by Elin Wyn
Snared
Star Breed: Book Six
Elin Wyn
Contents
1. Xander
2. Xander
3. Loree
4. Xander
5. Loree
6. Xander
7. Loree
8. Xander
9. Loree
10. Xander
11. Loree
12. Xander
13. Loree
14. Xander
15. Loree
16. Xander
17. Loree
18. Xander
19. Loree
20. Xander
21. Loree
22. Xander
23. Loree
24. Xander
Epilogue
Letter from Elin
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Also by Elin Wyn
Xander
“Loree!”
My fists beat on the pod cover, but it wouldn’t budge. I scrabbled around the edges looking for a seam, an opening, controls, anything, but there was nothing.
All I could do was watch as Loree struggled, sputtered and sank in the clinging blue gel, her tiny fists hammering the inside of the cover, eyes huge with terror as her hair formed a dark auburn cloud around her.
She spasmed, her back arching in a spine-cracking curve.
“Get her out!”
But no one heard me. No one listened. I bashed at the cover, willing it to crack, to shatter. The stink of my own frantic sweat mixed with the harsh astringent that flooded the tiny room. No one was here. Nothing was around us. Only Loree drowning, dying.
Another convulsion and then the thrashing of her limbs stopped.
A shudder ran through her body and slowly she sank beneath the blue gel, her unseeing eyes fading away, accusing me.
My howls of rage woke me and I stared blankly at the early morning sun.
I jerked away from the low wall edging the roof where I’d sat down. I didn’t mean to fall asleep even if I was off-duty. Sleep wasn’t exactly restful these days.
Over the pounding of my heart in my ears, ocean waves crashed against the cliffs. The soft breeze brought the clean scent of salt water and vegetation.
But I could smell the gel.
I scrubbed my face, seeing Loree’s eyes fixed on me, feeling the smooth surface of the pod cover under my hands.
It didn’t happen that way, I reminded myself. She’s not dead.
But she might as well be. And that was killing me, too.
Suddenly my hackles raised, I whirled, surveying the empty Compound below.
Most of the remaining residents were cordoned in their dormitory building until we had a better way to determine who was still faithful to mad General Melchior and who had been simply trapped here by circumstance.
I sniffed the air. Nothing. No sound out of place, not a whisper or a creak.
But something was wrong. I knew it.
I hurried down the stairs from the roof and threaded my way through corridors until I emerged in the gaudy throne room we’d commandeered as our operations center.
Ronan cocked an eyebrow in my direction. “Thought I told you to take a shift off, kid. You were here all night.”
“Something’s wrong.” I stalked over to the monitors, watched the screens flip through the cams we’d placed all around the buildings, then paused the view when it splintered to display the inhabitants of the prison cells below.
Twenty-eight men, crammed into the five cells we’d found.
They should be fighting, playing cards, beating the shit out of each other, shouting at the walls. Weeks of confinement does that to humans. But instead each and every one of them sat, spine straight, gaze fixed ahead.
Waiting. But I didn’t know for what.
“They’re not Hunters,” I mused.
Quinn looked up from his commstation across the room. “Obviously. We’d figured that out without your brilliance.”
I ignored him as usual. “But there’s something wrong with them. Nadira or the Doc should come down, check them over more thoroughly.” I argued, dropping myself into one of the chairs at the table littered with tablets. “Maybe they’re brainwashed or something.”
“No.” Ronan glanced at me then away. He’d been acting weird the last few days, half-distracted. “They’ve got a patient they’re working with on Orem.”
“Doc,” I snorted. “Working with a patient. I’m sure that’s going well. Next you’ll tell me she’s going legit.”
“She helped me,” Valrea retorted, looking up from poring over screens of data. “Nadira says Doc’s done a lot of talented work, besides her more extravagant projects,” Valrea’s cheeks reddened as she glanced at Geir, who’d lately been unable to leave her side. “Not that I’m complaining about those, either.”
“And you’re not worried about her doing anything extravagant with Vicki?” Quinn asked.
“Nope, Granny Z is babysitting this week,” Valrea shrugged. “At least she’s had practice with toddlers.”
“Kid’s gonna have some strange career choices,” I muttered.
The screens weren’t telling me anything. “Any clues yet as to what Stanton took with him?”
Quinn shook his head. “We’ve been going over every file, looking for traces, but nothing clear yet.”
I’ve been helping! chirped the silver cube on the console next to him.
“Yes, Nixie. You’ve been very helpful,” Valrea soothed.
Good thing the AI wasn’t so great on body language yet. Eventually we’d have to stop rolling our eyes at it.
Zayda joined me at the table, shoved aside a stack of tablets as she dropped her face into her hands. “I was sure I’d be able to trace what he was doing, find breadcrumbs, something.” She raised her head, eyes dark with misery. “How could I have worked with him for so long and never suspected he was the enemy?”
Mack brushed her shoulder, and she leaned back into him. “We’ll find him, darlin’. And then we’ll kill him.”
The big pilot was certainly blunter than he had been. Of course, that was before he’d been captured and tortured by Stanton and the Hunters.
But I didn’t disagree with the sentiment. None of us did.
The answer lay with those silent prisoners. Cadre, Valrea had called them. The faithful soldiers of the General.
We didn’t know how many there had been. Their black masks concealed identities from friends and neighbors. Some had likely escaped when Geir blew the security dome and Stanton fled with his mystery package.
But more lurked around us like an unseen rot. My gut knew it even if evidence was scant right now.
“What if-” A thundering crash cut Valrea off, and we all leaped to attention at the barrage of blasts that followed.
“Get down!” Ronan roared as Mack and Geir sheltered their mates, but instead I tore out of the room, Quinn hard on my tail.
Whatever the Cadre had been waiting for had arrived.
Xander
Debris rained down on us, littering the floor with obstacles.
“Where should we head?” shouted Quinn.
Another burst of explosions rattled the room, almost knocking us to the ground.
“Sounds like that’s as good of a place to start as any.” I tore towards the sound, knowing where it would lead.
The cells.
Swearing as we ran, we cornered into the narrow stairwell that led down to the prison level.
Somehow the still hidden members of the Cadre had found a way to rescue their imprisoned comrades.
Another level down, and another explosion. Closer this time.
Somehow they’d gotten them weapons.
&n
bsp; Someone had a lot of explaining to do.
By the time we hit the level above the prisons, Ronan had caught up with us.
“You’re both too old to be dashing off without weapons,” he growled. “Or a plan. Unless you’ve thought of something brilliant as you were leisurely strolling towards the intruders?”
Quinn and I met each other’s eyes and only barely managed not to shrug.
I patted the long knife strapped to my side. “Kill them all?”
“Keep a couple of them alive, smartass. I’m not worried about the rest,” Ronan bit out.
I nodded. If they just wanted to escape, just wanted to get away, rejoin Stanton or get on with their lives or do any one of 1000 other things, they would have snuck away quietly, tried to steal one of the wrecked shuttles on the landing pad.
They made the choice to attack us. It was the wrong one.
Exiting the stairwell, I gave a cursory scan of the room. Nothing fancy, bare pillars breaking up a large room filled with machinery. One more thing we’d need to decipher in this madhouse. Figuring it out would have to wait for a bit though. We had work to do.
“Take your positions.” Ronan tossed a small dark ball up the stairs. It stuck where it hit, embedded lights flashing.
“Mack and Geir will be pissed they missed the party,” Quinn said as we backed away.
“Not as pissed as they will be if we let those idiots near their mates,” Ronan shouted over the boom when the mini-mine blew. “Fan out.”
We spread out behind the machinery, far enough away from the door that it would be easy to cut the enemy off from their retreat.
Lure them in and ambush the bastards.
“Hey, don’t see you with a blaster, either,” I called over to where Ronan crouched.
He grinned, and I remembered how mad he’d been for a while, trapped on the Star, hunting the Hunters. “No fun that way, is it?”
They might have been idiots, but the enemy must have known we were waiting for them when they saw the blocked staircase.
In pairs they entered, blaster barrels sweeping the room before them with each step. Whoever had brought the weapons had also provided a fresh stack of the stupid black masks. Maybe that had been an effective way to terrorize the civilian population of the Compound, but none of the Pack gave a damn about their attempted creep show. We’d seen real horrors, and they weren’t it.
We waited, counting the figures as they filed through the door and worked their way into the room.
Twenty-six, twenty-seven.
Twenty-eight.
No more followed.
Whoever had sprung them had decided not to stick around for the messy stuff.
Interesting.
They spread out through the room, attempting to keep us from flanking them. It wasn’t a bad plan, might’ve worked. Against other humans, sure. Hunters, maybe.
Us? Not so much.
“This is boring.” I stood up and tossed the chair that had been pushed back behind the machine where I’d waited behind at a cluster of fighters in the middle of the room.
With a solid clang it struck two. From the angle of their necks as they sprawled to the floor, they weren’t going to be in Ronan’s group of survivors.
Whoopsie.
I ducked and rolled as the air filled with the stench of ozone and laser fire peppered the casing of the machine.
Maybe we should have figured out what all of this stuff did first. Ah well, too late now.
With the squad focused on me, Quinn had plenty of time to dance behind them, slitting their throats as he went.
Six down now.
The rest turned to take him down, giving me an opening.
Thirteen left. Almost halfway done.
They wised up, formed a ring with their backs together, slowly rotating as they tried to shuffle further into the room.
Black masked faces jerked from side to side, jittery, uncertain they could trust their own reflexes.
Strange. They fought competently enough but with no real skill, no spark. And still none of them made a sound, no whimpering, no pleading.
Ronan slipped behind the dwindling mass and headed down the stairs. It’d be nice to know there wasn’t a second wave waiting for us.
I vaulted over the console, tackling two of the enemy on the way down.
Packed so closely together the stink of sweat rolled off them. And something else, a scent I couldn’t place. Something wrong.
They had left themselves without any room to maneuver, would be as likely to hit one of their fellows as me.
Not my problem. A third down, a fourth.
“Ronan wants five,” Quinn reminded me as another crumpled.
Shit.
Only four were left standing.
“Check the ones on the floor,” I answered. “Maybe one of them’s salvageable.”
The four survivors tried to box me in, their movements so laughably slow I could wait until their fingers tightened on the triggers before sliding out of the blast’s way.
No edges now. Just sharp blows to the head until they crumpled where they stood.
“You’re out of luck,” Quinn called.
“You weren’t keeping any of them alive either,” I grumbled.
“Today’s your lucky day, kids.” Ronan emerged from the stairwell dragging a thin man in gray coveralls behind him. “Though I’d feel better about life if I knew either of you could at least count to five.”
“Fuck you,” I muttered. There wasn’t really any point in saying it under my breath. He’d hear me anyway. Ronan tossed the weaselly looking man to Quinn while I bound the survivors. “Shut him up.”
A gentle thump to the side of the head had the new guy slumped over with the others.
Ronan tapped the commlink in his ear. “Geir. We’re clear down here. Got a new visitor though. Can Valrea come down and see if she recognizes him?”
Quinn looked around the blood-splattered room. “Think we should tidy things up before she gets here?”
While we waited for them to join us, I took a look at the bodies. Twenty-eight had been in the cells. Twenty-eight in various conditions were here. I took off the masks, scrutinizing faces, comparing their features to my recollection of who had been in the rooms.
No one was missing.
No one was new.
Except Ronan’s weasel. He hadn’t been in the cells. His face prodded a memory, but it wasn’t from the group we’d been guarding. Maybe Valrea would know.
We shouldn’t have worried about the state of the room. Valrea didn’t seem to notice, her attention fixed on the new guy.
“Matthis, you bastard!” she hissed. “I should have known.”
“Who is he?” Ronan asked.
“Where’s Tianna?” Valrea looked frantic. “She set a guard on him. We suspected he was the one that betrayed her to the General.”
She never said father. I didn’t blame her.
“She’s dead, just as dead as you’ll be, bitch,” the man hissed, suddenly lurching off the floor, a small needle gun in his grip. “All traitors must die!”
Valrea didn’t have time to do anything more than blink and take a step back before Geir towered in front of her, lobbing the needle gun away, then driving the man back to the ground with one sharp blow.
He loomed, snarling over the attacker. I checked Matthis’ pulse and sighed.
“Think we’re down to four again, boss.”
“My own fault. Should’ve searched him better.” Ronan ran a hand through his dark curls. “You alright, Valrea?”
“I’m fine. Geir will be in a minute.” Valrea rubbed her hands across Geir’s back, waiting for him to withdraw from the killing edge.
Ronan turned to examine the four survivors. “You know what? I think you’re right, Xander.”
“That’s a first,” Quinn joked, but shut up at my snarl.
“I want Doc to take a look at the bodies, and the survivors.” Ronan ignored us both. “See what’s been done
to them.”
“Who says they’re not just fanatics,” Quinn argued. “History’s full of people willing to die for a stupid idea.”
Ronan rocked back on his heels, thinking out loud. “I know. But there’s something not right about these guys. Not right about this whole setup. And nobody knows more about that sort of thing than Doc.”
Which was how I found myself on the bridge of the Seeker half a day later, catching up with Connor and Eris.
And Nixie. Void knows you could never forget about Nixie.
“Had they killed Valrea’s friend?” Eris asked as she and the perky AI finished laying the course back to Orem Station.
“No, hell of a concussion, but nothing we can’t fix up.”
Connor pulled Eris onto his lap, lacing his fingers over her slightly rounded belly. “How’s Ronan planning to sort out the rest of the fanatics?”
A baby. Still couldn’t wrap my head around that one. I tried not to stare, sure they’d notice, and “talk” about it between themselves.
“No idea. One of the many problems that I’m glad to leave to Ronan. My job is just to deliver those idiots to Doc and let her figure out what’s making them tick.”
I pulled up the screen to monitor our heavily bound and medicated guests. “Ronan said she’s been helping Nadira with a patient. Hopefully that’s wrapping up.”
Eris shot Connor a look, and I wondered what passed through their mental link. “I think she’s finished with that project, yes.”
I shrugged. “Wouldn’t matter. She may be interested in charity work, but this is the sort of project she lives for. Especially if she doesn’t feel like she needs to be careful with them.”
Traveling through jump space, the trip back to Orem didn’t take more than a few hours.