Stalker's Luck (Solitude Saga Book 1)

by Chris Strange

  His voice echoed in the silence. He edged further along the gangway.

  “Leone’s men are coming. Too many of them. It’s the end. Put your gun down and come on out. Come on out and tell me where Lilian is.”

  A figure moved in the darkness of the ship interior. Eddie stopped and raised his guns. But the figure wasn’t Williams. It was smaller, more slender. His heart started hammering.

  Cassandra Diaz stepped into the light and gave a small sad smile.

  “Hi, Eddie,” she said. “Long time.”

  “Real long time,” he said. He lowered his guns. “Come here, quickly. I’m getting you out of here.”

  “I’m not going, Eddie.” She tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. “Roy’s about to disengage the umbilicus. You have to get out of here.”

  “Not without you. Come on.” He couldn’t stop staring at her. “I can’t believe you’re alive.”

  Footsteps clanged out on the spaceport catwalks. They were nearly here.

  He put one of his guns away and stepped towards her, stretching out his hand. “Come on. We have to go now.”

  She didn’t move. Another figure appeared behind her. Roy Williams.

  Eddie’s gun snapped back up. “Cassie, get down!”

  Williams glared at Eddie and raised his machine pistol. The bag of money was still slung over his shoulder. Cassandra turned, put her palms against Williams’ chest. She said something to him. Eddie thought it sounded like “Don’t.”

  Dom’s voice spoke in his ear. “I’m coming in on the train. Leone’s men are swarming the port. If you’re in there, get out.”

  Eddie bared his teeth, ignoring Dom. “Williams. Let her go. She’s done with you. Put the gun down and you get out of this alive. Cassie, get away from him.”

  She shook her head slowly. “I’m not coming, Eddie. I’m…I’m sorry about Fractured Jaw.”

  “What?”

  “I made sure you were out. I made sure you were safe.”

  “What are you talking about? Let’s go.”

  “It was good to see you again.” She turned and nodded to Williams.

  The fugitive scowled at Eddie and punched the control panel next to him. The airlock hissed and began to close.

  “No!” Eddie said. But before he could take a step forward, the airlock door shuddered to a halt, still open most of the way. A warning light flashed inside the ship.

  “What is it?” Cassandra said.

  Williams growled and punched the panel again. Nothing.

  Then a voice came over a speaker above Eddie. “This is an automated message. By order of the Temperance Port Authority, the vessel at airlock two-three-three is now under lockdown until further notice. Ship control has been surrendered to Port Authority staff. For more information, please consult a Port Authority representative at the customer service booth.”

  “Shit,” Williams said. He pointed his gun towards Eddie. “This is his fault!”

  “Can you get us away?” Cassandra said.

  “Not in time.”

  Eddie watched the exchange in confusion. He could understand why she was so desperate to get away from Leone. But trading a syndicate leader for a murderer and a fugitive was madness. Here he was, offering her a way out. Why wasn’t she coming with him?

  “Cassie,” he said.

  She glanced at him, then looked back to Williams. “The city. We have to find a place to hide.”

  He nodded and stepped through the partially closed airlock door, aiming his gun at Eddie. Cassandra followed close behind.

  “Eddie!” Dom’s voice yelled in his ear. She was panting, her footsteps clanging through the tab connection. “They’re on you. Get out now!”

  He spun around as two of Leone’s men appeared at the umbilicus entrance. They raised their guns.

  “Nobody move!” one said. “Drop the guns!”

  Williams’ machine pistol roared. The thugs ducked for cover as bullets ripped past them. Eddie stood in stunned silence as Williams and Cassandra dashed past him. He could smell her hair as she passed.

  Instinctively, he reached out, his fingers brushing the skin of her hand. She glanced back, gave him one last sad smile. She said, “Run.”

  And then she was out of the umbilicus, following Williams. Gunfire roared. Footsteps clanged and people shouted.

  Dom yelled through the earpiece, shocking him out his blank stare. “Where the hell are you? I’ve got sights on Williams, but I can’t make a move. Get to the Solitude. It looks clear. Eddie?”

  “Yeah. Yeah, I’m here.” He started running. “Come out shooting or play it casual?”

  “Casual,” she said. “Port’s full of scared civilians. Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine.”

  He tucked his guns into his pockets and came out the umbilicus’ entrance. The port was wild with movement and screaming. Tourists were running for cover or standing around watching the flood of gangsters and Port Authority uniforms streaming along catwalks and out of doors. Eddie dove into the chaos and moved with it. He couldn’t see Williams or Cassandra, but it wasn’t hard to figure out where they were by the flow of Leone’s men. Williams had left a few more thugs wounded and bleeding on the floor.

  “How’d you get the ship shut down so fast?” Eddie said to Dom as he ran.

  “I had Knox do it. He told them it was Roy Williams. That seemed to get their attention.”

  His stomach sank. Leone had to know Cassandra was missing by now. And if he knew Williams was here, he’d know who had taken her. How was he supposed to get her off the station now?

  He scanned the spaceport through the swirling crowds. A flash of brown hair caught his eye, the locks bobbing as Cassandra ran. Williams pulled her behind him. They were heading for the grav train platform, shoving aside the waiting tourists.

  One of the men pursuing them yelled into his tab, but the grav trains were automated just like the supply trains. Shutting them down would take time. The grav train waited at the platform. The doors began to close.

  Williams darted forward and grabbed the doors of the rear-most carriage, holding them open. He ushered Cassandra inside. The train began to move away from the platform.

  The pop of gunfire echoed across the spaceport. Red blossomed in Williams’ thigh. He toppled into the train and the doors slid closed, blocking him from view. Eddie ran towards the train, but it was hopeless. Within seconds the grav train built up speed and screamed away from the platform into the city. Eddie watched it go. He thought he glimpsed Cassandra’s face through the window. Then it was gone, the train hidden by the rise of the buildings.

  The chaos around him slowed. He stood in the centre of it for a moment, staring at the rails where he’d last seen the train. Then he slid his hands into his pockets and hurried towards the Solitude.

  28

  Dom made her way through the Solitude’s interior, shotgun at the ready. Leone’s men had obviously been here—they’d cleaned out most of the armoury and emptied a dozen food containers onto the floor of the common room. But she couldn’t hear any voices or footsteps now.

  Anger boiled within her. The Solitude had been violated by these bastards. And she couldn’t even kill them for it.

  She swept onto the bridge, swinging her shotgun back and forth to cover the corners. But it was empty. Exhaling, she lowered the shotgun and dumped the rest of the guns in the armoury. If the thugs had been here recently, they must’ve been pulled into the pursuit of Roy Williams. They had a few minutes at least to regroup and hide out while the heat died down. She picked up a couple of cigarette butts from the floor of the bridge and tossed them in a trash receptacle in the wall.

  The airlock door hissed. She raised her shotgun again, but lowered it when she saw Eddie limp into the main corridor. He looked even more tired than she felt. His eyes stared blankly around before finding hers.

  Dom jerked her head towards the common room. Without a word, they moved down the corridor. Eddie sat down at the small table. She wen
t through the storage cupboards, found two metal cups that Leone’s men hadn’t destroyed, and set them up on the table. While Eddie sat staring into space, Dom went back to her quarters, lifted up her mattress, and retrieved the bottle of cheap vodka she kept there for special occasions.

  Eddie hadn’t moved by the time she got back to the common room. She half-filled each cup with vodka and sat down, resting her shotgun against her leg. Silently, they both picked up their cups and drank. Dom sipped hers, letting it burn, suppressing the urge to cough.

  Eddie set his cup down in front of him. “Williams took a hit.”

  “Where?”

  “Thigh. Could be bad if they got the artery.”

  “Shit,” she said.

  They sat silently a few more minutes, drinking.

  “I was listening in over the tab,” Dom said after a while. “I could hear you talking.”

  “Yeah?”

  “That woman,” Dom said. “The one with Williams. That’s Cassandra?”

  He nodded.

  “Also known as Lilian Mayweather?” she said.

  “That’s the one.”

  “A woman from your past.”

  “Yup.”

  “And now she’s with Roy Williams.”

  He spun the cup on the table in front of him. “Something like that.”

  She nodded and was quiet for a minute. She was no good with any of this stuff. But she’d never seen Eddie like this before. He was always moody, distant, but this….

  “I’ve got to tell you something,” she said. “Maybe you’re not going to like it, but it has to be said.”

  “Do what you gotta do, Freckles.”

  “I talked to one of the convicts who broke out with Williams. He knew about the girl. Knew her name. Both her names. He told me a story someone had told him. About a youth gang on Fractured Jaw, and a syndicate who wanted them out of the way. He told me this girl, she was the leader of the youth gang. But she sold them out to the syndicate. She told the syndicate everything they needed to find them and kill them.”

  Eddie’s knuckles whitened around his cup of vodka.

  Dom licked her lips. “The convict wanted me to taunt Williams with it. He thinks she helped Leone betray him to the Feds, got him locked away. Maybe that’s true, maybe it’s not. But the girl isn’t who she says she is. She’s dangerous. She betrayed you once. She can do it again. She’s bad news, Eddie.”

  “You haven’t got a shred of evidence for that.” His voice was flat and sharp. “Some fugitive said he heard it somewhere or other? Come on. Gimme a break. He jerked you around and now you’re jerking me around.”

  “I believe him,” she said. “He knew her name. He knew what happened on Fractured Jaw. There’s truth in there. You can feel it.”

  Eddie stood up and tossed his empty cup on the table. “Don’t tell me what I feel.” He kicked his chair, walked around in a small circle. He whirled back towards her. “You don’t know shit, Freckles. I know her. I know what she’s capable of and what she’s not. She’d never betray her friends.”

  “Sit down, Eddie.”

  “Ah, to hell with you. I don’t feel like sitting.”

  “Sit down and let’s talk about this.”

  “What’s there to talk about? Why do you even care?”

  “You’re really going to ask me that?” She stood slowly, stretching to her full height.

  “Yeah. Yeah, I’m going to ask you that. Let’s hear it. Why the fuck do you care so much about what I do?”

  She growled. “The same reason I took a sniper rifle to the top of that building and saved your arse from Leone.”

  “And why’s that, huh?”

  “Because I’m your partner!” she roared. “Like it or not, we’re in this together. And you can talk about leaving and taking your woman and flying off into the sunset with her but until that moment comes I will do everything in my power to protect you. And I thought you’d do the same for me.”

  “I would and I have. But now you’re saying all this shit and I haven’t got a goddamn clue why you believe this convict over me. Maybe you want her to be the villain in all this. Maybe you’re afraid to go out into the void in this big lonely ship all by yourself.”

  “You really are full of yourself, aren’t you? You want to go, then go. I’m trying to open your eyes to the truth you can’t see.”

  “What the hell do you know about the truth? She’s out there. She’s out there in this city with a murderer. I have to find her.”

  She watched him across the table, the heat of anger in her cheeks. Why could he never see sense? She took a few breaths and spoke again in a calmer voice. “I heard your conversation over the tab. You asked her to come with you. So why didn’t she?”

  “Williams was right there. She couldn’t get away from him.”

  “Is that really how it happened?”

  He hesitated. “I know what I saw.”

  “You don’t sound sure about that.”

  He shoved his hands in his pockets. “And now you’re going to psychoanalyse me, huh? You’re some kind of shrink? No, you’re just like me. We’re just a couple of thugs with guns who hunt down people for money. The only thing that separates us from our contracts is that we have the backing of the Feds. All we have is what we can hold and what we can take at the barrel of a gun. You do what you want, Freckles. I’m getting Cassandra back.”

  “You’re making a mistake. She’ll hurt you.”

  “Then so be it.” He turned. “I’ll get my stuff.” He limped towards his quarters.

  “Eddie, where the hell are you going?”

  “I’m getting off your ship. Don’t worry your pretty little head, Freckles. You won’t need to save me anymore.”

  She followed him. “Sit down and have another drink.”

  “I’ve had too much to drink already.”

  “Then just sit down.” She stood at the doorway to his quarters and watched as he sifted through the wreckage left behind by the syndicate men.

  “I don’t have time,” he said. “She’s out there.”

  “And how do you plan to find her?”

  He spun around to face her. “I don’t know, all right, Freckles? Is that what you want to hear?”

  He ran his hands across his bruised face. Her heart twisted to see him like this.

  “I don’t know how I’m going to find her,” he said, quieter now. “All I know is that I have to. Maybe you’re right. Maybe she did betray me all those years ago. Maybe she’s the evil bitch you say she is. None of that matters. I can’t explain why. I just need to find her. If she’s innocent, I have to save her. And if she’s guilty, I need to know.”

  “Are you sure? If she’s guilty, do you really want to know?”

  “You know me, Freckles. I’m here for the truth. That’s all. She’s alive. I need to know why. I need to talk to her. And that’s all there is to it.”

  His shoulders slumped, like those last few words had taken all the strength he had left. She studied him.

  “You can’t do this alone, Eddie.”

  “Maybe not. But I can try.” He opened a bag and shoved a handful of clothes and data disks into it.

  “Stop,” she said. “Stop packing, for the love of Man.”

  He stopped, but he didn’t move, didn’t meet her eyes.

  She sighed. “We’re partners. We’re still partners. We help each other out. Right?”

  He didn’t say anything.

  “If Williams is wounded, we might not have long. We need him alive. So we work together. Williams and Cassandra, they’ll be in the same place. We can capture him. You can find out the truth.”

  “And if I have to kill him?” Eddie said. “If I have to kill him to protect her?”

  “It won’t come to that.”

  “But if it does?”

  She watched him for a long time. She could feel that leash around her neck. Lieutenant Pine’s whiny voice whispered in her ear. She owed the Federation a debt, a debt she p
aid with men like Williams. If Williams died, what would happen to her? She hadn’t lost a contract yet. What would happen if she did? Would the Feds decide she wasn’t as effective a stalker as they thought? Would they come up with another way for her to repay her debt? Would she end up in the Bolt instead of Williams? Or would they just stand her up against the bulkhead and end it with the blasts of a firing squad?

  “If it comes to that,” she said, “you’ll do what you think you have to.”

  He looked thoughtful for a few moments. Then he nodded slowly.

  “All right. Partners.”

  “Partners,” she agreed.

  Her pocket chirped. As Eddie emptied his bag out onto the floor of his room, she pulled out her tab and answered it.

  “Good, you’re still alive,” Knox said. “How long does it take you to get a few guns? I was starting to think I’d have to go looking for that money myself.”

  “We ran into some trouble.”

  “We? You and Skinny back together in holy matrimony, then?”

  “Did you call just to mock me?”

  “No,” he said. “I called because the news is saying that the station’s life support systems are going to fail earlier than expected. If we want to get out of here alive, we should probably get on with it. And while you two have been horsing around all over Temperance, I’ve been hard at work.”

  “You’ve got the tracking information?”

  “Nearly. Give me thirty minutes and access to a public computer terminal and you’ll have your man. And I’ll have my money.”

  Yes. “We’re coming back to the hotel now. Give us a while to dodge Leone’s people.”

  “Bring some food with you. Real food, I mean. And something with caffeine. And maybe a—”

  She hung up and returned the tab to her pocket. Eddie met her eyes.

  “You ready?” she said.

  “I’m always ready, Freckles.”