Flight of Dragons
Page 67
“That’ll soon be changing.” Xeth patted her shoulder with sure confidence.
Not believing a word of it, she dug out a friendly grin.
Footfalls warned of someone’s approach, cutting off whatever else the weapon master might have said. He nodded toward the miniature reader into her palm.
“Keep that well hidden.”
Distracted by the nearing footsteps, she glanced away from him for a second. The sounds retreated, moving in another direction, she turned to bid him farewell. But in his usual fashion, Xeth had already disappeared.
She shrugged and headed for the kitchen. With any luck Lilu, the indulgent cook, would be working and she’d let her have some charred pork sides and a cup of olive oil. She shook her head in dismay, admitting to herself that she’d had some rather strange cravings lately.
No matter how many trays Lilu smuggled out of the kitchen, Zaynah’s growth spurt seemed to have topped out at age seven. She remained the smallest and weakest of the troopers.
Later that evening, her hunger sated for the moment, she hid under the covers long after the final bell for lights-out sounded. Much too excited for sleep, she clicked the silver reader, eagerly learning about Ranin Seven.
Chapter Two
Three days later on the outer edge of the Orion Galaxy, Zaynah’s small prototype Dragonfly fighter entered hostile territory.
Zaynah received updates from Basilisk Prime, during her voyage to the outer edge of the galaxy. The latest dispatch reported another of Prado’s transporters dropped off the info-web. Like the previous missing vessels, the massive ship vanished without a distress call. More worrisome, the most recent loss was escorted by a full squadron of imperial fighters, also missing.
Far too many ships disappeared in route to Ranin Seven for the unprecedented losses to be attributed to natural causes. Stranger than the unexplained missing transports, no wreckage, not even the almost indestructible locator every imperial craft carried, had ever been recovered.
She rubbed away a rash a chill bumps at the latest news.
Before she had a chance to worry about the hazards she’d face, the very elements themselves assaulted her ship. Dust particles swirled, overwhelming the fighter’s purifiers. Strange energy fields hammered the hull. Worst of all, flurries of fiery meteors battered the small craft.
The vessel’s systems struggled to maintain course. One by one, alarms blared as navigation, weapons, and cloaking reached dangerous lows.
Fire suppression went off line almost immediately. She wielded a handheld spray canister, battling a dozen smoldering fires before they wiped out more of the ship’s vital functions. To add to her challenges, many of the craft’s safety systems, including fire suppression went off line—demon-level inconvenient.
A flashing orange light warned her shields had already fallen to ten percent of capacity. Another solid hit and they’d be gone. A second display blinked. Life support registered at half the normal reading. Not surprising and not good.
The severe damage threatened to make her lovely dragonfly beyond repair, perhaps beyond landing.
“Stinking demons!” The rare curse left her lips as despair threatened to overwhelm her. She wanted to weep for the beautiful ship. The wreckage seemed doubly unfair on the prototype’s maiden voyage, to say nothing of her first solo mission. She’d been improving—growing stronger and faster. Now none of her hard-won achievements mattered. She’d failed within sight of her destination.
The dark side of Ranin Seven loomed on the ship’s viewer, the moon’s surface a study in black. The only signs of life were twin rows of surly red landing lights, so dishearteningly different from the welcoming glow of the safety beacons shining on Basilisk Prime’s tarmacs.
She pushed away the suffocating sadness before depression overwhelmed her, and coated another set of sparking connectors with the smothering spray.
Then even the low-tech extinguisher sputtered. The steady stream of foam narrowed, finally ending with a sullen hiss.
Smoke thickened around her too quickly for her to don a bio-suit. The stench from burning syns stung her eyes, pinched her sinuses, and scratched her throat. High-pitched warnings blared more system failures. Her ears buzzed from the constant din. At least the alarms worked.
Thanks to the Goddess, the main engines were still on line. Although without oxygen, warp power didn’t mean much.
Zaynah dropped the useless canister, tapping the manual thruster to avoid a spray of small meteors. Shields had quit working, so even a fist-sized rock would puncture the hull. A smoldering wire burst into flame near her feet. She should stomp on, try to smother the fire, but it seemed warm and somehow cuddly.
The ship lurched and shuddered, yanking her attention back to the growing disaster.
Another hit?
Her eyes watered from the burning syns and her chest tightened, unable to draw enough breath.
Her vessel changed course, beginning a controlled descent to the moon’s surface. Not a meteor then, unless they’d developed artificial intelligence capabilities.
Thrusters no longer responded. If it were simply a matter of losing engine power, the fighter would’ve been in freefall. Something, or more accurately someone, had locked a tractor beam on her ship.
The smooth glide beat crashing. Maybe.
At least she wasn’t landing on the light side with its violent volcanic activity. The moon came into closer view—still bleak and barren.
Already chilled in the rapidly cooling cabin, Zaynah shivered, imagining the minus ninety degrees surface temperature.
The sphere remained an inky mass without enough light to distinguish a single feature. There should have been some evidence of a massive duranium mining operation. At minimum she’d expected some full-spectrum illumination, a biosphere, and multiple life signs. The ship’s sensors registered nothing.
A plume of fiery red sparks blew into the night, wafting from a column of magma fifty kimilors long. The lava whispered to her, promising her power and the unimaginable fulfillment of a perfect union. The eruption disappeared almost as fast as it had risen, subsiding back into the remote moon’s crevices. This was the icy dark side. The lava pipelines were on the other half of the sphere. She blinked away tears from the searing brightness. She couldn’t be functioning at optimal levels.
Had she just hallucinated a sentient pillar of molten rock?
Fresh chill bumps pebbled on her arms and chest, while not a superstitious woman, the connection she’d felt had been as real as the deck beneath her feet—instantaneous and tangible. For a moment, she’d longed to lose herself in that violent eruption.
Had the crews of all the lost ships succumbed to similar suicidal impulses? Fear knotted her belly.
Ranin Seven seemed to be the Orion galaxy’s own black hole.
Her small fighter drew nearer to the inky moon. The knot in her stomach developed a lead bottom, plummeting as fast as the ship. She was about to learn the fate of all those missing vessels.
Too bad she wouldn’t survive long enough to share answers to the mystery.
Everyone knew syn-people didn’t have souls. Just in case popular wisdom was wrong, she made the sign of the goddess as she her icy fingers fumbled with the pilot’s seat safety straps.
A d’skeku trooper’s wishes counted for nothing in the workings of imperial schemes. She understood too well she and the dragonfly were the merest of opening moves. Aside from her first objective—the assassinations—she been tasked to find and exploit opportunities for the more powerful fighters, which would soon follow.
Her heart raced and her lungs fought for oxygen. Her imminent death signified held little import. If she survived landing and capture, since she’d failed to accomplish her mission, duty required she take her own life at the first opportunity.
Acceptance of the fate’s decrees had never been her nature. The stubborn streak that had kept her training for hundreds of hours without any improvement in her fitness scores kicked in,
filling her with fresh determination.
By the emperor’s teeth, she would not dishonor the corps. She would find an opening.
Or make one.
***
On the dark side of Ranin Seven, two rogue fire demons clawed their way from serving as lowly dust devils deep in the mines to ruling the remote moon. The brothers forged a powerful pan-galactic alliance with planets from both the Orion and the neighboring Sagittarian galaxy. The pair of demons wielded absolute control over the production and distribution of the duranium essential for hyper-light travel.
The female of Diablo’s dreams beckoned him closer. Her eyes flashed red fire while she challenged him with a sultry look over her pale shoulder. She bent over and her bare sex glistened hot and juicy with promises of impossible pleasure.
His cock, thick and hard with arousal, throbbed enthusiastically, way past ready to mount her. Something in her called to him on a different level. He didn’t want to jump on her like a horny demon. He needed her wild for him. A quick roll wouldn’t satisfy. He needed to savor their coupling.
“Show me how you like to be touched,” he demanded.
She licked a mouth made for pleasure with a slow, pointed tongue. With a lazy arch of her back, she used her small hands to cover proud, full breasts. She rolled taut, plum-colored nipples between her slender fingers.
A groan escaped his lips when she let one hand drift lower, dipped into her tender slit, and exposed soft, dusky petals, wet with welcome.
“I don’t have enough hands.” She beckoned him closer with a sultry smile. “Can you give me a little help?”
Oh yeah, he was up for that. He intended to answer her like a civilized male, but the growl that came out of his throat was harsh with raw hunger.
“Don’t make me come all by myself.” She arched, panting, stomach muscles rippling.
He wasn’t the kind of demon, who’d ignore a female in need. He stepped up and rammed his cock into that hot, tight, wet pussy using more power than finesse as he sank balls deep into sheer bliss.
Lucky for him, she didn’t complain.
Her delicate sheath clamped his shaft, massaging the aching flesh. She tugged on his tender ear with her teeth and moaned.
“Harder.”
A harsh groan was his only response as he stroked in and almost out of her silken clasp, tighter than his fist. Each hard thrust brushed his crown against the mouth of her womb, driving him closer to climax. He wouldn’t last.
Thank the Goddess his endurance didn’t matter, because she tightened around his rod again, screaming his name and covering his smoking cock with fresh cream as their perfect connection carried her over the edge into the free-fall of rapture.
One more stroke, the tantalizing woman shuddered violently, aftershocks of pleasure bucking her beneath his punishing hips. She felt so good. He wanted to hang on for one last short, hard ram into her tight cunt.
“Diablo, get your ass topside.” Gunn’s rough voice penetrated his erotic dream.
He bit off a curse, rolling over. The interruption stank like dragon’s breath and was about as welcome.
“Forget it,” he growled. “Sleeping.”
“Wake up, fiend. You’re needed on the surface—pronto.” His brother’s tone took on a sharper edge, grating over Diablo’s raw nerves.
He pulled the pillow over his head, trying to block the irritating noise. The female of his dreams had already vanished, leaving him harder and hornier than ever.
Some days it didn’t pay to be a demon. He had no hope of recapturing the dream. Fire demons couldn’t find release by their own hand, which was a total dragon bitch.
Grumpy, he tuned back into his brother’s ranting.
“I need your help with an imperial ship…”
Diablo quit listening again. Clearly Gunn didn’t intend to give up and leave him alone as any decent male would’ve.
He pulled the pillow off his face, summoning the small store of patience he possessed.
“Let the droids secure the hatches. I’ll check out your prize tomorrow.”
“Negative. Didn’t you hear me? She’s a fighter and a new class, going by her looks. Do you really want mechs trying to seal the beauty? Like as not, they’ll set off one of its weapon systems or maybe implode the whole ship and a good chunk of our landing pad. Do I need to remind you what’s involved in surface repair?”
Diablo threw off the light cover, swinging his legs out of the bed.
“Manned?”
“One life sign,” Gunn grunted and paused, no doubt scanning his readouts.
His brother had to be the front runner for the most cautious—make that totally anal—fire demon in the galaxy.
“Correction, no life signs. Bloody dragonheads!”
“On my way.” Diablo killed the comlink, tossed it aside, and then yanked on a clean lightweight jumpsuit, standard issue under-surface gear.
Abruptly he grabbed the comm and reactivated the connection to his brother.
“Clamp the fighter fore and aft, kay?”
“Way ahead of you, bud. I have her anchored stern and bow.”
“Not the droids?”
“Course not. I used the remote access arms.” Gunn sniffed.
Diablo grunted approval and ended the convo. He slung a loaded weapons’ belt over one shoulder, slowing long enough to check he had full charges before tucking an extra phaser into the holster and the kekeor from his academy days into his left boot. The surface suit would conceal everything. No sense advertising the arsenal. The endless night on the dark side of Ranin Seven had eyes.
He entered the tube at a sprint. He and Gunn controlled all of the moon’s transports. Only their quarters included dedicated pipelines with access to every level. After selecting the surface, he braced for the rapid ascent.
Six minutes later, he entered their modest station. The fighter had been anchored to the near end of the tarmac. He didn’t bother firing up a crawler. He headed for his locker and inspected his gear as if his life depended on the equipment. With nothing but a layer of syn between him and instant death thoroughness became a necessity. Once satisfied with his gear, he stepped into the tough biohazard suit. He tested each fitting sealed, taking several more minutes. At last he buckled on a rugged harness, snagged his pack, clipped it to the outer straps, and entered the passageway to the surface.
Once again he waited, this time for the hatch to seal behind him. He lowered his face plate and switch on the oxygen while the chamber depressurized. Finally the access panel retracted, allowing him outside.
A broad road of crushed and melted rock leveled the area between the camouflaged station and the landing pad. The short highway facilitated moving material and equipment to and from the moon and the giant transport ships they permitted to dock.
He spotted the damaged fighter in an instant. With quick, efficient movements, he threw the hooked end of his safety line ahead, snagged a clamp, and clipped on a come-along loop to his harness. His need for speed warred with the need to follow the painstaking protocols that kept him from drifting off into the void of space.
The light gravity field allowed him to close the distance in a half-dozen smooth, floating strides. He caught a clamp, stopping himself.
His palms itched to touch the elegant ship. He inspected the outer hull visually. After his careful scrutiny revealed no booby traps, he placed a gloved hand lightly on the sleek surface.
Under his palm, the craft hummed to life, the metal eager to conform to his slightest wish. A rush of pleasure washed through him. The vessel might not be quite the same as a willing female, but she had plenty of sex appeal.
He keyed his comlink. “I’m going to need syn-steel, duranium, and piles of circuit connectors. Fire alone knows what else.”
“Not a problem.” His brother asked wistfully, “What’s she like?”
“Hot as the seven hells and twice as pretty.”
“Fast, huh?”
Diablo grunted, feeling his way ov
er the outer skin, seeking an opening that had to be there. “I’ll let you know when I’ve got her up and running.”
He pressed next to an almost invisible seam. Even through the thick biohazard suit, the surface heated, responding to his touch.
Seconds later, the metal parted, revealing a portal. He angled his shoulders to pass through the hatchway and unhooked his safety line. By twisting along the narrow corridor, he managed to keep his suit intact. Imperial troopers must be shrinking. The ship was built for a lanky cadet.
Once inside he resealed the hull. The flicker of emergency lights provided little illumination.
Alarms sounded, muffled by the filter of his protective helmet. He found no trace of a pilot.
The man could’ve bailed days ago. Gunn might’ve imagined the life sign on his scanner. Wouldn’t be the first time one of them fucked up. Diablo and his brother took turns running the skynet system that protected Ranin Seven in alternating twenty-four hour shifts fueling enough to drive a male wacky enough to imagine false readings.
He tested the craft’s atmosphere and kept breathing from his tank. The oxygen levels were scarcely adequate for a human. Demons had higher requirements.
First he called the fire imps to heel, shushing them, and tucking them inside his surface suit. His body absorbed their heat and energy, storing the power until he needed a boost.
The emergency lights flickered and died.
Even demon eyes had limits. He strained to make out the broad outlines of equipment. Locating the console, he moved to disable the ship’s weapons and power off the systems. Once he’d secured the craft, the droids could stand watch until tomorrow. Time to shut this wounded bird down. He prowled closer to the ship’s controls.
The toe of his boot caught, nudging something soft.