Storm Fleet

by Tim Niederriter

“Captain,” he said. “You’d do well to listen to me.”

  The cabler behind Mosam swung the weighted butt of his weapon into Mosam’s shoulder.

  “Shut it, traitor.”

  Mosam staggered forward. He said nothing more as he and Yajain were taken from the bridge to the brig amidships.

  Yajain slumped in a cell opposite the center passage of the brig from Mosam. His hands swished back and forth between his knees. He hunched down over them, head low, eyes closed. Cold air filtered down from ceiling vents each a hand span wide at the center of each cell. Fans within the vents provided the only sound in the brig, a metallic hum.

  “This is a fabulous situation,” said Enna Loyanneal from a cell adjacent to Yajain’s. She sat close to the pane of transparent steel with its external iron bars.

  Opposite Enna, in a cell adjacent to Mosam, Joth paced back and forth shaking his shaggy head.

  “Is that your contribution, sister?”

  “It’s more than you did. You and your door-hacking got us here.”

  Yajain closed her eyes most of the way and laid her head against the cold wall behind the bunk. Mosam’s hands stopped swishing. He sat completely still except for his breath.

  Joth walked to the front of his cell. His face furrowed. One hand stroked his beard.

  “It’s this guy who tricked us. He’ll get what’s coming to him, and then we’ll explain ourselves.”

  What’s coming to him. Lin, do you really want to see what happens to him? To me?

  Enna folded her arms.

  “You think they’re not going to punish us? This is Dilinia, Joth.”

  “I know, I know!”

  “You didn’t a second ago.”

  “Sister, you are getting on my nerves.”

  “Brother, you always get me into trouble.”

  “This time I’m in it with you. We’ll just tell them what happened. We’ll explain how we were tricked. Stupid people don’t get jettisoned like traitors.”

  Yajain looked at Mosam. He raised his head.

  “Voicing your wishes doesn’t make them come true. Dilinia is merciless.” He shook his head, then turned back to Joth. “You could get lucky. But your odds would have been better if Doctor Aksari hadn’t uncovered my identity.”

  “You’re a real idiot,” Enna said. “It was your idea to use the fluids, wasn’t it? None of us would be here if she hadn’t.”

  “Yeah, you helped all along the way,” Joth said. “I don’t get it.”

  “You don’t need to understand.” Mosam shifted and lay down on his bunk. “You played your part, and I appreciate that.”

  Joth marched to the back of his cell, glaring through its transparent side at Mosam.

  “You’re a real piece of work.”

  Mosam yawned.

  “Tell me about it.”

  Joth’s massive fist pounded on the wall.

  “Don’t make me mad, little man.”

  “Doesn’t take much, does it?”

  “Just be quiet.” Joth turned from Mosam, trembling with rage. “Your the one they’re gonna drop into the abyss.”

  Mosam said nothing but turned and met Yajain’s eye. He smiled slightly.

  The bandojen is right about him being a piece of work. Mosam really has changed. Was he always so flippant?

  She climbed off the flat bunk and marched past the air vent, stopping a meter from the glass, arms folded. Her breathing sounded impossibly loud in the quiet following Joth’s final word.

  Enna glanced at her.

  “What do you think, doctor? They gonna execute this bastard?”

  Yajain sighed and put a hand to her temple.

  “I don’t know. This isn’t his first treason.”

  Mosam’s eyes closed and he shook his head. He made no further sound. The vent above Yajain hummed. Joth returned to the center of his cell.

  “I don’t care what happens to him. What’s gonna happen to us?”

  “Don’t know about the doctor,” Mosam said softly. “For you and your sister, Mister Loyanneal, I’d expect interrogation. Possibly torture. You look pretty suspicious right now.”

  “Shut up, damn you!” Joth seethed. “You don’t know anything.”

  “I know this ship is about to be attacked.”

  Yajain massaged her temple, dislodging a few strands of hair.

  “Mosam, be quiet.”

  He sat up and eyed her.

  “Doctor?”

  “Don’t call me that. You know my name.”

  “Yajain.” He exhaled. “Too bad it came to this.”

  Joth snorted with derision.

  “Don’t get too sad now. To hear you tell it we’re all doomed anyway.”

  “Never said that.”

  Yajain glared at him.

  “Why does it matter to you if we’re attacked?” Unspoken, unwanted hope surfaced in her voice. Hopefully, he can’t hear it. But he will. She asked the other nagging question to cover herself. “What makes you so sure anyway?”

  “Proximity. The Hunter’s Hall of DiKandar is still adjacent in the near pillar’s arc.”

  “You think someone’s targeting them?”

  “They’re at war. You heard the same as I did.”

  Joth grimaced.

  “Look, I don’t think you want to die here, buddy.”

  “My name is Mosam Coe. And you are right, but you’ve jumped one conclusion too far.”

  “How is that?” Joth asked.

  “I am not going to die here. If you’re lucky, neither will you.” He looked across the corridor to meet Yajain’s gaze. “Yajain, we need to contact the bridge. There is an emergency comm terminal on the wall of your cell. If it’s unlocked you can still warn someone else.”

  “They won’t just leave a comm terminal like this unlocked, Mosam.”

  “They might if they thought you were just misguided, not disloyal.”

  Yajain’s gaze broke from Mosam’s. She turned to the back of her cell. The terminal was attached to the wall at the foot of her bed. It was inactive, but anything would be worth a shot.

  Yajain sat on the edge of the bed and reached for the receiver at the top of the terminal. The phone clicked free of its struts. Yajain hit the terminal’s activator with her palm and held her breath as it activated. Yellow lights sprang to life.

  Static crackled through the receiver, terminal unlocked. She dialed the wireless with a few tentative keystrokes on the terminal.

  Behind her, Joth grunted something at Mosam. Mosam didn’t reply. He tricked me before. Could he be trying to do it again? Yajain reached the wireless connection and found Ruane’s Blade still connected. Dara’s cabin showed an occupied alert. Newer rangers had voice terminals in most rooms. Yajain took a deep breath and entered the call command on the terminal.

  Dara’s voice answered her over the line.

  “Hello?”

  “Dara,” Yajain whispered. “I need your help.”

  “Yajain. Where are you?”

  “I’m stuck amidships. Can you call the bridge for me?” She spoke as carefully as she could, and as softly as she thought Dara could hear.

  “Sure. This lock down is pretty tense.”

  “Yeah.” Yajain looked over her shoulder at Mosam. Then she turned back to the wall. “Tell the bridge they need to send guards down to the brig. There’s an escape attempt in progress.”

  “Escape? Are you alright, Yajain?”

  “I’ll be okay. Give them that message. Stay safe.”

  Dara hesitated.

  “You too.”

  Yajain closed the line. She turned to Mosam.

  “I sent the message.”

  “Thank you, Yajain.” Mosam rose from his prison bunk. “Now I think I should bid you all good luck.”

  He strode to the thin outline of the door at the front of his cell. One palm pressed against the transparent steel. His other hand tugged back the sleeve. Th
en he rubbed the top of his arm with his palm and closed his eyes. His lips moved slowly, forming soundless words.

  A thin strip of skin peeled back. Yajain recoiled at the sight of a small hollow in the flesh beneath. Mosam lifted a sliver of a blade between two fingers.

  Yajain reached for the terminal beside her and started to dial.

  Mosam held the blade’s wire handle in two fingers, with one end wrapped around his thumb. He pressed it into the tiny crack between door and wall.

  Red hot sparks erupted from the cell door and splashed against the door to Yajain’s cell. Mosam gritted his teeth and turned his head away from the blaze. Yajain reached the wireless and mentally fumbled with the directory for emergency security.

  Mosam’s door burned. Sparks jumped to Yajain’s door and burned holes through the steel at the hinge. Mosam pulled down, slashing the hinge from his door. Joth shouted in surprise.

  Mosam’s cell door clanged to the corridor floor. He stepped over it. Yajain dropped the receiver and rushed to her own door. Her shoulder hit the shuddering pane of transparent metal. It swung outward. She burst out into the passage and jabbed at Mosam’s head.

  Her fist connected with Mosam’s chin. His head snapped back. He grunted in surprise. Yajain stood in his path, blocking the corridor.

  He regained his footing and faced her. The wire blade he’d used to cut through the door still glowed red.

  “What is that thing?” Yajain asked.

  “Miniature arc burner. Useful. Deadly.” Mosam smirked. “Step aside.”

  Yajain activated her arc lifts with a slight press into the palm of her closed hand. Hopefully he won’t see.

  “Not this time, Mosam.”

  "Don’t stand in my way, Yajain.”

  “You aren’t giving me any other options.” The sob broke through into her voice. “Mosam.”

  “Come with me. I’ll explain everything.” He lowered the arm carrying the arc burner. The light on its tip went out with a hiss of the heat filament losing its charge.

  She stared at him, still tensed to fly, to bowl him over.

  “You’re serious? After what you did to Lin?”

  Mosam’s face darkened and he looked back into his cell.

  “Answer me, Yajain.”

  “I can’t go with you. And I can’t let you leave.”

  “Pity,” said a cold woman’s voice from behind Yajain. “You can’t stop us.” The last word was accompanied by the feeling of the blunt metallic barrel of a pistol being pressed into the small of Yajain’s back.

  Yajain froze. Mosam turned from the cell.

  “Don’t shoot her, Adya. Everything is under control.”

  Joth pounded on the wall of his cell.

  “Put the gun down. The guards might go easier on you.”

  “Noted. Doubted.” Mosam strode toward Yajain. She stared at him, shocked still, lips trembling.

  He averted his gaze, and for a moment his expression seemed hollow, brittle. He passed her in the narrow corridor. One hand fell gently onto her shoulder.

  “Goodbye.”

  The pressure of the gun barrel withdrew. Adya’s footsteps announced her turning to join Mosam. Yajain had no doubt she couldn’t beat the woman’s draw with her flight speed if she tried.

  Adya whispered something unintelligible to Mosam. He made no sound at all in reply. Yajain turned slowly and watched the two figures approach the end of the hallway.

  A warning siren began to ring somewhere else in the ship. But even over that, Yajain heard Dara’s voice from ahead of her.

  “You…No!”

  A gunshot rang out down the hallway. Yajain pushed off on lifts and flew the length of the corridor. She emerged from the cell block into the guard office. A few wounded guards and cablers lay slumped against walls and desks, groaning.

  Blood streaked terminal screens and speckled walls and doors. Dara lay with her back against the open outside door’s frame, eyes squeezed tight and one hand clamped on the wound in her side that pulsed blood out of the hole in her uniform.

  Yajain flew to her side and landed. Dara looked up at her, eyes suddenly wide. Blood flecked her chin.

  “Yajain,” she said. “How did you?”

  “Shh, never mind that.” Yajain looked around the room for a medical kit. She couldn’t look frantic. Yajain reached down and touched Dara’s shoulder. “I’m gonna patch you up, Dara.”

  “There should be more guards here,” Dara said. “Where did they all go?”

  The whooshes of arc movers came and went outside the doors. Blood pounded in Yajain’s ears. She shook her head.

  “Dara, hang on. It doesn’t look so bad.”

  Dara looked down the length of her body to the wound.

  “Personally, I disagree. Going to pass out now.”

  Her eyes rolled into her head and she went slack.

  Yajain gulped and returned to her full height. She acted. She found an emergency medical kit beside a nearby terminal. She sprayed a nutrient seal over Dara’s wound, then turned her onto her side and sprayed another dose onto the larger exit wound.

  Tiny fibers began to crisscross the wound. Yajain wrapped a bandage around it next, then checked Dara’s pulse. Still alive, but weaker than she should be.

  That’s all I can do with this.

  The shot no longer looked fatal.

  Yajain went to help the wounded guards. Before she reached the first guard a voice called out, “Stop!”

  Agan Pansar strode into the room from the open door beside Dara. Behind him, two military police stood with weapons ready.

  “What is going on here?” Pansar said.

  Yajain leveled her gaze at him.

  “You should know,” she said. “Mosam escaped. There was another agent on board this ship.”

  His face screwed up with rage.

  “Find them!” he shouted to the officers behind him. “I’ll call for medical help.” His hand fell to the pistol at his belt. “So they broke both of you out. What are you still doing here?”

  “Sir, I am trying to save lives.” Yajain gritted her teeth as she turned from Pansar and approached the wounded guard. The sound of his pistol releasing from its holster drew her attention. She turned halfway around. “If you shoot me, you’ll be killing these guards too. And they were only doing their jobs.” She unspooled a bandage roll.

  Pansar lowered the pistol. He trembled.

  Castenlock possessed extensive hospital facilities, spread through a whole bubble in the forward part of the ship, replacing a docking bay. When the movers arrived they took Dara and the wounded guards. Yajain rode along on the mover carrying her friend. The whole ship lurched this way and that, chaotic in the uproar.

  When they reached the hospital, the staff took Dara into surgery. Yajain waited by the door, shivering with bloody hands clasped together. The warnings continued to ring throughout the ship. It took almost a whole hour for Yajain to realize they were under attack.

  Just like Mosam said. He wasn’t lying.

  Sitting on a crash-capable bench outside Dara’s surgery, Yajain set her jaw. Mosam may have been trying to help, but Adya shot Dara and all those guards. She hadn’t heard anything about them yet, whether they’d escaped or not. The battle distracted everyone. She put her face in her hands.

  Kaga Pillar 9 Years Ago

  Broken bottles littered the street outside Yajain’s parents’ house.

  She and Mosam picked their way through shards of glass sprayed like miniature diamonds across the pavement. Lamps glowed behind drawn curtains within. Yajain pulled the robe tighter around her legs as she passed over a vent blowing hot air from pipes below. She stopped on the front step and looked down at herself.

  “What will they think?” she asked. “I mean, I didn’t do anything.”

  His hand felt her shoulder.

  “They’ll think what you tell them to think. Trust me, Yajay.”

  She loo
ked up at his face.

  “I can do that.”

  He smiled.

  “It’ll be fine.”

  Mosam reached out rapped his knuckles on the door.

  Shadows inside shifted. The door opened, bathing Yajain and Mosam in yellow luminescence. Father, his tall, lean shape casting a long shadow, and mother, small and slender, made their way to the door from the living room.

  The sight of her parents combined with the pain in Yajain’s knees to make her sway. Tears beaded in her eyes.

  “Yajain!” Father’s arm stretched out and guided her into the house. “What happened?”

  “It was the other girls.”

  “They beat you?”

  Yajain nodded, recalled the harsh impact of the cold iron bar. Tears stung her cheeks.

  “Mosam helped me get to the doctor.”

  Father nodded to Mosam over Yajain’s shoulder.

  “Thank you, young man.”

  Mother approached Yajain.

  “Yajay, are you alright?”

  “I walked home.” She looked down at her feet at the ends of battered legs. “I just want to sleep.”

  Mother nodded.

  Yajain looked past dad to Mosam.

  “Thanks for walking me home,” she said.

  He smiled and gave a slight nod.

  “It’s nothing. Say hello to Lin for me.” Then he turned and walked off down the street.

  Yajain slept heavy that night, tears on her pillow.

  Yajain raised her face from her hands. Tears ran along the lines of her palms. The sirens fell silent.

  Has the fighting passed? Is Dara alright? How long has it been?

  From down the hall from Yajain came a shout.

  “Yajain! You’re alright!” Sonetta charged down the hallway. She grabbed Yajain’s shoulder and dragged her to her feet.

  “So are you,” Yajain said. “What happened out there?”

  “Where have you been?” Sonetta asked. “Ija’s fleet attacked the Ditari.”

  “Ija?” Yajain frowned. “Why?”

  “Nobody’s sure yet. They didn’t exactly explain.”

  Captain Kebrim Ettasil limped down the hall toward them on a wounded leg. He caught Yajain’s eye.