by Rhonda Mason
Three months ago he wouldn’t have wasted any energy dreaming about such a place. Now, he’d fight with everything he had to get there.
“I’m pretty sure you can guess how I’m doing,” he said, “or at least the beginnings of it.”
Tia’tan nodded. “Corinth, at least, seems pleased to be here.”
“Make no mistake. While the kid is fascinated by all things tech, the only place he wants to be is with my ro’haar.” And she should be here. With them.
“At least he has you.”
That wasn’t even worth a response.
Silence fell, Tia’tan looking at him with concerned lavender eyes that made him feel unaccountably guilty.
Her voice softened when she spoke again. “I never meant to bring you here, you know.”
He arched a brow. “Then what the void are we doing in the Middle of Nowhere?”
She shifted in her seat, seeking a more comfortable spot. “When we hadn’t heard from the Radiant in so long, I had to investigate. I only meant for us to stop outside the Mine Field and hail them, I didn’t plan on getting ripped out of stream and deposited mid-field.”
“Happens to fifty percent of hyperstreams anywhere near the area, Corinth said.”
“Yeah, well, our stream drive is more efficient, I thought we’d be fine.”
“Clearly, that was not the case.” Now he was trapped on an ancient battleship with a crazy crew and other insane Wyrds with a thirst for genocide. “What’s so important about the Radiant that you risked coming here at all?”
“The rebels on Ordoch can’t scavenge the massive amount of fuel the Yari will need. And even if they could, it would take forever to transport it through the Tear, considering that’s only slightly larger than a person. We need the fuel the Radiant is carrying.”
“Frutt that,” Malkor said. “You had a mission—rescue any POWs and get them to Ilmena. You detoured, putting us all at risk.”
Tia’tan let out a quiet breath. “It’s Kazamel. He’s head of security on the Radiant. He’s… an old friend, from a while back.” Tia’tan shrugged.
For once Vayne felt in sympathy with her. He knew too well the pain that fear for the life of a loved one caused, how the uncertainty ate at you. Some of his resentment bled off as understanding.
“And now we’re here,” she said, gaze going to the observation deck’s windows.
Damn.
It was easier to stay furious when he’d thought her obstinately reckless.
She finally brought her gaze back to him. “You’re right about the other reason I sought you, to ask about Natali.”
Vayne tensed, every muscle tightening in response to his sister’s name. “Yeah?”
“Was she always so… intense?”
Vayne crossed his arms over his chest. “Before she was tortured for five years, you mean?”
Tia’tan flinched, as if she’d forgotten. “I mean— She’s…”
He waited while she floundered.
Tia’tan finally decided on, “She came on a little strong.”
Everything about Natali was strong. Only he knew what it took to break her.
And of course, me, Dolan whispered. Bile rose to the back of Vayne’s throat as his stomach lurched. He coughed, but he couldn’t clear the pain away, the taste of it.
“You okay?” Tia’tan asked.
Not remotely. “As for coming on strong, rightful rulers bent on reclaiming their homeworld will do that.”
A frown line appeared between Tia’tan’s brows. “She’s bent on a little more than that.”
Vayne shrugged. “That’s her prerogative.” And he washed his hands of it.
Tia’tan looked less than pleased with his answer. “You’re her brother; you could counsel her to temperance.”
“Whatever thoughts you’re having in that brain right now, stop. I won’t ‘counsel’ Natali. I won’t gainsay her and I won’t start a conflict. If she wants to blast the entire empire to bits, she’s welcome to. In fact, I might cheer her on.”
Tia’tan got to her feet, taking a balanced stance—hands loose, shoulders relaxed, eyes up—an excellent ready position that Natali had taught him to identify, back when she used to train him in the early days of their captivity. A stance ready to make a move. “The rebels on Ordoch have been working with Ilmena’s help,” Tia’tan said. “Mutual cooperation.”
Vayne shifted off the window to match her stance. “You can’t have it both ways. You can’t bring in the royal family as a rallying point for the rebellion and not expect them to take control as the rightful rulers.”
“‘Them?’” Her tone was challenging. “Are you not one of ‘them?’”
He shook his head definitively. “Not anymore.”
The tension grew between them. Thankfully Noar and Corinth entered the observation deck, ending the conversation.
“The drive’s coming along surprisingly well,” Noar said, ignoring the undercurrent of conflict in the room. “If the Ordochians are able to get the right parts to us, we might actually be able to complete it.”
It was that kind of thinking that scared the shit out of Vayne. “No way I am sticking around for that. We need to get out of here now, before the crew fires this thing up and blows themselves to bits.” Seeing Corinth’s serious little face made it doubly important they leave. Kayla hadn’t spent five years of her life protecting Corinth to have him killed after a few weeks in Vayne’s care.
“And how do you propose we leave?” Tia’tan asked, a bite to her voice. “The hyperstream drive on the Sicerro is shot to shit and we can’t risk flying through the Mine Field again and encountering rooks.”
“We could always step through the Tear to Ordoch,” Noar offered.
“Absolutely not,” Vayne said. He refused to strand himself in the middle of a rebellion. Corinth’s eyes glinted, and Vayne stabbed a finger at him. “You aren’t to either.”
Tia’tan spread her empty hands. “Then…?”
::Kayla.:: Everyone looked at Corinth. ::Kayla will come for us.::
If only. “She doesn’t even know where we are. She thinks we’re safe on our way to Ilmena.”
Corinth shrugged. ::Then we tell her.::
“If there was a way to get a signal through the field, the crew would have done it long ago,” Tia’tan said. “The only reason they can contact Ordoch is because the signal goes through the Tear that opens on Ordoch.”
::Our sensor emitter tech is five hundred years newer than the Yari’s. We’ve made major improvements.::
Noar’s speculative look lifted Vayne’s hopes.
“You’re talking about using the sensor array from the Sicerro,” Noar said, and Corinth nodded. “What about the signal interference from the field? Our sensors were scrambled after a short distance.”
“And didn’t that make fleeing from the rooks a real party,” Vayne said.
::We’ll dismantle the array, and send the sensors out into the Mine Field. They’re tiny enough they shouldn’t draw the rooks.:: Vayne could see the idea shaping in Corinth’s mind, the boy’s focused excitement as his brain jumped steps ahead. ::The first one will only go as far into the field as it can while still having a connection with the ship. Then the next will maintain a link to the first and go out into the field that same distance, then the next and the next, and we’ll make a line of sensors heading to the edge of the field. Once beyond that, we’ll be able to broadcast a message back to Falanar.:: He grinned, and looked two seconds from doing that slap-clap thing Ida did with her hands when she was excited.
Noar was nodding. “It could work. As far as each sensor determining distance and driving itself—”
::We’ll use the guidance array from the weapons system, pair a targeting link with each emitter.::
Vayne took a step toward Corinth, stopped short of touching him. He knelt down so he was on eye level with his brother. “Can you do this?”
Corinth looked at Noar, and they shrugged simultaneously.
> “Worth a try,” Noar said.
Corinth reached out and laid a gentle hand on Vayne’s shoulder, as if he were the elder brother, comforting the younger. ::Kayla will come when she knows we need her. Trust me.::
Tia’tan started, “If she could bring the fuel for the Yari…”
Vayne shot her a look, then got to his feet and followed Corinth and Noar from the room.
21
IDC HEADQUARTERS, FALANAR
Sunrise battled the city’s haze for dominance as Malkor strode into IDC headquarters on his day off. Not that a man embroiled in Isonde’s schemes and investigating an interagency conspiracy really had days off, but, it sounded nice. The quiet of the building at this early hour gave the impression that all was well, that the empire wasn’t rapidly headed toward crisis. The TNV, Wei-lu-Wei, an IDC-army collusion, the assassination of the Low Divine… Yeah, days off were a luxury he couldn’t afford.
His two complinks booted and he saw Carsov’s report on the Trebulan-TNV situation waiting for him as a secure download on his non-networked drive. He breathed a silent sigh of thanks that Carsov had come through. Malkor collected the file and brooded over it as he ate his oatmeal.
Carsov was as good as his word. Every detail, every finding was in there, nothing redacted, nothing held back.
It wasn’t pretty.
After an hour of looking it over, Malkor called together the octet members he could reach. Day off or not, within a half-hour Hekkar, Rigger, Trinan and Vid were on their way to his office. Aronse was away with her family for a long weekend and Gio was handling some “personal business.” Malkor didn’t begrudge them the time off; they’d been overworked since the start of the Empress Game. Besides, this wasn’t exactly an “official” IDC investigation he was inviting them to.
Rigger had the empire’s largest mug of coffee in one hand and a stack of datapads in the other as she shouldered her way through the door first. She was oddly bright-eyed for someone who probably hadn’t slept in days, with both IDC work and Dolan’s scientific data to deal with. Typical Rigger, burning it at both ends.
Hekkar arrived next, his bright red-orange hair still wet from a shower. “Little early, isn’t it, Malk?”
“You expect me to believe you’ve even been to bed yet?”
Hekkar grinned. “True.” He commandeered the chair closest to Malkor’s desk and sprawled into it, legs straight out in front of him, ankles crossed, arms behind his head. “I’d forgotten what it was like to have a night off—and a morning to sleep in.”
Trinan and Vid arrived right after that, the two giants looking as well-rested and relaxed as he’d seen them in a month.
Guilt hit Malkor in the gut. His team should have had a day off.
“How’s the physical therapy going?” he asked Vid, instead.
Vid flexed his shoulder, rotating it without a flinch. “Good as new; I’m ready for active duty.” Trinan didn’t look convinced. Considering the burns and tissue damage Vid had taken a while back, when Janeen kidnapped Corinth, the man was healing with the speed of an adolescent.
“Glad to hear that,” Malkor said. “I still demand Toble’s okay, first.”
“I said the same thing, boss,” Trinan said, cuffing Vid on his good shoulder as they both took a seat.
For one minute, Malkor was thrown back to another world—was it only months ago they’d headed to Altair Tri to find Shadow Panthe, aka Kayla? Before they’d all gone quasi-rogue, a dedicated team member had betrayed them, and they’d changed the fate of the empire with the outcome of the Empress Game.
They’d done their jobs back then—shit, they’d liked their jobs—and they’d known who they were working for.
Now…
Rigger ribbed Hekkar good-naturedly about his busy night/morning in the Pleasure District while they all got settled in. Within a minute they were down to business. Before they could get their datapads out and styluses in hand, Malkor cleared his throat.
“This is going to be an ears-only briefing.”
Eyebrows rose. Hekkar gestured to the door. “Gio and Aronse?”
Malkor shook his head. “Busy.”
“So this is an unofficial, ‘we were never here’ briefing?”
Vid chuckled. “My favorite kind. Lay it out for us, boss.”
“So,” Malkor started, glancing at his complink display, then back at the group. “Sergeant Carsov came through with his official version of the investigation into who supplied Prince Trebulan with the TNV.”
“And?” Hekkar asked. Rigger set her stack of datapads on the floor beside her chair and took a serious gulp of her coffee.
“It’s not as straightforward as I’d like.” Of course it wasn’t. If tracking this info down was easy, Senior Commander Vega, her fellow IDC conspirators and whoever they were allied with in the army would have long ago been busted. “Here’s what Carsov’s got:
“Trebulan was in possession of two canisters of TNV, the one he brought to the wedding and the one stashed in a hideout in Shimville. Both were regulation biomech isolation canisters used by the army’s Biomech Containment teams, as well as various medical and research centers. Carsov’s team traced the serial numbers of the canisters—they were issued to the army. Those specific canisters were part of a batch of supplies on one of the army’s ships, a ship that carried biomech teams to Thu Tal to help with TNV quarantine there.
“As per mission reports from that trip, no samples of TNV were collected at that time, and no samples were logged in upon return. During a resupply of the ship afterward, the quartermaster discovered the inventory was missing one batch of collection canisters, fifty in all. It was written off as ‘ruined supplies, destroyed without proper paperwork.’”
Hekkar whistled low. “Wow. The army collecting and storing TNV samples off the record?”
“Was he able to locate the other forty-eight canisters?” Rigger asked. “Talk about a nightmare, forty-eight unaccounted-for canisters, all possibly full of TNV.”
Malkor shook his head. “Not at this time, and the investigation has since been closed.”
The impact of what was out there, in who-knew-whose hands, silenced the room.
“That’s lunacy,” Vid said, pretty much echoing Malkor’s thoughts since he first read the report. “How does this info help us with what’s going down inside the IDC?”
“Carsov’s team pulled every available source of surveillance for the area and was able to put Siño in Shimville, entering the same warehouse two days before Trebulan’s attack, carrying the same case the second canister was later discovered in.”
“Siño?” Rigger said. “Bredard’s pet biocybe?”
“Exactly.”
Vid swore. “You should have ended those two at the information drop.”
“Bredard’s a middle man. Taking him out doesn’t solve the problem.”
“What’s the final consensus on Carsov’s report?” Trinan asked.
Malkor scanned Carsov’s summary of findings at the end of the file. “Basically, this proves the army is collecting TNV illegally, and trading it to people to use as a weapon. It also proves that Siño and Bredard—imperial citizens, not Wyrds—provided Trebulan with the TNV for the attack.” Thank the stars. This was a much needed political weapon right now. “He wasn’t able to get any farther with Bredard, but…”
“But we have evidence that links Bredard to Senior Commander Vega, among others in the IDC,” Hekkar finished. That was intel Parrel had been able to discover. Hekkar crossed his arms over his chest, face going hard. “So our crazy conspiracy theory is correct—IDC leaders and rogue elements in the army are working together, against the best interests of the empire.” He shook his head. “Shit.”
“Remember when this job was simple?” Trinan asked.
Vid barked out a laugh. “Being an IDC agent has never been simple.” That brought nods all around.
Rigger jumped into the silence. “What’s our next move?”
Everyone looked a
t Malkor. What the void was their next move? “Honestly, I haven’t gotten that far yet. I’ll have to speak with Commander Parrel. Thoughts, first?”
“This puts us in an impossible situation,” Hekkar replied. “Anti-Wyrd sentiment is rising, even with Isonde announcing that Kayla is here as an emissary of peace. If it tips to the boiling point, the Council of Seven will have no choice but to increase the military presence on Ordoch, which is a waste of resources we need at home.”
“Not to mention likely to be ineffective,” Trinan added.
Hekkar nodded, running a hand through his tousled hair. “On the other hand, if we let the people know who’s really behind Trebulan’s TNV attack—and likely the assassination of the Low Divine—the empire will be in major upheaval.”
“We can’t begin to predict the fallout from revealing a conspiracy within the IDC to grab more power,” Vid said. The big man tapped his finger unconsciously atop his knee as he thought. “It could bring the entire agency down, and then what would happen to the empire?”
Rigger leaned forward with a shake of her head. “We can’t sit on this, it’s too big.”
“How can we even think of letting the truth out, though?” Trinan countered. “What happens to the army if it gets out that they’re storing rogue samples of the TNV and giving it to terrorists? If we dismantle the army, or sideline them while a huge investigation is undertaken, who’s going to help quarantine Wei-lu-Wei and get the situation under control there?”
“There’s no controlling the TNV,” Malkor said, “not once it gets its teeth into a planet.” The best they could do was hope to slow the spread.
The room fell into quiet, each octet member spinning ideas in their heads, looking at the problem from all angles no doubt.
Malkor gestured to Rigger’s stack of datapads. “What else did you bring to the party?”
“Hmm? Oh! Yeah, hang on.”
“Do you ever sleep, Rigger?” Vid asked.
“Sleep is for the weak, like you guys.” She grinned and dug the datapads out from under her chair. “Okay, I’ve got updates from going through more of Dolan’s data.”