Her eyes narrowed to dagger points. “Don’t pretend you’re doing this for anyone but yourself.” She took a breath and willed herself to calm. “I can’t set up a formal meeting. That would be insane. You’re the most wanted man in the system. But maybe I can arrange an…impromptu crossing of paths. I’ll send you the details once I have them.”
“Thank you.”
Before Delphyne could respond, a voice from her end of the comm cut her off. A woman’s voice, very business in tone. “He wants to see you.”
Delphyne stood, the upper half of her body disappearing from view. “Of course. Tell Mister Byers I’m on my way.” Her finger reached below the area of the monitor, and the call was cut off.
8
“Are you sure?” Mao said.
Bayne arched an eyebrow at his XO.
“Right,” Mao relented. “Of course, you are.” He turned his attention to Graeme. “Set course for the Rickard Sea.”
“Aye, sir,” Graeme answered. He keyed up the coordinates but hesitated before entering them. “Are you sure? That sector is ninety-five percent controlled by the Byers Clan. And they currently want us dead.”
“I’m aware,” Mao answered. “Set the course, Officer.”
Graeme shrugged and muttered something to himself. It wasn’t an insubordinate act, at least not as Mao viewed it. It was more a tic than anything else. Graeme could not help but voice his thoughts. It was grating initially, especially to Mao’s strict sensibilities, but the XO had grown to understand Graeme’s quirks.
“Course is set,” Graeme said. “We will be surrounded by the enemy in twelve hours, thirty-one minutes, and sixteen seconds. Thirty-one minutes and fifteen seconds. Fourteen seconds.”
“Thank you, Officer Graeme,” Mao said.
The bridge fell into standard cruise protocol, which was once the medium alert protocol—constant monitoring of radar, scanning all communication frequencies, combat stations at the ready. There was no more protocol when combat stations were not at the ready.
Mao stood by Bayne’s chair, which currently held a very tired-looking captain. “How is she?” Mao asked.
Bayne was steady. “Fine.”
His terseness did nothing to endear him to Mao, though Mao knew the captain did not have that intention. When Mao remained, Bayne looked up at him. “Is there something else?”
“There are a great many things else,” Mao answered. “I’ll settle for why we’re sailing into a Byers-held territory.”
Bayne rested his chin on his knuckles and stared ahead at the map display. “You’ll need to settle for because I said so.”
The anger bubbled up in Mao and burst out his mouth before he could think to stop it. “Perhaps I would if I were a child. But I am a sailor who has chosen to follow you into the dark, so I think I deserve some stars-be-damned respect.” His face burned hot. Beads of sweat formed on his upper lip. He cleared his throat and straightened his coat, as if it was somehow responsible for his outburst. “Sir.”
Bayne rose slowly from his chair. He stood nose to nose with Mao, not speaking. Mao felt the captain’s hot breath on his face, like Bayne was spitting fire on him with every exhalation. Mao stared straight ahead, through the captain, hands folded behind his back.
Silence swallowed the whole of the bridge until, finally, Bayne spoke. “With me.” He marched off the bridge.
Mao was frozen in place, surprised by Bayne response. Rather, his lack of response. He spurred himself forward and followed Bayne all the way to the captain’s quarters.
Bayne uncorked the bottle of black rum that sat on his desk. Mao had lost count which bottle it was. There was a time when Mao believed the bottle nothing more than a desk ornament. And that was after Bayne had removed it from whatever dust-filled corner of his quarters it had been hidden in all those years. Now, there was rarely a time Mao saw the inside of Bayne’s quarters when Bayne was not drinking from it.
It was also becoming alarmingly infrequent that Mao did not join him. Bayne handed him a half-full glass.
Mao could gauge the severity of what Bayne was about to tell him based on the fullness of the glass. When he learned of the true nature of conflict on Triseca, Bayne had filled the glass near to the brim.
Bayne sipped as he walked away from Mao, stopping at the small viewport that looked out the starboard side of the ship. His shoulders rose and fell in rhythm with his breathing, which was surprisingly calm.
Mao drank and felt the warmth spread through his body. He was acquiring a taste for the pirate liquor, which may have made him feel queasier than the liquor itself.
“We’ve been through much together,” Bayne said, still looking out at the stars. “Countless battles with the most brutal pirates in the system, navigating the Black, always on the brink of running out of fuel and supplies. But I don’t think you’ve ever sworn at me before.” His shoulders shook with muted laughter.
The shift in tone caught Mao off guard. He expected the same combative attitude to which he’d grown accustomed. He didn’t adapt well to drastic changes in expectations. “I’ve often felt the urge,” Mao said, trying to insert some levity into his voice, though the statement was true.
“I’m sure you have,” Bayne said, turning to face him. “And I understand why that urge finally overtook you.”
Dark circles had formed under Bayne’s eyes. Mao knew they couldn’t have appeared just now, that they must have been there for days, weeks perhaps, but it only just struck him how tired the captain must be. He knew Bayne wasn’t sleeping more than a couple hours a day, always focused on what must come next.
“But now may be the worst time of any to let your impulses get the better of you.” Bayne sat, like a sack of flour dropping into his chair. “It may seem counterintuitive to you, being a man of protocol and regulation.”
Mao nodded. “A bit, yes.”
“Without the threat of court-martial, of sentence and punishment being handed down from Central, the weight of punishment rests solely on me.” The idea seemed to press Bayne deeper into his chair. “If I don’t act on every instance of insubordination, then what remains of my crew could quickly spiral out of control. I need tight reins right now.”
“Then I’m to be punished?” Mao asked.
Bayne sighed. “No. And I’m afraid you’re missing my point.” He leaned forward and looked into his glass, at his reflection in the rum. “We are on a knife’s edge right now. The slightest step in the wrong direction will see us cut in half. If I lose the crew, then all is lost. I need them. I need you.”
Mao wanted to feel some pride at that. But, underneath Bayne’s words, he heard the true nature of the sentiment.
Without the crew, I will be alone. I cannot be alone.
To be needed to right a wrong, to oust Colonel Tirseer as a bad actor, a poisonous seed implanted in the heart of the United Systems, was something in which Mao could find a sense of pride. But to fall in line so Bayne wouldn’t have to clean his mess up alone? That was not something Mao cared to do.
But he realized that he may not be able to do one without doing the other. And, regardless of all that had transpired to date, Mao considered Bayne not only his captain but his friend. A man for whom he had much respect and loyalty. He wanted to protect the United Systems as much as he wanted to protect Bayne.
“Sir,” Mao said. “Everyone on this ship is here of their own will. That cannot be said of any Navy ship. They choose to join the Navy, not which captain they serve. As much as I loathe saying this, now is the time to embrace your Ranger background.”
Bayne looked up from his liquor reflection, confusion in his eyes. “Don’t think I heard you right.”
Mao took a bigger slug of his drink than intended and spoke through a tightened throat. “You did, I’m afraid. Running this ship as though it’s still part of the Navy, and like we’re all still sailors, would be a mistake. Not that I would have ever accused you of following protocol.”
Bayne seemed to fall into
a comfortable posture for the first time, leaning back and crossing one leg over the other, running his forefinger along the rim of his glass. “No, that is one thing of which I can say I’ve never been accused.”
“My point being, you can’t continue to operate somewhere in the shadowy area between Navy and Ranger captain. It creates a sense of unease among the crew. You can’t expect them to know where they lie if you don’t know where you lie.” Moa took his turn studying his reflection in his drink. “And I recall a story you once told me of your Ranger days, serving under Captain Alistair Kyte.”
Bayne shifted in his chair. His posture changed, shoulders tensed and hunched forward as though preparing for a fight.
“You spoke of the crew and how they had a certain amount of say aboard the ship,” Mao said.
The tension in Bayne’s shoulders eased. He sunk back into a comfortable position. “All whose name was written on the ship’s ledger had equal share in the ship’s success.”
“That’s right,” Mao said. “As opposed to the Navy ship, which is run to the captain’s will alone, whose directive is, in turn, dictated by Central. The crew is bound by duty, not loyalty. These people are here now out of loyalty to you. Reward that and your fears of rebellion will diminish.”
The devilish smile spread across Bayne’s face, and Mao had never been so pleased to see it. “I’ll take your advisement into consideration, XO.” Bayne stood and gestured toward the door, signaling for Mao that he could leave.
Mao, instead, remained seated. “Perhaps you’d like to begin right now. By telling me why we’re sailing into the Rickard Sea and what role the former Lieutenant Delphyne still has in the running of this ship?”
The devilish smile only spread wider. “I like you free of the shackles of protocol, Taliesin. You’re craftier than you’re given credit for.” He refreshed his drink and brought a picture up on the monitor over his desk. “Do you know who this is?”
The man, though he could barely be called such, looked to be in his early twenties. His eyes shone with the arrogance of youth and money, his smile with cold indifference. His blond hair was nearly white, striped with thin strands of red.
Mao shook his head.
“Jaxwell Byers,” Bayne said. “Eldest son of Jasper Byers, patriarch of the Byers Clan. Jaxwell runs the clan’s mining operations in this sector of the Deep Black, a task he thinks well beneath him.”
“Also a task that puts him in charge of the operation at Ore Town,” Mao said.
“Precisely that,” Bayne said.
“And what does Delphyne have to do with this man?”
Bayne sat on the edge of his desk. His faced changed from that of a man in the midst of devilment to a man about to say something he knew would elicit anger. “I asked Delphyne for one last favor before she left. She was conflicted. She wanted a new life, a new start, but she also wanted to serve. She just couldn’t, in good conscience, serve aboard this ship any longer. So, I got her a new identity.” He sipped his drink. “And a job as Jaxwell Byers’s executive assistant.”
Mao shot up from his chair. “Are you mad?”
“Quite pleased, actually,” Bayne said. “My plan has just borne fruit.”
“You’ve put her in extreme danger. She’s alone in the lion’s den.”
“Jaxwell Byers is a whiny child who complains all day that daddy doesn’t love and respect him. He is hardly a lion.”
Mao paced the small distance from the door to the bed, hand running compulsively through his hair. “The Byers Clan wants you dead as much as the Navy, and they’ve fewer qualms about murdering you outright. The Navy would at least put you on trial.”
“Debatable.”
Mao wanted to yell. Just when he thought he was making progress with the captain, Bayne took two steps into the dark. “You did exactly what she was afraid you would do. You crossed a line, and now she is at risk.”
“Delphyne agreed to this.” The anger was rising in Bayne’s throat. “Of her own free will, just as you said. I didn’t order her. She wasn’t a member of my crew anymore. She knew the risks and she took them because she knows the payoff.”
“You’ve pushed her into the grey area she never wanted to be in. She is a sailor. She follows a code. Right and wrong. She does not step in and out of shadows as you do.” Mao realized then that he wasn’t speaking just of Delphyne.
“Maybe she isn’t as naïve as you think her to be,” Bayne said. “That code you follow is a lie. The Navy never abided by it. I took a page straight from their book. And from Parallax’s.” Bayne slammed his glass down on his desk, splattering rum all over. “Because they follow the same damn book. I planted someone in the Byers operation, so she could gather intel, so she could help me sort this mess out and put it right.”
Bayne focused on calming his trembling hands, on steadying his breath. “According to Delphyne, Jaxwell is responsible for the contracts. She’s forwarded me his itinerary. We know where he’s going to be and when. And we are going to have a conversation with him.”
Mao stood at attention. Out of habit. Or because he knew that it would bother Bayne. But, in honesty, because it was one of the few ways in which Mao could cling to the code he still needed to follow. “Yes, Captain.”
9
The Rickard Sea was both dangerous and boring. It was mostly vast nothingness, an expanse of empty space, but it was pocked with gravity wells and solar storms. They cropped up at random intervals and each encounter was tumultuous enough that it could destroy a ship. That meant constant vigilance when mostly nothing happened. The combination made for an exhausting and frustrating trip.
Add to that the Byers presence, and the Royal Blue was on edge even more than usual. Also, Mao and Bayne seemed to want to kill each other more than usual, so that didn’t help things.
Wilco wasn’t as bothered by the tension as the others seemed to be. So fragile, they all were. They claimed to be sailors of the Navy, the most elite in the system, yet they were bickering and sniping at each other like children in a schoolyard.
That bothered him more than anything else—the whining, the second-guessing, the attempts at undermining Bayne. Mao was the worst offender. The guy didn’t say much, and when he did, it was wooden and boring and seemingly placid, but his eyes burned with something Wilco had seen in the eyes of every second-in-command he’d ever come across—the desire to lead. He thought he’d do a better job in the captain’s chair.
Wilco was no stranger to challenging a captain. It was a regular occurrence among pirates. If an XO thought the captain was failing at his duties, he would challenge him for the right to lead. Sometimes formally. Sometimes with a knife in a dark hallway.
The sidelong glances and hushed voices were beginning to grate on Wilco. He preferred a straight-up fight.
Hepzah was in the communications room preparing a channel. The two hadn’t spent much time together in recent weeks. Preferring the action, that was where Wilco found himself. He wasn’t so sure Bayne had fully forgiven Hep’s near betrayal to Tirseer. The captain said he understood, that Hep was targeted by the best spy in the system, but Wilco didn’t buy the amnesty act. From either of them. How could Bayne so easily forgive something like that? How could Hep reconcile what he did with his continued presence on the ship?
Maybe that was why Hep was always in a dark room, elbow deep in the ship’s guts, alone.
Didn’t matter. Hep didn’t need protecting anymore. He wasn’t a child.
“All hands,” Mao’s voice said over the ship’s general comm. “Secure your persons. We are now approaching mark A.”
The tumultuous nature of the Rickard Sea made it a real pain to navigate, but it was smack in the middle of the quickest route from this sector of the Deep Black to the central planets, meaning it was essential for mining operations to move their ore. The frigates still made the voyage. That made it prime opportunity for pirates to hide amongst the turmoil and pick off miners with their minds on navigating.
&nbs
p; Or recently disavowed naval captains. There wasn’t much of a difference.
Wilco burst into a run at the news. He wanted to be in the shuttle bay. It was the most open space on the ship, and the most secluded. Few spent time there if they could avoid it. It was by the engines and, so, the loudest space too, and it smelled strongly of ionized air and solvents, a metallic combination that stung the lungs.
He rounded the final turn, the shuttle bay door now in view, as Mao’s second alert sounded over the comm.
“Now positioned at mark A. Activating lockdown procedures.”
Wilco pushed his legs harder, his muscles flooding with blood and adrenaline. He passed the threshold into the shuttle bay just as the bulkhead doors slammed shut. Lockdown procedures meant sectioning off the ship in case of hull breaches. Any damage from loss of atmosphere would be contained to specific sections of the ship.
A rush of victory flooded Wilco as he scanned the bay. Empty. Perfect. He was as far from the bridge as he could be. As far from where the decisions were made, where responsibility lay.
“What are you doing here?” Hep stepped out from behind a stack of crates.
“Seriously?” Wilco said, throwing up his arms. “Figured this was the only place on the ship where I wouldn’t get locked up with someone who insisted on talking to me. Guess I was wrong.”
“No worries,” Hep said as he walked away. “Don’t much feel like talking.”
Wilco suddenly hoped for a hull breach. “Good,” he said. Once the words left his mouth, he wanted nothing more than to talk. He tried to find other ways to pass the time as they waited for the word from the bridge. He paced, twirled his dagger, paced some more. “Why?” he said after an excruciating two minutes. “I get the feeling you’re pissed about something. Pissed at me?”
Hep’s expression barely changed. Even knowing him for years, he was hard to read. “No.”
Captain Bayne Boxed Set Page 22