by Chris Turner
He skulked around the side of the ship, using some parked loaders as shields. He dipped into a ship’s service entryway. The cramped corridor connected to the open cargo bay where he’d have to be on guard for hostiles.
Dim amber light streamed down from a source within the corridor. Navigating by the light source, he saw a steel bulkhead ahead—a dead end. Heavy cables ran along the walls where they met the ceiling, along with electrical equipment, scanners.
Yul looked back. The adjoining cargo bay within the ship was huge. More crates hauled by loaders, mechno-drays, and men wielding trolleys, were stacked against the far wall. Yul snuck forth, using his knife to jimmy open the lids of certain crates in his vicinity, discovered electrical tools, expensive lab equipment, weapons, oxygen tanks.
He made a wide sweep with his collar so that Mathias could get a better look at what was being loaded into the hold. Just as he was about to backtrack to the depot, a deep voice boomed out at him from the shadows. “Hold up! Where you think you’re going, boss?” The man trained his weapon on him, a sleek 6-inch Obviator.
Yul shrugged. “Eugene sent me to check.”
“Who the fuck’s Eugene? Check on what? I’m the watchman here.”
“Eugene from security. Somebody’s breached the warehouse, didn’t you hear?”
The man’s brows rose and that split second gave Yul opportunity to lurch forward, elbow the man in the guts and twist the weapon out of his grasp, breaking the wrist. Bones snapped. The man squawked, but was silenced as a steel fist pounded on his back and sent him sprawling face first on the metal floor.
Yul’s heart pounded. He crouched low, hoping no one had heard.
No footsteps or voices.
Close. One slip and he would have been rat bait.
The man lay at his feet, a limp rag, likely dead. He listened for followup activity. None. Apparently nobody had heard the man’s cry. Good. He hurried back down the ship’s companionway, wanting to get out of this tin can. Yul winced. The workers and draysmen were moving closer, blocking his exit. Dumb bastards. No easy way to sneak past them without being seen. He could try to make a break for it, but at considerable risk. For the moment, he was trapped.
Yul turned back toward the dim companionway, the glow casting a gleam on his steel fingers. Hearing the sound of men’s muffled laughter ahead, he paused. It was clear if he moved up there, he’d bump into some other nosy shiphand. Yet he couldn’t backtrack and risk the loading men seeing him. Gritting his teeth, he waited, crouched on the balls of his feet beside a ventilation shaft. There were some lockers nearby. The sprawled body was a liability and he dragged the limp figure into one of them.
Now the workers were coming into the bays, loading foodstuffs down the companionway. Yul tucked himself into an adjoining locker and pulled the door shut.
No sooner had he done so when the tramp of feet came closer. An authoritative voice snapped, “Denga, where’s Hagran?”
“Haven’t seen him.”
Another quipped, “He’s probably stepped out for a swig.”
“We leave at 0100 for Remus in the Dim Zone,” said the first man. “If he’s not back, we leave without him and he’s fired.”
“Roger that.”
Yul gnawed the knuckles of his good hand, squeezed deeper into his hiding place. Dim-fucking-Zone? Could this be for real? Mathias was not joking about Hresh having liaisons out there. But why?
There was no bloody way he’d be forced back to that no-man’s land.
The footsteps stopped with the clink of the bulkhead door closing and the whoosh of air.
Yul waited some time before he eased open the locker’s door, enough to glimpse a stealthy figure creeping up toward the bulkhead. This was no patrolman. Neither the garb nor the poise for one. He burst out, caught the figure in his grip and disarmed her of her weapon. His knife flashed millimetres from her throat.
“Who the fuck are you?”
She gazed at him with curious surprise. “I’m Cloye. Backup, in case you fail.”
He sized her up, her intent, cougarish gaze. Her black, skin-tight assassin’s garb so easily blending into the shadows. “Yeah, like my ass you are. You’re Mathias’s goon, here to watch me and kill me, if he orders it.”
She shrugged. Her face, picture-perfect, remained deadpan. Her amber hair fell loosely over her broad-cheeked features, her face a growing sullen knot...Tight, anti-ion garb did not discredit her figure.
She twisted away from his grip as fast and easily as a snake. That movement showed the perfect contours of her cleavage, her breasts heaving.
Yul grinned unpleasantly. At least the woman was honest, but quick, and dangerous. He motioned her to the locker. “Hide in here. Quick! I don’t want you giving me away. You’ll be lucky if they don’t kill you on sight.”
“I can take care of myself.”
“Like the way you did a few seconds ago with my knife at your throat. I could have gutted you.”
Her mouth drew tight, lips ruby red, closing over perfect teeth.
Yul took a quick look around, dragged the corpse out of the locker, stripped it down and donned the dead man’s grey uniform. He stuffed the limp form back into the locker. Cloye seemed startled at Yul’s impressive physique and muscled body. He remained entirely oblivious to her scrutiny of his near nudity.
He crouched, thinking furiously. What to do?
Capture the bridge, take over the ship? No, too messy and risky. He doubted he could safely make it back outside and over the fence. Better to stay put. When they were docked at their destination, he would make his move. If it came to that. As for what that move would be... that would depend on what was there. The risk of staying here was too high. Huddled in the dim murk like a rat, he squeezed his temples in thought. The female... He looked over at her.
“How did you get in?”
“Same as you. You were easy to follow. I came in with a fake ID no different than yours. I could track you with a device Mathias gave me.”
“Let me see it,” growled Yul, thrusting out his hand. “I wasn’t expecting tails.”
Dutifully, she reached into a slit at her spandexed hip, a barely perceptible smirk on her face as she handed it over to him: a flat blue triangle, no larger than an oversized Namith coin.
“It must work off local frequencies,” Yul mused.
She swung her pale-blue cat’s eyes left without comment. A movement in the shadows? Yul ventured a glance. No, just the instinctual reflexes of a seasoned spy assessing the situation.
He could not help but feel attracted to this assassin-spy. She had a lithe, feral energy to her and was more than a shapely bit of eye candy: muscular, but feminine, curvy in all the right places, just the way he liked a woman. But the eyes. Something mysterious and bewitching about them. This was an extremely unpredictable vixen.
He couldn’t stay alert every second or watch her constantly while foes roamed the ship. Sometime, somewhere he would falter and she would pounce. A minion of Mathias he couldn’t kill. He tossed her gun back her way. She snatched it out of the air with a look of surprise; she would need the weapon to get off this ship.
A heavy tramping of steel-toed boots rung off metal.
Cloye’s eyes widened. In reaction, she threw her arms around the startled mercenary who couldn’t see the figure coming up behind.
“Here, what the hell is that?” called a voice behind Yul. “Is that you, Lequin? What the hell are you doing stowing a broad here for? Stifford will have your balls for that.”
While the man’s attention was diverted, Cloye moved from her embrace and brained the man with her pistol.
A take-down in seconds. He fell like a log.
Yul stared, blinking at the motionless man. “Good thinking. I mean with the amorous advance.” He turned toward her, his face wary.
“Don’t mention it.”
He did not like the edge of insolence underlining her tone. But he didn’t have time to complain. A sudden spasm of pain r
ipped through his spine and he sagged, arching in pain, falling to his knees.
Cloye blinked in bewilderment.
Yul groaned. The ship’s light drive function. Of course—it was the carrier that had allowed Mathias to send him pain across the light years. One of the bastard’s little reminders he was not keeping his mind on the job. Yul gasped for breath, staggering for the wall.
“What is it? Mathias?” she hissed.
“Who else?” Painfully he regained his balance.
She gave a disapproving scowl, reaching out a hand to him.
“Just hope you don’t fall on the snake’s wrong side, like me. It’s easy to do.”
“Let’s just focus on staying alive,” she said, ignoring his outburst. “If we get Mathias the info he wants, then we both get paid.”
“Maybe you do,” Yul scoffed, “but I’m getting nothing out of this deal. The man says I owe him a debt.”
She paused, toying with her blaster. “Then that’s your problem, Yul, not mine.”
He swayed on his feet. “What do you know of this Biogron we’re looking for?”
“Some glass container hooked up to some electronic gizmos and computers.”
“You saw it?” he croaked.
“When I was in the lab and Mathias was explaining this mission, the top was open enough to take a peek inside. I saw some ferns growing in the sand which Mathias’s lab monkey Dez, claimed had grown from some pod creature. A moth flew out and landed on my arm.” She chuckled. “Grey-winged thing with red spots on it. Cutest little thing.”
Yul felt a cold shudder run up his back. “No more talk of Mathias and his bugs.” He winced as he staggered down the hall, jerking open the companionway door. His nerve ends pulsed to the torment in his aching joints. His mechanical fingers flexed, ready to take his wrath out on someone’s neck. The ship’s towering outer cargo door clanged shut somewhere behind them. Yul turned, glaring, hearing an annoying buzzer as the ship was finally sealed. A female countdown voice announced departure in T minus 5.
The headset of the prostrate man on the floor crackled. “Captain Lorde here. What the hell is going on down there, Rourke? You high or something?”
Yul cursed. He scrambled back, picked up the receiver, his fingers itching to crush it. The man was out cold, maybe with a cracked skull. Cloye had hit him hard, perhaps too hard. Yul spoke into the com as unruffled as he could. “No, sir. Checking for stowaways, sir.”
“And?”
“False alarm. Falling crate near took my head off. Some fool piled it too—”
“Take care of it, and be seated and strapped in within five minutes. Hresh is a stickler for orderliness, as you know.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And hurry up and get back to the bridge. Departure is at 0-15.”
“Roger.”
“By the way, what’s duty Sergeant Lequin’s status? He hasn’t reported in.”
Yul hesitated. “Don’t know, sir.”
“That’s Captain Lorde to you.”
“Yes Cap’n, I mean Captain Lorde, sir.”
“Rourke, anything wrong with you? You impaired? And what do you mean you don’t know? He was down there with you in bay L3, wasn’t he?”
Yul winced. Things were going sour. “Hard to hear you, sir. This headset seems to be breaking up. Com must be malfunctioning. Crappy thing.” He whacked it hard against the wall.
The captain’s angry voice surged through the com. “Rourke, you dumb ass, what the hell’s wrong with you? Are you gassed again? I’m sending someone down there.”
Yul heard some more expletives and some mumbling about the shipment being too important to tolerate mistakes.
Yul hissed. “Now what in hell are we going to do?”
Cloye shrugged. “It was you who decided to hop this ship.”
Yul balled a fist. He looked away in indecision. “I have to think.”
“I could kill our sleeping beauty, solve our problem.”
“Wouldn’t help.” He held up a hand. His mind fled over the possibilities. If the captain found Rourke passed out, he’d assume he was intoxicated, had maybe slipped and banged his head. He would order him taken to sick bay before slapping his wrists and taking disciplinary action. End of story. But if he found a dead man, or no man... Better to leave him alive. “Discovery of a murder victim’s only going to complicate things. We’ll have to risk it.” Yul shook his head sadly. This was very sloppy work.
“Suit yourself, ace, you’re in charge.”
Yul scowled, resenting the woman’s sarcasm. “Rourke’ll be out for a couple of hours, if he even wakes,” grunted Yul. “Gives us a chance to come up with a plan.”
She opened her mouth to argue but Yul was at the edge of his patience. “Move!” He shoved her up the companionway, recalling that she would have standing orders from Mathias to terminate him at will. But neither of them could finish the job alone, and he’d have a bitch of a time dealing with an assassin while in investigative mode. An uneasy truce was the only option... He had to reason with this lone falcon. Manhandling her throughout the ship would only get her pissed off, and make his job that much harder.
A wave of heat surged through him. Her sultry curves in such close quarters were impossible to ignore. Rarely was he affected by a woman so shamelessly. There was an electricity about her. Or maybe he’d been out in the hinterlands too long—likely both. Things were never easy on a mission, especially with a woman serving as a distraction.
He felt the tug and flighty, otherworldly lift-off course through his bones. The ship was entering the lightstream to another place in the universe, Hresh’s world and the completion of his mission, if they got lucky and weren’t caught.
Yul moved forward about the deserted halls like a hound on a scent. No question of sitting still. He had to look for some place to ride out the search for the errant duty sergeant. He kept her ahead of him. She seemed reasonable but she might try something stupid even under their dodgy circumstances. At least until this mission was over, at which time they could get to know each other or kill each other, he wasn’t sure which. Too many variables surfaced for his brain to compute—too much beyond his control.
But clear to him that if they didn’t get out of the area where Rourke got clubbed, they’d be discovered.
The ship’s ventilation system was noisy and gave out a clunking rattle. No secret it was an older model. Very old. The artificial grav was archaic and out of whack. Yul’s gait seemed sluggish and his frame slightly heavier than normal as he trudged down the corridors deeper into the ship. A particular rectangular unit was suspended from the ceiling and he cocked his head and leaned in to hear the unit buzzing with an electrical hum—boosted too high. He scowled. Maybe he should lodge a complaint with Captain Lorde...? Wry thoughts like these did little to calm his nerves.
Yul scratched at his shoulders where the skin itched something fierce. The coarse material of the man’s uniform reeked of sweat and rot-gut booze and was not helpful. Combined with his own sweat, the greasy stickiness felt as if he hadn’t washed in over a week.
He did not know how long they would be in light drive. If they were heading for the Dim Zone, it would be at least six, maybe eight hours.
It turned out to be seven.
He ducked back at a sudden noise, pulling Cloye down with him, as a grey-uniformed officer clumped by a cross-corridor. This was the second time they had almost been discovered.
“Only a matter of time before we get sighted and ID’d,” Yul murmured gloomily.
“Do you know this rustbucket well enough to navigate it?"
“There’re three levels in ships like this, as I recall: cargo on lower, ships’ engineering and weapons at stern, the bridge above, the toad-shaped belvedere seen from outside. We could go—”
“Elevators?”
“Maybe, or just a series of emergency stairwells at both ends.”
“Let me go ahead to scout out the ship for you. You hang back here and find some
locker to duck into and jerk off. I’m better at this sleuthing than you.”
“Too risky. We go together.” Yul shook his head. Did she think he was that stupid?
“Have it your way,” she griped, staring at him, her dark eyes focusing languorously. “What do you suggest?” She contrived to reach out a hand behind her head, arching her chest, twisting close enough to brush against him.
“Certainly not what you’re thinking,” Yul grumbled.
“Oh, come now, Yul! You playing the prude on me? I’m sure we can get to know each other better, have a few moments of fun. We both get lonely on the job, far away from home. We can find a locker big enough for the two of us. Unless you want to jerk off there on your own.”
“As much as my animal instinct urges me to take up the offer, I’ll pass.”
“Oh, Vrean, such a gentleman! Charming one too. Didn’t anyone tell you a woman hates to be turned down?”
Yul shrugged, struggling to get inside her head. “So what’s your story, Cloye? Daddy lean on you a little too heavily when you were a schoolgirl?”
“Father? No,” said Cloye sullenly. “Uncle. Introduced me to the spy world too early on. Recognized in me the manipulative streak I had. Plus, I was a hot piece of ass.” She chuckled. “Used me.” Her lip downturned in a moody scowl.
Yul said nothing.
“Irony is, I used him in the end—to get big contracts.”
Yul ignored the remark and pointed ahead. “Look over here, smart ass, by those bulkheads, some storage areas. Maybe I should lock you in there while I go ahead and scout out the terrain?”
She sighed in irritation. “Why don’t we just storm the bridge and take over this ship? Rather than being a bunch of pansies begging to be plucked?”
Yul laughed at her brazenness. “Bad idea, think harder, Cloye. Let’s say we take the bridge. You want Sybcore security after us? They’ll send attack ships out to intercept us. I’ve already been in this situation and not about to do it again. If Hresh is half as ruthless as Mathias, we’re dead.”