by Shéa MacLeod
“Milady, your chariot awaits.”
Chapter Seven
SOUND FILTERED IN FIRST. Muffled, distant, like an annoying gnat buzzing around his head.
Then came the pain. Throbbing, insistent, stomach-churning.
His mouth tasted of something dead. It was hard to swallow, and he felt distant from his body, as if moving was something someone else was doing for him.
Xander opened one eye, blinked, and the room swam into view. It was small, hardly more than a cell, with bare walls, ceiling, and floors. He was strapped to a hard cot. Next to him was a box. He recognized it immediately, and his blood went cold. He struggled against the straps holding him down, but they were made of titanium and unbreakable.
Flipping the cot was impossible. He tried but found it was bolted to the floor. Yelling wasn’t an option. He opened his mouth, but nothing came out. It was as if his vocal chords had been frozen.
The door slid open, and someone entered. He couldn’t make out its features against the light streaming in around it.
“Help me,” he managed to croak.
It marched toward him. His eyes widened at sight of the featureless face and metallic skin. Android. It would not respond to anything but its program. Begging for help was useless.
The bonds fell from his wrists and ankles, but it did Xander no good. He couldn’t move. Whatever he’d been shot with had rendered his muscles useless.
The android picked him up like he was a rag doll and tossed him into the box.
“No!”
The top slid closed, plunging him into darkness. Panic surged. He fought it back. Until he heard the hissing.
Gas.
He screamed. There was no one to hear him.
Chapter Eight
“APPROACHING OMICRON 5, Captain.” Audley tapped his comp and the viewscreen filled with the image of an orange planet suspended in dark space like a dusty marble. Around it spun tiny moons and even tinier satellites.
Zala squinted, a frown marring her brow. It was not an inviting place. Giant funnels of dust swirled in the never-ending wind, and there wasn’t a drop of water anywhere she could see. Definitely not somewhere she would have chosen to make landfall, but the archives had been specific. “The Chancellor knows we’re here?”
“He has been notified and sends his greetings for a Happy Founders’ Day.”
Zala snorted, unimpressed. If Formia was Hell, Omicron 5 was Hell’s toilet. Why anyone would celebrate the founding of such a place was beyond her.
“We are allowed free rein as long as we...” He shot a hesitant glance at her.
Her eyebrows inched toward her hairline. “As long as we what?”
He swallowed a laugh, hiding his smile behind a fall of braids. “As long as we’re subtle, sir.”
A slow grin spread across her face. “Subtle is my middle name.”
“Yes, Captain. That’s what they’re afraid of.”
“Wimps.”
He grinned. “Jeric needs parts. Said he’d be back before you returned.”
“He’s leaving the ship?” Jeric was their mechanic. He lived in the bowels of the ship. She’d probably seen him once since she hired him. He wasn’t what one might call a people person.
Audley shrugged. “Guess even an introvert needs fresh air now and again.”
Omicron 5 wasn’t exactly filled with fresh air, which was confirmed the minute she stepped off the ship. The stench of fuel, combined with something like cooked cabbage, permeated the air. She ordered her implants to dull her olfactory sense and felt immediate relief.
The spaceport on O5 was pretty much like any other planet-side spaceport outside the home galaxy. A couple of landing pads had been built in the middle of a dust-bowl of a plain. A shanty town had sprung up around them. The orange dust that made up most of the planet coated everything in a gritty layer an inch deep. She grimaced. It even coated her tongue.
Captain Zala Lei had spent more than her fair share of time in such backwater places over the last few years. Humanity’s greatest frontier. What a joke. Figured she’d wind up landing during the middle of yet another idiotic holiday, too. Between the original home world holidays, and the newfangled ones each planet insisted on celebrating, it was a wonder anyone got anything done.
A cold wind cut through her dark blue flight suit, despite the dingy cloak Audley had foisted on her. Her implants compensated until she was warm enough that she probably wouldn’t freeze her ass off. Deity, she hated these bloody frontier planets.
A hawker with half-rotted teeth shoved some kind of dead carcass at her. “Turk-bird for the lady’s Founders’ Day table? Juicy. Delicious. Melt in your mouth. You got my promise on that, lady.” He jiggled it up and down, as if the flopping of its lifeless wings would convince her to buy the creature.
Her nose wrinkled. She wasn’t sure if the stench of dead carcass came from the man or his offering. “Get that thing out of my face,” she said calmly with a hint of steel. Starship captains didn’t snarl like hawkers’ wives. They glowered and made idiots mess their pants with the sheer power of command.
The hawker hadn’t gotten the memo. The reek of his breath wafted straight up her nose as he leaned in a little too friendly-like. “I’m sure the lady’s husband would be pleased if she brought home such a feast for his pleasure.”
That tore it.
She slammed the hawker against the side of the nearest building, ramming a forearm against his throat and pressing a blaster into the side of his soft belly. He gasped for air, struggling against her powerful hold, but the scrawny hawker was no match for the implants of a Syndicate captain. Microscopic chips buzzed up and down her arm, ramping up the power of her hold.
“Listen, you piece of trash,” she snarled. “The last thing I’m interested in is cooking for some pathetic man. I’m here to do a job, and you are in my way. If you know what’s good for you, you’ll find yourself halfway across the planet real quick-like. Feel me?”
The hawker nodded so hard, his dented bowler tumbled off his head. Long, greasy strands of hair whipped in the wind. Zala sneered. Planet dwellers were so... unhygienic.
She pulled back and let the man sink to the ground as she holstered her blaster. “And by the way, you can call me Captain.”
She took a certain satisfaction in watching the blood drain from his face. Insulting a Syndicate captain meant instant erasure, if the captain so desired. Most captains did, but not Zala. Some called her soft, but she’d never seen the point in killing someone simply because they pissed her off. It was a lot more fun to toy with them. Sometimes watching a grown man wet his pants was the highlight of her day, especially chauvinist dogs like this.
She turned away from him, hands clenched as she braced against the onslaught of wind. Without a second glance, she strode down the street to the designated meeting place, cloak swirling around her knees, hair blowing into a cloud. It was time to focus. She had a job to do.
ZALA SANK INTO THE chair across from her contact, a middle-aged man, weathered and ragged, his simple homespun clothing covered in orange dust. He easily passed for a planet-bound local. A farmer, maybe. In reality, he was something far deadlier: a Syndicate spy.
She tugged her battered cloak around her self-consciously. She was glad Audley had made her wear it, otherwise she’d have stuck out like a sore thumb. The last thing she needed was to get demoted for exposing one of the Syndicate Houses’ spies to the locals. She already got enough grief from her mother without adding to it.
“Beer?” He nodded at his clay mug, the same orange as the dust outside. Trails of foam darkened the sides and left a sticky residue on the cheap plaswood table.
“No thanks.” Beer smelled like piss. Tasted like it, too, especially the cheap crap available on planets like O5.
“Where’s your rider?” the man asked, glancing around as if one might appear from thin air.
Nerves hit her, but she kept her back ramrod straight. “I’m it.”
The spy
looked her up and down. “You’re no rider. You’re a captain.”
If Syndicate captains were like the circuit judges of old-Earth West, riders were the hangmen. Captains commanded the ships, lead the investigations, and relayed their findings to the riders, who handed down the verdict and the sentence.
“The two aren’t mutually exclusive.” Hers wouldn’t be the first ship to operate without a proper rider, forcing its captain to pull double duty.
He snorted. “Maybe on a small ship, but you’re a Lei.” He nodded at the intricate tattoo that swirled around her right eye, half hidden by her wild curls. “I recognize the sigil.”
Zala barely resisted touching her right temple. Each highborn Syndicate family had a specific sigil tattooed on their children at birth. As the child grew, it was added to and embellished until he or she reached majority. Hers began at her right temple and curled up and over her right eye and down across the cheekbone. It was beautiful, the cobalt ink creating an intricate and ornate decoration. Most highborn captains wore their sigils proudly exposed for all to see, but she kept her hair down to hide the mark. She wanted to succeed on her own merit, not because of who her mother was.
“I run a small ship.”
He whistled. “Who’d you piss off?”
For a moment she floundered. Self-doubt reared its ugly head. Then she gritted her teeth. She would not let him see her weakness. There was a reason she’d chosen this man, this planet. “Did you find what I came for?”
He nodded, swallowing a mouthful of beer. “Got it all ready for you.”
“I’d like to get it on my ship as soon as possible.”
“You know,” he said, leaning back in his chair, “finding and delivering such parcels is usually a rider’s job, not mine.”
“And I appreciate the favor.” Who did this jackass think he was?
His smile was unpleasant. “I don’t do favors, Captain. House Lei owes me one. Maybe you can pay up.” He waggled a suggestive brow.
She’d enough of this game. In a flash she was around the table, her hand against the side of his throat. To an onlooker it would appear as though she were flirting with him, caressing him. In reality, she could have snapped his neck like a twig, but that would invite questions. The last thing she needed was a Syndicate investigation.
She pricked his neck with a hypo. “One wrong move, and I flood your system with ventris. You know what that is, right?” The edge in her voice could have cut glass.
He swallowed, clammy sweat breaking out on his forehead and mixing with the orange dust. “Extract from the ventris plant. Poison.” His breath came in shallow pants.
“Indeed. You’ll be dead in seconds, but those seconds will be filled with so much agony, you’ll be glad to die.” She spoke in a low croon, but her eyes were hard and cold. A man at the bar scuttled away with a look of terror.
“You wouldn’t dare.”
“Oh, I would. You may be outside the Laws of Hierarchy, but I am a Lei. We created those laws.” The stench of his fear stung her nostrils, thanks to the implants in her brain that boosted every sense. She wondered when such a man as he had last been afraid. Had he ever? “Ventris is completely untraceable, and you’re kind of on the old side for O5. The local police will assume you died of a heart attack.”
He swallowed. “Fine. The package is yours. No favor owed.” He did not sound happy about it. Tough.
She kept the needle pressed to his neck. “Where do I find it?”
“Out back. A crate in the shed. It’s marked.” His brow glistened. “Now would you get that thing away from me?”
She leaned down, her breath a whisper in his ear. “The Syndicate thanks you for your service, Thomas Jaquinus.”
“How did you know my name? Oh, shi—”
She’d plunged the needle into his neck and depressed the plunger. Green fluid shot into his veins and spread through his system within nanoseconds. Fortunately for Jaquinus, Zala wasn’t in the habit of killing people she didn’t have to. The hypo contained not ventris but a chemical brainwashing drug mixed with a sleep agent. The spy would wake up with one Hades of a headache and no memory of her visit.
Chapter Nine
“DANG, THAT’S ONE HEAVY-ass box. What’s in this thing, a dead body?” Audley collapsed on top of the box and fanned himself with a bright red handkerchief before using it to mop the sweat from his brow and upper lip. His dark skin glistened in the brightness of the cargo bay lights, and his massive chest rose and fell with every breath.
The small spaceport on Omicron 5 lacked most of the usual equipment for loading heavy cargo. The port chief had only been able to provide a single lev-dolly to assist in getting the crate onto the ship. Lev-dollies were slow, wobbly, and required a great deal of assistance from their human handlers.
Zala smiled. “Something important to our future.”
Audley quirked a brow. “Care to explain, Captain?”
“Soon. Is Jeric back?”
“Yep. Back in his rathole.”
“Good. Get this crate airborne. I want to be as far away from Omicron 5 as fast as possible.”
“Oh, drakk. Who’d you piss off now?”
She crossed her arms and tapped her foot. Not a very captainy move, but she and Audley went back a long way. He wasn’t much impressed even when she was in full leader mode, so there was no point worrying about her image being tarnished.
He raised his hands in mock surrender. “I’ll get this rust bucket in the air. You think we’re going to have any problems with the locals?”
“I hope not.” If they did, there’d be Hades to pay. She might be a scion of House Lei, but that wouldn’t save her from a court martial. The Syndicate did not like the public knowing about its dirty laundry. Liberating the box was another matter and one she planned on the Syndicate never learning about.
Audley wandered to the bridge, mumbling about clusterfraks. Zala couldn’t disagree with that. She was taking a huge chance, but the ends justified the means.
Those means were in the box sitting in her cargo bay. “You better be worth it,” she said softly to it before following Audley to the bridge.
After they strapped in, Audley hailed the tower and requested a departure code. She held her breath. With any luck Jacquinus would still be out cold and no one the wiser.
The comms crackled. “Cleared for takeoff, Justice. The chancellor wishes you a Happy Founders’ Day. Deity speed.” The voice was almost painfully cheery.
“Roger that and same to you,” Audley replied with equal cheer.
She got the feeling the chancellor was glad to be rid of them. Not every world welcomed the Syndicate with open arms but rather viewed them as a necessary evil.
“You know today is supposed to be a holiday, right, Captain? I’m pretty sure my contract states I get today off.” Audley had pulled out a peppermint stick from deity knew where and was sucking away at the thing totally against regulations.
“Aud, you don’t have a contract. Besides, it’s only a holiday on O5.”
“Oh, right.” He turned back to the viewscreen for a moment before whirling to face her again. “Still, we should do something special. You know, to celebrate the day since we spent a bit of time planet-side.”
She gave him a baffled look. Trust Audley to come up with any excuse to throw a party. “Like what?”
He shrugged. “I dunno. Cook something? Force Jeric to join us for tea.”
Zala snorted. Jeric was not known for his friendly demeanor and love of good company. “It’s not like I have a bunch of gourmet ingredients in the galley. We’re on flight rations.”
The Syndicate didn’t waste money on good food for a lowly bit of space junk like the Justice. Not even if its captain was a Lei.
“I’ll tell you what we’ll do,” she said. “You fly the ship, and I’ll go open that box in the cargo bay.”
“You are no fun.” He pulled an orange and brown striped hat—the colors of the O5 flag—out of one of the many pocket
s on his flight pants and yanked it down over his braids. “I, for one, am getting into the Founders’ Day spirit.” He punched a button and old-Earth music spilled from the ship-wide intercom. Something with a lot of guitar and drums, and some guy screaming about getting satisfied. Or maybe he wasn’t getting satisfied. She wasn’t clear on that.
She barely restrained a groan. If this kept up, she was going to need earplugs. “You know, with my implants I could kill you with my mind.”
He raised his middle finger without turning around and waved it around in the old-Earth symbol for “frak you.”
On any other ship, that would have gotten him shot. Zala just laughed and headed for the cargo bay.
The closer she got, the more nervous she felt, which was ridiculous. Her actions would very likely be considered treasonous should anyone find out. She’d just have to make sure no one ever did.
Once in the cargo bay, she ran her palms over the smooth surface of the six-foot-long plas-wood box. The man-made material was cool and smooth to the touch.
Real wood was as hard to come by on Omicron 5 as it had once been back on Old Earth. Items that had been made of wood back in the day were now made of the synthetic plas-wood which was far more durable than the natural product it mimicked. Plas-wood could even be melted so it came together seamlessly. That meant a box made of it, like this one, was impossible to pry open. The only way she was getting into it was with Jeric’s laser saw. He was not going to be happy when he discovered she’d liberated it from his lab. She slid a pair of goggles over her eyes and flipped down the dark lenses. Old school, but effective.
The plas-wood gave easily under the harsh red beam of the saw, peeling off in melted ribbons. Acrid smoke stung her nostrils and made her cough. Thank deity for the goggles, or her eyes would have been watering, too.
The plas-wood fell away, revealing a metal casket. It was a stasis box. The Syndicate use similar containers to transport high-risk clients between planets. Those boxes were big and luxurious in comparison. This one was bare bones, without the usual viewing window on top. A small orange panel flashed a warning: prisoner transport.