by Rachel Aukes
Chapter Three
Macy Durand woke in a gray room, though it wasn’t a room. Not really. It was more of an artificial cavern about twice as tall as her and was as wide as her classroom. It was long, like her school hallway, except there were no doors. Instead of lockers, the walls were lined with drones. Dozens and dozens of drones like the two that had chased her.
She remembered being poked with the needle. She brought her hand to where her muscle felt bruised, and found some dried blood. She started to tremble, and she hugged her legs to her chest.
The floor and walls hummed around her, and the sensation caused her to pause. It felt a lot like when the High Spirit was in jump speed. Was she in space? If there was a bridge, it was in another room. Where was she going? If there was a window, she’d look out, but the walls were smooth. She must’ve been in a cargo hold. The only ship she’d ever been on was the High Spirit, and its cargo hold was tiny. When she looked more closely at the walls, ceilings, and floor, she noticed a cargo door that ran the length of the floor.
She gulped. If that door opened to the outside, she’d be sucked into space. She shivered and hugged herself tighter. She tried to stare at her shoes, but her eyes were drawn to the stacked rows of drones that filled much of the space. They hung from the curved walls like bats.
Macy hated bats.
Her lips trembled, and her eyes welled with tears. No matter how tightly she hugged herself, she couldn’t wish herself to another place. When the first tear fell, she sobbed. Crying took over her thoughts and actions, and she gave in to the sensation.
“Stop crying.”
She thought she’d heard someone, but her sobs, echoing through the gray room, blocked out any other sounds.
“There is no need to cry. You’re in no danger.” The voice came louder, unmistakable this time, and it came through a speaker somewhere in the wall. The accented voice was neither kind nor cruel, but rather, it sounded like whoever was talking simply didn’t care.
She stiffened and looked around but saw no one there. “Who said that?”
There was no response.
She sniffled and wiped her nose with her sleeve. “Why am I here? What do you want from me?” She struggled to even out her breath. “I want to go home,” she said; then she corrected herself. “I want Punch.”
Still, the voice didn’t answer.
She sniffled again. “Please let me go. I won’t say anything to anyone, I swear.”
When there was no response, she sobbed again. She cried until she ran out of tears and was exhausted. She pressed against the wall, trying to make herself as small as possible. She watched the drones. None had lights on, which she hoped meant they were all powered down. To pass the time, she counted them. Six rows of twelve, making it seventy-two drones. That was a lot of drones. More than any boys in her school had. She’d never seen so many drones before, and she knew whoever had a collection that size must’ve been very rich.
Her stomach growled. The sound startled her and seemed to echo through the cavern. The silence was an oppressive jailer. She built up her courage to speak again.
“I’m hungry,” she said, then repeated those same words louder.
When there was no answer, she asked, “Can I have something to eat?”
Still no response.
“Can I have something to drink? Please.”
No response again.
She whimpered but refused to cry. She was done crying. Instead, she took a deep breath, then shivered, as her gaze took in the ship from a more clinical viewpoint. Nothing had changed. It was still a long room that seemed to be a drone storage room. She didn’t understand why she was there. She hadn’t done anything wrong. All she did was go to school and back to the Kershaws’, and she never spoke badly about them to anyone.
She wondered how long she’d be stuck on that ship. It felt like she’d been there forever already, but she knew she’d probably only missed dinner. The Kershaws would be so mad at her for missing dinner and not telling them where she was. She hoped she wouldn’t get a beating when she returned.
But, maybe, they knew where she was. They were greedy—she saw how quickly they spent the money Punch sent them every month for Macy’s care. Had they sold her to someone else? She’d heard stories of people being sold to others before, but she hadn’t really believed them. Now she wasn’t so sure. Maybe someone bought Macy to work in their house. She did a really good job cleaning, and her small fingers could reach a lot of places Mrs. Kershaw’s chubby hands couldn’t reach.
She gulped back the lump that was clawing its way up her throat. She wouldn’t throw up. She would be strong. There was no way Punch would let her be sold to someone. He wasn’t around much, but she knew he cared about her.
The sound of metal clicking open snapped Macy’s attention back to the room. A drone in the second row near the far end had detached from the wall. Its yellow light was on as it hovered, seemingly focused on Macy. Goose bumps raised the hairs on her arms, and she pushed herself to her feet while hugging the wall.
Pincers emerged from the drone’s body. A needle then emerged from its belly, and her eyes went wide. The needle was way too big to be for her—it was bigger than the dart-thing one of them had hit her with back at Denton.
The drone began to move toward her.
She ran. She skidded to a stop where the wall blocked her retreat. Her only path was through the drones, but that ended with another wall. Her hesitation cost her. The drone sped at her with uncanny speed. It grabbed her biceps with its pincers and slammed her against the wall. Pain shot through her arms and back, but with no breath in her lungs, she couldn’t cry out. The needle stabbed into her stomach. She sucked in a breath, never feeling such pure agony in her life. Something cold poured into her, and she screamed.
The drone held her in place while the icy liquid attacked her from the inside out, drowning out the pain from the needle. She screamed from the pain, trying to break away from the drone even with the needle still stuck inside her. The assault lasted for minutes, and by the time the drone retracted the needle and released her, she was too weak to stand.
The cold slithered through her like tiny snakes. Shivers racked her body uncontrollably. It felt like someone had ripped away her skin and poured freezing water over her.
She could feel the liquid crawling up her spine, like a spider pulling itself up its web. When it reached her brain, she discovered a new kind of agony. A hundred tiny icicles stabbed at her brain over and over. She clutched at her head. She might have screamed, but she couldn’t hear herself over the noise of a thousand beetles burrowing in her skull.
The outside world didn’t exist throughout the attack. Every nerve was raw, every cell within her violated, as the liquid killed her from within.
Then, suddenly, everything was numb. She felt no pain, but she felt nothing.
Absolutely nothing.
She was no longer hungry, no longer thirsty. When she touched herself, she couldn’t feel her own skin. It was as though she’d become a walking ghost. Tears found their way out again, and she cried, wondering if she was dead. She’d always thought death would be like a comfortable dream, but this was a nightmare.
Sensation creeped back into her body, starting at the top of her body. It was the worst headache she’d ever had, and she wondered if her brain was going to explode. She lay on the floor, cradling her head in her hands.
“Why?” she cried out.
Stop crying.
The same voice as before, but now it was in her head.
The tears stopped, like someone had turned off a faucet. She frowned and clenched her jaw. She wanted to cry again. That was her right, but she couldn’t.
Go to sleep.
She tried to fight the command, but her body refused to listen. She was hopeless as her eyes closed, and the world slipped away into oblivion.
Chapter Four
Punch had the High Spirit clear of Free Station’s docks in three minutes flat after the
restraining cables were retracted. Adrenaline surged as he finally acquired the freedom he’d desired since receiving the message four days earlier. Before that, he’d given up all hope. He went through the motions of being a marshal but felt numb to everyone and everything. He couldn’t function without stims. He couldn’t sleep without pills. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw the ship blowing up, over and over and over.
He’d sent messages on the communicator that his contact had sent him, but there hadn’t been a response. He knew why. His contact had been on the ship…along with his daughter.
No one knew about Macy—it had cost Punch a lot of credits and just as many favors to keep her relationship to him a secret. Marshals had a knack of making enemies, and Punch had made more than most during his time wearing a badge. Any relative, especially a nine-year-old daughter, could be a target, just as little Sophia Mercier had been for her aunt, Marshal Caterine Mercier.
Being sent to retrieve Sophia had been a sucker punch for him. The kidnapped girl was the same age as his daughter. Seeing the torture Sophia had been put through at the hands of her captors only added to his nightmares of what Macy had suffered before she died. He’d racked his brain trying to figure out how they’d found her. He hadn’t made a mistake—he’d been too careful. That they’d taken Macy without being noticed worried Punch. He was up against pros.
Problem was, he had no idea who “they” were. He didn’t believe in aliens, but whoever his contacts were, they were skilled. The communicator that had arrived in his mailbox four months earlier had no electronic signature, not even a serial number to trace. He’d never spoken to Macy’s captors, only exchanged messages. He’d spent every free minute trying to find out who they were and where they had his daughter, but he hadn’t been successful. They were smarter than Punch, and he hated it, especially since it was the bastards blackmailing him.
He’d been about to hand over what they’d demanded, when their ship was blown to bits. Seconds before that, he’d received a status request on his communicator. He’d replied that he had what they wanted. Then silence.
Ninety days, down to the exact hour, had passed within a numbing silence. He’d assumed that both his contact and his daughter had been killed in the blast until another message came. It’d arrived in the middle of the night. He’d been awake—sleep didn’t come easily anymore. He’d thought he’d been hallucinating until the second chime echoed through his small cabin on board the Javelin. The first message had contained only four words:
>> Confirm possession of package.
But what had come next was a three-second video of his daughter.
He pulled out the communicator and watched the video again. He’d replayed the video at least a hundred times since he received it, and he knew he’d watch it a hundred more times before he arrived at the coordinates where the handoff was to take place.
The small screen showed Macy, her long black hair looking cleaner than it had on the previous videos. They’d allowed her to bathe recently, though she wore the same blue shirt in all three videos they’d sent. She stared at the camera with a tired gaze, as though she’d been woken for the recording. She didn’t look tortured—at least not physically—but her eyes had a haunted, far-off look to them, and he craved to hold her in his arms again.
He’d handled a kidnapping case once where the kidnapper had imprisoned six women for over four years. All had been traumatized from being tortured. When he checked in on each of the survivors a year later, five were on the road to recovery. The sixth woman had been found catatonic, and she never came back to life. That sixth woman had a glazed look in her eyes much like Macy had. He hoped that her jailers had drugged her and not that she’d suffered an emotional breakdown.
His heart ached.
“Hang in there just a little longer, pumpkin,” he said softly at the video.
When the video ended, their message exchange scrolled down the screen.
>> Why the hell did you wait so long to message me?
>> The communication blackout was a safety precaution following an attack on a compatriot. Confirm that the package is in your possession.
>> I have the package and am ready to make a handoff as soon as I get to a ship. Macy better be uninjured when I see her.
>> Your daughter is alive and in good health. Relaying coordinates for a handoff.
>> Give me a day to get a ship. Then I’ll head straight for the coordinates and I’ll give you my ETA when I depart.
>> Will wait for your update.
>> Just be ready to give me my daughter back.
The last message had been four days ago. He pulled out the data card and set it on the panel in front of him. He typed in a new message:
>> I’m en route to the coordinates now. I have the package in hand. Should be there in 46 hours. Send me visual confirmation that Macy is okay.
A video response came ten seconds later. He tapped it to play. Macy was staring at the camera again, showing no emotion. It could’ve been a photo for how still she was, except she blinked. Three seconds. No more, no less. The same length as the other videos.
He leaned back in his seat, watching it several more times to analyze every centimeter of her face to search for signs of abuse. Dark circles underlined her eyes—she wasn’t getting enough sleep. Her features were relaxed and emotionless, and that concerned him. While he was relieved to find her not crying, he was worried that she’d “shut down” under the stress. He hoped not. A person could withdraw only so far into themselves before getting lost in the dark and never finding a path back out to the real world.
He picked up the data card. Two inches long and half as wide, the small black piece of composite looked no different from any other data card on the market. Yet this one would bring his daughter back to him.
Punch pocketed the communicator and data card and shifted his focus back to the computer panel in front of him. He was in the first of four jumps that would take him out to the Tumbleweed Trail, an asteroid belt that ran alongside an edge of the Ross system. Each jump maximized the High Spirit’s speeds to nearly point three two light speed until he’d have to slow to sub-speed and adjust course. The ship could travel faster, but at higher speeds, the radiation would build too quickly for his ship’s shielding to handle.
Exposure was the highest cause of death for space travelers, with radiation poisoning the second highest. Third highest was cancer, which came from long-term radiation exposure. Punch hoped to avoid all three if he could. He’d like to die of old age, but both his lifestyle and career choice made that unlikely.
All systems were green, and everything was on track for the rendezvous. He looked at the narrow second screen on his panel. His main systems were connected to the Atlas network and therefore exposed; this narrow screen accessed a closed system. In it, he’d entered the precise coordinates to the rendezvous, not just the final coordinates where he’d drop out of jump speed. He ran a scan over his primary systems and received an alert.
A smile crept up his face.
He pinged the Javelin.
Throttle answered a few seconds later. “Missed us already?”
“Let me talk to Sylvian,” he said.
The software specialist’s image appeared a moment later. “Hi, Punch.”
“Hi, Syl.”
“I told you not to call me that. It’s ‘Sylvian’ to you.”
“Why are you stalking me, Sylvian? Already bored with Finn?”
She frowned. “What are you talking about?”
His lips thinned. “Cut the crap. You don’t think I wouldn’t notice you in my systems? You don’t think I wouldn’t expect you to be in my systems? Sniffing around systems is what you techie types do. But you must be pretty damn bored if you’re in my systems while on leave. Unless you’re planning to come meet me for a romantic rendezvous. If that’s the case, then—”
“I don’t want to meet you for a rendezvous, Punch. Not now, not ever.” Her eyes narrowed. “Why would you thi
nk I’m watching you?”
He wagged a finger. “Tut, tut. I never share my secrets. You’re a hacker, but I have a few tricks up my sleeve. My guess is Chief told you to keep an eye on me. That’s fine. Poke around my systems all you want. All you’ll see is that I’m heading far away from civilization for ten days for a little peace and quiet.”
Sylvian blustered. “I’m not keeping an eye on you.”
“You’re a shitty liar, Syl. Oh, and you have the wrong coordinates.”
He disconnected the call. Sylvian was running a mirror on his computer screen. He was disappointed that Chief trusted him so little as to monitor him while on personal leave. Punch was going to have words with his boss about personal space when he got back to Free Station. It was bad enough that Chief had put Punch with a team of babysitters, but tracking Punch during leave was going too far.
As far as babysitters went, the Black Sheep weren’t bad. They’d given him his space, and not having to fly solo had a few perks. Finn was a decent cook, and Eddy could fix just about any piece of hardware out there. But flying with a team meant having to keep secrets—more secrets than usual, anyway. He couldn’t grieve the loss of his daughter when the ship was destroyed. Then, when he found out Macy was still alive, he couldn’t immediately change the Javelin’s flight plan to get her back. Instead, he’d had to act normal while they’d completed their assignment and returned to Free Station.
With time to burn, he headed back to his bunk. He lay down and pulled out the communicator to watch the video of his little girl again.
Chapter Five
Macy hated the voice in her head. The only times he spoke to her was when he made her do things, such as forcing her to eat her daily meal. At least she assumed she ate only once a day—she couldn’t tell with no windows or clocks in the room where she was kept.
He had to command her to eat because what was provided couldn’t be called food—it was certainly nothing like anything she’d ever eaten before. Every meal was the same: a dull gray pudding with no texture and a metallic taste. It was cold, just like everything else on the ship. The first time she ate the gray pudding, she gagged. Since then, the voice had ordered her to eat it without gagging, and somehow, just by telling her, she did.