allies and enemies 02 - rogues (17 page)

There were
actual
portals onto the bleak expanse of the void, a concept that flew in the face of safety concerns. The thought of only inches of clear-plas between her and grisly decompression was unnerving. Looking out into the void beyond the horizon of the
Noble
evoked a strange falling sensation. As the engines muttered into disconsolate life, she searched for something labeled blast shutters, just to cover the portals. Anything to make that weird vertigo go away.

“Up. Now.” Korbyn yanked her out of the chair.

She collided with Rachel and together they fell back into the partition. Korbyn either did not notice or didn’t care about the angry glares they both gave him. He accessed the console with practiced ease. From the other side of the hull came a distant series of pops and clangs as the vessel decoupled from its berth on the
Noble
. Underfoot, the engine rattled to life.

Rachel jerked her chin, an unspoken question.
You okay?

Erelah nodded. A lie: She was far from fine. The vertigo from staring out into the void was still there. It was growing worse. Something wasn’t right.

“What the hell was that about? What did you do to Neesa?” Rachel wedged past Erelah in the tight confines. She leaned over the back of the pilot’s chair, bracing against the cant of the deck.

“Hey! I’m talking to you!” She prodded his shoulder.

He did not turn around. “Nothing that concerns you.”

Erelah pulled at the healer’s sleeve.
What was she doing?

Rachel continued to glare at Asher. Something bad must have happened while she was in here puzzling over the console.

“If you’re not going to help, get out of the way,” he barked.

Rachel seemed far from cowed. “You just
shot
her? Just like that? She wasn’t even armed.”

“What happened?” Erelah asked.

Neither answered. It was as if she didn’t exist.

“We
won.
You didn’t have to—”

“Won?” he scoffed. “She wouldn’t have hesitated to kill you.” His voice was flat. “Either of you.”

The pitch of their angry voices, the engines, the powerful strum of her heart, became a mix of noise from far away. The grayness cloyed at her field of vision. She rubbed at her face and stared blankly at the blood on her hand.

How’d that get there?

Everything would make sense if they just stopped screaming at each other.

“Rachel?” she choked as her legs gave out.

The woman’s anger flattened into surprise. “Oh. Jesus. Your nose is bleeding.”

Rachel’s arms were firm around her. Erelah slid down her torso, knees hitting the deck in twin shocks of pain.

“Help me!” the healer bellowed. At first, Erelah thought the command was for her. She wanted to say she was trying. Then far stronger arms scooped her up in a graceless bundle. The room changed to a narrow cabin with a low ceiling. She landed against a firm surface covered with a slick material. Her stomach railed against the sudden shift in position.

“Splendid, my ass,” Rachel muttered. Her hands moved over Erelah, ignorant of the contaminating emotions that rolled from her.

“You got her?” Asher was already moving back to the direction of the cockpit.

“I got her.” The annoyance and fear were buried under a growing tide of worry. There were sounds of rummaging into the enormous medikit she’d insisted on taking.

The healer’s thoughts were already ticking into a clinical mode of diagnosis. Alien terms buffeted her. Erelah fought to stem the invading thoughts. Her control on the Sight was slipping.

Damnit. What’d I miss? What’s wrong with this kid?

She wanted to tell her not to be angry. That it was nothing she’d missed. It was her own fault for abusing the Sight. The Fates were punishing her. A familiar sting pierced her lower arm.

“No. No pharms.” It was a pathetic mewl.

Rachel made a shushing noise. “It’s just fluids.” The explanation meant nothing to her. “No drugs.”

For a time Erelah drifted on the cusp of sleep. She resisted, but kept her eyes shut. She listened to the hard burn of the engines, the softer sounds of Rachel moving at her side.

After what seemed an eternity, Erelah opened her eyelids a crack.

She could see the curve of the enormous pilot’s chair, the back of Asher’s head.

He and Rachel had not spoken to each other. Now an uneasiness had settled in the air. Rachel gave off waves of suspicion toward him, but still to Erelah, he was just this flat space that everything moved around.

A band loosened on her arm as Rachel removed a monitoring cuff. The woman studied the deck, as if an answer could be found there. She settled back onto the bench that faced Erelah’s. Her hands shook and she clasped them to make them stop.

“You don’t know who to trust.” Erelah swallowed against a dry tongue.

“You doing some mind reading now?” she asked with a thin smirk.

“I just…I understand.”

Curiosity mixed with trepidation radiated from Rachel. It had been there under her surface ever since she’d witnessed Erelah use the Sight on the guard. “
Can
you read my mind? Like that thing you did to the guard?”

She did not want to answer. She did not want the woman to fear her, to think her a freak or a danger.

Rachel must have sensed her hesitation. “I think you left this bit out. And I don’t blame you.” Then the question that had been waiting, tugging at her insides. “Did you…do that to me? When you were asking me to help?”

“No.” Erelah sat up with the ferocity of the denial. “No. I didn’t. That wouldn’t have been right.”

Rachel made a quieting gesture. “I’m just trying to understand. I get the impression that this thing…the Sight…it’s not something you know everything about. Seems like it’s new to you. Like it was done to you without your say so.”

Erelah drew in a deep breath.
This was inevitable, wasn’t it? But what did it matter now?
Her voice was low. “Things were done to me. Tristic held me captive and meant to turn me into something… horrible. She used splicers to change me to her needs and make me more like her. It gave me an ability to control others—sight-jack them.”

The doctor’s mouth set with anger. “Her
needs
? No wonder you freaked when I said I was a geneticist. That explains the damage on your profile. Lot of tinkering going on there. Maybe even nano-tech.”

“There’s something wrong with me, isn’t there? Something new. It never affected me like this… after.” Erelah swallowed. “Perhaps the Fates are punishing me.”

“No, kid. I don’t think that’s it at all.” She gave Erelah’s shoulder a brief squeeze. Then, her eyebrows lifted with sudden enlightenment. She scooted closer to her on the bench. “What if I said there’s a way to fix it? Get you back to normal?”

35

Stay the course. Contact Ironvale. Do the trade.

A simple plan. Elegant, in fact.

It just felt wrong.

He could do it. Northway was all mouth. The girl, depending on how you caught her, she was afraid of her own shadow and willing to follow a strong lead if there was logic involved. But that was the challenge, wasn’t it? There was something going on in there, behind those green eyes, that made him wonder just who he was talking to at times: the frightened marsh hare, some hardened soldier, a haughty brain-case. It just made him so…curious. Curious pushed him dangerously toward caring.

That was why Ironvale had rules.

Not that he was much of a rule-follower to begin with. The rules never covered what to do if you accidentally downloaded someone’s memories and emotions, only to have them bubbling up during inopportune moments.

Like what had happened with Neesa at the airlock. His finger was on the trigger. She was a loose end that needed tying up and he couldn’t do it. That victorious sneer on her face. He could have still removed it physically.

It was a memory from the girl that had stopped him.
A gray-haired man, stern in appearance but full of patient teaching. He would have never allowed it. Uncle.

Who in the Burning Fields was Uncle?

He rubbed a disconsolate hand over his face and regarded the navsys.

Two days of dealing with these alien memories in his head and trying to think of the pitch he’d give Ulrid to talk him out of shooting him and into getting him a line with the Guild. All he needed was a crack, a wedge, and he could do the rest.

It would give Asher time to get the girl into a place where she’d practically run to the Guild and offer her services.

He’d name his boon and then life would be splendid once more.

Cautiously, he glanced over his shoulder. The chatter from the passenger benches had quieted into hushed conspiratorial voices.

Something like concern stabbed at him.

The girl’s memory surged over him, filled with hopelessness and fright. The foreign wave of fear was inescapable. It was too big for the tiny cockpit. It pressed against his chest and behind his eyes.
A charred plastic smell filled his nostrils. It wasn’t the interior of the yacht, but the sleek contours of the stryker’s interior.

He shook it off.

“So let’s hear this plan, hot shot.” Northway stood over his shoulder.

He swiveled in the chair to face her. In one deft move, he hid the navsys reads. By his guess, she was most likely as unfamiliar with their tech as she claimed, but he was not about to take chances. The fact that she had not only survived, but had found her way into the rather sensitive role of Ix’s medico, indicated she was clever and quick to adapt. “I know someone. He’ll help.”

She grunted, unimpressed.

“How is she?” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder.

Northway regarded him with narrowed eyes. Without invitation, she settled into the jumpseat beside him. “As good as could be. Someone did a number on her and in more ways than one.”

A chilly, expectant silence followed.

Asher growled. “It wasn’t me.”

“Right.” She sounded unconvinced. “She’s tight-lipped about the whole thing. It’s like pulling teeth.”

He scowled.

“It’s an expression. Never mind.” Northway propped an elbow on the nearby console. There was an off-tone bleat. She startled at the sound. “And I did notice you changed the subject. Where are we going?”

He shooed her back and reset the trim line she’d accidentally jarred.

“Volgen.”

“Never heard of it.” She sank back into the seat, making herself at home. The casualness, for some reason, irritated him. He did not need this interrogation.

“They call it Tintown. I know someone there.”

“
You know a guy
?” she scoffed, folding her arms. “That’s your giant plan?”

“Best
I
got. Let’s hear yours.” He stared through reads, feeling his jaw tighten.

“I need to find my people. Erelah needs help and if we can contact my outpost, we can—”

“We got fuel for one trip.” He stared her down. There was no flinch to her, was there? “You want to find your people, wait ‘til we get there.”

Northway gave him another one of those measuring looks: dark-brown eyes half-lidded, chin tilted up. “You’re plotting something.”

“Am I?”

She watched him in silence. Maybe her stare worked on Liet, but not him. She was trying to push him, gain a confession. He nearly laughed.

Finally she spoke: “Whatever it is, don’t you dare hurt Erelah. I made a promise to her to help.”

“So did I.”

“Funny. Somehow, I don’t think we’re talking about the same thing.”

36

Snowden stepped over the fallen pressure door and checked the atmo reads on the device strapped to her forearm. It still read clean. No toxins. Rads within parameters. Air was a little thin compared to the E-standard, but no worse than being at high altitude. She hated leaving Roughbook. Too many variables. Too many unknowns.

But Wren had been very convincing.

The grimy beige walls of the pirate vessel held the blast shadow of what she guessed were at least two low-density grenades, special UEC design for shipboard engagements to prevent hull breaches. She added that to her mental inventory of the aftermath of Wren’s pet operation. More fuel for her growing displeasure.

“So much for low profile.”

The corpse at her feet was Zenti, judging from the thick tattoos along his face and jaw. This was sloppy.

It occurred to her that she should never have let Wren talk her into this, but the details of why it seemed so vital at the time now eluded her. She frowned. Seemed the sloppiness was growing.

The UEC could ill afford making their presence high profile. Going around eradicating pirate communities was dangerous and foolhardy. What should have been simple recon had somehow turned into an involved police action. So far, the crime boss that held claim to this site was among the confirmed dead. A good thing, she guessed.

The escapees had scattered like roaches the second the kitchen lights flicked on. They were no doubt at this moment winging their way to spread the tale of a well-armed foe that had overwhelmed the famous Lucien Ix’s keep in less than an hour. Not good.

“Major. Good. You’re here.”

Wren strode toward her. He seemed almost buoyant for a man that she was going to hold responsible for this fuck up. Excitement supplanted his usual reticence.

“I’m curious. Do you know what ‘low profile’ means?”

Wren paused. “Major?”

“You sold this as a simple recon.” She gestured at the nearest corpse. “Should we ask
him
what it means?”

Wren blinked, flustered. “The escalation is regrettable, yes, but…the benefits we have reaped here are huge.”

“Regrettable?” she huffed. “The whole point of being a secret installation is not to go around blowing up the natives.”

Wren nodded. He held his hands up, beseeching. “Of course. You’re right, sir. But when you see it, you’ll have to agree that the find is a boon.”

Boon?
Snowden bottled a sigh.
That’s a new one.