Atrophy (22 page)

Zander hunkered down on the far end of the table, gun ready, while Callan and Sen took up a strategic location behind the galley counter.

Slinging the strap of the rifle over his shoulder and checking the power pack, Rian looked at the three girls where they’d sat down between Zander and him. Zahli had her own pulse pistol ready, but the doc and priestess were unarmed.

He looked at Ella, with that damned calm expression on her face, despite everything going on. “I thought you said if the Reidar tried to take you back you could do something about it.”

She returned his stare, her hazel eyes striking deep within him. “I have not been directly threatened. My training forbids me from acting in such a way that could harm or interfere with others unless my life or wellbeing is endangered beyond all doubt.”

He shoved the power pack back into the rifle with more force than necessary, anger and incomprehension adding fuel to the blaze already on the verge of exploding within him.

“They’re here for you,
princess
. How does that not fit into your definition of being directly threatened? You going to wait until we’re all dead and one of them walks up to grab you before you blast them into oblivion?”

Her eyes narrowed, lips thinning, but she looked away, no doubt because she knew he was right.

“Fine, we’ll all just shoot it out and see what happens then.” He tightened his grip on the rifle and lined up the sights toward the hatchway.

A banging echoed from somewhere along the passage, probably the blast doors on this level.
More frecking currency sucked out the hatch
.

“Weapons at the ready. We’re about to party.” He uttered the words automatically, something he’d always said to his men before going into battle.

The old sensations of fighting for survival day in, day out, and the exhilaration mixed with piss-inducing fear washed through him, as though all the years hadn’t passed and he was back serving as an IPC officer. Zander threw him a grin as a hollow thump resonated from the galley doors. No doubt the bastard would enjoy every second of this. And people thought Rian was the psychotic sonuvabitch. They’d never met the real Zander Graydon.

Rian turned his attention to the hatchway, where a large circular area in the middle of the panel had turned darker. A weird popping noise sounded and the darkened area seemed to crumble in on itself. Whatever the assholes were using, it’d been quick and effective.

The lights in the passage beyond had been knocked out, so he couldn’t see much besides gloom and shadows. But as soon as he spotted an indistinct figure, Rian opened fire, a split second before Zander and Callan started shooting.

Flashes of gun blasts lit up the outer corridor as the Reidar returned shots. They all ducked for cover. He’d guess their enemy had their weapons set to stun— they’d want to take Ella alive, but he still didn’t want to get hit. He wouldn’t be able to kill many of the mongrels if he was unconscious.

He ducked his head around the edge of the table. Two of the brazen bastards had stepped through the hole.

“Incursion!” he shouted over the peppering whine of the automatic fire. As he shoved to his feet, Zander went up with the same fluid motion. They exposed themselves for a split second to take down the pair trying to duck for the cover of the galley bench.
Just like old times
. A blast glanced off Zander. Rian swore, thinking Graydon would go down, but the tough-guy shook it off and kept on firing.

As the Reidar made the end of the counter, Sen came out shooting at the far end. Callan rose up right in front of them and blasted one in the throat, spinning to crack the other in the face with his elbow. With blood gushing from his nose, the Reidar tackled Callan, taking them both down behind the counter and out of sight. Another two slipped through the hole in the door and Rian swore.

How much did it take to bring these assholes down?

More gunfire echoed out in the passageway, adding to the chaos. He could feel them closing in. They needed to get a handle on this situation. He stood, bracing the rifle against his shoulder, and aimed his nucleon gun on the closest Reidar. Zander would have his back.

Chapter Eighteen

“W
hat kind of security cameras does this ship have?” Tannin searched for access to feeds, but the only one he could find was in the cargo bay, where he’d first seen the six men come aboard. No, not men. Reidar, according to Rian. And no doubt they were aliens, since thermal scans and bio imaging had shown their bodies to be running at a higher temperature—like someone with a fever—and their bio composition was made up of slightly more fluid. They were small anomalies that could be explained away or not noticed, if people didn’t know what they were looking for, which was obviously how the Reidar’s presence in their galaxy had gone undetected for so long.

“IPC standard security tech we never had refitted,” Lianna answered, her voice tight. “But Rian disabled all the cameras except for the ones in the cargo bay. He didn’t like having them running all the time.”

He swore at Rian and his weird paranoia. Okay, so keeping his privacy, and the privacy of the crew made sense on one hand. But he wanted to see what the freck was happening in the galley right now. Especially as the sound of rapid gunfire and shouting started.

“Did he manually disable them or just take the system offline?” He pushed to his feet, unable to sit down, even though it meant he had to bend over the console as he searched the system to find any other feeds.

“I don’t know, I never checked.”

Damn it, why had Rian ordered Lianna and him to stay up here? The Reidar obviously weren’t interested in taking over the ship, otherwise they would have tried to get into the bridge by now. They had to be here for Ella; that Baden Niels bastard apparently wanted his
cargo
back.

At last he found the routing and got in, narrowing in on the cameras. Thank Christ they were only switched off. Fortunately Rian hadn’t done a very good job of burying them all.

“Got it,” he couldn’t keep the satisfaction out of his voice. Damn, he was good.

Lianna sent him a brief, surprised glance, then looked at the viewport as he pitched in the feed from the galley. As soon as the image came into focus, he swore, splitting the screen and adding a second feed from the passageway outside the common room.

The crew were taking heavy fire and were about to be overrun. His heart stalled and then kicked into a gallop as he focused on Zahli, crouched behind the tipped-over table next to Ella. Every now and then, she peeked up and let off a few rounds, covering her brother and the captain admiral, who seemed to be doing the bulk of the shooting.

Cold sweat pricked over his skin and he picked up the gun he’d set on the console earlier. The aliens might have been after Ella—and to an extent Rian. But that didn’t mean they wouldn’t hurt Zahli or anyone else. He couldn’t stand here and watch that play out on a couple of cameras as though it was happening to someone else.

“What are you doing?” Lianna demanded as he stepped toward the blast doors.

“I’m going out to back them up. They’re not going to last much longer down there.”

Lianna stood, her expression hard, but he could see a hint of uncertainty in her gaze. “Rian ordered us to stay here.”

“Yeah, I heard him.” He hurried to the blast doors. Before he could hit the release icon, Lianna caught up and grabbed his arm.

“You do realize if you defy Rian’s orders, you’re a dead man? He’ll shoot you. I’m not kidding.”

His heart bumped. Sure he was taking his life in his hands. But if he stayed here and something happened to Zahli— Yeah, that would be way worse than Rian shooting him.

He shook off Lianna’s hold. “Those things are about to overrun the common room. If we don’t go now, Rian will be too dead to ever shoot anyone again. So sorry, but this is one order I can’t follow.”

He slapped a hand on the door control, waiting impatiently as the blast doors started to rise. When they were halfway up, he ducked underneath. Swearing one hell of a dirty streak, Lianna followed him out.

The passageway below was dark. With the light spilling out of the bridge at their backs, they’d made themselves the perfect target. Nonetheless, Tannin hunkered down on the landing, lining his gun up over the lower railing. At the last second he switched the pulse pistol from stun to kill, then squeezed off a number of rounds in quick succession.

Two of the Reidar slipped into the common room through the opening in the blast doors. Two at the back turned to fire at Lianna and him. He ducked, blasts sparking off the railing and bulkhead near him.

He took a breath, chest tight, and brought his head back up, ignoring the shots to aim at one of the bastards. The guy went down, while one of the others stumbled from a glancing shot Lianna hit him with.

The two who’d covered the breach-hole spilt up, one ducking inside, the other running to pick up the guy who’d gone down. Tannin let off a few more rounds, but they were definitely retreating, only returning sporadic fire as they made a run for it. Three came out of the common room, one dragging the other, who was stumbling. Pushing to his feet, Tannin ducked back into the bridge, wiping at the sweat dripping down his face as he tabbed up camera feeds to show the five figures hustling off the ship.

“We’re clear,” he called out to Lianna as he went back out to the landing. He stepped over where she was still stretched out on her belly covering the stairs, where the Reidar had disappeared a moment ago.

Tannin kept his gun up as he approached the hole, since one of the aliens was still unaccounted for. Trying not to imagine the worst he stepped through the clearing smoke into the ringing silence.

I
t took more shots than he would have believed possible, but the Reidar in front of Rian went down at last. He swung toward the door, ready to take on the next, but only caught a glimpse of the others retreating. One paused, starting toward the guy laid out on the galley floor.

No way
. If that fallen Reidar wasn’t dead, Rian wanted himself a prisoner. He took two steps out from behind the table, firing off a couple of rounds so the scum-sucker would get the message. The guy abandoned his fallen comrade, leaping out through the hole and disappearing along the darkened corridor.

Rian held up his hand to hold everyone in place, just to be sure it wasn’t some kind of trick and the Reidar weren’t about to come back with reinforcements. A figure loomed up in the opening and he brought his rifle back up, registering as his finger tensed on the trigger that it was Tannin, with Lianna behind him.
Frecking Christ.
Rian blew out a breath as he lowered the gun.

“I thought I told you to lock down and defend the bridge.” He pressed the safety on the rifle and used the strap to sling it around so it sat across his back. Tannin stepped through the hole and walked over to the upturned couch and table.

“They didn’t want the bridge. They only wanted in here. We thought you could use reinforcements.” Tannin’s gaze strayed to Zahli as she stood and help Kira to her feet.

Emotion Rian didn’t want to recognize burned in the man’s eyes.
Damn it to hell.
It hadn’t been about helping or backing them up, it’d been about Zahli.

Grabbing Tannin’s shirt at the shoulder, he half shoved the scumrat around so the guy would cop his fist, full in the face. Tannin stumbled back a step, but didn’t go down. He straightened, hand going to his jaw, a pissed off expression on his face. Rian half hoped Tannin would come back at him. He could do with a good punch-on right about now.

“Next time I give you an order, scumrat, follow it, or it won’t be my fist that hits you in your pretty face.”

Rian stretched his hand, knuckles smarting. Of course, Tannin’s face no doubt felt a lot worse. He ignored the death glare Zahli sent him and moved over to the fallen Reidar, where Zander was already crouched down. The Reidar wore black from head to toe, including a head piece that covered his entire skull, apart from the eyes.

“He’s dead. Ready to explain yet?” Zander gripped the edge of the mask, pulling it away. He dropped it with a sharp curse, shooting to his feet.

The disguise gone, the real face of the Reidar started lifelessly up at the ceiling. Rian had seen their true form many times, but it still wigged him out. Its hide looked to be a mixture of scales and normal skin. Though it had dark hair and its features and form closely resembled human, it clearly wasn’t. Slight differences were obvious in the flatness over its brows and nose, the tilt of its eyes, and the black-red color of its irises.

“What in frecking Christ’s name is that?” Zander had a palm on his gun as he backed up a few steps.

“An alien.” Rian crouched to double check the thing was in fact dead. Not that he didn’t trust Zander, but these assholes were annoyingly resilient.
Damn
. Zander had been right, dead as black star. They only had a few minutes at best before the thing started the rapid discomposure that would leave nothing but a puddle of watery goo in clothes.

“An
alien
?” Zander took a sharp breath and rubbed his forehead. “This is an alien and it wanted Ella? Hell, people, someone better start explaining.”

Zahli sighed. “I don’t know about anyone else, but I certainly don’t need to hear this spiel again. Tannin, let’s go to the medbay and get something for your face. It’s already bruising.”

Rian glanced over at his ship’s new tech analyst, touched near his eye and pointed at him when Zahli wasn’t looking. Tannin nodded; he’d gotten the message.

“Sen, how long will it take to get the engines back online?” Rian pushed to his feet, fatigue tightening his muscles. Coming down off an adrenaline high always sucked.

“With the delta-shield or without?” Jensen asked as he handed his gun over to Callan.

“Without. We’ll finish installing it when we get to Tetsu.”

Sen ran a hand through his hair. “An hour.”

“Make it half that.”

“Forty-five minutes. That’s pushing it.”

He didn’t like it, but what could he do? Sen and Lianna knew the stakes. They’d work as fast as they could. “Fine, get on it then.”

Rian picked up the mask from where Zander had dropped it and chucked it onto the middle of the dead Reidar’s chest. “Callan, we’ve got a body to get rid of.”

Zander crossed his arms and watched them as they hefted the dead weight. “So aliens, eh? And what was that about a delta-shield? I hope you’ve got the appropriate paper work and IPC authorization for that?”

Rian shot his old friend an irritated looked, trying not to puff under his load. If Graydon planned to go all IPC-officer on his ass, then the captain admiral would be the next thing dumped out the hatch.

“Do you really want to know the answer to that question?”

Zander held up both hands, a smile edging his mouth. “I was happily living in ignorance earlier today. Think I’ll just stay there, thanks.”

“Good answer.”

As they made their way through the dim passageway, Rian tried not to think too far into the future. The Reidar wouldn’t give up so easily. And it wouldn’t be the last time he’d hear from Baden Niels. Ella was important to them, so they’d be back.

Maybe he should just send her back to Aryn. Though she’d done nothing to prove otherwise, she seemed confident in her ability to protect herself, for all the good it’d done when she’d first been abducted.

Something stirred deep within him, a primal urge to keep her near, to keep her all to himself. He shoved the compulsion down, hating all the strange things she made him feel. For that reason alone, he should get rid of her. Yet those illogical impulses drove him, even when he didn’t want to acknowledge them.

First and foremost, however, he had a decomposing Reidar to get rid of and a long story to tell an old friend.

He and Callan hefted the dead weight of the alien down to the cargo bay, each damaged blast-door they went through pissing him off even more. By the time they reached the cargo deck, the clothes on the Reidar had started to get damp as the thing literally liquefied.

Rian set down his half of the body and did a quick check of the spaceport outside the ship. Luckily at this time of evening, there weren’t that many people around. He motioned to Callan, and the two of them dragged the body out and dumped it into a passing waste droid. By the time anyone else saw it, there’d only be a pile of gooey, wet clothes.

They returned to the ship, and Callan muttered something about hitting the shower. Rian headed to his quarters, all but able to taste the Violaine hitting the back of his throat. As he walked in, he found Zander reclining on his couch, a full glass already in hand.

“Hope you’re going to pay me for that. Violaine is frecking hard to come by,” he threw over his shoulder as he went into the privy to wash his hands.

He returned to the main room as Zander took a considering sip of his drink, then held the glass up to study the violet-colored liquor. “Can’t imagine why, considering it’s banned in the central systems.”

“All the best shite is.” He splashed the drink into his own glass, pouring all the way to the top and knocked it back in a few long swallows. He shook himself out as the liquor burned all the way down, heating him up and chasing away some of that perpetual ice he always walked around with.

He poured a second glass and dropped down in the armchair adjacent to the couch, pushing his hair off his face, beads on his wrist clinking softly.

“So, aliens, huh?” Zander leaned forward and topped up his own drink.

“Yeah, frecking aliens.” He sighed, slouching into the cushions. Zander had been everything but a brother in blood once, back before he’d become intimately acquainted with the Reidar.

“That’s got to be some story.”

“You have no idea,” he muttered, knocking back another mouthful, fortifying himself to talk about the things he usually tried to forget. Zander was one of the few people he couldn’t lie to.

“Has it got anything to do with all the stories I’ve been hearing about you since the war ended? Because I gotta say, you might have been one heck of a soldier, but the stuff they say about you now is downright—”

“Certifiable?” He grinned, because he’d come to the conclusion there wasn’t much point having a reputation like his unless he enjoyed it. Especially since some of the more extreme things—like the one about him slaughtering an entire station food-deck worth of people because they’d put the wrong meat on his sandwich—were just ridiculous, exaggerated, or entirely made up. In actual fact, they’d put mayo on his sandwich. And he frecking
hated
mayo. Plus, it’d only been that one guy, and he’d survived…probably.