Derelict: Halcyone Space, Book 1 (34 page)

"The cuffs and his feet."

She made a sour face.

"I'll take the feet. Can you handle the cuffs?"

"At least I won't pass out if I get zapped by the cuffs," she said, glancing quickly at Micah's blistered feet and swallowing hard.

The inside of Micah's hands had mild burns from where he'd gripped the rifle, but nothing compared to what the feet were going to look like. He attached the medicated saline to the tiny catheter sticking out of Micah's arm. Short of full anesthesia, which would take his parents and a real sick bay, this was the best Barre could do. It would have to be enough.

He grabbed the suture kit and sat by Micah's feet. Running the full burn treatment sim hadn't included the smell, but he vividly remembered the soldier his parents made him examine who had later died from his wounds. He shuddered and focused on Micah. The remnants of his low boots looked as if they'd fused with the inside of his ankles. What the hell had he done? He peered closer and reached for the long handled tweezers. Barre carefully picked out a thin piece of curved blue metal about three centimeters long. "Ro, does this look like the same crap the wrist cuffs are made of?"

She scooted closer, keeping her eyes averted from his feet. "Son of a bitch."

"That's what I thought." Barre's estimation of Micah's resolve rose way, way up. He met Ro's gaze with his until she turned away, her face pale. "Your father did this."

"I know."

They didn't have a whole lot of time. Maldonado would get impatient with his lack of progress controlling the AI. He'd come for his daughter. She had value to him. Clearly Micah did too, or he wouldn't have restrained him and kept him alive. Barre knew he had nothing Maldonado could possibly want.

Ro swore softly and methodically as she worked. Barre switched the tweezers for a pair of laser cutters, glad for the pain meds that would keep Micah sleeping. A metallic snick echoed in the bridge. "Got it!" Ro cried and flung the cuffs across the room.

"I got this. Get your lock-down running before he comes back for you." Barre turned back to the problem of Micah and his injuries. The battlefield kits were state of the art. At least the senator didn't skimp. If he had gotten cheap knock-offs, Micah would have lost his feet for sure. It was also a good thing the standard issue station boots were made of a basic polymer similar to body armor. Barre mixed up the antibiotic-laced enzymes that would dissolve the manufactured composites and leave the damaged flesh alone.

"Sorry, buddy," he said. Even through the sedation, it would hurt. "Ro?"

"Hmm?"

"You might want to cover your ears."

***

The scream that ripped through the bridge raised goose bumps up and down Ro's arms. Bile gathered in her throat, tasting of the mingled stench of burned plastic, flesh, and something oily and noxious she couldn't even name.

"Fuck, Barre, what are you doing to him?" She whirled around, terrified of what she'd see.

"Trying to save his god damned feet. Now shut up and let me work."

Ro swallowed hard, and breathing through her mouth, turned back to her micro. There was nothing she could do for Micah that Barre couldn't do better and more safely. "Halcyone, locate Maldonado, Alain," she whispered, not wanting to break Barre's concentration.

"Engineering."

So he was still wrestling with the ship. She pulled up the AI's schematics and found her way into the rad sensors subroutines. Barre had done his work. Manual overrides were enabled. A combination of changing ALARA settings and tweaking the sensors should trigger a lock-down. If nothing else, it would buy them some time. She found the rad safety officer's interface. ALARA was a moving target. Even forty years ago, they understood that. And what was 'as low as reasonably achievable' differed on a military mission versus a civilian one. It was all about acceptable losses.

She'd like to dump her father in a radiation waste facility and consider him an acceptable loss.

Halcyone didn't even hum as Ro tinkered with radiation sensors. The trick would be to slide the ALARA settings down to something approximating the slightly elevated levels actually present in engineering. Then she could dial up the sensor readings. "Just a safety exercise, nothing to worry about," she murmured to the AI, before closing the subroutine.

"Hack that, daddy-o," she said.

The blare of the rad alarm whooped through the ship. "Warning, radiation leak in engineering. Radiation twenty-six percent above ALARA and climbing."

"Thank you, Halcyone." Ro smirked, imagining her father's expression about now. He'd be attempting to dig through the computer, trying to figure out if this was her doing, but he couldn't be certain and he'd have to check the levels manually. It only took a few minutes before the AI sounded another alarm.

"Radiation levels in engineering thirty-three percent above ALARA. Initiating emergency lock down and containment. All personnel in engineering must proceed to indicated decon chambers."

"Good girl," Ro said. That would keep him busy. Even if he did figure out it was her hack, he'd have a tough time convincing Halcyone to stand down.

"Rosalen."

Even though she expected it, his voice emerging from her micro jolted her. "Hello, Father. Safe and secure?"

"I know you did this, Rosalen. Clever. Very clever."

"You taught me well," she said, her jaw tight, her right eyelid twitching.

"Perhaps I've miscalculated," he said. "You have done nicely, but now it's time to put our disagreements behind us."

Cold coiled in the pit of her belly. "What do you want?"

"Control over the AI."

He was brutally direct. Some things never changed. She rested her head in her hands. "And if I help you?"

"Then your companions will have safe passage."

Her cooperation for their lives. Why wasn't she surprised? She tugged her fingers through her long, tangled hair. "I don't believe you." The weariness in her voice was a thing with weight.

Approaching footsteps made her look up. Barre sat beside her, stripped off his gloves, and placed a hand on her arm. Ro put her hand on his and squeezed. She waited, counting the seconds for her father's response. Based on long, bitter experience, it would be either a threat or a bribe. She was betting on threat.

"Rosalen, I'm giving you a chance because you're my child. We both know you can't lock me in here forever. And if my business associates think you are my adversary, I won't be able to protect you."

Ro bowed her head. Parents were supposed to protect their children. It wasn't something open for negotiation.

Barre kept his silence, waiting with her.

"I need to consult with my crew." She glanced at Barre. He nodded.

"Don't go away, Father."

Barre smirked as she muted his response. Whatever it was, it wouldn't be pretty.

"How's Micah?"

"Asleep. His feet are pretty messed up. I sealed them with antiseptic goo, but he's going to need skin grafts."

That meant getting back to Daedalus somehow, and before her father's 'associates' showed up.

Barre frowned. "How long do you think before he gets out of engineering?"

"Not sure. Depends on how cooperative Halcyone is feeling."

"I might be able to do something about that." Barre's dark eyes shone. "Can you carry a tune?"

"I guess."

Frowning, he shifted his gaze from her to her micro. "Never mind. Here, record this."

A few trilling notes from his device created a brief fanfare in the bridge.

"It'll let Halcyone know you're authorized."

"That's different," Ro said, smiling as she imagined her father trying to hack that password.

"Will that buy us some more time?"

"Hell, yeah. It's brilliant."

Barre smiled before turning away to try and hide the flush on his cheeks. She knew what it felt like to be systematically squashed for being good at what she loved.

"Okay, then. We need to figure out how to ping Hephaestus. Even if Halcyone's jump drive were on line, without maps, we're just so much floating space junk."

"Any word from Nomi?"

Ro ducked her head, staring at her micro. "No."

"Intruder alert, sector two."

"Hey, there's our ride." Talk about perfect timing. "Halcyone, put it on screen and magnify."

The broken image of the star field remained unchanged.

Barre smirked and played the fanfare.

She nodded her thanks and repeated the command. The screen blanked out for a brief flicker. When it brightened again, the image shifted so quickly, Ro got queasy and had to look away.

"Intruder alert, sectors two and nine. Time to intercept, three minutes."

"What?" Ro scanned the screen. A single moving blip at its center moved in and out of the jagged crack that split it into two discontinuous images. "Halcyone, display both ships with trajectories."

Another nauseating shift and her perspective changed. Two vessels streamed towards them at nearly identical bearings from either side.

"Time to intercept, two minutes, thirty seconds."

"Shit," Barre said softly. "Which one is Hephaestus?"

Ro's mouth dried and she swallowed hard. "What if neither of them are?" She pulled out her micro and reestablished comms to her father. "Who did you contact?"

"Rosalen, give me access to the AI."

"Who. Did. You. Contact." Ro pushed the words out between gritted teeth.

"Time to intercept, two minutes."

"They'll be expecting a greeting. I think you'd better rethink your current course of action."

"And if I don't?"

"They'll cripple the ship and take the cargo. My way will leave us with money and freedom. What will your way accomplish?"

"Fuck you." Ro cut him off again.

"Time to intercept, one minute, thirty seconds."

"Barre?"

"Can we hail them and bluff?"

"I don't think so."

"We have to run."

Time seemed to slow down and speed up at the same time. They couldn't jump and they couldn't outrun anything in this ship. Halcyone was a cargo vessel, retrofitted to transport troops. Their shields would hold against an asteroid hit or a near miss, but not against modern weapons fire. Hell, even if they had weapons, she wouldn't trust them not to tear themselves apart.

"Time to intercept, one minute."

She glanced at the ruined bridge doors. They would never seal again. "Grab Micah. Come on!" She ran towards the corridor without looking back, a countdown starting in her head. "Hurry!" Ro led them into the storage bay that had been Micah's lab.

Barre grunted as he set Micah down on the floor. He didn't stir.

"Halcyone, seal the doors in this compartment." Engineering was already taken care of, and if not, her father would experience a very nasty decompression. "Vent atmosphere from unsealed compartments and one third of our plasma. Shut down all but emergency lights." She hoped Barre didn't get motion sick. "Take inertial stabilizers off line and roll the ship twenty degrees to port."

Halcyone fell eerily quiet. The soft breath of life support, the nearly imperceptible hum of the stabilizers, and the high-pitched whine of the lights that Ro had become accustomed to were all silent. She was sure Barre would be able to hear her wild heartbeat.

"What about life signs?" Barre asked. "Can you mask our signatures?"

"I think so." Her fingers flying across the micro's input, Ro tweaked her ghost program. It wouldn't hold up to scrutiny, but it was the best she could do. It would have to work.

"Time to intercept, zero seconds."

She looked into Barre's wide eyes, knowing hers were just as frightened. "We've got company."

"Ensign Nakamura, report to the bridge."

Nomi smiled grimly. She was already on her way there. At least now she didn't need to find a reason for them to let her talk to the commander. Sprinting hard the rest of the way, she was out of breath by the time she got to the doorway. The doors hissed open.

The bridge was a model of quiet efficiency. Soft task lighting cocooned each work station in a cone of brightness and every bridge officer sat focused at task.

She stepped up to Targill's command station. "Ensign Nakamura, reporting, sir."

He turned his intense blue-eyed regard to her and it took all her will power not to retreat. "Take primary comms," he said.

"Yes, sir," she said, blinking in confusion. The woman sitting at comms handed over her headset before vacating the chair. The routine of settling in kept her thoughts from spinning into a whirlwind. Sweat beaded at her forehead.

Targill's voice vibrated through her headset. "We're tracking an unknown, unmarked ship in this sector."

Nomi's heartbeat thumped in an erratic rhythm. The ship's signature brightened on her display. Nothing traveling that fast could be a forty-year-old wreck.

"We're extrapolating its trajectory in relation to Halcyone's last known position."

What could he possibly want her to do that Hephaestus's own comms officer couldn't do with more skill?

"You will have the entire ship's array at your disposal, Ensign. Find a way to contact Rosalen Maldonado."

"Yes, sir," she said, pairing her micro directly to the vastly more powerful ship's antenna array. "Sir?"

"Ensign?"

"The cargo, sir, Jem told me. It's weapons." She hoped Ro would understand. "Micah Rotherwood may be part of the conspiracy." Targill didn't answer. At least she'd passed on the message. Now she needed to warn Ro or at least to find her before the other ship did.

Nomi narrowed her focus to the micro and Ro's tunneling program. The ship's transmitter should be able to directly hit most of the ansibles in this sector. One of them had to be close enough to one-hop a message right to Ro.

We're coming. Hold tight. Rogue ship also searching.

She paused for a moment before adding something for Barre.

Jem's in recovery.

No matter what happened next, if it had been her brother, she would have wanted to know. Nomi set the message to loop every five seconds as they streamed toward wherever the enemy ship was heading.