Dragonfly (19 page)

“Y—”

“Then shut up and eat. That’s a week’s bloody food where I come from.”

Anger glimmered in Foxy’s tired eyes, and for a memory-rich moment I tasted her rage.

Fucking Imperials, get everything while we starve
. My father and his friends, whispering in our gaslit cabin while I lay behind the flimsy plastic wall wrapped in greasy blankets, me and my sister fighting over who got to sleep with the baby because he was always so warm.
Army parasites
…
stealing our food
…
send a delegation
…
discussions
…
talk to the council
… It never did them any good.
They don’t hear us when we whisper
, Spider said. He was right.

Foxy grabbed her rifle and walked out into the mess hall, and I followed. It looked strange with the rows and rows of empty benches, no noise or laughter. Shadows flittered in the far corner, and I jumped, searching for a weapon, but when I peered into the darkness, no one was there. I forced my pulse slower, breathing deep. This silent, empty ship was giving me the creeps.

I plonked down on a bench. Foxy waited to see where I sat before she chose her own seat, opposite me at a safe distance, her rifle beside her. I dug into my food—I rated a spoon, at least—and the familiar sweet-fruity flavor filled my mouth. We ate in silence, only whirring refrigerators and the slipspace drive’s distant rattle keeping us company.

“So,” I ventured, “you’re pretty fine with that rifle, right?”

“You ain’t seen me fire it yet.”

“Well, yeah, but you don’t miss nothing that’s going down.” Easy to slip into her mode of speaking. Not so different from my own a while ago. “I seen you on the station. You got everything covered while the big man does the doing. That why you’re here?”

Foxy shrugged, but her gaze softened a little. “I help out.”

“So how long you been at this? Here, I mean. On this ship.”

She shrugged again, chewing. “A stretch.”

“It’s a pretty shady deal. I mean, I don’t have nothing like this. I got me a little Phoenix, roll on my own mostly.”

“You and Sasha.”

Was that a twinge of envy? Maybe what Foxy-only-Lady-on-the-ship needed was some girl talk. I dropped my gaze and thought about
him
kissing me on Esperanza to work up a flush. Fucking prick. He’d deceived me from the start, and I’d walked right into it.

I squirmed, my face hot. “Oh, no. I mean, he’s … Well, you know how it is. You and Spider, right?”

Her mouth twitched. “Nope.”

“You’re stitching me. I seen him scope you out.”

“You reckon?” She tried to look casual. It didn’t work.

“Sure. His eyes and your ass, hello.”

She jammed her mouth full of food, her gaze down. “In his dreams,” she muttered.

Time for a change of subject. “So how’s it go around here? You work long shifts?”

“We do our share.”

“I mean, four doesn’t seem a whole lot for a battleship. There’s just four, right?”

Foxy snorted, scratching her rough-hacked hair. “You should know.”

What did that mean? I’d only seen four. Was she trying to trick me?

I poked my chin toward Natasha, who, by the scraping and slurping coming from the kitchen, was taking lessons in how to eat from a bowl without her hands. Wouldn’t do the spoiled little miss any harm. “What you think he’ll do with her?”

Foxy scraped the last of her dinner into her mouth. “What do you care?”

“Will he kill her? I mean, would you, if he asked you to?”

“Enough with the questions, okay?” Her hand slid over her rifle’s butt, a touchy threat.

I lifted my palms in surrender. “Hey, I don’t mean nothing. I’m just … Well, I’m on my own, like I said. I decide who lives and dies. Only now there’s Sasha, and … Well, you know men. Always wanna be in charge.”

Foxy stared at me, her green eyes blank and hard. Testing me. I didn’t look away. I’d stared down hard-ass marines. I could surely break a skinny girl.

At last, she spoke, and unexpected pain roughened her voice. “I don’t think, okay? Spider does the thinking. I just do. If thinking’s your game, you get out right now. Hear me?”

I swallowed. She made me think of Mishka, guiding my hand on some practice weapons test long ago.
You’re thinking too much
, he’d murmured over my shoulder, his fingers strong and steady on mine.
It’s making you hesitate. Just aim, breathe, fire
. Fact was, Axis did my thinking for me, at least as far as identifying the enemy was concerned, and until lately that had been just fine.

“But you didn’t. Get out, that is.”

Foxy shook her head, her stubborn chin set.

Unwanted sympathy warmed my skin. I knew what it was like when your heart screwed you over. “He’s really worth dying for, huh?”

“And don’t he know it.” She shoved her plate aside, slung her rifle over one shoulder and walked away, her boots ringing cold in the empty mess hall. The elevator door crunched open, and she was gone.

I sighed, and pushed my unfinished dinner away. Wow, that was fun. But at least I got what I wanted. Swiftly, I wiped my hands on my unclipped uniform and went to talk to Natasha.

She was on her knees, licking the last scraps of rice from her bowl. Her hands were locked fast to the table leg beside her, and she had to crane her neck awkwardly over one shoulder to reach. Her loose yellow hair dangled, clogged with fruity rice. She heard me approach and jerked back, her face red.

I watched her, impassive. Her petty humiliation didn’t please me. But it didn’t move me to sympathy either.

I squatted, and she shrank away. I reached out an impatient hand. “You finished?”

She nodded, eyes wide.

I retrieved her bowl, dropped it with the others, and leaned on the bench, unclipping my pistol and clunking it onto the metal so she’d see I wasn’t planning to shoot her. “You know why you’re here?”

More nodding.

My fingers clenched. I had an irrational urge to slap her. So different from me at that age. So sheltered. So helpless. She hadn’t even tried to break her cuffs while Foxy and I were eating.

“Tell me.”

“Because they want my daddy to do things.” Her voice sounded childish, like she’d regressed to a younger, safer place.

It happens. I’ve seen hard men suck their thumbs and beg for their mothers. Sometimes, the mind gives in before the body gives up. But usually it takes extreme torture. This little princess couldn’t even take being tied to a table.

“That’s right. Do you understand why your daddy can’t do those things?”

“He will.” Her lip quivered.

“Stop crying.” I shoved her with my toe. “You’re wrong. He won’t rescue you, Natasha. Do you know why?”

“You’re lying.” Her eyes glittered bright with tears. “He’ll rescue me. He’ll come here and he’ll rescue me and then all you horrid people will be sorry!”

I crouched and grabbed her chin, forcing her to look at me. “No, Natasha. He won’t. Not because he doesn’t love you. Because his superiors won’t let him. You are in deep danger. Do you understand?”

She sobbed, shaking her head.

I squeezed her chin harder, nails drawing blood. “Do you understand?”

“Yes!” Spit and tears splashed my cheek. Her face twisted into a snarl and her little-girl shell broke. “Yes, you fucking bitch, I understand. You’ll keep me cuffed here, and your stinking rebel friends will beat me up and rape me, and when they’re done getting off, they’ll send me back to my father in pieces. That make you feel good, you lump of shit?”

She actually snapped at me, teeth bared. I dodged. Good. A rise at last. Anger, I could work with.

“No, it doesn’t make me feel good, Natasha. Listen to me.” I whipped my arm around her shoulders, holding her tight. “Shh. I don’t belong here either, okay? I can help you.” She clawed at me, dragging my hair loose, scraping for my eyes. I pushed her hands down and held on. “I can help you. I promise. They won’t hurt you if I can help it. But you have to calm down and keep quiet. Okay?”

Gradually her struggles subsided to quiet sobs, and she rocked in my arms, her face pressed to my chest like I was her mother. I sweated, uncomfortable. I wanted to tell her I was an Axis agent, that I had everything under control, that it would all be okay. But I didn’t want her knowing the truth in case she spilled it. I might still need Dragonfly to get out of here.

“Okay,” I whispered. “Listen, Natasha. Once I’ve found us a way home, I’ll come for you. But until then you have to—”

Metal crunched, and the elevator door slid open. Fuck. I jumped up, shoving her backward onto the floor. “Remember what I said, bitch. Soon.”

Lux’s spiky brown head emerged from the elevator, his pierced brow shining with sweat. “Everything okay?”

I holstered my pistol and strode from the kitchen. “Sure. Why not?”

He shrugged, swinging from the doorframe on one hand, and glanced into the shadows, grey eyes sharp. “Just making sure.”

I pushed into the elevator, shoving him aside. “Where do you guys sleep? I’m wasted.”

“Level four. Officers’ quarters. We got the LSS inactive down below to save juice.” Lux leaned against the doorjamb to stop it closing, and scratched his ridiculous hair, studying me. “You really Sasha’s girlfriend?”

I grinned, feral. “Wanna try something and see?”

“Maybe.” An answering grin that transformed his face: angry boy to man on a mission. Bright, strong, hard. Older than he looked? “You don’t seem his type.”

“No? What’s his type then?” I was curious despite myself. They all had history together that I knew nothing about. I didn’t even really know Lux’s job on
LightBringer
.

“Absent. Dead. Imaginary.” He twisted a platinum earring, his lean forearms gleaming. “Shit, I don’t know. Never seen her.”

My belly warmed. A handsome liar like Dragonfly could have any girl he wanted, for a while. A loner? Or did he keep someone at home—wherever home was if it wasn’t here. How recent was his famous falling-out with Spider anyway?

Not that I cared.

I twirled my loosened braid around my finger. “Maybe you still haven’t seen her.”

Lux wrinkled his nose in another grin—yeah, okay, that was kinda cute for a terrorist psychopath—and shoved his hands in his pockets. “Nearly two years.”

“Huh?”

“That’s how long since Sasha left. And yeah, he did leave of his own accord. That’s what I do here, by the way, since you’re wondering.”

Now I was bewildered. “What?”

“You’re wondering what Lux does here, if Vish flies the ship one-handed and Foxy Lady plays with guns. I tell Spider what other people are thinking.”

I snorted. “What, you think you’re psychic or something?”

All that mind-control crap is bullshit. Even ESE is just a window, not a doorway. We’ve split open a dozen dimensions since etherwave was discovered and we’ve never found anything resembling a psionic-capable medium. Unless you can stick an electrode in it, you can’t control it.

“No. I just think like other people. Wanna come put the girl away?”

Put her away? Did he mean kill her? Or lock her up? Damn. A pair of cuffs was easy. A cell, not so much.

“I’m sorry?”

“The girl. We got rooms. Might as well lock her in so we can all get some zees.” Lux’s smile turned dark. “Unless you was thinking of letting her go.”

Okay, so that was spooky.

I faced him down, lifting an unconcerned eyebrow. “What do you think, psychic boy?”

“I think you’re hiding something, Sasha’s-girl-or-not.” Lux flipped a little disruptor like Foxy’s from his pocket and flicked it on, gesturing toward the kitchen with a dark glint in his eyes. “That’s what I think. Coming?”

21

Twenty minutes later, I was pacing in my room, the white plastic walls closing in on me. Icelights glared on the blue-quilted bunk, white storage lockers, the mirror in the tiny washroom. No window, no reflective holo to give the illusion of space. Junior officers’ quarters—small and private and stifling like a coffin.

Lux and I had locked Natasha in a cabin the mirror image of this one, around the corner along the narrow white corridor. Everything in the officers’ mess was white and it gave me the creeps. Deep down in the enlisted dorms, I knew, the black metal walls shone with condensation from the slipspace coolant and the air trembled with engine noise and stank of hot metal. The officers’ quarters were pristine, plastic, pretend, like they’d covered up the real world so no one would see how dirty and noisy and rank it was. In the corps, we’d despised our officers with healthy fervor, no matter how competent they were, and it helped us band together, though they were likely just normal, decent men and women with a job to do.

Natasha had the good sense to keep her complaining mouth shut when Lux threw her on the bed and tightened the cuffs so she could barely roll over. Not even when he pulled her coat off and left her in her nightgown did she speak. She hadn’t looked much at me. Either she was pretending so no one would find us out, or she hadn’t believed me. I guessed I’d find out when I went for her.

If I ever got the chance.

Lux had locked her door with a voiceprint emergency lockdown code. I’d have to figure out how to bypass it. It was only thanks to Lux’s whim that I wasn’t locked in too. I had no idea where the rest of them slept. It could be across the ship. It could be next door.

Damn, it was hot in here. I looked around for a dimmer switch before I remembered where I was.

“Dim the lights,” I ordered, feeling foolish.

Lights down,
said the virtual valet in a soft female voice, and the harsh white light faded to soft yellow.

I tugged off my boots and stockings, my feet sticking to the plastic floor. I stripped off the uniform Spider had given me and tossed it in the corner, leaving only my shorts and tank top. Sweat soaked my body, trickling down my bare limbs and between my breasts, and I dragged my knotted hair from its ruined braid and tucked it up in a rough ponytail.

“Can we cool it down in here?”

Temperature is set to minimum for comfort,
the valet advised.