Riding on Whispers (the Wolfegang series Book 3) (5 page)

I raised an eyebrow. Exactly how old was he? “So what’d you do to get kicked out?” An honorable discharge was just a pretty way to say you did something they didn’t like. It wouldn’t be enough to get a dishonorable discharge. They usually reserved that for law breaking and a terrible reputation.

He stared at me, mouth agape. I couldn’t tell if it was in horror or shock, perhaps a little of both.

“You know, it’s not polite to stare.” I shifted my weight. He was making me uncomfortable. I hadn’t meant to put him on the spot, but he was the one who brought up the discharge.

He closed his mouth. “You amaze me. Always when I think I’ve got you figured out,” he said softly.

I looked at him closely. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say he was interested in me as more than a friend. While it was flattering, I wouldn’t even consider the idea. It would only complicate my life further.

I was utterly grateful to Wolfe for being so generous and giving me a new life, but being more than a friend wasn’t in the cards. Kris was my priority. If I had to leave the crew and the ship to find him, I would, without hesitation.

I had to remind Wolfe of the huge gap between us. “Sir?” I asked, hoping for clarification. That rank barrier could be very useful.

“I refused to comply with certain orders,” he told me.

Wolfe looked away briefly to check something on his tablet. I studied his face. The muscles in his jaw and cheeks were clenched. Whatever came next, he still couldn’t think about it without reliving the experience.

He stared straight into my eyes - telling me he knew I was studying him and to get a good look. Wolfe’s gaze roiled with pain, something I could relate to. I was about to ask when he turned away from me again. “When Ricky and Celeste get back, we’ll talk with them about setting a course to Enzo.”

That’s it? He would take me there, no questions asked? “Sir, I don’t understand. Why would you fly me there? I don’t even have a plan of action, and I have no idea how to even get into a military base as a civilian.”

Wolfe put down his tablet and gave me his full attention. “As a civilian, you shouldn’t even know that military base exists. It’s top-secret and highly classified, even to military personnel. If we want to get in, we’ll have to pose as soldiers.”

I chewed on my lip, not sure that would work. “You think that’s a good idea?” I asked. “How would we pull that off?”

“Being ex-military has its advantages.” He crossed his arms and gave me a blank look. Everything I thought I’d seen behind that militant exterior was gone.

“So it does.” I still wasn’t satisfied. There was one last thing I wanted to know. “Why take me there at the drop of a hat?” I asked. “You have your map, and whatever mission that involves, not to mention your original course before I came aboard was Anarkia. How does all that fit in?”

“Anarkia was a final destination. It’s where one of our safe houses is located. As a passenger you didn’t need to be informed of that, but as crew you have the right to know.” Wolfe’s smile was small and sad.

Something was bothering him.

“Captain, why is the shield down?” Ricky’s voice crackled over the comms system.

I would have to ask exactly what was on his mind later. We had to talk to Celeste and Ricky about the new flight plan.

Wolfe gave me an apprehensive look, like he knew I wouldn’t forget our conversation and all the questions I still had. He signaled back. “Kat just arrived. Go ahead and bring everything onboard. Is Celeste with you?”

Silence for a few seconds and then, “Yes.”

“Good. As soon as everything is loaded, the two of you come straight to my office.”

“Yes, sir.”

The transmission ended, and Wolfe and I sat in silence.

Maybe the other two would have questions similar to the ones I had spinning around in my head. I eyed the captain from my spot on the couch, and brought my legs up under me. I was always more comfortable that way.

Wolfe was back on his tablet, studying whatever information he had on there. He seemed engrossed by its contents; he didn’t look up once until the door slid open to let Ricky and Celeste in.

Ricky was all smiles and he seemed relaxed, despite his resistance to letting me roam the city alone. Celeste on the other hand looked immensely annoyed. The market was probably affected by the raids. I hadn’t even thought about that. I grimaced; whoops.

“Did you know the Federation was all over the city?” she demanded the second she crossed into the room.

I cringed. That was probably something I should’ve mentioned to Wolfe.

Wolfe glanced at me, and I knew he could see the guilt on my face. He didn’t react at the news. All he said was, “We need to be ready to leave this planet in the next few minutes. We’re changing course and heading to the Seifu Galaxy.”

Celeste’s eyes widened, and she gave him an incredulous look. “That is the wrong direction. Anarkia is only 1,500 light years from here. Why would you change our heading to a location over 200,000 light years away? That trip will take weeks!”

Ricky gave me a look. He knew exactly why we would change course.

“Enzo is our new destination. We now have the supplies we need for the journey, and I have not made the progress I should’ve on the map,” Wolfe said. He set down his tablet and crossed his arms. His gaze never moved from her face.

“Enzo!” she exclaimed. “That is the last place we should be heading. Seifu is where the Capitol is located! That section of space will be brimming with Federation! What are you thinking?”

I jerked in response to the sharpness of her words. When she put it that way, it sounded like a terrible idea. Kris sure made finding him as difficult as possible.

Wolfe straightened. She was outright arguing with his authority, and it looked like he didn’t appreciate it. “Celeste, as my first mate and weapons master I expect you to evaluate the dangers of a mission, but I also expect you to trust my judgment and follow my orders. I promised Kat I would help her find her brother. New information leads us to believe we might find him there.”

Celeste’s face turned ugly, and she glared at me. “We will be risking our lives for her? This is by far the most imbecilic idea I have ever heard.”

I kept quiet. This was not my fight. The captain and first mate were butting heads, and it wasn’t pretty.

“Captain, I strongly advise against this.” She planted her feet and crossed her arms, ready for a fight.

“Silence!” Wolfe yelled. “I have already decided what we are doing. I will not change my mind! I want you at your station in five minutes.” He stalked across the room and left his office, leaving the rest of us to stand there awkwardly.

Celeste was suddenly in my face, pressing me back against the couch. “If anything happens to the captain, it will be you to blame,” she hissed.

I winced as she whipped around and stormed out. I released my breath slowly. The danger of the situation hadn’t escaped my attention. Wolfe had put me in a tight spot, but he was also keeping his word. I didn’t know what to do.

I looked across the room at Ricky, who was still standing next to the door. He seemed frozen in place.

My hands shook. I quickly stood and shoved them in my pockets again. The argument between Celeste and Wolfe reminded me of all the ugly moments between my parents.

“I didn’t ask him to take me to Enzo,” I told Ricky quietly. “It’s not my place.”

Ricky sighed and crossed the room. “I know,” he murmured. His arms encircled my shoulders, and he gave me a hug, gentle and loose. He left me the opportunity to move away if I wanted. I let out a huge breath and rested my head on his shoulder.

Sometimes, it was nice having someone who knew everything I was thinking without me ever saying a word. He always knew what I needed, and it was quickly becoming something I didn’t know what I would do without.

“Thank you,” I whispered. Sometimes it was nice to hear the words, even if you already knew how somebody felt.

After all the stress from looking for Imre and the terrible meeting in Wolfe’s office, I slept for a solid eight hours. When I woke, I still felt apprehensive. I needed to let off some steam. Knowing Ricky would be able to help; I dressed quickly and headed to his quarters. He said he’d have something I could work on. I wasn’t so sure when he first told me about the record player, but when I saw it I lost my doubts. It was in almost perfect condition. The only problem was that it had a loose wire somewhere.

Ricky collected old things – very old things. Things I recognized from my life before the experiment. Ricky gave me the broken record player, and I took it back to my quarters with it in hand, grateful for something to work on. I placed the record player on my desk, and swiped at the clear surface. The programs appeared as images on the flat surface of the desk, and I tapped a command to run a diagnostic of the record player. The three dimensional figures displayed around the player with the loose wire indicated. I started taking it apart, following the indication of the displayed images. I waved my hand at the display, and the image fractured, showing me every individual piece of the player expanded from the original point.

I bit my lip. It was a completely different method of working on machinery than I was used to. I would figure it out, right? I wasn’t so sure. My mind wandered as my hands worked. It was kind of soothing. It wasn’t as good as being under the hood of a car, but it was close. I should find something I could work on regularly, a hobby or chore to focus on. There had to be something I could do to keep my hands busy, something to help me not worry about everything else in the universe.

I chewed on my lip a bit more. My hands paused as I thought. Maybe Wolfe would have some idea; something I could do to help contribute more, something useful. Driving was something that wouldn’t be needed all that often.

The closest to driving would be to pilot a ship, but it seemed like the
Wolfegang
was almost always on autopilot. I mentally shrugged at the thought. It could still be useful. I’d always wanted to learn how to fly.

I shook my head and continued taking the record player apart. No, I wouldn’t ask him. Wolfe had been acting off ever since Ricky brought him back from jail. I didn’t want to talk to him yet. Was he being weird because I’d replaced him as the driver on Speed, or was it because memories haunted him?

No. I would wait until he was in a better mood to ask.

I scratched idly, and wiped the sweat from my forehead. Why was it so hot in here? I got up and checked my room settings. The climate control said it was only sixty-eight degrees Fahrenheit. I shouldn’t feel so warm. I brushed it off and turned down the temperature to sixty.

Maybe something else in my body chemistry was different now. After all that time in the cryogenic pod, and all of Ricky’s tests, I still didn’t know what exactly had changed. I only knew some of what I could do, things that I never could’ve done before the treatment. I worried at what else I would learn. The thoughts were constantly eating at me, even when I pushed them as far back in my mind as I could.

Work distracted me.

The
Wolfegang
was currently on a flight path to Enzo, but I’d been informed that we might make a stop before we reached the base. I wasn’t sure how long the trip to Enzo was supposed to take. I made a mental note to ask next time we went over our plans.

When we did reach Enzo, I had no idea what I would do next. What should I look for, or who? I didn’t know if Kris would be waiting for me there. That wouldn’t make any sense, not when he’d worked so hard to make himself a ghost. The only thing my brother left behind was whispers.

Maybe there would be something more than faint strands of information on the base. According to Wolfe, the location of the military base on Enzo was highly classified. Only a small percentage of the Federation’s military even knew it existed. So for Kris to know where it was, worried me. I did not like the look on Wolfe’s face when I’d shown him the note Imre gave me. Something else was going on that our captain wasn’t saying.

I had to come up with some sort of plan; figure out what I would do once I was on the base. Maybe there was some hidden message in the note I was missing. I dug around inside the record player, searching for the wire as I thought. I would have to go back and look at the note again, but later. I was too distracted to think about hidden meanings.