The Star Thief (9 page)

“I want to see, too.” Myka struggled against the harness.

“Stay where you are,” she said with a frown. “This isn’t going to be pretty.”

“But you’re by the window.” His voice rose to a whine.

“And I’m an adult.”

The boy opened his mouth, but a look from Renna silenced him. She gripped the steady-handle beside the window and rested her forehead against the thick glass, letting her eyes drift shut for a moment. Who would want to destroy a planet just to find a little boy? It didn’t make sense. She shivered. Would she ever see Hesperia again?

Luckily, most of her liquid assets were stored in off-world banks and other locations. She’d learned long ago that diversification was the best bet for someone like her. Having to go into hiding on a moment’s notice meant always being prepared. Her free hand drifted to her throat where she carried her most prized possession, the Seralline Star Sapphire. She’d taken the job as a challenge, as a way to prove she was the best thief in the galaxy. Now she wished she’d never heard of the damn thing. It had caused her nothing but trouble.

Case in point: being blackmailed into helping on a suicide mission.

Unfortunately, the Star was worth more than the gross domestic product of all the Outer Rim worlds put together. It was her security blanket, her ticket to freedom. As long as she had it, she had an escape plan. And she always liked to have an escape plan.

Even that last day with Blur’s gang, when the cops had arrived. She’d mapped a route out of the warehouse sometime during that first year with them, never thinking she’d have to use it. Three years later, slipping out the ventilation shaft had saved her from a life of hard labor on a prison planet. She’d worked alone after that. Getting involved was too dangerous. She could only depend on herself.

What would her life have been like if Hunter—if
Finn
—hadn’t betrayed them? Would she still be working for Blur? Still tied to the gang by death and lies and violence? Renna let out a sigh. No sense in going down that road now. All of that had been a long time ago.

Beneath her feet, the engines rumbled to life, the ship’s blood starting to pump and churn as they readied for takeoff. Sunlight streamed into the hangar as the doors above opened to the Hesperian summer sky.

Right. It was still daylight out here in the real world. Soon, they’d be in space, where time didn’t matter, where the velvety darkness was a constant presence, wrapping her in its soft cocoon.

Captain Finn’s voice came over the comm. “Stand by for takeoff.”

Renna’s stomach fluttered as the ship moved. And then they were out into the bright summer air, shooting upward so fast she gasped and clutched the grip as they went vertical, her ears screaming with the pressure of rising so quickly.

They cleared the MYTH building, then the other skyscrapers. Below them, the city of Veth was laid out in a grid. A smoking, crater-filled grid. She bit back a gasp, the image burned forever into her mind. The Warehouse District was gone, nothing but rubble. She craned her neck toward her apartment building, but there was nothing left. Even the less inhabited part of the city off to the east was now pocked with craters and smoking debris.

Strange destroyers churned through the city, obliterating everything in their path. They were unlike anything she’d ever seen: three stories tall, with double wings on each side and a long narrow tail.

Three MYTH battlecruisers shot past the
Athena
, their engines grinding as they banked toward the attacking fleet. Fire and missiles burst from the weapons bays of both fleets, streaming toward their closest targets in a blast of fire.

As one of the enemy cruisers pulled away, an explosion shook the air around them. Below, near the center of the city, a gaping crater had opened up, smoking and blazing with fire.

Renna unlatched her harness, her stomach tightening at the sight of the city below them. She had to clear her throat before the words came out properly. “Stay here. I need to check in with Finn,” she said to Myka.

His eyes widened, and he put out a hand to stop her. “But Renna…”

“I’ll be right back. I promise.” She smiled reassuringly, waiting to pick up her pace until she was out of sight. She raced back to the bridge and heard Finn barking orders before she spotted him pacing in front of the holomap.

“Bank hard to port. Keva, patch through Dallas’s comm feed. I need to know what’s happening on the ground. Bokal, charge the guns. We’re going to need them before we’re out of Hesperia’s atmosphere.”

“Aye, aye, sir.” Keva typed in a command at her console, and the crackle of static from the intercom filled the ship.

The roar of an explosion from the comm shook the bridge before Dallas’s voice boomed out. “Evacuate! Get all support staff to the bunkers! Team Alpha to the ground entrance! Order the fighters to come around for another assault!”

Finn stared down at the console, his hands clenched into fists. “Dammit. They’re getting killed out there. We have to do something.”

Keva frowned. “You know our orders, sir. We have to escape with the boy.”

Dallas’s voice shouted through the comm. “Status on the
Athena
. Now!”

A woman answered. “Sir, they’re approaching atmospheric release. They’ll be away in three minutes.” Her voice was cool and collected, a sharp contrast to the sound of explosions in the background.

“Keep the fighters on the offensive! Captain Finn has to get away. Evacuate all personnel from the facility. Then get to safety yourself.”

The woman’s voice came again. Renna assumed she was one of the technicians she’d seen in the command center. “What about you, sir?”

“I’m on my way. Now get going!” Ragged breathing sounded over the intercom, then Dallas spoke again. “Finn, I don’t know if you’re catching this, but the attackers are on the ground. They’ve destroyed most of the city center and the Warehouse District. They’re looking for the boy. Keep him safe. We’ll do our best from here.”

The comm crackled again, a whine filling the air. The next second, a blast shattered through the comm speakers. A moment later, the ship shivered with the aftershock.

Renna dashed to one of the portals and pressed her forehead to the glass to peer down at the tiny city below them. A mushroom of smoke and fire rose almost to the atmosphere. The city of Veth was nothing but a smoking ruin now. There was no way Dallas had survived unless the facility had been made of bombproof material.

“Try him again!” Captain Finn shouted, pounding a fist on the control panel.

“Sir, we’re almost out of the ground-to-air comms range. There’s nothing there. We’ll be clearing Hesperia’s atmosphere in thirty seconds.” Keva’s gaze never left her screen, her lips a thin slash on her face.

“Dammit!” Finn slammed his fist down again.

Renna had one last glance of the enemy battleships starting to retreat before the
Athena
shot into the twilight of the upper atmosphere. Below them, Hesperia rapidly shrunk into a glowing ball.

Renna took a deep breath and released her death grip on the portal edge. It took her a moment to realize the trembles she felt in her limbs weren’t vibrations from the ship. The icy rage that had silently crept into her belly as she watched those fuckers destroy her home and slaughter millions of innocent people rushed through her veins until she was shaking.

Boyd was dead. The crazy woman down the hall was dead. The guy who always walked his kids to school so they wouldn’t be bullied by thugs was gone. And so were his eight-year-old twins.

The whole godsdamned city—nothing more than ashes of bodies and buildings.

Suddenly, she didn’t care that she’d been blackmailed into boarding this ship. She didn’t care that MYTH had enough information on her to send her on a one-way ticket to hell. None of that mattered anymore.

Because this? This act of war? Bombing her city?

It was personal now.

The intercom clicked on, and Finn’s voice filled the ship. “MYTH headquarters is silent. We are on our own now. Let’s take a moment to remember those whose lives were taken in the attack.” There was a long pause before he spoke again. “Everyone, settle in for now. We’ll land on Krooss in twenty-four hours, where we’ll refuel before moving on to Dr. Aldani’s labs.”

He ran a shaking hand through his dark hair and snapped off the comm. His shoulders sagged for a moment, and he stared down at the console in a moment of despair. Renna wanted to go to him, to tell him it was going to be okay, but before she could move, Finn sucked in a deep breath. With that one action, his shoulders straightened, and he was back to the cool, unflappable Captain Finn. He wasn’t the one who needed her now.

She spun on her heel. Dammit.
Myka
.

EIGHT

Renna rushed back to the port observation deck just as Myka unhooked his harness. He slipped from his seat to gaze out into the darkness of space.

“You okay?” she asked, coming to stand beside him. The cool recycled air from the vents brushed her skin, made her hair tickle her face. She pushed it away, forcing a smile. The kid had been through enough already. He didn’t need to see how pissed she was.

“What happened?” he asked. “All I saw was smoke.”

“They hit Veth pretty hard, but we got away. You’ll be back with your uncle soon. I promise.” The word slipped out before she could stop it. Promises were few and far between in her line of work, and she never said it unless she meant it. It was a personal policy of hers.

From the corridor came the heavy thud of boots on the metal floor. Captain Finn stood in the doorway, his eyes shadowed and tired. Renna saw the effort it took him to keep his face friendly as he looked down at the boy. “Everything all right over here?”

Myka threw his shoulders back, head held high. “We’re fine.”

“Good. I thought I might take you on a tour of the
Athena
now before you get settled in. We’re in the pre-FTL check phase so I have a few minutes.” Although he spoke to Myka, his gaze flicked to Renna.

She nodded. “Sounds like a good plan. Myka and I could use a snack, too. We’re both starving.”

“First stop, galley!” Finn gestured to the corridor with a flourish. “Right this way, honored guests.”

Renna’s heart twisted at the lopsided grin he gave Myka. It was the same one he’d given her ten years ago, when she’d shown up dirty and hungry at Blur’s warehouse. The same flourish he’d used as he held the door for her. She put out a hand to the cool wall of the ship to steady herself.

Stop it.

The mess hall was a long room along the port side of the ship. Several large community tables filled the space, and a service area lined the wall. A matronly woman in a crisp white apron stood guard over several pots of soupy liquid.

“My mate and I are looking for some grub; got anything space-worthy?” Finn asked with an over-exaggerated wink at the woman.

“You must be our new passenger—Myka, is it?” The woman’s plump face beamed. “I’m Mary Wilson, but you can call me Miss Mary, if you like.”

The boy nodded. “Pleased to meet you, Miss Mary.”

She beamed again, her smile stretching her wrinkled face. “Isn’t he just a doll? I have just the thing for you, Myka. How about a steaming mug of tea and a plate of my fresh molasses cookies? They’re my great-great-gran’s recipe; she was from Old-Earth.” She moved away to get a plate and cup while Myka slipped into a chair at the nearest table.

“Are you going to stay here? Or finish the tour?” Finn asked, slanting Renna a reluctant look.

The last thing she wanted was to be alone with him again, but the sooner he realized she wasn’t going to let him push her around, the better off everyone would be. She glanced at Myka, who nodded.

“Sure,” Renna said. “I’m curious to see the rest of this beauty. This is one of the Infiltrator models, right?”

Finn led her away from the mess hall. “The
Athena
’s one of the newest starships in the fleet. Specially designed for MYTH operations with a near-silent quantum core, she’s equipped with special cloaking material to get us in and out without detection.” Finn ran a hand along the seamless metal wall, caressing it like he might a woman.

She forced away the image of his hand caressing her like that and cleared her throat. “It’s gorgeous. Think Dallas might get me one, too, after this is all over?” She said it flippantly and then wished she hadn’t when a shadow passed over Finn’s handsome face. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean… I’m sure he’s fine. He seemed like a tough old guy.”

Finn shook his head. “Dallas’s one of the best. I’ve known him since I first joined MYTH. I hope he made it out.” His tone made it very clear he didn’t want to talk about it. Instead, he led her to the bow of the ship where the pilot and first mate were prepping the
Athena
for the jump to hyperspace.

“This is Flight Lieutenant Mark Kojima. He’s one of the best. Kojima, this is Renna Carrizal.”

The guy looked about twenty-one or so, a few years younger than Renna. Finn let someone so young pilot his ship? But she hid her surprise and smiled at him as she held out her hand.