allies and enemies 02 - rogues (2 page)

To her left was a sealed hatch with a smear of frozen blood across its otherwise featureless surface.

Death-causing. Such a lovely sound to it.

“I’ve reached the cargo hold door. It’s as Ephid described.”

The ancient vox produced a flinch-inducing squeal as Jon replied:
“Got a visual. You trust the intel you got from him?”

“About as far as I can throw him.” He was the fattest Trelgin that she’d ever encountered.

“We can pull out. Think of another way—”

“We’ve been over this,” Sela snapped. “Are you ready?”

“Yes…boss.”
His reluctance was plain.

He liked the plan no more than she did. They were low on options. Within months of their arrival on Hadelia, they’d managed to barter off nearly all of the contraband pharms some nameless smuggler had stowed aboard the Cassandra. They sought work to keep the aged ship running and to keep food in their stomachs. That required money. No one hired outsiders for legitimate employment. The jobs they could secure settled into the more gray area of security runs and salvage.

An entity with the dubious moniker of Poisoncry Guild controlled all legitimate means of employment, an impossibility for renegades. The center of their power rested in their control of conduit travel in the region. Ships with velo drives relied on mapped flex points—flexers, in the vernacular of the Reaches—for travel between systems. At flex points, velo drives made the fabric thin enough to slip through and propel vessels along a conduit. It required a great deal of energy, but reduced travel between systems to days or hours.

Although the Three Armies War had decimated the natural flex points in the Reaches, Poisoncry had used the interim decades to develop tech to reopen once-damaged flexers. They had come to control them like gateways, commanding staggering fees for access. Even the other two ruling Guilds of the Reaches, Ironvale and Splitdawn, had to pay restitution to Poisoncry to journey among their own territories.

When Ephid had approached her on this job, even offering payment in Guild scrip, she already knew it would be complicated. The cagey Trelgin had been very clear that Sela and Jon were not his first choice on contractors.

The cargo had eaten that.

The hapless crew had not discovered the sealed interior cargo hatches until they’d towed the interceptor back to the salvage yards in Hadelia’s orbit. There was no way to tell how long the grendlic had been there, sheltered from the freezing black. The creatures were bred to withstand harsh environs. Sceeloid used them in ground engagements, loosening them as a first-wave assault to “soften up” enemy lines. Their jaws could pulverize bones. It was said they were trained to sniff out Eugenes blood in particular.

A runt was roughly the size of a man: a tough, scaled exoskeleton and ravenous appetite. Its powerful claws could make short work of an econ suit, borrowed or not. Sela had never seen the creatures in person. She had been witness to their aftermath and glimpsed blurry images taken from helm-cams.

The op was simple in description alone. Corner the grendlic, lure it out, and blast it from the airlock. Don’t get eaten in the process. Easy, right?

Sela was a fast learner and one of the first lessons bestowed upon her by life in the Reaches, on Hadelia in particular: what should be easy, never was.

Another check at her reads on the heads up. The level on the decades-old assault boots remained green. Power for at least three more hours. None of this should take that long. Things were to her advantage here. Although the lack of atmo would have little effect on it, the low g should be a handicap for the grendlic. She guessed…

She drew the A6. The weapon was modified for close-quarter combat. Its rounds were more likely to damage her suit in a hard-vac plasma kickback than to pierce the tough skin of the grendlic.

Having it made her feel…better.

“Open the hatch,” she told Jon.

Nothing. She thought he was stalling purposefully and was about to repeat the order when the door rolled up with agonizing slowness. A grinding vibration translated through her boots. The remaining hatches between here and the lock had better shut with more speed, or things could get interesting.

“Confirmed.”

The floods on her helm illuminated the inner chamber. Something drifted in the dimness. She tensed, aimed the A6. A severed hand, blood frozen to its chewed stump, bounced away from the wall in a lazy arc.

“Found the former crew.”

“Lovely,”
Jon commented on her helm’s vid feed.

“Perhaps it’s gone back into hibernation.” With no more live food around, that was likely. She suppressed the notion. That would be far too easy.

A sinister shifting of shadows caught the corner of her eye. She tracked it. “Movement.”

“Too dark on this end.”

“Not for me.” Another darting shape, this time to her left. Could there be more than one, or was the creature that fast?

“Ty…I’ve got two new signatures in there.”
His voice was tight with panic.

Ephid, you lying sack of—

“Run!”

She pivoted back out the door. The soundless, airless world deprived her senses. The sudden motion triggered the combat mode in the assault boots. Biostats fluttered to life on the heads up.

As if she needed to be informed that her heart rate was elevated.

She cleared the first intersection. Three more to go. “Clear!”

A faint rumble to the deck told her the hatch had shut behind her. A sinuous dragging sensation transmitted through the deck, lighter, far more insidious. She activated the rear cam on the helm. For a moment, she saw nothing. Then panned up.

The two grendlics scurried along the wall near the ceiling, using their black talons to pull them. The cast-off light of her helm glinted over their hard chitinous skulls and fanged maws. A scaled tongue flicked, as if tasting the frigid vacuum. The lack of gravity granted them an unnerving grace.

The sight inspired more speed.

The race to the second hatchway was an adrenaline-laced blur. She leapt across the threshold, momentarily losing contact with the deck. Power redirected to the assault boots and sent her back to the deck with enough force to make her stumble. She cursed.

The second hatch rolled shut. A quick glance at the rear vid feed sent her the nightmare image of the two grendlics in pursuit.

They were tracking her now. Another hot meal.

Not today
.

One more hatch. This time she used the shuffling run the boots required and cleared the threshold. The dancing uneven light of her cam revealed the beautiful sight of the final pressure door a few feet away.

Jon’s voice in her ear:
“Problem.”

She checked the rear view. Behind her, the door had seized partially closed. The grendlics’ sinewy bodies clambered through the opening, but seemed to hesitate. They had modest problem-solving skills—not enough to open a door. Could they sense danger?

Have to chance it.

“Shut it,” she barked. “Try a reboot—”

“Mechanical. It’s jammed. There’s a manual interface on your end.”

She searched the walls. The dark silver handle was set in the center of the wall, just beneath the advancing creatures. Suicide.

The initial calculation for the pressure rig was for the smaller chamber of the airlock, not the antechamber too. This would have to work.

Would there be enough air to push the two creatures out?

She positioned herself at the pressure door that led to the outer hatch. “Set the door.”

“There’s not enough—”

“Do it.” As the door rolled open, Sela hunched under to step inside the airlock. As soon as she reached the other side, she slapped the override to close. The door slammed shut.

Around her, the room washed with the churning orange light. As air filled the chamber, the wail of an ancient alarm pounded outside her helm. The battery they’d rigged to power this section had revived the final death throes of the ship. A guttural voice spat orders in Sceeloid, most likely evac instructions.

“Ty…just wait. I’ll come get you on the skiff. Pick you up at the exterior hatch.”

She muted his feed. A tremble had started in her hands. The pleading quality of his voice only seemed to fuel it. No second thoughts. They were doing this. Seeing it out to the bloody dismal end.

A bony talon slammed against the clear-plas of the window, trailing deep gouges. The grendlics were definitely still interested in her. She watched the exterior reads for the chamber and set the boots to deadlock.

The smaller oval window of the exterior hatch showed her a slice of Hadelia’s rusted curve. At this moment, she despised every single thieving, conniving soul on its hateful surface. A pity the grendlics would fry as they fell through the atmosphere. She could think of no other populace more deserving of their visit. Ephid in particular.

The ready light signaled on her display. The rooms were pressurized.

If there were a more foolish way to meet her end than being eaten by grendlics, she could not imagine it.

She opened Jon’s feed.
“—damn it, Sela. Answer me.”

“Opening the hatch.” She punched the override.

The windstorm was instantaneous, roaring into the small chamber, pushing her body out toward the void. The boots’ mags held firm against the deck. A dark shape flew past her with a flash of thrashing claws and gleaming teeth. She glimpsed its tumbling shape growing smaller against the arc of Hadelia.

Too soon, the vented air was slowing, almost depleted. She leaned toward the interior hatch as far as she dared. A talon swiped at her. She dodged back in time for it to miss her helm. A second slash caught the left knee of the suit. The breech alarm bleated against her ear.

She bellowed, surprised, as the burning cold of the poly-seal filled the gash. The pressure around her knee worsened as it hardened. Flexing the joint was impossible now. A new alert sprang up as the breathable mix reads plummeted. Sixteen minutes left.

Brilliant.

The proud sleek head of the remaining grendlic appeared at the threshold. The alien intelligence harbored under that gleaming dark skull seemed to weigh its options. Incredible. Clearly in danger and it was still looking for a meal.

The chamber was fully vented.

The grendlic descended the wall and slid into the chamber. Sela deactivated the useless deadlock on the boots and performed a shuffling side step to watch it.

Lure it in. Get your back to the interior. Find a way to force it out.

She raised the A6.

In response the creature hissed, head canted. Did it sense a threat? Perhaps her suit’s appearance made it hard to determine to how attack. She shuffled back. One more step to cross the threshold to the interior and she could shut the hatch between herself and it.

“Jon—”

“Thank Miri. I’d lost your vid feed.”

“Get ready to shut the inner hatch. On my mark.”

Her motion elicited another hiss. The beast drew itself up on its rear legs. Framed against the open exterior hatch, it towered over her. The powerful muscles coiled, poised to spring.

“Now!”

Sela pushed herself back into the corridor, firing the A6. Three rounds struck center mass on the grendlic mid-spring. There was no hope the rounds would even pierce its thick shell, but the powerful momentum of the expanding plasma rounds did their job. The impact sent it tumbling back through the door out into the void. The hatch snapped shut.

The mag on her left boot contacted a bulkhead, anchoring her. Moves made awkward by the stiffened knee, she scrambled to the door. Through the portal, she glimpsed a writhing body falling to Hadelia.

She slumped, realizing she’d been holding her breath. “Jon, you mentioned something about picking me up in the skiff?”

2

Jon dodged a beige-and-white blur. The helm struck the wall then landed with a hollow clunk at his feet. Sela had been too quiet since they’d made it back to the docks in the tired skiff. It was a silence of a sinister variety. He could tell by the flat line of her shoulders and the tense jaw that she was planning…something.

She plopped to the torn cushion of the bench in her struggle with the locks on the suit’s chest piece. With a grunt of disgust, she gave up and pulled the thick gloves from her hands with her teeth.

“Here. Let me.” He stooped against the low ceiling and snapped open the closures at her side. She snorted her appreciation and snaked loose of the yoke and collar. Both joined the gloves on the deck. Like the assault boots, the suit was a luxury they’d never be able to afford. With the damage incurred, he supposed it was hers to abuse now.

Sela squirmed her arms from the suit’s top half. She stood, pushing the suit down around her hips. One leg of the suit was free; the other held firm by the breech seal. Judging from the firm set of her jaw, she was prepared to gnaw it off if it meant getting free. Growling in frustration, she gave it a ferocious tug.

He winced in sympathy for the suit. “Just breathe. Let me help.”

“I’m fine.” She swatted angrily at the dark blonde hair that had fallen into her flushed face. A utility cutter appeared in her hand. For a wild second he thought she was about to hack the offending hair off before attacking the leg of the suit.

“Ty.” Jon eased the cutter from her grip.

Her shoulders softened. Barely. She exhaled, looking up at him. “This cannot go unanswered. Ephid lied.”

Angered like this, she was a creature of stimulus-response with little time spent on deliberation. He liked to think she’d gotten better at it. Although he could sometimes steer her clear of her worst reactions, she was forever hard-wired this way, no matter how far this new life took them from the Regime or Origin. For Sela, it wasn’t enough that they had gotten out of this in one piece. Ephid had underestimated her. That was a personal affront.

We should count Miri’s blessings and slink off to lick our wounds.