Chapter 18

EIGHTEEN

" H e's okay," Nessa said as Flick sagged into the float. "Vitals are good. He's just worn-out."

Zed swallowed down a lump of worry. He trusted Ness—if she said Flick was okay, he was okay. Still, watching his lover pass out wasn't high on his list of enjoyable things to witness.

But he had other stuff to worry about.

He turned to Elias, who'd already pinged Qek to see what was happening. The pilot's voice sounded tinny across the comm system. "A vessel has locked their navigation on to us and is on an intercept course. It matches human configurations. It will take a moment to confirm its registration." Qek paused, then clicked rapidly. "It is the Magdalene ."

Elias glanced at Zed and Theo. "The Church's flagship?"

Why would they show up now? Lucas Wystan and his small fleet of ships had hightailed it away from the convocation after he'd been released from custody. Zed had assumed they'd run back to Sol with their tails tucked between their legs.

Theo shared a glance with Zed. "Doesn't make sense."

"Have you tried hailing them, Qek?" Zed asked.

"I have not."

"Do it," Elias ordered. "Ness?"

"I'm going to take Fix to the med bay. It's a little more secure." She turned to the tent, dismantling one of the pieced-together sides to make an exit.

Theo watched her, his gaze drifting to Flick's float and his too-still form. Part of Zed wanted to shove Theo in a corner with the resonance. But a flicker in his gaze echoed the emotions in Zed's own gut. Worry, fear, concern.

Maybe a bit of love.

"Go with Ness, Theo. Keep an eye on him." Zed nodded in the doctor's direction.

Theo didn't hesitate, didn't question Zed's suggestion. "I'm not supposed to be here, anyway…"

"Exactly." A half smile twisted Zed's lips. "Just…ping me if…"

"You got it."

That left only the resonance to manage. Zed reached out, touching Gleams with a mental finger, and relayed what had happened so far. She sent back encouragement tinged with concern.

"You should probably strap in," he said, showing them a mental picture of the cargo restraints.

"Agreed. Be careful. Good luck."

Blowing out a breath, Zed looked at Elias. "Let's see what's going on."

The bridge didn't seem quite right without Ness and Flick in their places. Zed usually leaned against the wall by the door—mostly because everyone else had already claimed the seats. Now he took advantage of the space available and leaned over where Qek sat in front of the navigational console. Elias stepped up behind them, eyeing the readouts on the holos.

"Any response to your hails?"

"None whatsoever."

The back of Zed's neck tingled in a way that had nothing to do with the resonance. Pure instinct, developed over the course of years of covert operations, was making the little hairs stand on end. Something wasn't right. "Have they wavered from their course? Changed speed?"

"No." Qek clicked and her face smoothed. "At their current trajectory and speed, the Magdalene will intercept the Chaos in ten minutes, five seconds."

What the hell? Possibilities flashed across Zed's mind—maybe the cult ship had suffered some sort of navigational failure and had locked on to the Chaos 's signature accidentally. Except even the dumbest computer wouldn't mistake the Chaos for a station or a ship large enough to dock with. And why would Wystan risk further annoying Central or the AEF?

"Okay, let's go for a little Sunday drive, Qek," Elias said, nodding at the view screens.

"It is not Sunday?—"

"He means slow and gentle," Zed clarified. "It's a saying."

Qek clicked. "I see. Any particular direction I should choose?"

"Stay in neutral space. And keep an eye on the Magdalene ." Elias looked at Zed over his shoulder. "Weird, huh."

Zed rubbed the back of his neck, trying to get the little hairs to stand down. "Yeah."

J-space wasn't an option—even though it would be the perfect solution to losing the Magdalene . Unless you knew in advance where a ship was going when it jumped into the in-between, there was no way to track it. But with Flick's arm just past the gestational phase, and with a unit of resonance on board, it wasn't something they could do. Zed didn't want to risk messing up the arm that had taken so much out of Flick to grow, and he certainly didn't want to risk a misunderstanding with Gleams and the rest of the resonance—not that he really thought they would believe the Chaos had kidnapped them, but still. Best not to even go there.

"The Magdalene has adjusted her course and remains on an intercept trajectory."

"Okay, what the fuck?" Elias looked at Zed, his eyes wide.

"The Magdalene has increased her speed," Qek reported.

Zed brushed his fingers over his Guardian cuff and accessed the cult ship's comms. " Magdalene , this is the Guardians' emissary. Stand down."

Silence. Then an alarm sounded on the console—an alarm Zed knew too well and had hoped to never hear again. Weapons locked.

"What the—they have guns ?" Elias shouted. They shouldn't—the Magdalene was a pleasure cruiser, a rich man's toy. But the alarms didn't lie.

Qek jerked forward, her long, blue fingers dancing across the controls. "Evasive maneuvers underway," she said in her calm, collected voice.

"Shit. Strap in, Zed," Elias ordered, doing the same.

Zed sank into an empty seat as the ship lurched sideways, sending his heart into his throat.

"Zzander Anatoliussss." Apparently he'd accessed more than one channel with his cuff again. His name buzzed through general comms and every wallet on the bridge.

Elias's eyes widened. "That's not…a human."

No, it sure the fuck wasn't. It was a stin.

The creature chuckled, a horrible, rasping sound. "Glory will be mine."

The sibilant hiss of a stin voice invaded the black space of Felix's stupor. His eyelids snapped open. Instead of the dark, dusty cave where he'd spent the bulk of his captivity, he saw the familiar riveted ceiling of the Chaos 's med bay. But when he tried to sit up, straps held him fast. Panic squeezed his chest, emptying his lungs.

Nessa came into view, her hand alighting on his bare chest. Felix drew a sliver of comfort from the reassuring warmth of her fingers. Then the Chaos lurched sideways—which shouldn't happen under normal maneuvers—and her nails scraped across his skin toward the strap. She grasped it and held on until the ship steadied.

"Sorry," she muttered, patting him again.

"Wha's going on?" His tongue still felt thick.

Theo appeared next to Nessa, his face all but obscured by six competing holoscreens. The stin voice issued from all open channels, growling and hissing.

Felix shuddered.

"We've got the Magdalene on our tail," Theo reported, not looking up from his displays. "She's firing on us."

"The Magdalene ?" Where the fuck had they come from, and since when was a pleasure cruiser armed? Felix fought the med bay restraints. The memory of pain shot down his left side, pulling a hiss from his lips. "If we're under fire, I need to get to the bridge."

Nessa patted his right shoulder, the gesture an ill-disguised nudge to get him to lie still. "You're not going anywhere."

"I should be helping Qek."

Zed's voice boomed through the open channel. "Identify yourself! "

A response came in the form of more guttural hissing.

Felix locked eyes with Theo. "That sounded like Stin. Why did that sound like Stin?" He'd woken to a nightmare. The stin and the cult couldn't possibly be in league—the cultists revered Zed. The stin obviously did not.

Shaking his head, Theo stabbed two of his displays in sequence. "I'm searching Hemera's records for the Magdalene . She never jumped back to Sol. But I have found the trip in through the gate, and her registration does include a small complement of weaponry for self-defense." He looked up. "The stin question, I have no answer for. Everything is quiet back at the convocation."

The Chaos banked sharply enough to send a shudder through the bulkheads. Elias's voice thundered through the comm. " How long would it take us to get to human space? "

Zed answered him. " We can't risk dragging a volatile situation anywhere near Hemera or our gate. Or the convocation. There's no telling how whoever's piloting the Magdalene might react to a number of targets."

"I think we are their only target," Qek said.

If he could move his new left hand, he could thumb the release on the straps. Growling, Felix tried to turn in that direction. His body refused to cooperate, and bucking against his restraints was wearing him out faster than he'd like. He flopped back. "Fuck."

"Fixer, you need to remain as still as possible or perhaps risk wasting every minute of the effort you just expended to grow that arm. You remember the arm, right?"

"Yeah, I remember the arm. I still can't fucking move it." He still loved it, though. Even with the Chaos 's engines pitched to a high whine and Theo and Nessa radiating fear and panic, he loved his shiny new arm. And he wanted to keep it, which was why?—

The Chaos lurched again, bulkheads groaning this time. With a cry, Nessa fell away from the side of the bed. Felix heard her sliding across the floor. Theo dropped out of sight with a curse and Felix listened helplessly as his companions rolled into one another. Before the Chaos leveled off, he heard a sharp thump and a quiet groan.

"Are you both okay?" he yelled.

Theo's head popped up over the end of the bed, holo displays warping and flashing off walls as he clawed his way upright.

"Nessa?"

Theo glanced down and disappeared from view. "She's out cold," he said. "Must have hit her head."

"You need to get to the bridge. Let me up and I'll take care of Nessa."

To his surprise, Theo stood up and thumbed the release.

With his help, Felix slid off the bed and onto the floor. His legs immediately buckled beneath him. His left arm jerked, though, as he tried to use it to catch himself. Another conscious attempt to move the new limb failed. He dropped down next to Nessa, who sat in a crumpled heap, head listing sideways. She had a lump the size of Alpha Station pushing through the hair across her forehead.

Felix flapped his good hand at Theo. "Go, before Qek tears the ship apart."

"We need to get Nessa secured."

"I'll look after Nessa." Carefully, Felix pulled Nessa against his chest, then eased her head down onto his lap. "Find me her wallet, the medical one. I need to scan her vitals." He peeled an eyelid back, mentally apologizing for scraping his thumb across her eyeball. Had her pupil contracted? It was supposed to contract, right?

Theo crouched beside him, holding out another wallet. The deck of the Chaos shuddered beneath them. "Theo, you need to get in the copilot's seat and help Qek evade whoever the fuck is out there shooting at us." The Chaos 's shielding could handle maybe one glancing shot. One. "She can thread the eye of the needle in j-space, but she relies too much on the computer in real space. She doesn't feel it, know what I mean? The intuitive adjustments. She's never raced a flyer through a canyon in the middle of an earthquake."

A brief smile visited Theo's lips. "Neither have you, if memory serves me correctly."

"But I could have, and so could you. We plotted it on Ditto, man. We could have done it. Go." Felix waved at the door. "And don't break my fucking ship."

Zed never thought he'd wish for zero-g on a ship. The maneuvers Qek was pulling to escape the Magdalene 's fire weren't easy to stomach with gravity engaged—it meant they all felt every dip, every turn, despite being strapped in. He hoped the resonance had followed his suggestion to secure themselves in Cargo One.

Elias examined the holo in front of him and tapped in a few coordinates. "Try that."

"Acknowledged." Qek's face was smooth as she changed their course. "Though I do not think our speed will be sufficient to evade the Magdalene . We need a distraction."

"Or fancier flying." Theo staggered onto the bridge. "No offense, Qek."

"None taken, Ambassador."

Zed glared at him. "You left Flick?"

"He insisted. I'm almost as good a real-space pilot as he is."

"Then I will happily cede the controls to you," Qek said, a single wrinkle appearing in the skin above her eyes.

Elias gave a decisive nod and unbuckled himself from the copilot's seat. "Do it." He and Theo quickly changed places, and Qek passed over the controls. Immediately, the difference in handling became apparent. Before, the Chaos had seemed to lumber and lurch—now she danced through space, smooth and silent.

Theo glanced at Elias. "Nessa's hurt. Not serious, we don't think…bump on her head. Felix was looking after her?—"

Elias's dark skin acquired a gray tinge. He glanced at Zed, and Zed nodded. "We're good. Go."

"Don't break my ship," Elias said over his shoulder as he raced out the door.

Theo snorted. "Felix said the same thing. With extra emphasis." He looked over at Zed. "Status update?"

"The stin at the helm of the Magdalene knows me, but I don't know him."

"We heard. How the hell did a stin get control of her?"

"Your guess is as good as mine." Were the cultists still on board? Were they alive? And why had the stin grabbed this particular craft?

"We have more ships on sensors."

Zed's head snapped around to regard Qek. "What? More?"

"Stin vessels." Qek clicked, the sound slow and worried. Her face smoothed out again. "We are being hailed."

Shit. Zed resisted the urge to rub his temple and nodded. "Put it through."

" Chaos , this is Ambassador Krenikk. We have been monitoring your trajectory and communications."

Fantastic. Were they getting too close to the stin side of neutral space? Zed cast a glance at Qek, who clicked in bafflement.

"The individual who has commandeered the human vessel Magdalene is Warlord Grugguk. His ship, the Hrakkahr , was discovered in our home system without her captain. Hiding," Krenikk sneered. "His crew has been…most forthcoming."

Zed would just bet they were. He didn't want to imagine the techniques the stin might use to encourage honesty.

"His actions have been disavowed by the High Chancellor. We stand ready…to provide assistance." The tone on that bit was clear enough. Krenikk was not pleased with the idea of assisting humans, no matter what his government said.

So zero rescue from that quarter—the ambassador would probably wait until the last second to intervene and just say oops when the Chaos ended up in a million pieces.

"Thank you for the support, Ambassador," Zed said—though he really wanted to say thanks for nothing. "How did he get the Magdalene ?"

"We have not yet discovered why he targeted that particular vessel, but it is clear it was a planned appropriation." Krenikk paused, a soft hiss reverberating across the line. "Grugguk was one of the commanders of the raid against the human colony Vorean."

"The source of tri-hex," Theo muttered.

Zed's Guardian cuff tingled just before stin laughter filled the bridge. "It took you long enough to realize that, Krenikk."

"Because no one thought you would be so stupid, Warlord."

"Warlord," Grugguk scoffed. "We have no more warlords, because we have no war! We allowed the Guardians to neuter us when we could have assured our superiority in the galaxy. We had the humans at our mercy, Krenikk. You know this as well as I do."

Krenikk hummed, but did not offer a denial.

"War is what makes us strong," Grugguk continued. " War is what makes us rise above the rest of these pitiful creatures. But the High Chancellor bared his throat to the Guardians and here we are. Subservient."

"You insult all stin, Grugguk."

"No. I am going to bring us back to glory!"

"By killing your compatriots?"

"They were no compatriots of mine! Ryrrk was weak. A fool." Hisses and hums filled the line. "Stand with me, Krenikk."

"War benefits none of us," Zed growled into his cuff. "The Guardians?—"

"The Guardians will be too busy mourning their pet!"

"Oh shit." Theo's hands flew over the holo interface and the Chaos dipped and swerved. Zed held onto the arms of the chair, his knuckles bloodless, and waited for Theo to straighten the ship out again.

It didn't happen.

"Goddamn—how much fucking ammo does he have?" Theo muttered between gritted teeth.

"The Magdalene is thirty kilometers to our aft," Qek reported. "Twenty-five. Trajectory is changing. Now they are twenty kilometers to our aft at a thirty-five degree angle?—"

"I see them," Theo growled. The Chaos danced some more—up, down, sideways. "Zed, we're not going to be able to outrun him."

Fuck. Zed swiped at the comm line they had open with the stin ambassador. "Krenikk, can you manage a disabling shot?—"

Krenikk buzzed. "No," he snapped, as though the thought of trying to limit himself to a strike that would damage but not destroy was an insult. "We cannot assure accurate targeting from this range, Emissary. Though if you like, we could certainly try."

"The Magdalene 's crew might still be on board, so no. Thank you." Zed closed the channel. "Asshole," he muttered, turning to Qek. "Can you get anything else out of the engines?"

She clicked. "If Fixer were available?—"

"Yeah, but he isn't." Even if Flick could get his new arm working, Zed doubted he could see straight, with the amount of effort the whole process had taken. The fact that he was down in the med bay, not resting but looking after Nessa, was something Zed was trying hard not to think about.

"We need a plan!" Theo said, his hands flying over the controls so quickly they were a blur.

The regular comm crackled.

"Redeemer, it's me. Lucas Wystan." The young man's voice shook. "You have to save us. Please."