Now, it was time for me to go.
I exited the captain’s quarters and stepped out into the hallway. The ship went dark.
“Mayport, switch to auxiliary power.”
I got no response. The Rockhurst soldiers had taken out the lights and ship’s computer, but left the life-support systems, including gravity. And they did it in less than a minute. If they had some sort of plug-in override, that would almost be worth risking certain death to retrieve.
Sometimes even I couldn’t outrun my von Hasenberg genes.
Shouts erupted from the hall that led to the crew quarters as the mercs tried to figure out what was going on. I needed to move before they decided to come this way, but I was frozen in the dark.
Luminescent eyes glinted in my memory.
I headed to the holding cells, counting doors and following the schematic in my head. Once I reached what I hoped was the right door, I fumbled until I found the manual release.
“Loch?”
“Been having fun, darling?” his voice rumbled from the dark.
“A squad of eight Rockhurst soldiers just took out the captain and the power. A Rockhurst battle cruiser is pacing us off our starboard side. I’ll pay you a hundred thousand credits to get me safely to a planet or station with an interstellar port and let me go. You can have the escape ship after that. I’ve already unlocked it, but the mercs might have the same plan at this point. You have five seconds to decide.”
I was met with silence. “Marcus?”
“What are you waiting for?” he said from directly in front of me.
I froze as he lifted one of the rifles from my shoulder and pulled a pair of knives out of my pocket. Holy shit, he was loose, and I couldn’t see a thing. How had he gotten out of the chains?
I fell back on my training. “So we have a deal?” I asked coolly.
“Yeah, we have a deal. Wait here,” he said, pushing me just inside the cell. “If you see anyone, shoot them.”
I laughed quietly. “I can’t see shit,” I admitted.
“I know. But I won’t be carrying a light, so if anyone is, shoot first, ask questions later. I’ll be back in three.”
I didn’t hear him leave, but I had the sense that he was gone. I pulled the pistol from the holster and flicked off the safety, grateful, for once, that my unconventional childhood had included weapons classes. I wasn’t a sniper by any measure, but if someone came down the narrow hallway with a light, I’d have good odds of hitting them somewhere fatal.
Time stretched thin. Distant yells and blaster discharges echoed strangely through the ship. The docking bay was past the crew quarters. So was the escape ship. The overhead access tunnels would get us close, but the firewall between the bays and the rest of the ship meant we’d have to go through one of two main hallway hatches to reach the escape ship.
I began to wonder if Loch had left me behind. The credits I’d offered him were a fortune by any standard, but if he’d decided I’d slow him down, he could’ve realized that being alive was better than being rich.
A boot scuffed on the floor from the direction of the crew quarters. My heart sped up. Whoever it was didn’t have a light, but Loch had not made a sound either time he moved. And I was loaded down with items that would make noise the second I shifted a centimeter. I barely breathed.
“Where are you, you little bitch?” a female voice whispered from just down the hall. If she had night vision, I was so screwed. The air shifted in front of me and a hand or arm brushed against the doorway.
“Ah—” Her quiet exclamation was cut short on a wet gurgle, followed by a soft thump a little farther down the hall to my left.
“Don’t shoot,” Loch whispered. “It’s me.”
I reengaged the safety and holstered the pistol. “About time,” I hissed.
“Ah, sweetheart, did you think I’d leave without you?”
I didn’t bother to confirm what he already knew. I tried not to think about the woman’s body just down the hall. It turned out the darkness was good for one thing, at least.
“I couldn’t find you any goggles, so you’ll just have to trust me and follow my lead. The soldiers have three mercs pinned down in the mess hall, and for the moment they’re at a standoff. We’ll have to take the access tunnels to come down behind them.”
I was not looking forward to crawling through the access tunnels in the dark. Even with lights they were claustrophobic. In the dark, one wrong turn could mean endless hours spent finding the correct path again. But the other option was a much longer route through potentially locked-down maintenance areas, so I swallowed my fear and focused on the next problem. “I need to rearrange my gear. I jingle loud enough for them to hear on the Santa Celestia,” I said.
Before I could protest, Loch rifled through my pockets, rearranging knives and ammo to his liking. It was quick and professional—his hands didn’t stray. My pockets felt lighter and I wondered if I’d been left with any weapons. I checked my holster; I still had my pistol.
Loch must’ve been watching me. “You have your pistol and a knife in each back pocket. Your side pockets each contain an extra energy cartridge. I have both rifles and most of the rest. Good job, by the way. You’ll have to tell me how you managed to raid the captain’s private stash—nothing else worth having on this heap.”
“I knew Captain Rockhurst wasn’t coming over for tea,” I said. “I thought it best to be prepared.”
He chuckled and the sound wrapped around me in the dark. “How well do you know this ship’s layout?”
“I found you in the dark,” I said. “As long as the access tunnels still match the reference schematics, I know where to go.”
“Good, you lead. The ladder is just in front of you and the hatch is open. But if I say, ‘down,’ you flatten yourself to the deck, no questions, understand? And wait once we get to the other side. I’ll go down first. If you can lead us to the farther hatch, that would be better.”
“I’ll see what I can do,” I muttered. I stepped forward with my arms out until I found the promised ladder. I mentally pulled up the schematic for this ship. This tunnel should lead back over the cell we were in for fifteen meters or so, then it would branch left and right. The left branch would take us over the crew quarters. The right branch led deeper into maintenance areas and then, after a few more turns, to the second bay access door.
“I’m right behind you,” Loch said as I hesitated.
I wasn’t sure if that was supposed to be comforting or intimidating.
Chapter 4
With nothing but the map in my head, I crawled through the dark, cramped tunnels until I was sure I was lost. When Loch hissed, “Down,” behind me, I flattened to the floor. I didn’t know what he saw, but since I saw nothing, I deferred to his judgment.
He crawled up beside me, though he was mostly over me in the small space. “There’s an open panel ahead,” he whispered in my ear. “Is this our exit?”
This wasn’t the first open panel we’d encountered. So far, we’d been able to cross them without incident, though not without a lot of unflattering flailing and wiggling on my part. I thought about our route. We should’ve dead-ended into the firewall. “Does the tunnel go left and right, but not straight?” I whispered back.
“Yes.”
Hallelujah. I’d somehow managed to find the exact exit I was looking for. “This is it. You’ll drop into a hallway that runs left and right, same as the tunnel above it. The hatch into the docking bay and escape ship bay will be directly in front of you. There’s no cover in any direction.”
“Stay put, and I mean it,” Loch whispered. “We have a deal, and I don’t want my payday getting shot. But be ready to haul ass.”