Relaunch Mission Page 3

  Not Lindy.

  Fifteen years was a long time and the war had left no one untouched, but Gabriel couldn’t envision Lindana informing on her own crew. Nor Tomas, for that matter, though his freshly mended nose twinged in pain at the thought of the man. The Nyotas would do anything to protect their ship—it was their sole source of livelihood.

  No, there was a traitor in Lindana’s ranks, and Gabriel couldn’t warn her about it.

  * * *

  “Okay, boss. Spill.”

  Ryder studied her across the booth’s dented table. His burly frame barely fit in the seat opposite from Lindana and Tomas; space was at a premium on stations like Tortue, and the pub’s owner made every square inch count. The result was cramped, loud and reeked of cheap booze and sweaty, unwashed spacers. Tomas kept elbowing Lindana in her ribs, but she was too upset to protest.

  Lindana pounded a shot of rotgut whiskey that burned a ragged path down her throat. She was grateful for the pub’s dim lighting. Supposedly the darkness was meant to create a casual atmosphere and not to hide suspicious activities—or stains on the floor—but Lindana also suspected that the poor lighting kept the power bills manageable.

  “Are you sure you want to tell him about this?” Tomas asked. “It’s kind of a girl talk thing, isn’t it?” Ever the protective big brother. Lindana patted Tomas’s shoulder.

  “Heartbreak is universal and has no gender.” Lindana fed another credit into the table’s draft system and the spout spat amber liquid into her empty glass. She swirled the drink and frowned at it. Was that a bug? There weren’t bugs on space stations, were there? Hmm. Someone could’ve brought them in with an organic cargo like foodstuffs...

  Tomas shifted beside her and fidgeted with his bottle of cola. He had been sober for nearly five years now. Serving in the military during the war had cost Tomas his sanity for a time, and nearly his life. If Ryder hadn’t contacted Lindana when he did... She slugged down another slap of whiskey.

  “Do I need to take care of this Steele character?” Ryder asked. “Because I can, just say the word. I know a guy who works Tortue sanitation who can help disappear the body.”

  “Tempting, but no. I don’t want him dead, per se. Just suffering. Maybe a swift kick in the nuts.”

  Tomas and Ryder shuddered in unison. “Geez, Lindana,” Tomas said, “death would be kinder. Though if you want him surgically gelded, I could do that. There’s probably a market for eunuchs somewhere on the edge.”

  Lindana swallowed the reply that she wanted Gabriel’s heart cut out and not his balls chopped off. She sighed. There was no point in wishing him ill. It wouldn’t change anything; no amount of cursing his name had eased the pain Gabriel Steele left in his wake. Seeing him again, especially without warning, had ripped open every old emotional scar, but she would manage. Her head was bloody but unbowed.

  “I met Gabriel during my senior year at the Academy. It was...like a fairy tale, I guess. He was wealthy and handsome and completely swept me off my feet. I’d never met anyone like him before. Or at least not anyone like him who was polite to me. Most wealthy people...”

  “They don’t see you.” Ryder nodded in sympathy. “It’s like they look through you, or past you. Like you’re part of the scenery. Or worse, like you’re something in a zoo. My home town got a lot of tourists looking for local culture.” Ryder rolled his eyes.

  “Or someone to save. We had missionaries set on saving our souls.” Lindana snorted. “We grew up poor, on Earth.”

  Ryder nodded—according to his personnel file he’d grown up in similar conditions, though on the other side of the planet. Lindana and Tomas were Kenyan, but Ryder was mainly Maori with a dash of Hawaiian.

  “The Alliance navy was our way out. We both tested in the top five percent on the entrance exams so they paid for everything. Housing, schooling. It was like winning the lottery... Anyway, I thought Gabriel loved me. He didn’t.” Lindana rubbed her face as though trying to scrub the memories from her mind. “I was young and stupid. I’d never been in love before. I’d barely dated.”

  Tomas refilled his cola. “Good thing you don’t have a love life. You obviously have crap taste.”

  Lindana barked a watery laugh. “Thanks.”

  Ryder frowned, his dark brow furrowed like a disapproving mountain. “This man deflowered you?”

  She blinked at the delicate word being used by a muscled, tattooed giant with flowing dreadlocks.

  “Yeah,” Tomas answered for her.

  “Hey, I’m not a Victorian heroine in a white lace nightgown. I was a virgin before I met him, then I wasn’t one. You don’t refer to your first time as a deflowering, do you?” Lindana quirked a brow, and Ryder chuckled.

  “More like a comedy of errors. Sex on the beach is not as romantic as you’d think. I had sand everywhere, and I do mean everywhere.”

  Tomas winced. “Ouch.”

  Lindana traced her finger around the rim of her glass and it whined in protest. “He promised me all sorts of happily-ever-after fluff and nonsense to get me into bed, but it was all lies. He’d strung me along for some sick bet with his rich friends. They counted how many Earth girls they could bang before graduation, because apparently core colony girls are for marrying, but Earthers are for fucking.”

  “Assholes.” Ryder scowled. “I hate core colonists. Selfish pricks all got sticks up their asses.”

  “Don’t let Jiang hear you say that,” Tomas warned.

  Ryder shrugged and looked away. “She’s different, she wouldn’t care. She’d probably agree with me.”

  True enough. Jiang’s home world had been a Soviet colony before the rebellion, but now it was part of the Core Colony Collective—or at least what was left of it. Jiang had lost everything when New Hong Kong was razed. Gabriel’s home world was one of the founding core colonies and had weathered the war fairly well, which begged the question of why he was serving Alliance intelligence instead of the C3.

  “I can’t work with him,” Lindana said. “Even if you ignore our personal history, which would be damn hard, I can’t have an intel officer I don’t trust.”

  “Yeah,” Ryder agreed. “They’re usually lying bastards, but they’re supposed to lie to the enemy, not to us. I’m not sure I’d trust him on the Mama Mo. He’s too damn pretty. The engine rats would swoon over him, and there’d be chaos.”

  “I’m sorry, did you just use swoon and deflower in the same conversation?” Tomas asked. “You have unexpected depth.”

  “I’m a mystery, wrapped in an enigma,” Ryder said, and Lindana laughed.

  “And pretty? Really?” Tomas shook his head.

  “What? I like pretty men.” Ryder shrugged. “But there’s a line. It’s never good to date someone hotter than you, of any gender.”

  “Am I pretty?” Tomas asked.

  “Hell, no. You’ve got a face like a Rottweiler.”

  “I’ve always thought it was more like a horse’s ass,” Lindana teased. “Well that’s three officers in agreement that we’re not accepting Lieutenant Steele. I’m going back to the ship. I’ll send a message to Command that we need a new officer.” She tossed her empty glass into the receptacle and nudged Tomas out of the way. “Don’t let Ryder drink too much.”

  Tomas grinned. “I’m not sure that’s physically possible.”

  “Anything’s possible,” Ryder said.

  Lindana’s smile faded as she walked away. She’d believed that once—that anything was possible, and an orphan from the streets of Mombasa could marry a handsome prince from the core colonies. Now she knew better. Wishing for happiness was a waste of time. If you wanted something done, you damn well did it yourself.

  * * *

  The ship was quiet while docked, with only the whisper of the ventilation systems and the slight buzz of the lights as they flicked on
and off around her. A skeleton crew remained on board to monitor the Mombasa’s systems, and Lindana’s footsteps echoed through the empty corridors. Lindana hated the quiet. The absence of life and noise made the ship feel like a cramped metal tomb, haunted by the ghosts of crew members killed in the line of duty. It didn’t happen often, but it happened.

  Like Erik. Lindana’s stomach twisted and rolled. God, she missed him. Even now she still caught stray thoughts of I should ask Erik about that, only to be reminded again that she wouldn’t be receiving any more advice from her mentor. Erik had been the glue that held the Mombasa’s crew together. Lindana could never trust the lives of her people with a lying bastard like Gabriel Steele. People were pawns to him. She had been nothing more to him than points scored in a sick game. She refused to work with anyone who valued lives so cheaply.

  Her comm beeped and she tapped her earpiece. “Go for Captain.”

  “Cap?” Maria said. “We have a problem.”

  Lindana sighed and leaned against the bulkhead. Cold seeped through the shoulders of her uniform jacket and she shivered. “Is it a cheap problem?”

  “Is it ever?”

  No. Lindana grimaced. “Spit it out, Chief Watson.”

  “The Tortue mechanic has only one coupling left that is compatible with Mama Mo. And he’s charging an arm and a leg for it because he knows he’s got us over a barrel. And he is clearly an asshole.” Maria’s voice rose with her temper, no doubt making sure that the mechanic in question overheard her opinion of him.

  “How much is it?” Lindana asked. Maria named a number, and Lindana banged her head against the wall. “Right. Have him put it on our tab.”

  “That’s the problem. He wants it in cash, up front.”

  The whiskey that sloshed in Lindana’s gut roiled and threatened to make a return appearance. They didn’t have that much cash on hand. She’d have to liquidate...something. Damn it all. Word spread fast on a deep space station. By the time she liberated an item from the Mombasa’s storage to sell at the market, the vendor would know she was desperate and offer her a shitty price for it. If there was even anything left in their coffers that would cover that tab.

  What they needed was a nice, juicy job with a fat deposit, but no intel officer meant no jobs.

  “We don’t have it,” Lindana said. “We’ll work on it. Maybe you can barter with one of the other ships in dock. The Quebec is the same model as Mama Mo.”

  “Yeah, but their engineer is even more annoying than your brother. The rats don’t like him.”

  “They don’t have to like him, just barter with him. Come home when you’re ready. Captain out.”

  “But what about the new int—” Maria started, but Lindana cut the call. She was in no mood to retell the tale of Gabriel Steele.

  Jiang remained at her station in the cockpit, as reliable as the Rock of Gibraltar. Lindana set offerings of tea and cookies in front of her pilot and plopped into the seat beside her.

  “You’re back early,” Jiang said.

  “Everything went to hell.” Lindana stared out into the black beyond the cockpit. Not much to see from this angle, just the void of empty space. “Turns out I have history with the new intel officer.”

  Jiang quirked a brow. “Personal history?”

  Lindana nodded. “Tomas punched him in the face.”

  Jiang blinked. She was motionless for a moment, then she opened the tin of shortbread and offered Lindana a cookie.

  “Thanks.” Lindana smiled weakly and took the pale, sugared twist, turning it over with her fingers until they were sticky. She was afraid to eat it, worried that it would disagree with her already sensitive stomach, but she couldn’t refuse a gift.

  “This is the one?” Jiang asked. Lindana frowned. “The lover who taught you not to trust?”

  Lindana nodded slowly. Brutal but accurate. “Never thought I’d see him again. It’s been... God, fifteen years. When did I get so old?”

  “Don’t make me shoot you,” Jiang warned. She was turning forty this year, though it was hard to tell. Jiang’s unflappable calm made her seem almost ageless. “It’s been fifteen years for him, too. He must have changed in that time.”

  “More likely he’s finally hit rock bottom. Gabriel must’ve royally fucked up to be banished out here. He’s from a New Britain founding family. His father could buy a fleet of Mombasas. No idea what he’s doing working for UADN instead of the C3.”

  “You’re sure he’s a no-go?” Jiang asked.

  “Positive. Can’t have an officer I don’t trust.”

  “Trust is earned. It’s been fifteen years. He may have learned his lesson. You could put him on probation until you’re certain he won’t work out.”

  “I can barely stand looking at him, even on a probationary basis. This is my damn ship, and I don’t want him on it.”

  God, she sounded petty, like a scorned woman—which she was—but damn it, Command wasn’t going to torture her this way. They’d already done enough to her family with the way they’d mishandled Tomas’s illness. When the C3 left they took their resources with them, which hobbled the economies of their former nations. The UADN thanked the veterans who had fought for them by cutting their benefits and leaving them high and dry, especially ones like Tomas who had seen the worst of the war and cracked under the relentless pressure. Cheaper to abandon them than to treat them.

  “Better call Command now,” Jiang said. “It’ll take at least a week to get a replacement shipped out.”

  “Well, we’ve got the time. We’re grounded until we scrounge the funding for the power coupling Maria needs.”

  “Can we afford to wait?”

  “A week won’t matter.”

  “Are you sure?”

  Lindana paused in her harassment of the shortbread cookie. Every day without work sucked away their meager savings. The hold was nearly empty—they had a few things to barter. It wouldn’t buy power couplings, but it would keep the ship running for now.

  “We’ll manage,” Lindana said. “I’ll ask Tomas to freelance for the next few days. Station med centers can always use a few extra hands.”

  “Good idea.”

  Lindana rose. “Well, I’m off to make that call.”

  Chapter Three

  REQUEST DENIED.

  Lindana gaped at the message, then unleashed a string of expletives in Swahili so blistering that the screen should have melted. Instead it remained intact, and the text continued to mock her pain with its emotionless font.

  How could those bastards deny her request? After all she had done for them? Her military service record had been fucking spotless, shining with commendations and praise. So what if her last few missions had tanked? Besides, it wasn’t like there was a shortage of operatives—Intel was the largest UADN agency, and had been since before the war. There had to be a qualified replacement reasonably close by. She ought to sue them for the emotional distress she had been in for the past three days. Gabriel Steele was somewhere on Tortue Station, and Lindana was a virtual prisoner, trapped aboard her ship, avoiding him.

  “I guess that means no.” Tomas stood in the doorway of her quarters, watching her warily.

  Lindana waved him in before anyone else in the corridor heard her tirade. “Yeah.” She tossed her data tablet to him, and he perused the message. “They threatened to pull our marque if we don’t take him.”

  Tomas scowled. “That’s dirty pool.”

  “I know!” She scrubbed her eyes. She was so damn tired, but despite her exhaustion she hadn’t been able to sleep. Lindana had tossed and turned in her bunk until the sheets were tangled around her like a boa constrictor, and her sleep was haunted by nightmares where she screamed all the things she’d wanted to say to Gabriel but hadn’t. There hadn’t seemed a point to it at the time—nothing would have
eased the pain of his betrayal, and she hadn’t meant a damn thing to him. Eventually she’d found the strength to move on, and was better for it.

  She never thought she’d see him again, much less have to work with the asshole. What the hell was wrong with Command?

  “We could go back to trading.” Tomas sat beside her on her bunk and handed her the tablet. “Take on passengers. Freight.”

  Lindana wrinkled her nose. “That didn’t work before. Our situation hasn’t improved enough that it would work now.”

  “We understand the business better now,” he pointed out. “The good trade routes, the locations with reliable contacts.”

  When they first purchased the Mombasa five years ago it had been a trade ship, and they’d transported supplies to struggling young colonies. But after two years of honest work their skyrocketing debts had forced them to accept that there was little profit in foodstuffs and farm equipment. Privateering had solved that—more or less. It was state-sanctioned piracy, for a good cause. The C3 rebellion had left the UADN navy spread thin, and to compensate they granted letters of marque to privateer ships like the Mombasa to patrol the borders, raid ships of interest and provide backup in the occasional territory skirmish. Privateers played a vital role in strengthening the UADN while weakening the USSR and the C3.

  “We’re not specced for basic trade anymore. Freighters don’t need cannons.”

  “We could go full pirate. New Nairobi loves us, so we have a consistent home port. We’d make it work.” Tomas grinned, but it was an empty smile.

  “No. They’re still getting the colony off the ground. They don’t need that kind of trouble.”

  New Nairobi had become a haven of sorts for the Mombasa’s crew—the closest thing to a dirtside home that Tomas and Lindana had known since they left Earth. The Kenyan colonists felt like family, and Lindana refused to jeopardize that. Lindana was still a naval officer at heart, as though the importance of duty had been tattooed onto her very soul. She remembered the position of each component of her station from her first UADN assignment, and even now she would bolt from a sound sleep reaching for that control panel as though it was a part of her. Piracy was vicious and too violent. Most ships that they boarded understood that the Mombasa was a privateer, after goods and not blood, and the crews surrendered after only a token resistance. But they fought like hell against pirates, who often spaced the crew or sold them into slavery on colonies too desperate for labor to care about the legality of the subject.