Pursue the Past: Samair in Argos: Book 1 (56 page)

              “Oh, please, Tamara.  It’s me you’re talking to here.  You’re not hiding this.  Something is going on in that gorgeous head of yours and now you’re going to tell me all about it.”

              “Don’t flirt with me, Cookie,” she said, looking down at the plate.

              “You are in my mess hall, I will flirt with whoever I please,” the chef replied, taking another sip of coffee.  “And since I’ve met you, I can tell just by looking that you haven’t been sleeping well.  That and the fact that you suck down coffee as though you need it to keep your heart beating.”

              “Let it go, Cookie,” she warned.

              “No, Tamara, I won’t,” he said, looking at her straight on.  “Look at me.”  She brought her chin up, but her face was stormy.  “Something is going on, Tamara.  You’re not sleeping and I hear that you’re not the most pleasant person to be around.”

              “We can’t all be bubbling cauldrons of joy, Cookie,” she pointed out, a bit sourly.  She increased the pace of the eating, something her companion noticed immediately.

              “Tamara, please.  I want to help.”

              She finished her omelet and gulped the rest of the coffee.  Setting her fork down, she looked up at him.  “All right, Cookie.  You want to help me?  Fine.  Let me show you what it is that I dream about almost every night.”  Clearly, this conversation was burning away her good mood.  She stood.  “Come on.  I don’t want to do this in public.”

              He blinked, but stood up and followed her out of the mess hall, with a nod to one of his fellows.  They would have to muddle along without him.  He wasn’t worried.  They had in fact worked the breakfast shift many times without his oversight and assistance; they’d be fine.  He hoped Tamara wasn’t going to do anything drastic, though her demeanor made that a forlorn hope.

              They arrived at the lounge where she gestured him to sit down on one of the couches.  He sat on one of the arms of the couch, while she moved to the door, closing it behind them.  “Closing the door…” he said in a pensive tone.

              Tamara glared at him.  “Do you want to see or not?” she snapped.

              Cookie held up his hands in surrender.  “I’m here, aren’t I?  I’m sorry.”

              The fierceness went down a notch and she turned to the monitor closest to the couch.  Pressing her thumb to the control panel, the display immediately lit up and then a video began to play.  “Don’t talk,” she ordered.  “Just watch.”

              Cookie nodded and focused on the display.  It was a first-person video, as though someone had a camera attached to their head.  The camera panned over from a shuttlecraft which was parked in some sort of hangar bay as a man’s voice spoke.  “
I don’t think so bitch.
”

             
“Took you long enough
,” a woman’s voice – Tamara’s voice – replied.  The camera panned to the man’s face and then down to the gun in his hand.  “
I could scream.
”

              “
You could
,” the man answered, amusement in his voice.  “
Then I’d shoot you and say that the gun went off accidently.  A misfire.  And of course you were trying to escape, so I’d be a hero and you’d be dead.
”  Cookie shuddered at the pure malice in his eyes and his tone.

              The scene continued, as the man led Tamara through the corridors of what looked like either a station or a ship, until they arrived at the hatch of an escape pod.  “
An escape pod?
” she demanded, whirling around.  “
I’m not getting in there.
”

              The man just smiled.  “
Yes, you are.
”  The man sounded sure of that.  “
You can either get in there on your own.  Or,
” he lowered the gun, but still pointed it at her, “
I can put a round in your thigh and then you can get in there.
”

              Cookie was getting a sick feeling in his stomach.  But it wasn’t over yet.  He could hear Tamara’s breathing getting more panicked and labored.  Her voice shook.  “
I will… not… get in that escape pod.
”

              The man didn’t even reply, just kept that grin on his face and fired.  Tamara screamed and collapsed.  “
You bastard!
”

              “
I did warn you,
” the man told her.  He tossed her his belt.  “
Tie this around the wound like a tourniquet.  It’s not going to take long before you bleed out.
”  Gasping, Tamara stuffed a rag on each side of the wound, then put the belt around the wound and pulled it tight, cinching it up.  Blood had pumped from the wound, but it had slowed considerably once she put on the belt.  “
Now, get up off your whining ass and get inside the pod.
” 

              Cookie found he couldn’t pull his attention away from the display.  It was intense.  Tamara’s hands pulled the camera forward and she slithered more than crawled inside the escape pod.  It was agonizing to watch, especially accompanied by Tamara’s whimpers and moans of agony as she pulled herself along.  She stopped right at the edge of the hatch and looked back at her assailant.  “
Get inside, bitch
,” he told her.  Then he shoved her inside and the camera crashed inside, as the video came to a stop with her facing the outside porthole. 

              “
No, no, no!
” she shouted.  An instant later, he started firing.  Bullets hit the inside of the pod, ricocheting off the inner panels, off the electronics.  Cookie could see that she had curled into a ball, screaming in terror.  Suddenly the picture disappeared as what looked like the lens was covered.  He was confused.  Was she wearing a camera?  Had the man damaged its visual capabilities with his gunfire?   Eventually the fusillade of bullets ended but the inside of the pod was wrecked.  Most of the panels were dark, coils of smoke came out of them.

              The camera came back on as Tamara pointed it back toward the hatch.  It swung closed and sealed.  A few seconds later, there was a loud
clunk
of the magclamps disengaging and then video wobbled, as though there was a sudden burst of acceleration, as presumably the pod launched. 

              The video stopped and the display turned off.  Tamara removed her hand from the controls.  “
That
is what I see every night when I close my eyes.  That bastard, tossing me out into the void, hoping I would either bleed to death or suffocate when the pod’s life support failed.”  Her voice came out in a strangled growl, as though it was a sheer effort to get the words past her throat.

              The chef found he was wringing his hands in his lap and stopped himself.  He tried to speak, but his throat had gone dry.  He cleared his throat.  He started to speak, then reconsidered and tried something else.  “Who is that man?”

              Tamara blinked, not expecting that from him.  She must have expected some sort of useless platitude or apology or some sort of expression of sympathy.  “That creature is Lieutenant Oliver Islington, one of my subordinate officers at my last posting.  He and our superior officer, Captain Horace Bythe had been skimming funds and cargoes for months and then framed me.  The video you saw was a recording from my implants when Islington caught me trying to escape the brig.”  She let out a long breath and turned away from Cookie, staring at the door.  “He and Bythe decided that instead of just murdering me, it would be best if I were to just disappear in the battle that was going on at the time.  You found my pod drifting after that.  I got the hibernation system active just as the air was growing toxic.”  She sighed.  “You know the rest.”

              Cookie blinked.  “It didn’t look like you could have done anything except get shot, Tamara.”

              “I didn’t even try,” she barked.  “I just let that worm lead me right to the pod and throw me in.”

              “So what’s the alternative?” he asked.  “You fight him, he kills you, then what? 
Grania Estelle
dies a very slow death in orbit of Instow.”  She glanced over at him out of the corner of her eye.  “From what I saw, I don’t think he had any qualms about killing you.  In fact, I think he was hoping you’d try something so he could just blow you away and be done with you.”

              “I never really thought of it that way,” Tamara whispered.  “But it never stops.  I think last night was the first in a very long time that I haven’t dreamed about him.  He’s always there when I close my eyes.”

              “He’s also dead now, Tamara,” Cookie pointed out.  “He looked human, so I doubt he’s alive two hundred and fifty years later.”

              “You’re right, he
is
probably gone,” she grated.  “But he’s always going to be there.”

              “Is it the violence?  Is it that he tried to kill you?  Was
going
to kill you?”  Cookie stood up.  “Because he didn’t.  You got the pod working and then we picked you up.”

              “I don’t know,” she said, throwing her hands in the air and pacing the length of the room.

              He shook his head.  “I don’t think it was the violence.  Because I heard about what you did when we got boarded by those pirates.  Oh, I’m sure you were scared, but you soldiered on.  That pirate tried to rape and kill you and you took care of him.  And even after that, you still were Janie-on-the-spot helping Corajen and the others to fight them off within the ship and the boat bay.”

              “I saw him there,” she said quietly.  “In the cargo bay.  I thought that pirate that attacked me was Islington.  My implants were telling me he wasn’t, but I was
convinced
that he was.”

              “Have you seen him since then?”

              She shook her head.  “Only in my dreams after that.”  She grimaced.  “That sounds a lot more romantic than it is.”

              He managed a small smile.  “I can see that.  But it wasn’t him.  In the cargo bay, I mean.”

              “Of course not,” she said, continuing to pace.  “I know that now.  But at the time, it was just so… real.  And shortly after that the nightmares started.”

              “But he didn’t kill you, Tamara,” he told her. 

              “But for a twist of fate, he would have,” she replied bitterly.

              “That’s bullshit,” Cookie countered, closing the distance between them and stepping in front of her.  “He shot you and threw you in that pod, damaged it badly enough that you would be dead in a matter of hours.  But he
didn’t
kill you.  You, struggling with a serious leg wound, managed to repair the pod enough and then you slept.  You survived, Tamara.  You beat him.”

              “I beat him?” she asked dully.  “My whole life was gone.”

              He reached over and grabbed her wrist.  Pressing his thumb against it, he spoke.  “Still feeling a pulse.  So I guess your
whole
life wasn’t gone.  You beat him,” Cookie repeated, then released her hand.

              Tamara leaned over and took his hand in both of hers.  “Thank you, Raoul.”

              He looked away, embarrassed, but he didn’t pull away.  “You’re being too hard on yourself.  He didn’t kill you.  He failed.”

              She squeezed his calloused hand and he gave a gentle squeeze back.  “He did fail,” she replied, her voice soft.  “Thank you again.”

              He gave a sardonic smile and snorted.  “I just did what anyone else would do.”

              Tamara let his hand go, but a very small smile touched the corners of her lips.  “No, Raoul, they wouldn’t.  Not many.” 

              He shrugged.  “Come on.  I’ve got to get back to the galley before those boys burn everything.”

              Tamara nodded, grinning now.  “Can’t have that.  The crew would mutiny.”

              “Are you free for a drink later?” he asked, greatly daring.

              She laughed.  “You’re buying.”

              Two days later, Tamara was summoned to the Captain’s stateroom for some sort of meeting.  The last two days had been an interesting time for her.  She had been assisting Ka’Xarian and a few others on building a third shuttle, and also working on a few maintenance issues on deck three.  At night, she’d been spending time with Cookie.  She got a few looks from various members of the crew, but she didn’t care.  They would spend time in the lounges, having a few beers, watching vids on the displays, they even had rather heated arguments over the virtues of saffron being added as a spice.  They hadn’t gotten together in any private way but that didn’t stop the crew from hiding smiles and leering at them.  And she didn’t care. 

              She arrived at the Captain’s stateroom hatch and pressed the buzzer.  “Come in,” his voice came over the intercom.  Grabbing the handle, she pushed the hatch open and stepped inside.

              The Captain was seated on the edge of his bed, a datapad in one hand, a mug of coffee within easy reach on the nearby nightstand.  He looked up as she entered and stood.  Tamara nodded to him, and then saw that someone else was in the stateroom as well.  Corajen was seated at the Captain’s small table, her tail wrapped around her waist, as the chair was designed for humans, not for lupusan tails.