Star Brigade: Odysseys - An Anthology (12 page)

Ella stared down at the fallen beast, looking so frail and pathetic. She had lost count of how many times she’d dodged death since taking up the bounty hunter trade. Still, Ella couldn’t stop trembling. Whatever weird psychic shit that creature did to her…she had never felt so utterly hopeless in her life. So naturally, Ella covered by lashing out. “Took your little ass long enough.”

Jaellyn shrugged and kneeled next to the osvowraith. “Wouldn’t have been an issue if you stuck to the plan.” The Tarkathian pulled a glob of greyish goo out of her left boot pocket and slapped it over the osvowraith’s mouth. Immediately, the grey goo wreathed around the beast’s face and solidified into a smooth-surfaced muzzle.

“Well, I didn’t,” Ella spat petulantly, pulling a flat six-inch rod from her own boot.

“Clearly,” Jaellyn shot back, unfazed. “We’ll look at those ribs later.” Ella made a rude noise and kneeled down to hold the rod over the beast’s body. The rod took on a fiery glow, extending from the osvowraith’s upper torso to its feet. Several beams of shimmering energy shot out of either end of the rod, wrapping around and binding the beast’s body securely.

With the muzzle and EM restraints in place, Ella looked up at her partner. “Short-range teleporter?” Jaellyn nodded quickly. “Good.” Ella rose to her feet and grimaced, needles of pain stabbing her midsection. “Let’s go before our audience gets too nosy.” Already, the beggars and alley vendors she had passed earlier were spilling into the passageway to see about all the commotion.

Jaellyn brought up her wrist and tapped a few buttons on what looked like a common chronometer. A half-sphere of gleaming blue surrounded them and their quarry. As the grimy Rimhara alleyway and its nosy crowd faded into a shimmering white nothingness, Ella realized how that could have been her grave.

Dying in an alley on Bimnorii.
God, how fucking sad.
Ella turned to Jaellyn to say “Thanks.”

“You’re welcome,” the Tarkathian cut her off with tolerant expectation. Ella rolled her eyes and smiled. Rimhara was replaced by the familiar surroundings of their ship, the
Aurora,
parked just outside of Rimhara’s borders.

The
Kyrior
-class stealth cruiser was small, but still large enough for Ella and Jaellyn’s needs—mainly home and fast transportation. Most importantly, the
Aurora
—originally owned by a despicable and now-dead Tarkathian hunter—was where the pair first had begun their improbable partnership.

Now safely aboard, the bounty hunters carried their subdued prey to the ship’s chaotic cargo hold—Jaellyn taking the osvowraith’s shoulders while Ella struggled with the feet. Once inside the cargo hold, they reached the floating containment tube—over six feet long—and dropped the beast inside. Despite how startlingly light the osvowraith was, Ella’s ribs shrieked with such protest she almost cried. The bounty hunters quickly secured the beast inside the tube with a series of passcodes and activated the sleep stasis function to keep it unconscious. Then, Jaellyn contacted Xubes to confirm the capture of the quarry.

“Superluminal!” the Xyobian exclaimed via 3D projection in the ship’s helm, more surprised than delighted that they succeeded. He stood not much taller than Jaellyn. “You sure you got the correct species—Okay, I believe you!” he squealed after Jaellyn snarled at him. “I’ll tell the client, and get back to you with a meet time and location.”

Only then did Ella let Jaellyn evaluate her injuries: two ribs cracked, another three bruised, a mild concussion, and dark choke marks all around her neck.
Nothing that an injection of mendonanocytes and five shots of black dwarf couldn’t cure…

“Is this a good idea?” Ella slurred out, tipsy from pounding down liquor shots one after another. She currently lay on her stomach in bed, topless. Jaellyn, meanwhile, used a slim hypo-injector to infuse a payload of mendonanocytes into her partner’s injured ribs. Ella winced. The uncomfortable tingling rippled through her body, signaling the start of the healing process.

“Is
what
a good idea?” the Tarkathian answered idly, packing up the medical supplies in a pouch.

“Delivering something so dangerous,” she whispered, almost as if afraid that someone was eavesdropping.

Jaellyn scoffed. “Silly human. It’s just a job. What the client does with the bounty is their business.”

Ella knew the Tarkathian was correct. “Right.” Yet that didn’t ease her conscience.

“And the pay is good,” Jaellyn added gently as she stood up. “We will be set for near six months!”

“It’ll be nice to pick and choose our next jobs,” Ella admitted and smiled, stretching her arms out cat-like.

The Tarkathian stood at the exit, casting a long shadow against the light from outside. “Get sleep. We need to be ready for our client meet tomorrow.”

Once the door closed, Ella pulled out a thin strip of lightspeed from her stash under the pillows. She pressed it to her nose and inhaled greedily. The hit shot up into her brain and through her body like a comet. Suddenly, a million sparkly dots of silver light danced before Ella’s eyes, the good kind of sparkly dots. Then came a flood of tranquility that washed away all pain, leaving Ella delightfully numb as always. She sagged and fell face down onto her pillows. The twinkly dots blurred into infinite trails of light, shooting off into a distant direction, pulling Ella into a fathomless void….

The human came to several orvs later, sporting a mild hangover and slightly sore ribs. Jaellyn informed Ella that while she was sleeping, Xubes had gotten a time and a meet location— midday today at the furthest edge of the Sandstone Sea. The massive valley of high sand dunes and bizarrely-weathered rock formations was east of Orabesq, a remote settlement. After getting a look of the site on their 3D holomap, the Tarkathian thoroughly hated it. “Too easy for ambushes,” she bristled.

Ella had felt her blood run cold as she scrutinized the location as well. It appeared far too similar to an earlier job months ago that had gone way south. That client had double-crossed and nearly killed both her and Jaellyn. She sucked in a calming breath, “We’ll ‘port in, keep our ship about a mile out and make sure the containment tube is rigged.”

Jaellyn noticeably relaxed upon hearing this. Rigged meant syncing the tube to their heartbeats. If anything happened to either Jaellyn or Ella within a mile of their bounty, the tube self-destructed. This precaution was expected, given their profession’s duplicitous nature.

Ella donned an ensemble similar to yesterday, the only variance was a white tank top, a reddish-brown armorweave vest, and letting her thick, black hair down. And unlike yesterday, she was beyond thankful to carry more weaponry on her person—her cherished RR-5 rifle which she hefted in her right hand, and an ArmoryTek DraCross 530 long pulse pistol slung on her hip. Jaellyn cast aside the hooded cloak, going with a navy blue, ribbed catsuit of oiled nanoclothe. She carried two long knives in her boots and two DraCross long pulse pistols.

After soaring for half an orv over a seemingly infinite stretch of rolling crimson dunes, the
Aurora
reached the coordinates Xubes specified for the meetup: a series of distorted, arching rock formations at the end of the rolling dunes, a precursor into a longer stretch of craggy, cracked desert.

“They’re already here,” Jaellyn stated grimly once they were a mile out, reading their ship’s scans. “We should have gotten here first.”

“But we didn’t,” Ella scoffed. “Let’s just do this and get paid.” With their captured quarry, Ella and Jaellyn transmatted in just under a far-jutting shelf of gnarled rock. It provided the perfect shade from the ball of bright cherry flame hanging in the clear sky. But the shelf provided no protection from the suffocating dry heat…or the half-dozen intimidating humans that surrounded the pair the moment they materialized onto the site. Jaellyn whirled around, always cagey as she took in their company.

Ella never flinched, even when seeing how exposed she and Jaellyn were in the middle of this rock structure. The Tarkathian gave her an
I told you so
glare to hammer home the obvious. Shafts of light pierced through holes in the rock shelf, giving a solid illumination of their grim-faced clients.

Ella recognized the Children of Earth at a glance.

The humans had sense enough to dress in dusty, tattered clothing, befitting of Bimnorii smugglers and prospectors. But the heavy-duty firearms they carried—ArmoryTek and Vega-Millum, to name a few—were definitely UComm military-grade. Their speakers introduced themselves: a lean, dark youth named Chidi, and Priyanka, a petite, dusky-skinned woman with a large hooked nose. Both stepped forward to authenticate the osvowraith in the containment tube.

Priyanka looked fascinated, waving a medical datapad across the tube’s pane that displayed the beast’s face and upper torso. Ella and Jaellyn backed away to give them space. Chidi, however, kept sneaking in nasty looks at the Tarkathian teenager, who returned them in kind.

Dios Mio
, Ella swore, her nervousness contained beneath a blasé façade. The bounty hunter slipped into survival mode again, taking in her potential opponents with a quick glance. The Children of Earth had the edge in terms of cover behind the bulbous rocks, and superior firepower. Even if Ella and Jaellyn took out Chidi and Priyanka, they would never make it to the other side of this formation before getting cut down. Ella could at least console herself with the fact that if their client took them out, the quarry would self-destruct.

“Is there a problem?” she finally asked.

For a long, charged moment, Chidi locked eyes with Ella, his contempt obvious. The whole scene became loaded with an ugly, taut energy—Jaellyn looked ready to explode into action, her hands reaching for both pulse pistols. The other four gunmen behind Chidi seemed to coil with an alertness born from countless skirmishes. Ella let the hand at her side with the pulse pistol slip down gradually for a possible fast draw…

The moment passed, and Chidi shrugged with an easygoing smile. “Nope. Just admiring the pistols you two are carrying.” Jaellyn remained rigid, keeping a wary eye on the Children of Earth operatives.

Priyanka brushed aside her blunt fringe of bangs, and whispered in Chidi’s ear. He nodded. “Let’s take care of payment.” He pulled out a thin, black datapad and clacked away. Ella whipped out her 6” datapad to access their vault account, watching the exchange take place in less than a macrom. In fact, Ella gaped in shock at the sight of their second payment—twice the agreed-upon amount.

“The few bounty hunters that have actually captured an osvowraith seemed to think, ‘capture alive’ shouldn’t include, ‘in one piece,’” explained Priyanka, noting the bounty hunter’s shock.

That won a laugh out of Ella, which died quickly under Jaellyn’s disapproving frown. “You should now have the passcodes to open the tube,” Ella stated soberly. “They’ll be active in about an orv.”

Chidi nodded gratefully. “Many thanks. We might call on you again.” That both excited and turned Ella’s stomach a little. The dark youth made a terse head gesture. Moments later the Children of Earth contingent transmatted away with the containment tube in a golden shimmer.

As soon as the last sparkle of their exit dissipated, Ella felt like she could breathe again. “Thank GAWD,” she said in a gusty sigh. You okay?”

Jaellyn nodded, eyes still trained like lasers on the area their clients were just standing. “You?”

“Fuck yea,” Ella blurted out with a gleeful clap, feeling very celebratory at their big payday.  “All I want to do now is just drink myself stupid.”

Jaellyn patted Ella on the head mockingly, “Didn’t know drinking was needed.”

Ella aimed a hard swat at the back of Jaellyn’s head. But the Tarkathian easily ducked and dodged away with a playful smile. In those fleeting moments when Jaellyn actually acted her age, Ella thought her heart might burst. But she’d never reveal that to a Tarkathian, since sentimentality was something they usually distrusted. The two bounty hunters laughed while activating their teleporting device, which transported them back to the
Aurora
in a bluish shimmer.

Once more, the distorted rock structures at the edge of the Sandstone Sea lay barren under the blazing Noriida Major sun.

Usually, Pilot Pub’s atmosphere of loud and stupid fun was infectious and unshakeable.

Tonight the mood inside the dingy, undersized dive bar was thick with tension.

News had spread across Union Space about an ‘incident’ on Alorum. The story UComm had spun for the news streams detailed a diseased betelydra escaping from Merrivel Nebula, and colliding with a UComm warship. Most beings in Pilot Pub believed otherwise, correctly assuming that the Korvenite terrorist Maelstrom was involved.

Samantha D’Urso couldn’t fault the pilots’ assumptions, nor would she confirm them. The truth about Alorum’s surface had almost gotten her and Star Brigade killed.

On the outside, Sam was the epitome of relaxed, a crooked grin on her face and a half-empty drink in hand. Inside, her stomach roiled, anxieties bouncing back and forth like a swarm of angry bees.

She stayed focused on her teammate Liliana Cortés, sitting by her side on another floating bar stool.

Better that than eavesdrop on the noticeably loud speculations among Pilot Pub’s mix of AeroFleet, private contractor, and freighter pilots.

Far better than paying heed to the ogling of a somewhat doughy earthborn space jockey at the far right end of the bar. He’d been trying to get Sam’s attention with those ‘fuck-me’ eyes for a while now.

Not that she could blame him.

Unfortunately, he was audibly an obnoxious loudmouth amongst a bar full of obnoxious loudmouths. Even worse, by how much he was swaying in his seat, this one clearly couldn’t hold his liquor.
Must be a UComm PLADECO pilot,
Sam mused, skin crawling.

She watched Liliana with concern. The young doctor, usually all long-limbed and lovely with perfect posture, was hunched over in dread. The poor thing shook so badly she could barely hold her tumbler glass of superluminal without the blue and white swirl of liquor spilling over. The black, long-sleeved tee and khaki slacks fit Liliana’s tall, slender figure well. The shell-shocked expression didn’t, in Sam’s honest opinion.

Tonight she had made it her mission to wipe that expression off the doctor’s face.

“Might want to drink some of that, while it’s still in the cup,” Sam insisted dryly.

Liliana hesitated briefly but did as instructed, taking the daintiest little sip in the history of the universe.

Sam snorted out a laugh.

Liliana glared at her. “What’s so funny?”

“The way you drink,” Sam answered between cackles. She tucked sleek locks of blonde hair behind both ears. “You act like you’re carrying a live grenaser.”

“So?”

“
So?
If I had just survived a mind-controlled betelydra, attached a Protectorate Base and discovered how secretly awful the Union can be, I’d be chugging down my drink. Like this.” Sam snatched up her own glass of superluminal and guzzled down most of it in three big gulps.

That finally coaxed a faint smile out of Liliana. She straightened her posture and tossed her tumbler back again for a real gulp. Her face scrunched up as the superluminal ran hot down her throat. Now Sam openly guffawed.

“Please tell me that all our missions aren’t always so,” Liliana leaned in close, dropping her voice to a whisper like someone divulging government secrets, “so overwhelming.”

“I could tell you that, but I’d be half-lying. Keep drinking,” Sam encouraged.

Liliana did so without hesitation this time, and her gagging expressions lessened. The lighting cast a sickly purple glow over the tavern tonight, doing no favors for the low-grade HV screens showing football or the grimy lived-in texture of its walls.

Pilot Pub felt not quite like home, but safe enough to relax her guard just enough. Sam needed that tonight.

She took in Pilot Pub’s scene with a smile, letting its familiar atmosphere fill her senses: the pungent, alien liquors permeating the air, the various rowdy debates ranging from what really went down on Alorum to if the Union should be in bed with the Kedri. Small groupings of patrons here and there, along with the solitary customers, were either lost in their own worlds or mindlessly watching whatever was on the HVs. Pilot Pub’s clientele tonight included regular AeroFleet patrons stationed on Hollus, mixed with unfamiliar government-contracted freighter pilots just passing through or private military company on the starbase for training exercises—sentient beings from every corner of Union Space. It was an unofficial rule for Pilot Pub customers not in flight uniform to dress down. Sam always happily complied with that edict, hence her clingy grey tangtop and loose army green cargo pants with flip-flops.

Sam heard the familiar digitized sounds of a Cressonish voicebox, and glanced over her shoulder. The hulking Cressonish was a shaggy mass of silver-grey hair working the floor, greeting newcomers to Pilot Pub and catching up with frequent patrons. That would be Nan’oud, former AeroFleet and one of Pilot Pub’s original founders. Sam caught his eye and they exchanged a friendly nod.

Working behind the bar was Solrao Ytod, a stork-like Ibrisian with a burnt orange complexion and not a single hair on her finely segmented skin. She was former AeroFleet, like Habraum and one of his oldest friends, as well as an occasional drinking buddy of Sam’s.

Tonight the Ibrisian had been a mid-level irritant, constantly hovering near Sam and Liliana, trying to interject herself into their conversation during any lull in drink orders.

The only things I want from her tonight are drinks.
Sam rolled her eyes and pushed away the aggravation, remembering that coming to Pilot Pub was as much for herself as it was for Liliana.

She had checked in on each CT-1 member after the Alorum incident—
even
Marguliese. Most of the team was coping just fine, except for Liliana and Honaa. The Rothorid had holed up in his quarters, refusing to see anyone. Sam would try again with him tomorrow.

Liliana was easier to engage. The doctor had been hiding in her Medcenter office barely holding it together, all the excuse Sam needed to suggest a few drinks to calm both their nerves.

It’s the least I can do for the Brigadier who saved my life.
“I never got to say thank you for what you did on Alorum,” Sam admitted after Liliana had finished her superluminal. She wasn’t the only grateful Brigadier, but V’Korram would never tell the doctor that. “We’d all be dead if not for you, lovey.”

As expected, Liliana shooed away the praise. “I have Khrome, Marguliese and Captain Nwosu to thank for that,” the doctor was now blushing. “But you more than anyone, Sam, for believing in me the whole time…and those extra training sessions these last few weeks.”

That remark filled Sam with more gratitude than Liliana could ever know. Of course, her default response was a snide wisecrack—specifically at the expense of Habraum’s pet Cybernarr—all to win a cheap laugh out of the doctor.

But Sam held her tongue. Liliana didn’t need that now. She needed to recognize her incredible inner fortitude and embrace it. “Give yourself
some
credit, Lily,” she reached out and gave the doctor a tender pat on the cheek. “We just provided the tools. You’re the one who did the work to get this far.”

“Well, I’m not there yet. I thought…” the doctor reclined back, folding both hands behind her head. Liliana’s pixie cropped hair looked as black as her shirt under the dim lights and no longer spiked. Sam noted the slight but noticeable growth these last few weeks. She liked it better this length.

“I thought we were all going to die,” the doctor admitted in a rush.

“Same here,” Sam admitted easily. She leaned over the bar counter, finishing off her drink. “That was as close a call as it could get.”

The doctor propped an elbow on the bar counter, scrutinizing her teammate through narrowed eyes. “Yet you’re very
le zen
about the whole thing.”

Despite Sam’s devil-may-care attitude, the strange fear kept on buzzing inside her stomach. Masking her true feelings came as easy as breathing, given the countless times she’d stared death in the face and lived to laugh about it. But the Alorum incident…
that
had rattled Sam, as much as it clearly did Liliana.

Suddenly, all she wanted was to speak to the doctor like a true friend. Sam longed to admit how terrified almost losing another combat team had made her. Every cell in Sam’s body burned to confess over the rush of emotions that had coursed through her when the Retributionaries were about to kill CT-1.

Then there was that devastating look of longing, or whatever that was, she and Habraum had shared when the end seemed certain.

And afterward in the Cerc’s office, every moment between them so open and honest and raw…

Yeah, like Liliana wants to hear about my drama
, she scolded, regaining some much-needed resolve and making those pesky feelings go dead as easily as if it were breathing.

“Two things help after a mission like that,” Sam raised her glass, putting on her mischievously lopsided grin. “A few good drinks or a good fuck…usually both.”

From the corner of her eye, Sam caught Solrao perking up and ignored the overeager Ibrisian.

Liliana turned her head from side to side, taking stock of Pilot Pub’s occupancy. Her gaze landed on the tanked PLADECO pilot right as he tumbled out of his seat.  She wrinkled her nose in disapproval. “Think I’ll settle for another drink.”

Sam gestured for Solrao’s attention, pointing at her own and then Lily’s cups. “Two more.”

“Make mine a small one…” Liliana quickly pointed out, and then caught Sam’s barefaced scorn. “A
large
one,” the doctor amended with a laugh.

Solrao returned in no time with their drink orders. “You two look like you’ve been through it,” she declared in her usual sleepy-sounding Ibrisi accent. “Hard mission?”

“That’s an understatement,” Liliana muttered after thanking the Ibrisian for her drink.

Much to Sam’s displeasure, the ex-pilot didn’t look ready to depart yet. “And yea, yea I know you can’t officially confirm this,” Solrao leaned in all conspiratorial-like. The blood-red limbic rings in her eyes rapidly narrowed and then widened, narrowed and then widened, the telltale sign of an Ibrisian’s interest. “I’m guessing your mission had to do with whatever went down on Alorum? Am I warm?”

“We’re good, Solrao. Thank you,” Sam replied sharply, her taut smile saying,
Back the fuck off
.

Solrao took the hint and retreated to the other end of the bar, sulking. Sam watched her go, glowering. Indulging the needy Ibrisian a few weeks ago had been stupid.
I should cut her off for good.

Solrao’s hovering didn’t go unnoticed. “Uh…which one of us does she wanna sleep with?” Liliana inquired, observing the Ibrisian with far too much curiosity.

“Why, you interested?” Sam joked.
God, please don’t be.

“Nooo,” Lily shook her head, dead serious. “Something about her just screams too much baggage.”

Sam nodded and continued nursing her drink. Smart girl.

As they continued talking, Liliana’s silence on the Korvenite internment camps became glaringly obvious. Given how much the Alorum location had upset the doctor, Sam left that asteroid mine alone. So she broached another topic. “When you were flying the
Phaeton
by yourself, what did you feel…beside fear?”

Liliana frowned at her, confused. “Not sure what you mea—”

“Yeah, you do,” Sam interjected briskly, searching the doctor’s face. “And the answer scares the shit out of you, way more than Maelstrom’s ambush did.”

Even under the bad halolights, she saw Liliana turn bone white.

Christ
, this girl had no poker face. Sam needed to work with her on that. At least her suspicions were dead on. “Now,” she continued in low and huskier tones, “what
else
did you feel?”

“I…” Liliana looked like she’d rather be anywhere else. Then she seemed to calm, her eyes going vacant. “My blood was singing,” she admitted, soft and trembling. Discovering this hidden aspect of herself was a clear jolt to her system. “The risks, the impossible odds… Even at one point, V’Korram got knocked out and I was alone, I’ve never felt so alive…so powerful.”

A sister in arms.
Sam tried not to smile, but pride had rendered her poker face as transparent as Lily’s. At the Brigade all-hands where Habraum made his return, she had seen a glimpse of that steel within the doctor. But when Liliana had stepped out of
Phaeton’s
cockpit after rescuing them from Alorum, eyes ablaze with fear and fire and focus, Sam knew she was Star Brigade material through and through.

“On a mission like that when the odds seem insurmountable and death’s coming at you from every turn?” Sam shook her head wistfully, jostling loose a few locks of hair. The familiar thrill she got from each and every field mission, nothing topped it. “Gets in your blood, like a drug.”

Liliana shuddered. Clearly that kind of addiction didn’t agree with her. “After all this time, can you imagine your life any other way?”

If Sam had been asked this question eight years ago, the answer would have been a resounding, ‘yes.’ Settle down somewhere on Terra Sollus, find a mind-numbingly boring civilian job, marry an adequate male, start a family—the expected things that normal sentient beings were supposed to do.