The Assassin's Salvation (Mandrake Company) (3 page)

Jamie nodded back to both of them, but jerked her attention back to the console when more laser fire splashed against the shields.

Hazel growled. At the fighter, Jamie hoped, and not her. She didn’t know what else she should do. Commander Thatcher would doubtlessly flip around to face his opponent and engage in a cockfight, but she didn’t have as much confidence in her abilities.

“Why isn’t he sustaining fire?” Hazel wondered.

“It’s almost like a pattern, isn’t it?” Jamie watched the lasers pitter-patter against the shuttle. A dangerous pattern, she reminded herself, observing the percentage of remaining shield power take another dip. “Is he toying with us? Why would he? He must be aware of the
Albatross
approaching.”

“Not for long. Our missile’s almost back on his ass.”

On a whim, Jamie checked the flight recorder to make sure the incident was being preserved. What if—

She sat up straight with a start. “Does anyone know Morse code?”

Hazel frowned over at her. “Why would an enemy fighter be trying to send us a message with lasers?” She waved at the console. “The comm channel is open.”

“Would someone from the planet know our frequency?”

“The pilot could blast a message on all of the common frequencies if that was his intent. We would pick it up.”

“And would the cities pick it up too?”

Hazel looked at her sharply. “With the satellites in orbit, yes.”

“I can read it,” spoke a quiet voice from behind Jamie’s seat.

She hadn’t noticed Sergei’s approach, but she was quick to lean to the side so he would have a view of the exterior cameras. But the laser fire had stopped. She tapped a couple of buttons, so the flight recorder would repeat the sequence, even as she checked on the fighter’s position.

“His thrusters are finally burning out,” Jamie said.

“Missile’s almost on him,” Hazel said.

“Maybe we should call it off. Until we figure out—”

The sensor display lit up with a burst, and Jamie sagged in her seat. “The missile got him?”

“Actually,” Hazel said, “I think that was—”

“Y’all are welcome over there,” came Lieutenant Frog’s chipper tenor.

Jamie turned to meet Sergei’s dark eyes. “Was it my imagination? Or
was
there a message?”

“Morse code, yes.”

“And could you tell what it said?” Jamie asked. He might not have had time to decipher it yet. He hadn’t pulled out a tablet to make notes.

Sergei hesitated.

Hazel sighed. “Spit it out, Zharkov. I don’t want to have to run it through the computer.”

“We are in trouble. Your assistance requested. We can pay.”

Chapter 2

Several moments passed with Sergei standing outside the captain’s door, not waving at the sensor. Mandrake knew he was coming and would expect him to report, but at the same time, he would have heard about the incident with the fighter, and he might be wrapped up trying to figure out who had sent the craft. There were a number of countries and nomadic factions on the planet, all fighting for the few resources that remained after GalCon-protected freighters came down to pick up crops, botshen crystals, and petroleum. Sergei didn’t know more than that. He had merely been passing through on assignment.

It was strange being back on the
Albatross
, in the same gray corridors, seeing many of the same faces, but it wasn’t unpleasant. He never would have expected the weird feeling in his belly, but it was there, nonetheless… the feeling that he had come home. But did “home” still want him?

Sergei took a deep breath and waved at the sensor. It wasn’t so much that he feared interrupting Mandrake; more that he was reluctant to share his news. What if Mandrake thought Sergei wasn’t here to report that bounty but to collect it? Fifty thousand aurums would solve a lot of people’s problems. Sergei wished something as simple as money would solve his.

“Enter,” came Mandrake’s voice over the speaker as the door slid open.

Sergei stepped inside and gaped as soon as he crossed the threshold. The corridors might have been the same, but Viktor Mandrake, the man who never sat down, had a couch and coffee table in the middle of his cabin, occupying a space that had always been open for a punching bag that could descend from the ceiling. The woman. Ankari, wasn’t it? This had to be her influence. A few other feminine touches had been added to the sparse cabin—perky teal towels for the kitchenette, a lush white rug covering the friction mat flooring, and bright flowering plants peeping from the grow system that housed Mandrake’s beloved dwarf apple trees. His weapons collection and family portraits were still on the walls, otherwise Sergei might have thought he had entered someone else’s cabin.

“You met Ankari,” Mandrake said from the standing desk next to the porthole, guessing what Sergei had been thinking.

“Yes. She’s pretty.” A vapid compliment, but Sergei hadn’t spoken to the woman during the flight, everyone being rather distracted by the attack that turned out to be an attempt to communicate. Besides, against his better judgment, he had been spending more time paying attention to Jamie.

Mandrake grunted. Still as garrulous as ever. A few flecks of gray were sprinkled into his dark hair, but other than that, he hadn’t changed much. He still had that dense armoring of muscle that, at first glance, gave the illusion that he might be slow in a fight. Sergei knew better. Sergei’s lean wiry build and fast-twitch reflexes let him dance circles around
most
opponents in the boxing ring, but Mandrake’s muscles twitched just as quickly. He rarely got hit. And when a man
did
land a blow on him, he was lucky to do any damage. Sergei almost smiled, remembering how cocky he had been as a young private, fresh from his assassin’s training. And how he had gotten angry and challenged then-Sergeant Mandrake to a brawl. Sergei still had a scar from that battle. Rather than having a medic repair it, he had kept it as a reminder of the lesson learned.

“You looking for your old job back?” Mandrake asked.

That wasn’t exactly what had brought Sergei to the
Albatross
, but out of curiosity, he asked, “If I were, would it be available?”

“Always available for you.”

“But not for others with my skills?” Sergei doubted Mandrake Company employed an assassin, a dedicated one, anyway. Once upon a time, Sergeant Mandrake hadn’t been tickled to have one added to his squad, especially one who had lied about his age and entered the service at fifteen. Funny how Mandrake had been the first person to figure that out. Sergei had always been tall for his age, and he had sprouted chin hairs young; even if the ones he had worn to the recruitment office had been glued on, he’d had a decent set of his own by the time he had finished training at sixteen.

“Kept the job for you. Figured you’d get bored and be back. Twenty-five was young for retiring.”

“I was older than that,” Sergei said dryly, though he hadn’t been much older, he admitted. He still had a couple of years to thirty, but at times, he felt old enough to have some of Mandrake’s grays. Because he’d never had a childhood maybe, or because he’d seen so much of the dark side of human nature, so much of his own dark side. More than a man ever should.

“And the rest?”

“You’re right. I was bored. I tried not to be. Didn’t want to miss the job.” The killing, Sergei added silently and gazed wistfully toward the porthole and the distant stars. “Didn’t like what it said about me that I did.”

Still leaning against the end of the desk, his arms folded across his chest, Mandrake gazed back at him without judgment. He was one of the few people who did. Maybe because he had killed as many people, if not more, in his day. The difference was that he shot men in the chest, not in the back. Sergei supposed it didn’t matter in the end, the result being the same, but society said one act was brave and one was cowardly. Sergei had looked a few men in the eye and killed them in a fair fight, but it was the challenge of the hunt that drew him, the stalking, the seeing without being seen, the striking out of the ether, a phantom never heard, never sensed.

“I might take the job for a while, as long as you’re offering it,” Sergei said, “but there’s another matter that brought me here.”

Mandrake’s gaze did not waver. If he had a curious bone in his body, it never showed.

“There’s a bounty on your head. Fifty thousand aurums.” Sergei jerked a thumb toward the porthole. “Originates down on one of those cloud cities, so I’m guessing someone knew you were heading this way. I tried to look up the person who posted it, but it went through an intermediary. Someone clever with the net might be able to find the person fronting the money. And once the person is identified…” Sergei flicked his hand in a lazy knife-throwing gesture, almost hoping Mandrake would ask him to deal with it. Sergei would need help uncovering the person behind it all, but it never bothered him, killing those rich enough to afford such luxuries as hit men. And he owed Mandrake a favor, a pile of them. It would be nice to pay at least one back someday. Also, in offering to take care of the shadow man, he hoped Mandrake would realize beyond a doubt that Sergei hadn’t come in an attempt to collect on that bounty himself.

“Figured that might happen,” was all Mandrake said.

“Been annoying people lately, have you?”

“Killing finance lords.”

Sergei let out a low whistle. Even he would think twice before taking a contract against someone so rich and powerful. “Mandrake Company never used to stick its neck out so blatantly.” He kept himself from asking if the woman might have had something to do with it, but he did glance toward the pretty hand towels.

Mandrake’s eyes closed to slits.

Sergei cleared his throat. “Like I was saying. I could help you deal with this problem.”

“I can deal with my own problems.”

Sergei hadn’t meant to imply that Mandrake couldn’t. He groped for a way to say he wanted to repay old favors without actually bringing up a past that wasn’t comfortable for either of them. Maybe levity would be a safer route. “’Course you can, Captain, but you always make such a bloody mess when you deal with your problems. People tend to notice that. Get pissed off, irked on behalf of the fallen as it were. I, on the other hand, can make a person disappear without attracting anyone’s notice. No notice, no certainty as to the party who handled the mission, no repercussions.”

Mandrake didn’t say anything. Maybe there had been a little too much blunt truth in the words for them to be considered levity. Or maybe Sergei just wasn’t funny.

A comm bleeped. Mandrake waved to answer it and responded with his name.

“Thomlin here, sir. The message that Zharkov decoded is correct. ‘We are in trouble. Your assistance requested. We can pay.’”

Mandrake’s jaw tightened. “Where’d the ship come from?”

“Looks like it flew out of the largest continent down there, Ferago. The fighter originated somewhere else, though, another system probably. It was an old Fleet Viper, decommissioned at least twenty years ago.”

“I recognized it.”

“I don’t know where they got it, but it definitely came from Ferago. Looks like someone there wants to see you.”

“Less so now than an hour ago, I’ll wager,” Mandrake said, as grim as a dagger.

“I don’t know about that, sir. According to your Flipkens’s report and the video footage, that pilot knew that was likely to be a one-way trip for him.”

“Comforting.” Mandrake’s tone said it wasn’t. He cut the comm.

“Your Flipkens?” Sergei asked, then immediately wished he hadn’t. It was a knee-jerk reaction, him wanting to know why Mandrake apparently had some ownership over the young woman, when Sergei had gotten the impression she was working for Ankari and that their business was something mostly independent of Mandrake Company. It was silly, but the idea of anyone having some ownership over Jamie Flipkens bothered him. But Mandrake had more pressing concerns on his mind; it was foolish to say something.

Mandrake grunted, not appearing offended. “The crew likes to remind me that all persons, equipment, and notions related to Microbacteriotherapy, Inc. are indeed my pet project and shouldn’t be allowed to interfere with regular company operations.”

Micro-what? “Huh, I didn’t get all that from that one word.”

“It’s there. Trust me.”

“Always, Serg—sir.” Sergei had worked under Captain Mandrake the mercenary for a year, but still found it more natural to think of him as Sergeant Mandrake. Maybe because those three years in the Fleet had been so much more eventful—more painful and seared into his memory—than the one he had spent on the
Albatross
. “Are you going to go down to the planet to talk to those people?”

Sergei thought about volunteering to accompany him, to watch his back, but Mandrake might wonder why he was trying so hard to help with his problems. It would sting to learn that Mandrake didn’t think Sergei was trustworthy, after all they had been through, but he allowed that people changed over the years, and Mandrake hadn’t seen him for a while. He couldn’t know Sergei’s mind, couldn’t know that his time spent with the company had been some of the only months in his life that hadn’t been entirely miserable.

“I might.” Mandrake didn’t look happy about it. “You say you want to help with a problem?”

“I had your bounty problem in mind, not a random one.”

Mandrake grunted again. “This would be related to that.”

“Oh?” Maybe Sergei could help, after all.

“Ankari. Half the reason we’re here is because she has a number of appointments on those cloud cities. Lots of rich clients down there.”

“So Mandrake Company is hanging around while she works?” Sergei tried to keep any censure out of his voice, but found it odd that mercenaries would be waiting on these women. From the snippets of conversation as the shuttle had been preparing for takeoff, he had come to understand that the business had its lab on the
Albatross
, but he didn’t know why.

“While her company makes money, yes,” Mandrake said, then flashed an edged smile. “We own twenty percent, if you hadn’t heard.”

“We? Mandrake Company?”