Fallen Empire: Starseers Part 21

Chapter 17.

Still in the c.o.c.kpit as the Striker drifted into the Nautilus's hangar bay, Alisa unfastened the seat harness and awkwardly buckled her belt around her waist, so that her Etcher once again rested on her hip. She did not know why she bothered when the Alliance soldiers would simply remove all her weapons, and maybe all of her clothes and all of her dignity, before tossing her into the brig. They would do no better to Leonidas.

Guilt gnawed at her, and she looked over her shoulder at him as the Striker settled to the deck with a soft b.u.mp. His knees were still up around his ears, his armored body almost folded in half to fit into the snug seat. She tried to manage a smile. "At least you'll be able to stretch your legs now."

He was checking his weapons and only glanced at her. Alisa did not think he was angry with her, but she wished she had never told him to join her in the Striker. She had fought without a gunner on numerous occasions. She could have done so this time too. He would not necessarily have been safe if he had gone in the Nomad, but he wouldn't have been lining up for an interrogation, either.

The sensors still were not working well on the Striker's control panel, so Alisa could not scan the atmosphere out in the bay, but she saw the big doors slide shut, and she felt the grab beam release her. A red light flashed in the distance. Any second, it would switch to white, letting the soldiers know they could come out and inspect their prize.

"Marchenko," Leonidas said. She was about to correct the name usage when he did it himself, saying, "Alisa."

"Yes?" Alisa started to look back again, but movement drew her gaze to the left.

Soldiers in blue and gray Alliance combat armor were striding toward them, followed, several meters back, by a trio of officers in solid blue uniforms with uninspired gray earstars hooked over their ears. They did not have armor or rifles, but a couple wore stunners on their belts, and one of them was carrying a medical kit and something that looked like a tranquilizer gun. She thought of the gas that she had encountered with Leonidas on Starfall Station, gas specifically designed to paralyze a cyborg.

"Don't get yourself into trouble-more trouble-on my account," he said. "If you can save yourself-and your reputation-by coming up with a story to explain why I'm not drugged and drooling, do so."

"Unless you want to take off your armor now and artfully dribble down your chin, I think it's too late for that," Alisa said, remembering how the Alliance had thought she was Leonidas's prisoner back at the skirmish near Perun's moon. She suspected the odds of fooling anyone a second time were nonexistent. By now, the entire Alliance had probably figured out that Leonidas was her pa.s.senger, not her captor.

"Maybe, but you have a scheming mind and may come up with something to explain this to your benefit. If you can do so, do. Don't risk more for me." His seat creaked as he leaned forward, laying a hand on her shoulder.

The gesture made emotion swell in her throat, and she reached up, resting her hand on his. His was armored, so it wasn't exactly an intimate touch, but she held her palm on the cool metal anyway.

She wondered if he had figured out that there was a reason she kept risking herself for him-and offering ma.s.sages. He seemed a little slow when it came to dealing with flirtations, or perhaps he simply was not interested. For all she knew, he could prefer men. But even if he didn't want romance, he did seem to care about her. And that made her feel all the worse for having led him here.

The armored soldiers were drawing close so Leonidas extracted his hand.

Alisa took a deep breath and popped the canopy. Several rifles swung in her direction. No, not quite in her direction-in the direction of her back seat. She almost felt affronted that n.o.body was worried about her. Just because she was wearing a fifty-year-old, bullet-slinging gun from some backwater world where there were no facilities for manufacturing BlazTech weapons did not mean she wasn't a threat...

"Get out," a woman in armor said, standing slightly ahead of the rest of the squad, her rifle trained unerringly on Leonidas.

"No please?" Alisa asked. "No thank you for coming and we hope you enjoy your stay? Alliance hospitality has deteriorated since I served."

She worked in that mention of serving in the vain hope that it would make the men less likely to shoot her. Neither the woman who had spoken, nor any of the other soldiers acknowledged her. Their stares never wavered from Leonidas. The three officers had stopped several meters back and also watched him tensely-the one in the lead had gray hair and commander's tabs. So, Commander Farrow himself had come down for this. That was surprising, given the situation outside.

Her back seat groaned again as Leonidas pushed himself to his feet. He did not seem too worried about making the soldiers twitchy or accidentally drawing fire as he hopped to the deck. Of course, he was as armored as they were and could take a few hits. Alisa did not have that luxury. She eased out of the c.o.c.kpit slowly, turning around and sliding down to the deck-clearly, none of their hosts thought it would be polite to push one of the mobile ladders over. Deteriorating hospitality, indeed.

"Remove your weapons, power down your suit, and take off your helmet," the woman in charge said, a sergeant, Alisa a.s.sumed. Her armor carried no designation of rank. None of their armor did. n.o.body wanted to make it easy for enemies to pick out the leaders in the field.

Leonidas stood calmly, his arms at his sides. He kept his hands away from the rifle hanging across his chest by a strap, but he did not do any of the things the woman ordered. Maybe he was waiting for a please.

"Colonel Adler," Commander Farrow said after a tense minute pa.s.sed with neither side doing anything else. "Are you going to be difficult, or are you going to make this easy on all of us?"

Leonidas did not move, but his helmet swiveled a couple of degrees, his faceplate toward the doctor with the medical kit and tranquilizer gun. Alisa had the feeling he might be stalling. Was he trying to buy time for the Sta.r.s.eers? Did he truly care what happened to them? Or maybe he wanted the Nomad to get its chance to escape. Or maybe he just dreaded the inevitable.

"Cyborgs aren't generally in the business of making life easy for Alliance soldiers," Leonidas said, his faceplate s.h.i.+fting toward Farrow.

"I suppose that's true, but this needn't be a bloodbath. We just want to know where the boy is, Colonel. The war's over, and there aren't any war crimes listed on your record that you should be held accountable for. Just the usual-" the commander already had thin lips, and they almost disappeared when he pressed them together, "-but understandable grievances."

Alisa wondered if that was a lie. While she believed Leonidas wouldn't have done anything atrocious, she wondered if her people would truly let him walk after this.

"I haven't seen the boy in over six months," Leonidas said. "I have no idea where he is now."

The commander looked at his medical officer, who shrugged in return. "I can't tell if he's lying without dosing him, sir."

"Where was he when last you saw him?" Farrow asked Leonidas.

"You're going to drug me regardless of what I tell you." Leonidas sighed and lifted his hands toward his helmet.

The soldiers all tightened their fingers on the triggers of their weapons.

Leonidas didn't even acknowledge them as he pulled off his helmet. Alisa was surprised that he did it, since it made him vulnerable, but maybe he sensed that the soldiers would start firing and find a way to peel him open like an old-fas.h.i.+oned sardine can if he did not.

Or maybe a certain Sta.r.s.eer was influencing his actions. She s.h.i.+vered.

Leonidas tucked the helmet under his arm. He wore his stoic, difficult-to-read face, but Alisa thought she saw some of his pain and weariness in the tightness at the corners of his eyes. Thinking of how much the Sta.r.s.eers had worked him over before throwing him into his cell, she worried that the armor was the main thing keeping him upright. Once again, she regretted that her actions had brought him here. Dealing with an interrogation while at full health would be bad enough.

"What planet did you last see him on, Colonel?" Farrow asked, waving his fingers for the doctor to step forward. "And who did you hand him off to?"

"He's just a boy," Leonidas said softly. "Will you go after him with a squadron of armed soldiers and fighter pilots?" His gaze flicked briefly to Alisa-remembering that she had been an Alliance fighter pilot not that long ago?

For the first time, Farrow looked at Alisa. She had been standing quietly in the shadow of the old Striker, having puzzle pieces click into place as she listened and finally started to realize why the Alliance wanted Leonidas. The boy. The only boy they could possibly be talking about who would be of such interest was the emperor's son. Prince Thorian. Had Leonidas been there at the end? The imperial palace had been destroyed days before the emperor's actual death out on an asteroid base where a hidden palace had been his final refuge, a place the Alliance never would have known about if not for a spy. Had the elite Cyborg Corps been there in the final battle, defending it? And if so, had Leonidas been called away when the fall became inevitable and when the emperor wanted to make sure his only surviving son escaped?

"He will be captured," Farrow said. "We have no intention of killing a child, if that's what you're worried about, but he will be made to disappear, and we'll let the press believe he was killed. I'm sure you can understand why we don't want him secreted away somewhere so that your people can trot him out later on, using him as a figurehead to rally around."

Leonidas gazed back at him, his face giving away nothing.

"Doctor," Farrow said, tilting his head toward Leonidas.

"Do you want me to question the woman too?"

Alisa felt her eyebrows fly up. Being questioned with drugs wouldn't be as bad as being questioned by having fingernails and toenails ripped out, but she couldn't imagine it would be pleasant. And what did they think she knew? What could she possibly know? She hadn't been there when the emperor's hidden refuge was destroyed. She had been across the system, engaged in the chain battles, taking down the Dustor 7 Orbital s.h.i.+pyard.

"I've told her nothing of this," Leonidas said. "She's someone I hired to give me a ride, nothing more."

Alisa knew the words were for the sake of the officers and weren't true for him any more than they were for her. Farrow squinted at him, perhaps suspecting the same thing, and met Alisa's eyes.

"You won medals for fighting the empire during the war, and now you're ferrying around its officers, Captain Marchenko?" he asked.

"We met at gunpoint," Alisa said, thinking of Leonidas's admonition that she should save herself if she could. She loathed the idea of lying to do that, but this wasn't a lie. "And technically, he didn't pay me for that ride. He had a big destroyer pointed at my nose." Granted, he had been telling her to go away when he'd been pointing his gun at her, not ordering her to take him anywhere. "What's a girl to do when that happens?"

"I've seen the reports," Farrow said. "You refused to give him up at Perun." He nodded to the doctor. "Question her too. He may have confided in her."

"Why would I confide in an Alliance officer?" Leonidas asked.

"A former Alliance officer. One you seem oddly interested in protecting now."

"You're supposed to protect civilians from the enemy," he said without hesitating. "It's what soldiers do."

"We're not her enemy," Farrow snapped.

Alisa bit her lip to keep from pointing out that he hadn't seemed to have a problem with blowing up the Sta.r.s.eer temple while the Nomad was stuck in its docks.

"We needn't be your enemy, either," Farrow said. "The war is over. Your unit was disbanded. We just need to find the boy."

"And annihilate a temple full of Sta.r.s.eers?" Leonidas arched an eyebrow.

"Are you also concerned about protecting them? One wonders what you were doing down there."

"Research."

"Question them on that too," Farrow told the doctor. "We thought she would lead us down to a city where we could catch up with the cyborg once he departed. This-" he flexed his hand in the direction of the deck and the battle going on far below, "-was an unexpected bonus."

Leonidas's jaw tightened, the first sign that he was worried with the way things were going.

"You're welcome," Alisa said. "Perhaps as a sign of your grat.i.tude, you could refrain from sticking giant drug-filled needles in my neck."

"It's only a medium-sized needle," the doctor said.

"I'm sure that'll make it far more comfortable."

The s.h.i.+p shuddered, and Farrow frowned slightly. Even though Alisa knew the battle continued on while this meeting was happening, this was the first sign that the Nautilus was currently being targeted. Either the s.h.i.+elds had absorbed previous impacts so she had not noticed them, or the Sta.r.s.eers had flown up and found the wars.h.i.+p in the mist. It was also possible the Nautilus had descended and rejoined the fray as soon as it had Alisa and Leonidas on board.

Farrow's lips moved as he communicated subvocally to someone via his earstar. Alisa could not hear the response, but Leonidas stirred slightly at her side.

"I need to get back to the bridge," Farrow told the doctor. "Where would you prefer to do your interrogation? The brig or sickbay?"

"The brig, and I want him out of his armor," the doctor said firmly, his wary glance toward Leonidas promising that he wouldn't underestimate him. "I have an injectable form of tyranoadhuc gas to immobilize him for the trek down-" he lifted what Alisa had taken for a tranquilizer gun earlier, "-but it will have to wear off before I can question him, so I'll want him somewhere we can fully restrain him before then."

"You heard my doctor, Colonel," Farrow said. "Drop your drawers."

"You needn't sound so excited at the idea of getting him naked," Alisa muttered.

Farrow ignored her.

Leonidas regarded the armored men and women lined up in front of him, along with the weapons they carried. Alisa had seen him fight against more people, and she wondered if he was contemplating it now. He might have been thinking to wait and bide his time for an escape, but if the doctor meant to immobilize him with that drug, this could be his last chance to do something.

His gaze paused on her, and he frowned. She hoped he wasn't worried that she would be caught in the crossfire. She didn't want him sacrificing himself because of her. She glanced toward the c.o.c.kpit, trying to let him know that she would jump up and lock herself in if he took action.

"Sergeant," Farrow said, backing up, "have your men grab him and hold him for the doctor. We'll remove his armor once the drug has been administered."

"Yes, sir."

The s.h.i.+p shuddered again, the deck lurching beneath Alisa's feet. Farrow tapped his earstar and mumbled a question as four of the armored men surged forward. The doctor lifted the tranquilizer gun, aiming at Leonidas's head.

At first, Leonidas did not move. He held his arms away from his rifle, as if he meant to give up. He waited until two of the soldiers were close enough to grab him. Then, using their bodies as cover, he attacked.

With the soldiers in front of him, Alisa could barely see what happened, but two hulking armored men went flying, cras.h.i.+ng into those who had stayed back. Weapons fired, and she jumped, catching the lip of the c.o.c.kpit. The idea of fleeing from the fight rankled, but without armor, she was like a mouse among stampeding Senekda buffalo. Besides, once inside the c.o.c.kpit with the canopy closed, she might be able to get the Striker in the air so she could use the weapons.

She had only managed to pull herself up and sling one leg inside before something struck her in the back and a nimbus of white light flashed around her. Stun gun. Her entire body clenched, muscles spasming in a second that lasted a small eternity, and then everything relaxed. Her eyelids fell shut. She had no control.

She lost her grip on the hull, and gravity dragged her down. She expected to hit the floor hard. Instead, she landed in someone's armored hands. Unfortunately, that armor was gray instead of crimson. Someone wearing a uniform jerked her upright, and she felt something cool press against the side of her neck. The muzzle of a weapon?

Blazers had been going off all around her, but they halted abruptly, and silence fell in the hangar bay.

It took a Herculean effort for Alisa to wrestle her eyelids open. She had no control over her arms or legs.

She found herself looking straight at Leonidas, his red helmet back on, his rifle in his hands. He was less than a meter from her, but he froze, staring at her-and at whoever held her. The muzzle of the weapon pressed deeper into Alisa's neck. She had no trouble feeling it, even though it would take several moments before she was able to move.

Leonidas did not try to reach her. Regret and defeat flashed in his eyes. Alisa wanted to tell him not to give up for her sake, that the Alliance men wouldn't kill her, but perhaps it was good that she couldn't speak, because she was not positive it would have been the truth. If Farrow believed he could get his hands on the heir to the empire, he might believe that sacrificing her was worth it. Bile rose in her throat. She did not know if it was an effect of the stun gun or just how her body felt at this betrayal, at knowing her people would possibly kill her.

The Alliance soldiers that Leonidas had hurled aside rolled away from him, collecting their weapons and pus.h.i.+ng themselves to their feet.

"Back up and remove your helmet again, Colonel," Commander Farrow said, his voice beside Alisa's ear.

She hadn't realized he had been the one to grab her. She had no idea what the future would bring, but she hoped she one day had the opportunity to press a gun to his neck.

"No delays this time," Farrow added.

Leonidas met Alisa's eyes, though she could not read the message in them. Then he stepped back, removed his helmet, and tossed his rifle and the other weapons not built into his suit to the floor.

"Strip," Farrow said.

A soft clack sounded near Alisa, the doctor fumbling to load another tranquilizer dart. She imagined one sticking out of the wall somewhere in the bay. He needn't have bothered. This time, Leonidas obeyed the order.

Something else hit the s.h.i.+p, making enough of an impact to be felt through the s.h.i.+elds. Farrow cursed softly, his breath stirring Alisa's hair.

You've provided us a suitable distraction, a voice spoke into her head, the same Sta.r.s.eer who had been communicating with her all along.

I'm so glad for you, she snarled in reply. Any chance you want to come up here and help us out of our predicament?

In front of her, Leonidas removed his armor in pieces, unfastening the chest plate and boots as the soldiers looked on, once again stationed around him and pointing their rifles in his direction. Their faces held more irritated expressions than before, and more than one looked like he wanted to club Leonidas in the head-or maybe just shoot him. The doctor edged forward, that tranquilizer gun at the ready.

"Think you can handle him from here, Sergeant?" Farrow asked, his tone dry as he looked toward Leonidas, who now wore little more than the snug underwear and T-s.h.i.+rt that he wore under his armor.

Even through her faceplate, the embarra.s.sed flush to the female squad leader's cheeks was visible. "Yes, sir."

Alisa could wiggle her fingers but not much more. Reaching her Etcher was out of the question. Someone might have already removed it, anyway.

"Doctor?" Farrow asked.