Bitter Angels (22 page)

Kapa was ready for it and we weren’t. He had his knife out and he drove it straight into Ceshame’s guts.

Ceshame screamed. Red bubbles of blood exploded into the air. Kapa took a faceful and choked. I grabbed the edge of the threshold and forced myself to see straight. Leda swam headfirst down the ladder in time to see Ceshame curl in on himself, clutching his stomach.

Kapa kicked off the wall toward Leda, knife first. Leda, the fool, yanked out her pellet gun and took a shot, which, of course, went wild. The kick drove her back into the wall, knocking what was left of her breath out of her.

I launched myself, slamming my shoulder into Kapa, shoving us both against the wall. I got my hand around his wrist and twisted hard. Bone snapped and he screamed and the knife was loose and floating away. I reached for it with my free hand.

Which was when the rest of Kapa’s crew flew through the air lock. The deadman’s switch had failed, or they’d been ready for it, and they still had hold of us.

A noose looped around my neck before I could get my hand up. My momentum slammed the line against my throat and pain blinded me. I gasped and gagged, and got a mouthful of Ceshame’s blood.

“For fuck’s sake, get the acceleration on!” shouted Kapa.

“I’d rather not do it, Brother,” he said.

Ceshame was on the deck, spattered with his own blood and not moving. Leda had collapsed on the deck beside him. Pain hazed her eyes and she tried to get up, but only fell back panting. Kapa had two men and a woman behind him, and out of the corner of my eye I could see two more of his crew just waiting for the room to fit themselves in.

I held very, very still. I caught Leda’s pain-wracked gaze, and prayed she’d understand she should be still too. She panted hard, and spat and curled more tightly in on herself. Gradually, her breath slowed. Then it stopped.

Her sightless eyes rolled open.

I could do nothing at all.

Kapa just turned to his crew. “Go get the saints,” he ordered. “If they’ve locked themselves in, tell them I’ll shoot their minder if they don’t come out.” He winked at me. “Don’t worry. They won’t let it come to that. Against their codes.”

Disbelief surged through me. “You are not talking about kidnapping a pair of saints, Kapa.”

He shrugged. “You pick your hole, I’ll pick mine.”

“Either way, we both go down.”

That only made him grin wider. “Unless you change your mind. Door’s open for about sixty seconds longer, Brother. Put in and we can go get Emiliya out too. Be just like the old days.”

I felt sick. I had screwed up, utterly and completely, and now Kapa was trying to recruit me over Leda’s corpse.

“Shut it,” I croaked. My throat burned like fire from the noose. “Even if they didn’t have my parents, you’d be asking me to turn on my own people.”

Kapa shrugged. “Well, at least you get to go out on a clear conscience.”

One of the women had gone to the door. Had Emiliya and the saints locked it in time? I had no way of knowing. I had no way of moving without getting shot. Kapa was not going to miss me at that range, and he wouldn’t give a damn if he pinholed the ship doing it. After all, he had another ship. An internal drive ship. That whine I’d heard was the jump engine ramping up.

Kapa’s crew member was banging on the passenger compartment door. “Come on out!” she yelled into the intercom grille. “And you won’t have anything to be sorry for!”

I thought about Terese Drajeske and Siri Baijahn, and the weapons they had stashed in the lockers. I thought about the fact that they were forbidden to kill, and that Emiliya was in there and I had absolutely no idea what any of them could, or would, do.

“Okay, okay,” came Terese’s voice over the intercom. “I’ve unlocked the door.”

“Good girl,” sneered the pirate, and she cranked the latch.

“No!” yelled Kapa.

Too late. The door pulled back and Terese, fully dressed, slammed the muzzle of her gun directly in the pirate’s solar
plexus. The blow doubled the woman over and dropped her to the deck. Terese hit the deck full length, giving me a perfect view of Siri kneeling in a firing position and taking a bead on Kapa. Kapa swung my pellet gun around and I raised my fists, but there was a sharp crack, and the gun vanished out of his hand, and Kapa was knocked back against the wall.

From her position on the floor, Terese rolled, swinging her gun out to sweep the woman pirate’s feet out from under her. I spotted the gun Kapa had dropped and darted for it. I heard the firing crack behind me. Kapa was swearing and shouting. Another crack, and I turned, gun up. Kapa was struggling to pull himself from the wall. He couldn’t seem to move his good hand. A massive blob of shiny mucus covered his fist and wrist.

Glue. She’d glued him to the wall. His broken hand dangled uselessly. The pain had to be intense. Hate distorted his features.

The last pirate still standing struggled to pull his feet free from the deck. Glue covered his boots.

A rush of wind told me the air lock had closed. I whirled around in time to see the warning light blink over to yellow. I dodged over to the panel. That wasn’t our door. Whoever was still on board Kapa’s ship had cut us off from their side.

I spun again to face Kapa. Death had slackened all of Ceshame’s features, and his corpse slumped across Leda’s. I swore, bitterly and silently.

Terese was breathing hard and she and Siri had their guns up, covering all three of the pirates: the one glued to the deck, the one groaning in pain between Ceshame’s and Leda’s corpses, and Kapa, glued to the wall.

Emiliya was nowhere to be seen. And the door to the internal drive ship was shut and locked.

“He’d be killing you too,” Terese pointed out.

“What makes you think he’d give a damn? You think I hired a bunch of Guardians?” He sneered the last word. “Make your decision now, Lady Saint. Play tough and you’re killing us all.”

“Is he bluffing?” Terese asked me.

Kapa met my gaze without blinking. I expected his expression to be cold, but it wasn’t. His face was warm and open, absolutely sincere, like a friend’s.

“Kapa,” I said. “What do you think you’re doing?”

He shrugged and winced as his broken hand flopped. “And I’m going to tell you now? Answer the seña’s question.”

My jaw worked back and forth a few times before answering.

“No, he’s not bluffing,” I said. “He’s gambled everything on this. If it doesn’t work, he’s dead anyway and he knows it.”

“Make up your mind fast, Lady Saint,” said Kapa. “I did not leave a patient man over there.”

Terese looked at me. I looked at her. Siri was still kneeling in her firing position, waiting. A bead of sweat ran down her brow.

“Stand down,” said Terese hoarsely. She laid her gun on the floor, but I thought I saw her finger make an extra tweak
on the trigger. She met my eyes, but I saw no fear, only grim determination. As far as she was concerned, this fight was a long way from over.

Anger rushed through me, together with a hot, ferocious adrenaline wave, and I had to suppress the most bizarre urge to smile.

“Up to you now, Brother Amerand,” said Kapa. “You gonna shoot, or give Isha there your gun?” He nodded toward the woman pirate between my dead crew. She’d risen to her knees, gritting her teeth against the pain. The look she sent toward Terese was pure hate.

I could stop this now, but I would end as a corpsicle, and I wanted to live. I wanted revenge for the death of my crew.

I laid my gun on the deck and kicked it over to Isha. Moving slow and lopsided, she scooped it up, checking the trigger and the load.

“Now get me out of this.” Kapa jerked his chin toward his glue-covered hand.

Terese shrugged. “I don’t have the release.”

“I don’t believe you,” answered Kapa, and Isha pointed my gun at Terese’s face. Isha’s arm shook. Her finger on the trigger shook.

Terese met the woman’s eyes, letting Isha see she was not afraid. She shrugged again and nodded to her second. The Field Coordinator had also laid down her weapon. Moving slowly, Siri Baijahn crossed the deck to Kapa.

“It’s in my pocket,” she said. Keeping one hand up and out, she pulled a capsule about the size of her thumbnail out of her belt pocket and smashed it against Kapa’s trapped hand. A sharp ammoniac scent burst from it followed by a soft hiss, and the epoxy turned to a clear jelly and sloughed off down the wall.

Siri performed the operation on the other pirate’s boots. His foot lashed out and caught her right on the temple, snapping her head back and sending her sprawling onto her back.

“Siri!” Terese was beside her in an instant. Coordinator Baijahn blinked unsteadily at the ceiling.

“None of that,” said Kapa mildly to his man. “No unnecessary waste.” He tapped on the intercom. “Open it up. We’re in control here.”

The warning light blinked over to green and the air lock whooshed open again. Kapa’s remaining crew member—a squat, scarred man with a bird icon tattooed on his temple—came out, pellet gun pointed at us. I looked toward Terese, but she was helping Siri sit up. Siri blinked unsteadily at her surroundings. Blood trickled down her cheek.

“What the hell?” she said. “What the hell?”

Kapa paid no attention. He was busy taking charge. “All right, Gull, search the passenger pod. Make sure they haven’t stowed any other little surprises in there.” Gull was the new arrival. He worked the action on his own weapon by way of response.

“Then we stow these three in there,” Kapa went on, nodding toward the passenger cabin. He cradled his broken hand in the good one. Pain turned his face grey, and his forehead was slick with sweat. “After pickup comes, we can strip the rest of the shuttle.” His gaze wandered over his prisoners and lingered on Siri Baijahn where she sat beside her commander. “And maybe now you’ve learned a little lesson?” He smiled at Terese where she crouched next to Siri, who still blinked dazedly around at all of us.

Terese’s smile was sharp and dangerous. “And here’s one
for you. Touch one of my people again, and I will cut your balls off.”

Kapa flashed his amethyst tooth at her. “No good. I know you can’t kill me.”

Terese’s smile did not waver. “So you’ll be alive, and without your balls. Think about it.”

Kapa narrowed his eyes, turning his face genuinely ugly. He leaned in close to Terese, trying to make her shrink back. “You’re so lucky I need you.”

“Thanks for letting me know,” she answered evenly. “Gives me a whole world of latitude, that little factoid does.”

“I need you alive, but you don’t have to be in one piece,” Kapa said quietly, seriously. “Think about that little
factoid
while deciding how much
latitude
you really have.”

Siri finally seemed able to focus again on what was happening. She and Terese both watched Kapa as he straightened, their expressions hard and cold. I wondered how many things you could do to a man before he died, and how many of them the saints knew.

Gull was in the passenger compartment now, gun ready, eyes sharp, the pirates backing him up. The obvious place to hide was in the bunks. But Emiliya was a tunnel runner. She knew how to hide. She wouldn’t be waiting in the most obvious spot.

The pirate opened the first bunk.

Nothing.

He opened the second, the third…nothing.

He moved to the lockers, and opened the first, the second, the third.

Still nothing.

I was beginning to wonder if I had dreamed Emiliya’s
presence. I stared straight ahead. I could not betray the possible hiding places with my glance.

Then I noticed Terese Drajeske’s mouth moving. None of Kapa’s crew was looking at her. They were all watching Gull. Terese Drajeske was watching the passenger compartment, and slowly, softly, counting down.

Gull bent down and hauled up the floor plates with one hand.

He slammed them shut and straightened up.

A white blur dropped from the ceiling. Gull gave a strangled shout and toppled over. Emiliya rolled to her knees, his gun in her hand. Gull was flat on the deck with a needle in his throat.