Hold the Star: Samair in Argos: Book 2 (21 page)

              “Boss,” Kek’rikor said with a grunt as he moved the body off to the side of the bridge.  “It’s just been sso long!” he whined.  “You’ve kept us away from them for so long.”

              “Stop complaining,” Jax snapped.  “I did it because the Captain ordered it.”

              Kek’rikor dropped the corpse of the hak’ruk on the deck and gave it a sharp kick for good measure.  There was an audible crunch as his foot busted the hard carapace of the thorax.  “The Captain?  You give a damn what the Captain here thinks?”  He gave a blat of laughter.

              “No, you idiot,” Jax said, going over to the communications console and tapping a few keys to bring up the displays.  Nothing happened.  The console was dead.  “Not the man on this ship, the
Captain
!  Captain Verrikoth!”

              The zheen blushed a rose hue, which was quickly banished back to his normal lilac shade.  He hung his head.  “Sorry, Boss.  Didn’t mean nothing by it.”

              Jax glared at him for a moment longer.  “Fine.  What is going on with these consoles?”

              Kek’rikor started in surprise.  “What do you mean, Boss?  When the girlie waz here earlier, there wasn’t a problem.  She was using them as normal, checking on status every few minutes.”

              “And that one?” Jax asked, pointing to the dead hak’ruk. 

              Kek’rikor shrugged again.  “She was only at the console for a moment before I interrupted her, Boss.  Don’t think there was any problem, but I was a bit too preoccupied to pay much attention at the time.”  He actually sounded embarrassed.

              Jax stabbed his fingers at the keys on the console, but there was no response.  The console was active and lit up, but the display indicated “Idle”.  Nothing he did changed that message.  He moved to the Operations console, but the effect was the same.  “Check the helm,” he ordered. 

              Kek’rikor immediately moved over to the helm console, but he too, was unable to affect the systems at the console.  “Sorry, Boss.  Locked out.”

              “Damn it!” Jax cursed.  “I cannot
believe
this is happening.  That I
let
this happen!”  He turned back to the door.  “Get your weapons.  We can’t stay in here.  The crew most likely have decided it’s time to try and regain their ship.  We can’t let that happen.”

              The zheen pulled out his sidearm in one hand, a blade in the other.  “Let’ss go get ‘em, Boss,” he said, his tone joyous. 

              Jax couldn’t help but find himself smiling as well.  “We can’t kill them all,” he cautioned.  “We need enough of them alive to crew the ship.  We need to get to Amethyst.  But after that, I’m giving you and any of ours that make it full permission to do what you like with the survivors.”

              Kek’rikor chittered with pleasure.  “That, Boss, will make this whole trip worth it.”

              “We need to move,” he ordered.  “We have to get to the berthing areas, link up with the others.  We’ve got to put down this mutiny before it spreads too far.”  They both ran from the compartment.

              Tamara slumped against the bulkhead in the corridor, breathing hard.  Her knees gave out and she slid to the deck.  Her vision was swimming and she couldn’t take another step.  For a long moment, she sat there, gasping like a landed fish, trying to force her body to obey.  But it wouldn’t.  The long imprisonment, the beatings, the lack of sufficient food and water, it was all just too much for her to take.  She was almost to the berthing compartments, knowing that she was a long ways behind the Captain, if indeed he had continued down in this direction, and she hadn’t seen any sign of the lupusan.  In fact, she hadn’t seen any of the crew since her release from the brig.  She was almost to the berthing compartments, which meant the odds of her running into someone were increasing with every step.  It was also more likely she’d run into one of the pirates, though Tamara was sure she could handle one of them if they crossed paths.  Well, mostly sure.

              Who was she kidding?  The fire of vengeance that had been burning inside her had flared out during the run up the corridor.  She really wasn’t up for this, she knew that, but there was no way she was going to be left out of the mutiny.  Her mind knew that, but it seemed her body wasn’t up for the job. 

              “Well now,” a voice came from up ahead.  Tamara looked up, into the face of one of the pirates.  He was human, large and thuggish, like most of them, though this one looked as though he only was just coming off his shift.  Where from, Tamara had no idea.  He was coming from the forward section of the ship, and it looked as though the sight of a woman slumped down against the bulkhead was just too good of a temptation to pass up.  He had an assault rifle slung over his back, though his hand was on his sidearm.  A nasty smile was spreading over his face.

              Tamara didn’t blink, she didn’t even hesitate.  Instinct kicked in, her arm came up and her finger squeezed the trigger.  Her ears rung from the shot, which reverberated around and down the corridor.  The side of the man’s neck exploded outward, showering the bulkhead with blood.  The man’s eyes bulged in horror and surprise.  His hand flew to the terrible wound, and his mouth opened and closed as though he was trying to speak, but no sound came out.  Tamara stared at the weapon in her hand for a second, wondering at what sort of ammunition was in there, and then fired twice more, putting two in the man’s chest.  The force of the impact knocked him backward a step and he collapsed to the deck, dead, a pool of blood rapidly expanding beneath him.

              Tamara knew that the noise of the shots would have drawn attention, but at this point, she was too exhausted to care.  She felt nauseous and sick, only partially because of the life she’d just taken or the pain she’d just narrowly avoided. 
There
, she told herself,
now I can say I helped. 
The arm holding the gun went limp and her weapon, still clutched firmly in her fist, clunked to the deck and she went limp against the bulkhead.  She didn’t lose consciousness, but she just stared off at a part of the corridor, not really seeing anything, still trying to get her breathing down to a reasonable rate.  Her heart was hammering away against her chest but with every breath, she was starting to regain control.

              The arrival of two different parties to the berthing compartments caused absolute chaos to break out all at once.  There were four of the pirates sleeping in their bunks there, who were awakened by popping of gunfire in the nearby corridor.  The four of them started, a zheen and three humans and all of them bounced out of their beds, looking around in confusion.  Never before had there been any kind of activity like this aboard this captured vessel, this prize vessel, not since the initial taking of the ship by Verrikoth’s forces.  And then it had been a straight up boarding action, none of this ambushing or gunfights in the middle of the night.  They’d all been suited and booted, armed to the teeth.  Now, the four of them pulled hand weapons, stunners, pistols.  Their blades and their rifles were all safely stowed in the Security office, away from where the crew could get their grubby civvie hands on them.  It was standard procedure aboard a prize vessel to keep the majority of the big weapons out of prisoners’ hands.

              Now they were all regretting it.  Still, they carried weapons and the crew was expressly forbidden them, it didn’t mean that they hadn’t gotten their hands on weapons somehow.  And that was one of the biggest fears of the remaining pirates.  Things seemed fine and manageable before the massacre in the cargo bay, with twenty-four of their number inside.   Now, tension was raised in every compartment.  Every turn, every compartment was a potential ambush.  And since Armsman Jax was not allowing them to keep the crew cowed in the proper way, they were getting bold.  Oh, killing a bunch of them certainly made them wary, but the pirates were convinced that all that had done was make them back off a bit.  The first opening they got to stick a knife in the back, they were all convinced the crew would try it.

              And now it seemed that opening had come.  “Arm up!” yelled the zheen, though it was hardly necessary.  “Go!  Get to Security!”

              They pushed to the hatch leading toward the corridors heading aft but their way was blocked.  Captain Vincent Eamonn stood there, to the left of the hatch, weapon raised.  He fired, catching the zheen in his left compound eye, green blood spurting from the wound.  The insectoid screeched and dropped to his knees, clutching the wound.  Two of the men opened fire just as Eamonn dodged to the right, but a bullet clipped his right forearm and he yelled in pain.  He switched the gun from his right hand to his left, and immediately fired back, his right arm dangling limp.  It hurt too much to try and move it.

              Bullets and needles ricocheted off the bulkhead all around him; it seemed as though the pirates were just spraying projectiles in in direction to pin him down while they got in a position to take him out properly.  Eamonn, hiding behind the very small cover of one of the metal struts lining the bulkhead, raised his weapon and fired again.  He didn’t hit anything, in fact the bullet bounced off the hatch and into the berthing compartment beyond.  There were no cries from inside, and he cursed.  This was not going at all the way he’d hoped.  Surely, the gunfire would bring help?

              But then Eamonn cursed again.  Aside from the lupusan, who were going to be busy with the Security office, there wasn’t any help coming.  He’d left Moxie behind (which was probably a very good move) and he had no way of knowing what was going on in the rest of the ship.  He should have waited, he knew, as he pulled back against the bulkhead, crying out as projectiles clanged off the metal.  Eamonn fired again, but then his luck ran out.

              One of the pirates ducked right and fired, his needler perforating Eamonn’s left leg, which was just a bit too far forward from the dubious cover he was cowering behind.  The captain screamed and pulled back, but it was too late.  They seized the moment and rushed out the hatch, surrounding him. 

              “You’re a dead man, now,
Captain
,” the one who’d shot him growled.  “I’ma take you to Armsman Jax and he will
gut
you for this.  Kill my boys?  You gonna
pay!
”  They relieved the captain of his weapon and frog marched him inside the hatchway. 

              Eamonn’s leg was a bloody mess.  From his left knee to just above his ankle, blood was rushing out, the needler having torn the flesh.  The metal spikes had been stopped by the bone in his knee, to it looked now as though he had little shiny prickles poking outward, like a bloody pincushion.  Bringing him inside, they shoved him roughly onto one of the unused bunks, and two of the pirates stood over him, weapons drawn. 

              Vincent Eamonn had never experienced this level of pain before and hoped he never would again.  Gingerly, he grabbed one of the bed sheets and wrapped it around his right arm, trying to staunch the flow of the wound there.  It was serious, but more of a graze, just along the top of his forearm.  It had sliced the muscle there, making his hand go very weak, but it wasn’t bleeding quite as badly as it was before.  Once the arm was dealt with, he looked to his leg.  With his left hand, he tried to pull out one of the spikes, but it was imbedded in the bones in his knee.  Pulling on it sent waves of agony pulsing outward from the wound and he gasped.  He retched, and the thugs, grinning, took a step back from him.  Vomit dribbled down the front of his shipsuit, but Eamonn couldn’t muster up enough will to care at this moment.  This hadn’t at
all
gone the way he’d expected and he certainly didn’t look the part of the dashing, charismatic hero he’d envisioned when he’d started on this path back at the brig. 

              Laying his head back against the metal leg of the bar connecting to the bunk above, he drew in raspy, shuddering breaths, wondering how long it would take for the end to come.  At least he’d done some good, he thought.  He’d released Moxie and the sisters, who would undoubtedly be doing their best to reclaim the ship.  If he knew the lupusan, and he did, they would bring down hell on these poor fools, even if Jax did in fact “gut him” as the man had threatened.  More than threatened, Eamonn knew.  It would be unlikely that Jax would be able to overlook this particular transgression.  At this point, if Cookie and the sisters had done their jobs, Jax would be rapidly running out of soldiers.  He may have to settle for just killing as many as he could before Corajen took him down.  Eamonn chuckled, though it came out as almost a strangled sob.  He hoped he’d get to stay alive long enough to see that.

              He was getting cold.  He knew the wound in his leg and arm were still bleeding, the makeshift bandage on his arm was helping a little, but he couldn’t do anything for the many wounds on his leg.  With the metal there, trying to bind it at all might only do more damage.  But if he did nothing, he’d bleed to death. 
Maybe I’ll be gone before Jax can get here
, he said, strangely hopeful.

              But there was no such luck.  Less than a minute before that morbid thought crossed his mind, the hatch on the other side opened and the man himself stepped through, followed by one of his zheen compatriots.  “Report!” the Armsman demanded.

              “We’ve secured the area, Boss,” the man who’d shot Eamonn replied.  “Captured this little piece of trash, but he shot Kovix.”  He indicated the zheen, who had bound up his injured eye.  “Can’t get in touch with anyone else.  We were going to head to Security when this one,” he indicated Eamonn, “got in the way.”