Traitor (Rebel Stars Book 2) (19 page)

"I'd try to explain if I thought you had any interest in listening."

She had an annoying way of saying things like that while making them sound a fraction as mean as they were. That made it hard to respond in kind without sounding like a total ass. Whatever. As long as she was on board with the big picture, he'd suffer her quirks.

The pirate squadron, now firmly within the green sphere, spread out. It was an obviously aggressive maneuver, a corralling tactic. Only the most passive of drones wouldn't respond with equal aggression, all but tearing themselves apart to escape. Instead, the freighters barely budged course, yet the Locker fighters continued with their unsuspecting approach. See? So focused on the prize they were blind to the simplest of traps.

The first salvo of rockets seared from the pirates' bows.

"Okay, I'm ready to be enlightened," Thor blurted. "How is this not overkill?"

Iggi laughed out loud, glancing his way. "You're telling
me
about overkill, Mr. Assassination?"

"I do what I do in order to reduce the number of problems in our lives. This here, though, is inefficient. We don't need this asset. We've got the strength to roll over the System as is."

"You know damn well that resource management is about more than accumulating strength. It's also about denying resources to those who could threaten you with them."

"You mean keeping the Locker out of the hands of the Hive."

"I knew the others were wrong when they said you only got your seat through nepotism."

He gave her a hard look. "Valiant was founded by your great-grandfather."

"Great-grandpappy the doctor. He thought the future lay within the human body.
I'm
the one who kicked us out into the only future that matters: the vacuum."

"Brilliant move, figuring out exactly what the rest of us have been proving for decades." He smiled at himself. She licked her lips, chambering her next snipe. He moved on before she could fire back. "So how is this supposed to secure us the Locker?"

"We've been through this like fifty times."

"The debts? That, I get. But you appear to have moved on to murdering them. In my experience, this tends to make people
less
interested in cooperating with you."

For the last few seconds, the freighters and pirates had been engaged in the standard tussle of missiles and counter-missiles. Pretty boring shit. Tactics Thor hoped to soon render obsolete. As the Locker's ships came ever nearer, though, the freighters just…fell apart. Without being struck.

Each of the dozens of pieces were nearly identical in size. Unnatural, that. Almost as if they weren't chunks of blown-up debris, but were, in fact, independent, mobile entities.

The newly-revealed swarms of military drones swung on the pirates, enfolding them in an inescapable net of rockets.

Watching the display, Iggi raised her palms to chin height and clapped. "Oh, that's just too good. Now let's assume for a second I'm not an idiot. Then why would I be killing these fine crewmen?"

"Because," he said, seizing on the answer, "someone else in the Locker wants them dead."

"Attaboy!" She thrust her fists above her head. "And that someone is about to owe me big time."

On the screen, the first of the pirate vessels went up in the voluminous explosion of a vessel carrying an oxygenated atmosphere. The others followed like a string of lights being popped by a young boy with a hammer. She was smarter than he thought, wasn't she? He eyed her sidelong. Young. Good body. Suppose it was as flexible as her morals?

"What?" she said.

"Nothing." He nodded at the screen, where bulbs of flame were fading into the ether. "So how shall we celebrate, Blackbeard?"

12

The shot was an understated puff of air. Admiral Garnes' head snapped back. Blood sprayed the wall behind him and streamed from the hole in his forehead. He stood there dumbly, then dropped to his knees, falling to an awkward rest, back bent over his shoes.

Ced scrambled back, banging into the wall. "How did you know?"

Kansas walked forward and kneeled over the body. "Where to shoot? Typically, the brains are kept in the head."

"That he was threatening to kill you!"

"Was he? My conscience is happy to hear that. Why'd he want
me
dead?"

"To keep me leashed to his desk." Ced edged closer to the body. "Why..?"

Kansas lolled his head side to side, pressing a small white rod to his neck. A screen on the end of the rod displayed a list of figures. All of them read zero.

"I'm taking over."

"You'll never take over the Dragons. Is this some kind of joke?"

"I'm not taking over the Dragons." She put away the white rod and looked him in the eye. "I'm taking over the Locker."

His brain tripped and fell. "You've been out too long. You've got space madness."

Kansas closed on him. She was still holding the gun and its scent was vaguely offensive, almost flatulent. Outside of spacecraft, guns were illegal on the Locker, but he supposed that was not the biggest issue at the moment.

"I don't have a lot of time, Ced," she said. "Make a choice. Help me out, or leave the Dragons."

"Can you at least tell me—"

"Three. Two. One—"

"I'm in." He glanced back into the reception room, ensuring it was empty, then closed the door. The lock sealed with a beep. "What do you need?"

"I knew they hadn't squeezed the fight out of you." She grinned, then pocketed the gun and got out her device. "Call Landon Furley."

"The pole?" He got out his device.

"Don't use yours. Use the admiral's."

He moved to the desk, stepping around the body. The admiral's eyes were open, staring stupidly. Ced's horror had faded. He'd envisioned the admiral dead on many occasions. The man had deserved it—he had actively exploited children—but seeing the body, Ced felt an unwanted weight on his shoulders.

Ced swept open the dead man's device and ran a quick search of his listings, bringing up Landon Furley. Kansas held up a finger, stopping him before he put the call through. She lifted her device to her face.

"Testing," Garnes' voice said. "I am one dead son of a bitch."

Ced whirled, but the body was still. Kansas burst into laughter, waggling her device, which was processing her voice to imitate the admiral. "Well? Give Mr. Furley a ring. Sound-only, needless to say."

He did as told. After a moment, the connection went live.

"Furley?" Kansas said, her device spitting out her words in Garnes' much deeper voice. "I need to chat with you."

"And I need a divorce," a bass voice answered. "What do you want?"

"It's the Halder matter. How's tonight?"

"After dinner. Fair warning: I will be drunk."

"I'm sending two of my financial people first," Kansas said. "They'll go through the options with you. Once I get there, we'll discuss whichever you like best."

"And here I thought you'd drag your heels on this," Furley said. "How's 10 PM?"

"See you then." She made a cutting gesture at Ced.

He hung up. Raised an eyebrow. "The Halder matter?"

"Doesn't matter."

"Furley is—was—in Garnes' pocket. Do you really think you can talk him into hopping into yours? After what you've done?"

"The poles are no different from a steak or a cruiser. They can be bought by anyone with the money." She pocketed her device. "Now. Who's in charge of cleaning up the bodies around here?"

"No one." Ced didn't know whether to grin or puke. "But I have the feeling we'd better assign someone."

* * *

The car wound through the park. Eerie purple light glowed from the underside of leaves and branches, filtering to the ground. The air smelled like fruit and yeast. Ced knew the smell and the glow was from bacteria of some kind, but had no idea why it was stuck to the trees. Some inscrutable rich person thing.

To either side of the road, trees shot two hundred feet into the air, as high as most towers. Lights shined from the apartments built into the boughs. The car turned, arriving at a metal gate. Ced's device pinged as the gate identified him, determined he was expected, and rolled open. Individual homes rose on both sides of the street. The car ambled up a driveway and parked itself in front of a black glass edifice.

Kansas gazed up the steps at the doors. "Don't talk unless you have to. I've got this one."

As if he needed the reminder. Back at the office, Garnes' killing had been received with more enthusiasm than shock. Some of them had been
expecting
it. A handful of his loyal officers had protested furiously. They'd gone quiet in a hurry when the troopers in blue and white armor had stormed in behind Kansas. Nobody seemed to know exactly what was going on, yet the coup went off as if it had been choreographed like the dancing animals in the movies Ced had watched as a kid. Somehow, Kansas had seized the Dragons. And that was that.

He exited into the yeasty-smelling air. Kansas loped up the steps. His device pinged again and the front doors slid open. A disembodied feminine voice informed them Mr. Furley awaited them in the den at the rear of the house. Kansas moved through the dim rooms like she'd been there before. Everything was glass or metal or wood.

Three steps descended to a sunken room filled with stuffed chairs, glass coffee tables, and shelves of trinkets. Floor-to-ceiling windows looked out on a stone patio and a dark lawn.

A man rose from one of the chairs. His black hair swept back from a sharp widow's peak. He was in his fifties, but his skin was smooth, with the shiny look of treatments.

He extended his hand. "Landon Furley. And you are?"

"Are you alone?" Kansas said.

"Like I need my wife knowing how much I'm pulling in?" He raised an eyebrow. "You two look a little young for financial wizards."

"That's because we're not. My name is Kansas Carruth."

"If you're not with finance—" He angled his head, staring into her eyes. "Did you say
Carruth
?"

"Good. Then I don't need to explain."

His eyes went wide. "I don't know who you're with. But if you do this, Admiral Garnes will cut off your hands and feet. Then your eyelids. Then—"

"Garnes is dead," Kansas said. "I'm going to give you three seconds."

"To do what?"

"To understand there's no way out."

He bared his teeth and ran to his left. Kansas leveled a pistol and shot him in the ribs. He crashed to the lush white carpet and pulled himself up on his elbows. She stepped on his spine and shot him in the back of the head.

"Stop!" Ced yelled. "We're in this man's house!"

"A house built with the blood of the Locker," she said evenly. "Seems fair it should get his blood in return."

He grabbed her shoulder, twisting her to face him. "Next time you want to make me accessory to murder, how about you ask?"

"What did you think we were going to do? Share cucumber sandwiches?"

"I thought you were going to turn him. Let him know he had a new boss. You just killed a pole! Do you know what the others are going to do to us?"

"They're going to do whatever I tell them to. Now get your damn hand off me."

He dropped it, breathing hard. "You can't kill your way to the top. The other crews will hit you like the Panhandler."

"I have no intention of turning this station into a bloodbath." She put away her pistol, moved to the corpse, and sat on its back. She patted Furley's rump. "Do you know who he was?"

"One of the most powerful civilians on the Locker."

"My parents were politicians, too. Not for the bribes. Because they believed. They were going to reform the care debts. Up the minimum age for enlistment. When Furley understood what this was going to do to his kickbacks, he had them killed."

Ced rubbed his mouth. "And he got away with it?"

She smiled, drier than moon dust. "They like to make us think the Locker's orphans all come from pirates who never made it home. That's how they cover up all the killing they do here on the ground."

"Do you know about my mom? Did she really die on a flight?"

"As far as I know." She sprawled her legs, still seated on Furley's back. "Accidents happen."

He wandered closer. A minute ago, he'd been so angry he could have punched her, but now he just felt confused. "What's going on here, Kansas? What's the plan?"

"Told you."

"How did you take over the Dragons so fast? It was like they were waiting for you."

"They were." She laughed wryly. "Isn't hard to get people to turn on a tyrant."

"What about the rest of the Locker? The other crews aren't going to throw themselves at your feet."

"Some of them have already been taken care of. Replaced by people more sympathetic to our cause."

"How are you doing this?" he said. "You're just a spacer. Where is all this power coming from?"

Her shoulders shook. At first he thought she was laughing, but then a sob pierced the quiet of the den.

"He's dead." She laced her fingers into Furley's bloody hair and lifted his limp head. "Do you know how long I've wanted this?"

"Where's his security? How are you going to keep the other poles off you?"

"You don't have to worry about that. Or anything else." She stood, silver eyes crackling with the thrill of conquering. "Not as long as you're with me."

She pressed herself against him, finding his mouth with hers. His heart raced harder than it had when she'd shot Garnes. He dug his nails into her back. She tore off his jacket, running her hands up his stomach to his chest. Her fingertips were sticky with Furley's blood, but Ced was far too gone to care.

* * *

He lay naked on the white rug. Her body stretched against him, skin slick with sweat. Three feet to his left, the politician's corpse stared at him.

"We have to end it," he said. "The care debts. If you're taking over, you can't leave these people as your slaves."

"Way ahead of you." Kansas bounced to her feet and snagged her underwear from a coffee table. Firm muscles shifted under smooth skin. He drank in the image, unsure he'd ever see it again. She came and went like a storm. She slid her underwear up to her hips, gazing down at him. "Get your pants on. We've got work to do."