Victorious Star (17 page)

Too many damned people…
She nearly stepped back into the lift.

The decision was removed by a small crowd of crewmen that jostled past her to get into her lift. The door closed behind her like the crack of doom.

Leaning heavily on the practice sword, Victoria started down the shipway, head down and hugging the wall to avoid notice. After a few strides, Victoria realized that she was acting like a coward. Disgusted at her petty fear, she deliberately stepped away from the wall and lifted her chin. This was her ship, damn it, and there was nothing on it that could harm her.

She focused on the communication lines that laced through the walls and felt the ship respond to her query with a rush of welcome. Oh yes, this was her ship… A grim smile lifted the corner of her mouth.

Victoria made it to the far side and pressed the lift call with a small sigh of triumph. No one had noticed her. They walked blithely past her chatting to their fellow crewmembers.
Apparently I’m not different enough to question.

The lift doors opened and she stepped in. She leaned against the back wall and panted for breath. Fate, she was tired…

The doors slid to close only to stop for a hand. The doors opened back up and two crewmen stepped in. The doors closed firmly behind them.

“Mind if we share your lift?” said the first. He was big, bald-headed and broad shouldered. His insignia indicated that he was a chief petty officer from engineering. He focused on her with interest.

The second crewman was smaller, but just as muscular as the first with stringy blond hair caught back in a narrow braid. His insignia also said engineering, but he was only a petty officer second-class. His mouth was tight and grim as he stared at her.

Victoria eyed both of them uneasily. She was pretty damn sure that they were the same two men that had attacked her with Nav-Pilot Richards. She had laid them both out on the deck before Richards had pulled out his sword with fatal consequences. She released a calming breath, desperately hoping that her physical changes were radical enough that they wouldn’t recognize her.

The chief frowned mockingly at her. “Haven’t I seen you somewhere before?” He folded his muscled arms across his broad chest.

The smaller crewman’s mouth tightened.

Damn… Maybe I can bluff him?
Victoria raised a sarcastic brow. “It’s possible. I’m Senior Nav-Pilot Chaste.”

The chief’s brows rose. “Is that so? Are you sure you’re not Senior Nav-Pilot Stark?”

Victoria raised her own brows. “There’s only one nav-pilot on this ship, and my name is Chaste.”

The engineer glared. “Call yourself what you like, but I watched you kill Richards.”

The smaller crewman glanced up at the chief. “Richards was a shit-sucking bastard.”

The chief tilted his head. “So he was. But he was kind enough to bring us in on his deal. Which is still in effect.” He grinned slyly at Victoria. “It seems that one of your previous senior officers didn’t like you much.”

Victoria frowned. “You don’t know any of my previous senior officers.”

The engineer sighed. “Oh, but I’m afraid we do.” He nodded at the other crewman, who nodded back.

Victoria felt a growl rumbling up and choked it back. “Really?” They could not be saying what she thought they were saying.

The engineer nodded slowly. “The
Adamant’s
executive officer promised the three of us a nice chunk of credits for your ass on a slab.”

My what? That ass-wipe!
Victoria clamped her jaw until it ached. Heat flared at the base of her skull.

The smaller crewman shrugged then flashed a nasty grin. “Pity Richards won’t get his share.”

“That is a pity.” The chief raised his brows. “Seeing as the
Adamant’s
commander put one hell of a price on your corpse, Stark.”

What?
She applied what small grip she had left on logic.
They can’t be in communication with him; all communications go through my piloting array. I would have spotted a transmission to Imperial space…
They had to be bluffing. “Pity you don’t have the right nav-pilot.”

“The cosmetic job is pretty damn convincing, but your face is one of a kind, Stark. Nice try.” The chief’s smile tightened. “Might have convinced us, if we hadn’t spotted them dragging your ass on board.”

Victoria felt the hair on her neck rise. “I see.” She suddenly wanted to make them bleed so badly she shook with the effort to hold back. “Why here? Why now?”

The chief shrugged then grinned. “Oh, we knew where you were, but with the captain and that alien sniffing after you, we just didn’t have a chance to get near you, till today.”

The smaller crewman snorted. “I bet sniffing ain’t all they’re doing.”

How dare they?
Red rage blazed down her spine. “You’ve fought me before. What makes you think you’ll win this time?”

The chief snorted. “I saw the way you limped down that hall. My guess is that all that surgery is new. I bet that if you try to fight us you’ll rip yourself apart, which will suit me just fine.”

“You think so?” A tide of ferocious anticipation washed through her. She smiled. “I’m not exactly unarmed.”

The chief bared his teeth in something that wasn’t a smile. “That’s only a blunt practice sword, Nav-Pilot.”

Victoria gave him a brief nod. “Why, so it is.”

The doors opened behind the two men.

She brought her blunt sword up, gripping both ends crosswise like a fighting staff, and rushed forward on a surge of fierce exhilaration. She caught them both across the stomach and swept them before her.

The men were shoved out into the hall and landed on their butts.

Victoria leaped right over them, and nearly dropped to her knees from bone-weary exhaustion. The adrenaline rush had been short-lived. Grimly she trotted towards the far end of the hall with the sword over one shoulder. If she could make it to the far lift she could let the captain deal with them.

Both men lunged to their feet and came for her, roaring with fury.

Victoria measured her speed, their speed and the distance she had to cover. She wasn’t going to make it. She would have to fight… She felt her temper roar with a feral heat that seared through her brain. Strength flooded her limbs in a cool and delightful rush.
Why the hell was she running from them? This was her ship! If they want to bleed, then so be it!

She turned at bay in the center of the hall. “Gentlemen?”

Both men abruptly halted only a few yards away. The chief smiled. “Yes, Nav-Pilot?” They began stalking toward her.

Victoria bared her long teeth and pointed her sword at them. “Tell me, are you afraid of the dark?”

“What?”

Victoria sent a pulse through the ship’s sentience. The entire hallway plunged into stygian blackness.

Both men shouted.

It took barely a moment for Victoria’s eye augmentation to realign to the total loss of light. Her mechanically enhanced vision showed them as green figures floundering in the hallway.
Oh dear, I guess they can’t see in the dark.
She felt a grin stretch broadly across her lips. And they thought they could kill her? Kill
her?
Her temper flared like a white star and a strange hunger burned in her.
Kill them…
She licked her lips and lunged for them with inhuman speed, laughing.

“Victoria!”

She turned sharply, blinking as her eyes adjusted to the glare. Two men stepped from the lift, one tall and dark, the other slighter and pale as a moon.

The dark one threw out a hand. “What the fuck happened?”

The belligerent shout raised the hair on her neck. Wrapped deep in boiling fury she stepped away from the body at her feet and repositioned her bloodied blade. A warning growl rumbled from her chest.

The pale one snorted. “It looks as though she was attacked. Very stupid of them.”

“Victoria, put that damned sword down!” The dark one strode aggressively for her.

She dropped into a deep crouch, baring her teeth with a body-shaking snarl. She raised the gore-soaked blade and tensed for a leap.

“Don’t!” The pale one grabbed his arm, stopping him. “She’ll attack.”

The dark one glanced sharply at his companion. “What the hell are you talking about?”

“Look at her.” The pale one tilted his head. “She doesn’t recognize us. Apparently the attack triggered
rahyt,
the blood-rage.”

The dark one curled his lip. “She’s not
skeldhi…”

“She’s close enough.
rehkyt
have been known to fall into
rahyt
when pushed too far.” He turned to look up at his companion. “Now you know what the
shen
is actually for.”

The dark one frowned. “She’s not wearing the
shen.”

The pale one raised his hands, smiling grimly. Metal gleamed on his wrists. “Or the force cuffs either.”

She lifted her head in confusion. Their stances had changed from aggressive to something non-threatening. There was no trace of the fear-scent either. The white-hot anger unclenched from her mind. They didn’t act or smell like quarry. The upraised sword trembled in her hand.

“She’s shaking.” The pale one narrowed his eyes at her. “She may be coming down.” He took a slow step toward her.

The dark one grabbed the pale one’s arm. “Seht…”

The pale one raised his hand. “I know what I’m doing, trust me.”

The dark one released him. “Be careful.”

“I will.” The pale one took another slow, calm step, and then another. “Victoria…”

She backed cautiously away. Something was familiar about him. Familiar and intimidating… Her knees quivered as she sought to maintain the crouch.

“Victoria,” he whispered, and moved steadily toward her.

She backed away until she felt the wall behind her. She panted and her body shook with crushing exhaustion. She was forced to use both hands to hold the sword upright.

He stopped. “Victoria,” he said in a stronger voice. “Who do you serve?”

The raging fire of her anger bled from her mind, leaving ash and uncertainty. Her mouth opened. “I…”

He lunged at her, catching her by the shoulders, pinning her to the wall and forcing the weapon down. “Who do you serve?” His voice lashed at her like a whip.

“I…” Victoria snapped awake, pressed against the wall. She looked up at Seht in confusion. “Seht?” The smell of blood and death was overpowering. She gagged and exhaustion crushed her. She sagged in his hold. The sword clattered to the deck.

Ravnos came up behind him. His face was white. “Victoria?”

“I serve you both,” she finally got out and the world closed to a small hole, very far away. The deck felt amazingly comfortable.

She struggled to sit up. “What happened?”

Ravnos gave her a shove upright. “I was hoping you could tell us.”

She looked around. She was in a hallway painted with spatters of dripping scarlet. Then she spotted the two bodies. The chief lay crumpled against the wall, both legs broken from impact and his head at a very wrong angle. There was a ragged hole in his chest. He was most definitely dead, as was the smaller crewman. His legs had been shattered, and he had a gaping hole in his chest too. Memory slammed into her.

She stared in shock.
I did that?
Suddenly, anger flared hot.
They thought they could kill me!
A growl rumbled.

Seht grabbed the back of her hair and shook her. “Control that temper, and tell us what happened here!”

Victoria felt a strong rush of shame. “Sorry…” She took a deep breath. “I was cornered in the lift. They said they were hired along with Richards to kill me, and I…I lost control.”

Ravnos’s expression turned brutally icy. “Hired by who?”

Victoria stared at him in shock. He believed her?

Ravnos leaned closer. “Who hired them to kill you, Victoria?”

She stared steadily at him, holding his icy gaze. “They said my former executive officer from the
Adamant.”

A growl rumbled, but this time it wasn’t hers.

Ravnos snorted at Seht. “Who needs to watch their temper?”

Seht bared his teeth. “If those men weren’t dead already, I’d kill them myself!”

Ravnos’s eyes blazed cold fire. “How did your former commander know you were here?”

Victoria shook her head. “I don’t think he does. No communications were relayed to the Imperium. I would know if they were.” She tapped her head, indicating her piloting tech. “They said they were hired before they left the station and that they saw you bring me onboard. They probably planned to kill me, then apply for the reward.”

Seht frowned. “There’s a price on your head?”

Victoria shook her head. “I think it was just a one-time deal, but I don’t know for sure.”

Ravnos glanced at Seht. “If there is one, it’ll be posted.”

Seht bared his long teeth. “If he’s dead, it won’t matter.”

Ravnos nodded. “Good point. I’ll see what can be arranged.”

Victoria looked up in surprise. “You’re going to kill him?”

Seht gave her an unholy grin. “We’re mercenaries. It’s what we do.”

Ravnos’s lip curled in almost a smile. “We can’t send you back if you’re a target.”

Victoria wasn’t sure how she felt about the intended murder of her former executive officer. She wanted him dead, but she wasn’t sure she wanted Ravnos and Seht arranging for it. It seemed so casual…

Something else occurred to her.

She looked up at them. “How did you know? How did you get the lights back on?”

Ravnos snorted. “I have the same augmentation you do, remember? The ship notified me that the lights had gone out in this hall. Since you’re the only one with that kind of access to those controls, I assumed something had happened to you.”

“Oh…” They pulled her to her feet. Pain stabbed her in the stomach. Victoria gasped and nearly doubled over.

Ravnos grabbed her. “Are you hurt?”

She shook her head, amazed at the amount of pain she was in. “I think it’s just hunger.”

Seht took Victoria around the waist and glanced up at Ravnos. “She needs to eat and she’s overdue for the next course.”

“Get her fed.” Ravnos tilted his head at the lift at the far end of the hall. “I need to get a crew in here to get this mess cleaned up.”

She turned in Seht’s arms to face Ravnos. “I’m sorry.” She glanced toward the corpses.

Seht sighed. “It’s only natural to defend yourself.”

“I wasn’t defending myself.” Victoria dropped her chin in bitter shame. “I shut out the lights and I went for them. I could have just gotten on the lift in the dark, but I didn’t. I knew they were blind and I went after them deliberately. I
wanted
to kill them.”

Seht snorted. “They attacked you. Of course you wanted to kill them.”

She shook her head. “They weren’t attacking anymore, they were trying to run. I could smell their fear and it made it worse, like I wanted to kill them more.” She winced. “I don’t kill the unarmed or the defenseless…”

Seht snorted. “You’re not human anymore. Part of what you are now hungers for the smell of fear and the kill.” Seht glanced at Ravnos. “I suggest you watch your temper very closely from now on.”

Victoria nodded. “That’s what it felt like, a hunger. Wait a minute… You mean I’ll do this again?”

Seht nodded. “Under the same circumstances, yes.”

Victoria shuddered. “That’s insane.”

Seht shook her. “No, it’s your nature, as a
rehkyt.”

Ravnos stared coldly. “Victoria, the penalty for attacking another crewmember is a walk out an airlock door. If you hadn’t killed them, I would have.” There was not one drop of regret or remorse in his expression.

Trapped by his hard gaze, she shivered. She believed him utterly. But then, this was the captain that had coldly pulled his saber from the heart of his own nav-pilot. How had she forgotten?

Ravnos turned away. “Seht, get her out of here.”

Seht turned her toward the lift at the end of the hall. “This way.”