Wanderer 3: Tainted Universe (2 page)

Chapter Two

Jess sat in the pilot’s chair of the
Wanderer
, watching the mists of jump space sliding past.  As always, nothing else was visible.  Jess knew there were three other ships out there though.  He could pinpoint their location using the
Wanderer
’s seemingly unique abilities.  But there was no visible sign of them, even where the mists parted.

Was it just impossible to see in jump space?  Or maybe the other ships were in a slightly shifted dimension, both close by and infinitely far away?  It was impossible to tell.  Under Jess’s control the
Wanderer
had destroyed several ships in jump space, but using weaponry based upon jump technology so that proved nothing.  If the ship’s engines could access parallel dimensions then so could the jump technology based weapons.

“
Hey sexy.”

The voice from behind was accompanied by soft hands rubbing down his arms and a kiss on the top of his head.  Then Ali dropped into his lap, kissing him properly.  Jess responded enthusiastically, letting his hands start to wander.

After a few minutes Ali pulled back a little, flustered and flushed.

“
Wow,” she said.  “Sometimes you make it too easy to get distracted.  I came up here for a reason.”

“
Not just to see me?” Jess asked, feigning hurt.

“
No.  Well, yes.  But not like that.”  She glanced towards the back of the flight deck, then continued in a quiet voice.  “I’m worried Jess.  Worried about Dash, and about where he’s leading us.  His men have only just tried to take over the
Wanderer
.  I know he stood against them, or certainly seemed to, but do you actually trust him?  Enough to risk flying into a base that he and his men control?”

“
Honestly?  Not really.  But I don’t see any other choice.  We’ve freed the prisoners on board but the other three freighters can’t do that.  If we don’t get them somewhere safe pretty damn soon then people will start dying.”

“
I know but… I’m scared Jess.  We nearly lost Sal.  You were badly wounded.  Elizabeth and I were lucky. You managed to fight them off, but only just.  What’s to stop that happening again, but with far more attackers?”

Jess gave her a squeeze before speaking.

“I don’t know.  I’m scared too.  When they opened up with those pistols that punched straight through the internal shields you were standing out in the open.  I couldn’t protect you.  That scared me so much.  I can’t imagine my life without you in it.”

She smiled at that, leaning in for a quick kiss then pulling back again.

“I’m scared but I can’t let those prisoners die,” Jess continued.  “I
can
reduce the risk to us.  The
Wanderer
doesn’t need to dock.  The prisoners we freed can leave on shuttles, and I should be able to ensure nothing unpleasant is on board when the shuttles return.”

“
Should?”

“
Yeah.  I’d have said definitely a couple of days ago, but those stealth ships made me realise how little I know of the universe.”

“
You and everyone else.  Even Elizabeth knew nothing about them, and that’s pretty much unheard of.”

Jess smiled and nodded.  Elizabeth was much older than Sal, Ali and he.  Older and far more experienced.  She’d been captain of her own freighter for most of her adult life, and had used it as a base to explore new systems and worlds.  She seemed to know of, and have an opinion on, almost everything.

Now Elizabeth was flying one of the other freighters, the
Steady Light
, which she had claimed for her own and nursed back to partial flight worthiness.  Jess was pleased she had the chance to own a ship again, yet disappointed at the thought of losing her advice.

“
Dash hadn’t heard of those ships either,” he said.  “And he was the head of a major pirate organisation.  Or still is I suppose, assuming the attempted coup by the men he brought with him hasn’t been repeated across his organisation.”

“
And assuming he was telling the truth,” Ali replied.

“
Yeah… we keep coming back to that.  I’ve done everything I can.  We’ll just have to take a chance.”

“
What about those guns?  The ones that cut right through the shields.”

“
I’ve got the ship working on them but it’s slow progress.  Some sort of energy field is generated around the bullets.  There aren’t that many bullets to play around with.  I think they only came with ten each so that’s ninety to begin with and quite a few were fired.

“
It’s odd though.  They had advanced combat armour, but they didn’t have any shields.  The fact they carry specific shield-piercing guns means they must face shields quite often.  So why don’t they have shields?”

“
I don’t know.  There must be a reason though.”

“
Yeah.  I’d feel a lot happier if I knew what it was.  I would ask Dash but…”

“
Yeah.  How about asking Elizabeth?”

“
I’d like to, but I can’t do anything until we finish the jump.  I don’t know how secure any communications with her would be even then.  I really don’t want to give Dash or his forces any kind of tip-off telling them our vulnerabilities.”

Ali nodded without speaking, deep in thought.

“Sorry,” Jess said after a couple of minutes of silence.

“
What for?” she asked, surprise in her voice.

“
I’m supposed to be making you less scared.  I’m not doing a very good job of it!”

“
You’re doing better than you know,” she replied with a smile.  Then she leaned into Jess, pressing against his chest for comfort this time.

He tightened his arms around her, enjoying the sensation.  It wasn’t enough to remove the lead weight in his stomach though, the fear of letting anyone onto the ship where they could hurt Ali.  Jess stared out at the mists of jump space once again, desperately trying to think of more ways to keep her safe.

*****

Sal sat on the cold stone floor, leaning back against Markus’s chest and enjoying the warmth from his body and his arms.  Most of the other prisoners were asleep, huddled together for warmth or curled up under any scraps of material they could find.  The air was damp and cold.

“I love you Sal,” Markus whispered in her ear.  “I want to stay with your forever.”

Tears started to fall down Sal’s face, and she hugged Markus’s arms closer to her.

“I love you too,” she replied, turning her head as far as she could.  “But I’m scared.  Sometime soon we’ll be split up.  We’ll never see each other again.”

Sal suddenly found herself laying on the floor, staring up at a now standing Markus.  Had he just shoved her away?

“It can’t come soon enough for me,” he said, sneering at her.  “I can’t wait to be away from you, you disgusting piece of shit.”

He spat on her then turned away, stalking towards the open cell door and the guards waiting there.  Sal lay on the floor.  As the shock faded she curled into a ball, sobbing at the betrayal.

“Sal…”

She looked up in surprise.  It was Markus, but not the Markus who had just plunged a knife into her heart.  His face was tight with concern and his voice was soft.  She tried to stifle the sobs, unsuccessfully.

“I couldn’t leave you Sal,” he said, still gently.

Her heart leapt for a moment, warmth filling her body.  Ice replaced it as she remembered his words of just a moment before.  Markus smiled and warmth replaced the ice again.

He held out his hand towards her.  It took her several moments to realise it wasn’t empty.  It held a gun, so black it seemed to suck in the cell’s dim light.

“
I couldn’t leave you alive.”

Sal just had time to register his words before the gun fired.  Her body jerked repeatedly as the bullets struck home.

*****

Sal jerked upright, body soaked in sweat and heart pounding.  The lights in her room came on dimly, responding to the fact she was awake.  She stared around for several moments, completely disorientated, before understanding where she was.  Then she vented a string of curses, with the odd reference to Markus thrown in.

The start of the dream had been based in reality.  Her last memories of her time with Markus came from sitting in that cell.  Well, her last memories of him until a handful of days before.

Despite being a prisoner she’d been happy then.  Markus had returned her love, had promised to escape and find her if they were ever separated.  Minutes later they were.  Guards had stormed into the cell, dragging Markus and several other prisoners away.

There had been no betrayal by Markus, no rejection.  Not then anyway.  Her path had crossed Markus’s again just a few short days before, and she had learnt everything she thought she knew about him had been false.  He’d been an Imperial agent posing as a slave, and she’d just been part of his cover.

He’d claimed to be someone else when they met again, claimed not to know her.  Circumstances had exposed his lies and ultimately led to his death.  Before he died he’d told Sal what he truly thought of her, while under the effects of interrogation drugs.  He’d told her how much disgust he felt for being with her.  How he saw her as vermin.

Now Sal was left trying to pickup the pieces of her life.  The dream had woven together the two conflicting emotions she wrestled with.  The love she still felt for her Markus, even if he hadn’t ever really existed, and the pain and anger she felt whenever she thought of the real Markus.  Or Andreas as she had learnt his real name was.

Often she wished she’d never learnt the truth.  She wished that she’d spent the rest of her life in ignorance, nursing memories of her lost love.  Other times she wished it had been her that killed Markus, not Jess.  Anger burning through her veins she wanted to make Markus suffer.  Make him pay.  The anger was so strong it scared her.

And then there were times, like now, when she just felt lost.  So much of her previous life had been ripped away she felt cast adrift.  Sometimes she even missed being a slave.  Then at least life was straightforward, if never easy.  She did what she was told and tried to survive.  Now… well, now everything was so complicated.  So difficult.  What was the point?  What was there to live for?

She sat on the bed in the dim light, blanket pulled tight around her, staring at nothing as dark thoughts pulled her deeper into depression.

*****

Dash sat on the edge of the bed, mind whirling.  He knew he should sleep but it wasn’t going to happen.  He’d managed three hours before the worries and plans whirling around his head had jerked him awake.  Another two hours of restlessness had convinced him to give up on sleep.

Chief among his worries was the reception they’d get at Desolation.  He was still shaken by the betrayal of the men he’d brought with him, even as he understood that the true mistake had been trusting Hackett too far.  Hackett had stuffed the crew with those willing to betray Dash, and Dash had missed it.  The fact that Hackett and the other twenty men were all dead didn’t lessen the sting.

Before that betrayal Dash would have been certain of his reception at Desolation, certain that he would command loyalty and respect.  Twenty years of effort had gone into ensuring the pirate organisation he headed up remained his to control.  Now, though, he had no idea what awaited them.

If nothing had changed then he felt confident all would be well.  Desolation was a fallback location, one that held many ships but only a skeleton crew.  It relied on secrecy for protection rather than force of arms.

Most of those stationed there owed Dash strong loyalty.  Those who had joined him in the early days, back when he controlled a small, tightly knit force.  Back when he could take the measure of everyone in his team.  Before everything had got out of hand.  Before he’d started his rapid rise to become a powerful player in the organisation, then on to becoming its leader.

He worried that things would have changed though.  Hackett hadn’t acted alone, in fact he must have been confident of considerable support to risk taking the action he did.  Could those behind Hackett have spread their influence to Desolation?

It was an obvious target to those who knew of it.  If Dash’s power base was damaged but not destroyed, if he needed to make a tactical retreat, then Desolation was where he would head.  He could be leading Jess and the others into a trap.  One that even the incredible ship they flew couldn’t save them from.

He couldn’t see any alternatives though.  Not if they were going to save the slaves in the other three ships.  That was something that Jess and Sal insisted on.  That insistence had reminded Dash of his younger self.  It reminded him that he would once have been just as eager to do the right thing as Jess and Sal were.

Sal.  Thoughts of Sal streamed through his mind too.  There was no denying it, he found himself strongly attracted to her.  He cared deeply for her.  Dash saw the pain that Markus had caused Sal and knew that it was partly his fault.  She’d met Markus again purely by chance, and that would have been the last of it without Dash’s interference.