Ann Aguirre - Havoc

“You have the battle madness,” she said.

“I have all the madness. Shall we see if we can find the others?” He considered for a moment, wondering about something belatedly. “Why were you on your own?”

“I thought it would be better to die in battle,” she said quietly. “I miss Katur.”

“I don’t think he’d be very pleased if you just gave up.”

Her muzzle pulled away from her teeth. “What do you know? Our faith teaches that lovers are reunited in death. He would be happy to see me.”

That seemed backward, but Jael had been courting death for a long time, enough to understand where she was coming from. It had taken being sent to a place like Perdition for him to learn how to live. Now he was fighting, not just to find a way out of here, but to do something other than kill people who deserved to be put down. That was a tempting idea, actually, but playing judge, jury, and executioner had gotten Dred sent here in the first place.

To Keelah, he finally said, “Then I hope you find a worthy death if that’s what you’re seeking. Do you know where the others are?”

She shook her head. “Dred was fighting on her own when I saw her last.”

Dammit. Despite himself, he remembered what had happened to Einar. The Dread Queen might have half of his healing ability now, but neither one of them was invincible, and Vost had given them a hard fight; Mungo and Silence hadn’t made it any easier. She had to be exhausted since she still possessed a full human’s need for sleep.

“Hurry.” He tried to pretend he wasn’t worried, but from the sharp look the female sent him, she wasn’t fooled.

“I hear something . . .” The alien cocked her head.

Jael listened, but he detected nothing besides common station noises. It was unusual to find someone with sharper senses than his own. “What?”

“Combat. It seems there are a few stragglers who don’t mean to surrender.”

“They’re animals,” Jael muttered.

“I’ve heard your people say that about mine, more than once.”

“ My people?” He smiled slightly. “You’re mistaken. I have none.”

“You’re human, aren’t you?” She stepped closer, as if he’d piqued her curiosity, and she circled him, whiskers prickling as she investigated by scent.

“Not exactly.”

“Interesting. There’s another layer.”

Do I smell different? Cleaner than Mungo or Silence’s lunatics, definitely. In any case, it wasn’t the time for explanations. “We should move.”

Keelah led the way since he couldn’t hear the battle. They ran two hundred meters, then the sounds reached him. Jael closed his eyes, listening for Dred’s voice, but he heard nothing that made him think she was nearby. Then a muttered curse rang out. That’s Tam.

“It’s Mungo, with the last of his holdouts,” Keelah said, as they closed the distance.

“You know what Mungo smells like?”

She shivered. “I could never forget. His people hunted us for food. With Grigor, it was hate . . . and sport.”

Before he could reply, the hallway opened up. This was abandoned territory, claimed by no one, and Mungo’s crew had already soiled it. Scraps of flesh, bits of skin, and gnawed bones littered the floor. I’ll be so glad when this asshole dies. At the moment, however, Mungo had a hand around Tam’s throat and was squeezing the life out of him. Four of his men looked on with slavering anticipation. They were so focused on the kill that they didn’t spot Jael or Keelah.

“I’ve had enough of this shit,” Jael whispered.

He dropped to one knee, got out his rifle, and shot Mungo in the face. His hands went slack as Tam dove away. The rest charged as Jael fired two more bursts. One cannibal down. Keelah killed one with a vicious swipe of her knife, and Tam jabbed his blade into another’s back. The last one left alive tried to run, and Tam tackled him. The spymaster wasn’t usually much for hand-to-hand combat, but from the bruises and bite marks on him, he wanted the pleasure of this death, so Jael stood back while he worked.

“That was a timely arrival,” the smaller man said a few minutes later, wiping his blade. “Thank you.”

“Thank Keelah. She heard the fight.”

A few seconds later, Dred ran into the room, covered in blood, but from what Jael could tell, she was in one piece. She seemed almost disappointed by the fact that Mungo was already on the ground. “I guess you don’t need me after all.”

Jael crossed to her and leaned his forehead against hers. “That’s a filthy lie, and you know it. Back to Queensland, love?”

It should’ve been easy from there. With the enemy defeated and Vost in hiding, where he’d either starve or be killed by Silence’s crew, Dred expected to stride home to a heroine’s welcome. After the fight, Keelah had asked for solitude to mourn her fallen mate, leaving the others to return without her. Outside the checkpoint, they met up with Martine, who was bloody but not too badly injured.

“You all right?” Dred asked.

The other woman nodded.

By now, Cook should be preparing a welcome feast. Instead, the chef was up on a table, using up all the words he’d saved over long turns inside.

“The time is now! Join me and be among the lucky five. I’m not dying here.” The huge man’s eyes focused on her, and he leveled a finger in her direction. “Stand with me and kill the Dread Queen.”

Dammit.

She tried to shout, “Vost’s men are dead, the transport’s blown,” but the growing shouts of agreement drowned her out. She cursed the need for secrecy now, the fact that the men wouldn’t have understood Tam’s decision to sabotage the ship. In trying to prevent a mutiny, she’d ended up causing one. Some things were, apparently, inevitable. The nearby Queenslanders looked at her small group speculatively, violence brewing in their eyes. Then someone threw a knife. It sliced past her ear and embedded itself in the wall behind her. As if that was the spark the kindling needed, the fighting broke out in earnest. It was hard to tell who belonged to what faction unless the men attacked her directly.

“Mary curse it,” Tam spat. “Are they truly this stupid?”

“Most are.” Jael ducked a punch and threw one of his own.

“We have to rally the defenders,” Dred said.

“How?” Martine asked.

“I’ll clear a path,” Jael said.

True to his word, he hurtled like a madman into the teeming crowd. Now and then, men lashed out at him, but most of them had learned not to mess with him. He didn’t carry the title of Dread Queen’s champion for nothing. Dred charged after him; the armor she wore would protect her from most attacks, but Queenslanders were dying left and right in the scrum. Blood spattered from a man’s mouth, scenting the air with a coppery tang. The noise was overwhelming, snarls and screams overlaying whimpers from dying men, and those who were being trampled underfoot.

“This keeps up, it’ll be a handful of us against Vost and the rest of Silence’s crew,” Tam growled. It was the first time she’d heard such obvious temper in his voice.

“It’s not your fault.”

Jael pushed through the melee and headed down the hall to her quarters. At first, she wasn’t sure why, but then the answer became obvious. While the four of them were armored and had good weapons, they were too few to put down a rebellion without the body count becoming astronomical. Silence would swoop in and mop up. Dred couldn’t let that happen; everyone had fought too long and hard for the tale to end that way.

Tam shook his head, not letting himself off with the absolution she offered. “I’m in charge of intelligence. I should’ve seen the betrayal coming. There were likely signs among the men—”