The second Starseer whirled toward the open hatch. Leonidas rode into view, leaping from his bike before it fully topped the ramp. He charged straight at the two men.
But they’d had time to brace themselves, to prepare. One already had a staff pointed at him.
Alisa cringed, expecting Leonidas to fly across the cargo hold. But he flung a ball—a fluidwrap. It spun toward the Starseers, the crackling strands of energy unfurling in the air. Their staffs switched from targeting him to targeting it. The energy net expanded, but it halted short of enveloping them. It froze, fully expanded, hanging in the air. One man’s head twitched, and it flew up to affix to the ceiling.
“Two things to fix,” Mica muttered. “Or at least clean up. I didn’t even notice that. It’s probably gumming up the light fixtures right now.”
Eyes locked on the holodisplay, Alisa did not answer. The Starseers had thwarted the net, but it had done its job, giving Leonidas time to reach them. He threw something else at one of them, then slammed into the man who had been trying to yank out Alejandro. The robed figure flew backward, crashing into the wall above the open cubby so hard that Alisa could imagine ribs shattering even without the benefit of sound. His hood fell about his shoulders as he tumbled to the deck, his staff falling from his fingers.
The second man was fast, almost as fast as a cyborg. He’d raised a barrier to deflect the object Leonidas had thrown—a smoke grenade, Alisa realized, as clouds of grayish blue spewed into the air.
Leonidas must have deemed the Starseer he had struck to be out of the fight for a moment, because he spun toward the second one. He only managed a step before his entire body stiffened, his back arched as much as it could in the armor, his faceplate pointed toward the ceiling. He looked like he had been struck by lightning, and Alisa rested her hand on Leonidas’s shoulder as she stared, imagining him screaming with pain. As he stood frozen in that tableau, the hooded Starseer raised his staff and took a step toward him, fearlessly touching the tip to Leonidas’s chest plate. There was no lightning, nothing like Alisa had seen come out of Abelardus's staff, but Leonidas’s entire body trembled, and his hands went up to his head, gripping either side of his helmet.
To his side, the other Starseer stumbled to his feet, bracing himself on the wall and clutching his ribs. For a moment, he watched his comrade tormenting Leonidas, a grimace on his face. Alisa was certain that grimace was for his own pain rather than a sympathetic gesture for Leonidas’s agony. She gritted her teeth, trying to memorize his features in case she had to identify him later. Before she shot his ass. He had tidy gray hair, brown eyes, a neatly trimmed short gray beard, and an L-shaped scar on his jaw where the hair did not grow.
His comrade said a word, and Scar turned back to the cubby. He had to crawl halfway into it to find his prey. Alisa couldn’t help but make a noise of disgust and glare across the exam table at Alejandro. Couldn’t he have done something? Besides hiding in the back of that cubby? Hells, even if all he had done was run out and bite the one attacking Leonidas in the calf, it might have helped. Surely, if Leonidas had been freed for a half a second, he could have done something.
Then he did do something.
He lowered his hands from his helmet, seeming to focus on the Starseer. Every tense limb bespoke pain, but he found the strength to grab the staff pressed against his chest. He yanked it out of the man’s hand and hurled it to the ground. It struck so hard and bounced so high that Alisa could not believe it did not break.
The Starseer stepped away, raising his hands and flinging some invisible force. Leonidas staggered back on one leg, but managed to plant it on the deck and brace himself. Then he sprang for his opponent. The Starseer tried to block his attack, but Leonidas was too quick. He knocked the man’s hands aside and grabbed his neck.
The Starseer must have gotten off another mental attack, because Leonidas convulsed again, his back arching. He almost lost his grip on his foe’s neck, but he hung on, even as pain clenched his entire body. His red gauntleted fingers tightened around the Starseer’s neck, and his shoulders moved in a quick twitch. The man’s arms and legs flopped like they belonged to a rag doll. Leonidas dropped to the deck and rolled away from him, again gripping his helmet with both hands.
The other Starseer backed out of the cubby with not one but two staffs in his hands, his own and the ebony Staff of Lore with its rune-engraved shaft and golden orb at the top.
Alejandro groaned. “I fought. I swear.”
Intent on watching Leonidas, Alisa ignored him. Unfortunately, Leonidas had collapsed on his back, his hands falling away from his helmet. Her stomach churned anew, as if she hadn’t known all along that this was how it ended. That was the position he had been in when she charged in.
The gray-haired Starseer stood up and wiped away blood trickling from his nose, the only evidence to back up Alejandro’s claim of fighting. The Staff of Lore glowed vibrantly in his hand, both the runes and the orb on top.
“Shit,” Abelardus whispered.
Alisa looked at him.
“Whoever they are, they’ve got a descendent of Alcyone. Someone who can wield the staff right now.”
Alejandro cursed. “I didn’t see that.”
A chill ran through Alisa’s entire body. Why hadn’t she thrown that staff in a lake—or out into the middle of space—when she’d had a chance? It had glowed faintly when she picked it up, but nothing like it was doing for that man. She half-expected him to throw his head back and cackle with glee, knowing he now had the power to destroy planets.
Instead, with his face grim, the man knelt beside his fellow Starseer, touching his throat, checking for a pulse. He looked over at Leonidas’s still form, and Alisa was surprised he didn’t go over there and use his powers to finish the job his comrade had started. Maybe he knew he didn’t need to, that Leonidas would die from his injuries.
Blinking back tears, Alisa touched Leonidas’s face again. At least it wasn’t contorted in pain now. His unconsciousness—his coma—prevented that much. Would he dream in that state? Nightmares that wouldn’t end until he came out of the coma? In weeks? Months? Blessing of the Suns Trinity, she hoped not.
Scar’s head swiveled toward the cargo hatch. Alisa glanced at the time stamp. She and the others had been passing through the city’s main gate then. Could he somehow know? By sensing Abelardus, perhaps?
The man walked over to Leonidas and bent down, touching a palm to the top of his helmet.
“What’s he doing?” Alisa demanded, grasping at the holodisplay, as if she could somehow stop what had happened before she arrived. “Abelardus?”
“I don’t know. Maybe just checking to see if he’s alive.”
Whatever was happening, Leonidas did not move, did not react in any way. The Starseer straightened and strode toward the cargo hatch, pulling his hood up as he went. He must have commanded the Staff of Lore to mute itself, because the runes and orb lost their glow. He disappeared from the cargo hold camera, then reappeared on the external one, walking down the ramp and into the crowd, heading in the opposite direction from which Alisa and the others had come. She grimaced because she spotted Abelardus on his hover bike no more than twenty seconds after the man walked away.
“We were so close,” she groaned.
Alejandro slumped back against the counter, as if watching the video had drained every ounce of strength from him. “We never should have brought the staff here,” he whispered. “We shouldn’t have come.”
Alisa wanted to retort, to combat the implication that she was at fault for this, but what could she say? She’d been told how powerful that artifact was, and yet she hadn’t worried about leaving it in her unguarded ship. She was to blame, at least in part. Again, she berated herself for not spacing that thing or destroying it on the way here. What good would have come of keeping it? Of toting it around the system in a ship with no weapons and no way to defend itself?
But the staff hadn’t been her mission, damn it. How had she ended up r
esponsible for some super weapon?
All she wanted was her daughter. And Leonidas. She leaned forward, resting her cheek against his chest, feeling dejected and forlorn.
Chapter 12
Alisa sat in NavCom, watching numbly as Mica poked at the ship’s computer console, grumbling about the slow speed of the sys-net interface and wondering if the city deliberately made it slow so they could charge more for their pay-by-the-hour access. The view screen looked out in the opposite direction of the docks, toward a street of warehouses and the domed wall that marked the boundary of the city. The light outside was growing dimmer, the suns setting on this side of the moon.
Back in sickbay, Leonidas remained unconscious. Alisa felt like she should be at his side or at least sitting in the room with him, but it had been several hours, and Beck had not responded to his comm. She had to assume he was in trouble. She couldn’t give up on the rest of her crew to hunker down beside Leonidas. He wouldn’t want that. Besides, there was nothing she could do for him. Alejandro was looking up medical facilities on Cleon Moon to see if any might be good enough to help. If there were any good enough anywhere. Could even a master brain surgeon with all the most advanced equipment combat what some twisted Starseer had done?
“Got his helmet comm pinpointed,” Mica said, leaning back in the co-pilot’s seat. “He’s in a warehouse a few miles from here.”
“The chef’s warehouse?” Alisa wasn’t sure whether to find that reassuring or not. It was good that he hadn’t been waylaid by a pack of mafia men in an alley somewhere, but why would he have run into trouble going to what had essentially been a job interview?
“It’s not the address listed on that original flyer, but…” The display changed as Mica researched something else. “According to the public records, that warehouse is owned by the Satin Scourge—I get the feeling everything here is—and is rented to a Chef Leblanc.”
“That’s the fellow whose burgers Beck was drooling over. He might have been drooling slightly over the chef too.” Alisa rubbed her chin. “We met one of the leaders of the Satin Scourge. Solstice.”
“How alliterative.”
“She said her husband leads the mafia family, but that she presides over the city.”
“Could you ask her to check and see if anything strange happened at her warehouse?”
Alisa grimaced. “I don’t think she’d give me any information. Or answer if I commed. She might tell Leonidas.”
“I don’t think he’s in a position to chat with people right now.”
“No. We’ll check for ourselves. I’ll see if Abelardus wants to go for a visit.” Alisa had never thought she would depend on Abelardus to act as her security backup, but she didn’t have much choice. She doubted it would be wise to visit that warehouse by herself. “Do you and Yumi want to come?”
The ship shouldn’t be in much danger now, but Alisa worried about leaving them behind since any Starseer who wandered past could apparently thwart the Nomad’s locks. Of course, Alejandro might not appreciate being left alone again.
“Yumi’s going?” Mica sounded surprised.
“I don’t know. I haven’t asked yet.”
Alisa stifled a yawn, trying to remember the last time she’d had any sleep. Right, that had been the night before, when she had been woken before dawn by being hurled across Leonidas’s cabin. She looked down at her wrist brace. At least it had not bothered her for several hours. Alejandro’s nanobots must have finished the majority of their work.
“The last I saw, she was ensconced in her cabin with her mushrooms,” Mica said.
“Ah, right. She must want to make her drugs. Maybe the orgasm one can help Leonidas come out of his coma.”
“If nothing else, he might at least have a good time while he’s in it.”
“Your commentary is rarely helpful, you know.” Alisa pushed herself to her feet, fighting back another yawn. She had better chug some caffeine pills before heading out to visit what might be a dangerous warehouse.
“I’m an engineer. My tools are supposed to be helpful, not my commentaries.” Mica frowned as Alisa headed for the hatchway. “Are you going tonight?”
“Seems like the appropriate time to skulk around and look for a missing person.”
“Maybe he’s not missing. Maybe he’s in bed with a pretty girl and he doesn’t want to be disturbed.”
“Somehow, I doubt Beck would let sex get in the way of his quest to share his sauces with the system.”
“That could be true. Alisa?”
Alisa paused, turning back toward her.
“I should have stayed and put together his booby trap,” Mica said, a rare hint of chagrin in her eyes. “Maybe Starseers could have defeated it and gotten the staff, but I bet I could have at least blown some up, made them pay for their thieving ways.”
“If you had stayed here, who would have saved Yumi in that tunnel?” Alisa asked. While she appreciated that she wasn’t alone in feeling guilty right now, she did not think Mica should take the blame for anything. This was even less her quest than Alisa’s.
“Yumi could have stayed here too. We could have watched vids and played with her chickens.”
Alisa rested a hand on the jamb. “I’m trying to decide if that’s kinky or just an odd version of domestic life.”
Mica grinned and saluted.
Alisa almost bumped into Abelardus as she stepped into the corridor.
“News?” she asked hopefully since he had come from the direction of sickbay.
“Yes, but not about your cyborg.” One of his eyebrows twitched, as if to remind her that he did not care a whit about Leonidas.
“What is it? Have you identified those Starseers?”
“I’m still waiting to hear back from Lady Naidoo on that—I did send her the video and a picture of the dead one. What I’ve been doing is looking up our thrust-bike racer.”
“Why?” That was the last thing Alisa cared about right now.
“If he’s a local, he might know what happened to my brother and the others. I know you’re worried about your pretty soldier, but allow me to remind you that we don’t have any leads in regard to my people—or your daughter.”
Heat swarmed into Alisa’s cheeks. She did not need to be reminded about that, especially not by Abelardus.
“Why would some bike racer know anything about what was going on at an outpost?” she asked.
“There aren’t that many Starseers on Cleon Moon—or anywhere. We tend to know about our own kind, especially if they’re local. In addition to wanting to know where my brother is, I’d like to know if this group of… belligerent Starseers has been here long or if they just showed up. They might have come to kidnap the prince. Or they might have felt the Staff of Lore on the move and somehow anticipated that we would show up here. Or it might have something to do with both.”
“So did you find him? Can you contact him?” Alisa didn’t think a bike rider was much of a lead, but since she did not have a better one, she did not point that out again.
“I got in touch with him. He was terse, but he’s agreed to meet with me. Tonight. He’s staying in the city.”
“Doesn’t everybody? The dinosaur-infested swamp doesn’t seem like a nice place to build one’s mansion.”
“Some wealthy people have their own private domes.”
“Ah, do we believe the racer is wealthy?”
“If he’s using his talents to win repeatedly, why not?”
Alisa yawned again. “I was going to ask if you would accompany me to the warehouse where Beck was last seen. Are you determined to visit this lead first?” She did not want to delay in case Beck was in trouble. If Abelardus wouldn’t come, that left going by herself.
“I’ll go with you.” Abelardus reached out and touched her shoulder. “I’m not letting anything happen to you until you wise up and realize that I’m a much better prospect than Coma Cyborg.”
“You’re a much better asshole than he is,” she said, pushing
his hand away.
“Why? I just want to help you.”
“I appreciate help, but I’d appreciate it more if you could do it without insulting him.”
“Not at all? That would be difficult.”
“Try.”
“I’ll meet you in the cargo hold in ten minutes,” he said. “I want to look up how long the driver has been here and winning. It seems a strange occupation for a Starseer to take up.”
Alisa waved in acknowledgment and headed to her cabin. She buckled on her Etcher and also jammed a blazer pistol into the belt. It was one of Leonidas’s many weapons, one that he had lent her and that she had used sporadically. It was a superior tool to the old bullet-chucker, but she was developing a sentimental fondness for her gun. She had been through a lot with it—and killed two dinosaurs. Dinosaurs whose heads needed to be turned in to the bounty place—wherever that was—before they started to stink. Maybe she would assign that task to Mica. That would give her plenty of material for unhelpful commentaries.
Alisa stopped in sickbay before heading down to the cargo hold. Leonidas still lay on the exam table, the rest of his armor and his clothing now removed, and a sheet draped over him. Alejandro had wired him up to deliver—and remove—fluids. Her eyes threatened to tear up. It seemed strange to see someone so virile and muscular hooked up to hospital paraphernalia. That was for sick people, not for hale cyborgs. Not for someone she had come to care deeply about.
She walked to the exam table and laid her hand on his chest, somewhat reassured by his even breathing. She had lost too much. She refused to lose him too.
“Leonidas,” she said softly, as if he could hear her. He did have those enhanced ears, after all. “I’m going to a dark, creepy warehouse owned by the mafia to very possibly get myself into trouble. I would greatly appreciate it if you would wake up and accompany me.”
She lifted her hand to the side of his face, brushing hair behind his ear, stroking his jaw. He needed a shave. She would do it for him when she got back.
“We didn’t find Jelena or Thorian, I’m afraid,” she said. “I’m hopeful that they’re in the city somewhere. There’s some Starseer thrust-bike racer that Abelardus thinks might know something. For the first time, I envy those Starseers their power. If I had a telepathic link to Jelena, I’d be able to sense when she was close, to reach out to her and let her know I’m coming. To speak with her even if we weren’t in the same room. That would be useful right now.”