Rogue Pursuit: A Space Opera Adventure (Shades of Starlight Book 1), page 19
Next came the disinfectant and the dermal regenerator. The red faded to pink as the wound began to seal.
“Should be good as new by tomorrow.” His voice was rough. “Want me to wrap it?”
She shook her head. “Thanks, doc.” Her voice squeaked.
They sat for a second, her hand on his leg, not making eye contact, until as one, they jerked away.
A smuggler and a government agent mixed like matter and anti-matter. If not for his job, she could have liked him. A lot. She rarely found someone she both respected and enjoyed spending time with. But they couldn’t possibly have a future together.
Clearly the last wormhole had addled her brain.
She retreated to the safety of her room.
A message from Mak awaited her. From a few hours ago. She must’ve missed it after they left Digger’s, distracted by being forced to spill her secrets to Tai.
“The Sky Wolf was stopped leaving the desert. Extra cargo found on board. Crew in custody, refusing to talk. I suggest contacting our counsel but not revealing everything. Please advise. Mak.”
The words hit her like a physical blow. Her crew wouldn’t have been caught if she’d let them unload their goods in town instead of telling them to wait.
Refusing to talk meant they’d kept her out of it. She should’ve been grateful, but it was her fault they’d been arrested.
Under normal circumstances, she wouldn’t have hesitated to take the blame. But she couldn’t do that now without compromising this mission, and she only had three days left to find Kel. More was at stake now.
Her crew didn’t know that, though. All they’d know was that her decision cost them, and they’d wonder why she stayed silent as they sat in a Confed prison.
Unsure how to reply to Mak, she stared at the screen until the computer alerted her they were near the wormhole.
She headed to the bridge, wondering how many more people her quest was going to hurt.
19
When Tai left his cabin after an unplanned nap, the bridge was empty.
He’d been surprised he’d been able to sleep after the pirates and Perrin’s secrets and that terrible wormhole. Not to mention the moment with Perrin. Despite knowing what she was, he couldn’t shake his attraction to her.
That situation offered more danger than a moon full of pirates.
He hadn’t been the only one off-balance after tending her wound. Right? Perrin’s usual snappy comebacks had been absent. Jumping out a window, getting shot at, and fighting pirates hadn’t dampened her sarcasm.
Was she feeling the heat he did? And trying to talk herself out of it, same as him?
Anything between them was completely impossible. Ridiculous. She was a criminal, for shades’ sake. He’d promised not to turn her in if they succeeded, and he wanted to honor his word, but could he really let crimes against the Confed go unreported?
He checked the console and found they’d already passed through a wormhole. Perrin had laid in a course for a planet in the system, following a trail of photonic plasma from a leaking ship. He must’ve slept through the wormhole passage. Which meant he trusted her enough to not worry about it.
Despite her lawbreaking, he’d placed his life in her hands without a second thought. Trust like that was rare. He just didn’t know what it meant.
Better to focus on the message he’d received from Bryson, which he still hadn’t decided how to answer. He loaded it on the console and was staring at it when Perrin joined him, a bowl cupped in her hands.
She scuffed her boot on the deck and didn’t meet his eye. “Thought you might be hungry. I made too much. Hate to waste it.” She extended the bowl.
“Thanks.” His fingers grazed hers as he took it.
She nodded at the screen. “Message from your mom?”
“Worse.”
“Bad news?” she asked. “No more lies.”
“Lies aren’t the same as secrets.”
“Then why are you mad at me? You can’t expect everyone to tell you everything.”
He sighed and took a bite, debating whether to answer. But they’d agreed to honesty. And despite his intention to distance himself from her, part of him wanted her opinion on the situation. “One of my fellow agents keeps checking on me. He wanted to come to the cabin for a day. I told him no, but he went anyway and found I wasn’t there, and it was obvious I hadn’t been all week. It’s possible my mom sent him.”
“You’ve heard from her too?”
“Twice.”
“Did she ask where you were or what you were doing?”
“No,” he said. “Which is a bad sign.”
She snorted. “What did you tell her?”
“I didn’t lie to her.”
“Just carefully avoided the truth. You’re good at that.”
He gave her a dirty look but was too tired to full-on glare. Plus, she was right.
“She didn’t get her job by accident. I’m sure she’s suspicious, even though she didn’t sound that way.”
“What are you going to do about the other agent?”
“I can’t ask him to lie for me.”
She shrugged. “You’re spies. It’s what you do.”
Again, she wasn’t wrong. But playing a role for the sake of gathering information was different from lying to a friend. Not that he enjoyed either option.
Perrin rested her forearms on the back of her chair. “If you hate lying so much, why become a spy?”
He didn’t answer. His previous reasons sounded weak these days. And that hesitation made him lose his appetite. He ate a few more bites anyway to give himself time to think.
“What are your other options?” Perrin asked. “Go home. Tell him everything. Tell him part of the truth and see how much he trusts you.”
“What would you do?”
“Why, are you planning to do the opposite?”
“Probably.”
She wrinkled her nose. “Part lie, part truth, promise to explain everything when I got home, and ask him to cover for me.”
“Even if he gets in trouble?”
“It’s his choice.”
Tai twisted his ring and stared at the view screen.
Stupid, loyal Bryson. Loyal to whom, though—Tai or the Agency? Did Bryson want to make sure his friend was okay, or had Tai’s mom grown suspicious and sent Bryson to investigate? Would Tai’s actions cause trouble for Bryson?
It was an oddly familiar situation, but with the tables turned, considering Tai was in trouble because of someone else. He didn’t know if he could do that to his friend, on purpose, the way Kel must have known his decision would affect Tai.
Should he lie, say he went somewhere with girls and booze, and hope Bryson bought it?
In the end, he decided to try Perrin’s approach. Partial honesty. He settled for, “I’m working on something. Can’t tell you now but will explain everything later. It would be great if you could cover for me, but if you can’t, no hard feelings.”
When he finished, Perrin was frowning, staring at the screen like she didn’t see it.
“Problem?” he asked.
She sighed. “I got a message of my own.”
He raised his eyebrows. “Planning to share?”
She rose onto her toes and bit her lip. “The ship we ran into… After I saw the weapons stash in the desert, I told my crew not to deliver their… less sanctioned cargo.” She gave him a pointed look. “And to hold off on extracurricular activities until they heard from me. Then they got caught by blockade ships. My fault. They wouldn’t have had those goods if I’d let them finish the job.”
“They knew the risks,” he said.
She didn’t acknowledge his words. “They took the fall, but I’ll face an inquiry at a minimum. Unless I help them.”
“What are you going to do?”
“The responsible answer is, get them out of prison and accept blame, isn’t it?”
“The responsible thing would have been not to break the law in the first place.”
“You’re one to talk, Runaway.” But there was no heat to her voice.
A surge of admiration rose in him that she would consider taking the blame. The feeling was quickly replaced with an image of her in a Confed holding cell, facing treason charges. That idea shouldn’t have bothered him as much as it did. He didn’t want her to get caught. And that was unacceptable. She was a criminal, and he was supposed to stop criminals. He swallowed hard. He’d worry about that later, when he had no other choice.
“You want advice?” he asked.
“Generally, no.”
“Now?”
“Entertain me.”
For some reason he still wanted to help her. “There’s nothing you can do right now. The Confed believes in fair trials. Even if you sent a transmission and took the blame, your crew wouldn’t be released. And unless a wormhole folds on us, you’ll be home long before any action is taken. Don’t decide anything yet. Maybe something will come to you.”
“So I should let my crew take the blame? I thought you believed in loyalty.”
“I didn’t say that. Just hold off for now.”
“Okay. Fine. I guess that’s a good plan. I just feel bad. I’m the boss, it’s my responsibility.”
“They had a choice. Unless you held that gun to their heads, which I wouldn’t put past you.”
“It only has a stun setting, anyway,” she said. “It’s not all that persuasive. I guess you might be right, this once.”
“What’s the galaxy coming to?”
Her lips lifted slightly, and she grabbed his empty bowl before padding down the hall.
Regret flashed through him. He’d had no idea this mission would become so complicated. When he’d asked for Perrin’s help, he’d done so without considering the ways he might cause her trouble.
He had to remind himself her current situation wasn’t his fault. She’d chosen to smuggle. Their current mission didn’t change that fact.
As the ship entered the atmosphere, a warning light flashed on his screen. Low pressure readings in the thrusters. They’d need to recharge and check on the stabilizers.
A siren joined the light as the thruster drive shorted out.
20
Perrin rushed to the bridge as the gravity fluctuated and the ship wobbled. They plunged through a layer of puffy clouds.
She strapped in and watched Tai work. Wormholes were her thing. Piloting was his.
When had she become comfortable letting him take charge? A week ago she would’ve been giving commands, offering suggestions, arguing with his decisions.
To distract herself, she loaded his readouts onto her console as well. “The trail I picked up led to the largest island in the southern hemisphere. Coordinates are in the system.”
Tai nodded, but didn’t reply, jaw set as he focused on not crashing. He stabilized the ship enough that they landed unevenly with a thump, harder than usual, but didn’t totally crash.
She considered complimenting him, but settled for the safer, “If we have to stop, this is a nice place to do it.”
He stretched out his fingers and rolled his neck. “Why’s that?”
“Tropical island.”
“I thought this planet was an ag colony.”
“It is. The large northern continents grow grains. But the islands have sugar, fruit, coffee, spices. The first colony ship that came here landed on this island, so even though there are larger landmasses and cities, most of the trade still passes through here.”
“You’ve been?”
“Several times.”
He didn’t ask, and she didn’t offer, what type of business those visits had included. The topic would’ve been safe enough—little Network activity occurred here.
They exited the ship onto the open-air platform. Towering posts supported shelves like a giant staircase. Every level contained multiple ships.
A warm sea breeze ruffled her hair and carried the cries of gulls. In the distance, the ocean spread out blue like the wormhole she loved so much.
Perrin opened an outside hatch and went to work on the stabilizer drive, giving Tai orders on which tools she needed. He handed them over quickly, as if anticipating what she wanted.
“Hey, what’s this?” She plucked a small, circular device from the panel.
Tai snatched it. “A tracker.” He grabbed a tool and pried open the cover. “Amber tech. That agent must have planted it before he chased us across the desert.” He pocketed the device. “I’ll find somewhere to stick it to throw him off.”
“I have a suggestion for where he can stick it.”
Tai’s lips curved. “If you’re close enough for that, you’re in trouble.”
Glad to see his smile reappear, she replaced the panel and wiped her hands on her pant legs. “This needs two hours to reboot.”
“I propose a trip into town.”
“Really?”
“I happen to know today is someone’s birthday. It would be wrong not to celebrate.”
She blinked. He was right. The Confed used standard dating for all citizens based on Ruby Prime’s calendar, even though each planet had years of different lengths. By Prime reckoning, today she turned eighteen.
“What do you usually do to celebrate?” he asked.
She stared toward the horizon. “The last two years, dinner with my crew. Before that, my dad would arrange to be somewhere good, with a market or fun restaurants. We’d take a few hours to explore.” And have a quiet moment, since her birthday was also a reminder of the day her mom passed away.
“This seems like the perfect place for that. Let’s go.”
Words left her. Why was he being so nice?
He handed her an earpiece. “Wear this. Just in case.”
She put the tiny comm in her ear and watched as he used his comp-pad to check for surveillance in the docking area. Finding no cameras, he positioned one of his on the ship’s exterior to see who came and went.
They climbed down the stairs past levels of other ships.
A woman tinkering with an engine on the bottom level eyed them as they passed, ducking behind her ship when they neared so Perrin didn’t get a glimpse of her face. Strange. Most people here were fairly friendly.
A grassy field separated the landing area from town, leading to a sidewalk bordering a harbor. Slender palm trees danced in the wind. Wooden docks housed point-to-point surface ships and motorized water vessels that carried goods to and from the mainland. Tai tucked the tracking device in one.
The town was a decent size for a colony, several thousand people. Colorful buildings lined the main street, made from a combination of wood, palm fronds, and pre-fab building parts, painted in tropical colors. The pieces blended together in an interesting mesh of tech and nature. Personal wheeled and hover vehicles parked on the streets, giving the town the feel of a past Era.
Definitely not the worst place to turn eighteen.
More people than she’d expected filled the beaches, side streets, and squares. Many spoke with this system’s gentle accents and wore the colorful, loose clothes that were popular here, but she also saw varied outfits and heard off-worlder voices.
Vendors sold handmade goods from open-air tents. White sand beaches beckoned her to take off her boots, and bright purple flowers crawled up the walls.
A year ago with Kel, it would’ve been romantic.
Tai had loosened his shirt. His hair blew in the breeze, and he hadn’t shaved that morning after her teasing.
It could have been romantic now with Tai, if he wasn’t the Confed spy who’d just found out she was a lawbreaker.
They stopped at wooden stalls for fresh fruit and recently caught fish fried in salty batter.
“You said they grow coffee here, right?” Tai asked. “I’d love to try some.”
This time, since he already knew the truth, she had no reason to conceal her opinions. “They do, but you won’t find any for sale. Because of Confed trade laws, the island isn’t allowed to keep it. They have to send it to Prime. With the taxes and tariffs, they can’t afford to buy it back, so it’s hard to find for the average citizen. If you want to use your connections to bribe the governor, he might be willing to share.”
Tai blinked. “That’s not fair.” He sounded truly surprised.
Before Perrin could educate him further, the woman at the stall handed them their fish, and asked, “Are you here for the festival?”
“Yes, we are,” Tai said before Perrin could ask what festival. “Supposed to meet a friend. I don’t suppose you’ve seen him?” He showed the lady a photo on his comp-pad.
Perrin noted he’d ditched the wanted poster and switched to one of him and Kel at a grav-ball game.
The woman studied the screen. “I haven’t seen him, sorry. But lots of people are visiting this week. Where’d y’all come from?”
“We’re here during school break. Like you said, the festival.” Tai held up the fish. “Thanks for this.”
“You and your girlfriend have fun. This is a romantic place. My husband proposed during this festival thirty years ago.”
Heat flooded Perrin’s cheeks as they stepped away, and she avoided glancing at Tai.
“If Kel was here,” he said, giving no indication the lady’s words affected him, “it will be hard to find anyone who remembers him with all these tourists. And if he’s still here, he has plenty of spots to blend in.”
She cleared her throat. “Should we head back to the ship?” she asked. “Or search for him?”
“We can try asking at repair shops. He might’ve needed parts to fix his ship. Besides, we can’t leave yet. That,” he nodded to her food, “is not sufficient for a birthday celebration. We still have an hour. Might as well look around.”
Nibbling on the piping hot fish, they joined the crowds funneling toward the main street. It looked like everyone on the island and half the mainland had come, not to mention off-worlders like them.
The scent of fried food and fruit and sugar filled the air, and underneath a hint of salty sea. Music floated on the breeze, a combination of steel drums and brass and something stringed. They moved toward the sound without speaking.
