Orbital Decay (Galaxy Mavericks Book 7) Read online

  “Private security,” Miloschenko said. “They’ll take care of this.”

  They reached the bridge door, but Florian sped up and blocked Miloschenko’s path.

  “You’ve got one shot at this before I take over,” Florian said. “You better make it a good one.”

  “They’re the best tracker and marksman in the galaxy. They’ll make sure that ship disappears.”

  Florian paused.

  He tried to think of who might be chasing them.

  “Are you betraying us?” Florian asked. “It better not be a Zachary ship.”

  “It’s not a Zachary ship,” Miloschenko said.

  “It’s not that GALPOL bitch, is it?”

  Miloschenko said nothing. He sighed.

  “You’re probably right, Mr. Macalestern.”

  “Shit! I’m taking over. I’m—”

  In the porthole window next to the bridge door, a Zachary warrior corsair burst out of hyperspace and zoomed by, rumbling the pioneer ship.

  “Let me work my magic,” Miloschenko said as they stared after the ship.

  “You better hope it’s magic,” Florian said. “because if it isn’t, we’re going to need a miracle to get out jail.”

  22

  Florian watched from the darkened bridge as the pioneer ship reoriented itself toward the Zachary warrior ship, which rocketed toward a black corsair in the distance.

  “They’ve asked for identification,” the skipper said, listening to the play-by-play on his radio. “Whoever it is, they’re not speaking.”

  “Tell them to shoot,” Miloschenko said. “Blow them the hell up.”

  “Amen,” Florian said. “Now!”

  The corsair quickly turned and blasted into hyperspace. The Zachary warrior ship followed.

  “Follow them,” Miloschenko said.

  “No, don’t follow!” Florian said. “What’s the matter with you? What if it’s a trap?”

  “I need to know who’s following me,” Miloschenko said.

  “How about you let the guns shoot first and give you a report?” Florian asked.

  “And lose the opportunity for torture?” Miloschenko asked. “Sit down and shut up. This’ll be over soon. You might even get a chance to see some of my torture devices in action.”

  “It looks like they’re heading for Coppice,” the skipper said. “Right on the border.”

  “Coppice?” Miloschenko asked. “The jungle planet?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Tell them to shoot to kill. If we’re lucky, they’ll burn up in the descent, or the ship will be lost in the jungle.”

  Florian sighed a little.

  “They’re out of hyperspace,” the skipper said. “They’re shooting.”

  Florian waited quietly.

  Silence spread across the room.

  “Target is evading,” the skipper said.

  Silence.

  Silence.

  “Target is shooting back,” the skipper said.

  Silence.

  Silence.

  “Target hit. Descending into the atmosphere. Target hit again. Threat neutralized. We’re in the clear, sir.”

  A sigh of relief spread through the room.

  Miloschenko turned to Florian.

  “Why did you doubt me?” Miloschenko asked. “We’ll have to start rebuilding trust now.”

  “You’re lucky,” Florian said.

  “Get me to Coppice,” Miloschenko said. “And tell Marks and Jax to follow the ship down and make sure its destroyed.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The pioneer ship blasted into hyperspace.

  “Make yourself comfortable, Mr. Macalestern,” Miloschenko said. “We’re making a little detour.”

  23

  “We found the ship, sir.”

  A female spoke on the bridge intercom.

  The bluish green planet Coppice took up the entire view of the bridge, rotating slowly.

  Florian straddled a chair. For the last hour he had been waiting nervously for the outcome of the search.

  The female voice on the intercom was a welcome sign.

  “Ship’s destroyed,” she said. “We found it. We’re going to perform a search. We’ll advise after.”

  The intercom went silent.

  “So far, so good,” Hux said, clapping a hand on Florian’s shoulder.

  Then the intercom crackled.

  The woman’s voice was muffled, with loud cracks.

  Gunshots.

  “Man down!” the woman cried.

  CRACK!

  CRACK!

  Zzzzzzzzzzt!

  Florian jumped at the gunshots.

  “What’s going on?” Miloschenko yelled.

  “Subject is still alive and is fleeing through the jungle. She—”

  CRACK!

  “I’m following her,” the woman said. “Subject is a woman with dark skin, likely Indian or Middle-Eastern descent, long hair, black coat. She’s got a handcoil.”

  “Kill her!” Miloschenko cried.

  The intercom went silent.

  They waited in silence for what seemed like an hour.

  Then, the intercom crackled and the woman spoke again. This time, the background was quiet with birdsong.

  “Mr. Miloschenko, the subject got away, sir,” the woman said.

  Miloschenko screamed. He grabbed a nearby tablet off the wall and threw it to the ground.

  “How hard is it to point and shoot?” Miloschenko asked.

  “She’s a cop,” the woman said. “It’s not that easy, sir.”

  “Come back,” Miloschenko muttered. “So I can berate you in person.”

  Miloschenko growled and turned, catching Florian’s eye.

  “I’m remaining shockingly patient throughout this exchange,” Florian said. “Your incompetence is so bad it’s funny.”

  Private Kyla Kyla bowed her head. Her battle armor was covered in grass stains, and she had twigs and vines in her long auburn hair.

  She was such a sad sight, and Florian immediately marked her as useless. What good was a soldier who couldn’t shoot?

  Florian stood in the shadows and watched her give a report to Miloschenko, who stood looking out into space with his back to her.

  “She shot Ryan, sir,” Kyla said. “He’s dead.”

  Miloschenko did not turn.

  “I am supposed to be back on Zachary in two days,” he said. “And I don’t need this, do you understand?”

  “I understand, sir.”

  Florian spaced out as Miloschenko proceeded to berate her, tell her how incompetent she was, how he didn’t need GALPOL crawling up his ass.

  Florian didn’t need GALPOL crawling up his ass. Not today. Not ever.

  He tried to think of a strategy.

  He was stuck on this ship with no chance of escape. Not in plain sight. Even if he called a private corsair, there weren’t any escape pods on the pioneer ship, and an airlock-to-airlock transfer was risky.

  His best course of action was to stay put and endure Miloschenko’s incompetence. Risk a chance of getting caught.

  If he was lucky, that GALPOL agent would die of starvation, hunger, or even better, animal attack.

  He turned and whispered to Huxley and Tatiana.

  “We’ll have to be patient,” Florian said.

  “If anything, we’ll have to step in,” Tatiana said. “Miloschenko’s not doing well under stress.”

  “I’d expect that from a scientist,” Hux said. “Why’s he so nervous?”

  “Don’t know,” Florian said. “But you both saw the artillery room, right?”

  “The one with all the guns?” Hux asked. “How could we miss it?”

  Florian smirked.

  Hux wagged a finger.

  “Now wait a minute, mister—”

  Tatiana’s face wrinkled in disgust.

  “Florian, no—”

  “Improvisation,” Florian said. “It’s the jazz of life.”

  Tatiana shook he
r head.

  “No,” she whispered. “Florian, no—”

  “Spread the word to the staff,” Florian said. “Nonverbals. They’ll know. Only on my signal.”

  “But why?” Tatiana asked.

  “Because we may not have a choice,” Florian said.

  He turned his back to her, ending the conversation.

  Miloschenko was still belittling Kyla, who was taking it surprisingly well.

  “My staff are all scientists,” Miloschenko said. “They couldn’t shoot a gun if you pulled the trigger for them. Do you think I should send one of them to help you? Would that make you feel competent about your abilities?”

  “It’s hard to take someone in by myself, that’s all I’m saying,” Kyla said.

  “You’re a soldier!” Miloschenko said. “Following orders is what you do!”

  Florian reached for the lump of pecans in his pocket.

  Then he cleared his throat.

  “This doesn’t concern you,” Miloschenko said.

  Florian stepped out of the shadows.

  “Your handling of this situation has become so laughable that I have no choice but to step in,” Florian said, chewing.

  “So you think this involves a corporate solution?” Miloschenko said. “I doubt that. I brought you here to observe, not to comment, Mr. Macalestern.”

  “But the answer is so simple, Tavin,” Florian said. “You’re supposed to be the genius, not me.”

  Miloschenko frowned.

  He wasn’t going to be receptive.

  Florian read the man’s defensive body language and thought back to all the conversations he had with similar people.

  He could either try to make Miloschenko feel comfortable, or he could use strange reasoning to rattle him further. At some point he would have no choice but to accept the reasoning, or shut down and let Florian take over completely.

  Negotiation tactic that worked every time…

  “Out with it,” Miloschenko said, waving his hands.

  Florian grinned and tucked the rest of his pecans into his shirt pocket. The answer was so clear, and if Miloschenko couldn’t see it, he was even more of a fool than Florian thought.

  “Now, it seems to me,” Florian said, “that you have a rodent problem.”

  “Obviously,” Miloschenko said.

  Florian walked with a lilting gait, circling Kyla. He moved in close, smelling the skin on the back of her neck, putting her on her guard.

  She was pretty. She might have been his type if she weren’t so damned sweaty and dirty…

  Kyla moved away from Florian and he laughed a little.

  “I hate rodents,” Florian said. “The way they scamper and scurry and squeak. And I especially hate how they always seem to find their way into places they shouldn’t be.”

  Florian kept walking and stopped in front of the glass.

  “That’s why they invented rat poison, Tavin,” he said. “And exterminators.”

  Miloschenko, Florian, and Kyla stood in front of a giant glass tube in the Specimen Room.

  The super soldier slept inside the tube.

  “Out of all your weapons,” Florian said, “this one amuses me the most.”

  Miloschenko shook his head.

  “No. Not this one.”

  “Give Kyla here a better gun, then,” Florian said angrily.

  You didn’t need an ivy league education to figure out the solution to a problem! He wanted to crush the pecans in his hand and throw them at Miloschenko.

  “He’s not ready yet,” Miloschenko said. “We’re months away from a viable test.”

  “Why?” Florian asked. “Are you telling me that you can’t keep your promise? Am I wasting my money on him?”

  “Your money won’t go to waste,” Miloschenko said. “Quite the opposite.”

  “It’s called proof of concept,” Florian said. “But clearly you don’t give a rat’s ass about sound business principles.”

  “Proof of concept?” Miloschenko asked.

  “You can’t aim for perfection,” Florian said. “Scientists just don’t get it. Sometimes you have to release your baby into the wild, and hope that it survives.”

  “That’s awfully cruel, isn’t it?” Miloschenko asked.

  Florian harrumphed. “Business is cruel, Tavin.”

  Their eyes went back to the man sleeping in the tube. The man’s chest rose up and down as he breathed in and out rapidly. The jagged, raised scar on his face looked like a big, blotted tattoo.

  “His story is magnificent, you know,” Florian said. “Imagine a Bartholomew Four transplant orphan being murdered by a Bartholomew Four survivor.”

  “His radiation burns were the worst the doctors had ever seen,” Miloschenko said. “He should have died.”

  “Didn’t he spend a bunch of years in therapy?” Florian asked. “Didn’t the dossier say something about that?”

  “Before the cybernetic implants, yeah. Skin was so badly burned his organs shut down. We replaced them, of course. He had to learn how to walk again, how to swallow, how to do just about everything. Took years.”

  “Ah, but what about the lobotomy?” Florian asked.

  “Successful,” Miloschenko said, pointing to a glowing bead of red orbs on the man’s forehead. “We installed neuron blockers just behind the eyes and ears, too. Whatever he sees or hears is now filtered through a sophisticated program that ensures that he will always be loyal to the Empire.”

  Florian laughed. “I love that. It’s like you’re talking sexy to me.”

  Miloschenko cleared his throat. “Trust me, I’m not. But he’s not ready yet. He still hasn’t passed field tests.”

  Florian rubbed Kyla on the shoulder and gave her a massage. The woman looked at him oddly.

  “Kyla here said she needed your help. Where I’m from, in the corporate world, we always help each other. Even when it hurts. Because it grows the bottom line, Tavin. You wouldn’t sabotage a dear, sweet, beautiful soldier like Kyla, would you?”

  “Don’t touch me,” Kyla said.

  Florian took his hands off her. Then he pointed at the man in the tube.

  “Use him, or I’ll pull out of our deal.”

  “Fine,” Miloschenko said. “But if this fails, it’s on you. Not me.”

  “What’s this fine gentleman’s name?” Florian asked, smiling.

  Miloschenko shrugged. “Hell if I know. But around here, we call him Smoke.”

  Florian threw another handful of nuts into his mouth. “Is that right? Well, let’s have a drink for dear old Smoke.”

  He raised his fist as if it were a glass of alcohol.

  “To Smoke,” he said, his eyes wild in the starlight. “And to extermination.”

  24

  Florian watched as the guards brought in Devika Sharma and tied her to a wall inside the metal tube.

  “Mmm, mmm, mmm,” Florian said. “All that effort—two soldiers and a super soldier, and she still almost got away.”

  Devika’s eyes were wild as the guards secured her to the wall.

  Miloschenko stood next to Florian and said, “We haven’t even shown you our best weapon yet.”

  “After the disaster with your super soldier, I doubt I want to see it,” Florian said.

  “But you’re going to,” Miloschenko said.

  Florian watched as Miloschenko stepped forward and interrogated Devika. The woman was strong-willed. Clearly the line of questioning wasn’t working. He whispered to Hux throughout the conversation, and Devika glanced to look at him, but he retreated.

  “Plan B,” Florian said. “Miloschenko is completely incompetent, and if we’re not careful, he’s going to expose us.”

  He, Tatiana, Hux, and the dozen staff members crowded in the corner of the airlock, away from Miloschenko’s scientists. He scanned the ceiling for microphones or bugs but found none. He spoke quietly.

  “I don’t agree with this,” Tatiana said.

  “You don’t have a choice,” Florian sai
d. “I can’t get caught with these people. Do you have any idea what the fallout would be?”

  “Florian—”

  “Hux, your thoughts?” Florian asked, irritated.

  Hux shrugged.

  “It’s settled, then,” Florian said.

  Tatiana’s eyes widened.

  “Have you no conscience?” Tatiana asked.

  “Sometimes I don’t know if I have one, according to a certain Crystalith,” Florian said, smirking.

  A scientist approached.

  “Sir, Mr. Miloschenko requests your presence in the Specimen Room.”

  They were in front of another planet. Or at least, a semblance of one. Video footage overlaid the bridge windows.

  This planet was Earthlike. Midnight blue with brown clouds surrounding it. It looked uninhabited.

  A large cruise ship shaped like a pistol was orbiting the planet.

  “What the hell!” Miloschenko said. “Who is that? Who gave them clearance to be here?”

  “It’s a planet for sale,” a scientist said. “It’s called Kepler. Our scanners are showing approximately thirty people down on the surface. Probably a real estate showing.”

  “You don’t think it’s one of our company agents, do you?” Hux asked.

  Florian shook his head. “Too hard to know. But remember, we’re not ‘here’, Hux. We don’t know anything about this if anyone asks.”

  Tatiana sighed.

  “Shut it,” Florian said. “Not a single word or expression more from you. Got it? I want to see what Miloschenko is going to do.”

  Tatiana folded her arms.

  “Release the Planet Eaters,” Miloschenko said.

  A giant silver ball was floating in space in front of the ship, and it drifted toward the planet.

  Florian and his team watched with curiosity as the silver ball stopped spinning.

  A door in the center of the ball opened.

  A liquid smoke, black as space, poured out, wisping over the planet like ink spreading through water.

  Specks of red appeared here and there in the darkness as it drifted down into the atmosphere.

  The ink spread, growing ever bigger, until it was the size of an entire continent.

  Florian opened his mouth to say “what the hell?”, but nothing came out.