Markovich, the wanted poster said—had been agile. She
might have some combat experience. If she was still alive.
According to the write-up, they were criminals, so their deaths
shouldn’t bother him, but he hated bungling a job. Even if Mandrake
Company was more known for killing people than kidnapping them, his
crew ought to be able to manage either in a competent, professional
manner. Otherwise what was to separate them from all the
ill-trained mediocre mercenary outfits in the galaxy?
Aware of Sergeant Hazel shadowing him, Viktor
stepped inside before she could offer to go first and remind him,
as she so often did, that it was foolish for the captain to come on
these missions personally and risk his life. No matter how many
times he pointed out that he was a combat specialist and would be
bored into insanity if he never left the ship and saw action, she
never failed to point out that captains weren’t supposed to be
expendable. Few others would presume to lecture him, but she was
from Grenavine, the same as he and a handful of others in the
company, and she had known him for years. They were part of the
original crew. The survivors.
Ceiling panels dangled everywhere in the
warped corridor, and Viktor had to walk in a hunch to reach the nav
cabin. A woman’s unmoving form lay crumpled on the shaggy floor
covering—a carpet, he supposed it would be called, though it looked
more like the fur off an animal that seldom bathed. As he knelt to
check the woman’s pulse, he spotted the other two crew members
slumped against the base of a nav console so devastated it was
barely recognizable. Blood smeared one of the women’s faces, and
neither person was moving. At least this one—Lauren Keys, according
to the poster—had a pulse.
Viktor winced when another panel fell from
the ceiling, banging down between the two other women.
“I’ll get that one, sir,” Hazel said, “if you
want to grab the others.”
Viktor stepped past the Keys woman, letting
Hazel pull her out, and gathered the other two, draping one over
each shoulder. Dr. Zimonjic wouldn’t approve of using anything
other than a stretcher, but she wasn’t here, nor did Viktor want to
wait for someone to grab first-aid equipment out of the
shuttle.
Ducking panels and buzzing circuits, he toted
the women back to the hole in the hull. Maneuvering out of the
smashed corridor with two people balanced over his shoulders was
awkward, but he had carried heavier loads.
One of his passengers stirred and moaned as
he stepped out into the night. The temperature was plummeting now
that the sun had set, and it had already dropped below freezing.
The shuttle should land on the flat hilltop a quarter of a mile
away. After eyeing the winding, rocky path leading up to it, Viktor
handed one of the women to Jiang to carry.
“Don’t let that one go, eh?” he said.
Jiang wasn’t one of the original crew, and he
gulped noticeably at Viktor’s slight censure. He was cocksure with
his comrades and most people he met, but he gave a mild, “I won’t,
sir,” here.
“Someone get that shuttle down here,” Viktor
ordered.
He wondered if Frog was taking his time
because he was afraid of being chastised. At least their quarry
hadn’t escaped. That would have been annoying. This was nothing
more than a side trip to earn extra cash for repairs and new
equipment. He had never had any intention of chasing these women
across the system.
Viktor’s remaining captive, Markovich,
groaned again and tried to push her way off his shoulder. He put
her down, getting a face full of dark wavy brown hair in the
process. It had been tied back in a more practical ponytail
earlier, but it must have fallen out in the crash.
He fished out flex-cuffs and secured her
wrists behind her back before she had stopped blinking her eyes in
confusion—or perhaps that was less confusion and more an attempt to
focus them. He patted her down, checking her dusty khaki jumpsuit
for weapons. Full of