Chapter 39
They didn’t try to sneak.
They shot their way through the Caruson ship, until they found the inter-ship connection across to the Raptor.
It consisted of an airlock that had been fixed open, with a tunnel extending from the warship into the Raptor, and Velda didn’t know if the Caruson had used an existing Raptor airlock or cut one open.
The Caruson side of things looked like it was expressly constructed for this purpose, which meant they’d thought about and engineered their designs with boarding other ships in mind.
It was impossible to see if there was anyone waiting on the other side, or where they’d come out, so she and Ethan crossed cautiously, weapons hot.
They leaped out the other end, ready for anything, to find they were in the launch bay, and alone.
Velda walked back a little to study the tunnel that stretched through the launch bay’s airlock membrane, and hoped that when they were able to escape and break away that there would be no damage.
Because they planned to take this ship and run.
“How will we do this?” Velda would not be a prisoner again.
“They’ve fought each other for a few hours, now.” Ethan’s gaze was sweeping the bay, and he moved to a stack of supplies, and pointed his laz at something on the ground.
Velda joined him, saw there was a Caruson soldier down, and two Cores crew.
One of the crew was sliced open and had bled to death, the other one seemed to be unconscious, shot with a laz.
“If there’s more like this in the rest of the ship, it will make things easier.” Ethan lifted his weapon. “Let’s stay together.”
She nodded her agreement and moved with him to the launch bay doors.
“Ready?” he asked.
“Yes.” The doors opened and they each took a side, backs together, pointing their laz down the passageway.
Shock slammed through her.
She’d expected signs of a fight but there were a lot of bodies lying in either direction, and not all unconscious. Like the crew member in the bay, some had bled and died, others were just out.
No one who had been sliced or stabbed had been left alive.
Velda started to count heads as they moved toward the bridge. The Cores had been overrun, but there were at least twelve Caruson down as well, some dead, some unconscious.
“Sylvester’s people started out with their laz set to a lower level, and then realized the Caruson were out to kill them, and they upped it.” Velda guessed she didn’t blame them, but it meant she and Ethan needed to be careful.
There would be no coming back from a hit any more.
Up ahead, she could hear the sounds of fighting, and it was definitely coming from the lounge in front of the bridge.
They moved silently down the passage, but suddenly a door opened just up ahead and she shot the person who stepped out before she even realized she’d lifted the laz.
Ethan glanced at her, eyebrows raised, and she shrugged.
“Got to keep up with you,” she said. “That was some seriously impressive fighting with Nirro.”
He shook his head, amused, and she grinned back.
Someone screamed up ahead, and they both moved faster, running into the lounge together.
There were four Caruson soldiers fighting five Cores crew, and the one screaming was a Cores guard who’d been cut by a Caruso blade, and was trying to stem the bleeding.
She and Ethan opened fire with the Caruson laz, taking down three before both sides turned on them.
And then it felt as if she went weightless, as if time slowed down.
She knew where Ethan was, what he was doing, and she left him to his side, as she got busy on her own. She leaped forward, flipping herself up and over a Caruson soldier and a Cores guard, putting out a hand as she flew over the Caruson, using his shoulder to help her move faster.
She landed behind them and shot them as they tried to turn around, spun, and took out another two Cores crew.
Ethan finished off the last Caruson on his side, and there was sudden, sweet silence.
But it wasn’t over.
It couldn’t be that easy.
Velda looked over at the bridge and saw the double doors had been levered partway open, so there was a gap between the two halves. There was even more damage on the left side, as if it had been hacked with a blade.
They approached cautiously, skirting the gap so that no one inside could fire out at them.
It would probably be foolish to peer through the gap, Velda decided.
“I can try to pull one side open, if you’re ready to fire,” Ethan said.
It looked like the best option, so she stood close to where the two doors met.
Ethan took a deep breath, hands closing around the thin gap, his feet bracing. His muscles flexed as he pulled as hard as he could.
Before the door even moved, a shot lit the air, coming from the passage to the right, and they both dived away.
They were crouched down, weapons up, but exposed, and Velda rose to her feet and ran to her right to draw the shooter out as Ethan stood, angled toward the passage.
Brink stepped out, weapon raised, saw Ethan, and ducked back down the passage.
Damn.
“If I can open the door wide enough for you to squeeze through onto the bridge, then I’ll go after her.” Ethan was back at the bridge doors, ready to try again.
Not ideal, but they needed to take the bridge, and they had to deal with Brink. She might not be alone.
“I’m ready.” She took up position again, weapon in both hands, and Ethan strained, giving a grunt as he hauled the door toward him.
The gap widened a little and the moment she could fit through, Velda threw herself at it, rolling as she landed and then coming up on her feet. She dodged a laz strike, running toward a chair and jumping so she could use the chair’s arm to boost herself even higher.
She pointed her laz downward and moved it left to right, lighting the room up.
A few of the panels had their covers removed—she guessed as part of the crew’s effort to get the Caruso bug out of their systems—and they sparked as they were hit. Still, she got everyone who was standing.
She landed lightly in the middle of the room, then darted to the right. She moved silently because she’d seen someone duck behind a console just in front of her.
She crouched down, edging along the side to get a better view of the person hiding, and when she peered around another console, she saw Sylvester, his back to her, laz in hand, slowly raising his head to look for her.
She considered having a conversation with him—about where they were, what his plans were, and then realized she couldn’t trust a word he said.
She shot him and rose to her feet.
Then she ran toward the bridge doors and crouched low, looking through the narrow gap.
Ethan was nowhere in sight, but a head suddenly popped up from behind the food bar in the lounge.
It was a Caruson, bulky in his protective gear.
He had obviously not taken a bad hit, to have recovered so quickly.
He studied the lounge, and then, like Velda, heard the sound of fighting from down the corridor.
He moved toward it, keeping to the side so he could see down the passage and still have cover.
She couldn’t let him come up behind Ethan.
She got even lower, her laz at a difficult angle, and tried to work out which shot would keep him down. Eventually, as he began to creep down the corridor, she chose his head.
He went down silently.
She’d most likely killed him, but he was carrying a curved blade in each hand, and Ethan was not expecting an attack from behind.
She suddenly realized she could hear buzzing and she turned, laz up, and saw one of the consoles was shorting.
She walked over and switched it off, and it began to emit a thin wisp of smoke that smelled sour.
That was on her, using the big Caruson laz with abandon.
She’d have been shot herself if she hadn’t, but she suddenly wondered if the Caruson had chosen blades not only because of their usefulness in close quarters fighting, but also because there was much less damage to the ship that way.
She hoped whatever she’d destroyed hadn’t hobbled them.
She turned back to the doors. She wanted to follow after Ethan, but she needed to hold the bridge, and she couldn’t see a way to get the doors open anyway.
She just hoped he’d be back soon.