Chapter 26 #2
Standing in the middle of the access pad like he stepped out of a nightmare and decided to enjoy the view. His uniform jacket is open, one hand resting lazy on the pistol at his hip. The other lifts a small comm unit that glows faintly blue.
He’s smiling.
Not the fake diplomatic smile he used in the medbay. This one’s wider. Meaner.
“Evening, Doctor,” he calls over the wind. “Commander. Fancy seeing you two here.”
Vael moves in front of me before I can think, his body blocking the glare, the subtle whine of his servos rising like a growl.
Tarek’s pistol clears its holster with a whisper. The muzzle finds us easily.
That smile doesn’t fade.
He’s just standing there.
Like he owns the stars and the dust between them.
Like we didn’t just crack his secrets open and broadcast them to every corner of Alliance space.
Tarek’s coat flutters in the wind, pale blue under the floodlights, the insignia on his collar darkened by soot or blood—I can’t tell which. His smile doesn’t falter, not even when Vael shifts forward like a storm barely leashed.
“Don’t,” I murmur, fingers brushing his arm. “He wants a reaction.”
“I’ll give him one,” Vael growls.
And he does.
He launches. A blur of motion, teeth gritted, eyes blazing. There’s no warning, no war cry—just raw, explosive power propelling him forward, feet pounding against the pad with enough force to shake the plating.
But Tarek’s ready.
His hand doesn’t go for the pistol. It dips to his belt, flicks a switch—
And the world lights up.
A sharp crack splits the air. Not like a gun. Higher, faster. Wrong.
Vael jerks mid-charge, body arching like he’s been yanked by the spine. His limbs seize. His cybernetics whine, sparking at the joints. The impact throws him sideways, hard.
He hits the tarmac like a fallen pillar.
I scream his name and drop to my knees beside him.
“Vael! Vael—hey—”
His body’s still twitching, teeth bared in a grimace of pain. His left arm spasms once, then goes limp. The plating smokes at the seams. He’s breathing, barely—but the disruptor scrambled his neural grid.
“You piece of shit!” I snarl, whipping toward Tarek. “What the hell did you hit him with?”
Tarek doesn’t answer right away. He lifts the disruptor in one hand, tilts it like a wine glass. “Vakutan synaptic breaker. Illegal on human circuits. Instant full-body nerve cascade. Gorgeous tech, really. Took years to replicate.”
He flicks it again and slides it into the holster with a little flourish.
I’m already reaching for the medpatch on my belt, fumbling with shaking fingers. Vael’s heart rate’s all over the place.
“I warned you not to cross me,” Tarek says, stepping closer. The sound of his boots—slow, deliberate—grates against the back of my skull. “But you had to play the martyr. Had to make it personal.”
“You shot him,” I spit, not looking up. “He wasn’t armed.”
“Wasn’t he?” His voice is slick with contempt. “Vael Draykorr is always armed. That body of his is a weapon. You know that better than anyone.”
Vael groans softly beside me, fingers curling, but his eyes stay shut.
“Stay down,” I whisper. “I’ve got you.”
Tarek stops a few meters away, just inside my peripheral vision. His tone changes—goes flat. “You think this ends with a data leak? You don’t understand how deep this goes.”
I rise slowly. My hands are wet. I’m not sure if it’s blood, coolant, or sweat.
Tarek gestures behind him at the smoke-wreathed horizon. “The Alliance doesn’t need evidence. It needs narratives. Enemies. Threats to stability. You gave them both when you birthed that creature.”
My stomach turns to ice.
“What did you just say?”
He doesn’t blink. “You should’ve terminated when the scans came back abnormal. But you got sentimental. Weak. You raised her like she’s a person.”
I feel the baton before I remember grabbing it.
The one I stashed after the last raid—old scavenger tech. Half-charged, dented, humming softly in my palm now like it knows.
“Say her name,” I say, voice barely audible.
Tarek’s head tilts. “Nessa.”
He says it like a curse.
“Cute. Wild. Stronger than she should be. And without training, she’ll rip herself apart. Or worse, someone else. The moment her claws show in public, she’s a weapon. One we can’t afford to lose track of.”
He steps forward again. His tone drops, quiet and cruel. “That’s why I tagged her before you ever left Luria. You thought you ran fast enough? Sweetheart, we’ve been watching her grow.”
Something breaks.
Not like glass. Not like bone.
Like silence.
I move.
Tarek barely has time to register the change before I’m inside his guard. The baton snaps up. One sharp arc through the air, and the charge connects with his rig.
The effect is instant.
Electricity surges through the loop of his body tech. Sparks erupt across his chest plate. The disruptor at his belt overloads and pops. His back arches, teeth flashing in a grimace of disbelief—because this wasn’t supposed to happen. This isn’t how he planned it.
“You don’t touch my daughter,” I say, voice shaking.
He tries to swing at me. I dodge, grab his wrist, and drive the baton straight into the base of his neck.
One second. Two. The current catches.
Tarek screams.
Then he drops like a stone.
Smoke curls from his rig.
I don’t breathe. I don’t think. I just stare down at him, my heart thudding so hard it feels like the world is shaking with it.
He twitches once. Then stills.
I wait for him to move again. For the smug voice, the clever pivot, the lazy smirk.
Nothing.
Only the wind, and the low whimper of sirens curling off into the horizon.
Vael groans again behind me, louder this time.
I don’t look back.
I leave Tarek where he lies.
And I walk toward the man who didn’t flinch when the whole damn system turned on him.