Chapter 16 #3
Kira didn’t know what was going through his mind as he brushed past her. She turned and followed, hoping that whatever it was didn’t end with her at war with her cousin.
They hadn’t gone far before they heard her name being called. Retracing Kira’s steps, they headed toward the sound of Raider’s voice.
As soon as they appeared out of the forest, Raider dropped the hands he had cupped around his mouth. “There you are. The big guy was getting antsy.”
He nodded at the unhappy Finn by his side.
“This is why I have trust issues,” Finn said stiffly.
Kira glanced at Raider. “You weren’t worried?”
“Not for a little dust up like that.”
“I don’t suppose you left any of them alive to interrogate?” Kira asked, glancing at Finn to find him studying Roderick.
“Where have you been?” Finn asked abruptly.
“Scouting.”
It was the same answer Roderick had given Kira. He was consistent if nothing else.
Finn wielded silence the way others did words. His distrust and suspicion as loud and unmistakable as a shout.
Roderick’s expression remained arranged in polite, neutral lines even as he held Finn’s stare.
Kira found her patience quickly waning. This confrontation could go on forever if she let it. And might, since they were Tuann. “About my earlier question. Did you and Dylan leave anyone alive to interrogate?”
Several long moments passed where the two studied each other.
“No,” Finn answered finally.
“It’s not a total loss though,” Raider said. “We may have found something.”
Roderick remained behind as Raider beckoned them to follow.
They made their way over to one of the bodies.
Raider crouched to roll up the dead person’s sleeve, exposing a tattoo of a skull with purple tubular shaped flowers growing out of one eye socket and its mouth. Black berries hung from its stem.
“Mean anything to you?” Raider asked.
“Atropa belladonna. More commonly known as deadly nightshade,” Kira said.
Highly toxic and a favorite method of poison for most of humanity’s history.
“Guess that answers the question of which clan they belong to,” Raider said, letting the man’s arm fall.
Kira frowned. “That doesn’t make sense. Belladonna isn’t near big enough for an operation of this size.”
They were barely a pirate clan at all. Their existence was more rumor and myth than actual fact.
“Current circumstances would appear to contradict that assessment,” Raider said, rising.
“I guess so,” Kira said, her gaze lingering on the dead man’s tattoo before she shook her head and looked at Finn. “Was anyone injured?”
“Jin, Raider and I are fine.”
Kira supposed she should have been clearer. Silly her for assuming he’d know what she meant.
“What about the rest?”
Finn’s tone was stiff. “Caius’s pod took damage. Pye and Az will heal, but they won’t be much use in the interim.”
“Can they move?”
“With difficulty.”
That was better than nothing. Kira wanted to get back to the gate as soon as possible. They’d been attacked twice in a matter of hours. Who knew what else awaited them out here?
Kira realized something. “I saw Pye go down, but I lost track of Az during the fight.”
One moment she was there; the next she was gone. That wasn’t unheard of in a fire fight. The same thing happened with Dylan and Finn.
“It appears she had the same thought Dylan and I did. We found her unconscious next to one of the humans after we finished the rest off. It looks like he got off a lucky shot before she took him out.”
“That was careless of her,” Roderick mused.
Finn’s face said he privately agreed.
“What about Maksym and the rest of the gate party? Have you been able to get in contact with them yet?” Kira asked.
They hadn’t been able to at the compound. Kira had hoped that proximity would change that, but Finn’s shake of the head crushed that hope.
“Do we still not know the reason for the comms blackout?” Kira asked
A second shake of Finn’s head sent disappointment shooting through her. They should have been in comms range by now.
Spotting Jin sitting alone on top of the ruined wall, Kira decided to wrap things up. She was already walking toward him as she said over her shoulder, “Let’s get the injured stabilized so we can get moving. I want to rendezvous with Maksym and the rest as soon as possible.”
Raider ambled after her.
“Penny for your thoughts?” Kira asked Jin.
She infused her voice with a little levity, hating how crestfallen he looked.
He had his arms wrapped around his bent knees and was resting his chin on them as he watched their approach. “Is it always going to be like this?”
Kira didn’t have to ask what he meant by that. “First battles can be hard.”
Fight or flight was a saying for a reason. The physiological reaction allowed the body to confront a coming threat or escape it. But there was also a third option that most never considered—freezing in place.
It was also a lot more common than people thought.
Jin rubbed his cheek against his pants, getting rid of any suspicious wetness. “You can’t exactly claim this is my first.”
“I guess that’s true.”
What did it say about their lives that in a little under three days he’d gone through more life and death situations than most did in their entire existence?
It wasn’t likely to get better anytime soon either.
No, it was going to get much worse.
“How do you do it? How do you keep moving through the fear? Sometimes, it’s like my body is not my own.”
“Organic beings are basically just a bunch of chemical reactions,” Kira said.
Adrenaline. Dopamine. Serotonin. Endorphins
Hormones to bring you up. Hormones to bring you down.
“The trick is not letting them control you.”
It was hard. Impossible to master fully. Biology was one of the most powerful forces in the universe. There was no defeating it. But you could fool it sometimes. Delay your reaction—or suppress it.
“How?” Jin asked.
“Practice.”
The military trained its soldiers in a specific way for a reason.
There was no way to guarantee that someone would hold up during actual battle, but by pushing them to their breaking point and replicating certain conditions you could get a fairly decent sense of what they might do during the real thing.
Some broke apart and had to be built back up. Others soared, made stronger in the forging.
“For my part, I like to play a game with myself. See how close to the fire I can get without being shot or otherwise maimed,” Raider volunteered.
Kira and Jin stared.
“He asked,” Raider defended.
“Her. Not you. I don’t need a glimpse into your twisted mind,” Jin said.
“Last time I try to comfort a tin can.”
Despite the harsh words, Jin’s faint smile showed no hard feelings. He, like Kira, probably sensed the concern under Raider’s bravado.
“Maybe next time someone tells you a mission isn’t for you, you’ll listen,” Kira pointed out.
“If not for me, you’d be dead, you insufferable woman.”
“Maybe so, but you’d still be kicking your feet up and enjoying the easy life if you weren’t so insistent.”
So really, there was no reason for her to feel that guilt sitting in the middle of her chest like a ten ton city-killing bomb.
He’d volunteered for this.
Raider made a placating motion with his hands. “Alright, you two, back to your individual corners, we—”
Before he could finish, a giant force lifted them up and threw them against the ruins.
Kira’s head collided with the stone wall. It was light’s out.