Chapter 12
Three pairs of eyes snapped to Carmen – Sark’s wide and hopeful, Norvik’s black and unreadable, Mila’s green and calm as deep space.
The lingering scent of synth-stew and recycled air couldn’t quite mask the ghost of Mila’s earlier presence, that musky, thick sweetness that seemed to cling to Carmen’s sinuses even now.
It was a distraction, a low prickle beneath her skin she ruthlessly shoved aside.
She had clarity. Bought and paid for in sweat and frustration and the temporary oblivion Letitia had offered. Now it was time to act.
“We’re taking her home,” Carmen announced, her voice cutting through the quiet like a plasma torch. No preamble. No room for debate. Just the hard edge of command. “To the Forbidden Zone. To her people.”
The words hung in the air, stark. Sark flinched as if physically struck. His orange skin paled, the vibrant mottling seeming to fade.
“Home?” he choked out, his voice cracking. “Captain, the Forbidden Zone? That’s ... that’s crazy!”
Norvik didn’t flinch. He merely tilted his head, a precise fraction, his blue hands still folded on the table.
“Captain, Zed is not here to give us the precise calculations, but the probability of successfully navigating the interdiction perimeter, evading COPS patrols optimized for Forbidden Zone incursions, locating the XenX homeworld without reliable astrogation data, and returning intact is astronomically bad. Factoring in the Antilles’s current condition, those odds fall to practically zero. ”
Carmen met his black gaze, unblinking. She’d expected this. Needed it, almost. The resistance solidified her own resolve.
“We don’t need probabilities, Norvik,” she said. “We need a course. Plot the fastest vector to the nearest viable entry point. Avoid known patrol lanes.”
“Captain, please,” Sark pleaded, leaning forward, his webbed hands gripping the edge of the table.
“Think about it! The COPS have those barrier satellites crawling with sensors! They shoot first out there! And Velasco, he’ll have hunters sniffing every shadow port by now! We can’t outrun them and the UPA Navy!”
His voice rose, edged with panic.
“Two hundred thousand creds, Cap! That solves everything! Velasco paid off! Fines cleared! New thrusters! Shields that don’t flicker when someone sneezes! We could be safe!”
Safe. The word was a barb. Safety bought with Mila’s freedom. Carmen’s gaze flicked to the XenX woman. Mila sat perfectly still, her striped back straight, her expression serene. Her green eyes were fixed on Carmen, waiting.
“Safety isn’t on the menu, Sark,” Carmen said, turning her full attention back to him.
The frustration, the bone-deep weariness of carrying their collective survival, threatened to bubble over.
“Not that kind. We sell her, we become exactly what Maltese tried to make us: traffickers. Slavers. We become part of the chain that grinds her people down.” She jabbed a finger towards Mila without looking at her, the gesture sharp, accusatory.
“I won’t have it. Not on my ship. Not with my crew. ”
“But Captain—”
“No!” The word cracked like a whip. Sark recoiled. “The decision’s made. We take her home. End of discussion. Sark, report to the bridge and start calculating a course. Now.”
For a long moment, no one spoke. The silence stretched, thick with Sark’s ragged breathing and the ever-present groan of the ship’s straining engines. But at last, Sark’s shoulders sagged.
“Yes, Captain,” he said.
He trudged to the hatch like a man being led to execution. Carmen bit her lip not to shake her head at him. Where was her smug, affable pilot? What ghost was haunting him?
“Captain, if I may make a suggestion,” Norvik said.
Carmen threw him a warning glare. This was not up for debate.
“What is it?” she growled.
“Since Mila’s home world is in the Forbidden Zone, the required data on stellar coordinates is incomplete. Simply put, none of us has been there, and there are no astrogation charts available. Mila’s assistance would likely make Sark’s task easier.”
The Sensoori paused at the hatch, looking back as though he might get a last-minute reprieve. Carmen grunted. As usual, Norvik’s logic was sound. She nodded curtly.
“Fine. Mila, accompany Sark to the bridge. Give him everything he needs.” Her gaze finally landed fully on the XenX woman. “Coordinates, cultural protocols for hailing, anything that gets us in and out faster.”
Mila rose smoothly from her chair. The movement was liquid, drawing Carmen’s eye despite herself. That damned scent seemed to intensify for a heartbeat. Mila walked towards Carmen, stopping an arm’s length away. Her green eyes, level with Carmen’s, held an unsettling calm.
“Captain Díaz,” Mila said, her voice soft, melodic, yet carrying perfectly in the tense room. “I appreciate your conviction. Your desire to grant me freedom is unexpected. And noble.” She paused, her gaze unwavering. “But it is unnecessary. And potentially catastrophic for you and your crew.”
Carmen stiffened. Unnecessary? Catastrophic? The sheer wrongness of the words struck her like a slap to the face.
“What are you talking about?”
“My purpose is service,” Mila stated simply, as if explaining the most basic fact of existence.
“My disposition, as I stated, is yours to determine. Selling me fulfills that purpose. It provides the capital your vessel and crew desperately require. It resolves your debts, your fines. It grants you security. Survival. To risk all this, to hazard your lives and this ship on a near-impossible journey into forbidden space to return me to a life I chose to leave is foolish.”
For a moment, Carmen was shocked. How could she know about the debts and the fines? And then it dawned on her with icy certainty that Sark and Norvik had filled her in. How convenient that the sex slave was begging to aid them, offering herself as the solution to her problems.
She cast a furious gaze at the two of them. Sark wilted immediately, unable to even look at her. Norvik blinked impassively – as if to say Carmen should have expected this. She’d never felt more disgust for people under her command, not even Corso when he was second mate back on The Buccaneer.
A white-hot fury ignited in Carmen’s chest. The image flashed – Maltese’s greasy smirk, Corso’s sneer, the vulnerable curve of Mila’s back as she’d followed Zed, Sark no doubt laying it on thick as he revealed their predicament.
Hearing this calm, intelligent woman reduce herself to a commodity, a solution to be liquidated, was obscene.
And the fact that the men on her ship had tried to convince her to sell herself for their benefit made Carmen want to scream.
“A life you chose?” Carmen said, her voice low, dangerous.
She took a step closer, invading Mila’s space, forcing the taller woman to look down slightly. The musky scent was overwhelming now, cloying, mixing with the sharp tang of Carmen’s own anger.
“You call starving in a debtor’s camp while the Kovoids feast a choice? You call selling yourself to some rich pendejo so your family doesn’t end up breaking rocks until they die a choice?” She spat the word. “That’s not choice, Mila. That’s desperation wearing a negligée!”
Mila didn’t flinch. Her green eyes held Carmen’s, clear and unwavering.
“It was the only viable option available to secure my family’s future.
A future free from fear, from want. I embraced the path of Harimi willingly, Captain.
It is an honored role. My service is my purpose.
Selling me achieves that purpose and saves your crew.
It is the optimal solution. The logical one. ”
“Logic?” Carmen laughed, a harsh, brittle sound. “This isn’t about fucking logic! This is about you standing there, calm as vacuum, telling me you’re just ... just property! Disposable cargo! That your whole worth is wrapped up in what some rich bastard is willing to pay to own you!”
Her voice rose, raw with an emotion she couldn’t name – frustration, outrage, a fierce, protective ache that surprised her.
“You are more than that, Mila! Do you hear me? You’re smart.
You’re capable. You walked onto my ship, lit a fire in my tactical officer, and scared the shit out of Sark just by existing, and you did it without breaking a sweat!
” She gestured wildly, encompassing Mila’s striped form.
“Look at you! You’re a force of nature trapped in a cage you built yourself!
You deserve more than being some pervert’s prize!
You deserve to choose! Really choose! Not because the alternative is watching your family suffer, but because you want something! For yourself!”
The words poured out, hot and furious. Carmen was breathing hard, her chest tight. She hadn’t planned to say any of that. It felt like something ripped from deep inside, a truth she hadn’t fully acknowledged until this moment, facing Mila’s serene acceptance of her own erasure.
“And the fact that these two men – These ninos! – tried to talk you into bondage, tried to influence you behind my back, is proof everyone here has a lot to learn about a woman’s worth.
“Because it sure as shit ain’t two hundred thousand credits!”
The silence that followed was absolute, thick with shock.
Sark stared, mouth agape. Norvik remained impassive, but his head tilted slightly, as if recalculating.
And Mila just looked at her. Her green eyes had widened, just a fraction.
The calm mask hadn’t cracked, but something flickered deep within those emerald depths.
Surprise? Confusion? A crack in the serene certainty?
Before Carmen could decipher it, before Mila could respond, the ship’s comm crackled to life above the mess hall hatch. Letitia’s voice, usually so controlled, was sharp, tight with alarm.
“Captain! Bridge!”
The urgency in those two words cut through the charged atmosphere like a scalpel. Carmen’s head snapped towards the comm speaker, her captain’s instincts overriding everything else.
“Díaz here. Report.”
“Passive sensors just lit up like a supernova! Incoming vessel, bearing three-two-seven mark zero-one-five! Closing fast! No transponder signal, no comms hail!”
Cold dread washed over Carmen, instantly dousing the heat of her anger. Pirates. Or worse. Velasco’s hunters. The timing was too perfect.
“Raise the shields!” she barked. “Everyone get to the bridge! Now!”
Sark had already disappeared through the hatch. The rest of them made a run for it.
But they’d barely made it to the corridor when the Antilles bucked violently beneath her feet. The deck plates heaved like a living thing. Carmen staggered, thrown sideways.
A deafening CRUMPH reverberated through the hull, a sound felt in the bones more than heard.
The lights flickered wildly, plunging the ship into strobing darkness before surging back, casting frantic, jumping shadows. Alarms began to wail – a harsh, pulsing klaxon that drilled into the skull, accompanied by the frantic bleating of proximity alerts from the bridge comm.
They’d been hit.