Chapter 51 Lacy
Lacy
My hand clenched the wrench and my shoulders twitched with every sound in the hangar.
The loud music continued to pulse, echoing around the space.
Hyperaware of every movement and every shadow, I tried not to crowd Burn.
For years in my teens I’d begged my dad to let me come on his missions.
He’d laugh his ass off now, if he knew how much I wasn’t enjoying this.
My nerves were not made for these operations.
Burn stopped a few feet in front of me. Orion slipped into the shadows and Mercer followed him.
When they returned, Mercer gave the all clear.
“I knocked out the two guys who were nearby. We’ll need to make a wider search to make sure.
” He smirked at me and I wanted to punch him in the nose.
“Your turn. The shuttle is just around the corner, not too far from another set of doors. Get it running.”
I gave him a plastic smile. “Get me that tool chest.”
Burn led the way, keeping her body between me and whatever was ahead of us. There were plenty of places for people to hide in here. I hunched over and tried to make myself as small a target as possible as we hurried to the shuttle.
When we reached it, the side doors were both wide open. I plastered my body against the side, while Burn cleared the interior.
I barely waited for her to whisper “Clear” before I scrambled inside and made my way to the cockpit.
“Can you start it?” Burn asked as she clambered in after me.
“Let’s find out.” I studied the console, noting the location of the controls. I’d worked on this model of shuttle before, but they weren’t common on Elegium Station. Too small for interplanetary work and too old in some crews’ eyes. That age could come in handy.
I pressed the ignition button. Maybe we’d get lucky.
Nothing.
“So you can’t get it running?”
Was that disappointment or a challenge in her voice? I couldn’t tell and I didn’t have the time to worry. “Shhh.”
I slipped MAKO out of my suit and set it on the console so I could work unencumbered.
Sliding out of the pilot’s seat, I dropped to my knees so I could access the panels under the main console.
I popped the panel off with my multitool and flicked on the tiny flashlight I’d brought with me.
Turning my head so Burn could hear me, I said, “I need you to hold this over my shoulder so the light shines right here.” I wiggled the light so it flashed over the section I needed to have illuminated.
“Little busy here watching your ass, Lacy.”
“Do you want me to get this thing running?”
“Yes.” Her tone implied it was a stupid question.
“Then figure out a way to do both.” The actual work was a one-person job, but working under these less-than-ideal conditions required extra hands.
She took the light from me with a deep sigh. “Fine.”
“Thank you.”
After ensuring that the light was angled where I wanted it, I lay flat on my back and scooted closer to the control panel. I stared up at the tangle of different-colored wires.
They were color coded for a reason, but experience had taught me that some mechanics were lazy and didn’t always match the colors up correctly after a repair. Who knew what kind of chaos I’d find in a chop-shop ship.
I ran my fingers over each one to figure out which system each wire was connected to. As I feared, it was a mess.
A perfect fix was out, but I was pretty sure I could create a workaround.
“Are you done yet?”
I ground my teeth together to keep from making a snarky reply. “Not yet. Tell Mercer I need wire strippers and snips from that tool chest.”
“You need what?”
“Wire cutters or something that can cut through wire. And wire strippers. They’ll have a series of holes on the blades to pull the plastic off the wires.”
The light bobbled as Burn passed my request on to Mercer. While I waited, I mapped out the wires for the most crucial systems to have a working, flying shuttle.
“Are these what you want?”
I held out my hand and she carefully set the tools in my palm. I pulled them closer and, surprisingly, they were exactly what I wanted.
“Perfect. Tell Mercer he did good.” Maybe being a people doctor helped him recognize ship doctor tools.
I took a deep breath, then got to work. I stripped and twisted wires, made and tested connections until I was satisfied. The whole time, I ignored Burn’s increasingly concerned questions or answered with single words or grunts.
I patted the underside of the console. “Okay, baby, if you get us through this, I’ll make sure to fix you up right.” The shuttle didn’t deserve to be left here with people who treated her so badly. We could fit her onto our ship.
I slid out. “Okay, we’re good to go.”
“Good. The boys are getting antsy.” Behind her words were the faint sounds of a fight.
I understood, since I was feeling the same way.
I smoothed my hand over the shuttle’s console again, then tried the ignition. After a cough she sprang to life. More of a stutter than a purr, but I could fix that later.
“Good girl,” I crooned. “Get the guys on board and have someone open a door for us,” I told Burn, while continuing to pet the shuttle.
She nodded and raced to the open shuttle door. “Somebody open the door. Everyone else, get onboard!”
Pounding feet and the sounds of a scuffle came from behind me, but I was too busy familiarizing myself with the controls to worry about them. Either Burn had my back or she didn’t, but my job was getting us out of here on the shuttle.
Burn appeared in the space just behind the pilot’s and copilot’s seats. “Go now!”
I eased the shuttle a few feet off the ground, prayed there wasn’t anything in the way, and aimed for the slowly opening hangar door.
The shuttle glided forward more smoothly than I’d expected and I gave her another approving pat. “Such a good shuttle.”
I kept a slow, steady hand on the throttle. We were airborne, but I had no idea how she would fly until I put it to the test.
Burn dropped into the copilot’s seat next to me.
“Everything okay?” I asked. Please don’t let there be a problem.
“So far. Orion and Mercer are in the back keeping an eye out from the side doors. Dax is opening the door for our departure.”
My heart leapt into my throat. He could handle himself, but that didn’t stop the worry. It just increased my need to not screw this up.
“He’s a professional. This is what he does.” It was like she read my mind.
“I know. It doesn’t make it any less worrisome.”
“If the two of you are going to make this relationship work, you’re going to have to get used to this.”
“Get used to stealing a shuttle and sneaking out of a hangar in the middle of the night to meet up with more bad guys? I didn’t think you guys wanted to be that kind of cargo runners.” I had to keep this light, so I could function through the tension riding me.
Burn laughed like I wanted her to. “Well, true. But given our backgrounds, I don’t think we’ll be able to escape exciting situations like this every once in a while.”
“That’s good to know.”
“We don’t want to be anything like Blazer,” she continued. “He gives a bad name to all the other ex-military who want to go into a nice private cargo business.”
My hands tightened around the wheel. Had Burn noticed? If she did, hopefully she’d chalk it up to nerves. “He probably thinks he’s doing the right thing.”
She snorted. “Being known as a scoundrel across the galaxy isn’t an endorsement.”
Fuck it. “What exactly do you think he does?”
Burn sneered. “Whatever the fuck he wants. That’s the problem. He wheels and deals and makes governments look like asshats.”
“Governments are asshats,” I muttered, scanning the distance between us and the door. There was a surprising lack of activity around us. Please let that be a good thing.
That startled a laugh out of her. “But starting rebellions and selling arms to both sides isn’t a great look.”
Had my dad actually done that? Not that I knew of, but I didn’t track his escapades that closely. He appreciated profit and underdogs, and you never knew which one would come out on top.
“Look, I don’t know who’s right or who’s wrong,” I said, still concentrating on piloting the shuttle. “But did you ever consider what those people might be rebelling against? Maybe they can’t feed their families on what the companies pay them. Maybe they just want to decide their own lives.”
“You flew with the guy,” Mercer commented from the back. “Are we supposed to believe that you don’t agree with him?” The guy from the rich family, with his charming take on the world.
Why were we having this conversation now?
“It was a job,” I lied. It was family. “Did you agree with everything the space corps did?”
Silence met my words. Not just from Burn, but from Mercer and Orion in the back too.
All of the sudden, I realized how alone I was with three heavily armed and highly trained professionals.
Dammit. This was why I tried to distance myself from my dad. Not because I didn’t agree with him—although I didn’t believe in everything he did—but because he’d raised me with a completely different set of rules and beliefs compared to most people. And they didn’t always like that.
I didn’t take the words back. That would be cowardly and I’d been raised to stand up for my beliefs. “Just because something is wrong doesn’t mean it isn’t the right thing to do.”
That was Dad’s motto. Maybe it was mine, too? I didn’t really know.
“I’ll think about it,” Burn said. “Can we get out of the hangar now?”
More than happy to end this conversation, I steered toward the open doorway. I was still tense. The conversation, thinking about my dad, worry for Dax, making our escape path. I was going to need a drink when this was all over.
“How fast should I be going for Dax to get onboard?”
“A little slower than this.” Burn spoke first but the others echoed her response.
“Okay. I’ll slow down when we get through the door.” It was coming up quickly. I kept my speed and my course steady through it. Dax gave me a thumbs-up as we passed him.
I immediately dropped my speed. We were practically hovering in place. “Do you have him?” Worry for him crept into my voice.
Quiet murmurs from the back practically begged me to turn around, but I kept my focus on the controls. A couple of grunts and then Burn’s voice. “We got him.”
“Good.” I released my breath in a whoosh. Knowing Dax was safe on board significantly lowered my stress. Now only one of the people I cared about was still in danger.
Dax and Burn traded places. I glanced over at him, checking for injuries. “You’re okay?”
“I’m fine,” he said. “No need to worry.”
“I wasn’t worried,” I shot back so quickly it was obviously a lie.
He reached over and cupped the back of my neck. The warm, steady weight of his hand eased the last of my tension.
“Can I go faster now?”
“Do it. Not sure how long it will be ’til someone sounds an alarm. We need to get in and out with your sister as quickly as we can.”
I nodded, hating that we were going in mostly blind.
Upping our speed, I kept a close eye on the gauges. I didn’t expect problems with the shuttle, but I was prepared for them.
Cooler night air rushed in as we covered more ground.
“Can’t we close this door?” Mercer asked.
I ignored him until Burn asked the same thing.
“That mechanic said the doors were wonky. I can take a look later, but the priority was to get her running.”
“Think the shuttle was there for parts or repairs?” Burn asked.
“Parts, probably.” The wind carried Mercer’s words up to me.
I was instantly offended on behalf of the shuttle. “It’s okay, baby. Ignore the mean man. He doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”
“Do you honestly think that works?” That was Orion.
I couldn’t prove that it didn’t. “Would you rather be flying in an angry shuttle?”
“Seriously, you’re talking to this piece of shit shuttle?” Mercer again.
Asshole.
I’d never admit it, but I was starting to enjoy the sniping with Mercer. He was like the brother I never wanted.
“We could call it the shittle,” Burn said with a laugh.
“It’s okay, baby,” I whispered again. I had to believe that the shuttle would take us to the compound and the team would find my sister. When we found her, we needed to have a way back to our ship. “I believe in you.”