The Catherine Kimbridge Chronicles #4, Retribution Read online

  My dear companion could only stare at me and blink. I tilted my head the other way. I forced myself to keep the simmering satisfaction from my tone as I continued. “Now, I understand you are busy. I get it. I wouldn’t want to babysit me either. I also know that you think I am a worthless piece of space garbage. Fine. You are free to have your own opinions. But how about you let the Academy Board of Admissions decide my worth on their own? Tell me how to find the Academy Branch.”

  Westley stared at me for a moment more before glancing away. After clearing his throat Westley gave me amazingly clear directions. Of course, that was after he offered to actually escort me there. I turned him down. He had his chance and I was tired of his judgmental attitude. I had gotten enough of it from Valencia and others. I repeated the instructions he gave me, to make sure that I had heard them correctly. He nodded, and I left him there in the crowded intersection.

  The Academy Branch, of course, was in the innermost ring of the station. It would have been far too convenient if they had had it in one of the outer rings. I sighed and concentrated on weaving through the crowd. That and not stumbling when I saw a different species. After a while my mind numbed at seeing so many people and species in one place. There were plenty of humans, but there were also many Hivens (who look like wingless flies if you ask me), and petite fluttering Avrens. The last flew in the upper corridor so none of the rest of us would step on their long, iridescent feathers. I kept glancing up at them, fascinated by the pulsing beat of their four wings. Once I almost stepped on a furry tail belonging to one of the Leopard Kin. That would have been an eviscerating experience, I am sure. From then on, I kept my eyes busy at finding a path through the crush.

  The directions Westley had given me were easy. All I had had to do was to follow the corridor until I found Ring One. Then all I had to do was find corridor C, turn right and walk past the Moon Café. Fifty feet beyond that, near the transport rentals, was the Academy Branch on the left side of the corridor. Of course, at Ring Two, these wonderful directions became worthless.

  Trust construction to confuse everything and make life a little more interesting. At the time, I just hadn’t known how interesting my life would become. Sighing I decided to take corridor C of the second ring. My hope was to meet up with another ring connecting passage and continue on to Ring One. Once there I would figure out just how far I needed to back track to find the Academy Branch. It was a solid plan and it was my only option.

  The only problem was, it got a little creepy. The constant crowd began to lessen till I was the only one. At the time, most of my thoughts were occupied with how I could convince the Admissions Board to let me join the Academy. I had no idea how much pull Captain Wingstar’s recommendation would have on their decision. So I began to rehearse possible pleas or arguments to bring before them that could possibly sway them decide in my favor. A trial, and my only crime is the one of my birth, I thought with morbid humor.

  Suddenly I heard a woman’s cry for help.

  Chapter 3 - The Inadvertent Witness

  I froze for a moment, wondering at the odds that something like this would happen to me while on a Prime Planet’s space station. Not just any station, either. This was the Imperial Station. A colonist like me would surely be blamed. But even so, I had to do what I could for the woman. I ran toward the cries. As I ran I could hear the sounds that hinted of a scuffle and the low taunting laughs of guys in a gang. I grimaced. Back on Lenti, I had heard similar sounds all the time. Up ahead, I could see a bend in the corridor. I slowed down and hung close to the wall. Eventually I saw an old woman on the ground pleading with a group of young men. They were digging through her bag, littering the floor with the odds and ends of a traveler. Each of the men had tattoos on every inch of skin that I could see. It made them look like walking comic books. The shortest of the gang turned a sneer on the sobbing old woman.

  “Your credits, ma’am. Know you ‘ave to ‘ave a few.”

  “Please. You have taken everything I ‘ave,” the woman sobbed, weakly.

  The thug shook his head and balled his hand into a fist. “I don’t think so.”

  Narrowing my eyes at him I decided that he and his gang were going to pay. Honestly, who other than the scum of society harmed the elderly? I mean, really? I glanced around for a weapon and smiled when I saw a crowbar near a stall under construction on the other side of the hall. I just needed to get over there. Weapon, check. I glanced back at the old woman. Now I just needed to distract them from her.

  Well, here it goes. I thought taking a breath.

  “So, who is your tattoo artist?” I asked coming out from my vantage point. At the sound of my voice they all turned to me. I kept my pace to a leisurely stroll, walking around them toward the construction section. I shrugged when they just blinked at me. “I was just curious, because I want to know if he did you guys up like comic books on purpose. He must have had a laugh at your expense.”

  “They make us look tough,” the guy holding the old woman’s bag said.

  “Is that your opinion? Or what you were told to say when you were asked?” I inquired, smiling patronizingly at him.

  “Look, girly, none of this is your business. But if you keep flappin’ your jaws like dat we will just have to include you,” the short leader said. I decided to call him Shorty L. The others smiled.

  I rolled my eyes and continued walking toward the crowbar that was looking more useful by the second. The old woman shrank down upon herself to avoid attention. Pretty soon here she would have the opportunity to get away before things got nasty. I had a moment of worry: what if she couldn’t walk? I mentally shook my head. Then I’ll just have to keep the fight far from her. I glanced at the construction site thoughtfully. Perhaps there was an alarm in there that I could trigger that would send the thugs running and get help for the old woman if things went south fast. Keeping my thoughts to myself, I continued my taunting.

  “Please.” I said. “Your ‘business’ interests are amateur at best. I knew some real gangs, and they would be embarrassed to be caught dead within ten light-years of your ‘business.’” I reached the construction site and faced them. The crowbar was three feet behind me and to my left. I eyed the leader with a smirk. “They also wouldn’t look like walking comic books.” The leader’s face grew redder with every word I said. My eyes widened dramatically. “Oooh! Looky dere! They even come in a single color! How fascinating!”

  The Comic Book gang had completely lost interest in the old woman. I love it when a plan comes together. They dropped her bag and kicked her belongings out of their way as they came toward me.

  “Something I said?” I asked innocently, as they came closer.

  “Scrag, hold her!” Shorty L snarled. “I want to beat some respect into her.”

  “Can I play with her?” Scrag (or Scrap which I think sounds more appropriate) asked with a leer.

  “We all will, but first I want to beat her into submission.” I think they were trying for terrifying or disgusting. All I got was pathetic… and more ammunition.

  I raised my eyebrow and started to move slowly backward. “I shudder in absolute disgust. You guys get off on raping girls of thirteen cycles? That’s just sad,” I snorted. “Probably the only action you lot get, though eh?”

  That was the last straw. Scrap lunged at me with a roar that was more obnoxious than anything else. I skipped backward and lunged for the crowbar. I felt the breeze of Scrap missing me. The crash of him stumbling over the knee-high bundle of bricks thundered in the hall. I rolled and snatched up the crowbar. I swept the bar in a low arc that toppled the next thug. I regained my feet as he lost his.

  I danced away from the downed thugs. I took tally of my opponents. Two of them were down. The last three couldn’t stop glancing between their groaning companions and me. I could only imagine what was going through their minds. Both big men were taken down by a thirteen-cycle-old girl. And, may I remind you, a girl holding a lovely crowbar. I think I might call it
Bertha. The leader was gaping like a fish out of water.

  “What? You just gonna stand there like a bunch of dead fish?” I asked. Shorty L glared at me, so I continued. “Now, you have a decision to make. You could send your last two guys at me and then you will have no one else to send,” I said. “Only plus of that is that you could run without them seeing you. Or you could just come at me yourself, which would make it the last two who will just run.” I paused to let them think about it for a moment. “Or,” I began, “you could just leave with your friends and make up a beautiful story about how you survived a skirmish with three Telmicks or something.” It took them a moment but the three thugs gathered their buddies and ran away.

  I waited a single moment before dropping the crowbar and rushing to the old woman’s side. “Are you okay, ma’am?”

  Her intelligent, bright-blue eyes looked from me to the retreating thugs. She returned to me and smiled in gratitude. “I thank ye, lass. Help me up?” she asked, holding out a withered, bony hand. I grasped it with one hand and began to pull her up. My other arm was offered as a support.

  “Where did ye learn to move like that?” she asked me, once she was upright.

  As I steadied her I said, “I guess you could say the best school in existence.” Not wanting to reveal where I came from.

  She raised a steel gray brow at that. “Oh? And what would that be, lassie?”

  “Life.” I replied. Once sure that she could stand on her own, I began gathering up her belongings and putting them back in her bag. “

  I’m sorry I didn’t arrive sooner.” I said.

  She smiled. “Lass, you came. That is all that matters.”

  I met her gaze for a moment before nodding and handing her her bag. “Do you want me to escort you to wherever it is you are going?”

  “That’s fine, dear. I can find my way. T’is not far.”

  I looked about the empty hall under construction and wondered where the woman could possibly be going. “Are you sure?” I asked. Because I wasn’t.

  She smiled knowingly. “I’m sure. I don’t want to keep you from where you are going. Thank you again, lass.” She said, before turning and walking down the hall back the way I had come. I watched her go. I knew that she would reach the more populated sections within a couple minutes. If she headed any other way I would have followed anyway. I started to turn, when I had a horrible thought. The thugs had gone that way, too. What if they were lying in wait?

  Ah, what the hell. It isn’t as if anyone is expecting me, I thought, picking up Bertha the Crowbar and following after her. I kept a wary eye from a distance on her progress. Within a few minutes she made it to the busier sections without incident. Assured that she hadn’t been mugged again, I turned around and continued on my way.

  I began to wonder if I should turn around myself as the halls were getting darker. My only light soon came from dim console lights. My grip tightened on Bertha. My goal was to be as silent as possible, but the LF boots I had been issued were defeating it. I stopped and slipped them off. My ears tickled from straining to hear any possible sound because I doubt that I would ever see it coming. I clipped the boots together and held them in one hand. I wished I could just leave them behind, but there was some ‘civilized’ policy that stated ‘no shoes, no service.” And I need to at least enter the Academy Branch. Another thing that I wish I could have done was make my white clothing darker to match my surroundings. But like leaving the boots, I couldn’t do that either.

  Grasping Bertha in one hand and my boots in the other, I continued. My feet padded softly, making next to no noise. Just when I considered that I had made a wrong move in continuing down this creepy dark hallway, I found the main corridor that led toward the central section of the station. At least, I assumed it was, because it was bigger than the corridor I had just left. What made me hesitate was the fact that it was dark. Why is there a whole section dark like this? I wondered looking up and down the hall. It just didn’t make any sense. Yet this main hall remained, dark as the little corridor.

  Sighing silently, I turned to the left, which was the direction I hoped would meet up with Ring One. There was no sound, next to no light, and the metal floor was cold through my sock-covered feet.

  A sudden lance of pain made me gasp. Through the sensation of trembling nerves I heard a voice. Not a woman’s voice, but a male’s called out. Not again! No! Don’t! Leave her alone! Someone! Anyone! Hear me! Help me! It was both a plea and a command.

  What was the coincidence that one person, in an abandoned section of a space station, would hear not one, but two cries for help—and by the sound of it, there were at least two people who needed help. Another difference was they were in a different hall. By the sound of it they were in a smaller corridor. I set the boots down in a little nook behind a counter of some abandoned store front. I then padded into the side corridor with my trusty crowbar. I wandered down its length following the pleading male voice. I began to hear another male voice; it was less clear than the first. I could also make out a woman’s murmur. I had no chance of understanding her.

  Why could I only make out the one voice? It didn’t make any sense. As I got closer I realized that there was light up ahead. If the corridor had been lit normally, the light would have been negligible. As it was, one was very much aware of it without it hurting. I came to the corner and couched down before peering around. I froze as what I was seeing sank in. A woman with short brown hair was bound wrist to ankle on her knees before some figure in the deeper shadows. By how this figure moved, I was fairly sure that it was male, human, and rather large. Though that that least could have been because he was in the shadows. His voice was deep and patronizing when he spoke again. “Stupid Shade, you think a mouse can sneak up on a serpent?”

  Serpent? The male voice that had drawn me here in the first place snorted. You are neither cunning nor graceful nor fast enough to apply that title to your miserable pink hide. The voice continued scathingly. No, the only title that fits you is “leech.”

  The shrouded man stepped forward into the light, revealing he really was large in stature and wore a mask that fitted over his entire face. I flinched, thinking that the male prisoner certainly had guts but no brains. But to my surprise, the masked man didn’t act as if he had been insulted… or even that he had heard the voice. Neither did the woman. She eyed the masked wonder and laughed.

  “Has something I said amused you?” the man asked.

  The woman smiled, grimly. “Kill me and the Emperor will still know everything that I do.” Two words of that sentence fought for dominance on the attention stage of my mind. And those were “emperor” and “kill.” The emperor because he was the guy in charge. Yeah, there was the Council, that was scary on its own, but the word “emperor” just echoed with power that frankly “council” didn’t. As a mere colonist, the chances that I would ever see the emperor were the same as seeing the center of a star without being vaporized. That’s right, pretty low.

  The other word was something I was far more familiar with. It was something that I had rolled around with in the destruction of my home. Words like “kill” and “death” were something that I could understand. They were dirty, gritty, and common—something that no one could avoid forever. But to see it being forced before its time was terrifying. I had to do something. Anything.

  As I searched for a plan, the masked man crouched before the woman. A smile colored his words. “That would be true.” No! The other voice became panicked, distracting me. The masked man continued, unaware of the other voice. “…if your Spectral could escape.”

  “What?!” The woman gasped, her face paled in the faint light. I could see the man’s hand reaching into his vest. I knew that could only mean a weapon. I need a distraction… distraction, distraction. I thought over and over again, looking around.

  The voice that only I seemed to be aware of inhaled sharply in shock. The light! he said, just as I saw it. A single faint purple orb light was suspended fr
om the ceiling. It was the main source of light in the room. I glanced down at the crowbar in my hands and decided that wouldn’t be a good thing to throw. What if I missed? The only good thing could be hitting the man in the head. But then, I could just as easily hit the woman. Suddenly my muscles holding Bertha went slack for one terrible second. I caught hold of Bertha before she slipped entirely out of my hands. But an end clattered on the ground just as the man pulled out a black blade of some creepy make. I dodged behind some crates just inside the door. Hopefully before he saw me. I heard him curse, and knew that one of two things would happen. He would kill the woman before looking for me. Or he would come find me, try to kill me, then kill the woman. My fingers tightened reflexively on Bertha.

  Ah hell, I thought, upon realizing that I didn’t have time to find something else.

  In that split second I stepped back from behind the crates and hurled the crowbar toward the light. That is when time decided to slow down. Bertha the Crowbar summersaulted end over end. The man had the blade back. He started to look in my direction. Bertha shattered the orb, throwing everything into darkness and time back to normal. But at the same time I heard the horrible sound of flesh parting before a blade and the woman’s scream and blinding pain brought me to my knees. Get up! The male only I could hear demanded. Get up and run like hell! You need to get the two of you out of here!