“Negative. Do you hear me? Do not engage. The shuttle is not equipped for this sort of thing. You need to get back here, and gear up to do this right.
“Sorry, can’t hear you,” the voice said, quite clearly. “You’re breaking up. Transmission is going?—”
The line went silent.
The veins in Valin’s neck were standing out, his shoulders tense with barely contained anger. He knew damn well the transmission was just fine. The fools were ignoring his direct order.
Shalia wondered who might be down there. Zepharos had fled, and that was days ago. But could Kuxx be in the area? It seemed unlikely, given how they had made a point to get all of the freed prisoners back to their own people all across the continent. No, whoever was down there, it was someone else. It had to be.
Valin hurried down the corridor. Shalia wasn’t sure what she should do, but she figured following until told otherwise was the wisest course of action, especially given his mood. The commander made his way to a large array of monitors and equipment whose purpose was a mystery to the prisoner. Valin quickly tapped several icons on the screen and pulled up what looked like a very basic topographical map of sorts. There was hardly any detail at all, but the moving dot seemed to share the same symbol as other things on the display. More likely than not, it was the Dohrag shuttle.
Valin keyed open a comms line. “Turn that shuttle around, that’s an order!” he barked into the system.
The shuttle ignored him. The men piloting it had decided to boost their status by capturing some prisoners. If Shalia’s hunch was right, they were positioning themselves for when the nextwarship arrived, all on the assumption that Valin would be relieved of his command.
She had to admit, it made sense. In their cutthroat world, the toughest rose in rank while all others toiled beneath them. Now that she was living among them in their own setting rather than a work camp, Shalia was able to observe just how brutal the whole thing was firsthand. And for this half-breed to have excelled, he must have been ruthless, indeed.
Flashing lights blazed abruptly on the panel, bright blips showing on the screen.
“Who’s shooting?” Valin shouted into the open comms. “Talk to me, damn you!”
The shuttle appeared to change course suddenly, then a moment later it vanished from the screen entirely.
Valin stood there, staring at the empty screen silently, his shoulders rising and falling with his heaving breath. Shalia remained absolutely motionless. Silent, like a mouse mere inches from a deadly snake. Anger was radiating off him in waves.
The screen shattered as his fist slammed into it in a rage. Valin spun and stalked in circles, pacing with barely contained fury. There was anger there, but something else as well. Was it a hint of fear? Something had happened to his away team.
“Commander! The shuttle has been destroyed!” a voice called out over the comms.
Valin stormed off in a hurry, his booted feet booming on the metal deck as he moved, as if his rage was somehow coming through his feet with every step. Shalia knew better than to follow him this time. Whatever had happened to the shuttle, something had shifted in the commander, and he was decidedlynotsafe to be around. She watched as he quickly vanished down the corridor, leaving her all alone without anyone else around.
Oh, shit. That was the last one, Shalia realized, suddenly understanding why there had been a worried edge to his anger. They were trapped aboard this thing, and not only could they not add to their supplies, which was a problem for the arriving warshipsexpecting to refill their larders, but there was another much bigger problem.
They had no way off if anything went wrong.
Way out in the icy vacuum of space, aboard this understaffed space station, they were stuck.
22
The rest of the day passed with the remaining crew completing their work in something of a state of shock. They continued their tasks—Valin would have their hides if they slacked off, especially now that they’d lost even more of their men—but the feeling in the air was one of anger, fear, and confusion.
How could this have happened? What sort of failure of leadership had led to this catastrophe? Those were just a few questions Shalia heard several of the disgruntled men muttering as she went about her chores silently.
She had opted to work as though she’d been given specific directions, the idea being that in so doing she would be able to avoid any interactions or scrutiny from Grallox and the others. And in the aftermath of the initial shock, that plan had played out as she’d hoped all the way until bedtime.
Shalia simply worked hard, then prepared a smaller meal than usual, seeing as more of their ranks were now gone. All of this was done in silence, moving slowly but deliberately, staying off everyone’s radar. Emotions were high, and the last thing she wanted was to give anyone reason to pay attention to her. Their thoughts, and grievances, were elsewhere, at least for the moment.
As for the commander, he hadn’t been seen in hours, and that was probably a good thing. He had locked himself in his quarters once he set his men to their tasks, likely trying to figure out some way to effect some sort of damage control. But after this degree of screw-up by his men, costing him their last functional shuttle at that, the crew voiced their belief that he would be replaced, and sooner than later.
Shalia loaded a tray for him once the others were eating but Valin’s door remained locked when she knocked.
“Your dinner,” she called out, but he didn’t reply. “Okay, leaving it outside for you,” she said, then returned to the kitchen.
The men were finishing their meals when she arrived, and now that they weren’t otherwise occupied, she became the focus of their attention despite her best efforts.
“He’ll be gone soon,” Grallox said quietly to the trio seated with him, eyeing her intently. “The bitch will be all ours when he is.”
A chill ran through her body, but Shalia pretended her newly enhanced hearing had not picked that up and simply continued cleaning up the kitchen, albeit slower than normal. She dragged her feet long enough that Grallox and his buddies eventually tired of their lurid talk and headed for their bunks.
