Barbarian Lover(50)

A million things can go wrong. All I can do is cross my fingers.

I replace the filter cover and sniff the air. I don’t smell anything. The air doesn’t taste weird. I have no idea if it’s working or not, if the poison is seeping into the air of my small chamber or throughout the ship.

I tuck my body against the wall and wait.



• • •





Hours later, I’m in a frenzy of worry. There’s no difference in the air that I can tell, and all I have left is the small bit of computer I’m supposed to somehow interface to one that’s three hundred years younger.

This is the stupidest plan ever.

Despair threatens to overwhelm me. I ignore it, because there is no Plan C. This has to work. This has to.

A mental image of Aehako’s fallen body flashes before my eyes, and I clench my fists, determined not to cry. He’s not dead. He’s not.

I’d know if he was, wouldn’t I? But we’re not connected by khui. We’re only connected by heart and mind and choice. We don’t have that deeper bond. We never will because of my body—

Someone fumbles at the door.

I jerk to my feet, my stiff muscles complaining. My body’s instantly on alert, my heart hammering in my chest. Did they decide to take my offer after all? The broken ship for our freedom?

Then again, what is to stop them from taking the ship and us? Or taking the ship and then coming back and snaring us at a later date? If they’re into slavery, it’s not as if they’re upstanding people anyhow. They can’t be trusted.

The door slides open, and the guard walks in.

No, he staggers. His steps trip, but he manages to catch himself, and he raises the gun. “Come on,” he says. His words sound slurred.

My hands fly to my mouth.

Oh my God.

It worked. He’s sick. I’m immune to it because of my khui, but it’s affecting the guard. Maybe it’s affecting everyone.

Hope flowers in my chest like a sunburst.

I get to my feet. He stumbles forward again, and I dart behind him. He turns groggily, and I kick the back of his knee. The guard falls forward, weapon clattering to the ground. I grab it, and race to the other side of my cell. There’s a place to put the hand that’s similar to my laser cannon, and I aim it at my enemy and fire before I can think twice about it.

The gun blasts, shooting forth a bolt like liquid flame. It slices through the guard’s head like butter, and he slumps to the floor, dead.

My throat closes and my nostrils flare as the hot smell of charred flesh saturates the room. I did it. I killed him. I’m not even sorry. These monsters don’t care if I live or die, so I’m not going to waste a minute on regret.

I step over him, clutching the gun, and head for the door. It’s slid shut again, and no amount of me slapping my hand on the panel will open it. Shit. This wasn’t something I considered.

I turn and look back at the fallen guard. His arm is extended out to one side, his rough palm face down. Oh, man. Swallowing hard, I lock the gun under my arm, aim, and shoot again.

The dismembered hand flies across the room.

Ugh.

I swallow hard and move to pick it up, then lay it across the panel. The door opens a moment later, and I step into the hall.

I’m one step closer to freedom. You can do this, Kira, I tell myself. Just find the bridge, find a place to wire the two computers together remotely, and you’re golden.

There are two doors on one side of this narrow hall, and a door at the far end. I have no idea where I’m going, which means checking every door. I move quietly toward the first one, slap the dead guy’s hand on the panel, and hoist my gun, ready to fire, as the door slides open.

It’s a small room that looks like a storage closet. Of course it is.

Breathing a little easier, I pick up my extra hand and move down to the next door. This door leads to a cargo bay that makes me shudder with bad memories. It reminds me too much of my first time here.

It’s also oddly empty. That makes me incredibly uneasy. Where are all the aliens?

The door at the end of the hall leads to another hall shaped like a T. I head directly across instead of forward, because I want to narrow down all possible ambushes. The last thing I want is to be close to freedom and then have it taken from me because I wasn’t careful. So I explore the other wing of the ship. I find the medical bay again, and resist the urge to use my gun like a flamethrower and burn everything to the ground.

I also find the dead body of one of the Little Green Men sprawled on the floor. My poison’s working better than I thought. I push away the twinge of sadness I feel at killing them. They wouldn’t have thought twice about me, and they aren’t worth my pity.

Two doors over, I find a room with four small, strange doors lined up in a row. They’re rounded, almost like bubbles in the wall, and I can’t quite figure out what they are. I push my severed hand on one of the panels next to a bubble and speak in szzt. “Computer, can you open the door to one of these? What are they?”