Forging the Alliance short Page 4

  He took the stairs up to the main cabin level two and three at a time, his heart thumping loudly and his palms sweating. Xerces had been right about one thing. The guards would move her any day now. They were probably waiting on Dr. Kandre to give them the go-ahead. Darius was a little surprised that Kandre hadn’t sent her away already, if only to spite him. Maybe the old man thought he was buying himself a bigger favor, Darius supposed.

  Darius hurried down the hall toward the officer’s quarters. The ship was large, but it wasn’t too large, and he had a general idea where he could find the man he was looking for. He reached his destination and banged on the cabin door urgently.

  It swung open almost immediately, and inside stood a bewildered and half-dressed man - Darius’s immediate superior, and the officer who saw him in the medical bay the first day after the raid on Faylir.

  “Darius?”

  “I need to talk to you,” Darius said, hovering too close to the doorway so that the officer had to take a step back.

  At the first opportunity, Darius stepped inside the door, preventing it from closing.

  “All right, come on in,” the officer said with more than mild irritation.

  He stuck his head out into the hallway and checked both directions before closing the door and turning to face the agitated Darius crowded into his space.

  “I’m going to guess this is about the girl,” he said with a disgruntled eye roll.

  Darius sat down heavily in a chair, throwing his hands up in despair.

  “They’re going to throw her in the brig. You can’t let that happen.”

  “I don’t have to do anything for you, soldier. In fact, I should make sure to report you for bursting in here unannounced and being so insubordinate. On second thought, maybe that’s what you want? Is that it? You want to be locked up with your little girlfriend for the rest of the ride back home?” Despite his relative state of undress, the officer was imposing, and he spoke with the tone of a man who was used to doling out punishments for the sake of teaching harsh lessons.

  “If that’s what it takes to make sure she’s safe, then so be it, but I’m asking you to help me find another way. Please, sir.”

  The officer sneered at him, before turning away and sitting down on the edge of his bunk.

  “I’ve seen soldiers make a lot of bone-headed moves in my day, but you sure have gone out of your way to make trouble for yourself with this one. If it means so much to you, perhaps you could enlighten me as to why?”

  Now it was Darius’s turn to be exasperated. He had already explained this to Dr. Kandre and the officer before. His answer hadn’t changed, only now the instinct to protect Xerces had intensified.

  “She doesn’t deserve to be locked up. She is not the enemy.”

  “You can’t be sure of that. I heard you’ve been paying her visits down in medical.” Darius looked up in surprise, and the officer smirked. “Yeah, word gets around. Anyway, I’m inclined to believe that she’s not one we have to worry about, but that doesn’t change the realities of where we are. We can’t just let strangers wander the ship freely because you got all up in your feelings about her. She isn’t cleared. She has to remain under guard, at least until we can get her back to our port and check her out. If she’s clear, then you are free to ride off into the sunset with her as you wish. Until then, I expect you to steer clear and let our guards do their job with no further interference. Am I making myself clear?”

  Sensing that the conversation had drawn to an end, Darius gave his assent and rose to leave. The officer’s insincerity incensed him, but for the time being, it didn’t seem like they were in any rush to kill Xerces, and that gave him some hope.

  “Can you at least tell me when they’re moving her? Just so I know?”

  The officer rolled his eyes again, but said, “I’ll do what I can.”

  7

  Darius stepped out of the shower, a towel wrapped around his waist and droplets of water clinging to his shoulders and chest. The shower had been cooler than he liked, and not nearly long enough to wash away the grunge of being trapped on this ship for so long, but that was the life he had signed up for when he joined the Administration’s army. He pulled on a pair of shorts and tried to wipe away the last of the water that ran down his back, thinking about his duties for the day. He was up for watch tonight, and he still had a few other important tasks to take care of before it was time to report.

  A knock on the door interrupted his thoughts, and he dropped the towel. Tugging a shirt over his head quickly, he went to see who was there.

  “Glad I could find you here, soldier.”

  It was the officer, and this time he was the one who planted himself in the doorway and forced himself into Darius’s cabin. Darius took the slight wordlessly and tried not to show his irritation. He knew he deserved as much.

  “Is it happening?”

  “It is, and I’m warning you, if you go down there right now, you’re going to make a bad situation worse.”

  “What does that mean?”

  The officer’s words put Darius on high alert. A few days earlier he was reassured that nobody had any interest in hurting Xerces, but now he wasn’t so sure.

  “I don’t have many details. All I know is that the girl hasn’t been very cooperative. Kandre had to sedate her before they could move her.”

  “Why didn’t somebody tell me? Why didn’t they find me? I could have talked to her. I could have calmed her down. She’s just scared.” Darius was rambling, running his hands through his hair over and over.

  “Look, I’m not in charge down there any more than you are. I’m just relaying what I know, and I wouldn’t have done that except I figured word would get back to you one way or the other and you’d go down there looking for trouble. All I’m saying is to give her a few days to cool off down there before you go sticking your nose in things. Maybe by then she’ll have apologized to the guard she kicked in the nuts, and you’ll have an easier time of getting through.”

  At this, Darius couldn’t help but laugh in surprise. “She did what?”

  “You heard me. One of those guards went in there and laid hands on her when she wasn’t expecting it, and she caught him a good one right between the legs. Kind of feel bad for the guy, if I’m being honest, but you know he will not forget it anytime soon.”

  “Well, at least she seems to be making a good recovery,” Darius mused to himself. “Maybe there’s a way I can get a note to her. It would be better than nothing.”

  The officer shook his head disapprovingly. “I wouldn’t if I were you, but what the hell do I know? I’ll see you on watch.”

  The officer dismissed himself and left Darius to his thoughts. On the one hand, the move meant that there was no immediate timer counting down for Xerces or him. They deemed Xerces healthy enough to live with the rest of the prisoners, and now it was just a matter of waiting until they got back to their home port, but that could be weeks away, and Darius wasn’t willing to wait that long. There was always the chance that they got called up on another mission and Xerces would remain down there, forgotten and alone, for who knows how long. That was the last thing he wanted. He decided he would make a little detour on his way to his watch and forego his other errands until later.

  Darius finished dressing for duty and folded a piece of paper with a hastily written note inside his pocket. He wasn’t sure he could get the note to her right away, but at the very least he wanted to scope out the brig and see how tight the security was. They had been in open space for nearly two weeks now, and aside from moving Xerces, there had been little action to speak of. He hoped that the guards downstairs were well on their way to complacency as they sat around and listened to the prisoners complaining.

  As he approached the holding cells, he hesitated in the hallway. He could see one guard sitting behind a desk, and he assumed there was at least one more somewhere further down. For the most part, the prisoners were quiet. Some of them sang or hummed to themselves, a
nd others chatted with their cellmates, but everything seemed relaxed. Wherever Xerces was, she wasn’t giving them any trouble at this precise moment, which meant he might have a chance of getting to her.

  Tentatively, he approached the first guard in sight.

  “No visitors,” the man stated flatly.

  “I know. Dr. Kandre just sent me to check on the girl. He wanted to make sure the sedative was wearing off.”

  The guard gave Darius an unsure look. “Are you his assistant now?”

  “No, more like errand boy,” Darius quipped with a grin. “Got into some trouble with him when I brought her in, and now I’m in his service until he’s decided I’ve learned my lesson.”

  The guard chuckled good-naturedly. If there was anything that all soldiers had in common, it was an understanding that punishments came swiftly and often, and they were almost always tied to somebody’s feelings of self-importance. That Dr. Kandre had a reputation for being a bit of a prick didn’t hurt the story any.

  “I haven’t been down there, but you can ask O’Reilly. He’s down there somewhere conversing with some of the guys. That idiot could make friends with anybody.”

  “Thanks. I’ll be quick.”

  Encouraged by his good luck, Darius slid past the desk and trotted down the hallway. If O’Reilly really was down there, he might not get a chance to pass Xerces the note. Plus, he wasn’t sure if she would even be awake, or if she might have a cellmate he needed to watch out for. There were still too many moving pieces to have any certainty about his plan, but at least he made it over the first hurdle.

  Scanning both sides of the hall, Darius searched for any sign of Xerces. The crowding in the first several cells alarmed him. They crammed five or six men into each, with barely enough space to crouch on the floor without playing footsie. Each cell had only two bunks, and it seemed that the prisoners were meant to share them, or sleep in shifts. Idly, Darius wondered where all these prisoners had come from. The crew must have found them all hiding in the buildings after he left with Xerces.

  As he ran past, the men looked up and some of them shouted after him. The further he traveled down the hall, the fewer prisoners he encountered. As expected, O’Reilly was leaning on a post, nodding along as one prisoner talked animatedly in his cell. When he spotted Darius coming hastily toward him, he frowned and peeled himself off the post to confront the intruder.

  “Does Gary know you’re back here?”

  “Yeah, sent me to find you. O’Reilly, right?”

  “Yeah, that’s me.”

  “Good. Show me where the girl is. I’m supposed to check her pulse and make sure the sedative’s wearing off.”

  “She’s at the end of the hall. We had to separate her from the others. Just watch out, though. I heard she’s got a mean kick and pretty good aim.”

  Darius offered the man little more than a nod of understanding before skipping off to the end of the hall. This was too easy.

  When he found Xerces, he stopped. She was still out cold, lying on the dirty floor. When the guards brought her down, they made no attempt at making her comfortable. Darius’s heart panged with a strong desire to pick her up and tuck her into the little bunk. He couldn’t even reach her through the bars, and she couldn’t hear him as he called to her quietly. All he wanted was for her to open her eyes again, just like last time.

  “Please wake up, Xerces. I’m here,” he tried again.

  The sound of footsteps approaching made him pull back from the bars of her cell.

  “So?” O’Reilly asked.

  “Hard to tell,” Darius answered, gritting his teeth to keep from saying anything else. “She’s still out, but looks like she’s breathing normally. No signs of distress.”

  For a moment, Darius considered asking the guard if he might open the door so they could get a closer look, but decided against it. These were not the same guards posted outside the medical bay before, and he did not want to tip them off to his special interest in the girl. He had to remain aloof if he wanted to gain access to her again.

  “Eh, as long as she’s quiet, she’ll be just fine. If she gets to making a racket like some of those other guys, we’ll have to shut her up.” There was a mischievous glint in the guard’s eye and it lit a fiery rage inside of Darius.

  “Just keep an eye on her. I’ll be back after my watch to check on her again. Doctor’s orders.”

  “All right.”

  Darius crumpled the note in his pocket in frustration and quietly tossed it through the bars, watching it land next to Xerces’s outstretched arm, and trotted back out past the guard at the desk. He had only a few minutes left before his watch started, and he didn’t want anybody to see him coming from the brig.

  8

  The afternoon watch was dull. Darius scanned the skies outside the window with disinterest. Thoughts of Xerces kept him preoccupied. She had looked so helpless on the floor of the brig, and he worried that her body couldn’t take any more stress. The time crawled by, and Darius checked his watch over and over. Everything in him wanted to call down to the guard’s desk in the brig and ask about Xerces, but he knew they wouldn’t tell him if something was wrong.

  As soon as his replacement arrived, Darius ducked out and headed straight back downstairs. It had been six full hours since he saw her, and that was plenty of time for the sedatives to wear off. He expected to find her alert and moving about when he got back down there. He secretly wondered if she’d found his note. Perhaps she would even be raising hell with the guards again, if she was feeling well enough. But when Darius reached the brig, he heard no signs of Xerces’s voice. The guards had changed shifts, and Darius had to remember the lie he told earlier to get past the desk, hoping that it would work as well the second time as it did the first.

  “Doctor sent me down to check on the girl again,” he said before the guard could even ask why he was down there.

  He marched right past the desk, hoping that his authoritative stance and declaration would be enough.

  “Hang on a second. You got a note?” The guard at the desk asked, rising to follow Darius.

  Darius stopped and turned to face the man, a dangerous look in his eye. “A note? You think we’re in elementary school? I’m just trying to do my job, and I suggest you do the same.”

  For a second time, Darius turned back around, this time quickening his step and listening for the guard to follow him. To his relief, Darius’s admonition seemed to give the man hesitation, and he hung back.

  One down, one to go, thought Darius grimly.

  The second guard was standing at the far end of the hall. Unlike O’Reilly, who seemed to at least acknowledge that he had prisoners to look over, this guard was whistling to himself and daydreaming. Prisoners were calling loudly to the man, and he made a show of ignoring them completely.

  “Do something, damn it! She’ll die!” one prisoner screamed, banging his fists against the wall to get the guard’s attention.

  That was all Darius needed to hear. He rushed forward, hurrying to Xerces’s cell and letting out a string of curses under his breath. When he got there, he froze, momentarily petrified by what he was seeing. Xerces was still on her back, exactly where he left her, but a thin stream of white foam was running from the side of her mouth and her eyes were wide open in horror. She choked and sputtered, but she appeared unable to move. Between coughs, she gasped for breath, and the veins in her forehead and throat pulsed violently.

  Instinctively, Darius rushed the guard leaning against the wall. The man barely had time to see Darius coming before he found himself pressed flat against the wall with Darius’s arm across his throat. He put his hands up to stop the attack, but he was too slow, grappling with Darius at close range as Darius leaned in nose-to-nose with him.

  “Give me your keys, you idiot,” he snarled, letting his right hand snatch at the man’s belt loop where the keys hung.

  “I’ll have you in a cell next, traitor,” the guard spat at Darius.

 
; With the keys firmly in his grip, Darius thrust his forearm into the man’s throat one last time and then let him drop to the ground before spinning back to Xerces. He jammed the key into the door and got lucky on the first try. The lock clinked open, and only after he swung the door aside did he realize that an eery silence had fallen over the hall. The rest of the prisoners were watching him closely, waiting to see what he would do.

  Immediately, he went to Xerces, dropping to his knees and scooping her up under the shoulders. Her head lolled forward and foam ran down the front of her grungy shirt. He adjusted himself so he could support her while he patted her on the back with some force, trying to get her to clear her airways so she could breathe again. He felt tears slipping down his own face, and he didn’t know how they had come on so suddenly. He couldn’t bear to look into Xerces’s bloodshot eyes as she struggled to suck in air.

  The footsteps behind him made him freeze again. He tried to scramble to his feet and lift Xerces with him, but before he could even get to his knees, he felt something hard impact his skull and he went down, his body folding over hers half in an act of protection and half because he could not hold himself upright under the blow.

  Stunned, Darius tried to roll over to see his assailant. He was vaguely aware of a hot wetness on the side of his head, and his right ear felt sticky with blood. It took him a moment to focus on the face that towered over him before he recognized the new guard from the desk. In his hand, the man was holding a short baton, letting it swing at his side.

  “I spoke to the doctor. He said he gave no order for anyone to come down here looking after the girl. I came to tell you to get out of here. Thought I’d leave it up to your commander to deal with your little crush, or whatever this is, but then I got here and found out you assaulted my man. You know I can’t just let that go.”