“Mack?”
“I’m here,” he said, but he sounded completely drained, and I wondered what had happened while I’d been out.
“You have a bomb in your head.” He lifted his face to look at me. “It’s insurance to make sure we do the mission.”
I squeezed his shoulder, and then patted it, before getting to my feet.
“Better get it done, then,” I said, and was pretty pleased when I didn’t hear the tiniest ounce of fear in my voice—and that’s saying something, because I was terrified.
He followed me with his eyes, and then glanced over at the lordling.
“We’re ready,” he said, and stayed beside him—because all I wanted to do was punch the self-satisfied smirk off the lordling’s face... and then maybe pound his head into pulp. Yeah. That would about do it. A sticky, wet pulp.
I looked up at Mack, trying very hard to keep my thoughts off my face, and behind my eyes. He reached out and took my hand, and we looked at our unworthy host, waiting for him to decide our next move. He stood there and studied us for a very long moment. It helped that I could feel Mack’s grip tightening on my hand, even if it started to hurt.
That was a good thing. It reminded me I needed to be careful. I might be able to survive a blade through the lungs, but an explosion in my head? Yeah, not so much.
I really hoped Mack had a way of fixing it. I didn’t ask him, though. He didn’t seem to be in the mood for talking, and I figured he had his reasons. I also figured Tens and Delight were on stand-by, and I wasn’t going to like what had to happen next.
There are days when I hate being right. And those stretch into months, when I’m around Mack.
The Corovan lordling led us back through what turned out to be a small fortress, and into a courtyard surrounded by stone walls reinforced by field generators. A shuttle stood in the centre of the courtyard, and the lordling stopped at the edge of the path leading to the landing pad, and waved us on board.
“You’ve got four days to bring me my fiancé,” he said, looking at Mack, “or you’ll be needing a new sidekick.”
I glanced from him to Mack, and back again, and was worried when Mack let go of my hand.
“Understood,” he said, and wrapped his arm around my shoulders, as he turned toward the shuttle.
I let him keep his arm there, as I walked with him. I also tried very hard not to think about the deadly cargo in my skull, or the possibilities that might be waiting once the shuttle got us to our destination—and I was hoping that destination was Mack’s ship, and not Blaedergil’s mansion on Magnus 19.
At least I lucked out on that one.
We hit orbit and docked. Apparently, Mack’s pilot had decided being tethered to the beanstalk was a security risk, so she’d taken a high orbit, and let the Corovans make contact. Doc and Tens were waiting, along with an honor guard made up of the galley staff. I took my cue from them, and dropped to two paces behind Mack, as we stepped off the shuttle.
If they wanted a show, I could play the game.
No one tried to escort us out into the shuttle bay, and Mack extended no invitations.
We were inside, and watching from the observation deck, when the shuttle was politely shown the door, and allowed to return with what it thought were the results of the covert scans it had done of Mack’s ship. Tens’ smile turned downright evil, as he watched it go.
But he didn’t say a word, and neither did anyone else, until Tens had swept us clear of the half dozen bugs the Corovans had tried to smuggle on board in our clothing, our hair, and via our implants.
“Well,” Tens said, when he was satisfied we were clean. “That was rude.”
“You have no idea,” Mack said, and the look he turned in my direction was more than worried. “Can you fix it?”
“I did that during the bug scan,” Tens said. “To anyone watching, the program I ran was just the usual security measure for decontaminating spyware from an implant—and we’re all damned lucky the protections on the exploding device weren’t wired for more direct forms of interference.
From the outside, it looks like the device still works. It sends out the right responses to their scans, and everything it’s supposed to do, but it won’t explode. The worm I put in has taken over the receptors so it can divert external signals, and is mimicking the correct responses for the check-ins. While it’s doing that, the programs on the device itself think they’re still being pinged, so they’re happy... Now, all we need is for Doc to do his part.”
Doc? I turned my head, just as Doc came and sat down beside me. There wasn’t a needle in sight.
“What do I need to do?” I asked, and failed completely to keep my suspicions off my face.
He cracked a smile, and held out a canteen.
“Drink this.”
I looked at his face, and then glanced over at Mack and Tens. They shrugged in unison, mirroring each other’s frowns. Well, fair enough then. I opened the lid, and started to drink. I got two mouthfuls in, when the first mouthful bounced.
“For fuck’s sake, Doc! What is this shit?”
“Chemical response to the stuff in your head.”
I’d been about to try another sip, but I lowered the canteen, instead.
“Say what?”
“You heard me. Now, shut up and drink.”
I gave him a good hard stare, but it was just to cover the fact that I was trying to get my stomach to settle, while I got ready for the next sip. The next three tries stayed down... and then came up on the fourth.
“Damn. This is worse than the stuff they give you to get rid of colds.”
And that gave me
