“Man’s a piece of work,” I said.
I didn’t add that I wanted him dead.
“Get in line, hon,” Abby told me. “Dasojin has first call.”
“You and whose army?” I wanted to know, and found myself on the floor, the faint taste of copper filtering over my tongue.
“I don’t need an army.”
I hadn’t known an AI could be that righteously pissed. Probably should have, given what she told me next.
“He’s taken three!”
I also hadn’t known an AI could snarl.
“That’s because I’m not an AI. I am a Human Mind Transfer, and I still know what it is to feel!”
Oh. Well. That explained it then.
“He has my brother, my sisters, my lover and my friends. He threatens my livelihood. And, for that, I will take his livelihood and then his life, and woe betide any who stand in my path.”
I was pretty sure Odyssey might have something to say about that, but Delight was shaking her head.
“Penalty for what he’s done is death on some worlds,” she said. “We just have to charge him, and then prove he committed those crimes on the appropriate world, or worlds…and if those crimes aren’t enough, I’m pretty sure we can find enough to legally kill him many times over.”
And I’d thought Delight was unprincipled.
“Not yet, I’m not,” she said, and then tilted her head and looked me in the eye. “So, you helping us get your people free?”
I pushed myself up off the floor, and accepted the hand she offered. My head protested the sudden movement, and I wondered what Abs had hit me with. Girl had quite a temper!
“Only where my friends are concerned,” she told me, and I felt the pain ease.
I could live with that.
“So, when do we get there?”
23—Training Intensifies
A week—apparently the oligarch had wanted some distance between him and the sale of the Shady Marie’s crew, but he’d wanted to be close enough to come and gloat from the audience. Mack, Tens, and Rohan had been taken to Aktrovaran, a world in the borderlands of the Star Shadows’ territory, far enough on the edge of human space to be unattractive to all but the most entrepreneurial of a multitude of species. It was not a signatory to any of the law-abiding alliances that sought to protect sentient life on all worlds.
No surprise there.
I’d like to say I did a lot of reading up on the world and the wolves. The Stars knew I needed to, but I spent most of the journey getting back into shape, which meant close combat training with Delight and her crew, and a little practice in running with the Hack Team.
And then there was Abby.
I spent the first four days getting back a lot of the fitness I’d lost from the most recent stints in stasis and regen—and I spent a large portion of my nights back in a tank, while absorbing the data and language I needed through direct transfer. Six hours of sparring and fitness training followed by another couple of hours of weapons instruction, rolling into cyber drills and scenarios will do that to you if it’s done at the right intensity.
And Odyssey’s training regime was intense.
I’d forgotten. And then I surprised myself by discovering I’d missed it.
“You can always come back, sweetie,” Delight suggested, and I tried to take her down to prove how much that just wasn’t gonna happen.
Damn she was fast…and merciless. Don’t forget that. Absolutely merciless.
The worst part of it was that, every time I lost, or came in under par—and there was a lot of that, they took blood. Literally, not figuratively, a small vial to be used in tweaking stim packs for me.
“Doc is gonna want your hide,” I said, when Delight pinned me for what felt like the millionth time.
Day Three and I was remembering why I hated Odyssey, and didn’t like Delight much better.
“He’ll understand.”
“Nope. He really won’t.”
“Well, it’s not like you’re going to tell him, is it?”
I just looked at her, and she smirked.
“You do what you feel you have to,” she said. “It’s not gonna matter to us.”
And she’d let me up.
“Again,” she said. “You’d still be wolf bait, if you’d been unenhanced.”
Which was what it was all about. Enhancements. They were taking blood until they’d found the right combination of stims and nans. One that didn’t send me right over the edge, or completely incapacitate me, when they wore off.
“Good luck with that. Her system’s as recalcitrant as she is,” Pritchard muttered, and put down the second of a pair of team members he’d been sparring against.
He was enhanced?
“Sometimes the combination becomes self-replicating.”
Oh, Hell, No.
“I’m not like you,” I told her, and she gave me a pitying look.
“Pretty sure you’re exactly like me,” she’d replied, “much as you don’t want to admit it.”
And she’d let me up to dispute the fact.
I want Mack, back, I thought ducking under her first strike and slipping past her second to land one of my own.
I wanted Tens around, too, I realized, bending under a kick that would have sent me into a wall, and pivoting to sweep Delight’s leg out from under her. She hit the mat and rolled sideways before I could take advantage.
“Incoming,” Pritchard said, and I swore.
Like I needed the added difficulty.
“You put her on the mat,” he said. “That means you’re ready for the next level.”
I was?
I suppose it was a promotion. It just wasn’t the kind of promotion I appreciated.
“Ingrate.”
I took one down, knocked the second one back, and landed another three strikes on Delight…kinda. This sort of shit made me really miss my blaster. Or a stick. I could really use a stick about now.
Or a machete.
Or a sword.
Or…
Wow. Someone needed to confiscate that guy’s sledgehammer!
I tried not to stay in the same place I’d fallen, as Delight came in for the kill.
Couldn’t. Move. Aninch.
She stopped, the blade of her hand
