Since when was I anyone’s ‘kiddo’? But there wasn’t any time to think about it as I found the port in the shell’s skull, and slid the jack home.
“You can unjack; I’ll take it from here,” Abby told me, seconds later. “You and Scarpil need to get Hermes back to his real shell. He’ll be fine when he’s home.”
A brief sob from the shell in Scarpil’s arms seemed to contradict that, but I took Abby at her word, and unplugged, pushing the big teamster in front of me.
“I’ll cover you,” I said, and he looked upset. “I can’t carry the shell; it’s too heavy. You can get Hermes safely back to the ship shell he should be in, and I’ll plug him in. I’ll cover you.”
“Five,” came through the door, and Scarpil turned, carrying Hermes across to the door on the other side of the room in a few swift strides.
“Four.” I followed, drawing the Glazers from their holsters and cursing Delight’s admonition.
“Three.”
I saw why the team was counting down.
The wolves had them in a pincer movement, and were closing.
“Two,” and they fired another round into the incoming warriors, before letting their Glazers fall, and reaching for their stun batons.
At least Delight’s orders counted for all. Poor comfort that it was.
One caught me watching, and waved me away.
‘One!’ The others shouted, even as I heard him shout, ‘Go! Go! Go!’
I went, tearing after Scarpil’s rapidly disappearing back, and remembering I hadn’t fed the big guy the map of where he had to go.
“Already done,” Abs said. “Now, move your ass!”
Wow—and I was pretty sure Abby didn’t swear often… maybe my memory was amiss. Who the fuck knew what Delight’s mix was doing to my head?
“Not as much as I’m going to do to the rest of you, if you don’t get going,” Mack growled. “Don’t make me come get you.”
Like he even could. Man had his own HMT to deliver.
I took the point, though, snapping off enough Glazer shots to lighten the opposition coming at the Odyssey team, and hoping they could make the break, before I turned and ran headlong in Scarpil’s wake. The team were doing what they did best, and I had no right to second guess their decision. If they said Delight would come get them out, Delight would come get them out; I had no doubts about that.
And Hermes was the priority.
I caught up with Scarpil as he turned for the hangar where Hermes’s ship shell was locked down. I also caught up with him in time to shoot the first wolf tech that thought it might be a good idea to step in his way. I took the second one out, too, and started laughing.
This was just like training.
Yeah. I knew this.
My sole job was to make sure the package reached its destination, and Scarpil was playing courier. I pinged his implant, and he laughed, too.
“Damn straight we can do this.”
And that was when the fun began.
Ever been on a shooting range where the targets move, and you’ve got a split second to decide whether or not to shoot the hostage? Yeah? Well, this time there were no hostages—and the targets we dropped were all armed. It was kinda like gathering candy. I was thinking I might come to love wolf ships, if this was the kind of shoot ’em up we could have when we boarded.
“That’s the stim-pack talking,” Tens cut in.
Passion killer.
But I kept going, scooping up a new weapon and remembering to flick it to stun before shooting it dry. Scarpil ran like a line-backer in that galaxy-wide plague—football. He carried the female shell tucked close to his chest, doing his best to shelter the HMT settled inside the skull space. Made me wonder if it wouldn’t have been better to just take off the head and—
“No!” came through in five shades of horrified denial, and I shrugged.
What did I know about HMTs and shell connections, anyway?
There was no answer to that, and we didn’t need one.
Scarpil bolted out into the open space of what turned out to be a repair hangar, and I ran through just behind him, taking down two wolves before they could follow us in. Abby shut the doors behind us, and then set to closing everything around the perimeter of the open space. That still left plenty of targets.
“Go!” I shouted. “Get him to the shell. I’ll hold them while you get him plugged in.”
“Not my area!” Scarpil shouted back, but Abby was shouting, and Hermes was talking, too.
A self-contained bolt of light flared around the door I’d come through, and I realized we were deep in it. The door hit the deck, its edges glowing, and I knew we had maybe twenty seconds before the sides of the hole cooled enough for whatever had cut it to get through.
“No time to change, Scarpil. Go! Don’t fuck the mission!”
He went.
Don’t fuck the mission.
Should have known that would have some currency with Delight’s people.
“I’ll switch when he’s in safe,” Scarpil said, “or the mission won’t be the only thing needs to be unfucked.”
Sure thing, big guy, I thought.
“Incoming,” Abby warned. “Odyssey’s people are awaiting alternative extraction, and you have wolf security coming in hot.”
Well, fuck me.
“Not likely, Hon.”
“Ready?” Scarpil asked, and I realized he’d made it into Hermes’s ship shell.
I slammed the shell door closed, and had Abby override the locks.
“Tell him what to do, Abs.”
“Cutter!”
Scarpil was not a happy man.
“Suck it up, princess!”
“You and me, we gonna talk.”
“Yeah, sure thing, big guy. Just get the HMT back into his shell before this mission is more fucked than it already is.”
I half-waited for a response to that, but Abs poked me.
“He’s got it, kiddo. Now, you need to find yourself another ride out.”
Wait. I shouldn’t go full bore rattle with the wolves coming through the door?
“You can’t breathe vacuum, hon, and Hermes is going to make one Hell of
