THE CELL

Nova crawled on her belly through a dusty air shaft, pushing the needler in front of her. The spectres’ black suit felt strangely warm against her skin, keeping her comfortable in the cold passage, although the dust somehow got into her nose and throat, even with the mask on.

She had entered the air shaft from the corridor below, climbed straight up like a Mongol cat until she reached the next level, then wriggled her way to a spot just over Mal’s cell. A mesh vent cover lay just ahead, and she could hear movement from the room below. She sensed a lone guard inside the cell with him, probably the same one she’d seen earlier in the hologram, holding the blade to his throat. There were many others in the hallway outside, however, which was why she chose this approach. She had to time everything perfectly, or Mal would be killed before she could get to him.

She made her way carefully forward the last meter until she could peer inside. Mal was chained securely to the wall, his wrist clumsily bandaged, dried blood still speckling the floor. The guard stood with his back to the opposite wall, holding the blade in his huge hands. He had already been warned that she was on her way; his thoughts were a mixture of fear and aggression, and he was as alert as a predator keeping watch over his kill.

Don’t make a move, she projected silently. I’m right above you, and I’m coming in.

If Mal heard her, he didn’t acknowledge it. She focused her mind on the guard and pushed, hard. He stiffened, shuddered, then fell heavily to his knees. Blood began to drip from his eyes as he tipped forward and smashed into the floor, face-first.

She removed the vent cover and dropped silently to the floor beside the dead guard.

Mal watched her as she stood up again. You know how to make an entrance, I’ll give you that. It’s the exit that’s going to give you trouble. Mal jerked his head toward the door. There’s a small army outside, and you’re not stuffing me back up the way you came. Nice suit, by the way. He had a bemused smile on his face; at least he’d kept his sense of humor, she thought.

Nova teeked the cuffs, and they split in half and fell to the floor. She tossed him the gun. We’re going to fight our way out of here.

Are you nuts? If those spectres catch up to us—

I’ll take care of them. And I have a plan. We have an important ally, at least for now. She took the remote console from her belt and typed: “Lio, you there?”

A moment later the reply came: Yes.

“Good. We’re going to need some help getting out of here and back to the Palatine.”

His reply was so shocking that it stunned her to silence: Kath Toom is dead.

Kath had been fine when Nova had left her, she was sure of that: the cut on her head had bled profusely, but her breathing and heartbeat had been strong.

“How did this happen?”

Bennett murdered her, but Gabriel thinks it was you.

Tears welled in Nova’s eyes, and she blinked them away. She was not used to feeling like this. But Kath had been a friend once, and the pang of regret bit deeply. She had not asked to be brought here and forced to fight against the Dominion. Now she was dead. It all seemed so unfair.

Mal put a hand on her arm, and the warmth of his touch spread through her. His eyes were full of concern. You okay?

She nodded. We need to move fast. The entire plan she had set in motion when she escaped from Shaw hinged on getting them to the Palatine at the right time. She typed to Lio: “Kill the lights as I take down the door. Give me five seconds of darkness.” She turned back to Mal. I’ll go out first; stay back until the lights are on again, then come out firing.

Nova turned to face the door, probing the hallway outside with her mind. She sensed a dozen resoced marines in the immediate vicinity, three of them armored, all on high alert. Two spectres were there as well.

Lieutenant Ward was leading them all.

She was going to enjoy watching him die.

She closed her eyes and shoved. The thick neosteel door groaned and then blew outward in an explosion of rock, dust, and debris, crashing into the opposite wall with enough force to shake the floor. The two marines who had been standing directly in its path were crushed instantly, and several others were knocked aside. As the lights winked out, Nova was already moving with blinding speed, leaping through the jagged opening and darting through the confused soldiers milling around in the dark. She could see everything as clearly as a cat through the spectres’ headgear. She grabbed one’s weapon, twisting it inward toward the man’s stomach and pulling the trigger, blowing his guts out through his back, spun and shot another through the face. She took out three more with carefully placed shots teeked precisely to their targets, all before the chips of rock had finished falling from the explosion of the door.

But there were still at least six more marines, including the three in full combat armor, and the two spectres had now locked on to her. She had used surprise to her advantage, but they had not been fooled. Instead, she realized they had been cloaked and maneuvering into position on either side of her, and were ready to attack.

It was a move that blocked her and Mal from escape down the corridor, but she thought they had miscalculated; the space was narrow enough that if they opened fire, they risked hitting each other and the other marines. She could feel them pushing at her mind, the heat of their teek abilities making her flush. One on one, they were no match for her, but the two of them together strained her abilities to push back. It was as if she were holding her hands in front of her face, and they were poking at her fingers, trying to find a way in.

These two were more powerful than Talen Holt, the one she’d faced in the palace courtyard at Augustgrad. And smarter too. As they swung the barrels of their rifles, she realized they meant to aim their fire to bounce off the rock walls at an angle, taking her down on the ricochet. She leapt upward as the rifles went off, stitching a pattern up the rock face, narrowly missing her.

She did a neat flip and landed lightly on her feet. As the lights came on again, temporarily blinding the soldiers, Mal gave her the distraction she needed. He rushed out of the cell with the needler blazing, rounds piercing the marines’ armor and punching through the flesh of the unarmed. Several more men went down, and Nova fried the brains of the last marines with a focused mental push.

Both of the spectres broke their concentration for a split second, and that was enough.

Nova found a gap between their psychic fingers and pushed her way in.

The first spectre shuddered and dropped without a sound, bleeding from the eyes. She whirled. The second one, a taller man with a shock of prematurely white hair, cried out. Mal zeroed in on the sound and fired the needler. Normally, a properly trained psionic assassin would have little trouble evading the rounds, but Nova’s mind had weakened the spectre enough to distract his attention. He took the rounds square in the chest, blood flowers blooming across his black suit as he fell.

Dust and smoke drifted through the now-empty corridor. There was only one figure left. Lieutenant Chet Ward was at the end of the hall. Nova met his gaze, and he slowly backed away, his rifle up and fixed on her, then moving to Mal, then back again. “No you don’t,” she said, and crossed the distance between them in two seconds flat, leaping over the dead and bleeding bodies before he had the chance to fire a single round.

Ward was wearing CMC armor. She grabbed him by the arm, servos whining, and tossed him into the wall. He bounced off the rock, staggered, but did not go down. He raised his rifle.

(I’m gonna kill you like I killed that slike in Hudderstown)

Not this time. She lashed out with a vicious kick, smashing his rifle and damaging his armor. Ward spun wildly around, his right arm dangling uselessly, and he screamed with pain. Nova grabbed him again with both hands; with his combat suit he weighed several hundred pounds, but she teeked him off the floor like a rag doll.

He tried to batter her with his left hand, but the suit was clumsy in close quarters compared to the agility of a ghost. She drove him into the wall again, feeling the force of the impact shudder through her limbs and rattle her teeth. He dropped to the floor.

“Where’s Bennett?” she said, probing his thoughts for the truth.

“Go to hell.”

“You first.” She tore his visor off his helmet, locked eyes with him, and felt his surprise and fear as the full force of her mind focused inward and his brain cooked instantly in his skull. Ward’s eyes burst in a bloody shower of gore, and his head slumped forward on his chest.

“Bennett’s close,” she said to Mal, who had come to her side. “Ward didn’t have an exact location, but he knows we’re going to try to escape from Gehenna and he’s waiting for us nearby. He’s got a small army of marines guarding all the possible passages.”

“What are we going to do?”

“I have a few things up my sleeve.” Nova picked up one of the dead marines’ gauss rifles and glanced at the time on her heads-up display. Bennett’s little army wasn’t the only one who could play at deception, she thought. So far, her plan was working perfectly. But now she had to depend on someone else, someone she didn’t exactly trust to follow through. And he was late in arriving.

“What exactly do you mean by that?” Mal asked.

As if in answer, the entire massive space station shuddered slightly, and she heard a distant rumbling like thunder. Finally.

“A distraction,” she said, smiling. “Come on, I’ll explain on the way. We’ve got a ship to catch.”