A PAIR OF ACES

This is going south fast,” I tell DJ and Borden while we are being led aft. “Once we help break down the door, we’re no more use to any of them.”

“Big surprise,” DJ says. “Bad hand all around.”

Ulyanova seems dazed. I’m not sure she hears us. She’s listening to something else and I don’t like the implications of that one bit. If she has a connection to a Guru or to a couple of Gurus, what’s the guarantee they can’t delude her, too? But to tell Ulyanova that seems to be as fraught as waking a sleepwalker. She might just explode.

We pass by the cage full of corpses. Leathery bits drift around us, as disgusting and pitiful as ever. From the corner of my eye, I see something floating near the mesh, a faint glint with a chain or wire attached. Borden, the closest, reaches out and grabs it.

We’re taken by the railcar aft around the screw garden, then returned to the first hamster cage, where the rest of us wait. Bird Girl and two subordinate Antags escort us to the opening, unlock it, and swing it wide. We let go of the leash and pull ourselves through.

Inside, Ulyanova kicks away, grabs a stray mat, and then kicks off again, crossing the cage to get as far as she can from the rest of the squad. She wraps herself in the mat, then peeks up briefly, staring in our direction for a second or two. Her face is stolid, numb. Litvinov and Vera cross the cage to be with her. Bilyk keeps well away.

Borden explains to the rest where we were taken in the ship, what we saw, and the very little we were told. They learn there is at least one Guru on this ship and probably two.

“Antags want our help, her help mostly,” Borden says. “This could be the endgame. They’ll kill us if we’re not useful, Ulyanova first. She’s the most dangerous if she gets out of their control—if somehow she gets back to Earth.”

“What chance of that?” Ishida asks.

Borden shakes her head.

“What else can we do?” Jacobi asks. She sounds hoarse and exhausted.

“This may have been Mushranji’s plan all along,” Kumar says.

“Your ignorance is awe-inspiring,” Ishida says, and Tak gets between them, just to be careful.

WRAPPED IN A mat, I try to close my eyes, but there’s too much going on behind my head, wherever that is, to let me sleep. Bird Girl truly believes that the starshina and likely their own exposed soldier are crucial to piercing the nightmare gate, taking control of this ship and getting the hell out of the solar system. Crucial to going home.

My eyelids disagree with my brain. They become too heavy. I drift off.

Comes a sudden jerk-up to full awareness. Ulyanova is floating a few feet from me, suspended in shadow and the last few drops of cage-cleaning spray from our attendant bats. She looks at me as if she would solve all her problems simply by figuring out how I work, what I mean. Turnabout.

“What?” I say.

“Do not need live Gurus. Will be problem.”

“All right,” I say.

“Do not want this,” she murmurs. “I will not be me.”

As I have never been quite sure who Ulyanova is in the time I’ve known her, what can I say that might help? Nothing.

“I feel Antagonista who is connected to Guru,” she says. “Very unhappy. Others do not treat her well. Stupid, no?”

“Stupid,” I agree. Her English has improved. Is that some sort of proof of her connection?

“All Antag fighters are female,” she says, after a thoughtful pause.

“Interesting,” I say.

“Once I thought females in charge, bottom to top, would be good. Now, not so much. Well, she needs me to finish this work. Can you tell her that? Your Antagonista, your steward?”

“I’ll tell her.” I decide against passing along Bird Girl’s design for the starshina’s fate.

“Good,” Ulyanova says, then presses her lips together, as if evenly spreading lipstick. At least that’s familiar. She looks away, looks up, then focuses her pike-sharp gaze on me again. “Gurus know you,” she says. “I know what they know.”

“Okay,” I say.

“You brought dead girl from Mexico.” She gives me a disgusted look.

“True.”

“You almost died walking on railway bridge.”

“Yeah,” I say.

“And you killed your father.” She smiles with a sad, creepy kind of pride. “I stabbed my father. He did not die. Why I joined Skyrines. Anybody else know these things?”

Honesty is definitely the best policy here. “Joe Sanchez,” I say.

She shakes her head. “He is not like you, the corporal, or me, right?”

“Right.”

“Proof this comes from shithole Gurus. What they know, I know. Poor me! My soul is rotting. But is good.” She moves closer and grabs my arm. Her broken fingernails dig in. “Bits of Guru inside you, like bombs. No others needed. We kill other Gurus, and you help open gate.”

Before I can think of a response, she backs away, folding her arms. Joe moves into view as another volley of food is tossed through the cage. Nobody tries to catch the cakes. The bats watch, squeaking, then retreat. Maybe they need us fat.

“Borden’s getting bored,” Joe says, with a worried glance at the starshina. “Time for a conference.”