The Spider and the Fly Read online

  He snorted. “Tough talk from a girl without a gun. I figured you’d be so blinded by rage that you’d blunder in here all by yourself. I guess you haven’t changed much.”

  Jenavian winced when she caught a glimpse of her flechette pistol lying on the ground at his feet. He had every advantage, but if he’d wanted her dead he would have fired already. He must have felt like standing around and taunting her for a while yet, which was fine with her—all she had to do was keep him talking while Thexyl got into position.

  “You’re still buying weapons to help your terrorist friends blow up innocent civilians,” she bit out, “so it doesn’t look like you’ve changed, either.”

  Markus didn’t even twitch. Now that she could see him, she was able to stretch out with her mind and press against his thoughts. She couldn’t read them, not with his mental defenses up in full force, but she could at least get a feel for his basic surface emotions. She’d hoped her jibe might trigger a surge of anger or at least irritation, but it hadn’t. The only thing she sensed was the same maddening calm she’d felt from him that day on Typhus—the calm of an idealistic zealot absolutely convinced he was doing the right thing.

  “I’d hoped you would come around eventually,” he murmured. “I thought that maybe once you’d had time to digest everything you’d finally see I was right…but I guess not. You’re still the Convectorate’s little concubine.”

  “If you surrender, the Widow might have mercy,” Jenavian pressed, taking a half step forward. If she could just keep his eyes on her and his mind focused on blocking out her intrusions…

  “Mercy?” Markus said with a snort. “She doesn’t know the meaning of the word.”

  “She might just wipe your memory and give you a second chance. It’s better than the alternative.”

  “Tempting, but I’ll pass. Speaking of second chances, though, this is yours, Jen. It’s not too late to come with me. We’re closer than ever to freeing our people and winning this war.”

  Now it was her turn to snort. “Some victory. You hide in rat’s nests across the galaxy and emerge only to blow up innocent people. You’re despicable cowards.”

  A shadow fell across his face, and for the first time a genuine emotion pierced through his tranquil façade. Except it wasn’t anger; it was more like…disappointment?

  “I can only imagine what lies they’ve been feeding you about us,” Markus said softly. “I’d hoped you were smart enough by now to see through them. We’re talking about the future of our species, Jen. The future of humanity!”

  “Humanity has no future,” she growled. “In case you forgot, the Dominion collapsed a hundred years ago, and its Sarafan overlords died with it.”

  “I’m not talking about the Dominion—I’m talking about freeing our people from refugee camps and slave mines. They deserve better than that.”

  Jenavian shrugged. “We had our chance to rule, and we fucked it up. Now surrender. I won’t ask again.”

  This time he visibly flinched, and she could see the white lines on his knuckles from squeezing his pistol so hard. “I won’t be a slave to the Convectorate again, Jen. I’d rather die.”

  “I can arrange that, too, if you want.”

  Slowly, solemnly, he shook his head. “I suppose I should be glad that you’re the one who finally found me. I’ve been waiting for you to come to us for a long time, but if you won’t…then maybe it’s for the best that I just end this now.”

  “Maybe you should,” she murmured. “I don’t know what you’re waiting for.”

  His thoughts flickered, and this time she managed to briefly slip past his mental barriers. His disappointment and regret washed over her, but beyond them she could see into his surface thoughts, his short-term memories, his—

  Jenavian froze as a single image abruptly burned into her vision: a long silver starship, floating like a corpse in the middle of deep space, its engines and running lights dark. It was a vessel she’d seen countless times on archival holograms but never in person. It was a vessel that wasn’t supposed to exist.

  And yet somehow, some way, Markus and the Mire had found it.

  “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry,” he said softly, leveling his pistol at her head. “I never wanted it to end like this.”

  She stared up at him, her mind still frozen, waiting for the inevitable flash of light to send her into permanent darkness—

  The flash came, but not from his barrel. Markus screamed as a burst of energy exploded in his back. He hit the ground with a dull thud, and his pistol clattered harmlessly away.

  “Are you all right?” Thexyl asked, his shadowy reptilian figure slowly detaching itself from the opposite wall. His scales were already returning to their normal gray as he suppressed his camouflage reflex. “I wasn’t sure I’d make it in time.”

  “Neither was I,” Jenavian said hoarsely, her eyes still fixed on Markus. His mind had closed to her again now that he was unconscious, but she couldn’t get the image of the derelict ship out of her mind…the ship, and everything it represented.

  “I’m not sure why he hesitated so long,” her partner commented. “He had every opportunity to fire."

  “He didn’t want to. He’s still believes I’ll switch sides and join him eventually, the same way he believes the Mire is a bunch of noble revolutionaries and not mass murderers. He’s delusional.”

  “Ah. Well, I’m certain the Widow will cure him of that.”

  Jenavian pressed her lips together. “Right now I think we have another problem.”

  Thexyl’s yellow eyes flicked down to meet hers, and a patch of inquisitive blue shimmered across his scales. “And what is that?”

  “I caught a peek at his thoughts while we were talking,” she said. “It turns out that Pasek wasn’t just selling the Mire weapons.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He found a derelict ship somewhere, and I think Markus was going to buy the location from him.”

  Thexyl’s serpentine head bobbed to the side. “I assume from your tone that we’re not talking about an old cargo freighter or pleasure yacht.”

  “No. It was an old Dominion psi-ship, fully intact.” She swallowed and took a deep breath. “I think it was the Damadus.”

  For a long moment her partner remained perfectly still, but eventually the blue shimmer in his scales transformed into a concerned orange. “I see.”

  Jenavian grunted and waved a hand dismissively. “He’s probably mistaken. A million charlatans from here to Keledon have claimed to have found the Damadus over the years.”

  “True enough, but either way the Widow needs to know about it. If the legends about that ship are accurate, then its discovery could drastically shift the balance of power. The Mire could potentially use it to resurrect the Sarafan.”

  “I’m sure that’s exactly what they want,” she said gravely. “We can’t let that happen.”

  A few additional specks of orange danced across his scales. “I suppose not. So then what are we going to do about it?”

  Jenavian glanced down to the unconscious body of the man at her feet—the man who had once been her best and only friend in the entire galaxy.

  “We’ll take him to the Widow,” she whispered. “And on the way, we’re going to learn everything he knows about the Damadus.”

  Chapter Two

  Wake up!

  Markus Coveri’s eyes shot open, and between the cold slab of metal pressing against his skin, the iridescent pink lights blinking in front of his face, and the unrelenting pain stabbing into his temples, his first thought was that someone had spiked his drink and left him unconscious on the nightclub floor. But then the memories gradually returned: the battle in the club, the chase through the station, the searing agony of a pulse blast hitting him in the back…

  And through it all, the familiar face of a woman he never thought he’d see again.

  Markus winced and brought his hand up to his throbbing forehead. Of all the thousands of inhabited systems in the galaxy—of all the hundreds of potential Spiders the Convectorate had at their disposal—he couldn’t believe they’d sent her to a remote space station like Briton Chalo. It was almost inconceivable. He knew precisely how the Spiders operated, and he understood the limitations of their vaunted psychic webs. Despite the claims of the propaganda vids circulating the Holosphere, the Intelligence Ministry didn’t possess nearly enough agents to cover every system in Convectorate space, let alone fringe worlds and starports. Generally speaking, using his powers on an isolated station a hundred light-years from the nearest trade route should have been relatively safe. Evidently not.

  He rolled over on his side and experimentally stretched out his arms and legs. Everything appeared to be in working order, thankfully, and he took a few seconds to study his immediate surroundings. Even in the dim lighting he recognized the alabaster-colored walls and box-shaped cargo bay of a heavily modified L-74 Ziradies passenger liner, a common, unassuming vessel that wouldn’t draw special attention in any port in the galaxy. It was one of several similar models used by the Spiders, and right now he was sealed into the far corner of the bay by a translucent pink energy barrier. Distantly, he wondered how many innocent people Jen had stuffed in here over the years…people whose only crime had been being born immune to the Pandrophage, the bio-engineered disease crippling the rest of humanity.

  Sighing to himself, Markus shook away the thought. Right now he needed to focus on finding a way out of here. He wasn’t going to be busting through the barrier anytime soon, but perhaps there was still a chance he could get through to Jen before she handed him off to the Widow. Four years ago on Typhus he’d been on the verge of convincing her to defect with him, and he’d learned so much more about the Convectorate and the Tarreen who ruled it since then. Enough, hopefully, to finally convince her to cross that line.

  He slowly brought himself to his feet and let out another deep breath to calm his nerves. On impulse, he reached out across the ship with his mind, wondering if he could sense her nearby—

  The pain was so sudden, so intense, that Markus thought he’d been shot in the back a second time. His knees buckled and he collapsed face-first onto the cold deck plates, screaming despite himself.

  “Neural implant,” a calm, carefully modulated voice said from the shadows nearby. “For your own sake, I suggest you refrain from accessing your psychic abilities.”

  Markus craned his neck and squinted into the darkness. He didn’t recognize the exact alien intonation at first, but once he caught a glimpse of the trim, almost snake-like silhouette standing in the corner, he belatedly understood how he’d been ambushed.

  “Thanks for the warning,” he croaked. “Since when did the Widow start allowing her agents to work with Kali?”

  “Jen was hoping I’d be able to take you by surprise,” the alien said, his reptilian scales rippling a cool gray as he stepped into the light. “Fortunately, she was correct.”

  “You could say that.” Markus shook his head and sized up the other man. The Kali were a short, slender people that looked roughly like a cross between a human and a lizard crowned with a serpentine head. As a race they were known for their keen minds and cold rationality, and they made some of the finest engineers and technicians in Convectorate space.

  They also had two distinguishing characteristics that were, as far as Markus knew, unique among sentient beings in the galaxy. The first was their chameleon-like scales that allowed them to blend into virtually any background—like the back alley walls of Briton Chalo, for example. The second was their innate resistance to telepathic manipulation. The former had always made them exceptional hunters, while the latter had gotten their home world bombed into rubble a century or so earlier. Apparently the Sarafan, the caste of human psychics who had ruled the Dominion, hadn’t been particularly fond of a species that was impervious to their most powerful weapon.

  “Your vitals have stabilized,” the Kali said as he studied a readout terminal on the adjacent wall. “It is likely that you will remain mildly disoriented for a few more hours, but the effects of the medication should wear off soon.”

  Markus grunted. “Does that include the headache?”

  The alien’s yellow eyes locked onto him in that disconcerting, unblinking way of theirs. Markus hadn’t interacted with a great many Kali over the years, but they always managed to look like they were perfectly in control of everything around them. And in this case, it wasn’t far from the truth.

  “I may be able to give you something for the pain,” he said after a moment. “I’ll need to check—”

  “Don’t bother.”

  Markus turned as the cargo bay door slid open and Jen stepped inside. She’d ditched the civilian garb in favor of one of the simple white jumpsuits she’d always preferred, and just like when he’d first spotted her charging across the nightclub, he had to fight back the flood of old memories threatening to pull him under.

  It was hard to believe it had been almost four years since he’d finally mustered the courage to walk away. It was even harder to believe that she never had.

  Jen stopped in front of his cell and eyed him as if he were something she’d just scraped off her boot. “He can handle the pain just fine.”

  He snorted. “I guess you never were big on sympathy.”

  “Not for traitors, no.”

  Markus glanced over to the Kali then back to her. “I guess I should have just pulled the trigger the moment you wheeled around that corner. I never expected you to have a partner.”

  “One of your many mistakes,” Jen replied icily. “You’re fortunate I didn’t order Thexyl to kill you.”

  “You wouldn’t pass up the opportunity to drag me back in front of your mistress. I’m sure the Widow is salivating at the prospect of trying to break me.”

  “She will, right before she executes you for treason.”

  He sighed. “It’s really too bad.”

  “You deserve worse.”

  “That’s not what I meant,” Markus said, sitting up and leaning back against the cell’s only wall. “I mean it’s too bad you still haven’t developed a personality. I thought we’d made real progress before.”

  The cargo bay lighting wasn’t particularly bright, and she’d positioned herself in such a way that her features were mostly veiled in shadow, but he could still see her face well enough to notice her cheek twitch. He half-expected her to trigger his implant and shock him again, but she didn’t. Instead she just continued to stare at him, her cold blue eyes glittering with barely contained revulsion.

  “You can return to the bridge,” Jen told her partner. “We should be in position to jump soon.”

  “Of course,” Thexyl replied. If he was at all irritated or concerned at being summarily dismissed, his voice didn’t show it. Not that Markus was surprised—if the man had been working with Jen for any duration, he would have developed some thick scales by now.

  Once the Kali was gone, she took another step forward and crossed her arms. “It’s time for you to start talking.”

  “You won’t get anything out of me, and the Mire will have already gone to ground before the Widow can finish her interrogation.”

  “Like the rats they are.”

  “They’re people, Jen,” he insisted. “Real, honest people who could still use your help. It’s not too late to—”

  Having already felt the sting of the implant once, Markus had naturally assumed the inevitable second attack would be a bit easier for him to deal with. It wasn’t. He was writhing on the floor again before he even knew what had happened, and by the time the pain subsided his vision was so blurry the only thing he could see was the tip of her boot just beyond the energy field.

  “You can stow the recruiting pitch,” she said. “I wasn’t planning on asking you about those sniveling dregs, anyway.”

  It took him a few seconds to process her words, and there was no mistaking the smug amusement on her lips when he rolled over to look back up at her. “Then what do you want?”

  Jen crouched down a half-meter from his face. “I want to know about the Damadus.”

  He coughed. “What?”

  “The Damadus, the lost Dominion ship supposedly drifting somewhere out on the fringes of the galaxy,” she said. “You were thinking about it back on Briton Chalo. I want to know why.”

  Markus blinked, and it took all of his self-control not to smile. So she had managed to slip into his mind just before he’d lost consciousness. He’d felt her probing around during their brief battle, undoubtedly hoping that he would waver and leak a secret or two. Apparently she’d been right. He probably should have been annoyed or even terrified at the prospect of her rummaging around his memories, but right now it gave him a unique opportunity.

  Assuming he could keep her out this time, of course. He could feel her not-so-subtly prodding against his mind even now, but fortunately the neural implant wasn’t sensitive enough to prevent him from erecting his mental barriers. He needed to make sure she didn’t recognize what he was up to, and he definitely needed to make sure she didn’t realize he’d already gotten off a message to the Mire before he’d gone under…

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he said.

  Jen cocked an eyebrow. “Do you want to spend the entire trip writhing around in agony?”

  He allowed his expression to sag as if he were really debating whether or not to tell her. Something like this was too important to give up without a fight. Of all the Mire secrets he knew—the base locations, the funding sources, the operatives inside the Convectorate ranks—this was one the Tarreen would do anything to get their claws on. Over the last century the Hierarchy, the Convectorate’s governing body, had systemically eradicated every last trace of Dominion technology from starships all the way down to crystal capacitors, and they’d purged nearly every mention of the Sarafan and their rule from the history banks. They’d used the Spiders to track down and capture human children born immune to the Pandrophage, and they’d all but forced the rest of the species to eke out a living on the fringes of the galaxy.