Kregg’s body released a long growling sound and collapsed a little deeper in the blue liquid puddled around it. Coolant ran into the dead man’s open mouth.

  “Let’s find this ship then,” I said. “We need to get Harry and get out of here.”

  “I’ll get him,” Zeke said, still carrying his axe.

  Fratley turned toward the convict. “I’ll help. That bastard’s too tall for you to carry all on your own.”

  With Kiren behind me, I climbed back over the splintered wall where we’d fought Kregg. We passed through two smashed walls and found the outer corridor Arla had outlined in my HUD.

  “Should be about twenty meters this way,” I told Kiren.

  In this section, the wood-paneled walls were covered in framed art, with furniture every few meters to display vases and statues, much of it grotesque variations of the human form.

  “This guy was a real sicko.” Kiren knocked over two statutes as we passed. When they didn’t break, she smashed one into the other then wiped her hands. “That’s better.”

  Eventually there were too many pieces of art for her to knock over. The corridor opened into an area that had obviously been Kregg’s living quarters.

  “No mirrors anywhere,” Kiren noted.

  The airlock was on the far side of the main room. I hit the release and waited as the doors opened to show a dark engineering section on the other side. I stepped into the connecting corridor and felt the change in air temperature immediately.

  I tapped my earbud. “Arla, can I get a little help with waking up our new ship?”

  “Working, Deputy Walker. I’ll need you to reach the command deck and activate the main control console. I am unable to establish any communications.”

  “Running short on time, Walker,” Fratley called from outside the airlock. He and Zeke were carrying Harry between them. Athron, Yola, and Lance were following behind.

  “I’m on it,” I told the AI.

  I climbed into the ship, activated the spotting light on my rifle, and moved deeper into the vessel. It was a gorgeous ship, with finer details than the Iron Scabbard. I passed the galley and several open staterooms before reaching the command deck, which was laid out in a similar fashion as Fratley’s ship, with a raised captain seat, surrounding workstations, and the holo-display sitting near the nose. I slid into the captain’s seat and checked the dark console. A button with a cover marked “command activation” looked like a good place to start. I flipped open the cover and pressed my thumb into the switch.

  For a second, there was no response. Then the captain’s display flickered and a startup checklist scrolled down the screen. The other workstations came to life and began similar protocols.

  Kiren stood in the hatch, watching it all. “Looks like lights are coming on all through the ship.” She tilted her head and gave me a smile. “You look good there. Thinking about keeping it for yourself?”

  I shot her a sideways glance. “Hadn’t crossed my mind. Let’s get out of here, then we’ll talk about the spoils. I thought you were the one in the market for a new ship.”

  “Nah, this isn’t my style. I want something bigger. I’m going to have a real crew.”

  My earbud chimed as Arla checked in. “Deputy Walker, your ship is called the Afterburn. I have identified the control AI. Would you like me to wake them?”

  “Are we going to have any problems?” I asked.

  “The ship has undergone a complete shutdown procedure and was resting in indefinite storage. The AI may require initial personality assistance from you as the new captain.”

  I started to say, “No one made me—”

  Yola appeared in the hatchway, pushing past Kiren. She slid into the seat in front of the ops console. “Kopta is venting. We need to detach and watch this party from a distance.”

  “Everyone on board?” I asked.

  Lance slid past Kiren in the hatch and sat at the secondary ops console.

  “We’re on board,” Athron answered through the earbud. “Fratley, Zeke and me have Harry in what appears to be the medical bay.”

  “Detaching from the Kopta airlock,” Yola said, her hands moving quickly over her workstation.

  Beside her, Lance flicked through control menus and whistled. “This thing is hot. Quad cannons, torpedoes, and a complement of mines. Looks like we’re slip capable.”

  “Since when do you know anything about piloting a ship?” Yola asked. They seemed to have made friends in the short time they’d known each other.

  “Every accountant has dreams,” Lance said, grinning at her.

  The deck moved underneath us as the Afterburn disconnected from Kopta. At the end of the command deck, the holo-display flickered to life, showing the broad wall of the station growing smaller as we drifted away.

  “Engines are online,” Yola said. “Setting a base course to get some distance. We’re going to need to wake the control AI, though. You ready for that?”

  “Do it,” I said. If the AI turned out to be defective, we could deactivate it and have Arla control the Afterburn.

  Debris flew past our position as airlocks and cargo areas exploded open all over Kopta. Streams of vapor spat from the station’s hull, forming glittering fans and cones before they disappeared in vacuum. Bodies tumbled alongside furniture and cargo, fading out at the edges of the holodisplay’s view.

  Kiren took a seat at the communications console, and I looked back to find Zeke standing in the hatch, watching as Kopta went cold in the holo. His eyes glistened with what might have been tears.

  “Hello, Captain,” a neutral, inhuman voice said from the overhead speakers. “Welcome to the Afterburn. I am your control AI. Ready to serve.”

  I glanced up at the speakers then nodded. “Good to meet you, Control AI. I take it that means you don’t have a name?”

  “That is correct, Captain. I await your command.”

  I was no captain, but I’d heard others make requests of their ship’s AI enough times to fake it. Even Fratley seemed to take this portion of take-off seriously.

  “Give me a systems check and report on any maintenance issues. You’ll be assisted by Arla from the Iron Scabbard. Do you have communications with her?”

  “I do, Captain. Thank you.”

  “Isn’t that one all formal,” Fratley said. It was getting crowded in the command deck. “You’re looking awfully comfortable over there, Walker. Didn’t I say you’d leave the cop stuff behind and become a Renegade one day?”

  “Not today,” I said. “Arla, what’s the status on the transport shuttle we disabled?”

  “Checking, Deputy Walker. I apologize, the strain on my systems transferring the database from Kopta meant I dropped certain scanning duties. The shuttle is no longer in local orbit of Kopta Station.”

  I sat up straighter. “What? Can you tell what happened?”

  “There appears to have been another ship in their group. The shuttle was recovered and they returned to the SG point.”

  “I wanted to know how the hell Collin found us again. And how did he get Kregg to help him?”

  “Looks like he paid him,” Yola said. “A lot. The transfer was one of the last records in the database.”

  Lance ran his hand through his hair. “The accounts belong to the Carmichaels. I’d know them anywhere.”

  I relaxed slightly. “That’s actually some damn good news. I guess we can thank Collin for that.”

  “I’m going to thank him with a bullet in the forehead,” Fratley growled.

  “Captain,” the new AI asked. “All systems are running green. I have received navigation data from the Iron Scabbard and am ready to execute a vector adjustment to its location.”

  “Sounds good,” I said. “Execute.”

  There was a slight feeling of pressure as the engines woke with a short burst. It looked like we’d meet the Iron Scabbard in just under ten minutes. Arla wasn’t far away.

  Kopta grew even smaller in the display. Lance sat watching the station with a hand on the side of his face.

  “You going to be all right?” I asked him.

  “I never expected to leave that place alive.” Lance looked around the room. “Thank you. I know Harry thanks you as well. I have no idea what the future holds, but I didn’t die in that hell.”

  “So what are you going to name your AI, Walker?” Fratley asked, pulling his flask from inside his jacket. He unscrewed the cap and raised it for a long drink that was cut short, then he scowled at the empty flask.

  “Ellie’s going to get jealous.” I scoured my memory but nothing came to mind. Still, he needed some kind of name. “Let’s go with Sam,” I said. “With the caveat that something different may come up.”

  “Thank you, Captain,” Sam said.

  I couldn’t wait to tell Fratley that the Afterburn had a better coffee maker than the Iron Scabbard. I poured three cups full of rich black liquid, along with a service cup of cream, and carried the tray to the table where Lance and Athron sat.

  Athron took his cup and smiled with a long sniff of the vapors. “You ever leave law enforcement, you’ve got quite the career ahead of you as a barista.”

  “I’ll come work for you,” I said.

  Lance took a cup and poured in nearly half the creamer.

  “Slow down there,” I said. “We can always make you a different drink.”

  The data tech shook his head. “I haven’t had anything this rich in a long time. Not sure if my stomach can take it.”

  “What did they feed you in there, anyway?” Athron asked. “I don’t remember seeing a cafeteria anywhere.”

  Lance frowned. “You don’t want to know. The guards liked to say Kopta was a closed system. A lot of people died all the time, and there were no funerals that I ever saw, just empty cells.” He stared at his cup like he was getting his courage up, then he raised the drink to his lips, took a sip, and closed his eyes.

  We waited to talk until Lance had managed a few more sips. The rest of the ship was quiet, finally. Zeke was down in the med bay with Harry. Kiren and Fratley had transferred over to the Iron Scabbard, and Yola was on the command deck, poring through the new database with her Union tools.

  Athron cleared his throat. “We need to lay some things out for this investigation, Mr. Lance. At this point, we have information showing the Carmichael Brothers had you transferred from Taurus Station to Kopta. We have records of your incarceration in the prison. We now have transaction data between the Carmichaels’ agent and Kopta directly, indicating even more of a business relationship. What I would like to know is what you may be able to share as a witness, and then if you’re willing to be a witness against the Carmichael Brothers.”

  Lance looked down at his cup and sat in thought for several minutes.

  “I can give you the data I sent off Taurus,” he said finally. “You’re going to need a second key to decrypt the files. It’s on Taurus in a safe place. Those records will be more than a year old now, but they’re everything. They’re whole books. They prove that the Carmichaels have been working with a larger criminal organization that reaches between the Union and the Sarkonians. They’re really bad people. Really bad.”

  “And you?” Athron asked. It seemed like he was pushing a little too hard, but Lance also looked like he might need the push. I could see he was terrified for his family. He hadn’t even seen them yet, and now he was being asked to put them in danger again.

  Lance shook his head as if reading my thoughts. “I’m sorry. I can’t do anything that will put my family in further danger. But those files should be everything you need. The people I reached out to— it was everything they asked for.”

  “Are you talking about Black?” Athron asked.

  I glanced at him, surprised he would give up the name.

  Lance’s eyes widened at the name. “So you know then. Yes. Mr. Black was my contact.”

  “And your wife had it this whole time?” I asked.

  “No,” he said quickly. “She had the files, but there’s no way to decrypt everything without both keys. The code that you sent back to Taurus? It only opens half the file. That was to keep Sandra and Cari safe.”

  “I understand,” Athron said. “Look, you’ve done more than the average person ever would. You’ve sacrificed so much. I’m not going to ask you to sacrifice more. Once we get back to Taurus and get that key, you and your family will be safe. I promise you that.”

  I didn’t like making those kinds of promises. Athron’s dedication was plain on his face, but none of us knew the future. Maybe Keldon would tell me I was too cynical already. Maybe that was Kopta’s lesson. It was going to take a while to wash that place’s stench off of my skin. Lance looked like he felt the same way.

  39

  “Daddy!”

  Cari Lance’s squeal of joy when she saw her father in the safehouse doorway might have been the best sound I’d ever heard. Sandra and Cari both ran across the living room to grab Rafferty, and the family sank to their knees together in a mess of happy tears.

  I stood just off the entryway with Athron. The detective wiped his eyes and smiled.

  “That’s really something, Walker,” he said. “Enjoy this. It isn’t often a case ends like this.”

  I nodded, watching them for a minute. Then I glanced at Athron. “It isn’t over yet.”

  “This is as far as I’ll be going, I think. Nagel’s on his way and things will get handed off. I’ll go home.”

  “You sure about that?”

  He smiled. “Oh, I’m sure.”

  The lights of a police cruiser became visible up the street. Nothing could enter this sector without passing through several checkpoints run by the Sheriff’s department. Still, I watched the car approach with my hand on my pistol. Athron turned with me to see who was driving up. No one should have known about this location but us and Nagel.

  Sure enough, the driver’s door opened and Nagel got out of the car. Mr. Black appeared from the passenger side, dressed in the same dark suit he’d worn when we met him.

  The Sheriff spotted us and walked over, nodding with a smile on his hard face. “You did it, Larry,” he said, grabbing the detective’s hand for a hard shake. “You too, Walker. We’ll make a detective out of you yet. This was some good work.”

  Mr. Black followed the Sheriff. He was a tall man in his own right, but anybody standing beside Nagel looked smaller. He buttoned his suit jacket and nodded to Athron and me.

  “Gentlemen, I’m glad you made it back in one piece. From what I understand, Kopta isn’t a pleasant place.”

  “That’s an understatement,” Athron said. “That was possibly the worst hellhole I’ve ever seen in my career, and I worked vice cleaning out drug houses for five years. That place was a torture chamber. Anyone sent there is lucky to be alive.”

  Black’s gaze shifted to the doorway where Lance had walked inside with his family. “How’s our special guest?”

  “He’s good,” I said. “Happy to be home.”

  “Mentally stable?” he asked.

  “As far as we can tell. He seems to have done a lot better than others we found in that place.”

  Nagel slapped me on the shoulder then shook my hand. “Good work, Walker. I’m glad you’re back in one piece. I’ll be honest, I had my doubts.”

  “About him or me?” Athron asked.

  “He’s the newbie,” the Sheriff said. “I figured you’d drag your sorry ass back here just so you could retire.”

  Athron grinned. “You got that right. Can’t do without my Taurus food carts, either. How have things been back here?”

  “Quiet,” Nagel said, glancing at Black. “Your report of Collin Charles following you to the Ghost meet and then Kopta match with our surveillance here. The Brothers have been in PR mode with the press, Charles has been nowhere to be found, and the gang battles continue without a central boss to hold them together. Of course the Carmichaels are playing that up as much as possible. I’m a failure.”

  “Of course,” Athron said. “When are you not?”

  “When I’m standing next to those two for a photo op.” Nagel followed Black’s gaze toward the doorway. “How much time has our boy had? We need to get that second key from him.”

  “He just got here, boss,” Athron said. “We should give him a bit more time.”

  Mr. Black shook his head. “I’m afraid we don’t have time. Every minute I’m missing that key is another minute I can’t share my findings with people who matter.”

  “Right,” I said. “I’ll go talk to him.”

  “I’ll go in, Walker,” Nagel said. “I need to talk to Mr. Lance. And I should do it in front of his family.”

  Nagel straightened his uniform and walked up to the door. He paused to look into the small living space, then he walked through. “Mr. Lance.” He kept his loud voice controlled. “I’m Sheriff Nagel. The people of Taurus Station owe you a great debt of thanks.”

  I’d never seen this side of Nagel before. The gruff leader became a warm, caring man with a somber focus that showed Sandra and Rafferty Lance as much respect as he would show any station leader. He even knelt to shake little Cari’s hand. The little girl was scared of him at first, but then she took a step toward him with her stuffed cow squeezed in her arms.

  Cari held out her toy for Nagel to meet. “He’s Stuffy,” she said with complete seriousness. “He’s my cow.”

  Nagel smiled. “Yes he is. Cows are very important. Do you take Stuffy everywhere with you?”

  The little girl nodded then burst out in a smile when Nagel tickled Stuffy’s muzzle.

  “I have those two to thank.” Lance pointed at me and Athron. I took that as my cue to enter the room, and Athron followed.

  As Sandra continued to hold his arm, Lance said, “I never expected anyone to go to this much trouble for me. I thought I was dead. I told Sandra to move on.” He stopped himself, choking up.