KILL SPREE

  STARSHIP FOR SALE

  BOOK 7

  M.R. FORBES

  Published by Quirky Algorithms

  Seattle, Washington

  This novel is a work of fiction and a product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons or events is purely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2022 by Quirky Algorithms

  All rights reserved.

  Cover illustration by Tom Edwards

  Edited by Merrylee Lanehart

  CHAPTER 1

  “Keep? Is it really you?” I asked, staring dumbfounded. I wanted to vault over the couch and wrap him a massive bear hug. Instead, I remained hesitant, unsure if I could trust what I was seeing.

  He was dressed in his familiar dark suit with a navy tie, a long dark raincoat and pork pie hat. His brow was drenched with sweat and he looked pale. The left side of his jaw shifted rhythmically, chewing gum in place of smoking a cigarette. He had literally come out of nowhere to listen in on my all-hands meeting with my replacement crew as we plotted our course toward rescuing my original crew. My friends.

  “In the flesh, kid,” he replied, coming down the steps into the lounge. Kat and Ki both stepped in front of him, barring his path. “What’s this?" He looked Kat up and down. "You’ve got your own army now? Cute.” His eyes shifted to Ixitat. “And a xixitl? You have a thing for exotic aliens, don’t you? How you doin’?” he asked her.

  “Goodssss,” Ixitat replied, lowering her body guardedly. She didn’t trust him either.

  “I’m not really feeling the love right now, Bennie,” Keep said, looking at me between the two rebels’ shoulders.

  “Are you kidding?” I replied. “You’re supposed to be dead.”

  “That’s news to me. Says who?”

  “Admiral Lyke told me she airlocked you when you refused to talk.”

  Keep laughed heartily. I’d never heard him so amused. “Ahh, Bennie. She did airlock me. And let me tell you, floating around space unprotected is no fun.” He tapped his head, referencing his restore sigil. “But it wasn’t like I had much of a choice. Leave it to a hothead like her to know I’m a few centuries old and not bother to wonder how. She and Sedaya are made for each other. Dumb asses. Anyway, enough about me, kid. How are you? I wasn’t sure I would find you alive. Honestly, I wasn’t sure what I would find, which is most of the reason for my shit-eating grin.” He wrapped his hand around his chin. “By the way, your mom says she loves you. I didn’t tell her about what happened on Omega. I didn’t want to worry her.”

  “You went back to Earth?” I blinked with surprise. "You saw my mother?”

  “She sure as shit didn’t come here,” Keep answered. “No offense to your bodyguards here, but it would be easier to have this conversation without them blocking me.” He glanced irritably at Kat. “Sorry, pal. I think I may have taken out your hangar campsite on the transit. But don’t worry, I have insurance. Badabing badaboom.”

  “Kat, it’s okay. Let him through.”

  Kat and Ki both stepped aside. Keep passed between them and circled the sofa to reach me. “It’s good to see you, Bennie." He put a hand out to shake mine, his eyebrows shooting up when he saw the veins glowing in the back of my hand. “That’s new.”

  I ignored his comment, dropping my hand. “You transited to Earth and then here?” I asked, still cautious. “That means…” I trailed off, waiting for him to fill in the blanks.

  “Do you want the long version or the notes?”

  “How about a happy medium?”

  “You know Lyke wrapped us up like sausages on Omega and brought us into her transport, and then up to Dominator. Let me tell you, kid. That ship is something else. It’s like a cross between a warship and a pleasure barge. Obviously, Sedaya plans to make it his flagship and personal transport once everything’s settled. Anyway, she tossed all of us into a new dungeon they’ve built in the bowels of the ship. A bit less damp, a lot more uncomfortable. They’re able to control life support in the individual cells. Want to make someone three times heavier? They can do it. Want to steal their oxygen? No problem. You get my drift?”

  “Yeah. But you’re giving me too much detail right now.”

  “Lyke didn’t waste any time once we left Omega. After a few hours, she came back to get me.”

  “How was Matt holding up?” I asked, unable to hold back the question.

  “He was more worried about you than himself. Kept pacing like a caged animal, frustrated and angry. Shaq wasn’t much better. Quasar and Druck were unhappy, but they stayed mostly silent, just sat and waited.”

  “What about David? Did you see him?”

  “Some big guy I’d never seen before took him to the transport, along with the Star of Caprum. David sobbed the entire ride up. He said Alter and Gia were dead.” Keep’s smile faded. “Is that true?”

  I nodded somberly. “Unfortunately. Sort of.”

  “What do you mean, sort of? There’s no in-between with dead.”

  “The guy you saw David with is named Blorb. It—”

  “Did you say Blorb?” Keep interrupted.

  “Yeah, it—”

  “What kind of name is that?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t care about its name. It—”

  Keep chuckled. “Stupid name.”

  “Blorb killed Alter back on Atlas and took her place when we left. It’s also masquerading as the Empress. She's dead too.”

  Keep stopped laughing immediately. “What did you just say?”

  “Blorb is the Empress. And has been for at least a couple of weeks, maybe longer.”

  Keep stared at me in shock. “Damn. I didn’t see that coming. That explains why Lyke chucked me into space so close to Atlas. She was probably returning Blorb to the palace. What about Alter and Gia?".”

  “Blorb took all of Alter’s personas. We don’t know exactly how Aleal work, so I’m not giving up hope that some part of her is still alive inside Blorb. If that's the case, we might be able to get her back. As for Gia, she made a digital version of herself before she died. She still exists as an AI operating in her likeness.”

  “A virtual replica? Not bad.” He paused, making a face. “Not to sound like I’m not happy as hell to see you, kid. But how are you still alive? I take it that it has something to do with your light-up veins?”

  “We’re not talking about me right now,” I replied. “I want your side first.”

  Keep’s expression shifted again. “You really took our leadership conversation to heart, didn’t you?”

  “Isn’t that what you wanted?”

  “Abso-freakin-lutely. Like I was saying, Lyke left us hanging for a few hours before she came for me. She brought me to a compartment outfitted for torture, but she didn’t need any of the equipment. Not as a Gilded.” He held up his hand, showing off the buds of new fingernails. “She pulled them out slowly, one at a time. Toenails too. She wanted to know what I knew about Prince Hiro, which I thought was strange. From what you said about Blorb and the Empress, it seems even stranger to me now.”

  “My latest theory is that Hiro knows Blorb is a fake, and someone got him out of there before Sedaya could stage an accident to get rid of him for good.”

  “Sounds reasonable. What someone?”

  “No clue. We’re working on tracking Hiro down. Hopefully, he’s still alive.”

  “I hope so, too. I guess we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it. Lyke also wanted to know about restore. I can’t tell you why she airlocked me instead of cutting open my noggin to take a look-see. Too focused on the cause instead of the effect I guess. I also think she enjoys causing pain more than actually learning anything. In any case, it worked out in my favor. When I refused to give her a single word in response to anything she did, she pulled me to the nearest airlock and opened the outer door. Just because space can’t kill me, it still hurt like hell. More than the finger and toenails, for sure. Lucky for me, I managed to hide this…" He wiggled his finger with the push ring on it. "...before Lyke captured us.” Also lucky for me, I spotted a freighter making a long distance approach to Atlas, so I pushed myself to it.” He laughed. “You can imagine the captain’s surprise when I showed up on one of his hull cameras, waving and mouthing to him to let me in.”

  “I’m surprised he let you in,” I said.

  “It took him almost three hours before he opened an airlock. He was confused as hell, but he gave me a ride back to Atlas. From there, I made my way to Old Haydrun, hopped in the Mustang, and went back to Earth. I spent three days recovering and then transited back here.”

  “What did you tell Mom about where I was?”

  “You know, I lied like a rug. Told her everything was great.”

  “And she believed you? She always knows when I’m lying.”

  “What can I say, kid? I’ve had a lot of practice.”

  “I don’t know. I think you’re better at omission.”

  He shrugged. “Still a type of lying. I’m just glad I caught up to you.”

  “Just barely. We were about ten minutes from going into hyperspace." I was curious. "Can you transit into something moving faster than light?”

  “Nope." That settled that for me as Keep continued. "I expected to find Head Case still on Omega Station. I figured if you were alive, you’d be stranded there and would need some help getting away.”

  “How did you find us? I thought you needed coordinates to transit?”


  “Exactamundo. Good thing I planted one of Miklos’ tracking beacons on the ship so I could always find you. The part where I exited the void into the asteroid field where Omega used to be wasn’t the most fun. I’m only still upright because I’m just so damn happy to see you alive.”

  I smiled, finally allowing myself to relax. “I’m happy to see you too.” I didn’t hold out any longer. A smile spread across my face, and I lunged at Keep, wrapping my arms around him. Stiff and awkward at first, he softened up and patted me on the back as we embraced. “Let me introduce you to my crew.”

  Keep backed away, looking the others over. “Avelus Keep. Good to meet all of you.”

  “I wouldn’t be so quick to say that,” Justus said. “You don’t even know who we are.”

  “Any friend of Bennie’s is a friend of mine.”

  “Justus, can we save the potential complications for later?” I asked. “You saw the video. Matt will be starring in Kill Spree before we can even get to Kirillia to figure out where the show is being broadcast from.”

  “Sure, Captain,” he replied, eying Keep warily. “No rush.”

  “What do you mean by complications?” Keep asked. “Is there something going on that I don’t know about?”

  “There’s probably a lot going on that you don’t know about,” Leo said. “Since you just got here. I’m still not clear how that happened. I’m Leo, by the way. This is my twin sister, Meg. We’re the ship’s engineers.”

  “Hi,” Meg said, adding a weak wave.

  “No argument. I'm kind of behind the eight-ball. I need a major debriefing.”

  “Later,” I said. “That’s Kat and his unit. Ki, Stearns, O’Neill, Narayan. And that’s Ixitat, and Justus.” I pointed to each of them in turn.

  “Greetingssss,” Ixitat said.

  Keep nodded to her. “Greetings.”

  Justus settled for a curt nod. It was obvious to me he was struggling to contain his animosity toward the man he believed had abandoned the woman he loved to die.

  Keep looked back at me, ignoring Justus. “I told you mine, kid. You should tell me yours.”

  “I will, after we get underway." I looked to Justus. "Is there anything else we need to discuss, or should I head up to the flight deck to set a course for Kirillia?”

  “I think we’re good, Captain.” he said.

  “Good. You’re all dismissed.”

  “I’ll come with you,” Keep said as I turned to leave.

  “Captain,” Justus started, conveying his discomfort in leaving me alone with Keep.

  I clapped him on the shoulder. “I’m guessing Kirllia is at least a few days from here. We’ll have time to sort everything out before then.”

  “Aye, Captain,” he replied, still eyeing Keep skeptically as we headed for the elevator.

  “What crawled up his ass and died?” Keep asked me as we neared the elevator.

  “It’s nothing,” I replied. “He’s just slow to warm up.”

  “Yeah, right. Okey dokey, kid. Whatever you say.”

  We stepped into the elevator. “It’s good to have you back.”

  Keep draped his arm over my shoulders. “It’s good to be back.”

  CHAPTER 2

  “That’s everything,” I said, staring across the conference room table at Keep. Two hours had passed since I guided Head Case into hyperspace, pleased with the smooth operation of the new reactor. Keep and I had switched locations soon after that, my debriefing on everything that had happened to me from the moment Lyke touched down in Omega Station’s hangar filling the rest of the time. Keep interrupted at different points, filling in the gaps with his own experiences during some of the events. It helped us paint a clearer picture of our situation.

  Of course, it was impossible to tell that story without revealing Duchess Dryka’s involvement in my rescue, and her ongoing help in the search for Prince Hiro. Keep had remained strangely silent during that part of the tale, listening intently without interruptions for questions or to show any signs of defensiveness or remorse over Dryka’s accusations.

  “At least now I know why Justus hates my guts,” Keep said, apparently saving those thoughts until I had finished. “I’m shooting straight with you, kid. I didn’t abandon her. I saved her life by pulling half of Sedaya’s kill team off her scent.”

  “It doesn’t really matter what I think,” I replied. “From her point of view, you left her to die. But she wants to believe in you. And I think she’s open to hearing your side of things, at least. Justus? Maybe not so much. He's in love with her.”

  Keep nodded. “I’m just happy she’s still alive. So many years of searching for her, and she was under my nose the whole time.” He laughed. “It figures she would be the one to rescue you. Though I am curious to know how she learned so much about my past. And about sigiltech.”

  “Hopefully you’ll get to have that conversation with her one day soon. In the meantime, maybe you can try to patch things up with Justus? We don’t need the tension on board.”

  “I’ve got nothing against him. The opposite, since he’s serving Dryka so loyally. I’ll see what I can do to patch things up with him. Okey dokey, Bennie?””

  “Okey dokey,” I answered. “Thank you.”

  “No problemo. What I really want is to get a look at your chest.”

  “Isn't that sexual harassment?”

  “Funny,” Keep deadpanned back. “Come on, kid. Let me get a look at the construct.”

  I stood up and pulled off my hoodie and t-shirt, revealing the metal embedded in my flesh, pulsating with chaos energy as the restore sigil worked to keep both my cancer and rejection of the catalyst at bay.

  “Whew,” Keep whistled. “Now that is impressive.”

  “You’re talking about my abs, right?”

  “They’re looking pretty good too,” he admitted. “Stronger and less wasted than the last time I saw you.” He stood up, circling the table and sticking his face just in front of the construct to get a closer look. “I saw some of David’s earlier designs, but he managed to get a lot more in here than I expected.”

  “Really?” I replied. “Besides restore, I counted ten more: Push, pull, reflect, absorb, disperse, separate, excite, dampen, calm, and calmed-to-death.”

  “You have more than that. I see expand, transfer, shift, and a few others here I don’t recognize, even from the Grimoire. I think David might have included some of his own creations. I wonder…” He trailed off.

  “Wonder what?” I asked.

  “Nevermind.” He straightened up. “It’s a nice collection, using either one sigil at a time or in combination.”

  “I haven’t done too many combos so far. Do I have a shoryuken in there?”

  “A what?”

  “A shoryuken. Are you curious about it?”

  “Yup.”

  “Just like I’m curious about what you were wondering but then clammed up. Come on, Keep. You can’t do that to me.”

  “If I clam up, it’s for your safety.”

  “Bullshit. I don’t need a babysitter,” I said. “I did this all on my own. I made it work, and I’ve used it to get this far. Tell me what you were going to say.”

  We locked eyes, staring one another down until he finally relented. “Okay, kid. I was going to say, I wonder if you have enough energy to transit, because you have all the sigils you need. Expand to open spacetime, shift to adjust your phase so you can see and enter the void, transfer to create a pathway through it, and of course push or pull to do the actual crossing. I should have realized that’s why David was so interested in those last two.”

  “Do Gilded normally have enough power to transit?” I asked.

  “Some. Not all. If all you had was the catalyst then I would tell you there’s no way. But with the strange mutation to your blood it may be possible.”

  “Jacinda called it chaos energy,” I said. “The glowing stuff in my blood. I’m like a battery, storing extra power for later. I bet I could do it, but it might leave me wiped out afterwards.”

  “Even if you do have enough, it’s still an advanced action. Four sigils at once. It took me nearly three hundred years to master sigeltech to the point where I felt reasonably confident to go through the rift.”