Tech World (Undying Mercenaries Series) (32 page)

What happened next was predictable
but unplanned—at least, it wasn’t planned by me. I wasn’t so sure about Turov. She was a woman who got what she wanted any way she could.

We ended up emptying the bottle and making love on top of a pool table. The balls had all been sucked down into the table, stowed for flight so they didn’t get in the way. The whole time we were doing it, I was thinking to myself something along the lines of
this is crazy! You’re crazy, McGill!

But it didn’t matter. We did it anyway, and we were just lucky no one came in and caught us.

Afterward, I found myself stretched out on my back with her draped over me and snoring. I could feel her small tight breasts against my belly. I wondered if anyone was going to notice a large sweat-stain on their pool table in the morning. The thought made me chuckle, causing Imperator Turov’s cheek to bounce on my ribs.

Not wanting to disturb her, I lightly wound my fingers in her hair. It felt silky and nice.

I had the time to contemplate who’d taken advantage of whom. There were a number of mitigating factors to consider. First off, she was an officer while I was enlisted. Technically, that meant
she
was in the wrong.

There were countless extenuating circumstances, however. I was a big guy who was physically older than she was. I’d plied her with strong drink which her young body had no resistance against—that was wrong even if she’d ordered me to do it.

I decided in the end there was plenty of guilt to go around between the both of us. In my honest opinion, I figured even a council of Nairbs would’ve declared the situation to be a tie.

-34-

When I woke up, Galina was gone.
Instead my eyes focused upon a very pissed-off looking Centurion Leeza.

Her face loomed into mine. I’d thought before that she was too tall and had narrow eyes like a ferret, and her newfound rage hadn’t improved things. She was as sour and sneering as an officer could get.

“Get off that table, Specialist!” she roared.

I rolled off with a groan. An empty bottle went over the edge with me
, making a splintery crash.

“Varus trash!” she shouted. She made my legion’s name sound like an expletive. “This is just what you’re famous for. Disorder, slovenly behavior, drunkenness—”

I didn’t really listen to the rest, but the list was a long one. I got to my feet. Behind the Centurion were several of her grinning noncoms. They were obviously enjoying the situation.

“Sorry sir,” I said. “Tough battle. I’ll be going back to my unit now.”

“Unit?” she scoffed. “What unit? You’re alone on this ship, Varus—except for that crazy bio and a few of her sidekicks. She revived my unit to full strength first.”

I nodded, unsurprised. It was standard operating procedure after heavy losses to revive entire units together instead of spreading the service around. What good would it do to have a dozen solo centurions standing around? Better to have a cohesive force that knew one another and had trained together.

“Can I be dismissed, sir?” I asked, tugging and patting my uniform into place until it started to grab and latch onto my shoulders.

Smart clothing generally attempted to cover a person up, but if you pushed it away repeatedly, it was intelligent enough to give up and stop trying. Later, you had to coax it into covering your body fully again. That’s what I was attempting to do now.

“No,” she said, putting one hip up on the corner of the pool table and swinging her leg like a cat lashing its tail. “I want you to tell me how a man like you—an obvious moron—managed to take out a shipload of invaders almost singlehandedly.”

I smiled a fraction. “There was nothing ‘almost’ about it, sir. I fried them all.”

“How?”

“They’re not too bright, these rioters. They’re untrained and their brains are only operating on half-power anyway if you ask me. All I did was flank them and unload.”

She nodded and heaved a sigh. “This is Germanica’s officers’ mess—you know that, right?”

“Yes sir.”

“Why would you put me in this position? I owe you a great deal—without your aid both our legions might have been permed. Immediately after your heroic effort, you have to go and do something like this. Something that would get any of my men flogged. How am I supposed to handle this situation?”

I knew she was telling the truth about the flogging. Just as they’d done so long ago back in Roman times, our legions still flogged men for things like breaking into the officers’ liquor. If a soldier was beaten so badly a coat of sprayed-on skin wouldn’t fix him, well hell, they could always run him through the revival machine again to freshen him up.

“You could let me off with a warning this time, sir,” I suggested hopefully.

Leeza shook her head and her troops chuckled. She tossed them an annoyed glance over her shoulder, and they quieted immediately.

“I will,” she said, “if you tell me why you broke in here in the first place.”

We stared at one another for a full second after that. My head swam with words I couldn’t afford to let out of my mouth. I could have told her the truth—that a very youthful version of our Imperator had ordered me down here, fed me booze until we were both out of control, and then proceeded to strip me down on the pool table. But somehow, I knew that wasn’t the way to go.

For a full second I didn’t know what the hell to say, but fortunately God has gifted me with a quick wit and a quick tongue—at least when I’m faced with the kind of dilemma where I need to come up with a good story or be flogged.

“After the battle, I really needed a drink, Centurion,” I said. “As far as I knew, this was the only place on the ship I could get one.”

Leeza heaved another sigh and nodded. “At least you’ve been honest. Everyone was wiped out aboard this ship, is that right? Everyone except for you and the Imperator? Then you began reviving bio people.”

I nodded warily. Could this woman know the truth about Turov and me? Was she having a little fun right now? Was all this being recorded and posted on the Germanica legion laugh-boards even as we spoke?

“Dismissed, Specialist,” Leeza said suddenly. “But don’t pull this crap again. I won’t stand for more petty crimes, not even from you.”

I was halfway to the door by the time she finished her sentence. “Won’t happen again, Centurion,” I said over my shoulder, “and thank you, sir.”

One of her veterans, who’d been looming behind her this whole time, flipped me off on the way out. I touched my hand to my brow and gave him a very informal salute in return. There never had been any love lost between our two legions.

Not knowing where else to go—and not wanting to meet up with Galina again right now—I headed to the bio module.

Blue deck was even busier and steamier than it had been the night before. The first thing I saw was a muzzle in my face when I entered. Germanica had posted guards. I thought it was a wise move.

“State your business—” began the guard, but he broke off. “Oh, it’s you, Varus. What do you want?”

The trooper lowered his gun. I was surprised he’d recognized me. I guess I’d made quite an impression by coming to their rescue while they were pinned down in that module.

“Where’s Centurion Thompson?” I asked.

He pointed with the butt of his snap-rifle. I followed the gesture and saw the bio was indeed nearby, sprawled out in a chair. Her hair was matted with blood, sweat, and that unidentifiable goo that drips from the lower regions of revival machines.

“She worked all night and passed out. They finished getting Leeza’s unit together and started on yours. Your people are operating the machine now.”

I walked past the man and peered into the revival chamber. There was Anne Grant working the machine with two orderlies. I smiled, but she didn’t even look back at me.

Reviving Centurion Thompson had been a good move, I thought to myself. She wasn’t Germanica so after she’d finished a full unit of their troops she’d started on one of ours. Which unit? Why, mine of course. Why not? They already had an active weaponeer who knew the score. That was a good start. The revival machine might have made the same choice if they’d left it up to the AI.

“Anne?” I asked, coming up behind her.

She glanced at me and smiled thinly. She looked tired but determined. I sympathized with her plight. Bio people got the worst of it after the battle was over, and generally, their little slice of hell lasted longer than the battle itself.

“McGill! Can you give me a hand?”

I stepped in even though my stomach was jumping from too much alcohol and too little food. I knew she needed the help, and by now I’d helped to revive enough fresh troops to qualify as an orderly myself.

A few minutes later, I had a chance to check the roster on the machine’s console. “Sargon is up next?”

“Yes. All the bio people in the unit are already back in the game. We’re working on front line people next, then the officers and auxiliaries.”

“Can I make a request?”

She immediately frowned. For some reason, the bio specialists were very finicky about their technology. They didn’t want us to know anything about it, and they certainly didn’t want their decisions second-guessed by an amateur.

Anne heaved a deep breath. “What?”

“Bring Natasha out next.”

Her face darkened, and I realized immediately I’d made a grave error.

“No, no, no,” I said, throwing my hands up in a cautioning gesture. “I think our unit needs her. She was working on a system to turn off these rioters.”

Still frowning, she crossed her arms. She made a small gesture indicating I should continue speaking. I explained the holographic clothing, the tampered boxes, and the rest of it.

“So,” I finished,
“that’s what Claver was up to.”

“You’re blaming everything on him? All of this?
You’re claiming that he went so far as to blast the crap out of this planet to stop the spread of the infected holo machines?”

“Pretty much, yeah. He was in the midst of a dozen scams, trying to get rich. When Turov ordered Legion Varus to replace Germanica, his timetables were screwed up. He had to rush everything to go home. His schemes came apart. Unfortunately, he just about took the planet down with him.
”

Anne stared at me distrustfully. “That’s a longer story than usual,” she said.

“Oh, come on. I didn’t make all this up.”

“Who can back up your story?”

“Natasha can, that’s who.”

Sighing, she tapped at the revival unit’s control screen until Natasha’s name came up. She selected it and engaged the unit.

“I hope you’re happy,” she said.

“I’m miserable. Hey, you’ve got enough people working in here. How about you and I get some breakfast?”

“No,” she said in a quiet voice, not looking at me.

Behind her, the two orderlies exchanged glances. They gave each other a nod. I frowned at them then returned my attention to Anne. I had to wonder why everyone in the unit acted like I was always up to something with the ladies. Sure, I’d had more than my fair share of entanglements, but lots of people did. I guess my rep had come because my affairs tended to be a little more high-profile than the norm.

“Come on,” I said to Anne. “When’s the last time you ate?”

“I haven’t yet. Not since she brought me back,” she said, jabbing a thumb at the lanky, sprawled figure of Centurion Thompson.

“If she wakes up and complains about you leaving your post, just blame me,” I suggested. “She’ll believe any story that points a finger in my direction.”

Chuckling, Anne finally gave in and accompanied me out the door.
Behind us, I noticed one of the orderlies slapping money into the other one’s hand. I’d won someone a bet.

We walked together to the wardroom. Fortunately Centurion Leeza had moved on, and we avoided the closed pub in any case. We were after food, not booze.

We ate ravenously, barely talking until we’d stuffed ourselves with real eggs, toast, hash browns and coffee.

“Wow,” I said, leaning back and sighing in satisfaction. “That’s almost enough to turn me into a smuggler like these Germanica snots.”

Anne frowned at me. “They aren’t all like that. Like Claver, I mean.”

“No? I could tell you a story or two—but I won’t. Let’s just say they like to live well while on deployment. We get remanufactured pork and beans while they eat and drink the real stuff.”

“It
is
good,” she admitted.

She shifted uncomfortably in her chair and didn’t look at me for a moment. I could tell she wanted to say something, so I stayed quiet and sipped my coffee.

When she got done staring at her plate, she finally spoke. “James? Could I ask you something real for once?”

“Sure.”

“Do you ever get serious? About women, I mean?”

“Uh…sure I do. Especially when they’re about to kill me.”

Anne nodded as if confirming a suspicion. She got up and took her tray to the recycler.

“Did I say something wrong?” I called after her.

She gave me a tired smile. “No, not at all. Thanks for the company. I’m going to check in on blue deck then hit a bunk, if you don’t mind.”

We parted ways, and I drank another cup of coffee before heading out. I found a bunk for myself and stretched out on it. This was easy to do as the ship and most of the unit modules were as empty as tombs.

Despite the caffeine in my blood, I could hardly hold my eyes open. My head found a musty pillow, and I was snoring like a baby two minutes later.

* * *

Someone woke me up hours later. This time, it was Natasha. Unlike the other women aboard, she actually seemed to be happy to see me.

“James,” she said. “I heard what you did. I can’t believe it. You’ve given us all a second chance!”

“Yeah?”

“Are you still asleep?”

In truth my mind was fuzzy. Last night’s booze hadn’t completely exited my bloodstream and neither had thoughts of Galina Turov. By the stars, I swear that woman knew things most girls her physical age hadn’t dreamed of yet. I had to remind myself that for all I knew she was actually seventy years old. It was a strange thought.

“Are you listening to me?” Natasha demanded suddenly.

“What? Yeah, sure I am. Keep talking.”

She gave me a quizzical look then let it go. “You’ve given us a chance to recover. It’s a thin one, but we’ve got to take it before they arrive.”

Natasha had my full attention after I’d absorbed that sentence. I didn’t ask who “they” were. There was only one “they” that mattered.