Page 16 of Stealing Mercury
Samantha signed into the med-bay terminal and did a remote check of the logs.
Nothing but nominal readings.
Listen to your gut, kiddo.Her father’s voice whispered in her mind as she looked at the log. He might not have been much of a dad, but he’d been a good mentor. She let her fingers fly over the screen and started a more comprehensive sensor sweep running.
As the data scrolled up the screen, she searched for something, anything, that might explain what her gut was trying to tell her. Another wave of... whatever... washed over her, just as the reading jumped out at her. The signal detection sweep showed something in the sub-audio frequency range. An intermittent, low frequency burst. It had occurred several times in the last fifteen minutes. She couldn’t have heard the infrasound, far below her hearing range, but somehow, she’d felt the vibrations carried through the ship’s skeleton.
She pulled it up as a waveform in one pane, then arranged the raw sensor data in another. If the signal had been in the audio range, she’d have said it was an amplified vocalization. An incredibly loud moan.
The disorienting feeling hit her again. She had to work to keep herself upright as she checked the read-out and tracked the signal to its origin point... in the cargo-hold.
The sound of her own boots echoed ominously as she strode down the corridor. She felt as hollow as the pale corridor sounded. She didn’t have any expectations for what she would find, save one: it wouldn’t be good. This trip seemed to be one bad thing after another. The hatch to the hold stood open and the crack of noise that shot toward her didn’t call up any immediate images. The wave of discomfort that chased after it added nothing to her understanding. Neither fit neatly into any of her boxes. Not mechanical. Not a normal ship noise. Not something against the hull.
She reached the hatch and froze. The smell of sweat and something sharper clung to the air. Drake stood in front of Mercury’s cage. His hands were on the bars, and she heard the lock engage. He’d had the cage open. Why? Then she noticed his whip hanging from the loop on his belt. The leather glistened wetly.
Her heart stopped.
Drake stepped aside, and it was so much worse than she’d expected. Mercury hung from plasmold restraints, pinning his wrists to the top of the cage. Slick, red blood coated his back. Defeat and defiance etched into the stiffness of his body. If she’d arrived a moment earlier, she’d have tried to stop Drake, but he’d already stopped and there was nothing she could do to undo it.
Drake released the restraints. Mercury dropped to his knees, then lowered his chest to the floor in silence.
Drake’s voice broke her concentration. “Don’t worry. He’ll be fine for now.” He grabbed her arm to turn her. “I know what he can handle, and I know what I’m doing.”
Because he’d done it before.
All her doubts winked out of existence. No one should have to suffer the abuse Drake had carved into Mercury’s back. No one. No human. No alien. No animal.
Resistance or no resistance, she would do whatever it took to free Mercury and the others. Whatever it took.
Chapter Five
TheDove
EarthAllianceBetaSector
2210.155
Samantha stepped into the cargo-hold an hour later than usual. She’d wanted to be doubly sure that Drake and Resler were sleeping. They’d been traveling for ten days and visiting the cargo-hold had become a nightly ritual.
Mercury and Carnage both lay quietly. Mercury turned to watch her, stretching his body as he shifted, no trace of lingering stiffness or pain in the fluid movement. He’d healed incredibly fast and with nothing more than a sealer sprayed over his shredded back. As he got to his feet, she swallowed hard. He had a way of making every move mouthwateringly sensual.
Carnage kept motionless in a tight curl in the back corner of his cage, looking impossibly small for such a big man. Diablo huffed rhythmically as he gripped a bar running across the top of his cage and pulled his body up again and again in a slow, relentless rhythm. He couldn’t get his head between the bars, so he tipped his head back, raising his chin to the bar at the top of each motion. His lean musculature stood out in sharp relief as he lowered his body, then bulged with effort as he pulled up again. Tiny beads of perspiration made his skin shimmer with the movement.
She gave herself a mental shake and looked away. She was there to feed them, not ogle them. “Good evening, gentlemen.”
Undaunted by the lack of response, she set her pack on the floor, then dug out the rations.
Since the night after Mercury broke Resler’s leg, she’d been sneaking in ration bars. With everything else she was doing, her conscience wouldn’t be pricked by breaking her word to Drake. She didn’t understand why the caged men had gone back to acting as if the cargo-hold was a words-free zone. If she was going to help them, she needed to gain their trust. At least they were eating.
She tossed an unwrapped protein bar first to Mercury, then to Diablo, who stopped his exercises to stand near the front of his cage to catch the offered meal. She still kept well out of his reach. It was better, she reasoned, not to tempt him.
“Sorry, it’s just rations again, but they’re easier to get out of the supply stores and less likely to be missed.”
Diablo’s gaze tracked her as she moved to stand in front of Carnage.
“Carnage?”
His chest rose and fell, but not even a muscle twitched in response. It felt wrong to toss his food on the floor, but she didn’t have time to consider other options. She needed to get to work.
