A guard moved in and Fain turned to catch his hand and disarm him.
More guards were rushing into the room.
Remembering Venik's orders for them to shoot him if he resisted them, Galene panicked. Before she could stop herself or rethink it, she ran forward.
"Fain?"
He swung around with a punch for her throat. She moved to block it. But less than a millimeter from contact, he froze as he realized she wasn't his enemy.
His breathing ragged, he stared down at her. Time froze as the absolute power and beauty of him hit her as hard as that blow would have had he not stopped it.
And it was almost as debilitating.
He blinked twice before he drew her in for the hottest kiss she'd ever tasted. His arms trembling, he lifted her from her feet and held her against his chest.
Then he carried her to Talyn and set her down. "Watch your mother. Keep her by your side."
She scowled as he lowered his head like a fierce predator and stalked the first Tavali he'd slammed into the wall. He grabbed the male by his shirt and hauled him to his feet.
"Where is it?" Fain demanded in a fierce, deadly growl.
The male wheezed and coughed.
"Answer me or so help me gods, I'm pulling your entrails out through your nostrils and choking you with them."
With a calmness that was astounding, Ryn walked up to Fain. "Um, Commander? I hate to intrude on this private beat-down you're having with your friend here, but before the Hadean Corps shoots you dead for it, might I inquire as to the source of this violent rage session you're having?"
"Sure," Fain said in the same mocking therapist tone as he held the man against the wall with one bloody fist. "I found the bastard rat who set the charge. And there are two more rigged to go off that he planted."
The color drained from Ryn's face. "Where? When?"
"What I'm trying to find out. Wanna help me beat the shit out of him now?"
Ryn drew his blaster and held it under the Tavali's throat. "Fuck yeah, I do. Where is it?"
"Up your ass." Laughing, he bit down hard.
Ryn cursed and dropped his blaster, then pried his jaw apart and tried to swipe something out of his mouth. "Suicide cap!"
The Tavali began convulsing.
Galene stepped forward with Talyn. "I need water. Fast. Step aside."
Ryn frowned at her.
"She's a doctor," Fain explained.
Ryn slung the Tavali at her and called out orders for them to assist her.
Fain stood back and watched as Galene calmly pulled out the medpack from the cell's wall unit, and went to work on the human with Talyn's assistance. Since Andarions and humans had a long-standing history of war between them, part of Andarion medical training was human anatomy. How to heal them.
How to kill them.
Neither he nor Ryn spoke while they watched Galene and Talyn do their best to purge enough poison from the human to keep him alive.
A Tavali med unit showed up a few minutes later.
Fain stopped them from replacing Galene and Talyn.
Ryn scowled at him. "What are you doing?"
"We don't know who's working with him. I'm not about to put him in the hands of a Tavali coconspirator who could kill him off before we get what we need out of him. Are you?"
Ryn turned toward the med team. "Get them out of here. Leave the gurney and gear."
"Are you serious?" The medtech gaped at them.
"Go! They need you in the infirmary to help with the wounded there. We're good here."
Grumbling under their breaths, they obeyed.
Fain took their gear over to Galene.
After a few minutes, Galene sat back on her heels and sighed. "I've got him stabilized, but I doubt he'll last long. It was keratol he ingested."
Fain cursed again at the fast-acting poison that shut down organs and quickly brought on death. "Will we be able to interrogate him?"
"No. But if we can keep him on life support until Nero gets here, he might be able to use his powers to get what we need. It's the best we can hope for."
Ryn pulled his blaster out and aimed it for the Tavali's head.
"Whoa!" Fain caught his hand before he pulled the trigger. "What are you doing?"
"Making myself feel better. Not productive, I know. But a little bloody violence goes a long way in consoling my soul."
"You know, I don't think it's your mother keeping you single, buddy. But this," Fain took the blaster from his hand and held it up to his gaze, "might be the actual reason."
The color faded from his face. "My mother..."
"What?"
"That's where one of the bombs is. I know it!"
"What?" Fain repeated.
Ryn looked down at Talyn, who was still on the ground next to the Tavali. "We killed Parisa ... me and Talyn. Nyran wants revenge on us. He wants to kill my brother and mother."
"He's right. That would make total sense. She's the Lady Tavali. The symbol of your Nations and the head of them all. It would be like taking down the entire War Hauk family on Andaria. It would divide the Tavali clans into war against each other, and personally devastate Ryn."
Pulling out his link, Ryn called his mother.
She didn't answer.
Ryn bit his lip. "She never rolls my calls.... Something's happened to her. Something bad." His breathing ragged, he took off at a dead run.
CHAPTER 15
Fain was barely one step behind Ryn as he traced his mother's location through her link to where she was in the station. According to their intel, she should be in her apartment.
By the time they reached her quarters, they were both sweating. Ryn opened the door and froze so fast that Fain almost slammed into him.
Galene actually did collide with Fain's back. Then gasped as she saw what had brought them to such an abrupt stop.
Hermione Dane stood on the opposite side of the room, stock-still. Brax Venik sat in a nearby chair and was just as uncomfortably posed as she was.
"Don't move," Hermione breathed slowly and without moving her jaw. "There's a bomb." She cut her eyes toward the device that was wired beneath the table between them. "We tripped it and we're not sure what detonates it. But it hasn't gone off yet."
Fain nudged Galene back. "Call Syn and get him here stat. Tell Talyn to stay with our traitor. I don't want him near this."
"Agreed." She moved slowly and carefully back into the hallway to make the calls.
Fain placed his hands on Ryn's shoulders to keep him from doing something stupid to save his mother. "Can you call Kere?" Fain used Darling's Sentella code name in case someone was listening in, hoping that if they were, they wouldn't know Kere and Darling Cruel were the same person. Since Ryn's little brother Darling was the most skilled explosives engineer in the Nine Worlds, he was their best bet on saving Hermione's life.
"Already coded. Waiting for him ... Hey, Kere. I have a situation here." Ryn slowly pressed his ear to conference the call to Fain's link, too. "Fain and I are standing in front of an IED that is about to blow my mom to the gods. We need your help."
Darling cursed in their ears. "I need eyes on it."
"Yeah, we're not sure ... hang on. Mom, what the hell are you doing!"
Hermione had sunk to her knees and was slowly and very carefully making her way toward the device with her own link. "He'll need visuals. I'm getting them for you. Conference my link in with his call."
"Oh my God, Mom! Stop moving! We don't know what we're dealing with yet. If you get killed, I'm going to strangle you!"
"And if you don't get behind a blast shield and into a hardsuit, I'm going to bust your Canting down to slag."
"All right, everyone! Let's calm down and regroup." Fain took a deep breath as he struggled with his own panic over the escalating situation. "How about we all discuss anything else we want to do before we do it? Huh? This is the time to work together, not have a free-for-all that could get everyone killed."
Hermione nodded
in agreement. "Fine. My link's on. Conference and I'll pull back to wait. I won't do anything else. Promise."
Ryn concurred.
Darling took a second to look the device over. "All right. There's bad news, and some serious suck-the-joy-out-of-your-life news. Where's Hauk?"
"I'm right here."
"Not you, Fain. My wingman."
"He's in the hallway. You know how he is about explosives."
"Yeah, I do, which is why I asked. Send him on a bullshit and long errand across the station. We don't want Grandma freaking out on us. Now where's Mari?"
"With Nyk, I think. Or with Saf. I'm not exactly sure, but he's not here."
"Well, that sucks." Darling let out a tired sigh. "All right, Fain. Do you share Dancer's aversion to explosives?"
"Only if they blow up in my face."
"That's what we're trying to avoid." Darling paused a few seconds before he spoke again. "I need you in a hardsuit, with a blast box. Tell Syn to set the onsite dampners for that room to the sequence I'm sending to his link right now. You need a diffuser kit from him and he will have to be in the command center working in tandem with you to disarm it. If you two cannot work as a single unit and in the right order, we're all going to have a bad day."
"What can I do?" Ryn asked.
"Stay out of this. And don't argue. I know you're the best in a fight, but not when it comes to your mother. I need a clear head and not an idiot in the way. You want her out of there. Stay in the back and let us do our job."
"I'm taking advice on this from you?"
"Exactly. I'm speaking from experience, as I was the moron who got all of us into war because I went in to save my wife and I couldn't keep my mouth shut. Had I let all of you do your jobs and stayed home, you wouldn't be plotting my death right now. So, please, Ryn. I love Mama Dane, too. She's the only real mother I ever knew. So let me save her. I'm as upset by this as you are, and hanging on by a thread. We can only afford for one of us to be hysterical right now and I'm claiming it."
Tears glistened in Ryn's eyes as he looked at his mother, who gave him a sad smile.
"Danes don't flinch, baby. We stand and fight. They're not going to get me. Not today. Don't you worry."
He nodded. "Love you, Mama."
"Love you, too, Trey-vey."
Syn joined them and handed Fain a hardsuit. "Hey, I got the note from Kere that said you were in need of this." He glanced past him to see Hermione and Venik inside. "How you doing in there, Lady Tavali?"
"Pissed off and wanting to taste the blood of my enemies who dared to attack me here in my own space."
"Working on delivering that to you. Venik, what about you?"
"Get me out of here so that I can give her the head and throat of whoever did this."
"From what I heard, Fain beat you to that. It's why he's here." Syn set the blast box at Fain's feet, along with the diffuser kit. "You know how to use any of this?"
"Not as good at it as you or Kere, but I've had a few training courses."
"You pass any?"
"A couple."
Syn turned positively green. "Oh, goodie. Ryn, you might stand back ... a lot. We're about to have Explosives Amateur Hour. My favorite form of entertainment ... when I'm watching from far, far away."
After making an obscene gesture at the Ritadarion, Fain turned to give Syn his back so that he could fasten the couplings for the blast armor.
Fain glared at his brother while Syn suited him up. "Dancer, listen to me. I want you and Galene to round up your wife and kids, Talyn and Felicia, and Vega and War. And grab Gavarian and Brach, too. Get everyone to my ship and secure them there until this is over. I'm not playing this shit anymore. You'll all be secure there and no one will be able to touch you."
"That's against Tavali Code," Venik snarled.
"Kiss my hairy ass, Ven." Fain kept his gaze locked on Dancer's. "You already have access and clearance to board. Tell Storm to follow Level Two protocols. She'll lead you through how to scan everyone in for clearance. There's plenty of crew quarters for everyone. And supplies."
"I'm not leaving you to face this alone."
"You're less than useless with explosives, and you know it."
"You have the same trauma I do ... for the same reasons."
Fain winced as he tried not to think about either of their childhoods. "Yeah, but I'm not the one who fell off the side of a mountain after a charge detonated in my face." He jerked his chin toward the end of the hallway. "Go on, Dance. You've already watched one brother die in front of you. I don't want to be your next nightmare. You have a baby on the way. Children to protect. I need you to keep them and my family safe. For me, little brother."
Instead of leaving, Dancer moved forward and jerked him into a tight hug. "You die on me and I'm following you into hell to beat your ass. You hear me?"
"I hear you."
Dancer yanked his hair before he let go and stepped back. "I mean it, Fain. Don't make me have to commit a mortal sin to damn myself to come after you."
"Go on." Fain playfully pushed him away. "You're annoying me. Get to the others."
Dancer took three steps before he turned to look back. Tears glistened in his eyes.
I love you, too, brother. Neither of them had to say it out loud.
Syn clapped him on the arm. "All right. You're in." He handed Fain the helmet. "Mic check."
Fain put it on and sealed himself in, then checked to make sure the audio and visuals were transmitting. "Check?"
"You there, Kere?"
"I'm here. We're ready as soon as you're in the commcen."
Syn inclined his head to Fain. "Good luck. I'm dragging Ryn with me so that he can have his nervous breakdown in a less distracting area."
As Fain reached for the box and kit, he realized that Galene had vanished while he'd been suiting up. That she hadn't even bothered to say good-bye to him.
Or good luck.
It stung a lot deeper than it should have that she'd abandoned him so quickly. For all he knew, he could be dead in the next few minutes. It was actually a good bet. And she hadn't even cared enough to wish him luck.
Don't think about it.
That was easier said than done.
"Fain? You with me?"
"Yeah, sorry. I was distracted."
"Um, okay, buddy. A bit of advice? Let's not get distracted while handling something designed to explode. Wanna stay focused. Trust me, your odds of survival go up exponentially that way."
"Titana tu, giakon."
"Yeah, keep it in your pants, Andarion. You're not pretty enough for my tastes. Now make your way to the device and try not to bump it or the table. I want you to slide up under it, slow and easy, with as little motion as possible."
Fain was barely under the table when Syn's voice returned to his ear.
"I'm tapped into the system, Kere. I've given you full access."
"Beautiful. Fain, freeze."
He heard Darling tapping frantically.
"Syn, power up their cross shields with their interior routers for me."
"Done."
"Lights will dim on my mark. No one panic, but Fain, tell Mama Dane and Venik to run for the door when they do."
"Lady Tavali. Ven. The lights are about to go dim. When they do, you need to rush from the room." Then, he counted down with Darling. "Three. Two. One. Go!"
The lights dimmed.
Both ran past him, into the hallway.
"Are they clear?" Darling asked.
"Think so."
"All right, you ready for this?"
"Yeah, lead me through it."
Darling brought the lights back up. "Gently pull the cover off and expose the belly of the beast."
Fain did as he said and grimaced at the mass of gnarled wires that were wrapped around explosive mineral clay. Though the clay was no bigger than his fist, it was enough to take out this entire wing of the station. "Hey, Syn? You need to tell Venik to evacuate the entire southern quadrant."
/> "On it."
Darling calmly continued talking Fain through the disarming sequence. "All right, Fain. What I need you to do now is count the third brighter orange wire from the left and isolate it."
Fain hesitated. "Brighter?"
"Yeah. See it?"
He blinked as he stared at all the wires in his hand. Orange ...
"It's this one, keramon."
Fain went cold at the sound of the sweetest voice in the Nine Worlds as a warm body slid up next to him. "What are you doing here?"
"I had a feeling you didn't tell them that the reason you never passed those diffusing classes was because you were partially color-blind."
Darling cursed in his ear. "Is she serious? Are you serious? You can't see a full color spectrum and you're handling a minsid wired explosive? Hauk? Are you out of your Andarion mind?"
"Yes. When he was a boy, he got into a fight with Keris and his brother injured his retina and did a significant amount of damage that left Fain with dichromatism." She covered his hand with hers and moved it to one of the wires. "This is the third brighter orange one."
Grateful for her help, Fain cut it while he ignored Darling's insults for him and his parentage that continued without interruption through his link. "You need to go to my ship with Dancer where it's safe."
"I'm right where I belong. You need someone here with smaller hands, who is used to handling delicate instruments. I'm a trained surgeon, with a full range of color vision. I've got this."
"Stormy--"
"Strong alone. Stronger together." She took his hand in hers and removed his glove. Her gaze paralyzed him as she took the ring from his finger. Then she pulled off her glove and placed the ring where it had once rested on her hand. "I have loved you since the moment I met you as a child. You are my life, Fain Batur. If you die here today, then you're taking me with you. I don't want to live another moment of this life without you in it."
Love for her choked him as Darling finally shut up. By naming him like that, Galene was claiming him as her husband, before witnesses. According to Andarion law, that would legally bind them as effectively as a unification ceremony.
He touched his bare hand to hers. "And you are the air I breathe, Galene Hauk. I shall never allow harm to come to you."
Darling let out an irritated sigh. "Aw, that's all sweet and moving, but could we please focus on the bomb that's about to detonate in your faces?"
"Yeah, waiting on you to tell us what to do, Kere. What's taking you so long?"
He broke off into a round of Caronese Fain was glad he couldn't understand, otherwise he might have ended the emperor's lineage. "Galene, shine the light and follow this sequence. Dark blue, light blue, green, yellow, light orange, red, red, purple."