The Emperor's Edge 3: Deadly Games

The Emperor's Edge 3: Chapter 17 Part 1

Basilard led the way to the laboratory from which he and Sicarius had escaped mere hours earlier. Books, Akstyr, and the athletes followed, grunting and panting as they toted the unconscious practitioners. Clunks and thumps sounded as limbs—or heads—collided with pipes and bulkheads. Despite the damage the vessel had taken, the barrier remained in place, blocking the laboratory entrance.

“Do you know how to get past?” Books asked.

Basilard stared at the eyeball-reader thoughtfully. He had no desire to try Sicarius’s method.

“Akstyr, do you know how to get past?” Books asked over his shoulder.

“That work’s beyond me,” he said.

“Can we hurry up?” a man asked at the rear. “This bloke’s stirring. I think they’re going to wake up soon.”

Basilard pointed at an unconscious woman strung between Books and Akstyr. Lift her up, pry her eyelid open, and wave her face in front of that device.

“That’ll work?” Books asked skeptically.

The alternative is to gouge her eyeball out and wave it on a stick.

“Let’s...make the first thing work,” Books said. “And please don’t tell me if you know for a fact the other method works.”

He and Akstyr jostled the woman into place. Basilard used his good arm to pry her eyelid back and held his breath. Nothing happened. The iris was rolled back in her head. Grimacing—and worried she would wake up—he used his finger to slide her eyeball downward.

The barrier winked out.

Before he could let his breath out in relief, something tinkled to the deck inside. Basilard had no idea how many of the crew had been accounted for. Not everybody, apparently.

He drew his knife and motioned for the rest of the team to wait inside the threshold.

Only tables and equipment occupied the first aisle. Basilard tiptoed toward the second and paused at a tank on the end.

In case someone waited around the corner with a pistol, he stuck his hand out as a decoy, then whipped it back. No shots fired. He listened but heard nothing. Knife in hand, he peeked around the corner....

 Only to find it empty. He ducked to see if someone might be hiding beneath the beds. Nothing. The hairs rose on the back of his neck, and some instinct told him to look up.

A pair of black boots swung toward his face.

Basilard dropped into a crouch so low, his rump smacked the deck. He bounced up instantly, whirling as a gray-haired soldier hanging from the ceiling pipes swung past him. Taloncrest. Before he could release the pipes and drop down, Basilard jammed his knife into the man’s kidney.

Taloncrest snarled as his boots hit the deck, and he whirled, a pistol in hand.

Basilard dropped again, this time hurling himself onto his back. He kicked up, sending the pistol flying with surprising ease. Taloncrest stood there, face slack, a bulky tote slung over one shoulder, papers fighting to escape the flap.

His eyes grew glazed, and he toppled forward.

Basilard scrambled backward in the tight aisle and barely avoided having the man land on top of him. A second knife protruded from his back.

Akstyr stepped forward and removed it. “You’re welcome.”

Thank you, Basilard signed.

“This goon’s waking up,” someone said.

A loud thump sounded.

“Never mind,” someone else said.

Let’s get these people strapped to the beds, Basilard signed.

Books stuck his head around the corner in time to see the message. “Do you know how to sedate them?”

Basilard pointed to one of the globes that perched beside each table. I saw it done.

“So, that’s a yes?” Books asked.

Basilard hesitated. Not really.

“This should prove interesting then.”