Neela’s eggs were fragile. Mur had made that perfectly clear the first time she caught her playing with one. As the patrol car bounced through the port gates, she couldn’t help but remember her sister’s lecture. The eggs needed steady temperatures, a completely controlled environment, no jostling. Their vehicle tilted and she slid into the Captain’s shoulder. A hangar flashed across the view screen and the car skid to a stop, sideways, in front of their bay.
Zora slid out of the Captain’s grip, but not before she caught the look on Iggy’s face. He stepped out of the cab first, and he didn’t look back. Instead, he stalked to the nearest burly official and immediately began to shout. She caught site of Murray using her no nonsense, I’m completely in charge stance on any of the port staff she could get to look in her direction. It didn’t seem to be working in her favor this time.
“I’ll find the unit leader.” The Captain stalked away from her, causing only slightly more of a ripple in the activities than Mur had.
The uniformed port staff crawled all over the bay. They poked their heads out of the Slug One’s main hatch, probed her underbelly, opened compartments and stood in huddles all around her pointing and nodding together. It was a full scale invasion. Zora cringed as four of the goons disappeared up the cargo hatch. Too many to be here for the one bottle of contraband booze under her mattress, or the half vial of Tyrillian herb in the hidden compartment—these idiots meant business.
“I have all the permits!” Murray’s voice whined into higher octaves, the ones she only touched on at her most desperate.
Both the Captain and Iggy joined her, though from different directions, and a swarm of officers surrounded them. The shouting escalated. Zora slunk against the wall, where the shadow of the overhead ramps gave her a measure of cover. She circled away from the confrontation, kept her back against something solid, and worked her way around to the open cargo doors.
It was her damned ship.
She lined up with the entrance, waited until she had a clear pathway straight into the rear of the Slug One, and then straightened her spine and smoothed the rumples out of her nightgown. The one port officer she passed didn’t even flinch. Zora smiled at him and walked up the ramp of her ship as if she owned the place, which in fact, she did.
If she’d told Mur once, she’d told her a hundred times. It was all about attitude. Still, her sister’s voice screeched from the huddle, panicky, announcing her weakness. The Captain’s boomed alongside it, and when he stopped to take a breath, she might have heard Ignatius, calmer now, level and reasoning in his most charismatic tone. Bugger all of them.
The incubators pulsed softly around the converted space. Glowing blue cases filled with Neela’s offspring lined up in neat aisles. Zora’s silver-haired brother-in-law cursed loud enough to rattle the doors and darted from one control panel to the next. She stopped her march toward the ship’s weapon stores and stared at him.
“Rook?”
“The dials!” He waved a hand at her and didn’t even look up.
“Excuse me?” She considered the guns again. After the night she’d had, a little armed violence would probably be justified.
“They messed with the dials.” This time his head snapped around. His metallic eyes narrowed and his expression shifted back to dead-pan, back to the severe, I’m-still-an-android-on-the-inside look he saved for real emergencies. “The eggs.”
“Right.” The pulsing made sense now. Zora spun on her heel and crossed back to the doors. She looked out from the top of the ramp. The huddle of morons still held their verbal sparring match, and they’d attracted most of the errant officers as an audience. Perfect. She put her hands on her hips and inhaled one deep, terrified breath before letting every ounce of irritation loose on them. “SHUT UP!”
The sound pounded off the bay walls. It bounced upward and rattled the overheads, and it turned every pair of eyes present directly to her.
“Good.” She tossed her hair over one shoulder and smiled. “Anyone here actually fancy three thousand baby space slugs running loose in the city?” The silence continued for half a breath, long enough for her to tighten the reins a little. “Because one of these jackasses,” she swept a hand in an arc that might have indicated anyone. “Has turned off the stasis controls.”
Chaos erupted, but then, she’d expected that. This time it worked in their favor as booted feet, the right booted feet, scrambled back up the ramp. Murray led them, but Ignatius managed to push past the Captain and hit the units a step behind her. They both went to work on the dials automatically, and when the Captain and a ruffled-looking port official joined them, Rook started shouting orders. Good. That should take care of the babies.
She turned to the grunts still huddling in the cargo bay. A cluster of men in uniform, confused, without anyone to tell them what to do—this, she could handle. Stepping down the ramp, Zora let her hips swing a tad more. She let her smile widen and gave them all a look that said, this is just for you. The whole mob took a step forward.
“Well, boys.” Zora wrinkled her nose and sighed softly. “Let’s talk.”
Next Episode ◦
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