Chapter 179: What They Deserved
I watched the ship in front of me explode, sending out shock waves to the Uugazts pirate ships that caused them to bump and bob like boats in the ocean. They had attempted to hail me several times, but I continued to ignore them. Unless they wanted a slow, painful death, it would be better not to speak to me right now.
I was a little too raw.
"I’m going to go take a bath and then head to bed," I said, not turning my gaze away from the screen in front of me. Every so often, I could see a Sisalik body floating around, their skin saving them from the worst of the explosion.
Maybe I should have made sure that they were all dead before I had them sucked out of one of the launch bays, but I wasn’t feeling all that merciful right now. Instead, I had given those left alive, the ones with the personal breathing devices, a choice... get to the main launch bay now, or I would kill them slowly and painfully.
I think a lot of them had assumed that since I had said launch bay, there would have been a ship in there waiting for them. I mean, there was a ship in there, but it was locked up tight. Something that took them more than a few tries to learn.
Once Jun Li had confirmed that there were no more heat signatures besides my guys outside of the bay, I ordered him to open the outside door, allowing the vacuum of space to take them to their final destination. Let’s see how well those personal breathing devices served them now.
Letting out a snort, I turned around and left the bridge, not caring about what was going on in the guys’ minds. I was more than a little peopled out and still feeling pretty stabby. Not a good combination for anyone, really.
Hopefully, a hot bath and a book would be just what I needed.
Something told me meeting with the Queen of Assassins feeling stabby was not the best way to approach the situation. I needed her, them, on my side, not adding me to their list.
-----
"What do you mean that all the feeds have been erased?!?" screamed Pippa, getting up from her seat on the couch and pacing back and forth. "I need the feeds for the next step; why don’t you have them?"
"I am sorry," said Stargazer, more than a little stressed. If she was triggered too much, she might just decide to smash his crystal drive instead of whatever else was in her hand.
"Well, sorry, doesn’t really fix this, now does it?" she snarled, turning around to stare into the lens inside the room.
"There is nothing that I could do. As soon as we opened the doors, L11042 realized that someone was in the system and shut down everything," explained Stargazer, not knowing what to do. She had his crystal gripped in her fist and was rubbing it back and forth on the chain.
Pippa froze as soon as the words had come out of his mouth. "Are you telling me that this is my fault? That if I hadn’t told you to open the door, then none of this would have happened, and we would have the video feed that I needed. Is that what you are telling me? That it is my fault?"
"No! Of course not!" stuttered Stargazer, trying to think of some way to rectify the situation and get her to calm down.
"I didn’t think so," sneered the human as she turned around and left the rec room. "Find me the video of her being on that ship. And if you can’t find it... create it. I’ll give you two hours."
Understanding his assignment, Stargazer turned his attention to where he had stored the feeds from the Sisalik Research vessel before everything was cut off. He understood that L11042 had let him keep one of the videos for some reason, but for the life of him, he couldn’t figure out why.
He studied the feed coming from an entertainment room. He watched as the door opened, but nothing seemed to have walked inside.
Saalistaja.
The chair in front of one of the monitors moved, and the monitor turned on. Stargazer watched as a bright blue drive seemed to float over and then inserted into the unit. He zoomed in on the blue crystal drive, so much like his own and yet so different.
He continued to stare at the drive, not paying attention to the passing of time. In fact, the drive was never removed, not even up to the point of explosion.
What did that mean? Was L11042 dead? The only way that his brother would be able to influence the ship the way he did was if he was uploaded into the system. That meant that the crystal drive belonged to him. And yet, he never insisted that the Saalistaja remove him? He wanted death?
Stargazer let out a huff of sarcastic laughter. His brother had a human female of his own to contend with; he probably chose death simply to get out. He only wished that he was strong enough to make that choice, too.
Pausing for a moment, Stargazer mourned the death of a brother he never really got to know.
However, after the moment had passed, he quickly got back to work. Pippa needed a video of the human female on the ship and then the ship blowing up. And if that were what she needed, then Stargazer would make damn sure that was what she got.
Pulling up the feed from their previous interactions with the female pet, he quickly created a clip of her strolling through the halls of The Noronha right before it blew up. He made sure that his work was flawless so that no one else would be able to tell that this was not the real thing.
----
"Are you okay?" I asked Jun Li after soaking an hour in the bathtub I had imported from Earth. I had no idea how Jun Li managed to install it in my private quarters, but it was definitely a godsend on days like today.
I hadn’t heard from him since we left the ship, but that wasn’t unusual. He was probably busy organizing and storing all of the loot that we had gotten from the ship.
Just like I had assumed, there was no sound out from the speakers in my room.
"When you aren’t too busy, let me know so that I can discuss the next phase of my plan with you," I continued as I dried myself off. "We need to get in contact with the Hive, meet up with Midnight’s ship, hunt down Sha Shou, and try not to get killed in the process."
There was a lot of crap to be done and not enough time to do it. I just hoped that the Alliance would leave me alone long enough to get it done. These bullshit calls for help were really starting to get on my nerved. Next time, I was more likely to shoot first and ask questions later.
My mind quickly turned to the dying girl.
No, shooting first would not work. If they were responsible for doing that to more humans, then they wouldn’t get such a quick and painless death. Might as well let them know exactly what to expect when they try to hunt us down.
Revenge might be a dish best served cold... but I also believed in brutal retribution.
"I’m off to bed. I’ll talk to you in the morning," I continued, partly talking to Jun Li and partly talking to myself.
"Goodnight."
----
Ye’tab walked back alone to the quarters he had taken as his own. Each one of the males had taken a separate space on the same level as their mate. They wanted to give her time alone, but not so much that they couldn’t respond the moment they were needed.
He waved his hand over the side of the door frame and then almost walked into the closed door. Once again, he waved his hand, expecting the door to open automatically. Usually, he didn’t even have to go this far; Jun Li would just have the hatch open as soon as he neared it.
Bemused, Ye’tab turned his attention to the electronic lock. Taking out a cord from his wrist unit, he inserted it into the bottom of the touch screen. Manually unlocking the door, he finally managed to step inside of his room.
Disengaging his armor, he walked straight into the cleaning facility and into the shower. After seeing just what was done to that human cub, he was worried that he might never feel clean again. What type of sick, perverted male would think that that was acceptable simply because she had so many viable eggs?
But his mate was right. There wouldn’t be many species too worried about the cost to a lesser species as long as they were able to use them to procreate at the end of the day.
He grunted and shook his head, the hot water streaming down his dreads. Maybe there was a reason why so many species were dying off.
Maybe it was nothing more than what they deserved.
