Galactic Treasure (Quads of Galafrax) (12 page)

“Mindless nothing, hey, so would mindless nothings overhear you telling your Piclar friends how you set up the other Ambassadors to make them look untrustworthy? Or am I stupid enough to tell the Morax how you plan to strip their asteroid so fast, they wouldn’t know until it’s too late, and you’ve sold all the
frillian
deposits off to the highest bidder?”

“Ruby, stop, now!”

She ignored fish face. “Even if the Morax try to take you to court, you have enough power to keep it tied up for years, and years?”

Fish face reached for his control for the collar on her neck, and started gurgling when it did nothing. She faced the Morax, who stared at her.

“I am sorry, Ambassador Kipkalya. I am an intelligent being, was kidnapped from my planet and forced into slavery. I have nothing to lose, and I can’t sit by and let you be taken for a ride by this lower form of swamp life, if you do, you and your people will regret it.”

Fish face grabbed a fist full of her hair, yanking her so hard, tears sprung to her eyes. “You no good little
dugngaha
!” He swiftly dragged her from the room. She struggled but fish face was too strong. He threw her onto her bed.

Fish face was panting, gurgling with rage. “I will deal with you after I fix this mess.”

He took a moment to compose himself before walking back out. “My friends, I am so sorry…” The door slid shut.

Holy moly, she was in trouble.
She had to get out. God knows what he would do to her now. She ran to the door, hoping to make a run for it, but it was locked.

Damn it. Glancing around the room she spied the com panel.
Racing over, she curled her hand into a fist and thumped on it.

“Hello, help emergency!”

“Species not recognised, enter identification code.”

“I don’t have a damn code, it’s an emergency, damn it. Can you put me through to the Demos ship?” Her men would come for her, wouldn’t they?

“Species not recognised, enter identification code.”

Damn it, no doubt fish face made sure she couldn’t use the computer thingy.

Her hands shook, knowing whatever fish face planned to do to her would not be good. She sucked in a deep breath, trying to calm her erratic pulse, as her fear made it leap. But what to do? Stand and fight or run and hide?

She looked up at the air vents above her.  Ruby snorted,
you sure can’t fit your fat arse in any air ducts. Think again.
The bathroom was open with a tub and little privacy.

“Well, looks like I’ll have to fight it out until help arrives.”

Another quick search of the quarters. What did she have to arm herself? A toothbrush and a glowing lamp.

“Yeah, that’ll get 'em, clean their teeth and brighten their day.”

The door slid open. She took a step back when fish face and his two original Piclar guards stepped in.

With a trembling hand she clutched the toothbrush. “You dare harm me and there’ll be hell to pay.”

“You think the Demos will come to your rescue, pet?”

Ruby’s jaw dropped, how the hell did he…

“You don’t think I didn’t notice, the way they looked at you? Lusting like animals in heat. They are Demos men, and will mate with anything, even sex droids. I allowed them to touch you, believing it would keep you and them placid. But I now see, it’s given you more of an ego than I suspected. They are not coming, pet, and when I’m through with your punishment, you’ll be on a transport heading for my home planet. You’ve cost me a lot of credits, and now it’s time to take it out on your flesh.”

Oh shit, this was not good.
She stepped back until she was cornered, as fish face’s guards advanced.

“You primordial, bottom feeding worm! Think you can ever tame me! I’m human and what’s more I’m a redhead! We have the worst tempers in the whole entire universe!”

The guards batted away the toothbrush and gripped her arms. She struggled and kicked out, even managed to get a good blow in before they lunged at her, pinning her against the wall.

“They’ll come for me, and when they do you’re in big shit, fish face!” Breathing hard she stilled her struggles when she realised it was useless. But her eyes grew wider when from behind fish face's back he produced a long glowing thing, which looked very much like a whip.

“My men are going to turn you into sushi and blow you bit by bit out into space!”

“Oh, I think not.” The evil menace behind his words turned her blood cold. “You’ve been very bad, my pet.
Now you must pay the price. Turn her around, hold her against the wall. I’ve always wanted to try the laser whip. Now I have the chance.”

Chapter Ten

A tremor ran down Niz’s spine.
He’d been uneasy ever since the Ambassador dismissed them for the evening. “I don’t like this.” Niz paced the bridge of their ship. “We are not there to protect her.”

“You worry too much, bro.” Zay shifted in his seat, adjusting his crotch. “Tomorrow she’ll be in our possession, I have it all plan—”

The beeping of the ships external com made Zay sit up and glance over the console. “Odd, the line is coming from the Morax’s quarters.”

Niz strode over, answering the com line.

“Fire Bond brothers, how can we help you, Ambassador?”

“My friends, it is not I who needs your help right now. I have to give thanks to the Piclar’s little human. She has rescued me from making a bad deal with Ambassador Rageelna. She is an intelligent species and should not be at the mercy of the Piclar. He was very angry with her when I left. If you care at all for the human, I recommended her immediate removal.”

“Thank you, Ambassador, we’re on our way.” Zay finished as Niz raced towards the weapons locker and punched in the code. He pocketed pulse cannons, and four blades. Damn the ice plains, he
knew
something was wrong! He’d tear the Piclar to pieces if he’d harmed her in any way.

Ignoring Zay’s shouts, Niz raced out of the bridge, through the ship to the airlock.
He heard footsteps behind him.

“Niz, halt, you will wait.” Bir put all his commanding dominance behind his tone. That wasn’t going to work this time.

“No, brother, she’s in danger. I’m not going to wait.”

“We do this together.
We are four remember, and she is ours to protect.”

Niz paused with his hand on the opening panel, turning slightly to glare at Bir. Zay was racing up the corridor and Tev not far behind, buckling weapons to his belt as he ran.

“Ready yet?” Impatience rode him.

“Yes,” Bir nodded. “Whatever it takes, we bring her back, and this time we will not be letting her go.”

Damn fucking straight.

* * * *

Zay took point charging the two Piclar guards outside the Ambassador’s quarters. Even before they could draw their weapons, he’d rendered them both unconscious.

Tev pulse blasted the quarter's locks. As the door rolled open, Bir raced inside, closely followed by Niz, Zay and Tev.

“What is the meaning of this?” Fish face rose to his feet, looking outraged. “Attacked by my own guards, how dare you!”

Niz broke off to search the rest of the quarters as the others surrounded the Piclar.

“We’re not attacking, only coming to take what belongs to us.” Bir’s tone was menacing as he towered over the Ambassador.

Zay turned to see Niz emerge from the other room, a bloodied dress clutched in his hand.
He could feel Niz’s rage. They all could.

“Where is she?
What have you done to her?” Niz strode up to the Piclar and shoved the bloodied garment into his face.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Fish face struggled in Niz’s grasp. “I’ll have you all up on charges, how dare you treat me like this!”

“You know damn well what we’re talking about. Where is Ruby?”

“My pet belongs to me.
She only got what she deserved, and has now learned her place. You’ll never have her.”

“Wrong answer, she is ours and we will not stop until we find her. Tell me where she is or Niz here will happily start cutting off fins,” Bir said as Niz pulled a long blade from his belt.

The Piclar squealed.

“Transport, put her on a transport back to Piclar.”

“Consider our contract terminated. The payment for our protection is Ruby. If you dare try to counter that, there will be no place in the galaxy you can hide from us. Zay, if you will.”

Bir and Niz stepped back allowing Zay to do what he wanted to do from the start. He swung his shoulder back, and the crunch of his fist connecting with the Piclar’s skull was deeply satisfying, along with watching fish face crumple to the floor in an unconscious heap.

“Damn that felt good.”

“Tev and Zay, get the two guards in from the corridor, and tie them up, along with the Ambassador. It’ll be a few hours before they’ll be discovered,” Bir ordered.

“I only monitored two ships leaving the station in the past few hours.” Niz re-sheathed his blade.

Bir glanced at Tev.

“I’ll have to search for engine trails, but we should be able to catch up to the transport within the hour. I made sure the engines are in top condition.”

“Good, let’s move out. We need to intercept them before they reach Piclar space, or we could have Piclar War Scuttlers to deal with.”

They followed Bir out, the determined lines of their mouths set, as they marched back to their ship. It was time to correct the mistake of letting her get out of their sights, and put her back where she belonged, among them.

* * * *

Every time she twitched or was forced to move, the resident burning pain from her back radiated out through the rest of her body. There was no relief. After she’d passed out the first time from the lash of the laser whip on her skin, fish face had injected her with something to ensure her body would stay awake, to suffer even more.

Why didn’t they come? ‘
Cuz they didn’t know, idiot
. Well, at least the pain hadn’t addled her wits. But she was on a ship headed to an alien world. Would they know, do they care?

Oh god, lost forever. A sob of despair tore through her, making her wince, as pain flared again.

Are you going to let them crush your spirit? Take away every part of you that is human? Oh hell no
. No matter what they did to her, she’d always fight. Fish face and his kind were nothing but bullies.

Once she stopped hurting so much, she’d give them what for.

The engines of the ship shuddered, and the craft jerked to a sudden stop. Had they arrived? A loud bang reverberated through the ship, and a sudden fear of the unknown ran through her. What was going on?

The three crewmembers burst through into the cargo area where she lay on a mat. They scrambled to a locker, ripping it open and grabbing what looked like strange twisted devices before
wrapping them around their webbed arms. From the trembling way they held them up and pointed them at the entrance, it was a clear indication they were up shit creek with no paddle.

Gritting her teeth she forced herself to sit up. “What’s going on?”

The three Piclars ignored her, their eyes fixed on the door. She couldn’t help but stare at it too. She jerked as the door suddenly blew off its hinges. She ducked as it narrowly missed her head, slamming into the back bulkhead with a loud
swaack!

The pain became so bad her head spun and she felt sick. Oh god. Deep thumping footsteps sounded on the metal floor. She pushed through the nauseating sensation in her stomach, as hope suddenly soared.

The sight of a large red man clothed in a tight black uniform made her grin through the pain.

“Surrender now and you won’t get hurt.” The deep commanding voice of Bir made her want to weep for joy. They hadn’t forgotten her. Muscles bulged in his arms, as he held a kick arse black glowing gun aimed at the three Piclars behind her. He stepped through the door.

“All we want is the human, understood.”

“Y… yes, take it.” The wimpy Piclars threw down their twisty guns.

Another brother stepped in behind Bir. Niz, she spotted the scar on his face. He skirted around Bir, his gaze meeting hers.

“Oh, beauty, what have they done to you?”

He must have spotted her bloodied back.

Unable to stand the pain any longer and so relieved to see them, she burst into tears. “Zay, bring me my med pack right now.
Our
sheraz
has been hurt, badly."

He soothed a hand over her face. “Keep still, Ruby, we’ll have you feeling better in no time.”

“F… Fish face did it…” she choked. “W… when I r… ruined his d…deal.”

“Shhh, don’t worry, I’m so sorry we didn’t come for you sooner.” Niz’s tone was calm and soothing, even if her back was screaming.

“H…he gave me s… something… keep me awake, t… to feel more p…pain.”