The scream of laser fire erupted in a corridor ahead of her.
Ankari cursed and broke into a run. She forced herself to pause at an intersection and look both ways before bursting through it. She spotted a couple more men in towels as they ducked into a doorway, but they were not armed.
As she raced for the next intersection, more lasers fired. This time, when she popped her head around the corner, she saw Viktor and three men in nondescript black clothing. He was slamming one into a wall while dodging laser fire from another. Before she could more fully process the situation, movement from the other direction drew her eye.
A fourth black-clad man was racing down the corridor toward the fray, a compact dark gray item in his hand. A knife? He must have intended to sprint through the intersection, but he faltered when he glimpsed Ankari.
She reacted more quickly than he, lashing out with a straight kick. The man flung an arm up to protect his face, but that had not been her target. The hard toe of her boot struck his hand, and the dark item flew from his fingers. It clanked against the wall and clattered to the floor.
The startled man reached for his belt—he must have a weapon inside his jacket—but Ankari didn’t set her foot down. After finishing the first kick, she pivoted on her standing leg, and rammed a side kick into his waist. He stumbled against the wall.
He had more than fifty pounds and six inches of height on her, so Ankari had to press the advantage, to keep attacking before he had a chance to recover and employ his weight and strength against her. She launched her next kick into the side of his knee. He gasped, the leg collapsing beneath him. Doubting that would put him out of the fight—especially if he carried a pistol—she grabbed his shoulder and rammed her palm into his nose. Cartilage crunched, and she grimaced, but he pitched forward, grasping at his face. Since he was dazed, she had the opportunity to squat and pat him down for weapons.
She found his pistol, made sure he carried nothing else dangerous, then reached for the dark item on the floor. As she did so, she checked in the direction of Viktor’s fight to see if he needed help. She did not know if these people were Fleet or hired thugs, but she would not hesitate to shoot their kneecaps off if they were trying to kill him.
But Viktor was watching her from a few feet away, not so much as a scratch on his face. The three men lay unconscious behind him, stacked in a pile against one wall like storage crates. Had he already searched them? That had been quick.
“Is it sadistic that I enjoy watching you kick people?” Viktor asked through slitted eyes, unconcerned that thugs had been trying to shoot him seconds earlier.
“Probably, but I don’t think compassion is in the mercenary personality description.”
“Hm.” His lips twisted. Ruefully?
Maybe Ankari should not have made the joke. One of the things that had first attracted her to him was his noble streak. Most people would have turned in a trio of women with an extravagant bounty on their heads, no questions asked, but once he had learned the truth, that they were not criminals, he had instead risked everything to help them.
She stood up and squeezed his arm. “If it makes you feel better, I also like watching you beating up opponents. In fact, it’s a shame that you finished so quickly.” She tilted her chin toward the heap of men. “I didn’t get an opportunity to admire your brawny grace.”
He grunted, but the noise sounded vaguely appeased.
“Is that for me?” Viktor pointed at the item she had picked up. It wasn’t a knife, but a compact, military-issue medical injector.
“In every sense of the word, I suspect.” Ankari dropped it into his hand.
Viktor flipped open the end and checked the capsules inside. “They’re all the same. Brynarksarium. The drug the Fleet uses to lower a man’s barriers and make him amenable to answering questions. Truth serum, in essence.” He grimaced. “A counselor stuck this into me a couple of times when I was in the Fleet. It’s effective.”
Ankari tightened her grip on his arm, hoping he found the gesture supportive. “Are they the only ones that use it?”
“No, but this came out of a Fleet dispensary.” Viktor held up one of the capsules, so she could see the tiny print on the side. “I recognize the label and their nomenclature.” He replaced the capsule and slipped the injector into his pocket, a grim expression on his face, like he might be thinking of using it on someone.
“What truths do you know that the military is interested in?” Ankari wondered.
He knew a lot of the details of
her
business, of course, and it wouldn’t surprise her to learn that the Fleet might be interested in their work. After all, Lauren had published a paper about how implanting humans with the same intestinal microbiota that ancient aliens had housed might create healthier, stronger, and longer-living humans. But Lauren would be the one they would want to inject with a truth serum for details about that, and she would be a far easier target to get close to than Viktor. No, this time, Ankari’s business should not be at the center of the trouble.
“More than you might think,” Viktor said, but he did not elaborate. He patted the pocket where he had stored the injector. “Let’s visit Sherkov in the gym.”
“Shall we split up again? I’m assuming he has ambushes waiting along all of the possible entrance routes, since we came down the least obvious one.”
“Either that, or he knew I’d be suspicious and come in the back door.”
Viktor waved for her to walk with him, at his side. He probably could have handled that fourth man as easily as he had the other three, so Ankari admitted she was more moral support than an ally he could not do without. She did not mind though. So long as he found her kicks sexy.
He led them through the back door into the gym, past saunas and steam rooms with partially clad men and women ambling out amid clouds of mist. Nobody else attacked them, though an attractive lady in nothing but a towel batted her eyelashes at Viktor and gave him a long, speculative perusal as he walked past. Ankari glared at her, but did not comment. Viktor, wearing a determined expression, did not acknowledge the woman.
He and Ankari walked through a busy weight room and into a dance studio covered with mats. The bars and the mirrors made Ankari think more of ballet than judo, but a pair of men in gis were entwined on the floor.
A burst of movement came from the wall beside the doorway. A shirtless man in white gi trousers leaped at Viktor, fully willing to go
through
Ankari to get to him. She skittered back an instant before she would have taken an elbow in the face.
From the doorway, she crouched, whipping up her pistol, not certain whether this was another ambush or the unsporting start of a wrestling match. Viktor had turned instantly to meet his opponent, whose limbs were a blur as he lashed out. The thuds of flesh sounded with the rapidity of old-fashioned machine-gun fire as Viktor blocked a hail of blows. Arms and legs moved so quickly that Ankari struggled to follow the flow of the fight—or tell who was winning. What she
could
tell was that this was not the mercenary captain she had seen in the mechanics’ shop. He was younger, with darker skin and black hair in a braid that danced like an agitated snake on his back as he fought.
Ankari scanned the rest of the gym. The two men who had been grappling had stopped, turning toward the battle just inside the doorway. She spotted one more figure leaning against the wall in the corner, his arms folded over his chest, a laser pistol resting lightly in his grip and pointed at the floor near the combatants.
That
was the mercenary captain. Sherkov. He flicked his gaze toward her, but returned his attention to the fight. She could not tell if he was irritated or entertained. If he’d had this man ready to fight, he must have expected Viktor would get past his ambushes.
As the thuds and slaps of flesh meeting flesh continued, Ankari fingered the trigger of her pistol, letting the muzzle point toward the floor near Sherkov. One of the men watching from the middle of the room frowned at her, but he did not say anything. Was he with Sherkov? Or maybe these were the security men she had theorized might be here.
Though Ankari was determined to watch Sherkov and the pair of fighters, so she could protect Viktor if someone raised a weapon greater than a fist, she found her eyes drawn to the battle. She had watched him spar with the men on the ship numerous times, but with the intensive training he had received during his years in Crimson Ops, he usually made short work of his opponents, with a few exceptions. There was Sergei, the trained assassin, and a couple of combat specialists who had also come out of the elite forces, but Viktor had speed, strength, and experience that had always let him come out on top, at least when she was watching. This opponent was not quite as brawny as Viktor, but he had the speed and grace of a man who had been training at martial arts since he was old enough to walk. He also had to be at least ten years younger than Viktor.
Viktor deflected everything the newcomer threw at him, but when he went on the offensive, his own strikes were also deflected. The flurry of blows was so swift that Ankari could not imagine blocking them, or even tracking them with the eye. These men moved on instinct, anticipating each other’s moves three attacks before they were made.
A successful leg sweep surprised Ankari, and Viktor fell to the ground for the first time, landing hard on his back. Usually, he would have rolled to his feet before an opponent could take advantage of his vulnerability, but his head thudded against the mat. His opponent’s eyes widened with the realization that victory might be his, and he dropped down with the speed of a viper, his elbow aiming for Viktor’s solar plexus. Ankari stepped forward, turning the pistol toward the man, but she hesitated. Aside from that surprise attack in the beginning, it had been a fair battle. She couldn’t shoot someone over a sparring match, not unless the man pulled out a knife or made it clear he would kill Viktor.
But Viktor was not defeated, after all. Impossibly, he caught that descending elbow at the same time as he surged upward, thrusting the heel of his other hand into his opponent’s chest. The blow landed with the authority of a wrecking ball.
A ploy, Ankari realized. The fall had been a ploy.
Bone crunched, and air flew from the younger man’s lungs with a strangled whoosh. He might have been flung several feet, but Viktor gripped his arm, keeping him close. His legs scissored, and between one blink and the next, Viktor rolled atop his opponent. He smashed the man’s face into the mat, even as he twisted his arms behind his back, using his bodyweight to make the hold impossible to escape. For a few seconds, his opponent struggled to escape, trying to buck Viktor from his back, but pain contorted his face—that blow must have hurt. Ankari would be surprised if he did not need medical attention. Viktor only tightened his hold. The man’s face flushed so red, it looked like his head might burst open from the pressure.
“Do you yield?” Viktor asked calmly. Though he spoke to his opponent, he watched Sherkov, having clearly registered his presence sometime during the fight. His gaze flicked toward the other two men, too, letting them know he was aware of them.
But they were not doing anything threatening. Indeed, one clapped and nodded with approval.
“Yield,” the red-faced man whispered. Blood dribbled from a split lip and dripped onto the mat. Viktor had received more than a few injuries, too—his left eye was already swelling shut.
Viktor leaned back, letting his opponent rise, though he kept his guard up as he did so. Wincing, the man rose to his feet, clasping a hand to his solar plexus. He straightened, clearly struggling to maintain his dignity as he faced Viktor and bowed, his single braid slumping over his shoulder. As far as Ankari knew, Viktor had been trained to kill, his instructors drawing on a variety of different armed and unarmed combat techniques, so she did not know if bowing was a part of his repertoire, but in this instance, he returned the gesture.
His opponent walked over to Sherkov, his head drooping, more in apology than a bow. “I did my best, Captain.”
“Hit the shower, Na,” Sherkov said, glaring past his man’s shoulder toward Viktor.
The two men who had been watching walked through the doorway ahead of Na, and Ankari moved to the side to let them pass. Sherkov’s lips thinned.
“Are you next?” Viktor asked, his voice cold with menace.
His burgeoning bruises only added to that menace, and Ankari was glad
she
was not the recipient of his glare. Later, he might admit that he had relished the battle, but he would not let Sherkov know that.
“Not me, Mandrake,” Sherkov said. “I figured you would want a true challenge. That’s why I brought Na.” He continued to stand against the wall, his shoulder brushing it, but he edged toward the door.
“What I want is to know why you’re hounding me.”
Sherkov hitched a shoulder and took a couple more steps toward the door. “Money to be made.”
“Are you done?” Viktor asked. He had not yet moved to head off Sherkov, but his eyes closed to slits.
Still standing by the doorway, Ankari tried to draw his attention, wondering if Viktor wanted her to stop Sherkov or step aside to let him go.
“Probably,” Sherkov said, taking a couple more steps, his focus never leaving Viktor. Did he see her? Did he not consider her a threat?
When Viktor did not move, Sherkov strode toward the door, his grip tight around his pistol. Ankari shifted her weight, thinking of stopping him with a kick to the knee, but Viktor sprang, moving so quickly, she almost didn’t register it until he was on top of Sherkov.
Sherkov jerked his pistol up, but Viktor knocked it aside with so much force that the other captain’s hand cracked against the wall like a hammer striking, and he gasped, the weapon falling from his grip. Viktor spun him into the wall, smashing his face against the unyielding metal. He tried to struggle, to push away, but he had even less luck escaping than the martial arts practitioner had.
“Henry,” Sherkov called. “Sebastian?”