Orion of Dethocoles strode to the bridge as quickly as he could without breaking into a run. Truok, the thug following him, would think it odd if he appeared overly eager to see the captain. Nobody was eager to see the captain. Ever. Of course, Orion didn’t care one drachma what the head slaver wanted. He just wanted to return to the brig so he could keep the horny bastards on this ship from ravaging those women.

Where the hells was his brother, anyway? The slaver ship had cleared the planet’s orbit, and its inhabitants didn’t seem to have any spacecraft that they needed to worry about. Nothing but satellites and a primitive space station orbited the remote blue and green planet. Gaia, if the opportunistic slavers aboard this ship were to be believed. Orion didn’t believe that, not after mankind had spent centuries looking for Gaia, the place that all humans had supposedly come from more than two millennia ago. However, the newly discovered planet, whatever it was, was ridiculously populated, and the captain had just proven its people were easy prey.

Oh, some of the women had fought valiantly to keep from being captured—the one with the blue-tipped black hair had almost gotten away from them—but the slavers had captured dozens and slipped away without the planet’s military or law enforcers any the wiser. The captain could have stolen hundreds if his ship had the room and supplies to feed that many for the trip through the gates to Zi’i space. Once the word got out among slavers about how easy the pickings were on this planet…

Orion shook his head and walked onto the bridge, ignoring the slavering growl of the svenkar that always lay, sat, or stood at the side of the captain’s chair. Orion had seen him order it to kill a prisoner, and it sickened him. There were svenkars on his brother’s ship, but Star Guardian trainers used them to hunt down criminals, not torment and kill innocent people.

“Orion,” Cutty, the one-eyed captain said, turning in his seat. He slung a leg up over the arm and smiled lazily, displaying a row of silver and gold teeth.

Orion had no idea if he’d had his regular ones capped or if someone had knocked the originals out in a fight. In the three weeks Orion had been aboard the ship, he’d never cared enough to ask. Of course, the captain rarely called him up for private chats. Orion would have been more worried about this if he hadn’t been busy worrying about those women. When Captain Cutty had said he was going to capture some humans to sell to the Zi’i, Orion had imagined it being men. The Zi’i were infamous for the deadly games they liked to watch, pitting humans and other alien species against each other in gladiatorial matches. Then they ate the losers. He supposed they might enjoy eating human women as much as they did men. Bastards.

“I heard you beat the shit out of Bray,” the captain said, draping his arm across the back of his seat.

He looked completely relaxed, with the four-hundred-pound svenkar munching a bone at his feet, but his eyes were sharp, and he watched Orion intently. Just because of the fight? Or did he suspect the truth?

His first officer, a cool, calculating man who rarely spoke, also watched the exchange from his station at the helm.

“So?” Orion asked, figuring he’d only look weak if he made up some lie or excuse. “Don’t tell me he came and whined to you about it.”

“I asked him why he let some woman pound on him, and he said it was you.” The captain’s single eye narrowed. “Normally, I wouldn’t give two piles of bantok shit if the crew fought, and I let them work problems out for themselves, but you attacked him in the middle of a mission. That’s an idiotic time to be anything but united. There could have been trouble if we’d been caught by what passes for the armed authorities on that planet.”

“He pissed me off.”

“He said he was just capturing a woman.”

“He was about to screw her. It was, to use your words, an idiotic time for it.”

The captain’s eye narrowed further. “Don’t presume to use my words, rookie. Unless you want to challenge me.”

He managed to flex his shoulders and look intimidating, even from his lounging position in the chair. Normally, Orion would be happy to challenge him, even if rumor said Cutty had a lot of implants that made him strong and fast, but there was more at stake here than his ego.

But he couldn’t back down like a wilting irakian flower, either. The captain wouldn’t respect meekness.

“Rookie.” Orion snorted. “Just because I’ve never sold human beings to the Zi’i doesn’t mean I haven’t killed as many people as anyone on your crew.” Of course, he killed criminals with bounties on their heads.

“I doubt that. And don’t act like you’re superior to the rest of us when you’re the one who came to me, begging for a spot on the crew and a cut of the booty. How sad it must be for you that your ship’s in hock and you didn’t have the money to pay for repairs and get it out. You can’t be a very good bounty hunter if you’re broke.” The captain offered his lazy smile again, his metal teeth gleaming even in the dim lighting of the bridge.

The lighting was poor everywhere on this ship. Maybe the captain hoped that dimness would keep his crew from noticing how decrepit and dirty it was.

Orion gritted his teeth at the insult. He was a good bounty hunter, a damned good one, and he wasn’t broke, but he could hardly deny the story he’d given to get this spot aboard the ship.

Besides, the longer he let this discussion go on, the longer he was away from the women. It was clear that Bray had no qualms about molesting the ones he liked before selling them. It wasn’t as if the Zi’i had any sexual interest in humans or would care if they were eating virgins or not.

“I suppose I could be a bit better at it,” Orion forced himself to say.

“Of that I have no doubt. Get back to your duty, and keep your weapons ready. It doesn’t look like this planet has any ships to send after us, but it’s our first time here—it’s everybody’s first time here—so it’s possible they’ve got some defenses we just didn’t see evidence of and that they could come after us before we reach the gate.”

“Understood.” Orion took a step back, but the captain’s eye narrowed again. “Am I dismissed?” he asked.

“Yes, but don’t fight with my men again while we’re on a mission or any other time a united front is needed. Got it?”

“Yes.”

Orion turned and almost crashed into Truok. Truok looked like he intended to continue his escort duty. Not surprising. Orion had an escort almost everywhere he went, and he had a bunkmate in his cabin at night. He hadn’t figured out when he was going to sneak in a communication to his brother, but he needed to do it soon to see if he could hurry up the ambush. He had no idea how he alone could keep a crew of more than sixty slavers from raping those women.

“You think the back of my neck is sexy, Truok?” he asked.

“It’s as ugly as the rest of you.”

“Then quit trying to kiss it and back off.” Orion pushed past him and strode off the bridge.

He headed down the curving corridor that led back to engineering and the brig. Truok followed right on his heels. Orion took an abrupt turn and yanked open the heavy metal hatch to the lavatory. Truok moved to follow, and Orion halted in the hatchway.

“Unless you want to hold my dick for me, I can do this without your help.”

Truok snorted, and Orion thought he would insist on coming in, but he leaned against the corridor bulkhead instead. “Go ahead, hold your dick all by yourself. Like you do every night alone in your bunk.”

Orion’s fingers curled into a fist, but he held the punch and stepped inside. He wanted to knock every member of this crew on their asses, and he hoped he would get an opportunity soon. But if he got himself killed before his brother’s people arrived, that wouldn’t do anyone any good.

What should have been automatic lights didn’t come on, and he slapped the bronze controls. They beeped irritatingly at him, and one wall sconce came on, flickering.

After a quick check to make sure nobody else was using the head, Orion lifted his hand to his lips, murmuring a command to activate his logostec computer and communicator. Making contact with his brother while aboard the slaver ship was a risk, especially if the communications officer on the bridge was alert and noticed an unauthorized outgoing signal, but he had to know when he could expect help to arrive. In addition to the problem of the women, he needed to be prepared to do his bit of sabotage.

“Captain Sagitta of the Falcon 8 here,” his brother’s voice came from the logostec, projected from the small speaker in the side to sound as if he were standing next to Orion.

Orion rolled his eyes at the formality, as if Sage didn’t know exactly who was calling.

“It’s me,” he whispered, glancing toward the hatch. It was as thick as every door on the ship, designed to withstand enemy fire if need be, and he knew Truok wouldn’t hear him through it, but it was always possible there were monitoring stations in the ship. Captain Cutty was a paranoid bastard. Slavers didn’t last long in the galaxy if they weren’t, not with the Star Guardians hunting them like lab krogs looking for the candy prize at the end of a maze. “I take it you’re in the system.”

“We wouldn’t be able to speak live if I weren’t,” came his brother’s dry tone.

“Yeah, yeah, impress me with your scientific knowledge another time. Look, they did exactly what they said they were doing, and they’ve got a batch of slaves. We’re heading to the gate at the edge of the system now. I need you to move up the attack.”

“We’re lying in wait by the gate, as I planned from the beginning.” Sage’s tone cooled a few degrees. “This call, I’ll point out, is not according to plan. You risk having your transmission discovered, and you risk them getting wind of our presence in the system.”

“I’m aware of that,” Orion said, biting back his inclination toward being sarcastic with his older and oh-so-decorated Star Guardian brother, “but I need you to move everything up. The gate is way out past the last planet. It’ll take too long. You need to attack as soon as possible.”

“Why?”

“The slaves are in danger.”

“Cutty can’t plan to kill them, not if he wants to get paid.” Sage’s voice turned to a snarl of distaste, and he spoke the last word like a curse.

“Oh, I’m sure he’s going to deliver them, but they’re all women. Pretty, young women.” Orion thought of the one he’d tackled outside of that building. She was definitely pretty with the kind of voluptuous curves that men who’d grown up on harsh ice and desert planets full of scrawny women found particularly exotic and appealing. Even though Orion had grown up on Dethocoles, where food was plentiful, he’d found those curves appealing too. He also liked the way she’d fought against her fate, doing her best to club that fool into oblivion. He’d been happy to step in and help with that. “The kind of women this crew of ugly worm humpers couldn’t ever attract legitimately,” he added.

Belatedly, it occurred to Orion that he didn’t have as much luck at the bars of the galaxy as he’d once had, either. His line of work was dangerous, and he had the scars to prove it. Unlike his brother, he didn’t have that Star Guardian uniform that tended to make human women from planets and moons all across the Confederation swoon. Not that Sage seemed to notice swooning that went on in his presence. The man had a single-minded focus, to say the least.

“I already stopped one attempt at rape,” Orion went on, in case he hadn’t been completely clear. “And it got me noticed by the captain. I can’t take on the whole crew, not if I’m going to be able to sabotage the ship when you need me to.”

A clang sounded in the corridor outside. Truok? Or someone else on the way in?

“I have to go,” Orion added in a harsh whisper. “You’ll attack early?”

Sage hesitated. “I have orders to wait until the gate.”

“The gate? That’s hours away. Why can’t you ambush them anywhere? There’s a gas giant we’ll fly by shortly. You can hide behind it.”

“The Confederation has only known about the route to this gate and this system for a few weeks. They want time to study it before we consider contacting the inhabitants. In the event they choose not to, we don’t want to reveal ourselves to the long-range sensors of the populated planet. One ship might have slipped in without anyone noticing by using its camo shields, but the people of the planet are sure to spot a battle being waged next door.”

“Sage, I’m sure our government wouldn’t want a bunch of women to be tortured before being sold into slavery to mankind’s greatest enemy. You’re a Star Guardian. It’s your job to protect—”

“I know what my job is,” Sage said. “But I have my orders.” He sounded irritated, but Orion couldn’t tell if it was because of him or because of the situation. “Don’t contact me again. Just be ready when we need you.”

The channel closed with a beep.

“You’re not my captain, you ass,” Orion growled, something he probably wouldn’t have said if his brother were still on the line. He respected Sage, and he even liked him sometimes, but he hated it when his brother started giving him orders, as if Orion was a part of the doting crew that gazed adoringly at him and waited for him to spew wisdom.

The hatch opened.

Orion made sure the display on his logostec was off, then made a show of buttoning his fly before turning around. He didn’t know the name of the slaver who walked in. Fortunately, the man went straight to a head with only the barest grunt for a greeting.

Orion stepped back into the corridor, not surprised that Truok still waited there.

Truok glanced at his own logostec, and Orion stifled a wince. He hadn’t been in there that long, had he?

“You and your hand have a good time?”

Orion couldn’t tell if there was suspicion or only annoyance in the other man’s voice.

He went for a cocky smirk. “Always do.”

Orion headed toward the brig again. It had been luck that he’d been placed on guard duty, but since he was supposed to be there, and since Truok was apparently going to make sure he stayed there, he would have a hard time slipping away to engineering later when his brother finally got around to attacking. Normally, Sage would have been able to take down Cutty’s ship without much trouble, but doing it in such a way that the slaves all survived the attack was another matter. Capturing the slaver ship and forcing a boarding would be much easier for the Star Guardians if the shields were down.

Orion now wished he hadn’t so cockily promised he could accomplish that when he’d told his brother about the mission, and had come up with the idea of infiltrating the slavers. But if he weren’t here, those women would have nobody to watch out for their interests.

He quickened his step, wanting to get back to them before something awful happened, but an idea came to mind, and he took an abrupt turn.

“Got a headache,” he announced to his shadow. “I’m going to stop in sickbay to see the doc.”

“Aren’t you a delicate flower,” Truok grumbled.

Once again, Orion fought the urge to make a fist and use it. Soon, these thugs would get their comeuppance. He hoped he would have a chance to kill more than one of them at that time.