The Complete Razia Series, page 52
She unhooked her belt and slammed it into the box, glaring at him as she did so. "There."
"And the mini, too."
She started, her fingers tightening around her trusty mini-computer. The thought of being parted with it sent an irrational jolt of fear down her spine.
"Can't I keep it?"
"Them's the rules," the officer said, jiggling the box. "Put it in."
"But you guys don't pay attention to the rules—"
"Put it in."
"But!" Before she could say another word, he reached over with a swiftness that was alarming for a man his size and snatched her precious mini-computer, placing it in the bin and yanking it out of her reach. She suddenly felt cold and anxious, needing to check all manner of statistics. But, as the officer turned the key on the wall of lockers, she knew she wasn't going to see it again for at least a night.
He took his time waddling out of the small desk area, leading her down a long stretch of iron doors with windows too tall for her to see inside. She wondered who'd been captured tonight, who had been stupid like her. If Eamon's was any indication, it was probably nobody interesting, since everybody who was anybody had witnessed the mortifying episode.
A fresh wave of embarrassed shame fell over her as the memory replayed.
The officer stopped in front of a door just like all the rest and slid his keycard on the swiper. The door groaned as it opened, revealing a stark white room with a single cot in the corner.
"In ya go." His sweaty hand on her shoulder shoved her inside, and before she could bark at him, the door slammed shut.
Then silence.
So much silence.
She cleared her throat, the sound bouncing off the blank white walls. She spun around and looked at the white steel door with a high window that she couldn't see out of. There was a wool blanket on the cot, but nothing else in the room.
She shuffled over to the corner and sat down on the bed. It squeaked loudly.
She was suddenly aware of her own breathing, the quiet hum of the air coming through the vent, the buzzing of the light overhead. An overwhelming urge to check her mini-computer surfaced, and she breathed deeply to quiet it. She wouldn't be in there but a few hours. It was simply a formality that she sit there for some amount of time to allow the consequence-free game of piracy to continue unabated.
She really could have been in a worse situation, she tried to tell herself. If she hadn't been in the web, if she'd been captured by one of Jukin's Special Forces…or, she winced, if she'd been captured by someone like Linro Lee, who might not have brought her to the bounty office at all.
The thought made her shudder and feel even dumber for putting herself in such a dangerous position. Getting into a fight drunk was probably the stupidest thing she'd ever done, and she had done some stupid things.
That's probably why Sage hovered over her.
Except, she realized with a jolt, he hadn't been really hovering lately and he hadn't for some time. He had let her walk out of Eamon's with naught but a casual query of her inebriation. Perhaps he'd finally decided he was done coddling her and would let her stand on her own two feet.
And now she was sitting in a jail cell.
He was going to be as bad as Dissident probably, with a big, hearty, "I told you so." She could already see his smug face.
He was right. About everything.
Balling up her fist, she slammed it into the mattress in anger, and winced as the odd angle shot pain up her arm. Now she'd hurt herself. And she was stuck in jail. And her bounty had been zeroed out.
She heard the squeak of the bed and realized she was tapping her foot distractedly on the floor. With a heaving and not-at-all-satisfying sigh, she leaned against the wall and looked up at the white ceiling.
If it was difficult to get noticed in the top twenty, it was going to be downright impossible to do now that she wasn't even on the list. She could capture every pirate in the known universe, but her bounty wouldn't move an inch unless someone else thought she was worth catching.
With a heavy sigh, she wrapped the scratchy blanket tight around herself and curled into a small ball on the mattress, hoping to drown out that voice with sleep.
***
A noise startled her awake; her cell door was being unlocked. With no clocks in the room, she had no idea what time it was, but perhaps her one night stint in jail was complete.
What she didn't expect to see was Sage pop his head in the doorway, a smug grin on his face.
"What are you doing here?" she asked, wondering if she was still half-asleep.
"Heard you got captured, wanted to see it for myself." He leaned against the doorframe. "Well, I would say I told you so but that would be…" He paused and chuckled. "Oh, why not. Told you so."
"Get sucked," she hissed. His face was just as she imagined it the night before. "Are you just here to gloat?"
"A little, yeah." His grin widened when she snarled at him. "Nah, I'm here to get you, since your ship has been so conveniently parked back at that scientist place."
"My ship..." She'd completely forgotten about it, parked at an expensive docking station far on the outskirts of the city. But then again, she'd only been away from it for a day. "Why did you take my ship?"
"Because I'm kidnapping you," he said before adding, "Wouldn't be the first time."
She rubbed her face, too tired for that memory to elicit a painful response. "Wh…what do you mean?"
"Look, you've been running yourself ragged for the past few weeks," Sage said. "You're exhausted—look at you."
"Am not."
"We—me, Lizbeth, and Vel from whatever planet he's currently surviving on, we all think you need to take a break."
She stared at him for a second, only the first part of his statement making sense. "How in Leveman's did you get in touch with Vel?"
"Okay, so I didn't speak to him, but I'm sure he'd agree," Sage said with a grin. "C'mon." He stepped into the cell and offered his hand to help her out of the bed. "What are friends for, hm?"
"I'm not your friend," she snapped, slapping his hand away and marching out of the jail.
Sage followed her down the hall, stopping to wave at some of the other pirates in the cells. Razia was thankful she was too short to be seen through the windows on the doors.
She came to the end of the cellblock where a different U-POL officer than the night before sat watching a television. She stood in front of the counter for a few breaths, waiting for the officer to notice her standing there. But he was engrossed, or didn't care.
"I need my stuff," Razia said to get his attention.
He grunted at her, ran a hand lazily across his rotund belly, and made no move to go to the set of lockers behind him.
"Come on." Razia just wanted to get out of there already.
"Eh?" He turned his head slightly to look at her then slowly, painfully, and deliberately turned around in his chair and waddled over to the lockers.
"Which one are you?"
Razia resisted the urge to roll her eyes. "Razia. You know, the only woman that you've seen in here in…ever?"
He grunted again and opened a locker, pulling out a small box. He placed the box on the desk and checked his tablet.
"One utility belt."
Razia snatched it as soon as she could reach it, rehooking it around her waist.
"One set of handcuffs."
Again, Razia took her things, but her eye was on the mini-computer at the bottom of the box. She hadn't gone this long without looking at it, and she was getting twitchy.
"And one mini-computer—"
"I'll take that." Sage appeared at her shoulder and took the instrument before she could get her fingers on it.
"Hey!" Razia spun around, livid.
Sage held it above his head, just out of her reach."No, you need to detox. No mini-computer for you."
"Give it back!" Razia jumped up and down, but as Sage towered above her by almost a foot, she was unable to grab it. She latched onto his arm and swung from it, swiping and grasping at the air, and he shoved her off.
"Oy!" the U-POL officer snarled from behind the glass. "Take the rest of yer stuff too."
Razia, still furious, snatched her floating canvas and disks from the table and stuffed them into her utility belt. By the time she spun back around to yell at Sage, he was halfway out the door.
"Get back here!" she screamed, running after him. She burst out of the back room into the main bounty holding area, and immediately felt the eyes of everyone in the room. But she no longer cared that they knew she'd been captured; she had a blond pirate to murder.
She saw Sage talking with Jeam Bullock, who was bringing Max Fried to the bounty office and she marched over.
"Give me back my mini-computer you son of a bitch," she growled through gritted teeth.
"Oh, it's you," Bullock said, looking like someone had just handed him something foul. "Nice work getting captured, moron."
"Get sucked, you were captured last week," Razia said, waving him off before turning to Sage and lunging for her mini-computer. "Give it back!"
"No."
She balled her hands into fists and groaned loudly.
"Calm down." Sage tossed her mini-computer into the waiting hands of Ganon, who pocketed it. Razia was so furious that she hadn't even seen him standing there. "Let's go."
"Go?" She blinked at him. "Go where?"
"Vacation, remember?" he said, wrapping his arm around her shoulder. She struggled against the unfamiliar feeling, but he had a firm grip on her. "See ya, Bullock."
Bullock grunted and Razia heard him mutter something about the two of them that made her want to get as far away from Sage as possible.
Unfortunately, Sage's iron grip didn't let up until they were safely on his ship.
CHAPTER FOUR
Sage's ship was moderately sized, as far as pirate ships went. There were three levels, the lowest for storage and on-boarding, the second level comprised of five bedrooms, and the upper level for a small conference area and the bridge, where Sage and Ganon disappeared to after they arrived. Which was a good thing, because if Lyssa had to look at them for another second, she might tear off one of Sage's appendages.
Huffing and puffing, she remained on the lower level with Sage's equipment until she could at least see straight. She wanted her mini-computer; she didn't want to be kidnapped. She needed to get back to work. But Sage didn't listen to her cries of protest, and so she watched out of the window as D-882 disappeared.
"Vacation," she scoffed, running her hands along the netting holding the space jump gear against the wall. She and Lizbeth had gone to Sage for help breaking into the Universal Bank, and they'd used this very same gear to descend onto the planet. She briefly considered using the gear to escape Sage's ship, but considering how he jumped after her—not to mention her fear of falling—she decided against it.
Resigning herself to this fate, at least for now, she began the slow climb up the stairs. She paused on the second level and slowly walked down the short hallway. She counted five doors, two on either side and one on the end, which she made a beeline for.
Immediately, she knew it was Sage's bedroom, if not from the location and the size, but from the way it smelled. It wasn't a bad odor, but something about it was comforting and familiar. She opened the door wider and turned on the light, illuminating the posters of naked women on the metal walls above the bed.
Men will be men, she supposed. Tauron had the same set up in his room, too.
Sage's bed was sizable, bigger than her one-person mattress, and he had a collection of blankets and a maroon comforter balled on top as if he'd thrown them off and walked out the door. That was, at least, how he used to get up. In the corner, she spotted an open closet with a two-foot high pile of wrinkled shirts and pants. She left the closet alone, if memory served what he kept under his dirty clothes.
Without another thought, she walked over to the unmade bed and flopped down on it, catching even more of that familiar scent. It made her smile and daydream about weekends and semester breaks arguing over whose socks were smelling and whose trash was on whose side, and all manner of other things that Lyssa forgot about as she drifted off to sleep.
When she awoke some hours later, she felt refreshed and in a much better mood. She hadn't gotten sleep like that in a while. She stretched and realized she was curled up underneath Sage's cheap, scratchy comforter and blankets and her boots and socks had been pulled off. She lazed around for a minute, running her bare feet along the rough cotton sheets, a sleepy smile on her face.
She tilted her head down to gaze around the room and noticed a black duffle bag on the floor that wasn't there before. Curious, she got up and padded over to the bag, kneeling down and unzipping it. Her own clothes were stuffed inside—shirts, shorts, even a few sets of bras and underwear. The idea of Sage in her closet made her both queasy and amused, but she was actually rather thankful. She'd been in these same clothes since before she was captured and she needed a shower.
Sage’s bathroom was attached to his room. The only towel she could locate was threadbare, and some very old looking rags would have to suffice as washcloths. She showered quickly, as she remembered what showering on an all-male pirate ship was like. She stepped out of the shower and toweled herself off, quickly putting on her bra and underwear (usually the first things to disappear) and wrapping the towel around her hair. She stepped out of the bathroom and nearly jumped out of her skin.
"Oh shit, sorry," Sage said, nearly falling off his bed.
"You scared me," Lyssa said, her hand covering her heart. She was surprisingly fine with him seeing her like this; after all, they shared a room when they were kids. Although he seemed to be blushing something fierce.
"Thanks for the clothes," she said, plucking a shirt out of the duffle bag and sliding it over her wet hair.
Sage coughed, his face even brighter. "No worries, Lizbeth said—"
"Lizbeth?" Lyssa's head swiveled around as she pulled on a pair of cargo pants. "Is she going to be wherever we're going? And how long am I going to be there for that matter? And where am I going?"
"In order: Yes, a week, and I'm not telling."
Lyssa muttered something about him being a jackass, but then furrowed her brow in thought. Since the assassination attempt, she really hadn't seen Lizbeth in person but once or twice. Lizbeth had been promoted twice to lead investigator and was trying to tie up the loose ends of the conspiracy. If Lyssa had to be kidnapped and held hostage, at least she'd have some good company.
"What?" Sage asked, watching her face contort as her mind worked.
"Just thinking this won't be so bad if Lizbeth's going to be there." Lyssa crouched on her haunches and dug through her bag, hunting for some clean socks.
"You two seemed to have really hit it off," Sage said, an odd expression on his face. "Are you…seeing her?"
Lyssa nearly fell off her heels and she blanched at Sage. "What?"
"Other than Vel, she seems to be the only thing you show any affection for." Another blush rose to Sage's face. "I mean, it's okay if—"
"I'm not dating her," Lyssa said, with enough emphasis on "her" to pique Sage's curiosity.
"Then who are you dating?"
"Nobody," she snapped. Relleck's face at the bounty office floated back into her mind. She shook her head to clear the image; that was obviously over. "You know me. I don't do that crap."
"Yeah, I know." Sage shrugged and offered a sly smile. "Still, it's nice to see you branching out."
Instead of responding to his comment, she asked, "Did you pack me twenty pairs of underwear and zero socks?"
"I wouldn't worry about it, you won't be wearing clothes much anyway." The moment the words left his mouth, he seemed to immediately regret them. His face turned the brightest red she'd ever seen and he stood up stammering idiotically. "I mean, never mind. I just came by to tell you that…uh…if you're hungry…there's food…and we'll be there…in a bit."
Lyssa wasn't able to respond before he bolted out the door.
She sat in the quiet room, wondering what in Leveman's had just transpired, but desperately needing a pair of socks to warm her increasingly chilly feet. When she found none in the bag (damn Teon), she slid on the socks she had been wearing and laced up her boots, as those were the only shoes she had, too.
She climbed the last set of stairs to the top level of the ship and made her way to the bridge. Like the ship itself, it was modest in size, with room for the pilot and mechanic, and, of course, Sage's captain's chair in the center of the room. She noticed he had installed (poorly, she might add) some monitors which were currently set to the pirate intraweb. Small pictures of pirates flipped over each other on the most wanted list and her fingers itched to start hunting.
Before she got two steps in, the screens went blank.
"Good morning, princess!" Ganon was standing behind the screens with the plug hanging from his hands. "So lovely of you to join us."
"Where's Sage?" she asked, looking around the bridge. The only other person was Sobal, the young computer hacker. "Actually, where is…everyone?"
"Boss gave them the week off," Ganon said, resuming his place at the helm of the ship.
"So why are you still here?"
"Because I thought it would be highly entertaining to watch you twist in the breeze." Ganon snorted. "Fighting drunk. what is this, amateur hour?"
Lyssa was about to snap at him, but stopped herself. She really had no right to argue with him. So instead, she flopped down on Sage's captain's seat and kicked her heels up on the table as she'd seen Sage do countless times.
"You can't sit there," Sobal said, sounding very much like the petulant young man that he was. "That's the boss' chair. Anybody who sits there gets dish duty for a week."
"I'd like to see him try," Lyssa scoffed, leaning back. She looked up at the screen in front of her, spotting the navigational application in the bottom corner, and the destination. "C-47478462?"
"Yep," Ganon said and added under his breath, "Middle of frickin' nowhere."
