Depths of Blue Page 15

  The orders confirmed, she spent a little time pulling any additional information she could find. Maps were always good; those she could turn in to Command when she got back. Intel would pore over them and hopefully be able to make use of them. There wasn’t much else of interest. He’d obviously had a mind wipe recently. It was important to move out obsolete and irrelevant data periodically. The human mind only had so much capacity for artificially acquired information. It was possible to internalize data uploads and hold on to the information that way, but the actual data packages needed to be removed before they either filled up all the available space or became corrupted.

  Satisfied that she’d gotten all the information she could, Jak moved on to his pockets. She rifled through them and found some small, useful pieces of equipment. Another fire starter, a length of flexible cable, three scopes of varying strengths, some trail food, a couple of glowsticks and another knife. Looking around, she spotted his rifle a meter or so away and picked that up as well. Critically, she examined his jacket, but the shot to the shoulder had torn a huge hole through the fabric. It was covered in blood, the collar stained with what could only be chunks of brain matter. There was no way she would be able to convince Torrin to wear it. That was unfortunate. Torrin’s red outfit was nice on the eyes, but the color didn’t blend well into their surroundings.

  She retraced his tumble back to the top of the hill and looked around to see if she could locate his pack. It was unlikely that he had been there without some additional equipment. From his orders, it was clear the Orthodoxans hadn’t known precisely where they were, so he would have covered some distance. A few meters past the hill’s crest, she located the bag nestled among some rocks.

  “Good deal,” Jak whispered exultantly. She snagged the bag and headed back down to Torrin.

  “Any luck?” Torrin asked as she got closer.

  “Jackpot,” Jak said, holding up the bag. She broke open a glowstick. It gave off a sickly green glow that cast enough light to see by, but not enough to ruin her night vision and unlikely to attract unwanted attention, nestled as they were between the two hills. “Let’s see what we have,” she said and opened it up. Torrin leaned in so she could see.

  At the top of the sack was a set of folded fatigues. She handed them to Torrin. Next she pulled out a pair of binoculars. “Not as nice as the ones you threw into the river, but better than nothing,” Jak said. Torrin flung the clothes back at her, but she easily snatched them out of the air.

  “Nice catch,” Torrin groused.

  Jak tossed the fatigues back to Torrin and reached deeper into the bag.

  “Yes!”

  “What is it?” Torrin asked, intrigued by Jak’s jubilation.

  “Food!” Jak pulled out a bunch of Orthodoxan military ready to eat meals. “They won’t be as good as the ones made by my people, but at least we won’t starve. There’s a few days’ worth there and more in the bag. It looks like he was planning on being out here for a while. If we’re careful, this’ll be enough to get us back on the other side of the fence. If we’re lucky, we’ll be able to stretch this with some hunting and we won’t be hungry at all.”

  “Well, that’s good news, anyway.”

  “Unfortunately, that’s all the good news there is,” Jak said, still reaching around in the bottom of the bag. She didn’t feel anything other than more meals and a large canteen. It would be worth it to go through the bag again in daylight to make sure she hadn’t missed anything, but she was glad she’d made the call to recover what they could from the corpse.

  “What do you mean by that?” Torrin prompted. She seemed annoyed at having to ask.

  “Hmmm,” Jak replied helpfully, shoving what she’d pulled out back into the bag. When she finished, she looked Torrin in the eyes. “The Orthodoxans have men out looking for us. I don’t think they know for sure we’ve gone this way. The orders read more like they’re covering their bases. That’s the good news. The bad news is that it looks like they sent out a lot of snipers to hunt us down. They’re really pissed that we killed Hutchinson and they’re out for our blood.”

  “Oh, crap!” Torrin couldn’t believe their luck. With everything else that had happened, it had been easier to just hope they would be able to get away without any more problems. “Wait, what do you mean by ‘we’ killed Hutchinson? You pulled the trigger. I had nothing to do with it.”

  Jak gave her a hard look, his face bathed in the green luminescence of the glowstick. The color lent a ghoulish cast to his features.

  “Would you rather I’d let him keep on with what he was doing?” he asked. “Not that it matters much now. We’re both in this mess together. We just got to be more aware, and it’s going to slow down our return from behind enemy lines. No more cutting across hills. We’re going to have to skirt them. The last thing we need to do is make ourselves any more visible than we have to.”

  “So how long before we can make it out of here?”

  “Once we get past that toll bridge, I think we can make it in about two and a half days. Maybe half a day to a day more, depending if we have to detour around a lot of hills or not.”

  Torrin noticed that Jak looked exhausted. There were circles under his eyes she hadn’t noticed a day ago. His eyes looked like they glittered at her from the bottom of a well.

  “Do you plan to go the entire time without sleeping?” she demanded. “You look like shit, and I haven’t seen you sleep for the past two days. There’s no way you’ll make it at this rate.”

  Jak shook his head. “Don’t worry about me. I got it covered. It’s not my first time trapped out behind enemy lines for longer than I planned.”

  “Can we at least make camp here and you can take a nap? I’ll keep watch.”

  “No way. We need to head back to the bridge so we can find out exactly what we’re up against and come up with a plan.” He stood up and shouldered the pack, then picked up the dead sniper’s rifle and tossed it to her. “Try not to shoot me with it.”

  Torrin snagged it out of the air and struggled to her feet. Her legs were tired from all of the walking they’d done over the past few days. She wasn’t used to all this exertion. While the rolling hills were a welcome break from the mountains and forests, she still wasn’t getting the rest she needed to recover, and of course Jak didn’t flag at all. Even though the dark circles under his eyes were so pronounced that he looked like he’d been beaten about the face and he looked like he was seconds from falling asleep on his feet, his stride was as even and purposeful as ever.

  “Leave the glowstick,” he said over his shoulder when she stooped to reach it. “I know it’s not much light, but it could give our position away, especially if there are more snipers out here.”

  How did he know she’d been about to pick that up? He must have eyes in the back of his head. A disturbing image, to be sure. She smothered a snicker as she imagined two blue eyes blinking at her from under short blond hair. She was really getting punchy. If she was lucky, there would be some sleep for her when they got to wherever Jak decided they should watch the Orthodoxans from. With a smothered groan, she forced her legs’ burning muscles to keep on after the sniper.

  True to his word, Jak skirted them around hills and kept them to the lowest ground he could find. Their trip back to the rise that overlooked the bridge took significantly longer than their first trek. It was a little easier since she didn’t have to negotiate the varying slopes, but the walk took twice as long.

  “I’m not moving any further.” Torrin sat down next to a boulder that jutted out of the hillside at an odd angle. If it rained, she could probably fit most of her body under the overhang. If it rained. She gave a mental snort.

  Jak continued a couple of paces before her statement registered. “We’re almost there,” he said, turning back to face her and continuing to walk backward a few paces before stopping.

  “I don’t give a rat’s ass. I’m not moving another centimeter. You keep on. I’m perfectly happy bunking down
for the night by this rock.” Torrin folded her arms and glared at him, jaw set. “You may be used to trekking around the back of beyond with no food and less sleep, but I’m not.”

  “Fine, stay there if you want to. I’m going to keep going and set up an observation post at the top of the next hill. I’ll come back for you in the morning.”

  By his tone, she could have sworn he was rolling his eyes. “That’s fine by me.”

  Lying back against the grass, she sighed in relief and closed her eyes. Immobility had never felt so good. She could have fallen asleep right there, except that she could feel him standing, waiting for a response. She cracked one eye open and glanced over at him.

  “I’m fine, go do your observing. If you get tired, we can switch places, and I’ll watch them while you sleep.”

  Jak shook his head once more. “I told you, it’s taken care of. See you in the morning.” Torrin closed her eyes and waited to drift off to sleep.

  Sleep was slow in coming. Without Jak’s presence, the surrounding countryside brimmed with life. Before she knew it, every little rustle and chirp was making her jump. A while later, she convinced herself it was too quiet and something awful was sneaking up on her. She pulled herself up to a seated position and leaned her back against the rock, cradling the Orthodoxan rifle to her chest. Satisfied that she would have at least a fighting chance if some wild animal decided to attack her, she eventually drifted off into a light doze.

  She woke when something closed over her elbow. Swinging the rifle blindly, she connected with a mass that gave an explosive “oof.” She opened her eyes just in time to see Jak folded over the butt of her rifle.

  “Sorry, sorry, sorry!” She snatched the rifle back from his midsection.

  “It’s okay.” He wheezed, struggling to fill his lungs. Torrin watched him work to breathe for another few moments until he was able to struggle upright and fill his lungs. “Heh, you really had something behind that.”

  “You scared me. Next time, call out or something to wake me.”

  “Now you tell me,” he groaned, rubbing his abdomen. “Next time I will. I might not live through waking you a second time.”

  “I am trained in self-defense. You’re lucky that you grabbed me by the elbow. If you’d taken my shoulder, I probably would have broken your arm.” It was the truth, but she could tell by the way he nodded that he didn’t believe a word she said. There was no reason he should. It wasn’t as if she’d proven her mettle to him. He’d had to rescue her from the clutches of a power-hungry, misogynistic rapist. Then he’d shepherded her across the countryside and saved her from drowning in rivers and being eaten by giant bear-things. She wouldn’t have believed her either.

  “So what’s our situation?” Torrin asked. If she pushed her knowledge of self-defense, it would only look like she had something to prove.

  The sky was still dark but beginning to lighten in the east. The local wildlife knew daybreak approached and the air was filling with the chirps of birds, punctuated by the occasional strident, grinding shriek. She hoped that was also a bird. Jak didn’t seem concerned by the noise so hopefully nothing within earshot was interested in eating them.

  “We’re up against eight men, split into two shifts. They just finished up their shift change and from what I can tell our same friends from yesterday are out there again now.”

  “So we’re outnumbered four to one?” Torrin was worried. Those didn’t sound like good odds at all. “Maybe we should find another place to cross the river.”

  “It’s not as bad as it sounds, especially now we have two sniper rifles. This is our best bet to cross the river. It only gets wider downstream. I really don’t want to have to backtrack for a ford that might not even exist.”

  “Does this mean you finally have a plan?”

  Jak nodded. “I have the beginnings of one. We’re going to attack them at this time tomorrow morning while they’re switching up their shifts. I just need to iron out some of the kinks.” He looked excited about the prospect. Torrin noticed that all traces of the previous day’s fatigue were gone. The deep circles under his eyes were barely a shadow and he moved with a crispness that she hadn’t noticed was gone until it was back. She wondered how he kept doing that.

  “So you woke me up even though we have twenty-seven hours before we even think of launching our attack?”

  He had the grace to look a little embarrassed. “I thought you might want to know what’s going on.”

  “Never mind,” she said, a little exasperated. “I’m going to sleep a few more hours. You look bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. You can keep watch.”

  “Fair enough,” Jak replied calmly.

  She lay back down on the grass and closed her eyes. He started moving away, back up the hill.

  “Where do you think you’re going?” she asked, not bothering to open her eyes.

  “To keep watch. It’ll be easier from atop the hill.”

  “Go ahead and stick around here. You can make sure that one of the beasts from this planet of yours doesn’t attack and eat my sleeping body.” Her tone was light, but she really did want him to stay. She knew she’d sleep better in his presence, knowing that he watched over her.

  “There really isn’t too much in the grasslands that’s big enough or has a taste for humans.”

  Torrin opened one eye and looked over at him, standing a few meters away. “Please?” she asked simply.

  Jak looked surprised but came back down the hill and seated himself near her. “Since you asked so nicely, I suppose.”

  Closing her eyes, she relaxed. Sleep came very quickly this time.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Jak was floored. Torrin’s request for her to stick around had caught her off guard. She hadn’t lied. It really would have been much more effective to keep watch from a higher vantage, but when Torrin had asked she’d been disarmed by the simple request. The lines of sight down here were crap. It wouldn’t be hard to move a whole mess of people on top of them without being seen. The idea made her skin crawl. Not being able to keep an eye over a sizable area was kicking her fear into high gear.

  To keep her mind off it, she reached over and picked up the Orthodoxan rifle Torrin had been carrying. It probably needed a good cleaning. She started breaking it down. To her surprise, the rifle was fairly new and seemed quite well taken care of. She cleaned and oiled it as a matter of course. The magazine held enough bullets for twelve shots. That was a greater capacity than her rifle; she was limited to eight. It usually didn’t matter, since she typically went after single targets and was almost always able to kill with one shot. One shot, one kill had been drilled into her and Bron by their instructors in sniper school. The sniper from yesterday had required two because he’d been wearing a helmet and had been facing away from them, not to mention the long distance. Three clicks was a long way, even for her. Not her longest kill, but it was up there. As she’d anticipated, the impact to the shoulder had spun the Orthodoxan around, enabling her to administer the kill shot.

  There was an extra clip of ammunition in the stock of the rifle, for a total of twenty-four bullets. She looked around for the supply pack and saw that Torrin was using it as a pillow. Searching through the pack in daylight would have to wait until she woke. She hoped there was additional ammunition in the bag. For her own rifle, she was limited to what she had in her pockets. Half her extra ammo was with her own supply pack at the top of that ridge in the forest all those kilometers back. The Orthodoxan rifle took a different size of ammunition from hers, but between what she had in her pockets and what was in her rifle, there was more than enough to clear the bridge of enemy combatants. The sticking point was that she had no idea what they would face closer to the fence. She would have to be judicious with her ammo expenditure.

  Her eyes strayed back to Torrin’s sleeping face. She wanted to take the smuggler into her arms and hold her. She looked so vulnerable and the way she’d asked for Jak to stick around while she slept made Jak feel…s
omething. Valued, maybe. It was an emotion she couldn’t readily identify, but she knew that if someone or something came around the hill with the intent of harming Torrin, she would protect the sleeping woman at the expense of her own life. The intensity of the emotion scared her. After only a few days, it was getting hard to imagine a life without Torrin. She would have to let her go eventually. Torrin had to return to her own life on her own planet. There was no future for them together in any case. Down that path lay only misery—and disgust when Torrin realized that Jak was female and harboring unnatural feelings for her.

  If only Torrin had been a man, she would be able to feel for her without having to hate herself. Jak’s lips twisted as the seething turmoil of emotion threatened to overwhelm her. She clamped her eyes shut, but tears squeezed out from under the lids anyway. She couldn’t keep watch with her eyes closed. Angrily, she dashed the tears on the back of her hand, then scrubbed it across her face, destroying any remaining tracks.

  Even though she had told Torrin that she would stay close by to watch over her, she moved halfway up the hill. The vantage would allow her to survey a larger area and the physical distance from the source of her emotional turmoil should help to clear her mind. She longed to be back down there, pressed against Torrin. She had a sudden mental flash of her skin against Torrin’s. It was so strong that she could almost feel her bare belly and breasts pressed to the length of Torrin’s naked back. A bolt of heat seared through her loins and spread between her legs. The feeling was so intense that she moaned and closed her eyes. The illicit peeks she’d taken of Torrin’s nakedness fueled her imagination. Her imaginary self reached around Torrin’s side and cupped the bottom of her breast, running her thumb lightly over an erect nipple that hardened further at her touch. Dream Torrin moaned deep in her throat and rocked her hips back, pressing her buttocks into Jak’s pelvis.

  Jak’s eyes snapped open, breaking her out of her lustful reverie. Her hand was down the front of her pants, fingers tangling in damp hair and parting the slick folds of her sex, touching herself in scalding wetness. She snatched her hand back as if burned. Her face flaming, she sneaked a glance down the hill to make sure Torrin hadn’t woken up and witnessed any of her aberrant behavior. To her relief, Torrin still slept soundly.