“The same way they knew we were headed for the station. The Grays have a spy planted somewhere.” Dax checked the time. “You don’t have long. Anything else I need to know?”
“Yeah. Uh. But it’s a personal issue.”
“And it’s relevant now?”
“It could be.”
Dax sighed. “What happened?”
“I fraxxed up with Nyx. Like, supernova levels of kaboom.”
What did you do?”
“I called her Echo.”
Dax winced. “Ouch.”
“We were arguing about Nova Force and who she could trust. She doesn’t have faith in anyone but the team, really. I told her she was wrong…” He gestured around them. “But I’m the one who was wrong, and now I can’t even warn her. I need you to get a message to her. Tell her what’s happened and that you’ve got her back. Please? Because I’m not going to be able to help her, not for a while, anyway.”
“You got it. We’ll take care of her. You have my word.”
He exhaled and one of the knots in his guts loosened a little. “Thank you. And thank you for doing what you could to derail the general today. If he’d had his way…”
“You’d be in a cell, and Nyx would probably be being prepped for transport off the station. Yeah. I noticed that. Like I said, there’s more here then what we can see, and I don’t like it. Someone’s messing with my team.” Dax straightened and laid a hand on his shoulder. “My family.”
Eric opened his mouth and Dax cut him off with a slash of his hand. “One daddy joke out of you and I’ll hand your ass over to the general myself.”
“No daddy jokes. Got it.” Eric lightly slapped Dax’s hand where it sat on his shoulder. “But thank you.”
“But since we’re family, and no one can hear us right now, I’m going to give you a little advice.”
He shrugged off Dax’s hand and stepped away from his friend. “I know what you’re going to say. Stay away from Nyx. But I can’t do that.” The idea of letting go of Nyx made his heart hurt. He didn’t want to lose her.
Dax snorted. “Of course you can’t. You’re falling for her.”
Eric spoke before his brain caught up to his mouth. “No. I mean. Maybe. Yes?” Fraxx. Was Dax right? He’d been enjoying their time together. She challenged him, made him laugh, and when she smiled at him, the whole universe vanished except for her. He’d fraxxed up and called her Echo, but that had been a thoughtless slip of the tongue. She was the original, the source code, and there was no comparing her or mistaking her for anyone else.
“And that word-salad of confusion is all the confirmation I need. So, ready for that advice now?”
“Uh. Yes. Because I have no idea how to fix things with her, and she’s going to be even more pissed now because everything she tried to warn me about is happening.” He threw up his hands in frustration. “I already apologized. She didn’t want to hear it.”
Dax sat on the edge of his desk. “Yeah. Apologies are nice, but they’re only the first step. You need to tell her.”
“I’m not even allowed to talk to her right now. And tell her what? You just said apologizing won’t be enough.”
“You can’t talk to her yet, but we’ll get this mess sorted out. Then, you need to tell her how you feel. I didn’t do that, and it cost me years with the woman I love. Dante was in denial, too, and he nearly died before he could fix it. So, that’s my advice. Tell her.”
He could do that. Maybe bring a present. Flowers. Make her dinner. Show her she mattered. Yeah. “Okay.”
Dax turned off the privacy field and dropped the device back into his pocket. “Then take a seat and start thinking about what you’re going to tell the JAG officer when they get here. While you do that, I’ll send Buttercup to track down Nyx. He can explain what’s going on while he’s bringing her in for questioning. I’m going to assign Blink to monitor her interrogation, and Sabre will sit in on yours.”
Which meant Dax wanted both of them to have a friendly face in the room. An ally who could make sure that things stayed above board.
“Thank you, sir.”
“Don’t thank me. Just show your gratitude by making sure you don’t piss off anyone else for a while. Less paperwork for me that way.”
“Yes, sir.” He already had enough people angry at him, and one of them was a fraxxing assassin. His dance card was full and he hadn’t had breakfast, yet. It was time to focus on what was important: getting out of here, and talking to Nyx.
Chapter Twelve
It was a short walk from Eric’s quarters to hers, but she ran into several IAF personnel along the way. The day cycle was starting, and people were heading to the gym or the common room to grab a meal and some conversation before they went on duty. She didn’t recognize anyone, and it struck her that apart from Eric and his team, she had no connections to anyone on the station. She was almost as alone here as when she was a prisoner. In some ways, she was even more so because back then she’d been linked to her clones. Being with Eric had distracted her from the truth of her situation. She was still a prisoner, still isolated and on her own.
Her time with Eric had been an enjoyable escape, but that’s all it could be. She needed to finish her mission. Find Absalom, destroy him, and end the Fury Project forever. If he had any more of her clones, she’d free them, but her main goal was to take down the one man who had used her as a test subject for years. He had to pay for what he’d done.
Focus. That’s what she’d been missing. She’d lost sight of her goals. She concentrated on her anger, letting it push aside all thoughts of Eric and the hurt he’d caused with his verbal slip. She let herself remember the years of captivity. The petty torments, the tests, the loneliness. She had to make sure Absalom never did this to anyone else. She was the original, the source of all their suffering, and it was up to her to put an end to it, for all of them.
She walked through her door and engaged the locks behind her. She looked around the sparsely furnished room and saw nothing that would work for what she wanted to do, so she turned off her comms, set it aside, sat cross-legged on the floor and closed her eyes. She slowed her breathing, centered her thoughts as best she could, and focused on the one person she still wanted to hear from.
“Where are you? Why haven’t I felt your presence?” She’d never attempted to create a connection. She wasn’t sure she could do it at all, and she hadn’t dared to try before, not when her every move was being monitored by Absalom and his techs.
She tried again, reaching out blindly, pouring all her thoughts and emotions into forming a link, but there was nothing. Again and again she tried, only giving up when her frustration grew so great she couldn’t focus anymore.
Feeling more alone than ever, she got to her feet and stretched. She couldn’t stay here. The walls were already closing in on her, the spartan space feeling too much like the cell she’d left behind. She needed to move. To do something… but she couldn’t leave the area without an escort, and she didn’t want to see any of Eric’s friends right now. She might have called Tyra, but she was working at the med-center today, and to reach it she’d need an escort.