Seasons of Murder: In the Shadow of This Red Rock Page 5

  “I must have misheard. So, what do you do for recreation on board? It’s a long trip to Titan.”

  Cal snorted. “The first transports took six years to get there. I’d say nine months is a fairly short hop.”

  “Well, our perspectives differ. And, remember, you have a job. I’m not sure what I’m going to do for nine months. Any suggestions?”

  “Do you…?” Cal hesitated and regarded Z. “Do you work out?”

  Zero cast him a quick sideways glance. “Are you asking me on a date, Lieutenant?”

  Cal closed his eyes for a moment, and Zero did not need to be a mind reader to sense the conflicted thoughts. “Tomorrow, 0600 hours. If you can keep up, you can call it whatever the hell you like.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  That night, Zero actively sought the man with evil on his mind—the one who relished agony. He had debated long and hard before he’d decided to attempt it. He had never been overwhelmed before, trapped in a mind, and he hadn’t liked it. But it was new. It was what they had all done this for: something novel. They were dying—inbreeding, nothing but the endless cycle of the empty Martian landscapes, no dreams worth having anymore. No nightmares even, except ones full of cloying, red dust.

  He listened to all the voices on the ship, flitting between them, hearing, moving on, assessing, rejecting. He finally found the one he sought through the memory of the smell of blood. This recollection was strong, coppery and stale, overpowering, but so exciting. The dreams were of liquid red spilling over rough hands, and although Zero could see the palms, he could not make out who was dreaming of them. He could get no sense of the man’s personality. It was as if the other’s sleeping mind was blank, except for the bloodlust and delight in pain. Very carefully, Zero began to push his will onto the man to make him reveal himself, but before he’d even established a reliable connection he was slammed out, shut down.

  It was so abrupt that it was like a physical rip, and with a cry of pain he fell to his knees, holding his head as if it was splitting apart. He reached out again, but the woken thoughts were now veiled from him. He could still glimpse the other’s essence, but indistinctly, as if seeing through a smoke-darkened pane of glass. He stood, unsteady and nauseous. He had never experienced being thrown out of a send. The deck beneath his feet suddenly seemed to waver, and he sat heavily on the edge of his bunk.

  He needed reassurance. He needed…a friend. He did the only thing he could think of and found the lieutenant, closing in on his thoughts far more intimately than he would ever have allowed himself to before. Cal was still awake. Zero could feel warm water cascading on his skin, smell an intensely familiar but elusive scent of soap or shampoo. He twisted his neck around to mirror the actions of the human, vicariously enjoying the warm shower. He went deeper, coiling, twisting into the relaxed depths of the human’s mind. He enjoyed a hand upon his chest, running down it, soap slippery against his skin and then further. The hand reached to pull and squeeze. He hissed and began to withdraw, but the need to stay and share was too strong.

  With the smallest flick of his mind, he could have made the human aware of him. With another tap, he could make the human want him, make him open up to him and lay himself bare. He had all the power.

  But he wouldn’t.

  With a sigh of regret at his own annoyingly high standards, he began to ease away.

  But before he could fade entirely, the atmosphere in the shower changed. There was no longer a feeling of pleasure, although he could still sense a strong tug of flesh, and his groin ached in reciprocal desire. Now, a wave of angry regret enveloped him. The touch didn’t bring pleasure, only painful memories. Once more, he was small and vulnerable, pressed down on a bed, and shame overwhelmed him. Zero struggled, trying to free himself, his conscious mind rejecting this shared, intimate recollection, his unconscious mind struggling just like the child.

  Zero snapped out of Cal’s mind, panting, his heart racing from a desire to fight or flee from something that had not happened to him and only now existed in remembrance.

  Cal was the boy he had sensed earlier: a child of the past. He put his head in his hands. He should not have invaded the human’s mind. Echoes of their conversation came back to him from earlier. Life in a colony of mind readers had not prepared him for this. Hurting a child was unthinkable—even the desire to would screech like nails scratching down chalkboard. Darwinism at its most perfect on an off-world colony: only the pure of heart survived. He was intensely sad for his new friend. He wanted to reach out to take the memories from him, change them perhaps. But the temptation made him feel terribly conflicted. If he did that, was he not just as bad as the man who had invaded Cal before?

  The line dividing power and abuse was beginning to blur for Zero, and he went to bed troubled and heartsick for the first time for what he was.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Cal had to laugh when the Minder opened the door to him the next morning. If he’d had a bad night and felt rough, Zero looked ten times worse. He could barely manage a grunt, his arms wrapped around his body as if to ward off the hideous truth of 0600 hours. But he dutifully followed Cal down the darkened, deserted corridors to the gym, moaning faintly about the cold.

  When they arrived, Z went around examining the equipment before stepping onto one of the treadmills. “I’d like to run for a while. I used to do miles every day at home, around the largest bio-dome. Only a third of your gravity, I know, but still…I miss it.”

  “I thought you were all from the orbiting stations.”

  “I was born and raised on the surface. My mum and dad still live there. It’s why I’m so tall and beautiful.”

  Cal frowned. “The height thing I get with low gravity, but I don’t see how living on the surface made you so beautiful.”

  “It was a joke, Lieutenant! But you’ve agreed I’m gorgeous—wouldn’t be much of a date without that.”

  Cal snorted and fixed the running machine’s programme to one of his most challenging routes. He was pleased to see that it at least shut the commander up for a while. It also gave him a chance to study the man, admire his natural running ability and his smooth muscle tone. He was hardly breathing and hadn’t even broken into a sweat. Cal smirked and turned up the temperature of the room to high summer. No point in working out if it didn’t hurt. He sat on the weight bench and began his reps. He felt better already, dreams of the previous night fading. He didn’t often experience the bad times of his childhood disturbing the present. He’d battled too hard to make sure they didn’t. But ever since he’d had all these new work responsibilities, he’d been plagued with strange sensations and uncontrollable thoughts. Some were better than others. He preferred the ones of grass and chocolate and water droplets on a smooth, hard body.

  The Minder positively bounced off the machine at the end of the programme. He grinned, sweating and obviously revitalised. Cal had to smile. He hesitated for a moment then asked, “You ever play handball?”

  Zero frowned. “That’s a little forward for a first date, isn’t it?”

  Cal rolled his eyes fractionally and nodded toward a door. “Follow me.” They entered one of the small courts attached to the gym. It was designed for squash, one of the more popular and space-saving fitness activities encouraged in deep space, but Cal preferred handball if he could persuade someone to take him on. He retrieved one of the balls and demonstrated an easy stroke to the wall and back a few times.

  Zero pursed his lips. “I think I can just about hit that ball against that wall, yes.”

  Demonstrating this, he caught the ball and served, but before he could get to the rebound, Cal slammed him to the ground and took the shot. “My point.”

  Zero stood up slowly, rubbing his shoulder, regarding the offending ball. He suddenly grinned. “You’re on.”

  They played viciously until their muscles ached from the pummelling and from bashing against the walls and floor. No quarter was asked for or given. They were soaked in sweat.

  Halfw
ay through, they ripped off their T-shirts and played on, dressed only in shorts. Zero went to serve, faked the movement, caught Cal off guard and tried to trip him, but Cal seized him around the waist and took him down. They wrestled on the scuffed court for the ball, which was held tight in Zero’s hand. Cal rolled on top of the Minder, holding him down, trying to force his fingers open. He relished the surge of pleasure he only ever achieved after extreme physical effort and laughed, despite himself. The Minder’s pupils dilated, the disc on his temple shiny with perspiration. Zero licked his lips and groaned at the pain apparently in his fingers. Cal heard the groan and something deeply erotic stirred between them. His tongue flicked over his own lips in unconscious mimicry, and he dipped his gaze to the bare chest beneath him. The Minder shifted and the reaction of Cal’s body was visible through the thin material of his shorts.

  He made a tiny sound of shamed awareness and let Z’s hand drop.

  Zero looked up at him, and after the briefest of moments said huskily, “This could go either one of two ways, Lieutenant.”

  Cal clenched his jaw. “I don’t know what—”

  “Sure you do.”

  Cal swallowed. He hesitated, lowered his head a little to gauge the other man’s reaction, and then opened his mouth and took the waiting lips in a hot, unpractised kiss.

  §§§

  Zero immediately brought his hands around Cal’s back, crushing them together. He could hear a symphony of thoughts, jumbled, confused, erratic, intense…erotic. There was uncertainty and alarm, yes, but there was also a deep need and willingness to surrender to that necessity. He flipped them so he was on top. It would be so easy to just ease this man’s journey, to take his mind and gently coax it along paths Zero knew well. He’d shepherded willing lovers before. That temptation was as strong as the one he was actually indulging—kissing the stubble-rough mouth, grinding and rubbing. It was obvious where they were headed. He could feel Cal’s hard erection beneath the shiny fabric. He thrust his against it, circling, arching and dipping his back sinuously while still seeking the contact of their mouths. The human seemed unsure what to do with his hands. He’d gone from the initiator to the receiver and waves of dismay began to pour off him.

  Then panic.

  Suddenly, Zero was slammed again with a jumble of images he didn’t want to see; feelings of shame made him hiss against the open mouth. He drew away and held Cal’s head gently between his hands. He gazed down at the wide, blue-black eyes. “It’s okay. It’s okay. We don’t have to do this.”

  Cal frowned deeply and tried to pull him back into a kiss, but Zero shook his head and smiled to soften the gesture. “Hey, I don’t put out on a first date. Cut a Martian some slack, yeah?” He could sense relief flooding Cal’s mind, but the human seemed less in touch with his own emotions than the mind reader currently sharing them with him. He tried once again to get the kissing back on track, but Zero fended him off, turning it into a game, keeping the desired object of his lips just out of reach. Sighing inwardly at how often he was breaking his own rules, he sent reassurance across the tiny physical gap between them, finding the core of the man’s dread and uncertainty and easing it away, seeking the arousal as well, and dampening that by seeding Cal’s thoughts instead with ones of amusement and fun. He brought the human down off the edge of this fraught encounter as he would comfort a terrified infant who had woken from a nightmare.

  After a while, Cal relaxed beneath him, panting from the release of adrenaline, but otherwise calm. He stared into Zero’s eyes. Very carefully, he said, “I believe I need to check your implant, Commander.”

  Zero raised an eyebrow. “I kinda don’t need to be a mind reader around you, Cal.”

  Cal twitched his lips, and Zero knew the lieutenant was accepting the truth of this between two men who had very obviously been interpreting each other’s body language for some time. “Perhaps you could read this then and get the fuck off?”

  Zero chuckled and rolled away from the powerful body beneath him, and they lay side by side on the floor of the small court. Zero turned his head to the other’s profile. “I like this game. Handball you call it? Very appropriate.”

  §§§

  Cal began to laugh. It was the most weirdly inappropriate reaction he could think of for the head of security compromised on the floor with one of his charges, his lips stinging and sore from the other man’s stubble, and the memory of their erections leaking together still vivid. He groaned and sat up. “I think you won that game, Commander.”

  Zero smirked. “Is there a prize?”

  Cal snorted and stood up, offering his hand to Z. “How about I buy you breakfast?”

  Zero accepted the assistance and nudged Cal. “Best offer I’ve ever had on a first date.”

  Cal didn’t bother to reply. He’d laid all his cards on the table now, and without his habitual shields in place, he was somewhat at a loss how to respond to the blatant flirting. Cold, austere professionalism seemed a bit redundant now. He’d tasted Z’s mouth for fuck’s sake, but now he couldn’t think of a word to say to him. He glanced sideward as they towelled off and exited the gym. Zero was giving him sly, amused looks.

  “See, wouldn’t it be better if I could read your mind, Lieutenant? Save you from having to think of something to say.”

  “Hmm.”

  “I could read that you’re falling in love with me but you can’t tell me because you’re afraid—”

  “Jesus! Will you shut up? Read what I’m thinking about you now!”

  Zero then had the nerve to pretend he had and grinned broadly as if it was so not what Cal wanted him to believe it was.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  They split up to go to their respective cabins to shower, and then met up for breakfast as agreed. Now that they were released from their initial lockdown, there was a small group of Minders eating together in the mess hall—pancakes with lashings of maple syrup straight from Canadian maples tapped fresh that morning. Cal wrinkled his nose as he read the familiar Inter-Sol Corp autumnal lies on the menu card and ordered his own stack.

  There was a tense atmosphere, an undercurrent of resentment and suspicion—Cal could sense that without being a mind reader—but no overt hostility toward the group. Cal was amused to see that Zero ordered a huge breakfast, just as he did, and then the Minder headed over to sit with his friends. Cal hesitated but then reasoned that professional and private motives could occasionally coincide. He wanted to eat with Zero, and as head of security it would look good if he joined the Minders.

  Zero winked and patted the chair next to him. “Everyone, you remember Lieutenant Hartland.”

  They all nodded dutifully, staring at their commander as if he was telegraphing some private message to them. He then began to make introductions. The tall, willowy girl who had been sent first to have her implant turned out to be Zero’s sister, Quarter. Cal frowned at the name and glanced at Zero, fearing he was being had, but she gave her brother an eye roll and corrected, “I prefer Mina. I chose it myself at my naming day.”

  Cal raised his brows and murmured to Zero, “You had a naming day and yet you stuck with Zero?”

  Zero leant over and replied right against his ear, “Ah, but then if anyone asks what you were doing before work this morning, you can reply quite honestly…nothing.”

  Cal buried his face in his coffee cup and pretended to listen to the rest of the introductions. They were a mixed bunch, mostly scientists. Cal wanted to question them about the implants but didn’t know where to start. For some reason, they didn’t seem to be taking the change to their lives quite as cheerfully as Zero, and this puzzled him. Tentatively, he asked Mina, “Why did you volunteer for this?”

  She regarded him for a while, then replied, “I wanted to be with my brother, obviously. But it was more than that. I remember the day I decided to volunteer. We were in the middle of one of the dust storms. It had been raging for four months. Everything obliterated, Lieutenant. Four months. I think sometimes that I�
�ve spent a third of my life living in the darkness of a dust storm. And you forget that just because you know nothing about us, we know everything about you.” She saw his expression and drew back, a horrified look on her face. “Not like that! Do you think that of…? We would never…I meant via the comms links. We have all your holoprogs and movies and books. I even watch your soap operas and daytime chat shows. Life in the Mars colony is a life of envy, Lieutenant. For my generation, at least.” She closed her eyes. “I’ve seen green grass on a screen, but I don’t know what it smells like or feels like to walk on. I’ve seen pictures of oceans, but, oh, to float, to…swim? I want all these things. I’m greedy. And if I have to give up hearing thoughts in my head? Being linked? Well, I’d burn out my eyes and slice off my ears to be allowed to lie on grass on a warm summer’s day on Earth.”

  Cal could think of nothing to say to this. He glanced over at Zero. The commander was staring at his sister with an intent look, and she suddenly added, “Of course, after we have proved ourselves on Titan. I meant to say that.”

  §§§

  Zero returned to his cabin with a sense of excitement and anticipation he had not enjoyed for a very long time—perhaps ever. Being an all-powerful mind reader on a small off-world colony of other mind readers didn’t exactly lead to a life full of surprises. His lieutenant astounded him. Cal delighted him. He had shone one faint light into the man’s darkness and had been intrigued by what had been reflected back. He had even been able to remove most of his calming tendrils now, leaving the human raw and exposed to his own genuine emotion. The kiss had not been faked. The kiss had not been suggested by him—although he was more than capable of implanting that desire and much more, if he had a willing partner. But perhaps more than all this, he believed that he could make a friend of this seemingly cold human. That was something he had not anticipated. After all, who would want to be friends with a Sender? If they knew…