Page 21 of Alien Mercenary's Wife
Reese palmed her knife in her good hand. It wasn’t much against serious firepower, but it was better than trying to negotiate with empty hands.
Sliding from her hiding spot, she made sure the woman saw her and then led her deeper into the maze of containers, away from the main surveillance net. If this were another hunter, she'd isolate her and use the element of surprise. If it was help... well, genuine allies wouldn't mind a little paranoia in someone who’d almost gotten blown up yesterday.
The woman followed, maintaining a professional distance while never quite losing contact. Good fieldcraft, but that familiarity kept nagging at the edge of Reese’s mind. What the fuck was it about her?
She turned the corner and ran half the length of the next container to slide into cover, turning just as the woman rounded the corner.
She stepped into a shaft of sunlight between the two containers, and Reese's world tilted sideways.
"Archer?" The name escaped as barely a whisper, disbelief and hope colliding in her chest.
The woman—Eris Archer, Tank, the best damn pilot Reese had ever had the privilege to command—smiled.
"Hey there, Captain. Wondered how long you were going to lead me on a chase."
Reese's legs nearly buckled. Tank was alive.
"Shit. They told me you were dead," she managed as she walked clear of cover, voice cracking despite her efforts to maintain command composure. "Official records said?—"
"Records say a lot of things." Tank stepped closer, her eyes scanning their surroundings with professional awareness even as genuine warmth showed in her expression. "Got your call for help. The question is, can you move? Because we need to extract from this area before those surveillance teams decide to tighten their net."
Can you move? Not "are you ready?" or "when do we leave?", but "Can you move?"
Because Tank knew. She'd been ascorperiopilot just like Reese. She knew what those implants could do… had done.
"I can move," Reese said, pride making her voice steadier than she felt. The lie came easily—command training had taught her that confidence was often more important than truth when it came to maintaining unit cohesion.
"Good. Because my partner's working on a solution to our surveillance problem, but we're operating on a tight timeline."
Partner. So Tank hadn't come alone. Smart.
"A partner? There aren’t many of us left.”
Tank smiled. “He’s not one of us.”
Reese blinked. “Can we trust him?"
"With my life," Eris replied without hesitation. "And yours, if you're willing."
Reese studied her former pilot's face. Tank was telling the truth about the trust part, but there was subtext she wasn't sharing.
"Good enough for me," Reese decided. "Those teams won't maintain overwatch positions indefinitely, and I'd rather not discover what their extraction protocol looks like."
Tank grinned.
"Copy that, Captain. This way."
As they moved deeper into the industrial maze, Reese allowed herself something that might have been hope. She wasn't fighting alone anymore. Whatever came next, she'd face it with backup that had proven itself in real combat.
But it was more than that…
Tank was alive. Tank had come for her. And for the first time in months, the universe felt like it might have room for something other than failure.
The crackof boots on concrete echoed off rusted shipping containers as T'Raal pressed himself against corrugated metal, the smell of machine oil and rust thick in his nostrils. Fifty meters ahead, two males rounded the corner of a crane housing, their movements too coordinated to be the casual workers their clothing said they were. Their comm chatter carried on the wind, clipped and professional. His eyes narrowed. They were getting ready to close the net.
He keyed his comm. "Tank, status."
"Inbound. About thirty seconds to your position."
