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LENGTH: Mid Novel
SENSUALITY: Sensual

Cover art (c) Dan Skinner & Eliza Black 2006
ISBN 1-58608-901-3
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Arrested for the murder of thirty members of the High Council of the planet Carnelia, Sienna McCade could face a hundred years in cryogenic suspension, the maximum punishment allowable by Galactic law. Jordan Dane is the Courier assigned to transport Sienna's cryo-stasis tube to a prison ship, where she will remain until her trial.

When his ship crashes and Jordan is injured, he finds himself at the mercy of the beautiful assassin who has managed to escape from the broken stasis tube. He knows he owes her a debt of gratitude for saving his life, but he can't ignore his mission. Should he deny his growing feelings for her and turn her over to the authorities, or risk everything to help her prove her innocence and spare her a hundred years in cryo sleep?

Rating: Contains some violence, adult language, and sexual content

FLIGHT OF THE VALKYRIE

By

Jennifer Colgan

© copyright April 2006, Jennifer Colgan
Cover art by Dan Skinner & Eliza Black, © copyright April 2006
ISBN 1-58608-901-3
New Concepts Publishing
Lake Park, GA 31636
www.newconceptspublishing.com

This is a work of fiction. All characters, events, and places are of the author's imagination and not to be confused with fact. Any resemblance to living persons or events is merely coincidence.

Chapter One

Pain lanced through Sienna McCade's body, white hot and relentless.

Starting at the base of her spine, it crept upward to the back of her neck, moving like hot lead in her veins. When it reached the base of her skull she clamped her eyes shut and tried not to scream. She'd promised herself when they captured her that she wouldn't show any fear. Had she known then what it would feel like, she would never have made herself that promise.

In her mind, she cursed and fought the dozen hands that held her down while the paralyzing drug worked its way through her nervous system. Had her efforts been any more than an illusion, she might have broken free, but the drug worked too quickly, rendering her inert and silent only seconds after the first injection plunged into her veins. All she could do now was force herself not to panic until the darkness overtook her.

Sienna had never been afraid of anything until she tasted the faint sweetness of the cryogen gases as one shallow breath pulled them to the back of her throat. The flavor of it flooded her senses and made the nightmare all too real. This was actually happening. She was being put into cryogen sleep where she would remain until it was time for her to stand trial for her crimes.

Her heartbeat slowed, beat by beat, and her blood felt like a thick snake, slithering through every dark, arterial passage in her body. It chilled her to near freezing.

I'm dead, she thought. The idea itself didn't frighten her. Her people believed that death was only the beginning of something new and wonderful. They believed the world beyond this life was a comforting place and she believed it, too. She sensed it on a primal level and thus she knew also that this could not be death. This was only a suspension of life, a terrible sleep.

She held her breath and waited for the next exhalation, but it never came. Her lungs filled with thick liquid that hardened like ice, and she cursed her captors with her last coherent thought.

Finally, she descended into blackness.

* * * *

Jordan Dane's eyes traveled the smooth contours of the face visible within the small observation port of the cryogenic stasis tube. The white metal cylinder stood upright against the aft bulkhead of the Valkyrie's cargo hold. It generated a slight hum as the technician who had brought it on board completed the last diagnostic tests on its systems.

"I heard this one put up quite a fight," the tech said, double-checking the cargo manifest. Naturally, he found everything in order. As a registered collector for the Galactic Protectorate, Jordan possessed all the proper clearances to carry dangerous human cargo.

"They all do," Jordan responded with a shrug. Some more than others.

After a moment's scrutiny the technician handed over the thumb pad attached to the manifest. "Sign here."

Jordan placed his thumbprint on the bottom of the touch-screen and returned it to the tech. After tucking the manifest into his pocket, the man walked around the stasis tube one more time. He eyed the collection of wires that connected the device to the Valkyrie's computer and electrical systems and tightened one of the jack-ins while Jordan looked over his shoulder. The ship had been overhauled only a month ago, so all of the connectors in the cargo hold were brand new and in perfect working order. The tech uttered a grunt of satisfaction and gave the cool surface of the tube a reassuring pat.

"You're all set here." He pulled his lanky body upright. "I jacked the tube into your ship's main power supply. It has a full battery charge, so should anything interrupt power on the ship, the tube can run on its own for three days."

Jordan nodded while the tech explained the intricate workings of the stasis tube. He'd heard the mandatory safety speech countless times before, and he probably could have recited it just as quickly as the tech. After five years transporting criminals for a living, Jordan had heard the safety procedures a thousand times. He knew everything that could go wrong with a stasis tube and in most cases how to fix it. In all that time, with more than three hundred trips to the outer colonies logged, he had never come up against a problem he couldn't handle.

While the tech finished his spiel, Jordan surveyed the rest of the hold. The space was small but well-utilized. The stasis tube took up the aft wall across from the hatch that led to the rest of the ship. Four large plastic supply crates that held everything else Jordan needed for this run and several more sat against the port and starboard bulkheads. The heavy crates were magnetized to keep them in place should the artificial gravity fail.

Besides the crates and the stasis tube, the hold was empty and spotlessly clean. No unnecessary items cluttered the space, and that was just the way Jordan liked it. No mess. No extraneous debris to cause problems.

Jordan sensed the end of the safety speech at hand and turned his attention back to the technician.

"If anything should happen, and she were to get out of the tube, use this." The tech handed Jordan a small weapon that didn't look like though it could do much damage at all. With the practiced ease of a former soldier, Jordan opened the weapon's chamber and found it loaded with clear casings containing a bright red liquid.

Jordan gave the tech a curious glance. "Nerve toxin?" In all his time as a courier he had never been given a weapon other than the standard issue stunner he wore clipped to his uniform belt.

"It's a fast acting tranq," the tech replied with a sidelong glance at the observation port. "Just an added precaution courtesy of the Feds on Carnelia."

Jordan frowned again. He looked at the face framed in the small window of the tube. Her name was Sienna McCade, and in addition to conspiracy and treason against the High Council of the planet Carnelia, her warrant listed thirty counts of murder-all members of the High Council on Carnelia.

Somehow she had eluded a planet-wide search and ended up here on Trifida where she'd become Jordan's next assignment. Jordan wondered why someone so dangerous hadn't been executed immediately on Carnelia. A good number of criminals never made it from the colonies to the Galactic Hub for trial. Often during escape attempts, many met with 'accidents' that facilitated their untimely deaths. There had to be a good reason the Carnelian High Council wanted her alive and healthy.

Jordan closed the gun chamber and hooked the small weapon onto his belt. Like most collectors, he wasn't authorized to do unnecessary damage to a criminal, even in the unlikely event one managed to escape from the stasis tube. However, like all his brethren in the service of the Galactic Protectorate, he knew how to defend himself and was adequately armed in case the necessity arose.

Now, with all the paperwork complete and the mandatory safety rules explained, Jordan's stay at Trifida's orbital spaceport was over. He checked the tube's control panel himself, just to make sure all the system lights were functioning. While the tech's attention was elsewhere, he stole another glance at his passenger. Her face, bathed in the tube's green internal light, was expressionless and unblemished in the dreamless sleep of cryogenic suspension.

Of all the criminals he'd transported over the years, Sienna McCade was certainly the most attractive. How could someone so dangerous look so innocent in sleep?

Her dark hair hung in a thick braid that ran down her left shoulder. Dark lashes fringed her closed eyelids, and her lips were slightly parted as though she were perfectly relaxed. Her arrest record hadn't listed a motive for her crimes or much personal information at all except that she resided on the planet Kyrasau and her chronological age was twenty-seven. The docket gave no indication what had driven her to kill thirty people.

"Safe journey," the tech said. He gave Jordan a thumbs-up and exited the cargo hold.

"Thanks," Jordan called as the man hoisted himself up the set of rungs that led to the Valkyrie's upper deck. After the tech left, Jordan placed his hand on the side of the stasis tube. The internal mechanisms that continually pumped cryogen gases into the tube's interior chamber caused a faint but steady vibration under his fingers.

He wondered what it was like to sleep for months or years at a time. He'd never been in suspension but he'd heard that going under was often unpleasant. The combination of chemicals used to induce cryo sleep caused strange hallucinations and sometimes feelings of intense panic before the brain shut down. After that, the subject felt nothing, remembered nothing, and was completely unaware of the passage of time. One could remain safely in suspension for a hundred years or more before the body's organ systems finally began to break down. The Protectorate considered this a humane way to transport prisoners, and on some worlds, a way to maintain them as well. Jordan wondered if Sienna McCade would end up back in a stasis tube after her trial and if she would spend a century in dreamless sleep as punishment for her crimes.

With a final glance at the tube, Jordan left the hold. He shut the door and locked it securely from the outside, then berated himself for wasting time contemplating her fate when it was none of his concern. He had work to do and couldn't afford to daydream about his cargo.

The small tranq gun dangled against his hip and he shook his head. If his prisoner somehow managed to escape her confinement, she wouldn't be going anywhere. The manual lock on the cargo hold worked only from the outside. Now with the door secure, even wide awake, Sienna McCade posed no danger to anyone but herself.

A few moments later, Jordan folded his six-foot frame carefully into the Valkyrie's pilot seat. He began the ship's launch sequence while he fastened the straps of the flight harness around his upper body. He worked quickly, eager to get out of Trifida's space dock and on his way so he could move around more freely. The narrow pilot's seat wasn't the most comfortable place for him on board. The Valkyrie was a fast ship, but small. Since their planet's gravity caused them to be shorter and more compact than average, the shipwrights on Verados, where she'd been built, had designed her with smaller humans in mind. Jordan considered it a fair trade. He could give up a little comfort during launch and docking in exchange for raw power and unparalleled maneuverability. He made up for it by spending most of his time in the passenger cabin where he could stretch out and relax. A courier's life wasn't glamorous, but it had its perks, among them, lots of free time.

The Valkyrie's engines came online, and the voice of Trifida's dock manager crackled over the ship's com. "Valkyrie, please transmit your launch sequence."

Jordan entered the sequence on the ship's navigation console and hit transmit.

"Coming through, now," he responded. The engines powered up and the ship came to life around him. In a moment, the massive clamps that held the ship in the orbital framework of the space dock would disengage, allowing Valkyrie to float free in space.

Only a sliver of the planet Trifida was visible below, nothing more than a silver crescent of the northern hemisphere now currently under heavy winter cloud cover. Beyond the glowing arc, the planet's two moons looked like a large double star, glowing with reflected sunlight in the distance. His launch would take him past the moons and three more planets in the Trifida system, then beyond into the huge, empty expanse that separated the outer colonies from the Hub worlds.

He looked forward to the solitude away from the frenzy and chatter of the colonies. Jordan considered himself a loner and the quiet darkness of interplanetary space suited him well. He couldn't wait to return to it.

"Received sequence, Valkyrie. You are cleared," the dock manager responded.

"Thank you, Trifida."

"Safe journey, Valkyrie."

Jordan waited for the docking clamps to fall away and after a second he felt the subtle change take place. The ship wobbled as it broke free and then small thrusters kicked in and pushed the hull outward away from the clamps. Jordan counted in his mind and watched the framework of the dock recede. When he reached ten, he keyed the final sequence to ignite the Valkyrie's main engines. The sudden acceleration pushed him back into the firm cushions of his chair and the safety harness tightened around his chest.

Trifida's north pole slid by under the ship and the moons grew exponentially larger. The white globes drifted apart and the tiny transport ship shot between them like a silver arrow. When the gravitational adjusters came on and his body settled back into the seat, Jordan sighed. He unbuckled the uncomfortable harness and leaned forward to access the long-range communications terminal.

"Dane, Jordan. Valkyrie, registry Calabrel. ID one-two-two-six-nine-seven, requesting rendezvous confirmation," he said in clipped staccato. A moment later a stream of information crossed the tiny screen on his control console. He read the instructions and made a few course adjustments. With the prisoner's transfer confirmed, he now received orders to meet with the Protectorate prison ship, the Guardian, in orbit above Ontares Prime in four standard days. There, he would relinquish his cargo and receive another assignment. Until then, he had nothing to do but enjoy the ride.