Orbit Guard Attached Read online

  ORBIT GUARD ATTACHED

  (Book 2 in the Orbit Guard Sci-Fi Romance Series)

  F.E. Arliss

  Table of Contents

  Fish, Grease or Vodka

  The Major

  Stoicism or Static

  Forward

  Taken

  Concern and Confusion

  Kindness or Caring?

  Kick Ass or Be Polite?

  Un-attached

  Platform

  Respect

  Mine Field

  Attack

  The Cavalry Arrives

  Reunion

  The Soclaued

  Hijacked

  Faction Action

  Rustalov Rush

  The Coupe

  Simultaneous

  Baby Coat

  The Binding

  Many thanks to my fabulous editor, Andrew.

  This book is a work of fiction and does not portray actual places, times, people, or events.

  Chapter 1

  Fish, Grease or Vodka

  Katyia Rustalov huddled further into the wolf-skin fur on the inside of her long, ragged-edged coat and pulled the collar up around her ears. It was negative twenty-degrees Celsius and the wind blowing in from the North seemed to be laced with icy-tipped fingers. It twisted and swirled, rooting to find any gap in the barrier of the leather. She’d been lucky when she’d found the coat at the estate sale of a local fishing magnate’s wife. Instantly, she’d known she had to have it and had plunked down every Euro she’d saved to purchase it.

  That had been five years ago. It had taken her another two years, working as a waitress in a local café, to save enough money to earn the tuition for the Licensed Nursing Program at the local technical college. She’d worked hard, studying and waiting tables, for the two more years it took to finish and earn her degree. The coat had been with her through it all.

  For some reason, the coat made her feel strong. When she put it on, felt the soft fur against her skin and witnessed its burnished leather exterior, it was like the cloak of invisibility in the Harry Potter novels she’d read on the floor of the local library when she was younger. It provided a barrier between her and the scary world around her. Katyia wasn’t sure if it was the act of wearing the feared predator’s skin, or because it was impenetrable to the ever-present, cutting wind, or because of the cozy cocoon it gave her.

  Fur seemed to be one of the few things that didn’t absorb the lingering scent of fish that pervaded most things in their small village. It wasn’t just fabrics that smelled like fish. It was people’s hair and skin, the interior of cars, the inside of houses, upholstery and even bedding. Katyia was sick of fish. Of course, it was also the major food source in her village, and she frankly, didn’t care if she ever ate or smelled fish again.

  Even if someone worked at the machine manufacturing plant instead of the docks, the scent of fish just seemed to add to the smell of grease. Fish scent was practically inescapable. The fur had been a boon to her, not just against the persistent cold, but also against the odor she was coming to despise.

  Of course, there were others in the village that hated the smell of fish too. It was just that they tried to escape the scent with vodka, crime, or violence. Katyia had learned early that vodka didn’t seem to help her father drown the scent, it just added a peculiar tang to it. And, of course, made him angry, violent, and unbearable to be around. Others in her village had resorted to sex trafficking and all sorts of other terrifying organized crime in order to earn money to escape.

  Her mother Vika, also a beautiful blonde, had escaped by running away with a far more educated and kind man than her father. She’d left with a surveyor on one of the science expeditions that had stopped in town for two weeks to measure the glaciers that crept in from the sea like long, splayed icicles.

  That, had been the beginning of the end, for any family life for Katyia. Vika had kissed her daughter on the forehead and murmured, “Someday you will understand. I love you, but cannot stay with him. Nor can I take you with me. That cannot be. Be safe.” Then turned and fled into the gathering night towards the tall Finn standing near a large equipment van, awaiting her. They drove off into the night and were never heard from again.

  Katyia did understand. And it hadn’t taken long to understand her mother’s full meaning. Not only was Katyia just coming into the first bloom of young womanhood, which made her a target for any man over the age of twelve, but her mother had fled with a Finn.

  There were still many in the village who harbored old hatreds against the Finns. Border disputes from centuries ago still colored the traditional mindset from the ‘Hundred Years War’, and about outside people and cultures. She often wondered if that was why her father hit her so often, though he’d done that before her mother fled with the Finn, so probably not. That fact had contributed to the ridicule she suffered from the rest of the village.

  She’d learned to always look over her shoulder. Several of her school mates, particularly ones with no strong ties to the local community, had suddenly gone missing. No one said what they were all thinking…taken to be a sex worker, then sold overseas. A horrible existence that had Katyia always with a knot in her stomach when she had to walk after dark. She supposed her father’s violent temper had had some small benefit, as it probably acted as a deterrent for any who thought to snatch her.

  It hadn’t surprised her when she got the call from the local clinic that her father’s corpse had been found. What had surprised her was that her job at the private hospital in Moscow where she now worked, wouldn’t give her more than 3 days leave to attend her father’s funeral. Three days hadn’t been going to be enough to take care of the mess he’d left things in. Katyia had to laugh at the irony of it all. He’d been just as unobliging in death as he’d been in life. He’d left a mess of finances, a boat and supply leases that it would take weeks to clear up.

  When she’d talked with her supervisor about the time she’d need, he’d simply looked at her and said, nurses were a dime a dozen. She was a good nurse and he’d write her an excellent letter of recommendation, but he couldn’t hold her job for her. If there was an opening when she got things cleared up back home, it was hers. If not, well, she’d have the letter of reference to get another job.

  What Katyia knew is that she’d been lucky to get the high-paying job at this prestigious Moscow hospital upon graduation at the head of her class. Her looks and mile long legs hadn’t hurt either, as the interviewing Doctor had ogled her throughout their interaction and all during the tour of the facility.

  The ogling hadn’t ended there. Since the facility was a private and exclusive hospital for Moscow’s elite, it often catered to family patriarchs that felt that any female body within reach was simply theirs for the taking…taking, not asking. She’d been groped, pinched, wrestled, and generally mauled until she’d taken to wearing a pair of the thickest adult diapers she could find while on her shift. As soon as some lecher got a handful of her ass, they found out it was padded with incontinence layering. She didn’t try to buy the nice ones that many of the nurses, who were on their feet for long shifts, favored. Katyia went for the thickest, cheapest, lumpiest brand she could find.

  That always seemed to deter the pawing bastards! It had earned her a reprieve from their groping, but it wasn’t always the most comfortable way to spend a twelve-hour shift. The cheap ones were hot, and itchy!

  Then there were the women. Oh, yeah, the women! The wives, mistresses and girlfriends had done everything from tripping her, to slapping her, to trying to stab her with an empty syringe. If one of the men even tried to look at her, in their presence, it would bring on gales of retaliatory behaviors. Every significant-other seemed to think that Katyia was trying
to take their gravy-train of a man, away from them.

  Several times she’d found jealous girlfriends digging through the disposal bin for used syringes, the needles know as ‘sharps’, to use against her. Only once she’d had to wrestle a soiled one from the fingers of an irate wife who had walked in on Katyia finishing a sponge bath for her pinching pig of a husband. That resulted in an assault charge for a broken wrist.

  It hadn’t taken much, if Katyia was honest. The woman’s wrist bones snapped like chicken wings under her expertly applied twist. The hospital had had to call in the police, who had cleared her easily. After all, she was protecting herself from an armed ‘assailant’, as the report had read. The police officer had commiserated with her. People often tried to attack the police for little or no reason, he’d assured her with a leering smile.

  When the word had gotten around about the adult diapers, the women’s snarls had turned from vengeful fury to sneering condescension. After the broken wrist incident, they all stayed clear, and the condescension turned to a healthy wariness. They didn’t like her, but at least they hadn’t tried to bodily harm her any longer.

  It had gotten so bad about three months into the job, that Katyia had sought martial arts training from an older ex-KGB officer, Vlad Kostov, that lived in her squalid apartment complex. She’d spent hours in the dimly-lit, damp basement, learning how to take and block hits, use an opponent’s weight and momentum against them. And how to deliver stinging assaults using her speed, and long legs and arms.

  Vlad was no push-over for her looks, legs, or beauty. He’d pounded her mercilessly, which frankly, she knew how to take. Her father hadn’t been a violent drunken fisherman for nothing, it turned out. If she was one thing, she was tough. At first, she’d hated Vlad, but kept at the training so that she could begin to feel safer. She’d been afraid all her life. Afraid of her father, afraid of the dark alleys full of pissing drunks in her home town. And now, she was afraid of the men and women who assaulted her in the hospital at every turn, simply because she was beautiful and alone.

  Eventually, she came to like and respect Vlad. He didn’t beat on her because he wanted to, he beat on her because he wanted her to stand up and fight. And fight, she had done. Vlad often told her now that she was one of his most outstanding pupils. She had spirit, now that she’d found her stride, and she wasn’t going to back down from a fight.

  It was funny how the training with Vlad had seemed to open a deep well of aggression and anger in her. Vlad had taken that anger and showed her how to channel it. Katyia was one hell of a fighter now. It had also changed how she held herself and perceived herself. She was more confident and felt her own worth more. That was the best gift of the training. She valued herself now.

  Since the hospital hadn’t been willing to give her any slack, she’d accepted the letter of recommendation, resigned reluctantly, and had gone back home to take care of the mess her father had left behind.

  Katyia didn’t even feel sorry that her father was dead. Any tender feelings or twinges of guilt, had long been snuffed out by his spiteful tongue and flailing fists.

  He’d been found dead on the sofa in their tiny old apartment. Bottles of vodka littered the filthy rug when she’d entered the apartment to close it up after the funeral. When she’d rented a car, and driven north to attend the funeral, she hadn’t bothered to even imagine staying at the apartment. It was ground zero, as they said, for too many bad memories and stinging regrets.

  She’d chosen instead to rent one of the itinerant fishermen’s huts along the docks. A bad neighborhood to be sure, but she didn’t feel any more unsafe there than she ever had at the hospital or at home.

  Once she’d driven back to Moscow and dropped off the rental car, she’d crept back into the building she lived in. Vlad had been caring for her apartment, so everything was clean and the heat had been turned on. She’d climbed the piss-scented stairs to her tiny flat and fallen into bed.

  Moscow didn’t smell like fish, but it did smell like urine. Just as the alleys in her small hometown had. No matter where you were in Russia there were always drunks. Drunks urinated anywhere they found themselves. Even in the stairwells of their own housing buildings.

  It had taken her three weeks to settle her father’s fishing contracts, and sell the boat and apartment. After her return to Moscow she’d begun sending out inquiries into positions for a nurse of her standing. So far, no positions had come up. It seemed that resigning from a prestigious hospital made people believe that there was something wrong with you. In Russia, no one in their right mind would ever resign from such a job. To do such thing after having had the luck to land the job in the first place, was a sure sign of mental instability.

  Over a sparring session with Vlad, she’d told him of her lack of success with finding a placement. He’d suggested that she go see an old friend of his who was recruiting for the frontier station of Orbit Guard. They needed a medic, the friend had said. Figuring, what did she have to lose? Katyia made the journey across town. She’d gotten the job in the Women’s Corp, the first female support staff to be assigned to space, before she left his flat.

  It shocked her how easy it had been. All her life things had been one struggle after another. This was the first time that anything had ever gone easily for her. All she had to do was show her nursing school transcript and degree, and hand him a copy of her licensure as a nurse. He’d offered her a contract for two years in space. Katyia signed on the spot. It paid triple what she’d made at the private hospital, and since it was the military, she was hopeful that there would be more men like Vlad. So, in other words, less groping and more respect. That alone would make the two years fly by.

  Still struggling to keep the frigid air from creeping in, Katyia slung the carry-all bag she had with her over one shoulder and hurried toward the lights of the train station barely visible through the gathering gloom. It had been a very long two months and she was anxious to leave this place behind and never come back.

  Chapter 2

  The Major

  Major Hiro Donji strode down the corridor of Frontier Station. He was on his way to a training session where he would meet the first group of Women Corpsmen to go on a forward mission for Orbit Guard. While he looked calm on the outside, he felt anything but calm on the inside. It was a huge responsibility. An honor, to be sure, but also a huge responsibility.

  Hiro Donji was an 8th generation Orbit Guard serviceman. A century ago, one of his ancestors had signed up for the very first mission into space, and in every generation since then, a Donji had served with distinction and honor. Hiro loved the Orbit Guard. Here he’d found a family that supported him and his decisions. He was respected and fought side by side with some of the finest warriors in the known universe.

  The Japan of his childhood had not been a forgiving place. Most people thought the traditions of ancient Japan were long gone. In his family, they were not.

  Mistakes were taken seriously in his highly traditional training. He’d earned severe punishment and endless work whenever an assignment had been less than perfect. It hadn’t helped that Hiro had leaned towards a certain rounded softness in his younger years. In his family of lean sword fighters, this was considered a detrimental trait. This had made all his training harder. Each instructor had been sure that they were the one that would whip this dumpling into the sinewy, whippet-fast fighter that would honor the family. It never happened.

  The only thing that had kept Hiro going during many of the tough times in training, was the support of his cousin, Haruto. Haruto was two years older than Hiro and had the build that all his family found to be perfection. Whipcord muscles, strong lean physique, and lightning-fast reflexes. Most would think that made Haruto’s life less miserable than Hiro’s. The truth of the matter was that they both had equally deplorable lives. As hard as the trainers and familial expectations were on Hiro for his supposed failures, most of which were simply weight prejudices on their part, they were stern, or more so,
with Haruto.

  Haruto was destined to great things. That was what they all said. It was always amazing to Hiro how much appearance made peoples beliefs change. In truth, he and Haruto were a good match in strength and technique. Where Haruto was slightly faster, Hiro was a better tactician. Their endless bouts of sparring helped them become the great fighters they were today.

  Their cousin, Michael, who was also part of their training regime, had it easier. He was slower, weaker, and less thorough in preparing. Perhaps to compensate, he was meaner. Often casting blame for his failures onto Haruto or Hiro. Even though this was obvious to the trainers, he was never pushed the way they were. As the youngest son of a youngest son, he just didn’t warrant the effort in their opinion. Life challenged those with high expectations and just didn’t care about those without any. History has shown that to be true, over and over again.

  There were times when Hiro and Haruto wished they had Michael’s lowly status. Life would have not been nearly so harsh. Later they would ruminate about that wish, and be glad they had not been in his shoes. Perhaps that position had nothing to do with the way he turned out. Neither, knew the answer to that.

  During times of particular duress, they’d kept each other going. As Hiro matured, he kept his kind nature underneath the stiff formality of his surface persona. Nothing ruffled Hiro’s placid exterior. Haruto, on the other hand, grew hard and bitter. His hatred for the discipline and pressures of his family’s expectations, simply grew as he grew. It had surprised everyone but Hiro, when Haruto had suddenly broken away from the family and taken a management position in a highly successful universal investment firm. The murmurs throughout the family were that ‘highly successful investment firm’ really meant organized crime.

  Hiro kept in touch with Haruto. And, while Hiro suspected that Haruto’s businesses were perhaps not fully on the up and up, no one spoke of these things, of course. Haruto would occasionally crack a derogatory comment about the duplicity or stupidity of the police enforcement agencies around the galaxy, and that was enough for Hiro to accept that Haruto had cause to know. There was only one way to do that, and that was to have had experience out-smarting them!