Rendezvous: The Ship Series Book Four by Jerry Aubin

Author:Jerry Aubin [Aubin, Jerry]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780997070866
Publisher: Lekanyane Publishing
Published: 2017-07-16T22:00:00+00:00

23

Let’s just get it out there.

Adan’s fist crashed into Markev’s head and sent his bodyguard sprawling to the deck. Adan scrambled to stomp on the giant’s belly, but the man rolled away from the blow at the last second and then grabbed Adan’s ankle and threw him off balance. While Adan regained his footing, Markev popped up off the deck and turned to him and spoke.

“It’s been twenty-four hours since you attacked Comms. I was tempted to cancel our sparring session, but I was hoping you might have calmed down by now. I can see that I was wrong.”

Adan didn’t respond but instead charged at Markev and pounded him with a flurry of kicks interspersed with punches to the man’s core. Markev was able to block most of the blows, but enough landed with sufficient force to once again send him crashing to the deck. Adan backed off and downed a big slug from his water container while allowing his aide an opportunity to recover. Markev didn’t stand right away, but instead spoke from his knees.

“You’re not yourself. Do you see that? The rest of us do.”

“What the hell are you talking about, Markev?”

“You haven’t been the same man who hired me for a couple of years now. You’ve always been a demanding boss, but you’ve started to behave more like a sociopath. Even before what happened yesterday, I can think of another half-dozen situations where your response to someone who challenged you was entirely non-proportional and inappropriate. I had assumed it was all of the stress catching up to you, but your reaction yesterday was something else. It was pure, unmitigated rage. That isn’t anything I’ve seen from you before, and it was scary.”

Adan wanted to spar more, but Markev clearly had something to get off his chest. He sat down and leaned against the bulkhead while he took another long swallow from his container before he replied.

“I tried not to react yesterday. I swear I did. I was excited to share our vision with everyone, and at first it was going so well. And then that little skinny punk started talking about genocide, and I just had to wipe his stupid smirk off his face.”

Markev shook his head. “That’s what I’m talking about, Adan. Three years ago you would have gutted someone who talked to you like that, but you would have done it with words. You would have torn him apart with a logical argument and left him quivering and useless. That ability is why I and so many others chose to follow you. What you’ve done recently instead is shut down dissent by force. Whether it’s that woman you kicked off the asteroid a while back, or beating the crap out of Comms, you just can’t seem to tolerate any semblance of disagreement. What do you think might be going on?”

“Stop beating around the bush, Markev. I’m pretty sure you’ve got a theory. Let’s just get it out there.”

“I’m certain the changes started back when we were testing the faster-than-light technology.

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