by Scott Baron
Of course, had they wished it, they could have simply poisoned the man with ease, then been safely off world before he even felt the first cramps of his impending demise. But that was not the task for the day. Not for this one. He had valuable information, and they were going to extract it.
The plan was to get him alone after worming their way into his good graces. Once he felt a particular fondness for the pair, a fight would just happen to break out, spilling over to all areas of the establishment.
Their boss would be drunk. Very drunk, and not really capable of defending himself, so, naturally, his security detail would sweep him away from the commotion to his personal safe room.
If all went according to plan, the two Wampeh would be invited along, with Arvin intending to keep his new friends from harm’s way in his safest bolt hole. But the man would be anything but safe there.
Once they were alone, he would give up the answers they sought, having been incapacitated by a quick stun spell, then dosed with more elixirs to the point he would likely talk about anything and remember nothing.
It was a difficult maneuver in that it took time to coax information from a victim in this manner. But, if done properly, none would be the wiser, and the poor loose-lipped sap would not recall anything they had said.
His security detail would be standing guard outside of the chamber, leaving him with the seemingly unarmed and harmless visitors within. And when they finally took their staggering, drunken leave of him, he would simply appear to be sleeping off the effects of one hell of a bender.
Hozark and Demelza clinked glasses and took another drink, laughing merrily and keeping up their act. But their eyes met, relaying their shared assessment with a glance. The plan was going according to design. And with perhaps another bottle finished between them all, Arvin would be primed for the next stage of their mission.
The staff was always close when Arvin was in the building, so Hozark flagged down the nearest one and ordered them another bottle. It was all going perfectly. Perhaps a bit too perfectly. Something was always bound to go wrong, but no one could ever guess exactly what it would be.
In this case, however, Henni would have been a good bet.
The violet-haired young woman was having a fantastic time, making the rounds of the place, eavesdropping on any conversations that seemed of note, while lightening a few pockets along the way. She had heeded Hozark’s warning, however, and was only taking coin and other items that would not be missed by their owners.
It was the most fun she had had since she couldn’t remember when, and she even paused in her work to simply let loose and be, enjoying the warmth, her cleanliness, and the freedom she felt in this new place with her new friends. For the first time in ages, she felt her guard begin to lower, just a bit.
A stocky man with slicked-back hair of the deepest blue bumped into her as he passed, jarring Henni from her moment of grace. She spun and pushed back instinctively, shoving the man off-balance despite her diminutive size. The adrenaline surge had given her a start, and now she was ready for a fight.
But Hozark had said to stay unnoticed, and with great effort, she forced herself to ease off the aggression throttle and calm down. Unfortunately, the man she had shoved was not similarly inclined.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” he growled in a very menacing way.
He was not about to let that slight pass, it seemed, and he moved for Henni quickly and with open aggression. Bud saw the whole thing unfold and was actually impressed the girl had managed to control herself as she had, but he pushed through the crowd toward her regardless, just in case.
The reason had just become readily apparent, in the form of a blue-haired man with a bone to pick.
Bud shoved harder as he tried to reach the outsized girl. “Out of the way!”
But before he could reach her attacker, Henni did the unexpected. Rather than cower and run, as the larger man expected, she launched herself through the air with a piercing shriek, spinning as she flew, landing a brutal kick to the man’s cheek.
He shook it off as best he could, but the people around them had already reacted to the sudden outbreak of violence in the way people in crowds so often did, despite having no reason to.
They joined in.
Uzabud leapt into action. Not so much because Henni needed his help, but because he didn’t know what else to do. There was a whirlwind of fists, feet, and elbows flying around him, and to attempt to be the calm in the center of that storm would be a sure-fire way to lose a few teeth.
His old pirating ways were never that far below the surface, and when it came to melee brawls, pirates really were the best, and Bud had been one of the better among them. And here, outnumbered as he was, this promised to be fun.
He ducked a punch, kicking the attacker in the groin while simultaneously snapping out the opposite direction with his fingertips, catching a would-be assailant in the throat, making him gasp for breath.
Shifting on the balls of his feet, he changed direction and followed up with a headbutt, putting thoughts of breath far from the man’s mind as he slumped to the ground. Another attacker was flying his way, and Bud spun to face them, his fist already in motion.
Abruptly, he pulled back, barely missing Henni’s face. The smaller woman, on the other hand, struck him square in the solar plexus before realizing who was in front of her.
“Same team! Same team!” Bud gasped.
“Oh, shit. My bad.”
“Ya think?”
“Stop whining. You’ll be fine,” she said with a grin and a wink, then jumped back into the swirling fray.
It had seemed like the brawl was going to be a small, contained affair, when Laskar saw Henni and Bud involved.
“That’s got to be the sign,” he reasoned. But what was he supposed to do?
Without another moment to ponder that question, he took a swing at the nearest of the guards he had been drinking with, punching him square in the face. The stunned man looked at him with shock as his nose started to bleed.
“What the hell? Why would you do that?”
Laskar didn’t have the chance to reply as the question was followed up with an immediate punch, returning the favor. Laskar simply rolled with it, swinging wildly at patron and security alike, and in no time that section of the crowd was engaged in an all-out brawl as well.
The energy had shifted, and the two distinct fights quickly blended into one large rumble.
“Get in there and stop this. Now!” Arvin shouted to his staff. The nearest guards joined the fray, but the personal security detail simply pulled in a little closer, creating a perimeter around Arvin and his guests.
Hozark flashed a glance at Demelza. This was too soon, and Arvin was not nearly drunk enough for their plan. The security detail wasn’t whisking him away. In fact, he wasn’t fleeing at all. He wanted to fight.
Arvin reached under the table, his hand emerging with a skree to call for even more help. Hozark, however, put his hand on his arm, stopping him.
“What are you doing?”
“We should let this play out,” Hozark replied, hoping the man would agree.
Unfortunately, seeing damage inflicted on his property sobered him up somewhat, and he didn’t.
“My bar, my rules,” Arvin said, pulling his arm free.
Hozark sighed. “Well, don’t say I didn’t try.”
Before Arvin could ask what the hell he meant by that, he found his head violently slammed down into the table, knocking him out cold. The sound, along with the sight of their boss facedown and unconscious, sent the private security team into action.
The slim woman nearest Hozark pulled a blade from a hidden sheath, lunging for his heart. Even as he disarmed her and rendered her unconscious, he had to admire her tactical prowess. She had foregone the obvious weapon at her hip, pulling the secret one instead, saving both time and distance required to strike.
However, against the master Ghalian, she simply didn’t stand
a chance. But Hozark had no desire to kill such a talented fighter. She was only doing her job, after all, and she was not a Tslavar. So he merely rendered her unconscious before turning his attention to her comrades.
Demelza was already in motion, and two of them lay writhing in pain, grasping their broken limbs a moment before she kicked them to sleep. Hozark quickly took out the remaining threats, then turned his attention to the all-out brawl that had spilled across the entire establishment.
None of these men and women were targets. Just unfortunate victims of bad timing. The wrong place at the wrong time. And given the time constraints at hand, and the very real possibility their friends might wind up seriously harmed in the fray, the two Wampeh set to work in earnest.
They moved through the crowd like a tornado of fury, disarming, disabling, and pounding to unconsciousness all who crossed their path. And that meant pretty much everyone.
Bud, Laskar, and even Henni stopped their fighting at the sight of the two Wampeh Ghalian cleaning up the place with such brutal efficiency, all three suddenly feeling woefully inadequate. They’d never seen them work like this, and it was a sight to behold. They were good fighters, no doubt, but the two Ghalian were just so much better.
In barely a minute, all lay unconscious or wishing they were. A few patrons had scrambled out into the night, but that could not be helped.
Hozark looked at their copilot. “Why did you strike those men, Laskar?”
“I saw the sign,” he replied.
“That was most certainly not the sign,” the Ghalian master groaned. “That was simply Henni being more than a little overenthusiastic.”
Henni, her mouth bloody from battle, smiled broadly and gave a cute little wave. Injuries be damned, she was having a blast.
It was such an unexpected sight that they all found themselves chuckling at the diminutive woman. For her size, she could certainly fight.
“What is done is done,” Hozark said, striding over to the unconscious form of their target and hefting him over his shoulder with surprising ease, then heading for the doors. “Come. We move on to Plan B. And I fear we haven’t much time.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
When Hozark snapped off two table legs before departing, then grabbed a length of rope from one of the unconscious patrons’ snow-covered conveyance parked outside of Arvin’s establishment, Uzabud had absolutely no idea what his friend was up to.
The captive was, well, captive, and with the five of them and one of him, there was simply no way he would be escaping any time soon.
“Henni, would you mind? I wish to keep my hand unoccupied,” he asked, handing the young woman trotting at his side the coiled rope.
“Sure thing. I’ve got it,” she said, slinging it over her shoulder.
He shifted the unconscious man slumped over his shoulder and pushed on, heading for the expanse of white nothingness that marked the edge of the inhabited area. Henni and the others followed quietly, not just to keep their egress unnoted, but because they were deep in thought about what had just happened. What they had just seen.
Their friends had taken out dozens in a minute, and non-lethally at that. It was a reminder that, while they were their friends and colleagues, the two Wampeh were also something else entirely.
Henni stumbled as her leg caught a loop of the rope. With all of the bundled layers she was wearing, it kept slipping off, forcing her to constantly readjust as they walked.
“Here, give me that. I’ll carry it for you,” Bud said, intending to make up for his failing to protect her when the fight broke out.
Unfortunately, all he did was aggravate the young woman.
“I don’t need your help. What, do you think I’m not capable?”
“No, no. Nothing like that,” he said, backtracking as best he could before the dynamo of a woman truly lit into him. “I just wanted to help, is all.”
She glared at him, only the sparkling orbs of her eyes visible through the bundling wrapped around her head. What expressions she was making underneath all of that were anyone’s guess, but her gaze had a hard edge.
“I don’t need your help. I don’t need anyone’s help,” she said, continuing along in Hozark’s footsteps as he pushed on into the white.
Laskar stepped closer to his partner. “Damn, Bud. That one really hates you.”
“Thank you, Laskar, I noticed.”
“No, man. I mean, like, really, really hates you. More than that Umarian gal you met on Trakkal, even.”
“That was just a fling. She knew it as well as I did.”
“It didn’t seem that way when we were leaving,” Laskar replied with a chuckle, muffled beneath his bundled clothing. “Did you ever get that scar healed?”
“Not yet. And it was just a fork. Seems like a waste of coin for something so insignificant.”
Laskar chuckled. “Whatever you say, boss.”
His spirits were greatly improved with the pleasant addition of a little bit of petty thievery that had become a part of the day’s agenda. With all of the patrons of Arvin’s place out cold on the floor, they wouldn’t be needing the plentiful coats and cloaks stowed at the entrance, and Laskar had taken his pick.
Where he was freezing on their arrival, now he felt perfectly comfortable out in the icy tundra. Of course, he didn’t know how long they would be out there, so it was always possible the misery might make a return appearance if they stayed out long enough.
But Hozark had a plan. And that plan did not involve trekking too far from the town. In fact, not too long after they headed out into the ever-falling snow, they found themselves outside of the town proper, but still quite near to its periphery.
Close to its guard beasts.
The roar of the Obanta had been a somewhat distant sound when they’d made their arrival, but now, much to Laskar’s distress, it appeared to be getting louder. And that meant closer.
“Uh, Hozark? Where exactly are we going?” the man asked, a slight waver of fear in his voice.
“Just up ahead, Laskar. We shall be there momentarily.”
The ice beast roared again, and this time it was close. Really close.
Hozark nodded to Demelza, who slid a konus she’d liberated from one of the slumbering guards back at Arvin’s place onto her wrist. It was a pretty substantial piece of magical gear, she noted now that she had a moment to better look at it. It had been quite fortunate there were so many people involved in the fight, lest the guard be tempted to use it, even in those close quarters.
Demelza uttered a few arcane words and cast a minor force spell, pushing back the snows around them, leaving the group in a tiny bubble of clarity within the flurries. That was when they saw it.
The Obanta was almost invisible, its icy-white shape blending perfectly into the swirling snows. If not for the flat-trampled area around it from the beast’s agitated pacing, one might even walk right within its reach and not realize it until it was too late.
“Here,” Hozark said, stopping just outside the packed snow.
The others stopped just behind him and waited. A tense silence crackled through the air, waiting for something to happen.
The beast lunged at him silently, long, cold claws outstretched as it tried to snatch the Wampeh and make him its meal. But Hozark had stopped outside its area of danger, and the magical collar around the beast’s neck violently pulled it back to within its prescribed boundaries.
“Holy shit!” Laskar blurted, falling back over his own feet as he frantically backpedaled.
“It’s okay,” Bud said. “Look at the collar. It can’t get us.”
Henni dropped the rope and reached down.
“What are you doing?” Bud asked. “You’re not actually going to––”
The snowball flew from her hand, traveling with impressive accuracy for one as bundled up as she was. Its path was true, and the snowy burst as it hit the Obanta in the face enraged the beast even more.
“Come now, Henni,” Demelza said. �
�Let us not torment the poor beast.”
“But it wants to eat us.”
“Yes, but can you blame it? It is simply its nature. We do not need to be cruel to a beast in unfortunate circumstances, even if it does wish us harm.”
Henni thought about it a moment, shrugged, then picked up the rope and walked over to where Hozark had placed their captive on the snowy ground.
“You still want this?” she asked.
“Yes. Now is the appropriate time,” he said, taking the rope from her. “Uzabud, Laskar, will you please give me a hand here?”
The two men walked over to the Wampeh and found themselves somewhat puzzled at what he was doing.
“Uh, why are you stripping him?” Laskar asked. “Bud, why is he taking off Arvin’s clothes?”
“I am preparing our friend for a little talk,” Hozark said. “And if you would be so kind as to help speed the process, perhaps we might finish here sooner than later.”
Bud and Laskar squatted down and set to work helping the assassin remove their captive’s clothes. All of them. Demelza and Henni shared an amused look as the men pulled off the man’s underpants. It might have been cold out. Even really cold out. But that still wasn’t much of an excuse.
Demelza kept her stoic demeanor and straight face, but Henni pointed and laughed. The men, however, just continued their work, refraining from any comments about the chill in the air, or growing rather than showing. With the violet-haired imp, it would have merely amused her more, most likely.
“Now, help me get him in position,” Hozark said, moving the nude man and tying his wrists securely, then fastening the rope around his body.
Demelza stepped closer, the Obanta roaring and swinging its claws futilely as she passed just outside of its reach.
“Right here will do perfectly,” Hozark said, pointing to a spot just within their magical bubble.
Demelza nodded and focused her mind. Then she pulled the magic from the konus and spoke the words, using a common spell but in a most uncommon way, as Hozark had instructed her. In no time at all, her work was done.
