My Gods, those bastards are actually working, he laughed to himself.
“What do you think Billy Don’t and Vaughn are up to?” he whispered to Mom.
His first mate growled, unappreciative of the tease. Leaving the unwelcomed crew members back on the ship without a chaperone was not Mom’s first choice.
“Come on,” Reht joked. “How much fun could a rehabilitated ex-con and pre-pubescent Liiker have in a dirty, sublevel Fiorahian bar?”
“Probably more fun than we’re having,” Bacthar sighed.
With a chuckle, Reht turned his attention back to Sebbs. “If Di didn’t acquire us such fine upgrades this trip would be hardly worth it. Tell me you have something worth hearing or I’m postponing your shipment.”
Sebbs’ eyebrows shot up and lips peeled over stained teeth; Reht placed his hand over his gun. The Dominion officer was normally a bit edgy, especially when he was low on hits, but this was abnormal even for him.
“Oh, Gods—those launnies—if they fit the profile the senior officers have been talking about, we’re chakked. What if this starts a new war?” Sebbs mumbled.
That got Reht’s attention. “What profile? What are you talking about?”
Sebbs patted down his jacket, muttering to himself. Over the years Reht had watched the Dominion officer’s personality splinter under the weight of addiction. Bright eyes blinked out, turning into wells of raw need. Sebbs used to enjoy a good hit of methoc once in a while, but now he used on a daily basis.
“Talk,” Reht said, producing a booster from his pocket and pushing it across the table. Sebbs scooped it up and injected himself without hesitation.
“Jeez,” Bacthar whispered, just loud enough for Reht to hear. Mom growled. None of his crew liked Sebbs, but they couldn’t argue the profitability of their deals. As chakked up as he was, Sebbs had a knack for acquiring valuable Dominion intelligence to sell to Reht, who in turn supplied him with ample amounts of methoc.
“Start from the beginning,” Reht said, shaking Sebbs’ shoulder. “I want to know your source.”
“General Duncan,” Sebbs slurred. “I gave him a triple hit of Sapphire.”
Even the thought of Sapphire made Reht shudder. He had seen plenty of flavors in his day, but nothing as viral and as toxic as the Sweetness. Nobody could trace the rare drug’s origins, but it was rumored that several Core officers were associated with its distribution.
“Ahh, good ol’ Duncan,” Reht chortled. “I didn’t know the old bastard loved to party.”
Sebbs shook his head. “No, that’s not why he takes it. That not why any of the officers take it.” The Joliak leaned forward, bloodshot eyes about to pop from their sockets. “Sapphire calms you down. It makes you not care.”
Bacthar perked up, his giant wings scraping the top of the alcove. “A disinhibitor?”
Sebbs snapped his fingers. “Yes! The officers love it. Takes the edge off during combat.”
“So?” Reht said. “You gave Duncan a loaded dose. Then what?”
“He told me about his orders to comb the galaxy for telepaths—and not just for Prodgies anymore,” Sebbs said.
Reht shifted in his seat. Prodgies were once a revered telepathic race, with the unique ability to heal and restore almost any Sentient being no matter how severely injured or diseased. Over the years the Dominion Core had managed to shift reverence to fear by sensationalizing the Prodgy potential to Fall, or turn into a Dissembler with the power to destroy living tissue with thought. When the public had been sufficiently frightened, the Core introduced their new technological advancement: the telepathy inhibiting shock collar. The USC had nothing to match this new means of control and detainment, and Dominion gained support as the public demanded protection against the Dissembler threat.
Triel. Starfox. The Dominion is coming for you.
Reht could feel both Bacthar and Mom’s eyes on him. It felt like ages since the crew had helped Triel return to her homeworld, Algar, to try and reconcile with her father. A day hadn’t gone past that he didn’t think of her. No woman had ever had such sway over him, but then again, a Healer’s touch went deeper than any other.
“And?” Reht said.
“He said they’re doing mass intelligence screenings on all telepaths. Like the tests I give the launnies, only he said that these were designed by somebody contracted by the Core,” the Sebbs sputtered. Shaking, he reached for his drink and knocked it over. Mom, standing up to avoid the spill, nearly took the table off its hinges.
“Sorry, Mom, sorry—” Sebbs said, cowering in his seat.
The giant blue Talian growled as he sat back down, using Sebbs’s jacket—with the Joliak still in it—to mop up the mess. Sebbs didn’t protest, but gave Reht a dirty look.
“Easy, Sebbs. You want to keep all your limbs, right?” Reht laughed. “So, what are they searching for? What possible connection could there be between smartass launnies and telepaths?”
“I don’t know. Duncan says the orders are extremely vague, and he mostly just seeks telepaths out, imprisons them, and sends them off-world to some place I can’t remember.”
Reht ran a hand through the mess of platinum-blonde hair on his head and shrugged his shoulders. “You really aren’t much help, Sebbs. What am I supposed to sell to the USC? That the Core wants smartass telepathic launnies? That won’t buy me grandma’s handbag.”
“Look, that’s all I know. If you had just seen them you’d get it. They were creepy. All silent, like they were talking to each other in their heads, I just know it. The Core could probably screw ‘em up real bad—make them some sort of target or weapon—I don’t know.”
“Ahhh, Sebbs, there you go again.”
“Don’t chakking do that, Reht,” Sebbs screamed. “Don’t put me off! You know I’m right about these things.”
Reht raised an eyebrow at him. Baring his teeth, Mom placed both of his hands on the table.
“Sorry, Mom—really I am,” Sebbs said, eyes widening as the Talian dropped his claws. “I just think this is it. If the Sovereign has a new weapon that can take down the USC, then we’re chakked. We’ll all be under the Sovereign’s thumb. We’ll have to register to take a chakking piss.”
Before Reht could respond, an eruption of laughter broke out from behind the main bar. Reht ducked his head out of their alcove and saw a large group huddled underneath the airshaft where a vent grate had been pushed out from the inside.
A tiny figure wormed her way through the crowd and took off running. Without thinking, Reht jumped out of his seat and nabbed her before the horde of criminals claimed their prey.
“Awh, come on. We was just playin’ with the launnie!” shouted a drunken Vreaper stumbling toward Reht, his brew tipping as he knocked into a nearby table. Several others joined in and heckled the dog-soldier captain for interrupting their fun. Reht looked down at the tiny girl furiously fighting his grip.
“Enough, already. Go back to your drinks,” he said, putting a hand over the girl’s mouth to muffle her screams. The bandages around his hand protected him from her bites, but he didn’t think they’d hold for long.
“She looks like a squealer. Maybe this be how the Dominion’s been finding our jukes!” an angry voice cried out. “They run launnies through the pipework to figure out our adaptations!”
“Let her go, Jagger,” the drunken Vreaper said, moving his free hand to the gun strapped to his hip.
Mom got up and stood by Reht’s side. Towering a full meter above Reht’s tall frame, the Talian warrior commanded the entire bar’s attention.
“I’ve said enough. I’ll take care of this. If anybody disagrees, they can take it up with my first mate,” the captain said, smiling and nodding his head toward the Talian. The crowd froze as Mom’s claws protruded from his hands and forearms, transforming his upper limbs into deadly, razored weapons.
“Alright, alright—call off your dogs,” the Vreaper grumbled. The rest of the crowd muttered and cursed, but returned to their drink
s and previous conversations.
After making sure his Talian had adequately tempered the Fiorahian crowd, Reht wrestled the little girl back to his alcove.
“Now what have we got here?” Reht asked, setting the child down next to his chair while dodging her scratching fingers.
Is she human? Reht didn’t believe his eyes. Fiorah is no place for a Deadskin.
Barring Dominion soldiers, Fiorah’s inhabitants were a menagerie of cutthroat outerworlders with the physical capacity to withstand the planet’s hostile environment—and each other.
How can she handle the heat—the pollution? he thought, looking her over as she backed up against the wall. Cuts and bruises marred her face, arms and legs. ...Or the violence.
“Just chill, kid,” Reht said, taking his seat. “I just saved your scrawny assino, remember?”
Gods, she smells like she’s straight out of the gutter, Reht thought, taking a closer inspection of the dirty child. Topitrate and sweat caked her face so that only the green of her eyes shone through. Barefoot and clothed in rags, the kid looked like she had just finished a bout in the fighting rings. He assumed she was a child laborer, though he had never seen one so banged up. How she had even made it down here was beyond him.
Reht looked over to Sebbs. The Joliak had gone white.
“You alright?” Bacthar asked, jabbing Sebbs in the ribs.
“That’s one of them, Reht.”
The girl’s eyes narrowed as she looked the officer over.
“You two know each other?” Reht said, signaling the circulating members of his crew to join them at the table. If there was even a chance that what Sebbs had been bumbling about was legitimate, he wanted his crew there to protect the asset.
“Yeah. This officer gave us an entrance exam for the Core,” the tiny girl said, her eyes flashing over each of them.
What a defiant little stinker, Reht thought.
“Aren’t you going to introduce us, Sebbs?” Reht asked as Tech, Ro, Cray, and Diawn joined their party in the alcove.
Sebbs remained silent and his color ghostly.
“Changing diapers at a bar, Cappy?” Ro laughed as he slouched into the chair next to Mom and Cray.
“What gives?” Diawn said, glowering at the kid as she passed her by and sat on the other side of table with Bacthar and Tech.
“A wee one that manages to make her way into an Underground bar interests me. Especially since it looks like it was on purpose,” Reht said, pointing toward the vent grate. He lit a smoke and signaled for the girl to talk.
“My name is Jetta. My siblings and I are indentured to Yahmen Drachsi. We can’t survive much longer. We’re looking to bargain safe passage on an outgoing ship,” she said, her speech slightly rattled but deliberate.
“The street rat can talk?” Ro snickered. Jetta’s brow furrowed. She inhaled and briefly closed her eyes before responding.
“The three of us can learn to do anything an adult can do, and if it weren’t for size limitations, we could match any crew member on a starship. The only thing we have to trade is ourselves. Like I said, we won’t survive much longer under Yahmen.”
Only on Fiorah would a little kid be willing to trade her flesh for a ticket, Reht mused, taking a long drag from his cigarette to keep his conscience from weighing in.
“Yahmen Drachsi—what a gorsh-eating sellout. I’d love to kick that little baech in his lady parts,” Cray said pretending to kick Ro in the crotch. Ro covered his mouth and acted faint.
“What’s your problem with Drachsi?” Reht laughed. “You know he owns half this dump of a planet. And he’s a bloody bastard. You’re like soul mates.”
Cray scowled and jabbed his thumb at the crowd. “Word’s out that he’s doing business with the Dominion. I don’t sleep with the enemy.”
“Only if she had triple tits like Veronica!” Ro laughed, spraying beer and spit across the table. Cray grabbed him by the ears and slammed his head into the table. Only Mom’s intervention prevented things from escalating as he held them both by their throats until they waved their hands in submission.
Reht wiped his face and looked at the girl. She seemed shaken by their banter. He knew that Yahmen Drachsi was a vicious businessman who had a fairly nasty reputation in the Underground, but he was no different from any other scumbag he’d come across. But apparently, to this little girl, he was much, much more.
“Sweets, you’re a launnie. A gutter kid. What makes you think you could handle a dog-soldier’s life? Hell, do you even know what a dog-soldier is?” Reht asked, leaning back in his chair and glancing out of the alcove. Most of the bar’s patrons had directed their attention toward his table, making him itch for his gun.
She took the insult well, keeping her tone in check. “Being a dog-soldier means you’re a mercenary, but it’s deeper than that. You have your crew, and that goes above all else, even profit sometimes. You hate organized government, military—whatever—and you’re not afraid to screw over your own mother. It’s Underground slang. Anybody knows that.”
“Close enough. So what makes you think you could handle what we do?”
The little girl’s face disclosed no answers, but her words were freighted with anger. “After surviving Yahmen for this long, I doubt there’s anything we couldn’t handle.”
Reht studied her for a moment before checking the reactions of his crew. Diawn yawned and stretched her legs out on the table, inspecting her empty glass of ale. Bacthar completely disengaged, leaning his giant head on his arm and starting a low conversation with Mom and Tech.
A small part of Reht felt sorry for the girl. None of them are taking this kid seriously.
Cray shook his head. “If you came here for a pity party, you ain’t gonna get it. This here is a table full of sob stories,” Cray said, tipping his drink at his crew. Mom rolled his eyes. “There ain’t one person here who’s had the royal life, so your sad story ain’t gonna twist our britches.”
“That’s not my point,” she said calmly, though she stiffened at their indifference.
“Then what is it? Because you’re making the whole bar go to jitters, and we’ll off you sooner rather than later,” Ro snapped, drawing a knife from his sleeve.
Reht raised a brow at her, curious to see her response.
“We already know what it’s like to live life on the skids. We know all about loyalty and family because that’s all we have. What don’t we know about being part of a crew?”
“We ain’t babysitters,” Reht said. “Besides, why not just chance it with the Dominion? Probably do a lot safer under their belt than with criminals.”
The girl looked at him with a careful eye.
“I’m young, but I’m not stupid. I hear what the adults say. Think I don’t see the connection? The Dominion touches down and all of a sudden me and my sibs are working double shifts.”
“And,” she said, angling her head toward Sebbs, “I saw him dragging the other kids through Dominion propaganda gorsh-shit. Tell me that isn’t a setup.”
“Then why did you take the entrance exam?” Reht retorted, blowing a ring of smoke at her. She stifled a cough and continued.
“We never thought we’d be able to take that test ‘cause of our age or ‘cause of Yahmen. But we’d chance the Core over staying here if it meant regular schooling and three meals any day. Besides, you can defect or be discharged from the Core and have a chance. Defect from Yahmen and you and anyone you’ve ever known are iced. But still, we’d rather take our chances with you. I can’t fail,” she said, locking eyes with him.
“I don’t know, kid. The Core ain’t no playground. What if you’ve got talent? What then? You know they’ve got an unusual taste for telepaths these days. Nobody even knows what they do to ‘em on the ships. They just disappear,” Reht said, spreading his fingers out in her face.
Although the change in her facial expression was subtle, he caught it—the slight retraction of her lips when he said the word “telepath.” She’s one of th
em. The price tag on her head jumped by at least five digits.
“You think I’d put up with any of this gorsh-shit if I was a leech? We’re just street rats—launnies—right?”
“Ahhh, girly, you can try to hide it, but the Dominion is all high-tech these days. Your talents don’t have to be obvious for them to nab you. They may say they don’t got a way to weed ‘em out, but be sure that they do. Then they slap you with a shock collar and bam—you’re either fried or in a freezer case.”
“Gorsh-shit,” the little girl repeated, this time less fervently.
“Do you believe me now, Reht?” Sebbs interjected, glancing nervously at the girl.
“Yeah, I guess. So she’s smart. All three of them are probably smart. What’s the big deal? General Bersisa was smart and he caved an entire armada in less than two hours. Look, kid,” Reht said, stabbing his smoke out on the back of his chair. “You’re too hot now. If you’re as smart as Sebbs says, you’ve already been tagged. My job is risky enough high-tailing it back and forth between Dominion and USC lines.”
“But if we’re taken away, there’s always the chance that our Dominion superiors could find out about your private operation,” she said, looking directly at Reht. Her face had gone cold and hard. “Given the number of crewmembers you have, I’d bet you’re into illegal weapons transportation. I hear that will get you a lifetime on Plaly.”
“Just give me the word, Jag,” Ro snarled, lurching over the table and waving his knife dangerously close to the girl’s face.
Without flinching, the kid kept her eyes on Reht. “You can’t kill me," she said. "I’m too hot, remember?”
Reht stifled a smile. The way the launnie talked, reasoned—she was probably more intelligent than half the crewmen he had gone through in five years as captain. And her audacity was something he had never seen in a child. To risk everything crawling through kilometers of pipeline to the dregs of Fiorah took gumption, even if she was desperate or crazy.
Triorion Omnibus Page 6
