As for his DNA, Sko took a little comfort in that he was the runt of the litter, as it were. He could not broadcast knowledge his life had gained, not as a Bhest should, and his family would not attain it until he died and they absorbed him and hopefully, he planned, that would not be for many, many years.
Sko’s thought fell back onto his current effort, and he ran his digits over the case. “This one is difficult,” he said, as if he had a rapt audience waiting on him, and fell to working it, careful because this one had locks in layers, intricate and impossible. He approached it as one might an elaborate bomb, part of his salesmanship of his skill.
Ant’h noted, “You are perspiring.”
“Am I? Interesting,” he answered, both of them subvocalizing, having gauged the hearing range of their current clientele. “Prepared to scan?”
“Always.”
“Good. I have a feeling about this core.”
One of the three muttered to his fellows, and although Sko was not an expert in their dialect, their body language suggested that they did not like the idea this item would cost them a fortune to have opened.
Without looking up, he said, almost diffidently, “This item should be quite valuable to you, once I get it unlocked. You will need to take precautions until you dispose of it.” One of his picks clicked successfully and a seam opened up lengthwise. He ran his greater hand down it. “Almost done. Notice the difficulty of the securing system? A good indication of its worth.”
Ant’h subvocalized again. “Receiving alert transmissions.”
“Oh? And are our customers on it?”
“No, but it’s another inquiry,” and she beamed an image to him. He’d never seen anything like it and made a noise indicating his disinterest as he focused on this last locking system. Ant’h would copy the alert away, if it should ever concern them. At the moment, it did not.
At last the case opened for him. Three drive cores lay inside, their crystal construction sparkling up at him, like stars fallen from the Plexis version of sky. Sko paused for a moment, transfixed by their gemlike beauty before reaching in to lift each one and hold it up to examine for flaws or damage. And for Ant’h to read. She would not get a complete cloning of the drive, not unless it were plugged in, but they would obtain enough to make it worth their while and add to their library. His customers muttered in awe as he showed and evaluated each drive. Then he snapped the case shut and told them what they owed him for the last.
With a nod amid the grumbles, they paid and returned each item to their net bag. They pulled away, the last turning on heel to add, “We will bring our last relic back.”
“I’ll be here.”
Or he wouldn’t. Sko rubbed the back of his neck thoughtfully as they loped away, staying to the shadows of the tier although not necessarily the surveying circuits. He did, however, take a steadying breath and reached for the hydration she pushed toward him. He’d made the rent, and more, with that little transaction and now he could afford to retain Ant’h as his for a good decade longer. She did not know that he must pay for her, and it would crush her to find out; she must never know, and he could never let her go. If he returned home, his family might decide that she was not the best partner for him and force a separation. No. He knew what was best for himself. Extinction be damned. What was worth being alive if forced to be alone or unsuited? He knew his obligation, and she stood with him, joining him, making him whole and happy.
After a lull, they had a few more customers interested strictly in appraisals and insubstantial repairs, which were worth little but kept him busy and one of them intrigued Ant’h enough that she hummed happily as they examined it. Their deposit account profited slowly but steadily and that made Sko breathe a tune himself. He could feel the tension leave his shoulders and retracted his lesser arms for an internal hug of sorts. Refreshed, he returned to work.
“They’re back,” Ant’h interrupted mildly.
Sko turned about, for he had been fiddling with that infernal broken lift on the kiosk, thinking that if he could open any locked item in the universes, he ought to be able to repair a recalcitrant motor (and proving himself wrong) and looked at the three approaching. They looked little different from their earlier approach, if a bit more disheveled and . . . dare he say, burned about the whiskers? Were they being pursued?
He focused on the artifact in the right prehensile hold of the third one, his companions warily protecting his every step. Whatever his customer held: 1) they thought it valuable and 2) they thought it might be taken from them. Had perhaps already fought off an attempt. But he knew what the trio headed for him did not, that the artifact would be deadly to any associated with it. Ant’h had already sent him the image of it in the Plexis alert.
He bolted into action, trying to pack the kiosk and shut down his business before they could get any closer. It didn’t work.
* * *
• • •
Paigen watched the appraiser work. She hadn’t been there long but long enough, surveying not only the Bhest but those who frequented him. Noted, as she smoothed down the seams of her jacket, that the humanoid had cyborg qualities but definitely an internal system that radiated both interest and showmanship and nerves. It/he would be nearly as tall as she stood, though ambulated mechanically, and might be difficult to run down, if it came to that. Paigen doubted it would. She wouldn’t let it. The Eima studied a reflection of herself on a nearby column and flushed with pleasure at the sight of her newly won junior security officer status. Her cheek flaps flushed faintly green to betray her slight bit of vanity. Even if it had come to caretaking, she would do her job well. She watched the customers come and go and recorded enough that she could pressure the Bhest if necessary.
Paigen had gauged it just about time to approach when, unless she were no reader of body language at all, the tradesbeing began frantically folding his kiosk in upon itself to haul ass. She couldn’t blame Skoranth for his actions. The trio loping toward him looked like trouble in anyone’s report, and Plexis had broad standards. She positioned her ’scope on the object one of them carried, a battered bit of debris if she ever saw one.
The lopers cleared holsters, closing in on the hapless Skoranth who plowed to a reluctant stop. He threw up his arms in negation. “Stop there! I’ll have nothing to do with it. I am closed for business.”
The local portlight went out. Figures grew indistinct except that of the Bhest, barely chest-high to his salvager clients but who shone with a brilliance of his own, one which quickly got damped when it was obvious he’d become an easy target. Paigen drew a bit closer for a better view and reaction position.
She saw a tall and confident figure stride out of a darker shadow, armed and moving with purpose, in a body language that stilled the others. To Paigen, new as she was, he exuded menace.
“Don’t anyone move. Especially you three.” Even in the dim light, the barrel of his weapon gleamed, and his voice, gravelly and rough, vibrated with intent. “I’ll take that.”
Hearts thumping, Paigen guessed the object was the “certain artifact” of interest to both the inspector and the mysterious Facilitator. If so, she and the Bhest were in deep trouble.
The newcomer spit to one side in disgust even as he threatened the lopers. The poor Bhest swung about fluidly, arms moving as if he could signal for aid.
Paigen knew that she was all the help available for Skoranth. She signaled for backup and readied herself to step out. She kept her ’scope on the menacing new arrival. From here, at best she had a flank shot; at worst, no shot at all.
“The bounty can be divided, or I can take it all.”
“How much?” said one of the three.
“I take half and you three split the rest. We all gain reputation as well as credit, and I hear the Facilitator has a good memory for those who benefit’m.”
The three jostled one another before one blurted out, “We found it! It�
�s ours!”
The newcomer peeled his lips back from his teeth and raised his weapon.
“You can’t accept a commission on our salvage. We claim client privilege! The Facilitator can deal with us.” The loper carrying the object tossed it at Skoranth who scampered forward to catch it before it could fall, then carried it back with a cry of dismay.
An emotion Paigen shared. In the eyes of Plexis Authority, his now became the legal responsibility to protect and guard the object against all misfortune, and his duty to do the job for which he’d taken a retainer. Skoranth froze.
It was a ploy, she realized in the next instant. Barrels came up, the lopers aiming their own heat, and Paigen swiftly freed her tangler. The newcomer laid down fire, scouring the walkway and flashing up at the lopers’ boots to drive them back.
His attention turned to the Bhest, holder of the object. Counting her options, Paigen tensed for desperate measures.
* * *
• • •
“Incoming!” Ant’h warned and activated all her cladding and shields. She wrapped herself tightly about Sko, as he put all his focus on the artifact. He could not resist it. Out of instinct, he reached out to protect the relic, the ancient bit of luggage shielded against the vagaries of space and time, its dull metal sides pocked and ravaged by solar winds and shrapnel. It sang to him even as Ant’h did, hers of warning and the artifact’s one a herald of glory. He gathered it in, this relic of deep space, even as the lopers snarled and surrounded him in defensive fury. As he reeled it in, hugging it close in protection because he had no choice, a violent force hit him.
It knocked him across the byway and against a wall, the fabrication sounding as he landed. Bits and pieces of Ant’h went flying. His own brain seemed to scramble inside the nesting she’d provided and his greater and lesser arms tightened about his precious bundle.
Even the violence as the villain shot again, clipping him and swinging him about, couldn’t muddy the attraction of it, the glorious song it sang to him. He had to unlock it and set it free. It had waited for . . . centuries? Gripping the piece closely, his lesser hands ran over it and locked their grips on it, freeing his greater hands to examine the locks and safeguards and pry them open. Like petals of a flower, he thought to himself, waiting to bloom—and they, he and Ant’h, the sun to ripen them.
A seam opened with a slight but rewarding whine as his head pounded, and Sko could barely see as he laid the object open. He implored Ant’h to scan what he’d revealed. She did not answer. He felt about himself and realized that her shielding, her cladding, even her mechanical arms had been ripped from her shell.
She’d given all she could to protect him.
Sko began to weep even as he activated his own poor cameras to record what he’d just unlocked, seconds of exposure before it snapped shut in his arms. Then he felt Ant’h activate, weakly, as their mysterious assailant laid the hot barrel of his weapon alongside Sko’s head. It whined as it gathered a charge. “A mechanical symbiote. No one will miss it. No recording, no evidence.” He put a hand on the artifact and prepared to yank it free.
A voice, feminine but firm, snapped: “Cease fire and hold!”
A uniformed figure appeared in his peripheral view.
Ant’h let go.
The relic exploded.
* * *
• • •
A blinding flash set her on her heels, and the air rained bloody for a moment, spattering her. It took her a moment to realize that the object had detonated. Paigen started for the broken being and his shattered bundle, her hearts pounding in her chest, her cheeks flaring with heat. She discharged the tangler, sending the lopers to the ground, arms and legs waving but their weapons on hold. As for the newcomer . . . little remained of him.
As the lopers kicked and cursed in their net, the Bhest keened in distress. She reached him and put a hand out, surprised to find it shaking. He dodged away from her and, fractured, Skoranth rolled back and forth unevenly, retrieving wreckage, armor that had given him protection beyond measure. Bit by shattered bit, he gathered all he could, no piece too unimportant. The only shards he threw away Paigen could see had possibly come from the instigator.
She disengaged the net. The lopers climbed to their feet and glared at her. “Our salvage, little Jelly—”
“Gone. Be glad it didn’t take you out as well.”
Grumbling among themselves, they backed away and then disappeared among the planters.
The constable found a mechanical appendage underfoot and held it out as she slowly approached. Perhaps part mechanical, but the sorrow on the Bhest’s face undoubtedly came from within. He took it and managed a weak smile.
“Will you be all right?”
“Always. Our core is solid. We will rebuild. Inside, we are intact. It must be.” He hugged the appendage to himself.
“You’re certain.”
Sko nodded, his face still wet. “We are reassured. We live still.”
“I . . . I am directed to have you contact home.”
He looked at her, big, dark eyes brimming with his tragedy. “When there is time. I have work to do. This is home, here and now. It must be again.”
She watched him roll off to his battered kiosk, patting and talking to the small pile of debris arranged there even as he began to reattach minute bits. His four arms moved surely and quickly.
Backup answered her call with typical Plexis tardiness. Paigen answered crisply, “No need, the situation is concluded. I’ll handle the report and notify maintenance of a cleanup.”
“A demolition has been recorded.”
“Yes. An attempted robbery set off a relic. Contained explosion. No fault of the tradesbeing involved, and he has no accountability for it. It’ll be in my report.” Paigen found no sympathy for the would-be robber. She watched Skoranth continue to scuttle back and forth, putting himself back together.
“The Bhest?”
“Yes. Please inform the inspector the welfare check has been made.” She terminated the transmission and took a step forward, finding another gleaming bit and took it to Skoranth who crooned when he saw it and promptly reattached it.
He patted himself and then Paigen’s wrist. “I have seen the stars,” he said. “And they have looked back. All will be well. She must be.”
. . . Truffles continues
Interlude
BOWMAN. THE FACE. Now Keevor’s, preferred meeting place for those on Plexis who felt free to commit violence. Morgan was mildly surprised his inner warning hadn’t sounded yet.
Didn’t mean safety. Only that any threat wasn’t imminent. Until it was, they both knew Sira mustn’t use her Power to get them clear.
Not even then, he thought grimly. They’d made the Clan known to those who could help them survive as a species and efforts were underway to do just that but . . .
. . . Sira knew as well as he how fragile that relationship was. A mistake—such as a too-public display of the Clan’s incredible Power—could end it. There were those with reason to want the Clan extinct.
And if any place in the universe held secrets, most for sale, it was Plexis.
If there was any place on Plexis to find those trading secrets, it was in Keevor’s. The stench made Morgan almost nostalgic. How many deals had he made in this cesspool—and how many had he walked away from—
Another life now, with another life in it. He reached along their link, reassured to find Sira preoccupied. She was the most curious person he’d ever met. Doubtless, she’d have a story for him.
Morgan slipped through the crowd along the left wall where the lights were marginally brighter. He’d warn Keevor about Plexis’ new Consumables fee. The being served the worst liquor on the station, granted, but in such quantities he was a major importer. There were those who dismissed Keevor as an odorous slug with the disposition of a mad Brexk. Few knew—or would
credit—that the alien was a gifted biochemist. Fewer that Keevor had created the airtags everyone wore—including the fakes. A story there, he’d always suspected, but one the grim little alien wasn’t sharing.
And he hadn’t come to talk to him.
If he wanted to free the Silver Fox—and Huido, damn his eyeballs for the situation but they were, in the end, brothers, and who’d have guessed it’d be the truffles—
It was time to reach into the dark.
A Traitor’s Heart
by Karina Sumner-Smith
AFTER MORE THAN two years of snow, rotten ice, and bitter, hardscrabble fights over a find barely worth the marker used to claim it, Triad Third Maja Anders had more than earned her vacation.
Her plan was simple: a few days on Plexis to shop and gather supplies, then a blessed tenday on Areill, a small moon close to Plexis’ planned path that happily catered to Humans. The brochure had shown everything she wanted. There were more swimming pools than she had fingers, filters on the resort domes to make the sunlight appear yellow, and—most importantly—no ice that wasn’t part of some fruity drink.
It had been, she reflected sourly, a good plan. But her transport ship was almost due to undock, and here she was some ten levels below, secreted in the corner of a less-than-reputable spacer bar and hoping to remain unnoticed.
Maja leaned back, using the flickering menu projection as cover as she scanned the room.
The bar was set to station night, the light pillars set between tables doing more to accentuate the shadows than illuminate the patrons and their drinks. It was a blessing. What little Maja could see over hunched shoulders and bowed heads—or, in one case, the shielding bulk of chitin plates—told her that the less she knew of the business negotiated across those scarred tables, the better.
The establishment’s reputation had nothing to do with the drinks or questionable selection of food on the menu; a reputation that should have been enough to make any respectable Triad member steer well clear, even on their free time. Yet here she was—and there, across the room, was ’Flix.
The Clan Chronicles--Tales from Plexis Page 33
