by Alex Kings
He mind wandered back to the call he'd gotten yesterday.
“Deal with it,” Sukone had said.
Sukone was a Varanid, His words were deep and filled with bass rumbles.
Two parties would be meeting here soon. One was a minor gang. The other was Sweetblade, the organisation Zino belonged to.
Zino didn't care about what they were exchanging. Nor did he care that he would be attacking people from his own organisation. Right now, the only thing on his mind was Sukone's last instruction.
“No survivors,” Sukone had.
I can handle that, Zino thought, a grin spreading across his face. He took a pistol out of his jacket and held it against his chest, pointing outwards.
After a few minutes, he heard the distant clang of a door being opened two floors below. Muffled voices floated up through the air.
The low-level guys were looking around the warehouse to make sure there were no surprises in store before the really important people arrived.
After a while, he heard the clanging of someone climbing a steel staircase, then footsteps.
Zino lay perfectly still, aside from his pistol, which he angled towards the changing direction of the footsteps as best he could.
The footsteps circled the room.
They stopped.
They came closer.
Zino's hands tightened around his gun. His smile became a rictus.
There was a thump, and the engine casing around him rattled. Someone had put a hand on the shuttle.
Silence. The seconds dragged by.
Then whoever it was seemed to move. The footsteps receded.
Zino stayed ready, just in case this was some sort of ruse.
The stairs clanged again as someone went back down. They were gone.
Zino waited silently, counting out a minute, two minutes, three minutes. At last he heard a new set of voices. The important people had arrived.
He reached up and slowly unscrewed the cap on the engine housing. It didn't fall – he'd already connected it from the inside with a strip of smart matter like a hinge. So instead it gently swung upwards as he pushed it, allowing him to slide out silently.
Pistol raised, he scanned the room. It was empty. Good. He lowered his pistol and picked up a sturdy length of cable from the floor. This was another thing he'd placed there beforehand. It looked perfectly innocent amongst all the other detritus.
He checked the window. As expected, no one on this side was on guard.
Zino firmly knotted the end of the cable on a railing by the window, and unfurled the rest out the window.
Then he stopped and listened to the conversation and movement downstairs for any change.
Nothing.
He swung out the window and climbed down the cable. Outside the second floor window he paused and listened.
“Did you see her?” said a voice.
“Who?” replied another.
“The one in the pink skirt.”
The voices were muffled. Zino climbed in. Dingy corridors stretched away to left and right. He put his pistol in his belt and took out a box cutter, a throwing knife, and a tiny screw.
“Yeah. What about her?”
“The way she looked at me, man!”
Zino threw the screw down the corridor. It landed with a barely audible clink. He hid round a corner with his back against the wall.
“Hey. Shut up for a moment. Did you hear that?”
“Of course I did!” hissed the second voice. “Look, it's probably nothing. But go and check it out.”
“Why me?”
“Because you heard it!”
Zino rolled his eyes. After a little more bickering, someone came sauntering down the corridor.
Zino waited.
And then he struck.
Lighting fast he was out, grabbing the man, one hand over his mouth, the other drawing the box cutter across his neck before he knew what was going on.
Blood sprayed against his suit. An electric surge of joy went down Zino's spine. He suppressed the urge to laugh, letting the man twitch and shudder, and then put the body down quietly.
Throwing knife out, he advanced down the corridor.
“That you?” came a voice. “What, is someone here to kill us all?”
Zino stepped out, knife ready.
The man's eyes widened. He began to raise his gun. Before it was halfway, Zino's throwing knife was embedded in his throat.
As soon as he'd thrown the knife, Zino ran down the corridor. He caught the man before he could fall, and before the gun could go off.
“Good guess,” he told the dying man, and retrieved the knife.
Out the window again. He cleared the ground floor, coming at the Glaber and humans guarding the door from behind. He took a brief trip outside, sneaking up behind each of the parked shuttles in turn and popping up to kill the drivers.
That just left the main event.
This time, he went up the stairs, clanging loudly.
Whoever heard him assumed it was one of the guards.
“Who is it? What's the matter?” he roared.
Zino appeared at the top of the stairs. His formerly pristine suit was dark with blood. In one hand he held a submachine gun, stolen from a guard. In the other, he held a throwing knife.
He surveyed the scene.
The floor was open. In the middle stood three humans and three Glaber standing apart from one another. The humans were from Sweetblade. They were the people making the transaction. A pair of human guards and a pair of Glaber guards stood in each corner. The human guards had the Sweetblade sigil – a silhouette of a serrated knife – on their uniforms. A few pieces of machinery scattered about the place offered some cover.
At last, Zino thought, he could have some real fun.
“Hello, friends!” he shouted with glee. And, without pausing, he fired, taking down two guards.
“What the fuck?” someone said, bringing out a gun.
Zino sprinted for cover, pausing to throw the knife. One of the human guards fell, clutching his stomach.
Zino dodged behind a robot arm as return fire sparked against the floor and took out another knife.
“Zino? What the fuck are you doing here?” shouted the guy from Sweetblade.
“I'm here to bring you a very important message!” Zino shouted. Motion to the side caught his eye. He threw the knife. A Glaber went down.
“What the fuck are you talking about? What message?”
“You're all going to die!” shouted Zino, and laughed. He leaned out and swung the submachine gun across the room, back and forth until the barrel was empty. He dropped back into cover.
One of the Sweetblade people ran for the door. Zino took out his pistol and shot the man. He leaned out of cover and fired at the only bit of motion he saw.
Silence.
He leaned out for a moment and counted the bodies.
One missing. The window was open. He saw his cable twist into view briefly.
“Tricky bastard,” he muttered.
He ran down the stairs, checking behind him in case this was a ruse.
It wasn't.
He left the warehouse to see one of the shuttles lift off, the body of the driver crumpled on the floor.
“I'll have your head for this!” roared the Sweetblade guy as the shuttle rose. “You and Sukone! When Mr. Wells hears about this, he'll –”
Zino took out a controller from his pocket, flicked off the safety, and hit the button.
There was a sharp crack. The interior of the shuttle flashed briefly. The doors came flying off, chased by tongues of flame, then tumbled to the ground. The shuttle hovered ten metres up for a few seconds, listing slightly, then nose-dived into the ground and crumpled with a bang.
Zino rubbed his hands together, grinning. “Wonderful!”
Chapter 7: Partners Become Prey
Olivia rolled her bags into her tiny hotel room and shut the door behind her. There was just about enough floorspace for t
he bed, the bedside table, the bag and herself. She leant back against the wall and closed her eyes. She could hear the rain outside, and the muffled sounds of a couple arguing through the paper-thin walls.
So this was it. This was where her escape had taken her. And even here, on Hagbard, she couldn't settle. They'd still be looking for her.
She found herself thinking about the Outsider. Her room there had been much smaller, but it was still the first time she'd enjoyed travelling.
After a minute or so of just letting her thoughts wander, she stood and stretched. Tomorrow, she could worry about all the problems of real life. Tonight she was on a new planet. May as well go out and see what Hagbard had to offer.
She grabbed a few essentials from her bag, unwilling to leave them alone in a place like this, and headed back out into the rain.
She traipsed down the streets, keeping under the awnings and out of the rain. A few cars skated past on effector fields, briefly lighting up the night with their headlights. Water rushed off the buildings and crashed against the cobbles.
Something moving down the narrow alley between two storefronts caught her eye. A Glaber and a Petaur, pushing a pallet.
Rurthk and Mero?
They were out of sight in an instant, before she could tell. An idea flashed through her head. Perhaps she could go back to the Outsider, and work there?
She knew it was unlikely, but it couldn't hurt to ask.
Pulling her coat around her, she stepped out into the rain.
*
The pallet just about fit between the two featureless brick walls to either side. Mero, sodden and muttering, scrambled along aside Rurthk.
Rurthk stopped. “Here,” he said. “Hang back. We're meeting two blocks ahead. If anything goes wrong –”
“Yeah, yeah. Come in guns blazing all heroic and such,” said Mero. He peered up the wall. “Not even a fire escape.”
Rurthk just looked at him.
Mero sighed and shook his head. Then he leapt into the air. His small claws found just enough purchase in the brickwork to allow him to kick off upwards and towards the opposite wall. He twisted mid-air to connect with the other wall, and without hesitation pushed off again. Moving up like that in a zigzag from one wall to the other, he soon reached the roof four storeys up.
“Looks clean up here,” Mero said over the comms.
Satisfied, Rurthk continued onwards. Two blocks further, where the alley widened, he pushed the pallet round a car, then turned a corner to find Eloise and the Twins.
He looked around. Blank brick walls on either side. No windows. Rain lashed down from above. The Twins were carrying identical umbrellas. Behind them, a Varanid waited with a pallet of his own.
“Wonderful!” said Cora.
“Here's the rest of your money,” said Dora, handing Eloise another slip.
Eloise checked it and nodded to Rurthk, who pushed the pallet forward. The Twins stepped aside. The Varanid with them gave Rurthk a cold look, then wordlessly started loading the barrels.
When he was finished, the Twins smiled at Rurthk.
“Pleasure doing business with you,” said Cora.
Eloise smiled at them. “Let's do this again some time.”
“One more thing,” said Dora. She took a pistol from her coat and levelled it at Rurthk. Simultaneously, Cora did the same thing, aiming at Eloise. “We'd like our money back.”
Rearing up over the Twins, the Varanid had pulled out a pistol of his own, the size of a small cannon. Another couple of goons came up alongside them, assault rifles raised. Rurthk heard footsteps behind him, from which he surmised another group had come up behind him.
“Before you get clever, we've also got a couple of snipers up there,” Dora told him.
Rurthk gave a subvocal command to his comm. “Mero, they're on the roof.”
Eloise, still holding her umbrella and balloon in one raised hand, said, “I don't remember this part of the plan.”
“Now, Cora,” Rurthk said. “I'm surprised at you. I would have expected this sort of thing from Dora, but not you.”
“Sorry, Rurthk,” said Cora. “Things change. We've moved up in the world since you last saw us. You know how it is. You get bigger, and partners become prey. No hard feelings, okay?”
“Well said, sister,” said Dora. “No one here has to get hurt. Just give us the money – and your ship – and you can live to fight another day.”
*
Mero crouched in the rain, his ears flat against his head, cradling a rifle.
He kept his tail twisted around his body, reaching under his jacket, with its tip curled around one of the grenades he had hidden there.
He sniffed the air and looked around. Everything was clear so far. No one was on the roof with him. Rurthk should be finishing the deal now.
The rooftop door ahead of him burst open, came flying off its hinges. In less than a second, Mero had his rifle up ,pointed at …
… the Varanid on the other side. Two humans came behind him. “Put the gun down!” one of them roared.
“Oh, crap,” muttered Mero. Keeping his tail where it was, he dropped the rifle.
His comm chimed in his ears, telling him Rurthk was in trouble.
It came with the subvocal message: “Mero, they're on the roof.”
“Great, Rurthk,” muttered Mero. “Thanks for that.”
Chapter 8: A Daring Rescue
Where had they gone? Olivia came to a halt, feeling slightly ridiculous. Was this a fool's errand? She certainly did have a few useful skills, but it didn't seem like they were hiring.
She put that out of her mind and turned back to the more immediate issue. She'd lost track of Rurthk.
She ducked into a jazz bar opposite and looked around. Mostly humans and a few Varanids enjoying the music, but no Glaber.
Okay, one more look, then I'll go back to the ship, she decided, going down the alley behind the jazz bar.
As she advanced, she realised she could hear voices over the clatter of the rain.
And one of them was the instantly recognisable gravelly tones of a Glaber.
Grinning to herself, she ran forward, past a car and round a corner.
Then she stopped and fell back.
“Holy shit, holy shit,” she whispered to herself. A shootout! Not even a shootout. She recognised Eloise by the balloon. She and Rurthk, surrounded by a whole gang of people. Including a Varanid.
Olivia swallowed, resting her hand against the front of the car.
What could she do?
Just walk away. That was the smart thing to do. She had no guns, no backup, no combat experience. There was nothing she could do.
She paused, then looked at the car.
Almost nothing.
Could she really do that? For people she'd just met?
What was the alternative – just leave them to die?
Before she'd made the decision, she had a modded tablet out and was working at the car's lock.
The door opened.
No alarm. So far, so good.
Olivia slid into the seat, staying low and started hacking into the console. She glanced up through the windshield. No one had spotted her yet.
When she was young, she'd learned a trick you could do with cars on effector fields.
Please work. Please work!
The console came to life.
*
Rurthk held Dora's gaze while Cora retrieved the slip of money from Eloise's jacket.
He was desperately searching for a way out. Mero hadn't responded to his call, and he didn't seem to have many options available to him.
The Twins clearly had a lot more goons at their disposal than the last time he'd met them.
“Where's the first half?” Dora asked him.
“I left it on the ship,” said Rurthk.
Dora sighed. “Fine. Put your hands behind your back.”
Then Rurthk caught sight of something racing up the alley towards them.
“Bos
s!” said one of the goons behind him. “Look out!”
The Twins turned in time to see the car as it passed a group of street lights. It was still accelerating towards them.
The Twins swore simultaneously. Each leapt to one side of the alley. The rest of their team, hindered by the Varanid's bulk, wasn't quite quick enough. The car ploughed into them.
When it hit the Varanid's head, the front of the car crumpled with a thunderous bang. The windscreen cracked open. The Varanid fell forward, apparently more stunned than injured. The car tipped forward under the impact.
But at the same time, the cloud of effector fields beneath it ballooned suddenly, kicking it upwards.
The effector fields vanished.
Rurthk and Eloise ducked as the car hurtled a couple of feet over their heads – and crashed down on top of the goons behind them.
Rurthk grabbed his gun and took down a couple of those who had escaped. Eloise went to grab the slip of cryptcreds from where Dora had dropped it.
He turned to see the Twins scrambling away to hide behind the Varanid. The Varanid was awake, but he'd lost his gun, and was now shepherding them to safety. They weren't an immediate threat, so Rurthk turned away.
He ran over to the car, wrenching the door off. “Mero, you're a bastard, but sometimes I love – .”
He stared at the young woman crouched behind the console. “Uh … Good job.”
“Olivia!” said Eloise, helping her out.
Olivia seemed more shocked by what had just happened then Rurthk was. “Did it work?” she asked. “Are we safe?”
“Safer than we were a minute ago,” Rurthk said. He looked around. “Still advisable to get out of here though.”
Eloise leaned into the car and jabbed at the console. The effector field beneath it flickered briefly, then went out with an electrical crack, leaving behind a strong smell of ozone. “Looks like we'll be going on foot.”
