Learning the Hard Way 3

by H. P. Caledon

  Saleek had woken her up those nights, and they had talked about anything but the dreams, leaving her as cold to the bones as she imagined Keelan to be in the dreams.

  Saleek’s naïve view of the world sometimes bothered her, because he’d always been safe and didn’t know of much that could hurt him. She especially didn’t like the news that his pack would take her in if Keelan didn’t make it back, because it didn’t help her shake the fear of losing him now that he’d finally found her.

  And then there was the detail that she was on the run and had a bounty on her head. That would keep her from visiting her mom, too.

  As that thought hit her, she shook her head, scolding herself for even entertaining the thought of a future where Keelan had been caught or... worse.

  So she kept her days busy with anything that wouldn’t allow her to think. Training and reading. She remembered the look in Keelan’s eyes when she progressed in something. How proud he would look. She wanted him to look at her that way.

  She didn’t mind that she and Mike had more time together, even though he did refuse her most details about how they’d met. But she got pretty good in the training facilities, and she looked forward to training with Keelan, whose fighting style Mike talked about a lot.

  The remaining time she spent with Saleek and the pack, who taught her all sort of stuff. She’d never been good at math, but now she could do more than add and subtract. She knew multiplification—or whatever they called it—and division. And Mike had taught her some basic stuff about plotting routes through space and load weapons. Knives and other close combat weapons were Keelan’s specialty, and even though she had sworn twelve weeks earlier she’d never be able to learn all that stuff, she now found it might be possible.

  An alarm went off in the cockpit, and Misery looked up from where she sat in the common room, reading.

  Koolmok came toward her, smiling. “Your dad’s home.”

  Misery’s heart fluttered, and she felt flustered from relief. She couldn’t make her mind put what she had to do into a working order. She finally hugged Koolmok for bringing her the good news. He purred in contentment as he hugged her back.

  Mike raced past her.

  “I wanna come!”

  “You better stay up here for a minute. Even though Keelan thinks this con is a good guy, I want to know more before I remove the fixations.” Mike was halfway down the stairs before he’d finished the sentence.

  A ruckus of things commencing from downstairs had Misery hopping eagerly. A minute later, Keelan came up the stairs. She hurried to him and hugged him, her many feelings over the past twelve weeks finally settling.

  “Mike is returning your ship’s coding to the original,” Keelan said, not letting go of Misery.

  Saleek came from the bathroom. “I heard you!” he said, and snuggled in to hug both Misery and Keelan.

  Koolmok chuckled. “I’m afraid we have to leave in a hurry. Mike made it clear that you can’t land anytime soon to get provisions, so we arranged for you to buy from us, and we will come back here with more once we have been at the Frontiers.”

  “They promised to get produce for Mike’s stew and a melon for me,” Misery said, smiling up at Keelan.

  “Melon!” Keelan exclaimed and dug into his pocket. “I had to sell the one in the cargo hold. My little disappearing act from Irgang has put them on edge.” Keelan handed Koolmok some money, which the big varanuide took and handed to Misery.

  “That’s okay.” Koolmok caressed Misery’s hair. She pocketed the money and smiled at the big varanuide. She still couldn’t understand why Tommy feared the species so much.

  Keelan held his hand out for Koolmok. “Thank you. For all your help.”

  “Our pleasure. We hope we can ask for a favor someday, too.”

  “Sure, but... hope you never need my skills.”

  “You are more than a murderer.” Koolmok placed his heavy hand on Keelan’s shoulder. “We have enjoyed our time here as your guests.”

  “And when we get back, I’ll make you neelskanbpek,” Saleek said.

  “What’s that?” Keelan asked.

  “A dessert,” Misery explained.

  “Oh, well, in that case, I’m looking forward to it.”

  Saleek hugged Keelan so hard he’d lost his breath before he followed Misery to her room to pack up Saleek’s stuff. It was sad to see them go, but she looked forward to spending time with Keelan again.

  * * * *

  Keelan was sorry he hadn’t gotten to spend more time with the pack, but he was grateful for their trust in him and their willingness to lend him their ship to bust out a prisoner. While saying goodbye, he hoped he’d get to enjoy their company longer when they returned from the Frontiers.

  “The children have played so well together,” Koolmok said. “Saleek told Rosita about your time with us, and she’s shared some of her past with us. Even though it is horrible to wish this life on anyone, we’re at least happy you share enough of a past to be able to understand each other and so that you can support her better.”

  “Yeah, I’ve thought that, too,” Keelan admitted.

  Misery and Saleek came down into the cargo hold with Saleek’s stuff. The varanuides left the ship, and Keelan and Misery watched as the ramps closed. Mike took care of the decoupling of the ships, and once it had been declared a success, they went to look at Danny, now out of cryo but not yet conscious.

  “He hasn’t said anything yet,” Mike announced.

  Keelan turned to smile at Misery. “You probably shouldn’t be down here while we explain all this to Danny.”

  “If I’m quiet?”

  Keelan smiled but shook his head. She pouted, he detected humor behind it, so she clearly didn’t see it as a rejection. She was more happy and relaxed than before he’d left for Irgang. Had to be the influence of the pack, and especially Saleek. And maybe she’d inherited Keelan’s ability to quickly adapt to new situations and environments. He wondered whether it had to do with the ability to take on someone else’s figure—if it could be instinctual to whatever he was and thus be hereditary.

  Danny stirred, and Misery left them. From experience, they knew it would take a while before he had enough of his wits about him to understand what was going on, so they took a seat on some crates further away to give him time. While they waited, Mike told him about Misery’s progress, and Keelan was happy to hear that Mike’s observations about Misery were close to what he’d thought.

  “Hello?” Danny’s hoarse voice sounded.

  “He’s awake.” Keelan got up.

  Danny looked around dizzily and squinted to focus as Keelan stepped closer. “Keelan?” Danny asked confused.

  “Told you I’d come for you when I found the way out.”

  Danny struggled to get out of the insert, and Keelan helped him. Finally free, Danny stepped over the ledge of the coffin and wobbled on still cryo-dazed legs to hug Keelan. “You love me!” Danny exclaimed. Keelan held onto the young man, whose legs still refused to hold his entire weight. But the comment warmed him, and he half turned to look at Mike’s puzzled expression.

  “There’s obviously something I don’t know about here,” Mike said, laughing.

  Danny twisted in Keelan’s arms to see Mike step forward. “What’s going on?” Danny looked at Keelan with growing worry. And, why wouldn’t he? As usual, Mike was in uniform.

  “Danny, Mike, Mike, Danny. Mike’s my partner. Come on, let’s go upstairs. You need a shower because you stink of incarceration,” Keelan mumbled while he hauled Danny to the stairs.

  “I’m so happy to see you. I was actually really shit-scared about this transfer. I mean, luckily you iced Walter... how did you escape? Anyway, Johannes took me in. He’s an okay, nice guy.”

  “Uh-huh,” Keelan mumbled, lowering Danny’s still uncooperative body onto the couch. “I wasn’t transferred, Danny, I was sprung. By Mike. So, now that I knew how to spring prisoners from maxes, I, of course, sprang you. I—”

&n
bsp; “They said you were dead,” Danny said with a pained voice.

  “Yeah.”

  Mike came in with two glasses of water. One for Danny, who smiled thankfully and guzzled it, and one for Keelan, but he declined, so Mike drank it.

  “I need your help, Danny,” Keelan said.

  “So you didn’t just come and get me because you love me, miss me, and want my body for awesome sex?”

  Mike coughed into his glass so hard the water sprayed his face and shirt. But instead of wiping at it, he stared at Keelan.

  “What?” Keelan exclaimed. It wasn’t like consensual sex didn’t exist in prison. Out the corner of his eye, Keelan noticed Misery hiding behind a wall. “Come on in.” Keelan waited until Misery stood next to him, but he didn’t miss the hurt look on Danny’s face when he saw her. “Danny, this is my daughter.”

  Danny’s eyes brightened and the hurt evaporated. “The one you dreamed about?”

  Keelan nodded.

  “You found her.” Danny smiled.

  “Yeah, and like I said, I need your help. Did you really hack the Senate?”

  “Yepper.” Danny looked proud.

  “Can you hack SWIS?” Keelan asked.

  Danny’s proud smile froze in a grimace. “SWIS? As in the Species’ special intelligence SWIS?”

  “Yes. They’re refusing us access, and we think every lawman in the known Systems is after us right now,” Mike said. “And her.”

  Danny looked from one to the other while scratching his cheek. “What did you do?” he finally asked Misery.

  “Murdered a slave collector,” she said, shrugging.

  Danny’s raised his brows in surprise before snorting something between a grunt of disbelief and a laugh. “Is that why you came for me?”

  Keelan definitely heard the pain and disappointment Danny so eagerly tried to mask. “I promised you I would. I found the exit. And yeah, I missed you even though it wasn’t... that I was thinking about when I thought about you.”

  Danny got that devil-may-care look on his face.

  “You love me.” Danny kissed at him.

  Keelan sighed good-naturedly.

  “Well, let’s see what techno-gear this heap’s got!” Danny got up, but his legs still didn’t appear to be ready. Keelan caught him, and Danny flung his arms around Keelan’s neck, looking up with great tenderness. “Thank you for keeping your promise.”

  Keelan smiled, but didn’t have time to react before Danny pressed a loud smacking kiss on his cheek.

  This is gonna be interesting. Keelan steered Danny into the cockpit while trying to ignore Mike and Misery laughing.

  Chapter Seven

  Keelan and Danny sat in the cockpit with the door closed, enjoying a cup of coffee. Danny sighed contentedly and looked at the cup as if he was in love with it.

  “Good coffee?” Keelan asked.

  “Fantastic! It sure beats that dehydrated piss they dropped in portion packages in Irgang.”

  “That wasn’t coffee but broth,” Keelan said, laughing.

  “Oh, well that explains quite a bit. Tasted like stale nut sweat,” Danny said and sipped his coffee.

  Keelan suddenly lost his thirst for coffee and stared at the black liquid.

  “It’s so nice of you guys to want to give me Misery’s room, but I can sleep on the couch,” Danny said.

  Keelan laughed. “No, Misery has big plans, because she’s declared that her and I’ll be reading each other bedtime stories.”

  Danny studied Keelan for a while. “I think it’s nifty you found her. Did the mercenary really help you with that? Can’t make head or ass of that story. Wasn’t he the one Walter said you tried to kill? Or was that Ratkins you tried to flat-line? If that’s the case, you’ve got my gratitude even if you failed, because he collected me.”

  “It wasn’t Ratkins I was trying to kill. He used Mike as bait, and in my thirst for vengeance, I was blind to it. Mike accidently snitched me to the guards in Delta because I had ended up in isolation. Mike thought I had escaped, so he was shit angry with me. So then I had to escape, because people don’t walk away from betraying my trust.”

  “Fair, but he ends up in the hospital and is close to leaving this world and then gets the brilliant idea to spring you from Irgang, so you’d... what, forgive him?”

  “Yeah,” Keelan said, smiling at the jumbled logic the young man had put together.

  “And this is where a few details take an unhindered trip through my otherwise very information-filtration-proficient brain.”

  Well, there’s a word to look up. “Come on, Danny, I had kind of discovered I wouldn’t be able to skip Irgang. I had to find my daughter, and I wasn’t clever enough to do that on my own while running from lawmen. Plus there’s a few details I’m not sharing with you from Delta. Short version, I forgave him.”

  “Aha,” Danny mumbled, looking contemplative. “And now you’re a badge-flasher?”

  “Nah, SWIS caught on that we had messed about in their system, so now we’re just on the skip again.”

  “Gotta say it’s pretty nifty circumstances you brought me out to join you, but don’t worry, I can do more than look overly sexy in my birthday costume.” Danny wiggled his brows.

  Keelan once again thanked whatever lucky star they’d passed that Misery didn’t mind moving in with him when he’d asked, because then Danny wouldn’t attempt to sneak in at night in his... birthday suit.

  * * * *

  It wasn’t as horrible as she would have thought from the smell. But then again, the coffee did smell different than the thick, bitter matter she’d once sniffed. Why she suddenly wanted to taste it, she didn’t know. It was just so cozy to sit with Keelan and read, and he always drank coffee with a book, so she figured it could add to it.

  Keelan was transferring information from one pad to another and grousing cuss words at himself for not having named the files better. In the common room, she could hear Mike and Danny shifting everything around to make a workspace for him.

  “Why not just make the workspace in Danny’s room?”

  Keelan looked up. “Because there’s not enough room, and because Mike wants to be able to follow everything he does. Mike isn’t as trusting as he once was. A lesson he learned the hard way.”

  “Are there other useful ways of learning stuff like that?”

  Keelan smiled, shaking his head. “Finally, I think I managed this. Here you go.” Keelan pushed a pad to her, and she flipped through the files.

  “You’ve been busy, huh?”

  “I’ve been bored out of my skull.”

  Misery laughed loudly and shook her head. “Well, more coffee.” She looked at the pad again.

  Keelan poured the cold leftovers in Misery’s cup into the sink before he topped off both their cups. “Do you even like coffee?”

  “I’m learning to drink it clean from the beginning.” She took a sip, trying to suppress the subsequent shiver. Judging by her dad’s expression, she hadn’t succeeded.

  “You could dilute it a bit.”

  “With what?”

  “Hmm... give me your cup, and I’ll try something.”

  “Nope!”

  “Yup!” Keelan had snatched her cup before she managed to, and he smiled diabolically as he turned his back. She couldn’t see exactly what he was doing, but he poured something else in there and stirred. Then he turned again and set down the cup, whose contents now looked murkier. She glanced at him skeptically and got a bright smile in return.

  “You suck at looking innocent, you know that?”

  “Runs in the genes, my girl, now drink.”

  She tried it. “Shit, that’s good!”

  “I might just end up teaching you to drink coffee anyway.”

  “What did you add?”

  “Half coffee and half cocoa. You can learn to drink it alone later. Homework time.”

  “Okay, but you have to sit here, too.”

  Keelan smiled and took a seat.

  By the t
ime Mike and Danny came in and collapsed on the bench, Misery and Keelan were reading the third article.

  Danny emptied his pockets of electronic things onto the table and began unassembling some of it and putting it back together to... Misery couldn’t guess.

  “How’s it coming?” Mike asked, pointing to the pad.

  “We’re reading politics, so it’s not coming. Politics is, from my current point of view, a whole lot of talk about progress which they think will happen by running in circles or opposing each other’s ideas. Talk, talk, talk, complain, grumble, moan,” Misery exclaimed.

  Mike chuckled. “Are you learning anything, Keelan?”

  “Who do you think wrote up the assignment?”

  “Can’t imagine you a politician, Keelan,” Danny said. “Your diplomatic abilities are a bit too... final.”

  “Agreed,” Keelan said.

  “Ever heard of dictatorships?” Mike asked.

  “Hold the break, that’s for next subject,” Keelan said.

  “Finally!” Danny proudly held something into the air. “It’s finished!”

  “What is it?” Keelan asked leaning closer to study it.

  “It’s a... thingy.”

  “And the thingy is supposed to do what?” Mike asked.

  “I’m not sure, but that’s how the colors ran. This power thingy here is supposed to go through a connector here and connect some boards so I can make a file passage with a pin, and apparently something has to be routed this way, too.”