by Jake Bible
“Did I make it look real enough?” Roak asked.
Then Ms. Lika’s head spun in reverse and she took a huge breath.
“You will now,” Wendell said, responding to Roak’s previous question.
“What the fuck?” Roak said as Ms. Lika leapt up onto her feet and lunged at Roak.
She was still blind, but the pain and panic had been forgotten. Even though she couldn’t see, it took all of Roak’s skills to block blow after blow after blow she sent at his head. Blows that were meant to distract him when one of her hands dipped into a cargo pocket and came out with a very large, sharp knife.
Roak saw the blade too late and was more than surprised when it was plunged into his abdomen. Ms. Lika let out a squeal of triumph and hopped away until her back was against the opposite wall. Then she slowed all her movements and methodically began to pluck the needles from her eyes.
Roak stared down at the knife handle, not quite believing it was there in his belly. He felt the pain, he saw the blood pouring out from around the wound and down across his crotch. He knew it was happening, but it didn’t seem like it was happening to him.
“Shit,” he said.
Then the single door of the room burst open and all Roak saw was a yellow blur.
Wendell screamed. Ms. Lika screamed.
Wendell died, his chest ripped open, heart yanked out, his body falling to the floor next to the heart.
Ms. Lika’s chest was ripped open and she collapsed to the floor next to her two hearts that were still beating. And beating. And beating.
“She’s not dead,” Roak said, but he wasn’t sure who he was saying it to.
Then he was being lifted up and the room was gone. Everything became part of the yellow blur as Roak was taken out through a large warehouse that was strewn with heartless corpses of various races.
Roak managed to pass out just as the door to the warehouse was opened and he was carried out into impossibly bright sunlight.
9.
Roak was not surprised to find himself waking up inside his med pod.
The pod was obviously his because of the scratches on the plastiglass lid that he’d been forced to stare at for hours and hours at a time on more than one occasion. Roak knew those scratches like he knew the scars on his body.
Yellow Eyes was staring down at Roak, making him jump once he’d focused past the med pod lid to see the strange creature.
“You are fun to be around,” Yellow Eyes said.
“Uh,” was all Roak could say.
“Don’t ask me,” Hessa said over the comm before Roak could even compose a question. “I got a comm call from a public pay unit and this guy was jabbering at me to come pick you two up. So I did.”
“Thanks,” Roak said.
“By the way, we’re banned from Ballyway. Probably for life,” Hessa said. “Or as long as we use this ship. It’s burned as far as Ballyway authorities are concerned.”
“Reveeeeeeenge,” Yellow Eyes said in that deep voice that did not fit the body it was coming from. “Reveeeeeeeenge.”
“You learn a new word there, pal?” Roak asked.
“Those sons of bitches killed Carla, man,” Yellow Eyes said. “They killed Taps. I’m gonna kill them. You’re gonna help.”
“Gladly,” Roak said as the med pod rose to let him out. He sat up and started to swing his legs over the edge, but Yellow Eyes was in the way. “Do you mind?”
Yellow Eyes grumbled and shifted back away enough for Roak to hop out.
“Hand me that pile of clothes over there on that chair,” Roak said.
“You’re gonna help me kill the bastards?” Yellow Eyes asked.
“I will if killing them furthers my interests,” Roak said. “If keeping them alive works better, then they stay alive. All depends.”
Yellow Eyes crossed his many arms across his thin body and blocked Roak’s view of the pile of clothes. Roak blinked at the creature, waited, sighed, then walked around Yellow Eyes to fetch the clothes himself.
“They killed Carla,” Yellow Eyes snarled.
“They did,” Roak replied as he got dressed.
“They killed Taps,” Yellow Eyes continued.
“They did that too,” Roak agreed. “Although I didn’t know the guy real well.”
“You knew Carla real well, right?” Yellow Eyes asked. “You trusted her. She was a friend of yours. They killed your friend, Roak. Killed her dead, man.”
“Dead is how folks end up when they get killed, so yeah, they did that,” Roak said as he looked about for his boots. “Hessa? My boots?”
“In your quarters,” Hessa replied over the loudspeaker.
Roak glanced up, looked over at Yellow Eyes, then back up at the ceiling.
“Private comms is fine, Hessa,” Roak said.
“Oh, what? So, you two can talk about me? Figure out how to get rid of me?” Yellow Eyes snapped. He was becoming agitated and his thin body was shaking with emotion. “Fine. Toss me out an airlock. I don’t care. I’ll float in space forever, thinking of revenge.”
“Don’t you mean reveeeeeeenge,” Roak said as he debated whether or not to put his socks on or leave them off until he fetched his boots. Socks were slippery. But the floor was freezing cold. “And we’re not tossing you out an airlock. You saved my ass, right?”
“I did,” Yellow Eyes replied. “You were a goner, man.”
“Well, thanks for saving my ass,” Roak said, opting to tuck his socks in his pants pocket. “Hessa? My armor?”
“Being repaired and cleaned by the bots,” Hessa replied over the comm. “You got some of your blood all over the armor. Again.”
“You owe me, man,” Yellow Eyes said as Roak walked out of the med pod bay. “I saved that armor for you.”
“What?” Roak asked. “I owe you? Sure. If you say so. How about I give you a ride to wherever you want and we call it even?”
“There it is!” Yellow Eyes said with great exasperation. His many arms flew up into the air and waved about wildly. “Getting rid of me! Like always!”
Roak stopped in the middle of the corridor. Yellow Eyes ran into his back. Taking a deep breath, Roak turned around and pressed his hand against what Roak assumed was the creature’s chest. He gently shoved Yellow Eyes back a few paces.
“Listen, whatever your name is,” Roak started.
“Yellow Eyes,” Yellow Eyes said, pointing at the orbs in his head.
Roak blinked then shook his head. “Right. Of course.” Another deep breath in then out. “I have my own mission to deal with, alright? I’m not interested in your revenge.”
“He has plenty of his own in the queue,” Hessa said over the loudspeakers.
“Hessa!” Roak snapped.
“Oh, what, I have to only speak into your comm even when I want to address you both?” Hessa asked, her voice still coming from the loudspeaker. “How’s that going to work when there’s nothing you can do to—?”
“Got it,” Roak snapped. “Talk however, wherever, to whomever you want. Fine.” Roak pointed at Yellow Eyes. “Back to you. I’m busy. I can drop you off somewhere close, but I’m not interested in your revenge plan, alright? I have real work to do.”
“Do you know who you’re going after next?” Yellow Eyes asked. One by one, the spindly arms crossed again. “Do you, Roak? Huh? Well? Where ya going? Huh?”
Roak wished he had a pistol on his hip.
“Wendell and Lika weren’t exactly a chit a dozen beings,” Roak said. “It shouldn’t be too hard to figure out which Syndicate they worked for.”
“Work,” Yellow Eyes said. “Not Wendell. That asshole is dead. But Ms. Lika still lives. She’s probably on our asses right now. She was fond of Wendell. Oh, man, she is so going to kill us, man.”
“You ripped her heart out,” Roak responded.
“Hearts,” Yellow Eyes corrected. “So?”
“So, when you rip hearts out, beings die,” Roak said. A memory of two hearts on the ground, both still beating
, came flooding back into Roak’s mind. “Or, beings are supposed to die when their hearts are ripped out. How can Lika be alive?”
“Ms. Lika,” Yellow Eyes said. “She likes the miss to be used when you say her name. She kills and eats anyone that doesn’t address her that way. Crazy bitch, right?”
“She said she was vegetarian… Never mind.” Roak rubbed at his face. “The point to all this is that you are not coming with me.”
“I know who Wendell worked for,” Yellow Eyes stated, crossed arms tightening over his broomstick of a chest. “Do you?”
“Like I said, I can find out,” Roak said. “It’s what I do.”
“Good for you, tough guy,” Yellow Eyes replied. “Then drop me off at the nearest GF station. Full GF, not corporate contracted. Last thing I need is some executive eyeing me for his trophy case. Beings are weird as all the Hells, man.”
“Stop calling me man,” Roak said. “And I’ll drop you off at the nearest safe location. It may not be a Galactic Fleet station.”
“Then shoot me out the airlock like you were originally going to do,” Yellow Eyes grumbled. “Same difference.”
“I was never going to… You know what? Great idea,” Roak said and went to grab for Yellow Eyes. The being was no longer standing in front of Roak. “Yeah. That’s what I thought.”
He turned and Yellow Eyes was behind him.
“You’re in my way,” Roak said. “I’m going to fetch my boots…?”
Yellow Eyes was holding a pair of Roak’s boots.
“You need to see this,” Hessa said in Roak’s comm.
A holo was projected down from the ceiling of Yellow Eyes running through the ship’s corridors and into Roak’s quarters. Then he was racing out of the quarters and back to Roak.
“I slowed that down to five percent speed,” Hessa said, still speaking into Roak’s comm. “Five percent, Roak. He looks like he’s running at a normal speed at that percentage. I’m thinking we should keep the being around. He could be quite helpful.”
“Look at me go,” Yellow Eyes said and glanced up at the ceiling. “Your holo processors are good shit. A lot of recorders can’t catch me.”
“Thank you,” Hessa replied over the loudspeakers.
“We’re dropping you off at the next safe location,” Roak stated. Roak took the boots from Yellow Eyes and knelt down to put them on. “Thank you for getting me my boots.”
“Oh, you are sooooo welcome,” Yellow Eyes said and bowed low, his head touching the corridor’s metal alloy floor. “I am sooooooo glad I could be of service.”
“Knock it off,” Roak said, done putting his boots on. He stood and walked past Yellow Eyes. “I’m going to put my armor on… Dammit.”
Yellow Eyes was standing in front of him again, but was now holding Roak’s light armor.
“Or did you mean the power armor?” Yellow Eyes asked as he let the light armor drop to the floor. He was gone then back in the time it took Roak to blink, power armor clutched in all his arms. “Shit. This stuff is heavy.”
“Light armor is fine,” Roak said. Blink and Yellow Eyes was standing in the corridor with empty hands once again. “Stop that.”
“Roak?” Hessa asked over the comm as Roak picked up his light armor and put it on while Yellow Eyes stared at him.
“Yes?” Roak replied.
“I began a preliminary search for lieutenants in the various crime syndicates that go by the name of Wendell,” Hessa continued. “Yellow Eyes was kind enough to give me a full description of the man while you were recuperating in the med pod. I entered that into the search and came up with nothing.”
“There isn’t a scumbag directory that has these assholes listed, Hessa,” Roak said. “I’ll need to call some contacts.”
“Call some contacts?” Hessa scoffed. “Roak, you have been killing contacts across the galaxy. No one is going to talk to you anymore.”
Yellow Eyes tapped the side of his head. “She’s telling you that you need me, isn’t she? You’re realizing you don’t have anyone to comm since you’ve been playing galactic butcher for a while now, right? Am I right?”
“Shut. Up,” Roak said to Yellow Eyes. “Hessa? I still have plenty of contacts that will talk to me about a guy named Wendell. I won’t mention Bishop.”
“They will know. Everyone knows,” Hessa argued. “Roak, just ask Yellow Eyes. Have you seen how fast he is? We could use that kind of skill. What happened on Ballyway is only the start. You will be going up against worse and worse opponents the closer you get to Bishop.”
“She’s telling you that things are only going to get worse, right?” Yellow Eyes asked. “That with me on your side, you might have a shot at your own personal reveeeeeenge? Yeah?”
“Shut up!” Roak shouted at the creature.
Yellow Eyes frowned and held up all of his hands in surrender. “Fine. Sure. Yeah. My bad, man. Drop me off wherever you want. Good luck finding Wendell’s bosses, or that Bishop guy you’re hunting. Seriously. I wish you all the best in your future endeavors.”
There was a pounding at Roak’s temples and he clenched his fists.
Yellow Eyes glanced up at the ceiling. “Hessa? How likely is it he will try to attack me right now?”
“Odds are weighted towards very likely,” Hessa said over the loudspeaker.
Yellow Eyes was gone. Roak looked about, but he was nowhere to be seen in the corridor.
“Where’d he go?” Roak asked.
“The mess hall,” Hessa replied.
“Good. That’s where I won’t be going. I’m coming up to the bridge,” Roak said. “You’ll see how wrong you are regarding my contacts.”
10.
“So, you were going to tell me how wrong I was,” Hessa said as Roak slammed his fists down on the ship’s control console over and over and over.
“That guy? That fucking guy! He owed me not one, but two life debts! Two!” Roak roared. “You owe a guy a life debt and you can’t refuse when he comes calling to cash it in! Two life debts? Refusal is unthinkable!”
“He thought about it,” Yellow Eyes said from the back of the bridge, suddenly seated at what would have been the scanner station if Roak had a crew onboard. “He thought better of it. Who are you calling next?”
“Yes, Roak, who are you calling next?” Hessa asked.
“No one,” Roak said quietly.
“What was that?” Hessa asked.
“He said no one,” Yellow Eyes replied in a loud, exaggerated voice.
“Oh, thank you,” Hessa said. “I wasn’t sure I heard him correctly.”
“My pleasure,” Yellow Eyes said.
“Who did Wendell work for?” Roak snapped without looking back at Yellow Eyes.
“What would be the benefit in my helping you now?” Yellow Eyes asked. “Don’t say because you won’t throw me out an airlock. We both know there is no way you’ll catch me. Ever. So, give me a reason to help you now and I will think on it.”
“They killed Carla and Taps,” Roak said.
“That. Right there. They killed Carla and Taps,” Yellow Eyes said, nodding. “That is a damn fine reason to tell you. If, and only if, you promise to kill the sons of bitches when we get our hands on them.”
“Once I get info on where Bishop is,” Roak said. “Then, yeah, I’ll kill them.”
“Perfect,” Yellow Eyes said and stood up to take the co-pilot’s seat next to Roak. “Hessa? You ever been to the Spor’Cheeva Nebula?”
“I have not,” Hessa replied. “Is it nice?”
“Beautiful damn views for light years,” Yellow Eyes said. “Also very difficult to navigate. The nebula is a wily little bitch. Likes to conk out engine drives and leave ships adrift for years.”
“That’s where Wendell’s bosses are?” Roak asked. “In the Spor’Cheeva Nebula?”
“No, Roak, I brought it up as a conversation starter,” Yellow Eyes said then looked up and hooked the end of one of his arms towards Roak. “This guy, right? You’
re a saint, Hessa.”
“It does take patience,” Hessa replied.
“Is there some trick to avoiding having our engine drives go offline when we arrive in the nebula?” Roak asked through gritted teeth.
“I am glad you asked,” Yellow Eyes replied. “There is a trick. An easy trick. We shut down the engine drives upon arrival and simply use thrusters to propel us through the nebula.”
“How far is the nebula from the wormhole portal?” Roak asked, teeth still gritted.
“Not far,” Yellow Eyes aid. “Take us maybe three or four hours to hit the outer edge of the nebula. Once we’re within about fifty clicks of the perimeter, we’ll want to kill the engines and coast on in from there.”
“Hessa? What’s the status of the wormhole portal in that system?” Roak asked.
“Not the greatest,” Hessa said. “The Spor’Cheeva Nebula is in the Sabulos System. At one time, there was a considerable amount of mining activity on the various moons and asteroids that populate the system, but they are no longer active due to a viral outbreak that killed every living being in the system over the course of three galactic standard years. I have a holo of survivors talking about the horrors they saw, if you want to watch.”
“Why would I want to watch that?” Roak said then faced Yellow Eyes directly and scowled. “Viral outbreak?”
“Yeah, that, bad shit, man,” Yellow Eyes said. “We don’t want to visit any of those old mines.”
“And where are the crime bosses?” Roak asked, his tone making it clear he had a very good idea of what the answer would be.
“On one of the old asteroids that drifted into the nebula,” Yellow Eyes said. “They built a stronghold in one of the abandoned mines.”
“You just said we don’t want to go to one of the mines,” Roak said.
“We don’t,” Yellow Eyes said and performed his approximation of a shrug. “But looks like we’re gonna have to. Not ideal, but it is what it is.”
“Hessa, what info do we have on this virus?” Roak asked. “Environmental suit protection enough?”
