by Tanya Huff
Watching Ressk’s fingertips tap against the screen in a sequence Werst saw as completely random made him wonder, not for the first time, how he’d gotten so fukking lucky. He’d grown up on the lower branches, barely off the ground, worked his ass off to reach the Corps’ minimum academic requirement and joined the moment he could. The Corps had been good to him, Recon like coming home, and he’d have been career if not for the plastic aliens. He knew he wasn’t stupid—stupid didn’t survive Recon—and he had complete confidence in his ability to come out on top in any shit situation he got thrown into.
He looked at Gunny and saw what he could’ve been. Right up to and including the cracks. He respected the crap out of her. More than that, he liked her.
He looked at Ressk and saw a diplomat’s son, best schools, top of the tree. Someone so chrick, so out of his league he thanked Turrist every day they’d ended up in that prison together. Except he didn’t believe in Turrist and considering how it had turned out, he should be thanking the plastic aliens except he wouldn’t give those fukkers credit for shit if they were holding a laxative.
He looked at the rest of the team and he saw where they fit, strengths and weaknesses linked together like the nets that kept his people safe. Krai people. Not Corps people.
Metal scraped against stone, and he looked up at the roof of the last warehouse in the row to see five Trun swarming over the edge.
On the one hand, it was about fukking time all the muttering and the finger pointing turned to violence. On the other hand . . .
“Why us?” he snarled, grabbing Ressk and dragging him back half a dozen steps until they were in the gray area between the overlapping circles of light that best suited their eyesight, backs against the wall of the warehouse on the far side of the street from their attackers.
“Probably because they’re not entirely stupid. Appearances to the contrary.” Ressk snapped his slate back onto his belt, gave it a tug to check it had locked in, and hit record. The chime, required by law, bounced between the buildings. “We’re about the same size, so we’re their best bet to prove a point.”
“They think we’re easier to beat than Ryder or Alamber?” Werst watched the five descend down the pipes and narrow platforms used for paths on most of the walls they’d passed and decided to be insulted. Ryder had some solid muscle on him, but for all his smarts, the kid would blow away in a strong wind.
“We’re smaller. And they’re extrapolating from sweet fuk all.”
Tails extended, the Trun made jumps Werst wasn’t sure he’d try, not at those light levels, but their feet, while flexible and not as limited as a Human’s or a Taykan’s, were still limited. When all five reached the road, they advanced slowly in a half crouch, hands at shoulder height, expressions . . .
Confused, if Werst had to guess. They looked confused.
“We’re outnumbered. They expected us to run.” Ressk’s nostril ridges closed. “So they could chase us.”
“Okay, they’re not entirely stupid, but they’re a little stupid.” They’d heard him, as intended. Ears flattened. Eyes narrowed. Not a lot of teeth visible. Werst showed his.
“Organs are in the torso—ribs up top, soft tissue below, pretty much the usual for bipeds.”
“Bad time to point out I find you prepped for a fight hot as nerser?”
“Little bit.” He could hear the grin in Ressk’s voice. “Throat and joints are weaknesses. Genitals are internal. Tails are used for balance; prehensile, but not strong enough to do much.”
“Yeah, I’m so looking forward to Alamber complaining about that.” Werst stepped forward, toes spread.
The large, orange Trun leading the pack snarled.
“Go home.” Werst spread his hands in the universal symbol for Seriously? We have to do this now? “Have a drink. No one has to get hurt tonight.”
“You’re not so fukking tough!”
Ressk sighed. “Don’t kill anyone.”
“They’re civilians!” Werst ducked under the orange Trun’s charge . . . “Why would I kill them?” . . . rolled zir over his shoulder, and slammed zir into the ground. “See? Not dead!”
All five were street fighters and if they’d put together any kind of a coordinated attack, the numbers might’ve been a problem. But street fighting was as much posturing as making contact.
The Corps stamped out the need to posture early on.
He took a moment to admire Ressk leaping off the lamppost and flattening the largest of the Trun. Krai bones were heavy. Trun, not so much.
When the fight ended, in the interest of preventing any further negative opinions about the Younger Races, Werst spit out the piece of tail he’d bit off.
“Waste of food.” Ressk turned off the recording as they walked away from the stains and the tufts of fur on the road, the Trun having staggered off in the opposite direction. “I swallowed.”
Torin wasn’t surprised to find Ressk sitting up in the other nest, already intent on his slate when she woke. He didn’t acknowledge her as she slid out from under Craig’s arm and padded across the room into the . . . facilities, she was going to stick with facilities. Turned out there was a lot she didn’t know about the Rakva digestive system. She was good with that.
Werst and Craig were up when she returned. The former pushed past her into the facilities, the latter tucked his face into the curve of her neck, head resting on her shoulder. “What flaming bastard left the lights on?”
“It’s artificial sunlight. Automatic.” Light levels said it was about midmorning. Her internal clock, still working on ship’s time, said about six. “I assume it’s a Rakva preference.”
“Any chance of coffee?”
“No idea.” She stroked the warm length of his back, her thumb sliding along the dip between heavy muscle that followed his spine. “Ressk?”
He glanced up. “Coffee didn’t catch on with the Trun, but there’s a local stimulant that should work almost as well. Oh, and I have the ship.”
“Good work.”
Craig lifted his head and asked the question she couldn’t. “Already?”
He shrugged. “Ran a search algorithm overnight. It sifted the bits and pieces we all brought in and spat out a registration number at about dawn.” Eyes narrowed, he peered at the light emanating from the ceiling. “Local time.”
“So you’re saying we don’t have to go to another planet?” Binti dragged herself up and flopped one bare arm over the edge of the nest.
“What part of I have the ship did you miss? Gunny was right, it’s registered to a Katrien. No one we know,” he added before Torin could ask. Odds would be astronomical that Presit had begun flying supply ships for grave robbers, but it wouldn’t have been the first time the fuzzball had shown up uninvited. “Seelinkjer Cer Pen registered to Jamers a Tur fenYenstrakin. So yeah, I’m saying we don’t have to go to another planet.”
“Fukking yay.” Binti’s head dropped onto her arm like her neck had been broken. “My brain is still buzzing and my mouth tastes like socks and our antiintoxicants are shit up against Trun alcohol.”
“Good to know,” Torin murmured. Frowned. And leaned over the edge of the nest, attention draw by a sleek brown-and-green–feathered curve tucked along the side of Binti’s body. “What the hell is that?”
Muttering a protest, Binti leaned back. “It’s a stuffed waterfowl.”
“Where did it come from?”
“I think I remember buying it.” She balanced it on the edge of the nest. “Of course, I think I remember peeing liquid nitrogen, so who knows.”
The beak felt enough like plastic that Torin shook it gently back and forth. No visible alien reaction, but the motion rocked the entire bird.
Pale fingers wrapped around Binti’s shoulder, closely followed by Alamber’s face, the dark makeup he wore around his eyes smeared enough it looked like a Katrien mask. �
��You’re holding the corpse of a living creature!”
Binti winced. “Thank you, Alamber, we’ve covered that. It’s been stuffed. Also, stop fukking yelling.”
“I can’t believe you’d be a part of something so barbaric!” Hair clamped to his head, he scrambled out of the nest, slipping into the facilities as Werst exited.
“Hey, a duck. Where’d you get it?”
Binti cuddled it in both arms. “No idea.”
“I want everyone ready to go in ten.” Local stimulants, Torin decided, seemed like a very good idea.
“Visitors.”
These were not the three facilitators who’d stopped them the day before. Attitude and the amount of salad on the uniform announced the tri-colored Trun standing out front was of significantly higher rank and the two Trun flanking zir were close behind. Maybe yesterday had been their day off. Maybe they’d been brought in from a more affluent sector to deal with the situation. Torin neither knew nor cared.
The facilitators in the background, moving the crowd along, they were locals.
One of the great things about interacting with a species she didn’t know well was that she could ignore what she saw as blatant contempt, secure in the knowledge that it could be admiration and she was merely misinterpreting an unknown physiognomy.
Facilities. Facilitators.
So many parallels.
Long years of practice standing in front of shiny new second lieutenants and senior staff officers with the shine long since worn off kept the amusement from showing on her face. She descended the inn’s three steps to the street, putting her feet, at least, level with the facilitators. “How can we help you?”
Forced to crane zir head back to meet her eyes, zir tail tip flicked back and forth. “We’ve had reports of fighting, Visitors. This is not an OutSector station. This is Abalae. This is the Core.”
Torin smiled. “Yes, it is. The fight was recorded.” She snapped her slate off her belt. “Ressk.”
“File’s up, Gunnery Sergeant.”
“That’s not . . .” one of the backup facilitators began.
Cutting zir off with a glance, Torin thumbed the file open, let it run until the first Trun hit the cobblestones, then thumbed it off. “Did you need us to press charges?”
“Charges?”
“Against the Trun who attacked my people. We will if it’s required, but I don’t see the point. Do you?”
“Do I?”
“See the point.”
Zi snapped zir tail back up as it began to lower, and Torin could almost see the effort it took to keep zir hands by zir waist. According to Werst’s sitrep, raised hands indicated a Trun fighting stance. “You informed us you came to shop. I see no evidence of this.”
Binti held up the duck. Torin reached back, pushed it down, and said, “The day’s young and the Commerce Sector is large.”
“No.”
“That was definitive,” Alamber murmured.
“We would appreciate it, Visitors, if you were on the next link back to the tether.”
“The next link?”
“And in the next rise off Abalae.”
“You’re telling us to leave?”
“No.” Zir took a deep breath, took a long step back, and locked an expression so neutral on Torin’s face she found herself respecting the ability if not the Trun. “We have no reason to tell you to leave.” Although we both know I could come up with reasons if I wanted to. “I clearly said, we would appreciate it if you would leave.”
“Of course. Let’s go, people.”
“Thank you, Visitors.” Zi took another step back and pointed, the metallic tips on the fur of zir arm gleaming in the sunlight. “The link is that way.”
“We know where the fu . . .” Werst’s mutter cut off so suddenly, Ressk’s elbow had clearly been applied.
As they stepped into the open area, the half circle in front of the station where the three roads met and where there was no possible way to cover every defensive angle, Alamber moved up beside her and said quietly, “You made them think we were leaving because they wanted us to.”
The facilitators were watching from the edge of the curve. She could feel the weight of their regard. “Yes, I did.”
“But we have what we need. We were already leaving. Why play the game?”
“They could have prevented us from leaving. You don’t piss those people off. You should know that.”
“Prevented us? Boss, they wanted us to leave.”
“Not the point. Keep walking.”
The link back to the tether was empty of everyone but three Trun who kept to themselves by the door and tried unsuccessfully to look like they weren’t facilitators. Binti, Ressk, and Craig slept. Werst finally closed his eyes when Torin made it clear she’d take first watch. Alamber sat close beside her, as far from the duck as possible.
“So, Boss,” he leaned against her side, “I’m a little confused.”
“About?”
“Well, I had a lot of on the job training rather than actual schooling, so there might, possibly, be the chance of a few small holes in my understanding of interspecies relationships.”
Torin hid a smile. “I somehow doubt that.”
The ends of his hair traced short lines against her cheek as he grinned. “Not those kind of relationships. Political ones. The Trun are one of the Elder Races, right?”
“Yes.”
“And they live in the Core.”
“Obviously.”
“And they don’t seem to like us Younger Race types very much.”
She thought about telling him to get to the point, but even without the frequent stops, it was a long enough trip she was happy to have the diversion. “Also obviously.”
“But there were Niln and Rakva and Katrien all over the place, just like they’re all over the place in the MidSectors and OutSectors. I mean, we found three Katrien-only bars last night and we weren’t even looking that hard. None of them are Elder Race species, are they?”
“No.”
“So why are the Trun willing to be all buddy buddy with the Niln and the Rakva and the Katrien when we’re getting an escort back to the tether?” He leaned around her and languidly waved a pale hand at the three facilitators—who managed to simultaneously ignore him and record the gesture.
“The Niln, Rakva, and Katrien all joined the Confederation after it was formed. Some people call them the Mid Races, most don’t bother. Their homeworlds are on the edge of the Core so if they want to expand, they have to head out, that’s why we see so much of them.” Had she been talking with Craig or Werst, she’d have added that they saw more than they needed to of some Katrien. “The Trun want nothing to do with us . . .” She raised her voice enough to carry to the far end of the link. “. . . because the Younger Races were brought into the Confederation to fight a war. The war got us in before we overcame the societal impulse toward violence . . . Societal,” she repeated raising a hand and cutting off Alamber’s protest about the gang who’d jumped Werst and Ressk. “There’s assholes in every species. But a societal impulse toward violence makes us at best uncivilized.”
Alamber nodded. “And at worst, murderers. That got shouted at us last night,” he continued in response to Torin’s raised brow. “Binti dealt with it; no one died. The shouter, though, didn’t even care that not all of us fought.”
“Why should they?” Werst growled without opening his eyes. “They don’t care that if we hadn’t fought they’d have died under a Primacy bombardment, blown to bleeding bits. Weeping and wailing and not enough left living to take care of the dead who’d begin to rot and bloat and stink and . . .”
“Enough.” Torin could see the tip of a tale lashing in the aisle. A fight would be in no one’s best interest. Confident in Werst’s compliance, she turned her attention back to Alamber. “
Abalae is designed for off-worlders and its commercial sectors need a variety of goods, so why not allow the Mid Races access to a Core market. Of course, Commerce Three, Sector Eighteen wasn’t exactly high end, and I have to wonder how many Mid Races you’d find in the pricier sectors.”
“Harsh, Boss.”
“Those Trun bars you and Binti went drinking in last night, any Katrien drinking in them?”
“No, but . . .”
“Any Trun drinking in the Katrien bars you found?”
“No, but . . .” Alamber’s hair flipped up.
Torin swept it away from her eye. “People work together because of the demands of the job, but they socialize because they want to. Question becomes, why don’t they want to?”
After a moment, Alamber nudged her with a pointy elbow. “Well, Boss? Why don’t they?”
“How the hell should I know? We were only here for . . .” She glanced at her slate. “. . . just over thirty-one hours. I can’t work out the problems with an entire species in . . .”
“Less than three days,” Craig said on her other side.
“Oh.” She felt Alamber nod against her shoulder, accepting the comment at face value. “That’s fair.”
They were the only passengers on the tether’s rise. The rest was freight.
Station security met them as they exited and escorted them to the docking arm. Which would have been incredibly stupid had they actually wanted to cause problems since, had it come to a fight, Craig and Alamber could have taken them.
From the way their fur had puffed out, doubling the size of their tails, it seemed they knew that.
“Your supplies will be transferred from the freight compartment the instant the drones are available, Visitors.” Zi didn’t sound happy about the delay. Gesturing zir companion to the left, zi stood at the right of the pressure hatch, counting the six of them off as they stepped into the docking arm. “You will be detaching immediately after?” It was only just barely a question.
“We will.”
“Thank you, Visitors.”
Visitor, Torin realized following her team down the dockway, was not an honorific. It meant, you don’t belong here. She caught Binti’s eye and realized the other woman had realized the same thing.
