IceFlight

by Casey Lea

Darsey twisted savagely in an effort to wrench free from the stranger. She spun and looked up into a face distorted by fury. She paused and breathed in sharply, struggling to control her com’s surging battle mode. Her body quivered on the edge of lashing out, but her opponent was familiar.

  “Wing?” she croaked, and got a snarl in response. “Nightwing? What the hell?”

  “What… are… you… doing?” he panted, and she realized his anger was no act. His fury at seeing her here cut soul deep.

  Darsey took a calming breath, but it was useless and, despite her best efforts, her own anger flared. “I’m escaping,” she bit back. “All by myself, without any help, because, oh yes, there was no help.”

  Nightwing glared at her and in the sudden tense silence she heard his teeth grind together. Her temper rose further on a fresh swell of indignation. Words long unspoken crowded for release, but before she could tell the kres exactly what she thought of him he spun away.

  He turned without explanation and stalked further into the darkness. Darsey knew she should walk away too and continue her escape, but she was spitting with fury. She strode after him instead, trusting her com to stop her from running into anything before her eyes could adjust.

  Darsey slowed her pace when a dim figure appeared ahead and squared her shoulders, but before she could start shouting Wing moved. The grainy shadow of his arm punched forward to collect the greater darkness of the wall. His fist slammed into it and the concussion was deafening.

  She flinched at the noise and the metal beneath her feet thrummed in response to the blow. There was another impact, louder than the first, which almost covered a furious shout from the kres. She struggled to keep her balance and to understand that primal cry of rage and frustration. Ahead of her, Wing pummelled the shuddering wall and the hangar rang like a bell in response.

  The Bizarre Bazaar started to sway above their heads and Darsey ducked automatically when it swung past, but Wing spun to kick the now-buckling wall. He continued his assault in oblivious fury while the hanging shop started to oscillate wildly. Its supporting straps groaned and Darsey took the deepest breath she could, to yell with full com force, “Wing!”

  Darsey’s hands flew to cover her ears and Wing was thrown against the damaged wall. The echoes of his name rang around the station with ten times the force of his recent attack. “Drak,” he swore, and clutched his head too.

  Out in the brighter light of the hangar, the few shoppers who had stayed during the earlier disturbance stood frozen within their protective fields. Everyone was staring into the shifting shadows beneath the Bizarre Bazaar.

  “Gods drakkit,” Wing’s lips shaped, but Darsey could hardly hear him. His face creased in pain and she would have felt guilty, if he didn’t so thoroughly deserve it.

  He shook his head, then closed his eyes against it instead, squeezing them tightly shut. “We kres have most sensitive ears,” he eventually pointed out.

  “I know,” Darsey flashed back, but Wing ignored her attempt at provocation.

  “I’m sorry,” he said simply. “Truly sorry. I left you feeling your escape was needed and I should have known you’d manage such. It’s my failure that you’re here. I should have thought forward and guessed that you’d best Jileea.”

  “I didn’t,” Darsey answered shortly, struggling with her emotions and Wing’s unexpected apology. “Best Jileea, I mean. I made a trade with her instead. My freedom for a future favor and for you.”

  His eyes narrowed at her admission. “You offered me as trade?”

  “Not exactly, but you’re part of what she wants. So I suggest you get lost.”

  Darsey turned away without further explanation. She strode out of the drifting shadow cast by the still-swaying Bizarre Bazaar and away from the kres as fast as she could without running. She glanced up at the fabric shop when she passed beneath its open front and the worried face of its proprietor quickly disappeared behind a bolt of cloth. Along the line of hanging shops, other curious faces vanished just as fast, but she forgot them the moment Wing matched stride with her. She tried to ignore him, but he had the check to step in front of her and block her path.

  “How did you trade me?”

  Darsey managed to stop herself just shy of the loathsome alien. She glared up at him, but he looked completely unrepentant. Perhaps kres didn’t feel guilty, even when they were back-stabbing weasels. She took a deep breath and hoped her voice wouldn’t shake.

  “So now you want to talk. Now that it’s all about you. Well you’re way too late. I don’t want to talk to you ever again. I don’t want to help you in any way. Nothing could induce me to spend a single, excruciating second longer in your company. Go. Away.”

  Darsey tried to walk around Wing, but he stepped sideways too and blocked her again. “Move,” she ordered, and felt a rush of energy that matched her anger.

  Wing stepped back a pace, so he must have seen she was combat ready, but then he stopped and held his ground anyway. “All you say is true. I won’t ask more of your deal with Jileea, but please, most please, let me help. There’s more of danger here than you might think. I found you because I bought word of you from a child. A boy called Malik saw passage energy when you first arrived and sold news of you through the station com. He called you mermaridian, but I bought the visual because I feared it might be you, and it’s well that I did. It showed you passing through a guard rail and it might have been bought by any-all Rim scum.”

  He snorted in apparent disgust at such an idea, but Darsey wasn’t so easily fooled. She started him down and tried not to flinch when his hand landed gently on her shoulder. “Instead, I paid the chick for his trace so that no other will see it. Is that not proof that I want you all-times safe? I truly want to find passage for you and see you set for home. I swear it.”

  Darsey backed away, tossing his hand off and Wing had the grace to look down.

  “I’m shamed that I’ve earned such distrust.” He looked up quickly as if sensing her anger flare. “I know I deserve it and I’ll make no protest. My actions to you seemed cruel.”

  “They were cruel. You were cruel.” Darsey stopped, breathing hard, and Wing actually offered a human nod in response.

  “I know and I deeply regret it. I’ll tell you all, explain everything, after a passage is safe booked. Agreed?”

  “Do you really think you can explain abandoning me? Just walking out? And leaving me a slave?”

  Wing sighed and shrugged a shoulder. “Probably not. Can we find a safe ship first and then you can judge all?”

  “I don’t think so. I can find my own ride and every second you spend with me brings Jileea closer. She placed a pretty obvious tracer in my com, after using some equally obvious reverse psychology to try to make me look for you.” She offered Wing a challenging stare and flipped a hand to shoo him away. “So go. I know you don’t want Jileea following you.”

  “I don’t care,” he said firmly. “I won’t just leave, Darse. Not ‘til you’re safe-set for home. I owe you that and more.”

  Darsey stared along the row of shoddy shops and struggled to remember that the kres had already left her once. She needed to do this alone. “No. Depending on you is a bad habit. It never works out and it makes a mess of my self-reliance. So get lost, okay? Just go away. We both know you’re good at that.”

  Darsey stepped around Wing and this time he let her go. She moved on unhindered, heading for a small shop, tethered high above them with a rope ladder dangling from its front. However, when she reached the ladder, she realized there was still someone close behind her. She swore under her breath and turned to face Wing again. “What?”

  “Just a sugges-”

  “Yes?” Darsey asked in an ominously clipped manner.

  “Small travel agents are not best honest. They charge top credit and then book passage on any ship, even one on an opposite route. The worst will simply sell you to Harvesters. The smart move is to book direct with a ship’s cargo senior. You can che
ck the ship first. Its route, usual cargo, affiliations, past performance… they’re all public knowledge. I can show you the station access.”

  Wing’s reminder that Darsey could find herself in a slave pit again was instantly sobering. She was forced to face her own unavoidable ignorance and, although it galled her, to admit that she still needed him. She told herself she had no intention of relying on the kres again, not in any serious way, but using him? That was quite another matter. “All right,” she agreed brusquely. “Show me.”

  Wing instantly turned away and backtracked toward the metal gantries. A frond twitched back over his shoulder to check that Darsey was following, so she kept close behind, almost on his heels. He stepped over the chasm with casual ease and dove back into the crowd as if challenging her to keep up.

  Darsey’s jaw set and she increased com power before leaping after him. He set a rapid pace, ducking and diving through the throng, jumping stairs and stepping onto railings to climb straight to higher levels. She had to push hard to keep up, but she managed and found their increasingly rushed passage unexpectedly thrilling.

  Darsey took the risk of pushing past a mutt and finally drew level with Wing as they raced each other upwards, toward the outer shell of Gratuity. They reached the final superstructure together, but she swung round an upright post that marked the edge of the docking rim to land on its metal expanse first.

  Wing hit that shiny surface a second later and they shared a grin. They’d halted at the foot of a ship’s ramp and Wing turned to face it. Darsey stared past him, up an unusually long gangway to a giant, spiral seashell floating above.

  “Are we there?” she asked, and was disturbed to hear the disappointment in her voice. Her smile disappeared and she stepped away from Wing.

  His grin faded more slowly, but he stepped away too, increasing the distance between them.

  “My recommendation, ye. Com says this is best.” He turned and gestured toward the grimy metal tongue extended from Gratuity’s latticework of passages to connect with the loading bay of the strange shell. Darsey looked up at that multi-colored hull with its odd patterns in renewed doubt.

  “You’re sure this is the best?”

  “Certain-sure. There’s not much of choice at the moment. Only Harvesters are docked, or the three t’ssaa ships on farside. Do you fancy such?” He raised an eyebrow at Darsey, but before she could answer, an energised disk flashed from the darkness of the ship’s hold. It hummed and glinted once in the light as it slashed toward Wing’s legs.

  He leapt back and the weapon buried itself at his feet. “A sh-tar,” he stated calmly while it sank into the dock with a hiss of steam and the stench of melted metal. He exchanged a glance with Darsey.

  “Friendly,” she said, but he just shrugged in response and turned back to the unwelcoming hold.

  “Hey! Ship’s owner!”

  There was no answer. The oval opening at the top of that steep ramp was as dark and silent as ever. Darsey’s breath escaped as a short, impatient snort, but Wing was undeterred.

  “We bring trade,” he called confidently into the silence.

  She tipped her head to look up the ramp again and this time there was movement. She almost missed that faint stirring in the dark, when a sliver of black slipped out of the greater darkness behind it. A further fluid step brought the stranger into the light, but, surprisingly, it was no easier to see. Its outline shimmered when it moved from the darkness, shifting from black to a bewildering array of colors. The different shades blurred, then blended, to subtly mimic the environment behind it.

  Darsey guessed that the creature’s clothes must adapt to copy its surroundings. The camouflage was effective and she had to watch closely to track the alien’s rapid progress down the ramp. It came to a halt a metre ahead of her and was instantly still. It vanished completely and, if she had missed its initial movement, she would never have noticed it. There was little to betray its position, not even the glimmer of its eyes.

  However, the creature did have eyes and Darsey recognised them when they flicked toward Wing. They were surprisingly dark, with huge irises nearly as black as the alien’s pupils. They would have shown as holes in the camouflage, if not for improbably long eyelashes. Darsey had a profile view of the strange captain and caught the flutter of multi-hued and feathered lashes when it risked a more open examination of Nightwing.

  “What trade, male?” it demanded in a voice that, while curt, was surprisingly deep and mellow.

  “Passage,” Wing answered just as succinctly.

  The only response was a clipped sound of obvious annoyance and the alien flickered into sight when he took a step back up the ramp. However, Wing raised his hand in quick reassurance and gestured at Darsey. “Not for both, just the female.”

  The alien halted again and there was a moment of silence and stillness before those dark eyes opened fully and turned to Darsey.

  She made no effort to look inviting and scowled instead. She could feel Wing’s frustration at her hostility and glared harder. Annoying the kres was unbelievably satisfying. However, the alien smiled at her response, to show an unexpected gleam of teeth against lips as gray and grimy as the loading ramp.

  “A new species,” he observed in a baritone that showed no trace of offence. He looked straight past her com’s mermaridian glamour, with the insight of a natural expert in disguise. “I like her attitude.”

  “Amazing,” Wing muttered, and matched Darsey’s scowl with one of his own when she turned her glare on him. “Truly,” he continued, “the rest of her is equally pleasant.”

  Her eyes narrowed in disbelief at such criticism from the person who had so recently sold her.

  “Slaver,” she hissed, but was unable to say more before he threw back his own insult.

  “Dumb gat.”

  “Excuse,” the alien interrupted, but Wing ignored him.

  “I'm no slaver and you ignore me more-on-more than any-”

  “I ignore you. Arrogant pig.”

  “Arrogant? Justly proud perhaps-”

  “Yeah, we’re all proud of your selfless compassion.”

  “What’s ‘pig’ anyway?”

  “You are and a jackass too-”

  “Excuse.” There was a brief, charged silence and then two heads turned together to sight the alien.

  All Darsey could see clearly was a pair of heavily fringed eyes, which widened further while they studied her. “You wish passage, female?”

  She tensed, but then sagged when all tension left her. She felt strangely flat, and shrugged without looking back to Wing. “I suppose.”

  The alien chuckled in response and Darsey watched him warily, but still started when a hand appeared in mid-air before her. Its coloring changed from an exact copy of what was behind it to a startling blue that fluoresced to green around its now clear outline. The alien twitched three of his visible fingers, beckoning her closer and Darsey moved cautiously forward to step onto the ramp.

  She used the faintest of outlines that seemed to trace the alien’s head to judge that he was actually not much taller than herself. The newly visible hand moved again, this time stretching out toward her. It stopped, palm up, in clear invitation.

  Darsey hesitated, but only briefly, before offering her own hand. Those alien eyes continued to study her intently as surprisingly warm and smooth fingers closed around hers. Darsey looked down in astonishment while the alien drew her hand closer.

  Her eyes confirmed what her fingers had already told her. She was touching skin, oddly colored skin, but bare skin all the same. She had only a second to wonder about the rest of his body before she was distracted by distorted movement. The alien’s head ducked forward, over her hand, and she tensed when her arm seemed to disappear beneath his camouflaged body. There was a sensation of air passing over her knuckles and the clear sound of sniffing.

  “What the-?” Darsey protested, and he instantly dropped her hand before straightening and backing up the ramp.


  There was another moment of stillness when he stopped, to disappear against the background again. Darsey took a shaky breath, and then retreated down the ramp to reassuringly level ground.

  “Definitely no kres,” the alien’s voice stated, and Darsey shook her head vehemently.

  “No,” she confirmed with deliberate emphasis.

  There was another flash of teeth from above. “Good. You have some days ‘til ovulation, but I will accept passage any-all. Four thousand credits.”

  Wing hissed in outrage at the price, but Darsey hardly heard him. She was too busy being outraged herself while simultaneously trying to work out if the alien was right. She’d lost her contraception along with her med-chip and she realized that the outrageous merchant was probably correct. She accepted his judgment with an internal shrug. She may have been fertile again, but that fact was presently irrelevant and likely to be irrelevant for some time.

  However, the alien’s sexual interest in her was a cause for concern. Even Wing seemed to agree and abruptly turned her away from the ramp. He took her by the elbow to steer her back into Gratuity.

  “What happened?” Darsey wondered, and he glanced at her with a raised eyebrow.

  “The deal for passage is done. I’d normally barter more with a ch't'kar, that price was high-as, but we’ve no time. I’m busy and your ride will lift as soon as the ch't'kar has it prepped.”

  “Wait, wait, wait,” she protested, and dug in her heels against his steady pressure on her elbow.

  The kres cursed under his breath and retained a firm grip on her arm, but his other hand, which was against the small of her back, stopped pushing her forward. Despite the halt, she could feel his impatience. The set of his body and the tension in the fingers now around her wrist, their strength held rigidly in check, all screamed of impatience.

  “What?” he demanded, and, although the clipped word was quiet, it carried the emotional force of a shout.

  Darsey turned toward him, but slowly, and her free hand rose to cover a deliberate yawn. She expected further anger, but Wing sighed instead.

  “All right,” he conceded, and relaxed a little. He was still poised to move, but ready to give her at least a moment’s attention. “Darsey, I’m sorry. I know he seems strange. Truly, all ch't'kar are odd. To us herd sentients anyway.”

  Darsey tilted her head in surprise. “Herd sentients?”

  “Ye. People used to living in groups. Like us.”

  “But not like these ch't'kar?”

  Wing nodded a finger. “Ye, they’re a loner species and most territorial. They meet only to mate and the males can be very aggressive. Your owner lives alone on his ship and will be wary of letting other males aboard, especially a kres.”

  “Yeah, I noticed he didn’t like you. At least he has good taste.”

  Wing frowned, but Darsey offered him her sweetest smile and he sighed. “It’s true enough. Ch't'kar hate the way we kres can sense their where-at. Their camouflage is vital to them, their most evolved form of protection, but it’s completely useless with kres.”

  Darsey almost asked why, before remembering that Wing’s fronds sensed longer wavelengths than the visible spectrum. “Ch't'kar camouflage doesn’t work in infrared.”

  “No, so we can see them clear-as. They’ve no brainwave shielding either, so we can read them easy-as too. They hate that and avoid us even more than other species.”

  “I repeat, good taste. So why has this loner agreed to take me? Just because I’m a member of the opposite sex?”

  “That and the money. He’s asking top credit, curse him.”

  Wing’s answer was less reassuring than Darsey had hoped. “But he is keen on the fact that I’m female, right? He’s not hoping to breed with me, is he?” she asked with growing concern, but Wing shook his head, very slowly and carefully as if the human gesture was profoundly unnatural.

  “No,” he said simply, without the condescension he would once have shown for such ignorance. “Reproduction between sentient species doesn’t work. No offspring have ever been produced, not in any combination, and the gentik have tried many times. Their best was to tie in a few genes and even that was a disaster. They put fronds in mermaridian and made the Beserks, who are most-times so wild they’re useless. No, be easy minded. Natural sex leads nowhere and the ch't'kar has no such plan.”

  “He might not expect children, but trying could still be fun,” she pointed out and the wretched kres responded with a grin.

  “Could,” he agreed, and she twisted away from his grasp.

  “That’s my point,” Darsey snapped. “I don’t want Captain Be-a-Mate-or-Walk-the-Plank thinking those sorts of happy thoughts. Not if they involve me.”

  “Trust me, thoughts involving you are seldom happy.” Wing raised an eyebrow at her, but instead of anger she was swept by something much more sad and bitter.

  “Trust you? Again? Never.”

  Wing’s face set hard and he stepped away from Darsey. “I’m sorry you feel so. Just stay with me til you lift. That way, I can see you safe, whether you believe me or not-” He broke off abruptly and his fronds bushed wide. “Perhaps it’s too late for explanations, but I do have a gift for you, Darse. Something that will keep you safe.”

  She frowned, trying to resist his surprisingly contagious and completely unexpected smile, but his grin simply widened.

  “You’ll like this,” he guaranteed, and looked down at his com. His fingers and mind were momentarily busy as he accessed its most secure levels, then a shining band dropped into his hand. Her breath caught in her throat when he opened his fingers to reveal a familiar circle of gold.

  “My com,” Darsey whispered, before she could stop herself. Her cheeks flushed and she looked up quickly to see if Wing had heard. “I mean, your spare com,” she amended, but he was still smiling hugely.

  “No more.” Wing stretched forward and passed the wrist band to Darsey.

  She accepted it carefully, curling her fingers slowly around it, scared to believe that such a gift was real. It felt reassuringly firm and cool when she opened it and pressed it around her wrist. It snapped into place and any sense of cold, inert metal vanished when warmth surged up her arm. She gasped and closed her eyes against that wave of energy. The com’s embrace was overwhelming and she had to struggle to stand quite still, senses tingling, while she adapted to it.

  “Good?” Wing asked quietly, but to Darsey’s newly sensitive ears his question was a shout.

  “Oh, yeah.” She stood still for another moment, before gently flexing her wrist. The silver com that Jileea had given her was thrown clear and clattered across the gridded walkway. It skidded over a ragged metal edge and disappeared. A series of fading chimes marked its fall past other gangways and on toward Gratuity’s heart. Darsey looked up and offered Wing a completely genuine smile. “Thank you.”

  “You’re most welcome.” His grin was briefly dazzling, but abruptly faltered. He must have felt her suspicion return. “What’s wrong?”

  Darsey struggled to hold onto her smile, but the joy behind it was gone. “It doesn’t matter,” she said, and tried to believe that. “I can guess why you gave me your spare com and it’s a fair trade. You don’t want Jileea following you and now her tracer is gone, along with my old com. That’s a win-win exchange, so good for you.”

  “Darsey,” he protested and stopped, as if briefly lost for words. “There’s no… no motive here. Jileea means naught to me and I’ve no fear of her interference. She can follow or not, I don't care. Even if I did, I’d never make such a trade to stop her. There’d be cheaper ways, truly. That com is not my spare. I kept it secret-safe because it’s precious. It was created with our latest technology. It is the best, most advanced military device we kres have and even the Arck is without one.”

  “Then how come you had it?” Darsey asked sharply. She stiffened when the kres stepped closer in response, and then froze completely when he leaned down until his lips touched her ear.r />
  “I’m in-mission,” he whispered, so softly that only her com-enhanced hearing could separate the words. “Recruited by the Shadows. My success will force the Arck’s pardon. He’ll grant it reluctantly, but if I render great service to all kres he won’t be able to deny it. I must learn what the t’ssaa want from my people. They’ve been stalking us for three years past and I’ve been sent to find all. I can’t match their numbers, but my best advantage is that com.”

  Wing stopped and one of his fronds curled around Darsey’s throat. Its soft touch initiated a mental connection that surprised them both. She could feel his amazed relief and beyond it a strong sense of conviction. There were no words in their contact, just emotions, but the strongest by far was honesty. He wanted her to believe him and he made a frond-wrenching effort to open his mind to hers.

  The communion was incomplete, but he still managed to share enough of himself to convince Darsey that his story was true. This was Wing at his most vulnerable and their closeness continued, growing until it threatened to carry them both into a completely unwanted intimacy.

  Darsey broke free first, stepping away to back up to the far side of the walkway. Wing’s frond collapsed when she broke the contact, to lie flat and limp across his shoulder. His jaw clenched and a trickle of blood ran from behind his left ear, where that frond was attached.

  Darsey shuddered, but her concern was for Wing as much as herself. “You okay?” she asked in a shaking voice, and he managed a tight smile of reassurance. “Good. Alright. I believe you. I believe everything. But why give me the com? It’s your protection and your responsibility.”

  “Certain-sure,” he agreed, sounding just as shaken. “It’s hard to explain in words. Even harder without words,” he admitted with a rueful grin. “It’s just… I know you can't trust me. Not easily and I’ve no time to argue that now. The most I can do to fix what passed between us is to trust you instead. So, this is the most trust I can give. Darsey, I want you to all-time keep my com. All I ask is that you melt it, if you’re ever caught. Don’t let others take it. It will self-liquefy if you think the melt order while feeling most scared.”

  “Whoa,” Darsey snapped, even as her hand closed protectively around the com. “Don’t tell me things like that and don’t just give me your state-of-the-art gadgets. You don’t have the right to start acting all self-sacrificing now. You have to stick with mean and selfish, because that’s what you are and I am not keeping this-”

  Her fingers tightened against the com, but, before she could order its release, Wing jumped at her. He leapt the width of the walkway to snatch her round the waist and spin them both back into the shadows of the port entrance.

  “What?” she hissed, following his gaze to look down through the gridded floor. Several levels below their feet, a group was emerging from the thinning crowd.

  “Drak, it’s the t’ssaa,” Wing stated with quiet vehemence.

  “T’ssaa? Which t’ssaa?”

  Wing spared her a distracted look. “Payiss and his crew.”

  “You mean that frill-for-brains who tried to buy you from Greon?”

  Wing was accessing his com, but still smiled at Darsey’s description of the t’ssaa leader. “The same. I planted a trace residue in the cells he harvested from me, so I knew he was Gratuity bound. His ship’s docked and security has Payiss tracked to… the Hub. This group scans as from his crew, drakkit.”

  Darsey looked down again, trying to follow the fluid movement of the t’ssaa.

  “Isn’t that good?” she whispered. “I thought you were hunting them.”

  “Ye,” he agreed, “but I don't want that turned ditto, with them hunting me.”

  Wing looked back to Darsey and frowned. “I needs must go. Can you get back safe to the ch't'kar ship?” He grimaced at himself and lifted an apologetic hand before Darsey could answer. “Of course you can.” He paused awkwardly and glanced down past his feet again. “So… fare you well then.”

  Darsey folded her arms. “You’re joking.”

  “Err… no.”

  “Yes,” she informed him with quiet certainty. “You are joking if you think you can just gift me your secret spy stuff, hint that there’s more going on than I know, say goodbye and then run off. You owe me some answers. Lots of answers, and I intend to get them.”

  “Darsey,” Wing said just as quietly and firmly, “I truly need to go.”

  “Fine.” She nodded absently, but her mind was racing. If she was finally going to escape this place… if it was true and Wing could really be trusted… then she needed all the information she could get, to take back home. “I’ll go with you. There’s still time before my ship lifts.”

  She turned and strode away from the approaching t’ssaa. Wing was momentarily frozen, but then leapt to follow her. “I can interrogate you as we go,” she pointed out, and he groaned.

  “Sounds fun-as,” he answered brusquely, and glanced at his wrist. “No more time for asking. We need total speed now.”

  Wing took off and Darsey mentally punched her com into combat mode to follow. She flew around the curved docking ring after him and it was impossible to hear any pursuit over the pounding of her boots, but Wing called back, “they’re close.”

  Darsey picked up her pace, becoming a blur as she leapt over cargo piles waiting for loading, and Wing had to accelerate to keep up.

  “Next off,” he panted and she veered back toward the exits.

  They dove into a transport tube together and were instantly falling. Darsey cried out in shock, but Wing grabbed her by the wrist before his com fired a braking thrust. They slowed, but were still falling way too fast toward a vortex of people below them.

  Most of the tube was filled by aliens fluttering between levels, but Wing’s com pulsed repeatedly to manoeuvre them safely past the slower traffic. They continued to drop at speed, coms firing a warning to the swearing individuals they hurtled past. It took only seconds to fall to the surface of the planet.

  Darsey flinched when its darkened soil leapt into focus. She had an instant to realize they were about to slam into that chilly earth before Wing braked hard. Her arm was ripped over her head, but the ground was still hurtling at them.

  Wing’s com fired again and slowed them just enough to sweep sideways, away from an immediate collision. They were still travelling too fast to stop, but shot into another tunnel instead, one that drilled deeper yet beneath the surface of the planet. They plunged into a dim and bustling well, where Wing had to slow them again in order to work through the crowd. He looked across to Darsey with a reckless smile.

  “They won’t catch us now. They’ll need to be more discreet and more slow. Station powers have no love of t’ssaa.”

  “Good,” Darsey managed, before her breath was stolen by another rapid drop.

  Wing steered them into another side passage that fell diagonally toward the heart of the planet. It was less crowded and they dropped to its steeply sloping steel floor, to slide deeper into the station. They gained momentum, sweeping up one side of the tube and then the other as they worked past fellow travellers. The people they swung past were increasingly slow, clearly braking for the end of the trip, but Wing continued at a reckless pace.

  “Make ready to roll,” he shouted at Darsey, and she started to protest, but the end of the tunnel was suddenly ahead and it was too late to stop.

  She braced herself as they shot from the exit and into a small plaza. The square space was busy, but not so crowded that people had no room to move, and they scattered when Darsey and Nightwing flew through the air. The ground rushed up once more and she threw herself forward to meet it, tucking into a somersault when she landed, to absorb the impact. She came to their feet beside Wing amid an ominous silence. Flustered onlookers picked themselves up, while other disturbed shoppers stared balefully at the source of their disruption.

  “Just passing by,” Nightwing said with firm authority and strolled forward into the crowd.

  There
were some resentful rumblings when he pushed past, but no one made any move to stop him. Darsey followed quickly, trying to project the same aura of confidence and invulnerability. She was allowed to pass unhindered and the two of them hurried toward a pillared exit from the square. They stepped through it, pushing into a moving crowd again, and entered a cavernous space that was filled with buildings.

  Darsey drew in a sharp breath at the sight ahead. Walls towered above them, a close-packed mass of buildings tall enough to belong in the centre of any large city on Earth. They formed a patchwork of stone and metal that rose toward an icy roof hundreds of metres above. She was staring at a cityscape sandwiched into a single rocky bowl. The distant ceiling was hung with massive stalactites that looked like pins scattered in place of stars. They seemed tiny compared to the buildings rising like stalagmites beneath. Nature on Gratuity was dwarfed by the constructs of sentient life.

  “The Hub.” Wing sniffed in quick dismissal. He looked down at his com and nodded to the left.

  Darsey followed closely while he dodged his way down wide steps toward conveyor belts that disappeared into the city. Clanking metal scales overlapped with grinding imprecision in an endless loop that carried people into the Hub.

  Darsey eyed them doubtfully as she approached, but Wing pushed his way straight on and she followed without further hesitation. The ride was rough, rising and falling unpredictably so that she was soon glad of the close-packed bodies around them. However, she was even gladder when Wing pulled her across to the travelator’s far side and gestured that they should jump. An alley was approaching below them and they launched themselves into it.

  The drop was further than Darsey was used to, but she still landed lightly. She shook her head and brushed a finger gratefully across her com. Wing had found his feet just as easily and urged her forward.

  They hurried into the shadows of a slim space between massive buildings. Dark stone walls, embedded with strips of metal, drew close on either side. The gap between them narrowed as the pair moved deeper, until they had to turn sideways to continue. “Where are we going?” Darsey whispered, just as Wing stopped to check his com.

  “Inside,” he answered, even more quietly, before turning his attention to the blank face of the foundations in front of them. They appeared to be made of solid blocks, but he raised his com confidently to those dark stones. He had to twist awkwardly to access the band on his wrist, trying to read its display despite being pressed between two walls, but he somehow managed.

  “Ye, here. A service way,” he murmured to Darsey. “It’s been secured, but I can break through.”

  “Breaking and entering,” she agreed softly, and Wing grinned before pressing his display against the building.

  “We hope.” His smile faded and his expression became intent as his mind and fingers started their analysis. His hands danced over the featureless rock and slowly a border appeared beneath them. A gold-lined square gleamed from the wall and light spilled along the alley.

  Darsey raised her own com and the betraying energy disappeared, hidden behind a dark glamour. Their narrow space grew increasingly claustrophobic, but the blackness was brief. Wing broke the security code and punched though the energy field. It vanished to reveal an open service way, pulsing with color. Rivers of energy flowed into the building, twisting through the passage walls.

  However, Wing hesitated and gave Darsey a considering look. “This may be your last time to leave-” he offered, but something in her expression stopped him. “Kay. So let’s hunt t’ssaa.”

  He levered himself into the service way and she followed close behind. The entrance obeyed his command to seal and her ears popped, while she crawled on into a rainbow.

  36

  The Dance Goes On