“We aren’t here under orders,” said Barnabas, his enunciation perfect. “We are here to stop two gangs from fighting.”
“WE WEREN’T FIGHTING!” two voices yelled back at them. “YOU CAME HERE AND STARTED KILLING US!”
Tabitha shook her head “No, I’m pretty sure we were shot at first. Hell, I didn’t even have any weapons.”
“THAT WAS THEM!” one of the red aliens yelled, pointing toward someone in the other group.
That alien yelled back, “THEY WERE IN OUR TERRITORY!”
“FUCK YOUR TERRITORY!” the red alien pointed down the hallway. “DO YOU THINK THEY GIVE A SHIT ABOUT TERRITORY?”
“Theyy calllled the Missstresss ‘bissstok ssshit,’” Peter ground out.
“Well, she has been called the Queen Bitch, so I’m pretty sure names won’t kill her,” one of the gang members said more calmly.
“It was the disrespect,” Barnabas answered. “If we take out this group, I doubt they will bother the police anymore.”
“SOMEONE CALL THE POLICE,” the red alien yelled again. “THAT WOULD BE FINE WITH US!”
“YOU KILLED…” The gang members started yelling at each other, and it took few minutes for them to settle down. Tabitha walked toward them.
“If you so much as pretend to shoot me, I will kill every last one of you and feed you to him,” she said, jerking a thumb toward the other end of the hallway.
Peter turned to Barnabas. “Ssshe musst beee taalkinng aaboouut youuu.”
Barnabas straightened, fixing his jacket and working on his cuffs. “I don’t eat raw.” His eyes had dimmed and were barely showing red at all.
“Where are the ones who did the killing?” Tabitha asked when she got within regular speaking distance.
“They are dead,” the red alien admitted.
“The speaker was the one who killed their own people,” the other supplied.
Barnabas walked up behind Tabitha, and a few of the gang members took a step back when his eyes flashed red. “The Mistress of the Planet will not accept this type of behavior. If you wish to kill others, then killing will be done unto you. Let’s go.” He turned and started walking back out of the dead-end alley. “This is your only warning,” he called back.
Someone cursed softly.
Tabitha walked back out of the hallway while Peter, his eyes glowing yellow, watched everyone for movement. First Barnabas walked past him, then Tabitha, who walked up and grabbed his clawed hand as she went by to pull him along.
The gang members heard the comment she made as it floated back down the alley. “I like what you do to frogs…”
QBBS Meredith Reynolds
Patricia sat in front of the camera looking at the screen and a face. “Are you recording this, Meredith?”
“Yes, Patricia,” the EI responded. “We can record this as many times as you want to get it right.”
Patricia nodded absently, reaching up to move a few strands of hair out of her face. “Record, Meredith.”
“Hey, Bethany Anne,” she started, then put a hand over her mouth, “or am I supposed to call you Baba Yaga?” Leaning toward the camera, she remarked, “Well, if you are offended, then come home and I’ll listen to you bitch about me getting your name wrong.”
She leaned back and sighed. “Look, I’ve thought a lot about what I want to say, and it all circles around to, we want you back with us.” She reached up and wiped a tear away. “I know everyone feels terrible about not noticing just how badly off you were, but honestly I think that was a bit of your own fault. I know I asked you at least once a month if you needed a break.”
She pointed an accusing finger at the screen, her voice getting more strident. “Do you think I don’t remember checking on you, and you lying to my face for decades?” She dropped her finger. “I’m not suggesting I don’t know why you did it, but how the hell were we supposed to know you weren’t in a good place, seriously?”
Patricia paused a moment. “Meredith?”
“Yes.”
“Erase that and I’ll start fresh,” she told the EI, then leaned forward toward the camera.
“Hi, Bethany Anne, it’s me,” Patricia started again, then paused before continuing, “Baby, come home to us. We miss you.”
This time the tears fell freely down her face as she waved goodbye to the screen.
She leaned back and reached up to wipe the tears away.
“End Message, Meredith.”
QBBS Shinigami, Between Transit Points
The workout area on the Shinigami was built using some of the best engineering methods the Etheric Empire could come up with. When the Empress and her bodyguards needed to let off a little steam, they didn’t want someone accidentally tossed through the skin of the ship to float off into space.
Those left inside the ship as the explosive decompression occurred wouldn’t do well either.
Baba Yaga was working through her katas, the movements she had learned as a young girl, the ones to help the body learn to flow from attack to defense and back to attack again.
She had been doing this for too damned long.
>>Baba Yaga, we have located a possible candidate location. Planet Vel’aisle.<<
Baba Yaga finished her kata, then stood up. “The last time you said that you dropped us on a planet that only served Pepsi.”
>>You wanted, again, to prove that Pepsi wasn’t the only drink planets served, and didn’t allow me a chance to properly sensor-sweep the planet.<<
“It isn’t the only drink out there. I just happened to select a bad planet,” she said, popping her neck. “A no good, very bad, horrible planet.”
TOM interrupted. I believe Nathan did too good a job.
Baba Yaga nodded in agreement. “Yes, he did.” She thought about it for a moment. “I should constrain Coke now and flood the market with Pepsi.”
ADAM offered over the speaker system, “I suggest marketing it through entertainment. Fund a group of characters who are loved but are outlaws, who have the people’s safety as their core purpose and fight against despotic governments who can’t get their shit right. They drink Coke and disdain Pepsi, because only those who truly support governments drink Pepsi.”
“You just said a curse word,” TOM said through the speaker system as well.
“Wait, we drink Coke in the Empire,” Shinigami said.
ADAM explained. “It’s entertainment! It doesn’t have to be accurate, just fun.”
“Wait a minute,” Baba Yaga said, tapping her lips. “Isn’t that our story?”
“Yes,” ADAM confirmed, “but who would believe it?”
“True,” TOM agreed. “He has a point.”
She waved a hand. “Fine, what the hell, ADAM. You and TOM take a small portion of my funds and see if you can make it happen.”
>>TOM?<<
Yes?
>>How are we going to write the scripts to make this entertainment idea work? I wasn’t expecting her to agree with me. I just wanted to point out our history, get her remembering some of her friends and maybe pull on her heartstrings.<<
I think you dazzled her with bullshit, TOM replied. And, it just might actually work.
>>Which part?<<
Both. The entertainment to push Coke sales, and putting a little bit into her subconscious to remember all that TQB has accomplished.
>>Okay, so how do I get some of these story ideas?<<
You go to the source.
>>Baba Yaga? She doesn’t want to speak about it.<<
Not that source, the source.
>>Who is that?<<
Frank Kurns, of course.
“So,” she exclaimed, unaware of the sidebar conversation, “Baba Yaga is the ever-patient avatar of Death. How much time will this take?”
“Baba Yaga,” TOM retorted, “is full of shit.”
The white-haired female with the mouthful of sharp teeth started laughing, her raspy throat not helping the image at all. “Yes. Yes, she is.”
Sper
soneck, Unaffiliated Worlds
“Why here?” Eric asked John as the two of them walked through the afternoon sun—blue this time.
“I’ve got a feeling,” John told him. The two of them were wearing their Shinigami armor.
“You ‘had a feeling’ on the last three stops,” Eric chuckled. “What’s different about this one?”
“I blame McClellan for the last three,” John replied. While they were talking, he was working on the HUD information screens inside his helmet. Eric had doffed his helmet and was holding it as they walked.
“McClellan?” Eric thought back to the crew. “I don’t remember any McClellan.”
“Dapper John.”
Eric nodded. “Yeah, you both have the same name, so they gave him a nickname.”
“When it still has ‘John’ in it, it isn’t much of a nickname,” John told his friend. One of his filters went orange, so inside his helmet he issued commands.
He reached over and tapped Eric on the shoulder, and started to turn to his left. Eric lifted his helmet and slipped it on.
The two men followed the audio source.
Y’elga was just under four feet tall and weighed almost enough not to get blown away by a large gust of wind.
If she had been bathing in the mud puddles.
She had red eyes, dark brown skin, and at the moment, both fists in the air. Her head was covered in sharp white needles.
Her friend Tellah was behind her, trying to get her breath back.
“Leave us alone!” she hissed, trying to make her high-pitched voice sound deep.
Their four attackers were laughing at the two of them as they spread out.
The park was empty. Everyone else had gone home already.
J’ahm was holding the back of his head with one hand and gripping the tree limb she had used to beat him when he had kicked Tellah with the other.
“Why?” Thy’Jet asked. As the leader of the group he was the biggest of the four, probably four times her weight, no mud needed, and easily towering over her. He didn’t have to try to make his voice sound deep.
“Because Baba Yaga will take you out if you mess with us again!”
J’ahm shook the limb. “You will feel this, I promise!”
Thy’Jet looked at J’ahm. “What?” J’ahm asked, pointing to Y’elga. “She hit me with it first!”
“Yes, and if you use it and break her bones, they will send you to detention camp all summer for using a weapon!” Thy’Jet told him. “Smart, not stupid, remember?”
J’ahm looked at the branch and then at Y’elga, and finally threw it away angrily. “CatsHull!” he screamed in frustration.
Thy’Jet turned back to Y’elga. “Tellah stole J’ahm’s pendent. Give it back to him so we don’t have to take it back.”
“It isn’t his!” Tellah breathed out.
“You took it from him,” Thy’Jet responded. “We all saw you do it. We can go under the truth detector and say we saw you take it. What are you going to do, then?”
Tellah screamed, “YOU TOOK IT FROM ME FIRST!”
Y’elga kept her eyes to the front but asked over her shoulder, “Is this true? Did you take it from J’ahm?”
“YES!” J’ahm yelled in frustration.
“Yes, but you stole it from me last summer!” she yelled back.
“I didn’t steal anything! I found it,” J’ahm retorted.
Y’elga started to understand the picture “So, what happened, Tellah?”
“I was playing and set down my books and stuff, and when I came back it was missing.”
“Found!” J’ahm countered. “It wasn’t in your backpack!”
Y’elga’s eyes narrowed. “Tellah never said she had a backpack.”
“She always carries a backpack,” J’ahm answered. “We’ve all seen it.”
“She hasn’t used a backpack during this whole semester of school,” Y’elga responded, her red eyes narrowed. “So you stole it from her backpack, and now you want to claim she is stealing it back?”
“I. Found. It!” J’ahm hissed.
“I. Don’t. Care!” Y’elga stood her ground. “Baba Yaga doesn’t suffer thieves!”
“Oh, for bistok shit!” Thy’Jet said. “You aren’t Baba Yaga. There is no Baba Yaga.” He put his fingers up, about four inches apart. “You are a little Huithek female who can barely fit on chairs at school. You are—” He was interrupted by a deep voice.
“Someone who can call the Shinigami.”
All six of the kids turned in surprise to see two black-armored humans. Both had their helmets on, a slightly purple tint glinting from them as the sun hit them.
They had the fabled armor and the guns.
“Oh, my ancestors,” Y’elga whispered.
“Did you call them?” Tellah asked her friend. Y’elga shook her head no.
“Yes, Y’elga of the Huithek, you did call Baba Yaga’s Shinigami.”
“You… aren’t them, are you?” Thy’Jet asked, his bluster gone.
One of the men turned toward him and reached up, pushing a button. His visor retracted and two eyes peered out at him.
Everyone there saw the eyes start to glow red, and his voice was deep and malevolent. “Do you want to sacrifice some of your blood to me?”
All of the children shook their heads no.
“Then do not ask disrespectful questions again.” The Shinigami reached back up and touched the button again, closing his visor.
John spoke to Eric over the suit communications. “I think you just made the one in back pee itself.”
Eric looked and sure enough, there was a little liquid at its feet.
John pointed to Thy’Jet. “You will come here, Thy’Jet. The rest of your group will leave, or my Spirit Brother will start eating.” He paused for about three seconds. “He is a bit hungry, now that you have mentioned it.”
Thy’Jet heard his friends backpedal and then turn to run. He didn’t blame them.
Hell, he would be with them if the Spirit hadn’t called him out. Now he couldn’t move, he was so scared.
“NO!” Y’elga ran in front of Thy’Jet, placing one hand on his stomach, and stretching one out toward the Shinigami who had spoken. “I didn’t mean to call you! I don’t want you to eat him!”
Thy’Jet reached in front of him and picked her up. “Stop wiggling!” he told her. “You need to get behind me.”
“They…are going…to eat you!” she hissed.
“Better me than you!” he hissed right back, “and I’m sorry.”
“For what?” she asked, still trying to get out of his grip. “Let me down, you bistok!”
He looked at her and dropped her. “I didn’t know J’ahm took it from Tellah last summer!” She looked at him, speechless. “So grow up and kick his ass for me in a few years. Then, when you get old enough, come drink by my grave, okay?”
“NO!” She started to run around him, but he snatched her arm. “SHIT!” he screamed, releasing her when her head got too close to his unprotected skin. He grabbed her with his left and swung her behind him again. “DAMMIT, stay there!”
She glared at him. “I’m not your pet!”
“No shit!” Thy’Jet answered. “You are a spunky female I’d like to have dated in about five years when you settle down!”
Y’elga stopped squirming, stupefied.
Thy’Jet felt a hard metal hand grasp his shoulder. He closed his eyes and when he had silently turned around and opened them again he was face to face with one of the Shinigami, who had his visor open and was staring right at him.
“One of these days,” the Spirit told him, “you will be a great warrior. Baba Yaga’s Shinigami salute you, Thy’Jet!”
With that they stood straight and raised their hands to the tops of their helmets, then brought them back down.
Thy’Jet’s mouth just stayed open as they gave him respect.
The taller one continued, “Protect them all, just like you tried to bring justice for your
friend.”
The one who had shown his red eyes added, “Just pick better friends, like Y’elga.”
The Shinigami walked away from the three children and five steps later they broke into a jog, then jumped, easily clearing the multistory building across the street, and were gone.
The very next day, Thy’Jet kicked the crap out of J’ahm and made him apologize to Tellah.
The six of them became fast friends, keeping the truth of the meeting with the Shinigami to themselves.
Because…who would believe Baba Yaga’s spirits were real?
21
Planet Vel’aisle, Valley of the Damned
The odd-looking ship crested the mountain and floated down toward the valley floor. Sharp rocks, brown and grey with slices of yellow through them, littered the slopes.
It wasn’t a particularly large ship, oval in shape, and two levels of windows surrounded the silvery craft.
Noiselessly it glided over the river that cut through the valley until it came upon a grassy area, then, slowing down, four supports unfolded like insect legs and sharp claws extended on the ends as it lowered itself.
The legs found secure footing and the craft delicately settled, confirming the strength of the millennia-old ship as it finally supported its total weight.
Most of the creatures had bolted off the grassy plains, the large craft scaring them.
Two, however, went through the brush to the grassy area, their legs scrabbling on the ground as they made their way toward the craft.
When they were halfway there, a ramp under the silver vehicle opened and lowered to the ground. One alien, a Leath in robes, slowly descended and moved away from the craft. She waited patiently as the two creatures came up to her.
Greetings, Levelot, One of the Six sent to Behome’t, hosted in the larger creature in the front.
Greetings, Levelot, Behome’t sent back.
Where is Teret? Levelot asked. Did she make a transfer?
The giant creature half-turned. We are not sure. She did not like these creatures, so she went farther into the valley to locate another option.
Kurtherian Gambit Boxed Set Three: Books 15-21, Never Submit, Never Surrender, Forever Defend, Might Makes Right, Ahead Full, Capture Death, Life Goes On (Kurtherian Gambit Boxed Sets Book 3) Page 135
