Date Point: 3Y 8M 4W 5D AV
Hravin IV Observation Station
Adrian Saunders
The research station was small, uninhabited, and didn’t have toilets. It was placed – for surely it had not been built there – upon a moon that orbited a gas giant that Adrian suspected was the greenest thing he’d ever seen. It was an enormous viridian orb of nearly uniform hue, and tidal locking ensured that the ceiling viewport was forever fixed on that gorgeous sight. Looking upwards, Adrian let out a low whistle of appreciation that drew the attention of all present.
“It’s very green,” he explained himself, painfully aware of how simple that made him sound. “You’d, uh, think they’d have people here to appreciate the view. Or work.”
“The planet is larger than it should be,” Trix explained through his earpiece. “Its substantial mass should have prevented it from expanding to the size that it has. It seems that made it interesting enough to put a station here, but not interesting enough to permanently staff it.”
He stifled a nod or any other reply; he remembered how people back on Earth – arseholes mostly – would walk around and carry on conversations over hands-free. They hadn’t looked much different to crazy people, and given his long-standing issues with slowly succumbing to madness he’d decided that he wouldn’t give his companions any more reason to worry. The two humans did look up, though, before shrugging in unison and turning back to what they were doing.
Chir rapped his knuckles on the central table to regain attention, and the metallic thump rang around the small domed room like a high-pitched gong. The Gaoian frowned, held a hand against the table to still its vibration, and cleared his throat awkwardly. “I was hoping we could get down to business. We might be alone here, but I am ill at ease with remaining for too long.”
“Well said,” Askit replied. “There are three matters for our discussion. Layla, Point Zero, and Jennifer Delaney. In that order.”
Adrian frowned at the little Corti, who studiously ignored him doing so. He wasn’t ignorant of their views on his thought processes regarding Jen, and nor was he entirely in disagreement with them; while he wasn’t as unbalanced as he had been, he was remained far from objective, so for now he allowed the others to control the course of the conversation.
“Layla claims she was first employed as a spy, and then, upon reaching the limits of her loose morals, was forced into further betraying our confidences by ever more underhanded means,” Chir related, and the growl that edged his voice made no secret of how he felt about any of that. “However, if – and I do mean if – she does turn out to be telling the truth, I’d rather not allow Gaoian children to languish in some corporate prison.”
“If it’s of any help,” Grznk interrupted, “the few scans I was able to get on her did indicate she has previously been pregnant, but that she is not pregnant now. That confirms part of her story, but I couldn’t tell you more than that.”
Darragh scratched his throat thoughtfully, plainly enjoying the fact that his first beard was slowly beginning to grow in, even if it was just in patches. “What about some kind of alien lie-detector? Or even a truth serum?”
Doctor Grznk snorted in derision. “There’s no such drug, and I don’t have access to the advanced laboratory equipment that would allow me to read brainwave patterns. I’m not even that certain we even have that information anywhere accessible.”
Rubbing his own stubbled chin, Adrian thought back to the various ways of getting the truth out of somebody on Earth, and excluded anything that would immediately kill an alien. “I might be able to manage it,” he reluctantly announced, getting their undivided attention immediately, “although I’d like to try the easy way first.”
Darragh frowned, but was surprisingly quick to puzzle it out. “Are you talking about your heat vision? Because I heard that’s not all that effective.”
“On humans, mate,” Adrian reminded him, “but I don’t know how Gaoians work. Do different parts of them light up when they spin bullshit? Maybe, or maybe not, but we’ve got Chir here to help me find out. Let’s not forget about vocal stress; I watched a docco on that once and it seemed alright.”
“Those might work,” Doctor Grznk noted. “I can work with your hacker to use her translator implant as a measurement tool, although once again we’ll need Chir for our test subject.”
“Forgive me for my reluctance,” Chir replied, “but I’d rather not be a Corti test subject, and I especially do not want my implants further tampered with. What were the hard options, Adrian?”
“Uncomfortably close to torture,” Adrian replied, grimacing. “I don’t really want to go down that fucking path unless I absolutely have to, and I know that amongst humans it’s not that reliable anyway.”
“So if she is telling the truth…” Askit interrupted, attempting to get the conversation back on track, “what is your intention, Chir?”
“Reconnaissance and rescue,” the Gaoian replied simply. “I’m not going to just throw myself at these people without a plan, but nor am just I going to walk away. As for Layla–”
“We should dump her on the nearest backwater planet,” Keffa finished, scowling angrily; Adrian gathered that Keffa had started to trust the Gaoian female, and now that they’d had time to catch a breath she’d been busy stoking her anger. “Or leave her here. Anything that gets that lying bitch the fuck out of our lives.”
“We should incinerate her,” Xayn suggested. “That way she will never pose a threat again. It is objectively the safest option.”
“I’ll send you through a list of nearby planets that are suitably shitty,” Askit advised Chir while tapping away at his data pad, Xayn’s suggestion pointedly ignored. “Somewhere for her to be miserable that won’t actually kill her.”
“Thank you,” Chir replied, then issued a heavy sigh. “I suppose the next item is this ‘Point Zero’. I know effectively nothing about it, would you care to enlighten us?”
Askit looked up from his data pad. “It’s a massive data node. Just about everything from the Hierarchy runs through it, and losing it would cause them severe disruption. It won’t stop them entirely, but their operations will suffer considerably. My information states it is located inside the core of a small moon.”
They all looked down, and Askit was forced to dispel their presumption. “Not this one.”
Chir looked back up from the floor. “I suppose you intend to use your skills against them, then? Break their computers with some bad code?”
Askit shook his head. “I’m not optimistic about my chances there, since that’s actually not how computers work. I was hoping to find a way to engage in some good old-fashioned ‘breaking shit’, and fortunately we’re allied with the worst thing that can ever happen to anyone.”
He turned to Adrian. “I mean that in the nicest possible way.”
“Thanks mate,” Adrian replied gruffly. “Appreciate it, but even I might struggle with getting out of that plan in one piece. You’d need a big fucking army to attack a planet.”
“He’s not wrong,” Darragh agreed. “When I was working on the docks, I’d hear a lot about how many soldiers were getting chewed up in the galactic war. The numbers weren’t reassuring, and we don’t have anywhere near that number of people.”
“But they did not have three humans and a V’Straki!” Xayn contended. “We are worth thousands of lesser soldiers, and with the technology of my people behind us–”
“Still can’t get aboard the Zhadersil, mate,” Adrian reminded him. “I’m told you’d need a fleet of radiation scrubbers to get it even close to habitable again.”
“I was thinking of another way,” Askit replied, looking at Adrian very pointedly. “But I imagine you’ll know more about that than I do.”
“He means the V’Straki super-weapon,” Trix added, once again speaking to Adrian in private.
“I know what he means,” Adrian hissed back, then observed the raised eyebrows – and whatever substitutes existed – that resulted from talking to himself in an apparently irritable manner. He decided to ignore it. “I’ll look into it.”
Chir observed him for a moment, but Adrian maintained an impassive mask that would have frustrated the humans, and a Gaoian had no chance of divining anything he shouldn’t know. He gave up after a few moments, unsatisfied but willing to leave it there. “Let me know if you need anything further,” he said, “and I won’t hesitate to help. That leaves us with the final matter.”
“Finding Jen,” Darragh announced.
“Indeed,” agreed Chir. “The discovery, and recovery, of Jennifer Delaney. It’s difficult to find a single person in a galaxy if you’ve no idea where to look, but fortunately we’re not completely uninformed. Her last known destination, according to our most recent data, was the Ilrayen Band.”
“An awful place that every sensible person avoids,” Askit told Adrian, “so you should feel right at home. It’s full of Deathworlds, about fifty all told.”
“Fifty haystacks,” mused Darragh, “one red headed Irish lass. How hard could it be?”
“Dunno mate,” Adrian replied, knowing fated words when he heard them, “but I reckon we’ll send you to find out.”
+++++
+++++
Surface above Derktha, Agwaren Capital City
Jennifer Delaney
Jennifer Delaney didn’t like Wednesdays, hated them in fact, even more than Mondays. On Wednesdays she just couldn’t seem to summon the will to give a shit, and if she was being honest with herself she was always a bit of a cranky bitch whenever they rolled around. There was no doubt in her mind that today was a Wednesday, even if it wasn’t.
“You know,” she said to her nurse, a squat Agwaren male who didn’t understand her, “I remember when getting half-blind meant going down to the pub and drinking too much. Although I never did that, come to think of it, because I was too worried about what my parents might think.”
She rubbed the eye-patch, trying to trick her body into thinking she was scratching the interminable itch that lay behind it, and eventually gave up with an irritable hiss. “What a fucking waste, eh? Although I suppose that I finally fit the title of ‘Pirate Queen’.”
“As you say, Chosen One,” the Nurse replied, not able to understand but also not wanting to offend their new messiah. “I’m sure you must be hungry… and here’s the baker-boy now.”
Jennifer Delaney shifted herself in a struggle against sheets that eventually left her sitting upright in her bed, regarding the Agwaren male whose task it was to bake what she’d decided to call ‘yeti-bread’. It was hard, far more suitable for Agwaren jaws, and tasted like a wet dog, which was apparently on purpose, so it wasn’t her favourite meal of all time. There also wasn’t anything else.
“Thank you so much,” she said, taking two of the awful rolls and making generally pleasant noises that anybody could understand. These particular rolls were heavily fragrant in moistened Labrador, and it took all her strength to avoid gagging as she passed it under her nose to demonstrate how much she liked it. “You’ve really outdone yourself.”
It was something about aliens, she’d decided. They just didn’t seem to care about their food like normal – read: human – people did. The best they managed with some sort of sad salad made from a sort of alien lettuce that was somewhat less satisfying than a wilted iceberg variety, and the Agwarens didn’t even seem all that interested in anything that didn’t include their breads in some capacity.
“You’d really think that a bunch of aspiring Wookies would like a good bit of meat,” she muttered to herself as the baker left and young Lord Groddi made his entrance, dismissing the nurse as he did so. “I don’t get it,” she said, “you’ve obviously got the teeth for it.”
Groddi was plainly perplexed for a few moments as he processed the words, but finally nodded with the light of understanding. “There is little chance for hunting. Those who travel the surface – as we do now – only ever took meat when it was easily gathered. Most have no taste for it.”
Jen raised an eyebrow, earning a pang of pain for choosing the wrong one, and placed a hand over the injury to soothe it. “By your choice of words, you do?”
“It was an infrequent delicacy for the upper classes,” Groddi replied. “I consumed it whenever it was available. I’d hoped that while we were on the surface we might find more meat, but we seem to have scared the beasts off.”
That was a pity, but not entirely unexpected, and you only had to observe the Agwarens for a moment to realise they wouldn’t make particularly good hunters. “How do preparations go for the assault on the Dark One?”
Groddi frowned. “Haltingly,” he grudgingly admitted, “but as little can be done to speed proceedings, you should just think of it as extra time in which to heal. With the exception of your eye, you seem nearly fully recovered.”
She nodded, fully agreeing with the observation. “But the Nurse says I should remain until there is no danger of infection. He wasn’t sure if that was even possible with the ‘Chosen One’, but he doesn’t want to be the one to get me killed.”
“Then that is what you should do,” Groddi replied, nodding to the wisdom of the advice, or at least to the parts he understood. “Can you be infected?”
“I don’t know,” she replied truthfully. Out in the wider galaxy she’d have said definitely not, but this was a Deathworld and the rules were different here. Not to mention the Cruezzir in her system would undoubtedly have something to say on the matter as well, and who knows what it might do in response to some ghastly alien microbe trying to colonise her eye-socket? “Better not to find out.”
Young Lord Groddi answered that with the delivery of an old, wood-bound book. “I did bring the details that you were hoping for. They were not easy to find, given the state of our city, but it isn’t damaged. This is the first recording of the Dark One.”
“I’ll need you to read it to me,” she told him, and sat patiently as he did so, but was frustrated to discover that there wasn’t much to be learned. As she’d expected there were hints of an ‘old time’, a golden age before the Dark One, and it came as no surprise that in the stories the Dark One burned the world with flames from the sky. The Agwarens had hidden away below the ground, avoiding the moulting sickness of the overworld – probably radiation – and had somehow managed to survive by hiding beyond the Dark One’s reach.
“Nothing much of use to us now,” Jen surmised as Groddi finished reading. “Are they all like that?”
“People who went investigating the Dark One typically did not come back,” Groddi replied defensively. “The metal creatures are fast and deadly, with strange weapons unlike anything we’ve ever seen, and unlike the Chosen One we have little hope of fighting back.”
“Speaking of weapons…” Jen reminded him. “How are my blades coming along?”
Groddi frowned, as he did whenever he began to wonder whether he really was in charge anymore, but although Jen had made a series of requests of him she had also kept to her side of the bargain and hadn’t given the new Agwaren overlord any tangible reason to distrust her. “The bladecrafters are attempting to make weapons to match your requests. Excepting kitchen utensils, they have never made such light, sharp blades before.”
Light and sharp compared to Agwaren weapons; Jen had thought to retain more weight than in an Earth-sword in order to allow the weapons to hack like an axe. The illustrations she’d given Groddi had been similar to a falchion or machete, and she hoped that her new abilities would allow her to figure out how to use one in each hand without accidentally cutting them both off.
“They are certain to be finished soon, however,” Groddi promised. “I have impressed upon them the price of failure. It is fortunate that the Dark One has not made any further advances while they dally. The Elders suspect that the Dark One fears you, and rightly so, but I believe that he is also wisely exercising caution; the Dark One did not become such an ancient monster by being foolish.”
“Perhaps he just ran out of robots?” Jen guessed. If she were the Dark One, she’d be busy assembling an army to take care of the human who’d killed the last one, and she’d be doing it as fast as she could before the enemy arrived and kicked in the door. If Jen let that happen, she guessed the results would be less than superb, and she’d only have herself to blame. “On second thoughts, I think we really must go kick in his door.”
“The army is ready,” Groddi replied. “As soon as you are ready, we will march. So you must rest, and I shall take care of everything else.”
“I’ll heal on the way,” Jen replied sharply. “I need those blades, and I need something to ride and rest in as we go – some sort of carriage, perhaps. We can’t let the Dark One finish preparing for us, and as you said: he didn’t get to where he was by being stupid.”
+++++
+++++
Spot, docked at Hravin IV Observation Station
Chir
The scent of meat was still fresh, a rich and bloody aroma that could only be found in the dense flesh of Deathworlder beasts. Chir had gagged when they’d first opened the stasis box and had shoved Layla inside, and had cleverly decided not to be there when she was released. He had not expected that the smell would stick to her fur, nor that he would actually feel sorry for the traitor in her current miserable state, but he made every effort not to show it.
“You know what we need to do?” Adrian mused as he herded the dishevelled female into an unoccupied room, though he didn’t wait for an answer. “We need to have another barbeque. Use up the rest of that meat so I can go hunting again.”
“There is enough meat in there to last a Gaoian family for two months,” Chir replied, trying not to think of the pile of raw, bright red flesh that sat in careless piles in the stasis box.
“Yeah, so enough for me for a few days, and enough for Xayn for a few minutes,” Adrian said, shrugging. “That guy just can’t get enough.”
“He’s a meat-eater,” said Chir. “That’s what he eats, and he hates nutrient spheres as much as you do.”
“May I ask what you’re doing with me?” Layla interrupted, her voice quiet and her eyes harrowed. Clearly being in the stasis box hadn’t been an enjoyable experience, and Chir suspected that being covered with meat-juices was even less so. He truly enjoyed it when his enemies received their comeuppance, but this was bordering on the cruel and unusual, and he wondered where they’d keep her once they were done with the interrogation.
“This is pretty straightforward,” Adrian replied. “Right now my Corti mate is setting up a lie-detector in your translator implant. I’m about to dim the lights so I can see the warmth your brain is putting out. Between the two of us, you’ve got a fucking snowball’s chance in hell of being able to bullshit us.”
“I don’t understand…” Layla replied, puzzled. “What’s a ‘snowball’, and what’s a ‘hell’?”
Chir chuckled to himself, he had also posed these questions and had received completely nonsensical answers, but at least now he could look like he knew what the human was talking about for once. “A ‘snowball’ is a sphere of packed ice that humans hurl at each other with all their might… for mutual enjoyment. ‘Hell’ is a mythological place that can be hot, or cold, or have things sent or ‘fucked’ to it.”
He looked up at Adrian, who was wearing an unusually solemn expression. “Is that about everything?”
Adrian cleared his throat and nodded. “Must be.”
Chir puffed up a little; it had taken a while, but he was finally getting the hang of these human expressions. “In short, we will know if you lie to us. This is Adrian Saunders, you might have heard of him? And as you might have gathered he really doesn’t like it when people don’t tell him the truth.”
Not that he had a problem with lying to other people. They were lying right now, to Layla, because none of the tests they’d run on Chir had provided them with any immediately useful ways of telling if a Gaoian was lying. Darragh had suggested a method he called ‘Good Police Officer, Bad Police Officer’, and Adrian seemed to agree that this might work if he didn’t overplay it. Effectively this meant that Chir had to be nice to Layla – a concept he was not altogether pleased with – and that Adrian had to be a barely-restrained psychopath, which was not always that far from the truth.
Playing his part, Adrian looked away and sniffed unhappily. “Yeah…” he drawled out, “I accidentally crushed the last bloke who made shit up. Looked like a really painful way to die.”
“I really don’t want to die,” Layla replied immediately, unable to stop staring at the galaxy’s most individualised force of destruction, and Chir had to admit that the human was doing a very good job of being incredibly intimidating. “Can I just tell you everything I know instead?”
“Don’t worry,” Chir said kindly, a little surprised that she had broken so easily but not wanting to deviate from the script in case it was simply a ploy. “I’ll keep you safe… but I just need some information. Like your employer’s name.”
Layla regarded him strangely. “Iridis Industries… or at least, they were the head of the consortium. They banded together to kill Adrian Saunders and destroy you, Chir. But I can tell you who–“
“We already know who they are,” Adrian growled, leaning in menacingly. “And we already blew the fucking shit right out of them.”
He held up a datapad displaying images and reports of the attacks on Cavaras, all of them already being blamed on Chir and Adrian. “Just like any other orbital bombardment, but using life-pods with their own people inside… I do have a spare, though, if you’re interested in going for a ride…”
“I’m sure it won’t come to that,” Chir interrupted. “She’s cooperating, Adrian! You only have to look at the readings to see that she’s telling the truth!”
“Then why hasn’t she told us about the children?!” Adrian demanded, growling at Chir from such a close distance that even a seasoned veteran of several wars would have taken a step back.
“I’m sure she was getting to that!” Chir replied, his voice breaking in a slight, involuntary panic.
Layla nodded her head fervently, eyes wide in terror and confusion. “I was getting to that! I did some checking, and I engaged the services of an information specialist to find out where they were. Her name was Vakno – a Corti female – but I didn’t hear back from her before you grabbed me!”
There was a beep from the datapad, and Adrian frowned and passed it over to Chir. It was easy to forget sometimes that the Human Disaster had absolutely no ability to read anything but his native language and the defunct V’Straki script, and that the datapad was little more than a prop in his hands.
The message was concise, however, and as expected it came from Askit: All data is encrypted, and will take time to break. Need date when she engaged Vakno’s services.
“When did you ‘engage the services’ of this information specialist?” he asked Layla. “We need the data as per the Dominion calendar.”
The best Layla could give them was a small date range, and Askit made his frustrations quite clear on a subsequent message that Chir immediately deleted. They kept up the pointless questioning for a short time longer, although it became increasingly apparent that the ex-spy had little other information to give them, but Chir finally received the message he’d been waiting for.
Verified. Her story checks out.
“It seems that we have that information now,” Chir replied, and felt a pang of pain and anger as he saw hope light up Layla’s eyes. “We’ll help them, but not for you, Layla. We’re done with you.”
“Please,” she begged, “just tell me where they are.”
Chir looked down at the datapad again and waited for the answer. Then he looked up at Adrian, unhappy with the answer.
“What’s it say?” Adrian asked, breaking character now that they had everything they wanted.
“It says ‘We’re not going to like the answer to that.’” Chir read. “Although I’d much prefer to have read the actual location.”
Prompted by his words, a new message appeared. This time it was just a single word, but Chir groaned; he really didn’t like the answer.
Perfection.
+++++
+++++
Hierarchy Communications Link
Three
The latest news from his operative had sparked quite the argument over the communications link, details on an attack on Point Zero were nearly as important as Saunders’ apparent ignorance over the fate of the Zhadersil.
+0003+: I think you’re attributing him with a higher capacity for deception than he is actually capable of. There is no indication that Saunders suspects he’s being spied on, and there’s nothing to suggest that any of them knows anything about the disappearance of that starship.
+0009+: If that is truly the case, then we need only obtain the details of how they intend to assault Point Zero. We can prepare for it, and finally rid ourselves of this problem human.
+0002+: Orders will be conveyed to fleet-masters: Point Zero will be protected from Adrian Saunders with maximum force. As this single point of failure has been identified by our enemies, I shall also commence a project to more evenly distribute our network, as this single-point of failure.
+0009+: Then that is that. Saunders will be destroyed, and we shall be made stronger through his own efforts. Ironic, when you consider it.
The only thing that Three was considering was that gloating before the fact was foolish, but he was confident that Nine would eventually receive what he was earning. It would be nice if Saunders could take the over-confident idiot with him when he expired.
User 0130 has joined the channel
+0009+: Ah, and here’s our venerable relic, come to tell us all about her lack of success.
+0130+: How did you know that?
+0022+: It seems I owe you five credits, Nine.
+0002+: This is not a matter to be gambling over, you two! We have identified your problem human as Jennifer Delaney, best known for being substantial problem for the galaxy in general.
+0130+: That ‘substantial problem’ has eliminated almost my entire Abrogator swarm! My forces had no problem in subduing this entire planet when I was first assigned to this world, but this single human was able to crush almost all of the units I had left. Your information was useless, Nine! She has now raised a force against me, and I do not have the ability to strike back with my remaining drones!
+0009+: The information relates to standard human parameters. Jennifer Delaney has probably been a more significant threat to galactic stability than Adrian Saunders, if only for her ability and proclivity to actually organise militant groups.
+0130+: I am uploading my combat report for your perusal. How did you identify her?
+0009+: These images confirm it, but shall we call it an educated guess? I’m sure that we will spare some help so that we can finally kill her.
Shortsighted as usual; Nine was little more than a blunt instrument, and it was shocking that he had ever achieved single-digit status. Apparently all things were possible, given time.
+0003+: I suggest that capturing Jennifer Delaney would offer substantial benefits over simply killing her. Saunders values her life, and that gives us leverage if we can’t manage to actually stop him from destroying Point Zero.
+0002+: You think he can fight his way through a surprise attack from the bulk of our forces? He may have killed a thousand Hunters, but he was the one with the element of surprise in that instance.
+0003+: I think that we should discard a tool just because it’s unlikely to be needed. We can ‘rescue’ Delaney, and keep her in our care until the threat has passed. If nothing else it may give us the time we need to reduce the impact of losing Point Zero.
+0130+: Then I take it that I can expect assistance?
+0002+: Do not fear, One-Thirty. We will be sending you assistance at the earliest opportunity. You need only delay until we can provide an extraction.
The outline of a plan had been drawn, and soon the details would be well underway. Three knew from experience that this would be a far more complicated strategy than the galaxy had usually demanded of them, but he was confident that they would rise to the challenge. In the distant past, when their kind had been the tools of the original Igraens, they had held the essence of flexibility that allowed them to survive the death of civilisation, and Three was sure that essence remained in spite of the ages and forms now left behind them.
The Hierarchy was nothing if not adaptable.
+++++
+++++
Hravin IV Observation Station
Keffa
Grznk and Askit were busy inside of Spot – working to support Adrian and Chir who were busy questioning that Gaoian whore – and that meant that there wasn’t much else to do but kick back and stare up at the big green orb through the ceiling viewport. It was impressive, although she’d shrugged it off when Adrian had mentioned it earlier, but that didn’t mean you wanted to look at it all the time. It gave her more time to think than she wanted, because whenever she had time to think it meant that her thoughts would naturally turn to all those things she wished she hadn’t done, or those things she wished she had. She wasn’t even clear on what the plans were, but she was sure that somebody would fill her in while they were doing them, and it didn’t seem like there was much demand for her input.
That was why, against her better judgement, she had decided to accept the offer from the V’Straki to teach her and Darragh some kind of card game. This was easier said than done, because the creature that somehow managed to smell worse than bad meat had a tendency to ramble on bizarre tangents, and was likely what her mother had actually been referring to all those times she’d accused Keffa of having ‘the A.D.D.’
“I must warn you that I have now mastered this game!” Xayn noted as he shuffled the deck by smearing cards all over the table and randomly re-sorting them in a long, arduous process that was difficult to watch. “But you must remember that while this game is called ‘Poke-Her’, there is to be no poking! Adrian was very clear on this rule!”
Keffa turned to look at Darragh for an answer to this, but his only reply was a subtle shrug and shake of the head that indicated she shouldn’t start questioning it. She had the feeling that this was not, in fact, an official rule, but was instead an invention to stop Xayn from saying or doing things that Adrian didn’t want him to.
She picked up the five cards she’d been given, and briefly studied the crudely drawn pictures to figure out what they were supposed to be. “So how do you win?” she asked. “I only have… four guys wearing crowns, and also a two.”
With a noise and expression of disgust, Darragh threw his own cards onto the table. “Fecking hell…” he said, “that’s got to be what you call ‘Beginner’s Luck’.”
“You have a set of four of a kind, with odds of one in four-thousand, one-hundred and sixty-four,” Xayn informed her. “This is what Adrian calls ‘Total Bullshit’, and if we were playing for currency you would have experienced a net gain.”
Regarding the winning hand again, Keffa smiled. “I think I like this game. Can we start playing for currency?”
“I do not have any currency,” Xayn replied. “Nor do I have many clothes to remove, which Adrian informs me is a popular variant.”
“As far as I can tell, he’s basically wearing a onesie,” Darragh added. “And I can’t say I really want to play strip poker with a lizard-man; a line’s got to be drawn somewhere.”
The timely return of Adrian and Chir saved them from needing to endure any further instruction from the V’Straki, and as the lying, Gaoian bitch-queen wasn’t accompanying them it was probable they’d stuck her back with the meat. Knowing the reaction of most species to piles of cut up bloody flesh, she’d probably find it very unenjoyable, which Keffa judged as a good thing.
“So…” Darragh began. “Things go how you wanted?”
“We’re going back to Perfection,” Adrian replied bluntly. “Turns out her kids were there all this fucking time. Then I guess we’ve got to drop them back on Gao.”
“For that I think we’ll simply hand them over to the first patrol cruiser we meet,” Chir replied. “That should save us some time, and will save me from being asked to go talk to important people who don’t agree with my way of doing things.”
“Maybe you could avoid stealing their fecking ship this time,” Darragh suggested, “and shooting everybody in the dick? I don’t know what the deal is with that, but I’ll have you know it’s really uncomfortable to watch!”
“Noted,” Chir replied with a frown, “but I promise nothing, and unfortunately we’re going to have to work without Adrian’s help on this one.”
“What?” Keffa asked. “Why can’t we?”
Aware that her sudden outburst was putting her on the spot, she quickly changed gears to push her line of questioning down a more logical path. “I mean, surely having the ‘Human Disaster’ with us would help put the odds in our favour?”
Adrian shook his head. “After my last visit they’re going to be very quick to respond with all the force they can muster. With that in mind, I’ll be causing a distraction that will get the heat off you. It should let you have an easier time of it, but if you happen to find a Corti ship with a sealed-FTL drive I’d really appreciate it if you could borrow it for me.”
“Don’t you already have a Corti drive?” Darragh asked. “As well as a regular drive…”
“It’s for a project I’m working on,” Adrian replied, but didn’t go into more detail. “Don’t want to get you involved unless I have to.”
“We’ll be dealing with the children while Adrian works on whatever he’s doing,” Chir continued. “As you’ve said, his ship has a sealed-FTL drive so his travel times are considerably less than ours. If all goes according to plan, we’ll be seeing each other soon enough.”
“And if it doesn’t?” Keffa asked.
“When plans go wrong is when people die,” Chir replied, matter-of-factly. “But we’re no strangers to dangerous situations, and if things don’t go how we like we’ll just have to make sure that we’re not amongst the casualties.”
Keffa frowned, not happy at the way things were panning out. She was fairly certain that she’d be resuming her role of ‘plucky pilot girl’ for this mission, and that there was absolutely no chance of finding her way aboard Spot to fill that same job while Trycrur was still around. Her best bet was to help them get through their respective missions, and do a good enough job that she’d really get noticed, so with just a moment spent to refocus herself, she began to think of things to help them along. “At least tell me that we’ll be staying in contact this time around?”
“That’s a good point,” Adrian replied, sharing a glance with Chir. “I’ll have Trix work something out with Keffa. Regular check-ins and meeting points in case we lose communications and need to find each other again, that sort of thing. Good thinking, Keff.”
She hoped her cheeks weren’t flushing, though she felt the burning in her ears as the praise fell on them. She wilfully ignored it, setting it aside until she was alone and didn’t need to worry about other people noticing.
“Don’t worry,” she assured him. “We’ll put together a basic plan, and something more detailed to be conveyed when we next meet. I assume you’re going now?”
The two leaders both nodded, though the initial uncertainty in the look they traded told her that this was not something they’d thought to discuss with each other before getting here.
“Like Chir said,” Adrian replied for the both of them, “we shouldn’t be sticking around this place for longer than we have to.”
+++++
+++++