“Thanks,” Rechs said, turning to leave.
The bartender held out a hand to stay him. “But I gotta ask why you wanna go into the city. It’s dangerous. Total collapse. No police or anything.”
But Rechs was already gone. Walking out into the constant foot traffic of the concourse.
17
That night they moved them out of what Amanda had come to call the “student union.” She’d named it that because most of those in the basement operations warren were little more than kids pretending at playing Freedom Fighter. And it wouldn’t have been so scary, in fact it would have been laughable, if they weren’t carrying blasters and waving them around like they knew how to use the incredibly lethal weapons, their fingers carelessly on the triggers. Usually the safety was on. Sometimes it wasn’t. She wasn’t sure whether they knew it was even there.
They came by in small groups to spew hate at the wounded and semi-conscious legionnaires lying on the cement floor of the holding pen. And her as well, of course. She tried to protect the legionnaires from the spit and piss that came through the badly constructed cage. She could handle that. It was better than a blaster bolt. It would dry up and wash off. Marine boot had made her tougher than that.
But she knew something was up when a new team dressed like the Soshies came in. All of them big ex-military types. Pros. Probably veterans from the local militaries of a dozen different worlds. Probably MCR. The growing problem the political types didn’t want to acknowledge, because of how big it had the potential to be. And that wasn’t supposed to happen in this gilded Age of Reason. The Savage Wars were over. The sundry wars for independence like Psydon had all been squelched. The Republic was supposed to be entirely secure in its power.
But these men didn’t seem to think so. These thugs knew how to carry and use their blasters. How to cover each other as they worked. And how to make sure she knew that no tricks could be pulled as the legionnaires were heavily sedated and carried out on stretchers. They bound them up as well, despite their wounds. The lights were turned on, and she could see what a pitiful job she’d done trying to keep them clean and dressed.
In her time playing nurse, the one called Beers still hadn’t really regained consciousness. Lopez was occasionally lucid.
“Where are you taking them?” she shouted past the pros who remained to cover her with wicked little subcompact blasters.
“Easy, girl,” said the one in charge. The man from before, with the cruel eyes. “Question is… where are we taking you? That’s really the question, ain’t it, shooter?”
And then the old professor was back with the hypo. Sweat poured down into his eyes as he pushed his way past the pros covering her. She was backed into a corner, her hands out and ready to slap, grapple, smash a throat, or even gouge out an eye if she got a chance. She wouldn’t make things easy on them as long as they had control of the two wounded legionnaires.
And as long as she had control of herself.
Maybe, she thought as she got ready to smash the gangly academic’s Adam’s apple, maybe they’ll figure out that if I can help the leejes I’m much more controllable. Without that… I’ll be a problem.
Never make things easy for them. They’d taught her that in sniper school. During the escape-and-evasion course specifically.
And here she was… making things easy for them.
The two pros came in quickly and restrained her with little effort. The academic came close now and jabbed her with the hypo, then backed off like he might from a wild taurex.
She felt herself instantly slipping into the darkness of a nightmare world she was sure she wasn’t going to like.
“First we gotta go down the rabbit hole,” said Cruel Eyes from far off. And then he called her “Alice,” though she didn’t know why.
Amanda only knew that she kept losing every battle she was fighting. She knew that. And one other thing. An important thing. Maybe the most important.
She wouldn’t quit.
The legionnaires were going somewhere, and she’d likely end up there too. The pros needed her. Otherwise they would have let the vicious children spewing hate use their blasters along with the spit and piss. She was sure they’d shoot down an unarmed marine in a heartbeat and think better of themselves for having done it.
Some prayer surfaced in her mind. Or maybe it was just a plea. Please don’t let me fall into the hands of these children.
And then she thought of the legionnaires.
Good men in a…
She fought the closing nightmare. Felt the wall slide up her back.
Good men in a galaxy full…
Her eyes were closed and she felt them rush in and grab hold of her ankles to carry her out of the cell.
… of bad people.
18
Rechs was in his armor, sans the battered old bucket, organizing his gear within the weapons workshop aboard the Obsidian Crow. He would carry the hand cannon as always. That was his secondary. He’d probably need to keep moving within the city, and a heavy or even a medium blaster would stand out. Especially if Repub Navy Intel was running drones over the populated urban areas. The drones would tag and identify every weapon they could spot.
Those type of blasters got spotted easily.
He selected the Jackknife V he’d picked up from the Altirian arms bazaar. For CQB. It looked like a large datapad, but with the flick of a button it became a small subcompact automatic blaster capable of thirty blast
