“Where else would I be?”
I looked around the small cabin, and knew she’d ported me in behind the cockpit. Abby wasn’t that big a craft. She was nimble, though, and fast. I figured even Tens was going to have trouble tracking us.
“Not with what that boy has put in your head,” Abby told me. “He is very good at what he does. I wonder if Mack would part with him?”
“I doubt it. Those two…”
“Don’t give me that, child. I know more about Mack than…” she stopped. “… than never-you-mind.”
I huffed out another sigh, and pushed off the wall.
“You going to tell me what happened to my clothes?” I demanded. “I was fond of those boots, dammit.”
“Psh. You’ll get your boots back. It shouldn’t take your Mack more than three days to get here, and, by then, you should be up to speed.”
“Not without my knickers, I’m not.”
“I could always turn up the heating…”
“Not the same thing.”
“You humans and your skin shyness.”
“Don’t tell me you don’t remember what that’s like.”
“Honey, it’s been too long. Closest I can get to it is imagining myself cut down to a chip, instead of inside this magnificent machine.” She paused, her voice curling with distaste when she continued. “And I’d really rather not.”
“So, what did you do?”
“What? To get you naked?”
“Well….”
“I wasn’t sure what kind of situation you’d be in, given just how possessive your Mack is, and I didn’t want an extra passenger until we’d had time to talk.”
My Mack, huh? I ignored it, and pushed her to continue.
“And?”
“So I keyed the teleport to your DNA, and grabbed you that way.”
I leant back against the wall, my mind not entirely grasping it. And then I checked my implant.
“How come I’ve still got…”
“I included it.”
“You couldn’t have just included my clothes, too?”
Okay, now I was starting to sound like a whiny brat. I didn’t like sounding whiny. Mind you, I didn’t like being without my clothes, either. And I mean I really didn’t like being without my clothes.
“Panel on your right,” Abby said. “Should be just your size.”
It should? Okay, then.
I found the panel, and dug out the combat fatigues and boots. Underwear—and that looked armored—and socks, which didn’t.
“What kind of favor is this, anyway?” I asked, holding up the underwear.
“One where you’ll need those,” Abs snapped back. “Now, quit your whinging and get dressed.”
Fine. Whatever. I got dressed, pausing when I got to the boots.
“You remembered,” I said, noting the knife sheath in each.
I pulled them on.
“And they’re a perfect fit.”
“You want me to tell Mack that the way to your heart is through a good pair of boots?” she snarked back, and I shook my head.
No way was I going to tell her that I thought he’d already figured that out. She picked it up, anyway.
“Ooh, sweetie. You have it bad.”
“Don’t go there, Abs,” and, then, because I figured we should get down to business, “What do you need me for?”
“Someone’s stolen one of my brothers.”
I just stayed where I was, leaning against the wall and turning her words over in my head. Her brothers? As in, not her sisters? As in, there was more than one AI and she was related? And it had been stolen? So. Not just kidnapped. Which meant someone had nicked the entire ship body with the AI inside. I wondered if she had any ideas who.
“No.”
Well, that answered that, then.
“You got a name? Also, some details on your business and what he was supposed to be doing when you worked out he was gone?”
“You just want ‘in’ to my files?”
“You want my help?”
“And I thought you were one of the better retrieval artists out there.”
“Abs, I’m one of the best. Just ask Mack.”
As soon as I’d said it, I regretted it. Abby was without mercy.
“He’s biased.”
“Abby!”
“Well, he is. I’d be surprised if you two hadn’t—”
“Abby! We haven’t. It’s not like that.”
“Oh, no. The man just tears the universe apart for all his staff.”
Right up until she’d said it, that had been exactly what I’d believed. After all, those were Mack’s conditions. He’d let you off the Shady Marie but you came back when he called, or he’d come fetch you.
“You mean he doesn’t?”
Abby giggled, and the sound jangled along my nerve endings.
“Not everyone, Hun. Last gal he chased every time she left was Marie—and they parted on good terms, in the end. No blasters involved. The man doesn’t like to let go… and neither did she. They sorted it out in the end.”
The way she said it, Mack had had something real special with Marie. Had to disagree that we had anything at all, let alone something as special as that. I sighed.
“I’m just crew, Abs. I like it that way. And so does Mack.”
“Sure, Hun. You keep telling yourself that. The man won’t wait forever.”
“He doesn’t have to wait, Abby. There are plenty of other girls out there. If one of them can grab his attention, they’ll have a catch for life.”
I pushed away the vague feeling of depression that crept through me, and went back to business.
“Even the best can’t work in a data vacuum—or do you want me to hack your systems.”
“No, sweetie. I prepared your access earlier.”
“Hand it over.”
She did, and I took the link, and skirted its edges, letting myself slide down the wall until I was sitting on the floor.
“Call me when it’s time to eat.”
“I’ll let you know.”
It was all I needed, and I plunged into the data that was Dasojin Transport & Security. To be honest, the scope of their operations astounded me, and it didn’t take me very long to work out they were more a loose network of allies than anything else.
“What tipped you off?” I asked, surfacing from the log they kept of their activities.
“Septu’s world fell.
“Septu?”
“My brother. He specialized in planetary security. When the reports came through, we knew he was in trouble. We did not expect him to be so thoroughly gone.”
“What did you expect?”
“We thought we would find
