I turned to the crew. “Shit. What now?” I whispered, though I had no doubt the Im-bor heard.
“I will give him my name, but this is where things may get interesting. Are we ready for this?” Elyek said quietly.
“Sure. Let’s do it,” I said, and Ember nodded in agreement. Elyek stepped forwards.
“The account name is under Elisialor Yekandistripolisiumar”
I looked to Ember in surprise at Elyek’s real name. She shrugged back, and she was right. It didn’t matter what their real name was, and there was no way I could pronounce that anyway. The clerk typed upon his terminal. After a couple of seconds, he looked up, “I will go and inform the manager.” He quickly took off from his seat, his wings beating so fast I could only see a blur.
We all stood there on edge, waiting for whatever would happen next. Finally, a large alien came over. This one was completely black with red streaks on his visible skin. He was a minimum of seven-feet-tall. Despite the demonic appearance and towering height, he wore a smart suit and a pair of glasses. I assumed we’d finally met a member of the Mazltor leadership caste, an Ang-bor.
“Good day to you. Elisialor Yekandistripolisiumar, I assume,” he said to Elyek. “If you would like to follow me. Your friends can wait in the foyer.”
I was about to jump in and say, ‘No fucking chance,’ but Elyek did it for me, “These people are my business partners. They must be present for good reason.”
“Very well, if you insist. Though I will have to have security present while we discuss our business.”
“I assume measures will be taken so that we can conduct our meeting with confidentiality,” Elyek replied.
“Certainly. We can ensure that we are not overheard.”
“So be it. Please lead the way.”
The manager spoke into a small mic on his suit jacket, then led us off out of the main area and into a corridor. We walked all the way to the end where we found a room by itself with a massive, heavy door.
On entering, we found that the walls of the room were filled with Tri-bor. I did a quick count. There were fifteen of them, all carrying heavy laser rifles and decked out in some serious body armor. We had seen a couple of Tri-bor at the docks, but these were like a few levels up from those guys. These motherfuckers had muscles on top of their muscles, built along the lines of Jotun.
“Don’t worry,” Havok said into my mind. “We can fuck these dudes up. No danger.” Now I’d like to think I’d grown in confidence recently, but I did not like the look of these guys one bit.
The manager took a seat behind his giant, ornately carved, ebony desk and gestured for us to take seats. Everyone sat but me. Aside from Havok on my back, I wanted to be ready for anything.
“What is it I can do for you today?”
“I wish to withdraw the entirety of my account,” Elyek said. The manager raised a bristly eyebrow at that.
“I fear carrying such a sum upon your person would be very risky under the present circumstances.”
“How so?” Elyek asked.
“Well, you have been flagged as having a rather large bounty on your head. There are also criminal charges set against you. Luckily for you, they have not been verified by the galactic courts. Otherwise, you would be unable to withdraw anything at all, and your accounts would be frozen.”
“I’m willing to take the risk. If I leave the money in my account, I will lose it all. I have no doubt these false charges will be made to stick.”
“Yes. I imagine they will, as is usually the way. Perhaps, I could suggest an alternative to your predicament. Your friends are not as yet considered criminals. I would suggest if you have trust in them, you transfer the money into one of their accounts.”
We quickly discussed the pros and cons of such an arrangement and had to agree it would be hard to move five million senlar from the bank to the ship.
“I agree in principle, but won’t such a transfer be traceable?” Elyek asked.
“For a small fee, I could ensure it will be untraceable. I could, at great expense to myself, route the transfer through a few different accounts. Does this sound like something you’d be interested in?”
We huddled together and discussed it amongst ourselves, again.
“Yes. This is agreeable to us if it can be done. Obviously, depending on your fee,” Elyek said.
“My fee? Half-a-million,” he smiled.
“Yes. Okay,” Elyek said without preamble. I was shocked by their lack of hesitation. I probably would have said no automatically. I didn’t really trust this greedy bastard.
On a whim, I entered his mind. He looked at me suddenly, even though I had said nothing and was silent in my approach. We stared at each other intensely, then I said into his mind, “We will pay but do not fuck us over, or I will find you and I will kill you.” He raised his eyebrow at me, no doubt surprised at my wicked skills, I imagine.
“You have my word that I will not double-cross you. Now, let me arrange the necessary documents,” he said out loud. He may not have been able to reply with telepathy.
“Who will be taking over the funds? I will need a name for the account.”
“Can we set up a business account which we all have access to? Without naming Elyek of course,” I asked.
“Why, yes! A truly excellent idea,” he replied, altogether too happy for my tastes. I felt like I’d made a mistake.
“Name of Company please?” he continued.
“Uprising,” Ember said, jumping in.
“What she said,” I added.
“Okay, bear with me a moment.” He began typing on the terminal furiously. After fifteen minutes of silence - other than the incessant tapping on the terminal - he looked up again. “I’ll need a CEO name, and it has to be your real name. Otherwise, you will
