The perfect operative. Always right behind him. Prudence eyed him suspiciously, something glittering in her right hand, while her massive soldier reached out to grab Kyle’s shoulder.
Kyle struck, sinking his fist into Jorgun’s gut. The man was huge, but Kyle would not die without a fight. Jorgun fell like a tree to the ground.
The giant stared up at him in anguish, and burst into tears.
FIFTEEN
Revelations
She nearly killed him.
Stepping deftly forward, the mordant knife shielded behind her body, she was already in motion. The name came to her from ancient fairy tales.
He couldn’t be a supernatural undead monster, of course. He was just an ordinary, living monster, sent here by the League to intercept her. Covering their bases. She had stumbled too deep into the web, and now they had caught her.
But not without a fight. Not without cost to themselves. With her left hand extended, covering her approach, she moved into killing range.
“I’m sorry,” Kyle said to Jorgun.
“Why did you hit me?” Jorgun whimpered through childlike sobs.
Kyle’s face was a mask of confusion. Unconsciously Prudence stopped, waiting for the answer.
“I thought you were someone else,” Kyle said, shrugging helplessly.
She tapped him on the chest with her left hand. She could have used her right hand, delivered the fatal blow. She could have gutted him from sternum to throat in one smooth, easy sweep. But she didn’t.
What kind of wight apologized? What kind of assassin attacked bare-handed?
“Who are you?” she demanded.
“Kyle Daspar. The real one.” He grinned lopsidedly at some private joke. “Who the hell are you?”
“That’s an idiotic question.”
“And yours wasn’t?” He swayed a little, as if he were dizzy.
“When I left Altair, you were dead. Burned in your bed. So, no, my question was not idiotic.”
“They missed me. Bungled it, like they always do. And now here you are, to finish the job.”
On the edge of her vision, two men approached. Wearing uniforms of gray and blue. Station security.
She let the knife collapse into a harmless medallion.
“Are you done?” she said loudly. Bending over, she picked up Jorgun’s sunglasses and put them on his face, hiding his red-lined eyes.
“What’s the trouble here?” The thick security guard was the first to speak, his voice challenging, like a dog daring you to pet it.
“No trouble, officer.” She tried to smile sweetly, but under the circumstances, she didn’t think it came off very well. “Just a crew dispute. I don’t allow violence on my ship, so they had to wait for port to settle it.”
“We don’t allow violence here, either, spacer.” The thick one wanted a fight.
The skinny one just wanted to make fun of someone. “Why’s the big guy crying like that?”
“He’s ribbing me,” Kyle answered. “Said I punched like a girl, so he might as well cry like one.”
The skinny guard guffawed, satisfied with a target of scorn. Kyle reached down and offered his hand to Jorgun. With the glasses on, Jorgun looked like a grown-up. He took Kyle’s hand and stood up, grinning weakly.
“That was funny,” Jorgun said.
“Sure it was.” Kyle clapped him on the back. “Just a couple of tough guys, we are. Sorry, officer, it won’t happen again.”
“Show me your IDs. All of you.” Chubby was angry at being disappointed.
Kyle reached into his back pocket, pulled out a card, and handed it to the officer. Prudence stood perfectly still, waiting to see what would happen when he ran it through his scanner.
The officer glared at Kyle.
“There isn’t a date of arrival for you. Why don’t you have a date of arrival stamped in your file?”
Kyle shrugged and looked over his shoulder, at the hatch that led to the ship.
“Guess the system hasn’t updated yet. I mean, come on, I just walked through that door.”
The guard grunted and handed the card back. He turned to Prudence, took the card she extended.
“I’m logging a complaint on your file, Captain. Any more of this crap and you’ll be fined.”
“Yes, officer.” She’d started out disliking this planet. Five minutes on the ground had brought that to a full boil of hatred.
The three of them waited, doing nothing, while the security team wandered off.
“Back to the ship,” she ordered.
“I can’t check out.” Kyle objected. “They monitor every person in and out. You’ll have to sneak me out in a cargo container.”
As a smuggler, the man was a complete failure.
“Come here.” She grabbed his arm and dragged him through the hatch.
Inside the tube-way she banged on the comm panel until the screen lit up.
“Hey,” she said, before the tired-looking girl on the other end could speak. “You didn’t register my crewman. He just disembarked, walked through the hatch with us, but your damn machine didn’t take his ID swipe.”
“Ma’am, the machines don’t—”
“He’s right here. Look, here’s his ID.” She held his arm up so the camera could see the card in his hand. “There’s a fine for this crap. I’m gonna make sure you pay it, unless you fix this right now.”
Prudence’s conscience twinged when she saw the girl was too tired to even complain.
“Swipe it again, sir.”
Kyle obeyed, playing the part of slack-jawed hayseed to perfection.
“Okay, you’re clear now. Sorry for the trouble, Captain.”
Prudence wanted to thank her, but she couldn’t break character. If the girl knew that Prudence had just got what she wanted, she might become suspicious.
“Stupid machines,” she grumbled. It was the closest she could come to an apology.
The screen clicked off.
“Damn, Pru,” Garcia said from the ship’s hatch. “I thought that dude was dead.”
If Garcia had spoken seven seconds earlier, they would have all gone to jail. But it wasn’t luck. Garcia was naturally adept at conspiracy.
“So did I.” She stared at Kyle.
“He hit me,” Jorgun offered helpfully. “But then he said he was sorry.”
“Maybe we should, you know, set the record straight.” Garcia brought his right hand out from behind his body, revealing the splattergun he was holding. “It’s not like anybody is gonna be looking for the corpse.”
“Put that away, Garcia,” Prudence demanded. With this angle of fire, he was as likely to kill her and Jorgun as he was to hit Kyle.
“I thought we were against the League.” That was a surprise, coming from Garcia. She hadn’t realized he cared one way or another.
Kyle laughed. “Then why are you volunteering to finish their job? You won’t even get paid for it.” He was arguing for his life, but he didn’t seem to be trying very hard.
“Nobody’s going to kill anyone,” Prudence said. Kyle had stopped fighting when Jorgun had started crying. That earned him a chance to explain. “Kyle is going to take a shower. Garcia, you’re going to take Jorgun into the city and buy him a puzzle. Then you’ll start looking for a cargo.”
“We can’t transport out of here.” Garcia knew they didn’t have a license.
