It takes a bit of consulting my tablet, but I eventually figure out where I am—much closer to the core of the city than I expected—and get myself in the right direction.
As soon as I get within five levels below the hangar, my comm starts crackling. I consider turning it off, still not ready to talk to anyone, but if I don’t answer Bat or the princesses might get worried and think they should come looking for me. Yvonne is liable to throw a hissy fit over something like this.
I turn it on. “What?”
“Geez, Aaron, I’ve been trying to call you for twenty minutes.” Yvonne’s voice is light, and I’m reminded again that they don’t yet know how miserable I am.
“Sorry,” I mumble. “Went lower than I thought I did. Bad connection”
“Yeah, I couldn’t get ahold of Zane or Lalia, either. How’s it going down there?”
I stop in the middle of the street, back in the more populated area, and stare between my boots.
“Aaron?”
“Yeah, I’m here.”
She’s quiet for a moment. “Oh, God. You don’t sound happy.”
“I never sound happy,” I say, realizing I sound extra pissed off and she doesn’t deserve that.
She’s quiet again, enough that I know she realizes I’m bluffing. Softly, she says, “Aaron—”
“Stay in the ship, I’m heading back.” I disconnect from her comm. There’s a beep saying either she or likely Bat is trying to call me back, but I ignore it. They know I’m alive, they can wait.
As it is, I don’t want to do this, don’t want to have this interaction. I’m counting on what little of a walk I have back to give me time to pull myself together. She knows I didn’t get myself in trouble now, she can be patient for another ten minutes until I get back to the ship.
I suppose, technically, I should call Zane and Lalia since they obviously haven’t returned to my ship. They shouldn’t be staying here, and as I figured, we should get them some sort of transport pass back to Hytha. They can be there with their parents, keep hiding out from Captain, and figure out where they’re going to go from here. Perhaps Yvonne can help them out with getting a new ship, if even a small one. She certainly has the funds.
I’m so wrapped up in my own thoughts I barely notice what’s going on around the hangar until I’m nearly upon it. I stop, veering behind one of the shops near the edge of the void. The owner gives me a dirty look I don’t pay attention to. There’s a group of five figures hanging around near the catwalk I need to take to get to my ship. I squint, trying to pick out features without getting too close. I recognize one of them at least.
Kel.
I wonder if she recognized my ship. There are plenty of others in the hangar. In fact, I can barely see the wing of mine sticking out from all the way over here. Maybe she’s causing trouble for someone else. Authorities aren’t going to be much help to her here—plenty of bounties hunters might cluster to this city, looking for work or to team up, but there are even more people like me and the humans with the actual bounties on their heads. It’s a pretty neutral zone, mostly because the criminals outweigh the hunters so badly there’s no good luck at trying unless you get unfairly lucky.
I can’t tell if the men she’s talking to are human or otherwise, but they’re large enough it makes me uncomfortable. Knowing Kel, if this is about me, she managed to find whatever sparse Amerov numbers are here as crime control. Based on our last interaction, she shouldn’t be stupid enough to underestimate me and think a handful of humans would do the job. Then again, I don’t know if any hired Amerov numbers would be bothered by non-violent bounties. Hopefully, they’ll be annoyed Kel has dragged them into a situation with an unregistered and slightly unhinged number.
When she doesn’t leave within the next two minutes, I call Bat up on my comm. “Bat—”
“You weren’t answering, what happened—?”
“Kel is standing out on the edge of the hangar. I’m trying to work out if she sees our ship or not. Be on alert.”
“I vote to shoot her right now.”
“She’s got some people with her, they might be authorities.”
“Oh…lure her over and shoot her?”
I roll my eyes. His tone is enough to make me almost crack a smile until I remember why we’re so pissed at that woman in the first place.
Zane.
Speaking of. Where the hell are the humans? I’ve been wandering by myself for at least an hour, and it isn’t a far walk back here from Yala’s. I doubt they would just decide to make their own way out of here without at least a heads-up, considering they have no ship of their own.
But who knows? Maybe their reason for being with us is moot, so they took off. There’s certainly no reason to stay. Common courtesy would be to let me know, but they probably don’t consider that nearly as much now that they’ve been proved to I’m nothing to them.
Still, I can’t take off and find a way around into my ship from the opposite side of the hangar without knowing if they’re relying on us. Grimacing so hard my implants hurt, I try to tap into one of their frequencies and get nothing but static. I frown, glancing back over my shoulder. This is the way they’d have to come to get back to the hangar. They’re both fully capable adults, and Yala didn’t seem all that threatening, and completely human at that. If there was a problem, certainly they would’ve called one of us. Not much reason to be concerned something happened between the three of them, but now I’m wondering.
“Bat, can you get in touch with Zane and Lalia? My comm isn’t getting through.”
“I’ll try—”
“Aaron, what the hell?”
Zane’s voice startles me. I glance over my shoulder and find them both maneuvering through the throngs of people, bumping into shoulders and nearly tripping, making their way around the edge of the booths I’m huddled between.
“Never mind, found them,” I tell Bat.
Zane looks pissed, which is not exactly the expression I was expecting. Lalia looks like she’s been trying to wind him down, and shoots me an apologetic look over his shoulder.
I don’t know what I was expecting over all of that, but an attitude wasn’t it.
I scowl. “What?”
“Why’d you walk out?”
Is he serious? “Why wouldn’t I have?”
“Zane, relax,” Lalia says, shoving him in the arm and glancing back at the street. We’re mostly hidden, but drawing attention still isn’t great. At least there’s plenty of talking and shouting going on around here, it isn’t as if Zane’s pissy tone is gonna stand out, and it certainly won’t attract Kel’s attention.
Though I can feel my own irritation rising.
If I look at Lalia for more than a moment, I can tell she’s been crying. Which I don’t want to think about.
“Before you decide to have a hissy fit, Kel is standing at the hangar and I don’t know what she’s up to—”
“Oh, fuck her,” Zane snaps, which I don’t necessarily disagree with but still wasn’t expecting. “Why did you leave like that?”
I glower, not knowing what to say. “I’d assume it was fairly obvious.”
“Oh really? You’d assume it was fairly obvious, would you?”
Lalia says, “Zane—”
“Because,” I grit out, my patience dissolving rapidly, “I didn’t want to be there and it’s not exactly like you needed me.”
I’m trying to keep my tone down, knowing this must be plenty harder on them than it is on me. Their real bother is not me. He’s dead. If he wasn’t, they’d probably be a lot more relieved than they appear to be. Actually, they’d probably be glad he’s someone else, much more of a chance he’d be someone friendly and happy to see them and who doesn’t look like a monster. They’re grieving, so I tell myself I shouldn’t get pissy in return.
But I’m also not gonna get blamed for any of this.
“You don’t get to stomp off like that, not in that situation.”
He also doesn’t get to tell me I shouldn’t be upset. “I can do whatever the hell I want, do you want a ride off this floating city, or not?”
“What the hell does that mean?”
“I think it’s fairly self-explanatory.”
“Don’t do that defensive sarcasm shit with me—”
“Zane,” Lalia says, voice strained. “You’re not helping.”
I shrug, feeling heat rising to my face. “No, no, he knows so much about me, let him psychoanalyze me, maybe he’ll come up with another magical bullshit reason why I’m related to you.”
Lalia goes quiet and Zane grinds his jaw. “There was never a bullshit reason and you’re acting like a child.”
“Oh, I’m acting like a child, that’s really original, thanks for that.” I glance back around the shop corner at Kel, because it’s easier than looking at their irritating faces.
“You know, maybe if you learned how to have an adult conversation—”
“Sorry, I missed that part in my childhood for some reason…oh yeah, because no one wanted me.”
“That is not our fault!”
“Really? Because to me it looks like a couple of strangers showed up in my life and made me believe I was wanted when anyone with half a brain cell knows I’m not. I knew I couldn’t’ve been your damn brother, I tried to tell you I wasn’t your damn brother, but you two just had to go and make me believe it. I am sorry your Aaron is dead, I really am, but you don’t get to be pissed at me about it, and believe it or not, I’m allowed to be mildly upset that you two ruined everything.”
Zane blinks, all anger completely draining from his expression. Nothing I said was wrong. In fact, it was much truer than any of the crap they’ve been feeding me for the past few months, but guilt rises in my throat anyway. Embarrassment is nearly stronger. Why did I admit any of that? I didn’t need to be pathetic on top of all of it, but I suppose that ship has sailed. Lalia is staring at the ground, looking like she’s probably crying, but my eyes are glitching with all the heat signatures of the crowded street.
“Aaron,” Bat’s solemn voice over the comm makes me jump. I hadn’t realized it was still on. “Those men Kel is with are wandering down this way. I can’t tell, but I think at least one of them looks like a cyborg. He has metal in the side of his skull. And I don’t know what the uniform is but it’s something official.”
Oh, I cannot deal with all of this right now. Scrubbing my palms into my eyes, I say, “Move,” and shove past the dead-silent siblings so I can get another look at the hangar.
Kel is waiting where I last saw her, still with two other figures. Three others have headed down the hangar toward our ship.
I let Yvonne stop me from shooting that bitch the first time. It was a mistake.
Leaving the siblings where they are—they can follow if they want, or leave if they’ve decided I’m no longer any use to them—I head down the street, maneuvering through the crowd. I don’t know what my plan is, but shooting all of them in the back and taking off from this flying heap of space junk is not entirely off the plate. I’ve never shot anyone not in self-defense, but maybe I better start. What will happen if I do? Humans will think worse of me?
“Bat,” I say into the comm. “Fire up the ship. If those cyborgs try to get in, shoot them.”
His silence is loud, but I catch a glimpse of the lights on my ship’s wings blinking to life. At the last minute, I decide not to pick the stupidest option ever and instead veer left, going up a platform and taking a different catwalk. I’ll circle around and try to get into my ship from the backside. At least, I won’t have to shoot my way through Kel and the cyborgs remaining with her, as tempting an idea as that is. If the siblings want a ride out of here, they’d better hurry.
Jogging down one of the nearly empty catwalks with barely a railing, I tap into Bat’s comm again and tell him, “I’m one level above you, just fly up here and get me, we’ll get out of here—”
I stop dead in the middle of the catwalk before I can get level with our ship. Two more cyborgs glance up, on my level, and directly in my path.
It takes a bit of consulting my tablet, but I eventually figure out where I am—much closer to the core of the city than I expected—and get myself in the right direction.
As soon as I get within five levels below the hangar, my comm starts crackling. I consider turning it off, still not ready to talk to anyone, but if I don’t answer Bat or the princesses might get worried and think they should come looking for me. Yvonne is liable to throw a hissy fit over something like this.
I turn it on. “What?”
“Geez, Aaron, I’ve been trying to call you for twenty minutes.” Yvonne’s voice is light, and I’m reminded again that they don’t yet know how miserable I am.
“Sorry,” I mumble. “Went lower than I thought I did. Bad connection”
“Yeah, I couldn’t get ahold of Zane or Lalia, either. How’s it going down there?”
I stop in the middle of the street, back in the more populated area, and stare between my boots.
“Aaron?”
“Yeah, I’m here.”
She’s quiet for a moment. “Oh, God. You don’t sound happy.”
“I never sound happy,” I say, realizing I sound extra pissed off and she doesn’t deserve that.
She’s quiet again, enough that I know she realizes I’m bluffing. Softly, she says, “Aaron—”
“Stay in the ship, I’m heading back.” I disconnect from her comm. There’s a beep saying either she or likely Bat is trying to call me back, but I ignore it. They know I’m alive, they can wait.
As it is, I don’t want to do this, don’t want to have this interaction. I’m counting on what little of a walk I have back to give me time to pull myself together. She knows I didn’t get myself in trouble now, she can be patient for another ten minutes until I get back to the ship.
I suppose, technically, I should call Zane and Lalia since they obviously haven’t returned to my ship. They shouldn’t be staying here, and as I figured, we should get them some sort of transport pass back to Hytha. They can be there with their parents, keep hiding out from Captain, and figure out where they’re going to go from here. Perhaps Yvonne can help them out with getting a new ship, if even a small one. She certainly has the funds.
I’m so wrapped up in my own thoughts I barely notice what’s going on around the hangar until I’m nearly upon it. I stop, veering behind one of the shops near the edge of the void. The owner gives me a dirty look I don’t pay attention to. There’s a group of five figures hanging around near the catwalk I need to take to get to my ship. I squint, trying to pick out features without getting too close. I recognize one of them at least.
Kel.
I wonder if she recognized my ship. There are plenty of others in the hangar. In fact, I can barely see the wing of mine sticking out from all the way over here. Maybe she’s causing trouble for someone else. Authorities aren’t going to be much help to her here—plenty of bounties hunters might cluster to this city, looking for work or to team up, but there are even more people like me and the humans with the actual bounties on their heads. It’s a pretty neutral zone, mostly because the criminals outweigh the hunters so badly there’s no good luck at trying unless you get unfairly lucky.
I can’t tell if the men she’s talking to are human or otherwise, but they’re large enough it makes me uncomfortable. Knowing Kel, if this is about me, she managed to find whatever sparse Amerov numbers are here as crime control. Based on our last interaction, she shouldn’t be stupid enough to underestimate me and think a handful of humans would do the job. Then again, I don’t know if any hired Amerov numbers would be bothered by non-violent bounties. Hopefully, they’ll be annoyed Kel has dragged them into a situation with an unregistered and slightly unhinged number.
When she doesn’t leave within the next two minutes, I call Bat up on my comm. “Bat—”
“You weren’t answering, what happened—?”
“Kel is standing out on the edge of the hangar. I’m trying to work out if she sees our ship or not. Be on alert.”
“I vote to shoot her right now.”
“She’s got some people with her, they might be authorities.”
“Oh…lure her over and shoot her?”
I roll my eyes. His tone is enough to make me almost crack a smile until I remember why we’re so pissed at that woman in the first place.
Zane.
Speaking of. Where the hell are the humans? I’ve been wandering by myself for at least an hour, and it isn’t a far walk back here from Yala’s. I doubt they would just decide to make their own way out of here without at least a heads-up, considering they have no ship of their own.
But who knows? Maybe their reason for being with us is moot, so they took off. There’s certainly no reason to stay. Common courtesy would be to let me know, but they probably don’t consider that nearly as much now that they’ve been proved to I’m nothing to them.
Still, I can’t take off and find a way around into my ship from the opposite side of the hangar without knowing if they’re relying on us. Grimacing so hard my implants hurt, I try to tap into one of their frequencies and get nothing but static. I frown, glancing back over my shoulder. This is the way they’d have to come to get back to the hangar. They’re both fully capable adults, and Yala didn’t seem all that threatening, and completely human at that. If there was a problem, certainly they would’ve called one of us. Not much reason to be concerned something happened between the three of them, but now I’m wondering.
“Bat, can you get in touch with Zane and Lalia? My comm isn’t getting through.”
“I’ll try—”
“Aaron, what the hell?”
Zane’s voice startles me. I glance over my shoulder and find them both maneuvering through the throngs of people, bumping into shoulders and nearly tripping, making their way around the edge of the booths I’m huddled between.
“Never mind, found them,” I tell Bat.
Zane looks pissed, which is not exactly the expression I was expecting. Lalia looks like she’s been trying to wind him down, and shoots me an apologetic look over his shoulder.
I don’t know what I was expecting over all of that, but an attitude wasn’t it.
I scowl. “What?”
“Why’d you walk out?”
Is he serious? “Why wouldn’t I have?”
“Zane, relax,” Lalia says, shoving him in the arm and glancing back at the street. We’re mostly hidden, but drawing attention still isn’t great. At least there’s plenty of talking and shouting going on around here, it isn’t as if Zane’s pissy tone is gonna stand out, and it certainly won’t attract Kel’s attention.
Though I can feel my own irritation rising.
If I look at Lalia for more than a moment, I can tell she’s been crying. Which I don’t want to think about.
“Before you decide to have a hissy fit, Kel is standing at the hangar and I don’t know what she’s up to—”
“Oh, fuck her,” Zane snaps, which I don’t necessarily disagree with but still wasn’t expecting. “Why did you leave like that?”
I glower, not knowing what to say. “I’d assume it was fairly obvious.”
“Oh really? You’d assume it was fairly obvious, would you?”
Lalia says, “Zane—”
“Because,” I grit out, my patience dissolving rapidly, “I didn’t want to be there and it’s not exactly like you needed me.”
I’m trying to keep my tone down, knowing this must be plenty harder on them than it is on me. Their real bother is not me. He’s dead. If he wasn’t, they’d probably be a lot more relieved than they appear to be. Actually, they’d probably be glad he’s someone else, much more of a chance he’d be someone friendly and happy to see them and who doesn’t look like a monster. They’re grieving, so I tell myself I shouldn’t get pissy in return.
But I’m also not gonna get blamed for any of this.
“You don’t get to stomp off like that, not in that situation.”
He also doesn’t get to tell me I shouldn’t be upset. “I can do whatever the hell I want, do you want a ride off this floating city, or not?”
“What the hell does that mean?”
“I think it’s fairly self-explanatory.”
“Don’t do that defensive sarcasm shit with me—”
“Zane,” Lalia says, voice strained. “You’re not helping.”
I shrug, feeling heat rising to my face. “No, no, he knows so much about me, let him psychoanalyze me, maybe he’ll come up with another magical bullshit reason why I’m related to you.”
Lalia goes quiet and Zane grinds his jaw. “There was never a bullshit reason and you’re acting like a child.”
“Oh, I’m acting like a child, that’s really original, thanks for that.” I glance back around the shop corner at Kel, because it’s easier than looking at their irritating faces.
“You know, maybe if you learned how to have an adult conversation—”
“Sorry, I missed that part in my childhood for some reason…oh yeah, because no one wanted me.”
“That is not our fault!”
“Really? Because to me it looks like a couple of strangers showed up in my life and made me believe I was wanted when anyone with half a brain cell knows I’m not. I knew I couldn’t’ve been your damn brother, I tried to tell you I wasn’t your damn brother, but you two just had to go and make me believe it. I am sorry your Aaron is dead, I really am, but you don’t get to be pissed at me about it, and believe it or not, I’m allowed to be mildly upset that you two ruined everything.”
Zane blinks, all anger completely draining from his expression. Nothing I said was wrong. In fact, it was much truer than any of the crap they’ve been feeding me for the past few months, but guilt rises in my throat anyway. Embarrassment is nearly stronger. Why did I admit any of that? I didn’t need to be pathetic on top of all of it, but I suppose that ship has sailed. Lalia is staring at the ground, looking like she’s probably crying, but my eyes are glitching with all the heat signatures of the crowded street.
“Aaron,” Bat’s solemn voice over the comm makes me jump. I hadn’t realized it was still on. “Those men Kel is with are wandering down this way. I can’t tell, but I think at least one of them looks like a cyborg. He has metal in the side of his skull. And I don’t know what the uniform is but it’s something official.”
Oh, I cannot deal with all of this right now. Scrubbing my palms into my eyes, I say, “Move,” and shove past the dead-silent siblings so I can get another look at the hangar.
Kel is waiting where I last saw her, still with two other figures. Three others have headed down the hangar toward our ship.
I let Yvonne stop me from shooting that bitch the first time. It was a mistake.
Leaving the siblings where they are—they can follow if they want, or leave if they’ve decided I’m no longer any use to them—I head down the street, maneuvering through the crowd. I don’t know what my plan is, but shooting all of them in the back and taking off from this flying heap of space junk is not entirely off the plate. I’ve never shot anyone not in self-defense, but maybe I better start. What will happen if I do? Humans will think worse of me?
“Bat,” I say into the comm. “Fire up the ship. If those cyborgs try to get in, shoot them.”
His silence is loud, but I catch a glimpse of the lights on my ship’s wings blinking to life. At the last minute, I decide not to pick the stupidest option ever and instead veer left, going up a platform and taking a different catwalk. I’ll circle around and try to get into my ship from the backside. At least, I won’t have to shoot my way through Kel and the cyborgs remaining with her, as tempting an idea as that is. If the siblings want a ride out of here, they’d better hurry.
Jogging down one of the nearly empty catwalks with barely a railing, I tap into Bat’s comm again and tell him, “I’m one level above you, just fly up here and get me, we’ll get out of here—”
I stop dead in the middle of the catwalk before I can get level with our ship. Two more cyborgs glance up, on my level, and directly in my path.
