Seven-Two

  Precipia Station — you've almost certainly noted the root word precipice there, haven't you? Well, Precipia Station hangs in the low-low-low orbit of a moon called Venon, adjacent to the planet Qiariz which is the fifth rock from the sun in the Pellvar system. Venon is, putting it nicely, a frozen shithole, and the unfortunates who actually live on this backwater trading hub do so only on floating stations such as this one.

  Of particular note is the unusual construction of Precipia Station — for there are two components, essentially, the first being a hovering cylindrical base. The second? The actual station itself, a gargantuan platform upon which a city in miniature has sprung up — built atop a platform that hangs, suspended, from that floating base via enormous and lengthy and rather perilous steel cables. Precipia, in short, is quite literally dangling like a flowerpot from the ceiling. Right on the precipice, as it were. Now go on, ask the obvious questions: who would be insane enough to construct such a thing in such a fashion, and who could possibly be foolish enough to actually live on it? Well, to the first—nobody knows. Records of this monstrosity's construction have been lost to time and strife, and thus shall the true intent of its creators forever remain a mystery.

  To the second? Merchants, artisans, smugglers, thieves, businessmen, pirates, miners, mercenaries, traders, even deep-space whalers. Disenfranchised men and women of every stripe imaginable pass through this dead-end hub, all of them quite literally balancing on a razor's edge the entire time. The entire endeavor is a beautiful testament to the arrogance, stubbornness, and bravery of which humans are so readily capable.

  On the topic of stubbornness and bravery, 'Team A' of the Dagger Dancer are currently making their way through a crowded open-air bazaar. Whilst Morgan and Veis follow closely him closely, the broad-shouldered Drobyek is pushing and shoving his way through the crowd, clearing a path for his smaller-statured companions. Morgan has undergone a complete transformation from the anxiety-wracked woman in the cargo bay; she is bright and loud and energetic, the picture of effortless charisma and confidence. Seven-Two understands that this is to some degree a front, of course, but he also strongly suspects that this is simply Morgan Kal in her element. This is a woman born of a lion's court, after all. The bustle, the chaos, the noise, the confusion, the natural predisposition to simply being seen — surely these are all things that have been instilled in her since birth.

  Seven-Two, meanwhile, could not possibly appear more opposite. He isn't with the group at all — instead, he's allowed himself to drift back, following at all times two or three paces behind and moving in a lazy, meandering path (that nonetheless leads to the same destination, in the end). He's all but invisible in that crowd, perfectly plain and nondescript. Shoulders hunched, posture slight. His face is boring. His clothes are boring. He's the type of man your eyes just slide right off, a bit of extraneous data and nothing more — no individual, no, just an extension of the crowd around him.

  He's also hard at work. With head tilted ever-so-slightly down, his eyes are kept almost permanently in shadow, and thus they are unseen as he glances rapidly back and forth, scanning with mechanical efficacy and borderline-neurotic diligence through the sea of surrounding faces. Seven-Two, you see, has been trained in the art of blurring the eye. The crowd fades, becomes naught but background — and the patterns leap right to the foreground. And thus is Seven-Two immediately aware that there are three men following them, all doing decently good jobs of never staring directly. They're all carrying concealed weapons, judging by their gaits, and at periodic intervals all three subconsciously tilt their heads whilst listening in on cochlear-implanted comms.

  Seven-Two photographs them all, via his own ocular implants, and the data goes immediately to the tiny shard of Patrick's personality living in Seven-Two's earpiece. Patrick, then, has now spread like a virus across Precipia Station's security systems, and is constantly tracking the undercover Yellowjackets through a vast network of hijacked surveillance cameras. Seven-Two alone knows of the AI's efforts; Veis had explicitly forbade Patrick from going beyond the ship, and even now the AI must be strictly careful to evade discovery. He is on foreign turf, after all, and Precipia's nigh-omnipotent security AI can obliterate him in an instant.

  "You wanna be useful?" Patrick's voice had come, in his ear, whilst Captain Kaela was giving orders in the cargo bay.

  "Of course," Seven-Two subvocalized, so that even nearby Morgan could not hear.

  "Then let me help."

  And so there it was. Two weeks off — and then Seven-Two was back in the game, like he'd never even left.

  Morgan

  Sekto Raa's compound sticks out like a sore thumb. And it is indeed a compound, an absolute brutalist slab of concrete with iron-barred windows that writhes between ordinary civilian buildings like a crepuscular serpent. The entrance is a rusted metal door surrounded by a half-dozen severe-looking men and women with weapons openly displayed; two of them flank the door with arms folded and expressions even grimmer than the rest, whilst the others crowd around an old folding-table and holler drunkenly over a game of cards. It's bizarre how normal this all seems, how just ten feet down the road the market-stalls and artisan tents resume, as though these blatantly-violent criminals are just an ordinary part of daily life. Morgan can't quite square it in her head — but she isn't stupid, either. She has the self-awareness to know that she's lived a sterile, curated facsimile of a life; it's only natural that the real world defy her expectations, now and again.

  Though she still finds this all markedly unpleasant.

  Seven-Two, who's been doing a fantastic job of looking like a complete stranger, splits off from the crowd to join with Team A as they approach that forbidding metal gateway. A couple heads turn, quickly assess that the visitors are no threat, then immediately return to the card game once more. The two men standing guard look over each and every one of them — and their eyes linger on Drobyek by far the longest. Scar-faced, big-bodied Drobyek, who currently has a ninecal las-carbine slung over his shoulder. No small wonder, that.

  "That's far enough," of the guards says, and Morgan diligently halts in place. "State your names."

  That's it. Showtime. Morgan steps forward (disobeying orders, whoops), clears her throat, looks this tattooed killer right in the eyes, and says with full confidence: "I'm Morgan Kal, Face for Captain Medo Kaela. These are my associates—money-man Rohn Veis, my assistant Sevus Taicht, and our very good friend Nelenn Drobyek." Drobyek flashes the guard a wolfish, gap-toothed grin. Veis inclines his head, and Seven-Two bows obsequiously at the waist. "We have an appointment with Lord Sekto Raa."

  The guard's expression does not change. He looks them over just a few moments longer — then steps back and raps three times against the door. And with that, and a squealing of rusted hinges, that same door swings open, and an interior of blackest shadow beckons. A literal gaping maw, eager and ready to swallow Morgan whole. Delightful.

  "Inside," the other guard orders, hitching a thumb over his shoulder. And forestalling any reasonable hesitation on the part of Morgan or her entourage. "You're late."

  And so they go, into the abyss, and as they pass Seven-Two steeples his fingers and bows again. "Ten thousand apologies for our tardiness, kind sirs," he simpers, which Morgan thinks is laying it on a little thick. But Seven-Two is fully in character now, and it's kind of miraculous the degree to which the weird, laconic, machinelike little man has disappeared entirely behind the persona of Morgan's neurotic assistant. Of course Drobyek is the one drawing all the heat — right now, Seven-Two is perhaps the least threatening man Morgan has ever seen. It takes genuine effort to remind oneself that this is the same Seven-Two who murdered a man in cold blood. And who didn't seem particularly bothered by that fact, either. Now there's a scary thought: that Seven-Two can turn it on and off, just like that. That he could snap at any time, go straight from harmless to dead-eyed killer, and then—stop it, Morgan. By the void, pay attention!

  Morgan, paying attention now, is being led down the hall of what almost looks like an ordinary office. Plaster walls, dark-grey carpet, fake plants in the corner. This probably was an office at one point, though now the air is thick with haze and most of the lights have burnt out and, oh, there is some manner of terrifying and heavily-armed individual lurking at literally every corner. And there are screams. Oh, by the void, there are at all times distant but wholly unmistakable screams. Sekto Raa's primary trade, one must recall, is that of the flesh.

  Morgan shudders and steels herself, and dares not meet any eye.

  Drobyek, meanwhile, is doing the exact opposite. Right now he is undoubtedly the team's rock — a stalwart bastion of strength and stability, a fearless and well-armed anchor who looks everyone in the eye and all but bares his teeth at anyone who gets too close. He makes abundantly clear that these three poor saps are under his protection, and thus do the circling vultures keep a respectful distance. For the moment, anyway.

  "Don't look at them with such disdain," Veis mutters, apropos of nothing, out the corner of his mouth, and it takes Morgan a full second to realize he is talking to her. "These people weren't afforded the same chances as you and me—you especially."

  "Flesh-traders are fucking scum," Drobyek disagrees, a tad bit too loudly—though nobody musters the courage to press the issue. "My unit purged a coupla ratholes just like this one, back on Melithia, and we were happy to do it."

  "Save your ire for Sekto Raa," Veis insists. "We're all drinking from the same corrupt well. Tell me, both of you—if this deal goes through, from whence do you think the money will have come?"

  Neither Morgan nor Drobyek has an answer to that.

  "I just want you to understand our place in all this," the money-man adds, his tone softening somewhat. "I'm not chiding you. Or—well, okay, yes, I am chiding you. But the point still stands." Morgan does her best to take that to heart, even if she doesn't exactly know what to do with it yet. And even as another scream rips out across the smoky darkness.

  They come then to a pair of double-doors that are almost comically ornate, in comparison to their dilapidated surroundings. Standing guard is a literal hulk, a vat-grown corpse standing nearly twelve feet tall with a hundred different wires snaking from the back of its skull to a black box embedded in its back. The Golem's face is just outright gone, melted away by void-knows-what, and in its place there is only a concave mass of discolored scar tissue. It is also quite starkly naked, exposing a purple-veined and muscular body rife with invasive surgery and terrible, terrible scars. Its skin, stretched taut, is beginning to tear.

  Doctor Meriya was the first Golem that Morgan had ever met. This thing is now the second.

  "I-uh, greetings," Morgan stammers, staring up at that nightmare-made-flesh. You can't really blame her for needing a moment to compose herself. "I'm-Morgan Kal, Face for Captain Medo Kaela. We're on our, ah, I believe Sekto Raa is expecting us..."

  The eyeless creature just stares in silence. Morgan wonders if it can even hear her, given the obvious and disconcerting lack of ears. Then, from the lump of blinking machinery on its back, an automated voice sounds out in eerily pleasant register: "There's no need to stand on ceremony here, Morgan Kal. My master is indeed expecting you. Please; come on inside." And with that, those beautifully-engraved doors swing open, and with some hesitation Morgan and the others shuffle past the hulking bodyguard/majordomo. Morgan holds her breath and tries not to retch, at the smell of rotting decay, and then the doors shut behind them and then they are well and truly on the inside of the dragon's lair.

  This place is night and day from the rest of the compound. Tufted red carpet jars against umber walls and gilded pillars, and a vast spiderweb of chain-linked lanterns dangle from the ceiling, all of them emanating various forms of pleasant incense. Mournful brass tones sound from concealed speakers amidst jittery and frenetic drumbeats — it seems that Sekto Raa favors the neo-Horatian musical styles of the nine-hundredth century, to which Morgan would ordinarily remark that there is no accounting for taste.

  And there, at the far end, propped up on an enormous plush couch, can only be the man himself.

  Sekto Raa.

  He is an elongated, emaciated figure, his nails and teeth both filed down to razor-points. His eyes have been surgically altered to appear as vertical, reptilian slits. Twin rubber tubes trail from what were once nostrils, running down below his waistband and disappearing into void-knows-where. His hair is long and vividly scarlet, and runs nearly to the floor, hanging over his rail-thin body like a funereal shroud. And he is surrounded, of course, by a pair of women both beautiful and entirely unclothed, and the three of them look up in perfect unison as the crew of the Dagger Dancer enter.

  "Late." Sekto Raa taps a three-inch nail against the endtable with an audible clack-clack. "You, my dear, are late."

  No greeting but a condemnation, then. So be it. Deep breaths, Morgan. Narrow your focus. Blur the background, blur everything. Let who-you-are be entirely subsumed beneath the gentle waves of who-you-should-be. Believe in the deception, Morgan. Let the falsehood become your reality. You are Morgan Kal, the confident and intelligent and unflappable negotiator, and nothing here can surprise you. And you are also Morgana Ten Kal Vell, the woman who was raised amongst a court of snarling wolves and prancing lions. You are the daughter of the most powerful and dangerous man alive. You stood at the very pinnacle, Morgan, then stepped down by choice.

  You can do this in your sleep.

  "Fashionably so," Morgan replies, with an unbothered little shrug of her shoulders. And so she sits down upon the proffered chair, and so do the others join her. Seven-Two, the loyal assistant, right at her side. Veis, the diligent money-man, cross-legged and unfolding his holo-tablet. Drobyek, the unflinching sentinel, looming large behind them all with burly arms crossed and eyes narrowed to slits. All told, the four of them could almost pass for legitimate.

  "There's nothing fashionable about wasting my time," the flesh-trader scowls, with a roll of those reptile eyes. But he sounds more bored than angry, and so Morgan does not fear retribution. "Let's get this moving, shall we? I have things to do."

  "I'd love nothing more," Morgan agrees, with a congenial half-smile. "I am Morgan Kal, Face and chief negotiator for Captain Medo Kaela." There's nothing unusual about Kaela's absence — it's a matter of age-old social contract that ship captains never appear in person for negotiations such as these. "These are-"

  "Yes, yes, I heard through my doorman's ears." Raa waves her introductions off, then snaps his fingers. "Money-men," he orders. "Sync up. Like I said, I want to get this thing moving."

  Raa's money-man turns out to be one of the topless women — and only now does Morgan notice the small metal bolt on the side of her temple, one that matches Veis's own. Both accountant's eyes roll back, then, momentarily, and a few seconds later their minds are in total synchronicity. The two of them are now interfacing on a wavelength of massive, constant data, one that takes years of training to properly parse or comprehend.

  "Right, then," Morgan says. She can't help but break into a hungry grin, then, feeling very much like a predator on the hunt. "Let's get into it."

  What follows is nearly an hour and a half of sustained negotiations. The Raa Syndicate, you see, had essentially sent out a 'wishlist' of desired (illegal) goods, and it fell upon crews like the Dagger Dancer to interface with the right people to make that happen — and to ship the goods across territorial borders, once secured. The Dagger Dancer had brought to Venon quite a sizable chunk of Raa's latest wishlist, and had hopefully made it here before another crew beat them to the punch.

  That wasn't even the dodgiest part of this whole venture, mind you. The real messiness lay in the fact that the prices for all these goods was simply to be determined. And so, well, here they were. Meeting. Negotiating. Determining. A bad price could mean no profit whatsoever—void, it would almost certainly mean a net loss, for the thieves they hired had been far from cheap.

  Morgan lets Raa have his way at first, providing little if any pushback on his initial offers. She argues, of course, and haggles back and forth, because that is the game and that is how one plays it. The spirit is a key part of this particular exercise. But in truth she is conceding everything, allowing herself to be lowballed time and time again, because both she and Raa know that there was only one item on that manifest that truly matters.

  "Next up..." Veis intones, his eyes glowing for a brief moment of calculation. "One Weirkas-manufactured Güzman Device, charge level rated up to Omega Four." And there it is. If you didn't know, the item Veis refers to is the same type of invisible energy shield that kept the Panopticon untouched during the Season of Crimson. It took only four Güzman-devices to envelop a palace the size of a city; just one would be enough to sheath an entire warship. Alas, like so many of humanity's greatest works, the schematics for this exceptionally powerful device were lost during the Sky-Melting of Venus — along with Heraks Güzman himself. What the Dagger Dancer now offers, then, is a truly rare commodity, and just finding the right people to steal one was a herculean effort all its own.

  "Mmh," Raa muses, eyes flicking momentarily to his own money-man before settling on Morgan once more. She meets his gaze with an easy smile. "I can do twelve."

  Morgan snorts, then bursts out laughing, and for a few seconds that is the only sound there is. Just laughter, faint music, and even fainter screams. Seven-Two looks equal parts mortified and terrified; Drobyek, with thumbs hooked through his belt loops, is shifting uncomfortably. And Veis is just lost in the data, totally oblivious, his hands twitching in periodic reflex.

  This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

  After eight taps of his fingernail, finally, Sekto Raa loses his patience. "Something funny?" he demands. His voice is taut with veiled threat.

  "I mean, come on," Morgan chuckles, her laughter finally drying up. She sighs happily and wipes a tear from her eye. "Seriously, that was a good one. Your delivery is impeccable."

  "My offer was no jest."

  "Jest or no, it was comical," Morgan shrugs her shoulders. "Anyway, let's start at eighteen."

  "You're mad."

  "My money-man disagrees."

  "We have not yet come to consensus," Raa's barechested accountant cuts in.

  "There is indeed some amount of consternation," adds Veis. "This is an item of exceptional rarity. Simply put, there is no market to which we might refer. There has been not one single recorded sale of a Güzman Device in the past four centuries."

  "You hear that?" Morgan cups a hand to her ear. This time she might be the one overdoing it, though that doesn't slow her for even a moment. "This is likely the first Güzman sold in four centuries. We are but a humble crew, Lord Raa. Do you know how difficult it was to find someone willing to thieve in Alpha Centauri space — and how expensive it was to hire someone with the skills to pull it off?"

  "Perhaps you should not have wasted your money."

  "And then you wouldn't have your Güzman, now, would you?" Morgan clicks her tongue. "We took all the risk-"

  "Did you now?"

  "...all the financial risk," Morgan corrects, conceding the point. "It will cost you a drop in the bucket to make us whole, Lord Raa."

  "Morgan, my dear, you must think of the opportunity cost." Raa leans forward, interlaces his fingernails. They clack together, and Morgan heroically manages to suppress a shudder. "The only reason I bother meeting with bottom-feeder smugglers at all is because it's marginally simpler than simply boarding your ship, slaughtering your crew, and taking whatever I like."

  "Those aren't the only reasons." Morgan interrupts. And then she decides to try something truly ballsy: "Good luck finding anyone willing to run your shipments, once it gets out that Sekto Raa is a shameless oathbreaker."

  The moment the words leave Morgan's mouth, the other topless woman is on her feet, and the concubine's entire arm splits open to reveal a bevy of grey-steel machinery and, more importantly, the barrel of a prosthetic las-gun. Drobyek, to his credit, doesn't even begin to make a move, although the muscles bunch in his neck and his mouth draws into a thin line. He restrains himself only out of trust in Morgan's ability, which she finds surprisingly touching.

  Meanwhile, Seven-Two has gone completely and perfectly still, the false expression frozen upon his face. Though he appears to be sitting casually, nobody in that room realizes that he has one hand on the stolen gun — nor do they understand that he can snap out of this particular pose in an instant, that what appears a loose and relaxed posture is in fact moreso akin to a tightly-coiled spring.

  Violence is but a hair's breadth away.

  Raa arches an eyebrow. "Shameless?"

  Morgan tilts her head to the side, more curiosity than contrition. "Ah, void. Was that a bit much?"

  "Just a little," Raa chuckles, and instantly the tension is gone. The prosthetic laser is sheathed; Drobyek relaxes, and Seven-Two undergoes no visible changes whatsoever.

  "Let me make it up to you, then," Morgan offers, moving things quite smoothly along. "Sixteen." Before anyone can even catch a breath.

  "You have lost your fucking mind," Raa tells her flatly. "Thirteen."

  "I don't intend to go home empty-handed," Morgan smiles. "Fifteen."

  "Fourteen, along with a personal apology for your earlier remark."

  "The apology costs extra. Fifteen."

  "You would be wise to take what you can get."

  "I'd also be flat broke. Fifteen."

  Raa changes tact. He narrows his eyes, tightens his focus. Lets the presence and weight of him loom, run wild, bathe them all in his shadow. This is a cruel, terrible, dangerous man. This is a man who would traffic Morgan like literal cargo, were he granted the opportunity to do so. This is a man to whom she has no right to speak casually—or, no, it's not about having the right. This is the most basic matter of self-preservation. If Morgan had even an ounce of sense, she'd shut her mouth and nod her head and take what she was given, and then get the fuck out of this void-damned butcher shop as fast as she possibly could. She would by no means be talking back to Sekto Raa.

  Morgan doesn't even flinch. That smug smile doesn't fade for even a moment.

  "Fifteen," she repeats.

  To that, Sekto Raa does not say a word.

  Nobody moves.

  Everyone waits.

  And then, finally, the crimelord inclines his head.

  "Fifteen," he sighs, at long last. Then: "With the aforementioned apology."

  Morgan narrowly resists the urge to let slip some manner of celebratory whoop or yell, forces her face to remain in exactly the position she has left it. She just nods her head, in acknowledgement of her victory, and so do the negotiations continue.

  Her exuberance stems in part from the fact that she only needed thirteen to break even; fifteen will be a dramatic windfall the likes of which Kaela and Veis dared not even hope for. A great many of the Dagger Dancer's problems are about to be solved in one fell swoop. But on a broader level, Morgan is ecstatic in that moment because this is the reason why she ran away! This is why she had to escape that pampered, coddled, grotesque life high on that lofty mountaintop — to face real challenges, to solve real problems, to deal with real people in real (albeit gruesome) places such as these. Morgan had to escape, so that Morgan could prove she was everything that her father's subjects were ordered to treat her as.

  She had to prove that the Vell on the end of her name didn't mean a damn thing.

  Anyway, the negotiations conclude; Morgan and co. bid a polite yet hasty farewell. Nobody wants to spend a single extraneous minute in this hellpit, and it is old wisdom that one should get out while the getting is good. Thus do the crew of the Dagger Dancer do exactly that, and thus do they depart that wretched compound in near-total silence. With Veis at the helm, they delve back into the bazaar, pathing through the crowd for several minutes until they are finally able to slip into a quiet alley — and only then do they speak.

  "So," Drobyek begins, rocking restlessly on his heels. "Fifteen, huh?"

  "Fifteen," Seven-Two confirms, as though it were an actual question.

  "Fifteen," Morgan agrees, because right now she really likes saying that word.

  "Fifteen." Drobyek repeats, in acknowledgement. Then he turns to the money-man. "Veis, is fifteen good?"

  For a moment, the older man does not reply. He is lost in thought, or calculation, or what-have-you. But then, finally, his head tilts up, and a wry smile spreads across his face. "Fifteen is good," he says, quietly. And then, louder: "Fifteen is very, very good."

  And then Morgan is partly deafened by Drobyek hollering in her ear, and the big man is excitedly shaking her by the shoulders and Veis is laughing and Morgan loses herself in the euphoria of victory and celebration and, void, actually earning respect for once in her spoiled life! Just like that, she has a reason to be here. Just like that, she's booked a spot on the Dagger Dancer for as long as she likes. Fuck you, Jaheed! Fuck you Johann, and Jargas, and Raynia! Fuck everyone who ever doubted her, and anyone who ever-

  Then Seven-Two, who has offered not even so much as a polite smile, steps in to ruin the mood. "Our mutual friends are still watching closely," he reports, the bastard. What an asshole he is, actually doing his job at a time like this! The last thing Morgan wants to think about is the reality of their situation, which is that they are currently in a great deal of danger. That all the money in the world will mean nothing, when the Yellowjackets murder her friends and snatch her away. Or murder her, too. Even though she won! That's right, she won, and that is why she feels — and it's stupid, she knows, but still — as though the universe is obligated to reward her thusly. As though her father's man should simply vanish, transmuted to vapor that can neither touch nor see nor hurt her.

  "These assholes don't have anything better to do?" Drobyek groans, his smile vanished at once. His hand drifts to the pistol on his hip, and he rubs the handle with obvious unease.

  "It would seem not," Veis sighs, pushing those wireframe spectacles back up his nose. He reaches down, keys his wrist-comm, and all Morgan can do is frown and fold her arms as Veis and Kaela discuss. She's gone right from useful to useless, and there is nothing she can possibly do to help in their current situation. Worse, she is the nexus of this predicament, a fact of which every crewmate must be keenly aware. By now the elation of Morgan's victory has rotted and gone sour indeed.

  "... can't move without being seen," Veis finishes, as Morgan snaps back to reality. Focus, Morgan. That's the second time you've gotten lost in your own head today. Just because you're useless doesn't mean you get a free ride to zone out. "So what's the play, Medo? Do we just make haste to the Dagger Dancer and pray to Belos's gods all the while?"

  "We won't make it," Seven-Two chimes in flatly, and Morgan's irrational irritation at the Mondatti flares up once more. Would it kill him to sound like he actually gave a shit?

  "If Seven-Two's saying that, then I believe it," Meriya's voice crackles in, over the comms. "Look, we've got Yellowjackets in full armor over here, just strutting around like they own the place. I wouldn't be surprised if they start shutting down street corners."

  "Boxing us in," Drobyek growls. "Bastards."

  "We could always try shooting our way out, keep the cargo for ourselves and just bolt," Vasck offers. "Raa paid us in advance, right?"

  "Nero, that is a fantastic idea," Morgan rolls her eyes. "Let's rip off Sekto Raa—why not! More enemies, that sounds good to me!"

  "C'mon Morg, a few enemies never hurt nobody."

  "There is," Captain Kaela interrupts sharply, "something else."

  Naturally, everyone shuts up. Most of this bickering was really just waiting for their Captain to say something.

  "I received a private-coded transmission last night," she explains, after a moment, "from an individual trying to buy passage off this rock."

  "We're not a transport-"

  "I know. That's why I didn't bother to respond — but I didn't delete the message, either. Worst comes to worst, I figured we could lean on that small fare if the Güzman thing didn't work out. Still. I don't trust any anonymous commission, you all know that."

  "Probably some stupid-ass fucking Vell behind that request," Drobyek remarks — then immediately glances back at Morgan, who offers him the driest of stares. "Shit. Sorry, Morg. You're still pretty smart."

  "Glad to be the exception," the firstborn Vell deadpans.

  "It could absolutely be bait," Kaela resumes, "because they just messaged me again — and now they're claiming they can help us."

  "Help us with...?"

  "Waddya think? The bag we're in."

  For a moment, nobody says anything, as everyone parses and interrogates the idea from whichever suspicious angle they prefer. Then Meriya states the obvious: "How does this person know that we're being followed?"

  "Because it's fuc-king bait," Vasck insists, and Morgan can literally hear him rolling his eyes. "It's the shittiest, dumbest, most obvious bait I've ever seen, and we would be the biggest fucking morons on planet Venon if we actually took it."

  "Maybe," is all Kaela says, in reply. And that sets everyone off.

  "Maybe?" Veis blurts out, above it all, speaking up for the first time in minutes. "Medo, surely you're not seriously considering this?"

  "We have limited time," Seven-Two states calmly, staring out the alleyway all the while. Just watching, at all times, whilst the rest of them bicker. He alone can see the noose tightening around their necks with perfect clarity. "We need to decide quickly."

  "They want us to meet them at a bar," Kaela adds, before anyone can interject. "The Liar's Eye, three blocks down from where you are now."

  "Well that's certainly on the nose," Meriya scoffs.

  "They say if we meet 'em there, they'll be able to make sure we get out in one piece."

  "Bullshit."

  "What's the alternative?"

  "...abduction at best, a shootout at worst."

  "Shootout sounds good to me."

  "That's what you hired us for, right?"

  "A shootout sounds terrible to me, for the record."

  "Five are watching us now," Seven-Two interrupts again. "Very soon we will be trapped, and the decision will be made for us."

  Silence, then, as everyone mulls over the fact that the bars of their cage are shrinking tighter. That the walls are literally closing in. The danger becomes real; hearts start beating faster, sweat begins to bead. The threat of being tailed turns to something real and deadly, and abruptly Morgan has a vision of herself returned, shamefully, to kneel at the feet of her father.

  And to that one possible future, she just says: No.

  And thus there is nothing further to discuss.

  "Look, we're stuck either way!" Morgan blurts out. Veis and Drobyek's heads swivel around; Seven-Two, characteristically, does not react. "The Yellowjackets are elite soldiers, right, and they've got us outnumbered, and they've got us boxed. There is no alternative to meeting with this person and praying that they can do what they say. Yes? No? Am I crazy here? We're talking about a one-percent chance of success versus zero-percent, people. That's not a choice at all, that's just a void-damn directive. And the longer we wait, the harder it gets to even reach that shitty bar, so-" Morgan gestures rapidly, and with great frustration, "-let's fucking move already!"

  For a few seconds, the only reply Morgan receives is the bustle of the crowd and the crackling of her earpiece. But then, finally, Captain Kaela calls it. "You heard the lady," she tells them. "Get your asses moving. I'll see you at The Liar's Eye."

  "Wait-" Meriya starts — just as every comm-unit, in unison, goes silent and dark.

  The four of them exchanged harried glances.

  "Fuck," Drobyek says, speaking for everyone, because somehow the Yellowjackets have just shut off Precipia Station's comm network. Somehow they've done this in a place far outside their jurisdiction, under purview of what is almost certainly a mission unsanctioned by Duke or Planetary Governor.

  They want Morgan that badly.

  Nobody says another word. There's no need. They just take off running.

  Weapons of a Bygone Era

  Five minutes prior to the blackout, the silver-eyed women arrive at Sekto Raa's compound.

  They are dressed, the both of them, in grey-tan trenchcoats that run nearly down to the ground. The younger of the two sports messy, close-cropped onyx hair, and is currently smoking a cigarette. Her name is BAST. Her sister, ANUBIS, stands a half-foot taller, and her hair — also jet-black — is tied back in a lengthy ponytail. She isn't smoking right now, because she tries to take her job seriously.

  "Well, waddya think?" Bast asks, after a moment. "Wanna cut loose?"

  "Boss's kid said gloves are off," Anubis shrugs. "So sure, why not. Let's go a little crazy."

  "Don't have to tell me twice," Bast chuckles, putting the cigarette out on the palm of her hand. She drops the butt, crushes it beneath her heel — and then they are moving, stepping briskly across a busy roadway with hands thrust into pockets. They pay no heed to the hovercars rushing past, many of which are forced to slam on the brakes and lay on the horn at this sudden obstruction. And it is the chorus of furious honking that has everyone at the card-table glancing up, and all eight of Sekto Raa's door guards are now seeing these two strange women approaching with very deliberate purpose indeed.

  Anubis and Bast step onto the sidewalk, then reach up in unison to unbutton their coats.

  "I got this," one of the card-players says, yanking his knife free and rising to his feet. "Hey," he calls, as the silver-eyed twins approach, "you two morons have any idea where you're about to walk into?"

  "No," Bast answers innocently, batting her eyes, just as both coats fall open. "Where are we?"

  "This is Sekto Raa's-" the man starts - and once he's said that name aloud, he gets to enjoy about a half-second more of his life before Anubis blows his head clean off.

  The gunshot rings out like a thunderclap; Anubis has a ornate cartridge-revolver in her hand, and Bast's coat opens to reveal a snub-barrelled ion shotgun.

  Everyone leaps to their feet.

  A few seconds later, every one of the guards is dead, and without further ado Anubis tries to open that forbidding metal door. Naturally, it is locked, though Anubis can hear quite clearly the commotion as mercenaries and hired killers line up on the other side, ready to fend off these unknown intruders.

  "May I?" Bast requests, batting her eyelashes just as she did to the dead guard. And because Anubis is a good sister, she steps back and gestures for Bast to proceed.

  Bast grins, cocks her leg back, and kicks the door right off its hinges. Or—not off the hinges per se, because the door actually takes a sizable chunk of the wall with it. This slab of metal and concrete hurls forward, flattens three men into paste, bisects a fourth at the waist, and skids and skids until finally it slams to a halt, leaving in its wake a streak of crimson gore.

  "Alright," Anubis says, as she and her sister step inside. The assembled guards stare in frozen disbelief. "Ten minutes, Bast. I've got a timer on."

  "Easy," Bast laughs. And so the two of them just step forward and start killing, their weapons ringing out again and again and again. And all the while they chat idly with one another, because for these two this really is just business as usual.

  "You wanna know something weird?" Anubis offers, as she lays the revolver over her shoulder and shoots a woman through the eye—without looking.

  "Weird? In what way?" Bast inquires, blowing a man's legs clean off. She lets him howl in agony, for a few seconds, before atomizing his chest as well.

  "It's a language thing." Anubis fells five guards with five perfect headshots, all lightning-quick. "Did you know that flammable and inflammable mean the exact same thing?"

  "I-" Bast pauses — though still manages to fire her shotgun with one hand, blasting a guard's chest clean open and showering his companions with shards of molten bone. "Huh," she remarks, after a moment's consideration. "Yeah, that's right."

  "Weird, isn't it?" Anubis tosses six shells into the air, catches them all in her revolver in the blink of an eye, then spins the chamber right back into place with a satisfying click. "The prefix there doesn't do shit."

  "That's stupid," Bast remarks, stopping a melt-knife with her bare hand and shoving it — handle-first — right back through the attacker's face. "So there's no word for thing that won't catch on fire? Like, at all?"

  "Fireproof?" Anubis offers, firing three shots all in seemingly random directions. The shells ricochet madly, then strike a man three times through the skull.

  "Oh, sure," Bast acknowledges. "Fair enough." And then, finally, one of the guards gets lucky. He springs out from behind cover, before his silver-eyed assailant can react, and shoots her square in the back.

  And so Bast goes down, with a smouldering hole in the back of her coat.

  Except.

  She doesn't go down.

  Not all the way.

  Just to one knee.

  Briefly.

  And then she stands.

  Back up.

  And.

  Turns.

  And the look

  on

  her

  face-

  "Tough luck," Bast chuckles, because she is not human.

  Moments later Anubis is kicking in Raa's door, as Bast beats the Golem to death. The crimelord raises his las-pistol at once, as the arms of his concubines split open to do the same, and one of them nearly gets a shot off before Anubis fires six bullets — two into the heads of the concubines, two into each of Raa's knees, one through Raa's gun-wrist, and the last one to neatly sever his right ear. The last one, of course, was just to prove that she could.

  Bast lights a cigarette and watches, as Anubis hauls the screaming man upright. His reptilian eyes are wide with agony.

  Anubis puts a finger to her lips.

  "Quit hollering," she orders.

  He quits hollering.

  "Thank you," Anubis says, because she — unlike her sister — is polite. "I'm gonna ask you some questions now."

  "You got 'em all written down?" Bast calls.

  "Nah, I got it all up here." Anubis taps the side of her skull. And so the interrogation commences.

  Two minutes later, Anubis has what The Boss requested, and so she just drops Sekto Raa right there on the floor. He whimpers, rolls onto his side, and shudders periodically as his body is wracked with pain.

  "All good?" Bast asks, looking up from her cigarette. She's been pretty bored for these past two minutes.

  "All good," Anubis nods, stomping Raa's head like an eggshell. Bone and brain spray outwards and stain her boots, which she isn't thrilled about.

  "Cool, 'cuz I just got a call." Bast jerks her head. "Boss's kid wants one of us with him, and one of us to go help kill that crew."

  "Huh." The two of them are leaving the compound now, stepping quite casually through a vivid nightmare of scorched, bloody carnage.

  "So who's doing what?" Bast asks, as she snaps the neck of a disemboweled survivor, because she tends to defer to her older sister in matters such as these.

  "You go meet up with Johann," Anubis orders, to which Bast immediately begins to pout.

  "Oh, come on," she complains. "Why do I have to babysit the kid?"

  "Cuz I let you kick the door."

  "Damnit." A long pause. "Fine, fine." Bast waves her off, as the two of them step outside. "Have fun killing people at the bar or whatever, I guess." All this is said just as a hovercar pulls up, and a pair of uniformed Peacekeepers — a well-armed local police force — step out. The sisters give them looks of complete and total disinterest.

  "Holy shit," the first blurts out, his words immediately forgotten at the sight of the door-guards' mangled corpses. "What the-"

  "Drop your weapons!" the second shouts, simultaneously, swallowing his fear and raising his gun. "You have three seco-"

  Bast, annoyed, just kills him on the spot, and his partner's eyes go wide with terror and grief, and the surviving officer has just a moment to tearfully raise his own pistol before Bast cocks her shotgun and blows a hole right through him The ion charge scorches clean through flesh and bone, carrying on straight into the hood of the hovercar — and the vehicle seems to swell for just a single fraught moment before erupting into a fireball that sends flaming shrapnel rocketing in all directions.

  The bazaar-going crowd erupts into screams, and is forced to flee as literal fiery death rains down from above. Sirens wail in the distance. The sky is choked black with smog.

  And if anyone had stuck around to watch, they would have remembered forever the sight: a pair of silver-eyed demons emerging in casual stride from that roaring inferno, coats singed and skin untouched.

  "Well, whatever," Bast sighs, sparing a brief glance for the death she has so carelessly wrought. "Like I said, have fun killing that crew." And then, with that, the sisters part ways.

  "Thanks," Anubis calls, over her shoulder. "I'll certainly try."