A Bad Deal for the Whole Galaxy

by Alex White

  Harvest was the sort of place where one could get lost forever. It shouldn’t have surprised Boots to find so many Clarkesfall refugees there. Everyone was either trying to be noticed—ultra-colorful feathered dancers—or trying not to be noticed—a hawk-nosed man, fearfully wrapped in a trench coat—and they all clustered together in the alleyways.

  Boots sidled up to Orna. “Where are we headed, chief?”

  “Where I say,” the quartermaster replied. “That’s all you need to know.”

  “Does ‘where I say’ have snacks?”

  “No,” said Orna with smiling eyes. “And you’re not going to like it.”

  “Great.”

  Boots wrinkled up her nose and scoffed. The rebreather wasn’t exactly choice for situational awareness, and she found herself scanning her surroundings over and over. Her vision was filled with armies of scantily clad people of all shapes, slick-suited executives, and that same hawk-nosed man.

  Again.

  Perhaps he was just headed in the same direction. Boots moseyed toward Orna; it was easy to disguise her alarm behind the thick filtration mask.

  “We’ve picked up a tail,” said Boots. “Maybe find somewhere quiet.”

  “Copy,” muttered Orna, picking up speed and pushing ahead.

  Now Boots felt bad about not including Charger. Orna could’ve sent the bot back to pick up old hawk-nose and bring him somewhere more private. Then again, Charger would make a scene no matter where he went.

  Boots dropped back in the processional to Malik. “We’ve got a tail, and my slinger is loaded up for hole punching, not stunning. I’d prefer the latter.”

  “I understand,” he replied in a low whisper and cut to one side of the thoroughfare, away from the group.

  Before long, the ship’s doctor disappeared into the crowd, and Boots breathed a little easier knowing he had their back. Ahead of Boots, Orna peered down alleys and through tunnels. Nilah immediately took note. The Ferriers were less observant.

  Orna gestured for them to follow her down a side street. Boots and the others turned in behind her; by this point, Malik had faded from view entirely. Whether he’d ducked into one of the many shops or simply found an out-of-the-way alcove, she couldn’t say. Boots hoped he could still see them.

  This place was far less populous, lined with shabby dwellings and garbage businesses unable to afford the rent of the main thoroughfare. The number of drugs on offer grew exponentially more diverse, and infinitely more sketchy. There were sensory magi, capable of neurological stimuli so potent that addiction was a foregone conclusion. Once they’d gotten someone hooked, they’d coax away all of a person’s passwords and bank data, then fry their brains with pure bliss. This side street reminded Boots of the place where she’d first gotten rolled for her paragon crystal—waking up with a throbbing head and an empty bank account.

  Orna turned down another, darker blind alley.

  Inside, they gathered into a group and waited. Boots could only hope Malik had found a way to sneak up on their pursuer. Their tail turned the corner, immediately saw he’d been made, and decided to run. A smoking purple hand landed on his shoulder, and arcane energies crackled into the hawk-nosed man. He opened his mouth as though to speak, but his eyes rolled back in his head, and he went slack.

  Malik caught him, then dragged the fellow into the alley.

  “Anyone got any bindings?” asked Orna.

  “Fresh out,” said Boots, and no one in the group offered anything up.

  “Great,” said the quartermaster. “Going to be tough to interrogate him.”

  Boots considered their options. On the one hand, they could leave hawk-nose sprawled out in the alley, unconscious. The only problem was that he’d awaken eventually, and he must’ve followed them because he knew who they were. They could try to drag him back to the other Fallen at the dock, but they might be spotted, and who knew what those desperate men and women might do to him.

  Alister crept over to the sleeping man and peered over him before rummaging through his pockets.

  “Careful,” said Jeannie.

  “He’s asleep, sis,” said Alister, patting his chest down. “He can’t hurt us.”

  Boots was impressed by his frisking skills. Alister wasn’t shy in any way with another person’s body, and Jeannie joined in. They treated hawk-nose like a coroner would treat a corpse—or perhaps like a butcher would treat a piece of meat.

  “Hello, there …” Alister pulled out a pocket slinger, one round, short range, from a hidden holster by the man’s shoe.

  “You think the Children have already spotted us?” asked Nilah.

  Boots scowled down at the unconscious man. “If that’s the case … we can’t allow him to report back.”

  “Maybe,” said Malik, “or maybe he’s a petty criminal, or a journalist. We are people of note, you understand.”

  “With a hidden slinger?” she asked.

  “It is kind of a crappy one, though,” said Orna. “I’m all about some violence, but, you know … he could just be worried about getting jacked down here.”

  “We’ve got a lot of enemies,” said Boots. “This guy could’ve been waiting to plug us. If he wakes up—”

  “I was followed by journos all the time,” urged Nilah. “You can’t just murder him.”

  “Okay,” said Boots. “If you’re going to shoot down my idea, give me a better one.”

  “Well …” Nilah fumbled with a plan. “If we leave him here in the alley to sleep it off …”

  “He wakes up and knows we came through here,” said Orna. “We … can’t afford that. I hate to say it, but I’m with Boots.”

  There was a flash of anger on Nilah’s face, but it faded as she stared down at the fellow. She opened her mouth to make a case, but nothing came out.

  “Doc?” Boots asked.

  “We were followed in Harvest by an armed man,” Malik replied, stroking his chin. “He might also work for the Taitutians. They want to keep tabs on us, too.”

  Boots crossed her arms. “Except they’re full of leaks, and we’re basically enemies of the state. But you’re right—killing one of their agents would definitely provoke a response.”

  “Let’s just read him,” said Alister.

  “No!” interjected Jeannie. “I mean, we don’t have the right setup.”

  Alister rolled up his sleeves, straddling the man’s body. “I’ll rip the memories out of his head, then. Hold him down.”

  Jeannie put a hand on her brother’s shoulder. “If he resists you, you won’t be able to—”

  He shot her an annoyed look. “I’m a lot more powerful than you. Quit treating me like we’re back in … Quit treating me like a child.”

  Jeannie took a step back, shaken at his sudden outburst.

  So the two of you aren’t perfectly synced after all.

  Swallowing her trepidation, Boots knelt down, unsnapping her slinger holster in case she needed it in a hurry. She wrapped both hands around the man’s right wrist, and Orna did the same on the other side. Malik and Nilah pinned his legs.

  Alister traced his reader’s mark, holding it in one hand. With the other, he gave the unconscious man a brutal backhand. Hawk-nose’s eyes fluttered open in shock, then horror at seeing his restrained limbs. He bucked helplessly against Boots and the others, and Boots crushed his forearm to the ground with her knee.

  “Why are you following us?” Alister growled, placing his spell against hawk-nose’s forehead.

  To Boots’s surprise, the man began to speak. His voice came out hoarse and panicked.

  “A mellow man lives near the graves, and five chairs at his table saves. From noon to noon and night to night, he hosts the ghosts to their delight.”

  “Mnemonics,” Alister grunted, tracing a larger glyph, which sizzled with dark magenta light. He strained, pushing the spell into hawk-nose’s head by grabbing a handful of hair. “Why were you following us?”

  Hawk-nose writhed and began reciting faster and
louder in a panic. Jeannie rushed to his side, speaking the man’s poem back to him, a half-step behind his cadence. Her words echoed with his, and hawk-nose began to stutter with confusion.

  “Why were you following us?” Alister demanded once more, sweat beading on his brow. He wrapped his hands around the man’s throat, choking out his poem.

  Hawk-nose looked up at Boots, terrified and red-faced.

  Alister grinned madly. “Money. Of course it’s money, but whose?”

  “Let him speak,” urged Jeannie. “I can’t recite if—”

  Tears rolled down hawk-nose’s cheeks, and in a panic he recited, “A m-mellow man l-lives—”

  Alister leaned into him, their eyes locked upon each other, touching foreheads, their lips close enough for a kiss, and whispered, “Your thoughts are mine.”

  Hawk-nose’s eyes went even wider for a split second, then he subsided, shaking and sobbing. His lips began to move. “Don’t—”

  Then Alister yanked Boots’s slinger free and blasted his brains into the pavement.

  She jumped back, barely avoiding the splash of blood. “Whoa! Whoa! Whoa! What the everloving—”

  The assembled party gasped in horror, backing away from the shuddering corpse and the ginger perched atop it. Only Jeannie remained at his side, her disappointment palpable. After a moment, Alister stood, brushed himself off, and held out Boots’s slinger for her, grip-first.

  His whole body shook, his skin was pale, and fury clamped shut his jaw. Slowly, Boots leaned forward and took her weapon, clicking down the safety and returning it to her side.

  With a shuddering breath, he said, “Thanks.”

  “Did you have to kill him?” Nilah breathed.

  He affixed her with a stare so cold that Boots nearly stepped between them. “The short answer is: he was a Child of the Singularity.”

  “And the long answer?” asked Boots.

  His lips pulled back in a snarl. “I didn’t need the long answer.”

  Even Orna looked a bit stunned, but she composed herself and said, “Show’s over. We’ve got to get to the surgeon, so fall in.”

  Nilah’s blood had run even colder at the mention of a surgeon. She couldn’t imagine a single medical procedure she’d want to have on Harvest. When they’d arrived at their destination, however, Nilah was surprised at the warmth and opulence of it all. They’d stepped off the dirty streets of Harvest and into sunbaked stucco and sparkling water features. Floating silver chimes whispered melodically across the ceiling as thick mahogany discs drifted into them. The lobby of this doctor’s office was as pleasant as any treatment center on Taitu.

  Nilah nudged her girlfriend. “What, uh, sort of doctor is this, love?”

  Orna pulled off her rebreather and smiled back. “You’re not going to like him.”

  The others shuffled in behind, pulling off their rebreathers and staring at the decor. Though everyone had been treated as heroes in the interposing year since they returned the Harrow, most of them would be unfamiliar with this level of luxury. A clean, woolen scent drifted past Nilah’s nose, that of her mother’s dresses on a Green Belt summer day. Only one magic cleaned while enchanting everything with nostalgic scents—the hotelier’s mark. This surgeon must’ve been pretty rich to have one on call.

  At the far end of the room, a pair of ornately carved wooden doors opened up, revealing a woman in a shimmering gown. Her smoky eyes overshadowed full, dark lips and black hair like crude oil, spilling down her alabaster shoulders. The entrance had an obvious theatrical quality to it—the newcomer wanted to be seen in her entirety. Nilah’s heart leapt at the sight of her, a guilty little jump in the wake of her recent fights with Orna.

  “Hey,” said Orna, unfazed. “We’re looking for Checo DosSantos.”

  “Did you have an appointment?” asked the woman, her voice smooth and sonorous, interweaving with the tones of the chimes.

  “Yeah,” said Orna, “and we’ve got his cash, so we’d like to get underway. Where is he?”

  “I am they.” The woman smiled. “I am Checo.”

  “Oh,” said Orna. “How do you want us to talk to you?”

  “I prefer they, them. Now, if you’ll please follow.”

  Checo motioned the group to follow with a languid gesture from their long, slender arms. Nilah was accustomed to seeing beautiful people in her racing days, but Checo had a supernatural attractiveness that baffled her—and set her on edge. The graceful, musical person summoned their charges inside, like a light beckons prey into the belly of an anglerfish.

  As Checo turned away, gliding ghostly down the hall, Nilah caught Orna’s arm and held her back, away from the others. “Okay, babe, it was fun being coy, but I’m going to need you to tell me what kind of doctor this is.”

  “She’s a sculptor,” said Orna. “We’re here to pick up a few disguises.”

  That explained the alien beauty, the strange length of Checo’s bones, even the name. Checo had remade themself to be whatever they wanted, pulling and twisting their body into an artistic interpretation of a human. The sculptor’s mark was one of the rarest of all.

  “No! No bleeding way!” Nilah hissed. “You must be daft if you think I’m letting them muck about with my bones!”

  “Babe,” said Orna, “we’re going to show up on facial geometry scanners all over the galaxy. We can’t wear rebreathers forever. You’re a rich kid from Taitu. Surely you’ve done some work.”

  “Yeah, but just a nose tweak or something! Nothing like a full disguise. They’re going to mess up my face!”

  Orna crossed her arms and frowned, obviously watching Checo’s backside as they receded down the hall. “You literally gaped when you saw how pretty they were. You’ll be fine.”

  Nilah shook her head. “No. You’re new to this fame thing. You don’t understand: our faces are worth money. We’ve got agents and publicity deals all tied up in our appearances.”

  Even as she said it, she knew it was silly. A new face would be invaluable if they were going to deal with the Children of the Singularity.

  “Yeah. Our faces are going to be worth a lot more if we make the most-wanted list. Besides, we can put it back after we’re done.”

  Nilah looked into Orna’s eyes and bit her lip. She knew Orna was right, but she couldn’t escape the feeling that she was about to make a terrible mistake. “Please, babe. I really, really can’t do this.”

  Orna softened, taking Nilah by the shoulders and pulling her in close. Her voice was low, and Nilah rested her head against her girlfriend’s chest. “This is for your own good. I don’t know what Cap’s plan is, but it’s going to be dangerous.” She pushed Nilah back. “I … look, uh … I know we’ve been snippy, but no matter what you look like, I’m still going to love you.”

  Nilah searched the face she’d fallen so hard for, memorizing the rifts of white scars dotting its surface, the blue eyes like liquid fire, the lips that had been so shockingly soft among Orna’s hardened features. She ran a finger along Orna’s cheek.

  “I know … I just like waking up to this. Will you promise to put the scars back?”

  Orna winked. “Only if you do.”

  “Everything okay?” asked Malik, leaning out the door. “Doctor DosSantos is waiting for you.”

  “Yeah,” said Nilah. “Just jitters, mate. Let’s go.”

  The interior of the office was even more peaceful, with low lighting and deep hues of pink washing the walls. Checo led them to a cozy waiting area filled with soft pillows and couches, as well as a low pulsing thrum. Sweet botanical scents filled the air, which was a little too warm for the maintenance gear Nilah was wearing. It all struck Nilah as very womb-like.

  Checo went to a hidden panel in the wall and pulled out a pile of silken robes, handing one to each of them in turn.

  As Nilah took her robe, she asked, “Can we, perhaps, turn up the aircon just a touch, love?”

  Checo smiled politely, and up close, their face was disturbingly perfect. “I’
m afraid this is the optimal temperature for molding flesh. You’ll be more comfortable once you’re in robes.”

  The doctor turned to the others. “For those with a need for modesty, there are dressing rooms to your right. Just press your palm to the wall, and they’ll open up.”

  Boots and Orna took her up on the offer, disappearing into the hidden dressing rooms. Malik was quick to remove his maintenance gear, but the twins were even faster—startlingly comfortable with their bodies.

  Nilah removed her clothes, and it was like cracking into a crate of old laundry. She’d grown sweaty in the maintenance garb, and she reluctantly donned the soft robe. It had a lovely feel, and she hated to soil it.

  Checo stood stock-still, hands folded in front of themself. When everyone was robed and rejoined, the doctor cleared their throat.

  “Right,” said Orna, producing the chit with an unsigned bank account number in it. “There’s a hundred large in there. Captain Lamarr sends his regards with the tip.”

  “Unexpected generosity,” said Checo, taking the chit in their delicate fingers.

  “Yeah, so, uh … let’s do a good job today,” said Orna.

  Checo cocked their head. “My rates are usually ten times what your captain has paid. Frankly, I’ve taken you on as clients in gratitude and curiosity.”

  Nilah winced. Great, darling. Insult the person who’s going to be twisting us up like clay.

  “This is a transformative, safe place,” said Checo. “Though you are here to disguise yourself, honesty is appreciated. If there is anything you desire, any way in which you are out of harmony with your visage, I urge you to request it of me. However, Captain Lamarr was quite explicit that you be made plain of face, so my more—exotic—services are off the table.”

  “I’d like a firmer butt,” said Malik. “My wife would back me up if she was here.”

  “No body mods. Six faces will be quite taxing on my powers,” Checo said. “Now, who’s first?”

  “I’ll go,” said Boots. “Already pretty plain, so you don’t got much work, Doc.”

  “I disagree, but we’ll see what we can do for you,” said Checo. “Right this way.”