Set the Terms

by Mia R Kleve

  “Let your boss know that this old man can still kick your ass,” Sempay told them as they stared wide-eyed at the unmoving Jivool.

  Sempay nodded at Reynor. “Let’s get out of here.” The pair walked back to the bar. Silver was standing in the doorway. He had watched the whole thing.

  “Did you like the show?” Sempay asked shouldering his way through the door.

  Reynor followed. “I have some questions.”

  Sempay sat on the stool at the bar “Silver, how about some of the good stuff?”

  Once Silver had shuffled into the back room, Sempay looked at Reynor. “What questions do you have?”

  Reynor took a seat on a stool next to him. “Well, what are we trying to accomplish here?”

  “If we can stir up enough trouble, we can get the two groups to turn on each other.” Sempay nodded at Reynor’s belt. “Did you get the drone in place?” he asked.

  Reynor cocked his head, his whiskers twitching. “Yeah, the listener is in place.” He pulled out a slate, tapped a few keys, and the audio came up.

  “What the heck happened?” said a rough voice.

  “It was just a misunderstanding, boss. The old man caught me by surprise. It won’t happen again.”

  “That must be the guy you hit,” Reynor said quietly.

  Sempay hushed him so they could hear the conversation.

  “You want me to go take care of it?” another voice said.

  “Nah, we got that shipment to take care of. We’ll let Junior here take care of his own mess later,” said the voice that must’ve been the boss. “What time is the shipment due to be here?”

  “Should be here tomorrow at noon if those skaggs can keep up production,” a third voice said.

  “I think that’s one of the Pushtal,” Reynor whispered.

  “Is everything in place?” the boss asked.

  “Yeah everything is out in the blue warehouse. Me and the boys will head over there midmorning,” the Jivool said.

  Just then, Silver came out of the back room, his eyes wide at what he was hearing. He slammed the bottle on the counter. “What on orbit are you doing? You’re gonna get us all killed.”

  Sempay looked at him. “Take it easy, we know what we’re doing.”

  Silver’s eyes narrowed. “Who are you?” he asked.

  Sempay waved at him to be quiet.

  “Make sure you drop the payment, so the constable isn’t in the way,” the boss said.

  A female voice came into range. “When can I see my son?” she asked.

  “Not right now,” the boss said. “Let’s get this into the other room.” There was a shuffling noise and then voices faded out.

  Reynor fiddled with the data feed. “I think I can hop it to another room if you give me a minute,” he said.

  “It’s okay. I think we have enough,” Sempay told him and looked at Silver. “Needless to say, once we get them to turn on each other, things will change quickly. Trust me. When we’re done, this will be a different town.” He tapped the top of the bar with a claw. “How about that drink?”

  Reynor put the slate away, squared on the bar and asked, “So, what kind of shipment are we talking about?”

  Silver held up a bottle and poured three glasses. “Lithium delivery. That’s what was going on in this town before these two crews moved in. They have the locals extracting the isotopes and the rest gets processed out for a variety of things like electronics, weapons, circuitry, and batteries,” Silver explained. He put one glass in front of each of them and picked up the third. “Here’s to success.”

  “You two wait here,” Sempay said. “I’m going to go do an information exchange with our new friends to see if we can’t turn up the heat a little.”

  Sempay finished his drink in one swallow, set the glass back on the counter and headed out the door.

  Reynor fiddled with the slate. He tried to get a better read with the eavesdrop drone. After a little bit, he put the slate away.

  “Your boss is going to get us all in trouble. I feel it,” Silver said morosely. He stoppered the bottle and took it into the back room.

  * * *

  Sempay walked down the street to the casino and walked in the front doors. The two Zuul guards let him pass. He pushed the doors open and was assaulted by noise and lights. Games for several dozen species binged, bonged, blinked, and otherwise called out to the empty casino and lack of patrons to separate from their credits. When it opened, it must have been amazing. Today, it was a sad reflection of its former glory days.

  Sempay looked around until he spied the entry to the back area. He headed for the door. Next to it was a very large Oogar who stood just under two-and-a-half meters tall, his purple fur dull and matted in places. Like the casino, he had seen better days.

  The Oogar spoke with a gruff deep voice. “What do you want?”

  “I have some information for your boss,” Sempay said.

  The Oogar did not look impressed. “What is it?” he asked.

  “I’ve told you, it’s information for your boss. Are you having trouble understanding?” Sempay asked.

  The Oogar bristled, not liking Sempay’s tone. He took a step forward just as the door to the back opened.

  “What’s going on here?” Tivek said.

  The Oogar looked chagrined, reflexively turning toward the Jeha and shuffling back a step. “He says he has information for you, boss. I’ll take care of it.”

  “You’ll do no such thing, Graga,” he told the Oogar. “This is our new friend, and he’s taking care of business for us.” Tivek looked at Sempay. “Why don’t you come to my office where we can talk.” He moved back into the room.

  Sempay gave the Oogar an, “I told you so” look, walked into the office, and closed the door, leaving the Oogar on the outside. Sempay turned and studied the Jeha.

  “So, what is so important?” Tivek asked.

  “Well, I found some information I thought you might find especially valuable,” Sempay said. “Just how valuable is up to you.”

  “Well, what is it?” Tivek asked, his arms rippling in agitation.

  Sempay took a seat. “The other crew has a shipment coming in tomorrow. It will be at a blue-painted warehouse at noon.”

  Tivek’s arms waved in excitement. “By all the songs, how did you come by this?”

  “That doesn’t really matter. What matters is if you find that information valuable.” Sempay leaned forward and stared intently at the Jeha.

  “Oh yeah, it’s valuable all right. In fact, why don’t you take what you want out of this box.” He pulled open the small strongbox. Inside were credit chips of a variety of denominations, red diamonds glinting in the center of each. Tivek flowed to the door and opened it. “Hey, you idiots, get in here. I got something for you.”

  The first in the room was Graga. He noticed the open strongbox and the Besquith scooping credits out. He looked at Tivek and snarled in indignation. “You’re just letting him help himself?”

  Tivek went back around the desk and sat in his chair. “That’s none of your black hole business,” he said gruffly.

  Several Zuul and a Lumar, a two-meter-tall brute with four arms, also came in.

  Sempay stood up and moved for the door.

  “Where you think you’re going? You’re gonna help us with this, aren’t you?” the Jeha asked.

  Sempay shook his head. “I think you have this well in hand. You don’t need me. I’ll be back when I have more information.”

  “You’re just gonna let him go?” the Oogar whined.

  “We have work to do,” Tivek declared. The Zuul and Lumar moved out of Sempay’s way.

  Making his escape, Sempay left the casino and headed back to the bar where Reynor and Silver waited for him.

  He pushed open the weather-worn door and resumed his perch at the bar. He picked up the drink Silver had poured for him while he was gone. He savored both the flavor of the beverage and the annoyed expressions painting his compatriot’s faces. “
Did you pick up the signal?” he asked Reynor.

  Reynor stared at the senior Peacemaker uncomprehendingly until he finally grunted and picked up the slate. After a few claw taps on the pad, Tivek’s voice came across. Another tap and it ceased. Reynor looked up chagrined. “I should have figured you would put a bug in their office.”

  “That’s all right.” Sempay chuckled. “You’ll learn that more information is always better.” He turned to Silver. “We’re going to need two rooms for tonight.”

  Silver looked at Sempay, then at Reynor, almost as if he were weighing his options. “All right, but it’s gonna be double. If any of this blows back on me, I’ll need to vanish.”

  Sempay smiled a fanged grin at Silver, fished out two credit chips, and set them on the counter. “Will this cover it?” he asked mildly.

  Silver’s eyes bulged and he quickly swept the red diamond encrusted chips off the counter and into his apron pocket.

  “Let me show you to your rooms.”

  * * *

  At first light, the pair set off to the warehouse. They had scouted the area around the warehouse with a drone as the sun came up and found a spot to observe the delivery, and what they hoped were to be some antics and friction between the two crews.

  Their vantage point was on top of the roof of the neighboring building. They had grabbed some boxes and a pallet as well as a partially torn and well-used tarp from inside the building they were perched on and pulled them up onto the roof to break up the roofline. This way they wouldn’t be obvious, and even if they were spotted they hoped they would be mistaken for homeless squatters.

  The blue warehouse had clearly been selected for the quiet nature of this part of the town. The only thing moving were a couple of gray, half-meter-long Chiran lizards digging at the corner of the building trying to find shade. The skrit-skrit of their nails on the wall echoed eerily off the buildings.

  Right at noon, a transport trundled down the street toward the warehouse. Its tires crunched down the road, and Reynor could make out figures in the cab of the vehicle as well as on the bed of the transport itself.

  The whine of a ground effect car from the opposite end of the street showed that the Orange crew had arrived. The vehicle stopped at the edge of the large door to the warehouse. One of the Pushtal got out and rapped on the door as he watched the transport come to a stop. Not getting a response from inside the warehouse, he hammered on the door. The driver and the two transport crew members disembarked to talk with the Pushtal. The Pushtal driving the car got out to see what the hold up was.

  Sempay and Reynor watched intently.

  The door shook then retracted upward. After it had lifted a meter, the sudden whine of needler weapons echoed off the walls, and all five of the Orange Circle gang were on the ground. The door continued trundling upward.

  “What do we do?” Reynor asked in a whisper.

  “Observe,” Sempay said tapping his slate to get a better angle on their drone’s camera.

  Four people came out once the door was up. Sempay hissed as an Oogar came into view. He barked orders at the others who began dragging the bodies into the warehouse. It was only a few minutes before the five bodies were inside.

  A forklift trundled out carrying a large metallic crate. Soon enough, they had it strapped down on the transport and the door to the warehouse closed. The Oogar and two others climbed into the transport. The others jumped into the ground car and took off in the opposite direction. The transport engines revved up and it headed down the road, eventually turning toward an even rougher section of the town.

  “We’ve seen enough.” Sempay tapped on the slate to recall the drone. “Let’s get out of here before Orange comes looking for their missing people.”

  Reynor was stunned at what he had just witnessed. “We have to do something,” he sputtered. “We have to arrest them.”

  Sempay looked at the junior Peacemaker in sympathy. “Look,” he said gently, “nothing has changed other than five of the Orange Circle are gone. We have a video of what just happened and a plan. We work the plan, and we’ll get to a point where we can make an arrest without getting killed.” He stuffed his slate in his jacket. “Let’s go talk to the constable and see what we need to fix there for when we are ready to make arrests.”

  * * *

  Sempay held out a hand for Reynor to stop just shy of the constable’s office. “Follow my lead in there. Don’t mention who we are. We have to see what we are dealing with and how corrupt this guy really is,” he explained softly. “You good?”

  “Yeah. This isn’t anything like the scenarios we went through in the academy,” Reynor said.

  Sempay snorted. “You’ll find that life outside the classroom is a lot different.” He resumed walking up to the office and opened the door, gesturing for Reynor to proceed him. He followed, pulling the door closed behind him. He was surprised to see the constable wasn’t alone.

  Another Besquith was sitting at the desk. He was about the same size as Sempay with jet black fur. His golden eyes regarded the pair.

  “Oh!” Sempay exclaimed. “I hope we aren’t interrupting.” Reynor noticed that Sempay had adopted the subservient tone again. “We can come back…” He turned for the door as if to leave.

  “Hold right there,” the constable said. “It’s good that you showed up. Otherwise I’d have had to send for you.” He pointed at the newcomer. “This here is Peacemaker Marrok.”

  Reynor started at that and shot a glance to Sempay. He was awash with emotions. Another Peacemaker? Here?

  Sempay bowed, subtly shaking his head “no” to Reynor. That caused a bolt of momentary panic to ripple through Reynor. Involuntarily, he took a half-step backward and took a firm internal grip on his Radskhat instincts to flee.

  “Oh, a Peacemaker,” Sempay said ingratiatingly. “How fortunate you are here. This town could use you, and I’m sure the constable would welcome the assistance,” he whined.

  Marrok stood up. “I bet he would but cleaning up the insects in this town isn’t worth my time. I just got back from the Peacemaker Academy on Ocono, and I have an important meeting to attend at the regional barracks. I’m going to deputize you…” He hesitated. “What’s your name?”

  “Rhys, Honored Peacemaker,” Sempay said subserviently.

  “Rhys, you are now an acting Peacemaker Deputy charged with helping the constable here clean up this shithole. The two gangs are your problem. This town can handle one; I don’t care which one. Again, that’s your problem.” Marrok moved closer to Sempay. “Now, I’m going to transit for Peacemaker Headquarters, and when I come back here in two days I’ll be bringing twenty enforcers with me. If there isn’t peace, then we will kill everything and everyone regardless of who is who.”

  Reynor shot a quick glance at the constable, and he appeared rocked at Marrok’s declaration, who towered over them. Reynor also noted that Sempay had hunched a bit to make himself appear smaller. Reynor did the same.

  “Oh yes, it will be as you say,” Sempay simpered.

  Marrok headed for the door. He opened it and paused in the threshold. “Two days, then the Enforcers will bring peace, permanently.” He didn’t wait for a response and left.

  Reynor stepped back so he could watch Sempay and the constable at the same time, his thoughts racing as fast as his heartbeat.

  Sempay looked after Marrok thoughtfully for a moment then turned to the constable. “How long has he been extorting you?” he said softly. Reynor hadn’t expected such a direct question.

  The constable was shocked. “I have no idea wha—”

  “Stop,” Sempay said in a command voice while flexing into his full Besquith height and presence, all pretense at meekness falling away like a cloak. He stared at the constable who visibly deflated under his gaze.

  Reynor was impressed. I need to learn to do that.

  “For two years. Just after the two outfits showed up, he came along. He makes visits about every six months to collect his payment. I
don’t have a choice, so I get money from both groups and give the bulk of it to Marrok. He has the Enforcers. We have to do what he says,” he said defeatedly.

  “Well,” Sempay told him, “not everything is as it seems.” He turned so the constable couldn’t see and winked at Reynor. “How do you get your payment money? From the two gangs?”

  The constable sat back in his chair and told them everything over the next couple of hours. When he was done the constable looked at the pair. “What are we going to do? We have two days.”

  Sempay scratched his chin thoughtfully. “Do you know where the Paper Hand keeps their stuff? Where they process their lithium?”

  “Sure. It’s over by the old concrete plant,” the constable said.

  “This is what we are going to do. You are going to go sell information to the Orange Circle that the Paper Hand swiped their shipment,” Sempay said.

  “Okay. What are you going to do?” the constable asked.

  “I’m going to tell my buddy Tivek that Orange knows.” Sempay grinned.

  “Ah, that could lead to some shooting.” The constable frowned. “The townspeople might get hurt.”

  Both Reynor and Sempay looked at him.

  The constable held up his hands. “Look, I might be taking money to look the other way and pay off the Peacemaker, but these are still my people, and I’m doing what I do to keep them from getting wiped out. They are forced to work and their families are being held hostage, but they aren’t harmed otherwise. That’s the deal I was able to make.”

  “All right, we will take care of the workers. You just sell that info to the Orange Circle and get them the location of the shipment.” Sempay headed to the door. “We don’t have much time to set this up.”

  Outside, Reynor and Sempay watched the constable head to the cantina where Orange Circle hung out.