Return

by Blaze Ward

  “You’re fighting your own war,” he said flatly.

  Whether it was a guess, or the man had learned Churquen physiology as well in the last twelve hours.

  “It’s much worse than that,” Aileen spoke up now.

  Lazarus had caught the glance the two women shared. The subtle nod Eha gave Aileen before she spoke. Held his breath.

  The Yithadreph loadmaster leaned forward enough to look around Lazarus. Oluchi was all eyes now.

  “We’re after revolution.”

  Twenty-Two

  Lazarus

  The rest of the ride had been pretty much in silence, which had suited Lazarus. Oluchi was obviously still digesting things. Lazarus was tired. Aileen and Eha were in silent communication that he really wasn’t offended to miss.

  They were close to the port now, winding through some of the older, smaller streets with tall warehouses on all sides.

  The vehicle slowed suddenly. Jammed on the brakes hard enough that Eha was nearly knocked off her coil.

  “What?”

  Lazarus started to turn to see what the problem was, when another vehicle suddenly appeared from an alley and stopped right behind them, blocking this one from moving.

  Figures on foot surrounded the limo they were riding in. Guns were pointed inward.

  Lots of guns.

  Lazarus didn’t figure the metalwork of the vehicle would do much to stop them.

  “Oh, crap,” Oluchi muttered with such vehemence that Lazarus presumed they probably weren’t friends of his.

  A fist rapped on the window. Made it clear that they could open the door, or have it opened for them.

  Oluchi turned to him with honest fear in his eyes, like maybe he’d stayed in on a hand he should have folded earlier.

  “What do we do?” he breathed.

  “Open it,” Eha ordered. “There’s not much we can do, and they won’t wait long before asking harder.”

  Lazarus considered drawing his pistol, but that would just get them all killed right now, assuming that wasn’t already somebody’s plan. Westphalians?

  No, this did not feel like a bunch of random spacers deciding to cause trouble. Things like that got you evicted, even in a place like Yisan, with instructions to never return.

  No ship’s crew would push their luck that hard on the ground.

  Oluchi cycled the lock and a man outside pulled the door open, kneeling down with a sub-machinegun pointed into the back and a crude smile on his face.

  “Pistols first, if you want to live,” he snarled in a rough tone. “Not asking twice and I’ll kill you if you give me any grief. Savvy?”

  Oluchi glanced back and Lazarus nodded. It was a trap, but hopefully somebody just wanted to talk. There wasn’t anything any of them could do right now.

  The gambler gingerly reached down and slid his pistol out and held it for the stranger to take and hand off to one of the others. Lazarus went next while the other two sat perfectly still, probably watching the others around them.

  The glass was clear enough that someone standing close with a barrel resting on the outside could see in. There were at least six men in that category.

  Aileen passed her Manticore over, and then Eha’s went.

  “Good,” the man said in a brighter voice, still sounding like a ballpeen hammer trying to drive a sheared-off nail deep enough to ignore. “Bodies next and don’t get stupid, right?”

  He rose and stepped back, that one barrel never wavering for an instant, not that Lazarus figured he could do anything right now but die stupidly.

  Oluchi climbed out of the vehicle and was manhandled over to the truck, hands on the metal and feet spread like he was being arrested.

  None of the men had badges, but the frisking was expert, as Lazarus emerged next and got the same treatment. Someone left their uniforms at home?

  Aileen popping out brought a round of mutters from the dozen men around him. They weren’t all dressed alike in anything like uniforms or combat attire, but they all had the look of rough men from the docks.

  The kinds you crossed to a different street to avoid if you saw them in port.

  “What’s this?” the man frisking her snarled.

  “That’s my tail, you dork,” Aileen snapped at him. “Keep your hands to yourself.”

  Lazarus feared things were going to get ugly, but the man stepped back with a satisfied nod.

  Eha nearly caused the men to lose it.

  Cries of shock and fear emerged from the crowd around them, even as they kept guns centered. At least Lazarus had been able to turn and watch.

  Eha looked like the Empress of the Universe as she slithered out and stared at the man who seemed to be in charge.

  This was exactly the opposite of the mongoose and the cobra, whatever that was. The man wasn’t a rabbit, but he turned white around the edges.

  “You, too, princess,” he managed in a gruff tone.

  Eha stretched on her coil and rotated enough to place her hands on the side of the vehicle.

  “You like snakes?” she murmured as the man stepped close, too tough to admit intimidation, but at least more nervous than the others.

  Gloved hands ran down her sides and patted pockets, the man trying not to touch her tail with his legs. When he was done, she turned and smiled at him.

  “You missed one,” Eha offered, pointing at a pocket where a Human woman would have had breasts.

  Aileen hadn’t been groped, tail notwithstanding.

  The man hesitated.

  “Go on, then,” their leader snapped.

  Lazarus was sure Eha leaned into the man’s hand as he reached out to pat her chest. Must have learned that trick from Aileen, because he couldn’t remember ever telling her something that would cause her to do that with Humans.

  The man shivered, but did his job and then nodded to the other. Their Chief.

  Lazarus thought of the man as a Chief Petty Officer, a non-comm in charge of enlisted men. This group had that feel to it. Marines out causing unofficial trouble.

  “Right,” the CPO in charge said. “My orders were to pick up the two women and take them to the boss. You lot get back in the car and return to your ship or you’ll get hurt right now.”

  Oluchi started to say something and one of the others on this shore party grabbed him by the collar with a hard jerk.

  “I’d like that,” the CPO continued. “You get stupid and me’n’th’boys will see you put. Get me?”

  He was staring at Lazarus now, daring something.

  Six on one, unarmed when you had guns? Not my day.

  Lazarus nodded briefly to the CPO, admitting defeat.

  Live to fight another day.

  He grabbed Oluchi and propelled him into the car before the local did anything else stupid.

  If they made the mistake of letting him get to his ship, he could always escape into space, even if something happened to Aileen and Eha.

  And if those two were hurt, he would find the people who did it and bring Ajax back here. Kirov’s Lance could punch a hole in an atmosphere. The beam would attenuate a little, but only enough to annihilate an entire house and most of the yard from orbit to a depth of a few feet.

  Or maybe turn someone’s yacht into a puddle of smoking metal. With you aboard.

  He didn’t let any of that into his eyes, because he needed to stay alive.

  Addison might not stop at just killing everyone responsible, if something happened to Eha. He might burn the whole city to the ground, and Lazarus just might help at that point.

  Before Oluchi could speak, Lazarus climbed in and the CPO slammed the door shut. A moment later, the car began to move again.

  “I’m going to need your help,” Lazarus explained in a voice that felt like death as he looked back. “Whether you like it or not.”

  Behind them, the two women were being hustled into a van.

  “Oh, I’m already in, whatever it is,” Oluchi’s anger almost matched Lazarus now. “I recognized that man,
although he might not realize it.”

  “Oh?”

  “He works for Ardna,” Oluchi said.

  Lazarus nodded. He might not stop Addison at just destroying Tershuvi, if anything happened to Eha.

  It might be time to end Yisan as a pirate haven.

  Maybe as an inhabited planet.

  Ajax could handle that.

  Twenty-Three

  Oluchi

  Out of the frying pan, into the fire. Oluchi’s mom had said that about her son more than once, as he always tried to fast-talk his way out of trouble, instead of just accepting responsibility.

  Thirty years later, he still didn’t do it all that often, but this was different. This was a couple of innocent strangers that were going to catch a ration of his shit for nothing they did but be born and be in the same room as him. At this point, it really didn’t matter that they also might be his meal ticket.

  They hadn’t asked for the problems of Oluchi Pryce and his wandering dick. Ardna already hated him for giving both Leena and Fernanda someone more interesting to play with in bed or across the dinner table. Oluchi had seen the raw terror in the man’s eyes seeing Eha Dunham for the first time.

  Nearly pissed himself in fear. With most people, that was a useful bit of knowledge. He should have known that Strav Ardna would over-react on this one. Should have been expecting trouble on the way back, since the man had gotten a several hour head start on whatever grief he had in mind.

  “We’re going to need guns,” Oluchi turned to the other man in the back of the limo.

  “Oh, I got guns,” Lazarus said in a calm, deadly, off-hand manner than froze the blood in Oluchi’s veins.

  The stranger suddenly sounded just like a Rio Alliance naval officer, standing on his deck and getting ready to unleash a serious ass-whooping on someone.

  Did the aliens have a warship out there? Something big enough and mean enough to come down here and blow shit to Kingdom Come?

  If he was looking at the apocalypse descending, Oluchi really wanted to make sure he was on the right side. The other tycoons would be miffed, but not nearly as rageful as the eyes of this redheaded stranger.

  Terrible things were coming.

  “What do you need?” Oluchi asked.

  He could find anything. That was his super power.

  You want it? I know a guy.

  “Can you use a gun?” Lazarus asked, those sharp, green eyes boring in now. “And I mean kill someone because he’s in your way, or stepped out of the wrong door, or you don’t like the cut of his suit? That’s where this is going.”

  Oluchi shivered in spite of himself. You had to be hard and dangerous to make a living as a gambler. Sometimes, charming the ladies came with the gig. They required even more effort.

  Lazarus looked like a man about to kill everyone he met for the next twelve hours. Oluchi had known a few of those over the years. Most of them had been ex-soldiers who couldn’t handle civilian life, and had gravitated to a life of brutality.

  It never ended well.

  Lazarus of Bethany might just kick in the door and shoot everyone in the room, from the raw anger in his eyes.

  “I can,” Oluchi said simply.

  No braggadocio. No hype.

  Lazarus was clearly past any sort of showing off. Those two were just a pair of alien women that Oluchi knew. They were Lazarus’s friends. This had suddenly turned into the point in the movie where the hero rounded up his posse and went to rescue the princess.

  After killing everybody in the tower first.

  Oluchi took a deep breath and gulped past a throat that wanted to choke.

  “I know a guy,” he offered.

  Lazarus’s smile turned colder than the hell of Oluchi’s youth, back when religion still offered some greater purpose than pleasure.

  “I need information,” Lazarus said instead. “If that’s Ardna, where is he and where are Aileen and Eha going right now?”

  Oluchi pulled his comm and selected a contact number in town. Smart gamblers make friends and offer favors for cheap, so they can call things in later.

  Like now.

  “Hey, Oluchi,” a man’s deep, gruff voice came on the line. Xiuying Bălan. “How’s the gigolo business?”

  Oluchi kept the snarl to himself.

  “Good enough,” he replied. “Got a bigger problem tonight.”

  “Those alien chicks end up being too kinky for even you?” Xiuying asked with a crude laugh. “I might be willing to give them a go.”

  “Somebody just kidnapped them out of the back of my limo at gunpoint, Xiuying,” Oluchi said quietly. “Pretty sure I know who’s behind it. You doing anything tonight?”

  “I was working, but they can cover for me,” the man’s voice turned to a cold, steel blade. “Or hire a replacement. Ardna?”

  “Khan was there with a bunch of his friends,” Oluchi said. “Don’t figure he’s dumb enough to do something like this on his own.”

  “Where do you want me?” Xiuying asked.

  “We’re headed to the port,” Oluchi said. He turned to Lazarus. “At the ship?”

  Lazarus nodded.

  “Dock fifty-three,” the Rio Alliance officer said quietly.

  “Dock fifty-three, Xiuying,” Oluchi said. “Then I need to make some calls and see where he took them.”

  “Ten minutes,” Xiuying said. “No, make it twenty. Need to swing by the apartment for some things first.”

  “Thanks, Xiuying,” Oluchi said.

  “No, thank you for thinking of me,” Xiuying replied, cutting the signal.

  “That’s one,” Oluchi said to Lazarus.

  “Dangerous?”

  “Head bouncer in one of the rougher joints on the strip,” Oluchi offered. “Owes me some favors, and really hates Strav Ardna and his men for reasons best left unsaid right now.”

  “You can’t make me any more of an accessory to murder and mayhem than tonight’s going to be, Oluchi Pryce,” Lazarus sneered. “You do understand that I’m not playing even remotely nice now, right? There will be blood before this is over.”

  Oluchi nodded back at the man. It was like he was sitting with a complete stranger now, and not the guy he’d been drinking, eating, and chatting with for most of the last ten hours.

  This was who Lazarus of Bethany used to be. He and Xiuying would see eye to eye on a lot of things, at least metaphorically. Lazarus was too tall, and Xiuying too short, but yeah, murder and mayhem.

  Is the brass ring worth it, Oluchi?

  Twenty-Four

  Eha

  Eha kept herself calm as these Humans hustled her and Aileen into a boxy ground transport, surrounding them with guns at all times. Orders were gruff monosyllables, but they didn’t feel like they were intent on killing her and dumping her body on the side of the road.

  Addison might never stop hunting these men if that happened. While the thought warmed her, she’d prefer talking him out of doing something personally, from the deck of Ajax.

  Safe.

  They rode in tense silence as the vehicle careened around corners and drove right out at the limits of safety. At least the windows were glass, so she could see when they headed away from the port city of Tershuvi and out towards the shore of that immense, hostile ocean that covered so much of this stupid planet.

  Churquen didn’t swim worth a damn. Not like Yithadreph, who were born in water. She wondered if someone had managed to read her mind and understood how much terror she would have on open water, but these Humans were just goons. They weren’t good enough actors or professional enough thugs to refrain from saying something like that right now, even if just to taunt her.

  Aileen seemed to sense it, though. A hand reached out and took hers, squeezing it just enough. Eha tried to draw a breath deeper into her lungs and let calmness reach all the way to the sharp tip of her tail.

  The vehicle was caught in something of a traffic jam, but the driver kept largely to his lane and followed everyone. It was the middle of th
e night, so she wondered if the vehicles were fishers getting ready to head out, or folks from the coast that had gone into the city for the evening, and were returning home now.

  She kept her mouth tightly shut and studied the terrain. She remembered low mountains both north and south of here, but this area had appeared to be a broad river valley draining into a bay.

  There were lights down there when she looked. A small city, perhaps four or five thousand people, with low, small houses clustered together mostly on the left side of the bay, with several roads running like arterials from the waterfront itself.

  They followed the traffic down through the town and to the marina itself, only turning off at the end and going down a side street where many of the others ended up in a massive parking lot.

  Endless rows of vehicles, just parked and waiting for the owner to return. That brought home to Eha the relative wealth of the Humans, that everyone might own a private ground vehicle for personal transportation, and just leave it someplace while they were at work.

  On a station, you had tubes and slidewalks. On most planets there were well-funded mass transit systems, buses and trains to take you where you needed to be.

  Of course, upon comparison, that also made it nearly impossible to do something in private on an Innruld world. You couldn’t just pop into your personal vehicle, where nobody else might be able to follow you.

  Huh.

  She had never really appreciated how ease it must have been for the authorities to monitor dissidents and trouble-makers, back on Dormell or the Station. What if everyone could drive privately somewhere? Where an extra vehicle showing up to drop someone off might draw attention, rather than the regular bus swinging by.

  She needed to start a social and economic revolution, and not just a political one.

  What other useful things could she glean from the Humans?