Eko (NINE Series, #1)

by Loren Walker

  * * *

  As Renzo worked on the Arazura flight console, his Lissome buzzed in his pocket. That familiar wave of panic came over him. Something terrible had happened.

  Just as quickly, he chastised himself for jumping to conclusions. Instead, he forced his brain to slow down and take step after step: turn the blowtorch off, lift his goggles, stretch out the ache in his neck and, finally, read the message.

  It was from Phaira: a few lines on how she had been accepted as a guest at the Jala Communia, and she’d managed to convince Yann to teach her about Ekos. She didn’t know how long she would stay.

  She’s not happy, Renzo mused, snorting to himself. I bet they aren’t too happy, either.

  Then his smile dropped. He hadn’t thought much about the actual confrontation to come with Huma, so absorbed in the Arazura’s construction. Was that really going to happen? Could he really get involved in something like that? Come to think of it, he hadn’t seen Anandi much either; she was working in a secret location, trying to uncover more information about Sydel’s location.

  “Something wrong?” The question came from one of the volunteers, crouched at the other end of the console, bundling red and blue wires together.

  “No,” Renzo said, thinking quickly. “Just getting a headache.”

  The man nodded. “Yeah, I know about that. People don’t understand how debilitating it is, head trauma.”

  “What do you know about it?” Renzo said shortly, fitting his goggles back over his eyes.

  The man tapped his forehead. “Frontal lobe. Headaches and seizures. Plus, sometimes I get these blinding flashes of light in my eyes, usually when I’m working. You?”

  Renzo paused, suspicious of the sudden admission. But he had never met another person with the same issues.

  “Fractured skull. Parietal lobe damage, mostly,” he finally admitted. “Some frontal lobe. Long-term memory loss. And yeah. Headaches. A lot of headaches.”

  The man nodded as he twisted wires into a compact rope, checking for any signs of rupture along the way. “You seem pretty functional for that much damage.”

  “Lucky me,” Renzo muttered, working on lighting his blowtorch again.

  “That accident take your leg, too?”

  Renzo’s irritation prickled again. “Why are you so curious?” he asked, pushing up the goggles again. “What, you want to see the stump? Who are you, anyway?”

  The man didn’t look up from his work. “I ask because I think I can help you.” He gestured at Renzo’s right foot. “At least, get you out of that awful thing and into something decent. I’m surprised you haven’t built something better.”

  Renzo blinked, taken aback by the judgment. It was a good question, though. Why hadn’t he built his own prosthetic?

  Then his Lissome beeped again. “Ren?” came a voice from his pocket.

  “Busy, Ani,” Renzo hissed.

  “You’re not that busy. I found her.”

  Renzo froze. Glancing to the right, he caught the volunteer’s eyes: they were golden, like a cat’s.

  Clearing his throat, he turned away and stumbled to his feet. The prosthesis bit into his right knee joint, as it always did, permanent grooves etched into his skin. He did his best to restrain a wince of pain.

  “I’m Theron, by the way. Let’s talk later,” the man said, his attention back on the wiring.

  Renzo limped off the ship, heading for the back of the factory. Inside the old accounting office, Anandi was a tiny silhouette in a glowing blue field.

  “What did you - ?” Renzo began. Then his eyes adjusted, and he saw Emir sitting next to his daughter, their exposed arms, and the blood transfusion tube that linked them together.

  Catching sight of Renzo, Emir leaned forward and stopped the flow.

  “It hasn’t been long enough,” Anandi protested, glancing at Renzo. “It’s okay. I trust him.”

  “It’s fine for now,” Emir said, unhooking the transfusion tube with expert hands. Wrapping it in a cloth, he stowed it away in a satchel, along with other steel tools. “You have work to do.”

  As Emir exited the room, Anandi rubbed the skin around the port, avoiding Renzo’s stare as she turned back to her screens. Her fingers became a flurry of activity: camera angles adjusted, images magnified. Her screens showed multiple perspectives of a vendor mill choked with travelers, bright hair colors, dull clothing, faces in profile and out of sight.

  Renzo peered over her shoulder. Occasionally, he caught himself staring at her arm. There was a spot of blood on her sleeve.

  “Blood disorder,” Anandi muttered, her eyes never leaving her work. “He needs transfusions. That’s why we stay close.”

  Renzo tried to think of what to say in response.

  Then Anandi nodded. “Wait. There. That’s her, right?”

  On the video, Sydel stood against a gray wall, separate from the sea of movement. Wrapped in a navy blue cloak, her skin was sallow, her back stooped. As the projection played, her eyes lifted to look into the camera; straight into Renzo’s eyes, it seemed. One of her hands emerged, and she rapped the wall twice with her knuckles. Then she shuffled out of camera range.

  Anandi replayed the five seconds of video. No question, Sydel intentionally looked into the camera.

  “This was timestamped two days ago, from a vendor mill in the south. No sign of anyone matching Huma’s stats, though,” Anandi said. “And Sydel doesn’t show up again.”

  Renzo stared at Sydel’s frozen image. His gaze moved to the girl’s hand. “Why the knock on the wall?” he wondered out loud. “What’s that wall? Why draw attention to it?”

  With a flick of her fingers, Anandi magnified the image by ten, then ten again. Renzo and Anandi leaned in to study the area around Sydel’s hand. Nothing. Just a grey slab, like a million others in the world.

  Still, she was alive.

  “Can you send that image to Cohen and Phaira?” Renzo asked. “They could probably use the good news.”

  “Already done,” Anandi mumbled. By the lines of code, she was already busy creating an algorithm to access local surveillance cameras and identify Sydel if she turned up. Renzo flopped down in one of the executive chairs. His right thigh ached. He rubbed it, mulling over what he’d seen, both onscreen and in the room.

  A beep: an incoming call.

  “That was quick,” Anandi said. She waved her hand to generate another screen to her right. Renzo reached over and pulled it in front of him, waiting for the connection to establish.

  Finally, a translucent Phaira shimmered into view. Her hair was pulled back, and shadows cut into the angles of her face. “There’s a message, Ren.”

  “From who?”

  “I didn’t tell you at the time. I wasn’t sure if I should tell you or Co,” Phaira explained in a rush. “Remember when you were searching Huma’s old ship? And I had you focus on the door with the burn marks? There was a message there: a psychic etching, I guess it’s called. It said: Find the missing Hitodama.”

  “You can see psychic etchings?” Anandi interrupted, leaning in front of Renzo. “That’s so interesting! I can’t see anything, I don’t have a spiritual bone in my body, I wish I did….”

  “Come on,” Renzo grumbled, pushing at Anandi to move aside. She stuck out her tongue and shifted back into her seat.

  “Anyways,” Phaira said with a tiny smile. “I think, somehow, Sydel knew that by finding Emir, we’d be able to meet Anandi and work with her. And she’d save our lives,” she added awkwardly.

  “That’s true!” Anandi exclaimed. “So this girl can see into the future, too? That’s - ”

  “Phair,” Renzo interrupted. “You said there’s a message on the wall. What does it say?”

  Phaira’s amusement faded. “Feel the fear.”

  All three were silent, processing those words. Anandi was the first to speak. “What kind of message is that?”

  “I don’t know,” Phaira said. “But she left it for a
reason.” She glanced off-screen. “I have to go. Stay low, stay safe. I’ll call soon.”

  The connection broke, the screen collapsing into itself and disappearing.

  “She thinks we’re in trouble?” Anandi asked quietly.

  Renzo rubbed the knuckles of his left hand with his right. “I really don’t know.”

  “Well, I’ll tell you, Ren: the network is getting hot,” Anandi said. “There’s a rise in encrypted transmissions. Something is going to happen, and soon. And it’s probably not for the greater good.”

  V.

  Cohen made his way through the city of Daro: into industrial parks, past abandoned mills and down unfamiliar paths, the few he could find. He didn’t note any street signs on purpose. He wanted to be lost to everyone, and alone.

  His stomach ached. He had sharp pains in his chest, too, where the scars lay. Phantom pain was common after trauma, he read that somewhere. Sometimes, he even thought he smelled burning skin.

  Finally, Cohen ducked into a back alley, behind copper pipes running vertically up the apartment building. Then he took out his Lissome and brought up the still image. Light and noise streaked over him as transports rumbled overhead. He didn’t notice.

  It didn’t even look like Sydel. His nausea grew at the weird, haunted look in her eyes, at the sickly tinge to her skin.

  The first time he saw her, he was running through the desert, his heart in his throat, following the signal of Phaira’s solar tracker, the first indication of her whereabouts in weeks. But when they found the Communia, he couldn’t help but stare at the girl with the braided hair and big brown eyes. Funny: she was barely five feet tall, but everyone in that place was hyper-aware of her presence. Especially that man, Yann.

  Then, when the Vendor Mill bomb went off, she stayed with Cohen, even when he pretended like he wasn’t in pain, terrified and reliving the explosion in his dreams. She smelled like soap and vanilla. When they talked, she listened without getting distracted or impatient. It felt like Sydel saw him, really saw him, not just as a little brother, or someone slow and stupid.

  And he saw her, too. She was just young and confused, like him. Always a step behind everyone else, unsure of the right thing to say or do. From the first time they spoke, his instinct was to protect that girl from the world.

  Nox noted that instinct on his first day of training.

  “A team needs multiple components to thrive,” Nox told him. “Defense is just as important as offensive. That’s your place in all of this.”

  “What - what were you?” Cohen said, stuttering a little. They were the same size, physically, but the man had extensive military experience, been a part of overseas missions that Cohen couldn’t even comprehend. “I mean, on the team? When you were working with Phaira.”

  Nox half-smiled. “Direct action operations and artillery. Sometimes counter-terrorism. Your sister was all about unconventional warfare and direct reconnaissance. The star of the show.”

  Cohen thought he heard resentment in the man’s voice. Then Nox grinned, and Cohen dismissed it.

  The former soldier took Cohen’s training seriously. Nox had a connection at the Daro infantry training ground and he worked with Cohen for hours, showing him how to use howitzers and heavy mortars. Cohen learned how to fire a number of weapons, how to adjust for recoil, how to reload in seconds. When he peered through the scope of a Vacarro sniper rifle, it felt natural. Then he blasted three targets, one after another, over two hundred feet away. A rush of pride coursed through him, and Nox seemed to agree. “So that’s where your talent lies,” the man mused. “Very interesting.”

  Cohen might have been a natural sniper, but Nox still insisted on physical combat. Nox encouraged Cohen to do as he did: focus on overpowering and overwhelming the target. Both men were over six feet and thickly built, so they naturally unnerved the opponent on first look. Cohen already had high muscle endurance to bodyweight ratio from years of physical labor work; vital, Nox pointed out, for balance and maneuvering. The key was to surprise the opponent with their agility: quick strikes on vulnerable points, or throwing them to the ground with a shoulder toss.

  The biggest lesson for Cohen, though, was learning to trust his instincts.

  “You’re a follower,” Nox said bluntly. They were back in his apartment after a long day, and Cohen longed for sleep. But Nox confronted him in the spare bedroom. “There’s nothing wrong with that. Not everyone can be a leader. But when you’re in a dangerous situation and alone, you have to be able to act independently. And you need the mental toughness to stick it out.”

  “I’m not stupid,” Cohen snapped. “I can think for myself.”

  “Can you?” Nox straddled a chair and stared at Cohen. “What would you have done about Huma?”

  Cohen balked. “I did do something. We tried to stop them -”

  “And it blew up in your face,” Nox finished. “You’re not listening. Was it the right thing to do?”

  “It’s what Phaira decided,” Cohen said. “She knows more than I do about it.”

  “She’s not perfect. She doesn’t know everything,” Nox shot back. At Cohen’s recoil, Nox seemed to check his temper. “Think about it,” he continued in a calmer tone. “Was she right?”

  This is a mistake. He thought it when Phaira brought up the idea to storm Huma’s carrier ship, though he tried to mask it with bravado. But she was so certain, so experienced, and he’d always wanted to do what she did.

  “I don’t know,” Cohen finally said.

  “You know.”

  “Well, I don’t know what we should have done.”

  “Here’s your next assignment,” Nox said, rising to his feet. “Think about what went wrong. Then figure out what you should have done instead. With or without Phaira.”

  When Nox left the room, Cohen boiled with anger. What did he know about any of it? Who was he to pass judgment on his sister, on his family?

  His anger didn’t dissipate. So that night, as Nox snored in the next room, Cohen left the apartment. He didn’t know where to go, but he didn’t care.

  Within minutes, though, the cold began to seep through his jacket; it was colder outside than he realized. But he didn’t want to go back yet.

  Shivering, Cohen searched the trash-filled streets for somewhere to warm up. As he walked, he rubbed the thick scar on the back of his left hand, soft and sensitive to the dampness. Stupid dare for the fat kid: take a rana coin and scrape it against the back of your hand, back and forth, until you admit pain. Backed into a corner by three bullies, he decided to beat them all. By the time he was done, a bloody groove lay between his bones. He’d won, but no girl wanted to hold that worm-scarred hand. He wondered if Sydel had noticed it.

  There was a sudden muffled sound, which quickly faded away. Cohen turned in place, confused. It came again. The ground rumbled under his feet.

  Cohen tracked the sound to a rusted-over metal door, tucked in an abandoned warehouse. Curious, he yanked on the door handle. Despite the rust, the door opened silently. A pinprick of light shone at the bottom of a flight of stairs. As he descended, Cohen tensed for any kind of trouble.

  The basement teemed with cheering bodies. Two men fought in a makeshift ring in the center of the space. One of the fighters spat up a mouthful of blood. Everyone seemed to scream in unison, as bookies yelled and waved fistfuls of money. Cohen kept to the shadows and near the exit, intending to stay for only a moment. But he was gradually sucked into the bouts, one after another, men and women of all ages in combat.

  It was fascinating to watch the outcomes: who prevailed, and who crumbled within minutes. It had nothing to do with size; no, the ones who were successful had the stamina and temperament to outlast their opponent, or else they lashed out with well-placed brutal strikes that ended the match in seconds. And with both, so much of it was influenced by attitude. Just like Nox said: overwhelm and intimidate.

  Phaira just had to look at someone, and they shriveled int
o themselves. She was probably a big hit on the circuit. Maybe she had even fought in this basement. Cohen took in the exposed pipes overhead, the stagnant heat, the smell of sweat and blood. Did she rank near the top of the roster? Was she ever high on mekaline when she fought? How bad did it get in those months after she vanished from their apartment? She wouldn’t talk about her time away. There was just a void between the day he found her, and the night she ran.

  On that night, Cohen woke to the sound of his siblings’ whisper-yelling. He crept down the hallway, trying to make as little noise as possible.

  In the shadows of their tiny living room, Phaira hissed unintelligibly at Renzo. He whispered back, waving his hands and clenching them in front of her face. Phaira smacked them away. The sweet smell of mekaline drifted down the hallway; Cohen recognized it immediately.

  Then Renzo grabbed Phaira by the upper arms. A loud bang reverberated through the apartment. Renzo had shoved Phaira into the windowsill. As she straightened, Cohen saw the angry glint in her eyes. He knew a fight when it was brewing.

  But when he ran to break it up, Renzo had already left the apartment, slamming the door behind him. The sound of his heavy limp and cane echoed down the stairwell. Phaira remained in the darkness. When Cohen touched her shoulder, she’d recoiled from the touch. Her eyes were shiny with despair, her throat still bandaged from the crowd assault. Cohen froze at the sight, grappling with what to say.

  But before he could speak, she had retreated to her bedroom.

  And the next day, she was gone.

  Cohen still hadn’t forgiven his sister, deep down, for leaving him behind like that.

  Nox is right, Cohen mused as he watched the last match of the night. I have to make my own decisions. They are my family, but Phaira is a mess. Ren is completely lost. The only thing I know is that I owe it to Sydel to find her.

  VI.

  "After you left, I ran into a friend last night.”

  Cohen tried very hard to muster a look of interest as Nox shuffled around the apartment, talking. “I told him I was training you. And he was really impressed, asked a bunch of questions about you. You won’t meet him, of course, but word is getting out - ”

  Nox kept going, but Cohen tuned him out. Instead he counted the number of days passed since he had arrived. Three weeks? What was taking so long?

  Though the training started with an exhilarating rush, Nox’s methods were growing erratic, equal parts informative and confusing. Instead of the drills from the first week, Nox’s focus changed to recounting all of his missions within special forces. Sometimes he even reenacted certain events, with Cohen as the stand-in.

  And at night, another version of Nox came out. Those grand tales continued at the bar, where Nox’s group of friends, law patrol, some firefighters and military personnel, swilled liquor and traded stories. The same stories, Cohen soon realized, every night.

  Pressured to join their company, Cohen drank, he laughed, he got tangled in shadowy corners with girls with no name. If he acted any other way, Nox and his friends would tease him mercilessly, so he went through the motions. He wouldn’t smoke the mekaline when it was brought out, though, or try any of the other drugs, so Nox and his friends still had the opportunity to poke fun at him. But Cohen just watched them smoke and snort, and waited for an opportunity to leave.

  One night, when Nox passed out, Cohen crept out of his bedroom window. The moon was out, blazing white, illuminating the rotting city. It was second nature now, for him to navigate one road and then another, winding his way to that rusted door and the roar of the crowd.

  But as Cohen watched the last two combatants of the night prepare for battle, a hand clapped down on his shoulder.

  “So this is where you’ve been sneaking off to!” Nox laughed, his breath reeking of alcohol. “So secretive! What, you thought I didn’t know about this place? I come all the time! Hey, are they still taking bets?”

  Cohen kept his eyes forward. Decorated, accomplished, and you act like a damn fool, he thought.

  “Hey Cohen, remember that guy I told you about?” Nox sang. “This is him! Keller and Keller’s friend, this is Co, the kid I’m working with....”

  Cohen glanced to his right. Keller had short black hair, sandy skin and a sharp profile. Nothing remarkable. Keller pushed through the crowds in the direction of the ring, and Nox followed, waving a fistful of rana.

  Someone stepped up to take Keller’s place. Cohen looked over again, and then up. A rarity: this man was even taller than Cohen, with long, straight black hair tied back.

  “Cohen, right?” the man said. “I’m Theron.”

  He extended his hand. Halfheartedly, Cohen shook it. “Friend of Nox’s, huh?” he asked. “Are you an officer, too?”

  Theron ignored the question. “Nox is your teacher?” His tone was skeptical. “You don’t look like you need his help.”

  “He’s not - ” Cohen scoffed, and then stopped. Nox was still Phaira’s friend. “He’s a good guy,” he said instead. “I’m learning a lot. I am.”

  In the ring, the combatants finished taping their hands, and acknowledged each other with a nod.

  “So were you the friend Nox was talking about?” Cohen finally spoke up, shrugging at the same time. He didn’t care, but it felt like something should be said. “Talking about my training?”

  “He’s an idiot,” Theron said. “Don’t listen to anything he says.”

  Cohen recoiled with surprise. Theron noticed, and his tone of voice changed. “No, it’s not me he’s referring to. But how does your friend know Keller?”

  Cohen shrugged again. “I don’t really care. I’ve heard enough war stories to last me forever. It’s not going to help me - ”

  He didn’t finish the sentence. Frustration bubbled up in his stomach. What was he still doing in Daro? How much longer was he going to wait around for direction?

  “So what do you need, then?”

  Cohen glanced over at Theron, but the man was watching the fight.

  The answer popped into Cohen’s head immediately. To be taken seriously.

  Instead, Cohen gave the second answer he could think of. “The truth, for once.”

  Theron nodded. “I understand that.”

  A sudden roar turned their heads. One of the combatants was unconscious on the mat, the other walking away. Nox suddenly appeared, followed by Keller. Cohen tried to sound bored as he asked: “Bet on the wrong one?”

  “One kick! That’s the whole fight? Come on,” Nox groaned.

  “You should leave,” Theron muttered to Cohen, buttoning the panels of his overcoat. “Don’t speak to Keller, he has nothing good for you.”

  But Cohen barely heard him. In the sea of faces around the ring, one stood out: a long, rat-like face with pale pink burns on one side, yelling at the fallen opponent. Familiar. Where did he know that guy?

  Then it clicked: Meroy. The warehouse, the bombing. Cohen assumed that the man was killed. Apparently not.

  “You know that guy?” Nox asked. Keller glanced at the two of them, one eyebrow raised.

  “Yeah,” Cohen said. “Hold on.”

  He wove through the departing crowds. He didn’t know what he was going to do. But it felt like a signal for action, Meroy alive and in front of him.

  Meroy picked up on his approach; the man’s back curved and his eyes went narrow. Then something clicked in Meroy’s face. “Wait, I know you,” he said, straightening and looking Cohen up and down. “How do I know you? Are you here to collect? Who do you work for?”

  Cohen drew himself up to his fullest height.

  “For me,” came a voice from behind.

  Cohen deflated, confused. Then he realized that Theron stood at his side, glaring down at Meroy.

  The weasel man went pale, his mouth dropping open. Cohen was dumbstruck. Why? What was going on?

  Meroy raised both hands, palms out. “I’m not making any trouble with your man, sir,” he deferred. “I don’
t even know him.”

  Sir?

  But Cohen couldn’t let this opportunity pass. “You know me. From the warehouse bombing.”

  A flash of recognition lit up Meroy’s eyes. “I didn’t have anything to do with that. Clearly! You’re Phaira’s brother, right? Well, your sister contacted me! I hadn’t heard from her for weeks, she never showed for her last bout, I assumed she overdosed in some alley...”

  “You don’t monitor your fighters?” Theron asked sharply. “Or their drug problems?”

  Cohen winced, even as anger bubbled in his blood. Meroy was the dealer. He’d gotten her on mekaline, he knew it.

  “Not mine, sir,” Meroy protested. “Booking and promotions only, I don’t represent them. I would have considered it, though; she was a great prospect. You know, I lost a lot of money when she didn’t show up for that last fight - she owes me for breaking her contract.”

  Meroy turned to Cohen. “You can work it off if you’re interested, kid, and more. Big guy like you - or maybe I should just take her in for the bounty reward? Heard it’s up to 300,000 rana now - ”

  A streak of red flashed past Cohen, grabbed the yelping Meroy and wrestled him to the ground.

  “Get off!” Meroy roared. “What are you doing?”

  But Nox was in a frenzy, grabbing at Meroy’s hair, his right fist driving down again and again.

  Flushing with humiliation, Cohen hauled Nox off of Meroy. The other man cowered on the floor, his mouth bloodied, but Nox kept swinging. Cohen caught sight of Theron, looming above them all, his face twisted into disgust. “Walk away, kid,” the man said. “Don’t look back.”

  Then he was gone, and the click of safeties reverberated through the basement. Meroy’s associates had emerged, a semi-circle of firearms now aimed at Cohen and Nox’s heads.

  Cohen pushed Nox towards the stairs. “We’re going,” he announced to the gun barrels. “Don’t shoot. We’re going.”

  The cold air assaulted Cohen’s lungs as he trudged in the direction of Nox’s apartment. Six feet behind, Nox stumbled, rambling under his breath. A wave of repulsion hit Cohen at the sounds, the smell of it.

  Then Cohen heard his sister’s name. He spun around. Nox almost ran into him, skidding in the light layer of snow. “What about Phair?” Cohen demanded. “What are you saying now?”

  Nox pushed him away with a snort. “Personal relations. You don’t want to know.”

  Nox? And Phaira?

  “Long time ago, buddy,” Nox added with a snort. “Just a couple of times. Then she wasn’t interested anymore.”

  “You’re right; I don’t want to hear about it,” Cohen snapped. He stomped down the street, willing for Nox’s apartment to appear.

  But Nox continued to talk. “She’s a cold one, you know,” he called from behind, his words slurred. “When she needs a warm body, it’s good. Then the next day, nothing. What’s that about? I stick up for her, I defend her, and for what? You know, I should come with you guys on this Huma mission, I’m rusty, but I’m still ready to - ”

  Cohen reached the apartment first. He walked straight into his room, shut the door and locked it. Then he flopped onto the bed, his feet dangling over the edge, and put his pillow over his head.

  Eventually, Nox stopped banging on his door. The weight of Cohen’s pillow grew heavier with each breath in and out. He was so tired of stupid people, of stupid comments…

  A sharp knock on the door startled Cohen awake He had barely moved during the night, the mattress cutting into his ankles. When he lifted his head, it felt like an anvil was dragging his skull down.

  The knocking started again.

  “Get out of here, Nox!” Cohen groaned.

  “Co,” came Nox’s voice, low and serious. “I’m leaving.”

  Grumbling, Cohen wrenched his body up from the bed, yanked off the soggy boot on one foot and padded across the room.

  Nox waited outside. He had changed clothes, and shaved. A satchel was slung over his shoulder. His eyes gleamed with excitement. Cohen heard movements in the living room; he craned his neck to see two shadows on the wall. “What’s going on?”

  “I’ve got a job,” Nox said under his breath. “Contract work. I don’t know how long I’ll be gone.”

  “Oh,” Cohen said, taken aback. “With who?”

  “Remember Keller from last night? Well, he came to recruit me. Personally.” The word was framed with pride.

  Cohen’s head swam. Should he go to Ren, or find Phaira? The thought of that creepy Jala Communia made him shudder. Maybe Ren would be better, him and all the technology people. “What kind of work?”

  “I can’t tell you,” Nox murmured. “Sensitive mission. High risk. But don’t worry, I’ve worked with them before,” he added with a wink. “I’ll catch up with you in a few days.”

  And with a crisp turn on his heel, Nox walked back into the living space.

  Cohen sighed. He should see him off; it was the polite thing to do. Then he would pack up and figure out where to go.

  That man from last night, Keller, paced the circumference of the living room. Another man was with him; dressed in a slim-cut grey suit, he had a full head of white hair on a young tanned face. They both looked up at Nox’s entrance. Uncomfortable, Cohen nodded at the two men in greeting. Neither of them reacted. Instead, they studied Cohen, their gaze running up and down.

  The back of his neck prickled. Cohen did his best to ignore them, and called out to Nox: “I’ll just head out tomorrow, all right? Don’t worry about me.”

  “Thanks, kid,” Nox grinned as he stepped through the threshold of the front door.

  Then he waited. But the two men didn’t move.

  “Are we going?” Nox called over to them.

  “In a moment,” Keller said. Under the fluorescent light, Cohen could see thin spidery scars crawling up one eye. His pale blue eyes never blinked. “Cohen Byrne.”

  “Yeah,” Cohen said, wary. “What?”

  “You speak to him with respect,” the white-haired man snapped.

  “Hey!” Nox exclaimed, striding back into the living space. “Easy, Xanto, he’s just a kid.”

  Keller ignored Nox. “How would you like to earn some rana, Cohen?”

  Nox dropped his satchel. In three steps, he was across the room and in front of Cohen. “No,” he said firmly. “You hired me. I’m ready to go, so let’s go.” His voice dropped in volume, a warning in every word. “He’s a kid. He’s off-limits.”

  Keller smiled thinly. “You said you wanted me to meet him, Nox. I have, and I’m impressed. Isn’t that what you wanted?”

  Was Cohen crazy or did Nox’s face turn red? “I wasn’t thinking straight. Just - let’s go. I’m ready to go.”

  What was going on? Who were these men?

  Tension billowed, hot and smoky in the small apartment. No one moved.

  Finally, Nox turned his head to the side. There was panic in his command to Cohen: “Get out of here.”

  Cohen jumped back and sprinted for his room. The sounds of fighting followed him down the hallway. Cohen was halfway out the window when he heard Nox scream. A bellow of pain followed, and a dull thud. Cohen craned his neck to see into the living room. The lower half of Nox’s body was visible on the floor, convulsing.

  Cohen’s feet hit the carpet and he ran.

  Xanto was closest. Cohen grabbed him by the collar, spun and threw Xanto headfirst into the wall.

  Keller stood over Nox’s body. He held a shock-round in one hand, still crackling. At the sound of his partner’s crash, Keller turned, his bloodied face exposed.

  A flash of blue. Cohen dodged the electric blast and tackled Keller. The current surged past him and struck the wall. The shock-round flew across the room. Springing back onto his feet, Cohen pivoted and struck Keller’s sternum with the heel of his boot. Just as the man coiled into himself, Cohen snatched him by the lapels, his free hand balling into a fist.

  Then everything went
white. Searing pain tore through his body. Cohen felt his body drop, and his head hit the carpet.

  Then something jammed into his spine and everything went black.