“I’d still like to come.”
Ankari shrugged. “Fine with me.” She looked at Sergei.
As if he was going to object.
“I’m just the bodyguard,” Sergei said, keeping his tone indifferent. The last thing he needed was for Hazel to think he had some particular interest in Jamie. He shouldn’t have any interest in her.
“Off we go then,” Ankari said.
* * *
Jamie tried not to gawk like a tourist as she, Ankari, and Sergei took the high-speed moving sidewalks from the docks to the interior of the city, but everything from the cars crossing overhead on invisible air-bridges to the floating vendor carts that dispensed meals at the wave of a hand was new to her. Sure, she had been on four different planets and at least a dozen space stations in the months since joining up with Ankari and Lauren, but this was the first metropolis she had been in, and it was a wealthy one at that. Luxurious spa treatments were touted at every corner, along with thousand-aurum meals, adult amusement parks, and floating casinos that were bigger than her family’s entire farm back home. Marinth, the other cloud city, seemed a tiny outpost compared to this, not that Jamie had been given time to explore there.
The hospital was the first underwhelming building they encountered, a squat, three-story structure surrounded by skyscrapers and floating homes. Its old-fashioned glass windows longed for a cleaning, and the peeling paint on the walls would doubtlessly fall off if they were cleaned. The tired security kiosk that slumped against the wall by the front door wasn’t manned.
“I’m not sure if this place will be able to afford us,” Ankari murmured, “even with a group discount.”
Jamie didn’t know much about the appointment, other than the handful of words she had pulled out of Lauren, who had been preparing the specimens that Ankari now carried in a briefcase. “But you brought everything along, anyway?”
Ankari looked down at the briefcase. “Yeah, for these cases, I would give the specimens away, but I’d certainly rather make enough money to cover our costs.”
“What exactly does your business do?” Sergei asked.
It was the first time he had spoken since they left the docks, though Jamie had been aware of him watching their surroundings alertly and standing behind her and Ankari, keeping anyone from coming up too close behind them. Having a bodyguard was decidedly weird. Granted, he was Ankari’s bodyguard, but Jamie liked to think that he would expend some effort to protect her, too, if she was targeted.
“Do you want the long or short version?” Ankari asked as they stepped off the moving sidewalk.
“Short,” Jamie told him, a piece of friendly advice. Ankari wouldn’t burble on the way Lauren did, but she did know enough to give a very thorough answer, even if she ostensibly handled only the business’s accounting and marketing side.
“Short is fine,” Sergei said.
Jamie tucked strands of hair behind her ears, ones that had escaped her braids in the wind generated by the open-air sidewalk. She caught Sergei watching her movements, his eyes intent. His normal expression was on the intense side, as if he was always trying to figure someone out or decide if there was trouble around. It was a little intimidating. He seemed to realize he was staring at her and softened his face, giving her a slight bow. A thank-you for the advice? She wasn’t sure, but he returned to surveying their surroundings as Ankari spoke, and they walked toward the front door.
“We have a research part and a clinical part to our business,” Ankari said. “I won’t bore you with the details of the research we’re doing on ancient alien microbiota—” Sergei blinked a few times at that, “—but our current clinical work involves providing transplants of gut flora, giving people with compromised intestinal systems the microflora of a healthy and, of course, thoroughly screened person. There are numerous parasitic ailments that can be overcome this way, and a person who had previously suffered from all manner of gut dysbiosis can develop a healthy intestinal system after just a few treatments.”
Sergei touched his abdomen. “Why would someone have a compromised system to start with?”
“Any number of reasons from poor diet to extreme stress to past diseases to infections. Infections are particularly problematic in our system. We believe it’s because humans didn’t evolve here. We’re studying what remains of the ancient aliens’ microbiota—it’s all fossilized as you might imagine—in the hopes that we can use the same gut flora that they possessed to thrive here. Maybe more than thrive, since the aliens were purported to be similar to us but lived much longer and were healthier and stronger overall.”
“Huh.” Sergei leaned closer to Jamie as they stopped at the front door. “That was the short version?”
He had whispered it, but Ankari smirked back at them. “Sorry, I’ve had to write these things a thousand times for the marketing literature. It all sort of rambles out.”
“I did ask,” Sergei said.
“That’ll teach you.” Jamie grinned at him, and he paused again, his lips parted and his eyes intense as he looked at her.
Her grin faltered—had she said the wrong thing? Maybe she shouldn’t be teasing him, in light of what Sergeant Hazel had said. Or simply because he was supposed to be working, to be focused on protecting them.
Sergei winced slightly and looked away.
Ankari spoke into an intercom, and the door soon opened. Jamie hustled inside after her.
Despite the dilapidated exterior, the corridors inside were wide and clean. A cafeteria opened up to the left and a waiting room to the right, with a woman working behind a desk. A few of the floor tiles were chipped, but the remaining ones were polished and free of dust. The people sitting in the chairs, presumably waiting for service, were less tidy. A mix of white- and brown-skinned men and women, they wore clothes not much different from what Jamie and her family favored around the farm, long-sleeved cotton shirts and sturdy overalls, no hint of the Gar-zymes or other technological weavings that allowed garments to change colors, adjust sizes, or repel stains. That much was clear from the dirt smears and faded stains on the clothes, many of the overalls baggy and large on the gaunt frames of the people. Some had yellowed skin, shaking hands, bags under their eyes, and other signs of vitamin and mineral deficiencies. With tired, weathered faces, they all looked like they could use some extra meals. Now and then, one would glance toward the cafeteria, eyes full of longing, but the only people eating in there were men and women dressed in the hospital’s white and pastel green uniform.
“Those are the downsiders?” Jamie whispered.
Ankari gave her a grim nod, then walked to the desk.
“I’m beginning to see why they need help,” she muttered to herself, “and why one of them might throw away his or her life for a chance for… something better.”
She had been speaking to herself, thinking out loud, and hadn’t expected an answer, but Sergei said, “It’s likely the majority of their crops go to GalCon.”
“That’s how it was on my farm, too, but we still had enough to eat.” Not enough to ever amass any wealth, but that was the plight of farmers all over the system; at least her family owned the land and had the freedom to work it as they saw fit, so long as they made their annual quotas.
“My guess is that they’re being double-taxed.” Sergei spread a hand toward the ceiling—encompassing the entire floating city? “There’s not much in the way of industry or food production up here. The wealth these people enjoy must come from somewhere.”
“That’s despicable.” Jamie was probably being naive—she knew she was—and showing her sheltered youth, but she couldn’t keep from feeling indignation on these people’s behalf.
Sergei lifted a shoulder.
“You don’t think so?” she asked, a little disappointed. She wasn’t sure why. Someone who killed people for a living probably didn’t care much about the plight of humanity in general.
“Oh, it is,” he said, “but I’ve seen… much worse. Where I was born…” He
considered her face for a moment, then shook his head and said, “Never mind. Your friend is waving to you.”
Ankari was gesturing for them to join her, but that didn’t make Jamie forget Sergei’s words, the hint that he had grown up in unpleasant circumstances. Maybe his youth, whatever it had been like, accounted for why he had picked such a dubious career in the Fleet.
He paused before following her, frowning at something down the hall. Jamie looked but only glimpsed someone darting into a cross hallway.
“Trouble?” she asked.
“Maybe. If there is, I’ll take care of it.” Sergei pointed toward Ankari. She and the receptionist were heading through a door behind the desk.
Jamie hurried to catch up, though she couldn’t help but look at the people she passed, the forlorn faces watching her. There was a gaunt boy of eleven or twelve in the last chair, and she wished she had a candy bar or some other treat she could have given him. She caught Sergei giving the boy a long look, too, and wondered if he was as jaded and indifferent as his shrug had made him seem.
Jamie caught up to Ankari as she turned into an office down the corridor behind the waiting room. There might have been a door once, but it had been removed—or the hinges had rusted off.
An older woman in white and pastel green sat at a desk inside, no less than three holographic displays hovering in the air, showing accounts and medical records. She flicked a couple of them off and waved for Ankari to sit down. Jamie sat in a chair farther back from the desk.
After Sergei took a look around the office and skewered the doctor with a soul-piercing expression, he stepped into the hallway and leaned against the wall next to the doorjamb. From her seat in the back, Jamie could see his arm. She wondered if she should wait out there, too, since she had nothing to add to the meeting. Maybe she could talk to Sergei and ask him about the childhood he had hinted at. No, she shouldn’t bother him. He was working. She didn’t know why she was interested in his past. Some morbid curiosity about what might prompt a man to become an assassin?
“I appreciate you coming,” the doctor said. “The downsiders who are sent up here tend to be experts on equipment or have otherwise critical positions in the system, so the government prefers to keep them alive rather than finding and training replacements.”
“How magnanimous,” Ankari said. “What happens to the people who aren’t experts on anything except harvesting crops?”
The doctor spread her hands, a helpless expression on her face. “Trust me, I would prefer to help everyone and improve the conditions down there if it were possible, but we’re given an extremely stringent budget. We put everything toward helping patients.” She glanced toward the missing door. “And I do mean everything.”
Jamie followed the doctor’s gaze, again noting the rusty hinges. She also noted that Sergei’s arm wasn’t in sight anymore. Weird, he wouldn’t have left, would he? Not when he was supposed to be watching them.
She leaned closer to the doorway. He had probably shifted a few inches to the side. But even when she left her chair, she couldn’t see him. She lifted a hand toward Ankari and mouthed, “Be right back,” and stepped outside. Sergei wasn’t anywhere to be seen. Surely he hadn’t wandered off to the cafeteria or something, not two minutes into the meeting. If Ankari had been in there for hours, it might be understandable, but deserting so early? She barely knew him, but didn’t think that seemed like him. Then she remembered the person who had darted into a doorway and Sergei’s admission that there might be trouble. Had that person made another appearance?
Jamie glanced toward the office, wondering if either woman would care if she wandered off. They were engrossed in a conversation—that was Ankari’s negotiating face—so they probably wouldn’t notice. If there was trouble, Jamie should probably let Sergei handle it, but when there was a pause in the discussion in the office, she heard voices in the distance. They weren’t coming from the waiting room, but from somewhere beyond an intersection that lay in the other direction.
She spotted a lavatory sign near the cross hall and decided she might have to use the facilities. That would at least be an excuse for her to wander in that direction.
Not trying to silence the clomp of her work boots, she headed for the door. She doubted she could sneak so quietly that Sergei—or some bounty hunter who had Sergei-like training—wouldn’t hear her.
The voices became clearer as she walked down the hallway. There were two men speaking, and one sounded like Sergei. They stopped before she could make out what they were talking about. They had doubtlessly heard her. She pushed open the bathroom door, glad it did have a door, and it squeaked on rusty hinges. She took a step, but didn’t go in. She let the door fall shut. It squeaked again. She froze, wondering if the silly ruse would work to fool an assassin. Would the men start talking again, or would they know she was there? Judging by what she had heard, they were too far down the side corridor to see her. There was a little noise coming from other offices and hospital rooms along the hallway, so it wasn’t so quiet that they could hear her breathing. She hoped. For all she knew, Sergei had cyborg enhancements.
“Listen, Zharkov,” the speaker she didn’t recognize started up, “I see that you’re trying to get in with Mandrake Company, and it doesn’t take a genius to figure out why. I don’t want to compete with you in this. I know your reputation. But I’ve been doing a ton of research. I might know a few things you don’t. Like I just learned that Mandrake went down to the planet—not one of the cities, but to the actual planet. Did you know? He’ll be out in the open down there. An easier target than in the city, maybe. What say we work the job together and split the bounty, fifty-fifty?”
Jamie, listening in horror as the realization dawned as to what the man was talking about, stood absolutely still, hardly daring to breathe. After this thug—whoever he was—had admitted his plans, he wouldn’t risk letting a spy go, if he caught one, would he? She gulped. Maybe she should have gone into the lavatory, after all. But she couldn’t move now. She had to hear Sergei’s response. If he had one. Silent seconds ticked past.
“I work alone,” Sergei finally said, his voice even icier than it had been when he had spoken to Striker. “Mandrake’s mine. If you go after him, I’ll kill you. The only reason I’m not killing you right now is that I want you to tell anyone else in the guild you see. They cross me in this, and they’re dead.”
Jamie stopped breathing altogether. Mandrake’s mine. What could that mean except that Sergei planned to kill the captain himself?
Without warning, Sergei walked around the corner. He stopped when he spotted her. Jamie couldn’t tell from his expression if he was surprised to see her or not, but that might have been because she was too busy lunging into the lavatory to study it for long.
She rushed into one of the stalls, locked the door, put her back to it, and… immediately felt stupid. What? Did she think that the woman-in-a-dress symbol would keep an assassin from coming in to get her?
Groaning, she let her head clunk back against the door. What now?
Chapter 4
After Sergei checked to make sure Ankari was fine and still in her meeting, he returned to the lavatory door, put his back to the wall, lifted his knuckle to his mouth, and waited. He doubted Jamie would stay in there indefinitely, regardless of what she had heard, so he used those few moments to think.
What exactly had he said? How would she have interpreted it? Zhou had thought he was after Mandrake, so it had seemed wisest to go with that, to try to deter him and the other bounty hunters who lacked the specialized training Sergei had received. It had crossed his mind to admit he was working for Mandrake now, and that they would have to go through him to collect that bounty, but that wasn’t the truth, since Sergei was here with the girlfriend instead. That idiot Zhou had known Mandrake was down on the planet, too, but for all he knew, Sergei was just getting some quick information from Ankari and then would be on his way down to deal with Mandrake…
He sighed and
lowered his hand. His head hurt. There was a reason Fleet had put him into a combat unit and not anything that required a more cerebral capacity.
He was on the verge of pushing open the door and going in to talk to Jamie—at this point, he was certain there wasn’t anyone else in there—when it opened. Part way. Jamie looked out warily, grimacing when she saw him. He sighed again. That was not the expression he wanted to elicit from her. He wanted… nothing that made sense. He needed to stop himself from paying such close attention when she fiddled with her hair or smiled. She was noticing; he was sure of it. Why couldn’t she be mean? Or indifferent? Or haughty? God knew she had twice his IQ. Instead, she kept giving him friendly expressions, as if they were already comrades. At least she had been until she had overheard that conversation. Sergei couldn’t believe he had been fooled by that squeaky bathroom door.
“So,” he said, trying to sound casual—she hadn’t stepped into the hallway. “That was a bounty hunter, one I’ve come across a couple of times.” No need to explain that they were technically guild mates, since they were both dues-paying members. “If he’s here, others will be too. I’m sure some are down on the planet, trying to catch up with Mandrake himself, but there are more than a few cowards out there that will see his girlfriend as a way to set a trap for him.” Sergei kept an eye on that office door even as he tried to explain things to Jamie. He had already ensured that there wasn’t another way out and that the old, scratched window was too small for someone to climb through. “I know what it sounded like, but I was trying to scare him off. I’m not angling to get Mandrake.”
Jamie’s face was hard to read, and it usually wasn’t. That probably meant she didn’t believe him. He couldn’t blame her. Wouldn’t he say the same thing if he was angling to get Mandrake?
But she stepped out of the lavatory and said, “Good. Should we go back to the meeting?” There was a slight tremble to her hand when she extended it toward the office.
The Assassin's Salvation (Mandrake Company) Page 5