With laborious care, Proton took his first step down the hallway.
Nothing.
No surprise attack.
No sudden charge.
Up ahead he could see the doorway to freedom. Proton gathered himself, and took a second, more purposeful step forward. He was mastering his fear now. The urge to run was being replaced by the urge to not appear afraid. He took a third step.
“Going somewhere, Proton?” came Restive’s voice from just over his shoulder.
Proton shrieked, spun around and came face to face with Restive Pro.
“Meep!” was the best he could muster before the rest of his fragile mind went to look see if it could catch up with his sanity.
Restive sighed, then smiled to herself as Proton crumpled to the floor.
“Boss,” her F.R.B. said, “Incoming message from Prio.”
“Go ahead,” Restive rumbled.
“Mistress Pro?” Came the voice of the Lord High Prime Minister of Prio. “I have a mission for your consideration.”
“I’m not interested,” Restive said.
“Very well.” The Prime Minister sounded disappointed. “Thank you for your time. I felt that a challenge of this stature should at the very least be offered to you first, but I will attempt to find someone who is available, or capable of handling the operation.”
Restive bristled at the implied insult. The cigar she had been raising to her mouth stopped and she glared at the F.R.B. on her belt.
“What’s the job?” She asked.
“I would not wish to take up anymore of your precious time...” the Prime Minister said.
“Cut the crap and tell me the job,” Restive interrupted.
“Very well,” the Prime Minister said. “We have a certain problem that requires your professional services. Two individuals are, we believe, traveling to Sevres Prime. We wish them to be intercepted and terminated.”
Restive lit her cigar and puffed a large cloud of pink smoke into the air. “Why is that a job that you need me for?”
“One of the targets we feel will prove to be a challenge, and we are unsure as to the abilities of the second, but we feel that caution on our part will suit our needs better.”
“Who?”
“The one we have little information on is from a primitive planet called Pangaea. Our sources suggest that the planet is populated by a savage race, which is why we felt it better to be careful.”
“And the one you know?” Restive was beginning to tire of the way the Prime Minister seemed to take forever to get to the point.
“The other is an individual you have some experience with.”
The tone of smug self-satisfaction was barely concealed in the Prime Minister’s voice. “The other is Lu Pillah.”
Restive dropped the cigar.
“Did you say what I thought you said?”
“Special Agent Lu Pillah, yes.”
Restive leaned back against the wall and considered this new piece of information.
“I assume you are now interested in taking the commission?” the Prime Minister asked.
Restive didn’t answer.
“I can arrange the usual amount to be transferred to your account if you wish to take the job,” the Prime Minister said.
“That’s fine for the Pangaean, but for Pillah, the price is double,” Restive said.
“Very well. I will make the necessary arrangements and forward what information we have managed to gather. I look forward to paying the balance when you have successfully completed your mission.”
There was a slight buzz as the Lord High Prime Minister of Prio broke the connection.
“Jet,” Restive addressed her F.R.B. “Start the pre-flight checks and get the ship ready for takeoff.”
“As you command,” the F.R.B. responded.
“And make sure that you check the account for that payment.”
“Very well, boss.”
Restive headed for the door at the end of the corridor, stepping over the broken bodies of the Bolch Gang.
“The current mission, boss?” Jet asked.
Restive paused and looked back at the lifeless gang and the unconscious Proton.
“Screw that.” She spat.
“Your reputation?”
“What’s the good of having a reputation if no one is ever alive to pass it on?” Restive said. “When he wakes up, Proton will offer the kind of first-hand endorsement of my unique talents that is priceless. You can’t buy that kind of advertising, y’ know?”
Chapter Seventeen
Once Kirk and Lu were safely on board the stringer, a barrage of small robots swarmed past them and began welding the compressed loader to the hull of the freighter. Kirk couldn’t help but think that perhaps Lu had been speaking more seriously than he imagined when he saw the swarm of repair robots, as they did in fact bear an uncanny resemblance to trash cans. Of course, that could just be the F.R.B. interpreting the visuals after the suggestion by Lu had been made, but nonetheless, the idea that all that stood between him and a dreadfully frightening death back out in the wormhole was this rag-tag bunch. Well, it didn’t make for the most relaxing thoughts. Lu assured him this was a temporary fix and would hold until more permanent repairs could be made.
Outside the toilet they had blasted into was a small cabin that held two bunks and not a great deal more. Lu told Kirk to wait there while she went to find where Dexter Sitee was going and what help he would be.
Kirk decided to sit down and wait for Lu to return, but found the bunks to be not really the right size for him to sit on comfortably. As he swung his legs up and lay back on the hard bunk, he idly considered just how far he had traveled since he left for work that morning, then realized that it must have been yesterday, possibly longer, and in all that time he’d not had anything like a decent amount of sleep. The last thing he remembered thinking was that inside the ship, the sounds of their descent through the breech in space was a gentle vibrating hum. Quite relaxing really.
When Kirk woke up the ship was no longer generating the steady vibrations that had eased his passage to sleep. He assumed the ship had emerged from the wormhole and was either traveling the last part of its journey in normal space, or had reached its final destination and was hanging amongst the stars like it had been the first time he’d seen it.
A sudden and disconcerting thought occurred to him, and he sat bolt upright, smacking his head on the bunk above. What if Lu had left him? What if Lu had been wrong about this Sitee guy? What if she was dead and he was now a hostage, or worse, destined to be the main exhibit at some intergalactic zoo. He’d seen the Twilight Zone, he knew the way these things played out.
Then a strangely reassuring thought made its presence felt at the back of his head. What if Lu was gone? Was that such a bad thing? Since she had taken over his life, he’d been blasted to Titan; almost killed outside a Southern Fried Chicken franchise where he found that chicken was not what he thought it was; he’d been vaporized down to his basic molecular level, then zipped across the universe faster than light, which he knew was down right impossible; been captured and forced to remain as the permanent house guest of a bunch of obviously insane giant bugs; only to escape down what had to be the most terrifying tunnel he had ever experienced. So what if Lu had gone? Could things really get any worse?
“Wake up, sleeping beauty!” came the bellowing voice of Captain Dexter Sitee as the door to the small cabin flew open and bounced off the wall.
Outside the cabin was a great deal brighter, and for a moment, all Kirk could see was the immense silhouette of the ship’s captain. Kirk immediately pulled out the P.R.P. Lu left with him and aimed it at the figure. He wasn’t exactly sure why he did this, but he felt that just in case Lu had been dispatched he’d better let this gian
t know that humans would not be so easy to subdue. Then Dexter switched on the light in the cabin, and Kirk lost his grip on the gun as it slipped from his weak-muscled hand.
The brief seconds it took for Kirk to regain the use of his body, and more importantly, the ability to think straight again, seemed to lag for hours.
“Cas... Casio?” He stammered to his F.R.B.
“What?” snapped Casio testily. “I was in down time. My power cells don’t last forever y’ know? I need some recharge time!”
“You are working Okay aren’t you?” Kirk had not moved his frozen gaze from Dexter who still filled the doorway and was now grinning down at his passenger.
“Of course I’m working! I’m always working! That’s what F.R.B.s do all the time. WORK! Just because I’m on down-time doesn’t mean I’m not working! You should try this for a change. Being at your beck and call all the time takes it out of my cells, I can tell you! And then, when you decide to rest, it seems you think I shouldn’t rest as well? Is that it? Huh? Is it?”
“Er... no,” said Kirk. “It’s just...”
“Just what!?”
“It’s just that he’s never seen an Aweddi before,” said Lu squeezing past Dexter Sitee and sitting on the bunk beside Kirk. “And I’m guessing that the way you’re bending the light is still pretty strange.” She turned to Kirk. “Right?”
Kirk nodded, still looking at Dexter.
The captain let out a low rumbling chuckle that grew steadily and finished as a loud guffaw.
“What you have to remember about your F.R.B.,” said Lu as he picked up the P.R.P. from where it had landed. “Is that it will use your subconscious and all your previous experiences to determine what you can and can’t deal with. If you have a very vivid imagination, and from your expression, I am guessing you do, then you might see things a lot closer to the way they really are.”
“But, I can see his...” Kirk said, hypnotically caught in the moment.
“Insides?” Lu asked.
Kirk nodded again.
Lu grinned. “Probably seeing him as he really is then. I’m impressed. I just hope Casio is filtering those shorts he’s wearing, because they are disgusting.”
Dexter looked annoyed. “S’ wrong with ‘em?”
Kirk managed to draw his eyes away from the gelatinous body that revealed two robust, pulsing hearts and four lungs cycling as they took in and released air. All of this made the multiple limbs, strange protuberances from his head and complete absence of a skeleton seem only mildly strange.
His eyes traveled down and for the first time realized that Dexter was wearing what appeared to be the loudest, most obnoxious pair of shorts which would make the most audacious Hawaiian shirt-maker drool in delight. The problem was that just above the waistband was Dexter’s stomach, and it was obvious to Kirk that the Captain had just eaten. And while he couldn’t be sure, as the digestive juices seemed to be doing a pretty thorough job, he suspected that the Aweddi were not too particular as to whether their meals were alive or dead.
As he leapt from the bunk and dived at the toilet, Lu gave Dexter a knowing nod.
“I told you those shorts were bad,” she said over the noise of Kirk being violently sick. “Look at the effect they had on him.”
By the time Kirk emerged from the toilet the cabin was empty.
While he felt a little better now, the fact that Casio was still complaining didn’t help.
“Does your species do that on a regular basis?” the F.R.B. asked indignantly.
“Depends, if we’re watching someone digest their lunch. If that’s the case, then yes. We do.”
“Only you could have warned me. I lost three nanoprobes in that.”
“Sorry,” replied Kirk weakly. “How come you didn’t filter him better?”
“Why would I need to? I’m aware, from accessing your memories, that you have a species back on Pangaea that bares a striking resemblance to the Aweddi.”
“There is?”
“A particular favorite of yours as a matter of fact,” Casio sounded a little smug.
“I seriously doubt that.” Kirk cringed.
“I am aware that one of your favorite meals is shrimp fried rice.”
“What’s that got to do with what Captain Sitee looks like?”
“The Aweddi and the Peneid shrimp are very close in appearance.”
“The shrimp I’m used to, do not walk upright and stand at around seven feet tall!”
“For future reference, can I assume,” asked Casio in a tone which suggested the F.R.B. had mastered the art of changing the subject. “That the disorientation, excessive saliva production and increased stomach juice activity is a precursor to that kind of episode?”
“If you want to experience it again, keep talking about stomach juices, otherwise, shut up.”
“I simply need to know so that in futu....”
“Shut. Up.”
“I will assume that those signals do indicate that response and adjust accordingly,” said Casio, intent on having the last word.
Kirk shook his head, picked up the P.R.P. from the bunk and headed out of the cabin.
Sitting at a large table, eating, was Lu. There was no sign of the captain. Lu smiled and indicated that he should sit and eat. Kirk slid into a seat but declined the offer of food. He could feel his stomach lurch at the thought of eating if Dexter returned and thought that it was probably not the best idea.
“So tell me,” Kirk said. “If someone looks just like me, well, a human. Does that mean that the F.R.B. is making major changes?”
Lu looked up from the bowl of what looked like pasta, but smelled like chicken, and made Kirk wish he wasn’t wondering what part of something she was eating.
“Usually, that would be the case. There are some species that actually do look humanoid, but there will usually be differences that give you a clue they aren’t the same.”
“So the stranger they look, the more likely it is that I’m seeing them the way they really are?”
Lu sucked in a long noodle and nodded.
“Only I can’t help but notice that you look very human,” Kirk said.
Lu gave him a smile. “Interesting, isn’t it?”
Before Kirk could respond, Dexter Sitee came back. He’d gone and found clothing that covered most of his body, for which Kirk gave a silent prayer of thanks. The fact that Dexter’s head was still transparent and he could see that behind the eyes, floated a brain, and when he opened his large, toothless mouth in a broad grin it became a little clearer to see the captain’s, in this case, green matter, convinced Kirk that skipping the meal had been a better option.
“I have a transport ready for you, Lu,” he bellowed.
“Thanks, Dex,” she replied. “I’ll make sure the Agency returns it to you.”
Captain Sitee smiled at Kirk. “I trust that my attire is a little more to your liking now, my friend?” he chortled.
Kirk nodded, embarrassed.
“Then I shall return to my duties and wish you good luck in your endeavors.”
With a low bow, Dexter Sitee left them again.
Lu pushed a bowl towards Kirk. “You should eat. It will be a while before we get another chance. Dexter won’t be back now, he’s too busy, so hopefully we can avoid anymore incidents like earlier.”
“Where are we?” Kirk asked. “Not that really means a whole lot to me, but you said we were going to Service Prime?”
“Sevres Prime,” Lu corrected him. “The administrative center of the universe.”
Kirk nodded and scooped a portion of the noodles into his bowl, sniffing them suspiciously.
“We had a little luck. Dexter was making a run back to the Sevres system when he made his unreported stop with the Enon Citadel. We’re st
ill a few hours away, because Stringer freighters can’t get too close to a planet due to the energy field they create a worm hole with, but Dexter has loaned us a small pod and we should be there before nightfall.”
Kirk took a small bite of the noodle. It was good. Tasted like barbecued chicken. As he ate, Kirk tried not to think about what that meant.
The pod was small, and nowhere near as comfortable as the swooper they left Earth in, but by the same token, it was a great deal better than the loader they borrowed from the Citadel. Kirk offered to fly part of the way, and Lu accepted the offer, pushing her seat into a reclined position and closing her eyes. The journey was uneventful and the only thing that struck Kirk as strange was that while the controls he used to steer the pod looked very close to those of a Mini Cooper his cousin used to own, there were several controls in the middle of a console which were obviously those of a ship designed for space travel. He reasoned that he must be making progress and that there was less need for the F.R.B. to convert everything. Either that or Casio wasn’t working properly. Of course, there was every chance the F.R.B. was deliberately not doing its job to teach Kirk a lesson for his perceived affront back in the stringer’s toilet.
Whatever the case, Kirk realized that for the first time, he felt somewhat comfortable. Despite all the strange events he’d experienced recently, the curious foods he’d eaten, and the incredible aliens he’d met, he was piloting a space vehicle, with very little training, towards the administrative center of the universe, a place he hadn’t even known existed last week, and that the rest of his world was completely ignorant of, and still felt at ease.
“Hey, Cas? You on down-time?” He asked.
“I felt it prudent not to take any more until I knew you wouldn’t be needing me for a while,” came the slightly snooty response.
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