Dominion-427

by Blaze Ward

  Exactly the place for a sailor down on his luck. At least as far as the humans and their cousins would interpret things, according to Leader, Big Guy, and the two, dangerous women: Bayjy and Kyriaki.

  Glaxu settled on a bar stool designed for a fat human. The seat was round, forty centimeters across and the thing was tall as he was. But it was a perfect height for him to squat and see over the bar.

  He wore his long shorts today, the heavier ones that he needed when the heat was so low that his ankles would start to hurt. The longer squatting cloth as well, since he could fold that over his legs like a blanket and remain warm as he sat still enough for heat to bleed off.

  Glaxu had even gone so far as to dig out a sleeveless shirt and wear it under his crossed bandoliers and belt, covering up his chest feathers.

  Humans had an entirely different perception of hot and cold than Mondi did. At least Bayjy understood where the thermostat should be set. If he stayed in human space for too long, Glaxu expected that he would have to invest in gloves and earmuffs.

  And pray nobody ever managed to take a picture of him.

  However, the bar’s interior was wood, hauled up to orbit at great expense, even as a veneer, so his general fabric shades of taupe did not stand out, except contrasting with the aged copper surface of the bar where his drink rested, slowly steaming.

  Apparently, the humans even drank their fruit juice refrigerated, which was all sorts of wrong, but the bartender had enough experience to not argue about steaming it to the proper temperature for a Mondi.

  Glaxu presumed that the next one of his kind that ever graced such an establishment would thank him, if the knowledge of how to serve good drinks stuck.

  He had chosen this restaurant because the officers of Dominion-427 were lazy. It was the closest place to where their own ship was docked, and they had immediately gravitated towards it with the sorts of mindless placidity he normally expected from herd animals.

  Prey.

  But that was a rude way to conceive them. The humans as a species were probably the most treacherous in space these days. Others were more violent, individually, but humans were pack hunters, like Mondi, and you never faced just one. Leader had taught him just how dangerous a team of humans could be when agitated to violence.

  The group approaching today wasn’t a team. Four of them appeared to be officers of the Dominion Armada, based on the clothing descriptions not-Dave-Hall had supplied, including the commander of the vessel. A fifth was a female human in civilian garb.

  The sixth was the one to watch. Athanasia. The Widow of not-Dave-Hall. Of a height closer to Bayjy than Kyriaki. Of a build and coloration more like the smaller woman. Of a temperament, as well, dark and cold. Lethal but quiet.

  Glaxu had a spot at the bar where the corner wrapped the square. It made him almost a pocket nest, but there was one more chair beyond him, deeper into the corner if one wanted to sit so close to an obvious alien. An obviously-armed alien. In a space that had less than one third of its capacity currently filled.

  Their dinner was a formal, brittle affair as he watched, judging from what little he had learned of human body language from Truqtok’s people, and Valentinian’s. The rest were carefully deferential to Athanasia, as they had been previously.

  It helped that Dave had been able to tell Glaxu the exact clock schedule the crew of Dominion-427 probably still kept, based on the time patterns of a place called Dominion Prime, several sectors away.

  Stations were constant things, but even they tended towards light and dark cycles based on the planet they orbited. Dominion-427 was well off that schedule, and still as predictable as death and tax levies.

  He had watched variations of the group previously from his perch at the side of the bar. Not obvious, but he was the least like the standard patterns of erect, simian, bipeds in the room, so Glaxu knew he stood out.

  But he had a good cover identity established. Ozzo the shopkeeper could place him in context with Longshot Hypothesis, when enough people began to ask around.

  Valentinian had once said that all fixers appeared to be cousins, across species and systems. Glaxu had no reason to doubt that logic. Mondi hunters were no different.

  Eyes studied him now. Two more heads were turned his direction from the six at the table, leaving only one not at least glancing his way.

  In any other situation, Glaxu would have drawn a weapon and held it close to the invisible side, away from the humans, so he did here as well. He was already wearing his shock bracers, however uncomfortable they were to sit on for long periods, because he had promised Valentinian that he would not accidentally dewclaw somebody’s life out all over the deck in a wet, messy mistake.

  Mistake being the operative phrase. He could still easily knock some fool down, stun them silly, and then take off a bracer. If somebody really pissed him off. Even humans seemed not to be so dim as to miss that option.

  Words were murmured over there. Glaxu regretted not having his helmet with the advanced electronics on. Then he could have listened in on their conversation, as well as measured their skin temperature, heart rate, and the pupil dilations of the ones looking this way.

  Just to stay in character, he flipped the safety off. Even six humans weren’t a threat in a room like this. He could use the bar, the stools, the tables, and even the other humans as obstacles and weapons. They’d be better off hosing this area of the room down with plasma rifles, but none of them were armed with anything more than polite pulse pistols. Dangerous in the right hands.

  Maybe two of them qualified over there, not counting the younger, civilian female who didn’t move like a sailor, a dancer, or an assassin. Her purpose with the group was not clear.

  The command officer rose, eyes carefully looking this direction, but face utterly neutral. At least he was smart enough to keep his hands in clear sight and open at his sides as the man moved this direction.

  Glaxu shifted around so that the bar was at his side, the one with the pistol. The man noted the stance and adjusted his path to remain on the outside, rather than crossing behind Glaxu to box himself into the corner.

  Glaxu doubted that the human understood head crests, but he kept things compact for now, rather than up and spreading in a threat display. He let his eyes talk instead.

  “Captain Redtip Windrunner?” the human asked in a quiet voice as he came to rest just behind the empty stool around the corner.

  Glaxu nodded in a friendly, offhand manner. Like one of the tree shrews could mistake the only Mondi on the station.

  “I am Captain Palaiologos,” the human said. “Commander of the vessel Dominion-427. I was hoping you might be available and interested in talking.”

  So, some fixer cousin had already reached out to these people and filled their oversized ears with idle chatter and silly lies. In just two days. The tales Valentinian had planted before he left.

  As Leader had expected.

  “About?” Glaxu asked in a clipped tone he understood sounded bored to human ears. A Mondi might try to whap his headcrest for it, instead.

  “It is my understanding that you recently worked with a ship known as Longshot Hypothesis,” the man explained himself without any physical motion that might get him shot. His crew likewise remained still enough to not provoke. “And that the ship left for a different system while you remained.”

  Glaxu eyed the oversized, tree shrew. Any smart operator would smell a trap. And it was.

  But what kind of trap was it? Whose?

  “They are merchants, human,” Glaxu tutted rudely. “Not warriors. The captain was too worried about shipping margins for me to ever fit in with his kind.”

  Which was only partially a truth. Valentinian had done an admirable job of translating moneymaking endeavors from piracy or security work into what humans did to explore and expand into other folks’ space. Outermost would never carry significant cargo, but Glaxu made an excellent caravan guard.

  If he could ever find anyone dumb enough th
at they deserved to be shoot.

  “Do you know where they went next?” the man asked in an offhand way.

  Oh, you think I’m stupid enough, or perhaps angry enough, to just give you information? No, I think you’ll have to purchase it at retail rates, tree shrew.

  “Why?”

  “My superior would be the one to explain that,” he said.

  Glaxu looked past the human and studied the tall blond. The true power here.

  Humans might make the mistake of thinking that a Mondi not focused on them would miss movement. Snakes frequently made a similar mistake. The captain didn’t take the bait. Neither did the other humans.

  Pity. Dave and Kyriaki had both explained how to make something look like self-defense, at least in the aftermath. It certainly would have solved most of Valentinian’s problems, for Glaxu to kill the commanders of the fools chasing him across the galaxy. But he couldn’t count on surviving afterwards, even in a nicer place like this.

  “What’s in it for me?” Glaxu drawled in a tone that would have caused a duel back home.

  “Again, she would be the best one to negotiate such a matter,” Captain Palaiologos replied neutrally. “I am just the messenger here.”

  Yes, you would be, wouldn’t you?

  Glaxu nodded to the human in the accepted, interspecies manner and watched the man back carefully away. He had already paid, but Glaxu left another coin on the bar for the tender as a thank you for getting the juice just right.

  And to perhaps mark the Mondi as a good customer, in case all hell broke loose in the next five minutes and Glaxu ended up splattering human blood all over the tables, floor, and other patrons.

  Five of these people looked like bilgebeasts ready for a spring shearing. Only the blond woman carried herself like a warrior.

  But then, Dave had been mated to the creature for a long period, so she probably had to be capable of violence.

  Hopefully, not as good as a Mondi.

  16

  Athanasia

  Until she had left Dominion space, Athanasia wasn’t sure she had ever met a truly alien species. Most of the Dominion was comprised of pure human, not even interspersed with the so-called Variant Humanities of Wildspace and very few humans even darker than the pinkish-white tones she was most familiar with. Laurentia had a few near-humans running around, the kind that you might not realize weren’t, if you encountered them naked in the dark.

  This creature was alien.

  Ground bird, with long legs, short arms, long beak, and big eyes. Clearly intelligent and tool-using, just from the clothing and equipment it wore. Barely a meter tall, most of that legs and neck. Perhaps eighteen kilograms soaking wet.

  It moved like a killer. Athanasia had known enough of those in her time to tell the difference between baneful and lethal. She watched him holster a pistol he had been holding to his side as Iulianus had approached.

  Eyes quick-scanned the others, lingered briefly on Stephaneria, and then ignored the sailors entirely. Not a bad risk analysis.

  A chair had been pulled close to the oval-shaped table. The creature caught a foot on the crossbar and popped right up onto the seat, squatting quickly down in such a way that only made him look smaller than her.

  Athanasia wasn’t fooled one bit.

  “Who are you?” the birdman demanded of her in a bold, bald opening.

  “An Ambassador from the Dominion,” Athanasia replied with enough of a partial truth.

  That was the rank she had been assigned, as a means of putting the ship under her authority.

  “And I am the only being in this room that’s ever even heard of such a place,” he sneered. “Unless you accidentally run into a cartographer who’s lost.”

  Athanasia caught the joke in the creature’s words, but suspected that it went right by everyone except Stephaneria. Possibly Iulianus noted it, but he had retreated into his formal shell in public. The man he had been for the last several months, perhaps years, rather than the one who might turn into a co-conspirator in the near future.

  “We’re hunting Valentinian Tarasicodissa,” Athanasia offered.

  “You’re the reason he tucked tail and fluttered at Kryuome?” the birdman whistled in a way she could only classify as derisive.

  So, she had the right creature. The bribes she had spread around had led her to the one that survivors at Meeredge whispered about.

  The few survivors.

  “Probably,” she said. “The man is a wanted criminal with a bounty on his head.”

  “How much?”

  Athanasia quoted a figure that the authorities back home would gladly pay, because the only way someone was taking Tarasicodissa’s head in also involved including Apokapes and Dave Hall in the deal.

  Again, a whistle. More interested this time, perhaps.

  “Who’d he kill for that kind of reward?” the birdman known as Redtip asked.

  “One of his crew is an assassin,” Athanasia offered.

  “The tall one or the blond?” the creature replied, confirming that he had known the crew of Longshot Hypothesis well enough to judge.

  “The male,” she said.

  “Interesting,” the creature nodded. “I still suspect the blond is more trouble, but they didn’t kill enough people for me to really judge their relative abilities there. So?”

  “So,” Athanasia countered.

  It was hard, doing this with a true alien. The body language was completely different from anything she had ever encountered, and Athanasia couldn’t rely on femininity as a secondary weapon.

  She wasn’t even sure if the creature was of a bi-gendered species, and it would be rude to ask right now.

  “So I would like to see what your price might be for information, or perhaps assistance,” Athanasia ventured carefully.

  The creature cocked his head left and then right, as if a predator studying his lunch before striking. Glanced once around the table again, lingering briefly on Stephaneria before returning to her.

  “Why should I care what the featherless do to one another?” it asked her in a tone that seemed calculated to range exactly midway between sarcasm and insult.

  “You probably should not,” she said. “If you are no longer associated with them, I presume you’ll get on with your life and eventually I will continue after them, once we determine where the ship has gone.”

  “Eventually?” the creature caught the key word. Apparently it was better at speaking Spacer than most aliens, and many humans.

  “I have business at Chatosig first,” Athanasia said.

  “Need someone killed?” the birdman popped up and eyed her in a way she could only classify as hungry.

  “Later,” Athanasia offered as a morsel, just to see if the thing would strike. “First, I have shopping to attend.”

  The head retracted again, almost deflating back to the compact form it had first assumed.

  “When you need killing done, you let me know and I’ll make you a great deal,” it said suddenly, hopping quickly off the chair and backing away with a bobbing head. “’Til then, I’ll be around.”

  And with that, it sauntered away, not once looking back as it cleared the front hatch and disappeared around a corner.

  “That was…interesting,” Stephaneria said in a calm, detached voice.

  Athanasia smiled lightly. Not what she had been expecting, but then, she had assumed the little creature was a spy, left behind by Tarasicodissa to deflect them onto a different course.

  She wondered if the concept that Dominion-427 not going anywhere immediately was enough for the bird to flee to his master, or if she had gauged the situation wrong and the little monster was too much a warrior to have any interest in anything except violence.

  That would also explain why it had parted ways with the others. They were in an unarmed freighter, looking for trade opportunities and trying to keep a low profile, even as they were being chased across the galaxy.

  “Interesting, yes,” Athanasia agreed.
“Now we get on with our other plans.”

  Iulianus had a look in his eye like he wanted to say something, but had hidden himself back behind those walls so carefully that he might not be able to escape again for a while.

  “Captain?” Athanasia asked.

  “We asked no questions, volunteered little information, and he flounced off as if bored,” the man observed critically. “Were we wrong in our estimations?”

  “Oh, no, Captain,” she smiled. “That was merely the opening moves of what will become an incredibly complex game. We will remain on our usual schedule, to allay spies, and see if the little beast is still here tomorrow.”

  “And if he is?” Stephaneria asked.

  “Then we convince him to lead us to Valentinian.”

  17

  Glaxu

  Glaxu wished that his face was capable of the kind of broad grin that humans adopted when things went well. Fools had assumed him to be a dumb wing-gun, rather than a flank hunter, and not once guessed that he had used the opportunity of stepping up onto the chair at their table to stick a small listening device onto it.

  Everything they said was being recorded right now, by a tiny device just waiting for him to send a signal so it could dump its brains in a complex burst.

  He jogged hard, once he was out of immediate sight of the dock where the Dominion vessel and a few guards were stationed. Humans would probably drop their lower beaks in shock, watching him move, but he wasn’t even running that fast. Only about half again quicker than the best human could do on his best day.

  It got him to his ship while the group was still seated and eating dinner, so he skipped the recorded bits and listened in real time to their conversation.

  Flank hunter, blond lady. The one that sweeps long and herds fools into the nest’s guns, or suckers them into chasing.

  Outermost.

  Farther.

  Dave had warned him that Dominion folks tended to be specist shits that assumed intelligence declined as one moved away from the upright, hairless tree shrew morphology. Glaxu hadn’t seen it with Longshot’s crew, but the last couple of days on the station had shown him just how different Leader and the others were from the rest of their kind.