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Then, the flood of error messages from my leg takes over, and I change my focus to it. Dimly, I hear Bethiah having a conversation with someone, but I can’t let myself be distracted. This mission is ruined if I can’t work my keffing leg. We’ll get arrested for breaking into the resort and then Dora and Rhonda—and the ship—will all get impounded. This moment is crucial and I can’t be the one responsible for it all keffing up.
So I work on the alerts, parsing through them one at a time as a scuffle breaks out behind me. I want to help but I can’t. I’m frozen in place, my leg sending shocks of pain up my spine and into my brain as I try one override after another.
When the last message disappears, there’s a heavy ache in my prosthetic leg, and my toes aren’t working correctly. I try to flex them in my boot, only to get no response. My head throbs, too, and I sag against the wall.
“No, it’s cool,” Bethiah says behind me, panting. “I got it. Don’t rush on my behalf.”
Biting back a groan, I get to my feet again and focus on my mate. There are two male szzt collapsed at her feet and she’s pulling the uniform off of the larger of them. A trickle of blood slides from her nose and she wipes it away.
“You…all right?” I manage.
“Other than having to do everything myself? Yeah. You?” One of the guards stirs and she slams a boot back down on his head again and returns to tugging off his sleeve. “You were making some odd noises for a moment there.”
“Tricky system to hack into. I’m better now.”
“Good.” She activates the auto-fastener on one of the fallen men’s belts. “Help me undress them and then we need to find a safe spot to stash them until they wake up.”
“Sure.” I heave off the wall, and if I stagger a little, Bethiah doesn’t notice. I’ll have to run a new diagnostic when we get back to the ship, but I can manage until then.
A short time later, we’re dressed in the ill-fitting uniforms of the resort’s security, the two guards stashed in a maintenance closet. Once they’re discovered missing, our problems will multiply, but my hope is that we’re gone by then. We continue down the long, winding tunnel and hop on the moving walkway when the tunnel branches, heading toward the long-term port docking instead of the maintenance department.
As we approach, Bethiah turns to me and musses my hair, pulling it over my red cybernetic eye. “Keep your head down and let me do all the talking. They won’t remember just another mesakkah woman but they’ll definitely remember someone with a red eye.”
I nod, ducking my head. I should have brought a mask or employed a masking program in my system. Didn’t think about it, but I normally don’t bother with subterfuge, either. It’s another thing that’ll change now that I’m with Dora and Bethiah, I suppose.
Of course, then I wonder if I should bother, as I doubt I’ll be kept in our triad for long.
The moving walkway comes to an end in front of a large set of doors, and Bethiah swipes her stolen badge. The doors roll open and she snorts. “Security sure is lax around here. They’re letting all kinds of trash in.”
And then she gives me a wicked smile.
“Just focus so we can get back to the ship,” I hiss, keeping my head ducked. “We don’t need to get caught.”
“We won’t,” she reassures me. “I’ve got it all under control.”
Now that’s a terrifying statement.
I follow behind her as she strides into the hangar. It’s enormous here, the ceiling so high above us that it fades into darkness. This hangar is protected from the outside elements, with several large and expensive-looking pleasure cruisers docked in rows as far as the eye can see. It’s quiet, too, with an employee sitting at a control panel at the front and several others moving between ships in the distance.
The employee looks up at us as we approach.
“Hey there,” Bethiah says in a flirty voice. “Busy day today?”
The employee relaxes, not getting up from his desk. “Is it ever down here?”
She laughs and leans over his control panel. “You’re telling me. It’s a fool’s errand to have anyone down here while all these rich lordlings play around up above. At least it’s an easy day’s credits, right?” She makes a big show of pulling out her data-pad and pretends to flick through the screen. “Speaking of fool’s errands, I have a request I have to fill out. Do you know where Lord Nerit il’Aiven’s cruiser is?”
The employee frowns at us, his gaze flicking over to me. “You mean the skater?”
A skater? Now that’s interesting. That means he didn’t come here with any crew. He drove his skater himself, or brought one other person with him. Most skaters are one- or two-seaters and designed for racing (and showing off) instead of longer distance travel.
