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“Yes,” I say. “Perfect.”
I have never had anybody on my side before like this. All the deceptive decisions I’ve had to make were my own. Now I have Kail on my side, and with his presence comes a new level of competence. We were good together when we were working in opposition. But now? Working in harmony? We are going to be absolutely fucking unstoppable.
“Perfect. There’s a Persinian trader fleet over there. We’ll see if any of the captains want to quietly cash out.”
“Or we can just hide on one of their ships.”
“Stow away! Another good idea. For a savage predator, you have incredible prey instincts.”
“A good predator understands prey,” Kail says. “In matters of survival, we are all prey.”
Persinians are gilled aliens who breathe air, but only reluctantly. They very much prefer to be in water. It’s not their fault so much of the universe has a tendency to be dry. Their ships are made in scaled fashion, and when new they would have glimmered with iridescence like the scales of their bodies. After many years of exposure to solar winds and other universal influences they are dulled and no longer shine, but they are still colored in pink and purple and teal, silver and gold. They’re flashy but weathered.
I like the idea of buying our own ship, but Kail has a good point. If we stow away, we leave this place without trace, and that is the best possible outcome. Nobody will have any idea where we went. Assuming, of course, no footage is being taken of the dock. This being a criminal outpost, the likelihood of Colony forces ever seeing that footage, if it exists, are low.
“They’ll be loading cargo soon by the looks of things. We could try to take cover in a crate and hope they load us without noticing.”
The docks are very busy. That might give us cover from being spotted, or it might mean we are spotted without noticing we’ve been spotted. Nothing about this is easy.
And then things get worse. I see a flash of white uniform marked with a red flag. It is the insignia of the Colony.
We have pulled up on the dock at almost exactly the same time as Colony forces, it’s just that they chose another landing spot. They haven’t seen us yet.
“Come here.” I drag Kail down an alley, through a small set of stores, and then out the other side. We’ve evaded the troops for now, and the locals are not at all welcoming toward Colonizing forces, so we have that going for us.
The sheer nerve of the Colony is impressive. To barge onto a station of criminals, declare themselves the law, and then attempt to enforce that law against wild brigands, outlaws, and general scum, is borderline insane.
Chaos ensues immediately, with some trying to flee and others thrilling to battle. A lot of outlaws have beef with the Colony. Many of them are excited to take advantage of these free hits against the self-proclaimed authorities.
“We are trapped. We may have to fight our way out of this,” Kail says.
I know very well that Kail is capable of killing an entire battalion. His savagery is without peer. But I also know that if we draw that kind of attention to ourselves here, the chatter will spread across not just Colony space, but Illicit space, and that means we put a massive target on our backs for mercenaries, bounty hunters, and general opportunists.
“We’re not going to fight,” I say. “We’re going to sneak. That’s what our disguises are for. They found the ship, and they’re going to look for us. So what we need to do is wait them out and not be found. That way, they go off with a cold trail, rather than the entire universe being alerted to our presence and our worth. We can only disappear if we stay in plain sight.”
I hope he listens to me. If he does not, it could mean disaster. This escape is going to take nerve and patience.
“We will try this your way. If it does not work, we will do it my way.”
Kail
My senses prick and my rage flares at the sight of Colonist uniforms. I want to tear them apart, but I promised Tarni we would play this her way.
I watch, stunned, as she walks right up to a soldier. She has dyed her hair a red color and cut it much shorter, and also made her face up with bright colors in such a way as to change her appearance, but still.
“So yannow, how long’s it going to be? We got places to be. We got things to do. We got stuff to sell. We got.”
The soldier looks directly at her, the very woman he is trying to capture, and gives her a dismissive wave.
“Leave us to our business, criminal scum.”
She is brave beyond my wildest conception, and reckless as well. I watch, realizing slowly that it is not recklessness at all. It is strategy. She planned this. Every bit of this. She knew precisely who she would go to and what she would say. And she somehow knew what they would say in return.
When she fooled me, I assumed it was because I am a hulking savage, incapable of understanding many of the machinations of colonists. Now I realize this woman could be anything to anybody. Now I see why her guilt is so deep. Nobody has ever seen her for who she is. She may not even know who she is.
Tarni looks over her shoulder at me and flashes a wide, proud grin.
“Listen, I think I saw these two guys. They paid a Paragon for his ship and took off at light speed toward the Dexter nebula, maybe twenty minutes ago. Not long before you colonists landed.”
