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The Slitheron grinds his beak in agitation. His beady black eyes blink slowly, then he swallows thickly. “I … I don’t … I can’t. I don’t have any credits left on me! Please! I need to feed my family! Just tell Osho I’ll get him his money in a week!”
His squawks are grating to my overly sensitive ears, so I set him down gently on the ground. Of course, I don’t buy it. There’s always an excuse for why they can’t pay. Sending money back to their family, feeding their kids, taking care of a sick relative. But the truth is usually that they lost it all gambling at the Luxuria Gold Nugget, wasted it on Solace, or in this guy’s case, the brothel.
“Maybe you should have thought about that before you ran up a five-hundred credit charge with the women next door,” I say. “You had plenty of money then. Or were you going to run out on them, too?”
My Slitheron friend says nothing as he presses his scaly hide against the damp brick wall.
“Aiken,” I call out for my partner, who steps up from behind me. His thick, burly body is even bigger than mine. As a Gorcian barbarian, the guy is built like a Terran gorilla. Gorcians are perfectly suited for this line of work. Their bodies are covered in a glossy black carapace like a built-in bulletproof vest. Despite their deep-set eyes, they have excellent eyesight and make perfect sharpshooters. He’s also got a scar down the length of his grizzled, battle-hardened face that makes him look way more menacing than he actually is. You definitely don’t want to meet one his kind in a dark alleyway, that’s for sure. Sucks to be the Slitheron.
Aiken’s hot, thick breath hits the back of my neck, and I wince as the scent of the chili dog he scarfed down twenty minutes ago wafts over me. He’s disgusting to work with sometimes, but he’s reliable all the time. I wouldn’t want to go anywhere on this godforsaken planet without him. He smashes his fists together and snarls as he shoves himself into the alleyway, squeezing into the narrow space with his hulking body. There aren’t many places on this planet that are Gorcian-friendly, thanks to their wide girth.
Aiken’s gaze meets mine, and he lets out a snort. I nod.
“P-Please!” the Slitheron begs and skitters across the pavement before pressing his scaly, crimson body against the metal dumpster. I hate it when they beg. It’s annoying and time-consuming, and all I want to do right now is collect my mark, get my damn credits, and go the hell home.
Aiken grabs the Slitheron by his scrawny, paper-thin neck. The thing about this job? It’s not glamorous or pretty. And the people we chase down? Absolute scumbags. I never take a mark for petty crimes, and I vet the assignments carefully.
I run a palm down my tired face, going to wait by the alleyway’s entrance for Aiken to motivate our mark. At first, it gnawed at my conscience, this job. Couldn’t sleep at night, couldn’t get out of bed in the morning, and couldn’t eat for the first several weeks as a new bounty hunter. It’s not like I entered this line of work because I love it; I did it because I needed money, and I needed it fast. It’s hard to believe that my life wasn’t always like this. Three years ago, I was at spring training off the coast of Vancouver with my Terraball teammates. I played center for the Toronto Reapers. I’d gone pro when I turned eighteen and entered the League mostly because I loved to swim, and I was damn good at it. The sport is played entirely underwater inside a dome and could be considered a creative mashup of ice hockey and soccer. For a time, it was my whole world. And just like that, because of some stupid drunken night, my whole world came crashing down. No more League. No more teammates who I once called brothers. Just me and my depression back in Toronto, licking my wounds.
But then I met Aiken in a shitty sports bar on Bremner boulevard, and he took me under his wing. Showed me what our marks get up to in their spare time. The innocent lives they ruin, the suffering they spread throughout the universe. It helps knowing that I’ve taken down Human traffickers, drug lords, and other terrible people who belong behind bars. Unfortunately, law enforcement paid with taxpayer’s money isn’t cutting it. Seeing them take bribe after bribe and turn a blind eye to the monsters who lurk the streets at night—it wears on you. It wears on you a lot.
Keeping my gaze firmly on the neon purple sign across the street, I wince when I hear the faint snap of bones and the thud of a body falling to the ground. Aiken turns toward me and lets out a low grunt. My partner is reliable, but he barely knows a word of Universal, so communicating is complicated. We make do with charades, context clues, and our instincts. Being with Aiken has taught me that you don’t need to speak the same language to understand each other. Besides, when in doubt, as I keep him fed and watered with as much junk food as he can inhale, he’s low maintenance.
“Really, Aik?” I say as I pat him on the shoulder. “Did you really have to kill him?”
Yes, I’m a bounty hunter. But I’m not in it to kill people. Aiken, however, relishes the thrill of the hunt. A little too much, if I’m being honest.
“Didn’t pay,” Aiken chuffs and stares down at me, blinking.
“All right, buddy, I trust you,” I say, but I spare a glance at the broken body coiled limply beside the dumpster.
Aiken raises his comically skinny wrist and presses a button on his commlink band, confirming our job as completed. He then shuffles back to the dumpster and takes a picture of the Slitheron’s mangled corpse to send to our client.
Almost instantly, ten thousand credits arrive in both of our accounts, along with a short message from the person who hired us.
Good job. I may have more work for you in the future. – D
Shuddering, I stare at the message. More work. I should be thrilled by the promise of more opportunities … but I’m not. Instead, bile rises in my throat as I think about going after yet another criminal. I can tell myself I’m ridding the galaxy of dangers, but that would make me sound too much like a hero. There’s no dignity in bounty hunting. How long can I keep this up, I wonder? Until I’m, what, sixty? Eighty? Or until someone finally gets the jump on me and kills me?
We don’t bother cleaning up our mess. It’s Sar Nouveau. No one is going to care about a dead Slitheron in an alleyway, as fucked up as that sounds. This guy was on so many hit lists it’s amazing he was able to crawl around in broad daylight, let alone hang out in brothels for as long as he did.
Aiken glances down at the body and nudges it with the tip of his foot. “Yup. Dead,” he croaks out, offering me his fist to bump. As if there was any actual doubt the guy was deceased. My partner is nothing if not thorough.
As we leave the alleyway, he grabs me by the shoulder and tugs me toward the line of men queuing for the credits terminal. I let out a groan when I realize what the big guyactuallywants.
The streets are hazy and smell of petrichor. It rained recently, and the lights from the neon signs that cover every inch of available space on the skyscrapers surrounding us are all melty in the dark puddles. Shit weather doesn’t inspire me to stay out late, and the only thing I want to do is shower. I shake my head as Aiken tries to haul me off into the line.
“Aik, no, man. I’m not in the mood, and we literally just got those credits. We need to save ’em,” I plead, but the Gorcian is not having it. He wants what he wants. And what he wants is pussy. Lots of it. “Okay. I’ll go in with you, but I’m not partaking.”
I never do. As much as I respect the lovely working women of the city, I don’t do brothels.
Aiken looses a rough growl through the thick flap of brown skin he uses as a mouth. He’s not pretty to look at by any means, but it doesn’t matter to the ladies of The Cosmic Wink Inn.
“I’ll be at the bar,” I grumble.
Aiken claps his grubby mitts together like a child on Christmas morning, and when I get into line with him, a few onlookers stop to gawk at us. The middle-aged Lunan Human male in line in front of us swallows so hard I hear the gulp.
As a full-grown Terran male, I’m about the same height as Aiken. I may look Human-passing enough thanks to thousands of years of interbreeding, but I’m not, and society likes to remind me of that every chance it gets. My pointed ears always give me away, anyway. Even with Weave tech making it possible for a person to look however they want these days, a Human could never hope to be as tall as a Terran. Our women are taller than Human males.
