Mistrust

The Lone Wolf slowly docks in Portus Conversorum. A smaller port, mostly for smugglers and merchants. And, of course, one of their most frequent selling places. Over the comms speakers, Captain Leslie Thomas’s voice is crisp and clear. “Everybody. This is a restocking port call, not a vacation. While yer free to leave and visit the freeport, return before station-night. We be setting out in thirteen hours. Over’n’out.”

Alicia presses her own comm unit, linked to her assault team. “Paul, you’re with the Captain. And if he says he doesn’t need it, remind him about the incident last time we tried to do a speedy run.”

“Got it, boss,” Paul says, clearly just waking up.

“Me?” Gregor asks.

Alicia pauses. On the one hand, both of them would be better than one. But Gregor has the same effect as herself, albeit to a slightly lesser extent. Just over two meters tall with a jawline and cheekbones that could cut glass, the man has an intimidating presence. Not the most useful with how Les likes to negotiate his deals. “We’re buying,” she chooses to reply. Gregor should understand.

“Got it,” he says over the intercom.

Alicia leaves the call. Her other half is on fire, warning her about a nearby threat. But it’s not actually a threat. She just set it so that any other monster puts her on high alert like one were present. Just in case. As she makes her way to disembark, she feels her skin itching. Today was a late day, so she didn’t get her morning routine in. It never feels good. But it’s more important to make sure the drunk and his new boss aren’t doing shenanigans relevant to her job than it is to be comfortable. Because Yawen used to like Zhihao more than she liked Alicia herself. Back before the most terrifying of the monsters started to lose her grip on sanity. So if they both are asking for conflicting favors, Alicia needs a plan B.

Leslie has Alessandra with him, and is complaining at Paul’s presence when he notices Alicia getting ready to run off into the late morning. He holds up a finger to pause the discussion and heads over to his head of security.

Alicia smiles. “Captain, ser,” she says, solely to annoy the man. “This about Paul’s assignment?”

Les shakes his head. “Not happy ‘bout it, but,” he gets quieter so the rest of the people on the dock can’t hear, “but that’s yer prerogative. Yer sure this staging area plan’ll werk out?”

“Up until we came in-system? Eighty percent sure. Dropped a bit, at least until I check something out. More info after I have a chat with an old friend, okay?”

It was his turn to make fun of her. “Same old friend as we’re gunna be meeting, or a different old friend. Yer too old, got too many old friends.”

“Different old friend,” Alicia replies, being honest with her captain.

“Need to worry about it?” he asks.

Alicia smiles. “We’ll see. If the Portus starts exploding, probably. Or he might just not be happy to see me.”

Leslie nods and heads off to resupply, stock up on fuel and ammo, and grab a few goodies to keep the crew in high spirits for the upcoming battle. And Alicia tenses her muscles, closes her eyes to remember a map, opens them, and explodes out at a sprint. Too many of her crewmates like to follow her around, and in case this wasn’t going to be friendly, she’d prefer not having any of them in danger. And even if it is friendly, some things are best to keep in the old squad. Alicia follows the pings. If the drunk isn’t out of his mind drunk already, he’ll know she’s coming. And if she sprints in, he’ll be on murderously high alert, so once she gets reasonably close by, she slows down to a walk. Lets him know that she is not trying to be aggressive.

Much to her surprise, where she is walking towards is not a bar, but a ship rental dock. And, standing behind a small, skinny man haggling intensely with a manager here, is the massive form of Xin Zhihao. His eyes flick in Alicia’s direction to tell her that he does, in fact, know she’s there, but his head and body stay focused on the person in front of him. Or, more accurately, the manager that he’s intimidating merely by standing at his full height to help his partner haggle. Standing with good posture as he is now, Zhihao is tall enough that the manager doesn’t even reach the monster’s pectorals. Alicia politely waits at a distance for the transaction to go through. There is a shiver down her spine as she waits. Someone is near her, watching her. Who, she wonders to her mind, and her other side replies with an alert. Someone at the foodstall in one of the entrances to the plaza. Over two meters tall by a hair. Gregor followed her. She turns to look at the man, who is not dressed in workout clothes nor in his terrifying outfit. Instead he is wearing what would be casual clothes if he had about ten fewer pounds of muscle on him. The shirt was nearly popping off his chest, and the contours of his thighs and calves were visible. But, over the shirt he did at least think to throw on a jacket that mostly obscures his form. Alicia nods her head, and the man comes over. “Were you followed?” she asks her subordinate.

Gregor merely looks at her, a bit offended. Then he asks, “Who are the odd couple?”

“An alcoholic and a smart asshole,” Alicia answers.

“Which is your fellow monster?” he asks.

Alicia pauses and chooses to be annoying. “The tall one,” she jokes.

Gregor looks at the pair, confused by something, but he doesn’t choose to voice his confusion. After a few moments, Zhihao and his partner have a ship’s starting sequence and ID tags, and the tall man gestures for them to meet with Alicia. Only then does he notice that someone has joined his old friend at the side of the plaza.

“Alicia,” the monster says as he approaches.

“Zhihao. Surprised you aren’t in a bar.”

“That’s next. What are you doing out of a ship?”

“Stretching.”

There’s a pause and, in the silence, Xin Zhihao’s companion speaks up. “I’m Andrew. I don’t believe we’ve met.”

“We have not,” Gregor says, still trying to get a read on something that is bugging him.

Zhihao begins to head across the plaza, with a gesture to tell Alicia, at least, to follow. Andrew and Gregor do as well. “Why are you here?” he asks.

“Our humble free transport is selling some goods and restocking. You?”

“Needed a ship to venture into non-public-transport accessible space.”

“Meeting with any other old friends?” Alicia asks.

Zhihao shakes his head. When talking to each other, ‘old friends’ means something specific. Each other. “Not intentionally,” he says, “But guess who I felt while I was drinking the other day?”

“Here?” Alicia asks.

“Madi,” Zhihao replies.

Alicia thinks as they walk. Quinn’s on a rock, she wasn’t there, Yawen doesn’t leave her system much, and Zhihao isn’t nearly grumpy enough for Spitzy. “Did Frank finally take a vacation?” she jokes.

“Nope,” Zhihao says with a chuckle.

That confuses Alicia more. Who else could it be? “Who, then?” she asks.

“Quinn.”

“The fuck?” Alicia says almost instinctively. The fact that the deadliest of them is not in self-imposed exile anymore is one thing, but on Madidorum. “Quinn wouldn’t want to go to Madi when we were all young and reckless. What’s he doing there now?”

Zhihao laughs. “I love how your objection isn’t that the man is off of the rock he’s lived on for decades, but that he was in the Portus Madidorum system.”

“But do you know?” Alicia presses.

Zhihao shakes his head. “Nope. Never came close. And I’m not in the habit of letting my other side communicate with anyone but me.”

Alicia nods. “Good habit.”

“Why do you ask?” Zhihao wonders.

“We’re gonna visit the devil, I was hoping you weren’t but needed to make sure.”

Zhihao nods, understanding what she means. Andrew seems a bit confused, but doesn’t express it. Zhihao says, “No, Drew just got curious so we’re investigating. For free.”

“I already paid for the trip,” the shorter, skinny man insists. To be fair to Andrew, it isn’t that he is particularly short, he’s probably about average height, maybe even a bit above average. But the three others around him right now are all just far too tall to make anyone not look short.

Zhihao shakes his head as they enter a bar. “This is more like what I was expecting,” Alicia jokes. Zhihao laughs as he orders a round for the four of them.

“You have to tell me about your quiet friend,” Zhihao insists as they sit.

Gregor looks at Alicia. The woman shakes her head. “No I don’t.”

“You don’t object to friend,” the skinny guy says, “That plus your demeanors says it’s not a relationship. You’re both security personnel on your vessel. But not a free transport. More likely a pirate. No monsters among the marauders, which means you’re one of the Marauder-hunters. Heard rumors of you, though we never could confirm the ship ID. Mind telling me?”

“Yes,” Gregor replies before Alicia could, causing the monsters both to laugh.

Andrew sighs. “Fine, give me a minute. On average Conversorum has seventeen free transports docked at a time. Easy enough to cross-reference.” He pulls out a tablet. According to my other half, he is doing exactly that.

“What are you talking to the devil about?” Zhihao asks.

“Assuming you’re still avoiding Spitzy, nothing you’ve got to worry about.”

“You wouldn’t ask her to help in the fight,” he muses, “So it’s just her home. To or from?”

Alicia shrugs. “From. Ideally, after we won’t have any issues just leaving.”

“What are you guys looking for?”

“One command ship. Hopefully Astro, they have the best loot without risking Spitzy being there. Betting she’ll ask for it, so I’m probably stuck visiting her again afterwards assuming the pilots are uncooperative after we take the ship. Another plus for an Astro command ship.”

“That’ll be fun for you,” Zhihao says. “Got a good enough team to take it?”

“We’ll see,” she jokes. Quite frankly, they both know that, assuming she isn’t worried about enemy casualties, she alone would probably be enough to take any one ship. The others are mostly there to help with keeping the surrendered people out of the fight, and to prevent her from getting shot too many times.

Suddenly, Andrew speaks again. “The Lone Wolf. Wait, the energy and mass sigs are all off. Do you have some kind of capital ship weapon that the rest is built around or something.”

“Hacking into the Portus security systems isn’t ideal, Andrew,” Zhihao scolds halfheartedly. Then, to the others, he adds, “We best be going before he decides to do something even dumber.” And he leads his companion out of the bar.

Gregor looks at Alicia. “Can’t trust him,” the former miner states.

“Zhihao? He’s mostly harmless.” Then, she corrects herself, “I mean, he’s a monster, and you probably don’t want to fight him, but relatively speaking harmless.”

“No. The Andrew one.”

Alicia looks confused. “How so?”

“How he walks, how he stands, how he looks. Reminds me of me. But refined. And too much of a pleasant face. It’s lying. Don’t know about what, but it is.”

“I’ll keep it in mind,” Alicia says. Whenever Gregor speaks that much, it means it’s important.

“Why call your friend we’re meeting the devil?” he asks.

“Because she is. You’ll see. She was the scariest of us, and that was before she started to lose her grip on reality.”

“Can we trust her?” he asks.

“To keep her word, yes. To not kill us if we offend her even slightly before we have a deal? Less so.”

“And this Quinn person.”

“A problem, if it comes up,” she answers honestly. “But he left because he did not want to kill, so hopefully isolation hasn’t changed that.”

Gregor finishes his drink. “I’m going to check out the antique knives over in the thrift quarter. Want anything?”

Alicia smiles. “If you see any old records, I’ll take it, otherwise, enjoy.” She watches him leave. Then, she approaches the bartender. “The big guy,” she begins, “How much was left on the chit after he bought us our drinks. I want to make sure we didn’t bankrupt him with our surprise running into one another.”

The bartender smiles. “Don’t worry about it, there was plenty.” Alicia nods, putting on a fake smile. Plenty isn’t good. Means whatever the pair is up to, it’s nowhere near over.