Space Assassins: The Complete Series 1-5, page 29
Chapter Thirty-Seven
The waterfront was expansive, as the entire city was an island, but the former space pirate and his smart-mouthed sidekick were steering clear of the hoity-toity rich kid areas in favor of the rough-and-tumble dives where the real action took place.
The kind of bars and clubs where you were likely to be stabbed or hit with a blast of particularly nasty magic if you eyed the wrong person in a way they took offense to. It was violent, it was gritty, it was dangerous, and for Uzabud, it felt a lot like coming home.
After a few hours sticking close by his friend’s side and learning the ropes, even Laskar was starting to enjoy the wondrous houses of ill repute, though, despite all of his tough talk and bravado, he just didn’t quite fit in among the rabble. It was his natural tendency to come off like some sort of high-bred snob who was rubbing people the wrong way more often than not.
Fortunately, Bud was more than able to compensate for his friend’s shortcomings.
The great thing about the dens of iniquity was the way in which information flowed. It was a world of gossip and tall tales, for certain, but also a place where valuable tidbits could be acquired.
For a price.
Bud had greased more than a few palms by way of purchasing many rounds of drinks––courtesy of the extra coin the Ghalian had given him with which to better carry out his task––and they felt like they may have actually gleaned a bit of useful information in the process.
It was thirsty work, and Bud had found himself drinking shot-for-shot to loosen those lips, but he was a pirate, after all. Unfortunately, his tolerance was not quite what it used to be. In any case, they’d acquired intel, and that made the inevitable hangover worth it.
Hozark likely wouldn’t like what they’d found out, but at least progress was being made.
“We should be getting back. It’s almost time for the rendezvous,” Laskar said.
“I know, I know,” Bud said, tossing his skree in the air, catching it lazily in his hand as he had been for the better part of the last hour. “But we can always call them and say we’re going to be a little late, right? I mean, we’re making good progress down here.”
“If by progress, you mean bad news and you getting drunk, then sure.”
“Oh, lighten up, Laskar. Work and play don’t have to be separate things, you know,” his drunken friend slurred.
“Yeah, but at least my play doesn’t require a full battery of decontamination spells afterward. I mean, look at these people,” Laskar said, gesticulating at the crowd.
The man whose beverage he just knocked from his hand with his waving arm was anything but amused.
“You’re going to pay for that, fancy boy!”
“Hey, now,” Bud said, stepping in front of his copilot. “Thass no way to talk to my friend. And come to think of it, didn’t I already pay for that drink?”
“You know what I meant,” the man growled.
“No, I really don’t,” Bud said, abruptly getting right up into the man’s face. “Because so far as I could tell, it was starting to sound like some little bitch was trying to start a problem with my friend. And that would be a mistake of fucking epic proportions.”
“Epic, you say,” the man shot back, not retreating an inch. “You? Epic? What are you going to do, little man?”
“Normally, I’d have already dropped you like the sack of shit you are. But since this is a respectable establishment––”
The patrons watching the exchange all chuckled.
“––I’m waiting to teach you a lesson outside.”
“Why wait?” the man replied, much to the delight of the crowd.
It was going to be a fight, and by the looks of things, it would be a good one. The crowd was amped up and ready to go as well. In just a moment, an all-out bar brawl was going to be unleashed.
“Enough!” Demelza said, shouldering her way through the crowd.
The angry man glared at her, perfectly happy to strike a woman just the same as a man. “Who the hell do you think you are, bi––” he started to say.
She lay her hand on his shoulder. “Drop dead.”
The man instantly crumpled to the ground in a heap. The bar patrons scattered in a panic, their bravado gone in an instant.
“Dark magic!” people shouted as they ran.
It was simply impossible. No one could cast in anything but the arcane, almost gibberish language of spellcasters. Plain-speak couldn’t do a thing, no matter how powerful a person was. Or, at least, it shouldn’t. But this woman had just dropped one of the toughest men in the bar without batting an eye. And she’d done it using plain-speak.
Bud stared as well, though his gaze was more of annoyance than anything else.
“I could have handled it,” he slurred.
“I would have expected a foolish altercation from Laskar,” she shot back. “But from you, Bud? You know better.”
“Hey, what’s that supposed to mean?” Laskar asked.
“Oh, you know precisely what it means. But it seems Uzabud here managed to out-mouth even you.”
Laskar started to protest, but Demelza held up her hand, and judging by the look in her eye, he decided perhaps silence was the better option at this particular moment.
“How did you even find us, anyway? Aren’t you supposed to be in the marketplace?” Bud asked.
Demelza reached out and snatched the skree from his hand. “You’ve been keying this on and off for over twenty minutes, Bud. If not to stop you from starting a bar brawl, I’d have tracked you down to simply shut you up.”
“Hey, that hurts.”
“Be glad it is only your feelings that are experiencing that sensation.”
Laskar bent down and examined the man on the ground. “Hey, hang on a minute. He’s not dead. I thought you cast a killing spell. A totally new one I didn’t even know could be done, I might add.”
Demelza looked at the slumbering ruffian with disgust. “That was no magic. Do you see the spots on his skin beneath his hair? This man is an Ohkran, and their people possess a vulnerable nerve bundle at the base of their neck. Fortuitous, as it negated the need for any real violence.”
Bud looked at Laskar, then back at Demelza. He then started to laugh. And not a little chuckle. A full-on belly laugh, tears welling in his eyes. “Oh, the looks on their faces. They all thought you were some deadly visla come to kill them all.”
“Tempting as it may be, no, Bud.”
“But you’re a Ghalian. Why would you blow your cover like that when we’re stalking someone?”
“Because I have it on good authority that our prey has already fled this world.”
“Oh? What have you heard?”
“That Tikoo did indeed make his contract with the order from here, but when Aargun was slain, and Master Prombatz managed to escape, he got spooked and skipped out of here, heading off as far away as he could.”
“We heard pretty much the same thing,” Bud said. “But where does that leave us? We haven’t the faintest idea where he ran to.”
“Kraam,” a voice said from a dark corner of the bar.
“When did you get here?” Bud asked as Hozark stepped into the light.
“Some time ago, actually. You really must take care not to activate your skree like that, Bud. Next time, someone else might take notice.”
“Wait, you were watching all this time? And you let us almost get into a fight?”
“I was curious to see how Demelza would defuse the situation. And while it was not exactly how I would have done it, her method was nonetheless effective in its swift efficiency.” He turned to Demelza. “Help me get Bud back to the ship and sobered up. We have a long flight ahead of us.”
“I can fly,” Laskar offered. “I only had one drink.”
Hozark studied him a long moment. Uzabud’s copilot did indeed appear sober, to his pleasant surprise.
“Very well,” he finally said. “You will start the jumps that take us to Kraam. We will then begin preparations.”
“Preparations for what?”
Hozark smiled, darkly. It was a grin devoid of true happiness. “We prepare for a far more challenging hunt.”
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Where Obahn had perhaps been an odd-smelling and somewhat damp world, it was also a hub of travel, trade, and culture. The cities were clean, for the most part, and the air free of the reek of factories and pollution. And as for the rougher parts of the populace, they tended to stick to their own neighborhoods, tussling and brawling well away from the more well-heeled of their fellow citizens.
Kraam, however, was something completely different. Something that was going to make tracking down Tikoo quite a bit more of an ordeal. For Kraam was a smuggler’s paradise, tucked away in a tumultuous solar system with an unstable blue giant at its center. And even in the main city, searching could prove quite an ordeal.
The magic from the sun was benign, but its flares could wreak havoc on a person’s skin and eyes if they weren’t paying attention to the magical warning tabs mounted to every building and carried by most people.
They would give enough notice to head for cover, but every so often one would find themselves stuck outside during a solar event. They weren’t fatal, but a particularly strong one could lead to some time out of commission, and with substantial coin spent on a healer.
The cloudy regions were largely protected from the effects of the flares, the particular composition of the mists managing to break up and disperse the harmful rays.
The same could be said about the undersea communities. They were fewer in number, but the underwater caverns were protected by not only the waters above, but also the thick stone and minerals that formed the vast spaces.
A few hidden tunnels would typically connect them to the surface, but for the most part, access was made by water. Underwater, that is. And underwater travel for more than a minute or two required a particular type of magic that very few possessed.
The robust communities in the open-air surface cities and farmlands were the ones that typically felt the brunt of the sun’s impact. It was there that Demelza would be conducting her survey of the main towns, flaunting her zaftig, bronze-skinned tavern worker persona to coax information from the lips of those who dwelled in that area.
Given the relative safety of the elevated, cloudy region looming above the main city below, Hozark had felt Uzabud and Laskar would at least be less likely to suffer from any adverse damage should a random solar event pass through.
Undersea would be the safest, in that regard, but also by far the deadliest. That was why Hozark had taken that network of townships beneath the main city’s coastline for himself.
The toughest of the tough would be found down there, and if things got hairy, it could quite possibly require all of his considerable skills to complete the task and apprehend the man. Should he even find Tikoo, that is.
“How is it that you knew where to go before we even told you?” Laskar had asked as they departed Obahn and made the first jump toward their new destination. “I know Bud didn’t transmit that bit over the skree.”
“No, he did not,” Hozark replied. “But I acquired some intelligence from a worker in Tikoo’s residence tower. With that helping direct my further digging, I was able to piece together our quarry’s flight from that world, and his eventual destination. Kraam.”
“And I also acquired a similar bit of information in my search,” Demelza said. “Though the name of the world he had fled to had not yet been revealed to me. Only that he had departed, and in some haste, I might add.”
“Yes, after Master Prombatz escaped the trap that had been set for him, it seems our friend Tikoo wisely deduced someone might come looking for the man who had arranged that contract.”
It had been a fluke that an additional Wampeh Ghalian had been present on the contract with Master Prombatz. And an even more surprising twist was that it was the younger, weaker assassin who was attempting to complete the contract.
Blind luck, bad timing, whatever you’d call it, having Aargun completing his final test had been the unforeseen variable that had allowed the master Ghalian to escape. And even then, only barely. But the repercussions would undoubtedly be great.
“Seems like we were all pretty successful with that information gathering, if you ask me,” Laskar said when they dropped out of the jump.
“I would agree with that assessment,” Hozark noted.
The copilot looked at the star charts and confirmed their location while Uzabud slept off his buzz, then began plotting the next jump.
“I mean, sure, Hozark, you were the one who learned the actual name of the place first. But I think we were all on track to find out soon enough.”
“Again, I would agree. But that is neither here nor there. What matters is that we have a location and whereabouts of our target. I know if he is still on this world he is within the main linked cities of the capital of Kraam, but it is still a spread-out area. Fortunately for us, Fakarians are not a common sight, though on a somewhat wet world such as Kraam, it is possible we might come across others.”
“Or similar races,” Demelza noted.
“We’ll kill ‘em all!” Bud slurred, lurching into the command room.
“Oh, my friend. We need to get that out of your system,” Hozark said. “And I am afraid it will not be pleasant.”
He rose to help the drunken man back to his quarters, where he would use a rather uncomfortable bit of magic to rid his body of the toxic fluids.
“So, all killing talk aside, we split up and somehow track this guy down. That’s the deal?” Laskar asked. “Seems a bit tough in a place that big.”
“It will be, but I have faith in you all,” Hozark said, pausing in the doorway, supporting Bud’s semi-conscious bulk. “But whatever happens, remember, this is an interrogation mission, not an assassination. We need Tikoo alive.”
“It’s not him being hurt that I’m worried about,” Laskar said as he dialed the last coordinates of the jump into the Drookonus. “All right, hang on. We’re jumping,” he said, then uttered the little spell that engaged the device and once again set them in motion.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
“Remember, this is a capture and interrogation mission,” Hozark reminded his crew as they strapped on all manner of weapons, both magical and conventional.
Going after Tikoo, and on the rough world of Kraam, no less, was not going to be easy. Not by a long shot.
“Give it a rest, Hozark, we’ve got it,” Bud grumbled, still feeling the effects of the abrupt voiding of alcohol from his system.
It had sucked. Even more than he remembered from the last time Hozark had done it to him, though on that occasion he had nearly wed the most comely daughter of a Bazarian warlord of sizable holdings seeking to expand his territories.
Bud had thought it a good idea in his drunken stupor. The girl was nice enough, he supposed. And it was true, she did possess huge tracts of land––something more than one suitor had taken note of.
What Bud had neglected to realize in his drunken zeal was the price from his side of the bargain. Namely, he would become a communal brother-husband to the other members of the family, helping keep the bloodline fresh and strong.
When he had been forcefully sobered up and saw what he had very nearly signed up for, Bud nearly vomited again, and not from the effects of any alcohol or food poisoning.
“So, you feeling like yourself again?” Laskar asked. “You got a bit carried away back there.”
“I was fine. It just hit me harder because I had an empty stomach, is all.”
The other three looked at one another but let his lie slide.
“All right, then. Let us load into my shimmer ship and depart for the main city. Uzabud’s mothership will be safe where it is. There is no likelihood of any suspicion being drawn with it parked this many islands away.”
Laskar had set them down expertly, right on target in a quiet and remote landing area on a small farming island. He had stepped off the craft and paid a local youth to keep an eye on it while he and his friends supposedly descended to the underwater city nearby.
The mothership was too large to have fit in the small undersea tunnel leading to the alleged destination, so that part of their ruse was solid. And the boy was young enough to not run with the truly dangerous types who frequented that particular locale.
He might talk to locals up top, but no one with direct contact with them would be around to identify either their presence or absence in the cavern. This left them free to take off in the invisible ship when the coast was clear, then make the quick hop over the few islands to their true destination.
Hozark set down a few minutes later and tucked his ship carefully atop a small rocky crag surrounded by an animal refuse dumping site. No one was around for quite some distance.
“This is so disgusting,” Laskar moaned when the stench hit his nose the instant the door opened. “Why here, of all places?”
“Because no one ever lurks around an open sewer,” Demelza said.
“Exactly,” Hozark agreed. “The ship is invisible, but that does not mean people might not bump into it on a bustling island such as this.”
“Do not worry, Laskar. The air in the higher altitude region you will be investigating is fresh and clear. You’ll have the smell cleared from your sinuses in no time,” she added.
“Come on, man. Stop jabbering and start moving. The quicker we get out of this muck swamp, the sooner I can scrub this nasty from my nose,” Bud said, quickly hopping across the rocky patches that led to dry, non-fecal land.
“I’m going as fast as I can without falling in!” he shot back.
It was a perfect place to hide the ship, and this just confirmed it for Hozark.
“We will rendezvous in two days. Keep your skrees on silent alert at all times. And, Bud, please do take care not to activate yours so carelessly this time.”
“Yeah, yeah,” he replied, then set off on foot toward the base of the small volcanic mountain at the center of the island that rose above them into the mists.
