1
TYLER
The disruptor blast hits the Betraskan right in her chest.
She shrieks, and her armload of e-tech goes flying as she collapses in a drooling heap. I vault over her as she falls, ducking as another disruptor shot hisses past my ear. The bazaar around us is crowded, the mob parting before me in a panic as more blasts ring out behind us. Scarlett is running right on my heels, flame-red hair plastered to her cheeks with sweat. She leaps over the unconscious Betraskan woman and her scattered goods, offering an apologetic shout.
“Sorryyyy!”
Another blast rings out. The gangsters chasing us roar at the crowd to step aside. We leap over the counter of a semptar stall, past the gobsmacked owner, and out the back door into another packed, humid street. Hovercraft and rotor bots. Pale green walls around us, red skies above, yellow plascrete beneath our feet, a rainbow of outfits and skin tones ahead.
“Left!” Finian shouts over comms. “Go left!”
We left it, barreling into a grubby alleyway off the main drag. Hucksters and fienders stare at us as we sprint past, boots pounding, trash flying. The tiny gangsters chasing us reach the alley mouth, filling the air with the BAMF! BAMF! of their disruptor blasts. The whoosh of charged particles rushes past my ear. We skid behind a dumpster full of discarded machine parts, looking for some kind of cover.
“I told you this was a bad idea!” Scarlett gasps.
“And I told you I don’t have bad ideas!” I shout, kicking through a doorway.
“Oh no?” she asks, cracking off a shot at our pursuers.
“No!” I drag her inside. “Just less amazing ones!”
· · · · ·
Yeah, let’s back it up a little.
About forty minutes, maybe, before things got quite so shooty. I know I’ve done this before, but it’s more exciting this way. Trust me. Dimples, remember?
So, forty minutes ago, I’m sitting in a crowded booth in a crowded bar, music thumping in my ears. I’m outfitted in a tight black tunic and tighter pants, which I presume are stylish—Scarlett chose them for me, after all. My sister’s squeezed into the booth beside me, also in civilian wardrobe: blood-red and formfitting and cut as low as she likes it.
Sitting opposite us are a dozen gremps.
The place we’re in is a dive, all pulsing light and smoky air, stuffed to the rafters. There’s a broad pit in the center of the room where I guess they hold some kind of blood sport, but fortunately nobody’s killing anyone else in here right now. Drug and skin trades are going on all around us, the small-time hustlers of the station and their daily grind. And along with the smell of rocksmoke and the speakers’ thudding deepdub, a single question is buzzing in my head.
How in the Maker’s name did I get here?
The gremps sit across from us—a dozen small, furry figures crammed into the other side of the booth. Their slitted eyes are fixed on the uniglass Scarlett has placed on the table between us. The device is a flat pane of palm-sized transparent silicon, lit up with holo displays. Rotating a few inches above it is a glowing image of our Longbow. The ship is arrowhead-shaped, gleaming titanium and carbite. The Aurora Legion sigil and our squad designation, 312, are emblazoned down its flanks.
It’s state of the art. Beautiful. We’ve been through a lot together.
And now we have to let her go.
The gremps mutter among themselves in their own hissing, purring tongue, whiskers twitching. The leader is a little over a meter tall, which is big for her species. The tortoiseshell fur covering her body is perfectly coiffed, and her pearl-white suit screams “gangster chic.” Her pale green eyes are edged with dark powder and have the gleam of someone who feeds people to her pets for kicks.
“Risky, Earthgirl.” The gremp’s voice is a smooth purr. “Rrrrisky.”
“We were told Skeff Tannigut was a lady who could handle a little risk,” Scarlett smiles. “You’ve got quite the reputation around here.”
The aforementioned Ms. Tannigut drums her claws on the tabletop, glances up from the hologram of our Longbow and into my sister’s eyes.
“There’s regular risk, Earthgirl, and then there’s the risk of twenty years in Lunar Penal Colony. Trafficking in stolen Aurora Legion hardware is no joke.”
“Neither is the hardware,” I say.
Twelve sets of slitted eyes swivel toward me. Twelve fanged jaws drop open. Skeff Tannigut looks at my sister with astonishment, ears twitching atop her head.
“You let your male speak in public?”
“He’s … spirited,” Scarlett smiles, giving me a side-eye full of Shut uuup.
“I could sell you a pain collar?” the gangster offers. “Break him in?”
I raise my eyebrow. “Thanks, but—hrk!”
I clutch my bruised shin under the table and glare as Scarlett leans forward to look the syndicate leader in the eye. “If you’re feeling so generous, let’s skip the foreplay, shall we?” She waves at the holo image of our Longbow. “A hundred thousand and she’s yours. Weapon passcodes included.”
Tannigut confers briefly with her colleagues. Not fancying another boot to the shins, I keep my mouth on the right side of shut and study the club around us.
The bar is lined with bottles full of rainbows, and the walls are lit with holographic displays—jetball games and the latest economy reports from Central and news feeds of Unbroken ships on the move in the Neutral Zones. This station is a long way from the Core, but I’m still surprised at the number of different species here. Since we docked two hours ago, I must’ve counted at least twenty—pale Betraskans, furry gremps, hulking blue Chellerians. This place is like a dirty slice of the whole Milky Way, dropped into one dodgy, suborbital melting pot.
The planet we’re floating above is a gas giant, a little smaller than Jupiter back home. This station hovers in the stratosphere, suspended above a storm that’s four centuries old and twenty thousand klicks wide. The air is filtered, the whole floating city sealed inside a transparent dome of ionized particles crackling faintly in the skies above our heads. But I can still taste the tang of chlorine gas that gives the storm its color and this station its name.
I take a sip of my water. Glance at the coaster beneath it.
WELCOME TO EMERALD CITY! it says. DON’T LOOK DOWN!
The gremps have stopped conversing, and Tannigut’s glittering eyes are back on Scar. The gangster smooths her whiskers with one paw as she speaks.
“I’ll give you thirty thousand,” she says. “First and final offer.”
Scar raises one perfectly manicured eyebrow. “Since when do gremps do stand-up comedy?”
“Since when do Aurora legionnaires sell their ships?” the gremp asks.
“We could have stolen this baby. What makes you think we’re Legion?”
Tannigut points to me. “His haircut.”
“What’s wron—hrk!”
“All due respect, but the whys aren’t your concern,” Scarlett says smoothly. “There’s no tech anywhere in the galaxy like the tech that comes out of Aurora labs. One hundred thousand is a bargain, and you know it.” Scar tosses her flame-red bob out of her eyes and manages to look nowhere as desperate as we actually are. “And therefore, madam, I bid you good day.”