Imminent Danger: And How to Fly Straight Into It (17 page)

Varrin raised an eyebrow. “We are talking about
me
, here,” he replied before sauntering off toward the cockpit.

Eris glared at his retreating back. “I loathe him.”

“Yes, that much has been made clear.” Miguri chuckled.

“Hey, you hate him as much as I do.”

“He is a Rakorsian. How could I not?”

“I didn’t see you helping me when I was yelling at him.”

“I tried that the first trip.” Miguri sniffed. “This time I am trying the noninterference, noncontact method. It is working out well so far.”

“Yes, and it’s making me homicidal.”

“He is not a human. Therefore, any murderous urge you feel cannot be homicidal,” Miguri said helpfully.

“Xenocidal, then. Hey! I made a new word.”

“Is it not amusing how aggression increases our capacity for creativity?”

“You’re speaking from experience, aren’t you?” Eris said suspiciously.

Miguri laughed.

“So this is Vega Minor,” Eris mused. She and her two shipmates were standing in the middle of a huge marketplace bustling with merchants selling everything from dried fruit to spaceship engines. Birdlike aircraft soared overhead through the pink afternoon sky while tiny robots skittered around the cobblestone streets, weaving between aliens’ legs, tails, and various other appendages.

Leaving the main market square, the trio strolled along one of the dusty streets, taking in the sights. Or at least Eris did. Varrin walked with his usual long, confident strides—she doubted the Rakorsian would ever deign to be seen gawking and gaping—and Miguri trotted along with an air of nonchalance. Her little friend claimed he had been to the moon before, which Eris didn’t doubt, considering his long life of travel since leaving Claktilla.

They had just stopped to examine the produce at a fruit vendor’s colorful stall when four large, bald humanoids swaggered by.

“A Scalkan gang,” Miguri whispered to Eris. “I suggest we avoid eye contact.”

The foursome spotted Eris before she could look away, and began leering and whistling lasciviously. Turning red with embarrassment, she tried to ignore them by picking up a large, spiky purple fruit and peering at it.

“Hey, sweet thing!” one of the aliens called out in Common. “Why don’t you ditch those pipsqueaks and come with us? We’ll show you the best time this side of Arcturus.”

As Eris puzzled over what Arcturus was, Varrin took a deliberate step forward.

“Kari, this will not end well.” Miguri sighed.

Alarmed, Eris grabbed Varrin’s arm. “What are you doing?”

He shrugged her off. “I believe you were insulting me?” he challenged the thugs.

“Looks like we’ve got a genius on our hands here, boys,” the leader of the gang crowed while his cronies hooted in the background. “Step aside, pretty boy. I want to have a chat with your girl. She’s the hottest little humanoid I’ve laid eyes on in a long time.” He eyed her head appreciatively. “That’s one sexy solar panel you got there, sweetheart.”

“Thank you very much,” Eris said politely.

Varrin threw her an astonished look.

“What?” she hissed. “They’re bald too—coming from them, it’s a compliment.”

“This loser bothering you?” the leader grunted, stepping closer to Varrin and cracking his knuckles threateningly.

“I’m not bothering her,” Varrin said. “I am escorting her. So you can either back off or spend the next month being spoonfed your meals.” When the thugs stared at him blankly, he elaborated, “Because I’ll have broken your arms. That was a threat.”

“Are you sure?” Eris asked.

The Scalkans were now flexing their muscles and affecting fighting stances. Eris surveyed them with a worried look. “Hey, Varrin, maybe we should just walk away.”

“Shut your mouth, little woman,” the leader snapped. “Don’t get involved in things you don’t understand. Keep your mind to your kitchen.” He leered at her. “Or to my bedroom.” His minions sniggered appreciatively.

“I take it back,” Eris said. “Pulverize them.”

“You really might want to rethink this,” Miguri piped up. “My associate is more dangerous than he appears.”

The Scalkan guffawed. “Him? I could squash him easier than a Kildulan dung bat.”

“Ha!” Varrin snorted. “My great grandmother could take you all on with both hands chained to a
klozaj
. Kari, even my little brother could kill you with his eyes closed.” He paused, reconsidering his statement. “Well no, actually, he would probably faint at the thought of bloodshed and then upon awakening compose an epic ballad on the evils of war. But my point stands.”

The leader cracked his knuckles menacingly. “Enough talk. Let’s do this!”

As he roared and charged forward, his cronies right behind, Eris and Miguri retreated to a safe distance to watch the fight.

The thugs rushed at Varrin, who stood calmly in place, arms at his side and an amused expression on his face. But when they reached Varrin, there was no impact—just a blur of black where the Rakorsian had been standing. The four Scalkans slammed into the fruit stand, scattering the neatly stacked produce in all directions. They piled up in a jumble of bodies against the side of the stand, looking almost comical amid the colorful mound of smashed fruits.

Eris heard laughter overhead. Looking up, she saw Varrin crouched on the edge of the building’s awning. He looked completely unharmed, and she realized he must have jumped straight up to avoid the attack.

“How did he
do
that?” she wondered aloud. Miguri shot her a confused look.

“You were there when he rescued us from the Ssrisk ship,” he said. “Do you not remember how agile he was?”

“I thought he was just having one of those super adrenaline rushes they say you get in a crisis.”

“Rakorsians are deadly combatants. That is one of the reasons they rule a quarter of the galaxy.”

The thugs had finally scrambled to their feet and were now peering around wildly, looking for their prey.

“Get down here!” the leader bellowed when he spotted Varrin. The Rakorsian responded by grabbing a tile from the roof and whipping it at the thug’s bald head. “Argh!” the Scalkan yelled.

Varrin leaped off the awning and landed catlike on his feet. He yanked one of the metal awning poles out of its socket and began spinning it around, passing it back and forth between his hands. The staff whistled angrily in the hot afternoon air.

The aliens rushed at Varrin for the second time. Apparently unconcerned, he stilled the makeshift polearm, held it in a ready position, and waited. The first thug to reach him sent a right hook toward Varrin’s face. It almost connected, but then Varrin’s staff was swinging up, turning the fist aside, striking the thug between the eyes. Howling in pain, the bald alien tumbled back and fell to the ground.

As the prone thug lost consciousness, two others charged in. Varrin rolled to the side and then executed another gravity-defying leap to avoid their spiked boots. The jump carried him over their heads, and he landed directly behind the charging ringleader. “Rule of combat number one,” Varrin lectured. “Never leave your back undefended.” He poked out with the metal pole and caught the leader in the lower back.

The Scalkan howled in pain, staggering sideways. Varrin circled him, dancing lightly from foot to foot. Then he ducked as the leader’s fist flew at his face. Discarding the pole, Varrin kicked out and brought the leader crashing to the ground.

The remaining two thugs jumped Varrin from behind, knocking him down as they flailed at him with their fists. Although he twisted quickly to face them and blocked their blows easily enough, Eris could see through the tangle of bodies that he was rapidly growing annoyed.

“All right, that’s enough,” Varrin declared. Using one arm to protect his face, he reached out his other hand and grabbed the discarded pole. Bringing it up in a sharp arc, he knocked the thugs away and used the momentary reprieve to regain his feet. He immediately swept the pole in a mighty arc, connecting solidly with the nearest thug’s skull. As the Scalkan fell, Varrin swung again and sent his remaining assailant into a nearby pie stand.

“I’m going to split open that hairy little head of yours and mount it on my wall!” the leader of the thugs howled, having at some point managed to haul himself back upright.

“At least I have better taste in interior decorating!” Varrin retorted. He launched himself into a spinning leap toward his opponent. The thug lunged forward to meet him, jabbing his fist toward Varrin’s stomach. The Rakorsian dodged nimbly and then cracked the pole down on the alien’s broad back. There was a sickening crunch, and the leader sprawled senseless on the ground.

Varrin looked around at the devastation he had wreaked, and a satisfied smile lit his face. Ignoring the wailing of the merchants whose stands were now in ruins, Varrin reached down and picked up a fruit pie that had somehow emerged intact from the battle. He poked his finger through the crust, pulled it out, and licked it. “Pie, anyone?”

18

E
ris and Miguri approached the fallen gang leader, who was lying on the ground, groaning. Setting a foot on the thug’s back, Varrin tossed the pie aside, flipped the awning pole, and aimed the lethally pointed end at the Scalkan’s chest.

“Wait!” Eris shouted, darting forward to grab the pole. “What are you doing?”

“Finishing this fight,” Varrin said.

“You can’t just stab him!” she protested, tugging at the pole. Varrin looked at her curiously for a moment and then relaxed his grip. Eris wrenched the pole from his hands.

“The technical term is impale,” Miguri said helpfully.

“You, quiet,” Varrin commanded and then turned to Eris. “You, explain.”

“He’s a living, breathing creature!” she cried passionately. “You can’t go around killing defenseless people! Sure, he attacked you, or insulted your honor, or my honor, or whatever, and I know in your culture that probably justifies tracking down and murdering his entire family, but the point is that you can’t!”

“I can’t what?”

“Kill him!”

“But he attacked me.”

“Yes, but that doesn’t mean you can impale him when he’s defenseless!”

“He would have done the same to me given half the chance.”

“But you’re a better person than him!”

Varrin looked at her with astonishment. “You do realize we’re talking about
me
here?”

“He is as awful a person as you can get,” Miguri agreed.

“But you don’t have to be!” Eris insisted.

“I’ll be whatever I want,” Varrin said, snatching the pole back.

Hmm,
Eris thought.
Maybe I need a different approach.
“So you like being the stereotypical Rakorsian?”

“Huh?”

Eris took a patient breath. “Look, if you took a typical Rakorsian and put him in this situation, what would he do?”

“Kill the thug,” Varrin said instantly. “He’s a repulsive brute that deserves a jagged pole through the heart. Which is what I was about to do, before you decided to—”

“Which means,” Eris interrupted, “that if you kill him, you’ll be exactly like all other Rakorsians.”

“And that’s a problem because …?”

“I’ve heard you mock Rakorsians on more than one occasion. You obviously don’t think very highly of them. I mean, don’t you want to be different?”

Varrin seemed perturbed. “I am different.”

“Not if you kill him, you aren’t.”

Varrin opened his mouth as if to argue, closed it, and then threw the pole at the nearest wall. Eris winced as the pole embedded itself deep in the bricks. Then Varrin stalked off without another word.

“Should we follow him?” Eris wondered, watching as he disappeared into the throng of market-goers.

“That is probably a good idea,” Miguri said.

They hurried in the direction that Varrin had vanished. Eris soon spotted his dark, shaggy hair near a bright display of giant, multicolored feathers. “Varrin! Wait up!”

The Rakorsian slowed his pace. Eris fell into step beside him, trying to match his long strides. “Oh, come on, you did the right thing. Why are you ignoring me?”

“I’m not,” he said.

They made their way through the crowd, ducking every now and then to avoid the exotic wares hanging from beams in front of the various stalls. The pungent smells of the market were so strong that Eris felt her eyes watering.

“Then why are you mad?” she pressed.

“I’m not,” he repeated tightly.

Grabbing her arm, Varrin suddenly turned off the main path and onto a narrow lane leading into a less crowded section of the market. Eris’s demands to know where exactly they were going were met with silence. After a few minutes, Varrin stopped them in front of a drink stall fronted by a few tables and chairs.

“You stay here,” he told Miguri, handing the Claktill a small metallic hexagon. “Take this. It has plenty of tetras on it. Get smashed if you want, but stay out of trouble. We’ll be back in three hours.”

“If you do not bring her back safe and sound with a full head of hair,” Miguri said sternly, “you will regret it.”

Varrin tugged Eris back into the throng.