The woman was a little shorter than he was, thin, but muscular. Short brown hair, hard brown eyes. She might have been pretty at some point, Alex thought, but even though she was smiling, there was something ugly about her.

Alex looked at the guard, who looked confused, then back at her. “Me?”

Her smile tightened. “Of course you. Who else do you think I mean?”

“I’m afraid you have the wrong person then. I’m Orville Pantor.”

“Really? You’re going to play that game?” She made a gesture and the seven mercs spread out in a semi-circle around him. “Well, Mister Pantor, you’re in the fortunate position of being exactly where my scanners tell me Alexander Crimson is standing, so I’m going to treat you as if you were him. I’ve been waiting too long to be face to face with him to care of he somehow switch the tag to some pour third party who happens to look exactly like him. Well, except for having lost all that fat. You were a lot fatter the last time we stood face to face.”

Who was that? What did she mean he’d been tagged? He studied her, trying to find anything familiar in her face and body language, but there was nothing.

He turned to the guard. “Maybe you should call the Law.”

“Don’t,” one of the mercs said. A compact man with gravely voice. He took his gun out of its holster, but didn’t point it at anyone.

The guard didn’t move.

“You don’t have to call anyone,” the woman said. “I’m a bounty hunter, this man is a thief, a pirate and the accomplice to a killer. I’m here to collect the price on his head, after we’ve had a talk and he tells me where Tristan is.”

Her voice as she said Tristan’s name rang a bell. The hate in it, the anger. He’d heard it before, but where? Luminex, it had to be. It was the last place he’d been overweight. Tristan had attacked it, used him to do it. It had landed him in one of the secret cells somewhere under the company building, being interrogated by….

“Oh good, you do remember.” She smiled. “So, where is Tristan? He still owes me a death.”

Alex shrugged. “Sorry, I have no idea where he is. I never found him.”

She snorted. “Sure, that’s why you were fighting at his side on Derelict. Tell me did he give you want you were after? Did he hurt you? Treat you like you were worse than nothing? Did he punish you for being human?”

At her words Alex remembered the beatings, the pain as the Samalian moved on top of him, his stay in the hospital and he made fists. He hadn’t gone looking for that. 

“Looks like I hit a nerve. So you’re what then? His pet?”

Alex took a step forward and stopped as the man raised his gun toward him. “She wants you alive, but she doesn’t care if pieces are missing.”

“These mercenaries are among the worse of the worse. I figured I needed creatures who weren’t afraid of doing horrible things if I wanted them to kill Tristan.”

Alex leaned to the side and made a show of looking past her, through the glass entrance. “Did you bring a hundred more? Because if you think this is enough to take on Tristan, I’m thinking you’ve forgotten what his file says.”

“I haven’t forgotten anything,” she said. “Now put your hands behind your head. We’re going someplace more appropriate to an interrogation.”

Alex had no issues complying, slipping his hands inside the sleeves of his shirt in the process and closing them on the handle of the knives there.

 She motioned to the two at the end of the semi-circle to grab him. One’s plated shirt went up to protect his neck, the other didn’t.

“Lady, do you know anything about me?”

“I know everything about you,” she snarled.

“No, you don’t.” He took a breath. “If you did, you’d know better than to let anyone come within reach.”

The hands came out of the sleeves. He slashed one man’s neck open, then stabbed the other one three times in the space between the stomach and chest, where they couldn’t put any plating to keep the shirt flexible. It was reinforced, but not enough to stop a direct stab. 

Alex jumped the counter, grabbing the guard and pulling him down as blasts flew over them.

“Do not kill him!”

“You have an alarm, right?” Alex asked the guard, who was crawling away from him.

“Cover the exits! I don’t want him escaping!”

Alex snapped his fingers in front of the guard’s face. “Alarm, where is it?”

The guard looked up at the underside of the counter. Alex searched it, but he couldn’t see anything. “It’s on the counter, isn’t it?”

The guard nodded.

“Of course it is. You have a gun I can borrow?”

The guard shook his head.

“Of course not, that would make this too easy, wouldn’t it. You know, there are days when I think the universe has it in for me.”

He could hear them move, some away, some closer. He wished he had more than his polymer knives, but they were the only thing that couldn’t be detected.

“I’m going to draw their attention, you set the alarm off, okay?”

The guard’s eyes were wide in fear.

Alex snapped his fingers again. “Come on, focus. You need to get the Law here, that means setting off the alarm.” He saw someone’s leg come around the edge of the counter. Thick calves, well armored, exposed join. He could keep the guy from moving, but he had a limited number of knifes. He couldn’t throw one and not take that person completely out of the fight.

So he didn’t throw it. He threw himself. The merc, a woman with a thick body lowered her gun at him, but he was too close. He batted it aside, sliced at her wrist. The armor there kept him from cutting it completely off, but she dropped the gun.

Gunfire trailed him as he moved, and hit her multiple time before stopping. Her armor had taken the brunt of it, the pain on her face was from more than the wrist. She didn’t have another gun.

Alex planted a knife between the plating in the middle of her front and the other one below her stomach and kept her up as shock settle into her.

He wouldn’t be able to do that for long, once she started falling, he’d have to let go, or go down with her. He pushed her back toward those shooting and thought about Will. She’d be his type. Muscular, large, aggressive. He wondered if his young friend had ever made a move toward the ship’s cook. He’d never said in the occasional messages they’d exchanged. He’d have to ask in his next one.

The two shooter moved aside, one was a tall and thin merc, the other the woman who led them. The one who'd made his life difficult at Luminex. He went for her. Taking out the leadership was always the best move. Mercs tended to lose interest when the person with the money was dead.

She was faster than he’d expected.

“I’ve got to say, the knife play didn’t make it into the files I read.” She dodged and avoided his fast strikes. “They have you as more of a straight up thief. A daring one too. Did you actually break into a Law office? That takes guts, I’ll give you that.”

She struck him so fast he barely saw the arm move and with so much strength Alex flew across the room. He slid on the floor until the wall stopped him.

“I too have a few surprises in store.” She raised her hand to stop the mercs from firing on him. She flexed her right arm. “I had to get this after a botched infiltration of the Brogarian’s Enclave. I had good intell you were working for them. They brought down a building on me, can you imagine that? I almost got out, but my arm was stuck, so I had to cut it off. Replacing it was expensive, but so worth it to see the surprise on your face.”

“That isn’t surprise,” Alex wheezed, “it’s pain.” He forced himself to his feet, arm over his chest, and without bothering to pick up the knife he’d dropped. The worse of it was passing and he could breathe again.

“I’m guessing you’re wondering what I’m doing among people like these. Why I would leave my comfortable position at Luminex.”

“Don’t care.” Five left. His exit options were the door leading outside, the lift or the door leading deeper inside on this level. The lift was out. He had no way of knowing on what floor it was at, and unless it opened on its own to discharge people, he couldn’t afford to wait for it. 

“I have to thank you for that. You showed me that I couldn’t get what I wanted by working within the system. So I left, not too long after you did actually. Unfortunately you vanished quite well.”

Outside was an option, but then they’d run after him. It was open space, no cover other than the vehicles in the parking lot, and if he was going to reach his hover, he’d have to run along one full side of the building with no cover at all.

“It wasn’t until you broke into the Law office that I had my first lead. Of course, by the time I got there, you were long gone, and no one there would tell me what you were after. But at least I knew you were alive.”

That left the door leading deeper in. It was locked, but Orville had access, Alex had made sure it wasn’t revoked after his last visit. The merc at the door was average build, average everything actually, except for his eyes. They were wild. Probably not entirely sane.

“Let me make you a deal, Alex.”

“It’s Crimson.”

She raised an eyebrow.

“Alex is the guy you tortured, you’re never going to be dealing with him again. I’m Crimson, and you’re not going to be dealing with him for much longer either.”

“Alright, Crimson. I’m annoyed at you, I’ll admit that. You gave me the slip for a lot longer than a cubicle jockey should have been able to, even an expert coercionist. But you’re not the one I want. I’m sorry for goading you earlier. I know you’re not a masochist looking to be punished. You’re attraction for aliens has always been affective, not punitive. I won’t claim to understand it, but I know that what you’re looking for is someone to love. Is Tristan really giving you that?”

Alex tried not to react, but he had to have given something away.

“Why are you protecting him? He’s a monster. He kills and hurts everyone around him. Wouldn’t the universe be better off without him in it?”

She wasn’t wrong, he knew that. Tristan wasn’t a good person. So why was he helping him? There was the fact they were on a job, and Alex wouldn’t betray a partner, no matter what, but past that, there was that look Tristan had gotten in the medical clinic, regret. Sure, Tristan was a master actor, he could fake it, but only a few days later he’d told Alex to leave. He’d said it outright that this wouldn’t be good for him. Why act out regret one day and then tell him to leave, explain why he should. It had to mean something, even if Alex wasn’t sure what.

“Tell you what, I’m on a job right now; how about you look me up once I’m done with it and we can talk this over?”

“You mean kidnapping children? I thought you’d be above that.”

“Like you haven’t had to do anything you didn’t want to in this life? Somehow I doubt you’re the nice and good woman you think you are, just look at who you hang ar—”

“I’m done here. Grab him and lets get out of—”

The alarm sounded.

The woman and her people all looked at the guard. Alex flung his knife at the merc by the door and ran for it. The knife went in the side, between the plates, not a killing blow, but it kept the man from drawing his gun. Alex punched him in the face then swiped his card. He almost forced the door closed once he was through but stopped himself. He couldn’t just leave; he had to keep her from following him.

There had just been an attack on the company, now a group of merc had entered it, wouldn’t it be nice if everyone thought they were the people responsible?

The merc grabbed the door and Alex ran.

He couldn’t add anything in the mainframe, but if they were caught running through the building, they’d have a lot of explaining to do.

Alex headed down hallways, turned left and right as he needed, but always made sure they could seem him make it. At least until they’d reached the center of the building, then he ran as fast as he could, doing his best to lose them. He didn’t want them on his tail when he reached the open space that was the warehouse.

Their voices dropped into the distance, and when he swiped Orville’s ID by the door it opened; it closed, he was out of reach of his pursuers, or so he hoped. He didn’t slow down, not caring for the looks he received. He had no idea if the door would even slow them.

He reached the warehouse and headed for his hover, only to stop halfway there. He pulled out his datapad and checked the status of the loading. It hadn’t even begun, still.

Alex cursed. He looked behind him, no signs his pursuers were coming. He accessed the warehouse’s listing for the freight movement, it took him a moment to locate the computers he’d come here to get, then the hover they were on.

They were at the other end of the warehouse from his shuttle. Could he override the system? Get one of the loaders to transfer the computers?

There was an explosion in the distance. He looked in the direction he’d come. That was a drastic way to do it, but they’d gotten through the door. Which meant he didn’t have the time to argue with the system. He had to get out of here now.

But could he leave the computers? He could take that hover, it would be easy to override its simple system, but that meant leaving the cameras behind. Which one did they need more?

Cameras. 

He ran for his hover.

If they were going to have something to broadcast, they needed to be able to record it.

Once in the hover he told the warehouse he was leaving, but it wouldn’t disconnect him. As far as it was concerned, he couldn’t leave since the loading hadn’t been completed. He put his earpiece in and began arguing with it. Psychology was all he could use since he had no computer terminal of his own.

To his worry about his pursuers finding him, he added the Law when he heard sirens approaching. He was confident his ID would pass most examination, but the guard had seen him fight and kill. He’d have to explain not only his act of self defense, but where a movie producer had learned to fight. The universe might be a harsh place, but there were limits to what officers would easily believe.

He had to be out of here before they arrived, and let her deal with them.

What was her name anyway. He couldn’t remember that.

He finally convinced the warehouse that what he was supposed to pickup wasn’t even here, there were, after all no waste material ready to be picked up. It had been easy for him to send a command with his datapad to undo the code that marked the computer as waste.

He began moving, sticking to the speed limit on the lot, and was out of the gate a moment before the Law vehicles raced in his direction. He pulled to the side and let them pass. When they were all gone, he resumed his course at a nice and reasonable speed. Now was not the time to attract attention.