Chronicles of a Space Mercenary 3: Vengeance (14 page)

“Gallchem.” Serrath ordered once the reader had taken her retinal scan.

“Nothing for me.” Leethea said.

“Gallchem huh.” I said when the Druella moved away to make our drinks.

“As always you’re confused.” Leethea said. “Gallchem is a blend of several kinds of blood. It’s supposed to be good as an anti-oxidant though.”

I laughed inwardly until the drinks were actually delivered- I couldn’t tell if she was telling the truth or not because I couldn’t smell her over the stench of the mammals around us. Now I understood why reptiles couldn’t use their olfactory senses to smell my bluffs. The Druella brought our drinks back and they really were raw blood drinks. I motioned for the Druella to hold up his idento-reader again; “Something intoxicating.” I said.

Chapter 33

It was fairly expensive- even given Station prices- but burned as it went down and had an abrupt effect. As I felt it immediately enter my bloodstream it became quickly clear it would do a much better job than anything designed for an Alartaw or human metabolism. In other words it would get me intoxicated without a whole lot of effort- what more could a being ask. I gave Serrath a meaningful look that I was sure conveyed my triumph. I didn’t want to smile and precipitate death and mayhem from the twitchy mammals all around us but I think my look carried my meaning without having to smile. The tension was electric and like other similar situations I have found myself in there was no telling where this one was going to lead us. Apparently they weren’t used to uppity lizards in this neck of the woods but they weren’t quite sure what to do about it now that we were there. Violence wasn’t yet out of the question, was my opinion.

“That’ll do the job in a pinch,” Serrath said, “but it’s not the fix you’re looking for.” She gave me a meaningful look in return
that conveyed her own feelings succinctly. That she had triumphed over me entirely and that there was absolutely nothing I would be able to say to induce her to tell this grand secret she supposedly held. The problem was that I did in fact believe her because this was exactly her style. She seldom bluffed. I did smile this time, but I doubted there was any confusion as to who my
smile
was directed at. I
poured
the rest of that drink down my overlarge neck- now here was a benefit- and motioned to the Druella for another.

“Order me that drink!” I snarled at Leethea to a cold stare
in return for my efforts, then smelled both their amusement over the stench of the mammals. Their amusement was strong though I still couldn’t understand what drink could be so potent that there was no doubt in either of the girl’s looks that I was really missing-out on something good and they were really the ones doing it to me. I consider it to be my vocation and duty to test not only the potency of the girl’s secret mysterious intoxicant as much as it is to travel the wide Universe in search of ever better. I’m a connoisseur of intoxicants and through experience can generally tell when I’ve gotten-in too far- when it was time to drag myself back to my doc for servicing- and in any case what had this life been given for if it wasn’t meant for us to enjoy it? Since I could think of no logical rebuttal to this I felt it was my duty to enjoy my life to its utmost and spent every possible waking moment doing just that.

“
You
won’t get it from
me
.” Leethea replied with an ill-disposed look. I wondered that these hostile creatures could be my friends. She was on the other side of Serrath and I could no longer smell anything of what she was thinking. What I did know was that she wasn’t going to tell me. I also knew something else about Leethea and Serrath both; that when the cards were down was when they would be up at my side, despite the theatrics in-between.

“This
will just have to do.” I said as I took the new drink, tilted my head back and poured it down my neck. I handed the empty glass back to the bartender. “Another.”

“I’d like to do some immediate shopping.” Serrath said. “Someplace uptown.”

“This waterfront trash disgusts me.” Leethea said. I froze where I was, trying to see if anybeing had caught her statement on a translator but the remark in Fsyth seemed to have slipped past unnoticed.

“Good idea.” I said with a look at the both of them. Just because I
thought
it was possible we might fight our way out of this mob of hairy stinking bodies didn’t mean a damn thing. Reptiles weren’t the only creatures God has endowed with native weaponry- and every other kind. If I didn’t know better I would think the two of them were spoiling for such a fight and though obviously I expected it from Serrath this was a relatively new development with Leethea. I poured the new drink down my neck and headed for the hatchway. I was glad when they followed.

“Are you trying to be Serrath when you grow up?” I asked conversationally once we had achieved the outside corridor with our lives intact. “You may never grow up.”

“It’s time I lived a little.” Leethea replied, even drawing a speculative look from Serrath. I knew what her speculative look meant because I had noticed it as well. Melanie would never have been so aggressive, and not because she wasn’t capable. Her reptilian instincts were at play on her sense of reason.

“Spill some blood and get it out of your system.” Serrath said. “I have to admit, that might have been a close shave.”

“Spill some blood?” Leethea said with a speculative look of her own in her eye. “You know maybe that’s exactly what I need.”

I wasn’t sure if Serrath’s therapy would wo
rk and settle Leethea’s nerves or turn her inner mass-murderer loose. Of course it is not a crime a Kievor Trade Station, there were no laws and beings re free to murder whosoever they chose- but one thing I did know for sure; any time blood was going to be spilled I was tagging along to watch. Blood draws the flies and I’m the biggest fly of them all.

Chapter 34

“Who are you going to murder?” Serrath asked Leethea casually after we had continued along for a while without Leethea finding any likely candidates for her murderous rampage. As we had suspected we had been docked in a mammalian zone and an even larger reptilian area was right next to it. Right next to it being a fifteen minute walk while we took in the sights and while also looking for Serrath’s uptown section- which could appear anywhere- and somebeing for Leethea to murder. An uptown joint, as Serrath so fondly liked to call them, might encompass ten or even twenty regular business spaces and you could be sure your credit balance would be checked before you were allowed in. If you were going to kill somebeing you might as well kill somebeing who had something worth salvaging after. At least that was Serrath’s philosophy. It was more my style to clean them out legitimately and then if I had to defend myself after who could blame me? I slept at night- the intoxicated sleep of the innocent.

“This could backfire.” I told them. I didn’t mean the murder part itself- I had little doubt there would be
any hardship in that. Life can be a very tenuous thing and easily extinguished.

“It won’t just be anybeing.” Leethea said. “I’m not a monster.
However, I do not believe it will be too hard to find an appropriate applicant.” I wasn’t so sure in her present guise but I couldn’t have been more wrong. Once we entered the reptilian conclave and any mammals at all became far and few in-between I began to notice the looks of many of the males we were passing. They were looking my way but they weren’t looking
my
way.

“Do we do a lot of that?” I asked. Race didn’t seem to be a
barrier for the varied reptiles looking the girl’s way as we moved through the crowds and I certainly meant races from different worlds and entirely different genetic ancestry. I wondered how often such unions resulted in new reptilian bastard-races and surmised that it must be quite often- given the proliferation of such activities. Mother Nature takes care of herself- given opportunity She will upon occasion find a way. Mammals participated in more than their own share of cross-race sexual activity and I have seen the results of such unions with my own eyes. Such beings usually never left the Stations where they were born, having nowhere else they were welcome and amongst the hundreds of thousands of alien races on the Stations the only place they truly fit in.

“Endemic.” Serrath said as she returned a most complimentary look- a largish brown reptile had shown her at least a meter of forked tongue.

“Who would have guessed.” Leethea said as she tried not to be revolted by the smells of lusting lizards. Most of these had just climbed into the gene pool of sentience and their thoughts were clearly understandable without having to read their pheromones. Most were capable of but few thoughts and those seemed to be centered on one topic.

There were plenty of females as well and I began to catch a number of surreptitious glances in my direction by those we were passing but any time a good looking male was with two beautiful females I was going to receive a few glances as they wondered what my mojo was- and likely a bit more. It was never a bad policy to surround yourself with beautiful women you weren’t sleeping with and who were in collusion with you no matter how treacherous your soul. Then I thought about what I was thinking. Meerla and I were married and even beyond that I had suddenly found myself a bit too interested in those
lizard
females. I reminded myself how much I did not want to do that because I did not want the memory of that staining the rest of my life and then Leethea found somebeing to murder. Several in fact!

Gangs were an endemic problem and slavery a huge business within the reptilian races- a point Melanie was intimately aware of. What could be taken and held on a Kievor Trade Station was the property of the holder and likely to be shipped off somewhere unpleasant as soon as the slaver-ship was full. It was a more than common practice and probably the main reason human women who lived among other races had become so fearsome. They were in high demand because of their hairlessness and uncommon beauty as sexual slaves throughout the mammalian races- if you lived through capturing them. There were no humans here that I was aware of but business here was pretty much business as there and quick as a striking serpent Leethea changed direction and began moving purposefully toward her goal.

“Do we help her?” Serrath asked as we paused to ponder.

“There
are
six of them, it appears.” I said. Six huge heavily-armed reptiles- blast rifles held at the ready- were shepherding a group of at least fifty chained females of various reptilian races. “They seem to be headed for a voyage.”

“One way would be my guess.” Serrath said. “Maybe we
had
better help.”

“Do tell.” I said as I studied the guards. I couldn’t find a single weakness in their stance and intimate awareness of their surroundings. They looked a tough bunch in the least. “We pull our weapons
and they’ll level this corridor.” I added judiciously. This was no bunch of bumbling fools Leethea had chosen. These were trained killers with their weapons at the ready.

“Do tell.” Serrath said as we moved forward.

Chapter 35

Leethea seemed to have eyes for the lead guard. Though technically a reptile’s face
could not form any type of facial expression the eyes themselves could be very communicative. A little tilt of her head, a seductive lilt to her walk and thoughts of intimate moments with Bren so she would exude the proper scent as she slowly minced toward the row of prisoners and the guard she had chosen to begin this. These were worthy of her attentions and she had an itch she just couldn’t seem to reach to scratch in any other fashion. She was completely calm and self-assured as she approached- so calm she could hardly believe it herself- considering what she was about to do.

It was by no means a rule that large beings had to be slow of intellect, I noted as Leethea approached the
first overlarge reptile, but in this case those were the prerequisites for the job and this stereotype the sort which would thoroughly enjoy their occupation. Of course these brutes weren’t the mind behind this operation but in my opinion were plenty guilty enough- not that this type of operation took a lot of thought and planning. Grab whatever beings were close to hand, throw them in chains and march them to a ship. It was possibly the second oldest occupation in existence and easy enough for the likes of these brutes to understand. Then they would brutalize the females on their trip to being sold to other beings which would brutalize them even further and forever and those not lucky enough to end up in the mines, factories or whore-houses likely to end up on dinner tables. Such was life in the wondrous spacious Universe and I had seen its like many times. I had interfered in more than a few of these situations but as with everything else Time wears you down and breeds callous indifference. It was how Melanie had become a part of my original crew, a dedicated member no matter what her mouth might say, but I had long since given up being a hero. It was perpetual harvest-time in these places and nothing an insignificant being like me could do about it.

The lead reptile brought the train of prisoners to a halt as a tongue slipped out to taste the air, taste Leethea’s intentions, and smelling her desire let his guard down. Leethea had reached him by then and laid a caressing left hand upon the leering beast’s left arm while looking deeply and longingly into the stupid brute’s eyes. Leethea would be a prize for a brain-dead brute like this and he was immediately enthralled. I knew what was going to happen next and it had nothing to do with Serrath blurring into motion as she bounded towards the rear of the train- a Fsyth on the move was a sight I was not likely to forget soon- I’ve seen slower lightning bolts. I went for the middle still surprised at how fast
I
could move when I had thought being an Alartaw was the very pinnacle of physical achievement. I hadn’t guessed the half of it.