Cleon Moon (26 page)

“I know I said I’d help with Beck, but can it wait?” Abelardus asked. “I was planning to go out to the racetrack in the morning to talk to Ostberg again. And morning is only a few hours away now.”

“I’m certain we can finish this rescue and have you back by then.” Alisa looked at the time display on her comm unit. “We’ve got what? Four hours? We’ll have Beck back in time to make pancakes.”

“Pancakes on the grill?” Mica asked.

“You’re questioning that instead of my optimistic timeline? And don’t put those pancakes past him. Have you seen his muffins?”

“Since you are clearly in need of my help and pancakes are at stake,” Abelardus said, “I shall join you.”

“You are very magnanimous.”

“It’s true. I am.”

Mica rolled her eyes. Alisa was just happy Abelardus was talking on the comm instead of into her head. Maybe she was outside of his telepathy range. She gave him the location of the hangar and was about to close the channel when he spoke again.

“Aren’t you going to ask me about the dino heads?”

“Since you didn’t enthusiastically tell me about a huge pouch of money you’re lugging around, I assumed it didn’t go well.”

“Ah.”

“Am I wrong?” Alisa asked. “Were they worth anywhere near what we heard?”

“Not exactly. The five- and ten-thousand tindark bounties are for people who slay the dinosaurs with the cameras watching, thus to ensure solid entertainment for viewers and sponsors of the hunter channels.”

Alisa thought of the way Leonidas had smashed the cameras.

“I did convince the man to pay
something
for them,” Abelardus said, “but you may have to downgrade your shopping list slightly.”

“From combat armor to…?”

“Perhaps a toy soldier wearing toy combat armor.”

Alisa groaned. “You couldn’t use your Starseer charms to get more out of him?”

Even though Beck and Jelena were her prime concerns right now, she couldn’t help but feel disappointed. It sounded like she had hacked off a dinosaur head and that they had carried the collection of them all the way back for nothing.

“His charms?” Mica asked as they turned a corner, the flat roof of Solstice’s headquarters coming into view. “You mean his mental manipulation skills?”

“More or less.”

“I did attempt to persuade him to open his coffers further,” Abelardus said, “but he was already grumpy since I’d woken him in the middle of the night—and also because I’d dumped a pile of bloody heads on the floor of the betting shop that he runs out of his basement. He informed me, with vitriol, that he doesn’t keep much physical currency on hand and that when full-price dinosaur bounties are dished out, the money comes from the city vaults. Which are controlled by the boss.”

“Solstice,” Alisa grumbled, and turned off the comm.

“So Leonidas is the one who will have to be charming if we’re to be paid decently,” Mica said.

“Yes, but I don’t want him being charming to Solstice.”

“Because it would make you jealous?”

“Because her walls are filled with displays of dinosaurs eating people. She’s probably the one who came up with that whole scheme. Bloodthirsty bitch.”

“Because it would make you jealous,” Mica repeated, this time with a firm nod.

Alisa sighed at her, but the hangar had come into view, so she curbed further responses. They turned a corner and paused, waiting for an opportunity to cross an intersection that hover bikes and automated delivery trucks zoomed through, despite the late—
early
—hour.

“She’s not coming
with
us, is she?” Mica pointed her chin toward the front of the hangar.

The giant sliding door was open, as was a smaller one for personnel. Leonidas stood in front of that one, wearing all of his armor except his helmet, which was casually tucked under his arm. Solstice stood next to him, a hand resting on his forearm. She wore a tight dress with a slit in the lower half revealing most of one shapely leg. Her eight-inch hover heels brought her head nearly level with his.

“Not in that outfit,” Alisa grumbled. “You can’t infiltrate the enemy compound in a dress like that. I doubt she could even run.”

“Will running be required?” Mica asked, as they found their opportunity to stride across the intersection. “I was hoping that stealth approach you mentioned would come into play.”

“That was for when we were infiltrating an air-traffic control tower. Now we’re infiltrating an enemy compound in a city full of White Dragon loyalists who want Beck dead and, after the help we’ve given him, very likely want us dead too.”

“That seems like
more
of a reason to employ stealth rather than less.”

“We’ll see what we can manage.” Alisa forced herself to smile as she walked across the landing strip in front of the hangar. “Good evening, Leonidas. Good evening, Solstice.”

“
Boss
Solstice,” the woman said, oozing closer to Leonidas, pressing her body against his armored side.

“Is that what passes for an honorific here?” Mica muttered.

“This is my pilot,” Leonidas said, extending a hand toward Alisa. “You’ve met.”

“Have we?” Solstice asked, feigning surprise as she looked Alisa up and down. “I must have forgotten. She looks rather forgettable, doesn’t she?”

“No. Alisa, Boss Solstice says that her spies have verified that Beck is being held in the White Dragon compound in Terra Dhwan.” Leonidas met Alisa’s eyes, and she thought there was a warning in his gaze, a let’s-not-take-her-word-for-it warning.

Alisa nodded, having exactly the same feeling. She hoped they could trust the information about Beck’s location. She would hate to break into an enemy compound for no reason.

Leonidas extracted his arm and walked to the large open door. “Which craft may we take?”

Solstice strode after him, giving Alisa a snide look down her nose as she passed.

“She probably has to be bitchy,” Alisa told Mica, as if Mica had made an opening comment. “Nobody would take a nice mafia boss seriously.”

Mica arched her eyebrows. “Insults? Shouldn’t you kiss up to the person who’s lending us a spaceship?”

“Is that the proper protocol?” Alisa asked. “I didn’t know. Nobody ever lends me anything.”

“Hard to imagine why.”

Alisa elbowed her and whispered, “You’re supposed to be on my side.”

“I’m just here to fix your engines when they get shot up, which I suppose will be inevitable since you’re eschewing stealth.”

“I’m not eschewing anything. Except kissing up.”

Solstice and Leonidas strode into the hangar without waving for Alisa and Mica to follow. They walked down a wide aisle with aircraft and spaceships parked on either side, their noses pointed toward the center. Alisa followed the pair, somewhat pleased when Leonidas avoided Solstice’s attempts to take his arm by wielding his helmet like a shield.

“This will seat six,” Solstice said, stopping to pat the nose of an imperial charger that had received a paint job, leaving it a bland off-white. “Unmarked, so they won’t know it’s mine. I had my men put some extra weapons in there since the rest of your team appears poorly outfitted.” She sneered at Alisa’s clothes and the Etcher in her holster, then included Mica in her sneer.

“I’m outfitted just fine,” Mica said, patting her satchel. “Besides, if I end up in a shootout with someone, we’re in all kinds of trouble.”

“Nonetheless, there are weapons,” Solstice said, “and also rappelling equipment in case you want to drop in on their heads.” She smiled and gripped Leonidas’s arm. “I will take it as a personal favor if you destroy a few of their buildings on your way in and then lop off a few heads on the way out, preferably Boss Medric’s. I’m sure he’s the one who sent that team into my city without thinking he needed my permission.” She bared her startlingly white teeth, her eyes glinting with predatory intensity.

“If you want me to announce to them that you’re behind our visit, I’ll attack any of them you wish,” Leonidas said. “But it seems wiser to sneak in and out without leaving carnage in our wake.”

Solstice tapped her jaw thoughtfully. “I
do
like carnage.”

“Shocking,” Alisa muttered.

“But I would prefer it if they not know I’m behind any calamities that befall them,” she added, ignoring Alisa. “Not over such a trivial matter. Though their presumption does vex me terribly. Leonidas, if you kill Medric while you’re there, sneakily or not, I’ll reward you handsomely.”

“I’m not an assassin,” he said, though he did not hold her gaze. “Not anymore,” he added softly, looking toward a distant corner of the hangar.

“Not to mention that the White Dragon clan has more heads than a Farol octopus has tentacles,” Alisa said. “We’d rather not have the rest of them hunting for us.”

Solstice sniffed. “Too late for that, girl. You should look yourself up on the mafia sys-net someday.”

“They haven’t seen fit to give me a passcode.”

“A
handsome
reward, Leonidas,” Solstice said. “Keep my offer in mind.”

Abelardus appeared in the large doorway and strode toward them, the hem of his black robe snapping around his ankles at his brisk pace.

“Forget rewards. What would we have to do in order to get the full bounties for the eight dinosaur heads we tried to turn in tonight?” Alisa asked, reminded of that problem by Abelardus's appearance.

“Eight?” Solstice asked. “There were eight dinosaur slayings that weren’t caught on camera?”

“Cameras malfunction. You know how it goes.”

“I see.” Solstice pursed her lips. “Wreck up Medric’s compound nicely and in a way that it won’t be pinned on me, and I’ll see that you’re paid well.”

“Eight-dinosaur well?” Alisa asked.

“Yes.”

The woman blew a kiss to Leonidas and sashayed toward the exit. She paused to give Abelardus a head-to-toe appraising look before she continued. He gave her a Starseer bow.

“Let’s go while night may still cover some of our actions,” Alisa said, waving toward the hatch on the side of the ship.

Leonidas led the way. Alisa still suspected Solstice might have laid a trap for them, but even if she hadn’t, Alisa cringed at the idea of being a pawn in some feud between mafia families. That might be worse than the trap.

• • • • •

It did not take long for the charger to fly across the dark swamplands between the two domed cities, but Alisa added some time to their trip by swooping up a few miles into the atmosphere before angling toward Terra Dhwan. She did not care much about keeping Solstice out of trouble, but since the
Nomad
was still parked in her city, she would try to make it look as if this craft had flown in from space.

While she flew, she tapped into the local sys-net and found the comm code for Chef Leblanc’s warehouse. She did not know if that guard would still be there, but it would not hurt to check.

“Looks like they have a similar forcefield regulating access into their dome,” Mica said, monitoring a sensor display from the passenger seat.

Abelardus sat behind her. Leonidas should have been in the seat behind Alisa, but he was poking through the pile of gear in the back, the weapons and equipment Solstice had included with their borrowed charger. Alisa had not taken a thorough look, other than to note that there was enough there to outfit an army. The woman either wanted them to do a
lot
of damage to her rival’s city, or the clans weren’t rivals at all, and she wanted Leonidas and Alisa to be in a lot of trouble when the White Dragon people caught them. Not that Alisa intended for her team to be caught.

“Do we have a plan for getting in?” Mica asked, when Alisa did not respond.

“Of course.” But Alisa had someone else to comm first. She punched in the code for the warehouse.

“Leblanc’s Fine Ingredients is closed for business right now. Please call back between the hours of—”

“What is it?” a frazzled voice asked, interrupting the automatic recording.

Alisa paused. She’d had a message rehearsed to leave, and she had to readjust her lines. “Is this the person who was on guard there a few hours ago?”

“Yes,” the man said warily. “Who is this?”

“Alisa. The woman you talked to. We’ve discovered the location of your boss.” Technically, Alisa only knew where Beck had been taken, and even that depended on Solstice’s word, but she assumed the mafia kidnapping team had taken Leblanc, too, rather than dumping him in a swamp somewhere. If nothing else, it sounded like the chef would be a valuable prisoner who could be traded for a ransom.

“Where is he?”

“The White Dragon headquarters in Terra Dhwan.”

The man swore. “You sure he’s being kept in their main compound? We’ve been planning—never mind.”

“A rescue, by chance?” Alisa asked.

“Look, we’re only going after our boss. I’m sorry your man got taken, but he’s not our priority.”

“I understand perfectly well. We’ll take care of our man. I just thought you’d want to know where to look for your fellow.”

“Thanks. Appreciate it.”

Mica was watching her curiously.

“Just being friendly and sharing information.” Alisa smiled.

The comm flashed on the console.

“That’ll be the person who operates the forcefield, I’ll wager,” Alisa said, and answered it. The charger was heading straight for the dome, only a minute away now.

“Access to the city is only through invitation,” a female voice announced.

“Is it?” Alisa asked. “That doesn’t seem like it would foster tourism, gambling, and economic growth.”

The voice turned dry. “It sounds like you don’t have an invitation.”

“You’re correct. Who do I speak with about getting one? I’m looking to sell a large quantity of Bliss, and I’d prefer to wholesale it to someone rather than working with individual dealers all over the moon. I understand the drug is popular down here?” She had no idea if that was true, though if it did what Yumi claimed, she didn’t see how it
couldn’t
be popular, unless there was an oversupply on Cleon Moon since the mushrooms grew here. Still, she couldn’t imagine it was easy to harvest those mushrooms with dinosaurs roaming all over the place.

“Show me your supply,” the woman said.