Survivor’s Guilt
Chapter 3: Survivor's Guilt
Notes: Shift in POV
Dahl weaved in and around various traders and vendors as the morning shops began their waking dance. One woman called to her detailing the great advantages of her cryo beanies. Multicolors hats of various sizes and knits already cascading over black waffle crates. Dahl begrudgingly let the woman lead her to one of the crates where she fingered a blue knit, its black sequined gems sending rainbows flickering over her skin. The knit was soft, lush even.
“Pretty no? 30 cred.”
“No thanks,” she said pushing past the vendor, her stomach growling at the delicious smells coming two doors down. Two brightly clad children darted past her as she entered the tavern. Johns sat nursing a steaming tea cup. He looked tired, eyes red, hair still wet from showering.
“Hey Boss.” Johns smiled when Dahl slid into the adjacent chair.
“You and your girlfriend have a good night?” Johns said his tea cup clinked against his plate. He resumed scooping his mash potatoes, meat, and corn into a combobulated pile. This place offered real dishes and silverware for extra cred. Apparently Johns felt the need to use such extravagances this morning. She lifted her hand waving for service.
“She’s not my girlfriend, Boss.” Dahl responded. A petite mouse of a girl scampered up to the table. Dahl ordered the prime ribs and potatoes with a cold beer on normal metal slabs, no fancy ware for her.
Johns chewed thoughtfully, “Nah you’re right. Kind of expect a contract on her one of these days. Sooner than later with how she’s going.”
The barmaid brought the beer in a frosted tankard.
“Nah she’s too deep in that bottle to come up for air.” Dahl drank deeply. She thought back to their evening, a smile creeped across her face. Something nagged in her hind brain, there was a moment she had seen a very different Rhreas. She looked into Rhreas once after watching her fight a guild agent once. She just couldn’t remember what happened after the first blow or the outcome of the search, only there was nothing. As an unaffiliated weapons specialist there should have been at least some type of background or licensure history. Trouble followed those who tried to strike out on their own apart from the guilds, but Rhreas sauntered through life oddly spotless and unencumbered by those deadly politics.
“What are you humming?”
Dahl blinked. When had she started humming? She shrugged, “Not sure. Luna’s at her shop by now, ya?”
John nodded. His fork clanked against the empty plate. “Should be back any minute now especially with how efficient Rhreas is. Probably should have a return appointment sometime next week. We can swing to Polaris and pick up the mail before returning for Luna’s kit.”
Dahl stared into her tankard mutely. “Mmm. Ever heard of a planet called Furya?”
John shook his head, “Not that I remember. No. Any reason to?”
“No. Just something Rhreas told me last night. I wonder if the death bringers she told me about had any relation to those Necromongers that wiped out Helion Prime.”
Johns sucked a piece of meat from his teeth. “How do you mean?”
Dahl leaned back and took another draw of her beer as the maid set her food on the table. The meat dripped juices and butter into a lake of potatoes and gravy.
“Her planet was destroyed by the death bringers, as she called them. It just struck me as odd since we’ve been hearing quite a few testimonies from people who say they are refugees of the Helion system.”
John closed his eyes, “If true, that explains a lot why she is the way she is. Poor kid.”
Dahl nodded before delving into her breakfast.
“I’m back, Boss.”
“Luna, good hurry up and order we need to be out of here at 0930.”
“Oh ok.”
“Did you get everything set up? When does she want you back to pick up your kit?”
“She doesn’t. I walked in and everything was laid out on the counter with my name on it. See?” Luna produced a bag with a rifle and armor kit and a crumpled note.
Dahl took the note, read it, then handed it to Boss Johns.
Pay me when I see you. - R
Johns turned the note over but the moonshit wrapper held no further message.
Luna pulled out his bracers. The first one laced up easy enough but the second one proved a bit more difficult. Johns stood and stretched. Cement, stone and wood fragments shattered behind him throwing him forward, over the table, and onto Dahl. Luna was knocked sideways as a vendor's cart blasted through the window. Prayer tumbled out of Luna’s mouth in frantic starts. Shattered wood and dust sluffing off as he crawled toward Johns and Dahl.
“What is God’s name happened?” Luna exclaimed. Dust clouded the air leaving the residents and patrons coughing and stumbling around in the hopes to find breathable air and the cause of the explosion.
“Not sure but let’s go find out. Could be a reward posting as we speak.”
“I’ll check the news board.” Dahl opened her communicator. Dust clung to everything.
Johns leapt over the crumpled door and dodged the throng of people rushing directionless in the street as he led the group outside.
“Was there another explosion?” Luna asked. Black smoke poured into the sky not fifty feet down the street.
“Johns, its Rhreas shop,” Dahl shoved a pedestrian as he fell into her. He yelped when she tossed him farther down the street and into a bush.
“I was just there,” Luna said paling.
“That shouldn’t have affected the tavern.” Dahl said wiping her hands off on her pant legs.“You sure Rhreas wasn't at her shop?”
“Yeah, the shop looked completely empty except for my stuff.” Luna looked embarrassed and ashamed. “I checked all the doors when no one came. I called for someone over and over. No one came…I didn’t mean to be nosy or anything.”
Johns nodded slowly. Dahl settled her rifle between her palms. “Relax Luna and suit up.”
Luna swallowed nervously, “My bag is back inside.”
Dahl snarled and stalked back to the tavern. Luna found his bag under the crushed cart. He quickly slung the chest plate on and ran to join the remainder of his new crew crouched over the cart remains.
“Look here,” Johns pointed to a scorch mark on the cart.
Dahl huffed, “They did a poor job of trying to kill us.”
“Unless that wasn’t their target,” Luna said. “That cart and the building happened at the same time, don't you think?”
“Hard to say, but it might be safe to assume so. Let’s not stick around to find out. We have a job to do.”
John turned and led the way back to the ship, authorities already pouring into the alleyway rounding up “suspects”.
Dahl leaned into her chair, closing the cryosleep loop and settling in for the long haul. The liquid, cold and blue, filtering into her veins. The edges of her vision faded until she felt fingers brush down her check. Something soft slipped over her head. Her eyes blinked slowly, the cryosleep slowing her heart rate and raising her thermal temperature to deep sleep status. A blurred face grinning, eyes shining, shimmered into view before Dahl faded into the nothingness of cryosleep.
“Easy does it Skippy. Don’t want to be so violent so early after waking up. Struggling will be a complete waste of time. Although Dahl is correct, duck tape is a sexy look.”
Angry muffles and the jiggle of metal on metal grated on Dahl’s nerves.
“Now, now, Johns don’t look at me like that. I practically hired you with that relatively large sum of money you still owe me.”
More angry muffles. Dahl blinked to see Rhreas leaning over Boss, who sat chained to the copilot seat.
“Aren't you precious? Now stop trying to chew through the tape. That never works, especially with how blunt your cute nibbins are.”
Ripping tape, skin, and a pained half-scream of Johns finally brought the edges back into Dahl’s vision. Rhreas flicked the tape piece off her fingers repeatedly. Finally she slapped it against the pilot's chair before sinking into the chair. She wiggled to the edge of the seat to stare down at Johns, whose face held a large angry square wrapping from ear to ear and a scowl. Rhreas twirled a thin curved blade lazily, before her eyes captured Dahl’s slitted eyes.
“Dahl, you look so happy to see me and Luna too. Good everyone is awake and kicking. Which means we can FINALLY begin.” She whirled around, typed a destination into the console, and spun back around the image of Helion Prime appearing in the halo.
“Johns? Dahl?” Luna groggily asked his head lolling between the adults that should have been in charge. Dahl tried to lift her hands only to realize she too had been chained to her seat.
“You blew up your shop?” Dahl stated her words slightly slurred.
“Yes, can you guess why?” Rhreas asked rubbing the top of Dahl’s head. Dahl felt soft fabric wipe against her forehead. Tiny rainbows flicked across Rhreas face briefly as the ship pasted the system’s star. Rhreas turned and shut the blast shield. The auxiliary lights flickered on, throwing the top deck into twilight.
“Rhreas!” Johns growled.
“Johns,” she purred. “You did say to find a way to manage my grief better?”
“How is this managing?”
Her grin twitched, “Oh that’s why I hired you. Your crew is one of the best hunters in the business and I put out a contract, which oddly enough YOU accepted. Thank you!”
Rhreas clicked a few more buttons on the console, popping up another window showing the bounty contract with Johns signature.
“Boss?”
“I never signed that!” He said glancing incredulously at the bounty screen.
“Oh I know that. You know that, but the guild doesn’t. In fact there is no way they will ever refute that you didn’t accept the bounty I hired you for. Even the ship’s computers recorded you accepting that particular bounty. Wanna see?”
The recording lit up showing Johns sitting at the front console speaking with the guild contract agent. He listened to himself accept and joke with the agent in the manner he always did. The words were his, the mannerisms were his, but he wasn’t in control. He could see it. He could see her standing casually in the background with a crooked smile and direct eye contact with the camera lens. She even winked playfully at him through the image.
“Rhreas!” he hissed bewildered, terror tingled up his spine. The back of his neck itched, ready for a fight that would never come, could never come.
Rhreas slid over to Dahl, leaned in and in Johns’s exact voice she whispered, “I don’t just sing love.”
Dahl’s eyes widened as Rhreas pulled away. Her eyes slid to Johns, his face steeled, unreadable except for the deepening crows feet lines.
“Now then, we get under way. This will be exciting.”
“Rhreas you will regret this.”
“I doubt you even know what regret is Johns.” Rhreas’s playful tone darkened hinting at the danger of refusing cooperation. He heard Rhreas’s breathing change tempo.
“Please god,” Luna whispered.
“Oh come on, this is just a little hunting trip. You are getting paid, and quite a lot to be honest. I just tied you up because I wanted to drive for a bit. I’m a wee bit rusty. It’s been a few decades.”
“Are you drunk?!” Dahl snarled twisting in her chair. Johns silently shook his head at her.
“Not right now. No. I think you were right. My drinking was becoming a problem,” Rhreas bounced in the pilot’s seat before buckling the harness up. “We will be running dark until we get to Helion Prime. After that I expect you to pull your weight for what you’ve been hired for. If you don’t, I will jettison your asses.”
“Who are we hunting?” Johns asked tightly. Dahl slipped a pick out of her belt.
“Planet killers. Death bringers. We are hunting the Necromongers that murdered my family and my people, even id I have to hunt them to the gates of their Threshold.”
