One of the Shellheads she’d missed ducked low behind one of the stages, while the other pulled out a sonic knife and did a pirouetting lunge at Stacia. She recognized this one as Derre Mur, a woman who had been discharged for pit-fighting. Although that alone was not considered a dischargeable offense, since Galactic Marines making money on the side as pit-fighters was kind of an open secret that the bureaucrats tried to hide under the rug, this woman had been known for taking particular glee in killing her opponents. She wasn’t the kind of person Stacia wanted to take on in a melee.
From some far spot in the back of the room, some man drunkenly screamed, “Everyone attack!” This was promptly followed by a spray of bullets that hit more of the person’s erstwhile friends instead of Stacia. This provided Stacia the perfect opportunity to duck out of the way of Mur’s attacks, and she dashed over to a Skin cowering nearby to shove her down before a stray bullet got her. The Shellheads might be able to survive a body shot just fine, but Stacia doubted Leviathan had the medical supplies to help a randomly injured Skin.
In Stacia’s mind, the red of many of the direct threats to her turned to a burning orange as the stray bullets caused many to turn on the nearest person and take out whatever aggressions they’d pent up. Faust might have intended to get everyone in the bar to go after Stacia, but all he’d done was start a barroom brawl. Stacia scanned the immediate area for anymore Skins in danger, found that most of them were sufficiently out of the way, and then took advantage of the chaos to run back to the stairs. She had to duck one drunken punch and redirect one not-so-drunken kick into someone else, but otherwise made it with minimal effort. She looked up to see the Skin staring down at her with a wide-eyed look that could have been anything from amusement to pure terror. She still had the knife held straight out in front of her.
Stacia motioned for her to come on down. The woman cocked her head like she didn’t understand. “Come on!” Stacia said. “We don’t have much…” There was another burst of gunfire. Stacia ducked, even though it had apparently been directed at some woman in the corner who was crying mournfully that someone had gotten blood in her drink. Her protests ceased rather abruptly. “If you don’t come down now, I’ll have to leave you behind.” It occurred to Stacia for the first time that maybe that was exactly what the woman wanted. After all, what did Stacia really have to offer her? She felt a strange desire to keep this peculiar woman safe, but could Stacia really give her any safety once she left Hobbes in search of Stanton? How many more vicious creatures were out there that would see her as a quick snack?
Before Stacia could voice any of these possibilities, the Skin hurried down the stairs. “I’m coming. But, um, where are we going?”
“We’ll figure that out later. Right now, anywhere but here.”
Stacia turned for the door just in time to see Mur charging at her. It wasn’t enough time to dodge, though. Mur barreled Stacia over onto the floor, where they rolled for several seconds before Mur ended up on top of her. She thrust her sonic blade down, aiming for Stacia’s eyes. Stacia caught her wrist and tried to hold Mur back, but the pit-fighter had obviously been keeping up with her training. Slowly, Stacia gave up valuable inches to Mur’s strength, and the blade got closer, closer…
Then a completely different blade popped out of Mur’s eye. Stacia didn’t understand what was happening at first. Did Mur have some kind of weird additional implant that allowed her to sprout another weapon from her head? But as Mur worked her mouth, trying to speak, blood flowed down her face along with pieces of her eye. Definitely not intentional. Stacia pulled out from under her as she dropped forward, revealing the Skin woman over her, the sonic blade Stacia had given her now jammed into the back of Derre Mur’s head.
The woman’s mouth hung open in horror at what she had done, and Stacia had no doubt that she would have continued standing there uncomprehendingly until someone else finally came along and knifed her in the back. Stacia stood up and shook her out of her stupor.
“Come on!” As Stacia pulled the knife out of Mur’s head, the woman finally blinked and seemed to realize she was in even more danger now than before. Previously, she had just been yet another Skin caught in the fight. Now, she had actively taken the life of one of her masters. If there had been any way for the woman to stay behind, it was completely gone now.
Faust had somehow gotten lost in the fight, leaving the door just open enough for the two of them to run through with a minimum of kicking and punching on the way. Outside in the mostly deserted street, a single Elite stood in Stacia’s way with a plasma pistol pointed at her. The Elite might not have been wearing his armor anymore, but he would still have the neural implants and all the enhanced reflexes and perceptions that came with it. Now that Stacie was closer, she could clearly see the scars on the exposed skin where it has been cut off some other helpless fellow and reattached onto him. Not that she had had reason to doubt her companion’s story before now, but this proved the horrible fate of many that were born naturally on Leviathan.
The Elite nodded at her, then indicated his pistol, then indicated her 808 and shook his head. Stacia understood what he meant. A duel. It would be crazy and stupid to actually agree to this. Without the armor, the Elite would probably be faster on the draw. Yet she also knew that, if she tried to use her 808 at the moment, he’d be able to get her first. Silently, Stacia nodded to the man in agreement, lowered her 808, and hit a switch on it. She turned to the Skin.
“I need you to hold my rifle while I take care of this.” She thrust the weapon into the startled woman’s hands. “Just hold it in his general direction and squeeze the trigger if he tries to do anything outside the rules.”
“I don’t even know the rules.”
“I don’t think there are any.” Keeping her back to the Elite and moving slowly, Stacia stepped aside from the Skin and then slowly pulled out a pistol and held it at her side.
“If you don’t think there are any rules, then why are you following them?” the woman asked.
“I’m not.” The switch that she had flipped on the 808 clicked. A burst of fire came out of the rifle, scaring the Skin enough that she dropped the weapon. Stacia spun around to see that, while most of the bullets had missed the Elite, one had hit him in the leg and the other in the chest. Stacia fired off two more shots from the pistol, both of them hitting him in the head and melting his face. The Elite never even raised his gun.
Stacia picked up the 808. “Next time, hold on to it.”
“Uh, okay.”
Stacia grabbed the Elite’s body and slung it over her shoulder. The Skin would need clothes, but they didn’t have time to strip the corpse just now. They instead had to get as far away from Hobbes as possible.
As the ran over the tiny metal wall, the Skin hesitating ever so slightly as though she thought whatever might be beyond was worse than her fate might be if she stayed, Stacia looked back at the center building. Lexton stood near the door with Faust. Neither of them gave chase and neither of them had weapons, but Lexton shaped her finger into a gun and pantomimed pulling the trigger.
The parting message was obvious.
Chapter 8
Home on the Strange
The Skin was not used to running, especially not in the wide open uneven ground. She tired quickly, so Stacia had her climb up on her back for a time as Stacia continued to put some distance between them and Hobbes. After about two hours of this, and with the sun beginning its descent to the horizon, Stacia realized she wouldn’t be able to keep this up anymore without food and rest. So they stopped to make camp, and Stacia was finally able to take stock of the situation.