‘What are you doing?’ she yelled again, struggling. Despite the very real threat of the weapon, she was refusing to cooperate.
‘For Throne’s sake, Xomat! I know they tied you up, but Csoni’s sent a strike team against us!’
‘I know,’ said Xomat.
Elodie went limp, and stopped fighting. Now she understood.
‘Oh, you worthless son of a–’ she began.
Daur appeared in the parlour doorway opposite them. He threw his lasrifle onto the floor, and drew his laspistol. They faced each other in the dark red gloom of the unpowered parlour.
Xomat yanked Elodie close, so tight that she gasped for breath. He made a shield out of her, the gun planted against her head.
‘Back off!’ he offered.
Daur took a step forward, and aimed the pistol, straight-armed.
‘Let her go,’ he told the muscle.
Xomat graphically outlined something that Daur might like to do, provided he could find a number of specialist agricultural items, some livestock, and a means of contacting an elderly female relative at short notice.
‘He’s in on it!’ Elodie squealed.
‘Shut up,’ Xomat barked, vicing her neck with his forearm.
‘You’re in on it?’ Daur asked. ‘You’re what, the inside man? Feth, you must have been gakked off when we turned up and taped you to a fething chair.’
‘It was a setback,’ Xomat admitted. ‘But since I didn’t open the door, Lev’s coming in the old-fashioned way, and that means you’ll be leaving in a zip-up carry bag.’
‘If Lev’s coming in hard,’ Daur said, ‘he’s made the worst mistake of his life. So let her go. Now.’
Xomat shook his head, and pulled Elodie closer.
‘You’re going to let me past, or I swear I’ll put one through her head.’
Daur half-shrugged.
‘Actually, she doesn’t mean that much to me, so that’s not much of a threat. Do what you like.’
Elodie’s eyes widened.
‘I’m not joking!’ exclaimed Xomat.
‘Me neither,’ said Daur, focusing his aim. ‘In fact, she matters so little, I may just shoot you through her and have done with it. We’re trained to do that, did you know? Specialist marksman stuff. I know where the soft targets are, you know, the places where a body isn’t bone dense. I can hit an area like that, and the round punches clean through into you. You might as well be hiding behind a curtain.’
‘You let me pass!’ Xomat yelled.
‘Gut, for instance,’ Daur said, lining up his weapon.
‘Holy Throne!’ Elodie wailed.
Xomat roared, and aimed the las-snub at Daur instead.
Daur fired once.
The las-bolt blew out Xomat’s forehead, and toppled him onto his back. He still had his arm halfway around Elodie’s neck, and she went over with him.
Daur rushed to her, and pulled her up.
‘Are you all right?’
‘What the hell was that?’ she yelled. ‘Soft targets?’
‘Take it easy!’
‘I don’t mean anything to you?’ Her eyes were staring in angry disbelief. The shock was still a few seconds off. Elodie had spats of blood on the side of her face from Xomat’s explosive demise.
‘Listen!’ Daur urged, trying to wipe the spats away, ‘I had a good head shot. Right over your shoulder. I just had to get him to take the weapon away from your head in case he pulled the trigger with a muscle twitch when I took him down. I had to get him to change his aim.’
‘You were going to shoot me too!’
‘I wasn’t!’ Daur yelled back.
‘You said you were!’
Ban Daur realised that she was a little too flustered to grasp any of his explanations and calm down.
So he kissed her instead.
Rawne drew back the last of the bolts and opened the service gate. The three men waiting outside started to move towards him, but then stopped in surprise.
Rawne had them casually, but securely, covered with his battered Blood Pact lasrifle. The three of them were armed, but they instantly recognised that raising any of their weapons was going to constitute a terminal decision.
‘Which one of you is Lev Csoni?’ Rawne asked. He knew full well it was the slightly balding, ruddy-faced man in the middle, because he recognised him as the one the girl Elodie had picked out on the pict-feed. He was, however, feeling sportive.
‘Uh… I am,’ Csoni said.
‘You picked a really, really bad night to do this, Csoni,’ said Rawne, and shot the other two men.
Csoni turned white and began to quiver.
‘Toss your weapon outside,’ Rawne told him. Csoni obeyed.
‘Now drag those two inside the gate, and bolt it shut.’
Csoni did as he was told. When he had finished, he looked at Rawne.
‘Who are you?’ he asked.
‘Let’s go,’ Rawne replied, and ushered with his gun.
Rawne walked Csoni into the parlour. On the roof, Varl had just reconnected the power and the lights were flickering back on. Rawne heard the air-circulation cycling up too, and felt it starting to skim off the smells of fear and sweat, gunsmoke, blood and birdshit. The air began to cool.
Banda was watching the front door. Daur was comforting Elodie at the bar. Rawne raised an eyebrow. He knew precisely where comforting like that could lead a man.
Leyr came in from the back.
‘Rear’s secure,’ he said. ‘We’ve got the hatch blocked again.’
‘And no one’s lying around dead outside?’ Rawne asked.
‘Who the Throne are you people?’ Csoni muttered.
‘We dragged all the stiffs in before we shut the hatch,’ said Leyr.
Rawne nodded.
‘And no one got perforated?’
‘Varl and the lad report they’re intact so, no,’ said Leyr.
‘Which outfit are you working for?’ Csoni pleaded. ‘You’re not Urbano’s regulars. Look, I can pay you. Pay you good!’
‘You’re keeping him alive, why?’ Banda called from the front access, nodding at Rawne’s prisoner.
‘Collateral,’ replied Rawne.
‘Please, which outfit are you with?’ Csoni implored.
‘The Tanith First and Only,’ said Rawne.
Csoni blinked. ‘Who?’
‘What do you mean, “collateral”?’ asked Daur.
Rawne shrugged.
‘Csoni’s… what was the word again?’
‘Outfit?’ asked Leyr.
Rawne sat down at the bar and poured himself a sacra.
‘Csoni’s outfit decided that tonight was the night they’d take down Zolunder’s. Now, I’m only guessing, because I have no idea of their resources, but I figure if they don’t come back, then maybe the outfit will send another strike team, and another, and maybe even another and, frankly, by that stage, I will have become pissed off with the whole thing. So, we’re keeping Mister Csoni alive in case we need a negotiating chip. Leyr, tape his sorry arse to that chair. Mamzel?’
Rawne was looking at Elodie.
‘What?’
‘Don’t unwrap this one, all right?’
Elodie nodded.
Rawne sipped his sacra. A slight smile whispered across his lips.
‘What?’ asked Banda.
Rawne sighed.
‘In hindsight,’ he said quietly, holding his glass up to the light, ‘this entire fething thing was a bad idea. I know. I recognise the fact. I admit my mistake. The op, the scam, the getting arrested, the whole thing, was a wrong-headed feth-up from the very start. We are still, all of us, in a very bad, dark place, and the only glimmer of hope in the distance is the sunlight shining out of Viktor Hark’s backside. That, you’ll agree, is a dismal prospect.’
He took another sip.
‘But, you know what?’ he asked. ‘If you think about why we all did this, what drove us to it, I’ll tell you this… feth, I’m not bored any more.’