Samira

“Are you certain that’s wise?” Doc asked Ithnaa as he leaned over to hand me one of his spanners. I was working in the cramped space under the floor trying to attach some indecipherable magi-tech box to the shield modulator. To make matters worse, all of Doc’s fasteners had weird measurements, so none of my tools were the right size. Which meant I had to use his, and they had all been modified to fit his huge hands.

On top of all of that, we were now in the Halcyon system with less than twenty-four hours left until we were supposed to confront Mother and everybody was just pretending that this was normal.

“Bryce seems to think it will work,” Ithnaa argued. “Besides, she walked me through the plan, and even if the initial trap fails, we’ll be half a million kilometers away on the planet’s moon with a dozen other safety precautions in place.”

“How many primordial beings has Captain Virra killed in the past?” Doc asked and continued when it was obvious that Ithnaa was hesitating. “It’s clear that the captain is powerful, and if she survives long enough to ascend, then I have no doubt she’ll become a force to be reckoned with. However, it’s my genuine belief that she's out of her depth here.”

“And what about you? How many have you killed?” I asked before tightening the last bolt and pushing myself out from underneath the reactor so that I could sit up. “Well, how many?”

“Four.”

I honestly hadn’t been expecting him to answer, and wasn’t entirely sure how to respond.

Thankfully, Ithnaa was better at talking than me. “If you’re such an expert, then why haven’t you offered to help?”

“I just assisted in installing a series of wards that will prevent Mother from scrying aboard the ship, and I offered to create a mana-fissioning device in exchange for releasing Anali from her contract, but your captain refused. I’m unsure as to what else I could offer you.”

“Bryce was worried that the bomb you had planned would destroy Mother’s soul, and she can’t risk that right now. Besides, we don’t have three months for you to put it together. This is the only chance we’ll have to get to her outside of a literal fortress. If we lose Mother now, then we’ll need a fleet just to knock on her front door.”

“Some might consider that reason enough to avoid confronting her entirely, don’t you think?” Doc tilted his head in a way that was obvious, even in his environmental suit. “I don’t offer advice frequently, so please understand the significance of it when I suggest that this operation is unwise.”

“Yeah, sure, whatever.” I pushed myself off the floor and stomped my way out of the engineering corridors before shouting back at him. “I’ll let you know when we start caring about the opinions of kidnappers.”

“Hey, Sami, all done?” Thea asked, and I spun around to see her standing in the middle of the cargo-bay.

“Yeah, it’s installed, but I need to talk to the captain. I’m kind of worried about the plan.”

“Sure, she’s upstairs. Let’s go watch her win a bet, then we’ll both talk to her about it, alright?”

“Alright, fine. What’s the bet, anyway? Is she going to win anything good?” I asked as I followed Thea up the stairs.

“No,” she scoffed. “It’s a nothing bet. If Bryce wins, then she gets to boss Anali around, like she already can, and if she loses, then she has to pay Ithnaa literally nothing.”

“What? Why even bother then?”

“I think Bryce gets off on being smarter than other people.”

“That’s… ew. Definitely didn’t need to know that.”

“Not like literally.” Thea stopped on the stairs to roll her eyes at me. “Outsmarting people makes her feel like she's in control, and Bryce kind of needs that in her life right now.”

“Well, yeah, that's what happens when you spend too long as an executive. That's like all they care about in corporations.”

“No, that’s not it.” She seemed conflicted for a moment before continuing with a weirdly serious expression. “When I first met Bryce, she had just been kidnapped by the only people she trusted, and even before that, she was being forced to either recreate the spell that ruined her life, or face execution. Basically, she spent the last three decades with almost no control over anything and then had any illusion of it ripped away in a single night. It’s a trauma thing, not an executive thing.”

“I, uh, didn’t realize. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry, Sami. You couldn’t have known. Besides, I’m only telling you now because I’m kind of worried about the upcoming fight, and it sounds like you might be, too.”

“Wait, seriously?” I crossed my arms as I glared back at her. “You told me it would be a piece of cake. Thea, you literally made me a cake to tell me that.”

“Yeah, I know. Look, we’ll talk about it later.” She made a point of looking back down the stairs, and I followed her line of sight to see Doc waiting patiently below us.

“I apologize for interrupting. Your djinn has already teleported away, and I was hoping to witness the outcome of Anali’s bet.”

“Sure, we were just on our way up.” Thea smiled at him and made like she was about to continue up the stairs before slowly turning back around. “Although, if you’re really interested in this bet, then we could always double down on it. I mean, your shield doohickey is probably pretty spectacular. It’s made to stop a djinn, right? Why should some random elf chick be able to get past it? Plus, how can one woman be that sexy, and still be super smart then, on top of all of that, be amazing at magic? There’s no way. I mean, that’d be completely ridiculous, right? Totally unfair for all of us normal people. Honestly, if I were you, I would bet against her just on principle.”

“Thea, it feels like you’re laying it on a bit thick here,” I whispered to her, but she just winked back at me.

“Did you have a particular wager in mind?”

“If Bryce wins her bet, then you have to make it up to Sami for stealing her.”

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“What? No!” I objected, but that just led to Thea stepping down to grab my waist and pull me into a side-long hug. “I don’t want to be involved. Please, just leave me out of this.”

“Come on, Sami. There must be something you want from him.”

I was about to refuse outright, but when I saw Doc standing there below us, I felt my heart start to race and just blurted out the first thing that came to mind. “Teach me magi-tech.”

“I’ve seen the modifications you’ve made to this ship, including to the magical components. You’re already quite capable as a mechanic.” The alien man didn’t even seem to react as he responded. He just kept standing there impassively. For some reason, that really pissed me off.

“I’m more than a capable mechanic, I’m a damn good one,” I shouted, then continued a bit more calmly. “And sure, I can fix the magic stuff, or modify it, and even improve it sometimes, but I don’t know how to make any of it. The enchantments are way beyond me. Hells, that little magic box you gave me to install was just that, a magic box. I have absolutely no idea how it works and wouldn’t have a clue where to even begin if I wanted to make something like it. So, teach me.”

“I refuse,” Doc said without hesitating, and for some reason, I felt my heart sink. “Captain Virra won’t be able to brute force her way past the wards, but that won’t matter. She has something planned to bypass them, which will lead to Anali losing the bet. Doubling down on something that’s already lost would be foolish.”

“Welp, sorry, Sami. I tried.” Thea gave me another side-long hug before turning back upstairs to leave. “We can ask Bryce later. I bet she knows some of the best techi-magic people to ever exist. She’ll definitely introduce you to someone way better than this guy.”

“Allow me to finish what I was saying,” Doc continued and Thea gave me another wink before spinning back around to face the man.

“Alright, go ahead. We’re listening.”

“I refuse to participate in the bet, because it would be foolish. However, I am willing to teach Samira in exchange for alleviating some of the debt Anali owes to her.”

“How much?” Thea asked, and I leaned over to whisper to her.

“The price doesn't matter. I was just going to give Sora my share, anyway.”

She grabbed my hand and squeezed to let me know I'd been heard. “Sami says she needs that money for something else. If you want to be paid to teach her, then you’ll need to accept iron coins and you can’t use them to pay Anali’s debt.” I was about to argue when she squeezed my hand again. So, I begrudgingly let it go.

“I assume that you mean the iron coins that are only minted in Hades?”

“Those are the ones! I take it you know them?” Thea beamed at him and he nodded.

“If I am allowed to authenticate them first, then I’ll accept five-thousand iron in exchange for instructing the girl while Anali is busy working jobs for Captain Virra.”

“Authenticate them? Seriously?” Thea started waving dramatically and I took a step away to make sure she didn't accidentally hit me. “Hi, devil here. I literally picked them up in Hades myself. They’re all real. Here look.” She put her right hand over her chest and I tried not to laugh as she continued. “I swear on my tiny black heart that the coins were hand-picked by devilish beauties from only the highest quality lich-owned and operated casino in all of Hades. Even stored in extra-dimensional space to preserve freshness. They’re super-duper real. I swear.”

“Be that as it may, I'm still going to insist on being allowed to authenticate the coins.”

“Sure, whatever.” Thea waved off the man as she started up the stairs. “Come on, Sami, let’s go. I don’t want to miss the fun part.”

“Thea, we’re going to talk about this later,” I half-whispered, while rushing after her.

“There’s nothing to talk about, Sami. If you told Bryce that you wanted to learn magi-tech, then she would have paid for it in a heartbeat. Probably with my money. I’m just cutting out the middle-elf.” She turned back towards me and started walking backwards as we crested the stairs. “For real, all you have to do is say ‘thank you, Thea. You’re my bestest friend ever and I promise to build you a bunch of really neat stuff,’ and we’ll call it even.”

“Fine. Thank you, Thea, you’re my ‘bestest friend ever’ and I promise to build you a bunch of really neat stuff,” I recited, much to her apparent enjoyment.

“Alright, now hop on one foot and rub your head while patting your belly.” She tried to demonstrate, and I had to reach out to catch her by the shirt before she fell over. Thankfully, Thea was ridiculously light, otherwise she would have just pulled me down on top of her.

“I have no idea what you two are doing, but if it were literally anybody else, then I would definitely call it a sex thing.” Sora’s voice brought me back to the room we were in, and made me realize that everyone was standing around, staring at us. Like literally, everyone. The captain, Sora, Ithnaa, all three of Thea’s siblings, Anali, the half-orc, the strange primate man and even Sanya. All of which were staring at me.

“Uh, right. Captain, the warding device has been installed and everything should be set whenever you’re ready.”

“Thank you, Samira,” the captain thanked me before turning towards the group. “Now, Ithnaa, would you mind teleporting me to the surface of the moon?”

“Wait, how will we know if the spell works if I’m not allowed to read the captain’s mind?” the primate man asked.

“Trust me, you’ll know,” the captain smirked. “But if you’re that worried about it, you can hold up a number of fingers and I’ll tell you how many. Shall we?”

“Of course, Captain Virra.” Ithnaa placed a hand on the captain’s shoulder and the two of them disappeared. We all just stood there for a few moments before the half-orc spoke up.

“So… how long do we wait?”

“It took her a few minutes last time. Sami, do you mind?” Thea asked. I quickly let go of her shirt and she cursed as she fell to the floor. “Just give Bryce a second. She does magic weirdly, which means it…” She trailed off as the room started to feel like it was filling with power. “Oh, never mind. There she is.”

“Fucking hells. Doc, how is she doing that?” Anali asked, and I turned to see the alien man reading through a data-pad.

“I’m uncertain. The spell appears to be originating from inside the wards. She’s bypassing their protection entirely. As best I can tell, it’s coming from you, Anali.”

“Wait, what?” The half-elf started panicking while patting herself down. “How is she doing that? Is this blood magic? She swore she wouldn’t use it!”

“It was Ithnaa who swore she wouldn’t use blood magic on you, not Bryce,” Aurora corrected with a shrug. “I warned you that I could only tell if she was lying, not if she was trying to get you on a technicality.”

The power flooding the room stopped all at once, and the captain reappeared with Ithnaa a few seconds later. “Ja’kal held up two fingers, but they were behind his back, so I’m not certain if they count. Nobody else seemed to bother.”

“Congratulations are in order, Captain Virra. You seemed to have won the bet,” Doc announced without looking up from the data-pad.

“Thank you, doctor, and thank you for installing the wards. They seem to be quite effective. I wasn’t able to break through them with conventional means. As per my agreement with Anali, I believe I owe you forty-five thousand credits.”

“Less than I would normally charge, but I’d say these circumstances are exceptional. So, an exception will be made.”

The half-orc stepped forward. “I’ll send you the account information. Just don’t forget to subtract twenty-five percent for Anali’s share. Feel free to divide that between Sora and Samira however you’d like.”

“I’ll do that,” the captain confirmed. “The four of you are free to leave, but don’t get too comfortable. We’ll be in contact as soon as we’re back on Paradise. I already have a number of jobs in mind for you.”

“You’re not going to make me stay to fight Mother?” Anali asked and the captain looked to Sora.

“No. We’re not making you stay, and Bryce isn’t going to offer to pay you, because she knows you wouldn’t be able to refuse if she did. However, if you’re interested in helping out, then I’ll knock two million off the debt you owe me. It’s not a payment, so you can’t split it with your crew, but it would be a big step towards releasing you from Ithnaa’s contract.”

“Yeah, no, fuck that. I’m leaving. Try not to make this whole thing pointless by getting yourselves killed.” Anali made for the exit while holding a single finger high into the air. Then the rest of her crew followed without the salute.