Emilia and Pria stumbled out onto the street, giggling and tripping over their own feet. The hostess glared at them when they turned, bowing lowly and thanking her kindly for the most wondrously delicious food and the many, many drinks they had indulged in. The cost of their meal had, frankly, been obscene, probably because they had drunk the good stuff. Emilia hadn’t even blinked at it. It had been years since she’d had a disgusting amount of money in her bank account, generations of wealth accumulated to the point that she technically had never needed to work, even if Baalphorian culture and expectations meant that she would anyways.

She hadn’t needed to join the war, either, and that one she could have gotten out of. She’d still joined. She didn’t exactly regret it, but before she had started at Astrapan she had wondered—driven herself mad obsessing over it, really—whether her life would have been better if she had never joined. Probably not. War would have still raged around her. People would have died, her creations helping them fight their way to an early death, regardless of her stepping onto the front lines herself. Life still would have sucked, and she still would have left those decades broken, but she probably would have lacked the strength to leave and find her way away from the world she had grown up in.

Astrapan—her life now—was a reclaiming of herself. Without her experiences in the war, she wouldn’t be here. In this time, in this place. She loved her friends. She hadn’t lied when she’d told Olivier she was happy. She missed the money, the way she had never needed to worry about what her next meal was going to be, whether she’d be able to buy a new pair of runners when hers inevitably fell apart. Still, it hadn’t been enough for her to go back, to beg her parents to give her freedom and money and forgiveness—none of which she deserved.

She also wasn’t above using Olivier’s money, not when he’d look at her so beseechingly, begging her to use what he gave her to make her life—and by extension, those of her friends—better.

“That was good,” she laughed, bumping shoulders with her friend as they straightened up.

She shook off her fake-drunkenness. Pria did the same. They were heavyweights. Even the substantial amount they had drunk in the restaurant wasn’t enough to take them down, thank you. It had been fun, though, making the rude wait staff think they were right and toasted. They hadn’t done anything too atrocious to them, but they doubted they’d be welcome back there any time soon.

“Best. Meal. Ever,” Pria agreed, swaying slightly with music only she could hear. “Too bad we can’t go back. Totally worth it—that waiter was a prick—but a little sad.”

Emilia hummed in agreement. He had been a prick, making them prepay for their meal, plus extra. He hadn’t said the extra was because he was worried they’d break something, but it had been implied. Rude little shit.

“Maybe I’ll have Olivier take me back, one day,” Emilia mused to herself as they made their way towards the clubs that they often frequented, only a short walk away. “They wouldn’t kick him out.” Who knew when—or if—she’d ever be willingly seen in public with people from her old life again, save Nettie. Nettie was different. No one recognized Nettie when she was out in public to begin with, even if she was more famous than Olivier. Not that she’d heard from Nettie in more than pictures for a while now. Too busy with her picture-perfect life to bother with her sad, broken friend.

The streets were busier than when they had entered the restaurant several hours earlier. Before, people heading to dinner had been their main company, their eyes trailing over her and Pria’s outfits because fucking nebulas, did they look hot. Now, the streets were filled with people heading out to party for the night, more and more people passing around bottles of pink vapour. Emilia was half-tempted to get her and Pria some hits, but they were on a mission. No time for hallucinations tonight!

The bouncer of The Grint, the club they were at the night before, eyed them up when they walked past the long line of people waiting to get in. “You two look fancy tonight.”

Emilia smiled at Mazi. He’d worked a few different clubs, in the years since she’d first met him, the night before she and Beth had started at Astrapan. He’d just been another patron, but he’d kicked a couple assholes who’d been making snide remarks about Beth out. The bouncer who’d been heading over to help had been impressed and offered him a job. That club had gone under a few years ago, but in a college town, there was always work for someone able to toss drunk students out on their asses.

“We went to a fancy dinner~” Pria bragged, blinking prettily up at him. She didn’t need to—any club Mazi worked at was open to them immediately. Perks of being nice to him and never causing problems—not without telling him first, anyways.

“You got a break coming?” Emilia asked, pressing herself up against him. Sadly, he wasn’t into her; otherwise she totally would have jumped him years ago. To anyone watching, though, it would look like she was hitting on him, tempting him into a quickie in one of the club's private rooms. Mazi knew her, though—knew she was perfectly aware she wasn’t his type.

He raised an eyebrow at her, one of his huge hands dragging up her spine. So compliant in selling her scene to the people around them. “Sure thing, sweetheart,” he said, just loud enough—just huskily enough—that all the people watching them would think he had agreed to that quickie. He called out to one of his coworkers, hovering in the doorway, chatting to a girl with a bob a similar colour to Emilia’s own. Fake. You couldn’t fake her shade, and she really didn’t know why anyone tried. Anti-irregular sentiment might be less than it had been a few decades ago, but it still existed, and not everyone could tell a dye-job from the real deviation. The other man grumbled slightly, motioning the fake-irregular girl inside and stepping out to take over for Mazi.

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“I’ll be back in a bit,” Mazi said, hooking his arm around Emilia’s waist and pulling her close.

The coworker glared. “Last time you said that, it was an hour.”

Mazi simply laughed as he pulled Emilia up and into the club with him, Pria following behind.

“Do not drink anything,” Emilia hissed at her through their Censors as she waved goodbye. Her friend rolled her eyes, and someone else might have assumed that she was about to go get something to drink. Emilia, on the other hand, knew her friend wasn’t going to be risking a repeat visit to knot therapy anytime soon.

The bouncer sent her a quizzical look, but at her nod, continued leading her into one of the private rooms. As a regular patron, getting one of the private rooms required a reservation, but a few were held aside for close friends of the staff, and Mazi ushered them into an empty one to talk.

“What’s up, sweetheart?” Mazi asked, a slightly concerned smile over his face. His reddish-brown skin looked redder under these lights, burning soft and sensual around them, his dark black clothes shimmering slightly. It wasn’t that kind of club, but what patrons did in the private rooms, the club didn’t question, as long as they paid for the cleanup.

“Pria got dosed here last night.”

The man’s smile fell away, replaced by deathly rage. “With what?”

“A knotter.”

Mazi swore, something foreign, the sound musical and lilting compared to her own native tongue. He’d been a soldier from the Free Colonies, one of the ones on the southern side of Baalphoria that the Grey Sands had held tenuous relations with for a few hundred years. When the war had ended, connections had been strong enough that travel and work exchanges between their countries had been officially opened up. Emilia had never been, but Mazi insisted that she go one day—would even take her and her friends himself if they could make it work.

“You sure it was here?”

Emilia shrugged. “Bartender gave her a shot of something ‘special.’ Other than that, we took the same shit, and I’m fine.” She leaned back against a table, trying to not look like she was one moment away from heading downstairs and slitting the bartender’s throat. She was, but she’d prefer Mazi didn’t realize she was that pissed off—not yet, anyways.

“Ain’t been anything on the news,” the older man noted, his stance widening like he was preparing for a fight. Arms crossing over his wide chest, thick muscles flexing. It was seriously too bad he wasn’t into her. The things he could do with that body of his—make her do with hers.

“There will be, unless we find out where the drugs are coming from.”

He snorted, eyes that had been staring blankly into a wall flicking back to her. “You’re serious?”

“As a tundra swell,” she said, pulling herself to attention and saluting him. Technically, she had outranked him during the war, not that he knew that. Most people didn’t even know she’d been in active duty, but Mazi had known, asked about it in the way only other vets could—awkwardly. She hadn’t told him much, but sometimes she teased him by doing shit like this. Salute him, give him an order, reference something only they would understand. It both amused and annoyed him.

Mazi’s frown deepened. “New guy? With the fake glasses and stupid hat?”

Emilia’s lips twitched. “Yes.”

The thick, black glasses really were quite obviously fake, and she was pretty sure the ugly hat was a distraction. She’d assumed it was to distract from an equally ugly scar or a bad personality when he hit on his customers. Maybe it had been meant for this, though. Distract the customer while he slips them something extra. Maybe he’d been meant to be gone by the time anyone tracked the knotter back to him, no one remembering anything about the man under those hideous accessories.

Too bad for him, Emilia had insisted Pria go to a clinic today and Payton had been the one to check her out.

She felt a slight twinge in her chest over that. He’d tried, yet again, to get closer to her and Pria as they left. Pria hadn’t been in the mood to say much, so it had been easy to make excuses and get out of there without being too rude. He had helped, though. He’d been kind to Pria, not made her feel stupid for being afraid of knot therapy. Yes, he had a black knot. Yes, she had had bad experiences with black knots in the past. She’d also had wonderful ones. Maybe she was being a little too insistent that he didn’t join their friend group… or that he wasn’t at least given the chance to try and vibe with her friends, at the very least.

“How you wanna deal with this?”

Emilia relaxed back against the table. “We could hand it over to SecOps—or The Black Knot—but I’m fine keeping this internal. As long as I get a chance at him.”

Mazi assessed her for a moment. They’d known each other for eight years, but they’d never talked like this. Talked like people who had killed before and would do it again, even if the enemy wasn’t the usual monster, but one hiding in human flesh. “Club business isn’t any of the government’s concern.”

She smiled, slow and cruel. “As long as I don’t have to get rid of the body. That part can be the club’s business alone.”

Mazi’s mouth twitched, not quite a smile—unlike herself, he was much too serious to smile in the midst of this fuckshow—but just a sprinkle of amusement at her words. “I’ll be right back,” the bouncer said darkly, and Emilia snickered, wondering what the frighteningly massive man would say to get the bartender up here. Mazi could sweet talk with the best of them. He was also pure muscle. Fast and strong, eyes as sharp as the best pilots she’d known during the war. She didn’t actually know where Mazi had served, what his specialty had been even, but she liked to imagine he had an outstanding record, with many commendations and honours.

She yawned, glaring up at the ceiling. Too long a day, it was catching up with her. Her Censor reached out, prompting the room’s drink dispenser to give her a canned coffee. It wouldn’t be as good as one made by an actual human, but she was not drinking anything prepared here until management had checked the place over.

The top snapped open, fizzing quietly, and Mazi opened the door, the bartender flying to the floor as he was unceremoniously tossed inside.

“Hello there,” Emilia said, sipping her drink and gazing down at the man. “Why don’t we have a little chat.”