Jack took the command chair. He looked at the display on the arm. They would be

over the South in a few seconds. He was glad that he had built the Enterprise for days

just like this one.

“Do you have a plan?,” he asked. “I am going to assume you have a plan.”

“We have to keep Kyle alive,” said Josie. “I was thinking that we could just wait for

Mister Warner to show up and handle things. Now I am thinking that he’s going to

have to come with us.”

“All right,” said Jack. “I’m in favor of that. Then what?”

“Then we take care of Shemmaria and Grecious,” said Josie. “Then I use a bird to

figure out who wants Kyle dead. I might have to use a lot of birds if no one likes

him.”

“Would one bird pick out a conspiracy?,” asked Jack.

“I don’t think so,” said Josie. “I could maybe figure out who the assassin was, and

then we can sweat him for the details. Either a lone gunman, or a shadow cabinet, will

come out of that, and we will have to do something to prevent the guy from being

murdered.”

“Unless we’re the ones who have to murder him,” said Jack. “I bet you the Society

will not like that option being used.”

“Which is why we won’t do that,” said Josie.

“Nothing says foiled assassin like already dead,” said Jack.

“Stop,” said Josie. “Just stop. Let’s concentrate on the part where we keep Kyle alive,

and running his country.”

“All right,” said Jack. “How do we find him?”

Jack’s phone rang again. He turned off Can’t Get No Satisfaction with a swipe of his

thumb.

“What’s going on, Mister Warner?,” he said. “We brought the Enterprise down to talk

to Kyle and keep him safe until we figure out what we are going to do. We planned

to bring him onboard and keep him locked down until we are done with the other

quests. You didn’t happen to talk to June before you came back, did you?”

He listened for a minute, drumming the arm of his chair with his fingertips.

“If you think you can get it done,” said Jack. “As soon as you give the sign, we’ll

transport you both up.”

He hung up the phone and put it back in his pocket.

“What did he say?,” Josie asked.

“He didn’t see June,” said Jack. He frowned. “I should have gone with her and made

sure things went right.”

“Were you planning on punching the other woman out for her?,” asked Josie.

“Sure,” said Jack. “You know I’ve punched women before I came here.”

He had done worse than that in some places.

“Enterprise?,” said Jack. “Can you scan for Mister Warner and put his location on

the screen.”

“Affirmative,” said the machine.

The sprawling city sprang into view on the main screen. A tiny red diamond flitted

from one building to the next. It paused for a long moment in what looked like a

central position in the biggest building of the city.

Jack’s phone rang with the Rolling Stones again. He thumbed the answer slide, and

listened.

“Enterprise, beam up Mister Warner and his passenger,” said Jack. “We will meet you

down in Transporter Room One.”

He hurried to the lift, putting the phone away. He triggered the door. He paused as

the door slid open.

“Enterprise, take us to King Rickard’s castle,” said Josie. She nodded as the ship

started coasting north. She joined Jack at the elevator.

“Do you have a plan?,” asked Jack. The elevator hummed around them as they

descended from the bridge. “Or are we winging it?”

“Yes,” said Josie. “I have a plan.”

“I would love to hear it,” said Jack.

“The first part of the plan is to bring Rickard onboard, and then call on his

counterpart in the Shemmarian bureaucracy,” said Josie. “Once we do that, we

negotiate what we want them to do versus what I will do to settle this quest so we can

break off and stop the Bloodborn.”

“That seems too reasonable for one of your plans,” said Jack.

“I used to plan gigs,” said Josie. “I know how to make a checklist, thank you very

much.”

“Okay,” said Jack.

“Are we letting Kyle on the bridge?,” asked Josie.

“No,” said Jack. The elevator opened and they headed down the hall to the transporter

room. “We’ll have Mister Warner take him to the lounge. We should have some

people to help us keep the peace.”

“We can circle around and pick up some people from Eric,” said Josie.

“I suppose it will make Rick happy,” said Jack.

“He’s going to get tired of you calling him that,” said Josie.

“And I never will,” said Jack. He paused in front of the transporter room door to

straighten his red double d shirt. “I wish I had some red sunglasses right now.”

He stepped in front of the door and let it slide open. He walked inside. Mister Warner

stood beside a pudgy man in leather armor. The older watchbearer had his strongman

persona on, and had the other man by the neck, and slightly off the floor.

“Hi,” said Jack. “Are you Kyle?”

“Yes, this is the elected high king of Gurny, the Hound of Worlin, the incredible,

The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

inedible Kyle,” said Mister Warner. “Now that we have him, what are we going to

do with him?”

“We’re supposed to be saving his life,” said Josie. “I don’t think the Society will

like it if you break his neck by accident.”

“On the other hand, if you do break his neck,” said Jack. “We can put him on the

transporter and put him somewhere no one will ever find him.”

“What do you think, Kyle?,” said Mister Warner. “You want to live, or do you want

to be given a fiery cremation by being dropped from orbit to the planet?”

“I have never seen a fiery cremation before,” said Jack. “Say fiery cremation. The

Society won’t like it, but I can take one failure against my many successes.”

“I would like to live,” said Kyle.

“Knife,” said Jack. He held out his hand. “Give it up and we don’t have to worry

about you trying to do something stupid.”

Kyle made a face. He reached up and indicated a knife at the back of his neck. Mister

Warner took it and handed it over to Jack.

“All right,” said Jack. “Someone wants to kill you. We don’t know why, we don’t

know who. We have some other business to do, so we’re going to take you around

with us, and keep you safe until we can concentrate on figuring out who wants to kill

you. You can cooperate and let us do our jobs without undue problems, or you can

sit inside the brig until we get around to dealing with you. I’m good with either

option, but the Society wants to keep you alive, and I’m willing to roll with that

since I don’t know you.”

“Why would anyone want to kill me?,” said Kyle. “I was just elected.”

“It might be a side effect of what’s going on in the north,” said Jack. “A proxy war.

Someone who doesn’t want you to get involved in whatever they are planning. We

don’t know because we just found out a few hours ago there was a threat. Things

might change if we can fix the other things going on that we need to deal with.”

Mister Warner let his Samson persona go.

“So I think we need to come up with a list of people who want you dead,” said Mister

Warner. “You might have some problems coming out of your sexual harassment of

the maids.”

“I stopped doing that,” said Kyle.

“Some people never forget,” said Mister Warner.

“And they never forgive,” said Josie. Her look was a little more grim as she

contemplated what she wanted from Kyle.

“Put the maids and their boyfriends at the top of the list you are going to be making,”

said Jack. “Mister Warner, if you want to take Kyle down to the conference room and

get him started on the list of people who want him dead, that would be okay. We’re

going to be doing some negotiating in a bit, and Kyle can sit in and watch how we do

things.”

“What kind of negotiation?,” asked Kyle.

“Someone wants to start a war up north between your neighbor, and their neighbor,”

said Jack. “The Society wants to keep that kind of thing down to a low conflict kind

of thing instead of ruin the continent kind of thing. So we’re going to have a talk, and

see if we can figure out what’s going on.”

“And we’re going to make sure that the people who want the war aren’t the people

who want to kill you,” said Josie.

“If they are, it will make my life a lot simpler, and help yours a lot faster,” said Jack.

“What does this Society want from me in return?,” asked Kyle.

“I don’t know,” said Jack. He glanced at Josie, and Mister Warner. They didn’t seem

to have an idea either. “They want to keep the peace and generally protect the planet

as a whole. I think they want you to do the best you can to help the people around

you, and make sure any fires on your border with Grecious and with the Goblin

Tribes are stamped out before they become big things. Maybe be a better person than

someone who coerces the employees.”

“Maybe don’t be that better person and make us come back to deal with you,” said

Josie. “I think I would like that.”

“So Kyle,” said Jack. He grinned at the high king. “You might be able to give me that

cremation slash falling star I never wanted to have before I met you.”

“I think you might want to put Josie Fox at the top of the list who wants you dead,”

said Mister Warner. “Let’s go down and get started on it, right?”

“Don’t let him fall out of the cargo deck,” said Jack. He waved at Kyle as he was

escorted away. “Enterprise, make sure Kyle gets put in the brig as soon as he does

something wrong, and deny him access to anything except the rooms we put him in.”

“Affirmative,” said the machine. Jack could almost hear doors being locked all over

the ship.

“Mister Warner seems to have some personal history there,” said Josie.

“Probably over a girl,” said Jack. “And he is living here. He probably doesn’t want

Kyle to send his army down to the village. I’m sure he thinks he can take care of

himself, but Dot, Rope, Elena, everyone else would all be caught in the crossfire.”

“If Mister Warner lived after something like that, Kyle would be deader than Elvis,”

said Josie.

“Let’s see about the rest of our guests,” said Jack. “We need to pick up the King, at

least, and then we need to grab whomever’s in charge of the army for Shemmaria.”

“We might need adventurers for security,” said Josie.

“We’re definitely going to need our Three Stooges,” said Jack.

“All right,” said Josie. “Let’s pick up the King, and maybe his chief advisor, and then

grab up someone from the hospital detail to help us out.”

“I’m for that,” said Jack. He led the way back up to the bridge. “We can pick up the

adventurers first.”

“I’ll use a bird to go back to Hawk Ridge,” said Josie. “Work on the Rick thing.”

“We’re practically best friends,” said Jack. He grinned at his partner.

“I don’t think he sees it that way,” said Josie.

Jack nodded. He looked out over the capitol. He rubbed his scar. He had to do what

he had to do.

“Enterprise,” said Jack. “If Kyle is escorted to the bridge, he is not allowed to use the

controls in any way. I don’t want him crashing you by mistake.”

“Affirmative,” agreed the machine.

“Let me grab up our adventurers,” said Josie. She pulled on her Zatanna and sent

out a bird. “Try to be less annoying.”

“I’m the least annoying person you know,” said Jack.

“I don’t think so,” said Josie. She vanished a second later.

Jack rubbed the scar over his eye. He had things to do. He didn’t want to leave Mister

Warner alone with Kyle, but he couldn’t just sit on the bridge and wait for Josie to

come back with extra hands.

He could, but she would give him flak about being lazy while she was doing all the

work.

He went back to the transporter and beamed down to the throne room. The guards

pulled weapons and paused when they saw it was him. He waved at them in turn.

“Is King Rickard around?,” asked Jack. “I need to pick him up to do some

negotiating.”

“What kind of negotiating?,” asked one of the guards.

“I was thinking about having my friend move up here,” said Jack. “A new town might

cheer her up.”

“Your friend, the bird lady?,” said the guard. He looked at his friends. “Moving

here?”

“You should have seen her before we came here,” said Jack. “Her social skills are

way better than what they used to be.”

“I would hate to see what they were before,” said the guard.

“Everyone says that,” said Jack.

“Jack?,” said King Rickard. “Josie sent me a letter. I have sent for the general in

command of the north. He will be here in a few days.”

“Come on,” said Jack. “We’ll talk to him in a few minutes.”

“Really?,” said the King.

“Josie went to get some adventurers to help out,” said Jack. “As soon as she returns,

she can find the guy with a bird. I was wondering if you wanted her to move up here

and settle down. Maybe kick over some rocks for you.”

“Really?,” asked the king. He slightly frowned at the guards behind Jack shaking

their heads. “Why?”

“Where Josie goes, her kids will go,” said Jack. “Elaine and I will have time to work

on our own things.”

“Is this part of the issue that we are looking to solve?,” asked the King.

“Not really,” said Jack. “It’s a random thought.”

“I think it will be easier for you and Elaine to move here,” said the King. “But I think

Hawk Ridge is the better place for both of you at the moment. Everyone already

knows you there, and your reputation should be good with the Duke.”

The guards nodded in agreement with the King’s words. Two dangerous magic users

inside the city walls were two too many.

“Okay,” said Jack. “I will put that on pause. I’m trying to get her to settle down with

some guy so she’s all grumpy around the Hangar. You wouldn’t happen to have some

guy you won’t miss if his head explodes, would you?”

The King frowned at the question. His guards definitely didn’t like the thought

he would even consider having Josie pick one of them out.

“I will have to think on it,” said the King.

There was an almost audible sigh of relief.

“I think we should be going,” said Jack. “Kyle is onboard with Mister Warner.

Somebody woke up and wanted him dead this morning. Guess who’s stuck making

sure he doesn’t.”

“Your Society is full of surprises,” said the King.

“They’re full of something,” said Jack. “Enterprise, the king and I are ready to come

aboard.”

“Affirmative,” said the machine. Blue sparks carried them away.