There was no point in further hiding games. The men saw them clearly, and Ayna’s group in turn saw them. The three approached, an arm’s length from one another, wearing confrontational expressions that said plenty before they were within speaking range.

“Talking?” the one in the middle said, in a voice that matched his stern brow. “You been talking?”

He was an average-sized man, clean-shaven, but with a mop of light brown hair that was the sort of messy that might have been deliberate or not. They all wore matching green jackets, not long or baggy enough to hide big weapons, but then small things could kill just fine.

“You’ve been asking questions?” he went on, as the group slowed their steps a bit during the final approach. “The wrong kind of questions?”

Herdis was in the centre of their own little group, and took two steps forward.

“We are fresh arrivals, and are just getting a feel for this place,” she told him evenly. “That is all.”

Ayna recognised the subtle tension in the woman’s body, from sparring lessons between her and Kiris during long flights. She didn’t need to turn her head to know what Bers looked like at the moment.

“You’re sure about that?” the man replied, head cocked. “Because, I don’t know, it sounds like you’ve been asking about some specifics?”

“It sounds like you’ve been listening to empty gossip,” Herdis countered.

“Yeah?” the man said sharply. “Yeah?” he repeated.

What was it about these types, that they always seemed just as childish as they did threatening?

“What do you boys think?” he asked his companions.

“I don’t think I believe it, Sammy,” the one on the left told him. “Not. At. All.”

That impish part of Ayna felt an impulse to point out the contradiction in his statement, but she restrained herself.

“Fire,” the one called Sammy said. “You asked about a fire, and the bodies taken out of it.”

“We passed by the ruins,” Herdis said. “It’s something to talk about.”

The man looked at his two companions, with a showy expression of condescension.

“I don’t know,” Sammy said, and still his voice matched his look. “I don’t know.”

He reached into a pocket and brought out what looked very much like the handle of a folding knife.

“I think you need to convince me better,” he said.

He moved the handle slowly through the air at head-height.

“I think you-”

Bers darted forward and wrapped his fist around the hand holding the knife. Sammy screamed as the Fringer squeezed with that monstrous strength of his. One of the other men reacted, and Bers smashed his free fist into his chest. The man collapsed in a gasping heap.

The other one stood with a foot off the ground for a moment, caught between running and fighting. Either way, his hand did produce another folding knife.

Herdis extended a collapsible baton and raised it for a strike. The man backpedalled, as his apparent leader let out more pained sounds. Sammy was trying to pry Bers’s fingers loose, to absolutely no effect, and his fingers remained crushed around a hard object. The Fringer forced the man to bend, while staring him in the eyes. Ayna couldn’t quite tell if the look on his face was a smile or a feral baring of teeth.

“Ah! You… you… ah!... bastard… gn!” Sammy let out, and threw a couple of punches into Bers’s face. The only effect was an even tighter grip, and his gasps and yells turned into a high-pitched wailing.

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“I think you should leave us alone,” Herdis told the trio, and maintained a careful watch on the one with the bared knife. “And trouble someone who is troubling you. What do you say?”

“AAAIIIEE!!”

“Does that mean yes?” Ayna asked Sammy.

Bers had now forced the man onto his knees, still only using his right arm.

“What do you guys think?” Ayna asked. “Did that mean yes?”

“YES!” Sammy exclaimed.

Herdis took a few steps back, but did not let the third man out of her field of vision.

“Well, Bers, unless you’re keeping him, I think you should let him go.”

“Huh.”

Bers did let go, and Sammy’s knife fell out of a limp and very red hand. Bers then gave him a backhand across the face.

“Little rat,” he rumbled. “Little rats, everywhere.”

A few pedestrians turned to look at the scene, but they were at a distance and their only reaction was to walk slightly faster. The sole exceptions were Gaylen and Kiris.

“What’s this?” the boss-man asked calmly.

“They didn’t like us asking around, apparently,” Herdis told him.

“Ooohhh, you assholes are going to-” Sammy began, with pained anger, then stopped as Beres stepped up to him again. He tried to flinch away, but hadn’t saved his threats for when he was back on his feet, so Bers caught him in another grip. This time it was around his throat.

“Bers,” Gaylen said.

The Fringer pulled the wide-eyed, open-mouthed man upright.

“Bers, no killing.”

Bers’s show of teeth got even wider, and then he flung Sammy into the just-risen man he’d knocked down earlier, sending them both back into the pavement. The third man, still unblemished, seemed content to keep it that way.

“Just walk away,” Gaylen said as he walked closer to the scene. “Just walk away; that’s all you need to do.”

Sammy and his comrade sort of helped each other get back up, and then staggered to that third fellow. Sammy held the wrist of his half-crushed hand, and both he and the other one coughed as they went, and eventually vanished into the distance along with their more sensible buddy.

Gaylen gave the group a look.

“Not us, dagi,” Bers insisted.

“Yeah, we were careful,” Ayna said. “Just asked the normal sort of questions a normal bunch of clueless spacers would.”

“As the designated adult, yes,” Herdis said.

Gaylen looked after the vanished trio.

“Just rats,” Bers added.

“There are always more rats than you can see,” Gaylen said, and the potential for repercussions started occurring to Ayna. At least she wasn’t to blame for this in any way.

The boss-man spent a moment in contemplation.

“I know that breed well,” he then said. “It pops up everywhere circumstances allow for. They don’t strike me as having carried out that arson-murder. I don’t know enough to rule it out, of course, but…”

He faded out, still looking thoughtful.

“So, was this some kind of speed record for getting into trouble on a new planet?” Ayna wondered out loud.

“No,” Gaylen told her, still looking in the lowlifes’s direction. “I’ve been threatened before actually stepping out of the Addax. Can’t beat a time record of zero.”

“These could be local contacts of more important people,” Kiris suggested.

“They could be,” he agreed.

“I could follow them,” Ayna offered. “See where they go, who they talk to.”

“We don’t know the lay of the land,” Gaylen warned, and she did appreciate the concern on his face. “And Dwyyk stand out around here.”

“We stand out in most places,” she countered. “I’ve managed all the same. And our spook friend gave me some tips while I was working for him.”

“Opportunity has come knocking,” Kiris told Gaylen.

“And those jokers are moving further and further away…” Gaylen said.

Ayna saw a decision being made.

“Alright,” he told her. “But be careful. Don’t try anything daring. Don’t sneak into their homes or anything. Settle for finding out where they go, and consider anything else a bonus. And keep us constantly updated on where you are.”

He tapped his earpiece.

“As much as you can, without them overhearing you.”

“I’m on it,” she told him, and set off at a light jog to catch up with the losers.

Recent events in her life had rather altered her definition of ‘daring’, but she understood what the guy meant. And, sure, she didn’t need to stick her head in a beast’s jaws. Just approach it a bit.

She touched the inside of her jacket’s lapel and found a little button there. A touch changed the colour of the outer layer, from black to a light brown. It didn’t make her face any less noticeable, but made it slightly more likely that they would overlook her at a glance. Then she put her hood up, for a little bit of cover. One never knew what might make a crucial difference.

She spotted them at a bit of a distance, heading down one of the city core’s longer unbroken streets. She didn’t know if it was familiarity that made people give them a berth, or the obviously poor condition of two of them, and she didn’t care. She just inserted herself into the moving foot traffic, and began today’s little bit of stalking.