It took To Vo a long time to scrub the blood out of her fur. Her species had evolved a dense coat to stop dust and parasites from getting through the coat, but that same dense fur also trapped any form of moisture. It wasn’t a problem on her arid homeworld, until blood got involved. As it had before. As To Vo had very much hoped it never would again.

The last drops of blood finally worked their way out of her fur, and To Vo reluctantly stepped out of the cleanser. The only exit from the room was into the communal living space. Where the bodies and the blood might still linger. Tooley had already set them into the stars and away from the station, but there was still a mess to clean up.

To Vo took three deep breaths and counted to ten. Then counted to ten again. Before, she had always calmed herself down by citing some codes of the Galactic Council rulebook or officer’s conduct handbook. She couldn’t stomach the thought now.

When To Vo La Su finally exited the cleansing room, she found the central living area shockingly clean -and occupied by the entire crew. Kamak looked at her expectantly as she stood in front of the door.

“Captain.”

“Sit down, To Vo.”

Ever obedient, To Vo did as she was ordered, and took a seat. There were multiple open chairs, and she picked the one next to Doprel. Kamak took note of that, and then returned his attention to his drink. They had broken into their new alcohol supply almost immediately.

“So.”

To Vo dug clawed fingertips into her kneecaps as she awaited Kamak’s next words.

“What happened the first time?”

Kamak sipped at his drink as To Vo’s tight grip relaxed.

“What?”

“Corvash says according to you, this isn’t the first time you killed someone,” Kamak said. “So. What happened the first time?”

After waiting long enough to take two more sips of his drink at a very slow pace, Kamak figured To Vo wasn’t going to talk. At least not on her own.

“See, my first kill was way back when I was just a security grunt for a Timeka corpo-colony,” Kamak said. “I was doing my beat on patrol of some bean-paste manufacturing joint when I got a call that said a fugitive was heading my way. Gave me the description, and told me to kill on sight.”

Even though everyone in the room could guess how the story ended, a moment of silent tension still hung in the air. Kamak tapped the edge of his glass with a finger.

“I still don’t know what that poor bastard did,” Kamak said. “Never asked. Probably never going to.”

When working a Timeka job in a Timeka-owned town on a Timeka-owned planet, second-guessing Timeka’s orders was a ticket to poverty and death. It didn’t matter much to Kamak if his target had been a serial killer or a petty thief. If Timeka wanted them dead, they were dead. He’d even gotten a promotion out of it, getting the security gig that had eventually led Kamak to becoming a bounty hunter, which had been going pretty well until recently. Kamak took a larger than usual sip of his drink.

After a long wait, To Vo continued to show no signs of talking. Doprel was the next to volunteer his own story.

“Me, I had to fight my way off some shambling Doccan ship with a few of my siblings while the rest of the Doccan tried to eat us,” Doprel said. “It was...easier, than I thought. One of my brothers tried to reason with the others, convince them we were still useful, and he got his face bitten off for the trouble. I never gave them the chance.”

Doprel didn’t regret anything he’d done to any of the Doccan during his escape, only what he had done after. Reasoning that the other Doccan would not waste time and resources chasing multiple targets, Doprel and his siblings had split up, going their separate ways. It was the last time he’d ever seen any of them. He didn’t know if they were dead or merely hiding, but as far as Doprel knew, he was the last. But he didn’t talk about that.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“You were only a few solars old when this happened, yes?” Farsus asked. “In your own terms.”

“Around three Doccan years, yes,” Doprel said. “That matters less for Doccan, though. They come out of the egg fully mature.”

“I am aware. I was merely curious whether you had killed at a younger age than I.”

Everyone turned to Farsus with a mix of disgust and curiosity. He did not leave them waiting for long.

“When I was eleven local years old, the older scholars called me in to our medical ward, to show me a man in a coma,” Farsus said. “They told me that he had a severe and likely untreatable illness, and had requested he be allowed to pass if he went into a coma. They also told me that after he made this request, a possible treatment for his condition was discovered that he had not been aware of. They asked me my opinion: whether to respect the mans desires, flawed as they were, or deny him autonomy in the hopes of a longer life.”

Farsus crossed his arms and leaned back. Corey looked sick to his stomach.

“I told them to respect his wishes,” Farsus said. “And I watched as they unplugged his life support, and he died. It was the first of many decisions that set me on my scholarly path.”

“Well you didn’t really kill the guy,” Kamak said.

“I made a conscious, informed decision to end the life of a man who would otherwise have lived,” Farsus said. “I do not absolve myself of responsibility simply because my hand did not flip the switch that ended his life.”

Even if he sought to absolve himself of that first kill, which he did not, Farsus had killed enough that it no longer mattered. One death meant little among a lifetime dedicated to the study of death. He moved on, and looked to Tooley.

“What, you want my first-kill story?” Tooley scoffed. “I was flying for some other crew of bounty hunters and I used the ship’s guns to shoot down the guy they were chasing. Killed six people. Didn’t give a fuck then, don’t give a fuck now.”

She defiantly put a bottle of shiiv to her lips and ended her story. Corey watched the exotic beer tremble along with her hands. She noticed his eyes locked on her and clenched her fist around the bottle.

“Quit staring, Corey. Your turn in the sharing circle.”

“What? You guys were there,” Corey said. “Whichever of those slavers I shot first, I don’t really know.”

Kamak’s glass froze in his hand, and he stared past the rim of the glass at Corey.

“I hired you on as a bounty hunter three swaps after your first kill?”

“Yeah, and I’m doing a pretty good job,” Corey said. “What about it?”

After a moment of tense contemplation, Kamak relented with a shrug and finished his drink. Corey hadn’t turned out to be too bad of an investment, all things considered. The moment passed, and though everyone tried to act casual, To Vo could still sense occasional glances aimed in her direction. She had tried as best she could to shrink into her chair and disappear, but failed. She pawed nervously at her own knees and tried to choke out the world.

“It was a dry season,” To Vo finally mumbled. “Food was scarce. The old rules took over. You feed yourself, or you don’t get fed. A lot of people didn’t get fed.”

It had been years ago, but To Vo could still remember the worst of it, and her hand drifted to her stomach as it remembered the stabbing pangs of starvation. She’d fared better than most, being smarter and more agile than many of her tribe, but that could only do so much.

“I had a friend. Someone I cared about. Someone I trusted. She hadn’t eaten in days, I could tell she was close to wasting away,” To Vo continued. “I pulled her away from the rest of the tribe, offered to share half of what I’d gathered.”

To Vo curled up in a ball, and held her knees close to her chest.

“She decided she wanted all of it.”

The cocktail of starvation, panic, and the haze of time had dulled the memories of the fight itself. She remembered stinging pain from desperate claws, getting hit and falling, scrambling in the dirt for a rock, and swinging her arm. After that, everything became clearer. Much clearer.

“I hit her. In the head,” To Vo said, choking on every word. “And she was- she was still trying to eat. She clawed around in the dirt for the scraps I’d dropped, even with her skull broken open like…”

To Vo looked like she was about to throw up, and said nothing more. The memory of that girl, not so different from her, mindlessly gnawing on her own fingertips while her brains leaked on the ground, was seared in To Vo’s memory forever.

As To Vo sank into grim memories, Kamak glared daggers at Doprel. This whole talk had been his idea.

“That’s fucked up, kid,” Kamak said, in the closest thing to sympathy he’d ever mustered. “But you did what you had to do.”

“No, I didn’t,” To Vo said. “I shouldn’t have had to. She should’ve been better, or luckier, or less proud, our stupid people should’ve taught us to share, I should’ve…”

There were too many things that should’ve happened to list, so To Vo gave up, and sat in silence. This time, no one spoke up.