Several hours later, Urtiga collected him from his temporary room, and informed him they had a vessel to catch on the other side of the station. Feeling much more confident about his situation, Jack followed her, but froze when he saw that they were approaching the Tier Two Concourse.

“We can’t go in there,” he protested. “I mean, I can’t.”

He had been happy to let his new business partner take the lead in planning his evasion, while he sat in his dingy low rent hotel room browsing the web. Urtiga had presented a substantial bill for her services, which he had been willing to accept, so it didn’t seem reasonable that she would try to sell him out until after she had been paid. She had only described their itenary in vague detail, explaining that they would take ‘a shuttle’ to the travel hub at Misian. Now, he worried that he had misplaced his trust.

“What’s the problem?” she asked.

“I’ll get flagged for sure. I thought you were going to find something lower profile.”

“Your new ident is completely secure—you won’t get flagged.”

“How did you—”

She smiled that warm, honest smile that was beginning to beguile him. “Why do you think my bill is so high? I provide only the best service, and besides, I like to travel in comfort.”

He stammered for a moment, before he realized that he really wanted to believe her. The idea of taking a luxury cruiser held its own seduction, and besides, he argued to himself, the level of martial arts that he had witnessed the night before had been impressive. She was certainly an experienced professional.

Swallowing his anxiety, he stepped up to the checkpoint, counting the seconds for the scanner to process his profile… and passed through without the guard even looking up.

She followed him through. “See?” she said, and punched his arm. “I got this.”

A gorgeous starliner waited for them on the other side of an expansive observation window. Jack had to admit that the open, spacious and comfortable boarding lounge was worth the price, and if he was going into hiding, it would be the last time he could expect to enjoy such comforts. Perhaps Urtiga had this in mind when she planned their trip, he thought. She seemed to be quite empathetic.

With a sigh, he set down his finely aged whisky.

“Something wrong?” she asked.

He grinned. “It’s a hard life, being on the run.”

“I can imagine it’s positively tiresome.” The cold, piercing voice behind him made his blood run cold.

Fighting back nausea, Jack turned to see Allana Rayker, her face as pale and expressionless as a statue.

“Uhhh…” he managed.

“A little unscheduled holiday? I don’t believe we’ve concluded our business yet, Mr. Fenway.”

Urtiga leaned back in her chair, her warm smile ever present. “Is that your old boss, Jack?” she asked.

Jack was frozen, uncertain if he had been betrayed or even the victim of an elaborate prank.

“I don’t believe we’ve been introduced,” Rayker said, turning away from Jack.

“No, we haven’t,” Urtiga said happily. The two women maintained eye contact, neither blinking.

“I’m afraid I’m going to have to deprive you of your companion for a moment,” Rayker said, interrupting the awkward silence.

“No, you’re not.” Urtiga’s smile never wavered.

Rayker laughed. “Oh, don’t be dramatic. We have some old business to discuss.”

“No, you don’t.”

“Well, I can’t imagine what business it is of yours—”

“I don’t care what you can imagine. Mr. Fenway is under my protection, and he isn’t going anywhere.”

Jack cringed, wishing he could crawl into an airlock to be shot out into space. Nobody interrupted Allana Rayker.

“Young lady—” she said coldly.

“You are either going to leave us alone, or I’m going to make a scene. And it isn’t going to go the way you think it will.” Urtiga’s smile had faded to a cocky smirk.

Jack wondered if the woman wasn’t narcissistically overconfident, even if she was obviously a world class poker player. Rayker glared at her, then at Jack, then turned and stalked back to a delegation of VennZech employees gathering by the bar. He began to shake as Urtiga put her feet up on the coffee table.

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

“Do you know who that was?” he said quietly.

Urtiga shrugged. “I’ve heard rumors. I thought she’d be taller, to be honest.”

“Are you afraid of anything?”

She frowned. “I’m not super fond of heights, if I’m being honest.”

“Oh my god. Please tell me she won’t be on board at least.”

“No. Some VennZech research team is having a business trip. I honestly didn’t think she’d come to send them off.” She smiled contritely. “I screwed up. It won’t happen again.”

Jack downed the rest of his whiskey in one gulp.

A few hours later, they were on board the starliner, and with a few more drinks in him, Jack had begun to calm down. It was certainly a restive environment. As soon as they boarded the vessel, helpful, smiling servants had rushed to their side, eager to cater to their every desire. Urtiga had shrugged them off, while Jack listened curiously to the variety of luxuries available. There were spas and hot-tubs, massage parlors and swimming pools. He found himself attracted to the botanical sphere, with its luscious gardens and light-enhanced glass ceiling, that allowed awed onlookers to see more of the galaxy than would be visible to the naked eye.

Urtiga dismissed these suggestions as ‘too complicated’, preferring to keep in the vicinity of a small, but elegant restaurant. She chose a vantage point which allowed her to watch the entire room, and the concourse beyond it, while they chatted about the possibilities of colony life.

“It’s very romantic,” Jack said. “Setting down farms and homesteads on a completely unexplored planet.”

“Yes, easy to see how adventurous types are drawn out there,” Urtiga agreed.

“Is that where you’re from—the outer cluster?”

“No.”

“Oh… well, anyway, I suppose I can see how those colonists find a real purpose in their lives, and I think that’s really special. Uniting.”

“When the purpose is making sure you don’t all die—yeah.”

“But I just don’t see that in our society anymore. Helvetic society, I mean. It’s so…”

“Narcissistic.”

“Yes—that’s exactly right. I don’t know why that is.”

Urtiga thought for a moment. “What sticks out to me is the recent Frontier war. Nobody talks about it.”

Jack thought back to what little he had remembered of the conflict that ended more than a decade ago. The Helvetic League had been a military superpower, and sought to crush cartel activity in the fringe worlds. Anxious to avoid accusations of imperialism, they had assembled an alliance of planetary forces to try and crack down on the trafficking, corruption, and gangsterism of that part of human space.

After years of fighting, with millions dead, nothing seemed to have been achieved. The cartels were as powerful as ever, while the League had shattered its public image as a force for justice. Critics complained openly about naked war profiteering. Earth wasn’t a leader of civilization; it just controlled the largest gang, they argued, before the League’s censors began to silence them.

“Well, why would they? I don’t think anyone really understands what happened.”

“True,” Urtiga said. “But war is just the word given to the kinds of extreme human interactions that go beyond a certain line. It’s a line that exists in our minds, but not so much in reality. If you’re not talking about war, then you’re cutting yourself off from a ton of experiences and lessons that can apply to your own life, no matter how boring you think it is.”

“That’s an… unusual perspective.”

“I mean, okay, violence is a different beast. All bets are off, no rules, disaster, and misery at every level of society. But they sent a lot of men and women out there, who experienced all the awful things that war generates. They saw, they learned, and they grew and returned to their homes with a vast storehouse of new experiences. Now, imagine if all those veterans told their stories and explained what they had learned and why it mattered. Imagine if it was discussed and debated by the artists and philosophers and became the cornerstone of cultural discourse. Those hard truths: the lessons learned in blood, all the accumulated experience that would teach a new generation how to confront darkness and overcome it—wouldn’t that push humanity to grow? Wouldn’t that help people get a better sense of meaning and purpose?”

Jack was captivated by her passion as she grew more animated. He found himself wishing he had such powerful convictions. “I can’t imagine a society like that,” he admitted.

“Well, actually, you don’t need to. ‘Cos that’s what happened in ancient Greece, after Homer wrote Iliad and Odyssey. And some people say there was no Homer, or that it was a group of people, and they were just condensing all the stories people had collected that meant the most to them. Their world had emerged from a dark age, surviving war and tragedy, and the writings provided the cornerstone of their culture.”

Jack nodded, deciding he would go looking for history books at the next opportunity.

“But this Helvetic society just waves its hands.” Urtiga continued, her tone growing frustrated. “They shrug their shoulders, make a few quickly forgotten documentaries that misrepresent what happened, and refuse to dig any deeper. The League didn’t win, and neither did the rebels. Humans can’t process anything without an obvious winner and loser because it’s too painful and confusing. Nobody wants their happy, meaningless lives disturbed.”

“Did you serve in the war?” Jack asked, then wondered if he shouldn’t have. She looked too young, but she had been so immersed in her argument that it seemed like she must have had a personal connection.

She shrugged. “Nah, I just watched from the sidelines, like everyone else.”

They talked well into the shipboard evening, and Jack began to feel intoxicated by the presence of the young woman. She had such a treasure trove of stories, both hilarious and heart-breaking. He moved closer to her, craving the warmth of her smile as the warmth of the wine seeped through his nerves. She was certainly attractive, and he found himself getting lost in her open, honest eyes. Brushing aside all thoughts of professionalism, he didn’t blink when she placed her hand on his wrist, giggling as she playfully pushed back his sleeve. Their eyes met again, and…

He felt an intense stabbing pain in his forearm.

Jack looked down, saw the needle she had withdrawn, saw the small rivulet of blood draining from the puncture hole in his flesh. When he looked back up, Urtiga’s warm smile had been replaced by a cocky smirk, and her eyes sparked with mischief.

Jack didn’t hesitate. Driven purely by instinct, he bolted from the restaurant, sprinting across the concourse without looking back. He tried to identify the maintenance access, hoping to use the maze of confusing walkways to lose the psychopath who had manipulated and tricked him. Eventually he found a hatchway to engineering, and he ducked inside. Following the signs, he headed for the engine room. There, he would certainly be able to find a corner to crawl into, never to be found by the endless parade of thugs who wanted him dead.