“Dammit! You’re cheating!” Cash roared.
It was later in the day and this was the fourth round of darts in a row Ryuuk had won.
“Cheating!?” Ryuuk exclaimed, his sense of honor clearly offended. “You dare call me a cheater? I can put a bullet through a brawny man’s nipple ring from 432 yards away. You think I can’t hit that bullseye every time from 12 feet away?”
“That seems oddly specific,” Dick commented from his seat beside me at the bar.
“Don’t ask,” I groaned. “He’ll just spout out some ridiculous story about a time he did a thing that was incredible and that’s why they call him Ryuuk the Ringer or some dumb shit like that.”
“It was Ring’em Ryuuk, actually,” the man in question called, and Dick descended into a fit of laughter.
I simply rolled my eyes and took a drink from my mug to hide an amused grin.
Most of us had gathered to watch the dart throwing showdown of the century. And although it had quickly turned into a boring beatdown, watching Cash’s blood pressure visibly rise each time he lost proved more entertaining in the long run.
“You got to admit,” Matthew pointed out, “his story seems plausible. Ryuuk certainly is the best aim I’ve ever seen.”
“Oh wow,” Cash said grouchily. “He’s the best aim of all three people junior here has probably ever seen shoot.”
“Well, I’ve seen you shoot,” Matthew grumbled, and his comment was met with snickering throughout the room.
“I’m no cheater,” Ryuuk said, bringing the conversation back around. “So, either prove it or pay-up.”
We had all been making side bets on the competition, at first. When it became obvious to everyone in the room, apart from Cash, that the big man was outmatched, we quickly cut our losses and traded good-natured barbs instead of credits.
Cash stared stubbornly at Ryuuk’s smug, smiling face for a moment.
“Double or nothing,” he said.
The room erupted with various sounds of disbelief and amusement. They’d already doubled-down three times with the same result.
“I don’t suppose it’s occurred to you that the guy who makes his living off the long range sniper rifle he carries around might have a slight advantage in this game?” Vomero asked.
“I make my living off Carla!” Cash argued. “You people just don’t seem to respect who you’re talking about here. People piss their beds at night worried they’ll find themselves in my crosshair.”
“Yeah,” I said with a doubtful sigh, “but Carla’s not the only way you do business. I mean, look at Ryuuk. He literally has nothing else going for him. I’m sure he probably sleeps with that gun.”
“Why would I not sleep with my gun nearby?” Ryuuk said. “Where else would anyone keep their gun?”
Dick stood and slapped Ryuuk on the shoulder as he moved to pour himself another drink.
“I don’t think she meant that kind of sleep, buddy.”
Ryuuk sputtered in equal parts confusion and consternation.
“Wha...uhhh...that’s not even...you’re all deranged.”
Abandoning the doomed game of darts, we soon settled in the lounge area. The old man was teaching Dick how to play some convoluted board game on a holopad. I was pretty sure he was making up the rules as he went. Dick pretended not to notice.
Ryuuk tucked himself in a corner with Jack Trader’s book and a warm cup of Syreni cider. Vomero had Cash’s rifle in pieces on the bar. Cash had purchased a replacement power core for it during our pre-mission preparations, and Vomero agreed to install it for him.
While I unpacked the bag I had stuffed the Malunites’ clothes in at the warehouse, Matthew seemed intent on prying out everyone’s secrets.
“Have you ever killed anyone and regretted it later?” Matthew asked Cash with the type of candid innocence that came from inexperience.
“No,” Cash replied.
“Really? Not even if it was an innocent person?”
“Innocent people don’t usually find themselves the target of someone like me.”
“What about the Queen?” Matthew pressed. “You guys said it was Owen and that other assassin lady who were doing all the bad things people thought the Queen was doing. She was innocent, and someone hired an assassin to kill her.”
Cash leaned forward and poured himself a drink from the table in the center of our lounging area.
“Owen and his bunch had only been on that gig for a month at most,” Cash explained as he took a drink. “The Queen might not have destroyed Mandala or implemented drastic policies of discrimination, but she did use that creature to hold that magical item everyone was searching for hostage. No doubt it was for selfish reasons. And the anti-Malunite sentiment and loyalist movement was already a hotbed of hatred before Owen’s people decided to exploit it. That’s not exactly what I’d describe as actions of an innocent person.”
I pulled Tor, Par and Celo’s clothes from the pack first. Examining them, I noticed they all had the same label inside them. Morilla Tactical Apparel and Gear the label read.
“Still,” I said joining Cash and Matthew’s conversation, “you can’t possibly think that innocent people never get targeted by some greedy bastard looking to take what’s theirs.”
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“I said usually,” Cash clarified. “And it’s always up to someone in my business whether they want to accept a job or not. Only idiots accept a job having only vague information about it.”
I gave him a sardonic look because I knew he was referring to our own deal with Owen’s benefactors.
“So, you just don’t take jobs that you’d regret later?” Matthew asked. “That doesn’t sound ideal. I mean someone else probably came along and took that job, right? They still died.”
“There was one time someone tried to hire me for a job that involved killing a little girl,” Cash said, taking a big swig of his drink as he stared blankly into space. His mind was clearly wandering in the past. “They were pretty specific on how they wanted it done. Suffocation, quick, nothing that would damage any internal organs. The family attempting to hire me let it slip that she was a donor match for their rich, dying grandmother, and they needed the old bat to stay alive long enough for some estate changes to go through.”
“You refused the job?” I asked. “Let someone else kill her?”
“I got a better offer,” he continued. “When the grandmother found out her conniving relatives were trying to get their hands on her fortune, she had a fit. Hired me to kill her instead. The money her relatives were offering was to be paid after the paperwork went through and she was cold in her grave, but the old woman paid double and up front. She passed peacefully in her sleep, and all her money went to charity as she had intended.”
"I don’t suppose you know how she found out about their little scheme?” I said knowingly.
Cash shrugged.
“There’s no professional integrity lost from trying to score a better deal. Assassins play people against each other all the time for profit.”
“A happy ending for all,” I said, ironically.
“It doesn’t always work out that way,” Cash said. “But there are always choices we get to make, even in our business.”
“It’s cool how you found a way to save that girl,” Matthew said.
“Don’t go thinking I’m some saint, kid. I’ve probably killed more people than you’ve ever met.”
“Maybe not, but I bet Katra wouldn’t have thought twice about killing that little girl.”
Cash leaned back in his chair with a sigh.
“A lot of assassins wouldn’t have either, though that woman wasn’t exactly the best example of our profession.”
“Don’t tell me hired guns have some code they abide by,” I said, examining a security pass I pulled from Tor’s discarded clothing. Thinking it might prove useful later, I tucked it into my back pocket.
“Not hardly,” Cash laughed. “It’s more like an occupational hierarchy, and you get to the top by not taking any shit off anyone.”
“That’s why you had to put Katra down?” I asked, looking up to meet his gaze. “Professional integrity? She tried to kill you, and you couldn’t let that slide or it’s back to the bottom of the food chain? Nothing personal, just business.”
“Oh, it was definitely personal,” Cash said, rubbing his chest absently near the spot where he was shot. “But people like Katra are always looking to climb their way up the ladder by trying to one-up someone higher on scale. Sometimes they’re successful and earn the right to fill that spot. If they’re smart, they learn to stop before finding out exactly where their limit lies.”
“You mean before they piss off someone who’s better than them and end up dead,” I said.
Cash nodded an affirmative, saluting with his drink before taking a sip.
“Now you get it,” he said. “It’s not just about revenge. It’s about me proving where I belong in the hierarchy, as well.”
“Sounds exhausting,” Dick said, looking up from his game.
“Oh?” Cash countered. “And what do you do for a living that’s so different?”
“Do I look like the kind of guy who has a career?” Dick said sarcastically. “Climbing the killer corporate ladder sounds like too much work. And there’s no point in building and maintaining a reputation when your identity can change anytime you want it to.”
I pulled another piece of clothing from the bag.
“You didn’t get those flying skills from just anywhere,” I said to Dick. “You’ve had some kind of training, aka a career, at some point.”
The shirt in my hand unraveled and the Drowned Diadem I had stuffed in the bag tumbled free. It clanged to the floor with a melodious chime. Reaching down to retrieve it, I looked up at Dick to see if he was going to respond to my comment.
Instead, he was staring at the crown in my hand and clutching his stomach. Concerned, I called out to him as he seemed a million miles away.
“Dick? What’s wrong?”
This got everyone’s attention, and we waited for him to speak. Instead, he pulled up his shirt to look at his stomach. There was a round glowing area in the center of his abdomen. The entity was active beneath his skin.
Slowly, it traveled up his torso, through his chest cavity and into his bicep, causing noticeable discomfort as it went. Making its way down his forearm and into the palm of his hand, the glow slowly faded as the shiny, black orb manifested itself in his hand.
The orb began emitting a humming sound that seemed to resonate off the metal crown in my hand, the two sounds almost tuned in harmony.
“What the hell...” Vomero said, leaving the bar area. Instead of moving toward Dick and I, however, Vomero was making his way toward the door leading to the control room.
I turned to look at Dick, who seemed to have snapped out of whatever weird stupor he had been in. He shrugged at me and grasped his hand tight around the still resonating orb.
“Vomero,” I called down the hallway, “what are you—”
My question was interrupted by the sound of a deafening, low moan that seemed to encase the transport. The rumble of the noise shook the cabin like turbulence.
The shock I felt mirrored itself on the face of my companions, and everyone moved at once toward the doorway. One by one, we followed Vomero down the hall to the control room. He had flipped on the viewscreen, although it was mostly dark shadows outside the transport.
“The ship’s sensors started freaking out,” Vomero said in explanation of his hasty departure.
As he adjusted the sensitivity and contrast on the cameras, an immense swirl of shadows rolled languidly past the viewing area. It was the type of lumbering pace indicative of something massive moving at a rapid speed. It took a full thirty seconds for the creature to clear the viewing screen.
Another loud groan shook the cabin, but this time we could pick up the subtle clicks mixed in with the sound thanks to the audio sensors. It sounded like a creaky wooden ship sinking all around us.
I glanced over at Dick, who was still firmly grasping the orb in his right hand. He was fixated on the crown in my hand. Looking down, I saw why. The Diadem was giving off a subtle sheen, like it was drenched in water, though it was dry to my touch.
Looking back up, my gaze met Dicks, then Vomero’s.
“Lord Acheron,” I whispered shakily.
MMMMMOOOOOOUUUUUUUUUUMMMMMMM!!!!!
This time the sound physically shook the transport enough that we each had to brace ourselves to keep on our feet.
“Turn it off,” Cash barked, “before this thing sinks us.”
“I don’t know how to turn it off!” I exclaimed. “I didn’t turn it on.”
“Dick turned it on,” Vomero said.
“It wasn’t me,” Dick said. “It’s this damn orb.”
YAAAAAAAUUUUUUUUURRRRRRRRRRR!!!!!
“Would you stop rilin’ it up!? I told you that thing can hear you!” Ryuuk screeched in panic. “Can’t you do the melty thing with it again?”
Dick closed his eyes and seemed to concentrate, gripping the orb tightly with both hands.
The humming of the orb stopped as abruptly as it had began, melting back into Dick’s grasp to become a subtle glow under his skin, once again. In my own hand, I noticed the Diadem had also gone silent and dim.
Lord Acheron let out one last, ear-splitting bellow and then was gone, leaving the seven of us horror-stricken in the resounding silence.