Though there were no windows in the back of the transport vehicle, Vik tapped into the cameras in the front, so the three of them could watch where they were going and see what was happening. As they approached the outer ring, they saw that there were many security drones wandering about, scanning the streets and skies. Oddly, there were no police and no authority vehicles.

“Three, six, eight… Look at that; nine drones just in our immediate field of view.” Vik said as they glanced up from their communicator to the projection that they had set up. “Though I don’t know if that’s for you specifically. There’s been more surveillance here since Gyrini showed up.”

“Doesn’t matter if it’s for us specifically or not.” TO said as their ears flicked with concern, “If all these drones are around, we can’t leave the vehicle. And if this vehicle makes its way to the tunnels on its own, I’m sure that’ll seem suspicious.”

“Oh, it will, no doubt about that!” Vik said. “That’s why we're not landing in the street or going into the tunnels. We’re heading to a warehouse on the shoreline.” He brought up a different image, showing a rather large, innocuous warehouse. “This one, specifically. Management only uses robot workers with low AI capabilities, and they’ve let the cameras stay ‘broken’ for years. Most people use it to get rid of things they don’t want, or to smuggle things that are technically illegal. Or just actually illegal. Getting people in and out is absolutely easy.”

“People?” TO’s ears flicked back. “What do you mean, people?”

“Just what I said. People. Well, sometimes just bodies. If it’s coming from the inner circles, nobody asks too many questions. The point is, it’ll be easy enough for us to get away in there.”

They approached the warehouse, hovering before the street entrance for a few seconds as Vik put some commands in on his communicator. A moment later, the door slid open, and the vehicle went inside.

Dull yellow lights illuminated the interior of the warehouse, where a handful of civilian shipping vehicles were sitting, waiting. Though a few ServAis were working on filling one or two transports with tightly sealed boxes, most stood along the wall in an idle mode.

“Should we be worried about all these other vehicles?” DH asked.

“Nah, it’s fine.” Vik said, “Most of them are here to wait for a pickup, and they’ll be waiting until they get called back, until someone smuggles in what they’re waiting for, or until the blockade ends. Whatever.”

“And you’re sure the cameras here are-“

“Entirely deactivated. Even if Gyrini wanted to activate them, half of them are fake and the others are broken. This warehouse doesn’t deal with off-planet transport, so it doesn’t need to have the same level of security as the others do either.”

“And nobody asks questions?”

Vik shrugged, “Not really.” They said, “I mean, the owners do have contracts with some local producers. Nothing particularly legit, though; knockoff shit, cheap electronics. Stuff people see on ads in the social, and order late at night. It’s not much, but it’s enough to make things seem legitimate even if some people get scammed.”

The transport hovered over a landing spot, a series of beeps and pings coming from the front before it lowered down on a platform and powered down.

“There we go.” Vik said. “Now, the warehouse is half on land, and half over the water, where the Okoian sewers empty their contents. We’re over water, and we’ll be heading into the sewers. Just jump out of the transport, lift the metal floor panel, and drop‌ down.” He dove into TO’s bag once more. “Zip me up and put on your armor.”

“Wait, I thought you said that the cameras were all taken care of.” DH said, their ears flicking back, “Why do we have to put on our armor.”

Vik looked up at DH for a moment in silence, their ears flicking as they tried to decide if DH was joking or not. “... because we’re going into the sewers.” He said. “It stinks. I mean, you can keep your armor off, ‌but I’m going to be hiding in the bag with my paws over my nose.”

It took no more convincing for TO to put on their armor. They had been covered in sewage once in their life, and that was more than enough for them.

======

The sewers were small, dark, and cramped. There was slime all over the sides of the tunnels they wandered through at Vik’s direction, and it made TO exceedingly glad that they wore their armor. Also, though the trek was long and irritating, it was more or less uneventful. They sludged their way through the muck until finally, at a bend in the tunnel, there was a break in the sturdy metal that surrounded them. They nearly didn’t ‌squeeze out, but with some effort, and with applying only a little more damage to the metal, they made it.

Stolen novel; please report.

“In some places, they ran the sewage pipes through the old tunnels.” Vik said, “It saved on labor and made it easy to repair. However, this crack has caused no problems yet, so nobody’s bothered to fix it.”

The tunnels under the city were all connected, so following Vik’s directions and using their echolocation to make their way through the lightless old tunnels, they eventually made their way to a section that the insurgents used. It wasn’t a part they were familiar with, but it was lit by the same fluorescent lights that the insurgents used to illuminate every other space, so for the moment at least it felt safe.

Safe around insurgents; TO didn’t think they’d ever feel like that.

“And we’re home!” Vik said, “Unzip me; it's stuffy in here.”

“It’s stuffy in these.” DH said as they pressed their wrist. The armor dissolved around them and back into the bracelet, but the thin film of muck that clung to the armor ended up splattering them. DH made an awful gagging noise as the smell hit them.

“You’ll get used to it.” Vik said as TO unzipped the bag, letting them pop their head up, “But… Yes, you might want to get cleaned up. A change of clothes and all that. Might make you feel better before we tell GiDi what all we did in your ship.”

“Yeah, I know!” DH whined, their voice distorted as they tried to speak without using their nose at all. “I’ll head to our room, heat ‌some water for that little bowl-”

“... little bowl?” Vik frowned, their ears twitching for a moment before they laughed, “Oh DH, please don’t tell me you’ve just been bathing in your room this whole time!”

TO and DH both stared at VIk. TO hadn’t removed their armor yet, wanting to postpone for as long as possible ‌when they’d get splattered as well.

“... Isn’t that what we’re supposed to be doing?” DH asked. “That’s all we have-”

“Dee. We have hot springs down here.”

TO wasn’t sure when Vik started calling DH ‘Dee’ and they weren’t sure they liked it, but either way, that wasn’t important at the moment. “Hot springs?” They asked.

“Yeah. Used to be part of a heating system underground, but we rigged it up for a bath ages ago!”

TO held the bag before them, bringing Vik to just below eye level. The helmet normally altered the tone of translated speech more harshly than normal, but this time, even the angle of the ears, the tension in TO’s wings, and the slight barring of their fangs - all of which were of course unseen- the helmet got the tone just right as it hissed out in a low, angry snap a single spoken word.

“Where?”

======

The only showers or bathing facilities that TO and DH had encountered had been the open public ones in the training center, the large private one at the portal dock, and the tiny one in their ship. Three very different ‌accommodations! However, this was the first time that they went to a communal bathing area and saw any effort to provide privacy. A pipe came out of the rocks and ran along one makeshift wall, shower nozzles installed in the pipe at regular intervals, the spaces below separated by large plastic panels, and closed off with flimsy plastic curtains. At the other end, the pipe fed into what appeared to be an old plastic pool, a steady stream of steaming water flowing in, the excess pouring out on the other end into a bucket with a hose in it. The hose trailed off out of the room - likely into the old river that trailed under the city.

It was not fancy. It wasn’t as small as the shower they had in their ship — that was true — but it also simply wasn’t as nice. The faint smell of mildew permeated the air, and everything had a thrown-together feel to it.

Still; it was a hot shower. The hot water filled the room with steam, and that put TO in mind of the showers at the training center and that, oddly, filled them with some peace despite the dingy appearance of everything.

Wordlessly, TO headed straight for the shower.

“Hey, TO, aren’t you going to remove your armor?” DH asked as they pulled off their top, throwing it in a pile on the floor.

“No.” They said, “I’m rinsing off my armor first so I don't get splattered first. I have no interest in having the sewage of hundreds of different species on me.”

“Well, thanks for that.” DH grumbled as they stepped out of the rest of their clothes and went to the closest shower. “I wish I knew about this before. I would have showered here instead of using the bowl in our room. It took three fills before I was certain the smell was gone!”

Goretta should have told him, TO thought. Really, someone should have told them both that this was here! Even GiDi failed to tell them that there were actual showers here! Only Vik had told them!

Well, Vik had told DH. Did that make a difference? Was it intentional? Would they have told TO if DH hadn’t been there?

With their armor rinsed, they stepped out, deactivated their armor, undressed, and stepped back into the free-flowing hot water. As soon as the water hit them, it felt like days of residual cold collected from bathing from a bowl was driven from their body with a single, final shiver as the warm water flowed over them.

Nothing else mattered at that very moment. Their worries melted away as they simply closed their eyes and let the water hit them.

Whether Vik intended to tell only DH, or both of them, TO would still thank the small rodent when they were done.