To Harry’s surprise, the Princess didn’t use their reunion as an opportunity to get sexually aggressive again. Instead, she stopped at a proper distance away and bowed to both him and Snnmnarath as Harry made introductions. And even though there was another tiny-chomper in the room, she didn’t even so much as make bedroom eyes at Henry. Instead, she shook his hand with all the proper care and decorum.
Over next to the window, Jevnar did his best to keep chatting with Reglnen while keeping a weather eye on the newcomer.
“[I’m glad to see you well,]” the Princess said, “[I feared you might have been injured during the rather...unfortunate circumstances which ended our last meeting.]”
“Oh. No, my safety systems worked as intended. Sorry about the audible alarm giving you so much distress. We’ve toned it down since then.”
Snnmnarath raised one edge of his hood. “[I sense there’s a story I’m missing.]”
“Oh hell yeah,” said Henry. The other human held a mixed-drink along with a big smile. “Might you care to enlighten us? Unless it’s too embarrassing, of course.”
The Princess let forth a grinding laugh. “[Oh, I suppose I can tell you all. It involves an accident with [Harry] that I’m mortified to say was entirely my fault…]”
Again, Harry felt surprise as she launched into a retelling of their disastrous zoo encounter. Of course, she made a lot of careful editing, particularly about the part where she’d described her previous sexual exploits and then all but thrown herself at him. She made it sound merely as a pleasant outing between friends, with a bit of embellishment around the circumstances leading to his suit’s safety system getting triggered.
Whatever her other faults, Mrg-Znrnah proved to be quite the amusing raconteur. By the time she reached the punchline, both Henry and Snnmnarath were bent over, the latter almost forming an infinity loop as he hissed in laughter.
“[So by the time my head stops ringing, I find out that [Harry] is just gone and for a moment I thought I’d lost him. You can imagine my horror! Me, losing track of a whole entire [human]!]”
A crackle of loudspeakers cut into any response to her tale-telling. “[The pack is now past ‘The Shiv’ and finishing the last lap, fellow sapients! There’s now the merest belly-feather between Hrn-Gnrar and Driver!]”
Snnmnarath unreeled himself back into a straight line. “[By Sotek, he might actually win!]”
They all clustered around the windows now, and Harry didn’t miss the little smirk on the Princess’s face as she glanced towards Jevnar and Reglnen. But then he was caught up as the racers came into view.
From the announcer’s words Harry expected the front two cars to be neck-and-neck. But Driver was about a car-length ahead of Hrn-Gnrar, which gave Harry a happy glow. Even if Driver became insufferably smug after winning the race, that was a far better prospect than having to endure a few weeks of a Driver who was pouting.
By now there was no fancy jockeying for position; if either of the racers tried a fancy move or shove, such a maneuver would merely result in lost speed. Hrn-Grnrar clearly thought the same, because her larger car didn’t so much as swerve as she slowly gained on Driver. Harry glanced between the oncoming cars and the finish line, trying to gauge if there was enough distance remaining for the Dorarizin racer to close the gap.
The chatter in the booth stilled as everyone unconsciously pressed forward. Harry found himself sandwiched in between the Princess on one side and Snnmnarath on the other. Fortunately, they both avoided putting pressure onto the relatively squishy human between them; that, plus the padding in his tricked-out monkey suit, prevented him from feeling any pain or injury.
He ignored the possible threat to his person as his vision narrowed to the two blurring vehicles heading directly towards the stands; there was a last-minute turn just before the finish line to bring the cars right past the grandstands. Of course, Harry’s booth was perfectly placed to get the best possible view of the race’s end.
And it was a glorious end. The two streaks, one red and one off-white, made the turn as if synchronized; Driver, of course, was on the inside…and mere seconds later, which felt like eons, the pair of streaks crossed the finish line.
As one the booth’s occupants spun to regard the screen behind them. It showed a frozen image of the photo-finish…and the red blur was ever so slightly ahead of the off-white blur, crossing the finish line by mere feet ahead of its competitor.
The announcer’s voice was more hushed than elated. “[...WOW! That’s the first victory by a [human] in this race! You’re witnessing a unique moment in history!]”
The VIP booth became bedlam for a moment, filled with cheers and raised fists and paws. Even Jevar was smiling, and Harry was glad his implant was recording. That little rarity was definitely going into a special edition for the entire galaxy to witness.
After a bit, the cheering died down. The Princess stepped back and bowed to them all.
“[I’ve fear taken up too much of your time. I should leave you to your celebrations. Still, I consider myself blessed to have witnessed it!]”
Then she moved very carefully towards Harry, clearly not wanting to trigger his suit. She extended a paw. “[Be well, and I wish you the blessings of the First Pack.]”
Harry smiled and took her paw. She clasped her other paw on his shoulder as they shook hands, but her demeanor was comradely rather than lewd. It felt to him just like a friendly gesture. For once he felt a bit of sympathy for the Princess. She was nothing but a creature of luxury who was lost to her appetites, and she would never stun the galaxy the way in which Driver had just accomplished.
“Hey, same to you!” he responded, with a bit more of a smile than he’d originally intended.
She bowed and released his hand, then said “[You should go and congratulate Driver. He’s earned it.]”
“You got that right!”
The Princess beat a hasty retreat after her proclamation, and a minute or so after Harry felt the need to go congratulate his human shipmate. For one moment he thought about bringing Jevnar along but when he glanced over, his majordomo was engrossed in conversation with Reglnen. Both of them gestured at the screen at the rear of the booth, each clearly ecstatic about the historic victory they’d just witnessed.
For a moment, Harry considered bringing him along. But then the human let out a silent sigh; Jevnar had been working his tail off ever since setting foot into Thunderbird One. It was well past time that his butler had a break. He resolved to slip out quietly; Jevnar’s work ethic was such that if he even thought that his employer was off doing something then he’d insist on being included.
And maybe it was a bit of a risk, but Jevnar looked happy for the first time in a long while, ever since he’d eaten those tongue-twisting ‘Gnaltnah’ pancakes back during Harry’s first breakfast with Jevnar.
Harry became filled with a determination to keep that smile on his butler’s face. Thus emboldened, he made his way to the door while moving as quietly as possible; even as he cracked open the exit he half-expected to hear a oh so polite throat-clearing behind him followed up by a firm “[…and where does Sir think he’s going?]”
But that challenge never happened. Harry slipped himself sideways through the barely-cracked-open door and closed it softly behind him. He then realized there was a fuck-off huge Jornissian coiled up beside the entrance.
“[Sir?]” asked Prnaana’shan.
Harry held up a hand. “Stay here, Perry. I’m just gonna slip down to the pits and give Driver a handshake.”
Prnaana’shan straightened up and made as to wriggle forward. “[Very well. I’ll shadow you…]”
The human realized he was very much done with being coddled like an infant. “Nah, just chill here. Enjoy the buffet. I’ll be back in a bit.”
“[Sir…]”
“Harry.”
“[…okay, [Harry]…still, my duty is to protect you.]”
The human wanted to roll his eyes, but instead put on his cutest smile. “I’m only going a few hundred yards. Plus I’ll be in public view the whole time.” Then he tapped his lapel. “Not to mention I’ve got enough tracking devices in this overengineered monkey-suit to fix my position halfway across the galaxy.”
The Jornissian subsided. “[All right. Just check in when you get to Driver, okay?]”
With a happy nod and a hum Harry strolled off down the hall. Fortunately, the grandstands used ramps instead of stairs thanks to the needs of Jornissian anatomy, so he didn’t have to go through the humiliation of using stairs with steps three times bigger than he was used to. He passed a few aliens on the way to the underground tunnel that led to the pits.
He could see the brilliant daylight at the end of the darker tunnel, and framed in that light was the form of a Dorarizin also heading towards the pits. They were moving slower than expected, and as Harry drew closer he saw that the alien wore a black all-covering garment. A black, featureless helmet also covered their head. He wondered if it was some kind of fire-safety gear; maybe this was one of the pit crew?
Harry’s musing was cut short as another black-clad paw swooped around from behind him and clamped over his mouth.
----------------------------------------
Kant’nat’s crest twitched. “|What the spirits…|” The Karnakian peered closer at his comms panel.
Shnhsnrnan, the ship’s engineer, was the only other one present on the bridge of Thunderbird One; neither of them had any real passion for racing, and they could watch the festivities from up here just as easily as they could while sitting down on the planet whilst broiling in the sun.
She slithered over to the communications officer with appropriate alacrity. “[Is there a problem?]”
He tapped a few holographic keys. “I saw a glitch in [Harry’s] carrier signal.” A few more taps called up a schematic of the grandstands; the little orange blip of Harry still moved towards the pit area. “|Looks like he’s going to celebrate with Driver.|”
The engineer’s eyes narrowed. “[Have you ever seen a glitch like that?]”
“|No, not even during that whole incident at the zoo.|” They stared at each other for a split second, then Kant’nat lunged for his panel.
“|[Jevnar], [Prnaana’shan], are you with the boss?|”
Jevnar was the first to respond, but only barely. “[What? Sir is still here…wait, where’s he gone?]”
“[He’s gone to the pits to celebrate with Driver,]” added Prnaana’shan, somewhat talking over the butler.
Kant’nat could hear the horror in Jevnar’s voice. ”[Gone? Aren’t you with him?]”
“|We still show him heading for the pits,|” said Kant’nat as he tried to ignore the sick feeling in his stomach. “|But we did see a glitch in the carrier signal…|”
He was cut off by Jevnar’s roar. “[EVERYONE! FOLLOW ME!]”
----------------------------------------
The bridge now functioned as an impromptu emergency conference room. Jevnar-of- Ahnrans stood with perfect posture in front of the viewscreen, with his paws clasped behind them. He fixed each of them in turn with a gimlet eye. Kant’nat shuddered a bit as that flat green stare swept cross him.
“[Nothing,]” he said. “[We found no trace. Several eyewitnesses saw him go into the tunnel, and he never emerged.]”
“[It makes no sense!]” cried out Shnhsnrnan. She was coiled into a ball of distress. But her tightly-wound body was as nothing when compared to the bodyguard Prnaana’shan. The latter’s head was invisible as the Jornissian silently berated himself for his lapse in judgement. Kant’nat could only feel sympathy for him.
“[Even if [Harry] was grabbed in the tunnel, someone would have seen them carrying him out,]” continued the engineer.
Jevnar shook his head. “[My guess is they had a satchel ready. To knock out Sir and stuff him in would take but a moment. They could then turn around and exit the tunnel with no-one the wiser. There were plenty of people carrying packs and so forth.]”
Driver stood off to one side of the butler with his arms folded. Kant’nat tried to avoid looking at the human. His aura was unsettling at the best of times, but now that singular pulsing beat was lit up like he’d never seen from any little-needs-protecting.
Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.
“|We need to call the police,|” said Kant’nat.
“[We’ve notified the race organizers, of course,]” replied Jevnar. “[And they’ve notified the local authorities. Unfortunately, due to the sparse population of this planet there’s only a local constabulary. They are not equipped for a massive search.]”
“|We’ve got to tell somebody!|” Kant’nat clutched his claws together as he fretted over the possible fate of his small friend. “|Those criminals could be doing all sorts of horrible things to him right now!|”
Jnsnrnan’sn’ah, [Harry’s] chief lawyer, now spoke up. “[Probably not. This took careful planning, not to mention they were able to disable Harry’s suit alarm and defense systems. That’s not something your average thug could pull off.]”
“[Agreed,]” said Jevnar. “[My educated guess is that we’ll be contacted shortly with a ransom demand. They’ll demand payment in a timeframe well before any serious law enforcement can arrive. This planet’s remoteness acts in the kidnappers’ favor.]”
Kant’nat felt a bit of relief at that. “|No ships have left the planet in the last [forty-eight hours], and none are scheduled to depart for another [seventy-two].|”
“[Good.]” Jevnar jabbed a claw at Kant’nat. “[You keep an eye on the planet’s traffic control, and let me know if there are any requests for immediate departure.]” Then he swiveled that claw to Shnhsnrnan. “[You work with [Kant’nat]. Go through all the data-logs since we’ve set foot on this planet. I want to know how in the name of [Hades] they deactivated [Harry’s] suit.]”
“|They didn’t just deactivate his suit, they spoofed it,|” added Kant’nat. “|They made it look as if he was still heading for the pits. Don’t worry, sir, we’re on it.|”
“[Good. In the meantime…]” Jevnar ground his teeth together and strode for the lift doors with purpose. “[In the meantime, I have someone to interview.]”
----------------------------------------
Ever since her first encounter with Jevnar in that elevator, Dgnrah-of-Wnran made sure to keep her ears tucked in. She performed her duties, interacted with the crew as usual, and after every stop transmitted a bland report (unencrypted, just in case Jevnar was watching) to her minders. The report contained what had happed thus far and their next planned stop. Thus far things had proceeded smoothly, and for a while Dgnrah hoped her problems were behind her.
But then [Harry] had been vanished, probably kidnapped. And that was the best case scenario. At worst he’d been captured for more…unsavory motives than mere money. The very atmosphere of [Thunderbird One] was now tense, a result of everyone being on edge.
Dgnrah knew in her bones that this crime was perpetrated by her minders. They’d used her info to get ahead of the ship and set up this trap. She tried to tell herself that she was not to blame, that she didn’t know what they’d planned. But deep down Dgnrah knew they’d been planning something nefarious. Something she might have been able to stop, if she’d spoken up sooner.
At least she had some standard maintenance duties to keep her mind off of its endless loop of self-recrimination. The Dorarizin came to a T-junction and turned right. She took a few loping steps forward before stopping in surprise.
Jevnar stood in the middle of the tubular corridor, his hands folded in front of him and a placid smile on his face.
Dgnrah decided to bluff it out. Maybe he was here for some innocent reason? She nodded. “{Good afternoon, sir.}”
In response Jevnar cleared his throat. “{Thunderbird One, this is Jevnar-of-Ahnrans, access code One Niner Seven Alpha Six. Close emergency bulkhead door Two Eight Seven Niner.}”
“{Acknowledged,}” said the dispassionate computer voice. Dgnrah spun as the ship spoke, only to see the thick metal slab of an emergency bulkhead slam across the corridor behind her. Her only clear escape became cut off with a thump as the massive door seated itself in its airtight seals.
“{I’ve put [Prnaana’shan] on suicide watch. Did you know that?}” Jevnar’s voice was quiet and composed in the still air of the corridor.
“{I…didn’t sir.}”
“{This whole mess isn't his fault, of course. I keep telling him that. But, naturally, he doesn’t see it that way. The poor man can’t help but feel responsible. That’s because he’s a good and loyal employee who has his employer’s best interests in mind.}”
Dgnrah shifted her eyes away from his flat green stare as she dropped to all fours. “{Sir, if this is about…]”
“{You know, I blame myself,}” interrupted Jevnar. He strolled towards the crouching engineer, adjusting his cuffs as he went. “{Quite the stupid error on my part. I knew you were a spy. But, like a fool, I assumed that meant you were on a mission from the Senate, placed here to keep a protective eye on Sir.}” He stopped a couple body-lengths away from her, his small smile never wavering.
Dgnrah decide to keep up the bluff. “{But sir, that is who I’m working for…}”
She was interrupted by Jevnar’s upraised claw. He was no longer smiling. “{You have one chance to make this right. One. Chance. Only.}”
She swallowed as she tried to gauge how much open space was around the smaller Dorarizin. Surely she could get past Jevnar if she rushed him? During their extended trip she’d managed to surreptitiously gain admin/pilot access to one of the shuttles. If she could get to it in time…
“{I would not advise on that course of action, madame,}” said Jevnar as if he’d read her mind. “{I am quite proficient in close-quarters combat…as many have found out far too late.}”
Dgnrah tried anyway, launching herself like a gray tsunami at Jevnar. She had one moment of hope when he didn’t try to sidestep her charge; if it came to the grapple she was much stronger than him…
He vanished like smoke, and suddenly one of her outstretched arms became wrenched hard behind her back. With a practiced shove from Jevnar, Dgnrah smacked face-first into the deck like a gut-shot grlnada; she cried out in unexpected pain as Jevnar knelt on her back and levered her arm up her back in a direction it was not meant to go.
The corridor filled with his furious roar. “{WHERE IS HE?}”
“{I don’t know! I’m not invol…}”
In response her shoulder flared with fresh pain as he continued inching her arm upward. She could feel a shoulder tendon or two tear, and she screamed again.
“{WHO DO YOU WORK FOR?}” he roared, and his voice was that of a revenant sent back from the land of the undead to wreak a terrible vengeance upon the living.
Dgnrah flailed her other paw at the deck in panic, but she had no leverage to rise, not with his weight on top of her. “{I told you! I work for the Senate-}” Her breath hitched as she felt his lips brush against her ear.
“{If [Harry] gets so much as one scratch on him, I will kill you myself,}” Jevnar whispered into her ear. “{I promise you that I will make it last, and I promise you that it will hurt all the while.}”
Dgnrah’s fear increased, if such a thing was possible. Gone was the proper gentleman, gone the polite and handsome petite male who turned so many heads. Now she was effectively locked in a cage with a slavering demon seeking her soul, and there was only one way to escape.
She sagged her head to the deck. “{I…I work for…[Whrnsnnanth’nan]. That’s who I work for.}”
Jevnar released her arm and stepped back off her. “{Get up.}”
Dgnrah managed to lurch to her feet, holding her injured shoulder with her other paw. Jevnar pointed a claw towards the open end of the corridor.
“{Bridge. Now. So you may make your confession before all the crew.}”
----------------------------------------
Harry came to with quite the elaborate headache ringing between his ears. He could dimly hear harsh, electronically garbled voices. The voices sounded as if they were separated from him by a thin wall. The human kept his eyes shut as he listened; one of the voices sounded tinny, as if emanating from a speaker.
“[Are you receiving us?]” asked the first voice. “[The target is acquired.]”
“[That’s excellent news, but I can barely understand you two. This voice changing is ridiculous. Why can’t we just take out his translator bead?]”
“[It’s his implant,]” said another guttural, modulated voice. “[It’ll record our voices even if he can’t understand us. If they can pull out the data and do a voice analysis, it might give us away.]”
“[Plus we’ll need to ask questions and give him instructions,]” added the first. “[Specific ones which can’t be conveyed using simple sign language.]”
“[Very well. Any collateral damage?]”
“[None. He came without the bodyguard, so no casualties.]”
“[Excellent. Proceed to the next phase, we’re on a time crunch here.]”
“[Understood,]” said the first voice, and Harry heard a click as a terminal shut off. “[Stupid [useless] bitch, of course we know time is limited.]”
“[She’s just like that,]” said the second voice. “[Don’t get your tail in a knot. Let’s see if he’s awake by now.]”
Harry cracked open his eyes to no great effect; he couldn’t see anything. He opened them wider and saw he was laid out on a large cot in a dimly-lit metal room. His suit was gone, of course, replaced with a plain cotton shirt and pants. At least he wasn’t tied up, but that was small comfort right now.
Overhead lights clicked on, and he threw up an arm against the sudden glare. As he blinked his dazzled eyes he heard a door hiss open.
“[Sorry about that,]” said the first voice. “[That probably didn’t help with your headache at all. Are you feeling well?]”
He lowered his arm and sat up. In the doorway stood two Dorarizin, both of them clad in the same all-over black bodysuit and featureless helmet. Harry was pretty sure that the bigger one was the one he’d followed into the tunnel. The other figure was shorter and leaner, but still massive.
It turned out the leaner Dorarizin was the owner of the first voice. “[Please remain calm. We are not going to hurt you. You are being held for ransom, and therefore we are concealing our identities for obvious reasons. We expect you to be reunited with your friends shortly.]”
Harry glared at the smaller Dorarizin. Her form was of the right size and shape of a Dorarizin he knew all too well, and he was starting to get a horrible suspicion. “Fuck you both,” he growled.
“[If we did that, the results would certainly qualify as hurting you,]” said the larger Dorarizin. Even through the modulated voice Harry picked up a feminine and humorous tone. “[I’m afraid we’ll have to decline your kind offer.]”
“[Do you have a headache?]” asked the leaner Dorarizin. “[It’s a possible side effect of the sedative. We do have analgesics available.]”
Harry tried to have a staring contest with that flat black faceplate and failed. Finally, he nodded. “Yeah. My head is splitting.”
“[I’ll bring the medicine, along with some water. In the meantime, be assured there is no escape from here. So let’s just everyone stay calm and not have any silly antics, hmm?]” The leaner Dorarizin left, leaving the other to stand impassively while she blocked the doorway. She stared down at Harry with folded arms.
“So whose little girl are you?” he asked with a sneer. “I hope you’re getting a good cut from this caper. Although…you know, sometimes the mastermind doesn’t like to part with so much. It’s easier to split the loot two ways instead of three, you know what I mean?”
The Dorarizin didn’t answer. Finally, the leaner Dorarizin slipped in around the door frame and into the room. She set a paper plate bearing two tablets on the cot next to Harry, then placed a paper cup filled with water on the floor next to his feet. “[Please, take these.]”
He eyed the pills suspiciously. “More knock-out drugs?”
“[No. I promise.]”
Harry snorted. “Like that means bloody anything.” Still, his head was pounding. He scooped up the pills into his mouth, chasing it with the water. At least the latter was nice and cold.
The lean Dorarizin nodded. “[Good. We’ll be back later with some food.]”
“What if I need to pee? Or, you know, the other?”
In response she pointed at one corner of the room, towards a hitherto-unnoticed black button. “[Touch that to unfold the latrine, once again to activate its [bidet] function, then twice more to flush and stow the latrine away.]”
She turned to go as Harry let out a bitter laugh. “I guess I should be grateful. After all, you could have just left me nothing but a mere bucket to shite in…isn’t that right, Princess?” The lean Dorarizin’s stride didn’t falter as she strode out the door…but he did catch the slightest rise in her tail, a ‘tell’ which indicated extreme anger.
The bigger Dorarizin nodded cordially at Harry. “[We’ll be back later. Knock on the door if you require something.]” She paused as she turned to leave. “[Oh, and it’s no use trying to pit us against each other. Such efforts are clever and admirable, but pointless.]”
The door slid shut behind her, leaving Harry alone and sealed within his metal cell.
----------------------------------------
Jevnar paced back and forth in his tidy, sparsely-furnished quarters. In spite of its rather spartan interior, his suite was still larger than the norm on board. That was good, since the larger form of Snnanfnthan’hal lay coiled up out of view of the holoprojector. He’d told the paralegal to remain there and simply listen.
What he was about to do was a gamble; this particular contact from his old days might have the information Jevnar required, but it was by no means certain. Still, this was the only option he had available at the moment. He felt a slight lift in his heart as the holoprojector clicked on. A white-furred Dorarizin appeared within, one with bright blue eyes and a nasty-looking scar that meandered up one side of her snout.
“{Jevnar! This is a pleasant surprise. What’s the occasion? There’s multiple rumor-scents floating about that your current client is a tiny-chomper…}”
Jevnar held up a paw. “{I apologize profusely for my rudeness, Hgnan-rn. But time is of the essence. You are correct that my principal is a tiny-chomper…and he’s been kidnapped.}”
Hgnan-rn’s semi-transparent face went blank in shock. “{Kidnapped? From you?}”
He rubbed one ear ruefully. “{There were several lapses of judgement, both on my part and his. We have it on good authority that this crime was orchestrated by a Jornissian named Whrnsnnanth’nan. She’s head of some intelligence service operating out of Jornissian space, but any details beyond that are sketchy.}”
“{Oh, her.}” The holographic Dorarizin sneered. “{Yes, I’ve had the misfortune of dealing with that [bitch]. She runs the intelligence operations for the [Snnnfnahn’ah] cluster of systems. A real [cowboy] and sketchy as [Hades]. There’s a lot of rumors floating about of dirty tricks on her part…but nothing concrete.}”
“{What about a particular Princess? Her name is Mrg-Znrnah-of-Hrnsnah, she’s been crossing our paths too many times to be a coincidence.}”
“{Hmmm, that name is not familiar. If she’s a deep-cover operative for [Whrnsnnanth’nan], she hasn’t shown up on my [radar].}”
Jevnar took a deep breath as he asked the next, most important question. “{I might be able to get you something concrete on [Whrnsnnanth’nan] with regards to serious crimes, but we will have to move quickly. Do you have any information on known agents in her network? DNA sequences would be the most useful. We’re up against a network with significant resources, so fake identities are likely.}”
Hgnan-rn stroked a claw thoughtfully under her long chin. “{I don’t have anything myself, but I know others out there who do. For the chance to pin that bitch’s tail to the ground? Heh, they’ll be more than happy to help. How soon do you need this information?}”
“As soon as possible. We expect at any moment to get a message from the kidnappers with their ransom demands. The Senate’s been notified, but it’ll be at least three days to get an investigation team out here. My best guess is they’ll give us only one day to cooperate. After that they’ll…}”
Jevnar paused and stared at the floor in distress, his shoulders hunched in despair and his composure completely gone. They might inflict Sir with horrible tortures until they were paid…or just take him away and sell him into captivity. He could become a rare curiosity or worse to some degenerate far beyond Senate space...
“{Jevnar.}” Hgnan-rn’s voice made him look up in surprise. Her scarred face was set like grim death. “{If anything, you know, happens, there will be nowhere for them to hide. I swear to you we will hunt them down no matter how far they run. Now I must go. I’ll get back to you when I can.}”
The hologram flicked off, and Jevnar let out a shaky breath he didn’t realize he’d been holding. He looked over at the paralegal. “{What do you think, madame?}”
The Jornissian uncoiled herself. “[I still say that Princess [Mrg-Znrnah] was involved. If that [bitch] is part of a spy network, it would explain her mysterious source of income. And if she is involved, we have a way to find them.]”
Jevnar tilted one ear. “{Pray explain, madame.}”
“[Sir, would you say that they required more than one person to carry out this kidnapping?]”
“{Without a doubt. For one person, getting a struggling tiny-chomper into a satchel would be difficult, even if one used a sedative. For two it would be mere Burrowers-play.}”
“[Therefore, [Whrnsnnanth’nan] must have sent someone else from her network to assist the Princess in [Harry’s] capture.]”
“{That is also quite logical.}”
She held her hands out and waggled one. “[On this hand, our Princess does have a few business interests. Nothing major, but enough to require some communications between her and them. That would make a good cover for contacting [Whrnsnnanth’nan.]]” She waggled her other hand. “[But the same holds true for anyone else in that scaleless [bitch’s] employ.]” She clasped her hands together in front of her, interlacing her fingers. “[Therefore, once we get a list of DNA and names from [Hgnan-rn], we can cross-correlate that list of identities with [Mrg-Znrnah’s] own businesses to see if there’s any commonality.]”
“{That, in turn, will greatly prune down our list of possible suspects,}” said Jevnar. “{And once we have a name and a DNA profile, we can examine passenger lists to see who’s traveled to this planet.}” He straightened up from his distressed hunch as he felt the slightest sliver of hope in his heart. “{Well done, madame! If you ever tire of the legal profession, might I suggest a career in spy-craft? You certainly have the requisite talents for it.}”