Kayla Martineaux needed help.
The 26 year-old tegu woman was stranded on a lawless pirate settlement on the wrong side of the Nakunan Empire's frontier planets. Powerful people were looking for her. She had been separated from her partner. She was starting to shed her scales. Most pressingly, she only had three days of estrogen left.
Kayla idly scratched at her chin, sending translucent black and white flakes of dead skin and scales snowing down the front of her poncho. She was hunkered down in a brick chimney, the only intact structure in the burned out ruins of a building on the outskirts of Big Zig. The unplanned and unregulated smuggling community was pockmarked with damaged and destroyed buildings simply left to rot. Eventually the derelicts collapsed and snuffed out the unfortunate souls taking refuge inside. That was why she chose to sleep in a hearth she could barely squeeze in to, thick scaly tail wrapped around her and using her backpack as a pillow to deter thieves.
It was night, often was in Big Zig. The planet it was built on had no official name, but the smugglers and refugees and outcasts called it Redtree because that's what it was covered in: striking red forest canopies from ocean to ocean. Because of the plentiful lumber and cover that these gigantic trees provided, a sprawling city of small buildings and subterranean compounds had been built under their canopy. Daytime was an endless twilight, dregs of light filtering through the leaves and branches to the anthros and humans below. Nighttime was so dark that even in the well-lit bustling areas of Big Zig the light stopped short above as the trees swallowed it up.
This darkness is why Kayla was aware that there was someone approaching. They were far off, but they were wearing a headlamp that cut through the darkness, illuminating whatever they were looking at for anyone to see. The light didn't seem to be sweeping the area, looking for someone, but was lowered to the ground, looking for something.
Whoever was wearing it was big. Kayla was almost seven feet tall herself so she had assumed she would at least have a size advantage in a confrontation. They stood almost a head taller than her, judging by the gaze of the light. The glare from the light made the person wearing it only a vague silhouette behind the point of illumination.
They were carrying something long in one paw. For a panicked second she thought it was a cattle prod, the type with a long handle to herd livestock from arm's length. But then it dipped down to the ground, and she realized that it was a claw. The claw grasped at a glass bottle sticking up out of some ashes, and lifted it up to a bag the figure was holding with their other paw. It was a grabby claw. A trash picker.
They were picking up trash, in an abandoned burned down area, hours into the night.
The beam weaved its way closer to her, pausing occasionally to pick up a piece of detritus. It wasn't making a beeline for her, but it was heading in her direction. She felt foolish for staying in that chimney for several days in a row, thinking it isolated enough to be safe from notice.
They were standing across the street from her. The beam swept and suddenly it was looking right at her, a shadow with a beaming white face. She reflexively held a clawed hand up to her face, shielding her eyes from the light.
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"Hey there! Heard someone might be looking for some estrogen?" a nasal, scratchy voice shouted with more friendliness than she had heard from any stranger since landing in Big Zig.
The tegu didn't say anything. She didn't know how to respond.
Seeing her hesitation, the large figure held up a paw with his finger raised. One moment, please.
Setting the bag of trash and the trash picker on the street beside them, the shadow began squirming as they pulled off a backpack. Kneeling down, they unzipped the backpack and reached inside, pulling out a metal ammunition box and unclasping the latch. Opening the lid, she recognized the silver-topped glass vials inside. A dozen of them, nestled in two parallel rows with protective foam spacers between them.
Now she was willing to talk.
"What do you want for it?" she asked, her scratchy voice remaining even. She was trying to get a feel for the stranger.
They laughed, a single high bleat. "You can have it. It's not expensive or anything, I made it myself. I didn't get into making black market hormones to get rich. I got into it to help people. And you look like someone who could use some help."
"Yeah, nobody ends up in Big Zig because they're doing great. Here, put that box on the ground and step away, would you? I want to take a look." she instructed.
They didn't push back at all. "Of course. It's yours regardless. I'm not expecting you to come with a complete stranger in the middle of the night or anything. One of the people you tried to get estrogen from told me about you, so I figured I'd keep some vials handy on my night walk in case we bumped into each other."
They set the ammunition box on the ground as they talked. They picked the trash bag and picker up, and backed away nonthreateningly.
"It's late and I'm almost 50 so I need to start heading back home. I won't bother you anymore, but if you ever need more estrogen or some needles come find me. My name is Buster Harkness. My friend owns a bar here, it's named Zed Steadman. You can always find me there. I'm happy to help."
He wasn't toying with her. It wasn't a trick. He simply turned around and started walking back home. Pausing every now and then to pick up a piece of trash.
Kayla stayed in the chimney until the light was gone. Using the flashlight on her communicator, she scurried over to the open box and pulled out one of the glass vials. It was labeled "Estrogen" in a blocky handwritten script. She had handled many such bottles over the last decade, this looked and felt like the real thing.
Looking down, she noticed sealed sleeves of sterilizing wipes tucked under the vials. The underside of the lid had an autoinjector strapped to it. She pulled it out and flipped open the filament storage in the stock, dozens of fine metal pins tucked inside.
She was still stranded on a lawless pirate settlement on the wrong side of Nakuna's frontier planets. Powerful people were still looking for her. She was still separated from her partner. Her scales were still shedding. But at least now she had one less thing to worry about.
She popped the vial into the chamber of the autoinjector, a hissing pop as it formed an airtight seal and punctured the membrane of the stopper. She pulled a filament out of the stock and docked it into the autoinjector with a practiced hand. She turned the dial on the side to the prep position and there was a barely audible hiss of air as a clear bead of fluid formed on the tip. She shook it free with a single smooth flick of her wrist. She turned the dial to her dosage. She was too impatient to sterilize right now. She took the autoinjector in her right hand and lifted up her shirt with her left, injecting into her inner deltoid. She didn't have to pull a trigger, as soon as the inch-long filament vanished between her scales and the tip of the autoinjector pressed against her skin it emptied her dose in less than a second. It had even warmed the oil suspension so it injected quickly and comfortably. When she pulled the autoinjector away, there wasn't any blood or precious suspension beading on the injection site. She couldn't even see a pinprick among her many small injection scars.
It was the first time Kayla had ever cried because an injection didn't hurt.