Village of Hayyam

Krandermore, Survivor’s Refuge

4453.2.15 Interstellar

The atmosphere was tense outside the garage. The proprietress and her guards had established a perimeter around the entrance, and Mick was guarding the alley. Opposite them were close to thirty villagers, some of them armed with actual pitchforks and torches. Elder Hiram and Wayfinder Ragheera were also there, front and center, as were five rough-looking Pugarians Janus had to assume were an aspirant team.

The Pugarian aspirants were not armed with torches and pitchforks. Most of them had pistols in holsters somewhere on their bodies, and their leader carried a long, curved machete used for cutting vines and high foliage. The team member on the far left was more heavily armed, carrying some sort of scrap thrower, like a 45th-century blunderbuss, and it looked like she was wearing body armor under her poncho.

Janus took all this in at a glance and stopped. He removed a gas grenade from his vest, gave the bottom a quarter turn, and replaced the gas charge with another from his front pouch.

“Janus? What are you doing?” Lira asked.

“Setting the terms of the negotiation,” Janus said. He put his fingers through the grip and tapped the two-button sequence that primed the grenade.

Elder Hiram’s face looked strained. “Honored Emissary, your creature has done grievous harm to the village. You will have to—”

Janus raised his hand, showing off the grenade, and the elder froze. “I was trained in chemical warfare in the Motragi labs of Cofan!” Janus announced to the crowd, using the voice amplification features of his helmet. “This grenade is on a dead man’s switch! If I let go of it, anyone within ten meters not wearing at least a combination respirator capable of recirculating your air will die horribly.”

“You’ll kill at least two of your teammates,” the Pugarian leader said, calling Janus’s bluff.

Janus shrugged. “My team is trained for this. I have a few doses of antidote. And before you say you’ll take them off my body, I don’t have enough for everyone here. What are the odds the others let you have them?”

The Pugarian team members looked at each other uncomfortably. Villagers in the back of the crowd were already slipping away. Hiram looked like he was thinking of leaving, too.

“Stay where you are, Elder,” Lira said, her expression grim. “If I’m going to die in this village tonight, so are you.”

Wayfinder Ragheera broke the silence with a slow clap. “Very impressive, Emissary Invarian,” he said, and this time there was no irony in his use of the title. “We are all equal in the face of pain and death, are we not?”

Janus gave the wayfinder a small bow. “I thought you’d appreciate it.”

“What are your terms?” Elder Hiram said, sweat running down the side of his face.

Janus adjusted his grip on the grenade, drawing everyone’s eye to his leverage. “Ragheera, Hiram, you’ll join us in the garage to discuss the situation in your village. There will be no talk of damages.”

Hiram frowned. “Your beast damaged our property.”

Janus looked at Lira.

“The creature is a valuable specimen,” Lira said. “It was almost killed because you allowed dangerous chemicals to be stored on the streets.”

The elder huffed. “We’ll deduct the price of your animal from the property damage.”

“The animal,” Lira said, “is able to set fire to prefab structures. She was not cataloged in the Motragi research databases. She is priceless. Are you certain you want me to estimate those damages? We have a Verazlan high noble on hand to enforce the judgment of Veraz.”

Elder Hiram looked like he’d swallowed something unpleasant. “That won’t be necessary.”

Janus wiggled the grenade to remind them they were very much in peril. “This is getting kind of heavy.”

Hiram swallowed. “We demand that the Pugarian team be allowed to attend the meeting.”

Lira laughed. “What? So they can kill us and be on their way? Or did they agree to help you with the disappearances if you set us up?”

The elder looked like he was going to protest, but Wayfinder Ragheera tucked his hands into his sleeves and said, “That’s exactly what he did, although I don’t think the aspirants would have honored their word.”

“We don’t need to honor our word, priest,” the lead Pugarian said. “We have a contract, but the elder hasn’t fulfilled his part of it, and I’m losing interest.”

“You’re welcome to leave,” Janus said.

No one spoke or moved. There were only about ten villagers remaining out of the original thirty, and most of them were standing as far from the garage as they could while still seeing the show. Janus knew that, based on their score, it was in the Pugarians’ best interest to kill them or force them to give up and that Wayfinder Ragueera could have borne witness to their forfeiture. At the same time, every minute the Pugarian team spent here instead of on the road put them farther behind the other teams.

“This isn’t over, Invarian,” the Pugarian said. He lifted the long, hooked machete, resting it across his shoulders, and took a step back before walking away. His team followed him, including two rifle-carrying sharpshooters who’d been hiding in a nearby alley.

Janus looked at Mick and tossed his head. “Make sure they’re really leaving,” he said over the comm.

“You got it, boss,” Mick said, melting back into the shadows.

That just left the garage guards, the ten villagers, Janus, Lira, Elder Hiram, and Wayfinder Ragheera.

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

“This is all your fault,” Hiram said to Ragheera.

The wayfinder rolled his eyes. “I’m really sorry your plan to have people murdered didn’t pay off.”

“Well, you can kiss your social programs goodbye if we don’t get that shipment!”

“They’re going to help!”

“Why would they?” Hiram asked.

“Because I’m a Promethean,” Janus said, deactivating the dead man’s switch. “Now, come on. Let’s get inside.”

Ragheera inclined his head, heading for the garage door. Hiram sighed and followed him.

“Hey, Janus?” Lira asked.

“Yeah?”

“Would that gas grenade really have killed everyone?”

Janus chuckled. “Of course not.”

Lira nodded and headed toward the garage.

Janus unclipped the Adamsite gas charge and swapped it out with a regular gas charge. “Frequent and painful vomiting for one to two hours, though.”

Lira stopped and looked at him.

Janus grinned and put an arm around her shoulder. “Come on, Aspirant Allencourt. Let’s go flip that old man’s world upside down.”

“If he drags his feet, can we still gas him?”

Janus winked at her. “I’ll let you pull the pin.”

***

Janus and Lira joined Ryler, Koni, and their guests, Elder Hiram and Wayfinder Ragheera, in the garage. Two of the garage guards stood off the side. A quick glance at Fury’s vitals told Janus the treatment was working, although they were probably going to have to back off the anesthetic sooner than planned. The little jungle dragon’s metabolism was burning through the drug on its own.

“You decided to help them, didn’t you?” Koni said, disgusted.

“It’s our best option,” Janus said, and then he laughed. “Besides, it’s kind of what we do.”

“Not willingly,” Lira said, although she was smirking.

Elder Hiram was staring at Fury nervously. “Is that thing safe without a muzzle on?”

“Oh, she’s fine,” Janus said. “Wouldn’t say the same for you if she knew you were responsible for drugging her.”

“I am in no way—”

Wayfinder Ragheera put a hand on the elder’s shoulder. “He is jesting with you, Hiram. I don’t think he means any harm.”

Janus inclined his head with a smile in half-apology. He didn’t regret bearding the Elder after the old man demanded his support and then tried to serve him up on a platter, but he recognized that part of that was how tired he was. “Let’s talk. You two,” he said to the guards. “Do we have any more chairs?”

“Yes, sir.”

The guards went into the bunkroom to grab more seats.

Janus didn’t wait. He dropped himself into a chair by his sleeping pet.

“Where’s Mick,” Koni asked, walking over to stand by him.

“Following the Pugarian team to the edge of the village,” Janus said.

“And if they turn back?” Koni asked.

“Then their leader will never hear the shot that killed him,” Janus said tiredly. There was a time that would have bothered him. Irkallans generally frowned on capital punishment. Even the exiled were given a chance to reach another settlement, even though anyone but a duster lacked the skills to do so. Once upon a time, Janus had held his most hated enemy’s life in his hands and let her live. The fact that Lira was with him now, having saved his life countless times in the past year, validated that decision. “It shouldn’t come to that,” he added.

“It won’t,” Koni said, crossing her arms. “Pugarians only act when there is profit in it.”

She meant it as an insult, but Elder Hiram nodded as if she’d said something wise.

The guards brought three more chairs, and Janus gestured toward them. “Please, take a seat.”

Koni remained standing behind Janus’s left shoulder while Ryler stayed with his patient. Lira, Hiram, and Ragheera took the extra chairs.

Janus’s eyes were watering from the fatigue catching up with him now that he was sitting down. He suppressed a yawn and said, “What do you think is causing the disappearances?”

“Probably bandits or some oversized predator,” the elder started.

“Really, Hiram?” Ragheera said with an eyebrow raised.

“That’s enough out of you, priest,” the elder said, flustered. “I don’t need you here if you’re not going to be helpful.”

“I’d like him to stay,” Janus said.

The elder clenched his jaw, then said. “We should talk about the shipment, anyway. If we can just get it back, we’ll have the resources to deal with the problem, whatever it is.”

“It’s drugs, isn’t it?” Lira asked. “The shipment. Mick told me what it was selling for; there’s nothing more valuable in this village on a per-ton basis, and that’s before export. I’m assuming that you’re producing it locally.”

“They would have to,” Koni said. “A village this poor couldn’t afford to buy it, let alone ship it.”

Janus, Ryler, and Lira turned to look at her.

“What?” the Verazlan asked. “I was a boat captain. Did you think I couldn’t understand supply chains?

The elder looked pained, and Ragheera looked endlessly amused by it.

“Be that as it may, honored guests,” Hiram said through gritted teeth, “this village is suffering. We need your help. If you will only help us regain what is ours, you will have our undying gratitude. We’ll even consider the debt for the damage your creature caused paid.”

“Actually, we’ll pay for that,” Janus said.

“We will?” Lira said.

“It’s only prefab board,” Janus told Lira. He looked at Ragheera, ignoring the elder. “I imagine they fabricate it locally.”

“It’s one of the things Hayyam has in abundance,” the wayfinder said.

“Now, wait a minute!” the elder said.

Janus nodded. “Lira, please draft a contract with the following terms. We will pay for the damage and the repairs. The repairs must be performed by the people who live outside the wall.”

The elder looked like he was going to have a fit.

“If the buildings we repair were vacant, and I know they were, they must be offered as free housing to the people outside the wall as long as there are no paying tenants willing to live there, and all the other itinerant buildings must be occupied before displacing them.”

The elder went from looking angry to horrified. “But we’ll never be able to remove them!”

“Actually, Hiram, it’s quite simple,” Ragheera said. “You just have to rent all the itinerant buildings to the people outside the wall at a price they’re able to pay.”

“It’s better than leaving them empty,” Lira said.

“Provided they don’t do more damage to the property than they pay,” Hiram grumbled, but Janus could see the elder was genuinely thinking about it.

It was a matter of principle, Janus knew. On Irkalla, no one would leave people unhoused and untrained. Life was so rare it was unimaginable to waste it. To the Pugarians, the idea of giving something away was just as unthinkable, but once the outsiders were inside the walls and paying what they could, they might even train them so they could pay more.

“When will you go find our shipment?” Hiram asked as if he’d forgotten the whole incident.

“We will go investigate the disappearances in a few hours, Elder,” Janus said, staring at the elder over Fury’s smoothly rising and falling chest. “I need to monitor my specimen’s recovery, and my team needs rest. I trust you will have an escort assembled for us by then.”

“Of course,” the elder said, rising to his feet. Ragheera rose, too, as did Lira.

Janus stayed where he was, hands on the armrests.

Elder Hiram gave him a curt nod and walked out, followed by the wayfinder, after taking a final look around the room.

“That was nicely done, Janus,” Lira said in a quiet voice. “Sometimes, I think you missed your calling.”

“You’re all crazy,” Koni said, heading for the side door. “I am going to wait for Mick to return.”

“I’m going to sleep,” Janus said. “These people… they’re everything I hate about this world.”

Koni looked at him sharply.

Janus stared back at her.

“I wouldn’t be that quick to judge, Janus,” Ryler said. “The Pugarians were the Splinter Fleet’s supply officers once. There was a crisis after they first landed on Krandermore, and there weren’t enough resources to go around, so they looked back into Old Earth’s history and brought back a system that might seem barbaric to you but that favored innovation and self-reliance in a time of extreme scarcity.”

Janus raised an eyebrow. “Are you telling me the Pugarians resurrected the clan system?”

“No,” Ryler said. “The clans have different origins. The Pugarians resurrected pure capitalism. It funded Motragi research and Verazlan expeditions. It saved everyone’s lives. It’s unfortunate that it passed into the culture, but everything on Krandermore has its origins in survival.”

“You know our history?” Koni asked. “All of it?”

Ryler smiled at her in a simple way, unaware of his privilege, that Janus recognized from when they were kids. “I’m a Cult librarian. It’s what I do. Would you like to know the origin of the Verazlans?”

Koni barely hesitated before turning away. “I am not a Pugarian, Ryler Abraxxis. I know who I am.” She opened the side door and left.