Just as we were about to leave, four armed men charged into the makeshift sick room with guns at the ready. Two of them pointed their rifles at the medical droid and circled around it into a pincer formation while the other two scanned the left and right sides of the room for threats. Without averting his gave from his target, one of the soldiers moving into pincer formation asked, “Are you ladies alright?”

Grace elegantly said, “Yes, we are quite alright. The danger has already come and gone.”

“I see…” said the soldier as he lowered his gun and relaxed, “We were downstairs communicating with the tower when they picked up the anomaly. They traced the hack target to this room as a matter of urgency and sent us in case.”

The soldier paused for a moment and pressed two fingers to his ear before saying, “It seems the hacker managed to cut the connection and clean up his trail before we could get a location on him.”

We failed to identify the culprit? How disappointing.

“Did anything of note happen?” asked the soldier.

“I’d say it did,” I casually remarked.

“Oh?” voiced the soldier inquisitively, “Care to give me the details?”

“Hmm? Sure,” I said nonchalantly, “It seems someone was behind several happenings meant to take over a portion of the underworld and I managed to foil his plans… on several occasions. He has also taken an interest in me; A wildcard that he can’t predict. He spoke to us through the droid.”

He looked at me with a serious face before turning to the side and saying, “The hacker seems to have used the medical droid to communicate with the guests.”

There was a moment of silence before he said, “No, I don’t think they are suspicious, it sounds like this is not the first time they’ve interfered with the hacker’s plans, or rather… the hacker sounds like a movie villain wannabe.”

There was another moment of silence before Grace raised her voice, “I was paying enough attention to start recording mere moments after he began speaking. Here, let me send you a copy.”

“Thank you, ma’am. That would be most helpful,” said the soldier as he pulled up his Digita interface.

Grace did the same and sent him the file. After the file had been sent Grace said, “I doubt it. He spoke via the droid’s voice emulator; voice identification won’t work. I did, however, pick up a lot of masculine mannerisms in his speech patterns.”

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

The soldier nodded in acknowledgement and said, “Noted.” He then did some quick typing on his Digita and spoke into the air again, “One of our guests recorded the interaction and has sent me the file, I’m forwarding it to you now… Roger that.”

The soldier sighed and said, “Is there a ‘Miss Cusith’ among you?” I nodded, “Captain Lorrig wants to speak to you when he returns from the tower, please head towards his office in twenty minutes.”

I simply said, “Understood.”

The soldiers grouped up and left, after a few seconds I turned to Grace and asked, “What do you suppose they want to talk about?”

Grace shrugged and said, “I’m not sure… Maybe something to do with the deals they made with the previous heads? The only thing that’s certain is that there will be plenty of politics behind it.”

“Great…” I said with an exasperated tone, “Am I entering a political phase now?”

Grace smiled gently and said, “Most likely, you’ve just shown the world you can’t be messed with so easily; anyone who has been paying attention to you will likely deem physical confrontation a bad idea while everyone else couldn’t be bothered with your existence.”

I sighed lightly and said, “I guess we’re staying here for now.”

I looked up and found Ajax staring at me. It was quite intimidating given her Amazonian build but I felt no malice in her gaze. After a moment of blankly staring back I decided to ask, “So, Ajax… Why were you so willing to give me your loyalty anyway?”

It was Grace who spoke up first, “If I may… After the essential memory-wipe you performed, all that’s left is her natural character. She appears to be quite caring by nature but she worked as a mercenary, isn’t that rather odd? Look at her physical build; She’s tall and muscular… That is the body of a natural fighter. A natural fighter with a caring nature? Those are very contradicting traits… until you consider two other traits I picked up on during our negotiations; her decisiveness and strong will.”

I raised an eyebrow and asked, “How do those traits change anything?”

Grace gave a wry smile and said, “They don’t, and that’s the trick. I imagine she would have become some sort of caretaker but with her appearances she wouldn’t have been very welcome in the hospitalities industry, so her decisiveness could have led her to the next best option; fighting. It’s more a matter of what options she had available to her than what she wanted to do.”

I grunted and said, “That still doesn’t explain why she so willingly threw her loyalty at me.”

“I know…” said Grace with a gentle smile, “But maybe her wilfulness had a helping hand in the matter? Maybe she felt she owed you a debt and decided to repay it?”

“A debt for what?” I asked dubiously.

“… A debt for sparing my life despite the situation,” answered Ajax willingly, confirming Grace’s hypothesis.

“Oh? You’re the excessively honourable type too? What an interesting combination…” said Grace with amusement, “This one’s loyalty can pretty much be guaranteed.”

I smiled wryly, but Grace is a Psion and therefore is quite adept at judging people. She also has no reason to lie so if she says something it is probably true. It never hurts to be wary though, I’ll keep an eye on her.

It looks like I have a lot of people to talk to; My mentors regarding future plans, that Tanya Smith regarding Kronos cells, the Olgym Captain regarding something else, and even the remains of both Viper and the Blood Fang regarding the relationship between their territory and my authority.