RavensDagger

  Chapter Forty-Six - A Certain Type of Person

  There were certain types of people that spent time in bars on dingy old space stations, and these could broadly be divided into three categories.

  The first were locals. People who genuinely went to these dives to spend a few hours with friends, i some alcohol into their system, maybe watch their favourite sports and argue over shit that didn't matter. For these, the bar was a home away from home. Some were there tet, because the dim lights, the unfiltered air and the easy access to inebriants made that so much easier.

  The sed were there to prey on the first. They were people looking to meet others, to make es in a pce where others were willing and ready to accept them. It wasn't all nefarious. Some people just tention, and they found it there. Some were, because they needed more than just attention.

  And finally, there was the third sort, the kind of person that saw a shitty bar, with its thirty-year-old decor, crappy audio and rowdy patrons as an aesthetic. They revelled not in the people but in the location.

  Missy was that st kind of person, Ivil realized.

  She walked into the bar, a pce called the Top Floor, and instantly rexed while striding over to the darkest, di er of the pce, a booth that Ivil gred at before sitting down. The pstic-covered cushions looked like they would stibsp;and she refused to sit on it before sweeping the surface with a small effort of will.

  "Nice pce," Ivil said as she looked around. There was some cssic pop in the air, one speaker was hissing faintly, ruining the already poor acoustics, and of course, it stank of vomit, sweat, alcohol and bar-b-que sauce.

  "It is what it is," Missy said as she tapped a s inid into the tre of the table. "Oh, it's gonna be o eat with gravity again."

  "I 't imagihat being a on occurrence for you," Ivil said. "You were raised on Haumea, right?"

  "Born and raised, yeah," Missy said. "We do have some gravity. Barely. Mostly it's trifugal ring gravity in most of our stations. It's kind of a bitch, being raised away from a p, you know?"

  Ivil nodded. She was aware, though that hadn't been the case for herself. She was Martian from birth and didn't leave the p until she was a teenager. "Growth hormones, I imagine?"

  "Urgh, yeah," Missy said. She tugged at the colr of her coat and jumpsuit, exposing the side of her neck. There were several small scars there. "We don't get the good shit way out there. Stuff's twenty years behind, even for the kids. Strao think that in a lot of eople born in the shittier parts of the system are still better off than we are, but that's the price the Lunatics pay for being so isoted."

  "I've noticed that you sometimes talk about it as if you're part of the group, but then sometimes you don't," Ivil pointed out.

  "Hmm," Missy said. She gestured to the menu and she gnced over her options for drinks and the like. Ivil leaned forwards a little and scrolled through.

  Missy herself had ordered a Driftwood martini, which was really just a sour apple martini with a spsh of bourbon and a sugar cube. She... didn't think that would taste good, so she scrolled until she found the simpler, better drinks. No Titanian Bourbon, but they did have a 'Scotch' that came from one of the moons of Jupiter named 'Scotch.' "Food?" Ivil asked.

  "Yeah, some finger food couldn't hurt if you want it. You're paying after all."

  Ivil smiled slightly. She didn't mind. Actually, she was more or less aware of Missy's financial situation at the moment, and the prices for things on this menu were b on the criminal. She picked out a few things that would be hard to mess up, even for a pce like this.

  "I... am Haumean," Missy said with some fidence. "I don't know if I'm a Lunatiymore. we leave it at that?"

  "We , I'm sorry if I stepped on your toes there," Ivil said. "If you want, we talk about something other than our sordid pasts?"

  "Hah! Alright, do you follow Goalball? Haumea got its ass kicked by Mars st circuit, but we kicked Earth in the balls."

  Ivil grinned. "I don't follow Zero-G soccer much," she admitted. She did root for Mars, of course, but only taially. She wasn't oo sit dourposefully follow the sport. "I do enjoy following MMA, though."

  "Mixed Martial Arts? Really?" Missy asked. "I kinda threw sports out there as a topic expeg it to get shot down. You don't seem the type. Especially not MMA."

  "Why not? I enjoy fighting well enough, and they do allow some degree of core-battling," Ivil said.

  "I've seen you 'fight'," Missy said with little air quotes. "You just stood there like a statue of... some sexy a death goddess or something. You never got in close."

  Ivil shrugged. This was a far more fortable versation than earlier, and she didn't mind being called a sexy death goddess at all, not that she found her ego wanting. "Before I had as many cores as I have now, I did have to get in close. I appreciate the art in martial arts. There's something very beautiful about hearing the snap of someone's bones. And core-wielders often uimate how dangerous CQ be."

  Missy nodded. "Yeah, that's fair. There..." she hesitated for a moment, the on. "There were lessons for any Warmime that basically relied on that. People that have a few cores tend to feel like they're immortal, like they're the most special thing in the world."

  "It only gets worse the more cores someone has, trust me," Ivil said.

  Missy ughed, a raspy chuckle that Ivil loved to hear. "Yeah, I guess so. But yeah, we had lessons on taking them out. The easiest way was almost always to just shoot them, and if that didn't work, then sometimes getting in close with a knife would. A lot of core-wielders are tough, but there's almost always something that'll kill 'em."

  "It's their humanity," Ivil said. "Being human means having more weakhan you at for. As a species, we are terribly frail."

  "Mhm," Missy agreed. She perked up as their drinks were delivered by an actual flesh-and-blood waiter, a young man that looked bored with a job that most pces had repced with a mae. "Thanks," she said befrinning. "Did you tip him?"

  Ivil gred across to Missy who only smiled wider. She sighed, then added a gratuity to the payment before sending it off. "Happy?" she asked.

  "A little," Missy said. "That'll help him fet that we were ever here, which might be handy once my friend arrives."

  "Your friend... who is this, anyway?" Ivil asked.

  "Someohat help us with our bounty and pirate problem," Missy said. "They're teically a merary, but they're in tight with the bounty hunting guild around Jupiter. They get paid for taking out pirates."

  "I see," Ivil said.

  "So, I spent a few hoing over the telemetry and footage of our little fight. retty crete proof that we took out six ships. And they weren't little fighters and b craft either. That'll bring in a nice k of cash, and some rep. The rep's the problem."

  "Because we don't eople to know that we're that dangerous?" Ivil asked.

  "Because only one of us actually deserves that rep," Missy said. "Pixie will take care of it for us. At least, I hope. She be pretty cut-throat for someone so unassuming, she's gonna want a slice. So best behaviour, alright?"

  "I'll do what I ," Ivil said without promising anything.

  She sensed someone ing into the bar, someoh a few cores. They'd crossed perhaps two others iation so far, and she could sense some two dozen more sprinkled across Driftwood, but core-wielders only made up a tiny fra of the popution here.

  A young woman was standing rather awkwardly within the bar. She was wringing her hands together nervously, then wheiced, her arms dropped and she adjusted her dress. It retty little sundress, very colourful, with flowers spshed all over it. It made her look youhan Ivil guessed she was, though her height wasn't aff her any favours there.

  "Is that Pixie?" Ivil asked.

  Missy leaned forwards and out of the booth, neck ing to see. "It is," she said. "Pixie!" Missy stood and walked over, hands going to her hips as she sauntered over. "Been a while."

  Pixie perked up, then smiled past a blush. "Missy. Hi."

  "o see you again," Missy said. "Hey, before we sit down, I should introduce you to someohis is Evelyn Ville, she's... kind of part of the crew. Don't fuck with her, she's dangerous."

  Ivil stood and walked over, theended a hand towards Pixie. The woman was... tiny, barely reag Ivil's upper chest. She followed Ivil's arm up with her eyes, then stared at her. "Ah-ah, hi," Pixie squeaked.

  ... This was the bounty hunter Missy was so impressed with? That didn't seem possible. How could a merary that was supposed to be talented be this cute?

  ***

  RavensDagger

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