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[kingquest]

II

There's a slow, burning tension in his leg. It pulses, aches, like a knot strung too tightly around some distant extremity, the pain reverberates through his bones and marrow and finally congeals somewhere in his head. Dizziness threatens to suffocate and lethargy pools with his blood; he's too distracted to notice the newfound scrapes and tears trailing up his torso.

His helmet weighs heavy against his chest. He stirs, struggling to pull his head up. He stares blearily at his boots, only half-noticing the binds that tie them. He glances at his leg, which by all accounts should be splattered against moonrock, only to find freshly applied bandages instead. A fibery gauze has been wrapped underneath his clothing, snug and bloody.

He tries to pull himself upward, but his muscles reject him. His back falls onto a rocky surface behind him, followed by his hands and elbows, both also bound.

"Morning."

He freezes. White noise gnaws at the following silence. Adrenaline shoots through him, his fingertips lighting up with stars, but no matter the strain, no matter the exertion, he still can't fucking move. It takes all of his willpower to jut out his chin just enough to get a better angle, to peer out from behind his mask to find the voice, and in the end the tendons in his neck scream nearly as loud as the bullet wound. His effort is finally rewarded with the sight of a terran sitting atop a storage device in front of him, a thermos in one hand and his own gun in the other. She smirks at him.

Recognition comes slow. The memory of how he got here is trudging behind. Still, when the other shoe drops, so does his gut. He tenses, fighting against the ropes, only for a headache to strike back with a vengeance.

Skullcap droops.

His target sneers.

She says, "I was worried you might not wake up. Some people don't."

She leans forward, the gun not leaving her hip. She squints.

"Seems like the paralyzer's still in you some. I'll have to let my tox man know."

Skullcap says nothing.

"It'll probably fade," she says. She sips at her drink, shrugging. "If it doesn't, well, I can at least say I tried to opt for mercy."

She sits, waiting. Her eyes roll over him, like she's sizing him up. She adjusts the gun ever so slightly, taking a glance at it. Skullcap keeps his mouth shut.

"I knew you were coming. I mean, obviously. What'd he say, 'alive, not dead?' Bet he wants a crack at me himself." She laughs, tilting her thermos back.

As she swallows, she goes silent, almost expectantly so. She tilts her head, pursing her lips. The back of her heel bounces off of her seat.

"You're making this so boring. The silent, intimidating thing doesn't work on me, babe. I've already got you cornered." She sighs. "Come on, don't you have any questions for your predecessor? Or were you just going to shoot me down?"

Skullcap doesn't have an answer for that. He watches her, his head hung low. His hands clasp and unclasp behind him.

She scoffs.

"If you're not going be any fun about this--"

"How do you figure this is mercy?"

Vaira's brows raise. Then she huffs a laugh.

"For one thing, I didn't take your silly little helmet off."

He sighs. It teeters on relief.

"That, and you're still breathing. Moron." She swings her legs. "Is it not enough that I wanted to meet you? I hear he's put quite a bit of stock in you."

Skullcap bristles.

"Though," she says, "he did send you on a bit of a suicide mission."

He clears his throat. "How's that?"

"Either he overestimates you or he underestimates me. And I'm fairly certain it's not the latter." She examines her nails. "The way I see it, it's more than likely there's a bug on your ship. Aside from the literal vermin you keep, of course. They're tracking you, so if you end up keeling over somewhere, they've got a better idea of where I am."

This flood of information is too much at once. He hesitates, processing. His kneejerk response is defensiveness. "It's... not vermin."

She laughs. "Do you even have a license for that thing? If it's your partner, you know you'd need a contract with the guild, yeah?"

Her words buzz around in Skullcap's head. They refuse to stick. He just stares at her, adjusting his arms.

She waves dismissively. "Don't worry. I won't tell anyone. Besides, we've gotten so off track anyhow." In a quick gesture, she leans behind her, his gun unmoving. She plucks a tablet out from somewhere, scanning through it.

"Shocked we couldn't get a proper name on you. I would've dug further, but," she gestures to her surroundings. "Let's see. God, Typhor? Of all places? I suppose that was a given, but... still." She grimaces.

She glances up at him, scrutinizing. She adds, as if speaking to herself, "I wonder if he pulled you by your scruff from the dunes or if you actually wax pious. I've seen those scars of yours; my initial assumption feels apt, but I could be wrong. Either way, he's got you hooked somehow."

Skullcap pushes himself forward, heat gathering in his throat and jaw. "Now, look--"

"--You've had some decent jobs," she says, as if he'd said nothing at all. "But you've also had some real shit ones. I heard you shot someone in court." She clicks her tongue.

He stifles a groan. "None of this is any concern to you. It isn't your business."

"Honey," she says. "I've already strip-searched you. And dressed your wound--"

"From your bullet."

"--Which was an act of kindness on my part that none will see the likes of again. May I remind you, you were sent to disable me, or perhaps even kill me, so therefore I consider myself privy to all your dirty little secrets. Unless you'd like to do something about it?"

Skullcap stares at her. She leers.

"I thought not. Now, where were we?"

"Can you just cut to the goddamn chase? Please? If you're gonna kill me, get on with it, but if not--"

"Do they not have rapport in Typhor? Or do they just shoot people down like bloody dogs when they disagree?"

Skullcap's head tilts, indignant. She sighs.

"I suppose you're right. Even still, there's nothing wrong with a little conversation. I'd prefer that over a bullet in my head. And it's not like you introduced yourself. You just stormed into what you assumed was my hideout, gun drawn. Where are you manners, Skully?"

They watch each other wordlessly. Her nails tap rhythmically against the aluminum of her thermos. Her brow is quirked. His helmet hangs low, his eyes cast over in shadow. If no one knew any better, it'd be easy to assume there was nothing behind the gaping holes of his headwear at all.

It dawns on him that she, however, isn't so easily fooled. It's like she stares right through him, past the metal and chrome. Like her pupils are little scalpels, probing and dissecting. He believes that she's true enough to her word, that she didn't remove it, only because he's not sure if it would even matter if she had. She's playing like she's already seen everyone else's hand, and yet the only other player at the table that's losing is him.

He grunts. She huffs a laugh.

"Perhaps they don't teach you any of those on Typhor either." She shifts her legs, refolding them. "Would you prefer that I go first?"

Silence. He is trying to stop himself from sinking lower onto the floor.

"Very well." She straightens herself, extending her hand as if she wasn't several meters away and his hands weren't already bound. "Allow me to make your acquaintance. My name is Vaira Talwar and I'll be your mark this evening. Welcome to my home away from home."

Vaira gestures to the cave surrounding them. The humidity compresses into him; he's able to make out a distant dripping of water. The caves probably lead to a reservoir, or something of that nature. Must be how she's survived.

"I'm sure you've met my partner on the way in. She was very excited to meet you."

He stutters then, as if buffering. His helmet raises to see her better; her expression is stone, smug. He was warned of no accomplice. Her eyes brighten considerably, as if the helmet's somehow conveyed his alarm. Her mouth twists into a smirk.

She sets her drink down, raising her fingers to her lips. She whistles a sharp, airy sound unlike anything he's ever heard, and in an instant, the dim light behind him is blotted out by a massive silhouette. The shadow cuts through the cave's stilled air as dust swarms behind it, loose particles filtering in from underneath his helmet. He coughs through it, unable to wave away space to breathe, and once the debris settles and his breath is steady enough to see, he is filled with a deep understanding, one that piles onto to the preexisting load of dread hanging in his chest.

Vaira's arm is outstretched, covered with a metallic sleeve he doesn't remember seeing her put on. It's armored fabric, perfectly able to support the massive talons of her apparent partner. The thing's feathered head tilts at him, brassy and angular. Its beak comes to a wicked point and, at a passing glance, seems to have been gilded with gold. Vaira clicks her tongue at it and it shrieks, its golden eyes not leaving him. She places the gun down long enough to run her fingers through its feathery chin.

"Aquila, Skullcap. Skullcap, Aquila." She leans forward, cupping her hand over her mouth as if relaying a secret. "And of course, she's a guild member. Licensed and everything. I'd hate to get fined, or worse!" She barks a laugh. The eagle ruffles its feathers.

Skullcap simmers. Of course, she takes notice.

"Come on. Don't be so chuffed. It's not my fault they didn't warn you, is it?" She adjusts her arm and Aquila shimmies to her shoulder. Vaira points to her claws. "If you're wondering what exactly you've got running through you, take a look."

At second glance, the points of the bird's central nails shift into an almost transparent finish; a middle-ground between grey and pink. They're hooked inward and almost... hollow looking. Like fangs, he realizes. The weight from his chest spreads through him like nausea.

Vaira, unphased, coos at the monster upon her shoulder. It preens in return, chittering from somewhere within its throat.

"I've always been the type to work from above," she says, "but Aquila can see what even I can't. It's why we work together so well." Vaira pauses, not once casting a wayward eye back to Skullcap. "I've got a mate who distills her toxins. The bullet breaks down with its own velocity and melts like butter on impact. Penetrates, but not enough to shred through entirely. Just enough to dig through to an artery."

She turns back to him now, her grin slow and easy. "It's a bounty hunter's best friend."

Skullcap opts to stare. He would rather not give her the satisfaction.

Her expression gradually flattens. Her eyes roll. She shakes out her shoulder and Aquila jumps, swoops over him, and perches behind his rock; her shadow looms before him.

"I weep for our mutual friend's taste. Seems like it's worsened since I knew him. Maybe he thinks boring would keep him safer. Or at least, less likely to lose his new favorite toy."

"I'm mostly wondering what this is all leading up to."

She pauses. "Oh?"

"At this point," he says, "You've had ample chances to kill me. Between your gun, my gun, and whatever the hell she is, the way I see it, you're either stalling or you're lonely."

Vaira's brows raise. Her lips purse. Skullcap can't quite read her expression. He talks past it regardless.

"So," he says, "which is it? You keep talking about him, but as far as I'm concerned, you're the one who ran out on him. Just now figuring out crime doesn't pay?"

Her cheeks twitch. The corners of her lips draw deeper into her face, panning out into a barely restrained simper, before the first peal of laughter escapes her lungs entirely. She's overwhelmed just as quick, nearly doubling over and off her seat. He watches her wipe a false tear from her cheek with her shooting hand's pinkie and even as she composes herself, she's racked with occasional chuckles.

"You think--" she pauses to laugh, "--You think I'm lonely? You think I'm lonely because I quit my job?"

"Now I didn't say that."

Vaira throws her head back. She leans forward again with an amused sigh, shaking her head.

"Listen babe. You've got me all wrong. Let me tell you something." She leans forward, almost conspiratorial. Her voice drops to a whisper. "I've never felt more free in my goddamn life."

She drops her legs from the container, sliding off into a stand. She takes a step closer, his gun dangling at her thigh.

"And maybe," she says, "maybe if you'd open your eyes for once, you'd see I'm trying to pay you a fucking kindness. Mercy, remember?"

He squints. "I don't follow."

Vaira takes a deep, dramatic breath. Her thumb digs into her brow. "Fuck, mate. Are you really this dense? I'm trying to give you an out."

"What the fuck are you talking about?"

"Do you even hear yourself?" She scoffs. "Of course I've had ample time to kill you. I could've done it a dozen times now." She lifts the gun, shuts an eye and takes aim. "Bang. You're dead. Or, bang," she points somewhere lower, "Dead again. It's so easy I could do it in my fucking sleep. But I haven't. Because here's the part you're missing, you stupid arsehole; we can be of mutual aid to each other."

He feels like she's struck him across the helmet with the gun. He works through the false tinnitus.

"What about any of this is mutual?"

"Must I spell it out for you?" She rolls her eyes, taking a step forward. "I'm letting you live. I'm letting you live so that you can let me live. And if we're lucky, we can both get out of this rotten deal we've found ourselves in."

"You mean... this?"

"No," she says, "his deal."

He hesitates, considering this for a moment. "There's no deal. I'm a freelancer."

"I thought that too. Like I said; I'm your predecessor, mate. In every sense." Her expression shifts. Humor leaves her in waves. "I was independent until, one day, I woke up and I wasn't."

They hadn't told him that, either.

"So, what?" He shifts his weight, the joints of his hands afflicted by pins. "You just up and left?"

She turns to stare at him for a moment. "How long have you been under his employment?"

"You're avoiding the question."

"I'm gauging how I'll answer. You go first."

His breath gets caught between a groan and a sigh. Every exchange is a new defeat.

"Two jobs," he says.

For an instance, a fragment of a second, something close to sympathy--or empathy?--softens her features. As soon as it comes, her natural sharpness returns.

"Then you don't know what he is. You can't see how deep in it you are yet."

"So," his brow furrows behind the helmet, "you're saying that if I help you now, you'll be doing me some favor by... what, saving me from the very same man that hired me to catch you?"

"Something along those lines."

"Right," he says. "Alright. Question."

"Shoot."

"Is your head screwed on right?" He lifts his neck, measuring his own strength. "How dumb do you think I am?"

A laugh rumbles in her chest in spite of his tone. "I don't think you want me to answer that."

"Har har." He huffs. "Can we be serious? I mean, why in the name of anything would I believe you, Kingfisher? After all of this?"

She brushes her hair back. She inhales slow. "Look. I know this seems like a classic case of the devil you know versus the devil you don't, but I'm trying to play in good faith. I'm turning a new leaf, yeah? I don't know how much of my reputation you've caught wind of, but--"

"--You killed eight people. Nine, if we're counting the decoy from the cave. 'Far as I know, that's all I need to know."

"Eight still," she replies, "But even then, they were eight bad people. Eight people who have been around him much longer than I have and still want nothing more than to exist in his shadow, hoping he'll even pass a glance towards them." She purses her lips with a sigh through her nose. "I'm not naive nor insane enough to suggest that what I did set them free, that it was justified somehow, but if I was so deluded as to fall completely victim to his bullshit like that, I'd rather die."

He hums. "Is this supposed to get me to believe you?"

She rubs the bridge of her nose. "Alright. Sure. Think of me as awful or evil or whatever the hell you want. Go on. I don't need to explain myself to you and, quite frankly, I don't care to." She shifts, jutting a finger out at him. "But I need you to know--to realize--that whatever you think I am or however you see me, he's ten times as bad. He's the worst kind of person there is, hell, even calling him a person would be an undeserved compliment."

He watches her jaw clench, the strain of the tendons in her cheeks. Her gaze drifts, following a thought unseen, before she trains herself upon Skullcap again.

"He's a monster," she says. "The kind that makes running with an inevitable bounty seem like a far better alternative."

A chorus of thoughts speak over each other, everything suddenly hurtling toward him too quickly. It muddles together, registering more like the echo of blood against the shell of his ear. His focus becomes overwhelmed by parsing through each voice before it dissolves into nothing, his judgement clouds over. He feels himself approaching a threshold of a decision, whether to believe her or not, and while his senses scream at him to deny her, to resolve himself against her, there's something else there, something that's pleading with him to hear her out. It comes anytime he looks at her now, anytime she stares back, and despite her hard expression, despite the tension in her frame, her eyes refuse to settle. They wander, searching, almost uncertain. Or desperate, he thinks. He's seen desperate before in marks, but not quite like this. Not quite so... reliant.

Frustration burns like acid in his gut, rising through his chest and drying his tongue and he's not sure if it comes from her or his own mental strife. His boot wiggles in its binds.

"If you were anything like me," she says, like she's read his mind, "you'd have your eye on this gun. You'd be waiting for me to slip up, for my grip to falter. Waiting for your chance. You wouldn't even be listening to me, you'd just watch and wait."

"Look--"

"--But you're not like me. I've read your files. I studied your cases, waiting for you to show up. I had a hard time figuring out what drives you at first, but I'd neglected to consider Occam's razor. A good shooting hand can pay for most meals, can't it?"

He doesn't respond.

"But you don't go for the messy jobs. You'd rather take shit pay for something that'll let you sleep at night. Sure, you're a killer, but you've got a conscience. More than most of us can say for ourselves."

"What's your point," he says.

"You want to know what I'm saving you from?" She lowers herself to her haunches in front of him, her forearms resting over her knees. "I'm saving you from becoming like me. So you don't have to look at yourself in the mirror and ask yourself how your decent heart ever turned so black."

He mulls on that. The flood of thoughts have softened to an erratic buzz.

He clings to his instincts, clearing his throat. "But you don't care about that. You're not even doing this for me. You're doing it to get an extension on your clock. And at the same time, you want to drag me down with you." He pauses. "I'll end up like you all the same. Running for the rest of my life."

Her brow twitches. "Isn't that better than losing your integrity? Or, hell, your sense of self?"

He isn't sure. The acid builds.

He shakes his head, pushing his doubt away. "The way you talk about him like that, it--it's ridiculous. I've got no reason to suspect him the way you say."

A memory unclogs itself and bubbles upward, but his trust is an ever-moving metronome. He hesitates, uneasy. He swallows harshly before opting to share. "You were right. He wants you back breathing. But he didn't seem angry so much as he seemed... disappointed. Or something between the two."

Her eyes narrow. "Betrayed?"

"Kinda," he says. "The impression I got was he wanted to, well, negotiate your terms."

Vaira's brow creases. No words follow. She instead focuses intently on his helmet, almost studious, her mouth pressed into a firm line.

"All I'm saying is--"

"--You're wrong," she says. "Your impression was wrong. You were lied to."

"How do I know that? Better yet, how do I know you aren't lying?"

"I don't have any reason to lie. I could've just killed you."

"You have every reason to lie," he says. "But I reckon that's a fair point."

"If you're so concerned with thinking I'm bullshitting you, then I'd like to make myself tremendously clear, for a moment. If we're being honest and all that."

Her voice lowers. She leans forward. "If you decide to take him at his word and bring me back to him, if it even crosses your mind, I swear to everything in my life I hold dear that I will not stop fighting you until one of the two of us is dead. And if you get the upperhand somehow, if you get your chance, I want you to promise me you won't miss."

He flinches. The air gets caught in his chest.

She adds, "They'll punish you less for that, if it helps. Better to lose one plaything than two."

The thoughts in his head have gone quiet all together. The metronome's gears grind.

He speaks again after a spell. "Say I believe you," he measures his words carefully. "Say I'm in. What then?"

Her expression clears ever so slightly. "Then we find the bug on your ship."

"My ship," he repeats.

"The three of us won't fit in mine," she says, simply. "We find it, tear it out, and leave it here. They'll send someone else in your place and by that time, we'll be long gone. I know a few good hiding spots, I'm sure you do too. You can drop me off somewhere, if it so bloody pleases you. It's easier for you; no one knows your face, your name. I could change mine I suppose, maybe swap species entirely."

"You might have the cash for something like this. But I sure as hell don't."

Vaira snickers. "Well, that's easy. I'm greedy, not stingy."

"We're still fucked, Kingfisher, no way around it."

"You've been fucked," she says. "You've been fucked since he found you as my replacement. I'm trying to unfuck you, 'Cap. This is our only chance."

His helmet lulls. Anxiety leeches the warmth from his hands.

"You offered a pretty good deal earlier, you know. If I shoot you, everybody gets off square, justice gets dealt. This shit fades, we'll be in my ship, I get a gun and it's over. What's to stop me from doing that?"

"You won't," she says.

"I won't," he repeats.

"No." She's smirking now, white glinting past her lips. "Because you're not like me."

His head jerks back. "What's that got anything to do with it?"

"For starters, you didn't notice that I lowered the gun ages ago."

His eye follows her arm. His gun sits between her knees, rocking back and forth, its grip held loosely between her thumb and index finger.

Skullcap exhales slow.

"That ain't any fair."

She snaps the gun back into her palm before he decides to prove her wrong. It's twirled into the holster on her leg and she stands with it, her hands finding her hips. She towers over him, shifting her weight to one leg.

"What is, in this business?"

From the ground, he isn't in a position to argue with that. He redirects instead.

"You sure keep acting like my opinion matters any, like I got some say."

"You're not a hostage," she says. "We'd be working together."

"Sure doesn't feel like it from here."

Vaira hums. "Do you trust me?"

"What do you think?"

"Then the feeling's mutual," she says. "And until you trust me, I can't trust you. But."

"But?"

"I'd like to. And I understand that earning your trust is not an easy feat, but we can work on it."

He laughs dryly through his nose. "You could start by untying me."

"You're so cute." She sighs. "Fine. Little by little. I'm not such a hard arse that I'll drag you there again this time. I'll free your legs once I'm ready."

"On the flip side of things, then." He readjusts, finally able to bend his knees through the binding. "What if I say no?"

She shrugs. "Would you prefer being left to die?"

He gestures loosely with his shoulders. "But wouldn't that be easier? What exactly do you gain from taking me?"

Her head tilts. She narrows her eyes, as if in thought. Her cheek twitches.

After a moment she says, "I'm not entirely sure." She sucks air through her teeth. "Maybe you're right. Maybe I am lonely. It's nice having someone to talk to after so long. Or, well, someone who talks back." She glances at the shadow behind him. "Sorry, my love."

The bird snaps its beak.

Skullcap dwells on her words. It was an intuition he'd pulled out from somewhere, but with hindsight, perhaps it'd been projection. For the first time he considers if this is some universal hunter experience, why so often those of his creed join together as a group. He reflects on his many hours spent within silence, between his own breath and the groan of his ship's hull. Sometimes he didn't mind it. Sometimes he did.

He wonders how Vaira spends her time alone. He wonders how she copes.

These ideas come at a surprise to him and he wills them away. They recede, but not far.

"Right." She bursts through his bubble and he jerks back into focus. "Well, I'm going to collect my things. Let me know what you decide. Or if you, ah, need anything."

She turns on her heel, stepping beyond the storage device, deeper into the cave. He hears the pull of metal across dirt and rock, the opening and closing of clasps unseen. Her head bobs distantly, wandering deeper into the stretch of cavern than he realized initially existed.

Aquila's nails drag across the rock above him, as if to remind him of her presence. He doesn't concern himself with it. Instead, he deflates with a breath he hadn't realized had accumulated, shrinking into the stone at his back. Neither his judgement nor his morals have any answers left to give him now. He visualizes his thoughts as a mass of white, intangible and empty. He opts to go limp, then, letting his head fall back with a clunk as he stares at the clusters of moonrock above.

He can't help but ask himself what she would do in his position. Then he realizes, of course, she'd already given him her answer. A gun provides an easy solution to any ethical dilemma.

Her earlier threat suddenly returns to him and settles anew, like something raw in his stomach. He suppresses a shudder. Skullcap has to remind himself that easy does not always mean just. Too many unanswered questions. Too much doubt.

His thoughts then, naturally, turn to the emperor. Skullcap cannot reconcile his own predicament with even the smallest proximity to Zusk; it's like his parts can't fit right in the picture, like if he willed it, the matter would simply dissolve before him. But as he considers it, he can't quite visualize how Zusk would address any transgression against him. The various middle men he's sent to deal with Skullcap can only convey so much about him, let alone his motives. Vaira's bias threatens to sway him; was that his intent all along? Or just an inadvertent flaw illuminated by hindsight?

Skullcap didn't know. He doesn't know. The uncertainty churns away at his insides and his knuckles dig into his forearms. He isn't sure what's worse: stuck, forced idle, waiting at an unknown precipice or not knowing which way he'd run even if he could.

So he opts to breathe. To focus on each breath as if it were his last, to savor them like a last meal. Every inhale welcomes a new exhale, another tick of the clock that he can claim as his own, something definitively his.

Until he's forced to move, to act, at least he will have this. At least this solution was still his own.

[kingquest]

I

The moon itself is a crumb among crumbs, hidden away in the far corner of a forgotten pantry. It’s nearly lifeless, save for an obscure species or two, certainly nothing carbon-based. It’s a void in the middle of an unwritten map. It's surrounded by nothing and no one. Not even the cheapest contractor would risk bringing anything to fruition on its surface. It’s a fool’s errand; a death sentence. The only thing a bounty hunter would expect to find here is a corpse.

And yet.

Skullcap maneuvers his ship around bits and pieces of space rock. He eyes unfamiliar asteroids and unnamed planets. He taps his steering mechanism in a crescendoing rhythm, his boot bouncing against the floor. His helmet glances sidelong at a tablet cradled within the passenger seat, eyeing a list of coordinates that stopped updating over three weeks ago.

The average bounty tends to hide in one of two places: in plain sight--the success rate depending entirely on their ego--or somewhere abandoned, but not yet dead, civilization still twinkling from the horizon. The goal of the coward is to survive, of course, but it’s only instinct for a hunter to track its prey where it knows it can sustain itself. Simply put: A hare cannot expect where the wolf will strike because it does not know its nature, it will always be surprised; it would take something as clever as the wolf to know where it would not go.

Therefore, something--someone--very far from average indeed.

He’d been left with very little to go on; the only trace his target had left behind was the signal of a communicator that was only sparsely used. They’d found her subdermal tracker embedded in the skull of her enforcer, carved into the shell of a bullet. The rest of her trail had been smeared to hell with blood.

A chill plucks at the chords of Skullcap’s vertebrae and as he tears himself away from the coordinates, shaking his head. The dusty gray moon looms over the nose of his ship. He flips a switch, enters the last seen coordinate, and the ship’s engine shifts. He eases the ship onto the surface, circling a mountain range he likes. He nestles himself from view, landing far enough away from the point of interest that--ideally--his entrance into the atmosphere went unnoticed.

The ship settles. Rocky debris tumbles around its foundation, the path of wind suddenly interrupted from its course, but soon all is quiet.

Skullcap hesitates. He takes a deep breath.

“If I don’t come back,” he says, “the ship’s yours.”

There’s a rustling behind him. Pottery clangs together. From underneath a UV light emerges a pink, ringed head that cranes towards him. It snuffles something like a yawn, before it digs itself out from the plants it made its home surrounded by. It approaches him expectantly, tilting its head.

He rubs at his collar bone while simultaneously feeling for the weight in his holster.

“Shame we didn’t get you your permit.”

The worm wags its tail and he leans over, rummaging through a compartment, before tossing it an egg shell. A hole at the bottom of its head snaps around it, cracking it in half. It’s engulfed within seconds.

Skullcap huffs a laugh. He finally stands, taking his time, wandering over to his weapons hatch. The worm slides through his calves.

With his gun already on his hip, he plucks out a knife, and then a second one for good measure, sliding them safely within their respective pockets. His hand hovers over the variety of less lethal options within his arsenal before his fingers fold into his palm. He takes a step back, pausing only for a moment.

In hindsight, he’s lucky there’s enough oxygen in the atmosphere to keep him breathing. He doesn’t consider it until the ship’s door is already open and he takes his first breath. The air’s thin; measuring his inhales becomes a conscious and calculated effort. Still, after he rides down the lift, he takes his first step onto the moon’s surface. The dust of his impact floats ever so slightly before falling back to the terrain.

His line of sight is trained on every crevice and rock formation. When no ambush comes, he proceeds, only realizing too late his path has been hindered. He nearly trips, but stumbles into a recovery, gripping onto one of the lift’s support bars to maintain balance.

The worm is tense and completely still as it hovers over his shoes. There’s a rumbling deep within its flesh--one he’s never heard before--and while he tilts his head and squats down to soothe it, he runs his hand down the worm’s taut muscles and follows its arched head to the sky.

In the darkness above him, he’s blind to everything but stars. It’s an overwhelming blankness; like the sort that could swallow you whole. At first he thinks his companion’s been spooked by something in the air, or a sound his ears can’t pick up, but he persists, squinting up at the emptiness. The worm’s head swoops in a subtle sort of way, so he follows it’s direction, and it’s only when it jerks suddenly, snapping to a specific point, does Skullcap finally spot it.

A dark shape floats above him, obscuring the little light he has. It’s small, not a ship, it’s something within the atmosphere. He thinks it’s some sort of… drone, or maybe a weapon, but its shadow flickers suddenly, folds and expands, a sort of movement that can only be organic and breathing, and a hand erupts from his intestines and squeezes his guts when he puts two and two together.

It’s an oblong shape. It’s carried over him by two distinct wings, feathered and massive. A sharp, pointed head looks down upon him, moving before its body does, staring at him from miles above.

It’s a bird. They’re being circled, preyed upon, by a bird.

He scratches the worm’s head and squeezes it against his chest, only to drop it back onto the lift. As it rises, it whimpers once, before the door closes behind it, silencing it. Skullcap keeps his eye on the lingering shape, carefully stepping around the more perilous and loose configurations across the range. He occasionally ducks out of sight, even attempting to crouch-walk in serpentine to lose its trail, but it never gives. At the slightest sensation of hope, a star will go out above him, and the hand inside him grips harder.

He navigates to a clearing in good time, tablet clasped in his hands. He crouches behind a rock and glances at the coordinates, then back up again, rooting around in a pocket for his binoculars. As he pinpoints her position, a light trail of smoke catches his eye, leading to the entrance of a cave. He checks in with the coordinates once again and nods, replacing his tools.

Skullcap braces himself against the rock. He inhales, rubbing his gloved thumb against the side of his index finger. He pokes his head up behind him, towards the cave; there’s no sign of anyone or anything. If she has a ship, it isn’t here. They’re positioned in the lowest point of a valley--a glorified crater--surrounded only by shrubs and the peaks of mountains. It’s all flatlands: nowhere for her to run, nowhere for him to hide.

He takes his time with his exhale, the air filtering through his helmet. He bends his knees, gets low. He unlatches his holster. His gun is a comfort in his hands.

He approaches slowly. His steps are as shallow as his breaths. Halfway there, his helmet turns upward, pausing for a moment to shift his focus completely. The stars shine interrupted and complete.

He hums. His thumb runs across his knuckles. He presses forward.

The smoke wisps from the cave’s entrance, smudging ash onto its highest ridge. He can hear the lovebite of kindling against tinder bouncing off the cave's walls, but nothing more, the silence of the valley pushing in. He idles near the entrance, waiting, not sure for what, his hand steadies himself against the structure with his gun at his hip.

His weight shifts. He tilts, bit by bit, until he silhouettes the darkness of the interior. He leads with his pistol, his finger ghosting over the trigger.

The source of the smoke is little but dancing embers and withered wood. It creates a short glow that barely reaches the cave’s inner workings. Still, he’s able to make out the outlines of shapes against the far wall. There’s a pile of baggage slumped in a corner, a chrome looking cooler with a frying pan propped against the side, and most significantly a sleeping bag, complete with a feathery crop of hair sticking out from the padding.

He approaches her, steady, his gun trained on the head. His eyes adjust to the cover of the starless ceiling and behind her he makes out the outline of a rifle and he hesitates. He lingers near the entrance.

His shoulders square. His muscles tense. Then loosen.

He clears his throat. “Kingfisher,” he says, “by order of the Court of the Glass Dunes and Lord Emperor Zusk, for the crime of mass homicide, put your hands in the air or be shot where you lie.”

His voice reverberates across the cave, snuffed out somewhere deeper within the cavern. The fire crackles a ways behind him, dwindling to dust. She is still. There is no stirrance nor sound.

He clears his throat. He takes an involuntary step forward.

“There’s nowhere left for you to go. It ends here.”

Nothing.

He glances behind him, but snaps back, watching for movement. He shifts his weight back and forth, raising his piece a few inches.

The shot’s impact is worsened by the echo. He swallows a wince, his line of sight ricocheting from the newly created divot in the wall to the sleeping bag. When the dust settles, nothing changes.

Skullcap turns toward the fire. Then back to the body. He aims again, for a lower extremity, and fires. Blood spurts outward, leaking from the dawny hole, and his shoulders leap, but even now, even with a hole in her leg, she doesn’t move.

He eyes the blood, leaning forward. It oozes rather than sprays; it makes a meandering path to the bottom of the sleeping bag, where it drips sparingly onto the dirt. He looks back at the fire pit, at the collection of wood and smoke, and his arms fall by his waist.

He sighs, his hand scratching his neck. He checks the tablet, then his surroundings. He lingers on the body a final time before making his exit.

With the stars above him again, he reholsters his gun. He checks over his shoulder before scanning the horizon for something, anything, even the slightest of exhaust fumes. He rubs his hands against the fabric of his pants, setting his jaw.

“The body count grows,” he says, “And I’ve got shit-all to show for it.”

He rolls his shooting shoulder and pivots, directing himself towards the mountain range he came from. He keeps his helmet pointed upward and an eye out for any flapping wings. Ultimately, there are none.

Skullcap fidgets with the tablet. He swipes the coordinates’ screen downward, yet they remain the same. He turns, walking backwards, as if by some miracle he'll spot treadmarks, or exhaust stains, or any sign of movement other than his own. His tracks sit alone, disturbed only by the flow of dust. When he turns again, his shoulders are relaxed. A cocktail of relief and disappointment alchemize in his chest. He fingers the latch of his holster almost involuntarily, opening and shutting it, keeping his hands moving.

He's squarely in the middle of the flatlands when he hears it. A sharpness, high and loud. A whistle. His spine's shocked squarely straight. His boots are weighed by lead. His helmet snaps upward, first towards the sky, and then to the mountain range in front of him.

His gun is pointed high on instinct. His eye trails the jagged cliffs ahead of him frantically, every muscle taut and ready. He doesn't breathe, doesn't move, he's all trained focus.

A shadow flickers. He's on it immediately, but it's not quick enough, the seconds slip away from him like sand as he watches the figure, crept between two rocks, lean into the scope of a rifle. His shooting arm is still trying to adjust when the air between them cracks, broken by the whip of a bullet.

In the milliseconds it takes for him to spin, to drop low, to force the feet beneath him to fucking move, he catches her waving at him.

He hears the tearing of cloth and meat before he sees it, feels it. He's toppling over as it hits him, white and hot like an explosion of metal underneath the skin of his thigh. His gloves dig through the moon's surface, strained, the thrumping of his heart nearly audible through the veins of his neck. As he pulls himself forward, his elbows creating dirt tracks of their own, he realizes with a dawning horror his injured leg's gone completely dead.

His vision vignettes. His fingers loosen. The muscles of his lower body relax in a domino effect, he's not made even a foot of headway before both legs shut down entirely. He slows his breath, as if that'll help, but he ends up sputtering.

With the last of his strength, he forces his hips to turn. He raises his shooting arm, the gun nearly weighing it down, and stretches his neck around to aim.

The cliff side is barren, without a single sign of disturbance.

His muscles all come crashing down at once. His leg seeps. The gun is stuck locked in an embrace with his fingers.

Skullcap blacks out.