Page 95 of Throwing Fire

“If you go down without a fight, I’ll even give you a massage,” I offer.

Kez snorts. “Doc Gray said no massages. Not until you’re healed. I’ll consider taking a nap if you tell me what you’re really going to be doing.”

She knows me too fucking well.

“Acker caught one of the Ojos. I got some questions for him. Then I want to hear what Payton’s got to say for herself.”

Kez rolls her head against my shoulder. “I’d like to hear what the Ojos and Payton have to say, too.”

Not a chance. Questioning the drummer-kid upset her, and that was sweetness and light compared to what I’m gonna do to the Ojos. “I’ll vid it for you.” Too bad that vid ain’t gonna come out. E.M. flux off the binary, fucks with all kinds of tech. Damn shame.

Kez huffs. “I could help.”

“You could sleep.” I take a skewer in the tray and leave the last one for Acker. “Doc’s orders.”

Kez rolls her eyes but goes back to eating her bugs. I take that as a win. Two whole arguments in one day. New record.

Acker offersKez a blandly furnished room to sleep in, two corridors away from his suite, so I’m betting it’s a guest room. The only real feature of interest, beside the bed, is a round mirror on the wall. Guest room plus big mirror equals a room that’s wired for sight and sound. I’m down to two tinglers, but I’m tempted to set one spinning beneath the mirror just to teach the rats a lesson about eavesdropping on their guests.

When Kez strips down to a lacy shift that definitely isn’t hers and climbs straight into bed, I decide to save it for later, when we’re more likely to do or say something I don’t want the rats overhearing.

I tuck Kez in, careful to keep my smelly boots clear of the bed. Brush a kiss over her forehead and resist the pressure of her arms when she tries to pull me down.

“Behave,” I tell her.

“Okay, but don’t be too long. I can’t sleep by myself.”

“Traumatic, huh?” I give her another kiss to make up for my absence.

“Deeply traumatic,” she says when we come up for air. “Go easy on Payton. I don’t think she had anything to do with this.”

“Me, neither, but this shit’s hitting too close to home.”

Kez nods. “She could have been tracked.”

“I hope she’s smarter than that.”

“Not everyone has your skills.” She holds up her left wrist, which is circled by a collection of wires, straps, beads and mirrors. It looks like jewelry, but it’s not. Before I got my hands on it, it was already a kick-ass viewie. After I got finished with it, it was an identity masque. It randomly mimics any signals within a fifty-meter radius. No one will ever shoot my kitten by tracking her viewie’s signal.

“Get some rest. I won’t be too long.”

I give her another kiss, disentangle myself before she manages to pull me into bed, rank boots and all, and rejoin Acker in the corridor.

“Thanks,” I tell him. “She needs to rest. This shit’s beginning to wear her down.”

“And you, my friend?”

I shrug. “People been tryin’ to kill me most of my life. I’m used to it.”

Acker tilts his head. “I would not have gotten used to it.”

“Yeah? You got your own tag,” I observe.

“It has only become a problem since the Ojos joined forces with the Founders.”

“It’ll go back to bein’ an annoyance once we got the Ojos under control. Let’s go find out what this fucker knows.”

Acker beckons me with his claws and leads me down two levels, nearly back to the sewers. Low red lights come on as we descend, but otherwise these tunnels are dark and silent. It’s an eerie quiet. The silence of deep places: of wormholes, of the spaces between stars. Places I left behind when I came to this bright, garden world.