Page 2 of Sway’s Peace (Delivery Service #2)

The Master had already gone that far. It was the only thing he ate anymore, in fact. He considered it one of his experiments. Proving that he could be a cannibal without consequence. That meat, even sapient meat, was all the same at the end of the day.

Sway was long past being horrified. Even when he was the one cooking that meat. The Master would eat people Sway had just helped him operate on, staring him right in the face as he did it, knowing and enjoying that it made Sway uncomfortable.

Or, at least, that it used to.

“All meat is food,” he would say, smiling through yellowed and dulled teeth. “A beast would surely not turn its nose up at eating a person, so why should we?”

Sway never had an argument for him. He’d long ago learned not to talk back. If he fought, if he resisted, the Master would just make things worse. If he didn't react, he wasn’t amusing, and the Master would turn his attention elsewhere.

It was as Sway was drying his hands with a stained rag, frowning at the blood that still stubbornly stained his skin and feathers, that the door to the lab room slid open with a soft beep.

They might have to fight for water, but there was never a lack of power.

The station was rather self-sufficient in that regard.

Some people made a living on Rik-Vane just keeping the station functioning so that they didn’t all die.

It was the closest thing to a respectable job here.

Even if it was usually done in the way of blackmail or extortion, it was still technically trading goods for services.

“He died during the closing,” Sway said without looking back, focusing on digging under his nails to make sure all the obvious blood and viscera was gone. “I can’t tell if it was subspace exposure, exsanguination, or just the shock of having his chest cavity opened.”

“Sounds pretty brutal.”

Sway whipped around, immediately reaching for the weapon on his belt. The metallic claws he wore over his blunt nails.

That wasn’t the Master.

He didn't know this stranger standing in the lab doorway looking at the vir corpse with a singular raised brow. It was a gray skinned s’skree male, quills flat to his head.

Those were a weapon, even if they weren’t up.

Being down meant he was relaxed despite standing within the Master’s layer.

A place no one dared even come near. Too many had been captured and become subjects inside. They all knew to stay away.

So, then, who was this guy? And how did he get here?

He lifted his red eyes, giving Sway a sharp grin that flashed in the light, cutting through the shadows partially concealing his face.

“Calm yourself,” he said easily, showing his hands. There was no weapon in them, but that mattered little with the knuckle claws that would become a threat the moment he made a fist. “My name is Tanin. I don’t mean you any harm.”

Sway started in surprise. It wasn’t often that someone would just offer their name like that.

Sway’s fingers were quick and deft as he pulled on his fake claws, legs tense in preparation for the fight he expected to come.

His species didn’t have claws naturally; the ones he used helped even the playing field.

They were simple, jagged, in design. Caps that fit over his fingers connected by chains that snapped onto the silver rings on his wrists.

“This is no place for you,” he said firmly, facing this stranger with metallic claws raised. “Leave or join the dead one on the table.”

“I have something to offer you.”

“You have nothing I want. Leave. Now.”

“Your Master is dead.”

Sway stilled, stunned. His mouth gaped, lips moving as he struggled to find words.

The Master was… what?

The s’skree, this male named Tanin, stepped further inside, casting his body fully in shadow, looking around with simple curiosity.

Completely unbothered by the death and blood that stained this room.

Maybe it was the fact that the dim surgery light was so focused on the body, but it was hard to see him clearly in the darkness as he moved closer.

Finally, Sway managed to gather himself enough to sputter, “You… what ?”

“I killed him,” Tanin said simply, like it wasn’t a ground shattering thing he just stated. He wasn’t even looking at Sway any longer. “Nasty piece of work that guy. I suppose there’s a reason no one comes around these parts.”

The Master… dead?

It was both unbelievable and easier to accept than Sway would have expected.

The Master had controlled Sway’s life for so long, he didn’t even try to fight any longer.

Really, he had it pretty good. He had all the food he needed, a relatively safe place to sleep, and the only person who could, or dared, torment him anymore was the Master himself.

So many people had it a lot worse. Why leave this lab when nothing in Rik-Vane would be any better?

Sway had been a prisoner in this place once. But those years had long since passed. The Master was a powerful, commanding presence in his life. An untouchable authority that he didn’t even attempt to buck. Immutable. Undeniable. Unchangeable.

But Sway had seen a lot of supposedly powerful people broken and killed in this room. Death came for them all. It really wasn’t a surprise that the Master had fallen as well. It was bound to happen to all of them eventually.

How long until others found out and tried their hand at breaking in here? Sway would have a lot of work to do reminding would-be looters that the Master wasn’t the only dangerous individual in this lab.

And it appeared this Tanin person was first.

“Now you’re here to kill me, I suppose?” Sway asked, quickly gathering himself, claws tensed.

The Master had controlled him for so long, but he always knew it was just a matter of time before someone came after them.

No one lived to old age on Rik-Vane. He had to focus on what came next.

S’skree were smaller, on average, than others, but they were also stronger.

He’d need to be careful of underestimating this male once he attacked.

“Not really,” Tanin said easily, coming to a halt on the other side of the table. Hands resting casually in his pockets. A dark shadow that set Sway’s nerves on edge as it smiled at him just beyond the reach of the surgery light. “Actually, I came to recruit you.”

“What?” For the second time, Sway was surprised. A bit less so this time, however. The Master was famous for being demented and dangerous, but Sway had earned his own notoriety. He couldn’t be that shocked someone else would attempt to control him.

But this wasn’t the same as when the Master first obtained Sway. He wasn’t weak and helpless any longer. If the Master was gone, then Sway wasn’t going to be puppet to another. He would rather-

“How would you like to get out of here? Out of Rik-Vane, I mean.”

Sway blinked. For the third time in such a short period, he was stunned.

Out… of Rik-Vane…?

Sway threw his head back, laughing loudly. He couldn’t help it. That was probably the most ridiculous thing this shadowy male could have said. “Oh, yes. I’d love a potion of immortality as well if you’re just handing out miracles.”

“I’ll see what I can do, but let’s focus on one miracle at a time.” Tanin smirked, unbothered by his mockery. “I mean it. I got a plan. I can get us a ship and a way out of here. But I need someone who can fly the void damned thing.”

Sway held out his hands, gesturing to the lab around him. “Do I look like a pilot to you?”

“No, but you’re smart. You can learn the math needed to do subspace navigation. This plan will take a while to complete. You have time to figure it out.”

Sway scoffed, tapping his claws against his thigh. “So, you have a half-baked plan and step one is getting a pilot that can’t navigate? Brilliant. Where do I sign up?”

“Yeah, Alred thought my choice was odd too. He had a whole list of candidates that could be my navigator, pretty much all of whom already knew at least the basics of subspace navigation. Your name was pretty far down that list. And even then, you were only there because he’s a completionist and you do know some subspace math. ”

Sway’s eyes narrowed. He did know subspace math. But only because of the very experiment that had created a dead male that laid cooling between them.

Death. Terrible and awful death. That was the only subspace math he knew. But-

“How do you know that?”

Tanin chuckled. “Alred knows a lot. Including the experiments your Master ran exposing living flesh to the subspace. And the fact that you were the one who had to do those calculations. Still, he argued against me when I picked you. Said that you knowing how to access subspace isn’t nearly enough to actually navigate through it. ”

Sway fought against himself. The urge to dismiss this fool battling with his curiosity about someone who had clearly just proven strong and clever enough to get into the Master’s well-fortified lab and had the resources to know about the experiments they ran.

Eventually, curiosity won out and he found himself asking, “Why choose me then?”

“Because I don’t care if you know it now.

You can learn it at all later. You’ve already proven you can.

You learned how to access subspace using little more than scrap and half-remembered equations given to you by people your Master tortured for information.

You can learn under pressure, and, more importantly, you can figure out what you don’t know without being told directly. That’s a rarer skill than you think.”

“I don’t delude myself into thinking I’m the smartest male on this station,” Sway sneered. “You still had better options than me.”

Tanin’s grin widened, small fangs glinting in the light. “You’re right. What I really need are males I know I can trust and depend on. Males I can put at my back who I know won’t stab me in it.”