Excerpt

Jeane had been ignoring her beeping comms for the last five minutes, rejecting the call again and again. ALU started squirming beside her, so she hushed them and flattened herself to the wall, preparing to take a peek outside.

"Why stop?" the technician whined, pulling on the sleeve of her jacket like a scared child. "Go, go!"

"Are you okay?" Jeane asked. ALU seemed unhurt after the brawl, but one could never be sure with them.

The technician chirped nonchalantly. "Okay. They hurt, but we didn't hurt back. Why stop?"

"I want to see those jerks," Jeane whispered. "I mean, what the hells? Did you see them? That was the bloody Union back there!"

Her comms beeped again. She silenced the device, then leaned out of the alleyway.

After the presence of the agents registered in her brain, she and ALU had bolted through the back door of the pub, spilling out onto the streets of Central. She'd heard shouts behind them but quickly realized it wasn't the enemy: other lanehunters had the same idea, and soon, they were sprinting down the cobblestone road among a group of people.

Darkness and thick fog enveloped everything, blotting out the orange orbs of the streetlamps. After a few turns, most people had dropped away, and she'd steered ALU into a side-alley, so they could assess the situation.

No one walked on the road now. The airships of late-night travelers passed above, and drunk hollering filtered out from one of the nearby pubs, but all these were completely normal noises. No shots, no screaming.

"How?" ALU asked. "How is Union here?"

Jeane huffed in frustration. "You got me there. This shouldn't have happened. This place was always safe. For hundreds of years—from the beginning! It's impossible!"

"Followed someone?"

"No way."

"Betrayal?"

But who would do this, and why? Sure, everyone could be bought for the right price, but it was hard to imagine any lanehunter giving out the position of the Cities after all this time. This place was one of their primary living grounds, and they took its protection seriously. Too many things had to go wrong at the same time for the Union to suddenly find its way in.

«Every security system has its flaws.»

But it didn't make sense! The agents must have invested a lot of time and energy to get through the Cities' defenses, so why would they show up on a random raid in the tiniest, nastiest pub of Central? Where were they hiding their army? Already a bunch of destroyers should have been hovering above, ready to give an ultimatum to the clan heads.

So, why there? Why now?

«You know why.»

She shook her head. She needed to think, but her mind was a jumbled mess of panicked ideas and ominous speculations, and even the make-believe conversation with Hollis didn't help to clear out things. If this wasn't another awful prank or some arrogant nitwit's overdone threat to a rival smuggler, then lanehunters were in a stinking heap of trouble.

She pushed the button on her tablet, annoyed by the noise that had started up again. "Yes, Kliks?"

"Finally! Where are you guys?" The Talalan's voice sounded unnerved. He was heaving, and there was a hum in the background, almost like—

"Umm...where are you?" Jeane asked.

"Just taking a stroll above Central. Since Dikent threw me out."

She could feel her blood pressure shoot up into the skies. "What? Why?"

"Something is happening."

"I noticed!" Distant, shouted commands echoed through the mist, but Jeane still didn't see anyone around. "You can guess, but I'll spare you the effort. The Union is here."

Kliks was silent for a second, digesting the information. "Oh. I see." There was a slight waver in his voice.

"Well, I don't! What the fuck? We were about to leave that dive when they appeared. This is not—"

"Were they looking for you?"

Hollis gave a hacking cough in the back of her mind, and she exhaled forcefully. "I don't know. Why did Dikent throw you out?"

"I'm not sure. The mechanics already finished their thing, but he was still around. He kept saying we should leave because our timetable changed, and we won't make it to the rendezvous. Then he got a call and demanded that I contact you again. He was talking nonsense; it might have been funny if he wasn't holding me at gunpoint."

"Bastard!" Jeane spat. "What did you do?"

"I shot him in the shin with stun."

"Kliks!"

"I'm…sorry?"

The answer got caught in Jeane's throat because six uniformed figures walked out of the fog on the other side of the street. She pulled her head back, gestured to ALU, and they drew back further into the alley, crouching behind some hefty garbage bins.

"Jeane?" Kliks called out to her.

"Ssh!"

"Jeane, I think the Union is here because of me."

She shook her head like that could delete the idea and plastered the comms to her ear. "Have you seen nailships up there? Destroyers? Any scuffle or weirdness?"

Kliks didn't speak right away, probably checking the radar. "Nothing as far as I can see."

"They came to bar," ALU said. "Low probability. Why there?"

"ALU is right. They're looking for the manipulator. They must have followed us."

"Let's not jump to conclusions!" Jeane huffed. "Agent Jerkface died in the lane. And even if they got a transmission out, no way the Union knew in which little pub ALU and I would pop up in. Why weren't they at the port if they can track the manipulator so well? Through several lanes and cracks, might I mention, which should be hard as fuck!"

"Guy at the pub," ALU said slowly, looking up at her with widening insect eyes as if realizing something important. "Brown jacket, staring at us. Agent Jerkface."

It was like the sky collapsed on Jeane. "What?"

"I recognize. Saw him through airlock door on Lark. He lives."

Kliks cursed into his comms. "How in hells did he—"

Jeane hushed him again. The group of figures she'd seen before appeared at the mouth of the alley.

Despite the smell of rotten fruit invading her nostrils, she tried to duck lower behind the trash cans. Now that she could examine them, those goons didn't strike her as average agents. Their uniforms were black instead of the usual gray, they were impossibly tall and built like tanks, and they moved together like connected by some invisible force or shared knowledge.

«Inspectors,» Hollis groaned in her mind at the same time that she whispered the word. Two inspector trios.

But that didn't make sense either. Inspectors were specialists, genetically engineered sons of bitches working in hivemind-like trios on occupied planets to deal with internal conflicts and to supervise agents and errand-people. And the Union was not good at gene-en, at least not until recently, so there weren't a lot of them around. They certainly weren't sent after lanehunters.

«You should have started running five minutes ago. What in skies' glory are you waiting for?»

They might have been looking for Agent Jerkface. He'd acted exactly like he'd been chased when she'd seen him barge into the room. What if the inspectors had been following him? Would fit their profile, but either way—

«Kid. Run!»

ALU poked her in the arm, and that snapped her out of it. The inspectors started marching down the alley.

"We're running now," she said.

They jumped up and sped towards the other end of the street. One of the inspectors shouted something, and several shots ricocheted on the pavement, terrifyingly close. Jeane pulled out her gun and blindly fired a few blasts backward. At the next junction, they took a sharp right, then a left.

No more gunshots came, but the sound of footsteps behind them was persistent.

"They want us alive," she panted into her comms, realizing that Kliks was still on the line. "We gotta scram, now!"

"I'll pick you up," the Talalan said. "But I don't have much space to land."

Jeane and ALU swerved around another corner, arriving at a busier street. The dirty white mist was thinner here, and numerous pedestrians walked about under more frequent streetlights on both sides of the road. Jeane pushed through a group of young lanehunters and risked a glance back. Their pursuers had fallen behind.

She tried to catch her breath, but her lungs were stinging something awful. "Meet us at East Point," she heaved into her comms.

Kliks mumbled, uncertain. "What's there? This map doesn't show much."

"Big-ass lighthouse. You can't miss it."

"Captain?" ALU's voice rang anxiously. A few yards before them, three looming figures broke off from the evening crowd.

"Shit!"

She clutched ALU's arm and dove into an alley to the right.

They kept running. The streets led uphill and became steeper as they entered the eastern boundaries. The inspectors chose endurance over speed, silently chasing them down like the creepy predators they were. Every time Jeane thought she'd lost them, they showed up even closer behind at the next crossroad.

Then ALU turned sharply to the right and zoomed through a gateway so fast, she could barely follow.

"What are you doing?" she wheezed, catching up at last. The technician didn't answer, so she had no other choice than to race after them across a grassy yard surrounded by a ramshackle stone wall while ALU ran forward as if pulled on a string. The two of them climbed a row of steep staircases between high-walled houses, the path branching many times, leading ever upwards.

"This is why...I hate...all these...blasted planets," Jeane cursed, breathless. "They're all...too...fucking big!"

Then ALU caught her arm and pulled her down to her knees. They dragged her through a small archway carved into a yellow building to the left and crawled forward a few feet in a narrow stone tunnel ending in a closed metal grate.

Jeane rattled the bars, but they didn't give. She stared at ALU, petrified. "What now?"

They shushed her, gripping the grating with three arms and fixing their eyes on the opening behind them. Jeane dropped to the ground, threw her back against the grate, and raised her gun. If those three-bodied motherfuckers found them here, she could at least try and bring down a few of them before it was all over.

They waited in silence. Jeane counted her heartbeats, staring into the darkness beyond the archway. She got to twenty-four before they heard the steps.

Two massive figures, jogging forward in terrifying unison. And passing their hideout without even taking a second look.

She remained unmoving on the off chance the third one came this way too, but there were no more noises. When the thumping of heavy boots died down, she lowered her weapon and let the air out of her lungs.

"Nice job," she said, unable to mask the traces of panic in her voice. She patted ALU on the shoulder. "How did you know this was here?"

ALU raised a hand and rapped their fingers against their metal head a few times. "Have a good map. Downloaded it in hangar."

As if on cue, Jeane's comms signaled again. "What's up?" she spoke, expecting Kliks to answer.

"What in hells is going on here, Jeane?"

It was Dikent, so angry that he was almost shouting. Jeane held the tablet away from her ear and stage-whispered back at him (better not risk being discovered) while boosting the transmitting volume up to the maximum (for a fun effect). "Dikent, how do you know this number?"

The man cursed, and judging from the noises, he turned down the volume on his end. "Irrelevant, darling. What did you get me into this time?"

«Keep calm, be cool!»

"This time? I don't know what you're talking about. By the way, sorry for the shot in your leg. I think Kliks is allergic to you."

Is that calm enough?

"Don't screw around!" Dikent bellowed. "Seems a little suspicious that an agent tries to hunt you down in a lane, and then even more of them appear in my city. Do you have any idea how this happened?"

«'In my city,' huh? He would looove that.»

Jeane rolled her eyes. "You are aware I'm not the only person who crossed the Union in the last few days, right? What do you want me to say?"

"Stop lying, for starters. You barely escaped a group of inspectors. Why are they looking for you?"

Jeane gulped. Dikent did have eyes everywhere. "I said what I said. I have no idea what's going on."

«Technically, that isn't a lie.»

"Well, you have to get out of here."

"I'm working on it." Jeane beckoned ALU, and they both crawled out of the tunnel. "What do you know?"

"Only two battleships so far, and Defense are sending out their units as we speak. You can still slip through before they set up a blockade."

Two Union ships wasn't an army by any means, but if they had a way into the Cities, more could come later.

"You think I should leave?"

The question slipped out before she could stop herself. Stars damnit, habits were hard to break. But Dikent wasn't her partner-in-crime anymore; she had no right to ask for his opinion.

"You better," the man answered, not noticing her lapse in judgment. "Either the inspectors get you or Defense, curious why you're in the center of the Union's attention."

They started scaling the stairs again, ALU hopping forward at each turn and signaling all-clear.

"If you tell me where you are, I can help," Dikent went on.

«Hmm, so he doesn't know everything. Cool.»

Was that worry in Dikent's voice, or was she imagining things? Either way, he was right. Away from here, now. They needed time to think this through.

"J, you can tell me. What's going on?"

«Oh boy. Trust me, we really can't.»

But gods damnit, why did he have to use that old nickname? That didn't help things at all.

"I'll be fine," Jeane said, curtly closing the argument with both of her conversational partners. "You just make sure they don't blow up my ship from under me again."

Then she disconnected.