Her name is Anemone. Sometimes Nemi, sometimes Moni. She one time decided to start calling herself Noni, but she ditched that one quickly. Flighty, fickle and irrational. Energetic, creative and charming. I’ve only ever met two kinds of people in the galaxy during my travels. People who love Anemone, and people who can’t stand her.
I used to be one of those, but now I am the other.
Three weeks ago, I learned that she was here in the Lathe sector, eastern spiral arm of our galaxy at about four o’clock. She took a shuttle that set her down on the fourth planet out from the sun, on a long and spindly archipelago of islands off the coast of a grand, volcanic continent. There were only so many cities I had to search. I set a programmed watch for her on the planetary civic defence network. And thirty minutes ago, I caught her.
I could not afford to be reckless with my precious time. I packed only what I needed, and I made landfall at once.
Now, I step up towards a nightclub called The Counting House. A quick scan of the club’s logs in the government database tells me that the building used to be a public-owned accounting institution before the planet’s paradigm lurch towards private, independent services. Now, the building’s basement is a labyrinth of cathedralesque arches framing score upon score of sealed subterranean vaults. The precious belongings are gone, so they filled them with music and people. According to reviews, the acoustics are priceless.
The Counting House secures its entertainment from the rabble by way of a computerised bio-recorder set into a panel beside the double doors of the entrance. Guests line up along the front wall of the building and place their hands on the panel, one at a time, when they want to enter. The AI keeps track of how many people are inside and holds that number at a safe level, only admitting the next in line when space is freed up for them. And the line is kept in relative order by the trundling, lumpy white shapes of protective, robotic servitors, armed first with demanding voices and then, when diplomacy breaks down, with charged lightning. It’s decent security for a planet of this technology level. Unfortunately for them, it is still behind the curve on the galactic stage.
I arrive at the building from the road leading up the hill from the city centre and ignore the queue to head straight for the door. There are angry protests from some of the visitors when they catch sight of what I am doing, but I can ignore them. And the servitors can’t even see me. Where natural eyes witness a tall human male, pale of skin and dressed in a sleeveless jacket and cargo trousers suitable for a temperature much colder than this tropic balm, the machines see only an imperceptible blur.
There’s a small gaggle of partiers holding the fort at the head of the line, and a dusky-skinned woman with the tall, feline ears and swooshing tail of the planet’s native populace has her hand pressed ready on the entry panel. It has already determined she is old enough to enter and has no criminal record, so she just waits for space. She casts me a caustic yellow glare as I come to stand in front of her, and then begins shouting angrily when I put my own hand next to hers on the panel. The programme I let slip into the digital infrastructure through implants in my palm is a familiar one, and it does its work swiftly. The door clicks open.
I move to the entrance and open it up. Then, feeling bold, I turn in the entryway and nod for the feline girl to come along too. Her demeanour immediately changes to delighted mischief as she and her fellows, and then the entire line, march forward to enter the club unimpeded. I’m not yet sure what I will be required to do tonight, but a little chaos in the halls of my hunt will only help, I reckon.
In the entry hall, music roars skyward from a set of stone stairs leading deeper into the vaults of the club, and I move down confidently. My ears are assailed by heavy bass, a thrumming that my primate brain confuses for my own unhealthy heartrate, but I push that aside. I don’t recognise the song that is playing. I assume it’s a bespoke piece made for clubs, judging by how well the bass-heavy rhythm matches the music system that The Counting House is using.
In the basement vault complex, the dance floor is crowded. It is a night for parties on the archipelago, apparently, and the people have heard the siren song of celebration. There’s a long, wooden bar for drinks on the eastern wall in front of one of the more prominent vault hatches. A second bar’s digital signature, its cash register and employee communication system, can be felt through my implants. It’s on the far southern wall beyond the brimming dance floor, likely an overflow service for the guests at the back of the hall. The music is provided by a semi-automated audio system that I also feel with my senses. I use my digital scan to imagine the brilliant data-lights of the tangled wires in the round, stone pillars winding up into one of The Counting House’s disused offices where the music system is being controlled. Each pillar has a square interface for guests of the club to make their own requests to the overseer.
Bright colours. Flashing lights. Incomprehensible sounds. Heat and scent. How long has it been since I was witness to so many lives at once, all crammed together and burning with the desire to represent themselves to their fellows? I take a moment to lean back against the wall to the right of the entrance to acclimatise myself to my chaotic surroundings. I let the lights and music saturate my skin and then deeper, my very spirit. The music calls me to move, and I acknowledge the urge even as I push it aside. I need this to be my space before I get to work. I can’t let myself get distracted. Not when my target is Anemone, who is so very, very distracting.
The feline girl from the entrance steps into the vault now with her little group of friends. Her dress is indecently short, and her tail is an assailing whip of excited activity at her back. She turns and spies me, then waves. She gestures for me to follow. It’s a nice offer, but I wave my own hand in dismissal. She shrugs and moves off into the crowd with her friends. They have to force their way through the mess of dancers in order to reach the bar. And that is where she is…
This is why I had to take a moment to calm myself before getting underway. Seeing her again after all this time takes the breath out of my lungs. The surrounding people seem to slow and freeze mid-sway, and the frenetic lighting overhead seemingly bends out of alignment to touch her gently, illuminating her with a multicoloured halo. I stare. I glare.
Anemone is human, like me. That isn’t her real name. But these days, what does ‘real name’ even matter? It isn’t like Anemone herself even sticks with one nickname for longer than a year. I understand that she originally came from a backwater world in the Alpha Centauri galaxy, but she told me that she doesn’t remember any of her time there. She was discovered as a baby on a primitive long-haul extragalactic shuttle leaving the galaxy, was raised by smugglers, and that was the start of her life. A life spent untethered from the concept of ‘home’.
Anemone is pretty, even I can appreciate that. It’s part of why we worked so well together. Me with my implants and resources, my ability to wheedle my way into computers and ingratiate myself with simple AI. Her with that attractive, stylish aura, her network of contacts across the galaxy and her winning smile. There’s also her skill with a blaster and ability to wrangle any ship’s helm into obedience. My careful attention to detail and seamless plans of action. Her impulsiveness, my consideration. My brains, her good looks. When I was wary, she was impulsive. And even when there was chaos in the aftermath, her smile made my anxiety shrink away.
She is wearing her hair short tonight in a tangle of colourful spikes like a particularly eccentric hedgehog. Crimson red at the crown turning to peach pink, then dusky orange and tipped with brilliant yellow that glows in the dark. Must have taken her some time. She has a woven strand of longer hair at her fringe on one side of her face which she has tied into a braid using a metallic charm in the shape of a butterfly. I’m not sure how she stops it bonking her on the nose whenever she shakes her head. Maybe she just doesn’t say no to anything. Her eyes are a shining, shimmering, sunset orange, clearly visible in the dark of the club, which is also not her natural colour. She likes to be colourful, does Anemone.
And that is reflected in her outfit most of all. Anemone doesn’t purchase clothes, which is the norm across civil parts of the galaxy. Anemone acquires clothes. They are either gifts from allies or loot from scavenged derelicts, sometimes even taken from the restrained forms of her more stylish enemies. If they fit, great. If not, she cuts them up and restitches them into new shapes and designs. Her wardrobe is a dizzying array of colour, a vast collection of fabric patchworks of art. Tonight, she is wearing a thin, cotton t-shirt that is white down to the swell of her bust, then pink around the tightness of her waist. She has topped this with a jacket of a thicker, woven material that I assume must be wool, and this is a minty green in colour. I don’t see signs of customisation in the fabric’s shape, but splotches of black on the cuffs and around the collar tell me that she has chosen this shade of green intentionally and dyed the jacket to her liking. It’s short, coming down to just under her chest, but the sleeves are long and occlude the soft wrists of her slim, dextrous hands. Her skirt is frilled at the hem and reaches her mid-thigh. The pleats flow and bounce in time with her movements, and since Anemone is incapable of stillness, this means they are always flowing. Three quarters around her hips in a plaid material, but then one quarter on her left flank that is solid black and considerably shorter, clearly an addition to make the tighter plaid fit around her waist. The shortness on that one side is enough to be scandalous, but the creamy swell of her thigh is enough to hide her underwear, just barely. Thick socks, odd of course, are bunched up around her calves above a pair of sporty, white sneakers. When enough of the crowd moves to let me see, I can identify wear on the heels from all her walking, all her dancing, and even when not moving, the idle bouncing she uses to offset her vast reserves of energy.
She is smiling mischievously. That’s her default. Anemone has painted one of her round cheeks with a purple sigil that looks like a stylised image of a roaring tiger, and her smile makes the beast yowl. I imagine it’s an image from the local culture, given their feline heritage. Her eyes are framed in a dusting of purple that shines slightly with glitter, and her lips are her natural pink but shimmering with gloss. She has early wrinkles along the corners of her mouth, because she smiles a lot. She hasn’t taken measures to hide those little folds framing her lips. She always smiles, and people love her.
I cannot stand her.
Before I realise what I am doing, I am pushing towards her through the crowd. I can feel the plastic lump of my needle accelerator concealed under my sleeveless jacket like a solid, deadly tumour. I hope I don’t have to use it. But if I do, at least I know it doesn’t kill. The needles are bespoke ammunition of my own design, and are filled with a firm, carbon solution that melts at body temperature when the needle impacts the skin. Inside the target’s body, it expands to form a simple digital framework that I can then cast my programming into from a distance. It seizes the muscles and binds the bones. A perfect weapon for a bounty hunter. I can also feel the weight on the back of my belt from a small utility pack with some other means of keeping her from escaping, and I would rather use those if I can. Anemone knows all this. She knows the full arsenal I usually bring to an operation. But I don’t see or sense a weapon of her own on her body tonight.
But she is armed. That energetic, often slightly manic smile of hers cuts deeper than any blaster. She has it turned on a boy who looks to be about the same age as her. Which means he is actually quite a bit younger. People forever mistake Anemone for a younger girl, thanks to the way she dresses, the way she acts, and her considerable shortness of height. This boy, a dark-haired feline humanoid, is smiling with the sharp, practiced smile of a trained hunter, and his hand is hovering close to her hip in case she feels like falling into his embrace. She doesn’t, of course. Anemone hates to be held down, even by an affectionate gesture, and her energetic bouncing keeps her constantly out of his reach. She’s the hunter here. She is drawing him in with a litany of spoken words and the overwhelming gravity of her energy. She likes the attention. She likes to play. When the boy laughs and retorts on a comment she has made, Anemone feigns that she cannot hear him so that he has to come closer. She is teasing him, and he loves it. He will invite her home to bed with him later, or maybe they won’t get that far. Maybe she’ll push him down in an alleyway and ride him in the dust, since I know Anemone is both prolific and undiscerning in romance. Maybe she’ll even do it to him here. I don’t actually know what this world’s policy is on exposure, and I’m not ignorant of the hormones and pheromones making chemical patterns in the air around me. Maybe these cats are actually gearing up for an orgy.
My blood is boiling by the time I reach her. I step around the last of my obstacles, skirt along the edge of the bar, and put a hand firmly on her shoulder. She spins about as if just continuing the flow of her dance, and she looks up at me. And the music swells around us. Her eyes fix on me, and mine on her. We are mutually paralysed for one, heartstopping chord of thrumming music.
“Ray…” she mouths beneath the sound. Her face falls. Her smile vanishes. Her brow twitches. And in an ensuing moment of quiet in the music, I hear her voice. Lyrical and resonant, clear as crystal. “Oh, fuck.”
I keep a strong grip on her shoulder as I lean in towards her ear. She smells of sweat and cheap perfume. “We need to talk.”
“R-Ray…!” I can feel her shaking nervously through my palm. “You sound angry.”
“Where’s the money, Anemone?” I ask her.
“I-It… It’s…”
I loom in closer to better hear her.
“It’s Annie, now.”
I shake her, taking a hold of her other arm and holding her in a steel grip on both sides of her body. Her eyes are big and anxious, and I see that the colour of her irises has changed from orange to purple. Maybe the colour of her contacts is connected to her body temperature, or something.
“Where is my money, Anemone?!”
“Hey, do you know this guy?”
The boy, ‘Annie’s’ seduction target, has approached and put a hand on mine. He is glaring threateningly, and I can’t blame him, but I do wish he wouldn’t get involved.
“Leave,” I tell him, as deadpan as I can manage amidst the club’s music.
“Fuck you!” The dialect of this world is a lilting cavalcade of consonants, and it sounds like he’s spitting at me. He takes the time to put his bottle of drink on the floor so he can tighten one hand into a fist.
“It’s okay!” Anemone turns awkwardly over one shoulder to regard him with a worried smile. “I’m okay. Get out of here.”
“Annie…” he growls.
“I enjoyed meeting you, but you have to get out of here. This doesn’t concern you. Go find your friends. Please?”
He doesn’t want to go, obviously. I don’t look at him. Meeting his eyes would look like a challenge. I keep my eyes on her, since that’s my instinct anyway. And eventually, he draws his hand away. The boy’s shoulders are hunched angrily as he retrieves his drink and skulks away.
“Dance with me,” whispers Anemone.
“I’m not here to fucking dance.”
“Please, Ray. People are watching. I know you’re armed…”
She steps forward toward me and pushes her body against mine. I can feel my limbs tightening in surprise. Her breast makes soft contact with the shape of the weapon under my jacket and, identifying the device, she nods in acknowledgement.
“But I also know you don’t want to use it. Neither of us want to have to deal with the authorities here, so let’s not make a scene. I’ll talk, I promise. Just… Just dance with me.”
It’s a mistake to listen. Her honeyed words are seductive. She always gets her way. But she is right. I don’t want to unload on this planet’s young heroes when they come to the defence of a seemingly helpless girl.
“Please?”
I tuck one of her arms firmly behind her back and push her into the crowds so that we are out of sight. I can feel her wincing at my rough treatment. She really doesn’t like to be restrained. We reach the centre of the mass of bodies, and as she spins in my grip to fall against my chest, she frowns up at me. But she still takes tight hold of the collar of my jacket and makes a show of moving to the sound of the beat. It comes naturally to her. We probably look like an awkward couple out on the town for the first time in a while, or maybe just after a difficult argument about something trivial. Anemone moves her shoulders back and forth in alternating sway, and her hips rub sensually against mine. Her body tilts forward towards me one way, then retreats in the other, over and over. I’m not dancing. And yet, holding her left wrist tight in one hand and her waist with the other, I still find myself moving gently with her rhythm. How could I not?
Anemone leans forward suddenly and sniffs my jacket with an angry pout. Her purple eyes are judgemental when they meet mine again.
“You started smoking?” she complains loudly over the music.
I seethe as I reply. “A lot has changed since you left. Me smoking is the least of it.”
Her narrow eyes dart away guiltily. I can see her chewing her tongue behind her lips. Telltale.
“Is Sapphire here?” I ask, leaning close enough that her spikes of hair tickle my nose.
When she shakes her head, her butterfly hair ornament knocks against my chin with a light, metallic impact. “I haven’t seen her in ages.”
“Is that the truth?”
“Yes!” She is scowling now, and her shoulders tense up as if receiving a blow. “Yes, she… She didn’t want to be around me anymore. She ran out on me about half a year ago.”
I shake my head, unimpressed. “With all the money, I bet.”
“N-No…”
She isn’t meeting my eyes, so I have to lean down and into her space to force her attention. The dancers around us probably think I am trying to kiss her.
“Then where is it?”
“I don’t have it!”
“You just said-…”
“We spent it!” She flashes her teeth at me spitefully, and I shrink back from an imagined bite. “We spent all the fucking money, Ray! We toured the resort worlds and we ate and drank and saw shows and hired musicians. And I got us suites that let us stretch out our legs when we slept and… it’s all gone! It’s all gone…”
I am truly livid now. I pull her against me, and I hear a whimper escape her lips.
“You’re hurting me…” she whispers.
“You think that was clever, do you?” I demand. Coloured spotlights rush across the crowd and Anemone is bathed in red for a moment, obscuring all her vibrant shades. “You think that was a clever way to use all your earnings? All my fucking earnings?!”
“I don’t remember you being so capitalist, Ray!” she shouts angrily, but a moment later, her shining eyes soften. “What happened?”
“A lot happened,” I simmer.
“Tell me. W-Wait…”
Anemone darts a look left and right. The feline crowds press in around us. It’s secrecy, in a sense. Their undulating, writhing forms are all designed to draw the eye, and they do so away from the relatively static pair of embracing aliens in their midst. But I agree that it’s inconvenient for conversation. She isn’t dancing anymore. She’s moving, but this is a nervous fidget, a staccato bounce upon her worn heels. There’s no grace in it. She wriggles in my grip, and I try not to get excited about the way she is rubbing up against me.
“Come with me!” she demands.
She doesn’t escape my grasp, but twirls in my arms so that she can lead the way back out of the dancers. I follow on. Her aura draws the people’s attention and encourages them out of her way, and I walk in her wake. We escape the crowd at the far western edge of the vaulted dance hall, where a narrow corridor leads deeper into the rock. My ears are ringing with the muting of the music from loud clamour to incidental quiet. Anemone leads me down toward the restrooms at the far end of the gloom, past necking couples and small groups of friends taking respite from the dance. There are three doors, and she pushes open the first one with her free hand.
I’m not supposed to be here, whispers a senseless part of my mind as it recognises restroom facilities designed for females. And it raises its voice at the sight of all the feline girls applying makeup in the long mirror or chatting by the tall cubicles. I instantly receive a volley of accusatory glares.
“Get out,” spits Anemone sharply.
They don’t seem to want to, so I draw the weapon from inside my jacket. It looks enough like a gun that the girls take the hint without me needing to explain the thing with the needles. In an instant, they pile past us and out into the dance hall.
Now alone, as I can see from the open doors of all of this restroom’s cubicles, I shove Anemone further inside. Then I turn to the door again. I have a magnetic bolt in my utility pouch, and I slam this into place on one side of the wooden frame to hold the door shut. The wood splinters under the impact of the black, metal spike, but now they’ll have to take the whole door down to get inside. That gives me some time if those girls do decide to call the authorities.
Spinning back to face the girl’s restroom, I see Anemone. She is leaning heavily forward on the long, flat, waist-high sink unit, built of the same stone as the walls of the facility. The sinks encased in the stone are metallic, likely a local steel equivalent. Anemone is chewing her tongue as she examines herself in the long mirror above the sinks. Her shoulders are hunched upward like a tiger preparing to pounce. Like the tiger marked in paint on her cheek. She’s plotting, I can tell. She’s considering her moves. She has her back arched in a gentle curve, accentuating the roundness of her bum beneath her skirt, but I can’t imagine she is trying to seduce me now. It’s just her idle stance, and she’s lucky that being sexy comes so naturally to her. She bounces on her heels, and her skirt flutters gently.
“I was having such a nice night,” she sighs. “I had been really looking forward to living carelessly for a change, you know? I’ve been hopping between worlds for a while now. All I want is a few hours where I don’t have to worry about my messy past and what the rest of galaxy is doing, and I can just-…”
She looks up and sees my approach in the mirror. But she can’t do a thing to stop me from reaching intimately around her shoulders and slapping the metal restraint cuff on her right wrist. A beep from the electronics to acknowledge activation, and then a crunch as the cuff bolts a line of thick titanium chain into the stone.
Anemone’s eyes widen with visible anxiety as she begins tugging at the restraint. The chain rattles to give her about a foot of movement away from the sink, but it’s still an awkward angle at which to be held. And she can be strong when she needs brute force, but not this strong. I’ve seen men twice my size rendered helpless by this brand of restraint cuff. It’s why I bought them.
Anemone spins to face away from the mirror with a frightened cast on her pale face, and she holds her bolted wrist against her chest with her free hand as if in pain.
“Ray, what the fuck?!”
“Oh, you think this is unnecessary?”
“Yes! I said we should talk, and I’m going to talk! I’m not going to-…”
“Not going to run?” I growl. “Wish I could believe that.”
Anemone squeezes her eyes tight. I see they’ve turned a verdant forest green before they are hidden from me by her eyelids. She breathes in a heavy breath, pushing out her chest against her shirt, then lets it out in a mournful huff. For a moment, her bouncing stops. A grave-like calm descends upon her. But when she opens her eyes and faces me again, the nervous energy reasserts itself.
“Tell me what happened,” she says softly.
I swallow down my anger and fold my arms. I can see myself in the mirror behind her, and I hate what I look like. Bitter, resentful Ray, glaring down at his helpless quarry. Still, I have been looking forward to this, in a sick sort of way. I’ve been longing to get my anger out into the open.
“You were watching Sapphire,” I recall from all those years ago, and I force my voice into relative calm. I’ll need it, for this story. “I had to go and switch off the baron’s gravity seals so the yacht could lift off, which I did. When I got back…”
“The ship was already gone,” Anemone nods. “I remember. That’s… But you can’t mean the baron’s men caught you?”
“No,” I confirm. “There was a second ship in his field yard, and I used that to get off-world. I think it was a crop cultivation ship, or something, since it was trashed by atmos by the time I reached Lunar Station. I ditched it in a bay and made contact with the Reclamation Agency. I was… really hoping you’d beaten me to it. But instead… I learned that you were missing, along with our target. They were not happy.”
“I’m-…”
“So I track the baron’s yacht through the subspace relay,” I interrupt, “and I get as far as Pylon Seventeen before losing track of you. I stall for time with the agency, hop on a public transit shuttle under a fake name and follow the trail as far as I can. And I can’t find head nor hair of you or the princess. I thought for sure that, even in the unthinkable event that you were trying to actively leave me behind, a bumpkin like her would mess up somewhere out in space and leave a trail. But you were obviously keeping a close eye on her. And then I run out of time.”
I pause for breath, but this time, Anemone doesn’t take the space I offer to interject. She’s rubbing her shackled wrist with her free hand, staring miserably down at the floor. Anemone doesn’t like being restrained.
“The fee for failing to accomplish an extremely high-profile contracted mission for the Reclamation Agency was… intense,” I tell her. It would be all too predictable if Anemone didn’t even know that critical benevolence agencies like Reclamation put a cost on failure, but she doesn’t look all that surprised. “To get myself square and avoid jail, I had to empty my accounts. I lost my stockpile, the Archangel frame, my three seizure wands… And still I came up short.”
This does surprise her. She stares up at me. “That much?”
“I took out a loan so they wouldn’t put me away. A big loan.”
Anemone raises a hand to her lips in shock. “That’s why you have those…” she whispers and reaches out with her free hand towards my face. She doesn’t reach me, bound as she is, but I’m at least impressed she can see the nasty, heavy shadow of a new subdermal augmentation above my cheeks and under my eyes.
“I’ve been working for the Darke Group ever since,” I confirm. “They bolted me with trackers and they took a bunch of my blood for their archives. I operate on synth-oil now, you know, and I can only get that from Darke. They’ll give me back my blood and my freedom when I can pay back what I owed to the Reclamation Agency, plus a fee for their troubles. So maybe you can see why I’m leaning towards cruelty tonight, Anemone.”
“It’s Annie,” she says softly, absently. “D-Doesn’t Darke use those trackers to control your movements in the galaxy?”
“Right,” I confirm bitterly. “They’ve always got their eye on me while I’m on the clock. I worked myself to the bone to earn enough ‘personal development time’ to come here off-record, but I only have two days left before I have to check in with them again. Other than this, to come here and find you, I haven’t had a day to myself in years.”
I know this will hurt her. Anemone cannot fathom having her time controlled for her. Her lip quivers sorrowfully. “Ray, I’m sorry.”
“I don’t care about you feeling fucking sorry!” Something has snapped, and I am raging. “I need money! I need to pay them back!”
“Why did you even let them take you in?!” Suddenly, she’s rising to meet me, and her eyes turn a brilliant crimson in response. “You could have just run, you big fucking idiot!”
“And end my reputation as a hunter, is that what you’re suggesting?”
“Oh, fucking… reputation doesn’t mean anything!”
“That’s so easy for you to say!” I’ve drawn close, perhaps unwisely, but Anemone flinches back from my bellowing instead of striking me. “Pretty, smiling Anemone doesn’t make enemies! I have scores of them! You know full well the sort of people that we came up against in our line of work, and they don’t forget things easily! Fuck, I probably have enemies that were meant for you, is why you’re naïve enough to say reputation doesn’t matter! I’m bearing your debts! And if I didn’t show that I can take responsibility for failure, I’d be out of a job for fucking life!”
“Then just…”
“What?” I ask when she doesn’t finish her thought. “Just start again from scratch? You think I’m capable of that? It’s been too long! I’m not-…!”
I’m not that strong, I almost say, but I slam my mouth shut and the weakness does not materialise.
She looks up when I am silent, and I hate that she’s being sympathetic. She looks guilty. She looks sad for me. I hadn’t expected that. Grimacing angrily, I fold my arms again and take a step back.
“Why do it, Nemi?” I ask, reverting to the name she was using when we first met out of habit. “Can you explain that? Please tell me that the reason for abandoning me was worth everything I’ve been through, at least.”
“It’s Annie…” Anemone swallows nervously. “And the reason… I talked with Sapphire on the ship that day we left you behind, and she told me that didn’t want to go home. That’s all.”
“She didn’t want to be rescued?”
“Oh, she wanted to be rescued,” Nemi chuckles darkly. “Who wouldn’t? You saw the baron’s estate. Those back rooms… But she didn’t want to go back to her dad, either.
“He was worried enough to pay the Reclamation Agency to hire us to get her out,” I remark.
“That doesn’t make him a good dad, Ray. And Saph just… wanted to see the stars for herself. She didn’t want to go back to her palace. She wanted…”
Anemone sighs. She knows that I won’t like her reason for turning her back on me. Sapphire wanted to be free, she’s trying to say. She wanted to be as free as Anemone. And that was enough for the bounty hunter to forget about paying the bill and make her wish come true.
“I could have let her go and then stayed with you,” Anemone continues quietly. “But I knew she wouldn’t last a week out here in the galaxy by herself. She’s a really clever girl, but she wasn’t space-smart in those early days, you know? She had to have someone watching over her.”
“Then why not let me come, too?”
“Because I know you’re sensible!” she implores with an edge of spite. “And I knew you’d want us to go back to the Agency! I should have seen that you’d do that by yourself anyway, but I knew that if you were with me, you’d… convince me to do the right thing, too. You’re always getting me to be sensible, like you. I knew that if I helped Sapphire, I had to… commit to being a bad girl. I hate that you suffered for that, but I hope you know that I didn’t want any of what happened to you.”
“That’s…” I sigh, looking to the floor and shaking my head. “That’s not good enough. I trusted you, and apparently that was stupid of me. I don’t care about Sapphire, not after everything that’s happened since then. I don’t care how much she wanted to be a free agent like you. That really is the least of my concerns.”
Anemone closes her eyes and shakes her head sadly. I tip my head back and stare up at the ceiling to keep from feeling sorry for her. Reinforced metal tiling keeps the heavy building up over the wide caverns of the basement of the club.
“So,” I say eventually, when I’ve forced my semi-mechanical heart back together. “You know the situation, now. I need money. How much do you have?”
“Ray…”
“This burden is yours, Nemi. You have a responsibility to shoulder it with me.”
“It’s Annie!” she growls, and her restraint rattles when she pulls her wrist up towards her chest. “And I’m broke too! I have nothing, Ray! I wish I did…”
“Nothing?”
“I got here on public transport,” she laughs. “I was going to get some guy to give me a roof tonight, maybe buy me breakfast if I was decent in the sack. But I haven’t eaten enough today, so I can’t drink the booze here even if I could afford it.”
“You’re lying.”
“I… I’m not… I wish you could trust me on that. You always used to trust me.”
I shake my head firmly. “Not possible.”
“I know. I get that. Ray… I really don’t have anything to my name. Really. But…”
I glare at her when she doesn’t finish her sentence. “But?”
Nemi tucks some spined hair behind one ear shyly. Her eyes are on her shoes. “I mean… I can’t give you money, but…”
“What?” I demand.
“I know you can’t walk out of here with nothing, so…”
“Anemone, what?”
“It’s Annie…” she smiles. There’s red in her cheeks, the most natural colour on her whole body. “Would you… like to have sex with me, Ray?”
I take a solid step away from her. “What the hell did you say?” I breathe.
“We’ve never done it before,” she implores me, “but I can tell you’ve wanted to try! I never thought it would be worth risking our friendship for, but now we aren’t friends so… So, come on! You fuck me, hard as you like, and we’ll be even, right? That’s a fair trade, isn’t it?”
“That…” My mouth is dry. My head is spinning. “That won’t solve my financial issues, Nemi!”
“But it’ll make you feel good, and that’s all I want for you!” she says, eyes still sad but lips smiling broadly. “I am a good lay, you know! It’ll change your life! I bet Darke doesn’t let you sleep around on that hideous contract of theirs, so you must be bursting for some action! Come on, please? Fuck me, Ray… I want you to fuck me…”
This is a game. It has to be. She’s going to use this to trap me. She’s going to make me vulnerable, then stab me in the back again. I’d never have dreamed that of her when we were working together, but now I can’t help but believe it. She’s flighty. She’s opportunistic. She’s untrustworthy.
But she’s beautiful and sexy and spirited, and I would be lying if I said I hadn’t fantasised about a night together in those years we worked as partners. And in two days, when I click back into the Darke Network and get back to my job, it will be the end of my life. I’ll never get this much time to myself again. I’ll be a drone, operating on Darke’s command. So maybe I should just do it. And if she kills me while I’ve left myself open to protect her own interests, then maybe that’s also fine.
And in an instant, as my resolve falls away, I take her in my arms. I push her backward so her bum presses against the stone sink unit. She gasps, and I love the sound of her surprise, accompanied by the clink of the chain on her wrist. She tucks her free hand against her chest so that it’s held between us and then slides it up to my cheek. She pushes herself up on the toes of her sneakers and bumps her nose gently against mine. Her eyes are closed, accepting of her fate.
“You caught me,” she whispers. “Now punish me.”
“Nemi…” Her name is all I can think to say. But this makes her smile.
“It’s Annie,” she says.
And that’s all I needed. The dam breaks. I make sure to turn her about in the same direction as the chain on her restraint and then force her into a heavy forward lean against the sink unit. Both her hands are now flat on the stone, one cuffed and one free, and her bum naturally curves upward towards by growing erection. She feels good against me.
Anemone chuckles. “Yeah!” she hisses. “Fuck me good, Ray! I want you to-…”
The second restraint bolt comes down on her other hand with a click and a crunch, and Anemone’s eyes flare with anger in the mirror.
“For fuck’s sake!” she complains. “Why? You’ve already caught me, haven’t you? You don’t have to-…”
“Shut up.”
I’m shaking and aflame as I slide my hands down her back to her thighs and then push up her skirt. It turns out her underwear is jet black. I pull them down and slip a finger between her legs. She shudders. She’s not complaining anymore. She coats me in fluid. She’s very wet. And nothing snaps out to take off my finger. You never know, out here on the edges of the galaxy.
I struggle to get myself out of my trousers, that’s how hard I am. I wonder if a rage boner is a thing as I dazedly position Anemone against me. She moans encouragingly as my tip presses up her skirt and between her legs. Then I do it. I enter her.
Anemone lets her head fall forwards with a gasping wheeze of shock. “O-Ooh… Wow…!”
I begin. She feels phenomenal, a warm embrace around the solid, angry rod of my cock. She melts the tension clean away. And she’s moving her hips in time with my thrusting. She’s taking me in deeper.
“You and your implants,” she giggles breathlessly as I penetrate her. “You feel like you’ve had a bit of work done on your cock, there…”
I sink inside and hold myself against her back. I like the way I look in the mirror, looming over her shoulders as I take her from behind. There’s no reason to respond to her question. Still, I can’t find a reason not to, either.
“No implants there,” I whisper. “Too squeamish.”
“You mean this is all natural?” laughs Anemone. “Wow, Ray. You sure did win the genetic lottery, didn’t you?”
She peers over her shoulder at me with a flash of teeth and glowing, pink eyes.
“I should have-…” she begins.
I can tell I’m losing my control over her. Instead of listening, I reach up and grip her hair tightly with one hand, her hip with my other. And Anemone’s words fall apart into senseless moaning as I plough her aggressively.
I’ve never done this before. Sex, and the vulnerability it creates, terrifies me. I’ve loved and been loved, but always gently. Passionately, but carefully. This is different. I’m angry and I’m horny. I’m grieving and spitting and furious. Anemone has wronged me, and she left herself open in front of me. My wounded heart demands that I make an example of her for the sake of my ego. My cock insists that I make her regret crossing me!
I fuck her heavily against the sink unit. Each violent thrust brings with it memories of her. I use these as kindling to fuel the fires that ignite my sex.
I’m meeting her for the first time, my partner on a particularly dangerous mission for a third party. She turns her nose up at my use of technology to enhance my body. We fight together, back to back in the dusty ruins, and she laughs joyously as the sunlight hits her skin.
I’m signing my half of a contract for a small, four-man scout ship, and her name is emblazoned above mine. We call the ship the Sparrow Ark, a compromise between our two wildly differing naming ideas. Other people will come and go to help us crew it, but we’ll share this little space together for eight glorious months. Then, Sparrow goes down in flames over an ocean world after a miscalculation of the atmosphere.
I’m sitting down heavily in the dark interior of a cargo container, and she’s right beside me. We’ve been outplayed by the Viper Family, and they seal us away in preparation for selling us to slavers. Help comes before that can happen, but until it does, she is scared. She shouts at me until she is hoarse, blames me for our failures, and she hammers on the walls with her fists in a wild abandon. Then she crumples into a ball, and I hold her tight to keep her feeling safe. Until we are saved, and fresh starlight finally filters in through the entrance.
“S-Stop…!”
I’m being introduced to another boyfriend, and I don’t like the way he does his hair.
“Ray, wait!”
I’m watching the fucking yacht take off without me!
“Wait! Please, wait!!”
I blink out of my nostalgia and realise I’m breathing heavily. My cock aches with unspent tension, but not as much as my strained back. The sudden drop from a hundred to one leaves me shaking with fury.
“What?!”
“M-My legs…!” Anemone is fidgeting in my grip, and she is laughing breathlessly. “I can’t feel my legs! You… You’re really doing a number on me! Please… can I swap around?”
She tries to turn, but her hands are still sealed to the sink and my cock is deep within her. I’m not sure I can finish like this, anyway. A reset might help me climax. I growl as I step away from her and remove myself from her dripping pussy. Anemone’s bum shakes as I unsheathe myself.
“Thank you,” she smiles.
Next, I reach around her shoulders like a hug and touch both of her cuffs with my hands. They use simple bio-readers, like the one on the front of the building. Both cuffs beep happily at my command and then release their chains with a click. I leave the unchained cuffs on her wrists as I step back. I scowl at her in the mirror and gesture for her to prepare herself.
Anemone turns with a wince for her legs and leans back on the sink. She rubs her wrists under the metal of her cuffs. “Are you feeling any better?” she asks me.
“Fuck you.”
“Yeah, I get that,” she nods. “You’re all pent up, now. It really sucks, doesn’t it, not getting to release? One second.”
Anemone puts her hands on the sink top and pushes herself up until she is sitting on the stone with her creamy legs dangling. Her pants are hanging off the toe of one sneaker, so when she parts her legs, I can see every inch of her under her skirt. I’d always assumed she would trim her pubic hair, but she’s apparently left it natural.
“You do what you have to do, Ray,” smiles Nemi. “I’ll take it all, until you’re satisfied we’re even. Come here.”
I step into her embrace. I feel her legs wrapping about my hips. Her lips are close to mine, and I can taste her breath. Anemone lays her arms on my shoulders and leans in to kiss me. This will undo me, I know it.
So I pull back. I take her cuffed wrists and push upwards. Anemone gasps prettily as I press her hands up over her head and into a dominating hold against the mirror. Her smile is dark and mischievous.
The wrist cuffs beep as they fire their chains into the glass. A mighty crash as the mirror cracks. And her face falls as I leave her arms bolted to the wall.
“Fuck!!” She wriggles angrily against the new restraint. Her arms are fixed tightly over her head, but her legs are free. She knees me in the side a couple of times, but it isn’t a flexible angle for her, so I barely feel it. “Ray!” she complains. “Come on!”
I almost smile. But I’m too busy grabbing her bum with my hands and pulling her lower body closer to the edge of the sink unit. My erection tickles at the opening to her pussy, and with a flush in her cheeks and a pout on her lips, my nemesis relents.
“I didn’t take you for a sadist, Ray,” she grumbles.
But the tension in her expression melts away as I enter her again. Anemone rests her head to one side against one arm as she gives in to my treatment.
“M-Mmhm…” she mumbles.
Holding tight to her hips, I thrust into her with passion. This is much easier, it turns out. Maybe the felines who run this place designed the height of their sinks with sex in mind. Regardless, like this, where I can see her pretty face and the rise and fall of her breasts under her shirt, it’s perfect. I fuck her, and she feels incredible.
I let my lips tremble open as I work. I allow the growling gasps of pleasure out into the air. They are mirrored and mixed inside hers. Anemone is moaning, and so am I. She is writhing in time with my movements. I let the distant sound of thumping club music fill my ears. I let my thrusts match the inexorable beat of the anthem. Anemone’s back arches with mounting tension, and her moaning grows louder. She likes that I’m using the music to pace our sex, so I continue. I squeeze her thighs, pressing them firmly about my hips, and she squeals with pleasure.
Anemone. Nemi… Nemi… I’m so… so tired of hating her.
I cum. The force is incredible, and I have to lean forward with my hands pressed into the stone sink or else fall over. My head hangs over the pretty pattern of her pleated, tailored skirt. I hiss and gasp as my semen coats her insides. My cock shivers and twitches as it empties itself inside her. So good… Such relief.
I stagger backwards and take my leave of her pussy, but as I move out of range of Nemi, she begins thrashing around me.
“No!” she shouts. “N-No! Don’t stop! Don’t fucking stop!”
Instead of acknowledging her, I try to catch my breath by putting my hands on the small of my back. My cock looks ridiculous hanging out of my trousers like this, but I need a moment for my hands to stop feeling so numb before I can clean myself up. And I’m happy to watch her as I wait.
“Please, Ray! Please!” Anemone gasps with a scowl. “It’s cruel to leave me on the edge like this! Please, I… I’ll beg if I have to…! Wait, are you smiling?”
“No,” I tell her, and I can feel the lie in the shape of my words.
“Holy shit,” growls Anemone, bolted to the wall by her hands and with cum dripping out from between her legs. “You really are a sadist now.”
She pouts angrily in silence, and I fold my arms patiently. We hold each other’s gazes solidly. Confidently. Leaving nothing back. Eventually, Anemone pointedly opens her legs and wriggles her hips at me. And in time, I relent.
Stepping forward, I press my thumb into the wet folds of her vagina. Immediately, she starts rocking greedily against me. She has her teeth gritted and sweat on her brow. Her eyes have turned a luminous yellow like a cat’s. I rub her clitoris vigorously. No reason to let her suffer, after all.
Suddenly, her legs clamp around my waist. I wonder if this is the moment she has chosen to end me, but instead, Anemone groans out a painful-sounding climax. Her shoulders tense up and cause the chains on her wrists to jingle. Her eyes bore into mine.
She’s… really quite beautiful. She isn’t at all like I had imagined she would look when climaxing. She’s not serenely smiling and in control. She’s not laughing proudly and mockingly. She’s desperate, flustered and sharp. She’s needy and vulnerable.
In the afterglow, with her breaths deepening and the colour in her cheeks receding, Anemone regards her own pussy critically.
“You really filled me up, huh,” she remarks, clicking her teeth. “I need to take something for that before you end up becoming a dad.”
I roll my eyes at her, and I say nothing.
“So?”
I meet her gaze and shrug when she doesn’t elaborate.
“Are we even?” she asks. “You don’t need to punish me anymore?”
I’ll have to go back to work after this, and she’s to blame. I’ll never see freedom again, and she’s to blame. But right now, with her sweaty, wriggling form spent by my sex and my cock warm with satisfaction, I cannot fathom the coming of the sunrise.
“Fine,” I manage softly.
“Cool,” she smirks. “Then let me down.”
I suppose it’s what she’s owed. I can feel her breath on my face when I reach up her body towards her sealed wrists. It’s tempting to squeeze her breasts while I have the chance to do so, since I still don’t know what they feel like. But I relent. I can’t indulge myself after saying I was done.
Still, I let my fingers slide up the woollen sleeves of her jacket, slightly damp from sweat, and I revel in the softness of the skin of her wrists before gripping the dark metal of the restraining bolts. I press down, and they come away from the wall. She lets me take her hands down into her lap, and she looks down at them as I hold her. I take my time removing the restraints. It’s nice to be together for a moment, and I know it’s the last time we’ll do so. It’s better we never see each other again after this final, messy reunion.
And with that thought, the cuffs come off.
“Thank you,” she says softly as I come away from the sink and slide the restraints back into my pack. Then, “Hey.”
I look up from adjusting my jacket and wiping down the slightly slick front of my trousers. “What?”
“We aren’t enemies anymore, right?” she asks. Anemone has come forward on the sink unit with her creamy legs together, and they swing playfully. Her black pants have dropped to the restroom floor. Her hands hold the edge of the unit lightly. And she is smiling. “I stabbed you in the back, then you caught me and made me pay for what I’d done. I’ll tell anyone who doubts your reputation the same thing.”
“You don’t have to do that,” I frown, but she shakes her head. The little ornament in her hair bonks her on the nose.
“It’s only fair,” she says. “But considering our relationship is now back to zero, do you… fancy a job?”
My mouth drops open. A job? After all this? She must be mad. Madder than I already knew she was.
But I’m not saying no, so Anemone grins as she reaches up and touches at her little metal ornament with her thumb and forefinger. There’s a tiny burst of data from the device, and then I am receiving a file into my eye implants. I had no idea the butterfly was a data unit. She usually doesn’t wear things like that. The file is an infiltration and reclamation mission specification, and I run my attention over it. And the reward is…
“This is a joke,” I scowl. “You’re playing a game with this.”
“No, no,” assures Anemone. “It’s real. The sponsor asked for me specifically. And it’s here on this planet. That’s why I came here, you know. I was planning on getting started after unwinding by having a bit of fun with the locals. You get it.”
The reward for this operation would put me neatly out of debt with the Darke Group. It would even leave a little left over. All for the recovery of a certain art item from the security room of some sort of luxury casino on the local mainland. If their defences are anything like those of The Counting House, a building I just finished breaking into and assaulting a guest in, this operation would be child’s play. The fact that this sponsor of hers is willing to pay so much for professional help must make the item sentimentally valuable. Or maybe they’re some rich tycoon with more money than sense. Or, even more likely, they’re just a fan of Anemone specifically.
“We do work well together,” Anemone smiles. “Working alone for these past years has shown me how much I’ve grown to rely on your techno-abilities. It’s been hard without you. And if you have those two development-whatever-days you said you did, you could help me out before you go back to Darke, right? I’d be happy to split the money in your favour, if that makes a difference.”
She can’t think I would trust her. I’ve just gotten done showing her how bitterly I hated her for betraying me. She cannot seriously think I would overlook her absconding and give her another chance to twist the knife in me. She must know by now that I’m not a fool.
…I’m not, am I? I’m looking at her, gazing at her. The playful swing of her bare legs, the winning smile on her glossy, pink lips. And I realise that I do trust her. I have to stall while I figure myself out, so I read over the report in a bit more detail.
It looks like the mission already has an insertion mapped out in its specification. The sponsor has booked out a room in the casino’s hotel for tomorrow night. It’s the honeymoon suite. The operatives would have to play at being a newly married couple before they began the extraction of the art item from the vault early the next morning. It would mean a night together with Nemi, spent in a luxurious hotel…
And we’ve already had sex. We’ve already proven that we can have fun together.
Anemone is watching me. “You have something more important to do?” she teases.
And suddenly, it all falls into place.
I came to this planet in pursuit of her, and I knew she was here because she was spotted by someone on the public Hunter Watch forums. Anemone is pretty and wild, so she has her fans. But it’s strange that she let them catch sight of her. If she came here for a job, she shouldn’t have revealed that she was enroute. Local authorities with an eye on the net might have warned the casino that a famous illicit operations specialist was on-world. She should have come here secretly, and I think she knows that.
Then, my scans picked her up on the planetary municipal security camera network, which I could have sworn she’d be too clever for. She hates having her picture taken. Why the slip-up?
I catch her, and she doesn’t have the money I need. So she lets me fuck her. To get even, she says. Then, there happens to be a mission that my skills would help her with, one I never would have dreamed I would help her with while still in the throes of my grudge. A mission that involves spending the night with her.
And didn’t I change the data entry number for my implants when I joined Darke? How did she send that file to me just now when I haven’t told her my new number?
I stare at Anemone’s glistening eyes, now a rich mahogany brown. Her natural eyes, I realise. And I also realise that I have been played. Masterfully.
“What’s that look for?” grins Nemi. “Are you in or not?”
I open my mouth to tell her I’m all in, since I can’t even fathom being anything else. But then the restroom door comes crashing down, and Nemi has to wait for my answer. First, we have to fight our way free of the authorities.
shortstory
Ewan Stone 
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