Episode 21
“I need a small favor,” Dr. Foxfire whispered softly.
Setting across from her in a dimly lit corner booth of The Rat Hole a gruff man
nodded his understanding. Of course the wily she-fox had called him for a
favor; she never reached out to him unless there was something she needed. He
had known her for many a year, he had even helped scrounge the necessary
elements together to make her escape to a quiet sector of space so long ago.
You might say surviving in any situation was his specialty. It was one of the
little ironies he enjoyed as many a customer came in need of his services to
ask in hushed tones amid back alleys for ‘the coyote.’
If only they truly knew just how true that moniker really
was. Perhaps if they had even a hint of how aptly he had been named. But he was
getting distracted again from the matter at hand. The dear doctor had caught
wind of something that had ruffled her fur or sparked her curiosity and either
was a dangerous thing to toy with in his estimation. “So what has managed to
get your tail in a twist this time?” He asked impatiently and took another draw
from his almost empty glass.
“Daniel, you know I never call on you arbitrarily,” Dr.
Foxfire began to explain. “But certain events have transpired that demand I
look into them. Things that could threaten to reveal my past and jeopardize a
lot of innocent lives. Including your own, I am afraid.” She noticed her
cautious companion was quick to raise an eyebrow at the proposed danger to him.
It was a safe bet to effectively lure him into helping her Dr. Foxfire had
always been able to rely on. Daniel may be a shameless scavenger with a
notorious reputation for doing just about anything for the right money, but the
one thing he held higher than anything else was his own well-being.
“Well, since you put it that way,” Daniel declared with a
weak cough to clear his throat as he playfully regarded his glass. “I think I
am going to need another drink and you are definitely picking up the tab this
time.” The attempted humor failed to mask the somber seriousness behind his
eyes as his full attention turned itself directly towards Dr. Foxfire. “What’s
up, doc,” he finally asked when his second full glass arrived to rest before
him. But instead of drinking it, Dr. Foxfire made a mental note of how her old
acquaintance merely held it in his hand and rolled it around.
Something about her implied query was worrying him that much
she was sure of. Yet if it was the concern of someone involved or just his
usual desire for self-preservation she couldn’t say. But either way she needed
to know the kinds of information that he might have access to. If someone had
smuggled something onto Gallu then Daniel Latran would be the one person sure
to know.
“Come on, Dan,” Dr. Foxfire implored with her best
‘I-am-not-amused’ stare. “We both know if someone wants anything to leave or
arrive without questions that they talk to you. And there is no way in the
entire outer rim that a ship could land here without its passengers or contents
undergoing a standard security check. Remember the kinds of things they check
for? Dangerous pathogens, illegal goods, wanted criminals and the whole lot;
nothing gets off until everything checks out. So I want you to just go right
ahead and tell me who would want to transport a feral shifter to Gallu just to
release him on its people. Let’s part the veil here and now; people are dying
and if I don’t find some answers the trail just might lead back to us with a
whole mad mob behind it. And you don’t need me to remind you how quickly such a
gathering can jump to conclusion about those of us with furrier dispositions.”
Suddenly Daniel’s throat was impossibly dry. He knew he
never should have taken that job in the first place, it had never felt right to
begin with even if the payoff had been a stack of hard coin high enough to make
him forget such hesitations. As much as he hated to admit it the foxy doctor
had a good point. If a shifter had gone savage and been released on a backwater
world like Gallu it would only be a matter of time before word got out. And
then anyone even remotely hairier than generally accepted would bare the brunt
of the blame. Not to mention the corresponding vengeance of anyone with even a
measure of suffered loss.
“Alright, alright,” Daniel said simply with both hands held
out before him as if he gestured for the whole world to pause for him. He
nervously licked at his lips and closed his eyes to try and recall as much of
the details as he could manage. Typically he tried to avoid as much of the
specifics as he might to preserve his own ability to claim ignorance later. But
on occasion he came across a job that even he couldn’t completely remain
untouched by. And when you were getting paid in the manner that he was it was
far too foolish not to keep an eye on the turning gears lest you find yourself
crushed by their movements. He really hadn’t managed to stay alive and kicking
this long in his line of work without learning from his experiences.
“A coded com channel is how I was approached, you know the
routine. At first it was just a nameless middleman wanting a meet to offer me a
job. Seemed simple enough, but simple often leads to skinned hides so I entered
into everything extra wary. The whole matter was altogether hush-hush all the
way down to them paying me in hard coin to avoid the issue of traced funds.
There was no names, no records just a word to ear arrangement. They wanted me
to help ensure a package was safely delivered to Gallu and no questions would
be asked along the way to complicate matters. That was it.
Which, I have to admit puzzled me. Usually if someone wants
my services it is for the entire deal – including getting whatever it is onto
the world and reporting the jobs completion. But this one they just wanted me
to make sure it arrived to Gallu orbit, not onto the world itself. So I
naturally expected competition, especially with the pay I was receiving. I mean
think about it, if they were just paying me so well to do the easy part they
must have someone else on site to finish the job that would have to be getting
as much or more. And I despise competition.”
Daniel definitely did enjoy painting himself in a brighter
light, Dr. Foxfire decided. But she needed the condensed version of the tale
right now. “Skip to the important bits Dan, before I accidentally forget that you
have on occasion done some decent things in your life,” she advised. It didn’t
take an overly clever coyote to see that the doctor was seriously stressed by
the situation. So Dan quickly agreed that perhaps it was a good idea to bypass
the sweeping strokes and get to the point.
“Long story short, I did my own deductive digging and came
up with only one thing. The group that hired me was none other than the
Magistrate Council itself,” Dan answered and then made his drink vanish in a
single swallow. “And now I think it is best if I turn tail to get myself clear
of this whole system for a bit. Care to join me doc?”
“No,” Dr. Foxfire said absently as she tried to make sense
of this new piece of information. “No, I think I still have some work to finish
here first.” There was someone else out there in the night doing his job as
promised and she had agreed to do her best in return. She owed it to Gabriel to
stick around to help him. Because if anyone could stop this thing without
becoming a monster themselves she had faith that it was that miraculous man.
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