Chapter 30

Benson’s quadcopter passed low over a warzone.

“Ho. Lee. Shit,” Korolev whispered.

“Cuut be merciful,” Kexx said solemnly.

“I’ll need one of those rifles,” Sakiko added with all sincerity.

The scene below them was appropriately apocalyptic. The Native Quarter was quiet, eerily hollow. But it only took a glance to understand why. The Atlantians had emptied their ghetto and moved on the rest of the city in force. A wave of native youths crashed against Shambhala’s defenders and scattered them like leaves in a strong autumn wind. The Glades were already lost. Benson spotted his home of the last eighteen years as they flew by. It had not been spared.

The muscles in Benson’s jaw clenched involuntarily. “I just trimmed those topiaries,” he said, trying to force some levity onto the grim situation, but it didn’t take. Smoke columns billowed up into the sky from a dozen or more structural fires, which was no mean trick. Humanity had spent the last two centuries and change living onboard a starship. Fire consumed irreplaceable resources, burned through precious oxygen, poisoned the air, and clogged the environmental filters. In space, it was the greatest threat they faced outside of catastrophic meteor collisions. Out of necessity, they’d gotten very good at fire-resistant materials and fire-suppression systems. You really needed to want a building to burn to get it to stay lit.

Public transit was already offline after someone had torn up a length of track, electrocuting themselves in the process. Benson had ordered Korolev to divert the quadcopter from the airfield and land it right on the roof of the station house.

They’d had to dodge a thunderstorm on the way back from the mine that ate up almost fifteen minutes of flight time. Their drone’s batteries were being drawn down to the dregs. A shutdown warning sounded through the cabin, alerting everyone that the quadcopter would perform a forced landing in fifteen seconds.

“We’re not going to make the station,” Korolev said.

“Override the shutdown,” Benson said.

“Are you serious?”

“They build spare capacity into everything. We’ll make it.”

“And if we’re short?”

“We’ll autorotate down.”

Korolev blew out a long breath and worked the controls. The alarm chime and countdown disappeared. “No offense, coach, but I’m going to take her a little lower. Just in case.”

“Oh, no, please do. I insist.”

Korolev set the copter’s altitude to ten meters, which was still a hell of a long way to fall if it came to that. The two- and three-story rooftops of Shambhala’s residential district swept by underneath them at disturbingly close proximity. The nest of com antennas perched on the station house’s roof came into view. Another two hundred meters. They were going to make it.

Right up until the propellers stopped spinning.

The quadcopter died around them, first the even whine of the electric flight motors, then the augmented reality overlay and heads up display in the canopy. Benson’s stomach lurched as the quad abruptly lost airspeed and altitude.

“Brace! Brace! Brace!” Korolev shouted frantically just as the bottom of their fuselage clipped the first rooftop and compressed the spines of everyone aboard into their fight chairs. Everyone except maybe Kexx, who didn’t technically have a spine, but–

The forward arms of the quadcopter crashed headlong into the second story of a café. The motors snapped off at the roots among the clinking of a thousand shards of shattered window glass. The copter held there for a long moment, until gravity won out and dragged the back of it towards Gaia’s embrace as it slid down the building’s faux-brick exterior, ripping off chunks of veneer as it fell.

The rear motors hit the sidewalk first, shattering the propellers and fraying the carbon composite of the structural members that held them. What remained of the quad fell backwards and came to rest upside down next to a gelato cart abandoned by its owner.

Korolev hung from his seat’s five-point harness. “Spare capacity, huh, coach?”

“Shut up, Pavel.” Benson craned his head back to the rest of the passenger compartment. “Everyone OK back there?”

“I am intact,” Kexx said.

“Still need that rifle,” Sakiko answered.

“When you’re older,” Benson said, then braced his good hand against the top, now bottom, of the canopy and hit the release on his crash web. The anchors of the five-point harness came loose with a metallic click and sent Benson falling towards the roof, floor. He tried to open the starboard side door, but it wouldn’t give, not even with a shoulder check of encouragement. The portside door was more accommodating.

“I’m never flying again,” Benson said.

<Bryan!> Theresa’s voice burst through his plant link without a connection request. <Bryan, we saw your quad go down. Did you just crash?>

<Me? Oh, I’m great. Surrounded by rioting aliens and getting sick of my lunatic husband trying to find new and innovative ways to kill himself. But other than that…>

<We’re about a hundred meters from the station house. We’re going to go get in our crowd control kits and head your way.>

<10-4.> Benson stuck his head back inside the downed quadrotor’s cabin. “C’mon kids, time to get out of bed. Mommy’s pissed.”

Bumped and bruised, but none the worse for wear, they recovered what little equipment they’d brought along from the quad’s storage compartment and pushed hard for the station house where Benson and Korolev could get into the rest of their riot gear. There might even be spares lying around for Sakiko. Kexx, well, ze was already pretty damned hard to kill. Ze’d manage.

The normally bustling street that divided the Glades from the Museum District was bare, and eerily silent. The sounds of chanted slogans, crackling of fires, and smashing of windows filtered through the alleys from several blocks away. Remote enough not to present an immediate threat, but ominous all the same. Benson led his mismatched little quartet down the center of the avenue. They were exposed, walking in plain sight, but the wide lanes gave them plenty of visibility and time to respond to any surprises that might pop out from around a corner.

Assuming the rioters hadn’t gotten their hands on any rifles.

Benson crossed mental fingers and pressed on. Fortunately, they arrived at the doors of the station house without any amateur snipers throwing potshots downrange at them. The equipment lockers inside had been thoroughly picked through, but Korolev’s personal gear was still there, and he managed to scrounge up some older, mismatched pieces for Benson and Sakiko.

They emerged a handful of minutes later donning well-worn and somewhat ill-fitting helmets, chest protectors, shoulder pads, forearm guards, groin and thigh coverings, knee pads, and shin guards. It wasn’t ballistic rated, but it would do the job against blunt objects like clubs, thrown rocks, and most edged weapons. There were gaps in the armor all over the place, especially the joints, but it would have to do.

Benson had grabbed a hard plastic tonfa, as well as a clear acrylic shield that already carried the scratches of several past engagements. Sakiko still wanted a rifle, but Korolev put the kibosh on that idea real quick. And since he was the only one with the access codes to the weapons locker, it was his call.

“It’s itchy,” Sakiko complained as they marched towards the Museum.

“Yeah, well we usually wear shirts and pants under the armor, kiddo,” Benson said. “It’s going to be ugly when we get there. Stay close to Kexx and me.” Benson expected a fight, or a biting retort, but the gravity of the situation had apparently worked its way into even the teenager’s brain. She’d been somewhat more somber since they’d discovered Foreman Lind’s body. Sometimes growing up took years. Sometimes, it happened in an afternoon.

<Esa,> Benson linked up with his wife’s plant. <We’re two minutes out. What’s it look like over there?>

Benson started to jog despite the extra weight of the gear. He’d never given into the temptation to let his workout routine slide, even as the battle grew increasingly difficult as the years piled on. Now, he was really glad he’d been so hard on himself. The rest of the quartet followed suit. The sounds of unrest grew in intensity as the Museum itself came into sight until they drowned out all other noise.

“They’re really worked up,” Korolev said. “I can barely hear myself think!”

“Lucky you don’t do much of it, then,” Benson shouted back. “Switch to the squad link. Kexx, Sakiko, just stay close and keep an eye out for hand signals. You might not be able to hear anything over this racket. And stay sharp. Theresa says half these kids are high as kites.”

“Lovely,” Kexx said.

The Museum campus sat at the very end of the long central avenue that bisected the district. Theresa’s forces had set up a perimeter spanning from one side of the avenue to the other with a string of safety barriers and constables wearing the same sort of riot gear Benson and Korolev were wearing, plastic shields, and a variety of less-than-lethal weapons ranging from batons, to tonfas, to stun sticks. A couple of the constables even held the shock shields they used in the jail for extracting noncompliant inmates from their cells. Benson spotted a dozen PDW rifles identical to the one Korolev carried, but they were shoulder slung and being kept out of the confrontation. For now.

But the safety barriers were flimsy affairs, meant more as visual warnings around construction sites than proper barricades. The line of constables worked to hold their ground, but a constant barrage of rocks and debris rained down on them, thrown from deeper in the crowd with the unnerving accuracy Atlantians possessed. The defenders had to split their attention between incoming missiles overhead, and the pulsing mass of bodies on just the other side of their inadequate blockade.

In the crowd’s wake, desolation ruled. Every window and door along the boulevard was smashed or splintered. Awnings had been ripped off their frames. Recycling cans were either tipped over with their contents strewn about the street, thrown through storefront windows, or set ablaze. Benches were torn free of their foundations, and several of them had been passed overhead to the very front of the crowd where they were being used as makeshift shields, battering rams, or counter barriers. Street lamps had been pulled down or had their LED bulbs smashed. All of the bushes, trees, and landscaping had been uprooted, slashed, and torn up by thousands of grasping toes. It would take months to repair the damage, and set their manufacturing queue back just as long.

The throngs of rioters flowed and convulsed like a violent sea. Most of them had taken off their shirts and let their skinglow run wild with waves of harsh patterns and light. But these Atlantians had mostly grown up in Shambhala. They lacked the fine control over their skin of their kin across the ocean. Whereas a large gathering of warriors, or a village assembled in ritual prayer looked like a single, coherent, interconnected organism. But this mob, they looked like static loudly blaring from a broken video display.

But as they approached the line, the rioters’ chants became clear enough. The translation matrix in his plant lagged trying to sort out the different voices from the din, but Benson didn’t need it. “Defilers of Varr,” they shouted, over and over, as if in a trance. The rhythm of it all was almost… hypnotic.

Benson found the hedonistic crowd’s newfound piety more than a little convenient, but then riots were seldom about their cause célèbre, not really. It was a spark, an ignition source for a preexisting, highly-combustible mix of social grievances, economic stagnation, and emotional despair. Couple those fuel sources with thousands of listless, frustrated, drugged-up youths, and you had the perfect fire triangle of social upheaval.

The ingredients had been present for years, but the humans of Shambhala had let them fester in the dark, so obsessed they were with keeping their eyes fixed on a brighter future they refused to look down and see the suffering around them. Now, they were paying the price for that neglectful hubris. All Benson and his allies could do was work to contain the damage.

A bench came crashing down on one of the barriers, splintering it into a hundred white and orange plastic shards. Emboldened by the breach in the line, the mob surged forward and pressed against the defenders. The center of the line bulged and threatened to break entirely.

<We’re here, Esa,> Benson sent. <Where do you need us?>

<Roger.> Benson grabbed Korolev by the shoulder and opened the squad link. <Patch up the middle. Don’t point that cannon at anyone unless they start throwing spears or something really serious.>

<Understood.>

Benson turned to Kexx and Sakiko. “We’re going up the center. Stay on my ass and back me up!” he shouted over the surging crowd.

The four of them joined the rest of the thin blue line separating civilization from chaos. Theresa had called in her reserves, which included many of the Mustang’s bench of players, including several brave Atlantians standing up to defend the city from their own kin. Benson finally spotted the outline of his wife, standing right in the thick of the action because of course she was. He pushed towards her position at the breech in the middle of the line.

<Hello, dear. Sorry I’m–> Benson’s sentence stopped dead when Theresa turned around to look at him. Half of the clear plastic face guard attached to her helmet had cracked and fallen away. An angry purple bruise and a stream of blood dripped from her left cheekbone.

<You’re hurt,> he said flatly.

<I’m fine.>

<Who did it?> he said as vengeance rose in his throat, but Theresa slapped him down.

<Bryan, I need you here, doing your job as a reserve deputy. Not settling scores. Clear?>

<Yes ma’am,> he said sheepishly, and advanced to fill in a gap in their coverage. Even in his fifties, Benson was not a small man. He presented a large, tempting target, especially for adolescents with a chip on their shoulders. A lot of people would like a chance to earn the title of the one who beat the Zero hero.

A fist-sized chunk of masonry came flying in at an oblique angle, but Benson got his shield up in time and it skipped harmlessly off the acrylic, leaving another new scratch to mark its course.

“Gunna have to do better than that!” Benson shouted in challenge to the mob.

It answered with a bigger rock that left a crack in his shield.

<Maybe don’t antagonize them, honey. They’re plenty angry already,> Theresa said.

<I see that now.> Benson changed tactics. “Hey Sco’Val! Has the Bearer figured out you planted that bomb in the Temple yet?”

“You lie!” Sco’Val shouted, loud enough to be heard over the din.

“I saw how you looked at it, Sco’Val. You also knew where the drug house was. And now you’re inciting a riot along with all these kids you gave the bak’ri to. You’re under arrest as soon as I get my hands around your skinny little neck.”

“Do your worst, defiler!” Sco’Val physically shoved several hesitant rioters towards the line. They pressed in with renewed vigor, bowed the barricades inward and put the defenders behind them on their back feet.

<Bryan, why do you never listen?> Theresa demanded.

<How’s that working out?>

Driven by bak’ri courage, a squirrely little Atlantian managed to squirt between the legs of two of the defenders on the line, causing one of them to turn their back on the rest of the crowd to try and tackle zer. It was a rookie mistake, a reflex Benson had to train out of his linemen as they learned to trust their linebackers and secondary to pick up anyone who gets by.

The crowd sensed the break in the line and pressed, shoving the turned man to his knees while five, then ten, then twenty rioters flowed over him like hydraulic fluid spraying from a hole in a hose. Nearby constables and deputies moved to contain the spill, but that left the line thin in other places, emboldening the crowd up and down the barriers to press their newfound advantage. Rioters broke through in two more places, and suddenly Theresa’s constables were being flanked.

Benson knew a breakdown in protection when he saw one. They were being blitzed, and there just weren’t enough linemen to hold back the flood.

<Forget it,> he said to Theresa. <We’re boned.>

Begrudgingly, Theresa agreed. She didn’t like giving ground in a fight. It ran counter to her nature. But she sent out the order to withdraw and regroup anyway, because she liked losing even less.

They retreated… tactically repositioned themselves halfway up the steps to the Museum’s main entrance. The higher ground meant the rioters had to climb up to meet them, and gave Theresa a much better field of view over the situation from which to direct her constables. Distinct advantages in a battle when your opponents didn’t possess firearms.

But as good as their position was, the mob’s advantage in sheer numbers rendered any small tactical advantage moot. Their backs were against the wall now, literally. By abandoning the avenue, they’d also allowed the riots to engulf them on three sides. The crush of Atlantian youths, chanting and hurling debris, closed in on the few dozen defenders like a rising tide. A defender went down. Linqvist, an absolute brute of a man who had played for the Mustangs as both a Zero goalie and later a football center. He’d been hit in the head, hard, but his plant data remained intact. He was conscious, but concussed, out of the fight. Kexx and Sakiko ran over to where he had slumped, dragged him up the steps to the rear by the handle on the back of his riot gear. Kexx ordered Sakiko to remain with him, then returned to zer position on the line.

<That does it,> Theresa barked into the com link. <Break out your sidearms and stun rounds. I want that front line pushed back, now!>

<We cross that line, there’s no going back, chief,> Korolev said apprehensively.

As if her plea had been heard, a thundering voice from on high blanketed the plaza like a sonic boom.

“Play. Time’s. Over. Kids.”

Everyone froze in place, collectively caught with their hands in the cookie jar, afraid to turn around to face their parent’s wrath.

<What the hell was that?> Benson said into the link.

<It came from the Museum’s public address system,> Korolev shot back.

Behind their deteriorating defensive line, the double doors of the Museum’s main entrance cracked loudly, then swung inward on creaking, ominous hinges. Behind them, clad in resplendent crimson samurai armor, a black-lacquered katana scabbard tied around her waist, stood Devorah. A tiny, furious vision in red.

Everyone, from the knot of constables, to the very back row of rioters, looked up to see what the diminutive woman would do next. Once she felt she held the crowd’s attention, Devorah stepped out and strode slowly, but purposefully down the stairs, her knees creaking nearly as much as the doors she’d just exited.

“You lot want to fight? Fine, knock yourselves out,” her voice boomed. She’d tied her plant into the Museum’s outdoor speakers and cranked the dial to eleven. “Rip down lights, tear up trees. Break windows. Have fun. But this!” She lifted an arm, shaking in equal measure from fresh rage and the weight of years, and pointed back at the entrance to the Museum. “This is the history of MY people. It is the collected work of a thousand generations of MY elders. And it’s the history of YOUR people, too. We have artifacts from Atlantis in there that go back to before the Shrinking. And it’s the history of what our Trident has already built together, here and across the sea.”

Devorah pushed her way through the line of constables, down to the foot of the steps of the Museum, her true home. Incredibly, the mob moved back, hollowing out a hemisphere of space around her.

“So have your little temper-tantrum out here, but before any one of you steps a wiggly toe inside my house…” She put a hand on the katana’s leather wrapped handle, and the sound of ringing metal echoed through the scene. “…you’ll have to fight me, personally.”

Devorah held the glimmering katana high in the air in a ready position as the last amber light of the day glinted off its centuries-old polished steel. “C’mon. I’m basically mummified already. Even the weakest among you could finish me off easily. Who wants to have a go?”

Devorah pointed the tip of her naked blade at one of the tallest Atlantians at the front of the column, who looked suspiciously like the one Theresa had to tase to keep zer from turning Benson into reddish pudding. “You, Hul’gik. I remember you from our summer program six years ago. You always had some smart comment for me. How about it?” Hul’gik was a full meter taller than Devorah, but under her sudden withering glare, ze seemed to shrink down to half zer size. “No? How about you, Jimale?” She pointed at another face she recognized a few rows back. “You were one of my fall interns two years ago. Did I cheat you out of lunch breaks or something?”

“Elder, I, um…” Jimale answered weakly.

“Nobody? You mean I got all dressed up for nothing? I had to have this armor fitted. Look, I’ve got another archeological expedition with G’tel to organize. So if you’re not going to have a proper riot, stop embarrassing yourselves and go the hell home!”

Cowed and humiliated, the crowd mulled about and shuffled their feet, but it was obvious Devorah’s chastisement had broken the spell of their bloodlust. Benson shook his head in disbelief.

As the back layers of the crowd began to peel away like an onion, Devorah turned around and walked back up the stairs, but paused on the third step. “And you’re all coming back here in the morning to help clean up the mess you left on my lawn!”

No one objected. No one said much of anything. Devorah turned around and started back up the steps again.

Benson jogged over and knelt down to hug the old woman. “Devorah, that was amazing. You really pulled us out of the fire with that bluff.”

“What? Them? They’re good kids, they just need a firm hand sometimes. Here, hold this.” Devorah handed the katana over to Benson. “It’s getting heavy and I need a damn nap.” The gathered officers watched as she returned to the Museum and the doors creaked shut behind her.

Benson just chuckled. “Crazy old bat. I’d hate to play her in poker.” He ran a thumb over the edge of the curved blade, and immediately regretted it.

“Ow!” Benson yelped as blood surged out from the slice on his thumb pad.

“What?” Theresa said.

“I cut myself on this damned sword.”

“Why the hell did you touch the edge?”

“I thought it was a prop!”

“That’s the Honjo Masamune katana. You really think Devorah would tolerate a prop in her collection?”

A chill gripped Benson’s heart as he regarded the still impossibly sharp weapon. “She wasn’t bluffing.”

“No.” Theresa said.

“She was really ready to fight them all by herself.”

“Yeah, if it came to that.”

“… She’s nuts.”

“Duh, we all knew that, Bryan.”

Benson pinched his thumb against his forefinger to stop the bleeding and held the katana away from himself at a more respectful distance. “Then why’d she give it to me?”

“Probably because she knew you’d hurt yourself,” Korolev added.

Benson was about to respond when a plant connection request popped up in his field of vision. A ‘weak signal’ alert hovered next to the tag for–

“Jian Feng?” Benson said aloud.

“What was that, dear?” Theresa asked.

“I’m getting a call request from Jian Feng.”

“That little idiot? His stunt is what caused all this!”

“Yes, I remember,” Benson said.

“What could he possibly want?”

Benson shrugged. “One way to find out.” He accepted the call. The image was grainy, about as compressed and low-def as he’d ever seen. The feed dragged and halted frequently, and was occasionally overwhelmed with static.

<Hello?> Benson said after several seconds.

<Mr Benson!> Jian said three and a half seconds later, and Benson understood why the feed was so weak. The time delay imposed by lightspeed put Jian at more than four hundred thousand kilometers away.

<Yes, Jian. It’s me. What can I do for you?>

Three and a half seconds later. <Actually, I’ve discovered information critical to your investigation.>

<Ah, that’s pretty incredible. In the original sense of the word. Last I heard, you were on your way to Varr in a stolen shuttle.>

<Yes, that’s true.>

<Yes, I did. You really need to listen to–>

Another feed broke in from Captain Chao Feng. He hadn’t bothered with a connection request.

<What the hell is going on here?> Chao demanded.

Jian’s face blanched. <Dad? How did you find this link?>

<Guys,> Benson said.

<What are you two conspiring about here?> Chao demanded.

<We’re not conspiring, I’m trying to tell Mr. Benson something important that I just discovered down here that he needs to>

<Guys. Can we maybe do this some other time? I’m right in the middle of cleaning up after a riot at the moment and could–>

<For fuck’s sake. Will one of you please listen to what I’m saying?> Benson said.

<So that’s how you got onto the local network,> Chao ignored him. <Very clever, but I’m cutting you off now. You’re in more than enough trouble as it is.>

<Guys!> Benson snapped. Both Chao and Jian paused, as if they’d forgotten he was there. <Good, now, I’m sure you two have a lot to work out in your father/son relationship at the moment, but I assure you, there are better and more appropriate places for that counseling session than inside my goddamn head. So, if there’s nothing else–>

<It’s about Benexx!> Jian interrupted.

<What? What did you say?>

Some… thing crawled up Jian’s arm and glared back at the camera with a triangle of green glowing eyes. It looked like something pulled up in a dredge net from the coldest depth of the blackest ocean.

<Him? That’s Polly, he’s mostly harmless.>

<Mostly?>

<Hardly, we tore up half the ship looking for that little móguǐ. But we’re losing the thread,> Chao Feng said. <My son believes he’s found a research or surveillance station of some kind. But until we know who built it, their motivations, and what their intentions for us and the rest of the Trident are, we cannot trust any information that comes from it, much less entertain the idea of using it as actionable intelligence.>

Jian rolled his eyes clear back to the base of his skull. <Fuck that. This place has taken no action against me or anyone else who’s set foot inside it. It’s even made me a nice little work station with heat, light, oxygen and everything. And Polly’s been nothing but helpful. We can trust this intel.>

<That’s it, I’m locking this channel.>

<No, Chao, wait!> Benson pleaded. <It’s my kid, Chao. Not the codes to the ship’s computer, my kid. Nothing is on the line except zer and whoever comes along with me to get zer back.>

Chao’s face contorted, his expressions of consternation and sympathy exaggerated by the microgravity.

<Chao, please. It’s my kid. Please.>

Chao sighed and rubbed at the furrows in his forehead. <It’s never fuckin’ easy with you, is it, Bryan? Fine, but from here on out, we’re so far off the record you couldn’t even see it with that big honking Early Warning telescope on the other side of Varr. Understood?>

<Yes,> Benson said.

<Yes, sir,> Jian said, the “sir” tacked on as a sign of both respect and contrition.

<One of the two of you is going to be the death of me,> Chao said.

<Who’s the odds-on favorite?> Benson asked.

<It’s even money. Commander Feng, please tell Mr Benson what you think you’ve learned.>

Jian squared himself up in his seat. <There’s an uncharted network of caves a few klicks northwest of one of our mining operations on the continent. Less than an hour ago, there was a seismic event that almost exactly matched the profile of the explosion at the First Contact Day parade. I believe something went wrong and one of their bombs went off prematurely, probably during construction.>

It wasn’t much, Benson had to admit, but it was something, and it was something he could move on immediately.

<Send me the coordinates,> Benson said coolly, trying to keep the sharp edge of vengeance out of his voice.

<It’ll do.>

Jian uploaded his best guess numbers and whatever other intel he’d gathered about the area. The moment Benson finished saving the file, Jian’s screen went dark, replaced by a “Loss of Signal” alert.

<Jian? Jian! What happened?>

<Don’t go off all half-cocked and get yourself killed.>

<Chao, I’m touched. Was that genuine concern I just heard?>

<Oh, neither of us will live long enough for you to pay me back on this one. Go get Benexx. Bring zer home safe. Ark Actual, out.>

Chao dropped the call, leaving Benson alone in his own head once more. A heartbeat later, he snapped out of it and returned to the world around him and the interrogative glare of his wife.

“Well?” Theresa demanded.

“Chao’s boy has a lead on the terrorist’s camp. We’re going there.”

“Now?”

“Now,” Benson said, then turned back to scan through the sea of former rioters as they tried to get out of each other’s way and return to their homes in the Native Quarter. “Hey!” Benson shouted at the familiar-looking brute. “Hey, you, Hul’gik isn’t it?”

“What do you want, ruleman?”

“You still feel like picking a fight?”

Theresa grabbed his arm. “Bryan, what the hell do you think you’re doing?”

“Networking.”

The enormous Atlantian rumbled to a stop at Benson’s feet, zer toes almost touching his. Benson had to crane his head up almost as far back as it would go just to stop seeing chest.

“Yes, I still want to fight,” ze grumbled.

“Excellent. Follow me. We’re going on a field trip.”

Thirty