Sixteen
Dita feigned sleep, waiting for Kralj to be called away, as he often was. Some of the potentially deadly situations in the Refuge required his physical presence. She usually joined him, standing by his side as the issue was resolved.
This planet rotation, when the silent communication finally came, she remained still, keeping her breathing level. Although she was tempted, she didn’t open her eyes as he pressed his lips against her forehead. She didn’t reach for him as he rolled off the sleeping support, taking his hard body, his entrancing heat away from her.
The doors closed behind him. Dita quietly dressed, verified her weapons were in place, slipped out of their chambers, hoping she’d return soon, see Kralj, the male she loved again.
He’d reprimand her, give her the spanking of her lifespan, and she wouldn’t protest because she would deserve it. She wasn’t a fool. Todt-933 had set a trap for her.
But Dita was compelled to do this, to take the risk. If Sari was alive, she had to rescue her. That was what a good friend would do. If Sari was dead, she needed to confirm that, see the body. Not knowing her friend’s fate would drive her insane.
The corridors were empty. Dita exited the structure through a back door. Dare, the Dracheon male standing guard, was arguing with an intoxicated male. It was easy to slip by him.
She hastened forward. The sun was breaking over the wall, painting the sky delicate pastel colors. Merchants were setting up their tents, displaying their goods, murmuring sleepy greetings to each other. Dita dashed from shadow to shadow, every length of darkness reminding her of Kralj.
I could search for the rest of eternity and never replace you. That wasn’t a declaration of love but it might be as close as he’d ever get to one. Her powerful male saw her as a unique being, special, one of a kind.
Dita had believed being normal would make beings care for her, bring her peace. She’d been wrong. The way Kralj looked at her, his eyes glowing, his grim face soft, communicated that. He allowed her to embrace her individuality.
Balvan guarded the gate. She paused, lingering out of view. He glanced upward. Dita ran, zigzagging between the display of corpses. She’d hunted many of those targets with Kralj, the two of them playing in the settlement they protected.
Once out of Balvan’s line of sight, she ran to the collection of ships parked in the designated stretch of flattened rocks. It was a simple feat to steal a skimmer, a small yet fast ship. It had been covered with a thin layer of sand, indicating it had been ground-bound for many planet rotations. The beings lingering in that section were few. There were newer vessels to tempt thieves.
The guard, a huge bald-headed male, didn’t look up from his private viewscreen when she started the engines, the floor tiles vibrating under her booted feet. No alarms were sounded. No one chased her.
Dita flew the ship toward the nearest beverage outlet, crafting plans in her mind. A few domiciles had been erected around the replenishing source. The inhabitants residing there serviced the travelers.
She guided her ship around the structures, circling the beverage outlet. The clone and his cronies would expect her to travel from the Refuge. She would attempt to surprise them and enter from the opposite direction.
Dita parked the skimmer out of human earshot range of the domiciles. She ran the rest of the way, her tread light, soundless, her senses on high alert. Smoke billowed from the structures. Her nose twitched. The scent of blood, of death clung to the air.
The first body she spotted was a female, a baby in her arms. She’d been ravished and then sliced to pieces or sliced to pieces and then ravished. It was difficult to determine which order. Even the baby had been abused, the head several strides away from the body.
Kralj called himself a monster but the males who did this were truly horrifying. They were cold, callous creatures with no hearts, their actions sickening Dita.
The next corpse was a child, a little boy with the same coloring as the female. He lay face down in the sand, multiple projectiles in his back, his gray flight suit torn.
The closer she trekked to the center, the more bodies she found. All were long dead, the blood dry and cracked on their skin, the insects feasting on them, a rare source of moisture in the parched terrain.
Sari could still be alive, she told herself. The chances of that were slim but Todt-933 knew the importance of the female to her. He’d talked with Yorick, Sari’s handler, would have heard how Dita had defended her. The clone could have taken her hostage, thinking to use her as a possible bargaining lever.
Dita ran. Finding cover was no longer an issue. Any traveler venturing close to the beverage outlet had been attacked, killed, their bodies, ships, possessions scattered over the sands.
The clone’s gang were vicious but not very bright. They should have kept the space clear, made it easier to monitor. It wouldn’t have stopped her but it would have slowed her progress. And they might have seen her.
She saw them. A human male stood between two huge white boulders. Todt-933 must have augmented his gang’s numbers with mercenaries. Dita pressed her back against a large container, hiding from his view.
That precaution wasn’t necessary. The male gazed down at a private viewscreen, oblivious to her presence, his stance relaxed, his long gun slung over his right shoulder.
She extracted one of her favorite daggers, crept toward him, moving slowly, slowly, slowly. He gave no indication he sensed her approach, the male chuckling at something he viewed. She reached around him and sliced his throat, cutting deep.
Blood spurted. He gurgled, fell to the sand, his legs kicking. She wiped her blade on his chest covering. There were warriors positioned to the left and right of him, out of sight but heard.
Dita resisted the urge to kill them. Saving Sari was her priority. She continued toward the beverage outlet.
Domiciles were positioned around that structure. A smaller, inner circle of warriors guarded them. These males were more alert, their guns in their hands.
They were still no match for her, a trained assassin. She threw a dagger and ran. The blade zinged through the air. The male she’d targeted didn’t have time to interpret what his eyes were seeing. The dagger pieced his throat, silencing him.
Another male turned, raised his gun. She flung a second dagger, rolled, yanked the first blade out of flesh. The second throw was another direct hit.
Her sense of satisfaction faded as she glanced at the beverage outlet.
Bodies were strapped to the pillars decorating the front façade. The males must have used them for target practice. Daggers, battle-axes, other weapons stuck out of their flesh, their garments shredded, fluttering in the breeze. Blood stained the strips of metal around their necks, wrists, ankles. Their eyes had been gouged, empty sockets where they’d once been.
One of the bodies belonged to Zeb, the leader of the settlers. She didn’t recognize two of the females. The third female’s identity froze her to the bone.
Sari’s neck had been pinned to the pillar with the dagger she’d given her. Dita grimaced. The bastards had used her gift to torment her friend, to kill her.
Sari was dead. She was too late to save her.
The female’s debt to the universe had been repaid.
That was the message Sari had relayed through Azalea and Kralj. Her friend had believed her destiny was to protect the girl, to save an innocent to offset the one she’d inadvertently killed.
She’d done that, settling her outstanding balance with pain, with torture, with death.
A scream crawled up Dita’s throat. She clamped her lips together, containing the sound.
She was an assassin, had killed thousands of beings, seen many more die, but this was different. This was a friend, a rarity in her solitary world. She cared for Sari.
And she was to blame for her death. Her friend had died because Dita hadn’t completed the assignment she’d been given. If she’d done her damn job, Sari would still be alive.
Dita sank to her knees, her shoulders slumping, the sand yielding under her weight.
She’d failed her friend, failed Azalea, failed everyone in the caravan.
Kralj would tell her to return to the settlement. He’d bark that order in his deep, dominant tone, sling her over his shoulder and smack her ass if she refused to listen.
Sari had been killed. There were no innocents to rescue. Todt-933 and his males had slain them all. Dita couldn’t change that.
But she could change the future.
Because the killing wouldn’t end. Every caravan approaching the beverage outlet would be attacked. Other beings’ friends would die. Other young females would be abused.
She had to stay, had to complete her assignment, end this.
Dita studied the terrain. Todt-933 would have males positioned inside the structure. There were more males guarding the far perimeter. She hadn’t killed them, not wanting to alarm the clone, thinking there were hostages to save.
When the males sounded the alarm, which they eventually would, she’d be pinned between the two groups of killers.
She’d die.
Assassins didn’t live long lifespans. She knew that. Dita rested her fingers on the battle-axe Kralj had given her. She had thought she’d have no regrets when the end came.
She’d been wrong. She regretted that she hadn’t told Kralj she loved him. She regretted that she’d never see his handsome face again, never touch him, never hear his voice.
But her honor wouldn’t allow her to walk away from her responsibilities. Dita couldn’t be selfish, couldn’t save herself at the expense of others. She’d vowed to protect the females of Carinae E and that was what she’d do.
Clearing the inner circle would increase her odds of success. Dita sprinted from domicile to domicile, slitting throats, throwing daggers.
She killed every male she spotted, retrieving her weapons from each target’s corpse. Every male whose life she ended was a male who couldn’t hurt another being.
She felt no regrets, not about their deaths. Her gaze drifted once more to Sari’s corpse. She had other sources of guilt.
Once the inner circle was clear, Dita studied the beverage outlet. It wasn’t as secure as the structure she’d shared with Kralj. Large viewing portholes made the inhabitants vulnerable, the clear substance penetrable by projectiles.
Dita ran, jumped, climbed up the side of the structure, perched on the roof, crouching. She switched her daggers for guns. Their weight in her hands felt right.
The males would protect their leader, positioning Todt-933 at the back of the beverage outlet. She ran across the roof, swung over the edge, blasted a round of projectiles through that porthole.
Males shouted. By the time they returned fire, she had pulled herself upward and had sprinted to the other side of the roof, replicating the assault through another porthole. The fools tried to shoot upward. The structure was designed for the desert, insulated against the hot sun. There was no breaching the roof.
She ran, swung over the edge, shot, pulled herself up, ran again, bombarding them from all portholes, all sides. The males tried to predict her movements and failed. The trainers at the Guild had taught her that a predictable assassin was a dead assassin.
The males eventually gave up on that and blasted every porthole with projectiles. One caught her in the left biceps. Pain shot up her arm. She gritted her teeth, swung onto the roof.
Warmth dripped over her fingers. Dita pushed the agony away. If she survived this assignment, she’d bind her wound. Until then, she had a task to complete.
The males continued to shoot out the portholes, that entry point temporarily barred to her. She traded her guns for a long gun and used the break to pick off males on the ground. Her vantage point put them at an extreme disadvantage. As they hurried to defend their leader, she shot them methodically, without emotion.
The projectile fire originating from the beverage outlet stopped. She resumed her portholes assault. There weren’t enough males remaining alive to cover all of them.
One by one, she eliminated them until no one returned fire.
Had she killed Todt-933? She looked around her. Warriors circled the beverage outlet, hiding behind structures. They talked on their private viewscreens to someone, likely their boss.
Todt-933 must still be alive, holed up in the beverage outlet, protected from her assaults. Shooting through the portholes wouldn’t accomplish anything other than wasting her limited stash of projectiles.
She had to switch tactics.
“Are you hiding from me, Todt-933?” Dita yelled loud enough for both him and the males surrounding her to hear. “Are you scared of one little female?”
“Fuck you,” the male hollered back.
“You couldn’t fuck me.” Dita laughed. “Todt-931 might have been able to. Maybe Todt-932. But you?” She snorted. “Not a chance, you short-haired excuse of a male. That would require facing me, a tiny female, and we all know you don’t the courage to do that.”
The males positioned around the beverage outlet frowned. A couple of them touched their longer locks. Her guess must have been correct. The length of a male’s hair signaled their ability to kill, to lead.
“You’re on the roof. You’ll shoot me as soon as I exit,” Todt-933 whined.
His minions looked at each other. Their opinion of the leader had dropped even lower.
“I won’t shoot you. I give you my word.” She holstered her guns. “I’ll use daggers only.” She chose her two favorite blades. “Unless you’re scared of those too.”
“Fuck you.” The male had a limited vocabulary.
“I’ll assume that is a ‘yes.’” She pointed one of her daggers at the closest male, a warrior with hair down to his shoulders. “What about you? Do you have the balls to lead this gang? If so, show us.” Dita tilted her head at the others. “Fight me, hand-to-hand combat, no guns, no explosives, nothing but daggers.”
“Fuck yeah.” The big brute tossed his guns to the side.
Dita’s lips twitched. He wasn’t very intelligent.
“Back down, Qifu.” Todt-933 barreled through the front doors. “I’m the leader of this gang.” His purple face dripped with sweat, his eyes wild. “I’ll fight her.”
“You can fight me, Qifu, after Todt-933 begs me for mercy.” She’d die eventually. She couldn’t kill them all, even if she fought them one at a time. But she would complete her assignment. Todt-933, her last target, would be dead.
“You’ll be the one begging for mercy.” Todt-933 extracted a huge blade. He must have believed bigger was better.
It wasn’t. Dita somersaulted off the roof and landed on her feet, planting her boots on the sand. “Does that weapon make you feel like a tough warrior?”
She circled the clone. Her muscles ached. Her arms and legs were tired from the previous assaults. Blood coated her fingers.
“You’re not very tough.” She’d kill Todt-933 slowly, torture him emotionally and physically. “That’s why Todt-932 sent you away. He knew you’d be useless during the coup, get in his way and fuck everything up.”
“Shut up.” Todt-933 ran at her, his big knife raised.
Dita threw her right dagger without thinking, a response honed from solar cycles of killing. It embedded with a twang in the clone’s left eye socket, popping his eyeball, piercing his brain.
Todt-933’s scream was high-pitched. He toppled backward, his body gyrating.
“Shit.” She had killed him too quickly, hadn’t inflicted enough pain on him. Dita walked to the clone, yanked her dagger from his eye socket, turned to face Qifu.
The big male stared at her with his mouth hanging open.
“Your turn.” Dita smiled at him. “Or can you operate without a master giving you orders?”
Todt-933 was ruled by emotion. Qifu wasn’t. Her taunt didn’t draw any response, the male’s eyes flat. She suspected he was already in the zone, the mental place experienced warriors went during a battle.
The male drew his weapons. The blades were long, thin, wicked looking.
They walked round and round, orbiting each other like planets around a star, both of them looking for weaknesses in the other. She tested him with a couple jabs.
He countered, his reflexes surprisingly fast. One of his blades grazed her shoulder, cutting though her body covering, shaving a layer of skin. She hissed at the pain.
The brute grinned. “I’ve killed many like—”
She released both of her daggers. Both lodged in his throat, the male making no attempt to dodge them. His eyes widened as he dropped to the sand. The giant couldn’t fight and talk at the same time.
“You’ve never seen any being like me.” Dita retrieved her daggers and turned.
Three very large, very angry males faced her, swords in their hands. They’d attack her together, learning from their predecessors’ pride-induced mistakes.
If they weren’t successful, the other males would be. The crowd behind them were armed with daggers, guns, weapons of all shapes and sizes.
There was no chance of survival. She was going to die.
So be it.
Dita sheathed her daggers, grasped her battle-axe, Kralj’s gift to her, feeling the caring engraved in the hilt. “Who is next?” She grinned.
The three males rushed toward her. She ran, meeting them midway, spinning, slashing, ducking, blocking, intent on making her death as glorious as possible.