Chapter 1

He’d never meant to stay on Dirt so long.

Wait, not Dirt. Something else… His universal translator whirled in his head and corrected the synonym he’d peevishly substituted: Earth.

Whatever these Dirters—Earthers—called their inconsequential world on a lesser arm of an unremarkable spiral galaxy, Dejo Jinn had been here too larfing long. He should’ve blasted off once he discovered the data trove abandoned at this outpost of the Intergalactic Dating Agency was scrambled and nearly useless.

Much like himself. Huh. No wonder he’d found himself sinking into the dirt—earth—like a four-booster nova-class cruiser with three boosters flamed out.

He’d figured the data trove might interest several powerful and credit-flush entities after this Big Sky Alien Mail Order Brides outpost had been forced to blackout abruptly when they’d almost exposed the existence of extraterrestrial life to the closed-world Earthers. During their mismatched mating efforts (who would’ve guessed there were so many sad lovelorn larfers in the universe?) they’d been compromised by an alien abductor Blackworm who’d stolen some brides. Those Earther brides hadn’t been recovered, and the thief refused to reveal their fate.

The universe must seem like a very large, very unfriendly place to them, wherever they were…

Dejo shoved away the thought. Of course the universe was large—it was the larfing universe. And a universe was larfing deadly to everyone who couldn’t breathe in a vacuum and drink starlight.

“Get ya another drink?”

He canted one eye up at the serving wench—his universal translator pinged an alarmed protest at the mental designation, which he ignored. He didn’t intend the words as insult. He liked serving wenches, especially ones with well-developed secondary sex characteristics in well-fitted clothing arrayed to properly flaunt said sex characteristics. He especially liked the bubbly little spaceship tattooed on the upper swell of her left breast—she might be a clueless Earther, but obviously her subconscious simian instincts told her there was something extra special (extraterrestrial, even) about Sunset Falls, Montana, United States of America, Dirt, Milky Way. “Make it two.”

“Finally expecting a friend?” The wench grinned.

“Not ever,” he said honestly.

He could afford to be honest with the wench because, one, the truth wasn’t worth a single larf-lick anywhere in the known universe, and two, he’d never see her or any of these Dirters again. Just as soon as he left.

Which should’ve been numerous day/night-cycles ago. Except…the data trove was still there, tantalizing him like the mouthwatering scent of ripe pixberries. Between Blackworm’s clever hack of the IDA’s data core and the IDA’s bumbling attempts at recovery, what remained was an unnavigable asteroid field of sludged bytes. The data was corrupted, degraded, and irretrievable to interstellar law enforcement—also much like himself—but it was there, somewhere.

Which provided a neutron-narrow sliver of space for a freelance data scavenger to make a living. Or at least earn enough credits to refuel his ship and stay one jump ahead of the aforementioned interstellar law enforcement.

If only they’d focus on finding missing closed-world innocents instead of harassing hard-working scavengers. He was a liar and a fugitive and a scavenger, but it wasn’t like he was a dirty thief, taking things that belonged to others. He had nothing that anyone else knew they wanted.

Especially now. Since his initial remote access of the IDA site had yielded less than a hardrock asteroid miner’s payday in a cloud-whore’s pillowbed, he’d have to break in bodily to gain access to the damaged system. Ugh, how he hated being personally and physically present at a scavenging. No doubt he’d bruise his fingers on the locks and might even have to face down a weapon or something even worse.

He hated weapons or worse somethings.

As if in consolation for his upcoming night-cycle task, the serving wench returned with twin beverages of the exact golden hue of new Foundation world talisman coins, exactly like the first one drink he had quite enjoyed. At least he had something he wanted for the moment…

But as he reached out to draw the drinks closer, someone yanked them both away.

With a scowl, he jerked his gaze upward. If the serving wench tried to say his Dirter money was no good, he’d show her exactly how perfectly he’d replicated it down to the shifty smirk on the face of the pictured patriarch.

But it wasn’t the wench.

This female was as insignificantly sized as her home galaxy, although the thump her thick-soled boots made as she spun around the chair across from him and decisively straddled the seat made him assess her density as high enough to warrant at least some minimal effort should he decide to lift her for any reason. Such a reason being, for example, to eject her from his vicinity for stealing his beverages. The slightly ragged, chin-length locks of her hair were a darker gold than the so-called whisky he’d been drinking, but her eyes—the moody blue-gray hue as the atmospheric vapors of this liquid water world on the cusp between the day/night-cycle—struck him with the same gut-kicking heat.

He didn’t need heat from anything besides the whisky.

He shifted his gaze to the purloined beverages. “Why have you stolen my drinks?”

“I need you sober enough to answer a few questions. Then you can go back to getting as drunk as you’ve been the last two nights.”

He lifted his nose to give her a distrustful stare down its length. She’d been watching him? And he hadn’t noticed? Not good. And she wanted answers from him? Even worse. “Are you a…” he waited for his translator to spit out a word “…cop?”

Her hesitation was so slight he might’ve missed it if he’d had at least one more sip of his drinks. “No.” She snapped the word off as she jutted her chin aggressively.

Liar. A bad one. Not so bad as a drink thief, but bad enough. “I haven’t been drunk,” he said. “And even if I was, drunkenness within reason and without violence is not a crime on this pla—in this land.” Although Dirt lacked many interstellar charms, the golden beverage was potent, just not so potent as himself…

His muscles flexed with the urge to posture for her, and it was only with difficulty that he kept his crest from ruffling in a threat display.

Hmm. Perhaps the beverage was stronger than he’d thought.

The female narrowed her storm cloud eyes. “You can get as drunk as you want, and I won’t care. After you talk to me. I know you’ve been asking questions about the resort outside town that closed recently, and I know you’ve been sneaking around there.”

“I thought you were asking me questions.” His scalp twitched again with the urge to ruffle, but he tilted his head instead. “But you appear to have all the answers already.”

Those blue-gray eyes flickered for a moment, assessing and repositioning. She’d need to be firing on more thrusters than that to get the best of him.

She pushed one of the drinks toward him but kept the other for herself. “Tell me what you’ve found out about this…alleged dating agency.”

It was his turn to blink. When she flinched, almost imperceptibly, he realized he’d let his inner eyelid twitch in his surprise. Revealing extraterrestrial attributes was a punishable offense on a closed world. At least these Earthers were prone to telling themselves whatever they needed to hear to still believe they were alone in the universe.

He wondered why they were so adamant. Even with hundreds of sentient races inhabiting thousands of worlds, the universe remained empty enough for even the most nihilistic soul.

He should know.

“Dating agency… Are you looking for a date?” he countered. “Because I warn you: I have expensive tastes but poor manners.”

As he intended, his jibe distracted her from what she thought she saw—well, what she did see, but she’d tell herself it was a trick of the lights or maybe a physical defect of his to go along with the character flaws he’d so blithely and honestly confessed.

This Earth whisky must be stronger than he knew if he was being so larfing truthful.

She grimaced, the wide curve of her mouth twisting as if his not-really-an-offer had been the most distasteful suggestion she’d ever heard. “I’m not looking for a date. I’m looking for my sister. She disappeared from here.” With one practiced snap of her wrist, the female downed his drink—washing away his maybe-could’ve-been-an-offer—then gazed at him through grim eyes just slightly reddened around the rims. “And I think you know where she went.”

She whipped out one of the primitive handheld data devices—so much less powerful than his port-link—that everyone on this backward planet coddled like rare drakling eggs. The static image displayed to him showed an Earther female with perhaps a few more solar-cycles than the female across from him and the same shadowed whisky hair but darker eyes. Genetically similar, no doubt. A sister, she claimed.

One of the IDA’s missing Earther brides?

Dejo spun the last glass of whisky in front of him slowly, giving himself a moment to consider. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said at last.

The female drew a breath to argue.

“I’ve never heard of your sister and have no idea where she might be.” He added the cruel truth like a dose of bitter poison to a sweet pixberry pie that made the whole thing unpalatable and final.

The glassy sheen around the edges of the female’s eyes crept inward, obscuring the cool blue-gray. “I know she was here, in Sunset Falls. She told me she was coming down from Bozeman to meet some guy at a dating resort…” She trailed off, her throat moving in a hard swallow. But as if she’d choked down whatever uncertainty she’d had, with her next breath she growled out a harsh accusation. “I need to know what you found out at the resort.”

The “resort” was the IDA outpost. Its illusion of enforced exclusivity was meant to repel curious outsiders and disguise its extraterrestrial nature. Though it was currently empty, the safeguards that protected it from clueless Earthers (and from, say, data scavengers) were still in place. Which was why he’d cased the grounds without success. His next attempt—should he choose to make one—would have to be more forceful.

Or not, now that he’d discovered he was being tailed by a suspicious Earther.

“I was out for a stroll,” he drawled. “I enjoy fresh air.”

She scoffed. “Right. I know your type.” She flicked a finger at him. “I recognize that sad lack of a tan. If you ever left your mama’s basement, it was only because she kicked your ass out.”

His hand tightened on the beverage he was spinning until the slide of his fingertips roused a faint, clear tone singing from the glass. “You are so right. She kicked hard enough to leave a scar. Want to see?” He half rose from his seat, sliding his hand slowly down the front placket of his coat.

The female’s gaze swept along behind his trailing gesture, a taut, inadvertent reflex that woke a clarion song to vibrate through him the same as a careless finger on the glass. When she reached the transverse plane of his body, her stare snagged where the stiffening rod of flesh between his legs pressed at the front closure of his pants…and her glare immediately rebounded to his face.

Bright red human blood flushed through her cheeks. “Sit down,” she said. The command was sharp but with a wavering edge, like the ceremonial sword of a Jaxian metal-lord.

Unnerved by his primitive response to her stare, he pointed between her eyes. “Only I tell myself to sit down.” He widened his stance on principle.

Wait, since when did he have principles? Maybe he was just making room for the inexplicable attraction to her making itself felt in his pants.

Having that part of his alien anatomy at her eye level made him twitch, and he lowered himself back into the chair with a disgruntled thunk.

He never did what anyone ordered, not anymore, not since his great-matre had kicked him, just as he’d said.

Larf it, more honesty? He raised the glass to his lips and tossed back the whisky in one gulp, as she’d done.

He had to get off this Dirt.

“Don’t lie to me,” she said. “I know you were out there. I know you’re looking for something.”

“Don’t lie to me,” he shot back. “I know your type: pushy, hostile, rule-following, telling-others-what-to-do cop.”

They glared at each other over their whisky glasses, their breaths hissing and the bite of the flammable liquid tingeing the air between them.

After a quivering chunk of forever, she slumped back in her chair. “Not anymore,” she muttered. “That was…before. Now I just want to find my sister.”

If her sister had been taken by the thief Blackworm, higher powers with greater resources than him or this used-to-be cop had failed to find the missing brides.

He exhaled slowly, the whisky burning his throat. “Your sister is lucky you’re looking for her, but I’m sorry. I can’t help.”

He pushed to his feet, half prepared for her to jump up and detain him. If she grabbed him, he would have to… Well, fighting was for those who weren’t clever enough to twist probable outcomes in their favor, so he’d have to run or something, which would be awkward and embarrassing for everyone. But she only stared at their empty glasses, her shoulders slumped.

He hesitated for a long moment, not trusting it. Not trusting her.

He stalked away without looking back. Because in this universe, luck, apologies, and trust were worth about as much as the truth and an empty whisky bottle.

Exactly nothing.