Firebrand

"Vice Admiral," Boyd interjected, her round ears swiveling in his direction. "What do you have in the pouch on your belt?"

"What?" she snapped, "which pouch?"

"One of the pouches on your right, I'd say...the small one that's hanging from the belt towards the front, next to that big revolver."

"What is this?" Korbaz snarled, rising to her feet and planting her hands on the table as she glowered at them. "I have been patient with you, Security Chief, more than cooperative considering the circumstances. State your intentions plainly, or get out of my suite. I will not be mocked like this."

"Please...open the pouch, Vice Admiral," Moralez insisted. Her eyes darted angrily between the three of them, her sharp claws piercing the wood to leave furrows in the table as she bared her carnivore teeth.

"I am a Coalition diplomat, my status affords me rights. I refuse to cooperate any further."

"Sounds like she's asserting her right to diplomatic immunity," Boyd said, glancing at Lorza. "But I must have misheard her."

The Polar nodded, the legs of her chair squeaking on the floor as she rose to her feet, her ice-blue eyes fixed on the Vice Admiral. Korbaz took it as a challenge, her lips pulling back to expose incisors that would have made a wolf blush, her sandy-colored tail puffing up like a feather duster as her ears pressed flat against her cropped hair. One of her clawed hands moved to her belt, out of view beneath the table. She was laden with knives and firearms, who knew what she was about to pull on them.

Lorza moved faster than Moralez would have imagined possible, the table flipping as she threw it out of the way, a gunshot ringing out. When he was able to get his bearings again, Lorza's hand was gripping Korbaz's wrist tightly, her snow-white fur contrasting with the blonde of the Rask. In the Vice Admiral's hand was one of her crude revolvers, the barrel smoking, and he glanced up to see a fist-sized hole in the ceiling.

The Polar took her other wrist in her hand, Korbaz struggling, her biceps bulging from beneath the sleeves of her leather jacket. Lorza seemed to be stronger, however. She squeezed until the handgun fell to the ground, making a sound like a dumbbell being dropped. The Rask's feline pupils expanded into dark circles that made her look possessed as she spat and hissed, trying to free herself from the Polar's hold. She kicked with one of her paw-like feet, aiming for Lorza's belly with her claws, and Lorza threw her back with enough force that she slammed against the far wall. The cupboards above the kitchen counter were knocked open, plates and glasses raining down on the furious Rask as her hand darted to her belt, drawing a serrated blade the size of a butcher's knife.

Moralez moved to intercede, but Boyd held him back, pulling him away from the fight.

"Lorza knows what she's doing," the agent insisted, "let her do her job."

Korbaz yowled, surging forward faster than Moralez's eyes could track, driving her wicked blade towards the Polar's throat. Lorza sidestepped her, delivering a swift strike to the kidney, the Rask buckling under the blow. She quickly recovered, swinging the dagger, Lorza darting out of her reach. Korbaz was undeterred, and she was obviously an experienced knife fighter, switching to an underhanded stance as her strikes whistled through the air.

The Polar was faster than she looked, dodging and parrying, ducking in do deliver a monumental blow to the Rask's belly that made her double over. Borealans usually fought with their claws, seeking to slice and cut, but Lorza was employing a human fighting style that she had no doubt been taught as part of her UNNI training. Besides, she didn't want to gut the ambassador, only subdue her.

Before the Rask could recover again, Lorza slammed into her, leveraging her immense mass to knock her opponent off-balance. It was like being hit by a giant, furry freight train, Korbaz staggering across the kitchen and leaning a hand against the counter to steady herself.

Moralez had fought Borealans in hand-to-hand combat before, he understood the forces at play, but Lorza was strong enough that even the eight-foot, five hundred pound Rask was being pushed around. Lorza probably weighed about eight hundred pounds, and she had the muscle to carry that weight under the high gravity of her home planet, her insulating blubber was entirely misleading.

Korbaz came at her again, visibly tiring, her steel flashing under the soft lighting of the suite. Lorza caught her wrist with her right hand, letting the Rask's momentum carry her forward, twisting her opponent's arm behind her back. She gripped Korbaz's collar with her left, getting behind her snarling opponent.

The knife clattered on the floor as it fell from her hand, the Rask making noises like a one-person catfight, the Polar's hand gripping the back of her neck as she kicked the back of her knee and forced her to the ground. She straddled the Vice Admiral, sitting on her rump as she twisted her arm, pinning her against the wood floor. Korbaz tried to reach behind her with her free hand, swiping at her assailant, but Lorza caught that arm too and twisted it.

Finally subdued, the Vice Admiral began to relax, ceasing her ardent struggling. Perhaps she knew that she was beaten, or it might be her Borealan instincts kicking in, urging her to submit. Now that she lay still, Moralez and Boyd returned to the kitchen area, stepping around broken plates and scattered cutlery.

"You will regret this violation," Korbaz hissed, her amber eyes fixing on Moralez. "When the Matriarch hears of this..."

Lorza yanked her arm, the Vice Admiral gritting her sharp teeth and going silent. Boyd crouched beside her, reaching into the pouch on her belt and fumbling for a moment. When he withdrew his gloved hand, he was holding a small, metallic object between his thumb and forefinger. It was about the size of a button, disk-shaped, the agent pausing to examine it.

"Just as I thought," he muttered, turning it over in his hand. "This is the source of the encrypted signal, it's some kind of concealed scanning device. Looks like a radio emitter, it was probably using radar to scan the room and deliver the positions of its occupants to the shooter."

"What is this babble?" Korbaz snapped, "what do you have there?"

"There's no use playing dumb," Boyd replied, "we have the evidence that we needed. Chief," he continued, glancing up at Moralez from beneath his visor. "I assume you have a brig that can hold a pissed off cat?"

"Yeah," he sighed, "we're going to have to walk her to the military quarter. This isn't going to be a good look. Korbaz, why did you do it? I thought that you and I had an understanding?"

"I have done nothing," she spat, "I am innocent of this crime! These two spies are framing me! It is their profession to lie, to deceive, how can you be blind to this? What better scapegoat than the Rask, we are always under unjust scrutiny, we are always treated with suspicion by those who profess to be our comrades!"

"How did you get this device past security?" Boyd demanded, waving it in front of her pink nose as Lorza kept her pinned with her weight. "Something like this should have shown up on the scanners."

"I cannot answer, and you know it," she replied with a menacing growl. "If this overweight kitten was not sitting on my back, I would flay you alive with my bare claws for daring to make the accusation."

"You won't be flaying anyone," Boyd replied, giving her a playful tap on the nose. "You're going in time-out until we can figure out how you managed to sneak this thing past the security check."

"Agent Boyd," Moralez warned, "I don't think we need to make her any angrier than she already is. Agent Lorza, let her up. She's still a dignitary, and she needs to be treated with the respect that her status affords her."

"At least the Security Chief has some manners," Korbaz muttered as Lorza pulled her to her feet, keeping a tight hold on her arms. Moralez stepped forward, beginning another pat-down, sliding his prosthetic hands beneath her jacket. He pulled knives and revolvers from her belt, patting down her thighs and her springy butt through the tight leather as she grinned down at him.

"You should have fought me yourself, Security Chief," she whispered as he set the items on a nearby counter. "We'd both be having a lot more fun right now if you had..."

"My apologies for the rough treatment," he said, knowing full well that it was entirely her own fault. "If you'll please accompany us to the brig, we'll try to get this matter sorted out."

He reached into the pocket of his uniform and withdrew a heavy-duty zip-tie, passing it to Lorza, who secured it about the ambassador's wrists.

"I won't cooperate until I am allowed to contact my people," she replied, beginning to walk as Lorza guided her with a firm grip on her upper arm. "My rights must be respected."

"I'll see what I can arrange," Moralez said, leading them towards the exit. He should feel elated, they had solved one of the mysteries, but he couldn't shake the feeling that they were missing something important. Oh well, all that they could now was process the Vice Admiral, and see what happened next.

CHAPTER 9: BAD BEAT

Harry felt his companion stir, one of her feathery antennae tickling his cheek as she lay her head on his shoulder. They were still sat on the couch in front of the holographic fireplace, the flames crackling in the hearth as they licked at the burning logs. The two had talked for what must have been a couple of hours before Holly had fallen asleep, seeming to cling to him instinctively in her groggy state. She was accustomed to sleeping in piles with her sisters, so she had told him, and so sleeping alone might be unnatural to her. Her two right arms were wrapped around his left, and her fluffy ruff was pressed up against his sleeve. She didn't snore, she might not have lungs at all, but her torso and her thighs seemed to slowly rise and fall as though they were doing the breathing instead.

As her eyes slowly opened, she blinked up at him, drawing back as she came to her senses.

"My apologies," she stammered, shuffling away from him. "I must have fallen asleep."

"It's fine," he replied, flexing his now free limb. "You made my arm fall asleep, too. You must have been tired, didn't you like the bed?"

"I find it...difficult to sleep alone," she replied, confirming his theory. "Why did you not move me?"

"You looked like you needed it," he said, the tingling in his fingers slowly abating. "Feel better now?"

She nodded her head, reaching up and cleaning her antennae with her hands. Harry rose to his feet, stretching his arms above his head and yawning widely. He noticed Blackjack, who was sleeping in his usual place, walking over and giving him a tap on the flank with his boot.

"Wake up, you lazy lizard, you're on watch. I gotta take a shower before I start smellin' like a Rask's jockstrap after a workout. I didn't think we'd be stuck here for so long."

The Krell rumbled his displeasure, but rose to his feet obediently. He shook his massive body like a dog, sending a ripple through his fat and muscle, his jaws opening wide to expose his jagged teeth and his purple tongue as he yawned.

"You want anythin' to eat...er...drink before I get in the shower?" Harry asked, Holly shaking her head as she peered at him over the back of the couch. "Cool, I'll be out in ten. Let BJ know if you need anythin'."

He was already shedding his armor before he reached the bathroom, removing the ceramic plates that were strapped about his thighs and shins, unstrapping his chest carrier. He stripped down to his Navy-blue uniform, stacking his armor by the door, then entered. Once it had closed behind him, he removed the rest of his clothes and took a much-anticipated shower. Wearing the heavy, black combat armor in a casual setting for hours on end was a bit of a nightmare. It was about as light as they could make it, but there was no getting around the weight of the ceramic plates that were designed to dissipate the heat from plasma bolts.

Harry sighed as he stepped beneath the showerhead, letting the cool water flow through his hair, washing away the prior day's sweat and grime. As he upended a bottle of shampoo into his hand, his thoughts turned to Holly. She had reacted strangely when he had jokingly asked her what he smelled like. She was far more sensitive to scents than humans were, it might be polite to use a lot of scented soaps, maybe human body odor was unpleasant to her.

As much as he wanted to get out of the suite and feel the artificial breeze on his face again, he had to admit, he was starting to like Holly enough that he might miss her when she was gone. It had never really hit him before now, how tragic her death would have been at the hands of the assassin, how undeserved. He would never have imagined that he would feel sympathy for a Bug, but his desire to keep her safe now went beyond the Chief's orders.

Was he starting to sympathize with her cause? No, he still thought that admitting the Bugs to the Coalition was a bad idea, but what if they were all like her? What if every Drone and Worker had the capacity to empathize and emote in the way that she did? The question was becoming less black and white. Maybe she was right in that they deserved the chance to prove that they were different, if nothing else. He knew that the thought of gunning her down as he had so many others made his heart sink, he saw her as a person now, not as an insect.

***

Harry emerged from the bathroom, still drying his hair with a towel, finding Holly sitting quietly on the couch as Blackjack watched over her like a scaly gargoyle. For a moment, he wondered why she wasn't finding some way to entertain herself, then he remembered that the Chief's orders prevented her from accessing any of the entertainment that would usually be available.

Maybe he really was interpreting those orders too literally. It wouldn't do any harm to let her watch a movie, or read a damned e-book. Although, there were other options...

"Come on guys," he announced, the two aliens turning to peer at him from across the open-plan living room. "I'm gonna go stir crazy if we don't find a way to spend the time. You up for a Poker game?"

Blackjack loosed an affirmative rumble, Holly kneeling on the cushions and leaning on the backrest as she looked between them in confusion.

"What is Poker?" she asked.

"I'll show you," he replied, gesturing for her to follow him. She hopped down off the couch, making her way over to the kitchen on her digitigrade legs, her dainty feet giving her a graceful gait. Blackjack lumbered along after her, as far as one could get from graceful, his many-toed feet making the floor shake as they slapped against the wood.

The three of them sat around the kitchen table as Harry drew a pack of cards and his tablet computer from his pocket, Blackjack sitting on the floor, his stature putting him at an appropriate height. His long tail trailed out of the kitchen and into the hall, tall enough that a human would have needed to step over it as if it was a low garden fence. Harry shuffled the deck, then began to deal, Holly watching with fascination as his practiced technique landed the cards directly in front of her.

"What is the purpose of this game?" Holly asked, holding one card in each of her four hands as she examined them carefully.

"Poker is a game of subterfuge," Harry explained, shuffling the deck again. "It's about gambling, strategy, deception. You're supposed to defeat your opponents by outwitting them."

Blackjack rumbled affirmatively, the vibrations making the hanging skin beneath his jaw vibrate. He was holding his own cards in his scaly, seven-fingered hands as he examined them with his beady, yellow eyes.

"We're teaching Holly to play," Harry warned, glaring across the table at the giant reptile. "So don't cheat!"

The Krell replied with another low, resonating vocalization that made Harry's teeth chatter.

"Yes you do, I don't know why you bother denyin' it. Just because we have faster metabolisms than you doesn't mean that we have no attention span, you were doin' it just the other day!"

Holly glanced between them, trying not to laugh as they had their one-sided argument.

"Alright," Harry continued, turning his attention back to her. "There are four suits, those are the little symbols on the cards. Clubs, hearts, spades, and diamonds."

"Why are they called that?" she asked, looking down at her cards in confusion.

"Er...I dunno, they just are. Then you have thirteen different ranks, those are the little numbers on the cards. The higher the number, the more value it has. There are also Jacks, Kings, Queens, and Aces. Those are the highest ranks. Ace is the highest, then King, then Queen, then Jack."

"But the Queen should be the highest rank," Holly protested, cocking her head at him.

"If it was based on Betelgeusian hives, yeah, but it's based on the human feudal system. There are also Jokers, but don't worry about those right now."

"So the goal is to find the highest value card?" Holly asked, Harry shaking his head.

"No, you have to have what's called a hand. A hand is a combination of cards, and some hands have more value than others. Here," he said, tapping at his tablet for a moment before sliding it across the table. She caught it, turning it around and examining the screen. "These are the different hands, you can use this as a reference until you've learned them."

"This looks complicated," she grumbled. "Where does the strategy lie if what cards the players are dealt are randomized?"

"You'll see," he replied. "When you play Poker, you're usually playin' for money, or for some substitute for money. You make a bet, which means that you gamble with a certain amount, then the other players have to raise or call. Call means they bet an equal amount, and raise means they bet a larger amount, which the other players then have to match. If you think your hand is too weak to win, you can fold, but that means forfeiting the money that you bet so far."

"My people do not use money," Holly replied, "the hive works cooperatively to provide for the needs of its members."

"Oh, right," Harry mumbled. "Well, we're just playin' for fun, so it doesn't really matter. We have no chips, though. What can we use instead?"

He glanced around the room, thinking for a moment, then rose from his chair. He opened one of the drawers and fumbled around, then returned to his seat to deposit a handful of small, colorful packets on the table.

"We'll play for condiments," he declared. "Ketchup packets are worth twenty, mustard and mayonnaise are ten, and salt packets are one."

"Ten of what?" Holly asked skeptically.

"Just ten, that's their value. It's a substitute for money."

"Alright," she said, her long antennae twitching. "I will try this game."

***

"Fold," Harry said, tossing his cards on the table. "That's it, I'm out of mayonnaise. All I have left now is the shirt on my back and two salt packets."

Holly glanced up at him, her pink eyes flashing mischievously, then she turned her gaze to BJ. They both had large piles of condiments, but it looked like Holly was edging ahead with that last hand. She had picked up the game remarkably quickly, and she was surprisingly good at it. She had been designed from the chromosome up to be good at diplomacy, and what was Poker if not diplomacy boiled down to its most basic form? The ability to persuade, to mislead, knowing when to play your cards and when to take a loss.

"Talk about a Poker face," Harry muttered, "how is this fair? Your face is made of chitin," he said, gesturing to Holly. "And you have the emotional range of a doorstop," he added as he turned an accusing finger to Blackjack.