Chelen City: Chapter Three, Part Two

Notes: Am I actually getting this out on the right day? God I hope so. Anyway, enjoy some bureaucracy and an assassination attempt!

Title: Chelen City: Chapter Three, Part Two

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Chapter Three, Part Two

Chaos was fun, but it had its limits.

Elanus had to lock his implant down after the third time one of his minions tried to project their question at him both verbally and mentally. “Don’t be rude,” he said, and a few people had the grace to look slightly ashamed. “You haven’t even waited for introductions.”

“Apologies,” his secretary, Martel, said with a frown at the rest of them. “Queue up or get out,” he told them, and the people obediently lined up. “Please introduce us to your companion.”

Elanus motioned at Kieron, who was standing with his hands relaxed at his sides, doing his best to project an air of normality. Wow, it wasn’t until Kieron actually tried to be normal, for whatever that designation was worth, that Elanus realized how sharp his movements normally were. He might have a civilian implant, but years of training as a child had done their part to make him more dangerous than the average person. He’d probably learned to make himself look harmless on Trakta.

Nope, not thinking about that wretched idiocracy right now.

“This is Kieron Carr,” Elanus said, keeping his smile firmly in place. “Be sure to treat him far better than you vicious brutes treat me.”

Of the ten people staring at his lover, only one of them is close to Kieron’s size—Vini Mae, who was born on a planet in the Central System and now worked in his engineering department. She seemed curious, but wasn’t about to let it distract her from getting her question answered first. “Nice to meet you, now talk to me about processors,” she shouted before Elanus could whisk Kieron away.

“Get back in line,” Martel snapped. “I bent the rules by letting you come to meet him here at all. Don’t make me lock you out of the cafeteria.”

Vini gave him a shocked look. “You wouldn’t. It’s Taco Tuesday! I love Taco Tuesday!”

“Then shut up and wait your turn.” Martel pointed at someone in a very nice suit—Elanus thought it was his head of legal. “Dravus, you go first.”

“We’re being petitioned on all sides to release data on the latest version of LifeShips,” the dark-skinned man said. He was head of legal because he was unflappable, but this morning was as close to worried as Elanus had ever seen him. “The claims are of varying legality, but we’re going to have to respond to some of them. At the very least, the ones from the government.”

Ahh, yes. The grinding gears of bureaucracy descended like a shroud. “Let’s walk and talk,” Elanus said, and headed down the long way to his office. Kieron kept pace beside him. After a moment, Elanus reached out and took his hand. Murmurs erupted behind him.

Yeah, soak it in. He’s mine. Elanus was willing to bet that some of his more cutthroat executives were already wondering what they ought to be bribing Kieron with to get more favorable decisions for their problems. He hoped they went high quality instead of insultingly provincial.

They walked. He talked. Martel kept everyone in line as best he could, and Kieron didn’t say anything but his eyes were constantly moving, taking in everything he saw and categorizing it accordingly. By the time they got to the office, only three people were left, and Martel was able to wave them off with promises of “later” before finally shutting the outer door and nearly collapsing against it.

“I’m so sorry about that,” the heavyset man apologized. He actually looked a bit sweaty standing there. “I had everything worked out, I swear, an actual schedule of appointments and confirmation from all parties, and then something went wrong in the system and people got word that they were all moved to the same time, which of course was the time you arrived. I can’t explain it.”

“It’s perfectly all right,” Elanus said, knowing exactly what was going on here. “I don’t blame little bugs like that on you. I’d rather get the lot of them out of the way early, to be honest. We’ve probably saved half the day, although seriously, most of that could have been messaged.”

“Impossible,” Martel replied.

“No, I really think that—”

“They wanted to see you,” Kieron said. Martel looked at him approvingly. “They obviously missed physically being in your presence. They’ve messaged you for months now, but this is the first time you’ve been back here since you left for Cloverleaf Station, right?”

“It is.” Well, how sweet, but hopefully their curiosity had been sated. “Thank you for your assistance, Martel. I’ll take it from here.”

His secretary frowned. “I can stay and organize your calendar again, it’s no problem.”

“Don’t worry about it. Go put out some fires and meet me back here in, oh, an hour or so.” The upcoming confrontation shouldn’t take any longer than that.

“If you’re sure…”

“Very sure. Go on.”

Martel heaved a long-suffering sigh, but left. Now only Elanus and Kieron were left in the outer vestibule that led to his office.

“So.” Kieron didn’t give himself away by nodding his head, but his eyes were active. “Nice place.”

“Thank you.” Elanus smiled in the sleaziest way he knew how. “Want to see my desk? It’s wide enough for two.”

“Desks are a shitty substitute for beds, but okay.”

“You haven’t seen this desk,” Elanus said as he pressed his fingertip to the reader outside his office door. In a second, it read his DNA and opened the door automatically. “Gentlemen first.” He waited for Kieron to stride into the too-large room, seeming completely unconcerned and perhaps a little playful as Elanus followed. Any second now…any—

“Stop.” Kieron pushed back against Elanus’s chest and lashed out with a dagger at the same time, cutting something nearly invisible in front of them. A second later he deflected a series of darts that would have hit Elanus in the chest, but were at the perfect height to perforate Kieron’s head. They didn’t, but Elanus was immediately on edge. Expecting attack was one thing, but seeing Kieron nearly get shuffled into the “acceptable losses” category made him feel extra murderous. He reached out to grab Kieron and pull him back when a shadow detached from the ceiling and fell to the ground right in front of them. Twin blades struck out, one for each of them, lethally fast.

Kieron parried, spun once, kicked the attacker in the middle of the chest, then pulled the gun Elanus had given him that morning and shot their assailant in the back of the neck.

The shot wasn’t going to kill the attacker, just paralyze him. Or it should have paralyzed him. Instead, the man straightened up, ripped the shimmer-cloth mask off his face, and glared at Elanus like he’d lost the plot. “What the fuck was that?” Ryu demanded.

Elanus had the same question.