Furious

3

Kris let her team enjoy Nelly’s joke. “You’re getting better, girl,” she told her personal and not very personable computer.

“I didn’t have much to do for the last month,” Nelly answered, pointedly.

“Well, the vacation is over. Nelly, how safe are we at the moment?”

“You’re stretching your safety margins. Abby needs to get out of that bath, and you need to get out of your vomit. Penny, here, needs to get moving. This hideout is needed by some real thugs, and I can’t vouch for the cops not banging down the door much after they get here.”

“Can you and your kids keep Penny off the security net?” Kris asked.

“We’ve done it for a week now.”

“You’ve been here a week?” Kris said.

“I needed a couple of days to connect with Abby, then a few more to set up this meeting. Kris, if you think you’ve lived in a security bubble before, you have no idea how tight things are around you now.”

“Yeah,” Kris admitted. She hadn’t known, and she hadn’t been all that interested in knowing how tight the shackles were on her legs. It didn’t seem to matter, there was no way to cut the chains.

And no real reason to try.

Now she had a reason.

Jack needed help to get out of his mess. And, apparently, all human space needed to be saved from one of her relatives.

Oh joy.

With a promise from Nelly to arrange another meeting soon, they slipped away. The light in the room once again became near nonexistent. Penny went first, her clothes ninja black, and, Kris suspected, absorbing her body heat to make her a hole in the night. Abby went next and vanished before her footsteps were lost in the night.

Kris and Cara quickly found themselves back on the street, retracing their path to the road across from the park. Cara put her shoulder under Kris’s arms, and the two of them staggered a bit.

YOU’RE BACK ON THE GRID, Nelly warned Kris. The walk back to quarters went quickly, with Kris trying to absorb all that had been dumped on her.

She really was a prisoner here.

Jack was locked away just as tight and had even less of a chance than she did to get out of jail.

Grampa Al, of all people, was dabbling in politics and alien affairs!

And none of it got down to the real problem: Kris had started a war with alien hordes, and humanity seemed intent on pretending it hadn’t happened.

Back in her quarters, Kris played her part. She dutifully apologized to Abby for her black eye . . . and was ignored by her surly maid. She sputtered through a cold shower, griping the whole time at Abby, then let herself be put to bed.

Only after the lights were turned out did she attempt to contact Nelly.

CAN WE TALK? Kris asked her computer.

IF WE DON’T DO TOO MUCH OF IT. I THINK THEY’RE MONITORING MY ELECTRICAL USE AND YOUR BRAIN ACTIVITY.

CAN THEY DO THAT?

I WOULD. NOW QUIT WASTING TIME.

CAN YOU GET ME OFF THIS PLANET THE SAME WAY YOU GOT PENNY HERE?

NOT LIKELY. WE’LL HAVE TO COME UP WITH SOMETHING ELSE.

ARE YOU WORKING ON IT?

OF COURSE, KRIS. IF WE DIDN’T THINK WE HAD A CHANCE, WE NEVER WOULD HAVE LET PENNY BRING MIMZY DOWN HERE.

Right, of course. Nelly would never needlessly risk one of her kids.

KRIS, I NEED TO DO SOME OTHER STUFF, AND I CAN’T DO IT AND TALK TO YOU. THAT WAS ONE OF THE REASONS I WASN’T TALKING TO YOU. THAT AND YOU BEING A LUSH. I’LL TALK MORE WHEN I HAVE SOMETHING TO SAY. GOOD NIGHT.

On that note, Kris rolled over. And found she could not sleep.

Undulled by alcohol, her mind spun madly through the last five years of her life. Assassination attempts, one after another, flashed before her. And battles—battle after battle with high butcher bills extracted from enemy and friend alike.

Kris tried squeezing her eyes tighter shut. She did everything she could to drive her skull to blankness.

Nothing worked.

Finally, a tiny voice in the back of her head asked, Do you really want to go back to this? Are you crazy enough to think they’re worth saving yet again?

“No,” Kris shot back to herself. “I’ve never wanted all that. I’m not crazy.”

Well, you’re sure acting crazy. Look around you. You’re safe here. No one’s taking potshots at you. No one’s asking you to go out and save the world. Hell, Kris, what has saving anything got you but a kick in the gut? Has anyone ever said thank you?

Kris sighed. This other self had a point.

I mean, you don’t have to crawl into a bottle, any more than you have to get back onto this damn horse and go charging back out into the bloody slaughter for those ungrateful SOBs. Calm down, girl. Take a deep breath. You can put your time on Madigan’s Rainbow to better use. There’s no reason why you have to gallop out of here and pull their and Grampa Al’s chestnuts out of the fire.

Kris took that deep breath. She was none too sure where this other self of hers was coming from, but she did have some very good points. Yes, Penny and Abby had risked a lot to get her a chance to bust out, but where was she going?

Don’t have any idea, do you? that voice pointed out.

But then you usually don’t have a clue where you’re going and what you’ll do when you get there, another side of Kris joined in from somewhere deep in herself. You don’t know, but somehow you pull the right miraculous rabbit out of your hat. That’s what you do best. Right?

Yeah, right, came back at her. But you know you’re running out of rabbits. Even Captain Drago said you were scraping the bottom of your rainbow’s pot of gold. How much longer before there’s just no more of you left?

Kris allowed herself another deep breath. Both her selves were dead-on. And if Kris was honest with herself, her stay-here version was way ahead on points.

What was there out there for her but more bloody gambles with her own and a whole lot of other people’s lives?

There’s Jack. Because he got crosswise with those damn Longknifes, they’ve got him locked in a corner. He could be stuck there for the rest of his life unless someone like you lends him a hand, came back at Kris.

Kris found herself scowling. Nobody put Jack in a corner. Not while she had a say in it. And besides, she wanted Jack. She needed Jack. She even missed fighting with him. She missed bouncing ideas off him. Missed having him bent over a battle board beside her, the smell of him close. His warmth . . .

Right, his warmth close but never touched. Never touched until she finally did . . . and they carted her away and left him standing there on the dock.

That decided it for Kris. Not for all humanity. Not for Grampa Al. Certainly not for King Ray. But for Jack. Yes. For Jack, Kris would take this ticket out of her quiet little corner of the universe and see what havoc the morrow brought.

Kris rolled over to the other side and went to sleep, perchance to dream of Jack.