Page 72 of Fought and Found

The positioning shift is deliberate. I feel the warmth of the orb's light near my collarbone where it usually hovers near hers. The AI that spent days threatening and monitoring and classifying me as hostile has moved.

"Davin is not a threat," Sprout says. Quiet. For me. "His heart rate is baseline. He has a partner on Level 3. They have been together for four years. I monitor everyone. This is not new information for anyone except you."

"I did not ask."

"You were about to extend your claws. In a market district. Around civilians. Context seemed prudent." The orb bobs once. "I have also taken the liberty of mapping a route to Morrison's office that avoids the three vendors most likely to hug Flossie. You are welcome."

"Why are you telling me things?"

The orb glows warm amber. The colour of an AI that has made a decision it will not explain.

"Because she won't," Sprout says. "And you'll panic."

Flossie glances at the orb at my shoulder. At the space where it used to hover at hers. Her eyes soften—the bright, fierce warmth of a woman watching her family rearrange itself around a new shape.

"Since when are you two on the same side?" she asks.

"Since his tactical assessments became marginally more consistent than yours," Sprout says.

"SPROUT."

"I said what I said."

The orb dims, briefly, to something more operational. "Also: two observers logged on the dock since we cleared the umbilical. Professional posture, civilian clothing, no approach. I am watching them watch us. Continue being enormous and distracting."

I continue being enormous. The distracting is involuntary.

We move through the market level. She stops at the Darjeeling stall—twenty minutes, exactly as Sprout predicted—and purchases a tin that the vendor wraps in paper while telling her she has been gone too long and the good stock almost went to a Corsairian freighter captain with inferior taste. She introduces me. "This is Xor." No title. No designation. No qualification. Just my name in her voice in a public market.

The vendor looks up. And up. Takes in the horns, the claws, the tactical gear, the tail currently maintaining a perimeter around Flossie's waist.

"Does he drink tea?"

"He's learning," Flossie says.

"Darjeeling. Second flush. Tell him to brew at 85 degrees, not boiling—if he boils it I'll know." The vendor hands me a sample pouch. Small. Paper. The kind of object that does not exist in SRS operational parameters because SRS does not have tea merchants who give you things because you are standing next to someone they love.

I take the pouch. My claws retract to receive it. The vendor watches the retraction—the same look Flossie gave me the first time, in the cockpit, when I took her mug. The look that sees gentleness and does not announce it.

"He'll do," the vendor says to Flossie. To me: "Break her heart and I'll sell you decaffeinated for the rest of your life."

"That is not a proportionate consequence."

"Lovey," Flossie says, taking my arm, steering me away from the stall before the vendor can escalate, "in this market, decaffeinated is a proportionate consequence."

The bite mark sits above her collar. She has buttoned nothing over it. Twice between the tea stall and the lift, I watch station acquaintances' eyes find it, register it, flick up to me. She watches them watch. She does not adjust the cardigan. The not-adjusting is a flag planted in a public corridor, and my biology regards it as the finest thing on this station.

Morrison's office is on Level 4. The door is reinforced polymer with a small plaque that reads DISPATCH—M. MORRISON in lettering that manages to be intimidating despite being 12-point standard.

Flossie stops outside. The transformation is physical—the woman who leans into my tail in public corridors becomes the woman Morrison trained. Spine straight. Jaw set. The brown eyes going steady and clear. She rolls her shoulders once. Cracks her neck. The pre-combat ritual of a woman who learned to fight from the scariest person in the Outer Rim and is about to fight the scariest person in the Outer Rim.

"Twenty-five minutes," she says. "Stay with Sprout. Do not engage until I signal."

"Morrison's left eye twitches before she shouts," Sprout provides from my shoulder. "You have approximately four seconds of warning. I recommend using them to leave the room."

"Thanks, Sprout."

"I was not speaking to you. I was briefing your partner." The orb bobs. "Someone should be prepared."