Tag Archives: A KGD Scifi Romance Adventure

Dragon Ascending Part 49: A KDG Scifi Romance

June 22, 2026Blog, fictionA KGD Free Read, A KGD Scifi Romance Adventure, Book 2 Sentient Ships Series, Dragon Ascending, Piloting FuryK D Grace

Happy Monday everyone! I hope you’re enjoying Dragon Ascending, book two of the Sentient Ship Series and the continuation of Fury’s journey to find his family. In the meantime, if you have just arrived and would like to start at the beginning of Piloting Fury, follow the link, and enjoy! If you like what you’re reading, make sure to catch all of Dragon Ascending from the beginning.

Dragon Ascending :Book 2 of the Sentient Ship Series

On a desolate junkyard of a planetoid, scavenger Lenore Felik, disturbs something slumbering in a remote salvage dump and uncovers secrets of a tragic past and of the surprising role she must play in the terrifying present she now faces.

Robbed of her inheritance after her tyrannical father’s death, Tenad Fallon is out for revenge on her half-brothers, one who happens to be the sentient ship, Fury. Fury, with his human companions, Richard Manning and Diana McAllister, has his own agenda – finding the lost sentient ships and ending the scourge of indentured servitude in Authority space.

Dragon Ascending Part 49: Does the Truth Hurt?

She was barely out the bathroom door, still wrapped in a towel, when Ascent said, “Is this Arji Finkle’s your lover?”

“What? Of course not, Ascent. He’s been like an uncle to me. I’ve never thought of him in any other way.”

“That is certainly not the way he thinks of you.”

“So I noticed.” She slipped out of the towel and began to dress.

“He kissed you. Twice.”

“I know that, Ascent. I was there remember? I didn’t kiss him back, but I don’t suppose you noticed that since you were too busy growling in my ear. Jesu Vaticanus, Ascent, I was trying to do my job, what I was sent for.”

“And if that job had involved fucking him?”

She pulled her shirt on over her shoulders with so much force she nearly ripped a seam. “If it would have kept you and Fury safe, if it would have gotten rid of the Fallons, I would have done what I had to do, yes.”

“Is that how you paid for your passage on the Dart.”

If he had gut punched her it couldn’t possibly have hurt any more, and with everything else that had happened today, she wasn’t up for anymore. “Get out now! Get the fuck out, or I swear I’ll go sleep in the goddamned sandstorm outside. Get out!”

“You cannot go out. You’ve been forbidden,” came the irritatingly smug reply.

“I’m not a goddamned little girl!” She jerked her trousers up over her ass and scrambled for her boots. “I’m not a prisoner and I’m not a fucking whore. But even if I was, it would be honest work. And guess what, you judgmental son of a bitch, it was two whores who kept me alive and nursed me back to health. And they treated me with respect!” The last word broke in her throat and the room around her refracted and glistened through tears she blinked back. “Now get the fuck out!” She threw a boot in the general direction of where she thought he stood, then she grabbed it back, jerked it on along with the other, stumbling about the room on one foot. It wasn’t dignified, but nothing about what was happening was dignified. She shouldered her pack and turned back toward the door.

“Where are you going? I will not let you go out? You cannot. It is not safe.”

“If you’re not leaving, I will. This room is not the only place I can go.” As she shoved through the door, she stopped and glanced over her shoulder. “At least Arji would treat me with respect and kindness. Is that a part of your memory you lost as well, how to be kind, how to be decent because if it is, then what’s the pissing point of any of this?”

She left.

“I did not mean that the way you took it.” He seemed to be walking along beside her.

She picked up her pace. “Then why did you say it? You knew it would hurt. First you say I’m your home and then you accuse me of … of letting those men do what they did, as if I have ever given you any reason not to trust me. What is it, Ascent? Can you really not know my heart any better than you allow me to know yours? Fury knows my heart. His compliment know my heart, and they barely know me. But you! You can’t seem to forgive me for not being your goddamn compliment, who’s been dead for twenty years. Do you think I don’t see my own inadequacies every day? Hell I’ve lived with them every day for the past ten years!”

“I don’t compare you to her. You compare yourself.” He grabbed her by the arm, and she took the chance and slapped, feeling the sting of her palm as it contacted the representation of flesh.

“Not only do you have no memory, but you’re in complete denial, and yet when I spend an hour with a friend doing what little I can do to help this mission, you turn that into another flaw that doesn’t measure up. You’re darling companion would never have let a friend kiss her.”

“Shut up!”

“Your darling companion would have never ended up on a fucking pile of sand in the middle of nowhere working as a goddamned salvager.”

“Shut up, Lenore.”

“You’re darling companion would have never crawled onboard a ship and got herself savaged because she wanted a better life.”

“Lenore stop it!” The words were only half articulated, half spoken pressed against her mouth, as he jerked her into his arms with such force that the bones in her neck cracked.

She slapped him again and shoved free. “What? The goddamned truth hurts, does it? Well does it?” She shoved both hands hard against his chest, but he rooted, grabbed her arms and back walked her to the closest wall, trapping her wrists above her head with one hand. The other cupped her chin with such force that for a moment she was frightened, and then she kissed him hard before she even realized what she was doing, biting his lip until he opened and took her tongue into his mouth. “You’re a fucking asshole!” She said pulling away from his mouth only long enough for the words to escape against his lips, and then he lifted her up against the wall, cupping her butt in both palms while what? Had he cuffed her hands over her head?

“You’re a reckless, naïve child.” He ripped open her shirt and buried his face in between her cupped breasts, tonguing and licking his way to the nearest nipple, then he bit. It hurt, and it made her wet, and she fisted his hair and pulled him closer feeling the nibble and suck all the way down between her legs.

But she wasn’t ready to let it go yet and she pulled his hair. “The only thing you fucking remember is how to be surly and hurt me, and I’m not a child.”

“No! No you are not.” She was startled to find herself completely naked. Well, he’d made her clothes; there was no reason why he couldn’t unmake them just as easily. He fingered her open and slid inside her, and this time, the pain of being entered so roughly sent waves of pleasure up and down her spine, all culminating in her own hard heat at her center. “You are a goddamn woman, a wild creature, untamable, and you drive me fucking crazy.” He thrust so hard it took her breath away, and she came in waves. “I cannot stand the thought of anyone else touching you the way I want to touch you, wanting you the way I want you, and I will not have this … bartender, pawing over you every time you go to Sandstorm. I don’t care what he can tell you.”

“You stupid bastard!” she kicked him hard in the kidneys and bit his neck until she felt him surge inside her. “Have you lost your superior intelligence with your memory? Goddamn it, Ascent, it’s you I want?” She clamped down on him hard and felt his fingers bruising her ass, felt his chest expand against her and then every muscle went tight. “It’s you I want and nobody else. Are you too stupid to figure that out?” And then he pulled her so tight, he was practically inside her ribcage, and she was inside him, and together they came in waves and the world fell away around them, except a flash of memory Ascent’s memory, and it hit like the sandstorm after dusk.

“Come back to bed, my love. Nothing will happen tonight. And you are exhausted.” Ascent’s voice came from a long way off, in the memory. “I shall make love to you and together we shall keep the rest of the galaxy at bay for a little while longer.” And then he was thrusting and grinding and caressing a woman, pale in the ambient lighting, and yet dark haired, her face was pressed to his, and they were one, more one that Len ever knew two people could be.

And then it was Ascent and her again, and they were one, more one than she could have ever dreamed it possible to be, and she felt whole. But it was the place of a compliment to feel whole with her Bonded. Was it possible that her body felt another woman’s memories, her muscle memories of love with Ascent? Surely he could never feel that for her.

Back in her quarters, in her bed, Ascent held her close and spoke against her throat between kisses. “Lenore, I am sorry for what I said, all the words I did not mean. I am not sorry for the sex it brought about.”

She didn’t respond. His mouth was suddenly no longer on her neck, and as her legs fell open, and he found his way to the place he’d already left tender and quivering, intimate, almost too intimate, closer than her heart, and yet, somehow she felt farther than ever from his in her inadequacy.

Dragon Ascending Part 48: A KDG Scifi Romance

June 15, 2026Blog, fictionA Free KGD Read, A KGD Scifi Romance Adventure, Book 2 Sentient Ships Series, Dragon Ascending, Piloting FuryK D Grace

Dragon Ascending :Book 2 of the Sentient Ship Series

Dragon Ascending Part 48: Reunions

Len was trembling all over when Fury ‘tranned her onto Ascent’s bridge, and she nearly fell on her ass before she could stumble to the captain’s chair and dropped into it. “I’m all right,” she managed. “I’m just not used to being transported.”

“It does take a little getting used to,” Mac said, “but you look like you’ve seen a ghost. It’s more than the transport, isn’t it?”

“Don’t trust Kresho Ivanovic,” she blurted out before anyone could say anything else.

For a moment there was confused silence and then Fury spoke. “Of course not. He is working with the Fallons, which I don’t understand. My research tells me he’s a man to be trusted. Very strange.”

Len waved a dismissive hand. “He’s a slime wad, who deserves to be Shimmered, and that’s too fucking good for him.” She wrapped her arms tightly around her and swallowed back tears, not wanting to cry, but remembering the last time she saw her mother’s face.

“Lenore,” Fury’s voice was gentle, nearly an embrace, while Ascent’s rage felt nearly like Shimmer heat coursing over the bridge. “What has happened?”

“He said he’d return for us as soon as he could. He said we would be safe on Tak Minor at the science station, that no one would find us there. But he didn’t. He didn’t come back.” She closed her eyes and fought back the memories that came slamming in on her after seeing Van again. “And then they killed my mother, and no one came. No one came for me.”

“Jesu Vaticanus,” Manning’s voice was a harsh whisper.

“Tell us,” Fury said gently.

“His name was Keith Vanderbilt, well he went by Van. He was a scientist working on the SNT project alongside my mother. They became lovers. He was good, really good. He and my mother worked closely with Professor Keen. When everything happened, when my Uncle Matt and Quetzal disappeared, they knew we’d be saddled with the debt and all three of us would get the shackle, so Van got us on a tramp freighter heading to the Taklamakan System with the scientist who was to take over at Tak Minor Station. Enroute, he found out who we were and betrayed us to the Authority. The Fidelio’s captain didn’t take kindly to that kind of betrayal, and after we’d survived our first run-in with the Jaegers by hiding out in a nebula, he dispensed deep-space justice and blew the man out the airlock. Then Captain Martin and Van devised a plan for my mother to take up the position on Tak Minor under the scientist’s name. The station was intended to support two scientists, and we fudged the documents to make it look like Professor Devon had a colleague. No one knew or cared who was there. We were left at the station and Van went to find a friend on Hammer Fell who owed him a favor and could get us off Tak Minor and safely beyond the Rim. We waited, but he never came. He never came.”

“That does not sound like the man I researched,” Fury said.

“The man you researched is betraying all of us to work with the Fallons,” Mac said.

“Did you not say he was a top scientist for the SNT projects?”

“Yes.” Len said, taking the cup of traditional English tea Ascent had replicated for her and inhaling the clean, crisp scent.

“I remember Van, and your mother,” Fury said.

“You knew my mother?” She nearly spilled the tea on herself.

“Not very well, for Professor Keen worked almost exclusively with me, while they worked with my brothers and sisters, but they came to me from time to time, ran tests occasionally, assisted Professor Keen when he needed it. In truth, Ascent would have known them better than I.”

“If the man has betrayed you and your mother, Lenore, then he will pay for it. I promise you.” She was surprised at Ascent’s bloodthirstiness, but then she shouldn’t have been, as she recalled what he did to the Dart.

“Perhaps he already has paid for it,” Fury said. Before anyone could respond he continued. “I think that we now understand why Tenad Fallon wants his help, for if anyone can find a way to infiltrate an SNT, it is someone who worked so closely on the project that brought us into existence. I would guess that Tenad Fallon is holding that information over the man’s head, on which there is still a price and the guarantee of a shackle.”

“Arji told me that the Fallons know Fury is here and that they also know about Ascent.”

There was stunned silence, and then Fury spoke softly. “I do not suppose it would be too difficult to figure out what might bring an SNT ship to this desolate system, and while my brothers and I have tried to keep low profiles, it was inevitable that we should be discovered.”

“At the moment they’re stymied by Fury’s cloak and by the de-mole.” She sipped her tea thoughtfully. “Is it possible, Fury, that your brothers can help?”

“Physically, I do not think so. They are too far away. But it is possible that Professor Keen and his team’s help may be able to help us get Ascent’s memories back. I am certain from our diagnostics that physically, there is nothing stopping Ascent from rising up, and then we could leave together.”

When Ascent made no response to this, Fury continued. “You are vulnerable now, my brother, and if I am not able to protect both of us, I do not know what might happen.”

“I am willing to do all that is required of me,” Ascent finally said.

“I think they will not easily find a way through the de-mole, nor will they be able to find my exact location, but the longer we linger here, the longer you are unable to move from the Sea of Death, Ascent, the more at risk we all become.”

“The fact that Ivanovic was one of the top scientists on the SNT project in hiding, and that he’s now hanging out with the Fallons worries me a lot,” Mac said.

“They definitely have him by the short hairs, Manning observed.

“Fury, how soon do you expect to hear from Professor Keen,” Len asked.

“I cannot say for certain. But I do know that he will contact us as soon as he possibly can.”

“It occurs to me that maybe we also need to be talking with Gerando Fallon,” Len said. “He knows the Fallon brats better than anyone, I suppose, and he may be able to point out anything we can use against them.”

Gerando Fallon is even farther away than Professor Keen,” Fury commented, “but I have already thought of that and have put in a message.

“Is there anything else your friend, Arji, could tell us about the situation?” Fury asked. Len could feel Ascent bristle at the mention of Arji’s name.

“Apparently Jessup Fallon is a Mist addict,” she said. “Everyone at Sandstorm seems to think that his big sister keeps him happily doped up so that he won’t get in her way. So far it’s working, but he’s pretty unpredictable. Arji is the ears in Sandstorm, owning the Dust Bowl. People talk, and they gossip. Not much else to do there. A lot of both gets done in the Dust Bowl, since it’s the only watering hole. Add to that the fact that the only thing people in Sandstorm hate worse than the Authority sticking its nose in their business, is a Fallon or two showing up on their doorstep. I suppose a few people might happily snitch if they thought it would get them a ride off this sand heap, but they also know if word got back, and it would, they’d get their asses shimmered before their next piss.”

When everyone waited in silence, she finished her tea and said, “That’s all I know, only that I did put the implant in Arji’s neck, and he’ll get in touch if he finds out anything. If he says he’ll do it, he’ll do it. Oh, and there is one more thing. I’m not entirely sure, but I think Ivanovic recognized me.”

“Well shit! You can’t very easily go back then, can you?” Manning said.

“I would just as soon you did not go back to that place anyway,” Ascent commented with what damn near sounded like a growl.

“Do you think he’d betray you to the Fallons?” Mac asked.

“I don’t know why he would. I’m a nobody, and I’ve been a resident of Sandstorm for ten years. There’s nothing to be gained by telling them about me. Anyway, I’m not sure he saw me, and I wasn’t going to hang around to ask. Besides, you lot heard everything that went on, didn’t you?” She tapped the device in her own neck.

“But we do not know Sandstorm and its people, Lenore Falish,” Fury said. “You do. You know what would be normal and what would not.”

“The indentured, Fury,” Len said, remembering Camille. “Can you deactivate her shackle?”

“Of course I can, but in order to do so, I must ‘tran her onboard. I certainly would if there is any way to make that happen without betraying our efforts any more than they are already compromised. Let us hope that as the situation unfolds, we may be presented with an opportunity. I shall certainly be watchful for one.”

“Thank you,” she said quietly.

“And now then, you must rest after your ordeal,” Fury said, “and I will try again to contact Professor Keen and Gerando Fallon. Tomorrow we shall make another attempt to help Ascent regain his memories.”

In the silence that followed the end of the conversation, Len sighed and pulled herself to her feet. “I need a shower, Ascent. I’d almost forgotten just how filthy Sandstorm is.”

When he gave no response, she shrugged and made her way down to her suite. It sometimes amazed her how sensitive she had become to Ascent’s presence and his mood. She could feel him just beyond her bathroom. It felt like he was pacing, waiting for her. She could also feel the static of his less than stellar mood. She heaved a sigh and turned her back to the door, deciding to linger and avoid the inevitable as long as possible. Right now all she wanted was to wash Sandstorm off her, to wash off the sight of Van carousing with the Fallons, the man who had left her to die. Those memories were not so easy to wash away. Instead, she concentrated her energy on what they might do tomorrow to stimulate the return of Ascent’s memories further. Without them, without the knowledge of his own functionality, he could not escape if he were taken, and there was a very good chance that Van would know exactly what to do to fix him and to force him into bondage to the goddamned Fallons. Well, she wasn’t about to let Van do that. She’d happily slit his throat, or stab him in the heart, the way her mom had been stabbed. He deserved no better.

Dragon Ascending Part 45: A KDG Scifi Romance

May 25, 2026Blog, fictionA KGD Free Read, A KGD Scifi Romance Adventure, Book 2 Sentient Ships Series, Dragon Ascending, Piloting FuryK D Grace

Dragon Ascending :Book 2 of the Sentient Ship Series

Dragon Ascending Part 45: We Need Your Help

Once they were safe away from prying eyes, Arji didn’t wait for formalities. “They’re looking for SNT1, if you can believe it.” He turned to her, looked her up and down and said, “I’m guessing you can believe it, new clothes, a little flesh on yer bones, and you sure as hell don’t look like you’ve travelled six days across the worst of the Taklamakan.”

“Arji, the less I tell you, the safer you’ll be. I can only say that there’s one helluva lot at stake here, and if we all play our cards right, the galaxy might be a happier place.

He offered a toothy grin. “One with two less Fallons in it, I’m hoping.

When she only gave him a raised eyebrow, the smile got bigger still. “You know me, Girlie-Girl. I’m all ears. If they say it in my bar, I’ll find out, don’t you worry. They say it outside my bar,” he gave a one shouldered shrug, “I’ll hear it anyway.”

“I knew I could count on you, Arj,” she said, but when he took a step closer and pushed the hair away from her cheek, she began to pace, not wanting to know where it might lead if she didn’t, and not wanting to lose a good friend. “Do you know why Kresho Ivanovic is drooling down Tenad Fallon’s tits?” She asked.

“Ain’t had a chance to talk to him yet. I ‘spect he’ll be poking his head in the old back room first chance he gets though. If he’s drooling down that bitch’s tits, then he’s got something up his sleeve, if I know Ivanovic. He ain’t doing this for the love of the conglomerates, you can trust me on that. ‘Sides, from what I hear, getting between that woman’s legs ain’t good for a man’s health.”

“If Ivanovic wants to bang that bitch, well that’s his problem, not mine. And anyway, an extra pair of trustworthy eyes and ears on the inside can’t hurt. Now tell me, Arji, what have you heard so far?”

Jax stuck her head in the door and handed them each a pint, “Glad you’re back Girlie. Arji’s been beside himself,” she said with barely a face quirk.

“Mum’s the word, Jax, ‘bout her being here.” He laid his finger to the side of his nose, and the barmaid gave a jerk of her head that passed as an affirmative and left. She’d been in Sandstorm long enough to roll with the punches.

Len took a sip and grimaced. She’d forgotten how vile the stuff really was. “This sauce’ll have you pissing sand, Arji. You working to improve the brewing technique, I see.”

“My goddamned one goal in life is to become a meister brewer, don’t you know?” He downed half of his and licked his cracked lip. “‘Sides, it’s better than not pissing an all.” He polished it off in a couple of quick gulps and sat the glass aside on a battered table, where he kept several smokes he made up in advance for a quick fix when the place was busy. “They came in around High Shimmer yesterday, the Fallons did, but I’m betting you knew that.”

She nodded and took another tentative sip before setting the glass aside next to his. “And they know about Fury?”

“Fuck me!” He ran a hand through his thinning hair. “Are you telling me you and SNT1 are on a first name basis?” When she only blushed, he said, “Fuck me double time. Seriously, Girlie-Girl, if we get through this shit storm alive and Fallon free, ain’t a person on this sand heap that won’t want to hear that story.”

“If we get through this shit storm alive and Fallon Free, I’ll bore the piss out of all of you at the going away party I’ll be throwing before I fuck off for the Rim.”

He chuckled. “We skin these bastards out of enough credits, we might be on the next ship out ourselves, and leave the whole goddamn place to the glass vipers and the sand infestations.” He scratched his stubbled chin and huffed out a stale breath. “Here’s the thing that’s interesting to me, Girlie-girl, not more than a couple of Shimmers before the Fallons show up, there’s a man and a woman, off-worlders, show up here asking around about you. We was all worried so when they said they wanted to help find you, we told them a little bit, ‘specially when they said the damn Dart and its crew weren’t gonna be bothering anyone again.” His face reddened the way it always did when Arji was anger, and then he offered a sympathetic smile. “Hell, ain’t a one of us that wouldn’t like to take that lot out and leave ‘em in the Shimmer after what they did.” He shifted uncomfortably from foot to foot, then looked up, forcing a smile. “Anyway, we thought we could trust those two was trying to help you, and ifn they had a ship, then if anyone could find you still alive and bring you back, they could. By that time, though, you’d been gone long enough most people figured you was infestation fodder.”

“That would have been Fury’s compliment,” she said.

His mouth fell open and his eyes got even rounder than they usually were. “You’re shittin’ me! SNT1 has two compliments?”

“In the flesh,” she said.

He chuckled and stroked his chin. “Well, I suppose an SNT ship would be … insatiable. Hell, an SNT ship could have a whole harem. At once.” He glanced up at her and shot her a wicked grin. “You wouldn’t know anything about that would you, Girlie? You sure look mighty pleased with yourself.”

When she blushed only harder, he let out a long low whistle. “What? He does his compliments and has a little bit on the side to boot? Lucky sonovabitch. Ifn he’s looking for an old fart with thinning hair and a paunch, I’m available. If his tastes run toward the eclectic, if you know what I mean. Hell, everyone in Sandstorm would happily volunteer, I’m pretty sure. Ifn his tastes run that way.”

She giggled and he raised an eyebrow, watching her pace. “So how was it?” He said stepping closer. I hear SNTs don’t care about your sex and they can make you feel like you’re in a right proper orgy, all attention on you. Is SNT1 that good?”

“I don’t know about SNT1. I’ve never had sex with him.”

He studied her for a moment, then grabbed up a smoke from the table, lit it up, inhaling deeply. “Then it is true, what they’ve been saying. They’re saying that SNT1’s here looking for another SNT, one somewhere in the Sea of Death.”

She only blinked, but in Sandstorm, a blink could speak volumes.

“We all told them they was full of shit. What the hell would an SNT ship be doing buried beneath the sand in Tak Major? Makes no goddamned sense at all. But then what does these days when here the fuck we are hosting two bloody Fallon brats and their goon squad.” He took another puff and blew it out. “The son is no chip off the old block. He’s a bloody Mist addict. Pretty damned useless. I wonder how he managed to find the toilet with his own ass when he has a shit. First thing his sister did when she got here was make sure we could supply his habit. ‘Course we couldn’t. That stuff’ll dry up your piss faster than a couple hours in a Shimmer Wind. Turns out Ivanovic sorted him. Oh it’s not sisterly love on Daddy little girl’s part. She wants him out of the way. You can damn near feel the hate rolling off those two like heat in the Shimmer. But Tenad, now she’s one dangerous bitch. She scares the piss right out of me. They say she’s nothing like her old man. She doesn’t have a petty bone in her body. She’s all business, they say, all fairness, maybe even more than fair. Don’t argue over the price of things. Just pays the credits with a smile. Hell, she acts like one of those navel gazers on High Mount, so fucking serene and peaceful that her shit don’t stink. But when she sets a plan in motion well, hell hath no fury, and forget the woman scorned. Just hell hath no fury. I’ve heard things that put me right off my rations and give me nightmares, sure enough. Still waters run deep and fucking dangerous with that one. I hope ole Ivanovic knows what he’s doing. He might end up with his dick in a knot.”

He puffed on his smoke for a second, ruminating on that scary fact, and then he continued. “Apparently they can’t find SNT1 because he has one helluva cloaking device, and they can’t get into the Sea of Death Yard because it has a de-mole fence around the whole goddamn thing. Around the whole goddamn thing. Now who in the hell would have the tech and the credits to do that sort of thing if it weren’t a Fallon?”

“A good question,” she said.

“Anyway, they’re stymied by the de-mole and by SNT1’s cloak. That means they could be here awhile. If they have a plan, I haven’t heard anything, and no one has questioned me. I think if I went about it just right I could probably get little Camille to fill me in on some things. Oh I know most of them that’s got indentureds aren’t afraid to tell all their secrets around them. Their poor indentureds would never speak out when they know the consequences. Dig’s trying to get his hands on someone who can deactivate a shackle, but there are so many quacks out there, you know. She’s a good girl, quiet, but not cowed.”

It was standard beyond Authority territory, if you brought an indentured into non-Authority space, any effort that could possibly be made to free that indentured would be made. There was still far too little of the cure for the SNT virus that kept indentureds from trying to escape, but that would gradually change. Still, an indentured making an escape was rare enough even beyond the Rim, that it didn’t keep Authority ships from bringing their indentureds right on over with relatively little fear.

“Would do my heart good though, to rob a Fallon of an indentured,” Arji said. Len couldn’t help thinking the same.

“Bitch is got a lot of nerve bringing in indentured into my bar.” He shook his head as though he suddenly remembered the task at hand. “So, there really is another SNT? Well fuck me! Which one is it, and how did it get here?”

“He has no memory of who he is or what he’s doing way out here,” she said. “That’s why Fury’s here, trying to help him.”

“And he likes you, this mysterious SNT?”

This was not a conversation she wanted to have. “He doesn’t hate me, at least not most of the time. Look Arji, please don’t ask me any more questions. Answers may only put you at risk. All I need is for you to keep your ears open and,” she fumbled in her jacket and pulled out the small leather case with the subdural device. “I need you to wear this. You can communicate with me, with us, if there’s anything we need to know. Just rub your hand over it. You know, like you’re rubbing your neck. That’ll activate it and we’ll hear what you’re saying and I’ll come if there’s something important you need to let us know.”

He held her gaze until she blinked. “He ‘tranned you here, didn’t he, SNT1 Fury.”

She only blinked at him and loaded the subdural into the syringe. He pulled his hair away from the spot behind his ear and gave a little hiss as she inserted it. “What’s that like, being ‘tranned? Weren’t you afraid it’d scramble your brain?”

“Arji, how goddamn long does it take you to shoot you’re wad? Vaticana Jesu. Finish the fuck up already. I don’t need to see this,” Ivanovic said, but he didn’t look away.

As Ivanovic burst in, Arji grabbed Len, pulling up her hood as he did so and then kissed the hell out of her just like they had been fucking, then he pulled away and nodded her toward the back door, but even in the recess of her hood, she got her first look at Kresho Invnovic, and she froze. He hadn’t gone by that name when she knew him. He was Van, they called him. Keith Vanderbilt, and he had betrayed her and her mother, left them to rot on Tak Minor.

She barely heard Arji tell the man he was a cocksucker, as he turned her toward the door with a little shove. She glared back one last time at Van from under her hood, then fled out the back door to a litany of Ascent’s growls and grumbles about Arji’s lying, filthy, disrespectful mouth. Once she was safely back in the blind spot and she could calm down enough to stop shaking, she told Fury she was ready to ‘tran up.