Chapter Text
The zenith of summer on Faerûn meant being near-blinded at every turn. Plasma lenses captured memories of park picnics; sunlight bounced off the airborne silver taxicabs; and the bedazzling chrome smile of Ettvard Needle on the 24/7 news. Luckily for Violante, the Alliance budget didn’t quite stretch to every corner. Instead, the shining streets of the Upper City gave way to the cobbled glow of the Lower, in turn swallowed by the grey clouds and dank daylight at Wyrm’s Crossing.
Vi preferred the latter over the former. These days, her favourite kind of stage was the one half-cloaked in shadow.
The Blushing Mermaid was considered a high-quality establishment by Undercity standards, meaning it was on street-level and only half-diluted the liquor. Still, the beaten aluminium countertop sucked at Vi’s fingers. Prising them loose, she bit back bile and kept her face impassive, her back slouched against the bar. Total ease was in every line of her body, ankles a crossed kickstand below, as she contemplated the beetroot-faced man in front of her. Her hand drifted over to pick up the dirt-dappled shot glass to her left.
“Your credits bounced, Aradin. Way I see it, you and I are done.”
“I paid you for a job you didn’t do, Calder!” His spit landed on the side of her shot glass. Vi’s lip twitched in disgust. “I don’t want my credits back. I need the reward for that cargo.”
She sighed, watching the nauseating cloudy spirit swirl in her glass. Let the silence stretch. Timing was everything, especially for men like Aradin. Like holding a rest in a song for just a beat too long, so he bristled and muttered and got too comfortable. Once he was following the predictable cues, she finally dragged her eyes upwards.
“See, that’s our two minds.” Her voice was cut from steel. “Last I checked, people aren’t cargo.”
“What are you, some kinda martyr?” Aradin scoffed. He loomed closer. Her knuckles went white. “You’re nothing but a scummy crook. I’m gonna get that girl, and then I’m gonna get my reward, and then I’m gonna hire a knife to stick in those pretty ribs.”
He punctuated each statement with a poke to her sternum.
“So what–” poke– “are you gonna do about it, bitch?”
Vi pushed away from the bar suddenly, so close to him now she almost gagged on his tobacco-rotten breath. Clenching her jaw, she looked down – men like Aradin also hated being shorter than her – into his bloodshot eyes.
Then she broke into a beaming smile.
“Nothing,” she said brightly. “I just wanted you to look at me so she could get behind you.”
Before the mercenary could blink, the rifle butt connected with the side of his head with a satisfying thunk. Not a single person in the bar, from the android bartender to the four catatonic patrons scattered about, flinched. Aradin was out cold before he even hit the ground.
Almost doubled over in relief, Vi released a long exhale. Then she raised an eyebrow at the green-skinned woman now standing above the body.
“Talk about last second, Lae’zel. Did you fall down the bowl?”
Lae’zel rolled her reptilian ochre eyes. “G’lyck. You had it completely under control, Captain.”
The sarcasm was thick enough to choke on; she’d left her pistol on the ship, while Aradin was armed to the teeth. But she knew Lae’zel’s gallows humour better than that.
Instead, Vi smiled warmly as the other woman joined her at the bar, a smirk also tugging at her lips. The bartender was quick to put down a matching shot of Marsember spirit, even as he side-eyed Lae’zel suspiciously. Vi didn’t blame him. A githyanki on Faerûn usually meant military occupation or political summit, and both were bad for business.
The two tapped their glasses together before knocking back the acrid drink. Lae’zel’s snubbish nostrils flared – Vi coughed.
“What was his problem anyway?” the gith continued, as Vi regained her composure. She waved another black-mottled hand to get their drinks topped up.
“Complaining about the service.” Vi shuddered, recalling Aradin’s ‘job’. “Remember the Gauntlet run, a few cycles back? He was the merc that bought us to capture that girl.”
“Of course.” Lae’zel drew out the words in recognition. “Four fuel cells and three thousand credits bounced, just to return her … Isobel, was it?”
“Aylin. Isobel was her love. We’re not criminals.”
The gith muttered something under her breath that Vi pretended not to hear.
“I mean -- we are criminals. But we’re real polite about it.”
The acerbic lines of Lae’zel’s face were still dripping with derision, but Vi only tipped her shot glass towards her with a cheerful grin. Then the glitchy CRT screen above the bar snagged her attention.
A live interview was being broadcast: a greasy, pockmarked man with tousled black hair, and a quick, easy smile that didn’t reach his eyes. As Vi watched, his gaze darted to the camera, like he knew she was there.
“…adapted the Gondian design for Auto-Guards, arguably flawed in its need for an internal pilot. Instead, my new Steel Watchers are entirely remote-controlled from…”
Her lip curled as she listened. Every. Fucking. Time. Gods, I hate this planet.
In space, she could go months without remembering, without seeing him polished and preening on every corner. Oooh, look at you, big saviour with the shiny death robots. ‘Adapted’ her ass – he’d probably stolen that too, just like–
Lae’zel nudged her on the arm, dragged her back to the present before her mind started spiralling. The battle-hardened gith never exactly looked sweet; but her features had softened a little now. Pushing the hot, sour memory away, Vi nodded back at Lae’zel, just once. Five by five – for now.
The interview ended only moments later, thankfully. For a few minutes, the only sound in the half-empty bar was the tin can laugh tracks of daytime television, punctuated by the occasional squeak of old leather as a drunk shifted in their seat.
Nursing fresh shots, the gunner and her captain sat in companionable silence. Until a high, musical voice from behind made them swivel on unsteady stools.
Astarion stood over the still-unconscious thug, arms crossed, eyes narrowed downwards in hatred. “Ew, is that Aradin? May I?”
Vi waved a hand – go ahead. Astarion delivered him a hearty kick in the stomach.
The aggression was quite at odds with the way the elf slicked back his silver hair afterwards. But that was Astarion – a vicious killer wrapped in a silk bow, and the finest first mate in the galaxy.
Like he could hear her thoughts, Astarion spat on Aradin.
“Scumbag. Anyway–” He looked up, waving the holo-watch on his wrist. “Jaheira pinged us, Vi. Said to meet her at the Guildhall.”
“Ugh. So it’s Keene today,” Vi groaned, standing up and tossing a few credits on the counter. Heading for the door, the others fell into step behind her as she continued: “You know, just once I’d like to meet someone new? In a pretty place, where all the towels are white and clean…”
There was another moan from the floor as they left - a parting kick from Lae’zel.
“Your idea of class makes me weep, darling, truly,” Astarion said with a theatrical sigh, as they stepped out into the muggy, grey air of the street. It was quieter than usual, Vi noticed - or at least, since their last visit to Faerûn six months ago.
“What, are towels not white anymore?”
She raised a hand to her mouth with mock horror, affecting Astarion’s upper class Corellian diction - to the elf’s great chagrin.
“Blast it, darling, I must have missed that brochure–”
Before she could finish, all the wind was smacked from her lungs as someone barrelled straight into her back. Distracted, walking backwards just to tease Astarion, whoever it was had come charging around the corner at the same time. Vi managed to fling hands out to catch herself in time, and spun in a tense crouch. Aradin’s cronies, maybe, or-
But whoever he was, he was no Undercity thug. He’d hit the ground harder than Vi, and was now gingerly getting back to his knees, coughing and apologising profusely in a distinct, polished accent.
“I am so very sorry -”
A black metal tube resonated with a clang as it hit the ground and rolled away, knocked clear in the collision. The man reached after it desperately – but Vi was faster. Her hands closed around cold metal before it was even three feet away, and her brows knitted in confusion. Not cold - freezing. But it’s so hot today…
The stranger was still babbling as he lunged for the tube. Vi’s mouth was forming the shape of a question when she looked up, and finally saw her attacker’s face.
First, she saw rich, golden-brown eyes widened in panic. Her vision traveled over the angular, aquiline nose; thick, raised brows; the high, slightly sunken cheekbones hidden under a scruff of brown beard, threaded with grey. His mouth hung open in a lush ‘O’ as he scrabbled long fingers over her grip on the tube. The question died in her throat.
“Careful, handsome,” Vi murmured, pulse racing as she drank him in. “You could send a girl heads over heels, going warp-speed like that.”
The sexy stranger’s hazel-flecked eyes somehow went even wider. She particularly savoured the new flush gathering at his temples. But before she could keep flirting, she felt the tube ripped out of her slackened grip. He clutched it to his chest as he scrambled to his feet.
“I’m sorry!” he yelled breathlessly before turning on his heel and sprinting away.
Staring after him, Vi stayed kneeling on the filthy pavement, mouth half-open. What was a specimen like that doing in the Undercity? And just who was he running from?
“Since when do you let them slip away so easy?” She heard Astarion’s smirk even with her back to him. “You’ve been so soft and slow since turning thirty. Humans really do age like milk.”
“I know…” she replied, still lost in thought. Then the comment finally cut through the mush of grey matter left in the stranger’s wake.
“You’re two hundred and forty-three, asshole!”
It didn’t take them long to reach the Guildhall, a nondescript warehouse tucked in the Heapside district near the docks. A credit and a password slipped from Astarion to the wiry man at the side-door bought them entrance into the cacophony inside.
Tables, merchandise and customers stacked so thick from wall-to-wall, they had to move in single file, ducking through displays and skirting aggressive vendors. There were food stalls at one end, the scent of perpetual stew wafting towards them; slightly-less-than-legal items and services for sale at the other.
Like everything in the Undercity, it was grimy, shoddy and haphazard. But there was beauty in the discordance too. It was honest, even if it operated outside the law. In Vi’s experience, the two rarely, if ever, aligned.
She dodged a halfling trying to wave clearly-fake jewels in her face, heading for the double doors at the back. The four women in front of it were carrying more guns than Vi had piercings -- twelve at last count -- Keene’s personal guard, dubbed the Ladies Court. They gave the trio curt nods, allowing them to pass.
As the doors closed with a soft hiss, the racket from the Guildhall went with it, much to Vi’s relief. The office on the other side was intentionally simple – dark walls and faded carpets furnishing a space ruled by an imposing steel slab of a desk.
It could only be Jaheira sat in front of it; in her telltale leather jacket, silver rings glinting in her braided hair. But she didn’t turn when they came in, setting Vi’s teeth on edge.
And on the other side of the desk – Nine-Fingers Keene. There was a rumour she never carried less than thirty knives.
“Violante,” Nine-Fingers drawled in her native Undercity accent. She didn’t get up. “Aren’t I honoured.”
Vi plastered on her best client-facing grin as she approached the desk. She didn’t sit down. “Nine-Fingers. Tell me something shiny.”
“Afraid not, Vi.” Nine-Fingers tutted. She waved to the embossed gold bar sitting on the desk between them. “I can’t take this, it’s got Alliance all over it. You understand me, hon. Bad for business.”
“I said we got them honestly, but she’s being leathery,” Jaheira said fiercely from Vi’s right, arms crossed. “Speak some sense into her.”
Vi took a deep breath. Jaheira and Nine-Fingers went back further than sin, but sometimes it was unclear if they were better friends or enemies. She got the impression neither of them were quite sure either. Regardless, she would need to strike the right note – or risk not only losing their best fixer in Faerûn, but put Jaheira on her ass as well.
Resting her hands on the back of the empty aluminium seat, Vi leaned forward and wrinkled her nose towards the Guildmaster cheerfully.
“Nine-Fingers, we both know the goods will end up in Alliance hands anyway, once you’ve flipped them so many times they’re dizzy. Why does it matter where it’s come from?”
Her attempt at flattery slid right off.
“You lot have been off-world for a whole cycle,” Nine-Fingers said flatly, pulling her cushioned swivel chair closer to the desk. “Things are getting hairy ‘round here, you know. Rumblings in the Outer Rim got these new clankers on the streets, and I’m losing cutpurses and grifters faster than I can sneeze. I’m not drawing any more attention than absolutely necessary.”
She pushed the bar towards them with a pen, like it was red-hot.
“I’m no snitch, Keene,” Vi countered quickly. “I get you’re squeezing me, but I don’t feel juicy. You’re a friend of the family, so maybe–”
“I mean it, Vi. I’m not shifting this for you.” Nine-Fingers rose to her feet, pointing to the door.
But Vi stood her ground. “Then who will? You know full well there’s no-one else on this rock I can trust to handle this.”
“I’m sorry, I truly am.” To her credit, Nine-Fingers tried her best to look sincere. She paused, then glanced towards Jaheira. “Maybe try the Darklands Belt – I hear the sheriff is real friendly.”
Behind her, Lae’zel and Astarion started moving towards the door. Vi sucked at her teeth, trying to scrape a saving grace from her racing thoughts. But the Guildmaster’s face said it all – she wasn’t going to budge. It was a rare day when words failed her, and she hated it every time.
Jaheira put a hand on her shoulder, shooting a final daggered look at Nine-Fingers. “Come, cub. Leave Astele to her spreadsheets.”
Vi gritted her teeth, then nodded to Nine-Fingers, snatching the gold bar back from the desk. They left without another word.
✩‧₊˚─────⋆⋅☆⋅⋆─────˚₊‧✩
In the alley outside the warehouse, Vi finally let it out.
“FUCK. We were counting on that-”
Lae’zel drew a quick finger across her throat. Vi looked around to see the hulking mass of copper, wire and brutality – patrolling a few feet away – stopped at her words. They exchanged glances, then began the casual meander to the end of the street in silence. Once they were around the corner, and out of the Steel Watcher’s sight, their pace made double-time.
“Did you see the hardware?” Lae’zel’s voice was thick with barely disguised admiration as they headed for the docks. “Integrated mag-pulse repeaters, pneumatic dampeners, and sh’har’lek plasma cannons … That’s not standard blue-issue. They’re instruments of war.”
“Watch it, Lae’zel, or I’ll tell your wife you were drooling over guns again,” said Astarion wryly.
“She knows. It was in the vows.”
Vi barely heard their conversation. Her racing thoughts were on the gold bar burning a hole in her jacket, and the twenty identical ones currently lining the walls of their ship. They'd pulled the cargo from an abandoned transport ship three weeks ago - no crew, no distress beacon. The payday could be enough to keep them flying for a year. But with Alliance stamps all over them, they were radioactive to any fixer this side of the Toril system.
“Buzz the others, Astarion, see if they can catch some dock-flies,” she barked with no preamble. “We’ll need to take some passengers after all. Cover the scent of the merchandise.”
“Already on it.” Perfectly manicured nails danced over his holo-watch.
Vi turned to Jaheira, keeping step by her side. “What happened in there?”
“Forty years, and I’ve never seen her so squirrelly,” she replied, shaking her head. The usual crinkles around her eyes doubled as she frowned. “I think it’s more than the androids - rumours are flying about a new cult, even an entire army. The last is probably exaggeration, but still, it seems the Alliance is also having some leadership issues. On the broadcast I saw Gor–”
She stopped herself quickly, but the damage was done.
Vi ground her teeth to dust. “Yeah. I heard.”
Shoulders hunched and hands plunged deep into her pockets, she fixed her glare on the cracked concrete ahead. The others would be sharing looks behind her, she was sure; but she also knew they wouldn’t say anything. Things like pity and comfort had their time and place, but she’d made her feelings clear long ago. Never when there’s work to be done.
“I think we should be ready to make waves by nightfall,” Vi announced.
Jaheira nodded approval. “I’ll follow up on this Darklands tip, see what I can shake loose from the local Harpers.”
“Thanks. Any word, Astarion?”
“Wyll and Shadowheart are canvassing now, but they said options are slim. If we can afford to wait–”
“We can’t. Tell them to say we just got Elvish cable.”
“We did?”
Vi shot a Look over her shoulder at Lae’zel that said don’t-be-stupid.
“Oh. Shka’keth.”
Complaining yet again that they never stocked the ship’s kitchen properly, Jaheira forced them to stop for supplies at the merchant stalls near the docks. Vi hardly disagreed – they all lived on saltines and cheap wine – but she tapped her foot with impatience as the others browsed.
The light was dipping towards the horizon, and the sky was calling her back to its safety. The clouds parted. For one blazing moment, she got a rare, complete view of Baldur’s Gate.
The gargantuan jump station was responsible for seventy-five percent of the galaxy’s exports. Built by humans from Faerûn and named for a legendary hero, it was declared public property a century ago – for “the good and prosperity of the cosmos”.
Everyone knew it was bullshit. It belonged to the Alliance of High Elves and Men, situated perfectly between their twin home worlds. Most ships could handle shorter hops through the Weave, hers better than most, but crossing systems? Intergalactic commerce? That required a station. By forming the Alliance and controlling the Gate, the millenia of AnarchEra ended by threat; trade was monopolised, and after nearly five centuries of rule, both Faerûn and Corellon were richer than gods.
But even as it pissed her off – the sight was still awe-inspiring. Baldur’s Gate was both a towering arrow of steel, the floating headquarters of the Alliance; and the nearby, exquisitely crafted series of flat rings that formed the long-distance jump portal. As she watched, a freight hauler approached and the rings hummed to life, spinning and connecting with threads of purple light. The ship accelerated through the tunnel they formed, the air shimmering as a space-time anomaly bloomed open. In a moment, both were gone. Weave-jumps, the spacers called them.
Jaheira finally waved her forward to pay, and Vi counted out their remaining credits like gold dust. Lae’zel shouldered a sack of vacuum-packed, flavourless goodies, and they were moving again.
The sun was just brushing the tops of the Upper City skyscrapers when they reached the docks. Her frustration over the failed deal began to subside, even eased into a reluctant smile as they crossed the walkway of the public hangar. It was hard to stay mad when she saw her baby.
To her, the Eurydice was perfection in black titanium, the most beautiful ship in the docks, no competition. To anyone else, though, it was a squat, rectangular ex-military frigate with a battered hull and peeling paintwork. It was a squeeze to fit seven crew members inside, even when four of them shared two rooms. Once you packed it with cargo – which was most days – there was barely room to swing a gremishka. But it was also the only real home Vi had ever known.
The ramp that led into the front-loaded hull was down, crates stacked beside it – they took legal work as often as the other kind, when beggars couldn’t be choosers. Two figures perched on the boxes jumped up as they approached. Lae’zel joined the small, white-haired half-elf in light blue scrubs; Astarion was pulled into the arms of the muscular black man in a faded floral shirt.
“Ah, young love,” Shadowheart smiled, as Wyll planted a kiss on Astarion’s cheek and made his pointed ears go pink. “Remember when we were like that, Lae’zel?”
“Never, vo'n'fynh,” the gith replied, one arm around her wife’s waist. “You tried to stab me on our third meeting.”
“That was just foreplay. But now we’re so jaded and miserable…” Shadowheart sighed, idly fingering the zip of Lae’zel’s cargo pocket. “Don’t worry, boys - you’ll be there one day soon.”
Wyll took his boyfriend’s hand and swept into a comically low bow, one fist across his chest.
“If that day ever comes, beloved, I swear, I will fly this whole sorry boat into Sol itself. Better to end all our sufferings than endure your wrath at my appalling behaviour.”
The immovable wall of Astarion’s sardonic shell was simply no match for the unstoppable force of Wyll’s devotion. The elf’s expression melted to a small smile as he muttered some private joke. The pilot threw back his head in a soul-deep laugh, his eyes – one normal, one cybernetic – crinkled with joy.
Watching the two drenched in happiness, the last of Vi’s frustration dissipated. From anyone else, the words might have been corny, but she’d known him since they were eighteen. Insincerity didn’t know the meaning of Wyll.
She realised she had a huge grin on her face. Completely unprofessional. She tried to school her features back to the no-nonsense captain.
“You’re all terrible thugs and lowlifes, you know that?” Wagging her finger did little to offset the smile still tugging at the corner of her mouth.
“Aww, Vi’s feeling left out,” Shadowheart declared. She grabbed Vi by the waist to kiss her on the cheek. “I love my captain.”
Vi tried to squirm out of her grip even while laughing, but then Wyll threw his arms over both of them. The struggle became futile.
“Alright, alright, get off,” she gasped, both from amusement and the bone-crushing hug. When she was finally freed, she continued: “So? Did we find any passengers?”
“You wound us, captain,” Wyll said affably. “There’s three up there now, just waiting for your say-so.”
“Thank you. Today’s overdue on good news.”
She tossed out some quick instructions to the group, but they were on it before she even finished speaking – a well-oiled operation. The shadows of the cargo hold moulded into recognisable shapes as she scaled the ramp: a steel-panelled tall room and a scattering of people.
Two were tieflings, probably Faerûn born-and-bred; they had been emigrating for generations from the Baator Nebula, and these two looked young and related. Her gaze drifted lazily from them to the other – then snapped to attention as it landed on familiar brown eyes, distinctive angular cheekbones.
“Well, hello again, handsome.”