Hard Luck Hermit

The march back to the ship was bad enough already. The view on arrival was worse. The ship was just as they’d left it, with the additional of one unsightly blemish standing outside. A lithe, serpentine humanoid in tactical gear, glaring towards the hangar entrance with his unnatural eyes. The Ghost. Corey put a hand on his gun the minute he spotted a stranger in the hangar, but Kamak waved him down.

“Thanks for not being an asshole about this,” Ghost said.

“Don’t get ahead of yourself,” Kamak said. “If you came here just to say ‘I told you so’, I’m letting the kid shoot you.”

Corey put his hand back on his gun. Ghost scoffed at the threat.

“Luckily for you, I’m here on other business,” Ghost said. “Though for the record, I did tell you so.”

Kamak rolled his eyes.

“Say your piece and get the fuck out.”

“I’m here to give you a friendly heads up,” Ghost said, though the way he said “friendly” sounded anything but. “There’s a video.”

Kamak did a quick turn around to make sure the hangar doors were sealed before he shouted “Fuck” at the top of his lungs. Farsus kept his mind on business.

“What does it show?”

“Nothing useful,” Ghost said. “There’s a voice, but it’s synthesized, no good for tracking. The vid’s graphic, and it calls you out specifically. We did what we could to suppress it, but the perp sent it to hundreds of outlets at once. It’s going to slip through the cracks, and it’s going to spread fast.”

“What good is a shadow cabal if it can’t even censor one fucking video,” Kamak said. “So what now? You try to bully us into retiring again?”

“Quote the opposite, unfortunately,” Ghost said. “We wanted you to rest on your laurels. Now there’s a new threat, and it’s after you. You disappear now, it looks like you lost, or ran away. The big heroes got beaten. Not exactly good for public confidence.”

“So you’re trying to help us?” Tooley said. “If this is you trying to be helpful, we’re fucked.”

Ghost glared at her with half-lidded eyes.

“I could care less about helping you,” Ghost said flatly. “But my employers disagree. We’ve sent you a copy of the video. Maybe you can make something of it, get ahead of the public inquiry. Aside from that, I have information. A suspect.”

“Finally, something useful,” Tooley said. “Lay it on us.”

“Security footage from the Loben killing picked up an unknown individual entering the mansion but never leaving,” Ghost said. “Gentanian female, middle-aged, no identifying markers beyond that. We’ve forwarded you a copy of the security footage too.”

“Gentanian?”

“I know one when I see one, yes,” Ghost said.

“This is a complication,” Farsus said. “To his limited ability, Quid described our culprit as having red skin and long hair. Neither being traits of the Gentanians.”

Kamak ran a hand over his own bald head for emphasis. Ghost didn’t even look his direction.

“It’s entirely possible we’re dealing with a small group,” Ghost said. “Or one individual who knows how to do stage makeup and put on a wig.”

“Damn, don’t know what’s worse, a cabal of assassins or a theater kid,” Tooley said.

“We’re running the story as if it’s a single person for now,” Ghost said. “A serial killer is upsetting, but not as much as a cadre of killers.”

“Yeah, stars, just imagine what people would think if there were secret assassins running around,” Kamak said, with a pointed glare at Ghost. Once again, Ghost ignored his petulant behavior.

“You know everything we know,” Ghost said. He ceased leaning on the walls of the Wanderer and took a few steps towards the door. “A line of communication that will be going both ways, naturally.”

“You say that like a threat,” Kamak said.

“Because it is. You people have some importance, but you are far from indispensable,” Ghost said. “You become more trouble than you’re worth, you get tossed out with the rest of the garbage. You play nice, maybe we can help each other.”

He turned his back on the ship and crew and began to walk away, never looking back.

“So play nice.”

As part of playing nice, Kamak allowed Ghost to have the last word. He waited until the door had slammed shut to mouth off.

“Cunt.”

“Hope the killer gets him next,” Tooley said.

“He’s kind of an asshole, yeah, but then, so are you guys,” Doprel said.

“Thanks for volunteering to give the reports to Ghost and friends, Doprel,” Kamak said. “Come on. Let’s watch those videos and see what we can figure out. We’ve got a killer to catch.”