“A baby frien?” the man with Bart asked. “You’d think they’d be less dangerous because they’re much smaller, but they’re actually more trouble than the adults. The Garmman we had here got bitten and—” He made a gesture that had Fee guessing the Garmman hadn’t made it.
Maybe he’d been their Class 5 expert.
“What did it look like?” Bart asked.
“About this long.” Fee had never seen a baby frien, but she’d seen an adult up close and she guessed how big one might be, holding her hands out. “Thin and a peach color.”
“Shit. That’s it.” The man went still and looked around. “We go through anti venom like it’s water here.”
“I’m not staying in this room,” Fee said. “I can’t. I don’t even know if your anti venom will work on me.”
Bart gestured to her and she walked to the edge of the bench, looked at the floor carefully, and then stepped down, eyes fixed on the bathroom area.
Bart grabbed her arm, holding her slightly behind him, his grip hard. Bunny wiggled out from her sleeve, jumped onto his jacket, and ran up onto his shoulder.
Before he could even register what was going on, before Fee could voice any opinion about what should happen, Bunny lifted a foreleg, which extended a thin needle that went straight into Bart’s neck.
Then he leapt onto the shoulder of the man who’d come with Bart, and plunged the needle into his neck, too.
Bart noticed Bunny at last and stumbled back, shoving Fee away from him.
“What is that?—?”
Then he fell, crumpling to the floor in an awkward heap.
The man with him turned at the sound, Bunny still clinging to his back, and his eyes widened at the sight of Bart.
“Where—?” He fell to the side, struck the screen with his shoulder, and then slid down to the ground, coming to a rest half sitting up.
Fee crouched beside Bart, felt for a pulse, and was glad when she found one.
Then she held out her arm. “Good job, Bunny. Let’s get out of here.”
CHAPTER 33
Hal reached the floor below,and Crane stepped out of the shadows.
“All good?” he asked.
Hal nodded. “You see anyone? Hear anything?”
“Nothing. I was about to go up to find you,” Crane said. “Things are too quiet.”
Hal nodded. “Let’s see what’s going on in the conference room.”
“Fiona wouldn’t let me put a lens in there,” Eazi said in his ear. “Otherwise I could have told you what was going on.”
A cold drip of unease snaked down Hal’s spine, and he shook his head. “We’ll manage,” he said.
The Grih’s need for privacy and a deep-seated dislike of being surveilled was a result of the Thinking Systems Wars. Thinking systems had been banned for two hundred years, and as a consequence of the war, most spaces were lens feed free. That Eazi had broached putting one in the inner sanctum of Grih Battle Center without their knowledge was alarming.
But Fiona had told him not to, and he had listened. That was something, at least.
Juy was right behind him, and Vistna and Crane trailed behind her. They encountered the body again, and moved around the dead Balcoan. No one said anything, but Hal could sense the tension rise as they were reminded that this was deadly.
As they got closer to the conference room door, Crane made a sound of surprise. Hal glanced over his shoulder. And froze.
“Vistna.” He said it as if it was a revelation. “You were the lookout at the front entrance for them.”
