Page 64 of Hell Breaks Loose

“Out with it.”

“My tits or the bad news?”

“Both, please, to soften the blow.”

“Right away, sir.”

Good. Goddess. The way she says that in that cool, low, sarcastic tone makes me simultaneously scared of her and ready to wrestle. Mostly the scared thing, though.

The woman was, or is, a notoriously deadly assassin. Hit-person. Ex-mercenary.

And Gavin Rorshak’s ex-wife. Those. Two. Together.

What.

A thought that has absolutely never crossed my mind during bathtime.

Ahem.

“I’ve been exploring ways for us to fight back against the druggies.”

“Great. Cause I haven’t had time to explore fucking anything other than how to feed all the people in this valley and how to make sure that we're protected when that psychopath Marco comes back to town.”

“And dice to dicks you’re doing a hell of a job, too.’

“Thanks. I think?”

“I guess ‘fighting back’ isn’t the right way to say it. We need a cure. Or we need a way to wipe them all out.”

“That’s…”

“A little too genocidal, even for my tastes.”

“So…”

“So, I’ve been looking into who might be qualified to work on a counteragent or drug. Found a couple of biochemists who came in just last week. One was a professor at the university, other was a former Devonde employee.”

“Does he know what this Devo shit is?”

“No. But he and our local pharmacist who’s already been helping us with meds for the general public?—”

“Dr. Chan is the best!”

“Agreed. She said they can probably reverse-engineer some if we can get our hands on a vial.”

“I thought you said this was bad news?”

“I’m working my way there. First, there’s the whole army of junkies that harass us at every turn. Makes it hard to figure out where the stuff is coming from.”

“Take whatever you need to get it done.”

“You know what we need.”

“You want to send Gavin and Tell back out.”

Alaya tilts her head in a begrudging acknowledgement.

We’ve already been through this, how much help they can be around here, providing a solid foundation to my council of ever-problematic leadership. Frankly, I was sort of hoping Gav would take over for me.

---