Page 6 of Synnr's Ride

She wore the same dark uniform she'd been wearing for weeks. Well, not completely the same. Her quarters had three versions of the same outfit that were taken away and laundered for her in rotation. She might have appreciated the service if it didn't come with a cell.

Her feet were cold in the slippers she wore. They were thin and terrible at keeping the chill out. They were also too big, and she kept having to flex her toes to keep them from slipping off.

But at least she had shoes. She'd be shivering otherwise.

The door opened and Hanna perked up, hating herself even as her body angled towards the door. Having inconvenient feelings for her interrogator was going to get her in trouble.

She was still disappointed when the man who walked through the door wasn't Jori.

He was Zulir, probably close to her age, and wearing a crisply pressed military uniform. He had short hair and a closed expression. She could see the slightest hint of a tattoo peeking out from his collar and wondered if it was a Synnr Match tattoo.

Synnrs loved to mark themselves, and Hanna would be lying if she said she wasn't fascinated by it. But she was a spy. Lying was what she did.

Or what she used to do.

Where's Jori?The words were on the tip of her tongue, and she only barely managed to bite them back. She didn't see Jori every day. They'd never spoken outside the confines of the interrogation.

For all she knew, he was on vacation with his wife and three children.

"What's that look for?" today's interrogator asked.

Hanna realized she was scowling and schooled her expression. She shrugged. No use starting out the meeting with a lie, and she definitely wasn't going to admit she had a preference for anyone on the team. "Who are you?"

The man set a thick file on the table between them, just far enough to be out of reach. It had to be on purpose. Hanna's fingers itched to grab it and read through. What secrets did they think she was hiding?

Who was she to the Synnr military?

Who was she at all anymore?

"My name is Solan Zadra. Major Ozar asked me to talk to you." Solan took a seat and pulled the folder closer to himself but didn't open it.

Solan Zadra. There was a wealthy Zadra family on Aorsa. He could be a member. Part of her job training had involved memorizing the richest and most influential Synnr families. Not that the information would do her any good now.

"Was letting me stew in here all morning a new trick?" She'd been brought in for interrogation not long after breakfast. Since then it had been hours, so long waiting that a guard had even brought her lunch. She'd snatched a brief glance out the door, but the interrogation room was off a hallway and she couldn't see anything important.

It was weird. She didn't like weird.

"What do you know about Starstone Construction?" He tapped his finger against the file twice before flattening his hand over it.

"Never heard of it. Is Starstone a name or a building material?" She wasn't a carpenter and had never considered having anything built. Certainly not on Aorsa. Her time on the planet was limited to her brief stint at the university.

Luci.

Punt. Hanna spent most of her days trying desperately not to think about the young woman she'd hurt. Luci was an innocent kid who'd gotten caught up in interspace politics and espionage. It had worked out alright in the end; after all, Hanna was the one in a cage while Luci was all snuggled up with her hulking Synnr warrior, but it didn't undo the damage Hanna had caused.

"What about Fazuz Realty?" Solan continued in his annoyingly terse tone. "Or the Xynthorp Taxi Company? NovaTek Toys and Robotics?"

"I think I remember seeing signs for the realty company when I was at the university, but otherwise I've never heard of these companies." A real estate agent, a toy company, a taxi service, and construction. They didn't have anything to do with each other. And they certainly had nothing to do with her.

So why ask?

Zadra flipped open the folder and pulled out a photograph before sliding it her way. "Tell me what you see."

It was low quality security camera footage of a street. Probably Osais, though she couldn't be certain. Her eyes automatically focused on the center of the image. "That's a SynStar 5, maybe a 4 if it was late model. Released about 6 years ago, it's one of the best bikes on the market. You don't see many of them on Aorsa since they need to be imported from the shop down on Kilrym, and they're ridiculously expensive, even before the export costs."

"You know a lot about this bike," he prodded, not quite coming up to the tip of an accusation.

But it made Hanna relax in her seat. "You're looking at the Sunset League under-16 Junior Fusion Cycle Champion. It should be in my file."

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