Page 71 of Stars in Umbra
‘All right,’ she said. ‘Run facial reconstructions based on available posture and metadata. Flag any matches with any known augmented operatives in the region.’
‘We’ll get on it,’ Sean confirmed.
Rina cut the feed and sat back, the silhouette still frozen on the screen.
She stared at the silent specter slipping through the trees.
The answer was just on the edges of her memory.
She couldn’t see it yet.
RINA
Rina slammed her tablet shut with more force than necessary and let out a groan that came from the soul.
The grainy forest footage, the endless round table briefings, the parade of generals too eager to flex their medals or their tired pickup lines, wrung her dry.
Tyran’s assassin was still a ghost, the conference was a bureaucratic crawl, and if she had to field one more ‘Are you seeing anyone, Colonel?’ from a man with liver spots and ego inflation, she was going to throw herself into Eden II’s core.
She tapped her comms and waited.
‘Hey,’ came Mo’s voice, warm and deep.
‘I need saving.’
After a pause, came the familiar rumble of his laugh. ‘Bad day,mikaya?’
‘The worst,’ she groaned. ‘I have to get as far away from generals, intel briefings, and middle-aged combat dogs trying to buy me dinner with glory stories from the last Unification War.’
‘I’d fight them for you,’ he said, still amused.
‘You’d win,’ she muttered, rubbing her temples. ‘To be honest, I just want not to think. Can you make that happen?’
‘Fokkyeah,’ he said, voice dropping a degree. ‘I’ve got something in mind.’
She hesitated. ‘Should I be nervous?’
‘Naam, in the good way.’
Despite herself, she smiled. ‘You’re for real?’
‘Be ready in an hour, at your suite. Dress smart casual, and no tactical gear in sight, Colonel.’
Rina ended the call and blinked at the wall for a second, then she was up and moving.
14
A Night of Primal Rhythm
RINA
Rina tore through her wardrobe like a woman possessed.
She settled on a lithe jade jumpsuit that hugged her curves but moved like second skin, cinched at the waist, zipped just low enough to hint at trouble.
She pulled on knee-high heeled boots of soft, burnished leather.
She then braided a few pieces of her hair back, leaving the rest to fall in a dark, unruly wave over one shoulder.
