3
"Sorry, my what?" He couldn't possibly have heard her right.
"Ser-vant." The judging sister repeated. "The ac-cused will re-pay crime by acting as ser-vant."
"Yes, well, that's a wonderful plan, one of the best systems of justice around, really, but I'd prefer not to have somebody tagging along after me. How about we just let the whole thing go? She's got a good scare in her an' I'm sure that'll set her back on the straight'n'narrow. How about that?"
The judging Sister stared at him for a long moment.
"She is your ser-vant. It will re-pay her debt. She will be re-deemed."
"Yes, I got that part," the Doctor replied loudly, "but I really don't have time to play Mr. Brownlow in the feathered version of Oliver Twist. I've got things to do, and-"
"And your ser-vant will aid you. Re-turn her here when you leave pla-net." As she spoke, the first guard opened the tub and lifted out its captive. The Doctor had opened his mouth to voice his arguments, when the small Pa'aqui was set on the ground. Walking up to him, it bowed so low that its beak touched the floor, its wings spread to the fullest extent.
That was the symbol for complete submission. And, if he remembered right, the symbol for requesting aid as well.
The Doctor let out a long breath.
"Fine. All right! I don't have time for this. You're my servant; just keep up."
He turned on his heel, and strode from the room. The girl stayed behind him as if she were a feathered shadow.
Blood. Everything smelled like blood now. More men were arriving. The work day must be getting on, and the smell of blood was overwhelming. Which made sense for an underground slaughter-house.
That was what this place was. Chunks of meat were carried into the room, packaged, put into the produce boxes. And it wasn't hard to figure out the type of meat. Feathers were mixed into blood stuck to the aprons, scattered on the floor. Occasionally she saw skinned legs and wings being carried through the tunnels.
They were butchering Pa'aqui. Killing men and women and selling the meat off-world.
When she got loose, this was going to stop.
The market place outside the Little Court bustled as it had earlier, thronged with people and movement. The Doctor stared at the commotion for a long moment. She was there, somewhere. Somewhere in this mess. Where could they start?
Start with the obvious place, work forward. He turned to the little bundle of feathers.
"All right, you can start helping right about now. The girl you-well, stole from, I need to find her. If you can just take me where you two ran off to, that's a pretty good starting point I think. Don't you think so?"
Two wide yellow eyes stared up at him. The Doctor raised his eyebrows. "All right then. Not big on the conversation factor, that's fine. Lead the way."
With another long look at him, the girl jumped off the steps, walking away.
"I went this way. Come sir."
The girl wove through the crowd, ducking under and sometimes leaping over obstacles and shoppers. Wasn't this always the way of it. They'd been relaxing in this plaza not long ago. And then, of course, little miss thief had appeared, and everything had gone to pot. Why did something unpleasant happen whenever he tried to relax? He squeezed between a cart and a very fat Reyata. Something about that seemed inherently unfair.
He couldn't really blame the kid, though. She'd been pickpocketing as a form of survival. And no wonder; on this planet a child without the pedigree of a hatching line or a guardian was essentially among the walking dead. The avian mind didn't have a lot of compassion written into it. Most kids like this one didn't survive into adulthood, and the ones who did lived out their lives on the streets. Sad situation. But, until these people learned better, that was the way it was. He ducked a low-flying Pa'aqui.
And all this fuss for a few credit sticks.
"Credit sticks." He complained as he walked, "all this for a few bloody credit sticks. Something she could've done just as well without. So she lost a few credits. So what?! 'S not like we need them. Why did she have to go haring off after a few pieces of blue metal? Crazy kid. Chased you all the way across this plaza for something she didn't even care about particularly. But you know that's just like her. I'll lay diamonds to donuts it wasn't the credits that kept her running. It's the thrill of the chase she was running after. And I'd win the donuts on that bet. And-" The Doctor paused his tirade, glancing up as the sun disappeared behind buildings that hemmed in the alley, creating a jostling gauntlet.
"Oh…she kept running in here?"
Sha-Ta nodded, staring up at him.
"She was ve-ry ex-ci-ted. And an-gry. Ve-ry big light. It is why I ran so fast."
He rolled his eyes.
"Oh, she probably thought of it as a challenge. Now, where did you go next?"
The girl bobbed her head forward, plunging into the crowd. Between the people, the carts, the tobo used to pull loads and the looming buildings, this had to be one of the most congested places the Doctor had ever been in, and that was saying something. He pushed past a group of laughing taeda cadets, trying not to step on anything too squashy underfoot. The air rang with voices and assaulted him with scents; fruit, incense, feathers, sweat, clay from the buildings. A person could disappear into these alleys and never be found again.
Well, not if he had anything to say about it. He pulled his coat out of the seeking jaws of a tobo who apparently thought it looked appetizing. Sha-Ta led him down another alley. The smell of metal was strong; made sense, since this was the metals alley. Anything that could be made from metal had been. Normally the place would've fascinated him.
Alley after alley after alley. He was starting to have more respect for the little avian. If she'd kept ahead of Jenny this long she must be quite a sprinter.
The lanes were getting clearer of people now, and the stalls shabbier. After a few more streets they were nearly alone. The Doctor glanced around at the semi-darkness between the buildings.
"Whew. Nice to be out of the crush, hmm?"
The girl looked at him, cocked her head, then turned away.
"Did you run all this way?" he asked to keep up conversation.
"No." the girl piped, "I flew some." She glanced further down the alley. "It was not a good thing I did."
"Oh, water under the bridge. Really, I don't care that much."
The girl turned her head completely around on her long neck, staring at him.
"It was bad to steal. But it was worse to run down here."
"Oh?" the Doctor replied curiously, "Why's that then? Rough neighborhood?"
The girl ruffled her wings. "It is too near Tra Ret."
"And what would tra-ret be?"
"It is a place. A bad place. A few streets wide, a few long. Bad place."
"Why is it a bad place?" the Doctor asked quietly.
Sha-Ta ruffled her feathers again.
"Peo-ple go in-to Tra Ret. They do not come out some times."
"People?" The Doctor asked sharply. Sha-Ta nodded. "Peo-ple. Al-ley walk-ers. Peo-ple with no hatch-ing line. We try not to go there now."
"Are you saying that your people have been disappearing down in these alleys?"
The little girl bobbed her head.
"Tra Ret takes them."
"Ow!! You little bitch!!!"
Jenny grinned. They'd finally remembered she was here and come to take her away. At least she'd gotten one decent kick in. The man glared at her as he wiped the blood from his nose, and came at her again. This time she kicked him in the solar plexus. With a growl, he pulled out some kind of gun.
Shix. A stun ray. Her legs burned with numbing pain. At least she'd gotten a few blows in.
"I thought you said she was still out cold?!" The bloodied man snarled at his companion.
"She was!!"
"Please." Jenny scoffed. "None of you can hit hard enough for that."
Both of them glared at her for a moment.
"We can't just dump her now. She's seen." The man she'd kicked held up his weapon, changing the setting. Putting it to kill probably.
Jenny stood still, waiting. Dying should be interesting. Her first true regeneration. It would probably hurt, though.
The other man shattered her reverie as he smacked the gun out of his companion's hand.
"You idiot! We can't kill her until we can dispose of the body!!"
"Yeah." Jenny laughed harshly, "I bet your customers wouldn't like the taste of me."
Again, both men glared at her. More than angry, they were panicked.
"You're a crazy bitch." Her victim said, "And you're going to shut up, or-."
Jenny gave a feral grin. "Actually, Let me tell you what I'm going to do. I'm going to get loose. Then I'm going to kick your asses. And then my father is going to get here, and you'll really regret this."
The man nearest her whipped out his arm, hitting her hard in the mouth. She tasted blood, felt it running down her lip.
Intimidation was an asset in situations where the opponent was already panicked. And Jenny wanted these men unnerved and unsure. Besides, it'd feel good scaring them.
She slowly licked the blood from her lip, and gave them a wide, dangerous grin.
"That didn't help you any."
Then they were out of the room.
Tra Ret. That seemed to be a trouble spot. Logically, that was where Jenny would be. Ergo, that was why the Doctor was strolling down an alley even dirtier, narrower, and darker than the one before. Tall buildings, warehouses and shipping buildings, and the solar panels atop them cut the sunlight to a weak gloom.
There were few people down here, and the ones he did see-youturo, human, taeda and Pa'aqui-scurried away. That is, if an eight foot tall avian could be said to scurry.
Beside him, the girl fidgeted constantly, ruffling her feathers and fluffing her wings. Judging by the stories she had told before he'd come down this way, she was probably nervous.
"Tell me, Sha-Ta, why does anybody go down into these streets if it's so dangerous?" he asked, stepping around something he really didn't want to identify. The girl looked up at him, cocking her head.
"It is where the mer-chants are. Speak qui-et, please"
"Merchants? What self respecting merchant would put up shop in a place like this?"
The girl moved her head side to side in a shrug-like gesture. "Gar-ta ma-kers. Ret-y-Ba. Ses-ha. Things like that they sell here."
"Sesha?" The Doctor's eyebrows rose. "That's a strong narcotic. I thought it was…oh, I see. So the drug vendors use the area, and anyone who needs their fix, or buyers, or what have you, they have to go down here to get the stuff. Happens in every big city I suppose. So what do people say about the disappearances?"
"Tra Ret takes them."
"Yes, but what do you mean by that? I mean are these drug dealers killing clients and vice versa, or is something more than that? Are there many bodies found?"
Sha-Ta shook her head. "No. Ne-ver are they found. But at times…"
"At times?" the Doctor asked, cocking an eyebrow. The girl fluttered her wings.
"Oh come on, you can tell me."
The girl looked up. "At times they find bones."
The Doctor nodded. "That's something…that's definitely something."