Page 6 of Claimed By the Alien Assassin
I swirl the liquid in my glass and stare into the mirror. The face that looks back is tall, lean, scar-slit above one brow. My features are human enough—for now. The image inducer masks the truth, reshapes the edges, darkens the eyes. But I see it. The parts that don’t belong. The flicker of my real skin trying to claw through the deception. A jalshagar doesn’t forget what he is. Even when the galaxy begs him to.
I finish the glass.
The bartender doesn’t ask if I want another. It just pours.
Good droid.
I sip slower this time. Try to pretend the burn fills the void.
It doesn’t.
Nothing does.
Not the jobs. Not the credits. Not the chase. Not the silence after.
I don’t dream anymore. I used to. Back when I still believed in things. In honor. In the bond of blood. In something greater than shadows and whispered contracts. That part of me died a long time ago. Probably on a slab somewhere, another ghost with no name.
The only thing I still do well is kill.
And even that’s starting to feel more like maintenance than purpose.
Outside the bar’s filthy viewport, the stars smear like bruises across the black. Somewhere out there, entire civilizations pulse with light and noise and hope. I used to care.
Now I sit here, anonymous, invisible, sipping rotgut and listening to men sell pieces of their soul for half the price they’re worth.
Maybe this is all I’ll ever be.
Maybe that’s all I deserve.
The glass is halfway to my mouth when the disturbance happens. Not unusual, not here. The Nebula plays host to bruised egos and barely restrained violence like it’s a stage performance. Screaming, shoving, threats hissed through clenched teeth—these are just punctuation marks in the conversations of this place.
But this voice?
It cuts clean through the mire.
Sharp. Human. Female. Bold in a way that’s not performative. Not desperate.Honest.
It snaps through the fog in my head like a blade through fabric.
I turn slightly, letting the warped mirror do its work. I see a woman—short, curvy, dark hair pulled into a messy bun like she hasn’t slept in a day or three. She’s wearing boots better suited for engineering work than diplomacy, and her stance is pure, feral challenge. There’s grease on her sleeves, a stubborn smudge across her cheekbone. Brown eyes full of lightning.
And she’s yelling at a group of mercs three times her size.
The laughter around her is mocking, but there’s something different about her voice—it vibrates with conviction. She’s not trying to bluff her way through. Shebelievesevery godsdamned word she’s saying.
“—don’t care how many medals you’ve got rusting in your drawers, you overgrown windbag—if you’re too scared to stand up to the Vortaxians, then sit down and shut up!”
I see the crowd stiffen. The nameVortaxiandoesn’t get tossed around lightly. Especially not in this sector. Some of these grunts have probably watched an entire unit vanish under Vortaxian fire. The fact that she said it out loud, here, like a dare... well, she might as well have slapped them all with her compad.
“You calling us cowards?” one of the mercs growls, standing. He’s built like a cargo hauler and smells like one too. Shiny scalp, broken nose, eyes narrowed with the kind of mean that’s grown sour from years of losing.
Josie doesn’t flinch. She tilts her head, hands on hips, eyebrows arched like she’s a queen addressing unruly subjects. “No. I’m calling yougutless, tick-ridden meat puppetswho talk big and die small.”
Someone snorts. Someone else says, “Oh, damn.”
But the big one doesn’t laugh.
He moves.
