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"Ean, you still there Ean?" came from above, and slightly to the left and behind him.

Ean turned around from a sitting position and kneeling he inched up to peer above the rim of the blind.

A lance of red light screamed down and before he could think, it made a miniscule hole in the top of the blind next to his right cheek. Ean ducked back down.

"Ean, did my friend hit you yet? Ean? Come on, answer me Ean!" the laughing voice called.

In the native language of his race Ean yelled a curse "C'll Lar mi Narv, Bartholomie!"

He thought to himself, "Bastard mother - C'll Lar, Ds'navr," he yelled in his own mind.

Frustration and anger stirred to froth within: the Xicaphi aide to the ambassador was motionless. The Xicaphi are normally jerking, their motions seemingly always on edge, always nervous. Even his wings had stopped their near constant twitching. Ean knew that the first shot from the laser sniper had killed the Ambassador's aide instantly.

He had been hired as an escort for the Ambassador and his entourage. Now the aide was dead, and the Ambassador was lying just beyond, struck dumb by the second shot from the sniper. The twin green suns of this world were at full zenith, casting a jade glow upon the head and body of the insect-like Ambassador. The Ambassador's multifaceted eyes showed no sign of whether there was still life in the little exoskeletal being.

The two jade green suns above made little double images in each of the facets of the Ambassador's eyes. Clothed in a projectile-proof 'Battle skin' the Ambassador had been shot in the throat, silencing him. A fume came out of both the entrance hole and the exit, as the laser had cauterized the wound on the way through.

When high velocity bullets touched the 'skin' of the suit, it stiffened to point of hardness that each bullet or projectile would bounce off harmlessly. But a bullet did not shoot the Ambassador; a laser had been used on him instead. Since he was looking directly at the thin pole neck of the Xicaphi, Ean could see that the shot had severed the Ambassador's spinal cord as well.

Told not to disobey the pompous Ambassador's orders, Ean had sighed while walking behind him. Set in his overbearing importance of self, none of Ean's protests had changed the Ambassador's mind.

"The help will walk behind me! Not in front and not beside! Decorum at all times!" the Ambassador had said.

_ "Where's the decorum in death Ambassador?"_ Ean thought to himself.

"Ean, you still with us?", called the C'll Lar.

"Yeah Bartholomie, I am!" Ean yelled out, "What's next, C'll Lar?"

"Now is that anyway to talk to me?" Bartholomie yelled out with an insincere tear in his voice." "We're old friends, you and I."

The C'll Lar continued "It is not my fault you're on the wrong side, again!"

"Did you get full price this time or only half like usual?" The C'll Lar asked like it was a weapon he could throw.

Ean thought to himself, "Then why isn't he just tossing a grenade down here? What is he planning?"

Out of the corner of his eye, Ean caught sight of a form moving slowly and carefully to his right, a flanking maneuver!

Ean slowly extracted his Berretta GV-4 out of the back holster and lay it across his lap.

Ean was again in his original position with his back to the blind. Stealthily Ean lay hold of the grip of the machine gun. It slid into his hand as if it were coming home. In a movement made simple and quick by experience, he held up, aimed, and pulled off a burst of nine rounds, and caught the slinking henchman completely by surprise. A line of Ean's bullets spun the man down to the left. Knowing that the snap of his gun would cause the sniper to jump, as all snipers are a bit nervous, he stood up and let off another burst of nine.

An arc of dull mustard sprayed up from the sniper's position on the rooftop. In the greenish glow of the sunlight it looked almost brown. Ean then dropped back down behind his blind.

"Good shooting Ean!" Bartholomie called out; "You took my man's head completely off his shoulders!"

"Now I don't have to pay either one of them!" Ean could hear the smile in the C'll Lar's voice. "You've saved me quite a lot of money once again my old friend!"

Ean spat out "Money! You haven't changed at all!" Ean yelled.

"Money is all you'll ever be about, OLD FRIEND!"

" Is there anything else?" Bartholomie yelled back.

"Well gotta go!" Bartholomie yelled, "Again its been fun chatting. I've got people to kill and time to do!" Ean heard it as fading laughter.

Realizing that Bartholomie was leaving, Ean got up and started after his 'old friend', revenge on his mind. His two clients still did not move, showing that both were dead.

As he moved to the building where the sniper was stationed he saw the man that had taken his first burst of shots, lying in a spreading pool of blood. The striped fur of the Descarti-Carthan's tiger-like body was soaked so that the fur matted down. The Descarti's feline body was half stripped of the anti-photonic armor plates of plastic that he had worn. He had done it himself, to feel with his hands how badly he'd been shot.

"Wait!" The wounded Carthan pleaded. "At least finish me."

"You're really a good shot", he added "I'll not last that long; you shot me all in the same place! Oh, it really hurts! Please, finish it!"

Ean wondered at that moment at his choice of professions.

"No, I can't stop. You should get out of this business." Ean said and knelt down to put into the badly wounded Carthan's clawed hands a small package.

"Here this will help."

"You should get into another line of business. You're really bad at doing this sort of thing."

The soft pads of Ean's feet made no noise as he ran after Bartholomie.

Rounding the corner of the end of the street, he had forgotten to slow down. A double burst of machine pistol fire sprayed all around Ean's retracted claw toes. Thinking quickly, Ean rolled into a ball and somersaulted forward in one revolution, then changed to a fast vector to the side by pushing off with his feet. He was up and running, again hearing Bartholomie cursing his guns' ammo capacity behind him.

Ean dove to the left behind a vehicle that was next to the building's facing wall. Ean still had his GV-4 in his hand, so he stood up and lay across the trunk of the vehicle and let off his last burst. Bartholomie looked up from fussing with his guns, and spread his arms out away from his body a big grin on his face.

The bullets passed right through him! "Oh, Narv," Ean thought," a hologram, he could be anywhere." Just then a chem-grenade bounced under the vehicle and off of Ean's left ankle. Ean rolled off of the back of the vehicle pushing off finally with his left elbow and flattened to the ground.

A blinding flash left a white after-image on the right sides of both Ean's eyes as the grenade went off. The concussion chain-reacted into the vehicle and it too exploded, but the fireball went straight up. "Hydrogen powered," Ean thought. "Big bad explosion that will roast the hide off you, but only straight up; it's lighter than air."

Ean scrambled up to his feet. He could see Bartholomie just going into a far building up the street.

He ran after him. "I am glad I'm wearing Battle skin. Once again it has saved me from bullets and the shrapnel of that explosion!" He made it up to the building in less than a minute, but stopped just short of the door. His mind was in control again not his flash-anger. He put his GV-4 into the holster at his back, as the magazine was exhausted. Ean pulled out his .41 automag in his right hand and his own Kawaska P-5 laser pistol in his left.

Turning around to back into the wall next to the doorframe, Ean inched up closer to the doorway. He turned to face the doorway in one concerted movement that took him past the door to the other side. He continued the upright roll to beyond the other side of the open doorway. Both pistols were pointing into the open doorway's interior as he rolled past. He resisted the temptation to fire both of the pistols as he rolled in and then out of the way.

Ean had seen with his Carthanian rarified-light night-vision that a couple of people had been murdered --peppered by a fast firing gun just seconds ago. There was a smell of gunpowder and blood heavy in the air of the darkened room inside. Silently Ean stepped into the room.

He flattened up to the wall just inside the open doorway. He glanced at the two people. The female, a spotted Descal-Carthan looked as if she was shot trying to get away. The Cheetah-like female was draped over a chair with one hip and leg; the rest of her suspended nearly touching the floor. All the bullets in her had gone into her back. The other was a man that was sprawled in a heap on the floor. A black furred Voreed-Carthan like himself. The man had not even been given a chance; he was lying flat on his back. The bullets had made his chest and face a ruin of blood and shattered bone. The blood was still flowing out of his wounds. The man's feline face and chest were disfigured by the pattern of the bullets.

Accurate as usual, Bartholomie had not put one bullet anywhere except where he had aimed. From the burned fur of what still clung to the Panther's head, Ean knew that the gun had been fired at point blank. Bartholomie had probably shoved the machine pistol into the man's face and sprayed out the poor victim's life.

Ean heard sounds coming from farther back inside, beyond this room of murder. The sound was a machine whining into life. Stepping past the victims, Ean cautiously moved quickly toward the sound. There were pieces of glass on the floor; this made Ean slow down to a walk, as he sensed another ambush. Glancing up he saw briefly where the glass had come from. The overhead lighting system had been broken, more than likely by an empty and smoking machine pistol.

Ean didn't like Bartholomie's choice in guns. Effective but still chancy, the MP's he preferred emptied all thirty-six rounds in one burst. Ean liked his own GV-4, better. It had better control longer range and didn't empty as quickly.

Ean came up to the room in which the machine was slowing its whine. Crouching down to just above the level of his knees, Ean then jumped into the room.

"C'll!" Ean thought to himself, he was in the smell of the stale air of a Long Arm finishing the teleportation cycle. Bartholomie had tricked Ean into moving so slowly that the teleport could cycle through.

Thinking fast, Ean stepped over to the control panel and saw where Bartholomie had gone just before the panel shut off. A good thing too, for now Ean could follow him.

Ean punched in the numbers and set the dial, knowing that when the machine started up Bartholomie would be then waiting to ambush him. So he set the control to back teleport him, within a single second, so that he could be brought back here. Now Ean could safely follow him. He went over to the pad as the machine started up, confident of his plan.

Ean put away his pistols, and instead took out his Flash Stator; a device that creates a flash that temporarily blinds anyone that has their eyes open. He was going to teleport in to flash Bartholomie and anyone with him; and since the effect lasts thirty seconds, Ean had set the time to teleport him back to this room.

Bartholomie would have to play Ean's game! The machine stretched out its arm to the destination and Ean saw the room around melt and elongate. A similar place began to come up melting and solidifying into place of the last room. Ean triggered his device. He saw Bartholomie just standing there with more henchmen. One had a little device in hand and fumbled it when the Flash Stator went off. Ean was happy, for once this day Bartholomie was surprised, and covered his eyes too late.

But something was wrong, the henchman had not thrown the small ball down but had fumbled it instead. A really long second went by as Ean now saw what the thing was. A MED! Ean closed his eyes then, sure he was about to die.

A MED would disintegrate all the matter and all the energy in a null like explosion leaving a pure vacuum in this room. No one could run from one of those! Guessing at last that Bartholomie had also guessed Ean's plan of teleporting in and retreating, the only thing that had saved Ean, was his Flash Stator.

The henchman had been completely surprised by the flash, and dropped his MED instead of tossing it into Ean before the Long arm pulled him back. The long second pulled Ean back to where he had come from; he heard the Matter-Energy-Disintegration bomb go off, because he had his eyes closed too. All he could hear was the sound of Bartholomie's last word in life as he screamed Ean's name in horror.

Ean felt something tug him into a vacuum, but then something else seemed to pull at him instead. He felt as if he was under water or floating. His senses were confused but still he kept his eyes shut. A warm breeze was the first thing he felt, then something odd. It was flat a little soft in places and thought he felt grass against his back. He decided to open his eyes. He closed them again because of the discomfort of looking directly into the orb of a fire engine-red single sun. This place was not where he intended or where he thought he would be. Ean rolled onto his right side and triggered his Flash Stator again, just in case.

End of chapter one.