The Vatsatz
The real question wasn't whether I would kill the woman, but how I would do it. I wanted to do it slowly and take my time, but duty required I not risk blowing my cover.
Danean shivered and clutched at my arm. "Why're we out here? It's cold!"
"Another drink?" I asked slowly, careful to keep a vacant tone in my voice. I pulled out a flask and passed it to her. "It keep you warm."
"Sure," she slurred. "Why not?"
"Drinks taste good." I placed one hand on the back of her neck as she swallowed the liquor. I'd endured enough with the humans, eating their overcooked, maggot-soft food, listening to their monkey chatter, and enduring their pointless pity. I hated them.
My cover was excellent, and I'd taken full advantage of its camouflage: a Starwolf veteran brain-damaged from a war wound. It bought me respect and pity from other warriors, and nobody questioned the glaring gaps in my "memory." Neither did anyone suspect my hulking physique and slack features hid the well-trained, shrewd mind of a BioDerm spy.
Humans were gullible. Play to their sympathies and they believed anything.
The datashard Danean had given me that evening was everything I'd asked for: Starwolf ship manifests and status reports for the armada currently in orbit around Ymir. She thought she was helping her simpleton boyfriend track down an old war buddy. Of course, when my pheromones wore off, her better judgment would lead her to question her actions. That couldn't be permitted.
She was attractive… for a human. Slender build, short-cropped blonde hair, high cheekbones. A slight overbite betrayed genetic defects, though, and she had not conditioned herself adequately. She would not have survived among the Hordes.
She eyed me with a mischievous expression. "What've you got in mind?"
I waited a couple of heartbeats to "process" her question, and only then laughed dully and swung her into an embrace. When her face pressed against the skin of my cheek, I triggered my pheromones and let her get a good whiff. Her eyelids fluttered behind her goggles.
"Leave soon," I told her, and put her down. "Come see fish first." She nodded dazedly, a lopsided smile on her face.
Not long now.
Skyrholm was icebound for three-quarters of the year with a good ten to fifteen meters of ice. In the spring, the ice was only three meters thick, so every spring holdfast citizens cut a broad hole in the middle of the harbor for fishing. I'd done plenty of fishing here myself, so I knew that at this time of the morning, nobody came out here. The only light came the distant fraytown, faint flickers of color across the snow-dusted ice. It was so cold the air seemed to crackle.
It was a perfect place to get rid of somebody. I'd claim we were drunk and that she fell into the hole by accident. I wasn't in the least intoxicated, of course. My liver and pancreas were designed to prevent such impairment. We'd been seen in enough of the clubs and taverns tonight, putting back drink after drink. My alibi would hold. I was just a simple-minded mountain of muscle, after all, good for nothing but killing the hated Blood Eagle.
Danean sniffed and wiped her nose. "I'm cold. Show me this fish and we'll go, OK?" She leaned up and gave me a kiss. She smelled of alcohol and soft flesh. Human. Weak.
But I grinned and hugged her. As I did so, I lifted her so her feet weren't touching the ice and carried her the rest of the way to the water. I was capable of far greater displays of strength, of course, even though vatsatz like me were weaklings compared to real Derms. I put her down near the water's edge. She teetered for an instant and clung to my arm.
"So strong!" She giggled. "I feel so safe with you." The statement was so absurd that I almost laughed in her face. The hole yawned behind her, an abyss of black water slopping lazily against the ice. I couldn't delay. Every moment carried the risk of discovery, what with shuttles coming every few minutes, and all the training going on. Troops were moving around at all hours, day and night.
I clamped down on her neck hard enough to paralyze her despite the padded hood of her coldsuit. "Sorry, Dani, but I got what I needed. Now you're a loose end." I dangled her over the water by the scruff of her neck. Something pale roiled past under her feet, kicking up a wake of foam. Her eyes widened.
"I hung a packet of meat in the water earlier this evening," I explained. "I was reasonably sure it would attract a razor hag. I've done a lot of fishing out here, you know." Below us, the creature snaked back and forth from beneath the ice, showing off over five meters of muscled bulk. Magnificent!
A distant light in the sky heralded another shuttle full of troops and supplies. I'd toyed with her past the point of caution. Time to finish this.
"Goodbye, human." I opened my hand and let her fall. The water instantly erupted into a frenzied boil, then fell still. A razor hag commonly pulled prey deep underwater before wrapping it in long, sharp-finned coils and devouring it. The fins could slash through hardened metaplas with little effort, and its six whiplike heads fed with lightning speed. I wished I could watch it work.
"Bon appetite," I told the black waters before turning back for the long walk back to the fraytown.
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