Chapter 2: Job hunting

I woke up refreshed and ready to tackle new day. I looked out from the cover of a blanket and first rays of a sunshine blinded me. At first I was confused and I didn’t know where I was. It came to me as I was looking around the room so I stood up from the bed and stretched myself.I walked downstairs and entered the bar looking for Johnathan. He was sitting at one of the tables with Harry.

Yesterday I was tired and I didn’t looked around much. Now I could see that the bar was cut into three parts. First was the bar desk with tables, second was the kitchen connected to the bar and last part was the dancing floor with a small stage. Compared to the city and other buildings I saw while going here, it was relatively clean. I headed towards Harry and Johnathan.

“And here comes our hero.” Said Johnathan and beckoned me with smile to sit with them.

I blushed little and sit down on an empty chair.

“Can I get you something?” asked Johnathan.

I thought about how to respond. I wasn’t hungry but I should at least pretend I eat something and also I could test if I could even eat. “If I could bother you?”

He stood up and went to the kitchen connected to the bar, “Be right back.”

“How’s your wife?” I asked looking at Harry.

“She’ll be fine and in all the hurry I forgot to tell you her name. She’s Nien and she’s very thankful to you for protecting us.”

“You can stop with this thanking or I won’t be able to stop blushing.” I said smiling.

“Ok, I’ll stop but know that we consider you a friend. You can call on us anytime.” He said.

I turned and blinked back tears going to my eyes. “Thank you. Just take care about yourself and I’ll be happy.”

He smiled. ”Now Johnathan told me you’re looking for a work. If you want you can work as a guard for me. You obviously know what you are doing out there at the barrens.”

“Sorry, for now I would like to stay in the town and when I get the money I would travel to another planet. I have friends on planet called Earth and I don’t know what happened to them.”

“I understand, I never heard about the planet with such name, but we don’t get too much news about the outside world. Even if we’re at the spaceport, we don’t too many visitors.” He stopped and looked thoughtful. ” No matter, we’re here two weeks. If you change your mind come and find us.”

“Ok, I will.” I said as Johnathan came with a plate full of food.

He placed it before us and sat down, “Enjoy your meal!”

“Thanks, I will.” I said and dug into it. There were fresh vegetables, fruits and little pieces of meat. Everything tasted perfect. Only distraction was that I was aware of contents in each bite, but I could ignore it when I didn’t focus on it. While I was eating, they talked about where Harry would set up the shop and about his journey.

I found out that he was going through this route for some time and that he was one of many traders driving from one city to another. They were only reason towns like this still survived. Harry decided to set up his shop two streets from the Johnathan’s bar.

Johnathan looked at me when I was done eating, “How did you like our food?”

“It was great. It was long time since I ate something good like this.” I said.

“Ok, I’ll tell it to our chef. Now we can move to business. I asked around and there are couple of jobs you could take. Most of them are guarding and one even asked for occasional bodyguard. There are two persons that asked for engineering skills. One is our Mayor and other is Hurriliat.”

I raised eyebrows, “Hurriliat?”

“Yes, it’s one of the aliens that live here. Hurriliat is name of his race and because he’s only one of his species in this town we call him that as no one can pronounce his name. He set up a repair shop but he lacks proper engineers. He’s got one, but he’s more of a helper then real engineer.”

That could work out. I also wanted to find out more about the aliens and if there was a problem that I could help them with.

“What about mayor? What does he need engineer for?” I asked.

“He needs someone to work on the city and spaceport. He has some engineers, but they always needs more at the spaceport. His pay would be definitely better than one Hurriliat can give you.”

“Lastly what can you tell me about this bodyguard duty?” I asked.

“This is from another alien. Recently, they let another one of them attend the town council, but there were already two attacks on representative. Because of the attacks he’s looking for a bodyguard. His name is Norman Klain. It’s not his true name, but his race hides their true names and reveals them only to family and close friends.” He said.

“Well, that’s definitely something to look up. I have to thank you for your help. What took you one night, would took me whole week or more probably.” I said.

“Take it as gift for saving Nien.” He said.

“I’ll go talk to them. First I would like to talk to Hurriliat and then I would go to Mr. Klain. Can you point me in right direction?”

“You can find them both at the south side of the city or alien district as they call it. Hurriliat sat up shop right in the main square. As for Norman, you would have to ask there. I don’t know where he’s living.” Said Johnathan.

“Thanks, I’ll go for now. I hope we’ll see each other.”

“Of course we’ll see each other. We’ll come to visit you when you get some accommodation.” Said Harry.

I smiled and head out to the alien district. I knew when I got there, as most of the buildings were dirty and some of them looked ready to collapse. I went straight to the square they mentioned and looked for the shop.

It was too dirty, like others, but I could see someone put work into it. It was in better condition than nearby ones. I walked into it and looked around. There were many gadgets in different conditions hanged around the room. Some looked already repaired while some looked completely broken. I walked around when I sensed someone coming from behind me.

I whirled around and surprised a small alien that was behind me. He jumped up and took two steps back, “Sorry didn’t want to startle you.”

He was really small and his head come up somewhere around my waist. He looked up at me with big blue eyes which were twice as big as mine with cat like pupil. He was smiling and that revealed a line of sharp pointy teeth.

I smiled back, “Nothing happened, I’m looking for Hurriliat.”

“Then you found him. What do you need? You don’t look like someone who would need something to repair and humans are not very welcome in this part of the city.” He said and eyed my weapons. I had to place them somewhere or everyone would look at me, like I was a hired killer.

“I’m here because of your notice. I heard that you’re looking for an engineer.” I said.

“Yes I am and you want to work for me?” he looked curiously at me.

“Yes, but I’m going to visit Mr. Klain about bodyguard work after this meeting. If he’ll take me, I would need some free time for that.”

He stroked his chin and looked at me, “Ok, I’ll give you some free time if I take you, but you need to prove yourself first. Come in the back and I’ll give you a test.” He said and moved to the workshop.

I went with him and entered his workshop. It wasn’t anything big just small workshop with four tables placed in the middle and tools hanging on walls around them. Currently sitting on table were three items. First was some lamp that was leaking plasma form a small fracture. Second was the laser pistol that would probably be easier to just scrap and start anew. The final item was a vacuum cleaner that had busted motor.

“So which one should I repair?” I asked looking at tables.

“This items are for the customer. I won’t let you work on them till I know you can do it.” He said and gave me another broken lamp that was laying on a ground.

I looked at it and scanned it. I could see immediately that the problem was with the wiring. It was old and burned on some places. I took it apart and switched the wiring with new. I tried it and there was still problem. In the end it was simple. There was just burned bulb. I changed it and switched the lamp on. Everything went fine so I put it back together and hand it to Hurriliat.

He was looking at what I was doing and I saw him nodding his head. Still he inspected it once more and put it back on the ground. “You’re good to find it so quick. Now one last question before you can start here. Why do you want to work for me? I can’t pay you as much as Mayor and I’m sure you heard about his offer already.”

“I want to work for you because I thought that it would be easier to make my shifts more flexible.” I said not revealing the whole truth.

“Yes, if that’s how fast you work normally, you can take a day off when you need. Only thing that I would want is that you would teach my other employee little about the engineering.” He said.

“Ok, no problem. Where can I sign myself?”

“No need to sign. I know who are you and you know who I am. You can ask around and they’ll tell you that I don’t cheat.” He said.

“Good, my only problem is that I have nowhere to sleep right now. If you know about some place where they would take me with payment going in one month later, I would be glad.” I said.

“If you don’t mind the noise from youngsters that comes to party near here, you can sleep upstairs. There are three rooms and currently I’m using only two of them. I would take a rent from your pay.” He said.

“Last thing, what is my pay?” I asked.

“I just opened the shop so I can give you three thousands credits a month and that’s with the rent included. That should be enough to cover your expanses and let you save something.” He said.

I didn’t know if it was too little or too much but we could negotiate my payment later. I still needed to go visit Mr. Klain.

“Yes that should be enough for now. Can you point me to residence of Mr. Klain?” I said.

“Yes, he’s just across the square. He owns the local apothecary.” He said.

“Thanks, I’ll go to him then.” I said.

“Tell him I vouch for you or he won’t listen to you and friends call me Harr.” He said.

I smiled and thanked him. Then I went out of the shop and across the square to look for the apothecary. It was exactly where Harr told me it would be but what he didn’t told me was, that there would be a guards before it. They looked like trolls from some fantasy world.

Both of them wielded plasma rifles that looked to be new. Also both had shields. That I could tell by how the air shimmered near them. As I came near, both of them pointed their guns at me.

“This shop is only for aliens.” He said.

I lifted up my hands, “I here to talk with your boss. Harr can vouch for me.” I said.

One of them snickered, “So you want to talk to our boss? Boss someone wants to talk to you.” He shouted.

There was laud swearing and another big Troll came from door.

“”Who wants to talk to me?” he asked and both guards pointed at me.

“What do you want?”

“Are you Mr. Klain?” I asked.

“Why do you ask?” he said and by the state of his knuckles, I could already tell I came while they were robbing him or worse. I was silent and considerer what to do.

“I asked you, what do you want?” he shouted.

“She told us that Harr vouched for her.” One of thugs said.

Their boss smiled when he heard it, “Why didn’t you said so sooner? You can come in when Harr vouched for you, but you’ll need to give us your weapons.” He was waiting, but when he saw me still standing he continued. ”Obviously, only until we finish our business.”

“Ok, I’ll give them to you.” I said and pulled out both pistols. I had them pointed at ground and took two steps towards them. They lowered their weapons, obviously they weren’t great thinkers. As they reached out for my weapons, I turned them up and fired at their face.

As I found out their shields weren’t as good as their weapons and both of their shields collapsed. They panicked when they saw their shield failing and jumped backwards. It was easy to dispatch them both with quick shots from pistols to legs and shoulders.

Their leader reacted faster than both of them and jumped on me. He wanted to tackle me down, but what he didn’t count on was that I was far more powerful than I looked. I dropped both pistols and caught his arms. He wore elevated expression but that changed as I forced his fingers up until he was groveling on ground. I interrupted his swearing when I kneed him in face. After he lost conciseness I took their weapons from them and shouted for Harr to come here.

He was already running towards me, “What happened here?”

“I’m not completely sure, but I need you to guard them, while I look inside.” I said.

I was already scanning inside of the building and there was only one source of heat. That should be Mr. Klain. I walked to the door and shouted, “Mr. Klain are you alright?”

“Who are you? You too want to rob me?” he shouted back and I could hear pain in his voice.

“She’s with us let her in.” shouted Harr.

There was silence for a while than I could hear someone moving towards the door. They were opened by older alien. His skin was green and he was same species as Leonard my Paladin boss from another universe. I could see that his third arm was broken and that he took pretty bad beating.

“Mr. Klain we need to take you to hospital.” I said when I saw him.

“No, I would be too vulnerable in hospital. Take me to Tara she can patch me up. Harr can point you in the right direction.” He said and winced.

I looked at Harr who just shrugged, “Ok, I’ll take you to her.” Harr said and I went to support Mr. Klain. I felt him place more and more weight on me, when he saw I can take it.

I told Harr to sheath my pistols and bind trolls with something. Then we moved towards Tara’s home. Luckily it wasn’t too far from us. When we saw her house Harr went ahead and pounded on a door. I could hear grumbling from the other side.

“I’m coming, you don’t have to pound on my door anymore.”

Finally door was opened by pissed of Hurriliat. I was surprised and Mr. Klain saw it.

“She’s our secret. If they knew we have her, they would attack her just to hurt us.” He said.

I wasn’t sure if he was paranoid or if someone was truly against them. I would have to take time and found out what was happening in this town.

Harr was explaining something to Tara in their language and pointing at us. At first she looked pissed but after while she looked at us and beckoned us inside.

“Place him on one of the beds. I’ll take care of him.” She said.

All beds were empty so I picked one and placed him there. He groaned as I was easing him down, but he held it and didn’t scream. I looked back at Tara.

“Now go away. We can introduce ourselves later.” She said and shushed me away.

I went back and sit down on chair in the kitchen. Harr was already there and when he saw me he chuckled, “Don’t mind her, when she has patient she’s always like that. Now sit down and drink tea. She’ll be back in a minute.”

I sat down and Harr poured me cup of a tea, “Now tell me what happened there.”

I told him what happened before Klain’s shop. I asked him if he knew who they were. He told me they were thugs working for a local kingpin. I was back from the grave no more than couple of days and I already fought with local fauna and pissed the kingpin in this city. I started to think that I had some sort of gift to take a normal day and make it an extraordinary bad.

I sent ping to a local network and was surprised when I connected to a pretty decent network. I was browsing it, when I saw Harr looking at me with smile.

“I knew you were something more. You have the implants, have you not?”

“Yes, but keep it secret. I don’t know much about this planet and it gives me an advantage when no one knows about it.”

“Don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone.” He said and winked.

I smiled back when Tara walked into the kitchen. She had some blood on her hands that she washed down in a sink.

She then looked back at us, “Don’t worry, he’ll be fine. He called for you stranger.”

“Ok, I’ll go see him.” I walked towards the ward and knocked on a doorframe, “Can I come in?”

“Come in. I heard that you’re one I should thank that it didn’t go worse than this. Let me just ask you. Why did you do it?”

I laughed, “It would be bad if I go on a bodyguard interview and don’t help my potential client when he’s in danger.”

“Yes, that would be bad for business.” He said smiling at me. “So you want to work for me?”

“I’m not sure myself, but from what I saw, I think that most aliens on this planet are harassed. That’s something I don’t like.” I said.

”That’s true, most of people living here don’t like us, but it’s mostly because of Mayor. I don’t know how, but I think that he’s making a campaign against us. When something breaks, alien did it. When someone is killed, alien did it. You can make picture about other instances.” He said.

That looked even worse than I thought. If he’s telling the truth, it could turn into lynch by angry mob and there isn’t enough aliens to defend themselves.

“Yes, I see where it could be problem. So what do you say? Do I have a job or not?”

“You can have it, if you pass my test.” He said.

I sighed, so saving his life doesn’t count. If everything was like this with him, I wasn’t sure if I wanted the job.

“Ok, what is this test?”

“You’ll fight against my friend and if he passes you can be my bodyguard.” He said.

I frowned, “Who is this friend of yours?”

“No one important, just local martial art teacher.” He said.

He was evidently enjoying himself, “Ok, point me in his direction so I can have it over.”

“Harr can take you there. Now let me sleep.” He said and turned himself on the other side.

I stared at him but that was evidently everything that I would get from him. He didn’t even thanked me for saving him. I was still looking flustered and little pissed when I get to the kitchen. Harr took only one look at my face and started laughing.

“What are you laughing at?” asked Tara.

“On her, she just found out who she picked for employer.” He said.

I glared at him, “You could have at least warn me about him.”

“And lose all the fun watching you now?” he said.

“I’m not sure, I can work for him.” I said.

“Don’t worry, he’s not all that bad. He’s little paranoid, but last three representatives died on their way to or from the council meetings.” He said.

“But he wants to test me for this job. Even after I saved him from thugs.” I said.

“Yes, but it’s little different then you think. He’s testing you to know that you are strong enough to protect him, but at the same time strong enough to protect yourself. If he takes you, you’ll be his third bodyguard. All of them lost life while saving his. Now, no one wants to take job and all that tried he sends to Liray. He takes them down quickly and shows them that they are not prepared. ” He said.

“Ok, that looks better than the impression I got from him.” I said.

“Oh, the impression was probably right, but not complete.” He said.

Tara was watching the exchange between us and after while she stood up and went to ward.

“I hope I didn’t offend her or something.” I said.

“No nothing of the sort. She just don’t talk much and she doesn’t like humans much. You’ll have to give her some time.” He said and stood up, “Come I’ll take you to Liray and on a way we can take care of this thug we wrapped before Normans shop.”

I stood up and followed him out. When we came before Normans shop, there were no sign of our thugs. On ground were just cut rope that we used to bind him with.

“Well that could prove inconvenient later. We should go to Liray and talk to him about it.” Said Harr.

“Why to him?” I asked.

“He’s something like a local sheriff. If someone does something stupid he explains to them, that they should back off or they would get visit from him.” He said.

“And they just listen to him?” I asked incredulously.

“No, they listen, because he’s best fighter in a whole town.” Said Harr.

My test gets worse by the minute. I sighed, “Ok, take me to him so we can report this and test me. I want it behind me already.”

We walked to the outer edge of alien district to a small cottage with a sparing ring behind it. Harr knocked on the house and went inside. He didn’t tell me anything so I followed him inside. It was only one circle room that was almost bare. There was one table with three chairs and one desk with small stove that served for food preparation.

There was no one inside and I could see Harr going out of the door on the other side of house. I hurried over and stepped out. There in the middle of a sparing ring was man whose race I saw most in most city. Of course I didn’t count humans.

They were mostly humanoid in a shape. They were partly transparent and their skin had a slightly blue color. He was about one head shorter than me, but compared to the other individuals from his species, he was muscular and he also didn’t have any hair.

He was sitting cross-legged on ground. Harr sat down on ground and waited for him to finish with his meditation. I sat down near Harr and waited for Liray to finish. After five minutes I had enough of this and stood up.

“Mr. Liray, I was sent by Mr. Klain to take your test.” I said.

He sighed and opened his eyes. He had golden eyes with a horizontal irises.

“Young people are always so impatient. What if this was the test?” he asked.

“Then I would have failed it and I can move on.” I said.

“Good, you’re not wasting your time with past. Come sit we’ll first talk, then we move on test.” He smiled at me.

Whatever I did or said, it looked that I impressed him and disappointed him at same time. I sat down and waited for Harr to start explaining our problem.

He made a small bow and started explaining what happened this morning. Liray occasionally interrupted him with question about some detail. After Harr told him everything he was sitting silently with thoughtful expression.

“Ok, I’ll do something about it, but for now take precautions against their retaliation.” He said. We nodded and he started to measure me with his eyes.

“So you overpowered Borg. You’re more powerful then you look.” He said.

“Maybe I’m just that good.”

He smiled and beckoned me to enter sparing ring.

“We’ll see about that.” He smiled and bowed towards me.

I started to bow when I sensed him moving. I instinctively blocked his first kick that would hit me strait in the face. I stumbled backwards from impact and he pounced on me. He punched towards my face and I caught his fist. I smiled because I thought that I won when his other fist connected with my arm that was holding his fist. I felt slight tearing in my muscles and if I had normal arm he would have broken it.

Both of us jumped from each other. He looked surprised at me when I shook my arm and prepared to take him on. My nanobots already repaired most of the damage. I thought that would be enough but he just smiled even more and came at me.

He was moving twice as fast as before and I could barely defend against his attacks. Finally I jumped when he tried to swipe my legs and suddenly I found myself thrown across ring at the wall. I hit it and fall down. I assessed the damage done to my body and I had broken four ribs and damaged my spine. I saw him put down his leg that he used to kick me across ring.

Harr rushed to me but I was looking at Liray who looked disappointed, “That’s all, I thought that you would be better. I’ll tell Norman you failed.”

I was furious. I didn’t want to fight with him in the first place and now he would tell me I failed because I couldn’t fight him bare handed. I had enough on my plate already and this tipped me over. I saw red as I launched at him with scream.

I didn’t even dodge his fist and connected with my face, I didn’t even blocked his leg going towards my side and instead I punched him in the face. I took him by surprise and landed good one on him. He was laying down on ground looking at me with dizzy eyes.

I looked back at him, “You failed.” and went away from him. Before I could make one step I heard him say, “You passed.”

I turned to look at him and he was already standing up from ground.

“Do you want more?” I asked.

He pointed his hands up. “No, no, this one was enough.”

“I needed to see if you can really fight, even when you’re hurt and overpowered. I needed to see if you have spirit of the warrior.” He said.

“So that’s why you tried to kill me? If I were normal human, I would be dead.” I said.

“Yes, but you aren’t. If you want, I can train you. I can see that you have some experience in fighting but you never learned properly. Am I right?”

“Yes I never learned, but why would I want to learn from someone like you?” I said.

He smiled and winced in pain. I hit him more than I thought, “Because I’m best at least I thought so.”

“He‘s telling the truth. There is no one better than him in a whole town.” Said Harr who stared wide eyed at me.

I thought about his offer and to tell the truth some training would be good. I’m not sure how far from the Earth I am, but with my luck it would be across the whole galaxy. I was still angry at him but if he’s best it would be good to learn something from him.

“Ok, I’ll learn but no kicking across ring.” I said.

“About that, I’m sorry it was long time since I could go full on someone. I kind of forgot that you have no training.” He said.

Harr’s eyes bulged at that.

“Can I go now? I need to look at my injuries.” I said.

“Yes, you can go. I’ll tell Norman that he should hire you.”

“Thanks.” I said and moved away. I went to my room at Harr’s workshop and lay down on bed. I let my nanobots repair the damage and thought about how I was going to survive Liray’s training.

● ● ●

Back in Liray’s house Harr was drinking tea.

“So, how is she really?” he asked.

“She’s untrained, but I can tell you she is more dangerous than I thought. When I hit her it was like punching the stone wall and she was obviously in more than one fight from her reaction time.” He said.

“You were both fast, but it looked that she took most of the beating.” Said Harr.

“Yes, but that was because I’m more experienced and skilled. I’ll tell you one thing for sure that I found out from this fight. She’s not human.” He said.

“I thought so too.” Harr looked thoughtful, ” Well, at least it would be interesting.”

“Yes, it would.” Said Liray then after a small pause he said quietly, “Yes, it would.”