It had been going so very well for all of them just five minutes ago.
There had been a half-open window. Terrible shame that; not even necessary in this heat. The Older had tut-tutted at it very firmly as the rust ate into its extremities and peeled it off like a grapeskin.
There had been a security door. It had been very fine and very expensive and incredibly modern and it had fallen apart like soft butter under the ancient and tender serrations of the Sleek Shark, its barcodes and binaries and PINs shearing off and away.
There had been a guy at a desk who'd said 'password?' and that was where the problem had started because Jimmy had said 'uuhhhhh' and no password in the world had ever started like that and they both knew it.
So now Jimmy was hiding in a bathroom being shot at. Again.
"Wish you guys had helped me out," he said, and convinced himself he'd definitely been trying and failing to keep the resentment out of his voice.
No he hadn't, the Mind All Light told him.
"Where were YOU?"
Right there. He'd just decided to say 'uuhhhhh' instead of asking it.
"Fine," said Jimmy. He wasn't sulking.
He was sulking, the Mind All Light told him.
"Am not!"
Was too.
"Am not!"
Duck, suggested the Older.
Jimmy ducked and the top of the bathroom stall sheared off and banged him on the head.
"Shit," he considered. "Shit, shit, aw shit, shit shit shit."
So he gave up and listened to the Completely Invincible Lizard.
Four floors later Jimmy kicked down a door shot five security manglers and placed a perfectly flawless thrown ball-point pen directly through the eye of a man in an impossibly expensive suit.
Then he sat down at the desk and threw up for a minute. Stitches.
When he was done he took the very small and expensive computer out of the pen-eye man's pocket and slipped it in front of the Sleek Shark, which vanished into it without a ripple.
No traces. No records. As if he'd never been there.
Well, besides all the blood and everything. That'd be a giveaway.
It was times like this Jimmy wished he was still a janitor. There'd be nothing but quiet cleaning for days now. Very soothing.
Found another, whispered the Sleek Shark directly behind him.
Jimmy threw up again, almost but not quite masking the sound of tramping feet. Weapons were clicking to themselves, lungs were bursting with purpose.
"Awwwwww nuts," said Jimmy. And he reached out to the Completely Invincible Lizard again.
***
Jimmy had spent very nearly twenty years on a derelict space station, keeping it running with polish and spit and elbow grease. He could clean anything. Anything.
Still, getting the blood off that stubborn little spot between his shoulder blades was extremely obnoxious.
Don't bother, said the Completely Invincible Lizard.
"Pardon?" asked Jimmy.
No one said anything.
Well. He didn't know what that was about. I mean, they had another name, another chance, another link in the long chain of folks that had decided to put people out in the middle of who-knows-where dark space to give them who-knows-who in their heads so they could be used for goodness-gracious-knows-what purposes.
