I never thought I’d be spending the last of my credits on this. But I haven’t been able to contact Brett and he’s the only one I trust to take care of my ship in my place. Did I seriously just put trust and Brett into the same sentence? That’s got to be a sign of insanity. Kind of like throwing my money away to give my ship a paint job. It has cloaking! Yet apparently, this crime lord has put my ship’s colour as part of the bounty details. And it’s not like I can just park it and leave it cloaked. That’d just make it glaringly suspicious.

Instead of the specific shade of navy blue that Yana chose years ago, my ship is now a standard black.

Thankfully, no passing bounty hunters or even other mercs have spared me a second glance in the past week. Then again, I haven’t left my ship without wearing dark brown contacts and a splattering of freckles faked through makeup. My hair grew beyond my shoulders while I was on holiday, or in prison depending on how you look at it, so it’s been out and covering my face. My normal, more elaborate, disguises would be recognised and I’m a little too short on credits to get anything fancy. I figure changing my entire demeanour by keeping my head down and body hunch will work better than a physical disguise.

That time’s over now though. I need credits and haven’t found a single job. Sure I’ve been blacklisted by the biggest crime lord in the galaxy, but since when has that stopped anyone from wanting something questionable done for a small price? I’ve heard of other mercs getting bounties like this before, but they always had at least someone give them a job. I’m up for taking out every enforcer in the sector for a hundred credits at this point. If it wasn’t for this stupid bounty, I’d go work for some mechanic on this wasteland world in the middle of nowhere.

But it’s not safe for me to stay in one place for even a day right now. If I had the damn resources, I’d just go after this crime lord. All this hiding is getting on my nerves. I’m meant to be falling backwards into a life of ease and fun, not glancing over my shoulder at every turn. It’s not even paranoia at this point. There are three heavily armed bounty hunters following me right now.

And I am so done with this hiding.

I spin around with my hands up. “Oh look, you caught me. What a shame,” I say. The three of them stumble to a stop, dumbfounded. I continue. “How much was my bounty again? It’d be a shame to split it. Just imagine having every single credit to yourself.”

They all take a step forward, then stop and stare at each other. “I found her first,” the one on the left says.

“Like you’d be able to handle her on your own,” the middle one says.

The right one draws his handgun. “She’s trying to make us fight each other.”

He’s not wrong.

“Shut up, Gerald,” the middle one says, knocking his gun aside. “This woman was stupid enough to get herself on the wrong side of every criminal in the galaxy. She’s hardly going to play us off each other.”

I did manage to only get only two months after blowing up the Torline Enforcer Headquarters, but I don’t mention that.

Gerald whacks the middle one’s head. “She used to be one of the best mercenaries in the Milky Way! We shouldn’t underestimate her.”

“Wait, what do you mean used to be?” I ask. “At least I’m not an absurdly loud bounty hunter that can’t discreetly tail someone if their life depended on it.”

Now all three of them are pointing their weapons at me. Change of plans then.

I smash the controls on my wristband and shiver as the modified cloaking device kicks in. Oh, did I say I spent the last of my credits on a paint job? I meant, after I rigged this beauty up of course. Gerald is the first to start shooting. I roll to the side and dodge his spray of fire. I take off into a sprint in a random direction, dodging my way into a crowd. I hear the other two open fire at where I was standing, but I’m long gone.

The personal cloak splutters to a stop as I round the corner to my ship and climb on-board. I guess that little trick won’t work again. I’m going to need more credits if I could even hope to make that last longer. Maybe it’s time to take to cleaning bar floors again. There’s got to be some way to get off this crime lord’s radar or I might just have to go find a cave somewhere and wait it out.

Yana would know what to do; she always had better plans.