Fragile Bond by Rhi Etzweiler

and lock it up.”
    Reccin nodded and carried the weapon to the far corner of Hamm’s office. He handled it as he would a poisonous lizard poised to strike. The prisoner watched the chief with a pained look on his face and pushed to his feet, leaning against the wall.
    Hamm pounced, crushing the alien to the wall with the force of his weight. He braced his elbow on the wall by Marc Staille’s head and rested his wrist against the front of the prisoner’s throat, half-claws poised against his neck. Just there, where the pulse pounded beneath thin flesh.
    “Tried taking your weapon while my back was turned. Not a smart move, Staille.”
    Though Staille registered Hamm’s attack, his focus had been on Reccin. His reaction was a fraction too slow to do more than tense. No doubt thinking the end of his life was imminent.
    The throat beneath his grip convulsed. “Dehna wasn’t very friendly. Of course I did. Self-preservation.” His breathing ragged, the soldier writhed, struggling. He didn’t manage to move much, but Hamm could feel the flex and tense of muscle, the resistance.
    He curled his lips, baring fangs as a growl vibrated up from deep in his chest.
    “This has been a misunderstanding. I can fix it, easy. Just need—” the translation device failed momentarily, Staille’s native tongue indecipherable “—contact with command. So I can tell them.”
    Reccin added his own growl in counterpoint as he returned to stand at Hamm’s shoulder. His mane had fluffed out so far from bristling that his shoulders and neck looked twice their actual thickness. The chief’s scent saturated the air, blatant disapproval. “Contact. What, so you can tell them coordinates for the next attack?”
    Staille made a sound like the cafa clans in the far north, body tensing as he shook, accepting Hamm’s weight as though it were nothing, no resistance against the arm at his throat. He let his head fall back as he continued to bark and Hamm retracted his claws a fraction to avoid injuring him. The male’s voice sounded strained when he continued. “If they wanted to drop munitions on you here, they wouldn’t need me to provide coordinates. Sir.”
    “They wouldn’t?” Hamm glanced at Reccin and nudged the prisoner’s chin with his wrist. “How would they simply know where you are, without you telling them? Does your race share some sort of mind-link?”
    Staille wet his lips, his gaze unfocused. He even lifted his head and let it drop back against the wall, repeatedly. The scent of ’nip swamped the air between them, but there was something different in the way it smelled. It fascinated him into relaxing his hand, fully retracting his claws. The alien had small teeth, but glimpsing them had an unexpected effect on him. There was nothing challenging in the male’s demeanor, and he wasn’t struggling. So why was he baring his teeth?
    “All forward personnel have devices kind of like the one you just crammed into my skull.” The sergeant angled his head, rolling it to the side beneath Hamm’s relaxing pressure, exposing the spot behind his ear where the bio-processor protruded, not fully interfaced. “I can be tracked anywhere. They just have to look for the anomaly in all their blips on the display.”
    “They won’t know why you’re here unless you tell them. Right?”
    Staille shifted, shoulders moving a fraction. “For all they know I’m dead, dragged off by predators. It’s what we thought you tawnies were. They can’t read vitals.” He made a sound resembling a purr, shifted his shoulders back and forth. Hamm lowered his forearm away from the soldier’s chin. “If I advise them that I’ve made first contact, explain the nature of your technological advancement, social structure, and cultural intellect, I’m sure they’ll withdraw.”
    A heartbeat of silence, during which Staille remained still. Unresponsive, not looking at either of them, gaze focused on something neither of them could see. Either that