RIDA Sr understood Senjen was playing for time and played along beautifully out loud.

“It sometimes takes ten to fifteen minutes to calibrate properly. Can I help you to some refreshments? H-herbal tea, perhaps?”

Meanwhile, her frontal light display said something very different.

”There is a big gun hidden in the white suit directly behind me. There are more weapons for sale on the mezzanine.”

The droid listened to this exchange and studied the partial view they had of Senjen through the aisles of suits. There wasn’t much time left before the rest of their fireteam arrived and they did this the hard way. They locked eyes with RIDA Jr and put a finger to their face in the way Humans did sometimes.

Shhh.

Then they turned back to Light and hauled him back up.
“Last chance, pal. Tell me what your friend is carrying or I kill the girl. Their blood will be on your hands, is that what you want?”

Light shook violently. “Don’t kill her, please! Kill me instead, just please don’t hurt an innocent, she has nothing to do with it please…”

It was at this moment that the droid realised this blubbering QV actually didn’t know what they were carrying. That did make sense; if they were simple couriers, there was no point in giving them potentially dangerous intelligence on their cargo.

The droid sighed, as much as was possible, then pulled Light to the fitting room doorway.

“We’re going to go out and convince your friend to stand down. If they don’t, the girl dies. If you say something stupid or try anything at all, the girl also dies. Got it?”

Light didn’t say anything, and the droid took that for compliance. They maneuvered the reddish QV suit so they were in front of them, stuck the gun into Light’s back and walked out of the room. They turned left and started down the aisle in front towards where Rida Sr was. The floating black disc took up the rear. Rida Jr watched them go.

Senjen gave a laugh. “You know, this isn’t the first time a QV has offered me food today, weirdly enough. No, I’m fine. I’ll just...wait over there.” He answered RIDA aloud, but as soon as the droid returned inside the fitting room, he jumped into action. He did not know how long he would have, so he had to get into position as fast, and as quietly, as possible. RIDA had pointed out a gun, so he grabbed it on the way. He did not know yet what exactly it did or if it would be useful, but better to have it than to not. He took a picture of it and did an image search to try to identify it, but for now his own pistol could handle what he needed. It was quiet, with an armor-piercing projectile that would penetrate rather than flatten, minimizing collateral on impact.

For Senjen’s plan, he floated up above the mezzanine. There were other weapons there, but since he needed to be careful not to make too much noise, he could not waste time with them. He had two ideas of what to do, depending on what the droid did, but both had him taking similar positions. He went up to the ceiling, securing himself in place so that he would be looking straight down on the droid when it came out from under the mezzanine. He had intended to message Light and get him to try to convince the droid to come out to the front, but from what he could see from the daughter’s view, it was doing that on its own.

Senjen, more than ever, needed to be precise. He had never been in a gunfight before, but this was really a lot more like his time at the shooting range. Locked into a stable position, lining up his shot carefully, and shooting a slow moving target at close range. He could do that. With the fact that he could lock his arm, keep it perfectly steady, and shoot with complete stability, he had hit reliably accurate shots at much longer ranges than this. This was all well-within his ability, as long as he kept a cool head and avoided panicking.

The droid moved out towards the front, and through the daughter’s view, he could see it was pushing Light ahead as a hostage. No problem, he could still make the shot at this angle, since the backdrop of the shot was the floor, not his friend. With what he had said to RIDA, the fact that Senjen was not immediately in view would not be instantly alarming, so he would hopefully get a chance to take that shot. Without detailed knowledge of the droid’s internals, he couldn’t know exactly where to aim to drop it in one shot, and he didn’t really want to kill regardless. He just had to stop the threat with the first shot, else Light could end up getting hit.

Since he knew about when the droid was stepping out from under the mezzanine, Senjen was as ready as he could be, his arm locked into place and his pistol on target. From directly above, he took aim at the droid’s gun. Though it was worryingly close to Light’s body, this was close range and he knew he could make the shot, so he took it. By disarming the droid, he hoped to be able to get it to stand down, so as soon as he took the shot, he shouted out. “Hold there! Let’s talk.”

Rewrite

Senjen’s first shot hit the target. The droid’s pistol was pulled from their hand and onto the floor in two pieces. They let go of Light and stepped back under cover of the mezzanine since they had only just emerged from under it.

Undeterred, the droid reached behind them and grabbed a much larger assault weapon which clicked out from inside its back.

“Senjen watch out!” Light warbled out loud, struggling to break his suit free of the control pad’s vice-like grip.

The droid aimed straight up and fired a spray of thirty thin, high velocity tungsten slivers into the mezzanine floor where they thought Senjen had been. It produced a sound like hail landing on a tin roof. Several suits on a chain at the front of the mezzanine pulled free and floated towards the roof. In the chaos, the black disc floated quickly up and went to hide with a translucent suit between it and the Utaysi.

Rida Sr scrambled for cover. RIDA Jr floated away from the droid to the furthest fitting room while they weren’t looking.

“You still alive, Senjen? I just need that file!” The droid called, looking around quickly only to discover RIDA Jr had disappeared. They stalked towards the back of the warehouse, eyes on a swivel.

The warning from Light ended up being a lot of help, because a moment after Senjen moved out of the way, several shots hit right where he used to be. Aside from fear, there were more than a few frustrated thoughts in his mind. ”Of course it had another gun. Why wouldn’t it? Why couldn’t something just be easy for a change today?”

Senjen scanned the area around the mezzanine. Options, he needed options. The motion of one of the gel suits floating up towards nearby caught his eye. Quickly, he reached out and grabbed it as it passed nearby, its momentum putting him into a slow spin as he pulled it close to himself. These suits had speakers for when QV needed to speak verbally, so he activated and made a connection with them, then pushed the suit somewhere vaguely above the area where he thought the droid had backed off to. Even better than just keeping the droid from tracking his voice, talking through the speakers might trick it into tracking his voice inaccurately.

Senjen himself stabilized his movement with the nearby shelving, then spoke by proxy through the gel suit. “And I was really needing to have a conversation without waving guns at each other. If you’re with who I think you’re with, then I know what you think is in my head, and how valuable that is to your boss. Might be worth considering that, if you hurt anyone here, I can destroy this data in an instant. Your boss will never know if I was carrying what they were looking for, and they’ll have to keep up this expensive manhunt for who knows how long. Might be a lot easier, and a lot cheaper, for them if we discuss this. Politely.”

The droid stopped for a moment at that, before kicking open the door of the last fitting room. As predicted, RIDA Jr was curled up in there with another control pad. She screamed when they reached in to grab her and hit a button.

Light found that the pressure on his body relaxed, and he could move his own suit! He pushed off towards the front door and then hid behind an aisle-end next to RIDA Sr. Poking out onto the adjacent aisle so the droid wouldn’t see, he signed up to Senjen.

“I’m free! Let's get out of here!”

“I’ll offer you a deal right now.” The droid called as he punched the writhing QV suit and pulled RIDA Jr out into the area bordering the garage. They struggled to hold both their hostage and their gun, but managed to get a secure platform then looked up at the ceiling above.

The black disc, which appeared to have successfully hidden near Senjen on the mezzanine, surveyed the area and relayed his position back to the droid. They aimed their gun up above them.

“I’ll swap you the girl for what's in your head. If I don't get it, or I don’t like what I see, she’s dead. Then the rest of my team and I will kill you all. Don't bother calling for help, comms are jammed.”

Light swore. RIDA Sr grabbed him and shook him.

“You have to rescue her, please! This is your fault!”

“Clock’s ticking. Do we have a deal?”

Light looked up at Senjen again, and didn't know what to say or do.

Senjen was still able to see through the daughter’s point of view, and while it was still hard to make out fine details, there were still at least two things he could gather from her perspective. One, he had a good idea of where the droid was standing on the floor below, in relation to him. Two, he could see that the droid was aiming up straight at him, rather than the source of his voice. Aside from how anxious that fact made him, it also implied that the droid had a way to see him. Senjen avoided giving an obvious reaction, but paid attention to try and figure out how.

Letting the QV die was out of the question, obviously, but just doing a handover on the droid’s terms did not seem wise. Not only did he have a responsibility to Light, but doing everything on the droid’s terms would give it the power to kill whoever it wanted, whenever. “I’m willing to make a deal, uh...random droid, but just putting this out there: anyone gets hurt or killed here, and your chance of getting the data disappears forever. I would destroy it before anyone could even have a chance of taking it from me. In fact...I’m putting the data on a dead man’s switch. I start shutting down for any reason, and the last operation my processor performs is to destroy the data. Now, let’s talk counteroffers. See, I always keep my word and never break a contract, but lucky for you, my contract is with Light. Not Light’s employer. If Light says sell, I sell, and we could sell it just for our delivery price. I guarantee that’s cheaper than what your employer would have to pay to smooth things over after shooting up an innocent shopkeeper. Probably the easiest, cheapest option you have.”

The droid paused, still holding RIDA Jr still with one hand. Their head swivelled slowly to look towards Light and RIDA Sr, who cowered behind a few layers of floating gel suits.

”The Vermillion Consortium will be furious if we give away their cargo. There goes my treatment plan.” Light sighed and studied Senjen as if he were a mirror. He felt resigned to the situation, despite the dire ramifications for him. He just didn’t have it in him to sacrifice these hapless QV.

”What is going on?” RIDA flashed at him.

”Don’t worry. You and your daughter will be free to go soon.

“What is your delivery fee?” The droid replied eventually.

“Fifty million Galactic credits!” Light called from across the shop, not daring to show his face. That was in fact double what he had agreed with the VC, but he was going to need a bit of ‘danger money’ if this was truly the route they were heading down.

“That is acceptable. We will have to check the file to verify its authenticity. My Monitor will approach you with a drop box. Remain calm and still.” The droid said immediately.

There was a bit of noise from out the front of the shop, like a few sets of feet activating the magnetic pavement nearby. The corrugated side access gate rattled lightly.

The black disc that had been hiding near Senjen emerged from behind a gel suit and floated closer to the Utaysi. It sent a request for him to execute the file in an isolated virtual environment.

The droid was willing to deal, which was more than a bit of a relief. Senjen did not see any other way to save the QV, with the situation as it was. If Light did not agree to take the deal, then he would try, but he would not expect to succeed. Of course, anyone would be a fool to hand over all leverage at once, so he would do his best to approach this with good business sense.

“Alright then, now let’s be honest with each other, the chances that we just happened to land in the same hanger as you with exactly what you’re looking for, out of all the thousands of other places we could have landed, are pretty slim. So, set your expectations. What I’ll do is make a copy of the file and send it for you to verify. If it is what you’re looking for, then we’ll exchange the money for the original. Either the file or the money are worth the same to me, so I don’t care which I walk away with. If it’s not what you’re looking for, then I’ll ask that you destroy the copy, and we forget this ever happened. I’ll even leave you with my business card, if your boss ever wants to work together.” Senjen said, then followed through to make a copy of the file and sent it to the droid’s monitor as requested.

The front door of the warehouse opened, and a chime sounded. Light turned and recoiled at the sight of another identical combat droid pointing a gun at him. RIDA Sr made to run away but he stopped her, then presented a pliant colour display. The robot stalked into the room, quickly surveying it while keeping their weapon trained on the pair of visible QV.

Behind the droid came a Human female in full combat gear. Light didn’t think it was the same one as they’d talked to in the hangar, but frankly they all looked alike to him so he couldn’t be sure.

“Hello gentlemen. Thanks for waiting - I’m Connie." So not the same Human after all.

“Lets have a little chat up there, shall we?” She pointed up to where Senjen was before gracefully lifting off and floated up towards the mezzanine.

“Put the shopkeepers together.” She ordered, and the droid closest to Light grabbed RIDA Sr.

“Don’t worry, they won’t hurt you.” Light tried to look reassuring, even though he was terrified himself. He then made to follow Connie up to the mezzanine. As he did so, he noticed the corrugated side access door rattled open and a third droid padded inside. They were now well and truly surrounded.

“Let's see what we have here, shall we?” The Human said curtly as soon as she landed next to Senjen. She flicked on a wrist readout and studied the copy of the file given to the monitor.

Light gave his assistant a worried look as he arrived too. “You ok? Unhurt?”

“Ok. We’ll take this file off your hands and give you fifty million credits.” Connie started after a pregnant pause.

“But none of us want the VC to know they’ve been cheated. Least of all you. So we’re going to give you a file to deposit with them that looks identical. You can collect your money from them too, and continue working with them. Everybody wins. Alright?”

The arrival of backup for the droid was initially worrying, though thinking about it, Senjen supposed it did not really change much. The first droid already outgunned him, so the only way this would turn out well would be by making a deal. Having more of their guards around did probably cut off the option of being able to run, though if they had been that close before, then fleeing probably would have failed by the time Light was free. At least this way, they were dealing directly with someone who seemed to have some authority in their organization, instead of a foot soldier who may or may not have even been sapient. When it came to alien AI, he had a hard time telling which ones were even truly alive, and which ones just had convincing personality routines.

Senjen stayed calm and quiet at first while the Human examined the copy, at least outwardly. He did find that trying to think rationally about the situation had something of a calming effect, but he could not deny feeling much of the same fear that Light was showing outwardly. QV had a harder time hiding their emotions than even most organics, which Senjen supposed could let himself seem more cool-headed by comparison. True or not, it was useful.

“No damage here.” Senjen answered to Light while they waited, before giving his new suit a look over from top to bottom. “Hmm, so you went with red. Neat.”

In any case, Senjen’s gaze snapped back onto the Human once she spoke up again, and the offer she made did actually help to genuinely calm him, to an extent. The kind of offer she was making was the sort where they would actually want the two of them to walk away for practical reasons aside from cost-effectiveness. “So, the file was actually what you were looking for. Wild that we ended up in the same hangar.” He shrugged. “Well, personally, I think that is a deal I would agree to: the original file for the money and a fake.” He said, taking a moment to set up a trade for his file. “I’m ready to make the exchange, as long as you agree, Light.”