The monk took my offered hand, more as an acceptance of the gesture than out of a need for help. He looked around. “I thought you were a sentry, but you do not smell like any of them, so perhaps we share a similar purpose.” He gestured to the charred arm of the man who’d tried to prod me. “I did not do that.”
“That wasn’t part of my purpose, as you put it,” I told him. “My purpose was to skulk about and find what these people were up to. I needed to know what was so special about their particular cargo.”
“Cargo?” the lynix growled. “These men are traffickers in children. Slavers.” He spat on the unconscious troll.
My head whipped around and my eyes, inexorably, fell on the long crate in the center of the room. I felt my jaw loosen and I kept it closed only by a herculean effort. Nothing could be done for the curdling in my stomach.
Oh, God, Link, Paige said, horror in her voice. You have to open that crate.
The Felis monk was already moving toward it. I followed closely. He grabbed the lid, dug his claws in, and tried to pry it off by main force. But it was solid nanocomposite and sealed tight. Paige was already scanning it when I tapped his arm.
“I got this,” I told him. Paige highlighted a panel in one corner. A swipe of my finger across its surface sent it retracting into the lid to reveal a lock screen. “What do you got, Paige?”
It’s isolated. No wireless access and no I/O ports. Wouldn’t be much of a lock otherwise. Touch it.