Vin's Rules (Outer Settlement Agency) Read Online Free Page A

afternoon beard of a face that bore the lines of wisdom and long hours in the sun.
    Wisdom not shared by Vin’s rambling co-prisoner, who was too clueless to know that she was, in fact, a co-prisoner.
    Allie sat on the edge of her chair and tapped Graham’s desk. The man’s eyes followed her thudding finger, and his face reddened. “One of your men took my omnitablet. If you’ll just give it back, I can show you precisely what the regulations say.”
    “My parents were Outer Settlement Agency folks. Good people, for a time. It’s fair to say I know plenty about OSA.”
    Oh, yeah, they were screwed.
    Not that she seemed to notice. While Vin eyed various pieces of furniture for possible weapons usage, Allie tried to share war stories of growing up as an agency kid.
    Maybe it was good she had her rules to fall back on. She sure as shit couldn’t rely on any innate sense of perception.
    Graham’s interlaced fingers turned white at the knuckles. Whatever restraint the man had, he was losing it. And for what? A woman daring to speak? What kind of sick ass were they dealing with?
    “Tell me, Graham, did all the girls run their mouths as much as this one?”
    And just like that, the pink returned to Graham’s hands, and his eyes crinkled at the corners.
    Vin bumped Allie’s knee with his own and shot her his best for-the-love-of-God-and-to-save-our-asses-shut-up look he could manage.
    “My father’s first wife was the same. My mother, that is. Things improved with the second one. He moved around until he found likeminded people. It’s tough to build a sense of privacy these days. So many people getting in everyone’s business, you understand.”
    “Quite.” 
    “Yes. Why are you here, again?”
    Vin didn’t risk lying. For as backwards as this place was... or chose to be... they still had modern weapons. It wasn’t too far of a stretch to imagine they had outside communication. His identity wasn’t a secret. A quick scan of his face would pull him up over all the infonets.
    “Vin Dhoma. I control security back at base.” He pointed a thumb to the openly pissed-off Allie. “This one is my guardian, I guess. You know how it is. All sorts of checks and rechecks. When I saw the assignment to observe this place, I took it from one of my subordinates.”
    “Hoping to shake her?” the thin lipped man asked.
    “I’m piss outta luck. So, what happened here? I need to file a report. I gotta say, Graham, it doesn’t look good in the town back there.”
    The man leaned back in his brown chair and pressed his thumbs and index fingers together. “Trouble, my friend. Had my boys not rescued you in time, you’d have been but a memory.”
    “Because?”
    “Things live in the woods, and now the town. Rodents.”
    “Mice?”
    “That fly.”
    “So, bats?”
    Graham’s eyes narrowed, and he looked at him dead on. “I didn’t say mice, and perhaps rodent wasn’t the best word. Arachnids.”
    “Spiders? That fly? Okay. Let me guess, and just for good measure, they’re poisonous.”
    “Lethal in seconds and about the size of a child. Some sort of mutation, though when it started is anyone’s guess. People disappeared from the outlying areas and...”
    Vin let him continue without interruption. No one noticed one or two missing townspeople — folks give up on roughing it in the harder quadrants all the time. It was initially believed that they simply left. No one panicked until the town itself was directly under threat.
    “And you provided them safety here,” Vin added when Graham rang a large metal bell on his desk. At its toll, a woman draped in blue came in, head bowed.
    Graham pulled out a ledger book, not looking at them or the woman as he spoke. “Vin, you appear comfortable enough, but Allie, that uniform looks positively furious. My assistant will get clothing for you. She’ll also bring us some restorative tea and be quick about it.”
    Vin opened his mouth to acknowledge the woman, but she was