DERELICT RUN
(Part 3 of 8)
Station watch let them out, and they hit the barracks showers.
“Why doesn’t the son of a fikolo just tell is what this crap is about?” Dalibor said, turning off the faucet and wiping water from his face.
“It’s about not sitting in a gaol cell with you lot for the next year,” Mercutio said, scraping his face with his razor. “Yah? And you can’t say we’ve had any fun out here.”
“Ain’t any fun around Aphrodite,” Maltego said, stamping his feet in fungicidal talc. “They need more than three brothels full of girls.”
“And they need better-looking ones.” Batalo pulled on an almost clean brown quilted coverall.
“And better stuff to steal,” Krimulo said cheerfully.
“We are where we are,” Mercutio said. “Even if it’s the arse-end of the solar system.”
“Commandant says we don’t go armed,” Feraji said. “We carry anyway?”
“We do not. Especially you.”
“Slag off with that,” the gunner growled. “It was an accident.”
“You suck, Feraji,” Vesparto laughed.
“He’s a good shot if he’s aiming for me,” Mercutio said. “No weapons this mission.”
They suited up and took the lift to the Station core.
“F-section,” Mercutio said. “Perfect name. What a hole.”
F-section dock was lonely and dirty. There were two docking ports on each side, like you’d expect. Only one was green-lit.
“Awful sad here,” Dalibor said, turning on his heel. It was only a tenth-g, and they lightly bounced from foot to foot. “But this must be our ride.”
Mercutio stepped in the docking port, grabbed the hold-bar, and banged the door with his fist.
A voice came over the comm. “Yah?”
Mercutio looked at them. “Yah, it’s Mercutio,” he said. “Warrant. Attached Falcon-4. I’m supposed to board with my team. Is this Kuŝim?”
“Yah, I’m Kuŝim.”
“Sounds like a kid,” Maltego muttered.
Bolts clanked in the port, and it swung open. Someone pulled forward out of a dim-light vessel.
“It’s a skirt!” Dalibor exclaimed.
“You also might know me as a woman,” she said. “Ratma Kuŝim. I’m your pilot.”
Mercutio made the sign against bad luck. “Nobody told us about this,” he said.
She shrugged. “I’m paid to sit here or fly there. Stay or go.” She retreated into the craft.
“What’cha think?” Dalibor said.
“I think we’re gonna die,” Batalo said angrily. “A girl on a spaceship?”
“We don’t a goat to kill,” Mercutio said. “Run the risk. Unless you wanna go to the brig?”
They groaned.
“Maybe it counts if you promise to kill a goat later?” Krimulo suggested.
This seemed reasonable. Promise made, they boarded, cautious.
It was an old medium-ranger. Engine compartment shut and locked, small cargo bay, tiny galley and head, passenger compartment with eight double seats, and four portholes. Control cabin up front. Their feet rumbled on the wooden decking, and they gingerly settled into the seats and buckled themselves in. The pilot looked at them, amused.
Mercutio eyed back, curious. She had a shabby old suit on, and the helmet was off; her black hair was pinned on the back of her head, and her eyes were little gleams of deep space in a brown face. KUŜIM was painted in white on the left chest of her suit cuirass. “Wait,” he said. “You the only crew?”
“You want another woman aboard? I thought you didn’t like the one that you had.”
“Maybe,” Maltego said. “Got any?”
“Shut it, Crowbar. Nah, a man, someone to make decisions.”
She spread her hands. “My can, my decisions. Welcome to Calabrono-9.” She turned away.
The team groaned again.
“I am not liking this, Warrant,” Feraji said.
Mercutio checked and rechecked his straps as the woman—the pilot—locked her helmet and began bringing the control panel up.
“Where we headed?” he said.
She leaned to the side again to look at him. “You serious?”
“We were told to get on and go. A pickup job.”
She snorted. “Looks like you’re bringing your bad luck with you. We’re going to Melainis.”
“Where?”
“Yah, you deaf? Melainis.”
Mercutio, no scholar, remembered little about Aphrodite from school except she was a bigger, denser world than home, and recalled less about her moons. But he did know Melainis was farthest from the primary, three, four hundred thousand kilometers, small, and black as pitch.
He decided not to appear stupid and refrained from asking more questions except, “How long’s the trip?”
“Sixteen hours,” she said. “Counting orbital injection. You all strapped in?”
“Yah,” Mercutio said.
“Hold on. I’m getting go from Control.”
The little ship kicked off with a jolt. Scruffy Aphrodite Station drifted by. Outside the ports, light flashed from the attitude jets, and then a brief burn from the main engine pressed them in their seats.
The warrant brooded. Commandant had nothing to tell them about this run, and Mercutio took that to mean that it was of dubious legitimacy. The team had speculated plenty, but it was just that: speculation. Mercutio worked from orders. He didn’t spend time trying to figure things out.
But this time, the scenario caused the hairs on his neck to prick, like when someone was behind him in a bar about to hit him over the head with a bottle.