Unconstant Love

by Timothy J Meyer

  The necessary button pressed, the driftjets ignite. The radio starts gabbing about flight clearance; Moira Quicksilver is scanning the interior of the cramped starfighter for something even more essential – a rag and spray bottle.

  Traffic control protesting all the while, The Target Practice departs the surface of Rhav and, guided by its passable autopilot, makes immediately for the planet's Warp Gate. All the while, Moira succeeds in cleaning the brains from her brand new vessel's viewport and smirks at the irony that her piratical career ended with a very honest act of no-strings-attached piracy.

  The planet's many clouds are soon replaced by that endless field of stars. Moira Quicksilver's scanning through the jump possibilities, attempting to eliminate any obvious candidates before she cases Rhav's Warp Gate for clues. Runshaw seems the obvious choice, considering its zero population centers but, knowing Nemo, she couldn't rule out Cylmia, given his confidence in his newfound “insurance” and all the planet's teeming throngs to disappear among. The thought of either brings a small, unwilling smile to her face.

  Armed with only her wits, her pistols and a fine piece of starship engineering, Moira Quicksilver is back on the hunt again.

  Odisseus shifts his weight and adjusts the hang of his luggage, attempting to impress his looming bulk upon the dawdling Nimglo ahead of him in line. The Nimglo, meanwhile, is completely oblivious to every other person in the galaxy, save for the TransGalax employee that's scrutinizing her ticket. The TransGalax employee, an entirely too serious blueskin, keeps scowling from her handheld machine to the Nimglo's ticket, attempting to spot some imagined discrepancy between them.

  The line to board the next transport off Rhav isn't necessarily long, considering the planet's tiny population. At this rate, though, it'll be nightfall before they're all processed and packed aboard what Odisseus is forced to assume will be an empty cruiser. As the end of TransGalax's Lhvargo Line, the Ortok can't envision Rhav is some dream destination for too many galactic travellers, considering its perpetual rain and its utter insignificance.

  From where he stands in the queue, Odisseus can see the upper mantle of the shoddy passenger liner, enough to recognize a WW968 Starlight Incorporated Storage Hauler. No doubt “converted” to ferry passengers, TransGalax apparently felt no qualms about shipping people around the galaxy in the same vehicles used to ship livestock. The impending commute, with its seating and cuisine designed for non-Ortoki passengers, Odisseus predicts will be something of an ordeal.

  Compared to scrambling madcap across the galaxy the past decade, running from engine failure, flamethrower-wielding psychos and entire fleets of warships, this would be a cakewalk, something the Ortok should honestly be looking forward to.

  Here, at the end of everything, Odisseus can't decide how he feels.

  He'd left Flask fuming, demanding assurances from Moira that she'd contact them, that she'd do everything in her power to see the Captain brought to justice. He'd left Moira cold and calculating, her mind fifteen steps ahead and eager to part ways, to take the impossible task under her own wings, to sever every tie that she could afford to sever.

  His two former companions on opposite sides of the spectrum, Odisseus cannot seem to locate any emotion he actually feels – not anger, not sadness, not really even relief.

  A still suspicious blueskin clears the Nimglo to board and the Nimglo, the living embodiment of wasting everyone's time, drags her fuzzy feet in collecting all her scattered baggage and rounding the corner. Eager to keep things moving, Odisseus is waddling forward and thrusting his papers in the blueskin's face before she's a moment to recover.

  He'd purchased his ticket from a scalper, not daring to brave anywhere as crowded as a transpo terminal. His forged ident, through some small act of providence, was still on his person when Nemo flew off with the Lover and the rest of his things. They were, in fact, the very same Quargish credentials Nemo arranged for their infiltration aboard the Franchise, incorrect gender and all.

  He doubts very much that this backwater blueskin has any more knowledge about Ortoki versus Quargish biology than the average galactic citizen. From all the attention he pays “her” and “her” ident card, Odisseus could be mistaken. Perhaps Nemo and Moira were right all along and Quargish physiology is considered quite common knowledge in the galaxy these days.

  The same idiot chance that granted him this fake ident also allowed him a small amount of petty cash, the spare change from a successful haggle over the conduit couplings. Most of that cash's been spent now, dwindled away on essential supplies and the cost of his fare. There wasn't enough remaining to purchase another ticket, once the South Lhvargo Line reached its terminus on Traptor but that was a problem for another day. Allow Odisseus to reach Traptor without running afoul of a stray bounty hunter or Imperial checkpoint and the Ortok wouldn't make a single complaining peep.

  Some part of Odisseus knows that, when he officially runs out of funds, he'll wind up back on some chopshop floor, selling his services again to make ends meet. Perhaps he should head back to Vollok instead, as good a destination as any for his pointless voyage across Bad Space. Perhaps Dirty Djembe's is all he deserves now.

  The blueskin asks a few questions in her arch and skeptical manner. He answers, of course, in Ortoki and she thanks him with an uncomprehending and blinking stare. Soon enough, Odisseus, wanted criminal and present danger to all passengers aboard, is permitted entry to the space bus. With every possession he now owns slung in a satchel over his shoulder, Odisseus plows around the corner and marches towards the transport that'll take him away from this gloomy planet.

  His paws scraping against the gravel, Odisseus gets his first proper glimpse of the ship, romantically named “4Q31Z9” in great blocky letters along her starboard loading ramp. As predicted, it's blockish, asymmetrical and in disrepair, a looming hulk that betrays its past as a cargo freighter at every hull plate. The sight of the enormous sluggish thing, dwarfing the short string of passengers in line to climb that access ladder instantly brings The Unconstant Lover back to the Ortok's mind.

  Odisseus is surprised to feel nothing, no twinge of loss or remorse or any sympathetic emotion at the thought of the ship that cost so much time and labor and heartache to support.

  The entire commute, from Rhav to Traptor, he would dwell on this emptiness – this conspicuous gap where he imagines he should be feeling a whole swirl of conflicting emotions – and he would come to certain conclusions. It is not, in his mind, that The Unconstant Lover is stolen or destroyed or even gone. It is to Odisseus, through some incredible feat of emotional acrobatics, like The Unconstant Lover never existed.

  It is to Odisseus like those seven years, spent on hundreds of planets across the galaxy, in the dankest dives, the dirtiest gutters and the dizzying heights of galactic infamy, never happened.

  To him, striding towards that towering transport, Odisseus never saved Nehel Morel from drowning all those years ago. They never misspent their youth in Gallow's alleyways and junk halos. They were never separated by half a galaxy and seven heart-rending years. They were never reunited in a dingy Vollocki garage.

  That meeting was not the kickstart to a glorious career of piracy that would come, when all was said and done, to irrevocably change the course of galactic history.

  In that moment and for every moment going forward, Odisseus has transformed himself into a simple wayfarer, a galactic commuter, someone making his way across the spacelanes and thinking nothing for what he leaves behind him.

  A bond formed in salt cannot be so carelessly broken, screams every voice in the Ortok's head. With every step Odisseus takes away from Nehel Morel and onto his own trajectory, he feels that much more weightless, that much freer from the strings that once tangled him.

  Step by step, Odisseus climbs that access ladder and falls in behind the pokey Nimglo, the grating of each step rough against his hind pad and his satchel slapping against his hip.

  His only luggage, the rough canvas knapsack,
is nine-tenths empty. On his unexpected pilgrimage, Odisseus brings only what tools he'd been wearing, what canned fish he could forage from Rhav's grocers and, with no way to dispose of the things on planet, the two conduit couplings.

  It's hard not to feel unequipped for the galaxy at large. Not knowing where he's actually going, Odisseus doesn't really know what else he might need.

  Traptor was the destination printed on his ticket and that's as far as he could ride before they'd throw him out. Never an expert in planetary lore, Odisseus doesn't know what manner of world awaits him at the end of the South Lhvargo Line. It must be one, he supposes, where TransGalax could profitably headquarter a public transit hub. Cosmopolitan, he suspects, and not really ideal, then, for what he needs, considering the staggering reward still balanced on his head.

  That said, he'll be plumb broke by the time he makes Traptor. He'd need to hang up his shingle somewhere, even for a week or two, before he'd have the necessary capital to move on to brighter pastures.

  Once actually aboard the transport, the Ortok's stomach sinks to discover how cramped and unaccomodating the passenger compartment actually is. For such an immense ship, there's precious little room to maneuver between the aisles and it's only with great difficulty that Odisseus elbows and muscles his way towards his specific seat.

  He's flashing his fangs to force a blueskin to scoot out of his way when the idea of a long term destination occurs to him. Having somewhere concrete to aim towards might give Odisseus the motivation he'd need not to linger on Traptor and eventually get cornered or captured. Vollok immediately comes back to mind and there's a certain attraction there, a certain security knowing that Djembe would likely welcome him back with uncaring arms.

  He gazes out the tiny porthole his row is allowed, at the grubby rain-shadowed landing pad, and supposes Vollok could easily be considered a step backwards or, at best, sideways. Numb as he is to thoughts of Nemo, The Unconstant Lover and his share of the 65 million, Odisseus cannot pretend time hasn't passed and he's not seven years older.

  Somewhere new, he eventually decides, as more passengers push and shove their way to their respective seats. There must be somewhere new, somewhere meaningful that he can, step by step, work his way towards, to make the voyaging seem worthwhile.

  It's only when he starts to doze, the wispy tendrils of dream starting to uncoil around him, that the answer comes. He'll return home, to what remains of the wooded shores and sheltered capes and plentiful reefs.

  Carrying only what a simple bag will bear and no more, Odisseus is heading back to his homeworld, back to the dream-shadowed shores of Pequod.

  Darling isn’t her real name. The sign out front reads “Darling’s Discount Dash Repair” and she supposes it’s a fair cop that bloom near everybody that comes through that doorway – the ones not born on station anyway – take her, the place’s proprieter and sole occupant, to be Darling. It was pointless to explain to every dumbass that she hadn’t hung the sign, that she hadn’t founded the place, that the place was older than even her memory and she’d been aboard Takioro Defederate Station since she was too small to reach the door access.

  For the time being, then, she’d be Darling.

  Moons knew she’d cycled through a whole holodex of names since those desperate days, when she begged, borrowed and stole every scrap of her life. They were all of them pseudonyms – Deshani, Nebula, Fleece – that she’d adopted at various phases but none of them touched her actual name. Far as she was concerned, she would always be Zoot.

  There’s presently nobody about to gainsay her. The shop’s empty, same as it has been for a disquieting length of time. Customers with misbehaving dash bikes had become pretty few and far between, something Zoot really ought be more concerned about. The upshot, she considers, is that now she’s got more time to tinker with her own machines.

  This one’s a Model G TurboTorque, a finnicky little beast that’s fallen in love with overheating. Zoot swears there’s a mild-mannered machine in there somewhere, even if she’s gotta pull the whole thing apart to find it. The driftmotor’s been utterly disassembled in the search and its insides lie in a random spread all around the gutted chasis. Zoot’s on her hands and knees, elbow deep in the guts of the bike, puffing away on a Yellowtooth and tapping her toe to whatever the radio plays her – this time, a Spacers standard so loud it rattles the rivets.

  This recent dry spell doesn’t worry Zoot any. People come and go, economies climb and crash but Takioro Defederate Station endures.

  Born and raised in her unhallowed halls, Zoot’s seen Takioro Defederate Station, that unconquerable old bitch, rise and fall through a dozen calamities – gross malfunctions, temporary Depot-Commissioners, a score of Yarba New Years, even the Freebooter Fleet a few years back. There wasn't an act of moons or government or gravity that could bring this station low, that much Zoot knew. She might waver, her lighting might flicker and her casings might crack but Takioro could and would weather any storm that Bad Space threw her way.

  Long as there were bad people in the galaxy who liked to drink and whore, Takioro Defederate Station would endure, limping or thriving.

  She’s plucking the cigarette from her mouth, ready to stub the thing out it's gotten so short, when she hears the back door swoosh open.

  She scowls and calls out for the radio to stop. It instantly does, the classic astrorock refrain dropping away fast enough to leave a slight echo. Zoot strains to listen but there’s no immediate reaction to this.

  “You got some problem,” she hollers towards the open doorway to the office, a dozen feet behind her, “using the front door like everybody fucking else?”

  At first, more silence is her only answer. That’s when she hears a tool clatter, hit the ground and someone make a muffled curse.

  “If you do,” Zoot continues, yanking both green hands from the dash and wiping them on her overalls, “I gotta 485 Hangman you can answer to. Ain’t sure what you’re packing,” she sighs, “but I can guarantee, I’m a good enough shot to make whatever you’re scheming right now more painful than profitable.”

  “All the shitting moons,” the intruder mutters through clenched teeth, “of motherfucking Jotor.” Behind her, he hobbles into the doorframe, his vaguely humanoid shadow playing out on the chopshop floor a few feet to Zoot’s left. “I stubbed my cunting toe.”

  The Hangman retrieved from her nearby things, Zoot turns slowly about to face her unexpected visitor. A trim little AccCo piece, she always keeps the weapon handy, no matter where she goes, feeling a little naked wandering around Takioro without a firearm. Who knows what this headache could possibly be; it certainly wouldn’t be the first time a drunk or a vagrant’s stumbled in here and it wouldn’t be the first time Zoot’s had to put down a motherfucker that got fresh with her.

  Who she does discover, leaning against her doorjamb and favoring one foot, takes her completely by surprise.

  His voluminous jacket, an overdramatic number in brown leather that idles about his ankles, has seen better days and many repairs. One of his hands clutches what appears to be a hefty wad of cash, while the other clutches his knee, like this’ll somehow rectify his stubbed toe. Despite the dim and unfavorable lighting, despite the distance and silhouette that obscures him in the doorway, despite the sheer impossibility of his unexplained appearance here, the Galactic Menace is unmistakeable.

  “The moons?” spits Zoot, more confused than starstruck.

  “Please tell me you're Zoot,” he implores her, limping forward a little and making a slight gesture with the significant amount of cash he's playing with. “You're the third greenskin girl I've bothered tonight and my clock's really, really ticking here.”

  “Zoot’s me,” she confirms, uncertain where Nehel Morel, of all people, had heard that name from. “Is there something she can do for you and your money, Mr. Menace?”

  “Matter of fact, there is,” he seems both pleased and relieved to confirm, stepping forward still more and revealing a
little more of that enigmatic smirk that's got the whole galaxy charmed. “You know the honeycombs, right? Down on the street?”

  Zoot scowls. “The drug dens?”

  “The very same.” Soon as he's within arm's reach, he extends the wad of bills to her, still shrouded somewhat in shadow when he does. “Want you to find 16E. Combo's written on the top bill there,” he mentions with a small point towards the stack.

  She considers the crisp stack of currency in her hand, thousand credit notes all and with easily a hundred bills in each wad. Scribbled there, across the face of the planet Sellele, is a short, five-letter phrase, that causes the breath in Zoot's throat to catch – 3SIES.

  “What's in your hands right now,” he explains, inching backwards as he does, his package delivered, “is for you to keep. The rest, what you're gonna find in that honeycomb, is for the kid.”

  Zoot looks up from the hundred thousand credits she's just been handed, enough money to retire from disassembling dash, if only temporarily. Her expression is level but her voice and her hands shake a little when she speaks. “The kid.”

  “It's a lot,” he warns her, in a reminding tone. “More than he's gonna be able to spend. I know you been keeping an eye on him but this is gonna be different. Now on, it'll be your job to see he isn't robbed or swindled or whatever, that he doesn't squander his father's share.”

  “His father. You mean–”

  “It's his by rights,” the Galactic Menace supposes, the last words he says before he disappears back around the corner. “It's what Two-Bit would have wanted.”

  She kneels there, long after he's vanished, stumbling his way out the back entrance again, the money so heavy in her hands she fears she might drop the whole wad. Upon that moment in time – a greenskin girl kneeling on the greasy floor of her chopshop, a massive pile of Garrock Brondi’s money in her hand – hinges the lives of Zoot, her young bastard and indeed all of Bad Space.