by J. N. Chaney
“Of course, sir,” said the AI. “I wish you the best of luck in your grand toy theft adventure.”
I smirked. “Was that sarcasm, Siggy?”
“Perhaps, sir.”
“I knew you’d catch on.”
A green light popped on above the door, and the exit slid noiselessly open as I rested my hand on the pistol in the holster at my side. I didn’t plan on killing anyone, but I never knew what sort of trouble I’d find on a job. I’d been hired to transport a family of three once, only to find myself pinned down between two sets of rival gangs by the end of the day.
The roof was typical for the city—concrete coated with plastic—but not for a factory. There was no sign of any security guard running to throw a pair of cuffs on me, which I took as a good indicator that my credentials were, in fact, actually good.
Always a plus when my agents gave me intel that actually proved useful. It wasn’t ever a guarantee.
At the end of the long open walkway between the docking bays, a small building with a wide glass door beckoned me inside. I jogged down the angled ramp and set a quick pace toward the door, shoulders squared as I kept my head down. In a place like this, security cams had to be a given—the only reason I hadn’t sounded off alarms already was because of the codes that disgruntled employee had swiped. If I looked too suspicious, however, I’d get my ass handed to me by security.
I needed to get a uniform, and I needed to do it quickly.
A mere five meters from the main doors, I squinted in an effort to see through the heavy tint protecting the interior building from the planet’s powerful sun.
Movement. One head—no, two. People walking casually into the depths of the building, gone as quickly as I noticed them.
I took a steady breath, wondering how I would manage to swipe a uniform without getting caught. Maybe I could—
An alarm blared through the air, its piercing screech deafening as I lost my train of thought.
“Godsdammit, that’s loud.” I gritted my teeth. “Siggy! I thought you said there weren’t any alarms on the roof! Did you miss one?”
“No, sir,” Sigmond responded through the comm in my ear. “The alarm is coming from inside the building itself. As far as my systems can tell, you have in no way triggered this.”
“What do you mean? Did someone manually activate it because they saw me coming, or is there some other, unrelated reason for it?”
“I am detecting movement within the building, toward the ground floor. Security is being dispatched.”
“This could be perfect. If security is distracted, then—”
“Apologies, sir, but they’re initializing scans of the entire building, and security is being dispatched to all levels. It would be unwise to venture into the factory at this point. I advise returning to the ship at your earliest possible convenience.”
“You don’t have to tell me twice.” I bolted back to the shuttle. “Open the hatch.”
It took a few seconds for the door to get low enough for me to scramble inside. “Lift off before anyone takes notice, and we’ll hide out for a bit to let the heat die down. We’ll run a check once we’re clear and see what the alarm was for. It’s probably nothing, but if the authorities show up, I’d rather not be here.”
“Agreed, sir.”
The ship rattled as the thrusters powered up, but it steadied to a smooth, familiar vibration once we’d cleared the roof.
“Sir, I am detecting someone exiting the west end of the building, not far from our location,” said Sigmond.
“Oh, great. More good news,” I muttered as I strapped myself into the pilot’s seat in case this got ugly. “Is security sweeping the area?”
“Negative, sir,” he replied. “My scans indicate a lone individual is running toward the lot where we were originally going to land.”
In that moment, it all made sense. The lone shuttle in an abandoned lot. The siren. I squeezed my eyes shut and shook my head in irritation.
We weren’t the only ones on this job.
“Damn it, Max,” I muttered.
It looked like my agent was more of an asshole than I’d originally given him credit for.
“Siggy, tell me, does this person have the box?”
“Yes, sir,” said Sigmond. “They appear to have the blue plastic box marked 0938.”
“Show me.”
The holo adjusted, the image blurring as it maneuvered around the building and strained the range on this relatively low-tech shuttle’s scanners. The thief wore a thin set of clothes with a hood just large enough that I couldn’t make out their face.
Someone had beaten me to the target. They were professional enough to snatch the box, but not quite good enough to do it undetected.
I cursed and smacked my hand on the dash, and the holo flickered. “No one said we’d have competition. How many people put a call out on that thing?”
“Unknown, sir. However, security guards are exiting the building. I recommend we leave the area.”
“Yeah, let’s get the hell out of here,” I said. We bolted through the sky away from the factory.
But not away from that damned thief.
I led the shuttle over toward another building nearby, careful to keep the factory in view as much as possible as we continued to track the thief’s path through the back alleys behind it.
Through the shuttle’s front window, I spotted four guards carrying military-issue rifles as they bolted through the factory’s side door and into the sun.
I scoffed. Military-issue weaponry at a toy company made me wonder how many times confidential toy designs walked off in the night, or if perhaps these toy makers weren’t so innocent after all.
Their bright blue uniforms practically glowed like beacons in the dirty alley around them. As they swept the alley, the hooded thief darted into a nearby building, and I lost my visual.
“Track that guy as best you can. Monitor all the exits,” I ordered. “That box is mine, one way or another.”
A glowing red blip appeared on the holo before me, pulsating as it slowly moved into the building. It flickered and disappeared. I tensed, waiting, but the dot reappeared a moment later.
“Keep on him, Siggy. If we lose sight of my box, we’re screwed.”
“Apologies, sir,” said the AI. “There’s some mild interference from a nearby satellite in the adjacent building. I’m attempting to filter it.”
“Good. Don’t lose that box, Siggy.”
“Perish the thought, sir.”
The dot glowed brighter a few seconds later. I leaned in closer to watch his movement. “Time to follow,” I said, taking the controls and increasing the throttle to gain more altitude. “Is he still heading toward that shuttle?”
“Affirmative, sir.”
“Okay, take the controls,” I ordered as I unbuckled myself from the pilot’s seat. “Fly us to the lot and open the hatch. Hover just low enough for me to jump.”
“Jump, sir?”
“You heard me.” I gripped the handhold by the door as the shuttle jostled into position and grabbed my pistol with my free hand. “Keep an eye on the thief and track his movement, as well as the security risk both on the ground and in the air. Stay within sight so he knows I’m not messing around here.”
“Very well, sir. If I may ask, what is it you are planning to do?”
“Get my box back. What else?”
The shuttle skated on the air, hovering just over the lot as Sigmond took us down. Dust billowed around us as we neared the ground, and a few loose pieces of trash darted past in the mini-gale caused by the shuttle’s exhaust.
On cue, the door slid open. Dust swirled in the air as we hovered roughly a meter above the ground, and I jumped. My boots hit the cracked street hard, and I signaled for Sigmond to take the shuttle higher.
“Keep an eye on that asshole,” I ordered, using the comm in my ear. “Let me know when he starts to get close. The alley behind this lot is the only way back to his ship.”<
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“The target has entered the far end of the alley and is heading your way, sir,” said Sigmond.
With my pistol drawn and loaded, I closed the distance between me and the small two-person shuttle, using their own ship as cover.
Time to earn a living.
“Target is twenty-eight meters away.”
A little closer. Come on.
“Target is twenty meters away.”
I stayed hidden behind their shuttle, my grip tightening on my pistol as I prepared to shoot if I had to. This guy didn’t need to see me until it was too late to run.
“Target has rounded the alley and entered the lot, sir. Four meters and closing.”
“He has the box?” I muttered into my comm.
“Yes, sir.”
I raised my pistol and stepped around the shuttle, my gun trained instantly on the bandit as I stepped between him and his ride out of here.
The thief came to a hard stop, his boots sliding along the asphalt as he clutched the bright blue box to his chest. It was easily twice the size of his head, and he struggled to keep it in place beneath his arm. His face was still shrouded by the hood, though his chin was visible from within the shadows.
“I think you have something that belongs to me,” I said, motioning to the box he clutched to his chest. “I don’t know who you are, and I don’t care. Hand it over, or I’ll put a bullet in you.”
The guy reached for a fancy-looking pistol in the holster on his thigh, and I fired a warning shot at the ground by his foot. He froze, his chest heaving as he panicked.
“I don’t miss twice, pal,” I warned. “Don’t be stupid, and do what I say. I’ve got no problem shooting someone who comes between me and my money.”
He tapped a device on his wrist, and as the light on the curved screen blipped to life, a red error light flashed across the surface.
“Oh, you weren’t trying to manually activate that shuttle, were you?” I asked, nodding to the dead-on-arrival ship Sigmond had hacked. “Because until you give me that box, your shuttle ain’t going nowhere.”
“Damn it,” he muttered, his voice light and high-pitched.
No, not he—she.
I grimaced, though I did my best to hide my disappointment.
Great. Just great. I didn’t love the idea of shooting a woman, but this little discovery didn’t change the fact that she stood in the way of a paycheck.
I would shoot her if I had to.
She tugged off the hood, and her long black hair spilled out over her shoulders. Her piercing blue eyes snared me, and as she held the box with one hand, she slowly lifted the other into the air in surrender.
“Look,” she said. “This doesn’t have to go south. You give me your information, and I’ll transfer some of the credits I earn on this job to you. Easy money.”
“You want me to just trust you to pay up?” I laughed. “That’s adorable.”
“I’ll do it, I swear,” she promised. “I’ll even give you my comms data. You can track me.”
“Pass.” I tapped my ear. “Siggy, how long until the guards arrive?”
“Security has begun sweeping to the north of the factory, in the opposite direction of our location,” replied Sigmond. “As many of the guards have remained in the building to lock down personnel, I believe we have fifteen minutes before anyone notices us here.”
“Listen up, lady,” I said, gesturing to the thief with my pistol. “Security will be here in less than two minutes.”
A lie, sure, but no one said a Renegade had to follow the rules. In fact, it went against our creed.
“As I see it, you’ve only got a couple choices,” I continued. “Option one, you set down the box. Option two, I shoot you in the knee and take it anyway. The guards are already looking for you, and when they find you, I don’t think they’re going to be friendly. Either way, it’s a bad deal for you, but one is definitely better than the other.”
“I’ll split it with you sixty-forty, then,” she countered, her lip twitching slightly as she stared at my gun.
I laughed. “You’ve got balls. Well, figuratively. You know what I mean.”
She smirked. “I have bills, too. Sixty-forty.”
“Nope.” I cocked the gun and glared her dead in the eye, daring her to do something stupid.
“You wouldn’t shoot a woman, would you?”
“Lady, you’ve got no idea what I’d do for a paycheck,” I told her.
Okay, so I wouldn’t kill her, but I’d certainly plant a bullet in her thigh if it meant knocking out this job and getting off this rock.
She frowned, her soft blue eyes narrowing as the wind blew through her black hair.
“You stay right where you are,” I ordered.
The thief stiffened, still clutching that box as she studied me intently. I took careful steps toward her, fully aware that every second I spent in this lot was a second closer to getting arrested.
I needed this to be over, and I needed her to behave.
As I reached her, I kept her gaze, hoping she wouldn’t try anything stupid. With my pistol trained on her, I reached for the gun in the holster on her thigh.
She wrinkled her nose in disgust. “What are you doing?”
“Just making sure you don’t shoot me in the back,” I promised as I grabbed the gun and slid it into my back pocket.
Lips pursed, she glared daggers at me, her free hand wisely still in the air.
With her gun in my possession, I slid my arm around the box in her other hand and tugged. At first, she held tight, her jaw tensing as she strained to hold it close to her chest.
She didn’t last long.
I yanked the prize from her hands, and she muttered obscenities under her breath as she watched me back away with the prize.
“Pleasure doing business with you,” I said, tilting my head toward her as I gave her a mocking little bow.
With both hands in the air, she just shook her head at me. “You’re an asshole.”
“Yeah, kinda.” I shrugged. “Siggy, bring the shuttle around.”
“At once, sir,” said the AI through the comm in my ear.
“You’re going to get your ass handed to you for this!” she shouted as the shuttle roared over a nearby building and lowered to the ground. “You don’t mess with a Renegade!”
“You’re not a very good Renegade,” I shouted back as the door to the shuttle slid open.
I slid the box into the main cabin and hopped inside, finally holstering my weapon as the door slid shut behind me.
“Shall I enable her shuttle, sir?” asked Sigmond.
“How long until security finds her?”
“Ten minutes, sir.”
“Set a five minute timer on it. I don’t want her following us.”
“Yes, sir.”
She raised a finger in the air as the ship rotated and she slipped out of sight.
“I see you have acquired the box,” said Sigmond. “Excellent work, sir.”
“We can thank our new friend for that.” I peered over my shoulder at the bright blue box resting by the exit. “All things considered, I’d say that went better than I expected.”
4
I was back on the Renegade Star and through the security cordon around Pratus in less than an hour, albeit a very tense one. I’d gotten enough of a lead that I knew the would-be Renegade I’d left alone in the lot wouldn’t have a chance in hell of tracing me.
With the box safely stored in a secret panel hidden in the cargo hold, I sat strapped in the pilot’s seat as I studied the star-studded holo and open space before me.
Home free.
“Where to, sir?” asked Sigmond.
“Take me to Max Ventrose’s place on Leoda,” I ordered. “What’s our fuel level?”
“Thirty percent. Your account has been nearly depleted due to our refueling here on Pratus.”
“That’s fine. We’ve got a decent payday waiting for us, Siggy.”
“Very good, sir. The
slip tunnel entrance is just ahead. Shall I open a rift?”
“Do it,” I ordered.
The black void split in front of us, and the buzzing green lightning of slipspace opened as the tear to the cosmic highway widened.
I braced myself in my seat. “Here goes.”
“Initiating slip,” said Sigmond.
The Renegade Star’s engines ignited, propelling us into the rift in space. As we entered, my stomach lurched, and the ship jostled around me. My grip on my armrest tightened as we dove into the electricity of the slip.
One wrong move in the tunnel, and a man’s ship could hit the edge—that meant instant death for all involved.
Having my atoms torn apart by emerald lightning wasn’t high on my list of life goals.
As we settled into the slip tunnel, the entrance closed behind us. Slipspace travel wasn’t instantaneous, but it was much faster than a regular cruise through the stars. Instead of taking centuries to reach a distant star, it might only be a few hours.
Though I would’ve loved to know how to make a tunnel of my own, each slipspace rift only allowed access to a pre-existing tunnel. These ones were more like rivers than highways—once inside, a ship could neither accelerate or decelerate.
We could only ride the current to the end.
Each tunnel would take us to a Slip Gap Point—or SG Point—that opened back out into space. These stretches between two tunnel entrances were normally filled with all sorts of life, but not always. Often the location of colonies and refueling stations, they served as the intergalactic road stops for those who used the slip tunnel network. While the busier SG Points were usually heavily policed, the less active locations remained somewhat dangerous due to frequent attacks and surprise raids.
And, out here in the Deadlands, there were far more raids than police.
The wall of the slip tunnel sparkled green and coursed with energy, though scientists didn’t completely understand why any of this occurred. All anyone knew for sure was that if any organic matter came into contact with the walls, the material would dissolve on an atomic level.
And, safely out of Pratus’s orbit, I had time to ruminate on the known universe’s worst Renegade.
“I don’t like it, Siggy,” I muttered.
