Avi hissed.
“I’ll take two glazed,” Rajiz said to Avi before responding to Betty.
Five minutes later, the pair was approaching the rendezvous, a four-story automated carpark, with a bag of donuts and a tray of coffees. As annoyed as Rajiz was with Avi and her never-ending need for carbs and caffeine, he had to admit that the stop would allay any suspicion, should the Niets review surveillance when the theft was noticed—if it ever was.
As they approached the building, Avi glanced his way. “Admit it, Captain, these are good donuts.”
He looked down at the half-eaten glazed in his hand. “OK…yeah, they’re not bad.”
“Not bad? It’s like heaven in a little circle.”
Rajiz only laughed in response as he passed a command to the carpark to have their vehicle brought down to the ground level.
Betty’s tone carried a heavy dose of concern, and Rajiz tensed, his gaze sweeping across the intersection, noting two groundcars, one aircar, and four pedestrians all alone.
Betty replied.
The captain turned and saw Betty come into view, her large frame and loping stride giving her away—something that was unavoidable with her four legs.
Other ship captains regularly questioned his sanity for bringing a literal centaur on as crew. As often as not, he questioned his own sanity right along with them. But when push came to shove, no one kicked ass in a fight like Betty.
The horse part of her body was a combination of cybernetic and organic—mostly machine underneath and skin on top, though a second set of organs operated inside to keep blood clean and flowing through her hide.
From the waist up, she appeared to be a normal woman…if you didn’t count the mane that grew down her back. She rarely wore clothing of any sort, though on Chad, modesty laws demanded that she cover her breasts, which she did with cups that magnetically attached to mount points on her chest.
If he were honest with himself, the fact that she was both majestic and beautiful fed into Rajiz’s decision to hire her—even if it did cost a fortune to buy the specialized armor and EV gear she required.
A sling hung across her back, and he could see the case’s profile inside as it bounced against her flank. The captain breathed a sigh of relief, knowing that if he could get it to the buyer, he’d be flush with food and fuel for the foreseeable future.
The roofless groundcar with a wide open bed in the back settled down next to Avi, and she got in the driver’s seat.
“Slide over,” he directed, and she shook her head.
“You shoot better than you drive, Captain.”
He jumped into the back and then slid into the front passenger seat. “I don’t know about that, but I sure shoot better than you do.”
“Guns are under the seat.” Avi activated manual driving mode and pulled out onto the street, driving at a leisurely pace toward Betty.
Betty replied.
The centaur was twenty meters away from the car, and as the vehicle approached, she reached into the pouch on her back and grabbed the case, casually tossing it into the back of the groundcar as it passed.
A second after it landed in the vehicle’s bed, two large men rounded the corner.
“She needs to work on her definition of ‘kinda small’,” Avi muttered. “Their biceps are the size of my waist.”
Rajiz shrugged. “When you’re three meters tall, you tend to see things differently.”
“I suppose,” Avi muttered as she drove past the two men tailing Betty. “The real question is why I haven’t mentally adjusted to how she describes people yet.”
“Yeah, she’s been crew for three years now. More than enough ti—”
One of the two thugs following Betty glanced at the back of the groundcar as they passed, and his eyes widened as he spotted the case.
“Hey!” he shouted. “Stop!”
“Your mom!” Avi yelled back and punched the accelerator.
“ ‘Your mom’?” Rajiz asked as he lifted his rifle, training it on the two men as the car sped away.
One of the thugs pulled a pistol from inside his jacket, and Rajiz fired a pulse blast, the concussive wave only causing the man to stagger slightly.
That’s all the delay they needed.
A second later, a voice screamed “Yeeehaw!” and Betty smashed into the thug, a hind hoof flashing out and catching the other in the gut as she ran past.
“Suckers!” she added while galloping toward the groundcar.
One of the men was back on his feet in a second, but Betty pulled a pair of pistols from her pouch and opened fire on him, a focused pulse blast driving the thug to his knees.
Then the groundcar rounded the corner, and he lost sight of the thugs and Betty.
“Slow down.” He waved a hand at Avi.
“She can run almost as fast as this thing’s top speed,” the first mate replied, maintaining her pace.
Sure enough, a second later, Betty rounded the corner, half twisted with both guns firing, a gleeful laugh filling the air.
“Oh hell yeah!”
“Just get in the car already,” Rajiz said, but the centaur shook her head.
“No way!” She galloped closer and tossed her two pistols into the car’s bed, and pulled a rifle from her pouch, opening fire on the corner just as the two men came around it.
The weapon spewed small pellets that dissolved in the air while flying toward their target, turning into viscous balls of liquid. They were non-lethal, but hit with enough force to leave serious welts.
One of the men went down, and the other ducked back around the corner.
“Shoot, I think I hit him in the eye,” Betty said as she drew even with the car.
“Now will you get in?” he demanded.
“Fiiiiiine.” With surprising grace for someone her size, the centaur hopped into the back of the vehicle and crouched down as best she could.
“Why are they chasing you?” Avi asked as they turned onto another street, this one busier, allowing them to blend in with traffic.
“Other than the fact that we used their truck to mule something for us, or maybe it’s that they probably didn’t even know that and think we stole from them?” Betty asked.
Gero chimed in.
Rajiz asked.
Betty said.
Avi muttered.
Gero replied.
Rajiz shared a look with Avi, and she picked up the pace, moving onto an expressway that led to the spaceport’s main entrance. For all the usefulness of having Betty on the crew, she was easy to ID and not at all hard to track back to the ViperTalon.
Betty said, referring to the crate she’d occupied, which had been delivered to a warehouse near the rendezvous the day before.
Avi countered.
Rajiz considered the contingency plans he’d put together. One involved getting Betty to a waiting shipping container, another involved getting t
he whole team to shipping containers, and the third involved just driving right up to the ship and flying off.
Granted, that was the plan for when the people chasing them were not part of one of the most powerful crime rings on Chad.
“Just had to be the PLI,” he muttered.
“Should have gone with my seduction plan,” Avi said. “It’s not failed us yet.”
“Maybe I should have,” the captain said, glancing back at the case that sat next to Betty. “Live and learn.”
The first mate banked onto an off-ramp and then took the first exit on the next road, skirting the passenger terminals, and angling toward the long rows of commercial cradles.
The rows of ships went on for three kilometers, and the group was halfway to theirs when a message hit Rajiz’s Link. He didn’t recognize the person reaching out, and considered ignoring it, but the message was tagged urgent by the spaceport’s routing system, so he grudgingly accepted.
the voice said.
The message came with no ident, not even a pseudonym accompanying it. A knot began to form in the captain’s stomach.
he said.
“Fuck,” he muttered.
“What is it?” Avi asked.
“PLI connected the dots. Probably going to have to pay them off.”
“With what?” she gave him a worried glance.
“I’ll think of something.” He drew in a steadying breath and released it slowly before replying.
the voice on the other end of the Link said.
Rajiz resisted letting out a long groan.
Rajiz’s sarcastic tone seemed to catch the gangster by surprise.
The words crossed the Link, and a leaden silence followed.
the voice muttered.
Rajiz couldn’t help but laugh, both aloud and over the Link.
the Talon’s captain muttered.
The connection dropped, and Rajiz slumped in his seat.
“That bad?” Avi asked.
“That bad.” He nodded. “Our new employers are going to send someone to meet with us in a bit.”
“Our what?” Betty’s head was suddenly in the front row. “What just happened?”
“The PLI has…hired us,” Rajiz replied. “Don’t worry. They clearly want our ship for something, so we just have to smile and nod, and then get the hell out of Burroughs as soon as we can.”
Avi snorted. “Run away. I like it, that’s more our style.”
“It’s not—” Rajiz began to protest, but both Avi and Betty fixed him with cold stares. “OK…maybe it is, but it keeps us alive.”
“Hey, not complaining,” Avi said. “I like being alive. Just calling a spade a spade.”
SCOURING
STELLAR DATE: 06.03.8950 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: GMS Pinnacle, Babylon
REGION: Genevia System, New Genevian Alliance
“We keep searching till we’re certain,” Rika ordered. “I’m not going to be the one that loses a stasis shield system and screws the war for the Alliance.”
“Stars, Rika, the Lance’s generators are probably on their way to Babylon’s core by now,” Heather muttered. “Along with the rest of my girl.”
Rika gave the captain a sympathetic look. The Lance had been her flagship for nearly two years, a symbol of Marauder strength to see Genevians flying a new—and rather powerful—Nietzschean warship, snatched away from the enemy in the Hercules System.
“I feel it too,” the magnus said. “She was home. The best home we’ve ever had.”
Niki chimed in, laughing softly.
“What do you mean by that?” Rika asked.
Rika groaned and glanced at Heather, whose eyes were misty.
“I never thought I’d captain a ship like that.” The other woman’s voice was barely audible. “Being a mech…it…well, you know.”
“And now look at you.” Rika placed a hand on her friend’s shoulder. “You went from a top-of-the line Nietzschean dreadnought to now captaining their most powerful superweapon-ship.”
“Bigger isn’t always better. This thing handles like a garbage scow, which makes sense since we’re lugging a black hole around.”
Rika snorted. “The Lance wasn’t a ballerina, either, you know.”
“Not even a day gone, and you’re besmirching my precious Fury Lance!” Heather exclaimed in mock anger—at least, Rika thought the statement was meant to be humorous.
“I’ll never besmirch the Lance. Trust me. I’m mourning both it, and all the gear we left behind.”
“The ISF is going to be pissed. They just got us that QuanComm blade. We’re cut off again.”
A sigh slipped past Rika’s lips. “Story of my life. At least Tangel is OK. I didn’t get all the details from Carson before he had to leave, but he said she’s alive, and that her internal QC was taken out by something or another that he didn’t fully understand himself.”
“Well, OK, so long as New Canaan isn’t destroyed,” Heather said. “Who would attack the ISF’s home system? I heard that their government had re-authorized the use of picobombs.”
Niki said.
“I hope we find out soon,” Rika replied. “Having Carson’s fleet back will solve about a thousand different problems.”
“You know we can’t count on that happening,” Heather replied. “We have to assume the worst.”
Rika shook her head, brow lowered. “No, that’s not how I operate. I’ll prepare for the worst, but I’m going to believe in the best until I see otherwise.”
“Ma’am,” Chief Ona looked up from her console. “I think we have it! There’s a section of the Lance in orbit a hundred klicks below us. If the decks within aren’t mashed up, it’ll have one of the stasis generators inside.”
“Good work, Chief,” Heather said. “Coordinate with Bondo, and get drones down there to see if we can pull it out.”
Rika smiled at the captain. “See? One down, two to go. We’ll get them installed in the Pinnacle, and be on our way.”
“About that…” Heather said. “How do you feel about renaming this ship? ‘Pinnacle’ is so…pretentious.”
“And ‘Fury Lance’ wasn’t? Niets are always a bit snooty with their ship names.”
“Again with besmirching my precious Lance. We kept the name because it was badass.”
“And we were ki
nda busy,” Rika added. “Fighting off a bajillion Niets around Pyra, if I recall.”
Heather nodded. “Sure, yeah. So, since there aren’t bajillion Niets to fight off right now, what do you think of naming this ship the… Death Spear?”
“Stars, Heather, no. That’s a terrible name.”
“Starkiller?”
“Nuh uh.”
“Perilous Strike?”
“Not terrible, but still no.”
A grin formed on Heather’s lips and she thrust a finger in the air. “The Even More Furious Lance!”
Niki groaned.
“Lance of the Marauders?”
“Hmmmm.” Rika tapped her chin. “That’s got some promise. What about the Marauders’ Lance?”
A grin split Heather’s lips. “I knew you’d come around.”
“You gave me those shitty options at first so we could land here, didn’t you?” Rika asked.
“Again with the besmirching!” Heather proclaimed.
“You need a new word.”
NEW EMPLOYER
STELLAR DATE: 06.03.8950 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: Corinth City Spaceport, Chad
REGION: Burroughs System, Old Genevia, Nietzschean Empire
The groundcar was stowed in the aft hold, and the crew had taken up positions in the corridor that ran along the starboard side of the ship, one deck above the keel.
Rajiz stood at the mid-ship starboard airlock, where a long ramp curved to the walkway below. A walkway being traversed by two hulking thugs and a slender woman.
Betty asked.
Avi snorted.
Gero commented.
the captain replied.
Betty sent a smirk over the shipnet.
The woman certainly was attractive, but she wasn’t Rajiz’s type, so resisting her charms—should she choose to use them—wouldn’t be problematic.
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