by Viki Storm
There’s never a shortage of desperate people willing to ignore common sense.
The fourth major colonization attempt, twenty years ago, someone brought a cat. Turns out, the feline (named Mutza, incidentally) was infected with a virus which causes no symptoms in cats. The virus jumped species and infected the extremophile bacteria, rendering it inert and allowing the settlers to build a thriving community.
For a little while.
They were still drinking the water that was now infected with virus-infected bacteria. It didn’t take long for the microbes to mutate and infect the people. Only this time, instead of violent gastrointestinal symptoms, the disease presented itself as mild fever and fatigue. At first. After anywhere from three to nine months, the infected person would drop dead.
This time, however, the scientists had a medicine that worked. A tasteless powder that mixed into the water. Drink it once a month and you lived. Don’t drink it? You were a ticking time bomb.
Needless to say, the corruption and black-market deals surrounding the powdered anti-virals are huge. A new industry opened up overnight: screwing over the people on Mutza's World.
That’s what Ason wants to move, a crate of antiviral premix powder, dropped on Mutza's World.
Knowing what I do about the people there—hosts to a tiny fragment of RNA that could decide to kill them at any moment, victims of pharmaceutical company collusion and price gouging, pawns of local black-market privateers—I can’t not go.
Ason has a contact with one of the medical supply warehouses and will often come across bits of ‘lost’ inventory. He passes it along to me, and I get it past customs agents on both planets and into the hands of the people who need it.
Except I was getting out, going clean. I’ve had too many close calls.
But I can’t turn this down. I can get the powder to the people who need it—and charge them a fair price for it. Not like the privateers who extort them for three or four times what the premix doses are worth.
I start cramming things back into boxes, back into drawers and cabinets.
I hightail it over to the usual meeting spot and let Ason and his little gal-pal or whatever she is load the crate into my ship. Ason’s a human, but his girlfriend or wife is a Fotte, a race from a distant non-Federation planet. Her planet is hot, dry, bereft of manufacturing or natural resources. Mostly the Fottes scrounge twigs and berries from the landscape and, if they’re lucky, spear the occasional booloo or usic. Her skin is dark green and covered in thick keratinized scales. She’s hitched her wagon to Ason, presumably for a chance at a better life, but whenever I see her, I can’t help feeling sorry for her. She’s living on a mostly human planet, can speak our language but can’t read or write it, and her culture is so primitive and simple compared to ours that she’s entirely dependent on Ason for everything. I don’t even know if she’s aware that what we’re doing right now is illegal. She’s exchanging her body, her household services, cooking and cleaning and whatever else, for financial security.
“That’s it?” I ask when Ason and his wife finish after only one mid-sized crate.
“That’s it,” he confirms. “My guy could only get one box of the stuff, but no job too small, am I right?”
It’s not worth it, this small of a load. If I’m going to be falsifying customs documents and executing an illegal landing when I get to Mutza's World, then a bigger load should really make it worth the trouble. It’s like powering up a factory so it can make one pencil.
Then I think of the people there who’ll get their doses and live. Would they say that this small of a shipment wasn’t worth it?
Of course not. And it’s them that I fly for, not the money. It’s never about the money, and now is no exception.
If I’m being honest with myself, it’s not even really for the people, not from the goodness of my heart.
It’s selfish. I’ve done a lot in my life that I’ve got to atone for, and I do it one smuggled shipment at a time. The box of antiviral powder? It’s the least I can do.
“You know the drill,” Ason says to me.
“Yeah,” I say. “I’ve done the Mutza run a few times. Land on the south end, by the lake, meet up with Hal. Get the coins. Count the coins. Weigh them just to be sure because he’s a stingy motherfucker. Then get the fuck out.”
“You’ve got a beautiful way with words,” Ason says.
“I try,” I say. His wife is looking down, as usual. Again I wonder what it’s gotta be like to leave everything you’ve ever known for a man. Could she actually love him? I assume that their relationship is transactional-bordering-on-prostitution, but it’s possible that there is fondness. Ason is a thief and a lowlife, but I’m not sure he’s evil or anything.
Ason lingers for a moment, his lips parted just a fraction, as if he’s debating whether or not to say anything. His wife is worrying a bent scale on the palm of her hand. I’m getting a little creeped out. A tingle starts at the tip of my head and spreads out all the way to my shoulders. I have to repress the urge to wiggle and flail my arms.
“Listen,” Ason says. “This is stupid. Really stupid. Never mind.” His wife kicks him—actually kicks him. He scrunches his nose and bares his teeth at her, but she doesn’t flinch. She says something in her native tongue, but I can’t understand it. He says something back to her and she kicks him again. I can’t stop the little dry laugh that bursts out my nostrils. Maybe I had their relationship completely wrong.
“What?” I ask.
“She had a dream,” he says. “She made me promise to tell you. She says she had a premonition that the box would explode and you would be engulfed in flames.”
“Not a dream,” she says. Her voice is scratchy, almost robotic. “I saw it in the flames. The flames will tell their future—and their future is you.”
I’m officially wigged out.
“Thank you for telling me,” I say, knowing that I’m still going to go. “One time I had a premonition about a job,” I tell her.
She looks at me, waiting for me to continue.
“I was flying, and I knew someone was coming. I could feel it. I knew that someone was going to come and either arrest me or kill me for the cargo I was carrying. My hands itched. I couldn’t shake the feeling. So I ditched the cargo out the airlock. The second I did, it was a huge relief. The feeling stopped immediately. And you know what happened after that?”
“What?” she whispers.
“Absolutely nothing,” I say. “No Federation pilots, no pirates, no warlords. Nothing. I ditched twenty thousand worth of product because I had the heebeejeebies.”
“Propitiation,” she says. “The gods were vengeful, but you dropped your shipment. You gave them an offering. They were satisfied. That’s why no Federation or pirates came.”
That’s an idea I had not considered. And it’s making me think of her little prophecy in a different light. The flames will tell their future—and their future is you.
Then let it be fate or the gods or whatever, I think.
“I gotta go,” I say. Ason’s wife shoots out her hand and grabs my wrist. Her grip is cool and dry. Her yellow eyes lock with mine.
“Do not do this,” she says. “Ason will find another, won’t you?”
“Yeah,” he says. “You can back out, no hard feelings. I got a couple other people I can call.”
“It’s fine,” I say. I’m not going to be swayed by the ravings of one lone Fotte.
“Alright then, best of luck,” he says. I feel something inside my hand. His wife has crammed something small into my fist.
“Wear it,” she says. “Promise.”
“I promise,” I say. I look at it. It’s a small leather satchel. I try to open the little flap, but it’s tacked closed with a single stitch.
“Do not open,” she says.
“Okay,” I say and slip the cord over my neck. “I can use all the luck I can get.”
“No luck,” she says. “You’re dealing with the gods, and they
don’t believe in luck. Only sacrifice and pain.”
That’s a cheery thought to leave on, so I nod and turn back to my ship.
I bluff my way past the customs officials as I depart. They don’t usually check a small ship like mine. They’re less worried about things leaving than things coming in.
Mutza’s World is only half a day’s flight. I don’t even have to travel out of the galaxy.
I’m an hour into my journey when my instrument panel starts beeping. I can’t say I’m surprised, not after what Ason’s wife said. One of my engines is running too hot and shuts down. Which wouldn’t be a problem, except something is wrong with the number two, and it’s making a high-pitched grinding noise that I can hear all the way in the cockpit.
I try to enable safe-mode, coming out of supra-light speed and disabling all superfluous systems, but I’m locked out of the interface.
The smoke starts pouring into the cockpit, coming in from one of the vents in the corridor.
I think of Ason’s wife’s words. My future is in the flame.
Well fuck. Then so be it. Maybe this was my fate all this time. Maybe all these years I’ve just been flying fast and flying stealth trying to outrun the flames.
And now they’ve got me.
Payback for the life of a coward, the life of a criminal. The life of a killer.
As my ship descends and the G-force threatens to pull my stomach out of my mouth, I grip the leather satchel around my neck, and one thought compulsively throbs in my head like the sick beat of a wardrum.
My future is the flame. My future is now.
Chapter 3
Auvok
Before my client left, he gave me a little more information about the jewel. I tried to tell him I don’t need the information, but I remembered what Glox said: no useless knowledge, only useless people.
The jewel is ancient; the carbon dating puts it at a billion orbits old, though when it was cut, no one knows. It’s made from bixbite, rich in manganese that gives it a deep red color. Despite its age, it’s been cut with expert precision into a classical round cut with more than fifty facets to make it sparkle.
“Auvok.” It’s Taxuu. He’s got that fussbudget look in his eyes, and his chromatophores are emitting low green pulses—anxiety.
“I’m leaving,” I say. “I already accepted the job. You’re not talking me out of it.”
“I know,” he says. “Be careful. I’ll research this jewel and keep you updated. But it sounds like it could be associated with the Seven Rent Souls.” If I wasn’t already exhausted from dealing with Glox and my poor ship, I’d have it out with Taxuu right now—and I think he knows it.
“I’ll be careful,” I say. “But it’s not the Seven.”
“You have no way of knowing that,” Taxuu says.
“You think everything is the Seven, but the truth is we haven’t confirmed any of their activity in ten orbits, since our one and only confrontation with them.” I expect him to argue, but he doesn’t.
“Jewels are powerful things,” he says. “They’ve always been important to ancient cultures.”
“Yeah because they’re expensive,” Yev says. Yev’s got a small bottle of something in his hands—either a poison or an antidote, if I had to guess.
“They’re only expensive because of the value a society puts on them,” Taxuu says. “And ancient cultures are purported to have many jewels of power—both good and evil.”
“Ancient cultures thought that the Universe revolved around the planet Earth,” I say. “Ancient cultures thought disease was spread by evil spirits. I’m not putting too much stock in their superstitions.”
“Most superstitions have a grain of truth in them,” Taxuu says. “Just be careful. I have a bad feeling about this.”
“You’ve got a bad feeling about everything,” Yev says. “It’s because you picked this damned planet for our headquarters. It’s got you jumpy.”
Planet Viltra is where the Seven are said to have given their souls to the Imperator Ingoull, Master of the Void. With his Dark Alchemy, he replaced their souls with cybernetic implants, stripping them of their humanity. Unable to feel happiness or sorrow or compassion, the Seven became perfect lackeys for Ingoull to control. Allegedly.
“I want to be able to keep an eye on things,” Taxuu says.
“I’m with you, Auvok,” Yev says. “The Seven are gone.”
“I’ll still be careful,” I promise. Taxuu scowls.
“You’re never careful,” he says.
I set out, cringing as I board my disfigured Vulp, figuring I’ll check in with a few of my well-known lowlifes to see if they’ve heard anything about a big score. It’s as good of a place to start as any.
I’m cruising through the Sporo galaxy, trying to dodge meteors. They’re not particularly virulent, but this is definitely not a place you can fly on autopilot. It’s not like traveling through the Void, where you can engage supra-light and go take a nap. I’ve already sent comms to people on Gaime, where I’ll check first. It’s not a Federation planet and as a result sees a lot of traffic in stolen goods.
I’m almost lulled into a trance by the meteors, but out of nowhere screams a fiery ball, hauling ass at terminal velocity. I check my nav chart and see that it’s getting pulled into a nearby planet’s gravity. If I’d seen it out of the corner of my eye, I’d have thought it was a comet. But I was watching all the debris carefully, and this is no comet.
It’s a ship.
I wish I hadn’t been looking, wish I had just seen it out of the corner of my eye and taken it to be a comet. Now that I know what it is—a ship in distress—I have to change course and go in after it.
It’s going to cost me a lot of time and energy—and in my line of work, those two things translate to money. A shipwreck is a huge diversion, probably going to cost me an entire rota and half of tomorrow.
But I can’t unsee it, can’t not help.
Warrior training is hard to ignore. They pluck you from your home, from your family, then they strip you of your name, your possessions, your hometown and work you into an ideal warrior, training and drilling and beating you until you’re no longer you. You’re a named warrior of Virix. Who were you before? You can’t even remember.
One of the central tenets is to help those who can’t help themselves. Defend the defenseless. We train so that we can be the strong arm to lift up those who can’t lift up themselves.
That’s all well and good, except I’m not a warrior anymore.
I reroute my ship and push it as fast as it will go, hoping to catch up with the distressed ship. I think of what Glox said, about upgrading my panels so that they will not burn up during reentry. I can’t help a little chuckle. Maybe I owe that bastard an apology.
When the other ship crashes, I can’t repress a shudder. It’s a small ship, and hopefully it’s been outfitted with anti-impact protections. Lots of people skimp on anti-impact measures, though.
I set down a safe distance from the ship, knowing full well that there’s no such thing as a safe distance if that thing decides to explode. I circle the ship and am surprised to see one of the emergency hatches wide open. I follow the trail of displaced rocks down into a small canyon. A small figure sits upright, massaging her—her?—ankle. Yes, even from this distance, I can see the swell of a sizeable bosom silhouetted against a sun-bleached boulder.
I call out to her, but she does not hear me. Probably wearing earpieces and trying to comm for help. A lone female flying in this galaxy? That’s quite dangerous. Federation ships patrol this area for pirates but not aggressively because most of these planets aren’t under Federation control.
A second figure appears, stepping out from behind her boulder. So she’s not alone; that’s good. Although a part of me is disappointed that she’s accompanied. I wanted to find a nice little prize—shipwreck booty.
Then I see just how wrong I am. In an instant, the new figure pulls a hand-weapon, either a blaster or raygun, and points it at
the female’s head. She deftly rolls, and the beam (it was a raygun) hits the boulder, sending dust and pebbles flying. I sprint all-out, as fast as I can—which is fast. I might not be a named warrior anymore, but I’ve never abandoned my training rituals.
I reach into my back sling, and like the welcome caress of a lover, Fear Shard slides into my hand. I grip the haft and pull it free. I aim it at the scoundrel, knowing my aim is true, having practiced this exact movement billions of times until my muscles act on their own. It’s loaded with three crystalline fragments, but I know I’ll only need one. It’s been loaded with the same three pieces of crystalline since it came into my possession—I’ve only ever needed to fire the first.
I deploy the firing pin, and it shoots silently, sending the crystalline shard over the rocky terrain and into the foe’s neck. He staggers, taking three halting, jerky steps, before falling over.
The female is looking around, confused, until she sees me.
Then she’s terrified.
I don’t blame her—a Virixian warrior, full of bloodlust and the singular joy that comes only from the sport of combat.
As I approach, it’s clear that she’s human. Her buxom curves fight against nature inside the oppressively tight spacesuit. Her dark hair is wild, a huge swath of it burned to the scalp from the crash. Instead of making her look gruesome, she looks fierce, wild—exquisite beauty forged in the flames.
That spacesuit needs to be in pieces on the rocky ground, that tangle of hair needs to be balled up in my fist. That soft, ripe body needs to be on the ground, too, underneath me, hot and wet and yielding.
I don’t even bother trying to clear my head. It’s the thrill of battle—it does weird things to a male. Conquering a foe always leaves a hot-blooded warrior in dire need of a female.
“Female,” I bark as soon as I’m close to her. “Are there any more?”
“Of survivors, or of him?” she says. I expect her voice to quaver or, worse, to come out as an unintelligible sob. Instead, she speaks to me with an air of command. My cock stirs, for the only thing better than the thrill of conquest and vanquishing an enemy is the thrill of conquest and taking a female.
