by Sara King
Jersey had gone back to scanning the canopy, visibly agitated. He started chopping at the foliage ahead of them with his machete again, not really looking where he was going.
Magali was watching Jersey’s blade carve through the brush, then saw a human face revealed by the shrubbery as it parted under his swing.
“Jersey, stop!” she screamed.
Jersey froze and brandished the machete between him and the man hanging in the undergrowth, almost like a terrified fencer. When he saw it wasn’t a cat, he let out a nervous laugh that was only semi-coherent.
But Magali had recognized the badly-bruised body slung in the vines and she gasped. “Jersey, that’s Runaway Joel!”
Jersey slipped the machete back into its sheath on his belt and, taking what was obviously a stabilizing breath, took a couple quick steps forward. “He’s still alive,” he said, before he’d even touched him. “But damn, someone beat the shit outta his face.” He began snapping the vines that held the smuggler in place between filigreed thumb and forefinger, then lowered the smuggler gently to the ground. “Sweet Aanaho, look at this…” He tugged on Runaway Joel’s sleeve, revealing a dark bluish crust. Leaning down, he sniffed it. Immediately, he reeled backwards, frowning warily. “He’s covered in dried Yolk.”
Magali felt her heart hardening. “He left me to die and went back to smuggling.” Up ahead, Magali started to hear cursing emanating from the jungle somewhere ahead of them.
“Maybe.” But Jersey was frowning at the jungle again. “A woman’s calling his name,” Jersey said. “Sounds pissed.”
“I hear it.”
Jersey frowned at her. “You do? It’s a long way out…”
Magali shrugged.
Still looking surprised, Jersey lifted the lanky smuggler from the ground and hefted him over a shoulder as if he were picking up a sheaf of wheat. “Come on. Let’s go find out why they went down. Keep a gun handy, just in case.”
“Always,” Magali said, without even thinking. It made Jersey pause and look at her, but she didn’t take back her words. She didn’t plan to be around strangers without a gun ever again, eighty dead coalers or no.
Jersey led the way, hacking more vines as he led them over the rocky terrain towards the crash site. Runaway Joel remained unconscious, his long form dangling from the Nephyr’s shoulder like a limp doll.
A few minutes later, the battered remnants of a very nice ship came into view leaning on its side against an ancient blackwood tree. Magali gasped, however, when she saw the avalanche of Shrieker nodule sacks pouring out the back cargo bay. Jersey saw it too, and slowed warily.
“Saw you guys crashed!” Jersey called to the ship. “You already call a tow?”
“Bugger off!” a woman shouted back at them. “Joel and I’ve got this.”
“Joel’s unconscious!” Jersey said, hefting the man on his shoulder. “Found him in the jungle.”
“Who the hell are you?” Jeanne Ivory’s voice demanded.
“Jersey Brackett,” Jersey called. He was frowning. “Who the hell are you?”
“Jeanne Ivory,” Jeanne said.
“It’s Jeanne,” Magali cried happily. She started moving towards the ship.
Jersey’s glass-hard arm shot out to bar her passage. “There’s nobody on that ship,” he said.
Magali froze. “What?”
“There’s no life-signs,” Jersey insisted. “I’d hear her heartbeat or see a heat signature. So unless she’s walking around in a heat-proof, sound-proof box, that’s not Jeanne Ivory.”
“Maybe the ship’s blocking it,” Magali replied. “She is a smuggler and it sounds like her.”
Jersey kept his arm where it was. “Hey Jeanne?” Jersey called. “How about you come out where we can see you?”
“Aanaho Ineriho, fine!”
Jersey and Magali waited. Nothing happened. After several minutes, Jersey called, “You gonna come out where we can see you, Jeanne? That’s an awful lot of Shrieker nodules you guys were carrying. You’re not planning on trying to shoot us, are you?”
“Shoot you?” Jeanne scoffed. “I’m standing outside the cargo bay waiting for you, and I’m carrying a goddamn wrench, you South-Tear knucker. How about you come where I can see you!”
Jersey frowned at the ship, then down at Magali. “The more she talks, the more it sounds like it’s coming from that back intercom.” He glanced at the front of the ship. “But there’s nobody at the helm.”
“Well, come on!” the intercom called. “I was busy fixing my damn electrical system.”
“I think she plans to shoot us,” Jersey said. “We just need to figure out where she’s hiding.” He turned to glance at the jungle around them.
Magali stepped past him. “Hey Jeanne?” she called. “It’s me, Magali Landborn. We’re not here to steal your Yolk, okay? Just come out where we can see you.”
“I’m about to get really pissed off and start shooting things,” Jeanne snarled. “I’m on the goddamn ramp. Are you blind?”
Magali and Jersey looked at each other. Neither had to mention the fact that there was nobody standing on the ramp. Jersey tucked the unconscious smuggler in between the massive roots of a honeytree root system and pulled a gun, a look of total concentration on his face.
“What is it?” Magali whispered.
“Shh,” Jersey said. “Possibly a Gryphon. Something programmed to use her voice. No heartbeat. Wouldn’t need to breathe.”
“Why aren’t you dumbshits coming out where I can see you?” Jeanne demanded. “I already said I wouldn’t shoot your sorry asses.”
“Don’t move,” Jersey whispered softly. “We’re obviously not within range of his shot, and if he moves, I’ll hear him.”
Magali swallowed, fingers whitening on her guns.
There was a long silence, then a tentative, “Guys?”
Since they were standing well within sight of the open cargo bay, her words—so perfect, so Jeanne—made the tiny hairs all the way up and down Magali’s body stand on end. She actually felt herself huddling against the Nephyr’s glassy body for support.
Seconds ticked by. Then minutes. Eventually, they heard a huge sigh from the entrance to the cargo bay. A few minutes later, the engines on the ship hummed and sputtered, then hummed again, then there was an electrical crackle and it chugged out. Even from where she was standing, Magali could hear what sounded like Jeanne’s voice cursing loudly, somewhere deeper on the ship.
Jersey frowned. “Nothing is moving in there. Like…nothing. It’s dead silent.”
“---fucking cunt, you do what I say, bitch or I’m going to feed you to a garbage compactor one pathetic ounce of titanium at a time!”
“Jeanne sounds pretty pissed,” Magali noted. “I don’t think a robot could fake that.”
“You’d be surprised,” Jersey said, but he was scowling at the ship. “Jeanne?” he called again.
“WHAT?!” she roared back from the belly of the ship.
“Uh,” Jersey said, “seriously, can you come out where we can see you?”
An instant later, the back intercom shouted, “I did come out where you could see me, and you guys hid in the bushes like little panty-waist coaler twats. What, you want me to beg?”
Jersey cocked his head, then started walking in a semi-circle around the ship, getting a better view of the cargo bay.
“There you are,” Jeanne snapped at them. “What the fuck took you so long? Grab a goddamn wrench and get to work. I’m busy working the kinks out of the—” Jeanne’s voice cut off suddenly. “Magali, that’s a fucking Nephyr.”
“Yeah,” Magali said. “He’s actually not so—”
The rear guns on the ship fired at them, plowing a furrow of armor-piercing shells into the forest at their feet.
In a motion almost too fast to see, Jersey grabbed Magali, yanked her from the ground, and ran. They were a good fifty feet into the forest before the guns stopped firing.
“And stay back, you filthy pig-fuc
king cyborg!” Jeanne screamed. “Magali, sweetie, you okay, girl?”
Magali stumbled as Jersey, who was frowning at the ship through the foliage behind them, set her back on her feet. “Am I okay?!” she shrieked. “You just tried to put ship-grade armor-piercing rounds through my chest.”
“I was aiming for the cyborg,” Jeanne said, sounding almost apologetic. “My sights must’ve gotten damaged in the crash, aim was a little off.”
“He’s with me!” Magali cried. “He switched sides! I took out his lifeline three days ago!”
There was a really long pause from the ship. Then, “You’re sure about that? Those crazy bastards like to play mind-games.”
“Speaking of mind-games,” Jersey shouted back, “what the hell kind of games are you playing with us, Jeanne? I can hear that there’s nobody on that ship.”
Jeanne snorted. “What are you talking about? I’m standing right here.”
Magali frowned. “Jeanne, if you’re standing by the back cargo bay, how did you shoot at us with the ship?”
There was a prolonged silence. Then, “You’re really starting to creep me out. I used my pistol. This ship can’t fire without someone at the helm.”
“Yes, we know that,” Magali snapped. “But you just—”
Jersey stopped her with a solid hand on her shoulder. “Look at the ship,” he said, gesturing.
All over its body, every light it had was flickering on and off in weird, almost intelligent synchronicity.
Magali got a creepy-crawly sensation as she watched that. “Malfunctioning computer?” she whispered.
“Looks like,” Jersey said. “Weird.” He raised his voice. “Hey, uh, Jeanne? You didn’t try to shoot your ‘pistol’ at Joel, too, did you?”
“No,” Jeanne snapped. “Though I should have.”
Magali squinted. “You got an AI on your ship, Jeanne?”
The ship’s lights all stopped flickering. “No, I don’t have a goddamn AI—too expensive. Now is somebody going to help me fix this hunk of scrap or am I going to have to put it all back together on my own?”
“Hey Jeanne,” Magali said, “we’ll help. Just don’t shoot, okay?”
“Thank you,” Jeanne snapped. “Finally, somebody willing to pick up a wrench. You! Brackett-boy. You know anything about ailerons?”
Jersey reluctantly straightened out of his crouch. “A little. Coalition taught me to fly.”
“Good!” Jeanne snapped. “Get over here. I think the right wing could use a little work. Planetside ailerons aren’t responding, and the retractors seem to be jammed.”
Seeing how the right wing was torn off the ship, Jersey glanced over at Magali with a raised glittering eyebrow.
“Let’s go deactivate the computer,” Magali whispered.
“Joel already did that,” Jeanne replied. “Didn’t help. Everything in here’s going haywire. Think it might be the Yolk, but I’m not sure.”
Jersey and Magali glanced at each other. It didn’t need to be said that Magali hadn’t spoken louder than a whisper, and only a robot could have possibly heard it. Jersey’s eyes narrowed.
Magali touched his arm. “All right, Jeanne. How about Jersey and I come onboard and take a look around? Promise not to shoot us?”
Jeanne snorted. “I’m going back to work on the engine. You guys decide to stop being chickenshits, feel free to come aboard and help out. I’ve got this really bad feeling I’m gonna be here awhile.”
As Magali stepped forward, however, Jersey’s arm stopped her. “Didn’t I hear somewhere that Jeanne Ivory was unstable? Something about a tooth-necklace?”
“She likes to shoot people,” Magali admitted.
“And with that much Yolk at stake…” Jersey raised a brow.
Magali considered that a moment, then raised her voice. “Okay, Jeanne, we’re coming in!” she called.
“Yeah, yeah, whatever!” Jeanne called from somewhere behind the mountain of Yolk sacks pouring out the hold of her ship. “Just find something to make yourself useful!”
Magali led them back to the rear of the ship, then glanced over her shoulder at Jersey. “Ready for this?”
“Yep,” Jersey said. He had a gun charged and ready.
Magali took a deep breath and started climbing the pile of Shrieker nodules.
Inside, they met no resistance. There wasn’t a Gryphon hiding behind the nodules, waiting to put a charge between their eyes, and aside from the flickering lights, the hallway was dark…
…but Jeanne wasn’t there, either.
Jersey slid into position beside her, staring intently up the passageway towards the cockpit.
“Hear anything?” Magali whispered.
Jersey gave his head a slight shake and took the lead. They clambered over the oddly-tilted floor towards the front of the ship, passing the stairs leading down to the engine in the belly, where Jeanne’s colorful invectives had started up once more.
“Wow,” Jersey said, blinking down into the engine compartment.
“Pretty sure a robot couldn’t come up with some of that,” Magali agreed. They stood there a couple more minutes, listening to the sound of Jeanne’s frustration in rapt awe.
“You know,” Magali whispered, “I wish I could remember half of that next time I’m pissed.”
“I’m taking notes,” Jersey agreed. “I especially like the succubus part.”
Magali nodded.
“Hokay,” Jersey said, visibly tearing himself away from the verbal abuse emanating from the staircase. He pulled a tactical flashlight from his belt and shone it around the ship. “Aanaho Ineriho,” he whispered. “This place is soaked with Yolk.”
Indeed, the floors, walls, and ceiling were caked with dried-on nodule slime, the purple tinge indicating it had been ripe when picked. On the floor near the mountain of nodule sacks, the puddles still hadn’t dried, and they were walking through ten inches of half-coagulated purple-blue muck.
“That,” Magali managed, flicking it off her boot with a twitch of her toe, “is a lot of money.”
Jersey just nodded. “Come on.” He walked them up the hall to the bridge, which was similarly bathed in Yolk. The whole ship, it seemed, had been packed with it. Magali had glanced into both the bedroom and bathroom as she passed, and she’d seen the bags stuffed to the ceiling in both.
“Looks like they stole so much they had to pack it away in the cockpi—” Jersey froze, looking at something on the floor. Magali stepped around a tumble of Yolk sacks to see.
Jeanne Ivory lay dead on the floor of her ship, face a pallid white, half her skull disintegrated from the back, her fingers still wrapped around her favorite Brackett pistol.
“Oh God,” Magali whimpered, quickly turning away. “That’s Jeanne!”
But Jersey was frowning, turning to look at the staircase and its stream of invectives. “Then who’s that?”
Magali was suddenly finding it hard to breathe. The heavy metallic smell of Shrieker slime was overpowering her, and she couldn’t tell if what she was smelling was the smell of blood or the smell of Yolk, as both items were spread liberally around the cockpit. “We need to get her out of here and bury her.”
“Bury who?” the wall beside Magali’s shoulder asked suddenly.
Magali screamed and leapt away, simultaneously putting three rounds through the offending speaker.
“What the hell, Mag?” another speaker demanded. “I asked you to come help me fix my ship, not shoot it to pieces. What’s wrong with you? Put the damn gun down already.”
Magali started panting, the tip of her gun spinning to face the latest speaker. “Possessed,” she whimpered. “Oh my God, Jersey, it’s possessed.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Jeanne’s voice demanded. “Are you high, Magali?”
“No, I’m not ‘high’,” Magali cried. “You’re fucking dea—”
Jersey cut her short with a hard, heavy hand on her shoulder. “Hey, Jeanne,” he said smoothly, “Mag’s had a re
ally rough time the last few days. Run in with Nephyrs, ended up shooting up most of Yolk Factory 14. She’s a bit twitchy. How about you get back to work on the engine and we’ll clean up here.”
“Yeah, sure,” Jeanne muttered. “And be sure to get that dead bitch out of my cockpit. She’s too heavy for me to move and she’s gonna start to stink.”
Magali slapped a horrified hand over her mouth, but Jersey squeezed her shoulder in warning. “We’ll do that,” he said, almost cheerfully. “Let us know if you need any help tinkering with the engine. I’m not a mechanic, but I’ve fixed a few combines…”
Jeanne snorted. “Combines? This is space-age technology, boy. Go back to your rice paddies. I’ll deal with this.” The voice returned coming from the staircase, some sort of monologue about the ship’s inner workings.
“I think we should take a look at the ship’s log…don’t you?” Jersey whispered.
Magali, who wanted nothing more than to leave the ship, just shook her head, terror tightening like a knot in her chest. “I just want to go, Jersey. No wonder Joel ran. It’s a ghost.”
“Shhh, keep your voice down,” Jersey whispered back. “You wanna piss it off?”
Magali whimpered and clung tighter to his arm.
“Come on,” Jersey said. “We’ll go access the computer and—” he froze, frowning at the consoles. “They’re all dark.”
“She said Joel disabled the computer,” Magali managed. “Jersey, I think I’m gonna throw up.”
“Just hold on for a few minutes, love,” Jersey said, frowning. He leaned close to the wall panel, then scraped at a brown, flaky substance with a titanium fingernail. “Shit, I think this is blood…” He reached in gingerly and fiddled with the wires. “Someone unplugged the power supply, then bled all over it.”
Further supporting the fact they were dealing with a bonafide ghostly possession. Suddenly, the invectives coming from down the hall weren’t so funny. Rather, they made her want to scream and start pulling grenades from her belt. “Jersey, I really want to go.”
Jersey plugged in the power core and immediately the consoles powered back up. “Just hold on a minute. We need to figure out what’s going on here.” He tapped his glassy fingers across the screen and a current camera view of the cockpit of the ship showed up on the big viewscreen in front of them. He bent his head in concentration and entered a few more commands and the image reset to one timestamped three days prior, then he set it to play at 30x speed. They saw Jeanne lock Joel in the compartment near the copilot’s chair—apparently willingly—and then her ship was loaded with Yolk by what appeared to be Coalition enlisted men. Then Jeanne went to the console, flew them a short distance, all the while talking and gesturing to someone. Then she pulled out a gun and shot herself right before the ship crashed.
