Charley’s heart sank. Far from being a bustling, thriving scene, Silverton’s old crew looked to be a spent force. Charley had heard stories of ruthless bandits taking over lucrative runs throughout the galaxy, but could never have guessed the situation was as dire as this.
Harry spotted the pellets stored along her belt.
“I see Silverton entrusted you with his gear. I wish I was able to teach you something. You might have been my last pupil.”
The pair shared a laugh at that. Charley couldn’t think of anything better than staying here and learning from this man.
“I was on the run for over a year,” Harry went on. “All I had was the credits I could shove down my pockets. It was enough to buy me three years tenure here at the Academy. I fooled them into thinking I was a mercantile expert. I suppose I am, in many ways.”
Harry sounded wistful, as if his tenure at the Academy couldn’t possibly last. Charley had an inkling of imminent danger.
“They couldn’t find you here, could they?” Charley asked worriedly.
“You did,” he pointed out. “They were tracking Silverton too. Did you notice anyone following you?”
At that moment there was a heavy knock at the door.
“Academy Security,” a gruff voice said. “Open up.”
“They’re not Security,” Harry said urgently. “Night Runners. They’ve found us.”
“What do we do?” Charley asked, feeling a rising tide of panic. “Fight?”
Harry considered the situation. The door shook from a violent impact. Their “visitors” would be in soon. He looked Charley in the eyes.
“I could escape them now,” he said tiredly. “But they’d keep coming. There’d be no rest. But they’re not interested in you. They don’t know there’s one last pirate in this sad old galaxy.”
Harry’s eyes twinkled. Charley’s heart swelled with pride. He actually thought she had the makings of the pirate!
“I won’t leave you,” she said. “I know nothing about being a pirate, but I do know that any Silverton would fight by your side. To the death.”
Harry looked at Charley with something more than wistful affection.
“Yes, I can see you would. But I can’t allow that.”
Harry pressed a button under his desk. A door slid open in the corner of the office. Beyond it a staircase descended into darkness.
“Most professors have these,” he explained. “The students rule those corridors. Let’s go.”
Charley was through the secret door when Harry said:
“You aren’t Silverton’s daughter, are you?”
Feeling like a fraud, Charley shook her head. Amazingly, Harry smiled.
“I knew it,” he said. “Wherever you came from doesn’t matter.”
“Really?” she asked, incredulous.
“Of course not,” Harry said. “What matters is the fighting heart in here.” He pressed a hand over Charley’s chest. “A pirate’s heart.”
And with that, Harry Teks activated the door but remained on the other side.
“Harry!” Charley screamed.
Blaster shots zanged echoed the office and fear clawed at Charley’s heart. She scrabbled at the door but couldn’t find a way in. Tears in her eyes, she ventured down the stairs and found a corridor two levels down.
A drop shaft took her back to Harry’s level and she rushed to the office door. A number of students had gathered round, but the violent scuffle was already over.
“They tumbled out the window,” one student was saying. “Two of them.”
Charley pushed her way into the office. The first thing she noticed was a sickening, chunky bloodstain on the floorboards. She stifled a sob as she considered the situation. The Night Runners had struck quickly and decisively. Harry’s first thought had been to protect her. Alas, it was too late to give pursuit - those goons were long gone. Charley felt strong emotions well deep inside. Hatred. Hatred for the thugs who’d muscled their way into the pirate trade and taken complete control. At least she had the name of a trade route - the Beluga Run. Apparently it was a famous run between star systems and would require more research.
The gathered students began whispering nervously. Charley realized she was the center of attention. She backtracked into the corridor and rode a drop shaft before Security arrived to investigate. Tears were still welling in her eyes as she found a quiet alcove in the Academy grounds. If she hung around too long she’d be detained for questioning, that was certain. Considering the small arsenal she was carrying, she might even be accused of murdering Harry. With a heavy heart she made her way to the shuttle bay. She didn’t care where she went, only that she was on the next shuttle. It was headed for Galveston, a city in Danderly’s northern hemisphere. The CabinBot accepted Charley’s very last credits. She literally had nothing left in her pockets.
Once the shuttle was filled to capacity it was catapulted through the port gate at the top of the Academy dome. Charley barely registered the flight as the vessel sought orbit over Danderly’s northern hemisphere. What could she possibly do next? She was penniless and her only potentially friendly contact was dead. Worse still, there wasn’t a pirate culture, or even a guild, to speak of. The old firm was dead or missing and there were no apprentices coming through the ranks. Except for her. What she really needed was a place where she could hole up and think. Things were moving too quickly. If forced, she could fence once of her blasters for a few hundred credits. Hopefully it wouldn’t come to that. Of course, there was also the PalBot hanging at her belt. She couldn’t bring herself to sell FIGJAM. After all, the annoying robot had been instrumental in negotiating Spacetown’s security.
Having broken orbit whilst Charley was ruminating, the vessel proceeded to soar over deep valleys choked with tall, imperious forest. At length it reached a wide basin surrounded by mountains. Charley was surprised to find a sprawling city in the cauldron. A bustling, teeming metropolis far larger than Spacetown. The shuttle settled into an air lane thick with all manner of private craft. She marveled at how the crazy traffic found a way to synchronize. Air traffic control towers rose above the general skyline. A parade of large buildings, most adorned with huge neon corporate logos, slid by on both sides. Charley’s wrist pad told her the local time was 1530 hours. She was extremely hungry and couldn’t wait to get her hands on a few credits.
The shuttle cruised low, joining one of the busier air lanes. A chime sounded and the vessel dipped into Galveston’s cavernous shuttle terminal. Charley marveled at the flowery creeper that covered the transparent walls. An ancient, mechanical clock face beamed over the various shuttle tracks. Dappled sunlight filtered through the vegetation and completed a most pleasant scene. Feeling a little more hopeful now, Charley disembarked and wandered the crowded terminal. Locating the main entrance, she emerged onto a packed concourse lined with bars and drinking holes. She selected a particularly edgy looking place and settled into a shadowy corner booth. A ServiceBot wasted no time in providing a glass of water, wondering how long it would take for the proprietor to banish her non-paying ass. For the first time since she’d met Silverton outside Sandflower Downs, Charley had no money to speak of.
22
Galveston seemed more prosperous than any settlement on Abeya. Charley wondered if there were any jobs in the offing. Trying not to think about Harry Teks, she consulted her wrist pad. Her passionate and ultimately violent encounter with the older man had left a strong impression. She was saddened that yet another potential mentor had died. At this rate there’d be no one left to teach her the old ways. Nex told her that Galveston had a job center of sorts. Charley hated the idea of a regular paying job, but just a few days might be enough to rent a room and consider her next move. Thinking the PalBot might have something to contribute, she activated FIGJAM.
“Man, you are the sexiest piece of ass I’ve ever laid eyes on,” it immediately gushed. “The way you nailed that old man was enough to have me leaking oil.”
“W
ait,” Charley said, thoroughly disgusted. “You were watching? I killed your power.”
“You muted me,” FIGJAM said through a shrill laugh. “I can’t actually be deactivated, but I can go into sleep mode. When I want to.”
“Great,” said Charley sarcastically.
“You’re smokin’,” enthused the PalBot. “Prime slab of meat.”
“Such a sweet talker,” Charley muttered, but she couldn’t resist a grin. “What do you make of this place?”
FIGJAM snorted. “It’s stuffed full of cash for the taking. I talked to Nex while you thought I was deactivated. Galveston is flush with educated professional types. Great art scene. One of Danderly’s most livable cities.”
“That’s great Figgy, but it doesn’t really help us.”
“Hang on, I’m getting to that,” FIGJAM said irritably. “I couldn’t help but notice you talking to that Teks character about being a pirate or some mumbo jumbo. Well, I listened in between ogling your superb tits. Anyway, I think visiting the job center is a waste of your fucking time. You might get a job cleaning shit off hotel walls and get paid barely enough to survive. You might as well have stayed in Sandflower Downs.”
“Fuck that,” Charley said vigorously.
“So here’s the deal,” FIGJAM said. “I did some diggin’. Seems there was a Pirate Guild. Once. All its members are presumed dead, but ten years rent on a guild hall in Galveston was paid eight years ago.”
Charley took a moment to absorb the information. “I wonder if there’s anyone there?”
“Squatters, probably,” warned FIGJAM. “I haven’t found any records of pirate activity on Danderly for several years.”
Charley beamed at the PalBot. “Then let’s check it out,” she said. “Good work, Figgy.”
“Figgy,” FIGJAM repeated. “I like it. It sounds like you’re about to suck my cock.”
“You don’t have a cock, FIGJAM,” said Charley, rolling her eyes.
“Killjoy.”
Following FIGJAM’s directions, Charley returned to the concourse and headed east on foot. Neither were familiar with the city and frequently needed to double back. Before long they’d descended into one of Galveston’s less salubrious areas, a ghetto-like slum under a huge, arching concourse. Packs of homeless men huddled around tin drum bonfires. The wind blew spiraling dust devils in the air. FIGJAM directed Charley to a rundown street lined with decrepit, crumbling buildings. She saw shadowy figures passing lobe kits to each other and resolved to keep her eyes firmly on the road ahead. Lobing was the practice of recalibrating the neurons in the frontal lobe that somehow triggered a flood of dopamine. Neural field generators were readily available in fold out packs. No research had been conducted into the phenomenon, but Charley had read that several ‘lobers’ were recently found dead in a ‘ghost house’ in Ulia, another city on Danderly. She quickened her pace and picked her way over several prone bodies. It was difficult to tell if they were asleep or dead. FIGJAM directed her to a nondescript concrete bunker. A skull and crossbones had been painted on the metal door. Charley smiled at the retro humor.
There was no immediately apparent way in. She was about to head round the back when a holographic projection spewed from a tiny aperture in the door.
“DNA scanner,” FIGJAM muttered. “You’re not related to Silverton even though you’ve assumed his name.”
Charley felt a wave of frustration. “We didn’t come all this way to be held back by a grumpy fucking door.”
“Let’s head round the back,” FIGJAM suggested.
To do that, Charley needed to backtrack around the entire block. Luckily there was an abandoned lot on the next street over, but it was piled with trash. She clambered over the stinking garbage and spotted a ragged hole in one the steel panels to the rear of the bunker.
“We got squatters,” FIGJAM warned. “Get your blaster out. Whatever you do, don’t listen to the scum.”
Charley held her right blaster ready as she climbed through the hole and let herself fall a couple of yards to a trash-filled, near-dark room. She padded through a central hallway into a larger chamber. Wrinkling her nose, she noted the feces on the floor and smeared on the walls. An even worse smell wafted in from the corner, where a muted yellow light suggested human presence. Two divina junkies, wide-eyed and paranoid.
“The fuck?” one of them said, rising quickly. He was tall, gaunt and covered in scabs. “We got no juice for you, bitch.”
The man reached for his weapon, a rusty knife hidden in his over-sized boots. Charley squeezed her trigger without hesitation, sending the junkie against the wall with a hole in his heart. The other junkie yelped and reached for a sawn-off shotgun. Charley’s targeting computer made things easy. She fired at the red graticule and the junkie’s hand disappeared in a puff of red mist. Her next shot struck him flush on the forehead and finished him off good. The smell was already fearsomely bad - adding corpses wasn’t gonna make it any better.
“I need access to the generator,” FIGJAM said. “The pirates wouldn’t have depended on grid supply.”
“Let me sweep the place first,” Charley said.
The Guild Hall was actually quite large, most of it underground. Aside from the main Hall, there were adjoining rooms that had been looted long ago. Once Charley was satisfied the building was secure, she allowed FIGJAM to access the generator in the cob-webbed basement. She stood over the PalBot as it spoke to the machine and coaxed it back to life. The light tubes in the basement flickered, then settled with a hum. The harsh light disturbed a nest of corpse spiders in the corner. Charley stood in front of FIGJAM and burned them with multiple plasma blasts.
“Oooh,” the robot said. “I love it when you protect me.”
“Easy, Casanova,” Charley said. “Can you climb steps?”
“How dare you. Of course I fucking can.”
“Then you’ve got full run of the place. I’m gonna sweep for more bugs. It’ll take us days to clean this joint.”
“Aye, aye, captain.”
Charley couldn’t help but smile. They’d actually found a place to stay. Sure, the building was run down, disgusting, and probably should be condemned. She couldn’t even access the front door. But … it was a genuine pirate den. The challenge was restoring it. Without money or resources of any kind, it was easier said than done. Charley completed her sweep of the other rooms, burning off three spider nests and finding a pair of dead corpses. Pirates or junkies, the decay was so advanced she couldn’t tell. There were no weapons at hand - no doubt they’d been looted long ago. Two things interested Charley - first was the row of lockers along the wall in the Hall. Several had been blown to pieces and ransacked, but three actually remained intact. Naturally, they were code-shielded. She made a mental note to set FIGJAM to the problem. The second discovery was the data jack on a great, circular desk in the center of the Hall. The desk itself seemed like some kind of reception area, whilst the data jack suggested an internal AI, long dead or deactivated. That was another thing FIGJAM might be able to help with.
“Figgy,” she called out. “Figgy, here boy!”
The PalBot’s mechanical whir could be heard at the back of the Hall before it appeared on top of the circular desk.
“Fido has arrived, Your Highness.”
“Stow the attitude,” Charley said crisply. “I need you to jack the AI that used to live here.”
“No fucking problem,” FIGJAM said confidently. Its diodes clicked as he tried to stir a long-dead ghost. Charley flinched when a voice crackled over the Guild’s com system.
“Yeah, you can suck my -”
Charley muted FIGJAM and spoke to the AI.
“My name is Charley,” she said. “I’m Silverton’s daughter.”
Charley felt a surge of excitement.
“I can’t tell you how great it feels to be here, Betty,” she said with a wide smile. “As you can see, we’ve got a lot of work to do.”
A pause.
Betty said.
“No, Betty,” Charley said, her grin fading. “As far as I know they’re all dead.”
Charley felt more determined with each word that Betty spoke. She noticed a faded logo on the floor. Crossed pistols in front of a naked woman. Hmmm - that might need to be updated.
“Betty,” Charley said. “I want to restore this place to its former glory. How do you suggest I go about it?”
The AI took a moment to consider the situation.
Charley beamed again. This was turning out to be a sad but hopeful day.
“Thanks, Betty. What does that mean exactly?”
“The Guildmaster System?”
“Who belongs to the Nefarious Guilds?”
The Pirate Guild Page 10
