“I don’t know what that means.”
She wasn’t looking at him. Her eyes wandered the scene, scoping the faces. “I put together parties for corporations. You know, if they have a product launch or something like that? I make sure the guest list has potential customers and celebrities of sufficient caliber to make the party worth attending.”
“Sufficient caliber?”
She was sucking down a long neck beer. As put together as she was, he had expected her to drink something fruity, with decorations. Instead she was putting away Texas brews like a freighter deckhand.
“It’s a balancing act. I have to maintain relationships with celebrities and other interesting people so they’ll come to parties when I invite them. On the other hand I have to make sure they aren’t bored when they come. You have to know how to mix personalities and events.”
“And be good at reading people, I assume.”
She nodded and took a long draw on her beer. “No doubt about that. You have to weed out the dipshits. Two weeks ago I got a call from this guy who wants to throw a party celebrating a new game, one of those total immersion ones, y’know?”
“Sure,” he said.
She wasn’t so sure he was sure. “Not the old kind. Not the ones that were hot five years ago that needed thousands of credits in projection equipment. This game is for the new platforms that use low level energy fields for tactile sensation and only cost about a grand. The game is like, three hundred, so they’re priced to sell if they’re any good. Be a music star, act out your favorite drama or just choose from a thousand adventure games.
“Anyway, this guy wants top celebrities, vid stars like action heroes and drop dead gorgeous babes. I’ve never worked with him before so I check around. And you know what?”
“He’s a dipshit?”
“Totally. He’s got no financing, the game is getting terrible reviews and his ad buy consists of what it will cost to throw this party. He’s broke and has a rotten product. I can’t invite my top stars to an event like this. I can’t ask the actors I know who do advertisements to this. If they’re seen kicking off this junky game the bad press could hurt them. I had to cut him loose. Clients like that are toxic.”
“So you’re here on vacation?”
“Going to see Alpha. I figured why not take a cruise until business picks up?”
“That guy I saw you with earlier your boyfriend?”
“Sort of. He’s paying for the cruise.”
“I just got back from Alpha. There are some pretty sites out there.”
She gave her hair a little flip and threw him a little smile. “What were you doing out there? Do you have a yacht of your own?”
“I have my own starship, yeah.” He leaned in a little closer and switched to a conspiratorial whisper. “I had to retrieve a stolen ship.” He backed away again, giving it the hard sell. “Millions in cargo and this gang had stolen her. My crew and I had to infiltrate them and grab it.”
“Wasn’t that dangerous?”
“A little, yeah. It comes with the territory though, y’know?”
“That’s really interesting.” She slid toward him a bit on her barstool.
“Would you like to see my ship? It’s berthed nearby.”
“Maybe. Derek will be looking for me.”
“You’re sort of banker boyfriend? We’ll be back before he knows you’re gone. He’s wrapped up in a game somewhere. Come on, you’ll love her.” He slid off his stool.
She bit her lower lip. “I guess it wouldn’t hurt to take a walk. Derek’s not around anyway.”
“Bonnie?” A voice said. “Are you going somewhere?”
Derek, the banker, walked up and put his arm around Bonnie.
“Babe? Were you going somewhere?”
“No,” she said. “I was just going to get some air. Take a little walk.”
The banker looked Nathan over and turned back to Bonnie. “I was thinking we should leave. Get some rest before the cruise starts tomorrow.”
“Sure,” she said. “That sounds like a good idea.”
They collected their coats and walked out of the bar. She glanced at him when Derek’s back was turned and shrugged her shoulders. Nathan watched them go and sat back down on his stool. No job, no girlfriend and he was going home alone tonight.
“Damn it.”
6.
Duncan rolled over and cursed himself for not pulling the curtains closed all the way last night. Bright New Mexico sunlight was streaming through a thin gap between the curtains like a laser beam, hitting him square in the face.
He stared at the clock. Almost two in the afternoon? The last thing he remembered was the party shutting down about three so he’d been out for about eleven hours. He checked the entertainment system to make sure they weren’t still logged in. The last thing he wanted was for anyone still up in the voyeur room to be watching him sleep.
Marla was beside him, still snoring because she was out of range of the laser beam coming through the window. That was it. He was going to upgrade to the programmable shaded windows. He was doing well enough now that he could afford to make some improvements.
He rolled out of bed and pulled on a robe. A champagne bottle almost tripped him and he kicked it out of the way. He and Marla had celebrated last night. Their investments with Lucy Bega were paying off nicely. An expensive dinner at Raul’s downtown had become drinks at The Red Rock and that had led to a loosening of inhibitions that got them into the voyeur room. Around midnight they turned on the full immersion entertainment system and joined a dozen other couples watching each other as they celebrated their own events around the globe. They’d done it a few times before and he was much less self conscious about it than he had been the first time Marla had suggested watching other couples and allowing those couples to watch them. From what he could remember, last night had been the best time yet. There had been an energized young couple from Paris who had caught the attention of everyone else in the room. He didn’t remember much else.
He showered, dressed and made coffee. Marla sat down, disheveled and half awake. She poured a cup of coffee and stared out the window. Her hair was plastered to the left side of her head and standing straight up on the right.
“We’re not as young as we used to be,” she said.
“No.”
“We’re certainly too old to drink like that.”
“I agree,” Duncan said.
“You see, it seems like a good idea at the time…”
“Yes.”
“But then you wake up feeling like this and you know at least half the day is ruined,” she said.
“More than half the day,” he said. “It’s almost three.”
She looked at the clock. “Oh, damn it.”
“We don’t get a lot of down time,” he said. “I guess we’re not used to carrying on like that.”
“How did we get home?”
“Taxi,” he said. “Not only couldn’t we drive, I’m not sure where we left our ride.”
“Did we go into a voyeur room again last night?”
“Oh yeah, we sure did,” he said. “And it was your idea.”
“The couple in Paris…”
“You seemed to take a fancy to them.”
They sat in silence for a moment, collecting their thoughts. Duncan rubbed his forehead. Marla hung her head, because of a headache or in shame at what they had done in the voyeur room, he didn’t know.
She poured another cup of coffee. “Nathan call?”
“No. It’s been a week and as much as I like time off, it’s probably time to get back to work.”
She perked up at that. “Yeah, things are going well on the money front. We need it to keep coming in.”
“I’ll call him this morning. Did I tell you I saw him at Lucy’s the other day?”
“No,” she said. “What was he doing there?”
“Getting paid for the Martha Tooey job. Apparently Lucy is his factoring company.”
; “I didn’t know Milky Way used a factoring company,” she said. “With the money we’ve been socking away I assumed Nathan was doing even better.”
“He should be,” Duncan said. “Pay from a job usually breaks down as half for expenses, two shares for Nathan and a share for you, me and Cole. I just assumed he was saving and investing that extra share. He owns the Blue Moon Bandit outright so he doesn’t even have a payment to make. I don’t know what he’s doing with his money.”
“Did he see you there?”
“No.”
“Good. I’m not sure how he would take us partially bankrolling our own jobs.”
“Yeah, that’s a little strange. I spoke with Lucy and she said Nathan is going to be self-financing the next job. He says he’s caught up.”
“We did get a lot for the Martha Tooey,” she said.
“Uh huh, big ship, cargo intact, maybe that was enough for him to get back on his feet.”
“Should we talk to him?”
“No,” he said. “He wouldn’t take this well.”
“But we could help him.”
“You’ve got to understand,” he said. “He’s prideful. If he thought for a minute we were offering charity…”
“Well, it wouldn’t be like that,” she said.
“Look, we can’t treat him as another investment. There’s no way to approach him without it seeming like an act of charity. And if he found out we were making money off the money he was borrowing from Lucy that would really piss him off.”
“Money changes things,” she said.
He raised his cup to take a sip. “Bet your ass.”
7.
Celeste was boiling mad. The pirates were holding them outside the colony of Port Solitude on a moon orbiting the gas giant Hubbard. The Charon was in orbit around the moon. She thought she could see it every few hours, a small glimmer of light quietly passing by the small portal of her room. Room? No, she thought. It was a cell.
Her captors demanded nothing. The men were held in adjoining rooms. As the only female crew member aboard the Charon she seemed to rate private accommodations. She stretched out on the bed and fumed.
Her captors were nice enough. They were mostly young men and women, dressed in pastel robes. The men shaved their heads completely or left long ponytails. The women all had long hair, usually drawn in a ponytail. They were extremely polite. Celeste had hurled insults and invective at them when they brought her meals but they did nothing but smile.
At first she asked what they wanted with them. After receiving nothing more than genteel smiles she escalated to demanding answers. At this point Captain Geechy had asked her to calm down lest her demands make the situation worse by angering their captors. Asked her, not ordered her. Celeste was so disappointed in his less than authoritative manner that she hurled a cup at the next person who brought her a meal. The young woman simply picked it up, nodded politely without speaking and set her meal on the small table in the corner before leaving. Celeste seethed.
A knock on the door startled her. She sat up on the bed and ran a hand through her hair, absently wondering what she looked like. She hadn’t seen a mirror or had a shower for at least a day.
The door opened and Captain Geechy came in. He was a small man, about as tall as Celeste and thin. His thin mustache was meant to give him an air of authority but it sat on his lip like a worm, she thought. She rose from the bed.
“They’ve given me a few minutes to fill you in,” he said. “May I sit?”
Celeste gestured to the chair at the small table. “They spoke with you?”
He nodded. “A little while ago. Their leader had me brought to an office.”
“What did he have to say?”
“The Charon is being held for ransom,” he said.
Celeste’s eyebrow went up. “The Charon is being held for ransom. The ship? Not us?”
“That’s correct,” Geechy said. “They’ve no interest in us, apparently. I was told we are being held to crew the Charon when it is eventually released. They feel the company will pay handsomely to recover the ship and its cargo.”
“They feel the company will pay for the ship and dead bodies but they don’t have any faith in them paying a ransom for the crew?”
“He didn’t say that explicitly.”
“But they aren’t calling your wife or my parents and asking for ransom?”
He squirmed, this line of thinking clearly had not occurred to him. “No. They are only contacting the company.”
“I wonder why?” She said.
“I suppose the ransom is a considerable amount of money. Certainly more than our families could pay.”
Celeste let it drop. This line of conversation was depressing her further. “Who is holding us? Pirates? Terrorists? Are they an organized group? They certainly seem to have some sort of religious tendencies.”
“Ah, yes, indeed they do,” he said. “It turns out they call themselves the Children of the Apocalyptic Rainbow.”
Celeste’s eyebrows knitted. “The kids in the spaceports that collect donations and hand out flowers?”
“Yes. They also run several businesses that specialize in employing under privileged youth and ex-convicts. Laundry, food services, cleaning and the like. They’re usually very peaceful.”
“I’ve eaten in their cafeterias,” Celeste said. “I’ve stayed in hotels where they clean the laundry.”
“Me too.”
“What are they doing in the Alpha system hijacking starships?”
Captain Geechy shook his head. “I don’t know.”
“Who did you meet with?”
“Ah, now that is an interesting question,” he said. “He was rather young, no more than thirty I would say. A man named Dawson. Montario Dawson.”
“And he was running the show?”
“It certainly seemed like he was. The others were subservient to him, they deferred to his authority in my presence.”
“Did he seem crazy?”
Captain Geechy seemed perplexed. “No. He was quite calm and businesslike, actually. Why do you ask?”
“I ask because his plan to get rich involves hijacking a starship full of dead people,” she said. “That seems like the act of someone who isn’t in their right mind. It concerns me that someone not in their right mind is holding me hostage.”
“I see what you mean,” he said. “But surely they are counting on the embarrassment of losing the deceased to make sure their ransom is paid. The company wouldn’t want to look bad.”
Celeste stood up and paced the room. “Did he tell you if the ransom demand had been sent yet?”
“Yes,” he said. “Apparently the company has agreed to pay it.”
She stopped and turned. “Good. Once the credits are transferred we can be on our way.”
Captain Geechy stood up. “No, Celeste. We have to stay until the ransom is delivered.”
“I don’t understand. What is it?”
Cash money was rarely used. Most transactions took place electronically. In fact, moving large amounts of cash created special problems, the least of which was having the stuff on hand to be stolen.
“I don’t know,” he said. “All I know is that it won’t be here for a few days. A courier is bringing it from Earth.”
She grabbed a cup from the small table and hurled it against the door. She counted to ten and turned toward the captain. “A few more days of this? We better get hazard pay.”
“Yes,” he said. “We’ll certainly be eligible for that. Being hostages and all.”
“Oh, well then. That makes everything better.” She lay down on the bed and ignored Geechy until he left.
8.
The punching bag jumped as Cole landed a right jab. He followed it up with a left, another combination and then backed off. He grabbed a water bottle and guzzled it. The gym was quiet at this time of night but he was feeling anxious. Nathan hadn’t found them a job so there wasn’t any work to be done. He’d been hitting the gym ha
rd the last few days, working off extra energy and trying to keep in shape. The boredom was making him antsy.
The closest thing he’d had to any action had been that business in the alley with the new guy, Duncan and Marla. The fire guy had been interesting. Certainly not something you see every day. He wondered absently if the new guy had made his payment or got himself barbecued. He made a mental note to call Duncan and find out.
He showered, changed and went out for something to eat. A diner down the street was twenty-four hours. He grabbed a booth, ordered a grilled steak salad and a beer and looked the joint over. There was a couple in a back booth. They looked too young and clean to be out late. Seeing them made him think of Duncan and Marla.
Duncan was as smart as they came; too smart to spend years on Nathan’s boat hunting down deadbeats and collecting their ships. The man could have been a college instructor but wanted to live life. He craved excitement. Cole admired that about him. Too many people were bogged down in jobs they hated. Duncan was living life the way he wanted.
He knew Duncan liked hanging out with Marla. She was a little freak underneath the frumpy flight suit and Duncan’s brains brought it out. He had considered making a move on her when Nathan hired her after Celeste left but Duncan had slipped right in and beaten him to the punch.
The salad came and he dug in, trying to pretend the steak was real and not a synthetic protein mixture molded to look the part. Real meat was expensive and he was watching his money until the next job. The door to the diner opened and a blonde walked in.
She was wearing a leather jacket and tight jeans. Her hair was tousled like it had been blown in the wind. It just made her look better. She knew how to walk, crossing the floor to a booth before seeing him. He smiled and her path changed toward him. She sat down across from him.
“Betty,” he said.
“Cole.”
“You’re out late”, he said. “And riding too.”
“I’m hungry and I still like the bike. I see you’re still eating healthy.”
Milky Way Repo Page 5
