Retribution Required

by C. R. Daems

  * * *

  I left the office wondering what the package contained that Mr. Armstrong thought Mr. Salgodo would only send it with someone he trusted and why Salgodo trusted me. Furthermore, he knew Uzomo wanted me in Lietzow and if I went willing or not the package wouldn't make it to Samxor...unless he expected me to go directly to Samxor. That appeared a risky assumption. The only way it made sense would be that the package was in code. That way it would only make sense to Mr. Armstrong. I decided it didn’t matter since the package wasn't illegal, even if the message might be.

  What if the Black Hand was tracking me and helping me get jobs that took me to the system they wanted. Uzomo had given in quickly to my compromise. Could the Black Hand have given him a nudge to accept? And if I lost—hijack the Tykhe? There were too many unknowns and ifs to come to a reasonable conjecture.

  I decided to visit the Meditation Room. Kraig was right that I was quite rich, however I needed to appear to be still be smuggling, otherwise the Black Hand might suspect something was wrong. The Meditation Room was the equivalent of the old-Earth's opium dens. The drugs the Meditation Room used weren't opiates but rather powerful hallucinogens that were legal on Samxor but no other place. A highly sought-after group of dream drugs.

  The Meditation building was divided into two areas: one to relax during your session and a bar and restaurant which offered exotic entrees containing mild doses of stimulants, depressants, hallucinogens, and dissociatives to enhance the experience. I chose a spice-free steak dinner for Shadi and me and had a Blue Ice to drink.

  I had finished my meal and was nursing my drink when a small woman of Asian descent approached my table. I stood and gave her a small bow, which she returned.

  "It has been several years, Zen. You have matured nicely."

  "Thank you, Mrs. Wu. I'm on my own now. My father was murdered a couple of years ago."

  "I'd heard a rumor to that effect. You were lucky you weren't involved. Are you continuing the business?" she asked. When I nodded she continued. "Dangerous for a woman."

  "It's that or get married," I said and received a genuine laugh.

  "That can also be a dangerous business." She nodded sagely. "I have some pending private deliveries if you are interested," she said after appraising me for several minutes. The meaning was clear—illegal drugs to transport.

  "Risk?" I asked. Risk—the difficulty getting the drugs through customs and the penalty if you were caught—would determine the charge. And Speed—how fast the product had to get to its destinations—would determine the premium. Wu looked down in thought for several minutes.

  "High. Tashir, Sidon, and Dacca on your schedule," she finally said when she looked up. "Thirty-five per kilo. One kilo per system."

  High meant one of the Dream Drugs legal on Samxor and nowhere else, had high leakage and therefore easy to detect, and customs routinely checked for those substances.

  "Forty," I said, thinking I would have to be desperate to transport it for twenty-five and Wu would have to be desperate to pay fifty. She nodded.

  "You and your father were always reliable and that is worth a premium. You can pick it up tomorrow."

  * * *

  I picked up the kilo-size bags from Wu the next day and the package from Armstrong the following day. The package looked the same except for the Osborne and Armstrong seal. I had the overwhelming urge to break the seal in the hope of resolving why me. Salgodo knew I might go to Lietzow and could be killed so why trust me with the package. Unless...Salogodo worked with the Black Hand and knew the Tykhe would be going to Samxor after Lietzow—with or without me. If true, that meant the package had something to do with the Black Hand and possibly the Raiders.

  "What do you think, Kraig?" I asked after explaining my logic, or was it paranoia? We sat eating in the galley after I had cleared Samxor space and set a course for Tyrus.

  "It's certainly possible. Clyde—" Kraig stopped when I grabbed my tablet and tapped on it three times, entered my password, and tapped on the feet. Sure enough, the bastards had been on the ship while Kraig and I were running errands. Kraig rose when I did and followed me to the missile room where I opened the two missiles using my new access via my tablet. Looking inside, I screamed obscenities in every language I knew—Dream drugs and not in the non-leak containers I used. I closed the missile compartments, retrieved the Sniffer from my room, and returned to the missile room. The Sniffer displayed a trace of Dream drugs that may have been caused by opening the missile's secret compartment.

  "They must consider those missile compartments leakage proof," Kraig said. "I don’t imagine they want you caught and the Tykhe taken out of commission.

  I could no longer trust anyone. There were other packages in the compartments. Were one or more of them intended for Tashir, Sidon, or Dacca? Was that the reason Wu wanted deliveries to those systems?

  "I think the Black Hand is leading me around by the nose," I muttered with my head buried in my arms on the table.

  "If not leading you, at least monitoring where you intend to go." Kraig had a faraway look as if in thought. "I too have an overwhelming urge to see what is inside that package from Osborne and Armstrong."

  * * *

  "That's not much cargo," the senior customs agent said after inspecting the area.

  "It's not the size of the cargo that matters, it's the size of credits to transport it," I quipped.

  "Don't suppose you are transporting anything illegal?" he asked, clearly bored.

  "Depends. What’s on this week's list of illegal items on Tyrus?" I asked and saw Kraig's look of concern.

  "Nothing new." His saggy face gave a snort.

  "You might want to inspect the galley. I might have a couple of illegal beers from the Central Systems," I said, trying to look guilty. They smiled.

  "Slipped my mind completely, Pilot Zenaida. I'm sure I saw that on this week's list." They left, grinning, with two bottles of Carl's Tavern beer, a product of a famous York distillery.

  "Will that help if they find something illegal?" Kraig asked. I shook my head.

  "No. But if they like you they tend to be a little less aggressive, a bit careless, and more willing to cooperate. One day, that might be important...in case you bring something illegal on board," I said, trying to look serious. Kraig laughed.

  "How long on Tyrus?"

  "A couple of days. Don't want to appear like we are in a hurry to leave." I proceeded to set Clyde's software and lock down the ship. I departed less than an hour after Kraig and went directly to the Racetrack to return the package.

  At the club, I took a seat at the bar. I had just received my Blue Ice when a middle-aged man approached.

  "Miss Zenaida?" he asked. I nodded. "Mr. Salgodo would like to see you in his office."

  I followed him down a hallway to a door marked Private. He knocked then opened the door.

  "Come in, Zenaida. I see you already have a drink. Sit and relax," he said and rose from behind his old-fashioned wooden desk and came to sit in the chair facing me. When he held out his hand I passed the package to him. He looked it over while carefully inspecting the seal. "I understand you stopped in Lietzow before going to Samxor."

  "You did say delivery wasn't time sensitive and my business with Mr. Uzomo was urgent."

  He nodded. "Better to face him rather than an unknown assassin. Since you won it was a good decision." He smiled although his eyes appeared amused. "Where is your next stop, Zenaida? I might have some additional business for you."

  "Depending on what, when, and where, I might be able to take another delivery. My schedule could depend on what business I find on Tyrus and how it fits with my current commitments," I said, feeling Mr. Salgodo was in league with the Black Hand and they wanted me to go somewhere. If so, they would pay dearly to have me on their leash.

  "I have another package I need signed and returned to me," he said, and I would wager it was to Sidon. "The law offices of Tromberg and Tromberg on Sidon."

  I man
aged not to show my amusement. "That's not on my current delivery schedule. Maybe if you can wait..."

  "No, I need my package back on Tyrus in two weeks. I'll pay a bonus to expedite delivery...say sixty thousand," he said, his eyes holding that same amusement.

  "Sorry, that could impact my other customers and hurt future business." I squeezed my face, trying to look tempted but concerned. It wasn't easy.

  "I'll double it...one hundred twenty credits. It’s critical." His amusement had turned to concern and was edging toward panic."

  "Two weeks?" I asked. He nodded in relief. I finally agreed and left the Racetrack two hours later with a sealed package and my head feeling like a pipe-bomb loaded with nails and broken glass had just exploded.

  * * *

  "You don't look...well," Kraig said as he entered the galley and saw me sitting with five empty bottles of beer on the table. "Bad day?"

  "Bad doesn't begin to describe the situation," I said and opened another bottle. "Mr. Salgodo is working with the Black Hand to send their favorite fuck-on-demand addict to fetch two of their biochemical canisters for them—"

  "You agreed?" Kraig shouted. His face twisted in rage.

  "And what do you think would happen if I refused?" I snorted. "Kill you, drug me, and hijack the Tykhe. Of course, it would all be legal. I'd be forced to sell the Tykhe before Shadi was killed for her hide and I volunteered to be used as entertainment at some pleasure resort."

  Kraig nodded, collected a beer, and sat staring at me. "Any suggestions."

  "None Colonel Sherman and you will like," I said, planning to get comatose drunk. He remained silent for several minutes.

  "It's where we think they are getting the gas. Maybe we can determine their distributor," Kraig finally said, trying to make something good out of a bad situation.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Star System: Sidon

  "What now?" Kraig asked after the customs inspectors had finished their tour of the Tykhe.

  "I'll get these documents processed, look for some work, and deliver them back to Tyrus." I caught a taxi to the address on the package, the Law Offices of Tromberg and Tromberg. On the way there, I thought about the Black Hand and how they would go about loading the canisters. They already knew I was headed to Sidon and had a close approximation of the time I would arrive and the earliest I could return if I chose to do so immediately. In all likelihood they would have the canisters ready to load at the first opportunity. But since I had arrived in the morning, I doubted they would attempt to enter the Tykhe in Hazmat-like suits in broad daylight—but they had before. They would have to be available on short notice day or night since they couldn't count on how long I'd stay in system, when both Kraig and I would be away from the Tykhe, or for how long. Made sense when I thought about it. That meant they had to have a system that would be authorized in the area and normal enough to be ignored.

  "Cabbie, are there any clothing stores in the area?" I asked as I considered the situation and an idea began to develop.

  "For Spacers?"

  "No. Working clothes."

  "About two miles back there is a complex which caters to working folks…those that get their hands dirty," he said with a toothy smile. "Those that fix things rather than use them," he added quickly, apparently not wanting to insult his passenger and lower any tip.

  "Take me there. I need to do some shopping in case I ever have to fix something on my ship." I smiled. The cabbie was a middle-aged man with a worn-out look. He wore a clean but old jacket. He pretty much had the right of it. The working classes, either by profession or by necessity, were the folks who fixed, or prepared, or fetched while the upper class used those things—dirty hands vs clean.

  When the cab stopped, I handed him two twenty-five credit chips. "One is to cover the wait. The second is a tip. If anyone asks, tell them I said I needed to shop for some things."

  A smile split his craggy face in half. "You bet, Spacer. You shop all you want."

  "I'm leaving my cat since she would frighten the shoppers. She won't be any trouble so long as you don't bother her or decide to leave. There will be another twenty-five-credit tip when I get back."

  After looking over his shoulder at Shadi, he nodded. Without the glass partition separating the driver from the passengers he might not have been amenable, even for the fifty credits. It helped that Shadi was currently curled up on the seat and appeared to be sleeping. I set her the command to stay and she closed her eyes.

  The building was a low-end shopping mall with discounted items from a variety of stores. The merchandise appeared to be last year's items the main store no longer felt viable, items that didn't sell well, and items with minor defects that were worth repairing. I purchased heavy work shoes, maintenance coveralls, heavy-duty shirt, a cap to tuck my hair into, and a workbag for my spacer clothes. Dressed in my new outfit, I exited through another entrance and caught a cab back to the customs area.

  "Drop me at one of the maintenance buildings," I told the cabbie when we reached the customs complex.

  "Which one?"

  "It doesn't matter. I'm job hunting," I said. He nodded and proceeded to the largest building and stopped. The meter read four credits. "If you wait, there is a twenty percent tip on top of the waiting charge." I handed him twenty credits.

  "I'll wait until this exceeds the waiting charge…about four hours."

  I exited the cab and entered the building. It turned out to be a maintenance hangar with twenty or more mechanics working on various ships or ship components. No one gave me more than a glancing look as I made my way to the other end and exited out the giant hangar doors which were partially open. Then I weaved my way past a variety of buildings until I found a sheltered spot behind a generator at the end of a small building which appeared unused. I settled down to wait. None too soon. Less than fifteen minutes later a truck pulled up to the Tykhe's forward entrance. The truck blocked my view but after several minutes the hatch slid open and I could see two men in HAZMAT suits enter. I had an urge to run to the truck, shoot the driver, and then shoot the two men as they exited the Tykhe. Good sense prevailed. Killing the two deliverymen, even if they were members of the Black Hand, would feel good but could make me unintended collateral damage. I needed to help the ACS shut down the Raiders to be free of the ACS. Then sell the Tykhe to be free of the Black Hand.

  I made my way back to the taxi and returned to the store and my original driver.

  "Where to, Spacer?" His smile when I handed him another twenty-five credits made him look ten years younger.

  "The law offices," I said. This game was proving very lucrative now that I understood the rules. But this was not the retribution I had in mind, and those canisters represented death and untold misery for hundreds of people. They weren't my responsibility but…what was the alternative. If I didn't deliver the Black Hand would be after me and they had a long reach. Not to mention the ACS, since I would have screwed up their chance to catch the Raiders—and in the end the Raiders would continue and people would die.

  The office of Tromberg and Tromberg was located in the center of the city in a thirty-story building. On entering, I was confronted by a man standing at an information counter, which also acted as building security, judging by the armed men on either side of the booth.

  "Can I help you ma'am?" asked the young man in the booth.

  "I'm Pilot Zenaida. I have a package for Mr. Tromberg."

  The young man tapped on his tablet and then nodded. "Yes. The elevators are to your right. Mr. Tromberg's offices are on the twenty-second floor. But I'm afraid animals aren't allowed in the building."

  "She's my security. If Mr. Tromberg wants his package either my cat and I go up or he comes down," I said, watching the two security men for their reaction. They appeared content to see what I did. I did nothing—merely stood awaiting a decision. The young man turned away and spoke softly into a mic he had extending from his right ear. After a few minutes he turned back to me.

&nbs
p; "You and your security are cleared. Mr. Tromberg is on the twenty-second floor and the elevators are down the hallway to the right.

  "Thank you." I turned right and found the elevators. When the elevator door opened, I pushed through the glass doors engraved with two eagles in flight over Tromberg & Tromberg engraved in an old English font. It appeared the law firm occupied the entire twenty-second floor. Judging by the building, furniture, and the dress of the people I could see, they were very successful. This made me wonder how they fit in with Selgodo, the Black Hand, and the Raiders—and what was in the sealed packages I was transporting. The urge to rip them open was like an itch you couldn't reach to scratch. Maybe I could claim Shadi tore it to shreds when I wasn't looking.

  A few paces into the room a tall shapely brunette met me. She was impeccably dressed in a white pantsuit, a red silk blouse, and wore a welcoming smile. Or maybe she was smiling at what it was going to cost to hire one of their lawyers.

  "How may I help you, ma'am," she asked, trying to keep her eyes from darting to Shadi.

  "I have a package for either of the Tromberg's from Mr. Salgodo."

  "Yes, Mr. Tromberg senior is expecting you," she said after tapping on a tablet she was holding. "He is available and can see you now. Please follow me." She waved to a hallway on the right and began walking. At the end of the hallway an older woman sat at a large wooden desk, watching us approach. She rose when we neared the area and opened the door. "Please go in. Mr. Tromberg is free," she said, nodding toward the open door. When I entered I heard the door close behind me. The room was big enough for a family of four, with floor to ceiling windows that provided a bird's eye view of the city. Tromberg was a medium-size man in his late sixties with graying hair. His round face was baby smooth and his warm smile appeared genuine.