"Oof. Full gravity sure does suck after you've been away from it for a while," Lex remarked, feeling a bit heavy on his feet as he dropped a handful of chips into the landing attendant's hand in exchange for a bout of amnesia.
"Only figuratively," Garotte said.
Bags and boxes were removed from the ship.
"Please insert your hands-free devices," Ma requested. "From this point forward I will broadcast my communications silently to avoid drawing attention."
"Yes, because a black and white striped dog tapping away at its own slidepad won't turn any heads whatsoever," quipped Garotte.
"For discretion, verbal communication will be kept to a minimum," she added.
"Okay, so here is the food and water for her. Just give it to her when she asks for it. Do you want the rest of these slidepads?"
"I'll take one. Assuming I am able to liberate Silo, it will come in handy. Keep the frozen food, and the water. I shan't be needing them. I've no intention of bringing the little creature along. She is your responsibility."
"What?" Lex asked.
Ma started swiping at her slidepad.
"I cannot envision any situation where that bizarre creature could be anything but a liability to me."
"This whole thing was her idea! You can't just ditch her!"
"Remember, my boy: goal-oriented," he said, shouldering his bag and pacing away.
Ma looked up from the device. She didn't seem particularly upset. After another glance, she brought up a menu and tapped an entry.
"Your accounts with pending payment from Karter have just been locked," she remarked.
Garotte stopped in his tracks.
"What was that?"
"Your only safely accessible source of funds for this mission or any subsequent actions is no longer available to you."
"I need that money to perform this mission!"
"Your methods and judgment have both become a concern for me. I am not comfortable permitting you to act on my behalf without my supervision."
"You would rather let the terrorists keep your master than let me do this on my own?"
"I am confident that you are wise enough to take me with you rather than abandon the mission."
Garotte glared at the little creature. She looked back at him evenly. The staring match continued for nearly a minute before the man finally relented.
"Give me the blasted burritos," he grumbled.
"Here you go. Here's her leash, too, and the rest of that wacky stuff she asked for," Lex laughed, handing over the items in a Cost-Mart bag, "And a word of advice? Things will go much more smoothly for you if you treat her with a little respect."
"And a word of advice to you. The day you start treating genetically malformed woodland creatures loaded with faulty software with respect is the day you renounce your sanity," he said.
"Goodbye, Lex. I will notify you regarding the results of the mission. Though it saddens me that you will not be joining us, your role was small but essential, and I thank you for it. Consider any remaining money you were given to be payment for your inconvenience. Consider utilizing one of the remaining slidepads as an upgrade over your own, which is rather outdated," Ma said, trotting off after Garotte, who was storming away.
"Good luck!" he called after them.
As the unusual pair walked away, Lex investigated the damage to the SOB. The torch had left a mark, but as a black burn on a black paint job it wouldn't stand out much to anyone but Lex himself. Evidently the gang had tried to hack their way through the hull with a pick ax or something as well, since a few silver marks had been gouged into the surface.
"Look what happened to you, buddy," he said to the ship, rubbing at the burn with his thumb, "This is what happens. You get mixed up with people like that and you get banged up. Now you aren't in mint condition anymore." He licked his thumb and rubbed at the burn again, to no avail. "Ah, don't worry about it. Nobody likes a showroom ship anyway. You gotta get out there and rev those engines. And it's been a while since we did that, huh? Basically not since we had to hightail it away from VC headquarters after that last fiasco. … God, has it been that long?"
He glanced after the others, who had reached the edge of the hangar and were just turning down the hall. Ma glanced in his direction and made eye contact briefly before disappearing around the bend. Lex shook his head and climbed back into the ship. He punched in a few commands to warm up the engines. Then he shook his head some more, as though if he shook hard enough he could dislodge some of the more troubling thoughts that were drifting around his head. He guided his ship off of the pad and out of the hangar, heading for the edge of the atmosphere and running through various system checks to keep his mind occupied. Temperature readings were good. Electrical systems were good. No amount of monotonous mental autopilot could keep his mind from falling back into the pit he'd been hoping to keep it out of. Finally he dug into his pocket and pulled out the slidepad.
"Call Mitch," he said.
The screen cycled to her contact entry, playing through a string of video clips of her as the words "Establishing Connection" pulsed across the bottom of the display. After a few seconds, a video window winked open, showing a completely black rectangle. There was the sound of fumbling, accompanied by a slurred profanity or two. Finally Michella's face came into view. She was sleepy-eyed, disheveled, and her face was lit with the sickly blue glow from the screen. Somehow she managed to be as beautiful as ever. A tired smile came to her face.
"Hey Trev," she said.
"Oh, I'm sorry babe. What time is it there?" he said.
She squinted at the screen. "I don't know. I don't have my glasses on. Two thirty, I think."
"I'll let you get back to sleep."
"No, that's okay. What's up?"
"Well... my charter job got cut short, and my other jobs all think I'm gone for another week or so. I figured, since I've got the ship out and about, and I've got my bag packed, and it's been a while since I got to see you..."
"You're gonna come to the convention!" she said excitedly.
"Screw the convention, I'm coming to see you," he said.
She squealed with delight. "When are you getting here?"
"I'll head your way right now. Say... three days?"
"Great! I'll get you set up with a room. VIP access to the rest of the convention. There are some great restaurants here, I'll get reservations and-"
"Just so long as you and I get a little time alone, too."
She let out a low, sultry hum.
"Oh, there'll be plenty of that," she murmured. "My room has a hot tub."
Lex's eye twitched. "I'll be there in twenty-four hours."
Michella giggled. "See you soon, Trev."
"Not soon enough, babe."
She closed the connection. Lex plotted a course that was suicidally direct.
"Let's go, SOB. I've got a date with an angel," he said, punching it into FTL.
#
Back on the surface of Maxis, Garotte and Ma were heading toward the center of town. The place was remarkably earth-like. Gravity was almost precisely 1g. Atmospheric pressure and composition were right where they should be. It was even a similar diameter. The only exceptions were the sun, which trended a bit closer to the red end of the spectrum, and the water supply, which was fairly limited. Due to these problems, it had been low on the list of terraforming candidates. Once VectorCorp installed a new monitored route that ran through that area of space, though, that changed. The decade or so since had seen the first stages of conversion to what the developers referred to as "human compatible micro-environments" begin to take hold. The end result was a bit like the early days of Las Vegas, both in layout and in climate. Tiny, isolated chunks of the planet were lush and thriving, while hundreds of kilometers all around were completely barren desert with scattered signs counting down the distance remaining to the next flush toilet. Currently they were walking down a fairly generic street with little traffic and large, new buildings lining it, many
waiting to be occupied for the first time. The sidewalks and street were wide, built to accommodate a far greater population than they'd managed to attract thus far, but those shops that were open were clean and seemed to be doing quite well.
Garotte, for a man experiencing his first few moments of freedom on a civilized planet in three years, was not happy. The source of his unhappiness was tapping along the sidewalk behind him. Strictly speaking, he wasn't terribly upset at having to take her along. His primary issue was the relative ease at which she had been able to force him to do so. He reached into his pocket, grimaced, and ducked down an alley, angrily beckoning the little creature to follow. When they were far enough from the street to have a degree of privacy, Ma lowered the slidepad to the ground carefully and looked up to him, panting heavily in the midday heat.
"I need money," he stated.
"How much money do you require, for what purpose, and in what form?" she replied from her prepared list.
"Enough to buy a bloody ship, preferably in an electronic format that will not trigger any warning flags. That account you locked would be ideal."
"A secondary account has been prepared and fifteen million credits have been deposited into it. I shall transfer all necessary credentials to your slidepad now," she said, adding with an additional gesture, "Your coarse language is not called for, Mr. Garotte."
"I'm asking a rodent for permission to spend money I've already earned. I'd say that jolly well calls for some coarse language," he muttered.
"Please be aware that funks have exceptional hearing," Ma said.
"I am quite aware." He pulled up the freshly installed identity. "Gervais Pilkington? My name is Gervais Pilkington?"
"Your identity is Gervais 'Gerry' Pilkington of Abingdon, Oxfordshire, England, Planet Earth. You are recently divorced with two children, Richard and -"
"Fine, yes. That is a wretched name."
"- Mildred. You have recently made it to a supervisory role after a seventeen year career as a real estate developer. I apologize, but due to the nature of my current means of communication, I am unable to interrupt a statement once it has started."
"Right, let's get on with this, then," he grumbled.
"Our current location is a town known as New Caldwell. New Caldwell has a leash law. Also, please affix the lanyard of the slidepad to my harness, taking care to make it accessible to me without the requirement of its removal."
"What? Oh, bloody hell," he growled, bending down to apply the leash and slidepad, "There, you've got your damn lead and your damn pad. May we go?"
After experimentally lowering and raising the slidepad, Ma found she was able to interact with it reasonably well. "That is sufficient. Your coarse language is not called-"
"Fine!"
"-for, Mr. Garotte. I apologize, but due to the nature of my current means of communication, I am unable to interrupt a statement once it has started."
Halfway through the unnecessary apology, Garotte felt compelled to inform his associate that he was well aware of that particular speech impediment, but he had a feeling the precise wording he had in mind would have resulted in another linguistic reprimand, and he was in no mood for the resulting loop of frustration. Instead he patiently waited for her to finish, then stormed out of the alley. With a flick of her head, Ma swung the slidepad around the back of her neck like a scarf and trotted along behind him at the limit of the leash.
Garotte walked down the street, slowly shaking off the angry tension he'd developed during his spat with Ma. It dropped away steadily, and as it did, he began to subtly change. His precise, efficient gait mutated into a somewhat more easygoing swagger. He slouched a bit, less trying to hide his height and more appearing to have lackluster posture. The anger on his face was replaced not with the bright, intellectual expression he usually bore, but a look of vague disinterest. His non-leash hand found its way into his pocket, and those people who made eye contact with him as they passed received a short nod of acknowledgment. It was a gradual shift, but over the course of a block, he seemed to have walked out of one identity and into another.
He stopped in front of a menswear shop, squinted toward the sun, sucked his teeth for a moment, then nodded. After tying Ma's leash to a light pole, and earning himself a smoldering look from her in the process, he stepped inside.
"Hello, sir. How may I help you today?" asked the salesman, a portly gentleman in a polo shirt.
"Sun's a bit bright. I was thinking I could do with a pair of sunglasses. Perhaps a decent hat as well." Garotte replied. His accent was still distinctly British, but a few notches more working class.
A few minutes of polite conversation earned "Gerry" a pair of mirrored shades and a straw fedora. He also picked up a few more shirts, a second pair of slacks, and a more fashionable piece of luggage. Swaggering out into the sun, the addition of the accessories completed his transformation. It might not be enough to fool digital surveillance systems, but just about any casual observer would never suspect that this man and the recently escaped convict were even related, much less the same person. After untying Ma, who was panting even more heavily now, he made his way down the street until he reached a city directory kiosk and began to tap through local business listings on the screen.
"Bit of a problem, if you hadn't noticed," he muttered, still in character, seemingly to no one at all.
Ma looked up at him, licking her lips.
"Me? I'm just another bloke. Could be anyone. People will forget me pretty quick. You? You they'll remember. One good reason not to bring you along."
Ma glanced aside, watched someone pass, and then shuffled into the shade of the kiosk. She didn't say a word, nor did she attempt to. Garotte stared at her for a moment, then flipped through a few more listings.
"Knows when to keep her mouth shut. That's something, at least," he muttered to himself.
As they progressed, working their way through town to fill out a list of items that Garotte had decided that he needed, Ma became acutely aware of some of the shortcomings of her current anatomy. Thermoregulation, she noted, was inefficiently handled in an environment with a high ambient temperature such as this. Panting was minimally effective at moderating her core temperature, and had a dehydrating effect, which Garotte had not seen fit to address. A primarily black fur coat was only compounding the difficulties. There was also the matter of waste elimination, which until now had been handled in a reasonably sanitary manner utilizing the same facilities humans used. Since Garotte insisted upon tying her up outside when he conducted his business, it was clear that the situation would need to be handled in the method deemed appropriate for her perceived species. In accordance with local laws, Garotte would be required to clean up after her. Currently, he was sitting inside an air conditioned diner, drinking a lemonade and chatting with the waitstaff. After consulting the resentment level that he'd managed to engender, she decided that this was a satisfactory outcome.
"I'll be sure to try a bit of the frozen custard before I leave," he commented to the waitress as he walked out the door.
"You won't regret it. I've heard of folks coming all the way to New Caldwell from off planet just for a cone from Carl's Creemees. Oh," she said, glancing at the sidewalk, then ducking inside for a plastic baggie. "You'll need this."
"For what?"
She pointed at the edge of the sidewalk, where Ma had left a present for him. The sight of his reaction brought a brief smile to the AI's face. After reluctantly taking the baggie, Garotte stooped down to gather the leavings.
"Don't look so proud of yourself," he muttered before standing up and depositing the bag in the trash.
#
In the fabrication lab of the Purcell's space station, Karter was finishing a demonstration of the fabricator controls to a handful of the commander's engineers.
"Parts inventory here, estimated build time here. You're going to want to keep this database up to date, and sort the input bin reasonably well, or there is going to be a hell of a lot
of slowdown when the arms have to disassemble and catalog the crap coming out of the chute," he explained, pointing at various parts of the screen. "Basically the output is entirely dependent on the input. Once the system knows what it has to work with, you can sort output by maximum number of producible units, shortest production time, etc, etc. Easy as pie."
"And how does one enter in new designs?" asked the head engineer. He was literally wearing a lab coat over a space suit, making him appear to be the final evolution of nerd.
"You ask me and I enter them in, for a price. That's my profit model. Or, more accurately, that's my 'making sure you can't kill me yet' model. The money is just a happy side effect in this case," he said, glancing down at the sidearm of one of his guards. "Hey, is that a Scorpion S-35?"
He reached for it, and instantly was backed against the wall, weapons pointed at his face and arms twisted behind his back. Seemingly unbothered by the manhandling, he continued enthusiastically, like a kid catching sight of a rare baseball card.
"I've never seen one in circulation! They discontinued them almost immediately. One hell of an energy output on those babies, but prone to overheating, right? Fire one too many bursts in a row and it'll leave your hand looking... well, kind of like that."
He gestured with his head to the soldier equipped with the gun. He had a peculiar pattern of scars on his hand that, upon closer inspection, perfectly matched the grip of the pistol.
"You know," he continued, "I'm noticing a few patterns around here. You guys love your experimental stuff. There's the ship you came to Big Sigma on. There's your gun. You want the CME Activator, which is pretty experimental by itself."
"We believe that-" one of the engineers began.
"I know, I know, I know! I got the whole sermon from boss lady. Most of the crazy terrorist leaders/cult leaders I've dealt with don't actually practice what they preach, though. You guys put your money where your mouth is. Which explains why most of you look like burn ward rejects. My god... What does terrorism pay these days? Because I've had a hell of a time finding people willing to test some of my more bleeding edge gadgets. You guys get your jollies using untested technology, I get my jollies making untested technology. This could turn out to be a fairly lucrative partnership for all of us."
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