by Strong, Ray
“Extensions are usually automatic…but not this time.”
“Can we buy her?”
Jeremy shook his head. “They’ve got the bid they want and closed the bidding. They did it without any announcement.”
“Is that legal?”
“For an impound that’s damaged, yes.” Jeremy leaned over the table. “Ms. Hope, as your counsel, it is my responsibility to advise you that a settlement has been offered to you first, not to the station.” He pulled out a link and displayed the offer letter. The sum, in bold, was a fantastic amount of money.
Meriel whistled. “That’s almost enough to buy a new ship.”
“Almost. It’s like they’re trying to discourage opposition.”
“Like me.”
Jeremy nodded. “Or our mutual friend.”
He means Teddy. “They don’t want me to have my ship but will compensate me when they steal her. This stinks.”
“I must advise you that you’ll lose everything if you pass up this offer. If we let the remaining time expire you’ll forfeit your rights, including any remainder from the proceeds. You’ll get nothing. Finding exculpatory evidence in less than three weeks is unlikely, and that information would still be subject to the ruling of the court. And that can never be certain.”
Meriel remained quiet.
“The settlement can set you up, Meriel.”
“You mean buy me off,” she said. She was ready to spit or cry but not sure which.
“As your counsel I advise you to be prudent and take the cash if you cannot meet the court’s demands. Make your peace with this and move on. Lots of people would say you’ve been through enough.”
“It’s not about me, Jeremy. It’s about the kids. They’ve got nothing—parents gone, ship in a graveyard, no future. All we’ve got is the Princess and each other. That bid will not go very far split between eight of us.”
“Don’t misunderstand, Ms. Hope. The offer is to you alone, not to them,” he said.
“But I can’t just take it and run.”
“It’s not the Princess, and it’s not a new ship, but it’s something, even if it is split eight ways.”
“It’s not enough to save us from drifting into danger if we’re alone,” Meriel said. “Did Teddy tell you about when Penny went missing?”
Jeremy shook his head.
“Penny is a real pretty kid—” Meriel began to say.
“It runs in your family,” Jeremy said with a playful smile, but Meriel just tilted her head and did not recognize his compliment.
“People always told Penny that she was pretty, but her folks played it down, hoping that she might not let that define her. Well, on her ninth birthday, she disappeared from a play area on Ross.”
“What about her biotag? Her link?” Jeremy asked.
“I’ll get to that. Anyway, the kids scoured the station for her with no luck. Sam Spurell, Tommy’s little brother, found her. Sam was looking after her because her older brother got spaced on their prior ship. That’s why the Hubbards joined the Princess. Well, Sam knew that Penny wanted something for her mom for Mother’s Day, and a vid might be the thing. He found her just down the boardwalk in a dress-up shop. He called us, and we all rushed there.
“We found Penny in tears. They had her all tarted up with big hair and lots of makeup, so she looked like she was going on twenty years old—unrecognizable. But Sam recognized her. My dad called the station police, and there was a big fuss. Apparently, the shop owner had lured her in with free vids for Mother’s Day. But the shop had a jammer to mask the biotags, and it made her untraceable.”
“EtnaVid?” Jeremy asked, and Meriel nodded. “I heard of them. Lucky you found her in time.”
“Not luck. Family. They closed them down after that.”
“I heard. What happened to Penny?”
“Penny’s mom got her out of there before the shouting and took her and us girls to a legit photographer. They scrubbed her makeup off, washed her hair, and redid her in very subdued makeup with a French braid. She was gorgeous. The photographer offered to introduce them to an agent, and her folks had the good sense to say no. But he kept a copy of the photos for advertising.”
“You saw it?”
“Yeah. It’s still there,” she said. “And Penny has only gotten prettier. You can’t hide beauty like hers. We all know she’s gonna waltz into a white-zone party when she gets older and walk out with a prince. But I’ll bet Sam will be two steps behind him, checking his pedigree.” Meriel took a breath. “We nearly lost her, and without the family, we would have. We’re stronger together, Jeremy. I want this for them.”
“It doesn’t change things with the Princess.”
Meriel tried her pathetic kitten look. “There’s nothing you can do?”
“Not and keep my license to practice,” he said.
Meriel looked as though she was going to say something, but Jeremy shook his head. “I can’t help you if I lose my license.”
Meriel sighed and stared at her uneaten lunch. “How many days to decide on the money?”
“Ten days, ET.”
“Damn. How can they do this? My folks never did anything wrong.”
“Then prove it. Bring the judges a better explanation—means, motive, opportunity. They have nothing but speculation, but it is the most obvious speculation. I’ll do all I can to help.” The link on his wrist buzzed and he looked at it. “Excuse me, Ms. Hope I have another appointment. Please advise me soonest of your decision.”
He rose and they shook hands briefly, but rather than let go, he held her hand and put his other hand over hers. She blushed again at the attention.
“Now, business aside,” he said with a steady gaze, “I did mention that the authorities moved the Liu Yang to the impound dock, yes?” When Meriel nodded he smiled and let go of her hand. “Great to see you again, Meriel,” he said and turned to leave.
Meriel watched Jeremy walk away and thought about what he had said. Of course, she knew that the authorities had moved the Princess. They had just talked about it, and he told her she could not visit legally. Then why would—
The waiter interrupted Meriel’s thoughts with a polite bow. “Pardon me, miss, but is there something wrong with your lunch? I am sure that Chef Pierre would be happy to prepare something special if this is not to your liking. Perhaps an ile flottante or raspberry crepes with crème fraiche?”
She had no idea what he was referring to, but said only, “No, thank you. I’m sure that would be delicious, but I’m just not hungry.”
The waiter frowned slightly and raised an eyebrow, as if forgiving a veiled insult. “As you wish. If I may, we will close for the afternoon in approximately five minutes. If there is anything else I can get for you, please just signal me.”
“Thank you,” Meriel said, and the waiter took her lunch plate, the only fresh food she had been served in her entire life, away untouched.
Meriel looked out at the busy square and the beautiful day and sighed. The settlement for the Princess and her current savings would buy her a vacation on Earth, perhaps in the real Paris, but it would only be for her and only for a little while. And when she left, it would all be gone, every physical reminder of the Princess and her childhood and her family. Everything would be gone forever. Still, I would have something more than I have now.
She pursed her lips. No. This is beautiful, but it’s just an illusion. This is not my life. She would need to prove that the Princess was not a mule and her parents were not drug dealers. But how do you prove a negative? she wondered and rose to leave.
As Meriel walked out of the café, the hologram faded away, and the space became featureless gray walls and ceiling. When the doors closed behind her, the waiters and customers, all mindless androids, lined themselves up against a wall and turned themselves off.
***
Meriel switched back to the “simple black dress” option and walked to the edge of the torus to avoid the security cameras. She boarded a tr
am headed for green-zone—where the regular folks went to relax, and the elites went to tarnish their reputations. Her mission there was simple: score some tranq boost to dispel her nightmares without taking the meds.
Neon holograms flashed outside the transparent ceramic window. Another tram passed in synch with hers every few moments to balance the mass and smooth the microgravity tremors with a compensating angular acceleration. The view was the same from the tram on Runner Station in the Ross 128 system, which was where Elizabeth found her seven years ago, except she remembered the flashing advertisements to be a lifeless gray.
***
There was no color in her life then, and the incessant advertisements and colorful signage of the blue-zone bars and businesses that passed outside the window left no impression on her. She was alone—three years after the Princess attack. Her parents and friends were dead and her sister was light years away.
She knew what she had seen the day of the attack and could not forget, no matter how much she wanted to. The anonymous faces in white jackets with pleasant smiles had told her all the reasons why the Princess attack could not have happened the way she had said, and they complimented her on her rich fantasy life and creative imagination. But the smiles turned cold when she couldn’t align her memories to the stories they wanted, stories of drugs and intrigue that she could never believe. In their notes, her creative fantasies became delusions that had to be controlled by medication.
After months of interviews, therapy, and separation, she doubted herself, and unable to invent a story that made sense to her and them both, she stopped fighting and took the medication.
Now at fifteen, she had no friends and desired none. There was only the job and the biological need to be suitably compliant for the leadership and the young men on her ship. She thought only of her mission to get a part to repair her power loader, without which she would fail her cargo-2 rating and not see the increased income for another year.
Within that lifeless, gray world, a young blond girl bordered the tram accompanied by an older woman who gave her a pathetic smile. From somewhere, Meriel remembered the faces and returned the weak smile, but there was no emotional tug of recognition, and she looked away. It was her sister, Elizabeth, with Aunt Teddy.
Elizabeth sat next to Meriel and took her hand. “I’ve been looking for you, Sis,” Elizabeth said.
“Uh-huh,” Meriel said.
“Where did you go, M?” Elizabeth asked. “I miss you.”
Meriel shrugged. The briefest memory flickered that once in her life, this young girl meant more to her than life itself, but the thought slipped away, and she just shrugged.
A tear rolled down Elizabeth’s cheek. “We’ve been at the same docks, and you never come by,” she said. “You don’t answer my texts any more. It’s like you don’t remember me at all.”
Meriel shrugged again and turned to the window wondering when the blond person would leave.
Reflected in the window, Mariel watched Elizabeth reach out to her. But just before touching the scar on Meriel’s neck, Elizabeth’s hand clenched into a fist and her frown changed to a scowl. She pulled her hand back, opened Meriel’s purse and rummaged through the contents until she found what she was looking for—the meds, Aristopine, the same drug that the doctors planned to give her and the other orphans from the Princess.
Elizabeth held the tube of meds up. Teddy nodded and tapped her link a few times and looked up to check the tram stops. Four stops later, Teddy waved to Elizabeth who took Meriel’s arm.
“Come with me,” Elizabeth said and stood.
Meriel rose reluctantly. “I need to pick up a part for my cruiser.”
“We’ll get that next, but first we need to stop here,” Elizabeth said and led Meriel from the tram and through the green-zone corridors.
Meriel stopped and looked around. “Why are we going this way?” Meriel asked. “I need to fix my cruiser.”
“Mom said you need my help. You want to do what Mom says, don’t you?” Elizabeth said and Meriel nodded. “Well, then we need to go this way. Come.”
Before entering the rehabilitation clinic, Elizabeth dropped the tube of meds in the recycling chute at the entrance.
Elizabeth and Aunt Teddy stayed with Meriel for a week until the meds had flushed from her system, and Meriel finally cried. The meds had helped her push the memories of the Princess to the depths of her psyche and dragged the memories of the kids down with them. Without the meds, it all came back in a rush, but it wasn’t so overwhelming this time, because her little sister had stayed with her through it all. It was there that she learned techniques to control her symptoms, including conscious blinking and contact with the other orphans to keep her grounded in reality.
When Elizabeth told her of the meeting in the tram, when Meriel had just shrugged, it scared Meriel so much that she swore to her sister she’d never take the meds again, regardless of the nightmares.
Her ship had noticed immediately because of her noncompliance and the return of her night terrors. They tried to get her back on the meds and threatened her with pulling her work card and certifications, but after her sister scared her, she knew it was wrong.
Her shipmates didn’t help. “Meriel, just go with the flow,” they had told her. “Take the meds and get along. Lots of us do it.”
At the time, she didn’t know what to tell them and just remained quiet. What was she, all of fifteen and a half? Now she knew what to say: Why take meds to adjust to a world that sucks? It’s seductive to take a vacation from reality for a bit, hoping that things will be different when you come back to real life, but life doesn’t change like that. Instead, make the world adjust to you. You don’t need to be an ass or a bully, but you don’t have to accept the crap either. Our ancestors didn’t stay up in the trees and numb themselves to relieve their fear of tigers; they came down and made spears.
Meriel’s spear was a lie, a disguise. And behind that disguise, Meriel and Elizabeth worked out ways to fool the psych evaluations and drug tests to keep Elizabeth and the kids from having the meds forced on them.
***
Meriel exited the tram and walked to her destination: Heinhold’s, a bar for neighbors and upscale stationers with no business in green-zone. It was dark, discreet, and nearly empty.
She sat at the bar, and a huge bartender with a chin as big as her fist came to her, drying a glass with a towel.
“What’ll it be?” he asked.
“Teddy here?”
Without moving his head, the bartender scanned her and then the room and the door. He put his elbow on the bar and flexed a big, tattooed bicep in front of her while pretending to polish the glass, and then he looked back at her with a cold squint. “What do you want with her?”
“She’ll know. Just tell her that hope has returned.”
“No promises,” the bartender said. He walked to the other end of the bar and picked up a link.
Above the bar, a large monitor displayed the latest news from IGB, InterGalactic Broadcasting, one of the few honest networks out there, and Meriel watched while she waited.
“In business news, LML Corp, representing the Local Merchants League, has added new routes to Alpha Station in the Alpha Centauri system and nearby asteroid habitats. This is a result of the redesigned and rehabilitated stations at Alpha and Proxima Centauri…”
A nicely dressed woman about Meriel’s age sat next to her and interrupted her thoughts. “Hey, spacer, need company?” she said and gave her a professional smile.
Meriel noticed the subtle spacer tattoo on her inner wrist and smiled back. “No, thanks. Bunk’s full, but have one on me.” Meriel gave her a large tip, about a night’s worth. The woman smiled, genuinely this time. She put her hand on Meriel’s arm and then left.
Must have lost her ship or her sailor, Meriel thought. Tough life. That might have been Penny in a few years. Or me.
Meriel returned part of her attention to the monitor and the news.
“
Top news in Sol System, recently elected UNE President Biadez pledged to uphold the United Nations of Earth charter today at his inauguration ceremony…”
The bartender, still on the link, looked back at her and stared for a few moments. Then he turned away. On the monitor, Biadez began his inauguration speech.
“My fellow citizens of Earth, we stand here on the brink of a resurgence of Earth’s influence on the galactic stage after decades of stagnation, a resurgence of the vitality and influence…”
Meriel looked around the bar. A woman in an expensive business suit, her black hair pulled back severely, now sat at a small table. She might have been a CEO or a corporate lawyer. Her glasses shimmered slightly—a heads-up display out of focus for anyone but the wearer. She looked at Meriel with a broad smile.
Other than Elizabeth, this woman was the only person in the galaxy in whom Meriel could confide: Theodora Duncan, her mother’s childhood friend and nav-6 who was so good that she could work any ship, even navy.
“Hi, sweetie,” Teddy said with a smile and signaled for some drinks. Meriel walked over, gave her a hug, and sat opposite her.
Meriel tipped her head in the direction of the girl who had approached her earlier. “What’s her story?”
Teddy frowned and shook her head. “Don’t know. She doesn’t work for me. I don’t have the heart to stop them. They’re all independent. Pimps get spaced around here, and I make sure they know it.”
Meriel glanced back at the monitor on which Biadez continued his inaugural address.
Teddy caught her glance and dropped her smile. “He’s still your hero, isn’t he?”
“Who?” Meriel said. Teddy nodded in the direction of the monitor. “Biadez? Well, yeah, I guess. No one forced him to help us, them, I mean; his foundation didn’t have to help us.” The Alan C. Biadez Humanitarian Foundation had helped them with their medical bills and relocation costs after the Princess attack. The foundation also funded the investigation. “The kids treat him like a grandfather. They still send him Christmas cards. Anonymously, of course.”
