Lost Valor

by Kal Spriggs

  I writhed around on the ground for what felt like forever, finally able to draw in a soot-tainted breath. I crawled out of the pile of ashes and slag, rolling onto the floor, my ribs screaming at me. Ted had crawled a short distance, on his hands and knees, staring at the far wall. It took me a moment to realize that I could see. I took a shuddering, gasping breath and looked in that direction, having to shield my eyes a bit from the light.

  It wasn’t artificial light, I realized. It was daylight. A sort of dreary, rainy daylight, but it was real, honest to God, natural light.

  I crawled towards that light, shaking off the singed rags on my hands, throwing off the dirty, nasty towel. I ignored the jagged pain from my ribs.

  It was a sort of low doorway, probably designed for hauling out carts of ash from the incinerator. It was open, a rusted-out door on the ground next to it. I crawled outside, feeling cool, rain on my skin. I tilted my head back, wondering at the sensation. The drops that landed in my mouth tasted bitter. I spat and then rolled over, lying on my back under the open sky. I was free.

  Well, free as long as I could stay that way.

  Staring up at the sky, a number of buildings seemed to loom over me. I was lying in an alleyway or narrow street between two of them. Looking either way, I could see more such buildings. They were tall, ugly buildings, with numerous ledges and additions, all of them box-like and the same ugly dark gray. The bitter, dreary rain continued to pour from the sky. I wondered where all the water ran to and just how much rain there could be. It only rained up near the polar sea on Century, and then only at night, or so I’d been told.

  Ted crawled out next to me and he knelt there, staring around with a wondering expression. “Who would have thought, it worked...” He shook his head, clearly dazed. I could still barely hear him through the ringing in my ears.

  I sat up, hissing in pain and I froze in place halfway up and in too much pain to flop back or sit up. He reached out a hand and helped me. We both staggered to our feet, looking around.

  The dark, murky alley we’d found ourselves in was littered with trash. A stream of foul water ran down it, puddling at the far end near what looked like a drain. It was paved in the same dark concrete or fused material as the buildings around us. The surface was rough and looked almost black.

  At the end of the alley, there was a street and I could see people and ground vehicles moving there. My first impulse was to call out for help, but a squashed that immediately. If a pirate like Wessek operated out of this place, then he most certainly had support. It was just as likely that any authorities would turn us over to him as help us, I figured.

  Back the other way, the alleyway twisted out of sight, with other structures blocking it off. In the distance, I saw a tower or spire rising up towards the low-hanging clouds.

  Ted and I stumbled out to the street, pausing at the alley’s entrance. The streets weren’t exactly crowded, but there were still more people than I’d ever seen in one place. There were hundreds of them, many of them with their heads down, hands in the pockets, not making eye contact. A man in a cloak and business suit with a high collar nearly ran into me and he shot me a sour look, “Beggars,” he scoffed, “out of the way.” He waved a hand and I took a step back as he swept past. I was too shocked to be angry, to disoriented and in too much pain to really understand what was happening.

  “We need to get out of here,” Ted jerked a thumb upwards and I looked up at the building above us. Fifty meters or more above us, smoke billowed from the side of the building. And now, as I listened, I heard the sound of sirens approaching. We’d blown out part of the tower and the enforcers, or whatever this planet had as police, were on their way.

  I nodded and we sort of merged into the flow of traffic. There didn’t seem to be any logic to it that I could see. Cars and pedestrians both moved through the streets. Most of the ground vehicles I saw were either big, heavy utility vehicles making deliveries or else ragged-looking vehicles that seemed to carry far more people than they’d been designed for.

  Ted and I had to frequently move out of the way of vehicles. There were no walkways for pedestrians, and vehicles wove their way through the crowds, sometimes nearly smashing us against the walls of the buildings.

  I watched one of those vehicles drive past, a low, four-seater, which had six people in the cab and six more clinging to the roof. I noticed the lights were on and realized that it was starting to get dark. I wasn’t certain if that much time had passed or if Wessek had us on a different schedule from the area of the planet we were on. Either was possible. For that matter, Drakkus might not rotate anything like Century, much less Old Earth’s twenty-four-hour day.

  “We need to find some shelter,” I told Ted. I realized that I was shivering from being cold and wet. My ribs throbbed with every step and my shoes, the only bit of clothing I had from Century, were soaked through with the nasty water that made puddles up and down the street.

  He looked around and then pointed down an alleyway. “This way,” he seemed remarkably confident. We went down that way for a distance and then Ted pointed in at a low doorway. It was just like the incinerator room we’d escape through, though this one still had a door. Ted pulled the hatch aside and it groaned noisily, but no one came to investigate and we stooped, me hissing in pain, to walk inside.

  It was much warmer than outside, though the soot and ash made me cough. “This can’t be healthy,” I choked out.

  “Better than freezing outside or catching something,” Ted coughed back. I couldn’t argue, but I felt like there had to be a better place to shelter.

  Ted plopped down, putting his back to the wall. “We’ll need to watch ourselves out there,” he said in a low voice.

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “I grew up in Nashik, down in the southern hemisphere, back on Century,” Ted answered in a low voice. “You see stuff like outside, in the worst parts of the city down there.” I stared at him, not understanding.

  “Desperate people,” He explained. “Poor people. There’s folks we walked past out there who would kill for their next meal... who probably already killed for their next meal. Or their next hit of drugs.”

  “We don’t have anything,” I countered. I was surprised by this turn of things, from Ted of all people.

  “We have those Drakkus Marks, and we don’t know how much those are worth,” Ted countered, keeping his voice low. “And the ration bars. And our clothes, for that matter.”

  The warmth from the incinerator was drying us out, but I was pretty sure we were both going to be filthy. I supposed that was good, given what Ted had said. The poorer we looked, the more ragged we looked, the less likely someone would try to rob us.

  I coughed as the ash burned the back of my throat and then bent over, hugging at my ribs. “I hadn’t realized you grew up in Nashik,” I said, trying to distract myself from the pain.

  “My parents got us out as soon as they could,” Ted murmured. “My dad got a job in New Provo, my mom got one after we moved there. They really pushed education on me, said that was what would make the difference, what would make it so I never had to live... like this.” He hugged himself, looking miserable.

  “We’ll get you home,” I coughed. “Back on Century, you could go back to Champion Enterprises or go to the Academy...”

  “Yeah, sure,” Ted put his head back against the wall behind him. He closed his eyes. “We should sleep.”

  I couldn’t argue with that. I lay back, closing my eyes. I thought that the pain, the stink of the ash, and the worry and fear would keep me awake. Instead, I was asleep before I realized it.

  ***

  Either the night wasn’t very long or I was more tired than I’d thought. Dingy gray daylight came through the low door to our shelter soon enough. I sort of remembered clattering and rattles as ash and debris fell down from the incinerator above us, but I’d mostly managed to sleep through it. Now, though, the noise of the city intruded so much that, like it or not,
I was forced awake.

  I was still wet from the rain outside. I was covered in ash and grime from my descent through the other incinerator and sleeping in the ash room from this one hadn’t helped. I tried to sit upright and gasped in agony as I moved. My ribs felt like they were made of fire and were trying to burn their way out of my body. I fought through it, taking a hissing breath as I got to my knees and then my feet.

  Ted opened his eyes and looked over at me. His expression struck me as odd. It was as if seeing the city streets had brought out some other part of him, some part he’d buried so deep that even captivity by pirates hadn’t awoken it. “We need to get you some medical attention,” he noted.

  “Sure, let’s just go find a hospital and tell them we’re two escaped slaves and I got injured escaping,” I said sarcastically.

  He snorted at that. “Yeah, probably not the best idea. But there’s street doctors, people who might be able to do something. I don’t really know what you do for injured ribs.”

  “Rest, try not to physically exert yourself,” I answered. At least, that’s what they’d taught us during Academy Prep Course. “Ideally, get quick heal. Cracked or broken ribs take weeks to heal, longer if you’re active and putting more strain on them.”

  “You think they’re broken?” Ted asked in surprise.

  I reached down and touched one of the areas that hurt the worst, then hissed in pain. “Yep,” I grated out.

  “Sorry,” Ted looked a little sheepish.

  “It’s not your fault, stupid grate caught me is all,” I lied. Ted had jumped early by my guess. If he hadn’t hit me at the grate and then landed on top of me at the bottom, neither of us would have been injured.

  “We need to find information, figure out where the spaceport is, see if we can buy passage out of here,” I changed the subject.

  “That’s going to be hard,” Ted noted. “We don’t have any forms of ID or travel papers. Some star systems, you can’t even get into a spaceport without travel papers.”

  “Yeah, well, it beats living out the rest of our lives here, doesn’t it?” I snapped back. Ted looked a little hurt. “Look,” I went on, “We need to go out and find out what we can.”

  “We should eat and drink,” Ted shook his head.

  “We can eat later—”

  “If someone sees we have food and clean water, they’ll try to take it from us,” Ted interrupted. “We’re safe here, eat and drink now.”

  I bit back a retort. He might be right about that. I just hated to defer to him. I didn’t trust his judgment. Still, it wasn’t like I had a better option. I opened my satchel and pulled out a ration bar. We had twenty or so of them, plus the two plastic Drakkus Marks. We didn’t know how much it would be to buy food, or to buy passage home. We had two bottles of water that I’d filled in the lab before we’d left. I broke the one bar in half and passed him half. Ted didn’t argue, he just gave me a nod.

  Other than those ration bars, I had my notebook and a couple of pens and the datapad with my parents’ research, plus we both had a pair of picks. On thinking about it, I pulled out the picks and passed one over to Ted, tucking the other through the top part of my pants. The weight dragged at them, but if Ted was right about people in the city, I wanted to have a weapon of sorts at hand.

  The ration bar tasted like cardboard and the ash and soot in the incinerator room didn’t help. I choked it down and then washed it down with a sip of water, passing the bottle to Ted, who took a couple small sips as well.

  Then I closed up the satchel and stooped to leave, forcing myself to ignore the pain in my ribs as I did so.

  It was no surprise to me that it was raining outside. The cool drops had an oily feel where they struck my skin, though whether that was from the grime that covered me or because the water was contaminated, I didn’t know. Moving down the alleyway, we came back to the main street. Wandering around randomly didn’t seem like the best option, but I didn’t see any other option. I nodded at Ted and we walked down the street for a bit. The crowds got worse for a bit and then we entered some kind of market. There were street stalls everywhere and, from what I could see, they were mostly selling junk. There were parts and equipment for vehicles, ragged clothing, bits of electronics like datapads and comm gear with cracked frames and screens. It wasn’t the kind of thing I would expect someone to pay for, but there were people exchanging goods, bartering for it or occasionally passing plastic chips of the local money.

  We came across a stand selling cloaks. Most of them were just patched-together out of sections of tarp or even just rags. “How much,” I asked, pointing at one that might fit me.

  “You couldn’t afford it,” the vendor scoffed. “Get out of here, you thief, or I’ll have you beaten.”

  I fought down the urge to flash the money I did have at him. It was a near thing, though and I turned away, boiling in rage. My parents hadn’t been wealthy, exactly, not even by Century’s standards, but we’d never really been poor. Sure, we’d lived under a water ration and we’d eaten vat-grown meat, but you had to live that way when you lived down near the deep desert. To be treated as if I had nothing, and waved off and threatened, to be accused of being a thief…

  I limped away and the cold rain running down my back as I walked was one more reminder about how even here at what looked like the bottom of things, there was still a social structure. I was at its bottom.

  It was a tough pill to swallow, especially as I limped along. I had no resources, no family, no friends besides Ted. I was on an alien world, far from home. I had nothing but what I carried and that was a pitiful amount.

  I was poor. I was destitute and I was lost.

  I remembered a quote then, one I’d liked in some of my history classes. “To this we pledge our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.” It had been a statement about fighting tyrants, if I remembered right. A war of revolution fought back on Old Earth. I had no fortune, I didn’t think I could afford to have honor. I didn’t even know if I had a cause.

  I was loyal to Century, but from what I understood, Wessek and his boss had some kind of deal with the Enforcers, maybe with some of the government back home. That meant that what they’d done was, if not sanctioned, then at least accepted. They’d murdered my family and the Enforcers had let them do it.

  For the first time, I asked myself if I really wanted to go home. As I walked through the cold, miserable rain, it was a question that clung to me and didn’t want to let go.

  ***

  Chapter 10: And Just Like That, I Joined A Gang

  We ran into trouble when we tried to leave the market.

  A pair of skinny boys moved to block my path. If I weren't injured, I figured I could have taken them both on myself, but they weren't alone. Three more of them came out of the crowd around us. As it was, I didn't know if Ted would even fight and I was injured.

  “This is Crooked Dagger territory,” the biggest of them told us. He had spiked hair and spots on his face. Like the others, there was a big white dagger painted on his pants, shirt, and jacket. “You're trespassing.” I assumed that was some kind of gang or something, but I wasn't sure.

  “We're just walking,” I said.

  “You're casing the market, looking for stuff to steal, we saw you,” their spokesman jeered. “The vendors here pay us to keep thieves like you out.”

  “Look,” Ted began, “we aren't looking for trouble...”

  “Give us what you got and maybe we let you walk,” their speaker snapped.

  “We don't have anything,” I snapped back.

  “Give us the bag, hongre,” one of them pointed at my satchel.

  That wasn't happening. Without food and water, we were as good as dead.

  My hand went to the pick I'd tucked in my pants. My ribs were aching and I could barely stand up straight. I didn't like the odds and I could barely walk, much less fight. For that matter, I didn't want the police to be called, because at best they'd arrest us and at worst they'd turn us
over to Wessek, assuming he was still alive.

  The five Crooked Daggers stepped forward. One of them began swearing at me, while two of them began slapping themselves on the chest. They were working themselves up to attack us and the best time to hit them was before they were ready. I tensed up, preparing to attack, when a calm voice cut through their patter.

  “Francis, are you waylaying kids in my territory again?”

  The five Crooked Daggers spun, clearly taken by surprise. A group of seven youths stood behind them, emerging from an alleyway only a few meters away. At their head was a tall, blonde-haired girl. She and the others wore patchwork cloaks, sewn with bright colors and bits of metal patched into it as armor or decoration, I wasn't sure which.

  “My name is Frankie, Jonna,” Francis snapped back, “this is none of your concern.”

  “Wastrel Market is my territory, Francis,” Jonna gestured back at the stalls and the crowd, many of whom had paused to watch.

  “Some of the vendors here pay me for protection,” Francis hissed.

  “Then we're going to have to make it clear to them and the rest that they made a bad investment,” Jonna answered. “You're trespassing, you and the Crooked Daggers are pushing in, well, we're pushing back. Shove off.”

  I saw the leader of the smaller gang tense up, considering whether or not to fight it out. It was five to seven, but that wasn't totally bad odds. I could see him thinking it through, coming to the decision that fighting and losing presented less risk than just backing down.

  I pulled out my pick, because if this was going to be a fight, I knew it was better joining in on the side that wasn't trying to rob us.

  The leader of the other group, Jonna, pulled out a length of cord. I saw her drop a stone or something into it and then she spun it quickly, the thing making a whistle as she whirled it. “Back down, Francis, this isn't a fight you'll win. It's nine to five.” She nodded in my direction.

  Francis and his gang seemed to have forgotten about Ted and I. His lips went in a hard line and he looked between me and Ted, then back at Jonna. “They're with you, then?”