Chapter 8 – I Wanna Be A Cowboy
We made our way back out to the Tac-Bike, pausing in Bulkhead H by some repair crews where a woman sat in the shadows, avoiding the light filtering in from the Day Lights outside in the massive hole Ember had burrowed through the ten bulkheads.
A vampire? Here? They rarely venture above the D or C rings and prefer the shadowed corridors close to the Skin as UV light gives them a nasty sunburn and hurts their eyes. Even star shine from the nearby nebula hurt their eyes at night.
“Ma'am, are you alright? What are you doing here in the corridor?” I asked.
She leaned forward, shielding her eyes with her arm. I often forget how attractive healthy vampires are. Like Gemma, the only Vampire in the Brigade, who taught Defense Against Vampires at the academy. They were hunters before the Exodus and used a glamour that is minor compared to the Fae to put the mental whammy on their prey before they feed. But now, on the ship, they got daily blood rations from Med-Tech.
She backed up a bit, the reaction most vamps had when an Enforcer was around. She pulled out her ration card, holding it up to me. I didn't bother scanning it to ensure she was using the blood provided her and not supplementing it with some illegal night hunting. Her clothing was high end if wrinkled a bit and she had an air of sophistication about her.
I waved her off. “Ma'am?” I still didn't know why any human would choose to become a vampire, it seemed shallow to trade your humanity and life under the lights of the Rings just for eternal youth. Especially with the risk of going feral. But I guess it was like witches and power, as Humans were never meant to have magic, and there was a price. There's a reason most of the stories you hear about witches describe them as old, wrinkled, crones. That power slowly drains their own life-force.
Vamps and Witches were an almost infinitesimal branch of humans when compared to the shapeshifter population, which was still less than one percent of the Human population on the world. Most of the other races didn't bother differentiating between branches.
The woman focused on me and pocketed her blood ration card and stood in that overly graceful manner her kind was known for. She motioned to the group of destroyed quarters. “That was my home... It's gone. The engineers think it will be weeks if not months before they get to rebuilding it. I don't have family on the World and don't know where to go. The shelters in the Alpha-Stack are all full of displaced people and families from the fire.”
I sometimes lose track of the impact which tragedies like this have on the citizens. It is a real toll that affects real lives or un-life in this case. Whoever caused all of this probably isn't even thinking of the people who lost their homes and everything.
I furrowed my brow. “I'm sorry, but I have to ask, you live on the B-Ring? The Fae are kind of particular who they allow in the A-Rings and have a lot of influence on who their neighbors are in the B-Rings. And even though you're a vampire, that still equates to human for them.”
She actually chuckled and nodded. “Very true. But I'm a botanist, I tend their night-blooming flowers by the lake just a quarter-mile from the fire. I have value to them because there are breeds of flowers who shy away from people without magic in them. The flowers don't react to me as I'm not exactly alive.”
Ok, her toothy and sheepish grin, showed a little fang. And the part of my brain that recognizes a predator was pinging. I pushed it down. All Vampires were predators, but so was I, so I grinned back at her self deprecation.
I supplied, offering my hand, retracting my gauntlet. “Knith. Lieutenant Knith Shade.”
She looked at me, cocked an eyebrow and then shook my hand with her delicate looking room temperature hand, being careful not to crush my bones. “You're not afraid?”
“Should I be?”
“No. It's just refreshing. Not many humans dare to speak with us, let alone let us touch them. Unless they're playing out some blood fantasy on the Remnants of course.” She shuddered in distaste at that, though her eyes did get decidedly darker at the mention of fresh blood.
“I'm not many humans.”
“I can see that.” Then she offered, “Victoria Morgan”
I nodded then nudged my chin toward her wrist console, she held it up to me and I typed into the virtual console as I said “This is the contact information for Thase Tanda. A Vampire in Beta-Stack C. He owes me a favor and has a new place. He's a recovering feral but has been off live blood for a few weeks now. He can put you up until your place is re-built.”
She blinked, her eyes going black as she cocked her head. “That's surprisingly thoughtful of you.”
I shrugged. “To protect and serve, ma'am.” I tipped an imaginary hat and she chuckled at me then stepped back into shadow as she said, “Maybe I'll look this Tanda up when night falls.”
I nodded and asked, “Do you need blood until then? I can have a Med-Tech courier deliver some on your card.” A hungry vampire isn't always a safe vampire.
“No, I fed just before the fire last night. But thank you, Lieutenant Shade.”
I nodded and then continued out to the bike. We were three bulkheads away by the time Graz came out of hiding. “You're certifiable, Knith.”
Nodding I verified, “Probably, but she's a citizen too. We can't just pick and choose which people in need that we help. And where were you, micro scaredy-cat?”
She buzzed up to hover in front of my face. “I was nestled down in the promised land. I wasn't scared, I coulda taken her.”
I cocked an eyebrow at the promised land quip, but I didn't doubt her assertion that she could take a vamp. I had seen it with my own eyes once. I had no clue that Sprites could vary the spectrum and intensity of their light except to hide it. She had burned Thase into submission by flaring up in the ultra-violet spectrum.
Then Mother snorted when Graz crossed her arms over her chest, narrowing an eye dangerously. “And did you just call me small?”
I shook my head as we arrived at the bike, and she zipped into my helmet as my visor snapped up. “Of course not, your head is bigger than all of ours combined.”
“Stupid null.”
“Flying rat.”
“Children!”
Graz and I said sheepishly, “Sorry, Mother.” Wait, did the Leviathan just chastise me? Grr, why was I grinning?
“Oh, could you please...” I asked.
“I've already messaged Thase Tanda, reminding him that he owes you, and informed him that Miss Morgan may contact him.”
“One of these days you're going to guess wrong when you anticipate me, woman.”
Mother countered in a chirpy tone, “But today is not that day.”
“No, it is not.” Then I slammed the throttle wide open and we shot toward the Spoke, Graz screaming all the way.
I wondered if the commander of the skin jockeys in the Alpha-Stack was as much a piece of work as Commander Lincoln in Beta. That woman was an old bitter human who was over fifty percent modded. Just one or two replacement parts away from going full cyber like Mir.
Being a skin jockey was hard and thankless work. Cleaning the hull and repairing strike damage or structural weaknesses, spending hours at a time in EVA suits, tugs, and exoskeleton walker rigs out in the vacuum of space. And their careers were usually short, with a high percentage going space-mad, or becoming violent and erratic.
Commander Lincoln was a lifer, so held a lot of clout with the other skin jockeys of the External Maintenance Crews. She earned her place and everyone just put up with her eccentric temper.
“Who's the commander here in Alpha?”
Before Mother answered, Graz said as she tugged my earlobe, “Commander Hardy, a bigger pain in the ass than Mac. He makes sure every trade is to his benefit. Old fart, ornery as hell, like Mac.”
Mother corrected. “He's only thirty-five, youngest of the four External Maintenance commanders.”
Our Sprite companion waved that off. “Yeah yeah, I can never tell with you bigs, e
specially you humans who live lives shorter than a fart in space. You all look the same to me.”
I corkscrewed, throwing Graz flat against the visor. She mumbled from the side of her mouth where her face was plastered to the visor, “Fair argument. Touchy touchy.” I smirked and leveled out as we headed down-ring to D.
“Ornery as hell though? Mother, I'm going to need a warrant for their records if he's going to be difficult.”
She replied absently, “I know a friendly judge who owes me. You'll have them before we reach our destination.”
How does a judge owe her? How does she have her virtual fingers in so many pies? There were so many questions I wanted to ask her, and now I had about a dozen more.
Before long we arrived at what looked like a scrapyard in front of a section of Bulkhead A in the lower gravity D-ring. I knew that Graz and other scavengers would pick through this mess like the ones in the other stacks, eeking out a living selling any viable parts they could salvage from the discards.
I knew behind the huge bay doors on the bulkhead, was a storage and hangar bay that extended all the way to the back of the ten bulkheads to the skin, where dual hangar doors which were like a huge airlock allowed the maintenance tugs out with the pristine replacement parts stored in the massive, cavernous space.
Skin jockeys were paid by the day, as they had almost a revolving door of turnaround. A lot of down on their luck citizens would take the job for a day or two, sometimes making it a full week under the command of the veterans. I saw the lines at the gates every morning in our stack hoping to make quick chit.
The salaried maintenance veterans were usually hardcore and were as likely to scare off the daily workers as the work itself. They often moonlighted as thugs for hire just to keep their adrenaline pumping. I had a run in with a group when I was investigating Lord Sindri. I guess back on old Earth they would be called mercenaries.
I mag-locked the bike by the smaller entry doors, and said to Graz, “If this guy knows you, you might want to keep out of sight. I don't suppose I can get you to stay with the bike?” Her snort was answer enough so I checked my gear, saw the warrant information scrolling in my peripheral vision as promised, and headed inside.
I blinked. The office area was immaculate, not covered with parts and info pads, and food wrappers like our stack's External Maintenance Crew main office. And soothing music was playing. I asked, “What is this music, Mother?”
“Jazz, from the mid-nineteen hundreds.”
I liked it.
A man with an external exoskeleton strapped onto him was asleep in his chair, feet up on the desk. He snorted an aborted snore and then opened his eyes and saw me and quickly stood. He was a young man with roguish stubble on his rock hard looking jaw. His smile was warm and inviting as he said, “Enforcer Shade I presume? The Leviathan AI set up this meeting.”
He gave me the grin of a scoundrel as he looked me up and down. “You're the one from all the news waves a few weeks back. Took down a Greater Fae hand to hand? Your reputation precedes you.”
I liked the man, he didn't seem to take life too seriously. “Yes. I'm here to meet with Commander Hardy, Battalion business.” I tapped my badge unnecessarily.
He held his hands out to his side, beaming a winning smile. “You've found him.”
Blinking, I said down into my helmet, “Really? This is the ornery old fart?”
Graz's voice squeaked out, “Always taking a cut of my profits.”
The man looked at me, cocked an eyebrow. “Is that you in there Graz? You're lucky I let you off the grounds at all, you dust sifting thief. Scavenging the scrap heaps is illegal, and don't pretend you aren't sneaking off with twice as much as you say you're taking. It's all property of the world.”
It was my turn to cock an eyebrow. “Extorting chits from citizens who are illegally scrapping?”
Graz buzzed out of hiding to my shoulder as the two of them blurted out in unison, “Allegedly.”
“Space me now. May the gods grant me patience for lovers and fools.”
The man shrugged and offered, “As of last week, I've got a new mouth to feed.”
I brightened. “You've a child?” The last seven days of Human birth records for the Stacks streamed in my peripheral heads up display, three for the Alpha-Stack, and one from the Reproduction Clinic to keep Equilibrium. “Hmm... none registered to you.”
The man smirked and pointed at a fluffy little bed at the foot of his chair and a ball of fur coiled up in it. “I got a guard dog to keep the riff-raff and undesirables out of the yard.”
Ok, I can't be an Enforcer all the time. I melted and crouched to pet the tiny canine. It stretched and looked up at me. Its cute puppy eyes wide and its little tail thumping. “It's so cute, what is it?”
The man said with pride, “It's called a Chihuahua, I had it grown at the gene bank. Doesn't eat much and is said to be a great mouser.” Mice and rats were a problem down in the D-Rings, how they got loose on a ship built in space, nobody knows. Theory has it they had stowed away on the construction and supply ships or Exodus population transports.
The rodents are a problem with the wire and cable insulation, as they find it tasty. Every effort to contain or exterminate them fails. This is why the lower rings have large cat populations as it seems to be the best way to keep the numbers down on the vermin.
I patted the Chihuahua dog, who had a little bone-shaped brass tag on his collar that read, “Spike,” and its tail sped up.
Each household was allowed one pet if they desired, but no additional food rations. So usually only those who could afford supplemental foods had them, or families would have a smaller pet like this or a cat so that it didn't put too big a dent on their ration cards.
Graz zipped down to the little dog. “This is a dog? It looks like a rat with big ears. Kind of cute though, in an... eep!” The tiny thing lunged at her, sharp little teeth snapping. But Sprite's reflexes are lightning-fast and Graz zipped out of the way, drawing her pointy little blade. “Oh yeah? You want a piece of me? I'll teach you to...”
Dust sifted from her wings when I reached over and twapped her on the top of the head. “Behave, you're in his house.” She growled back at the growling pup and put her blade away.
The Commander was all grins. “Ahh... money well spent. He'll do great keeping the vermin away.” He looked away from the indignant lesser Fae to me. “And to what do I owe the pleasure of your company today, Enforcer Shade?”
“Knith, please. I was needing access to the flight logs and Skin maintenance records for the past twenty-four hours.” I offered my wrist console to him, “I have warr...”
Before I could finish he said, “Of course...” He placed his thumb on the screen to give his authorization.
I finished, “ants...”
He beamed a winning smile. “Anything to help the Battalion. What does this pertain to?”
Ok, this was new, someone being cooperative and not caring about warrants. I usually had to fight tooth and nail just to get someone's com records. Hmm... “And com records for the vehicles assigned to your depot?”
“Of course.”
I nodded in appreciation, and his verbal assent allowed Mother to access and start streaming the records as she started going through them and the flight and repair logs. “We're just investigating the fire up-ring in B, just getting our proverbial ducks in a row.”
He nodded and said, “Terrible thing that. But I thought FABLE detained the Winter Lady for that.”
I shrugged noncommittally. “Like I said, just getting our ducks in a row.”
He looked from me to a set of doors that led to the back, then nudged his chin toward them. “Don't suppose you'd like a tour of the facility? We don't get many visitors who aren't looking for a day job or thieving from the scrapyard. Especially famous visitors. We run a tight ship down here.”
Graz didn't pay attention to the insult, she was busy teasing poor Spike by buzzi
ng past him, daring him to bite her. I told him, “I'd like that, Commander.”
He waved his hand. “Max, please, were both public servants here. I'm sure you'll find some of the streamlining we do here in Alpha is groundbreaking stuff.”
Ok, now he was being facetious. I rolled my eyes at his toothy grin. I liked the man. He wasn't at all like most of the skin jockeys I've met. Leaving Graz behind, we stepped through the doors and instead of the chaos of the Beta-Stack's External Maintenance Crew bay, this one was almost sedate. People moving around in an organized fashion, with drones assisting in the loading and unloading of the tugs and rigs.
Vehicles flying in and out of the giant bay doors at the end in an almost constant cycle. I always forget just how huge the scale panels they dealt with were, at least ten yards tall in a honeycomb shape, towering above us as we walked down the rows.
He pointed out some of the innovations he has implemented to make things smoother and the procedures that had been put in place to streamline any repair call. And even steps they were taking to minimize the dangers to the crews when they went EVA, like keeping the tugs between the exposed workers and the bow-shock of the Worldship, or between them and the nebula, using the vehicle radiation shields as a buffer for the workers.
Call me a geek, but I found some of it fascinating. I admit I never thought of any of it or how it impacted the mental stability or morale of the workers. The skin jockeys just... were. Like the Battalion just was. A fact of life on the world.
He introduced me to some of the veteran crews, but they were prepping for repairs so I didn't get to talk much with them. They seemed more well adjusted than most, though I could see that glint of instability in the eyes of some of the lifers that I associated with those who spent too much time outside the world. Odd the Ready Squadron rarely had cases of space madness. But I'm sure their psychological screening was much more stringent. And they got three months of paid leave per ship-year to decompress.
The hairs on the back of my neck were standing on end just as we were finishing up the tour, I glanced at one of the tugs, and the crew was watching me intently. They looked very familiar, but I couldn't place them.
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