by Leslie Chase
Gillian and Harry stepped into their spacesuits and Zardan fastened the mask around his head. The air pumped into it smelled of oil and plastic, but it was breathable. And then Gillian hit the cycle button, pumping the air out of the airlock.
"If there's any problem, tell me right away, okay?" Gillian's voice crackled out of a speaker inside the mask, startling Zardan. Of course she fitted a radio into it, we have to be able to talk, he told himself, trying not show his surprise. Harry's little laugh told Zardan that he hadn't succeeded entirely.
"I will come straight back inside if there is any difficulty," he replied, keeping as much of his dignity as he could. To his surprise, his heart was pounding. What is this, a dragon warrior excited at the thought of seeing the sky? He snorted in amused disgust at himself. I spend a few days in confinement and I lose all sense of proportion.
But when the outer door of the airlock slid open, he couldn't stop himself from laughing at the sight of the stars above. The sky was dark, the sun hanging low at the southern horizon and the twin moons of Mars shooting past in their tight orbits. It was a glorious sight.
All the more glorious that he shared it with his mate. Gillian stood by his side, arm around him ready to support him if he fell. A quick glance aside told him that she, too, was staring up at the beauty of the sky above them.
Together they stepped out of the airlock, and Zardan felt the sense of space around him like a physical relief. Finally, he could straighten up, could stretch, could breathe. Cautiously he extended his wings and hissed in pain at the movement. But he could manage it, and that was the main thing.
Harry dashed past the pair of them, scrambling up a frozen wave beside the farm's landing pad and out of sight over the top. Zardan envied him his mobility — he knew that if he tried to follow he'd fail. But his strength would come back with time and exercise. For now, Zardan made the effort not to worry about the future. It would bring what troubles it held whether he enjoyed this moment or not.
9
Gillian
Such moments of peace and quiet were fleeting for Gillian. Too many worries pressed on her for her to spare the time to relax, no matter how good sharing a moment under the stars with Zardan felt. In fact, in some ways that made her feel worse.
It doesn't matter how good being around him feels, she insisted to herself, trying to put away the thoughts that his presence raised in her mind. He's another man trying to take the farm away from us, no matter what he says. No matter how good he looks, or feels.
Focusing on her other worries wasn't any better. There was still no word from her father, or sign of him. Or of the money he'd taken with him, wherever he'd gone. Gillian and Harry wracked their brains trying to think of any other way to find him, but nothing helped. They'd called every hotel, every port that he might have gone through, and nothing helped.
It was as though he'd reached Fuller Station, sold the ice, and then vanished into thin air. And as unreliable as he'd been the last couple of years, that wasn't like him. Especially as the days passed without any sign of him, and the bank's deadline drew closer.
"Maybe we should hire a private investigator?" Harry asked hopefully, after another day's futile work. Gillian restrained an urge to throw her coffee cup at him from across the room, settling for flipping her pen at the dartboard. It hit with a solid thunk and this time it stuck. I'm getting too much practice at that.
"With what money?" she asked Harry, forcing herself to appear calm for his sake. It wasn't easy. "We can't afford to pay a reasonable fee and anyone who'd take the job for what we can afford to pay... well, I wouldn't trust them to do a good job. More likely they'd just sit on their asses and take our money for nothing."
"There has to be something we can do," her brother complained. "I'm not just going to abandon Dad out there."
"Neither am I, but what do you suggest? All we know is that he arrived at Fuller Station on schedule and sold his ice to Maxine." At least they'd been able to get that much — Maxine Rogers was an old friend of the family, and she'd done her best to help track down their father. Not that it had helped any, but at least they knew for sure that he'd arrived. No one could even confirm that he'd left Fuller.
Where are you, Dad? At the bottom of a bottle in some dive, drinking the farm's profits? That was perhaps the best possible outcome, bad as it would be. At least he'd be alive. Gillian had a hard time thinking about the alternative.
"He's not in the hospital," Harry added. "That's something, right?"
Gillian pursed her lips and nodded, not wanting to point out that the hospital would be good news. But I don't want my little brother thinking that way, it's not a happy thought.
"I can't think of anywhere else he could be," she said aloud. "Whatever happened, he has to have been staying somewhere."
She'd called every hotel in Olympus Colony. There weren't many, people on Mars didn't tend to travel much, but Olympus was big enough to have a few. None of them would admit to having seen their father, though. There were only a couple of places to stay in Fuller Station, and she'd checked there too.
"Maybe he got another ship somewhere," Harry suggested. "I know it doesn't make much sense, there's nowhere else he ought to be going, but it's possible, right?"
"Maybe." Gillian didn't think it was likely either, but she didn't have a better idea. Even if he'd died — and her heart sank every time she considered that — his body would have been found, surely? So he had to have gone somewhere. Maybe he'd left Olympus. Maybe he'd headed somewhere else instead of going to Olympus in the first place.
It didn't help them track him down, though. Olympus was one of the bigger ports on Mars, and from there he could have gone anywhere. Even back to Earth, maybe: Olympus Colony had a spaceport. Tracking him through Olympus's port would be nearly impossible. Maybe if I go there myself?
That was out of the question, though. She couldn't leave Harry in charge of the ice farm on his own. And while the crawler they had left would take her to Fuller, getting to Olympus would mean buying a berth on a skyship, and that took money they didn't have. Whatever they were going to do, they'd have to do it from home.
"I guess it can't hurt to call around and see if anyone at the port saw dad get on another skyship," she said for want of a better idea. They'd already asked if anyone had seen him arrive, but just possibly someone had seen him leave instead. Harry grinned and started to look for a phone number. Then he stopped, looking at his computer screen. Tapping the screen, he shook his head and waved Gillian over.
"Sis," he said slowly, frowning. "There's someone headed this way."
Gillian cursed and pulled up the radar display on her own screen. The ice farm's air traffic radar was cheap and primitive, not really intended for much. It had hardly been needed until the skyships became common, and even now they didn't use it much.
But it worked, apparently. There was a skyship heading in their direction, coming from Fuller.
By the time the skyship had made it over the horizon and approached the farm, Gillian had time to get her panic under control. Just barely, though: the incoming ship wasn't talking, and that worried her. The Trevoir was registered to the Ardashev bank, though, and that was enough to calm her a little. Or at least to drive away the fear of some kind of pirate raid.
Her grip on the shotgun didn't loosen, though. The idea that the bank would send goons to attack them was, on the one hand, ridiculous. On the other, it seemed all too real as the ship came in to dock and extended a pressurized connector to the landing pad airlock. They were far from any kind of law enforcement, and if something happened here she wasn't sure that anyone would even investigate.
Don't borrow trouble, she told herself, looking at Harry. Her brother watched the airlock door with a fixed, angry glare, and no fear that she could see. Gillian didn't want to be the one to put it in his head. Anyway, killing us wouldn't do the bank much good, would it? The deed to the farm would get tangled up in inheritance. I think.
Gillian wi
shed that she'd been able to talk to a lawyer about this mess, but that would have cost money they didn't have. They probably should have had a lawyer look at their situation years ago, anyway, but there'd never seemed to be a pressing need. Each of the family owned a third of the farm, and that seemed simple enough.
"Don't worry, sis," Harry told her. Gillian almost jumped out of her skin — lost in thought, she'd nearly forgotten he was there. "They won't take the farm away from us. You'll see. And if they're here to attack us, then Zardan will protect us, right?"
She smiled at his angry optimism, not wanting to risk asking why he thought that. Better to take strength from his certainty than to find out just how blind it was. Before she could respond the airlock made a grinding sound and the doors started to open.
It took longer than it should, just another system that was running down and needed more work than they'd been able to put into it. It had been years since anyone had used the landing pad or its airlock, after all. Eventually, the doors parted enough for Brooker Danforth to step through the gap, a forced and impatient smile on his face.
"First thing we'll need to do is replace those doors," he said by way of greeting. "Those definitely aren't rated for these conditions, and it'll only get worse in winter."
Gillian narrowed her eyes at his presumption, her hands tightening on the shotgun. She wasn't sure what she'd expected, but the man she'd talked to turning up in person wasn't it. Trying to be polite, she relaxed her grip on the gun and put it aside, taking his offered hand. His grip was almost painfully tight, and he looked into her eyes as he squeezed. Gillian returned the favor, squeezing back hard, and had the satisfaction of seeing the surprise in his eyes when she didn't back down. Working on the farm had given her more muscles than some people expected.
"It's not usually an issue since we don't get many visitors most winters," she said as they took their hands back. It took an effort not to show how much her hand stung, but she wasn't going to give him the satisfaction. "I'm not sure what you're doing here, in fact. It's a long way to come to be told 'no' in person."
Danforth laughed, though there was no humor in it. "You can say no all you like, Miss Willis. Doesn't change the facts of the matter, or the law. We'll be foreclosing on you and taking possession of this farm and it would be better for us all if you were gone by the time we do that. I've come to make that process easier on you."
Nodding to her, he turned to Harry. "Now, young man, I don't believe we've been introduced. My name is Brooker Danforth."
Gillian could see the fury boiling in Harry's eyes, but her brother managed to keep a grip on his temper. "I'm Harry Willis. And you can fuck off."
Well, he mostly kept a grip on it, anyway. Gillian was caught between admiring her brother's directness and being appalled at his impoliteness. In the end, it was Danforth's expression of distaste that pushed her into being more amused than not.
"That's not quite how I'd have phrased it," she said, putting a hand on Harry's shoulder. "But my brother has a way with words sometimes."
Danforth snorted and shook his head. "Is there somewhere we can talk privately, Miss Willis? I have a proposition to make."
Raising an eyebrow, Gillian didn't budge. "I don't think that's necessary. My brother is as invested in the farm as I am, we each own a third of it. Any deal you want to make we'd have to discuss with him, anyway."
Locking gazes with Danforth she stared him down until, eventually, he grimaced and nodded. "Fine. Where can we talk, then? And will your dragon friend be joining us?"
"I don't think that's necessary," Gillian said. She'd asked Zardan to stay out of the way for this meeting. He can be a trump card if we need him, but I'd rather deal with this myself if I can. And if I can't, then he can step in and save the day — he'll love that. "Come into the office and you can say your piece before you—"
"Before I fuck off?" Danforth surprised her by smiling as he interrupted. "Yes, yes, I get the picture by now. By all means, lead on."
The ice farm's office had a small meeting area, one that had gone unused in the years since her father had set it up. Mostly they used it for storage, but there was a table with a computer interface, and more than enough space for the three of them to sit at.
Sinking down into one of the chairs, Danforth put his briefcase on the table and clicked it open with a dramatic flourish. Gillian went cold as he swung it open to reveal not just paperwork but a pistol, too. It was a huge, brutish weapon, and she couldn't believe he was showing it off by accident.
There's the stick, she thought. I wonder what the carrot is going to be?
"As you know, this farm is going to revert to the ownership of the Ardashev Bank when the loan secured on it comes due," Danforth said. Pulling out a contract, he pushed it across the table. "Now, you've made a case that your father was intending to pay when he, ah, went missing a few days ago. That's not relevant to the facts of the case, but out of compassion for your situation, Miss Willis, I've decided to make you an offer for the farm ahead of the deadline."
Gillian picked up the document, read it quickly, and frowned. Danforth wasn't offering much, not compared to the value of a working ice farm and all the money her family had sunk into it. But it wasn't nothing, either. It would certainly beat being dumped in Olympus Colony or Marsport without a penny to their names, which is what she'd expected to happen if the bank took their property.
On the other hand, there was no sign of compassion in Danforth's voice or expression. He was watching her like a shark, and he'd made sure to show them that he was armed. This wasn't done for their good, that much Gillian was certain of. What would this cold-blooded man gain out of offering her and Harry this money? She couldn't imagine that he was doing it to soothe his conscience. It was hard to believe he even had one.
"Why pay us anything?" she asked, putting the paperwork back down. Harry folded his arms, glaring across the table at Danforth. "If you're right about the legalities of the situation, then you're just throwing away money."
Danforth tapped the contract, finger resting on the amount he was offering. "It saves me the bother of a court case. I'd win it, I'm sure of that, but who wants to waste time and money on a lawyer? Just sign the paperwork, take the money, and we're all winners here."
"If it was that clear-cut, you'd not give us anything. No lawyer would take our case if we've no chance of winning."
He looked annoyed, as though he'd not been expecting any resistance. For a moment Gillian thought he was going to lose his temper, and she wondered what he'd do then. Danforth was a big man, and looked like he knew how to handle himself in a fight. Maybe she should have kept the shotgun handy.
Zardan is in the next room, she thought. It was painful to admit that she was relying on him to save her if it came to violence, but he did make her feel safer.
Thinking of the dragon shifter made her realize what Danforth was after. "You want the deed of sale so that it's all final before Zardan gets the Dragon Empire involved, don't you? Why do you care so much about this patch of ice?"
Danforth's face gave away nothing apart from annoyance, but the look in his eyes let Gillian know she'd scored a hit. It was the dragons he was worried about, not the lawyers.
"You don't need to care why I want to give you money," he said. "Just sign. Take the payoff and go. Or you'll get nothing, and still lose your farm."
Gillian smiled with some difficulty. Whether or not it was the right thing to do, she knew then and there that she wasn't going to sell to Danforth or his bank. "You've wasted your trip, Mr. Danforth. Go home. We'll get you the money, I don't know how but we will — and if you try to foreclose on us before that, we'll see how much of a fuss I can make in the courts. Something tells me you don't want publicity, and I think some journalists will like the story."
Danforth's answering smile held no humor whatsoever as he picked up the tablet and put it back in his case. Snapping it shut, he looked at her levelly.
"This is a one-time deal, girl
," he told her. "You won't get another chance at this. Once I've left, you're all out of chances."
Harry answered for her. "We're not interested. Get out."
His voice didn't shake even a little, and Gillian had never been prouder of her brother. He was afraid, she knew that, but here he was backing her up anyway.
Danforth paused for a moment and then turned towards the door. "You want to be careful about who you talk to like that, kid. Accidents happen."
"Are you threatening my brother?" The white-hot rage that flooded her at the idea was a surprise. Danforth's response didn't make things any better.
"Take it however you like," the banker said. "Bad things happen to people who cross me, and you're way the hell out in the middle of nowhere. What would you do if there's a fire, god forbid? You ought to think about your family, especially now that your parents are both gone."
He strode out of the room and back towards the airlock as though delivering threats like that was a perfectly normal part of his day. Gillian resisted the urge to throw her pen at the back of his head, though it wasn't easy. Hurting him will only make things worse, she repeated to herself as she got up to follow him out.
The walk back to the airlock was icily silent, and Gillian was glad. Her temper was frayed enough that she didn't trust herself if he'd provoked her anymore. If she did anything to hurt him, she was sure that at best he'd use it against them in court. Or, worse, as an excuse to fight back — she didn't know who else he had on board that ship.
10
Zardan
While Gillian met with Danforth, Zardan decided to do a little investigation of his own. The human had come a long way for a meeting that he could have had over the radio, and Zardan had to wonder why.
Let the humans talk, he thought with a smile as he made his way to the docking bay. I'd be no good in there, and I doubt either of them will get anywhere, either. Gillian isn't selling, and Danforth isn't going to let her out of the trap he's got her in.