"Such as?"
"Do you recall the names of the first explorer ships which left Earth?" She nodded. "Galactica, Enterprise, Prometheus. Those names came out of the science fiction of the times. The series they came from have all been ported to each new technology, and been redone, and redone, and redone, so many different versions of them now exist, each designed for the technology of the time, or what fiction writers saw as the extension of technology of the time. I collect that stuff. Well, the ones I like, anyway. Too many to collect everything."
I didn't mention why my interest had started, as it was too close to a truth we didn't let on.
"So what were you watching before you left home?"
"Doctor Who." I laughed. "A time travelling alien who kept picking people up from a planet or time and leaving them behind on another planet or different time."
She laughed with me.
A female head poked around the inner door wearing a chef's hat.
"Might I ask how many there will be for dinner, and when you will be requiring it?"
Amanda went rigid. I could see immediately what was wrong. She hadn't checked the suite when we came in. Her posture changed as she realized BA had.
"Anyone else back there?" she asked the chef.
"No, just me."
"Hold on while I ask." She went blank for a moment. "Six for seven."
"Thank you. Would you care for a light lunch now?"
"Yes please," I said.
The head disappeared. A whole chef reappeared shortly after with a tray of various pastries, and another of dessert servings. For the first time I watched as the table materialized in the center of the room, and the food was deposited on it. The chef quietly vanished again.
Amanda and I helped ourselves. I sat in an easy chair with a plate resting on the arm, and started configuring my new pad between mouthfuls.
The first thing I did was link the pad to my emails, and let them download there. Not wanting any sound, I cross-linked the pad's sound back into my PC, so only I would hear whatever sound came from it.
I went looking for, and found, an upgrade for the mail program allowing filtering, and redirection. I set about making junk filters to remove the main junk I was getting repeatedly. After, I created a series of folders for specific topics. The first was for bank notifications, so I had them all easily to hand in one place. I could have done this all on my PC mail program, but a pad was just so much easier for me. Maybe I was some sort of throwback to the twenty first century, when pad usage had begun.
I looked up suddenly.
"Six?" I said, in Amanda's direction.
"The boss is coming."
Ah. I couldn't see BA doing a dinner party, and I couldn't figure who else it could be.
Having completed eating, Amanda headed for the door.
"Swapping, back later," she said as she swept out.
Shortly after, Aleesha came in, helped herself to some food, and seated herself exactly where Amanda had been. If I hadn't been able to tell them apart, and I hadn't seen them swap over, I'd not have known they had. I helped myself to some desserts.
I started through the emails. The Bounty Hunter's guild had sent me a profile update notification. I had a look at it, and found a bronze Ace of Clubs icon, and my five kills listed. I was still listed as flying a Gladiator, but it was noted as being under repair. They really did keep up to date with members. I took a quick peek at the Traders guild and found the same icon showing, also on the Mercenaries guild. The latter had my rank with the Australian sector militia listed. Oddly, the status of that listing read 'detached service', whatever that meant.
I wasn't expecting credits from this morning so soon, but there were a few more bounties from last week. Enough under normal circumstances, it would be plenty to live on for a while, and indicative that the life of a bounty hunter could bring in a decent living, assuming one stayed alive.
Which reminded me, finding out the bounties and information on the fourth pirate had taken too long. I needed to find a faster way of getting such information. I setup a search, and sent it off.
I yawned. The pad blurred in my hand, and I felt myself nodding off.
Aleesha went tense, and I jerked awake.
"Delivery on way," she said.
I became more alert, dragged myself out of the chair, and headed to the door. As I opened it, 'the tailor' pushed in a small grav sled.
"Your new wardrobe, sir."
He quickly unpacked the contents of the grav sled onto the chairs. I picked up jeans, shirt, jacket, and shoes, and headed to the bedroom to change. I emerged a few minutes later grinning. The clothes fit me perfectly, more so than I'd ever had before.
Aleesha wolf whistled me. My grin got bigger.
"Yes," said the tailor, "that will do nicely. Good choices. Projects a certain casual power, if you don't mind me saying."
I went over to the desk. The package beckoned, so I opened it, and found pilot and captain badges. There was no invoice. I picked up the badges I'd been given earlier in the day, and put them all on to both epaulettes on the jacket. Rank on the shoulders, pilot, captain, and kills near the neck. I added my guns to the ensemble to complete things.
"Casual becomes overt power," he added.
He pulsed me the invoice. I activated the drop trigger, and transferred the credits to his account.
"Thank you sir. I hope I can be of service for you again soon."
With that, he steered the grav sled to the door, and vanished through it.
"Nice look," said Aleesha.
"Thanks," I said. "I'm going to go have a nap, and a shower before dinner."
"Enjoy."
I gathered up all my new clothes, finding I had an extra of everything beyond what I'd ordered, and headed into the bedroom. Everything being hung or placed away, I also hung the new clothes I was wearing, slipped into new boxers and sleep shirt, and dived under the covers of the bed. I turned out the lights, and dropped straight off to sleep.
Thirteen
I woke a few hours later with a start. No nightmare, but maybe I dreamed something, as it was an abrupt transition from sleep to alert.
I sat and groaned, feeling stiff and sore, climbed out of bed, padded into the bathroom, stripped off, and stood under the hot water for quite some time. Feeling a bit better, I toweled off, dressed in clean briefs and socks from the dispenser, and padded back into the bedroom, where I put my new finery back on.
I took a long look at myself in the mirror. My bruises had still not begun to fade yet, but there seemed to be less purple, and more yellow than before. Yes, I did look like a pilot. I could hear voices out in the sitting room, so I walked out. Doing so felt really good.
There is nothing like new blue jeans, and the jacket you always wanted, to put a spring in your limp.
All eyes turned towards me. Amanda was back, and Aleesha was still here. Double trouble in the same place. I smiled to myself. George and Alison were here as well. I noticed they were all in casual civilian clothes for a change, and not any I'd seen in the suit list. Talking to Alison, and now interrupted, was a tall woman with greying hair, who exuded authority. She came towards me with a hand outstretched. We shook.
"Nice to meet you at last Mr. Hunter. I'm Annabelle Smith."
The penny in the air staggered a bit, but kept on twirling.
"Likewise sir," I responded.
"Please don't call me sir. Annabelle is fine, or if you want to get official, use Colonel. I don't stand on ceremony though."
"We just call her boss," chimed in Amanda.
"How are you feeling?" asked Alison.
"Not good. Very stiff and sore actually, but I have to admit the new clothes improve things."
"Would you care for a massage after dinner? I'm also the outfit's medic, so I know a bit about injury massage."
"I'd like that, sure. Do you know reiki?"
"No, what's that?"
"It's a form of energy healing. If I only had an injury in one
place, I'd be using it on myself. But being hurt all down one side is a bit much for one to cope with by yourself, unless you have a lot of time and patience, and I've not had either. I can't say I've had much practice, but I'm happy to show you. Combining massage and reiki works well."
"You're on."
I sank into an easy chair, and everyone else settled somewhere too. The table in the middle of the floor was set for six, I noticed.
"What did you think of the Gladiator to fly?" asked George.
"Not a lot. A brick on steroids, I think I told Bob over at the shipyard." We both laughed. "It's an ok fighter, but a real pilot wouldn't touch it, unless there was no other option."
"Why do you say that?" asked Annabelle.
"I'm not really sure," I replied. "Just felt like the sort of ship you give cannon fodder."
Annabelle and George met glances, and both nodded.
"I won't be keeping the one I flew today. I'll probably trade it in on something better. Maybe even get some custom changes done to whatever I decide on. If I get adjudicated the other four I brought in, I'll most likely trade all of them. Mind you, with the bounties I've been showered with, I certainly don't need to worry about the price of anything I decide I want."
I smiled, although it was tinged with some remnants of shock still.
"Did you throw up at all?" asked Annabelle.
"No. Why would I?"
"It's very common for people making their first kill to vomit after."
"I didn't get any time to do that after my first kill, and then I was out for a fair while getting patched up. Besides, I never actually saw who I was fighting. It was all at long range."
"Fair enough. With luck, you'll never need to kill someone at close range."
A white hatted head popped around the internal door, and Alison waved at it.
"On that note," she said, "we should be seated for dinner."
We all took a place at the table, and dinner began. It was the most enjoyable meal I'd ever had. The food was superb, and the company just as good. We chatted about inconsequential things, as if we were old friends. For all I knew, they probably were, despite being a military-style mercenary company. They were interested in where I came from, and I was careful to tell them things only about Outback.
They'd heard about the planet's isolationist policy, and wondered why it was like that. I told them how the planet was originally settled by some spiritual groups who'd suffered persecution in their past. They'd left Earth looking for a place no one else wanted, where they could be left in peace. Outback was right out on the end of the spine, one of the last habitable planets found by the exploration teams, was harsh with few decent living areas, and each group had chosen one such area to live in, away from the others. They chose an isolationist policy, and enforce it for all but five days each year, when they allow people to come and go. At the end of the five days, anyone not on the planet is forced to live on the Orbital station for the next year.
"Are you going back?" asked Annabelle.
"I can't. The five days was up while I was out. I can go back to Outback Orbital, but I've nothing to do there. And getting there could prove difficult for a while anyway. I have a year before I can go home."
Dinner over, we moved to the easy chairs. Very quickly, dinner remains and table vanished, and a highly complemented chef left.
"So what do you intend to do?" asked Annabelle.
"I really don't know yet. There hasn't been time to make a choice. Although it seems the cosmos might have already chosen for me, and I just have to figure out why it was made. Once I can understand it, I can embrace it. In the meantime," I shrugged.
"Would you like to join our outfit?"
I'd had an inkling this was coming.
"Thank you for the offer, but for now, no thank you. I would be happy to work with you though, should you think you need me for a job."
"Is this anything about that prophecy you mentioned?" asked Amanda.
"What prophecy is this?" asked Annabelle.
"It's hard to say. We have a group on Outback called the Keepers. Some say they keep the original documents of prophesy made some six hundred years ago before the exodus from Earth. It's supposed to document some major challenge for human kind. There are apparently a series of pointers to when it will occur, which if tales are to be believed, have been cropping up in isolation for hundreds of years. When all of them occur together, apparently the darkness comes. No-one knows what they mean except the Keepers, and they won't tell anyone. They visited me when I was a small kid, after I had my first recurrence of the same nightmare. They told my parents it was one of the pointers. I'm not sure if I wake up terrified because of the nightmare, or because of what they said about the nightmare. In any case, alone, it's not supposed to mean anything."
"But you can't shake the feeling it's real, and you need to stand apart until your part in the prophecy is revealed?"
"I'm not sure I'd put it that way. Let's just say I don't want to get entangled too deeply with any organization which might stop me from going a different direction, should the cosmos suddenly want me to go. Besides, I'm only just legally eighteen, and that's here, not at home. Back home, you don't choose a life commitment until you're twenty one. Before then, you do what I've been doing, studying, and trying out what interests me. Look how my first choice turned out," I ended with a laugh.
"Boss, both Aleesha and I have both had the same dream. Not at the same time though," said Amanda.
"Maybe it means the three of you are bound in some way. Could be why we all met the way we did the other day."
There came a loud belch from George.
"Pardon," he said. "All too deep for me."
He said it with a smile.
"Can I borrow your suit definition program George? I want to make a change to the outfit you guys wear. I like the style, but not the colour, and I need to add epaulettes and my badges. And since I did get drafted today, I'd better have suit options for military uniforms. Be damned if I'm going to wear real uniforms though. I'm actually hoping I can get out of it."
"You won't need to," said Annabelle. "The General discussed it with me, and he won't be making you part of the normal military. Had you taken up my offer, he would have been fine with it. He'll tell you about it tomorrow."
"I'll pulse you the program later," said George. "Feel free to modify it, but let me have a copy when you're done."
"Thanks, I will. There's probably a civilian market for the suit, and as many variations of clothing as you can make up. Like guild software overlays. I have a few ideas in that direction too. Their information is great, but getting it takes too long. I want to see it on my HUD, heads-up display, without needing to request the data. Shouldn't be too hard to figure it out, and if I do, should be a market for it."
The search I'd sent off had come back empty-handed. I'd have to think about writing an overlay which accessed all three guilds' information, and presented it without needing to do a deliberate search. I made a note to remind me to do it.
"That's a good way to think," said Annabelle. "Bounties are not usually easy to get, and when the credits you have now dry up, and they will if you get yourself a custom ship, since those don't come cheap, anything which can bring in regular income is a good idea. Our last combat pilot had some ideas, but never followed them up."
"Sorry I couldn't help with that," I said. "But you were already disabled when I came through the jump. And the first thing I knew anything was wrong, was when I slammed into the bulkhead, and got dumped on the deck."
"Ouch," mumbled George.
"Yes, hence my interesting coloration these days."
I managed a grin.
"What are your plans for tomorrow?" asked Amanda.
"Meeting with the General first thing. Then I want to look at ship specs. Maybe go back to the shipyard in the afternoon. I'll see how I feel though."
"I'll leave you in the capable hands of Alison and the twins then. Good night all."
With a chorus of "good night boss", she left. George followed straight after. Aleesha also headed out, to check on BA, and give her a meal break.
"The boss liked you," said Alison.
"I like all of you," I replied with a smile.
The remaining two ladies smiled with me.
"Massage?" hinted Alison.
We moved into the bedroom, leaving Amanda to whatever she did when she was on guard duty. I got a pillow off the bed, and placed it at the foot of the bed, and a towel from the bathroom, and laid it down on the bed.
"Right hand please," I said to Alison.
She held it out, and I slapped it hard.
"Ouch," she cried out, "what was that for?"
"Can you feel heat on your hand?" I asked. She nodded. "That's reiki. When you have a flow of healing energy going through your hands, they get hot."
"That's why. I've done massage on wounded team members, and most of the time, my hands got hot. I never knew why."
I grinned at her.
"Back home, the Masters teach it. They have all these signs you're supposed to do with your hands, but I found it's simply the use of energy, with focused intent. You want to heal someone, or help them heal, and it focuses your intent. You call upon reiki healing to flow through your hands, and it does. The flow varies from person to person. Some people flow reiki so powerfully, people get burns if they leave their hands on for too long. I should point out, reiki is usually done with the clothes on. It's not a hands-on thing. Probably because people might get burned. But I found it was useful with massage, as long as you check how hot it is for the person."
"When did you learn this?"
"When I was eight. But I haven't used it much since then. Home is a very spiritual place actually. We get taught a lot of spiritual stuff early on, and are allowed to choose what we practice later."
"So massage, or reiki, or both?"
"Both please."
"Ok, strip down as far as you're comfortable with, and let's begin."
I took off everything except my briefs, and lay down on the towel, head at the bottom of the bed, pillow under my chest and chin. By the time I was ready, Alison had gone into the bathroom, and returned with the hotel's massage gel. She started on my upper back and neck, being very gentle on my bruised side, and not so gentle on the other side. I could feel some heat coming though her hands, and tried to guide her in how to focus the healing energy.
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