Zero

by J. S. Collyer

“I'm certain, Colonel,” Hugo lied.

  “I think some more routine reconnaissance is in order for you until you find your feet.”

  Hugo ground his teeth together in his head. “Yes, sir.”

  “What does Webb have to say about the situation?”

  “He agrees with you, Colonel. That it was too soon for me to engage in fieldwork.”

  The colonel nodded. “I will contact you when we have the next assignment, Hugo,” he said. “Until then, work out how to get your head in the game, and quickly. I can play this one down to the admiral but if it happens again I won't have a choice but to let her know you are not fit for this position.”

  Hugo ducked his head, feeling heat flush his face. “Yes, sir.”

  “Right. Dismissed, Captain. You will hear from me in due course.”

  “Yes, Colonel,” Hugo said, and his wall display went black. He sat down on his bunk and rubbed his face, willing the anger to subside. “Hugo to bridge,” he muttered when he was a little calmer. More's face appeared on the screen.

  “Yes, Captain?”

  “How are we doing?”

  More paused and turned to look over his shoulder. Hugo could make out the sound of cursing in the background. “I think Webb's almost ready to go, Captain.”

  “I'll be right out,” Hugo said with a sigh then made his way to the ship’s exit hatch where they were getting ready to help Webb leave.

  “You're making a big mistake, Hugo,” Webb mumbled. He held the leg with the ankle brace at an odd angle and one arm was strapped up to his chest inside his jacket. He had another baseball cap pulled down low over his bandaged face and he leaned heavily on Bolt.

  “Commander, I'd rather manage without you for six weeks than let you stay and it take you ten weeks to get back on form.”

  Webb shook his head but then just hung it, swaying slightly. Bolt caught him by his jacket.

  “You are to stay in your pod and recuperate. Rami has someone who can check on you.”

  “Come on, Zeek,” Rami said, laying a hand on his shoulder. “Let's get you where you can lie down.”

  Bolt and Rami steadied Webb as he limped off the ship and down the ramp into the docking bay. Hugo watched them go and saw Webb attempt to straighten himself as they reached the exit into the colony.

  “Orders, Captain?” More asked as Hugo stepped back onto the bridge. He resisted the urge to rub his temples. His arm and head were pounding. Every muscle burned and his eyes stung with exhaustion. He sensed Kinjo looking at him and straightened himself.

  “We need to get away from the Lunar Strip as soon as we can. About the only advantage we have is that no one knows we saw Fitzroy with Gabor. Like Rami said, it's best we keep up the pretense that we know nothing about any potential LIL involvement. If they're not on guard they're more likely to let something slip.”

  “Where do we go?”

  “Sir,” Kinjo put in. “There are merchants around this area of Lunar 5 that have good connections with Haven.”

  Hugo blinked at her. “Are you trying to frighten me, Midshipman?”

  “I mean they always have a good supply of high-quality, budget ship and machine parts. The sort that are hard to come by on the Sunside colonies.”

  “I didn't think anything was hard to come by in the Sunside Strip,” Hugo muttered.

  “You'd be surprised,” Kinjo said.

  “If we're to keep up appearances, Captain,” More said. “Best we look to be heading away from the Lunar Strip for a reason.”

  Hugo peered from Kinjo to More and back again. “These parts and the people that buy them...are they legal?”

  Kinjo shrugged. “More or less.”

  Hugo sighed. “Pick up a consignment of whatever you think would sell best in Sunside. Can you get enough to keep us in business for a few weeks?”

  Kinjo nodded. “I think so, Captain.”

  “Do so. More, have everything ready to move out as soon as everyone's back on board.” There were a series of acknowledgements and soon it was only Hugo and More left on the bridge. Hugo stared out the viewscreen at the interior of the dry dock, the ache from his own healing injuries a dull veneer over something much grimmer.

  “Is there no-one on our side?” Hugo didn't realise he'd spoken out loud until More responded.

  “In my experience, sir, there are no sides. Just things you know and things you don't. And people you trust and those you wouldn't lend a spanner to.”

  Hugo swallowed. “Do you think the crew trusts me?”

  “Do you trust us?”

  Hugo looked back at More. His dark eyes calm. “I suppose none of us have much of a choice,” he murmured.

  More gave a small shrug and turned back to the controls. “I suppose that will have to do for now.”

  Hugo watched More go through pre-launch checks and scans until Rami and Bolt returned.

  “How was he?”

  Rami shook her head. “Not happy. But I believe you've done the best thing, Captain.”

  Hugo nodded, ignoring the claw of guilt that hooked itself into his stomach. “Did you remind him to maintain comm silence?”

  Rami nodded. “He's not daft enough to give his position away when he's this vulnerable. At least, not quite.”

  “Good work, Lieutenant. Be ready to move out. We're heading to Sunside..”

  VI

  The incident at AI was reported on the inter-Orbit newsfeeds as an unprovoked terrorist attack. Gabor, face grave, urged the Service to do their utmost to find the culprits responsible and bring them to justice. Hugo always switched off before they reeled off the names of the dead.

  There was no change that Rami or Spinn could find in the flow of credit or labour between AI and the Lunar Strip. Fitzroy's official schedule had him at Governor Cho-Jin's side on board the moon's flagship the Tide, en route to Sydney for a summit. There was nothing official about his impromptu trip to Old Europe and the AI base.

  Rami used her fake profiles on underground and illegal message boards and rumour forums to track through all solarnet discussion of groups supporting the re-introduction of an independent Lunar State, but found nothing that she would describe as out of the ordinary.

  “There are always troublemakers on these boards, Captain,” she said, scrolling her way through a discussion that made the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. “Disenfranchised sorts blowing off steam or craving the thrill of feeling powerful. But they're like surface rust on the hull: they're more often than not superficial. Only rarely does it go any deeper.”

  “Is there any mention of LIL?”

  “Only in relation to McCullough's Revolution.”

  None of this however, comforted him.

  Hugo accompanied the team on the first few ventures into the Sunside colonies, but quickly learnt he was still a long way off getting his head around the subtleties of underworld wrangling. He didn't let himself ponder too long on whether this was because he was slow to learn or just didn't want to.

  He sometimes found himself useful just hanging by the Jeep with a dark look on his face, but this seemed to send things awry as often as it helped secure a deal. After the first few meetings he insisting on regular reports but resorted to staying aboard the Zero or pacing around whatever docking bay they were berthed in, overseeing routine maintenance on the ship.

  They never stayed for long on any one colony. The Zero had points scattered all throughout Sunside and they checked in with virtually every one, parts in hand and ears open for gossip. Hugo looked up whenever anyone returned to the ship, only to be met with shaking heads. The mounting impatience and continued uncertainty made him itch.

  “Give it up, Captain. You ain't gonna find anything.”

  Hugo looked up from the data he'd been skimming through on the arm display of his command chair to frown at Bolt, who was sprawled on the deck, shoulder-deep in an access panel.

  “You carry on with your work, Crewman, and I'll attend to mine.”

  Bolt's sigh ec
hoed in the cavity. He extricated himself and sat up, wiping his hands on an oily cloth. “If there was anything to find on this whole LIL thing, Rami would have found it, sir. Believe me, if there's trouble out there, you don't need to worry about tracking it down. It'll find us.”

  Hugo gave the crewman a heavy look for a moment longer before sighing and leaning back in his chair. Bolt lay back down and crawled back into the cavity, muttering. Hugo stood and went to his cabin to lie on his bunk and once again stare at the bulkhead.

  ɵ

  The days slipped into weeks, one docking bay after another, until they were a blur. The burning frustration ebbed to a dull ache. It felt like it had been a year later when they reached Sunside 5 with the last of their supplies. Hugo had taken to sitting in Webb's seat, even though More was perfectly capable of piloting on his own, just so he felt more engaged. No one said anything as they approached the huge wheel-shaped colony, gleaming a burnished silver against the inky blackness of space. Sunside 5 harbour control assigned them a docking bay and Hugo went through the now familiar docking routine whilst watching Rami's face.

  “Does it feel like coming home, Lieutenant?”

  Rami didn't look. “It's not home, Captain. It's just where I was born.”

  He watched out the viewscreen as Sub, Bolt and Kinjo drove the Jeep across the bay and out the gate and onto the exitway into the colony.

  “I'm going out,” he said after standing and staring at the closed gate for the time it took for his frustration to reach a peak. “I'm on the comm. Rami, you have the bridge.”

  He retrieved his remaining gun and left, passing through the walk-through exitway gate with only a cursory glance from the customs guard. The Servicemen with automatic rifles didn't even glance at him. He blinked in the sudden light as he stepped out into the colony. The metal ceiling arched hundreds of feet above him, so distant and pale it was almost like a sky. Sunside 5 was, if anything, even warmer than the others. It also smelt cleaner. It wasn't Earth but it was as close as he'd known a colony to get. He shed his coat before going any further.

  He let the foot traffic on the walkways whisk him along, trying to ignore the ache from his arm and the tension of the inactivity that cramped up his neck and shoulders. He was concentrating so hard on not thinking about any of it that it took him a moment to realise what he was doing when he paused at a public comm booth and had to stop himself from dialling his parents' number at Service Headquarters. He stared at the list of inter-Orbit call prices on the screen, then made himself move away.

  Pulling his head up, he looked around at another prosperous shopping quarter. Buildings were large and well maintained, paved walkways weaving between them. The traffic on the groundway was almost entirely hovercraft. A few shuttles hummed by on thin rails above his head but there were no skyways cluttering up the space between the buildings. Artificial trees were set at intervals and he thought he could glimpse the green of a park down one of the side streets. Almost as prevalent as the greenery were the security booths at every corner, armed Servicemen at each one.

  He took himself across the groundway and into a café on the other side, ordered a coffee and sat himself in a corner by the window where he could watch the colony life roll by. The waitress brought him his coffee with a none-too-subtle glance at his scruffy spacer clothes and then left him alone. He sat there until the night cycle started to draw in and the café emptied out. Soon it was no one apart from himself and one woman sat a couple of tables down, also clad in a flightsuit, nursing a coffee cup and staring at nothing.

  He drained his cup and the waitress shooed him out. Ignoring the heavy feeling in his shoulders, he turned back toward the docks. The walkways were empty. The quiet was only broken by the rattles of shop shutters being secured for the night. The Servicemen turned lights on in their security booths. Hugo eyed one as he passed, the familiar grey and black uniform jolting something inside him, then ducked his head and carried on.

  As the light dimmed the streets emptied and the silence thickened. He was still some way from the docks when he became aware of a footfall behind him. He turned in time to see a shadow disappearing round a corner. He frowned and waited but no one appeared. He saw a Service officer across the way looking his way and moved on.

  He passed a brightly lit entrance to an apartment block and heard it again. He made himself move a couple of paces further on then turned and caught a glimpse of the spacer from the café just before she melted into the shadows again. He peered at the spot where she disappeared, resisting putting his hand to his gun. The Service officer was still watching so he resumed pacing as casually as he could then stole down the space between the apartment building and the closed-up retail block next to it. The alley was clean, but dimly lit. He paused at the end but no one followed.

  “Hey there.” Hugo swore and spun, tried to pull his gun but found himself slammed against the wall with a hand pressed over his mouth. “Shut the fuck up, will you? Want to bring the trigger-jockeys down on our heads?”

  Hugo blinked through the spots dancing in his vision into hard green eyes under a mop of mustard-coloured curls. The spacer grinned, glanced down the still-empty alley and let him go.

  “Come on,” she said, dragging him behind the building by a handful of his jacket.

  “Let go,” Hugo growled, still fumbling for his gun.

  She loosed her hold when they were out of sight and looked him up and down, arms crossed and brow clouded. “Where's Webb?”

  “Who are you?” Hugo said, finally managing to draw his gun and level it at the spacer's head.

  She raised her eyebrows at him. “Come now, Hugo,” she said. “Let's quit playing about. I need to speak to Webb. Where is he?”

  “How do you know who I am?” Hugo said, gun held steady.

  The woman rolled her eyes. “Honestly, Hugo. I thought you were supposed to be clever?”

  “Who are you?” he repeated.

  “Friend of Webb's. Where are you docked?”

  Hugo kept the gun steady. “Name.”

  She sighed. “Harvey, if you're gonna be pissy about it. Marilyn Harvey.”

  Hugo frowned as memories stirred. “From Haven?” She nodded. “How do you know who I am?”

  She laughed. “Everyone with a newsfeed knows who you are, Kaleb Hugo. Now, are you going to take me to Webb or am I going to have to make you?”

  Hugo sized up the spacer. She stood just about to his shoulder, in a red flightsuit and utility belt and heavy boots. He couldn't see any weapons but the way she held herself showed she wasn't afraid. He lowered his gun.

  “That's better,” she said. “Now. Where's the Zero?”

  “Webb's not there.”

  “He's not?”

  Hugo shook his head.

  “Where is he?”

  “What do you need to talk to him about?”

  She eyed him narrowly. “I think that's probably my business.”

  “Must be something important for you to break cover,” Hugo said, watching for any reaction but she kept her face still.

  Harvey chewed on her lip for a moment, eyes narrowed at Hugo. “You really the Zero's captain?”

  “Yes.”

  She looked at him a moment longer then threw up her hands and sighed. “Fucking hell. Just my luck. Come on, Captain. Let's get out of sight. I've got something to tell you.”

  ɵ

  “Who is she?” Hugo hissed, not taking his eyes off Harvey who sat in the galley with her feet up on the table, chewing on a ration bar.

  “She's a spacer, Captain,” Rami said with a shrug. “One of our points.”

  “Smuggler?”

  “When it suits her. She's given us good intel in the past and she's helped us on a few of our sticker runs. Plus she knows Haven inside out. You can't buy that kind of information.”

  “Do you trust her?”

  Rami smiled, not entirely nicely. “About as far as I can throw her. But if she's broken cover to tell us something, I'd bet
the Zero we're going to want to hear what it is.”

  “She knew I was the Zero's captain.”

  “Disgraced Service officer turned pirate?” Rami smiled again. “Think every point in the Orbit knows your story, Captain.”

  Hugo peered again at her through the window in the door then moved on through into the galley.

  “Anita,” Harvey said, dropping her boots to the floor and rising. “Thank Christ. Where's Webb?”

  “What's up, Marilyn? We heard you got into some trouble.”

  “You have no idea. It's more than my neck's worth to be running around Sunside, truth be told. But I can't sit on what I got any more. Webb needs to hear it.”

  “Webb's not here,” Rami said, pouring herself a coffee.

  “Well, I know that. Where the hell is he?”

  “You can tell us, Marilyn,” Rami said, sitting down and sipping her coffee. “We'll help if we can.”

  “I don't need help,” Harvey said, dropping herself back on the bench. “I need to offload some serious shit. And you know me, I'm attached to my neck. But this...”

  “Go on,” Rami urged.

  Harvey heaved a great sigh and shifted in her seat. She cast her eyes at the ceiling like she was looking for strength then brought her sharp, green gaze back to them and leant forward on her elbows, face intense. “I'm in over my head, in short. Mixed up with a bad sort.”

  “Splinters?” Rami ventured.

  “Uh-huh,” she said, eyes wide. “And before you say anything, you know I ain't normally that dumb. But they gave me no choice.”

  “How so?”

  Harvey sighed, stared at her hands. “They found out about some shipping I did for... someone. Someone I shouldn't have shipped for.”

  “Who?” Hugo asked.

  She shook her head. “I can't say. Someone dangerous. But I owed them. I ain't proud of it but if you owe someone, you pay 'em. If you know what's good for you, that is. So I did this run for them. I wasn't to hear from them again. Then all of a sudden this Splinter shit corners me in a bar. Says he knows. Says he'll talk to people who would be mighty interested to know who did that run, unless I agree to do the same run for him.”