Planet Broker

by Eric Vall

  It seemed the mechanic was also grateful to be back on track. The confidence came back to her face. It was a good look on her.

  “Yes,” she said matter-of-factly. “I took over after Dad … after he was gone. This is all mine.”

  She gestured to the large, open room, packed full of bent and twisted pieces of metal, wires and circuit boards, tools and oil. There was barely any space to move through here, let alone work.

  “It’s impressive,” I acknowledged. “Does someone help you run it?”

  The mechanic narrowed her violet eyes at me. “What, you think a woman can’t run this all on her own?” There was a bite to her tone, but I don’t think it was aimed specifically at me.

  “No, no,” I backtracked. “That’s not it at all. I just meant that a whole shop is a lot to take on for anyone, let alone someone so young. It’s doubly impressive. Honestly.”

  She only looked to be in her late twenties at most. She must have been a kid when she came into her inheritance. I hadn’t been very responsible once I finally made it off Proto. I would have probably run a shop like this straight into the proverbial ground.

  The compliment seemed to have found its mark. A faint flush of color bloomed against the mechanic’s high-boned cheeks. I gathered not very many people on Theron thought to compliment her on anything other than her finely sculpted looks.

  She had to fight for her position here. I could tell. She wasn’t used to people giving her a kind word.

  “It’s not that hard,” she muttered. She reached up and rubbed the back of her neck. I forced my eyes away to keep from checking if she had left more grease behind. “Most of the work is making sure this old bucket of bolts doesn’t crap out on us.” She kicked at the floor of the station she was referring to with the toe of what I saw to be thick, black, combat boots. They suited her.

  “Not very stimulating work, I gather?” I questioned although I knew the answer.

  Akela shrugged. “Keeps us alive,” she said. “Puts some food on the table.”

  But not enough, I could tell from her tone. And if her tone hadn’t told me, the sharp lines of her face would have. The mechanic was gorgeous, but there was hunger there. The whole station seemed to be hungry. While the fare at the market had been good, and there had been a decent number of stalls, I hadn’t seen many people actually stop to eat. I recognized the face of hungry stomachs. I used to see it every day in the mirror growing up.

  “What would you say if I told you that you could have more?” I asked the mechanic.

  Here it was: the hook. I hoped I baited it well enough to get her to bite.

  Akela tilted her head, torn between suspicion and curiosity. “More what?” she hedged.

  “More everything,” I told her. “Enough money to buy all the food you want for your table. Enough money to buy a new table. Hell, enough money to buy a ticket out of here, if you were so inclined.”

  The irony of the moment was not lost on me. Here I was, giving the same spiel a nameless Terra-Nebula peon had given me all those years ago. The difference, I hoped, was that I actually meant what I was saying.

  The curiosity had given way completely to suspicion in Akela’s purple eyes. Before she could show us the door with her boot planted firmly up my ass, I added the cherry on top.

  “And,” I emphasized, “you’d get to hit Terra-Nebula where it hurts: their wallet.”

  That gave her pause, like I knew it would. The mechanic studied me with a scowl. I knew she didn’t want to believe me, a stranger who wore the colors of the enemy, but I also knew that the fire in her eyes would not let her pass up even the slightest opportunity to screw over the Corporation that had taken not only her brother but her father now, too.

  I spread my hands in front of me plaintively. “Ten minutes,” I said. “Give me ten minutes and, if you don’t like what I have to say, you can kick us out. I’ll even pay you for your time.”

  Akela’s scowl didn’t lessen but after a moment she dipped her chin in assent. “Fine,” she acquiesced. “You get five minutes,” she countered. She held up her left hand and waggled the five digits at me. “And you’ll pay me for my time either way.”

  I smiled. A negotiator. I found myself liking the mechanic even more. “You got yourself a deal.”

  The silver-haired woman huffed but gestured for us to follow her deeper into the shop. Whatever she had been working on when we entered was still smoldering, so I made sure to steer myself and Neka away from the molten orange metal.

  We didn’t go very far. In the back corner of the garage, a handful of worktables had been shoved together to form some sort of counter. Stacks of crates that I realized were used as chairs were pushed up against the side. Without even glancing down, Akela picked her way across the floor, side-stepping every discarded wire and tool like she knew exactly where each one was.

  Unfortunately for us, Neka and I weren’t so familiar.

  Behind me, there was a great crashing sound of metal, followed by a startled hiss from my assistant. I glanced over my shoulder to see the cat-girl frozen with one foot in the air, her ears flat against her skull, her yellow eyes wide. At her feet lay a hunk of … something. Whatever it was, it looked broken.

  “Watch your step!” Akela called back to us. She had already reached the haphazard counter and hopped up to perch herself on the edge. “Some things in here aren’t necessarily stable.”

  I looked around the room again and saw a minefield of potential disasters. “Good to know,” I muttered. I held my hand out to Neka, and she bounded over to my side, tail curling around my wrist as I followed Akela’s path to the counter.

  “You only have three minutes left,” the mechanic informed me as I sat down on the nearest stack of crates. She was still perched on the edge of the table, and she swung her long legs back and forth as she spoke. “I’d get talking if I were you.”

  “Straight to the point,” I chuckled. “I like that. Okay, well what do you know about brokers?”

  The beautiful mechanic’s space twisted with contempt. “What, planet brokers?” She shrugged. “Not much. The paper pushers don’t get out to these parts much anymore.”

  I took the insults graciously. She wasn’t wrong. With Oevis dried up, there wasn’t a planet around for at least fifty light-years that a Corporation would even consider for purchase. If it wasn’t for my rainy day fund, I honestly would have forgotten the whole Palioxis System even existed.

  “Fair enough. You must have a basic understanding of what they do though, right?” I asked. I was being very careful to say “they” and not “we.”

  Akela waved her hand dismissively. She was sitting barely a meter away. Up close, she was even more beautiful and smelled like motor oil and something vaguely sweet. “Something along the lines of conning people out of their planets,” she said. “Convincing people to sell their homes to hungry beasts like Terra-Nebula.”

  I winced. Again, she wasn’t wrong.

  “But what does this have to do with anything?” she asked me. Her violet eyes pinned me to my chair … or rather my stack of crates. I fought not to fidget under that amethyst stare.

  “Everything,” I told her honestly, and while I still had her interest, I reached toward the utility belt of my flight suit. Her eyes tracked the movement sharply, but I only grabbed one of the glass display screens out of my pocket.

  I turned the display on and addressed the A.I. that had been uncharacteristically quiet in my ear all this time.

  “Hey, Omni. Bring up file H-G-9396Q,” I told the A.I.

  The mechanic in front of me started in surprise and looked around to see who I was talking to. An instant later, however, the display in my hand blinked to life and a hologram suddenly appeared in the air between us.

  The hologram depicted the image of a planet. It didn’t look to be anything special, a moderately sized blue sphere with few recognizable landmasses. This planet, however, was very, very special.

  “This is Proxima V,” I tol
d the two women on either side of me.

  Neka looked slightly confused as she studied the planet, but Akela looked floored. It took me a minute to realize she’d most likely never left the station before. And there didn’t seem to be many windows on Theron from which to view nearby Oevis.

  The realization made me smile a little. The three of us were all station babies. We weren’t so different after all.

  “I won’t bore you with the whole history lesson,” I said to the mechanic as I pressed the command keys and zoomed out of the hologram. “The long and the short of it is that Proxima V is the holy grail of unbrokered planets.”

  The hologram finally settled to show the tiny, blue planet surrounded by what looked to be like grainy, floating disks. “These,” I explained while I pointed them out first to Akela and then to Neka, “are wormholes. There are five in total in the Icarius System. Proxima V lies at the center.”

  I tapped another key, and a label appeared beside each of the wormholes. “Each of these wormholes leads to well-populated systems. Corporations from every reach of the galaxy have tried to gain a foothold in the Icarius System in order to build an intergalactic highway of sorts. Imagine how much profit stands to be made if a Corporation could cut transport times in half.” I had heard the speech many times before, usually from a broker drunk off his ass at the bar.

  “However,” I continued and zoomed back in on the blue planet at the center, “Proxima V is the only habitable planet in the system. So it’s become the unattainable crown jewel for all brokers and Corporations. If any one party could stake a claim on that planet, ports could be built to accommodate wormhole travelers and traders that need to stop to refuel. Whoever owns Proxima V would own the largest spanning trade route for millions of light years. Because of this, attempts have been made in the past by almost every major Corporation to colonize the planet, but none have been successful.”

  I closed the hologram and put the display monitor back in my belt pocket. I turned first to my assistant. Neka’s face was split into a wide grin, her pupils wide with excitement.

  “I knew you had a plan, CT!” the cat-girl mrowled. She wiggled in delight, and her tail lashed back and forth behind her.

  “Wait,” Akela interjected. She was looking from me to the cat-girl, who couldn’t stop dancing in her seat. The mechanic’s face was etched with confusion, her amethyst eyes clouded with the emotion. “I don’t get it. What plan?”

  Absentmindedly, I reached out and rubbed one of Neka’s ears to calm her down, and the cat-girl purred in content. Akela’s eyes tracked the movement, but she didn’t comment on it.

  “The plan,” I said, rather smug now that it was out in the open, “is to broker Proxima V right from underneath all those Corporate assholes. Once a contract is signed, even Terra-Nebula will have to abide by galactic law.”

  The mechanic’s brow furrowed. “But … how? Who even are you guys? And what the hell does this have to do with me?”

  I could read people rather well. On Proto, I had to learn that particular skill quickly if I wanted to eat and find a way to avoid trouble. Akela might be guarded, but I had recognized the pain she felt over losing her father and brother. She hated Terra-Nebula, and I thought she’d do anything to see them pay.

  Even work with little old me.

  I stood up from my makeshift chair and came to stand right in front of the mechanic. The silver-haired woman was still seated on the counter, so we almost saw eye to eye. I smiled and, for the first time since we had entered the shop, it was a genuine smile, my smile.

  “Hi,” I said as I stuck my hand out to her. “I’m CT. I used to be the best broker this side of the Epsilon Cascade. Full disclosure, I was employed by Terra-Nebula,” I confessed and gestured to the red and blue flight suit. “But now I’m looking to make those Corporate bastards pay. I pilot a modest cruiser, but my crew needs an engineer or a mechanic to keep our ship in good repair while we’re en route to Proxima V. My question to you is: are you interested?”

  Akela stared at my outstretched hand. Silence stretched between us. As the minute dragged by, I suddenly feared I had misread the mechanic. Would my past be something too big for her to look beyond?

  “What do I get out of it?” the silver-haired woman abruptly said. She lifted her delicate chin and looked me dead in the eye. Thankfully, there was no hatred there. Only steely resolve and a healthy dose of skepticism. “Terra-Nebula might not show their faces much around here anymore, but they’re still a Corp. It’ll be dangerous to cross them.”

  “Is the satisfaction of revenge not payment in and of itself?” I asked as I dropped my hand. It was a joke, mostly, but the mechanic didn’t smile. I watched as the wheels turned behind those amethyst eyes as she weighed the prices and counted the costs of my offer.

  “25,000 U-Credits,” she said at last.

  Behind me, Neka gave a startled mewl, but I wasn’t surprised. I had actually expected her to ask for more.

  I pretended to think it over. “Twenty,” I countered. “We have a limited budget until we reach Proxima V, and we still need to stock our ship.”

  The mechanic’s eyes slipped out of focus, and she chewed on her bottom lip. The motion made her look younger, softer. “Fine,” she conceded. “But I get ten upfront. Before we leave the station.”

  Neka snorted behind me. It wasn’t a very classy sound. Akela narrowed her eyes at the cat-girl before she turned her gaze back to me.

  It was a smart move, asking for half upfront. I was fine with it, but I couldn’t seem too eager. I rubbed at my jaw contemplatively, stubble coarse against my fingers. “I don’t know,” I hedged.

  Akela pursed her lips into a thin line, and he eyes were as sharp as glass. “Would you have paid it to my father?” she demanded.

  “Yes,” I admitted, “but he was a fully licensed engineer.”

  “And he taught me everything he knew,” she declared proudly, her chin lifted high. “I’m just as good as he was.”

  “I believe you but--”

  “The money’s for my mother,” the mechanic finally blurted out. She looked embarrassed to have said it and looked past me to the garage over my shoulder.

  I blinked in surprise. “Mother?” I repeated. The word always left a taste like ash in my mouth.

  Akela nodded stiffly but still wouldn’t meet my gaze again. She rubbed a hand against the shorn part of her scalp and sighed. “If this payday you’re talking about is real, I can’t let it slip by. But I can’t leave my mom here without anything while we go. She’d be dead within a week.”

  She said the words so matter-of-factly, my throat closed up. I had to clear it thoroughly before I spoke again.

  “Okay,” I conceded. “Ten upfront, ten upon arrival to Proxima V, and one-third of whatever profit our crew turns for the brokered deal. Sound fair?”

  The mechanic regarded me with those piercing eyes of hers. She didn’t respond for a moment. “How do I know you’re not going to screw me over?” she finally asked at length.

  I opened my mouth to defend myself, but Neka beat me to it.

  “CT is a good man,” she said suddenly. The mechanic and I both turned to the cat-girl. My assistant didn’t even spare me a glance. She was staring right into Akela’s eyes, a steely determination set in every line of her petite body.

  “I know you don’t want to believe it,” Neka continued. “And I know most men cannot be trusted,” she whispered softly, and her eyes dropped under the weight of her memories.

  A part of me still wished I had burned that station brothel where I found her to cosmic ash. Those bastards deserved much worse for what they did to her.

  “But CT is different,” the cat-girl stated firmly. She lifted her head again, and her yellow eyes found mine. She gave me a slight smile. “He saved me from a terrible life, and he gave me a great one. He is a man of his word. You can trust him.”

  My heart swelled to three times its size at my assistant’s words. “Thanks, Neka,” I said
sincerely before I turned back to Akela. “The only people I’m looking to screw over are the people who deserve it. I swear,” I told her.

  The silver-haired woman studied my face for a long moment. I felt my heart stutter under the weight of her gaze.

  “Okay,” she finally said. She hopped off the counter to stand before me and, this time, she stuck out her hand. “We have a deal. When do we leave?”

  The air left my lungs in a great whoosh. I hadn’t even realized I was holding my breath. Beside me, Neka chirped in success, and even Omni gave an electronic trill in my ear.

  Looked like we were in business.

  Chapter 4

  “That’s… the last of it,” I grunted with effort as I struggled up the ramp and dropped the final box of supplies on the floor of the cargo hold.

  “Careful, CT!” Neka cried. She bounded over from where she and Omni were working to catalog all the inventory we had just purchased and checked over the box. Her tail flicked back and forth anxiously.

  I groaned as I placed my hands against my lower back and stretched. “It’s just the last of the freeze-dried food,” I told her. “I think the potatoes and carrots can handle a little turbulence.”

  My assistant straightened out of her crouch with a small frown, but before she could chide me further, I realized something was different about her.

  “Hey,” I said with a smile. “You changed into your clothes.”

  The cat-girl blinked and looked down like she had forgotten. “Oh yeah!” she exclaimed. “I was tired of all that, blegh, red and blue.” Her cheeks flushed sweetly, and she gave a small spin. “Do you like it?”

  Instead of our old Terra-Nebula crew uniform, Neka now wore a sleeveless, gunmetal gray jumpsuit. It looked to be of a similar material as our flight suits, but this outfit clung to the cat-girl’s body much tighter than Corporate regulations allowed for. On top of the jumpsuit, she wore a black coat/vest combination garment that I had seen on a few people yesterday and this morning while we shopped around the stalls in the marketplace. This one was, of course, edged with a yellow that matched her eyes. It was also sleeveless and had a high collar that could button at the neck. It was form fitted as well, and it contoured itself to the cat-girl’s curves before it fell past her hips. When she spun, I noticed the back was split into coattails that fell on either side of her tail that was swishing back and forth happily.