“You’ll do it then?”
Webb drank his beer for a long moment and stared at the wall. There was something ghosting in his eyes that wasn’t anger. Something colder. But then he blinked, drained his drink and it was gone. “I’ll do it. If you swear you’ll take my lead. And my orders.”
Hugo nodded.
“Think about it first,” Webb said, leaning and prodding him in the chest. “Think real hard. Because I’m the furthest away from kidding I’ve ever been.”
Hugo finished his own drink whilst staring out the window, trying to silence the nagging doubts. But then he saw Harvey in her hospital bed when he was first allowed to see her, eyes bound shut with bandages and tubes sutured into her skin. “I’ve made my decision.”
Webb chewed his lip for a second. That look was in his eyes again and Hugo wondered again if it was fear. It was on the tip of his tongue to ask when Webb nodded and slumped back in his chair, tapping a command into the display on the table top.
“Fine. It’s your money. And neck, for that matter,” he said as the waitress brought over two more beers. She deliberately didn’t look at either of them this time.
“It will be fine,” Hugo said after she’d gone and Webb was watched her go, jaw working.
Webb shook his head. “If a Pole-Aitken waitress is recognising you, the Haven customs crews will too.”
“As I said,” Hugo said. “I’ll be careful.”
Webb sighed and rubbed his eyes. “Fine. We’ll come to that later. What is it that you do have on Ariel? Please tell me it’s how to find him on that poxy colony.”
“A starting point. Maybe,” Hugo said, watching a couple of Servicemen patrol the edges of Aitken Square out the window. People oiled by on either side like opposing magnets. His pulse quickened when they approached the Homely Inne but they changed direction before reaching the door. “Amongst her other investigations, Marilyn…Sub-Lieutenant Harvey,” Hugo corrected himself, earning another wry look from Webb, “was researching two suspected rings of bloodgrease traders.”
Webb choked on his beer. His eyes were watering as he wiped his mouth on his sleeve.“Bloodgrease?” he spluttered.
“Yes.”
Webb blinked, coughing and put the beer down. “Jesus, Eclipse didn’t start small then, huh?”
“No.”
Webb shook his head. “Wow. Never thought I’d see Harvey turn her coat.”
“She didn’t. She’s still Havenite through-and-through. And vocal about it.”
“And they gave her Service pips?”
“She proved that whilst she supports Haven and its rights as an independent colony, she doesn’t support those that take advantage of it to line their own pockets with Orbit credit.”
“Like bloodgrease traders.”
“Exactly.”
“How exactly did Eclipse plan to bring down any Haven-based organisation, bloodgrease or not? Sure, it’s illegal everywhere but on Haven, but there you can’t touch them.”
“If we get their contacts, we can bring down their buyers in the Orbit. They can’t sell if there’s no one left to buy.”
Webb chewed his thumbnail, eyes far away. “I guess so. Especially now it’s harder than ever to smuggle anything through the blockade and even harder to get anything through the ports.”
“You do seem to know a lot about this already.”
Webb grinned. “I know about ports. What spacer doesn’t?”
“What exactly are you doing these days?” Hugo asked carefully.
“What, you mean I don’t have a special Eclipse file of my own?”
“You have a file,” Hugo said, sipping his beer again. “But I suspect it only contains what you want us to know.”
Webb smiled. “If you say so. By the way…how did you find me? On Lunar 3?”
Hugo shifted in his seat. “Captain Rami found you. Don’t ask me how.”
Webb’s face blanked for a second at her name, but he nodded and said smoothly, “So, do you have the names of these trading rings?”
“There are two she had solid evidence on: one’s a gang called Catiline. The other she doesn’t have a name for…just some leads.”
“Catiline I know. Small-time traders. Petty but not dangerous. Bloodgrease on the side I can believe, but that’s all. I don’t see them feeling the need to hire a blade to interrogate a Service officer. But weirder and nastier things have happened. What about this other one? The one with no name?”
“We know very little about the other one. Harvey kept most of the details to herself but even her locked files had barely anything. I think it was little more than a hunch.”
“Well, I was on Haven not so long ago - ”
“You were?”
Webb shifted. “Yes. And Catiline are still very much alive and kicking. They’ve got a couple of yards under their control and connections with the refineries, which makes sense. But their operation is low-key. They avoid enemies rather than cultivate them by doing things like going after the Service.”
“I trust Harvey’s hunches.”
“Ok then, so, what? You think Catiline hired Ariel to find out how much Harvey had dug up on them?”
“With both Ariel and bloodgrease coming from Haven…it’s a coincidence too big to be ignored.”
“It’s still a coincidence if Harvey was investigating more than just bloodgrease. Anyone she was looking into could have hired him.”
Hugo tapped his bottle on the scarred table top. “It’s the only solid lead we have to go on. And besides, I don’t care who hired him. I just want him.”
Webb swallowed the last of his second beer. He slumped deeper in the chair and rubbed his forehead. “Haven,” he said with a sigh. “Shit. I can’t believe I’m agreeing to this.”
“He nearly killed her, Zeek,” Hugo said, not looking up from his bottle. “And the state she’s in…even now…I wonder if it would have been better if he had.” When Hugo looked up, Webb was pale. Hugo felt his cheeks flush with anger and shame. “I’m doing this, with or without you. But I’d sooner do it with you because we stand a greater chance of bringing the son of a bitch in if we do it together.”
Webb sighed again and tapped in a command for another beer. “Well then. Here we go again.”
III
Webb blinked into the shadows gathered on the ceiling of their boarding room for what felt like hours before cursing silently, shoving back the thin blanket and sitting up. He clutched at his head, willing the feeling that it was about to burst apart to dissipate.
You can do this, he told himself. Pull yourself together.
When his breathing slowed, he peered across to the dark shape on the other bunk. Hugo’s breathing was steady but he twitched and mumbled in his sleep. Webb stood and padded into the tiny bathroom and locked the door. He switched on the harsh light and stared into the mirror for a long moment before pulling off his t-shirt. His skin was spacer-pale, his tattoos sharp and black, still new-looking. But, as always, these weren’t the first things he noticed.
He ran his fingers over the ruler-straight scars that went up his ribs like a tally chart. They were thicker and longer across his chest, where the scalpel had sunk deeper. Long lines in the same precise, measured hand traced from behind his ears and down his neck to his collar bone. They were still a little red from the last attempt to laser them away but the nerves were dead and he couldn’t feel his own touch along them.
He breathed deep against a heat rising in his throat. His hands started to shake. He blinked away at the blurriness gathering in at the edge of his vision and clenched his fists, fingernails digging into his palms. He splashed cold water on his face, willing his blood to cool but the shaking wouldn’t still. He pulled his t-shirt back on, crept out, dressed in the dark and left. Pole-Aitken’s air wasn’t exactly fresh but it was cooler than in the Homely Inne. He paced down walkways aimlessly, weaving amongst the night-cycle foot traffic and waiting for his thoughts to align themselves into some sort of manageable o
rder.
The walkway turned a corner and he could see the blur of the atmosphere shield curving up above him. He stopped and craned his neck, trying to pick out the glint that was the drifting colony of Haven, out beyond the space stations of the Lunar Strip colonies. The air had calmed his shakes but still there was a swallowing feeling in his stomach. He fingered a scar on his neck, letting the memories come. Ariel’s face rose before him, pale apart from impossibly dark eyes that were empty and blank, even as he smiled. The scalpel peeled into his flesh and the neuro-enhancer made it feel like his very being was pouring out with his blood.
And all because of what he knew by accident. All because of what he remembered…even though the memories didn’t belong to him.
Fire flared through his veins and obliterated the chill. He turned and paced towards the nearest shuttle port. A ride later and he was back aboard Nod, the heat of determination burning in his belly. Even with with its heat, his hands still hovered over Nod’s comm for several minutes before he managed to start typing. He glanced at the display chrono, trying to figure out what shift Haven would be on as the connecting screen blinked. It flashed on for several moments and he spun the command chair back and forth, chewing on his thumbnail and wondering whether or not he was hoping for an answer.
It wasn’t long before the display bleeped and the screen filled with the image of the dark-skinned face of an older man with thick hair, shot through with streaks of grey and pits of scarring all up one leathery cheek. He was just pulling off a dust scarf and his hair was lank with dirt and sweat. His face was screwed up in confusion, pulling the scars deeper.
“Hey, August,” Webb said, dredging a grin from somewhere. “Good shift?”
The man’s face flattened out. “Fuck me. Ezekiel Webb? Is that you?”
“Long time no see.”
“I heard you were dead.”
Webb winced. “Who told you that?”
August shrugged. “No one in particular.”
“Gee, glad everyone was so broken up.”
“What can I say? You vanished that quickly, I guess some folk just assumed.”
“Dead men can’t fly their ships through the blockade.”
“Guess not,” the man said, his cracked grin showing missing teeth. “Still, that’s a few folk gonna be red in the face. So, what do you want?”
“I’m coming back.”
“Are you now?”
“Is that a problem?”
“Not for me, lad,” August said, running thick-fingered hands through his dirty hair. “You can do as you like as far as I say. Though I know a few guys who might not be, shall we say, thrilled?” Webb felt himself flush but August continued, “So,what do you want from me?”
“I just wanted to give you a heads-up.”
August frowned. “You’ve got your brand, lad. You don’t need to ask an Elder’s permission any more.”
“There’s more.”
“I knew it. What?”
“I want to Sponsor someone.”
August raised his eyebrows. “You do?”
Webb nodded, keeping his face as neutral as possible. “An old war buddy’s hit a dead end. Needs a new start.”
“That must be some dead end.”
“I can vouch for him, August,” Webb said. “He’s a good man fallen on hard times.”
“Takes more than that to earn a bunk here, Webb.”
“Can you just meet him?”
August sighed and rubbed his temples. “You timed this deliberately, didn’t you?”
“I just know how soft and gooey you can be when you’re tired.”
August’s frown deepened. “Fine, I’ll meet him, Ezekiel, but I ain’t promising anything.”
“Thanks, August. I owe you.”
“Yes. You do. Bring all the cargo you can lay your hands on and we’ll see what we can do. Hope he knows what he’s getting himself into.”
*
Webb leaving had jerked Hugo from an unpleasant dream. The sweat cooled on his skin and he didn’t want to think about sliding back into it. He got up, showered and went to lean in the reception doorway and watch the activity in Aitken Square as the day-cycle kicked in and the atmosphere shield lightened. He stopped himself from trying to connect to Webb’s comm. He had said all he could. He’d give Webb until mid-cycle. One way or another he was leaving for Haven today.
The thought did not rally him as much as he hoped it would.
Webb didn’t come back until the day-cycle had been running for a good couple of hours and though he looked tired, he was smiling.
“We’re on.”
*
“Now, Hugo,” Webb said as he battened down in the lockers in Nod’s cockpit. It was close to night-cycle again. Webb had taken most of the afternoon to complete his ‘business’. Hugo made himself sit still and not fidget with impatience as Webb did his cockpit checks. “I meant it when I said you would have to do everything, everything, I say to pull this off, right? Exactly as I say it.”
“I know.”
“Do you? You’re not my CO anymore and it’s my ass on the line too. I will not hesitate to kick yours.”
“I’ll follow your lead, Webb,” Hugo ground out. “Tell me what I need to know.”
Webb sighed as he strapped himself into the command chair. “Ok then,” he said. “Jesus…I don’t even know where to start. We should have taken longer to prepare.”
“Ariel’s trail is only getting colder the longer we wait.”
“Ok, ok,” Webb said. “Tell me what you do know about Haven.”
“It’s the Orbit’s only independent colony. And the oldest drifting one, the original space station built by pirates before Lunar 1 was established by Horatio Webb -”
“Right, hold on, stop right there, Commodore,” Webb said. “Let’s get that notion out of your head right now. Haven was not built by pirates.”
“They were a rebel army wanted by Earth and moon-bound Enforcers for smuggling, violence, and rebellion.”
Webb gave him a sardonic look as the skiff’s engines hummed to life. “That ‘rebel army’ started off as a community of ordinary people who one day decided they would fight back against abuse and oppression rather than just bearing it. This was before the Service, you know. This was in the aftermath of the Whole World War. Living on Earth was no picnic.”
Hugo gripped his armrests and reigned in his tongue.
“When fighting didn’t work,” Webb continued, tapping more commands into the control panel as systems started to hum and readings ran across the cockpit screens, “they found a way to escape. Haven is just that: somewhere beyond the reach of authority, sure, but somewhere safe. Somewhere free.”
“That’s a very romantic way of looking at it.”
“That’s the way they look at it. Then and now. You walk onto their colony with your nose turned up and a rod up your ass, you won’t get one pace past the docks. Try to open you mind.”
“It’s hard to be open minded about a colony where a man like Ariel can find sanctuary.”
Webb exhaled sharply through his nose. “I didn’t say it was perfect. I just mean however dangerous it is, it’s still not what you think it is.”
Hugo took a moment to process this whilst Webb cleared their launch with Control and fired up the thrusters. Pole-Aitken’s ragged skyline dropped out of view. The orange atmosphere faded to black and the stars blinked into view.
“What else?” Webb said as he began to type course commands into the console.
Hugo pulled out his panel as the gravity weakened and he bumped against his harness. “There’s no credit system on Haven,” he said, scrolling through his notes. “Everything is bought and bartered for with labour and trade.”
“Correct. Well, almost. There is still credit coming and going.”
“There is?”
“They can’t mine everything they need from the asteroids, Hugo. There’s trade off-colony. And how do you think the Service pay for their Haven-
built ships? Hugs?”
“I thought -”
“Individuals don’t have credit, no. Or very little if they do. They have no use for it. But the shipyards, manufacturing plants and anyone else who trades off-colony usually does it for credit. They’re supposed to turn it over to the colony’s brokers, who deal it out and trade it on to bring in things the whole colony needs: medical supplies and training, specialist parts, fresh food, that sort of thing.”
“Supposed to?”
Webb shifted in his seat, adjusting their speed as they fell into a long-distance space lane and the moon dropped out of view. “Well, yes. I’m willing to bet there are some points that bring credit in who find ways to keep it to themselves, those that are off-colony enough to take advantage of it. But they’re lucky if they get away with it.”
“If a ring of bloodgrease traders is hoarding too much credit, it might be in their interest to make sure the colony doesn’t find out.”
“I’d say so. You may be out of the Service’s reach on Haven, but better a Service detention centre than have the Elders turned against you. Anything else? Anything that Harvey’s told you and that you’ve not just read in the Analysts’ files?”
“She was always guarded about Haven.”
“Sounds about right. Havenites believe in keeping your business in your own pocket.”
“You lived there. What do you know about the place?”
Webb blinked in silence for a few moments. “I just know it as somewhere to get lost when you don’t want to be found. For some that can be the new beginning they would never get any other way. For others…it’s a more final sort of destination.”
“Which was it for you?”
Webb stiffened and adjusted a dial on the command panel. “Perhaps it’s time for you to start practicing the whole minding-your-own business thing they go in for there.”
“What aren’t you telling me?”
Webb threw him a glare. “Never mind what I’m not telling you. Just listen to what I am telling you.”
“I’m listening, Webb. But this is all very vague.”
Haven (The Orbit Series Book 2) Page 4