Confidence Game

by Britt Ringel

  “Casper will be disappointed that we’re leaving him out,” Lochlain predicted.

  “That’ll change when one of us comes back as a corpse.”

  * * *

  Lochlain softened the blow to Naslund’s ego by explaining that the shuttle would hold only four people and that Zanshin needed someone to remain on board. Further, he promised the aspiring smuggler that he could accompany Lochlain when he visited Janell Verdin.

  Lochlain climbed aboard the shuttle and sat in the copilot’s seat to assist Lingenfelter through the pre-flight checklist. Behind him, Truesworth and Brooke performed weapon checks on their submachine guns. Brooke had told Lochlain the weapons were Lancaster Executioner-Cs built with no metallic components, along with a more chilling feature. She had discovered ports for smartlinks and only dedicated gunmen endured the pain and expense to have cybernetics surgically installed to interface with their weaponry.

  Out of superstition, Lochlain had decided against jettisoning the bodies in tunnel space. Upon the discovery of the weapons’ smartlink ports, Brooke had repressurized Zanshin’s forward hold for a second inspection of the hitmen to confirm her fears but was relieved to find no evidence of smartlink hardware in their bodies. Dangerous men had been intent on murdering her but at least they had not been cybernetically enhanced humans with computer-assisted marksmanship.

  Brooke finished her weapons check and started the process over with what would be Lochlain’s weapon. “We need to find some gun-cleaning kits on the orbital when we’re done,” she commented while ejecting the magazine. “These were never cleaned after the gunfight.”

  “Will they work?” Lochlain asked from the front of the shuttle.

  Brooke nodded. “Of course they will. I just hate the message I’ll be sending when I show up with a dirty weapon. It’s embarrassing.”

  Across the aisle, Truesworth completed his own inspection and lifted the strap of his gun over his head and onto his shoulder. The Brevic had never held a submachine gun before. Brooke had half-expected the man to scoff at the offered weapon and pull a military-grade assault rifle from thin air. Instead, the war veteran confessed that he had never even qualified on the standard Brevic multi-rifle. As an officer, he explained, he had received a mere four hours of instruction on the standard navy sidearm and shot barely well enough at the firing range to pass the class with the minimum score. She threw him a confident wink as he looked up from his gun to her and smiled. The sensorman consistently defied her every preconception of a “‘Vic.”

  “It figures that you’re the muscle of the group,” Truesworth said from his jumpseat.

  “Why’s that?”

  “You remind me of the most vicious officer I ever met. Sure, she was a quiet, unassuming woman in everyday life but when you threatened something she cared about…” He shivered dramatically. “Let’s just say that not a lot of things would be left in one piece afterwards.”

  Brooke nodded as she leaned Lochlain’s weapon against her jumpseat. “I think I like this woman. What was her name?”

  “Strap in!” Lochlain shouted from the cockpit. “We’re lifting off.” In front of him, the wall screen displayed the opening maw of Zanshin’s hangar. Behind the receding doors, a Handy-max freighter maneuvered gingerly to ease into a slip four hundred meters from Zanshin.

  Lochlain watched their exit and he interfaced with the cargo master’s system on his freighter. Earlier he had set the ship’s controls to auto-accept the shuttle’s handshake. Lochlain brought up the camera feed to the last occupied hardpoint on the ship’s exterior. He powered the hardpoint and shuttle spotlights before activating the container’s anti-collision lights. “I’m extending the payload claws, Elease.” Yellow strobe lights flickered rhythmically over the protruding arms in front of the shuttle.

  Lingenfelter cautiously piloted the craft down the length of the freighter toward Isett’s container. Several minutes later, she lined up with one end of her quarry. After creeping forward, Lochlain ordered her to relative rest and maneuvered the claws to the container’s lift points. A minute later, Zanshin relinquished her embrace on the box and Lingenfelter withdrew slowly from the freighter’s shadow and into the star system’s red sunlight.

  Lochlain listened through his headset to the controlled mayhem on the orbital’s departure frequency and keyed his mic when there was a pause. “Orbital Departure, this is Shuttlecraft November-Six-Zero-One-One-Tango requesting departure to the planet.”

  The reply was measured haste. “Roger One-One-Tango, contact at Docking Bay Thirty-Two. You are cleared to planetfall. Maintain standard separation from all traffic and proceed on your own navigation. Departure out.” The orbital controllers had much more pressing concerns than the swarm of tiny shuttles buzzing the orbital like bees around a hive.

  Lochlain turned to Lingenfelter and smiled gregariously. “Let’s go deliver some contraband.”

  Chapter 27

  Vulsia-4’s thin atmosphere and docile weather patterns made for a gentle shuttle ride to the surface. As the small craft ducked below the cloud layer at 1,500 meters, Lochlain saw the familiar yellow and brown landscape of the plains surrounding the planet’s capital.

  The rendezvous coordinates were locked into the navigation controls and Lingenfelter had little to do in the pilot’s seat besides watch the shuttle’s MTI scanners for air traffic. They were flying toward a storage depot twenty-seven kilometers from the outskirts of the city. Lochlain knew the depot stored legitimate cargo but also was a well-disguised front for Isett’s smuggling operation in Vulsia. Among the many hundreds of freight containers in the facility, he guessed five percent might contain contraband that would eventually be distributed to various criminal enterprises. The fate of his shuttle’s container would be no different than the thousands of others that had slipped past Vulsian customs over the years.

  He contacted the depot’s traffic control when the shuttle approached to within ten kilometers to provide the container’s packing code. The controller replied with navigation instructions to a specific part of the facility. Lochlain looked to his pilot and said, “Take manual control, Elease, and give me a slow fly over the pad we’re supposed to land on.”

  The designated pad was in the farthest corner, away from the compound’s main roads. Lochlain saw a large ground vehicle idling nearby. He presumed it would haul the container to a storage spot until it could be processed and its contents disbursed. A single ground crewman equipped with pulsing landing sticks and a simple, visored helmet stood near the front of the pad. Three more figures were leaning against the side of the transport vehicle. Each carried a long gun but that did not surprise Lochlain. “Set her down,” he ordered.

  Two minutes later, the shuttle idled on the center of the pad. The three figures had moved closer to the ground crewman who was signaling Lingenfelter to kill her engines. Lochlain could now identify one of the men as Linwood McLaren, Isett’s lieutenant on Vulsia. He was not a fan of Lochlain and all three men had firm holds on their rifles.

  “Keep her running,” Lochlain said, ignoring the signals from outside the shuttle. “If people start shooting, don’t lift off until either I or Mercer tells you to.”

  “Can’t we just drop the container and go?” Lingenfelter asked in an unsteady voice. She kept her hands on the controls and Lochlain could see them trembling.

  He gripped her shoulder. “Relax, if they were mad at us, they probably would’ve started shooting the moment you touched down. I need to talk with them.” He stood in the cramped cockpit and slipped between the seats to the rear. Brooke and Truesworth were already standing near the door.

  Brooke offered Lochlain a submachine gun. “If people start shooting, I want both of you to lay down suppressive fire,” she coached professionally. “That means just hold down the trigger and spray. Don’t worry about actually hitting anyone. Your job is to just make them worried.”

  “So who’s going to actually stop them?” Lingenfelter asked from the cockpit.
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  Brooke charged her weapon before pulling on a light jacket over her CBP chest armor. The last thing she wanted was these men to think this was a law enforcement raid. She punched the portal controls and the door became a ramp lowering to the quickcrete landing pad. “Jack, you stay back but make sure you have line of sight to all of them. Reece, I’ll be near you but far enough away to prevent a quick burst on their part from hitting us both.” She motioned toward the door and gave a final instruction. “Nobody fires until I shoot or get shot.”

  Lochlain descended the ramp while noting with a grin, “You’re always so dour during times like this. Can’t you just enjoy the excitement?”

  Brooke followed him down. Once she stood on the pad, she pointed at a spot on the quickcrete and motioned behind her for Truesworth to move to it. She flashed hazel eyes at Lochlain and suggested, “How about I shoot you in the shoulder and we’ll see how quickly this excitement loses its luster for you.”

  The pair walked past the shuttle, along the side of the container. Ahead, the ground crewman was scanning the shipping label. The other three men were standing abreast, waiting. Lochlain noticed that their guns were much larger than the one that dangled from his shoulder. He was suddenly content to keep as much distance between himself and those rifles as possible but Brooke doggedly continued to close the gap until the two parties were a scant five meters apart.

  “Hiya, Linwood! Looking good,” Lochlain said loudly and with manufactured cheer. “Has someone been working out?”

  “Shut up, Reece.” The drone of the shuttle’s engines forced him to shout. McLaren tapped his foot impatiently while his eyes darted between Lochlain and Brooke. “Who’s the new bitch?”

  Lochlain desperately fought the urge to answer “CBP” just to irk the man and instead replied, “Just some girl I met in the orbital.”

  McLaren snorted his derision. “Yeah, that’s why she fearlessly marched you right into the range of your burp guns.” The two men next to McLaren exchanged nervous glances at the declaration. “Why are your engines still running?”

  “Oh, you know, Linwood,” Lochlain temporized, “I’m a busy man.” He crossed his arms defiantly. “Look, you know how much I enjoy catching up with you but I’ve got business, so are you trying to kill us or not?”

  “Jesus, Reece,” Brooke muttered through clenched teeth as she tightened her grip on her weapon.

  “We know about the bounty on your ship,” McLaren shouted with a sneer. The men flanking him sidestepped subtly.

  “And what did Cindi have to say about that?” Lochlain barked back.

  McLaren’s smile twisted distastefully and he let his rifle drop freely to his side. “She’s ordered us not to collect under any circumstance.” He spat on the ground. “I have no idea what you’ve done for her to warrant so many free passes but it’s bad business.” He looked at Brooke with a nasty leer and added, “Well, I have a good idea what you’ve done to her.”

  “Great,” Lochlain replied while exhaling his relief. “Then we’re all friends here.” He pointed at the ground crewman. “Is he done confirming the can?”

  The helmeted man waved the scanner at McLaren and gave him a thumbs up.

  “Goodbye, Reece. Don’t ever come back here, you snitch,” McLaren warned and began to turn away.

  “Wait!” Lochlain shouted. “I need an Appiation deck officer license template.”

  “You’ve got some nerve,” growled McLaren while shaking his head.

  “I’ll give you five thousand for it,” Lochlain said over the man’s protest. “Cindi said you’d take care of it,” he lied.

  “That’s funny, she didn’t say a thing to me about this.”

  Lochlain casually flipped a thumb back to the cargo container. “Yeah, well, what you don’t know could fill that crate. Just do your damn job for a change.”

  McLaren gestured to one of his men, who trotted to the cab of the transport vehicle to call the office. “It’ll take a few minutes for someone to run it out.”

  The two men waited in uncomfortable silence until a wicked grin overcame Lochlain. “You know, Linwood, I’m sure Jody was thinking about you the whole time she was with me.”

  McLaren’s face flushed redder than Vulsia’s star. He stalked toward Lochlain and launched a right cross toward his rival’s chin. Despite anticipating the punch, Lochlain managed only to partially dodge the haymaker and the meaty fist glanced off the left side of his cheek. Even the limited blow knocked Lochlain off his feet.

  McLaren took another step and chambered his foot for a stomp but then froze as the barrel of Brooke’s submachine gun closed to just outside arm’s reach of his face.

  “Call me a bitch now,” she threatened with piercing, unblinking eyes. “I dare you.”

  A smaller ground vehicle pulled up. McLaren slowly lowered his foot to the ground and backed away. “Too bad you don’t know him like I do, sweetheart,” he said while jutting his chin toward a prone Lochlain.

  “I’m pretty sure you weren’t even a passing thought to Jody while she was with him,” Brooke countered darkly. Her barrel tracked the man’s head with almost robotic precision.

  Lochlain stood and dusted himself off. He extracted his datapad and said, “Here’s your five-K, Linwood. I’d recommend taking a charm class with it.” The left side of his face throbbed terribly but he resisted the urge to touch it and check for blood.

  The driver of the vehicle waited for McLaren’s nod and then handed an empty certification template to Lochlain. Brooke watched him tap his datapad to the embedded chip at the certificate’s right hand corner to verify the goods.

  “If a CBP agent digs deep enough, that won’t hold up,” the driver cautioned.

  McLaren snarled, “Shut up, Dale. He already knows.”

  Lochlain offered the driver a curt nod. “We won’t be within fifty light-years of Appiation space.” He turned to McLaren and grinned. The simple action made his cheek ache worse. “Well, this concludes our business. As always, it’s been a pleasure, Linwood.” After a carefree bow, he turned in place and sauntered back to the idling shuttle. Brooke trailed him, walking backwards to remain facing Isett’s men.

  Lochlain reached the ramp and Truesworth asked, “Why’d he hit you? I couldn’t hear.”

  “Inferiority complex,” Lochlain replied as he stepped into the craft. He squeezed past the deployed jumpseats and left his weapon on Brooke’s seat. As he entered the cockpit, he looked at the window-mode wall screen and saw McLaren still staring maliciously at the shuttle. The shuttle’s door sealed and Lingenfelter quickly lifted off. On the screen, McLaren raised an empty hand, pantomimed a gun, pointed it at the shuttle and “fired.”

  “Not much love between you and that guy,” Lingenfelter commented as she increased the shuttle’s ascent. The craft was a spitfire when unencumbered. She giggled and confessed, “I almost peed my pants when he decked you. I thought for sure that someone would start shooting and that would be that.”

  Lochlain clucked at her but presented the certificate. “Congratulations, you’re now a fully qualified deck officer.”

  The blonde pilot gasped. “You got me a certificate? I’m legal now?”

  “Legal is subject to interpretation but you’ll look that way once we transfer your data into the chip,” he answered as he tapped the corner. “It won’t stand up to a full Appiation inspection but it’ll work just fine outside their space.”

  She looked up to him with doleful, blue eyes. “How expensive was it?”

  “Like Mercer said, this one’s on us,” Lochlain insisted. Five thousand credits would not make or break the freighter’s fuel cell charge fund. “You’re part of Zanshin’s family now.”

  Brooke stuck her head into the cockpit. She nodded approval at the certificate but then asked, “So, who was Jody?”

  Chapter 28

  It was late afternoon and only Brooke and Lochlain remained aboard Zanshin. After receiving their allotted shares for the run into Vulsia, the r
est of the crew had filtered off the freighter. As was typical with smaller ships, Lochlain had decided to just codelock the airlock and forgo a duty watch. Its primary purpose in Ancera had been to ensure the students would seize the opportunity to leave the ship when given the chance. Lochlain chuckled to himself at Lingenfelter’s resolve to return to Zanshin as Brooke booted up the holo-game.

  “What?” she asked as the screen flared into life. Shinshin now orbited Harmleikur-2.

  “Nothing.” He scooted closer to Brooke and scanned through the information. He pointed to one of the selections beneath the status screen. “There’s an option to take on refugees. Oh, can we negotiate passage prices?”

  Brooke touched the screen near Dr. Ling Tsai’s icon and searched the different options. She frowned. “It doesn’t look like it.” She dipped her good shoulder. “Oh well, it’s not like we’re a passenger ship anyway. Let’s see how many people are left at the science base.” She tapped the screen again. The display flickered and a list began scrolling down the screen faster than she could read. “Uh, what’s this?”

  Lochlain gulped when he recognized the list for what it was. The data racing down the screen seemed endless. “Are these the names of all the people still on the planet?” he gasped. Names continued to run from the top to the bottom and off the screen.

  Brooke paused the game and the list froze. Her lips curled back into a grimace as she leaned closer to the screen. She placed a finger to one of the countless names and read, “Onyang, Han, age thirty-seven, born nine thirty-five.” She moved a shaky finger up one row. “Ottswieler, Annabelle, age nine, born nine sixty-three.” She tapped the name and a popup window opened to provide a detailed profile on Annabelle Ottswieler. “Born at the Peter J. Dartston Memorial Health Clinic on Jarnsaxa to Audrey and Thomas Ottswieler.” Her eyes darted to the names above Annabelle’s. They belonged to her parents. The level of detail in the profile was baffling. Annabelle was allergic to most kinds of nuts.