Can't Shoot Straight Gang Returns

by Blaze Ward

  Everyone else laughed as the woman stood halfway up and gestured to her body, like a used repulsorlift salesman with a mark on the hook. But Rob had to agree. He’d seen it in action.

  “Okay,” Jorge said. “Three weeks hard haul gets us to the our pirates,” Jorge said. “We’ve got the standard equipment package aboard: special effects, both personal weapons and stuff we’ve hidden in Longbow’s gear, and a script. I’ll expect you to be in character three days before we land, and hold to those. And try to keep the egos in check this time. Remember, we’re poor, broke, and desperate for some cheap labor to help us film this movie. Questions?”

  “What if they actually provide a Director of Photography and a full film crew?” Rob perked up and asked. I mean, what was the worst that could happen?

  “Kid, you figure out how to sneak them into position and I’ll make the damned movie, starting with whatever footage we can salvage of however we manage this stunt,” Jorge’s face got serious. “A lot of the rest of it can be done on a soundstage, or we can borrow a couple of ships from folks I know for interior photography."

  Rob grinned at the man. So did the rest. They knew Jorge was serious. He could always get funding to finish the reshoots necessary to turn good stock footage into a movie.

  Now, he just had to con a planetful of pirates into signing up as extras and bit players.

  5

  The door to his private chamber was locked and barred. Fiongall Finn Fukui didn’t really think that he would have to deal with assassins, but he also kept a prudent level of paranoia around certain things. As Governor of 6940 Draconis, he had made enough enemies over his lifetime.

  So the banging on the door might be trouble, and it might simply be that he had turned off the comm last night because it was supposed to be his day of rest today, and someone needed something that Steafan couldn’t deal with himself or push off until tomorrow.

  Finn sighed heavily as Aoki rolled over sleepily.

  “Your turn,” she laughed quietly.

  It was an old joke. Both of their kids were grown and gone nearly a decade now, working on their own families and trying to figure out how to get little ones to sleep through the night.

  Finn rolled out of bed and, just because, grabbed a bolter pistol from inside his nightstand. He checked that it was loaded. The air in their bedroom was kept a little colder, because Aoki liked it that way, so he slept in loose pants and a shirt that were good enough for whoever wanted to bother him at…ye gods, who the hell needed him at three-fifty-three in the morning?

  “Who is it?” Finn walked into the main room and keyed the comm, having moved to one side of the door, in case it was an assassination and bullets were about to impact on the steel-core door.

  At least the knocking ceased.

  “Steafan,” came the reply. “Someone just made orbit and sent an urgent message to, and I quote: Finn Fukui, Governor General of 6940 Draconis and Grand Poobah of the Outer Reaches, unquote.”

  Okay, that was a pretty old joke, so whoever it was thought they had a connection from the days before he was Governor and wanted to remind him. Or at least call it to mind. He had introduced himself to the world that way for a year or so when he took over the Two-Ring Mothership Dragonfly.

  Who the hell wanted to talk to him that couldn’t wait?

  “Why do I need to be awake, Steafan?” Finn leaned close enough to the comm so that he could talk normally.

  “Jorge Royo and friends would like a private audience,” Steafan continued. “And they want to talk about filming a movie here, with all the tax incentives, write-offs, and accounting gimmicks that go with it. They claim that time and secrecy are of the essence.”

  He opened the door and stared at his right hand assistant, what other places might call his Chief of Staff, but Steafan Sìoltach still went by the title of First Officer, even though neither of them were shipboard pirates anymore. If there was such a thing in the era of Jessica I, Queen of the Pirates.

  Steafan wasn’t as tall as Finn. Hadn’t really been a good knife fighter, back in the day. Oh, he was still reedy and fast as a mongoose. Head kept shaved these days instead of having a bald ring. But his brains and ability to outthink and outmaneuver a foe had been why he had risen as he had, and why he stayed with Finn when they went into administration.

  “Jorge Royo? The movie star?” Finn let the sleepiness wash off him now.

  He had met the man once. Maybe twenty years ago, back when Finn was a hot-shot captain on a Two-Ring Mothership. Back when Finn’s uncle got elected Governor of Callumnia. Back when he did call himself Grand Poobah of the Outer Reaches.

  “And friends,” Steafan said with a perfectly straight face. “They included a couple of publicity stills. Mrs. Jones is apparently aboard, as well as a guy named Longbow.”

  Longbow’s here?

  Finn still had an album he had bought twenty years ago, back when the guy was the biggest thing in music in this entire octant. One of his favorite things to put on and listen to when he did paperwork in the evening and Aoki was in a different room.

  Finn reminded himself not to be starstruck. Much. He was also important and famous people these days.

  But still…

  “You landing them yet?” Finn asked.

  “Haven’t, pending your opinion,” Steafan replied with a grin. “They could be on the ground in three hours for an early breakfast, or I can slot you in for brunch. Or they can wait until tomorrow. Figured that Longbow was worth waking you up, since someone decided to wake me up, thinking this was an emergency.”

  Yeah, Steafan knew about Longbow. Didn’t listen to his music, being more of a Classical Pulse Pop fan when he thought nobody was watching. Still, perks of being Grand Poobah of the Outer Reaches, and all that.

  “Make it brunch,” Finn decided. “Here in the palace so we can control the gossip until we know what they’re up to. Wasn’t there some stink a while back about a concern in Salonnia?”

  “Dunno, but I’m awake so I’ll roust your intelligence people and put them to work,” Steafan replied. “Anybody I should invite to this one?”

  “No, let’s be private for now,” Finn said. “ You, me. Aoki if she wants, but she probably won’t. We can always hold a lottery later for tickets to a State Dinner, if they want to turn this into a three-ring-circus. I’m going to go work out for a while, and then be in the office in a few hours.”

  “See you then with updates.”

  Finn closed the door as Steafan retreated down the hall. He went back into the bedroom and secured the pistol before sliding back into bed.

  “Your hands are cold,” Aoki complained as he curled up against her back. “And I heard you tell Steafan you were going to the gym. I’m sleeping in.”

  Finn laughed and rolled back out of bed. A quick change and then he’d go assuage the gods of exercise before facing the demons of paperwork.

  And then he would have lunch with a couple of certified movie stars and a rock star.

  As well as see what they hell they wanted with 6940 Draconis.

  6

  Seriously, the surface of this planet reminded him of a bad parts of the desert just inland from Puerto Peñasco. And as near as Rob could tell, the rest of the planet was even worse. Arid and dry, with a few, landlocked oceans, subject to temperature extremes that made him wonder why anybody bothered to settle here.

  It wasn’t as though there weren’t a bunch of planets, even out here on the fringes of the galaxy, already habitable, having been terraformed in the days of the ancients. Why would anyone want nights barely above freezing and days that got to one hundred and thirty degrees regularly?

  Sure, there was mining. All sorts of odd, exotic metals and materials fairly close to the surface, apparently from a nearby supernova at the right time, billions of years ago. Maybe that sort of thing was worth digging, since you could mostly live underground and climate control things easy enough, with a sea of solar cells above, clustered around a bunch of bunkers
that looked like ant nests from any distance. Still, at least forty or fifty million people called this rock and the orbital stations home.

  Valencia del Oro was in a pretty good landing slot, compared to where they could have been. And the field was weird, with underground tunnels everywhere like giant rabbits or moles had lived here. You landed in a big pit and a tunnel would extend to more or less meet you.

  Wasn’t an airlock, because you still had to walk about fifteen feet from door to door in open air, but that was far enough that you didn’t roast or freeze, if you didn’t dawdle.

  But it was a weird planet, nonetheless.

  Rob had dressed like a traveling salesman for this one. Flashier suit than a Field Agent on a mission. Shiny and almost useless in a distracting way, to use the term his trainers had instilled in him. Like lawyers, or pimps, if you could separate the two enough to get sunlight between them. Of course, some pimps probably took exception to the comparison.

  Jorge and Roxy had gone for understated glamor today. Two past-their-prime superstar actors looking for one last gig. Longbow looked like they had liberated him from the hospital or morgue and grabbed the first shirt and pants they could grab in a darkened closet. At least Nigel looked normal. Raef was staying with the ship until Jorge decided he needed her in person. She was probably the smartest one here, on that count.

  Into the tube, they followed the landing instructions that had been transmitted and walked a couple hundred yards along a tunnel that honestly looked like any space station Rob had ever visited. At the far end, a small, automated train awaited them, whooshing them across the underside of the landing field to the capital palace for their reception.

  Apparently, the dude in charge really was the same guy, and he did remember being called Grand Poobah happily enough to welcome them. Hopefully.

  Rob was armed, just in case, but that was business, not need. Most of the rest of them probably were as well, but that was just careful prudence on a planet of pirates. Or however these folks introduced themselves these days.

  The train was automated, so they rode in companionable silence, deep in character. Jorge and Mrs. Jones were movie stars. Longbow was a down-on-his-luck musician doing soundtracks to survive these days. Nigel was the group’s gopher and personal assistant.

  And Handsome Rob was the con artist selling these poor schmucks on a con of his own. Which was funny when he considered how long some of these folks had been grifting. Still, they would make it work.

  They arrived at the main station, a vast, underground vault with low ceilings and many mole tunnels disappearing into the walls with tracks. A well-dressed, bald gentleman awaited when the car stopped, smiling as they emerged, his suit something extremely light-weight and well-cut, however taupe the fabric.

  “I bring you our Governor’s greetings. I am Steafan Sìoltach, First Officer to the Governor,” the man said floridly, somehow managing to look smarmy and malevolent at the same time.

  Maybe that was just Rob, hopefully being in character.

  “Greetings in return,” Rob said, introducing everyone. “My name is Roberto Segura, representing Blue Wave Films and Señior Jorge Royo. Mrs. Jones. Levi Framingham. Nigel Phipps.”

  “I am pleased to meet all of you,” Sìoltach replied. “If you will follow me, we have arranged brunch with the Governor at the palace.”

  Rob felt that a smile was appropriate for the grifting chiseler he was playing, so he let that sort of thing take up residence on his face as the First Officer led them to a different train. This one got unlocked with a fob extracted from the man’s pocket and replaced to open the door. The machine was already programmed, apparently.

  Or it only had one destination. You never knew when everything was underground.

  Rob figured that Jorge and Roxy had both already calculated the best way to separate the device from the owner, but, knowing Nigel, he had scanned the signal and the frequency and stored it against future use.

  The man never talked much, but there was never any doubt when he was on information security systems.

  They rode in companionable small talk. The lack of weather. Recent planetfalls. Exciting local news, what there might be of it.

  The palace was, disappointingly, just another subway tram stop, with a station done in the same white or black tile as the others, with only PALACE on two walls to indicate you had made it to the right place.

  Still, they were here. The same fob opened a locked door that led to something of a security airlock.

  Sìoltach beeped.

  “Oh my,” he said theatrically. “I’m afraid that you will not be allowed to carry your personal weapons into the brunch audience. A guard will be awaiting us on the far side with claims tickets.”

  A touch overdone, if anything. Probably not the first time this man had gone through this speech. After all, Corynthe prided itself on being a land of pirates, however semi-reformed and law-abiding they might claim to be these days.

  A good governor, the kind who had managed to stay in power for six years, was most likely expecting assassins or troublemakers.

  At least they were going to be polite about it.

  The inner door opened, revealing a large, impersonal chamber and a half-dozen men with guns in holsters, none of whom resembled the Governor.

  Rob figured he might as well settle things early, so he turned to his right and carefully withdrew the pulse pistol, handing it to a hard-looking woman with a checklist, in trade for a ticket. Jorge followed, then Nigel, then Longbow.

  Roxy just smiled serenely, almost beatifically.

  Interestingly, she didn’t draw out the holdout pistol Rob knew she had on her, but the locals didn’t say anything, so they must have missed it in their scans. She could get to it easy enough, just by showing off a flash of thigh and the spot where her garter belt snapped to her white, thigh-high stockings.

  Good to know she still had it. Must be one of Nigel’s toys. Rob wondered how many other such undetected devices there were in the party.

  “Very good, madam and gentlemen,” Sìoltach carried on as if nothing had interrupted their conversation. “If you would follow me?”

  He led them to a closed, double door. It was old and made of wood, from the weight and look, which meant it had been imported from off-planet, just to separate this room from the rest of the palace. That was a useful tidbit Rob filed he followed the man into a smaller space, almost a drawing room, set with one longish table and already prepared for breakfast.

  Now the fun part of the scam could unfurl. Down on their luck movie stars hoping for a little verisimilitude in their next feature. Maybe borrow a small squadron of ships and accidentally talk them into going a little overboard. A pirate romance designed to make the troublesome barbarians of Corynthe over into terribly-misunderstood bad boys, the kind that make the good girls swoon and think about running away from the abbey. Bit parts for important financiers and politicians. Tax breaks and matching funds.

  All the sorts of things that Rob had spent a lot of time studying over the last year, then boning up on as they flew out into the wilderness.

  The Governor rose as they entered. Older man, perhaps early fifties, but still fit and muscular. Longish, curly black hair was graying in stripes that probably acted to carbonate the hormones of most women, as his face had that perfect blend of rugged and handsome that would likely hold in place for another decade or two before fading, much like Rob’s father and both grandfathers had managed.

  The man appeared taller than Rob, perhaps by an inch. Heavier, too, with obvious muscles from lifting weights, where Rob generally concentrated on fluid mobility in his strength training.

  The man was wearing a blazer-style jacket, but instead of a dress shirt and a tie, he seemed to be wearing a simple, black T-shirt underneath. The top was faded from the original black, almost to gray. Washed too many times, would be Rob’s guess, but kept as a favored treasure.

  The front had a print of a much-younger Levi Framingham f
rom before the accident, on it and the word Longbow in the stylized font from the original album.

  Rob felt a horrible sinking feeling in his stomach, probably shared by most of his friends. It was as if his whole planned scam had just been chucked out the window in one go.

  7

  Finn was amazed how little the man looked like his old publicity stills, but that was probably to be expected, as badly as Longbow had been injured in the middle of his tour for that first album.

  Flipped a ground vehicle and tumbled it. Safety harness failed when the vehicle got t-boned by a heavy truck. Year plus in a hospital after they reconstructed his facial bones as well as they could from pictures and hope. And taught him how to walk and talk again.

  It was no wonder Framingham had never released a second album, since it was something like five years before he could play the guitar again that well, and the galaxy had passed him by to the next up-coming star.

  “Welcome,” Finn exclaimed to the group, taking their measure as he tried to figure out what the hell was really going on here.

  Didn’t feel like an elaborate setup for an assassination. Why would you employ people so high profile? These sorts of things were generally done quietly. And if you were going to make a production of such a thing, why stop with just this small team.

  Finn could see Queen Jessica, or more likely David the Regent, sending a team of ninjas, if it came to that. Technically, they would be in their rights, as he might not have sent in more than a nominal sum in tax revenue over the last three years, calculating his distance to the capital against the values of the mines and the geographic location of 6940 Draconis in the scheme of things.

  Nobody would normally drop a colony here, except that the 6940 Draconis system itself was in something of a salient, a thumb that stuck into a pocket, with Salonnia on one side and Lincolnshire on the other. Nifty, if you wanted to occasionally smuggle things to higher yielding markets without necessarily declaring them. Or paying the right taxes.