by J. S. Morin
Mort shuddered again, and this time it didn’t look forced. “Egads, boy. She’s softened up around the lady curves, and I still wouldn’t climb into that bed.”
“Really?” Carl asked. “You didn’t even try? I mean, that body’s essentially a rental. What did you have to lose?”
Enzio’s face grew red. “My pride! She thought of me as a hunk of desirable meat who happened to be useful as a wizard.”
Carl’s chuckle came from his belly. “Yeah. I used to be that hunk of meat back when she was fun.”
“And if you had a few weeks now to impersonate her boyfriend without her knowing?” Mort prompted.
Now Carl’s lip curled. “Rather she be after me personally, as Carl, and I’d enjoy turning her down. But if I was stuck in that body…” he said, nodding toward Enzio. He pursed his lips, indecision causing palpable discomfort. “Curiosity’d probably get the better of me.”
“You’re incorrigible. After all that woman put you through? Three divorces. Three! You’d think you’d have run out of curiosity by now.”
“Well, she’s off those marine drugs. I might even get a chance to—”
Enzio held up a hand, cutting Carl off. “Don’t want to hear it.”
Suddenly, Carl’s eyes went wide. “You can’t tell Amy any of this. I mean, it’s all hypothetical. I wouldn’t go behind her back, even if I was in a borrowed body.”
Enzio smirked. “You’re not the only one who can keep a secret. So… this crew got room for another wizard?”
# # #
It was bound to happen sooner or later. Cedric was the first to go. He had repaid his debt for the Mobius crew saving him from the disaster he caused on Mobile Excavating Station YF-77. They dropped him off on New Ganymede with a share of the terras they’d earned doing odd jobs since his arrival.
But it was Esper who came as a surprise. She spoke up at dinner one night on Pleasant Valley, right after everyone had stuffed themselves on spaghetti and meatballs.
“I can’t stay here,” she said.
“What?” Amy said. “You can’t go. You’re family.”
Esper gave a sad smile. “Family’s split up. None of us here stayed with our families before, did they? And besides, Kubu was family too.”
Carl swallowed and shrank in his seat.
“I haven’t forgotten that,” Esper said, pointedly looking his way. “I told you to leave that Squall and take Kubu. I didn’t tell you to let him decide. He’s still just a kid inside that huge body. He’s not responsible for big decisions like that.”
“He wouldn’t have fit,” Carl protested. The giant canid had to have been twelve tons. He couldn’t have stretched out in the cargo bay with the ramp up. “He made a convincing case that we didn’t have the food to sustain him, either.”
“You let a five-year-old sway you?” Esper said. “Savior Carl, who the entire stuunji government trusted to deal with Ruckers and Poets. That’s the guy who got outwitted by someone who eats rabbits whole and doesn’t like to wear pants? I could have shrunken him just like those Convocation wizards did to Rai Kub. Except instead of taking him captive, we could have rescued him.”
Shoni cleared her throat. “Magicking people against their will is wrong.”
“I’ve seen so much,” Esper continued. “We’ve been to another universe. I caught a glimpse of the afterlife. There are so many answers out there that I barely know the questions to ask. You’re all getting older. You’re settling down. I hear the whispers. Family. Safety. Getting by instead of getting rich. Frankly, it’s about time some of you grew up. But I can’t be content ferrying cargo and eking out a living on the trade markets.”
Carl felt hollow inside. He knew it wasn’t personal, per se, but it still felt like rejection. Someone was choosing another life besides the one he wanted. But would a twenty-six-year-old Carl Ramsey have wanted to fly with the expectant father version of himself?
Probably not.
“Where will you go?” Enzio asked. Everyone was getting accustomed to having him around. He was one of the guys, drinking shitty beer and laughing at stupid holovids. He had earned points with the crew when he got teary eyed at Mort’s most recent funeral.
“First things first, I’m going to rescue Kubu from Ithaca,” Esper said.
“You and what army?” Carl countered. “That place must be swarming with Earth Navy Intelligence by now. How will you even get there?”
Esper smiled. It wasn’t warm or sad, but as if Carl had played into her hand. “I’m taking your Squall.”
Carl stood from the table. “What?” After all he’d been through to get it. Even if he didn’t have cause to fly it, it seemed unfair to lose the craft after just getting it back.
“I told you to leave it on Ithaca and take Kubu,” Esper said. “You abandoned him there because you had a convenient excuse to save your toy instead.”
“But you can’t even fly it!” Carl protested. “Wizards and tech don’t mix.”
“Poo on that,” Esper said. “I’ve been practicing in Esperville. It’s not like I don’t have a pilot’s license. It’s just that none of it makes a lick of sense anymore. But I can go through the motions and get everything to work. I’ve even been writing myself an instruction book on real paper. I’m going to find a way onto Ithaca, shrink Kubu to the size of a lapdog, and get him out of there.”
Roddy pointed out the obvious. “But that Squall doesn’t even have a—”
Esper raised an eyebrow.
“…star-drive,” Roddy finished meekly. “Right. You. Forget I said anything. I’ll just be in the kitchen. Anyone need a beer?”
Enzio, Niang, and Yomin all placed orders.
“You’re set on this, aren’t you?” Carl said.
“You owe me,” Esper said firmly. “I’ve never asked for anything, and I’m not asking now. I am going to rescue Kubu.”
There were tears and hugs and heartfelt goodbyes all around. Esper packed up as much of her belongings as she could fit in the back of the Squall and climbed aboard.
Somehow, Carl expected none of it to work, right up to the point where the Squall vanished into astral space a few hundred meters from Pleasant Valley.
Everyone left on the asteroid stood watching the spot. “And to think,” Carl said. “I was hoping we could convince her to learn the drums in our band.”
“Band?” Amy and Shoni said in unison.
Carl ignored them and turned to Niang. “What do you think? Old rock music, maybe some R&B to appease our singer. You could learn on the job.”
“Singer?” Niang asked.
“Me,” Yomin said. “I only agreed if they let me update their catalog a little. Five-piece band, so I’d get a 20 percent share of the song selection. Imagine you’d get the same.”
Amy shook her head. “A band? You realize you’re turning into your father, don’t you?”
Carl cocked his head. “I grew up on tour, and I turned out just fine. Space is a great place to raise kids. Besides, Chuck was a comedian. I’m planning on being a musician. We’re nothing alike.”
# # #
Don Rucker drummed his fingers on his desk.
Tania Rucker stood her ground, trying to ignore the knot tightening up her stomach. She was seven years old again and had just broken a statue that had dated back to pre-space-flight Earth. Except this time, she’d broken a fleet of ships and cost hundreds of lives.
She wouldn’t speak first.
Don couldn’t sit there stewing forever.
Those thick, strong fingers continued to drum, marking the time. Those heavy, hard eyes battered at Tanny’s resolve. She’d been in the room for this sort of meeting before, but she’d never been on this side of the table. Even that incident twenty-six years past that had left itself indelibly etched on her psyche had taken place in her bedroom, not her father’s office.
What was he going to do to her? Was this the final straw? It wouldn’t be the first time a family member had become a liability. Mriy, waiti
ng outside for her, wouldn’t be able to do a thing if Don wanted her “taken care of.” This was Mars, and Don Rucker owned Mars.
The fingers drummed, each staccato thump a fist pounded against Tanny’s conscience.
“I can explain,” Tanny blurted. She hadn’t meant to say anything, but the waiting was killing her.
The drumming fingers stilled.
“You can?” Don asked calmly. “Oh. That’s good. Because for a while there, I was worried you weren’t going to have an explanation of how you lost 836 lives and over half a billion terras in equipment.”
Now that he put it in those terms, Tanny was no longer sure her excuse stood up to the light of day. “Carl turned us in. Enzio said he got a comm from him and—”
“Stop right there,” Don said. Tanny clamped her mouth shut instantly. “Before you go making yourself look like an even bigger idiot than you already are, lemme explain to you where you went wrong. First off, you had a nice cushy racket set up on Carousel. Freeride’s been lawless for decades. One quick ARGO sweep, and it was yours for as long as you wanted it. That was fine. Then, you get an offer that’s too good to be true from someone you’ve got no reason to trust.”
“It was Carl. It was poker. He’s a born loser at gambling,” Tanny protested.
Don held up a warning finger before she gained any momentum. “You and Carl… you’re nothing. He was good to you, and you got rid of him. And you knew, you knew, that Carl Ramsey is a Class-A con man, best in the business. You walk into a rigged poker game and—”
“It wasn’t rigged,” Tanny insisted. “We took precautions.”
“I assure you,” Don said. “That game was rigged. Ramsey got everything he was looking for. He gave up half a moon he didn’t own.”
“We checked with Chuck directly!”
“You got bamboozled,” Don insisted. “I don’t pretend to know how he did it, but you ain’t tellin’ me Ramsey walked into that room without a plan better than the one you did. Guy was playing for charity and you thought he was willing to lose? He won that game the second you and the pirate broad showed up. End of story.”
Tanny fumed in silence. She’d been on so many of Carl’s heists that she thought she could out-swindle him. How could Don understand how slapdash Carl’s plans always were, how close to utter disaster he tiptoed. It should have been child’s play to get the better of him.
“And then,” Don continued. “You take your cozy gig on Carousel and pack up for greener pastures. Except now, you’re not on a lawless planet that ARGO doesn’t care about. Now you’re on a hidden moon that’s only valuable as long as no one finds out about it. Nice place to mooch off of. Bad business to set it down. You wanna know what I think? I think the writing was on the wall before that poker game ever came down. Ramsey didn’t make his own stake in that moon, and he knew that the whole house of cards was coming down.”
“You’re giving him too much credit,” Tanny said, trying to keep a respectful tone. Don didn’t keep a bodyguard in his office for his meeting with her, but she was long past the point of being a physical threat to her father.
“You’re not giving him enough,” Don said, stabbing the air between them with a finger. “I’d have died a happy man knowing the two of you were carrying on my legacy. Maybe live to see some chubby-cheeked little rascals lookin’ like me. Now what’ve I got? A daughter who’s looking to run her inheritance into the ground before she even collects on it. An ex-son-in-law who just remarried—and who I still might leave this whole business to, if for no other reason than to think my life’s work will be in good hands.”
“He tried running a syndicate, and it—”
“Not like this one,” Don insisted. “He had a bunch of spit-and-polish types. Not enough good men and women. But enough about Ramsey. What’m I gonna do with you?”
Tanny held her breath.
“First off, you’ve got a few comms to make,” Don said. “Usually, I handle all condolences personally. Lets my people know I care. But this is the time for you to put on a suit coat, plop yourself in a room, and personally comm the families of every last associate you got killed out there.”
“But that could take weeks,” Tanny said, wincing even as the words came out. She knew that wasn’t what needed to be said there.
“Then you’d better get on it. Suit coat not optional. You will look professional, courteous, and contrite on screen. And once you’re finished with that, I want you to talk to your uncle Earl.”
Tanny nodded. “About what in particular?”
“About how you’re swapping places with Jimmy. Kid’s earned a shot running his own racket. You need a few years learning what it means to be a Rucker.”
# # #
Chuck Ramsey didn’t pace. Let other prisoners pace. The cell was too small anyway, and he had long legs. Two paces in either direction were just enough to drive a man stir-crazy—but only if he tried.
Instead, Chuck lounged. His data-fabric attire kept scrawling the word “PRISONER” across his body in various directions and at multiple angles. It was almost hypnotic. It’s not like the sixty-year-old man was liable to crash down magnetically sealed doors and storm out of a secure Earth Navy Intelligence facility.
The door slid open without warning, but Chuck didn’t flinch. Flinching was for suckers. The guards liked to see a guy jump. It unnerved them when someone kept his cool.
“Commander Nguyen wants to see you,” the guard informed him.
“Thanks, Sgt. Morris,” Chuck said to the marine. It was always his policy to learn names, and in this case, Justine Morris preferred not to be addressed by first name. He fixed the woman with a smile and stepped out of the cell. Spreading a hand in front of him, Chuck told her, “Lead on.”
They traversed a short section of military black corridor, brightly lit but at the same time more uninviting than pitch darkness. Chuck sauntered along, confident that the lack of restraints meant he was getting somewhere with his protestations.
The door to one of the interview rooms came and went. Chuck had spent hours in there that must have added up to days. But Sgt. Morris kept on going. “Change of venue today?” he asked amiably.
“Commander’s office,” Sgt. Morris informed him.
That certainly was a step up. Several turns later and past a mess hall, rec room, and locker facilities, they arrived at an unassuming door. The name plaque read simply:
Commander Thuan Nguyen
Chuck would have knocked first, but Sgt. Morris just pressed the door release and ushered him through. The office was by-the-book Earth Navy, right down to the framed still-pic of Fleet Admiral Tamara Washington on the wall behind the lone occupant’s chair.
“Mr. Ramsey,” Nguyen said, indicating the chair across from him. “Have a seat.”
Chuck slipped into the chair as the door slid closed behind them. “Nice place you’ve got here. Gotta say, I like what you’ve done with the—”
“Can the flattery, Ramsey,” Nguyen said. He slid a datapad across the desk and spun it to face Chuck. “This is your non-disclosure statement. Read it. Put your thumbprint on it. Then get the hell out of my office.”
So, this wasn’t a social call. “This mean I’ve been vindicated?”
“Ramsey, I don’t know how to tell you this. Off the record, I think you’re guilty as hell. But your story checks out—as much as we can verify. Your son discovered the ENV Odysseus, kept the knowledge to himself, and attempted to set up a criminal empire using it as a base of operations. Now… mind you, I can’t prove any of this, but I think that after that, there was a power play and you came out on top. You ousted Lieutenant Commander Ramsey from his own criminal outfit and set yourself up as potentate of some shit-hole backwater moon.”
“It’s all right there in my statement,” Chuck said. In that statement, repeated ad nauseam over the course of uncountable interrogations, he’d argued that Brad brought him in to keep competitors from using him or Becky as leverage, keeping them prisoner in c
omfortable luxury but denying them the right to leave or contact the outside galaxy. “Don’t know what else to tell you.”
Chuck only browsed the agreement. It was boilerplate. Not signing meant he stayed in custody. Signing meant freedom. Whatever else he did afterward, his thumbprint was going onto that datapad.
“Oh, I don’t expect a man like you to break, Ramsey,” Nguyen said with menace. “But I want you to know that for the rest of your natural life, we’ll be watching you. When you take a piss, Earth Navy is going to know if you wash your hands.”
“Always wash ‘em,” Chuck replied. “I’m in a handshake sort of business. Got a reputation to maintain.” He pressed his thumb to the datapad until it beeped at him.
“Finally,” Nguyen muttered as he reclaimed the datapad. “Sgt. Morris will bring you to a changing room where your civilian clothes will be returned. This ends our tenure together.”
“Mind telling me where I can find my wife?” Chuck asked.
“Rebecca Ramsey was released on psychiatric advise eight days ago.” The way Nguyen said it, Chuck almost believed he didn’t think Becky was crazy. But apparently she’d played her part to perfection. “Just another one of your little misdirections, eh, Ramsey?”
Chuck shrugged. “Couldn’t say. Always figured she was a little nuts. Married me, after all. Anyhoo, I’ll be on my way. Hope Earth Navy’s got some popcorn, because when I see Becky for the first time in a month, we’ll be putting on a show.”
# # #
Mordecai The Brown had run from his problems for most of his adult life. When the quickest of those problems caught up with him, the result had been murder. Cedric swore that despite the dark path he’d started down, he wouldn’t repeat any of his father’s subsequent mistakes.
As he stood in line to exit the passenger transport, Cedric felt like a stranger in his own skin. Of course, from the skin inward he was completely himself. He had never made Esper’s mistake of succumbing to practicing the rituals contained within the Tome of Bleeding Thoughts. But by his attire, one would never have mistaken him for a wizard.
Cedric’s outfit felt like a costume. The leather jacket with the outside zippered pockets looked better fit to a hooligan in an alley. Baggy black pants bunched up where they tucked into shin-high combat boots, the soles of which added a good two inches to his already impressive height. The data goggles he wore were secondhand and didn’t function even before they came into a wizard’s possession. The bandanna around his head was made from a jolly roger flag.