Red Noise

by John P. Murphy

  The hotel’s service entrance backed out onto the outer corridors of the station in a ring that went all the way around to Angelica’s home base in the casino. Guarding the service entrance was nice and quiet, usually the kind of thing people volunteered for when they wanted to get stoned in peace. After all, it would be stupid of any of her fighters to come around the hotel, just like it would be stupid of Ditz and Screwball to go around the casino. But it would also be stupid to assume they wouldn’t, because pretty much everyone involved was stupid.

  “That hurt?” Ditz peered at Screwball’s face, getting close enough that Screwball shoved him away.

  “How high are you, anyway?”

  Ditz considered that, then raised his hand palm-down and made a seesaw motion.

  “We can’t let them get away with this, Ditz.” His voice was muffled by the ice, and by not being able to feel his lips, but he didn’t care. “If we don’t fight back they’ll just ’cycle us. In the chute and flush, the whole lot of us. The old man isn’t bringing in any money, you know. How the hell’s he going to pay us if this drags on, huh?”

  “Man, lighten up. You’re new here, right? Look. They push us around, we slap them around. It’s all good. You can’t take it too personal. A couple months ago, with the real fighting, yeah, that sucked. People actually died. This is nothing. We’ll make some extra cash while the old man and the witch blow off steam, then they’ll make up and we’ll all be buds again.”

  Screwball started to object, but Ditz looked him in the eye, his blown pupils eerie. “Seriously. He who kicks your ass today, is just gonna owe you a beer tomorrow. Be cool.”

  DOC MILLS

  After working her budget this way and that, and getting increasingly impatient with the assay, the Miner decided that she had the time and money for an overdue visit to the sawbones. There was a doctor’s office right off the galleria, she’d passed it when she returned along the eastern spur, but the bartender Takata told her to skip him. “He’s for the gangs,” he’d said, “and these days he’s usually drunk or stoned out of his gourd.” He’d given her directions down into the back bowels of the station and promised to message ahead. There were stairs at the end of the southern spur; she took those instead of the elevator on principle.

  As she navigated the corridors she thought back to the same spaces on other stations long ago. She’d worn a uniform then, and fewer scars. Carved into the rock of the asteroid it clung to, Station 35 was divided into hundreds of little squared-off reconfigurable spaces. Not exactly a maze, but not easy to find one’s way through without directions. She could tell it had been designed for floor-to-floor fighting, meaning they expected their enemy wouldn’t want to seriously damage the infrastructure.

  The usual plan for taking a space station was simple: make a couple nice big punctures to evacuate atmo, and then be patient while all the little pockets ran out of food, water, heat, and air. Accept the surrender or clear out the corpses, then spend weeks bringing it up to working condition again without the benefit of schematics or working knowledge of the systems. Station 35 had been valuable once; the designers had known that an attacker couldn’t afford to be patient, couldn’t afford downtime. The Miner stopped and rested a hand on an access panel: thin plastic, as cheap as it looked, intended to deter invaders from throwing a lot of lead. Make some greedy commander order hand-to-hand fighting, an ugly, bloody rush against defenders who knew they could fix these systems ten times as fast.

  Yeah, the place had been something special once, some critical hub. She felt strangely sad at how irrelevant it was now, discarded and loaned out to scum like Anaconda so someone could else pay to keep the air on. Maybe it had drifted out of a useful location, or probably the political universe had just moved on without it. It had seen fighting recently, but pathetic street brawls, nothing serious. In a way, that made it sadder. She stopped once on her tortuous route to stare at a brownish-red handprint that someone had failed to scrub off the wall, barely bothered trying. Charming.

  The place was spooky empty. A couple times she caught a glimpse of someone, always just stepping around a corner. Once or twice a head poked out of a hatchway that closed again. But that was maybe six or seven people on a long walk. Maybe just one or two keeping tabs on the stranger in their midst.

  She found her destination down in what must have been the old command structure space, embedded deep in the rock in the belly of a poorly-oiled machine, part of a block that had been divvied up into offices and apartments. The seismic rumble of the air movers was palpable down there, thrumming the decking under her feet, only interrupted by the periodic rush of gurgling fluids. The doctor’s door just said “A. Mills, MD” and “NO CREDIT”, which she found oddly endearing.

  Mills answered the door by intercom, and only when told “Takata sent me,” did he open it. He was like every other doctor on every other station, if heavier and hairier than average. He was brusque and businesslike, which was fine by her, and didn’t ask her name. She paid in advance to be stripped, poked, measured, and prodded, told she had high blood pressure for her age, that her false eye needed to be recalibrated, and reminded that her facial scars could be removed for a fee – same as every other doctor on every other station. When she gave him the list of compounds she’d been exposed to over the years, he drew blood and ran the usual tests for the interesting diseases they caused, and thankfully got the same results as always. He also told her that she ought to get her augmentation implants taken out before they screwed up her joints, but unlike most of the other sawbones he didn’t offer to sell them for her, so she figured Takata had the guy right.

  She lingered after dressing slowly, and finally admitted, “I’d like a supply of sleeping pills, too.”

  He frowned so hard his mouth disappeared into his curly black beard. “Aren’t you flying solo?”

  He was shaking his head already before she finished saying “Yup.”

  “I really shouldn’t sell you any kind of sedative. It’s not safe for solo spacecraft operation. You know as well as I do how often emergencies crop up.”

  “Oh, that’s no problem. It’s not for me, it’s for my ship.”

  “Your… ship.”

  “Yeah. See, it gets anxiety real bad.”

  “Your ship gets anxiety.” He had a pretty good level stare, she had to admit.

  “Sure,” she said, grinning. “It gets this crazy idea that I’m going to pilot into a rock or something while I’m strung out on lack of sleep. Nuts, right?”

  Mills stared at her a long time, maybe wondering if he should prescribe an anti-psychotic. “You having trouble getting to sleep, or trouble staying asleep?”

  “Both. And yes, I’ve tried cutting out bright light and blue light, and taking melatonin, and I’ve got a white noise generator, and a pink noise generator, and a brown noise generator. Think of something and I’ve tried it. Drugs work.”

  He pursed his lips and studied her face for a while. His mouth moved like he was chewing his lower lip. “You were in the service, and you’ve obviously seen action.”

  “Not relevant.”

  If he was skeptical, he didn’t show it.

  “Don’t pry, doc. We’ve been getting along.” She gave him a wry smile and raised an eyebrow.

  “Mmm.” He didn’t return the smile. “I’d rather give you a sleep replacement.”

  The Miner considered mentioning that she’d spent the better part of two years on the damn things. She owed a couple scars to the hallucinations they gave her. “They don’t work for me.”

  He chewed a corner of his mustache for a while, then sighed and ran her bank chip again. He gave her a curious look for a moment, but if he was going to ask anything he was interrupted when the auto-pharm started chugging. It spat pills into the tin like a slot machine paying out. “One, and only one, right before bed. It acts fast, but nothing’s instant. Don’t take it with alcohol, and please, please take them sparingly.” She reached for the tin. “Not yet, I’m not don
e.”

  He punched a second order in and the auto-pharm started vomiting again. “This is the antagonist. It’s not safe to rely on, but it’s better than nothing, and it works quick. Keep it by your bed. Get some sugar pills or something to train yourself to take one when an emergency alarm wakes you up. Don’t start taking the other ones until you’re confident you’re drilled enough to take the antagonist in an emergency. Got it?”

  The Miner bit back the urge to snark. The guy was trying to do her a favor. At least, he was trying to keep her alive, and figured that was doing her a favor. Still. “Got it. It’s starting to get a little expensive…”

  “The antagonist’s on me, then. I’ll feel better if I think you’re not sleeping your way through a collision or raid.”

  “Asleep” seemed like the best way to experience those catastrophic events, the Miner thought, but said, “Thanks, doc.”

  “You want to thank me, stay alive. Repeat business, that’s the actual sincerest form of flattery.”

  She grinned and thanked him again, and then noticed that she had a message waiting: the assay was done, and the buyer was ready to meet with her.

  YOU CAN’T WIN

  The Miner had only been sitting in the black faux-leather chair in front of the buyer’s enormous faux-wood desk, staring at the rosy-cheeked little man in his too-big suit, for about forty seconds before she realized that she was about to get screwed a lot harder than she’d expected. He looked like Santa Claus, but sure as hell wasn’t talking like him.

  “…Arsenic isn’t necessarily a bad thing in an ore haul, but it’s something we’ll have to process out, especially in these quantities. Your onboard refinery is new, I know, but it’s not configured the way we prefer,” he was saying. He’d been talking in that vein for a while and looked very pleased with himself. “Plus, while nickel-iron is in demand, as you say, just like any of a thousand iron ores, the particular isotopic iron you’ve brought me isn’t quite as–”

  “How much?” she cut in, her voice hoarse. She hadn’t lost her temper, not yet. She hadn’t lost her temper in years, and this piddly little backwater cheat wouldn’t be the one to break that streak. The longer he spewed bullshit, though, the less confidence she had in that. She’d be patient like she’d been trained, but patient only went so far.

  “Well.” The buyer had an incredibly punchable face, especially with that poor attempt at an understanding expression. Everything that had come out of his mouth had been complete horseshit. He knew it, she knew it, and the smug little son of a bitch knew that she knew it. What he was deciding now was just how little she’d accept without making a fuss. When she’d finally broken off from her patch with thirteen tons of metal, she’d calculated the value of her haul at well over thirty grand. He’d probably offer less than twenty, the little cheat, and damn her, she’d even take fifteen.

  “I think I could see fit to pay ten thousand for the load.”

  She stared at him blankly, and did the only thing she could think of: she laughed. He didn’t.

  “I’m afraid I don’t see the humor, ma’am.”

  “Try again,” she said.

  He eyeballed her, and she could practically see the wheels turning. First timer at Station 35, didn’t usually do business with Anaconda, and she’d made the rookie mistake of letting it be known she didn’t intend to come back. He was the only buyer in a million clicks for the only company buying. He didn’t know she was too broke to push on to the next station, maybe, but who out there wasn’t? And since Anaconda did the assay, he held the cards and he had possession. Shit, shit, shit. Stupid. She almost couldn’t blame him for taking such an easy mark.

  “I’m afraid ten thousand is the best I can do.”

  “Thirteen. A thousand a ton is still cheap.”

  “Mmm. Not for this particular isotope.”

  “At least give me back the arsenic. They paid for it at the last station, I can sell it at the next one.”

  He shook his head. “The refining process makes that very inconvenient for this particular form of arsenic. I could do it, but I’d have to pay you less for the nickel-iron.”

  “Let me see the assay.”

  “I’m sorry, we paid for the assay and so it’s confidential.”

  “Bullshit.” Her heartbeat quickened and her augmentation implants warmed up, tickled by adrenaline and ready for a fight.

  She heard the door slide open behind her and two sets of footsteps. Heavy guys judging by the sound and the tenor of the mouth-breathing. Just two of them, what passes for muscle on a nasty corrupt little… She shook her head forcefully, and the buyer squinted at her. He’d misunderstood the gesture, but she didn’t feel like explaining it.

  “Are you saying we have a dispute, Ms…” He glanced down at his pad, frowned. “Ma’am?”

  “Damn ri–” She stopped herself. Something about that phrasing… Disputed transactions resulted in the seizure of the disputed goods until the dispute was resolved in arbitration. Seized, in this case, by Anaconda Consolidated. To be arbitrated by Anaconda Consolidated. Son of a bitch.

  He cocked an eyebrow, daring her to finish that sentence. She took a breath, reminded herself that she wasn’t going to lose her temper, that she’d gladly pay 20,000 credits to keep her temper and self-respect, and then shook her head no because she didn’t trust herself to answer right if she opened her clenched teeth.

  “All right then,” he said, voice all oily smooth. Such a punchable face, Santa Claus-looking or no.

  Her fuel bill would be about three grand on top of twice that much in supplies. Ten grand would leave her a measly two K profit, less than she’d have made selling her blood plasma for six months. The patch fees would eat that and her savings both. Repairs and updates to the ship could wait. She could limp back to a paid-for claim on that, and just pretend the last six months had never happened. And that her bank account had evaporated.

  She thought back to the plant room on her ship, put herself there for a moment, just a moment. The thought of tending the orchids, carefully trimming the bonsai, calmed her down. She wouldn’t lose her ship, and the plants, and her freedom, just because she lost her temper.

  “Your claim doesn’t seem to be doing you much good. Anaconda Consolidated has a very generous buyout program if you think you might be better suited to a different line of work.”

  Taking her answer from her expression he said, “You don’t have to accept my offer. I can return the load to your ship for a modest lading fee. Seven hundred credits would cover it, I think. Plus you’d have to reimburse us for the assay.”

  Which left her deep in the red. Unable to pay the patch fees, she’d lose her claim. Unable to pay for loaded fuel, they’d impound the ship. She hated herself, but she had to ask. “Ten thousand’s the best you can do?”

  “I suppose I could go higher.” He folded his hands on his desk, looked her in the eye, and smiled. “But I don’t see any reason to.”

  For a brief moment, she visualized herself demonstrating a very good reason. She took a deep breath, decided she’d rather lose it all than make a spectacle of herself like that, and said, “All right.”

  He transferred the ten thousand credits, and handed back her bank chip.

  “That’s an unusual name you have,” he said conversationally.

  “Yes it is,” she managed, and was up and out of her chair. The muscle had slunk away, probably once it had become clear that they wouldn’t be needed, that she’d knuckled under, clearly in fear of them. But the door still closed very quickly behind her and when she heard it latch she barked out a single bitter laugh.

  A message came in while she was storming down the passageway, from the dockmaster. The fuel bill. She swore and opened it–

  “Five thousand credits!”

  She stumbled to a stop and put her hand on the wall. That wasn’t the only item. Five thousand for the fuel, and another line item below it: a five hundred credit charge for the assay.

  YOU CAN’T BR
EAK EVEN

  Takata had actual honest-to-God customers in the bar when the Miner stormed in, so instead of launching into the stream of invective she intended to deliver to anyone with ears, she sat herself in the booth in front of Herrera’s and sank into an angry funk. In the walk down from the posh offices and residences upstairs she’d crossed over from being angry at that sonofabitch buyer to being angry at herself. She’d been stupid and naïve and it had cost her dearly.

  The customers looked and sounded too damn cheerful. Must have come in on that science ship she’d seen approaching. Five of them, obviously not related, but all looking well-off. Nice clothes, well groomed, expensive smiles. A kid who looked barely out of his teens sported the most ridiculous white fez she’d ever seen. He wore it at a cocky angle and kept finding excuses to tilt his head or turn abruptly so that the gold tassel swung around. The girl he kept making eye contact with obviously found it hilarious.

  “You keep looking like that, you’ll sour all my beer,” Takata said. He plunked a pint down in front of her and cut her off. “You can’t pay, I know. It’s on me. Or maybe on them if they get drunk enough they can’t keep count.”

  “Thanks,” she muttered.

  “That bad, huh?”

  “Bastards got me coming and going. Paid less than a third what the load’s worth, then charged me five percent for the privilege. And they’re gouging me on the fuel.”