One was metal, shiny and new, golden fingers covering a hint of black plastic underneath. The other was the hand he’d been born with. He was in a room, maybe a hospital room on account of all the white, but maybe not on account of the lack of people. Yvette was asleep in a chair beside the bed. Nate’s sword rested against the chair.
Of Dominic Fergelic and Julie Roper, there was no sign.
Nate looked down at the blanket covering him. It looked like he had two legs, but he remembered losing one in fire and pain. He reached metal fingers towards the blanket, pulling it free. Golden metal gleamed at him, a replacement leg next to his flesh and blood. Breathe, Chevell. Breathe. That was the ticket. Just take a little time to process it.
“You’re awake,” said Yvette. “We’ve got to go.”
“I need a minute,” said Nate, looking at her impassive face.
“I don’t have a minute,” she said.
“I need a fucking minute!” yelled Nate. “I … need. A minute.”
He wasn’t sure, but there might have been the slightest softening of her expression around the corners of her eyes. “Nathan Chevell. The Republic, as they call themselves, have starships in orbit around our planet. The Emperor has gone to fight a war.”
“Dom?”
“Dominic Fergelic left you this sword,” she said, placing the blade beside him. “You know what this is?”
“I know what it can do,” said Nate.
Yvette touched his metal arm with soft fingers. Nate was surprised in equal measure that he could feel her touch, and that she’d touched him at all. “The Emperor has no more need for your service. He thanks you for your sacrifice.” She looked away, fingers leaving his arm.
“That’s … it?” said Nate. He felt like the world had become hard, heavy, and without hope. “I’ve known him all my life. Dom was like a brother to me.”
“You were an employee. That’s all of it, top to bottom. Now you’re not.” Yvette turned away. “The medtechs are outside. They’ll explain everything. The arm. The leg.”
“I…” Nate trailed off. “I just need a minute.”
“You can have as many minutes as you like,” said Yvette, walking towards the door. “Enjoy your life. At least you’ll miss the war.”
NOW
THE GROUND CAR smelled like a men’s locker room, a mixture of sweat and balls that was universal. The old Nate wouldn’t have chosen to be here under normal circumstances, but losing an arm, a leg, and your Emperor set a new normal. Five years. Metal hand and leg. Out of the Black, the war happening without him. So, he’d signed up with anyone who’d hire a cripple like him. Up until today, it’d been security on starships and the like. Today marked a change: these mercs had taken him on. Nate was going to fight in the war, whether Dom wanted him or not.
Across from him sat Robby Deacon, a squat, ugly man who seemed to be trying to pick a fight with Nate at any given moment. Nate didn’t take it personally; Robby Deacon would try and pick a fight with a soda just to see what would happen.
Up front was Dave Wisdom, the most unlikely name any person had worn. Wisdom was suspicious, angry, and Nate suspected that — courtesy of the tattoos on the man’s knuckles — he was an escaped convict. Escaped might have been a stretch, but Wisdom didn’t have the air of a man who’d learned lessons behind lock and key. He was the kind of man who made his own keys.
Well, Chevell. You’ve got a particular set of skills that are good for very few things. You’ve been touring the galaxy, spiraling out from the core, and here we are. You’re just lucky these mercs were hiring. It’s not like Nate needed the money, though. Yvette had set him on his way with credits aplenty. Although on Nate’s ledger, money couldn’t make up for losing your job, home, and family in an afternoon.
“Chevell,” said Deacon, “your face looks like it wants to pack up and go home.”
“That’s fine,” said Nate. “Your face looks like an asshole.”
“Aw,” said Deacon. “Did I hit a nerve?”
“Nah,” said Nate. “I was just thinking it’s been five years since I met someone quite like you.”
“Quality is hard to replicate,” said Deacon.
“I guess that’s it,” said Nate. He turned to the front. “Dave?”
“It’s Sergeant Wisdom to you, Chevell.” Wisdom didn’t turn around, eyes on the road. Not like there was traffic worth spit here. Edinu Beta was a beautiful world. Warm yellow sun. Temperate climate. Soil that grew Earth plants like they were born here, after minimal terraforming work. But being a little further out from the core, coupled with the 1.1G, meant it wasn’t first on most people’s destination choices. It was rustic, and that felt good. Hell, anyplace with a town called Briar Glen was rustic as hell.
“Sergeant Wisdom,” said Nate, “what’s the op?”
“Easy enough even for a new fish like you, Chevell,” said Wisdom. “We’re going to collect a loan payment.”
“Three mercs for a loan payment?” said Nate. He shifted the hilt of his sword where it peaked out over his shoulder, catching sight of the Apollo Alliance armband he now wore. A long way down from the Emperor’s Black. Hard to tell at this particular point if it was rock bottom or not, but work was work. It kept idle hands from mischief. “Not fighting Republic?”
“Two mercs and a new fish,” said Deacon. “We’ll let you know when you’re one of the team, Chevell. There’ll be no fighting of Republic until your crippled ass proves itself.”
“Pirates playing soldier,” said Wisdom, perhaps more cryptically than was warranted. Nate gave a mental shrug. They wanted to send the ex-Captain of the Emperor’s Black to collect a loan payment? Easy money. No problem.
• • •
Like most things in the township of Briar Glen, the restaurant was nice. Benches — real wood, not some kind of synthetic material. Just two customers, an older couple enjoying a coffee in a booth by the window. At the back, a counter held a cabinet with a collection of cakes, pies, and pastries. A holo behind that advertised the day’s specials, bright lights promising the kind of fare that would lead a man like Nate down a path it’d be difficult to pull up from. Pancakes. Waffles. Nate checked his comm for the time. Lunch would be starting soon. Eh. Maybe we can pick up the loan payment and something to eat. Wisdom was heading towards the counter and the woman who stood behind it. Dark hair. Clean eyes, bright smile. A boy hovered behind her, then scampered through a door out the back.
Deacon moved to the older couple. “Gramps,” he said, non-specifically. “Get the fuck out.” The woman behind the counter’s smile fell like a dropped piano.
The older man looked up at Deacon. “Son,” he said.
“I look like the kind of person who gives a fuck about what you’re going to say next?” Deacon leaned in, low and mean.
It made Nate’s fingers itch — metal and flesh alike. Best not to show that though. He leaned against the restaurant’s doorframe. “Deacon? Bring it down a notch.”
Deacon whirled. “I ask for your opinion, new fish?”
“I think you’re going to get more than my opinion,” said Nate, fingers resting on his blaster.
“It’s okay,” said the older man. “We were just leaving.” The couple rose, edging past Deacon. The man nodded to Nate on the way out. Something about the way the woman’s eyes skittered away from Nate’s face and towards the ground made him feel sick. This isn’t what you do, Chevell.
“Happy?” said Deacon. He joined Nate at the door, clicking the lock shut.
“As a point of fact—”
There was a tight scream, and Nate spun, blaster in his hand. Wisdom had fingers wrapped in the shopkeeper’s hair, her face twisted in pain. “Dave?”
“It’s Sergeant Wisdom, Chevell.” Wisdom leaned in, putting his lips next to the woman’s ear. “You know what we’re here for.” She nodded, tight movements constrained by the fingers in her hair.
“I’m confused,” said Nate, blaster still held ready. “We’re here to pick
up a loan payment.”
“We’re here to pick up a loan payment and a little bit extra,” said Deacon, pressing his blaster to Nate’s temple. “Merc work doesn’t pay for shit these days. You’ve got to decide, new fish. You in? Or are you dead?”
The moment held: Wisdom, fingers twisting an honest woman’s hair so her face was pressed against the counter. Deacon, blaster at Nate’s temple. Here it is, Chevell. First real soldiering job out of the Black and you’re extorting civilians for crumbs. How’s it feel?
“I’m in,” said Nate. He holstered his blaster. Deacon nodded, relaxing, his own blaster returning to its holster. Wisdom wheeled back to the woman he held, and his personal quest to give her pain and humiliation while he robbed her. Nate ran a hand through his hair, then drew his blaster and shot Deacon. The man turned into a flaming pillar, pieces of him showering the wall. Wisdom pivoted, surprise dawning on his face like a star around the edge of a planet. He pushed the shopkeeper clear — perfect — and reached for his own blaster. Nate shot him twice, the hard fzzzshrk of blaster bolts doing all the talking that was necessary.
Smoke drifted in lazy turns from the muzzle of Nate’s blaster. He holstered it, then walked to the back of the store, vaulting the counter. He gave the cowering shopkeeper a nod, then slipped into the kitchen. The boy he’d glimpsed earlier was here, hiding behind the edge of an old style convection stove. “Hey,” said Nate.
“Are you a bad man?” said the boy. He looked at Nate’s metal hand. “Are you a pirate?”
Nate thought about that. Pirate captains of old, scarred and weathered, peg legs and hooked hands. “Maybe,” he said. “We are what we’re made to be. I’m Nate.”
“Benjamin,” said Benjamin, “but my friends call me Ben. You don’t act like a pirate.”
“Well now, Benjamin,” said Nate, crouching down. “I don’t know if we’re friends yet, but I’d like that to be the case some day. Why don’t you stay here for a spell?” Benjamin nodded, and Nate pushed himself to his feet. He snared the fire suppressor from over the stove, then went to put the burning bodies out.
• • •
Nate leaned against the counter, checking the windows for activity. “I figure I should get on. Ditch the car.”
Kimberlee — the owner of the store — nodded, her face still pale. “That would be best. They … they’ll come back.” She was cupping a mug of coffee or something stronger — Nate didn’t pry — to her chest, no more than an arm’s span away.
Nate frowned, then pulled the Apollo Alliance armband off. “Might do. I’m looking to get off this rock.”
She took his meaning. “I’ve got a family. I’ve got friends. I used to like it here. That was until the Republic’s justice came calling.”
“The who now?” said Nate. He tore the armband in two. “We’ve got us an Empire, last I checked.”
“You are out of touch,” she said. “News came down this morning. Emperor’s dead. His Empire’s gone.”
Nate felt his pulse kick up, his mouth dry. “Dom’s dead?”
Kimberlee continued like he hadn’t spoken. “They’re saying on the holos there’s an amnesty.” She looked at the charring on the floor. “They’re saying there’s a new law coming for the lawless.”
“Back up,” said Nate. “The Emperor’s dead?” He didn’t think it would pinch at him after so much time.
“Assassinated, they say,” said Kimberlee. “He seemed like a nice man.”
“He was,” said Nate. He caught a look from her off his starboard bow. “I mean, so I heard. You figure this new Republic will stop people taking what doesn’t belong to them?”
“Doesn’t much matter out here on Edinu,” said Kimberlee. “Emperor’s arm couldn’t reach this far. Why would theirs? Thing is, there’s not enough people wanting to do the right thing anymore.”
“Never was many of them,” said Nate. He remembered Yvette. He thought of Boye — dead. Julie Roper, most likely dead too. He thought of Filipe, gone too. “They burn themselves up on re-entry, Kimberlee.”
“But the flames are so bright,” she said.
Nate nodded, and took his leave. The ground car — and the bodies — needed tending. He couldn’t do much about the charring in the store, but Kimberlee said there’d been enough lawless racket of late that it could be written off as fighting between loyalists of the Empire and Republic. After he got rid of the car, the bodies, and the armband, Nate figured on getting a drink. He stepped outside into the light Edinu Beta’s warm yellow sun, but the planet’s gravity dragged his shoulders down.
But the flames are so bright.
“Hell,” said Nate. Chevell, your war’s gone and solved itself. Put your feet up. But Kimberlee’s words, and her hope, kept nipping at his heels.
CHAPTER THREE
THERE WEREN’T A lot of bars to choose from. Briar Glen was rustic in some of the wrong ways too. The bar at the spaceport was full of Apollo Alliance mercs, and there would be a series of uncomfortable conversations coming Nate wasn’t ready for. So he’d gone farther out, looking for the right combination of seedy enough for fewer questions and not so seedy you’ll get robbed after three beers. This place looked right. The holo had a dancing man above the name. Drench. A place wearing a name like that? Bound to be Nate’s kind of North Star.
Nate pushed open the saloon-style doors, cool air greeting him. Hand on his blaster, he checked for Apollo Alliance mercs. Not an armband in sight. There were five patrons in various states of inebriation. A pirate and a hustler stood behind the bar.
“Harlow,” said Nate, addressing the pirate and hustler, “you’re a thief and a liar.”
Harlow blinked at Nate over the bar, on account of the gloom. It wasn’t an oppressive gloom. It was comfortable, nurtured and cultured from the worn leather seats and the dim filament — filament! — lights. “Nathan Chevell? Is that you?” Then Nate’s old friend was hurrying out from behind the bar, grabbing him in a hug. “I heard about the … Empire. The everything. You’re alive. You’re alive, old friend. I … I hoped, but I also feared.”
Nate freed himself from Harlow’s hug, teetering his golden hand in the air. “Eh. Alive, but not unscathed.”
“That sounds like everyone, everywhere,” said Harlow. “The hand is new.”
“Five years old,” said Nate.
“It’s been that long?”
“Longer,” said Nate.
Harlow moved behind the bar, pulling out a bottle with a warm, amber liquid in it. “I heard about Dom.”
“Seems everyone but me heard that news first,” said Nate. He settled onto a barstool.
“Not on good terms?”
“Not since I broke down,” said Nate, holding up his golden hand as evidence. “Seems like the Emperor only wanted the best.”
Whiskey splashed into two glasses on the bar. Harlow pushed a glass towards Nate. “The Emperor had the best.”
The door opened behind Nate, and he saw Harlow’s eyes checking the newcomer. A tiny movement, well hidden, but Nate had known Harlow almost as long as he’d known Dom. A voice inside Nate’s head said Drink your drink, you’ve shot enough people today, and another voice said, Harlow is a friend, and you killed two people for a stranger today — least you can do is check in. He looked at his whiskey, wrestling with those two voices, then said, “Something up?”
Harlow tried on a smile, which flickered out like a cheap holo. “There’s always something up, Nate.”
“I mean, something specific.” Nate lifted his glass. “This is good.”
“I always have good whiskey. This one’s from Charon.”
“The moon?”
“The moon,” said Harlow. “They run a low-G still—”
“Harlow.”
“It’s just that the whiskey gets a unique flavor—”
“Harlow,” said Nate.
“Nate,” said Harlow, “I got no trouble for you to borrow. You look like a man who’s borrowed enough trouble as it is. It drags you down�
��”
“That’s the gravity on this crust.”
“It drags you down. I can smell it on you, Nate. You’ve walked into my bar, spent plasma smoke on your heels. You’ve got a look about you that says you want to go hide, except you just don’t know how. You ain’t built that way, and we both know it. Your friend — hold up now, don’t interrupt — your friend, the Emperor of all humanity, died today. And you don’t know what to do about that. You’ve got some people maybe already want a piece of you for something you did.” He leaned close. “There was a woman, wasn’t there?”
Nate gave him a stare. “It’s not like that.”
“I knew it. I knew it. There’s always a woman with you, Nate.”
“You sound like Annemarie.”
“What happened to her?”
“Annemarie? No idea,” said Nate. “So. You’ve made me feel right perky about all my problems. What’s up with you?”
“Assholes,” said Harlow, as if that explained everything.
“Okay,” said Nate. “I’m looking to get off this rock. Get a ship. Fire the drives up, punch the hard black. I could use a hand.”
“You don’t know how to sail those seas. You’re an Earther, born and raised.”
“I wasn’t born on Earth.” Nate sighed. “That’s … that was Dom’s home. Me, I just want to buy a ship.”
“Ganymede. Whatever,” said Harlow, waving a hand like the specific planet wasn’t important. He took a sip of the excellent whiskey. “Point is, you don’t know what a ship is like. How she’ll fly. What she’ll do to you and yours. You don’t know how to treat her right. A ship under your hands? She’ll rough you up and spit you out.”
Nate contemplated his whiskey. “So, you do have a ship to sell.”
“Fuck,” said Harlow.
“And here I was, not even got around to asking,” said Nate. “How much?”
“Ship’s not for sale,” said Harlow. “It’s kind of the nature of the business I’m mixed up in at the present moment.”
Nate thought that through for a while. “You’ve got a ship that you won’t sell to me. Your oldest friend in the universe. And you’ve got troubles you won’t tell me about. Which are related to the very ship. This ship—”
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