“Yes, the northeast quadrant. Our stake is already registered.”
“Excellent.”
Apparently threatened by the slight whiff of confrontation, the arrogant captain did not seem willing to let the point go without comment. “With the tension back home, you need to produce this ‘mother lode’ quickly.”
A smile crept onto the scientist’s face. The captain would have no way of knowing, but that was just how Weigner wanted it. He was nothing if not confident in his intellectual superiority.
“If it’s out there, I will.”
The doctor peered out the window at the surface of the Moon. Man versus nature—just the kind of story he enjoyed best.
And this one felt like it would have a more-than-satisfactory ending. At least for him.
* * *
Jarod watched with a certain amount of pride as the Rogues labored on their new bridge. This ship was a mess, but it was their kind of mess. They could make this work. Jarod doubted that there was a crew in the history of “acquisitions experts” that could rival them. Before, the craft had looked like pure junk. Now? Well, it still looked like junk, but at least it was starting to resemble organized junk.
It was not lost on Jarod that their mode of transportation, just like their accommodations, their legal issues and their credit, all seemed to be spiraling around the toilet bowl. He knew…he knew…that if they could just get out to the diamond fields, they would be fine. And yet, fate seemed determined to throw a monkey wrench in the works every time they got close. Jarod watched as Rob clambered up from the engine room. Well, engine closet. Cupboard. Whatever.
“So, how’s the engine?”
“Retros are shot,” Rob responded. Okay, that was no worse than expected. They could handle some shot retros, no problem. Then the boy continued, ticking off the issues on his fingers. “Stabilizers are erratic. The drive itself is only marginally capable—”
“But working…Yes?” Ouch. Maybe Jarod should’ve cut Rob off a bit earlier.
Buton decided to chime in at that point. “It will take me at least forty-eight hours to get the carbon dioxide scavengers back online.” Jarod knew that Buton wasn’t trying to ruin his life on purpose, but sometimes he could swear that the man took a perverse pleasure in being the voice of doom and gloom.
“Two days?” Jarod was not about to let this go down without some serious conversation. “I wanted—”
“Jarod!” Cleo interjected. “They’re barely at half the capacity.” Seriously. Did no one want to get out to the diamond fields? All he needed was an open door. Hell, a window. A pinhole. Jarod wasn’t picky. Cleo continued, after taking one last look at the readout.
“The atmosphere is close to toxic.”
Close. That was it. There was Jarod’s pinhole. “But still breathable…” He grinned at her, rubbing his hands together. He chuckled as Cleo let out a huge sigh, a sure sign that she was weakening.
“Perfect! I’ll let you guys get this baby purring while I scrounge for some supplies.” He ran to grab an extra oxygen boost for his tanks, bumping into the console in the process and dislodging a piece of metal that dropped to the floor with a clang. It probably wasn’t anything too important. At least he hoped not.
As Jarod passed by the navigation panel, a warning clang reverberated through the bridge. The proximity sensors were going crazy. Jarod looked at the cracked screen and saw a dozen rough-looking former prospectors surrounding the ship.
Rob, closest to the open door, glanced up from his work to see a very ugly man preparing to enter the ship.
“What the…?” As the teenager tried to close the hatch, a man with scars covering half his face grabbed the boy and put him in a choke hold. Well, it would have been a choke hold if Rob had been helmetless. As it was, Rob was helpless. He flailed his arms, trying to reach his assailant, but the scarface just laughed, pulling his arms tighter around Rob’s chest, constricting his breathing. Jarod felt he could almost hear the boy’s ribs creak from the strain on them.
The man looked around, finally settling on Jarod. “This here’s our ship.”
Jarod held out his hands, trying to put the man at ease. They needed to calm him down before finding a way to get rid of him. “Look. I bought this ship from a Mr. Onrove. I have the forms—”
The prospector’s face twisted into a frightening grimace. “He wouldn’t have lasted another week. Then we would’ve claimed it!” The ugly man tightened his hold on Rob even further. “And I mean to take what’s mine.”
Rob continued to struggle with his attacker, but Cleo crossed in front of the boy, catching Jarod’s eye. “I think it’s time to negotiate, Jarod.”
“What!?!” Jarod practically screamed at her. This was so unlike Cleo. She might be many things, most of them frustrating as all hell, but a pushover she was not. Then Jarod caught her slight nod.
“Don’t you agree, Rob?” Cleo emphasized her words, glancing down at one of Rob’s prosthetic legs. Jarod got it. Now, would Rob?
Rob’s eyes widened as the scarred man chuckled. “That’s right, little lady.” The man shifted his weight onto a hip as he leered at Cleo.
Rob slumped in an apparent faint, catching the man off guard. The boy hit a switch on his artificial leg, opening up the side compartment. He grabbed a spider-Taser and implanted it in the man’s arm.
“More like renegotiate, ass-bite,” Rob yelled as he slapped the Taser array, activating it.
The man screamed and fell back out of the hatch. Cleo and Jarod were right on his heels, slamming the door shut. Buton glanced out the window.
“Our visitors are retreating, but not vacating,” Buton observed. A ping sounded off the hull. “And they seem to have found a carbon dioxide rifle.”
Jarod slung himself into the pilot’s chair. Time to take out the trash. “Open the hangar doors.”
Cleo protested. “Jarod, the vacuum will kill—”
“Those guys? Please. They’re cockroaches,” Jarod sneered with more confidence than he felt. He was sure that the guys would scatter once they realized their lives were in danger. Probably.
As the warning chime sounded, the would-be thieves scrambled to safety. Pressurized air exploded outward, casting debris across the Moonscape.
The engines whined and grumbled, and then ground to a halt. Jarod felt his hopes deflate until he heard a loud clang from the direction of the engine. Rob strolled forward, holding a huge wrench.
“Just gotta know where to hit it,” Rob drawled. Jarod had never loved that kid more than he did right now. He punched the ignition again, and after a few more groans and moans, the engine caught and roared to life. This was more like it. Their fate was about to change. Jarod’s grin threated to leave his face it was so big.
Cleo saw the grin and queried, “What do we do now?”
Jarod laughed. “Snag us some diamonds, of course.”
Cleo harrumphed. “Yeah, right.” She slapped his shoulder a couple of times. “I’d better start looking for a brothel for you to work at…”
* * *
Buton stared out the window as their ship skimmed along a hundred yards above the Moon. This was no idle exercise. He was doing it to monitor their altitude. The amount of trust he felt for the ancient instrumentation their craft boasted could fit on the head of a proverbial pin. And while he was sure that Jarod was watching their height as well, the man’s crash record spoke for itself.
Prospector camps and squatters dotted the surface they were passing over, creating a motley pattern that boggled the eye. The camps ranged from those with ultra-high-tech machinery, digging and parceling out the dirt, to the lowest of the low…figures hunched over tin pans, poking at the dust with their fingers. But they all had one thing in common. At the end of the day, they all had to do the actual looking by hand. As yet, no one had discovered a detection device for the gemstones.
Jarod’s voice broke into Buton’s reverie, rousing him out of contemplating the mining process below.
&
nbsp; “Got those coordinates?” Jarod asked Rob, who was busy studying a topographical map of the area, displayed in only two dimensions. Had Buton referred to the instrumentation as ancient? Perhaps antediluvian was more appropriate. Rob was apparently having some difficulty adjusting to reading a flat map, as Buton observed that the teenager’s eyes crossed several times during his survey.
Rob pointed at a row of hills up ahead. “Our stake should be just over that next ridge. You should be able to—”
As their ship crested the ridge, an unexpected sight assaulted their view. The stake was fenced off, with red warning beacons spaced every few yards apart. The fence appeared to be armored and electrified, at the very least. It screamed armed strength.
Jarod sputtered, “What…? Who…?”
Buton pointed to a very large sign off to their right. It was emblazoned with a starburst pattern, and proclaimed that this site was registered to…Interstellar Specialists. Buton awaited the inevitable explosion.
“Gil!” Jarod ground the name to dust in his mouth, looking like he was ready to chew it up and spit it out. “That bastard! We’ve got the papers to prove this site is ours.”
Cleo spoke the obvious. “Like we did in the Bahamas?”
Jarod pounded the console in front of him, causing Buton to wince. One errant blow, and this entire ship could disintegrate. He moved forward to forestall any further assault on their vehicle.
Jarod wailed, “What are we supposed to do? The rest of the sites are all low yield. We’ll pull jack out there!”
Ah. Perhaps here Buton could be of help. “Perhaps not.” Everyone’s eyes swiveled to him. Buton blinked under the sudden attention. Did they have to stare at him so intently? It was…disconcerting.
“What?” Jarod whispered, as if he were afraid to let anyone else hear.
Buton swallowed, and then continued. “It’s unconventional, but I’ve been formulating a theory while studying the trajectory of the meteor shower.”
“Yeah, and…?”
“Simply put, I believe, from the pattern of the meteor spray, that there is a high probability of a larger core that—”
“That’s simply put?” Cleo broke in.
Buton decided to use the one holographic display available to them on this relic. It fritzed and jumped. Static ran through the image of the Moon that appeared in the center of the bridge, but it would be clearer than any verbal explanation Buton could give. Tiny dots sparkled, especially in the upper section of the Moon’s surface.
“These are all of the discovery sites as of yesterday.” Buton pointed out the glistening points of light, tracing them with his hand. “Can you see the pattern beginning to emerge? Notice that the strikes are forming almost a whirling pattern.”
Rob turned his head so that it was almost upside down. “I guess. If I look cross-eyed.”
“That’s a classic gravity vortex.”
Cleo studied the map with an intensity that Buton found fascinating. Her passion was quite engaging. She spoke over her shoulder. “Layman’s terms?”
Buton simplified, realized it was still far too complicated for them to understand, and simplified again.
“Something larger traveled with this cluster. A stone core much more massive than those tiny shards that everyone is so excited about.” He looked at Jarod, waiting for the question.
Jarod did not disappoint. “How big?”
“In terms you would understand…” Buton drew out the moment, wanting to impress upon everyone just what this could mean. “Larger than an apple, and smaller than a dog.”
Jarod waved his hand at the screen. “Nice theory. Now, if only someone knew where that baby landed.” He started to turn away, but Buton’s next words whipped him back around, fast.
“I believe I do.”
“You do?”
Buton pushed a button and the map pivoted, far away from where the diamond fields were located. He pointed to a spot with his index finger.
“Right here.”
Rob whistled. “That’s way out in left field…”
Buton chuckled. “Correct, but my calculations have a 92.722 percent statistical interval of confidence that—”
Jarod stopped him, waving his hands to apparently cut off the data flow. He pointed at the new location. “Nobody’s looked out there before?”
“Not to my knowledge. But with the current stakes drying up—”
“Wait. What?” Jarod spun back to face Buton. “What do you mean, ‘drying up’?”
“Over the past week, miners have discovered only tiny slivers, and even those are dwindling in numbers.”
Jarod turned to the marine biologist. “Cleo? What do you think?”
“As Buton says, he’s never been wrong…” She wrinkled her nose as if smelling something rank. “Besides, the farther from Gil, the better by me.”
Jarod clapped his hands together. “All right, crew. Looks like we’re going out to left field!”
Buton started to correct Jarod’s vast oversimplification, but then thought better of it. Left field, indeed. He decided he rather liked the sound of that.
* * *
Gil peered out over his operation. It was impressive, if he did say so himself. His three top-of-the-line UltraDozers moved about the site, casting their distinctive Earth-displacement fields that made everything within look a couple of shades darker than normal. Gil had flown over every operation here, and he had not been surprised to see that his was the largest, most efficient, and best equipped. He sighed in contentment. It was good to be king.
Movement caught his eye over toward the northeast sector. He strolled over to get a better look, passing by his second-in-command, Talon, who lowered a pair of binoculars, apparently seeing the same thing Gil was. A very large blur was descending into a deep crater.
The crater itself was gradually sloped toward the southeast, which was the only reason that they had spotted the disturbance. Anyone wanting to keep his arrival a secret could not have picked a more ideal landing site. Unfortunately for them, Gil had a nose for sniffing out that which others wanted to keep hidden.
As the blur drifted closer to the surface, they noticed a brief flicker. For a moment, Gil ogled a shuttle the likes of which he had never seen. Larger than any standard craft, this beauty made Gil’s own ship look like the ugly, redheaded stepchild of interstellar transport. And then, just as quickly as it had appeared, the ship vanished, leaving behind the same hazy shimmer as a strip of hot asphalt. Men materialized from the voided-out area, swarming around it like bees, seeking to cover over their landing site.
Talon grunted. “Looks like we’ve got company.”
Gil snatched the binoculars from Talon’s ham fist and raised the instrument to his eye level as he griped. “I thought I made it clear that all perimeters were to be under our—” Gil cut himself off, taking a closer look at the intruders. The cloaking field. The secrecy. The precision of the boots on the ground. He barked out a harsh chuckle.
“Who do they think they’re fooling?”
Talon nodded his gargantuan head. “Military?”
Gil chose not to grace the statement with a response. Who else could they be? He frowned into the binoculars. “Why weren’t we informed of their arrival by Moonbase?”
Talon flipped his Moon phone open. Numbers coalesced in the air above the instrument, swirling into place as Talon sorted through them.
“I’ll make the call.” He located the number and swiped his finger to make the connection. He spoke as he waited for an answer. “There are also rumors that two parcels east, some miners uncovered diamond crust. Want us to check it out?”
Gil spoke over his shoulder while still observing the swarm of military activity. “Yeah. Buy them out if you can. If not, you know what to do.” He frowned, refocusing his attention on his right-hand man. “And I want full status on the fields by 1700 hours.”
Gil turned back to the northeast sector. Now that the landing site was covered, the men were doing a
n adequate job of impersonating mere prospectors. So much so that Gil was almost fooled. Almost. He allowed a feral grin to creep over his face as he watched the just slightly too precise movements of the men.
The more predators the merrier, Gil thought to himself with satisfaction. This was about to get a whole lot more interesting.
* * *
Cleo felt her stomach leave her body for a moment as their ship pitched and yawed its way toward the surface. Observing the wonky angle of their descent, she found her body trying to compensate for the displacement. She leaned so far to the left that she bumped into Jarod, who glanced over at her. He must have realized what she was doing, as a frown plastered itself on his face. One good thing…he did adjust the yaw, although his attitude left a lot to be desired.
The landing was less a landing and more of a hop-skip-and-a-jump situation. Once the dust cleared, Cleo did a quick assessment. She had several new bruises—some of them would be quite colorful—but there were no broken bones. Considering the state of the ship they came in and the pilot in question, it wasn’t a bad landing.
Rob piped up, “Hey, you’re getting better, Uncle Jare! Nobody’s in a stretcher this time!”
“Har de har har. C’mon, guys…get to your workstations and give me a report.”
Cleo studied the readout. “We’re going to need more oxygen and another carbon dioxide scrubber.”
Buton piggybacked her request with one of his own. “Several more backup fuses would also be in order.”
“Okay,” Jarod responded. “Put together a list, and I’ll head to the supply station.”
Having dealt with Jarod and his attention span more times than she could count made Cleo cautious. Perhaps it was a good time to drill the point home. “Jarod, we really need that oxygen.”
Jarod waved away her concern. “No problem.” Ah, the next step in the Jarod-being-responsible dance. Cleo had drilled the point home. Now she needed to hammer.
Got Thrills? A Boxed Set (A McCray Collection) Page 38