“I hadn’t checked the contracts, yet I was more than happy to declare them void,” she grumbled before draining her beer and waving at the server for another. A humanoid-shaped bot appeared in short order with a beer nestled into a cooling tray on its flat top.
“You look like you could use some company,” Doctor Tyler Toofakre said as he leaned casually on the table. He pulled his arm away when he realized the top was wet and sticky.
“Sorry about that.” Rivka pointed with her chin. “I spilled beer number two.”
“How many have you had?” the dentist asked.
“Eight, maybe ten.” Her words weren’t slurred. She’d been at it for a couple of hours, but her nanocytes prevented her from getting drunk unless she overwhelmed them by chugging spirits to a nearly lethal level. She wasn’t ready to live life on that edge. She motioned to the seat beside her, but Tyler took the one on the opposite side, away from the beer puddle.
He got the server bot’s attention and asked it to clean up the spill. The bot readily complied, producing a rag from inside its cylindrical body. An arm telescoped forward, spraying from its tip before scrubbing vigorously. A second spray and a rag adjustment delivered a clean and shiny tabletop.
“How long have those been in here?” Rivka asked.
“The new crop arrived last week, but the management said that the employees would only be replaced as they moved on.”
“It was inevitable that people would be replaced by robots. We’re too flighty.” She took a long drink of her beer.
“What’s got you down? Too many murderers get away?”
She looked at him critically. “Murderers? Kind of like that, but it was completely different. It’s a whole planet where slavery is legal, but the deep, dark secret is that the slaves are willing to put themselves into indentured servitude—which is making me rethink what slavery is.”
“How about being tied to the same job with no hope of getting out of it?” He ordered deep-fried gajubi vegetable fingers with tangy white dipping sauce from the attentive server bot.
“More like that, but it isn’t a crime. I deal with crime and criminals. Where does seeking opportunity end and trafficking begin?”
“That’s your department,” he replied casually. “Where does a cavity end and a root canal begin? Patients never want a root canal.”
Rivka started to laugh. “I guess they don’t, and no one wants to believe that they’ve volunteered to be a slave.”
She replayed the Londil’s words in her head. We signed contracts that included room and board to be part of a labor force.
“I just tell them that I can take care of their pain,” the dentist continued. “Sounds like you need a better message.”
“Better marketing,” she clarified. “And I need to cut off the supply of illegal goods. Touché, big dog. You’re coming with us.”
“I’m what?” he asked. They had earlier agreed that he would come on the next mission but he had conveniently forgotten to bring it up. “But my practice?”
“Put a sign outside and send them to Payne. If that doesn’t get you more patients, nothing will.”
“Don’t fight dirty.” He looked at the tray of food in front of him before pushing it away. “I’m suddenly not very hungry.”
“You aren’t going to eat that?” Rivka pulled it in front of her and started to wolf it down. She’d devoured half of it before he pulled it back.
“Maybe I was just making a statement. Gods! Look what you did to my lunch.” He hunched over the fried gajubi, eating with the hand farthest from Rivka so he could shield his food from her.
“Practice for when you’re aboard my ship. We go hungry more than we’d like to admit.”
“I’m not afraid to admit it,” Red declared from a few steps away. He and Lindy moved to a table nearby where their backs wouldn’t be to the door and they could see both the entrance and the Magistrate. “Hey, Doc.”
“I’ve been replaced by a bot?” Lindy didn’t know whether to feel insulted or honored.
“Clearly,” Red began slowly, trying to gauge her reaction before the real reaction, “you were irreplaceable. They went with cheap because they couldn’t get good,” he finished with a flourish, and her smile told him that he had chosen wisely.
“Bullshit,” she replied, still smiling, blunting his celebration. “It’s modern business, that’s all. Those things are cheap. Labor is expensive.”
“What did you say?” Rivka interrupted.
The two bodyguards gave her the side eye.
“Labor is expensive, except on Corran, where it’s cheaper to buy and sell people than it is to hire them in the usual sense. Where the message isn’t in our favor. What about retirement? What happens when the commodity gets old and unable to work? Where do they go?”
Red and Lindy shrugged before waving at the bot to order their meals and drinks.
“Do you really think I’m going with you?” Toofakre asked.
“Don’t make me slap an injunction on your business,” she threatened with a wink. “Yes, you’re coming with us. Don’t get any ideas. You’ll have your own cabin. You’ll get your own body armor, won’t he, Red?”
“We’ll throw something on him,” Red replied.
“Why would I need body armor?”
“Red?” Rivka redirected. When Tyler turned in his chair, Rivka grabbed half the remaining vegetables from the platter and stuffed them into her mouth.
“It’s simple. If you take a slug or shrapnel in the vicinity of your vital organs, your chance of dying greatly increases. So we protect the important stuff. You can lose an arm or two and still survive, but not the soft and squishy bits, and especially not you without any Pod-doc time. Body armor increases your chance of survival.”
“Why would I be in a place where my chance of survival needs to be improved? My chances are great right here on old Station 7.”
“Is he coming or not, Magistrate?” Red asked.
“He’s coming,” Rivka replied definitively.
Tyler turned back to find her hands around the last of the fried gajubi. “Waiter, Can I get one more order of those please?” He looked at Rivka, who was trying to appear innocent. “Do you want anything else?”
“No. I’m pretty full.”
“Better get two,” Red advised.
The dentist held up two fingers to the server. “And two beers as well.”
Grainger rocked back in his chair in the Magistrates’ meeting room. “I don’t have much time,” he explained. “What’s the emergency, Zombie?”
Buster Crabbe was on the far side of the table. He waved.
Rivka stood inside the door, looking hesitant. She was unsure what to say and took her seat slowly despite Grainger’s request for speed.
“You’ve looked better,” Buster said.
“Out with it.” Grainger twirled his finger emphasizing his request for alacrity.
“I fucked up,” she admitted.
Buster chuckled. Grainger shook his head and threw his hands up. “So? What’s new? Did you do anything that can’t be undone? No? Then learn and move on.”
“I looked at Corran through the human lens. Through my view of how the universe should be, despite the fact that I knew their laws were different.”
“You’re a human. It’s what we do. Corran has legalized slavery, and it’s going to chap your ass. How do you look past that?” Buster asked.
“The slaves don’t know they’re slaves,” she clarified.
“Then what’s the issue? Does anyone know that they have surrendered their rights?” Grainger was starting to lose patience. “I’m surprised. Of all of us, you are the one who is a slave to the law. Are you turning away from that?”
Rivka clenched her jaw. “No. Which laws apply within the galactic spiderweb of intersecting superhighways? Jurisdiction is king. Still, there is overlap, and maybe even gaps in applicability. Individual rights are superior, and we believe that people cannot contract those rights awa
y. That is not the case on Corran.” She pointed at the ceiling and nodded. “That’s it! That’s the nuance that had me tied in knots. There is a human who was captured. We have two weeks to kill before I’m allowed to return and battle for her freedom. In the interim, I’m going to Elgar 7 and investigate the alleged kidnapping in a place that is under Federation law and jurisdiction.”
Rivka jumped up, smiling.
“Thanks for the advice, guys.” She hurried out the door as Grainger and Bustamove looked at each other in confusion.
“What’s in there?” Red asked, nodding toward the huge duffle bag Tyler carried.
“My stuff,” he answered tentatively. “I wasn’t sure what I would need, so I brought everything. Cold weather. Hot weather. No weather.”
“Did no one tell you?” Red taunted.
“Tell me what?” The dentist stopped, intently staring at the large bodyguard.
“Nothing. Never mind. Come aboard, Doc. Let’s get you settled.”
“What aren’t you telling me?”
Red disappeared inside the ship, leaving Tyler standing on the hangar deck looking at the open hatch.
The dentist adjusted the bag on his shoulder and powered up the stairs and into Peacekeeper, where he found a short passageway from the airlock to the bridge. At the end, Rivka stood with her hands on her hips, motionless.
“Go away,” a small voice said from inside.
“It’s my bridge on my ship,” Rivka argued.
“It’s my workshop on your ship after you kicked me out of the space previously known as my workshop. We have a deal.”
Tyler peeked over her shoulder to see a small body within a holographic projection that surrounded the captain’s chair.
“Do all ships have those?” the dentist asked.
“Mine didn’t,” Rivka replied, sounding unsure if she liked it or not.
“Go away,” the small voice reiterated.
“Only because I want to,” Rivka said, sighing in dismay at having lost her personal safe space aboard the corvette.
“Is it always like this?”
“Pretty much,” Red replied from the rec room. “Stow your trash, Doc.”
“Yes,” Rivka added. “Put your gear up. We need to get going.”
“I don’t have any trash.” The dentist put his bag down and opened it.
“What are you doing?” Rivka asked, putting her hand over his as he made to pull something from the duffel.
“It’s my stuff. I wanted to show that I don’t have any trash.”
“We know you don’t have any trash. The way it works is, everyone has their own stuff, but everyone else’s stuff is trash. My stuff. Your trash. You would call my stuff trash. I call your stuff trash. It’s how it is.”
“But I don’t think you have any trash.” Floyd sniffed the dentist’s leg before depositing a cube next to his bag. “What is that?”
“She’s claimed your bag for her protection. You don’t want to step in that.” Rivka headed for her recliner.
“I’m Jayita, but you can call me ‘Jay,’” a young woman with flaming red hair announced as she made her appearance.
“I like the new do, Jay,” Rivka said before activating the screen and issuing commands for Chaz to present information.
“Jay. I’m Tyler.”
“I know.” She picked up the wombat. “Say hi to Floyd.”
He carefully reached around her head to scratch behind her small ears, then casually lifted a lip to inspect her teeth.
“You ever work on a non-humanoid, Doc?” Jay asked.
Doctor Toofakre shook his head. “Not yet.”
Teeth fine! Floyd replied happily. The blank expression on the dentist’s face reminded the others that he didn’t have the implant.
“She says her teeth are fine,” Jay relayed.
“She did?”
Jay tapped the side of her head. “We have chips.” He also didn’t have what he needed to privately talk to the rest of the crew.
Red rolled his head to look at Rivka. “Don’t say it,” she warned. “We better not be going into combat. This is a case. Say it after me. ‘Case.’”
“Saying it after you doesn’t make it a case, Magistrate,” Red countered.
“You used to be the strong, silent type. What happened to you?”
“You happened to me, Magistrate. We’ve spilled blood. You’ve saved my life more than once, and I’d like to think I have saved yours. Lindy has saved us. Ankh has saved us. Jay has saved us. For all I know, even Floyd has saved us, but that little gray-spotted rat-bastard feline hasn’t saved anyone but himself.”
“Hamlet!” Jay announced.
“What’s that have to do with anything?” Rivka asked.
“He’s a cat. It’s his nature to be selfish.” Red waited, but Rivka didn’t bite.
Lindy added her take. “It’s because we’re one team and you don’t want us to follow blindly. You want us to tell you what we see and what we think. You want us all to contribute to whatever it takes to get the job done, complete the mission, and close the case.”
“Why can’t you be more like her?” Rivka quipped.
“I think I’m woman enough,” Red shot back, earning himself a punch on the arm.
“Doc, why are you standing there holding your trash?” Rivka wondered. Tyler held his hands up in surrender before pointing in the general direction of berthing as a question.
“First door on the right,” Rivka replied, returning to studying the information scrolling on the rec room’s large screen. The dentist trundled away. “Watch over him,” she told the remaining occupants of the rec room.
“We won’t let anything happen to your boy toy, Magistrate.”
“Not my… Why do I bother?”
Lindy, Red, and Jay chuckled. Floyd joined them. A scream. A white flash. Rivka was halfway to the corridor when Hamlet popped back out, sat, and started grooming his face.
“What’s the problem, Doc? Never seen a cat before?”
Tyler reappeared. “Okay, everyone. You’ve had your fun at my expense. I may not have served in the military or been shot at, but I’m willing to go with you and see what this is all about. I’ll give it my best. I will not be a liability, but I won’t be cannon fodder either. Don’t make me tell you all to fuck off. I don’t like saying ‘fuck off,’ much less actually meaning that you can fuck off, but if fuck off you must, then fuck off you will. I consider you all to be my friends, of which I don’t have very many. Don’t make me tell you to fuck off. It would hurt me more than you fuck-offs.”
Rivka’s mouth fell open. Red stared. Lindy smiled. Jay and Floyd giggled.
Lindy was the first to speak. “You fit right in, Doc. Dump your gear, and we’ll set you up with body armor.”
“Chaz,” Rivka started, “take us out, please. Destination is Elgar 7.”
“Body armor?” Tyler asked.
“Body armor,” Red confirmed. “We’ll be there soon; could be thirty minutes. We can’t have you wasting time playing with your trash.”
“Jurisdiction issues surrounding trafficking,” Rivka mumbled, and the screen flashed to a new series of topics.
Chapter Seven
“Find everything you can about Seequa Holmes, especially anything related to who she was with on the day of her disappearance.”
“I’m capable of much more,” Ankh countered.
“Then have Erasmus do it,” Rivka replied impatiently. “I need the information, but what else do you suggest?”
“Personal connections, complete profile of the young woman including financial history and status, and also other disappearances. I’ll see if there is a pattern that could lead you to a source.”
“Sure,” Rivka agreed. “Do that.”
Ankh stared at the Magistrate.
Red snorted behind her.
“Chaz, what do we know about Elgar 7?” Rivka asked.
“Elgar 7 is a natural moon with significant artificial enhancements circ
ling the inhospitable gas giant of Elgar. It is more than a space station, nearing a planetoid in status, with inhabited regions on both the outside and the inside. Atmospheric Generators are working at full capacity to establish an oxygen-nitrogen balance that can sustain life.”
“What about the people?”
“Average age on Elgar is twenty-four, enhanced humans notwithstanding.”
“Blue collar?”
“Mostly. Approximately nine percent are management. The rest constitute the labor force. There are very few families living inside Elgar 7, and none on the outside.”
“The younger crowd works hard during the day and parties their earnings away at night. Been that way for thousands of years. I suppose there’s a seedy underbelly of bars and strip clubs.”
“There is not,” Chaz replied. “Alcohol is rationed, and is only available for personal purchase from class-six stores. There are no drinking or dancing establishments.”
“Private parties, then? Ankh, what do you have for me?” Rivka looked forlornly at the hatch leading to what used to be her bridge.
The screen flashed, and a picture of Seequa Holmes appeared. She looked different than the young woman they’d seen behind bars on her work ID . Rivka clenched her jaw and puffed out her cheeks. A timeline of her contacts took shape, from calls to messages to appearances throughout the corridors using facial recognition.
“There,” Rivka declared pointing at the screen. “She messaged a friend about being invited to a party. The invite itself is missing.”
“Astute,” Erasmus’ disembodied voice replied from the sound system within the room. “Those messages have been wiped from the system.”
“Can you recover deleted messages?” Rivka wondered.
“Yes, but these have been wiped, as in, a digital virus has gone through the system and wiped out all references to the message. It has left a gap that stands out as much as the message would have. Look at the video in the corridors during the hour preceding her message.”
Slave Trade Page 6