Ada returned the smile. “Crush, sometimes you are a veritable fount of wisdom.”
By the time the afternoon was spent, they had a full charge on the ship’s engine, and a backup battery in the cargo bay; they’d completely resupplied her food and beverage dispensers; and they’d picked up another set of clothes each and stowed them in the living space. Ada felt a burgeoning sense of something she hadn’t felt since leaving her family’s hab in the outer belt.
Comfort.
She was musing over this when they strolled into a little tech outfitter and started perusing personal devices.
“Oh,” she said to Joyce. “This reminds me.” She took out the multi-tool and handed it to her. “This is yours.”
“Keep it.” Joyce smiled, her eyes on a display case. “I’m getting a new one!”
“On Dianne’s dime?” Ada laughed.
“What she doesn’t know, right?”
They left the store with new toys—Joyce and Crush with new multi-tools, Crush with some sort of techno-enhanced squeeze-grip workout device, and Ada with something she hadn’t even known she’d wanted until then. It was an earring, but chipped with twice as much data storage space and PC power as the old retro PCs her dad had used back in the mining hab. As they loaded their haul onto the ship, Ada snuck up into the cockpit and woke Moses up.
“Moses, I brought a present. There’s a personal tech device on my left ear. Can you link to it and upload a copy of yourself to it?”
“I think so,” he said. “Station bandwidth should be substantial enough that it should only take a few—ah, yes.”
The earring pinged her. “Here I am.” It was Moses, as clear and quiet and close as if she was hearing him speak into her mind. She smiled.
“That’ll do.”
“Shall I link up with your multi-tool, as well?”
She hadn’t realized it had the capability. “Sure. You’ll have control of it, then?”
“Only if you want me to have control. More importantly, you’ll have control of the tool, as you now have of the ship, from your earring.”
Her smile grew wider. “Well, stick a chip in me and call me a cyborg.”
“I wouldn’t say that, Ada.”
“No. Just about as good, though.”
—
Dinner was back at the food court. This time Ada was able to enjoy her plate more leisurely. Joyce had a glass of wine, but seemed unable to enjoy it. She was cross with Bone Crusher as they ate, dropping little hints and digs, none of which he seemed to notice. Blithely unaware, Ada thought. Or maybe just very, very good at pretending not to understand.
Eventually he excused himself and headed for Dianne’s. Joyce had more wine. Ada tried something chocolate for the first time, and made a mental note to try to pick some up for the ship before taking off.
“She needs a name,” she said.
“She has a name. Just can’t say it in polite company.” Joyce’s words were beginning to slur ever so slightly.
Ada squinted at her. “Not the old lady, Joyce. The ship. She needs a proper name.”
Another sip. “Why? Planning on keeping her?”
Ada shrugged and tried to look noncommittal. “You don’t have plans for her, do you?”
“Can’t fly her myself. Suppose I could try to sell her. Don’t know as I’d get much except as scrap, though. She really isn’t much to look at. Not every old bird is loaded.”
Ada frowned. She hadn’t considered the monetary value. It was too good to be true, of course, but she had begun to hope the ship would just fall into her lap now, discarded by Joyce and Bone Crusher. “What if I did want her? Is there a way I could compensate you?”
“Buy me out?” Joyce shrugged and sipped again. “Sure. Money’s money. You got any?”
“No.”
Shrug. Sip.
“I could pay you in transport. You could stay on for a while, I’ll fly you anywhere you want to go!”
Joyce sneered. “Spending more time cooped up in that chicken cage isn’t exactly my idea of how I’d like to start my new life of freedom, you know? No offense. You’re obviously smitten.”
“None taken.” She smiled wistfully. She really was smitten with the thing. “Cupid,” she said. It felt right.
“Who’s a what now?”
“We’ll call her Cupid. You know, after the Greek God. Technically a boy, but that doesn’t matter. I like it… the image of youth and love and arrows. It’s so evocative, don’t you think?”
Joyce emptied her glass and reached for the bottle. “If you say so.”
“Cupid,” she mouthed, subvocally. There was a little beep in her ear—almost in her mind.
“Shall I record that name, Ada?”
“Moses!” she continued to subvocalize. “You can hear me?”
“Of course, Ada. I’m attached to your person now, and very near both the Eustachian tube and the mandibular fossa. Subvocal communication is a go.”
Ada chuckled. “This is awesome. Ok, since you asked, yes. Cupid is now the name of our ship.”
“Name confirmed.”
“Are you talking to yourself?” Joyce held up a hand to shield her eyes from the dim dining court lighting, and spoke much louder than she normally would.
“I think we’ve had enough wine, Joyce.”
“Not enough. Not nearly enough. Just, let’s just have a—”
The floor quaked. The tables in the court shook, clinking glasses and knocking silverware to the floor. Somewhere, a wineglass shattered. Then the lights flickered out, and a woman screamed. Another quake, and the undeniable sound of an explosion somewhere on the station. Who was attacking everyone in the system?
“Seriously?” Ada stood up. “Moses,” she subvocalized. “Can you ready Cupid for departure?”
“Confirmed. We’ll be ready in five.”
“Good man. Er, program.” She felt her way around the table to Joyce, who had also struggled to her feet. Running lights came on, emergency power.
“Time to go?” Joyce said.
“Time to go.”
“I really need to pick better places to visit.” She lifted the wine bottle and took one last, long swig before following Ada out of the dining area.
Chapter 11
So far, the Rome Inc. multi-tools had worked exactly as Jeffrey had said they would. Lucas, Caspar, Mulligan, and Darren were all allowed out of the hangar bay, past security and customs, and onto the station. They paused once inside, and Lucas pulled up the holoscreen on his tool. The brief was readily available, and he opened it.
“Ok, sublevel nine… so far, so good…” He swiped through a few pages of information. “Our contact is a Lady Umbrador. Apparently she owns a level of this station. Nice.”
“Not longing for the civie life, are you, Sir?” Caspar needled him.
“Not in a million years. Wouldn’t mind a little less of the cloak-and-dagger thing, though.” He looked up. “Alright. She’ll be just through those doors, if I’m reading this right.”
They came to a set of double doors, where a console lit up to inform them they were being scanned. It beeped, and the doors opened. Lucas looked at the others, eyebrows raised. Darren, stoic as ever, seemed to squint at him. Lucas ignored him, and passed through the doors.
“Gentlemen.” An attractive older woman stood from behind the head of a small conference table. Her hair was a brilliant blue, and arrayed wildly about her face. Lucas caught a smirk from Caspar out the corner of his eye. If their operation to retrieve Taurius was going to keep them in the inner system much longer, perhaps they should pay a visit to a creative hairstylist to aid in their cover.
“And ladies.” She smiled as she took in Caspar and Mulligan. “Welcome.” She gestured to empty seats on either side of the table. Lucas, Caspar, and Mulligan sat. Darren glanced around the room, and took a spot standing in a corner near the door. The woman’s smile seemed to glaze over. She sat.
“So you’re here for the Rome shipment.”
“That’s right,” Lucas said.
“Harry send you?”
Lucas frowned. “Harry? I’m sorry, I don’t think so.”
“Oh, excuse me.” She gestured absentmindedly in the air. “I mean Cyclops, of course.” She suppressed a laugh. Caspar and Mulligan grinned. “Ohh, Harry, Harry. What a circus.”
“I believe he did send us, yes m’am.”
She waved again. “Call me Dianna. I can’t stand m’am.” She pulled out a multi-tool and spoke into it. “Jon, freighter is here. Yes, from Harry. Rome. Right. Ok.” She glanced up at them, smiling briskly. “Ok! That’s that.” She stood. “Jon will load you up, then you’re free to go. I just like to get a look at the new faces. I don’t like surprises popping up down the line.”
Lucas chalked it up to entrepreneurial eccentricity.
“Well, it was good meeting you all. Have a nice flight.” She nodded, and left them.
“Ah, what just happened?” Mulligan scratched the side of her head.
“We just got tabbed,” Darren said. “For Rome.”
Caspar shrugged. “Nice to have so many people finding us so interesting all of the sudden. C’mon. The sooner we get out of here and get this job done, the sooner we can find Taurius and put this whole sorry excuse for civilization behind us. It doesn’t matter if Rome has us tabbed, if we’re never in Roman territory again.”
They found strangers loading large blue tubs into the belly of the Fairfax. There were a lot of tubs, but a lot of hands, and it was moving quickly. One of the men crossed to them and gave Lucas a handshake. “Jon Kang. Pleasure. We’re almost done with your load. I gotta say, those are some nice armaments you got yourself there.”
“Thanks. Are we good to board?”
“Be my guest. We’ll have you all set here in about another ten.”
Ten minutes later the outer doors of the hanger slid open, and they were given the go-ahead to leave.
Then the shooting began.
It started with a single missile lobbed into the side of the station. Shields were presumably down, as there was so much civilian traffic moving on and off. Another missile followed, and the shields never managed to come up.
“Tactical on-screen,” Lucas barked. “What’s going on out there?”
“I’m getting an emergency warning from Geta-4,” Mulligan said. “They’re saying the station is under attack, Captain.”
“Right. But who, and where? Helm, ease us out.”
“Aye, Sir.”
“Lieutenant, make sure point-defense on our flanks is good to go. And I want your thumb on the trigger for forward guns.”
“Sir.”
“Jeffrey?”
“Yes, Jack?”
“Captain Jack. And you can call me Lucas again.”
“How refreshing.”
“Can you give us a split screen, tactical layout to the left, front exterior cam to the right?”
“I can.”
“Please do.”
The screen appeared as instructed. There were a lot of dots on tactical—many more than there had been ships when they’d arrived. The cam view was a blur of fly-bys and debris, so Lucas ignored it for now and focused on the dots. A cluster of them had come into formation and were moving toward Ceres, away from the station. Civilian transports? Escape pods?
“Private Mulligan, are you picking up any transmissions from these ships?” He pointed at the Ceres-bound clump.
“Negative, Sir. They’re silent.”
“Jeffrey, are you able to identify any of the ships heading toward Ceres?”
“I’m going to just make the leap for you and tell you that yes, of course I am, and what you really mean to ask is will I.”
“Please,” Lucas growled between clenched teeth.
Beep. “Bombers, every one of them. IDs are masked. Armed with nukes, and coming down in a bombing pattern.”
Lucas’ eyes widened.
“They’re going to bomb the tubes.” For the first time in the short time he’d known him, Lucas heard something resembling emotion in Darren’s voice. It only made him scarier.
They were in a pirate ship now, with a pirate’s cargo, flying over Empire space, occupied by Empire citizens, but it still took no time to make the decision. Not when civilians were about to be bombed. “Caspar, on my mark. Randall, bring us down hot. Strap in, people. It’s time to shoot some turkeys.”
“Whoo!” Caspar yelled and bit her lip, arming the rest of the turrets. Lucas spared a glance back at Mulligan, who knew a lot of people under the Ceres surface. She looked afraid. Darren had come to stand beside her station.
“Let’s take a strafing run. Hug her tight as you dare, Randall, just like last time, only this time we’ll break away before we lose sight of the station.”
“Aye, Sir.”
The ship careened downward, the power of the modified engine alarming. Randall’s arms were tense and his tongue was sticking out between his teeth by the time he had pulled them up, but he managed. They cruised along above the frozen surface, homing in on the bombers coming from the opposite direction. Randall dared a little burst of speed, and the leader came into firing range.
“Mark, Lieutenant!”
“Sir!” Caspar clenched her teeth and squeezed the thumb triggers, one in each hand, that were digitally routed to power any turret she chose from her console. Right now it was the full front array. The ship bucked a little at that much firepower leaving at once, but the engine kept them moving, and Randall kept the nose from dipping.
A wave of kinetic projectiles shot out from under them on the cam view. It was awesome and bizarre to watch. The first bomber took direct hits and veered off to the side, obviously sustaining damage. Lucas grinned. This was going to be easy.
Then the bullets just stopped.
“Lieutenant, fire at will.”
“I’m trying!” Caspar toggled the triggers frantically, and slapped the console, cursing. She turned, her face a mixture of rage and shame. “Captain, I swear, this has never happened to me before!”
“Jeffrey, what’s wrong with our shiny new guns?”
Beep. “Yes, I am sorry about that. My programmer will be quite distraught to learn that one of their ships took damage before I was able to mute all turrets.”
“Mute all turrets??”
“Yes. You may recall, you were warned that you would be unable to fire upon other ships in the employ of Rome Inc.”
Lucas deflated. “Rome is behind the attack?”
“NO!” Mulligan was on her feet, eyes wide with terror, as she watched a salvo of bombs drop into the main entrance to the Ceres tubes. Nuclear, each one. And there was nothing they could do to stop it.
“Helm, move us, now.” Lucas licked his dry lips. Randall was staring at the bombs, too. “Randall!” He snapped to attention. “Get us out of the blast radius. Hurry!”
“Aye, Sir!” The ship bucked up and pivoted violently to the left, and Mulligan, the only crewmember not strapped in, was knocked off her feet. Darren helped her back into her chair and fastened the straps.
Beneath them, Ceres became the sun.
Chapter 12
For the third time in as many weeks, Ada was in a hab being blown apart. At least this time they weren’t underground. Small blessings.
The floor rolled again beneath their feet, and Joyce fell forward into her, knocking them both to the ground. Ada reached down to stop her fall, and pain shot up her arm. She turned, gasping. Her wrist was on fire.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa.” Joyce staggered to her hands and knees. “How much did I have to drink? The walls are shaking.”
“Too much,” Ada said from between clenched teeth. “But that’s not why they’re shaking.” She rolled over onto her stomach to pick herself up, and set her hands down beneath her. “Gahhh!” She fell on her face. She couldn’t put any weight on her left wrist; it had to be broken.
“Hmmph.” Joyce crawled up to lean against the wall of the corridor. “Wi
ne wasn’t even that good.”
“Someday,” Ada panted, “you’ll have to tell me how you came to have such a cultured palate. Now help me up, I can’t use my left hand.”
Together they hobbled down the hallway and made their way back to the main concourse. Then they had a choice to make. Should they get to Cupid, or try to track down Bone Crusher first?
A thought occurred to Ada. “Moses,” she subvocalized. “Are you able to locate Bone Crusher at present?”
A moment passed. “There are precisely three lifeforms on Geta-4 that identically match the height-weight proportion of your previous male passenger. One is in a defense control room on the twenty-third level. One is moving toward Cupid’s location from a luxury suite on this level. And one just died.”
“That was easy,” she muttered. “Make sure he can get inside when he gets there, would you?”
“Confirmed.”
Assuming he wasn’t the dead one. She grimaced.
They ran as quickly as they could, given Joyce’s condition and the constant pummeling of the station. Lights continued to flicker, and an alarm was now sounding constantly. Civilians screamed here and there. They had nearly reached the hangar bay when a boom thundered so loudly Ada had to stand still a moment and cover her ears—at which her wrist protested. She gritted her teeth and braced against the wall, bending her knees. The quake that followed pushed her down onto her butt, anyway.
There was an enormous and nasty sound, like the creaking of a giant piece of metal and the tearing of paper, and a new alarm began to sound. “Station breach,” an automated voice announced. “All bulkheads sealing. Please remain calm and move to the closest possible exit. Repeat: station breach. All bulkheads…”
They turned the corner and found themselves staring at a dead end. A solid metal wall had closed off the hallway between them and the hangar bay—one of the closed bulkheads, Ada reasoned.
“Moses, can you help us find an alternate route to Cupid? We’re cut off here.”
Starship Fairfax: Books 1-3 Omnibus - The Kuiper Chronicles: The Lunar Gambit, The Hidden Prophet, The Neptune Contingency Page 17