Inner Life 6: Flight

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We didn’t rush back to the ship. Or at least, we didn’t openly run. We kept to a reasonable pace as we headed straight back to the ship with no detours.

“We don’t have anything to do with the prince,” Spanner Ann said quietly, sounding puzzled.

“No, but we can’t afford the additional scrutiny right now,” my body said back, even quieter. “Just because they’re looking for a prince won’t mean that they won’t find other things.”

Most of the crew was already back by the time we got back. Two of the missing posters were laid out on a table in the mess hall, the crew gathered around them while we waited on Earthman and The Gun.

“What fantastic timing,” Ricky Danger said, pacing back and forth. “Just what we need – more scrutiny. Couldn’t the crown prince have gone missing next month instead?”

“He probably went missing a long time ago,” said June. It looked calm, but the calmer June looked, the more stressed it was. “If this was new, all the stations around where he went missing would be completely locked down and they’d be searching every ship in the area; they wouldn’t have their forces spread out like this, kind of half-arsing the search everywhere. My guess is that they’re just now forced to admit that King Anders’ brat has been missing for a while and they’re putting on a show of a search they’d abandoned a while ago.”

“And probably using it as an excuse to bust some crime rings that they haven’t been legally able to touch without cause,” my body said. “If they can somehow create a suspicion that the Roach is involved…”

“Fuck,” Ricky Danger said quietly. “You’re right. If we’re going to offload this artefact, we need to do it before they get him.”

“Impossible,” June said. “Either they’re coming for him or they aren’t. If they are, we’re better off dropping this mission; he can’t take us down in revenge if he’s got no network. If they aren’t, we need to finish this mission, clear our debts, and make enough to get out of here. We’re running out of systems where a mob boss isn’t trying to kill at least one of us, and I’d rather not add another to the list.” June glared at Ricky with this statement.

“Hey!” Ricky raised its hands. “Akhai Station wasn’t my fault!”

“Akhai Station was your fault,” my body said.

“You were the one trying to kill me!”

“And if you hadn’t convinced me to work for you instead, then certain previous employers of mine might be less out for your blood. You should’ve just run away.”

“I tried! You wouldn’t let me!”

“Well, I was on good money. You should’ve been better at running away. Or let Sinner and Trigger finish me off.”

“Oh, ‘cause she would’ve been less upset if we killed her top hit woman than if we flipped her?”

“Of course. Getting your henches killed is part of the job. Getting them flipped is downright embarrassing.”

“Well, next time I’ll be sure to give you a bullet instead of a paycheck.”

“That’s all I ask.”

“So are we going to the Roach or not?” Lav the Nav asked.

“Have to,” June said. “There’s a lot of crime bosses out there and a good chance that the Roach isn’t in the government’s sights right now. The risks of not paying our debts are way higher. He has too much blackmail material on us, and we can’t afford to jump systems any time soon without this payout. If we don’t drop off the goods and he’s still in business past the due date…”

Ricky Danger nodded. “No choice. We gotta be quick, and hope the King’s Guard are after other people. Or, who knows; maybe they’re actually looking for the prince.”

“So we get the new pod installed an then we get out of here right away, right?” the Nav asked. “How long will that take?”

“Couple of days,” Annie said. “A scrap trade like ours isn’t exactly high priority.”

“Well, fuck.”

“We can afford a couple of days,” June said. “We lay low, minimise any chance of drawing attention. As soon as Earthman and The Gun are back, we stay on-ship unless there’s a specific reason to leave.”

“Where are they, anyway?” Pots asked. “I hope they haven’t gotten themselves arrested somehow.”

They had gotten themselves arrested somehow. Ricky Danger got the message right after our meeting adjourned.

“June, can you take one of the security and handle it?” he asked. “I’d probably just mess it up further. King’s Guard never have a sense of humour.”

So my body headed out with the First Officer to rescue two crewmates. Frankly, I didn’t see why. We ha the pilot aboard. Couldn’t we just leave them and pick up a new doctor and logistics officer at the next port?

The journey to the security station where we had to pick up our crewmates involve more long walks through nearly empty corridors, and at one point when we were alone, June asked, “Does Ricky know?”

My body stopped walking for a second. Adrenalin spike. It resumed walking again.

“How do you know?”

“I keep an eye on things that might endanger the ship. Especially when they’re crew. Does he know?”

“I don’t tell the captain things that don’t concern him.”

“You don’t trust him?”

“It’s more that I think he’s got enough to be worrying about pretty much all the time. I can handle it.”

June nodded. “I know you can.”

“Have you told anyone?”

“Of course not. I know you can handle it. But does anyone else know? Apart from the obvious.”

“I think… that depends on whether Earthman has noticed anything. You can’t hie much from a doctor if he knows what to look for, but he probably doesn’t. He’s never said anything, anyway.” A moment’s pause. “I’m sorry, Juniper, I – ”

“I’m not ma. I’m as guilty as you are for keeping the secret at this point.” It smiled. “Besides, it’s not like you’re the only one with shocking secrets.”

“Well, you know mine – are you gonna tell me yours?”

“Nope.”

“Aww, come on!”

We walked in silence for a bit longer, until Juniper said quietly, “We’ve lost so many crew recently. I’m terrified of losing more.”

“Hey,” my body said, putting a hand on June’s shoulder. “I’m not going to let anybody else die.”

“You and the captain got it the worst, you know? I mean, both Trigger and Sinner – ”

“And we still have you. And Goldie and Spanner and the Nav and everyone.”

“I should’ve prevented it. I should’ve seen it coming – ”

“I should’ve prevented it. I was running security.”

“I’m the First Officer. It was ultimately my responsibility.” June shook its body a bit. “But we can get back to grieving later. We don’t want to look distraught or in any way interesting while we get these tow idiots out of holding.”

“What I they even do?”

“Drunk and disorderly, apparently.”

“They didn’t have time to get drunk!”

“I know. So it’s probably regular disorderly.”

“And by regular disorderly, you mean they looked at a King’s Guard weird, or refuse to offer a bribe, or some cop was just bored?”

“Probably.”

The security office was small an unremarkable. A short human sat behind a large desk with a computer atop it behind a metal screen in what was probably a reception area. There were a few benches on our side of the screen for humans to sit on, bolted to the wall. On the back wall behind the desk was multiple thick doors with obvious locks on them.

June walked up to the desk. “Hello!” It tried a friendly smile. “We’ve been informed that you have some crewmates of ours?”

“Ship and captain?” said the desk human, not even looking up from the screen in front of it.

“Captain Turmer, the Lucky Star.”

“Oh. The drunk and disorderlies.” It input something into the computer. “I need to check your ID.” It pushed a small, flat device through a gap in the metal grate, an first June an then my body held hands against it until it beeped.

The desk human ragged the device back, eyes still on the screen. “Lucky Star, Lucky Star. Checks out. You can take them.” It input something else, and one of the doors in the far wall clicked open.

“Just… just like that?” June asked, sounding a bit confused.

“What do you want, a receipt? Just keep them out of trouble on our station. I assume you’re not hanging around here long?”

My heart jumped at the question.

“A few days,” June assured it. “We have some small ship repairs to get one, and then we’ll be gone.”

“See to it that you are.”

Two broad humans marched through the unlocked door, Earthman and The Gun between them. Our crewmates’ hands were shackle behind their backs, but they were released once the guards had escorted them through a heavy door to our side of the grate.

“Stay out of trouble,” one of them said sternly, and then the four of us simply left.

Which seemed like a good thing to me, but my body was very, very stressed. My eyes were flicking about, looking for new threats, new surprises to defend my crew from.

“They didn’t even dig for a bribe,” June said, very quietly. “And you two are the least disorderly people in our crew. What happened?”

“Nothing,” The Gun said quietly. “We were asked for ID at a routine checkpoint, and then the guards started trying to provoke us. We got a bit smart with them, but nothing out of the ordinary.”

“They only started trying to provoke you after they saw your ID?” my body asked.

Earthman an The Gun looked at each other. Earthman started patting down its pockets, only for The Gun to nudge it sharply. “Not here! Wait until we’re out of sight.”

It was, for reasons that I still couldn’t figure out, a tense walk back to the ship. As soon as we were aboard, June slammed the door behind us and took the radio from its hip. “All crew, confirm presence on the Lucky Star,” it spoke into the radio. “Sound off. Nav, get your butt in the pilot’s chair right now.”

We all called in, one by one, confirming that everyone was on the ship. “Which of you has it?” my body asked while the sound off continued, an Earthman and The Gun patted themselves down furiously.

“Initiate emergency takeoff,” June said into the radio, as Earthman pulled a white chip of plastic about the size of a finger out of a pocket. “Found it!”

“Ditch it.” June opened the door again, an the plastic chip was tossed out to site, alone and obvious, on the bare hangar floor. June slammed the door once more, and it locked and pressure sealed itself for spaceflight.

“Takeoff initiated,” the Nav’s voice came over the ship’s intercom. “Hold onto your butts.”

As a group, without discussion, we all started jogging down the corridor. We were joined by more crew as we went. I wasn’t sure where we were all headed, but it was clearly one place. The floor shook as the engines started powering up.

“June, what the hell is going on?” Ricky Danger asked, joining the growing group.

“Trojan search.”

“Oh, fuck.”

“What’s that?” Pots asked, panting a little – we were all starting to get out of breath, to varying degrees. “What about the new pod?”

“Fuck the pod,” my body said. “If we ever meet the engineer again, when can apologise then.”

“They detained two of our crew for spurious reasons and gave no fight or trouble in giving them back,” June explained. “Slipped something into Earthman’s pocket; my guess is that they ‘lost track’ of them in the security station at some point too. Then they made casual conversation with me to confirm that we’d still be in port for at least a couple of days so they’d have time to act. It’s an old trick; they accuse our crew of stealing something from the evidence locker, and find it when they search the ship.”

We arrived at the cockpit, most of the crew assembled, and threw open the door. Lav the Nav, in radio conversation with the station, ignored us as we all sat in the limited seats, on the bench or storage cabinet, or just leaned against the walls. The ship shook faster as the engine power increased.

“Don’t they already have an excuse to search any ship they want?” Shadow asked. “Just say they’re looking for the prince.”

“That’d work if they were looking for a person,” Ricky Danger said. They could pull the whole crew out, ID and NA test us, scrutinise our records. This is the kind of stunt that they pull when they want an excuse to deep search a ship, through the vents and under the plating, every nook and cranny, because they’re searching for something small.”

We all fell into grim silence, punctuated only by the sounds of the ship, Lav, and a couple of quiet “fuck”s from the rest of the crew. Lav finished coordinating our takeoff and settled back as the station’s robot arms helped guide us up, out of their artificial gravity field, an our already-active engines, suddenly no long fighting gravity, yanked us forward in a sudden jerk that made Spanner Ann yelp in surprise and fall sideways off the cabinet.

“I said hold onto your butts,” Lav said. “Anyway, what’d I miss? Why are we running?”

The crew exchanged grim glances.

“We can’t be certain,” June said, “but I think that the powers that be might know that we have that artefact.”

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