The station isn’t what Victor expected. It was clean, well decorated, inviting. If he hadn’t been told this station catered to mercenaries, he wouldn’t have been able to pick up on that. Sure, he’d never been to a merc station before. When was the last time he’d gotten off Bramolian Six? He’d been a teen, a vacation with his father. He couldn’t remember where they’d gone.
Since Merc stations were owned and maintained by mercenaries, he’d expected something dirty, barely working, barely holding together. Sure, he’d heard of Mobius as a tourist destination, but once he’d known mercs came here, it had altered his expectation.
Checking the berths, he’d found Katherine’s Folly was already there. On the other side of the station. He hadn’t wanted to attract attention by asking to move to a closer berth, so he was traversing the station, feeling like everyone was looking at him.
He’d bought himself reinforced clothing from a military store and was wearing it. The rest of his equipment was in the pack he carried over his shoulder. His gun, in a shielded case, extra clothing, his exercise equipment, his datapad. He hadn’t known what else to bring.
He did his best to look like a tourist, like he belonged here, to ignore everyone staring at him like he was going to pull out a gun at any moment and shot them up. He wasn’t a criminal he wanted to yell at them.
Not yet, anyway.
To his surprise, he made it to Katherine’s Folly’s berth without being stopped by security. They hadn’t even looked at him twice. Maybe he’d imagined all the other looks? Maybe the military came here for vacations?
He announced his presence and the door opened. Katherine’s Folly wasn’t what he’d expected. The inside was utilitarian, a long corridor with maybe a dozen chairs on each side. A small alcove on the middle with a table and more comfortable chairs, but only five of those. At the end of the corridor was the cockpit. Alex and tow others were seated at the table.
“Finally!” the woman said. “It’s about time you got here. Now Crimson can finally tell us what thus us about.”
The older man stood and offered Victor his hand. “Don’t pay attention to her. Miranda’s grumpy. I’m Jacoby, welcome to the crew.”
Victor hesitated before taking the hand. “Thanks. I’m Victor.”
“I know, the Lawman.”
“He isn’t one anymore,” Miranda said.
“I’m just on leave, while I help Alex.”
“Sure,” she said.
“Sit down, Victor,” Alex said.
And a hello to you too, Victor thought as he sat.
“So, why are we missing one? You said you’d explain why our medic can’t join us.” Miranda sounded like she didn’t want to be here.
Alex tapped the table and a picture of a woman with tanned skin, brown hair and eyes appeared. “Her name is Mary, and she’s being held—”
“Wait, is that Mary Holiander?”
Alex looked at the picture. “It is, you know her?”
“Yeah, I had to process her into the system a few years ago.”
“I didn’t think they let you do that stuff. She’s too young for it to have happened before you were ostracized.”
“What did you do for the rest of the rest of the Law to hate you?”
Alex glared at Miranda. “That isn’t important right now.”
“I made a stupid choice,” Victor said not even feeling any anger at it anymore. It was strange what getting to confront that mistake had done to all the anger he’d bottled up over the years. Yes, he’d been stupid, but Tristan would have gotten anyone to do what he wanted. It wasn’t about him being weak, it was about Tristan being that good. “And it was a busy day. I don’t remember what had happened but everyone had been called out except me. Some education security dropped her off with a list of drug making charges and I entered her into the system.”
Alex looked thoughtful. “Medical school security?”
“Could be. I didn’t pay attention to which school they were from.”
“She told me she moved to Bramolian Six after her trouble at medical school.”
“No, she’s a local. I think she grew up in some of the worse neighborhoods and had gone to school to escape there. She said something about that, but it didn’t work out.”
Alex nodded. “Regardless, she’s currently on Priam’s World, held there as some sort of indentured servant. She does more or less what she was doing on Bramolian Six, making drugs and medicine, but she isn’t given a choice here.”
“Never heard of Priam’s World,” Jacoby said. “Where is it?”
“It’s mobile, It’s a Valkyrie class ship. It’s bigger than most stations.”
Victor groaned. Miranda whistled.
“You’re not getting her.” He said.
“I have to agree with the Law here. The only people who have Valkyrie ships are Sovereign Families.”
“So? They have to obey the laws. If Space Gov sends someone to repatriate a wanted criminal they have to hand her over.”
Victor snorted. “The Sovereigns don’t respect anything but their own rules. It’s the reason they got on city ships and left whatever planet they came from. They weren’t going to be under anyone else’s law. Space Gov leaves them alone because they’re too big and rich to be worth bothering. I’d never believe Space Gov wants someone they’re holding.”
“Would they believe a planet wants one of their criminals back?”
“They might, but not for the petty stuff she’s done.”
“What would she have to do to justify it?”
Victor thought about it. “Blown up a city, maybe?”
“If she did that, every bounty hunter in the area would be after her,” Miranda said. “Mass killers was worth a lot of money.”
“So something big, but not so big it makes the bounty hunter’s boards.” Alex was typing on the table.
“You’d be surprised how small something has to be to make it on our boards. Some people throw up missing pets on there.” She made a face as if she’d had to take one of those jobs. Victor had to wonder why she’d do that. He didn’t know her, but he doubted Alex would hire anyone who wasn’t capable, and capable bounty hunters got better jobs than pet retrieval, didn’t they?
Alex slid what he’d written to Victor. “Would that do?”
With the first line Victor saw this was a list of crimes. Drug production and distribution, deaths related to those drugs, extortions, destruction of property, bodily damage, robberies, and the list went on. Alex had taken some lowly drug maker and turned her into one of Bramolian Six’s crime lords.
“The wording needs to be adjusted on some of the crimes she’s wanted for, but yeah. The Government wouldn’t want someone like that to escape prosecution.”
“So it’s credible they’d send one of their Law agents to retrieve her?”
“One? With this list of crimes, they’d send an entire team.”
“I don’t have a team to spare. Can you make it work with one other?”
“What do you mean, can *I* make it work?”
“You’re the Lawman they sent to get her back. You and Miranda.”
Victor looked Miranda over to give himself time to come up with an argument against him doing that. She was about his height, muscular, dressed in tight pants and shirt that left very little to the imagination. She had a gun at her hip. She could pass as one of the tougher, except for the way she was dressed. No one in his precinct or anyone other on the planet dressed like that.
Miranda grinned at me. “Look all you like, but don’t even think about touching. You’re not my type.”
Victor opened his mouth to respond, but Jacoby spoke.
“Alex, I should be the one going. Vic’s completely green. You can’t just drop him in the middle of a job like that, not with her.”
“You have a problem with me? Old man?”
“I have a problem with how you chew up your partners. Each and everyone who’s ever worked with you is either dead or ‘retired.’”
“Aren’t you worried I’ll do the same to you?”
“I can handle you, girl.”
Miranda stood. Pushing out her chest. Her ample chest, Victor couldn’t help noticing. “If you—”
“That’s enough,” Alex said. Not loud, but forceful enough everyone looked at him. “Miranda, sit down and keep your bad mood under control. I’m not paying you to have to endure the result of your bad luck. Jacoby, you can’t go. You don’t know the language, the behaviors, and I need you here to keep an eye on the ship.”
Jacoby’s face hardened. “Alex, can I talk to you, in private?”
Alex stood and indicated for Jacoby to lead the way. They went to the cockpit. Victor noticed a ladder going up the wall by where they stood. So there was another room above them.
“Alex,” Jacoby said, lowering his voice, but they were still close enough to be heard. “You can’t seriously think of having me sit this out. At least send me with him and Miranda. He said they’d send a team, two as backup is more credible than one.”
“Jacoby, I need you to stay here.”
“Why? Do you need me to play welcome comity to someone you didn’t mention yet?”
“No, I told you, I need you to keep an eye on the ship. I don’t want to leave it unattended.”
“Then take it to go to that ship.”
“No, I don’t want it flying around any more than I have to. The odds of the Sayatoga knowing I have it are low, but not zero.”
“Fine, but this is Mobius.”
“Exactly. For all the shine and polish on the walls and all the tourists walking about, this is still a merc station, and we both know there’s no way we can trust them not to poke their nose into what doesn’t belong to them. I need this ship to be here when we come back with Mary.”
“Then you lock it up tight.”
“No. Jacoby. This is my crew, you do what I tell you or you go back, your choice.”
“Fine. But you’re making a mistake leaving me behind.”
“Sorry, but I couldn’t help overhearing,” Victor said. “We can’t take my ship. The only thing I was able to afford to get here was a one person shuttle. There’s barely enough for me to move about, let alone two people.”
“Miranda, you ship can handle three extra people, right?”
“Sure, but there’s only one bed.”
“What’s the setup for cryo?”
“A field system for the bed and the pilot’s chair. Three chairs with fluid replacement as backup.”
“Then we’re covered.”
“Okay, but that still doesn’t mean we’re going to be able to get her,” Victor said. “To repatriate a criminal, there’s a lot of communication that needs to be exchanged. Preliminary work, documentation of the process. If I don’t show up with everything in order they’re not going to hand it over.”
“Don’t worry about that part. You tell me what’s needed, and I’ll make sure it’s there.”
“How are you going to do that?”
Alex smiled and placed an earpiece on the table. “You’re forgetting what I did to your department. I’m a coercionist.”
Victor nodded. “Then we have one last problem.” He indicated Miranda. “She needs a different set of clothes.”
“What’s wrong with what I’m wearing? It’s full protection.”
“No one working for the Law dresses this provocatively,” Victor said.
“This isn’t provocative, I don’t have any skin exposed below my neck.”
Jacoby smiled. “You don’t need to expose anything when what you’re wearing is tight enough I can see your abs through the material.”
“Don’t ever think of touching, old man. You’re way too old for me.”
“Girl, I wouldn’t even consider you if the four of us were the past people in the universe.”
“I’m taken,” Alex said. “And Tristan is possessive.”
Victor looked at Jacoby. He looked to be at least a hundred and twenty, with his graying hair. He wasn’t bad looking. In good shape but…
“You might be a little old for me.”
The older man looked at the two of them. “I’m not interested in men, that’s the point I’m making. Even if you were the only ones available to take to bed, I still wouldn’t take her.”
