I sat in the co-pilot’s chair as Doherty talked to the controller. They wanted us to dock at a quarantine bay, because the ship had been down to a planet surface. I felt a tap on the shoulder as we floated dead in space. The Walrus was looking over my shoulder at the massive space station ahead of us. It looked like a silver sausage with a doughnut wrapped around one end: the designers had never heard of a ‘Freudian slip’, it seemed. The doughnut was where the commercial and private vessels docked, levels six through eleven. Below the doughnut were shopping and maintenance levels, while twelve to fifteen were the entertainment district. Sixteen all the way to twenty-eight were a mix of hotels and private apartments, and twenty-nine to thirty-five were allocated for Confederate Naval Forces use only. Warships of all shapes and sizes floated listlessly in the space around the top end of Dessalines, and shuttles ran to-and-from the station constantly.
“I might suggest,” said McBride quietly, “that it’s not in your best interest to just barge on into the Commandant’s office and declare that you’re alive and well.”
“Well, I wasn’t exactly—“
“What I mean is that the Navy has you listed as Missing, Presumed Dead. If you walk into any Naval base, outpost, office, or dive bar, they’ll say ‘welcome back, hero’ and promptly put you to work, fighting the CSTO. Then you won’t have much chance to find your brother. However, if you can stay dead, you’ll have more time on your hands to find out whether he made it off that rock or not. And if not, you’ll be able to go back for him.”
I could see his point. “But, if I don’t announce myself straight away, they’ll declare me AWOL.”
“Only if they catch you. If you’ve got the money and connections, no reason you can’t stay dead for long enough to find him. When you do, you can pop by a Naval office and say ‘look, here I am’. If they ask how you got there, say you got a lift with us. I’ll make false log entries for you, I’ll lie through my teeth. I don’t care, I’m happy to help you out.”
Doherty began to fly us in toward the docking bay. A ring of lights winked on around the edge of the dock, showing him where to go.
“I have connections, but no money,” I said.
McBride wagged a finger. “Ah, I thought this might come up. See, I have another deal to propose. This time, we’re not trading the Honda; we’re talking cash. Up front, in your pocket, and more when you get it done.”
“What do I have to do?”
Walrus chuckled. “There’s a package for me at Reena’s Bar, at Dessalines. Sector Gold, twelfth floor. Know it?”
“Walked past it a few times. Not really the kind of place I frequent.”
Reena’s was probably the seediest dive of all the seedy dives in Confederate space. Salty old spacers, brutal privateers, ruthless smugglers, shady salvagers, and malcontents of all kinds jostled for position to be served by the buxom barmaids. McBride laughed. “I’ll bet you don’t, sailor-boy! Anyway, there’s a parcel there, with my name on it. Not literally, y’know, but—“
“Yeah, I get it. And you can’t go yourself?”
He shook his head vehemently, as did Doherty beside me. We finally docked with Dessalines station, and a very light gravity returned suddenly.
“Not a chance,” laughed McBride. “I’d never make it out alive. You, on the other hand… All you’ve gotta do is get served by the girl with the red streak in her hair, and say you’re a friend of mine. Don’t worry too much about anything she might say about that, just ask her if there’s anything for me. I mean, ‘me’ referring to ‘the Walrus’, not ‘Sam Kelly’.”
I laughed. “Yeah, I get it. I’m not gonna get shot, am I?”
“Of course not. Not by her, anyways.”
“And what do I get out of this?”
McBride reached out with his other hand and dropped a nice, thick roll of banknotes into my lap, all in twenties and fifties; because of the light gravity, it fell almost comically slowly. “Here’s a tonne. That’s all for now, but there’s four more waiting when you hand the parcel over. One of us will wait for you in the food court. How about near the Starbucks on the third floor?”
“Sounds good.”
The hatch opened, and a Navy steward droid wheeled itself in. I wondered if it would try to match our faces against a database. If so, the whole ‘staying dead’ plan might have all been academic.
Life on the Fringes 