The afternoon flew past. Crash and I went shopping, aided by twenty thousand plat from Vaughn. She seemed to have fun helping me pick out clothes, and we even found a suitcasey-thing for twenty plat that looked big enough to fit a Gorgon in with a bit of a squeeze. And maybe two dislocated hips.
We tried to get mostly tough, earthy-coloured clothes for both of us: if we were going to be running around on planets like Earth II and Ispania, brown and beige and grey were the best camouflage.
In one clothing store, I paused at the rack of men’s underwear. After eight months, I was so used to going free-bird that putting on a pair of briefs now would probably cause permanent psychological damage. I got a few pairs of plain cotton shorts, to rehabilitate myself slowly.
Danny had opted to wait aboard the Raven until we departed, just in case someone was looking for him. Crash and I went up to her apartment to pack their clothes into the suitcase as well, plus the energy rifle and its battery packs. She walked around the apartment, switching off lights and unplugging things, then pulled all the perishables out of the fridge and bagged them. It took both of us to wheel the massive case back to the lift, each carrying a bag of food. By the time we’d stowed the case, it was three in the afternoon. I had three hours to kill before meeting Veraa, so I went to stock up my backpack. The moment I unzipped it, the stench of a dozen dead cats wafted out. I swear I heard a nearby sailor retch quietly. Pinching my nose, I pulled out the dirty clothes, took them to the ship’s laundry and dumped them in the machine. Once my pack was free of the stench, I packed a couple of shirts into it along with my gun and holster, pencil and pad, knife, wallet, and a bottle of water.
I found Danny checking out the buggy in the cargo hold. It was a ‘Longline’, one of the fast-attack buggies the New Britannia Royal Marines had used so devastatingly well at Teotihuacan and the Battle for the Lesser Antilles. These buggies were incredibly resilient, with a skeletal roll-cage chassis made of tubular steel: Longlines had been known to flip end-over-end down hills without so much as a scratch on the crew, and they were so light that two soldiers could easily flip one over. Danny was standing in the rear tray, which had a weapon mounting ring above it, so a third crewman could stand on the back and fire anywhere through 360 degrees. A huge bolt gun was mounted on the ring, and Danny was busy cleaning it. I climbed up the side of the buggy, hanging off the roll-cage frame. “She work?”
“Should do. Needs professional care and some specialist tools, but she’ll fire okay for now. There’s a crate of ammo just over there.”
“Does the engine start?”
“They say it does, so I’ll take their word for it. Ever used something like this before?”
“Nup. You?”
“Rode a Chenowith a couple times, the American version of these. Great fun. Indestructible.”
“You can man the bolter, then. I don’t trust myself around anything that can launch a metal spike faster than the speed of sound.”
Danny shrugged. “Sensible.”
Life on the Fringes 