Total pages in book: 44
Estimated words: 41151 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 206(@200wpm)___ 165(@250wpm)___ 137(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 41151 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 206(@200wpm)___ 165(@250wpm)___ 137(@300wpm)
3
Dreamy
BAM! BLAM! RATATATATATATA BAM!
A sudden onslaught of weapons fire makes me shriek. It sounds louder for being in the afterglow of a rough ravaging that has left me thoroughly satisfied.
The weapons fire is so much louder than I expected it to be, and I didn’t expect it at all. Shah’s room must be right at the top of the ship. There are clear panels above our heads, something like windows, but massively reinforced. Charges are bursting against them, and against the ship’s shielding, making it crackle in bright blue and purple grids.
“What’s happening?”
“If I had to guess, I’d say the Authorities have found me,” he says. “They’re attacking the ship. Someone has led them to us. I have to take care of this. Stay here. Do not leave this room, Dreamy.”
I couldn’t leave if I wanted to. Shah stalks out of the room, and the doors seal behind him. I’m locked up here, in his custody, and under assault.
Shah
“Someone led them here.”
Malik wastes no time in pointing the obvious out. We are still docked at the Colony port. It should be neutral territory. At least, unofficially, it is. Authorities don’t tend to strike here. They don’t want to turn the place into a war zone with so many cargo ships, merchant vessels, and civilian runabouts all docked. Can’t trade the merchandise of the Colony if the dock is on fire. Apparently. I am big enough news to make them sacrifice all of that precious peace.
“What do you think?” I ask Malik. “Revenge for not completing the deal?” Last night I was supposed to finalize an arrangement with a rogue Elite. Maybe he took my refusal to finish the deal personally. There are only two types of people in colonies. Elites, who make all the money, and drones, who do all the work. Elites are greedy. It’s not enough that they get all the proceeds of the labor of the workers; they like to cut deals on the side too. That’s good news for me, otherwise getting resupplied would start to get difficult.
“Maybe. Or maybe it’s about the worker you snagged.”
“You think they break out the heavy artillery for a worker drone?” I shake my head. It doesn’t fucking matter. The shields will hold up for so long, but not forever. We need to do something about this assault.
“Why aren’t we halfway to the next planet by now?”
“I can’t undock. We’re locked in port. If I try to activate the engines, we’ll rip ourselves apart. Even if we make it out of the dock, we’ll burn up with the slightest bit of turbulence. Someone’s got to go out there and unlock the docking clamps manually.”
“Fine.” I reach for an armored jacket. “I’ll go.”
“Not you, Shah.”
“Why not me?”
Malik sighs. “Shah, you run trillions of dollars’ worth of assets. We need you in one piece. I’ll send one of the lower ranks.”
“I like doing my own dirty work. We have a hundred people on this boat right now who I promised safe passage.”
“I know you like doing your own dirty work. Dirty work is all you do, Shah. That’s why you keep almost getting caught. As for the passengers, they can take care of themselves. It’s not exactly a load of orphans. Besides, getting undocked is only the first part of the problem. Finding out how the authorities located us is a much bigger deal.”
“We are in a heavily armored vessel. Maybe they ran a scan.”
“No. There are two dozen other similarly armored transporters in dock. We’ve been singled out.”
“Let’s get loose, then worry about how we fucked up this time.”
“I don’t think we did fuck up. I think someone sold us out. Or, more likely, I think we got baited.”
“What do you mean?”
“The worker in your bedroom, Shah. She’s probably tracked.”
“Doesn’t make any sense. There’s no way anyone could have predicted I’d take her. I’ve never taken a drone before.”
“The second you saw her, you couldn’t take your eyes off her. You left a deal on the table to take her.”
“Yeah. I was in the mood. It was an impulsive thing.”
“Others might find your impulses more easy to predict than you do, Shah.”
Malik is a very intelligent man. He often makes the mistake of assuming others are as smart as him. They almost never are. I put the jacket back. It’s too late to run. I’m going to have to play a card or two.
“Open a channel to the authorities. Let’s see if we can’t talk our way out of this.”
He shakes his head. “You’re wanted in every galaxy we have a name for, Shah. There’s no talking out of this.”
“Open a channel, Malik.”
He does as I ask, though I can tell he’s getting agitated, as even the best of us get when we think we might die in a hail of weapons fire. The shields are still holding, but our power reserves are dwindling. As soon as the shields drop, we’ll go up like tinder.