AUTHOR'S NOTE: Originally written in 2004.
Simon tried not to sweat, but his heart was beating a thousand kilometers a minute, and the sun was hot, and the transport driver was giving him a calculating look. For a split second, he wished he was back on Osiris, away from the grubby chaos of Persephone's dusty marketplace-cum-space wharf.
"Something that big's gonna cost you extra," the driver said, nodding over Simon's shoulder to the large, metal box that glinted in the sunlight. The box was too big to be a trunk; to the driver's eyes, it looked large enough to hold all of a man's belongings, if he wasn't too very rich. And this man before him was definitely very rich, if his clothes and speech weren't a dead giveaway. No, the box, storage unit, whatever it was, was holding something else. For an instant, the driver allowed himself to fantasize. Perhaps it was money—the man could be an interplanetary mobster, on the run with his ill-gotten mammon. Or maybe he was a wealthy merchant, carting his wares from planet to planet. But, the driver conceded, it wasn't his place to ask, and chances were, there was nothing interesting inside it. He helped people get their things from here to there; that was all. Their business was their own. His business was to profit from their need.
"How much extra?" Simon asked, pulling out his wallet, his lips curling wryly as he opened the thin leather sleeve. Just a few days before, the wallet had been much thicker, but those days were gone. "Twenty?"
The driver eyed Simon. They weren't usually this easy. He felt guilty for a moment, then plowed ahead: "A hundred."
Simon's eyebrows shot up. "A hundred?" It was probably pointless to argue—plus, he doubted he would be back to this dustbowl back alley any time soon—but the amount was ridiculous. "Thirty," he said, trying to inject some authority into his voice.
"Eighty," the driver countered.
Simon sighed. "I don't have time for this," he said sharply in Mandarin to the driver. "Thirty is my final offer, or I can take my business elsewhere."
The driver hesitated. Was the rich man bluffing? Out of the corner of his eye, he could see one of his competitors loading up his cart. There was no way that sorry hump Conroy was going to outdo him today, not if he could help it. He turned back to Simon. "Thirty it is, then."
"Good."
"Jimmy! Shen!" the driver yelled in the direction of two teenage boys who had been lazing under the shade of a nearby shop's overhang. They snapped to life as the driver barked at them to load up the metal box.
Simon watched intently as the boys used a lever to lift one edge of the heavy box in order to slide some wheels under it, then used a ramp to push the box onto the flatbed of the trailer.
"That's some fancy trunk," the driver joked lightly, unable to stop himself from commenting on the mysterious box. "Got your whole life in there?"
For a second, Simon's heart froze. Could he possibly know? Of course not, he scolded himself. How could anyone guess? On the outside, it was unremarkable, except for its size. "Only what I couldn't leave behind," he told the driver, hoping he sounded nonchalant.
The driver just shook his head. Those rich folk, never able to travel light. "Where to?"
Simon nodded in the direction of an old Firefly. "It's called Serenity. I've made arrangements already. They're expecting my belongings."
The driver squinted at the ship. "Not exactly a luxury cruiser."
"It's enough." Simon took in the view of the oddly-shaped boat, the place where his new life would begin. "For where I'm going, it's enough."
