Author's note: This story is finished and stands at around 90,000 words. Unfortunately, I've not been able to arrange a beta reader. (Several people have kindly taken a look at a chapter, but scheduling just hasn't worked out) At the moment, I am making another pass through myself, but if you read this chapter and think you would like to have a go at beta reading the story yourself, please feel from to get in touch by PM. I'll wait a few days before posting the second chapter. If there's no offers to beta, I'll push on with posting the remaining chapters as they are ready.
On the story itself, I don't want to say too much. Just some warnings for some bad language, violence (almost all firearms) and some gore (nothing too graphic, I think, but best to be aware). Other than that, the main thing I'm hoping to achieve is that you'll have fun reading. 😊
nice-day
ooo
Cho Min-soo was dying, that much was obvious. His vision, darkening at the edges, swam in the half-light of the cockpit. To his ear, the roar of the engines seemed distant even as his craft screamed up and up through the Martian atmosphere. And Cho's hands, clamped so hard around the throttle that his knuckles shone white in the light of cockpit instruments, were to him little more than distant, throbbing lumps at the end of his failing arms. All that was missing was a voice beckoning him towards the light.
Cho cursed inwardly, lacking the strength to give voice to his frustration. The bounty hunter that pursued him had scored a lucky shot, a single round punching two holes in the hull as it passed straight through the cockpit. The ship wasn't losing pressure - the safety foam that now plugged the punctures had made sure of that - but a white-hot fragment of the projectile had lanced through Cho's leg. Cho was no doctor, but he was pretty sure that the bastard thing had nicked an artery. And now, encased in the claustrophobic cabin of his runner, with his engine damaged and his fuel supply trickling away, Cho was powerless to do anything other than slowly bleed to death.
Another shot rang from the hull of Cho's ship – a glancing blow. He'd have considered himself lucky were he not mere minutes from punching out. As it was, the sound of imminent death ringing the ship's chassis like a warped temple bell did not fill him with dread. Instead, he felt annoyed. Not angry, just very, very annoyed - that feeling one gets when interrupted from doing something important. In the encroaching stupor of shock and blood loss Cho gave no thought to how incongruous that feeling was in the midst of this final, mortal peril.
How stupid to die this way, killed by a fucking cowboy while running some menial errand for the hierarchy. Why was this idiot chasing him anyway? Were the Martian Justice Departments even offering bounties anymore? Cho was annoyed at the bounty hunter; annoyed at the lawyers; annoyed at his overseer for delegating this chore to him. But more than anything, he was annoyed at himself. He'd been complacent, had assumed that the secrecy surrounding the rise of the new order would shield him from notice. It had been a stupid mistake, and as a result his carcass would keep some cowboy scumbag supplied with cigarettes for another week.
Darkness.
Cho blinked back to consciousness. The cabin was silent, the canopy stained with the black of the void. The sharp tang of burnt electronics mixed with the stink of blood in the stagnant air of the cockpit. The ship was adrift. Cho scanned his instruments, trying to determine how long he'd been out, but the various dials and screens appeared only as flickering green smudges to his failing eyes. He tried to move his arms and found that he couldn't. Tried to lean forward towards the console but couldn't do that either. His body was all but dead, leaving only his mind to endure these final moments of existence as if he'd been upended and what little life remained to him had pooled in his head.
A dull thump ran through the hull, followed by a distant scuffing sound. Cho scraped together his last ounce of strength and swivelled his eyes to the left. Slowly, dreamily, a figure drifted into view on the other side of the canopy. It was sheathed in white and even as his mind faded, Cho could recognise the appealing contours of a female form. He'd have been tempted to think that an angel had come for him had it not been for the life he'd led.
The figure floated around to the front of the craft, grasped a handhold just below the cockpit seal and rapped soundlessly on the glass. Cho stared at the figure, with just enough lucidity to register that she was wearing a pressure suit. For a moment Cho thought he could make out the face of the wearer through the convex dome of the visor, only to realise with vague disappointment that it was his own reflection he was seeing in the tinted glass.
The space walker jerked back as if startled, and then began moving back around the hull. It seemed something else had caught her attention. Cho didn't much care. Not about the figure, or about anything else. As the shadows raced across the desolate landscape that had once been the mind and soul of Cho Min-soo, one last thought occurred before it too was claimed by the night.
It had been good. Good to serve again.
A single, whispered word sounded through the cockpit.
"Tiamat."
And Cho Min-soo was gone.
The Ace of Spades
The day was a warm one. Tharsis City bathed in the early-afternoon light of a sun so distant that it could do little to relieve the permanent chill of the Martian atmosphere, the real work being done by the city's overtaxed climate control system. Today was a day for relaxation, for sitting on the deck of a fishing boat and throwing a desultory line into the marina with little hope or desire of landing a catch. It was a day for taking things easy, and certainly not one for tedious hours spent queuing in the poorly air conditioned halls of a government building, waiting patiently for the kind of rubber stamps and condescension only the Department of Spacecraft Registration could provide.
Jet looked up at the tall wooden doors of the Tharsis DSR building and let out a long, weary breath. There was nowhere in the system he wouldn't rather be right now, but it had to be done. But perhaps not just yet.
Jet turned away and looked out across the square that spread away from the foot of the short staircase that rose from the pavement to the building. The Municipal Square lay at the heart of the administrative quarter of Tharsis, a lattice of intersecting paths and grassy quadrangles that, on any normal day, would have been alive with office workers dashing from one building to another, shoppers taking shortcuts between two of the City's more prestigious shopping areas, bags heavy at their sides, and loungers reclining on the grass as the hectic city life passed them by.
But today was not a normal day. Today was day six of the Occupation Movement's System-wide protest. Government budget cuts were eating into virtually every aspect of life on every world, from impoverished Earth to affluent Ganymede. As a result, an army of protesters had rallied from every walk of life on every planet and satellite, united in outrage against the near universal erosion of their quality of life.
Instead of administrators and bargain hunters, the square was filled almost to its edges with tents, gazebos and lean-tos, its scrubbed white flags and carefully mowed lawns obscured beneath a tangle of canvas and polyester. Jet could see heads and torsos of protesters as they negotiated the narrow channels of the makeshift settlement, making the whole thing seem like an ant farm laid down on its side. Even where Jet stood, some metres from the edge of the protest proper, the air was thick with sweat, cigarette smoke and weed, a sickly-sweet soup that churned in the warm air and reminded Jet of sultry nights spent manning the lockup during his early days as an officer on Ganymede.
He looked away from the protest, glancing once more at the doors to the DSR building. The Bebop's registration was due for renewal, and Jet was staring down the barrel of a long, painful afternoon spent filing endless paperwork. Sure, it could all be done via the net, but the cop-turned-bounty-hunter had seen more than once just how vulnerable those systems could be. A few months spent sharing his living space with the System's greatest living hacker had left Jet with a digital paranoia that he just could not shake. These days he preferred to handle his affairs in person whenever possible.
"Thanks Ed," he muttered, pulling a box of cigarettes from his breast pocket. "Wherever you are."
"Excuse me?" A young civil servant, who had just begun stumping his way up the stairs of the Registration building, had overheard the remark.
Jet glanced up, meeting the man's enquiring gaze. "Huh? Oh, nothing. Just talking to myself."
The suited man shrugged, adjusted the wad of documents wedged beneath his left arm and looked ready to move on when he noticed Jet's cigarettes. "Um, sir? You know you're not allowed to smoke that out here, right?"
"I'm not?" said Jet.
In answer the civil servant nodded towards a big, concrete planter just behind where Jet was standing. Jet glanced down to find a large sign emblazoned unambiguously with the image of a cigarette struck through with a big red cross.
Jet turned a frowning gaze on his cigarette, then out across the great mass of humanity that sweated and fumed in the square, and then back up to the civil servant. The latter arched his eyebrows, apparently oblivious to the point Jet was trying to make. Jet considered explaining it to him but thought better of it. Sighing, he put the cigarettes away.
The civil servant smiled, wished Jet a good day, and went off about his business, leaving the bounty hunter to reflect bitterly on the planet-wide smoking ban that had begun in the restaurants and bars of Mars, and was now spilling out onto its streets. There hadn't been a lethal case of smoking-induced cancer in almost forty years, but this ban wasn't about health so much as it was about 'social conscience', as the politicians put it. There had been a time when that sort of thing - consideration for one's fellow man and so on - would have appealed to Jet. Funny how spending the better part of a year fighting over food and elbow room with a band of unwashed misfits could erode a man's sense of civic duty.
Jet pulled out his packet of cigarettes again and leaned back against the planter, making sure to position his ass directly over the no-smoking sign.
"Assholes!"
The word rang through the thick air, momentarily silencing the low buzz of the protest settlement. Jet, his lighter poised before his cigarette, glanced left towards the source of the profanity. A stocky figure, swathed in an ankle-length leather jacket was stomping down the stairs, the report of boot falls and the saltiness of the language drawing the attention of nearby office workers and protesters alike. One of the latter, a tall, thin man in an old raincoat ill-suited to the weather, punched the air and shouted his agreement.
"Unbelievable," the woman growled as she arrived at the bottom of the stairs. Jet hadn't been sure at first; the broad shoulders and square features had, at a distance, hinted at masculinity. But viewed at closer quarters, there was a definite feminine quality to the eyes, the cheek bones, and to the waves of blond hair that swept out from beneath a black peaked cap. But it wasn't the face of the new arrival, or her outfit, that was the most remarkable thing about her. Instead, the standout feature was the strange accessory she had draped over her shoulder - a very large, live cat.
"Hey, keep staring at a girl's cat that way and she's likely to get the wrong idea." The woman, who nearly matched Jet for height, had stopped in front of him and was giving him an appraising look.
"Oh," said Jet. "Uh, sorry."
"Don't worry about it," said the woman. "Most action I've had in a long time." Jet had nothing to say to that. The newcomer let out a long sigh, and a lot of the tension she'd been carrying seemed to go with it. "Mind if I pull up a chair?"
Jet glanced down at his concrete perch. "Sure," he said. "Can't vouch for the comfort, though."
The woman approached and propped herself against the planter to Jet's right. She winced a little. "You weren't kidding," she said. "Still, beats the hell outta standing in line." Jet gave a sigh of his own. The legendary DSR queue still awaited him. "Name's VT, by the way." VT held out a hand. "And this here's Zeros." She tilted her head towards the grey and white cat sprawled over her right shoulder, like an epaulette made of fat and cat hair.
Jet fumbled his lighter into the same hand as his cigarette and accepted the invitation to shake. "Jet. Jet Black."
"Ah, parents had a sense of humour, huh?" VT grinned.
"Yeah," said Jet, trying to act as if he hadn't heard that one ten thousand times before. "VT's not exactly run-o-the-mill, either. It stand for anything?"
"Care to take a guess? I've got a pool going."
Jet considered it. "Some other time, maybe."
VT shrugged, somehow without dislodging her passenger. "Suit yourself. So, what is it brings you to this lovely spot? Plan on spending your afternoon kissing some bureaucrat's ass?"
"Something like that," said Jet. "My ship's registration is up this month."
"Renewal, huh," said VT. "That sucks."
"Yeah," Jet agreed sullenly. And it did, too. The thought of it made him remember just how much he needed a cigarette. He gently wedged the filter between his lips and struck the lighter.
"Hey," said VT. "You know you're not supposed to do that here, right?" She tapped the fingers of her left hand against the edge of the sign that was protruding from behind Jet's rear end.
Jet glanced across at her. "Yeah," he said, allowing a hint of challenge to creep into his voice.
VT smiled her approval. "Okay," she said. "Just checking."
Jet lit his cigarette and pocketed the lighter. Then, remembering he had company, he hastily pulled out the packet and offered one to VT.
"No, thanks," said VT. "Not my thing."
Jet put away the cigarettes, quietly relieved not to have to part with one. Part of the crackdown on smoking had involved a price hike that was putting a serious dent in his meager finances. The bounty hunter drew in the warm fumes, letting them percolate through his lungs before pushing them out into the close spring air. The sensation brought little comfort, though he couldn't quite put his finger on why; surely, something so expensive and antisocial should be more fun! Jet took the cigarette from his mouth and stared at it ruefully, then shook his head and stubbed it out in the planter behind him. Smoking was more fun when it was a team sport.
"So," he said, "how about you?"
"What about me?"
"What brings you here? Planning on some ass-kissing of your own?"
"Something like that," said VT. "I'm here on vacation."
"Vacation?" Jet's eyebrows arched in surprise. "Don't take this the wrong way, but you've got strange taste in vacation spots."
"I'm not here by choice. Believe me." A little of that erstwhile tension was sneaking back into VT's posture. "Damned haulage company forced me to take a break. Industry regs, or some crap."
"Oh, trucker huh?"
"Yeah. Bet you never thought a shrinking violet like me would be hauling ass across the System."
Jet chuckled. "Never would've guessed."
"I thought I could talk my way out of it with my bosses," VT went on. "But the assholes just went and had my license suspended."
"So, what? You thought you'd try and talk the Department around?"
VT pulled a face that suggested she knew exactly how dumb that idea had been.
"How'd it go?" asked Jet.
"How'd you think it went?" VT snapped.
Jet gave VT a moment to cool off before asking, "So, when do you get your licence back?"
"End of the month," said the trucker, now more sullen than angry. "Until then, I'm off the road and off the clock."
"That's too bad."
"Yeah," said VT. She glanced at her cat and began scratching him gently behind the ear. "How 'bout you? How do you pay the bills?"
Jet drew breath to answer but stopped himself. Could he honestly say he was bounty hunting for a living? Pickings had been painfully slim recently. He hadn't collected on a bounty head in weeks. Maybe it was the government cutbacks, or maybe the drop in syndicate activity since the collapse of the Red Dragon clan, but there wasn't much money to be made as a cowboy these days.
"This and that," he said instead.
VT eyed him, and then nodded knowingly. "Gotcha."
The pair sat in silence for a little while, watching as a warm breeze rippled the small city of canvas that occupied the square.
"So, this ship of yours," VT said after a while, "it got a crew?"
Jet, who had been tracking the progress of a young suit as she hastily negotiated a maze of tent lines and sandwich boards on her way to some engagement she had probably already missed, gave a small grunt of surprise.
"I mean, it's gotta be pretty big if you need to register it with an SSR43." The trucker bobbed her head in the direction of Jet's waste.
Jet followed her gaze to where the top of a folded-up registration document was poking out of his pocket.
"Oh," he said. He thought about it for a moment, and then wondered why he had to think about it. The answer was simple enough. It wasn't as if a single damn one of them was coming back. "No," he said. "It doesn't."
Something in Jet's tone must have been telling, as VT answered, "Sore point, huh?"
"No," Jet lied. "Just the way it is."
"I hear ya," said VT. "Still, gotta be tough running a ship big enough for an SSR43 all by your lonesome."
Jet shrugged. Truth be told, he hadn't really given it much thought. In fact, he hadn't really thought about anything in months. He'd just sleepwalked around the Bebop, cleaning this, cooking that, mending the other, filling his minutes, hours and days with one pointless chore after another. It kept the ship clean and running, but it sure as hell was no kind of life. Maybe it was time for a change.
"What kind of bird is she?" VT asked, oblivious to Jet's train of thought.
"An old trawler," said Jet, surfacing from his reverie. "She's called the Bebop."
"Bebop." VT tried the word out. "Interesting name. More of a rock chick myself, though." She tilted her head back and regarded the washed-out blue sky. "A trawler," she said thoughtfully. "Actually, a fishing trip might be just the thing to kill a few weeks. I know just the place, too."
A thought occurred to Jet. It frightened him a little at first. He hesitated at the edge of the idea, feeling something akin to vertigo at the leap it represented. But as the idea solidified, so too did his resolve. A hint of a smile came to his lips.
Time for a change.
"Take her," he said.
VT looked at him. "What's that?"
"Take the Bebop."
"What, you mean like a loaner?"
"No, I mean permanently." Jet turned to VT. "You want a fishing trip? Buy the Bebop. She's no pleasure cruiser, but she'll do the job."
VT had the look of a woman who was suddenly wondering why she had engaged some random crazy guy in conversation. But gradually her expression softened, her gaze turning skyward once more.
"My own fishing boat," she said, as if saying the words were a test of the idea's feasibility. "Can't say it's ever been a dream of mine. But it's probably someone's dream, and that's gotta be worth something. How much you want for her?"
Jet pulled the SSR43 from his pocket. "Make an offer," he said, and handed VT the document. "Specs are all here."
VT spent a few minutes reading through the form, her expression a neutral mask. Then she folded it up and handed it back to Jet.
"One and a quarter mil'," she said.
Jet's jaw sagged open. "What?" he said. "But she's worth at least two."
VT gave a short bark of laughter. "If she were five years younger, maybe. Okay, one point three."
"One point eight."
"Not likely! One point three five."
"One point seven five."
VT gave a sly smile that Jet wasn't sure he liked. "One point six," she said. "And you stand in line to get the new registration."
Jet looked up at the doors to the Registration department. By his guess at least two dozen people had entered the building since he and VT had begun talking. Two, maybe three, had come out. He sighed.
"Fine," he said. "One point five, but that's as low as I go."
"Done!" VT grinned and held out a hand to shake once more. "A pleasure doing business with you."
Jet clasped VT's hand, and scowled as if he felt he'd been cheated, but it was an outrage he didn't truly feel. If anything, he just felt… lighter.
"You got your credit book on you?" VT asked.
Jet gave VT a confused look. "Sure, but uh, don't you want to check the Bebop over first?"
"Nah," VT replied. "I get the feeling I can trust you. You got that kind of face."
Jet, not knowing quite how to take the remark, simply said, "Uh, thanks."
"You're welcome. And besides, if I wait too long, I might change my mind. Y'know, buyer's remorse 'n' all that."
"Well, if you're sure," said Jet.
VT was sure. The two exchanged contact details, with Jet providing the information VT would need to take ownership of the Bebop, including her location in a marina across town. Jet then took out his credit book and keyed in the amount. VT proffered her card, which Jet swiped, completing the transaction.
It was done.
VT took back her card while Jet stared at the balance in his credit book, absorbing the significance of the little blue numbers. "Guess that's it, then," he said quietly.
"Yep," said VT. She grinned at her cat. "Hey, Zeros. Looks like we got us a boat." Zeros yawned massively but didn't stir from his slumber.
Jet handed the SSR43 back to VT. A thought occurred to him. "Hey, you gonna have enough for the registration fee?"
VT made a thoughtful sound. "Good point," she said. "Hang on a sec." She reached inside her coat, rooted around its depths and extracted an object that it took Jet a couple of seconds to recognise as a stack of notes. "I reckon that should just about cover it."
Jet stared at the wad of one Woolong bills. The last time he'd seen that many notes in one place he'd been foiling a drug pickup. He hadn't got to keep the money that time either.
VT must have noticed his expression because she smiled, saying, "I told you I was running a pool."
"No kidding," Jet said as he watched the trucker place the money back inside her jacket.
The bounty hunter - former bounty hunter now, he supposed - reached into his pocket once more. This time he produced an electronic key. He held it up to VT.
"She's all yours," he said. And, with no more ceremony than that, Jet dropped the key into VT's open palm.
ooo
VT looked down at the key resting in her hand - a grubby, grey fob, its surface worn smooth from years of use.
"Thanks," she said.
She weighed the little object in her hand. It was good to have the key to a rig again, albeit a fishing rig rather than a hauler. VT liked Mars, with all its life and variety, but she'd been surface-bound for almost a week now and the dusty little world was beginning to feel claustrophobic. A city might afford more living space than the cab of a truck, but the views couldn't compare.
VT looked across at Jet. The man was staring off into the middle distance, an enigmatic smile pulling at the edges of his beard.
"Hey," said VT. "You okay?"
Jet glanced across at her. "Hmm? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Just thinking about tomorrow."
"Why, what's happening tomorrow?"
Jet, with that same odd expression, said, "I have no idea."
"Okay," said VT dubiously. A second later Jet pushed away from the planter and turned to leave. "Hey, wait. Don't you want to come get your stuff from the ship?"
Jet looked up at the sky for a moment. VT couldn't see his face, could only hear him say, "No, there's nothing there I need anymore." He looked over his shoulder. "See you around, VT. And good luck." With that he turned and walked off along the periphery of the square, where the protesters had been considerate enough to leave a path clear of tents and placards.
"Same to you," VT called after him. "And give me a call if you change your mind!"
Jet raised a hand in acknowledgment, then thrust both into his pockets. A moment later that odd, gravel-voiced man with the retro prosthetic arm and the image of an eagle spread across his back was gone, vanishing around the side of the building along one of the footpaths leading away from the square.
"Well, how 'bout that, Zeros?" said VT to her cat. "Looks like you and me got us a pleasure boat. We're going up in the world!"
Zeros gave a sleepy purr.
"Yeah, he was a little weird. Kinda cute, though. In a broken-in sort of way."
The cat opened one eye and regarded his owner.
"What, the old man?" said VT. She glanced up at the sky. "He'd understand. Anyway, it's not like he kept his peepers to himself." She pulled the SSR43 form out of her pocket and took a good long look at it. "What do you think, buddy?" Zeros had gone back to sleep. "I agree. Let's fill it in online."