“Hi, Miss, my name is—”
She ignored his outstretched hand and shouldered her way over to me, all business-like. “We’ve had about 28 hours, Jet, and counting since the homing beacon was up. We should get the hell out of here.”
Blest and I kept unpacking the rest of the bags of product as if we hadn’t heard. I took Follee up to the bridge. Noss gave him a guarded greeting. Wren trailed, wearing a peeved look. “I’m talking to you, Rusco.”
“Heard you, Wren. All in a day’s work. You see how much stuff there is? You should be dancing for joy.”
“I am, but this place gives me the creeps. Heard horror stories about The Dim Zone.”
“Worse than your own shithole on Talyon?”
“Well, yes, worse.”
I shrugged. “Could be all true, or maybe just wives’ tales.”
“Right, like mutants carving out brains and using victims’ skulls as wine gourds.”
I laughed. “That’s a good one. Right up Mong’s alley.”
Follee looked and stared bug-eyed. “Dim Zone?” His eyes flicked back and forth. Thick glasses, clamped at the bridge of his nose, fat, meaty fingers, short, stocky frame coming up to about Noss’s shoulders. At least he was keeping his mouth shut, unlike Blest.
“So?” Noss inquired.
“Noss, it’s looking good, my man. You may be able to retire yet,” I said with enthusiasm. Enthusiasm lit by Myscol.
“That’s good.” Noss grinned and beamed. His smile faded. “What about Alastar? Can’t just leave the ship there to get picked clean by scavengers. You know the law of the jungle, Rusco, finders keepers.”
“It’s a problem, I know.” I looked over at Wren, who seemed torn between ditching the craft and flying the hell out of here. Any moment our own warp could cut out even with the recent band aid.
Blest grunted. “Still say we lose her. Too much risk.”
My lips curled in a grimace. “Still could get some appreciable salvage for her. I hate leaving a starship behind.”
“Who doesn’t, Rusco, but—”
“Look, we have to act fast,” interrupted Wren. “Raiders could be out there sniffing down our trail right now.”
“She’s right,” said Blest.
“Any other place we can hide her at?” asked Noss out loud.
Blest snorted. “What, at the edge of The Dim Zone?”
“Wren, check it out,” I urged.
She pulled up the holo register and began zooming in on nearby worlds. “What am I looking for?”
“Asteroids, space stations, moons, planets, mining operations, any space junk that could create a smoke screen for us until I figure out a better plan.”
She shook her head. “Nada, Rusco. Wait! There’s an abandoned station.”
“What? Where?” I leaned over her shoulder.
“Dunno. Some decommissioned space station. No… Too big for that. Look. Holy, Christ, it’s a fortress.”
“How far?”
“A couple hours away on impulse thrust.”
I chewed my lip. “We could warp in, check it out. If it looks promising…” I saw the overload warning gauge flicker. “What the—” I whuffled out a breath. “Those bastards. Mechanics promised me it—”
“He warned you it could go at any time,” grumbled Noss.
“Said we’d get a month,” I groused. “Hairline crack must be getting wider.”
Blest waved a restless hand. “That station could be a magnet for trouble.”
“Few other options are knocking on our door. The long and short of it, our light drive’s buggered again.”
Blest threw up his hands. “That’s just fucking great.”
I shrugged. “Well, not much we can do about it. We’ll have to risk it.”
We headed out on max impulse to the station. I tossed the spider remote over to Noss, who used it as a guide to get Alastar trailing on our heels.
Chapter 11
The last leg was the longest and glummest ride I could remember. We were trucking along on impulse with both Noss and I trying unsuccessfully to get the warp drive up again when we came across a blip on the sensors.
“Visual,” I hissed.
“There.” Noss pointed.
The station loomed out of the darkness. An obtrusive cube with circular pods at either end. But much more than that, a complex wonder of science and technological engineering. Lights glowed on the superstructure. It wasn’t completely dark there and that worried me. Automatic lights? Still operating under some weak solar power from Daerzoo’s sun? It seemed a stretch.
“Wren, give me more info on this place.” The monstrous station had a look of promise—and menace. It looked too new for the age that Wren had quoted earlier.
“It’s four hundred years old. “
“No way!”
“Yes way. Name changed from Cyber Corp to Cygon, somewhere in the last few years of its life.”
“What else does the omniscient computer have to say?”
“Supposed to be haunted. A ghost station, actually.”
“Yeah, haunted my ass,” I scoffed.
“Why out here?”
“Some space laboratory. Experiments, controversial research, close to their base of operations, somewhere in The Dim Zone. It is said the firm’s senior scientist, Dezmin Yadley, assumed control of the company after the CEO, someone named Mathias, went mysteriously missing. The company dissolved, after repeated disasters rained on its labs.”
“Give me the visual on the schematics.”
Wren pulled up a complicated diagram on the holo display showing several bays, a series of side wings and work areas across four levels, fanning out radially from a massive warehouse several stories high and breasting out on the hangar.
“Last known to have been searching for alien life out on the remote planets, mostly The Dim Zone.”
“Makes no sense. Why The Dim Zone? Why would a cybernetics company be messing around with alien life?”
“Who the fuck knows, Rusco, or cares,” said Blest, “we’ve got ourselves a serious problem here—”
“Yeah, I know, and we’re trying to solve it without you naysaying
