Marty exhaled a sour breath. “Yeah, and that’s a wonderful fucking mystery, Rusco. All the gods up there questioning how you managed to survive so long.”
“Come on Marty, how hard can it be to take out a few parabolas? If it looks bad, we bail. Deal? Nothing ventured, nothing gained.”
He shrugged. He was on board, but just.
* * *
We visited Baelen’s, got the ship fixed up, selling on the ready black market some of the beryl for cash to pay for the repair work. At last we were in orbit around Thetis and made our approach to the station. A lot of nail-biting this time as we stayed glued to the bridge: Marty on nav, Deidra piloting, me working weapons. Much activity played out around Thetis’s dovetail futuristic fuselage. Repairs in motion. Scout ships flying in and out, repair craft with extensible crane arms locked onto port doors, maintenance vessels and new ore carriers drifting hither and yon. We were just another supply craft of the dozens coming in from Tyrone City to drop off some materials to repair the damaged parts.
Like ants these drones worked away—hodging together a new anthill the next day. So much for the breach we had created a week back.
Our weapons were still out of range. We’d have to get a lot closer in order to target those monster parabolas and solar guns.
I cast Marty a clown’s grin as I spoke into the com. “Delta control, this is Marmot. Request access to Deck 3. Over.”
“Marmot…” the station voice paused. “You’re unregistered.”
“Affirmative, we know. Got a call from a Mr. Sykes at Engram Enterprises on Tyrone for delivery of piping and platform slabs to Thetis Station. Looks like a rush job. Last ship couldn’t make it, so we were called in. Over.”
There was a long pause, a pregnant one that had us worried. I stared over at Marty, my fingers ready on the impulse engines, ready to blast out of here if things looked sour.
“You’re cleared, Marmot. Proceed. Landing designation, Bay 6. Talk to Jraden, the commissions officer. Unload your product as quickly as possible and move out. We have a dozen other vessels scheduled to land in the next few hours.”
I could barely suppress a laugh. Easy as that. What a joke. Security must be laxer than ever. Old Sharki hadn’t learned a thing, the arrogant fuck. But then again, what idiot in their right mind would try to sabotage the station so soon after the last stunt? The ultimate double-bluff, Rusco at work.
The oval portal slid ajar and Deidra took Goliath in closer to the massive station. Parabola #1 veered over us on station northwest like some thing from an alien planet. I cued up Deidra for our attack ascent to rip into the tower containing the parabola.
Just when I thought we were going to pull off this impossible feat, a repellor beam caught us broadside. I’d had to keep shields low to maintain the whole charade. It cost us. We were on a quick dive to hell—down.
“Of all the idiotic things!” yelled Marty. “You just lost us 100 grand in yols and our lives, Rusco.”
“Get us moving! Out of here, Deidra,” I cried, ignoring him.
The ship was toast, finished. No question. But I seized the controls at the last minute. Thrust Goliath in toward the closing portal before our nav was completely dead.
“You crazy, Rusco? That’s an enemy station staring at us.”
“Better than burning up out here—or would you rather get pegged by those bastards?”
Goliath surged in through the portal on sheer momentum, caught the tail end of sliding metal before lurching through, knocking us roughshod into the landing bay.
The bottom of her fuselage sheared off, crushing her landing gear, smashing her beyond repair. She ploughed through the closing portal, careening down on the platform landing, knocking us on our asses.
Systems went haywire; every buzzer and red light went off at once.
“Into the suits! Quick!” I grated. I knew we’d be in vacuum while the outer port stayed jammed. I scrambled for the wall, tore down the lightweight grey-silver suits. Marty was at my side, seeing the writing on the wall. I avoided his ‘I told you so’ gaze.
“Move!” I swatted at Deidra, who crouched frozen by the controls.
Marty grabbed an extra R4. After suiting up, we scrambled out of the cargo bay as Goliath smoked and new flames broke out on her starboard side. We raced along the padway past V-Zons and loader craft before any security men riddled us with shells. We moved as fast as our suits could carry us. Time was running out. Our chances were slim, if any. Stray gunfire nipped at our heels. One wrong shot and it would be all over in this vacuum.
I shot back at the gunners and glanced back at the dying Goliath. Her flank was black-streaked and smoking, our remaining beryl lost forever. Our get rich schemes had gone up in flames. Maybe Marty had the right idea all along if it were just a venture for profit. Yet we were still alive—but maybe not for long.
The place was cavernous with lots of metal piping and upper walkways. Huffing and puffing for breath from the mad sprint in our suits, we made it to the first airlock and turned the silver ring to pressure lock.
The chamber pressurized. Once through, Marty was about to strip off his ape-suit but I held him back. “Keep it on, Mar. We don’t know when this place is going to birdshit or the sky will fall on our heads.”
He gave a grim nod. For once the bastard actually listened to me without arguing. A record.
A plan, Rusco, a plan. What’s the use of all this running about without a plan? We were nearly at parabola #1
