She seemed amused by the animal roar and gave me a playful slap. “Enough, tiger. Let’s sleep it off. Plenty more time to play bride and groom in the days ahead.”
Chapter 12
We’d been scamming up and down the Zaion worlds for a few weeks now and after several false starts, began to turn a profit. We’d finally repaired the Barenium leak and equipped the landing shuttle on Starrunner with extra space suits. I’d got my knee looked after at the local regen clinic on Gainor, one of the six habitable, terraformed worlds. Some regen—not cheap, and a loving pat on the leg by the stony-eyed medic. After scouting down a new-old Barenium cylinder on Gainor, I gave a praise to the good Kazoo that I no longer had to worry about Baer tracking us. As for the blood-hungry pirate Mong, we’d keep an eye out for him. The man had discovered a superior form of armor or shield technology that had given him a significant edge over his enemies.
I walked onto the bridge to catch TK and Wren glued to the holo screen. The free store planetary press was having a field day with the latest sensation—always a new goldmine of cheery information. The face that stared back at me with those eyes black as charred coal had me cringing.
The broadcast came over the public channel—Mong, in all his glory and ceremonial garb, black-braided ponytails and leather shoulderpiece. His cheeks flushed a ruddy bronze, but that face was set as serene as an avatar.
“Citizens and people of Questra! Surrender your government, your ships and your wealth, or I will unleash a rain of fire that will send you to hell!”
The image cut out and the screen panned back to the announcer. “And that is the latest ultimatum from warmonger, Kaibus Mong, known as the ‘star lord’ or the ‘dark lord of death’. His latest conquest on Megal orbiting Tiran’s star turned the landscape into a fiery, feudal wasteland. Will ‘Questra’, another of the inner planets, suffer the same fate? No one has come to offer aid to either Megal or Questra. Experts say that nearby governments and planetary United Nations are reluctant to defy Mong, fearing retaliation with his blitzkrieg tactics.”
“Turn that fucker off, please,” I ordered.
TK hit the switch. “See, this renegade Mong is bad news, Rusco. Doesn’t look as if he’s going to let a few petty worlds satisfy his greed.”
“No kidding.” The transmission had cast a shadow over my mood. “No different than Genghis Khan, from what I gathered from history. Snatching up territories as if they were candy for the taking.” I shook my head. “No matter. Nothing we can do except keep a wide berth.”
I finally decided to quit Gainor and scout out crime leads in my old haunts on Tarsus, the second innermost planet. The gigs we were pulling out in the hinterlands were but two-bit shams, raking in a few yols, mere milk money, in retrospect. But they were stepping stones to test out my team, iron out the wrinkles, so to speak, see where TK and Wren’s weaknesses lay and how we could improve upon them. Wren was always too impulsive, a natural hothead, but brave and for the most part, unquestioning. TK, on the other hand, was a cautious worrier and a slightly lazy sort. But smart, and his input on cons, particularly timing and logistics, had given me an edge. Even that caper down on Zanzadeer had been a cockup, truthfully, a little bit too convoluted for my ragamuffin recruits. Had almost blown up in our faces. Not that I was Captain Gohimbo or anything. TK and Wren were rising in my estimation and I felt I could trust them with some bigger fish to fry. After purchasing some explosives down on Gainor with the gambling money from Zanzadeer, I decided to reach a little higher.
An old acquaintance of mine in Haifor City gave us our first genuine break. A Gigor Knox aka ‘Blinky’, who worked as the concierge at the Big Apple Hotel was my lead. He was a middle man up to his ears in larceny and schemes, from black market to sex trade. A contract job had come up through the grapevine, orchestrated by a certain gangster, the Dancing Slugger, Pazarol.
At the hotel and after a few words of catch up, Blinky took me aside. “I can hook you up for a meet down with Pazzy, kind of an open house.” He spread his arms wide, and I saw brown rotten teeth rooted there in his grin.
“Sure,” I said. “Whatever you say, Blinky. Just looking for a few opportunities here.”
“That’s the spirit, JR. That’s why I like you.” He patted my back with his ham-like hand.
Risky, making the contact with Pazarol, knowing the man was on a par with Baer from what I’d heard. A faint watery voice, a very distant one, told me to back off. But not a loud enough voice for me to take heed.
I did my research and checked out his modus operandi. A jack-of-all trades: arms, clothing, slaves, mercenaries for hire, anything that he could use to turn a profit, which in these days of gang-run, war-torn cities, was mostly contraband.
The gas cloud in the holo view coalesced and morphed into whatever 3D stimulus the ship’s computer willed of it. The holo image, drawn from the public free-store, showed a series of dingy warehouses in a seedy industrial neighborhood with broken antennae
