I held up my hand. “Relax. We just have a few questions to put to the yardmaster. You the head honcho here?”
“Yeah, why?”
A low growl came to my left. I turned, pulse racing, as some creepy animal skulked up. I stepped back, anxious breath on my lips. The creature had a scaly hide like a lizard, smelling of a hog, but smiling through a jowl of yellow teeth. Just what we needed, some slavering, waist-high beast ready to tear chunks out of our legs. Fear would get us nowhere. I took a giant step forward, but gripping fingers hard on the trigger.
“Easy,” the man called. “No need to get mean. Fifer ain’t going to hurt you. So long as you don’t rile her up. Or smell like cat shit.”
I came closer, bridling my unease, knowing it would only antagonize the creature to violence. “Hey, there, Shep.” The dog-lizard came bounding over, curling its salivating lip. It whined when I offered it my hand. A rangy orange tongue came out to lick it. I patted the beast and it wagged that scaly tail. Marty threw it an old piece of a synthetic bologna sandwich he’d half finished.
“No feeding the animals, dorkus,” the man growled. “What do you want to do, make her sick? What are you, bunch of wise-guys?”
Marty smiled. “Whatever you say, padre.”
“It’s Kragen to you. What do you fucks want anyways? If you’re looking to peddle product on that junker of yours, you’ve come to the wrong place. Malley over in equipment yard might look it over for trade.” He jerked a meaty thumb back behind the tin sheds. “Though that rustbucket of yours won’t get you a few k yols.” He scrunched up his eyes. “Looks like one of Sharki’s rigs. How’d you get ahold of it?”
More bodies came out of the woodwork. Tentative expressions, surly and wary. Men holding tools, drills, ratchet-irons, chains, other implements foreign to my eyes.
I did a quick scan. Most of these worker bees were slaves—had the blue slave tattoos branded on their necks.
Thetis was one of those old school, backward worlds where slaves were the norm. They still used slave labor here. I recalled the planet’s history that’d rolled up on the holo index while Deidra was working it. Some space mogul had capitalized on the destruction of a few innocent worlds and victimized what he could. Brought the ‘refugees’ or captives, down with other wartorn planets’ citizens. Refuge was Thetis’s middle name, a planet of ‘salvation’, if you wanted to call it that, but in my mind, slavery was slavery.
I nodded with enthusiasm. “What do you do here anyway?”
“I’m crog here. We prepare quality beryl for industrial use, and other gear, like crucibles for the beryl mining operation. See those catwalks?” He pointed toward long-grated steel and railing. “Need four men to monitor the feeders underneath, make sure the sluicers are always pouring in the right mixes. One slip and we lose a batch and Jakren, our distributor, is mighty pissed.”
I stared in curiosity at a massive crucible, fifteen feet wide, that sat on a low platform joining the first level catwalk. Two more tiers of catwalks ran above that. A chute was attached to the crucible’s top where a loader could pour raw beryl into the mouth. Hot flames licked up at the bottom of the vessel. A mix of smaller ones sat on the tarmac. Replacements? When the brew was done? All said and done, this looked like a capable, simple, but ragged ass operation.
Marty gave a curt growl. “Thanks for the breakdown, chief, but we’re looking for a bit of slide and dive, if you have it.”
I interjected a cough. “What we really want, Kragen, is—”
“I don’t care what you want. Getting a funny feeling about you two. Back that rig off and let’s call it square.”
“Wait, hear us out.”
He scratched at his beard. “I’m listening.”
I nodded, making appreciative motions at the machinery scattered about the yard. “Nice setup you have. Seems a little out of the way though.”
Kragen spat out a wad of brown goo. Local product, likely harvested from the swamps. “Only a few settlements on this wet sponge of a planet. Most of the action is in Tyrone City and Narpoon Town. I like it out here, the isolation, the loneliness, it suits me. You can hear the jackdaw and swamp crake over the roar of an engine, with the howl of firrits like Fifer here thrown in.” He patted the mangy hound-lizard on the head.
I signaled to Marty. With an irritated shrug, he turned and sauntered back to move the ship. I heard the whine of engines as he set her down in the adjacent yard. “Happy?” I grunted at the yardmaster.
“Very.”
Marty came loping back, looking slightly pissed, but then the hint of a shit-eating grin broke out on his face. “Heard our pigeon thrashing around, Ruskie. What a mouth on that one! Not liking it much in her birdcage.”
Kragen’s eyebrows shot up and I scowled at Marty, resenting him for his insinuations. Even an old ox like Kragen could put two and two together.
A skinny woman with pale brown cheeks and dust-covered curls and wearing a pair of faded blue overalls edged in. “Boss, that rig is sizeable enough for hauling stones from Jakren’s new pit over by Narpoon Lake. We could take it off their hands and get these three to work hog down on the feeders.”
Kragen smoothed out his moustache. “Not a bad plan, Bessy, if I don’t say. Provided these fellows’ll oblige.”
I gave a sad laugh. “You got it all wrong. See, we’re here about repairs, Kragen. We look like a couple of dopes to you? Take it off your hands...Jeez.”
