“What the hell you think I was talking about?” Dee shouted back, above the wind and noise of the above-board engines mounted on the two outriggers that flanked the main body of the craft.
Behind them, the sun had begun to disappear below the water. A bright orange orb, shimmering proudly in the last few minutes of daylight, glorious ‘til the very end. Up ahead, the eastern sky had already turned dark. Dusk-to-dawn lights flickered on along the shoreline, heralding the coming of another spring night.
As darkness fell, the wind off the water grew colder, and the two hunkered down in the back of the boat. Tiger pulled the Spacefarer coat’s collar up and did his best to turtle his head down. Up in the cockpit, the driver, a heavily bearded man with a ruddy, pock-marked complexion in his mid-thirties, seemed to pay the chilly air no mind. He was clothed only in a long-sleeve denim shirt and a Bama hat turned backwards. If the sixty miles-an-hour wind rushing past bothered him, he gave no indication whatsoever.
Tiger didn’t dare try to yell out his next question. So, he picked up his PDC and texted Dee, sitting right next to him.
Can this guy B trusted??
Dee felt his PDC vibe and picked it up. His face broke into an amused grin as he read it. His thumbs danced over the screen as he replied in the antiquated form of communication.
Who, Skeeter? I damn sure hope so! He’s married 2 my sister! He waited until Tiger read that text and replied with a “thumbs up” signal. He then shot another message.
He’s all about this! He’s a big conspiracy theorist. He thinks the Feds are conspiring with aliens inside there!
Tiger raised an eyebrow and shrugged. Who knew? He didn’t care one iota about all that conspiracy shit. He just wanted to get in, find out if what they were looking for was still there and get out. That was a pretty damned tall order in itself.
Overhead, a ship blasted off from Von Braun Spaceport, streaking through the dusky sky toward the Great Black. He felt homesick. For the first time in twenty years, he was without a ship, without a way off this polluted and overcrowded rock. He didn’t realize how much the ability to come and go meant to him until he’d lost it. He’d never take it for granted again.
Skeeter steered the high-dollar bass rig around a pleasure yacht and then weaved through some barges moored off Von Braun’s docks. No doubt, the cargoes of hybristeel beams and polyglass sheets were awaiting shipment off-planet somewhere. Maybe to the orbiting shipyards, where the New Exodus generation ships were being assembled for interstellar travel. More than likely, it was all headed to Mars and the herculean New Nawlins project, the full-scale reconstruction of the Crescent City under a plastic dome to replace the original on earth, flooded out by climate change and super-hurricanes. Once completed, the former inhabitants of the ancient city would be allowed to repopulate the Martian reincarnation.
Tiger thought back to the previous evening and Cutter’s proposition. The New Nawlins project would be a significant economic boom, the likes of which hadn’t been seen since the end of The Great Space Rush. There were a lot of points to be made, and not all would be legal. Cutter wanted a piece of the action, and he wanted Tiger to be his mule. He’d wanted Tiger back in the game, with his claws even deeper into him. Tiger had refused. It’d been the first time he’d ever refused the man. He thought he was starting a new chapter in life, cutting ties with nefarious influences.
Like most spacers though, Tiger was superstitious. Now, he was beginning to wonder if refusing his old friend had messed up his mojo. Since doing so, he’d become a wanted man on the lam. He’d lost his beloved Jenny. He’d rekindled his love affair with Lulah, but he knew all the joy and happiness it brought was short-lived. It couldn’t last. Only disappointment and heartbreak awaited at the end.
And Amber? There was no way of knowing how that was going to play out. His only plan was to get her off the planet. But what then? Where would they go? Was there someone who could help her? Cap’n Reb? The Baroness?
He’d make it up as he went along, he reckoned. First, he’d have to crawl before he could walk. As the perimeter fence that bordered the riverbank came into view, he thought to himself. Actually, I’m gonna have to swim before I even do that.
Skeeter throttled the boat down and cut the engines about a hundred yards west of the southwest corner of the fence. While it drifted to a stop, he climbed out of the cockpit and gave Dee an almost inconspicuous signal as he made his way to the bow.
“Ok!” Dee growled out of the corner of his mouth as he jumped up. “Time to get busy!” He turned around and lifted the cushion he’d been sitting on and reached into the concealed storage compartment.
“Here! Take this!” He handed Tiger a diver’s mask. He wagged a finger at Tiger’s midsection, indicating his clothing. “And be easing out of those! As inconspicuously as possible.”
Tiger checked the power charge on the mask’s oxygen regenerator. Diving equipment had come a long way in this century. As with most technological breakthroughs, it could thank the science of space travel. Oxygen regenerators had been invented for use on long-range ships. They recycled the air through a spacecraft, converting the carbon dioxide breathed out by the crew and passengers back into oxygen through an organic process, in much the same way plants use photosynthesis. This breakthrough meant no more bulky oxygen tanks, allowing for more cargo and passengers. And while the early ReGens relied on sunlight, real or artificial, progress in the development of the devices led to smaller, more efficient devices that
