My would-be assailant untangled himself from my chair and stepped away. His shoulders were heaving and he was making a labored huffing sound. It took me a moment to figure out that Nehenutet was laughing. At me.
“Esteemed Captain Beck,” he wheezed. “I am impressed. If you perform such effortless acrobatics with an injured kafat, you must be truly formidable when you are healthy.”
“Forgive the dramatics,” Khebu-Ka said, turning to Wallace. “But it is clear that your leader is more than capable. He will captain our expedition. A condition that is non-negotiable. We want only the best. This is too important for us to settle for anything less.”
“No,” I said, five minutes later in my uncle’s stateroom. “A big, unequivocal no.”
“They won’t accept ‘no’ from us,” Wallace said. “You were there. You heard it with your own ears.”
“Then we don’t do it. They can hire Allegro for all I care.”
“That’s the problem, Jannigan. You don’t care.”
I took a step back. “What is that supposed to mean?”
“Ever since your father died, I’ve tried to look out for you. I gave you a job. I made sure that you never had to compromise your lifestyle—since obviously that’s what’s most important to you.”
Whoah. Where was this coming from?
“That’s not fair,” I growled. “I played ball from day one. I’ve been to countless meetings. Learned all sorts of meaningless shit. And basically have lived one big gigantic lie for the past seven years. All for you and this company. There is no way I’m going to go into dark space—where my father fucking died by the way. Do you even know what you’re asking?”
“Yes, I do know what I’m asking! I know it very well!” He turned his back on me and stormed to the window, fuming in anger.
The room was quiet for a good amount of time. I sat down on the bed and tried to figure out how I could get off this liner and get back to my normal life on New Torino.
But when Wallace turned to look at me again, all the fight had left him.
“Jannigan, listen to me. There’s a reason we need this contract.”
“Yeah, so you can buy another villa on the Southern Ocaro.”
“Will you stop for a second? Just stop for a second, please.”
I didn’t say anything.
He took a deep breath and sat down. “Remember when I first told you about this opportunity? I said that this could be the company’s final job.”
I nodded.
“Well, we’re done. Either way. Beck Salvage is shutting down in thirty days. We can either go out on top, set for life. Us, our kids, our grandkids, probably for five generations. No one has to worry about anything.”
“Yeah?”
“Or we go out on the bottom. The company declares bankruptcy. Mashigino liquidates our assets. The office. This liner. The other ships in the fleet. Our equipment. You and I walk away with nothing. And that goes double for all the hundred or so folks who work for us.”
I shook my head. “Bankrupt? That doesn’t make sense. The company’s doing great. Just this year, we won half a dozen contracts. I was in the room, so I know—”
He cut me off. “That was us treading water. Small stuff. Didn’t really make a dent.”
“Dent? A dent in what?”
My uncle slumped down in his seat and he cupped his face in his hands. I expected him to burst into tears. But he didn’t. He took another deep breath and pulled his sorry ass together. Then he launched into a long explanation of how my father had made a very poor business decision before he died. And no one really recognized the significance of that decision at the time. It seemed like minor thing. An attempt to diversify by getting in bed with the Maltheusii. It started out as a small stake in Dessidia.
I knew what Wallace was talking about—partially thanks to Piettow’s mental force-feeding and partially because everyone knew about Dessidia. It was a major terraforming project on the moon of Harpallene. And it had been going on since I was a little kid. When it was done, Dessidia was supposed to be the most incredible resort in the entire galaxy. But they had encountered a lot of problems—including messing up the moon’s orbit. The latest news was that the whole moon might need to be destroyed before it crashed into Harpallene. The government was getting involved.
“That doesn’t make sense,” I said. “Why would my dad invest in a resort? That’s not his style at all.”
“He got some bad advice,” Wallace said quietly. “From me.”
A surge of anger coursed through me. “You messed up, you fix it.”
“That’s what I’m trying to do, Jannigan. Don’t you understand? I’m trying to fix it for all of us. For you. Gemma. Condy. All the Becks. And everyone else who has been loyal to this company. They shouldn’t suffer because of my stupid mistake. I just need your help.” He moved towards me and sat down on the bed next to me.
“Jannigan, it’s one job. A hundred hours. You wouldn’t even have to leave the ship. We get paid whether we find the thing or not. Larrow has run the numbers. With the Shima’s money we can be out of Dessidia free and clear.” He put his hand on my shoulder and I looked into his haunted eyes. Either Wallace Beck was the best actor in the world, or he was a man on the edge of losing it all.
“Jannigan, will you do it?”
An hour later I was in my own stateroom, all alone, cursing myself for being such an idiot.
I needed to talk to someone, but I knew I couldn’t tell Kane about what was going on. Ditto for Lir. Especially Lir. She was not the most empathetic person in the world. When it came to having fun, gossiping, and living on the edge, Lir was your girl. But any hint of anything negative or not going well,
