Edge of Redemption (A Star Too Far Book 3) (4 page)

“Six month minimum, option for six more.”

“Illegal?”

“No.”

“Dangerous?”

Emilie shrugged. “It’s not near Sa’Ami or Harmony space.”

Mustafa ran a finger on his upper lip. “I’ll need half of the first term up front, with the second half in escrow.”

She’d been afraid that would happen. She had the first half, expected it. But the second half would be a touch beyond what she had available. Or at least if she wanted to have any purchasing power on Winterthur. “First half up front I can do.”

Mustafa squinted and looked at Emilie. The tone of the meeting changed abruptly from a sales pitch to a negotiation. “No option for the second half.”

“I can pay once things get rolling in system.”

Mustafa waved a hand and sat back with his arms crossed. “Once you have the money we’ll talk. I’ll need a note from your bank on the second half of the first term.”

Emilie frowned. “And you won’t take that note for the second term?”

“Cash,” Mustafa stated. “I’ll not lay down a bond either, not for this, this, terrible deal.”

“Then why take the job if the deal is so terrible?”

“I’m in need of work. Things are a bit, eh, how do you say? Tight.”

“Prison?”

Mustafa winced at the words. “An unfortunate complaint that led to an unfortunate lodging.”

Emilie smiled thinly. A bargain mercenary at a bargain price with no bond. Not how she liked to work. But he was cheap... “Deal.”

Mustafa smiled and the shining teeth came out. He gestured to someone across the room and slid a chair to the table. “Well, please do tell us about the contract then, boss.”

“Us?” Emilie asked.

A tall woman in a floor length red dress walked across the room. Her skin was a touch on the olive side while her hair was shorn short to her head.

“Emilie, allow me to introduce my pilot. This is Salamasina, she is—”

“—Samoan,” Salamasina said.

Emilie looked to Mustafa with an impressed look. The fabled sailors of old still made the greatest pilots and mercenaries. She was starting to feel like things were moving in the right direction.

“Now Emilie, tell us about the contract. Where are we going?”

Emilie took a thin stemmed wine glass in her hand and stared up at the color. “Home,” she whispered. “Winterthur.”

T
he boy wore a smile bright as the striped banner he carried. His face was a caricature of happy, almost something beyond happy. The wind slammed the banner from side to side and he struggled to hold it aloft. It flapped like a cracking whip in the sea air. His small frame was battered back and forth. It didn’t falter and neither did the boy.

“A beautiful Founding Day yes?” Natyasha Dousman said to her companion. It wasn’t a question as she had no intention of listening to the answer. Natyasha’s face glowed as she watched the children pass. A smile, jovial and warm, was ever present. She waved excitedly and nudged the man sitting next to her. A tap, a nudge, another personal connection.

Natyasha was all about personal connections. On the scale, she barely went over one hundred pounds. For height she was a hair under five and a half feet. But she had a presence, a presence that added muscle, grit, and inches. A touch of gray, carefully cultivated, was dashed in her auburn hair. Her eyes, so blue they almost hurt, were what everyone remembered. Her campaign color was blue. Her house was blue. Her yacht was blue.

A low profiled tractor plodded by silently with a low-boy trailer. On it sat the original colony lander. The body was scarred, rippled from impact, and corroding slowly. Natyasha stood and placed her hand reverently over her heart. Others, watching for the lead, stood proudly with her.

“My grandfather was on that one,” Natyasha said with a slight choke in her voice. She liked to say it, as if anyone could forget, just to show that she didn’t forget.

The ancient lander plodded past, followed by rank after rank of proud workers, militia, and, of course, more children. Children with banners, flags, staffs holding blue orbs. Natyasha smiled as each group passed, a warm smile, a smile that people would remember.

Then the rowdy ones came. Men, drunk on grain alcohol, stumbled past with shovels in one hand and rocks in the other. The rabble followed behind the parade at a respectable distance. They chanted in loud, angry voices. “No more taxes! Keep your filthy poor! No more a whore for Core!”

Natyasha looked on and turned her glance to the side. The UC Ambassador looked straight forward, right through the rabble. His escorts, a pair of UC Marines, stood close with faces grim. Natyasha turned back to the rabble, she could almost smell the booze from where she sat. They looked about how she hoped they would. She smiled a bit.

The first rock landed before the Ambassador with a thud. It was no larger than a grapefruit but packed with raw minerals. The Ambassador turned and looked over to Natyasha. He nodded his head slowly, slightly, as if acknowledging her.

“Let’s go.” She stood and straightened her jacket, a jacket that was carefully chosen to match those marching with stone and stick. A jacket that was just a touch nicer, with a beautiful blue band on the shoulder. She gave a knowing smile to the burly man who led the rabble, Malic.

She didn’t bother looking back to the Ambassador or the parade. She already had her outcome. A touch of a tussle, she liked that. Just enough of a barb to remind the Ambassador that he wasn’t at home. He was on her turf.

Natyasha and her entourage stepped down from the stand and walked through the cool sea air. The sea wind blasted straight into them. She could taste the metallic brine in the back of her mouth. “I do love that,” she said to no one.

“Councilor!” A scraggly bearded man sprinted through the crowd. He wore a set of dull green clothes with a 3D camera array.

Natyasha snapped out of her moment and glared sourly at the man. “Jon,” she said without halting.

“Councilor, how do you feel about the allegations—”

“No comment,” Natyasha said, and nodded to Bark.

Bark stepped aside and shoved the reporter.

“Hey! I’ve got rights ya know!” Jon cried out as he tumbled to the ground.

*

H
alf a kilometer away the briny sea crashed against the breakwall. Distillation towers grew like pine trees from the edge of the sea. Inside of the breakwall a line of yachts, working ships, and cargo ferries bounced gently in the waves. The steam pillars twisted in the wind, casting shadows of dark and gray across the civilian fleet.

“Councilor! Councilor!” a man in a deep gray jacket shouted as he ran closer.

Men stepped out in front of Natyasha but pulled back when she nodded. The man stopped on the edge of the entourage and looked suddenly aware of the mass of muscle that stood before him. “Councilor, may we speak?”

“Of course, Garth,” Natyasha said in a warm, slow voice. “Just allow Ms. Bark a moment.”

A woman with a pair of dull alloy augmetic arms stepped forward. Her hair was shorn short to her head, in the style of the UC Military. One eye was completely milky blue while the other was gray like an old mans. Her face wore a smile that seemed as fake as her arms. “Clean,” she said.

Garth looked between the two with a confused look on his face.

“Can never be too safe.” Natyasha resumed walking.

“Councilor, with all due respect, what are you doing? The Ambassador knows you called in those, those
thugs!
”

Natyasha looked at Garth with a sharp glance. “Who do you work for? Core? The UC? Or Winterthur?”

Garth shook his head slowly. “Winterthur, you know that! My family was one of the founding—”

Natyasha cut him off. “No, the founding was a dozen men and women in that lander.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Garth said. “The UC is calling the shots, and the tariffs were negotiated—by you!”

Natyasha didn’t say a word as she continued closer to the piers. She watched as steam billowed from the gray towers before her. Reddish orange crust grew from each tower from the waste distillates pouring down. An industrial hum pulsed through everything. “We’re calling the shots.”.

Garth stopped abruptly. The mass of one of the escorts bumped into him and knocked him off balance. He looked behind to the man and opened his mouth to speak but closed it again.

“The tariffs need to go. We pay them, the Core Corporation doesn’t. I see a fundamental problem with that, don’t you?”

“But!”

“There’s no buts,” she hissed. “As long as Core has a stake here, it’s not our colony, it’s Cores. And as long as they keep bringing in immigrants, they stack the deck in the elections. How long ‘til the immigrants are running the show with Core’s backing?”

Garth threw his hands up. “Colonist or immigrant? Didn’t your family immigrate here?”

Natyasha spun rapidly and jammed her stark white finger into Garth’s chest. “Don’t you ever fucking say that.” She turned her eyes to Bark and stepped onto an alloy walkway leading to the yacht. “Bring him.”

“But I—”

Bark grabbed Garth by the biceps and pushed him forward. “If you would please, Alderman Garth,” she said in a voice just polite enough to not be a threat.

He looked at her with his mouth open and walked onto the yacht.

Natyasha wondered why anyone ever tolerated a democracy. It was a dance, a graceful shuffle, to get anything done. Dress well, dance perfectly, and they would love you.

She didn’t much like Garth. She knew he knew it, but still, she wasn’t ignorant of the fact that some people must be persuaded and not bought.

The yacht pulled away from the pier and powered through the light chop of the protected harbor. It sounded a booming horn as it passed each distillate tower. The chop grew as the yacht rounded the breakwall. The leading edge cast wide arcs of gray water onto the deck.

The inside of the yacht was sealed up tight from the corrosive winds. The windows shed a filmy mist of salts and brine. Inside it smelled of cinnamon and salt. It was arranged in a plain manner, barely a step above a prospecting yacht.

“Garth,” Natyasha said. She walked around the couch with one hand bracing onto the cushion. Her fingers touched Garth’s shoulder just for a second. “Things are changing.”

His face was a shade whiter than when he arrived on the boat. A wide mouthed glass jar was perched between his knees. The smell of pickles drifted out of it.

“Courier came in this morning. Looks to be a war,” she said, smiling.

“War?” Garth stifled a gag.

“Naval stations were hit around Earth.” Natyasha paused and pushed the numbers through her mind. “About three months ago. We’ve got an opportunity.”

“Natyasha, what are you doing? We’ve signed the Covenant, we’re full members, you’re jeopardizing everything our forefathers did.”

Natyasha walked around the other side of the couch and sat in a plush-armed chair. “Is that how you feel? We’re three damned months away from Earth. It took less time to cross the Roman Empire than it does to get here.”

Garth shook his head and gagged. The windows ran with sheets of gray water. Heavy sounds blasted against the hull. The yacht slid up each wave and rolled sickeningly down the other side. The whole room took on the smell of pickles and bile. “What can we do?”

“We’ve an opportunity here, fate favors the bold. We just wait for a chance,” she said simply. “Core won’t hold onto the claim if it’s losing them money.

“The protests.”

Natyasha nodded. “The protests, the riots, everything. We’ve been waiting for this for a long time.”

“What about defense? What if the war comes here?” Garth spat yellow bile into the jar.

“You just have to pick your friends.”

A roar slammed into the room. Bark walked in with seawater streaming down her jacket. The door closed and the roar stopped suddenly with only the dullest sounds of the sea behind her. She looked to Natyasha and then to Garth.

“Go ahead,” Natyasha said to Bark.

“He’s here. Shall I?”

Natyasha nodded and smiled thinly. “Bring him up.” She looked back to Garth. “Do you stand with Winterthur?”

Garth nodded. “You’ve asked me twice now.”

“And?”

“Well, yes. Of course.”

“Garth, your district will be crucial. Absolutely crucial! When Core pulls out we’ll have to rely on our own grit, our own resolve. We’ll need your fruits, vegetables, meats. The children, Garth, think of feeding our future.” Natyasha leaned forward and squeezed Garth’s hand. Her face was sincere.

“We don’t have enough food, do we?”

Natyasha wanted to snarl. Sharp, he thought. “No. Core can import it cheaper than we can grow it. Amazing, isn’t it?”

The very thought angered her. A colony, the embodiment of freedom, found it cheaper to buy food grown on Earth and send out into the stars. One more thing to keep them from being rid of Core.

Garth stifled another gag and burped beneath his free hand. “I should have stayed on shore.”

The roar resumed when the door opened. A crash of waves was followed by a roll of the yacht. A moment later a man carefully entered with both hands seeking something to hold on to. His face was shielded beneath the prospectors rain slicker. The nanite-sheathed hood kept the wind and rain out.

“Ambassador.” Natyasha stood and held out welcoming arms. “Please, sit. Do you need anything?”

The man stumbled in and gripped the edge of the window so tightly that his fingers turned white. One hand released a grip and felt for the nanite latch. Bark reached forward and snapped it down.

Garth let out a surprised sound.

“Garth, this is Ambassador Myint. From the Harmony Worlds.” Natyasha nodded to the Ambassador.

Ambassador Myint lowered the weather face-shield. Water ran down the hood onto the tip of his nose and skittered off the ran slicker. One cheek bore a metallic patch the size of a thumbprint. The same cheek patch that every Harmony Worlds citizen wore.

Natyasha looked over to Garth and watched for a reaction. Go on, she thought, let’s see how the level looks. Garth seemed to lose his composure for a moment and then captured it again. His eyes tightened and his lips pursed. She could see the fear in him.