Mina
pressed the pads of her fingers into the side of the controller, guiding the
vessel ever-so-slightly to the left. As she pulled back on the throttle and
extended the landing legs, she smashed the well-worn button labeled “Lazy-Ass
Communicator” and barked into the mic. Crackling over the speakers, echoing
through the steel halls of The Pigeon her voice resounded: “Arrival
time! Get up and meet me in the cargo hold – we have 3 hours before we’re due
at Herald’s place!”.
A familiar muttering and the sound of movement
in a hammock echoed back down the halls to the bridge from the engine room,
where a large, burly man slept. As she looked over her shoulder, Mina caught a
glimpse of Gerimiah rubbing his eyes, maneuvering roughly through the
corridors, muttering something about coffee. She smiled as she turned back to
the command console, precisely flipped a few switches, and set the craft down
softly on the landing pad.
Mina messaged her legs as she stood
up, arched her back, and did a few torso-rotations. It had been a long flight
from Yerbock. The jump into Lupine set them about 100,000 kilometers off-world,
which meant a long in-system propulsion to reach the starport. “I’m better than
that, I hope Gerimiah isn’t too ticked. He knows I’m usually right on the
money…” she thought as she grabbed her spiral notebook off the desk and strode quickly
to the cargo bay. Here on Lupine, 30 tons of crystaliron and 20 tons of
salvaged drone components will pay a pretty penny. Lupine was a hub for
shipwrights and machinists, just far enough away from the Central Systems so
that they have easy access to the products, but don’t have to feel like they
live in an industrial sector. “Ya know if every noble from a viscount on up has
their own artificial atmosphere around their estates, why do they care about
some vaporized metal emissions in the other hemisphere?” Mina said
absentmindedly as she entered the hold.
“Caring about useless shit is their
job. If they stopped that, us common folk might finally have time to realize
how useless they are,” Gerimiah responded in an even deeper tone than normal,
as he poured coffee into two cups.
“Well until then we have to make
ourselves useful.” Mina retorted as she accepted a cup from Gerimiah. “Alright
I’ll go talk to the port officers, the cargo should good to go. If the brokers
come around, make sure that they don’t try to short us. Everything we have
should qualify as StarLux-standard…apart from, well, you know.”
“Aye-aye captain!” Gerimiah shouted in
a much-too-chipper-for-this-hour tone, and cracked a wide grin, exposing
several gold teeth, as Mina whipped around with a glare.
“Call me that once more and you’ll
be out on the street finding someone else to use that title on” Mina spit back.
She kept her scowl as long as she could before it shattered into a grin to
match Gerimiah. “Get to work! Lots to unload!” she smile-shouted as she ducked
under the rising bay door, and made her way out into the madness of a Class A
starport. As she strode under hulls of merchant vessels to the port office, she
went over the plan again in her mind. There should be a man working at the port
office named Kell. She would pay the port officer the docking fee, and register
The Pigeon. She would then declare her 50 tons of cargo, along with her
intention to offload it here on Lupine. She would ask him if they could rent a
mag-cart for the day; they were planning on picking up some supplies on-world
before they departed. She would ask Kell where the best outfitter in Lupine
City is located. He would list a few options, then she would ask if Herald was
receiving guests. Kell would respond: “Yes, Herald is receiving guests. He
could certainly outfit you with what you need.” He would then process the
rental of the mag-cart with a cloaked compartment, and Mina would be on her
way.
As she approached the port office,
passing Imperial Guards wielding laser carbines, she performed the breathing
exercises her brother had taught her when they were children. His voiced echoed
in her head, “one…two…three, and out slowly, one…two…three. This will stop your
heart from racing, and keep you from sweating. They have tech that can read you
heart rate from 100 meters away. If it goes up while you’re lying, then that’s
it, they’ve got you.”
Mina wondered what he would think of
who she had become. Would he be angry or disappointed at the lengths she had
gone to, just for him? Just for the possibility of a whisper of his presence?
It had been 8 years since his Scout ship had been lost in the Paragon Nebula.
No salvage had ever been found, of course, and the Paragon’s dark roiling
clouds still twist and contort, silently, obscuring whatever occurred within.
During the first few months of his disappearance, she would sit on a mountain
on Excelion for days at a time and watch the amorphous mass through her scope.
But nothing ever appeared, nothing in her sight ever changed except for the
masticating clouds in their wordless play.
Everyone she confided in had told
her she was mad, and some even begged her to call off her plans. The Paragon
was a death trap, everyone in the galaxy but her foolish brother seemed to
understand that. But their pleas fell on ears deafened by grief. Deep and
profound grief for the only soul in the galaxy that had ever loved her and
cared for her. Grief that maybe, just maybe could be lifted if she could find
him. She knew her brother had gone into the Paragon for a reason, and it wasn’t
just to die. It would take another 5 years of this life to save up enough for a
down payment on a Forerunner-Class Scout Ship. Herald was just another rung in
the long ladder – a rung that paid well for refined uranium…
Mina stepped up to the clerk’s
window, and looked down at the man who smiled up at her. “Hello, I’m Port
Officer Kell, how can I be of service to you?”
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