Ad Astra Noctis Part 1

Bering

Zephyrantes 1337, Anno Astra 1002/5/3 0310

Glenn stretched, finally free of starport customs with his luggage claimed.  He'd been told that interstellar travel was like the trams and trains back home on Cluster 1; an interminable wait but that it goes by quickly.  Since his new employers had paid for his passage, he'd taken the stellar gate from Cluster 1 to Finster, shaving months off his travel time.  Skipping across 114 light years and most of the sector in an instant was miraculous to him.  But the journey from there had been a month-long affair from Finster to Vivian to Bering.  The novelty of red-shifted and blue-shifted stars out the windows had vanished after the first week out towards Vivian; he'd pulled the window blind down after.

Not that the landscape of Bering was much to look at either.  He remembered pieces of the briefing the chief steward had given on landing approach.  Bering was a rock only several orders of magnitude in size above being a dwarf planet.  No atmosphere.  No liquid water.  He supposed the main business of in-system traders was hauling ice in from the Oort cloud.  It was a stable commodity, he mused, low risk and low reward but a steady paycheck for freelance brokers like he had been.

His stomach reminded him he was hungry and that the starport probably had food that wasn't freeze-dried.  Glenn smiled as he realized that it was likely real food that didn't cost a kidney, and his step quickened as he followed the directions given on his phone.  He marveled at the strange architecture as he walked, so unlike the arcology clusters of his homeworld.  They were modular with an industrial look, the most alien element to his eyes being the uniformity of the design that Cluster 1's arcologies lacked.

As he stepped into the shopping concourse, he was struck by how few people there really were.  Only a month ago he had been living with trillions of others on Cluster 1 and Finster had orders of magnitude even more people than that.  Vivian's and Bering's starports were ghost towns by comparison.  The emptiness also might have been due to the fact that it was shortly after 3am local time.

He found himself moving towards a delicious savory smell, enjoying the fact that he didn't have to bump shoulders with anybody.  He was startled as a disc-shaped robot the size of his luggage case politely asked him to step aside so it could continue cleaning.  This would be the third time he'd been to the Dion's House chain of diners.  They seemed to be at every starport he had visited so far.  A pleasant-sounding femme-styled robot waiter that greeted him at the entrance.

"Hi hon!  My name is Suzy and I'll be your waitbot this morning.  Would you like a booth, table, or seat at the counter?"

"Thank goodness starports never sleep." Glenn said to himself as he took a seat in a booth and glanced over the menu in the table.  It looked like the diner was staffed entirely with automata and he could hear the quiet noise of the autochef.  He ordered a steak with a salad, which was an unheard luxury for him.  He didn't care that the steak had been made in a vat; even vat meat was exorbitantly expensive back home and all but the most affluent had to settle for plant-based proteins.  He settled back in the cozy booth seat and looked around.  There was a couple with a child in front of him, a few people at the counter.  Definitely a late night/early morning sort of crowd.

As he started eating his food, he caught something sail in through the open patio area out of the corner of his eye.  He barely registered that it was a canister before it exploded into a cloud of thick noxious smoke. He couldn't help but cough hard and spots swam before his vision.  He thought he saw the man who'd been sitting in the booth in front of him punching somebody, but the smokey fog and his fading vision obscured details.  Glenn's vision blurred as he passed out into his hardly touched food.

 *    *     *

Glenn woke up with crusty eyes that he couldn't wipe clean, his head pounding ferociously.  His hands were bound behind him and he was hung from a cross-beam in the ceiling by his legs.  It was cold and he could see his breath emerge as mist.  He heard the mother from the diner consoling the child.

"It'll be alright, Riley. Mommy and Daddy will get us home safe.  It might take a bit is all."

Glenn tried to get a better view of things. Like so many things since he'd left Cluster 1, this was something well out of his experiences.  He was fairly certain he was in cold storage for food.  Large things that reminded him of protein icons from food dispensers in the Down Below were hanging from the cross-beams.  He was surprised to see the father from the diner hung upside-down like him in a constricting jacket, with a mouth restraint affixed across his face.  The blonde woman was upside-down too, but less restrained than the big man was.  Twisting around uncomfortably, Glenn saw the kid tied to a chair, wrapped in a shiny foil emergency blanket.

"At least whoever did this isn't some child-hating monster." Glenn said, mostly to himself.

"No shit." The woman growled quietly.  Then, towards the man next to him, she said. "You awake yet,  Robinson?"

There wasn't a verbal answer that he could hear, but Glenn chalked that up to the restraint.  There was some quiet rustling of the straight-jacket though.

"Are you going to bust out of that jacket or what?" Her voice was on the hoarse side now that he thought about it.  Glenn heard more rustling, then there was a pop that made him wince for how painful it sounded.

Glenn was shocked. "Did. Did he just dislocate his shoulder?"

"Probably."  It was the equivalent of an audible shrug from the blonde.

The proceedings were interrupted by the door opening, three men in armor with short weapons that looked like cut-down rifles to Glenn.  One had a fresh bandage over his nose and was definitely pointing the short rifle at Robinson.  Glenn had seen the sort before in the expensive academy he'd gone to back on Cluster 1.  Hired muscle for some rich jackass.  He'd learned the fine art of negotiating not in debate team but by avoiding beatings for coming from Down Below.  Then the aforementioned rich jackass stepped into the walk-in freezer.

Glenn was surprised, another one in a day proving to be full of them. In front of him was Richard Khourry

Meticulously trimmed iron-white hair stood stark against the caramel brown of aging skin.  Khourry's suit was impeccably tailored and awash in a sandy cream color, the interior visible from the cuffs and colors having a slight gold pattern that had a faint sheen in the harsh light of the freezer.  The black tie was almost hidden against the neck of the black shirt but for its faint diagonal gold lines. Khourry & Khourry was one of the biggest brokerage and trading firms in the Zephyrantes sector, run by the famously ultra-wealthy Richard Khourry.  Glenn had seen the man's face countless times on newscasts talking about the sector's economics.

Khourry smiled. "I missed you at the last family reunion, Helios.  You and your... son?" He gestured at the boy in the emergency blanket.  Then at the restrained Robinson. "The boy's father I presume?"

"Look uncle, if you want to pretend to be civil, untie me." 

Richard smiled thinly. "I think not. I remember all the family stories about how you'd beat cousins twice your size when they tried to pick on you."  Glenn must have looked like he was about to say something to Helios, because Richard gave him a look.

"Mr. Willows, we meet after all this time.  Did you think I wouldn't notice the private reports you stole from my offices on Cluster 1?  Salvador was very upset when he figured it all out.  I fired him of course.  He's redeemed himself by luring you all the way here to Bering with your new job."

Before Glenn could respond, Helios interjected. "Wow uncle, that's a lot of work just to screw a clever kid over."

Glenn was flustered. "I'm not a kid."

She ignored him, continuing. "So where's this going, uncle?  Traumatizing my son?  Paying for a lifetime of therapy?"

"Something like that." Richard gestured noncommittally, approaching the boy in the foil blanket. "What's your name, boy?"

There was a mumbly reply.

"Speak up, I didn't hear you."

Clearly and loudly. "None of your business."

Instead of retaliating physically or even verbally as Glenn expected from somebody as powerful as Khourry, the old man chuckled. "I see he has your spirit, Helios.  It'll serve him well as my heir." He gestured and one of the goons picked up the chair, blanketed child and all, and carted the bundle out of the frozen locker room.

Helios screamed obscenities and spat inventive curses as they hauled her son away from her.  At one point it looked as though she was going to burst out of her bindings and rip Khourry and the hired guns limb from limb.  Glenn was certain she wanted to.  After the solid thump of the door closing, there was Helios' quiet sobbing and rustling from Robinson's direction.  Glenn took a deep breath and resigned himself to freezing to death.

The rustling stopped as the sound of ripping cloth broke the cold stillness. Glenn glanced over towards Robinson just in time to see the solidly built man throwing the face restraint off.

Robinson wiped the saliva and drool off his face onto the straitjacket sleeve. "It'll be fine, Helios." He was curled up practically in double, working at the knot that held up his legs. "Your uncle clearly doesn't know my service record."  The big man was down and shrugging his way almost bonelessly out of the jacket.  He pushed some controls and the meat hooks that were holding Glenn and Helios winched down, depositing them both on the floor.

As Robinson untied Helios, he talked to Glenn. "Look, you're on Richard Khourry's shit list too. If you come with us, we know a guy who'll help all of us.  A... business rival of Khourry's, if you will."

"Who are you people?!" Glenn felt exasperated as the couple helped him get out of the ropes.  Something caught his eye. "And is that somebody's nose?!"

With a matter-of-fact air, Robinson said "Bit a guard's nose when I came to so they'd put me in something easier to get out of.  Master Chief Ari Robinson, Union Department of Special Circumstances."

"And I'm Senior Pilot Helios Robinson, Union Courier Service." The tawny-skinned woman stuck out her hand.  Glenn grabbed it to shake it out of habit, but was pulled to his feet instead.  They both looked expectantly at him.  He shook off his dumbfounded expression.

"Glenn Willows, independent commodities broker from Cluster 1." He paused, rubbing feeling back into his wrists. "Pardon my language but how the fuck did a Union commando and delivery girl get on the bad side of Richard fucking Khourry?"

Helios scoffed. "One, he's a relative. My maiden name is Khourry." Robinson was talking her through how to put his shoulder back into its socket. There was a sound that made Glenn wince and the big man's eyes watered as he quietly cursed.

"Two, I told him to piss off when he asked me to transport illegal shit under the table.  Seriously wasn't worth my pilot's license if anyone found out." She was glancing around the freezer for something that wasn't obvious to Glenn.

"Three, that commando is my husband. Four, I'm a pilot, not a courier." She breathed warm air into her cold hands. "Does that answer your question, kid?"

Glenn was flustered at her deliberate provocation. "I'm not-. Okay I deserved that one.  For the delivery girl crack."  He glanced around. "How're we getting out of here?"

Ari took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, releasing a cloud of mist. "Not through brute force.  I need a medkit for my shoulder.  So that means." He nodded towards his wife.

Helios was shoving crates of food, stacking them. "The vents."

It was Glenn's turn to scoff. "Can't you see how out of shape I am? I swore I'd never do another chin-up as long as I lived after surviving PE classes.  Plus your hubby's shoulder is definitely not gonna let him spider-climb his way through a vent."  

 

The woman ripped the flimsy plastic cover to a meal in a metal pan. "You've never worked maintenance. And it shows." She had clambered up to the vent and was using the corner of the pan to undo the screws. "I go through the vent, get out, open the door."

Glenn said the obvious. "And the guards?"  

 

She shrugged. "I'll figure that out if it comes to that."  With that she limberly climbed into the vent and disappeared.