Devil May Care Ch. 03

[Stop reading corporate gobbledygook and tell me where our candidate is living on the place.]

I'll do you one better, Loki said, sounding proud of himself. I found his Facebook.

There are no telepaths. Some alien races came close -- the Sor'Kith claimed they could extrapolate emotional states via a long distance kind of electromagnetic senses, but no one bought the idea that they could read minds. But humanity had sidestepped the problem. It turned out, you needed only twenty five posts on social media to begin building a statistical model for what you would be like. Most people, from Paul DeVilbiss onwards, were more than eager to give the average government spook a lot more than twenty five posts.

It took Loki a few minutes to read everything that Marin Snook had written up on Facebook, Twitter and Twitch and turn it into a digestible set of intelligence briefings. Dey perused them as she walked into the STS shuttle that she had booked, strapped in, and waited for launch. As the ground of Charon started to receded underneath her, she finished the file.

She pursed her lips.

Total asshole?

[Total asshole,] Dey thought.

The shuttle darted into orbit -- turning slowly on its axis to give the fifty odd people on-board the best view through their windows at Charon. Proxima Centauri vanished over the horizon, giving the curve of the planet a ruby glow. Then they reached Persephone II. The station looked like a skyscraper that had been lifted into space and set in the center of a trio of concentric rings. The rings provided a pseudo-magnetosphere, buffeting away the solar radiation that might have threatened the occupants, while the actual station itself got gravity from deck after deck of DV emitters.

They could have spun it, but DV emitters were cheap and building a skyscraper under gravity, then chucking it into space was easier than making a Hamilton cylinder.

The shuttle was kept in a holding pattern for a half hour before it docked with the station. Dey walked through security without so much as a bead of sweat -- Loki redirected scans and fed the computer systems passwords that the DHS used to get by this kind of scan. Even if he hadn't, she was pretty sure that her augments were concealed enough to fool scanners. That made her frown. [Enough to hide from scanners, but not enough to avoid some loonie rightwing nutjobs?]

I know, Loki said. That's what's making me nervous too.

The main lobby of Persephone II was decorated in a gorgeous, art deco style. Large golden statues held up the central ceiling, facing outwards, their features just non-defined enough to be no particular race. Several shops and restaurants were set into the walls and most of the people off the shuttle were being met by people and lead off. The back of the lobby led to a series of grav-shafts that dropped people or lifted them up, depending on where they were going. The whole place felt like standing in the middle of an office complex -- it had that faintly to clean air. No one was here who didn't wear a button up shirt and everyone who had them were hiding their tattoos.

Dey took a grav shaft to the habitation deck. There, she walked through a series of corridors that felt like a Hilton -- carpeting, no direct overhead lightning, wait droids pushing carts full of toiletries along the center of the corridors, and the rec rooms she passed were all annoyingly fit and preppy, with loads of workout machines and indoor pools.

[And here we are,] she thought as she came to one of the junctions between habitation blocks that served as a communal area. There was a huge, broad window that looked out at the night side of Charon -- bisected by a single, curving magnetosphere projector -- and a few dozen tables set out near an open air cafe. There were half a dozen holotables that could be reconfigured to any setting proper, though two of them had been claimed by a half a dozen teenagers playing Magic: The Gathering.

Dey paused, looking over the shoulder of one of them. She smirked, then tapped one of the cards that the youth was thinking of playing.

"I wouldn't spike now, kid," she said.

The youth looked up at her -- then opened his mouth in adolescent shock. Dey grinned at him.

Down, cougar.

[I'm twenty five, I can't be a cougar.]

It's about mental age, sometimes.

Dey shook her head and looked towards the cafe. She saw Marin Snook. He was, at the very least, handsome. She could give him that. And she did appreciate that, among the well dressed, shaved and orderly looking corporate citizens of Persephone II, he looked like he did something with his hands. He was dark black, with pale white hair -- dyed, not natural -- that had had shaved down to a frizzy set of cornrows. He had dyed his left hand pale white and wore a scruffy leather jacket that might as well have said 'born spacer' on it. He was lounging back in a seat and talking to a demon.

Dey froze.

[Okay,] she thought. [Loki, diagnostics, you see that too, right?]

The demon looked vaguely humanoid. It had two arms, a vaguely leg-like shape beneath it, two eyes, and a wide mouth. There, all similarity with humanity ended -- and honestly, Dey would have preferred if it had been more different, like a Squiddy. Seeing echos of a man within that mass of inky blackness just made her shudder. Whatever passed for the creature's skin rippled like water, though the indications of movement were more suggestions than overt changes in tone or position. It was to dark, to black, to really show much of anything. Its head was slightly to wide, to swept back, and it had a pair of black horns that emerged from the top of its forehead. Its mouth wasn't so much a mouth -- in the same way its eyes weren't exactly eyes.

Rather, those facial features were pale white glows that were visible more by the absence of blackness than by any intrinsic features.

I do, Loki said. I think it's a Mumbler.

[No fucking way,] Dey said, walking over to the table. [They live behind a goddamn black hole -- you don't walk out of a black hole for a coffee in the local Starbucks.]

Except that, apparently, they do.

"Marin?" Dey asked.

Marin looked at her, his brow furrowing.

"Marin, don't you recognize me?" Dey asked, grinning. "It's Gidget!"

"Gidge?" Marin looked uncertain. Gidget Walts had been plucked from his friends list. She had a similar mixture of races as Dey, and the last IRL meeting between her and Marin had been far enough back that he wouldn't quite be sure if he had seen her before. Dey sat down, shaking her head slightly.

"Trust you to forget me," Dey said, frowning. "And after I posted you that birthday wish last week. How are you doing, space-dog?"

Marin laughed. "Gige!" he shook his head. "You look, uh..." he paused. "Good."

"I have been working out," Dey said.

Gidget brags a bit on FB. Feel free to show off dem guns, Dey.

Dey lifted her arm and did just that. From the way Marin licked his lips, he did appreciate the guns. Dey, personally, felt like she could chalk the extra few hours working out at 1.5Gs as something definitely worth the effort.

"And, ah, whose this?" she asked, nodding to the demon.

The demon smiled. "You can call me Mordin Lightbringer..." he said, his voice sibilant and seductive.

Oh dear.

[Loki?]

He might as well have said call me fucking Count Dracula von Doom, Loki whispered. Stay frosty, Dey.

[Don't trust the obviously evil alien? You don't say...] Dey nodded to the alien.

"Gidge is a friend from SOL," Marin said. "She runs an exoship like I do."

"Ah, so, you place your forms inside of small boxes of metal and use radioactive decay in steam boilers to shunt energy into unstable systems that warp space/time to allow you to go screaming through space many times faster than the speed of light..." Mordin Lightbringer leaned forward, his glowing white eyes narrowing. "And you do this so that you can earn script? To afford food? Yes?"

"We call them big fat American red blooded dolla dolla bills," Dey said, trying to stay as cool as a cucumber in hard vacuum.

Mordin laughed. "She does not scare easily, Marin. I like this."

"You heard of the Perseus Mumblers?" Marin asked. "This guy is one of their, ah, servants."

"You're not a Mumbler yourself?" Dey asked. "I thought, well, I mean, I guess they say that they never leave their home. But..."

"My, ah, masters," Mordin said, waving one hand. Dey noticed that rather than legs, he seemed to simply dissolve into a vague shadow below the impression of his belly. Within that shadow, she thought she was the occasional slippery tentacle. Her mind flashed back to the fungal pits as she tried to not shudder. "They can only exist in a place where physics as you understand it...break down." He smiled a Cheshire cat smile. "And so, when they need to explore the universe beyond, they craft beings like me."

"What are you made out of?" Dey asked, playing up how much she was gawking at him.

"You might understand it easiest as dark matter," Mordin said. "Such comparisons are not entirely accurate, but it is enough for the level of understanding your species has of this universe."

"Huh," Dey said.

"Well, Lightbringer, you can head back to your room," Marin said, nodding to the alien. "We're not going to steal much of your time."

"I would head back to my chambers, save that it seems that our, ah, shadow has returned," Mordin said. One of the tentacles that writhed inside of his shadowy trunk flicked out, pointing for a single moment towards the edge of the room. Dey turned her head back around. She frowned as she saw that another alien was standing in the entrance to the rec area. The alien looked female -- as far as that went, considering she was contained in a form fitting environmental suit. Dozens of blade-like protrusions stuck from the arms, shoulders, back, head, thighs, and even feet, sweeping backwards and shimmered with tiny ripples that made Dey think of DV emitters. The faceplate of the alien was a smooth, circular display case that simply showed an emoticon making a neutral :| face.

"A Huntress," Marin muttered. "Gidge, I suggest you leave. Now."

"Fuck that," Dey said. "What the fuck have you gotten your ass into?"

"Uh, fate of the galaxy, all that," Marin said. Dey mouthed the words in response -- feeling as if the situation was skidding away from the original AO.

That was when station security showed up. Everyone in the area started to make for the exits -- the young adults and the adults hurrying as quickly as possible. It was almost like they had all gotten a subtle alert on their handhelds -- not unlikely, considering this was corporate territory. Corporate preferred to keep collateral damage down, it meant less healthcare insurance issues.

Less witnesses.

The security officers wore light battle armor and carried civilian variations on the M2 pistol that the USAF used. Unfortunately, being civilian variations didn't mean they weren't able to put real nasty holes through people. Dey was about to open her mouth when Marin flipped the table she was at down and dove behind it. She flung herself down -- hitting the ground beside him as half a dozen M2s went off. The beams they put out could either carry enough energy to flash fry a pint of blood, if they had been on lethal. On non-lethal, the lasers just ionized the air, and allowed for a serious electro-static shock to be discharged into human flesh.

Kinda like a taser, sans the wires.

One of the lighting fixtures next to the window shattered and the air was filled with sharp, Tesla Coil crackles as the ES charges dispersed through the air.

Dey pulled her stealthed pistol at the same time Marin tugged out a kludged together mess of components that snapped themselves into a pistol. He looked at her. She looked at him.

Then together, they looked up at the Mumbler's messenger. Mordin Lightbringer had dissolved into nothingness.

"Fucking dickhead just always leaves me holding the bag," Marin muttered.

"Come out with your hands up!" The head station cop shouted.

"Uh, how about not?" Marin shouted back, then rolled to the side. Laying on his belly, he fired off two shots. His gun was definitely not a beam weapon -- the bullets hit the wall above the cops heads and caused them to go sprinting for cover. Dey grabbed Marin, shaking him.

"The fuck are you doing!?"

"They're rubber bullet, Gidge!" He snapped. "And I'm not going into corporate prison. Remember? Fate of the universe?"

"Fuuuuck," Dey said, closing her eyes. She peeked around the corner. [Loki, options?]

She jerked her head back as a beam of focused infrared burned a hole through the edge of the table, leaving a scorch mark on the floor next to her thigh.

Well, an order went out across the station to take you two alive and throw you into a very dark hole, Loki said. It doesn't make any sense -- we're missing some pieces.

[Ya thank!?] Dey jerked her head to the side as another piece of table was hit -- but this time, the beam didn't blow through. She shook her head as Marin looked at the ceiling. [Get us a way out of here. I want this asshole to tell me what's going on -- there's no way we're giving him to corporate.]

Finding a way out, Loki said. Then he highlighted an access panel, hidden behind some shrubs. Cracking the automated seals was the work of a few moments. The shrubs receded into the ground, revealing a maintenance crawlspace. Dey looked at Marin.

"Marin!" she said. "There. I'll cover you."

Marin, seeing the crawlspace, nodded. He tensed.

Dey popped up. A beam seared past her cheek, redirected at the last second by her integrated DV rig. She sighted and hit one of the cops in the face. Her gun wasn't a civilian knockoff -- it was the real deal, a composite variant on the M2-E13. Not that it mattered in this case. The electro-static charge was on par. The cop hit the ground and started twitching. She fired off a few more shots, hitting areas that would react explosively when tasered. A lightning fixture exploded. A holotable started over-emitting, filling the air with hazy shapes.

He's in! Loki said.

[Cut the lights!] Dey shouted.

The room plunged into darkness, save for the crackle and pop of damaged lights, and then Dey sprang to her feet, sprinted for the crawlspace, and flung herself forward. She almost crammed her face into Marin's ass -- but the pressure of her head against his butt got the space dog crawling forward. The two of them hurried into the vents.

Already scrambling their hunt. Now, take a right.

"Right!" Dey hissed. "Then a drop -- we'll get to the shuttle bay. Tell me you didn't park your ship in the CEO berth."

"Who the fuck are you?" Marin asked -- his voice tight as he crawled forward. Before Dey could respond, he yelped as his arms found the drop that she had mentioned. He scrambled for a bit, then swung himself around, cramming in the small space. With her growing night vision, Dey could see his panicked expression.

"Call me Jane Bond," she said. "Now start climbing."

###

The two of them slipped into the shuttle bay without triggering any alarms. Dey remained crouched behind several large tanks of hydrogen fuel, peeking around the corner. A half dozen corporate security officers and a heavy drone -- essentially two ducted fans, a DV engine to make it light enough to float in the air, and a set of rather nasty looking weapons mounted on a turret -- were waiting, doing regular sweeps. She figured she had about a minute before they came to the hiding spot she and Marin had chosen.

"Well, great, what now, Bond?" Marin whispered.

"Well," she said. "Is that your ship?"

She jerked her chin towards a cruddy looking Ford that had been parked in the farthest berth. It was a Stellaris-2080, easily forty years past the cutting edge. But where it lacked in flash, it made up for with reliability, armoring, cargo containers and slightly illegal weapon pods that she saw mounted on the dorsal ridge of the ship. It would be roomy for one, comfy for two, a crowd for three, and hellish for four people.

"That's her -- the Freedom's Ring," Marin said. "And that's a pair of corporate locks on the chassis. She's not flying till they pop."

[Loki?] Dey asked.

I have the computerized overrides, but they have physical safeties. You need to literally cut the wires or flip a switch on the bridge. There's no way to override it from where I am.

"All right," Dey whispered. "When I say, you're going to run for the Ring. You'll get on board and get ready to take her out of the front doors."

"And what are you going to be doing?"

Dey grinned. "Thrilling heroics. Now...go."

Marin -- clearly not seeing any better option -- stood and started sprinting. Corporate goons shouted out in alarm. Dey sprang from cover and ran towards the goons. She let her legs drop from under her and skidded along the floor. She slapped the palm behind them and sent a surge through her rig. An AG Field sent the goons flying up into the air about three feet before cutting out. This flipped them over and sent them crashing into the ground. Dey aimed her left hand up. Her implanted grapnel fired and her mass went to zero as she retracted the grapnel. She shot up into the air just before a pair of heavy static blasts from the drone hit where she had been.

She pressed to the ceiling, switching her gun to laser. She fired at the drone -- but it's shields refracted the light from a weak point to some ablative armor. A hiss of steam and armor-powder filled the air. Dey felt the strain of her DV emitters working to make a gravity field that kept her to the ceiling as the DV emitters in the station tried to send her to the ground. She ran along the ceiling.

Target lock, scrambling it.

A missile flew past her head and hit the wall. Dey closed her eyes -- but there was nothing that could be done for the crack of sound that smashed into her like a wall. She staggered and opened her eyes, still seeing smears of color from the flashbanger. Loki painted HUD images over the after-glow, showing her exactly where to sprint for.

Dey got to the override, using the heavy machinery at the ceiling as cover as the drone started to lift into the air to get a better line of sight on her.

Dey used her laser pistol on the override -- the beam slicing through plastic and cabling with the same ease.

The drone came closer.

Dey cut her AG field.

She started to fall.

Dey aimed her hand up.

Her grapnel went through one of the fans. The drone jerked and smoke poured from the suddenly jammed machine. The drone slewed to the side, skidding in the air, unable to aim directly down. Its turret spun in circles and Dey felt her arm strain. She gritted her teeth and saw that the drone's course had brought her over the Ring, which had wrenched free of the restraints. It hovered in the center of the shuttle bay. The doors leading out were starting to close.

[Cut it!]

Her augmentations sliced the cable.

She dropped. Landed on the roof of the Ring. Rolled. She felt the ship started to move forward. She grabbed onto as hard as she could, her implants working to glue her to the ship. It turned to the side, metal squealing on metal as it barely cleared the closed door. She knew, from the layout of the station, she had roughly five seconds before they emerged into space. She wondered if Marin knew -- or cared.