Finnras Marek Delain is the captain of the Binturong, an independent privateer/scout operating on the ragged border of space that lies between the human Concordance and the Remnants; alien-inhabited planets that were once part of a vast galactic empire – now entirely wiped out.
Deirdre brings the ship in to dock. How I got myself talked into letting a little girl pilot my ship, I’ll probably never know.
The Drift is the same; millennia-deep piles of ships welded into a moon-sized Tortuga of traders, thieves, and beggars. We are neither, which makes this next part tricky.
Deirdre opens hailing frequencies to request permission to dock; almost cute, if it didn’t mean getting boarded, killed and set adrift.
I grab the mike and complete the call, mentioning a different – very distant – airlock. D doesn’t frown – she’s a blank-stare type. Eerie.
Our comms-mod makes little Deirdre sound like a chain-smoking ore miner – unlikely anyone recognized my voice on the call. I hope.
Jon steps onto the bridge, scratching his jaw in the way that says he heard me on comms. I share our ETA. He doesn’t mention Burns. Fine.
The dock-shadow falls across our deck. Jon asks if we’re taking Yoren. Fair question, but no; even hostile, the Drift doesn’t deserve that.
We disembark and pick out a guide. I’ve been here many times, but not this decade – a half-klick of ‘new’ layers to reach corridors I know.
Our guide: a six-limbed, optionally bipedal, gray-furred marsupial. The asymmetrical rows of nipples and squirming carry-pouch? Distracting.
Our guide’s name is Bilabil… give or take. His fur ripples when I ask questions. Yes, this area is stable; almost no one shot today. Hmm.
Surprise: we aren’t shot or robbed on our way to Manifold Bazaar. The towering, giant plants of the place still impress; the babble still deafens.
The ‘bazaar’ is dozens of hanger bays cemented together, leading in all directions. In the feather-light gravity, every angle is an option.
We arrive at a stack of shipping-containers-turned-building, covered in multicolored human handprints; “Five Finger Freight.” My comm beeps.
It’s Deirdre; says she’s tried to reach Mak a half-dozen times, but got no reply. Odd, since I’m watching him walk down the ramp toward us.
Mak’s expression says “… the HELL are you doing here?” while his mouth says “Come on inside!” Taken together, that’s less than reassuring.
Connected like stacking blocks, the cargo containers create a nest of junk-filled ‘rooms’. The junk hides actual valuables… in theory.
We take seats in the “office” container. I take a crate; Jon, a futon; Mak, the pilot’s chair with pistol holstered on the side. Hmm.
Mak doesn’t waste time asking if I’d forgotten that Burns wants me in tiny pieces. He asks why I’m here, and I say Kaetlyn’s name.
She was here. I let out my breath. Mak says she had a freelance scouting job. Normal type of deal; client was Church of Isabel. Wait, what?
The Church of Isabel is supremely anti-expansion, anti-exploration, anti-anything about returning to space. They do NOT hire remnant-scouts.
I ask what kind of supplies she’d needed – a hint of her destination – but he shakes his head. She didn’t get supplies; she hired a guide.
Why would a planetary scout hire a guide? Apparently, when she’s going *inside* a world; Mak says she wanted to go to the Drift’s core.
The Drift is a millenia-old accretion of ships; an archeologist’s dream. At its core? Relics from before we first lost our right to space.
Kaetlyn found something in the guts of a federation-era jumpship and heads off into the Remnants. I ask Mak for the guide’s name. Jon sighs.
Kaetlyn found something in the guts of a federation-era jumpship and heads off into the Remnants. I ask Mak for the guide’s name. Jon sighs.
Mak can’t get me in touch with Kaetlyn’s guide. It’s not secrecy or client priviledge, just impossible; he died on the trip back topside.
The core is dangerous; got it. Maybe another g– My comm beeps. A red light on Mak’s desk starts flashing. Outside, klaxons wail. Wonderful.
I pull out my comm while Mak flips monitors on and fingers his chair-pistol. Deirdre says ships are landing. Everywhere. Raiders.
[[Story posts for February are complete. Read all 28 posts of the-story-thus-far in proper order here: http://tinyurl.com/finnras-feb ]]