Navarre 6 was a shithole planet with no orbiting stations and only a few military outposts. It was seen as a strategic location and several governments had a presence there. About a year ago, I was on the run and hid out in a cave near a listening station. The person working there was part of Altrusian intelligence. They were a fairly peaceful race with close ties to the main players in the galaxy. She gave me a place to lay low and in return, I provided her with much needed company.

As I got closer, I carefully avoided the various radar systems and flew close to the ground to prevent detection. I hoped she was still there because she knew nothing about Colleen and didn’t have any criminal connections. I was pretty sure she could also fabricate a clean id for Rem as intelligence and light espionage were her areas of expertise. I pulled close to the station and landed in a crater.

‘You two wait here.’ The atmosphere was breathable, but the oxygen levels were on the light side and too much walking could cause me to pass out so I carried a portable oxygen canister with me, taking a puff every 2 or 3 steps. The station was built to withstand the frequent solar flares and was mostly underground, with the entrance in a deceptively rickety shack sticking out of the surface.

I walked to the door and waved at the camera monitoring the entrance. A click let me know the locking mechanism was released and I pulled the door open, walked in and made my way down the spiral staircase, hoping she wouldn’t be too upset with me.

‘Aia!’ A familiar voice greeted me and I turned to see Shay walking towards me, snacking on Choco-no-nos™. I gave her a hug and dug my hand into the bag.

‘How’s life on Navarre 6 treating you?’

‘I’m almost done here. Hopefully being rotated back to Cerese Prime soon.’ She gave me a pouty frown. ‘You promised you would come see me.’

‘I know, I’m the worst. Things have been... crazy.’ I pulled her close and intertwined my fingers with hers. ‘I hate to do this, but I have a favor to ask.’

‘Fine.’ She looked a little annoyed and I didn’t blame her. It would get really lonely in this place. ‘What do you need?’

‘An ID for a friend. He’s in trouble and needs to relocate to Governance. He can’t use his real identity because I fucked up.’ She scoffed and I worried that she wouldn’t be able to help. ‘He didn’t do anything wrong, just some bad people are after him for his connection to me.’

‘That’s a rough one, Aia.’ She sat down at her desk and put her feet up. ‘You know they really investigate those IDs. It’s not some space station.’

‘Yeah, you’re the only one that I trust to get something like that done.’ I gave her a grin and ran my fingers lightly down her arm.

‘Ok. How long will you be here?’

‘As long as it takes.’ She raised her eyebrows. ‘My friend is actually here. Would you mind if I bring him in?’

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‘Alright.’ She sighed and kissed me. ‘But you’re sleeping with me, right?’ I could feel her hand creeping down my back and knew that coming here was the right call.

‘Of course.’ Moments later I left the bunker and went back out to the ship to get Rem.

‘Grab your shit and go over to the door, she’ll buzz you in. ’He grabbed a canister of air and made his way to the structure. I got back into the ship with Cloe.

‘I have a big favor to ask before you go.’

‘Whatever you need.’ It was so nice to be able to count on her.

‘If something happens to me, I want you to give the Oranium to Ammet.’ She nodded and disappeared. I got out of the ship and took a moment to stare at the barren landscape, enjoying my brief taste of freedom and looking forward to having this Colleen shit finished once and for all.

Rem and Shay were chatting when I got back inside. They seemed to hit it off and I felt a slight tinge of jealousy. Brushing it off, I dropped my bag on the floor loudly and joined them. He poured me a drink and we raised our glasses.

‘Cloe left?’

‘Yeah.’ Shay raised her eyebrows, but didn’t ask, which was a good thing as I didn’t want to even attempt to explain.

‘So what did you need from me?’

‘Rem here needs a new ID. Something authentic and verifiable.’ I took a drink. ‘Do you think you can do it?’

‘Sure, but if you want a real id, it will be for an Altrusian. We’ll need to alter your look a bit and I don’t think a hood will cut it. When they scan you in, they look for any sort of holo-devices.’ That was frustrating, but it’s not like the Altrusians were Nollers. A slight purplish tint here, some shading there, it should be doable.

‘You have appearance implants, right?’ I knew Rem had some bio alterations, but I wasn’t sure how invasive they were.

‘Yeah- I can change my skin tone. I thought it would be fun, but I’ve never really used it.’ His was naturally dark brown, which was the way he had kept it all these years, but a re-tint was a matter of plugging him into an interface and running a program to adjust levels of melatonin. ‘I also got, uh, facial implants, so I can make some minor structural tweaks.’

‘Ok good- we can just paint on the rest and you should be fine.’

‘I just hope I can get back to looking normal at some point.’ He looked at Shay apologetically. ‘Sorry, no offense.’

‘I get it.’ Shay was cool and got to work digging out the identity of a recently deceased Altrusian who was around Rem’s age. She erased the death certificate and created a chip to replace the one in Rem’s wrist. ‘We’ll just need to get a picture of you, so let’s start making some changes.’ She pulled up the dead man’s image and they connected Rem’s implants to her terminal.

While they were getting that sorted, I checked Colleen’s messages to see if there had been any update about the earlier events.

‘C- I just heard about what happened. I had told them not to fuck with that guy, but they didn’t listen. Problem taken care of. Need guidance on another matter urgently- call me when you can.’

It was a message from Bron, Colleen’s right hand man.

‘Call you later- in the middle of something important. Will fill you in.’

I would need to get somewhere to contact him, but I wanted to take care of Rem first. Nothing from Ammet, but I hadn’t expected it. I made my way back to the others and was shocked to find two Altrusians.

‘Wow! You look good.’ I missed his original color, but it had to be done. His hair and facial features had also been altered to blend in. ‘You’ve got your translator, right?’

‘Yeah- it’s almost undetectable. Not like that piece of shit you use.’ He had always tried to get me to upgrade, but I preferred not having it in at all and would forget if it was too comfortable.

‘It keeps me grounded.’ I turned to Shay. ‘Thank you so much for doing this.’

‘It was actually fun, more interesting than the usual transmission monitoring around here anyway.’ She made us dinner and we sat around for a while catching up. After powering down her equipment, she grabbed my hand and pulled towards her room. Rem took the hint and parked himself on a palette in the middle of her work station.