Herdis gave the pirate another injection, then stepped back. It only took a few seconds for him to start stirring, though there was little to no awareness in the initial mumbles.

“Thank you,” he said. “Now give us some privacy.”

The woman nodded and walked off. Gaylen kept his focus on the pirate, but heard one of the cargo bay doors open and close behind him. She would be watching on a screen, along with the others.

The pirate stirred further, forced into wakefulness by the stimulant. He groaned and grunted and tried to move, and it took him a few moments to realise that he couldn’t.

Gaylen touched the spot where the plasma had hit his chest. Herdis had given him a skin patch, but it was still sore.

The pirate looked at his limbs, and realised that they were bound to a chair with tape. They’d stripped him of his armour and checked him thoroughly for hidden surprises, finding two.

“Good morning,” Gaylen said in Otuka as the man focused on him.

“You’re a d-dead man,” he replied through raspy vocal cords, a heavy accent, and chemically-induced twitchiness.

“No. That would be your buddies,” Gaylen said. “Oh, and your ship is gone too. I know about the Pirate’s Farewell.”

“There are other ships!” the pirate growled and tried to yank his arm free. “And other buddies! I’m going to kill you.”

“Absolutely,” Gaylen said. “If you manage to tear loose. And if my gun fails. And if I trip and break my leg. And if both doors jam and the others can’t rush in. Then you will absolutely kill me.”

He poked the man’s forehead.

“Come ooon. You couldn’t kill me while you were armed and armoured.”

The pirate screamed with rage and effort and again tried to tear free. Again the tape and chair both held.

“GRAAHH!” Gaylen screamed in mocking imitation, complete with a contorted face and arm-waving. “Come on, I’m sure you almost had it. Try again. Just wave your arms to get that real GRAAHH!”

“Go to Hell,” the man growled through his teeth.

“Gasp!” Gaylen said and did a flourish. “Original! Really, that is original. Have you considered going into writing?”

He poked the pirate again.

“Oh, sorry. I forgot: Not much reading in Scorchspace, is there?”

“That’s Greater Warkana to you, scrag!” the man shouted.

“So you are from Scorchspace,” Gaylen said. “Thanks. A little out of the way, weren’t you boys? To be here all by yourselves in one small ship? And weirdly dedicated to taking down one unremarkable vessel that was actually firing back.”

“The strong take!”

“Yeeeaaah,” Gaylen said slowly. “I know that’s what you feral animals shout at each other as you’re reminding each other what big, tough guys you are, but the fact is that pirates pick soft targets. And there are plenty of targets to choose from. So either you guys were complete desperate losers, or you were specifically trying to hit us.”

“I am going to slice you open from-”

“Oh, Great Fates!” Gaylen said theatrically. “Please! Have mercy! Save me from boilerplate tough-guy garbage! Show me just ONE thug who doesn’t talk like a nasty little kid!”

If there was anything these types absolutely could not stand, it was mockery. The pirate’s face contorted some more before he spat. Gaylen ignored it.

“Look... I’m wearing a skin patch...”

He touched the spot on his chest where the vest had narrowly saved him.

“It hurts, and also itches like crazy. And my brand-new ship now has scorch marks, fried electronics, and a whole lot of blood on the floor. And you’re going to pay me back for it. In some form or another.”

“I’m not giving you anything!”

“Oh, really? Because I’m thinking of handing you over to one of the slaver networks.”

“I will never be a slave!”

“You will, if I want you to be. Oh, but you think you’re too tough? It’s those bastards’ job to break people. How long are you going to stay tough and manly, naked in a cage, wearing a shock collar... knowing that that is your entire future? Because you’re not going to break free on your lonesome. And your buddies won’t show up to save you, because they won’t know where you are. And the Chainbreakers... oh, if they ever make a strike at wherever you’re being held, they’re going to take one look at your pirate markings and decide you’re exactly where you belong.”

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

Gaylen crossed his arms.

“Because you scavengers keep slaves of your own. I’ve seen what’s done to people on the toxic dumps your people call homeworlds. You know what’s coming for you. What your life is going to be like. I mean, you’re not pretty enough to be someone’s petboy. And you don’t have any useful skills. So that leaves labour. Being worked to death, treated like the cheap commodity you are, shocked every time you mumble about how tough you used to be.”

Gaylen poked him.

“OR... you can just tell me why you attacked me.”

The pirate just gave him a glare of impotent rage.

“What?” Gaylen said and smirked. “You’re not even going to give me a good GRAAHH?”

The pirate glared.

“Oh, I see,” Gaylen said. “You think I’m feeling patient today.”

He unspooled a safety cable from the centre of the floor and clipped it to his belt. Then he took out his comm and linked it to the cargo bay loudspeakers. Then he touched a button on the remote in his belt.

The cargo bay main doors opened. The pirate twitched and jerked and tried to look behind, and it dawned on the man that the back legs of his chair were right by the edge of the ramp.

Faintly visible through the clouds was a planetary surface.

“WELCOME TO KOR-12,” Gaylen said through the speakers, the only way to be heard over the rush of wind.

He put his foot against the front of the chair and pushed, tilting it backwards slightly.

“WE’RE SIX KILOMETRES UP. PLENTY OF TIME TO THINK THINGS THROUGH ON YOUR WAY DOWN.”

He held the comm to the pirate’s face.

“THIS ISN’T A WARRIOR’S DEATH!” the wide-eyed man protested.

“NO IT ISN’T, IS IT?”

He pushed some more, and the man’s hands and feet desperately clawed for any kind of purchase.

“TALK, OR I’LL JUST ENJOY WATCHING YOU DROP. I’VE NEVER DONE THIS BEFORE.”

“THE BRECKE BROWNS, ALRIGHT?!” the pirate said. “THEY WANTED THE SHIP AND EVERYTHING IN IT. THEY THOUGHT YOU MIGHT TRY AN OUT-OF-THE-WAY ROUTE. THERE WAS SOME OTHER SHIP AT ANOTHER STOPPING POINT.”

“WHERE WERE YOU TO BRING IT?” Gaylen asked.

“FARKON KANA STATION!”

Gaylen searched his mental starmap. It made sense.

“ALRIGHT,” he said. “THAT’S ALL I WANTED. THANK YOU FOR COOPERATING.”

He gripped the underside of the chair and pushed with all his strength. The pirate screamed in terrified outrage, but his words were lost to the wind as he and the chair tumbled off the ramp. Gaylen hit the remote again, and the door closed.

“Oof,” he said to himself, chilled to the bone.

He unclipped the rope, then strode to the back of the cargo bay and into the entry area. Bers, Ayna, Kiris and Herdis stood gathered around a screen. One of the hull cameras was tracking the pirate as he plummeted through the air. Gaylen turned up just as the parachute they’d fastened to the back of the chair deployed.

Ayna and Bers laughed.

“That was mean,” Herdis said, although she smiled a bit. “That was really mean.”

“Some people just have it coming.”

“It was also a waste of a perfectly good parachute,” Kiris said. “And a chair.”

Gaylen smiled stiffly.

“I’m not in the execution business. Oh, and...” He waved his hand, “Just to be clear, everyone, that bit about the slaver networks was a bluff. I’m not going to do anything to help those maggots stay in business.”

He turned to the open door into the engine room.

“Jaquan! Do you have a verdict already?”

“In a few more minutes.”

“Right.”

He looked at the stack of armour and weapons they’d taken off the pirates before flushing their bodies out into space.

“We can go over this stuff a bit more thoroughly, then we’ll have a meeting.”

“What did that pirate say?” Ayna asked.

“We’ll discuss it. Just a little... extra complication.”

# # #

Per leaned his rear against a railing and let out a sigh. Walking was exhausting when it meant hobbling around on a cane.

A government job was good for having kneecaps fitted back together, but not much more than that. He was having to pay for his own day-to-day painkillers, and since his job officially consisted of sitting and pressing a few buttons he had already been ordered back to work.

Never mind that there were all sorts of little things to be done when one was the only regular employee. But the bureaucracy up above him didn’t care about things like changing air filters or minor repairs required to keep tiny problems from piling up into a big one.

So here he was, up in the rafters, and below him the steep stairs down.

He grumbled and pulled up his pants. The bright-blue fittings around each knee remained perfectly in place, giving him the support needed to let the bones knit together properly.

As far as he knew the police had no lead on those armoured bastards. And it would probably stay that way. They’d disabled the security cameras, after all. And given the rate people passed through here, if a crime wasn’t solved within hours it was usually forgotten about. By those not affected by it, that is.

Per supposed he wouldn’t be visiting that parlour any time soon after all.

He sighed again and rose with the help of his cane. Then he put his free hand on the rail and began the nerve-wracking journey back down.

Cane, step, step. Cane, step, step. Cane, step, step.

He’d almost made it when he slipped up. He wasn’t even sure what went wrong; suddenly his foot was just waving through empty air and he was pitching forward.

As it always did in moments like these, time slowed down and his mind took in the worst-case scenario. He had time to envision an agonising impact on his already-injured legs.

But something stopped him, and after the moment of panic subsided he realised it was an arm across his chest. He really had been focused on his feet.

The person held him as he steadied himself, then set his feet down on the floor.

“Uh... thanks,” he said.

“No problem.”

The person wore a crimson full helmet of a very distinctive shape. The hard armour suit was mostly cream-coloured, with some more of that crimson added for flavour. The entire ensemble was well-worn, covered in scuffs and signs of repair.

The Kavian bounty hunter handed him his cane back.

“Now, I wanted to talk to you about the Addax.”