Travellers’ Waypoint

Melos Station

The spaceport at Melos was packed with many people from all over the cluster. Grace Dakota had been getting by, making enough money by moving cargo with her ship. She had little space but could take enough to make a small profit, and she could do it for cheaper than an interstellar by carrier. She had been slightly surprised when she found out her new cargo was a family of four. It seemed everyone was trying to get somewhere else these days. The fact there was a war on was Uppermost in people’s minds wherever everywhere she went.

Hemera had everyone on edge. The remote farming community had been struck without warning by interstellar missiles, kicking off this devastating conflict. Grace was lucky it didn’t fall on her to sort out. She was just trying to keep busy and find some profitable artefacts. It had all nearly gone so wrong for her when her boyfriend had betrayed her and stolen her ship aboard the SS Nomadic, a downed liner she had managed to locate. But she had a lead to a dig site on Beta Persei and if this dig site panned out, she wouldn’t have to, and she always enjoyed a gamble.

With her passengers disembarked, Grace made her way to the top-level bar. It failed at trying to pass itself off as a more classy establishment than the average drinking hole on this backwater. The station was one of the oldest in the cluster; it was a point for travellers to connect between different liners. The myth was it had originally built as a smuggler’s stronghold; it had actually been a stronghold of accountants overseeing humanity’s expansion into the cluster. Now a generic collection of hotels for long-distance travellers, and connection points for different liners.

Grace certainly had no particular love for the place, but it was the designated meeting point that her contact had suggested to complete the transaction. The fact he had opted for the top-floor bar was almost laughable to Grace. The clientèle were not much classier, but were willing to pay an extra twenty credits to enter the lounge and pass through its security screening. She had to admit the smell was much better in there. Whatever they had done to the oxygen scrubbers, it made all the difference.

Considering the door charge and the time of day, the bar was surprisingly busy. Grace had hoped for it to be quieter—not so quiet as to stand out, but just busy enough. She checked her slate. The seller had sent an image: a bald man in his thirties wearing a well-tailored dark business suit. She recognised him sitting alone at a table by the large floor-to-ceiling windows that looked out over the shipping traffic passing through. Currently about a dozen ships circled the station and several more hung in the distance Awaiting their turn. Grace almost expected the usual spotters sat around noting down the registration numbers in their slate notepads.

“You must be Marco?” Grace asked.

The man looked up from his own slate, clearly lost in a world of distractions. Her slate emitted an acknowledgement sound Grace was all too familiar with. He had just won an auction. Looking up, Marco made eye contact with his blue eyes.

“Grace Dakota,” he said with an accent she couldn’t quite place. It was Earth, somewhere from the Americas. Most Earth accents sounded the same to people out here.

“I sure am,” she replied, unintentionally she had slightly affected a similar accent.

“Pleasure to meet you,” he replied, reaching out to shake her hand. His grip was a little too firm. It was supposed to be an attempt to show dominance, but Grace always found it reflected a glaring insecurity.

“We have a deal?” he asked.

“I think we do.”

Grace had been contacted by this man several weeks prior whilst she had been sifting through the best places to find promising dig site speculation. He claimed he had a lead for the one on Beta Persei. Supposedly, there had been a ship that went down in history as carrying all the gold in the colonies. Unfortunately, it also went down quite literally around two hundred years ago, taking all the gold with it. Grace had no reason to believe he actually had the location, but she was playing every angle. It was cheap enough that she could take a punt, but these days, she tended not to be so high-stakes.

She smiled at Marco and sat down in the seat across from him.

“Are you gonna tell me where it is?” she said, meeting his blue eyes and offering an innocent smile.

“Now, why would I do a thing like that?” he replied, smiling all teeth. “It’s on this card, and I’m more than willing to sell it to you,” he said, sliding the small metal data stick across the table. It was a data storage unit that clipped into most personal slates or ships’ computers and would contain the grid coordinates for the site.

Grace went to grab it, but he slammed his hand down flat upon the golden oblong and said with a smile, “But I’m afraid it’s going to cost you a little bit extra, honey.”

She didn’t care for that, and she didn’t care for being called “honey.”

“And why is that?” Grace replied cooly.

“You see, there’s been another bidder. The price has gone up.”

She couldn’t believe his bullshit; it was the oldest trick in the book.

“How much?” she asked.

“Another two hundred,” he said, leaning back in the seat.

It wasn’t a game she was going to play. Grace knew he didn’t have another bidder—he just wanted to squeeze her for everything he could. Well, the joke was on him. She was not paying anything more than agreed.

“Another time then,” said Grace, standing up.

If he had been surprised by her reaction, he didn’t show it. Grace was impressed by this part of his performance, if nothing else.

“That’s fine by me,” he said, oddly calm. Perhaps he really did have another bidder.

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

She held out a credit chit.

“This is what we agreed. You can have this today and go about your business,” she said with a smile. “I’m sure you have bidders offering far more, but since you don’t want to transmit the location and I can’t see any of these bidders here, It seems such a waste. Now I am here. This is literally money you’re leaving on the table,” she said, placing it down next to the data card.

“Look, Grace, I don’t know the kind of slimy dealers you have been doing business with, but I’m not like that,” he said, trying to present himself as an honest businessman. Grace nearly laughed. “But I’m just telling you how it is. I’d love to finish this trade today, but you have the new price—take it or...”

There were several screens dotted around the bar, announcing sports results for the Ursa Major League. Suddenly they all cut to one newsfeed. Grace saw through the glass doors that the screens in the corridor outside had done likewise. There was gun camera footage of a naval installation being attacked by the alien vessels. An announcer explained the fleet sent from Earth had been devastated. It was being compared to Pearl Harbour—a sneak attack in Earth’s Second World War. Grace was surprised; it was a reference few people outside her field would appreciate out here. She had to admit it was apt. She didn’t have to do the maths, without those ships, the Navy’s control of the cluster was going to be precarious at best.

She looked at Marco. He was also wrapped up in the reporting.

“This is awful, isn’t it?” she said, feigning despair.

“Uh huh,” was all he replied, watching the devastation unfold.

She pocketed the credit chit and the data card, got to her feet, and started making her way out of the bar. She wasn’t sure how far she’d get before he noticed, but he had refused the agreed price. He wanted more, so she didn’t feel bad about this decision.

Grace had buried treasure to find.

Once she was through the doors, the crowd almost hit her like a wall; the smell certainly did. This was the busiest she had ever seen a waystation. Last time she had been in a crowd like this was the Fontana Quartet concert on Mellotte II. She had enjoyed herself, especially the mosh pit. This, however, was no fun at all, and she just wanted to get out of there.

Grace threw her head back over her shoulder to see if anyone was following her. If anyone was, she couldn’t have planned it better. A few steps into the crowd and no one could make her out.

A display screen announced a liner called Queen’s Star had docked in the last half hour, and its passengers were now clearing customs and joining this crowd. The population of the station was usually a fraction of this; there were at least twice the normal number of people living here. Many hoping to transfer to the ships heading out of the Alpha Persei Cluster for the Sol System.

Making her way through the crowds. The monitor screens that lined the corridors were all still showing breaking news. There was footage of the cluster shipyards at Caelus IV.

Now she was worried. That been where she had departed from Chase and the Trafalgar. She had recognised it immediately, having only been there herself days ago. The Trafalgar must have been due to depart by now, surely. She was shocked by what she now saw: wave after wave of Earth’s naval ships, the cavalry everyone had been waiting for, were going up in flame, and the shipyard itself burning. It was every space traveller’s nightmare: the world aflame and nowhere to run.

Grace needed to get out of here. Seeing this footage, others on this overcrowded tin can would feel the same. Making her way towards the docking bay where her ship waited. The internal direction screens had changed as well. She stopped and looked at the closest one. It declared that the station had been put in lockdown.

Oh, fuck, thought Grace. How long would that be for? She assumed everywhere had these emergency protocols on file in some archive somewhere, but they’d never actually been put in place before. Not in the cluster. For the hundred and fifty years of its history, there’d never been a war here. She knew immediately that she had to get back to the ship and find a way out. Lockdown or no, there was nothing else for it.

Heading down the station’s main central corridor. It was lined with restaurants, bars, hotels—the standard things at any traveller’s waypoint throughout the known galaxy. Grace passed a stall selling sweet baked goods, the kind she would genuinely stop and consider at any other time. Despite all the extra crowds, the merchants didn’t seem to have an upswing in trade. Scared travellers rarely gave into desires for treat food or anything not essential. A lot of them were simply standing or sitting in the corridors with nowhere else to go. She tried not to barge her way through the rows of people, but it wasn’t easy.

Grace wondered if the lockdown was simply to stop any more people from coming on board. Were they just at capacity? But that wouldn’t make sense. That the Navy was now in chaos meant that the transports that had been about to depart were now trying to factor in if they had a port to go to. While everyone waited to see what the unknown hostile’s next move would be, surely, they couldn’t maintain that for much longer, thought Grace.

She found the elevators and made her way down to the docking bay. Armed station personal were now standing guard at the bay’s entrance. They were definitely not just letting anyone leave. This was a traveller’s waystation. It had no external guns. Grace just needed to get to her ship away to somewhere safer.

However, the large, intimidating bald man, who looked more at home outside a capital-world nightclub than at a spaceport docking bay, might prove a problem.