The four mech-fighters looked at each other in the bunkroom. “Looks like we’re employed, people!” Joker said happily!

“Or dead already and we just don’t know it,” House grunted.

#

“So, we’re going to find out what we’re being held for, right?”

Austin received no answer. His hands, securely cuffed and locked behind his back, couldn’t move in the wild gesculations that he was infamous for making when his temper was high. He settled for muttering to himself about the fascists of old Earth when the robotic driver up front continued to ignore him.

“Remember what pater said our ancestor used to say on old Earth, Austin, when we tried arguing with him?”

“Yeah, ‘don’t try to run, Sparky. You’ll only die tired.’ How many times did he drag that old chestnut out for us when we tried to sway him atfer he’d made up his mind?”

“Well, it applies here, too. Appealing to the Constitution of New Avalon or even the one from the USA on old Earth isn’t gonna help us here,” Huston said, trying to adjust his seating as his own steel bonds dug into his back. “We’re not guilty of anything, except being in Viscount Moreded’s way when he wanted something.”

They were both quiet for a few more moments, sitting quietly on the benches in the back of the prisoner transport while it hummed over the city.

“Do you think he told us the truth?” Austin whispered, more out of a desire to keep from weeping than keep an enemy from hearing. “About Pater?”

“No, not at all,” Huston said. “Saying you’ve eliminated the previous ruler, and then spreading every true and false horrible rumor possible about them is standard procedure for slime like Moreded. Remember the old Earth history lessons that Rabbi Jerome taught us? They did that in the Russian revolution, the Anti-facts tried it in the second half of the twenty-first century, the Red Star Coalition on Gedi-Prime in the twenty-seventh. It’s standard for these people. Pater would let Mater come to harm, not without a fight so public and costly to the bad guys that the whole blasteed city would’ve known about it hours before any of Moreded’s lapdogs in the media would have gotten out’ve bed to report anything.”

“You- you actually studied what Rabbi gave us?”

“Yes. while you kept trying to study his daughter, I was trying to study in the library he’d made into our classroom.”

“Well…okay. But, you have to admit, she was cute.”

Huston rolled his eyes and looked at the ceiling. “Why do I bother?”

“Well? I thought you liked brunettes, too!”

“That’s not the-”

“I mean you married one, after all!”

“Will you-”

“Come to think, maybe it’s time I thought about settling down-”

“-shut up, Austin!”

“Well, what else is there to do but chatter? Unless you’ve got a way to get us out of here?”

“If you’d shut your incessantly gabbling verbal orifice of yours for more than a nanosecond at time, I just might be able to accomplish that!”

Austin paused in his chatter for a full half second before continuing. “How?” he asked.

“You’re near the window- how high are we?”

Austin strained and looked out through the transparent window out of the corner of his right eye. “They’ve got my cuffs magged to the wall, but I can just barely look out here. I think we’re about a half-mile up.”

“Good. We’re at the highest point of the trip, and we’ve got perhaps five more minutes left until we land and get shackled in the local crossbar hotel.”

“The what?”

“Jail, Austin. That’s how one of the ancients characterized jails.”

“Huston, you know I hate it when you talk to me like I’m a dribbling idiot!”

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

“Well? If the boot fits. After all, I thought you were the artsy one!”

“Will you just either get us out of here or shut your own little poetry hole?”

“Temper, temper, little bro,” Huston said, grunting as he visibly contorted his bound arms behind his body. “I’m actually in a position I’ve wanted to be in since we were four years old and you gave me that fat lip right before the y took the family pictures at Christmas!”

“Tied up in the back of a paddy wagon? Huston, I never would’ve taken you for that type.”

“Nope [grunt], just being in a [umpf!] position to taunt you when you couldn’t [HURRRRM!] fight back! There!” A small but discernible beep! Sounded behind him, followed by the clicking of his maglocks, and Huston shaking his hands free.

“How in the nine hells did you do that?” Austin said. “Did one o’ your gadgets finally do what it was supposed to do?”

“Kind of,” Huston said, kneeling behind his brother and ignoring his yells of discomfort as he pushed Austin’s body aside in an effort to better see the maglocks on Austin’s wrists. “Rabbi Telchin had a half-hour at the end of one of our sessions, and started talking about a fellow named Houdini. Fellow could escape any bond, pick any lock. I asked for a book about him for my fifteenth orbit party and got it, and started applying his principles to our own technology. And, you know what?”

“Wha-” Austin stopped himself as his own maglocks first released his wrists from the wall, and then popped open and freed his arms completely. “How did-?”

“Every lock is built by a person. And our Gendarmes aren’t Red Star Secret Police. They always use sequential numbers, in this case one-two-three-four for my locks, and the reverse for yours. And, now that we’re out-”

“RETURN TO YOUR SEATS! REPLACE YOUR RESTRAINTS! TAMPERING WITH OFFICIAL RESTRAINTS IS A CLASS BETA FELONY UNDER STATUTE FOUR-FIVE-SEVEN…”

“Resist code Yankee-Texas-Zulu,” Huston said, his voice momentarily louder than the recording booming through the paddy wagon.

The transport suddenly shuddered. Something inside its metal body coughed, gagged, and sighed as the humming engine suddenly fell silent.

“What was tha-” Austin started to say.

“BRACE FOR IMPA-”

They hit the ground.

#

The door slid open as House approached it. Joker and Anja followed, with Yue ringing up the rear.

“Come on in,” Gareth called, waving his artificial arm in a beckoning gesture.

The four of them walked in, uncertain. Dallas was sitting at one of the long tables in the cafeteria. In front of him on the table sat a small holo-projector, beaming a ball of silent static about a foot above it.

“Have a seat,” Dallas said. They sat, all in a line on the other side of the long table, facing him.

Dallas paused for a second, then tapped a button on the tablet. The ball of static flipped and became a 3-D starmap.

“Gareth and I have been going over everything from finances to the jobs out there for folks like us.”

“Mercenary jobs?” House said.

“Jobs that pay, if that’s what you mean,” Dallas said, letting the comment hang. “I realize this may not be the kind of meeting place you’re used to, but my predecessor didn’t do much in the way of decorating or space allocation.”

“You need a woman’s touch, boss?” said Anja, smiling.

“Maybe,” Dallas answered, keeping a straight face. “I’ve assigned crew to taking out the trash in a bunch of unused rooms. Hopefully by week’s end we’ll have an actual conference room, a chapel, and a rec room that doesn’t have gobs of drying baccy-spit on the floor.”

“The last’d be a plus,” Joker mumbled. “You gonna hire some pretty women to work here too, boss?”

“Different answer for a different day. Right now, just since we walked in the front door of this boat, the interest alone on our loans is enough money to keep even a guy like you in women and booze for a month. Now, here-” One of the pinprick stars on the holo-map hovering in the air lit up as Dallas’ extended his finger and tapped it, “is the Eolous system. Ever heard of it?”

No one had. “Good. Small, out of the way. Periphery rim world, a good place to get lost in. Seems that the local law-enforcement boys found a bad guy here who wanted to stay lost.”

“And we get to arrest him?” House said, “after kicking in a few doors and stomping on a few buildings? Sounds like a pretty simple smash-n-grab.”

“Negative,” Dallas said. “These guys are pretty focused on this guy, whoever he is or whatever he did. They really want to get him themselves. Our job’s just the smash, they do the grab.”

“Details?” Yue said, suddenly focusing on the starmap, where before she’d seemed to be drifting off into watching flakes of paint fall off the old wall.

“Intelligence is scant,” Dallas said, “but we do have this much: there’s a series of turrets in place that the local boys are very reluctant to engage. We, however, have mechs with long-distance weaponry, perfect for removing threats like this without so much as getting the paint scratched on our machines.”

“So, an easy job, then?” Joker said.

“Looks that way,” Dallas said, a six-digit number appearing above the star map, rotating with a money-sign in front of it. “And the pay’s enough to keep our bills and the banks at bay for two months.”

“That’s kinda high for shooting out a few turrets,” House said.

“Indeed,” Yue said. “A figure that high indicates that the locals might not be telling us all there is to know about this job.”

“Maybe,” Dallas said. “But we’’re new at the game, and folks aren’t exactly lined up around the system to hire us. You’re experienced, all of you. And I’ll be going down there with you.”

“You, boss?” Joker said.

“You think I can’t handle it?”

“No, it’s not that. It’s just…”

“We haff never,” Anja said, “ever had a boss who dropped with us. They always stayed on the ship, givink orders from the bridge.”

“Well, I’m not that kinda boss. ‘Way I was raised, you don’t ask others to do anything you wouldn’t do yourself. So, I’m dropping with you. Anything happens to me, Gareth is designated to take over. We set?”

-----

TO BE CONTINUED....