Rena and the other women were already doing double the workload of the typical crewmember in some instances, but Rena knew that would never be enough. Those who spoke against them would always speak ill, no matter how much Rena and the others helped.
In fact, it would only get worse, she knew. As supplies continued to diminish, and as fewer supply ships from Luna arrived, the complaints would get louder and more frequent and sooner or later someone would take action. Rena didn’t think the crew would turn violent, but she didn’t rule out that possibility. People became desperate when they were hungry.
Yet where could they go? All the WU-HU ships that came in were ordered to stay docked. Everyone was on inactive status.
And whenever a free-miner ship approached the station, it was always to beg for food. The supply depots were hoarding their storage, the free miners said. “We have money. We’ll pay for food. Please. We have nowhere else to go.”
Initially Magashi had sold what little food she could. But she had faced such a fierce backlash by some of the crew, that she now turned every approaching ship away.
Rena couldn’t ask passage on a starving ship anyway. She had nineteen women and several dozen children. If the ship didn’t have the food to feed them, going with them would be suicide.
It was a problem without a solution, and the clock was ticking.
“Incoming vessel,” said the spotter.
“Can you identify it?” asked one of the officers.
“Looks like a vulture, sir.”
Rena felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end. Several of the helmsmen looked uneasy as well, and for good reason. Vultures were recovery crews who salvaged dead ships for profit. Most of them were mining crews who had given up on rocks and found easier money stripping ships to the bone.
The rule was, if you found an abandoned or crippled ship unoccupied by living persons, then the laws of salvage applied: Whoever takes it, owns it.
The problem was, the rule invited fierce competition among vulture crews. Once a crew found a ship, they had to strip it of its most valuable parts as quickly as possible before another crew swooped in and tried stripping it as well. It was a feeding frenzy that always turned violent if the stories were true, and Rena had every reason to believe them. On more than one occasion El Cavador had found a salvaged ship that included dead vultures among the ship’s dead crew, suggesting that a competing crew of vultures had come in during the salvage and taken everything for themselves, killing everyone who stood in their way.
Piratas was the word Segundo had for them. Pirates.
“They’re pinging us,” said the spotter.
“Open a frequency,” said the officer. He moved to the holodesk and put his head into the field.
A head appeared in the air in front of the officer. It was the blackest man Rena had ever seen, skin so dark that the whites of his eyes were as bright as moons by comparison. His expression was fierce and unfriendly. “I am Arjuna,” he said. “I seek audience with the station chief.”
“For what purpose?” the officer asked.
“Are you the station chief?”
“No. I’m one of her officers.”
“Her? Your chief is a woman?”
“A very capable one. What’s your business?”
“That is for me to discuss with the station chief.”
“We’re not giving out food if that’s your request.”
“We do not seek food. I come with grievous news. And an offer. One that will help you extend the life of your supplies.”
“What news?” asked the officer.
“The destruction of more than fifty mining ships. All of them killed by the Pembunuh, as we call them. I can give you the coordinates. You can turn your eye there and see that I speak the truth.”
Pembunuh. Rena hadn’t heard the word before, but she knew what it meant. Every ship and crew seemed to have their own name for the aliens. Hormigas, Wageni, Bugs.
But fifty ships? The thought of it left Rena cold. So many people. So many families. Fifty versions of El Cavador. It was unthinkable.
“Give us the coordinates,” said the officer.
Arjuna complied, rattling off a string of numbers. The spotter put them in his computer, and everyone in the helm gathered around his screen. Rena hung back, craning her neck to catch a glimpse, but everyone was clumped together so closely she couldn’t see. It took several minutes to move the eye and zoom in on the coordinates, but eventually the images came through.
The crew fell silent. Hands covered mouths. Eyes widened. Rena pushed her way through the crowd to see. No one stopped her or seemed to even notice.
It was more wreckage than Rena had ever seen, most of it mere dots on the readout, stretched out across tens of thousands of kilometers of space and still moving.
“I do not lie,” said Arjuna.
The wreckage was between them and Earth, and the first of it was surprisingly close to their position. Only two to three weeks away perhaps.
“I will connect you to the station chief,” said the officer.
“I do not wish to speak to her via holo,” said Arjuna. “I want to speak to her in person.”