27
The Drenard’s presence triggered a primal kill response in Molly. Her nerves, already frayed, sent jittery commands to adrenaline-soaked muscles. Her knees went numb and she would’ve collapsed, but Cole arrived in time to steady her.
She looked back to mumble her thanks and saw the mask of pure terror on his face as well. She spun back around, expecting to be attacked at any moment, but the creature hadn’t moved. Huddled on the floor, not five meters from her, was a living Drenard. The race they and the rest of the GU had been at war with for longer than she’d been alive. This was what they were programmed for at the Academy: hunt down and kill Drenards. Pictures of them graced their gun-range targets, their punching bags, the Navy’s recruitment posters. Training holos incorporated front-line video from soldiers lucky enough to encounter and mow them down. A generic-looking representation of a Drenard popped up on the scoreboard after simulated battles to tally victorious kills.
This creature looked similar enough to startle her, but as most of her fear and rage drained away, she saw that it wasn’t exactly like the aliens from the videos and posters. The biggest difference was how small and emaciated it looked. The hairless body was a lighter shade of blue, almost translucent. And instead of wearing the white flight suits and combat armor of the Drenard Navy, this one had on nothing but dirty, tattered rags. Shackles on both of its slim ankles completed the pathetic getup; a chain snaked from them around the corner and into the cockpit. The miserable thing had its knees bent up to its chin—long, thin arms wrapped around its narrow shins. With large, wet eyes it peered directly at Molly and the last of her fear and anger fell uselessly to the metal decking. Pity and shame started to rise up in their place.
“A real beaut, eh?” Albert called up from the cargo ramp, his voice full of pride. “One hundred percent real Drenard. Not another like her this side of the Milky Way. Priceless, as you can imagine, but I’d never sell her. No sir-ree.” He marched back into the ship, smiling at Molly and Cole as if their reaction pleased him. He crossed to the poor creature and patted its head.
Molly watched the captive flinch slightly, the chain rattling like a spooked snake. But the Drenard’s eyes never left her own.
“Anlyn here sure brings in the customers, let me tell ya. Just a gem. And it’s true, you know. They can go forever without food. All you have to do is water them. Damnedest thing. She’s learning English too. Pretty good at it, but she doesn’t choose to say much. Still a little frightened, but coming around. Come this way and I’ll give you a full tour of the shop and introduce you to my family.” He went back to the ramp and waved them along. “I’ll give you a sense of what I have in stock and you can show me what sort of price range you’re looking at. Then I’ll let you get some rest and talk over your needs with your weapon’s officer. I’m assuming that was the clever fellow who tested my private shields?” He whirled on Molly and held his hand to one side of his mouth, but said, loud enough for everyone to hear, “Doesn’t say much does he?”
Molly didn’t respond, and it didn’t feel as if Albert expected her to. He strolled out into the open hangar, a constant flow of jabber following him. The habit reminded Molly of his contracts: a heap of words designed to hinder communication rather than facilitate it. She cast one last look at the Drenard and followed him out into the cavernous hangar.
The walls of his shop were rough stone, the entire facility chewed out of a massive asteroid. Cabinets and shelves lined one wall, a flat workbench another. Above the latter hung a wide board with hundreds of hooks. Every tool she knew—and some she didn’t—was suspended there. She turned to the others; Edison’s fur bristled at the sight of it all; Cole had disappeared.
Molly spotted him wandering toward the rear of the ships, mesmerized by the door they’d flown through. Primarily because it wasn’t there! She rushed over to join him, stopping in the pocket of heat near Lady Liberty’s thrusters. Ahead of them a plane of light shimmered where the hangar ended and the vacuum of space began. An invisible wall somehow kept the two separate. A forcefield.
“Look, but don’t touch!” Albert called out gaily.
Molly and Cole half-spun toward the warning and ended up locking eyes with each other. His were green and wide, his brows raised. Molly knew what he was thinking.
“You want one,” she guessed.
“Oh, yeah, I want one. Are you kidding? This stuff is still science fiction on Earth. Crap we read about in the pulp that circulates through the Academy.” Cole lowered his voice. “And this creep uses it for his garage door.”
“Don’t forget, he’s wearing one as well. Talk about not feeling naked, he could be naked and still be invincible.” Molly looked away from the forcefield and down at her feet. “Speaking of feeling naked, I’m sorry about what I—”
Cole reached over and squeezed her hand. “Forget it. I’m sorry too. Hey, you think his field comes from that black device on his belt?”
Molly turned to one side, in her peripheral she could see Albert by the workbench, explaining something to Edison. She supposed all was well between the two, the attack forgotten. “I don’t think so. More of a silent communicator. Maybe just a readout from his ship. Look, we need to play this like a simple shopping trip. The guy just wants to trade and make a buck, and we want what he has. We’re as powerless here as we were on Glemot, maybe more so. So don’t make any moves we might regret.”
He nodded and dropped her hand. “What do you make of that Drenard? I almost rushed the poor thing to take its head off. Could you believe we were seeing one in person like that?”
Molly looked away. “Let’s talk about it later. I’m?.?.?.?I’m not sure what I felt. No, that’s a lie. I?.?.?.?I felt the same thing you did, but I’m not sure what I feel right now. Sick, I guess. I don’t like seeing anything chained up like that.”
“Oh, gimmee a break. I remember you checking Orville’s restraints with care. And that was a Drenard in there.”
“I said I don’t wanna talk about it right now. Later. Just stay focused on what we came here for.”
Cole scrunched up his face and turned back to the forcefield. “Sure thing, Captain.”
“Hello, guys?” Albert called across the hangar. “I’d like to introduce you to my wife.” A large woman stood beside him, wiping her hands on her apron, prepping them for a polite shaking.
Molly led Cole over to the rest of the group. Her eyes flickered over to the distasteful sight of Parsona and Lady Liberty, still conjoined. The sense of violation would not go away, and it left a bad taste in her mouth.
“Gladys Gaines.” Her outstretched hand still had some white cooking residue on it.
Molly accepted it and found her grip warm, inviting. She reciprocated the gentle shake. “Molly Fyde,” she said.
Albert lifted a hand to the side of his mouth for another loud aside. “The ship’s captain,” he said, obviously impressed with Molly’s age or gender. She wasn’t sure which irked her more. Actually, that’s not right. She definitely knew which one.
Cole repeated the ritual with Mrs. Gaines, introducing himself.
“What can I get you kids to drink? Tea? Coffee? You’ll be joining us for dinner, I hope?”
Molly lost herself in the surreal scene as her crew put in beverage orders with a gun-runner’s wife. They were understandably eager to drink a beverage that wasn’t in a bag, but their excitement stabbed at her chest. This wasn’t supposed to be fun.
Edison’s joy hurt her the most. She recalled that glorious meal on Glemot and realized, for the first time, that the poor pup was used to eating like that regularly. It had been a unique and glorious one-time event for her, but for his taste buds, it was the accepted standard. Eating would probably never be the same for him.
Albert snuck up behind Molly and put an arm across her shoulders, causing her to flinch like the chained-up Drenard. “Is the furry one your Weapons Officer?” he asked her.
They didn’t have a weapons officer, she nearly told him. They’d never had any weapons before; they’d only been a crew for two weeks. Fortunately, she stopped herself, understanding the need to tell Albert as little as possible. She already felt as if he knew too much.
“Actually, that would be Cole,” she finally said. “He also does navigation duties.”
“Ah, excellent! Then I can deal with one person for both armaments and the star charts we discussed. I’m assuming you’re still interested in that triple package? It really can’t be beat, you know. And I’ll provide free updates for the next fifty years, just stop back by anytime. Now, Walter and I have been talking payment. The chap is very sharp, thinks highly of some of the goods you guys have to offer. But I have to tell you, the Navy tech he’s bartering with isn’t quite as rare as he’s making out. I’ll be doing you a favor, honestly, to take it off your hands. But don’t you worry about any of that nonsense just yet. Let’s eat some dinner and get some rest. We’ll have plenty of time for business tomorrow.”
But Molly couldn’t relax on command, even if she wanted to.
????
Later, in her bunk, her belly stuffed with a home-cooked meal, Molly still couldn’t make herself relax. Despite her exhaustion, there was no way she’d be able to sleep. And it wasn’t just seeing the Drenard for a second time—curled up in a ball on the cockpit floor as they returned from dinner. Nor was it the pressure of the business to conduct the following day. These didn’t help, to be sure, but Molly’s torment came from other thoughts.
First, she couldn’t help but second-guess her decision to avoid the Navy. Cole was persuasive with his theories, but she trusted Lucin completely, which made running feel wrong. Was she really betraying the closest thing she had to a family just because some dreamy boy batted his eyes at her? Lucin would feel betrayed when Parsona returned with chaff pods and laser canons. It seemed logical to her when she agreed to this mess, but now she was hearing her crazy explanation from Lucin’s perspective, and it sounded like pure gibberish.
Then there were the deaths she’d been responsible for. Glemot was almost too big a mistake to fully comprehend. Even as used as she’d been, she felt the full weight of a race’s genocide on her shoulders. The depression she’d dipped into briefly wouldn’t leave her, as hard as she tried to fake it for Cole’s sake. She could feel how edgy and dangerous she’d become, able to snap without provocation. It worried her.
And the more personal, up-close deaths haunted her with a more vivid ferocity. The sight of Edison flaying that council member. The numbness in her elbow when she struck that Navy man. The look on his face as the rains of Palan smeared him against that windshield.
Her big adventure and romance in space had turned into a mess larger than herself. Other people were getting hurt. She had watched everything she’d hoped for and dreamed of dissipate into the cosmos or get crushed into small pieces.
Molly wondered what the other kids at Avalon High would be up to right then. How great it must feel to be developmentally stunted. They could be physical adults, but gloriously brain-dead from years of rote memorization and regurgitation. Numb to the world from playing with toys well into adulthood rather than being honed for the ugly reality of a dangerous life. Molly had always felt so superior to those kids: beyond them in wisdom, power and ability. But that solid view was developing cracks. Which of them was happier right now? Which of them continued to hurt the universe?
Molly tossed her body to its other side, trying to find a comfortable pose, as if the conundrum were physical. She had no idea how long she’d been doing this, or what time it was, when she thought she heard a noise echo back from the front of her ship. She sat upright, already developing the unnatural skill that all pilots and captains possess: the attenuation to any change in the direction of their ship’s heading and a sensitivity to any foreign sound, however slight.
She slid out of bed and pulled on her jumpsuit, eager to be awake and doing something rather than in bed and dwelling on her sadness. As she slipped her shoes on, she found herself hoping it was Cole, unable to sleep himself. Hopefully he’d be willing to talk some. Because if it was Walter reorganizing the cargo bay at this hour, she was going to have a hard time being nice.
Unfortunately, Molly had no plan for what to do if it was Albert Gaines nosing into their ship’s computer.