Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Silver Night]

The Box was the first of the Syndicate Files, published back around the middle of last year. I originally published it on my fiction blog, but while that format is great for releasing a story in a serial format, it is less great for going back and reading through the whole story.

Ciarente co-wrote a lot of it. I think it turned out really well. It was my first shot at this kinda fiction, I'm up to the third Syndicate File now, and I think I might be getting a handle on the tone etc. Anyway, if you haven't read it before, or you have and liked it enough to re-read, enjoy and I would love comments and critiques:

Syndicate Files: The Box

Part 1

I was just minding my own business, leafing through a case file in my office, when trouble walked in and asked in a breathy voice, "You're Rordon Tarva? The detective?"

I knew she would be trouble. Maybe it was the curve of her lips, maybe it was the flight suit that fit a little too well. Who am I kidding, it was the podder implants. I stood and waved to a seat. Podder or not, a client's a client, and rent was due, "Call me Rory, Ms...?"

"Kaitane Ihonoka. You can call me Kaita." She sat with a nervous smile and a flip of her short, black hair. There wasn't any smile in those pretty gray eyes though, and I'd bet dirt against Exile that I'd never see nerves in them. Gray as a Raven's soul and dangerous, so much so I near missed what she said next, "I've been told you find things. Something of mine has disappeared."

I flipped open a notepad, "Can you describe the item?"

"A metal crate. Two meters tall, by one, by one. It has an on-board power source. It disappeared from my hangar floor. I have some diagrams."

She passed them over. Hardcopy, and there was pages of stuff. And lots of pages missing: The ones that showed the insides. For the rest, well, it was a metal box. I'm a simple guy, so I asked the obvious, "What's in it?"

"Nothing illegal." She laid it on thick, wide eyed, and even a little tremble around the mouth, "And I want it back badly Rory."

I wasn't falling for it. Not much, anyway. This is Syndicate, where "not illegal" means your bribes are all up to date. Still, a podder, she should be able to pay, "I'll look for the box for you. Now, I charge five hundred a day, plus expenses. Two days in advance is your deposit. That's whether I find it or not."

"The money is in your account." I thought she had been laying it on before, until she smiled. Cut through a man like a laser, that smile. "And if there is anything else I can do for you..."

I have rules, about relationships with clients and with people who give a bulk discount on massacres. Those kinda relationships get messy. So I got a few answers about dates, times, who might have access, things like that, scheduled a talk with her Hangar Chief and shooed her outta the office quick as I could.

The whole thing had gone colder than a priest's soul before she'd even got into my office, the box had been gone two days before she was desperate enough to bring in an outsider. I needed to get moving, but first thing's first. I brought out my neocom and checked my account balance. And nearly choked. She'd paid in isk, not syns - Syndicate Credits. I did a quick bit of math: With current exchange rate I could live like one of Quafe's pet senators for a year on that. Maybe even afford to hire a secretary.

Money like that, normally I'd say it stunk like three weeks on a shuttle full of cattle, but podders, right? She probably didn't even notice. That's what I told myself anyway. Money has a blinding charm all its own.

I squared things at the office and caught a ride down to Dockland. The bar nearest Kaita's hangar was a run down affair wedged into what was supposed to be the clear space between two internal bulkheads. If it had any kind of operating license, it was the cash-in-an-envelope sort, and the place didn't even have a name. Longshoremen who looked like they hardly needed help from a loader to move a few tons of ore around were lounging at rickety tables outside. I sidestepped as a man and a woman rolled out of the dimly lit interior. I'm not positive what they were doing, but the man spit out two teeth. I took the opportunity to slip inside.

The interior was crowded with a restless, shadowy mass of shapes. I pulled my coat a bit closer and tried to blend in, but I felt like the furrier in the slaver pen as I moved to the bar. The bar tender had a Caldari look to her, and seemed hard enough to do her own bouncing. I motioned her over and flashed fifty syns, "Anyone been showing a lotta credits round here lately? Last week or so? And a brew for me."

She pulled me a beer and gave me the usual: a hard look, a sneer, and a "Maybe."

I held out three fifties, "Got a name for me sweetheart?"

"For these, yeah, Gellique." She jerked her head at someone behind me, "And for calling me 'sweetheart,' this. You come back sometime honeycheeks."

I was grabbed from behind, and I got a look at the bouncer as I flew out the door. He looked like he might be a cargo loader. At least I didn't have to try the beer.

I dusted myself off to the laughter of the patrons at the tables outside, rallied my dignity like the Amarr at Atioth, and headed out. I sent a query to a friend in what passes as the station's government about the name 'Gellique' and whether the station's internals had a chance of detecting the power plant attached to the box.

It'd take a while for her to get back to me, so I set my sights on Kaita's hangar. I gave my authentication to her security there and got passed through. The guys manning the checkpoint looked tougher than the top shelf body armor they were wearing, and had a look I remembered from the days when I was drawing a corporate salary. Not amateurs, so how did someone sneak a man-sized box past them?

Well, that's why I was getting paid. I met Kaita's hangar chief, Oiman Mastako, in his office adjoining the main hangar. He had a face like a Veld 'roid: Lumpy, grayish, and begging for a laser hole. He radiated smugness like an antimatter charge radiated hurt. I wondered how well he knew someone named Gellique.

I took a seat without being asked and started right in. "Just got a couple questions for you. Tell me what happened."

He twisted his mouth like I walked in with a fedo conga line, but I knew my authorization from his boss was there flashing at him, "It was Tuesday, when myself and most of the rest of the regular hangar staff have the day off. We came back Wednesday, and the box was gone. There are no cameras or sensors on the hangar floor, for obvious reasons."

'Obvious' because a little run of the mill pilferage by hangar staff was nothing compared to creating a record of the things that transpire in your average podder's hangar, "What about security? The checkpoint on the way in didn't seem half-assed."

Mastako had the grace to look embarrassed at least, "Those are new, ex-Home Guard, mostly. At the time of the, um, incident we had contracted out to a local company. Ashte Security and Consulting. They came very highly recommended by the local contacts."

I'll bet they did. I knew of them. "And the box, you know what was in it?"

He hemmed and hawed and all I could get out of him was, "It's a bio-preservation unit, so something biological I guess."

Something 'biological.' Great. I pressed for a bit longer but didn't get anything useful until I was half out the door, "Last question, I wanted to talk to one of your guys..." I pretended to flip through my notes, "Gellique?"

His answer wasn't much of a surprise, "Henri Gellique hasn't shown up for work since Tuesday. You see him, tell him he's fired."

Part 2

As I showed my back to Kaita's hangar, my neocom buzzed. My government contact had some info for me and wanted a face-to-face. We arranged for a meet, later. First, I needed to have a talk with Bruve Ashte, 'CEO' of Ashte Security and Consulting.

I've heard on some planets they have big predatory fish - twenty, thirty, a hundred meters long, to hear some tell it. They are the biggest, baddest, meanest things where they live, and not an animal alive in those oceans would screw with them.

Swimming along behind those big fish, you've got little fish. They eat the scraps and enjoy the shade. Scavengers and hangers-on that live at the pleasure of creatures larger than they are. Maybe they even begin to believe the lie, that they are really under the protection of the monsters.

For the big fishes' part, I suspect the only time they notice the little fish is when they casually snap one up.

Bruve Ashte was, on his best day, one of those little fish. He was a small-time thug with pretensions toward grandeur. I didn't know the man well, but I knew the type. Slippery as a lawyer but not as bright. He hinted darkly at connections, sometimes in Venal, sometimes in Curse, but if he ever met a real Angel or 'Rista he'd probably need a clean pair of pants. The cleverest he ever got was bribing a few people to recommend his merry little band to incoming pilots for security.

Ashte ran his operation out of a low-rent office in a warehouse that had been illegally converted. 'Hiving' they called it. Just stacks of hexagonal containers linked with jury-rigged walkways, like a huge, dark, unusually fragrant beehive. I risked the climb - his office was well up the stack - and a sullen looking Sebbie kid buzzed me in.

The CEO himself was pacing nervously in the back room, drink in hand, when I walked in. He was powerfully built and blandly good looking, like a DED recruitment poster, a comforting stereotype for a security company. He stopped abruptly when he saw me and started babbling before I could even open my mouth, "Look, Tarva, you've gotta know, I didn't have a choice man. I mean, what could I have done? Guy like that shows up, offers to pay, you take it and go blind, right? You know me man, I can't mess with that kinda crowd."


I was expecting bluster and denials. I felt like I'd ordered the steak and gotten the vegetarian quiche instead. I held up my hands, "Whoa, whoa. Slow down. Guy like what? Just take it from the top."

He took a deep breath and a sip of booze, "Me and my boys were keeping an eye on that podder's hangar, like we was supposed to. Some guy with a face fulla' Rak' shows up with like, thirty hitters. Serious types. He offers me a tenth-kilo of crash, pure, if we find somewhere else to be for fifteen minutes. I took it and ran, man. Those freaks give me the creeps."

Rak'esme were facial tattoos favored by Blooders on-station. Their leadership claimed it was an ancient tradition, I suspected it was just a local affectation. They probably even made the name up, but Rak' were great for intimidation. Course, Ashte would have sold his mother to Blooders for a tenth-kilo of crash. I'd like to think if there were thirty Reds running around the station in a crowd, I'd hear about it. The rest might not be all bullshit though. Cult involvement would explain why he looked like he'd just seen the Void and she'd flipped him the bird.

Assuming there was a reason for Blooders to want the crate in the first place.

I worked on Ashte until it was past time for me to meet my government contact, and he didn't give me anything else. More like the Ashte I remembered, slippery as soap in a bath full of oil. I headed out, climbing back down past pimps' stables, black market pharmacies, and all the other Syndicate cottage industries. Hurrying by all that usual background noise. I was late for my meeting.

They hit me as I passed through the rat's warren of lean-tos and shanties that came about knee-high on the Hive. Two from behind, and one in front of me with black scrawls thick across his face and a curved knife in hand.

They showed their hand a little early though. I dashed toward the guy in front of me. He slashed wildly, and I grabbed his wrist while he was off-balance and used my momentum to smack him into a bulkhead face-first with a crunch like a walnut being cracked underwater, then I was off running again.

I managed to stumble out of the labyrinth of do-it-yourself shacks fifteen minutes later, and I headed for a section of the station I knew better. I kept an eye out, but there was no sign I was being tailed. I was now really late to my meeting, but I took the long way round, just in case.

My contact was named Auvergne Zarafa. You might wonder: how do you end up with a name like Auvergne Zarafa?

Couldn't tell it by looking at her, but she was Amarr, blood so pure that slavers would lick the ground she walked on. Her family fled the Empire before she was born for reasons they'd never wanted to talk about, and settled here. Her father wanted a 'Gallente sounding' name for her, so he picked one he had heard in a holo. I was a friend of the family after my folks and her folks helped each-other out, which is a whole other story, before I left to find my fortune and all that garbage. Auvy had been a gangling, cute-as-a-button ten year old when I left. By the time I got back she was all grown up, and had a job in the station's admin section.

I skidded to a stop and straightened my coat, taking a couple deep breaths (to make it clear I had not been sprinting to get to the meeting) before walking around the corner and approaching a certain cafe situated at the edge of a huge, open marketplace.

Auvy had already arrived, and was watching the swirling human tide of the market. She smiled and waved when she saw me, all in shades of yellow and cream and white. Hair so blonde it was almost silver brushing the shoulders of her pale yellow jacket, all of it in the latest Crystal Boulevard style, although if I knew Auvy, at nowhere near Crystal Boulevard prices. She looked as sparkling and fresh as a glass of the Guaranteed 100% Planetary Pure water they served in the kind of fancy restaurant I couldn't afford to take her to.

Or, if you knew her, as clear and sharp as a tumbler of Pator vodka.

The designer knock-off jacket might be buttoned over what I'd been surprised to notice, when I came back home to Syndicate, were curves that had a certain graceful economy, and she might have only missed being 'pretty' by a knife's edge, but it was the edge of the kind of knife made for carrying up a sleeve and slipping in between somebody's ribs.

The kind of knife you see in certain shops all around the cluster, guaranteed sharp for a life-time, stamped on the handle: "Caution: Product of Syndicate."

Just like Auvy was.

I saw there were already two cups of coffee on the table, and she nibbled on what looked to be a candied scorpion-on-a-stick as I made my way over through the crowd and sat. "Hey kiddo, what've you got for me?"

She sniffed, "Hardly even say hello? And here I am bringing you gifts."

"Don't count as gifts if I have to pay for them, and I sure pay." I put on a martyred expression.

Auvy threatened me with the candied scorpion, but couldn't keep a straight face, "Molok's balls Rory, you are full of it. Pretending you don't get off light."

I smiled and sipped my coffee, dark but sweet, "Well, maybe I do. I do appreciate it. This deal goes well, I'll buy you dinner, somewhere nice. Now, I need your help so I can afford it."

She raised an eyebrow but slid a folder across the table, "You didn't give me much to work with. Any idea how many 'Gelliques' there are on this station? Think I narrowed it down though, Henri Gellique, longshoreman, his address is in the folder. As for your body bin, no-can-do. If the station does have systems that could detect it, it's nothing I can get access too."

"Wait, what?"

"I said I can't get access, I'm an administrator, not a miracle worker."

I shook my head, "No, the other thing, body bin?"

She smiled, "Oh, you didn't know?" As if she didn't know damn well I didn't, "The box, I ran the stuff you sent me by a friend in the engineering section, he said it's a self-contained, cryogenic stasis unit. They call them 'body bins' because podders use them to store trophies."

This whole thing was beginning to make a nasty kinda sense. Podders are even worth something dead, after all. Particularly to Blooders.

I thanked Auvy and told her to say hello to her folks. And left a fifty on the table after she gave me a look. Like I said, Syndicate born and raised - I was lucky I got a discount. I left the market and headed for Gellique's address.

It was in a nicer, quiet part of the station, one of the blemishes in the otherwise familiar expanse of corruption; remarkable only for unusually clean corridors and a near lack of transients slumped in the alcoves and against the walls. No-one answered when I knocked at the door, so I entered the override code that Auvy had thoughtfully provided for me and slid into the place with a telescoping stun-baton at the ready - firearms costing more than my usual means in bribes. The smell hit as soon as I was inside. It smelled like blood and fear and worse things. A smell I recognized: violent death.

It was a single room and the place had been trashed. It looked like there'd been a cage match between exile addicts. Brownish splotches of dried blood were spattered here and there, among a mess of broken furniture and the detritus of Henri Gellique's life. The blood led to the closet sized bathroom, so I skirted the worst of the debris and carefully slid the door open with my stun-stick.

I recognized Henri Gellique from the picture in Auvy's file, even though he was hanging upside-down. He looked a little bit surprised, and very dead.

Someone had hung him by his feet from the light fixture with wire. He was shirtless, and there was a hole where his heart should have been. I got out a light and checked the floor. There was a ring underneath him, probably where there had been some kind of bucket to catch the blood. Quite a bit had gotten on the floor anyway, and the ring was smeared, as if the bucket had been pushed further into the room at some point. I took some pictures and left, making sure not to touch anything, trying to maintain good habits. Probably a wasted effort, since if the local cops had any forensics equipment that hadn't been hawked, it'd be able to detect I'd been there. Having to answer a few questions, or pay a couple of bribes, wasn't the foremost problem in my mind. I didn't like where this was pointing, not at all, even for podder money.

Dead men don't need cash, after all.

I made it back home - which happened to be the room behind my office - without any incident, and spent a long time in the scrubber before collapsing.

I dared Fortune and hoped tomorrow would be a better day.

That's me. Rordon Tarva: optimist.

Part 3

The next morning, my coffee was interrupted by Sergeant Eniver. He cruised into my office like a Dominix on afterburner: not quickly, but with a certain sense of implacability.

That wasn't where his similarity to a Dominix ended. Eniver was on the short side, but built big, with a face I'm not sure even a mother could love. Maybe he had more hair when he was younger, but these days the scattered survivors clung to the edges of his head; cut to short, gray bristles. Theoretically there was a neck to be found between his wide jaw and wide shoulders, but evidence was scant.

The Sergeant was also that rarest of creatures: a semi-competent, mostly honest cop. Easy to spot, because after 25 years on the force, he was still only a sergeant, and that's as high as he would ever go.

His eyes glittered, suspicious, "Wanna tell me where you were between 1000 and 1100 yesterday, Tarva?"

"In a hangar, one of the podder ones. There're visitor logs and witnesses, if you can get the podder to cough them up. Kaitane Ihonoka."

He chewed on that for a minute, "Client? And can you explain why you were in the compartment of one Henri Gellique?"

I faced away from him, pouring him a coffee, so he couldn't see my face as I answered, "Confidential, and I'm afraid I don't know anyone by that name." Never got the chance to know him, after all. I could tell Eniver didn't believe me, but you never admit anything. He was fishing. If he actually had evidence I was in that apartment, I'd have been in cuffs already.

"So it's just coincidence that we can place you near the scene on the day of the murder, and you're working for his employer?"

I tried on a surprised expression as I set a paper cup of coffee in front of him, "Murder? What happened?"

"He was killed, heart removed. You're tangled up in this, and the sooner you help me, the better I can help you." I wished he could help, as I sipped my coffee and he went on, "You remember anything, you give me a buzz. And don't be trying to leave the station, Tarva. I might want to chat more."

He drained his coffee and stumped out. I hoped he wouldn't be a problem. Worst came to worst, I could get his superiors to divert him somewhere else, Kaita could afford it. I would feel real bad about it though. Eniver was an alright guy, in his way.

I finished my coffee and caught up on message traffic: Bills, bills, a reminder about my rent, and mail from Auvy: No reports of large groups of cultists running around the station, according to her sources. About what I expected, but confirmation didn't hurt. Pieces of this case just didn't quite match up. Blooders, at least our blooders, weren't usually sloppy. Hell, no evidence they had been sloppy, except that half-assed attack on me. I felt like I was walking near a badly calibrated grav generator: off balance and annoyed. Well, something would come loose. It always did if you grabbed it by the collar and shook it long enough.

First stop was Kaita's hangar. It was that or find some blooders to hassle, and I wasn't ready to be an altar-jockey in a real short, real high stakes race just yet.

A couple hours later I had found out the following: Henri Gellique was a nice, average guy. Kept to himself, decent to have a couple rounds with after the shift, supported a sick mother back in the Fed. Couldn't seem to find anyone close to him though. Too average, like a ghost, hollow even before someone cored him like an apple. Did he belong to someone, maybe? One of Kaita's rivals or one of the criminal organizations? I made a note to have Auvy look into the financial records for me, see if there really was a mother in the Fed, or anything else and headed out of the hangar.

I nearly ran into my podder employer as I was leaving. She had traded a form fitting flight suit for a only slightly less form fitting mechanics jumpsuit, which was unzipped just to there. The artful smudge of grease on her cheek completed the picture, but I noticed the hangar staff nearby were still wary of her. So, a show for my benefit. Podders who got their hands dirty - out of the pod - remained a myth in my experience. I was touched that she cared what I thought of her. I think I might have ruined it with my first question, "Kaita. I was hoping to run into you. So, who's in the box?"

Her welcoming smile went cold as winter on Caldari Prime, "That isn't important. Just find it. I trust you are making progress Mr. Tarva? I'm afraid that corporate business will be taking me away from the station indefinitely soon, I can't delay over this."

I managed to keep the surprise off my face, "You're leaving? The hangar staff know that?"

She looked confused as to why I would even ask, anger disappearing as quickly as it had arrived, "My crew, of course, and the local hires... I would assume so. They would have been notified their last pay was coming. Does it matter?"

"I don't know. Maybe. Thanks for the chat. I'll let you know once some leads I've got firm up." There was something about Kaita that made me nervous, and not in a good-looking piece of work way. Well, not entirely. I made a dash for the exit before she could take back the initiative.

I finished up sending Auvy the new info I'd gotten, to see if she could make anything of it, right as I got back to my office.

I stepped through my door, something hit me in the back of the head, and I went out like someone flipped a switch.

When I woke up, my head felt like someone was having a neo-tribal concert in it, I was hanging upside-down, and a face dark with Rak'esme was floating in front of me. Smiling.

Part 4

I had trouble focusing on anything but those squirming tattoos.

They moved, crawling around and across each-other like so many pointy ended, occasionally bifurcating caterpillars. It took me a minute to realize that wasn't just the pop to the head I'd taken; the tattoos were actually moving.

I blinked and things came into better focus. The face behind the caterpillars was young: late teens or early twenties, and a smile of nervous relief hung like a ghost of innocence on those lips. A Blooder smiling in relief is like an expression of vicious blood-lust on your grandmother: a bit off-putting. She spoke, brisk and businesslike, over the slightly worried tone, "Good, you're awake."

She gestured and I noticed track marks on her forearm. Old and still fading, like footprints in sand. Must'a quit before joining up - I'd heard that Dun didn't like his troops sampling the product, and they had a real short recovery program. 1 step, in fact.

I was lowered to the ground by a bulky guy with a nose like a cargo hook and a permanent sneer. He had a few less of the Rak' cavorting across his face, and a scar pulling down the corner of his left eye. He wasn't really the chatty type, I could tell right away.

He cut off my restraints and lifted me to my feet like a sack of beans with legs. Maybe I was still a little wobbly, but I was coming to my senses quick - waking up surrounded by blooders'll do that to you.

They escorted me through the small room's only door. It opened onto a wave of thick, fragrant smoke from dozens of hookahs. Low tables were scattered around, most of them crowded with people. I recognized the place, its quasi-Amarr trappings and its mix of Empire and Kingdom ex-pats and local-born Intaki: Kalorr's Delight. It was a bar and lounge with a good reputation among those who enjoyed a pipe, a drink, and ignorance about who the powers on the station were. For the rest of us, it was blooder central, and the back rooms enjoyed their own reputation.

Trackmarks and Hooknose hustled me through the mixed, sweet haze, conversation dipping as we went by and picking back up behind us, a wave of interrupted susurration tracking our progress. Maybe the normal clientele knew more than I credited them with. Then we were through one of those notorious doors to the back, down a short hallway, through another door, and there was the man himself.

Dun was somewhere in his fifties, Minmatar, mixed tribe. I've heard it said he is just a little more of everything than anyone should be, and that's maybe true. When he was put together, they added a bit of extra everywhere. He's huge, powerfully built, a good half meter taller than me, and I'm not a short guy. He's also ugly as the morning after a bender and charismatic as a - well, as a cult leader. The Rak were swimming across his face, atop the faded remains of gang and tribal tattoos.

The Rak'esme, the fearsome reputation for fanaticism, even the garishly ornate tent Dun wore as a robe - it was all just branding. The man leaning back in a throne-like chair across a wide, design-inlaid desk from me had seen the Blooders and he had seen potential. For money, for power. So, he threw on the robes, rose in the ranks, and made up some scary tattoos. Before Dun, Blooders were non-existent on the station as movers and shakers. Strictly small time. Now even the local Cartel is wary of them.

No doubt he had wielded the knife himself, any number of times, and splashed around in rivers of blood, but Dun was an ambitious businessman, not a fanatic. At least, that's what my gut told me, and I hoped I was right. My life depended on it.

Dun dismissed his lackeys and gestured to a chair, "Rordon, I have a problem."

His voice, his manner, invited confidence - even trust. Like a dear old friend just rediscovered, or a well liked boss. Maybe there's a reason I'm self-employed. I took a seat as he went on, "I understand that you've been asking questions about the followers of the Faith. That someone told you we stole something. Even that one of my people might have attacked you. I thought if we could sit down, we could clear up this little misunderstanding."

"Whacking a guy over the head and stringing him up doesn't say 'let's have a chat' to me, Dun."

"Regrettably, when I made it known that I would like to see you some of my people took it upon themselves to actually capture you. I will make sure that they understand their mistake. Something to drink?"

"Sure."

He might have been telling the truth about how I ended up hanging up-side down in his club, or the whole thing might have been an exercise in pointing out how I could have ended up. I don't think I'll ever know. The important thing was he didn't want me dead.

Unless he just hadn't decided yet.

He pressed a button and spiced wine was brought in, piping hot - and blood red, of course. Hell, it did do wonders for my headache.

After a minute or two, he went on, "I can tell you categorically that none of my people were involved in this. In fact, I'm more than a little unhappy with whoever it is that is sullying our reputation, and I would consider it a personal favor if you would let me know anything you find out." Tempting. In Syndicate, a personal favor meant a debt that would be paid. He smiled, looking like some huge, Gothic, late-Doule-era gargoyle dressed in a brocaded, silk robe, "If I want podder corpses, I can buy them. Again: sorry about the rough handling."

An obvious dismissal. As I stood, the door was opened by the girl with track marks who indicated I should follow her. Before I left, I turned back to the Blooder high priest, "Just a question, Dun. The Rak, they always move?"

Trackmarks looked bit shocked anyone would speak after being dismissed, but her boss took it in stride, "Yes. They represent the power that rests in our blood. If your blood is still, you're dead, aren't you?"

You sure are. It might be bullshit, but he managed to make it sound good. I headed back to the office.

I checked behind the door first thing. No one waiting to clobber me.

Part 5

I poured myself a double, put it on my desk, and sat down. I stared at the amber liquid, watched it vanish a bit at a time.

It wasn't the blooders behind the box disappearing, or I'd be drip-drying. Instead, Dun wanted me to know he was on the hunt too.

Lucky break for me. The kinda luck I could do without having too often.


I checked my messages. Had one from Auvy: Gellique wasn't anyone's puppet, he really was just boring as a Caldari on a downer binge. Just a dock worker like a million others. Hell, he really did have a sickly mother in the Federation - round the clock care. It wasn't cheap.

More than he could afford, on the handful of ISK a month he was paid.

And then he ended up dead.


There were only a few ways a Gellique who didn't work for some bigger player would fit with what I knew. Like, maybe he was on the lookout for himself.

It took me a few hours, and a handful of favors, but I got a compartment number. I made a couple of calls, grabbed my stun-stick and the usual kit, and went for a walk.


The compartment number led me to an abandoned part of the station. The air had the slight metallic tang that comes from cycling through the scrubbers again and again without touching human lungs. The compartment door was big enough for industrial work. It wasn't locked.


The sounds: riveting, welding, grinding, hammering - echoed bizarrely inside, like the cackling of of one of the mad gods worshiped by the cults that infested the lower levels. Loud and disjointed. There was a short corridor, and then a sharp turn. Beyond that was the main room - a vast storage space.


My 500isk-a-day job was sitting in the middle of the room. About man-high, half as wide. Made out of some greyish metal - maybe the stuff Caldari are so fond of. Mostly featureless, aside from the small control panel and a viewport - both covered by panels.


Curved, triangular sections of something - a nuclear containment vessel, maybe - were piled nearby, like an out-sized drift of leaves. A half dozen figures were working to enshroud the box, fitting those pieces together around it, welding them in place.


Not a bad plan: it would hide whatever traces the Box's power plant threw off, and it wouldn't take much of a bribe to make sure no-one wanted to uncork a nuclear bottle.

One man was standing between me and the box, his back to me. Supervising. Even without seeing his face, I knew - the stance, the back of a recruitment-poster haircut, the smug look. Well, I couldn't see the look, but ISK to Syns he looked smug.

Bruve Ashte, of Ashte Security and Consulting. Sleazy rented shield for unwitting podders and general thug, and my employer Kaita's former local security contractor. The small fish that decided to try swallowing a shark. The man behind the shell company behind the shell company renting this place.


See, it'd probably all been Henri Gellique's idea. He had needed money, badly. With his primary employer - Kaita - leaving the station, he might not have even had enough to cover his own rent, much less pay for the care his mother needed. So he got desperate. Kaita might not have known that Ashte was a crook who happened to own a uniform, but Henri was a Syndicate lifer.

He went to Ashte, told him what the prize was, and offered to help for a piece of the action. Poor Henri must have thought it was perfect: he would have needed to deal with the security checkpoint at the hangar one way or another anyway; making them his only accomplices increased shares for everyone.

Ashte isn't the sort who likes sharing, though. Or maybe Ashte's plan was to frame the Blooders from the start - and Henri was a loose end.

So, Ashte offs him, and makes it messy.

Cue yours truly coming to talk with him, and he just has to point me at the blooders. He drives home the point - has some of his guys put on the face paint and try to shake me up.

Ashte just didn't count on Dun valuing his reputation enough to set me straight.

Ashte must have felt my eyes on his back. He turned and saw me. Smiled and walked closer. I sent a message on my neocom and got out my stun-stick.

"Thought you'd still be chasing Reds. Not that it matters." Gone was the terrified rent-a-cop I'd talked with in Ashte's office. He spoke with assurance - secure that he delayed me long enough, and that I had stupidly put myself in his power. That he knew the angles and had them covered. His next words confirmed it, "I hope you aren't counting on the good Sergeant coming with the cavalry. Eniver might be unreasonable, but his superiors are a different story. He's on a long assignment off the station."

He waved over some of his men, never getting close enough that I could take a swing at him. It was hard to tell, but I think one of them was the fake blooder.

They worked me over pretty good, but I took at least a couple of'em out of the fight before the others started practicing their dance steps on my ribs. Lost my stun-stick when I jabbed someone in the neck and one of them took a swing at my elbow with a length of pipe. I found myself curled up on the gound pretty quick after that.

Getting kicked in the head isn't generally a hilarious experience, but I couldn't help it anymore. I started laughing. Not the best thing to do, and with cracked ribs - but it just seemed so damn funny.

I was trying to cover my face - my nose's been broken plenty, I think it's got just the right touch of crookedness already - so I couldn't see Ashte, but I could hear him, "What's so damn funny, Tarva?"

His guys let off, so I rolled over, caught my breath, "Eniver isn't the one I called."

Speak of the demon. I heard noises behind me as I gracefully struggled into a sitting position. Saw Ashte and all his guys' sudden retreat. Managed to turn myself around, so I could see the door.

Aruvasa Dun, blooder high priest, looked a lot more natural in light body armor than brocade robes. In the flickering lashes of razor-edged shadow from welding torches and work lights, it looked a bit like his head was covered in black flames. That might have been the kicks to the old thinker again, though.

I couldn't afford to carry a pistol, and Ashte's crew had a couple of old local copies of Federation sporting rifles.

Every one of the couple dozen people with Dun was holding some kind of assault rifle. Looked like they knew how to use them, too. Two of them were in light powered armor.

Dun smiled, and he looked like something out of a nightmare. Not my nightmare, though.

I'd never been so happy to see blooders in my life, and I hope I'm never that happy to see them again.

I limped for the door. As I passed Dun he grinned wider and said, "I owe you Rordon."

I winced. Probably the cracked ribs. It didn't seem as funny anymore though.

I limped all the way back to my office, locked the door, washed a couple painkillers down with a lot of scotch, and went to bed.

In the morning I felt like a Nyx had fallen on me. I got a strong coffee and settled behind my desk before I noticed the box, sitting there in the middle of my office. Metal. 2m tall, by 1, by 1.

I mention the kicks to the head I took?

There was a note on my desk too. From Dun. It was sitting under the Stun-stick I'd left behind in that compartment:

Rordon,

Thanks for the help. I'm in your debt.

-Aravusa


Great.

I sent a message off to Kaita, let her know she could pick it up, along with a bill for the balance - in ISK.

I sent Dun a bill for 500 Syns for my services. Some debts I can do without holding onto.

I sent Auvy a message, asking her when she'd be free for that dinner.

Found myself at a rare loss as to what to do. Stared at the box a while.

Curiosity is an occupational hazard.

It took me a minute to find and open the view-port on the box, and I looked inside.

Grey eyes looked back at me with a surprised expression. Lighter than I remembered them, but maybe it was just the cold. The Kaita in the box looked innocent. Maybe that's why the Kaita that was paying me wanted her back.

Or maybe not. Podders... there are some things you're better off not knowing, not if you wanted to sleep through the night. My line of work, the stuff you're paid to find out about is bad enough. I snapped the view-port shut.

Kaita's people came and picked up the box, and paid in full.

Noone ever saw Bruve Ashte or a number of his associates on the station again.

Dun sent the money.

Someone anonymously set up a trust to make sure Henri Gellique's mother got the care she needed.

Dinner with Auvy was great, until it got interrupted, but that's a story for a different time.

[Casiella]

One of my favorite bits of EVE fiction.

[Silver Night]

Oh, and lemme know if you spot places that have goofy formatting. The conversion from blogger to forum post tends to be imperfect /o\