A Deal with the Devil's Broker Read online

  Oh yeah. And trash chambers.

  I should’ve left the bastard in there, she thought as she jogged down the central corridor, on her way through Cargo section to the Helm. If she kept moving, she should be able to avoid freezing to death.

  Noemi shivered as she passed the large viewing window that looked down into the cargo bay. Through the thick, narrow glass, she saw her team. Jeral, Mackie, and Kett were strapped inside their mechs, their techsuits bright green and their thermowire hoods covering their faces for warmth.

  They were hard at work. She could almost feel the vibrations from the steps of their two-ton mechs as they moved sheets of molybdenum, blocks of raw iron, and what looked like another palette of those mysterious locked crates that processing had been sending down on a regular basis since they left Tiber.

  She had no idea what was in those crates. Jeral was obsessed with them, insisting on stacking them himself. Noemi could tell Braddock wasn’t entirely happy with that, but the way he had acquiesced to Jeral indicated that the decision was above him. And as long as Jeral stacked them safely, Braddock didn’t have much to argue against.

  Through the window Noemi watched as Jeral’s mech picked up another of the crates and stalked toward the enclosed cage where they were being stored.

  Each cargo mech stood about fifteen feet high. They looked something like the giant skeleton of an Earth gorilla she once saw on an old nature vid: long metal arms, used for carrying cargo, and short, bowed-out legs to maintain a low center of gravity for balance. Their pilots rode in the mechs’ torsos, using their own arms and legs—via a system of haptic controls—to transmit their movements to the corresponding appendage of their mechs.

  These mechs were older models, probably made decades ago on New Carthage and sold second-hand to the outer zone when newer models came along. Each bore signs of age and use: chipped paint, a patchwork of replacement parts, dings and dents. Thick streaks of dark lubricant dripped from their joints.

  Noemi could tell which of her teammates drove each mech simply by their movements. Jeral was quick but unbalanced, always overtaxing his mech’s gyros. It gave his machine a jerky gait when it walked. How he had ever obtained a first-class ranking was beyond her.

  Mackie was overly cautious, almost as if unsure of himself, usually carrying much less than the max load the mechs could handle. His inefficiency drove Braddock crazy.

  And Kett, well—he was just slow as hell.

  She watched their breath puff out of the mesh of their hoods as they worked, freezing in the air before them. Cargo Section was always cold, but the inside of the bay itself was the coldest of all—a huge room separated from the icy vacuum of space by just a few feet of metal sheeting. A giant refrigerator.

  Noemi watched them for a full minute, despite the cold. It was tough work, exhausting and often miserable. And, at that moment, there was nowhere else she’d rather be.

  Just inside the cargo bay door she saw her own mech, empty and still. A thin crust of frost encased its limbs.

  In her mech’s torso, she saw the wide, flat pedals where her feet went, the limb brackets for her arms and legs, and its padded backrest with that thick strip of repair tape down the middle that she’d been meaning to replace with something more permanent. But now it just stood there, waiting for her to climb in and bring it to life.

  She turned away from the window and jogged toward Helm, hugging herself for warmth.

  The shiny brass nameplate bolted to the thick metal door was hard to miss.

  Mayve dar Bueil: Shipboard Corporate Officer

  Devil’s Broker, Barstow-Class Freighter

  ExoRok Astro Mining, Inc.

  Noemi tapped the access plate and forced herself to smile at the small entrance camera. She’d heard that Mayve liked to make people wait. At least Helm was heated—Noemi felt the temperature rise the moment the wide double-door in the bulkhead slid open to let her pass through from Cargo.

  Helm had its own heat source, gravity panels, and electrical power. It was well insulated and could fully detach from the rest of the ship in an emergency, saving the company’s costly human assets—its captain, officers, and corporate representatives—even if the rest of the ship had to be abandoned.

  After an interminable minute, during which Noemi could feel Mayve’s eyes boring into her from somewhere on the other side, the door slid open.

  Soft, old-Earth jazz spilled out. Noemi entered and the door slid shut behind her.

  The floor of Mayve’s office was covered with thick, cream-colored carpet. Woven into the rug in a tasteful shade of gray was the ExoRok logo. The center was a large “O” made of stylized asteroids. Appearing to orbit the “O” on its left was a snazzy-looking “Ex,” while an “R” at the top and a “k” at the bottom also shared the central “O.”

  A decorative waterfall cascaded down one wall, and real animal-skin lounge chairs were clustered around a glass coffee table with a selection of vidpaper magazines—mostly travel and architecture publications from New Carthage—tastefully fanned across its surface.

  At the far end of the room was a large desk. It looked like real wood. And behind the desk sat Mayve.

  She was middle-aged and plump, wearing a loose-fitting kimono that shimmered with posh holothread. The holothread projected fashionable patterns that seemed to hover just above the silky fabric, like curated clouds gliding over the surface of a couture planet.

  Mayve’s graying hair was up in a loose bun, stuck through with ivory pins, and stylish gold glasses perched on the tip of her nose. Her lips were buried under a thick coat of bright red lipstick, and a pungent whiff of floral perfume wafted across the room, causing Noemi to crinkle her nose. The woman clearly had been pretty once, but time and rich living had taken their toll.

  Mayve’s head was nodding animatedly, but not at Noemi. The woman had her headset on and was talking and laughing while she doodled on her input pad with a gold-colored stylus. As Noemi approached, Mayve held up a finger and gave her a curt shake of her head.

  The message was clear: Stop. Wait.

  Noemi did, passing the time by exploring the office with her eyes. Behind Mayve’s desk was a wide window, the star field visible beyond. The rough surfaces of nearby asteroids were only faintly lit by the distant sun. They must still be in the belt, dumping the excess tailings before continuing on to Cassius Station.

  Noemi stood patiently while Mayve chatted, looking out into space. It was beautiful. She hadn’t had a good look out a window in weeks. And this was a real window, not a grainy camera feed like in the Habitat lounge, where the “view” was just a vidfeed piped inside to an old monitor that displayed an image so poor you couldn’t be sure if you were looking at real stars or dead pixels.

  Only the captain, officers, and company executives had windows in their quarters and offices. Windowed rooms required a large allocation of heat to offset the chill they pulled in from space. And heat was of course a luxury on the Broker.

  Mayve’s window was impressively big. And she sat before it like a queen on a throne.

  Noemi had never seen a view quite like this before. Even Tiber Station’s few small windows had so much light pollution from the station’s exterior docking lights that deep space was merely an abstraction—it was out there, somewhere. But from Mayve’s dimly lit office Noemi thought she could see the whole universe. Distant galaxies hung like little jewels, while closer in was the sparkling topography of the Milky Way’s Norma Arm. In the distance, yet so big she thought she could reach out and touch it, was the bulging white smear of the Galactic Core.

  Wow.

  The Broker was slowly rotating, giving Noemi a changing view as she stood staring out into the black. After a few minutes, a thin arc of green-gray appeared.

  The planet Sarmatia. The smallest gas giant in the Aquitanian System, the inner-most giant planet of the outer zone. The Broker was close to Cassius, then. She knew from nav charts and word of mouth that Cassius Station orbited one of Sarmat
ia’s moons.

  It was beautiful. Noemi had never seen a planet up close like this.

  She wasn’t sure how much time passed, but suddenly, she realized Mayve was staring at her, headset off, an annoyed expression on her face.

  “Enjoying the view out my window I see. Yes, it’s lovely. I know. So, how may I help you?”

  With a sigh, Noemi set the coat on the desktop between them.

  “Noemi Ochana. Requesting—”

  “No.”

  “Pardon?”

  “The answer, Miss Ochana, is no.”

  She was taken aback. “How do you even know what I was going to ask?”

  The red-caked corners of Mayve’s mouth humped up in a smile that gave Noemi the chills. The woman’s skin was unnaturally rigid—some kind of firming treatment, Noemi guessed. Mayve pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose and tapped a screen.

  “I have a report here. Came in about an hour ago, filed by your team leader, Jeral. And another just came in from Medical. Both indicate that you removed your techsuit coat outside of the permitted areas. Two reports, both confirming the same protocol violation.”

  Noemi’s hands clenched around the ruined coat on the desk before her. She felt like she’d been betrayed. Jeral was a bastard, so his report was hardly surprising. But that nurse had at least seemed sympathetic.

  “But I tore it saving Jeral’s life! Didn’t he put that in his report? And he tried—”

  Mayve held up a hand. “The reason doesn’t matter, Miss Ochana. Jeral’s actions are not your concern. What is of concern is your violation. Do you deny that you broke protocol?”

  Noemi released her death grip on the coat and stepped back. So that was it, then. SCO Mayve dar Bueil was going to be her judge, jury, and executioner.

  “No,” Noemi said, defeated. “I don’t. Here’s my coat back.”

  Mayve, nose upturned, leaned across her desk and nudged the filthy pile of fabric back toward Noemi with the tip of her stylus.

  “This is still yours. And it stinks.”

  “It no longer works. I can’t use it.”

  “Not my problem, Miss Ochana. You’ve signed for it, and it is therefore part of your debt to ExoRok, as owners of the Devil’s Broker.”

  “Yes, but I can’t pay off that debt unless I can work. I need a new one.”

  “I can issue you a new one once you’ve paid this one off. Perhaps with credit from your account?”

  “I have nothing in my account. I used everything I’d earned on Tiber as a down payment on my techsuit. That’s why I took this job.”

  “Yes, that is a shame.” Was that a smirk on Mayve’s face?

  Noemi lost it.

  “Hell and starlight! What is with everyone on this ship? It’s like every single one of you wants to screw me over just because you can. I’m the one who saved Jeral. Doesn’t that count for something? He’s your third nephew twice removed, right?”

  Mayve didn’t blink during the outburst, but after Noemi finished, she calmly turned and tapped at her tablet.

  “Ah, Jeral. He’s a good egg, that boy. And yes, he’s distant family. But don’t imagine for a second that gives him any advantage on this ship.”

  Noemi resisted the urge to roll her eyes.

  Mayve tapped her tablet screen a few more times, read silently for a few seconds, then continued.

  “Ah, yes. Here it is. Under ‘additional compensation.’ Well, Miss Ochana, the company does provide small rewards when employees come to the aid of their colleagues. Should it be demonstrated that you did in fact help Jeral, you could be awarded a small bonus.”

  Noemi brightened. “How much?”

  Mayve ran her finger over the screen, peering down her nose through her glasses.

  “One hundred credits.”

  “One hundred? That’s hardly anything. I saved his life!”

  “Bonuses scale with rank. If you were second class, you could get …” she peered at the screen again, “… five hundred credits.”

  Noemi swallowed her anger. “How much is a new coat?”

  “They run 7500 credits. But you still owe, let’s see … six thousand nine hundred credits on the one you’ve destroyed.”

  Noemi sighed. She didn’t need to do the math—it all came out red. This day couldn’t get any worse.

  Mayve continued. “However, on top of your first violation, Jeral’s filed another report about you. It appears he has some concerns about your behavior. Behavior violations can lead to additional penalties, you know. It’s all in your contract.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Well, I haven’t had time to review his report completely. Been quite busy, as you can see.” She waved her stylus around vaguely, indicating her clean desk and empty room. Quiet jazz still played from hidden speakers.

  Noemi tried not to laugh in the woman’s face. “May I ask just what behavior violation he reported?”

  Mayve ran her stylus over the screen. “Let’s see … inappropriate advances, attempted bribery—”

  “That’s not true! He hit on me—”

  Mayve slammed her palm down on the desk. “I’ve had enough of your outbursts, Miss Ochana. Given your situation, I would advise you to be more respectful. You have ruined the coat of your techsuit. You broke ship’s protocols. As a result you cannot work. Those were your choices to make. I am not sure what you expect me to do.”

  Noemi bit her tongue and muttered, “Fine. So what happens now?”

  Mayve’s tone became clipped and formal, almost as if she were handing down a sentence. Which, from Noemi’s perspective, she was.

  “Your injury automatically puts you on a twenty-hour probation. But even after that, I don’t see how you can work if you can’t afford a new techcoat. Because you are unable to fulfill your contractual duties, I am afraid you will be demoted to passenger status for the remainder of the voyage, and will be debted accordingly. If you can’t pay off your debts to us, then by Aquitanian System law your debt package will be auctioned off at the next station to any entity willing to assume it. You will be indentured until that debt is paid off, with the addition of your debtor transaction fees, as well as interest, at a rate of—”

  Noemi was near tears again, remembering all the times she’d calculated interest on her previous debts as she worked so hard to pay them off. But she wasn’t going to give SCO dar Bueil the satisfaction of seeing her cry. “Yes, I know. 27.5% per annum.”

  “Actually, it’s 28.25% now. That’s the most recent Indentured Labor debt rate set by the System Commission. Just came through last week.” She folded her hands together and sat back, a smile on her face. “Is there anything else I can do for you, Miss Ochana?”

  Noemi’s jaw dropped. No wonder no one cared. Her debt was probably a more valuable asset to ExoRok than her labor.

  She snatched her coat off Mayve’s desk and left before the tears came.

  6

  Impact

  Surprisingly, Noemi made it all the way back to Habitat and into her quarters before bursting into tears. Not the tears she cried when Aunt Aylene left her on Tiber Station. Those had been the tears of a lonely fourteen-year-old girl.

  These were tears of defeat and anger. Of helplessness and rage.

  There was of course no window in her small, square room. The metal walls were insulated with cheap batting covered in some thin smartplastic that could be programmed to display various patterns to alleviate visual boredom. Floor and ceiling vents piped in minimal heat from Engineering.

  A narrow bed folded down from a metal frame in the wall, beneath which was a row of crates with her personal belongings. In one corner was a small sink and mirror. Toilets and showers were nearby in a communal bathroom. A low couch, covered in threadbare red fabric, was pushed up against one wall, with a small vid screen opposite. A tiny desk and chair completed her meager furnishings.

  On top of the desk were her work gloves, the ones she should have had with her. They were made of the same material
as her techsuit, and when connected to her coat—at least up until recently—heated her hands and transmitted her fingers’ neuromuscular signals to her mech. Next to the gloves lay her forgotten med kit, sized to fit in the cargo pocket of her pants.

  “Where were you guys when I needed you?” she asked them bitterly.

  Lights in the ceiling imitated the hues of dawn, day, dusk, and night. Right now, they cast the dim light of what was supposed to be dusk on New Carthage, though she’d probably only ever know it in the abstract.

  “Darker!” she sniffed, and her room was plunged into near darkness. It seemed appropriate to her mood.

  She threw her tattered techsuit coat in the corner and sank onto the couch, pressing her palms to her eyes to stanch the flow of tears. All this bullshit over a fancy coat.

  She pulled herself together and started to pack her things.

  The Devil’s Broker was likely in broadcast range of Cassius Station now, and Mayve was probably already transmitting a “crew wanted” job posting to find Noemi’s replacement, and a debtor auction notice to potential bidders to buy out her debt.

  When they arrived on Cassius, she might already have a new employer, and they’d expect her to transfer immediately. She’d probably get a station job. The odds of her debt getting bought by another freighter were low—she hadn’t even completed her first inner-zone run, and there were always higher-ranking lifters looking for work. No freighter captain in his right mind would buy a rookie lifter’s debt package.

  But she had station experience from growing up on Tiber. Maybe Cassius would put her in their kitchens. That was about the best she could hope for now.

  As she stuffed her few things into a duffel, she tried to figure out what had gone wrong. Yes, she’d violated a few protocols—to help Jeral.

  And now that she thought of it, she’d seen her teammates Kett and Mackie violate all kinds of protocols, too. Driving their mechs while drunk. Taking longer breaks than permitted. That kind of thing.

  Jeral never reported them.

  Braddock must have noticed. As Cargo foreman, he never missed anything. But if he’d ever reported them, she wasn’t aware of it. What she did know was that no one on her lifter team was as good as she was. Mackie drove his mech like a beginner. Kett had no finesse and spilled more crates than anyone she’d ever seen. Jeral constantly fought with his mech, driving it in a clunky, unpracticed fashion.