As I walked back to where I had docked Hauley, it hit me. "I checked, there's money." the one called Chance had said.
There's money... the words bounced around in my head. There's money... "not one of your bounties"... "I checked, there's money."
I ran.
As I reached the station arm where Hauley was docked, I slowed to a walk. As I approached the ship I couldn't help but notice that a couple of the station guards, in thier rediculous orange and yellow uniforms, had stationed themselves on either side of the airlock leading to my ship. The uniforms may have looked rediculous, but I knew the men in those uniforms were far from. Station security on the many space stations and star ports that I had visited in my time on the Haul-o-caster varied wildly. Some places, they were little more than criminals. Other places they were practically shock troups. Often, as we docked with a station, Pete would give me a run down of his impressions from the last time he was there. With this station, he always warned that I should be polite to the station guard. The station manager was passing strange, hence the uniforms, but he paid well enough to attract some very competent security personel. Regardless of what they thought of the uniform.
I didn't know what to do. If the Haul-o-caster was parked at one of the cargo docks, I might have been able to skirt around and sneak aboard using one of the other hatches. Every ship has a number of hatches so that there is usually one handy no matter how or where you are trying to dock. As it was, Hauley was attached to the station by her nose hatch, and all the others were out there in space. Without a survival suit, they were out of reach. Sure, I was wearing a ship suit, and ship suits are designed to provide SOME protection in the case of a hull breach, but not enough to risk a space walk in one.
As I stood there looking at the two station security officers blocking my way to the only home I had ever known, I heard from behind me "You know, you might want to get out of sight. Or at least stare at those staties a little less obviously."
It was Chance. Great, just what I needed.
"Gregorious send you to make nice?" I asked as I looked for a less obvious place to watch from.
"Nope, he sent me to make sure you were Ok. He would have asked someone else to come if what he wanted was to make nice. Never make the mistake of thinking that I'm nice." he replied.
Well ok. Chance is not nice. He said so, right there, openly. I'm inclined to take his word for it.
"Gracie, she's nice. Al is too unless he thinks you are out to harm Gregorious or the Pride, then he can become a right bastard. He hasn't decided about you yet, so for now watch your back around him." Chance said.
"Why are you telling me all this? As far as I'm concerned, as soon as I can get back aboard Hauley, I'm out of here and don't plan on seeing any of you again." I replied. I wasn't about to take his word on Gracie or Al. As far as I was concerned, I wasn't about to trust any of them.
"HAH!" he laughed. "You don't understand. Gregorious isn't going to just let this go. He thinks of you like you are family or something. Been referring to you as his niece that layed the golden egg. I don't get the reference, but he definitely isn't going to just watch you fly away."
I got the reference, and in the version of that story I remembered, the farmer got greedy and cut that goose open to see where all the golden eggs were coming from.
"Go away. I have to figure out what I'm going to do." I hissed. Standing here talking to this guy was not getting me anywhere except further and further into paranoidsville. I had to come up with a way to figure out what station security was doing guarding my hatch, preferably without getting arrested, and then figure out what to do from here.
Then I saw Chance's blasters and the beginnings of an idea started to form. Before Chance had a chance (ha!) to realize what I was doing, I snatched one of his blasters and held it up so he could see it. I didn't point it at anyone, since I didn't want anyone to get hurt in case there was an accident. Just as I expected, Chance tried to take it away from me... So I started screaming bloody murder.
I have long known that men could be a little dumb at times. Just as I hoped, hearing a female scream, got the attention of the station guards who came running to investigate. That's when I let go of the blaster and fell, as if Chance had overpowered me. My timing was a little off, but it was close enough. When the guards arrived there was Chance, with one blaster in hand and the other in it's holster, looking for all the world like he was standing over me threateningly.
"Drop the weapon!" The guards both yelled, then one of them went for a flying tackle. Poor Chance was slammed to the ground and cuffed before he knew what hit him. I on the other hand, slipped past the guards who were focused on the "dangerous badguy" with the weapon instead of the poor victimized, helpless girl, and ran for home.
I made it.
To Chance's credit, I will say he struggled and cussed much longer than he needed to. I think he was keeping the guard's attention on him to give me time. Or, I could just be fooling myself since he's... you know... kinda cute.
I'm such an idiot.
Once I had Hauley's hatch sealed, I couldn't help but hear the comm system beeping that I had messages coming in. Oh what a surprise! yea... right.
The sheer number of messages was a surprise. Who knew that many people wanted to talk to little ol' me?
There was, of course, the expected message from Gregorious. "I'm sorry for the miscommunication." "You need to come talk to me." "Pete was my best friend in the whole world, I think of you as my niece." yadda yadda yadda... I noticed he left off the "that laid a golden egg" part.
There was a message from station command saying that Senator Sampton wanted to "make my aquaintence". A quick look at the data net showed me that Senator Sampton was the for-mentioned station manager with the poor taste in guard uniform. So the flowery speech in the message wasn't surprising. It did, however explain why only two guards were at my hatch rather than an entire platoon.
There were a lot of messages for Pete. Invitations to meet for drinks. A couple inquiries as to rates for hauling cargo. A couple indecent solicitations from station prostitutes. Who knew Pete was so popular?
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