Renegades, page 22
6
“I can see your ribs.”
Petra frowned, but Reggie knew that once she understood his meaning, and why he was watching her as she showered, it would make her happy.
“I know, Reggie. Why would you say that?”
“What I mean is, I can see your ribs, but it’s harder than it was. Much harder, actually. Petra, you’re gaining weight. I can see it as plain as the nose on my face. And you wear it well. You are beautiful.”
Petra smiled, making no effort to cover herself. She had become very comfortable with Reggie and, after that particular comment, enjoyed having his eyes on her. “Thank you. That means a lot to me.”
“I love you, too,” he said. And continued staring at her. “I’m not saying it because I feel like I have to, and I’m not saying something I don’t mean. I love you, Petra.”
Her smile grew even wider, and she beckoned to him. He approached and she pulled him to her and kissed him, soaking his shirt. When they finally released each other, Reggie ran his fingers through his hair several times.
“Ok, I’m going to change. You finish up in here and then meet me in the starlight room. There is something I want to talk to you about. Don’t worry, it’s a good thing.” He winked at her and exited the bathroom.
After changing, Reggie gathered an ice bucket, a bottle of sparkling wine that was from a region of Gellar-16 that only produced a few dozen bottles a year – which many connoisseurs considered the best on Orris – two flute glasses, and a towel to wrap the pre-chilled bottle in. He filled the bucket with ice and the wrapped bottle and moved everything into the starlight room, where he sat and waited.
Petra towel dried and brushed her still-damp hair. In only a towel, she joined Reggie in the starlight room and sat on his lap as she often did.
“What’s all this?” she asked, spying the wine and glasses.
“We’re going to leave soon. I think it will only be another week. Ander is anxious to go. He’s close to being broke with all of the expenses we’ve had, and the longer we wait, the more opportunity for us to be caught. Do you understand what happens if we’re caught?”
“Yes, I understand.”
“I also want to make sure you understand that once we leave, we also leave my wealth behind. Now, I believe completely that my money has played no part in your affection toward me, so please don’t misunderstand, but it’s still an important aspect of our lives that I want to make sure you acknowledge. Do you understand that, too?”
“I do, Reggie, and you’re right, I don’t care about that. We could be homeless, and I would still want to be with you.”
A warm rush of blood entered his face, but he smiled anyway. “Okay, with all of that out of the way, I want to marry you. I want our souls bonded together. I want to give you a spectacular wedding, while I still have the means to do so. But most importantly, I want you to be my wife. I want to remove any doubt in our relationship, and I want to know that you’ll be by my side forever. I love you, and that’s what I want. Will you marry me?”
Petra stared at Reggie with wide eyes and started breathing harder. She tried to answer, but only high-pitched screeches came out. Tears began streaming down her face, and she abandoned the effort to speak and just nodded continuously.
Reggie smiled and pulled her in to kiss her.
7
Jerrick awoke from an unpleasant dream and felt as if he had only slept for an hour. He leaned over to read the time on his nightstand and was shocked to find he had actually slept for ten.
He slid off his bed and walked into the bathroom, where he gripped the sink and stared at himself in the mirror.
“You killed a man,” he said, only to his reflection, and sounding indifferent. “He was alive this morning, and now he’s cold and dead. He would be alive right now if you hadn’t murdered him.”
The exercise was meant to dig for guilt, because from the moment he awoke, the fact that he felt none at all was a surprise to him. He would have gotten you killed. You and Volo and all the others. It was him or us. Ander’s voice was the one that reasoned with him in the confines of his thoughts, and Jerrick knew he was right. The experiment yielded no more guilt than he had found when he awoke, so he decided to drop the matter and move on. He had to be at work in less than an hour.
8
Becca sat in darkness on the edge of Ander’s bed and listened to him snore. Old doubts were resurfacing in her mind as quickly as the resolutions she had settled upon could stamp them out. She wanted to get up and move, if only to allow her to focus on something other than the question: to go, or to not go.
She stood and gathered her underwear. As she dressed, she heard a hitch in Ander’s breathing, and then his voice.
“Please, don’t do that.”
“I have to. I have to go back to my place. I need to think, and I need to do… something. I’m not sure what yet, but if I’m going to leave, I’m not going to simply disappear. I owe much more than that to my family.”
“I understand.”
“Yes, you understand. But it makes you angry, doesn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“That’s okay,” she walked around his bed to the side where he lay and kissed him. “We will see much more of each other very soon. For now, you need to be patient. Do that for me, Ander,” she leaned in and kissed him again and then resumed dressing.
“I will. Are you going to come here tomorrow evening? Will you have dinner with me?”
“Yes, I’ll be here when you get back from Command, if you want. Can one of the lugs let me in?”
Ander smiled at her choice of word for his guards, but he shook his head. “No, they can’t access the apartment, but you can. Just touch the lock panel. It already has your signature in it. I added it manually.”
Becca nodded as she picked up her clutch. “Ander? Do you know yet? Do you know when we’re leaving? How much time I have left?”
“Eight days.”
Becca sighed deeply and nodded again. “Okay, Ander. Good night.”
“Good night.”
9
As the end of his shift was upon him, Jerrick started undoing his flight suit and walked toward the locker room. A voice called out to him. He turned to find Sola, still covering the back half of Chuck’s shifts while he was on the Command cylinder, walking toward him with a package wrapped tightly in brown packing paper in his right hand.
“This came for you a half hour ago, from all the way up front!”
Jerrick took the package and read the address information. It was from Ander. It did not say his name, but the return address was Ander’s apartment.
“Thank you, Sola.”
“No problem. Do you know what it is?”
“No, but it’s from my relatives up in the front, so it’s probably something dumb. They’re not gifted people.”
Sola seemed satisfied with the answer and walked back to the supervisor’s office. Jerrick changed into his street clothes and walked the heavy package back to his apartment.
Once his door had locked behind him, he tore the package open to find two thick manuals and a note card. He unfolded the card to find only eight words printed carefully:
One for you, one for another, find another
Jerrick set the note aside and read the covers of the manuals. They were identical.
Class 7 Lance Operation & Navigation
I have to find another pilot, he thought. Easier said than done. The problem was not that he had a shortage of pilots in his circle of friends and acquaintances. It was finding one that was also a renegade.
“Volo?” he asked aloud to no one but himself, then laughed. Volo was a fine friend, but an experienced pilot he was not[a8]. He would have no better chance of piloting a Lance than a student on his first day.
From conversations he’d had with both Ander and Dr. Clairbaugh, Jerrick knew that whoever flew the Lance would need to be good. As good as he was. The plan was to break into and shut down the chain yard on Link 3. Once they had taken the yard, they would board and untether two Lances. From the yard, they would visit eleven staging points to pick up supplies and passengers. That was the hard part. Anyone could activate the flex drive and follow the navigation program. Flying an enormous ship in and out of docks repeatedly was not for the faint of heart, nor was it for an amateur.
“Chuck would be perfect,” he said aloud, again only to himself. The inherent problem was that Chuck was not a renegade. Chuck had been Jerrick’s flight trainer when he had just graduated flight theory school, shortly after being hired as an apprentice operator by Rear Command. Chuck taught Jerrick everything he knew about navigating large, awkward crafts. When his trainer took the job of supervisor, Jerrick took his job as rigging operator. Chuck claimed Jerrick had surpassed him in performance, but Jerrick had seen Chuck in action on many occasions. Chuck was good.
So, his new mission was either to find an expert pilot who also happened to be a renegade or convince Chuck to leave Orris forever. Both seemed almost impossible.
10
“So, did you have a revelation?” Ander asked as the two ate a humble dinner at his kitchen table the night after she accepted his request.
“I did. A few, actually,” Becca said. “I wrote a farewell letter to my parents, and another to my extended family, but I will see them one more time before I leave for good. This week, I will spend two days with them. I’ll send the letters the day we leave.”
“Good. What else?”
“The Lances. I want to have the conversation now, so that there are no surprises when we leave.”
“That sounds very reasonable. What conversation?”
“I am intimately familiar with them. I lived on one for my entire life, literally. During my schooling, they introduced me to the more technical aspects of the machines. What I mean to say is that when it comes to the machines themselves, any question, any decision that needs to be made, any idea about how well the Lance would perform in one situation or another, all of these things must be deferred to my judgment. I know more than you, and I even know more than Reggie about them, and I ask that I be the final word on any Lance-related topic.”
“I would agree to that on one condition: if you object to any action we would otherwise take, you will need to offer an alternative. We will be living in a world where every decision we make is life or death.”
“Of course.”
“In that case, I am very comfortable with you taking charge of the machines.”
“Excellent, thank you.”
“It’s my pleasure. Is there anything else?”
“Yes. My name.”
Ander frowned.
“My last name, Potaglia, is a name that is tied closely to Garrett Rhodes and the successful journey to Orris from Earth, the success of Lance 5. I don’t want to use my real last name with the renegades. I don’t want it associated with them, or Keystone.”
“Okay, I can think of no reason you would need to. What would you like to use instead?”
“Just my first and middle name, Rose. I would like to be known only as Becca Rose.”
Ander smiled. “Becca Rose. It sounds a lot like Rhodes.”
Becca returned the smile but did not otherwise respond.
Chapter 11
The Vault
1
Todd Bixly sat at his desk with his face buried in his folded arms. Footsteps sounded in the distance, getting closer before seeming to stop in his doorway. He heard a familiar voice.
“How are you doing, Todd?” Commander Bellinger asked.
Todd lifted his head and looked at the Commander, expressionless. Without averting his gaze, he shook his head.
“May I come in?”
Todd took a deep breath and sat heavily back in his chair. “Yes, of course, sir. Please,” he gestured to the single chair that sat opposite his.
The commander stepped into the office, which was barely big enough to fit Todd’s desk and sat. “I’m sorry to say, Todd, that you look defeated.”
Todd laughed. “That’s one way of putting it, yes. I feel defeated. I feel like there’s nothing I can do to get this operation caught up. My entire staff is composed of nothing but tricksters, swindlers, and deadbeats. They can’t do a lick of math until it comes time for them to squabble over how much paid time off they have, and then they’re expert mathematicians. They call in sick or just simply don’t show up more than they actually come to work, and when they do, they act like any work they do is a personal favor to me, like they’re not obligated to work for their money. Like we pay them just to show up and be here. It’s exhausting.”
Len smiled and nodded. “What else? You can be candid, Todd. We’re peers, now that you are part of the management team.”
Todd clenched his jaw and stared down at his hands, afraid to see the commander’s expression at his next statement. “I want to fire all of them. I know I can’t, but I want to. The problem is that their pay is terrible, so even if I got rid of all of them, they would be replaced by new people with the same problems, who act the same way and get just as little done. I need to increase their pay, so I can hire better people to do the work and do it well.”
“But those jobs aren’t worth more money, so you can’t pay them more.”
Todd lifted his hands to his face.
“You can, however, fire anyone you want. There are no contracts at this level. All employment is ‘at will.’ You have complete authority over it, and you are directly responsible for it. Can I give you some advice?”
“Please, sir. Anything.”
“Every member of your staff is different, with varying degrees of competence and incompetence. Do you agree?”
Todd shrugged and nodded.
“Good. So… how many staff do you have?”
“Seven.”
“Okay, good. Rank them. Do it based on how much value they add to your department. At the end of the week, fire the lowest ranking employee. Always do it at the end of the week, Todd. They take it better going into a weekend. You will hire a new person to fill the role, and the chances are good that the new person will not rank last on your updated list. Do you see what that would do for you? It would improve your department; it would strengthen your workforce. Do it a few more times, and I think you’ll find that the people working for you recognize what’s happening, and if they need the job, their performance will improve without you having to do anything else. If they don’t care, then they will quickly fall to the bottom of your list, and they’ll find themselves unemployed.”
Todd was nodding. “That’s good advice, sir.”
Len laughed. “Of course it is, Todd! Do you think I fell into the role of commander?”
Todd laughed. It felt good to laugh with the Commander of Orris. He must have believed Todd could do the job. Why else would he be coaching him?
“How much money do you make, Todd? Not the amount, but as a factor of your staff’s rate?”
“Oh, um, I guess about three and a half times as much.”
“Do you think you’re overpaid or underpaid for this job?”
Todd squirmed in his chair and shrugged. “Sometimes I think I’m underpaid, but honestly, it’s a lot more money than I’ve ever made before.”
“Of course it is, Todd. Because you’re adding more value to Orris than you ever have before. Now, do you think your staff believes you’re overpaid?”
“Ha! I’m sure they do, but they have no idea what I have to deal with.”
“Exactly, Todd. Exactly. Now, I have one last question, and then I’ll let you get back to it.”
Todd nodded.
“Do you still think Chuck Simms’ job is easy?”
2
Garrett sat down at the terminal in his apartment two days after Becca had visited him. It was early in the morning, and the mission he assigned himself was to find some small-scale brewing equipment. Len Bellinger had warned him that droves of reporters, historians, researchers, and others would seek his presence in the coming weeks and months, but other than the banquet, nothing was scheduled for the former envoy for several days. Len recommended he use those days to relax.
The day after Becca had visited him, he did just that. He relaxed the morning away, then went out searching the Command cylinder’s bars and pubs for real beer. He was unsuccessful. Every variety he tried resembled the same diluted, unseasoned bread water that he had found in the refrigerator the night he moved into his new apartment.
