Still clinging
to a faint hope of survival, it gripped onto my tongue with its
sharp toes. The pain instead prompted me to bite down hard. I heard
the ribs crack, felt the squishy organs spill out of the holes in
its torso, the hot blood streaming down my chin. Not knowing
exactly what to do next, I flicked the corpse to the back of my
mouth with my tongue and, with a great deal of effort,
swallowed.
"You have a bit of something there." Jakob
Griggs, the shadowy director of the anarchy of Vesta, gestured to
his left cheek. I picked up a napkin and dabbed it at the
approximate area he had indicated, it came back stained dark red.
If I had been superstitious, I might have taken it as an omen of
things to come.
Chapter 10
A few days after my encounter with my
all-powerful employer, I was eating dinner with my former
crewmates. Nothing anywhere near the quality of that veritable
feast Jakob Griggs had, just some flavored lichen-based foodstuffs
that grew in some of the smaller caves set aside for food
production. To be honest, I hadn't had much of an appetite after
that eventful luncheon. I was cutting up a greenish loaf when Cole
spoke.
"It's funny," he said to no one in
particular. "Just a couple days ago, all our rates went up ten
percent. Wonder what changed this time?"
"No idea," I said. I really did have no idea
what he was talking about. My own rates hadn't changed since I
started working for the SPPS. Why would everyone else's rise?
Denal offered his own thoughts. "Well, I
asked some of the boys and girls I know by the docks. They said
that Marquez hadn't upped their own bills by any significant
amount."
"So it's just us?" said Aniya, who was
tearing off chunks of two whole loaves of lichen bread as we
talked. "You think it's because of the whole bounty hunter
thing?"
"Doubt it; it's been weeks," Cole said.
"Unless something else happened with Argen over in the genetics
labs."
I paused for a second. I couldn't tell them
anything about MOR10X-6; I had promised Jakob I wouldn't tell
anyone. "No, nothing like that." Which was true in the vaguest
sense. I had not encountered any bounty hunters or anything like
that.
"Here's an idea," Denal began, which probably
meant it was doomed to fail. "That Derrick Marquez guy is just a
big bully, like that VP's kid we splattered out by Ceres. He's not
used to people standing up to him, so how about we miss a payment
or two, and when he comes over looking for money, we firmly, and
with our weapons well at hand, tell him we're not paying the
increased rate?"
I could tell from the start that it was a bad
idea. "Look," I told him, "I still have some money left over after
the insurance deductions. I could give it all to you guys and just
live off the algal dole."
"And what about when the premiums get too
high for even that to help?" Aniya asked.
I honestly hadn't thought of that
possibility, though I doubted my income could make much of a
difference as it was. "Look," I said, "you do not want to fight
this guy. You just don't."
"Maybe you don't, Argen, but the rest of us
do." Even Cole was in on this idiotic plan. What was going on here?
"You don't have to participate but we are going to convince him to
stop charging us such exorbitant prices one way or another."
"Fine then!" I threw down my utensils and got
up to storm out. "Just don't come running to me when you need to
pay your medical bills after this fiasco goes down."
***
The next day, I headed down to the ship after
work, thinking that maybe I'd reacted a bit too harshly to their
plan and should have offered some more coherent arguments as to why
it would be a bad idea to try to intimidate Derrick Marquez into
lowering our payments. All day I had been thinking of new arguments
that I hoped would persuade them more effectively. But all those
ideas were dashed from my mind as I came around the bend and saw
Marquez enforcers setting up a perimeter of yellow tape around the
docking tunnel to our vessel.
"What's going on
to a faint hope of survival, it gripped onto my tongue with its
sharp toes. The pain instead prompted me to bite down hard. I heard
the ribs crack, felt the squishy organs spill out of the holes in
its torso, the hot blood streaming down my chin. Not knowing
exactly what to do next, I flicked the corpse to the back of my
mouth with my tongue and, with a great deal of effort,
swallowed.
"You have a bit of something there." Jakob
Griggs, the shadowy director of the anarchy of Vesta, gestured to
his left cheek. I picked up a napkin and dabbed it at the
approximate area he had indicated, it came back stained dark red.
If I had been superstitious, I might have taken it as an omen of
things to come.
Chapter 10
A few days after my encounter with my
all-powerful employer, I was eating dinner with my former
crewmates. Nothing anywhere near the quality of that veritable
feast Jakob Griggs had, just some flavored lichen-based foodstuffs
that grew in some of the smaller caves set aside for food
production. To be honest, I hadn't had much of an appetite after
that eventful luncheon. I was cutting up a greenish loaf when Cole
spoke.
"It's funny," he said to no one in
particular. "Just a couple days ago, all our rates went up ten
percent. Wonder what changed this time?"
"No idea," I said. I really did have no idea
what he was talking about. My own rates hadn't changed since I
started working for the SPPS. Why would everyone else's rise?
Denal offered his own thoughts. "Well, I
asked some of the boys and girls I know by the docks. They said
that Marquez hadn't upped their own bills by any significant
amount."
"So it's just us?" said Aniya, who was
tearing off chunks of two whole loaves of lichen bread as we
talked. "You think it's because of the whole bounty hunter
thing?"
"Doubt it; it's been weeks," Cole said.
"Unless something else happened with Argen over in the genetics
labs."
I paused for a second. I couldn't tell them
anything about MOR10X-6; I had promised Jakob I wouldn't tell
anyone. "No, nothing like that." Which was true in the vaguest
sense. I had not encountered any bounty hunters or anything like
that.
"Here's an idea," Denal began, which probably
meant it was doomed to fail. "That Derrick Marquez guy is just a
big bully, like that VP's kid we splattered out by Ceres. He's not
used to people standing up to him, so how about we miss a payment
or two, and when he comes over looking for money, we firmly, and
with our weapons well at hand, tell him we're not paying the
increased rate?"
I could tell from the start that it was a bad
idea. "Look," I told him, "I still have some money left over after
the insurance deductions. I could give it all to you guys and just
live off the algal dole."
"And what about when the premiums get too
high for even that to help?" Aniya asked.
I honestly hadn't thought of that
possibility, though I doubted my income could make much of a
difference as it was. "Look," I said, "you do not want to fight
this guy. You just don't."
"Maybe you don't, Argen, but the rest of us
do." Even Cole was in on this idiotic plan. What was going on here?
"You don't have to participate but we are going to convince him to
stop charging us such exorbitant prices one way or another."
"Fine then!" I threw down my utensils and got
up to storm out. "Just don't come running to me when you need to
pay your medical bills after this fiasco goes down."
***
The next day, I headed down to the ship after
work, thinking that maybe I'd reacted a bit too harshly to their
plan and should have offered some more coherent arguments as to why
it would be a bad idea to try to intimidate Derrick Marquez into
lowering our payments. All day I had been thinking of new arguments
that I hoped would persuade them more effectively. But all those
ideas were dashed from my mind as I came around the bend and saw
Marquez enforcers setting up a perimeter of yellow tape around the
docking tunnel to our vessel.
"What's going on
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