Stars Gods Wolves by Dan Kirshtein (good books for 8th graders .TXT) 📗

rivaled a phone book of the 1990s. It hit the desk with a thud, and the dust puffed into his tired eyes as he looked up above the text, which somehow read as passive aggressive: Can I get you anything else? A “sir” was added after a great pause.

“No thanks, uh, Monty. Just the black box for my friend here.” He pointed to Gally and leaned on the counter with a casual smile at the clerk.

The smile wasn’t returned. In fact, it was ignored all together, as the administrator talked directly to Gally. The words manifested more quickly and casually: You got the access codes?

Gally cringed in apology, knowing she was inconveniencing him. “I don’t. I’m late for two meetings. Can I send it to you after?”

The clerk pinched the bridge of his nose. After some more deep mumbling, the red text appeared again: What’s the name of the ship?

“The Ballpoint.” Her smile seemed out of surprise that she was actually going to get what she needed.

The clerk held up an index finger and walked to the back again.

Harper did his best to ignore the eyes he felt on the back of his neck during a silence. From the back, he swore he heard the racial slur for ‘typical Human’.

“You’re a pilot, right?” Gally eyed his navy green jumpsuit.

It took him a second, but he nodded and responded. “Yeah, I’m uh–” he couldn’t think of a follow-up thought. “I’m a pilot.”

“What’s your contract number? I need a pilot for a job I’m lining up.”

“Sure!” He fumbled through his pockets and pulled out a pen, writing it on the back of a nearby license application. “Here you go,” he said, quietly and needlessly.

“Thanks.” After taking it, she eyed it and folded it up, watching the clerk come back. He slid a small USB drive under the desk, and Gally took that too. “I’ll be in touch.” When she looked back at him, she gave him a small, confident smile before walking away at her usual hard-to-keep-up-with speed.

Harper’s smile didn’t leave his face after she departed. This was a smile that was given to the clerk, but not intentionally. This was a smile that said, “I just gave a cute girl my number”.

The clerk replied with a smile of his own. Being in a blindingly good mood, Harper took it to mean “way to go, buddy”. In reality, it was the kind of smile that didn’t reach the eyes and really meant “get out of my line, asshole”. Harper proudly took the mountain of a manual off the counter, patting it twice before giving an unreciprocated wave goodbye to the clerk.

Jupiter Proximity Station:Jutt’s Tavern

Nitro sat across a small, dirty table in a crowded, metal-walled tavern full of rowdy transients and travelers. He had a drink in front of him, and leaned on his elbows. His eyes were serious and focused, having recovered from the mistake of looking at his team to see Boomer attempting to juggle detonation tubes. “Fifty grand.” His tone was elevated, due to the noise level around him, but it was firm and intense.

Across the table sat a fat Hoxer, a dog-like humanoid with a trunk and wide ears. He chuckled to himself as he leaned backward, his trunk squirming into the bowl of liquid in front of him as he spoke. “A Ruxian class shuttle isn’t worth fifty new!” His mouth closed as his trunk pulsated a little, his drink slowly draining. “No, I’m afraid thirty-five is the best I can do.”

Nitro stared at the man, his athletic frame curling into a hunch over the table. He shifted his weight before making a counter-offer. “Forty.”

“Done.” The Hoxer replied immediately while holding in a belch. He leaned to one side and pulled fifty thousand currency from his pocket. His furry fingers dashed over the slab-like data squares, counting out forty thousand over to Nitro’s side of the table. He did so in a pleasant tone, as if he’d outsmarted some local color.

Nitro bit his lip as he watched the currency be flung to his side of the table. He was also counting, having been displeased by the Hoxer’s tone the entire time. He glanced over to his team and saw Ox angrily place oranges on the counter before snatching the detonation tubes from the surprised-looking demolitions expert. Josie and the captain met eyes, and she patted the others on the backs as a sign to finish their drinks.

“Your insignia.” the Hoxer’s trunk slowly wormed over and pointed to the plaque on Nitro’s chest. “What’s it mean?” He made conversation while his hands continued counting.

“Means ‘captain’,” Nitro said with a flat tone and even flatter eyebrows.

“I understand, but what’s its origin? Captain of what division?”

Nitro’s eyes darted up for a moment, as if annoyed to describe a band no one had heard of before. “An independent one.”

The Hoxer chuckled again, this time more condescendingly. “Independent? I didn’t realize you people were so organized.” He gave Nitro a half-amused, half-pitying look. “Or that numerous.”

“Yeah.” The captain looked down once the chips finally stopped flowing. “There used to be more of us.” Something called to him, a dark part of his past in the back of his mind, telling him to rip that trunk right off the Hoxer’s face. But he was older now, and he told himself he was in control of such urges. So he resorted to tapping on one of the chips with an index finger. “Speaking of, there’s a hole in the windshield.” Originally, this information was going to be omitted from the conversation. The Hoxer would discover he’d been taken for a ride once the Purple Company was long gone. But he’d made the same mistake as many enemies on the battlefield: he’d made Nitro mad. The shocked expression, albeit one that still had a trunk, was all the solace Nitro would be given. And it was almost enough. The captain stood up and slid all but one of the currency tablets into a