Hammer and Crucible by Cameron Cooper (easy books to read txt) 📗

to connect me to a suitable freighter. “There is a bar, The Oriental Monkey, just up the concourse from here. Let’s hit that one first.”

“Yeah, I know that one,” Juliyana said. “You said Billy was moving clockwise around the concourse?”

Like a great many very old stations, the core of New Phoenicia was a wheel which, once upon a time, had spun to impart gravity. That was before antigrav fields had come into common use.

Pseudo-gravity allowed entire cities to be built in space over their mother planets, for normal folk could live on the stations year-round without ill effect. Even freighters used pseudo-gravity, to avoid some of the nastier complications of long-term weightlessness and low gravity.

“Yes, he was moving clockwise,” I told Juliyana.

She thought it through. “By now, he could have moved right around the ring. We may meet up with him as we head for the bar—assuming he’s actually circling and not stopped somewhere.”

“If he’s stopped somewhere, it’s not a problem for us. So let’s assume he’s circling. We’ll go the long way around, which means we’d be following him, and won’t come face to face with him.” I picked up my sack. It should have been heavy, although the weight didn’t bother me at all as I slung it over my shoulder.

“Around, then?”

“Around,” I confirmed.

The mild-mannered barman did know someone who knew someone. When we walked into the bar, he jerked his chin at me, then jerked it at another patron.

The man in dirty overalls and spacer boots sat at a table by himself, watching the news headlines stream across the screen behind the bar. A half-eaten sandwich and a glass of something or other was in front of him.

I approached his table, while Juliyana hung back at the bar. “Can I get you another drink?” This close, I could see he was drawing close to his next rejuvenation. His whiskers were silvered and his jowls lose. His eyes were keen enough as they swept over me.

“You’re not propositioning me, are you?” he asked, his voice gravelly.

I shook my head.

His gaze flickered toward the barman. As the bar was behind me, I could only presume the barman had silently indicated that I was safe to speak to.

The spacer relaxed and pushed the chair opposite him out with his boot. “Sure, I’ll have another.”

I waved to the barman, who was already pouring the drink out of a bottle with a label I didn’t know. I sat down.

“You’re looking for passage, then?”

“Depends on how soon you’re leaving,” I said.

His brow lifted. “Most people, it depends on where I’m going.”

“As long as where you’re going is away from here, I’m good with that.”

He rubbed his chin, his whiskers rasping. “Is taking you aboard gonna be a problem for me?”

It was a fair question.

“Not if we leave here fast enough.” I paused. “There’s two of us.”

His gaze shifted to Juliyana at the bar. “Your mother?”

“Granddaughter.”

He snorted. “Serves me right.” He considered me some more. “I can take two, if you don’t mind sharing the room. The bunk’ll take two.”

“Not an issue. How soon are you leaving?”

“This is my last meal before dust-off.” He nodded up at the barman, as the man put the spacer’s glass of whatever in front of him. “And my last glass of Nightblack, too,” he added. “We’re a dry ship. I don’t need the hassles, you understand?”

“Perfectly,” I assured him. All Ranger vessels were completely dry, too.

“Military, right?”

“It shows?” I was surprised. This renewed body had the flexibility of youth, before parade stance had a chance to calcify the carriage.

“It’s in the eyes,” he told me. “Known my share of officers…yeah, thought so,” he added, looking pleased with himself. He reached for his new drink. “Thirty standards from now. Bay thirty-four. I’ll take your money when you and your granddaughter make it there.”

I appreciated his honesty. Lots of spacers would have insisted upon taking my money now and not given a damn if we made it to the ship or not. Although, this close to dust off, the captain—and I was fairly certain he was the captain—has nothing to lose by waiting to see if we made it to the bay. His chances of finding another passenger to fill his empty cabin were extremely low given there were only thirty minutes left before their departure.

I nodded to him and got to my feet as he took a big slug of the glass of Nightblack. “Thirty minutes. We’ll be there. Thank you.” I paused. “Can I buy you another glass of Nightblack, to tide you over until you arrive at your destination?”

“Yeah, I could be talked into that.” He hissed around the bite of the liquor.

I moved over to the bar and paid for the man’s drinks, with another tip for the barman. “Thanks for your help,” I told him. I left the card he had slid back to me on the bar and put my finger on it. “There might be a man asking about two women looking for passage off-station.”

The barman glanced at the card, then at me. For the first time I saw the mock innocence on his face. “Two women?” He shrugged.

I pushed the card back toward him. “Keep it. The change is yours.”

He made the cards disappear as he finished pouring the captain’s second drink.

Juliyana handed me my sack, I nodded at the barman, then at the captain, and we left.

“Bay thirty-four, about twenty-eight minutes from now,” I told her as we merged into the clockwise moving stream.

“You figure Billy has the landing bays staked?”

“I would, if I were Billy.” I looked around for navigation signs. A big station like Phoenicia had them everywhere. I spotted the readout and looked in the direction of the lower-digit bays. “It could take us all twenty-eight minutes just to get to the bay,” I said. “It’s at the far end of the city.”

The remote location made sense. The big commercial lines paid over the odds for central bays. The military got preferential placement, too. Freighters and