The First Run: Episode Three

When the tears came, I couldn’t hold them back, which only made how I felt even worse.

I don’t cry easily and I certainly don’t cry in public. In fact, the only time I ever remember crying in front of other people was at my mother’s funeral, and then I didn’t care what people thought of me.

Most of the travelers that came through the port were on business, so they were loading into the hovertaxis that would take them to their meetings. When I started sobbing, it was as if I’d developed a very contagious plague and suddenly there was a bubble of space around me.

I buried my face in my elbow, snorting back the snot that threatened to leak out onto the sleeve of my favorite sweater.

When the tears finally dried up, I took a deep and trembling breath.

That man, whoever had taken my MobiGlas, had not been an actor. That much I knew.

I’d seen men like that come into the Golden Horde before, and my father was always quick to point them out and quick to send me into the back to take inventory. There was something visceral about them, like they were predators set loose in a pen of sheep.

I’d been willing to delude myself up in the station, thinking that the captain could be an act, part of the trial mission that I was being sent on. But that delusion was shattered now.

It also made me realize that the company might have sent me with the wrong files, or they were the intended files, and had planned on sneaking them through station security. And this man, clearly a criminal of some kind, had known about them.

Which made retrieving them even more important. I pinched my arm, mad at myself for being so cavalier with the MobiGlas. If I couldn’t get it back, I’d surely be released from FTL, maybe even fined for my carelessness, and then I’d have to go back to my father not only a failure, but also in debt.

But how was I going to get the MobiGlas back?

As Captain Hennessy had said, I was a wet-behind-the-ears newbie. I didn’t know who this man was, or where he was going. And now he had a good ten minute head start on an electrocycle, while I was still on foot.

My stomach growled at that moment, reminding me of another problem. I was starving. Weak with hunger, in fact.

My father like to say that I ate like a bird, if that bird was a condor. I like to think I had the metabolism of a humming bird, but it meant I was always eating.

Giving up meant getting something to eat. It’s not like I had a way to find this guy.
I decided I’d find a spiced lamb kabob vendor first, while I considered my options.

When I grabbed the straps on my backpack, my hand hit the camera button and my face flushed with excitement.

I quickly unshouldered the backpack and rummaged through until I found my other MobiGlas, the personal one. I’d forgotten I had it, with (hopefully) a camera running, but who knew, with my luck?

“Please still be recording, please still be recording,” I muttered as I brought up the camera files.

I let the relief whistle out of my lips when I saw that it was still taking video.

Flashing back to ten minutes ago, I replayed the scene. The camera button was lower down, so it was showing him at an upward angle, looking right into his chest and chin. Then the view bounced around with me when he grabbed the MobiGlas and rode off.

I replayed the scene three times until I saw what I needed. The first was the license plate on the electrocycle, including the rental company sticker on the back. Unless he’d planned the whole theft weeks ago, including an incorrect file, I might be able to uncover his identity through the rental company.

The second clue, but the more worrisome one, was that he was wearing a deep-space jumpsuit under his leather jacket. I’d only seen his face when he grabbed the MobiGlas, but the camera recorded his chest.

It seemed probable that he had a ship hidden on-planet somewhere or in near orbit. Which also meant he wasn’t going to return the electrocycle.

But if I could find out where he rented it, it might tell me where he had touched down. It was a chance, anyway, but only if I was on his trail right away. Which meant I wasn’t going to get to eat.

I sighed.

Then I hailed a taxi, a diesel land cruiser rather than a hover since that’s all I could afford, and when the driver asked me which direction, I paused. I needed to be moving, even if I didn’t know where he was going. So I was going to have to make an educated guess.
South was the wealthier region, so it was doubtful he’d dropped in there. North was more industrial, so lots of security cameras. Which left west or east.

A quick review of the map on my MobiGlas showed me that the west side of New Alexandria was less populated. I found a village along the main roads and told the driver to head there. West also made sense because he was on an electrocycle, which needed roads, which the farms and country folk would still use.

While he drove, I started calling the area rental services, asking if a man too big for a bike had rented one recently. No one wanted to tell me anything until I told them that: one, it was my husband and he was trying to leave me and my new baby, and two, that he wasn’t planning on returning the bike.

I found the right company on the third try. It was out west, about a hundred kilometers from the city. I did the math on the taxi and realized I would barely have enough funds. If I needed to go any further west, I’d be broke.

Once I was settled into the seat, I had massive regrets about what I was trying to do. It would be safer to turn back, conserve my funds, and spend my time until the journey figuring out how I was going to earn the money to pay FTL back.

My other option was to just say the hell with it and stay on planet, finding a job appropriate for my skills, whatever those were.

But a little hard seed in me just didn’t want to let this opportunity go. I’d been planning and saving for years to get to this point. I couldn’t let a little bad luck keep me down. That, and I didn’t want to return to my father empty-handed and in debt.

I slammed my hand on the seat, earning a reproachful glance from the driver. And then my stomach growled, earning a smirk.

And right as a light rain began to sprinkle against the taxi windows, we passed a row of outdoor food stalls at least a kilometer long. Right away, I could hear the callers, yelling out their fare in their spacer’s drawl: fried cheese dumplings, tunnel bird stew, apple pops, quick beer, and the like.

We passed the stalls at a languid pace due to the traffic. If I hadn’t been so hungry, and staring longingly at each passing stall, I might have missed the behemoth, huddled under one of the awnings.

“Pull in here,” I said, and we stopped behind a huge transcontinental delivery truck with wheels as tall as me.

The behemoth was finishing up a pair of kabobs, spiced lamb, I guessed, based on the contented look on his face. Figures. He was still sucking the meat off the stick, so I decide to make a run for one of the stalls. I needed something in my belly, I was downright dizzy.

The rain had picked up, and I dodged through the crowd towards one of the food stalls with the shortest lines, wiping the water from my face. Fried cheese dumplings. I wasn’t a fan, but I wasn’t going to be picky either.

Despite the shortness of the line, it moved slow. I clenched my fists and willed it to go faster, but that only seemed to slow it even more. My stomach added a few grumbles to go along with my muttered swears.

And just as I finally reached the front and the stall vendor, a tan leathery man with numbers tattooed on his neck, asked in his lyrical drawl, “Whatchu want, ladybug?” I saw the behemoth moving to his electrocycle parked nearby.

When he got on and sped away, I cursed and ran back towards the taxi. The vendor called out after me, “I didn’t want cho business, anyway!”

I followed the behemoth in the taxi for another thirty kilometers and the whole time I had fantasies about food. Then the behemoth turned off the main two-lane road and headed down a gravel side path that ran between a couple of farms. It was getting close to dark, and the cloud layer made the light dim and flat.

I had the taxi go past, then circle back around, and go down the gravel road. Past the farms, the landscape turned to forest, though the trees were short and squat and had yellow-green leaves that smelled like eucalyptus through my open window.

When I saw the lander through a gap in the trees, I had the driver drop me off. He asked if he should wait, but I didn’t have the money for the ride back, so I told him to leave. He took my payment through the MobiGlas, which drained my account down to the dregs.

I crept down the path, noting the tire marks in the wet grass. When I made it to the edge of the clearing, I hunched down and looked around. Except for the steel-gray lander, marked with burns on the nose from numerous re-entries, the clearing was empty.

Crouched on my heels, a moment of rationality hit me square in the chest. What in the deep space was I doing here? This man was likely a killer, and at the very least, a criminal.

Closing my eyes, I listened to insects chirping amid the trees. Right at the moment I decided to abandon my foolish quest to get the company MobiGlas back, I heard a twig snap, somewhere behind me.

“Persistent little scrum,” said a voice, from about the location of the broken limb. “It seems Dario found himself an ally.”

The diction of the speaker rightly confused me. It was the smooth dialect of an Earther aristocrat, not a thuggish brute the size of a Vanduul warrior.

But I didn’t get a chance to see the speaker before something stuck me in the back and I went unconscious.

to be continued …

Als die Tränen kamen, konnte ich sie nicht zurückhalten, was nur dazu führte, dass ich mich noch schlechter fühlte.

Ich weine nicht leicht und ich weine auch nicht in der Öffentlichkeit. Tatsächlich war das einzige Mal, dass ich mich daran erinnere, dass ich vor anderen Leuten geweint habe, die Beerdigung meiner Mutter, und dann war es mir egal, was die Leute von mir dachten.

Die meisten der Reisenden, die durch den Hafen kamen, waren geschäftlich unterwegs, also luden sie in die Hovertaxis, die sie zu ihren Meetings bringen sollte. Als ich anfing zu schluchzen, war es, als hätte ich eine sehr ansteckende Plage entwickelt, und plötzlich war um mich herum eine Blase voller Raum.

Ich vergrub mein Gesicht in meinem Ellenbogen und schnaubte den Rotz zurück, der auf den Ärmel meines Lieblingspullovers auslaufen wollte.

Als die Tränen schließlich vertrockneten, atmete ich tief und zitternd durch.

Dieser Mann, der mein MobiGlas genommen hatte, war kein Schauspieler gewesen. So viel wusste ich.

Ich hatte schon einmal solche Männer in die Goldene Horde kommen sehen, und mein Vater war immer schnell dabei, sie darauf hinzuweisen und mich schnell in den Hintergrund zu schicken, um eine Inventur durchzuführen. Sie hatten etwas Eingeweides an sich, als wären sie Raubtiere, die in einer Schafherde losgelassen wurden.

Ich war bereit gewesen, mich in der Station zu täuschen und dachte, dass der Kapitän ein Akt sein könnte, Teil der Versuchsmission, auf die ich geschickt wurde. Aber diese Illusion war jetzt zerbrochen.

Es machte mir auch klar, dass das Unternehmen mir vielleicht die falschen Dateien geschickt hatte, oder es waren die beabsichtigten Dateien, und geplant hatte, sie durch die Station zu schleusen. Und dieser Mann, offensichtlich ein Verbrecher irgendeiner Art, hatte von ihnen gewusst.

Das machte es umso wichtiger, sie wiederzufinden. Ich kneifte mir in den Arm, wütend auf mich selbst, weil ich mit dem MobiGlas so ungezwungen war. Wenn ich es nicht zurückbekommen könnte, würde ich sicher aus dem FTL entlassen werden, vielleicht sogar wegen meiner Nachlässigkeit, und dann müsste ich zu meinem Vater zurückkehren, nicht nur wegen eines Misserfolgs, sondern auch wegen Schulden.

Aber wie sollte ich das MobiGlas zurückbekommen?

Wie Captain Hennessy gesagt hatte, war ich ein Anfänger mit nassem Ohr. Ich wusste nicht, wer dieser Mann war und wohin er wollte. Und jetzt hatte er einen guten zehnminütigen Vorsprung auf einem Elektrofahrrad, während ich noch zu Fuß war.

Mein Magen knurrte in diesem Moment und erinnerte mich an ein anderes Problem. Ich war am Verhungern. Schwach vor Hunger, in der Tat.

Mein Vater sagt gerne, dass ich wie ein Vogel gegessen habe, wenn dieser Vogel ein Kondor war. Ich denke gerne, dass ich den Stoffwechsel eines brummenden Vogels hatte, aber das bedeutete, dass ich immer aß.

Aufgeben bedeutete, etwas zu essen zu bekommen. Es ist ja nicht so, dass ich einen Weg hatte, diesen Kerl zu finden.
Ich entschied mich, zuerst einen gewürzten Lammkabobverkäufer zu finden, während ich über meine Optionen nachdachte.

Als ich die Gurte an meinem Rucksack packte, drückte meine Hand auf den Kamerataster und mein Gesicht errötete vor Aufregung.

Ich löste schnell den Rucksack und stöberte durch, bis ich mein anderes MobiGlas fand, das persönliche. Ich hatte vergessen, dass ich es hatte, mit (hoffentlich) einer laufenden Kamera, aber wer wusste, mit meinem Glück?

"Bitte noch aufnehmen, bitte noch aufnehmen", murmelte ich, als ich die Kameradateien aufriss.

Ich ließ das Relief aus meinen Lippen pfeifen, als ich sah, dass es immer noch Videos machte.

Als ich vor zehn Minuten aufblitzte, spielte ich die Szene erneut ab. Der Kamerataster war tiefer unten, also zeigte er ihn in einem Aufwärtswinkel und blickte direkt in seine Brust und sein Kinn. Dann hüpfte der Blick mit mir herum, als er das MobiGlas ergriff und davonfuhr.

Ich wiederholte die Szene dreimal, bis ich sah, was ich brauchte. Das erste war das Nummernschild auf dem Elektrofahrrad, einschließlich des Aufklebers des Vermieters auf der Rückseite. Es sei denn, er hatte den gesamten Diebstahl vor Wochen geplant, einschließlich einer falschen Datei, könnte ich in der Lage sein, seine Identität durch die Vermieterin aufzudecken.

Der zweite Hinweis, aber der beunruhigendere, war, dass er einen Weltraumanzug unter seiner Lederjacke trug. Ich hatte sein Gesicht nur gesehen, als er das MobiGlas ergriff, aber die Kamera nahm seine Brust auf.

Es schien wahrscheinlich, dass er ein Schiff hatte, das irgendwo auf dem Planeten oder in der Nähe der Umlaufbahn versteckt war. Was auch bedeutete, dass er das Elektrofahrrad nicht zurückbringen würde.

Aber wenn ich herausfinden könnte, wo er es gemietet hat, könnte es mir sagen, wo er angekommen ist. Es war sowieso eine Chance, aber nur, wenn ich ihm sofort auf der Spur war. Was bedeutete, dass ich nicht essen durfte.

Ich seufzte.

Dann rief ich ein Taxi, einen Diesel-Landcruiser und nicht einen Schwebewagen, da das alles war, was ich mir leisten konnte, und als der Fahrer mich fragte, in welche Richtung ich gehen sollte, hielt ich inne. Ich musste umziehen, auch wenn ich nicht wusste, wohin er ging. Also musste ich eine fundierte Vermutung anstellen.
Der Süden war die wohlhabendere Region, also war es zweifelhaft, dass er dort hineingekommen war. North war industrieller, also viele Überwachungskameras. Die nach Westen oder Osten verlief.

Eine kurze Überprüfung der Karte auf meinem MobiGlas zeigte mir, dass die Westseite von Neu-Alexandria weniger besiedelt war. Ich fand ein Dorf entlang der Hauptstraßen und sagte dem Fahrer, er solle dorthin fahren. Der Westen machte auch Sinn, weil er sich auf einem Elektrofahrrad befand, das Straßen brauchte, die die Bauern und Landbewohner noch benutzen würden.

Während er fuhr, fing ich an, die Vermietungsdienste anzurufen und fragte, ob ein Mann, der zu groß für ein Fahrrad war, kürzlich eines gemietet hatte. Niemand wollte mir etwas sagen, bis ich ihnen das sagte: Erstens, es war mein Mann und er versuchte, mich und mein neues Baby zu verlassen, und zweitens, dass er nicht vorhatte, das Fahrrad zurückzugeben.

Ich habe beim dritten Versuch die richtige Firma gefunden. Es lag im Westen, etwa hundert Kilometer von der Stadt entfernt. Ich machte die Rechnung auf dem Taxi und erkannte, dass ich kaum genug Geld haben würde. Wenn ich weiter nach Westen gehen müsste, wäre ich pleite.

Als ich mich auf den Sitz gesetzt hatte, hatte ich großes Bedauern darüber, was ich vorhatte. Es wäre sicherer, zurückzukehren, meine Gelder zu sparen und meine Zeit bis zur Reise zu verbringen, um herauszufinden, wie ich das Geld verdienen würde, um FTL zurückzuzahlen.

Meine andere Option war, einfach nur die Hölle damit zu sagen und auf dem Planeten zu bleiben, einen Job zu finden, der meinen Fähigkeiten entspricht, was auch immer das war.

Aber ein wenig harter Samen in mir wollte diese Gelegenheit einfach nicht verstreichen lassen. Ich hatte jahrelang geplant und gespart, um an diesen Punkt zu kommen. Ich konnte nicht zulassen, dass mich ein wenig Unglück im Zaum hält. Das, und ich wollte nicht mit leeren Händen und in Schulden zu meinem Vater zurückkehren.

Ich schlug meine Hand auf den Sitz und erhielt einen vorwurfsvollen Blick vom Fahrer. Und dann knurrte mein Magen und verdiente ein Grinsen.

Und gerade als ein leichter Regen gegen die Taxifenster zu sprühen begann, kamen wir an einer Reihe von mindestens einen Kilometer langen Verpflegungsständen im Freien vorbei. Sofort konnte ich die Anrufer hören, die ihr Essen in der Deichsel ihres Abstandshalters schrien: gebratene Käseknödel, Tunnelvogeleintopf, Apfelpops, Schnellbier und dergleichen.

Wir passierten die Stände aufgrund des Verkehrs in einem langsamen Tempo. Wenn ich nicht so hungrig gewesen wäre und sehnsüchtig auf jeden vorbeifahrenden Stand gestarrt hätte, hätte ich vielleicht den Riesen verpasst, zusammengekauert unter einer der Markisen.

"Halt hier an", sagte ich, und wir hielten hinter einem riesigen transkontinentalen Lieferwagen mit Rädern so groß wie ich.

Der Riese beendete ein Paar Kabobs, gewürztes Lamm, schätzte ich, basierend auf dem zufriedenen Blick auf seinem Gesicht. Figuren. Er saugte immer noch das Fleisch vom Stock, also beschloss ich, zu einem der Verkaufsstände zu laufen. Ich brauchte etwas in meinem Bauch, mir war geradezu schwindelig.

Der Regen hatte sich aufgehoben, und ich wich durch die Menge zu einem der Essensstände mit den kürzesten Linien aus und wischte mir das Wasser aus dem Gesicht. Gebratene Käseknödel. Ich war kein Fan, aber ich wollte auch nicht wählerisch sein.

Trotz der Kürze der Linie bewegte sie sich langsam. Ich presste meine Fäuste zusammen und wollte, dass es schneller ging, aber das schien es nur noch mehr zu verlangsamen. Mein Magen fügte ein paar Nörgeleien hinzu, um meinen gemurmelten Flüchen beizukommen.

Und gerade als ich endlich die Front und den Verkaufsstand erreichte, fragte ein brauner ledriger Mann mit tätowierten Zahlen auf dem Hals in seinem lyrischen Zug: "Was will der Marienkäfer?" Ich sah, wie sich der Riese zu seinem Elektrofahrrad bewegte, das in der Nähe geparkt war.

Als er einstieg und wegrannte, fluchte ich und rannte zurück zum Taxi. Der Verkäufer rief nach mir: "Ich wollte sowieso kein Cho-Geschäft!"

Ich folgte dem Riesen im Taxi noch dreißig Kilometer und die ganze Zeit über hatte ich Fantasien über Essen. Dann verließ der Riese die zweispurige Hauptstraße und ging einen Schotterweg hinunter, der zwischen einigen Höfen verlief. Es wurde fast dunkel, und die Wolkenschicht machte das Licht dunkel und flach.

Ich ließ das Taxi vorbeifahren, dann wieder umherfahren und die Schotterstraße hinuntergehen. Vorbei an den Bauernhöfen verwandelte sich die Landschaft in einen Wald, obwohl die Bäume kurz und gedrungen waren und gelbgrüne Blätter hatten, die durch mein offenes Fenster nach Eukalyptus rochen.

Als ich das Lander durch eine Lücke in den Bäumen sah, ließ ich mich vom Fahrer absetzen. Er fragte, ob er warten sollte, aber ich hatte kein Geld für die Rückfahrt, also sagte ich ihm, er solle gehen. Er nahm meine Zahlung durch das MobiGlas, was mein Konto bis zum Abschaum leerte.

Ich schlich mich den Weg hinunter und bemerkte die Reifenspuren im nassen Gras. Als ich es bis zum Rand der Lichtung schaffte, krümmte ich mich nach unten und sah mich um. Bis auf den stahlgrauen Lander, der mit Verbrennungen an der Nase von zahlreichen Wiedereintritten markiert war, war die Lichtung leer.

Auf meinen Fersen geduckt, traf mich ein Moment der Rationalität direkt in die Brust. Was in aller Welt wollte ich hier? Dieser Mann war wahrscheinlich ein Mörder und zumindest ein Verbrecher.

Als ich meine Augen schloss, hörte ich Insekten, die zwischen den Bäumen zwitscherten. Im Moment entschied ich mich, meine dumme Suche nach der Firma MobiGlas aufzugeben, ich hörte einen Astbruch, irgendwo hinter mir.

"Anhaltendes kleines Gebüsch", sagte eine Stimme, von der Stelle des gebrochenen Gliedes. "Es scheint, dass Dario einen Verbündeten gefunden hat."

Die Diktion des Redners hat mich zu Recht verwirrt. Es war der sanfte Dialekt eines Earther-Aristokraten, nicht ein Rohling von der Größe eines Vanduul-Kriegers.

Aber ich hatte keine Chance, den Lautsprecher zu sehen, bevor mir etwas in den Rücken fiel und ich bewusstlos wurde.

wird fortgesetzt.....

When the tears came, I couldn’t hold them back, which only made how I felt even worse.

I don’t cry easily and I certainly don’t cry in public. In fact, the only time I ever remember crying in front of other people was at my mother’s funeral, and then I didn’t care what people thought of me.

Most of the travelers that came through the port were on business, so they were loading into the hovertaxis that would take them to their meetings. When I started sobbing, it was as if I’d developed a very contagious plague and suddenly there was a bubble of space around me.

I buried my face in my elbow, snorting back the snot that threatened to leak out onto the sleeve of my favorite sweater.

When the tears finally dried up, I took a deep and trembling breath.

That man, whoever had taken my MobiGlas, had not been an actor. That much I knew.

I’d seen men like that come into the Golden Horde before, and my father was always quick to point them out and quick to send me into the back to take inventory. There was something visceral about them, like they were predators set loose in a pen of sheep.

I’d been willing to delude myself up in the station, thinking that the captain could be an act, part of the trial mission that I was being sent on. But that delusion was shattered now.

It also made me realize that the company might have sent me with the wrong files, or they were the intended files, and had planned on sneaking them through station security. And this man, clearly a criminal of some kind, had known about them.

Which made retrieving them even more important. I pinched my arm, mad at myself for being so cavalier with the MobiGlas. If I couldn’t get it back, I’d surely be released from FTL, maybe even fined for my carelessness, and then I’d have to go back to my father not only a failure, but also in debt.

But how was I going to get the MobiGlas back?

As Captain Hennessy had said, I was a wet-behind-the-ears newbie. I didn’t know who this man was, or where he was going. And now he had a good ten minute head start on an electrocycle, while I was still on foot.

My stomach growled at that moment, reminding me of another problem. I was starving. Weak with hunger, in fact.

My father like to say that I ate like a bird, if that bird was a condor. I like to think I had the metabolism of a humming bird, but it meant I was always eating.

Giving up meant getting something to eat. It’s not like I had a way to find this guy.
I decided I’d find a spiced lamb kabob vendor first, while I considered my options.

When I grabbed the straps on my backpack, my hand hit the camera button and my face flushed with excitement.

I quickly unshouldered the backpack and rummaged through until I found my other MobiGlas, the personal one. I’d forgotten I had it, with (hopefully) a camera running, but who knew, with my luck?

“Please still be recording, please still be recording,” I muttered as I brought up the camera files.

I let the relief whistle out of my lips when I saw that it was still taking video.

Flashing back to ten minutes ago, I replayed the scene. The camera button was lower down, so it was showing him at an upward angle, looking right into his chest and chin. Then the view bounced around with me when he grabbed the MobiGlas and rode off.

I replayed the scene three times until I saw what I needed. The first was the license plate on the electrocycle, including the rental company sticker on the back. Unless he’d planned the whole theft weeks ago, including an incorrect file, I might be able to uncover his identity through the rental company.

The second clue, but the more worrisome one, was that he was wearing a deep-space jumpsuit under his leather jacket. I’d only seen his face when he grabbed the MobiGlas, but the camera recorded his chest.

It seemed probable that he had a ship hidden on-planet somewhere or in near orbit. Which also meant he wasn’t going to return the electrocycle.

But if I could find out where he rented it, it might tell me where he had touched down. It was a chance, anyway, but only if I was on his trail right away. Which meant I wasn’t going to get to eat.

I sighed.

Then I hailed a taxi, a diesel land cruiser rather than a hover since that’s all I could afford, and when the driver asked me which direction, I paused. I needed to be moving, even if I didn’t know where he was going. So I was going to have to make an educated guess.
South was the wealthier region, so it was doubtful he’d dropped in there. North was more industrial, so lots of security cameras. Which left west or east.

A quick review of the map on my MobiGlas showed me that the west side of New Alexandria was less populated. I found a village along the main roads and told the driver to head there. West also made sense because he was on an electrocycle, which needed roads, which the farms and country folk would still use.

While he drove, I started calling the area rental services, asking if a man too big for a bike had rented one recently. No one wanted to tell me anything until I told them that: one, it was my husband and he was trying to leave me and my new baby, and two, that he wasn’t planning on returning the bike.

I found the right company on the third try. It was out west, about a hundred kilometers from the city. I did the math on the taxi and realized I would barely have enough funds. If I needed to go any further west, I’d be broke.

Once I was settled into the seat, I had massive regrets about what I was trying to do. It would be safer to turn back, conserve my funds, and spend my time until the journey figuring out how I was going to earn the money to pay FTL back.

My other option was to just say the hell with it and stay on planet, finding a job appropriate for my skills, whatever those were.

But a little hard seed in me just didn’t want to let this opportunity go. I’d been planning and saving for years to get to this point. I couldn’t let a little bad luck keep me down. That, and I didn’t want to return to my father empty-handed and in debt.

I slammed my hand on the seat, earning a reproachful glance from the driver. And then my stomach growled, earning a smirk.

And right as a light rain began to sprinkle against the taxi windows, we passed a row of outdoor food stalls at least a kilometer long. Right away, I could hear the callers, yelling out their fare in their spacer’s drawl: fried cheese dumplings, tunnel bird stew, apple pops, quick beer, and the like.

We passed the stalls at a languid pace due to the traffic. If I hadn’t been so hungry, and staring longingly at each passing stall, I might have missed the behemoth, huddled under one of the awnings.

“Pull in here,” I said, and we stopped behind a huge transcontinental delivery truck with wheels as tall as me.

The behemoth was finishing up a pair of kabobs, spiced lamb, I guessed, based on the contented look on his face. Figures. He was still sucking the meat off the stick, so I decide to make a run for one of the stalls. I needed something in my belly, I was downright dizzy.

The rain had picked up, and I dodged through the crowd towards one of the food stalls with the shortest lines, wiping the water from my face. Fried cheese dumplings. I wasn’t a fan, but I wasn’t going to be picky either.

Despite the shortness of the line, it moved slow. I clenched my fists and willed it to go faster, but that only seemed to slow it even more. My stomach added a few grumbles to go along with my muttered swears.

And just as I finally reached the front and the stall vendor, a tan leathery man with numbers tattooed on his neck, asked in his lyrical drawl, “Whatchu want, ladybug?” I saw the behemoth moving to his electrocycle parked nearby.

When he got on and sped away, I cursed and ran back towards the taxi. The vendor called out after me, “I didn’t want cho business, anyway!”

I followed the behemoth in the taxi for another thirty kilometers and the whole time I had fantasies about food. Then the behemoth turned off the main two-lane road and headed down a gravel side path that ran between a couple of farms. It was getting close to dark, and the cloud layer made the light dim and flat.

I had the taxi go past, then circle back around, and go down the gravel road. Past the farms, the landscape turned to forest, though the trees were short and squat and had yellow-green leaves that smelled like eucalyptus through my open window.

When I saw the lander through a gap in the trees, I had the driver drop me off. He asked if he should wait, but I didn’t have the money for the ride back, so I told him to leave. He took my payment through the MobiGlas, which drained my account down to the dregs.

I crept down the path, noting the tire marks in the wet grass. When I made it to the edge of the clearing, I hunched down and looked around. Except for the steel-gray lander, marked with burns on the nose from numerous re-entries, the clearing was empty.

Crouched on my heels, a moment of rationality hit me square in the chest. What in the deep space was I doing here? This man was likely a killer, and at the very least, a criminal.

Closing my eyes, I listened to insects chirping amid the trees. Right at the moment I decided to abandon my foolish quest to get the company MobiGlas back, I heard a twig snap, somewhere behind me.

“Persistent little scrum,” said a voice, from about the location of the broken limb. “It seems Dario found himself an ally.”

The diction of the speaker rightly confused me. It was the smooth dialect of an Earther aristocrat, not a thuggish brute the size of a Vanduul warrior.

But I didn’t get a chance to see the speaker before something stuck me in the back and I went unconscious.

to be continued …