Milk Run (Smuggler's Tales From The Golden Age Of The Solar Clipper Book 1) (2 page)

They squeaked onto the shuttle just before the doors closed, still wearing their dress blacks and earning grins from the cadet crew. A sour-faced second mate shot them an angry glance and a pair of astrogation rankers glanced back from the front of the cabin as they buckled in.

“Why are we doing this?” Natalya asked, leaning into Zoya to speak over the noise of the engines and the rumbling of the tires on the tarmac.

Zoya glanced around before answering. “There’s nothing keeping us here, is there? Let’s talk about it when we get aboard.”

“But I didn’t do anything.”

Zoya patted Natalya’s forearm where it rested on the seat divider. “Later, Nats.”

The shuttle turned onto the runway and immediately kicked in the afterburners. The low roar cut out any conversation as the acceleration pressed them back into the padded seats.

Natalya sighed and gazed out at the academy campus rushing past the port. She’d arrived with such hope. Her head still felt stuffed with wet clay but her thoughts began to cut channels in it. She’d done nothing wrong. Purvis or Gavin or whatever his name was couldn’t be dead. He’d just fallen down. She had barely touched him before he collapsed. People didn’t die from that.

Did they?

Why run when she’d done nothing wrong? Shouldn’t she stay and exonerate herself?

She thought of Margaret Newmar’s face. The sadness and certainty she’d seen there. Was it possible TIC would actually charge her with murder?

The bottom dropped out of her world as the ship tilted skyward, shoving her farther back into the seat as they climbed out of the atmosphere while the ship seemed to slow the higher they climbed. In what seemed only moments, she saw the horizon curve from a flat line to the gently arching limb of the planet. The sky, already dark, turned crystalline when the stars no longer flickered through air and became hard-edged jewels. The shuttle raced around the planet, into the light from the primary, and back into darkness again, always climbing to catch the orbital.

Natalya’s thoughts seemed to freeze in her head. Or perhaps they just ran in circles. The image of her cup falling, falling, falling to shatter on the floor. The flat expression on the man’s face. The slow spread of blood and the splash of tea. Margaret Newmar’s harsh commands. Her insistence that she run.

The suspicion grew that Margaret Newmar knew more than she’d ever said. That the universe that Natalya had grown up believing in was not the one that actually existed. That the evening behind them might be more significant than she suspected. Fear wrapped her gut in cold coils.

“You think they’ll let us leave?” Natalya asked, leaning her head close to Zoya’s.

Zoya glanced at her. “Depends on whether they know where to look. How soon can we get undocked?”

Natalya shook her head. “We’ll need to file a flight plan but once it’s on file, they’ll let us go. The
Peregrine
is small enough that we won’t need a tug or anything.”

“So? A few ticks?”

Natalya pondered, her thoughts still slowed and barely tracking. “Yeah. Something like that. Ciroda, she said?”

“Margaret? Yeah. Ciroda. You know anybody in Ciroda?”

“Maybe.” Natalya shook her head. “I don’t know. Not offhand.”

Zoya patted Natalya’s forearm again. “One step at a time.”

The sour-faced second mate cast them another impatient look, his brow furrowed in a scowl.

Natalya pushed herself back into her seat as if to hold herself down. As if the seatbelt wasn’t keeping her from floating away. What was his problem? Could he smell the blood? She glanced down at her blacks, a bit wilted from a long day that had started so well with a graduation ceremony on the parade ground and ended … where? She closed her eyes and took a deep breath through her nose, pressing it out slowly through her mouth. She called on her discipline to focus on the imaginary candle in her mind. One flame danced in the dark. She focused on breathing. In. Out. The flame was her life. It burned alone in the dark. In. Out. Her mind grabbed the image and held it. Her training carried her into the place where only the flame mattered. Where other thoughts slipped into the background. Not gone. Waiting to re-emerge. For now, her mind stilled. Her breathing smoothed out. The cold coils in her belly relaxed their hold and warmth filled her body as the heat of the flame filled her mind.

The thump of landing gear locking into the orbital’s shuttle bay vibrated in the background of her being. She released the flame, allowing it to fade away before opening her eyes. When she looked, the shuttle seemed clearer than it had when she’d entered. Her hands operated on their own, releasing the seatbelt from long practice.

Zoya looked at her. “Are you all right?”

A laugh struggled against her teeth.

“Sorry. Bad question.” Zoya patted her arm.

The shuttle crew came back through the cabin and opened the passenger door. The second mate bundled himself off the ship as soon as the crewman cleared the hatch. The two astrogators stared at Natalya and Zoya. Rank order meant they had to wait for the two new third mates to leave the shuttle.

Zoya nodded at the hatch. “Go ahead. We’re gonna need a tick to get our trunks off.”

The taller of the two nodded a thank-you and bumped his seatmate on the shoulder. They hustled down the center aisle while a shuttle crewman released the latches that held the trunks at the back of the cabin. With a friendly nod, he stepped back to let them pass.

“Safe voyage. Sars.” He grinned.

Natalya knew him. A third-year. She’d seen him on campus but couldn’t remember his name.

Zoya nodded. “Thank you, Mr. Mallory. Good luck with your classes.”

Natalya nodded and tried to smile. She didn’t trust her voice. She held the memory of her flame, the peace of meditation against the sea of outside influence. The control handle responded to her fingers and the grav-trunk lifted off the deck. She followed Zoya off the ship and into the hurly-burly of the Port Newmar orbital.

Chapter 3
Newmar Orbital: 2363, May-25

Zoya paused in the passage between the shuttle bay and the small craft docks. Most of the foot traffic had gone off toward the main docks or the lifts into the orbital proper. She looked at Natalya. “You hanging in?”

“I still feel like this is a nightmare. I’m going to wake up in my rack in the dorm and it’ll be graduation day.”

Zoya’s sympathetic grin felt good. “Yeah. I’m there. How soon before they lock down the orbital, d’ya think?”

Natalya looked around, taking stock. She blinked her eyes several times and stretched her neck. “Nope. Still here.” She returned Zoya’s gaze. “Won’t be long now, but we’re almost at the ship. If we can get out of the docking bay, we’ll be free.” She sighed. “Still doesn’t feel right.”

Zoya set off down the passage again. “I know. Not to me either, but Margaret Newmar hasn’t gotten to be nine hundred stanyers old by being stupid about the CPJCT.”

“She’s not nine hundred stanyers old.” Natalya felt a laugh forming in her chest. “She can’t be a day over five-fifty.”

The joke set Zoya off and the stress kept them laughing through the security lock, down the small craft dock, and up to the tiny scout craft resting on its skids at the far end.

“Mercy Maude,” Zoya said. “Could you have parked any farther away?”

Natalya just shook her head. “Cheapest slip. Not like I had a lot of spare credits, what with tuition and all.” She watched Zoya’s gaze take in the ship. “She’s not much to look at but she’s all mine.” She crossed to the lock amidships and keyed in a code to open the outer doors before leading her grav-trunk up the small ramp and into the lock. Zoya stood outside the ship, her grav-trunk behind her. Her gaze kept sweeping the ship. “Come on if you’re comin’. We need to leave and you’ve got the address.”

“She’s beautiful,” Zoya said, jamming herself and the trunk into the lock. “I guess I never really appreciated it before.”

Natalya keyed the lock sequence and the outer door closed so the inner could open. “One of the last exploration-class scouts still in service.” The door opened and she led the way into the ship proper. She patted the bulkhead as she passed. “Oswald Newmar flew a ship just like this one when he started filing claims in Venitz.”

Zoya shook her head. “You sure it’s still spaceworthy?”

Natalya grinned at her. “Well, this is a hell of a time to ask. Stash your trunk in there. We need to get out of here.” She nodded at a stateroom door and elbowed her way into a compartment across the passage, guiding her grav-trunk through the narrow door and locking it down. “I’ll get the engines warming up and file a flight plan for Halpern.”

“Why Halpern?” Zoya asked, having difficulty with the narrowness of the small ship’s doors and the width of her grav-trunk.

“It’s farther away and it’s not where Margaret Newmar said to file.”

Zoya locked the trunk down and followed Natalya to the cockpit that served as bridge. “Well, she gave us a destination. You thinking of ditching that, too?”

Natalya shook her head. “She never said it out loud. Nobody inside could have overheard.”

Zoya stared at Natalya as she dropped her butt into the pilot’s couch and started slapping keys. “You’re not paranoid or anything, are you?” Zoya asked.

Natalya threw her a smile. “Claustrophobic. Not paranoid.”

Zoya looked at the tiny spaces around her. “Claustrophobic? And you fly a scout?”

The ship vibrated and the blowers started a low whispering as the ship’s systems came online.

“Once we’re out there, there’s plenty of room. I’ve never felt claustrophobic in space.” Natalya patted the seat next to her. “Sit. Navigation console. You remember how to lay a course?”

Zoya made a rude sound and dropped into the couch. “Who taught you how to use the Mark Twelve consoles, huh?”

Natalya grinned. “And who taught you orbital mechanics?”

“As if. I knew more about orbital mechanics at twelve than you do now.” Zoya keyed the console open and started typing commands. “These aren’t Mark Twelves.”

Natalya laughed. “No. Fourteens. One of the Plunkett fast packets upgraded. I picked these up for scrap value last spring. Took me all damn summer to get them installed and calibrated.”

“Sweet.”

“Buckle up,” Natalya said, pulling her own harness into place and snapping it down.

Zoya looked up, her eyes wide in surprise. “Already?” She fumbled with her belts for a moment, untwisting them so they’d line up properly.

“No, but any tick now we’ll get clearance and I want to be moving before they change their minds.”

Zoya pulled out her tablet and slaved it to the console, transferring the coordinates for their jump.

Natalya watched the comms screen for the permission from traffic control to undock. “Come on, come on. How long does it take to let us out?”

Zoya chuckled. “We’re not exactly high on their priority list. You remember working there in our third year, don’t you?”

“Yeah. I remember.” She sighed. “But normally I get buzzed right through.”

“I’m guessing that
normally
you don’t have a potential TIC problem making every heartbeat feel like a stan.”

Natalya snickered.

A yellow warning message popped up.

“Uh oh.”

“What?” Zoya asked.

“We’re on hold.”

“Yellow-hold. Probably just traffic outside,” Zoya said.

Natalya took a deep breath and blew it out slowly. “Yeah. Probably.”

“As long as it’s not red-denied.”

Natalya nodded, her eyes not leaving the comms and her hand on the maneuvering controls.

A very long four ticks elapsed before the green-for-go message popped up on the console.

“Yes,” Natalya said, stretching the hiss out as she pulled shore-ties and triggered the lockdowns to release.

The ship lifted just off the deck and began floating toward the exit lock. As they approached, the lock’s tattletales flipped from yellow to green and Natalya slipped in. Behind them the inner door closed and the orbital’s heavy compressors started sucking the atmosphere out of the lock.

Time slowed for Natalya. The wait in the airlock never bothered her, yet she found herself tapping her fingers on the arm of her couch.

Zoya glanced at the pattering digits and smiled.

Natalya forced herself to grip the arm. “I just keep thinking, this would be a good place to keep us locked down until they can figure out how to get to us.”

Zoya nodded. “Probably, but the easiest thing is just pump the atmosphere back in and tell us to back out slowly.” She nodded at the pressure indicator on the bulkhead outside. “It’s almost vacuum now.”

A few more heartbeats. The green-for-go light blinked on over the exit door and Natalya goosed the thrusters to push them out of the orbital.

Comms popped a blue informational message for the exit vector to leave the orbital traffic control. Natalya cross-loaded the instruction to helm and followed the guiding signal out of the swirl of ships, cargo handlers, shuttles, and small craft that surrounded Newmar Orbital. The kickers rumbled the spaceframe as they came online and the ship picked up speed.

“There’s the delay,” Zoya said, nodding out the starboard armorglass port. A massive freighter under tow was still sliding into the dock on their starboard side.