Ship Heist Read online

  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Acknowledgments

  SHIP HEIST

  About the Author

  SHIP HEIST

  Doomsday Ship #2

  Barbara Lund

  Copyright © 2018 Barbara Lund

  All rights reserved.

  This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for brief quotations in a book review.

  Printed in the United States of America

  First Printing, 2018

  ISBN: 1-944127-20-8

  ISBN-13: 978-1-944127-20-6

  www.barbaralund.com

  For Heather and Quin and Holly and Shea.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Thanks to Adrien Raigne for the art;

  The Desolate never truly existed until you drew her.

  Thanks to EJ Clarke at SilverJay Editing for editing.

  Any mistakes left are mine.

  Walking the corridors gave me a pretty good feel for Balastasia Space Station and the people on it. By extension, those people gave me a feel for the people on the moon settlements and on the planet, too. Balastasia S.S. was a little newer than most, with a chemical smell to the air that meant they needed to adjust their filters a pico, paint still shiny most places, and no vermin yet.

  I’d seen worse.

  We’d come in under the entirely legitimate registration I’d purchased from an entirely illegitimate hustler; the registration claimed my ship was the Diebstahl—the Heist in long-dead Deutch—from a tiny planet on the other side of the galaxy, and we’d only ever used it a couple of times, all in this area and never on sketchy jobs, so it should be clean.

  The people on station were mostly human and human-mod, and a bit suspicious of me—even with my blend-in brown hair and brown eyes—so it was likely the locals on planet never saw aliens, but I hadn’t seen an alien in a while either and I wasn’t planning on heading down to the moon or the planet or into the corridors where the paint was already scuffed, so trouble should be hard to find. As long as I could keep my ship running, I was out of that life. Since we’d scavenged and brought in a small derelict and sold it to the station manager within ten minutes of docking, I ambled a little more slowly than usual through the main promenade. A pretty little café promising “homemade” pan dulce caught my eye, and I headed in for a late second-shift snack.

  Despite the press of people in the corridors, the café was mostly empty; the humanoid waiter-bot was polite, happy to accept my anon-credits, and quick to return with a drink.

  I settled into an older model anti-grav chair, leaving it neutral gray, and set my cup down on the white ceram-fab table. Activating the privacy shield at a level two lowered the voices of everyone outside my bubble and gave them a pleasant softness. As a bonus, no one could electronically eavesdrop. Not that we had any secrets to discuss here, but I made it a habit anyway. I set the mobile transmitter on the floor, then slid it across to the other chair. Then I crossed my ankles and leaned back, waiting for my friend to appear.

  He popped into existence with a shower of holographic sparks—though he’d been in my cochlear implant from the moment I’d left my ship—and mimicked me across the tiny table, crossing his ankles and leaning back as he cradled a holographic drink in his hands. “By the way, Tal,” he said, “we’re a little low on funds.”

  I straightened. “What?”

  “We’re impoverished. Insolvent. Destitute… Broke.”

  All the joy seeped out of a free afternoon in a mostly unexplored station. “What do you mean, exactly, by ‘broke,’ Josue?” My voice was low, and dangerous.

  He hesitated an eternity for an AI—though most days I forgot he was supposed to the ones and zeros running my ship and thought of him as my best friend—and then the slightly transparent, slender black man sitting across from me blushed.

  I stared. I hadn’t known Josue or the mobile transmitter he used to project his holo could blush—or rather, suffuse the holopix with faint magenta in an electronic approximation of embarrassment. Of course, I’d known Josue was special from the moment I got my hands on him—which was why I had installed him in my ship instead of taking him to… nevermind!—but when he pulled stunts like hesitating and blushing, I wondered just how special he was.

  “I… er… miscalculated the costs of Cara’s repairs and registration.” His holo cup disappeared as he continued with a mutter I didn’t think I was supposed to hear, “At least, that’s the only explanation I can come up with—”

  “You… what?”

  “I miscalculated—”

  “What about the wreck we just brought in?”

  He pressed his lips together.

  Damn. Bad then. “How bad?”

  He didn’t even pretend to misunderstand this time. “We don’t have enough for fuel to leave the station. In three days they’ll shut off access to their air. Three days after that, they’ll blow the locks and report us to the system authorities…”

  Groaning, I lowered my face into my hands.

  “In fact,” Josue said, suddenly cheerful, “your drink will pretty much wipe us out.”

  My shoulders slumped. How the hell had this happened? Oh, I know! I was so damned distracted by Josue pointing out that I was lonely that I forgot to double-check his figures. He was a computer—sort of—and I didn’t think he could make mistakes, so that was on me.

  Straightening, I clutched the warm mug with cold hands, sipped, and savored the liquid rolling across my tongue. Sweet with a pinch of cayenne pepper, just like my abuela used to make it, and since it was the last luxury I would see in a while, I might as well enjoy it. “Fine,” I mumbled. “We’re broke. Find us a job. One that pays really well.”

  His space-dark eyes widened and he leaned forward, whispering, “You know those are usually… questionable. I thought you weren’t going to—”

  “I know.” I rubbed one hand over the old knife scar on my belly. “I wasn’t. But that’s why they pay so well. And as you’ve pointed out, we’re broke. And desperate.”

  * * *

  “Got one,” Josue said almost immediately.

  Suspicion knotted my stomach and I pushed the rest of my drink away. “When you say ‘got one,’ you mean…?”

  “An employment opportunity.” His holo flickered, then steadied, and I wondered if he’d picked up a virus.

  “Breach protocol,” I told him. He never made mistakes, and never flickered. “Run a full scan.”

  He ran one hand over his short hair. “I’m fine, Tal,” he snapped. “Someone’s been trying to hire us since we docked. I’ve just been ignoring them. But you said we’re desperate, so—”

  “Hire us.” I scowled. “Since we docked.”

  “I listened in on station chatter. The Diebstahl is starting to get a reputation.”

  “We haven’t—!” I lowered my voice. “We haven’t used it on any questionable jobs.”

  He shrugged. “It might be time to recycle these particular IDs—”

  “Run the scan anyway.”

  “Right. Our prospective employer is on his way here. How do you want to handle this?”

  “You’re the owner, secluded on the ship. Me and… what are the specs? Will two do?”

  “Better make it four total. He’s asking for one.”

  Working alone had made me a target too many times.

  I snorted. “Me and three others, then. You have enough mojo to run three holos and that scan at the same time? You’ve been… flickering.”

  “I am running within approved parameters.”

  “Right.” Out of habit, I’d used my Diebstahl’s crew ident but I’d com
e in wearing my true face, trusting in my boring features and unremarkable actions to protect me. Now I opaqued the privacy shield, then, under the guise of rubbing my nose, I added a prosthetic that lengthened and broadened it, changing the shape of my eyes and measurements of my face, then had my implants lighten my irises to metallic gold. Generous blue lipstick changed the shape and fullness of my mouth, and finger implants grew long, blue nails to match. Before I’d left the ship, I’d donned boots a size too small to change my stride. Changing the eyes didn’t hurt, but the fingernails—and my feet—did.

  “Adjust the station surveillance,” I murmured to Josue.

  Most people, when faced with the various laws in various locations banning appearance mods, stuck with holo mods. Not me. I’d found physical changes simpler, more reliable, and harder to lose to a superior surveillance system, even with Josue replacing the real me with modded me. So despite having just broken every appearance mod law the station had, I felt more comfortable knowing our employer would never see my real face.

  “Josue?”

  “Got it.” The man across from me faded. “Your team will be entering in five, four, three…”

  I dismissed the privacy shield, discreetly staring at the front arch.

  We’d run this scenario enough times that I wasn’t surprised when an amazonian redhead, a short, weaselly swordsman, and a young girl with blue ringlets crossed the threshold. They split up, Weasel with his mobile transmitter to one corner of the café, and Amazon and Bait with theirs to the other so they all had a view of the door. And me. While I’d been watching, the mobile transmitter across from me had scurried to Bait and taken over her holo in case she and Amazon needed to split up. They each declined service, and the few other customers in the café found pressing business elsewhere.

  “Incoming,” Josue warned.

  The next person through the arch had mutt features—unmodified and able to fit in on just about every planet I’d visited—and a business suit that screamed off-world government official. His gaze flitted from Amazon to Weasel to me, and settled. Hadn’t even looked at Bait. Interesting.

  He crossed the floor, declining service with a wave of one hand, and raised one eyebrow.

  “Please,” I said, nodding to the chair across from me.

  “He’s put up a serious privacy shield over the whole place.” Josue’s voice was tinny in my ear. “And already wiped security tapes three hours back. I can’t trace him back to a ship, but I don’t think he or anyone else can trace us now, either. Saved me a few minutes of security wipe.”

  Double-checking my “crew”—holos holding strong and solid enough to be real as long as no one touched them—I noticed that the service bot had fled for the back room, leaving us as alone as we could be on station.

  “Chai,” the man said, holding out one hand.

  In a world of holos, the only way to be sure someone was human was to touch them. I shook his hand, gripping just hard enough for my long blue nails to gather enough DNA for later analysis. “Tal.”

  “I only need one,” he said. “A woman.”

  “I don’t work alone.” And what else are you after? Looking for me specifically? No thanks.

  “Pay is the same.”

  “Fine.”

  He raised one eyebrow then, meeting my metallic gold eyes without flinching. Definitely not from here. “Rufin Cove is the Balastasia station master. He knows of an item we—I—require,” he said. “He has no leverage except a wife, Madelene Cove. The wife never leaves their quarters, which are heavily guarded.”

  I blinked. “She his sister? Or did she take his last name?”

  “His name. Archaic tradition, but he demanded it.”

  Frowning, I crossed my arms. “You’re talking kidnapping… and murder?”

  “The subject will not be harmed.”

  “I need a guarantee.”

  “You may hold her until you receive the release codes from me.”

  “Mmm. And the item for which you would kidnap an innocent woman?”

  “She is not so innocent.” Chai smiled, revealing the predator beneath the suit. “The item is a doomsday device which could end all human life.”

  “Melodramatic.”

  He leaned forward. “Look at me,” he snarled softly. “Do I look like I’m playing? I need this information. I need it now. Before anything happens. You can help us both.”

  I looked. Desperation carved lines in his face—a face I might normally find attractive, if he wasn’t hiring me to kidnap a woman—and behind that desperation crawled fear.

  “We don’t have anyone with your skills,” he muttered, “and we need deniability. Please.”

  Glancing at my “crew,” I waited for each of them to nod, then faced Chai. “Right. Send me everything you’ve got on both of them.”

  * * *

  The schematic of the station glowed in my left eye as I strapped myself and my equipment into the tiny two-person pod—little more than a lifeboat with thrusters—and flipped switches. My ridiculously long nails tapped on everything, making me regret them almost as much as I would have regretted letting the target see my real self… but not quite. Josue’s scan had come back clean, Chai’s DNA had matched the ident on a very high ranking official on the board of trustees governing this and the other two closest systems, and his down payment had cleared just fine, so we were ready to go—my throat tightened—kidnap a woman. At least she’d be safe with us until Chai got what he wanted, then we’d release her, unharmed. It could be worse.

  So much worse.

  “Snail to Desolate,” I said over the encrypted com line. “After this job, we dump the Diebstahl ident. I’m ready to go.”

  “This is insane, Tal. It looks like…” My buddy was having second, third, and fourth thoughts. “Maybe we can get the credits another way,” he said.

  “Open the hatch, Josue.”

  One of the many hidden compartments on the belly of the Desolate vented to vacuum. The compartment, the hatch, and the Snail were all too damned small to show on scans unless someone was looking, and I’d disabled the emergency beacon way back when I started messing with the specs of this pod.

  No one would be looking.

  “It’s too easy,” Josue muttered. “It’s got to be a trap.”

  “For someone with such allegedly tight security, her security is shit,” I agreed as I piloted the pod down and away from my ship, staying away from all the other vessels. Despite being docked and it being against station regs, they might have their sensors on anyway. The Desolate did. “You’ve got the mobile transmitters ready to go?”

  “Yeah.” He paused. “Amazon and Bait are ready. But I don’t understand.”

  I bared my teeth. “The ‘crew’ goes in the front door while I go in the back.”

  “Tal… we’re on a space station. There is no back door.”

  I patted the torch next to me. “There will be.”

  “Be careful. I have a bad feeling about this.”

  “Yeah,” I muttered, sliding up next to the station manager’s quarters. “Me too. Where is everybody?”

  “Exactly where they’re supposed to be.”

  “Right.” Holding steady next to the hull, I pressed my right index finger to the scan over my head and activated the pod’s emergency seal. The Snail attached itself to the exterior of the station like the limpet it was named after and flushed the lock with air, then opened the interior door. I stared at the bright white hull of Balastasia Space Station and wondered what the hell we were doing.

  Then I settled safety glasses over my prosthetic nose and fired up the torch. “Tell them to go,” I said.

  Josue had compiled a dossier on one of the local criminals and when the hulking giant—completely unmodded, I was sure—had ducked into a bar, Amazon had followed and started buying him drinks, with Bait trying to avoid attention in the background. The local was much more interested in Bait than Amazon and soon enough made an offer that turned my stomach, but neith
er Bait nor Amazon would refuse. They adjourned to a tiny storage closet nearby where the mobile transmitter had used a sharp sonic to render the man unconscious. Before he could do any of the things he had purchased. Even if they were holos, his intent still turned my stomach.

  Now, Amazon’s transmitter broadcast a holo of the local emerging with her and Bait while the man lay unconscious and cramped on the floor of the closet. Poor guy. Things were about to get much worse for him, and I couldn’t feel sorry about it.

  The three holos strolled down the target corridor, the local grabby with Amazon now that he’d had a chance at Bait… at least in our made-up scenario. Bait trailed along behind, pouting. They approached a viewpoint and the local pointed out the window. Bait turned away, giving them space.

  Then Amazon’s mobile transmitter triggered a small bomb.

  Several things happened at once; the viewport and chunk of wall blew out, the transmitter shattered a bio vial with human blood registered to Amazon on the floor, and hatches sealed the breached corridor from the rest of the station.

  On the other side of the seal, Bait screamed and cried and then fled for the Diebstahl, darting through the quickly gathering crowds. Just like that, my transmitter was gone, bio evidence would “prove” my crew member had been lost in the explosion—making us the victims, not the suspects—and the station master would be alerted and respond to the… yes. Josue flagged the man moving toward the explosion. Slowly.

  My torch cut into the side of the station like it was made for cutting into hulls to make repairs… which it was.

  “Looking good so far,” Josue murmured. “Whatever trap they have waiting for us hasn’t sprung yet.”

  “I’m almost through… there. Through the hull.” I turned off the torch and set it aside, then kicked the new door in, following close behind it, stunner in hand, in case anyone was waiting on the other side.