I shifted my weight from one side of the stool to the other. “I guess so.”

The man shook his head in mock wonderment. “Tsk, tsk. You’re far too modest.” He turned to Sasha. “You should have seen him, my dear, charging through the Trans-Solar checkpoint like an avenging angel, shooting anyone who got in the way. But I did my part, yes I did, and saved his life.”

I thought back to the fight and remembered the bodyguard with the bullet between her eyes. “You did that? You killed the bodyguard?”

The man nodded calmly. “Yes, I did, and you’re quite welcome.” He stuck a hand across the table, and I took it. “The name’s Nigel Trask. Glad to meet you.”

He shook hands with Sasha while I tried to figure things out. “But why? Why did you help me?”

Trask shrugged. “Anyone who attacks Trans-Solar is a friend till proven otherwise.”

“Why? Did Trans-Solar do something to make you angry with them?”

Trask looked surprised, as if the answer was so obvious that only an idiot would miss it, which was probably true. “Trans-Solar, along with the other spacelines, oppresses humanity through the drug called technology.”

Sasha entered the conversation sideways, sliding in between the two of us so smoothly that Trask didn’t notice, and I wasn’t offended. “So you’re a greenie?” It was more statement than question.

Trask stiffened. “Labels are somewhat tedious, but yes, I favor a return to the agrarian past.”

Sasha nodded. “So that explains your opposition to Trans-Solar. But where do we fit in?”

“An excellent question,” Trask replied solemnly. “And one I was sent to get an answer to. Where do you fit in?”

Sasha spread her hands over the table. “Nowhere. Mr. Maxon and I are neutrals in the war between the corporations and you.”

“There are no neutrals in our war. Trans-Solar snatched you for a reason. What was it?”

Sasha shrugged. “I have no idea why Trans-Solar had me snatched. Ransom, perhaps?”

“No,” Trask replied, “I don’t think so. Not the normal kind, anyway. Trans-Solar is too big, too important, to waste its resources on a two-bit snatch, so it’s safe to assume they didn’t. What about Murphy Enterprises? What’s your connection with them?”

Sasha looked puzzled. “Murphy who? Never heard of them.”

Trask allowed an eyebrow to drift towards his hairline. “Really? That’s not what Rita says.” He grabbed the top of the sack and gave a powerful jerk. The cloth came away and Rita’s head rocked from side to side. A power saw had been used to remove it from her body. An auxiliary power pack had been hard-wired into her circuitry and was taped to her plastiflesh neck. Her eyes popped open and looked around. “Hello, Mr. Maxon. Ms. Casad.”

A lump formed in the back of my throat. Poor Rita. She had fallen out of the frying pan and into the fire. “Hi, Rita.”

Her face was wooden as always. “I’m sorry, but they forced me to tell them everything I knew.”

Trask nodded agreeably. “The android is correct. She did tell us everything she knew. And a boring lot of garbage it was. Her kind are an abomination, an expression of The Board’s contempt for humanity, and must be destroyed.”

So saying, he produced a pair of insulated side cutters, selected one of the wires that ran from the power supply into Rita’s throat, and cut it in two. Sparks crackled, the smell of burnt insulation filled the air, and Rita’s eyes rolled back in her head. She was dead. I was angry, but Sasha seemed entirely unmoved. “That was unnecessary.”

Trask returned the side cutters to a pocket. “Perhaps, but enjoyable nonetheless, and it did get your attention. Now, tell me about your connection with Murphy Enterprises.”

Sasha shrugged. “We took one of Trans-Solar’s boats, used it to escape from their thugs, and sold it to Murphy Enterprises. End of story.”

Trask stared at her as if able to see through her skull and into her brain. “Alright, that compares favorably with what Rita told us, but there could be more. Things she didn’t know. Things she didn’t hear. So we’ll wait and see what happens. But mark my words, if your mother’s company is working to unleash some sort of new technological hell on the human race, then we’ll learn of it, and do everything in our power to stop you.”

Sasha looked him right in the eye. “I have no knowledge of what my mother’s company might or might not be working on.”

Trask nodded, but it was clear that he didn’t believe her, and you know what? Neither did I.

“Management is not responsible for radiation-induced genetic mutations that may be experienced by guests, visitors, or crew of Staros-3 during or after their time aboard.”

Fine print found on the back of each Staros-3 boarding pass

There were lots of things to do, like losing Trask, and getting off Staros-3, but we were tired and went to bed instead.

In spite of the exorbitant amount of money we had paid for the cabin, it was little more than a shoebox. The beds folded down from the bulkhead and occupied most of what little bit of deck-space there was. That put the mattresses side by side, but I don’t mess with clients, especially when they’re almost twenty years younger than I am. The sheets had seen better days, but most of the holes had been patched, and they were reasonably clean.

Sasha started to remove her clothes, frowned, and gestured for me to turn my back. Hookers, the only women with whom I had recent experience, didn’t care if you looked or not. I turned my back and made a note to be more careful in the future.

I brushed my teeth in the tiny sink, took my turn in the fresher, and was careful to wear a towel when I emerged. There was no need, however, since Sasha had turned the lights down and was already asleep. I dried myself off, slipped into my spare underwear, and got into bed. It felt wonderful. I don’t know if the ensuing dream stemmed from the cafeteria’s heavy-duty spaghetti sauce, my return to space, or something entirely different, but it was a real lulu.

Sweat beaded the pilot’s forehead. She was very young and wore little more than shorts, a tank top, and her lieutenant’s bar. She had great nipples and I had watched them as she conned the boat through ten thousand miles of asteroid-strewn blackness. She bit her lower lip and whispered a mantra of her own making: “Holy mother full of grace, help me make it through this place, Holy mother full of grace…”

I grew tired of it after the first thousand times or so, but pilots are a weird bunch, and it’s best to let their idiosyncrasies go. There were three ships in all. I had the point position, Lieutenant Daw was number two, and our CO Major Charles Wamba rode drag.

It was a bad mission, the kind recon always gets, full of floating variables, insurmountable obstacles, and ugly ways to die. But that’s what the Mishimuto Corporation paid us to do, to kill as many of these nasty-assed tool heads as possible, and make it back if we could. But this was different, a little something thought up by the oxymorons in military intelligence, and intended to bag information instead of bodies.

My briefing had been provided by a man who turned into a woman with no face. She explained that Mishimuto owned stock in a small start-up company, that the employees of said company had gone over to the strikers, and might have taken proprietary information with them. And that’s where we came in. Our team was supposed to sneak up on the miscreants, surprise them, and recover the missing data. The only problem was that they had taken refuge in a research station called T-12, right smack dab in the middle of the asteroid belt, and defended by a rather sophisticated automatic weapons system. Not a walk in the park.

My thoughts were interrupted when the pilot screamed, “Shit! Shit! Shit!” and pointed at the screen. Her eyes grew wide with horror and exploded as we hit the asteroid.