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  FLY LIKE AN EGO

  MISSION 7

  J.S. MORIN

  Copyright © 2021 J.S. Morin

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher, addressed “Attention: Permissions Coordinator,” at the address below.

  Magical Scrivener Press

  20051 Colgate Circle

  Huntington Beach, CA 92646

  www.magicalscrivener.com

  Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.

  Ordering Information: Special discounts are available on quantity purchases by corporations, associations, and others. For details, contact the publisher at the address above.

  J.S. Morin — First Edition

  ISBN: 978-1-64355-919-3

  Printed in the United States of America

  FLY LIKE AN EGO

  “The sun never sets on Lasso Epsilon.” That was the planetary motto, emblazoned on everything from t-shirts to starship decals. With an axial tilt of 85 degrees and at the outermost edge of its star’s green zone, only the northern polar region was human-habitable. From a terrestrial perspective, their sun twirled circles in the sky, evoking the cowboy rope trick that gave the dull red rock its common name.

  A barren wasteland devoid of native wildlife and abandoned as a terraforming candidate halfway through the process, there was little to recommend the planet. It served as a waystation between the core and borderlands. TransGalactica had a hub at the center of a cluster of cities. Rayonica had a repairs-only shipyard in orbit. There were two Noodle-O-Ramas and one Cheapo Depot.

  It was the latter that had drawn the Ramsey family to land on Lasso.

  For Brad, the landing was an excuse to stretch his legs, breathe in some air that would give his antibodies a workout, and check one more planet off his list of places he’d visited. It would have also added to a total count, a number long since lost in Dad’s shoddy record-keeping and the haze of early childhood.

  Had to be more than 150 by now, though.

  The family dispersed throughout the giant warehouse of discounted and bulk-sale merchandise. Normally, Brad would have wandered on his own, keeping just enough of an eye on the exits to make sure his parents didn’t ditch him. On this trip, he lagged behind his father, feigning interest in garish area rugs stacked on pallets and plucking garments from oversized cardboard bins to hold up against him as if he were checking the fit.

  Ahead of him, Dad was doing likewise, except he was checking tags and tossing anything sized for a growing five-year-old Rhiannon or seven-year-old Mike into a handbasket.

  “He likes yellow,” Brad commented as Dad considered a gray-and-blue striped polo shirt.

  Dad glanced back as if just noticing his teenage shadow. “Well, if they’ve got any, sure. But beggars can’t be choosers.”

  “He won’t like it,” Brad warned as Dad jammed the shirt into his basket.

  Dad marched onward. He dug in the next bin of completely random clothing. The selection of bins seemed endless, and this was just the kids’ section. “Well, once he’s old enough to pick a whole wardrobe, he can knock himself out. In the meantime, we visit cold planets, too, and that means he needs sleeves and pantlegs.” The Ramsey patriarch stopped in his tracks, and a slight frown knit the wrinkles in his forehead together. “Then again, if we did just stick to semi-tropical and warmer, we could cut out clothing budget by more than half. Between the flexible sizing and passing hand-me-downs, one set of sun dresses could last us until Rhi’s in college.”

  Brad smirked. “So long as I get to opt out.”

  Dad made a show of looking him up and down. “What? You too good for a spaghetti strap floral dress? Show a little skin. Bronze up that spacer pallor.”

  The grin that broke out stayed entirely in Brad’s imagination. “Yeah. I see where this is going. New Cali. That stupid planet I can’t pronounce. Nothing to do inside, so it’s all outdoor sports and sunbathing like I was some kind of caveman.”

  “It’s good for ya,” Dad countered. “Plus…” He shielded his next words with the back of a hand. “I hear they’ve got girls there.”

  Brad tensed. This was his Achilles heel, and thanks to six weeks in a school on Paris VII, he now knew that phrase referred to more than a sports injury. “Everyplace has girls. Not every colony won’t let you watch holovids.”

  Dad burst out laughing. “Is that what this is about? You can’t go a full summer without holovids?” He shook his head in mock disgust. “Sport, when I was your age, we—”

  “Snuck into the holovids for free while the ticket agent broke up a fight two of your buddies staged. But that’s not what this is about.”

  “What is this about?” Dad asked in his “I’m already suspicious, so get to the point” voice.

  This was his opening. Dad flat out asked for it. “I want to go to race camp.”

  “No.”

  Without even bracing himself for a counterargument, Dad resumed rummaging through clothing of questionable origin and limited quality.

  Brad raced up alongside his father and galloped sideways to keep from either impeding him or letting him pretend he couldn’t see his son. “Why not? You know there’s nothing to do in New Cali.”

  “Maybe we’ll day-trip over to the other side of the planet and hit the gladiator bouts in Cicero’s Rome.”

  “One day. Whoopee. You know I’ll make my own fun, and you know I’ll just get in trouble.”

  Dad wouldn’t look him in the eye, pointedly paying far more attention to a pint-sized denim jacket than it deserved. “You could just—hear me out on this one—not.”

  “You don’t really want me around all summer. It’s the money, isn’t it?” Brad pressed.

  Dad nodded absently as he committed atrocity after fashion atrocity on behalf of his youngest children. “That’s a good chunk of it. Those camps aren’t cheap. We don’t have that kind of cash rattling around, and if we did, I wouldn’t burn it on overpriced daycare.”

  “What if I paid for it myself?” Brad blurted, hoping it sounded desperate and not rehearsed. “I could pull my weight on some jobs, enough to earn a cut. I could hustle side gigs. And anything I fall short, I can pay you back in the fall after camp’s done.”

  Dad’s smirk looked victorious. “How much is this camp?”

  “It’s the Academy of Speed Heroes. And they charge 3,800T, all-inclusive. Worth every terra. They’ve put like eight racers into the major circuits. With me, it’ll be nine. Whaddaya say? If I pay my own way, can I go?”

  Dad’s shoulders shook in silent laughter. “Sure, sport. You come up with… let’s say, three grand of that, I’ll float you the rest until after camp.”

  “You promise?” Brad stuck out a hand.

  “Yeah. Promise.” Dad shook it.

  They had a deal. Now the trick was holding Dad to the terms.

  “Super. I already prepaid the whole tuition and booked transit my flight leaves in less than an hour so I gotta go they’ve already got my bags loaded so I don’t need to stop by the ship say bye to Mom and the brats for me, OK?” Brad was already retreating toward the Cheapo Depot exit as he airlocked his entire itinerary in his father’s direction. Wit
h a wave and a parting “bye,” he turned and sprinted away.

  Chuck was left dumbstruck, standing there holding an overstuffed handbasket of kids’ clothes with his other hand raised in a confused wave.

  For a spacer mom, a civic swimming pool was an acceptable substitute for a bath. Becky mauled her daughter Rhiannon with a towel that had long since lost most of its factory-given absorption. The girl gamely held her balance, arms outstretched, until the assault ended with her uniformly damp all over. Mike was old enough to operate a towel without missing large swaths of his anatomy and dripping all the way back to the ship. He was already wearing jeans that came to his shin—despite still fitting snugly around the waist—and was working a sweater on over the onesie swimsuit he’d worn for playing in the water.

  Neither of the kids was fitting too well into their clothes these days. If she could have trusted Chuck not to incur a lifeguard fee while watching over them, she’d have gone shopping.

  “C’mon. Daddy’s gonna beat us back to the ship if we don’t beat feet like we mean it.”

  Mike yawned. “Aw, it’s just Daddy. He’s always late.”

  Well, shit. Mike was right, of course. That didn’t mean Becky appreciated being called out on her bullshit. Half of being Mom was being right even when she wasn’t. If she said maple glaze on broccoli made it candy, that was gospel. If she said bedtime was 6 p.m. on nights when a new episode of Missy & Madison came off the omni, her declaration bore the weight of law. And dammit, if she wanted to race home because the washroom at the public pool stank like it had a busted waste reclaim pipe, her cover story shouldn’t have needed airtight logic.

  “Well, we’re scooting,” Becky stated. “Next stop is Gramma and Grampa’s planet.”

  “What’s it like there?” Rhi asked as she laced up her sneakers with painstaking effort that furrowed her brow.

  Becky paused to consider how best to describe Peractorum, or whether she should limit this educational moment to New Cali itself. “Well, you see—”

  “It’s always sunny,” Mike informed his little sister. “The air smells like hot dogs, and the hamburgers have pickles on them.”

  “The pickles are optional,” Becky assured her daughter, who’d made a sour face at the mention of the drunken mini cucumbers. “Now, you two got everything you came with?” The question itself was rhetorical; she’d already checked both their gym bags. In a couple months, they’d be in school, and those same bags would serve as backpacks.

  “Yes,” Rhi replied after a cursory check.

  Mike answered “yeah” without even looking.

  Becky shooed them toward the exit, exchanging a few perfunctory goodbyes with other parents of escorted minors.

  Cab fare on Lasso was exorbitant. Despite the chill in the air and two soggy kiddos, they braved the two-kilometer walk to the landing yard.

  To Becky’s utter shock, Chuck was sitting in the living room when they got back. Beer in hand, he stared at the holovid menu on the projector, paddling down a listing of everything in the Radio City’s computer.

  “Didn’t expect you back so soon.”

  Chuck grunted.

  “You finish the shopping?”

  Chuck jerked a thumb toward the cardboard to-go box on the floor beside the couch. It bore the Cheapo Depot logo and a glued-on plastic carrying handle. If it were emptied out, Rhiannon would have fit inside.

  “Don’t tell me you just shopped the leftovers.”

  Rather than answer, Chuck continued to browse holovids.

  Becky raised her voice. “Mort? Where you at? Whatever whammy you put on Chuck, get out and unwhammy him, pronto.”

  The door to Mort and Brad’s bunk opened. Mort emerged, juggling a plastic game arena and a deck of colorful cards too big to possibly be for poker or gin rummy. “Didn’t even know he was back. Been futzing with this infernal amusement system for hours. Fella at the used toy emporium cut me a deal, said it was monsters battling monsters. Didn’t realize at the time that he meant it figuratively or that it used science. Damned if I can’t puzzle out a kiddie game, though.”

  “How’d you think it worked?”

  Mort shrugged. “Like some colonial version of Glyphs and Gremlins. How should I know? As for your husband, I’d check his ears for signs of leakage. Told him that thing’d rot his brain right out of his head. Object lesson for the children; best they not have to learn it firsthand.”

  Becky marched over and loomed over Chuck, interposing herself between him and the holovid menu. Not quite insensible to outside stimuli, he leaned his whole upper body to one side in an attempt to see around her. She shifted. He adjusted his lean. After two attempts, he blinked up at her.

  “Where’s Brad?”

  “He got me.”

  “Whaddaya mean, ‘got you’?” Becky gave Chuck a quick once-over, just in case he was sitting there toughing out a blaster wound, too delirious with pain to react. She saw nothing of the sort. “Look fine to me.”

  Chuck shook his head slowly. “He conned me. That little shit conned me. Wanted to go to race camp…”

  Becky mom-posed at him, fists firmly planted on hips. Normally, momming at Chuck just didn’t take. He wicked authority like a poncho wicked rain. But in his dazed state—which Becky now recognized as wallowing in self-pity—she figured it was worth a try. “Well, whatever he twisted you up with, he’s not going to any race camp. We’re hitting New Cali to see Mom and Pop. They’re all about seeing them some grandkiddos.”

  Chuck blinked and met Becky’s glare. “They’re out of luck.”

  “I don’t care what you told him. He’s coming with us.”

  “Too late.”

  Becky cocked her head. Suddenly, a horrible thought popped unbidden into her head. “He’s not… dead?”

  That perked Chuck up finally. He scowled in annoyance. “No. Fuck no. He’s a shitty little asshole who didn’t even lie. I keep going over it and over it, trying to figure out when I should have caught him. I tried winding him up. My mistake. He lined me up for it. Begged for it. It was a classic ice-cream-for-grades con, except I scaled it up. You just do it to stop the whining; next thing you know, you’ve got a kid hacking grades and pigging out on rocky road.”

  Becky stood watching in bemusement as her husband babbled. “What’d you promise?” she asked when he ran out of self-recrimination.

  “Told him camp was too expensive. He offered to work, pay for it himself.”

  “How’d he get ya?” Becky asked patronizingly. When no response was forthcoming, she prodded. “Admitting it’ll… well, I can’t even imagine it’s gonna help you, but I have to know.”

  “Thirty-eight hundred terras,” Chuck said, shaking his head. “You know how many times we could have used thirty-eight hundred terras? Little bastard…”

  “Ix-nay on the astard-bay,” Becky scolded. “Ain’t none of them three anything but born and raised to a happy married couple.”

  The puppy dog eyes almost broke her before Becky reminded herself it was a put-on. Chuck could don that look like a pair of goggles. “He had his tickets and camp fee prepaid. He ran off before I could stop him. Thirty-eight-hundred terras.” A snicker from the doorway drew Chuck’s ire. He barked at the wizard, “You better not have had anything to do with this.”

  Mort stretched. The pieces of his newfound children’s game floated before him unattended. “Nah. Didn’t even know he had money stashed. Boy knows how secrets work.”

  “Thanks to you, no doubt.”

  Becky stepped between the pair. “Now, look. Brad’s gone off and done something boneheaded and cocky. But, Chuck, you let him. It’s on you. And when we get to New Cali, it’s you who’s gonna take the rap and break the news to Mom and Pop.”

  The look on Chuck’s face told Becky that her sentence was harsh but fair.

  Brad slung his duffel over one shoulder as he exited the shuttle and sucked a deep breath of local air. Yet another new smell, same as every other. Ionized exhaust hung in an invi
sible cloud around the landing site. Arid dust had a prairie stench to it, thankfully minus the agrarian-colony bonus odor of manure. It fit the setting; a flat, vacant planet that felt half-terraformed. Distant mountains might as well have been the end of the place, if not for the shuttle having three more stops before returning to the starliner. Somewhere on Corsica, someone had repeated the mistake of whoever had built a racing school here.

  The Tathaniel de Rosa Academy of Speed Heroes lay on the far side of a chain-link fence topped by sharpened rotini wire. Ground-based hovers and row after row of parked racing craft stretched from the open entry gate to the complex of barracks beyond.

  “Thanks for the ride,” Brad called to the pilot, dropping a hint that the lazy fucker could lift off any time he liked.

  The reason for the shuttle’s lingering became apparent when another passenger disembarked.

  A pair of combat boots landed with a cloud of dust as their owner hopped over the final two steps. As ion wash roared up and the shuttle rose, Brad took stock of the newcomer.

  Her eyes hid behind a pair of stylish shader lenses. A mop of chem-bleached hair framed a round face, tanned from planetside sun. Hints of paler skin peeked from shoulders where the straps of a tank top shifted. Taller than him, the girl was a wiry, muscular sort of gawky. Like him, she carried her personal belongings slung over her shoulder.

  “Whatchu lookin’ at?” she asked in a colonial accent as she chewed something. Brad would have put equal odds on gum or tobacco.

  “Hey,” Brad replied with an incline of his head. “Just felt rude not to wait. I’m Brad.”

  She looked him up and down, inscrutable behind those dark lenses. “You sure are.” With that, she strode past him.

  Not deterred, Brad hustled a few steps and fell into stride beside her. “Just trying to be friendly.”

  “A might too friendly, spacer. Back off. You want shade? Buy a hat.”

  Brad inserted a pace of distance between them but grinned at the sass. “Nice one. You’ve got like two centimeters on me, and most of that’s boot heel.”