Planet Hustlers Read online

  Those hands beneath the hem of Esper’s sweatshirt slid up. Esper could have—should have—tucked her arms against her sides. Instead, she went along and lifted them overhead to let Emily take off her sweatshirt.

  Twirling the garment, still warm with Esper’s body heat, Emily glided over to the wet bar and poured two glasses from a crystal flask. An amber liquid splashed into the bottoms, two fingers deep.

  Esper accepted one of the glasses and took an experimental sniff.

  “Don’t drink that!” Mort scolded. “Could be poison.”

  Esper didn’t think so. Emily sipped from hers and wiped her lips with a fingertip. “It’s delicious. Faulkner swore by his whiskey, and they say this is an imitation of his preferred libation.” She daubed Esper’s lips with the finger.

  Involuntarily, Esper licked her lips and tasted the faint bitter sting of the alcohol.

  “Look that woman in the eye,” Mort commanded. “Break her. End this silly charade of pirates taking over pleasant little farming worlds.”

  “I’m… not much of an aficionado,” Esper said with an apologetic shrug.

  Emily cast a dramatic sigh. “Well, then. It also works in quick gulps.” And to make her point, the admiral threw back the contents of her glass.

  Mort was right. Esper could turn that woman’s mind to raspberry jam—either literally or figuratively. Her choice.

  “You’ve changed,” Emily said, slowly tilting her head to catch Esper from a different view. “Still wary but not so timid as you once were.”

  “Damn right!” Mort said. “Last time you had her in your succubus clutches, my apprentice here was still thinking her magic was a sin. Oh, you bet your sweet, curvaceous ass she can work some doozies now.”

  “A lot’s happened since then.”

  There was a mission here. It had changed drastically since coming aboard. Carl had wanted her along for protection—or had he? This outcome, while not guaranteed, could certainly have been predicted. They’d all voiced suspicions about what had gone on aboard the Look Upon My Works Ye Mighty and Despair last time. Esper had been the most pampered prisoner any of them had heard of.

  “Good gravy!” Mort bellowed. “I haven’t seen you moon over Cedric like this, and you… Oh, god… You’re not thinking…”

  No. She wasn’t. Esper had spent too many nights in Esperville and Mortania wondering what might have been had she chosen a different path. This was the fork in that road that seemed the most likely. Reject magic. Never read the Tome of Bleeding Thoughts. Stay with Emily on board the Look Upon My Works Ye Mighty and Despair. She never would have become Mort’s apprentice, never gone to Mortania. She’d have been a normal twenty-six-year-old woman with a comfortable life of roughly equivalent moral flexibility.

  Before she started thinking again, Esper grabbed Emily by the collar of her jacket. She could break this woman. Destroy her mind. Lay waste to her crew. Crash her starship into the planet below. Esper was in no danger here. She was the danger.

  There was a mission.

  The stuunji needed her.

  Carl had brought her along for protection.

  Emily’s lips tasted like strawberry.

  # # #

  Carl sat around eating little hot dogs. Rai Kub packed away cucumber sandwiches by the kilogram. Across the table was the guy painted like a mountain resort from a primitive Earth-like, popping beef Wellington into his mouth two at a time. His name was Leroy.

  “So…” Carl said between bites. “Takin’ a while back there. You… uh, got any idea what those two might be talking about?”

  Leroy shrugged, which ought to have caused a painted earthquake. “Oh, sure.” He didn’t elaborate. Carl began to suspect the man’s terseness—a rarity apparently, among the loquacious pirates—was his main criterion for pulling guard duty.

  Rai Kub leaned down and whispered, “These are excellent. If the deal allows it, get them to include the recipe.”

  There was no need for that. The recipe was cucumber plus cracker. Friendli Foods made a cracker that looked just like that, and they only cost three terras a pack on any civilized planet.

  A piece of classical music chimed from the far side of the table. Leroy reached out of view below and pulled out a datapad. “Ahoy!” he answered. Then there was a long pause. “Yes, ma’am. I’ll let ‘em know.”

  “Good news? Esper convinced the admiral to leave New Garrelon peaceably?” Carl ventured with forced optimism.

  Leroy’s shoulder shook in a soundless chuckle. “Nah. Nothing like that.”

  “Well?” Carl demanded, popping one last mini hotdog into his mouth before he lost the chance.

  “Your pink shirt friend is staying as the admiral’s guest.”

  Carl stood. “That wasn’t part of the deal. Actually, we hadn’t even started negotiating.”

  Rai Kub stood as well. “Why have you taken Esper prisoner?”

  Leroy’s teeth shone white as piano keys. “Who said anything about a prisoner? Your friend said you bowl 105. I take it that means something to you.”

  It did.

  Esper hosted the crew’s weekly bowling league in the imaginary town in her head. Weird as it sounded to describe, everyone had just gotten used to it being an extra room aboard the Mobius. Larger, better smelling, and a little on the quaint side for Carl’s taste, it had just become a part of the routine. There was no way in hell that Chisholm was prying mental details like that out of Esper’s head.

  Esper was staying willingly. She wanted Carl to know that. Best of luck to her, then. Into the den of the lioness…

  “Well, if the initial round of negotiating is over, we’ll head back to our ship.”

  “Sho thing,” Leroy said, pushing back his chair and rising to escort them. “Lemme just get a ride to come pick us up.”

  The ride on the indoor hovercar seemed to bother Rai Kub, but to an old pilot and racer like Carl, the blur of motion was second nature. The low moans of distress from the stuunji were his only real hints that here was something worth being bothered by at all.

  “Relax, big guy. This is their ship. They know how to get around. You think they get away with piloting like this if they crash ‘em?”

  Leroy’s grin wasn’t reassuring. “We got great medics.”

  Rai Kub whined softly.

  The stuunji’s fears aside, they reached the Mobius without incident. The pilot took Leroy back to whatever it was he normally did and left Carl and Rai Kub by the base of the cargo ramp.

  Amy stood cross-armed at the top of the ramp. “Missing someone?”

  Cedric pushed past her. “Where’s Esper?”

  Carl looked over both shoulders, then made a show of checking behind Rai Kub. He feigned a look of surprise. “Oh shit! Where did we—? Oh, yeah. She’s working on a deal with Admiral Chisholm.”

  The crew in the cargo bay parted as Carl wove his way through. It was his ship when you boiled away the bullshit little power struggles. As soon as Rai Kub was up the ramp, Carl raised it. No point getting too comfortable with the people most likely to remove that privilege of ownership.

  “What kind of deal?” Cedric demanded. It suddenly occurred to Carl that Cedric wasn’t his father; nor was he Esper. Carl couldn’t count on empty bluster or an innate aversion to wanton violence to save him here. He wasn’t sure just how far the kid was willing to go to keep the other half of his bunk warm.

  “Cool the hellfire, cowboy,” Carl said, patting the air with his hands. “Esper had a nice hostage situation last time she was here. All Stockholm Syndromey and shit. No one’s mentioned to these pirates that Esper could pull their spleens out their eye sockets. Far as they know, this is just a couple of friends catching up.”

  Yomin leaned against the stair rail. “And if Esper can thaw an icy pirate heart, bonus points for you.”

  Amy drew up tall. “Hey, that’s out of line. Carl didn’t—” But a realization must have dawned in that moment. “Wait. You didn’t. Did you?”

  “
Did what?” Cedric snapped.

  Yomin came over and clapped a hand on the gawky wizard’s shoulder. “You don’t get to hear the girl talk for obvious reasons. But let’s just say she did some things she might not have been proud of last time she was here.”

  Cedric cleared his throat and stepped out from under Yomin’s patronizing hand. “She told me.”

  With a smirk, Yomin said without words that she hadn’t.

  For his part, Carl had pieced the story together from gut instinct and scraps of hearsay. He was curious what everyone else thought went on, and he’d have put up a hundred-terra bounty for Mort’s opinion.

  Confusion evident on his face, Cedric looked around at the crew. “What? She knocked some poor unsuspecting guard out while he was taking a bath and made it look as if he were fraternizing with the prisoner instead of doing his duty. She had specifically mentioned hoping not to run into that fellow this trip.”

  Yomin’s smirk didn’t abate. “You’re sleeping in her quarters now. You ever check her wardrobe?”

  Carl always enjoyed watching a wizard squirm. Mort was too cool a customer for entertainment purposes. Esper wasn’t as blushingly naive as she used to be—or used to pretend to be, he supposed. But seeing a guy who played with planets like a kid with a tub of colored clay turn red and fidgety warmed his heart.

  “Not… as such. I mean… I allow Esper her privacy. It’s not as if I go pawing through her dresses like some pervert.”

  “Aha,” Yomin said. “So you’ve seen the dresses.”

  Cedric shrugged.

  “Including that little black number that looks like it was plasticoated onto her?”

  Cedric scratched the back of his neck and cleared his throat. “I’ve… never seen her wear it, but I believe I know the one.”

  “She got that and a few other little presents from Admiral Emily.”

  Cedric’s face turned bright red. Given that he was a wizard, that could have been a blush, rage, or some sort of demonic possession. Either way, Carl eased back behind Rai Kub.

  “You just left her there?” Cedric snarled. He stormed around the stuunji to confront Carl, who circled the overgrown security officer.

  “Hey,” Carl said, ducking out from cover. “It’s not like she’s in any danger. Wizard. Thunder, firestorms, gravity obeying her every whim. Ringing a bell?”

  “No danger? Says you!”

  Amy raised her voice over the bickering playground antics. “So, how’d the actual negotiation start?”

  Carl coughed into his hand. “I’m letting Esper handle the preliminaries.”

  “I knew it!” Cedric thundered.

  Yomin caught the wizard from behind by the shoulders. “Relax. Esper knows how to handle herself.”

  # # #

  Tuu Nau had requested him on the comm. Rai Kub. Personally. It was still hard to tuck the corners of that into his mind, that the high councilor was interested in speaking with him on matters of planetary import.

  “How may I be of service?” Rai Kub asked, keeping his voice low in an attempt to thwart the rampant eavesdropping that plagued the Mobius. He knew they lurked outside doors and that his bass voice carried better through those than other crew members’.

  “I hope I am not catching you at a delicate time,” Tuu Nau replied.

  Imagine that. A stuunji high councilor concerned for Rai Kub’s time.

  “Of course not, High Councilor. I am ever at your beckon.”

  “I just thought that perhaps, with the negotiations, that you might have a sensitive situation at hand.”

  Rai Kub winced. Oh. Tuu Nau had no idea what was going on up in orbit. For all he knew, Carl and the pirate admiral could have been standing in a field, planting the seeds of bargain. But unless Rai Kub was badly mistaken about human biology, there was no seed planting at work aboard the pirate ship with the very long name.

  With a sigh, Rai Kub explained the day’s bargaining session—if it could even be called that. Tuu Nau listened with patience until the end.

  “What is planned next?” the high councilor asked. “I have a media department awaiting word for a press release.”

  Rai Kub’s eyes went wide. Press release? There was going to be a broadcast of what was going on behind the pirates’ closed doors? “High Councilor, is a press release wise? Would it not anger our captors?”

  “What choice do I have?” Tuu Nau replied in exasperation. “The whole populace is in a panic. Streets are empty. Crops are on autopilot drones. Interstellar trade has come to a halt. All they are looking for is an answer to when it will end. Surely, these pirates can understand the fear they’ve caused.”

  Sadly, Rai Kub’s experience away from his people had taught him that lesson all too well. Of course, the pirates knew. They weren’t fools, despite their outlandish attire and quirky mannerisms. Fear forced people into poor choices. Intelligent creatures can become frightened animals the second their lives are threatened. Even those brave enough to risk their own lives often freeze up when faced with a threat to a loved one. This was the sharp end of the pirate fleet’s weapon, not the ships themselves. They would sooner have the planet intact and pliant than a smoking ruin in need of willing colonists.

  It was all too much to convey on a simple comm chat. The stuunji people were too closely bonded to one another to employ such tactics within their own society. Let Tuu Nau fly with Savior Carl for a few months and see what his opinions of a savior become.

  But Rai Kub had to tell the high councilor something. “Tell the people that negotiations have begun. Tell them that it is a process.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Tuu Nau demanded.

  Rai Kub paused broadcast for the duration of a weary sigh. Rai Kub felt a bit of “savior” rubbing off on him as well. “It doesn’t mean anything. It is an empty word meant to stall for time. People will ask the same question you did. Simply tell them when the next press release will be.”

  “But they’re still going to want answers!”

  “Yes.”

  “And I won’t have any for them.”

  “Yes.”

  “That will just make things worse. They’ll think I’m holding out on them.”

  This was the pitfall of an exile government established on the basis of freedom from humans and ARGO. They didn’t watch human holovids.

  “No. Simply tell them that you’ll inform them as soon as there is news. It is… an elaborate lie of omission. You must not tell the people or the news reporters, of course, but as high councilor you must not tell anyone what’s really going on. It would sour negotiations if the pirates heard publicly what your positions are.”

  “But… how?”

  “There is an art to saying things devoid of meaning. My time with Savior Carl has exposed me to a great deal of it. Carl himself is a masterful practitioner. It is called a sound bite.”

  “Sounds carnivorous,” Tuu Nau said skeptically.

  “Only the human term for it. It is simply a phrase that sounds nice and fits in the ear without moving inward to the brain. I could ask Carl to write you some, but I fear they would sound human-written.”

  There was a long pause. Clearly, Tuu Nau was weighing the option of letting Carl write his public relations statement. A nagging worry crept in at the prospect of his species taking on the habits and morals of Carl Ramsey. But then again, the stuunji’s lack of understanding of their oppressors just kept leading them in the festival circle dance of getting conquered repeatedly.

  “You know Savior Carl as well as anyone,” Tuu Nau began.

  “Well, as well as any of our people. I would say that is so.” Rai Kub wouldn’t claim to know Carl as well as Roddy or Esper, and especially not as well as Amy.

  “You do it.”

  “Of course, High Councilor,” Rai Kub replied, bowing even over a voice-only comm. “I’ll go see him directly.”

  “No. I mean you write it.”

  Rai Kub’s mind became a prairie. Wide. Flat. Featureless
except for a light breeze and a swaying of tall grasses.

  “Rai Kub,” Tuu Nau said into the conversational void. “I want you to write the sort of statement you just described. I will read it at the press conference. I trust you as our greatest human expert to deliver a message that will keep our people calm in this time of crisis.”

  “I… I…”

  “Consult Savior Carl all you like, but don’t let it sound like Savior Carl. He’s too well known on broadcasts. Too distinctly human. Be stuunji. Be proud. Serve the greater good of our people, and do so with honor and my blessings.”

  “Um… blessings to you as well, High Councilor Tuu Nau.”

  The comm ended.

  Rai Kub stared. He tapped at his datapad to bring up a transcript, still not sure he had heard correctly and hoping to find where he might have been mistaken.

  He was no orator, no politician. Nor was he a con man like Carl.

  Rai Kub was going to need help.

  # # #

  Esper was down to a bra and a pair of workout shorts that passed for undergarments most days. After that, it would be time to put up or shut up. Her hand shook as she poured two glasses of wine.

  Mort’s guerrilla badgering broke the mood often enough that Esper had thus far remained strong.

  I am here on a mission.

  Emily smiled languidly over the back of a couch. Without magic to hold her wits together against alcoholic incursions, the admiral had melted into an easy conversationalist with occasional lewd overtures mixed in. What Esper found her still wearing when she delivered the wine was guesswork she was trying to avoid. Already, Emily’s uniform jacket and slacks lay discarded on the carpet. A pair of heeled boots had been separated by meters from one another.

  “Do you need help over there?” Emily asked in her genteel accent with a hint of amusement peppered in for flavor.

  Esper jumped and nearly dropped the wine bottle. “No. I’m fine. Everything’s fine.”

  “Listen,” Mort interjected. “If you need to go through with this farce, take it easy on your conscience and let me handle it. Believe it or not, I do know what I’m doing around a strong woman. My Nancy could have twisted this ship into a pretzel and—”