Planet Hustlers: Mission 15 (Black Ocean) Read online

  Roddy shot Carl one of those “I hope you aren’t just lying for fun” looks. Carl rolled his eyes behind closed lids. It wasn’t as if this was his first rodeo. Losing Ithaca to Chuck made Carl look bad. Bad businessman. Bad crime boss. Bad son. None of that was going to improve his standing with the Ruckers. They weren’t the audience for “my dad screwed me over” sob stories. Don Rucker was everyone’s dad. Bitching about Chuck would send up uncomfortable comparisons to them bitching about Don, and that just wasn’t a done thing in the syndicate.

  “If you’re looking for work, Ramsey, we can probably find something for ya,” Rico assured him. “We’ve always got more jobs lined up than people to pull ‘em. You don’t harvest those money trees, the terras die up in the branches.”

  Carl gazed out the window of the hover-cruiser. Drab, utilitarian buildings sped past. “Maybe,” he said noncommittally. “I got something I’m kinda in the middle of. Depending how it goes, I might take you up on that.”

  Roddy elbowed Carl in the ribs, eliciting a pained grunt.

  Rico pretended not to notice, but Carl knew the guy was sharp. Don Rucker didn’t keep fools around long, family or not. Janice would be back on Mars, making her way up the ranks, if she had even the impulse control of an arsonist.

  The hover-cruiser pulled up to the Rucker building. It had undergone remodeling since the last time the Mobius was in the city of Calliope, Carousel’s de facto capital. Someone had grit-blasted the glitz and tawdry color away and replaced it with understated class. Chrome trim instead of gold plating. Marble facade instead of flatvid boards.

  As Carl, Cedric, and Roddy followed Rico inside, they entered not a cheap show of wealth without taste but a testament to what paying an interior designer can get you.

  Heeled shoes clacked, drawing Carl’s eyes like a laser range finder to determine the source.

  It was Janice Rucker.

  She swept into the foyer to greet them without a smile. Despite wearing heels, the rest of her attire was more function than style. Janice had on one of those skirts that was like two billowing pant legs. She had a buttoned black shirt that covered her to the neck and an open jacket that just showed a shoulder holster and the butt of a blaster peeking out with each step.

  “The fuck you think you’re doing here, Ramsey?” Janice asked, voice echoing under the three-story ceilings.

  Carl spread his hands. He could feel the I-told-you-so glares from Roddy and Cedric boring into the back of his head. “Hey, since when’s a guy gotta call ahead to offer congratulations?”

  “Cut the bullshit,” Janice snapped. “On second thought, just shut up completely. You, four-hands, tell me what your boss is here for.”

  Roddy sheepishly popped the top of a beer he’d smuggled in and took a quick sip. “Really, Carl being the boss has always been a bit overstated.”

  Janice’s attention snapped to Cedric. “You, then. Tell me what the three of you think you’re doing here?”

  “Parlay,” Cedric explained. To his credit, either the wizard had gravity stones in his boxers or was too stupid to be afraid of a Rucker scion with a temper like nitroglycerin. He didn’t flinch.

  Janice arched a painted eyebrow at the wizard, then turned to Carl. “New meat? I like him.”

  “I… think he’s spoken for,” Carl ventured. There were concessions he was willing to make for the sake of a mission. Esper staying on the Look Upon My Works Ye Mighty and Despair was her call. If she was willing to have a pillow fight or two with Admiral Chisholm, all the better. But if Janice pushed Mr. Stodgy a little too far, this whole building might come down around their ears.

  Janice sneered. “Pity.” Spinning on one heel, she headed for the lift. “Well, come on. Boss is waiting to see you.”

  Carl blinked. Then he hurried to catch up. “Wait… I thought…”

  “What?” Janice asked with a sardonic chuckle. “That I was running this outfit? Please.”

  They all piled into the lift, and Janice hit the console, indicating the floor below the penthouse. The lift rose with a lurch.

  “But if you’re not…? Then who?” Carl asked. The flowers of a budding plan wilted before his eyes. Carl’s mind raced, trying to think of Ruckers that Don might have assigned to reign in the ever-troublesome Janice. His head cycled through mental wedding albums and family reunions. He rejected name after name before it finally clicked.

  No.

  It couldn’t be.

  The lift doors opened, revealing an executive boardroom. A long, polished black table spread before them, chairs lining both sides. At the head of the table sat a woman Carl could see with his eyes closed. At her side, looming with a predator’s hungry glare, was an azrin bodyguard in tactical armor.

  Tania Rucker.

  And Mriy.

  “Hey, Carl,” Tanny called out in dry sarcasm. “So good of you to drop by.”

  # # #

  Her hair had grown out, and her cheeks had hollowed, but it was her. Tanny was dressed much like Janice, except that on her, the gear looked military. Plus, sitting at the table, Carl couldn’t see her legs or feet. He’d have bet the Mobius she wasn’t wearing heels.

  It didn’t take long for an uncomfortable silence to fall. Everyone was waiting for Carl to say something. He cleared his throat. “Well, fancy seeing you here.”

  Rico turned a shoulder into Carl’s back that sent him stumbling forward into the boardroom. Everyone else poured out of the elevator behind him. Janice skirted around the rest and joined Tanny at the head of the table, standing opposite Mriy.

  “You really had no idea, did you?” Tanny asked with a smirk. “Still the same fucking idiot.”

  Carl stuffed his hands into his jacket pockets and shrugged. “Hey, what can I say? I’m consistent. But for what it’s worth, you look good off the junk.”

  Tanny’s eyes narrowed. “You can tell?”

  “Baby, when you marry a girl three times, you learn what she looks like. You’re not eleven kilos of muscle in skin sized for ten anymore. I probably couldn’t arm wrestle you or anything, but I don’t think I’d get my arm broken trying.”

  Tanny crossed her arms. “If you’re trying to sweet talk me, you haven’t learned a thing.”

  A puzzlement fuzzed Carl’s mind until he remembered that the lack of current events keeping worked both ways. “Oh. Right. No. Nothing like that. I’m seeing someone. You made things pretty clear on Ithaca. Your way. My way. Two different directions.”

  “This wasn’t about you,” Tanny countered.

  “It never was.” Much as it hurt to admit it, Carl had always been the enabler, the shepherd, the shoulder to cry on about withdrawal symptoms until they could find another fix. Hot times between the sheets were just the work she put in keeping her hook-up around. Before he got maudlin, Carl smiled over at Mriy. “Syndicate life looks good on you.”

  “Better pay,” Mriy replied, showing teeth in an azrin expression that bordered between friendly and threatening. “Better food. Bigger bed.”

  “I’m surprised you didn’t bring Mort down with you, not knowing who was boss,” Tanny commented.

  A pall fell over the Mobius crew members. Carl looked down at his boots.

  “What?” Tanny asked. An incredulous laugh bubbled up from her belly. “Don’t even try to pretend that…” She trailed off when no one broke ranks with the supposed joke. “You’re serious. Aren’t you?”

  “Mission went bad,” Carl said. “Mort got himself into a duel with some high-paid ship’s wizard and took a blaster bolt. Imagine that, huh? A wizards’ duel ended in a tech fight.”

  “He must have died mortified.” Tanny cringed and slapped her forehead. “God, I’m sorry. That was horrible. I… I just meant that he hated tech his whole life and to go out like that…”

  “I appreciate your condolences,” Cedric said with iron in his tone.

  Tanny perked up. “That voice. You didn’t…?”

  Carl shook his head. “Nothing like that. Tanny, Mri
y… meet Cedric The Brown.”

  “Oh.” Tanny glanced sidelong at Janice, who replied with a curt nod and disappeared into the back of the room, talking into her wrist. “I suppose I see the resemblance.”

  Carl sauntered forward. “Neither here nor there right now. Cedric’s filling in on the team. Up to him for how long. Today, though, I’ve got business I wanted to talk about.”

  Roddy and Cedric followed behind Carl, but Rico headed Cedric off.

  “Sorry,” Tanny said. “But I’ve learned a lot about wizards over the years. Yours doesn’t get any closer until mine gets here.”

  “Yours…?” Carl echoed.

  Tanny’s smile was mirthless. “How many times did we cheat death because the grim reaper himself was riding with us? Guys like Mort don’t grow on trees, but I knew I wanted someone who could bend a few laws that weren’t part of the ARGO Code of Justice.”

  Carl jerked his head at Cedric. “Kid’s Order of Gaia. On the outs with the Convo cuz of his dad, not from being dangerous himself. You want fresh air on this ashtray of a planet? He’s your man. But he’s more use to me preventing violence than starting it.”

  Tanny chuckled. Mriy joined in. “Carl, the next time I take your word for something, I’ve given orders that my own people relieve me of duty. I don’t care if Mort’s kid can’t pull a card trick; he’s not moving until my wizard gets here.”

  The wait wasn’t long.

  With a ding, the lift doors opened, and a gentleman stepped out. He was square jawed and dimple chinned, with hair that flowed in waves like a shampoo model. Tanny’s wizard wore a black blazer over a white turtleneck, slacks with creases down the fronts of each leg, and a pair of glossy black wing tips. He flashed a porcelain white smile and stepped around the Mobius’s backup wizard as he made his way to the spot Janice had vacated at Tanny’s side.

  “Carl, this is Enzio Stiles. Enzio, this is the lyingest sonovabitch the galaxy has ever spawned.”

  “To be fair, I inherited my silver tongue from my dad,” Carl clarified, giving credit where credit was due.

  “I’ve heard so much about you.” Considering his name, Enzio didn’t have a charming Old Earth accent. He sounded more like a news reader for one of the major omni outlets, polished so smooth you could have skied down it.

  Enzio accepted a handshake from Carl before taking a seat at the table. Mriy left her seat empty, preferring to loom behind it.

  Carl wondered whether the azrin had any residual loyalty, or whether she was now just a merc on the Rucker payroll. He hated coin flip chances (unless they were rigged), and this sure felt like one. Without knowing what good Enzio was in a fight, Carl didn’t want to risk Cedric being his only defense against Mriy. He was going to have to exert his best behavior to keep his throat away from those claws.

  “So,” Carl said once he’d settled in. “How’d you boot the pirates off this rock?”

  Enzio held up a hand before Tanny had a chance to speak. “You don’t have to answer that.”

  Carl was gobsmacked. It was a trick he’d learned from Mort, years ago, and never had much chance to use. Before then, he’d never been more than flabbergasted. “This guy your lawyer or something?”

  “Or something,” Tanny said with a wry smile.

  Enzio inclined his head in a seated bow. “Yale Law, class of ‘49.”

  Carl drummed his fingers on the table as he scowled at the interloper. “Thought you said this guy was a wizard.”

  “He’s multi-talented,” Tanny replied. “Multi-talented. Sort of the way you can talk out your ass and move your mouth at the same time, except Enzio’s talents are useful.”

  Inside him somewhere, there was Diplomatic Carl, who knew better than to take bait resting on the trigger plate of a bear trap. Right now, though, Ex-Husband Carl was in charge. “Who knew that under all that chemical haze you had such a sharp wit?” Roddy tugged urgently on Carl’s jacket with one of his feet. “I mean, if I had the choice between a muscled thug in the crew and a devious, planet-stealing gangster, I’d obviously have gone with the useful one.”

  “Carl!” Roddy whispered urgently.

  “Although,” Carl continued, ignoring the laaku’s pleading. “I actually ended up clearing space in my life for a—oof.”

  Roddy may have been smaller than a human, but the laaku’s knowledge of human anatomy guided a lower fist right into Carl’s kidney. “Don’t mind him. He’s just a sore loser.”

  Mriy’s eyes narrowed. Her nose twitched. “I smell the answer on him anyway. He mates with the stray who found Ithaca.”

  “Scarecrow?” Tanny said. “Jesus, Carl. That’s like taking advantage of a psychiatric patient.”

  Carl pushed back from the table. “We’re done here. C’mon guys. Let’s go.”

  Roddy was only too eager to comply. He was on his feet before Carl finished sliding his chair. Cedric stood solemnly, never taking his eyes from Enzio.

  As he headed for the lift, Tanny called after him. “Why’d you even bother coming here, anyway? Mobius so hard up for work that you’d come crawling to the Rucker Syndicate for handouts?”

  Carl took a deep breath. Right. He had come here for a reason. The procession stopped as he turned to face his ex-wife. “No. I came to find out why you guys ousted the Poet Fleet. They ended up deciding to occupy the stuunji homeworld. I want them out.”

  “Why would you even care? Have you got some scam running there that the poets shit on?” Tanny asked.

  “Remember those two stuunji we rescued from the Gologlex Menagerie?” Carl asked.

  Tanny shrugged and exchanged a glance with Mriy. “Yeah.”

  “One of them is my new security officer.”

  Mriy snarled. “They’re pacifists. Half the galaxy knows it.”

  Roddy snickered. “You hand one a vehicle-mounted blaster for a hand gun, and they’re willing to second-guess that.”

  “Besides,” Carl put in. “Rai Kub’s taken blaster fire for me. We’re more defensive-minded now. He intimidates just fine if he keeps his mouth shut, and unlike some bodyguards I’ve had, he takes his job seriously.”

  Mriy bared her fangs but said nothing.

  “So it’s charity work, huh?” Tanny asked. “You’re all noble and shit, rescuing these docile herbivores from the prissiest pirate band ever? And you came here for what? Help kicking them off the stuunji planet, too? Looking for tips?”

  “We helped them out a while back. Feel kinda responsible,” Carl said. “I wasn’t coming here looking for help. I was looking to see how I could convince you fine folks to give the pirates this shithole back so the stuunji could get back to farming and praying—which is all they seem to really care about in the end.”

  Tanny glared blaster bolts. “Not gonna happen.”

  Carl shrugged. “I see that now. Anyway, before we head out, any chance Kubu’s around? Wouldn’t mind saying hi to the big dope before we take off.”

  “Yeah. He’s here.”

  The way she said it didn’t leave Carl feeling all warm and homey.

  # # #

  Kubu paced the playroom. Before Mommy had brought him to Carousel, this had been a ballroom, big and open with a slick glossy floor and nothing to do. He’d seen it. It had been very boring.

  Now, the floor was fake plastic grass with spongy padding under it. The emptiness had been replaced by ramps and obstacles, a play fort, and swimming pool. Toys lay scattered everywhere, many too heavy for his occasional human playmates to even budge.

  “There’s nothing to be nervous about,” Bill assured him, clapping Kubu on the flank amiably.

  Bill was Kubu’s teacher. Kubu had other teachers before Bill, but Bill was the best. Bill knew all kinds of things, but most of all Bill knew how to explain what he knew. Bill didn’t use words Kubu didn’t understand unless it was to teach Kubu those words. He didn’t yell or scold. He always seemed to know the right thing to say.

  “But I haven’t seen Carl or Roddy in a long time,” Kubu repl
ied. “What if they don’t remember me?”

  Though he was ashamed to admit it, he had trouble remembering what Carl looked like. Kubu had an impression of Carl, nothing more. Roddy would be easier to recognize since he was fuzzy and had four hands. Mostly, Kubu wished that Esper had come with them.

  Bill smiled. Unlike many people, Bill didn’t make fake smiles around Kubu. Knowing that, Kubu relaxed a little. “Don’t be silly. No one could forget you.”

  Kubu wasn’t as sure. There were so many people in the galaxy. Mommy had introduced him to more people than he could ever hope to remember. Names, faces, and smells got all mixed up, and if he met the same person a second time, he rarely put a name to a smell. Carl and Roddy were both older; they must have met lots of people since Kubu had last seen them.

  The lift doors opened, and Kubu bounded off as if he were spring loaded.

  “Carl! Carl! Carl!” Kubu shouted as he went.

  Carl exited the lift and threw up his arms to protect himself. “Holy shit, Kubu! You’re the size of an elephant!”

  Kubu resisted the urge to lick him feet to face and instead sat down and spread his front paws. Carl stepped forward cautiously and accepted Kubu’s hug.

  Carl shouldn’t have worried. Kubu was good at hugging. He got lots of practice. Humans were little and fragile, but all it took was a little squeeze to make a hug work.

  Roddy, on the other hand, was too small. When had Roddy gotten so little? Without pausing to think, Kubu scooped up the little laaku and cradled him against his chest. “I am so glad to see you!”

  “Your English is improving,” Carl said. “How’s life been treating you? You getting enough to eat?”

  Roddy squirmed loose, and Kubu returned him to the floor.

  “Yes. I eat lots of good food now. Mommy buys yummy animals, and I get ice cream every other day if I’m good.”

  Bill caught up with the gathering, having walked the length of the ballroom. “He’s always good. Don’t let his modesty fool you.” He reached up and ruffled the fur on Kubu’s neck.