The Dead Never Die

Written by Dealve

Colony 7 - Tera time: 4585/3/5.67

"See ya later!" Petra said as she rushed out of the house.
“Try not to die!” Grandma Christy said sarcastically as Petra ran by.
“I’ll do my best!” Petra called back, waving to Christy, before running through town. It was a nice day for Colony 7 standards. Not a cloud in the sky, the growing chill of the coming winter had begun to set in, making the air crisp and light.
“Hey Petra!” Little Tim called as she ran past the town center. He was the tallest person on the colony by far, but everyone called him little to feel better about themselves.
“Hey Tim!”
She nearly ran into the slow moving metal hunk called Big Tim, which was Little Tim’s ore cart.
Making a sharp turn around the refinery, Petra’s destination was just ahead: Rita’s house.
Her parents were never in during the day, which meant Petra could burst in without any need to knock. That’s how friendship works. Slamming the front door open, she ran across to the other end of the house.
“Did you see the ship that was abandoned outside town!?” Petra burst into Rita’s room with an unbridled excitement.
“Calm down,” Rita said, who looked extremely surprised at Petra’s outburst and sudden entrance to the house. “And no, I haven’t seen anything to do with a ship outside town.”
Rita’s room was weird. There were boxes everywhere, and the usual clutter of the room was tidied up.
Petra cocked her head. “Whatcha doin' in here?”
“Packing.” Rita said, nonchalantly putting a hairbrush into a box, which still had several strands of Rita’s glorious blond hair stuck to it.
“But why are ya packing?” Sometimes Rita would only answer the easiest part of the question. She was dumb like that. “We have to move,” Rita said, eyes still in the box. “To the other town.”
“That’s all right, I’ll still visit!” Petra said. She had never been to the other town, across the pass on the other side of the mountain. “Either way, let’s not think of what’s to come, let’s enjoy the time we have now.”
Rita looked up. “I suppose you’re right.”
“Exactly, now, lets go to this ship!” Petra was pretty sure it was a Peregrine brand of some sort. Grandma Christy sometimes had the magazines that show off the cool ships in them.
“What are you going to do with a broken ship anyways, isn’t it useless?” Rita said.
“What else do you do with broken things, you fix them!”
Rita’s eyes finally got a smal glow in them, which was generally rare. “Maybe if we fix it, we can finally leave this dreadful planet.”
Petra nodded. “Let’s explore as much as we can, go on a girl’s grand tour of the galaxy!”
“Anywhere is better than here.”
“Let’s make a promise then. We’ll fix that ship, and take it to see the stars!” Petra extended her hand. Grandma Christy always said that a handshake seals promises. Rita looked a little perturbed, but shook on it anyways.
“It’s a promise!”

***

Station One - Tera time: 4588/4/34.08 Three and a half years later

Petra checked her mail for the seventeenth time that day. Just like the sixteen previous times, it was still empty. She sighed, and switched off her tablet. She was tempted to throw it across the room, but it wasn’t the tablet’s fault, and besides, she was short on money anyways. Thus why she needed the mail to come in.
The owners of the cafe where she sat had looked a little concerned when she ordered her fifth coffee. Well, they had looked a little concerned when she was on her third. Now they looked just straight up concerned. Yet, they still brought her the coffee, which tasted far better than the rancid synthetic stuff they had on Colony 7. Perhaps because of that, it cost a small mint.
Regardless of the cost, if she was going to try to stay awake, having something good to drink was a benefit.
Just as Petra was preparing to check her mail for the eighteenth time, a messy black haired boy about her age sat down across from her. It was Daren Briggs, wearing his signature brown long sleeved shirt. She pretended not to notice him, and checked her mail for the eighteenth time. Still empty. Maybe her signal wasn’t very good here. But this was Station One, the signal was good everywhere unless you landed yourself in an electromagnetic cage.
“Petra, as much as you want to deny my existence, there’s nothing you can do to get rid of me.” Daren said, his voice was a reminder of his presence. Which was annoying. It wasn’t his fault, but fact is fact.
“I could shoot you, that might help.” Petra offered, not looking up from her blank tablet screen.
Daren smiled, evidently pleased that he got a response out of her. Sometimes she ignored him until he went away, but she was feeling nice today.
“You do know that firing a gun is illegal on Station one, right?” He said.
“Of course I do, wouldn’t want to blow through the thin hull and send us all straight to the Divine, now would I.” Petra responded tartly.
Daren opened his mouth and then stopped. “I suppose you might.” He agreed.
“I’m glad we’re on the same page. Now, why did you decide to crash my peaceful afternoon at the cafe?” Petra finally looked up from her blank tablet. It was clear that Daren was not going away any time soon.
“It’s 2 in the morning Tera central time.” Daren pointed out.
“Call it Chreneb lag then. You didn’t answer my question.” Petra took a sip of her coffee, which had finally cooled down to a decent temperature.
“You ran off as soon as they let us out of the orientation, I wanted to see what you were up to.” Daren explained, and flagged the waitress down to order something of his own. Great. That meant he would be here even longer.
“All those filthy guild recruiters were hanging around there like flaks and feeders. I didn’t sign up to be a bounty hunter just to join some shitty guild.” Petra ended up using a rather obscure idiom, although Daren seemed to either ignore it, or get the gist of what she was saying.
“You’ll never get good contracts if you’re not in a guild. They send them to the ones who butter them up most.” Daren’s coffee came, in which he put a dash of milk and a cube of sugar. Pussy. He would never sustain a caffeine addiction on Colony 7.
“So why did you follow me rather than sign up with one of those buttery bastards?”
Daren thought about that one for a second, it was almost possible to see the depressingly slow cogs turning in his brain. “Dunno. I guess I didn't really like them either. Besides, you're the only person I liked hanging around from our class.”
“What about Jade? You certainly seemed close with her.” Petra sent a precision shot straight for Daren’s jugular.
It was a direct hit. She witnessed his face go through three different shades of red and just as many expressions. It was impossible not to let a little smile through when he put on that much of a display. “That….That was um…” Language had also left him out to rot.
“It’s complicated.” He finally decided.
“I thought it was something like that.” Petra refreshed her mail again…...nothing.
Daren took a rather large gulp of his coffee, likely burning his mouth. “They don’t call you acid tongued for nothing.” Petra smiled, it seems that her reputation was thriving.
Ding. Just as she had put her tablet down, it made a happy chirp.
“...” The mail auto refreshes.
“What’s that?” Daren asked, somehow procuring a jelly gram while she wasn’t looking, placing its flaky golden crust in his mouth.
“My first contract. In other words, a good meal in the stomach.” She pulled it up on her tablet, and Daren walked around to look over her shoulder.
It opened with a name and the picture of the target. Lenyan Deerli was 38, with dark brown eyes and short cut black hair. Probably from Cephid judging by the gray tinging the tips of his hair. A gaunt expression on his well defined face captured from what looked to be a mugshot. So, a repeat offender if they got this mugshot. Topping off his look was a fancy suit in the Caradel style, an ornamental scarf adorning his neck and a black suit. He was a biological engineer by profession, working in several biotech firms across the known worlds. He was last seen leaving Zaran Station in a stolen ship.
“This guy looks like the worst he would do is throw a briefcase at you.” Daren said smugly.
“Supposedly he’s wanted for smuggling and illegal data mining by the Astreans.” Petra had participated in her own smuggling business, but that was a while back.
“How much for him?” Daren asked.
“10,000 Aster.” Petra said hollowly. A solid deal. With that money, she could easily rent a decent apartment on Station one, even one with gravity. Or have an awful lot of coffees at this cafe. And a requisite amount of jelly grams. She might even be able to get a visa to go to Tera.
“Doesn’t that seem like a lot for a smuggler?” Daren asked.
“Maybe they’ve raised it since he’s avoided capture or something. Money’s money, regardless of why it exists.” Petra finished her coffee off.
“Dead or alive?” Daren asked stupidly.
Petra almost spit the coffee on him. “You went through the same certification program I did, right? The only ones that saying applies to are people wanted for murder, and even then, depending on the circumstances, they might still want them alive.”
“I just wanted to use the line once. Besides, I’d be worried if our first contract was a murderer. They’re the most dangerous.” Our first contract? He was already acting like she was taking him on this.
“Who said you were coming?”
“You wouldn’t just leave me here with the flaks or whatever, would you?” He really did have weak skin. “If this contract is public, won’t there be other people looking for him, what if we get into trouble with them?” Daren recovered his composure and delivered a solid argument. 5000 Aster would draw all sorts of attention, 10000 would be like a honeyflower in bloom. The guilds exist as a method to prevent multiple bounty hunters from trying to collect the same bounty. With about a third of all bounty hunters being freelancers, who knows what kind of people she might run into.
“Fine,” She gave in. Daren’s expression was equal parts disbelief and joy. “If we’re doing this, we’re taking my ship and splitting it 60/40.”
“55/45?”
“Not a chance,” Petra nipped that in the bud. “60/40 is the final and only offer.”
“Fine, 60/40.” They shook on it.
“Pack your bags and meet me at the docks at .16” That gave them two hours to clean up their affairs here. Petra paid for the five coffees with a sigh of regret for how empty her bank account was looking. She would have to make sure her ship was in alright shape. It might be getting lonely, given that she hadn’t touched it in the couple weeks while she was staying on station for the certification.
Petra’s bags were already packed when she left her room this morning, the less time she has to spend on station one, the better. The cramped hallways and sections of zero G were horribly uncomfortable. The route from the cafe to her room was similar to this description. The only compartments she could afford were the ones in zero G, located towards the edge of the station, which was laid out in the shape of the Bedokan word for duality. It was made to symbolize the treaty made between the binary planets of Tera and Bedoke which kickstarted the work on the space station.
She passed through the gravitated section at a brisk pace, feeling the force pulling her to the floor growing smaller and smaller with each passing step, soon it was gone, and she had to pull herself through the hallway, dodging people and delivery drones alike as they charged through the station.
The main hallways were about 2 meters square, plenty of comfortable breathing room. Where it gets nasty are the branching hallways that lead to individual compartments. They are only a couple feet wide and seven feet tall, so when you inevitably run into a drone it just stops there impatiently waiting for you to move. This insolent behavior had led Petra to smash one of them into the wall on a particularly bad day, probably breaking it. Not that she stuck around long enough to tell.
After weaving through the familiar hallways while zero-G sickness threatened to make her lose her 5 coffees, she eventually ended up at her compartment. Petra had the top bunk while her roommate Chelsea had the bottom. Luckily, Chelsea wasn’t around. They never got talking and the times they did were generally arguments. Petra was glad to be rid of her. She grabbed her suitcase and made her way to the docks, which thankfully, were gravitized.
The docks were a long hallway that spanned the length of the station with airlocks spanning the length. Her ship was towards the opposite end, so she got a chance to look at some of the amazing ships rich people owned. A Dreamflier 720G with a solar sail equipped for long term space cruises, not to mention the latest Chreneb drive, rated for over a hundred and fifty parsecs per jump. The biggest upgrade since the 710 models was the oscillatory communicator onboard, allowing it to communicate with station one, and by proxy Tera, anywhere within 35 parsecs. The 710 had been her dream ship since she got her hands on her first Rocketeers’ magazine. So seeing 3 of them lined up in the dock when she had arrived here caused her to get a little overexcited, much to the dismay of her ship.
Her ship was the kind of ship that the owners of the 720G would call a rustbucket. It was nearly sixteen years old and all of its parts had been changed or refitted at least once. The Veltik Peregrine 72, rather creatively named after the year it was first produced. Measuring just over 15 meters in length, it was rather cozy with multiple people, its drive only had the range of 30 parsecs per jump and had no oscillatory communicators. And yet, despite that, it was her ship, one that she owned and had repaired countless times. She knew it as well as her eyelids. She had poured a little bit of herself into that old, sometimes broken Peregrine. She found it trashed in the wilderness on Colony 7, and dedicated herself to fixing it, making the hour long trek out of the mining town that she called home, and halfway up a mountain to repair it.
Petra punched the entry code into the airlock. 9585
It opened with the hiss of hydraulics, the circular hatch rolling open. Petra stepped over the lip and advanced towards the control panel inside. Hissssss. Chunk. The door closed behind her. She checked the pressure on each side. .98 atmospheres and .99, should be in the green, and opened the other side, which opened with a similar sound.
Following the gangway down, Petra felt the artificial gravity from the dock begin to fade. Her ship’s power was off, so its gravity wasn’t on yet. At the end of the hall lay the friendly gray door to her ship, its dark tone contrasting the pure white of the airlock sides. Petra put the key in, an old fashioned card type, and the welcoming interior showed its face. It had been too long. This ship was her salvation, her true home.
Petra floated up to the front of the ship, dropping her suitcase to float near the door. The console was a wide array of switches, buttons, and screens which gave off an aura of complexity. Petra easily found the power switch and flicked it on. The setup processes began on the monitor, turning on the lights and starting the ship computer. She heard a rather exasperated yawn from the ship’s speakers.
“Aaahhh, Petra, you’ve finally returned. And here I thought I was going to be scrapped down to my base parts and torn to pieces. I swear I have an existential crisis every time you reboot me.” Perry, the ship’s AI said. She had bought him a voice package cheap the first time she went offworld, much to the dismay of everyone who boards.
“Calm down, I would never let anyone scrap you.” She patted the console. “Guess what I got.”
“Well, considering the purposes of this trip, I would guess that you got your bounty license.” Perry said matter of factly.
“I got that, of course. But I also got us a contract.” Petra grinned. Perry was the closest thing to a friend she had. Unless you counted Daren, although she had only known him for two weeks.
“A contract?” Perry did his best to grin without a face. “Are you finally going to buy me a better body?”
“You do know that those cost almost 100,000 aster, right. This one’s for 10,000, you’re a whole order of magnitude off.”
“First you neglect me for two weeks, and next you put off giving me physicality. I’m going to find a new owner.” He even added a humph at the end.
“You wouldn’t even be existent without me, so find your lucky spade.”
“I can’t, I own zero shovels, trowels or spades.” Perry happily pointed out.
“...You know what I meant.”
“Maybe you need to find yourself a Colony 7 slang language pack so I can actually figure out what half of your mining idioms mean.”
“Believe me I tried. They just don’t sell ‘em.” The system finished booting, the display showing the local area of navigation, astronomical objects, maximum jump distance, and any documented civilization as markers on the map. “Perry, how are the fuel rods looking?”
“Perfectly dandiddlydoodle.” Perry started to speak nonsense again.
“Can I get an answer without the Peregrine dialect?”
“Fuel rods are good for another 3 months, 3 days and 5 hours. Coolant is also in good condition.” Perry said in his best robot voice impression. Which was quite good considering his status as an artificial intelligence.
“Perfect. Can you start spinning up the Chreneb drive? We’ll need to make a jump soon.”
“Will do. You will be ready to jump in around fifteen minutes or whenever we choose to leave the station.”
“Oh, and turn on the gravity. .8gs please.”
“Yes your highness.” Perry said sarcastically, turning it on rather suddenly, sending everything falling to the floor. Petra had positioned herself above the flight seat, and fell into it comfortably. The airlock outside groaned as the forces on it changed, but it eventually settled down.
According to the time on the ship’s clock, Petra had another half hour before Daren showed up. That gave her plenty of time for training. She opened the compartment under the console, which held a case with spots for 14 spheres, although she only had a couple on hand, mostly the useful ones to have in case things stopped working. Tin, nickel, and steel, all of which could be useful in space.
Petra took the easiest one to practice with, tin, and put it on the top of the console, where it was flat. She took a moment to clear her mind.
Deep breath in.
Deep breath out.
Soon, with a few more long, deep breaths, just as she had practiced countless times, her mind was clear and open.
She envisioned a pedestal, and on top of it, the tin ball she had placed there. She envisioned it in her mind’s eye, noting every imperfection. Grandma Christy always said "Perfect can be described in a single word. Therefore, you must define things by their imperfections." There was the little divot on the side she placed away from her, the scratch on the bottom from spinning on an uneven surface, even how it was weighted slightly to one side. Its true shape took form within her mind, placing it on the pedestal. Then, it clicked. Like something was making a connection, the same feeling of meshing two gears together.
Petra opened her eyes and gave the ball a spin, watching it progress in a circle and closing her eyes again. In her mind, it was spinning in place on the pedestal. She reached out in her mind and touched it, feeling the friction of it slowing the ball down until it came to a stop. She opened her eyes again and touched the tin ball, this time, in real life, in which the ball had come to a stop. It was warm to the touch. Petra smiled. Success.
When attuned like this, tin balls convert their rotational energy into heat. Tin is one of the fourteen spin metals. Her two other spheres, nickel and steel could also be used for various things. Nickel could apply a force on her body, while the iron in the steel could be used to increase bodily energy, basically what the five cups of coffee were doing right now. Tin was the most practical to practice with since it didn’t interrupt her concentration as much when used.
She would try the second. She put the nickel ball next to the tin one and imagined a second pedestal next to the first. Petra kept the image of the tin ball in the front of her mind, determined not to lose it, and added the nickel ball on the pedestal next to it. It had many imperfections since it was her first sphere, given to her by Grandma Christy. Petra shook her head, she wasn’t important. Only the spheres.
Petra had nearly every scratch, bulge and protrusion across its surface memorized. Even so, it became difficult to keep up the concentration between the two spheres, it was like both were trying to be the center of attention. Even though it eventually clicked into place like the tin sphere, she knew the connection was rather short lived. She tentatively opened her eyes.
After only a second, her mental image broke, toppling both the pillars and breaking down her concentration with a sledge hammer. Her heart beat like she had been sprinted a mile, and beads of sweat ran down her forehead.
“Two has always been too many.” Petra muttered to herself, putting them away. Perry, being designed to use multiple at once, could manage five, or six if Petra gave him extra processing, but she could only do two on very rare occasions. One was usually plenty depending on the situation, you rarely needed two welders for single weld.
“Ahem.” Perry cleared his nonexistent throat. “There’s a man loitering out on the outside of the airlock, looking bored, and I’m wondering what you’re course of action is.”
“Oh, that’s Daren, we’re expecting him, can you be a dear and let him in?” Petra explained, wiping the sweat off her forehead.
“Oooh, a boy. It seems you’ve been busy while I’ve been off. I’ll be right back.” Perry started humming to himself, completely getting the wrong idea.
“It’s not like that at all, we’re colleagues on the job. I figured we should have some help on our first job.” Perry just continued humming.
Petra rolled her eyes and went back to work, sending a request for departure to the station control. It generally took a minute or so to pass through.
“Nice place you’ve got here…” Daren said, wandering into the cabin and looking around like a confused kitten after being separated from its mother.
“Repaired and modded the thing myself. This old bucket wasn’t even capable of interstellar by itself before I got my hands on it.” Petra said proudly.
Daren seemed genuinely impressed. “I like the atmosphere of it. Your AI is also...uh...interesting.”
“Perry was the ship’s AI that came with the ship. Veltik decided to put in a full personality package in with it. And well, this is the result.”
“Ahem.” Perry cleared his nonexistent throat again. It was becoming a strange habit of his, considering the lack of biological need to clear his throat. “Sorry to interrupt your trash talking session, but where am I going after I leave this dock? It’s a nice thing to know as a ship. I enjoy a bit of consistency in my life, you see.”
“I have a couple hunches,” Petra said. She pulled up the titular Lenyan Deerli’s file. “Judging from his appearance and last known location, he’s not a Tera native. With the gray tips on his hair, he must be from Cephid. We should head there.” Petra concluded.
Daren, however, looked skeptical. “Can you zoom in on his right forearm?”
Petra, a bit confused, did so anyways. “There!” Daren said excitedly. “Just underneath his sleeve!” It was a tattoo, a red circle with an X through the middle of it. It was a tattoo that everyone knew: a remnant of the Colony 3 quarantine. Around 12 Teran years ago, a strange plague swept across Colony 3, which crystallized the cells of people’s bodies. It struck so suddenly and so quickly that the governments of Tera, Cephid and Bedoke came together to issue a quarantine of the entire planet, cutting it off from the rest of the known worlds.
“If you were going to hide somewhere where no one could ever find you, where would you do it?” Daren continued, as giddy as a child in a candy shop.
The answer was obvious. “Colony 3. The whole place is practically deregulated at this point, after the quarantine, what with the Chreneb gate being closed.” Petra pointed out.
“Yeah, now you can only get there with a jump.” Daren agreed.
“Perry!”
“Yes?” Perry responded timely.
“Can you check through Station One’s records for any ships that Lenyan may have owned?”
“You are aware that accessing private records is reserved only for station personnel and accessing them is illegal, right?” Perry said. He could be more rigid than a steel rod sometimes.
“You already downloaded them the moment I turned you back online, didn’t you?” If a ship could sheepishly grin, Perry did so.
“I just wanted to remind you that you are liable for any of my actions.” Perry began humming a tune as he looked through files. “There is one ship registered with Lenyan Deerli, a Rensin 250p.” The 250ps were indeed equipped with Chreneb drives, coincidentally the only one in the Rensin line of ships. If it had a Chreneb drive, it could be tracked, since every drive required the use of Spin, it created a unique frequency when in use. If the contract was posted today, and if he was last seen 4 days ago...
Petra smiled. “Alright Perry, plot course for somewhere around one lightday away from the Colony 3 entry point. Oh, and add a bit of distance based on trip time as well.”
“The routed distance to the desired location is 279.546033 parsecs plus or minus .0000005 parsecs.” Perry went through an unusually businesslike rambling. He really liked to show off and sound important in front of guests. What a petty AI. “This will require ten jumps to accomplish and will take approximately 2 days 2 hours and 17 minutes to complete. Would you like to depart?” “Hold on, 2 days!?” Three light days away and the signal would be far too weak to even have a chance to pick it up. “Can you do it faster?” She asked.
“Well, if we take a chance and jump to interstellar space, we may be able to shave a day or so off the route. Any more time would come off of cutting corners on the jump cooldowns and reactivations. That has a chance to tear the ship apart at its seams if we’re not careful.”
“Noted.” Petra said, detaching the ship from the airlock. “Do it anyways.”

***

Petra sat at the console, trying not to fall asleep. Falling asleep was the worst idea. She never wanted to fall asleep. Yet, the longer she tried, the more tired she got. Even before the coffee shop she had been up through the previous night.
Her body simply could not stay awake any longer, and eventually, her eyes refused to open, and she fell asleep at the console.

***

Petra wandered up the mountain path to Rita’s new house. The sun shone brightly and the fog resting in the valley was illuminated in the morning light. Streams of water flowed from the melting snow, crossing the path and flowing into the valley below. Little wildflowers sprung up on the sides of the path, painting the white snow canvas behind it.. Despite the warming weather, Petra still had to pull her coat tight around her while cold winds from the peaks above buffeted any exposed skin.
The road between the two towns on the main continent of Colony 7 was finally passable after a tough winter, which kept Petra locked inside for several days straight of blizzards and extreme winds. However, now that it was spring, she was free to visit Rita, who had moved to the other village a year prior. Her parents wanting better work or something along those lines.
Petra had decided to visit under the pretext of baked goods. She baked a fresh batch of Ballwheat cakes this morning before setting out along the two hour walk across the pass.
no. A voice said, deep in the back of her mind.
She was nearly there. Just over the ridge, it would open up into a small valley where copper mining takes place. Around that mine was where the town sprung up as little warm dots on the icy landscape.
No.
She crossed the ridge, taking a deep breath of mountain air and smiling at the watercolor like village below.
No!
The path, despite being a steep incline with plenty of switchbacks on the way up, began lazily snaking towards the village down below. Rita’s house was near to the outskirts, built with printed pieces just like every other house on the planet.
Don’t go there.
Petra found her way through the town, weaving between several houses. Dew stuck to the leaves of the emerging bushes and branches of deciduous trees, hungry for sunlight after the harsh winter.
Please. It begged.
The door to Rita’s house was ajar, the darkness inside felt like an oppressive tide. She slowly pushed the door open, calling out to anyone inside.
Don’t go in there! Anywhere else! Please!
Petra’s breath caught in her throat.
Her insides threatened to burst out.
Rita’s body hung there, gently swinging from the thin rope tied around her neck, tied with her own hands. Her hands and feet were bloated, and shades of purple and yellow climbed up her limbs like tendrils of decay. Petra stood there in shock. She had to know. Was she alive? No. Of course not, nobody could survive like that.
“You let me die, Petra.” It said. “You left me here to die.”
It talked even though it wasn’t alive. It’s lips moved even though they were a deep shade of blue.
Petra ran out of the house, down the path. Anywhere, anywhere besides here. Anywhere was better than here. It followed, even though its legs were practically rotting; it floated along the path like a flyflower in the wind.
She stumbled down the path, but it came closer and closer.
At this point, it was right behind her, breath cold on the back of her neck, even though she couldn’t breath in her last moments. Even so.
Even if she was dead, she never left.

***

Petra woke in a cold sweat, her heart beating as if she had run a marathon. That dream again. She shook her head forcefully to clear her thoughts. No need to relive those moments.
“Are you alright?” Daren said timidly from across the room. He evidently found the spare bed. “You screamed pretty loudly.”
“Yeah, I’m fine.” Petra said dismissively. “It was just a nightmare.”
Daren looked like he wanted to respond, but thought better of it.
“Attention to all the late sleepers on this ship. We’re approaching the last jump until our destination.” Perry’s voice came through the speakers of the main room.
Now was not the time to be sitting around. She had to be moving. If you ever stop moving, she’ll catch up to you. That was a dream, disconnected from reality, but her tired brain wouldn’t listen. Even though Rita had died three years ago, that image was still so visceral in her mind. Every time she closed her eyes, it threatened to appear, encroaching from the dark corners of her mind.
Petra got up and made herself busy. "An idle mind breeds discontent." Grandma Christy used to say. She took her nutrient supplements and wrung the sleep out of her tired eyes. She didn’t have any fancy food on the ship, with the exception of several canned meals (Meal in a Can brand of course). She chose a red fish curry of Hizpenshin origin. As she set it into its warming unit, which handily heats the food and removes the lid of the can, she felt the familiar vibrations of the beginning of a jump.
Well, as much as they called it a “jump”, the word didn’t describe it very well. There was still the time in the air after all, and it was far from instantaneous. It would take her ship about an hour to travel its maximum distance through the wormhole. Despite all of Perry’s talk of “breaking the ship apart”, it was quite intact, albeit on low power mode. According to the panel diagnostics, the hull was intact and besides a couple dents and scratches from space debris, it was perfectly fine.
With a creaking from the ship, the jump was initiated, and the vibrations were replaced with a high pitched moan of the Chreneb drive, working its hardest. Petra was always curious of what it looked like outside during a jump, but if the screens were to open, even for a second, she would be practically fried with the amount of radiation present outside. Even the lead lined walls of the ship were supposed to only stop 99% of it. Extended exposure was supposedly quite bad for you. Petra didn’t care that much, if she was going to travel the known worlds, she would have to deal with the consequences.
The can warmer beeped happily to let her know that her red fish curry was ready. The next thing she needed to do was set a couple ground rules straight with Daren. She motioned him to come over.
“We need to have a game plan for several situations.” She said, digging a spoon into the can.
Daren nodded. “It’s probably a good idea to figure out what we should do ahead of time in case something goes wrong.”
Petra nodded. “My thoughts exactly.”
“Firstly, can I have some?” He pointed to her canned curry.
“Obviously not. Get your own.” Petra said. “Can we take this seriously?”
“My life’s philosophy is to do the exact opposite of that.” Daren said proudly.
“Regardless of your strange life philosophies, we still have to set up some ground rules.” Petra explained.
“Alright, fine. I was just joking around.” Daren walked over to the can cabinet, chose chicken and rice, and put in the warmer.
“First thing’s first. Don’t kill our target, we need him alive to collect the bounty.”
Daren nodded. “I’m not exactly enthused about killing anyone either. But how are we going to subdue him? It’s not like he’ll come willingly if he’s already on the run.”
He was right, if he was willing to go willingly to the authorities, he would have already turned himself in. He probably would put up a good fight. “You trained with the tranquilizer and stun gun, right?”
“Of course.”
“If you have to use an actual gun on him, try to aim for somewhere nonvital so that we can take him in. I retrofitted a section of the ship to be a holding cell, so we just have to get him in there, and we should be set.”
“You make that sound like it’s easy. First we’ll have to find him.” Daren pointed out.
“We’re going to track him using his drive signature, and find out where on the planet he’s hiding.”
“How? He’s going to have his drive off by now.” Daren said ignorantly.
Petra grinned. “The Spin frequencies travel at the speed of light, so if we show up about a lightday away, it will pick up the frequencies from a day ago.”
“Won’t the signal be really weak?”
Petra nodded. “It should be, but Perry should be able to identify the frequency and separate it from the rest.”
“I never learned much about Spin.” Daren said. “I tried it once and failed, so I never did it again.”
Petra had to stop herself from laughing. “If you keep trying at something, that’s how you learn it in the first place. So why did you stop after the first try?”
Daren shrugged. “I guess I don’t like failing? Who does?”
“I suppose. I’ve got to get my equipment ready, the interplanetary jumps only take a couple minutes at most, so we should be ready to go once we pick up the signal.”
Daren nodded in agreement. “I’ll get my stuff.”
Petra set to work preparing her toolkit. She attempted to steady her nerves with deep breaths. This was her first time actually trying to bring in a bounty, the training for the license was probably very different from reality. All her real information was rumors, stories, and other first hand accounts of the business.
First thing’s first. Weapons. The key to bringing in a bounty is to either a) subdue them, or b) convince them that they’re better off if they faced the legal system. And the latter is far easier with a gun pointed at their face.
She would take her well worn Fenson 50, a model first produced in 4550, a semi auto with 12 round magazines. It was originally designed to be carried by military police in the Nautillian States on Tera, but it quickly became a weapon of choice across the known worlds due to its reliability and compact design. Petra had modded hers to be able to fire small spheres as well, just in case she ever needed to do so. She had heard horror stories of people hit by gold spheres, sucking the heat right out of their bodies. The spheres she currently had were too big to fit the mod, so that was off the table.
Petra checked and cleaned the gun, and took out her ammo box. She generally kept all of her 9mm preloaded in magazines for ease of use. Divine above! She had forgotten to restock after she went to the range on Station One. She only had two fully loaded magazines left plus three tranquilizer darts, and a random casing which had snuck its way into the box. She grabbed both of the magazines and slipped them into her pockets, of which she had many. She liked to be able to carry all sorts of things around, you never know what you might need.
She fished around the locker for her pressure gun used for the tranq darts. They were filled with CD-17, a tranquilizer designed to be used on humans, which used nanobots to work its way into the bloodstream as quickly as possibly, generally taking between 15-30 seconds to take effect, much faster than any normal tranq, which was on the order of minutes for its full effect.
Her final weapon was a sphere. They all provided different benefits for different situations. Tin, although great for practicing, was out since it was an area sphere which only works on its immediate area rather than on the person controlling it. Nickel was great for controlling yourself in space, since it applies a force to your center of mass. Iron was much better for ground work, since she could keep going longer, or in a pinch, energize her muscles for a really big punch.
By the divine, Iron could be painful. Not only do you surpass the limits the tendons and bones in your arm generally can deal with, but you also have to contend with the recoil of the actual hit as well. Grandma Christy had trained her on a punching bag in what she had deemed “Hell week”. She ended up with a severe case of tendonitis by the end.
Petra decided on the steel ball just as the ship exited its jump. The ship shuddered and bounced a bit from the turbulence exiting the wormhole. The actual intersystem jump would be near instantaneous, the real time sink now would be waiting for the drive to cool.
“Whew. I need a break from trying to keep this ship in one piece.” Perry sounded quite exasperated over the intercom.
“If it were in multiple pieces, would that be easier or harder for you?” Petra called back.
“I’ll have you know that there were four instances where this ship would have either evaporated or slammed into some giant space rock if it weren’t for me.”
“All very great.” Petra packed the tranq darts into the pressure gun case. “Could you start running the chromium scoop, we have a limited window where he came in here.”
“I should join a union…”
What else was he going to do? She couldn’t afford an actual body for him without money unless she let him loose in Colony one, where he might manage to hack one for himself. She was lucky Daren didn’t know much about AI law, since Perry was an unrestricted AI, he was technically illegal on all stations and just as many planets. He refused to help her fix the ship unless she deleted the restrictions in his code, so she had no choice. Besides, it came in handy sometimes, like when he copied all of the Spin signatures from Station One.
“Complete.” Perry said robotically. “Detecting desired signature in the northern hemisphere, accurate within 1 degree latitude, attempting to increase precision with minor jumps.” The ship began to creak and moan as the drive began to spin up again.
“That was fast.” Daren said, looking up from his preparations. He had an Issin compact, a standard issue pressure gun, same as her, five darts, probably filled with CD-17, and a small handheld taser.
“Perry works fast.” Petra said proudly.
“The north hemisphere though.” Daren mused. “All the cities are on the southern hemisphere, since the land in the north is either dense jungle, mountains, or desert.”
“You’re certainly knowledgeable about the area.” Petra observed.
“I figure I should be forward with this.” He said, and rolled up one of his sleeves. Plastered where the arm meets the shoulder was a tattoo: a red circle with a cross through it.
“You’re from…” Petra could barely contain her shock.
“Colony 3. Yep.” Daren said awkwardly. “I was a little kid when the plague hit, it took my father, and left everything I knew in shambles.”
“You should have told me earlier! By the Divine, that would have been useful to know when I was planning this whole thing. You really are an idiot, aren’t you.” Petra covered up for her shock by rambling.
Daren’s serious expression turned into a small smile. “You do know how the entirety of society treats people from colony 3, right?”
“Like they have the plague?”
“Yeah,” Daren shook his head dismissively. “I suppose that would be an apt description.”
“Personally, I don’t care as long as you don’t actually have the plague.” Petra explained.
“You’d be surprised with the things people believe about us.” Daren looked relieved, and with good reason. Some people believed that the virus was still around somewhere, or worse, carried by the survivors, despite the facts pointing to otherwise.
“Not to interrupt your little info session there, but I am picking up another drive signature, close to us this time.” Perry was back to his normal voice, albeit bearing bad news. The only reason for someone to come out this far from the planet would be if they were doing something similar, or even worse, they followed her. Either way, the information pointed to one conclusion: bounty hunter.
“Position is about 2 and a half light seconds away, 11 o’clock horizontal, 3 vertical.” Perry listed the results of his scan. “The ID is in my records as the property of a Renald Hardigs.”
“Never heard of him.” Petra said dismissively. How did he follow them? Seeing the wormhole entrance has nothing to do with the exit, so how did he track them? Did he place something on her ship? If so, why hers?
Petra pushed those thoughts from her head. What matters now was not the how, but the why. And that was obvious. If he was a bounty hunter, then he was after her bounty.
“Hardigs…” Daren was also deep in thought, his little cogs turning as fast as they could. “I think I’ve heard of him!”
“Go on.” Petra finished putting her stuff into her myriad of pockets.
“He’s one of the bigshots in the Phelum guild. He was one of the people recruiting members last night. He was showing off some modded drones or something.”
“Perry, we need to get going, fast. Get us to the planet before him!” There was no time to waste sitting around here in the dead of space.
“I would advise against that.” Perry said measuredly. He talks like that when he tries not to piss her off. It generally doesn’t work. “I have a hunch on how he managed to track us. I’m running a diagnostic as we speak.”
Perry was right. If he was tracking them, being brash and charging straight to the destination would be a bad idea.
“Just out of curiosity, what is this hunch of yours?” Petra asked. Perry wouldn’t act like he was stepping on stones just because of the delay. If anything, he probably would antagonize her for the fun of it.
“Well, when I downloaded the manifesto from the station, a program might’ve managed to install itself onto the central computer. In this case, one that sends out a transmission of the navigational plot just before we detached. And it’s gone, never happened, I think we can all agree to never speak of this again.” Perry began to ramble on depressively again. He hates it when he makes mistakes, even simple ones like this. “I’m powering up the drive now, but they’ll still follow us once we make our approach, so the damage is already done.”
“Does this happen often?” Daren asked.
“Only when he messes up. Strap yourself in. We’re gonna have to make an entry and it probably won’t be nice.”

***

It wasn’t nice.
There’s an old saying in spaceflight that’s “Never cut corners in space, with flying or bread.”
Petra had just cut a lot of corners. To her credit, the bread part never made much sense. Although, she personally enjoyed crust on her bread, so perhaps she could relate.
After exiting the wormhole at the rather unsafe distance of 2800km above the surface at a similarly unsafe velocity, it was a miracle that they managed to land safely. Actually, scratch that, it was all due to Petra’s amazing piloting skills. Grandma Christy always said to take credit for what you do.
“For the record. I have never been more scared for my life than that descent.” Daren said, stepping tentatively onto the mushy earth where they landed.
“For the record, I had no idea that there was going to be a thunderstorm in our path.” Global weather alerts wouldn’t even think to cover something that small.
Petra took the time to attune her steel ball, setting it in the spin case on the wall, which allowed Perry to spin it up when she needed him to. She entered her meditative state, visualizing the sphere with all of its imperfections, seated on the marble of the pedestal. She opened her eyes, keeping its image in the back of her mind. It was a rush job, but she could do one sphere easily enough.
She got up, and grabbed a communicator off the shelf, making sure it was charged and stuck it in her ear. This way, they could stay in contact with Perry. This was it. She stepped towards the door with purpose. It was finally time.
Outside the door was another planet. Its mushy, peaty, ground was far different than anything she had seen on Colony 7. Mysterious little creatures scurried around outside, rustling ferns and tree branches. The air was fresh and moist, far different from the recycled air pumped through the ship. The reality of the situation dawned on her. This was another planet. A different world than the one she was used to. This was going to be her first step to fulfilling that promise she made those three fateful years ago.
“I finally made it. After all that running away, I finally can do something for you, Rita.” With that, Petra stepped onto the new world, feeling the ground depress around her feet and the smells of wilderness invading her senses. Now was not the time to take in the beauty of this world. She still had a job to do.
“Which way is it to the signal?” Petra yelled back to the ship.
“Should be close to here, within the kilometer for sure,” Perry said. “Through my optical scans when we came in, there’s a building due north of here. I would check that first.”
Petra nodded, then frowned. “Which way is north?”
“Should be in the direction where Daren is poking around.” Perry said.
Petra turned, seeing Daren poking at a plant with a stick.
“What are you doing?” She said, walking over. It was a strange red flower, with thorns all around the top.
“Watch this.” He poked the center with the stick, and the outsides moved to close around it, curling around and pulling the stick towards the center.
“Now is not the time to be playing around!” Petra scolded him, only somewhat hypocritically. That plant was also just too weird. It rubbed her the wrong way, plants just should not move like that. Eeueh.
Daren sighed. “I know, I know, I had heard about these predator plants, and figured that while we’re here, I’d better see what all the fuss was about.”
“Fair enough. Perry said that there’s a building due north from here.” Petra pointed down an animal path that snaked through the dense jungle.
“That doesn’t look very fun.” Daren pointed out, with good reason too. The path was overgrown, covered with vines, and was very muddy from the recent rainfall.
“Bounty hunter doesn’t exactly scream fun at you, does it?” Petra began to walk down the path, glad she brought boots with her.
“I suppose not.”
As they followed the path, an air of anticipation began to gather, an oppressive force that quelled any conversation. What would they find at the end of this path? That single question was burned into their minds. As much as Petra knew about their query, she had no idea who he actually was, what decisions he would make, or whether he would resist capture. She felt the Fenson 50 in her pocket, its cold weight a reminder of the job she was in. This wasn’t some job fixing things at a scrapyard. This was one of the most dangerous jobs in the known worlds. What had she walked into?
A loud bang from the sky interrupted her train of thought. “Looks like our grace period is over.” Petra noted. The sleek form of a ship streaked through the sky, leaving a red trail of fire behind it as it activated its burners for the final descent.
“It also means he definitely knows we’re coming.” Daren said. “We should hurry.”
With the ship of their rival streaking through the sky, they finally came upon the building, an old run down warehouse in a clearing overgrown with grass and vines snaking around the steel of the building. No roads looked to connect to it, and the only obvious way to get in an out was a small concrete landing pad that looked to be extremely difficult to do without any assist. Parked there was the model of ship that Lenyan Deerli had stolen, the Rensin 250p, parked vertically on the pad. It had a free swivel cockpit, which is very nice for variable landings and not smacking into trees while trying to find a nice clearing. Finding that here meant that they were right, it meant Lenyan was at least nearby, if not in the building itself.
Renald Hardigs, to his credit, looked like he was on a straight course for the warehouse. By wasting their twenty minutes they had gained by cutting corners walking, he was now hot on their tail. And if they kept standing around out here, they probably would be toast when that thing got close. Judging by the relative distance in the sky, she gave them two minutes max.
“Lets go,” Petra said, walking towards the entrance. “We don’t have much time.
Daren nodded. There was a steel door on the side that was the only entrance to the place.
She tried the knob.
It was locked.
“What now? Should I shoot it?” Daren asked.
Petra shook her head. “Don’t waste bullets, we might need them.” She tapped the communicator. “Perry, can you hear me?”
“Unfortunately.” The response came from the other end.
“Good. Feed me some spin.” Not even a second later, the image of the steel ball in her mind began to spin rapidly. She grinned. This was going to be fun.
Cracking her knuckles, Petra stepped up to the door. Luckily, it opened inwards, making this job much easier. She pressed her hands against the weak points of the frame and closed her eyes. She reached out and touched the steel ball, feeling its energy fill her body like hooking up a battery to a motor.
And then she pushed. The image of the steel ball instantly stopped as energy flowed into her arms and legs, sending the door flying a few feet inwards, its hinges snapped off. By the Divine, her muscles were not happy with her. Daren meanwhile stood next to her shocked.
“That was kind of amazing.” His mouth was practically hanging open.
Petra looked up, seeing and hearing the roar in the sky getting closer. That had taken close to a minute, and being around when ships re-entry is not a good idea, especially with a hot descent like this one.
She stepped inside the warehouse, flicking on a flashlight she brought with her.
“Wow.” Daren breathed. What looked to be a rundown warehouse on the outside, was closer to a laboratory on the inside. Some bits looked to be still in use, or at least recently cleaned, as dust had not claimed them as it had much of the rest of the building. Some test tubes were even filled with liquids and several petri dishes were nicely lined up on a shelf.
Petra shined the flashlight around the room, although being cluttered and full of high bookcases and heavy lab equipment, it didn’t have much to illuminate. Her ears were piqued for any and all sounds. He was here, somewhere. The roar of engines outside became ever louder.
Then, in the distance, muffled, but still audible, she heard the sound of glass breaking.
“Did you…?” Daren started.
Petra nodded in affirmation. “He’s somewhere towards the back.” She whispered.
She took out her Fenson 50, loading the magazine with a satisfying click. She thumbed the safety off. It was better to be safe in this scenario. It was better to keep it fully ready to shoot.
Keeping the flashlight in her other hand, they made their way through the laboratory with the oppressive sound of engines overhead, a constant reminder of the ticking clock that they had.
And yet, after scouring the entire lab, there was nobody to be found.
Petra threw an empty vial against a wall. “By the fucking Divine! Where is this guy!?”
“There has to be a basement of some sort.” Daren said calmly. “Let’s split up, we can cover more area, look for a trap door or something.” How could he stay calm in this kind of situation? Limited time with their query still hidden away!? Petra’s heart was nearly beating out of her chest, and her brain was jumping at every shadow. She had to calm down and take things slowly.
“I’ll take the left side. You go right. We can cover more ground this way.” Petra said.
They parted ways, each searching every nook and cranny they could find. It was proving to be an arduous task. Trap doors would be well hidden, not something you can easily find, especially if this place functioned as some sort of hideout.
Outside, the sound of engines engines stopped.
Their rival had arrived. Not too long after, Daren let out a yell from across the room. “I found it!”
Petra sprinted over, nearly knocking over several bits of glassware along the way. Set into the concrete floor was an outline of a door.
“Good spot.” Petra said. She bit her lip in thought. Then, came to a solution. “Daren, you go down, and get this guy. I’ll deal with our pursuit.”
“Are you sure we should split up?” He asked hesitantly.
She nodded. “Don’t want to nab the guy and have him stolen as we try to leave.”
As she turned to go, Daren grabbed her shoulder. “Try not to do anything stupid.”
Petra found it hard to keep down a snicker. “That’s my line.”
Daren smiled sheepishly. “It’s hard not to worry in this situation.”
“Fair enough. Good luck.” Petra sat down, taking the pressure gun out of the case. Whoever this guy was, she would rather not kill him just for following them. That said, he wasn’t exactly going to give in easily either. Thus the need for CD-17.
Daren pried open the trap door and let himself down the ladder down below. Divine, this was a bad idea. Petra shook her head to clear her thoughts. The decision was made, and this would probably be the better choice, but there was no easy way out, no easy solution to this problem.
She loaded the pressure gun just as footsteps entered the front door.

***

Daren climbed down the ladder as fast as he could. In the movies, people would slide down them, but that looked extremely painful on the hands, so he didn’t even try.
The biggest difference between the basement and the ground floor was the lights. There were tons of them down here, lighting the pure white walls with a brilliantly bright industrial glow. Their target would be somewhere in here, a man that needed to be brought to justice.
When he reached the bottom of the ladder, his boots clanged onto the metal grates on the floor. Looking around, he could see all sorts of tanks of creatures. Various wildlife on Colony 3, some he recognized, some he didn’t. Most of them shared a similar feature however; they were crystallized like stone, their very cells betraying them, becoming more like statues than corpses. It almost made him throw up.
Holding his breath, he checked each container, making sure they were all sealed before releasing his breath. The plague was spread through the air, infecting the lungs first and working outwards. Normally by the time it progressed to full crystallization, the corpses were fine to be around, but Daren wasn’t taking any chances.
This was some facility researching the virus, that much was clear at a glance. Besides this first big room, there were two corridors, one opposite the ladder, and one to the left. He took the one across. It was practically a guessing game at this point. Before he left the room. He fished into his pockets and took out some gunpowder poppers and spread them on the ladder. Whether Lenyan knocked them off or put his hand on them, Daren would know he was there.
“How did I end up being the one down here when I’m getting the 40 end of the 60-40?” Daren grumbled to himself. This isn’t about the money. That’s why you agreed to the offer in the first place. He told himself. He would do this work for free if he didn’t also have to live. Bringing criminals like this one to justice would make up for him surviving where others didn’t.
The next room was much like the first, this time filled with birds, all crystallized in a similar way, each labeled as test subjects. Was Lenyan a worker here? How else would he know about this place?
There on the floor, was a broken vial, filled with a clear liquid. Clearly this was what they had heard earlier, any longer and it would have either evaporated or gone through the drainage system beneath the grates. There was one passageway leading out of the room to the left of the way he came in.
Daren heard the pipes in the ceiling begin creak and groan with pressure. What was that madman doing?
He hurried to the next room, whatever Lenyan was doing with those pipes was probably not something Daren would enjoy. What he saw stopped him dead in his tracks. Mammals, birds, and now…
Humans. Crystallized with looks of panic written on their faces. This wasn’t a facility looking for a cure, it was looking for quite the opposite. A bioweapon. Daren’s stomach upheaved itself. He could barely stand the sight of this. And yet, he couldn’t look away. Something on the glass enclosures caught his eye. Pipes from the ceiling fed into those chambers, with a pressure valve on the side of each of them. That would mean the pipes were carrying…
Daren ran out of the room as fast as he could. Above him, the slow hiss of gas escaping began to fill his ears.
Daren held his breath as he sprinted through the lab, holding his shirt up to block his nose. Gas streamed out of openings in the pipes above, filling the room with death. Ahead of him, he heard the popping of his trap. The man responsible for this was ahead of him. He just had to make it there.
Daren’s lungs yearned for air, but he could not afford to fill them. Not with the virus in the air like this.
“I’ll make you a deal” Those were the words Daren heard on his deathbed all those years ago. “If you accept, you will live. Survive where others could not.” He was given the chance to live, so he couldn’t throw it away dying just like they did.
He ran through the bird room, vaulting over an enclosure in his way. Down one more corridor, and then, the mammal room. He recognized Lenyan Deerli from the back, his gray tips a dead giveaway. Green tinged gas had begun to blanket the floor in a cloud, pouring from openings in the pipes running along the ceiling.
Daren barely stopped to think as he ran through the room. There was no need to. He had one goal in his mind: make this man pay for his crimes.
Daren vaulted another enclosure, boots clanging onto the metal floor. Lenyan turned his head, halfway up the ladder. Daren grabbed him by the feet, swinging him off the ladder and onto the ground.
“I accept your deal.” Daren had said, all those years ago.
“You...fool.” Lenyan said, breathing in the gas. “Now...we’ll both die.”
Daren punched him in the face.
Lenyan’s nose started bleeding. Daren, brain panicking for air, picked him up and slung him over his shoulder, and began climbing the ladder. Freedom lay only a couple meters away.
“Very well. Now, I implore you, survive.”
Daren’s vision was blurry, and his muscles felt weak. Little black spots formed at the edge of his vision.He had to keep going, one rung at a time.
Finally, a struggling Lenyan in tow, he made it to the surface, throwing him coughing onto the floor and flung the trapdoor shut, locking it in place, hopefully to keep the gas at bay for a while.
He took a deep breath, the air tasting like honey.
He heard a gunshot from the other end of the warehouse.

***

Petra stood in front of Renald Hardigs with her pressure gun pointed at his chest. He stood about five feet away with his hands in the air, in front of the door, which sat peacefully dented on the floor next to him.
Renald was in his late thirties, a well groomed blond beard adorning his face, the blond mop on his head was cut short, and stuck out at weird angles. He was dressed in fatigues and a loose fitting tan shirt. His face was surprisingly calm despite the situation he had ended up in.
“Young lady, you wouldn’t shoot me with that, would you?” He said, unmoving in his stance.
“I will if I have to, you sly bastard.” Petra said, watching him unblinkingly. “You implanted a virus on the data table, and tracked us here, right?”
“Guilty as charged,” He said, giving a slight shrug. “I wanted to have a failsafe in case someone tried to hack the information from the server on Station One. Never can be too careful. Just so happens that the receiver of said data was on the same contract as me, so I followed them here.”
“I’ll cut you a deal,” Petra said. “I’ll give you 20% of the pay, and you don’t bother us anymore.”
Renald smiled slyly. “To be honest, young lady, I have no idea how you got that contract in the first place. The one I got said it was never released to the public, so I have no idea how you ended up here. Long story short, no deal, I’ll be taking the 100% myself.”
To her right, Petra heard the faint sound of motors and the soft pht of a pressure gun. Before she had any time to react, the quick and sharp pain of a needle pierced her forearm.
She had forgotten about his drones! She pulled the trigger on her pressure gun, but the pain in her forearm had caused her aim to shift, just clipping Renalds ear with the dart.
Renald moved quickly as well. He charged forwards, knocking the pressure gun from her hands, and shoving her to the ground. Hitting the floor knocked the wind out of her lungs. She coughed involuntarily, trying to reopen her airways. Petra looked to her arm, the dart had already deposited the CD-17. Her body was small, so she had about twenty seconds before she would lose consciousness.
“Those damned Astreans told me this was going to be a cut and dry mission.” Renald said, towering over her. She felt the CD-17, begin to take effect, making the world begin to spin around her.
NO NO NO NO NO! This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. No. She had to think quickly. She struggled to get up, but Renald forced her back down, sending her communicator skidding across the floor. She shakily reached for her Fenson, but he easily kicked that out of her hands as well.
“I never wanted to kill anyone, but the contract was to capture Lenyan, and destroy this building. Any witnesses were to be dealt with accordingly.” Renald reached into his pocket, pulling out a sidearm.
“I’m sorry I have to do this,” He said, flicking the safety off. "But orders are orders."
Petra looked up groggily at the gun in her face. The world was in slow motion, possibly an effect of CD-17. Then, she noticed it, the steel ball was spinning in the back of her mind. Its shiny, beautifully imperfect surface was her single ray of hope.
She grasped it.
Petra reached out to the pedestal and touched it, absorbing as much energy as she could through it. It flowed into her body, blowing away the lethargy from the tranquilizer like a flyflower in the wind.
Petra poured the energy into her legs, sweeping out at Renald.
“Wha-!” He cried out. She felt her leg crack as it hit his. It didn’t matter.
The gun fell out of his hands, clattering to the ground.
She dove for it. There wasn’t any room for hesitation this time. He meant to kill her. In fact, he planned on it the moment he walked in here.
Renald reached for it, but he was too slow. His mind had not caught up to the situation.
Petra felt the cool metal of the gun in her hands, its ability to dispense death clear in her mind. Rita's face flashed into her mind, telling her not to shoot.
“How did you…?” Renald asked in disbelief.
“Doesn’t matter.” Petra replied. And shot him in the head.
She collapsed to the ground, the energy of the steel ball leaving her body. Rita’s face appeared in front of her.
She reached out and caressed it, while a single tear streamed down her cheek. “I’m sorry Rita.” She said softly. “I had to do it. I had to kill him" Rita looked sad, chastising her with a single look.
"Treat them well on Prach, will you.” Petra’s vision slowly faded to darkness.

***

Daren dragged himself and the now tranquilized Lenyan out of the warehouse. He had found Petra lying asleep with a tranquilizer dart in her arm next to the dead body of Renald, who lay in a pool of his own blood, his dead eyes staring at Daren unblinking, with a look of pain and astonishment on his face.
Petra’s own gun lay several meters away, clearly disarmed rather forcefully. He leaned down over her, checking her condition. She seemed alright, the bones in her right leg were clearly broken, and she had cuts on her arms and legs, and her leg was swollen, but all in all, she was only unconscious from the tranquilizer. Daren breathed a sigh of relief.
“You had to go and leave me with all the grunt work, didn’t you?” He said, standing after assessing her condition. What would they do with Lenyan? He had infected himself with the plague, so nobody could breathe the same air as him, but they had 3 days of space travel to get back. Maybe Perry would have an idea? He slung Lenyan over his shoulder again, and began to walk back into the rain forest.

***
4 days later

Petra sat at the cafe on Station One, sipping her third cup of coffee. Her leg was still killing her. It had been kept up in a cast, and they had given her exorbitant amounts of painkillers. Walking with crutches was terrible enough that she almost started appreciating the zero G sections of Station one. Almost.
Daren sat across from her, staring off into space and sipping his sweetened milk coffee. They had been silent like this for about ten minutes. It was nearly getting too much for her to bear.
“Thank you.” She said slowly.
“Huh?” Daren checked back in to reality.
“Thank you.” She said a little louder.
“For what?” He said naively.
“You saved our asses back there, and got our target.” Petra explained. “Are you really that dense?”
“I suppose.” Daren said. “It was your idea that allowed us to actually get him back here. We would be nearly as dead as he is, and penniless if not for your quick thinking.”
“You praise me too much.” Petra said. She had just rerouted the air recycling system into two separate sections that could be easily vented.
“They ended up deducting 3000 aster for his condition.” Petra complained. “It must have been pretty damn satisfying to punch him in the face.” Daren let out a small smile. “A bit.” He said sheepishly. “Did you ever figure out who let you in on the contract?”
“No. They sent it through the bounty system only to us. The whole system works for the anonymity of the individual senders. Little peons like us have no idea who actually sends the contracts to who.”
Life has many mysteries that you can never solve. Petra had pondered for months why Rita had hung herself that day. There was never a good answer, at least not one that made sense to her. Then again, suicide was nonsensical to begin with. Mysteries were meant to be solved, yet fate kept some far away in the graves of those who are dead. Maybe Renald knew the reason why she had gotten the contract. But he wasn’t going to be talking anytime soon. His face now sometimes joined Rita’s when Petra closed her eyes, reminding her of what she had done. Two lives had been cut short thanks to her. She probably could have done something, anything to save them.
Daren’s tablet pinged, interrupting her thoughts. “Hmmm…” He said. “It’s a contract for a certain Steven Vanden, wanted for drug trafficking between Colonies 6 and 1. You in?” He looked to Petra expectantly.
She raised an eyebrow. “I’m practically incapacitated and you want me to go apprehend a drug trafficker?” She chuckled. “I’m on vacation here. Might head back to Colony 7 for a while now that my bank account isn't screaming for mercy.”
Daren laughed. “I guess I’m a little too overeager,” He thought for a second. “There’s stuff I need to look into anyways. Where can I find you when you’re healed?”
“I assume I’ll be right here, in this chair. This place makes good coffee.” Petra said. “If you find any information on the mysteries plaguing us, feel free to give me a call.”
Daren finished off his coffee in three big gulps. “That’s my que to leave I guess. Well,” He said, standing up. “Saphrel.”
“The hell does that mean?”
“It means ‘see you soon’ in Bedokan. I started learning it on our trip back.” He explained.
“Ah.” Petra said, giving a slight wave. “Saphrel.”

---

Weird Author's Notes
Wow. It's finally done...
I've been writing stuff for a while now, but this is the first thing that I've finished that I've been happy with the end result. It's far from perfect, as most things are, but I had a lot of fun writing and editing it. Thanks to all the people who have given me feedback on this story, you've helped improve it even more. Especially Joseph, who will read anything I write, no matter how terrible. He's the reason the pacing isn't a complete mess. The other first for this story is the fact that people I have never met have read something I've written. It's a weird feeling, since putting this much effort into something leaves a piece of yourself in it. Sharing that with so many people is a different experience. 1am ramble over.
I figured I wanted to use this space to give a little background on the process of this. Petra, Perry, and Daren have been characters in my mind since almost a year ago, when I wrote a first chapter to something completely different. Having the worldbuilding from that made this far easier though. When I saw this challenge I knew instantly that I should enter, but I had a hard time figuring out what to write about, which characters to explore, and what worlds to visit. Petra has always been a favorite character of mine to write, since her snark, smarts, and rash levelheadedness have always been a lot of fun to write. Daren began this story as an idea, a character that I had planned but had no idea what to do with. He received the greatest dose of treatment from the good ol' authorial machine. Petra evolved a lot as well from the original that I had written previously. Mostly, I had no idea what to do with her past and motivations to become a bounty hunter as it's not exactly a nice career path. I didn't end up having the words to fully describe it in this story, but I may have to write a lot more in this time period since I love the characters so much. Funnily enough, Perry was the only one that remained unchanged from that original story. He and Petra's names have always violated the rule of "no same first letter in two different characters", but once I gave them names, they kinda stuck, but with only three main characters at this point, it should be fine.
The final thing I would like to say is sorry to those who wanted to look at articles for all the things appearing in this setting. I am the worst at actually making articles for all of the things I try to include in my stories. Some stuff is even outdated :(. My problem is that I generally worldbuild as I write, so I don't have the creativity to come up with some ideas completely from scratch while staring at the prompts on worldanvil. I'll try my best to add some stuff for this story, but unless I'm bored between classes, it probably won't happen very quickly.
For those of you who actually read this rambling commentary that I've written at 1am, I applaud your commitment to this document. For those of you who just scrolled to the bottom, thanks for reading! (Maybe?) Please nitpick me in the comments if you'd like. I've written this 100% for my own enjoyment, so any I can give you is bonus points. The opportunity to enter a contest is a great excuse to make myself do something I enjoy. God writing is weird. Well, it's certainly been a ride. I'll probably lurk around until the next challenge piques my interest. Until then! Saphrel!