Chapter 48: Chapter 40: Room for One More

The executive terminal ended at an unfinished security checkpoint. The Terminus officials led the procession past the empty booth and through the inactive body scanners into a plaza beyond.

The sight was instantly familiar to the Stardancer flight crew. At the top of the ten-story shaft above them was the executive suite where their fateful journey began a short time ago. A handful of tunnels stretched away from the plaza, bored through the planetoid by diggers. The tunnel to the executive lounge remained covered by a temporary gate.

Porter led them all to the gate. It popped open as he neared, and someone stepped out.

“I thought you were done back there?” Porter said.

“Someone can’t count. They were short a crate. I had to make another run,” replied an unmistakable voice.

Dash leaned out of the line of prisoners and spotted the gap-toothed grin on the haggard face of one Captain Bania. The man’s eyes met Dash’s gaze, then lowered to the restraints on his wrists. “Praise the Lords! Look at you, locked up like the slimy swindler you are.”

“I didn’t think even you would stoop this low,” Dash said, and earned a shove from a nearby guard.

“I do whatever it takes to survive,” Bania sneered. “Had you not screwed me over and stolen my contract, I wouldn’t have ended up in this situation.”

“That’s enough, Bania,” Porter said. “You should be thankful we’re letting you work off your debt, and that you’re not joining Anderton and his friends.”

Rakton snickered. “No one would want this goof.”

“Fuck you, lady!” Bania said.

Rakton stepped at him, and he jumped back. Porter slipped in between them, then glared at Bania. “I said that’s enough! Get back to work.”

Bania lowered his head. Boci said to him, “I’ll check in with you later.”

The other captain nodded and stepped around the Terminus officials. He looked to Dash, contempt in his eyes. “Go to hell,” he said as he passed.

“Let’s keep it moving,” Porter said before Dash could respond.

The guards ushered the prisoners through the open gate. The corridor beyond held a few pallets and construction equipment, most of it stripped of items of value. Hollow shells of unfitted spaces lined the walls on either side. The skeletal frameworks of bridges spanned between the upper walkways every so often. Bits of trash lined the ground, the cleaning bots long since reassigned or sold once the construction was shut down.

A few more minutes of walking, and the group reached a still-under-construction observation lounge. Floor-to-ceiling windows offered expansive views of the five executive terminal arms, each with multiple berths. The Stardancer and the Terran shared the farthest one, while five ships were docked randomly on the other arms. A line of connected maintenance carts ringed the edge of the lounge nearby. Clusters of seating pods sat back from the windows. An in-progress garden median stretched through the center of the lounge. Water leaked from the overhead irrigation system, dripped upon a pruning manipulator arm, then fell to the dirt below. Beyond the median was another row of seating pods, and along the back wall, fully stocked sustenance service stations and kiosks.

And standing among them, perusing the offerings, were four shifty-looking crews.

They spoke quietly among themselves, dressed and armed similarly to Rakton’s crew. Most held beverage containers procured from the service counters. The two crews in the middle were a mix of Humans and other bipedals, one led by a Manore, the other an unusually hefty female Slyvarkian. The third crew was all Eviun. Their birdlike features always creeped Dash out—sharp beaks, leathery skin, thin angular bodies, predatory eyes. The feathering along the limbs, back, and head were all but evolutionary decorations at this point—much like the fuzz of hair on Dash’s forearms and lower legs. Their race wasn’t new to the galactic stage, yet despite broad governmental and media persuasions, still held the reputation as irritable and unwelcoming tier one sentients among the common folk. The crew’s disposition did little to dissuade that stereotype.

Then Dash spotted the last crew.

It was a troop of Gyhera.

A few chittered with one another, whiskers twitching on their faces. From afar, they appeared even-tempered. But Dash knew the truth. It didn’t take long to rear its ugly head. One of the Gyhera snapped at another, and it scurried off to the rear of the troop. Dash stared at them, entombed rage awakening in his gut. It was the first time he’d seen Gyhera in person in over twenty years. The first time since the worst moments of his life.

He noticed the familiar scent then, the distinctive hint of sourness that was borderline repulsive. It wasn’t as potent when their fur was dry and not caked with mud—

“Captain, what is all this?” Wesley said from behind.

“It’s a slave auction,” Dash said, barely able to choke down his disgust. He said to Milia, “Were you involved in this before you left?”

“No, this is all Rakton,” she said, still refusing to look at him.

Dash couldn’t decide if he believed her.

The Terminus officials stopped in between the scavengers and the other crews. Rakton halted close behind the officials, the brutes and Mylo flanking her. The other scavengers arranged the prisoners in a line behind their leader.

The side conversations in each crew ceased, replaced by heavy silence. The other captains stared at the Terminus officials, looking like they’d caught a whiff of something unpleasant other than the Gyhera. Corrupt or not, any security presence was an unwelcome sight to black market trade, especially one as serious as trafficking.

Porter cleared his throat to speak, when the Slyvarkian captain said to Rakton, “You’re late.”

“Oh, piss off,” Rakton said. “I had to maneuver here linked with a hauler. A nice bonus I’m bringing to you, so how about you drop the attitude?”

The other crews flicked their eyes to the Stardancer out the viewport. “That thing is a piece of trash,” the Manore captain said.

“You’re one to talk, Chesser. Your ship has more fines for safety violations than all of us combined.”

Chesser smirked and crossed his arms over his upper body. His eyes settled on Milia. “Heard you changed first mates. I’m guessing she got sick of you and tried to take your seat.”

Rakton glared at her former first mate. Milia’s gaze remained straight, unfocused. Rakton said, “Twice, actually.”

“That’s all? Seems kind of low,” Chesser said, drawing a few muffled laughs.

“Good thing you weren’t her captain, or you’d be dead and she’d be standing there now.”

Chesser’s smirk dissolved into a scowl. Porter held up a hand before it went further. “We all appreciate the difficulty in obtaining product to sell, Captain Rakton.”

Dash’s forehead flushed hot at the casualness of the dockmaster’s cruel categorization. He wanted to grab the man by the neck and pop his bloated, ignorant head off.

Porter went on. “Before we begin, I want assurances that we’re going to play nice this time.”

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“As long as the rodents stay away from us,” the Eviun captain said above the grumbling of the other crews. 

A few of the Gyhera hissed in response, exposing their fangs. Porter looked to the Gyhera captain—a female with silver striping along her face. “He has a valid point. One of your crewmembers tried to eat one of his.”

The Gyhera captain did her version of a shrug. “The delicate Eviun shouldn’t have picked a fight with one of my troop.”

“Liar!” the Eviun said.

“Quit complaining. It was harmless. The feathers will grow back,” Rakton added.

“You’re lucky you have a good selection, otherwise we wouldn’t tolerate your behavior,” the Eviun captain said, å and snapped his beak for emphasis.

Porter stamped his foot. “Enough! We’re here to do business. Settle your squabbles on your own time,” he said, but it didn’t work.

Dash watched each of captains as they bickered, wondering at what point in their existence they’d justified the horrific practice of trafficking and slavery. The memories he’d buried burst forth from where he’d dammed them up inside his mind. Stepping aboard those haulers, seeing the cages and the remains of those who perished. The various uses the traffickers found for the bodies. He was so lost in the abyss, entranced by his hatred and disgust, that he couldn’t reply to Gaius whispering next to him.

“Cap?” Gaius repeated.

“What’s going on?” Wesley whispered to Gaius on the other side.

“This is going to get ugly fast,” Gaius answered.

The Gyhera captain pointed at Dash. “That one is eyeballing me.”

Dash’s mouth moved on its own accord. “Don’t mind me. I’m only wondering how you hull scrapers live with yourselves. What kind of a pathetic scumbag enslaves other sentients?” 

Every person in the lounge turned toward the insulting voice. The scavenger crews’ mouths hung open, while the captains went rigid, bristling at the public insult like a CEO who had gone too long without being told “no.”

Rakton turned slowly, her head a heavy railgun on a Human Coalition cruiser rotating to pulverize a separatist skiff. Her rage-filled eyes locked onto Dash. He sensed the guards behind him step away, as if fearing any collateral damage. His limbs shook with equal parts fear and rage. But as bad as she was, he’d survived worse.

The Gyhera captain pointed at Dash again. “That one is defective.”

Rakton broke eye contact with Dash to glance at the captain. “No, he’s fine. He’s just feisty,” she said. Her ire then shifted to the guard nearest Dash. The man nodded submissively and rushed to the prisoner. He grabbed Dash by the arm and said, “Say something again and I’ll—”

Dash threw his shoulder into the guard’s sternum, knocking him over. “I get all of you being scumbags. Comes with the territory,” he sneered at the other captains.

“Shut him up!” Rakton hollered at the fallen scavenger.

“But you Terminus slime are the worst,” Dash said, twisting away from the downed guard who clawed at his leg. “Extorting haulers for creds is one thing. Setting up a trafficking safe haven is another.” The guard stood up and pulled on Dash’s head. “After you’re caught, you’ll wish you were rotting in hell when you’re sent to a super max station. You have any idea what the other prisoners do to slavers—”

Something hard and blunt struck Dash in the mid-back. He cringed and doubled over. Boci stepped toward Dash, but Galo held him back.

Rakton said to the guard, “What is wrong with you? Not in front of the buyers.”

“You told me to shut him up, boss,” the guard said as he pulled Dash upright. 

“Don’t want to damage the product,” Dash said through gritted teeth.

“Something like that,” Rakton said with a sick matter-of-factness.

Dash held her twisted gaze. “I really wish Milia had blown your ugly head off.”

The lounge went dead silent save for a few audible gasps. Rakton’s jaw flexed, her nostrils flaring with each breath. She strode up to Dash and delivered a swift backhand, twisting his head to the side. It stung, and a tear sprouted from his affected eye. When he rotated to center to face her again, he found the barrel of his own pistol pointed at his head. 

“Care to repeat yourself?”

Dash focused past the barrel to Rakton’s face. Her brow was furrowed, mouth pulled tight in a heavy frown. In her eyes, he could see she was dead serious about pulling the trigger. Behind her, Lon and Jido shifted on their feet, while Mylo looked down, shaking his head.

Porter said, “Captain Rakton, we should try to minimize any chance of drawing attention to ourselves. I only have so much ability to conceal our activities.”

On the razor’s edge of death, Dash now saw the slimmest chance of saving Gaius and Wesley. Maybe even the ops crew, despite a question of them deserving it. Success would mean his death, but as captain, he owed it to his pilot and medtech.

“You heard me,” he said to Rakton, and pressed his forehead against his own gun. “Go ahead, pull the trigger. What’s your crew going to think about you throwing away the creds you’ll get for me because of your bad temper? Or Porter and his dishonorable goons? They want their cut from my sale. So stop pretending you’re stupid enough to shoot me.”

Rakton growled and pressed the barrel harder into Dash’s skin. He ground his teeth together to swallow the pain, shifting his weight to keep his balance. Rakton’s hand flexed on the grip. For a split-second, he thought she might actually vaporize his head. He braced himself, accepting it. Anything to give his crew a chance, to defeat Rakton at her own sick game. But then the pressure subsided, and she lowered the weapon.

“At some point, it will be worth it to shoot you. You’re very close to that juncture.” She grabbed his throat and squeezed. Her head neared his, her spicy breath hot on his face. “I’ll make sure whoever ends up taking you makes the rest of your life a living nightmare.” She released him, and said to the guard. “If he speaks again, I’m taking it out on you.” 

“Understood,” the guard said. He removed a roll of mechanic’s tape from his belt and ripped off a strip. Dash remained motionless as the man pressed it over his mouth. Conflicting emotions tumbled within; a gratefulness to be alive, but also a disappointment that he failed yet again. 

Rakton smirked at Dash in sick satisfaction. “Like I said, a feisty one,” she said to the others. She climbed atop the median, putting her head slightly above everyone else. “Enough talking. Let’s get this start—” 

“Is there room for one more?” a voice called from the opposite end of the lounge. All the prospective buyers turned in the direction of the intrusion, hands hovering over their weapons.

The fifth ship, Dash realized. They’d been short a crew in the lounge. This new one was the smallest of the bunch. Three men dressed in clean utilities approached. A tall dark one, with long blond dreads. A man with tan skin and a short beard. The last one, a stocky man with a very familiar nasty scowl.

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