Page 61 of Devin
He backed out of her way and turned his attention to Bright. Val didn’t care. She headed straight to the little spaceship bathroom and closed the privacy door, which wasn’t so much a door as a button that fuzzed a low frequency opaque force field. It wouldn’t stop anyone who really wanted to come in, but it gave quite a zap if you tried to pass through it. She’d seen them advertised on Earth as one of those new and trendy fads that only the rich could afford.
As far as the toilet was concerned, there was little to figure out there. A little triangular bowl extended and matched her height. She pulled down her shorts and let fly. When she was done, the little device beeped a few times, and then she felt a flush of fluid. Apparently on this ship they didn’t have a toilet so much as a space bidet, but her bladder was empty and that immediacy left her as she searched around, looking forsomething that she could use as a weapon. Unfortunately there didn’t seem to be anything that wasn’t nailed down to the ship.
Val pushed the button and the force field went away revealing a second orange dude that was shorter than the first, but the way he was looking at her made her feel dirty. Without much thinking, she slipped into waitress mode, as if he was a drunk or nasty patron that was looking to put his hands where they didn’t belong. Val moved past him without a word and moved into the main compartment. This ship was definitely small, more like the size of an RV than a spaceship. And it felt even more crowded when a third pan-faced alien followed them.
So the odds were even. Three against three, except she didn’t have a weapon, and these guys were much bigger and stronger than the three women. That’s if they could count on Bright, who was currently spinning yet another story.
“Princesses. Rutra doesn’t know what he’s got here. I heard he was planning on offering 5 million for their return. I got a contact that will give me twice that. Imagine if we come back with ten. Each of us keep a million, and give him six. He can’t argue with that. Of course we could always tell him it was nine, and then give him five and split that extra million between us.”
“He might shove you out of an airlock just on the principle of the thing,” Shargo said.
“Which is why I’m currently considering keeping a million for myself and letting you all split the extra million three ways to tell him I met my demise,” Bright said.
There was something in Creepy’s eyes that said he thought actually killing her was a better option, but Bright didn’t notice, or just pretended not to notice. It was hard to tell.
“How’d you get them into that box without a fight?” Shargo asked, eyes squinting at Bright suspiciously.
“I just told them I was going to rescue them. They bought it and climbed in themselves.”
The orange aliens all laughed and Bright joined them. Val didn’t have time to be offended, as something beeped over by the pilot’s chair.
Shargo turned and looked at the console. “We’re here!”
Here looked like a deserted brown rock in the middle of nowhere. There was a haze of clouds around it, but Val couldn’t see any water or vegetation at all. It was a dead planet. Shargo pointed the shuttle down and it shook a bit as it entered the atmosphere.
They settled down in a dusty brown crater full of rocks. Almost immediately the viewscreen developed a hazy film, making everything look just that much more sepia toned, like an old photograph.
“Is it even breathable out there?” Val asked.
“Not for long. There’s enough atmosphere so that you won’t explode the minute you step out, but I find inhospitable planetoids make for a quick business transfer,” Shargo said. He handed his fellow flat face a laser rifle and a thin circular collar. “Take the high ground,” Shargo said.
“Get in the box,” Bright said.
“That line worked once,” Val said. “I don’t think it’s going to work again.”
Bright trained her laser pistol on Val. “Get in the box,” she repeated.
“Are you going to shoot me? Because unless you plan to-” Val was interrupted by Shargo, who didn’t feel like arguing. He grabbed her by the hair and pulled her toward the box. Val let out a yelp of pain and followed along, rather than have her hair pulled out by the roots.
“Fine! Seriously!”
Val climbed into the box, narrowly missing Grena, who had stopped snoring but appeared to still be sleeping. Val doubted very much that this was the case. She hunkered back downinto the box, and Bright swung the lid shut. Except this time, Val didn’t hear the little whir of the box locking. They could, if needed, spring right back out of this box. It was too dark to see Grena’s face, but she felt Grena’s hand reaching around and searching for hers. A silent squeeze. Bright was hopefully telling the truth about trying to rescue them, rather than sell them to the highest bidder. The more transactions they went through before being handed over to Takalia, the harder it would be for the Mahdfel to track them, and the more chances there were for things to go badly.
The door hissed open and Val could hear the wind whipping the dust around. Shargo shouted above it.
“Remember, shoot first and well, there’s fewer to split the share.”
Wait, did he just decide to kill people on his own team? Was he planning to shoot Bright in the back? Or did that mean kill the people they were trading with, the Mahdfel? Devin.
She didn’t have much time to mull over that thought, because there was a muffled roar that was the unmistakable sound of another ship landing.
Chapter 31
Devin
“Ido not like this,” Devin repeated for the third time.
“You do not trust the mother of Scrubs?” Goru asked.
