Nova Cassidy's Chronicles: Back in the Saddle, Pt 2
13 May 2016Nova Cassidy
Well, that was interesting. A hundred tons of palladium,a hundred tons of other lesser metals, and a bounty. Didn’t think that pirates could get bored enough to poke around a random coordinate in an unworked asteroid ring.I was flying back to one of the only two beacons of civilization in the system, a dilapidated outpost cruelly named Paradiso Prospect. The locals simply called it “Paradiso”. It was out of my way and a pain in the ass to get to, but I wasn’t able to cash in my bounty voucher otherwise. Harris Station could take the cargo off my hands- but I was in the mood for a view other than dusty scrublands.
Not that this is better.
I had received my clearance to land on the only landing platform big enough for the Snowbird, but the scenery here was a beat-up hangar bay with flaking paint, The station itself had only minimal amenities, serving as a storage depot for refined metals that were taken elsewhere for manufacturing. You could buy fuel for your ship, basic mining gear, and what could only be loosely defined as food for yourself. Anything else- weapons, ammo, drones for anything other than ore retrieval- and you were out of luck. Even repairs were limited. They didn't even have a full mechanic crew or automatic repair system for ships, just a couple of guys that could seal hull breaches.
Of course, anyone who’s hanging their hat in these parts hasn’t exactly been smiled upon by fortune anyway.
I didn't really want to leave the Snowbird at first. At least I can trust my ship not to fall apart on me. Paradiso I wasn't so sure of. As the boarding ramp lowered, I was first greeted with a cloud of dirt and rust kicked up by my boarding that took longer to settle due to the lower gravity of the docking bays and the horrible hacking sound of air scrubbers on their last legs. Finally, it stopped, and I step out to be greeted by the hiss of a broken valve that blasts oily smoke into my face. A haggard man slamming way on a bent metal piece to wield it over the patch looking apologetically towards me. I hurried out of the bay before something else decided to fall apart on me. Needless to say, Paradiso Prospect was a penniless outpost in a constant state of undergoing repairs, and in dire need of funding.
At least the Snowbird seems secure on her platform.
I had only visited the station a handful of times since I moved into the system. It was run by people only slightly better off than those scratching out a living planetside- glum-looking technicians and warehouse workers, a few ore and supply dealers (both company and independent), and a lone equipment merchant were all that called Paradiso home. It had a bar, of course- but it was so bad that it actually made me feel a little better about the shabby planetside dump I used to work at before I became a Pilot. Whereas my old employer had staffed the bar with woman-shaped twentysomethings, a man here was lucky to get served by a woman with all her teeth. So when a 25-year old, blue-haired woman with a slim figure walks in, the looks she gets are-
Guess I’m doing my drinking alone on the Snowbird.
At least finding the local security office hadn’t been difficult. It was a tiny, disorganized mess of an alcove, with a sleepy-looking deputy manning the front desk, and an all-the-way asleep sheriff in the office behind him. No really. I'm not kidding. Someone fire off a message to the people who make dictionaries, I got their new photograph to put next to cliche.I walked up to the man- he looked to be in his late thirties, the victim of too many high-calorie station meals and zero exercise. He was wearing what looked to be a threadbare security uniform, with a silver six-pointed star pinned to his chest.
How… traditional.
I cleared my throat. “Um, excuse me?”
The man looked up, his face becoming slightly less jowelly for doing so. “C’elp you, miss?”
I pursed my lips. If this is what stood between the good folk of the system and any gang of pirates or raiders, well-
Just get the bounty cashed and get the hell out of here, Nova.
“I, uh- I need to cash a bounty voucher.” I told him. Normally, I'd just do this from my ship, but this place was so out of the way they didn't even have a proper wireless connection to the bounty database. I didn't even know how much the bounty was worth. So I had to do it in person. I could count on one hand all the times I'd had to do that.
A look of curiosity crossed the man’s face. He lifted his boots off the desk and sat upright, his chair squeaking in protest. He smacked his lips a few times and looked confusedly down at the papers strewn about him.
“A bounty voucher, you say?”
Is this a shock to you, or something?
“Yes sir. One, to be exact.”
With effort, the man nodded and rose to his feet, straining from the effort. He walked back to the door behind him and gently knocked. The man sleeping at his desk didn’t budge, so the deputy frowned and knocked again, this time harder. The sheriff- apparently that’s what he was, since his star was gold colored- sleepily rose from his desk and stretched. He sauntered on over and cracked open the door.
“What is it, Roy?”
The deputy- Roy- looked uneasily at me and then back at his boss. “This young lady is here to see you. Says she’s got a bounty voucher that needs redeemed.”
The man nodded and opened the door. “C’mon back, miss.”
That’s weird. Normally they just card you, run the bounties, and send you on your way.
I walked into the office, and the deputy closed the door behind me. The sheriff gestured to a nearly empty pot of coffee, sitting in a beat-up, stained coffeemaker. Next to it was a small stack of styrofoam cups and some generic powdered creamer and artificial sweetener.
“No thanks, sir. I’m just here to claim the bounty.”
The man nodded and sat down behind his desk. He swung to his right and pulled up an antiquated holo-terminal. He sniffed a few times as he navigated relevant menus before giving the old terminal a hard hit on the side to convince it to work.
No wonder people don't turn in bounties often is this is what hunters have to sit through.
“Pilot’s Fed Licence, please.”
I already had it ready from years of habit. I slid it across the least-messy parts of his desk, and watched him fumble to pick it up, fail to swipe it on the ancient reader, and then give up before inexpertly inputting the information into the terminal. He frowned and glanced at me.
Good thing I only have the one.
“I’m going to guess that you ain’t from around here. The setup here on Paradiso isn’t as fancy as what you’re used to. We don’t have a bounty verification database here, so I have to remote-patch in, get the funds wired over to us, and then from us to you.”
I nodded, already a little aggravated at the delay. “No problem.”
He nodded, frowned and looked at my ID. “Appreciate your patience, Miss Cassidy.”
And what a wait it was. He continued typing, looked down at my ID a few times, frowned, and shook his head. Eventually, he motioned his deputy over, exchanged a worried look, and joined him in looking straight at me.
Oh hell. What is it now?
The sheriff cleared his throat and handed back my ID. He seemed… nervous? “Ma’am, when you, uh- got this bounty, did this O’Malley character say anything to you? Anything that hinted at where he’d come from, or where his friends were hiding out?”
I shook my head. “Can’t say he did. Just something about my dumping my haul to ‘pay the toll’. Why, is there something I should know?”
The two men looked at each other, and then back to me. “Just that Gene O’Malley was the most wanted man in the system.”
In a Cobra III?
I raised an eyebrow. “So, what kind of bounty does the most wanted man in a place like this bring in?”
The two men again looked at each other. The deputy took a credit chip from the desk and loaded it into the terminal. A few seconds later, it was auto-ejected with a glowing orange number across it. He handed it to me with a whistle.
“Enough that you’re the richest person on Paradiso.”
Well hell. Finally a good score. The richest person on this dump walks around with-
I looked down at the chip.
Fifteen thousand credits.
I tried my best to smile graciously as I pocketed the chip. Thank God they won’t see my return on the palladium. They’d probably both die from a heart attack.
“Well, I’ll try to not spend it all in one place.”
The deputy frowned and walked around, holding the door for me. “Not much to spend it on anyway, but don’t let it get out that you’ve got it on you, especially since you ain’t exactly from around here. That’s what most folks make in a year.”
I smirked and turned my head back to face him as I walked. “Appreciate the advice. I’ll keep her on the down-low.”
I walked through the station, taking care to not make any lingering eye contact with any of the grubby locals who lived and worked there. As little as fifteen thousand was for a bounty, I had to remind myself that everything was relative, and if that was a year’s salary around here, then-
No telling what these folks would do if they knew that chip was in your pocket. And the local law enforcement doesn’t exactly inspire confidence, either.
Normally, a celebratory drink was the norm after a successful bounty hunt- but there was no way that I was stopping here for that. I wasn’t going to rest easy until I was in my ship with the entry hatch secured.
I made it to my hangar without incident, and found to my relief that all the palladium had been off-loaded and the credits deposited into my account. Swiftly lowering, ascending, and re-closing the ramp, I made a beeline for the pilot’s seat and swiftly activated the Snowbird’s systems. As they came online and the hangar ramp lifted my ship to the station surface, I closed my eyes and shook my head.
Stupid to go all reaper on that guy, even if he was a thieving asshole. You’re supposed to be hiding out. Avoiding attention. And wasting the local most wanted is the exact goddamned opposite of avoiding attention.
I lifted of the station and hit the boosters, setting a course back to Harris Station. Still- it felt good to space that scumbag. Like old times.
Chuckling softly to myself, I pulled out the credit chip and turned it over.
Even if it was only a measly small-timer of a bounty. I didn't do it for the credits after all.
Well, if I’m going to blast criminals in a system, I might as well mix it up with the locals.
I was back planetside, and I was waiting for glass a of whiskey in the Harris Station watering hole. All around me, people were looking at me and muttering amongst themselves.
I knew I stuck out, people had been whispering about me since the day I had arrived. I kept quiet, trying to hear what people were saying about me. I was that blue-haired Pilot, the woman in the white Python. They all knew I was with the Pilot's Federation, my rankings were painted on my ship. But it was unusual for a Pilot to stick around for more than a few days, and the fact I'd been around for two months now got people spreading rumors. Theories ranged from reasonable (I was on the run, I had stolen the ship, I just wanted to mine) to the ridiculous (I'm a pirate keeping an eye on them, I'm with one of the major powers (which one they thought it was seemed to change every day) or a mega corporation casing the system for expansion). I kept to myself for the most part, but most people were understandably equal parts wary and envious of me. After all, I was the richest woman in the system if you include the price of the Snowbird too, I had no reason to stay in one place and mine for two months.
When the bartender passed me my drink. I slid him a credit chip, waving away the change. His eyes widened when he read the number. It had a couple more digits on it than the usual tip. His gratuitous appreciation made me smile. I'd been on the other end of the bar like this, and I knew that in a poor and out of the way system like this, a tip from a Pilot could make your week, if not your month. People must have noticed his expression though, because that only got people whispering about me more.
I had been about three-quarters of the way through and getting ready to leave when the swinging doors parted.
Three shadows spilled across the dusty wooden plank flooring of the bar. I try not to be one to look at every new patron that walks into a place like this, but my old habits as a bartender proved difficult to overcome. Glancing over my shoulder, the setting sun obscured my vision, creating silhouettes of three figures who were surveying the bar. One of them nudged the one in the middle, and they all three started walking over to me.
I raised my hand to block out the sun, allowing the figure to come into focus.
"Which of you is the bitch with the white Python?" The 'leader' of them yelled loudly, at no one in particular.
Ah, fuck. Gene must have been chatting to his buddies before I spaced him. So much for laying low.