Space Deputy Read online

  Darlene laughed. “I admire your attitude, honey, but you’re out here and they’re snug in their privileged positions.”

  Max returned. He slid into the booth.

  Thelma scooted along the bench, making room for him.

  The waitress promptly brought his order. “One coffee and a slice of chocolate fudge pie for you, Sheriff Smith.” Despite Harry’s menacing presence, the waitress managed to sound flirtatious as she served Max.

  “The pie looks good,” Thelma said.

  Max cut a forkful and held it out to her.

  Over the last fortnight, she’d offered him similar taste samples when he’d visited the Lonesome’s kitchen while she and Lon were engaged in their cookery sessions. It was only as she caught Darlene’s fascinated gaze that she realized how intimate the action appeared. By then, it was too late. She was committed to her bite of pie.

  “Delicious,” she murmured. What were you thinking? she silently berated Max, or maybe herself.

  Through it all, Harry stood as a silent sentinel. He could have returned to the Lonesome. The prisoner had been safely delivered to it. But no, he wanted to observe her and Max. Lon was probably watching through Harry’s eyes.

  It was all too ridiculous. Thelma took a sip of milkshake. She had to stay focused. She was here to sell something to Darlene—her professionalism. “The legend of the Eldorado Cache is fascinating.”

  Abruptly, Darlene looked much harder and older. This was the woman who’d built and ran the Saloon Sector’s most successful refueling station.

  “And now Bill Singh has added to it,” Thelma said. She couldn’t bring herself to refer to Bill as Wild Blaster Bill.

  Darlene drained her coffee cup and set it down with a snap. “That damn star map. Idiots are going to continue coming here, damaging my business, creating trouble for Bill—not that the fool doesn’t deserve it.” But she’d miss him. Loneliness lurked in the downward curve of her mouth.

  “It’s very difficult to subtract something from a legend once it’s out there,” Thelma said. “But adding to a story…that’s always possible.”

  Darlene looked at her with new interest. This time the assessment wasn’t of her as the curiosity attached to Max, but of Thelma herself.

  “Don’t tell Galactic Justice,” Thelma began deliberately. “But they did me a favor assigning me to the Saloon Sector.” She specified the Saloon Sector, not Max, who sat quietly eating his pie and observing the two women. “I’m contracted to serve Galactic Justice for seven years. However, the Saloon Sector is the only sector in the Federation where a deputy is permitted to hold another job at the same time.”

  “Oh, now?” Darlene was intrigued.

  Intrigued was good. Thelma reached into the back pocket of her jeans. They were tight, but she’d managed to fit three of the business cards Lon had made for her in there. She passed one to Darlene, nudging it across the spotless surface of the table.

  Darlene picked it up and read Thelma’s title. “Information broker.”

  “I trade in information…and solutions.”

  The diner’s owner tapped the card against the rim of her saucer. “And you think you have a solution for me?”

  “I do.”

  Darlene’s shrewd gaze cut to Max.

  “Nothing to do with me,” he answered the unspoken question.

  She snorted.

  Darlene was right to be skeptical. Thelma couldn’t do this without Max’s tacit approval. And without Lon’s teaching and assistance it would take her much longer.

  “Go on,” Darlene invited.

  Thelma pushed her empty milkshake glass aside and leaned forward. “You need to take ownership of Bill’s story that the Eldorado Cache is on this asteroid. You’re going to claim it as a marketing ploy.”

  Darlene’s jaw dropped.

  “You’re going to choose a location on the asteroid that’s not too far from the dock, somewhere that a person in a boost-assisted lifesuit could reach within an hour, and you’re going to put a big sign there saying ‘Eldorado Cache’. And then in an obvious hole beneath it, you’ll put fake raphus geodes. When a person cracks one open, they’ll discover a coupon for a free milkshake, coffee or burger at the diner.”

  Max barked a laugh. This was the first time he’d heard Thelma’s ploy—unless Lon had shared it with him. Lon had approved of Thelma’s idea. The AI had even complimented her on her grasp of marketing and the tourist mentality.

  Darlene started to laugh; not a polite titter, but a cackle of wicked enthusiasm. “I like it! I could tell those idiot treasure hunters that there’s no Eldorado Cache until I’m blue in the face, and a few still wouldn’t believe me. But make them look like fools by turning Bill’s story into advertising for the diner…” She cackled again. “I don’t need more business, but by gum, I like your idea. What’ll it cost me?”

  “On the house,” Thelma said. “I’m just getting started.

  Her response sent Darlene into whoops of laughter as she eased herself up and out of the booth. “I’ll say. Galactic Justice has no idea what they’ve unleashed. I’ll be watching.” The diner’s owner disappeared into its kitchen.

  Thelma looked at Max.

  His mouth twitched. “Let’s go.”

  “Payment?” The light on the booth’s bill display showed green, but Thelma hadn’t swiped her comms unit against it. She wasn’t comfortable with the thought of her milkshake being free.

  “I paid at the counter for both of us.” Of course he had. As sheriff, Max wouldn’t take bribes, not even coffee and a slice of pie.

  She slid out of the booth after him.

  Harry fell in behind her.

  If there’d been interest in their arrival, it had doubled since Darlene’s outburst of hilarity. Spacers of all kinds craned their necks and whispered, staring and commenting, as the three of them strode to the exit. A Star Marine sergeant at a table near the exit gave Max a nod of recognition, Thelma a wink, and Harry a long, assessing stare.

  Fortunately, Darlene had ensured that the Lonesome had been able to moor close to the diner’s entrance, so they didn’t have to walk far along the blank tunnel of the dock. When the Lonesome’s hatch closed behind them and they were finally private, Thelma could celebrate.

  She flung her arms in the air. “Lon, it worked!”

  “I saw,” the AI said.

  “You handled Darlene with the skill of an out-world huckster,” Harry drawled, looking and sounding like himself once more.

  In her enthusiasm, Thelma spun around and hugged him.

  His hesitation was fractional before he carefully returned her embrace.

  It was decidedly odd, hugging a mech, but she went with it. It could have been worse. She could have impulsively hugged her new boss.

  Max watched her with amusement, the hat that had shadowed his face now hung on its hook by the hatch. “Congratulations. You picked the perfect first client. Darlene’s not easy to impress and you did it.”

  She beamed at him. “Thank you.” She had to double-check something, though. “You know I used her respect for you to get my foot in the door?”

  “You play the cards you have. I don’t mind.”

  She was tempted to hug him, too, especially when he added a final compliment.

  “Information brokerage suits your talents.”

  Trying to contain her glee was difficult. “It’s the perfect use of the expensive education Galactic Justice gave me, then threw away.”

  The humor vanished from his expression.

  “Their loss,” Harry said.

  “Oh yeah.” Thelma grinned. “And I intend to rub their noses in that fact.”

  Chapter 6

  Max’s plan had been to leave the Deadstar Diner and head further out from Zephyr and “civilization”. A protected planet Thelma had never heard of sat within his territory and he’d decided that this was an appropriate time to check its beacons, both that they still worked and that no one had attempted to breach the forbi
dden planetary zone.

  Forest was protected because the sentient species that had evolved on it was a long, long way from attaining space travel, and thus, under Federal law, the planet was off-limits to outsiders. No one was to interfere with the Banyaya.

  “They’re trees.” Thelma stared in wonder at the official photos. “Sentient, mobile trees.”

  “With complicated spiritual beliefs,” Lon said. “The xenobiologists are allowed one shielded drone to monitor a single, if large, island in Forest’s southern hemisphere. The Banyaya are remarkable people. They are very worthy of protection.”

  And that, Thelma suspected, was why Max had elected to visit Forest, now. He recognized her negativity regarding her assignment to the Saloon Sector, and he wanted her to see that there were positive aspects to being out on the frontier; that there were people and places worth protecting.

  What he claimed as justification for the mini-mission was that the journey out to Forest and back would give Darlene time to circulate her story that the Eldorado Cache was a marketing ploy for the diner. If the story spread as Thelma and Lon predicted, then they’d be able to return Wild Blaster Bill to his spaceship there, rather than hauling him back to Zephyr.

  Three quarters of the way to Forest, a space storm engulfed the Lonesome. From inside, Thelma felt none of the effects, but Lon reported that they were at half-speed and would deviate from their usual approach to Forest in an attempt to skirt the worst of the storm.

  Max ordered her to the bridge. “There’s a skill to riding out a space storm. Watch the meter for—”

  A corrupted emergency transmission interrupted him.

  “This is the Rapture. We are under attack from bandits. I repeat, we are under attack. We are…” It came through on an open channel, broadcasting on the bridge and lighting an alert on their personal comms units.

  “They’re looping the emergency transmission,” Lon said. “There are coordinates in there…got them!” A star map appeared on the screen in front of the captain’s chair.

  Thelma leaned close to Max to study it.

  “We’re two days away,” he said.

  “They’re Pilgrims,” Thelma said. “No one else would travel out there.” She traced the Rapture’s likely route. Unless it was a survey ship—surveyors being notoriously unpredictable—the troubled spaceship was headed from Chinook out to Levanter.

  Lon had been scathing in his brief overview on Levanter. It was one of the frontier’s barely habitable planets, more desert than temperate in climate, with the original surveyors recommending significant terraforming.

  The Pilgrims had purchased the planet, but judging by the lack of terraforming equipment they’d installed, that purchase had taken every resource they had. Pilgrims continued to arrive, and had to deal with arduous conditions. Along the way, there was the ever-present threat of bandits.

  The Navy patrolled commercial starlanes, but once away from those, and especially out on the frontier, spaceships were on their own. What the Pilgrims should have done was to travel in convoy and to hire security. But they weren’t that organized. Or else, they were desperate.

  Stray Pilgrim spaceships filled with colonists and whatever belongings they could afford ventured out alone. Over half of them arrived on Levanter safely. Of the others, some were harassed by bandits and either escaped or paid them off. But a few were never heard from again.

  The Rapture might yet fall into one of the latter two groups.

  “We’ll render assistance. If that’s not required or we’re too late…” Max’s fists clenched. “We’ll go in pursuit of the bandits.”

  A sheriff couldn’t—and wasn’t expected—to tackle bandits to protect spaceships that got into trouble in regions of space marked on star maps as perilous and unpatrolled. But this was Max. He wanted the bandits out of his territory.

  Thelma found herself rocking slightly, shifting her weight from her heels to the balls of her feet and back again as adrenaline surged.

  Max glanced across at her. He was seated in the captain’s chair. She still stood. “You can’t stand ready for a fight for two days. Hit the training ring and run off the rush.”

  Her face heated in an awkward flood of embarrassment. Max was a combat veteran. She was a dudette. Did he think she was afraid? Well, she was. She was also eager. She had a sudden vision of herself as a puppy yapping at the heels of a wolfhound. It was mortifying.

  His tone gentled into an unaccustomed note of encouragement. “We have time to talk about the bandits and what we’ll likely face, later.”

  “Yes, sir.” She cringed. She hadn’t been trying to be smart. Way to show him you’re rattled, like he hasn’t already guessed.

  Instead of dismissing her, he smiled crookedly. “First combat is tough. You don’t know how you’ll react, so you’re scared of your own fear. You’ll be fine. The Lonesome can handle bandits. Right, Lon?”

  “As long as we don’t have to take prisoners onboard. I’d rather tow them. The last lot trashed their cells. It took me days to get the reek of them out of the air filtration system.”

  Thelma gave a small choke of laughter. Oddly, hearing Lon complain about housekeeping issues put things into perspective. Max wouldn’t fly recklessly into danger, not with her aboard. Joe had promised her that, and her brother knew the man; had fought beside him. And then there was their current prisoner—or protective internee. Wild Blaster Bill was tucked away in his cargo hold cell, allowed to chat, albeit in a monitored manner, with Darlene about her progress on selling his Eldorado Cache story as an advertising gimmick. Max wouldn’t risk the old man’s safety either.

  As he’d promised, they discussed the situation they were flying into after dinner.

  Or rather, Max briefed his new deputy. “The bandits base themselves outside Federation space. That makes pursuing them difficult. They’re not within the Navy’s remit since they’re not a hostile force. They’re troublemakers, and the Badstars give them a place to hide.”

  “Ugh.” Thelma shivered. “I’d hate to spend years in space, trapped onboard ship.”

  “Lon, you didn’t tell her?” Max asked.

  “The knowledge is not available on official databases. I left the decision up to you.”

  Curiosity would eat like acid at Thelma if he didn’t tell her now. She curled up on the sofa, trying to fake disinterest. She wasn’t a puppy or a dudette. She could be cool.

  Max glanced at her fingers tapping on her mug of tea, then at her face. He grinned. “It’s not a complete secret in the Saloon Sector, but it isn’t widely known. There are at least two moons in the Badstars capable of supporting life and one planet that is comfortable to live on.”

  She pondered the new information. “But doesn’t that change the Navy’s calculations re ignoring the bandits? If the bandits have sites for bases, they can grow their forces.”

  “The situation is being monitored,” Max said. “The bandits are into their third generation. They have adult children who didn’t choose the life of an outlaw, and their children are now coming of age. The bandits could choose to go legitimate. The planet they’re colonizing has laws much like the Saloon Sector’s, although with harsher penalties.”

  “You think the Federation will stretch into the Badstars?”

  He shrugged. “There’s lots of useless or perilous space under Federation control. I don’t think the Badstars will become part of it any time soon.”

  “But you’d accept bandits?” She couldn’t believe it.

  “No. But if we want to move them away from crime, we have to allow them room for hope. There has to be a chance for their children, who haven’t committed crimes, and for their planet, if it’s operating according to the rule of law, to be accepted, one day. Until then, we hold out the lure of technology, resources, connection, and all the benefits of civilization that they don’t have access to now.”

  Harry leaned forward. The recliner creaked. A mech body was no light thing. “All of that while constraining
the bandits’ illegal activities here and now.” He flexed his dark gray, alloy fingers. “Max understands the balance of freedom and security out on the frontier. What we do is not about achieving a perfect outcome, but about balancing competing needs. Could we wipe the bandits out completely? Yes. Lon and I can change the balance of things decisively, but should we?”

  For a second, fear and shock strangled Thelma. According to the data she’d found in her research, the number of bandits hiding in the Badstars was rumored at anywhere from ten to forty thousand. Lon had suggested the true number was at the upper limit.

  Yet Harry spoke confidently of his and Lon’s ability to eradicate them.

  Just what sort of spaceship was the Lonesome?

  And what sort of person spoke casually of a kill count in the thousands?

  Even for an AI, the power Harry discussed was immense, and he placed the responsibility for wielding it on Max’s shoulders. It went far beyond any understanding Thelma had regarding a sheriff’s duties.

  “Thelma?” Lon called softly, uncertainly. “Harry meant his comment as a reassurance. You’re safe with us, even pursuing bandits.”

  “That’s…uh, good to know.” She cleared her throat. Her silent freak out had apparently freaked out her companions. Just how long had she been lost in her own thoughts?

  Harry sat unmoving, completely unmoving, in his chair.

  “I’m not scared of you,” she said to him. “No more than I was before.”

  He chuckled, a sound probably meant to be soothing. His mech body once more mimicked human micro-movements. “Nearly everyone fears me.”

  “People fear warriors,” Max said. “People fear death. But we also fear spiders, heights and cactuses.”

  Thelma’s head swiveled slowly till she focused on her boss. “Cactuses?”

  “They have spikes.”

  Lon interrupted, his voice contemplative. “I have a recipe for cactus gazpacho.”

  “No,” Max said.

  Two days later, they caught up with the Rapture. The old trampship hung stationary in space. There was damage to its hull and a cargo hatch had been ripped away. However, the Rapture’s communication system still worked, and it responded to Lon’s hail. It emerged that the bandits had made off with the bulk of the ship’s supplies, leaving the Pilgrims to live or die according to whether they could repair the damage to the engine sustained when the trampship had tried to outrun the bandits.