Mission to Sector ZZ1219 Page 4

  He shook his head. “Clyde and I… we’ve been talking about it since the attack. The navy needs some experienced people. Three-year terms…”

  “Of course, Syd. You must do what you feel is correct.”

  “I just don’t like leaving you…”

  “Careful, young man,” Arabella said, her eyes twinkling, “Best not to imply this clan and the operation could not operate without you. Might just have to find out another way that we can manage for your term of service.”

  Sydney grinned and hugged his mother. “Yes, Ma’am. I’ll go find Clyde, and a few others that have been thinking the same thing. I assume we can be shuttled in to enlist when we pass the closest Naval Station.”

  “Oh, I think it might be arranged.” Though he had released her and stepped back, Arabella pulled her son to her for another hug. As she held him she said, “I’m proud of you, son. All the traders operate as independent entities, but we are part of something larger. I am glad you are willing to contribute to the safety and well-being of all.”

  “Aw,” Sydney said as she released him. “It’s not that big of a deal. I just… well…”

  “I know,” Arabella said softly. “You just go have your adventures and come back to me safe and sound. All of you.”

  Sydney was grinning again suddenly. “I have to. Can’t let Willi take over without me here to give her some advice from time to time.”

  -

  It took Willi some time to work out in her mind the probable destination Johnny Oneshot had planned on taking the two Dominators. She wondered from time to time what might have happened to the one they had jettisoned.

  She almost decided to go back and try to find it, but knew that it would be impossible to find something that size among the huge asteroid swarm if it did not have a beacon, and they had not taken the time to attach one. Johnny had not wanted it found by the pirates. “Oh, well,” she said, “no use worrying about it. Let’s just see if I’m right about where he was going and take it from there.”

  Not wanting anyone to know where she was ultimately heading, Willi booked passage on a commercial liner headed back to the inner systems. From the huge transport center that served the inner systems she began her real journey toward the sector she had decided was the most likely that Johnny was headed toward. Sector ZZ-1219.

  “It’s the only thing that makes sense,” she told herself as she settled into the small cabin aboard the fast liner that would take her on the first outward leg of the journey. “He was taking two Dominators somewhere secretly. No way was he joining the pirates. And he would not be aiding the Ecronians.”

  There were occasional rumors of serious problems in several border sectors, but Willi had decided on the one that a large portion of the rumors said was a hotbed of pirate activity, with some rumors stating the problems were not pirates, but the Ecronians taking advantage of the still rather tenuous presence of the Confederation since the Transition.

  The last, rather long, leg of the journey, was aboard a cargo ship with a handful of passenger cabins. Willi was pleased to have a female companion aboard the ship. With a smile, she joined the woman at the small table they had made their own in the dining room. She had decided ahead of time to adopt an alias for the journey and she was comfortable now with the name she had chosen to use for the trip from the inner systems, Marilyn Monroe. It had caught her eye in one of the histories that Clyde was always reading on their shuttle trips. With the resources available to the trading clans, it had been no problem to create the travel documents she needed to use the name.

  “Captain,” Willi said, “were you able to check the cargo you are accompanying?”

  Naval Space Forces Captain Janet Echart frowned. “No. They would not let me in the hold. I shouldn’t say anything, I suppose… Naval Command is always right…”

  Willi laughed, drawing a smile and shake of the head from Janet. She found herself drawn to the personable young woman, so different from herself. Janet’s short bob haircut of dark brown, nearly black hair, contrasted with Willi’s long blonde locks.

  While Janet’s figure was trim, it was obvious she was in excellent physical condition. Willi looked sleek and willowy. Perhaps it was the fact that they were the only two women aboard. From what she had seen of Willi, Janet really thought it was more the fact that they seemed rather kindred souls, despite Willi’s looks.

  There was some steel in that backbone. Janet had seen it in the way Willi dealt with the two rather obnoxious male passengers, and a couple of the crew that were outright letches.

  “I really shouldn’t say anything, Marilyn,” Janet continued, “but I need to vent and I really do think I can trust you not to report me to my superiors.

  “I simply cannot understand why they decided to ship these craft commercially and with the contents marked plain as day. Not only are the crates marked Naval Property, but Combat Craft, no less. It doesn’t make any sense. The pirates would love to get their hands on them. It’s just asking for trouble doing it like this.”

  Janet shook her head then. “But I am an Officer and a Lady, and I do follow orders. Even ones like these.”

  Willi was comfortable now with the name she had chosen to use for the trip from the inner systems. It had caught her eye in one of the histories that Clyde was always reading on their shuttle trips. With the resources available to the trading clans, it had been no problem to create the travel documents she needed to use the name.

  “Well, I suppose someone had a reason for it,” Willi/Marilyn replied.

  “Oh, I’m sure of it. I just don’t have a clue what it could be. I’ll just be glad to get to the base with them. I know the guys out there need the equipment. Though I would think they would be sending them…” Captain Echart’s words stopped quickly. “Sorry. I really can’t discuss this anymore. I shouldn’t have said what I have. I hope you understand, Marilyn.”

  “Sure,” Willi replied. “But I have to say, I think I probably agree with you. I know you can’t really discuss it, but I would think Dominators would be better for what the rumors say is happening than Triple Sevens.”

  Willi watched Janet’s reaction closely. She could tell that Captain Echart agreed, but that she really was not going to discuss military matters. That was probably actually a good thing, Willi decided.

  She would like to learn more, but quite a few rumors were surfacing that there was at least some collusion between whoever was causing all the trouble and some governmental people, either intentionally or through carelessness.

  Janet, a bit surprised that Marilyn seemed to know the difference, decided to try to find out if she might know even more than she was letting on. Being beautiful did not make you stupid, despite what some people might still think.

  “I’m surprised you even know the difference. Not many do.”

  Realizing she had let slip more than she should, Willi thought quickly. “I was on a ship attacked by pirates. It was a Dominator that saved us. I saw Triple Sevens patrolling around the Transport Center. Just don’t look like they could have done what the Dominator did.”

  Willi hoped Janet would accept the explanation. Being beautiful did not make you stupid, despite what some people might still think. Janet did not get where she was in the Naval Space Forces being a dummy.

  “Oh. You’ve survived a pirate attack? That must have been frightening.”

  “I’ll say. I’m just glad there are people like you looking out for people like me.” Willi smiled brightly.

  Janet nodded, leaving it at that. She was definitely going to have to be a bit more careful in what she said. Marilyn Monroe seemed innocent enough, but it was a bad habit to get into, anyway.

  Willi had similar thoughts. She would have to be more careful about what she said. She turned the conversation to that night’s supper, which was actually quite good. The ship did have a good cook.

  When she saw the look on Janet’s face the day before they were to dock at the High-Mass-Core Moon-Ship base in geosyn
chronous orbit around the Capital Planet of Sector ZZ-1219, Willi knew something was drastically wrong. Captain Echart was ashen.

  “What’s wrong? What happened?”

  Janet sighed and said, “They finally let me into the hold to check the Triple Sevens. They’ve been sabotaged. I don’t know how or when, but both crates have been infected with mice. I don’t know how much damage has been done, but it is extensive.”

  “Mice?” Willi cringed. The two-centimeter-long mechanical devices were a favorite sabotage implement. They took quite some time to inflict damage, but when a few were placed into any type of mechanism they began to cut tiny slits in anything they contacted. Everywhere they moved, something was damaged.

  Any given point of damage was small, but every bit added up. Given enough of them they could totally destroy even a solid block of high density alloy. Their tiny power plants only lasted a few days, but even one could do enough damage to put sophisticated equipment out of commission for days, if not forever.

  “It looks like it was only the Triple Seven crates they were put into. There’ll be a team from the base meeting me at the transfer station.”

  “It’s not your fault, Janet,” Willi said. “They were out of your control from the minute they were loaded.”

  “I know. But I still feel responsible. I should have insisted on inspecting them. Maybe I could have found the mice and deactivated them. Something…”

  Willi knew there was little, if anything, that she could say that would make Janet feel any less responsible. She tried a few more times over the next day; but had no more success than the first time.

  Having said good-bye to Janet the evening before they docked with the transfer station, Willi was the first passenger off the ship. It took only moments to arrange to drop to the planet’s main port.

  A few inquiries at the busy terminus and she headed to a busy business section just a few minutes from the port’s main entrance. Just another port dive, Willi decided, as she looked over the exterior of the building housing Smokey’s.

  It was the name that had come up consistently when she had been asking where the Naval Personnel hung out. It had not bothered her… much… the looks she usually got when she asked the question.

  Willi took a deep breath, and then entered Smokey’s with determination. Or tried to. The front doors were locked. It dawned on her that a place like Smokey’s probably did not open until lunch, if then. “More likely early evening,” she muttered to herself.

  Despite having been in and out of more ports than she could probably remember, all of the crews from Trinity Home usually just went in and out. Very seldom did any of them hit the local places. At least, not in the outlying sectors.

  With a slight shrug, Willi walked around the side of the building, knowing that while they might not be open for some time, it was likely there was someone inside, working.

  She was right. It was not all that difficult to get a job, just as she had intended, she found. It just was not the job she had planned on, as a server or bartender. The only openings they had for her, so said the little runt that was Smokey, was entertainer.

  Or, “Entertainer!” he said again, winking and leering at her. “We have an arrangement with the establishment next door, sweetie. We get ten percent, they get ten percent and you keep eighty.”

  “I think I will just stick with singing,” Willi said firmly.

  “Don’t mind him,” said the more or less normal looking man that suddenly joined them from the doorway just past where they stood talking. “Go get the main room set for tonight, Slick.”

  He turned to Willi after watching the man shuffle away. “Sorry, Miss. Slick oversteps his bounds from time to time when someone such as yourself enters.”

  Willi felt herself brighten considerably. She had thought that her singing ability, slight as it was, would probably be adequate in the place, but perhaps there was another position available.

  “I understand.” She held out her hand. “I’m Marilyn Monroe. I’m looking for a server or bartending position.”

  The man shook her hand firmly. “Nice to meet you, Marilyn. I’m the real Smokey. And sorry. The only position I have open is for a singer. And of course, B-girls. I doubt you’d have any trouble getting licensed.”

  “Oh. But I thought…” She made a slight motion to where the runt had disappeared.

  “Slick doesn’t have the authority to hire or fire; but did happen to be right about the positions I have open. Just how good of a singer are you?”

  Her eyes dropping slightly. “Oh… average… I guess… I…”

  “No matter,” Smokey said, with a slight wave of his hand. “You’ve got the looks, and your voice isn’t bad. As long as you wear either short dresses, or tight dresses, it really doesn’t matter.”

  “But…”

  Smokey lifted a very expressive eyebrow.

  “I’m not a B-girl,” Willi said firmly.

  “It’s not only not required, I don’t allow it. The talent is completely separate from the talent. That’s why the last three singers I had here are no longer here. I pay good for singers, but most of them can make quite a bit more next door. I noticed you did not ask about the pay. That’s usually the first question.”

  Willi noted the keen interest he was showing. “I’m not desperate,” she replied easily. “But I don’t plan on becoming so, either. Just want to make sure I get enough together to get back home. Used a little more on my journey than I planned.”

  She was glad he left it at that. “When do I start?”

  “Tonight. Eighteen hundred hours. Thirty-minute sets, thirty-minute breaks. You can mingle, if you want, and accept any drinks and gifts. You might get a few. Lots of lonely, appreciative men out here. Four sets.

  “The strippers come on at twenty-two hundred. That’s about the time the family men go home and the rougher crowd comes in. But I mean it, no turning tricks, even after twenty-two hundred hours.

  “I want the two operations completely separate. Keeps me out of trouble with the authorities. I get a lot of military trade here, and they insist on legal operation. Anyone gets me blackballed, and they will regret it greatly.”

  “Understood,” Willi said quietly. It was obvious that Smokey meant what he said. “It won’t be a problem. I… ah… have one suitable dress. Where would you suggest I pick up another one? Or two? Inexpensively.”

  Smokey grinned. “Just check the dressing room. The one with the star. There’s probably a dress or two that will fit you, left by some of the previous talent.”

  “I think I would prefer to get something new,” Willi said firmly.

  With a shrug, Smokey said, “Suit yourself. Try Wendi’s. Some of the girls get outfits there. Down two and over three.”

  Willi nodded. “We need to do any new hire paperwork?”

  “Cash end of shift every night. Your responsibility to track for the Taxman. Your thumbprint will be on my copy of the receipt, so I’m covered when they collect my records end of quarter. What you report is up to you.” He was already walking away. “Be here by seventeen thirty so my head bartender, also the MC, can show you around and get the mikes set for you.”

  She stood there for a moment, at a slight loss, but then shrugged and turned to leave. Willi did not see the man watching her from the dark area near the bar.

  Johnny Oneshot’s lips curled, the smile, still sardonic, as usual, was broader than normal. He slipped his comm device into the hidden pocket in the work coveralls he was wearing and went back to his swamper duties.

  Even in this day and age there was manual cleaning to be done. “Marilyn Monroe, huh?” He chuckled. “I wonder if she knows the history of that name?”

  Looking completely different now, standing straight and tall, rather than stooped, and without the contact lenses that changed his eyes, and wig that completed the down-on-his-luck swamper persona look, Johnny Oneshot sat at the bar of Smokey’s nursing a drink as he watched the early crowd begin to gather.
>
  He flipped the bartender a large credit chip and said, “I’ll be back later, Cherokee. How about putting a bottle of Smokey’s Bubbles on ice for me? May want to celebrate something tonight.”

  Cherokee’s flat black eyes flickered just a tiny bit. The man had been coming in for over two weeks now and spent liberally. He tipped even better. There was something about him that kept nagging at Cherokee, but he still had not been able to put his finger on it.

  “It will come to me,” he said to himself, heading to find Smokey to get the okay to get the bottle of Bubbles. Everything that expensive was kept locked away securely.

  Willi had found a rooming house close by and transferred her few items of luggage there. Another hour and she was in Wendi’s, picking out two dresses.

  It took longer than she expected. It seemed like every dress she was inclined to try was either two sizes to small, or came down to her thighs, rather than past them. Finally, she did locate a couple of dresses similar to the one she had brought with her.

  With all three dresses and a few other personal items in a small case, Willi headed back to Smokey’s well before the mandated five thirty. She found herself with time on her hands before her first set. Cherokee had been quick and efficient.

  It took him only a few minutes to show her around, including her small, but clean, dressing room. Setting up the sound and lighting system had taken only a few more minutes. It was automated; and would track her anywhere on the stage and even out in the bar and dancing area.

  All she had to do was sing a few words into the setup microphone and fasten a tiny locator button to the back of her dress and the setup was finished.

  Another couple of minutes and she had selected the songs that she would sing. “The only ones I can sing,” she said silently to herself.

  She went back to the dressing room to check her appearance one last time. Willi shook her head and frowned, wishing for a moment she had not brought this particular dress. It had been in the crate of luxury items that Johnny Oneshot had left on the shuttle as some type of extra payment or something. It was a red shimmer dress and fit her almost like a second skin. It was an elegant dress, rather than a cheap and tawdry one. But it was still much more sultry than she was used to wearing.