Six

The Shade Tree

Gomp and the Colonel found the Captain in the ship’s mess room, where she was listlessly picking at a sandwich and fretting. On hearing the news the two brought from the Skyhook, it only took her a fraction of a second to reach her decision.

Barrett stood up, walked to the mess room’s comm panel, and called the Bridge. “Indira,” she snapped when the Exec answered. “I need crew status. Is everyone back on board?”

“As of half an hour ago, yes,” Indira Krishnavarna replied.

Barrett began barking orders. “Call the Bridge watch to duty. I’ll be on the Bridge myself in a few minutes. If there’s anyone at Navigation now, tell them to plot the best possible trajectory for Avalon. Call Port Control, get us a departure clearance.”

“On it,” the Exec replied.

“Avalon,” Colonel Feller said. He snapped his fingers. “Captain, I just remembered something; I was on Avalon two years ago. The colony itself isn’t much, mostly tourism, canyon gliding, parasailing and the like. No industry, very little farming or anything labor-intensive. But there’s something else there.”

“What?” Barrett demanded.

Feller sat down at a mess table, grunting slightly at a pang of pain from his belly. He reached into his jacket pocket, extracted a cigar, held it up at eye level and examined it carefully. “We were talking about all the little roughneck mining stations around when we were down on the Dock and it got me to thinking. See, Avalon, the planet itself, wouldn’t have too much appeal for a slaver; too much traffic, it’s a pretty place and lots of folks vacation there. That bothered me when we found out Dotsero was headed that way. But Avalon’s the second planet in that system; the fourth is a gas giant they call Titan. Most passenger ships take a sub-light swing within visual range of it on the way in to Avalon, it’s a pretty spectacular sight. Big damn gas giant, it would make three or four Jupiters – its gravity well has swept up most of the garbage in the system into a series of rings around its equator. Now, those rings are mostly ice and rock, but the ice is full of hydrocarbons and complex carbohydrates; there are a dozen or more little hydrocarbon and volatiles farming operations out there harvesting the ice blocks for water, oxygen, hydrogen, carbohydrates and hydrocarbons. The place is practically custom-made to re-supply ships, especially ships that want to keep a low profile. They call that ring system Titan’s Belt.”

“Avalon’s sort of out there on the southern periphery,” Gomp observed. “Lots of traffic to the colony, but I bet nobody much pays any attention to those hydrocarbon farms.”

“It’s a labor-intensive operation,” Feller pointed out. He removed the wrapper from his cigar, trimmed it and lit it. He leaned back, propped his boots on the table, took a thoughtful pull on the cheroot and blew a cloud of blue smoke into the air. “Rough living conditions, too, I expect; lots of men that have been out there for a long time, isolated, nobody much paying attention to what they’re doing – and they’re making plenty of money from their operations.”

“And Dotsero is picking up attractive young girls,” Barrett snarled, “to sell to those carbon farmers and ice wranglers. Perfect.”

“Makes sense, doesn’t it? And the thing is this; there’s got to be someone organizing this slaver ring. Find that guy, and you find your missing crew.”

Captain Barrett looked the old Marine in the eyes. “Colonel, your pleasure cruise just turned into a rescue mission. Are you sure you still want to ride along?”

“Captain,” Feller grinned, “I wouldn’t miss it for anything.”

“It might get rough.”

“I’ve got an M9 carbine in one of those footlockers I brought aboard,” Feller said, “and a Parks 12-gauge riot shotgun. I’ve even got my old battle armor. I’m always prepared for a scrap, Captain; it’s a hard habit to break.”

“Fair enough. Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.”

***

The Brookes

Mickie Watanabe woke up suddenly; something had changed.

“Sassy,” she said, shaking the other girl’s shoulder. “Sassy, wake up.”

“What?”

“Listen,” Mickie said. “The star drive has stopped.”

Sassy placed a hand on the deck, closed her eyes. The characteristic faint rumble of the Gellar drive was no longer there. “You’re right,” she said.

“Wherever they’re taking us, we’re there.”

“Wake up the others.”

While the other girls were getting up, rubbing sleep from their eyes, and pulling on their cheap paper coveralls, Sassy recovered the book reader she’d been surreptitiously modifying and tucked it inside her coverall just as the door suddenly swung open.

“All right,” the short, squat guard called out. “Get it together. We’re moving out.”

“Where are we going?”

“Never you mind that. You’ll find out soon enough.”

The six girls filed out of the compartment into the corridor. “Follow me,” the short guard said; Sassy noticed another guard, this one tall and cadaverous, took up the rear-guard position. His carbine dangled from one hand, and he yawned hugely as he fell into place behind them.

Two ladders and one hatch later, the procession filed into a docking umbilical connecting the ship to a station. Sassy managed a look out one of the umbilical’s tiny ports; the station was not a Skyhook, nor was it an orbital dock over a settled world. Instead, an enormous gas giant swirled slowly, dominating the view, while closer, a wide belt of ice chunks and boulders stretched away into the distance. Looking forward, Sassy could see part of a large station seemingly built into a large asteroid, one of the larger fragments of what had to be Titan’s Belt.

‘Mister D’ was waiting for them just inside the station.

“Take them to B deck, compartment B-24,” he told the squat guard. “We’ll be here a few days until everyone involved gets in from the other stations. Then we’ll be moving down to Brickstown to do the sale.”  Sassy saw Mickie’s face pale suddenly at the word sale.

“Yessir, Boss. This way, girls,” the short man motioned.

One by one, the girls filed into the mining station. Sassy Miroslava was the last into the port, wondering as she stepped across if she’d ever breathe free air again.

***

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