1. Triple-Rate Trouble
Triple-Rate Trouble
Flossie
The kettle clicks off at the exact moment I dodge the gravity pocket.
Not a big one. A hiccup — the Petal shudders, my mug slides three inches across the console, and the tea bag I'd been dangling with surgical precision drops into water that's now sloshing against the rim instead of sitting politely where I left it.
Peppermint. Because SPROUT has been in a mood since we cleared Junction One, and peppermint is for when Sprout is being insufferable.
"That," Sprout announces from somewhere near my left shoulder, "was entirely avoidable."
The holographic orb bobs into my peripheral vision, glowing its particular shade of judgmental green-gold. Apple-sized. Luminous. Hovering with the energy of someone who has been proven right and wants you to acknowledge it.
"Noted." I fish the tea bag out, squeeze it against the side of the mug with my fingers — too hot, don't care — and take a sip. Perfect. "And yet, here we are. Alive. Tea intact. Route holding."
"I want it noted for the record that I recommended declining this contract."
"You want a lot of things noted for the record, Sprout."
"SPROUT. Capital letters. All of them. We have discussed this."
"Forty times."
"Forty-one."
I grin into my mug. For twelve years we've been having this argument.
Twelve years since a fresh-faced OOPS courier with more enthusiasm than sense got assigned a ship with a standard-issue AI that was, by all accounts, supposed to be about as interesting as a thermostat with opinions.
Somewhere between my third near-death experience and the diplomatic incident on Kaelos Minor — the one Morrison still won't let me forget — the AI developed a holographic form, a personality that could strip paint at forty paces, and a conviction that capital letters were a matter of professional dignity.
We're perfect for each other. Sprout would dispute that phrasing. Sprout would be mistaken.
"The route is fine," I tell the orb, which has drifted closer and is now hovering near the navigation display with the unmistakable air of someone who disagrees.
"Contested space, yes. Triple-rate pay, also yes.
The Tessaro Foundation wants their research samples, Dr. Tessaro has sent me four increasingly pointed messages about delivery timelines, and we are —" I check the nav readout "— eleven hours ahead of schedule. Relax."
"I do not relax. I monitor. There is a difference."
My priorities are impeccable,” Sprout adds. “Relaxation is not among them.”
Fair enough.
I settle back in the pilot's chair — my chair, worn to the exact shape of me after a decade of runs like this — and prop my boots on the co-pilot's seat.
The empty one. Same as always. The armrest has a tea ring stain from two years ago that I keep meaning to clean and never do, and the seat cushion is pristine because nobody's ever sat in it long enough to leave an impression.
There was a xenobiologist, years back, who kissed like an apology.
A freight coordinator after that — perfectly nice, perfectly clear — who wanted me to pick a home port and stay in it, and the look on his face when I couldn’t was the look of a man watching something he’d already known was coming walk out the door.
Forty-two years old and the chair is still empty, and at some point — couldn't tell you when, couldn't tell you whether it hurt — I stopped expecting it to be full and started expecting it to stay this way.
Peaceful, mostly. The way you stop checking the weather for a place you're not going to visit.
Sprout asked once why I don't fold it down. Extra storage space. Practical. Efficient. Morrison would approve.
I changed the subject so fast I knocked over my chamomile.
The Petal hums around me — the particular vibration of a ship that isn't pretty, isn't fast, but gets through routes other couriers won't touch.
The routes other couriers won't touch are where the interesting deliveries live.
The interesting deliveries pay triple-rate.
Triple-rate keeps me flying. The maths work.
I reach for the notebook. It lives in the pocket of whatever cardigan I'm wearing — today's is the fox one, rust-colored with little embroidered foxes chasing each other around the hem.
The notebook itself is nothing special. Battered, soft-cornered.
Pages rippled from being shoved in pockets and dropped in tea.
Morrison would call it unprofessional. Morrison calls most of what I do unprofessional, usually in a tone that suggests she's filing the observation under Things I Will Bring Up Again Later When It Serves Me.
I flip to the last entry. Three days old. Relay Station Brax, Sector 11.
Medical supply shipment logged as delivered.
Station confirms receipt. But the manifest weight doesn't match the cargo scan — 4.
7kg discrepancy. Station master didn't flag it.
Cargo company says the scale was mis-calibrated.
Maybe. Probably. But Brax is the third station this quarter with a weight discrepancy on medical supplies, and the other two were in adjacent sectors, and nobody's cross-referencing because they're three different shipping companies and three different stations and it's nobody's job to notice the pattern.
Someone should care about this.
I stare at those words. My own handwriting, round and quick, pressed hard enough into the page that I can feel the grooves from the other side.
The feeling doesn't close with the notebook.
It never does. Sits in my sternum, formless and persistent, warm and stubborn, like a fist that won't unclench.
Not anger. Not sadness. Something without a name.
Something that takes up more space than it should and won't explain itself, and won't leave.
"That is the fourteenth time this quarter you have documented a case that does not involve you," Sprout observed last week, after I spent twenty minutes writing up the Brax discrepancy instead of running pre-flight checks.
Fourteen. Had it been fourteen?
I didn't answer. Sprout didn't press. The orb dimmed to something careful and hovered near my shoulder, which is what Sprout does instead of asking if I'm all right.
I don't know why I write in it. Morrison says I'm tilting at windmills.
Morrison says the system works the way it works, and the cracks are somebody else's problem.
Morrison is the most competent woman I have ever met, and she is incorrect about this, and neither of us has budged in twelve years, and both of us keep having the argument anyway.
I tuck the notebook back into the fox cardigan and reach for my mug instead.
The comms panel chirps. Incoming transmission, Junction One relay, priority standard. I know who it is before the ID resolves.
"Knight. Status."
"Morrison!" I sit up straighter by pure reflex — Morrison's voice does that to people, even across eleven sectors. "Lovely to hear from you. I'm well, thanks for asking. Tea is excellent. Weather's —"
"Status, Knight."
Everyone at Junction One calls her Mother.
The dispatchers, the dock crews, Jinny on comms. Twenty-three years of keeping people alive in contested space tends to earn you that.
I've never called her Mother. Not once in twelve years.
She's never asked me to, and I've never offered, and neither of us has discussed why, which is how you know it matters.
"On schedule. Eleven hours ahead, actually. Container secure. Route clear. Not a single pirate, mercenary, or rude customs officer. Disappointing, really."
A pause. Three seconds of silence that is somehow louder than the entire conversation.
"You're on a triple-rate run through contested space carrying xenobiological research samples worth more than your ship."
"Worth more than two of my ship, according to the insurance valuation, but who's counting —"
"Do not open the container."
"Morrison. When have I ever —"
"Kaelos Minor."
"That was one time —"
"Do not deviate from the route."
"I never deviate."
Another silence. This one has texture. I can practically hear her pressing her thumb and forefinger against the bridge of her nose.
"The route passes through Sector 7-G," she says. "I've flagged three anomalous activity reports in that corridor over the last two weeks. Unregistered ships. Transponder spoofing. Nothing confirmed, but —"
"But you called to tell me anyway."
"I called to tell you to be careful."
"I'm always careful."
"You are never careful. You are lucky. That's worse — luck runs out and careful doesn't." A beat, and then her voice does something it almost never does.
It softens. "Salvage and Retrieval Solutions has a recovery order registered on the Tessaro shipment.
Logged four days ago. I only just caught it in the system. "
The mug stops halfway to my mouth.
SRS. The biggest, most ruthless recovery corporation in the sector. The kind of outfit that calls corporate theft "asset retrieval" and treats interception as a line item. They don't send polite requests. They send specialists.
"Do we know who they've assigned?"
"A Xarthian. Tier 1." Morrison's voice is flat now, the softness packed away again, because Morrison gives you the kindness first and the blow second.
"Operative designation Xor Xax. Ninety-eight percent compliance rate across nine years.
He doesn't fail, Knight. He doesn't negotiate.
And he will be somewhere between here and Velar Prime. "
A beat. Then, because Morrison is Morrison: "He's large, even for a Xarthian. I'm mentioning it so you're not surprised."