Total pages in book: 44
Estimated words: 41151 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 206(@200wpm)___ 165(@250wpm)___ 137(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 41151 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 206(@200wpm)___ 165(@250wpm)___ 137(@300wpm)
His vessel is more like a small village than anything. A space-faring den of iniquity, with skimmers coming and going all the time. I see their silver outlines shooting toward the ship several times a day, and just as many departing. I wonder how they keep order, when there are so few people who seem to live here perpetually, and there are very few guards. Is it respect? Fear? Something else?
“Dreamy.” Shah nudges me out of my deep thoughts. “We are on our way to dock at an outlaw station in the next hour. I’ll be doing some business. It’s a good chance for you to get off the ship, go shopping, hang out. Enjoy. Don’t get into trouble.”
“What does that mean? You know there are people who want to get me into trouble. I can’t help getting into trouble if they bring the trouble to me.”
“Don’t let them, Dreamy.”
I suppose there are some battles I’m going to have to fight on my own. I don’t feel ready or equipped. In the Colony there were rules everybody abided by. I knew how to function there. Here I’m lost. Not just physically on the ship, but socially. I’ve never had friends in the way outlaws make friends with one another, but I did have colleagues. You know where you are with a colleague. I have no idea what to do with any of the people on this ship, none of whom can be trusted.
My plan is just to stay in his rooms while we are docked. I can’t get in trouble if I stay away from everybody.
Sure enough, as we make dock, Shah comes back for me. He’s really not going to let this go. Why can’t he understand that I’m an introvert? The idea of heading out to a crowded criminal station is less appealing than being put slowly through a meat grinder.
“Come on. I want you to see this place.”
“I don’t want to.”
Shah puts his hands on his hips in that muscular way he does when I’m about to be in trouble. “You can’t hide from life, Dreamy. And you don’t really want to, either.”
“But what if something happens?”
“If something happens, we’ll work it out. Let’s go. And don’t worry. Nobody is going to hurt you.”
“Zeki?”
“I’m finding something else to occupy Zeki. She’s helping me with business. She won’t have time to bully you.”
“The others? The women who want you?”
“There’s not that many women, Dreamy. Besides. I am with you, and they know it.”
“They know it, and they don’t care. It just makes them want me dead.”
“I know Zeki shook you, but nobody else is going to try anything.”
“I’d rather stay here, please.”
I’m afraid he’s going to try to force me off the ship and into this den of alien iniquity. But he relents. “Alright, Dreamy. You can stay here, but not alone. I’m leaving you on the bridge with Malik.”
“The Elite?”
“Sure. Yes. The Elite.”
I don’t know what to say to Malik. I have felt awkward since coming aboard the ship and being left with the massive Elite makes me feel deeply guilty. It reminds me of all I left behind.
Malik does not say much to me. I don’t think he likes me. Being Zeki’s older brother, he probably believes her over me. I resolve to stay quiet and out of the way. That’s an extension of all my plans basically ever, so I know how to execute it.
The bridge has a lot of surveillance capacity. The ship is teeming with cameras, and the feeds from those cameras are being displayed on a monitor. I find myself watching that. A bigger, main monitor shows the docks where the ship is berthed. That’s what I’m missing, out there. The docks are busy, full of aliens and traders, and I guess humans, or what passes for humans once you leave Earth’s solar system. The definition of a person has gotten extremely fuzzy over the years. All I know is that the docks are absolutely thronging with creatures of all sizes and shapes.
At the end of the docks is a large neon arch, ushering people into the interior of the space station. If I’d gone with Shah, I’d know what is inside. As it is, the interior remains a mystery.
Malik is sitting in front of the screens, monitoring the situation as much as he can. Shah and the others have crossed the dock and are now out of sight to all of us. That gives Malik very little to do but wait. I feel a certain awkwardness in the silence.
Don’t mention Zeki, I think to myself. Don’t mention Zeki. Don’t mention…
“I. Uhm. Didn’t hit your sister.”
“I know,” Malik says, swinging around. “Zeki has had her heart set on Shah for years. She is not going to give up on him.”
I don’t know what to say to that. I can’t believe I had the nerve to speak to him at all.