The Phoenix Darkness by Richard L. Sanders Page B

now, Boss?” asked Rolland, the first
mate and most trusted crew member on the ship. Though, despite
their long and shared history, Zander likely wouldn’t be able to
trust Rolland any more than the others, perhaps less, were he not
secretly bankrolling the man under the table. And allowing him to
take certain…privileges with his fourteen year old daughter,
whenever they made port at any place run by the Khans. Zander would
compose the arrangements for the meetings and Rolland would make
certain to pacify the crew. This had worked well, until Jasmine
came along. Suddenly, it wasn’t Rolland’s clever wit and fast
tongue the crewmen paid attention to, but instead the voluptuous
curves and strong, feminine attitude which was Jasmine. The woman
of the people who would stand up to the captain and make sure they
got paid and paid equally. To be fair, Rolland had warned Zander
Jasmine would be trouble when he’d first brought her aboard. Zander
shook his head, angry at his younger self for his mistakes. No
more…after this mission, Jasmine would be gone.
    “Yes, we get paid,” he said at last, mostly
to placate the increasingly unsettled crewmembers, each of whom
seemed ready to tear the Bridge apart wherever they stood. As if
the barbarians had forgotten this ship represented not only the
chance for wealth, bounty, and adventure, but it was their only
damned ride home. To any who still had one.
    “When?” demanded Jasmine. Her sentiment was
echoed by several others.
    “Yeah, when?”
    “We keep hearing it, but I don’t feel my
pockets any less empty!”
    “Silence!” ordered Rolland, drawing his
rifle. The rest of the crew reacted in two very different ways,
half obeyed and cowed down immediately, the other half drew their
own weapons and aimed them at Rolland.
    “Enough!” shouted Zander, to get their
attention back onto him. He looked down at Jasmine and nodded his
head, gesturing for her to help take control. This worked.
    “Lower your guns; we’re about to be paid,”
said Jasmine. Because it came from her, the crew calmed down. And
in that moment, Zander realized he was no longer the captain in
their eyes, she was. Never in my life have I seen a more
mutinous crew of filthy dogs anywhere in the galaxy , he
thought. After this deal, it would be time to get rid of them all.
All except Rolland…unless he too had some kind of trick up his
sleeve…
    “The repair is finished,” said Zander,
referring to the repair of their systems the outpost orbiting Izar
Ceti had performed for them after they'd damaged their own systems,
trying to make it look as natural as possible, so they could fool
the buyer, who unbeknownst to the rest of them was the highly
dangerous Enclave, into thinking that their delay had indeed been
the product of a systems failure, and currently it was fixed. “Now
we move out into open space, dock with Anton’s ship when it
appears, transfer the cargo, get paid, and everybody wins.”
    “This had better be worth all that effort,
Captain,” said Jasmine. Others grunted their agreement.
    “It will be, I promise,” said Zander. “Now,
just keep your heads down and be ready to move the fourteen units
of cargo onto the buyer’s ship, or let his people do the lifting if
he prefers.”
    “What fourteen units of cargo?” asked one of
the men. “I remember there were fifteen.”
    “No, there were definitely only ever
fourteen,” said Rolland, obviously trying to corroborate the
Captain’s story. Only he and Rolland had known that, while the crew
slept, they’d cautiously jettisoned one of the isotome weapons to a
hiding spot in open space near the neutron star Rana Kentaurus, far
enough away to keep it safe from the neutron star’s radiation. For
Zander, it was to be his insurance policy. For Rolland, well, God
knows what Rolland expected to get out of it. Half the profit? Not
bloody likely…
    “I swear it; there were fifteen,” the man
insisted.
    Zander raised his pistol and shot