thought it was good advertising, the idiot. I had climbed over the corpses of more than a few such in my time.
“What’s that, weller?” the guard asked.
“I said come over here and let me up. I’ll show you a good time.” He stuck his tongue out and flapped it at the woman.
I resisted the urge to roll my eyes.
Some people deserve the beatings they get. My father always used to say you can’t beat the stupid from people, but it sure beats listening to their stupidity.
The guard executed a flip, set her boots on the cabin wall, and launched herself across above the acceleration couch in front of us and out of reach of the convicts seated in that row. She said something into her mic, too soft for me to hear. She winked, winked at me as she floated by.
The convict’s laughter was tinged with eagerness. I thought for a moment he might be another of the Broken, but his jumpsuit had no stripe.
No, the thug was just a moron out to prove himself a hard man.
Moron’s restraints released with a pop.
He launched himself at the guard, knuckled fist leading the charge.
She seemed to writhe in the air, leaving him to bounce from the bulkhead without landing a blow.
Moron flailed, trying for another grab, and caught a magnetic boot in the teeth for his trouble. It proved the lightest of blows she administered.
I later learned she had been All-Navy in Z-G-Ryu.
Any reputation he might have made for himself for taking the beating was lost by the time the guard was done slapping him around. Groveling for mercy through your few remaining chipped teeth and a broken nose tends to make it hard to maintain a hard rep among criminals.
I committed her face to memory. Such skills were not common, and she might prove useful to my ends someday.
What, you wonder what use such information would be to me? Well, in my long, misspent life, I have learned one true thing: not everything that is, always was, or is destined to remain so.
INFIRMARY
The work the penal colony required wasn’t all that bad, especially when you possessed the means, opportunity, and experience necessary for gentling the grinding of the wheels of justice, as I did.
On the whole, it wasn’t anywhere near as dangerous as my experience of Imperial Supermax prisons. We had to mine, but we had good hardsuits, a modicum of useful training in their use, and my team, at least, wasn’t worked particularly hard. That said, the work wasn’t without risks. About the fifth month there, a mining unit slipped and ripped a good chunk out of my suit and left thigh.
My augments kept me alive, but I was recovering from decompression, blood loss, and the great, ugly wound itself when I saw Renaud again.
“Sol Boy!”
I flinched on hearing my old moniker shouted aloud. It had been centuries and several star systems distant when I’d last heard it, after all. No one living was supposed to know it. I had gone to great, bloody lengths to ensure that.
The Broken was staring at me from the next bed, left eye twitching. He was in a head-to-toe restraint system meant to keep him calm.
“Think you can get me out of here, Sol Boy?”
I considered ignoring him, but noticed he was speaking in the singular.
Besides, I didn’t want him shouting my name again.
“Why are you here?” I asked.
His lip raised in a half snarl. “I did a bad thing, of course.”
“Yeah, but you’re Broken.”
“Sure, but even the Broken have their uses.”
“No, I mean you can’t work the mines . . .” I realized he wasn’t talking about physical labor.
“Didn’t say ‘mines.’ Said ‘useful.’ Look, you gonna help me out or not?”
“Maybe. Tell me, what are you here to do?”
“Find something. We can hear it singing.” Sweat had popped out on his brow.
“What?”
“Not sure. Can hear it singing.” He grunted, screwed