If Credit's what Matters, I'll take Credit

There was nothing new on the newsbeam, at least nothing that pertained to business - no fresh hostilities in the stagnant war on the other side of the galaxy, no new security clampdowns along the edge of the frontier. No pirate skirmishes had made the headlines. The straw gurgled air at the bottom of his empty shake. The digital display timer set into the wall showed thirty minutes to ETA. The captain flicked off the vid and swung his feet off the edge of the bunk to stand. Ducking his tall frame through the galley hatch at the end of the cramped corridor he put the shake bottle into the compartment with the rest of the crew's dirty utensils and climbed the ladder to the bridge.

"Mornin' Lax," greeted Ram leaning back in his chair.

"Anything exciting?" the captain asked his crew.

"We got the rock on visual," reported Tori, her face to the console before her, her chestnut ponytail to the captain. The main viewer was the customary blanket of stars. The rogue asteroid was dark and inconspicuous, but to the experienced eye the small-moon-sized rock was keenly spotted floating in the middle of the viewer. Fuegueris, it was officially tagged. The locals preferred New Hades. "Dock control is on the line," Tori notified.

"I'll take it," said the captain. He climbed into his commander's perch, swiveled in his chair, and punched up the feed on his vid.

"XT779349er," the female recited his ship's registry. "This is Fuegueris Dock Control. I have you as the Good Credit. Please respond." Her face brightened up his console: early to mid-thirties with a wave of subtly blue-streaked dark hair falling across the edge of her brow and down to brush her cheek. She was a honey. His expression sharpened at the image and with hands clasped behind his head he casually leaned back in his chair and extended his feet out onto the end of the console.

"Captain Rhett C Laxton of the Good Credit," he introduced himself. "What may I do for you today, darling?"

Tori grimaced. Dock control blushed.

"The Good Credit is a privateer vessel is it not?" she asked coyly.

"The finest in the galaxy," Rhett replied, "if I do say so myself."

"Then your rank of captain is wholly unofficial?" she smirked with a glint in her eye.

"And unofficially, my dear, I was expecting Jakers. You're new. Who would you unofficially be?"

"Kishana," she admitted. Her eyes flitted downward as she desperately fought the smile that was curling at the corners of her pursed lips. After taking a moment for composure she continued. "Jakers is off duty. Even he has to sleep now and then."

"So we could discuss the particulars or we could just go on talking about us," he said using his feet on the console to swivel his chair lackadaisically back and forth.

"Ugh," Tori gritted, still not looking up.

"What?" Rhett shrugged at his annoyed first mate. Tori tersely tapped her console and cut in on the conversation.

"We intend to land, requiring one groundlock and no fuel. We expect to stay less then two hours," she voiced and tapped the console again.

"Was that your wife?" Kishana asked the captain.

"God no!" protested Tori.

"That's the unofficial first mate," informed Rhett removing his feet from the console. "Don't take it personal. She's had a long flight," he dismissed.

"You are clear to land on pad six-A," she directed. "Docking fees are 850 credits. If you want fuel, comm to local 449 and state your pad number. Arrange purchase with them." The captain leaned forward resting his forearms on the panel.

"Thank you, darling," he winked.

"What's the C stand for?" Kishana inquired as to his middle initial.

"Courteous."

Tori stood abruptly, stomped her way across the cramped bridge and decended into the galley.

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\

Fuegueris, or New Hades as it was more popularly known, was a stray asteroid orbiting just beyond the frontier. As such, it was basically lawless. With a population of about 50,000, it was controlled by the Duveks: a gang of brute thugs long on muscle and short on efficiency. They were usually easy to deal with as long as you paid your docking fees and didn't do anything to piss them off. Captain Laxton's ship had the extra protection of Big Jan, one of the Duveks' biggest clients. Not even the lawless brutes of New Hades had any wish to cross Big Jan. New Hades had an atmosphere, far too weak to comfortably support human life but sufficient for decent crops while the locals habitated underground. The Duveks' major business was the production of illegal organics. Technically, orbiting this far out where jurisdiction didn't extend, nothing was illegal, but distributing contraband to the rest of the galaxy certainly was.

A container of organics awaited the Good Credit on New Hades. It was to be delivered to Big Jan at the stardock Borus Alpha in six dates. For their troubles, Captain Laxton and his crew were to be paid 1.5-million credits - or about a sixth of the value of his ship. The goods themselves were worth tens of millions.

Turk lowered the ship towards the pad: patchy rectangles of tarmac covered with various blinking lights (the ones that weren't burnt out) and criss-crossing faded white and yellow painted stripes, surrounded by ramshackle hangars and buildings. An ugly old container sat at the edge of pad six.

"Oh my God, look at that thing," Ram chuckled, eyeing the can as it drew nearer on the viewer.

"Don't tell me," Rhett began. He counted the pin mounts on the top and let his forehead fall into his palm. "It won't fit."

"Maybe that's not it," Turk reasoned.

"Do you see any other one around?" rebuffed the captain. Turk casually lined up the airlock with the groundlock as he parked the bird on the big "6A" and powered down the drive. "I guess we'll find out soon enough," Rhett sighed as he initiated the airlock pressurization sequence.

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\

There may have been a lot more freedom on New Hades than throughout most of the rest of the galaxy, but it was still a shithole. Rhett, the captain, led Tori, his navigator and engineer, and Ram, his gunner and muscle man, down through the airlock hatch and into the underground mall. The metallic corridor was grimy, scraped and nicked. Various vendors displayed their wares, food, booze, drugs, electronic gadgets, clothes, along the outlets. There were lo bylaws, no rules as to what could be peddled. There were no business licenses, just rent to the Duveks. Prosititutes leaned in doorways, some cheaper than others. Local entrepreneurs occasionally approached to solicit and were ignored. There was a dull cloud of smoke. It seemed that everyone smoked.

At the end of the mall was Grubner's. Grubner handled all the exports for the Duveks. He had an open lounge at the top of the wide staircase with armed thugs hanging around casually. The ship's crew ascended to find a bar to the left and a display wall along the right. The lexan was covered in a myriad of hacks and scratches. Behind it were cubicles, perhaps a dozen, each two meters square and furnished with a bunk and a holoprojector. Some were lit, others dark. The lit ones displayed their various wares: scantily unclad, crazy dos, provocative makeup, busty and scrawny figures, and attitudes ranging from seductive to downright bored. A potential customer, some ship's tech with missing teeth and a pronounced limp eyed the living menu, pussy for rent, boxes in boxes. One of the lit up girls was busy at work, thighs apart all ladylike and moaning disinterestedly while taking some gangster's cock. Other lustful sounds emanated from the darkened cubes. The crew's stature reflected itself in the darkened pane of two adjacent cubes. All three were in working covers. Rhett stood over six feet tall and thin with his chiseled face and greying temples. Tori's long face wore an expression totally unimpressed. Ram had a neatly trimmed afro and medium brown skin. He was stocky and well-built.

The madam had begged the customer's pardon as she dealt with a matter. There was a commotion. A female voice was in vehement prtoest as the plump madam wrapped in a black and purple lacey gown directed two thugs drag a disgruntled ho from the back towards her appointed yet empty cube.

"Oh, give it up, sweetie," she lectured her tersely. "It aint so bad."

Roxa had to disagree with the madam on several counts. The first being that that purple lace affair was anything approaching flattering on a woman of her comfortable stature. The second argument would have centered around the concept of "giving it up", in which she would have had to defer to the aged whore's depth of experience. But the crux of their disagreement, of course, would be that the lot of a cubewhore was "not so bad". While Roxa didn't have a whole lot of chastity left to defend, she did take exception to the idea the precious (if, perhaps, slightly tattered) remains would be surrendered in a fuck-fishbowl. For credit.

The fact that she wasn't getting a cut of said credit added insult to injury.

And if there was a more ridiculous outfit to be found out there in the Big Black, Roxa had somehow managed to miss it on her tour. The cheap blue and gold brocade embraced her breasts and hips tightly, emphasizing Roxa's hard-earned hourglass with a wide gold satin corset. The billowing sleeves would have extended well past her hands, were said hands not so actively employed in making the two thugs miserable, and the way the collar had been designed to slide provocatively off her shoulders was adding an unwelcome layer of difficulty to her fight. It would take a very generous soul to describe the outfit as having a "skirt", as the hem terminated barely three inches beneath the ripe swell of Roxa's ass, and this brevity was not in the least improved by the four inch glittery gold stilettos locked to Roxa's ankles. Further, for all the delicate beauty of the hobbling chain connecting those locks, the material was impossibly strong.

That chain, in Roxa's only mildly biased opinion, was giving the thugs an edge they did not deserve. They were basically carrying her twisting, clawing body into the cube, undaunted by the multilingual litany of graphic curses pouring from Roxa's flashily painted lips. The imprecations were as creative as they were unending- while her body could launch a thousand starcutters, her brain was by far the most impressive work of biology at Roxa's disposal. If she'd not been so bored by doctoring, she could have had herself a damned cushy life. One that likely wouldn't involve hobble-chains, lexan cubes, and enough hairspray to personally account for the thinness of Fuegueran atmosphere.

With an unceremonious shove, one of the thugs pinned Roxa to the wall as the other opened the cube door. Seeing as the fight was evened now, Roxa pressed her advantage, and savagely bit her captor's arm. She tasted coppery blood, and the man's howl satisfied her soul on a primal level... until his fist made her jaw release, and introduced her own blood to her tongue.

Perhaps it was the bite-inspired viciousness in the thug that sent Roxa to her knees on the smooth tile floor of the cube. Perhaps it was the fact that not even a gaxlicor would have been graceful enough keep their footing in stilettos and hobble-chains. Perhaps it was simply that the punch the offended man had used to open Roxa's mouth was causing her lower lip and jaw to swell rapidly. Whatever the cause, Roxa took a moment to stand.

Yet, stand she did. Her honey-and-chocolate hair was mussed, now, despite the madam's expert craftsmanship, and the tendrils clinging to her chiseled cheekbones only enhanced the wild picture she presented. Roxa spat blood onto the floor, then lifted her chin. Slowly and deliberately, she met the eyes of each and every goggle-gazed spectator with a defiant glower. The spitfire rage reflected in those leonine gold eyes was a nearly palpable force as Roxa squared her shoulders and balled her beautifully-shaped hands into fists at her sides. Her stance advertised a fighting spirit more appropriate in a gunbunny than a wayward surgeon, and wholly undesirable in a whore.

Well, perhaps not wholly undesirable. The bloodied thug pounded his fist once on the lexan, catching Roxa's attention. His voice curdled with menace as he spoke.

"It's payday, girlie-twirlie. My shift's over in an hour."

The threat implied should have sent Roxa looking for a weapon among the cube's limited furnishings. Yet it served only to pale her very, very slightly beneath the heavily-applied blush. The gesture she made with her right hand eloquently deprecated the "threat" posed by the thug's manhood, a timeless and language-transcending insult she could have verbally elaborated on. Unfortunately, her tongue was a bit too busy investigating the damage worked by the punch.

Her cheek was going to be black and blue for at least a week, her lower lip was split and bloodied, and her ears rang with the percussive effect of her skull bouncing between the cube wall and the thug's fist. Judging by the sorry looks of the girls in the other cubes, however, it would have taken three rounds with Fuegueris' best to render Roxa unmarketable.

Still daring the crowd with electric, naked enmity, Roxa caught Rhett's gaze on her second sweep. Though defiance sang from every inch of her posture, she allowed herself a few seconds of imagination- she might have lowered her price for that one...

This momentary fantasy served simply to remind Roxa of the cut she wasn't getting. With a renewed sense of injustice, she dropped Rhett's eyes and settled for fixing her fuck-you stare on the middle distance.

"You're only ever out of options when you admit that you're out of options." If Rhett had a motto, that would be it. He'd been in many scrapes and tight spots in his life and if there ever was one that he couldn't get out of, then obviously he wouldn't be standing where he was, alive to tell the tales (or keep the secrets).

The chain-jingling, foul-mouthed, grunting, scuffling commotion could not be ignored by anyone, least of all the tall privateer captain, even if he deliberately eyed it casually with peripheral glances. Ram started to bristle at the mistreatment of a lady but knew well enough to behave himself. Tori ignored the scene with seething contempt as she focused her attention on her scanner.

The trio approached the counter. Over their shoulders was the panoram of the pad. The Good Credit took its place off to the left. In the foreground stood the can.

"That's not our can is it?" asked Rhett.

"Yeah," the thug behind the counter admitted cluelessly.

"I can't take that," Rhett held up an open palm and shrugged.

"Why not?"

"It's a four-pin can," Rhett explained growing exhasperated. "It won't fit my rack."

The thugs wrestled their defiant one into the cubicle. The loose collar of her outfit slipped down her arm towards her elbow, exposing the feminine vulnerability that her valiant struggle so desperately attempted to keep hidden. Rhett's attention snapped back to business.

"Grubner says you can just do the outer pins," the thug answered as if the contingency had already been accounted for, hence the problem duely rectified.

"Not on my ship," Rhett flatly rejected the notion. "If it starts to shake at factor 24 I'll be dead before I can hit the stabilizers. That's not what I'm in business for."

"It's supposed to go today," the thug iterated in futility. He was young, a punk with the recently granted authority of his post at the lounge counter.

"Yes, today," Rhett mocked with an exaggerated nod. "What do you think Big Jan will say?"

It was Shentic. Amongst her tirade of insults was a comment pertaining to the unfortunate misalignment of the male genitalia. Rhett didn't speak Shentic, at least not nearly fluently, but that was one insult that he had heard before. Listening more carefully, he discerned counting like a Rudzu (a three-fingered race - hence no ability to count past six), the Agnellian equivalent of "rock-brain" and a reference to "all the charm and grace of Sorrobrio bile worm".

Rhett turned and strolled casually to the panoram of the dock. The can sat there pocked, scraped and stain-streaked next to the sturdy (and to Rhett's eye at least, rather sleek) Good Credit. The ship's snub triangular capsule and cramped habitation quarters were separated from the rear drive section by a long dorsal spine holding the empty metallic ribs to which the appointed can was supposed to attach. The Good Credit's ribs could accomodate two full size cans. They currently held none.

"Just how old is that thing?" he inquired facetiously of the can while still regarding the panoram. Rhett's tall, slender coveralled figure stood silhouetted against the backdrop of the dock lights. "A four-pin. Who uses those anymore?"

"It's leaking too," Tori added as her handheld readout bleeped an error. "The goods will freeze dry and crumble the nanosecond we leave the atmosphere."

"You have like what? 200 empty containers kicking aorund this rock?" Rhett interrogated. "Pirated and pilfered from wherever. Why did you use that one?"

"A can is a can."

"This isn't harvest. This is live plants this time. They need seal, heat and a circulator," Rhett lectured. "How many times have I picked up here? I have a three-pin rack. You know this!"

"It's payday, girlie-twirlie. My shift's over in an hour."

The reluctant one sobered at the remark. The soft flesh of her chest rose and fell and a slight shake of her disheveled locks betrayed a tremble. Rhett looked into golden eyes, not glistening but probably should have been. They were the eyes of someone who was about to admit that she was out of options. Perhaps it was the knight in shining armour within him compeled to save the damsel in distress. Perhaps he was only helping a stranger in need. Maybe he was just making a mistake of cosmic proportions that they would all pay for. He decided that the witty, feisty and utterly unwilling prostitute wasn't out of options.

"Well are you gonna take it or not?" asked the idiot behind the counter.

"Give me a minute. I gotta talk to Big Jan."

He couldn't talk to Big Jan, at least not in real time. In order to send a private communication halfway across the galaxy it had to be relayed point-to-point. Big Jan would not appreciate a direct call about such business in the slightest. Rhett figured his Duvek associate not bright enough to clue in to that fact. He took out his communicator and strolled back down the staircase. He took a deep breath only to grimace at the dank smoke of the lower mall. It was now or never. Communicator to ear he turned and reascended the stairs, striding back into the lounge.

"All I know is these guys fucked up again ... I'm telling you the can is a piece of junk ... No no. No ... It won't fit ... yeh ... it won't fit and it won't even seal! ... I haven't even looked at the goods. What's the point? I can't take 'em and this aint the kind of place I want to park my bird for five dates waiting for a repack, especially if I'm not gettin' paid." Rhett paused to pinch the bridge of his nose "Didn't I tell you? If you want the ass end of a rimjob fuckup just give the job to Grubner ... All right ... All right, I'll tell 'em ... Later."

Rhett hung up.

"Big Jan's not happy."

The Duvek thug stared back intently.

"He says that you'll pay me my 1.5 million for coming out here, or you'll have to pay him," explained Rhett.

"I'll have to ask Grubner," said the punk.

"You do what you have to do," Rhett sighed, "but It'll be fun watching what Grubner does to the poor dude who tells him this."

"Hey man, I can't just let you walk out with 1.5 million for nothing," he answered. He was starting to sweat.

"Well what have you got?" Lax leaned on the counter.

"Well what's in it for me?" the punk asked.

"I tell Jan that you cooperated," Rhett enunciated. "What's your name?"

The punk thought it over.

"How 'bout forty-k?" he offered.

"Come on, man."

Ram labored to stifle a laugh and keep a straight face.

"Well, 70-k. It's all I can give you without going to Grubner."

Rhett looked unimpressed as he weighed the terms. He was doing a fine job of acting if he did think so himself. Still, this deal needed to be closed quickly. If Grubner actually decided to show up things would turn bad. Tori's urgent glare reinforced this.

"70-k, huh?" Lax scowled, glanced back at the cubicles and stuck his chin out in resolve to settle things on his terms. "I'll take the girl too."

Tori did a double-take.

"What girl?" asked the thug.

"The blue and gold one with the fat lip," he said. "I like a woman with a little fight in her."

Roxa did not believe in a lack of options. She believed in fast talk, easy money, frequent changes of scenery, and fighting until you died. Since she hadn't anyone to talk to, no money at hand, and nothing lovely outside out the window, she was left with fighting.

And so she was sitting on the bed, back to the lexan, shoulders drooped and trembling in a very convincing approximation of sobs. In reality, she had one slender heel looped up in the hobble chain, and was busily using the latter to saw through the former. It would give her two short, nasty impromptu daggers, and much firmer footing when she ran. Ditching the dress was going to be an absolute necessity- no point in trying to lose oneself in the crowd when you looked like flashy, ill-bred lovechild of a Orran bird-of-paradise and a candy wrapper.

Of course, the tacky gold-lace bustier and blue lace thong of -very- dubious structural integrity underneath weren't exactly inconspicuous.

The hiss of the door-lock made Roxa's heart sink. She'd made it a good three quarters of the way through the heel, but it was still firm. Had it really been an hour already? Obviously, the thug had learned to read a clock at the illustrious Rudzu Academy Of Things Wot Come In Threes Real Convenient-Like.

It was not the original thug, though it was, judging by the slackness of his jaw and the nervous dart of his eyes, a compatriot. One accompanied by that tall, rather interesting man she'd observed earlier, watching her unceremonious deposit with the pretty, serious girl and that short-order of sex.

The scenario at hand was the sort she'd detailed by the hundreds while grinding away at academy entrance exams. There were four entities, four outcomes, and a limited number of interactions. Given the strictures of role and agency, someone was going to get fucked, someone was going to get disappointed, someone was going to spend money, and someone was going to make money.

However, as the thug threw her a coat and grumbled about getting gone before Grubner got curious, Roxa began to hope that the outcome to this logistical nightmare was not entirely set in stone. She shrugged into the drab brown coat, not even entirely minding the smell, and hastily followed the two out of the cube and down to the pad. Even in her hobbles, she moved quickly, managing to keep pace with the taller of the two.

He was somewhere between savior and captor, and she wasn't sure he leaned heavily to one side or the other. Still, she was out of the cube, and, potentially, off the planet, increasing her odds for escape from the whole sordid situation of press-gang whoring.

Back, then, to the first box on Roxa's personal interaction flowchart: fast talk. Leaning her head slightly toward the captain and counting on engine wash to keep their conversation private, she chanced a question.

"You don't look the type to spend money unwisely, so you're either kidnapping me, or rescuing me. Want to let me know which? I'd so appreciate knowing how much fuss I ought to be kicking up."

The dumb thug went into the back room for a moment and came out thumbing a stack of plastic-wafer cash credits which he slapped down in front of Rhett. The Captain picked them up and took a moment to count them. 68-and-a-half-thousand - he wasn't about to bicker over the shortage. Satisfied, he wordlessly nodded and turned to his crew to leave. The human cargo was brought over in some dank coat which wasn't part of the bargain, but whatever. The five of them descended the stairs and left the scene.

"You don't look the type to spend money unwisely, so you're either kidnapping me, or rescuing me. Want to let me know which? I'd so appreciate knowing how much fuss I ought to be kicking up."

Lax grabbed her abruptly by the elbow and, keeping his expressionless face directed forward down the mall, through gritted teeth he muttered, "Just shut the fuck up or you'll get more than a fat lip."

The crew's pace became quicker and their strides more deliberate back past the same smoky vendors, pushers and hookers that had graced the way in. The journey this time seemed to take far longer regardless of their newly found haste. The locals raised lazy gazes at the jangling of the captive's chains dragging the floor like a mobile ice cream vendor slowly trolling for business.. The strapping Ram kept darting his eyes from one corner to the other, ready for any signs of trouble. Tori was genuinely steamed and it showed in her stamping gait.

"Turk," the Captain addressed his helmsman calmly over the comm, "fire the bird up. We're leaving."

"Aye," Turk's voice scratched back.

Mercifully they reached their airlock at six-A. Tori entered first, then Lax unceremoniously ushered the new cargo in ahead of himself. Ram brought up the rear and sealed the hatch behind them. Ascending the ladder from the stained cold steel of the groundlock to the clean white paint of the Good Credit's airlock was like crossing a jurisdiction line back into territory less hostile, but they were by no means out of trouble yet.

Into the cramped cockpit, the crew took their positions. Turk sat to the left of center at the helm and had the drive already humming. Ram was on the far left at the weapons station. Tori took up the scanners on the far right. Rhett climbed to his captain's chair behind and overseeing them all.

"Sit," he said tersely to the new cargo, gesturing to the lone empty chair to the right of center, between Turk and Tori. "Buckle up and keep your mouth shut," he warned.

"I can't believe this," Tori muttered under her breath shaking her head

"If you have something to say, Tori," the Captain almost raised his voice, "just shut the fuck up, okay?"

"You want your little bit of trash, do it on your own dime," the first mate spat without looking up from her readouts. "Do you know how much money you cost ..."

"Knock it off!" Rhett silenced her. "We can discuss this later. Right now we have to live to discuss it later."

They felt the metallic clunk and heard the hiss of the groundlock release. They were free to fly.

"Ready when you are, Lax," said Turk.

"Just get us in the air," said Rhett. "We'll plot course later."

"Dock control is on the line," Tori informed. Lax took it on his own console.

"Kishana, dear," he instantly reverted to charming mode at the sight of his dark blue haired video flirt. "I've missed you, but have definitely not forgotten about you."

"XT779349er, you are not cleared for liftoff. Please await further instruction."

"Sweetheart, you know what they say, 'If you love someone, set them free'."

"I repeat, you are not cleared for liftoff. Please await further instruction." Kishana's expression was cold. There was no winning her over this time.

"Certainly, darling," he replied and cut the visual before urging on his pilot.

The Good Credit began to lift. Faster and faster the lethargic shithole microempire of the Duveks dropped away until Turk nosed the ship upward, filling the viewer with nothing but stars. The entire crew were busy clicking away at their stations, including the Captain.

"All right, plot a course for Mu-Vigg-seven," Rhett directed.

Then the comm scratched to life again.

"Rhett," Tori said grimly. "Grubner's calling." The crew exchanged glances of concern. Rhett took a deep breath and then nodded to his first mate to patch him through.

"What can I do for you, Grubner?" he asked coyly.

"I'll be waiting for you at Mu-Vigg-seven," Grubner's baritone growled.

Vi-sha-lu Lax deliberately and silently mouthed to Turk the new destination.

"And at Vishalu," Grubner went on. "And Bolzac-two and three."

"Why whatever for," Lax played stupid.

"70-k is pocket money," said the crime boss. "Rimjobbing my deal with Jan does piss me off though. Costs me a lot more than 70-k and makes me look bad. But most importantly ..." Grubner's slow and clear delivery of the threat was ominous. "Nobody fucks me and lives."

"Hey Grubner, it's all a misunderstanding," Lax began to negotiate. "You know I can't pick up a four-pin can, that leaks to boot."

"Nobody fucks me and lives." The transmission ended.

"He took that well," Rhett broke the silence in the cockpit.

"Great. Just fucking great!" Tori voiced her disgust.

"Captain, I kinda have to agree with the first mate," Ram chimed in. "This isn't a very good situation."

"We're not dead yet. Not by a long shot," Lax reassured. His expression was calculated. "Grubner won't follow us into Federated jurisdiction. Take is to Millis-three."

"A military base?" Turk checked. "We're a pirate ship."

"Privateer vessel. Privateer," Lax corrected him. "Besides, we're empty. We're not pirating anything at the moment. We can refuel and go from there."

The pilot plotted the new course. A moment later the ship lurched forward, accelerating to factor two.