Memory's Ghosts

Chapter 1“Your fine’s been taken care of.” Max Murphy frowned at the station security guard who was releasing the overnights from the drunk tank. “What?” “Taken care of,” she repeated. “Your fine. Here’s your stuff.” She handed him a bag with his shoelaces and belt and his hand terminal. “But who took care of it?” Max asked, wondering if his hangover was the reason he couldn’t seem to grasp the information, or if he simply wasn’t used to anyone doing him favors. “He’s waiting out there,” she said, pointing a thumb over her shoulder at the reception area. “Now get out of here. And try to give it at least a week before you’re back again, eh? We’re not giving out loyalty points, you know.” Max decided not to argue, but quickly laced up his boots, put his belt on, and went out into reception. There were several people waiting out there, but as all except one of them were women, Max’s benefactor stood out. A nice looking, middle-aged guy in a good suit. The face was familiar. Was it some guy he’d slept with recently? And would he give Max the time to go take a shower before expecting a reward for his generosity? “Mr. Murphy.” The man rose and offered his hand. The voice immediately jarred Max into recognition. He’d heard it on station-wide announcements and on news interviews. He shook the offered hand in a mechanical way. “You’re Ishir Jha,” he said. Why the hell would one of the station managers of the Red Palace pay Max’s drunk and disorderly fine for him? “You look as if you could use some breakfast and a lot of coffee. Care to join me? My treat,” he added. Max never turned down free food, as long as he wasn’t expected to do anything too weird in return. He followed Jha from the security office. They didn’t go far, quickly entering a diner Max had used on other occasions after being released from station security. It brewed very strong coffee and made very greasy breakfasts, and was not at all the place you’d expect to see a class act like Ishir Jha, one of the joint managers of the station, along with his husband Finn Moran. “Order whatever you like,” Jha said, when they sat at a table. A waitress took their order, which included a large country style breakfast for Max—maximum grease—and a pastry for Jha. She came back quickly with the pastry and two mugs, filled those with coffee from her insulated pot, and promised Max’s breakfast would be here soon. Max refreshed himself with the coffee, and was quite sure he heard his brain making a booting up noise. This left him feeling slightly more human, though still with a pounding head, and inexplicably cold, making him huddle in his overly large jacket. It had fitted better when he obtained it six months ago. Obtained was the word. It didn’t count as looting when the goods in the stores had all originally been stolen by Li pirates. He’d lost weight since then, but obtaining a new jacket now would involve spending money. “I have to say I thought with your name you’d sound more like my husband,” Jha said, referring to Moran’s Irish accent. “But it sounds like you’re Australian.” “Yes, I’m from Sydney,” Max said. “Descendant of jailbirds, I’m sure. So what do you want from me, Mr. Jha? I know you’re a married man, so I’m assuming it’s nothing sexual.” He grimaced at his own words and wished he could take them back. He’d caught a glimpse of himself in a reflection on the way in here. Dark-circled eyes in a pale face, his hair in severe need of at least being combed, but also washed and cut. He probably didn’t smell his best either. Don’t flatter yourself, he told himself. As if Ishir Jha would be interested in a ragamuffin like you! Even if he didn’t have a gorgeous hunk of a husband. Jha didn’t appear to take offense. “Your virtue is safe with me, Mr. Murphy. Can I call you Max?” Max shrugged. “You’re buying the breakfasts, mate.” Speaking of which, that arrived, and Max started getting outside of it while Jha spoke. “I’m taking an interest in former prisoners who have stayed here on the station. Most of them left. Can I ask why you didn’t?” He was right that most of the people enslaved here, whether captured indie traders like him, or trading company workers, or even military personnel, all forced to work for the pirate queen Li, had left with the fleet that had liberated the station six months ago. Gone back to the inner system, and maybe even onwards, through the wormhole, to Earth. But Max assumed most of those had family to go back to. “I don’t have anything or anyone to go back for,” he said. “And I’m waiting for the cleanup fleet to bring me back my ship.” The cleanup fleet was more a flotilla, of military vessels currently working in the sector around the Red Palace station, seeking out Li pirate vessels that had been away from the Palace at the time of the liberation. “Right,” Jha said, looking at his hand-held terminal. “The Hot Mess.” He smiled. “Named for its owner?” “It had two owners,” Max said, and didn’t disguise the bitterness in his voice. He ate some bacon to take that taste out of his mouth. Jha sobered. “Right. You had a partner. David Ransom.” Had. Past tense. “They killed him,” Max said. “Li’s people. For daring to try to escape. How f*****g dare we not want to be slaves, right?” “I’m sorry,” Jha said, sounding sincere about it. Max wondered about him. His own father, one of the crew of the infamous Askensel, captured two decades ago, had collaborated with Li. That wasn’t Ishir Jha’s fault, but maybe he felt he had to put right some of his father’s wrongs here on the station. “Max,” Jha went on. “I’ve heard that you had quite a reputation as, shall we say, an operator, while you were a prisoner. A scrounger and a trader in goods and information.” Max shrugged. He took a pull of coffee. His brain seemed to be fully up to speed now. Sounds like they were getting to the reason one of the people in charge of the station was treating him to breakfast after paying his fine. He needed to be alert for any traps he was being lured into. “I had to keep myself busy somehow,” he said. And sabotaging operations in the factory and sorting rooms had only made him unpopular with his fellow prisoners, as they lost perks and privileges when they didn’t make quotas. Getting his ass kicked level unpopular. “And what are you doing to keep yourself busy now?” Jha didn’t wait for an answer, but went right on. “Apart from getting arrested for being drunk and disorderly, that is? You’ve had a couple of jobs, which you were fired from. I also see you haven’t paid the service charge on your accommodation for several weeks.” The station didn’t charge rent on the accommodation, since there was a lot of spare space right now. But there was a charge for the use of the station’s heat, light, water and air. “I’ve been claiming the hardship benefit you guys brought in,” Max said. “I thought maybe you didn’t charge the people claiming that.” “No, you’re supposed to use some of it to pay your service charge,” Jha said. “But all evictions have to be approved by management, and since there are plenty of spare quarters right now, we decided it was better to let you stay in yours, rather than having you sleeping in a corridor where people can trip over you.” “Okay, I get it, I’m a f*****g down and out,” Max said. “Did you buy me breakfast to rub that fact in?” “You do have options,” Jha said, “You’re still a young man, what, thirty-two? You could get a job on a company vessel. They’ve always got entry level posts. I’m sure a sharp fellow like you would soon earn a rating.” “I want my ship back,” Max said. “It’s mine and it’s all I have left in this damn universe. I’m staying here until they bring it in.” “Then you need a job,” Jha said. “And I have a job offer that would allow you to continue using the skills you honed while you were a prisoner, especially in the field of information gathering.” “What, some kind of informant gig? I can identify ex-Li loyalists, if that’s what you want. Hell, I’d do that for free.” “Something close to that,” Jha said, “Though more specific. What I really want are the names of anyone who might have been a Maze pilot.” Ah, Max, thought, so that’s what it was about. The fanatical corps of pilots who were the only people to know the safe paths through the Maze, the field of trillions of cascading micro bomblets that protected the Red Palace. There were three safe paths through it, but only one had been mapped so far, during the liberation attack. “Didn’t you guys and the military allow the pilots to disappear into the population?” Max asked. “To keep them from killing themselves to keep their secret?” One squad of the fanatics had suicided or been killed by their equally fanatical bodyguards, before the Admiral leading the liberation fleet had agreed to let the others go free, to prevent them doing the same. “I wasn’t in the room when that was agreed,” Ish said. “Anyway, I’m not interested in persecuting them. I want to recruit them. One passage in and out of here is not enough. I want the others opened up, too.” Frankly, Max wouldn’t have given a f**k if Jha did want to persecute them. The pilots were the most fanatical Li loyalists of them all. He also knew management had a team working on a way to bring the Maze down entirely, but that might take years, if they ever figured it out at all. “I’ll pay you a fee for any name you bring me,” Jha said. “And an additional one if they’re confirmed as pilots. I’ll cut you off if you just bring me randoms, I want a report of why you suspect them.” “Understood.” “I could have other little jobs for you here and there. And any other interesting tidbits you pick up along the way are welcome. I like to know what’s going on. Not only here on the station, but if you talk to fellow indie traders for example, who pass on anything about what’s going on in the sector. There’s a lot of change happening out there, now the pirates are gone. I want to know about it.” Fellow indie traders. Max would like to think of himself as that, even if he’d been out of the game for nearly five years. “Okay,” Max said. “Consider me on the payroll.” Anything to help f**k over Li loyalists was a good way to spend the day. And he could do with getting a job. Who knew how long it would take to get back the Hot Mess? “Here,” Jha said. “To help you get started.” He passed a card over the table to Max. “An introduction to the manager of a bar who’s looking for a new bartender. Her place happens to be popular with a lot of the indie traders when they’re on station. I believe you’ve tended bar before.” “I’ve been fired from several bars, yes,” Max said, with a smirk. “Stick with this one,” Jha said. “That way you’ll keep busy and earn some money. My personal contact details are on there, too. Send me reports there and I’ll put money into your account.” He drank the dregs of his coffee, grimaced a bit and rose, offering his hand. “Good to meet you, Max.” Max rose too, to return the shake. “Been my luckiest day in weeks.” He sat down again as Jha left and tapped a sensor on the card to read the contents. The bar was near the transit accommodation, rooms rented for a few days by people who wanted to sleep somewhere other than a bunk aboard ship while doing some business at the station. For sure it would be full of traders. The waitress came over. “Mr. Jha said you can order anything else you like,” she said. “We don’t serve lobster, before you ask.” Max chuckled. “I’ll have some toast then. Ah, and some…um, you have fruit?” “Sure. Some melon chunks tickle your fancy?” Not especially, but maybe he should start eating better. “Sure, lay it on me. Not literally.” She refilled his coffee mug and went off smiling. Still got it, Max thought. And he’d have it even more once he had a shower, and a nap, and, yes, he thought, definitely a haircut. By then the bar should be open and he’d rock up with his introduction from one of the actual station managers. Then he could get on with playing a small part in f*****g over the remnant of the Li organization. For David.