Claire Takes On The Galaxy

Claire - Chapter Six

One evening two days after the meeting with Colonel Murchison, James was waiting by the marine entrance to the Doll House. A sloping tunnel ran from beside the parade ground where it was screened off, through to the basement of the Doll House. May was usually stationed at that level with girls waiting for customers. The miners who also used the services of the Dollhouse came from another direction, but ended up in the same area. As it was a week night, there was just a trickle of marines looking for gratification, huddling in their long coats to ward off the biting night time cold of Devil’s Pit. The usually dim lighting in the tunnel had also been turned down, so they mostly did not notice James standing well to the side.

“Our party approaching,” said May through the earphone James wore in his left ear. She was watching the tunnel entrance through cameras. An informant in the barracks had told them their targets were venturing out that night. James did not ask what the informant’s reward was for that information, but thought he could guess. The two marines soon came into sight, laughing over some jest or other. James waited until they were two body lengths away then stepped out and switched on a powerful torch which he held in his left hand, above his head. In his right hand, he held a single stick. This was the real deal, a stick of a little under a metre in length made of ash, thicker at the business end. Single stick fighting had been neglected as a martial art for decades, but a stick could be surprisingly effective in the hands of someone who knew how to use it, and could be taken through security check points with little trouble. James was not a master, but he was good enough and he had kept in practise.

“Corporal Henshaw and Private Gellert?” he said, politely. At the same time the Doll House security Synth, stepped out of the shadows behind him, and another Synth moved up behind the two marines.

“Get that light out of my face,” snapped the corporal, shielding his eyes with his hand. “Who’s asking?” He was an ill-favoured fellow, with a squat figure, perpetually sneering face and dark hair that grew in clumps, but he also had the broad shoulders and long reach of a natural fighter. Private Gellert was much better looking than his companion as well as much bigger, being taller and broader than James. Either man would be a problem if things got rough, James decided, and together they would be a real issue.

“I see by the name tags I am speaking with Henshaw and Gellert. I want you to come with me, marines. You know the security Synth of course. There is another behind you.” This was, in fact, James’s house assistant who had been given a club for the occasion, but in the dark he could loom just like any Synth designed for the job. Both marines looked over their shoulder.

“We don’t have to go anywhere with you,” sneered Henshaw. “Get out of our way.” He took a step to the left. James took a step to the right and raised his stick. The corporal could see little beyond the bright pool of light, but he sensed the movement and outline of some weapon.

“This doesn’t have to get physical marines,” said James. “This is about talking. We have something to say to you. Then you are free to go.”

“Who’s we?” said Henshaw.

“You’ll be told in good time.”

“Put that light out. We want to see what arsehole civilian we are dealing with.”

“Yeah, so we can flatten youse,” said Gellert. It was apparent that Henshaw was the brainier of the two, for what that was worth.

“Charming as you two are,” said James, “the light stays where it is. Follow me, marines.” James backed away to the Doll House door. The marines reluctantly followed, the Synths bringing up the rear. He led them through two doors and a darkened passageway to another room, where May and Dog waited behind a table. Another, brighter light set up behind the table shone in their eyes, but Henshaw was able to make out the figure of May behind the table.

“May, what’s going on here?” he spat.

“Sit down gentlemen,” said James. “We’re just waiting on another marine – here he is.”

Provost Sergeant Wettenhall, in the dressing gown used by Doll House customers while waiting in the rooms, was ushered in by one of the girls.

“What’s going on here?” asked the sergeant, a thin, balding, older man. “The door to the room was locked, and my uniform has gone.”

“Your uniform will be returned to you in a minute or so, sergeant,” said James. “In the meantime let’s talk.”

“We represent, the town, the civil authorities,” said Dog.

“Oh yeah,” said Henshaw, “well civil authority this!” He stood up and grabbed the table, meaning to fling it at those confronting him, only to find he couldn’t. James and the others had watched the security recordings of the marine’s previous acts of mayhem, thought through what might happen and had fixed the table to the floor. Henshaw strained at the table then, realising he had been countered, was about to leap over it when the Synth grabbed both shoulders. Gellert stood up.

“Sit down both of you!” snapped James.

“Henry, pull him into the seat,” said May, addressing the Synth. Henshaw was forced to sit.

“Sit down Private Gellert, or the other synth will pull you down,” said James. Gellert glanced back at James’s Synth and decided to sit.

“When you two have finished,” said Dog. “We just wanted to talk. We never threatened you. We said specifically that we wanted to talk and then you would be free to go, yet you tried to attack us.” Before surrendering his practicing licence Dog had been a senior partner at a major law firm. He was impressive, when sober. “Your behaviour makes it all the easier to say that you are both banned from the services of this establishment, the Colonel Bar & Grill and the store.” That was the whole town

“You can’t do that,” spat Henshaw, who was still being held down by the Synth. “The colonel said he had no trouble with anyone letting off steam.”

“On the contrary, we can do it,” said Dog. “Everything outside the base is under the remit of the Space Administration, not the marines. In any case, all the townsfolk and the Dollhouse workers are independent contractors whose contracts specifically give them the right to refuse service to individuals. They don’t have to give a reason, although in this case they’ve all got a good one.”

“You hurt one of my girls,” said May, indignation in her voice, “and you expected us to keep on serving you?”

“Wait until the colonel hears about this,” said Henshaw.

“To quote your own colonel ‘complain to whoever you like’,” said Dog. “You can complain to the Space Administration who will ask us what’s going on. Once we tell them that this involves an individual being injured – an individual who is going to sue them for failing to provide a safe working environment – and your colonel will be in trouble, not us. By rights, Gellert here who shoved the girl should have been subject to disciplinary proceedings at the very least, and possibly court martial. The fact that the injured individual is a Dollhouse worker is irrelevant.”

“Why me?” exclaimed Wettenhall. “I didn’t hurt anyone. I wasn’t even there.”

“The problem is you didn’t do anything at all,” said Dog. “Not even file a report, giving your colonel an excuse to ignore us.”

“If you’re not going to protect my girls,” said May, “why should we even have you in the building?”

Wettenhall muttered something about the Dollhouse not being his problem, which the civil delegation ignored. Henshaw glared.

“There’ll come a time when you guys won’t be so proud about your customers,” he spat.

“Really?” said James. “And when will that time be? Tell us.”

“Soldiers will call the shots soon, just wait.”

“While we’re waiting, are you carrying the knife you used on the Synth?”

“What’s it to you?”

“Come now, this is childish,” said James, “and tiresome. You know the drill, it’s both a civil and a military offence to carry weapons off base without authorisation. Let’s see it.” Henshaw took the knife out of an inside pocket and slapped it on the table, still glaring. “Slide it over here.” The marine did so. James inspected the weapon, then raised it so that it balanced on one finger. Both blade and handle were one piece of metal. “This is a throwing knife. I’ve never been a Stellar Marine but I’m pretty sure they don’t issue throwing knives. Do they Sergeant Wettenhall?”

“No,” conceded the sergeant.

“Easier to shoot people. As it’s obviously not marine issue and we’re are on private premises I can’t give it back. This is May’s establishment, she should take it.”

“I don’t want it,” said May.

“Then with your permission, and that of Mr Grimes, I’ll take it. If the Colonel, Major Horne or Sergeant Wettenhall want it, then they can ask me for it, but I will ask for a receipt.” Dog nodded his assent. “That’s it I think.”

“That seems to be it,” agreed Dog. “May, do you have anything you want to say?”

“Yes,” said May, “all three of you, get out!”

After the marines had been escorted out, the sergeant pausing to put his uniform back on, the civil authorities moved out by another door, kicking over the details of the meeting.

“What do you suppose Henshaw meant about us not being so proud at some time, and soldiers calling the shots?” asked May.

“Trying to scare us, make us apprehensive,” said Dog. “If there’s anything deep going on, I doubt Henshaw is behind it.”

“He’s a thug, but he’d make a useful thug and thugs usually know something,” said May. “My husband had goons even less sophisticated than our marine friends, and their threats were never entirely empty.”

Aa attractive, red-haired girl with an athletic build came out of a door in front of them in the corridor, smoothing her dress into place, and smiled at James.

“Hi James, a long time.”

“Sam, you’re looking fine indeed. It has been a time.”

“You can book me during the day you know. Cut rates if you want to linger.”

“Not now, Samantha,” said May.

“I hear my wife calling me,” said Dog and left. Sam walked off, pausing at another door to smile again at James who smiled in return, then only May and James were left.

“Whew!” said James. “Your girls sure know how to get a guy’s interest.”

“You know if you want to book Sam, you can. I’m sure she wouldn’t mind a deal on the rates.” May had in fact mentioned the twenty seven million dollar figure to a couple of the girls in the hope that they would pay more attention to James. They already thought of the bank robber as several cuts above the usual marine or miner client, in addition to being unattached. The question of whether the police had really found all of that gold horde added to the interest. In other times, May might also have been curious on that point but now she wanted to keep James onside, as a protector of last resort if killers hired by her husband’s family came for her and her grandson.

“Very tempting but another time, maybe. I had hopes for the honest route.”

“Disapproving marines?”

“Maybe. At least that way Maddie won’t kill me.”

“Getting on the wrong side of Maddie is bad karma, I agree. No bookings then, although the girls will be disappointed. That leaves us with the other question.”

“Question?”

“What to do about Henshaw and Gellert.”

“Right, hmmm. If you want to take them seriously, then we can turn over a few rocks to see what crawls out. What about the marine who must be telling you the movements of our friends Henshaw and Gellert, no doubt in exchange for favours?”

“Yes..”

“I don’t want to know anything about the man, but ask him to keep his ears open for, I dunno, conspiracies, odd doings, whatever, and find out who those two hang out with. Ask your girls to keep their ears open, but just the ones that can be trusted to keep their own mouths shut, and no one’s to ask specific questions, or any questions out of the ordinary. While I think of it, your guy should delete any messages from you. If you’re in his speed dial list, tell him to change the name. Better yet, take his phone off him when he’s in here and do it yourself.”

“You’ve thought this through already?”

“Just taking precautions. Twenty seven million hard currency dollars slipped through my fingers because I didn’t take precautions.”

While James and May were discussing amateur counter espionage work, Claire was out on the valley floor, freezing, being questioned about the pool party.

“Is there a diving board?” asked Lou.

“Yes, there is – a single board,” said Claire trying to stop her teeth from chattering. They were sealed in their suits and wrapped in thermal blankets, but it was still cold. The idea behind the exercise was to stay a night out on the valley floor, equipped as if they were facing an enemy, but without freezing to death. As the marines of The One-Five had warned them, this was much harder than it sounded. At that time, Claire and Lou, as company sniper team C, were on stand down behind company lines, while company sniper team B were on stand-to in front of company lines facing an imaginary enemy. It was still early and sleep was going to be hard at any time that night. Chatting was permitted on stand down as suit-to-suit comms in line of sight was difficult for an enemy to detect. They were sitting with their backs to Adria’s hospital beast, along with the medic, as that was slightly warmer than sitting anywhere else. Ten metres beyond their feet was company headquarters where Lieutenant Masters and Captain Chan were also trying to keep from freezing.

“Heated? Please tell me its heated,” said Adria. “I cannot lounge decorously if I’m freezing.”

“Yes, heated. James said, heated.”

“Can we invite Taylor?” asked Adria. Claire and Lou’s romance-reading roommate from camp had also turned up in the ranks of the Two-One but was in two platoon. “Are there more of these presentable miners?”

“You want to invite Taylor? Sure, I guess, I’ll have to ask.”

“She’s lost, poor thing. Only woman in her squad and the guys don’t talk to her.”

“You’d better call now,” said Lou. “It’s Wednesday and you still haven’t accepted.”

“Haven’t accepted yet?” said Adria. “I thought we’d agreed to take up your guy’s offer.”

“He’s not my guy and, among other things, I’ve been too busy having my butt frozen off,” said Claire.

“Then accept your not-guy now,” said Lou. “We stand to soon, then we get to freeze somewhere else without talking.”

“Call from here?”

“Sure, there’s a link back, just ask the base AI for directory.”

“Better ask first,” said Adria. “We’re supposed to be on deployment after all.”

Claire flicked to officer comms, “Captain Chan, can I make a call out?”

“You know someone to call in Devil’s Pit?” The captain sounded genuinely puzzled.

“Yes sir. I’ve been yelling at people and it’s had consequences.”

“Yelling? Well it’s no business of mine. Make the call.”

After some fiddling around, Claire got through to James’ number on her suit comms.

“How are you?”

“Freezing out in the valley.”

“You’re out on the valley at night!” exclaimed James. “I’m horrified – impressed, intimidated even, but horrified. I’ve told Maddie that if anyone does start quoting poetry below that balcony of hers at night we’d better get him inside quick. It’s not Italy in summer out there.”

“You told me this pool is heated.”

“It sure is. This means you’ll come – you’ll have to be thawed out when you come, but you’ll be there?”

“Looks like it. Can I bring another friend and is there another miner to match the numbers?”

“No problem. The extra one may not be as presentable, but he will be tolerable. Rule is every girl has to talk to every guy.

“What about guys talking to girls?”

“They’ll do that – they’re guys, no need for the rule, but we can make one.”

They fixed up a time and Claire found out some details, such as the house Synth would be serving lunch of sandwiches and wine.”

“You have wine?”

“Of course, I’m a high-end criminal, remember. Beer is for common robbers, although the miners want it so I still have to serve it.”

“Are we talking fancy wine?”

“No, no – it’s just the same house stuff that they serve at the bar and grill but as I oversee its making, I get to keep some.”

“You make wine?”

“Among other things. Me and two other engineers have to work out how to make everything you can go and buy at the supermarket back home, out of vats here. The less bulk material the Space Admin and marine people have to ship to Devil’s Pit the better. As the other two guys are short termers, changing all the time, I’m usually the one who ends up overseeing the whole thing. You don’t want to know the struggle we had to produce reliable toilet paper here.”

“I thought you fixed things?”

“I do that too – and build stuff. I do a lot of things, although mostly it’s a matter of telling the AIs to do it and then intervening if there’s a problem. Pool parties are new. I can’t tell any artificial intelligence to organise parties and walk away, but I can tell it to lift the pool temperature a little.”

“Sounds good.”

“While you’re out there freezing, have you been looking at the stars?”

Claire looked up. In fact, she had been too cold to notice much about her surroundings. “Most of them are in a big band across the sky.”

“Yep. There are no bright lights or a big moon on this planet so the stars are much easier to see, including that band across the sky. That band is the Milky Way, the plane of the galaxy.”

“The galaxy?”

“Yep, you’re looking at it in cross-section. That’s what you’re taking on, in the Stellar Marine Corps. You can see it on earth but mostly away from the bright lights of cities.”

“How do you know about what they see outside cities? The bank you robbed was in a very large city.”

“Rob? There you go with those crude labels again. I’m an artist. A criminal perhaps – but an artist. I prefer to think of my exploit as relocation of certain items.”

“Without the owners knowing about the relocation?”

James sighed. “Are you going to continue to disapprove of me of at the pool party?”

“Maybe. I’m not sure how to deal with a criminal.”

When Claire finally ended the call, her two friends looked at her.

“You were on the phone a long time with your not-guy,” said Lou.

“There were a lot of details to discuss.”

“Uh huh,” said Lou.

Later it occurred to Claire that she was being charmed. Was that something to be concerned over? She did not know, but she did know that in a place like Devil’s Pit James could not have secrets like Brad.

Had Claire known of the meeting held the night after her conversation with James, between James, May and a Doll House worker called Jade, she might have decided that James did have secrets – and would have required reassurance that his dealing with Jade were strictly business.

For Jade was a girl that men would cross galaxies to be with, James decided. Her delicate features and jet black hair spoke to a mixed Chinese and Thai ancestry. A filmy top, held up by two delicate straps over bare shoulders drew a man’s eye. James had to remind himself to look her in the face, but found that her eyes were liquid pools. She also had the trick of appearing to be fascinated by what the male speaker was saying, no matter what the subject matter, and giggling just enough to show her appreciation of their manliness, without appearing to be flirty.

“Tell James here what you told me,” said May. They were sitting in one of the rooms used by the Doll House workers and their clients. May and Jade were on the single bed; James on the room’s sole chair.

“We were getting dressed afterwards, you know.” She spoke with a Chinese accent. “And the marine, the corporal that caused the trouble afterwards…”

“Henshaw. This was the night before the stabbing,” said May.

“He said that he could look after me if anything bad happened. I asked, what do you mean ‘bad thing’? And he said you know, if the Mercs come or whatever. I said I didn’t think the Mercs would come here, and he said that maybe they would. Guys say things to try to impress me all the time.” James had no doubt about that. “It was just the way he said it, that made me remember when May spoke to me.” Another reason to tell May was that Jade was interested to meet a man who had stolen twenty seven million dollars. Maybe the gold had been handed back, maybe there was some left somewhere, but a man who could steal that much might be able to steal enough again to interest her.

“Did he say anything else?” asked James.

“I asked what he meant by maybe the Mercs would come here – all he’s say was just to remember.”

“Hmm! I need to talk to May. Thanks for telling us Jade.”

“Soldiers came to my village when I was young and it was horrible. I have to deal with soldiers to make money, but I don’t want an invasion.”

“Sorry to hear about your village, but don’t say anything to Gellert if you see him again, or anyone else. Just listen and tell May. If Gellert visits again don’t refer to the previous conversation. Act as if you’ve forgotten all about it. May, we need to chat.”

Jade nodded and smiled at her instructions. James was showing an interest in her welfare which she found intriguing. Money was still everything, but if a lot of cash was mixed with tolerable looks and concern for her, that was all the better. On his way out James could not help but look back. Jade smiled again and shook her hair slightly, flicking one strand back over her shoulder.

Outside with May, James said, “can I close my mouth now?”

“Very few men even know they have their mouth open around Jade.”

“That trick of hers of seeming to be fascinated with what I’m saying, did you teach her that?”

“Not me. All I did was bring her out of hyper sleep and dust her off. The rest she knew already. Jade’s all about the money, if you’re interested, more so than any of the other girls.”

“I’ve no doubt, but is what she’s saying on the level?”

“It would be. She’d change sides in a heartbeat if the Mercs came and won, but for the moment the money is on this side and soldiers did come to her village,” said May

“Okay, but it’s not much to go on, is it? A corporal talking about the Mercs coming to a Dollhouse worker. We can’t tell that to the marine hierarchy on earth. They might just refer it back to Colonel Murchison with a request for further investigation. Short of sending someone to investigate that’s about all they’ll do, and Murchison’s more likely to arrest us than any of his precious marines.”

“Then what do we do?”

James noted that May was wringing her hands. If the Mercs came she and her grandson would be handed over to her husband’s family for a suitable reward. For the Mercs, like Jade, it was all about the money.

“I’m a criminal not an investigator but I suppose I can start digging in the base systems and see what crawls out, hopefully without tipping anyone off. That’s all we can do for now. Hang tight. Tell the girls you trust to keep their mouths shut and ears open, and we’ll see if we can identify a few suspects for Jade to work her charms on. If anyone can make a guy talk out of turn, she can.”

James left. He had a pool party to organise.