Author: DW Cook

Cody heard the PA speaker at the top of a pole whine with feedback, followed by the voice of the master of ceremonies:

“We’ll be announcing the winners of yesterday’s BBQ contest in about fifteen minutes at the amphitheater. Also, the Dog Agility Competition will start at ten o’clock, and the seats usually fill up by nine-thirty, so get there early if you want to get a seat!”

Cody was standing in line for the ticket machine. The device would charge a person an exorbitant fee in exchange for tickets to be used at the various games, food stands, and events for the festival. Cody had resolved to use every last cent of the $50-prepaid debit card he had been given by the newspaper for “incidentals”. He was going to sample every last fried food oddity he could get his hands on –even if it killed him.

He figured he deserved something good from this shit assignment.

The woman in front of Cody had a screaming baby in one hand, and a massive brown purse made of cracked, worn out leather in the other. She held the baby in the crook of her arm while digging through her purse.

“Dammit! Earl! You’ve still got my debit card!” the woman yelled at a man standing in line for the high striker.

Earl didn’t seem to hear her at first, or he just didn’t want to, because he continued his conversation with a young woman in the line wearing a pair of cut-off jeans, cowgirl boots, and a white tank top. Cody thought the young woman was easily a nine on the ten-point scale.

“EARL!!!” the woman with the baby yelled again. “Stop acting like you’ve got a shot with her, and get your ass over here with my debit card!”

Earl turned around. Cody could see the scowl on his face, but Earl also obeyed. He came to his baby-mamma like a dog with his tail between his legs.

“What the hell baby! I gotta start all the way at the beginning of the line now!”

“Just give me my debit card,” the woman said with a drawl, and shoved her hand in Earl’s face.

Earl looked at her for a moment, then dug into his pocket and pulled out the debit card.

Then Earl turned around and stormed off. He muttered: “Fucking bitch,” as he walked by Cody -but not loud enough for his woman to hear.

Cody then waited another five minutes while Earl’s woman figured out how to work the ticket dispensing machine.

As Cody waited, he felt his phone vibrate in his pocket. He pulled it out and glanced down at it:

Senator Johnston cheats at the BBQ contest. Meet me at the entrance to the haunted house in an hour for details.

Cody stared at the text message. It was from a phone number he didn’t recognize.

Senator Brandon Johnston? Cody thought.

Johnston was the Senator for State Senate District 32, which included Hockharth and a few other cities to the southeast of Austin. Solidly Republican for a generation or more, it had gone narrowly Democratic in the last couple of years thanks to all the northerners and Californians that moved to Austin and surrounding areas. Senator Johnston had been District 32’s first Democrat to hold that office since the late eighties.

Cody felt hard tapping on his shoulder followed by:

“Excuse me! Sir!” a woman said behind Cody. “It’s your turn!”

Cody looked up and saw that Earl’s baby and momma were gone.

“Sorry,” Cody said over his shoulder and walked up to the ticket dispensing machine.

###

The amphitheater was filled to capacity by the time Cody arrived to watch the awards ceremony. The word “amphitheater” was a bit more impressive-sounding than the reality. This part of the Hockharth Eighteenth Annual Barbeque Festival was located in the public park next to the Hockharth Independent School District building, and consisted of a series of three stone arcs at successively higher elevations. The diameter of the largest arc was probably no more than 80 yards. People were sitting on these stone arcs, looking down on a small brick stage slightly raised off the ground. The stage measured about 12 feet by eight feet. During the fall, the student theater group at Hockharth High put on a few plays, but it didn’t otherwise get much use.

“And second place goes to….” the Mayor of Hockharth said from the brick stage, then tore open an envelope, and pulled out a card.

“Jimmy Ray Jones!”

“Oh! Oh!” A full-figured black man wearing a white button down shirt with suspenders and a bowtie stood up. “I don’t believe it!” the man yelled. As he walked to the stage, he pushed his thick coke-bottle-lens glasses back up on his nose, and his big belly bounced in time with his steps.

When Jimmy Ray got to the stage, a young woman standing next to the mayor -Miss Hockharth 2017- handed him a trophy.

“Well Jimmy Ray, after four years of competing, you finally placed,” the mayor said. “Anything you’d like to say?”

The mayor held his microphone in front of Jimmy Ray.

“As a lot of you know…” Jimmy Ray said as he took his glasses off and wiped his eyes with a handkerchief, “…my Momma passed away last month. I wish she could have been here to see this. Thank you so much! I love you Momma!”

The mayor put his arm around Jimmy Ray’s shoulder for a moment, and whispered something to him.

“Let’s all have a moment of silence for Jimmy Ray’s mother,” the mayor said.

Everyone was quiet, and most people bowed their heads.

Cody looked around the audience until he found Senator Johnston, sitting next to his wife, Malary, and their four-year-old son, Brandon Junior. Cody noticed that Senator Johnston’s head was bowed and his lips seemed to be moving in prayer. Malary Johnston stared straight ahead, and seemed about as comfortable as someone sitting on a tack.

I mean Malary Godwin-Johnston, Cody thought with sarcasm.

Mrs. Johnston insisted on the use of the hyphenated last name.

After a minute, the mayor said: “Thank you.”

Jimmy Ray returned to his seat, and was received with numerous pats on the back from the people around him.

“And now, what you’ve all been waiting for,” the mayor said. “First place in the Hockharth Eighteenth Annual Barbeque Contest goes to…” he pulled out another envelope, and tore it open.

The mayor read the name on the card, then looked up and smiled. “For the fourth straight year in a row…” people began to clap and looked at Senator Johnston, who stood up. “Our first place winner is none other than Senator Brandon Johnston!”

Cheers erupted as Johnston walked down to the stage. Cody peered at Johnston’s face as he walked by.

Johnston had a broad smile, and his eyes seemed to twinkle. He walked with a spring in his step.

It’s like this is the greatest thing that’s ever happened to him, Cody thought. He seems genuinely happy that he won. How could anybody who cheated be that happy about winning?

Cody began to doubt that whoever sent him the text message knew what they were talking about.

###

Cody Lee was at the entrance to the haunted house at the time designated in the text message. He watched as a group of giggling teenage girls handed the person operating the entrance gate a wad of tickets. One of the older girls glanced over at Cody while he was still watching them. She turned back to one of her girlfriends, and whispered something to her. Then, they both turned and looked back over at Cody. He looked away. He wasn’t so far out of his teenage years that girls that age didn’t still fill him with anxiety. He had never dated in high school, and his current relationship with Clementine was only his second.

Cody looked at the people across the way shooting bb-guns connected to a pneumatic air system, allowing for rapid-fire at paper targets. A man in a cowboy hat and boots was chiseling out a nickel-sized hole in the bulls-eye of his target.

Why am I here? Cody thought as he watched the cowboy shoot. If I could just keep my mouth shut I wouldn’t have to do these shitty freelance jobs for the paper. I’d have a fulltime job with a steady income.

But Cody couldn’t keep his mouth shut. Stating the truth was almost a compulsion for him. It all started at a party he had attended right after his second interview at the Austin American Democrat, the city’s largest-circulation newspaper.

Complete Story Available here: https://www.amazon.com/Come-Read-Stories-Outside-Space-ebook/dp/B07D6FXKLT  

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“Looks like this won’t be a quiet trip after all,” the pilot said as she adjusted the shuttle’s flight pattern. It was a small ship, only meant for travel between the colonies of the Belt, but that made it more maneuverable than the ship that pursued them.

“What did they say they wanted?” Douglas Bradford asked from the seat next to the pilot.

Normally, he would have been required to sit in the back of the shuttle, but he was the only passenger, so the pilot had welcomed the company during their trip to Bala’s Colony.

“Claiming to be a patrol ship for the Colony of Yellow Rock, and they have probable cause to believe we are corsairs. Ever heard of a Yellow Rock Colony?” the pilot asked as she made further evasive maneuvers, pushing him up into the shoulder straps of his seatbelt.

“Never heard of them…,” Bradford said as he tried to hold his breakfast down. Once the g’s lessoned, he added: “But, small colonies come and go so quickly.”

“Yeah, and there are plenty of creeps that like to play this game. I’m not going to drop my panties and spread my legs for every stranger that claims to be a gynecologist.”

Bradford couldn’t disagree with her logic, given their lack of information about their pursuers. He watched in silence as she gently touched the shuttle down on an asteroid that was about ten times the size of their craft. There were enough other little asteroids drifting nearby to make it difficult for their larger pursuer to maneuver within the field, even if it did find them. She powered down the engines and then shut down most of the shuttle’s electronics. With that done, she unstrapped and floated out of her seat.

“You might as well do the same,” she called out to Bradford as she gracefully pushed off her seat and glided out of the cockpit into the passenger compartment. “We can eat while we wait.”

Bradford unstrapped with a bit more difficulty, and by the time he had pulled himself into the back of the shuttle, the pilot had a sandwich waiting for him.

“Thanks,” he said as he settled himself into a chair and hooked his feet into its stirrups.

“Its been getting worse over the last year,” she said. “The mining boom is bringing in a lot of new people. Most of them are good –just looking to make their fortunes and start a new life. Unfortunately, all that new money also brings the filth in like flies to shit. A lot of them play this con now -claiming to be a patrol ship for some non-existent colony, and then robbing you once onboard. Sometimes, they will keep the passengers of a shuttle like this alive long enough to determine if they can ransom them, but it’s usually in their interests not to leave witnesses…” She suddenly seemed to realize that now wasn’t the best time to be talking about the possibility that they would both be murdered, and changed the subject: “So, what brings you to Bala’s Colony?”

“I’m a delegate from New Connecticut for the upcoming Conference of Colonies. I’m here to investigate the incident between the Aries and the Claymore, and try to come up with a workable solution that will prevent it from happening again.”

“‘Incident’ is an understatement,” she said. She was on the verge of saying more when they started receiving a transmission. She touched a button so that Bradford could hear it over the speakers in the passenger compartment.

“This is Captain Aleksandrov of the Bala’s Colony patrol ship North Star, do you read me?”

“Sergei! You old space dog! They still letting you fly a ship?” The pilot turned to Bradford and grinned as some of the nervous tautness left her body.

Aleksandrov explained that he was on his way back to the home colony when he had noticed their shuttle being chased. He had made contact with the other ship, which had made a hasty retreat. Aleksandrov offered to escort them the rest of the way.

As they approached Bala’s Colony, the North Star broke away from them and maneuvered towards the main docking port, which, given their current orientation, was “up”. The Colony consisted of a roundish, large asteroid, or a small planetoid, that had a man-made shaft piercing through one end of the celestial body, traveling the length of its diameter, and exiting its opposite side. The side of the shaft that was “down” from them stuck out for about a quarter of a mile and had a habitation structure attached to it by long cables.

Bradford thought the habitation structure looked like one of the long, curved hotdogs he used to eat on Fourth of July picnics back on Earth as a boy. Its length was about twice the diameter of the asteroid, and it spun about the shaft with the cables attached to the shaft in such a manner that they could freely rotate about it without wrapping up. He could see the occasional puff of gas being expelled from the sides of the habitat to maintain its rotation, which provided centrifugal force to the people living inside. “Above” them, he watched as the North Star oriented itself with one of the ports extending perpendicularly out of the central shaft that was opposite the end the habitation structure was attached to. He noticed that a number of the docked mining ships were being fitted with weapons systems –as if they were being prepared for combat. Things would soon get out of control if the upcoming Conference of the Colonies couldn’t find a solution to this problem.

#

“Cigarette?” Captain Jones of the Bala’s Colony mining ship, the Vulcan, asked before lighting his own.

“No, thank you.” Bradford said from the guest chair of Jones’ office. The habit had come back into fashion with the perfection of organ cloning and medication that could break the addiction at any time someone wanted to stop, but Bradford avoided all mind-altering substances. “You were saying?”

“We were carrying a haul back from a mining operation when our radar picked up an approaching ship.”

“Did they identify themselves?”

“They claimed to be a patrol ship from Alpha Colony, but we weren’t sure.”

“Why weren’t you sure? Weren’t they flying their flag?”

“Those are spoofed all the time.”

A ‘flag’ was just an electronic signal that gave the name of the ship, and the colony it had a docking contract with. If a ship was part of a colonial patrol, then that information was also broadcast with the flag. A corsair ship could easily fake, or ‘spoof’, the flag of a patrol ship. Flying a flag had come into general use by most of the major colonies spontaneously, as a means of identification, and it worked reasonably well as long as everyone was honest, but criminals weren’t honest, and they rarely flew the Jolly Roger.

“Haven’t you ever been stopped and searched by another colony’s patrol in the past?”

“Yeah, sure. All of the major colonies have roughly the same laws and everyone knows that you will get treated fairly by any of their Patrols, so it was never a problem until the corsairs added lying to their repertoire…Honestly, I don’t know why you’re here. You have my report regarding the incident.”

“Just indulge me, and tell me what happened.”

“Well, like I said, we were carrying a haul back…” Captain Jones paused for a moment to tap his cigarette over an ashtray.

#

Complete Story Available here: https://www.amazon.com/Come-Read-Stories-Outside-Space-ebook/dp/B07D6FXKLT

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Amanda Saxton didn’t start out hating Jennie Chambers. They were nearly equal in every way. Jennie was pretty, but so was Amanda. Jennie excelled in academics, as did Amanda. Their fathers were in similar income brackets, although Amanda lived in a slightly poorer neighborhood just because it was the only way her parents could afford a big enough house for their sizeable family.

Every semester, the two girl’s academic achievements were like the two best horses running neck and neck on a racetrack. One semester, Amanda’s GPA might nose slightly ahead, but then in the next, Jennie would regain the lead, only to have them trade for first place again the following semester. At this point, one could not say who would be the Valedictorian of their high school’s graduating class. But, everyone knew it would be a photo finish between these two girls.

During the Fall Semester of their junior year, Jennie and Amanda were randomly assigned in their AP European History class to work on a joint research paper about the causes and consequences of the French Revolution. The paper was a semester-long project and would count for 25% of their final grade.

Amanda marveled at the size and splendor of Jennie’s house the first evening they worked on their paper together. It was a large two-story white colonial style home with faux Greek columns arranged in a semi-circle around the front door. It was Amanda’s first visit to Jennie’s house, as the girls ran in different social circles at school.

Jennie was an only child, and had a room of her own with a bed that was about the size of the room Amanda shared with one of her three sisters.

“There really isn’t enough room in here for this,” Jennie said after a few minutes of work. “Let’s just go to my office.”

They moved to another room with a large desk in it. Unlike Jennie’s bedroom, the walls of which were covered with pictures of teenage heartthrobs and a 52-inch TV, the walls of her ‘office’ were covered with pictures of Jennie’s horse, Scout, and a mere 32-inch TV.

“Alright, let’s get started,” Jennie said after she pulled another chair over next to the desk and opened her laptop. “I’ve got to keep my GPA up so that I can get into Stanford without going on the waitlist when I apply next year.”

“Is that where you are planning on going?” Amanda asked.

“Yeah, it’s got one of the best business schools in the nation.”

“Is that what you want to do? Business?”

“Oh yes! I want to be the CEO of a Fortune 500 company before I’m 40. I’m Vice-President of The Future Entrepreneurs of America at school. You should join. It looks good on your resume for college.”

Jennie hadn’t heard the contempt in Amanda’s voice.

“No thanks,” Amanda said. “I’m President of Students for Social Justice, and we do very important work.”

“Oh, that’s nice, I guess,” Jennie said. “Well, let’s get started!”

After about an hour and a half of discussing the outline of the paper, and deciding on research tasks, Amanda excused herself to go to the bathroom. Once finished, she walked back down the hall towards Jennie’s office. Halfway back, Amanda realized she could hear Jennie talking to someone. Amanda recognized the voice of Angie Dawson, and concluded Jennie was video-chatting online.

Angie was Jennie’s best friend, and “right-hand woman” in their group of friends at school. Angie’s father was richer than both Jennie’s and Amanda’s put together. Jennie was simply oblivious of Amanda and her friends, but Angie, on the other hand, seemed to enjoy making catty comments towards girls that weren’t in her clique at school.

“Yeah, she seems nice enough,” Amanda heard Jennie say.

Amanda stopped walking, realizing Jennie was talking about her.

“I’m really glad we were assigned to work on this paper together since she has a high GPA to protect too,” Jennie said. “I don’t have to worry about whether she will carry her own weight. She has as much to loose from a bad paper as me. You know, I never noticed it until today, but the two of you look alike.”

“Ugh! We’re both blonde, but that hardly means we look alike, and besides, I dress way better than her. The stuff she wears is always so out of date,” Amanda heard Angie reply over the Internet.

Amanda wished she could somehow magically reach through cyberspace and scratch Angie’s eyes out.

“Clothing is your hang-up, not mine,” Jennie said in response. “As long as she does her part on the assignment, she can wear a burlap sack, for all I care.”

“Well, your GPA is your hang-up!” Angie mocked, then changed the subject: “Anyway, what is going on with you and Avery Hanason?”

At the mention of this name, Amanda’s heart skipped a beat. Avery Hanason. Beautiful, perfect Avery Hanason. For a moment Amanda became lost in a few of her choicer memories of Avery.

She frequently called to mind these mental pictures, to the point that they were now burned into her consciousness like an image projected on a TV screen for too long. There was one of him studying intently at the library, and then brushing his hand through his blonde hair before diving back into a particularly tough math problem. There was another of him playing lacrosse, with his long, muscular legs pumping at full speed to get out ahead of the other team’s defense and score a goal. There was -.

Amanda suddenly had a sick feeling in her stomach, as she realized what Angie had meant by the question. Were Jennie and Avery dating?

“I just don’t know,” Jennie said in response to Angie’s question. “I’ve been dropping hints to him for the past week about how I need a date to homecoming, but he just doesn’t seem to get it.”

Amanda felt great relief when she heard this.

She hasn’t gotten her greedy claws into him yet, she thought, and then rebuked herself for having such a thought. She made a mental note to add this to her list of sins at her next confession.

Amanda realized she would need to add eavesdropping to that list, and continued walking down the hall, clearing her throat to signal her approach.

#

“Avery is so going to ask you to homecoming!” her friend Jill said to Amanda as she sat down next to her at lunch. Jill’s words were rapid, like a tape run at three times normal speed.

Complete Story Available here: https://www.amazon.com/Come-Read-Stories-Outside-Space-ebook/dp/B07D6FXKLT

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Hugh looked up the length of the pipe. From his position, it really could be considered “up” because centripetal acceleration was at a maximum here. The pipe was a uniform two meters in diameter, and it ran from where he stood, on the inside of the outermost wall of the crew habitat, all the way to the engine. The crew habitat of the interplanetary space ship Maine was like a large, circular bicycle wheel with a long metal cylinder, about a fourth its diameter, running through and perpendicular to its center. The crew habitat spun relative to the cylinder, which was the unmanned, fusion-powered engine of the Maine. One end of the pipe Hugh was in terminated when it reached the engine cylinder. The other end of the pipe terminated in the irsing door that Hugh currently stood on. When the Maine was in “dry-dock” for engine repairs, and the crew habitat wasn’t spinning, the pipe could give quick access to an entry hatch on the engine. When the crew habitat was spinning relative to the engine, the entry hatch could periodically be seen by an observer inside the pipe as it passed over the hatch, but it would be impossible to open in the short time it was in proper position.

While the ship was traveling in space, the pipe Hugh was in served a less glamorous function. All along the pipe were small openings that allowed the material collected from the ship’s human-waste-removal units to empty into it. Centrifugal force and air pressure than forced the waste material towards the irising door, which was periodically opened to empty the material into space. It was Hugh’s job to see to it that the tunnel remained clear of obstructions and clogs. Every Tuesday, Hugh would clean a different section of the pipe, 15 meters ahead of the section he had cleaned the previous week. By custom, all of the apprentices on ship were supposed to take turns at this weekly duty, but the Junior Crewman in charge of making the duty roster each week had decided that Hugh would always clean the pipe. The J.C. had a grudge against Hugh because his father had once been laid off by the company Hugh’s father used to own, before the Chinese Prosperity Alliance Space Expeditionary Force had annexed the Earth’s moon and nationalized all non-C.P.A.-owned businesses.

Hugh didn’t complain about the injustice because he didn’t want a reputation as a “tattle-tale”, whining to the senior officers about every minor transgression against him. The Junior Crewman, Thomas, was visibly angry about it now. Hugh knew the J.C. had wanted to get a reaction out of him, but Hugh had quietly obeyed the duty roster every week, refusing to play Thomas’ game. Today, as Hugh put on his cleaning suit and breathing unit before entering the waste pipe, Thomas had declared, his face red:

“If you don’t like cleaning it every week Richie,” which was Thomas’ nickname for Hugh, “you can go and stuff it.”

“I haven’t complained have I?” Hugh had said, looking him in the eye.

“You think this act is going to make me feel sorry for you?” Thomas had then turned and stormed out of the locker room.

Hugh had finished cleaning this week’s section of the pipe, and had climbed back down, using the rungs attached to its inner wall when “gravity” got too strong. Near this end, there was also a small hatch on the curved wall of one side of the pipe that allowed entry back into the ship’s crew habitat. Hugh entered this side hatch into a small chamber that decontaminated his suit before allowing entry through another hatch into the habitat.

As Hugh took off his suit in the locker room, Hugh’s friend Larry Chang, another ship’s apprentice from the asteroid mining engineering department came into the locker room.

“Did you clean the waste pipe again?” Chang asked, with disgust in his voice.

“Yes, sir!” Hugh said, with feigned enthusiasm.

“Thomas is a major bastard. Why don’t you complain to the officers?” Chang said with a touch of anger in his voice.

Hugh knew that Chang had his own reasons for disliking the J.C. Thomas had once called Chang a racial slur, and accused him of being a C.P.A. spy. Nothing could be further from the truth. Chang’s family came from Taiwan, one of the few nations in Asia that remained independent of C.P.A. political domination.

There probably would have been a fistfight if not for the fact that a senior officer had overheard Thomas’ comment, and intervened before the situation could escalate.

“Hey, guess what I found while I was cleaning in there today.” Hugh said, changing the subject.

“Feces?” Chang asked with a grin.

“Yes,” Hugh responded, ignoring Chang’s sarcasm, “but I also found a small panel that could probably be removed from outside of the waste pipe. If I took the panel off, I think I could fit through the opening.”

“Hmm….” Chang said as he put on his jumpsuit. “Is that portion of the pipe accessible from inside the ship?”

“Yeah, I just looked it up on the ship’s blueprints.   The irony is that the panel is located on the portion of waste pipe that runs through the Infirmary. I never noticed it because the opening on the pipe faces towards a corner, near the ceiling.”

“It was probably used when the ship was constructed,” Chang muttered as he finished lacing up his boots. “You up for cards later?”

“Yeah, Doctor Sloan said my quarterly apprentice’s examination would have to be postponed until next week, so I’ll be free.” Hugh said as he finished stowing the biohazard suit in its locker.

“Alright!” Chang said as they both headed for the exit. “Looks like there’ll be enough people for some serious poker tonight!”

Chang went back to Astrogeology, and Hugh went back to the Infirmary. Hugh had been the ship’s apprentice medical doctor for about six months now. He had arrived on the ship penniless, with nothing more than a few books and the clothes on his back. For several years now, Hugh had wanted to be a doctor, and he had planned to go pre-med at Sam Adams University on the Moon before the C.P.A. invaded. Except for his father, his family had fled the Moon with almost nothing, rather than live under the thumb of the C.P.A. occupation military government. His father had stayed behind to fight for the Lunar Free State Militia in a war of attrition against the C.P.A. Hugh had wanted to stay too, but his father had insisted that he leave with his mother and sister for Mars. Hugh had thought his career plans would have to be put on hold indefinitely since he could no longer afford the tuition at a university, and merely earning a living was going to be rough for a few years.

When Hugh had arrived on Mars, a message from his father had been waiting for him, telling him that he had purchased Hugh a one-way ticket to Alpha Station near the asteroid belt. Hugh was to be picked up by the Maine, to begin a five year medical apprenticeship under Doctor Sloan. His father had explained in the message that he had called in a favor with the current proprietor and captain of the Maine, who had borrowed the money to buy the ship, at bellow-market rates, from Hugh’s father several years earlier. This was the last time Hugh had heard from his father, who was missing in action and presumed dead after a major battle with C.P.A. forces a few days later.

Working and living on the Maine wasn’t easy, especially compared to Hugh’s lifestyle before the war, but he had always had a personal ambition not to take his father’s wealth for granted. His past self-discipline meant that Hugh had a good work ethic, and personal habits of frugality that served him well in his present state of poverty.

Dr. Sloan was in the Infirmary. He looked up from a monitor as Hugh entered. Dr. Sloan was in his late seventies, but he had the physique of a fit fifty-year-old. He was one of the smartest individuals Hugh had ever met. In addition to being a great medical doctor, he was also knowledgeable on many other subjects, and could converse for hours on philosophy, art, dance, or basketball. Hugh felt a warm sense of admiration and respect for the Doctor whenever he was in his presence, but he also felt completely at ease around him, and that he could really be himself.

“Are you here to do that dissection assignment?” Dr. Sloan asked as he went back to looking over a patient’s chart.

“Yeah, I decided to get it over with.” Hugh said casually. In reality, Hugh hadn’t been able to think about doing anything else since Dr. Sloan gave him the assignment yesterday, but his work schedule had made it impossible for him to do it until now.

“Well, as long as you’re here, I need to ask you for a favor.”

“Sure.” Hugh said with genuine enthusiasm at an opportunity to show Dr. Sloan his gratitude for all that he had done for him.

“Today we picked up a few passengers.” Dr. Sloan said.

“What do you mean?” Hugh asked, incredulous that anyone would be coming onto the Maine in the middle of the Asteroid Belt on a prospecting mission. Hugh knew that it would only occur if something extraordinary had occurred.

“Today, we responded to a distress call from a disabled civilian craft, and took on its passengers. One of the crew members was a young man about your age whose father owns the craft they were in. The Captain needs someone to keep an eye on him while he is onboard, and I volunteered you for the job.”

“That shouldn’t be a problem.” Hugh responded. He knew it would be a lot of extra work, but he was willing to endure a lot to please Dr. Sloan.

“You’ll be responsible for him even in your off hours. I know it’s a lot to ask, so I saw to it that all of your usual duties, not related to your studies, would be handled by others for the duration of this voyage. Also, I understand that you have cleaned the waste pipe for the past three weeks in a row, despite ship’s custom on the matter?”

“That’s right.” Hugh said, offering no explanation, and keeping his voice unemotional. Hugh was not going to complain about his problems to the Doctor, if he could help it.

“I don’t know why you didn’t tell anybody about this irregularity, but cleanup of the waste pipe will now be in the hands of Junior Crewman Thomas for the rest of the voyage. Since he saw fit to break custom on the matter, the Captain and I decided that it would be acceptable to disregard it entirely this one time and allow a J.C. the privilege.”

Hugh thought he could detect a hint of sarcasm in the Doctor’s voice, but he could never be sure with the man, since he rarely smiled or otherwise compromised his stoic demeanor.

Hugh rang the doorbell to the captain’s office. After a few seconds, the door slid open, allowing Hugh to enter the room. The captain sat behind his desk. Sitting in a chair across the desk was a teenager about Hugh’s age.

“Hugh, this is Ted Stevenson.” The captain said as he stood up. Hugh walked across the room and held out his hand, which Ted took after what seemed like a moment’s hesitation. His grip was limp and his hand was clammy.

In the back of his mind, Hugh thought that there was something wrong with Ted, but he pushed the thought out of his mind because he didn’t believe in prejudging people based on his initial feelings, when he had no hard evidence of their character. Then Hugh recognized the last name.

“Are you the son of Robert Stevenson?” Hugh asked, with awe in his voice.

“Yes.” Ted answered, sighing heavily.

“You’re familiar with Mr. Stevenson?” The Captain asked Hugh.

“Sure,” Hugh said excitedly. “He’s the CEO and majority shareholder of First Space Industries Limited, one of the largest ship construction companies around. The ship construction techniques he developed have revolutionized the industry, cutting production time and costs nearly in half!” As Hugh finished speaking, he thought he heard Ted mutter something under his breath, but the Captain didn’t say anything, and Hugh had been too absorbed in what he was saying to be paying enough attention to be certain. Hugh thought he saw a flicker of annoyance cross the Captain’s face, but he couldn’t be sure. After a few seconds of silence, the Captain addressed Hugh.

“We were planning to take Ted back to Alpha Station after we finished our normal prospecting expedition, but the elder Mr. Stevenson has agreed to compensate us generously to return him by the end of this month. Mr. Stevenson also requested that we assign someone about his son’s age to watch out for Ted while he was with us. He has also agreed to compensate us generously for this extra courtesy.”

As Ted and Hugh walked back from the Captain’s office to Ted’s new room, he looked over at Hugh, seemed to consider something for a moment, then spoke.

“Is the Captain always that way?”

“Always what way?” Hugh asked, as he shifted Ted’s suitcase to his other hand.

“Oh…I don’t know…just…sort of mean…” He said this last word with emphasis, as if it had special significance.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Hugh said in an unemotional tone, although he could feel himself getting angry.

“I just mean, he didn’t seem upset about the people who died in the engine room of my dad’s ship when it melted down, or whatever it’s called when that happens…he just doesn’t seem to have any….compassion.” He said this last word like he had said “mean”, as if it were a secret code-word that meant something else that Hugh would understand.

Hugh thought about the time the Captain risked his life to save some crewmen who had been trapped in a burning room on the ship after a pipe had unexpectedly ruptured.

“Here’s where you’ll be staying.” Hugh said to change the subject, and pointed to a door that was next to the door of his own small room. Hugh was beginning to suspect that he was going to have to put up with a lot from Ted, but since this was part of his job, he would try not to let the kid draw him into pointless arguments.

Complete Story Available here: https://www.amazon.com/Come-Read-Stories-Outside-Space-ebook/dp/B07D6FXKLT

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Officer Mike Thomas’ radio came to life.

“Dispatch to Unit 976,” the woman on the radio said.

Thomas thought it was Marie, but it could have been Cathy. He didn’t remember who was working tonight. He picked up his mic.

“Unit 976. Go ahead,” Thomas said.

“Respond to 417…”

The dispatcher went on to give Thomas the address information. It was a coffee shop he frequented in his sector.

“Received,” Thomas said, then added: “Responding. Be there in less than a minute.”

‘417’ meant ‘person with a gun’. Thomas knew the presence of a gun could mean a lot of things. It could mean a person was about to go on a shooting spree with an AK-47, but Thomas had learned a week back not to assume the worst.

As he drove he thought back to his previous ‘man with a gun’ call. Some soccer mom at a 7-11 had called it in. When Thomas arrived, Soccer mom had been standing outside, waving her arms and jumping up and down, while pointing inside the convenience store, yelling: “He’s got a gun! He’s got a gun!”

Thomas had put his hands over his eyes and looked through the window. Inside had been a guy standing in line, apparently oblivious to the commotion. He was waiting to pay for a carton of milk with a pistol in his holster. After checking his License to Carry, Thomas had explained to the woman that he wasn’t doing anything illegal. Thomas found out she had just moved to Texas.

“That shouldn’t be allowed. There aren’t any guns in New York,” the woman had said with an air of spoiled self-righteousness. She looked like she had never worked a day in her life, or lived anywhere but the best areas of a city, where people could count on the police and security guards to protect them.

Why did you move here? Thomas had thought, but did not say.

Thomas’ mind returned to the present. He turned right into the dark parking lot of the coffee shop, his headlights coming to rest on a girl in her early twenties yelling at a young man who looked also to be in his early twenties. The young man was also dressed like he was from the 1920’s -in a vintage brown suit with a bow tie and wingtip shoes. He was wearing some sort of fedora.

Thomas didn’t see a gun, but he drew his, just in case. He kept it to his side as he stepped out, scanning the area with his eyes. He didn’t see anyone but the young woman and the nerd in the suit.

“You call the police?” Thomas yelled out to them from behind his car door.

“Yes! I did!” the young woman said. Then she pointed at the young man. “He has a gun, and he threatened to shoot someone!”

###

Complete Story Available Here: https://www.amazon.com/Come-Read-Stories-Outside-Space-ebook/dp/B07D6FXKLT

https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/908827