Curse of the Iris by Jason Fry Read Free Book Online

great-grandfather’s day,” Carlo said. “And apparently it’s what Captain Lumbaba was looking for. There’s no platinum in the Hildas, but maybe there’s something else.”
    â€œWhat are you talking about?” Yana asked.
    â€œA fortune,” Carlo said. “Waiting out there for somebody to claim it.”

4
THE TALE OF THE IRIS
    T he Shadow Comet sat nestled in a docking cradle, one of dozens of starships moored in orbit above the gleaming white sphere of Enceladus. Workers in spacesuits swarmed over her hull, attaching fuel lines, cleaning fouled conduits, and patching damage from bits of space debris.
    Yana was busy with her mediapad, leaving Tycho to watch as Carlo shut down the gig’s engines, then tapped the maneuvering jets so the craft rose smoothly and latched into its socket in the larger ship’s belly.
    As he shut down his console, Carlo noticed Tycho’s envious look.
    â€œAll in the touch, little brother,” he said with a waggle of his fingers. “Well, that and a few thousand hours of practice.”
    They climbed up the ladderwell to the Comet ’s ventral airlock and found the lower deck silent and still—the crewers were away, enjoying a brief shore leave. But their parents were on the quarterdeck with their jumpsuits unzippered and bunched around their waists, revealing ratty T-shirts.
    â€œAh, able hands and eager young minds,” Mavry said. “Exactly what we need to finish recalibrating the fuel injectors!”
    Tycho and Yana groaned—that was a tedious job, even as shipboard chores went.
    â€œYou might want to hear something first,” Carlo said.
    Diocletia frowned at the account of their getaway from the refinery and the men with the wolf insignia, then asked them to go over what Japhet’s grandmother had said again.
    â€œDad, you’re going to want to come up here,” she said into her headset.
    â€œDoes this mean someone will finally tell me who Iris is?” Yana asked.
    â€œNot a who—a what,” Diocletia said. “The Iris was a mailboat that made runs between Earth and its corporate outposts in the outer solar system. She mostly carried documents and bulk freight, but luxury retailers started using her for moving more expensive goods around. Somebody told somebody who told somebody else, and so about eighty-odd years ago, a flotilla of pirate ships ambushed her between Jupiter and Saturn. They cleaned out her hold, then scattered with the Defense Force on their heels.”
    â€œThe Iris ?” said Huff, stomping onto the quarterdeck from the companionway that led aft to the engine room. “Arrr, that’s a name I ain’t heard in a long time. Father came to regret that particular escapade.”
    â€œYou mean your father? Johannes?” Tycho asked as six bells rang out.
    â€œAye, ol’ Johannes Hashoone. He was one of the Jupiter pirates what hit the Iris . Some said he was the leader, though soon enough nobody much wanted that honor. Like yer mother said, they scattered in all directions after the raid. Wasn’t the Defense Force chasin’ their tails, though—it was the Securitat.”
    â€œThe secret police?” Yana asked. “Why would they care? Seems like a pretty routine bit of piracy to me.”
    â€œNobody ever figured out why,” Huff said. “There were rumors, of course—there’s always rumors. The Iris was carryin’ the ancestral jewels of the heiress to the Amalgamated Social Graph corporate fortune, things like that. Whatever the reason, Earth raised enough of a ruckus with the Union that the Securitat was sent after the raiders. The dumb pirates shot it out with them and died, while the smart ones went to the brig—Father spent four years locked up on 1172 Aeneas. The Iris cache was never found, but good riddance to it. They say it’s cursed, an’ from the history I don’t doubt