Space Captain Smith by Toby Frost Read Free Book Online

useful starching agent for your moustache.’
    ‘No. It’s personal because it relates to you. You are Rhianna Mitchell, yes?’
    ‘In this cycle, yes.’
    ‘Right. I’m an agent of the Valdane Shipping Company. I’ve been sent to transport you to Midlight via supralux spacecraft.’ He held out the roster, then turned it the other way up when she started doing weird things with her neck. ‘See?’
    ‘Oh, I see!’ She laughed loudly, without inhibition. ‘And I thought you had a groin infection!’ A young woman, who had been looking at the products in the window, moved rapidly to the next shop. ‘Yes, that’s me. When do we go?’
    ‘As soon as the ship’s refuelled. That should be in about four hours. You’re ready, I take it?’
    ‘Well… no. I didn’t realise this. They didn’t say. I’ll need to get my things together, and arrange cover for the shop.’
    Smith nodded. ‘Can I help at all?’
    ‘Sure. Could you have a look at the front? Of the shop, please?’
    Suruk saw them in the garden. Two of his people stood in the main public park, in keen discussion. They were slim, tall, free of the podgy flesh and big stomachs of human beings. They stood with the weight on the balls of their feet, ready to run and fight.
    No humans were nearby: the closest group sat twenty yards away. Suruk strode towards them, pleased to see his own type among these dull, peace-loving Metchi’chuen . They turned as he came near, tasting the change in the air as one of their own race approached.
    ‘I greet you with honour, warriors,’ Suruk said in his glutinous English, uncertain which M’Lak dialect they spoke. ‘May your names be noble.’
    ‘I greet you too, honoured one,’ said the nearer of the two braves. He wore armour on his shoulders and long gloves reinforced with metal spines. Both had leather cuirasses as well as boots and trousers of human manufacture, restitched to suit their shape. ‘Speak you Asur’ah?’
    ‘Indeed, I speak it.’ Suruk spoke many of the M’Lak dialects, which had their own specific uses depending on the circumstances. There was one used for archaic language, similar to Chaucerian English, and one used solely for confusing non-speakers, similar to Welsh. Asur’ah was used to communicate, rather than to annoy passers-by. ‘Let us use that tongue.’
    ‘I agree.’ The brave sighed and slipped into Asur’ah. 
    ‘Whoa. That’s a major relief. I totally hate talking in English. It’s, like, really inexpressive, y’know?’
    It took a long while for Ms Mitchell to get ready to depart and by the end of that time Smith was twitching with irritation. To him, Rhianna’s personality combined a number of characteristics that were geared to delay their departure and wring the maximum possible quantity of annoyance from every minute he spent waiting for her. She was not only a woman, but a particularly vague variety of woman, who relied on a loose network of similar flimsy types to cover for her while she was away. This meant that she spent nearly an hour ringing round various people to deal with the shop. By the time that they were able to leave and head to her apartment to collect her things, Smith was ready to cosh her with the telephone and haul her back to the ship like one of the ‘dinner things’ Suruk was wont to drag on board any vessel that would have him as a passenger.
    Smith sat on a bean bag in her messy flat while she put things in a big satchel. New Fran was linked into the BCBC network, and he watched a documentary about the planned construction of new frigates for the Imperial Navy, sipping a dung-coloured drink that Rhianna had found him in the fridge. It smelt of fruit, and tasted of mango, but seemed to contain both pips and mud. The news came on. ‘Will I need a formal dress?’
    Rhianna called.
    ‘Probably not,’ Smith replied. Footage appeared of the Ghast Empire: Ghast Number One was delivering a screaming denunciation of mankind, Britain,