Was Once a Hero by Edward McKeown Read Free Book Online Page B

Glad of it, she’d not contacted him.  
    He
smiled when he saw her open the elevator cage.   “I hear there’s a mission,” he said, his eyes level with Shasti’s.   Breath steamed from his breather unit as it
whiffed O2 to him.
    “I
heard you had found a job already,” she replied.  
    “Bah,”
he growled.   “A few days behind a desk
and I begin to think death might be preferable.”  
    “You’re
being a fool,” Shasti said.   “This is a
voyage for the desperate and the damned.”
    “You’re
going,” he said, “that’s good enough for me.”
    “I
qualify on both grounds,” she snapped.   
    “My
choice,” he shrugged.   “For my own
reasons.”
    “As you
say,” she said, “your choice.”   Angry for
reasons she couldn’t quite understand, Shasti spun on her heel and left.  
    She
spotted Fenaday by the front landing jack.   As usual he had a preflight list in his hand.   He and their tactical officer, Katrina “Cat”
Micetich, were talking to an engineer and pointing at the immense jack towering
over them.   Fenaday spotted her and waved
her over, handing the comp to Micetich, who walked off with the engineer.
    “What’s
our status on ground troops?” he asked, adjusting his breather and zipping his
leather jacket.   It was bitterly cold in
the ship’s shadow.
    “Pickings
have been better than I expected,” she said, putting Johan out of her
mind.   “With the war over, the economy
lousy, there are lots of hard cases available: LURPS, Commandos, and Air Space Assault
Team troops.   Mars seems full of people
with little concern for life and hungry for money.”   Shasti knew the type too well, having been
raised from childhood as an assassin in the Denshi Order on Olympia.   She’d developed an eye for the good, for the ones putting up a front and
for the plain crazy.   She made her picks,
hoping she read people—standard humans as she thought of them—correctly.
    Fenaday
grimaced, “Great.   Well, the contractors
showed up an hour ago and began the most extensive maintenance Sidhe’s ever received.   I’m glad Mandela’s footing the bill for
it.   We’ll have shipwrights around the
clock.   I’m having them pay particular
attention our shuttles and fighters.”
    Something
tickled Shasti’s senses and she turned away from him.   In the distance, just coming around a machine
shed, a group of people came into view.
    Fenaday’s
stepped forward to stand next to her, eyes narrowed.   “What’s that?”
    “Must
be Mandela’s contingent.   About fifty of
them,” Shasti said.
    “I
wish I knew how you do that,” Fenaday muttered.
    “Just
rely on it that I can,” she replied.
    The
group passed the gate to Sidhe’s launch pad, led by another forgettable individual.
    “I do
like punctuality,” Fenaday said.   “Let’s
go meet the latest members of the legion of the damned.”
    Shasti
nodded, trailing him in her customary position to his left and slightly behind,
opposite his gun hand.   Shasti shot
equally well off either her left or right.
    *****
    They
walked over to the loading platform in silence.   Fenaday waited, trying to look relaxed as the newcomers came up to
them.   A breeze from the terraformed
desert tugged at his brown hair, he shivered again then put on a cap bearing
his ship’s name and identification numbers.
    A
nondescript man came forward, the group pausing behind him at a hand
signal.   He walked up to them
slowly.   “Good morning, Captain Fenaday,
Commander Rainhell.”
    “Just
Rainhell,” Shasti said, she didn’t look at the man, her eyes searched the people behind him for any threats.
    “Who
are you?” Fenaday asked.
    “Mr.
Gandhi,” he replied.   “Mandela sent me.”
    Fenaday
grinned mirthlessly.   “Your boss has a
hell of a sense of humor.”
    “I
assure you that you have no idea.   Be
glad of it.   I’m bringing you the
promised help, all sworn to secrecy, of course.   A damn sight better than