Chương 43: Ch. 39 - Third Time's the Charm

It was smooth sailing, only after Luna and Jeromy both stopped complaining. They weren't ready for the jolting feeling of leaving the gravitational pull of the Dungeon.

"You could've warned me. Luna I get, but at least me!" complained Jeromy.

"I thought we were family."

"Hey!" exclaimed Luna.

"My bad," I said.

"I just thought you guys would remember from, you know, the thousands of hours of sims we had to do."

"No need to be rude," said Jeromy.

"I was just saying."

"This Bastille, state your identifier," said the comms channel. Caddie had changed it without being asked.

"Hello, command. This is squad 1," I said.

"I don't have the third unit registered to your squad."

"We picked him up on the way." I gave him my identifier and took a moment to remember the other nine passwords left to recite.

"No place like home."

"Copy."

"Alpha 1: 1, In space we will find what else was made," said Luna and Jeromy. Jeromy had to repeat himself because it was meant to be one at a time.

"Alright, squad 1," said the dispatch voice.

"I have you three cleared for landing. Godspeed." Landing was one at a time. Luna was the first in and she moved at a snails pace. Then it was Jeromy and then me. The crowd formed, not at me, but at Jeromy when he showed up with a Gatherer unit. He had a whole freaking rainbow of jumpsuits surrounding his exit. The red from the engineers, other pilots, black suits and even my assigned gold suit. I tried sneaking out, but he seems to take his job very seriously.

"Mr. Reyes," said the tax man, pulling away from the crowd.

"Trying to skirt your duties?"

"Me?" I said feigning ignorance.

"Of course not. Doing my duty for the Bastille is the only reason I breathe air!" He rolled his eyes.

"What do you have for the colony?" He swiped at his tablet, connecting my inventory to his tablet.

"Oh my."

"Yeah," I said with a smirk.

"I have a few things."

"The colony is prepared to give you a sizable amount for the haul, Mr. Reyes."

"How much?"

"We are prepared to offer 300, 000 credits for the lot." Luna made an apperance.

"Too low," she said.

"Excuse me," said gold-suit. I really should get his name.

"Who are you?"

"Luna Arashi. If you need my identifier you'll need to make a formal inquiry. The assignment gave us a baseline price. So we are at 800, 000 by my count," she said.

"That was before we had others deliver-" The gold suit was interrupted.

"Peanuts. They delivered peanuts. We know what we have. I know the assignment price. That or I change them to inert." She flashed the tinkerer gem on her bracelet. The goldsuit frowned.

"500," he said.

"700," she said.

"What is happening?" whispered Caddie.

"We are watching the bane of my existence having finally met his match," I whispered.

"550," said the gold suit. Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.

"710," said Luna.

"It went up! It can't go up! That's not how negotiations work!" said the gold suit.

"You're annoying me. That's why it went up. Now it's 720." They were at a stalemate. Luna kept flashing the bracelet in her hand.

"Do you want to be the one that tells the tax collector super why you let this many slip past your fingers with no way of knowing when this many will pass by again. Sure you could take some, but I'll render them all inactive. And then what are you left with?"

"Holy smokes," I thought. Luna was terrifying. Where was this boundless confidence earlier. She apologizes to anyone new and is shy when meeting new people.

"Who is this person?"

"600," said the gold suit.

"That is my final offer."

"Then we'll make due," said Luna. She took his hand in a shake, her eyes having to angle up to look into his.

"600." Even though Luna was shorter, she felt taller than him. He swiped his screen and held the transaction on the screen.

"I need to approve it," said Luna. The gold-suit's frown doubled in size.

"You are well versed in our tax laws," he said.

"I've dealt with you all my life. You get good at things," said Luna, absent minded as she looked through the inventory list. She turned to me.

"Its good. You can click the accept button for the transfer."

"Was I supposed to?" I asked.

"Yeah," said Luna, turning back to the tax man.

"Every time."

"Ah," I said, realizing he had been approving it himself and I had more rights than I realized. I pressed the button and everything transferred over. The inventory and credits into my account. The gold-suit left without another word.

"That was incredible, Luna," I said. Her hands went to her chest and she took a deep breath.

"Oh, God. I was so nervous," she breathed.

"I tried mimicking the way my sister would deal with them. I can't believe that worked." Her hands were at her knees, but the smile on her face was as massive as I had ever seen.

"Dang. Yeah, I was wondering where that came from."

"So," she jumped up.

"That means we each get 200, 000."

"That is exactly what that means," I said.

"Caddie, could you?"

"Of course," said Caddie. Transferring items was one thing. But credits transferred easily. She held up her other arm, a thin band wrapped around it. Caddie bumped into it and transferred the credits to her account.

"Thank you," she said. The number on her credit band lit up with the new amount.

"I'm going to go home, shower and sleep."

"That sounds good to me. Then we should meet up with Jeromy after like two days to figure out next steps." She nodded and started on her way back through the hangar. Jeromy was still being hounded. Except he had even more people. Researchers in lab-coats who heard about his new mech. Academy instructors. Reporters. Almost anyone of importance was surrounding him.

"I did warn him," I whispered.

"Shouldn't you do something?" asked Caddie.

"What do you want me to?"

"Perhaps a distraction?"

"No way," I said.

"He knew as soon as we got home, he was cooked. Instead, I am going to do what Luna did, go home and rest." The black suits were called and they were having the large amount of people disperse so that Jeromy could have a clearing. It didn't help as more and more people kept hounding him for answers. I slunk away.

"Sorry, Jeromy," I whispered.

"Good luck." The Bastille's network of interconnecting blocks was so large and vast that walking on foot is what poor people did. The rich in Z-Block could get private transportation and cut the commute to mere minutes instead of hours. So each block to head home was about a twenty minute walk. After two hours, I made it home. The doors whooshed open and Aqua was there to greet me… by scurrying away through the wall. The shower felt like heaven. A moments repose after everything that happened.

Yet, in the silence, of the water hitting my skin. I felt it all well to the surface. Jacob and Eric. Hernando. Uncle Wilhelm. The warm water felt cold on my skin. The pit in my stomach grew. Jacob shouldn't have died. Eric shouldn't have died. But what could I have done? It was my first delve. I was in a Gatherer unit. They didn't deserve to have me on the their team. I hit the shower wall with a fist. Uncle Wilhelm. He helped me pass the Academy. He would jump in the sim with me every time I asked.

If I had a question on a test, he'd answer. He was the one vouched for me when grandpa wanted to bar me from the Academy. I only got in because of him. Bang. I punched shower wall. Bang. Hernando. He tried to kill us. To kill Jeromy. He was everything the Academy instructors warned us about. That once you're out there, there is nothing to protect you from the greed of others. And who could you tell?

Investigations were pointless because how do you get evidence when the people in charge of getting it can't go in there. I thought of Hernando, sinking into the water. We technically didn't kill him. But we… I didn't save him either. I was no better than him. Than Quinton and Felicia. Bang. I screamed, the sound escaping my throat without input. The steam let up. The water was no longer hot. But it stopped feeling warm a long time ago. Each thought was another hit. Another death.

Another tally of us dying in a place we shouldn't be in. Then there was the looming threat. Would they believe me? It felt so long ago that even I was starting to doubt myself. If I reported, at all, it would be thanks to Jeromy that I had more credibility on it. A flashing light caught my attention. The water gauge, a thin light above the shower knob was flashing red. We were at a third of our water budget for the solar day. I shut it off and let the water that was still on my skin, drip to the ground.

I had given the colony enough water taps to supply it for two months. And yet, that supply wasn't for us. Z-Block could use as much as they wanted. I closed my eyes and sighed.

"I'll get us there," I whispered. I grabbed the towel. Dried myself off. Put on a fresh set of printed Earth clothes using up one hundred credits, and lounged on the sofa before my eyes drifted to sleep.