“Also,” said a woman, slipping into the booth next to Nate, “you’ll surrender right of salvage. Fourth condition. Or stipulation. Call it something that makes you happy, like ’finder’s fee.’”
Evans, Nate, and even the Marine turned to look at the woman. Casual clothes, lots of black, except for her shirt, which was white. Ruffled collar, making Nate think pirate before he almost laughed at himself — if there was a pirate here, it was him, with his modern version of a hook hand and peg leg. Her arm, from exposed elbow to wrist, was etched in an ancient-style black tattoo, no dynamic colors switching with her mood. Not this one, no sir. She tabled a sword in a scabbard in front of them all with a casual toss, a similar casual toss of her hair — short-cropped, dead straight, black, just long enough to touch her chin, not long enough to get her into trouble — following. White teeth in a smile that made Nate take immediate interest, despite his better judgement, because nothing said trouble in quite the same way as a smile like that — Nate had a similar smile of his own. And nothing said run in quite the same way as a stranger knowing your business.
Because she was a stranger. He’d never seen this woman before in his life, and that made him uncomfortable. “Hi,” said Nate.
“Hi,” said the woman, a flash of that smile again peeking out from around her hair. “Been looking for you. For hours.”
“Captain,” said Evans, “who is this—”
“Grace Gushiken,” said the woman, “and I’m the Tyche’s Assessor.”
“You are?” said Nate. “I mean, yes, you are.”
This wasn’t when she lied to him. She was lying to them, and Nate could get behind lying to the Republic Navy. It was just more pulling of the tiger’s tail, and that lent a certain air of charm to her right away.
“And,” said Grace, “the captain shouldn’t have been talking to you without me.”
“He shouldn’t?” said Evans.
“I shouldn’t?” said Nate, but he wasn’t sure if he was asking a question or not.
“Because the captain,” said Grace, “is not an Assessor. He knows ships, and he knows people, and he knows bars,” and here, a chuckle, too natural to not be rehearsed, “just fine. What he doesn’t know is the value of good salvage. You’re sending him out to a place where there’s a downed transmitter.”
“How did you know—” said Evans.
“The thing about downed transmitters,” said Grace, “is that sometimes they’re downed, and sometimes they’re up and everyone’s dead. In the second instance, there’s salvage, and we want it. It’ll make the trip worthwhile even if you try and stiff us on the other eighty percent.” Grace looked at Nate. “You went for the standard eighty-twenty we talked about?”
“I … did,” said Nate, thinking well fuck me, but roll with it. He turned back to Evans, turning on his own smile. “I did.”
“How did you know—” said Evans, again.
“Everyone knows,” said Grace. “This bar is full of people who know. They know your precious Bridge is down, and that you don’t have any Endless ships to spare, and that there’s a colony out there ripe for piracy at the other end of that Bridge. We,” and she jerked a thumb at her chest, “have an Endless ship. We have an Endless ship with a cargo bay large enough to hold a new transmitter. Also got an Engineer who can bolt that right on the side of your gate, fire it up, and get things working again, even if everyone’s dead.”
“Why would everyone be dead?” said Evans, blinking.
“Pirates,” said Grace. “We were just talking about that.”
“And we need,” said Nate, slipping into the silence like it was made for him, “those ship-to-ship nukes. For the pirates. Who may have killed everyone. Not our first rodeo, Lieutenant. Not our first salvage run either. Grace here will take what’s lawful salvage and leave the rest. You know our records. You know how we work.”
“Yes,” said Evans, looking like he was downing cheap tequila, salt, and lime, except without the salt or lime. “We know your records, which is why there will be no Avenger-class weapons given over. Not only is it illegal to provide these to civilian ships, it would cause me to lose sleep at night.”
Fair enough. Nate frowned, but had to admit he wouldn’t put nukes in the hands of the Tyche’s crew either. Not after that incident back on Century Gamma. Unlucky for everyone, kind of a lose-lose, but less lose for the people with the nukes, which had been the Tyche. “So, Lieutenant,” said Nate. “We know what we’re hauling now — transmitter. We can live without the nukes. But we can’t live without the twenty percent.”
“I could,” said the Marine, speaking for the first time, and astonishing everyone, and not least of which because his voice was gentle in a way not common with the Marines, “rough him up a little.”
“You could,” said October Kohl, coming up behind the Marine, leaning close enough to kiss, and nuzzling a blaster next to the man’s neck, “not live past the next five minutes.” He looked up at Nate. “Captain. I could rough him up a little.” Kohl looked and smelled drunk, which was a standard state of affairs, but his eyes were bright. Like the Marine, he was a solid mound of muscle. Unlike the Marine, he had scars, a bad set of locks in dire need of washing or trimming or just burning, and what Nate was sure was an unhealthy desire to kill people. Which was why he was useful. The Marine’s eyes had gone wide, his posture stiff in a way that suggested he knew the kind of man who had a gun to the side of his head.
“I think we’ve about established how this will work,” said Nate to Evans. “Would you agree?”
“I would agree,” said Evans. “I’ll be in touch with the Tyche to arrange the details.”
“Great,” said Nate. “You want to be talking to El. She’s our Helm.” He gave a glance to Kohl. “You could…” He waved his hand, the one still made of flesh and blood.
“Kill this asshole?”
“No,” said Nate. “Let him go.”
Kohl looked like he was thinking about it, really thinking about it, about whether this was the time he would push the limits of his contract. He relaxed, letting the Marine go, and slapped a hand on the other man’s shoulder. “Sorry about that. No hard feelings.”
The Marine rubbed the side of his neck where the blaster had been. “Sure,” he said, because there wasn’t much else to say when there was a man right behind you with a blaster in his hand and murder in his heart.
The Marine and the lieutenant slipped out of the booth, leaving the bar, the Marine glancing over his shoulder, Kohl giving the man a friendly wave before slipping into the booth across from Nate and Grace. He looked at Nate. “Who’s this?”
“I’m Grace,” said Grace, flashing that smile.
“Was I,” said Kohl, “fucking talking to you?” He was slurring a little. He seemed to see the sword on the table for the first time. “Nice sword.”
“Thank you,” said Grace. “I’m—”
“Still not,” said Kohl, “talking to you.” He blinked, coughed, and looked at Nate. “Captain?”
“Kohl raises a good question,” said Nate. “Who the fuck are you?”
“Grace Gushiken,” said Grace, “your new Assessor.”
“Hell of a way to interview for a job,” said Nate, “but we’re full. And we don’t need an Assessor.”