The shuttle door screamed, as if in pain. The only passenger covered her ears, gritting her teeth until it was on the deck and the noise had stopped. Breathing a sigh of relief, she almost ran down the ramp to be off the old ship that smelled of body odor and onions. It had been the only one she could afford at the spaceport near her home, and after the turbulent trip she could understand why no one else was jumping to pay for a seat.
Not far away was the desk where she could search for a ride to her final destination. A trip that would take longer than the thirty minutes on the battered old shuttle. One that she’d been saving up for the last few years, hoping to join her brother aboard a Guild freighter. But that would never happen now.
“Hi,” she said cheerily to the man behind the counter. “I’m Tuya Sansar, and I’m going to the moon.”
The man only looked at her bright smile and grunted. His red-rimmed eyes returned none of her excitement or enthusiasm, as he pointed to a hand printed sign. Luna tickets sold out, it said. Tuya frowned but shook off the disappointment. “What about tomorrow?” The man grunted and pointed at the sign again. She looked closer, noticing a layer of dust settled on the top which indicated it hadn’t been moved in several days at least.
“The Luna shuttles don’t stop here anymore,” a scratchy voice said from behind her. Tuya turned to see the rat-faced pilot from the ship she’d just come off of. He was leering at her, chewing on a toothpick as he did so.
“Why not?”
The pilot laughed, waving his hand around at the dusty spaceport devoid of passengers. “This is a backwater, girl. Cargo ships stop here, mostly. No one comes here unless they can’t afford to go someplace better.”
Tuya looked around, feeling despair begin to crush her optimism. Then she thought about Altan and forced her shoulders straighter and smiled wider. “Okay, so where can I go from here?”
“I can take you back home,” the pilot said with a wink. “Won’t even charge you if you sit up front with me and play nice.”
She shuddered and declined as politely as she could. There was a building nearby, so she hurried over to push through the door and get out of the growing midday heat. She grew up in a place where even the strongest summer day wasn’t as hot as this desert spaceport at mid-morning.
Inside, the air was slightly cooler but stuffy and smelled like burning ozone. Tuya eyed the rusted old air conditioner sitting in one window, hoping it didn’t choose today to stop working or burn the place down. She approached a short counter and slid onto one of the plastic stools as she examined the sparse selections on the menu above a window that looked into a small kitchen. It didn’t look as if there was much call for whatever food came out of there.
An older woman wearing a pink frilly apron appeared through a swinging door. Her graying hair was loose and frizzy in the dry air, but she looked genuinely happy to see a customer. “What can I get for you, hon?”
Tuya felt her stomach gurgle, picking the worst moment to announce her ravening hunger. She thought about the few credits in her bag, barely enough to cover the cost of a Luna shuttle ride. “I’ll have a BLT, please,” she said, selecting the cheapest item on the menu and pulling out a loose coin to pay for it.
The sandwich was delivered five minutes later. She had expected vat grown bacon and wilted hydroponic lettuce, but was pleasantly surprised to get real meat and fresh vegetables. For a moment, she wondered if every meal away from home was going to be this good. While munching on the BLT, she watched through grimy windows as the shuttle pilot leaned against the desk. The man behind it had already put his chin back in his hand and seemed to be half asleep as the pilot talked with his hands waving in the air.
“Where are you headed, hon?”
Tuya turned back to the waitress, meeting her smile. “I’m trying to get up to Luna. My brother used to work on a freighter, and I’m going to do the same.”
“You look a bit young to be out on your own, hon. You sure you want to leave Earth? I’ve heard those spacer types are pretty rough animals.”
“I’m eighteen,” she lied, ducking her head to take another bite to hide the blush she knew would fill her cheeks after doing so.
The older woman looked at her with a smirk and raised eyebrow, clearly not believing it. But she didn’t push it. “Well, hon, you won’t get to Luna from here. Not unless you go up in a box.” She laughed, a loud braying sound that was at odds with her petite form.
Tuya stopped chewing for a second, her mind drifting to an idea, then she swallowed the mouthful as quickly as she could. “When’s the next cargo ship coming through? Maybe they’ll let me do some work loading up here and then unloading on Luna.”
The waitress laughed again. “Sweetheart, you look like you might weigh forty kilos soaking wet. Most of those crates are heavier than you are.” She hooked a thumb toward a pyramid of cargo crates sitting outside. Tuya looked at them, pursing her lips. There was definitely no way she could lift one of those, but she couldn’t imagine even a burly man doing so. They had to use some kind of forklift or other transfer device.
The air started to stir half an hour later as one of the cargo ships descended to the cracked concrete of the spaceport. She watched as the beat-up old ship bounced down too hard, amazed at how much charring covered the hull from repeated atmospheric reentries. As soon as it had settled, she grabbed her bag and threw the strap over her head as she left the small diner.
The pilot from the shuttle she arrived on was still standing by the open-air desk, chewing on another toothpick and eyeing her up and down as she walked across the concrete. She reached the cargo ship just as the back of the ship dropped to expose a wide ramp leading into an open area that filled most of the interior space. A dozen or so crates were already inside, strapped tightly against the walls.
A man in a stained old jumpsuit strolled down the ramp, his gaze on a large tablet he was tapping at. Tuya stepped into his path, causing him to jerk to a halt only a step away. “Hi!” she said excitedly. “I was hoping I could do some work for you and earn a trip up to Luna.”
He sniffed, and then pushed her aside. “Not a chance, kid. I don’t run a daycare service.”
Tuya frowned as his back as he walked away, raising his chin in greeting to the other men. She looked back up into the cargo ship, chewing on her lip as she thought about just running in and hiding behind some of the containers. Then she noticed that the front of the ship, where the pilot would sit, was behind an airtight bulkhead. More than likely, the cargo compartment wasn’t pressurized during flight to save costs.
The pilot passed her, going back up the ramp. This time the tablet was strapped onto his thigh, and he was moving with greater purpose. Tuya grinned to see him slip behind the control panel of a small, motorized cart with two metal prongs on the front. The machine whined as the pilot maneuvered it down the ramp, and she watched him speed across the concrete to approach the pyramid of containers.
She watched him load up the first couple of containers, happy to see that he was careful with them as he piled them up beside the other crates already on the ship. Once the small cart passed her to carry the third container onto the ship, she jogged across the concrete toward the remaining stack. She examined the crates, looking at the markings of each. They appeared to be food shipments, hopefully destined for one of the domes on Luna. Most were just vacuum sealed, but two near the bottom were refrigerated containers.
Tuya sat in a shady area beside the diner building, watching as the cargo pilot moved the containers onto his ship. It took him a few minutes to move each one, and she waited impatiently as the stack began to dwindle. Eventually, the bottom layer was uncovered. She checked to be sure no one was paying attention to her, and then crawled forward quickly. Opening the lid of one of the refrigerated containers was easier than expected, but the first was stuffed full. She opened the second with a brief prayer, smiling when she found there was enough room for her small body and bag.
She hadn’t wanted to make the trip this way, but she was quickly learning that the world beyond her home near Ulaanbaatar wasn’t as easy to get around in as she’d hoped. Altan had made it sound like getting up to Luna was the easiest part of the process when he left home to join one of the freighters venturing out as far as the colonies in the asteroid belt.
The container jolted as the cart picked it up, and she was bounced around as it was carried across the concrete and up the ramp into the ship. Even after no more than ten minutes inside, she was cold and regretting that she hadn’t brought her heavier clothing. She’d needed the bag space too much, and had assumed the temperature in the domes or on a ship would be tightly controlled.
She heard two more thumps after long intervals, both on top of the container she was in. Tuya hoped that meant they were about to leave. She was shivering already, dreading the hours long trip to Luna. She’d heard the passenger ships could take as long as four hours to reach the moon, depending on where it was in relation to the spaceport.
Scraping noises told her the pilot was parking the motorized cart, and she waited to hear the whine of the ramp as it closed. And waited. When the noise still hadn’t come after long minutes, she wondered if perhaps the pilot was grabbing a meal before he left. She hugged her bag tightly against her chest, trying to get some warmth out of it. At least it’s not frozen foods, she thought as she breathed in the odor of cheeses and yogurt.
It seemed to be hours later before the ramp finally closed, shaking the entire ship as it slammed closed. Steps pounded by, and then she heard a door open and close. Tuya heard the engines come to life and felt the shudder as the thrusters fired to push the ship off the concrete. She gritted her teeth as the pilot poured more energy into the maneuver than she would have expected. He clearly was more concerned with getting there fast than efficient use of the reactor.
When the main thrusters fired, Tuya felt herself pushed against one side of the container. She grunted at the heaviness of her body, the crushing weight of her bag against her chest. She tried to push the bag away from her ribs, struggled to get her lungs to fill with more air, but she could barely move her arms. Within seconds, blackness began to fill her vision and she lost track of her thoughts.
* * *
Tuya blinked her eyes open, her vision hazy and dark. It took several seconds for her to remember where she was, inside the dark confines of the cargo container. Noises nearby told her the crates were being unloaded, but she couldn’t tell how close the cart was over the sound of her teeth chattering. She felt colder than she’d ever been before, her fingers and toes numb with it. She tapped the button that should open the lid, and heard the actuators straining for a second before they stopped. There must still be crates piled on top of hers.
The ship rocked beneath her as the cart returned up the ramp. The sound of the engine sounded deeper, larger than the one she’s seen used at the spaceport. Metal screeched against metal as another container was lifted, this one very near her own. Perhaps even right beside her. She could also hear voices, speaking loudly but still muffled through the insulated walls of the container she had stowed away in.
She heard the cart returning, and then felt the scrape of the metal arms sliding beneath her. Tuya gasped in shock as the entire column of crates was lifted and then began to sway as they were rolled down the ramp. She’d expected them to take only one crate at a time, so that she could jump out before the cart returned to grab hers. If they set the stack down again, she’d still be trapped inside the cold container until it was unloaded. And that could be days from now.
The cart jerked to a stop but didn’t lower the containers. Tuya heard the sound of a large door cycling open, and then was jerked around as the cart lurched forward for a few seconds before coming to another abrupt halt. After a short wait, another door opened, and she was jolted again as they started moving. It was a short trip, and soon she felt the stack being lowered and heard the metal arms of the cart retracting.
Tuya was shivering uncontrollably, rubbing her hands on her arms as she tried to generate heat in her body. Hours seemed to pass as she waited, hearing the sound of more containers being unloaded nearby. “Come on,” she said, trying to will someone to remove the containers that were on top of hers.
When it happened, she almost missed it. Her eyes were getting heavier with every second, and she was fighting the urge to fall asleep. She knew it was her body’s way of trying to conserve energy that was being used to keep it working in the cold. It was the sound of containers being dragged onto a rolling cart that jerked her into wakefulness. Specifically, the one right above hers.
Muffled voices were speaking again, getting harder to hear as they retreated. She listened with all of her focus, wanting to make sure no one was around. Finally, she knew she had to go now, or risk being found when the container was opened.
Tuya stabbed the panel just above her head and breathed a sigh of relief as the top popped open. Until that moment, she hadn’t been entirely sure it would work. She didn’t imagine the panel on the inside of the container that was placed there for emergencies was tested very often. Grabbing her bag, she pulled herself up and over the lip of the container. She paused there, letting the warmer air wash over her and begin to counter the growing numbness pervading her arms and legs.
Finally, she shook herself and closed the lid of the container. Glancing around to be sure no one was watching, she put the strap of the bag over her head and began walking away casually. She came to a stop a few meters away, her eyes wide and mouth hanging open. Beyond the glass was a gray horizon below a field of stars like she’d never seen before. She’d made it to Luna.
“Hey!” a rough voice yelled. “You ain’t supposed to be in here, kid. What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
She turned to see an older man stomping over to her. He had a red hard hat covering his head and was wearing a nearly spotless jumpsuit with a name stitched over his heart. Below that was the title – CARGO SUPERVISOR. “Sorry,” she said in a quiet voice. “I wanted to see the stars.”
“Looking up through the dome ain’t enough for you?” He grabbed her arm roughly, pulling her along as he walked away from the cargo area. Ahead of them was an arrival area for passengers on the daily shuttles, and then a seating area for those waiting on the next ship to depart. “And why are you so cold? You should get to a doc, have that checked out.”
Tuya saw an advertisement flash on a screen as they passed, and she glanced over to see that the facility was looking for more dockworkers to help with loading and unloading cargo. Pulling against the large hand, she pointed to it. “Hey, mister. Can I apply for that job? I’m going to be a cargo specialist on a Guild freighter, but I need to earn some credits first.”
The man laughed, slapping a hand over his belly as he continued pulling her. “A dainty little thing like you hauling cargo? You couldn’t even shift one of these containers, much less move it onto a cart. Someone as small and cute as you should be warming a bed for a man to come home to at the end of a long day. But hey, if you ever want to earn twenty creds, I’ll be happy to share a bed with you for a quickie.”
She glared at him, but he didn’t pay attention. As soon as they were past the arrivals area, he gave her a last push and then released her arm. “Stay away from the dangerous stuff, huh? The last thing I need is some wailing mother asking why her snot nosed little brat got crushed when a stack of crates fell over.” He turned and walked away, and she heard him still laughing at the idea of her working as a cargo hauler.
Tuya glanced around, seeing a man behind the arrivals counter smirking at the display he was working on. She knew he had to have heard the conversation, and probably shared the same opinion about what she was capable of. It was something she’d had to deal with her entire life, people judging her ability based on her petite stature. She growled and grumbled out a few curses and she clenched her fists.
Catching herself falling back into familiar anger, she forced a snarling smile onto her face. Altan would have been happy. He was always happy and optimistic. Now that he was gone, she had to be the one to carry on his enthusiasm. She had to be the sister he deserved, the one who didn’t sulk every time she didn’t get her way or get angry because the smallest thing didn’t go exactly as she wanted.
Then she remembered that she was on Luna. Armstrong dome, according to the large lighted welcome sign that hung over the arrivals desk. She’d heard so many stories from her brother about this place, and now she would be able to see if it lived up to her expectations. She reached a hand into her bag, feeling the thin stack of plastic bills that had been meant to pay for her trip. Part of her was glad to still have it. Enough to find a place to sleep for a night or two while she tried to get a job on a ship.
Entering Armstrong from the docking facility felt like stepping into a new world she’d only dreamed about. There was a wide avenue straight ahead, and she could see a glimpse of the central square in the distance. Two other roads to her left and right circled the edge of the dome, where the walls sloped slightly as they rose to where the transparent dome began.
A cough drew her attention to a couple of small pedicabs. They looked to be waiting on the next shuttle to arrive, hoping for tourists who wanted to shell out some credits for a ride to their destination. “You new?” one of the lanky young men asked. “I didn’t see a shuttle arrive.”
“Well, just that cargo shuttle,” the other guy said with a sly smile. “Are you cargo, lady?”
Tuya looked at them with narrow eyes, trying to figure out if they were going to run to a security officer to report her. They didn’t move, though, so she felt safe enough to walk over. They looked a little rough under the clean clothes, as if they weren’t a shining example of the dome citizens. “So what if I am?”
“No sweat off my back,” the first one said, waving his hand in the air. “Welcome to Armstrong, gateway to the stars.” He said it grandiosely, and she could tell it was something he said to everyone who exited the docking facility.
“Where all your dreams come true,” the other one said, chuckling at the end. “Especially if your dream includes sleeping in a room with a dozen other people who can’t afford anything better.”
She wasn’t sure how to take that. Every story she’d heard about Luna as a kid talked about how everyone living there was rolling in credits, with their every desire met. It was the scientific outposts on Mars and the mining colonies in the asteroids that had a hard life, where each person had to work constantly to maintain a basic existence.
“So, new girl, where are you going?”
“I’m going to work on a Guild ship,” she said proudly, waiting to defend her decision if they laughed or made fun of her for it.
“Ah, the Guild.” The second pedicab driver nodded, looking at the ground as he rubbed his foot on the rough road surface. “You know you’re in the wrong dome, right?”
“Of course I do!” Tuya frowned, resisting the urge to ask what he meant. Her brother had never mentioned the Guild only having a presence in one dome. She’d assumed they would have in office in the Syndicate Armstrong along with the Coalition Aldrin, since they worked with both governments.
“How are you planning to get over to Aldrin?” the first guy asked, squinting up at her with a serious expression.
Tuya shrugged. “I’ll walk. I’m not paying one of you to pedal me a kilometer.” She jumped lightly on the balls of her feet. “Especially when I feel like I could fly in this gravity.”
“I think what he means,” the second one said, “is how do you expect to get through the transit tunnel?”
“Huh?”
“Have to have a pass,” the first one said, holding up a plastic badge that shimmered in the light. “If you don’t have one, you get to sit around for a day or two while they run all kinds of background checks and make sure you’re not a danger to their precious citizens.”
She grimaced, kicking herself for not researching this a little bit more before she ran away from home. “Can I borrow yours? I’ll bring it back.”
Both men laughed. “This is just for pedicabs. I have to turn it into our boss at the end of my shift, and if you tried to use it they’d have you in restraints before you could ask what’s going on.”
“It has his picture and biometrics attached,” the other explained. “Anyone else trying to use it gets locked up and kicked back down to Earth.”
“Oh.” Tuya chewed on her lip, trying to figure out a way around this new complication. She thought about trying to apply for entry, but now she worried that they’d know instantly that she didn’t belong on Luna. If they ran her background, they’d know she hadn’t paid for transport. “So what do I do?” she asked, thinking out loud.
“Come back to our place,” the first pedicab driver said, standing and brushing off his backside. He patted his chest. “I’m Tristan, this idiot’s Gerry. Some our roommates are pretty tied into the black market, maybe they can help you.”
She frowned at them. “Thanks, but I’m going to get a room of my own. I’ve got some creds.”
“Hope you got a lot of them,” Gerry said with a smile. “You know what things cost up here?”
“It can’t be that much,” she said. “I saved up for a couple of years to pay for this trip.”
Tristan smiled sadly. “Look, I don’t know where you come from, but judging by your accent and clothes I don’t think it’s somewhere with a lot of money. I really don’t think you get how expensive things on Luna are.” He pointed toward a shabby building farther along the rim road. “That’s one of the hostels where people like us share rooms. What do you think it costs to get a bed there for a night?”
She looked at the building and shrugged. “Five credits? Definitely not much more.”
Gerry laughed loudly as Tristan put a hand on her shoulder. “They charge fifty a night. No meals included.”
Tuya hissed at that, unconsciously feeling the wad of credits through her bag. She didn’t have nearly enough to live on with those kinds of prices. Why was the shuttle ticket going to be so cheap if everything up here cost so much?
“Because that’s how they get you here to spend all that money,” Gerry said. She hadn’t realized she’d asked the question aloud until then. “And then you find yourself working a crappy job for peanuts, and you don’t have the time or creds to do anything better with your life.”
“Just come back with us for one night,” Tristan said. “I promise that no one at our place will try to take advantage of you.”
“Well, they might try,” Gerry said, his face all scrunched up.
“We won’t let them,” Tristan said, adamantly.
Sighing, she knew she didn’t have a choice. “I’m Tuya. Tuya Sansar.”
“Welcome to Armstrong, Tuya Sansar. The place where all your dreams are shit.”
* * *
One night turned into four. During the day, Tuya would wander the dome. At first, she was astounded at how beautiful it was. She stood on a sidewalk for half an hour one day just looking up at Earth high above, entranced by the blue, green, and brown world. Mongolia had come into view after a long while, and she tried to figure out where her home would be. Deep down, she wondered how many times Altan had stared up at the same thing. Had he been looking up at her while she was looking up at Luna?
It hadn’t all been filled with wonder, though. Her credits disappeared quickly, even though she barely ate enough to keep up her energy. That BLT she’d bought for a single credit at the spaceport would cost five in Armstrong, and she’d end up with the poor-quality vat grown meat and wilted hydroponic lettuce she’d expected back then.
Getting a job had been impossible. The few people who accepted her application quickly lost interest when they asked to see her Luna identification. She hadn’t even realized that every occupant of the domes carried something like that. It was such an archaic thing in her mind, a remnant of old Earth civilization that had been left behind decades ago on the planet. Tristan had tried to get her hired on at the pedicab company, at the same time warning her that they barely made enough to scrape by. But even there she was denied without the documentation required.
Several of the people who lived in the old warehouse where Tristan’s group squatted were trained in chemistry. They’d managed to build a small still, and whenever the group could steal enough corn and sugar, both hard to get in the domes, they would brew up a batch of moonshine and everyone would get drunk for a night. It had been a few months since that last happened, but their stockpile had grown large enough by Tuya’s fourth day that they started the process.
She watched with interest as the liquid slowly dripped along a series of thin tubes and variously sized flasks. The smell of it was sharp but sweet, and even though she’d never tasted alcohol before, Tuya was salivating at the thought of a sip of the moonshine. Something the group was all too happy to give her, especially once they found out she’d never been drunk before. They fed her three small glasses full of the liquor. It burned in her throat at first, but by the third sip she was enjoying it much more.
That was how she ended up laying on a puffy cushion beside Titus, one of the few people in the group that she really didn’t like. He was older than most of them, in his early thirties, and made his living doing illegal hack jobs. He’d been a gene tweaker, picking up good credits making changes to unborn children so they’d meet parental approval, but the dome authorities had caught him at it too often.
Somehow, Titus got her to spill her story. She told him about her brother leaving home and getting a job aboard a Guild freighter, and then about the ship going missing. When pieces of the Telemachus were found in the asteroid belt, it had felt as if her world were imploding. The only thing she had ever wanted was to join him on a ship, flying through the cold vacuum of space. If she couldn’t do it with him, then she’d do it for him. Assuming she could ever get over to Aldrin. Or get a job, since the docking facility supervisor kept refusing to entertain the thought of her working as a hauler.
Titus looked at her with a speculative smile that she hadn’t like, thinking he was hoping to get her into his bunk. Luckily, she hadn’t been that drunk. Just drunk enough to wake up with a pounding head and a dry mouth that tasted like ass.
He found her while she was in the open kitchen, draining a glass of water. “You know, Tuya, if you really want to work with cargo, there’s a way it could happen.”
“What? You got someone who owes you enough favors to hire the smallest person in the dome?”
Titus grinned, shaking his head. “No. But if you had cybernetic implants, they would never turn you away.”
“Implants.” She looked at him, trying to hold back the disgust she felt at the thought. “Those are illegal, and you know that. No one would hire me if I were ever stupid enough to get them.”
“You don’t think the guys lugging those containers around are working with the muscle they were born with, do you? It’s cheaper to hire an implant freak and pay them under the table than it is to pay two other people to do the same work.”
Tuya wanted to walk away and forget she’d ever heard about implants, but a voice in the back of her mind was telling her that Titus was right. She was too small, too thin, too female to ever be considered seriously for a job as a cargo hauler on a ship. And she didn’t have any other skills that would qualify her for a position on a freighter. She definitely wasn’t going to ever have the credits to get that training, the way things were going. “I couldn’t afford something like that,” she said lamely.
Titus grinned, knowing he had her. “I know a guy. He’ll do the operation at no cost. You just have to do a little work for him afterward.”
“What kind of work? I’m not going to become a criminal.”
“Gray area work.” He laughed. “Come with me to see him, hear his proposal. You don’t have to agree, but you know you’re always going to wonder what could have been if you don’t at least listen.”
Against her better judgement, and a whispering voice that sounded like her mom’s disappointed tones, Tuya followed him through a warren of alleys and buildings badly in need of repairs. Too many people were living in crowded spaces, the workers who kept the dome functioning for the wealthy to enjoy as they strolled the square and open park. There were a lot of grubby kids, and sad faces of older people who had dreamed of a better life.
By the time they arrived at their destination, she was so lost that she never could have made her way home again. Titus stopped in front of a steel door, banging on it in a strange rhythm. When it swung open, it was noiseless and revealed a small medical layout that looked hastily put together but clean. Shining instruments were laid out on a couple of trays beside a gurney covered in plastic.
“Titus! Have you brought me another one?” The man who spoke appeared from behind a server cabinet filled with blinking red and green lights. He was wearing goggles, making his eyes look huge through the heavily modified lenses.
“She’s a newbie,” Titus said, walking over to throw an arm around his friend’s shoulders so they could both stare at her with wide grins.
Tuya glared at them, considering bolting through the door. “So what’s the deal here? Titus said you’d do implant surgery in exchange for some work.”
“Yes, yes. Just a little bit of work. The kind of thing that will be a breeze for you once you have implants.” Goggles stepped closer, eyeing her up and down as he circled around her. “She’s perfect, Titus. No one would expect such a small thing to be so strong.”
“Watch who you call small, bud.” Tuya snarled at him, really not liking this guy. Her fists were clenched as she scowled at him.
Goggles only laughed. “Ah, and fierce, too. Excellent!” He strode quickly over to a display, tapping a few times to input a command. Without warning, a laser beam emitted from the ceiling scanned her body three times. On the display, a startlingly lifelike representation of her body appeared. Unclothed.
“Are you guys just perverts?” she asked, stomping over to stand in front of the display.
“It’s a necessary step,” Goggles said, shoving her aside far too easily. “I assure you that my interest is not sexual, no matter how pleasing your body may be. Look, the computer is now determining the best placement for the implants, locations that will provide the best enhancement with the least amount of cutting.”
Tuya glared at Titus until he backed away with his hands raised, then turned back to the display to see small red lines appearing on the representation of her body. Goggles seemed pleased as he hummed to himself and started tapping in notes and commands. After several minutes, he turned to her with a triumphant look on his face. “Are you ready to begin?”
“No. You still haven’t explained what kind of job you’re wanting in return. I’m not going to break the law.”
He waved a hand through the air, dismissing her objection. “It’s a small thing. I just want you to fight for me.”
She leaned back, looking at him in confusion. “Fight? Who am I supposed to fight, and why?”
Goggles leaned around her to look over at Titus, who only shrugged. “Like I said, man, she’s new.” Tuya turned to look at him. “Okay, girl, here’s the deal. Almost every night, if you know the right people, you can get into something called the Brawls. They find an empty warehouse, or half empty if need be, and stuff in everyone who will pay a few credits to watch. Most of the money is made on the betting, as people try to pick which fighter is going to win each of the three bouts of the night.”
“Brawls?” Tuya asked with a raised eyebrow. “That doesn’t sound like a pleasant thing to be involved in.”
“Oh, it gets dirty,” Titus said with a one-sided smile. “The only rule is no killing. Can’t have bodies showing up and drawing the attention of the administration, can we?”
“And you want me to fight in these Brawls, with enhanced strength?”
“Yes,” Goggles said, looking as if it were the most obvious thing on Luna. “Someone small like you, with the strength to take down a burly fighter, will make us rich. Everyone will bet against you, driving the odds in our favor.” He giggled at the thought.
Tuya had never been in a fight in her life. She’d played a little rough with some of the kids of her village, but never in an angry way. The thought of having to fight people who were going to be larger than her was daunting. As was the thought of being hit by those people. At the same time… she needed to get a job aboard a freighter and these implants were the only way she could see that happening. It would be an advantage that few other people could provide. One that wasn’t entirely legal, but such details tended to get overlooked on Guild ships from what Altan had told her.
“Okay,” she said quietly. “I’ll do it.”
Goggles nodded, rushing around the room to put everything in place. Titus winked at her as he showed her where to change into a surgical smock. Once that was done, he helped her get settled on the table in the exact position Goggles wanted her. A large piece of equipment was hanging overheard, which she hadn’t seen until she was looking right up at it. She really didn’t like the number of sharp needles and blades poking out of it.
She jerked when she felt leather straps around her wrists, and she looked in alarm to see more wrapped around her ankles. “It’s okay,” Titus said. “We just have to make sure you don’t move around during the operation. Trust me, the last thing you want is those blades slicing the wrong part of you.”
Tuya didn’t trust him at all. Either of them. But she was too deep now to back out. All of her hopes were pinned on the implants. Without them, she’d be nothing but another street rat begging jobs and never making enough to even get over to Aldrin dome, much less onto a Guild ship. So she put her head back and tried to relax as much as she could through the nervous churning in her stomach.
Goggles looked down on her once she was strapped in, his huge eyes examining her. He held up a large needle. “This is a sedative and anesthetic. You’ll sleep through the whole thing, and when you wake up, you’ll have more strength than you could ever imagine.” She felt the sharp jab of the needle in her arm, and a cold rush as the liquid was pushed into her vein. It was the last thing she could remember.
* * *
It took five days before she was able to leave the room with all the medical equipment, another week after that before she was starting to feel like her body was adjusting to the new implants. She would stand up, and then end up jumping a meter in the air because she hadn’t realized how much extra power she was using in the movements.
Goggles warned her about the effects she’d suffer if the implants were ever removed. After the operation, of course, and before she could have factored it into her decision to accept. But she knew she still would have gone ahead. Getting onto a Guild freighter was her sole purpose, and this was the way to do it.
Two weeks after the operation, her scars were starting to fade from a vivid red to a pale pink. Tuya wore long sleeved shirts everywhere, hiding them and preventing the questions she knew would arise. She kept trying to find work, but at least now Goggles and Titus were paying for her food. They wanted her in good shape for the first fight, they said.
A fight that came much sooner than she’d expected. She was lying in her bunk at the end of an afternoon spent in rejections for jobs, when Titus walked over and crouched down. “You ready?”
“What do you mean?” she asked, half asleep.
“To fight. Brawl is tonight, and we want you there.”
Her eyes snapped open. “I’m still not even fully healed,” she protested, holding up an arm and pulling back the sleeve so he could see the scars.
He only shrugged. “It’s healed enough. Time to start paying us back for the money we spent on you, kid. It’s your first fight, so they’ll give you an easier opponent.”
She groaned but knew she didn’t have much choice. There was a debt to be paid, and it wasn’t up to her when it got paid. Rolling to her feet, Tuya followed Titus from the building and along the edge of the dome to where the warehouses were situated. Cargo coming up from Earth was stored there, or the occasional shipments of goods produced in Armstrong that were being sold to the planet. It was a part of the dome that was mostly empty except when a cargo ship was scheduled to arrive.
The warehouse he led her into was already filled with at least forty people, standing around the edge of a roped off square. It was loud with the many conversations going on, and the cries of those walking through the crowd taking bets. Goggles was waiting for them away from the crowd, his gaze focused on a scratched display set up near a hastily constructed booth for cashing in winning bets.
“Who’s she up against?” Titus asked, his eyes searching. He grunted when he saw her opponent’s name, grinning.
“Matheson?” she asked, reading the line that said Sansar v. Matheson for the first fight of the night. “Who’s he? What’s he like?”
“Big,” Goggles said. “Strong. Hauls around cargo containers from the dock to these warehouses all day. But he’s purely natural muscle.” He turned to look through the crowd, and then raised his chin.
Tuya looked in that direction, eyes widening as she saw a giant of a man standing shirtless as another man wrapped cloth around his knuckles. Matheson was easily over two meters tall, most likely born and raised in the low gravity of the Lunar domes. His muscles were bulging, with large biceps and astounding pectorals. She gulped, trying to imagine how much it was going to hurt if one of his meaty fists impacted her body.
“Don’t worry,” Titus said, taking her hand to begin winding cloth around it to protect her knuckles. “He’s a beast, but you’ll take him with ease. The best part is that everyone is going to bet on him, and the odds are going to be great. We’re going to rake in the credits.”
“You’ll need them to fix me if he lands a single punch.”
“Don’t underestimate my implants,” Goggles said. “The pain dampening features are top of the line. Just try to make it look like it hurts you more than it does.”
By the time her hands were wrapped, a shifty looking man in a tattered old suit was standing in the middle of the square. He announced that the brawl was about to begin, calling the fighters into the roped off area. Tuya ducked under the rope, shaking her head when she saw Matheson step over as if it were barely an obstacle. He swung his arms through the air, then performed a few shadow punches as he bared his teeth in her direction.
The announcer raised an arm, then snapped it down to signal the start of the match. Matheson ran straight for her, wanting to end it fast. Tuya shrieked in surprise, ducking under his whistling swing and rolling away. She got to her feet behind the giant and swung her right fist forward in a kidney punch. She felt like she barely tapped him, but Matheson let out a roar of pain and rage and hugged his side as he scrambled away from her.
Surprised by the effect of that single punch, she took her focus away from her opponent for too long. She turned back just in time to see a fist as large as her head swinging through the air. It slammed into her cheek, snapping her head around and sending her spinning to the dirt. Tuya lay there for a few seconds, tasting coppery blood and waiting for pain that never came.
Grinning at this new discovery, she jumped back to her feet and faced Matheson again. They began a wary circling of each other, and she saw with satisfaction that he was favoring his side. Spitting out blood, she smiled gruesomely at the big man. That seemed to enrage him, and he roared as he stepped forward with a wide roundhouse swing.
She easily ducked under his arm again, jumping onto his back to wrap her legs around his torso and she punched down into his neck. Once, twice, then a third time as he bellowed and reached back to try and pull her off his back. Matheson fell to his knees, and she wrapped an arm around his neck. He kept trying to swat her away, but his efforts grew more feeble as he couldn’t get air. Once she felt his body go limp, she released her hold to let him slump to the ground.
The announcer hurried over to raise her arm in victory as the crowd booed and hissed, all of them having lost money with her win. She could see Titus smiling, though, raising his fingers to rub them together in the universal sign for money. In that moment, she wished she had credits that she could have given them to bet on herself.
She was hustled out of the fight area quickly after that, as Matheson’s friends dragged him groggily away in the opposite direction. Titus grabbed her chin to look at where the giant’s punch had landed, grunting in satisfaction. “You’re going to have a nasty bruise for a few days, but just be thankful you still have all your teeth. That was a hell of a hit.”
“I barely felt it,” she said in wonder, reaching up to rub her cheek. “I still can’t feel it.”
“Just one of the benefits of implants,” Googles said, as he counted the credit notes he’d just collected from the booth. Some of them were passed over to Titus, his cut for finding her in the first place. Tuya could only look longingly at the thousands of credits on display, enough that she could have bought a counterfeit pass to get into Aldrin.
Goggles noticed her attention, but only smiled. “You did good tonight. But next time, make it look like you had to work harder to win. We don’t want too many people to start betting on you and driving the odds too low.”
They stayed in the warehouse, watching the next two fights. Tuya scrutinized them with interest, trying to pick up pointers that she could use in her next match. The final fight was the most interesting, two brawlers with scarred faces that spoke of many fights. She wondered if either of them had some kind of enhancements, as well.
At the end, when the crowd was trickling out slowly so as not to draw attention to the area, she saw a large form shuffling toward where she was seated. She felt her heart begin to pound, adrenaline begin to flow through her body, as she recognized Matheson. He approached with his hands raised and open.
“You fought well,” he said, his voice hoarse. “Is it true this was your first Brawl?”
“It was,” Tuya said, cautiously.
He looked her up and down appraisingly, grunting. “Implants, right? No, I’m not going to get angry about that. Most of the people who fight here have some kind of enhancement. It’s just rare to see someone go that far. Did they do your entire body?”
She shrugged, rubbing one of the scars under her linen pants. “Everything below my neck.”
Matheson sat down a few seats away, his head hanging low. “You need to be careful with those. Don’t rely on them too much. I had a friend a few years back who got them just in his legs. When the authorities discovered them, he had to have them removed. He hasn’t been able to walk since, his muscles were totally ravaged because he relied on his implants for everything.” He turned to look at her, his eyes imploring. “Only use them when you absolutely have to. They give you an advantage, but you never know when the day will come that you can’t rely on them again.”
Tuya bit her lip, thinking about his words. Finally, she nodded, appreciative of the good advice. She’d figure out how to do as much as possible without the implants, and never count on them unless necessary. “Is it true you work as a cargo hauler?”
He snorted. “Yeah. I even brought in most of this stuff earlier today.” He pointed around at the stacks of crates piled against the walls of the warehouse.
She wasn’t sure why, but for some reason she started talking to him about her brother and her childhood dreams of one day joining him among the stars. Matheson surprised her with his gentle empathy as she choked up while talking about losing Altan. He reached across, laying his large hand on her back reassuringly until she was able to finish her story. “And now I’m here, finally on Luna, and I can’t even get over to Aldrin.”
He was quiet for a while, before rising to his feet. “Come down to the docks tomorrow, around midday. Pretty sure I can vouch that you’re strong enough for the job.” He smiled at her, rubbing his side where she’d first punched him before turning and walking away.
Tuya watched him go, surprised at the offer. She never would have expected to get help from someone she’d just beat in a fight. For the first time since arriving on Luna, she thought maybe there was hope of attaining her dream, after all.
* * *
A month later, Tuya was walking back to the hostel she shared after a long day working at the docks. Three cargo shuttles had arrived during the day, with a lot of containers and crates to be unloaded and shifted out to warehouses and other destinations. Her muscles ached, even after having to tap into the implants every time she shifted a two hundred kilo container onto or off a cart. She followed Matheson’s advice constantly, using her body’s natural strength as much as possible.
That night would be her eighth Brawl. Seven fights, seven victories. The odds had always been in her favor after the third fight, with Titus and Goggles making less money from their bets each time. She’d seen them huddled together after the last couple of fights, seeming to argue about something. Tuya didn’t care, though. She just had to get through three more and then she’d be done for good.
When she got back to the hostel, she headed for the single bathroom. There were a couple of others already waiting in line, so she joined the queue and leaned against the wall. She felt like she reeked after ten hours of constant sweating and straining, and all she wanted to do was get clean and change into clothes that weren’t stiff with dried sweat.
Titus had other plans, and he found her when she was still two back in the line. “Let’s go,” he said urgently.
“Go where? We’ve got a couple of hours before it starts, and I want a shower first.”
“We have things to discuss. Now. Come on.”
Sighing in frustration, she followed him away from the bathroom. Passing her room, she leaned in long enough to toss her clean clothes on her bunk. No one cared what you wore in the square, as long as you were there to fight. They walked the familiar route to Goggles’ little lab, and entered to find him waiting, sitting in a chair with his arms crossed.
Titus walked over to sit beside him, a stack of credits on the small table between them. “What’s going on?” she asked, confused by their serious looks.
“We’re not making enough,” Goggles said grumpily. “You made it look too easy, and now we’re having to put down a thousand credits just to walk out with twenty or so in profit.”
“Okay, but what do you expect me to do about it? I can’t help that the other fighters haven’t been very good.”
“We want you to lose,” Titus said. She frowned at him, stiffening at what they were proposing. “Look, Tuya, the lady you’re fighting tonight is pretty new. This is only her second fight, and she got the shit beat out of her the first time. No one is expecting her to win.”
“So you want me to lose on purpose, just so you two jokers can make some extra cash?”
“Unless you have some other way to pay me back for the free surgery and implants,” Goggles said, his voice quiet and dangerous. “One way or another, I’m going to make my money. Or I’m going to rip those implants out of your body and leave you on the street as you bleed to death.”
Tuya gasped, only then realizing that she might have gotten involved with people who had fewer morals than she expected. Her fists clenched, as she looked around and considered just running away. She had the strength to fight them if they tried to force her back onto the table.
That’s when she felt a heavy hand land on her shoulder, and the sharp jab between her shoulder blades. “You think I’m stupid?” Goggles asked with a smirk. “I hired a little extra muscle, just for tonight. To make sure you don’t try to get brave on me. If you don’t do what we need, you’ll be injected with sedative and probably won’t ever wake up.”
She turned to see two goons behind her, hulking men but still smaller than Matheson. But she’d never fought two people at once before. She wasn’t sure if she could manage it, so she clenched her jaw and agreed to take a dive for them. Hoping that she could live with herself when it was done.
The goons stayed behind her all the way to the empty house where the night’s Brawl was being held. The owners were taking a vacation to Earth, and their lower level was large enough for fifty people to shove in and watch the fights. Tuya wondered if they would return to find their house a shamble, or if the fight organizers tried to cover their tracks after it was done.
Hers was the last fight of the night, and she had to stand beside the rope with her arms crossed watching the first two matches. She was fuming, her anger growing with every second that she had to think about what she was being forced to do. Tuya remembered when she was a kid, watching Altan play football with the other kids his age. His team had been so awful, almost never winning a game, but he never lost his enjoyment of the sport. He told her once, “It’s not about winning or losing, it’s about giving everything you have.”
Those words were echoing in her head as the announcer called her name. Ducking under the rope, she tried to reconcile that advice with what she was about to do. If she lost to a better fighter, she’d work harder for the next time but would be happy to have given her best effort. Losing to someone that didn’t have her experience or advantages on purpose grated on her nerves. Especially when it was just for two idiots to make some extra credits.
Her opponent was a tall, heavyset woman. She looked to be about a decade older than Tuya, with long blonde hair wrapped up in a tight bun at the back of her head. The white tank top she was wearing exposed rolls of fat, but Tuya had known overweight people to be hiding a lot of muscle before. If that were the case here, then maybe she could stomach a narrow loss.
As soon as the announcer swung his arm down, Tuya knew there was no way she should lose this fight. The blonde woman almost tripped taking a few steps forward, and after circling and ducking a few lazy punches she was already winded and breathing hard. Tuya closed her eyes, wondering what could have convinced this woman that she had any business fighting.
Yelling, the woman leaped forward and landed two weak punches to Tuya’s stomach and chest. She barely felt them and couldn’t help but think they’d have been ineffective even without the pain dampening implants. She threw a few more lazy punches, and her opponent dodged right into the second one. Knocked flat on her back by a half-hearted swing that shouldn’t have been more than an irritation.
The crowd was getting restless now, grumbling at the lack of effort from Tuya. Almost all of them had put their money on her, and she’d seen the blonde woman’s odds of a victory near two hundred to one. If she lost this fight, Goggles and Titus would walk away wealthy. Maybe they’d even let her out of the agreement without the last two fights, or at least split some of the future earnings with her. She was making decent wages at the docking facility, but it would take much more to get the falsified documents she needed to get registered as a dome citizen and get to Aldrin.
As the blonde woman struggled back to her feet, Tuya dropped her hands and grimaced at the display. Then she heard it, a voice from long ago. It’s about giving everything you have. Altan never would have considered losing just to lose. She couldn’t even imagine him being in a position where someone would suggest such a thing. She was the one who kept making bad decisions, trusting the wrong people.
Growling, she raised her hands. The blonde woman was already swaying on her feet, exhausted after no more than a few minutes of play fighting. She acted like she had all the time in the world to recover, and Tuya realized she was in on the action. No doubt Titus, Goggles, or both had found her and put her up to going through a couple of fights to walk away with a small cut of their earnings. That made her even angrier.
Her punches were no longer half-hearted. The first one slammed into the woman’s chest, eliciting a grunt and surprised gape. The second shut her open mouth, driving her jaw up as the uppercut sent her flying through the air to land on her back a few meters away. The crowd cheered at the sudden action, those nearby jeering at the woman laying unconscious at their feet as the announcer raised Tuya’s arm in victory.
She grinned around at the ecstatic crowd, grinning widely as she saw Titus’ frowning face near the back. Tuya ducked under the rope to leave the square, feeling pats on her back from happy spectators who would be walking home with a few extra credits in their pockets. She felt good, proud of herself for not taking a dive.
As she left the home, she felt lighter than when she entered. A burden had lifted from her shoulders that she hadn’t even realized she was carrying. When the stun baton slammed into her back, she was totally unprepared. She felt the electricity surge through her body, sending spasms through her muscles that should have put her on the ground.
Tuya turned to find Titus behind her, holding the baton high as he prepared to jab it at her again. She caught his wrist as it was moving forward, twisting until she heard a snap and the stun baton fell from his grip. Titus yelled in pain as she bent to pick it up, holding his wrist close against his body. “You stupid girl. Do you think you can just walk away after what you did?”
“Yes,” she said, bouncing the baton in her hand.
“We’re going to rip those implants from your body. I’ll make sure you survive, just so I can watch you suffer after.”
She looked around, trying to spot Goggles and his goons. “I’m going to walk away, and you’re going to leave me alone. Do you understand? I don’t want anything more to do with you criminals.”
“We’ll never stop coming,” Titus said, with a rictus grin.
Tuya shrugged. “I tried,” she said, just before she drew the baton back and then swung it forward with all her enhanced strength. It hit Titus’ thigh a few inches above the knee, and she heard a crack as the bone broke. He screamed out in pain, and then again as she slammed the baton against his other leg. He fell to the ground, writhing and trying to clutch his legs with his good hand.
She raised the baton again, but a large hand wrapped around her wrist. “Don’t do it,” the deep voice said, and she turned to see Matheson standing over her. “He’s not worth it, Tuya. If you kill him, all you do it ruin your own life before it really starts.”
“What choice do I have?” she spit out. “They’ll keep coming after me. It’s not like I can go to the authorities or anything to report them. I’d end up in jail longer than they would.”
The big man sighed. “There’s another option.” He released her hand and reached into the inner pocket of his jacket. “I knew you’d be fighting tonight, and I wanted to surprise you with this. I talked to a friend over in arrivals, and we managed to get you registered as a visitor from a recent passenger shuttle. It took calling in a few favors on Earth, but you’re now legally on Luna.” He presented her with a white card, the kind everyone in the domes carried. Hers didn’t have a picture on it, but that wasn’t uncommon for recent arrivals. It would still have her biometric data loaded, and a record of her arrival.
Tuya stared at the card in her hand, something she’d been working to try and acquire through the black market for more than a month. Then she threw her arms around Matheson and buried her face in his chest as she thanked him over and over for his kindness. Despite his size and imposing demeanor, he had proven to be the best friend she’d ever had. It almost made her sad to leave.
“You can get to Aldrin now,” he said, patting her on the back. “You’re approved for one transit through the tunnel, though if you ever want to come back, you’ll have to sit through hours of paperwork and questions.”
Titus was still rolling around on the ground, moaning and crying in pain. “We can get to Aldrin,” he yelled. “I’ll find you there, and make sure you suffer for days for what you’ve done to me.”
Matheson looked at him, and then pulled Tuya away. They were fifty meters down the alley when they heard Goggles and his goons run up to where Titus was. She turned back, almost hoping they would give chase so that she could land a few more punches and work out more of her anger. They only stared at her with hatred in their eyes, though, and she knew they’d never forget her.
* * *
She had to leave Matheson behind once they reached the tunnel between domes. He didn’t have the access needed to enter Aldrin, but he did stand and watch until she made it through the checkpoint. The Coalition Marines examined her pass as if hoping to find a reason to turn her away, but they finally waved her through. Tuya stopped to wave at her friend, hoping she’d get to see him again, before turning and entering Aldrin.
Her bag and few possessions had been left behind at the hostel in Armstrong. There was really nothing in there that she’d miss, just a change of clothes and the few credits she’d managed to save up from her job working at the docking facility. Her tablet was there, but it was so old and buggy that she had barely been able to use it.
Walking through Aldrin was a different experience from the other dome. Here, the buildings weren’t constructed to look beautiful, but to improve functionality. The avenue that cut through the center of the dome was just as wide, and it was crowded even late in the evening. She could well believe this dome was half again as large, and home to twice the number of people.
She headed directly for the central square, knowing that was where she’d find the Transport Guild headquarters. Even at that hour, she expected she could find someone working a desk who could take her application to join a ship. Maybe she could even get a job working with them until she was able to join a crew.
The Guildhall was an impressive building, and she came to a halt after entering the square to admire it. Built from concrete that was mixed with lunar dust, the building was a dark gray color. There were few windows looking out on the square, but the front of the Hall was covered with colorful flags. Eighteen of them, all representing a ship carrying cargo between Luna and the other colonies in the system. She almost expected to see the flag of Telemachus still hanging there, but the image of an arm drawing back a bow was nowhere to be seen.
A man was standing outside the Guildhall, pacing back and forth. He looked frazzled, as if he were waiting impatiently for something. A young man, maybe a few years older than she was, with short blonde hair and blue eyes. He had a military bearing, and she wondered if he had served in a Navy at some point.
The man looked up as she walked forward, hope in his eyes. “Did they find someone? Are you here for the job?”
She stopped, looking at him with surprise. “What kind of job are we talking about?”
He groaned in frustration. “I need a cargo specialist. Badly. I just became captain, and I can’t handle both jobs myself.”
Was it going to be this easy? At the same time, she couldn’t start a job with a lie. “I was just coming to apply for a job on a ship,” she said. “I’ve been working as a cargo hauler at the Armstrong docks for a month, so I have the experience you need.”
He looked her up and down, trying to decide if someone of her size could handle the job. She could see that he didn’t really have much choice, though, as he looked at his tablet again. “I have to leave the pad in half an hour, so I really don’t have time to be picky. If you’re willing, I’ll sign you up. For one trip, and we’ll re-evaluate when we get back from Interamnia.”
Tuya couldn’t believe her luck. “I’m in. Uh, what ship, sir?”
He waved for her to follow as he walked away from the Hall. “I’m Captain Erik Frost. You can just call me Erik. My ship is the Vagabond.”