"Get your flight suit on."
"Eeeeh, and Boris?"
Boris' question goes ignored as Ithallius does a visual check out of the vulture's canopy window before leaning over the panels to check nearby contacts. I get up from the chair and hastily undress then redress in my bird's resident - bright pink, as chosen by Mira (oof) - flight suit. There are two further suits aboard; both the same kind of shitty, basic skin-suit that I once found myself dressing in not too long ago when Ithallius took me aboard his ship: neither the irony nor the humour of the situation breaks the surface of my concentration now.
I flip my helmet up, take a breath of the nothing-tasting, filtered suit air and return to my seat. Ithallius withdraws from the panels, out of my way, and similarly undresses and puts on a skin suit. Boris looks on impassively as Ithallius flips up his helmet, confirms vacuum seal and air feed, then returns his attention to the panels.
"Signal Nari. Send her this," he hands me a slip of paper with a 12 digit code printed on it. "Tell her to plug it into my 'conda. Tell her we need her here in 19 minutes. Then prepare for self-destruct in 11 minutes. Make it look like an FSD ignition error; make it big and showy."
"Roger," I nod, not really letting the full implications of his instructions enter my mind as I set about my work: there is a lot to do and I must rapidly prioritise. First I fuck up my FSD, working back from explosion to overheat to coil burn to ignition in my mind and realising that I need to start that process immediately. I am working on the panels while I dictate Ithallius' message to Nari who, I presume, will be our ride. I read out the code carefully, then read it again to confirm. When my vulture's AI realises what I am initiating, there is no big frenzy of countdown timers and flashing lights. Just the usual confirmation beep and the light over my FSD panel starts to glow an incessant red. it's a bit disappointing, really; I'd expected more.
Meanwhile, Ithallius is leaning over Boris, who still looks unflustered. A part of me is impressed by this one's nerve; the rest of me finds it deeply unsettling.
"In 11 minutes, this ship is going to explode. Violently. And then we'll be floating in space for 8 minutes after that. This means you have around ten minutes to convince me that you should be wearing this skin suit and getting picked up with us, or I'll vaporise your ass and wear the dust that remains on the nose of my anaconda. Talk, fucker."
"Is big fan!" says Boris brightly. I wonder whether he has even understood what is happening. Ithallius remains silent. Boris makes a few more gestures and some sounds like he's clucking and then taps on the floor of my flight deck. It is a rhythmic little tap that repeats and repeats and repeats: A code.
In fact, it is old Morse Code, and spells out "No Talk Bug".
Ithallius and I nod to each other, stand Boris up, undress him completely and then I shred and eject the remains of his clothing while Ithallius conducts a quick bio-chip scan of Bori's naked - surprisingly unpaunchy (he'd been wearing a padded suit to make him look weightier than he is) body. Two beeps and Ithallius doesn't hesitate. In fact, even Boris complies, holding out first his left wrist and then turning around and bending slightly to present his right arse cheek so that he can have the tiny little Triple L (Listening, Lifesigns, Location) chips cut out from under his skin. Ithallius works quickly and accurately, scanning with one hand and cutting into Bori's skin with the other. Another bio-chip scan and Ithallius nods that Boris is now bug-free.
Ithallius drops both bugs into a small flask of water before handing them to me. I make quick work of jettisoning them out of the garbage hatch.
8 minutes.
"Empire," says Boris. His accent is still Russian, but far less heavy, and his language is now flawless. "Wants you dead. Doesn't like how things ended up."
"Fuck me," I say, running my hand through my hair. "I thought all this was fucking done. How much goddamn more do they want from me because of Mira."
Boris shakes his head. "Not you. Empire doesn't care about you. Him." He tips his head to Ithallius. "Payback time."
Ithallius simply stares for a moment and then shakes his head. "Nope."
Boris shrugs and continues, "Was meant to follow you, to join you. Was going fine. Did stupid pirate job in 21991 for blyat laugh - Empire pissed off but say to continue. Empire monitors Garay and sees your python and type 9 docked and not move. FDS won't be problem, says Empire. Fucking dicks. Empire wrong. Again." He shrugs and shakes his head, "You check FDS logs. I tell them nothing about you and bar. I tell them drunk gopnik bullshit. You check Boris logs."
"There's no going back, motherfucker," replies Ithallius as something on the console beeps 6 minutes. "As far as The Empire knows, we all died here today. For some of us, that might even be true. How did they know?"
"One survivor. Holo capture."
"We were careful. Anonymous."
"Wasn't on ship. Was researcher working alone. Quiet. Capture whole thing."
What is this? What the fuck is this?! My mind reels but the ship's status panel beeps, jolting my mind back to more immediate - instantly vaporising - issues: time is running out.
"Ithallius," I interrupt. "We gotta go." It's one thing to not be on a ship when it explodes, but it's all together another to not be in the blast zone of a faulty FSD.
Ithallius nods, eyes Boris again, then cuts his bonds and tosses the last skin suit at him. "Quickly."
Another minute passes, and we are now strapping ourselves into an eject-bench that fires from the side of the Vulture. Boris is between Ithallius and I, as soon as he is seated, I am activating the void screen and setting a 5 second countdown. We lean back into the seat, letting it do what it can to shape and mold the chair's foam around us, cushioning each of us as best as it can in the brief time that remains before we are blasted fast, fast, fast into the void.
All three of us moan involuntarily: the eject-bench is a rough way to go - much harder ride than the eject seats on the flight deck. But we need to be a single target for Nari to collect, and we need to be thrown clear of the impending blast very, very quickly. After a few seconds of heavy, multiple-G acceleration, the pressure in our heads, chests and spines relents and we are slowly able to breathe again. My eyes rest upon the vulture - suddenly there is a pang in my chest; it hadn't occurred to me until now that this would be the death of That's Not My Finger; her absolute moment of finality.
Fuck.
2 minutes.
We are still moving backwards, away from the vulture at a fine old clip, and I am watching her shrink into a single glorious, pink dot. Tears bloom in my eyes and I can do nothing about them. But I don't want to - I let the moment take hold of me; let the memories bound up in that bird - Tor, Dawg, Lori, fucking Mira (and, of course fucking Mira), Not-Dave, my sense of freedom, of redemption - fill my mind.
Ithallius flips a switch on his visor which will protect his eyes from the explosion that is about to take place before us; Boris and I follow suit. Seconds later and she is gone; that same fire flower that I flew through in her so many times before now extends from within her own hull. Her FSD coils erupt, the drive starts to spin up, igniting her fuel load and...
We sit in silence while I quietly weep; I am shocked at my sense of loss. I do not look at either of my companions; I stare at that fading fire flower until I can see it no more.
"She was fine ship," says a Russian accent.
"Fuck you, Boris," I spit in quiet reply.
"You get another one," says Boris.
"I'm gonna cut your tiny Russian testicles off at screw them into your eye sockets if you say another fucking word to me right now."
"Socks," says Ithallius quietly. His tone is gentle but his implicit message clear: Get your shit together now - get your head back in the game.
"So what now?" asks Boris.
"Now," replies Ithallius as the lights of his Nari-navigated 'Conda bloom into view. We do not activate our beacon, after all, we just faked our own deaths. Instead Ithallius tight-beams the 'conda from his suit coms panel as he finishes speaking. "Now you spy for us."
"But Boris-"
"You spy for us or," says Ithallius in a hardened tone, "I let Socks do whatever the fuck she wants to you."
Boris pauses and weighs up his options as the 'conda begins to utterly fill out view. "Very good. Is blin! I spy for you!"
I realise that I have been promoted to the role of Outfit Heavy as the 'conda ejects two collection limpets to retrieve us. Moments later we are in the 'conda's cargo bay. Nari is holding me; I am numb; Ithallius is securing Boris to a cargo rack. Nari throws me a questioning look; I shrug and nod: truth is, I suddenly feel like I have lost Mira all over again, and I feel guilty as shit about how much that hurts because Nari - fucking Nari - is standing right in front of me, desperate to offer comfort and all I can do is shrug her off and withdraw.
I break out of her embrace with a shake of my head and stride along after Ithallius: work to be done and I don't have time to get all moon-eyed right now.
That's just not what Heavys do, eh?