Drifter's Run Read Free Page A

suspiciously.
    But her cute little face was absolutely free from any hint of guile, sharp dealing, or subterfuge. For one fleeting moment Lando considered asking for more money, but it didn't seem fair to lean on a ten-year-old girl, so he let it go.
    Lando signed by pressing his thumb against the lower right-hand corner of the contract, accepted his copy, and watched the original disappear into a small case along with Melissa's portacomp.
    The girl was organized, you had to give her that.
    Melissa looked up and smiled. "Do you need to collect your gear or something?"
    "Nope," Lando replied, "everything I need is all right there." He gestured toward the suitcase that he'd left by the door.
    An adult might have questioned the single bag, or the fact that Lando had it with him, but not Melissa.
    Like most children she took adult activities at face value, unless they had something to do with business, in which case Melissa assumed they were lying. Except for the ones who underestimated her abilities… and they deserved whatever they got.
    Melissa moved on to the next problem. "Good. In that case I'll call for a robo-porter."
    "A robo-porter?" Lando asked, looking around the room. "What for? Have you got lots of luggage or something?"
    Melissa giggled. "Heavens no! I travel light. It's for Daddy. The spaceport's quite a ways from here… and Daddy's too heavy for me to carry."
    "Too heavy for you to carry…" Lando said suspiciously. "What's wrong with him? Where is he?"
    Melissa put a finger to her lips and motioned for Lando to follow. Together they tiptoed into the bedroom. The walls were dimmed to near darkness but Lando had no difficulty seeing a man sprawled across the bed.
    Moving in closer, Melissa patted the man's shoulder protectively and looked up into Lando"s face. There was something sad about her expression.
    "This is my daddy. He's sick, but he'll wake up in two or three hours."
    Lando felt a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach as his eyes confirmed what his nose already told him. Melissa's father, Captain Ted Sorenson, wasn't sick. Not in the usual sense anyway. He was dead drunk.

2
    It took more than two hours to load Captain Sorenson's unconscious form aboard the robo-porter, cover it with a blanket, and make their way up to the moon's surface.
    Lando had expected a certain amount of attention. After all, the combination of a man, a little girl, and what appeared to be a dead body should turn a few heads, and would have anywhere else.
    But most of those who lived in the moon station saw stranger sights every day, and besides, they had other things to worry about. Like making enough credits to go somewhere else.
    The robo-porter was little more than a beat-up metal platform with a drive mechanism and a low order processor. Having accepted a load, the robo-porter would electronically imprint on its customer, and follow until released.
    Nice in theory, but their particular machine had some sort of processing dysfunction, and followed anyone of Lando's approximate size and shape. As a result it had a tiresome tendency to carry its unconscious passenger off in unpredictable directions.
    Each time they chased the robo-porter down Lando was forced to stand in front of the machine, recycle its imprint function, and start all over. That, plus a screeching drive wheel, was just about to drive Lando crazy when Melissa found a solution.
    The robo-porter had just followed a tall willowy naval lieutenant down a side corridor, when Melissa called, "Hey, Pik! Wait a minute! I think I've got the answer."

    Taking Lando's place in front of the robo-porter's eye, Melissa recycled the imprint function, and led the device away. Ten minutes and a whole series of twists and turns later, the machine was still with them.
    "It's 'cause I'm smaller," Melissa explained cheerfully. "There aren't very many kids around here, so there's less chance of a screwup."
    About fifteen minutes later they left a lift tube and entered a