The Bounty Hunter: Reckoning Read Free

more
interested in the hardware than the man underneath it.”
    “Did he really have a Phalanx?
There are less than ten of those in circulation,” Jess explained rapidly. “No
one really knows where they come from. They’re amazing. You can’t get any
better of a personal arsenal. How the fuck did he die wearing one of those?”
    “I don’t know. Who cares?”
    “If the armor was left, that means
he was killed without time to retrieve it,” Jess said to herself more than to
Alan. “Maybe not even time to confirm the kill. I wouldn’t be surprised if he
was still alive.”
    “No, no way. The guy who hired
Marcus—er, the Captain—was certain he was dead.”
    “And who was that?”
    “I don’t know,” Alan muttered.
    “Brilliant.”
    Jess turned away and looked at the
terminal. She placed her augmented hand on the console and interfaced with it,
making sure to keep contact with it. The system was much older than her arm and
had terrible bandwidth unless she had a physical bridge. She let her thoughts
race as the connection was established. She was excited about seeing the battle
aegis in person and was suddenly pleased that her final job was turning out to
be a pleasant one.
    The ship’s artificial gravity was
slow to compensate for the change as they lowered down into the planet’s
atmosphere. She held onto the computer terminal as the ship shuddered and she
felt her stomach churn before the ship adjusted. A slew of errors crowded the
screen in front of her and she quickly dismissed all of the ones she was
already familiar with, problems that Marcus refused to pay to fix. She focused
on the new ones, rerouting power to avoid overloading the engine in tandem with
Alan’s flying. She had to admit he was a skilled pilot.
    “I don’t know how you keep us in
the air, Jess. Most of this ship needs to be replaced.”
    “Questioning your captain’s
decisions? How unlike you,” Jess grinned.
    “No,” Alan’s forehead was creased.
“He’s your captain, too.”
    “Not anymore. I gave in my notice.
Next time we put in port, you’ll be rid of me.”
    “Marcus agreed to it?” Alan
frowned. “That doesn’t make sense.”
    “Maybe he’s finally going soft. I
don’t care.”
    Alan was still grumbling to himself
when the ship touched down on the planet. The engine was still operational after
they settled onto the sandy surface and Jess immediately got to her feet. She
walked out onto the top of the stairs overlooking the cargo hold and watched as
the four men readied their weapons. The ship’s door opened slowly, lowering
down to form a gentle ramp out of the ship. The heat of the planet was immense
and smacked into them like a wall of hot air.
    She closed her left eye to the
glare of the light and watched with her artificial one only. The men followed
Marcus slowly out onto the sand and then fanned out in front of what appeared
to be a ruined smuggler base. Jess had seen many of those over the years but
never one so devastated. As she looked closer, she saw signs of rudimentary
repairs to the arrays on what had once been the roof of the base. The ground
around the collapsed buildings had been cleared.
    “Hey,” the new man spoke before she
could. “Someone’s been living here.”
    “Shut the fuck up!” Marcus snapped.
    She wanted to laugh but she kept
quiet as the four men split into two groups. Marcus took the new man closer to
the base while Eric and the other man broke off into the desert. She stood
still until all four were out of sight and only then moved down the stairs. She
could see the sand already creeping its way into the ship. She closed and
sealed off both doors to the engine room, hoping to minimize the contamination
that she knew she would be scrubbing away for the whole trip back.
    Alan was talking over the ship’s
radio when she walked back into the command room. She could hear Marcus’s
responses as she sat and monitored the engine. She could already see new issues
cropping up