Intergalactic

Outside the Grimalkin, space was black. Mostly the deep darkness sprinkled with distant stars kind of black, but to one side it was absolute nothingness. The ship was orbiting a dormant black hole, one that had little matter nearby to swallow and thus was not surrounded by an accretion disc.

The instruments in the empty cockpit showed the Grimalkin’s orbit and the event horizon. They had chosen the ISCO, still a safe distance away from that point of no return, but as close to the black hole as possible while still maintaining a stable orbit. That meant they didn’t need to constantly fire the thruster to maintain the orbit, making them as invisible as possible to anyone scanning the area. For the same reason, all systems had been shut down or turned to minimum.

They were huddled around a table in the small mess room connected to the bridge. Red put her mug down with some force, the sound filling the otherwise eerily quiet vessel. „I am not“, she said, with a very strong emphasis on the „not“, „bringing this thing back to Bloom. Every child knows how the Qyrl war went, and they are 4D creatures. The Xylars are 7D. Seven. They can probably reach out and grab this dimensional anchor thing with their bare hands. Heck, for all we know they bolted it on with some glue and tape, and we need special labs and experts just to take a look at it.“

Grubs was listening patiently, despite the captain having interrupted him. Twitch watched on absent-mindedly, lost in thoughts. When Red had ended, Grubs picked up again „Captain, I don’t disagree with that. Not at all. Just, we can’t sit here forever. Might as well turn left and fly right into that ex-sun.“

„Contact Yezz and set up a rendezvous point somewhere in deep space?“, came the distant, uncertain voice of Twitch who was half speaking, half thinking aloud.

Grubbs nodded vehemently. „That. Totally. Get rid of the thing, collect a nice pay-out, not involve Bloom. I’m with Twitch.“

Red looked at the two men, her fingers slightly tapping on the table. „Would be nice to be rich again for a couple months, sure. I’m just thinking - if that prototype ends up in the wrong hands, alien battleship will slice through the Junkstorm and put an end to not just to Bloom but the entire Junkstorm. And after that maybe the entire human race.“

„So we toss it into the black hole?“, Grubs was on the edge of his seat, „No pay, unhappy Yezz, and we’d need to score a new heist pretty soon to pay the bills.“

Red shook her head. „I don’t think it is that easy. I’m still sure the Xylars want it back, and if we tell them we tossed it out, they’ll believe we’re just hiding it on some space rock, moon, whatever. I’d do the same in their place.“

„Also, the rumor mill says,“, Twitch said, shoulders slumping. „that the Xylars are starting to wonder how human pirates have jury-rigged dimensional shears to drop just a part of a ship into normal space, instead of the whole thing. They’d take apart both us and the Rusty Bolt.“

A short pause settled over the mess, silence filling the room apart from the barely audible hum of the life support systems in the ship’s belly. It was moving along its orbit, teetering between the nothingness of the singularity and the void of deep space.

Red spoke out after a long few seconds. „That settles it, then.“. Both men looked at her quizzically. „We have two potential buyers. One from Yezz and another one from Elias, he spoke to me directly when I was walking with Twitch.“

„Elias?“, Twitch asked, „The tinkerer? Didn’t know he moonlights as a fence.“

„Sounded like a one-off, to be honest. I don’t think he does that often. Anyway, my point is this: We jump back to the Junkstorm but stay away from Bloom. Contact Yezz and Elias and ask some questions about their buyers. Make sure this gets into the right hands. Pay is secondary, in either case we’ll make good money.“

Grubs scratched his chin, saying „But what are ‚good hands‘? Who do you mean?“

„Yezz offered payment in intergalactic credits. That means her buyer is either alien or a planetary government. If anyone can keep this thing stored away so it does no harm, it’s the governments. Or they can play diplomacy and haggle out a deal with the Xylars.“

„And Elias?“, Twitch wondered.

„He said he could match whatever Yezz offers, and hinted that he can distract the Xylars from Bloom - and from us.“

Twitch raised his eyebrows. „How is he going to do that from his shop? That smells, captain.“

„You have no idea how confused I was after that talk. I’ve tried to come up with some reasonable guesses. I thought at first he’s dealing with the Xylars, buying their toy back before someone they don’t want to have it, or something. But I’ve had time to think and his secrecy doesn’t make sense if that were the case. So, truth be told, I got nothing.“

„I do.“, Grubs said calmly, a sly smile appearing on his lips while the other two looked at him expectantly.

„Elias“, Grubs began, „is off the station fairly often. Enjoys trips down to the planet. Not my place to pry into people’s hobbies, but it makes for a discreet meeting place. Especially for those who would raise eyebrows on the station itself. Someone who knew what the Xylars lost before we were back. Someone who always seems to know everything.“

Twitch's eyes widened, images of feathered creatures with two arms and four legs on his mind. „The Felindar!“

„Exactly," Grubs said. „They're low-dimensional like us, interested in high-dim tech. They'd love this prototype. But unlike us, they can't hide in swirly space regions. So, they became galactic traders.“

„They wouldn't keep it a secret," Red said slowly. „They'd use it to become the foremost traders in the galaxy, taking the heat off us. Just like Elias said.“

The weight of this revelation hung heavy in the air for several moments. The crew did not realize that wishful thinking was their guide, and it was wrong. But wrong or not, it filled them with a newfound sense of purpose and they all rose at once.

„Twitch, plot a course to that damn wormhole. Grubs, run the numbers on FTL messaging from here and from the wormhole. Find out if we get a message through to Bloom or not. Let’s go.“