I'd missed Katie more than I knew, it turns out. As soon as I woke up and made myself presentable, I went to the holo and dialed her up. She was there, awake, and already presentable; she'd either been expecting my call or she was nearly always dressed presentably just in case. Either scenario seemed likely. A lunch meeting was arranged rather quickly, words along the lines of "Why yes, it is nice to see you, I thought it might be" were exchanged, and vague reminiscing produced. The specific reminiscing would keep until later. In between the end of my call and the beginning of lunch, I kept busy by patching my panel through the house's computer into my ship's computer and then using it to look for contracts. I could have done it directly from the house panel, but my ship's got no end of my preferences saved on it, and I hate having to re-enter all of that everywhere I go. I'd also made a half dozen programs designed to filter and prod through job listings and make tentative agreements on my behalf, and the computer in the house, though nice, really didn't have that sort of processing power. The programs are surprisingly overcomplicated due to me being bored en route to places and re-writing them to do additional things far beyond the scope of typical software.
Finally, it was time to head over to the food ship - as the host of The Sleeper and a large number of other eating and drinking establishments were known. I'm uploading this and then I'll be on my way.
--
I'm writing the conversation as best I remember it.
"Alan, if things were different, I'd be taking you home tonight" is how she greeted me. Lately we'd been half-seriously trying to get the dreaded phrase out in the open before its weight could drag down what was usually, up until that point, a good conversation. It typically had mixed results, but today I was already in a good mood and blatant innuendo is always a way to get me to smile so that was the result she got. My reply was to say that I'd toast this particular idea. If things were different indeed....
Instead of going into that line of conversation, which would likely drag things down as it had in the past, I asked her to catch me up on current events, by which I meant things she'd been up to.
Gun-running, it turns out. She doesn't share my view on smuggling; being more of a free-enterprise minded person, she takes the position that anyone who can afford her services should be able to get transport for anything they want. Running weapons isn't what she's specifically doing, necessarily, that's just what I call it. She doesn't ask questions as to the nature of her cargo. She can get away with it because she knows that if she can't detect the contraband on her ship, nobody else can. Being the curious type, she always tries. Plus, she's a damn good pilot. If trouble reared its head like it does for all of us at some point, she'd get out all right. Hell, she has. I suspect that, despite her organized nature, she secretly likes the thrill when things go wrong. Any comments on my part along these lines just garner me annoyed looks, though, so I tend to avoid them.
The supplying of weapons to rebels and establishment alike ("It wouldn't be fair to play favorites," she rationalizes) aside, she'd actually begun a series of steady contracts. One that could, apparently, mean that a full-time job was in the works. A bit more prodding on my part revealed that her new employer was none other than the Earth-In-Exile peacekeepers force itself. They had quite an extensive bounty hunting contract system set up, and she'd always been one for bounties.
Hell, that's how we met. There'd been a bounty on my capture after I botched a delivery contract; I'd been forced to jettison the cargo I was supposed to deliver when my ship was damaged, and my employers assumed I'd stolen it. I was fortunate in that all they wanted was their money back, but I hadn't known that at the time and thus I had ran. Katie tracked me down and then prepared herself to use all the guile and cunning she had to get on my ship and capture me.
That turned out to be unnecessary, as seeing a pilot from the homeworld (and a female one at that) had been more than enough for me to invite her over. When I did, she proceeded to stun me into unconsciousness, throw me in her brig, and deliver me to the slightly miffed employers that I owed the money to. As I didn't have their money, they impounded my ship until I worked it off. After that, I found Katie and returned the favor. Unfortunately there were no bounties out for her capture, so I settled for actually eating dinner with her, as she'd promised me that right before she knocked me out and I intended to collect.
I'd been on bounty lists a few times since then, but she hasn't captured me since the first time. Whether it's out of courtesy for an ex-lover or the more simple fact that she might not have gotten to the contract before someone else did (I suspect the latter, something told me that given the chance she'd rather enjoy locking me up) she'd never knocked me out again.
I jokingly asked if I was going to get captured by her once more, and she changed the subject. I made a mental note to ensure that all my contracts were completed absolutely correctly.
"So, I heard about your little Ulix adventure" she mentioned at one point.
I nodded before it occurred to me that I hadn't told anyone the true nature of my visit to the lost empire. How did she know that I'd been to Ulix space?
"Oh come on, Alan, I know you better than that. The story is that you ended up in uncharted space, but you've never once gotten lost in your entire life. Yet, there's this expanse of empty space practically on our doorstep and you expect me to not suspect you just came from there?"
She had a point. If I'd known the story was going to get back to her, of course, I likely would have gone through pains to further obfuscate it. In retrospect, though, it probably wouldn't have mattered. She had a habit of knowing when I was lying. Fortunately, she didn't follow up in that particular line; I don't know how much I would have been able to keep from her. I suppose eventually I'd tell her the whole thing, but only after I'd let it settle in my mind a bit. The entire voyage still made me uneasy, the Border in particular.
Mainly, what we did was swap stories. I told her about Poln and Anor and, most entertaining to us, the rookies. She told me about a recon patrol she'd run that'd gone badly, and some bounty hunts that "weren't nearly as entertaining as some I could recall". I slipped in a few references to the Ulix ship when she asked about the happy little green light she'd hear about, and while I never specifically said it was an Ulix ship, it wasn't hard for her to figure out. She seemed to enjoy the story. I conspicuously avoided mentioning my favorite artifact that I obsessed over to no end. That omission, at least, seemed to work, as she had no idea it even existed.
We ate lunch and, after hours of telling stories, a walk around the area, and eating dinner, we said our goodbyes and headed back to our respective rooms. Instead of inviting me to hers, as she would if things were different, she instead left me with a cryptic remark along the lines of "Check the contracts." Among freelancers, it's a typical farewell to say "See you next contract", but that's obviously not what she was trying to say. Katie liked to leave me wondering, you could definitely say that about her.
When I returned to my house, my ship had found several contracts that fit my specifications. I felt briefly tempted to follow in Katie's footsteps and give bounty hunting a try, but it usually involved far too much actual physical fighting for someone my age. I ignored the fact that Katie was slightly older than me and doing fine.
My options this time around were: Delivery, delivery, deployment of scientific equipment, escort some rookies around, and passenger transport. This last was marked by my sophisticated screening programs as being the best candidate. I looked at the description briefing: The Exile Peacekeeping Force - that's our army, or what remains of it after the demilitarization - wanted new recruits transported from Earth-In-Exile to New Yotia (i.e. our old homeworld) in order to begin training. That was also part of the decision that left us homeless and adrift; anyone joining the peacekeeping forces had to spend a stint on New Yotia among the people that their species had caused such strife to. It seemed from a distance like a sound policy, but more and more it seemed to me that the tribunal were just tacking on punishments. It was popular to bash us, as you can well imagine. Hell, you've probably done it yourself. How many exiles does it take to screw in a light bulb? None, we just blow the whole neighborhood to hell and start over!
I wasn't sure why my computer had picked that particular job as being more desirable to one of the easy deliveries. I had no desire to see my home planet knowing that I would never have it again (and, as former military, I was forbidden from ever touching its surface) and my programs to find me a paying job had that fact built in. It didn't make much sense as a choice until I looked at the passenger roster. Turns out there was only one person on the list: Katie Simmond.
Guess she decided to take that job after all.