Free Expanse 03 - Abaddon’s Gate by James S. A. Corey Page A

couldn’t hear him.
    “Yeah. So Sam?”
    “Bull.”
    “I’m gonna need you to pick sides.”
    He watched her vacillate. It only took a few seconds. Then he looked across the bay. The technicians had the mech open, pulling an electric motor out of its spine. It was smaller than a six-pack of beer and built to put out enough torque to rip steel. Not the sort of thing to play with drunk. Sam followed his gaze and his train of thought.
    “For a guy who bends so many rules, you can be pretty fucking uncompromising.”
    “Strong believer in doing what needs to get done.”
    It took her another minute, but she gave him a name.

Chapter Six: Holden
    “ U ranus is really far away,” Naomi said as they walked along the corridor to the docking bay. It was the third objection to the contract that she’d listed so far, and something in her voice told Holden there were a lot more points on her list. Under other circumstances, he would have thought she was just angry that he’d accepted the job. She
was
angry. But not
just
.
    “Yes,” he said. “It is.”
    “And Titania is a shitty little moon with one tiny little science base on it,” Naomi continued.
    “Yes.”
    “We could
buy
Titania for what it cost these people to hire us to fly out there,” Naomi said.
    Holden shrugged. This part of Ceres was a maze of cheap warehouse tunnels and even cheaper office space. The walls were the grungy off-white of spray-on insulation foam. Someone with a pocketknife and a few minutes to kill could reach the bedrock of Ceres without much effort. From the ratty look of the corridor, there were a lot of people with knives and idle time.
    A small forklift came down the corridor toward them with an electric whine and a constant high-pitched beep. Holden backed up against the wall and pulled Naomi to him to get her out of its way. The driver gave Holden a tiny nod of thanks as she drove by.
    “So why are they hiring us?” she asked. Demanded.
    “Because we’re awesome?”
    “Titania has, what, a couple hundred people living at the science base?” Naomi said. “You know how they usually send supplies out there? They load them into a single-use braking rocket, and fling them at Uranus’ orbit with a rail gun.”
    “Usually,” Holden agreed.
    “And the company? Outer Fringe Exports? If I was making a cheap, disposable shell corporation, you know what I’d call it?”
    “Outer Fringe Exports?”
    “Outer Fringe Exports,” she said.
    Naomi stopped at the entry hatch that opened to the rental docking bay and the
Rocinante
. The sign overhead listed the present user: Outer Fringe Exports. Holden started to reach for the controls to cycle the pressure doors open, but Naomi put a hand on his arm.
    “These people are hiring a warship to transport something to Titania,” she said, lowering her voice as though afraid someone might be listening. “How can they possibly afford to do that? Our cargo hold is the size of a hatbox.”
    “We gave them a good rate?” Holden said, trying for funny and failing.
    “What would someone be sending to Titania that requires a fast, stealthy, and heavily armed ship? Have you asked what’s in those crates we signed up to carry?”
    “No,” Holden said. “No, I haven’t. And I normally would, but I’m trying really hard not to find out.”
    Naomi frowned at him, her face shifting between angry and concerned. “Why?”
    Holden pulled out his hand terminal and called up an orbital map of the solar system. “See this, all the way on this edge? This is the Ring.” He scrolled the display to the other edge of the solar system. “And this is Uranus. They are literally the two spots furthest from each other in the universe that have humans near them.”
    “And?” Naomi said.
    Holden took a deep breath. He could feel a surge of the anxiety he always tried to deny leaping up in him, and he pushed it back down.
    “And I know I don’t talk about it much, but something really unpleasant and really