Free Conviction by Tammy Salyer Page B

him.
    He jumps off the bunk and paces the short distance across the hold, turns, and paces back, his breath heaving as if he’s just run a race. Back in control, he faces me and says quietly, “Being a soldier is all I know. What else could I be?”
    “How about alive?”
    He looks at Soltznin for backup. The skin of her face is hard, shiny, and set, the picture of a woman whose mind is made up. He faces the stacked bunks once more and puts his forearms on the top, leaning into them with his back to me. The only answer I’m going to get.
    Ignoring the implications of my words, I continue, “Tomorrow, we can meet with this smuggler the kid knows, we can sell the ship, and then split the payoff. From there, we can all go whichever direction”—my voice goes husky for a second, and I have to swallow to get it back—“we feel like we need to. For me, that’s anywhere but back to the Corps. I won’t fight for a side I don’t believe in anymore. From here on out, I fight for myself. Period.”
    My glance jumps back and forth between them as I speak, and now it settles on Soltznin, mostly because I’m afraid of what I might see in David’s face if he turns around. The surface of a lake couldn’t be more blank, and I have no idea what she’s thinking.
    “If that’s the call you want to make, Erikson,” she says. “We sell the ship, then we go our separate ways. Agreed.”
    Speaking into the wall, David says, “Agreed.”
    Swallowing once more, I stay quiet, not trusting my voice to be steady. After a moment, Soltznin adjusts the internal climate switches to keep us from cooking—even in the evening, this planet is warm—and lowers the lights.
    “We need to set up our rotation. Tomorrow could have a few surprises,” David says, his voice deeper than usual.
    I clear my throat. “Speaking of surprises, there’s something you should know. The kid told me who his gunrunner contact is. You’ll know the name: Rajcik.”
    A fugitive for at least fifteen years, anyone in the Corps who’s ever been tasked with transport traffic security has heard his name at least once. The criminal went from thievery to smuggling to black-market arms dealing in a steady progression of worsening crimes, but no one has been able to catch him yet. He’s big time, dangerous, and by all accounts, fucking evil. Still, for what we need, there could hardly be anyone more suited.
    Soltznin looks like she’s swallowed something rotten, and David says, “Looks like we came to the right place, then.”
    “Yeah.” And because there’s nothing else to discuss, I finish with: “I’ll take first watch.”

10
STAINS THAT STAY
    Drew survives his night in the armored ATV, only looking moderately worse for wear after so many hours in its cramped confines. We radioed his father, Temple, last night, and he arranged our meet up with Rajcik for early morning in a heavily trafficked local tavern. With no real darkness on this planet because of the Algol system’s three stars, morning and evening, even for a canteen, make zero difference to those with business to transact.
    Soltznin and Drew guard the ship while David and I meet Temple and Rajcik. Soltznin seems to have reached a point of equilibrium and just wants to get this over with as soon as possible so she can do whatever she can to regroup with the Corps. Sweep and patrol ships can always be counted on to show up eventually, and I have no doubt one or two functioning non-Admin satellites orbit Dramma Sdutti, which she’ll be able to buy access to in order to contact a local patrol and get picked up. By now, the Corps has to be investigating the Hammer ’s destruction, and Soltznin and David shouldn’t have any trouble convincing them that they’re stranded survivors. Despite the stress of all the coming unknowns, I still maintain hope that there may have been others.
    Rajcik and Temple and David and I sit at a round table in the basement of the building that houses the tavern and a few