Free The Jupiter Pirates by Jason Fry Page B

“Taught me everythin’ I know about the pirate trade. Arrr, what a man he was.”
    â€œIs he buried here?” Tycho asked.
    â€œFather?” Huff looked surprised, maybe even a bit offended. “No . . . jettisoned into space, as was his wish. We’re not for buryin’, Tyke. Awful thought for a pirate, spendin’ eternity under dirt. When you hear me death rattle, lad, just shove whatever’s left of me out into space.”
    Huff reached for the panel that controlled the hologram, then stopped, grimacing and flexing his hand.
    â€œTyke, do your ol’ granddad a favor and get one of those pills out of my bandolier,” he asked.
    Tycho did as he was asked, and Huff placed the pill under his tongue gratefully, still flexing his hand.
    â€œArthritis,” Huff explained. “Don’t get old, Tyke.”
    â€œI hear it’s better than the alternative, Grandfather,” Tycho said.
    Huff rumbled with laughter. “Aye, that it is.” He stabbed at the buttons and Johannes’s image disappeared, replaced by that of a regal-looking man in old-fashioned clothes.
    â€œThat there is old Martin Luther Hashoone,” Huff said. “I gather you made his acquaintance, back on the Comet .”
    Tycho winced. “You know about the test, then.”
    â€œAye,” Huff said. “Was watchin’ on my viewscreen, even.”
    â€œSo whose strategy did you think was best?” Tycho asked.
    â€œYer sister’s,” Huff said at once. “Betcha knew that already. She’s got all the instincts to be a fine pirate one day.”
    â€œ Privateer , Grandfather,” Tycho said. “And what about me and Carlo?”
    â€œYour plan weren’t bad, lad,” Huff said. “When you’re dealt a bad hand, sometimes it’s best to lay back and play for a better card. As for Carlo . . . arr. That one needs to learn that flyin’ ain’t everything. And captain’s summat yeh earn, not summat what gets handed to yeh. A pirate never makes assumptions, Tyke—they’ll be the death of yeh.”
    â€œI know,” Tycho said. He hesitated, then plunged ahead, into dangerous territory: “Anything can happen. Like it did with Mom and Aunt Carina.”
    Huff was silent for a long moment, and Tycho wondered if he’d gone too far.
    â€œYou know I don’t talk about that, lad,” Huff said at last, staring up at the flickering image of Martin Luther Hashoone. But then he continued anyway—perhaps the presence of his ancestors made more-recent history less painful to confront. “We lost good pirates on that dark day, Tyke. Some of our bravest and boldest. And the reputation of some worthy pirates wound up just as dead.”
    â€œThe ones who betrayed us,” Tycho said.
    â€œArrr, the very ones,” Huff said. “Thoadbone Mox. And Oshima Yakata.”
    â€œWhat happened to them?” Tycho asked.
    â€œThoadbone ran and hid somewhere around Saturn, tryin’ to stay a step ahead of the Securitat’s agents—stay ahead of them and any Jupiter pirate he happened to run across,” Huff said. “Heard he met his maker a few years back—shot full of holes over Mars. And good riddance.”
    â€œAnd the other one? Osh . . . Oshima?”
    â€œSold her ship and retired to Io,” Huff said. “Ain’t seen her since. Don’t care to, neither.”
    They stood in silence for a moment, beneath the gaze of Martin Luther Hashoone.
    â€œGrandfather, do you believe what they say—that the Jovian Union betrayed us too?” Tycho asked hesitantly.
    Huff looked at his grandson, then turned to contemplate the shimmering image of their ancestor—a man whose last sight, Tycho realized, might have been the bow of an onrushing warship from Earth.
    â€œY’know about the jammers, then,” Huff said, still staring up at Martin