Quite Possibly Alien (Freeman Universe Book 1) by Patrick O'Sullivan

Author:Patrick O'Sullivan [O'Sullivan, Patrick]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781625600097
Publisher: Dunkerron Press
Published: 2014-07-07T22:00:00+00:00

Wisp seemed to know something was up. She flopped onto Ciarán's bunk and let him comb her, fluffing her ruff out, even rolling over so Ciarán could work out the knotted fur on her belly. It took a lot longer than when she'd been Plumpkin, and a kitten, and for once Ciarán didn't need the scarred hardhands and field-reinforced gauntlets he'd learned to wear when he'd first found her on Trinity Station dock, hiding in a battered FFE.

He wore them anyway.

Hardhands were a weapon. Carlsbad carried them. That made them a weapon.

Finished with Wisp, Ciarán slipped the hardhands into the pockets of his best dark-blue utilities. He pinned his merchant apprentice's pips onto the collar and checked his appearance in the mirror. He didn't look like a pirate. Not yet.

He adjusted the blood-red sash that Carlsbad had provided. He latched the vibraknife into place. Vibrasword was more like it. Carlsbad claimed he couldn't find the smaller weapon he'd pressed into Ciarán's palm on Ambidex Station.

Ciarán looked in the mirror again. Now he looked like a fool.

There was one more thing he needed to do. He pawed through the socks in his duffel until he found the sock with something in it.

One of the only benefits of being born a Freeman was what his dad called “group immunity.” If someone bent on causing trouble approached a Freeman and a Leagueman walking down a corridor, nine times out of ten they’d pick on the Leagueman. If a stationmaster decided to cheat their suppliers, they’d cheat the non-Freeman suppliers first. There were a hundred times, a thousand times, maybe even ten thousand times more Leaguemen and Eng than Freemen in the wider world. Anyone with sense would go after them and leave a Freeman alone. Because to mess with one Freeman was to mess with all Freemen.

The People weren’t organized enough to field an armada. They weren’t numerous enough to overwhelm even a single system’s defenses. What they were was everywhere, and neutral, and willing to trade. That made them indispensable. And it made them vulnerable. So the first families made a pact, and swore an oath, that regardless of how they might fight amongst themselves, they would present one face to the wider world, and that face would be hard as iron, and as unforgiving as space, and as sharp as a mong hu’s fangs. They would take no sides and brook no insults. And they would stand together.

Anyone might become a Freeman. All they need to do was take the oath and live by it. It was at once the simplest and the most difficult of tasks.

A task he’d failed at.

Ciarán felt the weight drop into his palm, ran his fingers along its sharp edges, its draping curves ending in a razor point. The pendant spire was not a comfortable ornament to wear. But then, ornamentation wasn’t its purpose. It served as an affirmation, a warning sign, and a reminder to the wider world. We are one.

Earlier, during Carlsbad’s presentation of

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.