The Pride of Parahumans by Joel Kreissman

Author:Joel Kreissman [Kreissman, Joel]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: sci fi, biotech, hard science fiction metaphysical cyberpunk
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 10

A few days after my encounter with my all-powerful employer, I was eating dinner with my former crewmates. Nothing anywhere near the quality of that veritable feast Jakob Griggs had, just some flavored lichen-based foodstuffs that grew in some of the smaller caves set aside for food production. To be honest, I hadn't had much of an appetite after that eventful luncheon. I was cutting up a greenish loaf when Cole spoke.

"It's funny," he said to no one in particular. "Just a couple days ago, all our rates went up ten percent. Wonder what changed this time?"

"No idea," I said. I really did have no idea what he was talking about. My own rates hadn't changed since I started working for the SPPS. Why would everyone else's rise?

Denal offered his own thoughts. "Well, I asked some of the boys and girls I know by the docks. They said that Marquez hadn't upped their own bills by any significant amount."

"So it's just us?" said Aniya, who was tearing off chunks of two whole loaves of lichen bread as we talked. "You think it's because of the whole bounty hunter thing?"

"Doubt it; it's been weeks," Cole said. "Unless something else happened with Argen over in the genetics labs."

I paused for a second. I couldn't tell them anything about MOR10X-6; I had promised Jakob I wouldn't tell anyone. "No, nothing like that." Which was true in the vaguest sense. I had not encountered any bounty hunters or anything like that.

"Here's an idea," Denal began, which probably meant it was doomed to fail. "That Derrick Marquez guy is just a big bully, like that VP's kid we splattered out by Ceres. He's not used to people standing up to him, so how about we miss a payment or two, and when he comes over looking for money, we firmly, and with our weapons well at hand, tell him we're not paying the increased rate?"

I could tell from the start that it was a bad idea. "Look," I told him, "I still have some money left over after the insurance deductions. I could give it all to you guys and just live off the algal dole."

"And what about when the premiums get too high for even that to help?" Aniya asked.

I honestly hadn't thought of that possibility, though I doubted my income could make much of a difference as it was. "Look," I said, "you do not want to fight this guy. You just don't."

"Maybe you don't, Argen, but the rest of us do." Even Cole was in on this idiotic plan. What was going on here? "You don't have to participate but we are going to convince him to stop charging us such exorbitant prices one way or another."

"Fine then!" I threw down my utensils and got up to storm out. "Just don't come running to me when you need to pay your medical bills after this fiasco goes down."

***

The next day, I headed down to the ship after work, thinking that maybe

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.