Big Dicker (Harem Station 3)

That’s where I heard of that constellation. The Big Dicker.

No. Dipper.

No. Dicker.

Fuck, I don’t know.

Should I believe the ship? Did she know my mother? Was she her partner? If so, what happened? Where is my mother now?

I think I already know that answer. My father told me she died. And yeah. He was a fucked-up liar if ever there was one. But if my mother is still alive and she left me with him, she’s a fucked-up liar too.

Sun-damned Cygnian princesses. They are all trouble. Just like I said before I met Delphi.

She’s trouble too.

But then I manage to crack a smile. Because she’s my trouble now.

I frown at that thought. Because I have no idea where we are and—oh, shit!

I reach into my pocket, looking for Flicka, but it’s empty.

Fuck. Fuck!

That little dragonbee was my only hope. What happened to her? Did they find her? Crush her like a bug? And when did they find her? Before or after we landed here on this station?

Because Delphi doesn’t know where this place is. She told me that much.

A buzzing sound makes my head jerk to the left and there! Flicka is crawling out of the vent near the floor. She beats and flicks her wings, maybe trying to communicate. But I can’t really hear her, and anyway, I don’t speak dragonbee bot.

“I’m glad you’re OK,” I say. Then sigh, because I’m so damn tired from being stunned and drugged. Not to mention the beating my body probably took going through all those gates to get here.

Flicka buzzes again. Flies out of the vent, does a little circle in the air, then flies back towards it and clings to the vent.

I shake my head and whisper, “I don’t know what you’re saying. Hopefully it was, ‘Don’t worry, I got this.’”

Then I laugh. Can’t help it. Because it’s ridiculous. I’m pretty well fucked right now. The little bot is powerful in its own way, and in a swarm the power of dragonbee bots can be downright apocalyptic. But come on. What good is one tiny bot against a whole station of crazy?

I don’t know where I am, how many people are on this station, who’s running the show, what kind of weapons they have, or why I’m really here.

Flicka buzzes one more time, then turns her back and disappears inside the vent. There’s a faint echo of a hum as she leaves me behind, but a few seconds later it fades away and there’s nothing left but the creepy moaning from someone in a nearby cell.

There’s a squeak and then the loud tell-tale sound of a heavy door slamming shut outside. Footsteps. Maybe three or four people. And a scuffing sound. Like someone is being held up and dragged past.

Another squeak of another door, then more shuffling of feet, and finally, whoever is being locked up in the cell next to mine falls to the hard stone floor with a slap.

I cringe, picturing that in my head. But a beeping at my cell door has me scrambling to turn my body towards them as they enter.

Cyborgs. All of them. They remind me a little of the Master back on Harem, but only a little.

They are the same model, I’m sure of that. But unlike Crux’s cyborg master, who has been well-maintained over the decades, these guys are all scuffed and dirty. Their formerly white body armor is a dull gray and one even has burn marks on his arms and legs, like he’s been blasted with a plasma rifle recently.

All of them have one rectangular eye port across the upper third of their faces with one red vision sensor sliding back and forth across the ridge mimicking a nose.

Creepy fuckers to most people. But to me, these borgs are familiar and relatable. I’ve liberated hundreds of them over the past ten years. One even joined Xyla and me on some campaigns, but he met a girl several years back and left the liberation business to settle down and get married. He runs an arcade on Harem Station now. He’s like the poster child for how well assimilated borgs can be.

I have genuine affection for the guy. Consider him a friend. Maybe even a good friend.

But these borgs are pointing rifles at me. And unless their core code has been heavily modified by my brother Tray on Harem at some point, they won’t have emotions like flesh-and-blood people.

They haven’t been modified. I’d recognize them if they had. At the very least, they’d have recognized me. And when an unmodified military cyborg points a rifle at you there is zero chance they will give you the benefit of the doubt if you make a wrong move.

I consider greeting them amicably and maybe doing some name-dropping, then decide against it. Because there’s a chance—a pretty high chance—that the borgs I’ve liberated over the years are probably on their shit list. Probably been tabled as traitors.