Wreckers: A Denver Boyd Novel by George Ellis (ebook reader ink .TXT) 📕

perceptive. I pretended to watch the movie with him for a few minutes as I gathered my thoughts.

There are basically two ways to captain a ship: hands on or hands off. I wasn’t a fan of surprises, so I chose the hands on option. That meant knowing what to expect from each of the crew members. After my conversation with Jiang, I worried about what Edgar could be capable of with his various enhancements.

“I need to assess any potential threats,” I said.

“Threats?” He turned to look at me. “How many times do I have to save your life before you realize how insulting that is? Are you going to ask Batista these questions? She seems more problematic than me.”

“Really? How so?”

“She’s a liar, for starters,” he said. “I’ve been nothing but honest with you since we met. For example, you annoy me. So I’m telling you that now. Honesty!”

I glared at him and waited. He sighed.

“You’re really not gonna leave until we talk about this?”

“I’m not,” I replied.

“Look, I get you need to do your captain thing. Some people might even find it cute. I’m not one of those people. But fine, I’ll tell you a few things about myself, and then you’ll walk out that door. If you don’t like that, I’ll remove you from the room by force. Are we clear?”

I didn’t like being threatened by him, but I was already pushing the boundaries here by demanding he explain to me why he was different. He was right to feel singled out.

He paused the movie and bored his eyes into my soul.

“I was born normal. I’m still normal. I just have titanium braces on some of my bones to strengthen them, along with anti-corrosion implants in 50% of the muscle tissue in my body so they don’t break down as easily as your muscles do. Everything else is all natural. My dad was 7 feet tall and I’ve always been roughly twice as smart as the average human. We done here?”

I nodded and stood up.

“Well I think this was a productive talk,” I said. “In the interest of fairness, I should let you know I have .5% more bone density than most people. It’s a genetic trait.”

“So you have a thick head? I already knew that,” he joked, the whisper of a wry smile on his lips.

Just before I left his room, I stopped and turned back, realizing something.

“Titanium on your bones, huh? You should watch X-Men,” I told him. “You might like the Wolverine character.”

Chapter 18

One of the problems with being a double-agent is that two different sides may decide to kill you. First it was Demond. Then Slay and the federation. And that’s not even counting the Rox. We had danger coming at us from all sides.

Before leaving the Burnett, I’d lobbied Slay to have the bounty on the Stang rescinded, but she said it would raise too many eyebrows inside the federation – and outside. In other words, people might start to wonder about me. One of the things she was banking on is that the Rox wouldn’t think twice about having me assist their crippled ship if I had an outstanding warrant. But if I was a wrecker with a squeaky clean record, they might keep looking for help elsewhere. Only after we successfully completed the job for her would I get the failsafe off my ship and bounty off my head. Since we were never going to deliver her the device, but instead give it to Desmond, that was just one more complication I could worry about later.

Speaking of Desmond, we quickly made the decision to inform him of the situation with Slay. I didn’t really have a choice, as I knew Edgar was going to tell him anyway. I agreed with him anyway – I was already on the outs with the federation, so angering another captain wasn’t a big deal. I didn’t want to double-cross Desmond and the Tracers, especially with his man Edgar on the ship. Romy seemed like a free agent more than a fed loyalist, and my hope was to turn her before we made our move on the Rox.

We waited until Romy was asleep and then Batista, Edgar and I contacted Desmond to break the news. We used an encrypted beam Edgar developed just for the occasion to ensure the feds didn’t intercept the transmission.

“I can’t say I’m surprised someone else is after the device,” Desmond said. “Though I wouldn’t have guessed the feds would even know about it, let alone the Rox’s plan for Jasper. They must have someone on the inside.”

“That seems to be going around,” I said, glancing at Batista.

“Indeed,” Desmond replied. Then he paused and seemed to have an idea.

“What is it?” I asked.

“Once again, the feds are being feds,” he said. “They’ve confirmed that the device is on board the Rox. And they’ve confirmed our intel is good – that the ship will be at Jasper. If there were any doubts, those are gone now.”

“They also did one more thing,” I said. “They guaranteed the Rox would need our assistance. Slay doesn’t strike me as the bluffing type. When she said the ship would be disabled, she meant it.”

“And I strike you as the bluffing type?” Desmond asked.

I had walked right into that one. Edgar grinned. Even Batista cracked a smile.

“I just meant –”

“I know what you meant, Denver, and I agree,” Desmond assured me. “While I have absolute faith in Edgar’s ability to disable the Rox, that now becomes our backup plan. For all intents and purposes, you are to follow Slay’s lead on this one. Once you secure the device, the Bear will take the Burnett out and all’s well that ends well.”

I cleared my throat. “There’s just one thing.”

“The failsafe, I know,” Desmond said.

“Oh, there’s that. I guess there are two things.” Everybody looked at me, unsure of what I was getting at. It seemed obvious. “Doesn’t anyone else think the Burnett’s ability to just show up