Jessica solar's Arc

Chapter 5 of 15

The crate sat in the airlock like a held breath. Jessica crouched a meter from it, welder cold at her hip, and listened. Outside the hull she could hear the scavengers again, a distant scrape along the lower plating, and under that a wet, glassy snarl she did not know yet. The ship was hers. The debt was inside it. Michael came down the corridor with his sketchpad clutched to his chest. His glasses were fogged. He was breathing too fast. "Wolves," he said. "On the hull. The plants I put out — they came for the plants. The scavengers are still out there too. They're fighting." Jessica did not look up. "Draw the crate. Not me. The crate." She circled it. The stencil on the side was the crimson mark of the enemy faction. A paper tag hung from the seal. She did not touch the tag. A forced lid could trigger a charge and blow the airlock. A cut hinge could burn a chemical fuse. She did not know which, and not knowing was the trap. She went back up two decks and came down with a scope and a coil of fiber line. She fed the scope under the lip of the crate where the seam was thinnest. On the little screen she saw a folded cloth, a curl of stem, and a soft, layered glow. Petals. A lantern plant, packed in shock foam. Under the plant she saw the shape of a wire running to the underside of the lid. A pull trigger. Open the lid, pull the wire, lose the airlock. "It's a bloom," she said. "And a trap. They sent me a garden with a fuse." She cut the crate open from the bottom. She laid it on its side, sliced the base panel with the welder at low draw, and eased the plant out through the floor of the box while the lid stayed sealed. The wire went slack in her hand. The lantern's petals opened in the corridor light, layered and slow, throwing soft color across Michael's glasses. Under the plant, folded in the cloth, was the tag. Three words in a clean hand. Grow it. Owe more. A heavy thud hit the outer hull. Then a second, closer. Jessica went to the port. On the plating, framed in its own red light, a wolf of glass stood over a scavenger's body. Its veins burned like a lit core. It turned its head to the port and looked at her. Behind it, two more of its kind were tearing into the last of the raiders. "They're not with the scavengers," Michael whispered. "They're eating them." Jessica set the lantern plant on the deck. Her hands were steady now. "Log it," she said. "The crate's open. I own what's inside. And something out there just picked a side."