Rogue Planets Read online

  “Yes!” she squeaked. “You know, I may be all cute and sweet now, but I can still wind up your clock and stick it in the oven!”

  Ramsey held up his hands in mock defense. “OK, I don’t know what that entails, but I really don’t want to find out. The world we’re going to is Crossbar.”

  The name was familiar to The CatWoman™, but she couldn’t recall what was special about it. Vampy, on the other hand, seemed to know all about the place.

  “What? Are you serious? Hellll no. I’ll wind up your clock and stick it in an oven before going there. We’ll need a lot more ovens, too. All the ovens.”

  “What’s the big deal?” Porty asked.

  Vampy shot him an incredulous look. “You’re not familiar with Crossbar? Crossbar and Allaran? Ring any bells? It’s not far from here.”

  “Ohhhhh,” Cindy nodded. “Those are the two shivery-cold rogue planets a few hundred light years anti-spinward of Sol, right?”

  “One—well, two—and the same.” Ramsey nodded while bringing up the worlds on the rec room’s holoprojector. “Two terrestrial worlds, just over an earth mass each, orbiting one another out in the deep black. Cindy’s right about the cold. They’re not part of a stellar system and are pretty much ice boxes…at least, they are now.

  “Allaran has a pair of little fusion suns in orbit to keep it habitable. Crossbar claims to have had some mysterious system they used to heat their domed cities. No one knew what it was, but it kept their planet warm enough to live on.”

  “Let me guess,” Vampy said while pushing The CatWoman™’s tail off her lap. “Allaran stole Crossbar’s special heat source.”

  “You got it in one,” Ramsey nodded. “We’re just about there, so when we drop out of the DL, we’ll coast in, then wait for any updates from our contacts at Crossbar before heading down to Allaran.”

  “So that’s why we took such a weird jump from the last system,” The CatWoman™ said. “I thought you just wanted to spend some more time with us on the ship before we got to our next job.”

  Ramsey snorted. “I love you girls—and you’re OK, too, Porty—but I like to get stationside as much as the next person.”

  “Even away from little ol’ me?” Cindy asked sweetly.

  “Well, I have to admit, you’re much more…relaxing to be around as Cindy. BAMF was always a handful.”

  A pout formed on Cindy’s lips, and she glanced at the others. “They’re a handful too, you know.”

  Ramsey shrugged. “Maybe, but Vampy and Kitty are pretty much the same as they’ve always been. Heck, Kitty’s really just made a wardrobe change from leather to rubber.”

  “Don’t forget her tail,” Vampy said as she swatted it out of her face. “That’s a bit of a change.”

  The CatWoman™ ran her hand down her thigh. “I’ll admit, it’s a nice upgrade from the leather…a lot stretchier. Honestly, I lucked out. Some of The CatWoman™s in the past had awful outfits. Glad I’m not the purple one; black is definitely more my jam.”

  “I distinctly recall you pining after the purple outfit when Cindy discovered she could change her clothes,” Vampy said, an eyebrow raised as she regarded The CatWoman™.

  “I changed my mind,” she replied airily. “I like being super shiny. I know you do too. Admit it.”

  Vampy shrugged. “Yeah, it’s pretty cool, I’m not denying it.”

  “But how will you be all sneaky-sneaky if you’re so shiny?” Cindy asked.

  “I’ll blind them with my stunning bod, then use my whip to take ‘em down.” The CatWoman™ grinned at Cindy. “I mean, look at me. I’m everyone’s dream.”

  “Not me,” Cindy’s face took on a wistful expression. “I dream of a pri—oh, posture peacock perfume!”

  “You really need to get better at just going with it,” Vampy said as she took another sip from her blood-filled cup. “Whatever the Fairly Goodmothers did to us seems to be permanent. You might as well just surrender to it.”

  “Easy for you two,” Cindy pouted. “Like Ramsey said, you’re both pretty similar to how you’ve always been.” She grabbed her poofy skirts and shook them angrily. “This isn’t me at all!”

  “I don’t know about that,” Porty said, stroking his beard. “The Fairly Goodmothers know what’s in your heart, and what’s best for you.”

  “And they thought what was best for you was to be a cute little dwarf?” Cindy arched a brow, trying to look stern, then gave up and giggled.

  A broad grin split Porty’s face. “You think I’m cute?”

  “Well, all dwarves are cute, it’s part of your charm,” Cindy replied. “It’s how you all got Snow White into that poly gig.”

  “You know,” Porty gave her a lascivious wink. “Dwarves are just the right height to fit under your dress.”

  “Porty!” Cindy squealed. “That wouldn’t be proper at all!”

  The CatWoman™ couldn’t help but laugh, and saw that Ramsey was hiding a smile as well. She glanced at Vampy, but couldn’t tell if she was smiling; with her fangs always poking out over her lips, she often seemed to be smirking.

  “See?” Porty grinned at Cindy. “That was a totally natural reaction from you. I think the whole tough-girl attitude you’ve always maintained was a cover for how you really felt. The Fairly Goodmothers are rarely wrong. Perhaps deep down, you’re really a pretty princess.”

  “That would have been one hell of a cover,” Ramsey muttered.

  Cindy didn’t reply, but her sulk deepened considerably.

  “OK,” Ramsey drew the team’s attention back to the briefing. “So here’s how this will go down. Once we get to Allaran, Cindy is going to pose as my sweet, adoring wife, a part she was apparently born to play—”

  “I haaaaaa…. Haaaaaa….” Cindy’s face grew red again and she let out a small grunt of frustration. “Fine. I strongly dislike you.”

  Ramsey winked at her before continuing. “We’ll head to one of the resort areas on Allaran—which for them means any place where you can go outside and not die from frostbite in thirty seconds. We’ll try to gather intel on where they might have stashed the power source…or whatever it is they stole. With luck, they’ll be making use of it.”

  “That should help in pinpointing it,” Cindy said.

  “Right.” Ramsey nodded. “Laylani, you and Porty are going to try to get into their networks surreptitiously, and get any data you can from that angle.”

  “What about us?” Vampy asked, jerking a thumb toward The CatWoman™ and then turning it toward herself. “We just supposed to sit on the ship?”

  The CatWoman™ knew she and Vampy cut imposing figures: in their aforementioned shiny black outfits, her with a tail, whip and gun, and Vampy with her fangs and long, yellow coat. They looked badass and were clear assets for any op, no matter the scenario.

  However, judging by the expression on Ramsey’s face, he did not seem to share her assessment.

  “Well, the two of you are excellent backup, what, with your bulletproof skin, but unless we’re infiltrating a seedier part of the world, or maybe some sort of nightclub, I think you’ll attract the wrong sort of attention.”

  “Plus, you can’t even have sex with anyone, so using seduction as a distraction is pointless.” Porty sounded more than a little saddened by his own statement.

  Vampy shrugged. “You forget, I’ve never had sex in my life. One doesn’t need to have sex to seduce a person, you just need the promise of sex. It’s all in the lips.”

  “And the hips,” The CatWoman™ added, wiggling side to side.

  Vampy chuckled and bumped her hip against The CatWoman™’s. “Yeah, never discount the value of a good sashay.”

  AN ENTERTAINING NEED

  STELLAR DATE: 04.03.8949 (Adjusted Years)

  LOCATION: Aboard the Van

  REGION: Approaching the Crossbar System, Alkaid Void

  “OK!” Vampy said, rising from the couch and turning to address the crew. “We have two more nights to kill before we get
to our destination. Who’s up for a vid marathon?”

  “Really?” Kitty clapped her hands with delight. “Can we watch all seven hundred and ninety two ManBat™ movies?”

  Ramsey burst into a coughing fit, while Vampy glanced around the room, noting all the shaking heads. “What if we narrowed it down to only the ones with you in them?”

  “Those are just the ones with me in them.”

  “Uhhh…Snark tournament?” Porty suggested.

  “Oh! Oh!” Kitty bounced in her seat, almost making Cindy look grumpy for a moment as the couch wobbled on its stubby legs. “We could play Superhero Snark.”

  “What the heck is that?” the dwarf crossed his arms.

  Cindy did the same, but somehow just managed to look cute. “Probably something she just made up.”

  “Did not!” Kitty insisted. “It’s an old version from way back. It just involves changing some of the suits and adding in The Joker™.”

  Ramsey frowned at her. “Pretty sure you don’t need to ‘TM’ the joker in a card deck.”

  “No no,” Kitty shook her head. “Not a joker, The Joker™. Like…my former lover before I found myself with the ManBat™.

  Vampy stroked her chin. “You sure about that? I thought that was Hardly Quinn™. Or maybe Dr. Quinn…you know, the medicine gal.”

  Kitty fixed her with a menacing glare. “Don’t make me get my whip. That trollop only went after the ManBat™ when The Joker™ kicked her to the curb. I mean…she was so desperate, it hurt. I kinda lost track of her once she shacked up with Poison Oak™.”

  Ramsey cleared his throat. “Yeah…I’m kinda superheroed-out at the moment. Cindy, what do you want to watch?”

  “Me?” CinderellaNot-TM daintily placed a hand on her chest. “Gee…no one ever asks me.”

  Kitty snorted. “Yeah, because you like watching such gory stuff that even a vampire would puke.”

  Vampy sighed. “Don’t be so sure about that. I mean…so long as it’s human meat, it’s pretty hard to gross me out.”

  “Uhh…” Cindy looked a little green. “I don’t know how I feel about you considering us as ‘meat’.”

  “You know what I mean,” Vampy waved a hand. “But seriously, Cindy, what do you want to watch?”

  The woman in white tapped a finger against her chin, her lips forming a near perfect heart shape. “Well, I’ve always been partial to Bambi.”

  “The one where she does all the pool boys?” Kitty asked. “It’s overrated.”

  “Um, no,” Cindy shot Kitty a confused look. “The one where she’s a kickass bounty hunter and runs FreePort City out at Not Our Jupiter. Remember? She takes out the woman who is making coats from spotted rabbits.”

  Kitty coughed and shook her head. “I think this is a different Bambi.”

  Cindy’s eyes grew distant. “I just love all those spotted bunnies…and how she rips out the entrails of that rabbit-murdering woman at the end.”

  Laylani commented.

  Vampy bounced on the balls of her feet. “You had me at ‘entrails’. Laylani, put it on.”

  “Waaaaaait!” Porty held up a hand. “We can’t have movie night without popcorn and booze! What’s wrong with all of you?”

  “Sorry,” Vampy shrugged. “I got a bit carried away…you know how gore turns me on.”

  Ramsey shook his head. “Ummm…not really, no. And frankly, we’re all a little disturbed. Also, can you not drink blood while we watch?”

  She looked over the rest of the crew, who all seemed to be in agreement. “What if I put it in a cup with a lid and straw?”

  “Could you drink it cold?” Kitty asked. “I’ll probably still be able to smell it.”

  “Cold?! It’ll be all congealed. That’s gross!”

  “For us?” Cindy asked sweetly. “Please?”

  Vampy couldn’t help but smile at the typically angry woman. “I’d have to eat it with a spoon.”

  “Aaaaaand scratch that,” Porty said. “I guess we’ll just have to deal.”

  “Good!” Vampy said, skipping off to the galley. “I’ll get your boring food too, just don’t start without me. I don’t want to miss the entrails!”

  STARLESS

  STELLAR DATE: 04.05.8949 (Adjusted Years)

  LOCATION: Aboard the Van

  REGION: Approaching the Crossbar System, Alkaid Void

  “And here we are!” The CatWoman™ announced as the Van transitioned out of FTL into…nothing.

  “Shit.” Ramsey rose from his seat and stalked to the forward display. “If Alkaid wasn’t beaming away over there, this would be almost as dark as the DL.”

  A trio of nav beacons gave her something to align with, and she adjusted course, directing the ship toward the pair of planets slowly drifting around one another.

  “Quarter AU apart,” Vampy said from the back of the bridge. “Can just barely make out Allaran.”

  “So, like…is this even a system?” The CatWoman™ mused. “I mean, don’t you need a star to have a ‘system’?”

  Ramsey glanced back at the pilot. “Does it matter? The people living here call it the Crossbar System, and it has multiple bodies in it.”

  “Not exactly,” she replied. “Half of those ‘bodies’ are the planets’ nav beacons. And sure, the people on Crossbar call it the Crossbar System, but the people on Allaran call it the—”

  “We get the picture,” Ramsey growled. “Folks here don’t really get along. And that’s where we come in. There should be a message from Crossbar on their beacon…I have a decryption code for it. We’ll see if they still need our help.”

  “And if they don’t?” Vampy asked.

  He shrugged. “They already paid half. If they don’t, then we’ll head back around to Aldebaran and see if that new League of Sentients needs any merc help.”

  Laylani exclaimed.

  “That does sound exciting!” Cindy said as she entered the bridge with Porty. “No creature should be caged, least of all sapient ones.”

  The dwarf harrumphed and stomped a foot. “I don’t know about that. In theory, you want free AIs…but what if they go ahead and start getting ideas…you know, like, angry ideas about the people who used to use them…or service them at spaceports? It might not be pretty.”

  Vampy patted him on the head. “Well, we can’t keep AIs in shackles just because they might get mad when they get out. The League is making a new nation for them all. This seems like a good thing to me.”

  “If you say so,” Porty muttered. “I’ll reserve judgment, if you don’t mind.”

  “Found the message,” The CatWoman™ announced. “Addressed to ‘Disknee Birthday Boy’.”

  Ramsey gave an embarrassed laugh. “Yeah, well, I wanted to give them something that the folks at Allaran wouldn’t pick up on.”

  “Hey!” Vampy turned to face him, fists on hips. “Does that mean you knew about the party at the Disknee World?”

  “Uh…no, not a bit, not me.”

  She rolled her eyes. “You’re a terrible liar.”

  “Or maybe I just want you to think I’m a terrible liar.”

  “Oh shut up.” Vampy collapsed into a seat. “And I worked so hard to keep that a secret.”

  Ramsey didn’t reply, his brow furrowing as he decoded the message on his HUD.

  After a minute, he nodded to The CatWoman™. “OK, Kitty, we’re still on. Set a course to Allaran, there’s a resort vacation waiting for us.”

  “Oh! I love resorts!” The CatWoman™ exclaimed. “Lots of rich people to rob.”

  “Uhhh…” Ramsey scrubbed a hand across his temple. “Maybe not alllll of us.”

  The pilot reached out and stroked his thigh. “You gonna cage this kitty up?”

  “If you keep doing that, I sure will.”

  “What if I like it?”

  Ramsey turned to Vampy. “Can you d
o something about her?”

  “Like what? You can’t punish someone who likes it.”

  Porty gave a throaty chuckle. “I bet I could come up with something.”

  Ramsey turned and walked off the bridge, shaking his head and mumbling as he went.

  “What did he say?” The CatWoman™ asked. “Was it ‘How did I get such an awesome crew’?”

  “Pretty sure it was, ‘What will I do with that bad Kitty’,” the vampire replied.

  Laylani clarified.

  The two women looked at each other, and The CatWoman™ shrugged. “Dunno, but it must have been pretty awesome!”

  FRIEND OF LAST RESORT

  STELLAR DATE: 04.06.8949 (Adjusted Years)

  LOCATION: Aboard the Van

  REGION: Allaran, Crossbar System, Alkaid Void

  Cindy peered out the porthole on the airlock’s outer door, taking in the snowy landscape that stretched out beyond the ship.

  “I thought you said they had some toasty little fusion suns?” She cast a concerned eye at Ramsey, who shrugged in response.

  “I’ve never been here before, and they don’t broadcast much tourist info. But with no nearby star and a frozen planet core…I guess even with fusion suns, it’s not going to be balmy by any stretch of the imagination.”

  “Why would any poor soul want to live here?” Cindy asked as she drew a deep breath and concentrated on making her skirts retract and form the shiny white catsuit once more.

  After a moment, it complied—though it seemed rather obstinate about the whole affair. Satisfied with her look, she grabbed one of the cold-weather coats from inside a locker.

  “It honestly beats me. I mean, why does anyone live on planets at all?” Ramsey asked by way of response. “Stations are a thousand times better.”

  Cindy nodded in agreement as she pulled the coat on and drew up the fastener. No sooner had she pulled it to the top than a strange tingling came over her, and she squealed in fright. “What in the sparkly, sparkly stars!”