The Fringe Wars

5.2

House Politics

Tulan Port, Playa

Aramis Reyne let the ice-cold winds blast him for a long second before hustling back inside and closing the door. He shivered but felt invigorated.

Jeyde Sixx looked up from the chair in which he was comfortably reclined. His brown eyes twinkled. "I can never figure out why you want to live here. This is exactly what I envision hell frozen over would look like."

He smiled. "It's not so bad. The air's crisp, there's no pollution, and the lower gravity can add a whole new level to sporting events."

Sixx nodded toward the door. "Crisp? Out there feels damn near as frigid as Mary, the Myrad madam."

Motion twenty feet behind Sixx drew Reyne's attention. It wasn't the construction crews working on the tunnel's walls. Their movements had become a part of the background over the past several weeks. It was the pair walking toward them in tailored clothes draped over their gravity suits. Only citizens wore clothes that nice.

He turned back to Sixx. "The thing I've always liked best about Playa is that it's the farthest world from Alluvia and Myr. In the past, the distance helped keep the citizens away."

Sixx turned to look. He pushed off the chair and to his feet, moving to stand protectively near Reyne's side. He was as tall as Reyne, thirty years younger, and well-built; a formidable defensive force. "Looks like they aren't wasting any time getting their claws into the new fringe station."

Reyne sighed. "Not when there's a chance for someone to get rich off someone else's hard work." He glanced at Sixx. "Make sure the dock operators notify us of all landings, especially Collective ships."

"You got it, boss."

The men watched the man and woman approach. Neither had bluish skin, indicating they were from Alluvia, which meant they'd at least be slightly easier to work with than the ever-snobbish Myrads. Reyne had even become friends with a few Alluvians over the years. Boden, when he wasn't on a Sweet Soy binge, made a damn fine mechanic on the Gryphon crew. Then there was Boden's pal, Kason, who'd found Reyne plenty of jobs when they still operated as runners.

Most citizens didn't like interplanetary mingling. Kason had been killed because of his association with colonists. Just like Gabriela Heid, who'd sacrificed everything to fight for the colonies' independence. As for the two approaching citizens, he suspected they were like all the other citizens he most certainly didn't like. Even though the colonies had broken free from the Collective to form the Alliance of Free Colonies, many citizens continued to act as though colonists existed to work for them.

Being a citizen used to mean having more rights than a colonist. Now, being a citizen simply meant someone was from Alluvia or Myr, the only two planets remaining in the Collective. When the Alliance was formed, its members quickly chose to keep the title of "colonist" as a source of pride.

On Playa, the planet farthest from anything and anyone, the only citizens Reyne had ever seen on its surface were trying to either get rich off it or destroy it. With the newcomers' expensive-looking clothes, this pair was after the former.

They came to a stop before Reyne. Both looked to be in their thirties, but with the medical benefits the Collective provided its citizens, each could be anywhere from thirty to seventy. Their skin was paler than Reyne's dark skin. The woman was attractive except for an overly rigid posture, like tension from a life spent looking prim and proper had fused her bones together. The man moved smoothly, but his gaze bore a hawkishness that reminded Reyne of a ship mechanic who'd once tried to triple-charge him for an engine overhaul. He didn't like this man already.