Stories from the Battleship Sraosha

You Pulled the Trigger

Mirza stared at the ceiling, not looking at her when he asked, "Can I stay the night?"

Her answer was firm, professional-sounding. "I'm sorry, you can't do it unless you pay for overnight stay."

He said nothing else, stood up from the bed, gathered his clothes, and with automated precision started to put on every clothing article one by one, ending with his shin-high boots and navy thick overcoat.

He didn't say thank you, nor bother to look back at the female body hidden under the warm blanket.

She'd forget him soon.

Mirza took two steps at a time, down the creaking stairs to the lobby of the brothel, nodding slightly at the burly guy guarding the entrance, who didn't return the courtesy. Dark Elam evening welcomed him. They could not afford too much energy for lighting and heating for these parts of the colony, although they're where many entertainment places could be found in.

Not everyone from the ships frequented these parts. Some said it depended on where you came from. Satana started as a colony founded by puritans, and so the Satanans avoided carnal and other worldly pleasures as best as they could. They're a ruthless lot on the battlefield, the Satanans. They sure had an abundance of energy retained needing outlet. The Donbettyr guys (and the women, wherever they came from) chose more classy, safer, brighter areas. The officers from Earth were more mysterious, but others tended to imagine that they blended with the upper classes of the society wherever their ship was having a stop.

No matter what colony or what planet they hailed from, each of them was only allowed three sets of uniform, and they might not have them washed anywhere but the ship's laundry service. Every uniform washed is recorded meticulously. No uniform is to be left lying unguarded where someone might snatch it and abuse it for their own ends. Bandits extorting money from civilians while brandishing stolen uniform are not unheard of in the less tamed parts of the colonized universe.

Mirza knew exactly where his three sets of uniform were: one should be available to be picked up from the laundry tomorrow at 2pm, one was folded neatly in the drawer in the room he shared with his buddy Karl on the ship, and one was protecting him from the punishing cold of Elam. Wearing a uniform everywhere might not be the most convenient thing ever, but uniform does help with quick identification should stupid skirmish or worse happen, while people are out and about looking for some compensation to either the hellish or the numbing weeks they've just had on board and likely will soon have again.

Life aboard can be dull for weeks, consisting of sailing through interplanetary space, with the occasional space debris whizzing by. No—scratch that. They don't even whizz. People inside the ships just pretend they do, or they supply the sounds with their own mouths to make things livelier. The space is not as interesting a place as they were taught about in school. The outposts might not be the best places for one to lie in or just to have a shot—of liquor, that is—but at least they give the longed-for break from the routine of a life regulated by artificial 24-hour cycle of light and dark. Unlike the lights in the colonies are always natural, anyway.

Mirza sighed, mentally counting how much cash he had left in person, before randomly getting into a bar. His walk had brought him to a street flanked by various watering holes and other shady places offering entertainment of some kind, and he didn't know what exactly had attracted him to that one place—he didn't even check the name. Bad move. Should something uncalled for happen, he wouldn't be able to recall the name of the place. But he did remember the tacky neon lights decorating the front part of the bar, and he was sure he could describe it later with details.

Mirza stepped in, and without taking off his coat, settled for a table and a chair on a corner. The bar smells strongly of alcohol and food, both fresh and stale.