GLoc was jammed, the air muggy with the sweat of writhing bodies moving to the beat of the music. The bass throbbed in his throat as he searched for her in the crowd , he was constantly bumped into crowd, but he pushed his way through, and in the flash of the lights he spotted her at the end of the bar.

She turned to face him, smiling and laughing, drinks in her hand, one of which she passed to him.

“ I watched you come in,” she shouted, “I wasn’t sure whether I should start without you…”

She was already getting dressed when he awoke, and he rolled up onto one elbow, “So that’s it? Love ‘em and leave ‘em?”

Marianna laughed, pulling on her tunic, “Yeah, that’s right, that’s what I do,” she leaned over, her brown hair cascaded  into his face, and she kissed him, “ but when I get back from this run, I’m gonna love you some more.”

She grabbed her gear and strode out the door. It slid shut with a hiss and he lay there in the silent apartment. She was a pilot for a local freight company, short and long hauls, Marx Brothers, and the owners loved her, she said, she brought the loads in ahead of schedule and complete. She piloted a freelancer, and this last job would keep her enroute for at least a month.

It would be a long month.

He walked into the hangar with his usual morning coffee (with beans grown in some hydroponics farm which cost a small fortune),set it down on a nearby crate and checked his mobiglas.

He still had contracts to fill, but was able to rent a larger ship, a Freelancer Max, to make shorter work of it. He had flown them before, but the fighter pilot edge was still there, and they felt slow and clumsy to him, better than the Aurora,  but still not his preferred mode of travel.

He chuckled to himself, out of the UEE, trying to avoid trouble, but still he wanted the excitement of a fast ride. No, he told himself, this is supposed to be a new life, a new beginning, and you have someone to look forward to now.

She would have long since completed her first jump, and setting her navigational  co-ordinates for the next wormhole. He laughed to himself again, he usually thought about money, not women, but this time it was different.

Across the hangar floor, a clean shaven, handsome man in his late thirties strode towards him, a pair of coveralls, worn from use, emblazoned with a small trading symbol. Marx Brothers Trading Co.

His face was grim, but his voice was calm, “ Are you cains?”

“ I’m Herbert Marx. Marxbro. Marianna is one of my pilots.

He told him that the Mariana’s Freelancer Max had left on time, as always, fully loaded but her co-pilot  did not show. She took the shipment out herself, saying she wasn’t going to miss another paycheck because Collins couldn’t stay sober long enough to make his flight.

She left her flight plan, Stanton to Virtus  on the edge of Xi’an space via Pyro, Nyx, Tohil and finally Virtus. Somewhere between Stanton and Pyro, they lost contact.

Marianna had vanished.

Cain felt ill, he was staggered, his blood rushing in his ears like the sound of an engine and he struggled to contain his anxiety.

He asked how could they find out so soon that she had gone, and Herbert told him she was to meet a transfer agent enroute. He was to provide a safer alternate route through Nyx, she never showed. Cain nodded, mind still racing  but clear now and computing.And this man Collins, did he know where he drank?

The bar Collins drank in was no GLoc,  it was seedy and dark, and even the air reclaimer couldn’t clean the stale smoke and dank urine smell from the air. Herbert had given him a description of the man, and the promise of a ship and his own self as co-pilot to find her. Cains said get the ship ready, that he would be back, with hopefully more info.

Collins was already sloshed, and Cain did not have to wait long before he rose to go relieve himself, he swayed as he moved to the washroom,  and Cain followed closely behind. As he stood at the urinal, Cain knelt into the back of his knees, pushing the man half into the urinal, his arms pinned with the weight of cain’s body, and he grabbed Collins by the lank hair as the man yowled.

“You need to shut up, “ he smacked the man’s face into the tile, a blood red smear left behind, “ until you tell me what I need to know. This would be a terrible place to die, holding your pecker in a men’s washroom “

Herbert was waiting on the ramp at the Freelancers tail, and he watched as cain walked up.

“Do you have more info? What did Collins say? We need to set a flight plan or a search route. ..”

“ Collins was helpful, I’ll tell you once we get started.”

He rubbed the swollen, split knuckles of his right hand, flexing it and he looked at Herbert with emotionless stare.

“We’re going to Nyx. “