Jazz, as she now called herself, left her room in Carron’s Lodge at four o’clock in the morning with a “do not disturb” sign on the door. It would ensure the body in the shower finished its regeneration before any housekeeping staff found it. With her backpack filled with all the usual things a holidaymaker would have, she made her way quickly to the dock of the Redler Rapide, one of two liners that made the daily run to and from the resort planet of Redler.
It was early and the ship wasn’t due to leave until eight o’clock, but with the lockdown it might not leave at all. Two male crew members were busying themselves at the departure gate and she headed straight for them.
‘Hello,’ she said, smiling cheerily. ‘I’m booked on today’s flight, I was just wondering if there was any news about this lockdown being lifted?’
‘What name was it?’ asked one of them, opening up the passenger manifest on his screen.
‘Jazz,’ she said. ‘Vaileenbough Jazz.’
The crew member nodded as she found the name listed. ‘All we know is a team of inspectors are due from Eritain sometime this morning and the flight can leave once they’ve checked the passengers before boarding. We think they’re searching for some criminal or something, but that’s only a rumour.’
‘Oh, okay, thanks,’ said Jazz, turning to leave, then stopping and turning back. ‘Do you know which cabin I’ve been allocated?’ she asked. ‘Just so I can go straight there and get some sleep once we’re cleared to board.’
‘Passenger Jazz,’ he said, scrolling down the screen again. ‘You’re in cabin 1239.’
‘Great, thanks.’
She walked back and sat on a seat right near the entrance and opened up her tablet. Looking at the station plan, she found the crew airlock was down a level, with stairs behind her in the corridor.
Slipping back out the door when the two crew members weren’t looking, she scanned the stairwell door lock and it clicked open. Hurrying down a level, she opened the lower door a crack and peered through, swearing to herself as she saw two security staff guarding the crew entrance.
She dropped down another level to find a similar airlock and the ship’s hull illuminated by the port lights visible through the small porthole windows. Hacking into the station’s systems, she disconnected the airlock alarm and opened the inner door. The two halves of the door whirred closed behind her as she found the schematic of the ship on her tablet.
She swore again as she found the nearest airlock to her cabin was on the opposite side of the vessel. Hacking into the ship this time, she disconnected the alarm to this airlock too and, checking there were no maintenance crews lurking outside, she vented the atmosphere and opened the outer door.
The glowing white hull of the liner was about thirty metres away and with one last check there was no one around, she leapt out. It only took a few seconds to float across in the zero-gravity vacuum and, finding she was in a slow tumble, she braced for impact at the same time as turning on the magnets in her feet.
She hit the hull back first and slapped her feet down hard to avoid bouncing off. Once orientated, she began the trek around the hull, avoiding any windows and making sure she got to the opposite side of the ship soonest to avoid being spotted from the station.
It was a big ship and it took her over fifteen minutes to clump her way around to the requisite airlock. The emergency handle was behind a small cover to the left of the door. Once turned, the door sunk in a few inches and slid away into the hull. She carefully stepped around the ninety-degree corner onto the airlock floor, immediately coming under the influence of the ship’s artificial gravity.
Closing the outer door and turning the magnets off, she peeked through the inner door’s rectangular window. She had to duck down out of sight as two crew members passed by and once they were gone, she opened the inner door and made her way quickly to her cabin in the centre of the ship.
The original Jazz must have bought one of the cheaper tickets, as the cabin was tiny and had no window. It had been serviced though, so she didn’t have to worry about a visit from housekeeping. Hacking back into the relevant systems, she turned the airlock alarms back on and waited for boarding to begin.
Four hours later, she heard the excited chatter of children in the corridor and, checking with the ship’s passenger manifest, she found boarding had indeed commenced. As she watched, the names gradually turned from red to green as they passed through the security checks at the main airlock. Waiting until around three-quarters of the passengers were aboard, she hacked back in and manually checked the box next to her name. As she hoped, it turned green and displayed her as checked and boarded.
Within the hour, she felt the ship lurch and a steady vibration and audible hum replaced the whisper of the life support vents from before. She opened her cabin door, made her way through the large vessel to one of the four bars, and sat in a window seat watching Zabbergain II and its ring of giant construction stations gradually recede into a pinprick of light, then vanish, as the ship undertook its first of a dozen jumps towards Redler.
She smiled and turned her attention to her surroundings and suitable biologicals.