curious cargo

We’re heading back to Collette (much faster than our voyage here, thankfully) with the cargo we were handed from our new contacts. I liked them approximately as much as I liked the Runners they originally hired. Small-time, greasy folk who tromp about self-importantly on a frontier planet like Agrafena. Once the world gets moving, they’ll be recognized for what they are and left behind. The man in charge, a sweat-stained bald man who sneered rather than speaking, will end his days in a drunkard’s prison cell. They seemed wealthy enough, however, and the crates they had for us were clean and heavy and hummed with cold units. The coin we’ll get on the other end is…good. Better than decent. I learned long ago never to open a crate just because I was curious to know what was inside. The first time I did, Sandy Havers kicked me to the brig using words I’d never heard before, and even now hesitate to use. Since then deals tend to go badly whenever someone has taken a peek at the goods, though Jamieson laughed harshly and called me superstitious. He made it a point to always know what he carried, and use it to his advantage, either deliver or sell himself. The man had his share of enemies, but by the end of our association (though I still refuse to say his life) he was the one distributing to smaller operations rather than fighting over the scraps. Lys would simply ask the contact, and more times than not, they’d tell him, because that is who Ulysses was. I of course deny my superstition, but believe that the contents of a stolen crate, unless they are explosive or crying loudly or, as Em points out, her (though I have been given more than one occasion to question the validity of that statement)…they are better left where they are.