Rogers shook his head and sighed. “Pirates . . .”

He looked over at Dorsey, who was still shaking his head and mumbling as he did his control checks. Could he really trust him if this got heated? Rogers didn’t need someone that was going to freak out at the first sign of trouble. He needed someone that could help them bug out if people started shooting. Rogers thought it would be a good idea to calm him down a bit.

“Dorsey,” Rogers said, sighing. “Don’t worry about anything. This is going to be simple, just like I told you. I know this is your first mission with me, but I’m going to take care of you. All we have to do is be the intermediary for the cargo and the cash. The Garliali are going to start sending us the credits, and then the Purveyors will let us release the cargo. They’ll pick it up, and we’ll go home. Does that sound so hard?”

Well, it was a little harder than that. Rogers wasn’t just planning on getting a kickback; he was going to steal the credits, too. He left that part out. He didn’t want to spook Dorsey any further. That and he’d have to give Dorsey a bigger cut if he was honest about the amount. Honesty didn’t pay.

Rogers also left out the part about the Garliali getting giant packets of baking flour instead of medical supplies. The . . . unlucky family he’d met at the transportation terminal on Merida’s second moon had convinced him that maybe pirates didn’t deserve to get patched up properly. That and the hospital there had been willing to buy them. At a discount, of course.

Dorsey looked at him, clearly dubious. “I guess it doesn’t sound that bad.”

“It’ll be easy. Like, uh, what did you used to do before I hired you yesterday?”

“Postal work.”

“It’ll be like postal work. Just delivering packages. See? You’re already an expert. Nobody is going to shoot us.”

After a moment of looking at Rogers with open distrust, Dorsey visibly relaxed. He was still shaking his head, but at least he wasn’t muttering about not liking pirates anymore.

“Great,” Rogers said. “Now, you’re in charge of maneuvers while I manage the communications and the cargo. Just like we talked about. Okay?”

“Okay.”

Rogers took a deep breath and wiped his hand across his forehead. It was now or never, he supposed.

“Alright,” he said to the Garliali over the radio, making sure to switch the comms channel this time. “Get your cargo ship in position and start the transfer.”

“Way ahead of you.”

A small tugboat-like ship had already separated from the Garliali group and was heading toward the Awesome—Rogers’ ship—its heavy-lifting engines emitting an eerie blue glow. It looked like a giant beetle, with two mandibles below its flat cockpit. The Garliali fighters maintained a tight wedge formation, the tip of which pointed right across Rogers’ bow and toward the Purveyors, whose formation was more like space popcorn.