The Ghost Mine Read online

  Justin stole a glance at Keontae, but he was focused on lathering up his body. Should he respond? This is so awkward.

  “Yeah. Not too bad.” Justin resolved to not look at the women unless he had to.

  A chorus of laughter and whoops sounded from behind them. Justin looked back in time to see Dirk, also unclothed, entering the showers. Two of his friends, including Pig-Nose, flanked his right side, and the other three flanked his left.

  Justin muttered a litany of profanity. He smacked the screen. It dispensed liquid soap, and he rubbed it all over his body. He needed to finish up fast. The last place he needed to be was in group showers, naked, with a bunch of guys who hated him.

  “There he is,” a voice said from behind him.

  Shit.

  Justin whirled around to face them, his fists clenched at his sides. He tilted his head slightly down like Keontae had shown him two worksites ago.

  Dirk stepped forward, glaring at Justin. A sadistic grin curled his lips. “Fancy meeting you bitches here.”

  Keontae, still covered in suds from head to toe like Justin, stepped next to Justin while Connie and Candy watched. Justin stole a quick glance around the showers. Everyone else was watching too.

  “You got a problem?” Keontae asked.

  “With you pussies?” Dirk’s eyes narrowed. “Always.”

  Each time Justin ended up anywhere near him, Dirk’s imposing height and muscled form shocked him anew. His body might as well have belonged to a comic book character—every muscle bulged, toned to perfection, from his neck down to his calves.

  Justin had worried about facing him before, but here, in the showers, with both of them naked, everything was so much worse.

  “We don’t want any trouble,” Justin said in a firmer voice than he thought possible, given the circumstances.

  “Your brown buddy said the same thing at lunch today.” Dirk motioned his head toward the goon Keontae had subdued. “Reggie complained about his shoulder all day. Seems the two of you need to learn a lesson.”

  “Why don’t you quit your dick-wagging and grow up?” Connie’s voice rasped from behind them.

  By now, everyone else in the showers had turned their focus toward the conflict.

  Dirk pointed a thick finger at her. “No one asked your opinion, you old warthog. This doesn’t concern you or your dyke friend.”

  “The hell it doesn’t.” Connie stepped forward and stood next to Justin, and Candy stepped next to her. “And you called them pussies? You want to come at these two with six men, and they’re the pussies? You really didn’t think this through, did you?”

  “I said to shut up, bitch.” Dirk’s eyes narrowed at her.

  “The only bitch I see is the tall asshole who needs his five idiot buddies to help him win fights.”

  The rest of the shower’s occupants oohed at Connie’s slam.

  Without taking his eyes off of Dirk, Justin leaned closer to Connie. “You really don’t have to—”

  “I’m about to smack those red eyebrows off that horse’s ass you call a face,” Dirk growled.

  “Go ahead,” Connie rasped. “If your punches match your intellect, you’ll probably just hurt your hand.”

  Dirk’s body tensed, and he cocked his right arm.

  7

  “Hey!” a sharp voice turned them all to stone. “What the hell is going on in here?”

  Shannon stood in the entrance to the showers, clothed in dark pants and a denim shirt. Her blonde hair hung around her shoulders, crimped from being tied into a ponytail all day at the mine. Pure rage exuded from her vivid green eyes.

  Her black boots splashed in the streams of water trickling toward the drain as she stepped between them. She alternated glares at Justin and Dirk. “I asked a question, and I damn well had better get an answer.”

  Dirk lowered his arm. “Nothing that concerns you.”

  “Like hell it doesn’t.” She squared her body to face him. “You work for me, in my sector. If you have an issue, that means I have an issue. Now I’m only going to ask this one more time: what the hell is going on in here?”

  “Just a disagreement,” Justin heard himself say.

  Shannon turned to face him. He hadn’t been this close to her since the incident on the hovercraft. He also hadn’t been stark naked at the time.

  He didn’t know if he should cover himself or if he should stand still. He reasoned that if he covered himself, it would convey some measure of weakness or insecurity, both to Shannon and Dirk. So he didn’t.

  She held his gaze for the longest she ever had. “If you or anyone else wants to file a formal complaint, take it up with HR. If you want to make it physical, do it on your own time and off company property. For all I care, you can both go suffocate yourselves outside the mining complex. But if I get wind of any more of this alpha-male bullshit, you’re both out. I’ll fly your asses off this rock in opposite directions if I have to. Crystal?”

  Justin nodded. “Clear.”

  Shannon shot him one last glare, then she turned to face Dirk. “Crystal?”

  Dirk slowly raised his arms and cupped his hands behind his head, his elbows pointing outward, and he pushed his pelvis toward her slightly. He grinned. “Oh, we’re good.”

  Shannon shook her head and walked past him, out of the shower, and into the bathroom. Amid the sounds of the streaming water, Justin heard the whoosh of the bathroom doors opening and shutting.

  Dirk glowered at Justin once more and then turned left and headed to a bank of showers. The trio of guys using it scattered, and Dirk’s posse followed him over to it.

  “JB.” Keontae nudged him. “Let’s split.”

  “I need to rinse off.”

  “Don’t bother. Use your towel or the sinks,” Keontae said, his voice low. “It ain’t worth the risk, man. Trust me.”

  Justin glanced back at Connie and Candy, who’d resumed their own showers. “What about the girls?”

  “Those boys won’t mess with them. They want us.” Keontae glanced at Dirk and his crew, half of whom stood under the running water, including Dirk, while the other half formed a loose perimeter around them, watching Justin and Keontae. “This could restart any time. Get your towel, and let’s go.”

  Justin nodded. He’d learned long ago to trust Keontae’s judgment and experience.

  He led the way out of the showers, grabbed his towel, and headed for the bathroom exit.

  Justin couldn’t keep from scratching his head at dinner. Not washing the shampoo out of his hair had inspired a persistent set of itches. He’d have to hit the showers again later that night.

  He and Keontae had gotten there early and now ate in silence. Normally, Keontae wouldn’t shut up.

  As more workers filtered into the cafeteria, Justin noticed Shannon and the head foreman, whose name he’d learned was Harold Skylar, heading toward a table in the corner. Several official-looking people in dress clothes, including Oafy the HR lady, already sat there. Justin recognized her bun of graying red hair.

  White lab coats occupied another table nearby, and another couple of tables seated others in far nicer attire than anything miners would wear. Segregation, classism—whatever. Justin didn’t care. He’d rather eat with other rockhounds anyway, as long as that didn’t include Dirk and his idiots.

  Worker-types, like him, occupied the rest of the cafeteria. Stecker and another security guard stood against the wall near one table in the back of the room. Its lone occupant, a woman with black hair draped over the shoulders of her white lab coat, picked at her food with her fork, held in her human hand.

  The left half of her face was metal.

  The cyborg? She had to be. He hadn’t seen anyone else with any metal parts whatsoever until that moment. He stared at her from across the room.

  Though he couldn’t be sure because of her lab coat, Justin figured she had a pretty good body under there—though he didn’t know how much of it was her and how much of it was metal. Her dark blue pant legs s
howed under the hem of her lab coat, and instead of heels, she wore a formidable pair of boots. Her left eye glowed with faint, blue light.

  Her left hand was metal, too.

  At first, Justin wondered if people didn’t want to sit with her because of her robotic parts, but then a few other scientists came over and set down trays loaded with food on the table. The instant their trays touched the Plastrex, the woman’s metal hand clanked on the table, and she stared at them, stoic, until they retrieved their trays and shuffled away.

  Maybe she and Dirk would get along. Justin smiled to himself and took another bite of his baked chicken.

  By the time they headed back to their room, Justin had gotten Keontae talking again.

  “Man, you know the New Germania Blazehawks can’t lose,” Keontae said. “I want my Electrosharks to beat ‘em, but I don’t think their powerback can make it happen. And your Glowing Gophers—which is a dumbass mascot, by the way—sure as hell don’t stand a chance.”

  “Hey.” Justin pointed his finger at Keontae. “Don’t knock the Double-G. We’ve won more Galactic Championships than any other team, all-time.”

  Keontae huffed. “Doesn’t make you relevant now. Just means you’re old news, bro.”

  As they approached their room, Justin noticed the door was open. He held up his hand, and Keontae stopped talking.

  “What?”

  Justin looked back at him.

  Keontae’s eyes widened. “The door’s open.”

  “Did you lock it?”

  Keontae shook his head. “I thought you did.”

  “I thought you did.”

  “Nah, bro. Sorry.”

  Justin cursed and darted toward the door.

  Inside, their mattresses lay on the floor, on top of each other, sandwiching their blankets and sheets. Their clothes lay strewn across the top of the mattress. On the very top of the pile sat their pillows with some sort of blue writing on them. A minty smell tinged the room.

  “What the hell?” Keontae pushed past Justin, and Justin followed him in. “You gotta be kidding me.”

  The same blue stuff covered their clothes, their bags, some of the carpet on their floor, and had even splattered on the sides of their beds and desks. In uneven, barely legible letters, the blue stuff spelled “pussy” and “bitch” on the pillows.

  Justin’s chest boiled. When he noticed the blue liquid oozing from the sheets between the mattresses, his anger flared hotter. He lifted the top mattress, and tendrils of blue goo stretched between the mattress and the blankets and sheets in the center.

  “Son of a bitch.” Justin dropped the mattress.

  Keontae picked up one of the pillows and sniffed it. “I think it’s toothpaste.”

  Justin turned toward the door. “I’m going to kill him.”

  Keontae grabbed Justin’s wrist. “Don’t.”

  Justin jerked free of his grasp. “No. This has gone too far. It went too far well before this.”

  “It’s not worth it, man. Let’s just report him to HR.”

  “HR won’t do shit. We can’t prove it was him.”

  “JB—”

  “Are you with me, or am I doing this by myself?” Justin snapped.

  Keontae sighed. “You know I’m with you, but—”

  “Then let’s go.” Justin stormed out of the room, turned left, and the edges of his vision turned red. At the end of the six-foot-wide corridor, standing just outside of his room, stood Dirk, his arms folded and grinning. Two of his buddies flanked him.

  Justin stopped about twenty feet away from Dirk, and Keontae came up behind him. “You’re an asshole.”

  Dirk and his friends laughed. Dirk’s grin resumed. “I see you found our welcoming gift?”

  “Yeah, I found it.” Justin’s hands balled into fists. “What the hell is your problem?”

  “You.” Dirk’s grin devolved into a scowl.

  “JB,” Keontae touched Justin’s shoulder. “We need to—”

  “This needs to stop. I don’t care if you beat my ass or I beat yours, but—”

  “It won’t be my ass that gets beat,” Dirk said.

  Justin’s eyes narrowed. “—but this stops right now. Crystal?”

  “Oh, we’re crystal, alright.” Dirk lowered his arms from his chest and clenched his hands into fists. “Come on over, pussy.”

  Justin took a step forward, but Keontae grabbed him and held him back. Justin twisted out of Keontae’s grasp and glared at him. “What’s your problem? You said we were doing this.”

  Keontae returned his glare. “Look around you.”

  “What?”

  “Just look.”

  Justin glanced over Keontae’s shoulder, and he realized why Keontae had stopped him.

  Pig-Nose, Reggie, and one of Dirk’s other friends stood behind them by about twenty feet, between them and their room.

  They’d walked into an ambush.

  8

  “I’m sorry, JB. I shoulda figured they’d try this,” Keontae said.

  Justin ground his teeth. “It’s not your fault they’re cowards.”

  “We’re in rough shape right now, JB. We’re gonna get beat bad.”

  “If it puts a stop to their bullshit, then we need to do it anyway.”

  Keontae nodded. “I’m with you, bro. I don’t like it, but I’m with you.”

  “Any suggestions before we get thrashed?”

  “Don’t get hit. Move your head when they swing at you. Keep your hands up by your cheekbones.” Keontae shrugged. “We’ll last longer if we can do that.”

  “Hey,” Dirk called. “You pussies gonna do this, or not?”

  “We should also try to take one side before the other. If we can take Dirk down, maybe the rest will back off?” Justin suggested.

  “We can try, but these boys don’t seem like the type to quit, no matter what.” Keontae shook his head. “But it’s a better strategy than each of us tryin’ to fight off three of them at once.”

  Justin nodded and held out his fist to Keontae. “Then let’s go.”

  Keontae bumped it with his own. “Been nice knowin’ you.”

  Justin and Keontae stormed toward Dirk and the other two guys.

  Dirk’s friends started forward first, and Dirk followed.

  Behind Dirk, the door to the corridor swooshed open.

  “Hey!” a loud male voice called.

  Everyone stopped, and Dirk turned around.

  Justin couldn’t see who it was at first, but then a smaller, bulky figure in black pushed past Dirk and his friends. Silver hair. A salt-and-pepper goatee. Utility belt. Tactical boots.

  Stecker.

  He pointed at Justin and Keontae, completely ignoring Dirk and his friends. “I was just looking for you two.”

  Justin and Keontae glanced at each other, and Justin asked, “Us?”

  Stecker’s partner, the younger security guard who’d accompanied him in the cafeteria, threaded between Dirk and his friends as well.

  “Yes, you.” Stecker approached them. “Heard you had some issues. I’m here to help.”

  Justin squinted at him and tilted his head. “What?”

  Stecker pointed over his shoulder with his thumb. “See that black circle above the corridor door? Security camera. Direct feed to our office. They let me know you were having trouble, and I came right over.”

  Justin’s eyebrows rose as he looked at the circle. “I didn’t—”

  “Yeah, we wanted to keep it a secret for longer, too, but it’s no use now.” Stecker looked over Justin’s shoulder. “You boys go on back to your rooms, now. This doesn’t concern you.”

  Justin glanced back. Pig-Nose, Reggie, and the other guy looked at each other for a moment, but they didn’t move. When Justin looked ahead again, Stecker’s partner had started to usher Dirk and his other friends back into their rooms.

  Dirk glared at Justin, or at Stecker—maybe both—but he complied.

  “Excuse me,” Stecker called to them again
. “Did you hear me? Do you have ears? You need to return to your rooms right now.”

  Justin couldn’t believe it, and from Keontae’s wide eyes and open mouth, he couldn’t either. Justin looked again, and the trio behind them turned back down the corridor. Ahead of them, Dirk and the other two disappeared into their rooms.

  “Good. Now what seems to be the problem?” Stecker asked.

  “They trashed our room.”

  “Well, let’s go have a look, shall we?” Stecker gave them a grin and started ahead of them toward their room.

  Justin eyed Keontae again, and they both shrugged.

  Stecker whistled and shook his head. “Haven’t seen a mess this bad since my kid blew up her science project awhile back. She made one of those volcanoes that shoots the fake orange lava everywhere—and I mean everywhere. You boys know where the laundry room is?”

  Justin nodded. “At the far end of the corridor.”

  “Bingo. I’ll radio for a pair of androids to come down here and assist. This all needs to get washed right away. You don’t want blue stains on your stuff forever, do you?”

  Justin shook his head.

  Stecker called it in, then he turned back to Justin. “Do me a favor, both of you? Use those sheets and try to sop up as much of the blue stuff as you can from the carpet, the desks, and the beds. It should come off the furniture easy.”

  “Sure.” This was so surreal. Justin glanced at Keontae again.

  They both should’ve been laid out by now, bloody, bruised, and beaten with Dirk and his posse standing over them. Instead, Stecker had appeared and saved them.

  But had he done anything but delay the inevitable?

  “While you’re doing that, I’ll make sure one of the custodial bots comes in here to steam the carpet for you. Don’t want that to set in. I’ll order fresh linens for you, too.”

  Justin and Keontae had just finished wiping things up when two chrome figures appeared in the doorway. Blue lights marked their wrists, ankles, and chests, and their glowing blue eyes scanned the room.

  In an electronic voice, one of them said, “We are here to assist.”