Read Online The Recollection by Gareth L. Powell - Free Book Online Page A

Kat directly, and there was something contagious about his shyness. Ears still hot, she led him up the ladder, and steered him into the co-pilot’s chair.
    Although it would take another three hours to reach their assigned berth, the Quay already filled the entire forward view. It comprised a row of fifty rotating wheels, stacked on a single axle, each one a kilometre in width and over ten in diameter. Navigation lights blinked on their rims.
    “There are three main sections,” Kat said, pointing them out, hoping to hide her self-consciousness by playing tour guide. She told him of the Medina , which lay along the non-rotating axle of the stack. It was the heart and soul of the docks, where on any day of the year you could find ships from six or seven merchant families, and pick up passengers, cargoes and diseases from a hundred different worlds. A place where you could walk down the central concourse between the bays and see the stalls laid out in front of each ship, heaped with knickknacks, weapons and curios from planets and systems a dozen light years away. Around that, the Dharamshala occupied the rim of the wheels, where spin gravity provided a comfortable abode for more than a million permanent inhabitants, and temporary accommodation for a transient population of more than a million travellers, traders and pilgrims. And lastly, the Observance lurked in the spokes and interstices of the station. It was the home of the Acolytes: a place of corridors that smelled of patchouli and sandalwood. A place of improvised laboratories and observatories, and temples filled with people from all corners of known space, here to see, study and worship the Dho.
    “Technically, the planet’s called Strauli and the docks are called Strauli Quay,” she said. “They’re politically independent, but over the years, the names have become interchangeable.”
    In theory, all starports were autonomous, neutral territories. To safeguard trade, the local authorities had no jurisdiction over visiting starships. It was only when passengers or cargo left the port’s environs that they had to submit to local customs and taxes.
    Kat looked over. If Drake’s eyes had been wide when he saw her in her ship suit, they were now as round as rocket exhausts. Watching from her couch, she smiled.
    “Surely this can’t be all that impressive to a boy from the Bubble Belt?”
    Drake shook his head.
    “No, you don’t understand. This is different. Nobody knows who built the Belt, but all this”—he swept his arm at the rotating docks—“all this is man-made.”
    With an obvious effort, he pulled his gaze from the forward view.
    “Does that make any sense?”
    Kat smiled.
    “So,” she said, nodding her head back toward the hatch that lead down to the lounge and the Acolyte waiting within. “Do you have any idea why they sent for you?”
    Drake glanced nervously over his shoulder. When he spoke, he leaned close, his voice low.
    “Not really. I’ve been kind of assuming it’s got something to do with James Harris. He was my professor at the university, and he came out here a few years ago, to study the Dho.”
    “Do you think he recommended you?”
    “I don’t know. Maybe.”
    A warning light appeared in Kat’s right eye. She hooked her implant back into the ship’s sensorium.
    > Trouble.
    The ship had detected another vessel emerging from jump a few thousand kilometres in their wake.
    “Is that Victor’s ship?”
    > Yes. Transponder ping confirms it as the Tristero . Besides, I’d recognise that ragged-ass drive signature anywhere.
    “What’s it doing?”
    > Mostly bitching about our little stunt. I’m seeing a lot of comms traffic to the Port Authority.
    Kat twisted a smile. Victor could complain all he wanted. This was her turf and her family commanded a lot of respect on the Quay. Now that they’d welcomed her back into the fold, there was little he could do to touch her.
    “Can we beat them into dock?”
    > Oh yes. At best