I woke in a bed, not my own. Too long by far, and too soft. The bunks on the Bucket were simple foam mattresses. This was a full-on active body molding material. I shifted and the mattress shifted beneath me, catching my weight as I half rolled.

  A sting in my arm, and a pressure, pulling me back into full prone position. Not good. Too late to pretend sleep. And my gut felt like a black hole.

  I opened my eyes, blinked twice before realizing what I was seeing.

  Hao, staring down at me. Maia, sitting by the bed. Soft green walls, with the Raist eyeball-on-a-stick logo above the door. White sheets. Largest com readout I’d ever seen in a private room. White surgical smock instead of my clothes, nothing but tubes and med pads beneath it.

  “Good evening, Captain,” Hao said, standing at attention by my bed. I noticed that the cut above her eyebrow had healed.

  “How long?” I said.

  “A week,” Maia replied. “You had a trasher round embedded in the shoulder. It failed to detonate, but the medics were very careful and wished to keep you comatose until they could disarm it. Then they figured to keep you sedated to speed the healing.”

  “Can’t blame them for that,” I said. Fools and dreamers. I’d had the fate’s own luck there. Trasher rounds were high-explosive semi-piercing. Made to penetrate and detonate.

  “Luck,” Maia said with a smile.

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  “The Captain’s too crudmucking stubborn to die,” Hao said. She tried to sound gruff, but failed. They’d been worried. “The Raist’s crew refused to let us in until this morning,” she said.

  “The kid?” I said.

  “Up and obnoxious,” Maia replied.

  “He asked her to marry him,” Hao said with barely concealed glee. “That makes sixty-three.”

  “Sixty-four,” Maia corrected. “One of his relatives proposed as well. Not that I am counting. At least he took no for an answer.”

  I laughed. I was starving, and the room smelled of fresh-baked pizza. With spiced meat, unless I was mistaken.

  “Popular as ever,” I said. “Where’s the food?”

  “He’s fine,” Hao said, sliding a plate holding half of a still-hot pie my way. I dove in, rolling up the crunchy dough and letting the fat drip from my fingers. Salami, from chicken, and hot peppers.

  “Fill me in,” I said. “What’s happened in a week?”

  “Trade, mostly,” Maia said. “We have what we came for.”

  That caused me to pause, but there were olives on the pizza, real ones, salty and sharp at once, and I couldn’t resist stuffing another bite in.

  “What, all of it?” I said.

  “All,” Maia confirmed. “We were offered family rates.”

  I coughed, spraying my fresh sheets with crumbs, a piece of pizza sticking in my throat.

  Family rates. Not trade rates, not associate rates, not even ship rates. Family rates. It meant that the Radell family had decided to give us a huge apology. Family rates meant zero profit. We were buying at production cost. Below it, likely, since the Raist would have reciprocity deals with other trade fleet ships. Young Voice must have really talked us up.

  “Void,” I said when I’d recovered. “That’s amazing.”

  “I’ve got something more amazing,” Hao said. She relaxed her military stance, pulling a battered shape from behind her back.

  My stockman, the leather freshly polished, the flat crown set correctly, the scuffs removed from the wide brims. Tears gathered in the corners of my eyes.

  “I’m going to cry,” I said.

  Hao merely grinned.

  “Wait ‘till you see what they’ve done to the Bucket,” she said, and handed me my hat.