The Vicious Delinquents

They were kids with personality problems, so they joined tough gangs, living only to fight and kill. Society had to find a way to correct—
Two or three things worried me on my trip back to the hideout. So my astrogation was sloppy and I kept losing Jupiter's shadow.
First, there was the showdown with Naomi over who would lead the Callisto gang. This meant another degravity fight with python whips and steel claws. Having just gotten rid of the old battle scars on my cheek, shoulder and breast, I wasn't so eager to have my title back on the same disfiguring terms.
On the other hand, wouldn't the girls take it as a sign of cowardice if I tried to settle peaceably for second in command?
Next, I kept thinking about the money I'd taken from my parents the day before. What amazed me was how they could be so stupid as to believe I would go to Mars and enroll in that technical school. Two thousand solars was just enough to buy this sweet secondhand 2064 model Spacer coupe. The gals in our ordnance crew would rig it up with missile launchers, turn it into a killer, flagship of our fleet.
But just now my ship was unarmed, defenseless. And as I approached our base on airless, rocky Callisto I again had the feeling I was being followed, trailed in space.
Not by any of the Io boys; I was pretty sure of that. Because that brave gang will always attack when the odds are five to one in their favor. And not by the police either: They've always left us alone. Someone else.
I circled Jupiter's fifth moon warily, searching a half million square miles of space for the suspected other rocket, but my instruments detected nothing man-made. So I radioed the password and hastily set down in the mouth of a giant natural cave entrance—the airlock of our underground hideout.
While air hissed into the chamber I strapped on my weapons belt and glanced in the doorway mirror. Not—mind you—because there's anything particularly feminine about me, but it's still such a surprise not to find a face full of claw marks that I studied my appearance with a kind of stranger's curiosity. Even without scars, I would hardly call myself an attractive girl.

Mark Reinsberg
Содержание

О книге

Язык

Английский

Год издания

2021-04-22

Темы

Science fiction; Young women -- Fiction; Gangs -- Fiction; Callisto (Satellite) -- Fiction

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