Luna: New Moon

VTO maintains a fleet of ten transporters stationed at widely dispersed locations around the moon. They are the emergency service, the ambulance, the rescue team, the lifeboat. Nowhere is more than thirty minutes flying time from a transporter hub. Nik Vorontsov commands the fleet and is occasional pilot, engineer and lover of his ugly moonships. They are dearer to him than any of his children.

‘So, you come all the way from John of God to lick my ugly babies and tell me they are beautiful?’ Nik Vorotnsov asks. He says the name of the city in Globo because he has always made a play about how impossible it is to pronounce Portuguese. He and Rafa are old university friends. They studied together, they gymmed together: weights and body culture. Nik went further up Muscle Road than Rafa, but Rafa has made it business to keep on top of the sport to be able to discuss supplements and training regimes with his former gym buddy when they meet at the Nevsky Bar in Meridian over vodka.

‘I came all the way from João de Deus to hire one of your babies,’ Rafa says.

‘Any baby in particular?’

‘Sokol at Luna 18.’ Knowing the locations of the VTO lifeboats is core surface-work knowledge, as is an up-to-date rescue insurance.

‘So sorry. That baby is rotated out for maintenance,’ Nik Vorontsov says.

‘What about Pustelga at Joliot?’

‘Ah. Pustelga. Still waiting spaceworthiness certification. The LDC is so slow.’

‘That’s the entire Tranquillity-Serenity-Crisium sector without any cover.’

‘I know. It’s deplorable. Civil servants – hah. What can I do about it? Be careful out there.’

Rafa slaps Orel’s landing leg.

‘This one.’

‘When do you need her?’

‘A forty-eight-hour wet lease, from now.’

Nik Vorontsov sucks in the air through his teeth and Rafa knows that Orel will not be available for that time, that no Vorontsov transporter will be available. Rafa’s jaw and belly muscles tighten. Anger blisters hot across his face, his hands. The personal touch, he had assured Lucas. Business is all about relationships. Now he has come all this way in his stylish clothes and groomed hair and manicured hands to be made to look like a fool by this Vorontsov blockhouse.

‘How much do you need?’

‘Rafa, this is undignified.’

‘Who got to you?’

‘Rafa, this is not good talk.’

‘The Mackenzies. Was it Duncan, or did the old man crank himself up to doing it personally? Family to family. Robert, it’ll have been Robert. Tying up the transporter fleet, that’s his sense of style. Duncan never had any style. Did he ask you personally, or did it ping up to old Valery and he told you to jump?’

‘Rafa, I think you should leave now.’

Rage bursts inside Rafa, a surge of boiling blood. He is shouting in Nik Vorontsov’s face, speckling him with spittle.

‘You want to make an enemy of me? You want to make an enemy of my family? This is the Cortas. We can fuck you so many ways you will never get out from it. Who the fuck are you? Bus drivers and cabbies.’

Nik Vorontsov wipes the back of his hand across his face.

‘Rafa—’

‘Fuck you, we don’t need you. We will get this claim, and then the Cortas will fucking deal with you.’ Rafa petulantly kicks the transporter’s landing leg. Nik Vorontsov roars in Russian and Corta security has Rafa’s arms pinioned. They came out of nowhere, silent, well-dressed, strong.

‘Senhor, let’s go.’

‘Let me fucking go!’ Rafa shouts to his bodyguards.

‘I’m afraid not, Senhor,’ says the first escolta, wrestling Rafa away from Nik Vorontsov.

‘I’m ordering you,’ Rafa says.

‘We’re not on your orders,’ says First Escolta.

‘Lucas Corta’s apologies for any slight to your family, Senhor Vorontsov,’ says Second Escolta, a tall woman in a well-cut suit.

‘Get your boss the fuck off my base!’ Nikolai Vorontsov roars.

‘At once senhor,’ says Second Security. Rafa spits as he is manhandled towards the door. The gob flies far and elegantly in the lunar gravity. Nik Vorontsov dodges it easily but it isn’t aimed at him. It’s aimed at his ship, his baby, his precious Orel.

The Professional Handball Owners Club is small, comfortable, intensely private. It displays a flagrant discretion: leave your escoltas at the door. The clubs heavily-muscular security tap left forefingers to their pineal glands as you pass: no familiars. The staff will politely remind you until you comply. The club is sporty not luxurious; its ambiance recalls university colloquiums. It has two dozen members, all of them men.