Soldier of Fortune: A Gideon Quinn Adventure (Fortune Chronicles Book 1) Read Online Free PDF Page A

Tall, lean, wary as the draco on his shoulder, there was something in his solitude that compelled one to take a second look.
    And then there were his eyes.
    Wolf eyes, one passing rigger thought whimsically, until those very eyes paused briefly over hers, leaving her a great deal less whimsical and a great deal more sad.
    Not that Gideon noticed the rigger's empathetic response. All he'd seen, all he'd let himself see, was a woman walking away, and so turned from the reminder of departure's past to hear a handful of the Ramushku's crew swearing they smelled rain in the air.
    Rain.
    Gideon hadn't experienced a drop of rain in over six years. At the mere thought, he felt himself go weak at the knees.
    Maybe there would be a downpour.
    Maybe he could just lay down on the open airfield and bask in the sheer wetness of it all.
    Or maybe that would be weird.
    Probably it would.
    He sighed and closed his eyes, trying to imagine how it would feel to be utterly drenched.
    "It had to be Nike."
    He opened them again to see Horatio Alva, theoretically reformed grifter and fellow parolee, joining him.
    "All the cities in all the colonies and they decide to dump us in bleedin' Nike."
    Gideon looked at Nike's skyline, then at the native Nikean. "Not anxious to see the hometown?"
    "More it ain't anxious to see me." Horatio glowered at the nearby city but, as the airfield's lights began shimmering to life, Gideon thought he spied a flash of quiet yearning in the other man's eyes.
    "Bugger this," Horatio said, ignorant of Gideon's speculations. "I'm for the river. I'll lay odds there's at least one steamer shipping out tonight." He glanced at Gideon. "You want to come along? You got skills, and like as not one of them boats will be heading Tesla way."
    "Thanks," Gideon said, "but I doubt Tesla would be too happy to see me, either."
    Besides, if Gideon read Satsuke's murky intentions correctly, Gideon had business in Nike.
    "You can never find Earth, again," Horatio quoted, still staring at the city.
    "Who'd want to?"
    Horatio's response was a bark of a laugh. "True enough," he said as he shouldered his own restored possessions and turned for the riverside wharf. "Good luck to ya’, Quinn."
    Because luck and I are on such good terms , Gideon thought. "You too," he said, but Horatio was already moving. In moments, he was little more than one shadow amidst many, and soon lost to sight.
    Gideon turned his back on the river to find himself alone at the base of the gangplank. From here, he could see the Ramushku's crew disappearing into the airfield's control center. Of the other ex-convicts returning to society, there was no sign.
    Maybe, like Horatio, they'd all decided to take ship elsewhere. Or maybe they were simply anxious to see something of the world before their recidivistic nature got them pulled out of it again. Either way, they’d all moved on while Gideon remained standing in the middle of the airfield with no clear plan of action.
    Possibly his uncertainty came from the fact that, for the past six years, his life had belonged to the corrections officers of Morton, and before that to the Corps and before that to Fagin Martine. And while Martine was a thief-maker, the Corps military and Morton a prison, each possessed their own rigid structure and crystal-sharp discipline.
    Now, here he was, and no one was telling him where to be, when to sleep, what to eat or who to kill and maybe, just maybe, it was more independence than he could handle.
    Except, if he were being honest with himself, he’d never been the most compliant dodger in Martine’s hive, and his Corps personnel file held half again as many reprimands as citations — and he didn’t even want to count how many hours punishment labor he’d pulled in Morton.
    And no one had ordered him to love Dani… or to send her away.
    For her own good , his ever so helpful self reminded him.
    Gideon, tired of himself already, shook free of the introspective chatter with a hiss — which