Space station of the sluts

He gave her a friendly smile, and Megan forced herself to return it. The man was certainly pleasant. But he was a pleasant outsider, and one she was likely going to owe a lot of money.

“How much are we talking to fix it?” she asked bluntly.

Shaylan sighed. He looked faintly wounded, as if he’d been hoping for more small talk, or at least more alien fantasies. “Depends on how fast you want it done,” he told her. “The crap’s everywhere right now. If we ship in a station’s worth of spare oxygen, I could have you clean in a day, plus travel time. Generating your own from hydroponics…that’ll take longer.”

Megan kept her expression neutral. “Longer” was an understatement. Hydroponics had been hit almost dead-on by the meteor. Jury-rigged tanks of algae grown from backup stock were keeping them afloat, but venting whole sections’ worth of atmosphere — on top of what they’d already lost in the initial impact — would start to tax her slender reserves very quickly. And the Consortium rep knew it, obviously. He had access to the same data she did, damn him.