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fill this thread with chaos, ya say?
fill this thread with chaos, ya say?
Less like chaos and more like quadruple-posting, really.
fill this thread with chaos, ya say?
aplay sounds/rimshot.wav
aplay sounds/rimshot.wav
Chapter 19
It was quickly apparent to Chi that the rules of the game had changed. She kept on scanning faces as she moved past people, an old quirk she had acquired, and two of the faces kept appearing in the background, unobtrusive, non-interfering. Both of the faces were young men with healthy complexions, a bit too healthy for the run-of-the-mill station inhabitants. Especially down in the lower commercial area where her contact was waiting. She had ignored the contact completely and instead walked over to the noodle shop opposite the meeting point, enquiring about the Verasi-spiced eel, the signal to her contact that she had been compromised. Fortunately, she happened to like the dish as well and took her time savouring the delicacy. Not as good as the five star cuisines they served at "Pearls of Sus" but then again, few places could compete with Dau's top restaurant. She wiped her mouth, tossed the bowl and sticks into the recycler, and started off towards the lower residential hub. A fairly large cart moved in front of her and she stopped to let it pass. At the same time, a couple of men started shouting at the cart driver, insinuating that the cart drivers mother was of fairly exotic genetic heritage and the cart driver responded that the two men were able to perform certain anatomically impossible actions on themselves. Chi smiled, that had been slick, so very slick. Only her years of experience made her notice the faintest of brushings against the onyx hairpin that kept her hair from her eyes. She had been tagged. And expertly too. The cart moved past and she moved away from the open area and into the connecting tunnels, onto the "park" area that served as the entrance to the residential area proper. The two young men had disappeared. Chi walked over to a bench, bent down to fix her shoe and leaned back to relax for a bit. Her contact would arrive when she was ready.
###
Asteroth grinned when he read the message from Aera. That double X official had giant balls of steel. He only changed the message slightly before sending it to his own contact in UIT, sending the second part to Pinhead. No doubt the Itani sociopath would relish the opportunity to wreak mayhem on Daltas Hold and get paid for it at the same time. He was right, it only took six seconds before Pinhead was on the other end of a secure line.
"Ast, you gotta level with me here. Confirm that you want the critter delivered to Daltas Hold, stasis lock powered down?"
"Yes, bay D-I-17. It must be that bay, it will be open and the airlock will be unsecure. I'd suggest putting a thirty-second timer on the stasis lock to give you time to get away. You know how vengeful they become once they have seen their captors."
The chuckle at the other end was put through three different filters before reaching Asteroth but he could still hear the nervousness in Pinhead's voice.
"You bet your sweet ass I'll put a timer on. I am not going to be anywhere near that station when it realises that it is free. What's the story with the solid boosters?"
"Seems they have some kind of power-out. They can't launch you from the bay and they would really like you to not use the fusion flame inside the bay."
"But they are okay with dumping the critter? They are fucking nuts Ast. I hope you have been paid already or we ain't gonna see that money ever."
"Yeah, I am sorted. Let me know when you have dropped the cargo, yeah?"
"Wilco boss. Pinhead out."
The hissing of the secure line died and Asteroth was left floating in the cockpit of his 107. He probably needed to call some backup just in case it went FUBAR. Work to do, not enough time to do it in.
###
".... Ligia, Dalwe, l'Wone, Prentiss..."
Buzz kept introducing the inhabitants of the large room that had once been the a storage room for food items but was now the territory of the collected misfits that had bunched together for warmth, security and food. John had stopped paying attention a long time ago and scanned for faces he could recognise. Gramps had a concentrated look on his face and John suspected that each and every one of the inhabitants were tagged and stored for future reference. He was also pretty sure that Gramps could remember all of the names, a scary thought.
"..and Rose, I believe you have met."
John's attention snapped back into focus at the petite young girl that was wrapped in many layers of brightly coloured clothing, her fine features beaming a smile up at him. John smiled his million credit patented Hero™ smile back at the uncut gem, grabbed the single vermillion rose that he had carried in a dimensional pocket on his chest and brought it forward to within a millimetre of the beautiful girl's nose, the girl who's eyes shone and glittered like opals before the rays of a rising sun. The rose had the intended effect and the girl blushed heavily, almost swooned and dropped herself into his...
"Hi John. Where is Waldoze?"
John closed his mouth and managed to smile loopsided.
"Dunno Rose, haven't seen him in a bit. Something with illegal Corvus Holo disks I assume."
Buzz grinned at that and pointed to the drop-bag on John's hip.
"You said something about sharing John? I bet the crowd here would be grateful for a taste of the liquid gold you have buddy."
John nodded absentmindedly and let Buzz take the two spare bottles of Helio Mists. He had a hard time understanding how the station had descended into the chaos he saw all around him. He grabbed Rose's arm and dragged her to the side.
"Rose, what happened?"
With a pained look on her face, she looked down to the deck before replying,
"I guess it all started to go really wrong when Uncle Xi appeared to tell us all that it was perfectly okay and that the powerouts were normal. Not long after that, the first fighting started around the main commercial hub. Our bodyguards were cut down as some of the first and the Pear was taken with us inside. They used the Pear as their base I guess you can call it, while they killed off anyone that resisted. I, they..."
She stopped talking, the tremor in her voice making it impossible for her to hide the raw fear and loathing that she tried to suppress. John moved his fingers to her chin and forced the beautiful eyes that were the highlights and gems of a pretty face, to face his own and wiped the tears that had welled up in response to the emotional pain she had been subjected to. With his finger's soft caress, a smile forced itself upon her delicate features and John Eldritch, Deep Space Alien Crusher, smiled his own patented Hero smile back the girl, reassuring her that he was here now, everything would be good, he would take care of her and make sure she.... grasped her shoulder and squeezed it gently for comfort. Silently and naturally, Rose moved in close to John and hugged him for comfort, sobbing silently. Not really knowing what would be appropriate, he just stood there, one arm on her shoulder and let him be hugged until she stopped sobbing. She moved slightly back, dried her eyes and looked back up at him.
"Sorry, it was… kind of rough at times. They used us as presents, as rewards and even as furniture. They did things that you can't imagine to the staff inside. I only managed to get away because of Buzz, because he short-circuited the power conduits to the Pear. Well, two of us got away but Leila was picked up yesterday by a roving XX patrol."
"Rose, who did this, who are these "they" you refer to?", John asked.
"I am not sure. I think they were the private security guards that looked after the prison and the docks. I think I recognised one or two of them."
John didn't say anything; he didn't have to. The Rent-a-Cops that were employed by the various grey space stations instead of real police were generally one of three kinds. The kind that couldn't be a real cop, the kind that had been kicked from a previous job in nation space and the kind of filth that not even the pirates would call their own. In a situation like this, he wasn't surprised that the last group would surface as the parasites they were. John looked around for Gramps and found him sitting next to two tired looking men with Buzz sitting behind him. John walked over and nodded in greeting. Gramps turned, a look of fierce determination painted on his face.
"John, I think the people here have bigger problems than we do. Looks like Hortie will have to ride this one out for a bit longer on his own, agreed?"
John just nodded and then sat down to hear what it was that Gramps had been told.
###
Trulo suited up, his augmented environmental suit heavy with power assists, tools, cabling and air. The others had been suited before him but he was simply too tired to care one bit. Every waking hour for the last week, he had been outside tweaking one or the other of the engines that provided what little power they had. Not to think of the one time they had to move in to the centre of the station and lubricate the main drive wheels in the residential hub. That had been a nightmare of a journey through the service corridors to avoid what gang activity that was still around. Still, they had run into one of the smaller gangs and had been forced to hand over six tubes of lubrication and a hydrospanner for their passage. This time they had to do some vital service on the K-level engine. It had started stuttering and as a consequence had started a slight wobble in the hub. One of his mechanics ran over from the sparse facilities they called home these days and handed him a note.
"Mr Mithans. The following doors need to be checked and bypassed for access. In the unlikely event that someone in an emergency, docks at any of the bays, they need to be able to secure instant access to the station. For the duration of this situation, the Xang Xi board have decided that normal station security will be secondary to the emergency procedures. This assignment has priority. Signed, Aera Hitro."
The paper ended ith a long list of bay door names. Trulo handed the paper back and sighed. Too much work and not enough time to do it. He'd go by the outer doors on the way to the engine and then fix a couple more when he came back. He signalled his crew and on weary legs, they followed him into the air-lock.
It was quickly apparent to Chi that the rules of the game had changed. She kept on scanning faces as she moved past people, an old quirk she had acquired, and two of the faces kept appearing in the background, unobtrusive, non-interfering. Both of the faces were young men with healthy complexions, a bit too healthy for the run-of-the-mill station inhabitants. Especially down in the lower commercial area where her contact was waiting. She had ignored the contact completely and instead walked over to the noodle shop opposite the meeting point, enquiring about the Verasi-spiced eel, the signal to her contact that she had been compromised. Fortunately, she happened to like the dish as well and took her time savouring the delicacy. Not as good as the five star cuisines they served at "Pearls of Sus" but then again, few places could compete with Dau's top restaurant. She wiped her mouth, tossed the bowl and sticks into the recycler, and started off towards the lower residential hub. A fairly large cart moved in front of her and she stopped to let it pass. At the same time, a couple of men started shouting at the cart driver, insinuating that the cart drivers mother was of fairly exotic genetic heritage and the cart driver responded that the two men were able to perform certain anatomically impossible actions on themselves. Chi smiled, that had been slick, so very slick. Only her years of experience made her notice the faintest of brushings against the onyx hairpin that kept her hair from her eyes. She had been tagged. And expertly too. The cart moved past and she moved away from the open area and into the connecting tunnels, onto the "park" area that served as the entrance to the residential area proper. The two young men had disappeared. Chi walked over to a bench, bent down to fix her shoe and leaned back to relax for a bit. Her contact would arrive when she was ready.
###
Asteroth grinned when he read the message from Aera. That double X official had giant balls of steel. He only changed the message slightly before sending it to his own contact in UIT, sending the second part to Pinhead. No doubt the Itani sociopath would relish the opportunity to wreak mayhem on Daltas Hold and get paid for it at the same time. He was right, it only took six seconds before Pinhead was on the other end of a secure line.
"Ast, you gotta level with me here. Confirm that you want the critter delivered to Daltas Hold, stasis lock powered down?"
"Yes, bay D-I-17. It must be that bay, it will be open and the airlock will be unsecure. I'd suggest putting a thirty-second timer on the stasis lock to give you time to get away. You know how vengeful they become once they have seen their captors."
The chuckle at the other end was put through three different filters before reaching Asteroth but he could still hear the nervousness in Pinhead's voice.
"You bet your sweet ass I'll put a timer on. I am not going to be anywhere near that station when it realises that it is free. What's the story with the solid boosters?"
"Seems they have some kind of power-out. They can't launch you from the bay and they would really like you to not use the fusion flame inside the bay."
"But they are okay with dumping the critter? They are fucking nuts Ast. I hope you have been paid already or we ain't gonna see that money ever."
"Yeah, I am sorted. Let me know when you have dropped the cargo, yeah?"
"Wilco boss. Pinhead out."
The hissing of the secure line died and Asteroth was left floating in the cockpit of his 107. He probably needed to call some backup just in case it went FUBAR. Work to do, not enough time to do it in.
###
".... Ligia, Dalwe, l'Wone, Prentiss..."
Buzz kept introducing the inhabitants of the large room that had once been the a storage room for food items but was now the territory of the collected misfits that had bunched together for warmth, security and food. John had stopped paying attention a long time ago and scanned for faces he could recognise. Gramps had a concentrated look on his face and John suspected that each and every one of the inhabitants were tagged and stored for future reference. He was also pretty sure that Gramps could remember all of the names, a scary thought.
"..and Rose, I believe you have met."
John's attention snapped back into focus at the petite young girl that was wrapped in many layers of brightly coloured clothing, her fine features beaming a smile up at him. John smiled his million credit patented Hero™ smile back at the uncut gem, grabbed the single vermillion rose that he had carried in a dimensional pocket on his chest and brought it forward to within a millimetre of the beautiful girl's nose, the girl who's eyes shone and glittered like opals before the rays of a rising sun. The rose had the intended effect and the girl blushed heavily, almost swooned and dropped herself into his...
"Hi John. Where is Waldoze?"
John closed his mouth and managed to smile loopsided.
"Dunno Rose, haven't seen him in a bit. Something with illegal Corvus Holo disks I assume."
Buzz grinned at that and pointed to the drop-bag on John's hip.
"You said something about sharing John? I bet the crowd here would be grateful for a taste of the liquid gold you have buddy."
John nodded absentmindedly and let Buzz take the two spare bottles of Helio Mists. He had a hard time understanding how the station had descended into the chaos he saw all around him. He grabbed Rose's arm and dragged her to the side.
"Rose, what happened?"
With a pained look on her face, she looked down to the deck before replying,
"I guess it all started to go really wrong when Uncle Xi appeared to tell us all that it was perfectly okay and that the powerouts were normal. Not long after that, the first fighting started around the main commercial hub. Our bodyguards were cut down as some of the first and the Pear was taken with us inside. They used the Pear as their base I guess you can call it, while they killed off anyone that resisted. I, they..."
She stopped talking, the tremor in her voice making it impossible for her to hide the raw fear and loathing that she tried to suppress. John moved his fingers to her chin and forced the beautiful eyes that were the highlights and gems of a pretty face, to face his own and wiped the tears that had welled up in response to the emotional pain she had been subjected to. With his finger's soft caress, a smile forced itself upon her delicate features and John Eldritch, Deep Space Alien Crusher, smiled his own patented Hero smile back the girl, reassuring her that he was here now, everything would be good, he would take care of her and make sure she.... grasped her shoulder and squeezed it gently for comfort. Silently and naturally, Rose moved in close to John and hugged him for comfort, sobbing silently. Not really knowing what would be appropriate, he just stood there, one arm on her shoulder and let him be hugged until she stopped sobbing. She moved slightly back, dried her eyes and looked back up at him.
"Sorry, it was… kind of rough at times. They used us as presents, as rewards and even as furniture. They did things that you can't imagine to the staff inside. I only managed to get away because of Buzz, because he short-circuited the power conduits to the Pear. Well, two of us got away but Leila was picked up yesterday by a roving XX patrol."
"Rose, who did this, who are these "they" you refer to?", John asked.
"I am not sure. I think they were the private security guards that looked after the prison and the docks. I think I recognised one or two of them."
John didn't say anything; he didn't have to. The Rent-a-Cops that were employed by the various grey space stations instead of real police were generally one of three kinds. The kind that couldn't be a real cop, the kind that had been kicked from a previous job in nation space and the kind of filth that not even the pirates would call their own. In a situation like this, he wasn't surprised that the last group would surface as the parasites they were. John looked around for Gramps and found him sitting next to two tired looking men with Buzz sitting behind him. John walked over and nodded in greeting. Gramps turned, a look of fierce determination painted on his face.
"John, I think the people here have bigger problems than we do. Looks like Hortie will have to ride this one out for a bit longer on his own, agreed?"
John just nodded and then sat down to hear what it was that Gramps had been told.
###
Trulo suited up, his augmented environmental suit heavy with power assists, tools, cabling and air. The others had been suited before him but he was simply too tired to care one bit. Every waking hour for the last week, he had been outside tweaking one or the other of the engines that provided what little power they had. Not to think of the one time they had to move in to the centre of the station and lubricate the main drive wheels in the residential hub. That had been a nightmare of a journey through the service corridors to avoid what gang activity that was still around. Still, they had run into one of the smaller gangs and had been forced to hand over six tubes of lubrication and a hydrospanner for their passage. This time they had to do some vital service on the K-level engine. It had started stuttering and as a consequence had started a slight wobble in the hub. One of his mechanics ran over from the sparse facilities they called home these days and handed him a note.
"Mr Mithans. The following doors need to be checked and bypassed for access. In the unlikely event that someone in an emergency, docks at any of the bays, they need to be able to secure instant access to the station. For the duration of this situation, the Xang Xi board have decided that normal station security will be secondary to the emergency procedures. This assignment has priority. Signed, Aera Hitro."
The paper ended ith a long list of bay door names. Trulo handed the paper back and sighed. Too much work and not enough time to do it. He'd go by the outer doors on the way to the engine and then fix a couple more when he came back. He signalled his crew and on weary legs, they followed him into the air-lock.
Chapter 20
The effect was probably best likened to swimming in warm syrup. With your mouth open and dressed in a papersuit, tied on hands and feet, eyes forced open to see through the halfway translucent liquid. Not that any of it was even remotely happening. Cat was lying in a nice and comfortable hospital bed, propped up on several pillows with the only thing uncomfortable being a datajack that was securely plugged into her head. The effect was that of having her brainpal de-activated for the first time in her life, slowed down to human norm and with no control of her body's enhanced functions. A thin man was talking to Strat next to her bed, talking so slowly that she had to focus to hear what they said.
"...probably not that much damage to the interface itself but we don't have the level of neurosurgeons here that can insert a new one."
"What is your recommendation doctor, do we ship her to Sol II or do we get a surgeon to come here?"
"I'd mean that getting her to Sol II would be the safest choice, let the Serco surgeons look after their own."
Cat could feel her body tense and grow slightly colder, a small amount of perspiration appeared on her forehead like beads of liquid crystal. Her stomach tensed into a small knot and she felt nausea forcing itself upon her. She had heard about the symptoms before but had never experienced it herself, being shielded behind her brainpal; fear. She forced her bruised vocal chords into action and whispered,
"no, I cannot."
"What's that Catherine?" the doctor asked.
With too much effort, she pointed to the suction flask next to the bed and Strat handed it to her. She sucked greedily and felt some strength returning, or at least some life into her throat.
"Just Cat doc. I can't go home, I am..." she hesitated, "not allowed."
Strat turned to the doctor.
"That is settled then. Make sure the surgeon knows his stuff and lets see if we can get her operated as fast as possible."
The doctor nodded and walked out, Strat behind him. Cat cleared her throat and used what little voice she had left on a single word.
"Shlim?"
Strat stopped and turned.
"Yeah, he made it. He was pretty badly messed up from the vacuum and the flare-over from the rocket. Not to mention the pieces of shrapnel that dotted his body like he had been shot with a flechette canon or the crushed legs. But he survived, thanks to your effort. Just... tell me Cat, how did you know he had a clone-malfunction? We would have been able to get him back if we could scrape something useable from the lifepod. Even so, if the samples had been too irradiated, he would have suffered true-death."
Cat shook her head; her voice didn't work. Strat nodded in understanding.
"I think you used one of your lives on him Cat. The good Lady Luck was favouring Shlim that day I guess."
Strat threw a casual salute and walked out. Cat knew he was wrong. It hadn't been Lady Luck; it had been Lady Serco that had guided her and helped her to succeed. Not willing to fight the molasses any longer, she closed her eyes and let the drugs take over. The last image she had before sleep was of a shining Serco female warrior, fierce and protective.
###
Chaakin dropped his helmet into the cockpit and closed the canopy, bond-locking it with the chainglass edges with a small wipe of his finger. Only someone carrying his DNA and fingerprint could open it now. He was tired and thirsty, not necessarily a good combination. He saw that Ardenus had dropped his own flight gear and was headed over, fatigue painted on his face as well, fatigue that he was trying to hide with a smile.
"Goin along fur a drink Rave?"
Chaakin couldn't help grinning back. A sure sign that Ardenus was tired was when he returned to the UIT behaviour of his youth and the Ukari accent changed everything to a barely comprehensible slur.
"Don't think so. I am knackered and I probably need to prepare for tomorrow."
"Aw, com oun Rave. Pey's goin tae be ther and mabbe Trakus too."
"Yeah, what the hell. But only one beer and I am off."
Chatting, they passed the cockpit of Azrael on the way out, none of them looking too close at the reflective surface that covered the cockpit. Inside, Azrael was methodically going through his flight tapes to see what he could have done differently in order to have succeeded in killing that last pod. Every vector was analysed, every firing of weapons was checked, every detail scrutinised. He finally came to the conclusion that he had done everything as correctly as possible. He had been bettered by an unforeseen situation and some impressively timed flying. He didn't feel annoyed, he didn't feel cheated. As a matter of fact, he didn't feel at all. The information was logged for future reference; the incident had no further relevance anymore. Azrael shut his system off and waited for the next combat patrol.
###
Riddik was known for a lot of things; timidity was not one of them. Yet, for some obscure reason he always behaved like the new boy in school on the first school day when he needed to talk to the boss alone. As a matter of fact, Riddik would rather face a whole tribe of Betheshee Bear-Dogs only armed with a medium-spiced salami than enduring a solo meeting with Ecka. This time, however, there was no way around it.
"Sorry boss, but that is the way it has to be for now. I can stay for the rest of the day but after that I won't be around for quite a while. Not even on the SSCU, security and all."
He smiled sheepishly while cursing himself inside his head. Why the hell had he elaborated, and to Ecka of all people.
"Och weel, ‘at isnae gonnae be a problem Riddik. When a headstrong hen sic’ as yer Keria gits an idea inside ‘er bonnie heed, thaur is jist abit naught most men can dae abit it. ‘at reminds me ay a time Ah was datin thes lassie in Nyrius fa decided ‘at we shoods fin’ a braw cubicle together, gie merit, hae bairns an’ nae longer bide th’ life ay a miner. She hud a special something ‘at fellaw jist cannae lit gae aff. Her’ was a deal ‘at was ance in a lifetime, a deal ‘at coods easily bide wi."
The old miner grasped his battered pewter cup and drained the Delicht from it, smiling into the cup from the memories. Riddik waited for about a minute, the silence stretching uncomfortably.
"Ehm, what happened?"
Ecka's furrowed brow cracked in a new landscape of fault lines as he looked over his cup at Riddik, a twinkle from a smile in his grey eyes. Keeping his voice low, the accent almost slurring the meaning to incomprehension, he said "Ah am nae most men Riddik. Noo, Cranston will tak’ ower as liaison tae ONE, hain ower tae heem an’ min’ tae bide in tooch. Brin’ mah fondest regards an’ congratulations tae yer guidwife Keria.”
Riddik nodded and left the room, slightly confused. He didn't really know what to make of the conversation, not that it was something odd when he spoke to the Man, but he knew that he had to brief Cranston and that was at least something he knew how to. Riddik walked out of TGFT for the last time in quite a while.
###
The data that had been gathered by the guild members floated in the display and ts tried his best to sort the data into something resembling order and meaning. The data were patchy at best but with a bit of help from the expert level foam-matrix artificial intelligence neuronics that was securely installed in the heart of the station, a set of scenarios appeared. The most dangerous was that this new pirate group or KAOS had caught Hortan for some unknown reason. No demands for ransom had been put forth though and surely they weren't keeping him for questioning. What did they want, the location of heliocene roids in Helios? That led him to the most likely scenario, namely that of a crash somewhere in Latos, a crash that had left Hortan's ship out of communications and out of telemetric contact with the guild. A quick entry in the input field messed the neat calculations up and ts sighed deeply in despair. He hated the new software that was supposed to make everything easier. Somehow they managed to mess up every update and make it less intuitive for him at least. Admitting defeat, he shouted for Charlie who appeared ten seconds later at the door, freckled face broken by a large white smile. Smiling back, ts wished that the feelings he had for Charlie were different but that would probably only have been appropriate if it had happened 40 years earlier. Now he felt protective instead, like a father to a daughter and that was probably good enough for all parts.
“Charlie, I have wrapped up the analysis, can you make sure it is presentable for the seven evening meeting? I need it on my desk no later than six I think.”
“Sure thing. Just send it and I’ll put it into the template.”
“Ehm, yeah. I have some trouble sending it securely.”
Charlie smiled and walked over to his screen, bent in close and with a couple of swipes of her hands in the input area, sent the data to her own screen.
“There Sir, anything else?”
A slow shaking of his head dismissed her and he focused on the data again. He needed someone to make deepscans of all the roids in Latos. Knowing how much the guild members hated these assignments, he frequently used them as punishment for various irregularities that he had spotted, irregularities that wasn’t criminal of against the guild charted per se, but wasn’t in accordance with ts’ moral codex. A name popped up and ts smiled. Ah, yes. He would do nicely. Now, next item on his list. A message from John and Gramps; hopefully that they had found nothing of interest.
The effect was probably best likened to swimming in warm syrup. With your mouth open and dressed in a papersuit, tied on hands and feet, eyes forced open to see through the halfway translucent liquid. Not that any of it was even remotely happening. Cat was lying in a nice and comfortable hospital bed, propped up on several pillows with the only thing uncomfortable being a datajack that was securely plugged into her head. The effect was that of having her brainpal de-activated for the first time in her life, slowed down to human norm and with no control of her body's enhanced functions. A thin man was talking to Strat next to her bed, talking so slowly that she had to focus to hear what they said.
"...probably not that much damage to the interface itself but we don't have the level of neurosurgeons here that can insert a new one."
"What is your recommendation doctor, do we ship her to Sol II or do we get a surgeon to come here?"
"I'd mean that getting her to Sol II would be the safest choice, let the Serco surgeons look after their own."
Cat could feel her body tense and grow slightly colder, a small amount of perspiration appeared on her forehead like beads of liquid crystal. Her stomach tensed into a small knot and she felt nausea forcing itself upon her. She had heard about the symptoms before but had never experienced it herself, being shielded behind her brainpal; fear. She forced her bruised vocal chords into action and whispered,
"no, I cannot."
"What's that Catherine?" the doctor asked.
With too much effort, she pointed to the suction flask next to the bed and Strat handed it to her. She sucked greedily and felt some strength returning, or at least some life into her throat.
"Just Cat doc. I can't go home, I am..." she hesitated, "not allowed."
Strat turned to the doctor.
"That is settled then. Make sure the surgeon knows his stuff and lets see if we can get her operated as fast as possible."
The doctor nodded and walked out, Strat behind him. Cat cleared her throat and used what little voice she had left on a single word.
"Shlim?"
Strat stopped and turned.
"Yeah, he made it. He was pretty badly messed up from the vacuum and the flare-over from the rocket. Not to mention the pieces of shrapnel that dotted his body like he had been shot with a flechette canon or the crushed legs. But he survived, thanks to your effort. Just... tell me Cat, how did you know he had a clone-malfunction? We would have been able to get him back if we could scrape something useable from the lifepod. Even so, if the samples had been too irradiated, he would have suffered true-death."
Cat shook her head; her voice didn't work. Strat nodded in understanding.
"I think you used one of your lives on him Cat. The good Lady Luck was favouring Shlim that day I guess."
Strat threw a casual salute and walked out. Cat knew he was wrong. It hadn't been Lady Luck; it had been Lady Serco that had guided her and helped her to succeed. Not willing to fight the molasses any longer, she closed her eyes and let the drugs take over. The last image she had before sleep was of a shining Serco female warrior, fierce and protective.
###
Chaakin dropped his helmet into the cockpit and closed the canopy, bond-locking it with the chainglass edges with a small wipe of his finger. Only someone carrying his DNA and fingerprint could open it now. He was tired and thirsty, not necessarily a good combination. He saw that Ardenus had dropped his own flight gear and was headed over, fatigue painted on his face as well, fatigue that he was trying to hide with a smile.
"Goin along fur a drink Rave?"
Chaakin couldn't help grinning back. A sure sign that Ardenus was tired was when he returned to the UIT behaviour of his youth and the Ukari accent changed everything to a barely comprehensible slur.
"Don't think so. I am knackered and I probably need to prepare for tomorrow."
"Aw, com oun Rave. Pey's goin tae be ther and mabbe Trakus too."
"Yeah, what the hell. But only one beer and I am off."
Chatting, they passed the cockpit of Azrael on the way out, none of them looking too close at the reflective surface that covered the cockpit. Inside, Azrael was methodically going through his flight tapes to see what he could have done differently in order to have succeeded in killing that last pod. Every vector was analysed, every firing of weapons was checked, every detail scrutinised. He finally came to the conclusion that he had done everything as correctly as possible. He had been bettered by an unforeseen situation and some impressively timed flying. He didn't feel annoyed, he didn't feel cheated. As a matter of fact, he didn't feel at all. The information was logged for future reference; the incident had no further relevance anymore. Azrael shut his system off and waited for the next combat patrol.
###
Riddik was known for a lot of things; timidity was not one of them. Yet, for some obscure reason he always behaved like the new boy in school on the first school day when he needed to talk to the boss alone. As a matter of fact, Riddik would rather face a whole tribe of Betheshee Bear-Dogs only armed with a medium-spiced salami than enduring a solo meeting with Ecka. This time, however, there was no way around it.
"Sorry boss, but that is the way it has to be for now. I can stay for the rest of the day but after that I won't be around for quite a while. Not even on the SSCU, security and all."
He smiled sheepishly while cursing himself inside his head. Why the hell had he elaborated, and to Ecka of all people.
"Och weel, ‘at isnae gonnae be a problem Riddik. When a headstrong hen sic’ as yer Keria gits an idea inside ‘er bonnie heed, thaur is jist abit naught most men can dae abit it. ‘at reminds me ay a time Ah was datin thes lassie in Nyrius fa decided ‘at we shoods fin’ a braw cubicle together, gie merit, hae bairns an’ nae longer bide th’ life ay a miner. She hud a special something ‘at fellaw jist cannae lit gae aff. Her’ was a deal ‘at was ance in a lifetime, a deal ‘at coods easily bide wi."
The old miner grasped his battered pewter cup and drained the Delicht from it, smiling into the cup from the memories. Riddik waited for about a minute, the silence stretching uncomfortably.
"Ehm, what happened?"
Ecka's furrowed brow cracked in a new landscape of fault lines as he looked over his cup at Riddik, a twinkle from a smile in his grey eyes. Keeping his voice low, the accent almost slurring the meaning to incomprehension, he said "Ah am nae most men Riddik. Noo, Cranston will tak’ ower as liaison tae ONE, hain ower tae heem an’ min’ tae bide in tooch. Brin’ mah fondest regards an’ congratulations tae yer guidwife Keria.”
Riddik nodded and left the room, slightly confused. He didn't really know what to make of the conversation, not that it was something odd when he spoke to the Man, but he knew that he had to brief Cranston and that was at least something he knew how to. Riddik walked out of TGFT for the last time in quite a while.
###
The data that had been gathered by the guild members floated in the display and ts tried his best to sort the data into something resembling order and meaning. The data were patchy at best but with a bit of help from the expert level foam-matrix artificial intelligence neuronics that was securely installed in the heart of the station, a set of scenarios appeared. The most dangerous was that this new pirate group or KAOS had caught Hortan for some unknown reason. No demands for ransom had been put forth though and surely they weren't keeping him for questioning. What did they want, the location of heliocene roids in Helios? That led him to the most likely scenario, namely that of a crash somewhere in Latos, a crash that had left Hortan's ship out of communications and out of telemetric contact with the guild. A quick entry in the input field messed the neat calculations up and ts sighed deeply in despair. He hated the new software that was supposed to make everything easier. Somehow they managed to mess up every update and make it less intuitive for him at least. Admitting defeat, he shouted for Charlie who appeared ten seconds later at the door, freckled face broken by a large white smile. Smiling back, ts wished that the feelings he had for Charlie were different but that would probably only have been appropriate if it had happened 40 years earlier. Now he felt protective instead, like a father to a daughter and that was probably good enough for all parts.
“Charlie, I have wrapped up the analysis, can you make sure it is presentable for the seven evening meeting? I need it on my desk no later than six I think.”
“Sure thing. Just send it and I’ll put it into the template.”
“Ehm, yeah. I have some trouble sending it securely.”
Charlie smiled and walked over to his screen, bent in close and with a couple of swipes of her hands in the input area, sent the data to her own screen.
“There Sir, anything else?”
A slow shaking of his head dismissed her and he focused on the data again. He needed someone to make deepscans of all the roids in Latos. Knowing how much the guild members hated these assignments, he frequently used them as punishment for various irregularities that he had spotted, irregularities that wasn’t criminal of against the guild charted per se, but wasn’t in accordance with ts’ moral codex. A name popped up and ts smiled. Ah, yes. He would do nicely. Now, next item on his list. A message from John and Gramps; hopefully that they had found nothing of interest.
Och, ye spin a bonnie yarn Whytee.....
this service is temporarily out of order.
Too much shit to do, not enough writing time. Probably gonna be a couple of weeks before the next one is out.
Too much shit to do, not enough writing time. Probably gonna be a couple of weeks before the next one is out.
probaly be a couple of weeks till im back around as well hortan..im in the middle of a god foresaken desert i cant say the name of and wont be state side for at least 5 or 6 more weeks..but your doin great on the stories keep em coming!!!
Chapter 21
Across the open communal area from where Chi was sitting, a small crowd had gathered around a single figure clad in bright yellow and red jumpsuit. Curious, she got up and walked at an unhurried pace over to the crowd, positioning herself to get a good view at the performer. The performer was doing a juggling and balancing act, quite difficult to do at the 0.3G gravity of the station. She felt a slight brush against her hand and closed her fingers around the object someone thrust into he palm, feeling it meld into her skin and become nothing but a blemish. She felt the small item connect to her brainpal as soon as it touched her skin and she allowed the communications-mole to squeak a small amount of data to establish contact to the sender. A whisper appeared inside her head like the voice of a ghost. The voice grew and dropped in intensity as if it was affected by the background static noise of the station.
"Finally we meet. And don't worry, this line is not only secure but uses the background noise to hide the signal in so it is concealed as well. I am Mya, your contact."
Chi knew for a fact that she wasn't paranoid; as a matter of fact, she as well as the other members of the PA diplomatic service had to undergo bi-monthly psychological test to ensure precisely that. However, in her line of work a little paranoia never hurt anyone and she lived by the old adage "just because you aren't paranoid, it doesn't mean no-one is after you." In this case she had to assume that she had been compromised especially since the signal removed any hints of identity after being compressed, coded and scrambled.
"Nineteen Alfa Four."
This was a common PA recognition code and one she knew that all PA assets should have. Even so, it was one that could easily be pried out of a non-willing captive by liberal use of drugs and torture. The response was correct and she upped the ante immediately.
"Reverse *** PA CENSURE. YES; WE ARE THAT GOOD ***."
All PA field agents had a subliminal message implanted in them which could be called forth by the correct phrase, phrases that were only known to higher level agents like Chi herself. Again, the response was correct. Chi allowed herself to relax slightly, the agent had checked out and she was no longer alone and cut off. She compressed the data she had discovered so far and squirted it over to Mya. The juggler bowed to his audience and she laughed out aloud, clapped along with the others. The crowd was slowly dispersing and she spotted one of the young men that had followed her earlier just as he was moving away again. Seemed like they had lost her in the crowd but re-established their surveillance now.
"Listen Mya," she said through her brainpal, "I think I am going to have to change my mission. This is all very strange and I believe I have stumbled over something important. Make sure NP gets the information from me immediately and meet up here again in a station day."
Without waiting for a reply, she closed the connection and moved into the station proper again. There was this Itani bar she needed to check up on.
###
Chaakin had to admit it; it had been a sweet idea to go boozing with Ardenus. All his worries had disappeared as soon as the second Flare Overload, the potent mix of cask strength Verasi algae-vodka and Divinia dark bitter, had hit his stomach like a pair of well aimed flares and turned his concerns into something for other people to take care of. The music was absolute crap and the bar was a scummy little filthy place with naught but two-dime whores and their equally worthless pimps; he loved it. Chaakin hoisted his fourth F'load and saluted Peytros as the notorious killer came over to the round chipped synth-wood table, a loop-sided smile on his boyish face.
"Rave, I need some moolah bad. Care to stick up some creds? Just 'til the next voy mahn, you know I am good for it."
Chaakin knew that he was good for it indeed. Despite his boyish good looks with the freckled nose that proudly split the space between his green eyes, the unruly mop of sand-coloured hair on top of his head that was anything but casual, completed by his gangly body that could have belonged on your average teenager, Peytros was in all shapes and forms a killer. And a very unscrupulous one at that, killing anything and anyone without a moment's consideration or hesitation. Chaakin had never told anyone, but Peytros reminded him of one of the old Sol I western legends they had been taught of back in the old days, the one they called Billy the Kid.
"Whaddayouneeditfore?" he managed to slur between two fairly large sips of his F'load.
The loop-sided smile turned into a predatory grin and the Kid turned to look up at the bar where three girls were huddled together, chatting between themselves. The amount of make-up and hair-extensions vastly outdid the amount of clothing on them. Chaakin wasn't sure whether one of them was dressed only in hair-extensions actually, he couldn't focus that far.
"I need creds to get them chickas into the right mood for a little bit of Peytros."
His smile turned from one of harmless predator into one of a psychotic killer ready to strike. Magnetic, scary, hypnotic, repulsive, alluring.
"They have been served already, I just need a bit to hang on to man. Set me up?"
Chaakin ignored the small voice inside his head that tried to warn him of all the evil things Peytros would do; watched his hands, through the alcohol induced inability to focus, as they produced a credstick and handed it over to Peytros.
"Twill be outa yur share Pey."
The young man switched his facial expression back to the innocent loop-sided smile and gave Chaakin a thumbs-up.
"Your' the shit man. Listen, if I come in late tomorrah, don't wait up, yeah? Lemme get you a new one of them there too."
He signalled the tired looking yesterday's-model-waitress for another Flare Overload, winked at Chaakin and walked over to the three girls. A predator stalking his prey. Chaakin sighed and emptied the F'load he had been drinking from and exchanged it for the new that Peytros had ordered. Tomorrow was going to be absolute hell. But that was tomorrow.
###
John had declined the heavy furs and many layers of insulating clothing that the other scouts were wearing, trusting instead in the infiltration suit he had entered the station wearing. He had suited up and activated the stealth layer of the suit. While it couldn't make him invisible like the Akanese Death-Commando infiltration suits, it mimicked the surrounding colouring and enabled him to hide as long as he moved slowly enough.
The trip to the Priggly Pear had been fairly easy so far, with Buzz leading the way around the two XX patrols they had spotted on the way. The already disused parts of the station had assumed a squalor that John had thought would be impossible in a space station, or at least in a station that was inhabited. At least the temperature was low enough that the no-doubt hideous odour of rotting things was suppressed to barely nauseating. Still, he had to admit that Buzz knew his way around the station and after about an hour they were looking out a metal-grilled opening at the entrance to the Priggly Pear. Down to the right side, a small corridor led to the back entrance, not that you could see it in the emergency lighting that was the only light source. The two broad fur-clad men outside the entrance made no effort to hide at all, one of them stamping his feet and blowing hot air into his fingers, the other merely sitting statue-like with the submachinegun across his chest. Three corpses were frozen in rather undignified positions to the left of the door and one corpse doubled as a chair for the immobile guard. John uploaded the image to his suit's computer and nodded slowly. This was not going to be easy but things that are worth doing seldom are. A plan slowly manifested itself inside John's head and a sly smile spread across his lips. He signalled Buzz and together, slowly and stealthily, they moved back towards the relative safety of the storage room.
###
The batteries that supplied power to the stasis box in the cargo hold had died four minutes ago. That mean that Pinhead had one more minute and then the stasis field would cut off and allow the fiend inside to wake. Or whatever you wanted to call it; when the stasis field engages, you somehow cease to be in the universe and everything stands still until the power is disconnected. Pinhead knew that it wasn't really a stasis field as such but rather a portal to another brane, an extra-dimensional world if you like, a brane where time doesn't exist.
All that fascinating physics would be absolutely irrelevant for him, however, if he didn't deliver the box to the station dock in less time than what was left until power cut-out. The twenty centimetres of military grade Xithricite armour that lined the cargo bay should on paper be sufficient to keep the thing inside but you never knew with these beasts. He had seen the deep gouge-marks on the xithricite armour plating that surrounded the stasis box and wasn't going to risk it. The required dock was showing a lack of power and was marked with the black and yellow stripes of an emergency lock-down as well as quite a lot of rubble inside the bay, making his escape more uncertain in the time given. Never one to be timid or take risks for anyone else, Pinhead decided that the original plan was not workable and instead docked three bays down and ejected the stasis pod into the airlock. Immediately after, he engaged the trio of chemical rockets he had strapped to his cockpit and accelerated ass first into open space at 15 G's. He grinned and pushed the comms.
"Yeah?"
"Ast, it is delivered."
"Cheers. Money is in your account as promised. I'll return to you when I have a new assignment."
"Thanks boss. I'll go home to Eo for a bit I think. Far away from here at least."
He could hear the chuckle on the other end.
"Fair enough. Later."
Pinhead shook his head slowly while he turned the Marauder, ejected the chemical rockets and engaged his engine. Nobody in their right minds wanted to be anywhere near wherever the stasis box was when the power stopped. The large male Betheshee Bear-Dog inside was the stuff nightmares were made off and coincidentally the favourite hunting object of Serco infantry-specialised warriors. Pinhead doubted, however, that anyone on the station had the customary Sercan Marine Powered Hunting Armour. He was just happy that he wasn't going to be around. He engaged the jump engines and disappeared from Daltas Hold.
Across the open communal area from where Chi was sitting, a small crowd had gathered around a single figure clad in bright yellow and red jumpsuit. Curious, she got up and walked at an unhurried pace over to the crowd, positioning herself to get a good view at the performer. The performer was doing a juggling and balancing act, quite difficult to do at the 0.3G gravity of the station. She felt a slight brush against her hand and closed her fingers around the object someone thrust into he palm, feeling it meld into her skin and become nothing but a blemish. She felt the small item connect to her brainpal as soon as it touched her skin and she allowed the communications-mole to squeak a small amount of data to establish contact to the sender. A whisper appeared inside her head like the voice of a ghost. The voice grew and dropped in intensity as if it was affected by the background static noise of the station.
"Finally we meet. And don't worry, this line is not only secure but uses the background noise to hide the signal in so it is concealed as well. I am Mya, your contact."
Chi knew for a fact that she wasn't paranoid; as a matter of fact, she as well as the other members of the PA diplomatic service had to undergo bi-monthly psychological test to ensure precisely that. However, in her line of work a little paranoia never hurt anyone and she lived by the old adage "just because you aren't paranoid, it doesn't mean no-one is after you." In this case she had to assume that she had been compromised especially since the signal removed any hints of identity after being compressed, coded and scrambled.
"Nineteen Alfa Four."
This was a common PA recognition code and one she knew that all PA assets should have. Even so, it was one that could easily be pried out of a non-willing captive by liberal use of drugs and torture. The response was correct and she upped the ante immediately.
"Reverse *** PA CENSURE. YES; WE ARE THAT GOOD ***."
All PA field agents had a subliminal message implanted in them which could be called forth by the correct phrase, phrases that were only known to higher level agents like Chi herself. Again, the response was correct. Chi allowed herself to relax slightly, the agent had checked out and she was no longer alone and cut off. She compressed the data she had discovered so far and squirted it over to Mya. The juggler bowed to his audience and she laughed out aloud, clapped along with the others. The crowd was slowly dispersing and she spotted one of the young men that had followed her earlier just as he was moving away again. Seemed like they had lost her in the crowd but re-established their surveillance now.
"Listen Mya," she said through her brainpal, "I think I am going to have to change my mission. This is all very strange and I believe I have stumbled over something important. Make sure NP gets the information from me immediately and meet up here again in a station day."
Without waiting for a reply, she closed the connection and moved into the station proper again. There was this Itani bar she needed to check up on.
###
Chaakin had to admit it; it had been a sweet idea to go boozing with Ardenus. All his worries had disappeared as soon as the second Flare Overload, the potent mix of cask strength Verasi algae-vodka and Divinia dark bitter, had hit his stomach like a pair of well aimed flares and turned his concerns into something for other people to take care of. The music was absolute crap and the bar was a scummy little filthy place with naught but two-dime whores and their equally worthless pimps; he loved it. Chaakin hoisted his fourth F'load and saluted Peytros as the notorious killer came over to the round chipped synth-wood table, a loop-sided smile on his boyish face.
"Rave, I need some moolah bad. Care to stick up some creds? Just 'til the next voy mahn, you know I am good for it."
Chaakin knew that he was good for it indeed. Despite his boyish good looks with the freckled nose that proudly split the space between his green eyes, the unruly mop of sand-coloured hair on top of his head that was anything but casual, completed by his gangly body that could have belonged on your average teenager, Peytros was in all shapes and forms a killer. And a very unscrupulous one at that, killing anything and anyone without a moment's consideration or hesitation. Chaakin had never told anyone, but Peytros reminded him of one of the old Sol I western legends they had been taught of back in the old days, the one they called Billy the Kid.
"Whaddayouneeditfore?" he managed to slur between two fairly large sips of his F'load.
The loop-sided smile turned into a predatory grin and the Kid turned to look up at the bar where three girls were huddled together, chatting between themselves. The amount of make-up and hair-extensions vastly outdid the amount of clothing on them. Chaakin wasn't sure whether one of them was dressed only in hair-extensions actually, he couldn't focus that far.
"I need creds to get them chickas into the right mood for a little bit of Peytros."
His smile turned from one of harmless predator into one of a psychotic killer ready to strike. Magnetic, scary, hypnotic, repulsive, alluring.
"They have been served already, I just need a bit to hang on to man. Set me up?"
Chaakin ignored the small voice inside his head that tried to warn him of all the evil things Peytros would do; watched his hands, through the alcohol induced inability to focus, as they produced a credstick and handed it over to Peytros.
"Twill be outa yur share Pey."
The young man switched his facial expression back to the innocent loop-sided smile and gave Chaakin a thumbs-up.
"Your' the shit man. Listen, if I come in late tomorrah, don't wait up, yeah? Lemme get you a new one of them there too."
He signalled the tired looking yesterday's-model-waitress for another Flare Overload, winked at Chaakin and walked over to the three girls. A predator stalking his prey. Chaakin sighed and emptied the F'load he had been drinking from and exchanged it for the new that Peytros had ordered. Tomorrow was going to be absolute hell. But that was tomorrow.
###
John had declined the heavy furs and many layers of insulating clothing that the other scouts were wearing, trusting instead in the infiltration suit he had entered the station wearing. He had suited up and activated the stealth layer of the suit. While it couldn't make him invisible like the Akanese Death-Commando infiltration suits, it mimicked the surrounding colouring and enabled him to hide as long as he moved slowly enough.
The trip to the Priggly Pear had been fairly easy so far, with Buzz leading the way around the two XX patrols they had spotted on the way. The already disused parts of the station had assumed a squalor that John had thought would be impossible in a space station, or at least in a station that was inhabited. At least the temperature was low enough that the no-doubt hideous odour of rotting things was suppressed to barely nauseating. Still, he had to admit that Buzz knew his way around the station and after about an hour they were looking out a metal-grilled opening at the entrance to the Priggly Pear. Down to the right side, a small corridor led to the back entrance, not that you could see it in the emergency lighting that was the only light source. The two broad fur-clad men outside the entrance made no effort to hide at all, one of them stamping his feet and blowing hot air into his fingers, the other merely sitting statue-like with the submachinegun across his chest. Three corpses were frozen in rather undignified positions to the left of the door and one corpse doubled as a chair for the immobile guard. John uploaded the image to his suit's computer and nodded slowly. This was not going to be easy but things that are worth doing seldom are. A plan slowly manifested itself inside John's head and a sly smile spread across his lips. He signalled Buzz and together, slowly and stealthily, they moved back towards the relative safety of the storage room.
###
The batteries that supplied power to the stasis box in the cargo hold had died four minutes ago. That mean that Pinhead had one more minute and then the stasis field would cut off and allow the fiend inside to wake. Or whatever you wanted to call it; when the stasis field engages, you somehow cease to be in the universe and everything stands still until the power is disconnected. Pinhead knew that it wasn't really a stasis field as such but rather a portal to another brane, an extra-dimensional world if you like, a brane where time doesn't exist.
All that fascinating physics would be absolutely irrelevant for him, however, if he didn't deliver the box to the station dock in less time than what was left until power cut-out. The twenty centimetres of military grade Xithricite armour that lined the cargo bay should on paper be sufficient to keep the thing inside but you never knew with these beasts. He had seen the deep gouge-marks on the xithricite armour plating that surrounded the stasis box and wasn't going to risk it. The required dock was showing a lack of power and was marked with the black and yellow stripes of an emergency lock-down as well as quite a lot of rubble inside the bay, making his escape more uncertain in the time given. Never one to be timid or take risks for anyone else, Pinhead decided that the original plan was not workable and instead docked three bays down and ejected the stasis pod into the airlock. Immediately after, he engaged the trio of chemical rockets he had strapped to his cockpit and accelerated ass first into open space at 15 G's. He grinned and pushed the comms.
"Yeah?"
"Ast, it is delivered."
"Cheers. Money is in your account as promised. I'll return to you when I have a new assignment."
"Thanks boss. I'll go home to Eo for a bit I think. Far away from here at least."
He could hear the chuckle on the other end.
"Fair enough. Later."
Pinhead shook his head slowly while he turned the Marauder, ejected the chemical rockets and engaged his engine. Nobody in their right minds wanted to be anywhere near wherever the stasis box was when the power stopped. The large male Betheshee Bear-Dog inside was the stuff nightmares were made off and coincidentally the favourite hunting object of Serco infantry-specialised warriors. Pinhead doubted, however, that anyone on the station had the customary Sercan Marine Powered Hunting Armour. He was just happy that he wasn't going to be around. He engaged the jump engines and disappeared from Daltas Hold.
hahahahaahahaaha ill be damned whytee that is some good shit
yar har yar, nice work Whytee! :}
Chapter 22
The amount of noise coming from inside was impressive, especially considering that only one person was making all the noise. The clanking noises competed with revving chemical fuel engines, that again competed with squeaking noises of caterpillar threads against metal at fairly high speeds and above everything an almost crescendo-ish noise of epic proportions in the form of nineteen huge speakers that were suspended from the ceiling delivering drums and guitars at an immense volume. The lead singer, the term song is being used liberally here, apparently wrenched some more anger out through the speakers and brought the song to a crashing end with a blood curdling cry giving tsreknor two seconds of almost silence. He used the most of it and shouted at the top of his lungs for Moda. The singer was apparently still full of anger and wrath and once more led the band into another extremely loud, extremely fast song, drowning everything out once more. Ts shook his head; he had been involved in battles that were less noisy than this.
He spotted some shadow-movement from the disassembled insides of a stripped and battered Valkyrie and decided to investigate. Inside, lying on his back, upper body, arms and head wedged under some exotic machinery and stroboscopically lit by an arc welder Moda was singing along with the drum rythm in a high nasal voice. Deciding that shouting wouldn't work at all, ts pulled Moda's foot twice. The arc-welder stopped flashing and Moda wiggled out from the machine. He lifted two singed eye-brows at ts and smiled broadly. The music went from deafening to merely loud and Moda pulled himself up.
"Not often we get a visit from the top. What can I do for you ts?"
"I have some data I need you to check out....” he lost his focus, ”tell me, what the hell is that noise?"
Moda grinned and nodded up at the speakers, "that? An old Sol band named Chimaira. I got this ancient storage disk from Hortan, something he had scrounged from somewhere and that he wanted to rip. He got the soft and mellow music, I ripped this. Loads of energy in it right? Catchy too!"
"I guess. Not quite my style I must admit. Do you have time?"
"Yeah, just let me wash up first. What do you have?"
"You know Hortan was lost?" Not waiting for an answer, he continued "well, I have the data from his ship up until it stopped."
"Transmitting?" Moda splashed water on his face and lathered his hands.
Ts frowned, "I don't know if it stopped transmitting. We stopped receiving anything is for sure. But that is what I hope you can help me with."
Moda finished washing, opened the very large refrigerator next to his desk and grabbed a couple of Lady's, handing one to ts and grabbed a seat. Before initiating the input area, he drank about half of the dark ale with great pleasure, cementing the experience with a belch.
"Right, lets see what you've got."
###
"... and if that bastard Aelius calls you little buddy, you have my permission to punch him in the face and tell him it was from me, awright?"
Cranston looked slightly scared and quite a bit intimidated by the towering Serco pilot but managed to nod. The handover briefing had been chaotic and improvised but he believed that he had the information he needed to initiate the liaison duties with ONE. Riddik's ridiculously large hand closed around Cranston's shoulder and squeezed it slightly.
"Listen, I am sorry that I have to dump it on you like this but I have to go. If you need to contact me, and this should only be for extreme emergency, go through Ironstar or through ONE if it isn't guild matters. He can access the Serco command net and send me a warning. Not promising that I will get back to you, but I'll do my best. Okay, I need to go now."
Cranston shook Riddik's hand and watched him leave. He adjusted the bright green ribbon on his sleeve, the mark of a TGFT liaison officer, and started reading the dossiers on the upper elements of ONE. Well, except the one on Keria, that one could wait for a bit.
###
They were just about to unscrew a metal grill across the service hatch when the howl reverberated trough the station. Even though John was at this time rather chilled, the sound still managed to give him goosebumps all over. The staccato noises of a machinegun mingled with almost deafening crashing noises. The manhinegun stopped but the noises continued, now mixed with almost inhuman screams of pain and terror. John looked at Buzz who had frozen in the same position, multi-tool about to engage the screws.
"Buzz," John whispered next to Buzz' ear, "is there something you haven't told me buddy?"
Buzz shook his head and whispered back, "no, this is the first time I heard anything like it."
John nodded and grabbed his thin-gun from the sheath that was placed across his chest. The indicator showed full charge and a whole load of ferro-nickel grains and John re-holstered it. Buzz had stopped his work on the metal grill and had likewise holstered his power tool. John indicated the way they had arrived with his head.
"What do you say we retreat and find some hardware before we investigate? I mean, it is not our business right now."
"Yeah, I guess we have as good an image as we are going to get of the Priggly Pear. We should be able to plan from this."
A horrible crunching sound destroyed the illusion of silence, followed by more screams, screams that were cut off by yet more crushing sounds. Buzz hurriedly packed his few remaining tools into the bergan he had been carrying and moved back the way they had come. They ensured that they left no traces of their passing. Except for their scent.
###
"I have the evidence we need to nail these bastards boss."
With usual disrespect for a higher officer, Eggert had opened the door and walked into Fletholm’s office, a handful of papers in hand and a victorious smirk on his face. Fletholm looked up from his screen, a mock look of annoyance that was an almost permanent fixture slowly improving into a scowl.
"Good, I need some good news. Who are the baddies? And what will it mean for us?"
Eggert nodded at the screen.
"What's the problem boss?"
"Bunch of over-privileged, under-stimulated young punks that have decided that all of UIT space should be free of Itani and Serco. As if we would be able to survive in isolation. Do you know they are responsible for no less than forty deaths so far in Dau alone? Irrevocable deaths too, they have in usual classy style targeted the small fry first."
"Sorry 'bout that. Well, at lest this one can be wrapped. Looks like it is a collection of old timers and new misfits. I have tagged them all as arrest on sight, even though most of them are on the KOS list of UTM anyway. They tag themselves with CHRN but it doesn't seem to be too much of a threat to UIT as a whole. Could be a problem for grey space but I suggest we let the Vipers handle that part. I have feelers out to find out what the response is from Xang Xi, Tunguska and Ineubis. I am not expecting a response from Corvus though."
"They are probably harbouring the bastards for all that we know. Good job Eggert. Wrap it up and let me know what the factions say. Next thing I want you to look at is this terrorism thing in Dau. The files are in your computer as of" he pressed a button "now. Any questions, we'll take that later."
Eggert mock-saluted and walked out of the office and back to his own cubicle. One more down, hundreds to go.
The amount of noise coming from inside was impressive, especially considering that only one person was making all the noise. The clanking noises competed with revving chemical fuel engines, that again competed with squeaking noises of caterpillar threads against metal at fairly high speeds and above everything an almost crescendo-ish noise of epic proportions in the form of nineteen huge speakers that were suspended from the ceiling delivering drums and guitars at an immense volume. The lead singer, the term song is being used liberally here, apparently wrenched some more anger out through the speakers and brought the song to a crashing end with a blood curdling cry giving tsreknor two seconds of almost silence. He used the most of it and shouted at the top of his lungs for Moda. The singer was apparently still full of anger and wrath and once more led the band into another extremely loud, extremely fast song, drowning everything out once more. Ts shook his head; he had been involved in battles that were less noisy than this.
He spotted some shadow-movement from the disassembled insides of a stripped and battered Valkyrie and decided to investigate. Inside, lying on his back, upper body, arms and head wedged under some exotic machinery and stroboscopically lit by an arc welder Moda was singing along with the drum rythm in a high nasal voice. Deciding that shouting wouldn't work at all, ts pulled Moda's foot twice. The arc-welder stopped flashing and Moda wiggled out from the machine. He lifted two singed eye-brows at ts and smiled broadly. The music went from deafening to merely loud and Moda pulled himself up.
"Not often we get a visit from the top. What can I do for you ts?"
"I have some data I need you to check out....” he lost his focus, ”tell me, what the hell is that noise?"
Moda grinned and nodded up at the speakers, "that? An old Sol band named Chimaira. I got this ancient storage disk from Hortan, something he had scrounged from somewhere and that he wanted to rip. He got the soft and mellow music, I ripped this. Loads of energy in it right? Catchy too!"
"I guess. Not quite my style I must admit. Do you have time?"
"Yeah, just let me wash up first. What do you have?"
"You know Hortan was lost?" Not waiting for an answer, he continued "well, I have the data from his ship up until it stopped."
"Transmitting?" Moda splashed water on his face and lathered his hands.
Ts frowned, "I don't know if it stopped transmitting. We stopped receiving anything is for sure. But that is what I hope you can help me with."
Moda finished washing, opened the very large refrigerator next to his desk and grabbed a couple of Lady's, handing one to ts and grabbed a seat. Before initiating the input area, he drank about half of the dark ale with great pleasure, cementing the experience with a belch.
"Right, lets see what you've got."
###
"... and if that bastard Aelius calls you little buddy, you have my permission to punch him in the face and tell him it was from me, awright?"
Cranston looked slightly scared and quite a bit intimidated by the towering Serco pilot but managed to nod. The handover briefing had been chaotic and improvised but he believed that he had the information he needed to initiate the liaison duties with ONE. Riddik's ridiculously large hand closed around Cranston's shoulder and squeezed it slightly.
"Listen, I am sorry that I have to dump it on you like this but I have to go. If you need to contact me, and this should only be for extreme emergency, go through Ironstar or through ONE if it isn't guild matters. He can access the Serco command net and send me a warning. Not promising that I will get back to you, but I'll do my best. Okay, I need to go now."
Cranston shook Riddik's hand and watched him leave. He adjusted the bright green ribbon on his sleeve, the mark of a TGFT liaison officer, and started reading the dossiers on the upper elements of ONE. Well, except the one on Keria, that one could wait for a bit.
###
They were just about to unscrew a metal grill across the service hatch when the howl reverberated trough the station. Even though John was at this time rather chilled, the sound still managed to give him goosebumps all over. The staccato noises of a machinegun mingled with almost deafening crashing noises. The manhinegun stopped but the noises continued, now mixed with almost inhuman screams of pain and terror. John looked at Buzz who had frozen in the same position, multi-tool about to engage the screws.
"Buzz," John whispered next to Buzz' ear, "is there something you haven't told me buddy?"
Buzz shook his head and whispered back, "no, this is the first time I heard anything like it."
John nodded and grabbed his thin-gun from the sheath that was placed across his chest. The indicator showed full charge and a whole load of ferro-nickel grains and John re-holstered it. Buzz had stopped his work on the metal grill and had likewise holstered his power tool. John indicated the way they had arrived with his head.
"What do you say we retreat and find some hardware before we investigate? I mean, it is not our business right now."
"Yeah, I guess we have as good an image as we are going to get of the Priggly Pear. We should be able to plan from this."
A horrible crunching sound destroyed the illusion of silence, followed by more screams, screams that were cut off by yet more crushing sounds. Buzz hurriedly packed his few remaining tools into the bergan he had been carrying and moved back the way they had come. They ensured that they left no traces of their passing. Except for their scent.
###
"I have the evidence we need to nail these bastards boss."
With usual disrespect for a higher officer, Eggert had opened the door and walked into Fletholm’s office, a handful of papers in hand and a victorious smirk on his face. Fletholm looked up from his screen, a mock look of annoyance that was an almost permanent fixture slowly improving into a scowl.
"Good, I need some good news. Who are the baddies? And what will it mean for us?"
Eggert nodded at the screen.
"What's the problem boss?"
"Bunch of over-privileged, under-stimulated young punks that have decided that all of UIT space should be free of Itani and Serco. As if we would be able to survive in isolation. Do you know they are responsible for no less than forty deaths so far in Dau alone? Irrevocable deaths too, they have in usual classy style targeted the small fry first."
"Sorry 'bout that. Well, at lest this one can be wrapped. Looks like it is a collection of old timers and new misfits. I have tagged them all as arrest on sight, even though most of them are on the KOS list of UTM anyway. They tag themselves with CHRN but it doesn't seem to be too much of a threat to UIT as a whole. Could be a problem for grey space but I suggest we let the Vipers handle that part. I have feelers out to find out what the response is from Xang Xi, Tunguska and Ineubis. I am not expecting a response from Corvus though."
"They are probably harbouring the bastards for all that we know. Good job Eggert. Wrap it up and let me know what the factions say. Next thing I want you to look at is this terrorism thing in Dau. The files are in your computer as of" he pressed a button "now. Any questions, we'll take that later."
Eggert mock-saluted and walked out of the office and back to his own cubicle. One more down, hundreds to go.
I had to put down my copy of "John Eldritch: Coolant Wars" to get caught up with this! Fantastic multithreaded plots intertwining, and I can't wait to see how they all converge. Bravo!
Sorry for the delay, RL has been a bitch the last months. Will try to get back on track with a weekly chapter. Enjoy (I hope)
Chapter 23
The comforts of the station proper was all very nice and to some extent addictive as well. It was easy to be lured into the safe and comfortable embrace of metres of specially hardened xithricite armour, especially when said armour was enclosing very good companions and all the sanitary comforts a girl could possibly dream off. It never lasted though. Once she had been in the station for a day, Mercy started wondering whether the hive had expanded into Latos again, whether the tramlines to Odia were safe from pirates, whether the prices on essential medicines, and yes, we are indeed talking about derivatives of opiates here, had regained their profit potential after she dumped the prices a month ago. Inevitably, she found herself in the usual discomfort of her vac-suit, hardened helmet under arm, staring at her ship without really remembering how she arrived in the dock. She had Grey in her blood.
This time it had been easier, especially since she had used most of her spare time poring over the data from Hortan's last flight deciding where to look. It hadn't been easy but the collection of the Latos O-12 roidfield movement dynamics she had done last year as well as a very nice programme she had hmmm…, acquired from Serco Sky Command via a, lets call him a friend from Xang Xi, assisted her immensely. Naturally, her backdoor access codes to the TGFT mainframe helped a lot as well, especially since the sheer amount of numbers that had to be crunched was staggering. Fortunately, the TGFT mainframe was connected to Moda's research quantum computer and within no more than a day, she had received her result. Too easy.
She boarded her white and hunter-green Atlas, checked everything was as she left them and requested a launch. She found Ironstar floating outside in a massively bulky Prometheus, the hunter-green colours served to make it look like a cargo container with bolted-on weapons. Kinda what the techs up Serco-land had engineered it for she guessed. She didn't carry any weapons herself; she rarely did apart from the deterrence mines on her Behemoth. Without further delay, she set up a course for Latos O-12, relayed it to Ironstar and hit the turbo. Mercy to the rescue!
###
Smurftopia, a very fitting name for the largest Itani run bar in Dau, was lit by garish blue neon and shaped in formed plastic in the mould of a large mushroom. The décor was obviously provided by someone who had indeed been imbibing mushrooms himself and was as the same time a play on the racist slur of calling the Itani people smurfs. Chi gritted her teeth and walked over to the very large and very non-Itani bouncer outside. With a smile that was supposed to be welcoming but instead just looked creepy, he opened the door to let her in. Her alert-O-meter redscaled as she passed him, so many things were wrong; subtle things that your average party-goer wouldn't notice ever but shouted out loud to Chi. However, she was committed and couldn’t back out now.
Inside, the thumping drums, shrill guitars and stroboscopic lights flooded her senses with a tidal wave of sensory noise. She looked around and quickly found the two emergency exits as well as the access panel to the station's ventilation system. At both the emergency exits she spotted more bouncers, bouncers like the one outside. She stopped moving when she was just inside, hesitating as to where she wanted to go and almost immediately she felt a hand on her elbow nudging her along into the bar, soft but insisting. Half turning, she smiled back at the person that had ushered her inside and almost reacted when she recognised the man that had been clearing her through immigration. The smile on his lips was posing as a genuine smile but the eyes were absolutely dead. Chi turned back to the bar and looked around for her connection inside, failing to see him as usual. Slowly she proceeded up to the main bar and turned so she could see the entrance where three bulky young men were barring the way out. She ordered a Pearl diver, a mixture of crushed Eo pink strawberries, Denic demi-vanilla icecream and synth vodka, easily swiping the small nanite transceiver underneath the glass. It penetrated her skin and linked her to the other user inside the bar. She initiated the codes and soon after a voice came through clear but very flat and toneless.
"You picked a crappy time to arrive Chi."
"Looks like it Mal. How long has it been going on?"
"They sealed the entrance about an hour ago. Load of people coming in, none allowed out. No contact outside, expecting a null-field emitter at the exits."
"Have they said anything? Are they armed?"
"They are just standing there and turning people back if they want to leave. And they are indeed armed."
Chi sipped from her drink and watched the bouncers walk outside all at once, closing the doors behind them with a finality that she didn't like the look off.
"Mal, the ventilation shaft now."
At the end of the bar, the cleaner, a boy of about 15 with bright neon green and golden yellow hair styled like an octopus on ecstasy, set his tray on the desk and moved with fluid grace and by the easiest route over to the ventilation access panel. Chi smile despite the seriousness of the situation; she had always imagined Malachia as an older man, definitely dull. Life is never what it seems. She started to move towards the panel herself.
###
Something was very wrong with his station. Well, not his station in any legal sense but as for knowledge of the station, it was Trulo's. He lived and breathed it and had done so even more than normal this last month or so. Several air scrubbers had stopped working on levels 14 to 16 within less than ten minutes and he knew that these scrubbers had been serviced no later than half a year ago. He had sent a query down to the guards at the nearest point but didn't get a reply from them. He had made a mental note of it; he would deal with it another day. Right now he needed to repair the grid on level 14 that had likewise gone off line inexplicably. The normal ambient light in the corridor they were working in was flickering on and off in tandem with the surges that kept on hitting this level and only the dull bio-luminescent panels, that were painted on the ceiling for emergency use, provided any real light. The air was reeking with unwashed bodies, partially combusted plastic and flesh as well as the ever-present taint of sulphur that betrayed a non-functioning air-scrubber. Despite of that, his crew was checking the null-res cable methodically with Trulo running diagnostics on the freeze nodes that were controlling the temperature inside the cable, ensuring that it would keep its super conducting abilities when they first heard or rather felt the wrongness.
Trulo looked up at his point man across the full-face mask he was wearing to protect him from the cold. Something bulky clad in bright orange and black fur appeared in the corridor with a suddenness that was as violent as the twin sword-like horns that projected from the top of the creature's wrists. With no hesitation, the creature stabbed one claw through the chest of his mechanic, exploding gore and blood into the corridor like a water disperser. Not stopping at all, the creature swiped another hideous claw at the mechanic's assistant, raking him with two long gashes that almost tore his body into strips. The other two mechanics in front of Trulo froze in terror and incomprehension, thus sealing their deaths; Trulo ran the fastest he had learned. The screams behind him echoed down the corridor, ending in a long and almost worse gurgling and wrenching sound. Trulo stopped and opened an access panel to the ventilation system, crawled inside and shut the panel behind him. He moved as fast as he could crawl, down the ventilation shaft and found a set of rungs that would take him up or down. He went down, down towards the engine section. A rustling, shuffling, clicking noise behind him approached too fast for it to be another human. Trulo opened another access hatch and crawled into the electrical supply tunnel, worming along the now defunct power conduits between the levels. He had only just moved in when the panel was ripped off and something tried to move into the tunnel with him. He looked down between his feet and saw the long muzzle with long metallic looking teeth that peered inside. Above the muzzle, four eyes looked up at him, the two eyes towards the sides of the head black and the central eyes almost like human eyeballs. A stench of blood and death poured out from the mouth of the beast, almost overwhelming him with nausea. He scrambled to get out of its reach as fast as he could, get away from the horror that was peering up at his feet. The beast withdrew its head and tried to stab out at Trulo but only grazed the sole of his boot, ripping it off completely. The second swipe was below him as he curled his legs up under himself. The nightmare creature bellowed up at him in impotent rage and then moved back a bit while it stared at the opening. Like a small animal in front of a massive predator, Trulo remained in foetal position, paralysed by the reptilian parts of his brains that had decided to take control. He realised the immense danger he was in but had absolutely no control of his own body and could only watch in horror as the creature started to rip the access port apart and enlarged the opening so it would fit in. This was it, now he was going to die for sure. The creature ripped another chunk of bulkhead metal away from the corridor and then suddenly stopped. It turned, seemed to sniff the air and then moved back away from his sights. Trulo forced himself to breathe again and then shuffled at maximum speed away from the opening, into engineer land, into safety.
###
The party had been awesome, the drinks had been fantastic, the girls stupendous at their particular art; the hangover was equally epic. What had seemed at the time to be such a good idea and so much fun had in too little time boomeranged right back into Chaakin's face and exploded in a torrent of a headache, a bad breath the would kill a guy from ten feet away and a body that hurt as much as if he had been the piñata at a Serco kindergarten. The perscom beeped incessantly at a volume that was definitely above what he needed right now and with no little effort he twisted his entire body to get a hold on it. The sheets that loosely covered him turned along with his movement into a tangled knot around his chest, at the same time hoggin' them away from the two girls that were passed out next to him. He forgot the perscom for a second as he stared at the two unconscious naked bodies. Damn, he had absolutely no recollection of what had happened from about the time that Peytros moved out from the bar with the three giggling girls. The beeping noise intensified and he tore his attention away from the girls towards killing that annoying sound. Under the bed, in his crumpled trousers' left pocket he found the noisemaker. Once more, he summoned concentration from somewhere far away and focused on the display. It was a summons from Azrael; combat duty on Latos O-12. Fuck. He ignored the hammering of his pulse on the insides of his forehead and pushed over the side of the bed. He needed to pee urgently and managed to stagger over to the cubicle reserved for that exact purpose. For some reason he couldn't quite let go and when at last his bladder won, he knew why. The pain from urinating surpassed the pain in his head for a full second and he instinctively pulled back, painting the entire assembly in orange liquid. He grinned despite the pain; apparently he had enjoyed himself last night.
On uncertain legs, he stomped back inside the bedroom and started rummaging for his clothes, finding the last sock behind a lamp next to the door. He dressed slowly with every incident of his head below his chest resulting in massive thundering inside his head. Finally he stood at the end of the bed and looked at the two naked girls, still bleary eyed and hurting. He couldn't remember if these two were working girls or just out for a good time. Nevermind, he put a credstick with enough Corvus credits in it to cover the most expensive hotel suite in Dau Senate as well as clothe the two girls in synth-silks from whatever fashion outlet hey preferred, put the sheets over them and walked out of the door. He accessed the station data sphere; why the hell was he in Latos?
###
Admiral Otestrom, commander of the Itani 6th Battle Fleet was not happy. From the command position aboard his flagship the “Mental Enlightenment” he had seen the once proud 3rd Fleet
smashed to expensive wreckage by repeated well-coordinated Serco attacks, attacks that seemed to be spearheaded by the elite pilots of ONE, the Serco quasi-military collection of ex-Skycommand pilots. And now the grinder was calling out for his fleet with little hope of breaking the stalemate of Deneb. The last 3rd Fleet ship, a Teradon class frigate aptly named as IMV Shrapnel from the amount of damage it had sustained, jumped out of Deneb leaving him as master of all Itani forces in Deneb. Well, on paper anyway. In reality, the defence forces were only half of the forces in Deneb, the remaining consisting of mercenaries, independent military outfits and their military misfit companions as well as a smattering of UIT pilots that had cast their lots in with the Itani cause. And the root cause for his unhappiness hailed from one of these quaisi-military outfits, no doubt clamouring for more spare parts, more docking rights or just some harebrained scheme to "win the war™". He had a war to run, not time for every self-proclaimed Alexander the Great. If it hadn't been for Commodore Kassad's recommendation, he would have rejected them outright. The persons that entered his bridge wore the light blue uniforms of SKV but that was just about the only uniting factor about them. The front man was a serious looking tall and broad Itani with only a single nametag with the callsign "Ghost" stitched across his chest in black letters; the other was slightly taller but very thin and had an insane grin plastered on his face, like a clown's rigor mortis mask; his nametag read "Niki". Both had black stripes on the left sleeves. Kassad noted that Otestrom was puzzled by that and leaned forward to whisper the explanation into the Admiral's ear.
"The three fat stripes on Ghosts sleeve means fifteen hundred Serco ships destroyed, with the two lighter ones denominating a further two hundred. The pilots of Skyggevakterne only get stripes for each hundred Serco ships destroyed Sir."
Otestrom nodded and counted the ones on Niki's sleeve. Five fat stripes, two thin ones. Impressive indeed. He cleared is throat.
"State your case Commander Ghost."
"Just Ghost Sir, we do not use ranks in the SKV." The voice fitted the nametag yet at the same time Otestrom wasn't in doubt that in combat Ghost's voice would come through clearly every time.
"We have a proposition to make. A proposition that would help you defeat the thrice cursed Serco and especially the mongrel guild ONE."
Otestrom leaned back, folded his hands in front of his belly and nodded. "Go on."
Chapter 23
The comforts of the station proper was all very nice and to some extent addictive as well. It was easy to be lured into the safe and comfortable embrace of metres of specially hardened xithricite armour, especially when said armour was enclosing very good companions and all the sanitary comforts a girl could possibly dream off. It never lasted though. Once she had been in the station for a day, Mercy started wondering whether the hive had expanded into Latos again, whether the tramlines to Odia were safe from pirates, whether the prices on essential medicines, and yes, we are indeed talking about derivatives of opiates here, had regained their profit potential after she dumped the prices a month ago. Inevitably, she found herself in the usual discomfort of her vac-suit, hardened helmet under arm, staring at her ship without really remembering how she arrived in the dock. She had Grey in her blood.
This time it had been easier, especially since she had used most of her spare time poring over the data from Hortan's last flight deciding where to look. It hadn't been easy but the collection of the Latos O-12 roidfield movement dynamics she had done last year as well as a very nice programme she had hmmm…, acquired from Serco Sky Command via a, lets call him a friend from Xang Xi, assisted her immensely. Naturally, her backdoor access codes to the TGFT mainframe helped a lot as well, especially since the sheer amount of numbers that had to be crunched was staggering. Fortunately, the TGFT mainframe was connected to Moda's research quantum computer and within no more than a day, she had received her result. Too easy.
She boarded her white and hunter-green Atlas, checked everything was as she left them and requested a launch. She found Ironstar floating outside in a massively bulky Prometheus, the hunter-green colours served to make it look like a cargo container with bolted-on weapons. Kinda what the techs up Serco-land had engineered it for she guessed. She didn't carry any weapons herself; she rarely did apart from the deterrence mines on her Behemoth. Without further delay, she set up a course for Latos O-12, relayed it to Ironstar and hit the turbo. Mercy to the rescue!
###
Smurftopia, a very fitting name for the largest Itani run bar in Dau, was lit by garish blue neon and shaped in formed plastic in the mould of a large mushroom. The décor was obviously provided by someone who had indeed been imbibing mushrooms himself and was as the same time a play on the racist slur of calling the Itani people smurfs. Chi gritted her teeth and walked over to the very large and very non-Itani bouncer outside. With a smile that was supposed to be welcoming but instead just looked creepy, he opened the door to let her in. Her alert-O-meter redscaled as she passed him, so many things were wrong; subtle things that your average party-goer wouldn't notice ever but shouted out loud to Chi. However, she was committed and couldn’t back out now.
Inside, the thumping drums, shrill guitars and stroboscopic lights flooded her senses with a tidal wave of sensory noise. She looked around and quickly found the two emergency exits as well as the access panel to the station's ventilation system. At both the emergency exits she spotted more bouncers, bouncers like the one outside. She stopped moving when she was just inside, hesitating as to where she wanted to go and almost immediately she felt a hand on her elbow nudging her along into the bar, soft but insisting. Half turning, she smiled back at the person that had ushered her inside and almost reacted when she recognised the man that had been clearing her through immigration. The smile on his lips was posing as a genuine smile but the eyes were absolutely dead. Chi turned back to the bar and looked around for her connection inside, failing to see him as usual. Slowly she proceeded up to the main bar and turned so she could see the entrance where three bulky young men were barring the way out. She ordered a Pearl diver, a mixture of crushed Eo pink strawberries, Denic demi-vanilla icecream and synth vodka, easily swiping the small nanite transceiver underneath the glass. It penetrated her skin and linked her to the other user inside the bar. She initiated the codes and soon after a voice came through clear but very flat and toneless.
"You picked a crappy time to arrive Chi."
"Looks like it Mal. How long has it been going on?"
"They sealed the entrance about an hour ago. Load of people coming in, none allowed out. No contact outside, expecting a null-field emitter at the exits."
"Have they said anything? Are they armed?"
"They are just standing there and turning people back if they want to leave. And they are indeed armed."
Chi sipped from her drink and watched the bouncers walk outside all at once, closing the doors behind them with a finality that she didn't like the look off.
"Mal, the ventilation shaft now."
At the end of the bar, the cleaner, a boy of about 15 with bright neon green and golden yellow hair styled like an octopus on ecstasy, set his tray on the desk and moved with fluid grace and by the easiest route over to the ventilation access panel. Chi smile despite the seriousness of the situation; she had always imagined Malachia as an older man, definitely dull. Life is never what it seems. She started to move towards the panel herself.
###
Something was very wrong with his station. Well, not his station in any legal sense but as for knowledge of the station, it was Trulo's. He lived and breathed it and had done so even more than normal this last month or so. Several air scrubbers had stopped working on levels 14 to 16 within less than ten minutes and he knew that these scrubbers had been serviced no later than half a year ago. He had sent a query down to the guards at the nearest point but didn't get a reply from them. He had made a mental note of it; he would deal with it another day. Right now he needed to repair the grid on level 14 that had likewise gone off line inexplicably. The normal ambient light in the corridor they were working in was flickering on and off in tandem with the surges that kept on hitting this level and only the dull bio-luminescent panels, that were painted on the ceiling for emergency use, provided any real light. The air was reeking with unwashed bodies, partially combusted plastic and flesh as well as the ever-present taint of sulphur that betrayed a non-functioning air-scrubber. Despite of that, his crew was checking the null-res cable methodically with Trulo running diagnostics on the freeze nodes that were controlling the temperature inside the cable, ensuring that it would keep its super conducting abilities when they first heard or rather felt the wrongness.
Trulo looked up at his point man across the full-face mask he was wearing to protect him from the cold. Something bulky clad in bright orange and black fur appeared in the corridor with a suddenness that was as violent as the twin sword-like horns that projected from the top of the creature's wrists. With no hesitation, the creature stabbed one claw through the chest of his mechanic, exploding gore and blood into the corridor like a water disperser. Not stopping at all, the creature swiped another hideous claw at the mechanic's assistant, raking him with two long gashes that almost tore his body into strips. The other two mechanics in front of Trulo froze in terror and incomprehension, thus sealing their deaths; Trulo ran the fastest he had learned. The screams behind him echoed down the corridor, ending in a long and almost worse gurgling and wrenching sound. Trulo stopped and opened an access panel to the ventilation system, crawled inside and shut the panel behind him. He moved as fast as he could crawl, down the ventilation shaft and found a set of rungs that would take him up or down. He went down, down towards the engine section. A rustling, shuffling, clicking noise behind him approached too fast for it to be another human. Trulo opened another access hatch and crawled into the electrical supply tunnel, worming along the now defunct power conduits between the levels. He had only just moved in when the panel was ripped off and something tried to move into the tunnel with him. He looked down between his feet and saw the long muzzle with long metallic looking teeth that peered inside. Above the muzzle, four eyes looked up at him, the two eyes towards the sides of the head black and the central eyes almost like human eyeballs. A stench of blood and death poured out from the mouth of the beast, almost overwhelming him with nausea. He scrambled to get out of its reach as fast as he could, get away from the horror that was peering up at his feet. The beast withdrew its head and tried to stab out at Trulo but only grazed the sole of his boot, ripping it off completely. The second swipe was below him as he curled his legs up under himself. The nightmare creature bellowed up at him in impotent rage and then moved back a bit while it stared at the opening. Like a small animal in front of a massive predator, Trulo remained in foetal position, paralysed by the reptilian parts of his brains that had decided to take control. He realised the immense danger he was in but had absolutely no control of his own body and could only watch in horror as the creature started to rip the access port apart and enlarged the opening so it would fit in. This was it, now he was going to die for sure. The creature ripped another chunk of bulkhead metal away from the corridor and then suddenly stopped. It turned, seemed to sniff the air and then moved back away from his sights. Trulo forced himself to breathe again and then shuffled at maximum speed away from the opening, into engineer land, into safety.
###
The party had been awesome, the drinks had been fantastic, the girls stupendous at their particular art; the hangover was equally epic. What had seemed at the time to be such a good idea and so much fun had in too little time boomeranged right back into Chaakin's face and exploded in a torrent of a headache, a bad breath the would kill a guy from ten feet away and a body that hurt as much as if he had been the piñata at a Serco kindergarten. The perscom beeped incessantly at a volume that was definitely above what he needed right now and with no little effort he twisted his entire body to get a hold on it. The sheets that loosely covered him turned along with his movement into a tangled knot around his chest, at the same time hoggin' them away from the two girls that were passed out next to him. He forgot the perscom for a second as he stared at the two unconscious naked bodies. Damn, he had absolutely no recollection of what had happened from about the time that Peytros moved out from the bar with the three giggling girls. The beeping noise intensified and he tore his attention away from the girls towards killing that annoying sound. Under the bed, in his crumpled trousers' left pocket he found the noisemaker. Once more, he summoned concentration from somewhere far away and focused on the display. It was a summons from Azrael; combat duty on Latos O-12. Fuck. He ignored the hammering of his pulse on the insides of his forehead and pushed over the side of the bed. He needed to pee urgently and managed to stagger over to the cubicle reserved for that exact purpose. For some reason he couldn't quite let go and when at last his bladder won, he knew why. The pain from urinating surpassed the pain in his head for a full second and he instinctively pulled back, painting the entire assembly in orange liquid. He grinned despite the pain; apparently he had enjoyed himself last night.
On uncertain legs, he stomped back inside the bedroom and started rummaging for his clothes, finding the last sock behind a lamp next to the door. He dressed slowly with every incident of his head below his chest resulting in massive thundering inside his head. Finally he stood at the end of the bed and looked at the two naked girls, still bleary eyed and hurting. He couldn't remember if these two were working girls or just out for a good time. Nevermind, he put a credstick with enough Corvus credits in it to cover the most expensive hotel suite in Dau Senate as well as clothe the two girls in synth-silks from whatever fashion outlet hey preferred, put the sheets over them and walked out of the door. He accessed the station data sphere; why the hell was he in Latos?
###
Admiral Otestrom, commander of the Itani 6th Battle Fleet was not happy. From the command position aboard his flagship the “Mental Enlightenment” he had seen the once proud 3rd Fleet
smashed to expensive wreckage by repeated well-coordinated Serco attacks, attacks that seemed to be spearheaded by the elite pilots of ONE, the Serco quasi-military collection of ex-Skycommand pilots. And now the grinder was calling out for his fleet with little hope of breaking the stalemate of Deneb. The last 3rd Fleet ship, a Teradon class frigate aptly named as IMV Shrapnel from the amount of damage it had sustained, jumped out of Deneb leaving him as master of all Itani forces in Deneb. Well, on paper anyway. In reality, the defence forces were only half of the forces in Deneb, the remaining consisting of mercenaries, independent military outfits and their military misfit companions as well as a smattering of UIT pilots that had cast their lots in with the Itani cause. And the root cause for his unhappiness hailed from one of these quaisi-military outfits, no doubt clamouring for more spare parts, more docking rights or just some harebrained scheme to "win the war™". He had a war to run, not time for every self-proclaimed Alexander the Great. If it hadn't been for Commodore Kassad's recommendation, he would have rejected them outright. The persons that entered his bridge wore the light blue uniforms of SKV but that was just about the only uniting factor about them. The front man was a serious looking tall and broad Itani with only a single nametag with the callsign "Ghost" stitched across his chest in black letters; the other was slightly taller but very thin and had an insane grin plastered on his face, like a clown's rigor mortis mask; his nametag read "Niki". Both had black stripes on the left sleeves. Kassad noted that Otestrom was puzzled by that and leaned forward to whisper the explanation into the Admiral's ear.
"The three fat stripes on Ghosts sleeve means fifteen hundred Serco ships destroyed, with the two lighter ones denominating a further two hundred. The pilots of Skyggevakterne only get stripes for each hundred Serco ships destroyed Sir."
Otestrom nodded and counted the ones on Niki's sleeve. Five fat stripes, two thin ones. Impressive indeed. He cleared is throat.
"State your case Commander Ghost."
"Just Ghost Sir, we do not use ranks in the SKV." The voice fitted the nametag yet at the same time Otestrom wasn't in doubt that in combat Ghost's voice would come through clearly every time.
"We have a proposition to make. A proposition that would help you defeat the thrice cursed Serco and especially the mongrel guild ONE."
Otestrom leaned back, folded his hands in front of his belly and nodded. "Go on."
Chapter 24
The massive space station was a legacy of military necessity and its designers had done absolutely nothing to hide that fact. The habitable parts of station in itself were fairly small and could easily have fit into the docking section of the Dau UIT Senate Mega-station. And even so, half of that was a square box that jutted out into space with a large red cross on it; the medical ward that served the frontline behind the next wormhole. The dry-docks that cradled the station like oversized pillows, harboured capitol ships of various degrees of damage, nestling them like the comforting embrace of a mother to her child. The arrays of guns and missiles that dotted just about every surface killed any notion of softness or peacefulness however, as did the several flights of vultures that buzzed around. Further out, massive gun and missile platforms were positioned around the wormhole nexus with a battle fleet parked directly on top of it for extra security. On the other side were contested space and the Itani archenemy. Cranston once more decided that he had made a very bad choice when he had decided for his hunter-green Valkyrie X-1 this morning. He requested permission to dock and after the slightest delay he was permitted a vector to bay 19-B-B. His threat radar indicated a radar lock from at least three missile- and one gun-batteries all the way into the docking bay, only disengaging when the heavy xithricite armour blocked the signal. Inside the bay, flickering blue light from an arc-welder painted the station's insides in a stroboscopic light. Cranston jumped out of the seat and looked around for his contact. There, a giant man clad in the red and black dress uniform of ONE looked directly at him and nodded when they made eye contact. Cranston walked over to the man and extended his hand in greeting. The giant shook his hand slowly and carefully as if he would crush it if he didn't take extreme care. Which was probably a fair assessment Cranston thought.
"Good day Sir. Cranston Gorky, special liaison to ONE. Glad to meet you."
The giant nodded and withdrew his hand. The voice was much lower and much cheerier than Cranston had anticipated.
"Hiya little buddy. Name's Aelius. Good to meet ya too."
"Riddik told me to punch you if you called me that you know?"
The giant's right hand moved down to rest easily on the ceremonial dagger, which could have doubled as a broadsword to normal persons, which was tugged into his belt and leaned slightly forward, eyes narrowing in concentration.
"Is that a formal challenge hunorm?"
Cranston felt a jolt of fear as his adrenaline glands emptied themselves into his bloodstream. He had not been on the station for more than a minute and already he had smashed relations with ONE. Ecka was going to have his hide, assuming that the giant let him have some of it when he was finished. He could feel his face go white and started mumbling something about misunderstanding, when the giant's face cracked in a mighty grin that was enhanced by a mighty roar of laughter.
"Ha, got you on that one little buddy. Rest easy, we of ONE do not get offended that easily. C'mon, let me show you the crew, get you sorted out, get you a drink."
Cranston breathed again. Okay, apart from him making an ass of himself, this was going to work. And the promise of a drink certainly was welcome.
###
Strat and Niut walked down the corridor, their soft-soled pilot's boots swooshing on the metal grid. The medical ward was a study in metal surfaces, harsh lights, white clothes and disinfectants with strange machines shoved into every corner. They were talking about the day's events on the way to Cat's room, ending the conversation as they entered.
"...damn freak I tell you."
Cat looked up at the noise. Her head was completed enclosed in soft plastic that was designed to keep her head absolutely still and remove her visual inputs. The looking up was merely a reflex; there was nothing to see.
"What is Niut?"
"Oh hi Cat, wasn't sure if you were awake."
Niut sounded concerned and looked over at Strat for permission to elaborate on the subject. He nodded.
"Station security on SEDINA D-14 reported they had found three girls in a hotel room this morning completely zoned out of their heads. Seems like someone hooked them up to a virtual environ and then used the brain access to mess them up completely. The haven't flatlined or such, rather it is the opposite; they are caught in extreme emotional bliss or hell whichever was programmed for them. As I told Strat here", Strat grunted a hello, "whoever did this is a damn freak."
Cat nodded, or did a mental image of herself nodding. That movement was equally impossible by the plastic. The door was opened again and Strat and Niut made space for the two medics that came into the room along with their test equipment. One of them nodded to Strat before he started to disassemble the plastic casing covering Cat's head.
"Please close your eyes Cat, the lights, even though they are dimmed, will hurt after this long in darkness."
Cat did was she was told and within a minute she felt light stab through her closed eyelids. She dared opening them slowly and saw the anxious faces of Strat and Niut. With a grunt of effort, she forced herself into a sitting position and fought the nausea that came from the movement. She had been prone in the mask for seven days since her brainpal operation. When an adult received a new brainpal, the brain needed to interact with it and semi-sensory depravation was the most efficient way of doing that. Still, she didn't have access to the machine in her head. The medic shone a red light in each of her eyes, checked the neural scanner and smiled. He snapped his fingers at the left and right side, poked her on the nose and produced something vile that he shoved under her nose. The smell was horrible and she pulled her head away. Once more the medic checked his board and smiled.
"Looks good Catherine. Sorry; Cat. If you can please say after me the following: one delta one bravo one charlie one omega."
Cat did what he said and waited for a second. Her brainpal came online, interacting with her entire body in a spasm of data collection that locked all of her muscles. Fortunately the medics were prepared for it and gently steered her onto the bed again until the system allowed her control of her body again. The medic sent a query to her link.
<confirm status brainpal.>
<fully operational. all systems working, no degradation.>
Strat and Niut waited anxiously to see if she was okay; without brainpals of their own they couldn't connect to her. She gave a thumbs-up and immediately sent a query for a particular VPR's status to the mainframe. Confused by the result, she looked over at Strat.
"What is this; why is Shlim not on the active roster?"
###
"And that ends my evening briefing Sir."
The room was empty apart from Ecka and ts. The various council members were off on different missions, the most important of which was the mission to find the missing miner Hortan. And with little progress made in any of the missions, the briefing had been, well brief. Ecka nodded slowly, his jowls resting in his left hand, the fingers of which stroked his chin softly.
"Somehaw mah gut feelin’ tells me ‘at thaur is mair tae these incidents than appears reit noo. Especially th’ report frae Gramps sounds loch somethin’ major is brewin’. Fa coods we task tae assist them if it goes wran?"
Ts flickered through the personnel roster, highlighting the members according to experience in piloting as well as combat skills.
"Not that many Sir. Most of the remaining pilots on the active duty roster are traders and miners, with little or no combat experience. I could send myself, maybe Shna and Ato as well."
"Onie bark ay Surb?"
"No Sir, he is still not in communications range I'd suspect. Nobody has heard from the exploration vessel since it moved away from the Azek main station and we haven't heard from Surb since the day before he was going aboard."
"Ah see. Send someain tae check oan Surbs belongins, see if he has a next ay kin ur th’ loch. Mebbe they kent something we dornt." Ts nodded and jotted an order on his screen. "An’ please min’ ‘at Ah was a capable combat pilot afair Ah was bogged doon in th’ labyrinth ay administration. If ye need a pilot, Eh’d loove tae assist."
Ts grinned; he had heard stories about the combat prowess of the Eckanatar, heard of the Eckataur but had never flown a COSP with him. It could be interesting indeed to see if all the rumours were true. Hell, if even half of them were true.
"Will do Sir. And someone is moving on the Surb question as we speak as well."
"Aw is weel ‘en. Noo, lit us hae’ ‘at bevy, we surely deserve it.”
###
Eggert slowly and methodically sorted the data into connecting sets, analysing them as he did so. Certainly, the 40-odd persons that had been killed by racially motivated youths in Dau was a problem. Or rather, that was the problem. Nothing really linked most of the killings, apart from the racist motive. He had a small cluster of seven persons that had been murdered in the same fashion, but that didn't necessarily mean that the group was responsible. Rather, it was probably the work of a serial killer and thus a police problem. He sent the data to one of his mates in the police force and hoped they would find the culprit. Another cluster of four murders was much more interesting, especially since they were all linked by their association to the UPK. He accessed the UPK personnel roster and started checking for data on the four deceased. Interesting, all had maximum-security clearance. He ran a query on persons working in the same areas or with the same level of access and came up with a list of around 400 persons. Sighing deeply, he started the tedious work of matching names to faces to backgrounds to data etc... Fortunately he had no social life whatsoever and his three fish, all named after the members of the UIT senate triumvirate, could probably wait with their food for some time.
The massive space station was a legacy of military necessity and its designers had done absolutely nothing to hide that fact. The habitable parts of station in itself were fairly small and could easily have fit into the docking section of the Dau UIT Senate Mega-station. And even so, half of that was a square box that jutted out into space with a large red cross on it; the medical ward that served the frontline behind the next wormhole. The dry-docks that cradled the station like oversized pillows, harboured capitol ships of various degrees of damage, nestling them like the comforting embrace of a mother to her child. The arrays of guns and missiles that dotted just about every surface killed any notion of softness or peacefulness however, as did the several flights of vultures that buzzed around. Further out, massive gun and missile platforms were positioned around the wormhole nexus with a battle fleet parked directly on top of it for extra security. On the other side were contested space and the Itani archenemy. Cranston once more decided that he had made a very bad choice when he had decided for his hunter-green Valkyrie X-1 this morning. He requested permission to dock and after the slightest delay he was permitted a vector to bay 19-B-B. His threat radar indicated a radar lock from at least three missile- and one gun-batteries all the way into the docking bay, only disengaging when the heavy xithricite armour blocked the signal. Inside the bay, flickering blue light from an arc-welder painted the station's insides in a stroboscopic light. Cranston jumped out of the seat and looked around for his contact. There, a giant man clad in the red and black dress uniform of ONE looked directly at him and nodded when they made eye contact. Cranston walked over to the man and extended his hand in greeting. The giant shook his hand slowly and carefully as if he would crush it if he didn't take extreme care. Which was probably a fair assessment Cranston thought.
"Good day Sir. Cranston Gorky, special liaison to ONE. Glad to meet you."
The giant nodded and withdrew his hand. The voice was much lower and much cheerier than Cranston had anticipated.
"Hiya little buddy. Name's Aelius. Good to meet ya too."
"Riddik told me to punch you if you called me that you know?"
The giant's right hand moved down to rest easily on the ceremonial dagger, which could have doubled as a broadsword to normal persons, which was tugged into his belt and leaned slightly forward, eyes narrowing in concentration.
"Is that a formal challenge hunorm?"
Cranston felt a jolt of fear as his adrenaline glands emptied themselves into his bloodstream. He had not been on the station for more than a minute and already he had smashed relations with ONE. Ecka was going to have his hide, assuming that the giant let him have some of it when he was finished. He could feel his face go white and started mumbling something about misunderstanding, when the giant's face cracked in a mighty grin that was enhanced by a mighty roar of laughter.
"Ha, got you on that one little buddy. Rest easy, we of ONE do not get offended that easily. C'mon, let me show you the crew, get you sorted out, get you a drink."
Cranston breathed again. Okay, apart from him making an ass of himself, this was going to work. And the promise of a drink certainly was welcome.
###
Strat and Niut walked down the corridor, their soft-soled pilot's boots swooshing on the metal grid. The medical ward was a study in metal surfaces, harsh lights, white clothes and disinfectants with strange machines shoved into every corner. They were talking about the day's events on the way to Cat's room, ending the conversation as they entered.
"...damn freak I tell you."
Cat looked up at the noise. Her head was completed enclosed in soft plastic that was designed to keep her head absolutely still and remove her visual inputs. The looking up was merely a reflex; there was nothing to see.
"What is Niut?"
"Oh hi Cat, wasn't sure if you were awake."
Niut sounded concerned and looked over at Strat for permission to elaborate on the subject. He nodded.
"Station security on SEDINA D-14 reported they had found three girls in a hotel room this morning completely zoned out of their heads. Seems like someone hooked them up to a virtual environ and then used the brain access to mess them up completely. The haven't flatlined or such, rather it is the opposite; they are caught in extreme emotional bliss or hell whichever was programmed for them. As I told Strat here", Strat grunted a hello, "whoever did this is a damn freak."
Cat nodded, or did a mental image of herself nodding. That movement was equally impossible by the plastic. The door was opened again and Strat and Niut made space for the two medics that came into the room along with their test equipment. One of them nodded to Strat before he started to disassemble the plastic casing covering Cat's head.
"Please close your eyes Cat, the lights, even though they are dimmed, will hurt after this long in darkness."
Cat did was she was told and within a minute she felt light stab through her closed eyelids. She dared opening them slowly and saw the anxious faces of Strat and Niut. With a grunt of effort, she forced herself into a sitting position and fought the nausea that came from the movement. She had been prone in the mask for seven days since her brainpal operation. When an adult received a new brainpal, the brain needed to interact with it and semi-sensory depravation was the most efficient way of doing that. Still, she didn't have access to the machine in her head. The medic shone a red light in each of her eyes, checked the neural scanner and smiled. He snapped his fingers at the left and right side, poked her on the nose and produced something vile that he shoved under her nose. The smell was horrible and she pulled her head away. Once more the medic checked his board and smiled.
"Looks good Catherine. Sorry; Cat. If you can please say after me the following: one delta one bravo one charlie one omega."
Cat did what he said and waited for a second. Her brainpal came online, interacting with her entire body in a spasm of data collection that locked all of her muscles. Fortunately the medics were prepared for it and gently steered her onto the bed again until the system allowed her control of her body again. The medic sent a query to her link.
<confirm status brainpal.>
<fully operational. all systems working, no degradation.>
Strat and Niut waited anxiously to see if she was okay; without brainpals of their own they couldn't connect to her. She gave a thumbs-up and immediately sent a query for a particular VPR's status to the mainframe. Confused by the result, she looked over at Strat.
"What is this; why is Shlim not on the active roster?"
###
"And that ends my evening briefing Sir."
The room was empty apart from Ecka and ts. The various council members were off on different missions, the most important of which was the mission to find the missing miner Hortan. And with little progress made in any of the missions, the briefing had been, well brief. Ecka nodded slowly, his jowls resting in his left hand, the fingers of which stroked his chin softly.
"Somehaw mah gut feelin’ tells me ‘at thaur is mair tae these incidents than appears reit noo. Especially th’ report frae Gramps sounds loch somethin’ major is brewin’. Fa coods we task tae assist them if it goes wran?"
Ts flickered through the personnel roster, highlighting the members according to experience in piloting as well as combat skills.
"Not that many Sir. Most of the remaining pilots on the active duty roster are traders and miners, with little or no combat experience. I could send myself, maybe Shna and Ato as well."
"Onie bark ay Surb?"
"No Sir, he is still not in communications range I'd suspect. Nobody has heard from the exploration vessel since it moved away from the Azek main station and we haven't heard from Surb since the day before he was going aboard."
"Ah see. Send someain tae check oan Surbs belongins, see if he has a next ay kin ur th’ loch. Mebbe they kent something we dornt." Ts nodded and jotted an order on his screen. "An’ please min’ ‘at Ah was a capable combat pilot afair Ah was bogged doon in th’ labyrinth ay administration. If ye need a pilot, Eh’d loove tae assist."
Ts grinned; he had heard stories about the combat prowess of the Eckanatar, heard of the Eckataur but had never flown a COSP with him. It could be interesting indeed to see if all the rumours were true. Hell, if even half of them were true.
"Will do Sir. And someone is moving on the Surb question as we speak as well."
"Aw is weel ‘en. Noo, lit us hae’ ‘at bevy, we surely deserve it.”
###
Eggert slowly and methodically sorted the data into connecting sets, analysing them as he did so. Certainly, the 40-odd persons that had been killed by racially motivated youths in Dau was a problem. Or rather, that was the problem. Nothing really linked most of the killings, apart from the racist motive. He had a small cluster of seven persons that had been murdered in the same fashion, but that didn't necessarily mean that the group was responsible. Rather, it was probably the work of a serial killer and thus a police problem. He sent the data to one of his mates in the police force and hoped they would find the culprit. Another cluster of four murders was much more interesting, especially since they were all linked by their association to the UPK. He accessed the UPK personnel roster and started checking for data on the four deceased. Interesting, all had maximum-security clearance. He ran a query on persons working in the same areas or with the same level of access and came up with a list of around 400 persons. Sighing deeply, he started the tedious work of matching names to faces to backgrounds to data etc... Fortunately he had no social life whatsoever and his three fish, all named after the members of the UIT senate triumvirate, could probably wait with their food for some time.
Chapter 25
Gramps ran the tape again, this time in ultra slow-motion, leaning forward and squinting to make the best of the low light conditions surrounding the ventilation shaft where John and Buzz had set up a surveillance camera. Again, something slashed across the picture directly into the semi-sleeping security guard that was stationed outside the Priggly Pear. The blur of orange and black didn't resemble anything he had seen before and no amount of squinting helped with this tape. He stopped the picture and called John over for a second opinion.
"Can't tell you Gramps. It looks like a localised lightning storm on steroids. And from the look on the guards face, it is a nasty bugger as well. Can you move a couple of frames forw.." Gramps pushed the toggle to let the movie resume, albeit only with two frames per second, "ah yes, As you can see from the angle of the guards head when the decapitated remains depart his occluded body as well as the really silly look of surprise he has plastered on it, the beast obviously moved extremely fast and knows how to stealth itself as well. He never noticed the blades as they tore him apart yowser, that has got to hurt."
Gramps grimaced at John in disbelief.
"The guy gets decapitated, and all you can think of is yowser?"
John grinned sheepishly and shrugged. "First thing that came to mind really. Do you know what it is?"
"No, but I do know that the Priggly Pear is now well and truly locked up with this thing outside. Want to re-consider the rescue plan?"
John lifted his Ornate heavy Eviltanium Corvus Special-Built triple-barrelled neutron hand-canon, checked the charge counter as full and grinned over to the admiring girls that were sitting on the benches against the wall. Rose, by far the prettiest of them all, walked over to him and with a slight reddening of her cheeks, handed him a scarf she had carried in her pocket. John accepted it, brought her into his massively muscled arms and kissed her hard before looking over to Gramps.. who snapped his fingers in front of Johns vacant eyes.
"Helloooo, are you listening man?"
"Sorry, tired and all. Yeah, we have to change it. But we'll go in tomorrow as planned anyway or it becomes a moot point. Listen, I'll talk to Buzz and we'll come up with a plan."
"Right, get some sleep first will you? I was worried for you there."
John nodded and walked over to the food pot, got a bowl of the tasteless gunk that someone had scrounged from a disused algae-vat factory and had with some humour decided to call stew. He had tasted paint and glue that was tastier but it filled the hole in his stomach. Rose came over and sat with him, a bowl of the same slimy chunks of ...stuff, nestled up to him for warmth and started eating with the same distaste painted on her face as he felt inside. Still, her presence made the meal just about bearable and he managed to finish the food. She had fallen asleep against his shoulder and with a tired smile he leaned into her head and closed his own eyes. Bliss.
###
Mercy was scanning the roids thoroughly, especially the iceroids but came up with nothing. No IFF, no trace of radio chatter, no emissions of any sort. She turned her directional beam radio towards Ironstar, who flew security around 2000 meters away and chirped a signal.
"I thought I could find him easily. Or rather, I assumed."
"You know what they say about assumptions surely."
Mercy grimaced, "yeah. The mother of all fuck-ups. Listen, I'll try to beam my distress code directly at the roids at full power. If his ship can hear anything, it will respond to that automatically. Don't worry, I am not in distress IS."
He clicked assent and she started blasting the iceroids with hundreds of watts directed through her directional antenna. No response, except from Ironstar's autonomous systems that queried her own ship's status. It wasn't working. Either he wasn't here or his ship was smashed. She was close to despair when she remembered the advanced mining scanner that was a permanent fixture of her Atlas. Thinking why not, she swung it to cover the nearest roids. One of the roids, a large one with a fairly big crater on one side, was twenty Kelvin above the other roids. Odd, she moved her ship over to the roid and positioned it very close to it. She blasted every erg she could put into her radio into the roid. Nothing. She punched her control board in frustration and leaned back. Dammit, she was so certain that she knew where he was she could taste it.
When she punched the controls, she had accidentally pushed the throttle controls and before she noticed, her ship buried itself a metre into the ice. Suddenly her ship was filled with a male voice that sang clearly through her hull. "Eeeeeaseeeee, whaaa whaaa whaaa whaaaaa, I'm eeasy like sunday moooorning." She grinned and reversed her ship, twisted the transmitter towards Ironstar and practicably shouted.
"Bingo, he is here."
###
The flash of the initial explosion saved Chi's life. The primer was only about half a kilo's worth of high-density explosives but still gave a flash that instantly triggered Chi to drop to the floor and close her eyes. Most of the other guests in the bar took the full impact of the fire-bombs that spread a sheet of fire through the bar at around a metre's height up to the ceiling, the lucky ones dying instantly and the remaining being turned into human sized torches by the gelatinous burning liquid. Chi closed her mouth, shut the vacuum-safe membranes across her eyes and crawled as fast as she could, ignoring the burning pools on the ground as well as the searing pain on her left calf where half of her leg was covered in the burning liquid, towards where she had seen Mal last. Through the hellish inferno she spotted a head with a singed green plume of heat-curled hair, fortunately not covered by the burning gel. Chi grabbed one lifeless arm and started pulling her precious cargo towards the ventilation shaft. The flames had more or less ceased roaring as the burning liquid had consumed all the air inside and a thick black smoke started pouring forth as the liquid started to turn whatever organic material it had touched into charcoal.
Chi turned off her pain receptors in her leg and switched to her small internal air tank that was meant to give her five minutes of miserable survival in vacuum. After a minute of painful dragging, she reached the ventilation shaft, emergency closed to stop the fire from spreading to the remaining parts of the station. She reached inside the emergency opening, closed her eyes and pulled hard. It gave way and the ventilation shaft opened with a mighty roar from the air that rushed into the smouldering bar and re-ignited everything that had almost died out. She ignored the smell of burnt hair and forced herself and Mal into the shaft and closed the door behind her. The roaring ceased and she focused on smothering the flames on herself and Mal as well as checking Mal for vitals. Still pulse, Mal could theoretically make it if she was quick to get him out of here. She opened a secure channel to one of her connections in the UIT secret service and sent her status and location. She needed help and needed it fast.
###
The lone Prometheus went through the Itani heavy bombers like a rhinoceros through an ant-hill with scant regard for the escort fighters that buzzed around it like gnats, smashing bolt after bolt of positrons into the rear armour plating before hitting the heavy rocket ammunition stored in the centre of the ship with gratifying results. The last bomber gone, the ONE pilot turned his Prometheus around and started chewing through the escorts with no more effort than the bombers. The Serco Heavy Assault Cruiser was safe and the lone Itani Teradon was soon to be so much scrap metal. Like the previous ships from the Itani 3rd fleet, this ship was destined for a heavy does of Serco missiles from the fighter-bomber squadrons that were escorted in by another two members of ONE. Yep, they had the war all contained in Deneb, nice and firm while they re-built their fleet for the big push.
Gramps ran the tape again, this time in ultra slow-motion, leaning forward and squinting to make the best of the low light conditions surrounding the ventilation shaft where John and Buzz had set up a surveillance camera. Again, something slashed across the picture directly into the semi-sleeping security guard that was stationed outside the Priggly Pear. The blur of orange and black didn't resemble anything he had seen before and no amount of squinting helped with this tape. He stopped the picture and called John over for a second opinion.
"Can't tell you Gramps. It looks like a localised lightning storm on steroids. And from the look on the guards face, it is a nasty bugger as well. Can you move a couple of frames forw.." Gramps pushed the toggle to let the movie resume, albeit only with two frames per second, "ah yes, As you can see from the angle of the guards head when the decapitated remains depart his occluded body as well as the really silly look of surprise he has plastered on it, the beast obviously moved extremely fast and knows how to stealth itself as well. He never noticed the blades as they tore him apart yowser, that has got to hurt."
Gramps grimaced at John in disbelief.
"The guy gets decapitated, and all you can think of is yowser?"
John grinned sheepishly and shrugged. "First thing that came to mind really. Do you know what it is?"
"No, but I do know that the Priggly Pear is now well and truly locked up with this thing outside. Want to re-consider the rescue plan?"
John lifted his Ornate heavy Eviltanium Corvus Special-Built triple-barrelled neutron hand-canon, checked the charge counter as full and grinned over to the admiring girls that were sitting on the benches against the wall. Rose, by far the prettiest of them all, walked over to him and with a slight reddening of her cheeks, handed him a scarf she had carried in her pocket. John accepted it, brought her into his massively muscled arms and kissed her hard before looking over to Gramps.. who snapped his fingers in front of Johns vacant eyes.
"Helloooo, are you listening man?"
"Sorry, tired and all. Yeah, we have to change it. But we'll go in tomorrow as planned anyway or it becomes a moot point. Listen, I'll talk to Buzz and we'll come up with a plan."
"Right, get some sleep first will you? I was worried for you there."
John nodded and walked over to the food pot, got a bowl of the tasteless gunk that someone had scrounged from a disused algae-vat factory and had with some humour decided to call stew. He had tasted paint and glue that was tastier but it filled the hole in his stomach. Rose came over and sat with him, a bowl of the same slimy chunks of ...stuff, nestled up to him for warmth and started eating with the same distaste painted on her face as he felt inside. Still, her presence made the meal just about bearable and he managed to finish the food. She had fallen asleep against his shoulder and with a tired smile he leaned into her head and closed his own eyes. Bliss.
###
Mercy was scanning the roids thoroughly, especially the iceroids but came up with nothing. No IFF, no trace of radio chatter, no emissions of any sort. She turned her directional beam radio towards Ironstar, who flew security around 2000 meters away and chirped a signal.
"I thought I could find him easily. Or rather, I assumed."
"You know what they say about assumptions surely."
Mercy grimaced, "yeah. The mother of all fuck-ups. Listen, I'll try to beam my distress code directly at the roids at full power. If his ship can hear anything, it will respond to that automatically. Don't worry, I am not in distress IS."
He clicked assent and she started blasting the iceroids with hundreds of watts directed through her directional antenna. No response, except from Ironstar's autonomous systems that queried her own ship's status. It wasn't working. Either he wasn't here or his ship was smashed. She was close to despair when she remembered the advanced mining scanner that was a permanent fixture of her Atlas. Thinking why not, she swung it to cover the nearest roids. One of the roids, a large one with a fairly big crater on one side, was twenty Kelvin above the other roids. Odd, she moved her ship over to the roid and positioned it very close to it. She blasted every erg she could put into her radio into the roid. Nothing. She punched her control board in frustration and leaned back. Dammit, she was so certain that she knew where he was she could taste it.
When she punched the controls, she had accidentally pushed the throttle controls and before she noticed, her ship buried itself a metre into the ice. Suddenly her ship was filled with a male voice that sang clearly through her hull. "Eeeeeaseeeee, whaaa whaaa whaaa whaaaaa, I'm eeasy like sunday moooorning." She grinned and reversed her ship, twisted the transmitter towards Ironstar and practicably shouted.
"Bingo, he is here."
###
The flash of the initial explosion saved Chi's life. The primer was only about half a kilo's worth of high-density explosives but still gave a flash that instantly triggered Chi to drop to the floor and close her eyes. Most of the other guests in the bar took the full impact of the fire-bombs that spread a sheet of fire through the bar at around a metre's height up to the ceiling, the lucky ones dying instantly and the remaining being turned into human sized torches by the gelatinous burning liquid. Chi closed her mouth, shut the vacuum-safe membranes across her eyes and crawled as fast as she could, ignoring the burning pools on the ground as well as the searing pain on her left calf where half of her leg was covered in the burning liquid, towards where she had seen Mal last. Through the hellish inferno she spotted a head with a singed green plume of heat-curled hair, fortunately not covered by the burning gel. Chi grabbed one lifeless arm and started pulling her precious cargo towards the ventilation shaft. The flames had more or less ceased roaring as the burning liquid had consumed all the air inside and a thick black smoke started pouring forth as the liquid started to turn whatever organic material it had touched into charcoal.
Chi turned off her pain receptors in her leg and switched to her small internal air tank that was meant to give her five minutes of miserable survival in vacuum. After a minute of painful dragging, she reached the ventilation shaft, emergency closed to stop the fire from spreading to the remaining parts of the station. She reached inside the emergency opening, closed her eyes and pulled hard. It gave way and the ventilation shaft opened with a mighty roar from the air that rushed into the smouldering bar and re-ignited everything that had almost died out. She ignored the smell of burnt hair and forced herself and Mal into the shaft and closed the door behind her. The roaring ceased and she focused on smothering the flames on herself and Mal as well as checking Mal for vitals. Still pulse, Mal could theoretically make it if she was quick to get him out of here. She opened a secure channel to one of her connections in the UIT secret service and sent her status and location. She needed help and needed it fast.
###
The lone Prometheus went through the Itani heavy bombers like a rhinoceros through an ant-hill with scant regard for the escort fighters that buzzed around it like gnats, smashing bolt after bolt of positrons into the rear armour plating before hitting the heavy rocket ammunition stored in the centre of the ship with gratifying results. The last bomber gone, the ONE pilot turned his Prometheus around and started chewing through the escorts with no more effort than the bombers. The Serco Heavy Assault Cruiser was safe and the lone Itani Teradon was soon to be so much scrap metal. Like the previous ships from the Itani 3rd fleet, this ship was destined for a heavy does of Serco missiles from the fighter-bomber squadrons that were escorted in by another two members of ONE. Yep, they had the war all contained in Deneb, nice and firm while they re-built their fleet for the big push.
Chapter 26
Chaakin entered reality again with a stomach-churning jolt that made him wish, once more, that he had refused the drinks yesterday. Silhouetted against the harsh glare of the background stars, a shape of darkness slightly darker than the carpet of the nebula that provided the faintest of lights, he spotted two fighters. One had the flattened oval shape of a Valkyrie but with the experimental slim profile of the X-1 model; the other was a non-standard Atlas X-class multi-role ship. Peytros and Azrael. Chaakin's radio immediately crackled with a too loud and too cheerful voice.
"Chaakin, 'bout time you came 'round. Tried talking to Azrael here for an hour but he is not really into small talk."
The silence from Azrael's Atlas confirmed Peytros' plight and Chaakin thumbed his own radio.
"Yeah, sorry. Woke up in Epsilon Hold with a massive headache, a tongue that felt like it was fur-covered and an emptied wallet."
"I bet the wallet wasn't the only thing that was emptied. Thousand to one that you liked the twins."
Chaakin tried desperately to remember the two girls that had been lying next to each other in the bed, scantily covered by the blankets. He recalled some details, some very interesting and nice details to be sure, but he could not for his life recall their faces nor whether or not they had been twins.
"No bet Peytros. What happened to the girls you ran off with?"
"I gave them what they wanted Chaak. As always, it wasn't what they thought they wanted, but it turned out to be what they needed."
The cheerful voice was just slightly creepy and for some reason Chaakin could feel his skin rise in a strange fear reaction that appeared out of nowhere. He decided to change the subject.
"So, any voys inbound that we know of?"
Azrael's voice, no emotion attached to it at all, came through with clipped precision.
"Inbound Latos O-12 in six minutes. Two Behemoths, three Vultures and a single Centaur model II. Low priority through the wormhole; medium grade cargo. Ardenus scouting."
Chaakin grinned despite the pain from his slowly receding headache and nausea. The machine was working, Kharon's Shore was running as efficiently as it should even if its boss was away on a drinking binge. He was proud.
"Right, formation trident-2 on Azrael's mark. Let the ferryman get some customers today."
###
The acknowledgement had been quite a blow to Cat, more so since she had been so unprepared for it. Head bent over a cup of strong Koffee laced with Verasi spices and a single drop of Helio Mists, she had been stirring the brew for over twenty minutes in a slow and precise movement. Someone sat down heavily opposite her and placed his own cup of Koffee, three spoons sugar and one helping of cocoa, on the table in front of him. Atice; she knew without looking up from his movement sounds, his smell and the small noises he made while breathing. The new model brainpal they had inserted was a marked improvement on the old brainpal for sure, she just wished it could be commanded to ignore... emotions. She guessed she had to label it eventually, that strange thing that kept on messing with her head. With robotic precision, she stopped the stirring and placed the spoon on the table before looking up at a very concerned Atice.
"Are you okay Cat? You look like, well pardon me and everything, but you look like something the cat dragged in."
With light speed thoughts she analysed the sentence for all possible meanings, analysed Atice's face and eventually came to a suitable reply. It took her less than 0.2 second.
"I am well enough. Just thinking is all."
"Well, I have some news that'll cheer you up. Strat has put you on the active roster and it looks like we'll be flying together tomorrow at late shift. Latos O-12 patrol."
That would give her around 36 hours, more than enough time if she started out around now.
"That is good news Atice. I will have to prepare and get ready. Excuse me."
With a slight nod, she left her Koffee and Atice behind, moved down to the Viper's external comms room and found a private booth. She connected via her brainpal and sent a query to the only person she believed could help her with this conundrum; Riddik Willennium.
###
The signal was untraceable and was sent on a one-time path through the networks that permeated the Dau Senate station like roots deep in the human mulch. Eventually it popped up in the lower part of Eggert's screen with an attached alert. Not that the alert was necessary, the mere fact that it arrived was enough to focus Eggert's attention upon it.
"Well, I'll be damned. Didn't think I'd see this signal ever. And especially not here in Dau."
He geo-referenced the location and whistled softly. Just outside Smurftopia. Following his intuition, he swapped channels on the wall-screen and quickly turned the volume down as the reporter was practically screaming into the microphone, that special look on her face that indicated massive disaster and equally massive ratings. A truly once-in-a-lifetime occasion that had to milked for all it was worth.
"..fire is still not under control and the latest information we have is that the station fire-marshal is getting ready to void the area to space and kill the fire that way. Once more, a massive fire erupted in Smurftopia, the famous Itani bar. Initial reports tell off more than two hundred guests inside."
Cursing softly again, Eggert quickly ran through his options. The Secret Service was not allowed to work with active field agents inside UIT space and the Internal Security Agency was not really all that keen on saving the undercover agents of non-UIT organisations, no matter how much goodwill it would generate. Right, that left him with only tow options; go there himself or ask nicely at UPK headquarters. He picked up the phone and dialled 1-800-UPKHQ.
###
Trulo moved slowly down the airvent towards the mechanic's quarters that incidentally doubled as the main power coupling for the station. Low speech; apparently the beast hadn't penetrated so far yet. He opened the grate and did a slow somersault in the low gravity, landing on his feet with a slight metallic noise. He waved the greetings away with a tired hand and motioned them to be silent. He accepted a flask of Bractus genuine cane Rhum and took a mouthful of the fiery liquid before clearing his throat with a grimace. Damn, that Bractus stuff was rough and was guaranteed never to have seen anything even remotely resembling a sugar cane. Well, they had run out of the good Aeolus rhum a week ago when someone dug a barrel of this evil fluid up from somewhere. Still, it beat not having any. To prove the point, he took another swig.
"Mechanics, someone let a beast loose on the station and I am not sure how in the face of the Nebulae we are going to get rid of it. First order of business is to do a tally of the patrols out and then we need to secure this area against intrusion in such a degree that a fully battle-armoured Serco marine would have a hard time getting in. In the meantime I'll see if I can identify the critter and let the brass know that we have this slight problem on top of the power-out. Now, stop gawking and start working. I am not paying you to sit around with open mouths like giant two-legged carps."
His crew laughed at his attempt at sounding serious and XX executive-like but started to discuss amongst themselves how to best solve this new problem and then started working with it. Trulo smiled lopsidedly, shook his head in pride and walked over to his perscomp to see if he could find pictures of the beast that would fit with the thing that had chased him. Surely it would have a weakness somewhere.
Chaakin entered reality again with a stomach-churning jolt that made him wish, once more, that he had refused the drinks yesterday. Silhouetted against the harsh glare of the background stars, a shape of darkness slightly darker than the carpet of the nebula that provided the faintest of lights, he spotted two fighters. One had the flattened oval shape of a Valkyrie but with the experimental slim profile of the X-1 model; the other was a non-standard Atlas X-class multi-role ship. Peytros and Azrael. Chaakin's radio immediately crackled with a too loud and too cheerful voice.
"Chaakin, 'bout time you came 'round. Tried talking to Azrael here for an hour but he is not really into small talk."
The silence from Azrael's Atlas confirmed Peytros' plight and Chaakin thumbed his own radio.
"Yeah, sorry. Woke up in Epsilon Hold with a massive headache, a tongue that felt like it was fur-covered and an emptied wallet."
"I bet the wallet wasn't the only thing that was emptied. Thousand to one that you liked the twins."
Chaakin tried desperately to remember the two girls that had been lying next to each other in the bed, scantily covered by the blankets. He recalled some details, some very interesting and nice details to be sure, but he could not for his life recall their faces nor whether or not they had been twins.
"No bet Peytros. What happened to the girls you ran off with?"
"I gave them what they wanted Chaak. As always, it wasn't what they thought they wanted, but it turned out to be what they needed."
The cheerful voice was just slightly creepy and for some reason Chaakin could feel his skin rise in a strange fear reaction that appeared out of nowhere. He decided to change the subject.
"So, any voys inbound that we know of?"
Azrael's voice, no emotion attached to it at all, came through with clipped precision.
"Inbound Latos O-12 in six minutes. Two Behemoths, three Vultures and a single Centaur model II. Low priority through the wormhole; medium grade cargo. Ardenus scouting."
Chaakin grinned despite the pain from his slowly receding headache and nausea. The machine was working, Kharon's Shore was running as efficiently as it should even if its boss was away on a drinking binge. He was proud.
"Right, formation trident-2 on Azrael's mark. Let the ferryman get some customers today."
###
The acknowledgement had been quite a blow to Cat, more so since she had been so unprepared for it. Head bent over a cup of strong Koffee laced with Verasi spices and a single drop of Helio Mists, she had been stirring the brew for over twenty minutes in a slow and precise movement. Someone sat down heavily opposite her and placed his own cup of Koffee, three spoons sugar and one helping of cocoa, on the table in front of him. Atice; she knew without looking up from his movement sounds, his smell and the small noises he made while breathing. The new model brainpal they had inserted was a marked improvement on the old brainpal for sure, she just wished it could be commanded to ignore... emotions. She guessed she had to label it eventually, that strange thing that kept on messing with her head. With robotic precision, she stopped the stirring and placed the spoon on the table before looking up at a very concerned Atice.
"Are you okay Cat? You look like, well pardon me and everything, but you look like something the cat dragged in."
With light speed thoughts she analysed the sentence for all possible meanings, analysed Atice's face and eventually came to a suitable reply. It took her less than 0.2 second.
"I am well enough. Just thinking is all."
"Well, I have some news that'll cheer you up. Strat has put you on the active roster and it looks like we'll be flying together tomorrow at late shift. Latos O-12 patrol."
That would give her around 36 hours, more than enough time if she started out around now.
"That is good news Atice. I will have to prepare and get ready. Excuse me."
With a slight nod, she left her Koffee and Atice behind, moved down to the Viper's external comms room and found a private booth. She connected via her brainpal and sent a query to the only person she believed could help her with this conundrum; Riddik Willennium.
###
The signal was untraceable and was sent on a one-time path through the networks that permeated the Dau Senate station like roots deep in the human mulch. Eventually it popped up in the lower part of Eggert's screen with an attached alert. Not that the alert was necessary, the mere fact that it arrived was enough to focus Eggert's attention upon it.
"Well, I'll be damned. Didn't think I'd see this signal ever. And especially not here in Dau."
He geo-referenced the location and whistled softly. Just outside Smurftopia. Following his intuition, he swapped channels on the wall-screen and quickly turned the volume down as the reporter was practically screaming into the microphone, that special look on her face that indicated massive disaster and equally massive ratings. A truly once-in-a-lifetime occasion that had to milked for all it was worth.
"..fire is still not under control and the latest information we have is that the station fire-marshal is getting ready to void the area to space and kill the fire that way. Once more, a massive fire erupted in Smurftopia, the famous Itani bar. Initial reports tell off more than two hundred guests inside."
Cursing softly again, Eggert quickly ran through his options. The Secret Service was not allowed to work with active field agents inside UIT space and the Internal Security Agency was not really all that keen on saving the undercover agents of non-UIT organisations, no matter how much goodwill it would generate. Right, that left him with only tow options; go there himself or ask nicely at UPK headquarters. He picked up the phone and dialled 1-800-UPKHQ.
###
Trulo moved slowly down the airvent towards the mechanic's quarters that incidentally doubled as the main power coupling for the station. Low speech; apparently the beast hadn't penetrated so far yet. He opened the grate and did a slow somersault in the low gravity, landing on his feet with a slight metallic noise. He waved the greetings away with a tired hand and motioned them to be silent. He accepted a flask of Bractus genuine cane Rhum and took a mouthful of the fiery liquid before clearing his throat with a grimace. Damn, that Bractus stuff was rough and was guaranteed never to have seen anything even remotely resembling a sugar cane. Well, they had run out of the good Aeolus rhum a week ago when someone dug a barrel of this evil fluid up from somewhere. Still, it beat not having any. To prove the point, he took another swig.
"Mechanics, someone let a beast loose on the station and I am not sure how in the face of the Nebulae we are going to get rid of it. First order of business is to do a tally of the patrols out and then we need to secure this area against intrusion in such a degree that a fully battle-armoured Serco marine would have a hard time getting in. In the meantime I'll see if I can identify the critter and let the brass know that we have this slight problem on top of the power-out. Now, stop gawking and start working. I am not paying you to sit around with open mouths like giant two-legged carps."
His crew laughed at his attempt at sounding serious and XX executive-like but started to discuss amongst themselves how to best solve this new problem and then started working with it. Trulo smiled lopsidedly, shook his head in pride and walked over to his perscomp to see if he could find pictures of the beast that would fit with the thing that had chased him. Surely it would have a weakness somewhere.
Whytee, put this all up on a wiki somewhere or something, I want to read the whole thing all at once :)
http://whytee.dk/the_pit/stuff_from_vendetta_online/
This one will be coming up there in chapters and for downloads as well
This one will be coming up there in chapters and for downloads as well