A Sage's Story(Endless Sky Fanfic)

[Star Sage]

Okay, I did this with Smuggler 5 a year or so ago, and I enjoyed it then, so how's about I do this again with a game I've played and enjoyed even more? Now, to be clear, this is a text longform lets play. Basically, this is my story, sculpted around the plot given in the main game. There are a few differences though. For one, the Pilot is identified as Male, not as Ageless-Faceless-Gender-Neutral-Culturally-Ambiguous-Adventure-Person as in the main game.

For another, the ship has an AI as a character, this one being STAR. Yes, Star and Sage, I wonder where I came up with that. The other difference is the New Game Plus aspect. I'm playing as someone who's beaten the game 9 times now, and dominated every world all those times, and I like to add that tribute, and my salary, to my characters as a pseudo-New Game Plus mode. I will be doing that for this let's play, mostly so I don't lose those numbers as I nearly did once already while editing them into a save. Still, I tried to work that into the plot, and I hope you enjoy. Remember, as with anything of this nature, opinions, good and bad, help the author keep going.

If you just want to read the story itself, as this topic can get a bit cluttered/hard to follow, I've been posting it on Spacebattle.net and Fanfiction.net

https://forums.spacebattles.com/threads/a-sage-of-the-endless-sky.464188/

https://www.fanfiction.net/s/12014897/1/A-Sage-in-the-Endless-Sky








I walk onto the bridge of my new ship, a Shuttle really, but still, it’s mine, and I sniff the air to find it smells brand new, like it had just rolled off the shipyards at Betelgeuse. I know that’s not the case, this ship had probably been sitting on the lot outside for more than a decade before I’d finally bought it, but no one anywhere could have convinced me that this ship wasn’t as spotless as a newborn, and waiting for me to take it wailing into the skies overhead, which, in opposition to all my hopes, was overcast and gray.

“Hello, Captain, welcome to your new ship. All systems conforming to your biometrics now, please hold,” said a pleasant sounding, male voice, and I smiled at it as I settled into the seat, feeling the motors beneath move, adjusting everything from the cushiness of the padding, to just how high the gravity was, as the engines test fired, the sound vibrating, and the computer logging how my ears sounded against them, buffering the space between till the roar was a pleasant sound, rather than a harsh rumble.

“Biometric adjustments complete. This vessel welcomes you aboard, Captain. I am the Strategic Tactical Analysis Recorder, you may call me, STAR, if you wish,” said the voice, and I nodded, running my hand over the controls in front of me, letting them fill my head with thoughts of freedom, as I looked out at the shipyard, or rather, junkyard, before me, where the man who had sold me this vessel was already working on the next sucker, trying to get them to buy a huge Star Barge with no engines, weapons, or anything else one would need to explore, while I had selected the slightly cheaper shuttle.

“Would you like me to alter my voice, Captain? I have many accents and tones you might enjoy. My previous captain said she most prefer an assistant AI like myself to be the opposite of their own gender, for instance?” as the computer spoke, the voice changed, from a rather refined sounding male to a woman who herself might have been a woman of class, in business or the like. I chuckled to myself.

“STAR, you can keep the old voice, if you prefer. I know AIs grow to enjoy their own voices, and I bet you’ve had that one for a while,” I told him, as I began to run through the settings on my controls, including beginning my preflight checks for the journey that would take this ship out of the yard, and to the starport a few miles away.

“Very good sir. I must admit, I was beginning to wonder if anyone would buy my old hulk. So many these days tend to purchase more...shall we say, copious or combative chassis. They all seem to want to haul freight or fight pirates, no one wants a personnel transport anymore,” he complained, and I nodded, looking towards a Sparrow light interceptor out the window. The thing gleamed far more brightly than almost anything in the yard, probably spit polished twice a day every day, hoping someone would purchase the glorified turret.

“I don’t mind myself. You’ve got more tanks than the Sparrow, even if you’re a bit slower, and you’re no clunker like a Star Barge. No, when I go up, I want a hull like this,” I told STAR, as we began to ascend, taking off into the wild gray yonder, and then being auto assisted towards a bay that was already prepped and ready for us.

“Ah, so sir wishes to go far? Any particular destination in mind, if I might be so bold to ask?” said STAR in that proper way I was beginning to enjoy myself. Something about his accent really made him sound nice.

“Well, how’s about, while we get down, you tell me your story, and I’ll tell you mine?” I offered, and the AI seemed to take a moment to consider this, before the screen in front of me changed, showing me logs.

“I find that an interesting proposition, but sadly, my own tale is not one that’s long. I was built on some backwater planet Rust, out in the fringe of space in a tiny system called Kraz. My owner’s mother had recently died, some accident that she blamed on her brother, and she had me made before taking off. Sadly, her own tale was not long either, as she was visiting the planet Hope when the supervolcano there erupted,” as he spoke, images began to play out, mostly showing the images of the ship’s cameras shaking, as everything around it became chaos.

“She was caught in it?” I asked, and got a red blinking light I assumed was the AI shaking his head.

“No, my owner then wanted to save people. This shuttle, she loaded it with as many as she could, and brought them here, to New Boston, but sadly, she caught something in the several day journey. One of the Hope refugees had been infected by some virus the eruption had released, and my owner ended up succumbing. I have sat on that lot for fourteen years now, because the government claimed me when no one could find her brother,” he told me, and it was my turn to nod.

“A tragedy, a hero that was lost in the shuffle of those days,” I told him, remembering the reports. Not that many from Hope had come to New Boston, as most had been taken to nearby Navy bases, as those had been the majority of the evacuating ships.

“Indeed, still, one soldiers on, and I’m happy to finally have a new master. What of yourself, sir? What tale do you have to tell?” he asked, and I chuckled again, as we slowly descended towards the port, mostly just a collection of concrete pads that were slowly being consumed by the surrounding swamp.

“Heh, my tale isn’t much longer, at least not my personal one, but I have a family story I could give you. First, what do you know of the Sages?” I asked, and I could hear the chirp as the computer searched his database, and probably those of the planet, for information.

“Sage, a knowledgeable person, often male, who tends to dispense wisdom, but not always in the ways one would expect. Hmm, an odd term to use for oneself,” he said, and I actually burst out laughing, slapping my knee as I sat there.

“Hmm, the response indicates that the information is correct, but incomplete,” he ascertained, and I nodded, pulling a tear from my eye, before recounting my tale.

“Indeed, I didn’t mean sage as a person, I meant as the name of a family,” I told him, and this time the chirping only took a moment. After all, you only had to do a cursory search of New Boston’s records to find my family.

“Very interesting,” as he spoke, a list of accomplishments flashed on the screen in front of me. My ancestor, the first of my line, that we knew of, Elizabeth Sage, who set out from Earth in a long range vessel, like so many others of her era. About twenty years later, she reappeared, unlike most of those, having scouted several new routes, including being the first human to enter the Deep, before it had become one of the most powerful single areas in humans space with technology there being almost a decade ahead of the rest of the galaxy.

It then went farther, my ancestors, always exploring, always pushing at the edges. From scouting for fleets during the Alpha Wars, to simply going away into the dark places, my family was always going where others feared to tread. Then my Great-Grandfather happened. The man, reaching his middle years, had decided to settle on a world only just starting to build itself up as a trade stop, New Boston. Investing his not inconsiderable fortune as arrived, he carved out a nice niche for himself and his family.

He’d figured the world would grow, after all, it was near enough to Earth to be considered near the core of humanity, but also far enough away to be right there when one wanted to escape the humdrum of the crowded cities. Then his ship had been claimed by some bit of the planetary government on some trumped up charge, and all the funds he’d had coming from the family’s various ventures dried up, as a stipulation of the family was that a Sage always must own a ship. While they held his, the planetary government itself claimed the incoming funds, as per the will of old Elizabeth.

That had trapped my family here for almost a century now, my great-grandfather dying of a broken heart when the corrupt officials had destroyed his Lady Anne, the ship of his youth, melting it down for scrap, and fragmenting the onboard AI. His daughter, my Grandmother, had fought all her life, trying to earn the money to gain a ship, and they’d blocked her at every turn, before she’d passed the duty onto my mother, and then, finally to me. I was now twenty five years old, by old Earth standards, and the old men who had blocked my family for three generations had found themselves stymied by my tactic.

I’d gone to the galactic bank, a common sight on any world, and ♥♥♥♥♥♥ a loan, putting everything my family had up as collateral, the banker looking like he was going to be sick as he signed the forms, knowing this was the end of his job here on New Boston, as the old men would surely drive him off. Still, I had the money, and before they could buy up every ship in my price range, I’d bought my shuttle, and now it stood on the pad of the space port.

“So, once we take off, we’ll get not only a million and a half credits a diem, but I’ll get you a bigger hull. How’d you like to be in a speedy ship. Say, we seek out a Flivver hull for you? They’re the fastest ships in the galaxy, even more than the aliens can build. Then we’ll get you some escort ships to command,” I offered, and the AI’s screen actually went through a kaleidoscope of colors, before settling down.

“Hmm, something with a real display would be nice. I good enough processor, and I could even make myself a face. Heck, if you could splurge on a holodisplay, I could have a body,” he said, his voice actually getting misty on me.

“For the one who got me off this mud ball, anything. Just let me confirm our course at the port authority, and we’ll be flying away into the heavens,” I told him, rising from my seat, and then walking out into the port. This was going to be the start of a beautiful friendship, I knew it. Star and Sage, sailing the cosmos together.

[Star Sage]

We stopped by Longjump in the Sabik system to collect the money, and hopefully to get some info. Sadly, that hope was dashed by the woman who’d posted the bounty being rather pushy. She shoved a chit into my hand, told me the Free Worlds appreciated my help, and then rather curtly asked me to leave. It was only as I was about to say something that I remembered vaporizing a militia vessel. Sure, it was one that must have taken bribes, everyone knew that happened, but still, it made the militia look less than good when an independent ship captain can take them apart like that.

So I stalked back onto my ship, to find the pair of young lovers in the mess, the sight of their exhaustion making me smile. Apparently their daughter wasn’t liking the ship’s noises, and while I was fairly gentle as pilots went, the lack of station noise, and the vibration of the deck plates kept her up. Still, they looked into each others eyes, and seemed to gain strength from it, before an android set another plate in front of them, and they attacked the meal like starving wolves, though ones with the manners to thank the cook.

As it had turned out, neither had ever had real food. They’d been born on that station of theirs, never a moment to themselves, and always bouncing around with whatever pirate needed a crew just to make enough to live. Joe was a tough, just muscle, and while I thought he looked scrawny, he was good enough at what he did to make that his career, so I figured it was enough. Maria meanwhile was a woman on a station where law was a thing that happened to other people. It told you all you needed to know about how her life had probably gone.

Both had lived there their entire lives, save the times where they were press ganged into pirate crews. As it turned out, while the crew got a cut of the spoils, said cuts tended to be rather small, and they were always dropped off back on Smuggler’s Den. With that in mind, neither had ever eaten anything but the nutrient paste the station made automatically, thus they found the stores on my ship, of real fruits, meats, and other such things, more of a feast than they had ever imagined.

Launching off, we headed for Arabia. I figured dropping them off would be quicker than the transport job for the Free Worlds. We did, of course, have to fight off a few more pirates, but mindful of what I’d learned, we left them disabled, rather than destroyed, with local enforcers boarding them as we jumped between systems. A few days later, we found ourselves in orbit of the world, our computers syncing with the databases below, allowing Joe to search through the employee lists for his ‘cousin’.

That was how we found the bad news, as Joe went through all the other man’s alias, before finally getting through to someone in charge. It turned out that his friend was dead. Refineries even in this day and age weren’t exactly safe places, and the one he’d been working in had caught fire, burning him and at least a dozen others alive. The foreman offered us his condolences, while the two beside me looked like they’d been shot, collapsing in on themselves as they hugged each other.

“Are there any other positions open?” I asked, and the foreman shrugged.

“Sorry to say, but with that refinery out, there just isn’t much in the way of jobs down here. We’ll get it back up in a few months, say five or six, but until then...:” he let this trail off and I nodded, eventually contacting others, and finding out just how connected the Arabian economy was. A single plant down had flooded their job market with new labor, and there just weren’t any openings anywhere, not even service industry. I did get a few tips on how Milrace, a Syndicate controlled world, was just starting to boom, and even that several of their own people had already headed in that direction.

“Thank you for your time,” I told the last person, closing the screen, and then turning in my chair to the pair. They’d since ♥♥♥♥♥♥ over their grief at losing their friend, and now looked totally defeated, as Joe got out of his chair.

“I...I’m grateful you took us this far. Here, it’s the amount I said I’d pay. If you’ll let us land, I’ll...I’ll find something down there, we’ll make due,” he said, holding out a chit card. Absently, I reached out, but rather than taking it, I slapped another card down on top of it, the two-hundred-thousand one I’d ♥♥♥♥♥♥ in bounty for the Rat Pack. When he say it, and more importantly the amount, Joe’s brain seemed to shut down, giving me time to bring up the galactic map.

“STAR, set course for Milrace. We’ll drop our young couple off there on our way to Glory for our other mission,” I ordered.

“But, but, but,” said Maria, as she cradled that lovely little girl in her arms, staring at the card, then back at me, then at the card again.

“Before you say anything, you’re only a jump out of my way, so it’s not that big a deal. Besides, you saw my fleet, I’m not hard up for credits right now. But I do remember what that’s like. I was born into better circumstances than you, I’ll admit, but still, I was in a position of getting beaten down by people over me too. Now get yourself strapped in, we’ll be leaving shortly,” I told them, watching as he fuel gauge climbed, waiting for it to hit full.

“Thank you,” said Maria’s voice, and before I could turn to tell her not to, she kissed me on the cheek, then rose and fell into Joe’s arms. Out of the corner of my eye I could see the twinkle of tears, joyful ones, as they just held each other close.

[jafdy]

Your realy going for it now. Keep it up.

[Star Sage]

İlk olarak jafdy tarafından gönderildi:

Your realy going for it now. Keep it up.

Heh, more time to write for fun.

[Star Sage]

We reached Millrace without any confrontations. Landing proved easy, and we quickly searched the local network for job postings, plugging in Joe and Maria’s skills. These almost immediately brought up some very nice offers from a few local factories and the like. Soon enough, they were at the ramp leading off the ship, their baby, Jesse as I had learned, in her father’s arms as he walked down to the new world. Before she left though, Maria turned to me.

“I don’t know how to thank you, Admiral. We’ll do our best to make our life here, and try to earn the credits to pay you back, somehow,” she assured me, and then sped off after her lover and child, leaving me behind with a grin as I closed the ship up and took back off. This side trip done, and my own emotional state just a bit more stable than it had been, I set course for Glory in the Wazn system, my fleet and I vanishing in a blue flash.

A few jumps later we were at Glory. The port authority, sounding almost as corrupt as the pirates, demanded an exorbitant landing fee for my fleet, and so I ordered them to the local primary instead. The ramscoops would fill their tanks, and I could land alone, so there was no need to bribe one of the port officials. That done, STAR and I gently guided our hulk down through the atmosphere, and then just as gently into the berth we’d been assigned. Once landed, I powered down, and sent the callsign I’d been given into the local network, before sitting down to wait. An hour later, I got an odd answer.

“Sage, there is a couple requesting permission to board,” said STAR as I was playing a game on a floating screen. Saving my progress to defeating the Dragon Lord, I turned to another screen to find the couple, a middle aged pair that had a look that just screamed tourist, including luggage and hawaiian print t-shirts.

“Hmm, interesting,” I said, rising from my seat, grabbing a pistol just in case, and then making my way down to the ramp. It hissed open a few minutes later, and I stood in front of the pair.

“Might I help you?” I asked, and the male of the group nodded, offering his hand to shake, which I took, finding a very surprising grip behind what looked like old hands.

“You just might, my good man. My wife and I, we’re kind of looking for some excitement in our lives. You know how it is, you get older, you want to explore a bit, maybe see some new worlds, right?” he asked, and I nodded, remembering staring up at the stars on New Boston some nights.

“Yeah, I was sure you would. See, we want to go somewhere where there’s a bit more roughness to be found. Not a factory world like the Dust Belt planets, but a real wilderness sort, with maybe a smattering of civilization on it, you know what I’m saying?” he said the last while patting me on the back.

“I can understand. Are there no transports off world? I can recommend a few good spots,” I told him, but the man shook his head.

“No one’s going from here to where we need to get. My wife’s got a bit of family ou on Skymoot, but this whole situation has got most free transport captains knickers in a twist taking tourists from the Republic to the Free Worlds,” he explained, and I nodded again, seeing how that would be the case.

“And you think I might be able to transport you?” I asked, and the man gave me a bright smile.

“Exactly,” he responded.

“And what makes you think I go to the Free Worlds?” I followed, and the man’s smile only got brighter, while gesturing to my Shield Beetle.

“Why, this hull of course. No way a Republic merchant would be flying some non-standard hull, and this thing is flying merchant colors, so that means you’re either from the Free Worlds, or someplace where it don’t make no nevermind,” he said, his accent slipping into something I’d heard before. With a start, I realized what was going on, and I offered the two a set of quarters onboard my ship, telling them we would be leaving that night once some goods had been loaded.

We were off less than a half hour later, my fleet and I falling into formation just as a Navy patrol came into the system, hailing us for reasons I wasn’t even going to try and grasp. We left them behind, skipping our way across the stars until we arrived in the Mulifan system. While there was a small port on New Kansas, it wasn’t nearly large enough for my fleet, and I decided quickly to just refill our tanks with the local primary instead, opening the ramscoops up and sucking away stellar material.

It was an hour later that alarms began blaring, and my fleet took guard positions around me, huge wings of ships sliding into formation against...well, a positively ridiculous number of opponents. The Navy’s Fifth Fleet, as STAR helpfully identified, had entered the system. Made up of almost ten thousand vessels, this represented one of the hammers that the Republic could use to crush its enemies and enforce its will, and right now, it was baring down on me, a channel opening with what I assumed was the flagship as they came closer.

“Mr. Sage, I must admit, you have been a hard man to track down, despite the large force you employ,” said an old woman, with silver gray hair, and a uniform that looked like she’d been born into it, moving easily, despite the clink of metals that dotted the front.

“Considering my position, the correct honorific would be Admiral, ma’am. As for the second part, I do make good use of the jump drives,” I bantered back, and the woman appeared to genuinely to consider my words, before moving on.

“Such titles are conferred to those who are actually fighters, not independent ship captains. Still, ‘Captain’ Sage, it has come to my attention that you stopped on Glory recently. Afterwards, many tonnes of material that were needed for our peace efforts were taken away. While I’m almost certain you have nothing to do with it, I’m sure you’ll understand our need to search your vessel, before it returns to Free World space,” she said the last, in a tone that wasn’t exactly threatening, until one noticed the beeps in the background, as turrets on her ship took aim, and I got several lock on alerts from STAR in a window behind her.

“Hmm, I see. Well then, Ma’am, I suppose my options are limited. I could run, fight, or allow you to board me, illegally I might add. Which of those three options do you think sounds best?” I asked, and heard my own sunbeams chimed as I locked onto her, every ship in my fleet doing the same.

“Yes, well, fighting, is not quite a good option, as I’m sure you can see. We are not some pirate gang, to run when you blow away our leader. And running would lose everyone flying with you their license, making them outlaws to the Republic. I’m sure you’ll agree those are not viable futures for you. However, should you submit to a search of your flagship only, I will assure you, no harm will come to you, or your fleet,” she said, and I almost dared her to try, before finally relenting.

Ten minutes later I had the big lady herself on board my ship, as a sign of faith, though she did bring a squad of marines with her, as well as inspectors that began to go over my ship with a fine tooth comb. They eventually found the tourists, apologizing as they went through their luggage as well, while the rest scanned my cargo, kicking deck plates, and even shooting static into the walls to search for hidden areas.

“You know, the alien tech you’ve acquired for yourself could be a big help to the Navy, if you’d consent to selling a few pieces of it to us,” she offered as her men continued to tramp over my home, trying to make conversation.

“I don’t have much love for the Republic myself. They allowed my family to be kept down for two generations on New Boston, and so far, the best the Navy’s done for me has been interfering in my personal business,” I told her bluntly, trying to think of even one time when the Navy ships had been around when I might have needed them, and drawing a blank.

“I’ll admit, we can’t be everywhere, we’re stretched pretty thin after all, but a few extra ships like these, and something like the jump drives could make a huge difference,” she responded.

“They do make one. Without them, I would have died more than once on my adventures across space. Three of the five people that held my family hostage for so long are currently nothing but dust, and until the other two join them, I’m going to be keeping my equipment,” I countered, and she looked about to respond when one of her aides came up to us.

“Ma’am, we’re done here. We’ve found nothing actionable on board,” he said, and I felt my anger rise for a moment, realizing they’d been looking for anything they could use against me, not any specific thing. Still, I was as polite as possible telling the Navy officer to leave my ship, and we jumped out before she could do anything else.

[Star Sage]

“Mr. Sage, it’s good to see you again,” said the woman as we landed on Skymoot, the couple coming down the ramp just behind me, some of STAR’s androids following with their luggage. The smiled at the sight of her, the woman running up and hugging her.


“Katya, it’s been too long,” she said, and the man walked up and shook her hand, before all three turned to me.


“So, Katya’s your name?” I said, motioning for the droids to begin loading the luggage into the car behind the woman.


“Indeed, sorry about the black ops stuff, but names can sometimes be dangerous things. Still, now that they’re here, I would like to introduce you to…” she trailed off as the droids finished their job, and then came up beside me.


“Professor Lynn Anderson and her husband Henry. The first being the premier mind in planetary sciences, known for putting forward many theories on how terraforming could be made more efficient and faster, something not well liked by the various corporations that do terraforming for the masses. The second a former Naval Intelligence officer, responsible for more than his fair share of stories, including several leaked documents that implicated Syndicate CEOs in some worlds financial troubles,” said the AI, giving the same report he’d given me when he’d ♥♥♥♥♥♥ a good scan of the couple.


“You’ve figured out our game then, I take it?” she asked me after a moment, and I nodded.


“STAR looked up their faces on the net. While Professor Lynn’s features are obscured well by the makeup she’s using, Mr. Anderson’s aren’t well hidden just because he’s wearing a very gaudy shirt and some sunglasses, especially since he had to take those off to sleep. Mind, that does beg the question of why?” I admit, and the gentleman actually looks a bit abashed at having been so easily found out.


“Ah, yes, why defect to the Free Worlds? It’s because they plan on making a dream of mine come true, Admiral Sage,” answered Lynn.


“I want to make worlds that humans can thrive on, not just survive. I want real Paradise worlds to extend to more than just the rich and powerful. Those same people, however, don’t like that idea. It’s too expensive, too time consuming, and some even admit, they simply don’t want the masses to have too easy lives, as it would let them multiply to easily,” she explained, and I nodded at that. New Boston was a core world in all but name, but only partially terraformed, to the point where it was livable, if not comfortable. That did indeed reduce the population by simply ensuring there weren’t enough resources to go around.


“The Free Worlds see things differently then, I take it?” I asked, and Katya nodded.


“Indeed. We see the benefit to humanity to having more worlds that are perfect for us, rather than just good enough. We even think that giving government control of that sort of thing, rather than a megacorps that do so now, will help build stronger infrastructure than we’ve got now. Maybe we can even get worlds that are truly self sufficient, rather than the web of commerce that’s needed now,” she explained.


“I see. Follow up question then. Why did the Navy stop us? That was a lot of effort to search my ship, and they had to know the Andersons were on board. Why not grab them?” I asked, and Katya actually laughed, a rather pleasant sound.


“That would be because they can’t officially act against Professor Lynn. She’s got too much of a public profile to act against without being obvious. Her husband, well, if they tried to make him vanish, would be noticed almost immediately by all the wrong people. One’s too known in public circles, one in private. Add in the fact that your fleet would probably take a good deal more firepower to destroy than they would like, and you become the perfect person to bring them to us,” she laid out, and again, I nodded, it made sense. It made me feel a bit used, but it did show trust to explain this to me now.


“What were they searching for then? If they weren’t going to just grab Lynn and Henry?” I said, asking the obvious followup.


“My equipment. It includes some data and materials that are considered to be highly improper for a civilian to own. Not illegal, just worrisome. Ms. Katya already had those out of my lab by the time we came to you,” answer Lynn.


“Exactly. The ship carrying them was supposed to arrive before your more obvious fleet, which was going to be the distraction. However, given how quickly you arrived, it won’t be here for a few days,” added Katya herself.


“Now, if you don’t mind, I’m going to take these two to their new home here on Skymoot, where we can set up what we can of Mrs. Anderson’s lab before the equipment arrives,” as Katya spoke, the Andersons both climbed into the waiting car. Just before she followed them, however, Katya turned back to me.


“You impressed me, a lot, with your work here. I know a professional when I see one, and I have another transport job that needs doing. If you’re willing to help us some more, I’ll be at the spaceport bar after helping the Andersons settle in,” she said, tossing a high value credit chit towards me, before the car started off. Watching it fade, I played with the card in my hand, before telling STAR to return to the ship, while I made my way towards the port itself.


“Ah, there you are,” said Katya as she entered the bar, where I was nursing a soda, rather than one of the more robust drinks. She, without prompting, sat down at the table I was at, and pulled out a sheet from her pocket.

“I’m afraid I have a meeting to get to soon, so I’ll make this quick. We have another friend in Republic Space who wishes to join us here in the Free Worlds,” as she spoke, she unfolded the paper to reveal a photo, with a name on it, as well as a map to a system near the core.

“Mr. Ijs?” I asked, curious about the name, and she nods.

“He prefers Mr. Eyes. I...well, his work is rather unusual, but I can assure you, this one isn’t so confusing as the last. We just need someone to get him before he moves on again, as he’s a bit flighty. Your ships, despite their number, can move faster than anything we have, so I’ll ask you to go there and get him,” she explained, and I take the paper to go over the details.

“He’s going to come willingly?” I ask, and Katya again nods.

“Absolutely. We’ve already contacted him, it’s just been a matter of getting to him. He’s not well liked by some of the corporate heads in the Syndicate. They’re skirting the edges of the law, but so long as you can get there before he has to move, he’ll come,” she say, and this tame I nod, putting the sheet into my pocket, and rising, downing my drink and then tossing a chit on the table.

“I’ll be back with your friend soon,” I tell her simply, and then walk away, returning to my own ship, and the launching. It took us less than a week to make it to Foundry, the world on which Mr. Eyes was staying. Landing was easy enough, and I did the same as before, sending out a signal that was supposed to tell my passenger his ride had arrived, before walking down to the bay so I could go outside. The very instant the ramp was down, a man wearing a large, conspicuous….everything really, trench coat, sunglasses, and even hauling a huge metal briefcase, came charging up the ramp, diving in, while looking behind him.

“Close, it quickly,” he shouted, and STAR did just that, while I offered the man a hand up.

“I’m Sage, Admiral of the fleet, and Captain of this ship,” I told him, and the man nodded.

“Ijs Springboard,” he said, slowing taking off the coat and glasses, tossing them aside like they were on fire, while grabbing the case and holding it close.

“Councilor Reynolds told me you would get here quickly, but I must admit, that was still a surprise,” he said, and at that I started a bit.

“Wait, Councilor? Katya’s a member of the Free World’s leadership?” I asked, and the man actually laughed.

“You mean you didn’t recognize her? That woman served two full terms in the Republic Senate, representing the entire Dust Belt. Defender of the small, the powerless, and the disenfranchised. Made her almost as unpopular as myself amongst the halls of power, and that’s pretty difficult, given what I do,” he explained, as I began to lead him towards the quarters we’d selected for him. STAR’s androids offered to take his suitcase, but the man kept a tight grip on the thing, while allowing them to take the coat and glasses.

“And what is it that you do?” I asked him.

“Vigilante Nuclear Power Plant Inspector,” he said, presenting me with a business card that said exactly that, while he smiled at me in a warm, but somehow mocking way. Stunned for a moment, I looked at the card, and then back at him.

“Uh...what?” I say, and this gets the man to laughing, pausing as he holds himself against the wall, before he catches his breath.

“Sorry, I do love doing that. I mean I’m a nuclear physicist. I go from world to world inspecting power grids. If I find a flaw, like a leaky reactor or a bad disposal dump, I call in the Atomic Energy Safety Commission to make things right. Needless to say, the Syndicate, who’s always cutting corners, really can’t stand it when I pay a visit,” he explains, and then motions for his card back.

“Only keep it around for the look on people’s faces,” he tells me, slipping it back into his pocket, and giving me a moment to collect my thoughts, before we continue on.

“So, why is someone of your skills off to the Free Worlds?” I asked, as we finally get to his cabin, and he sets his case down on the bed, before taking a seat.

“Isn’t it obvious? I’m going to be inspecting the blast sites of the attacks, and not only prove the Free Worlds didn’t do them, but then help find the ne'er do wells that did. With them in hand, it should be easy to get the Republic to back off, and give the Free Worlds breathing room,” he explained, and once again, I nodded.

“So, you don’t believe they were behind the attacks?” I stated, both in question and as a fact of the matter.

“Do you? I doubt it, if you did, you wouldn’t have agreed to come get me. But regardless, I’ve looked into it. The attacks, so close to the declaration of independence has only hurt the Free Worlds cause. Better, I’ve known Katerina and the rest of those leading the Free Worlds for a while. They were good, honest people, whenever I needed a hand with taking on corruption. It wouldn’t make sense for them to be involved in something like that,” he answered.

“Alright then, what’s our first step?” I said, deciding quickly this was something I could help with, and maybe get some info to help my own case.

“We go to Geminus. I’ll explain more once we get there, but I need to see the attack site itself, and after that, I can tell you how we’ll proceed,” he told me, and I made for the door, only for him to catch my hand as I turned.

“I should warn you, I seem to have attracted the wrong sort of attention lately. Specifically I seem to attract pirates, quite a few of them. I don’t know who, but I bet someone put a price on my head,” he explained, and this time it was my turn to laugh.

“Not a problem, Mr. Eyes. You sit tight, and my fleet and I will get you where you need to be,” I tell him, before walking back out and making my way to the bridge.

[Star Sage]

“That is quite the fleet,” said Eyes as we entered the Castor system, watching out the window as my group of Shield Beetles fell into line. I said nothing, just smiling as we grouped up, no one stopping us as we made our way towards the former, and future, home of the Republic Shipyards. Once there, a group broke off, copies of Eyes briefcase, a sophisticated suite of sensors, growing on their hulls as they slowly made their way into the atmosphere. Looking at the incoming data, Eyes almost seemed giddy.

“Oh, this is just fantastic. Those are so much sharper than I was expecting, and with these readings I can tell you the instant we find the place where these bombs were made,” he explained, showing me some of the readouts. It was gibberish to me, but he explained how fissionable materials all had unique isotopic signatures, depending on world mined on, and reactor used. It wouldn’t be definitive evidence, but it would be a big clue, and better than that bombs like this tended to be made in groups, if they could find a test site where others of the same make were detonated for trial, they could point some very large fingers at the actual bombers.

“Alright, everything is logged and filed. We should proceed to Rand now. That’s in the,” I cut him off, bringing up the galactic map.

“Zeta Aquilae system. I helped them with some Terraforming recently. Slamming asteroids into planets is a bit violent, but I’ve been keeping tabs, and it seems they’re doing well,” I say, locking in the course, and we flash away. A few days later we arrive in the system, the fleet taking up positions around the planet as we land, with Eyes going over his data, and taking further readings. Apparently while it’s unlikely, Rand is a possible test site for the nukes. While he goes over it, Katya arrives, and I allow her on board, one of the droids guiding her to the bridge.

“Certainly a large ship you have here, Mr. Sage,” she tells me as I offer her a seat, one literally growing out of the floor for her. She thanks me, and then we both turn to Eyes, who is very much consumed by his research.

“You’ve been briefed on the plan, I take it?” she asks, and I nod.

“Indeed I have, Councilor,” I answered, emphasising the last word, which made her wince a little.

“I see you’ve learned a bit more about me. Can’t be helped I suppose,” she said, passing me a credit chit with some nice zeroes on it, that I pocket, while we wait for Eyes to finish his data mining. It takes him almost an hour, with me distracted myself using the game, almost guiding my hapless protagonist into a duel to the death with a demon lord of the underworld, when he suddenly bounced up, swearing in some unknown tongue for a moment.

“Bad news?” I ask, saving my game with a touch, and then turning to him.

“Um, you could say that. My scanners are good, but they’re designed for high impact studies, not sifting through background radiation like you find on a world like Rand. I can pick up the stuff with ease, but I can’t get a fine enough reading with my equipment to actually tell you if they match the readings at Geminus,” he says, showing me the data on the floating screen. As it’s just a bunch of formulas and numbers, I decide to take his word for it.

“So, we need better scanners?” I ask, and he shakes his head.

“We do, but you can’t just buy the type we need. No, we need military grade stuff, the kind you find on Navy sensor drones,” he says. Katya, who had been reading something, paused as her expression became very thoughtful.

“Mr. Sage, are you familiar with the Derelict and Salvage Act of 2976?” she chimed in, and I had to think for a moment myself, but then shook my head.

“I’m afraid not,” I tell her, and she gets a rather wicked smile on her face.

“You probably wouldn’t, unless you traveled in the higher circles of power. Simply put, the Syndicate wanted the Navy to protect their automated mines and such, you know, the kind they leave in asteroid fields to break down rocks, that you can collect from a year later. They’re a favorite target of pirates, given they tend to have good parts, and some nice ore, with very few defenses,” she began, quickly bringing up another holographic display, and then sliding it over to me when she found the relevant document online.

“Suffice it to say, it can be stretched a bit to include any sort of automated unit, like say, a surveillance drone. One the mothership slaps one down, it becomes salvageable by anyone who can claim it. We find one of those, we find our equipment,” she explains, and I get a thoughtful expression thinking about that, before I shake my head.

“I’ve got another idea,” I say, and have them leave the bridge for a few minutes. A few minutes later I get on the comm to Tagon’s Toughs, the mercenary group that had helped me previously with capturing the Korath Raider. It took less than a minute to explain what I wanted, and even less time for them to admit to having done such salvage in the past. A few thousand credits and they sent the schematics over, with STAR growing one of the sensors on our hull, before I called the two back in.

“Um, that...these designs aren’t on the net, at all, they’re kept in secure servers in the Republic Shipyards. How did you…?” asked Katya as she looks over the specs, but Eyes is already diving into his work again, using the sensors to scan the planet easily, finding all sorts of things out, but it would take him a while to go over all of it.

“So, where are you from?” she asked, as we waited, and I gave her an abridged version of my life story. I left out most of my adventures amongst the stars, figuring they’d make for a good story later, but for now, she just wanted background. As it was, turned out she was Dust Belt baby herself. Born and raised on Hope, before the Supervolcano there exploded. That seemed to jar a memory loose, so I decided to follow up on it.

“How’d you survive that?” I asked, and she seemed to hug herself a moment, wrapping her arms around her chest protectively, before taking in a deep breath, and sighing it back out.

“Well, we were on the other continent when it blew. It was bad, sure, lots of infrastructure destroyed by the quake, but the worst effects weren’t going to hit us for a while. Evacuation should have been easy, and the Navy did send boats to start taking people off world, but it was slow going. Even with their fleets, only a few hundred per ship were able to go, and by the time Parliament actually got moving, we were in danger of losing people to the encroaching clouds of dust and debris,” as she spoke, STAR began to display an image of a port on his screen, one I didn’t recognize, but when she saw it, Katya gasped.

“That’s…” she trailed off, holding out a hand towards it.

“New Vertiform City, Capital of Hope. It was where I was docked when the eruptions happened. My owner, she wanted to save people, and when the Navy started drafting ships, paying any captain to save as many as possible, my chassis, a shuttle, was used. We loaded a family aboard, some of the last to leave as they were family of the colony leadership. One was a young woman, about eighteen who’d caught a virus. She was very sick, and my owner comforted her,” he said this while showing a view from a two dimensional image of a person looking down at a sick girl.

“That was me. I got sick, we had to pay a lot of money to make me better. That was...where’s your owner now?” she asked, and the STAR android on the bridge looked sadly to her.

“My owner at the time was not in the best of health, and mixed with all the problems, she fell ill shortly after dropping off the first load of passengers. She was attempting to return to Hope, to get more survivors, when I was forced to set down on New Boston due to her growing to weak to fly. She died there, and I was confiscated,” he told her in a dour tone.

“That woman, she was so kind...was there nothing anyone could do for her?” she asked, and STAR again shook his head.

“It’s possible had she not been so unfortunate as to land on New Boston, something could have been done. There, however, she was trapped on a world without many offworld niceties like modern medicine, and most travel was restricted,” he explained, and that seemed to cause Katya to collapse in on herself.

“What about your family? They got away?” I asked, trying to turn to happier subjects, and Katya did seem to brighten up.

“Yes, my father stayed with me, til I got better, then I started my career in politics. If the Parliament had just ♥♥♥♥♥♥ off their duffs a bit earlier, none of that would have happened. The Navy wanted to help, they sent almost half the fleets to do so, and even drafted civilian ships, but the Admiral in charge of the operation, despite getting everyone off Hope, was forced to resign. I vowed to change that, to get them to understand how it felt. But they always argued against making non-Paradise worlds better off, or to help those less fortunate,” she said, Ijs, at his station, turned to face us.

“It’s true, they sound bad, but it’s just...I grew up on Vinci, and I remember the reports of Hope. How every adult got angry for the Navy going off to save those people. They kept talking about Pirates, Aliens, even the Alphas returning while they were away. From their perspective, they pay taxes, about ten times more than the Dust Belt planets do, and that means they should be protected, first and foremost. Everyone else comes after,” he explained, and we all sat in silence for a time, before his station pinged at him. Turning back to it, he pressed a few buttons, before calling out over his shoulder.

“This place isn’t the one, the new sensors confirm it. I think we have a slight lead though. Looks like there’s something on Oblivion worth checking out. If you’re up for it, Admiral Sage,” he says, and in answer, I bring of the map, and set us on course, launching once more into space.

[jafdy]

İlk olarak Star Sage tarafından gönderildi:

“I’ve got another idea,” I say, and have them leave the bridge for a few minutes. A few minutes later I get on the comm to Tagon’s Toughs, the mercenary group that had helped me previously with capturing the Korath Raider. It took less than a minute to explain what I wanted, and even less time for them to admit to having done such salvage in the past. A few thousand credits and they sent the schematics over, with STAR growing one of the sensors on our hull, before I called the two back in.

That sounds much esyer then the cufuful I have to go through for this mission.

[Star Sage]

İlk olarak jafdy tarafından gönderildi:

İlk olarak Star Sage tarafından gönderildi:

“I’ve got another idea,” I say, and have them leave the bridge for a few minutes. A few minutes later I get on the comm to Tagon’s Toughs, the mercenary group that had helped me previously with capturing the Korath Raider. It took less than a minute to explain what I wanted, and even less time for them to admit to having done such salvage in the past. A few thousand credits and they sent the schematics over, with STAR growing one of the sensors on our hull, before I called the two back in.

That sounds much esyer then the cufuful I have to go through for this mission.

Yeah, I decided to go with that because taking out one of the drones always strikes me as the worst option. I would seriously think about putting in a 'buy a drone' side option in that one myself.

[Star Sage]

Oblivion, sadly, proved to be another dead end. There were some isotopes in the air, but not the ones we were looking for. At that point, I suggested splitting the fleet up, sending groups of ships around, but Ijs rained on that parade, pointing out that only he knew what we were looking for, even with the sensors attuned the way they were. STAR agreed with him, admitting even his mind wasn’t sure what the good Vigilante Nuclear Power Plant Inspector was seeing in the reams of data.


We discussed it for a while, given it could take months to search every single planet in human space for the test site, and finally they agreed, we needed a lead. Greenrock was suggested, and while I could afford it, they said bribing our way on planet would probably prove fruitless. We needed a contact to get us down without scaring away the information brokers. Luckily, they knew someone, an order of monks known as the Brothers of Harmony, based on the world named Harmony in the Girtab system.


Landing there proved difficult, as the planet barely had a spaceport, which forced me to again let my pilots feed off the local primary as my ship landed. From there it was a short trek into the mountains, and a ride up a long elevator to finally reach the Monastery where the Brothers of Harmony met. Exiting the lift, I stared out at said Monastery in shock, the riot of colors assaulting my eyes, and the smell of hay and grass an odd counterpoint to the snow and ice that I knew lay beyond.


The building of the Monastery were built of what looked like blue, clear crystal, inlaid with circuits that allowed screens to be brought up on almost any of them. On those screens one could watch many a scene that appeared to be an old two dimensional cartoon, with odd looking quadrupeds going about their lives. The Brothers(And sisters it should be noted), sometimes stopped in their toiling and lives to sometimes sit and watch one of the scenes, before making an odd gesture of placing their fist against it, and then continuing on.


The Monks themselves wore clothing that was of the same make, one could see that easily, and yet, the colors. Robes and hoods, almost always of two different hues, and none of them seeming like the sombre tones one would expect of an monastic order. Instead most of them were bright, with pastels and the like. From orange robe with purple hood, to red robe with orange, and even one that was a bright shade of gray with a yellow for its top, each was pristine, and clean.


Looking closer, I could see every robe had a mark on the front, and like the colors themselves, it appeared to be unique. Some were as simple as lines, done in odd designs. Other were full pictures, with things like a tri-colored shield with a lightning bolt on it, a large green apple with a slice taken out of it, and finally three bubbles, respectively for the three I’d been observing before. No one seems to comment on my gaze, as Ijs seems to know right where to go, walking up to a figure in a snow white robe, with a hood that appears to have been made of rainbow colored fabric that shifted color in the light.


“You have come to us, and the Harmony greets you as a Friend,” said the person, turning to reveal what looked like an old man, at least twenty years the senior of Ijs. Upon seeing the face of the man, Ijs does a double take.


“David, is that you?” he asks, and the man smiles gently, nodding his head.


“It is, Eyes, though you should be able to tell by my robes I am properly addressed as Solaris now,” he explains, waving us to follow him as he walks out of the plaza area, to a side room.


“I would ask why you have come, but I believe I can guess. You are looking for information regarding the atomics that were used on the Stock Exchange and Shipyards,” he said, settling down onto a bench on one wall, while we took our seats on the other.


“Heh, surprised you guys could take your eyes away from the ‘Sacred Screens’ long enough to figure that out,” he said, in a way that, had I just been reading it, I would have assumed he was being insulting, but his tone, and the chuckles of the man said otherwise.


“It is not everyday one needs to take in the Gospel of Harmony. It is, in fact, a gross negligence on our part to do so, as it would involve ignoring the worlds beyond, and holding the Spark within ourselves, rather than sharing it,” he explained, more to Katya and myself than Ijs, who just smiled at him.


“You mean you really worship an old cartoon?” I ask, unable to hold myself back from the question. Katya at first seems rather aghast that I would be so up front about the question, but the man in the white robes just shrugs, revealing a sun symbol emblazoned about his chest.


“Is it so strange to do so? For many years, text written by men, were claimed to be the world of God, and they guided many down a path of violence and war. Our teachings are not so harmful, showing us how to live with the five virtues. A Kind Heart, a Generous Hand, a Loyal Mind, an Honest Tongue, and a Mirthful Laugh. To have these five Elements, is to know the Spark. Can you say your religion teaches such gospel?” he asked.


“Not even close, but then, my gospel is rather empty of such things. I merely live my life to better myself, and if I can, maybe help others,” I answer bluntly, without a moment’s hesitation.


“Such is the way of men. Still, you try to help, and that is more than some. To business then, as I must be at the Sundown ceremony soon. What do you need, Eyes?” he asked, turning to face the man.


“Brother Greg, he’s still the one in charge of the outreach to pirates and miscreants, right?” answered Ijs. His response, however, was surprisingly a shake of the head.


“I’m afraid Greg has left us, for greener pastures like yourself. The last contact I had with him said he was working on Tezard designing ships along with many others. Sister Li, now Gleaming Shield, does that business,” answers Solaris, before pressing a button on the wall. A screen lights up, and he began to talk with someone on the other end of the line.


“You don’t seem surprised that the monks have an outreach program to pirates and the like,” says Katya, making small talk while we wait.


“I recently had it pointed out to me that the average pirate crew is ♥♥♥♥♥♥ via conscription, rather than offers of money. Makes sense that people like these would want to try and guide the young off such paths,” I answer, thinking of the two I’d left on Millrace. Before I could say more, another figure joined us, a woman in a white robe with a blue hood. Her emblem was a blue shield with purple stars on it, and a stripe that gave it a look like it was shining.


“You called for me, Prince Solaris?” she asked, bowing her head.


“Yes, we have need of you. Our friends are looking for information regarding the bombings a few years ago in the Republic. Perchance do you think your contacts on Green Rock might prove helpful?” he asked, and the woman nodded.


“Of course. I have been wondering when someone would get around to investigating such things,” she said, getting a warm smile from the older man.


“Excellent. I’m afraid she must stay for the Sundown and Sunrise Ceremony, her husband is being anointed as Prince Bolero tonight, and they are to be given the evening to enjoy it. Would you care to join us for tonight? We can offer you places at our table for dinner tonight, and breakfast in the morning,” he offered. After a bit of prodding from the other two in my party, I accepted, on the condition that I contact my fleet, to prevent any misunderstandings.


That evening, I saw how the Brothers of Harmony lived. They ate rather well, for being monks. I had expected porridge, water, and bread to be the fare, but instead they feasted, large tables covered in a variety of foodstuffs, with apple and their derivatives being the most prominent dish. After food, Solaris stood before the congregation, and made motions, as if lowering the sun, while a woman in a dark blue robe with a hood that sparkled like the night sky, stood beside him, and did a similar pantomime, appearing to raise the moon.


When that was done, they brought up Gleaming Shield and her husband, a man wearing a pink robe with a crystal in the shape of a cartoon heart on it. He appeared the two on the dias at the front, and was asked several questions, which at first I thought were trivia about their little cartoon, but turned out to be morals taught by the same, to make sure he understood it I suppose. When the last was asked, Solaris and the woman who appeared to be named Luna, placed a hood of ethereal looking pink on his head, the man wearing it well as he and the woman embraced and kissed.


What followed was a party, led by another pink robed woman, with balloons on her chest. She passed out pastries of every description, threw decorations hither and yon, and even led several songs that I actually found myself humming along with despite myself. When that was done, everyone congratulated the pair, before shuffling off for the night. Katya, Ijs, and myself were housed in an out of the way room that was far larger than I expected, with us waking up the next morning, to Gleaming Shield at our door.


“I believe I’ll be staying here, while you two go off. Even with your fleet, Admiral Sage, a pirate world is no place for someone with a price on their head,” he explained, as he closed the door behind us, and I led the way down the mountain, easily finding the path to the port.


“So, do I call you Gleaming, or Shield?” I asked to make conversation on the way down, and the woman just laughed.


“Neither. While out of the Monastery, I am to be called by my old name. My title is merely traditional. So please, simply refer to me as Li. It is my family name. Or if you prefer, my personal name is Nalas,” she explained.


“Nalas Li?” I asked, and she shook her head.


“No, Li Nalas. I use the name in the way my ancestors did,” she responded, and I nodded thoughtfully as we finally arrived at the port, and quickly shuffled into my ship.

[Star Sage]

Greenrock proved to be an easy place to land. Mrs. Li spent barely a minute talking to people over the comms before my ship was given a dock. Well, to call it that was to overstate it. The place was only slightly above the concrete circles on New Boston, with only some mag clamps on the sides to help with maintenance of the ship being more advanced than that. Still, we landed easily, my Shield Beetle dwarfing most everything else in the port, and then we made our way into the city beyond.


Li then dragged me around to every back alley and dealer in town. All of them had a smile for her, the instant they saw her robes, and some even made the fist gesture to her, allowing her to place her knuckle against theirs, before she got on to business. Sadly, most of that business was them telling us they had no information, no contacts, and not even a single lead. She would thank them, and then offer them chits for a few hundred credits, before encouraging me to follow her out of the slimy place.


Finally, we reached what she claimed was the end of the line, a small, rundown hotel that catered to a certain type of clientele. Here, in some dark room that smelled of things I don’t even want to think about, we found a man wearing the same grimy clothing as everyone else. However, one glance at him told you he wasn’t the same. He stood a bit too straight, he carried himself heavily, and most importantly, Li had us come in unannounced so we got a peek into his closet, which had a comm rig in it that was definately Navy in origin.


It took a few minutes of Li talking to him for his story to come out. He was a Navy Intelligence Officer, supposedly retired, but really he was active duty, spying for them out here. He had contact with the Brothers of Harmony, due to their operations overlapping with his. After that, Katya was able to convince him of who she was with a quick photo and database search, and he began to tell us what NI thought of the situation. Namely they didn’t believe the Free Worlds attacked them either.


He gave a lot of reasons for this, including motive, economic consequences, and a few others things. I only really paid attention when he got to the info we needed. Namely, the Navy was already searching for the test site, and had done their best, scanning everywhere they could. The list of worlds they’d already gone to was extensive, and he admitted, for the most part, they were cursory scans. Atmosphere only sorts of things. He advised us to tell Ijs to search for something less noticeable. Namely somewhere with a lot of deep mines, or possibly an ocean on a world with a lot of asteroid impacts, where a nuke could be detonated, and the vibrations the explosion caused could be masked.


The information in hand, we left the hotel behind, and made our way back to Harmony. Mrs. Li happily meets up with her husband at the port as we land, and Ijs comes aboard, looking back on the monastery with a rather longing gaze, as if he wants to stay. He does finally turn to us, however, and we give him the intel. After a few minutes browsing the network for planets, and listing out their info, he comes up with a few candidates in the local area, as well as some more distant ones in Syndicate space. For now, we decide to test the near ones, and set off to the first possible site.


Sadly, our first three stops found nothing. Our fourth stop had Katya in a funk, as we were running out of local places to check, and while I was confident we could do the same search in Syndicate space, she wasn’t so sure that was a good idea. It was, after all, a sovereign state like the Deep. Nominally it was part of the Republic, in actuality it paid taxes, and that was the only link it had to the Parliament, with the mega corp itself in control of the worlds. If she went snooping through their business, it could make trouble for the Free Worlds.


Ijs and I convinced her to keep going, mostly by reminding her that this was the only way to bring a lasting peace, rather than the war footing everyone was on right now. With her confidence boosted, she ordered us to take her to Clink, the moon in the sky over the world we were on. It was the last world in the local area, and who knew, it might be the place we were looking for. So we launched off towards the mining site, and with a few quick scans, Ijs got very, very excited.


“Yes, yes, YES!!!” he shouts, his displays showing data I couldn’t hope to read, at least until he brought two screens together, showing that the isotopic signatures in Clink’s atmosphere were a perfect match to those we’d taken on Geminus. This was definitely the place where the weapons had been tested. He even determined when it happened, and later where. That led to the odd revelation, however.


“You’re sure this is the spot?” asked Katya, as we flew over a crater. It was on the far side of the planet, unremarkable from all the others similar craters that dotted the moon’s surface, save the scanners giving readings of high radiation content in the air.


“Positive, this is the remains of a detonation,” he confirmed, and we all sat there, thinking the same thing. Navy Intelligence had to know about this. Clink was on the only path into the Free Worlds, and Navy ships entered and exited the system all the time. Yet for some reason, the Navy hadn’t acted. Someone, somewhere high up, was suppressing this information somehow, and that spoke of power far beyond the norm.


“Alright, we’ve got the site, but no one here’s reporting anything. That’s...tell me, STAR, are there any job openings in the local mines?” asked Katya after a few minutes.


“There are always job openings in a mine like this. However, if you’re thinking what I think you’re thinking, Ms. Katerina, then there is an administrative assistant’s position that is vacant at the moment,” said the AI, bringing up the listing on a screen in front of her. She quickly filled out the application for it, and got approved in moments.


“Are you sure about this, Katya? This won’t be the most pleasant workplace, and more, it’ll be dangerous in the extreme,” advised Ijs, but the woman shook her head.


“No, I’ve got to do this. We can’t wait much longer, and I need to know how this is being kept from us. You go back to Zug, and give them all the data. When I find out who’s controlling the information, I’ll call you, and you two can come riding in like my knights in shining armor,” she says, and with that, we land at the pad for the building she’ll be working in. A quick word with a manager, and she’s on her way, while we shoot off once more into the heavens.

[jafdy]

An admin job. An ADMIN job. Lucky her.

[Star Sage]

I dropped off Ijs on Zug, the man telling me how grateful he was for my help, and asking me to be ready, as the next act in this particular drama could start again at any time. I said I would, and then shot off into space again, finding the stars just a little less bright as I did so now that I was once more alone on my ship. Idly, I toyed with the idea of heading back to the Monastery, or perhaps just going to the Syndicate worlds and doing scans myself, to see if there was anything I could find out. Finally, after much thought, I decided to just fly around randomly again, making it known that I was open for jobs for the Free Worlds.


I got a convoy guard job that I quickly negotiated down to just getting the stuff myself. Wayfarer in the Tarazed system was the delivery point for supplies from the Syndicate apparently, including weapons and ship outfits, which surprised me. It seemed the megacorp was actually supplying both sides in this little war, and that might be suspicious, though I filed it away for later, merely hauling the supplies I’d ♥♥♥♥♥♥ back to Longjump. There, I was paid a handsome sum, due to doing at least eight trips worth of hauling, before another officer approached me, the same woman who’d given me the job of going after the Rat Pack.


This time the job was to hunt a freighter called the Moonless Night. Apparently the retrofitted ship had been preying on ships, acting wounded, and then pouncing with battleship grade weapons. The job itself proved much simpler, both because it was a single target, and more importantly, the trick didn’t really work when you were flying a fleet like mine. This time, I captured the vessel, however, sending the crew to Harmony, and executing the officers, before returning.


There, I found out about a transport ship, Shackleton, that had ♥♥♥♥♥♥ lost somewhere between stops. With a quick look, we found it disabled in an out of the way system, and escorted it on its way, finding more than one pirate group seemed to want the ship. As it eventually turned out, that was due to the ship carrying several tonnes of valuable gems, used both for their beauty, and in circuitry around the galaxy. The glittering hoard was worth more than even my own finances would allow me to buy easily, and thus, worth the price to the pirates.


Upon our return, the woman with the bounties had another one for us. This time it was unique, however, as the ship was using some unknown weapon they were having trouble defending against. I assured her my fleet could deal with it, and we launched out, to Greenrock where the Silverhawk was supposedly hiding. We easily entered the system, sadly, without Li on our side, we couldn’t land, but it only took a few hours for the ship, an Osprey, to show itself. The ship, as expected, had alien weapon, specifically, Hai ion cannons.


Luckily, the cores on my ships were more than capable of keeping up with the energy drain, allowing us to disable it with only a second or so of fire from the fleet. Unluckily, the captain of the ship had no idea how the weapon worked, and apparently tried to fire it despite the damage to their ship. This caused a rupture that tore the vessel apart, leaving a mystery as to how they got their hands on an alien weapon. That last was especially puzzling due to the Navy ships lining the jump points between here and the Republic.
Upon returning to recieve my bounty, I had a message waiting for me. My good work of late had apparently caught the eye of the Council...not surprising given I’d been directly assisting a member of it. What was surprising was that the note was handwritten, not printed, meaning they were taking me seriously. Sadly, Katya’s name amongst the five appeared to be a stamp, rather than handwriting, probably meaning she was still on Clink. Buoyed up regardless, I made my way to Bourne, the capital of the Free Worlds.


There, after giving my name, Bandit, Joe, and I were quickly shuffled into a room where two men were in a heated discussion while looking at a galactic map. They tabled this as we entered, their eyes going to my companions, and then back to me, as I offered a hand, and quickly introduced myself. They took the handshake, offering their own names as Alondo Gruyere and Tomek Voigt. The former the top diplomat of the Free Worlds, the latter, commander of the Military for the same.


“It has come to our notice, Mr. Sage, that you’ve been doing good work for us of late, despite being nominally unaligned in our little cold war. That is quite the dangerous line to walk,” said Tomek, pouring himself a drink, and then offering me a glass. I turned it down, as did the others, so he just shrugged, and with a toss, downed the whole thing in one swallow.


“To business then. I have to admit, we were surprised by what you’ve done. Your fleet is large enough, that you could have set yourself up as some tinpot dictator of an out of the way system, and continue to hold it forever. Why are you helping us? Do you really believe in our cause?” asked the military man, and Alondo beside him looked ready to say something. I cut him off, however, with a gesture.


“I helped out because I was here, and it was something to do. I will admit, your politics bore me. I could care less about who owns what pile of dirt. I did however, lose a friend in the bombing, and would very much enjoy bringing the ones who did that down. More importantly though, I have two more people I need to kill, before I can make peace with my life,” I told them bluntly, and then laid a small disk on the desk. Taking it, Tomek eyed the thing for a moment, before shoving it into the drive, and soon the image of Charles and Dorien replaced the galaxy.


“Hmm, a personal vendetta. That is something I can understand. Tell me, who are they?” asked Tomek.


“The last two remaining of the Old Men from New Boston. There were five. These two are named Charles and Dorien, with Claire, Hobbes, and Bernard having died because of me. Call me old fashioned, but I want to finish the whole set,” I told them darkly,and it seemed that Alondo took offense for some reason, but Tomek smiled.


“I can see where that would be nice. I must admit to never having heard of ‘The Old Men’ before, but I recognize some of those names from circles of power, names that have recently vanished. If they’re the ones you’re talking about, you did the galaxy a service getting rid of them, and I can see my way to helping you finish, if you help us,” he told me, and I nodded. We spent the remainder of the evening going over the fine details of employment with the Free Worlds, only to be interrupted by an alarm.


“Sir Voigt, I’m afraid I have bad news. The Kornephoros system fell a few minutes ago,” said a voice on the other end of the line, and we dropped our discussion to focus on this. Details were given in a military way, mostly that the Navy had entered the system in force, and then declared it was the place the bombs had been made, before cordoning off the whole system. The local militia, barely a hundredth the size of the Navy fleet they’d sent, surrendered easily, and now they controlled everything.


“What about Katya, has she returned?” I asked, and that got the two Councilors to look at each other, and then back to me. Apparently, while they’d known she’d gone undercover, they hadn’t heard much in the way of details, leaving me to explain that Katya was in the Kornephoros system, on Clink, where indeed, the bombs had been tested at some point, though whether they were made there or not I didn’t know.


“Hmm, that does create a conundrum, but you yourself present a fantastic solution,” said Alondo, gesturing us towards the galactic map.


“If you go there now, as a still mostly unaffiliated captain, they’ll let you into the system. You run in, get Katya, and get out. Simple, no?” he said, and I shook my head.


“We can try, but even if they let me land, they might still make a grab for Katya. She’d be a valuable prisoner,” I explain, but Tomek waves the concern off.


“True, but if it fails, I’ll be right behind you, gathering as much forces at Longjump as I can. If you find her, that’s fine. If not, we can roll in and take the planet back,” he declared, it seemed like Alondo wanted to argue for a moment, but he held his tongue as my companions and I left the office, quickly going to the port, and then towards Clink in the far off sky.

[Star Sage]

İlk olarak jafdy tarafından gönderildi:

An admin job. An ADMIN job. Lucky her.

I know what they were going for in the real game, but janitor is a bit too...mundane, and wouldn't be able to actually do what they needed. She would need access to files, not just facilities, and a secretary does have such access.







Landing on Clink proved far easier than expected. Finding Katya though, without tipping anyone off as to who she was, proved far more difficult. Sadly, trying every avenue, including attempting to sneak into the office she’d been in, proved impossible. The Navy officer who caught me that time actually seemed sympathetic to my ‘sister’s plight, but assured me that she had not been harmed, no one had been, and once they knew for certain what had happened, they would release everyone.


Landing back on Longjump, I was met on the pad by Tomek, who looked less disappointed than I would have expected given my lack of Katya. He explained quickly that, while he was hopeful I might be able to get her offworld, the fact that the Navy had moved as hard as it had indicated they knew something, and Katya was probably already caught. Still, she might have hidden herself, somehow, and we would be taking back the system, as soon as I declared myself for the Free Worlds.


“I even brought the paint,” he joked, holding up a brush and a can, and that actually got a laugh out of me, before ordering STAR to shift the colors. Soon, my fleet, both flagship on the ground, and the ships still in orbit, were sporting the green of the Free Worlds, rather than merchant blue. This was important, he explained, as without this sign, I would be labeled a partisan or pirate, rather than an enemy combatant, which had at least some rules on how I was to be treated. Just as he finished explaining, sirens went off in the port, and he quickly grabbed a comm station.


“Report!” he ordered, as a face came up on a screen.


“Sir, there’s Navy ships entering the system a lot of them. I think it’s the Fourth Fleet, mostly landing craft, with a few heavy hitters thrown in. They’re claiming that they’ve been ordered to re-establish Republic control of the system,” said a panicked sounding voice, and I could see why as the tactical display was overlaid on the screen. There simply wasn’t time to launch anything from the ground, a process that could take minutes, and the Free Worlds had few ships in space at the moment that were actually capable of combat.


“Foxtrot! We can’t let them take this system. Without it, we’ll be bottled up, and they’ll have the stronghold position,” he swore, and I turned to the android beside me. He didn’t even need a word to open a channel, his hand soon at me in a way to say I was live with my fleet.


“All forces, we’re with the Free Worlds now, and that means this world is under our protection. The incoming fleet is to be neutralized, ASAP!” I ordered, and got a click of confirmations. Suddenly the tact screen showed a lot more green dots pop into existence, as my fleet requested Friend or Foe codes from the central control, soon forming an almost solid wall of metal between the fleet and Longjump.


“Limit damage to just disable. These are good soldiers, and I doubt they want a war any more than we do,” ordered Tomek. I relayed that, and we sat down to watch the battle, unable to launch without risking destruction from orbital positions. That was taxing in the extreme, but with the help of STAR coordinating, projecting a 3D tact-screen for us, we could at least follow the fight, with Tomek giving advice that I tended to follow, my fleet’s first pass leaving a good chunk of the Navy vessels floating hulks.


Unfortunately, these weren’t pirates, or uncoordinated defenders not expecting an attack. These were trained soldiers, and at least fifty of my own ships were disabled, with a few captains actually having to abandon ship as the hulls gave out under the assault. Still, we’d inflicted far more damage to them, and a second pass showed that, as many of their landing craft decided to make a break for Longjump, rather than fight. Had they been against a less coordinated opponent, one or two of the troop carriers might have ♥♥♥♥♥♥ through, with their thousand or so marines. Instead, by the end of the hour, space was quiet, save the pings of rescue beacons.


“Your own ships should be the ones to make recovery operations on Navy derelicts. My fleet is single persons flying vessels crewed by androids, so we should only do it with friendlies,” I advised, and Tomek nodded. It took most of the rest of the day, and on into morning to save what could be saved, and to dispose of those that couldn’t. Sadly, that included not only Free Worlds and Navy, but also merchant ships that happened to be caught in the crossfire, leaving many a captain with a solemn mood as day finally dawned.


Total losses were bad. Almost every ship that the Free Worlds had at Longjump as orbital defenders were gone, destroyed, and worse, most of those included the loss of the crews. My own fleet had taken only two irrecoverable losses, with the remaining ships repairing themselves over the course of the evening. Of those two, the captains had been able to abandon ship, thanks to the liquid metal construction, and were waiting for me to get them new ships, or tell them to go away.


“Four-hundred-eight-six Free Worlds citizens, dead. Almost twice that in Naval personnel, and over a hundred civilians that shouldn’t have been there in the first place,” said Tomek later, sighing heavily as he looked over the list of names. He began to issue orders next, mostly what to do with captured enemies, and what hulls they’d captured would be best used for spare parts, and what would be best scrapped completely. When all was said and done, it took a full two days to get everything settled, and when it was, he joined me on my bridge.


“Despite everything, we need to press the advantage we have. They just lost a lot more military potential than we did, thanks to you. We’ll be launching in an hour,” with that, he handed me my marching orders. I then gave a few to my crews. This included Bandit and Joe, who both insisted on giving their ships over to the captains who had lost theirs, while they joined me on mine. With them manning positions, we launched into space, and almost immediately jumped into the Kornephoros.


“Remember, our object is capture of the system. These Navy ships don’t need to die for that to happen. If they retreat or surrender, accept it. No unnecessary loss of life,” came Tomek’s voice over the comms, and we swept forward at his command. There were few enough defenders here now, a few ragged ships with scattered pockets of heavy cruisers, that we didn’t even have to do a second pass. Sadly, several casualties amongst the enemy were required, as the captains made suicide charges against my ships, but even then, they lasted minutes, before the system was officially ours.


Three days after the cold war turned into open shooting, the Free Worlds claimed their first major victory. They corralled the Navy officers and enlisted in separate areas of the planet, and I was invited down, landing just alongside troop transports, including Tomek’s own. Men and women with large guns surrounded the officers, their weapons at the ready, but not pointed at the prisoners, as Tomek and I walked around to what looked like a hastily constructed stage at the side of the enclosure.


“My name is Tomek Voigt, Councilor of the Free Worlds. We lack the organized, professional fleet you Navy personnel enjoy, but we’ve obviously got a lot of force on our side. Still, as Commander in Chief, it’s my duty to help decide the fate of prisoners we capture in this conflict, and as such, I’ve come to tell you how you will be treated,” he said the words with conviction, before unrolling a piece of paper.


“By the power vested in me by the Free Worlds, I hereby extend this offer to all officers and soldiers of the Navy forces. You may remain prisoners until the conflict is settled between ourselves and the Republic, or, if you’re willing to gives us your parole, your word of honor, that you will cease to take part in operations against us, you will be allowed to return,” he gave a moment for a wave of confusion to pass through the crowd, both guard and prisoner alike seemingly taken aback by the statement.


“If you cannot find reassignment to other sections of the galaxy, you are to resign your commission, to avoid such conflicts of oaths. If you can swear to do that, you may go home. Otherwise, we will do our best to make your incarceration comfortable,” he finished, and soon he had divided up the people into lines, each giving the oath to an official notary, who took fingerprint, retina, and dna scans of everyone. When it was at least half over, he asked myself and some other captains to meet him in a temporary office he’d set up in the local port’s cafe.

[Star Sage]

The office in the cafe was stacked with forms, as Tomek began to fill out authorizations, issue orders, and otherwise handle the paperwork that came from running a government. He thanked all of us for our assistance, as none of us were native to the Free Worlds, despite now being members of its military. Once he’d passed out a few medals, he took me aside and laid out the next step in all this, namely, transporting the Navy personnel to a neutral planet, and then getting them back into Republic space.


My fleet was being tapped for that assignment, namely because we had the capacity for it. I did express security concerns, but Tomek assured me that Navy types were not ones to go back on their words. It was why those who took the oath to not come in conflict with the Free Worlds were being released at all. After that, he hammered out specific details with me, informing me of a temporary cease fire during the transport, and then passing me a credit chit, before shoving me out the door, so he could get back to work on other things.


Luckily, he was correct. The Navy officers and soldiers made no complaints, and didn’t once try to do any damage to my vessels. Heck, one or two actually offered some advice on fuel mixtures that would improve efficiency of my engines by almost ten percent. By the time we dropped them off on New Tibet, a world controlled by Buddhist monks, I was actually somewhat sorry to see them go. After that, it was a quick jump back to Deep, where Tomek quickly took me into his office.


“I’m afraid to say, we’ve now got evidence to say that Katya was captured at some point during the occupation of Clink. Not as a Councilor of the Free Worlds, but as a simple spy, it seems, so there is that at least,” he told me bluntly the moment the door closed.


“Well, that’s a kicker. Can’t we use the fact that we gave their people back to convince them to return her?” I asked, and Tomek shook his head.


“I’m afraid it’s not the simple They’ve got to know who she is by now, Navy Intelligence has ways of making you talk when they want to. More importantly though, she’d have to take an oath similar to the Navy prisoners, and I don’t see her being able to keep to it, should she be returned,” he answered, and I thought on that a bit, before nodding. Katya seemed the type to ignore such promises, or at least, skirt their terms, should she believe she could do the most good doing so. And if she violated her parole, the Navy might insist they could as well.


“Okay, well, what do we do then?” I said, not a demand for action, but in genuine curiosity as to our next move.


“For now? We sit tight. No reason to hit the hornets nest, especially as it’s going to take the Navy some time to shift personnel around with that oath holding so many of their forces back. Worse, they not only suffered two rather crushing defeats, but those were the assets they were keeping close to us, meaning it will take even more time to shuffle around enough ships to be a threat to us,” as he spoke, he pulled out a galactic map, unrolling it, and then pointing to dots on it that represented systems.


“This means we have time to fortify and hunker down. More importantly, it means we can look for allies,” as he spoke, his finger traced a line from where we were, to the heart of the Syndicate.


“You want to ally with the Syndicate?” I asked a bit incredulous at that idea. The megacorp was a business alliance, nothing more, nothing less. They moreso even than the Republic, with the antithesis of the Free Worlds stated goals.


“Want to? No, not in the slightest. However, it would be most advantageous if we could get them to align with us, both because of their resources, and because it would deny those to the Republic,” he explained, picking up a pen and drawing a route from Deep, to the world he was thinking of going to.


“Better, we’ve just proven to them that we can match the Navy, blow for blow. That was mostly thanks to you and your ships, I’ll admit. Alondo thinks that’s what makes you a good person to bring along on this mission. You, myself, and him proves how serious we are about the negotiations,” he finishes, and I nod.


“Do you think the Navy would get in the way?” I ask after a few moments studying the map.


“Not entirely likely, but if they do, I would advise more disabling, but I won’t say no to blowing them out of the sky,” he answers. With that done, we plan out the route down to the last stop, and I bid him a good day. He and Alondo, the head of Free Worlds Diplomatic Corps, and one of its five Councilors, come aboard my personal ship after sundown, having taken hours to get their affairs in order. Once that’s done, I launch us out at once, jumping the moment we’re in formation with the fleet.


Landing on Hephaestus was easy, they didn’t even bother with the usual checks of my ID or comm frequency. Heck, we were offered a dock in a private area, right next to the business center. Once there, the three of us were quickly shuffled into a side room, where we found ourselves confronted by security personnel. They scanned us, and confiscated weapons. When Tomek refused, he was offered another room to wait in, while Alondo and I went into a large conference room, where six men sat at a table, and gestured for us to take seats opposite them.


After that the typical scene played out, as Alondo and the old men traded pleasantries. I ignored it, without making an excuse for myself. This was not what I was here for, and I assumed they knew it. I was an independent in all of this. Oh, I flew for the Free Worlds, but a quick check into my background would tell anyone who wanted to know that I was more mercenary than patriot. That meant my actions wouldn’t reflect unkindly on Alondo, so long as I wasn’t openly attacking anyone at the table.


“To business then. You wish us to join ourselves to your efforts?” asked one of the men, and Alondo stared at him, probably because that was a lot blunter than he’d expected, given how much dancing around the issue they’d been doing for the last twenty minutes.


“Well, perhaps not that. We would be delighted if you chose to side with us over the Republic, but if you could remain neutral, we could see our way to signing trade deals favorable to the Syndicate’s interests in the future,” he offered, and the old men looked at each other, before one leaned forward. Placing his finger against the desk, he revealed it was not simple wood and metal, but circuitry, as he pressed a key built into it, and an image appeared on its surface in front of us.


“Are you saying we can believe your word of honor, when your people stoop to terrorism?” asked that one, as the image resolved into a news feed, the headline being, ‘Leader of Terrorist State ‘Free Worlds’ captured by Navy in a Heroic action at Kornephoros system’. Below that, I saw pictures of Katya that, at first, I though were of her dead body. Luckily, that proved to just be a trick of the holo, and she did prove to be alive when the image’s eyes blinked as the recording of her started, and then paused at a touch of Alondo.


“This is not a public news feed. This is only for those in high level government positions,” said the diplomat of the Free Worlds, and the six old men didn’t deny it.


“Such information is made available to those with enough power to find interest in Interstellar matters,” explained one of them simply.


“Well then, I can say for the record that the reason this information hasn’t hit the public feed is that they have no evidence against her. In fact, I have logs that prove she was actually hunting the terrorist, with the assistance of Admiral Sage and Ijs Springborn,” he countered, and I nodded.


“I would be happy to share those logs, if you like,” I offered.


“It won’t be necessary. We keep tabs on Mr. Springborn for his...other activities, and we are aware you assisted him recently in his travels. Still, as this is the line the current leadership of the Republic is being asked to believe, I’m sure you’ll understand our reluctance to do business with those they consider enemies,” said one of the old men, waving his hand and suddenly showing us several charts, not all of which I understood, but the gist of it was that the Republic was currently the largest customer for the Syndicate.


“I see. I notice you’ve been trading with the Tarazed corporation, but your routes are right near a pirate world. Perhaps we can assist you with deliveries through that part of space. If that were to happen, I would think it safe to assume you would be able to ship even more product to Tarazed now than ever before,” said the diplomat, indicating a route on the galactic map. This made a few of the old men across from his grin in a way that almost made me want to draw a weapon, but I resisted the urge.


“And, of course, who Tarazed chooses to do business with is none of our concern. Should some of our products find their way into the hands of the Free Worlds, we can claim we had no direct hand in the transaction,” added one of the men. Over the next few minutes, the seven of them hammered out a deal in how exactly the trade of goods for protection, as well as money, would go. At last, everyone present agreed, and Alondo and I left. Getting Tomek back, we explained the deal, and while he grumbled about certain costs, he did agree it was worth it.


“So, what next?” I asked as we returned to my ship.


“Tarazed needs to be informed of this new deal. If you’ll head there next, we can set this up with minimum fuss,” said Tomek, and I set the course.

[Star Sage]

Landing on Wayfarer, we are quickly allowed into a much less opulent boardroom than the one the six old men had had us in. In fact, it was obvious this place was typically used for other purposes, probably storage given the marks on the floor. Of course, that was to be expected. Tarazed was indeed a large company, given they’d named the system after it, but they were not the interstellar giant that was the Syndicate. Besides, they were actually trying to hide us being there, unlike the Syndicate board, whom I doubted cared who found out about their dealings with the Free Worlds.


Regardless, once we’d been shown in, a woman flanked by half a dozen men and women younger than her came in, issuing orders over her shoulder, before taking her seat across the simple wooden table from us. She was, according to Alondo, Emily Lane, current CEO of Tarazed, and once she confirmed who we were, she quickly lapsed into business mode. Her, Tomek, and Alondo discussed delivery, protection from pirates, and even the subject of Navy search and seizure, which they agreed the Navy couldn’t do without pissing off the Tarazed corp, which was producing about twenty percent of their vessels with the Geminus Shipyard still being rebuilt.


After that, we were dismissed, as she had a lot more to do today, letting us show ourselves out. Alondo then broached the subject of Poisonwood, a planet deep in Free Worlds space that, nonetheless, was remaining loyal to the Republic. Tomek dismissed them, saying they were cowards, who wouldn’t dare to stand on their own. Still, Alondo insisted on going, and Tomek allowed it, though he had one of my ships take him back to Longjump, so he could catch up on all the work they had missed over the last few weeks.


Landing on Poisonwood a few days later, Alondo and I are quickly shuffled into a waiting vehicle, and given a ride to the governor’s estate. On the way, Alondo gives me a quick prep course on Poisonwood’s history. Namely, this was a frontier world that had fallen farther than even the Pirate Worlds. Slavers, a lot of them, had descended on the world, and people’s lives became a commodity, to be bought and sold by the powerful. The Navy, for all its inaction against the Pirate Worlds, heard of this and dispatched a huge fleet, freeing Poisonwood, and causing a debt that the locals still feel obligated by to this day.


Meeting with the governor, I’m not surprised to find it’s an older woman, late fifties by her looks. She has that weary look of someone who’s being drained by her job, with long drawn out sighs as she and Alondo talk. It’s not important things, not really, at least to me. Mostly in how isolated Poisonwood is, especially if it won’t join the Free Worlds. There are some discussions of the Navy personnel who took the Oath perhaps being allowed to defend the planet, should it come to that, but otherwise, negotiations seems stalled.


“Hmm, a good point, Ambassador Alondo. Still, what of your companion?” she says suddenly, shocking me out of the stupor, and causing me to jerk a little.


“I’m sorry, what were you discussing?” I ask, not ashamed to admit I hadn’t been following. After all, I was here as a transport, not really to do the negotiating myself.


“Heh, well, to be blunt, we were discussing threats. Namely, what do you feel the greatest threat faced by the people of today is?” she asks, and I pause, my mind turning over the statement. On its surface, it’s not that hard, as I can name a dozen or more threats. Yet, the tone of the question gives me a moment to think. She’s not asking about local threats, like the pirates, or even asteroids or the like slamming into planets. No, the question goes deeper than that. What could threaten us as a species, spread across all of space?


“Whatever it is that’s isolating the peoples of this galaxy,” I said at last, a bit of a sharp pain behind my temple, causing me to wince, though it passes quickly. The two who had been doing most of the talking seem taken aback by the answer.


“I have my own answer, but you seem to know something I don’t. Please, explain,” she offers, and I nod.


“Well, I’ve been all over the galaxy now. I’ve been on a finished Quarg ring, two of them actually. I’ve met the Hai, squirrel like people in the north beyond the Republic. North of them there’s even an avian race called the Wanders I know no one has heard of yet. What’s more there’s the Korath, both the Ah and the Za variants. Heck, I even met a Drak. Do you know what all of them have in common? Well, save that last one,” I asked, and both of them shook their heads.


“They’re trapped. No lanes lead into their space, and they depend on the Jump Drives, like my own fleet, to move in and out, and those aren’t common devices. Yet, most have histories that speak of being great galactic powers once. Something collapsed those, perhaps the Drak, though I have my doubts there. Whatever the case, someone is isolating the peoples of the galaxy into little cages of systems. As a free, intelligent being, I find that to be a crime most reprehensible,” I explain, and that gives both of them a bit of pause, as they consider my words. The woman finishes first, and nods, before presenting her arm to me, showing off crisscrossing scars in her flesh, long healed wounds.


“That threat was unknown to me, but also seems more existential than most others. If there is such a force, I doubt we could fight it. To me, to the people of my world, the most likely thing to threaten the peoples of humanity is the return of the Alphas, or their ilk. As happened here,” she says that in such a way that I can draw my own conclusions, and what I draw are not pleasant. The Alphas, the greatest threat in recorded human history, and one that, by the scars on her body, I knew she was intimately familiar with.


“It was ten years of pain, of horror and death, when they came. Before that, we were what would be called a Pirate World, nominally part of the Republic, but not really. They came in great ships, destroyed the locals bosses, and claimed us all as their property. All this happened when I was five,” she says as she pulls back her sleeve farther, showing patches of green, where the Alpha’s had tried to inject her with their blueprints, to turn her body into a living factory to make more of them.


“They worked slowly at first. We didn’t even realize what they were, as none of their spokespeople had the telltale green skin of theirs. All they were was just more people in charge. I was working at a factory, a little over fifteen, when they decided to act. We’d been building weapons, and ships, but now they wanted soldiers, so every girl was taken in, for a ‘health checkup’ we were told. There, they did this to me, and to hundreds of others besides. We were violated in the worst ways possible, and many vanished, we call it the Disappearance,” she continued, finally rolling her sleeve back down.


“Somehow, someone got word off world when that happened. A few weeks later, the Navy sent fleets, at least five of them, to liberate us. They destroyed the shipyards we’d been building, blasting them to atoms, and then raiding facilities all over the planet, desperately trying to find the girls who had vanished, or those who had done the vanishing. But every other facility seemed rigged to blow, and after a year, they declared the threat over, and the girls likely dead, before pulling out again,” she finished her story with a long sigh, and looking out a window, towards a mountain I was only now noticing was split down the middle, probably because of a massive explosion when an underground base detonated before it could be searched.


“So you see, we owe the Navy, and the Republic, for what they did for us. We don’t know where those bastards are, why they picked us, or anything else. They could literally be on a nearby Pirate World, or perhaps fled human space entirely. Whatever the case, we will see our debt is paid. We won’t stop you, we know you’re doing what you feel is right, but you must know this. The threat of the Alphas is still out there. If you stand without the Republic, you must be on guard against them,” she said the last with the conviction of a woman who would not be turned, and after a few more statements, we left, our course taking us back to Longjump, where the Free Worlds Council was apparently waiting for us.