by T J Bryan
The hallway began to reveal mist as they ran. A sure sign Silvi thought of approaching an exit to the plaza. They approached another turn and as they made the turn three unarmed guard soldiers blocked their way to the plaza. Silvi did not stop but tried to gain momentum by running harder and faster. Silvi heard Buddy grunt as he tried to keep up. Approaching the guards Silvi lunged at the one on the right and together they fell to the stone floor. Silvi had landed on top and immediately grasped the soldiers head and bashed it upon the stone floor. The guard struggled and reached for Silvi's neck and began choking her. Silvi relaxed a bit then smashed the guards head again against the floor a second time. Silvi heard the satisfying grunt of the guard as she bashed him again and again against the floor. Behind her Silvi heard the sounds of struggle but her fight with the guard took all her concentration. The guard was strong and although pained by Silvi's attack his grip tightened on her neck. One more head bashing Silvi thought. That's all I have got left.
As Silvi was about to loose consciousness a large black boot descended on the guards head. The guards hands fell away from Silvi's neck. Silvi shook herself and looked up. Four Marines suited in full armour stood next to her. Emblazoned on their chest were the words "Legio XXV." The OCN marines had arrived.
...
New Carthago System - Iceland - Year 3246. March 1 ET: 22:10
"That's about it," Helen concluded. Silvi sat drinking real tea as Emmitt and OM Marx sat at the mess table eating supper.
"So let me get this right," Silvi said. "You heard on the tracker the ambush, our hijacking, and the fact we were taken to a different temple. So you sent another delegation to follow us but this time to the Ernau temple?"
Helen nodded yes as she added another spoonful of sugar to her coffee.
Silvi continued, "And you then negotiated a complete deal which will feed our people for three years?"
"Four," replied Emmitt. "Four years."
"It seems that our new build weather satellites and ground station was a highly desirable commodity and well worth four years of food, and an agreement to supply more in the future."
"And the satellites are in place now. The weather satellites are operating?" asked Silvi.
Helen spoke, "They are in place but still under test. The tests won't really complete until we are gone and on our way home. I don't suspect the God Emperor of a double cross, but the chaos and intrigue of the Temple Mount requires caution."
"And the events at Ormal Temple. How does that fit in?"
Helen responded, "The God Emperor has many sons. Many. Perhaps as many as one hundred, but only the sons in the prime number sequence are of any import. Your Arch-Priest was 19th and as is their tradition he was given his own temple to be raised by monks of the Order or Ormal. They raised the boy as was their temple tradition; drunk, drugged, ignorant, and confined to a basket. Kind of makes it easy to control. The real master of the place was your Factotum. And yes they were planning a coup against the God Emperor and just a handful of modern weapons would have made that coup successful. Arrows against plasma; does not take much math to figure out the odds on that one."
"Who murdered the kid," Silvi asked.
Well that's a bit of a mystery, but we think it was the God Emperor's inside man who did the job. Remove the Arch-Priest and you truncate the coup. Or at least that's one explanation. There are others."
"But the factotum and the guards did not react immediately. What was behind that?"
"The God Emperor and his children do not die. They are gods. Well actually they die just like us as mortal flesh. But in their belief system their bodies can lie rotting at the bottom of the stairs, yet they live. They are not dead until cremated, and even then they live in the clouds and mist. So to the Factotum's way of thinking the coup could continue in the name of the 19th son. It was not until you ran and took away the potential for those guns that he panicked." Helen paused and then continued, "Oh, he's dead now. The Factotum. Seem monks die all the time. Looks like he fell on a dozen arrows."
Silvi sighed. "You know I'm not sure giving them those satellites was a good idea. We are perpetuating a fake religion here. A fraud that plays of the distorted beliefs of hard working farmers. Did you consider that?"
OM spoke first, "Silvi, New Carthago needed those weather satellites. And as for the religion, the farmers got accurate weather forecasts in time to react. They were told when the rain would feed the crops, or when tornadoes would strike the land, or perhaps when snow or ice were anticipated. This gave them time to prepare their irrigation systems and dykes, or to take shelter from the storm, or hunker down as an ice storm approached. In return all that was required was prayer. A fair exchange if you ask me."
Silvi shook her head.
Helen interjected, "Their religion imposes very light taxes and is for the most part benign. Any violence on this planet is confined to a few on the Temple Mount. The entire system, seems on the whole, to be well balanced and peaceful."
Helen took another sip of her coffee, "Who is to say there is not cause and effect in all this. You know the chicken and the egg? Prayer, Emperor, Weather; or Weather, Emperor, Prayer. It really makes no difference and we have left these people as we found them, actually better off since the new weather satellites will probably last another 400 years."
...
New Carthago System - Iceland - Year 3246. March 9 ET: 12:00
It had taken the heavy lifters eight days to bring two years worth of varied foodstuffs to the hold of the Iceland. Silvi and the captains had decided to take a hint from Greaysons and rely upon redundancy. Half the food would return to Jamon via Wu on Iceland and the second half would be loaded on Greenland and return via a slightly longer alternate route. Iceland would take 5 days to return to Wu and then another 14 days to return home.
From the Greenland Toni Hamilton and her crew of SAR 1010 had fully qualified for their SAR which they named 'Kára'. Although the crew was very green, the captains had decided that when Iceland sailed for home she would be accompanied by OM Marx's Sigrún and Toni Hamilton's Kára. Once again a little redundancy on the return voyage. Ragnarök would remain with Greenland and escort her on her return. Nomi with Dilli's help set about crafting an alternative route home for Greenland that did not appreciably add any delay in their arrival. Of the five alternative routes two were selected for Silvi and Emmitt's consideration. Both looked like clean fast routes. They had only to decide upon one.
Loading Greenland would take another 8 days and the captains decided to dispatch Iceland immediately and Greenland would remain loading the last of the foodstuffs and depart when fully loaded.
Silvi had made one last request of the Emperator and although it was outside the formal systems of tithing and blessings the wish was granted. Six metric tons of five different types of wood were to be loaded on Greenland. Although Silvi was unsure of what they would do with the sweet smelling wood she was grateful for the gift.
The following day, the day of Iceland's departure, Silvi stood aboard the Iceland and addressed the crews of Iceland, Kára, and Sigrún. She did not want to make a speech, but she felt the need to acknowledge the crew and their success to date. The crews stood at attention on the marine deck. The captains stood forward as did Wain Peters who headed the Marines. Silvi thought of what they had accomplished and she saluted. The crew returned the salute. The only thing she could think of to say was to quote Abel. "Women and Men of the Greenland, Sigrún, and Kára, The Obsidian Commonwealth Navy expects every woman and man to do their duty."
Silvi turned away and left the deck lest anyone see the tears streaming down her face.
Silvi returned to the Greenland to observe the loading of the remaining foodstuffs and to inspect the remaining four SARs and their still training crews. The crews of the 1087 with Jason Mills as pilot, and the 1055 with John-Paul Holgata, were almost fully qualified. Emmitt thought only another four or five weeks was needed to complete their training. Vidar Thoranson of the 1078 lagged a
bit behind, but their crew had started several weeks behind the others. What astounded both Silvi and Emmitt was the progress of the Banshees. They had fully qualified two weeks before, but the captains had agreed that they were not to fly escort unless the consequences to the fleet were dire. Very dire. They were simply too young.
The Banshees were allowed real flight time under the supervision of Meg Asgeir or Rod Galindo, both pilots of the Greenland, and only in the pilot's off duty hours. Silvi had never really spent any time with the Banshees although she had often observed them from the instructors booth of the CTS. Their attention to detail and their raw skill was striking, but their teenage shenanigans and tantrums created chaos at times. Perhaps in four years or more the Banshees might well outperformed the entire OCN, but for now they were simply six very talented teen aged girls more worried about their complexion than the madness of The Dark.
But Silvi decided that the time had come to spend time with the girls. She corrected herself; with the Banshees. Somehow they were no longer girls, but not yet crew. Somewhere in between.
Of the banshees Emma Gunnulf had fully qualified as pilot almost four weeks ago and soon there after Ava Osulf qualified for the same position. Emma was a very old 15 year old. Ava was almost 16. Olive Gunnulf, Emma's twin sister had qualified on weapons when the Greenland had entered the Wu system. Isabella Santos and Sophia Tollson had completed their training in defence and ES/MS only days ago. Isabella and Sophia were just short of 16 and one half and made sure everyone knew it. The sixth member of the Banshees was the oldest at 17; Mia Nordlicht. While a sixth member of the crew was not a hard requirement for training Mia had an organizing effect, a calming, almost adult supervision effect on the Banshees. She also seemed to understand most of the skills required of a SAR and had achieved basic pilot status as Iceland prepared to departure. However Silvi saw leadership potential in Mia and Silvi began to value her contribution to the Banshees.
Silvi returned to the supercargo mess where she had scheduled a meeting with Emmitt, Nomi, and pilots Meg Asgeir and Rod Galindo. Dilli Ketill had departed with OM Marx on the Sigrún while Taylor Schmidtt remained on Iceland as back up astrogator. As Silvi arrived Meg was already present sitting in her padded chair surrounded by anti-grav chips. She was looking more healthy that Silvi had ever seen her before. Now she had real purpose in life, even if that life was to be short, and she intended to live it to the fullest as first pilot on the Iceland. Rod sat and leaned back drinking coffee, but when Silvi entered he straightened up and looked embarrassed. Silvi looked at her inter-tab, she was early. Silvi went to the food station and ordered up something called a 'cob' salad that she saw on the days menu. As the salad was being manufactured by the food station Silvi turned to Meg and asked about progress on the cargo loading. Meg replied that they were just a bit ahead of schedule. Unlike Iceland who had one of three heavy lifters modified for landing a detachment of 430 Greayson Marines, the Greenland had three unmodified lifters and that resulted in a speedier loading process. Meg estimated that within five or six days they would be ready to go, but the person who best understood the schedule would be Captain Emmitt Wong.
When the salad was done Silvi sat and ate her late lunch listening to Rod tell tall tales of his runabout racing days. Everyone knew most of Rod's stories were not lies, but they were hardly the truth, and even Rod understood this. But the stories were always complex, often hilarious, and frequently sprinkled with bits of truth if distorted beyond reason.
Nomi walked in with two vid-comps in her small hands. Her hair had recently been combed and Silvi knew that was the work of Farn Mayer. Without Farn, who bunked with Nomi, Silvi knew that Nomi would be unable to perform her work as astrogator. The importance of Farn only increased now that Dilli had gone with the Iceland. Nomi never smiled and rarely talked, but she loved the pickled beets that occasionally appeared on the Iceland's menu and today was her day. Nomi went to the food station and ordered two portions of pickled beets and then sat at the mess table. Nomi was not only young, but short, so the crew had added a cushion to her usual seat so that she could place her elbows on the table. Some children might resent such help, but Nomi seemed not to care. Mathematics and now astrogation was her life. Little else mattered. Farn had told Siliv several weeks ago that Nomi often charted paths through the galaxy using all the known portals as entertainment even though each path took hours and hours to complete. Nomi even speculated on known portals with unknown destinations. Apparently there were some indicators of where those portals might end up, even if the ancient Imperial Survey Service had failed to fully survey the region. Farn had said that Nomi 'wants the stars, she wants the stars'.
Emmitt entered moments later followed by Farn. Having Farn present always made communicating with Nomi easier or at least more efficient.
As Nomi gobbled her beets Silvi asked, "Nomi, do you have a plot for us to return home?"
Nomi kept eating but slid one of the vid-comps across the table to Silvi. Silvi reached or the device. A title page was displayed; 'To Home in 19 Days.' Silvi looked up at Farn who nodded.
"Home in 19." Farn said.
Silvi began to tab through the pages and details of the plot. The course took them first to Sargon which had a direct entry link from New Carthago and was only 21 hours distant in tunnel time. Transit across the New Carthago system to the entry point was almost 15 hours. Sargon was a small specialist mining colony and its' status following the Great War was unknown. The attraction of Sargon was that it was close and that the next jump was to Harappa a system known to be nothing more than a dead cinder system. The jump to Harappa was long at 165 hours tunnel time and then 80 hours in transit across the system to the entry for the IronBridge system. Since nothing could really happen in a knot line tunnel the more time spent in the tunnel the better. There was less exposure to The Dark and to chaos. IronBridge had a binary sun with the odd combination of one white dwarf and distant blue giant. Numerous gas giants circled the system, but no habitable planets. The potential for an encounter with humans or aliens in this distant system was very remote. From IronBridge it was an 80 hour jump to Dello and then home in less than two days. They should arrive no more than three weeks after Iceland's scheduled arrival.
Silvi wanted to ask questions but she knew, and could see for a fact on the vid-com, that Nomi had covered everything and even provided an Annex for actions to be taken if one of the systems in transit proved to hold an obstacle or unexpected danger. Alternate routes around each system except Harappa were provided in the Annex. It appeared that Harappa had only one entry and one known exit portal. There were two other exits but their destination was unknown and Nomi commented in a footnote that they were 'unknowable.'
Chapter Forty Seven
Sargon System - Ragnarök - Year 3246. March 12 ET: 12:21
The transit to Sargon had taken 5 hours in the New Carthago system and slightly more than one day in the tunnel. Sargon was a six planet system with a very hot white dwarf at its' center. None of its' planets were habitable, but two named Uruk and Akkad were very rich in rare earth minerals needed in advanced industrial manufacture. Yttrium, Erbium, Samarium, Gadolinium, and others were found in abundance and Sargon in its' hay day was a small but very prosperous mining community on the Wu-Carm-Sargon knot line. The mineral production of Sargon was useful in many manufactured goods, but they were critical in the manufacture of weapons systems. The Great War had come late to Sargon, but it did come and when it did the colony was devastated. Neither side could afford Sargon's production to be used by the other. The result was that one attacked first and the second finished the job. Who was first or second no one knew, nor did it matter.
The entry portal from New Carthago brought Ragnarök to the far end of the system and the exit portal required a complete cross system transit. Greenland was scheduled to follow in two hours. As they approached Uruk on their way to the entry portal to Harappa, Buddy called out, "I've got an energy reading on Uruk. Small but intense."
Silvi sat up from her captain's chair and took a few steps to Buddy's defence station. "What do you have Mr. Brunner?"
"I'm not sure Captain. Could be a ship, perhaps a small one, or some habitat operating on that planet or near it. I'll know in a while as we pass closer."
Silvi called out. "Pilot Karrlson, please reduce speed as we pass Uruk. Do not alter course but give Mr Brunner a chance at a complete scan."
Lennie replied affirmatively.
Moments later Buddy said, "It's a ship. On the surface."
Silvi thought for a moment then turned to Nomi, "Nomi have you got a fix on that ship?"
Nomi nodded yes but was intensely concentrating on her station. Any change in speed through the system required a plot update.
"Nomi is there anything interesting or unusual about the location of that ship on Uruk?"
Nomi did not look up. "Old mines."
So some ship was visiting the old mines on Uruk. Only one thing of value was found in this system and that was rare earths. If there were some advanced manufacturing and advanced tech still present along one of these knot lines then this was a logical place to come to seek these critical advanced raw materials. Silvi's curiosity grew. Silvi, always one to be cautious, called for defence and weapons to be on alert.
"Pilot Karrlson alter our course. Take us in toward that ship and the old mines."
Silvi felt the subtle shift of gravity on Ragnarök as Lennie altered course. Silvi looked at the ships clock. Greenland was due to enter the system in 9 minuets.
Buddy called out, "She's powering up."
"Buddy can you get it on visual. And I want as complete a scan of that ship as you can obtain."
