by J. W. Kurtz
Captain Wray saw it immediately. Wray considered himself a privateer, however those on the other side of his vocation referred to him and his crew as "pirates." It was all about perspective as in the notion that one man's freedom fighter is another man's guerrilla. Today, the Belle' wasn't a "scourge of the stars." No, today the Belle' and her crew were saviors. "I see it Kyler. If that shuttle had continued on her plotted course she'd have come out of transit space well inside the soup of Neptune, correct?"
"It looks that way, sir. Marie can confirm. Sloppy. Very sloppy plotting indeed. The shuttle, she'd of come out right at the grav limit of the system and into the soup of Neptune. It would of pulled her into the well and crushed her. It looks like, when the ship put out from the Minervan system, on the way to Sol, they didn't refresh the ships chronometer and synch with Earth local prior to entering transit space. They were still on Minervan local time for some reason and not Zulu standard. That's Astrogation 101 stuff, right? Even I know that. Also, I've never seen a deliberate plot this deep into a system outside of military strike missions. It's just too dangerous with craft trying to find undistorted gravity lanes in between heavy masses like planets. Whoever plotted their course killed this ship and everyone onboard the moment they set it in," Bachman answered, "they just didn't know it. Lucky for them we came along, eh?"
Bachman got up from the astrogation station and examined the cockpit for a minute while waiting to hear for further word to inspect anything more in the compartment. After not hearing anything from the Captain, he retraced his steps out the cockpit and back to the common area. From there he followed a short, dimly lit passageway, to the stasis-sleep compartment of the Osprey. He found two of his team, Marie Weston and Ayad Ibn Sula, examining some of the equipment discovered in the footlockers at the base of each of the six stasis-sleep couches. The Standard Class shuttles, favored by The Corporation and most other well financed private space faring corporations of humanity, were built solely for range and speed in mind. Because of those two characteristics the Standards are little more than flying fuel tanks with little room for cargo, passengers, or provisions. If the trip is to take longer than a week or two, the acceleration couches, which also double as stasis-sleep pods, are used so that the life-support systems are not over taxed. With the passengers and crew in stasis the already very limited space for provisions is instead freed up, to be taken by more valuable cargo. The trip from Minerva to Sol takes just over a month and thus the stasis-sleep couches were occupied. Well, at least four of them were Bachman observed.
Back on the Belle', Wray could clearly see the four green bands of lights above four of the six couches indicating that they were both occupied and functional and yellow above the two that were vacant. If red lights had been displayed it would have meant there was a malfunction, and that the couch was not safe to use, OR it was in use and the unlucky occupant was deceased. Wray had seen too many red bands above stasis-sleep pods in his lifetime but it was one of the hazards of interstellar travel.
"What have we found here lady and gentlemen?" Wray asked across the kilometer of space separating them.
"As you can see there are four occupied couches," Bachman responded. "They're all in deep sleep. The ship wasn't too far along in the revival cycle before we paused and then reversed it. I'm betting they never left REM longer than a moment or two."
The view panned to the deck to show a collection of clothes, weapons, and other miscellaneous gear spread out by Bachman's assault team for ease of inspection, cataloging, and for the capturing of images for the camera feed back to the Belle'.
Bachman again began with his review, "so, we have another couple of weapons it seems. Another Dyna-55, with what looks like a half charge or so. I definitely think this bunch was in a firefight or something prior to departure. Another antique looking gun but different from the one back in the commons cabin. Don't know if it's loaded because Chavez, with his expertise in such things gained by watching those old entrainment vids of his on his datapad, hasn't screwed around with it yet. And won't...until told to do so, right Chavo!?" A distant chuckle could be heard from a source off camera. "Best that we keep Chavez out of here for awhile. He likes to screw with stuff and push buttons. I may have to reconsider having him as part of this team...in fact, Marie, go keep an eye on him. He was lingering around the hatch to the cockpit when I walked out. Lots of buttons in there. Too many in fact with most of them brightly colored. Far too tempting. You hear me over the tac-net there, Chavez? Don't touch anything," Bachman ordered.
"Roger that. Not screwing with anything but if you are sending Marie to check on my screwing of things...," Chavez answered with a mischievous snigger.
"In your dreams jackass," Marie asserted as she departed with purpose through the hatch in search of Chavez in hopes of impeding him from blowing them all to shit.
"Sorry about that, Boss. Just taking care of the prize," Bachman called to the Belle'. "Back to the mission at hand." The camera again zoomed back in to items on the deck. "We have more gear like that found in the hold. Well used gear I might add. Nothing of note except...this." The camera jumbled around for a moment as Bachman bent down to retrieve an item. "Nothing except this datapad which is strange for a couple of reasons." A pause as the datapad was manipulated so the camera had a better view. "First, this is a construction I have never seen before in such a device. These things are common enough everywhere that they are almost disposable. This one is...it's seamless, clean, and appears as though it just came off the assembly line, but in looking at the rest of the gear, which is well worn and abused, it's hard to imagine that this thing remains pristine. It also lacks any make or model marks, proofs, or logos. Strange. I'm betting when we get it back to the Belle', and really give it a thorough inspection, we'll find it's made out of an exotic blend of alloys and that nanotech was extensively used. Very pricey. Very pricey indeed. And as for the second anomaly concerning this device...well I'll let Ayad explain . Ayad?"
A heavily accented voice began on the line, "Captain, the datapad is locked. Locked hard. Some of the deepest encryption I've ever seen. Multiple levels that look like they require bio scans. I'm afraid to even attempt to crack 90 percent of the files for fear that they'll delete as a countermeasure to my efforts," Ayad reported.
A kilometer away Wray thought for a moment. The orders and missions he followed now were very different than when he served in the Colonial Defense Fleet governed by the Centralized Earth Governments and blocs. He learned early in his 12-year contract with Interstellar Industries, also known as "I2," that the most important line, that the only line, is the bottom line. A failure costs credits, not to the corporation he was contracted with, but to the owner of the privateering operation, which in this case, was of course Wray. Captains of starships and commanders of men had pretty strict mission parameters and very little leeway under the CDF. Working for the private sector, especially a private sector that was highly unregulated beyond the Sol system, allowed for far greater flexibility and risk taking as long as the end resulted in black on the ledger and not red. The cost for this mission was already substantial in expendables, such as fuel to transit to this location with an expensive Siren device in tow, and then sitting for two-weeks waiting to draw a fly into the web. The Siren, expensive enough just to move around, was a rather expensive piece of equipment to simply even operate in that it required tremendous amounts of energy when functioning. Creating an artificial gravity equivalent to a gas giant the size of Jupiter did not come cheap in regards to required energy. And in the end to only seize a courier shuttle with questionable cargo of value risked putting them, him, very much in the red.
"You said 90 percent of the files are hard-locked," Wray stated, "but what of the remaining 10 percent of the files? Can you guarantee no data loss if you hack those?"
For a moment the speaker was silent and then the accented voice of Ayad answered, "I can get those files, those 10 percent, unlocked no problem, Boss. I'd hazard my share on it."
"Good. Because if you kill those files you will lose your share and then some. We aren't running a charity here. Hopefully some light can be shed on just what this shuttles mission was about and if that Minervan relic is of any value. Anything further to report, Ayad? Bachman?"
Bachman's voice returned to the channel, "just one last anomaly, Captain. We ran a standard RFID scan on all bands. Corp, I2, Maddox & Tokev. We even ran through the local bands used by the gen 4's of Earth military. Nothing. This is a Corporation ship so these must be Corp employees, right? Those guys are sticklers about their own regulations. They wouldn't let someone or someones scoot around in one of their couriers without an RFID implant. If you're in their employ they have you tagged. Whoever is in those couches aren't tagged. Do you want that we wake them up and ask them what is what?"
"No," Wray said for he had long made his decision, and this new bit of information, curious as it was, did not weigh enough to change his mind. "No, take control of the prize Bachman, and bring her home. A Standard will just fit through the main hangar airlock."
"Roger that, sir. We'll be under way in five. Bachman, out."
A brief blast of static played over the open comm line on the bridge of the Bellerophon for a moment and then went silent as the tactical net was disconnected from the bridge speaker system.
Chapter 2:
Time: 13:51 (Zulu)
The small crew manning the large, but mostly empty bridge, issued recalls of the assault skiffs that had transported and provided overwatch for the team now in control of the shuttle Osprey. The main hangar was also given word to prepare to the prize temporarily captained by Kyler Bachman and his assault team turned shuttle crew. After 20-minutes of careful well practiced choreography the evolution was complete. Both assault skiffs were on the deck and secured in the landing bay beside the captured Corporation shuttle parked in a very cozy fashion nearby in the confines of the hangar. The Bellerophon had also attached the magnetic tow cables to the 10,000 ton Siren device. A transit space course was plotted and the ripper drive was up and running, all green showing on the board with stable magnetic containment confirmed on the primaries. Emergency secondary's were prepped and ready. The ship was ready to return to home base dubbed the "Cove."
Captain Wray gave the command to initiate the run to transit space and watched as the three giant view screens mounted before the bridge, with live feeds from bow, starboard, and port external cameras, suddenly displayed an absolutely perfect white signifying successful entrance into transit space.
To the uninitiated this would be a surprising feature of modern high-speed interstellar travel commonly referred to as "faster than light" despite it not being so. Yes, vast distances were traveled faster than light could traveled through a vacuum. Far, far faster. But, transit space existed above the plane where light particles and waves were held to a constant speed constraint. It was first thought that traveling in this manner, FTL, that the light from stars would be seen zipping by as streaks, much like flakes of snow would look through the windscreen of a skimmer traveling 200kph through a snow storm at night. This was a common image from the science fiction entrainment vids for the couple centuries prior to human eyes viewing transit space for the first time. But instead of the expected streaks of starlight, as the exterior cameras demonstrated, traveling in the transit space plane allows for the viewing of every color in the visible spectrum.
These colors mixed together formed what was dubbed the "perfect white." The first to witness this "perfect white" described the white as having the purity of what must be Heaven. Some even called traveling in transit space a visit to Heaven. And did that open a can of worms. Several religious groups and sects, from all the major religions practices by man, devoted great time and effort exploring this plane of Heaven despite nearly every scientist explaining that it was only another plane, one of many, that existed concurrently in the complex lattice that made up the universe.
Despite the best efforts of these scientists and experts, the most fanatical of the religious factions were far from dissuaded in their beliefs, and they held high masses and worship while traveling in circles within transit space, just so they would be in what they believed was Heaven.
The three main large displays before the bridge were shut off upon the direction of Wray as he was departing the bridge, leaving the con in the hands of Oren Pfeiffer, an experienced former officer in the CDF. Pfeiffer had in fact served with Wray on this very ship in her previous life of service as the FC-37 Ridley. Wray trusted the man implicitly. When Wray was off duty, or otherwise off the bridge, the con was usually had by Pfeiffer. It seemed the man never slept. The choices were unfortunately few and Wray was all too happy to have the man on the roster. He wish he could afford more like him, but business was not exactly great and after the expenses of today...to say that the CEO, Captain Tilman Wray, of this small operation was concerned was an understatement. But he of course kept such worries to himself as any good CEO/Captain would.
Duty, or work as it was now considered, on the Belle' wasn't what it was when she was patrolling the trade lanes while serving in the CDF. She was more automated now, and could, in theory, get by on a very thin crew when the automated systems functioned properly. Fortunately, and surprisingly, this seemed to be the norm rather than the exception. At least in regards to the major systems anyway. The minors ones, which also seemed to be the most aged and neglected even when maintained by a full crew, now always seemed to go down. But because those systems were minor it was merely an inconvenience when they failed. And fixing those minor systems gave the crew something a purpose during idle time. Idle time has been a danger about ships sense man first took to the seas and sailed beyond the sight of land.
A short walk down the well traveled corridor from the bridge, across a deck of worn and rattling steel grates, Wray came to one of the four high-speed transport tubes on the Belle' . The transport tubes, called "fast-pipes" to the initiated, allowed quick transport along the length of the ship. He could walk for 20-minutes, the average length of time it took to walk from the bridge to the main hangar, through the labyrinthine maze that was the guts of the Belle', or he could high-speed transit via the maglev enabled fast-pipe transport. Normally he preferred the walk as it allowed him to think in peace, and to remember the days when the Bellerophon was his command and life was a simple path maintained by chains-of-commands and outlined regulations and directives. The life he had chosen was different now. A great deal of stress, near continuously borne upon his shoulders, needed an outlet and a hike through his ship often succeeded in alleviating some of the mental burdens.
The walk also allowed him to avoid losing fast-pipe Russian Roulette. A not so fun game he unwillingly played because it was he that invariably discovered that the fast-pipe he attempted to take was "red lighting," out-of-order. Wray wondered to himself why he was the one that almost always discovered the faulty piece of vital equipment onboard? Wray suspected he wasn't the one that made these continuous discoveries. No, he suspected the crew knew what had broken down and they purposely avoided telling him. This practice of avoidance was in no means evasion of a future work assignment. That would be lazy and insubordinate and he didn't have one of those in the bunch for no other reason than the crew knew, to a man and a woman, that he'd let them off on a rock with a 10-hour air supply and an 11-hour walk to a habitat first. No, the Captain suspected these absent reports were meant to spare the Captain both the expense of repair and consternation. They knew he was behind the proverbial eight-ball, running a ship that was becoming more and more costly to repair, replenish, crew, and simply keep the lights on.
The contract of service with I2 seemed like a great opportunity when Wray first agreed and signed on the dotted line. The funny thing was that he had signed on that dotted line of the contract to be a free man. Free of the corrupt oversight of the Earth governments and their control of their greedily and blindly wielded stick, the CDF. When he was a cadet, just breaking in to the
CDF, he was a true believer thinking he was part of an organization that mattered. They kept the trade lanes free of pirates. They offered assistance in the depths of space and throughout the colonies when called to do so. They kept the peace between colonial settlements with differing ideologies which was a swiftly growing area of concern. The CDF also was tasked with keeping the bickering, greedy, and aggressive corporations from all-out-war, as they continued to pace the technological advancement of man as well has helped steadily settle the stars within 100-light years of Sol.
It took 20-years of his career, 20-years with blinders on, to see what the CDF really was; a force that existed only to keep Earth and her immediate colonies in the Sol system fat, dumb, and happy. This kept the politicians of the various blocs, solely interested in themselves, reelected and steadily cruising towards their entitlements of pensions and the few and highly segregated plush off-world relocations. The latter being more sought after and coveted than the former because, for the past 100 or more years Earth was collectively agreed to be a dump.
In no other vocation and employment state on Earth, or beyond her atmosphere for that matter, did a pension or settlement entitlement exist other than for elected officials and those lucky enough to curry their favor and earn prominent appointments throughout the governments of upper echelon blocs. It was corrupt, self-serving, and disgusting to Wray. Had he completed his service and retired at the end of his 30-year commitment as an officer he too would have been allotted a modest pension and preferential settlement away from the contaminated home of humanity. Wray instead chose a different path that many would call foolish...and at times even he would agree with that label.
With no real connections on Earth, or anyone in the Sol System for that matter, especially after his wife divorced him while he was away on an extended deployment, and with the estrangement of his son due to the poisoning influence of his ex-wife, Wray found it very easy to break away from the CDF and Earth and signup with an all too willing corporation as a privateer. He, like many in his new line of work, found it amusing that for most of his career he was engaged in missions for the CDF hunting down privateers, raiders, and pirates only to now find himself become that which he previously hunted. But at least now he, like his contemporaries, were operating as free men, outside the soiled and corrupt bureaucracy of Earth and the nepotistic and aristocratic CDF.
