by M. D. Cooper
“I guess you don’t see nano like this much these days.”
Cargo looked Tanis up and down and then glanced at Nance. “She is human, right?”
“She was back when she was on the med slab.” Nance hadn’t taken her eyes from Tanis. “Though we could tell she had some pretty advanced tech in her.”
“Unless we’re gonna take out a pirate ship with ceramic pistols, you’d better have some better tricks up your sleeve…figuratively speaking,” Cargo said. “Have you ever been in a battle for your life?”
“I didn’t get my rank sitting on my duff.”
Tanis’s statement was met with blank stares.
“I’m a TSF major, remember?”
“That doesn’t really mean a lot to us,” Nance said with a shrug. “A lot of military types get promoted without ever seeing combat.”
“Yes, I’ve seen combat,” Tanis sighed. “I’ve fought planet-side, station-side and ship to ship. I’ve put a lot of holes in a lot of people. Satisfied?” If they only knew what she had done to get this far.
“Great, you can shoot people,” Thompson said. “Is that the extent of your plan for saving Sera?”
“Well, I obviously can’t take on a pirate ship by myself, and, since we need it intact, we have to board it, or be boarded by them. I’d prefer to be on the side doing the boarding. First thing we need to do is get some big guns or at least some raw materials so we can make some big guns. What’s the closest port of call?”
Thompson stood up and looked them all over. “This is total bullshit. You guys can take orders from her; I’m going to go clean up the mess one of those containers made when it got shot.”
No one said anything for a minute after he left and then Cargo shrugged. “Cheeky, what’s nearest?”
She looked at him and then shrugged as well. “Closest system is Silstrand. They’ve got a number of stations insystem we can dock at. There’s an independent mining platform out in their EK belt that has an arms dealer or two on it. How we paying for these guns anyway?”
Tanis smiled. “I’m betting I have some nano that could be worth a bit.”
* * * * *
Rebecca was no slouch—a real pro when it came to making people suffer.
Sera hurt in places she didn’t even know could hurt. She desperately wished she could escape her body. She’d heard of out of body experiences; maybe she could have one if she tried hard enough.
Rebecca had asked very few questions while she did her work. She said she just wanted to get to know Sera’s body a bit better. Needles seemed to be her specialty. Rebecca had them in varying sizes and could put a truly astounding number of them into a person’s flesh. One had started out the size of a sliver and grew to well over a centimeter in diameter. Rebecca had put that one through a lot of things.
After Rebecca had her fill and left, a med team came in and cleaned Sera up. They didn’t make anything hurt less, more actually, as they cauterized the wounds to staunch the bleeding and put her on an IV to replenish the fluids she’d lost.
Sera supposed it was one way to pass the day.
A better way was working on her escape. While Rebecca had been busy at her trade, Sera had been busy at hers—namely plotting Rebecca’s death. During the session, Sera had managed to pull a needle from her own thigh and slip it past her palm into her wrist where the strap held her arm down. Now that she was alone, she slipped the needle from her skin and began worrying its tip along the strap.
While under Rebecca’s not-so-tender ministrations, Sera had learned why there was no strap holding her head down: her torturer liked it when Sera pulled her head up or tilted it back to let out a really good scream. It worked to her advantage now as she twisted to see the needle tip doing its work. The strap seemed to be of the same material as a safety harness; there was a section where it had been sewn together and that was what she focused on.
The material held up well and Sera found progress to be slow. She walked a careful balance between not moving enough to lose her grip on the needle and have it fling across the room, but still fast enough to get free before another session with Madam Pain.
The hours ticked by as she picked at the stitches. One by one, they came free and Sera allowed herself to feel a glimmer of hope. Then, with a snap that did send the needle flying, the strap gave way. Sera didn’t move, but waited to see if the sudden twitch of her arm had been noticed by whoever may or may not be watching the cameras. After several minutes, nothing happened and Sera forced her breathing to slow.
Without any quick movements, she slid her right arm across her body and undid the strap across her chest and from her left wrist. Then, with great care, she slowly shifted her hand back to her right side and slipped it into the loop of the strap.
Sera tried to put her mind at rest. She was tired and had lost a lot of blood. Her best bet would be to get a good night’s sleep and use the first advantage that came her way tomorrow. She had no illusions about trying to use a med tech as a hostage; Rebecca would gun her own people down in a heartbeat. She needed to get the queen bitch herself if she wanted to get out of here alive.
SILSTRAND
STELLAR DATE: 07.15.8927 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: Sabrina, Silstrand Scattered Disk
REGION: Silstrand System, Silstrand Alliance Space
Silstrand was a heavily settled system, boasting fourteen major planets, six of them being rocky worlds rich with minerals. Methane and hydrogen mining facilities hovered around three of the gas giants. Stellar traffic was heavy, and an AI operating a beacon demanded Sabrina’s identification and their port of call within half an hour of dropping out of FTL.
Tanis was on comm and relayed that they were bound for the PeterSil EK mining platform. Stellar control informed them that the PS EK platform was currently on the far side of the system from Sabrina’s current position. They were given a deceleration vector and told to send a message to the PS EK platform informing them of their incoming vector and time of arrival.
“Bossy sorts here,” Tanis muttered as she passed the plot to Cheeky’s console and sent the required message to the mining platform.
Cheeky heard her comment and smiled. “Yeah, but the men really like a stern woman. Good times to be had at the main trading station off the fourth gas giant.”
“Been through here often?” Tanis asked. The whole idea of interstellar trade by small freighters was still very fascinating to her.
“A few times. Some on Sabrina, some on other ships I’ve piloted. They have three TPs that have amazing diversity and some great pleasure resorts.”
“TPs?”
“Means terraformed or terrestrial planets,” Cargo supplied from the command chair. “FGT had a ball with this place. It already had one planet in the habitable zone, so while they got it all watered up and ready for life they decided to hang out and make antimatter.
“That was around when gravity tech had improved and AP drives became the rage. They built a massive particle accelerator to produce the antimatter and then left it here. It’s still going strong, a good four thousand years later.
“I guess their tug pilots got bored while everyone else had something to do, so they hauled another planet into the habitable zone and then did something to one of the big gassies in the outer system to heat it up. Thing is just about a brown dwarf now. One of the other gassies had a slightly sub-terra sized moon around it, so they hauled it over to their toasty gas giant and set it in orbit.”
Tanis laughed. “Toasty gassie? I bet a thousand astronomers cringe every time you talk.”
Cargo chuckled. “I’d consider that a compliment.”
“Did they leave messages behind so we know what they did?” Tanis asked.
“The astronomers?”
“No, the FGT,” Tanis replied seriously before realizing that Cargo was joking.
He chuckled before replying. “Sometimes. There has been contact with them here and there. If you can believe it, some of them still have t
heir original crews.”
“You’re kidding.”
“Nope, some of those people left Earth over six thousand years ago and they’re still out there making worlds.”
Tanis had heard that was the case in the forty-second century, as well—even then it had seemed far-fetched. She had always suspected that it was some sort of FTG propaganda.
“They can’t have lived that long by stasis alone. They have to be doing something else; it still takes hundreds of years to terraform a world,” Tanis said with a frown.
“Your guess is as good as anyone else’s. After the Oregon incident, they don’t have much to do with the rest of humanity anymore,” Cargo replied
“What happened there?”
“Everyone believes that the FGT has tech everyone else has only dreamed of—kinda like you. It’s said they have the power to move stars,” Cheeky said from the pilot’s chair. “It was only a matter of time before someone decided to take a fleet around hunting for them. They found a worldship, the Oregon, terraforming a system, and tried to take it by force. Things didn’t go as planned and the Oregon was destroyed. Some of their smaller ships got away and word spread amongst the FGT. No one has had direct contact with them in millennia now.”
“They’re still out there though, right?” Tanis really hoped they were, she was counting on getting in touch with them to secure a new colony world.
“Yeah,” Cargo’s voice was low and serious. “Sometimes people stumble upon a terraformed world that’s just waiting to be discovered. Sometimes certain systems get messages about a new world they can expand to. There are even rumors that the FGT has agents scattered throughout space, shaping the course of humanity.”
Tanis stared at Cargo, attempting to keep a straight face. She covered her mouth, her eyes sparkling. “You could host a cast on evil government plots,” she began to laugh.
Cheeky joined in the laughter. “So dark and mysterious.”
Cargo shrugged. “Mock me if you want, but there are a lot of people who suspect it.”
Tanis looked over the system on the main holo tank. God complexes and guiding humanity aside, the FGT did amazing work. The Silstrand system gleamed off their port side as they passed over the stellar plane. Stations and stellar transports could be seen, reflecting their star’s light in the dark. The twinkle of fusion drives sparkled near one of the rocky inner planets, indicating heavy mining.
The TPs, as Cargo called them, were near each other and Sabrina passed within half an AU of each. They were sparking blue-green on the unmagnified screen. Under magnification they showed to be amazing planets, both sporting several elevators connected to planetary rings.
“Silstrand seems to do pretty well for itself,” Tanis observed.
“It’s the seat of the Silstrand Alliance’s government,” Cargo supplied. “They control most of this star cluster.”
“They a friendly sort?”
“Democracy of sorts. Big on trade, though, so freighters are never turned away.”
Tanis asked a few questions about the types of governments found across the stars as Sabrina shed velocity across the system. She could read about them in the databases, but Cargo had an interesting viewpoint to share on each.
He told tales of dictatorships, kingdoms, democracies, and oligarchies for hours. Eventually, shift changed and Tanis reluctantly begged off the conversation to get some sleep. Tomorrow they would dock at the mining platform and she’d have a show to put on for a merchant or two.
RESIGNATION
STELLAR DATE: 07.15.8927 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: ISS Andromeda, 0.5LY Rim-Ward of Bollam’s World
REGION: Bollam’s World Federation Space
Joe paced across the Andromeda’s main hanger bay where pieces of wreckage were being sorted. It had taken over a month to find the debris field from the Intrepid’s collision with what turned out to be little more than a pebble, and several months more to collect all the pieces.
They were now laid out in a pattern matching their original location on the Intrepid.
Joe was amazed at how much damage the impact had done to the colony ship. Over two hundred meters of hull had been torn up by the impact, seven decks vented atmosphere, and one stasis chamber was destroyed.
And Tanis was lost.
He watched as the crew pulled the pieces off the last hauler. The pickings were getting slim and Joe didn’t think they would find much more out there. Pieces of a lift were unloaded, followed by several chunks of bulkhead and a door.
Nothing that looked as though it came from an escape pod.
The ship’s records showed Tanis making it to a pod and ejecting. As luck would have it, no other pods were damaged or ejected in the impact. That meant there was only one pod out there, and so far, no debris from a pod had been found.
It meant Tanis was alive.
The last pieces of ship were deposited on the deck and tagged. The technicians organizing the wreckage concurred that none of it was from an escape pod and Joe sighed with relief. He could finally report that Tanis was not here.
Not that Joe expected her to be. Tanis had survived too much to be killed by a pebble. Even if that pebble had been travelling at relativistic speeds.
He had known from the beginning that Tanis was not in the debris field, but with no signal from her pod, everyone assumed she was dead—her pod destroyed. So, he worked to rule that possibility out as quickly as possible.
Now there was no reason not to search for her in the neighboring star system.
That was going to be easier said than done. In the months since the collision, they had gathered intel from listening to broadcasts and data streams from the system they now knew to be 58 Eridani. The crew of the Intrepid knew they were in the ninetieth century, and it was nothing like what they would have expected.
Joe took his time going back to the bridge. The Intrepid was two light-hours away, and a response to his request would take some time. He was fairly certain he knew what all the various directors and secretaries would say. Abby would vote to leave Tanis, Earnest would likely abstain, Ouri and Brandt would vote to continue the search. Sanderson liked Tanis, but he would vote not to risk the ship to find her. The captain was a mystery; he would need to think of the ship first—it all depended on whether or not he thought Tanis was necessary for the ship’s safety.
“Think it was the last haul?”
Joe turned to see Jessica walking toward him from the direction of the hangar.
“If I have my way it is. There’s nothing bigger than dust left out there. It’s time to stop wasting our time out here.”
“Do you think she’s in the Bollam’s system?” Jessica asked after catching up with Joe.
Joe shook his head. “I don’t know…but it’s the best place to start. There was that strange ion trail near the pod’s most likely trajectory. It could be that she was rescued.”
“Or kidnapped. You know what Sanderson thinks.”
“He’s not the only one—it’s pretty clear that we have vastly superior tech than pretty much everyone now.”
“You think someone has her?” Jessica asked, her voice strained with worry.
Joe nodded. “I refuse to believe she’s dead; if she were OK, she’d get in touch with us somehow. No, she is being held somewhere and getting into that system and checking their scan records is the first step.”
Jessica took his hand. “I want you to know I’m with you. If we have to steal a pinnace, or even the whole damn Intrepid, we’ll go find her.”
Joe clasped his hands around hers, taking a moment to calm his emotions. “I know she means a lot to you, too. Your support means a lot.”
“She gave me a chance when…she’s my best friend, Joe,” Jessica said with a
tear slipping down her face. “I’m ready to kick ass clear across the galaxy if I have to.”
“You’re a true friend, Jessica.” Joe embraced the lavender-skinned woman, thankful that she had come along on the Andromeda.
Four hours later, the response came in from Captain Andrews.
“I’m authorizing an excursion into Bollam’s to gather intel and hunt for Tanis,” the captain’s face was sober; he seemed to have aged years over the past few months. “But Joe, I need you back here. We have to protect the Intrepid and you’re second in fleet command right now. I’m sending Jessica to look for her. We’ll talk more when you get back.”
The Andromeda’s bridge fell silent. The anger flowing from Joe was palpable and tension radiated through the air as everyone did their best to look busy.
“Corsia,” Joe said after a moment. “Tell Andrews that he has my resignation. I’ll hitch a ride with Jessica.”
Jessica rose from her station and approached Joe’s chair.
“Joe, are you sure about this?” Jessica asked quietly, placing a hand on his shoulder.
He lowered his head and ran a hand through his hair. “You don’t know what she means to me.”
“I do know; how could I not know?” Jessica said softly. “I’ve been with you two for decades—and I know what it means to choose duty over your love’s safety.”
“That’s just it, you don’t know,” Joe turned to look in her eyes, willing her to understand. “She’s pregnant.”
Shock registered across Jessica’s face. “Tanis’s…pregnant?”
Joe nodded. “She’s held it internally in stasis for since before we got to The Kap—we were waiting to get to New Eden before carrying it to term.”
“Corsia,” Jessica addressed the ship’s AI, while not breaking eye contact with Joe. “Have the duty chief prep the pinnace for two, Joe is coming along.”
