Unfortunately for the twarlans, large deposits of rare earth elements meant that they could either benefit from trading with outside species or risk a hostile action and have those resources taken by force. For a comparatively underdeveloped species, there wasn’t really much of a choice, and many twarlans had begun to realize how badly they were being taken advantage of. In order to keep the peace between the touchy species and the technology firms clamoring for their mineral exports, the ConFed fleet had a near constant presence in the area. This was not good news for Omega Force.
The flight was a leisurely three days from their last position. Jason didn’t want to needlessly push the engines hard and, if he were being honest, he was more than a little apprehensive about coming up against that weapon again. Twingo and Doc were running simulations based on the sensor data of their last encounter, but so far all they knew was the obvious: the A’arcooni vessel could shut down every power source on their ship and they were helpless to stop them.
Taryn was quiet for the most part, seeming to have realized she had far overstepped her bounds by forcing her way onto the Phoenix. Jason let her squirm for a bit as he was still not especially thrilled with her bullying him to get her way, especially in front of his crew. But they were still sharing the bed in his stateroom, and he had to admit he could get used to having her there.
Lucky was still nonresponsive. His eyes would flit back and forth, but Twingo couldn’t be sure if it was some unknown stimulus or just stray sparks in his processors. Crusher moped around the ship, sometimes sitting silently with his friend and other times poking around in the armory aimlessly.
“You know, Captain,” Twingo was saying. “We may need to start thinking about what we’re going to do with him. From what I understand of his species, he may never wake up from this. Or worse, he might.”
“What do you mean by that?” Jason asked.
“Let’s say he does reboot and comes back online, but his mind is wiped clean from the shutdown. We could be looking at a potentially dangerous situation. I have no idea what sort of failsafe programming he may have. He could wake up and tear this ship apart.”
“We don’t have any other options right now,” Jason said hotly. “I’m not shoving him out the airlock. We’ll wait and see happens, it’s too soon for me just to give up on him.”
“I’m not saying give up,” Twingo said with his hands up. “I’m just saying we need to prepare ourselves for the fact we may be a crewmember down soon.”
Jason left Engineering in a foul mood and made his way back up to the bridge. When Doc saw his mood he just raised a single eyebrow questioningly.
“Is there any way to get in touch with Lucky’s creators?”
“I know what you’re thinking, and the answer is no,” Doc said sympathetically. “They’ve made an agreement not to render aid to battlesynths who have been injured.”
“What the hell? Why?” Jason exclaimed.
“There was some controversy with the decision, but Lucky’s species is quite dangerous under certain circumstances, and the ConFed Council decided it would be in everyone’s best interest if they couldn’t be repaired or rebuilt and let attrition handle the problem,” Doc explained. “When they were first emancipated, the normal synths scattered and tried to make a life for themselves the best they could; those like Deetz. But … well, you remember Lucky when we first found him. He didn’t even have a proper name.
“The battlesynths milled about for a while with no mission and no commander, so naturally someone took advantage of the situation. They were used as shock troopers in some bloody campaigns that left a lot of citizens terrified of them and demanding action. I’ll be honest, the fact he’s been able to move about so freely these last few years has surprised me.”
“You almost sound like you agree with this,” Jason accused.
“I’m giving you the facts of the situation,” Doc said coldly. “You can throw it back in my teeth if you want but that’s my friend down there on that slab as well.”
“Shit,” Jason said, turning away. “I’m sorry. Again. I’m going to go and get some sleep.” Jason trudged off the bridge, emotionally exhausted. He went back to his quarters and showered before slipping into bed. He was so tired he almost didn’t feel the mattress shift as Taryn slid in next to him and wrapped her arm around him.
“Where have you been keeping yourself?”
“I’ve been in the com room,” she said. “Now that I can read as well as understand languages I’ve been reading up on the history of the ConFed and some other stuff.” She paused for a moment.
“Jason … I know that you don’t want me here, and I’m sorry I forced your hand the way I did. I’m just scared right now that every time I see this ship fly off and I’m not on it, that will have been the last time I’ll ever see you.” Jason rolled over so he could look her in the eyes.
“Don’t ever think I don’t want you here with me,” he said gently. “I just don’t want you in harm’s way. Having you onboard makes me second-guess decisions about taking this ship into danger.
“I’ve never forgotten about you, and I’m sorry I was so screwed up the last time I came back that I didn’t see us falling apart until it was too late.” He could see her tears sliding down her cheek, even in the dark room.
“I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you,” she said in a choked whisper. Unable to think of anything else to say to that, he just drew her in close and let her cry silently against him.
It was some time later and they were both still awake.
“If we were still together and living in your cabin, would you have still gotten on this ship?” she asked, seemingly out of nowhere.
“I would have gone and checked it out and I don’t know that I can say I wouldn’t have come onboard,” he said. “I can say for certain that I wouldn’t have agreed to fly off with Deetz though. Does that answer your question?”
“It’ll have to do.”
*****
The rest of the flight continued uneventfully, which was unfortunate in the case of Lucky, and they meshed into the system just inside the orbit of the outermost planet.
“Active system scan, please,” Jason said as he throttled up the main drive.
“No enemy contacts in orbit over Torestellia,” Doc reported. “No sign of the A’arcooni ships anywhere in the system.”
Jason couldn’t decide if he was relieved or not by that news. He hoped to have some answers on that weapon before they tangled with the remaining two ships in Deetz’s armada.
“We do have two ConFed destroyers in high orbit, however.”
“That’s fine,” Jason said, “we’re running clean codes. Plot a standard approach to Torestellia and we’ll begin taking active scans from orbit and see if we can pick up either the smaller ship or at least the com signature.”
In order to not draw unwanted attention, they flew an approach a typical micro-freighter would, but it meant a thirteen-hour flight across the system. Jason was almost bored to tears by the time they slid into a low orbit and began circling the planet.
“We’re probably going to have to make landfall at some point, Captain,” Kage said. “Otherwise the twarlans are going to start getting pushy about why we’re here.”
“Can anything be simple on this damn mission?” Jason asked rhetorically. “Fine, I’m putting us into a decaying orbit. Tell Landing Control that we’re repairing a drive malfunction before attempting entry.”
They made ten complete orbits before Torestellia Orbital Control began sending borderline threatening messages, all via text. Jason got his clearance and dipped the nose to enter the atmosphere, leaving a fiery trail to mark their passage.
Torestellia was a beautiful planet. The vegetation was lush and dark blue, which contrasted nicely with the light green oceans. The only thing that marred the effect was the nasty gashes left by new strip mines that were visible from high altitude. The twarlans were not like humans in that they didn’t spread out over the e
ntire available landmass. In fact, they were concentrated within just five mega-cities on the eastern continent, with only small communities in place to service mining operations. From what Doc had told Jason, the mineral mines had become the sole source of income for the world and everyone worked, either directly or indirectly, to support that.
After some more back and forth between Landing Control and Kage, they were cleared to land at the outskirts of a city that looked to be about the size of New York City on Earth, complete with massive skyscrapers. The spaceport was not the slick, high-tech affair they had become accustomed to on ConFed worlds. To Jason it looked like nothing more than a patch of tarmac and a building housing an officious twarlan who would rather you not be there in the first place.
“Well,” Jason said after they had touched down. “We’re here damnit … might as well go poke around a bit.” He chafed at the delay, but had to admit he had no idea where they would go from there anyway. The all filed off the bridge and went down into the cargo bay to disembark. Taryn was trembling with excitement, as this would be her first time setting foot on an alien planet. Her eyes were wide and she looked like she was trying to avoid blinking so as to not risk missing anything. Jason smiled to himself as he lowered the ramp and opened the pressure doors.
Jason was pleasantly surprised to find this world didn’t have a strong stink to it. Almost every other alien planet had its own distinct odor, and they were almost universally unpleasant. Torestellia had a mild sweet smell of vibrant foliage tinged with a hint of machinery from the spaceport itself. Taryn stood on the edge of the ramp and jumped off, landing on the Torestellia surface with both feet. She turned and smiled largely at Jason and he laughed out loud despite everything that had been going wrong. Crusher also laughed softly and ruffled her hair with his massive hand.
“So now what?” Kage asked, unimpressed as he looked around.
“How about you and Doc, Twingo, and Taryn go grab some real food someplace close by. Crusher and I are going to reconnoiter the rest of the spaceport,” Jason said.
“I’m staying with the ship in case Lucky wakes up,” Twingo said, already walking back up the ramp.
“The bastard took my excuse,” Kage said.
“Oh, come on!” Taryn complained to him. “You don’t want to show me around on my first alien planet?”
“Ugh, fine,” the Veran said with resignation. “Let’s go.” The three made their way towards the terminal building to see what was close by that was compatible with their systems, Taryn almost skipping along with excitement.
“Trying to get rid of her already?” Crusher asked.
“No, but I don’t want to give the impression I’m hovering over her. This is safe enough, and she’ll get a bit more of an adventure by herself with those two,” Jason said. “Besides … you tend to attract random violence.”
“Me?” Crusher protested in a hurt voice.
After being cramped up on the ship for so long, the pair set off at a brisk pace to check out anything that might be interesting at the spaceport. Crusher’s absurdly long gait forced Jason to half jog, half run to keep up. There were the ubiquitous cargo haulers, private spacecraft, and government shuttles parked randomly along the tarmac. Some had access panels opened up with technicians crawling around in them, while others looked like they had been parked years ago and abandoned.
They were moving along at a nice clip, around a large, ovoid cargo ship about a mile from the Phoenix, when Jason stopped so short Crusher ran into him and sent him sprawling face first onto the hard surface. Hardly noticing the blood dripping off his chin, Jason stood and pointed. On the other side of the cargo ship, tucked up tightly against a service building, was the sleek ship Deetz had escaped from Earth in. Crusher knew what he was thinking without him having to voice it.
“How can you be certain it’s the same ship?”
“I’m not one hundred percent certain, but I’m pretty damn close to it.”
“So how do you want to play it?” Crusher asked, not even breathing hard from their run.
“Well, we’re not going to just waltz up there and knock,” Jason said after a moment of contemplation. “Deetz will have anti-intrusion protocols in place. I also suspect he doesn’t know we’ve arrived on this world or he’d have hit us while we were milling about at the bottom of the ramp.” A cold lump formed in his stomach as he realized Taryn was out and about with only Doc and Kage to protect her, and he had no idea where Deetz could be. If he grabbed her as a hostage they’d have a real problem. He grabbed his com unit as he and Crusher walked casually by the sleek-looking vessel, the latter discreetly taking a video of it with his own com unit.
“Doc, you there?”
“Yes. Is everything ok?”
“I’m not sure, but I think Deetz may be on this planet. Get everyone back to the ship without attracting too much attention,” Jason said as calmly as he could. “Crusher and I are going to try and confirm this.”
“Understood. We’re just letting Taryn browse around in some shops right now; we’ll head back to the Phoenix.”
Jason rolled his eyes at hearing Taryn had somehow gotten the two of them to take her shopping. Of course.
“Captain,” Crusher broke him out of his reverie, “we should grab a vehicle and head into the city to nose around.”
“Right,” Jason agreed, heading towards a low building up against the perimeter of the landing area that would likely have rental vehicles available. As they walked in ,an elderly twarlan eyed Jason with distrust and then gaped at Crusher when the big warrior shouldered through the door as well.
“May I help you, sirs?” The being’s demeanor changing from surly to servile in an instant.
“You might at that,” Jason said in a friendly voice. “I, and my overgrown friend here, would like to rent a vehicle to go down into the city. Could you perhaps help us with that?”
“I most certainly can,” he said, watching with some distress as Crusher poked at some scale models of spacecraft on a shelf with a clawed forefinger. “Is open cabin design acceptable?”
“I don’t see why not, it’s a beautiful day out.”
“It is indeed,” the twarlan agreed. “What brings you to our fair planet?”
“We’re supposed to meet up with a business connection, but we seem to have arrived late. Perhaps you can help me,” Jason said smoothly. “I’m looking for a synth. He would have likely been in a foul mood.”
“Oh! That lot,” the clerk said with obvious distaste. “One of the rudest beings I have ever encountered, even after I told him we welcome the synthetic species here with open arms.”
“That sounds like him,” Jason agreed, attempting to contain his excitement. “He’s unsavory, but his money spends the same. Did he give any indication of where he might be heading? There was nobody at his ship when we arrived.”
“He wasn’t much for talking to me as he was busy arguing with two others of a species I’ve never come across before. He did mention something about having to go to a meeting with news that would be unwelcome. It was something about being unable to secure a purchase from one of the mines.”
“Interesting. Where would a meeting between off-worlders typically happen?” Jason asked, now trying very hard to sound casually disinterested.
“Gallacin Square is a popular place for off-worlders,” the twarlan said. “A lot of non-Torestellia cuisine options.” He slid a data pad across to Jason so he could sign for the vehicle.
“Thanks, I’ll have to check that out,” he said as he signed and transferred the appropriate amount of credits from his chit.
“He didn’t seem the sort to be much of a businessman. I’d be careful if I were you.”
“That’s why I’m bringing my head of security,” Jason smiled blandly. Crusher turned his head slowly at the mention of security and affixed his intense yellow eyes on the clerk, holding the stare until the alien looked away, swallowing hard.
A moment later the pair was walking
out the rear exit of the building to wait for their rented vehicle to be delivered. The clerk had said it was automated and was being directed from an off-site yard. True to his word, an unmanned vehicle rolled up a few minutes later.
“How quaint,” Crusher grumbled at the wheeled ground car.
“Not everything with wheels is a piece of shit, Crusher,” Jason said to him.
“So you keep telling me.”
“I’m going to take you for a ride in a 1966 Pontiac GTO one day, and I promise you’ll change your mind.” Crusher just eyed him skeptically as he climbed into the squat, ugly vehicle. “Gallacin Square,” Jason said to the vehicle as he climbed in the opposite side. As soon as he put on his safety restraint the vehicle hummed quietly away towards their destination.
Gallacin Square was a bustling hub of activity that looked like it had been transplanted off any ConFed world and deposited on Torestellia. The vehicle dropped them off and rolled away, blending in with the rest of the traffic. Jason looked around in dismay as he realized that finding a single synth in such a large area, if he was even there, was an unlikely proposition. He and Crusher walked through the crowd casually, taking in everything as the bustling throng of aliens went about their day.
One could infer which worlds were the largest customers of the Torestellian mines by how many establishments there were that catered to that species. The pair gawked a bit at the spires of buildings in the distance that rose hundreds and hundreds of stories into the sky from the heart of the mega-city that housed millions of twarlans.
“This is a fool’s errand,” Crusher rumbled. “We should have just staked out his ship.”
“Where the hell were you with these brilliant suggestions an hour ago?” Jason shot back. In truth he was a little embarrassed he hadn’t thought of it himself. Once they’d confirmed the ship belonged to Deetz from the clerk at the desk, they should have just repositioned the Phoenix to cover his return.
“I’m Operations. You’re supposed to be Tactics,” Crusher shrugged as he continually scanned the crowd. Jason glared at his friend before resuming his own reconnaissance. With nothing better to do, they roamed the perimeter of the square looking for a synth, and/or a pair of A’arcooni—how they actually appeared when alive.
Omega Force: Savage Homecoming Page 11
