by Dave Bara
“What’s their position?” demanded the captain.
“Thirty clicks and closing, sir,” said Marker from his station.
“Full stop, Mr. Layton,” she ordered, then came and stood over my tactical station. “Can you scan them, Cochrane? What kind of weapons have they got?”
“Judging from their design and energy signatures, I would say at least six coil cannon batteries each and multiple torpedo launchers, perhaps four each,” I said, delivering the bad news. “Cruiser displacement, I estimate.”
“Analysis, Mr. Serosian?” she asked of our host, firmly ensconced at his central station, his hands flying smoothly over the liquid-like console.
“They have nearly equivalent weapons to our own, less sophisticated perhaps, but still formidable. We can withstand a lengthy attack and give as good as we get, but even an HD crystal can run low on power,” he said.
“So ultimately, we’re vulnerable,” the captain said.
“Ultimately, after taking the blows we already have, it would be wise to avoid a fight,” said Serosian. The message demanding our acquiescence continued unabated through the com, obviously a recording. The captain paced for a second, then made her decision.
“Mr. Cochrane, stand down on all our weapons and defensive systems. Let them know we don’t want a fight. If they wanted one they’d have likely fired on us by now,” she said.
“Aye, sir,” I replied, and carried out my orders.
“Mr. Serosian,” she said, “Reply on their com frequency, please.” He opened the channel silently, then nodded to the captain.
“This is Captain Dobrina Kierkopf of the Unified Navy ship Impulse, We are on a rescue mission and request your assistance. Please identify yourselves and reply,” she stated. The line stayed quiet for a few seconds. The reply came again in a heavy accent, but we could still make it out.
“Captain Kierkopf, this is the Royal Levant Naval Command, Captain Salibi speaking. Your vessel will be boarded and impounded. If you resist, we will destroy you. Do you understand?” said the voice. The captain left the line open for a second before replying.
“As I stated, Captain Salibi, we are on a rescue mission and request your—”
“You will stand down, Commander,” the voice shouted. “Open your airlock and prepare to receive Royal Navy personnel. Any other action will result in your destruction!”
The captain signaled for Serosian to cut the line. “Still think this is a good idea?” she asked him. He shrugged.
“As opposed to fighting, yes,” he replied.
“I’d sure like to show him what an HD-powered ship can do,” she said, then signaled for the com line again.
“Understood, Captain Salibi. And welcome aboard. We come as friends,” she said.
“That will be determined,” came the quick reply, then the line was severed from the other side. The captain looked at me and let out an exasperated sigh.
“Mr. Cochrane, open the outer airlock. Everyone into EVA suits, full helmets. I don’t want to lose anyone to space if they come in shooting,” she said.
“Sidearms?” Marker asked. She shook her head.
“Stand down means stand down, Mr. Marker. No matter how crazy I might think it is.” Then she sat down heavily. I kept my eyes pinned to my board, hoping we could get out of this in one piece.
Six armed men had boarded, carrying rifles that seemed roughly equivalent to recent-issue Union coil tech. My guess in eyeing the guns was that they would probably have to recharge after three or four volleys, whereas a proper Union rifle, or even a pistol, could fire ten times as many shots before a recharge would be required.
We all sat in our safety couches while Serosian guided the yacht to a docking bay on a low-orbit space station, escorted closely by the Levant cruisers. The station itself seemed fairly modern in design but was less than half the size of High Station Quantar. After landing, we were escorted by an unnecessarily large coterie of guards into pressurized cabins where our EVA suits were confiscated and we were, I assumed, interrogated individually for a short time by intelligence officers who spoke poor Standard. After being left alone for a while, I was escorted into what looked to be a command ready-room and sat at a single table with the captain and Serosian on one end, me in the middle, and Marker and Layton to my right. We were seated by presumed rank, I noted. After a few minutes of silence with swarthy guards staring at us, a man in a scarlet and black uniform with a large number of medals on his chest came through the door. He was dark-complexioned with a thick mustache that twisted upward at the ends. He was accompanied by a young attaché, clean-shaven and with hardly any rank insignia.
“I am Captain Salibi,” he stated. “This interrogation is now my responsibility. Whether you live or whether you die may now depend on your answers to my questions. I suggest you hold nothing back and tell me the truth.” I found this odd, as their initial questions had to do with our mission, and I assumed that each of us had answered truthfully already. If the interrogators had conferred at all then Captain Salibi must know our situation was as we stated. Although I was nervous, I didn’t take the captain’s threat of death seriously. He just didn’t seem the type.
Salibi sat down at a table facing us, his attaché standing respectfully behind him, a plasma in his hand that I assumed was for notes. “Captain Kierkopf,” he started. “Please recount to me how your ship came to be in the Levant star system.”
“I’ve already told your questioners this five times,” said the captain evenly. Salibi smiled thinly and with a bit of menace.
“Nonetheless, please indulge me,” he replied.
“We came here in our vessel, the Union Lightship Impulse, on a mission of contact and friendship to Levant,” she said. “And then—”
“And then you encountered our gatekeepers,” said Salibi, interrupting her.
“I don’t understand what you mean.”
“The Imperial weapons,” he said, offering nothing more. The captain looked nonplussed, then continued.
“We encountered those weapons once before, on our first foray into your space,” she said.
“Yes, I know. We watched with interest. Even more so when we saw you were not destroyed, and that you came back,” said Salibi.
“Of course we came back. As I said, we are on a mission of peaceful contact.”
“That has yet to be determined,” said Salibi. At this, the attaché leaned in and whispered something to Salibi. I began to wonder if some hidden observer was asking the questions through the attaché. “When you again ran afoul of the gatekeepers, your ship left you for dead and proceeded into our home space,” he continued.
“That was a rogue Historian, Tralfane. He took control of our vessel and brought it here, to your world,” said Dobrina.
“Not to our world, but to Tyre,” he corrected, meaning the moon with the HD cannon. “Where your vessel activated a device that is more a legend on our world than anything we believed could exist in our system, then vanished. And then we see your tiny vessel approaching, landing on Tyre, attempting, no doubt, to repeat the same action: activating an Imperial gateway.”
“We were trying to rescue our vessel, as I stated already,” said Dobrina. Salibi looked away from her to Serosian.
“And you, sir, you have no rank uniform, and say your name is Serosian, a Historian from Earth, of all places. Speaking of legends.”
“It is no legend,” said Serosian, “I assure you.”
“Your captain here—”
“She is not my captain,” said Serosian, interrupting. “My ship is from another vessel, like the first one. Which should, incidentally, be arriving here soon.”
Salibi eyed Serosian with annoyance. The attaché leaned in again. I could see a small earpiece in his left ear.
“Tell me what an Earth Historian does aboard one of these ships,” asked Salibi.
“And?”
“Engage in First Contact missions, like this one, to establish friendly relations between emerging worlds and the Union.”
Salibi shifted in his chair. “Tell me about this Union.”
I sensed Serosian tense ever so slightly next to me. Nonetheless, he was ready with an answer. “The Union was established by treaty a decade ago between Carinthia, Quantar, and Earth as an exchange of culture, technology, and trade. The goal is to establish a peaceful and democratic interstellar government as a balance to any remnants of the old empire and its corrupt government. By choosing two well-established worlds on the verge of acquiring interstellar capability again as the core of our Union, we hoped to promote cooperation, as each world was on opposite sides during the Imperial Civil War. And as Captain Kierkopf stated, we came here hoping to explore the possibility of inviting Levant into the Union as well,” he said.
“So you claim you are not Imperial agents?” Salibi asked. I sensed this was the key question, but which side would the Levantines come down on?
“We are not,” said Serosian.
“But you came here seeking to use Imperial technology.”
“Which we failed at, whereas our enemy succeeded. That alone should be evidence enough of our intentions,” interjected the captain.
“But we have only your word to go on. This Historian has locked out your ship’s computers. We can’t break the code, which would verify your story. Perhaps you are agents of the empire and your other vessel was attempting escape,” said Salibi.
“We aren’t from the empire,” I burst out, angry and frustrated at the questions. “I came here to stop the empire. The empire left those displacement wave weapons here in your system. The empire used them to surprise Impulse, killing an entire crew of my countrymen. The empire killed my friends. I hate the empire!” I said, half-standing from my chair.
“Sit down, Mr. Cochrane,” said the captain, furious with my outburst. Serosian’s hand on my arm and her withering stare made me sit back down again, but I was fuming that we were here wasting time with this man and his interrogation.
Once more the attaché came and whispered in Salibi’s ear. At that moment Salibi stood to attention and the door behind him opened. I wasn’t the only one surprised at who came through.
She was as tall as me, wearing a black one-piece formal suit with a white blouse underneath. Her skin was a soft caramel color and her eyes were a deep olive green and slightly almond in shape. Her hair was dark and hung well past her shoulders. I guessed she was about my age. She was stunningly beautiful.
Salibi and the attaché both bowed when she came in, indicating she clearly held a position of high authority. But her demeanor was not that of a military commander; she carried an aura of both power and privilege. She ignored Kierkopf and Serosian and looked straight at me, pointing.
“You, stand up,” she said to me in perfect, uninflected Standard. I did as commanded—there was really no other word for it. “State your name.”
I cleared my throat. “I’m Lieutenant Commander Peter Cochrane, of the Union Navy ship Impulse. Serial number—”
“I’m not interested in your military rank,” she said. “I demand to know if you are from the Cochrane family of Quantar.”
I swallowed. “Yes.”
“The ruling family of Quantar?”
“Yes.”
“Your title?”
There was no hiding it from her now. “Viscount of Queensland, heir to the Director’s Chair, soon to be occupied by my father, Nathan Cochrane,” I said. Her hands went to her hips and she contemplated me a moment. Without breaking eye contact with me she said:
“Captain Salibi, escort our guests down to Levant, to the palace at New Sydon. You will give them all the honors afforded to invited guests of Prince Sunil Katara of Levant, and of his sister, the Princess Janaan,” she said. “Do you understand?”
“Yes, madam,” Salibi said, then bowed again as she left in a rush.
“What was that?” I asked, turning to my companions. Serosian smiled.
“I’d say we just passed the smell test,” he said, then laughed in his deep baritone.
On Levant
We left the yacht at the station, which Salibi informed us was called Artemis, and flew down to Levant Prime in Salibi’s own cruiser. He was apologetic and went out of his way to explain his actions toward us. It seemed that the Imperial technology left in this system had been keeping the Levant Navy from leaving their own star system for nearly a decade, since before the Union had been formed. Every ship that had tried to venture to Levant’s natural jump points had been destroyed, as had ships approaching too close to the HD cannon on Tyre. It seemed Levantine culture and technology were nearly equal to our own, absent a few decades of Historian assistance. I could see now why Imperial forces would want to keep us apart. Levant would make the Union even stronger. And they hated the old empire as much as we did.
We landed at an empty airbase in the dark of night and were escorted to a pair of military vertical-lift vehicles, there to take us on the nearly thirty-minute ride to the Royal Palace. Levant medical teams took our injured, including Captain Zander, to the base medical facility. I felt relieved that they would be getting proper care now, even if Levant medicine was likely a decade behind ours.
We arrived in New Sydon at 0400 local time, which was fine with me. We had all been running on minimal rest for what seemed like days and, truth be known, I was exhausted. I hoped Prince Katara wasn’t an early riser.
We were ushered in to a grand foyer by Captain Salibi’s men, who addressed him as “General.” He admitted as much to us, apologizing for being deceptive. It seemed he wouldn’t dare risk leaving First Contact with an advanced potential enemy to some lowly navy ship captain.
I sunk into a large embroidered chair as we waited, feeling in my bones just how tired I was. Salibi said his goodbyes to the others and then bowed to me as he departed. I could barely lift my arm in response.
I must have dozed off immediately, as I was gently awakened by a military adjutant a few minutes later and we were escorted up an ornate, swept double staircase to the second floor. One by one each of my companions was given a room and an adjutant to see to their needs. Captain Kierkopf inquired about our forthcoming meeting with Prince Katara, and she was politely informed that we were scheduled to see him at lunch and would be allowed several hours of rest before the meeting. This seemed satisfactory and before I knew it I was at my room at the far end of the hallway. Wooden double doors swung open to reveal a large apartment with a sitting area in the middle and two large bedroom suites, one to each side. The adjutant asked which I preferred and I lamely pointed to the one on my right.
He was gamely explaining about how proper clothing would be brought up and asking if I needed anything like tea or toiletries. I said no and trundled off to the ridiculously large bed, pulling off my boots and crawling in. After a few moments, he said his goodbyes and was gone. I closed my eyes and was just about to drift off when I heard an unmistakable and unexpected sound.
Giggling.
I sat up and looked toward my bath where two young girls in exotic-colored garb, like that of belly dancers I had seen in trivids, were standing with a gold plate full of bottles and small cups. I was so tired I didn’t really register the implications of this. One of the girls stepped forward and offered me a massage in broken Standard.
“Later. Sleep,” was all I could mumble out. They giggled again and the near one kissed me on the forehead and set my head gently down on the pillow. I heard them leave the room and quietly shut the door, then I drifted off into sweet oblivion.
I was awakened at 1000 hours by the sound of bathwater runni
ng and the girls giggling again. I was escorted into the bathroom, which was also enormous, quickly disengaged from my clothes and then sank into a massive tub full of hot, bubbly water. The girls sat on the edge of the tub, still thankfully fully clothed, chattering to each other in their native language, which I had no way of understanding. One of the girls washed my hair for me while the other took to rubbing my arms and shoulders, giggling and chattering the whole time. I had to admit that after the last few days, this was heaven.
After a while, they left me alone, and I didn’t really miss them as I sat soaking my sore muscles for a few precious minutes. The next thing I heard jolted me back to reality.
“You seem to have settled in well,” came a deep female voice from behind me. I opened my eyes and whipped my head around to see the woman from the Levant High Station interrogation sitting in a boudoir chair observing me.
“How long have you been there?” I said, more forcefully than I would have liked. She laughed.
“Long enough, Sire Cochrane. Are our accommodations to your liking?” she asked. I noted she had changed into a less formal but still businesslike body suit. And she was still stunning.
“They are,” I said, swishing the bubbles as I tried to obtain a more dignified position. It was impossible. I was, after all, in a bubble bath.
“Good. I hope you had a chance to indulge in some of our . . . other offerings,” she said. I sat up in the tub as best I could.
“I am a gentleman, madam, and would do no such thing,” I replied. She laughed again, and I enjoyed watching every second of it.
“So you say,” she sat forward now. “I have come here on a bit of business, Sire. I wish to inform you of some helpful protocol before your meeting with the prince.”
“I’m in the bathtub, and you want to talk to me about protocol?” I deadpanned.
