Star Realms: Rescue Run

by Jon Del Arroz

  “I was in nets mode,” Dario confessed, as if he’d been caught sneaking treats when he were younger. He shouldn’t care what his father thought, and his father may not even say anything… but he gave Dario that look. The look of judgment and disappointment. It’d been on his face so many times. This time no different.

  “Perhaps if you’d spent less time on there and spent more in communication with the upper management levels we may have avoided some unfortunate decisions.”

  “Unfortunate decisions?” Dario’s shoulders tensed. “I made decisions that saved lives, future potential damage, and I made sure all of the quotas are still met for our clients. What else do you want?”

  “It’s not what I want, Dario. However, you’re new to management and you could ask your old man for some advice occasionally.” Mr. Anazao stood, moving to the kitchen and opening up cabinets to inspect their internal contents.

  “I really wish you wouldn’t do that. It’s my apartment,” Dario said, his tone as defensive as ever despite trying to sound calm. “And it is what you want. It was early in the morning, I did what I had to put out the actual fires so we could work the next day. Jake, my assistant you hired personally, told me I did well.”

  Mr. Anazao paused, hand on an upper cabinet, looking over toward Dario. “Did he now?”

  “Yes, he did. Does that change what you think?”

  “No, not at all,” Mr. Anazao said, dropping his hand from the cabinet. “I was only looking for a drink, something distilled.”

  “You know I don’t drink.” Alcohol had strange effects on his oculars as well as the net connection installed with them. The blurred thoughts it created could send both into a spiral of opening documents and other media contents. He’d been forced to shut them down on a couple occasions before he figured out the problem.

  “Yes, but you still have guests over, surely?”

  Dario gave him a blank look.

  His father shook his head. “If you don’t, you’re missing out on an important part of the higher echelons of corporate life. Contacts are everything. Your evaluation scores can only do so much if you intend on rising further in the ranks. You’ll need well connected people, and not just ones that revere me. Once I retire, I plan on doing galactic travelling. I won’t always be here for you.”

  “What’s that got to do with how I handled the crisis? And it was a crisis, with no training. I did well.”

  “Well enough, but you still should have asked my advice. This… prisoner release is the worst part. What were you thinking? Those people need to be punished.” Mr. Anazao held that subtle frown on his face that shamed Dario far more than words ever could.

  “Punished? They’re people without hope who were caught up in emotions of a situation. If anything they need our sympathy, need to know that we won’t put them in a position where they’re going to have to fear for their lives.” Dario gripped his chair’s backrest. He wanted to throw it, but knew throwing a tantrum would only make matters worse.

  “Fear for their lives?” Mr. Anazao shook his head. “They’re provided for. The corporation feeds them, and gives them lodging. They work in our factory as a consequence. They should be grateful. For every one job that we could use a human for, of which bots can do even the majority of those, there’s three thousand of them. What we do is charity.”

  Dario stepped to his table, toward his father, separated by more than just the physical furniture. He clenched his fist, shaking. “Charity? Seriously? Did you see the faces on the holovids? They’re hopeless. They’ve got nothing to live for. It’s a hellhole down there.”

  “And that is why I work so hard to ensure you stay on the upper levels of management. The executive levels are even nicer, Dario. You need to be there. For yourself, for your future children. It’s not perfect, but we care for as many people as we can. There will always be resentment against those above them. Some people don’t have the will to work hard enough, or the talents to be able to get further than their stations in life. I have sympathy, Dario. I truly do.”

  Mr. Anazao maneuvered around the counter toward Dario. “You have to understand there’s nothing we can do other than ensure that violence doesn’t occur again. That’s why letting them out is so dangerous. Now you have people who are hopeless as you say, with resentment, and they’re going to have fresh anger. They’re going to get their friends angry, and we’re going to have a bigger problem.”

  Dario looked at his father for a long time. It was somewhat callous, but he was right. There were implications to think of to his actions. He felt he did the right thing in ensuring those people were off the streets, and it didn’t look like that was being questioned. It was this latest action, the authorization of the prisoner release. That was the problem. But it didn’t feel right to keep them incarcerated either. The underlevelers weren’t at fault. Not all of them at least. “What should I have done? Do we just keep them there?”

  “Perhaps until the media heat died down, and we had psychologists go in and talk to them about their recent actions to ensure their productive reintegration. I would have taken more time and spoken with different advisors on this matter. I only want you to be careful, son. To cover yourself. Too much liability can cause you more problems than you know. Do you understand?” He walked around the table to Dario and clasped him on the arm.

  “Yeah, I understand,” Dario said, deferring as he always had before. It was just like any lecture he’d had when he was a kid. His father made him feel so small in each of those occasions, and he didn’t have any ammunition to fight back. But he was an adult now, in a management position at that. The algorithms trusted him with leadership. So did his team, or at least Jake did. There had to be a middle ground where the underlevelers could be protected and corporate interests maintained.

  “More than that, Dario. Do you know how our system is set up? Our Trade Federation thrives because of the rule of law the megacorporations offer works from the top levels on down. Those underlevelers need us, without us there would be anarchy. The support that they receive would collapse. Just look at those savage worlds out in the Hyrades Cluster. Ever since that idiot Martine scraped together a fleet, had the power go to his head. People starve there. You don’t hear about that here, do you?”

  Dario shook his head. He hadn’t heard about any starvation here on Mars. But did that mean it didn’t exist? The reporters, the news agencies all were under the payroll of the corporations. Would they report on something that cast the Trade Federation’s socioeconomic systems in a negative light? “I don’t, but maybe we should take a trip down to the underlevels, see what they really live like?”

  His father’s eyes widened at the question. “Are you serious? It’s dangerous down there. If someone checked your identity or recognized you, you could be held hostage or worse. You might be killed.” His expression grew serious. “Not an option. I’ll make sure that you have your security status revoked if you’re honestly considering this.”

  “It was just an idea,” Dario said. His voice sounded defensive even to his own ears. “It’s important that we understand the people who are working for us. If we understand what they need to improve their lives, it has to get better productivity out of them. That’s what the psych profiles at the corporate level are all about, pushing us in directions so that we’ll inherently want to work harder. That’s why my evaluations led me to this position, right?”

  “Those thoughts are dangerous.” Mr. Anazao paced over to the window and stared outside to the view of the different levels of Mars across from it. “Perhaps you don’t have enough work to do with this promotion and the transition period involved. I’m going to have Regina in accounting send up my next stack of AAR reports for you to mull over and approve. You might as well see what the finance side of the corporation is on the higher levels. It’ll be your track anyway.”

  Dario’s jaw dropped. “You can’t be—”

  “That’s final,” his father said. “You’ll have the reports in a
few minutes. Try to finish those and get some rest. We’ll recover from this lost productivity soon enough.” He gave a short glance in Dario’s direction before he trudged back out the door without even a goodbye.

  Chapter 7

  Assembling

  Trantine X—H.C.S.E. Intelligence HQ

  Local Date 1137.522

  “Joan, let me introduce you to Trian Mubari. He’s a defector from the Trade Federation—as many of us are. He has a history of lobbying for different megacorporations in the Centauri sector on behalf of labor groups. He also has a unique perspective of the geopolitical environment you’ll be entering into when in Trade Federation space. He’s tasked with setting up identification, lodging, and information gathering,” Minister Jaileen said.

  They stood in a conference room on the fifty-fifth floor of a Star Empire skyscraper in the city of Beltrada, near to Trantine X’s spaceport. The Trantine colony was situated on the frontier, not close to the Trade Federation, but closer to Blob—rather, Lly’bra—space.

  Every few minutes or so Joan could hear the hum of a shuttle launching from the port, though the walls dampened any vibrations from the speeding crafts. Spending most of her time on space stations or ships, the lack of that distinct engine or power core white noise in the background set Joan on edge. That, or the fact that she really didn’t belong here. She half-expected to wake from a long, vivid dream at any moment.

  Joan offered her hand to Trian, a middle aged man with dark skin and short, curly hair. He wore a tan suit with a crescent collared shirt. “Pleasure to meet you, Ms. Shengtu. I’ve read your files and look forward to working with you.”

  “You’ve got one up on me,” Joan said. It had been three days since the shuttle from the S.E.S. Transport One brought her down to the surface. She’d been moved from her prison cell to standard quarters at that time, and had her handtab rebooted.

  The universe had felt so empty without access to her handtab. It was odd, seeing as she never received many messages, being a loner as she was, but at least she could scroll the newsvids and play some games to amuse herself. Speaking of which… “Are there any updates on G.O.D.? I mean, my AI?”

  Minister Jaileen shook her head. “Our best engineers are working on the matter but there are several security subroutines that are beyond anything we’ve seen before. I’m not sure there’s going to be enough time to restore your AI to full functionality before the mission. Perhaps we could outfit you with a new one?”

  Joan inhaled sharply. Most people would find it ridiculous that she was so attached to an AI, but G.O.D. had been her only steady companion for more than a year. He was more a person to her than anyone in this room. His unique subroutines were half of what made her missions successful in recent weeks. She wouldn’t have been able to break the maglock on that abandoned Cutter-class vessel without him, for certain. Nor would she have survived that time she was on the run from Driandi Pirates. “No,” Joan said, exhaling to allow the stress of old memories to dissipate. “I can’t do this mission without him. I’ll need him, whether he’s got some buggy virus or not.”

  Trian exuded calm. He stared at her from where he stood nearby, hands neatly folded in front of him. “I’m not sure I’m entirely comfortable with a rogue variable. This is going to be difficult enough as it is.”

  “I can’t do it without him. No negotiations,” Joan said, her shoulders tightening.

  Minister Jaileen held up her hands. “Don’t worry, both of you. Let’s let our engineers work some more and see if they can happen to find some way to resolve this before we make any final decisions on the matter. Okay?”

  Joan and Trian both nodded.

  “Very well. Mr. Mubari, could you pull up the intelligence files and brief Ms. Shengtu?”

  “Of course,” Trian said, circling the conference room table and pulling up his sleeve to reveal his handtab holo. It synced with the table’s system and its own holodisplay shimmered above it. The display had a corporate logo of a crown and stethoscope around the letters RB. Joan read the side bar:

  Regency BioTech, Inc.—Megacorporation conglomerate with a headquarters on Mars. Founded 2392 by Janet Sheridan, the company specializes in prosthetics, biomechanical integration and modifications. The company has more than one million, two hundred thousand (1.2MM) employees between its fifteen subsidiary companies, including a robust security force affiliated with the Terran Trade Federation.

  “Our intelligence operatives in Trade Federation space believe that their extraction of Commodore Zhang was a joint venture between Regency BioTech and four smaller corporations who wish to penetrate the Star Empire’s fringe world markets and change those allegiances through economic warfare. Since our vessels routinely blockade against Trade Federation incoming and outgoing ships on our border colonies, crippling our fleet by removing our strategist is seen as an opening salvo for this long term plan,” Trian said. “Public opinion on the worlds in question favors the Star Empire over the Trade Federation by a margin of two to one as of most recent surveys. We were able to use this recent attack to our advantage, public perception-wise.”

  The image above the table shifted to one of Mars, plot points representing the space elevator, various sky and orbital stations around the heavily populated planet. Trian made a motion zooming in on the northwestern area of the sphere, where the original dome settlement still existed for the surface.

  “You think Commodore Zhang is being held at their headquarters?” Joan asked. A giant station grew on the skyline of the holodisplay.

  “That is correct,” Trian said. “We don’t have an exact location, but based on intercepted communications verified by our informants, we believe she is being held somewhere on the Regency BioTech Central Office on Mars. The goal will be to land a strike team on the inside to gather information on specific whereabouts of Commodore Zhang.”

  Joan focused on the holographic station. It had cargo bays with double redundant blast doors, camera systems apparent anywhere near an exterior hatch, as well as robust drone launching platforms. This company’s security was light years beyond Balibran Station’s. If it was like this on the outside, internally must be just as tight. “This is crazy,” she said under her breath.

  “Crazy, but also something the enemy wouldn’t expect, which gives us a slight advantage.” Minister Jaileen inclined her head. “Which leads us to our next discussion. We plan on bringing in a strike team of two dozen commandos to the Mars surface—”

  “That won’t work,” Joan said.

  “Pardon, Ms. Shengtu?”

  “It’ll be too obvious. If they have security as deep as I see just from a scan of the image of their station, that many people arriving would be too noticeable. We’d never get past their initial security scans.”

  “We do have people proficient at creating false corporate identities, which we’ll utilize,” Trian said. He motioned to create a new projection from his handtab, which displayed several different identicards.

  “No. Trust me on this one. Look, the reason a lot of my clients started to turn to me for my… ah, procurement services, is because I’m just a young woman on a cargo ship. People overlook me. That’s a big reason I’m successful.”

  “We have an operative on the inside,” Minister Jaileen said, tapping the table controls to switch the image again. This time a man appeared. He had blue hair and a strange looking mod just above his forehead. Joan guessed he looked to be a little older than her. “He’s done very well, gaining access to Regency BioTech’s executive levels.”

  “All the more reason not to bring a very noticeable strike force,” Joan said. “You don’t want to further the risk of losing someone with that vital of information access.”

  Trian cocked his head at Joan. “I see where she’s coming from,” he said.

  Minister Jaileen pursed her lips. “What do you suggest we do with the mission then, Ms. Shengtu?”

  “I’d want as small of a team as possible. Sneak in, sneak out before the Tr
ade Federation knows any better. That’s how I’d do it at least. Less red flags on the security vids.” Joan shrugged. “Curbs your potential losses, too.”

  Minister Jaileen looked to Trian and back to Joan again. “Ms. Shengtu, we do want you to lead this team and will take your advice very seriously. We are prepared to give you whatever support you need, but if you think a minimal team would be the best…”

  “I do,” Joan said.

  “Then that’s what we’ll give you. You’ll of course be bringing Mr. Mubari. I also have one other person I’d like to introduce to you.” Minister Jaileen tapped the commlink on the conference table. “Send in Ms. Amitosa, please.”

  Joan tensed at that name, spinning toward the door. Every instinct in her body screamed at her to run and never look back.

  The conference room door opened to reveal a compact woman, black hair and dark eyes, traditionally from the Asian continent of Earth. She wore dark but loose fitting clothes, and had her thumb hooked on one of her jacket pockets. She gave a quick incline of her head as she entered. “Minister, Mubari.” She spun toward Joan, giving a smile that might as well have been spitting fire. “And our little thief, Ensign Shengtu.”

  Joan narrowed her eyes. “I’m not an Ensign anymore.”

  Ms. Amitosa, of whom Joan knew all too well, stepped closer to her, challengingly. She met Joan’s eyes. “No, of course you’re not. Rank would imply some semblance of honor and duty. Thief Shengtu then.”

  Joan’s knuckles tightened around the fabric of her shirt that hung over her waist. She gripped it hard to hold herself back from punching Ms. Amitosa. Something had to be done to diffuse the situation. Joan forced a smile. “I’m not a thief,” Joan said. “I prefer the term ‘salvage liberating engineer.’”

  No one laughed.

  Ms. Amitosa returned that phony smile. “I see you rattle just as easily as you used to on the S.E.S. Destiny. Now that I look back on it, I should have noticed that was a sign of your guilt, not your nervousness of a new assignment.”