by Mark Wandrey
“Ve is always happy to accommodate ze Chosen,” the heavyset woman said when Minu entered the dock office. Outside huge bins full of vegetables and crates of squawking chickens competed for space as electric forklifts moved them around. Her accent was so thick Minu was forced to listen closely to understand.
“Well this isn't really a Chosen purchase,” Minu explained.
The woman narrowed her eyes at the black jumpsuit but didn't say anything else so Minu produced a computer chip. She looked at it closely for a moment before turning to a venerable computer tablet that had seen far too much hard use. Minu was frankly surprised when it powered up and accepted the chip. “This is for private purposes.”
“Zis is a vera large quantity of foods you iz ordering.”
Minu gave her the same account number she'd used to pay for the expedition equipment. The large woman gave her a skeptical look as she took a rather old fashioned credit terminal and keyed in the number. As the results appeared she seemed only slightly less skeptical.
“Very vell. Vere do you veesh it delivered?”
The rush order this time cost her an extra twenty-five percent. Minu was still stinging from the treatment when she jumped down from the dock and turned towards her car only to come face to face with the second to the last person on the planet she hoped to see. “Well, well, well, Minu Alma.”
“I've been Minu Groves for years now, Viktor,” she growled and turned to slip by. A strong hand grabbed her left arm and restrained her.
“You will address me with respect, woman.”
Minu turned to look at the hand then slowly up into his steel-colored eyes. His goatee was now mostly gray and he was balding, but the father Ivan Malovich still had the same pinched, pointy face that always looked like he was on the verge of yelling, even when he was. She glanced at the hand again before speaking.
“In deference to your position as a planetary councilor, I'll give you the respect,” she began, his eyes twinkling and the corners of his mouth starting to turn up, “of a warning. If you don't take your hands off this member of the Chosen council, you'll pull back a bloody stump.”
His look turned to sneer, but there was also fear in his eyes as he ever so slowly released his grip. Minu carefully controlled herself and resisted the urge to smooth her jumpsuit where he'd touched her. “Now excuse me, Councilor Malovich,” she intoned with the barest of a nod before turning away.
“A word,” he snapped, her head coming around and real anger beginning to flare, “Chosen,” he added hastily. It was the barest acknowledgment of her station, but enough to satisfy propriety in the same way her nod had to him.
“I am in a hurry.”
“It is in relation to your treatment of my son.”
“My treatment?”
“You are holding him back, keeping the specter of a minor incident over his head to be sure he never has any power in the Chosen.”
It was all she could do to not sputter and laugh up into his face. “Minor incident? He started a vendetta with the Rasa! Who knows how many died because of his incompetence.” Viktor's face blanched and she pushed on.
“The incident with the Rasa was a minor footnote after your earlier provocation against them! And you made that illegal trip into the frontier!”
Minu cocked a head at him and pulled out a hidden fact she'd picked up on some time ago. “Illegal trip? It was unsanctioned by the Chosen, this is true.” She pointed at a discoloration on his left hand, an almost indiscernible lightening of the skin.
“That codex I brought back has saved thousands of lives. It cured cancer. Many of the people on this planet have benefited from that.”
He jerked his hand up and covered it with his other hand, unconsciously rubbing the slight scar where a malignant melanoma had been treated with codex programmed nanites.
“The actions I take are almost always in the interest of the Chosen, and humanity.” He snorted but looked down. Minu was amazed he actually had some small measure of shame. “And that is why I wear two gold stars, and your son five green ones.”
Minu didn't look back at him as she marched to her Aerocar, but she felt his eyes on her back. It felt like two scarlet laser beams trying to bore through her being.
The Rusk supplies were the last step she needed to complete in her planning. Minu took her car into the air, double checked that she had enough power, and set course for Tranquility once again.
As the car flew itself she spent the time reading through encrypted files in her father's logs and checking off seemingly endless lists she'd been preparing. Finally she admitted there was no more to do before they left and she put the machine aside. As the autopilot carried her through the upper atmosphere at twice the speed of sound, she caught a few hours sleep. She dreamed of her father for the first time in years.
Chapter 21
April 6th, 534 AE
Groves Industries, Tranquility, Plateau Tribe, Bellatrix
As Minu swung the red aerocar on a loop to land at the edge of the main tarmac of Groves Industries small spaceport she saw the somewhat smudged form of the Phoenix shuttle sitting just outside the hanger with support personnel working around it. With a smile she recognized the same one they'd used to rescue Pip and Kal'at on Remus not too long ago.
Sections of the shinning hull looked new but otherwise it had the same slim shape and forward raked wings of the production model Phoenix. She doubted many would recognize the differences between this test-bed model and the final run. A little less interior space and more powerful instrumentation.
Leave it to Aaron not to want to be a burden on his company by taking a ship destined for delivery, she thought. This somewhat historic craft was slated to live in a museum. Instead it would take a trip to the stars first.
As she touched down on the car’s miniature road wheels, she steered out of the way and the doors swung upward. Her husband was already trotting over from the waiting Phoenix. She could just see a technician through the ship’s tinted forward viewport, working the preflight checklist. “You already emailed Jacob, didn't you?” it wasn't really a question.
“About a half hour before I landed. I didn't want to risk the emails not going through.”
“He's on his way here. He must know something is up.”
“Viktor,” she snarled.
“What does that Rusk twit have to do with this?”
“I ran into him in Murmansk. He must have paid off the office woman and realized we were planning to go off world again.” He shrugged. “How long before we can take off?”
“Just waiting on Cherise.” Even as he spoke another aerocar was looping in for a landing. Minu recognized her best friend’s forest green car even before it touched down. The long, shapely legs that emerged sealed the deal.
“Am I late?” she asked as she shouldered a big Chosen shoulder bag. Like Minu she wore her uniform, three green stars shining on the sleeves.
“Right on time,” Minu smiled and gave her a quick kiss on the cheek. “But we need to hurry, Jacob is unhappy.”
“When is he ever happy?” she asked but quickly fell in behind Aaron and Minu as they trotted towards the Phoenix.
Her phone buzzed in her ear as they walked. “Chosen Groves.”
“Minu.” it was Gregg.
“Hey buddy, little busy...”
“I know, saw your email. Jacob is gunning for you.”
“We know.”
“Oh, good. Well, I really called to tell you Faye is in labor!”
“Hey, great!” Minu quickly shared the fact with her husband and Cherise, who both smiled and gave thumbs up. “Tell her we're with her, even if we can't be there.”
“I will. I suppose I'll be a few years older again when you get back.”
“Hopefully it won't be like that this time.”
“Do what you have to do, Minu, then come back to us.”
Minu said her goodbyes and closed the connection. As they swung up the gangway, she caught sight of a typical
Chosen cigar-shaped personnel transport dropping towards the spaceport. “Time to go,” she told them.
“Come on, out!” she barked at the technicians who scrambled to close equipment boxes and remove ground cables. Aaron was already behind the pilot’s controls and Minu slid into the copilot seat. Cherise took the rear engineer’s seat behind Minu without being asked.
“Checklist is complete,” Aaron said mechanically with only a cursory glance at the tablet stuck to its place on the console. He stuck a headset over his right ear and quickly adjusted the little boom microphone. “Phoenix to tower, AX-2 ready for roll out.”
“AX-2, this is the tower. We have a request from inbound Chosen special flight to hold you.”
“Tell him to hold himself,” Aaron laughed and spun up the ship’s gravitic drive. He flipped a switch and loudspeakers on the shuttle hull boomed to life. “Clear the gravity flux zone, we are lifting off.”
Techs abandoned their equipment and fled. The shuttle’s gravitic drives were capable of turning a man into strawberry jam if they were caught in the wrong place.
As the shuttle smoothly climbed off the ground, Aaron spun it around in place. A small maintenance truck was caught in a gravity flux and was tossed like a toy. The half-ton cart bounced off the nearest hanger in an explosion of parts and tools.
“Sorry,” Aaron apologized over the PA as he scooted the shuttle out the door, aimed the nose up, and slid the throttle forward. The ion drives roared and they rocketed upwards. The collision radar screamed and he nudged the stick ever so slightly.
Minu felt her bowels turn to water as the cigar-shaped Chosen transport passed the window close enough for her to see the wide eyes of the stunned pilot. His eyes were blue.
“You’re going to get us killed one of these days,” she hissed through clenched teeth. Cherise chuckled behind them as she became familiar with the ship’s engineering controls.
“May you live so long,” Aaron said in a calm voice as he leveled them off at twenty thousand meters and headed west.
“Should I call tranquility traffic control?” Cherise asked.
“Why bother?” Minu replied. A slight series of shudders heralded their passage through multiples of the sound barrier. They were already almost out of Plateau territory. “But it might not be a bad idea to call the New Jerusalem controllers so we don't cause any undue concern.”
* * *
The dock workers were getting ready to wrap up their day with the multiple sonic booms broke the cool afternoon calm. Many kilometers outside the busy city center of Tel Aviv, it was rare to hear the signature sound of a faster than sound craft. It was an even bigger surprise as the sleek shape of the Phoenix shuttle dropped down from the sky to bank hard around the warehouse complex, obviously looking for a place to land.
The dock manager walked outside and watched the huge delta-winged shape circle.
“That crazy bastard can't be thinking...” He never got a chance to finish because at that moment it nosed up, stopped its forward motion, and dropped smoothly into the biggest open area of his commercial carrier lot.
Brakes screamed and drivers fled from their trucks, certain that the hulking craft was about to splatter itself all over the place. But just meters above the ground, magical forces took hold and gently slowed the decent. A second before it reached the ground three doors popped open on the underside and landing gear emerged, locking in place a bare instant before the wheels gently contacted the concrete.
“That man is a fantastic pilot,” the manager whispered. Hope of hiring the man did battle with his anger at having the busy afternoon routine turned to chaos, until the shuttle's hatch slid aside to reveal a shapely Chosen woman in her night black jumpsuit. “I should have known.”
The gangway lowered down smoothly and Minu strode down to meet the amazed man. “Minu Groves,” she said and offered him a three fingered hand. “You have an order for me?”
He surveyed the massive shuttle amidst all his transports and shook his head as he took her strong grip with ease. “I've heard a lot about you, Chosen Groves. Yep, we have your materials right on the dock.”
Using a pair of Concordia made lifters empowered with gravitic impellers, the dock crew easily maneuvered the six skids of goods down to the ground and over to the Phoenix. Minu requested one meter pallets so they could be maneuvered up the boarding ramp.
Even so, it was a tight fit and each pallet took several minutes. As the big olive-skinned men worked she checked her chronometer frequently, mentally keeping track of the time in Rusk territory at the same time.
Finally the job was done and she was signing off on an invoice and getting a copy for herself.
“Always a pleasure working with the Chosen,” the manager said with a grin as he walked away.
Aaron took a copy of the invoice and swallowed. “Yeah, pleasure screwing us I bet.”
He noted the account number but didn't say anything. He knew how much the expedition meant to his wife. How could he say anything about a few thousand credits? She almost never bought a thing, but just like the hot red sports aerocar she drove, when she did it was usually impressive.
He was much more careful taking off this time. It wouldn't be his corporation’s equipment that would be flung around by a stray gravity wave from the shuttle, and he was sure the warehouse manager would charge top credit for any damages. He rode the impeller controller carefully until they were a full hundred meters up.
Cherise came back into the cockpit after finishing securing the goods. Her logistics job made her the natural choice for handling the expedition’s provisions. A glowing earpiece adorned one ear and she was speaking as she entered.
“Affirmative traffic control, we are airborne again and headed east to Rusk territory.” She nodded to herself and glanced at Aaron. “They respectfully request the Chosen not be quite as brusque in their territory as we were in Plateau.”
“I'll take it under advisement,” Aaron winked at her as she took her seat, and a second later they were rocketing up into the afternoon sky. Two hours later they were entering Rusk territory.
“Rusk traffic control, this is Plateau Phoenix shuttle AX-2. We are entering your airspace at twenty thousand meters on a course of eight-eight degrees traveling eleven hundred KPH, requesting routing to Murmansk.”
“We have you on our screens, Plateau shuttle,” the slightly accented voice replied. “You will descend to eleven thousand meters and slow to six hundred KPH to course one-oh-seven until directed to change.”
“What the hell?” Aaron wondered aloud, “is he taking us to Murmansk via Petersburgh?”
“This is klothshit,” Cherise said and spoke into her mouthpiece. “Rusk control, you understand our destination is Murmansk—”
“Your transmission was received and understood. You will follow flight directions.”
“Malovich,” Minu spat. “And he's slowing us below supersonic too. Aaron, how long to reach Murmansk.”
“Two hours at this speed and heading. Assuming they let us change course over the Ural Spine Range.”
“There's a limit to how much they can screw with us,” Minu said, but she wasn't so sure. Their course was displayed on one of the glass cockpit’s many programmable displays. The area seemed to contain nothing but mountains and forests. Much of the Rusk territory was wild and uninhabited. The famed Bore Mines were hundreds of kilometers to the south, where what little iron the planet still held was found.
“Shall we just go low and fast?” Aaron asked. “Not like they can do much about it.”
“No,” she said and sighed. “We need to observe their sovereign rights.”
But nearly two hours later as they finally came around to approach the port city of Murmansk, her feelings on observing their rules was tested. The sun was going down and the warehouse was obviously closed.
“That was on purpose,” Cherise observed.
“Yep,” Minu agreed. Her husband glanced over at her as he brought the shuttle
into hover a few hundred meters above the dark and quiet warehouse. She could see a four-meter fence around the perimeter and cameras on each corner.
Discretion said to fly into Murmansk and take a hotel for the night, then come back in the morning. The fact that Jacob was probably trying to find her said she needed a different approach. It was her goods, after all. She'd paid for them, even extra to have the stuff waiting. Screw it. She looked at Aaron with a twinkle in her eye and he laughed.
“I know that look,” he said and shook his head.
“I take it we are no longer observing their rules?” Cherise asked.
“You take it correctly.” She leaned forward and looked at the warehouse’s dock area. “Over there, by that dumpster.”
Minu walked along the dock, looking through the slits in the metal doors every few meters until she found what she wanted. Five skids of shrink-wrapped fresh produce and frozen food.
“Found it,” she called out. Once she saw Cherise and Aaron trotting towards her she examined the lock. Simple brass padlock. She grabbed it with her right hand, mentally overrode the safeties in her mind, and squeezed. The metal snapped with a 'ping' and she pulled the door open.
Loading took a little more time without the handy gravitic handling carts. Aaron appropriated a forklift and quickly staged all five skids by the gangway where Cherise broke the shrink wrap and they all went two work in a bucket brigade passing crates from one man to the next up into the ship. They had just started on the fifth and last skid when the first siren sounded in the near distance.
“I don't think they appreciate us using the self-serve option,” Cherise noted as she tossed a heavy case of frozen fish to Aaron who turned and quickly tossed it to Minu.
“They should appreciate traffic control better,” Minu retorted as she took a couple steps and stacked the crate on top of another identical one. “Let’s step it up before we get into a shootout over our own goods.”
