by Ryan Krauter
He heard voices from the starboard escape trunk. It seemed like they were coming from the stairs that lead down to the Combat Control Center; C3 for short. He wondered if he should go see who was making the racket, but after a few seconds he recognized one of the voices.
He heard the clank of feet on the metal stairs, and soon enough he saw Loren and Cassie emerge from the escape trunk onto the bridge proper.
"Captain," Loren said with a smile and a quick salute which Elco waved off.
"XO. No need for the pleasantries tonight. I won't tell if you won't. Agreed?"
"Sounds fine with me," Loren replied.
"Evening, Cassie," Elco continued as he addressed Loren's wife, the person his XO had almost killed himself several times over to get back to. "How was the party going after I left?"
"Slowing down," she replied. "A lot of the guests are from Avenger, I'm told, and despite the elaborate plans Web was putting together, everyone seems to have behaved themselves."
"Good to know," Elco replied thoughtfully, then smiled good-naturedly at Loren. "I suppose there's probably some rule we're breaking with a civilian on the bridge, eh?"
"Says the man with a drink in his hand," Loren pointed out with a chuckle.
"Well, you've got me there," Elco replied, then turned somber. "I'm not the type for theatrics, but I have to say I came up here to work but couldn't get my mind into the game, and then it hit me. After all the toasts tonight at the dinner, I realized I needed to come make a toast to all the crew who weren't with us anymore."
"A good idea," Loren agreed.
"So what brings you up to Avenger?" Elco continued. "Taking a tour, planning on testing out my chair for fit, something like that?"
Loren laughed a bit. "I still have no aspirations to your chair, Captain."
"You should," Elco countered pointedly. "You can't have mine, though, but you should get your own some day soon."
Loren changed the subject. "Actually, I just came aboard because Cassie heard my quarters were somewhat the worse for wear."
Cassie held up a large bag which looked bulky but didn't seem to be too heavy. "I brought some tableware and a few touches of home to redecorate. I heard the place was trashed long before it took actual battle damage."
"Yes, leave it to Loren to blame the Primans for the sad state of his quarters," Elco smiled. "Well, don't let me interrupt you. I'm just going to sit here and brood for a while."
"Best wishes on your brooding, then, Captain," said Loren as he put his hand on Cassie's back and direct her to the rear lift on the starboard side of the bridge. He couldn't help but stop by the last display screen and call up a quick update on the in-progress work orders, which earned him a smack on the arm from Cassie.
"Decorating tonight, work tomorrow," she chided. Loren gave in and followed her to the lift.
Loren and Cassie took their time strolling the corridors of Avenger. The ship was quiet and dimly lit, and while at first Loren had felt uneasy, he soon felt peaceful. The ship itself seemed at peace. There was just the soft whoosh of air from the ducts, the barely perceptible thrum of the engines in the deck plates as the powerplants operated at minimum output. They only saw one other person, a yard tech putting the finishing touches on a power junction mounted on the ceiling as they walked past.
They arrived at his quarters, fully repaired now, though the place seemed cold and sterile with few furnishings and fresh Confed Gray paint.
"Wow," Cassie said in mock astonishment at the bare quarters, "I didn't know it was this bad in here." She set the bag she'd been carrying on the countertop in the kitchenette and began taking boxes out and stacking them next to the bag.
"War is hell," he said with a grin, though he kept from her the dark thoughts that had danced through his mind as he'd decided what he would be willing to do to save her and the population of Toral. "A bunch of the furniture was damaged, the hatch and most of the bulkhead were replaced, and a lot of the glasses and dishes you got me broke."
"The XO's quarters are pretty nice, though," she commented as she looked around. She knew Loren and the former XO, Delgin Marks, had been longtime friends before Marks had been killed in the opening days of the war. She'd met him a few times and could see why he and Loren got along so well.
"I'll give you a quick tour," he replied. He took her hand and led her to the small kitchenette. "This is the kitchen, where I prepare a gourmet assortment of flavored ration bars." He pointed to an empty space where a small table had recently been. "That's where I used to do paperwork instead of sleeping. Over there is the living area." He pointed to the small bedroom, just big enough for a bed, some built in drawers, and a small closet. "That's the bedroom- nothing ever happens in there."
"Oh, I think we could fix that," Cassie said with a smile as she turned and walked through the doorway. "It looks like a tight fit, but I think we can make do."
"We can certainly try," Loren agreed.
Senator Zek Dennix, representative of the planet Toral and head of the Governing Committee of the Confederation, sighed as his least favorite person in the entire galaxy entered his office. These visits were too frequent for his tastes, and no longer carried even the feigned equality of their initial engagements. No, now his visitor merely called on him to give him his latest orders and demand information. If it weren't for their arrangement, he would have sought a way to eliminate her long ago. Well, that plus the fact that she could destroy him politically as well as personally if he got out of line.
His visitor was a striking woman by the name of Tana Starr. She looked like an extremely fit, taller-than-average humanoid woman, attractive by the standards of most species in the Confederation. The only hang-up was that she was really a Priman operative, tasked to be his liason to the Priman conquerors swarming through the galaxy.
"Ms. Starr," Dennix began in a deadpan tone, "a pleasure as always."
"The pleasure is entirely yours, Senator, I assure you," she replied as she walked purposefully up to his desk and sat in the overstuffed chair in front of it. She reached into the small case she carried and withdrew several data cubes, about the size of playing dice, and placed them on his desk between them. The desk was entirely too large, the affectation of someone who desperately wanted to feel important and clutched to himself anything that could help with that imagery. In her own workspace, she had a workstation at counter height; there were no chairs, for her or any of the few visitors she might call to her. She believed that she was in her office to work, and inviting too much comfort for herself or others detracted from the purpose of being there.
"And these would be?" asked Dennix, still showing no emotion as he picked up the cubes one by one.
"Your latest orders and opinions," Starr countered reasonably. "Fleet directives plus some policy and opinion matters you should be pushing on the Confederation."
"I wasn't aware my opinions had changed overnight," he replied dryly.
"You know how this works."
He said nothing, instead choosing to simmer quietly. He had no idea making a deal with the devil would be this cumbersome.
"We have one very specific request for the navy," Starr continued. "I followed the paperwork we had you submit for court-martial proceedings for Commander Loren Stone and others on Avenger for various irregularities during their last deployment."
Dennix almost chuckled. Their 'last deployment' was such a sterile way to describe it. No, their previous deployment had single-handedly saved the population of an entire planet from a Priman DNA virus and cemented their spot at the top of the enemy's most-wanted list.
"Yes," he replied, "the paperwork seems to have been misdirected or lost by the administrative staff in the navy."
"Twice," she growled. "It appears you have a ship full of heroes that their fellows have chosen to worship."
"You can't blame them, can you?" Dennix replied. "They saved a planet, and that plus their combat record so far accords them a lot of attention and therefore consideration.
"
"I realize this, so I have a way to deal with it." She shifted in her seat, the first subtle sign Dennix had yet seen that might be considered a show of being uncomfortable. "You need to order Avenger off the front lines. We know she's just coming back from trials after her refit, so that's a fine excuse to keep her sidelined. You can even say you're doing it to keep the heroes of the Confederation out of the line of fire for a while. In any case, you need to order the navy to find them a far-off, out of the way hole to banish them to. Keep them out of our business for a while, or our methods towards them will become much more direct and make you look more suspicious."
Without anything else to add, she got up and took her leave.
Dennix blew his breath out in a rush. He was caught between two forces in his desire to shape the future of the Confederation.
On one side were the Primans. They had promised he would rule as their governor after they had pacified the Confederation. The problem was, they couldn't come to an agreement on what constituted 'pacified'. Dennix was willing to give them some leeway, as long as his vision of Confed would come to pass. The biggest factor working in their favor was the simple truth that he thought they were going to succeed. They wanted the entire galaxy, and had been doing a stellar job in this spiral arm of it so far. Even if they didn't make it all the way, he didn't see how they would ever relinquish their hold on this region of space.
On the other side was the Confed military. The navy had managed some spectacular victories, often against bad odds and fought at a disadvantage. There was the slimmest of chances that the navy could pull it off and push the Primans out of their space. If the navy won, he could still rule Confed by capitalizing on the victory with himself at the helm. The problem there was that the navy had the means to discover the game he'd been playing. If they managed a victory, he'd need to find a way to cement his control and de-fang them so they didn't try to oppose him. The crew of Avenger in particular had shown a knack for having their way with directives but always succeeding in their goals, and the brilliant but disgraced Admiral Nodam Bak saw his duty to the ideals of the Confederation above all else, including his own career and life. He'd need to convince them to follow him, but he had no idea how. It was important, though, that he was the one to steer the Confederation. He was the one who knew best; he was the one who deserved to be in charge.
He found himself having to choose to root for either the conquest-hungry alien horde or the people who would most likely be his undoing if they managed to keep Confed free. It was enough to give him heartburn.
Chapter Two
Commander Tash sat at the small dining table in his quarters on Callidor, finishing the remains of a light breakfast. He'd ordered Callidor heavily fortified once he'd chosen it as his new base, and construction had been going non-stop since then. His engineers had built reinforced bunkers, blanketed the planet in anti-aircraft defenses, and he'd kept an entire fleet tethered to the Callidor system and his own uses. While the Primans were busily reforming the Enkarran Empire's former planets to their own specifications, he'd chosen to make his formal headquarters closer to the front lines, on the first planet they'd claimed on that first triumphant day of emergence.
He dabbed the corners of his mouth with the fine linen napkin that had come with the meal. He'd grown to enjoy the perks that went with the office of Commander, moreso since he'd integrated some of the benefits and niceties the local population had to offer. It was decidedly un-Priman to be so caught up in material things, considering his people had learned to live without for generations while beyond the last habitable planets of the galaxy.
He got up and strolled to the large picture window of his suite. The new Priman building housed the government and administration offices, so his quarters along with other high ranking personnel were located in the building as well. The building stood one hundred fifty stories tall and was defended by military grade shields. He felt as safe as anywhere else he could be right now.
A soft chime from the door to his quarters signaled the beginning of the workday. He confidently approached the door and hit the tab to open it, revealing his new Representative. She was of middle age, standing tall and proud as befitted her rank. Commander Tash had taken an abnormally long time to reorganize his Representatives, breaking with Priman tradition. He had a few unique problems that accompanied the situation. Normally, there was a Commander and a handful of Representatives, two of which were crucial to the Priman chain of succession. The senior Representative was the former Commander, while the junior Representative would be the next Commander in line. The idea was that the Representatives would do their best to wisely advice the Commander, the elder offering experience from his or her own time on the job, the junior one learning on the job before taking the mantle someday.
The previous Commander, the now-Representative Velk, had been kidnapped by a Confederation strike team well inside the Priman lines. This presented Tash with a unique opportunity to hand-pick a replacement senior Representative, and he'd gone straight to Terir. Terir had himself once been a Representative, among the small and very elite cadre of Primans who had the ear of the Commander at all times and were trusted to issue orders as if they came from the Commander himself.
Terir had helped Tash come to power in the first place, well ahead of schedule. It was Representative Terir who had secretly struck a bargain with the Council to oust Velk and raise Tash to the status of Commander early, and Tash wanted the other Priman on his staff, both as a way to return the favor of his help as well as so they could converse in the clear and not have to play those silly cloak-and-dagger games of clandestine meetings.
Now, his new junior Representative, destined to someday become Commander after the Council had decided he'd met the objectives set forth for him to accomplish, stood before him.
"Ah, Representative Ravine," Tash said as he beckoned her to enter. She breezed in as if she owned the place, something Tash saw as both confident and perhaps a bit arrogant. Both attributes would be acceptable to him; he had plenty of practice in manipulating people, both Priman and otherwise.
"Commander," she replied neutrally.
"I suppose you're wondering why I asked you to meet me here your first day on the job as junior Representative." It was more statement than question, and she assumed he was being rhetorical so said nothing in reply.
"Your family is next in line to rule, and in accordance with our customs have offered you. The Council approved, and here you are." He grabbed a few data chips from a table and offered them to her.
She took them and waited for an explanation.
"These will get you up to speed, Representative," Tash continued. "You'll have much to learn, from Representative Velk's kidnapping to our DNA virus and other weapons programs. You'll be expected to learn more than to offer advice, but I will call upon you to see what you're thinking and to see how you analyze the situations we find ourselves in. The first thing you will do is oversee a small project that needs to be handled." He stared at her intently, as if looking for something about her that would tell him if she was up to the task. Finally, he continued. "There are a number of planets, systems, and loose coalitions that need to be dealt with. For every large and capable body like the Confederation of Systems or the Talaran Collection, there are a dozen smaller, weaker systems that need to be absorbed or eliminated. We've let some of these weaker parties have a pass as it were, since they were in no way capable of offering meaningful resistance to us. Now that we've pushed through the Talaran Collection and stalemated the Confederation, it's time to address these smaller groups."
"Are bargains to be made?" she asked, "or do I just offer surrender or destruction?"
Tash actually chuckled at that. "I like your way of thinking, Representative." He was silent for a few beats, then continued. "We may have led some of them on as to our final intent, but in the end there are only the two options you've just mentioned."
"Then it's time for me to start studying," Ravine re
plied.
"Let's introduce you to the rest of the administrative staff at the morning briefing," Commander Tash continued, and waved her through the door back into the hallway.
As much as everyone would have liked the festivities to run for a week, the next morning most of Avenger's crew was back aboard to finish putting her back together. Captain Elco was in his cabin when he received an incoming message from Fleet Admiral Privac aboard his flagship, the Sabre class fleet carrier Thunderbird.
Elco quickly tugged at his uniform and sat down at the desk, then tapped the button to receive the call.
"Captain Elco," Fleet Admiral Privac said with a gracious smile. "Good to see you."
"Likewise, Admiral," Elco replied.
"I heard some of your people got married yesterday," Privac continued. "It's nice to see the lighter side of things once in a while, wouldn't you say?"
"Definitely," Elco replied with a smile of his own. "The gift opening isn't for another few hours; if you're anywhere near, you could probably still make it."
"Well, I have a gift of sorts for Avenger, but I'm not sure what you'll think of it."
Now Elco's curiosity was piqued. He hadn't expected any personal interaction when it came to getting orders. He would usually just look at his message buffer, see new directives for his ship and plan accordingly. Captains of ships that operated so far away from the support of home were given wide latitude to exercise their missions as they saw fit, and a briefing from a Fleet Admiral was uncommon. "I tremble with anticipation, Admiral," Elco said with a straight face.
Privac grinned even if Elco wasn't going to. "I received a directive from Delos regarding certain ships and crews that were deemed overworked."
