Stars & Empire: 10 Galactic Tales Read online

“Well boys, I’m hitting the rack,” he said as he pushed away from the table. “See you later.”

  “We’re not going anywhere,” Twingo said. Jason rolled his eyes and trudged off to his quarters for some sleep.

  beep-beep

  Jason rolled over, not quite awake, but not fully asleep.

  beep-beep

  This better be good … He knew The Vault was still a few days away even with the incredible speed the DL7 was cruising at. He wanted nothing more than to sleep the “implant crud” off, but his door chime seemed to have other ideas. “Come in!” Jason shouted to the wall. The computer unlocked and slid the door open to reveal Twingo and Ma’Fredich standing in the passageway. The lights behind them were dimmed, indicating it was “night hours” on board. The pair slid in and managed to look a little sheepish as they saw Jason sprawled out on his bed, staring at them through heavy-lidded eyes.

  “We need to talk.” Ma’Fredich was the first to speak as they entered his quarters and slid the door shut. Twingo held up a finger to his lips.

  “Computer, disable all auditory monitoring devices within these quarters,” Twingo instructed the computer.

  “Authorization needed,” the emotionless tenor informed them. Twingo looked to Jason.

  “Do it,” he said.

  “Acknowledged. Monitoring systems disabled in the captain’s quarters under authorization of First Officer Commander Burke.” The ship fell silent.

  “I take it this isn’t a social call,” Jason said. The vibe in the room was heavy; whatever was on their minds had put them both in a somber mood. Twingo gestured to Ma’Fredich that he should do the talking.

  “From what Twingo has told me, this isn’t the type of work you guys normally do. I’m putting not an insignificant amount of trust in you by telling you this.” He took a deep breath and stared at the ceiling for a moment before continuing. “Do you know what the containers in your cargo hold are? No? Well I’ll tell you; they’re stasis pods, designed to hold biological entities intact for long-term storage or movement. These are typically used for dangerous prisoners or medical patients. The pods in your hold contain neither; you’ve unwittingly been drawn into the trafficking of sentient beings against their will.”

  Jason’s stomach tightened and performed a somersault at that last bit. He stared at the doctor in horror, not wanting to believe what he had been told. Ma’Fredich went on, “Before I continue, I suppose I should know what your views are on this practice.”

  “Some of our darkest chapters involved the enslaving of our fellow man. I can’t overstate the revulsion most of us feel at this.”

  “Most?”

  “Unfortunately, it does still exist even today,” Jason said uncomfortably. “We’re not a unified planet, and not all regions feel the same. There are some countries that still look the other way.” As he said it out loud, he felt a profound sense of shame for the human species. He was painfully aware of his species’ level of sophistication compared to many of the beings he’d met and was still a bit defensive about it.

  “They really are a relatively young species,” Twingo came to Jason’s defense, making him feel all the worse for it.

  “I see,” the doctor continued. “Your homeworld and its internal politics aren’t germane to this particular conversation. What are important are your views on the subject, of which you seem quite sincere. Twingo and I have been discussing some possible options we have, but we’re going to need your help.”

  “You’re going to try and free them.” Jason wasn’t asking, he was stating the obvious.

  “You wouldn’t? I need to reclaim my honor, Jason. It’s all I have left.”

  “How did you get mixed up in this?” If he was going to stick his neck out, he needed to know his co-conspirators were on the level.

  “I’m a geneticist by trade but I have a background in molecular biology, and even a smattering of surgical experience. I was approached by Bondrass some years ago to enhance some of his security personnel and find a way to circumvent the rules concerning bio-enhancements in a hand-to-hand combat sport he has a major stake in. I refused outright and let him see my disdain for the whole idea. Bondrass is not someone you insult, as I discovered.” He seemed to be breaking down as he tried to finish his tale. “He took someone very close to me: my sister. He used her as leverage to get me to perform the tasks he wanted. It wasn’t enough just to have my servitude, he wanted to break me … and break me he did. While I toiled away, he made certain I knew all the horrors he had heaped upon my sister. If I attempted to break away, call the authorities, or rescue her … she would be killed. My arrogance had cost her everything, and my cowardice made sure she never got it back.”

  “Doc, why are you deciding to take action now?” Jason’s voice was gentle, but he felt he needed to convince the doctor to abandon any rash plans that would endanger his sibling and himself.

  “Bondrass no longer has any hold over me. My sister finally succumbed to the constant abuse. His only leverage is to threaten my life directly … so he has no leverage.”

  “I guess you’d better start from the beginning,” Jason said, now fully awake.

  Over the next hour and a half the doctor laid out what he knew of the operation. Most of the beings that were stored at, and shipped to, The Vault were to be of some use, either as payment or direct entertainment for Bondrass and a handful of other crime bosses that made up the cadre. Many were pitted against each other in a type of blood sport that sounded like a vicious version of mixed martial arts tournaments on Earth. Others were used as shock troops once the proper behavioral controls were put in place. There were also the usual mix of what one would expect: sex slaves, trophies, and leverage against those being extorted, like Dr. Ma’Fredich.

  The stasis pods were all eventually transferred to The Vault as a staging area before being sent off to their final destination. The security was somewhat lax, according to the doctor, since nobody in their right mind would dare cross any of the powerful bosses that controlled The Vault, much less all of them at once. This didn’t mean it was going to be easy, however. The Vault was usually heavily populated and, from what Jason was hearing, it was often a free-for-all of true wild west-style proportions. The three sat in the captain’s quarters for a few more long hours hashing out the plan and using the station schematics the doctor had stored on his personal computer. They didn’t want to risk that one of the goons on board had the ability to monitor their use of coms and data networks, so they stayed off the main computer. Once they felt they had it down, Jason leaned back on his bed and laced his fingers behind his head, staring from one of his companions to the other. There was a long, heavy pause before he spoke.

  “You know we’re probably going to be killed for this, right?” Jason felt he needed to cut right to the heart of the matter.

  “It’s a good plan, Jason,” Twingo protested. “Your species is quite adept at subterfuge, it seems.”

  “It’s only a good plan because it’s based on nothing. Doc’s the only one who’s been to The Vault, and even he admits he wasn’t as observant as he should have been. If there’s one thing in covert ops I’ve learned as a constant, it’s that no plan survives first contact. This is likely to go sideways on us almost immediately.”

  “So you would rather not be a part of this,” Ma’Fredich stated flatly, but without rancor. Jason stared at the ceiling a moment before blowing out a huge breath through pursed lips, startling the two others.

  “No,” Jason said, “I just want you both to understand exactly what the consequences of our failure will be. Or our success. Getting caught on the station is easy, we’ll probably just get burned down and that’ll be it. If we manage to pull this off and get away…” He shook his head, “I might be able to get back to Earth and hide, but you two will be marked men. Beings. Whatever.”

  “We’ve thought that through,” Twingo said. “After learning what I have … I’m not sure how comfortable I’d be just walking away. It’s
easy to turn a blind eye to those you don’t know and don’t see, but we’re hauling a load of them to what amounts to a life of anguish and torture. That makes each of us culpable in some way or another.” Jason could only nod his agreement at the engineer’s point of view. He reflected quietly for a moment, and then his eyes snapped wide open.

  “Where the fuck has Deetz been during this flight? He hasn’t been on the bridge for the entire time, I’ve checked.”

  “While you’ve been getting your implants and recovering, he’s locked himself in the com room for much of that time,” Ma’Fredich said.

  “I’m not sure I like that he’s being so secretive. He’s the one loose thread in this plan; he wants this deal to happen, so it’s likely he’ll be a hindrance more than anything.” Jason still didn’t fully trust the sardonic synth.

  “You know, we can find out what he’s up to.” Twingo was looking speculatively at the others. “It might not be such a bad idea to see who he’s been talking to, and what about.” He laid out what commands Jason needed to give the ship’s computer to gain access to the com logs. Deetz had made an oversight when he named Jason as First Officer. He hadn’t realized that as far as the ship was concerned, Jason was the de facto commanding officer in the absence of a captain, far outranking the administrative assistant who only spoke for the captain on certain matters. Either way, the first officer had access and privileges to nearly all parts of the ship, something Deetz probably hadn’t expected Jason to discover on his own.

  “Shit. Here are the com logs. The date and times are recorded but he deleted the message bodies,” Jason said, dismayed. “The fact he bothered deleting the logs indicates whatever he’s up to isn’t something he wants us finding out about.”

  “That’s true. I wouldn’t be surprised if—”

  “He’s going active now!” Ma’Fredich was pointing to the new entry to the com log that had a flashing **ACTIVE** next to it.

  “Computer, display active com traffic to this terminal and record,” Jason said as he leapt off the bed and rushed to stand over Twingo’s shoulder to look at the display. One of the monitors divided into two sections: one showed Deetz quite clearly, the other showed Bondrass in far less resolution. The crime boss was talking.

  “ … is going well on your end. I’m trusting you with some high value cargo this time.”

  “Everything is still on track, sir.” Deetz’s tone was servile and made Jason cringe in disgust.

  “And what about our side deal?” Bondrass leaned into the camera so it appeared to zoom in on his face.

  “I think we’re a go on that. He’s had his implants installed and has been recovering in his room. The engineer has been puttering around with the ship and the doctor seems to do whatever he can to avoid your men.”

  “Excellent. Once you land, incapacitate the human and have him put in stasis. I was going to have my men deal with the good doctor, but I think I want you to do it. Kill that arrogant, pretentious Ma’Fredich and I’ll know you’re my guy.” Jason and Ma’Fredich looked at each other in alarm.

  “What about the engineer?”

  “Who cares? They’re a dime a dozen, I’m sure someone in The Vault can find an interesting use for him. Who knows … it may even actually be as an engineer.” Bondrass’ coarse laugh afterwards paled Twingo’s normally blue hue. The crime boss continued, “Once that’s done, and you’ve given the cargo to the handlers, get your ass back here with that beautiful ship. Klegsh may have been unwilling to sell her, but I can see you’re much more reasonable. Bring that gunship back and you’ll have earned a spot on my staff.”

  “That sounds excellent, sir. We’re currently three days’ flight out from The Vault. I’ll contact you when everything is in order.” The display blanked and a text header showing the log file location, time stamp, and message duration was displayed in its place. Nobody spoke for a long while.

  “Well, I guess that settles what the bastard was up to,” Jason broke the silence. “This changes the plan. We’re going to have to neutralize Deetz before we hit The Vault.”

  “I can help with that,” Ma’Fredich said. “I’ve got detailed files on the different types of synths, I’ll work out a way to incapacitate him.”

  “I’ll help,” Twingo said. “I never did trust that damn machine, I knew he had to be working another angle after Jason told me his story. You sure we shouldn’t just kill him?”

  “Not yet,” Jason said firmly. “This plan just became a lot more fluid, I may need him available still. If we blast him I won’t have that option.” Both nodded respectfully, indicating their assent. “Okay, so we know what we’re doing in the short term. Doc, find a way to knock that backstabbing robot out. Twingo, I’ll meet you in Engineering later to see about fabricating some concealable handheld weapons. I’d search the armory, but we need to be discreet. Any questions? No? Great. Now if you don’t mind, I’m going to try and get a couple more hours of sleep.” The two others took the hint and walked to the door. Ma’Fredich paused in the entryway and turned back to Jason.

  “Jason, sometimes you call me ‘Doc.’ Is there some significance to this?

  “Ah,” Jason said, smiling. “It’s short for doctor. In my time in one of Earth’s military branches, my team always had a medic with us that looked after us. We all just called them ‘Doc.’ It’s meant as a sign of respect, but if it bothers you I’ll try to stop.”

  “No, no. I think I quite like it,” Ma’Fredich smiled as he walked out the door. “Doc,” he repeated to himself before the hatch closed completely. Jason smiled and shook his head before lying back down and trying to get some more sleep with all the dangers that surrounded him swirling through his dreams.

  CHAPTER 13

  Jason woke up only a few hours after his two friends had left his room. He felt refreshed and ready to get started nonetheless. Despite the seriousness and the danger involved with this latest mission, he felt completely exhilarated. After a shower and some breakfast he wandered down to Engineering. He wasn’t surprised to see Ma’Fredich and Twingo together, standing by a work bench going over some type of schematic. The two had become nearly inseparable on this flight despite their differences in social standing and vocational backgrounds. The two saw him and waved him over to the table. From what he could tell, they’d been working tirelessly on their plan to knock Deetz out of commission.

  “Fill me in, boys,” Jason said, his usual chroot mug grasped firmly in his hand. They did. Although he didn’t understand most of the technical aspects of the plan (or any of them, if he was honest) he took it on faith that the doctor and engineer could come up with a working plan. It was relatively simple on the surface, and in the end he had them fabricate three sets of the specialized equipment they would need to execute the plan; that way any one of them could get to the synth in case he acted before they did.

  Next came the handheld weapons; they needed something like a hold-out pistol that couldn’t be detected by the security scanners that may be in place in The Vault. Twingo had decided to go low-tech, in a way. “I took some inspiration from your weapon that was in the armory, Jason. Fairly archaic, but effective. While making an Earth-type projectile gun is plausible, the necessity for metals means it still may be detected.” Twingo was showing an exploded view of what looked like a Buck Rogers version of an over-under Derringer pistol. “This baby is all synthetic and has no power source, that’s the beauty of it. When you pull the trigger, a chemical reaction instantaneously generates the power to fire a single shot. The shot will destroy the emitter and consume the chemicals so I’m including two shots per weapon. It isn’t much, I’ll admit.”

  “No, it’s perfect,” Jason disagreed. “If it takes more than two shots with one of these, we’ve already fucked the entire operation up beyond repair. I love it. Build it.” He nodded to the pair and left the engineering bay. He would have liked to have stayed to help out, but he would best serve their mission by wandering the ship and keeping Deetz and the guard
s distracted from what the other two were doing. With that in mind, he veered from his original course heading to the bridge and walked to the galley instead.

  As Jason had hoped, one of Bondrass’ security troops was seated at the table, as usual. He had no idea which one; the trio looked too similar and had the same apparent lack of anything that could remotely be considered a personality. He got another mug of chroot and sat directly across from the guard, plastering a wide, ridiculous smile on his face. “Hi!”

  “What do you want?”

  “I just realized that we’ve never really had a chance to talk, just you and me.” Jason kept up the same stupid smile while the alien had a look on his face that said he’d rather scrape Jason off the bottom of his boot than talk to him. Wordlessly, the guard stood, glared at him, and stalked out of the galley area. Jason got up and followed him to the lounge. “Ah! Good idea, the seats in there are so uncomfortable. This will be much nicer.” This time the alien actually snarled in disgust and stormed off toward crew berthing. As soon as he was out of sight the smile disappeared from Jason’s face and was replaced with a scowl. His harassment paid off as two of the guards were out of the way for a while and the third wouldn’t be leaving the cargo bay. He eyed the stairs to the upper command deck speculatively. It would be useful to go up and keep Deetz distracted, but he was afraid he wouldn’t be able to keep up the charade of the ignorant rube, or be able to keep his hostility in check. He decided that Deetz would probably be just as interested in avoiding them and would likely stay on the bridge for the rest of the flight, so instead he turned and walked back to his quarters to go through the technical data Doc had left him on his new implants.

  Nearly forty-eight hours later, Jason, Twingo, and Ma’Fredich had everything prepared that they would need to execute their plan. Since there was nothing to do but wait during the remainder of the flight, Jason took extra care to keep the nerves of his cohorts under control; they had never been in combat before, so they didn’t know how to channel the stress and energy that came with a pending operation into something positive, or at least non-destructive. The easiest way he knew how to accomplish this was to make them do something genuinely useful. They were both too smart to be coddled. So instead of busy-work, he asked them to help him get his implants configured and tweaked to suit him. Afterwards, he was able to have pertinent information fed directly into his visual cortex. The displays appeared to float in his field of view in a way that seemed almost natural. Twingo even slaved the targeting system from his railgun to his neural interface. He could now engage targets without having to shoulder the weapon and sight directly through the optics. Jason’s human brain seemed to adapt quickly and he soon developed an insatiable desire to see what other tricks his new wetware could do, but Doc cautioned him to take it easy and acclimate slowly. It was easy to become enamored with what the technology could offer to the point of becoming completely distracted and detached from reality, something they couldn’t afford during the upcoming mission.