by J. L. Curtis
The next morning he woke to find his arm around Nicole, and her looking at him with a smile, “Thank you for being a gentleman. Now can you let go of me? I need the fresher.”
Fargo jerked his arm away, blushing, “Sorry. I didn’t…”
Nicole laughed sadly, “Well, at least we’re sleep compatible, and I didn’t have a single nightmare. That’s better than the fleet average.” She got off the bed, and disappeared into the fresher. Fargo jumped up, quickly got dressed, then walked into the restaurant part of the building searching for a bulb of coffee.
***
Colonel Keads said, “So in summary, the Patel clan is gone, we’ve turned their house into a barracks for the unmarried males of both sects and peace bonded them, under penalty of death. Did the same for both sects for any honor killings.”
Fargo saw nods from the split screen of Nicole and Jiri and others at the Enclave, “That’s good, but what about keeping the peace? Are we going to be on the hook for that?”
Keads leaned back, smiling, “No, but you’re the threat I’m holding over them. The four that Horse…?” He looked down at his notes, “Yes, Horse beheaded turned out to be the father, mother, and two brothers of the Fathi Khanna. We’ve pretty much let it slip, if you will, that the Ghorkas will be happy to repeat that education if it happens again. Any questions?”
Fargo smiled, “Good. Just one question here, Colonel.”
“Go.”
“There were some weird noises as we were clearing the building, I was wondering what the source was.”
The colonel looked around furtively, “Ah, that was the major. He forgot to turn off the PA on his armor. Apparently, he was, shall we say, mildly upset when heads started coming out the window. It seems he has a rather weak stomach. Of course, he said he must have had a touch of food poisoning...”
Sightings
Fargo was enjoying the sunshine on the porch, idly throwing the rawhide chew for Canis and working on the link with her, as Cattus lolled in a patch of sunshine, belly up. Fetch he projected, only to have Canis look at him, sit, and scratch. Throwing up his hands, he said, “Okay, dog. You’re on your own there.”
Suddenly his wrist comp beeped an alert. Fargo glanced down and tapped it to clear the alert, only to have it reoccur moments later. Grumbling, he got up and walked in the cabin, flopped down on the chair and punched up the e-tainment console. “Display alert.”
The system displayed the header from Captain Jace, a coded string of numbers, followed by the words, DOWNLOAD ONLY. Fargo slid a data chip into the console, hit acknowledge and heard the console click, then spit the chip out. Huh, wonder why… Sliding the chip back in he hit display, UNABLE TO LOAD- DECRYPTION REQUIRED popped up. “Dammit.”
Fargo got up, dug out his standalone e-reader, powering it up, “Let’s see if this one will work.” The holo formed, the word NUMBERS swam up, Ah crap, now what? What the hell is Jace sending me that is so… “Ethan Fargo, eight three four six alpha romeo two four eight.”
The holo rotated to show Hunter from what appeared to be a satellite image, but not from the space station’s location. Some streaks that appeared to be tracks displayed, but none of them went to the regular spaceports. They seemed to concentrate in one location, well away from any terraformer, in the high northern latitude northeast of Rushing River. A string of numbers followed. As far as he could tell, it was track origins, dates, times, and maybe duration.
He shook his head in frustration, then bumped the holo forward, now it showed an IR shot of what looked like a depression, a ship, some kind of opening in the side of the depression, and what appeared to be people on the ground, “Gah, this is about useless. I don’t even know what I’m looking at.” Tapping the e-tainment console, he said, “Priority message, Nicole Levesque.”
It found Nicole’s address, popping up a message blank, and he continued, “Have something you need to see. Are you available in two hours? Send and disconnect.”
Fargo pulled the data chip out, got up, and headed out the door to the storage unit. Pulling the liteflyer out, he configured it for flight, then went back in and hit the autochef for a coffee bulb. Figuring he would be gone for at least four or five hours, he loaded the animals’ food dishes and carried them out to the porch, then brought the water dishes out.
His wrist comp pinged, and he tapped it. A message from Nicole scrolled across it, SURE. I’LL BE AT THE WINERY. REPLY REQUIRED? He smiled, “Yes, on the way. Will need reader. Send.”
***
Fargo flew quickly down to the spaceport, after releasing Canis and Cattus to go wherever they went when he left. When he arrived, he decided to take a quick detour on the way to the winery, and stopped by the clinic, finding OneSvel there by himself.
He quickly passed the data chip to him, “This is hot. I think this is possibly a Goon outpost here on Hunter. Can you push it up to higher?”
OneSvel took the chip in a pseudopod, slipped it into his datacomp and copied it as he chittered into the GalTrans, “Not until I get relieved here. I will get it out tonight, but I’m not sure how long it will take to get through channels. Where did you get it?”
“It came from an anonymous source, let’s just leave it at that. It’s a source that I can’t compromise, at least not right now.”
Waving his pseudopod, OneSvel chittered, “Well, without attribution, they will probably downgrade it.”
“Understood. You have anything for me?
“Nothing. Whom will you share this with?”
“Chief Levesque. She’s the militia intel person. She may be able to figure this out, and know who to get it to.”
OneSvel gave the chip back, chittering, “Maybe, but she will have the same problem with attribution.”
Fargo shrugged, “Well, I can only do what I can.”
***
Nicole looked up from the hologram, “Did you know this place existed?” When Fargo shook his head, she said, “I’m betting this is a Trader outpost. It follows their pattern. Get boots on the ground, establish a presence, then claim it for the Goons.”
She rolled the holo back, pointed at the tracks, “These are all direct approaches, not orbitals. They’re coming in hot, and burning down to stay directly opposite the space station, so there isn’t any tracking.” She looked up at him, “So how did Jace get these? This is over a month’s worth of data, but the IR shots are two days old. They aren’t even here, are they?”
“I don’t know. The big question is, what do we do with this? Turn it over to the Patrol? And how the hell do I explain it? Or do we try to get more information? Put some bodies on the ground? But if they have sensors…”
Nicole shook her head, “No, we don’t put people on the ground. That’s the Patrol’s job. How do we explain it? We don’t. Give it to me, and I’ll submit it through the intel channel. Nobody outside that channel will be cleared to see the raw, and nobody with any sense inside is going to ask. That’s just not done if you’re not directly involved.”
“Okay, push it up. The only question we don’t have an answer to is whether there is a Dragoon enclave there or not. If one is, then they are going to try to claim Hunter sooner or later.”
Nicole shuddered, “I don’t want to lose everything I have, nor do I want to be a slave to them. I’ve seen the reports of what happens to women under their control.”
Nicole did something with the data, then embedded it into a picture of the winery, Steganography? Is that… “How safe is that?” Fargo asked.
Nicole looked up, “This?” Pointing to the screen, she added, “Even if the bad guys intercept it, they don’t have either key, so it’s perfectly safe.” She added a few words about how the winery was progressing, pressed send and the message cleared from the screen.
“How is that possible? And how will the person that gets it know the keys?”
Nicole chuckled, “Basic intel weenie training… It’s called Kerckhoff’s desideratum which states that a cryptosystem should be secure eve
n if everything about the system except the key is public knowledge.” Waving her hand at the datacomp, she said, “It was a basic exercise we did for the entire time we were in school. If you got caught, you got set back a week for each catch. I never got caught.”
“But how did you send the key?”
“I didn’t. The person I sent it to is one of my classmates, she’s still active, and I used the same key we’ve always had. Nobody could ever figure it out,” she said with a laugh. Wagging her finger at him she continued, “Not telling. Don’t ask.” Handing the chip back to Fargo she asked, “Want to see the ancient stuff I use to make wine here?”
***
Nicole said, “So that’s the winery. Granted, most of the equipment is four hundred years old, but it was never set up until I got here three years ago. I figure it will last through both my and Holly’s lifetimes, except for that damn bottle maker.”
Fargo smiled, “I’m amazed you were able to get all those grapes trained like that, much less figured out which is which!”
Nicole laughed, “Well, when you grow up looking at vines, it’s pretty easy. The mechs make it even easier, since they do all the trimming, picking, and autosorting.” As they walked into the main building she added, “All of this is basically automated too, I just do some fine tuning based on the sugar content, and what I want the wine to taste like.”
Nicole’s wrist comp pinged, “Ah, an answer to my message. Let’s go back to the house.” She led the way back to the house, brought her e-tainment system up, chuckling, “It’s in the system. Now we wait. Gotta love FTL messaging!”
Fargo glanced at the message on the screen and asked, “How do you know from that? It just looks like a throwaway… Never mind, not asking.”
Nicole glanced at the system and said, “You hungry? How would you like a home cooked meal?”
“Home cooked?”
“Yes, home cooked. I actually do cook, not just autochef. Neardeer medallions, sauce, Asparagus and rice? It won’t take long.”
Fargo’s mouth watered, “Oh hell yes. Please!”
***
Fargo leaned back in the chair, “That was… Magnificent! Where did you learn how to cook like that? I never learned how…”
Nicole laughed, “Genied hostess, remember? And I actually enjoy cooking, I just hate cleaning up afterward.”
Jumping up, Fargo picked up the dishes, “I’ll gladly do KP as a payback for that meal.”
With the dishes done, they settled comfortably in the living room, talking about what might happen with the data that had been forwarded. Fargo sensed Nicole relaxing and she began telling him about her family and why she’d run away. She segued into her training, marriage, and how she’d ended up on Hunter.
Fargo shared his history up to the point of battle for the Vega system, but stopped short of describing the loss of most of his company, instead saying, “Wow, I guess I better get going. It’s getting late.”
Nicole stretched luxuriously, “You’re welcome to stay the night. I wouldn’t want to try to fly back into the Green at night in a basic liteflyer. I’ve got a spare bedroom.”
He thought about it for a few seconds, “It won’t be an issue with Holly?”
“She lives in the old house. She says she likes her privacy. I think she just doesn’t want me to tell her to pick up after herself. Damn girl is messy as hell,” she grumbled. “Should have put her in the military back in the day.”
Fargo laughed, “Yeah, that does teach you how to pick up after yourself. Sure, if you don’t mind?”
“Not at all, but you get autochef for breakfast. I’m not a morning person.”
***
Fargo made a quick trip through the fresher, looked around, then dumped his shipsuit, undies and socks in for a cleaning, figuring it wouldn’t make a difference how he slept.
Two hours later, he was in the middle of an erotic dream of making love to Nicole when he came awake, realizing it wasn’t a dream as Nicole gave a little scream and collapsed on top of him, “Oh God, I needed… Oh my God! You’re a psi!” He felt her mind slam closed with a block as she shuddered one more time, “You bastard!” She beat on his chest as she drew a deep breath, “How could you do that to me?”
Confused and stunned, he asked, “What did I do?”
“Not tell me you’re a psi! Now you know everything! Oh God, I felt your mind, I saw…”
Fargo hugged her, “I’m sorry, I never meant…”
Nicole sat up, “Oh well, in for a credit, in for a million.”
Fargo said, “I thought it was in for a thousand?”
Nicole laughed and wiggled, “Men…”
Fargo felt himself respond, and he stroked her softly as they made love again.
***
Fargo stretched as well as he could with Nicole lying half on top of him, snoring gently. His arm was asleep and tingling. He slowly worked it out from under her and eased out of bed, padding quietly to the fresher. Dialing it to rejuve, he set his clothes out and climbed in, reveling in the feel of the sprays of water and infrared.
Climbing out, he dressed quickly, noting that Nicole was gone. He hesitated, not sure what to do or say, sighed and headed for the autochef. Punching up a bulb of coffee, he sat silently at the table, What the hell happened last night? I know that wasn’t a dream, but I don’t know what I feel. It’s been too long. Lust? Hell yes… But what do I do now? I…
Nicole came into the kitchen, punched up one of her cappuccinos, and turned to Fargo as she leaned against the counter, “Second thoughts?”
He looked up at her, “Honestly, I don’t know what I’m thinking.”
She smiled ruefully, “Well, I was a little forward last night…”
“A little?”
“It’s been a long time, at least for me. I trust you, Ethan, especially now that I know you’re a psi. I also know how badly you’ve been hurt, and how long it’s been for you, too. I felt that when we connected. Last night can either be the start of something good between us, or a one-time thing. It’s your choice.”
The autochef dinged and her bulb dropped into the tray, giving him time to frame an answer. “I liked what we had, and yes, I’d like to see you again. That isn’t an issue, at least for me. But I wonder what…”
Nicole interrupted, “Holly isn’t an issue. She likes you, and has been pushing for me to find somebody. She keeps reminding me I’m not dead yet. I don’t see it being an issue with Mikhail or Luann either, unless you know something I don’t.”
Fargo shook his head, “Nor do I. But our living arrangements…”
His wrist comp went off and Nicole’s e-tainment system lit with INCOMING MESSAGE. IMPORTANCE HIGH, stopping both of them. They walked into the living room together as Nicole brought up the screen, “Display incoming message.”
F- CAMERON, SJ COL
T- HUNTER MILITIA GROUP A
S- MEETING
R- GALPAT HUNTER OPORD 28240326
GALPAT HUNTER REQ MILIT CDRS AND INTEL SECT HEADS FOR MTG AT HQ TOMORROW AT 1800. URGENT MATTER OF NAT’L INTEREST. BILLETING AVAILABLE.
COORD SHUTTLE TIMES-
NEWSYD 0800
ROSTOV 1000
RUSHRVR 1100
MANDATORY MTG. ALL ADDEES RESP REQ.
S/PALETTE FOR CAMERON
Fargo rogered up from his wrist comp as Nicole quickly replied that she would make an 1100 departure at the spaceport.
“Are you thinking what I’m thinking,” Fargo asked.
Nicole cocked her head, “Maybe, but less than twenty-four divs is a quick turnaround, unless there is additional information we don’t know about.”
“I don’t know, you’re the expert.”
Nicole shrugged, “Well, it’s a principal of intel for the right hand to never let the left hand know what it’s doing, so that’s very possible this data tied in to… Something...”
Fargo replied, “Well, I better to talk to Mikhail. Meet you at the spaceport at 1030?”
&n
bsp; Nicole nodded and hugged him, kissing him softly, “Thank you for last night.”
He hugged her hard, “Thank you.” He also felt her hard block still active, and wondered how she’d developed that capability, then remembered intel types were hypno’ed and trained for a lot of strange things.
***
Colonel Cameron turned the briefing over to a young, perky female lieutenant in GalPat blacks who started off, “Good afternoon, I’m Lieutenant Smythe. I’m the local planet intel officer for Hunter.” Fargo tuned out the rest of her introduction, keying on Nicole, who was watching colonels Cameron and Keads. Both of them appeared to have not gotten a lot of sleep last night, and Cameron seemed the more nervous of the two.
His attention was yanked back when Smythe said, “The Trader killed at Rushing River, third party information forwarded and graded out as A-2, and sniffs of data transmissions have been collated with data developed by the Fleet. There are indicators there is at least one Dragoon detachment operating in secret from Hunter, and at least one or two more detachments operating in this star system. The Fleet is sending a strike group via Altair Four and Star Center. ETA here is two to three weeks. GalPat’s direction is to not provoke any confrontations, try to take them out ourselves, or do anything that might alert them or their spies that we know about them.”
After another hour of back and forth with the other militia commanders, Fargo was frustrated, tired of the BS and ready to go. Turning to Nicole, he asked, “Why are we even here? This was… useless…”
“It’s the game they play. This way the colonel can say, quote, he is keeping his fingers on the pulse of the planet and sitting on the militia to keep them from doing things, unquote. It will look good on his OER when he goes for his stars, or so he thinks.”
Fargo rolled his eyes, “Fine, whatever. Let’s see if we can get a ride back to Rushing River.”
***
Fargo was literally neck deep in cleaning another Slashgator hide as Canis and Cattus rolled in the grass fighting over a rib bone. Suddenly both of them froze and looked off to the west, prompting him to quickly clean his hands and reach for his rifle. He saw an attack shuttle ghosting down the canyon, then pop up to land quickly on his meadow.