by D. M. Pruden
“There is a problem, Captain. Sooner or later, they are going to find out about us. What happens then?”
“I want a meeting of all department heads in half an hour. Include your girlfriend. We need to come up with a plan, or we may never leave this system.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
A New Plan
ALL OF THE “department heads” Pavlovich had euphemistically referred to were assembled in the briefing room.
Gunney was present, representing the tactical team. In another time, a company of regimental Rangers had been at his disposal. As things stood, a small group of former pirates who knew how to operate weapons served as a poor replacement.
Cora represented the technical and engineering disciplines, while Stella stood in for the medical services. Hayden had no idea how she became saddled with that responsibility.
He was the command representative, though with the captain in attendance, he wondered how redundant his presence was.
“We need a plan,” said Pavlovich.
“I presumed you had one when you got us into this situation,” said Stella, making no attempt to conceal her anger. “Perhaps if you had shared your brilliant idea with us to begin with, we might have something to work with.”
Hayden placed a hand on her arm. Annoyed, she shook him off.
“Okay, I’ll concede that things didn’t turn out as I envisioned, but we are in a far stronger position than if we had tried sneaking around the system.”
“How do you figure that?” said Hayden.
Pavlovich frowned. “Had we not declared ourselves, we would have been fired upon by the first patrol ships that came across us.”
“Now we’ll only be shot at by one side,” Stella said.
“That’s right,” said the captain, “and they are the weaker of the two forces. They employ exotic tech to make themselves appear more formidable than they really are.”
“They destroyed two warships,” said Gunney. “I wouldn’t say that was the work of a weak opponent.”
“I read your tactical assessment, and I agree with you. Despite their control of the inner system, the current government is probably unstable. Neither side could afford to lose those ships.”
“Which begs the question,” said Hayden, “why did they engage in a fight over us? Gaining an out-of-date battle cruiser at the expense of so many vessels, one of them a Hawking class destroyer, seems like a bad trade to me.”
Stella stared down Pavlovich. “What aren’t you telling us?”
The captain spread his hands. “I don’t know any more than you. It makes no sense to me either.”
Cora joined in. “How will we get the erganium we require without attracting attention? Now that we are under armed escort, I can’t see how we can do it.”
“And, as mentioned,” said Hayden, “it is only a matter of time before our new friends want to take a closer look at Scimitar.”
“You let me handle that,” said Pavlovich.
All eyes turned to him. Realizing the scrutiny he was under, he shrugged and said, “I know Kovacs and Stromm, and, I’ll bet, half of their upper command. I’m familiar with how these guys think. I can get inside their heads. Don’t worry.”
“You’ll forgive us if we don’t seem reassured,” said Stella.
The room grew quiet as she and Pavlovich stared each other down. Hayden was sure she must be reading something from the captain. He could think of no other reason why she would push him so hard. She wasn’t military, like the others in the room, and didn’t realize how close she came to crossing the line of insubordination. He needed to find a way to defuse the situation before Pavlovich decided he’d put up with enough from her and confined her to quarters, or worse.
“I have an idea about the erganium,” he said.
The tension in the room broke, and all eyes turned to him.
“Well? Don’t keep it to yourself, Kaine. What is it?”
“Our present course takes us to within a couple of million kilometres of Elgar.”
“Close enough to wave at the planet. So what?”
“Well, Kovacs suggested he thought we might be having engine trouble.”
“He was needling me about an old embarrassment.”
“I realize that, sir, but he wouldn’t know if we really did have problems or not. We’ve already bullshitted him about our power to the lasers. What if we incur a navigational error as we near the planet’s outer rings? If we were to drift inside them, we would be concealed from their sensors. We could launch my ship and hide it in the rings until the fleet passes out of sensor range, then proceed to the moon to look for the mineral.”
Pavlovich regarded Hayden as if he noticed him for the first time. “Son of a bitch! That just might work, Kaine.”
“We would still need a plan for how to reunite with Scimitar,” said Cora.
“How about if we go one step more?” said the captain. “What kind of system failure would force us to park in orbit to make repairs?”
“The only thing I can think of would be a massive radiation leak. Protocol is for us to abandon ship pending repair.”
“I don’t like that idea,” said Hayden. “Can you think of anything else?”
“No, no! I like it,” said Pavlovich. “It addresses a lot of our problems. It would prevent Kovacs from sending anyone over to inspect us. They wouldn’t be outfitted to address such a problem and would call a repair vessel from the inner system. It would give us the time we need to refuel the FTL.”
“But we wouldn’t have a crew,” said Stella. “Wouldn’t they evacuate everyone back to Pictor Prime with them?”
“He will take whomever is listed in our crew manifest,” said Hayden. “If we were to omit certain skilled individuals from that registry, they wouldn’t suspect we’d left anyone behind.”
“That could work,” said Cora. “They haven’t requested to see it yet.”
“What if they decide to do something we don’t expect?” asked Stella.
“Like what?”
“I don’t know; tow us, for instance?”
“I can use our drones to trick their sensors into thinking our containment leak exceeds their hull rating. They won’t be able to take us under tow for fear of contamination.”
“It sounds like we have the makings of a plan, people,” said Pavlovich, beaming.
“To make this appear convincing, we’ll need to look like we’ve all been exposed to radiation,” said Stella.
“I can help with that too,” said Cora. “Let’s talk later about it.”
“Then it’s settled. You and Kaine come up with a list of personnel to omit from the manifest. Make sure it includes you, XO. We don’t want to run the risk that any of the details of what happened at Mu Arae may have found their way here. You might not be welcome.”
“What about Stella?” he said.
“I want her with me when I meet with Kovacs and Stromm.”
A frown creased her forehead as she considered the captain’s suggestion. Finally, after a long pause, she nodded.
Hayden could not conceal how much that arrangement disturbed him. He thought he caught a subtle appearance of satisfaction on Stella’s face, and he suddenly wished he had psychic abilities of his own.
The door to Stella’s cabin opened, and she greeted Hayden with a sly smile.
“You took long enough to find your way here,” she said as she stepped aside to admit him.
“I’ve been occupied with all the preparations.”
She tilted her head and raised a skeptical eyebrow.
He felt himself blush. “And, yes, I avoided coming to see you.”
Unable to maintain eye contact, he searched about the cluttered room for a place to sit, eventually opting for the edge of the unmade bed. She approached and sat next to him.
“What made you finally decide to risk it?” she asked.
“I think there is an old expression about addressing the hippopotamus in the room...”
�
�Elephant.”
“Really?”
She nodded. “You were saying?”
He wrung his hands and studied his feet while gathering his thoughts. “Back at Mu Arae, when you left me, I was relieved.”
“You’d been holding back a lot. Guilt, anger, resentment.”
“After your departure, I guess I went through a catharsis of sorts. I felt unrestrained. I drank far too much and retreated into myself, constantly replaying the event and looking for something I could have done differently.”
“I sensed the conflict in you every day. Believe me, Hayden, it hurt me a great deal to leave, but after years of trying to reach you, I decided there was nothing I could do. You needed to forgive yourself before anyone could help you.”
He kissed her on the cheek. “Are you sure you want to go with Pavlovich? It will be dangerous.”
“No more so than if I remain here with you,” she said, “and, besides, I’ll be of more use going with him. It doesn’t sound like this Stromm character is someone we can trust.”
“Not if he was involved in the original coup in this system.”
He studied her face. “Why are you here, Stella? The story of you wanting to make your fortune like the others doesn’t wash with me.”
“A girl can’t want to buy a few nice things?”
“You know what I mean. You lived your entire life pretty much removed from all those trappings. Why the sudden interest in getting rich? There’s something else.”
“It isn’t anything complicated, Hayden. I saw this as an opportunity for you to redeem yourself, and I knew you wouldn’t want to go with Pavlovich without some motivation.”
“You’re doing it for me, then?” He shook his head. “This is some costly therapy.”
She squeezed his hand. “I went as far as leaving you for your own good. Why can’t you believe I would do this for you?”
“Because you should live your life for yourself—not for me, your father, or anyone else.”
“I’m an empath, Hayden. As much as you try, you can never know what it is like. When I am around others, I experience everything they do. When I am alone, I am empty.”
“It seems like a heavy price to pay for the ability. Sounds like a curse to me.”
“When I’m with you, it is a true blessing.”
She wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him down onto the bed.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Parting Ways
THE LAST DROP ship waited in the hangar, prepped and ready. The majority of the crew had already been ferried to Kovacs’s vessel, the Iliad. Pavlovich rubbed his neck where the dermal masking had been applied.
“You’re sure this makeup is going to fool their doctors, Cora?”
“It’s a synthetic dressing layer that mimics the effects of radiation exposure. Unless they try to do a biopsy, it should work.”
“And what do you suggest I do if somebody wants to cut a chunk out of it to look more closely?”
“Don’t let them,” she said. “The shots you and the others took should counteract the treatment you’ll receive once you get over there. The mask is programmed to respond to the chemicals they give you and will react as if the therapy is working.”
“So, no side effects, then?”
“I didn’t say that. You’ll puke your guts out for a while, like they’ll expect.”
“Great,” said Pavlovich. “On the bright side, I’ll drop some weight like I’ve been meaning to.”
“That’s the spirit, Cap’n.”
“Kaine, once we’re gone, you’ll be on your own.”
“So will you, sir,” said Hayden.
“Yeah, well, what I meant to say is, we’ll have to hope everything goes according to plan. If this works, I’ll be returning with the crew aboard the repair ship.”
“You’re taking a huge risk that they will permit it.”
“They’ll need somebody who can walk them through all the modifications they think we made to keep the old girl running for a decade.”
“I’m more concerned about our people. They’re pirates, and I don’t know them. I’m not sure they can all stick to the script.”
“They will. I’ve made sure they’re all motivated.”
Pavlovich let the comment hang, leaving Hayden’s imagination to fill in the blanks as to what that meant. Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted Stella approaching, a bag slung over her shoulder. The captain turned and winked at Kaine, and he worried that Pavlovich’s mentioned motivation had something to do with her.
She sidled up to Hayden and kissed him on the lips before intertwining her fingers with his.
“Good, I see you two are cozy again. I like the family to get along with each other.”
“Our relationship is none of your business, Captain,” she said.
“Of course,” he said, grinning.
After their final farewells, Pavlovich and Stella boarded the drop ship, and it carried them to the Iliad. Hayden made his way to the bridge.
The place was empty, most of the crew having transferred.
“How are you holding up, Cora?”
“Everything is under control. We’re only in orbit, after all, the engines are offline, and life support is on minimal. The only thing for me to do is maintain the false radiation signals our drones are sending out.”
“You’re sure they can’t see through that?”
“You worry too much.”
He sat in the command chair. “How long until they are out of sensor range?”
“Forty-seven hours.”
He sighed and shifted his position then rose and advanced to the science station. After inspecting the readout, he moved on to the tactical instruments.
“You’re going to wear yourself out if you do that for the next two days,” said Cora.
“I know,” he said, leaning against the console. “Patience isn’t one of my virtues. Did your scans of the moon find any erganium?”
“I confirmed significant associated mineral deposits in the right ratios. I’m fairly confident we will find what we need down there.”
“Yeah, okay.”
“Maybe now would be a good time for you to join me in VR? It’ll give you something to do other than worry.”
“Oh, er, thanks, Cora. I don’t think...”
“Stella said it would be all right.”
“I’m sorry?”
“She said you can come visit me if you want. “
Hayden’s face grew warm. “I don’t know; we finally got our shit together...”
“Yes, she told me all about it. I’m happy for you two.”
“Then you must understand—”
“What do you think is going to happen, Hayden?”
“What? Er, nothing. Nothing at all. I just...”
Cora’s melodious laugh filled the bridge. “Maybe some other time, then?”
Realizing how foolish he must seem, he smiled. “Sure, that sounds good.”
“I’m detecting engine heat from the other ships. They’re leaving.”
“Oh, good,” he said, glad for the change of topic.
“But there may be a problem. Only three are departing.”
“What?” He hurried back to the science station to check for himself.
“It looks like they left a babysitter behind to keep an eye on us,” said Cora.
“Well, that complicates things. Shit! Do you think they suspect something?”
“I’m not certain we are why they remained behind. They fired their engines to drop into a lower orbit.”
“That’s odd. Can you determine a reason?”
“I’ll need some time.”
“Sure.” He returned to the command chair and watched the other ship on the holographic viewer as it grew smaller.
“My guess is that they are on an approach to one of the planet’s moons.”
Hayden’s heart skipped a beat. “Is it the moon we’re interested in?”
“No, I can confi
rm that much.”
Hayden scratched his head. “Is there anything significant about the one they’re going to?”
“There’s not much in our database, but it doesn’t really stand out in any way. Most of the twenty-three moons orbiting Elgar are small, many volcanically active due to tidal forces. Some have thin atmospheres; a few are covered in water ice.”
“They sound a lot like those around Jupiter or Saturn back home. Any signs of habitation?”
“Records show that two of the outer ones had mining operations before the collapse. We’re too far away right now to determine if they are still operating.”
“What about the one we’re interested in?”
“Pomp is a—”
“Pomp?”
“Yes. All of this planet’s moons have names associated with the works of the composer, Edward Elgar. There is Pomp, Circumstance, Enigma, Hope, Glory—”
“Okay, I get it. I was never much into classical music. Out of curiosity, are the other planets in this system named after composers? John Lennon, perhaps?”
“Never heard of him, but the other gas giants are Bach, Brahms—”
“Thanks, Cora, I’ll look them up later. What were you saying about the moon? Pomp, was it?”
“It is one of the inner moons, about the size of Earth’s satellite, terrestrial with tidal-generated tectonism.”
“And how about the one they went to?”
“It is called Harmony and is basically a small captured asteroid.”
“Maybe they are searching for rebel activity, but I can’t imagine why something that small would interest them.”
The ship on the screen had all but vanished as it made its way around the curve of the planet.
“Keep an eye on them for a bit. I want a better idea of what they are up to before we launch to look for the erganium.”
“Our bugs are small enough to avoid detection,” said Cora. “I want to send them out to survey some of the other moons. We might be able to locate a source of the mineral that our long-range scans missed that is more accessible.”
“That’s a good idea. If we can make things easier on ourselves, I’m all for it. You’re sure they won’t be spotted?”