by Aer-ki Jyr
1
March 4, 2428
Alpha Centauri System
Tyr
“Olá,” the Brazilian receptionist said as she stood up from her chair and took a pair of steps up to the table/desk as she saw a man in a Star Force uniform approaching the Civilian Communications Depot, or CCD for short. It was the Brazilian government’s interstellar digital package delivery service, offering transit of data files and messages between planets via insystem relays or by carrying them via jumpship with a reasonable delay in delivery. For those with family or business relations off planet, or off moon in this case, the CCD was the primary means of communication and saw a steady stream of customers on a daily basis.
“What can I do for you?” the receptionist said with a smile, switching to English at seeing the man’s uniform.
The man didn’t return her smile, but in a very fluid and casual manner produced a pistol from behind his back and leveled it at her chest. Before she could react a bright blue plasma streak shot out and burned through her clothing and into her rib cage.
The Brazilian dropped to the ground, barely getting out a yip, then with his firing line cleared the man adjusted his aim and fired a pair of blasts at the man seated a few meters behind the desk as he jumped up and out of his chair in a panic.
He twisted as he was hit in the shoulder, then fell back down onto his chair face first as the second shot hit him in the back, leaving a small smoke trail rising up into the air as he lay kneeling into the chair with is head wedged into the gap between seat and backrest.
The shooter remained still and quiet, listening for a moment to see if anyone else was nearby, then he jumped up over the table/desk and into the back area of the kiosk, stepping over the woman’s twitching body and moving to the rear door that led into the equipment area. He pulled it open and stepped through, plasma pistol held ready, but no one else was in the area.
He lowered the muzzle and headed to a particular console, knowing well what he was looking for. He pulled up the control menu and input a flurry of commands, shutting off and locking down the communications equipment and creating a comms blackout in the colony…on the civilian side, at least.
He pulled out a small, pencil-sized personal comm and flicked the ON button.
“Point 2 is dark,” he reported.
“Copy that. Keep it that way.”
The man slipped the device back into his pocket and walked out into the reception area, finding the woman’s terrified eyes on him. He was surprised she was still alive.
Rather than using his pistol again he walked up and gently put his foot on her throat and constricted her airway. He held it there as he looked out the front entrance of the kiosk at the sparse passing traffic. The double doors leading in had done a good job of keeping the sound of his weaponsfire from drifting out onto the promenade, though there were few people out and about this early in the morning to have noticed anyway.
Once he was certain the woman was dead he dragged both bodies into the back area, then put the ‘Closed’ sign up on the reception desk and retreated into the equipment room where he took up a guard position, insuring that the CCD transmitters would remain dark.
Davis was studying a prototype schematic of a new civilian jumpship in holographic form over his desk when a chime sounded. He glanced to his clock inside the smooth, clear surface of his desk and saw a time flag, indicating that he had an appointment with the Brazilian ambassador. The Director sighed, collapsing the schematic and standing up. If he didn’t watch himself he’d be studying prototypes all day long.
He stepped around the side of his desk, hitting a button on top that retracted a portion the carpet to the right of his chair, well out into the ‘empty’ confines of his spacious circular office. He stepped on the exposed metallic circle and faced inward, putting the panoramic window behind him and the central staircase in front, with a hologram of a pair of men manifesting itself before him in full size, looking as if the individuals were literally standing before him.
One of the men was the Brazilian ambassador, the other a Star Force staffer that quickly walked out of picture, disappearing from the hologram to allow the two of them to speak in private. No longer did Davis accept diplomatic inquiries in person, nor any other type of business matter with non-Star Force personnel, given that Atlantis was now off limits to the public. The Brazilian ambassador, an amicable associate of Davis, was currently in the Star Force embassy wing, located in another of Davis’s ocean cities along with the rest of the permanent diplomats, all of which had to contact him through subordinates, or through holographic relay if the matter was urgent enough to occupy his time.
“Rodrigo,” Davis greeted him by name.
“Director,” the ambassador replied with an uncomfortable expression on his face. “I have a favor to ask, as well as a story to tell, assuming you are unaware of it.”
Davis frowned and crossed his arms over his chest. “Concerning what?”
“Tyr.”
Davis ran the name through his mental list, finding a few references, one of which was the name of a trailblazer, but the name of a moon that he’d given the Brazilians complete control over in the Alpha Centauri System seemed a much more likely candidate.
“Nothing currently on my radar concerning the moon. What’s going on?”
“I am embarrassed to say that…we have lost control of the colony.”
Davis’s frown deepened. “To whom?”
“At first we believed it was you…but subsequent intelligence reports quickly dispelled that ridiculous notion,” the ambassador said, toggling a control board off holo, followed by a series of video files popping up beside Davis. “A group of armed men in Star Force uniforms seized control of the colony while maintaining a communications blackout. These surveillance feeds we were able to obtain later from security agents within the colony.”
Davis saw several incidences of Star Force-uniformed men attacking security stations and other vital checkpoints with plasma pistols, efficient movements, and practiced coordination. No screaming or flailing about, just quick, clean, methodical kills eliciting no more emotional response than if they’d been ordering dinner.
“How old are these?”
The ambassador looked even more ashamed. “A little over 2 years.”
Davis’s eyes went wide with disbelief. Factor in transportation delays, and he’d expected no longer than 6 months. “Why have I not heard anything about this sooner?”
“We heard nothing of it ourselves for nearly a year. Whoever these men are, they took control of the moon without the general populace even becoming aware of it. Not a single transport, passenger or commercial, was so much as delayed. Business and commerce have been proceeding like clockwork, with regular reports flowing back to Mars. We’ve even seen an uptick in productivity from the moon since the takeover. Our people have complete freedom of movement, so we didn’t suspect a thing until certain personnel transfers failed to occur. The dead men from those surveillance videos couldn’t produce themselves, thus questions were asked and investigations begun.”
Davis found that remarkable. Even though the moon had no official Star Force presence on it, it was linked into their transportation grid, meaning his people had continued doing business with the colony all this time and his own security division hadn’t gotten wind of it.
“Detectives were sent to find the missing personnel, at which point the new rulers made themselves known to us through back channels. They wanted to keep the public from panicking, as did we, and they have declared themselves to be liberated colony in fact, if not in name. They actually had the gall to suggest that business continue as normal and Tyr remain part of Brazilian territory, but without us ha
ving any control over it.”
“Hostages?” Davis asked.
“None,” the ambassador said with disgust. “They are beyond arrogant…or so we thought. Our investigators brought back all the information we needed, including these surveillance recordings of the initial takeover, then we sent a military strikeforce to reclaim possession of the colony. They didn’t even bother to resist the troops coming into the city…then we got no word back from them, nor did any come out. Our agents continue to come and go as they please, passing off as civilians, and they say nothing is wrong with the colony in the least. Everything is as it should be, as if no takeover had happened. They also can’t determine what happened to the strikeforce.”
“When was your last report?”
“Dated a month and a half ago. We’ve tried to keep matters quiet on our end while we figured out what was going on, so none of this has hit the newsfeeds, though I don’t know how. Tyr has a population of 13 million. You’d think word would spread through that many people simply by word of mouth. It’s as if these people are ghosts and the takeover never happened.”
“Do you have any idea how many of them there are?”
The ambassador shook his head, disgust on his face. “They’ve blended in with the rest of the population. All we can give you are the casualty lists, and there are 38 people missing, presumed dead based off those surveillance recordings.”
“How have they covered for the 38?”
“There are now replacements in those positions, logged as transfers. Whoever these ‘liberators’ are they’ve got good hackers working for them. The 38 have disappeared from all local databases. We had to pull backups from Mars to get the headcount,” he said, referring to the Brazilian capitol on the multinational planet.
Davis looked at one of the still playing security recordings off his right shoulder, seeing for a fact that the gunmen were wearing various Star Force uniforms…some personnel division, others engineering and mining. While Tyr was a Brazilian world it wasn’t uncommon for Star Force personnel from the planet Glasir, around which Tyr and two other moons orbited, to visit the colony. That would make the Star Force imposters blend in without them being recognized as foreign, not to mention that they might be given extra courtesy given the good relations between Star Force and Brazil.
Then again, he couldn’t completely discount that they were Star Force personnel…but no, if they’d been gone missing for 2 weeks a flag would have been raised, let alone 2 years. They had to be imposters.
“We obviously didn’t have a hand in this, but I’m curious as to how you came to that conclusion?” Davis asked. “These are our uniforms…or a very good knockoff.”
“Aside from our long history of cooperation, the assault made no sense,” the ambassador explained. “If you wanted to take the moon from us you have many more efficient options of doing so…like buying it. Sneaking around and murdering people doesn’t fit with your methods. Also, the weapons they are carrying are not of Star Force make.”
“No they’re not,” Davis confirmed, already having sized up the approximate model despite not being able to zoom in on the footage from the holographic transmitter he was standing on. He’d have to go over to his desk to do that, which he’d get to later. “Do they have anything larger than pistols?”
“Not based on our intel, sketchy as it is.”
“What was the favor you mentioned?”
The ambassador swallowed hard. “We have no choice but to send a larger force to retake the moon, and that could lead to unforeseen complications, given we don’t know what happened to our first strikeforce. It is rumored that you have clandestine Archon units sneaking around taking out the trash, so to speak. We would ask, as either a favor or for a price, to root out these insurrectionists and reclaim the colony for us.”
Davis stared at him evenly. “How large was your first strikeforce?”
“All ground troops, ferried in on transports to the spaceports, some 500 men in total.”
The skin around Davis’s eyes constricted slightly. Making 500 soldiers in combat gear disappear was no easy thing, meaning this takeover was even more complicated than the Director had already suspected.
“Have any civilians gone missing?”
“We’ve been checking into that, but so far our record searches have come up clean…though those residing on Tyr permanently are impossible to check on, given that we have to work through the local databases.”
“Anything else changed since the takeover, even the slightest anomaly?”
“Other than the fact they’re managing the moon better than those they overthrew…nothing stands out, and our people have been data sifting extensively. We have no answers as to what is going on, nor is there anyone else on the moon to ask for assistance. One of the drawbacks of owning your own world, we’re coming to realize.”
“Have they made any demands?”
“Not a one,” the ambassador said, his mannerisms evident that the Brazilians were at their wits’ end. “Not even a tirade as to why we brought this on ourselves or why liberation was necessary. No manifesto, no demands, not even an ill word. They want to continue on as is, but have made no threats concerning the eventuality that we don’t agree, and we haven’t received a word from them since the strike force was sent…not that we really expected any. There’s been almost no communication whatsoever.”
“You haven’t restricted travel to the moon?” Davis asked rhetorically, for if they had he would have already known about it.
“So long as we have access and the citizens of Tyr aren’t in any apparent danger, we felt it would be reckless to try and alter the situation, given that they might then become hostages.”
“I understand,” Davis said, his tone turning formal. “In light of this information, I have a favor to ask of Brazil, Ambassador.”
“Name it.”
“It seems there has been either a theft or counterfeiting of Star Force uniforms on the moon of Tyr. I thereby ask for your permission to investigate the matter and deal with it in a manner of our choosing.”
For a split second the ambassador was lost, then he caught on to the Director’s meaning and bowed his head gratefully. Star Force wasn’t going to charge Brazil with any sort of debt, merely deal with the situation pro bono. “Permission granted.”
“You’ll forestall your next assault?”
“If you’re stepping up, of course, though our troops will be available if you need them.”
“That won’t be necessary, but thank you. As you mentioned, we have other means of dealing with these incognito situations. Please forward any additional data you receive from your operatives.”
“I will, and thank you, Director.”
“Just part of being good neighbors,” Davis said as the ambassador signed off. His image disappeared but the surveillance feeds remained, shifting to center view now that they had room.
Davis stepped off the pad and retreated to his desk, transferring the images there as the carpet resealed seamlessly. He sat down and brought one up in an analysis program he’d gotten well used to using, having sifted through thousands of hours of data trying to hunt down leads on The Word. He brought up one of the security camera feeds and paused it when the man wearing a Star Force aqua-colored medical uniform pulled out a pistol from a hidden pocket…which the standard uniforms did not possess…and pointed it at a guard.
No doubt the Brazilian had been taken off guard by the uniform, but even as the weapon was being aimed at the woman wearing a light combat vest she responded by stepping laterally and drawing her own weapon. Davis had seen this one play out several times already as he’d been talking to Rodrigo, so he wasn’t interested in seeing the outcome, but rather the weapon the man was wielding.
Davis advanced it forward and back several times, zooming in and out and taking snapshots at various angles. He could tell from the look of it what it was, but he sent them into a 3D recognition program anyway, and using the parallax of the images it
was able to construct a wireframe design and match it up against known weapon types.
A single option appeared, tagged as the custom plasma pistol design produced by The Word.
Davis had known as much as soon as the ambassador had started describing the takeover. They’d been getting progressively bolder as the years went by, even as Star Force had managed to root out a few of their operations centers. Industrial sabotage was usually their game, with the occasional assassination of individuals associated with the anti-Star Force crowd. Their aim seemed to be discrediting Star Force’s reputation…or rather, minimizing it. Death by a thousand cuts would be an overstatement, but their efforts had none the less been repetitive and selective, and Davis had often wondered what they were building up to.
This he had not expected, nor could he see their endgame, but the fact that they’d had effective control over an entire moon for 2 years meant they’d had plenty of time to misbehave. Even if Star Force went in and shut them down today, he wondered how much of their future plans they’d been able to accomplish in the interim with no one looking over their shoulder.
And the fact that they’d managed to keep it quiet all this time impressed Davis to no end, as well as being typical Word methodology. Granted, planets and moons were geographically isolated from one another, and if you hit the communications grid you could effectively black out or censor the primary comm channels, but with free flowing commerce being maintained there was no way to monitor and conceal what was going on on the moon, which meant their efforts to keep the takeover from reaching Tyr’s population’s knowledge…
Well, they were damned good at what they did. Davis had always known that, but this really took the cake. Granted, he’d have to confirm this intel, but he didn’t doubt the Brazilian reports. While Star Force didn’t spy on associated nations, they did monitor them, especially their commerce patterns, and had a takeover of even minimal blunt force been applied there would have been ripples of economic consequence that would have alerted his people to the incident.