It became warm, and I knew there was something that belonged to me right underneath that statue!
As if veils were lifted from my mind, it became clearer, and I longed for my ax to cut down this primitive leftover of a race that conspired with my eternal enemy Lord Lumis to keep me away from what was rightfully mine! Here, right below that statue, were my gauntlets and not even the Neutronium-covered statue and the million tons of metal they had poured over them, could keep me separated! I raised my arms and thundered, “Feel my wrath!”
The sun passed the hole and the light subsided, and I knew something had happened. Something that had to do with me, but why was I standing there just like the statue, my arms raised?
I also noticed that the sky had filled with dark clouds and it was starting to rain. Lightning crackled and hit the statue, followed by thunder.
The crowds were scrambling for their clothing, pulling up hoods and coming down the stairs. Someone complained about the lack of weather control on this world, and another tried to explain that it rained here only very rarely and usually at night.
My mind reeled to remember something. Perhaps I was more stressed than I realized and needed a good night’s sleep.
Mother Superior was still standing there and had not said a word since the light started to shine through the mountain. I said to her through the torrents of rain, “I hope I did not offend you asking you that question.”
The golden hood she wore was already soaked and clung to her head, and I could see her face much better. She looked me in the eyes and then her lips formed a fine smile under the equally wet veil. “No, not at all. I am just as surprised and startled about the sudden rain storm, but then they don’t have weather control or even weather forecasting here.”
I pointed to the mountains. “I guess the clouds were too heavy to climb over them and that’s why they dump their load on us.” I stretched my arms out again. “Sorry, ma’am, but I simply love rain and water.”
We had to wait almost two hours before we found room in one of the taxi flyers to take us back. At least the rain didn’t last that long and stopped pouring about twenty minutes after it had appeared.
We went to another hotel, this one also made up of large tents, but the tent bungalows were quite comfortable, had good hygiene facilities, and appeared to be low tech but clean.
I found out that Pilgrims Gamia and Renia Herton, sisters and natives of Leno’s Colony, had already booked this tent bungalow and our luggage was already there.
Mother Superior had not said much to me the entire time, and I felt I might have done something to disappoint her or offend her after all. After we had changed into dry clothing that was basically the same, except no cloaks, I asked, “Ma’am, are you sure I didn’t do something? I apologize if I did. I assure you I am very grateful for all you did and I am very proud that you called me your Soja.”
She was sitting down, combing her long hair, and said, “No, Eric, you have done nothing to offend me. Did you hear anything or experience anything strange while the sun lit up the statue’s head?”
I touched my head and said, “Narth did something to me so telepaths can’t read me anymore. So, if there was someone doing any psionic tricks, I did not notice. Not that I am all that comfortable with psionics in the first place. Did you feel something? I found the entire spectacle quite boring, to be honest, and that sun didn’t even completely line up with the hole. There wasn’t all that much colored light.”
She put the brush down, thinking for a moment, and then shrugged. “No, I didn’t feel anything either, and I guess the rain ruined most of it. I think we should eat something and then call it a day. We are booked for the first transport, and it leaves at 0900.”
We had a light dinner at the hotel’s restaurant. The menu even offered grilled fish from New Sweden, but the cook or the Auto-Kitchen had no idea how to prepare fish right, and it was dry and completely overdone, but it still tasted like heaven to me.
After we had returned to our tent bungalow, she drew a curtain cutting the room in half and wished me a good night. For the first time in a while, not counting the uncomfortable naps on the flight here, trying to find a non-cramping sleep position in the upright seats of the Poodle, I had a bed and realized how tired I was.
Just as I was drifting into sleep, I thought I heard her voice, and she was talking to someone. “I think he caused the tornado unconsciously with his rage at seeing the slaves and something happened today. For a brief moment, the Dark One stirred and was awake.”
I tried to think about what she was saying, but maybe it was just a dream. No one could create a tornado, after all, and I drifted completely into deep sleep.
The next day, I felt like a new person. She, too, appeared to be in good spirits, and we had a good but astronomically-priced breakfast. I insisted on paying for the rooms and the meals, and even though they charged us a little over 3,000 credits, it didn’t make a dent in the amount available on the credit box. We went one more time to the bungalow to get our luggage that someone had prepared for us as part of our disguise.
We were on time at the small spaceport with at least a thousand others again looking pretty much like we did. There were no customs officers, but the local authorities charged a 200-credit spaceport usage fee per person. Merchants pushed carts around, trying to make the last sale. One of them was selling little bottles of dirty water, praising them as Blessed Water from the Statue and the unusual rain event. To my surprise, he did brisk business.
On the landing field, I counted twelve old Leyland space busses, a Kermac T Cruiser, and two Kartanian armed merchants. Even the old buses were fitted with weapon turrets, and Mother Superior explained to me, “They fly in convoys, and the T Cruiser is there to fly protection. The syndicates and the temples here pay protection fees to some of the bigger pirate outfits, and these armed convoys proved to be quite effective to keep the smaller and lone wolf pirates away. In rare cases, pirate attacks do occur but usually not during the main season.”
I hoped she was right; I did not want to be captured and sold for Alvor’s Cove again.
Chapter 8: Checkpoint 96
Non-Union ships wanting to do business in Union space would have to stop at one of these checkpoints that dotted the imaginary border between Union and Freespace and get Customs clearance and a transponder code.
While civilian ships could freely enter Union space, they could only land on Union Worlds with the proper Customs documents. Detected warships of other civilizations would result in a border alert and cause an immediate response from the fleet.
Checkpoint 96 was a small ice planet with a rock core approximately the size of Sol Systems Pluto. Checkpoint 96, along with five other similar small planets, circled a very old bloated red sun named Herman’s Star that probably swallowed most of the bigger planets as it expanded.
We had made it. I was back in Union space. The dark gray inhospitable-looking ball we approached looked better to me than subsurface, which was a technically a garden world.
It appeared our transport got landing permission as it descended fast.
Now we could see the first details of a sprawling spaceport, vast Duro-Crete, modern-looking sturdy surface buildings. There at the other end, as big as a mountain, shaped like a huge wedge, sitting on enormous ISAH pots, a Union Fleet Battleship. Seeing this beautiful sight and symbol of Union might caused a knot of pride in my throat.
Octo-bots rolled busily around, and brilliant floodlights bathed everything in cool bluish light, separating the spaceport from the stark darkness of the rest of the planet’s surface. There was an orderly business-like, efficient atmosphere over everything.
A mechanical arm took our transport like a toy and guided it with machine precision past a forcefield curtain into a passenger-unloading terminal.
I could barely wait until the doors were open.
Moments later, we stepped on a spotlessly clean surface and at that moment, as if a weight was lifted off my should
ers, I felt free again.
Working slide belts, advertisement signs for McDonald’s, Arthur’s Swine and Dine and Fat Eddies Stir Fry made my mouth water. Not far from us a fleet destroyer landed. It was a new Barracuda, and a platoon of Marines stomped in perfect military precision toward the waiting ship, and a feeling of deep pride filled me to the last fiber of my being.
Never in my life was it clearer to me, that my decision to become a soldier, to join the fleet and defend all this and our way of life against slaver scum, pirates, scheming Kermac and whatever else was out there trying to do us harm was the right one.
She stood next to me. “It does feel nice to be back home, does it not?”
I could barely contain my feelings and gave a deep sigh. “I never thought arriving on a little outpost would feel so good. I have to restrain myself not to get on my knees and actually kiss the ground. There were times in the past month I thought I would never return. It makes me realize how fortunate we are to be Union citizens, despite the faults it has.”
She pointed toward public restrooms. “Before we go through customs, we need to get changed.”
She didn’t wait for a response but walked briskly to the busy restrooms, deposited a few credits to secure a stall and said to the system, “Human females.”
She basically pushed me into the roomy stall with her.
I said, “Can I not have my own stall? I don’t mind being frugal, but I got millions!”
She giggled. “Silly goose!” Then she pressed her hand against a wall tile and the tile lit up. A voice said, “Deepa Lydaa Gray Car Society of Sar and NAVINT Commandant recognized.”
The entire floor of the bathroom stall turned into an elevator platform and lowered us fast through a metal shaft and stopped at the entrance of a short corridor. A beautiful Saran woman who reminded me of Elfi, wearing a tight black velvet jumpsuit with only a stylized silver pin in the shape of a human brain on her collar, greeted us. “Welcome back, Admiral Deepa. It is such a rare pleasure to greet you here on this side.”
“I am glad to be back, Commander Alena, even if it is only for a while. I am bringing a wayward Midshipman who is in need of his uniform and his other belongings.”
I was still processing what just happened. Not that I was surprised to find that a public restroom was also a secret entrance to a NAVINT post, but that Mother Superior was the Commandant of NAVINT, and carried the rank of an admiral. No wonder Stahl knew and trusted her.
Speechless, I followed the two women through a sliding door marked NAVINT into a typical Navy-style Union lobby with the same mustard-colored carpet, wood-paneled reception desk, and the NAVINT logo illuminated behind it on the wall. There even was the obligatory pseudo leather seating group with a few magazines and a potted rubber tree in the corner.
We didn’t stop there and ended up in an office with a large shipping crate sitting on a table and an Auto-Dresser.
The woman I now knew was the Commandant of NAVINT said, “You’ll find some of your belongings in the crate, and the Auto-Dresser received its uniform assembly program from the Devastator so you should be fine. I’ll meet you in ten minutes in the lobby.” Without waiting for me to say anything, she left, chatting with the Saran PSI Corps officer.
A few minutes later, I had used the Auto-Dresser and looked at myself in the mirror field. All the female things were gone. No Bioflex mask, but my own face. I was me again, wearing a crisp black uniform with mirror-shine polished boots, the uniform blouse diagonally parted with the white lining forming a triangle across my chest. My ribbon read out on the left and my nametag to the right. On the wide black belt was a low-slung holster with a Union TKU Hellbore Type VI side arm. My leather jacket with the Fighter patch, black gloves, and a black duckbill hat with the Navy logo at its center and white circular top completed the outfit.
I checked the crate, and to my delight, there was the brown leather holster with my .45, the H&K Missile rifle and the Kermac Line blaster I had found on Sin 4.
My .45 was back where it belonged, and the TKU sidearm was in an auto draw low-slung hip holster. I felt right as rain, but I could not help but miss being female. That part of my adventure I had to admit to myself I enjoyed very much. However, it was time to be Eric again.
Out in the lobby, Mother Superior was gone as well. In her place stood a Union Admiral without any insignia that would tell what she was responsible for.
I saluted and stood at attention. There was an admiral on deck after all, and this time I even felt joy in this simple military protocol routine. “Midshipman Olafson reporting as ordered, ma’am.”
She smiled and returned the salute. “Seeing you like this makes me realize that you are also a very handsome young man. I guess I won’t be able to call you Soja anymore, but I think we still can forgo the military protocols. I am sure you heard my name, so you can call me Deepa and, as our time together draws to an end, let me say I feel blessed to have met you both, Eric, and whatever you call your female side. I have enjoyed your company, and I hope you can see past the admiral and past the things you know about me, and we can remain friends.”
“Yes, ma’am, I mean, Deepa. I have no words I can use to express the gratitude I feel for all you have done for me. I am very proud I was allowed to be your Soja, to be Nightshade and to be allowed to call you friend.”
She stepped closer and simply hugged me. “I’ll keep an eye on your career and you, I promise, and I am certain we will see each other again.”
I didn’t know if I should return the hug, but I did, and then we stepped apart, and she said, “I will remain here to take care of a few things and then I must soon return to Sin 4. You, however, will take the elevator back up, pass through customs and report to the fleet office. They have standing orders for you.”
I resurfaced in the passenger terminal with a purposeful swing in my steps, almost tempted to whistle.
At the checkpoint to access the concourse, I swiped my CIT, and the customs officer said, “Welcome back, citizen. Did you bring any luggage, weapons, or illegal wares?”
“No luggage, but I carry weapons.”
He checked them and my readout. “The Kermac Line Blaster needs to be registered or disposed of. The H&K cannot be carried loaded. Other than that, you are cleared. Your duty side arm is of course permitted.”
I simply left the Kermac weapon with him.
He pointed down the terminal and said, “Officers and fleet personnel do not have to go through civilian customs. Next time, you can use the military terminal down there.”
I thanked him and joined the people and beings in the busy spaceport terminal. The golden robes were everywhere, mostly queuing at the space bus terminal for connecting flights to their actual home destinations, but there were also civilians and service members of many different Union species. There was a Takkian merchant talking to a tall Spindlar and a Saran. Two flawless Saresii beauties with long silver hair and skin-tight catsuits sat at a café in the company of a Klack and a Terran, discussing something. The Terran, of course, was recognizable by his sunglasses.
A giant Perthanian in police uniform and his robot partner gave a group of tall Andorians directions.
Six Union Army soldiers with planetary defense patches laughed at jokes a Three-Ozian made.
This cauldron of species and individuals dressed in a myriad of colors and fashion choices, shopping, walking, traveling in a bright environment that was despite all these beings clean and free of trash was such a stark contrast to Sin 4 or Alvor’s Cove. No one here was afraid or tried to hide what they were or from where they came. My good mood observing all this got a serious damper as I saw a group of five smudgy, sloppily dressed GalDrifts, some of them with bare feet, others wearing beads and purposefully torn clothing. They were sitting underneath a tree that was part of a grass and fountain area with benches and bushes. One of them was playing some sort of stringed instrument. Two of them smoked something, the fourth and fifth simply sat there and watched. As one of th
em saw me, he began to make obscene and loud remarks about the violence-loving government-sanctioned murderers of the fleet.
This was Union, and everyone had the right to express their opinion and live the lifestyle they preferred, but it still got to me, especially since one of these derelicts ejected the core on Alvor’s Cove and betrayed us all, thinking he could save his hide that way.
I wondered if that group would be yelling insults if they were in a slave pen, waiting to be sold. I could already see the entrance to the local fleet office, marked by two Marines guarding it and below the fleet logo. My temper had caused me enough trouble, and I certainly didn’t need any right now.
So I told myself that there were only a few of them and that the entire GalDrift culture was laughable small. My fists clenched as I saw these leeches.
One of them, with long filthy blond hair he wore in long dreads got up and actually approached me in strange, almost dance-like movements. “Hey, the killer got a few Creds to spare? Instead of killing defenseless aliens, do some good and help out a few free spirits, trying to get off this ice ball.”
I was actually proud of my own self-control as I simply ignored him and walked on.
He didn’t give up and danced around me. “Come on, Killer. You love to be called Killer, don’t you, soldier boy?” He kept dancing around me. “I know you government slaves got paid today, so how about some Creds?”
His choice of words and seeing that the jacket he wore was a torn, mutilated fleet issue uniform blouse made me wish I could rip it off and stuff it down his throat, but as far as I knew, it was not against any law to wear surplus uniform pieces.
He did not give up. “So, what was your last assignment, oppressing a peace-loving culture? Or perhaps forcing Union laws upon a civilization that wanted to stay free?” Then his eyes went big, and he actually poked me with his finger. “You’re from the Devastator, a Wolfcraft fighter jock. How does that work out for you, government crook? Getting orders from a non-existent propaganda lie thinking it would impress anyone? If that legendary piece of garbage really existed, he should be arrested and turned over to the Kermac and then we would have universal peace!”
Eric Olafson: Space Pirate Page 16