by Welch, David
“My dear wayward Count, the prestige of bringing in a murderer and traitor is more than enough incentive,” Sobieski replied.
Rex restrained a grin. The idiot was taking the bait.
“Spoken as only a man covering for his shame can. Have you been out in the Quarter for long? Has this been your punishment for letting one of your counts go astray?” Lucius pushed.
Sobieski maintained his demeanor, saying, “You think too highly of yourself, Count Baliol. I was merely given the opportunity when word first came of your discovery, to discipline my vassal as any true man of worth would. Do you actually think the emperor would divert one of his warships to do naught but hunt for you?”
Five minutes until jump drive recharge, flashed on Rex’s screen.
“Perhaps not. Tell me, Julius, now you’ve found me, do you really expect me to surrender to you so simply?” Lucius asked.
“I would hope that you would maintain your dignity while facing justice,” said Sobieski.
“It was maintaining dignity that brought me out here,” Lucius spoke.
“You dishonor your father’s memory with your words,” Sobieski replied. “Do not—”
“A man who had no honor can never be dishonored,” Lucius spoke. “Had you knowledge of anything beyond the assholes of your serfs you might know that!”
Anger flashed across Sobieski’s face. He stared a long moment, fighting to regain control.
Four minutes until jump drive recharge, flashed the computer.
“Your vessel is outmatched and outclassed. If you will not surrender yourself, I will destroy you and any others who happen to be onboard,” Sobieski said, forcing out an even tone.
“So I should surrender to save them? You expect me to believe that you will show mercy to the hired help?” Lucius said, waving at Rex dismissively. “We both know that is not the path you will follow. Tell me, are you under orders to bring back anybody found with me? Execute them as an example to any who would harbor wayward Europan lords?”
“Your crew is of no concern. Surrender your vessel, Baliol. I will not ask you again.”
Three minutes until jump drive recharge.
“OK, that’s enough,” Rex said, getting to his feet. “Go sit down, Lu. Your way ain’t working.”
Sobieski’s eyebrows furrowed in confusion.
“What is the meaning of this?” he asked.
“Sorry about that. Lucius here said he could talk us out of this, you know, him being Europan and all. Clearly he’s in some deep shit here,” Rex spoke.
“I know that dialect. You are a Terran,” Sobieski said coldly.
“Close. Actually Sequoian, but hey, lots of folks make that mistake,” Rex said.
“I do not believe you,” the lord replied.
“Well I can’t help that, uh, Julius, was it?”
Two minutes until jump drive recharge.
“I am Lord Julius Daniel Jagiellan-Sobieski, Viscount of Althay, loyal follower of God’s True Servant, Emperor Gnaeus Cheseworth III.”
Rex blinked, hamming it up to look surprised.
“Damn. I’m gonna need to get you to write that down,” he said after drawing it out for a few precious seconds.
“The man you are carrying is wanted for murder, theft, and treason to the Divine Order. You will turn him over to me to face the Emperor’s justice,” Sobieski spoke, cool and calm.
“Lucius? Kid can barely shoot straight.”
“Nevertheless, he is a fugitive, and we demand his return,” Sobieski spoke, lines of frustration forming on his forehead.
One minute until jump drive recharge.
Rex huffed like a man conflicted and spent a long moment staring at Lucius. He crossed his arms and rubbed his chin to make it look genuine.
“All right,” Rex finally spoke. “Fifty bits gold and you can have him.”
“What?!” Lucius exclaimed, shooting to his feet. Rex didn’t know if he was acting or sincere, but either one would work right now.
“And why should I pay you anything when I can merely take him by force?” Sobieski asked.
“Just good manners is all,” Rex spoke. “You don’t need to be makin’ enemies out here. Enough people don’t like you as it is. And hey, I could get a few shots in, chew up that nice ship of yours. Could be a few of your crewmen die. Maybe some important noble types. You hand over some gold and we get to skip all that. Drop in the bucket for a big old Empire like yours, good payday for me. And you get your little murderer and can do whatever you want to him.”
Lucius seethed, “I will not—”
Rex pulled a pistol from a holster he’d taped under the pilot’s console. He pointed it at Lucius’s head.
“You just stay calm until we hash this out.”
Jump drive ready.
Sobieski took several seconds to answer.
“As you wish.”
“Good,” Rex spoke. “There’s an observation blister on the top of my ship, doubles as an airlock. Send me directions to your docking port and we’ll do this.”
“They are being transmitted,” Sobieski spoke, contempt dripping from his voice. The viewscreen shifted, returning to the image of the frigate staring at them.
“You didn’t actually believe any of what I just said, did you?” Rex asked.
Lucius ground his teeth together, his calm reserve long gone. Rex rolled his eyes.
“I told you I have a plan. Get back in your seat, we’re coming up on the dangerous part,” Rex spoke.
“Docking coordinates have been received,” the computer spoke.
“Yeah we won’t be needing them,” Rex said, “Thing about Spathion-class ships is that the docking port is about fifteen feet behind their jump probe.”
Lucius eyes perked up. Rex slowly steered Long Haul beneath the frigate. About twenty feet under the hull, running along the centerline, was a long shaft surrounded by coiled wires and small struts. This was the jump probe, where the frigate projected forward the massive energies necessary to tear a hole in space. The probe ended in a large, armored, hemispherical protrusion that housed the jump drive.
“This close, their point defense guns are going to tear into us,” Lucius spoke.
“We should survive long enough to get clear and jump the hell out of here,” Rex spoke.
“All right then. On your mark.”
“Computer, slave all of our Rake missiles to fire at once; lock them on our gun targets. Direct all turrets to fire at the frigate whenever it comes into their range.”
“Missiles ready.”
Rex pushed forward on the vertical controls, spinning the prow of the ship upward until it faced the protrusion. Outside, the sudden movement drew a response. Three turrets on the underside of the frigate, already locked onto the ship, let loose. Bolts of silver-white streaked through space and slammed into Long Haul, hurling bits of armor into space, chipping away in a relentless series of blasts. They fired pulses in bursts of twelve, rapidly, then recharged. Their fire staggered so that one of the three turrets was always ripping shots into Long Haul.
The dorsal and ventral turrets of Long Haul swiveled, belching shells out. They rippled along the hull, digging gouges out of the ship, hitting hard and fast. One focused on a defensive turret, blasting it with a dozen rounds. The heavy shells smashed through the turret’s thin armor and ripped apart the machine inside, sending the guts of the small pulse cannon hurtling into space. One of Long Haul’s tormentors fell quiet. The others kept up the attack.
Long Haul trembled from the impacts. Alarm klaxons rang as the already weakened armor absorbed the pounding. Rex’s hands kept a light grip on the throttle, moving it slightly. On the viewscreen the gun target aligned with the center of the hemisphere.
Lucius picked his moment and squeezed. Long Haul’s little pulse cannon pounded away at the ship’s armor, but the thirty millimeter guns did the most damage. Designed to give fighters some punch against large ships, each round could dig twenty centimeters into standard
armor, and dozens streaked from Long Haul’s forward guns. Rex struggled to keep the ship pointed at the target, pulse blasts rattling the vessel with every passing second. The frigate began to maneuver. He swore and moved to match the motion, keeping the prow aimed at the damaged hemisphere. If the frigate got free and turned its big guns on them, then all his fancy talk would have been for nothing.
Lucius’s thumb mashed down on the missile control. All four of the Rake missiles ejected from their position, on pylons amidships. They streaked forward, their computers communicating with each other to keep them from hitting at once. The first struck, a shaped charge blasting three hundred pounds of explosive into the heart of the frigate’s jump drive. The others followed in half-second intervals, consuming the drive and a good portion of the ship’s decks in fire. The lower turrets went dead as the explosions rocked the ship, severing them from their power source deep inside.
“Time to go,” Rex said, jerking the control levers, stomping on the acceleration pedal. The wounded frigate, still maneuvering away from their attack, wasn’t turning fast enough to follow. Its dorsal defensive turrets fired, strafing the stern of Long Haul with pulse blasts, tearing off more and more armor. Shots slammed into the cargo bay doors as he pulled away. Long Haul accelerated forward, putting half a million miles between itself and its foe.
Rex pressed down on the screen, activating the jump drive. Long Haul blinked away from space, vanishing across the stars.
* * *
The damned alarms would not stop ringing. Soldiers and techs scrambled about his ship, rushing to control the damage and put out a string of fires. Julius fumed. Lying peasant bastard! A ship not fit to be a junker had just blasted Severn’s jump drive to oblivion, then slipped away in plain sight. Images danced through his head: Baliol and his scheming, peasant employer, laughing hysterically, taunting him. The thought grated on him. Baliol: a traitor so weak and passion-bound that he’d thrown away God’s providence over a nameless whore. His employer: a soulless piece of rabble from God-knew where. No doubt they now congratulated themselves, holding up their lies as evidence of their “superiority.” His fingers dug into the arm of his chair.
“Sire, the jump drive has been sealed off from the rest of the ship,” one of his soldiers proclaimed.
“And the reserve drive?” Julius asked, hiding the anger from his voice. Last thing he needed were his retainers losing any more faith in their commander.
“It is unpowered, sire. The techs will need at least six hours to connect it to the reactor and twenty-four hours to charge it to operational sta—”
“A day?!” Julius shouted, exploding from his seat. He quickly forced the shock and anger down and returned to his chair. “We are stuck in this worthless system for another day?”
“Yes sire,” the soldier replied.
He muttered under his breath. Sequoian indeed! That man had known exactly where to hit him.
“A bleeding Terran…” Julius muttered.
“Excuse me sire?” the solider asked.
“Nothing. We shall pray to God that the bounties we put on Baliol’s head pay off. Go. Aide the technicians in whatever manner you can,” he ordered.
The soldier nodded deeply, crisply motioned his salute to his superior, and sprinted out of the bridge. Julius sat, seething, staring death at the meaningless red star at the center of this meaningless, backwater system. He had been outsmarted, outfought, and let a traitor to the Divine Order escape. If he managed to return home, he could very well find himself being ritually strangled by the emperor rather than the cursed Lucius Baliol.
During the Exodus from Earth, every group of crazies that could beg, borrow, or steal a small fortune left to build new societies, new civilizations. These weren’t rational people happy with freedom or an open society. Those people stayed in the Commonwealth.
No, most had some vision in mind. Some were based on ideology, others on religion, others on recreating some “great” past civilization that they saw as the epitome of human culture. And immediately upon settling down, reality set in, and like civilizations everywhere, they adapted to what they faced. Sure, some took on a flavor or thin veneer of past civilizations, or of what people imagined past civilizations to be. But in reality they were building new worlds, new societies, using everything they could pull out of humanity’s big ol’ bag-of-tricks to survive. The result, in space, was similar to that on Earth past. Variety. Profusion. Diversity. Barely contained chaos. Magnificent highs and unspeakable lows. Everything you’d expect out of human beings.
-Lecture given to students at North Harvon College by Professor Neil Prezalski, 2496
Why are we here? Because on the planet below us are a few million fuck-heads who think they’re nobles blessed by God with the right to be murderous tyrants. There’s a few million more assholes with guns protecting them. And there’s a few hundred million people living as slaves. They’re why we’re here. We’re here to make them free, make them all free! And to hell with any ‘noble’ fuckers who get in our way!
-Commonwealth Admiral Ivar Magnusson, toned down version of a speech to the troops before invading and liberating the Europan world of Thrace, 2456
Byzantium, Kingdom of Byzantium, Comenus System, Chaos Quarter
Standard Date 12/29/2506
On his way out from the Commonwealth, he’d not thought much of Byzantium. He had noted, sarcastically, that at least the residents were competent enough to control all of their solar system, even the asteroid belt ten million miles from the planet. Now this tiny nation and the minimal security it provided seemed like a god-send.
He could see at least one space station and the lights of settlements on the planet’s three asteroid-sized moons. Below him the planet itself hung in space, a world of shallow, greenish oceans and a single, massive, brown continent; all circling a bright yellow star. Corvettes actually worthy of the name and a frigate-sized ship not quite as intimidating as the last one he’d encountered, orbited the world with clouds of fighters, ever vigilant. Even the best the Chaos Quarter could offer still faced the constant threat of raiding pirates and aggressive neighbors.
“You said grain?” a voice spoke in a thick Greek accent. The Byzantines lacked the visual projection technology of the Europans, so Rex didn’t get to see who he was talking to.
“Wheat,” Rex said. “Looking to land in Nea Sofia, do some business.”
“Hold on, wait—” the voice spoke. He heard whispering in the background, then, “Sure you don’t want to go to the station? Nea Sofia spaceport, ah, it got a big landing fee.”
“That’s fine,” Rex replied. “I will gladly pay—”
“He said he’ll pay, be quiet! Sorry, OK Nea Sofia is a bit crowded. We send coordinates to you. Big complex, don’t want to get lost, eh? Aright, there it goes.”
A green line emerged on his screen, streaking toward the world’s Pangaea-like continent. It led just north of the planet’s equator.
“All clear now—yes, I made sure, no, that ship is gone, stop talking, I gotta clear this guy!” the voice snapped at somebody. “Come on down now. OK.”
The voice cut out. Rex scratched the back of his head, not wanting to imagine trying to talk to that guy in person. He directed the ship along the green course line, passing a small freighter heading for the space station before entering the atmosphere. He got a better glimpse of the continent as he went. Most of it was brown-to-gray, with scattered oases of green and ribbons of vegetation alongside several dozen longish rivers. Huge mountains made up the spine of the continent, twenty thousand feet tall according to the computer’s measurements. Smaller ranges spurred off of this central spine, pushing north and south to the sea. Broad lowlands stretched between these ranges, progressing from desert, to semi-arid, to grassland, and finally to thick forest as they made their way to the ocean. The outer quarter of the continent was a thick band of green, shifting from tropical to temperate the further you got from the equator.
His destin
ation, Nea Sofia, a major city, sat at the bottom of a smaller mountain range than split off from one of the major spurs, north of the continent’s spine. It rose from the dirt where the peaks slackened and rolling, semi-arid plains began.
As he brought the ship lower, it became clear that this truly was a metropolitan area. Stuck between two ridges, a forest of grey metal and brown terracotta structures sprawled across the flat of a valley, hugging a narrow river in its center. The city outgrew its bounds and advanced a few hundred yards up the lower slopes of the ridges. Rex figured there had to be a million people down there.
He nudged Long Haul away from the ridges, toward the spaceport. They were always hard to miss, and this one was no exception. Several huge terminals, surrounded by two hundred or so circular concrete pads of varying sizes, sat at the city’s edge. Beyond it rocky, cacti-covered plains stretched beyond the horizon. The green line pointed to a medium-sized pad. Unlike seemingly every other pad in this port, it was empty. Long Haul hovered momentarily above it, to let the landing struts extend. Then, with gentle touches to the vertical control, he descended slowly to the ground.
“Intercom,” he ordered; a chirp signaled him that it was on. “We’re down, people.”
He turned. Second watched, impassively.
“Let’s go get you fixed,” he spoke.
She looked down at her body, her head jerking from side to side as she examined her limbs and torso.
“I am not aware of any damages,” she replied.
“No kidding,” Rex laughed. “Follow me.”
He moved back through the main hall, pausing outside Chakrika’s door. It was left open. She was putting her shoes on. He paused.
“Going out?”
“Baby stuff,” she replied.
“Dress appropriately,” Rex replied.
“I know,” she said, slipping her pistol into her pocket. Her shirt hung to mid-thigh and was belted, hiding the weapon nicely.