Spinward Fringe Broadcast 5: Fracture

by Randolph Lalonde

  He looked to Ayan, who had worked as hard or harder than anyone and looked like she'd gotten up several hours too early. He couldn't help but smile at her. Jake hadn't had nearly as much time as he wanted to spend with her despite his desire to get to know her all over again. The biggest problem they had was finding something personal to talk about. He had no problem talking about the ship, the crew, but he was conversationally clumsy whenever he tried to bring up anything personal. It wasn't like they were picking up where they left off. Most of what he knew about her had been learned through simulations when he was back on Freeground. They had spoken for years and met as avatars before they ever met in person. Even though he'd never forget the time they had together on the First Light it had been cut short. They still had so much to learn about each other and he had no idea where to start.

  Oz was a different story. He'd seasoned, gained experience as a Captain of his own ship. To Jake's surprise he never showed dissatisfaction at being the First Officer of Triton. The easy relationship he'd formed with the man on the First Light reappeared within hours of serving beside him on the bridge. Theirs was an art of delegation and direction, each of them doing their absolute best to make sure that the Triton was safe, the crew was working at a sustainable pace, and that they had the right plans for the near future.

  All the while they watched their friend, Minh-Chu Buu, who was in his absolute glory. With years of practice in hundreds of sims while he was adrift between the stars and experience before that in an actual starfighter he dove into the qualifications, the tournament ladder and the squadron training with the rest of the pilots. Their enthusiastic old friend found his way to the top in short order, and while it was evident that he'd honed his skills to a deadly point, he had also gained a keen understanding of strategy.

  He was likeable, had the military training and discipline required for command and the few seasoned pilots aboard respected him. Jake appointed him as Triton’s first Wing Commander after ten days and charged him with the continued training and leadership of all the pilots aboard. It was an obvious choice to anyone who had jumped in on a starfighter or fleet combat simulation while he was participating.

  After meeting with Liam Grady Ayan took a day to decide which project to work on. She undertook the daunting task of building replacement engines for the Triton. Six days of manufacture and assembly led to the pair of completed thrusters that filled the rear section of hangar three. They were ready to replace the thrusters Captain Wheeler had destroyed in their last engagement. When that was complete she involved herself with repairing the bridge and other complicated control systems. If she had time left Ayan would work with Jason Everin in composing several messages meant for the Freeground, Carthan and Timar governments. Her hope was to open a dialogue so she and Jake could form a relationship with them, whether it be for trade, privateering or an all out alliance. There was so much for her to catch up on that her gaze was constantly affixed to her comm unit. If that wasn't enough she also worked with Laura Everin, her long time best friend, to implement systems first used on The Needle into the main engines and other Triton propulsion systems. There was never enough time in a day.

  Jacob couldn't help but think of Alice as they were about to start up the hypertransmitter systems. He had devised the plan behind the acquisition of the components required to build it but she rounded out the rough edges and created contingencies that were risky but worth it in the end.

  There were five seats in the centre of the bridge, more than enough room for everyone he'd want beside him in the worst of times. Ayan, Oz, Jason and Alice. Of everything he'd gained thanks to his life after the First Light, she was the best. She had even topped off her plan to rescue him and the others from Pandem with a safe destination; an asteroid field well off the charts with a successful mining and trading operation perfect for extended repairs.

  “You look light years away,” Ayan whispered to him as she double checked the power feeds leading to the main wormhole emitter systems using a holographic schematic.

  “I think they're waiting for you to give the order,” Oz reminded him with a wry grin. “You're going to have to let me in on that thought later.”

  Jake recovered himself and cleared his throat, focusing on the main holographic display arranged in a semicircle in front of the main command seating. “All stations ready?”

  “All stations report ready,” Oz confirmed.

  “Then flip the switch. Let's see what the galaxy's been up to.”

  The Triton’s hypertransmitter systems came online soundlessly. Even though no one could see them with the naked eye everyone on the bridge knew that the stolen system was generating hundreds of micro wormholes a second, reaching out to distant solar systems, other hypertransmitters, space stations, digital way stations and major shipping lanes across the known galaxy.

  At first a few messages trickled through, then Jason Everin's console lit up, followed by Jake's then Oz's and finally Ayan's. They were viewing a summary of collected data, hundreds of topics and titles scrolled by faster than they could read. Selecting one topic led to hundreds of subcategories that contained news reports, personal communications, financial reports, entertainment, purchasable designs, advertising and more advertising.

  Jake checked his personal directory and caught names of people he'd come to know since he'd taken command of the Samson, a few law enforcement offices that wanted to offer him work as a bounty hunter or repossession agent and even a call to arms for the Triton herself which he promised himself he'd look into later. Then something he didn't expect caught his eye and he put his finger down on it before it could scroll up and out of sight. Captain Lucius Wheeler of the Order of Eden ship Saviour conducts a public execution of Triton crew members. It said. He tapped it open and glimpsed the face of a former crew member from the Samson, Silver.

  Before anyone could see the small image he archived it. “Everything we're getting is quarantined, right?” Captain Valance asked Jason in a hushed tone.

  “Yeah, why?”

  “Nothing can slip out?”

  “Not with the block in place on everyone's comms. Only senior staff can start receiving news, general entertainment and personal messages have to be scanned.”

  Jake looked back and saw that the senior staff were just starting to receive updated news and new instalments from their entertainment subscriptions. He looked across the faces of the crew and spotted Ashley eagerly bringing up one major news and entertainment report after another. The small holograms that hovered over her comm unit would have been a little comical if he didn't know what she'd be stumbling upon. “Ash, shut down your comm unit please.”

  She didn't look up at him at first, concentrating on the preview of a Hyper Pongo League game she was receiving instead. “Why? Something wrong with my comm?” Her expression fell in the next instant as she came across an advertisement for her ex-lover's public and evidently painful public execution. His holographic face was ragged, complexion sallow, eyes red, and his gums were receding terribly, bleeding openly. A set of cables had been drilled into his head like a crown. Another group had been driven into his neck, their entry points seeped with blood and pus. “Kill me, please kill me,” begged Silver quietly, barely moving his mouth. As Ashley watched a signal was delivered to his brain. The slack and exhausted face on her display contorted and screamed, howled with reckless abandon.

  Ashley's eyes were instantly brimming with tears, her opposite hand went over her mouth and as the image faded to be replaced with the message; TRAITORS DIE, ONLY ON JUSTICE ONE, 2137, she shook her head in horrified disbelief. “Oh no, no no no,” she sobbed quietly.

  Stephanie's arm went around her waist and she was guided to a side passage that led to the security office before anyone else, Captain Valance included, could get to her.

  Jake made eye contact with Stephanie as she turned away and was reassured by her knowing nod. She'd take care of her more sensitive best friend, there was no one better on the ship. �
��Stop all justice feeds and archived programming,” he ordered Jason as he turned around.

  “Already on it. We'll have a master copy of everything in digital quarantine. Two other people have seen that advertisement though, it's marked as high priority on at least thirty networks.” Jason was silent for several moments as he worked the semicircular holographic display in front of him, there was so much information scrolling no one else could keep up. He turned white and shook his head; “They tortured some of them to make effective commercials. I'm sorry Jake.”

  “I should have seen this coming,” Jacob replied quietly, trying to help sift through the more sensitive data.

  “Let's hope the few people who received that ad didn't know anyone from the Samson and just skipped through it.” Something else caught Jake's eye then and he brought up his financial information. He was confronted with a display filled with red marks. With a quick twitch of his finger he hid the financial report. “All right, have we sent all the crew's messages?”

  “They're out.”

  “Good, shut it down.”

  “We planned for another nineteen minutes.”

  “I said shut it down,” Jake reinforced firmly.

  Ayan activated the kill switch for the wormhole system and it powered down. “On the brighter side, the test was a fantastic success.” The initial technical report on the wormhole systems started to come in, filling the air in front of her with electrical schematics, power readings, wormhole trajectory, compression and emitter stress data.

  “We contacted over twenty thousand nodes anonymously and released our packets into the network without origin markings. The communications systems that picked them up will automatically mark everyone's messages with their origin markers and it'll look like the crew's messages came from everywhere at once,” Jason said as he confirmed that everything had been sent and accepted by at least one hypertransmitter node.

  “Good. How often do large ships do that kind of thing?” Jake asked.

  “All the time. Military ships, pirates, slavers, you name it. They all like to keep their positions on the hush so anonymous transmissions are a must if they have a big enough vessel.”

  “I thought so. Send my congratulations to the crew and tell the flight deck to make final preparations to launch fighters. We need to clear out the raiders so we can make repairs and move on.”

  “Aye,” Oz acknowledged, starting to stand.

  Jake caught his arm and looked him straight in the eye. That expression was gravely serious.

  Oz sat down. “Privacy mode, command seating,” he ordered the bridge systems. A visual blurring and audio obscuring field surrounded the five command seats at the centre of the bridge. “What's going on Jake?”

  “There's more to the public execution situation. Wheeler. He's hunting down former Samson and Triton crew members and making an example.”

  “Isn't Wheeler dead?” Ayan asked.

  Jake didn't reply, only brought up a Justice One Station broadcast marked with the Regent Galactic and Order of Eden logo. As the program identification faded a gargantuan stadium appeared. It was marked with countless sponsor logos, even some of the front row attendants were covered with them. The green padded surface of the field surrounded a massive platform. Several humans hurried around, picking up what appeared to be small mechanical and organic parts from the synthetic turf.

  “This is a half time show?” Ayan asked, quietly shocked and appalled as she pointed to the platform that had risen out of the centre of the field. It came equipped with a pit for musicians, trap doors, a long restraint rack with three prisoners under a black sheet and several heavily armed guards.

  “Looks like it,” Jake muttered.

  “What sport is the field set up for?” Oz asked, looking at the ruled sections of the field.

  “Crush League Rugby.”

  “I've heard of that. Cybernetics are legal and anything goes, right?”

  “Yup. It's almost as popular as Hyper Pongo on the fringe,” Jake said absently. “There, there he is,” he commented as the holographic display focused in on a darkly dressed figure on stage. The caption beneath him marked him as Captain Lucius Wheeler, his grinning face looked over the tens of thousands who cheered at him expectantly. His dark hair was shorter, and he wore a Freeground vacsuit under a heavy black trench coat much like Jake's but it was impossible to identify him as anyone but Wheeler.

  “So it's true, they weren't just faking him when the Saviour attacked the Triton.” Jason commented.

  “They must have had a scan of him. According to the Wheeler who died here he was in Vindyne's inventory for a long time,” Jake added.

  “Hello Segoma Five!” Wheeler called out as the band's pounding music subsided. The audience cheered with renewed gusto. “Welcome to the Order of Eden Half Time Show!” He waited for the applause, cheers and whistles to calm before going on. “I'm Lucius Wheeler, Captain of the Order of Eden ship Saviour and I have the pleasure of announcing the new most wanted man in the galaxy! Before I let you see the face of this traitor, let me tell you a few things about him. He was born on Freeground, an old trader station where people live hard, isolated lives and keep to themselves, hoarding needed supplies and overcharging travellers who are unfortunate enough to get caught in that area of dead space for food and repairs. I know all about it, after all, I was fortunate enough to escape about fifty years ago. This man is no brother of mine or friend to us, however. After getting kicked out of the military and assigned to a console to review manifests all day he gathered a group of friends together and commandeered an old destroyer that was about to be decommissioned. They called it the First Light and began a crime spree as pirates and looters. Eventually they were captured by Vindyne but instead of going quietly our man here released a virus into their computers and eventually escaped. That program, that very same program eventually evolved into the Holocaust Virus!” He exclaimed, outraged and thrusting his finger up into the sky. The audience was starting to rally, booing, hissing and shouting.

  Wheeler let them go on, seemingly furious as he paced the length of the stage. With a surprising suddenness he stopped and whirled at the audience. “That's right! One man! One man with complete disregard for all his brethren removed the safety limiters on his personal artificial intelligence and unleashed it on the galaxy, ignoring the Eden Two Conventions and slaughtering billions! Our brothers! Our sisters! Our fathers and mothers died because this man did not want to face justice! He presents himself as a hero, a champion of justice and freedom and as soon as our own machines started slaughtering us he disappeared! But not before-” Wheeler took a breath and calmed down, addressing the audience in a conspiratorial tone. “-not before he could recruit hundreds of desperate souls. People who were unaware of his involvement, unaware that in truth he was the cause of their hardships. Most of them are aboard his new stolen ship now, the Triton, a ship he stole from a Sol Defence perimeter station. His new crew are serving him unaware that he has no way to pay them. Regent Galactic and the Order of Eden have frozen his accounts, petitioned the Core World Prime Justice to issue a galaxy wide search and destroy order and to review the evidence against him!” The crowd turned, cheering and beating a thunderous tattoo with their feet in the stands. “We didn't stop there! Today I have the pleasure, the privilege to present to you two Captains and a navigator who have willingly served the dread Captain Jacob Valance!” he whipped the sheet off of the restraint rack, revealing the stripped, emaciated forms of two women and a man.

  “Oh my God, who are they?” Ayan whispered, shocked.

  “The captains who retired from the Samson and bought my cargo haulers; Monica Albany of the Temperance, Tasha Pauley of the Bakersfield and my old navigator, Lawrence Silver. He and Ashley shared a bunk for a few months before he broke it off and left the ship when I quit hunting.”

  “Poor girl, no wonder she couldn't keep it together.”

  “You know the game!” The image of Wheeler exclaimed excitedly. �
�On your Civicomm you have the names and crimes they've been convicted of and it's up to you to decide which one gets a dose of pain or should be given the final, merciful jolt that will burn their brains from the inside out and end it all! Remember! It's not just your decision, only when seventy percent of the votes call for the death of one of Jacob Valance's co-conspirators will they be put out of their misery, so make sure you don't press that red button too early! Make sure the people watching across the galaxy see how we treat pirates, looters, and mass murderers. Anyone who signs up for his crew can expect the same! Now let's have it! Mob justice! Mob justice!” he shouted, raising his arms, clapping his hands.

  The crowd joined in, calling for blood, stomping their feet to the rhythm of their repetition; “Mob justice! Mob justice!”

  “I can't hear you!” Wheeler prompted tauntingly, cupping a hand behind his ear.

  The stadium erupted with renewed fervour as his hand hovered over a large red button and the band struck up an upbeat marching tune. The prisoners behind were exhausted, their heads hung low, forced to stand upright in the rack restraints. The brown haired woman on the left wearily shook her head as the other two wept, their shoulders shaking, bodies trembling with fear.

  Tens of thousands of people cheered as Wheeler's hand came down on the red button and the rack lit up. In the next instant the prisoners were twitching, writhing, incoherently screaming and wailing as the audience manipulated controls that sent pain to one of them at a time. Wheeler took a deep, slow bow as he was lowered into the stage.

  Jacob turned it off, exhaling shakily. His jaw was clenched, eyes cold, his hands clutched the arms of the Captain's chair. No one had ever seen him that angry, few had ever seen anyone so angry in fact. Jake's gaze was fixed to a point somewhere in the air in front of him as he spoke quietly; “Repair the ship. Harvest what we need, open trade talks with the raiders or clear them out so we can work with the station. I don't care who we're dealing with, just get us back in shape. Tell the crew what they can expect if they're captured.” His head turned mechanically and those cold eyes met Jason Everin's. “Find Wheeler.”