by M. D. Cooper
“Maybe that says more about him than me,” Sera replied.
“I know he’ll be happy to see you,” Serge’s tone was adamant. “He sent Andrea and I out to get you. He said it was time for you to come home.”
Sera let out a long sigh. “Serge, that’s the difference between you and I. You view people’s motives as altruistic; you see the good in them. I see the other side, how they’re self-serving, how they are really only interested in helping themselves and serving their own ends.”
Serge leaned forward with his elbows on his knees and hands outstretched.
“That’s the problem, Fina, don’t you see?” he implored. “You wall yourself off because you want to believe in people like I do, but your suspicion of everyone and everything…it limits you, and you fear the let-down of your hopes being dashed, so you just dash them all in advance.”
“First off,” Sera ticked items off her fingers. “Don’t call me Fina. Sera or Seraphina, no one calls me Fina anymore—”
Helen added privately.
“Secondly, if you had been a bit more like me, perhaps you would have seen that Mark and Andrea did not have either of our best interests at heart. They tried to use me as an assassin—they tried to force me to kill a good friend! If Flaherty hadn’t stopped me, I would have. Tanis would be dead, and the Intrepid…the Intrepid would be gone, out of our reach.”
Serge didn’t reply immediately as he appeared to consider her words, but Sera would never learn his reply as Elena appeared at the bridge entrance.
“We’ve arrived, I see,” she said simply.
Sera nodded. “Home sweet whatever.”
Serge shot her a dark look but didn’t say anything.
“Where’s Flaherty?” Elena asked as she took a seat at a console and spun it around.
“Down in the hold, checking on the stasis pods. It’s as though he thinks those two can escape somehow,” Sera replied.
“Knowing them, it seems like a reasonable precaution,” Elena chuckled. “So, what’s the plan, princess?”
“Stars, princess? First Fina, now princess…” Sera shook her head. “Plan is gonna be to run back to the Inner Stars as fast as this boat can take me if you keep that up.”
“Renegade Hand agent, Seraphina Tomlinson in a surprise move, absconds with her sister and heir to the presidency, Andrea Tomlinson, just after arriving in the Huygens system,” Elena said in a mock-formal voice. “I can just hear the reports now.”
“I would not abscond with them,” Sera grinned. “I’d push them out the airlock first.”
“Your board’s lit,” Serge said, pointing over Sera’s shoulder.
“Yeah,” she replied, “it’s Airtha traffic control. They’ve been pinging us for ten minutes now.”
“Ten minutes!” Serge exclaimed. “Well, respond before they blast us to atoms.”
Sera sighed. “Fine, but I was considering that as a viable option, you know.”
THE HAND
STELLAR DATE: 01.14.8930 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: High Airtha Space Port
REGION: Airtha, Huygens System, Transcend Interstellar Alliance
Sera’s father was not waiting at the bottom of the ramp.
His absence did not surprise her. It was not his style to wait on someone else. Even if those someones were two of his children, along with his estranged daughter. Instead, Director Justin waited at the ship’s ramp, with some form of a smile on his face.
Sera had never been able to read Justin’s expression. The man was a total mystery to her, from his motivations, to his allegiances, to his preferences in music and food—an utter enigma.
“Director Justin,” Sera greeted him when they reached the base of the ramp.
“Seraphina Tomlinson,” the director of Inner Stars Clandestine Uplift Operations, or, The Hand, replied. “I have to admit, I often wondered if I would ever see you again. You had quite the time romping about the Inner Stars.”
“I wondered the same thing,” Seraphina replied. “Though not for the same reasons. I have something for you.”
Sera set the case containing the CriEn module on the ground, and Justin signaled an agent standing behind him to retrieve it.
“And I see that you have indeed brought everyone else back in one piece. Including you, Agent Elena.” Justin’s expression darkened as he spoke Elena’s name, who, for her part, stood tall and met his gaze. “Though I’m not sure how you confused Ascella for Scipio.”
“The way I see it, sir,” Elena said, “you should be thanking me for staving off a rather messy battle in Ascella. Without my assistance, none of us would be here right now—and the Intrepid and the watchpoint, or maybe both, would be gone.”
“So you say,” Justin said dismissively. “The hearing will get to the bottom of that. For now, get your alterations undone. You won’t be going back to the Scipio Federation, and you can’t appear before the committee looking like that.”
Elena laughed. “Would their tender sensibilities be offended by seeing how humans really live?”
“Something like that,” Justin muttered before looking back at Sera. “And you? Will you need to get your skin re-grown? Or are you going to keep that…covering you’ve replaced it with?”
Sera looked down at her skin, covered in artistic whorls from her neck down. She wiped them clear, and her skin took on a creamy appearance. “I believe the appropriate answer is ‘hell yeah, I’m keeping it’.”
“Whatever,” Justin waved a dismissive hand. “And you, Serge, do you have anything to say for yourself?”
Serge shook his head. “Nope, you’re not my boss. Anything I have to say can wait for the hearings.”
“Huh,” Justin grunted. “Grown a bit of spine, have you?”
Serge didn’t reply and Justin looked at the pinnace. “Flaherty, I see you up there on the ramp. Bring those prisoners down and turn them over the agents here.”
“Sorry, Justin,” Flaherty spoke without moving. “I only take orders from Sera. I’m sworn to her, if you recall.”
“You’re a Hand agent,” Justin growled. “You all answer to me.”
“I am not,” Flaherty said. “My term has ended. I am bound only to Sera.”
“As much as I want to mess with him, too, Flaherty, we should just get on with all this. Bring them down.”
Flaherty grunted in acknowledgment and pushed the two stasis pods, stacked on a hover pad, down the ramp.
“I’ll need you to pass your token before I let you take the prisoners—my prisoners—into your custody,” Sera said to Justin.
Justin scowled and nodded. Sera received his token and signaled Flaherty to turn them over.
“You may remove them from stasis, but I want them held until the hearing that I see is scheduled for tomorrow morning,” she said to Justin.
“Yes, of course,” Justin sighed. “Your father would like to see you, as well.”
“I’m sure he would,” Sera replied. “I’ll let him know I’ll be there in a bit.”
Justin laughed as though he’d expected her to delay the meeting. “Sure, take all the time in the world. I bet it’ll make him so much happier.”
Sera scowled and walked off the landing pad with Serge, Elena, and Flaherty. A float followed behind with their belongings.
“Elena?” Sera asked.
“Yeah?”
“Do you have any money, or maybe a place I can stay?”
PRESIDENT TOMLINSON
STELLAR DATE: 01.14.8930 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: Airtha Capitol Complex
REGION: Airtha, Huygens System, Transcend Interstellar Alliance
Standing outside her father’s office, Sera couldn’t help but feel like a little girl again—sent to explain herself and receive whatever punishment he chose to mete out. She shook her head to chase the memories away.
She was no longer that little girl, afraid of her father in his high tower, overlooking the Airtha ring with his implacable gaze. Now sh
e knew him for what he was: just a man—a man with great power, and an ambition few could match, but still just a man.
She had fought enemies across dozens of systems in the Inner Stars, been in more dockside shootouts than she could count, and faced off with the likes of Rebecca and worse. Her father was just a man…just a man.
Get ahold of yourself, woman, she thought and took a deep breath before pushing open one of the doors. She forced herself to stride purposefully toward his desk.
Though, ‘desk’ was hardly the word for it. It was half the size of a small sailboat’s deck. At least seven meters long and two deep, it was always spotless and clear of any adornment, save for a single coffee cup, which sat on a warmer embedded in the wooden surface.
She passed between the rows of pillars and saw her father standing at the windows at the end of his office. Sera knew from experience that her father would often spend hours standing at the window, managing his empire from holo-spaces in his mind. The diamond panes wrapped halfway around the room and gave a stunning view of the ring far below and the star above.
She stood at his desk and announced herself.
“Father, you summoned me.”
Jeffrey Tomlinson turned, and his cold grey eyes—set above high cheeks and below a brooding brow—settled on her.
“Seraphina. Home at last,” he said with little emotion, perhaps just a hint of satisfaction.
“Not through any choice of my own,” Sera responded. The statement came out colder than she’d meant, but there was no taking it back.
“You had a choice,” her father said coolly. “You always have a choice; the outcome just wasn’t one you were willing to accept.”
“Andrea and Mark going free.”
President Tomlinson nodded. “Yes, they cannot be held if there is no accuser. But here you are, ready to testify against your sister, and your former teammate and lover.”
Sera didn’t reply, waiting for him to make his request—to demand she drop the charges.
“Are you ready for what will come?” he asked.
“Are you asking me to drop the charges?” she asked. “New Canaan will not be happy if they learn that an attempt on the life of their governor went unpunished.”
Her father waved his hand, dismissing New Canaan and its governor with a contemptuous look. “They are ten thousand light years from here. Governor Tanis Richards will get her system, and her people will build their new world and they’ll be happy whether or not justice is done here on Airtha.”
“I think you underestimate Tanis Richards,” Sera replied. “You are in a position to cross just about anyone in the galaxy without repercussion, Father. But Tanis Richards should not be taken so lightly—though, I suppose you don’t. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have sent Andrea to kill her.”
Her father’s face showed a moment of surprise, and Sera wondered if it was real or feigned. It was impossible to tell with him. His masks wore masks.
“Do you really think I would be capable of such a thing? To use you as an instrument of murder at the hands of your sister?”
“Father,” Sera barked a laugh. “You all but forced me to join The Hand, an organization which is nothing but an instrument of murder, wielded by you. This does not seem like a great stretch to me.”
“I shall debate neither The Hand’s necessity, nor its purpose, with you,” President Tomlinson replied. “But I will swear to you—swear to you on your mother’s soul—that I issued no such order. In fact, I wish very much for Tanis Richards to live. I believe we will need her before long.”
Sera’s estimation of her father crept up a notch. Either he was better at playing her than she could ever have expected, or he really did see the big picture in a fashion that granted them common ground.
“You did not expect such rationale from me?” he asked, seeing her expression change.
“I did not expect such…pragmatism,” Sera replied. “She breaks our accords—core, she breaks her own. By the Phobos Accords she calls upon so frequently, she is an abomination.”
“Many things are sacrificed for the greater good,” her father replied. “I have spent much time reviewing her actions, from her early years in the Terran Space Force, to her battles in the Kapteyn’s System, and the recent defeat of five fleets at Bollam’s World. She is a great tactician, yes, but there is more to her—or she is a lie.”
“A lie?” Sera asked, uncertain what that could mean.
“Never mind,” her father dismissed the statement with a wave of his hand. “Will you dine with me tonight? Shira, Troy, and Ian will all be present, along with you and Serge. It is the largest gathering of my children in decades.”
“Not Andrea?” Sera asked, probing her father’s intentions.
“No, I respect our laws, though others may not. You have brought strong evidence against her, and she will be held until the hearing tomorrow morning.”
“I am glad to hear that, Father. I was uncertain of where you would stand on this.”
President Tomlinson fixed his daughter with a hard stare. “I always stand with what is right. I always have, and I always will.”
From what she could tell, her father sincerely believed those words. It was one of the things that she found profoundly disturbing about him.
AN INTIMATE OFFER
STELLAR DATE: 01.14.8930 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: Airtha City
REGION: Airtha, Huygens System, Transcend Interstellar Alliance
“So, how was dinner with the fam?” Elena asked from her seat beside Sera at the crowded bar.
Sera shrugged. “As well as could be expected. My father made a series of pointed comments to each of us, which we did our best to ignore. We’re all used to it—have to be at this point.”
Elena chuckled. “My visits home are trying enough; I can’t imagine doing it when your dad is god-emperor of the universe.”
Sera made a sound of exasperation. “You have no fucking idea. I did have some fun, though. Since I wasn’t in The Hand, none of what I did over the last decade-plus is classified, so I regaled my brothers and sisters with tales. For once I got to make my dad feel awkward at his own dinner.”
“I can imagine,” Elena nodded. “Growing up here, they teach us that the Inner Stars are all chaos and squalor, but there’s a lot of hope and beauty there, too.”
“Speaking of beauty,” Sera replied, taking in Elena’s long auburn hair and almond eyes. “I’m glad that you’re back to your normal self—I have to say, the fangs weren’t so bad, but the red eyes were a bit much.”
“They did the trick,” Elena replied. “The guys—and girls—back on that mining colony in the Scipio Fed ate it up. I mean…their lives were dull, with a side of dull, but me? I gave ’em a bit of spice.”
“What were you doing there, anyway?” Sera asked. “Scipio is a beacon of stability—though a bit draconian. I can’t imagine why they’d send you there, and to a mining colony, no less.”
“I hadn’t gotten that far,” Elena said with a shrug. “Jutio, my latest AI, had no clear idea, either. It was fun, though, almost a vacation compared to what we normally do.”
Sera nodded without speaking and polished off her whiskey before signaling the bartender for another.
“What about you?” Elena asked. “Gonna go get your sexy skin undone? I wasn’t sure if you were just baiting Justin or not, back on the landing pad.”
Sera looked down at her body, sheathed in a very short, tight, purple dress, which complimented the lavender hue she had chosen for her skin that evening.
“Are you kidding? This is the best un-booby-trap that’s ever happened to me. This stuff can heal wounds in moments—compliments of a Mark pirate nam
ed Rebecca, and then upgraded by the Intrepid’s crew.”
“I heard about that,” Elena said. “Well, not that you went full kink—you were always on that path—but that you took on Rebecca in her own base. The Scipio boys and girls were none-to-happy to learn that The Mark’s main base of operations was right on their doorstep. Everyone is killing themselves trying to determine how they kept it in the dark layer for so long.”
“Well,” Sera replied. “Let’s hope not too many of them kill themselves trying to sort it out.”
“I imagine Justin has already sent someone to see what route Scipio’s research is taking them,” Elena sighed. “That could have been a fun gig. The upper echelons in their federation live the good life.”
“I just want to get back to the Intrepid and New Canaan,” Sera replied. “They need me there.”
“Do they?” Elena asked. “That Tanis Richards seems very capable. What is it that you think she needs you for—now that the deal is in place?”
“I…” Sera said and stalled. “To make sure that they get the system as promised.”
“Sera!” Elena admonished. “The FGT has never withheld a system once it has been promised. It would go against everything we all stand for.”
“We’ve never had a ship like the Intrepid coming for a colony,” Sera replied. “But you’re right. No matter how much anyone may want their tech, the FGT wouldn’t stand for any shenanigans, and though my father, and other factions, want to create…whatever it is they want to create, the Terraformers still hold too much power to be crossed.”
Elena nodded. “So what is it, Sar, what do you want to go back for? To wall yourself off in that colony? It’s what they’ll do to it, you know. No one in, no one out.”
Sera sighed and took a long draught of her whiskey before fixing Elena’s now-brown eyes with a long stare. “Would that be so bad? The galaxy will progress as it will. There will be wars, there will be peace. Progress, decline, whatever, it’s all happened before, it’ll all happen again. Maybe people like Tanis have the right of it. Just get out, build an Eden, and let the galaxy do what it will.”