by Blaze Ward
“And she’s just giving us this?” Dina asked, breathless.
“Oh, aye, Princess,” Moirrey said, “and I’ve got more for the folks at the library.”
“You know,” Dina said, “nobody’s called me ‘Princess’ in a long time, Pint–Sized.”
“Well, then, Princess,” Moirrey grinned evilly, “introduce me to some of the nice folks at the library and I can tell them what they’ve missed.”
She pulled the other object out of the now–deflated messenger bag and set it on the desk. It was a small box, exactly two centimeters thick, nine wide, and twenty–two long, made from a matte black material that seemed to suck the light out of the room.
“What’s that?” Dina asked.
“This, young lady, is a standard Aquitaine fleet astrogator’s navigation module, wiped clean and filled with books.”
“Wow,” Dina said. “How many?”
“About three million,” Moirrey said quietly.
“Moirrey, that’s more than we have now,” Dina replied.
“Yup. This be a personal present from First Lord of the Fleet Kasum.”
“Oh my God,” Dina said simply.
“So, you ever take a break from reading? I only have about two hours before I have to be to my next stop, and you’ve got six years of explaining to do.”
Moirrey poked Dina softly in the belly. “Let’s start here.”
Dina smiled. “I met Evgen my first semester…”
Ξ
Moirrey bundled up tight against the chill. The sun had been down for about twenty minutes and the air was dropping fast into too–cold–to–be–outside–thank–you–very–much.
She and Dina walked arm in arm into the parking lot at the far end of the campus, waving to the head librarian, hoping the man wouldn’t feel the need to hug her again. Seriously, books were nice and all, but let’s keep the emotional displays to a polite minimum. And no more crying.
Beside her, Dina snickered.
“What?” Moirrey asked with a huff.
“You know, Pint–Sized,” Dina replied with a giggle, “if we’d have stayed much longer, he might have asked you to marry him.”
“Is why we’re leaving now, Princess. That and Uncle Detrin or Cousin Dale should be here to pick me up shortly. Sure you don’t want to bring the man and come for dinner?”
“I would love to, but I have papers to grade tonight,” Dina said. “Somebody kept me from working all afternoon.”
Moirrey planted herself with hands on her hip bones and gave her best friend a mock–serious stare. “That’s because I’m way more important, missy.”
Dina giggled some more. “Whatever you say, Pint–Sized.”
Moirrey harrumphed once for emphasis.
She looked around the nearly empty parking lot. Couple of panel trucks. A few old beaters that probably belonged to faculty. A whole rack of zip–bikes and old–fashioned bicycles. And one flatbed rig still covered with mud. Moirrey began to walk that direction.
A door opened, and Cousin Dale climbed down from the cab. Moirrey refrained from running, since the pregnant lady beside her kinda waddled along, but she raised her hand and waved as the man walked closer.
“Moirrey!” he called to her.
Up close, Cousin Dale was all growed up. Like, almost 2–meters tall and half that across the shoulders. Still had the baby–face, hidden behind a few wispy whiskers. Course, he were only twenty now, so he still had some growing up to do, but he walked close and engulfed her in a hug that lifted her clean off the ground.
She let him swing her around once before she pounded on his meaty shoulder.
“Put me down, you big lug.”
“Yes, ma’am.” He smiled, setting her down like fine porcelain.
“Dina,” he continued.
She stepped up and gave him a much more sedate hug, belly stuck way out front. It was like an iceberg or something.
“You coming with us?” Dale said.
“I can’t,” Dina replied, “but tell Ma and Pa hi for me.”
When Dale put an arm around her, she noticed the two panel trucks across the way turn their lights on and start to inch forward. In the distance, coming down the main roadway into the campus, another vehicle was barreling along at a way–too–fast–for–this–kind–of–neighborhood speed.
Moirrey did the math and reached into her messenger bag while Dale and Dina chattered. Lincoln were supposed to be a quiet place, especially around the Institute, but she’d been bad places before. She knew what the signs of trouble were.
In the bag, her hand closed around a very small beam weapon. It was a kind specially designed for a woman’s purse, and a woman’s hand. Small enough to hold, big enough to whomp a horse upside the head.
The two trucks boxed Dale’s flatbed in and turned sideways. Almost a dozen men in black outfits suddenly jumped out and started pointing guns and things at her. At them, but mostly at her. What had she done?
A goon with some training and a pistol stepped a little closer. “Nobody move and nobody gets hurt,” he growled ominously. “Am I clear?”
“What’s going on?” Dina said, voice rising.
The man started towards Dina, violence in his eyes.
Moirrey stepped in between them and pulled the little pistol out. She’d never actually pointed it at someone before now, outside of training, but her hand didn’t twitch as she did.
“You will leave her alone,” Moirrey growled at him.
The man stopped. He appeared to be Dale’s size, but at least a decade older, a decade of violence obvious in a clipped ear and a ragged scar over one eye. He scowled hard at her.
“You’re coming with us, Aquitaine,” he said.
Across the parking lot, the car suddenly slowed down, but kept coming. Moirrey didn’t want to take her eyes off the man to see what the vehicle was doing.
“Fergus,” a man’s voice called, “stand down.”
The goon gave her his best stink–eye, but took half a step back and to one side. She watched him turn away from her group, so she took a moment to look at a new face.
Apparently, he had been in the back of the truck waiting. Short and skinny. Dark hair slicked back. Long duster and black gloves. No gun. Pretty–boy face. Moirrey kept her gun on the goon.
The car kept coming.
The man snapped his fingers.
Moirrey watched half a dozen guns, big battle rifles, suddenly come up and aim at it.
Nobody fired, yet.
The man turned his attention away from Moirrey as the car stopped sharply with a squeal of rubber on asphalt.
Moirrey felt Dale start to move forward, so she stepped in front of him as well and hip–checked him back hard. It felt like bumping a tree, but Dale stopped.
These people meant business. He were gonna get hurt if he tried something, however well he meant.
Moirrey saw most of the guns pointed away from her now, except for the big goon and one other. So she was dealing with professionals. Good to remember.
And then a voice rang out of the darkness and made everything better.
Chapter VIII
Date of the Republic September 24, 393 City of Lincoln, Ramsey
Jessica rode in the back of the limousine while Marcelle and one of Auberon’s marines were up front, hanging on as Marcelle drove at crazy speeds through mostly empty streets. Fortunately, Lincoln was the kind of town that rolled up the sidewalks at night. Traffic down in Landing would have been much more severe.
“Marine,” Jessica said, “identify yourself, please.”
“First–Rate Spacer Tawfeek, Commander,” a man’s voice came from behind the lowered face shield.
“Very good, Tawfeek,” she said. “I’m hoping that you have nothing to do tonight but sit around. However, we may need your skills.”
“Aye, sir. Do you want my spare pistol?”
Jessica weighed the options. It would be a nice fall back, but if things were that bad, then she was going
to need a ten–kilo maul, not a shiv.
“Negative,” Jessica said finally. “Marcelle is armed. You stay out of sight as long as possible.”
“Understood, sir.”
Through the front windshield, Jessica could see the parking lot at the university. Two big cargo transports had boxed in another vehicle. There were far more people standing around than normal for a weekday late afternoon.
“Marcelle,” she said, “we’re late to the party, but not too late. Let’s be a little more casual, please?”
She felt the vehicle slow as it entered the lot.
Over there, most of the figures were suddenly pointing weapons at them. Marcelle jammed on the brakes and brought the big beast to a screeching halt.
“This will do, Marcelle,” Jessica said, keying her comm and dropping it into an outside pocket on her overcoat.
She opened the rear door slowly, so as not to rouse them over there. Someone might get twitchy if she moved to fast. Best to move with careful grace.
She stepped out of the vehicle, but kept the door between her and the bad guys. She didn’t figure it was armored enough to stop the bad guys if they opened fire right now, but every little bit helped.
“I am Command Centurion Jessica Keller, commander of RAN Auberon,” she called across the parking lot. “Who the hell are you?”
She watched a slick punk in a long coat turn away from Moirrey and two locals and focus his attention on her.
“My name’s not important to you,” he sneered. “But you and your friends are coming with us. I have somebody who wants to talk to you.”
“I don’t think so, mister,” she called back.
He stomped closer. Not close, but enough that he could look intimidating without the light breeze ruffling his hair.
“I don’t think you understand, Navy,” he said. “You don’t have a choice. I brought a lot of firepower with me and I’m willing to use it.”
“Oh, I understand,” Jessica said conversationally. “I’m just playing for higher stakes than you are. Cayenne, you’re on.”
She watched the boy’s confusion grow. He shook his head and cocked it to the side like a dog might.
Jessica grinned politely at him.
Off her starboard beam, the night abruptly lit up with a howl as the big, red DropShip surged above the ridge and slid forward, belly turret tracking and a pair of searchlights blinding everyone.
Jessica watched the goons point their weapons up for a second before they realized that they had nothing that could even scratch the DropShip’s armor.
“I would suggest,” she called above the roar of engines, “that you all put your weapons down nicely. I will not give you a second warning.”
She waited a couple of beats for the shock to set in.
“Now!” she snapped.
She was rewarded by that special sound that metal makes when it impacts on concrete.
Jessica stepped clear of the vehicle as Marcelle and Tawfeek got out and began collecting guns from the goons.
Cayenne balanced on her rear landing struts just long enough to off–load eight more marines and Denis Jež, before ascending back up, the twin ventral turret never once wavering from the box truck in front.
Within moments, the men in black had been disarmed, searched, and herded into a small dispirited cluster. Jessica watched the punk in the longcoat as one of the marines searched him for weapons.
Jessica walked over to Yeoman Kermode, her favorite evil engineering gnome and smiled. “Perhaps you could introduce me to your friends, Moirrey?”
Jessica watched the engineering pixie’s smile light up as Moirrey stuffed a small pistol back into her bag.
“Commander,” Moirrey chirped, “it is my great pleasure to introduce you to me cousin Dale, and me best friend from school, Dina Zhao.”
Jessica shook hands with both with a smile. She gestured the group to follow her as she walked back to the punk in the long coat.
She sized him up for several moments before speaking. He seemed a little too defiant for the situation.
Jessica turned to the other group. “Which of you is his second in command?” she asked loudly.
Most of the eyes turned to a big thug with a scarred face. Jessica addressed herself to him.
“All of you are coming with me right now, but when I leave this planet, you will behave yourselves. I don’t feel the need to hurt you today, but if anything happens to these people,” she said as she pointed to Dale and Dina, “I will hunt you down when I return, and hang you all. Then I will destroy your organization. And then I will hunt down your families and friends and destroy them as well. I will even shoot your dog. I will know all your names and your blood types before I release you. Am I clear?”
The man scowled down at her, but nodded.
“Good,” Jessica said harshly. “Make sure his boss understands that when you see him tomorrow.”
“And what do you think you’re going to do with me?” the man sneered as she turned back.
“I’m taking you with me.” Jessica smiled harshly. “I’m hunting pirates, and caught you first thing.”
“Do you know who I am?” he snarled down at her from the distance. “You can’t touch me.”
Jessica pointed up and back at Cayenne.
“I’m the Republic of Aquitaine Navy, you two–bit chiseling shit. I can do anything I want. You should be looking to find a reason why I shouldn’t hang you from the neck until dead.”
She glanced at Marcelle and Tawfeek. The tall woman nodded. Jessica pulled the comm from her outer pocket.
“Cayenne, land now so we can transport the vehicles and the prisoners.”
She turned back to Moirrey’s friends.
“Dina,” Jessica said, “you should be safe to return to your office and file a police report if you would like. Dale, if you would drive your rig aboard the DropShip, we’ll make sure you get home after a brief stop.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Ξ
Jessica watched the last of the thugs from the surface being escorted into Auberon’s brig by her dragoon, Navin Crncevic, Navin the Black, and his entire marine force.
All fifty–eight of them.
The marines did not seem pleased. She watched them make that unhappiness plain to their prisoners.
When the task was done, Navin returned with an entire fire team and a heavy weapons squad as well, mounting up in the DropShip and quickly settling in to bodyguard Jessica down on the surface.
Across the bay, the GunShip Necromancer had already launched and was waiting to escort them back down to the surface, to a very late dinner date at the Kermode farm.
It was overkill, but she needed to make it clear to people around here that she wasn’t going to play by the old rules. She had cracked harder heads than these together.
Anyone giving her a reason now was going to be very, very sorry.
Chapter IX
Date of the Republic September 26, 393 Ramsey System
Denis took a deep breath and knocked on the door to Commander Keller’s office. It opened immediately.
Inside, he found her deep in paperwork and probably her third cup of coffee this morning.
“What’s our status, Denis?” she asked as she set down a report and rubbed her eyes.
He moved to the open chair and sat as the door closed behind him. She wasn’t a stickler for protocol, and it looked like she needed a break.
“Last shuttle is back from the surface and docked, sir,” he said simply.
He waited for her to nod.
“All of the prisoners, except the one we are keeping, were dropped off at the edge of Landing, fully clothed and unharmed. Auberon has been topped off with fresh food and water from the surface, plus general supplies for a long sail. Mrs. Kermode sent along a triple batch of chocolate chip cookie dough that your chief chef is preparing for dinner.”
“Did she now?” Jessica asked with wonder.
“She did.” He grinned at h
er.
Denis didn’t ask, but suspected, from things Moirrey had said, that the two women had accidentally turned into sisters. Not necessarily a bad thing. Keller didn’t seem to have any home life besides the fleet.
“I have also gotten everything prepped to break orbit in about forty–five minutes and head out–system for 9621 Jordani III.”
“Course laid in and ready to go?” she asked with a strange look on her face.
Denis hesitated before answering. “Yes, sir.”
“Good, Denis,” she said simply. “The more people who believe that, the better. We’re headed to the Sarmarsh system first, and I’d like to catch them cold.”
Denis felt his eyes blinking rapidly as he fought to recall the Astrogation Gazette.
“Farther out?” he asked. “Republic side of the gulf, just inside the Lincolnshire systems, but not far from several trade routes between Lincolnshire, Corynthe, and Salonnia?”
“Very good, Denis,” she said with an even broader smile. “Worthless place to live. Metal–poor star. Wide asteroid belt. Couple of boring gas giants. Couple of boiling–hot rocks too close to the star for life.”
“Just exactly the sort of place pirates could hide if they wanted to be missed,” he said.
“That’s my expectation,” she replied. “Rumor suggests that they’re too big for Lincolnshire to handle, so I want to see who’s funding them.”
“And thus, our little canary down in the brig.”
“Correct,” she said. “Has Mr. Bedrosian started to talk yet?”
“Only to complain, sir.”
He watched her lean back in her chair and stretch by turning her shoulders nearly sideways each direction. He’d probably dislocate something trying that.
She fixed him with a tight stare, as if reading his mind. Maybe she did that, too.
“Have Navin assign somebody to play good cop,” she said with a feral purr. “We have time to get through to that punk. And I won’t know what questions to ask until we find out what’s at Sarmarsh.”
“Roger that. Anything else you need before we head out?”
“No, Denis,” she said. “We’re probably six day’s sail to Sarmarsh, so we’ve got time to think. Let’s set up a way–point halfway, drop out, and spend a few hours meeting with the commanders and planning.”