Pirates (BOOK ONE OF THE RIM CONFEDERACY 1)

by Jim Rudnick

  Roison stood still, opening her eyes to peer at the guard.

  He shook his head at her and just said, "Damn wheels must 'a jammed in the track …" and smoothed his palms against his thighs as he slowly moved back to the edge of the shaft screen fence.

  Roison exhaled slowly as she trailed the rest of the goat crew off the collar floor and over to the exit, knowing she'd just dodged a painful needling. She smiled a bit under her hand as she wiped the sweat off her nose. She knew that all the Adepts she had ever met would have been needled as they could see … but not do what she had just done. She knew that she was different, and she wondered about what would happen to her when puberty came …

  She nodded at the guard who then checked off something on his wrist PDA, and she joined the lineup of other hostages while the cage returned below to gather more hostage miners at the end of the day. She waited and thought of the message her aunt, one of the only other Adepts who were held here in the same dorm barracks, had sent her in those few moments only hours ago.

  Turning back into her barracks twenty minutes later, she mounted the stairs to the ground floor and moved down the narrow corridor to her room that she shared with her aunt … who followed her in ten minutes later.

  Roison's aunt held up a finger to her lips signaling silence, took up her meager toilet articles, and pointed down the hall to the communal washroom. Roison followed carrying her towel and toilet items. They were almost alone in the washroom's outer room and washed in side-by-side sinks scratching off as much dirt first with just hot water and then applying the soap and scrubbing the grime of the deep soot and even more mud down the drain.

  Roison looked at the woman beside her and thought that she was—or at least had been once—a very pretty woman. Adepts who were always Issians, were generally shorter than most but Aunt Michelle stood almost six feet tall with wavy ash blonde hair and had a way of cocking her head to the side when she listened that made you feel that you were the most important thing in her life.

  Roison tried hard to copy that head tilt, and since she was only eleven years old, she knew she had a way to go. If her mom were still alive, she knew she'd agree with her that Aunt Michelle was still pretty, but yes, the past few months here had taken a toll on her, as well as on Roison. Work was hard, mining much harder, and yet there was still something that she felt was more important than all of this.

  Michelle turned to her and said only one word, "showers" and moved into the inner area of the washrooms. Stripping off the clothes to be dumped into the dirty bin followed by picking up a new jumpsuit, Roison moved into the shower stalls as quickly as she could. Therein, she felt the warming waters slowly knead her tired small body as the caked in sweat and dirt slowly dissolved and ran down the drain.

  The quiet notice that her aunt had entered her consciousness was a start, but she continued to let the water drift down over her body.

  She felt no sense of worry in her aunt's message and the resulting knowledge that Michelle would be attempting to get some of the hostage miners to stage a minor revolt on an upcoming day. Roison would be expected to help as much as she could by getting pre-selected guards to wallow instead of reacting with those needlers to get compliance from the miners. Michelle would be approaching the others and getting all of the Adept hostages to help, but Roison would have the major job when it was time to forge a way out. She would need to help deflect the Adept who was the head of the captor guards. This she knew would be no easy task, and she hoped she could at least provide enough of an inconvenience to the Adept to allow the balance of the revolt to work. She hoped. And she hoped again as the water continued to wash away the sweat and stains of the day's work…

  # # # # #

  As the Avalon yawed to port, the Free Channel nebula was still thick with its red and orange dust clouds. The nebula, like most, was simply a huge almost light-year thick wispy yet sometimes thick fog of colored dust and haze. While this was a supernova remnant, for a reason unknown to man or alien, it seemed to have extended two arms … one out toward the Duchy of d'Avigdor on one side and almost opposite a second arm that pointed directly at ITO.

  And as usual, it was this ITO arm that the Avalon now turned into to use as an aid to staying hidden on its final leg down to the planet.

  Rhys said, "True and slow, Helm," and received an “aye-aye” in response.

  In less than an hour at the Avalon's TachyonDrive speed plus the extra overdrive, they were entering the atmosphere and moving down toward the surface.

  At the top of the landing glide pillar, Rhys watched his helmsman carefully, not so much as the Bridge crewman was new at this, but that it was always a difficult task landing at the mine tarmac totally unassisted. It was extremely touchy due to having no port administration, landing controls, or beacons, and it required moving around the peaks of the tor that hung over the tarmac.

  Hidden in the mountains outside of the capital Emmanuel, it was as if the mine was cloaked by the rock and scree of what nature put both around it and above it. One had to start almost half a mile off the vertical drop and then move laterally using the thrusters as the ship dropped and then spun under the highest tor in the range.

  "Helm, we good?" Rhys queried, his voice betraying no emotion whatsoever.

  "Aye, Captain, the spin is in 3 ... 2 ... 1 … and we're laterally dropping now, Sir," the Helm lieutenant said. His hand holding the stick moved slowly to the right as his left hand danced over the throttle sliders. He nodded once … then again … and one more time finally.

  "Sir, we're under and will be on the ground … we're down, Sir," he said quietly, as his hands moved over the Helm console, shutting down sliders and toggles and buttons too.

  "Acknowledged, Helm," Rhys said and slowly rose from the comm chair and made his way to the lift.

  Minutes later, he strode down the boarding ramp to the tarmac that lay beside the mine and its accompanying barracks camp. Around him within the compound that held the mine, no other ships ever touched down here—this was a highly secure landing pad for one single ship only, the Avalon, the Pirate cruiser. A large watchtower stood at the gate into the mine areas of the compound, the guards within studying their landing.

  Watching the off-loading of the shuffling line of new hostages just taken from a small passenger ship off Duos, the twin star system closest to the edge of the Barony, Rhys studied them carefully too. All appeared to be healthy and there were very few youngsters, he noted, as most were couples though there were a couple of groups too. They were herded and with the aftereffects of the stunners they'd just experienced, they were all quiet and reserved to a degree. He knew they were all still in shock, and he knew that orientation and learning how to mine would be even more of a shock. “Needed though,” he said to himself and moved away from the bottom of the ramp to the gate leading to the barracks camps.

  "Sir," said the gate sentry, "this area is closed off—"

  One of the Navy provost guards from the Avalon moved ahead to confront the sentry, his hand on the blaster at his side.

  Rhys put his hand on the provost's forearm preventing him from drawing the deadly weapon.

  "Sentry, I am here on the orders of the … the person in charge—herself! I am here to check on one single hostage and this is to be on the QT as we do not want to alarm the hostages, which is why I'm here during their working shift."

  The sentry fidgeted with his Sam Browne belt and began to answer.

  "I would guess that I'd need your name, sentry, so that when I report back to the person in charge, I know who to blame for this stoppage of her desires," Rhys said softly.

  "Come on, come on," the provost guard said, "you're holding up our business, sentry!" he whispered forcefully.

  The sentry was already nodding before the dressing down by the provost.

  "Sir, yes, Sir!" he cried out as he pressed the keys that opened up the gate and stepped aside.

  "It’s just without uniforms, Sir, I have no idea whom is who, and your
ship is unmarked, and we learned that it’s not even in the RIM dBase either so … my apologies, Sir!” he said with some frustration.

  “Corporal," he barked out, "accompany this detail and clear their way for whatever they want to do or wherever they want to go. No hindrances or obstructions, complete access to anything within the compound," he finished off.

  "Sir, yes, Sir," the corporal said and fell in behind Rhys who had just walked through the gate and strode ahead to barracks number seven.

  As they walked down the graveled pathway, their boots crunched the stones in unison, and that sound resonated then echoed back when they passed the alleys that lay between the barracks. Above them the sun glinted off the side of the tor that shadowed the mine compound, rock crystals reflected back at almost every ledge or rock face, shiningly bright today. They marched slowly but made good time as they came up on the barracks with the big number seven on the sign above the door.

  "Wait here,” Rhys said as he mounted the steps up toward the barracks front door.

  "Sir, I was ordered to accompany you—" the corporal said but was cut off by the provost guard.

  "Ten-Shun!"

  The corporal stiffened quickly and stood ramrod straight as Rhys moved through the door and down the main floor corridor. He looked into a few rooms and saw evidence that they were being lived in, messy bed clothes with few meager toilet articles on the single shelf on the wall. Room after room was taken. Rhys noted the numbering system and climbed the stairs at the far end of the corridor.

  Moving directly to room number 211, he stopped at the open door and then stepped inside.

  The thin mattress was doubled over on both beds, and the shelf was empty of anything at all. The tiny window had no towel draped over it either. The room as Rhys could see was un-occupied. No one lived in 211. That was pretty obvious, he realized as his shoulders slumped.

  Coming down the front stairs, Rhys moved around the still frozen corporal and back toward the barracks gate.

  "Dismissed, Corporal" he mumbled, and followed by his provost guard, he made his way over to the compound offices to enter his recent mission report.

  No one, he thought, not a sign of anyone at all…

  # # # # #

  Aboard the CS Valiant, the mutineers had made their way in the past day through the Free Channel nebula by following the standard protocols for traversing the nebula. While none on board had ever been through a nebula before, they allowed the ship's computer to aid them with navigation, and the TachyonDrive powered them through, including the turn hard-a-starboard to move toward ITO.

  Moving out of the screen that was this cloud of gas and dust, so orange colored for the past few hours, Cadet Ensign Radisson felt the pressure of such a blind trek as a part of their movement toward ITO with calm elation.

  "Nicely done, Helm," he congratulated Jorgenson, his Helm officer and smiled.

  Jorgenson smiled back and moments later he replied.

  "Sir, nav computer says we're spot-on for the course. We're already hours away from bypassing Landers Station and will approach the mine within about five hours, Nick—er, Sir, I mean."

  Radisson ignored the lapse into familiarity and nodded.

  "Aye, Helm … stay on course but lay in that avoidance algo so we can avoid trouble if possible."

  "Ansible, if and when Landers Station hails us, I want to know soonest— copy that?" he said and half-turned to his left and the Ansible officer.

  "Aye, Sir, roger that," Ensign Smith replied and looked over at Jorgenson with a bit of a pooh-pooh look. Jorgenson just shook his head and continued to monitor their course.

  Ahead on the bridge view-screen, the planet ITO was dead center, and while still only a bright dot, it was their target.

  Hours passed with normal to and fro that happens on any starship, except due to the limited crew, there were no replacements for the Bridge crew. They labored on, and as ITO grew, they watched the sidebar up on the view-screen for any indication that Landers Station was on this side of the planet.

  After peering at the view-screen for over an hour, the soft gong of the mass detector rang the three times it was supposed to as the station hit their sensors.

  "Action, Helm … engage the algo," Radisson said harshly and the Helm officer's hands flew on his console.

  While it wasn't really there, the Bridge crew slightly appeared to lean to the left as the view-screen suddenly swung hard-a-port as the ship veered off and away from the station.

  Almost all eyes were on the view-screen and sidebar, but Radisson was watching his Ansible officer … waiting to hear that they'd been detected by the station and the Barony.

  All was quiet for more than an hour as the Valiant veered off and back out of sensor range … then veered again to sneak by the station well to port. They all studied that sidebar but it failed to show any indication that they'd been detected. They had slipped by and all breathed a sigh of relief.

  "Right, Helm … candle out and let's see where we are," Radisson said, as they were now close enough to kill the TachyonDrive and go to impulse power to land.

  The slide back out of light-speed was quick, and the planet lay below, as the Helm acknowledged same.

  "Helm, enter those co-ords, and let's see where we're going," Radisson said, as ITO now filled a major portion of the view-screen. One could hardly see the blue of their seas and the huge landmass of the major continent. It was unlucky that they'd found that side of the world well after nightfall, though the terminator could be seen slowly moving across the globe below with dawn a few hours away.

  The squawking of the Helm console sounded, and Radisson awaited the course information from the Helm.

  "Sir, it appears that we're about 1800 miles off, but it's nighttime, so we may be landing before dawn … or just after," Jorgenson said.

  That quieted the Bridge as each of them realized they'd not as yet done that kind of a landing before, especially down to a tarmac they'd never even seen. Swallows happened in more than a few of the throats on the Bridge, but they all knew they were committed to landing here.

  "Right, Helm … move us then down to the mine compound, and let's do that at regular impulse, shall we?" Radisson said, figuring that if they could just get the Valiant down soonest that'd be the best for all. Best bet, he thought as the ship moved off laterally to starboard and down, down, down to the surface.

  Less than an hour later, they were only a few thousand feet above a range of twisted and bent mountains with huge passes, cols, tors, and shelves that stretched for what appeared to be miles.

  "More contrast on screen please, Tactical," Radisson said, and as Frasier complied, the view-screen view got a little clearer. Higher up there were wisps of clouds, but as they watched below, the wisps were gathering into fog and it grew thicker quickly, obscuring vision even more.

  These were new mountains, and as such they were as raw as raw could be … and it was here that the Helm nav console directed them until it gonged three times to signify the co-ords had been reached.

  Radisson studied the view-screen.

  "Okay … anyone see anything down there?" he queried quietly.

  All eyes once continued to study the screen and a few heads shook from side to side..

  "Negative, Sir, plus visibility is now down to less than a few hundred yards," said Frasier over on Tactical to the right of the Comm.

  "I see nothing but scree and valley, not a single bit of civilization. But I do see that dusk is about upon us, and that fog is getting thicker too …" he said.

  "Right, Helm, lock her for landing protocols, and let's set her down," Radisson commanded and watched Jorgenson's hands fly over his console.

  "Permission to land, Sir?" he said.

  "Granted, Helm—take her straight down spot-on those co-ords …"

  As the ship rotated into vertical and began to drop down, the view-screen showed below that there was just a darkening fog … there was nothing else.

  The Valiant moved
down, directly on the co-ords, as the Bridge grew anxious as less could be seen by anyone. They slammed into the tor that hid the mine compound, and the ship listed hard to starboard.

  Klaxons rang wildly as the Bridge crew struggled to recover. Frasier had to re-take his seat as he'd been thrown against the starboard Bridge wall. The view-screen showed only fog as they continued to speed up as they fell, the sidebar roiling with red scrolling warnings, repair bulletins, and hull impact messages. The ship listed off to starboard by about thirty degrees and slowly continued to move even more off vertical.

  "Klaxons," screamed Radisson, "Helm, move her back to true vertical, stat!" He punched up the infrared filters on the view-screen, thinking he was late with this tactic.

  "Ansible, EYES ONLY report to Captain Scott with co-ords and damage reports now!" he yelled as the view-screen suddenly popped with a solarized scene of the land below.

  There was nothing but scree and more scree, and if they hit that even at gravitational speed, there'd be casualties, Radisson knew.

  "Helm, move her out off the target below by at least a half-mile, and kill impulse and go to full thrusters," he added as the klaxons died off.

  Jorgenson worked feverishly to right the ship and Smith pounded on his keyboard sending off that full EYES ONLY to Captain Scott. Radisson worked the view-screen controls to run an exterior view of the port side of the Valiant. There, he noted, was the issue as the now bent and twisted landing vane came into view. More than forty feet long, its butt end meant to sit directly on the tarmac at landing, it now jutted away from being straight by about twenty degrees, he figured.

  "What the hell is with those co-ords?" he said to no one in particular but was answered by a yell from the Helm.

  "Sir, look there … over to port," Jorgenson cried, his hands still dancing on his console as the ship slowly began to work back to true vertical.

  Below and off to the way they'd just moved away from was a dull red almost circular area that under infrared showed itself as a heat source or civilization with a single ship on the tarmac.