“As for her,” Spalding continued, “all she was ever in it for was half of my pension. As soon as I qualified, she filed for divorce and got a judge to give it to her, even though I wasn’t technically retired and had no plans to be so anytime soon! Mandatory retirement age, my left foot! I got a waiver—two waivers! I mean, do I look retired to you?” he said fiercely.
“But, Sir, Parliament can’t get to you here and if this grav-cart processor really works, the rest of us will know the truth,” Brence pointed out.
“Are ye daft? I told you we can’t do it, because we’ve no bloomin’ Caprian grav-carts!” Spalding said, throwing his hands into the air.
“Well…” Brence began drawing the word out like a hiss.
Spalding’s head snapped around.
“We did have a few grav-carts with us when the Constructor pulled out, for carrying equipment and transferring the more wounded patients on over. We never did have time to transfer them all back to the Clover,” Brence said, a faint smile tugging on the corner of his mouth.
“No,” Spalding whispered, his eyes widening.
“Of course, a few of them were on the Imperial Strike Cruiser,” Brence continued, then faked a frown, “sadly, they’d broken down or were having issues, and no one could get them fixed all the way back up to spec.”
“You mean we have some on this ship?” Spalding could barely believe his ears.
“A few broken down grav-carts, for a broken down ship,” shrugged Brence, before his lips twisted in a smirk. “I think them on the Phoenix figured as long as you were on the Hydra with us they’d all get fixed up eventually.”
“What are we standing around here jawing for, man?” Spalding said, starting down the stairs. “We’ve got a memory core to pull!”
Chapter 36: The Last Meal
“It’s time, Admiral,” said Sir Isaac LePierre, not looking nearly as triumphant as I’d imagined he would. In fact, behind his pleasant diplomatic mask, he looked…almost regretful. He proffered a meal tray, which he set down on the little table in my cell, like he was the waiter and I the paying customer. He even went so far as to arrange my silverware, and place the napkin in my lap.
I looked down at the plate of food that purported to be a Pacifica III specialty. “An entire plate of lightly Sautéed Oblong Pacifica Dung Beetles, and you got them here in only four days. I’m impressed,” I said appreciatively, and despite myself, I really was; they must have pulled out all the stops to get them here this quickly.
“A prisoner’s last meal is a time-honored tradition in this Sector,” explained the Caprian Ambassador. “It truly was an ingenious ploy, to request something just far enough away—like the Oblong Dung Beetle—that it was right on the edge of transport survivability, and yet would take a significant amount of time to acquire. Any well-bred person knows it can’t survive for more than a week outside of its native environment,” Sir Isaac commented smoothly, actually sounding fairly respectful of the idea.
I smiled wryly. “I admit it took a lot of thought. But when you’re gagged, all you have time to do is think,” I said, spearing one of the Dung Beetles and staring at it before putting it back down uneaten, “I figured it would have taken you at least two more weeks, between the time it takes to roundtrip a ship, not four days. If I may inquire…?”
“Sadly, a merchant ship just so happened to be passing through Central with live specimens of this particular Pacifican delicacy—although only Saint Murphy knows why,” Sir Isaac explained, his face making a moue.
“Blast,” I said, without any real feeling behind the word, “the wheels of commerce grind everything in their tracks; it would seem, that includes a certain former Montagne Admiral,” I said with a wistful tone, and this time when I speared a Dung Beetle with my knife, I plopped it in my mouth.
“I am told, this particular dish has been cooked to within an inch of perfection, and then sautéed the rest of the way by a true master of the culinary art,” Sir Isaac said, with such a straight face that it must have be true.
“Gah,” I choked, quickly swallowing down the bite with a sip of water, “it tastes just as nasty as I thought it would. Those spices only make the taste of the innards that much worse.” I shuddered, instead of continuing to describe what those innards really tasted like. It’s a dung beetle, I mean come on; you figure it out!
Rather than extending the torture, I pushed the dish away with my thumb and forefinger. “I fear that my last meal fails to agree with me,” I announced, calling upon all my royal manners and palace training, for just the right mixture of regret and disdain.
“The chef will be crushed; I do believe the poor man actually believes you are fond of the dish,” the Co-Chair of the UPN Sector Security Council said, placing the cloche back over the plate.
“Send him my regards; it’s a stomach virus, I’m sure of it,” I declared. Externally, I was the perfect version of a Royal Prince, but I was internally reeling from the blow. The final vestige of control—my last meal, and the time-saving increments I’d been hoping for due to transportation issues—vanished, along with the tray in Sir Isaac’s hands.
“I’ll pass that along,” Isaac promised. As he turned, he paused with the tray still in his hand. “You’ve been a surprisingly worthy adversary; far from the palace party prince I’d been led to expect, from perusing reports made to the Home Office,” he admitted, shaking his head benignly.
“That rascally home office; something must be done!” I declared with mock outrage.
“All in good time; there’s no need to rush,” Isaac LePierre said in a reassuring tone as he knocked on the door, to signal his desire to exit. For a moment, I was tempted to rush and overpower him but sadly, logic prevailed. I knew that if I tried and succeeded, the power-armored goons outside my door would only find joy in beating down my unarmored person straight into the floor.
“I bid you good day,” I sighed, watching as the only man with the power to set me free walked out the door. For a moment, I was tempted to attack him anyway, even without the possibility of escape. But sadly, someone else just as smooth and deadly would take his place in the span of time it took the doctor to make it official. I might have done it anyway, but unlike most of my enemies to date, he had just been too polite. Whether by his design, or my own, that politeness took me off guard.
I was used to more open animosity from my foes to date. Stood, Yagar, even Jean Luc had been very clear what they thought of me. While Sir Isaac (except for the little test about whether or not I was going to throw my men under the hover-bus to save myself) had been surprisingly civilized, for a man telling you how he planned to kill you. It was, for the most part, just the cost of doing business, and he made clear that he took no real pleasure in doing so.
So, although I cursed myself for a fool for not going down biting and clawing, I let him leave unmolested. I had to remind myself that I was just the same as any other political prisoner; I believed my cause was just the same as anyone else. I thought my death, and the blow to my cause, was a travesty just like any other person would.
I sternly reminded myself that for all of my supposedly royal blood, I had feet of clay just like any other man. I wasn’t the special ‘chosen one’ of the holo-novels; I had no secret destiny that would miraculously ensure my survival. The only outside shot I had entertained—the notion that had kept me up late at night—was that possibly someone might come to rescue me. Someone like, say, Heirophant the Tracto-an I helped escape. I didn’t even count Tremblay in there anywhere; I knew where that man stood.
But all the plotting and scheming, and hoping against hope for an exit strategy, ended tonight when I took the long walk to the hangman’s noose. When the door finally closed, it was all academic.
Chapter 37: Here goes nothing…or everything
“It’s ready,” Spalding declared.
“Here goes nothing,” muttered Brence before turning to the rest of the team down in Engineering.
“Why don’t you
give it a try?” Spalding urged, out of a desire for revenge over that particular comment.
Brence blinked and then had the audacity to actually look pleased. Suddenly, the loyal second in command was gone, and the burgeoning little would-be Engineering dictator stood in his place. “All right, you bunch of shiftless slackers,” the new Executive Officer shouted at the men. The tone in the man’s voice caused Spalding’s eyebrows to rise—pleasantly—in surprise.
“You’ve been waiting all day to put down the multi-tools and give this thing a second try,” Brence continued, and the Chief Engineer’s eyebrows lowered thunderously. The goodwill the man’s tone had generated was wiped clean, by speaking as though multi-tools were an accepted part of an Engineer’s life, but the formerly wayward space hand continued on, “So, if you’ve been dragging your feet these past couple days, thinking that working two or even three shifts in a row was tough, this is your lucky day,” Brence barked, smiling down at the lot of them menacingly. For a moment Spalding was taken back to the fond memory of his very own first Chief Engineer, “because if it doesn’t work this time due to your loafing, don’t worry; you’ll get a third chance to get it right!”
All around them the men and women of the Engineering team, and the grunt labor conscripted from the other departments across the ship, groaned.
“I couldn’t have said it better me-self,” Spalding added, looking at Brence with newfound respect beaming from his good eye.
“I learned from the best, Sir,” Brence whispered out of the corner of his mouth, causing Spalding to smile beatifically down upon the Engineering masses.
“So without further adieu,” Brence declared, stepping over to the same red lever that Parkiny had pulled before.
“After fifty years of secrecy so tight no one actually thought it was real, I give you—” he pulled down on the lever with all his might and it slowly lowered down into position with a click.
For a moment, nothing happened…then the lighting dimmed. The panels brightened and dimmed, then brightened and dimmed again, before steadying out to a slightly duller tone than before.
Brence waved his right arm in the direction of the old Engineer.
“Chief Engineer Spalding’s very own, secret, Montagne Maneuver,” he cried, and then clapped his hands triumphantly.
The rest of the Engineering crew broke into similar applause, and started cheering.
“Hurray! We can finally get some sleep,” one of the ratings cried.
Spalding broke out into a fit of giddy laughter. “That’s the ticket, laddies,” he coughed between his chuckles. Then he turned to Brence and leaned over. The former space hand looked at him with a smile.
“That multi-tool comment was hitting below the belt,” Spalding said as sternly as he could, with all the good cheer going on around them.
Before Brence could say anything, a rating started pushing his way through the crowd. “Chief Engineer Spalding,” he called out.
Too caught up in the moment, Spalding half-turned before rounding back on Brence, still determined to give the lad a piece of his mind.
“Lieutenant Spalding,” yelled the rating again, and Spalding scowled.
“Am I deaf,” he barked, rounding on the rating.
The rating stopped in his tracks for a half step before pushing his way through the last of the crowd between himself and the Chief Engineer.
“You’d better have a blasted good reason for yelling at me like I was both deaf and senile,” Spalding warned, pointing a finger that just so happened to occasionally pop open and let loose a little plasma torch action every now and again at the rating.
“Sir, it’s the Admiral!” cried the rating as soon as he was within spitting distance.
Spalding put a finger in his ear and wiggled it around.
“Watch whose face you’re yelling in,” he glared. “Now, what’s all this ho-rah-rah about?”
“They say he’s cut some kind of deal and pled guilty; they’re going to execute him tonight!” the rating’s voice started out at a shout, but in the face of Spalding’s increasingly grim appearance, he toned it down to a more normal—though still loud—voice.
All around them, the celebration slowly ground to a halt, until everyone turned to stare at Terrence Spalding.
Furious at the audacity of the politician, he glared around the room. Smoke all but poured out of his ears, he was so angry. “Then we strike now!” he bellowed, pounding the rail he had been leaning against.
“But, sir,” Brence sounded concerned, “we’re still heavily outnumbered, and not only haven’t we run any tests to see if it works the way we hoped; this is the only ship in the fleet rigged out this way!”
Pointing out that the Clover had been rigged this very way for the past fifty years would have been counter-productive, so the wily old Engineer let it pass…for now.
“It used to take this ship quite a while to build up to her top speed, and even longer to slow down,” he grumbled as he began stomping towards the exit. “Well, not anymore!”
“But what about the other ships?” begged Brence.
“If there’s one thing pirates keep working in top form, it’s their ability to run away,” Spalding sneered, taking big, droid-legged strides toward the lift.
“I suppose…but you yourself said they’re old, and in less than top form,” argued Brence.
“They’re faster than anything else in this system, and that’s all that matters for the plan I have concocted. So don’t you worry,” he paused to pat his second in command on the shoulder, before continuing on at a rapid pace, “we’ll be the ones doing the heavy lifting,” Spalding finished magnanimously.
The Engineers within hearing distance gave a little half-hearted cheer at this news, and Spalding would have stopped and burned them each a new exhaust port, had there been time. Fortunately for them—and the Admiral—there was not.
“I’ll sort you sorry lot out later,” he tossed over his shoulder as he made his way into the lift. One of the few perks of working in this old beast of burden was that it took nowhere near as long to get from one place to another. Of course, since in his opinion, there really was no place worth going to…it was a rather paltry advantage.
His XO in tow, the ornery old Chief Engineer made his way to the Bridge. Like all great plans, his was firmly based on a few, innovative Engineering principles.
“They like to say I’m old and behind the times. Well, phooey on them! I say it’s time we show them just what the old times were really like,” he grinned to himself, and if he looked more like an angry metallic bear than he did a proper Chief Engineer…well, at that particular moment, no one was brave enough to say so.
Chapter 38: Strange Readings
“We’re getting some strange readings coming off Sensor Array Alpha-Bravo, Lieutenant Commander,” said one of the Petty Officers in charge of a tertiary sensor bank.
“What have you got for me, Harry?” asked the ship’s Tactical Officer.
“Well, if I didn’t know any better, Sir,” the Petty Officer said, shooting a copy of the readings over to the Tactical Officer’s terminal.
“I see what you mean, Petty Officer. I want the entire Alpha bank deployed to a deep scan of this area. I want that anomaly locked down and identified,” ordered the Officer.
“Aye, Aye, Lieutenant Commander,” the Petty Officer saluted. He had just completed the gesture, when there was a disturbance from the rest of the team on the Alpha-Bravo Array.
“Contact,” cried one of his ratings, an experienced sensor operator with too much of a penchant for poker to rise any higher than his current ranking as an Able Spacer, Second Class.
“What have we got, Sensors,” asked the Lieutenant Commander in charge of Tactical.
“I’m reading a Corvette just inside the hyper-limit. She coasted in dark and just lit up her main drive, Sir,” reported the Able Spacer.
“Friend or foe signal? What’s she squawking,” the tactical officer demanded, shooti
ng a look between the Sensors and the Com Officer on the other side of the Bridge.
“I’m not getting anything on the Communications Array, George,” the Com Officer said to the Chief Tactical Officer.
“Nothing here, Sir,” reported the Petty Officer, having had time to look back down on his console and review the sensor results.
“What do you want to do, George; you’re Officer of the Watch,” prompted the Com Officer, a Senior Lieutenant with too much time in grade to have much of a hope at further advancement.
“She transferred to a point far enough out of the system to evade our planetary and ship-based sensor arrays, and coasted up the hyper-limit. She only activated her drive after she was already inside. We follow S.O.P.; standard operating procedure,” he said for emphasis.
“I’ll contact the ready squadron, if your men will be so good as to shoot me over the data dump,” said the Senior Lieutenant.
“Good,” the Lieutenant Commander currently in command of the ship said, “I’ll wake the Captain. Whoever these wankers are, they need to be taught a lesson in manners. No one infringes the Sovereign territory of Praxis IV while we’re hosting the Sector Central!”
Chapter 39: The Dark Side
“We’ve confirmed the reading, Sir; a second vessel, which we’ve now positively identified as a Corvette and running silent until it was inside the system hyper-limit, has just gone to full acceleration,” reported the Sensor Technician.
“I see that the Praxis System Defense Forces have point transferred two corvettes from their border ready squadron. They were likely hanging around just outside the hyper-limit, for just this type of occurrence,” explained LeGodat, in order to maintain a sense of control over the situation.
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