Jump Gate Omega

by Tom Shepherd

  “And Rosalie.” Noah regained his composure. Tyler hadn’t seemed to notice.

  Tyler smirked. “Little Sis ain’t no lawyer.”

  “I spent a lot of money on your education, Tyler. Why do you talk like a jobless drop-out.”

  “It’s proletariat slang. I know when to wax professional,” Tyler said. “Why Rosalie?”

  “You’ll need her. She specializes in…” He paused, searching for the right word. “Diplomatic resolutions. Proactive interaction with alien races and human expatriates.”

  Tyler leaned against the smooth housing of the inactive Gate. He took out his datacom. “What’s my job on the Family fantasy team?”

  “Senior partner of a new, autonomous law firm, practicing among the Rim Worlds.”

  “Funding a spin-off and making me the boss. You’re that desperate?” Tyler tapped the datacom.

  Noah looked him in the eye. “Will you go to the Rim? Put that damned datacom away and answer me.”

  “Do I get a starship to command?”

  “No.”

  “Then my answer is the same—no.” Tyler returned texting.

  His father crossed his arms. “Remember, Tyler, choices have consequences.”

  Two chimes and two musical notes sounded. Noah tapped his datacom. “I told you, no interruptions.” His mouth twisted into a lopsided sneer. “Put him through.”

  A large, ghostly display monitor materialized in front of them. The screen flickered and snapped into vivid resolution, a richly appointed office with art from multiple star-faring nations. Center screen, a middle-aged man with distinctly Latino features sat upright behind a cube-shaped desk that offered miniature holographic news programs in progress.

  Bianca’s only brother, Xavier Solorio, swept his hand and the displays shut down.

  “Senator, how can I help you?” Noah asked. And how much do you hate me today?

  “You can begin by greeting your brother-in-law like a member of the Family, Noah.”

  “Forgive me, but I believe the last time we spoke—the week after Christmas—you told me to go fuck myself then challenged me to a duel. I assumed a little formality was in order.”

  “I spoke in haste, my brother. You know my great affection for you.”

  Noah sighed. All right. Let’s dance. “How can I help you, Senator?”

  The head of the Solorio family leaned toward the screen. “Is that my nephew, Tyler?”

  “Hey, Uncle Xavier.” Tyler waved and backed out of the crossfire.

  “Noah, I need to ask about a Family matter.”

  “I’m listening,” Noah said.”

  “It is our Julieta. We have not heard from her in two months. Since she works for you, I thought the CEO of Matthews Interstellar might know her whereabouts.”

  “Let’s see…the last time I checked her work, Dr. Solorio was negotiating medical research exchanges with a Meklavite colony. That was a few months ago.” And she is way overdue to make contact. That worries me.

  “Did you send her on special assignment?”

  “Not recently.” Well, that was technically true. Xavier knew what Julieta actually did for a living, but neither would say it aloud with Tyler in the room.

  “Bueno.” The Senator sounded relieved. “Where is she today?”

  “I’m not exactly sure.”

  “You do not know where your trade representative is located?”

  “With five thousand reps working deep space, I can’t tell you where they are on a daily basis. I have people who track their routes.”

  The Senator said, “Her last message originated at Suryadivan Prime.”

  Noah trembled slightly. He had no idea what his niece was doing in the Sacred Protectorate. Julieta’s office at the Matthews Trade Embassy on the Suryadivan homeworld merely provided cover for her special assignments. Noah directed her to play the itinerant trader in medical technologies in the Perseus Arm of the galaxy and wait for further instructions. He did not want her near the Rim, where any hint of covert activities could screw up the negotiations for Jump Gate Omega. Julieta was good at what she did, but diplomatic subtlety wasn’t in her skill set.

  “Not surprising. Her office is at Suryadivan Prime,” Noah said.

  “You’ll look into it?”

  “I’ll check with Adelaide LeBlanc at Deiro Yord and get back to you soon as possible.”

  “Please notify me when you have something. Camilla cannot sleep with worry about her hija.”

  Noah felt a stab at the heart when Xavier mentioned his wife. “How’s Camilla doing?”

  “Better. We have great hopes.”

  Noah tried to smile. “Our prayers go with her. And you, Xavier.”

  Comforting but futile. Pray all you like, people with Blue Fever never got better. Periods of stability always deteriorated into relapses. There was no hope, even with the Blessed Virgin her side. Noah cursed his lack of faith, but he knew it was the truth.

  “You are my true brother in Christ. Notify me when you find Julieta.” The Senator signed off, and Noah dissolved the holo-screen. He reached out and steadied himself against the massive Gate. Camilla is dwindling away, and Julieta goes AWOL?

  What the hell is she doing—running from grief over a dying mother? Julieta follows orders poorly, and she leaves bodies in her wake. How much of this should I tell Tyler, who doesn’t even know about Camilla’s condition?

  “Julieta is missing on the Suryadivan homeworld,” Tyler said, “and you didn’t know?”

  “No, goddammit.” He wiped his chin with a hand. “I sent your cousin to open new markets along the Perseus Arm. She apparently went rogue somewhere along the Rim.”

  “Isn’t it a little early to declare her overboard? Maybe she found a new boyfriend and dropped out of sight for a little bingo-bongo. Might want to avoid her parents. You know how religious Aunt Camilla can get.”

  “God, I hope so.” Noah thumped on the floating Gate. “But my bones tell me otherwise, considering her special skills.”

  “What special skills?”

  “Well, you know—interspecies medicine and language interpretation.”

  Tyler laughed. “Doctors don’t like sex? Julieta’s a bit of a wild thing.”

  “Don’t talk about your cousin like that.” Noah shook his head like a horse shooing flies. “If your mother finds out she’s missing, I may have to emigrate to Andromeda.” And please, God, do not let her turn up a frozen corpse on some Suryadivan moon.

  Tyler leaned against the dark Gate. “So, you want me to find Julieta and secure the Alpha Site?”

  “Yes.”

  “Will you enroll me in Aunt Violet’s Starship Command School after the job is done?”

  “Your cousin’s life and possibly the Family’s survival is at stake, and you’re negotiating?”

  Tyler nodded. “I’m a Matthews.”

  Noah grunted, approvingly. “First sensible thing you’ve said all morning. We have a deal.”

  They shook hands. “I’ll find her, Dad.”

  “And secure the Alpha Site.” Noah activated his datacom. “I’m putting a priority on getting your scout ship patched up. As representatives of the Family, you will outrank everybody who works for me, diplomatic and military. Don’t abuse the power.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “You and J.B. leave tonight. Gate-hop to the rimward edge of the Perseus, where you will acquire a long-distance FTL vessel for the run to the Outer Arm.”

  “You own thousands of ships,” Tyler said. “If the mission is so crucial, why not task a fast-pursuit battlecruiser?”

  “Like I told your mother, too provocative. I want a low-key, diplomatic approach coupled with a massive assault by litigation. If all else fails, the military option is always available.”

  “Okay, I’ll fly commercial. Where do we catch a transport outbound to the Rim?”

  “You don’t. I’m sending orders to Safe Harbor shipyards on Sedalia-3 to release the best available long distance starship f
or your personal use.”

  Tyler threw up his hands. “Sedalia is a fucking junkyard.”

  “I own the fucking junkyard. Find the best long-range, fast FTL ship available on station. Something safe, but something you can buy cheap, or better yet something we already own. Strap in and go. If she’s big enough, tuck your scout ship in the docking bay.”

  “Still think it’s a bum deal. You have a fleet of—”

  “You want to back out?”

  He shook his head. “I’ll get the Sioux City through TG-3 before midnight. Anything else?”

  “Rendezvous with your sister before departing Sedalia.”

  “Did Mom sign off on sending Rosalie into harm’s way?”

  Noah squared his shoulders, regaining his robust stance. “I’ll handle your mother. And remember, the incoming signal from Andromeda must pass within a thousand meters of Gate Alpha—that’s meters, not kilometers. If you don’t get that easement reinstated quickly, the signal will pass through the disk of the Milky Way and return to the void.”

  “And we’re back to doomsday again.”

  “Time’s running out, Son. The Family is depending on you.”

  A moment later, Noah Matthews was alone, dwarfed by the floating Jump Gate prototype. He paced for a few minutes, messaged senior staff to gather in the briefing theater, and marched briskly toward the lift.

  What the hell is Julieta doing out there?

  Four

  “Registered prostitutes only.”

  Stocky and muscular with skin the color of unpolished mahogany, the doorman wore a dark suit sporting a totemic inscription in stylized Japanese kanji imprinted with metallic fibers running vertically along his left-sleeve. Naca Jen recognized the logo as Riley’s World Privateer League, a security contractor for the House of Sakura, which was a subsidiary of Tsuchiya Galactic Corporation, but she didn’t comment.

  She shifted her shoulders, rippling the body-hugging, white sheath dress with gold link belt. Thick tresses of midnight hair cascaded over her shoulders to frame a generous bosom. Already her pale blue eyes and lightly tanned complexion, complimented by full lips and snowy smile, enticed males in the waiting line to crane their necks for a better look. She ignored them. Quarry with serious money waited within, and she arrived with a memorized list.

  “We prefer to be called providers.” She flashed an ID bracelet, offering its data chip.

  “I prefer to be called ‘Your Majesty,’ but nobody does.” He brushed over the bracelet with a portable scanner. “Left hand for confirmation.”

  “Yes, Your Majesty.” She offered her palm coyly, like a lady expecting a kiss, yet fully aware he was browsing muscle, bone, and cartilage to the sub-atomic level to find DNA markers linked to her registered ID.

  “Your name is Naca Jen?” He sounded surprised. “Mindorian name. Do you know what it means?”

  “Night Storm.”

  “What are you doing on Riley’s World—business or pleasure?”

  “My career field embraces both.”

  “I am Mindorian.” The doorman sized her up with a sweeping glance. He took out a mini-scanner. “You are 178.5 centimeters tall. Too tall for Mindorian females. And your skin is too pale.”

  “My patron altered me in utero. I’m also tighter in certain places and quite flexible, unlike my sisters.”

  He switched to Rampaki, a dialect of the second largest Mindorian language group. “What was your settlement, whore?”

  “Eighty-seven by-the-Sea, Oncaro District,” she replied in flawless Rampaki. “And if you call me ‘whore’ again, I am gone. None of the rich men beyond your barrier will feel these long legs wrapped around them. Some are expecting me.”

  The doorman ignored her barb. “Tough neighborhood, Oncaro. Crowded high-rises, street gangs, vigilantes.”

  “Oncaro? How about rich villas along the shoreline? Watch towers and gates and private security. Excellent courtesan academies and art schools in the neighborhoods just adjacent. My villa was across from the Gregorian Temple on Baitman Plaza.”

  He grinned and reverted to Terran Standard. “We have to be careful. My proprietor doesn’t like complaints from members and their guests. We don’t need party girls. Are you on the clock?”

  “I never look at the clock. And my clients never complain to anyone.”

  “Sixty percent goes to the house. You may keep the rest, plus tips.” He lifted the force field, offering admittance. “No free drinks. Get the gentlemen to pay, if you can.”

  “Oh, they’ll pay. I promise you.”

  He touched her arm. “Beware, Naca Jen. Powerful men play here tonight.”

  “Tonight, they will play with me.” She flashed a smile and continued up the short staircase to another security door. A second access port swept her, this time for hidden weapons and contraband. Night Storm fluffed her raven hair and visualized her first target of the evening. When the scan panel flicked green, she removed her shoes and deposited them in a DNA tagged container, adding her handbag and all jewelry. It disappeared into the wall as she pulled on snug house slippers.

  She adjusted her golden belt, tugged the tight dress smoothly into place, and stepped up to a dim corridor leading to a hazy, third force field. Colored light throbbed through the misty portal, and she did not hesitate to step through this final scanner, knowing it was designed to identify and destroy any pathogens her body carried before she could expose the guests to alien diseases.

  Inside at last, she found herself in a circular greeting chamber ringed with transparent elevator capsules. Night Storm lifted her chin to watch the spiral chutes rise past bright decks where a cacophony of music from a medley of cultures seeped into the circular access shaft.

  She went to the curved, black marble bar in the center of the cylindrical room, found a tall chair, and slipped onto the soft wood seat. It was bio-engineered, supple, and responsive to the size of the ass parked on it. The chair purred audibly when her backside sank into its embrace.

  “You’re a delightful little pervert, aren’t you?” she said.

  The chair-creature squeezed her bottom mischievously.

  “Umm. Do that again, and I’ll screw you right here.” She ordered a Kansas City Star—ice tea, lemonade, and rye whiskey—and sipped the wheat-golden mixture, occasionally holding it up to the bar lights.

  “Do you enjoy waving a drink at the mirrors?” A humanoid man rotated the adjacent bar seat to face her. “Or were you trying to order a refill?”

  He wore Trade Supervisor’s dress coveralls of the Dengathi Stellar Lagoon, further identified by a bottle green complexion and four webbed digits at the end of thick hands. His nose was flat and his eyes as large as a bullfrog’s, and he had gills on both cheeks. Amphibian species. Not unfriendly, but prone to piracy. Sexually incompatible with humans, so he wasn’t after her professional services.

  “Just certifying the bartending droid knows how to make a KC Star.”

  “You are Night Storm?”

  She nodded. “Am I famous, or has someone sent you?”

  “Come with me.”

  She didn’t move. “Do you have my gift?”

  He slipped off the bar stool and handed her a small box. Inside she found a braided gold bracelet that matched her belt. She handed it to him. “Would you, please?”

  He bent and fastened it around her ankle. “Are you ready now?”

  “Pay for my drink.”

  He signaled the robotic bartender, and she followed her Dengathi guide to transparent elevators. Enterprising providers usually selected the upper levels, but her escort requested a lift to the House of Sakura’s permanent social suite, modestly located on a mid-level deck.

  As usual, she had done her homework. Human colonies swarmed with ethnicities from all Terran cultures, and the large portion of humanity that originated in Asia was well represented. Tsuchiya Galactic Corporation, a registered Japanese ethnic corporation originally located in Osaka, moved its headquarters to the multi-species colony
at New Osaka two hundred years ago. Today, it remained culturally Japanese but had grown to about one million employees from hundreds of spacefaring civilizations. TGC was both a major competitor to Matthews Interstellar Industries and one of M-double-I’s largest trading partners. Its merchant and security fleet was second only to Matthews-Solorio in human corporations trading among the stars.

  Tonight the Sakura House branch office welcomed the leader of its trade empire—Hideki Tsuchiya, CEO of Tsuchiya Galactic—on a coordination tour of his Riley’s World operation. He was not a military dictator in the model of feudal Japan, but his executive power was so absolute that everyone—human and alien—called him Shōgun. With regional managers in attendance from a corporation commanding interstellar assets estimated at 2.8 quadrillion galactic credits, it promised to be a lucrative party for providers in Naca Jen’s trade.

  The moving capsule dissolved before her, and they stepped into an envelope of Asian revival music flavored with Japanese cooking scents. Teriyaki, sake, ginger, and dashi; cabbage, onions, bean sprouts, beef and shrimp, stir-fried in sesame oil with a hint of shōyu to perfume the serving room. Tinkling strings of the shamisen, a traditional banjo-like lute, filled the small space with discordant tones while businessmen chatted and the teriyaki simmered. About ten women, mostly Asian, knelt around the room, all in white kimonos, each a step behind a seated guest.

  Night Storm removed her shoes and placed them in the designated rack by the entrance. She followed the guide to her assigned place and knelt behind the oldest guest. The balding old samurai in a gray kimono was unmistakably Hideki Tsuchiya. Rumored to be well over a century old, he looked in his early fifties.

  After a few minutes, the man next to the guest of honor turned to glance at Naca Jen. He was early middle aged and classically Japanese with a long, oval face, large eyes and strong nose.

  “Tsuchiya-sama, see what beauties I have procured tonight?” the younger man said in Japanese.

  Hideki Tsuchiya nodded grandly. “So-so-so. Very lovely, Yuki-san.”

  Yuki bowed, almost touching his nose to the serving bowl on the glossy black table. “And this special one is for you.”