Transterran Gambit

“You were raised well,” Lefleur said and used tongs to transfer pieces of cut fruit to his tray. “We had to remove that variable from our children’s equation. Our child care centers are the finest anywhere. We’re raising people that parents can be proud of.”

“But we’ve taken it out of their hands.”

“Of course. It’s too much of a burden for the resources of two people to handle. Our way is better. Parents get to interact with their children as they would normally. We just house them, feed them, and teach them.”
Newton picked up the tongs when Lefleur was done and transferred an equal amount of food to his tray. No more, no less, any deviation would be considered disrespectful.

“When we were banned from Sol system, our critics said it would be the end. The EuroCons were more than happy to take us in. So what if some of our products are mildly addictive. We’ve got products to counter them. We heal the sick, we’re working on the end of aging, we can do things with chemical combinations that there is nothing we can’t tailor a drug to treat. We came out stronger than any company in history. That’s what focus and determination can do for you. Like the other day… at the spaceport. Were you focused?”

“Yes, sir. Like I’ve never been before. I couldn’t hear anything except my own heart beating. All the shouts going on seemed to be muted. Everything seemed to be in slow motion. I had to keep reminding myself to breathe.”

Lefleur gave out a belly chuckle as he chewed. “If you can find away to recreate that kind of intensity then there’s nothing on this world or any other you can’t do.”

“Did they catch her, sir?” Kilgore said and ate only after the more senior man had started. “The criminal who assaulted me?”

Lefleur shook his head. “She was no mere criminal, people with larcenous urges are found and treated… no. This person was a terrorist; our intelligence service has linked her to the Cruxis Liberte. We’ve had nothing but problems with them ever since we agreed to administer the old EuroCon colony there. You’re lucky to be alive my friend.”

“May I ask that I be kept informed, sir? Of the progress of the investigation, that is, when we catch her I’d like to be present at the trial.”

“Of course. I’ll have you updated regularly. Now let me ask you this… what, in your opinion, is the greatest problem the company currently faces?”

“I’m not sure, sir,” Kilgore said. “Pirate raids I would say, but the recent upgrades to EuroCon warships should help ease that particular sting.”

“The most fundamental problems we face are tariffs and restrictions placed on our products,” Lefleur said and pushed his breakfast plate away. “Most specifically those that have generated large returns for the credits we spend on research and development.”

“Yes, sir, I understand, but this is not new,” Kilgore said. “But what can we do to open those markets that are currently closed? The NorCom markets, of course.”

“I’m going to tell you something I expect you to hold in the strictest confidence,” Lefleur said. Kilgore, though wary, leaned over the table to listen. “We do have a plan underway for opening the NorCom markets. The demand for our products in NorCom systems is very high. We’ve encouraged smugglers to meet this demand by offering them certain products in bulk at less than cost. Although the penalties for them would be severe if they were caught, the profit they make has, theoretically, made many of them very wealthy.”

“To what end, sir?” Kilgore said.

“You’re familiar with Serenity?”

“Yes, sir.” Kilgore nodded.

“The demand for that product has been especially high, partially because of its well documented addictive qualities. It’s very useful in treating Deep Space Agorapychosis but its potential for abuse is very high, which led to the NorCom ban in the first place,” Lefleur spread his hands wide. “Because so many were already addicted by the time the ban took place, the NorCom- despite our protests- began to manufacture a generic version of our product.”

“How could they be so thoughtless to our concerns?” Kilgore said, drawing a smile from the Transterran CEO. “Do they think they can just disregard their own patent laws?”

“Because they believe that they act for the greater good. In reality the opposite is true,” Lefleur said. “They’re doing more harm to themselves than they can possible imagine.”

“How can this be, sir?” Said Kilgore.

“Once we realized that the NorCom was manufacturing our product, we changed the formula. Ever load that any smuggler has gotten through into NorCom space carries a special lock. My researchers tell me that it blocks the uptake of any similar drug without our special additive included.”

“Christ and Allah.” Kilgore muttered. His mind raced as he noticed that Lefleur was giving him a strange, unpleasant look.

“What’s that?” Said Lefleur.

“It’s nothing, sir, just something I once heard a freighter captain say when he saw something beyond him,” Kilgore ad-libed, hoping that a slip of the tongue hadn’t just exposed his true origin. “I understand it’s used quite commonly in Sol system.”

“As is our Serenity,” Lefleur said as his expression relaxed. “Even while we speak, the supply of it is drying up and all those poor, addicted space-crews are going slowly mad without it.”

“How will this help us open their markets, sir?” Kilgore said. “I… I just don’t understand how…”

“Soon the NorCom and all their allied systems will be begging us for it.” Lefleur interrupted. “Just so they can keep their economies floating, just so they can get their people back to work. It’s tragic, really, that it had to come to this just so we could conduct business with them. Perhaps now they’ll understand that free enterprise must be allowed unimpeded access to any market where a demand exists. Business is war and they fired first.”

“What can I do to help?” Kigore said as he digested these new revelations.

“The company will find a use for you,” Said Lefleur and offered him a patronizing smile. “In the meantime there’s something else you could do for us.”

“Anything, sir.” Kilgore said, hoping that Lefleur had nothing unnatural in mind.

Lefleur pressed removed a small com-unit from his pocket and said, “Send them in. Leave the guards.”

Both turned as the door into the room opened and a dozen unkempt, bearded men entered in slow single file. At first Kilgore took them for captured pirates. They wore old, faded blue uniforms with EuroCon patches marking them as members of 5 Kreigsmarine. Kilgore’s face drained of color when he saw the ship’s these men had come from: Seydlitz, Ostfriedland, and Meteor. The infamous renegades had returned and were lined up against the wall opposite to Lefleur.

“Where is the son of Admiral Mannheimer?” Lefleur said as he scrutinized the ill-kept mob. A lean man with a taught face and stringy salt-and-pepper hair stepped forward with his posture erect and his brown eyes blazing defiance. “Ah yes… Captain Detricht Mannheimer, commanding ECC Meteor,” The Transterran CEO leaned back in his chair and steepled his fingers over his chest. “Welcome.”

Mannheimer responded with a silent glower.

“I apologize for your treatment en route to us here,” Lefleur continued. “It’s not often that people get to meet a legend… legends,” He corrected and let his eyes drift from one man to the other. “Everyone across known-space has heard of you and wondered where you’ve been for all this time, myself included,” His expectant look was met only by silence. “I’m sure that the many changes that have taken place in your absence came as something of a surprise, yes? Your European Confederation is no more. The colonies it once controlled are now managed by us.”

“Then what is to become of us?” Mannheimer said.

“The people of New Saxony cannot forget or forgive what you’ve done,” Said Lefleur. “Your fates, I’m afraid, were decided long ago,” He called for the guards. “Take them away.” Once they had been led out, Lefleur turned to Kilgore. “I have a special job for you.”

***

Delta Pavonis

“I don’t know how we’re gonna get out of this one, honey-jugs,” Hurricane said and shifted his eyes from Jena’s picture to the rear-view mirrors arranged around the canopy. “This can’t be happening. I designed these fighters to be better than this. Christ and Allah.”

The anti-shipping missiles coming in waves from Festung 21 had been spoofed by his ECM systems before he entered orbit of Delta Pavonis-4. The gravity assist from the 10 JM (Jupiter mass) gas-giant would sling him back toward the outer system. He’d contemplated the striated red/orange planet filling his view as he considered his options: a full power burn to get clear of any fighters that might be loitering around his exit vector seemed the only choice… to make a quick getaway and hope that Ranger would be close enough to get a tanker out to him.

EuroCon fighters were waiting for him on the other side of the planet. They were close to base and had full loads of fuel. Hurricane’s initial engine burn got him away from the first group, and the second, but the third pair of Dassaults on his tail would not let go.

“Trailblazer to Trailboss,” He triggered his XHF radio, secrecy long abandoned. The E-Cons already knew where he was. “I need immediate assistance. Trailblazer requesting immediate assistance, over.” The strike force from Ranger was probably too far away to respond in time.

“Attention unidentified craft,” A voice in Franco-accented English came over the Guard Channel- one of the Dassault pilots. “Attention unidentified craft… hull number seven-zero-seven-zero-seven. You are in restricted space. Shut down your engines and prepare for capture. If you do not comply you will be fired upon.”

Hurricane dropped his eyes to the fuel gauge, then to the rearward looking mirrors again. The Dassaults were, relative to the solar plane, behind him in perfect firing position. He had enough fuel left for a three minute extended burn. A sudden burst of retro-thrust would cause the E-Cons to overshoot and put them in front of his loaded HEPAC’s, but what then? The rules of engagement, for him, were not well defined. The mission had been planned around a strike on old derelicts, not a pitched dogfight.

“Attention unidentified craft,” The Dassault pilot called again. “We will rendezvous with a system defense boat. Respond on this channel if you understand. You have ten seconds to reply.”

Hurricane’s threat receiver went off seconds before a glowing particle dragged a plasma stream out in front of Thunderbird’s nose. “At least they’re polite.” He muttered as the warning shot dissipated. The round from the Dassault’s accelerator, had it impacted, would’ve punched right through his fighter. “Not without a fight, you bastards.”

His response to the E-Con demands were whisps of reaction mass vented from the Thunderbird’s multi-axis RCS ports as Hurricane started jinking… 10 pounds up, then 10 pounds left, 10 pounds right, another 10 pounds right, then 10 pounds down. Accelerated particles passed harmlessly around the ship as the Dassaults opened fire in earnest. He activated his ECM as a peeping alert tone in his helmet indicated a missile guidance radar seeking a lock.

A new contact appeared in his data-monocle… the system defense boat that Festung 21 called in to collect him. It was maneuvering into his glide path and had dedicated anti-fighter weapons that he lacked the fuel to evade.

“Attention unidentified craft,” The same Dassault pilot called out again. “Your situation is hopeless. Shut down your engines and prepare for capture.”

Whatever else the pilot tried to communicate was cut off by a sudden burst of harsh static that hissed through his helmet. More hostile fire flashed past his canopy but not the particles ejected by E-Con mounted accelerators. Instead it was the rapid, high-intensity stream of HEPAC fire. Hurricane twisted his head around to check behind him and saw the two Dassaults with engines lit, curving away. Two different fighters were on station off each side- burly F/A-300’s. Skyfall had come to collect him.

***

Procyon

The troopship ECC Ymir occupied its own orbit of Procyon A & B. Built to transport 5,000 troops to battlefields across known space, it had seen action in the Neo-Colonial War. Since converted to prison ship Ymir, it held four times that number of convicts in the most squalid, hellish conditions. Massive fuel tanks held water and air instead, critical supplies in constant need of refreshing. Water was withheld to keep the inmate population in line, but still the mortality rate among prisoners, through malnutrition or misadventure, was estimated to be 20-30 percent.

Kilgore, with full, armed escort, opened the hatch connecting one compartment to the next and ducked his head through, performing a quick survey. Every part of the ship looked the same: exposed wiring hanging from broken conduits, paint peeling off bulkheads, and dim corridor after corridor lined with cell-doors. The ship reeked of human waste- pockets of stale air filled with the stink of urine and feces. Personal hygiene was a thing forgotten.

Guards in tow, he stopped in front of a cell and compared its number to one he kept in memory. Satisfied that they were the same, he gestured toward it and said, “This is the one. Open it.” Key-card inserted, the door creaked open on rusty hinges.

The inside of the cell was covered with patches of yellow mold that fed on the moisture that antique atmospheric controls seemed unable to remove from the circulating air. Sometimes it migrated to prisoner’s skin as what became known as “Ymir’s Curse,” a deadly thing if spores were introduced to the warm, moist environment of human lungs. Mannheimer sat on the deck, cushioned by a foam pad that also served as his bed.

When the cell-door slammed shut, Kilgore put his back against the nearest bulkhead and dropped to a sitting position. After several minutes of silence, he said, “You probably know why I’m here. If you don’t then I’ve completely misjudged you. Just to set things straight, the company has assigned me to make a record of where you’ve been.”

Mannheimer opened a mouth filled with broken teeth and laughed. After several coarse chuckles he broke into a coughing fit. Ymir’s Curse had already taken hold. “What do you know of where we’ve been?”

“I know that your father led Five Kriegsmarine into the Crucible Rift,” Kilgore said and set his data pad between his knees. “I know that he was supposed to attack the NorCom forces landing on Avalon. I know that he returned to base without firing a shot and was relieved of his command. I know that five years after the end of the Neo-Colonial War he convinced you and the officers formerly under his command to mutiny. I know he led you all into the Rift again. I know it’s been twenty years since then and suddenly here you are,” He leaned forward and spread his hands wide. “Think of me as a historian. You’ve been places I can’t imagine and seen things…” Kilgore shook his head. “Things that can’t be allowed to rot away on this prison ship. Help me… help me and maybe I can convince the chairman to show leniency.”

“There is nothing I can tell you that you would believe,” Mannheimer said and laid his head back against the bulkhead. “Leave me alone… I have nothing to say.”

“If not for yourself, for your crew then,” Kilgore said quietly. “They believed in your father enough to follow him away from New Saxony, but they followed you back. Even now you have an obligation to them. I can help them, but I need you to help me.”

Mannheimer closed his eyes and took a deep breath but erupted in another coughing fit. He swallowed whatever had been brought up from his lungs as his eyes flicked open, fixed on Kilgore.

“I’m willing to believe you.” Kilgore said.

“To get around the NorCom sensors watching New Saxony, my father led his fleet into the Rift, further than anyone had reached. They spent three years in cold sleep just to reach the turnaround point where they would begin moving toward Avalon, but they found something out there… glimpses of something on the other side of the Rift, a system not recorded before, on the fringe of some unrecorded nebula. There were planets in the system.”

“I’ve seen the record of your father’s court-martial,” Kilgore said. “There’s no mention of a system beyond the Crucible Rift.”

Mannheimer nodded and said, “On his return to the fleet base, high control refused to believe that he’d gotten readings from the other side, the refused to even look at his evidence. They were angry because he’d failed in his mission to attack Avalon. He was accused of making up evidence supporting his claims, but I’ve seen them… the inferometer readings proving that the planets were there. I was convinced, and so were the officers in his command. They’d seen it, too. High control had other plans… they wanted Avalon back. The Neo-Colonial War was over for only a few years and they were ready to start it again,” He shook his head. “Five Kriegsmarine was fueled and provisioned and ready to launch. It was then my father decided to act. His command officers were with him. We loaded our families onto the troop transports waiting to take on the invasion force and escaped with some tankers. We jumped into the rift. To cross it we spent ten years in cold sleep but that was no matter... we were never coming back, or so we thought.”

“Why didn’t you stay?” Kilgore said as he felt Mannheimer emitting sorrow. “You’d already slipped into legend… what was the use in coming back?”

“The system was already occupied,” Mannheimer said and erupted into coughing again. He wiped his lips once the fit had passed. “There planets were there, just as my father knew they would be, but they were already colonized. We could detect electromagnetic signals that were not of natural origin. They were very strange.”

“Was it the NorCom?”

“We thought it was,” Said Mannheimer, his eyes fixed on something far away. “Whenever we detected contacts moving toward us we activated our ECM systems. When they got within visual range we knew then that they were not NorCom ships. They were nothing that we had ever seen before. What we thought was an asteroid belt was really a massive fleet, one that was focused on us. We were as strange to them as they were to us. They bathed our ships in powerful beams that might’ve been weapons, I can’t be sure, but my father seemed sure.”

“And what did he do?” Kilgore said and leaned closer.

“He tried to defend the transports carrying our families,” Mannheimer said with quiet morose. “Grendel opened fire. Soon it was joined by our ships that had finished refueling. Whatever they were reacted very badly. Our transports were such easy targets,” He fixed Kilgore with a vacant stare. “The last communication we received from him was… an apology. The Grendel was surrounded, being swarmed by them, my father ordered me and all the ships still operational back into the rift... he said that someone had to warn you… so we did,” Mannheimer lifted his eyes to the grimy walls around them. “And this is your thanks.”

Kilgore shrugged and said, “This wasn’t up to me.”

“There is just one thing that worried me, one thing that stayed with for the ten years of dreaming it took to return to this known space.” Mannheimer said. “There was nothing we could do about it at the time so I tried not to let it worry me.”

“What was that?” Said Kilgore.

“It would’ve been easy enough for them to analyze our trajectory. What if, somehow, they managed to follow us back?”

“If that’s the case then where are they?”

***

61 Virginis

Task Force Romeo wasn’t expected when they penetrated Virginis space ahead of schedule. Besides the military supply freighters and transports that made up the main body of the group, they brought with them the remnants of the Avalon; Pathfinder recon ships belonging to the ADF. The system that started the trade route known as the Virginis Run had doubled its population in an instant as the ships came out of transit and began to decelerate. Pax had several large, underwater colonies but very little above-ground area to build on. The large areas were taken up by spaceport tarmac. Inbound shuttles full of refugees were turned back as they approached. The additional burden of so many would work the life support systems of each settlement to dangerous levels, but they could supply air, water, and food when it was available.