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| The Holdfast is shutting down for the first week of the festival so I thought ‘why not?’ I’m just going to throw so things into a bag once my shift ends and catch the air ferry I’m sure someone in the TerraCom assembly can find time to put their signature on a command request ” “Give me time “Second Fleet I wonder how these ones escaped?” “A comet is my guess,” Hurricane said The Pax orbital garrison was a protective shelter that he longed to steer his ship for “Neptune and its moons were ceded to their control after Martian independence *** 61 Virginis The silence that greeted USS Ranger’s arrival set of instant alarms throughout the ship “Fighters, sir I think they got us out here as bait Except for her, the admiral had the lift to himself ” “If we get there I came out of the icebox forty-eight hours ago,” Hurricane said We’ve got little friends around ” “I’ve always thought that it was a good enough place to start “I guess I should’ve thought for a minute about what time it is there “Maybe in some ways it is ” “What on Earth did we do to piss off the Sun God?” Jena wondered and took a plastic cup from a dispenser full of them ” “Quite all right, commander,” Kinkaid said and filled his cup with the same Next time I’m going to find a better position to sleep in “I’m beginning to think I should’ve gone into business law Remember that for later “Sometimes I ask myself that same question “It must’ve taken a big one with some gravity of it’s own to drag them out of position like that “Maybe you can tell me what the hell is going on here, amigo What’s up?” “I got your messages about the exhibition Jena pressed the down arrow and said, “Then one of two things is happening, admiral, either what they have is so good they’re trying to find the right way to market it, or things are so bad they have to keep it under wraps I’m taking a few vacation days in a row ” Pancho came back I threatened them with removing our unfinished projects to the United Space Alliance works but they’re having the same troubles “Jena? Hi Tali squinted at something out of sight and reached out of frame for it ” The sensor display lit up with new contacts, a cluster of objects, ID’s by the computer as Nickel-Iron “Who do you think told that one to your father?” “Victor Borges?” Jena guessed What’s that supposed to mean?” “The settlement puts the Viking one lander on display and it just sort of becomes the focal point of the party His XO embraced him and pounded his back ” “I agree,” Kinkaid said but then heaved a disgusted sigh When Hurricane looked out of the canopy, the holo-HUD pinpointed them in space with red arrows hanging in his vision It was ten times better then what I got from Sol to Lalande ” “Heat it up, Pancho I won’t lie to you, Jena, it’s not a cocktail party,” Tali hesitated to reconsider “Tracking the shipping in this system is difficult enough when the sensors are operating The only true answer that ever comes to me is I-don’t-know “Commo, conn ” “Confirm that,” Pancho said The ship’s executive officer handed him a printout listing all his damaged systems ” They stopped when they came to the lift Friendly forces please identify yourself ” “Just follow my lead, amigo,” Hurricane said and visually swept the target area He found the fuel level display We’ll meet you there,” Hurricane said and reactivated the wireless link between the two fighters in his flight Every day there was a new message in Jena’s v-mail about the upcoming Founder’s Day I’d say one in three can be cleaned up and made serviceable again, that’s an extra twenty ships for Home Fleet at most, thirty if we can find crews willing to deploy with a marginal reactor In the worse case scenario, they’re just stalling us for time until more of them arrive ” “Turrets are over the rail ” “The solution is very simple, sir “It could’ve been worse ” Kinkaid shook his head ” “How’d the big nap treat you?” “I had a picture of Pax settlement pasted onto my icebox cover,” Pancho replied ” The bridge crew erupted into cheers that overwhelmed the addition of “On detached duty” to the pilot’s statement “If the latter is true then why haven’t they attacked yet? We know they’re here All we’re picking up are zapper clusters Are you with Second Fleet, over?” “Affirmative, Achilles,” Came the reply “We’re gonna hit the cluster inbound to the ship ” “Affirm that, Rodeo two Between Home Fleet and the ground defenses we’ve build into Earth and the colonies, they’d never get close to any of our worlds, not with their fleet Ours,” The sensor-tech said when the Captain 1st moved to look over his shoulder She reappeared with a pink ticket in hand and pressed it against the viewer I was waiting in the chow line after I came out of the box and what do I get? Egg omlet Someone transmitting on the Guard channel overrode their intercom banter Weapons free Tali twitched at a ticklish spot and switched vid-com off That’s the best way I can describe it Ares Prime Lager was only available off-duty “The main belt is a way back “I think their reinforcements just showed up It doesn’t look like any laser damage I’ve ever seen, over ” “We don’t have any fighter carriers in this system,” Captain 1st said as confusion started a slow perfusion through his mental process “It’ll take four minutes to charge Next off was the service jacket, then her garrison trousers ” “Conn, fire control He wouldn’t order the ship abandoned until the zappers started burning it through or he received a reply to his SOS “I had nothing but pretty Pax girls keeping me company for almost the whole transit “I’d just like to know how they got here ” Trailboss to Rodeo four I wasn’t expecting you to call so early This is Achilles The other option was coffee One guy described it as a ‘breathtaking experience ” Pancho added Relief flooded his system making his knees wobble Get back to the ship when you’re bingo fuel Other occupants got out of their way “Ask Captain Groove if you want to know anything else ” “This is RN Achilles “The problem is access “That is not our business, commander ” “Fire control, aye “Hello?” Tali said and put the call through clad only in a short, green robe that flapped open as she settled into the viewer Who still knows how to run them? Someone in a museum, I suppose, or a retirement enclave ” “And refining our starship fuel,” Jena said as they rounded a curve and saw a cargo robot approaching with a load carried in its arms ” “Accept new solutions *** 61 Virginis “Keep sending that SOS until we get a reply,” The Captain-1st of RN Achilles had 20 years in service and knew when he was in trouble, big trouble ” “You’ve seen the analysis of their ships ” “How much was my pass?” Jena said ” Jena sat on her bed-slab and pulled off her padded boots She pointed at a pan full of something labeled, “vegetable lasagna,” and a plateful of it was immediately delivered by a line cook “You’re our guest “You can make it up to me if you want to,” Tali said and took the ticket away, replacing it into storage ” “Stand by for course-correction burn,” Hurricane said and entered a vector into his navigation system, a heading for the flank of the asteroid cluster and a 12 second engine burn It’s worse after two Mega class storms All the logs we reviewed reveal nothing but merchant traffic previously accounted for ” “Achilles to Trailboss They either destroyed what was out there or it went into hiding ” “Which tells me that TIL is sharing what they know, just not with us,” Kinkaid said and muttered ” “Let’s go get our dicks in it ” Captain 1st said ” “Send the bearing to fire control,” Captain-1st said quickly “I’m so stiff and sore A caricature of Norse Goddess Freya beckoned in ink above the silver-embossed name of the event ” “Trailboss, this is Rodeo two,” Quickdraw called in “How did you know?” Kinkaid smiled This ain’t right Pax orbital garrison was still transmitting, infrequently, and in a code Ranger had no cipher to ” A quiet voice came through Hurricane’s helmet speaker She filled it with water and said, “If there is one The multi-purpose video board on the wall came on and filled with a string of digits “I don’t like the looks of this Cisco He took his eyes off the passive sensor display and pressed his helmet to the canopy so he could look rearward ” “Power transferred, accelerator charging,” Pancho radioed back “For about thirty seconds Were you up for the S-3 brief?” Both fighters were configured with a long accelerator tube that jutted out from SCRAM intake in a line following the body of the fighter out to 3 meters past the nose ” “I’ll have my report on what reserves we can draw on your desk before the end of the shift,” Jena said “Divert all power to weapons recycle “Why did they decide to wake me up this year?” Jena smiled Is there any sign of the ship that ejected the damned jump flare we’re out here looking for?” “Nothing yet, sir ” “That’s why we keep training archives, commander,” Kinkaid said as the lift doors parted and they stepped out onto the mess-deck “That’s why you have to eat it quick She might meet us there The S-3 gave them a brief before everyone was out of the freezers ” After several tense moments a reply came back SOLCorp would no sooner let one of us into their Triton fueling station as we would one of them here at the Holdfast “At best we can expect Bellapheron to be finished anytime soon At first we could monitor their transmissions to and from Earth but all parties involved are using couriers now In thrust we trust The air in the life-pods would not last long Despite our presence here, any heavy-handedness now would only make things worse, and these corporations! If we anger them, they suddenly stop work on things we need, or manufacture them improperly Set HUD for ship-to-ship and transfer reactor power to your accelerator,” Hurricane said ” Captain-1st said ” “Then the Outworld Alliance would object,” Kinkaid retorted ” “To hell with them for sending us on this wild goose hunt This fifth-day is one of them The HUD bracketed the section of space where the signal had come from in yellow What ship are you from, over?” The reply was broken by static as a zapper plasma weapon fired I have new target solutions “Negit The signal was weak but discernable “Play V-mail ” “Explain yourself Take as many runs as you can It’s gonna take us a while though I see way too many asteroids doing things asteroids don’t do ” “Maybe we weren’t looking with the right sensors,” Jena said and picked a Martian fruit/puffed rice bar from the dessert table ” Pancho chuckled No merchantmen were sounding off “I haven’t heard anything you haven’t heard,” Hurricane said Our engines are out ” “Prepared properly it’s good stuff Sos “The pre-flight brief didn’t mention how crowded this system is My vote is that have a tunneling drive or something similar Gravity arrived “Did your trip to the Free Callisto shipyard yield results?” “Their work crews have been decimated by Serenity toxification,” Jena said ” “You make friends with the one masochist around who likes it and trade as often as you can,” Hurricane said and Pancho laughed It’s Tali ” “The got us out here with anti-shipping packages for a reason, Hog We thought you could use some help with your situation “Rodeo four to Trailboss Any monitoring stations please reply Try to make contact with those fighters out there ” “If things are good, we’ve nothing to worry about,” Kinkaid said and stepped into the lift when it arrived and the doors opened “Inexcusable Jena closed the door to her Holdfast hab-unit and squeezed past the shower module into the unit itself “If they’ve been taking the slow route we would’ve seen them coming I think so serious smleck is going out here that they aren’t telling us about ” “So we use Home Fleet to put a cordon around Triton and we demand access Pax settlement was off the air If you can’t get off let me know The engine compartment has a big hole is the side where something burned through ” “Yes, sir,” Jena said You could’ve gotten smleck These ships have been in storage for seventy years ” “I never get that My hepacs were taking too long to recycle, too long, he thought and swallowed his panic ” “Hi, Jena “We’ve been waiting for you for a very long time Think of it this way, it’s a celebration of life Damn them and their two-faced shenanigans ” “Thank goodness the damage wasn’t permanent,” Kinkaid agreed as he carried his tray to the dispensary past the serving line Bye Ranger and her group rigged for silent running and had not gone down for 76 hours straight “I think we can reach it We’ll reassess the situation after the first pass “We’re picking up a mayday “If TIL won’t consider the complications that this lack of intelligence sharing creates, we don’t have very many options Hepacs have recycled “Achilles, this is Trailboss “I’m surprised that SOLCorp has been as tolerant as we have “Sensor, conn We’re getting a good look at the ship Watch yourself ” She said into the air “I hope you find her when we get there Her collection was filled with dainties and she fell back onto the bed-slab in a pair, simple, thin cotton patterned with daisies that rode low on her hips ” “It’s late, I’m sorry,” Jena said ” The full barrage from Achilles knocked the lead zapper out of formation but they continued to close “Of course, having our sensor nets taken down by solar-storms couldn’t have happened at a worse possible moment ” “Then why didn’t we detect any jump flares when they arrived?” Kinkaid said and lifted a bowl of orange gelatin to his tray Lock on nearest target and open fire ” *** “What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Pancho said as they overflew the crippled cruiser Sos ” “Conn, weapons control She laughed as Kinkaid muttered to himself and moved for the nearest table “You’re free to maneuver, amigo Don’t worry about right or wrong now Wild Bill and me will wait for your signal to start the fireworks, out “I don’t know where they came from but I show four fighters attacking the nearest zapper cluster ” “Tali, what are you getting me into? What kind of exhibition has a name like Viking Carnival?” Jena said and took down her hair Despite her attempts to maintain distance, Jena took a silent accounting of her friends on-planet and found a short list We are adrift and under attack Achilles still had weapons, which had been effectively keeping the closing zapper rocks at a distance, but without engines it was only time before more zappers arrived for an attack en masse *** SOL-4/ Mars Tali wouldn’t take negit for an answer “Don’t let ‘em get cut off SOL-4/ Mars Jena followed Kinkaid through the Holdfast at his side Achilles would need an overhaul if they survived this It’s time to go open up a can After all, it is their station ” Captain 1st demanded ” “Don’t remind me, amigo,” Hurricane said and dropped his eyes to the picture of Jena ” Roger, Trailboss We have to get some of our own people inside,” Jena said Call me back Achilles was hammering away at the closest object moving toward it “Conn, sensor “RN Achilles to any monitoring station He and Wild Bill worked a similar box of space 200,000 kilometers away It was like being blind in one eye Fleet issued “female utilities,” were kept folded to regulation standards inside garment lockers, non-regulation articles were worn instead ” Pancho trawled as he accelerated past Request permission to haul ass over there ” “And miss all the fun?” Kinkaid said wryly and altered their course toward the serving line The Captain-1st watched the power meter on the hepacs climb and thought, too long, too long The message was usually the same ” Hurricane said to himself and pushed the engine throttle control forward That’s a whole different complication “A fleet that size would’ve made quite a scene “I’ve been pressing the TerraCom assembly to act but they’re so busy writing and writing our new Terran Charter that nobody wants to notice “Eighty seconds to until main batteries are ready to fire Were they on a collision course? Hurricane wondered “We’re very, very glad to see you, Trailboss,” Captain 1st of RN Achilles sent out Pips of angry red battered targets that Thunderbird’s computers ID’d as asteroids ” “I’m telling you, Pancho Tali smiled and rubbed both hands through her spiky hair What do I need to bring?” “Just your moon boots and some pay-cards VF-two-two-one at your service, over The holo-dome he lowered over his face let him follow the shots from his weapons in Man, that smleck glows under black light “USS Ranger, over It followed the wall so they altered course to move around it “Conn, sensor ” *** Captain 1st of Achilles considered his options “Even with this system-wide crisis our friends at TIL are utterly deaf when it comes to questions about their interactions with the Xenos, and they’re mute about anything they’ve learned,” Kinkaid groused as he shuffled along slowly with his hands clasped behind his back “That’s assuming that the TerraCom assembly will vote us the credits to have them refitted,” He shook his head with disgust How the fek am I supposed to choke down Egg omlet ” A hand with long fingers appeared from behind Tali and waved at the vid-com, then dragged themselves down Tali’s neck and back ” Said Captain-1st and climbed into his battle chair ” “I’m with you, Cisco “Call Tali ” “Did you get that, Hog?” “I got it,” Hurricane said ” “Fire control, conn “Get wired tight, amigo Her friend Tali was near the top and communicated once a day I read eight more zappers moving toward us from the cluster I’m picking up some asteroids around Gabrielle says hello Not that I’m saying there is A system well known for its vibrancy was as empty as the first day it was discovered Aye-aye, connecting now ” “Conn, commo The situation is inexcusable There was another F/A-28 off his starboard side ” “Either they’ve been traveling for a very long time or they have a system like ours,” Jena said and reached for a try The corridor linking the control room with the cafeteria was lined with windows facing the rusty Elysium Plains expanding to the horizon in every direction Give us ten minutes to get into position and then commence attacking whatever it is that Achilles is targeting “I’ve barely had time to piss as it is *** Even from 100,000 kilometers, the disabled cruiser was localized by the flash of the cruisers turret-mounted guns unloading Commencing main battery fire As they passed, the Achilles opened up on the drifting asteroid cluster again, asteroids that emitted powerful streams of plasma that reached out to scorch the side of the NorCom warship They have what we need and, just this once, they’re not selling it to us I’m not willing to risk a single ship when it comes to the people manufacturing our transit drives “I asked some people about it ” “It’s alright ” “Your mother taught you that, didn’t she?” “Yes,” Jena admitted The good news is that my first ration pack was Enchiladas with Rice ” “I think I’ve got freezer lag,” Pancho said and Hurricane could hear him shifting in the cockpit of his fighter They know we’re here Just so something might come after us, so they find out what it is He could see Pancho in his cockpit, who waved back at him We’re scanning a maximum range We have a link on the Guard channel I’m picking up new signals, sir A face with pretty eyes and short cropped, dark hair framing her puckish grin ” “Achilles to Trailboss You said to remind you about Viking Carnival on fifth-day, so I am, again “I spent weeks crawling around the old hulls in our depots |
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