Birthright: Battle for the Confederation- Consequence (3 page)

              Tash just grunted.  "You're probably right.  I'd give up any planet we've yet conquered to watch that ship sail slowly into a sun."

              "Their worthiness as adversaries will make it that much more enjoyable when they are finally defeated or see the light," Ravine said with confidence.

              "You're a fan of their work?" Tash said, a dangerous tone creeping into his voice.

              "Not at their rebelliousness to us, Commander, only their dedication to the cause.  We speak of our own righteousness and virtue, and here is a ship full of beings we helped create showing those very traits.  True, they defy us, but they honor us with their drive."

              "My job, and by extension yours, Representative, would have been much easier if they'd ceased to honor us in this way a long time ago.  Between destroying the DNA weapon and kidnapping our former Commander, among other transgressions, I'd rather watch them burn so we can start over.  Sometimes I wonder what our ancestors were thinking."

              Ravine said nothing, just smiled and nodded as she'd learned to do.  Tash's desires were well known; destroy the experimental civilizations outright in order to cement the Priman hold on the galaxy.  They could start over with their studies if they really wanted to, though Tash was not a supporter of that, either.  He wanted to rule, to reform the entire galaxy in the Priman image.  Perhaps, his own image. 

              Ravine knew there was a growing divide among the Council regarding Tash's aspirations.  Some wanted to end the war quickly and return to their former lives as scientists, thinkers.  Others wanted to reconcile, to make peace with their 'children' in this galaxy.  Yet others wanted nothing less than retribution for being tossed out of the galaxy itself after losing their war.  Ravine still didn't know where she fell, but sooner or later somebody would need to rise up and be a voice for moderation.  For while Tash was all about obliteration, nobody else was willing to take the personal risk of offering another choice.  The Council deferred time and again, unable or unwilling to decide which course of action to back.

                Representative Velk, former Commander, would have known what to do.  No one man or woman could be perfect at everything required to rule, but he'd stayed in the middle ground better than most.

Two

              Garrett Drayven was not having fun.  He'd flown his ship to meet a contact in order to broker an information trade in return for providing transportation to one of his clients.  The trip had been short and uneventful, save for the lone Confederation destroyer which tried to board him since their sensor scans of his ship had made the captain doubt Garrett was a simple chauffeur.  A short code phrase whispered to the officer in charge had resulted in him being sent on his way.  No doubt the verbal lashing the poor bastard had received from Admiral Nodam Bak upon validating the code would haunt the man for years.

              Velk had been forced to remain in his expanded but locked stateroom for all three days of travel.  The arrangement between Garrett, Admiral Bak, and Velk had loosened the formality of Velk's 'capture', and instead the Priman usually found himself with free roam of Garrett's ship.  Admiral Bak had reluctantly agreed to let Velk go with Garrett as long as he conducted low-risk, easy deals while watching the most important prisoner in the Confederation's grasp.  Garrett's client was mildly perturbed that he couldn't go into Velk's locked stateroom, but it wasn't a deal breaker.

              No, the only thing that bothered him was the location, at the very top of the world where they were meeting.  It was an underground city, but all the hangars were on the surface, and Garrett had trudged around between hangars and meets for two hours before business was done.

              Now, slapping the button which closed the main hatch of his ship and stomping the snow off his boots, he realized he hated the cold.  He hated the heat, too.  He'd need to find just the right planet to settle down on some day...

              He hung his parka over the back of one of the chairs at his conference table in the main hold and sat down in another.  He quickly brought up his message buffer and a few favorite news feeds.  One message stuck out; it was an alias Loren used to contact him.

              Realizing that he was looking forward to hearing from the Confed man, he tapped the button to play the message.

              "Mr. Drayven," Loren began with a smile.  "I hope this message finds you safe from enemy fire with your portfolio on the rise.  I have great news.  Remember our mutual friend who's been begging for that ride home?  Well, we're all fixed up here and ready to get going.  So, if you can do it, in two days let's meet at that disgusting restaurant where we got food poisoning on the cargo orbital above the planet whose name we don't say out loud.  Don't worry; it's still our secret how badly you begged me to shoot you while in the throes of intestinal pain."  The message ended.

              Garrett laughed despite himself.  True, there had been food poisoning.  But Garrett had put the bacteria in their food himself.  He'd needed to get into the station's medical bays to do a little snooping, so after his meet with Loren was done he'd simply jumped right into the next job.  He had, however, crossed that particular trick off his list and instead put it in the column he liked to call 'Don't Ever Do This Again'.

              He tapped a control tab on the table top.  "Representative Velk, you might want to come out here.  This message is for you."

              Web was back in general population.  He recognized some of the politicians in the secret prison underneath the surface of Callidor.  It was obvious the Primans weren't positive of his identity.  Sure, they knew he was a saboteur, but they obviously weren't sure he was Confed or he most likely wouldn't be roaming free.

              He'd catalogued many of the political leaders during his time in captivity.  Most of the politicians were allowed to mingle freely, unlike the soldiers, mercenaries, pirates and Fixers that had been caught.  That second lot was a seedy bunch, and the Primans seemed to encourage infighting among that group.  Web had been hazed once by a man that had either been a pirate or merc muscle.  After breaking the man's arm and offering to do the same to any other challengers, he'd been left alone as they sought to refine the prison pecking order.

              "Another session with the interrogators?" Web heard a voice from behind him.  He turned, not as fast as prudence would have dictated but at the right speed to show he wasn't startled by the man's efforts.

              Web looked at the man.  He was tall, solidly built without looking like he lived in a gym, and carried himself with a confidence born of training and practice.  He didn't approach Web, either, and instead gave him his space.

              "Actually, we were trading recipes," Web countered lightly.

              "I'm a big fan of soup, myself."

              Web just stared at the man, measuring him.

              "Name's Mithus," he finally offered, to which Web just nodded.  "Sometimes people introduce themselves with their own name after a stranger does that."

              "Well, Mithus, you're right on that one."  Web shuffled up against a building and leaned back against it in the scant shadow that the roof overhang provided.  He would never let the Primans know how much he enjoyed the occasional surface time they were allowed.  It wasn't all that much; a simple high walled courtyard bordered by tall buildings that saw a constant stream of Priman shuttle traffic to the higher floors and roofs.  "The problem, being in a prisoner of war camp and all, is that you know as well as I do that either of us could be a ringer, selling out to the Primans.  You say 'Hi, I'm Mithus'.  We become pals and next thing you're asking me about all kinds of stuff I'd never tell an interrogator."              

              "Fair enough," Mithus said with an easy grin.  "At least you haven't broken yet.  Sooner or later they'll find a way, I suppose.  Want to help me escape?"

              "Nah, I'll find my own way," Web returned the grin.

              "You sound confident."

              "Oh, I know people."  Web smiled larger than he should have as he thought of Halley.  He knew deep down that she would rescue him.  He couldn't explain it, but the feeling was there.  And when she did, he was going to take her and run to the other side of the galaxy with her so he could confess how he felt.  Now
that
was a scary prospect.  Maybe a sadistic Priman interrogator would be less stressful than trying to process those feelings?

              "Anyone I'd know?" prodded Mithus.

              Web was curious, that was for sure.  For all he knew, Halley and this guy might have sat across from each other in one of their advanced how-to-kill-things classes.  But he couldn't tell him that.  He could, however, think of a great story that only he and Halley knew.  "You know if I
personally
had any good stories to even tell, I wouldn't.  But I will say that one friend in particular once blew up a dormant volcano and made it erupt just to cause a distraction.  Formed a new island chain and got what she was after in the process."

              Mithus seemed to process this.  "Is she for hire?"

              "You couldn't afford her."

              Kira Malix sat at the outdoor cafe sipping a stim-caf in the dusk light.  Despite her troubled mind, she had still noticed the various pleasant distractions Callidor had to offer; vibrant red/gold sunsets, friendly locals, unique cuisine, amazing architecture around the older, more preserved parts of the planet.  It hadn't lasted, though.  Soon enough, it all washed away; it was just background noise, a low level buzzing in the background that was discarded as irrelevant to her immediate needs.  It was a shame, but she sure as hell would never feel the same about the planet after the Priman occupation.  Too much had changed; she would leave as soon as she could and find reasons to never return.  But first, she had business.

              Kira Malix, of course, was simply one of the many IDs of Halley Pascal.  It was actually a Confed-issued one, which caused problems with her now being burned thanks to Enric Shae of Senator Dennix's staff.

              Add to that another problem: there were other SAR detached operatives like herself here on Callidor, and they'd been ordered to bring her in as a rogue.  She didn't know how many there were or whose side they were on.  The nanites in her body served as a form of cloud storage, and every time she checked in with her handlers they took a sample which the senior SAR commanders reviewed; there were no secrets for a SAR operative, at least not during their service.  So, they would have seen the confession of Tana Starr regarding the Priman plot to assassinate Representative Velk, the accusation against Senator Dennix of not only being a complicit pawn of the Primans but learning the ring data she'd helped acquire would prove it beyond a doubt.  That is, of course, if the senior leadership had felt it was something the outbound operatives needed to know.  And if the senior leadership wasn't corrupted.  And so on and so forth. 

              The short version is that she trusted exactly two people on this planet: herself and Web.  And with Web locked up in the prison on the other side of town, she needed resources.  That led her to this cafe.

              She'd been tracking the young man for two weeks and finally anticipated his routine.  He was an electronics supplier; he sold the sort of gizmos one couldn't buy legally in any store.  Automated defenses, remote controls, limited AI robotics, self-healing computers.  She needed the mother of all remote control packages.

              The dealer and his entourage of two bodyguards and a third party buyer got up from the table in the building's gloomy interior.  She knew that after a meeting, the dealer, who went by the simple nickname Mouse, would exit through the back and into the short alley where his hovercar was parked among the others in the building's ground level lot.

              She left a few credit chips for a tip and quickly walked out of the gated area and into the alleyway.  It was getting darker but Callidor was a safe city, its capital city Harkor definitely so.  Nevertheless, she didn't get more than a half dozen steps into the alley before she realized she wasn't alone.  She sensed one person behind her.  Normally, her nanites would have enhanced her hearing well enough to make a guess as to body type and gender, but they'd been mostly used up trying to stabilize her after she'd been shot at the secret Priman prison.  While they could replicate themselves to a degree using minerals and nutrients she took in, the core numbers were made of exotic materials and came in programmed.  The short version was the she was essentially a normal person again, albeit very well trained and overwhelmingly motivated.  She was going to continue.

              "Hey there," a woman called from in front of her as she stepped out of the shadows.  "Can you spare a few credits?"

              "Yeah, same here," added another young male as he joined the woman.  Halley stopped and looked at the third person closing in from behind, cutting off her escape.

              "Seriously?" she asked in disbelief.  "You want to shake me down right now?  Don't you have something better to do?  I'm sort of busy."

              "Then how about you just leave us something and be on your way," the man behind her suggested.  "Cause we don't have anywhere better to be."  His mood darkened as he finished, and Halley knew from long experience he'd use violence without remorse.

              Halley didn't have the time for this.  She kept walking.  As she drew even with the first man, he put his hand on her left shoulder.  Without missing a beat, she smacked his elbow down from on top, allowing her to fold his arm towards his chest.  She took a step behind his right foot with her own right, then shoulder blocked him in the right shoulder.  He flew backwards to the ground, arms flailing as he lost his balance.  He fell flat on his back, head making contact with the pavement.

              Halley immediately chambered her left leg and lashed out at the woman with a vicious side kick to the chin.  The woman was unconscious before the teeth finished flying from her mouth.

              She turned to find the third man had run up and tried to grab her shirt front.  She grabbed his wrist and rotated him into an arm-bar with an assist from her other arm.  As he became bent over at the waist, she used her closed fist to smash him in the nose.  Holding him from completely collapsing with the arm bar, she grabbed the handgun that had been poking out of his back waistband.  She let him fall in a heap to the ground.

              Halley looked at the door where the dealer was supposed to exit and saw that he was already there, bodyguards standing protectively in front of him with hands inside their light jackets, no doubt around the grips of some sort of weaponry.

              She simply smiled and expertly disassembled the gun, tossing the parts as she looked at the entourage.  Initiator battery went left, capacitor went right, top of the slide and main discharge coil ended up on the ground in front of her as she dropped the stripped frame.

              Halley approached the group, hands held out to her sides.  She took slow, small steps towards them, trying to suppress the pain in her side where she'd been shot not long ago.  Her failing nanites couldn't heal her completely and she needed to save them up for help tracking Web, so whenever she got tired or too active the tightness and pain made her want to limp.  "Mouse, my name is Kira Malix.  Please excuse the mess, but I had hoped to introduce myself with a little less mayhem.  I need some parts; the kind only you can get."