Chapter 3

“I found him, sir,” her rough, husky voice echoed throughout the large chamber in which she stood. Grand colonnades stood near the walls like sentinels. At the back of the room sat an oversized, ornate desk centered in front of a towering arched window adorned with exquisite velvet red drapery.

“Excellent, Colonel Reeves.” A tall, thin figure of a man moved behind the desk, backlit by the teal light streaming through the window. “I expect you to deliver him here, to me, personally.”

Reeves walked from the office entrance with trepidation. The scale of the office, an homage to the Consular’s political power, evoked anxiety every time she made an appearance. Stopping in front of the desk, she summoned her resolve and responded, “I’m already assembling a squadron. We’ll take him by force, if necessary, Consular.”

The figure walked to the window to stare out across the city. “Three years searching for that man. That prodigy is the key.”

“Yes, I understand, sir.”

From the window, the Consular turned back toward her, “His research is critical to making the device work, and I will not have my investments go to someone willing to ghost me.”

“Of course, sir.”

“Finding him unlocks everything. We’ll finally be able to tip the scales and take on the Thargoids.”

“Yes, I understand, sir. It’s what I signed up for,” she said with more enthusiasm than she’d intended.

“Once we have Master Xohn, we can build a new prototype. Be careful, Colonel, we can’t afford to lose him again.”

“We won’t, sir—I won’t.”

“Very good,” he nodded and sat at the desk. “On to other matters. The bioresearch facility?”

She took a look at the datapad in her hand, “Back on schedule. The quarantine has made it challenging, but the final assets are on their way.”

“Excellent. And, the labor dispute on 48 Tau?”

“Yes,” she tapped her datapad again. “The Dynamic Industry and the Revolutionary Party of HR 1279 held a summit two days ago. The deliberations over work contracts took up most of the agenda. The report said they also raised the issue of paying for the new Thargoid defense systems on the station.”

The Consular leaned forward, perching his fingers together in front of him.

Reeves continued, “The Revolutionary Party holds the Surayev Beacon, a refinery outpost. But, they maintain Dynamic Industry is still responsible for paying for the upgraded defenses. The negotiators from Dynamic Industry argued the Revolutionary Party controls the station.”

“And they don’t believe they should be on the hook for providing defenses for all outposts in the system.”

“Yes. The Revolutionary’s rebuttal claimed Dynamic Industry’s popular control of the system requires, by Hyades Defense Statute, to provide upgrades for all outposts in systems they control–”

Before she could finish, the Consular stood up and sighed, “These petty squabbles are going to leave a lot of civilians vulnerable. It doesn’t matter who pays for the defenses; if they aren’t installed, the people will pay for it with their lives.”

“I completely agree, sir,” Reeves knew it first hand—the screams of her family echoed from the past in her mind.

He paced behind the desk, “Are there any other outposts in HR 1279 that the Revolutionary Party doesn’t control?”

Reeves tapped on her datapad and pulled up the system details. “Yes sir, a planetary outpost called Larson– Larson Hub. It’s held by a group known as The Bureau.”

“Perfect, then the same applies to them. Have my admin send our envoy… what’s her name,” he snapped his fingers, trying to recall. “Nikki, Mickey–”

“Ricci? From Interstellar Affairs?”

“Yes, that’s it. Give her instructions that she must enforce the Defense Statute for the Hyades government. Consular Duryss requires their cooperation for the good of the people, etcetera, etcetera.”

“I’ll take care of it.”

“Thank you. We can’t allow any outposts to be undefended. It’s enough to have to deal with these terrorist cells; we can’t have local governments unwilling to protect their own people.”

“If I may, sir, installing these heavy battery systems to augment defenses will go a long way, but there will still be holdout systems, and there is no guarantee the AX batteries will drive them away. If the Thargoids do attack, it may be necessary to impose Martial Law on these outlying systems.”

“When they attack—because they will—it is quite likely we’ll need a lot more than Martial Law. That’s why Master Xohn is so important.”

“Consular, there is one more thing you should know about Master Xohn.”

“Oh?”

“He’s heading toward the Hyades, close to Gliese 170.1,” her dramatic emphasis on the system name elicited the intended effect.

“Intriguing. How did he end up there?”

“We got a tip on a passenger transport contract filed in HIP 22607.”

He walked up to the desk, leaned forward, spreading his arms to place his fingertips on the desktop in a slow deliberate motion. Light from a nearby lamp illuminated his thin, angular face. It highlighted the pockmarked cheeks and age lines over his brow. The silver in his pulled-back hair seemed to flash.

“So, we’ve come full circle,” he said with a wistful satisfaction. “Is the Vilant still in the system?” His head tilted with the question.

“Yes, Consular. They’re continuing their mission to search the rings of the sixth planet for the device.”

“Good. Have them dispatch a ship for reconnaissance. There’s an orbital station somewhere in system, if I recall correctly?”

“Yes, the mining outpost: Foden Dock. That’s where our sources suggest he’s headed.”

“And remind me again, who runs the station? Are they one of ours?”

“It’s Executive Marco Stephenson.”

“Ahh, yes, Mister Stephenson. He’s been generally cooperative with our efforts there. I’d like to have a conversation with him.”

She nodded, “Of course, Consular.” She looked down at her personal datapad to check the time on Foden Dock. “It looks like they’re still on daytime shift now, sir.”

“Excellent. Raise him, please.”

She moved to behind the desk to work the console. In a few taps, she called up the comm system and opened a channel. They both waited for the interstellar communication request to page the Executive.

A darker-skinned man with short, fuzzy hair appeared on the console viewscreen. Reeves made a swiping gesture moving the video from the console to the room’s central holo-projection system.

“Greetings, Consular Duryss. What can I do for you?”

“Executive Stephenson, it is good to see you again. I realize we’ve had only brief encounters in the past, for that I do apologize.”

“Think nothing of it, Mister Duryss. We’re quite happy remaining remote. The peace and quiet—the tranquility of the frontier systems is why I took this post.”

Stephenson smiled across the screen. A sizable gap between his front teeth made it difficult for Reeves to take the ‘frontiersman’ seriously. His familiar tone demonstrated a remarkable lack of respect for the authority of the Consular’s station. She already didn’t like him.

“Mister Stephenson,” Duryss also dropped the man’s title to echo his informal tone. “I need your cooperation holding an individual whom I believe has, or will arrive on your outpost. He is of great importance to our efforts to solidify our defenses against the Thargoid incursions. I expect you’ll do the right thing and hand him over?”

“Of course the Gliese 170.1 Legal Partners do not share your concern of attacks in our system. We cannot detain an individual without due cause. The law must be observed. Perhaps for the right fee the Legal Partners can identify just cause to hold this person?” Stephenson looked genuinely smug. It burned Reeves up to see a clumsy, rural nobody trying leverage them.

“I see,” Consular Duryss drummed his fingers across the desktop for a moment. “Let’s see if we can’t reach a legal understanding. Executive Stephenson, I happen to be privy to a number of open Tellurium contracts waiting to be serviced.”

“Consular, we do, in fact, refine Tellurium and would be happy to–“

“Then if you would be so kind as to host an engineer by the name of Vin Xohn as your guest it will be easier to negotiate the contracts. We can have a courier vessel on your pads in a matter of hours. A well-armed escort commanded by my associate, Colonel Reeves,” he gestured to her, “will ensure he arrives safely here on Emen. If we cannot come to an accord, I am entirely willing to seek out political alternatives that might find you and the Legal Partners legally displaced from that insignificant system of criminals and rejects of society. Are we clear, Executive Stephenson?”

Stephenson’s mouth hung open for a moment before he stammered, “I… I understand, but we won’t–”

Zip. The Consular ended the transmission. “Take your squadron and the Decimator. Bring Xohn to me, or Stephenson’s head.”

“My pleasure, Consular,” she moved around to the front of the desk and turned to face him again. She stood hesitating, expecting him to dismiss her. “Is there anything else, sir?”

The Consular pulled his reading glasses from a case in front of him to look over a tablet-sized datapad. He stopped to look up at her over his glasses, “Oh yes, Colonel– Please see that the funds sent to the campaign for Senator Draden’s missing son are diverted to our defensive investments in HIP 20935. Our installations in the system are dealing with ever-increasing attacks from that upstart group of malcontents.”

“Of course, sir. I’ll handle it.” She mentally noted the task to delegate later.

“You always do, Reeves. Thank you, that will be all.”

She nodded and turned to walk out of the enormous office. Her boots’ echoes followed her to the large, exquisitely carved wooden double-doors, which swung open at her approach.

The guards on the other side of the doors snapped to attention as she passed. She tapped her commlink, “Prep the Decimator. We have a job to do.”

Zip.

Space travel did not agree with Vin Xohn. Everything about it stressed him out. His cramped cabin couldn’t compare to the spacious apartment he kept on Maia. The light was dim. The decor was nowhere near the luxury he grew accustomed to living in. Much to his disappointment, all the first-class cabins were already booked. He’d have insisted on top accommodations on any other long-distance trip, but this was not a pleasure cruise. He needed to blend in, so here he was, stuck in a two-person economy cabin with no windows. He ran his hands over his smooth, bald head, rocking back and forth to take his mind off his growing anxiety.

The relentless snoring on top of the zero-G environment pushed his calm demeanor to the limit. His bunkmate was a large, grotesque man, with a smell unlike anything he’d encountered before. Xohn placed it somewhere between rotting flesh on the beach and a room full of sweaty socks. Out of the corner of his eye, he caught sight of toes that had wriggled free from their confines within the magnetic gravity blanket. It didn’t even fit around the man’s rotund form. Thankfully, his cabin companion slept often, keeping the conversation to a minimum.

Having detected a fresh dose of ripeness emanating from across the cabin, Xohn decided it was worth the effort to head to the lounge. This being a long-range cruise ship, there was likely to be an entertainer of some sort onboard. There would no doubt be a crowd, but at least he could get a break from his current circumstances and breathe some air that didn’t taste like sweat.

Standing up was as disorienting this time as it was the first time. Although accustomed to low-gravity, he never managed to get his ‘space legs’. The magboots felt heavy and took far more effort than he thought should be necessary.

Following along the path lighting of the corridor, he came to a lift that carried him to the entertainment deck. The lounge spanned the vessel’s width, giving access to a view of the stars beyond the transparent metallic windows running the entire length of the ship. Working through random tables and chairs, Xohn found his way to an empty bar on the outskirts of the crowd near the window.

Behind the bar, a human-like android bartender anchored a glass it had been cleaning with mechanical precision and slid in front of him.

“What can I get for you, sir?” The machine tilted its head in anthropomorphic mimicry. Its synthetic voice was all but indistinguishable from a real person. Like most androids, the mass manufactured assistant was purpose built to encourage people to believe it was a sentient being. Of course, intergalactic laws prohibited sentience in commercial robots.

“Oh, yes, will you make for me a Blue Maia?”

“Please transfer 300 credits.”

“300 credits for a drink? That is outrageous!”

The android ‘stared’ back at him and shifted back to the glass.

“No, okay. 300 credits,” he pulled his datapad, hoping the drink would clear the sweat stench in his palate. The android snapped back in front of him. With a flick across the display, Xohn transferred the credits and the android went about preparing his drink.

Most of the lounge was dim, giving an excellent view of the gem-filled star-scape on one side and, on the other, a planet wrapped in a cream-colored haze. Xohn noted hints of a deep blue water-world below the creamy atmosphere, topped with a single ice cap at one of the poles. The haziness caused an almost pleasant greenish-yellow tint along the terminator dividing day and night.

Xohn turned to look at the colorfully lit stage at the back of the lounge. There stood a striking woman with flaming red hair that seemed to glow, belting out an upbeat tune. The audience appeared to be enjoying the show. A group crowded the front of the stage, moving to the beat. Although not a music enthusiast himself, the balanced rhythms and melodic symmetry appealed to his engineering mind.

The android delivered his drink, a precious few ounces of azure blue liquid, with a slight bow of its head.

Xohn took a sip, wiping the excess from his mouth. He still hadn’t mastered drinking from zero-G glasses. The drink’s effects began to relax him, and he forgot about the bartender’s lack of intelligence.

“This entertainer must have been quite costly, I presume,” he commented with a gesture at the stage out of boredom. His mind was never idle for long.

The android glanced in the direction of the stage, then turned back to him. “Tonight’s entertainment is Miss Deanna Divine of Rhea,” it said with a matter-of-fact response.

“It is a very good way to pacify the passengers. Though, I suspect it is difficult to pay just the right amount for the quality entertainers and still be protecting your profit margins,” he said before taking another sip.

The android’s solid, unblinking ‘eyes’ continued to watch him drink without response.

“Ahh, I see it now—why the drinks cost so much,” he turned the glass in his hand regarding it with a bemused smile. His incessant curiosity diverted him into a thought experiment on the delicate game of cruise line operator.

He pulled out his datapad and began modeling the entertainer costs, drink sales, and ticket prices. He stopped after calculating the cost of an entertainer near a six -or eight-percent take of ticket sales would optimize profits.

“See, this is why I am being an engineer, not a cruise line operator,” he gestured to the data model on his pad. The android appeared to look down with faux interest.

He gestured the model off his datapad and found himself looking at his itinerary to Shinrarta Dezhra. The cruise had him at halfway to completing the 400 light-year journey.

“But, that is also why I find myself in this mess of a situation, of course. I never am expecting to be galavanting across the galaxy.”

The android seemed to tilt its head like a dog eager to hear from its owner. Xohn downed his drink.

“More?” The android’s head tilted back the other direction.

Xohn shook his head, looking into the reflections of the empty glass as he turned it about in front of his face. The drink made his mind wander.

“I have to find her,” he said quiet and somber. “My Azera. She didn’t deserve this.”

He put the glass down and looked up at the android. An uncharacteristic emotional wave brought tears to his eyes. “It was all my fault. I have to find her.” He cleared his throat, wiped the excess moisture away and shoved his emotions down. “And find it,” he finished with conviction.

His self-preservation instincts cut through his inebriation to remind him eyes and ears were everywhere. The machine itself, without sentience was still sophisticated. He dare not mention anything about his prototype out loud.

Looking back at his datapad he pulled up his ongoing analysis of the last message he received from Azera before she went missing. The garbled communication took years to decipher. His notes narrowed down the possible navigation flight paths of her ship to a half-dozen systems in the Hyades Open Cluster.

His dilemma now was finding a pilot to take him to each of the remote systems. Going all the way to the Jameson Base, a large, famous station, a central hub of civilization, would mean an ample number of pilots to choose from. On the other hand, finding a pilot near the rural systems could mean someone with firsthand knowledge of the region, and as a bonus, perhaps a cheaper contract.

From what he’d heard about the type of people in the outworlds, it might be a tall order to find a reasonable pilot. His impression was that the people that settled in frontier space were desperate grifters, or vagabonds hiding from inner system authorities. They were not the calibre of individuals that someone of his station would be seen associating with. It would, however, help him hide from anyone that might be looking for him.

He mulled it over, weighing the pros and cons while watching the entertainer croon on the stage. The audience roared and pulled him from his internal debate.

His awareness of the crowd brought into mind an unpleasant reminder that he was sitting at a table, alone, in a crowded room, sleeping in a cramped two-person cabin with a smelly, snoring slob, with a lot more to go on his long-distance cruise. He hated every minute of it, but he wasn’t going to let anything stop him from finding her.

A signal in the lounge sounded, and an announcement came through the P.A. from the flight deck. “Ladies and gentlemen, we’ll be breaking orbit to make our next jump in fifteen minutes. The next scheduled stop is Anthony de la Roche Point in HIP 22607. Thank you for choosing Oracle Cruises, where the journey is the destination.”

Emotions Vin Xohn wasn’t equipped to handle started to take over. There was hope and excitement that he was so close, countered by fear and anxiety that he wouldn’t find her, or worse, that he would. It had been three years. Could she still be alive?

His analytical mind took over again, shoving his emotions back down where they came from. Press on, or get off at the nearest starport? He did not like gambles, he liked data. If the outpost were anything like the stories he had heard, there was a slim chance at best. At the same time, the prospect of returning to his cabin and spending any more time with the foul creature cohabitating with him there was intolerable. Data or not, he had to get off this ship.

He arrived back at his cabin. His grotesque bunkmate emerged from the bathroom without magshoes of any kind, clumsily bouncing from the bulkheads toward his side of the cabin. Such a disgusting creature, Xohn thought to himself. He tried to ignore the belching after the animal collided into his bunk. He pulled his bags from the wall compartments as fast as he could manage and headed for the door.

“Hey, sorry for, you know,” a marble-mouthed gravelly voice came from behind him. “The trunnions. They do me in somethin’ terrible,” he smacked his belly that stuck out from beneath the undersized shirt while he floated over his bunk. The smack triggered a loud fart to escape. The man was pathetic looking. He could only hope the pilots available out here in the sticks were more civil. Without a word, Xohn shook his head, turned, and let the cabin door shut behind him.

He breathed a small sigh of relief even as he dragged his bags through the corridor. Emerging onto the upper level, he was mesmerized by the full-sized deck to ceiling window that made it feel as though he was walking in space. The hazy planet beyond was beginning to shrink as their cruising speed picked up. A chime sounded to warn passengers of the imminent jump.

An announcement rang out over the P.A. system: “Folks, we’re beginning our jump preparations. Please find your way to a jump harness. Follow the illuminated pathways or seek out a crew member if you need assistance.”

There were harnesses built into the wall in the corridor, and most of the other folks in the hall had already started to fasten in as the jump procedure became routine to them. Xohn grabbed the nearest harness, strapped himself up, and watched out the window. He could feel the tugging on his body. The star-field beyond the windows began to shimmer, and light particles around the ship were stretching. With a silent grace, the ship lunged, forcing him sideways in the harness. All light outside the window streaked across his vision, followed by a sudden bright flash. The jump tunnel bent the light from all over the galaxy around them in colored patterns of nebula-like gas clouds that seemed to swirl about outside the ship. In mere moments, the tunnel effect peeled back to reveal real space, and an intense glow appeared toward the bow.

“Ladies and gentlemen, we’ve arrived in HIP 22607 and will be docking shortly. For those staying at HIP 22607 we wish you well and hope you’ve had a pleasant journey with us. We’d love to have you again on future trips by joining our frequent traveller’s program where you can earn light-years to your favorite destinations around the galaxy. And don’t forget, this ship is in the top one percent of all cruise liners out there,” the P.A. continued to drone on, but Xohn tuned it out to slip out of his harness. He fell into line to disembark from the ship, his bags continuing to float about him. He felt pulling against his body in different directions as the ship navigated to dock.

Finally, he thought when the ramp to the deck lowered and a dozen or so passengers began to file out of the ship. Vin Xohn stepped down and saw a pair of armed guards scrutinizing passengers as they stepped onto the deck. They looked up at him and locked eyes. Xohn hesitated for a moment. Did they find me? He looked around for ways to jump the line, but people behind him pushed him onward. There was nowhere else for him to go but to keep moving down the ramp. When he reached the bottom, the guards were on both sides of him, small rail rifles strapped to their backs and hard looks on their faces.

“Gentlemen, how can I be helping you?” Xohn offered with his accent reminiscent of an Arabic speaker from old Earth.