Per Ardua, Ad Astra - Part 1
Alex was dead. Taka had lost pilots before, of course he had. But ONE OK ROCK was the best. The most elite, the most feared fighter squadron in the galaxy. They still lost fighters sometimes. People got injured, some retired out, but they hadn't lost anyone since Taka had taken command. Somehow, in the back of Taka's head, he'd come to believe they were invincible. That belief had allowed him to let his emotional shielding down. He'd gotten closer to ONE OK ROCK squadron than he'd ever let himself get to any of his other commands.
Alex was dead, and it frapping hurt.
In a way, he didn't know why he hadn't activated his network years ago, the day he left Jimsho and defected to the Bizi Kei Alliance. If his network had been active, Alex wouldn't be dead. If his network had been active, they would have seen the extra comm chatter and known that the fleet stationed at Ilanda was twice the size they had been expecting. They might have realized that the base went far underground, that the probe they'd sent couldn't catch that on its scans. Any of that, if he'd realized any of that, if he'd caught it, Alex might still be alive, might still be flying with them. Taka wasn't going to make that mistake again.
It was the work of a few hours to activate the net he'd set in place all those years ago. Then he just had to wait for the information to trickle in.
***
Koyama acknowledged the docking coordinates and relayed them to the pilot console. Ryo was flying because Yamapi had taken the early shift and was sleeping. Ryo was proud of having two certified pilots on his ship. It made things easier on everyone, and if there were some kind of emergency, there was a better chance someone would be able to take his baby down safely. It was also lucky for Ryo that while Yamapi was very good at piloting--it had even been his ship originally, before Ryo had become partner and they'd renamed to One Piece--he wasn't really ambitious enough to want to captain. He was pretty content with being co-captain and co-pilot, and letting Ryo take care of any crew problems or cut-throat negotiations. Yamapi stepped in smoothly to handle parts negotiations, or anything that required a pretty face and a friendly demeanor. Ryo tended to lose his temper in those situations, which usually meant a lost deal.
Ryo steered the One Piece carefully around the space station, making sure to keep clear of other entry lines in the crowded space. There was his docking space; he was lucky to get berthspace on the main ring of the space station this time, instead of on one of the little spokes sticking up and down from the main ring like a crown of thorns. His was a mid-sized cargo ship, but on the small end of middle, and when space was tight, they'd sometimes get pushed to the smaller docking ports. They tended to be just a few sizes too large for the small ship berths, which made for tight squeezes and, if the neighboring ships' pilots weren't as good as he was (and seriously? few were), sometimes damage. The One Piece was enjoying a small patch of relative prosperity--enough that they could take a special job instead of one focused on getting food for bellies and pay for crew. Jimsho Confederacy credits were only worth a decent amount on about a quarter of the planets in the galaxy, and since that was what they were getting paid in, sometimes these kinds of jobs didn't even cover the cost of fuel--but that didn't mean Ryo wanted to waste money on repairs for damage that could have been avoided. Today he got real ring space, though. Ryo smiled; this pleased him. His crew would be among the first to say how hard Ryo was to please.
Frap! And then, just as quickly, his good mood evaporated. The ship docked in the space next to his was the Space Queen. The Space Queen was the same class ship as his, a Manta 52 freighter, but whereas first Yamapi and Ryo and then later Shige had modified his baby for improvements in engine speed, fuel efficiency and cargo space, lengthening and sharpening the tips of the already oblong craft, the crew of the Space Queen had welded stupid little wings to the side of their ship, poorly mimicking the lines of the class's manta namesake. That wasn't why Ryo hated the other ship though; he hated them for trying to move in on his merchandise: underbidding him a few times, and making his deals harder to seal by driving up prices a number more. He also hadn't forgiven them for the time that drug lord had lackeys chasing them for two days because they'd leaked information that his beautiful One Piece was their clunker of a cargo ship. Sure, Kame, the Space Queen's captain, had also arranged for a space patrol to pick up the cartel's enforcer ship, but they'd also held One Piece's crew for questioning for another two days. They hadn't had any dealings with the cartel so they came out of that tight squeeze all right--but the delay gave the Space Queen's crew enough time to sneak into Ryo's destination port and secure a deal for the shipment Ryo had been hoping to get before he was even in the right system. The Space Queen had frapped with him and his business. Ryo wasn't exactly the forgive and forget type.
Ultimately though, the Space Queen and its crew had nothing to do with this run, so until he ran into one of the idiots stationside, he wasn't going to let them get under his skin. Pushing them out of his mind, Ryo guided his baby gently in until the docking clamps extending from the skin of the space station settled around the hold's bay entrance. There was the familiar sound of really big hinges moving, and then the hiss of air as the docking tunnel filled with breathable air. Satisfied, Ryo powered his engines down, petted the console once to show the One Piece how much he loved her, and pushed himself up out of the chair. He was going to wake that idiot Yamapi up to take care of boarding permissions and go to bed.
***
Kame sighed and suppressed the urge to call Ueda for an update on loading progress. He hated running munitions. It was just a whole lot of stress and Jimsho credits were up and down so much in value it almost wasn't worth the trouble. It definitely wasn't worth the trouble if they got caught, but Kame was good, and his Queen was full of secret compartments and hidden holds, so prison or summary execution was not too high on the list of probable outcomes. He owed Takki a favor though, they all did, so there the Space Queen was, docked at Px952 with a combination of vittles, medical supplies, and munitions being loaded into the hold.
They were nearly done with loading, really, just a few more large crates to move inside. The outer ring of the station, and consequently their ship as long as the engines were powered down, was under half gravity to make just this kind of loading job easier. Junno was down in the hold with Ueda, helping direct some station moving crews now that they'd gotten the sensitive stuff hidden away in their holds. Koki and Nakamaru were sleeping in their berths, the soft green blips of life forms glowing on a console to Kame's right. Jin was out somewhere on the station doing God knows what, as usual. He did his job, always, but he wasn't always enthusiastic about it, and he had a tendency to do his own thing. They all did, if Kame were being fair. The crew of the Space Queen were an independent bunch; they'd been together a long time, and worked well together--after some initial tension and friction as they settled in with each other--but they also maintained strong senses of individualism and kept their own interests outside the ship pretty much to themselves. It probably wouldn't have worked for any other crew, but it suited the crew of the Space Queen just fine.
Kame perched in the communications' seat. He was antsy. Part of the reason he liked the spacer's life was that it satisfied his workaholic ways--it was always busy, there was always something to do, someplace to go, something to be taken care of, and that sense of business appealed to Kame. Waiting was hard, particularly when he knew there was loading to be done and books to be balanced. He didn't have a choice, though, because the call he was waiting for was an important part of this deal, and the caller wasn't the sort who was just going to leave a message for Kame to view later. He'd probably cite some top-secret bull and compromisable security, but either way, he was only going to tell them the rendezvous details personally, and it's difficult to make a shipping run if you don't actually know where you're supposed to be running your cargo.
A light blinked on the console in front of him: incoming video message. At last. Kame toggled it on; afterward he might be able to catch a few hours of sleep before they had to start thinking about exit prep. Takki's face stretched out across the small message console as the screen warmed up. Everything was a vaguely green color, and Kame made a mental note to ask Koki to tune it up before they left port. Kame's mechanical skills were fairly minimal--he could do emergency patches to critical parts of the engine, because any spacer who didn't know how to keep his ship in the air in a pinch was an idiot or dead--but he didn't know if they'd need any replacement parts for the console.
Takki's face broke into a grin as soon as he saw Kame. "How's it coming?" he asked, and Kame thought again that he was too open and friendly for his military uniform. Takki must be harder than he came off or he couldn't have risen to Sector Commander at such a young age; but then again, the Space Queen was in this because they owed Takki, and Takki had ever so diplomatically suggested this was a good way to pay him back. They had been making for port in one of the contested border systems, when a Bizi Kei Alliance cruiser had stopped them under suspicion of ties with the Jimsho Confederacy. They hadn't been on any Confederacy runs recently, but they had happened to have some contraband in the hold at the time, and it would have meant big trouble if it were found. Takki's then-command ship was in-system though, and seeing the potential for trouble for the Space Queen and her crew as the cruiser closed with her, he'd hailed them in wide-band broadcast demanding to question them under suspicion of ties with Bizi Kei. The Alliance cruiser had mostly been stopping them for the hell of it, getting in a little more practice hassling small ships or whatever it was they did in neutral systems, so that exchange had been enough to convince them they weren't involved with Jimsho. Even if the cruiser's command didn't actually believe the Space Queen had any loyalty to Bizi Kei, obviously they weren't aligned with Jimsho, so they'd let them go. Takki's maneuver had probably saved them a lot of time languishing on a prison moon somewhere, and now Takki was collecting on that debt.
"We're nearly done. I think we can leave for rendezvous in six hours if we have to, if we knew where rendezvous was," Kame answered.
"Splendid!" Takki crowed. He glanced off screen for a moment, someone out of the videoview's line of sight relaying something to Takki. He looked back at the screen after a moment and continued, "It'll be a couple of days before you leave though. We convinced another ship in your area to join; they got in system a few hours ago, so you'll have to wait for them to load. Then the two of you shall make your way to Nera to meet the rest of your merchant convoy. We'll be sending a small protection force with you from Nera; further coordinates will originate from the commander of that force."
"Another freighter, you said?" Kame didn't like the idea of waiting, but there wasn't much he could do about it. These military supply ops were never as well planned as their leaders thought they were. Two extra days in port meant two extra days of port fees for no return. Their delivery pay was the same either way; it wasn't going to go up just because they had to sit around waiting for some other ship to be ready. They still had some small-hold space open. Maybe they could take on some extra cargo to sell at the next port to offset some of these extra costs. He'd have to have Jin see what was available at good prices. They had the time for that now.
"It's another Manta 52, actually," Takki elaborated. "I'm told it's not unusual for two small merchant freighters to create temporary convoys." Now that was annoying. The Manta series were all mid-sized ships. Small, his erzot rump. "Lieutenant Tsubasa tells me you've had some dealings with them in the past, so I doubt anyone will be suspicious. Anything else?" Takki waited a beat, then, "I'll transfer specs to you for the One Piece; you can take care of departure arrangements with them directly. T&T out," Takki signed off using the fake trading identity Tsubasa had set up for them. Tsubasa was one of the Jimsho's most promising intelligence officers, though privately Kame didn't think he could be that good if even Kame knew that.
The One Piece. Last Kame had checked, Ryo was still holding a grudge for snagging that deal on Ilbad while the One Piece was caught up in customs three systems over under suspicion of involvement with drug trafficking. Kame thought Ryo was overreacting; deals weren't just going to sit around waiting for you to mosey on over. Erzot, this was going to be such a fun trip.
***
Ryo woke up when something heavy dropped onto his stomach and chest. Ryo flailed around a bit under the covers out of reflex as his brain woke up a bit. Apparently, Yamapi was back. "Wake up, monkey-man," said a voice on top of him. Ryo got flicked in the forehead when he tried to shove Jin off his chest and onto the floor.
"Ryo-chan~" Yamapi singsonged. He did it to be annoying, Ryo was sure, though Tegoshi always claimed it was cute. "We have company! Be nicer!" he chided. Ryo sighed theatrically and pushed Jin off him enough for him to sit up.
"I should have expected you to show up, fatso, since that flying piece of junk of yours is on station."
"The Queen is a beautiful ship," Jin retorted, offended. "Much better than this fraptastic excuse for a spaceship."
"Hey now!" It was Yamapi's turn to take offense. When it was between Jin or Ryo, Yamapi came out pretty fifty-fifty. When it came to his ship, his loyalty was clear.
"Sorry, sorry," Jin held his hands up pacifyingly. "I'm just saying it to get under Shorty's skin here. The Sayaendou is cute."
Mollified, Yamapi subsided. Ryo, meanwhile, sputtered in shocked fury. How dare Jin call the One Piece 'the Sayaendou'? Sure, it was kind of endearing when Massu or Koyama did it, but Jin was no member of One Piece's crew. He didn't get to call it by nicknames.
Yamapi hopped to his feet lightly. They were docked, so gravity was down. The inner ring spun around the station's central spoke like an old-fashioned wagon wheel to maintain gravity, but the station's outer ring was attached to the inner ring only by magnetic force--an inner line of electromagnets turned so their poles matched, pushing the two rings away from each other, and on either side of that line, two lines of electromagnets with opposite, attracting poles turned towards each other to keep the separate parts of the station from spinning off into space--to make loading and unloading easier. Stations had stayed one-ringed for centuries, unable to cope with different rotation rates and transitions between rings that centripetal forces wouldn't tear apart, until C. Moriarty invented an energy field that successfully kept atmosphere inside a small area. Technically just energy, the Moriarty field didn't interfere with the rotation of a station's disparate rings. It was, naturally, unbelievably expensive to produce and only worked to reliably cover very small areas. Stretched too thin, Moriarty fields occasionally developed temporary holes, but even a temporary outage would be deadly if atmosphere vented with a live human inside, so they could not be used for large areas. The millimeter-wide gap between the station's two spinning rings, though, was no problem for the energy field to cover, and allowed the rings to spin at different directions while keeping the atmosphere safely inside the station.
The transition from the outer ring, where most of the spacers and spacer-oriented business stayed, to the inner ring, where stationsiders lived and the station maintained more permanent offices and businesses, was generally abrupt. You'd key open a door, and on one side was half gravity, while on the other gravity was in full home-standard effect. More than just that difference in weight, the orientation was completely different, sideways suddenly becoming down, so while you could 'walk' through one side, you had to crawl up the other. You could always tell who the newbies were by the way they tripped and staggered making the transition, some actually falling back into half gravity when they didn't anticipate the orientation shift.
"Dude, your ship even looks like a giant peapod. What do you expect people to do?" Jin picked up where he'd left off.
"Come on," Yamapi chirped excitedly, seemingly oblivious to how well he was heading off disaster. He probably knew exactly what he was doing, but he made it look almost accidental. "Koyama and Massu have kitchen duty today. They always make something good!" he continued, and hauled Jin out of Ryo's quarters by the arm.
Ryo flopped back into bed, trying to get some more sleep mostly out of spite for Jin and Yamapi for disturbing him in the first place, but his indignance had woken him up too much. Ryo pulled the pillow over his head briefly, and held it down over his face with an arm to try and get the effect of being under full gravity. Nothing for it, might as well get up. Grumbling, Ryo hauled himself out of bed and changed into work clothes. He'd be hauling cargo around the hold later.
He had just gotten to the galley when Shige intercepted him. Shige looked cranky, but that was pretty normal. He and Ryo butted heads a lot because Ryo felt like it was his duty to the crew to cut Shige down a few notches whenever his ego expanded too much. They needed the hold space for the cargo, after all.
"Tegoshi says you've got a vid waiting," Shige reported. "He answered it, but says you should probably go talk to him yourself." Ryo nodded his acknowledgement and then turned around and started the other way to the bridge. Shige stepped around him into the galley, and his face lit up as Koyama called a friendly greeting. Ryo would just make Tegoshi bring him a roll or something when he got up to the bridge.
***
Ryo did not, in fact, make Tegoshi get him a roll when he got the bridge. Instead, Tego-nyan talked Ryo into bringing him breakfast once his call was over, and then got Ryo to promise to take him out to lunch on the station, before disappearing into the back of the ship. Ryo was left shaking his head bemusedly, because Tegoshi was going to the galley anyway, but he just couldn't find it in himself to find Tegoshi's behavior anything other than vaguely endearing.
Ryo flipped on the vidview from standby mode. "So, what can I do for-" Ryo's voiced faltered as he saw just who was waiting for him on screen. "-you."
"Long time no see," Kame greeted him.
"I was trying to keep it that way. I saw your ship at dock, but I wasn't expecting the pleasure of your call." Sarcasm was practically oozing out of the vidview on Kame's end, Ryo was sure. His end was so full of it there was nowhere else for it to go.
"We've got business; that's all."
"Oh, have we now. Funny, but as Captain of the One Piece, I pretty much get to decide who we do and don't have business with, and I say we don't have business with you." Ryo moved to end the call. He'd regret it later, when he'd had time to mull over possibilities, however unlikely, of what kind of business Kame thought he'd want in on more than he wanted the Space Queen to be lost in space, but right now he just wanted to do the vidview equivalent of storming out and slamming the door behind him.
"Tell Takki if you have problems with this," Kame said, sliding it into the conversation quickly, like a knife between ribs, before Ryo could hang up. Erzot. Ryo pulled his hand away from the end button.
He pursed his lips in annoyance. Takki meant the Space Queen and her crew were there for the same reason they were: supply mission. From what Ryo had heard, they were just going to be a small part of a large convoy. Moving that much in the way of supplies meant the Jimsho Confederacy was stepping up for a major operation. Ryo and Yamapi had promised Takki they'd do this run, since they were able; Yamapi had a special kind of relationship with Takki from way back. Takki had kind of taken Yamapi under his wing, made him the man he was today (up to and including his girly nickname), and sure, Yamapi hadn't ended up going down the same roads Takki did, but that didn't mean he wasn't going to help out when he was able. Yamapi probably would have signed them up for this one pro-bono if Takki hadn't offered to pay. So they were doing this job, no matter what. Ryo didn't have to like the Queen's crew, but it looked like he was going to have to work with them.
"Fine then. We've got a job. What did you call for?"
Kame pulled a face. Ryo could sympathize with that one, much as he told himself he wasn't willing to try; he'd worn it many a time himself. It was a very "I'm having to depend on favors" face. It was a face concerned with the bottom line, and not liking the numbers that were coming out of the feed. "To be honest, I know you just got in, but I was hoping you might have some sort of idea of how long it will be until you're ready. We've been in port for two days already, and we're almost all loaded up." Kame didn't say it, but Ryo understood: the other captain was worried about how much he'd have to spend on docking fees waiting for the One Piece to be ready. Disengaging and waiting in orbit around the station (or what passed for orbit with space stations. You didn't move; the station just kept turning in place, so from stationside you looked like you swung around it) wasn't a much better option, because that was time spent, and fuel spent, and food and oxygen spent that you'd have to refill somewhere later.
"I haven't talked to Pi yet, so I'm not sure how buying's going. He went out as soon as we hit, so optimistically we can be ready in a day and a half. Pessimistically, maybe three days."
Kame nodded acknowledgment, face softening a little in what might have been almost thanks. "Copy that," he said, this time making moves to sign off.
"Oh, you know your boy Jin's here, right? I'd appreciate if you kept your monkeys off my ship," Ryo said. It wasn't exactly a peace offering, but maybe it was a little bit of a truce offering. Just until they finished this run.
Kame scowled, and that was kind of funny. "Is that where he's gotten to? I should have known, with you in port. He was supposed to be back on board a couple of hours ago." Kame half shrugged. It never paid to worry if Jin was later than he said he'd be. "He wasn't on board when Takki called, so I didn't think he knew you'd arrived." Kame's face softened to mostly rueful. "Well, when you're sick of him, just kick him off the ship. Space Queen out."
Ryo ended the call before Kame had a chance to. Time to talk to Yamapi. Ryo's stomach grumbled, reasserting its need for breakfast. Right. Time for breakfast, then time to talk to Yamapi. If he could pry him away from Jin long enough to get any work done.
***
Data started streaming in from Taka's network. Most of it was useless, low level communications, public information anyone could get by skimming the galaxynet. But a few small details running through the system together triggered an algorithm. A preliminary analysis favored the possibility of a troop build-up, which set other programs spinning into active mode. One spun out a net to gather information to support or contradict this preliminary analysis and predict the probability of its accuracy. Another wriggled a worm into the communications line the data that originally pushed the network into operation came from. It worked as a simple intercept and transmit. Whenever the line sent a local message, the worm also sent out a farbeam transmission of the data it had collected so far. All the data transmissions were scrambled and compressed, sent out in small enough packages they probably wouldn't be noticed as long as the system was only being monitored casually--just a little bleed, extra static on the line. If anyone was looking for it, the worm would be found, but it had had a self-destruct code built into it, and it should erase itself and whatever data it still had before anyone could get anything useful out of it.
***
Negotiations took slightly longer than Ryo was hoping they would. Yamapi's background with Takki gave him a special aptitude when it came to covering his tracks in sensitive situations. Ryo couldn't say he wasn't grateful for it; it also gave them an extra edge when it came to some of their less than legal cargoes, but it also meant Yamapi had walked away from several dealers without so much as a backwards glance, and they were on a time crunch. In the end, the extra time was probably worth it. They got the supplies on the list Tsubasa had provided them before they'd left the last system at a price that was a little less than Ryo was honestly expecting, and Yamapi assured him that they'd left no suspicious paper trails. Yamapi couldn't promise that none of their dealers would talk under pressure or suggestion in the form of several hundred credits, but he was reasonably sure that no one was going to turn around and sell them to anyone just for fun. He had practice making it look like their cargo and their destination simply weren't worth anything to that kind of buyer. Most of the time they weren't. This time they were, and extra attention could hurt a lot.
Shipments of cargo started being delivered overnight and they piled up in high stacks of boxes and crates in front of the closed holding bay around the ship as everyone caught some sleep. Ryo awoke to total chaos. There were sealed crates everywhere, labels reading the contents and the company of origin--or at least, the last place stationside to have them before they made their way here. Massu and Shige were working to organize the haphazard piles into a system more conducive to easy loading and unloading. The engines performed better if the cargo was balanced, and it would be easier to offload later if they knew where things were.
Kame called a few times during the loading process. Ryo took one late during the first day; Kame wanted to see when they thought loading would start. Koyama answered another early the next, when Ryo was sleeping. Kame offered the crew of the Space Queen to help with loading. Ryo might have rejected the offer on principle, or, more accurately, out of stubbornness, but Koyama had agreed cheerfully without a second thought. Massu and Nakamaru hit it off almost immediately, and settled into an easy rhythm clustering crates together on the loading dock, then moving them into the ship's hold. Inside, Koyama, Shige, and Tegoshi worked to arrange the crates in order to be as space-efficient as possible. The crates were of a fairly common make--all the major brands were designed to be able to stack one upon the other. A few companies had tried to monopolize the market using cargo containers that were incompatible with other brands, but the impossibility and total lack of price efficiency for either a shipping line or an independent freighter to use a single brand whilst buying supplies and market goods from a hodgepodge of vendors shot those ideas right out of space.
Crates were stacked floor to ceiling near the walls and strapped in place with large nets that attached to hooks set up and down the outer walls. The crew worked from the outside in towards the center, filling up the space in the hold quickly and carefully. Several smaller crates stacked up under the metal stairs that zig-zagged down from the portal to the rest of the ship. The stairs acted as a ceiling for those boxes, and another cargo net hung down from the bottom edge of the stairs and tied off on rungs set in the floor to keep them in place. Stacks in the center of the hold were arranged in neat rows, and cargo nets were draped over whole piles and tied down to similar rungs at regular intervals across the hold's floor. The nets kept the cargo in place in case of any sudden changes in direction or emergency maneuvers the ship might take, as well securing the cargo against any unexpected losses of gravity. Loss of gravity--or rather, the sudden restoration of gravity--could completely ruin any but the most durable of cargoes.
"Permission to board the Sayaendou?" Junno asked from the bottom of the deck, where the ship met the dock, with an easy mock salute.
"That's not it's name," Ryo growled at the same time as Massu cheerfully called Junno up to the ship.
"It even looks like a pea pod, doesn't it!" Junno declared brightly, once he was at the top. "It's a very clever name."
Ryo stalked back to the cockpit. He had better things to do.
***
Yamapi sat on top of a crate at the top of the loading ramp. Technically the door to the ship's hold, it lowered to the ground--or the decking, as the case may be--and formed a kind of loading ramp as well as getting the door conveniently out of the way. Jin was late. Not really surprising, and not usually a problem, but they were on a tighter than usual deadline, and the pressure was starting to get to Yamapi a little. On some level he realized that they had all the time they needed to take--that the convoy wasn't going to leave without them--but Yamapi hated to disappoint.
Yamapi was still waiting when a familiar face rounded a stack of crates Massu hadn't yet gotten to, and paused at the bottom of the ramp. "Koki!" Yamapi called down to him in greeting. Koki had an eye patch over his left eye that he hadn't had the six or so years ago that was the last time Yamapi had seen him. By itself, an eye patch was pretty hard to miss, but just in case you'd overlooked it, Koki had had his emblazoned with a large skull and crossbones motif, picked out in silver glitter.
Koki flipped the eye patch up as he strolled up the ramp towards Yamapi. "Yo!"
"Been a while," Yamapi replied once Koki was closer. "Fashion eye patch?"
Koki laughed. "Yeah, why not? It suits my image," he said, flipping it back down and scowling at Yamapi in his best imitation of a hardened spacer.
"Fearsome!" Yamapi agreed, laughing.
"You should have been there when Taguchi came on board. I had him thinking it was real for weeks. Ueda ruined it one night in the galley by asking me to take a look at some antique radio thing he'd broken. I couldn't get a good look with only the one eye, so I'd flipped it up, and just then Taguchi walks in. Real shame, it was," Koki shook his head in remembered amusement. "Before that, Taguchi was half in awe of my extreme manliness--not that he shouldn't be in awe of my manliness. I am the picture of manliness--and half terrified of me. I think he thought I was going to eat him if we ever ran out of food on a run. But man, you should've seen his face when he realized it was a fake! Pure shock! I thought he was going to fall over!
"So I hear you lazy slackers need help packing everything in so we can get outta here." Koki changed the subject smoothly and gestured at the chaos surrounding them.
Yamapi pulled a face. "Gonna get worse as soon as Jin gets his tail here and we go finalize some more deals," he said. "You met Koyama?" Yamapi caught Koyama's attention and waved him over when Koki shook his head. "Koyama, another grunt from Queenie come over to lend a hand," Yamapi yelled once Koyama's close enough to hear him over the grind of the dock's crane lift. "Tell him what he can do."
***
War had been a reality for the galaxy for at least the last fifty years, though in some areas, it had gone on for much longer than that. People Kame's parents' age, like Kame himself, had known the war all their lives--had almost gotten used to it, really, and as long as you weren't in an area that was being affected by enemy engagements or an active battle zone, you ignored it to the extent that it was possible. There were always stories on the news, slanted one way or the other depending on which planet or station you were on and where that system's loyalties lay, but for the most part it was just a background that had become part and parcel of life. Some of the older generation would talk about before the war easily and with obvious wistfulness; others simply said that the galaxy had been a different place then, and dropped the subject.
It was a space war, really, when it came down to it. It was a war about systems and resources, people and power, and who controlled more of it. Bizi Kei controlled a larger swath of territory, but Jimsho's area had essential resources in higher concentrations; when it came down to people, they were probably split about evenly. Independent nations drifted along the outer edges of the two biggest governments in the galaxy, but they stuck to themselves mostly. The ones on the edges, mostly they got there because they wanted to be left alone and, lying on the outskirts of the known universe, it was easy to leave them to themselves. Hundreds of other small, independent nations grew up along the borders between the two large empires as well, ranging in size from government seats ruling over single moons to nations spanning five or six separate systems. Those middle spaces were the most volatile, a kind of international free-for-all. Both Bizi Kei and Jimsho ships patrolled the area under the pretense of 'keeping the peace,' along with any local government militaries--who probably did more in terms of actual peace-keeping. Bizi Kei and Jimsho had larger, stronger militaries, sure, but they were too busy looking suspiciously at each other to really do much of anything else.
The independent nations also provided a space for businesses like the Space Queen's to thrive. Technically neutral to the decades-long conflict, mostly upright transport businesses like theirs had a lot of leeway to operate in the border nations. They could take the occasional shady job without having to worry that one of the big guns was going to come down on their backs, and they didn't have to ever turn down legitimate business simply because the destination system was on the 'wrong' side of the war. Maybe it was a little mercenary, playing all sides like that, but it was hard enough keeping a business running without getting tangled up in the complications playing politics brought. In that regard, this particular run was a bit of an oddity. Kame, and really, all of them, tried to stay out of military supply runs just because close associations with any military was a good way to lose business with people on the other side. Civilian business was a different matter.
Still, Takki had called in his favor, and the crew of the Space Queen prided themselves on their ability to deliver top quality goods at top quality speed. One job either way wasn't going to make a big difference, and a definite upside of the tight security that seemed to be involved in this particular run meant it was unlikely that they'd get reputations for being Jimsho gunrunners anytime soon. Kame didn't give the One Piece much credit--particularly anywhere Ryo would be likely to hear him--but he knew they had pretty much the same attitude. Yamapi and Ryo came from a Jimsho planet originally, same as Jin, but the One Piece had always done a good job of staying out of it. That was one of the reasons the two ships played rival so often: lucrative, mostly legal, non-military jobs were few and far between. If you went after them, you got to know your competition real quick.
It was pure luck they'd ended up in the same system to pick up goods for Takki's job, but that coincidence stuck them together for the duration. Kame had passed on rendezvous information to the One Piece dutifully; they'd meet up with the rest of the convoy at Nera, and they'd probably end up together for the next leg of the journey as well, wherever that happened to be. The faster they got out of the system, the faster they could be to Nera and then go their separate ways. Kame was looking forward to the end of this run. It would be nice to be able to push the war back into the background where it belonged again. Besides, Jin was really too cheerful when Yamapi was around.
***
They knew something was wrong the moment they jumped in system. It was supposed to be a fairly large convoy waiting at Nera, and they estimated that the One Piece and the Space Queen would be some of the last ships to arrive, but there didn't seem to be another ship in the entire system. Nothing registered on their navigation systems, and while theoretically there were some moons nearby that could be blocking communications and navigation systems from picking up other ships, it seemed hard to believe that all of the ships supposedly taking part would be able to hide in their gravity shadows. It was just as unlikely that the convoy would have left without them. They were a pair of smaller ships, but they were decently sized when it came to freighters, and breaking up a merchant convoy was like inviting pirates to take advantage. Pirates were a serious hazard in these borderlands because it was easy to simply slip into another system under the control of another minor principality who were too busy protecting their borders from their neighbors to have time to deal with ships who had yet to bother their citizens. Many of the smaller single system governments had mutual protection pacts with other nearby planets to guard each other's space, but seldom were these agreements enforced.
Something pinged off the Space Queen's hull, and Kame stopped trying to figure things out by looking at his monitors and looked out the viewport instead. It took a few moments for the hunks of space junk to really register, but as they did, Kame's eyes widened. He glanced over to Jin in the pilot's chair first, and then back to Junno, who was strapped into one of the gallery seats in the back of the small cockpit. "Junno, get Nakamaru and go down to the guns." There was enough debris floating in the space between the two moons to fill up their ship five times over, and just as much to fill the One Piece as many times.
Suddenly, Kame had a very clear idea as to where the other ships were hiding. They weren't. They'd been destroyed. This was bad.
***
Koyama was calling moments later, but Yamapi usurped the screen nearly as soon as they got through. "This wasn't pirates," was the first thing Yamapi said. Kame just nodded. He knew. Pirates wouldn't just destroy everything. Pirates were after the cargoes; destroying the ships would destroy their profit margins as well. If they were a large force coming up on a large convoy--though few pirate groups were large enough to take on a convoy the size the floating debris indicated this one used to be--they might blast a few ships, but disabling was still the route pirates would be most likely to take. Kill the engines, or better, breach the hull near the cockpit and purge the atmosphere. Instant death for any crew members who happened to be near the breach, which made boarding and pillaging easier; even if other crew members were in their quarters or the engines, automatic safety bulkheads would lock down to preserve the atmosphere in those sections, effectively sealing them away from the hold. Disabling a few ships as an example was usually enough to get an unescorted convoy to run or surrender: give up your cargo and get to keep your ship. Some groups might hijack ships entirely, and more ruthless pirates might simply kill the crews or leave them to die after stealing their cargo and tow the ships themselves off to salvage.
Shipping was a dangerous business these days, and anyone in it knew the risks. But this carnage wasn't the work of pirates. Pirates stole first, and accumulated kills incidental to the stealing. This was a massacre, and the point was to destroy everything and everyone there.
"It doesn't look good," Kame said. "It might not be worth it to look for survivors."
"It'll be worth it to the survivors," Yamapi replied, looking grim. Kame nodded again. If there are any, Kame didn't say. They didn't know how long ago the attack had happened. Anyone thrown into space would qualify as just more space debris. Most of the ships looked pretty much demolished, hardly even recognizable as once being space ships, but there were some larger pieces further away that might house some breathable atmosphere.
Koyama took back his console, and the One Piece started moving towards the further moon as Yamapi reclaimed the ship's controls. Jin started piloted the Space Queen towards the other moon without a word. They scanned every section of hull they came across that was bigger than a human torso, anything that could possibly hold a person inside alive. Kame kept his eyes on his monitors; it wasn't pretty out there. It took a lot of firepower to pulverize a ship of any size so thoroughly.
"Didn't Takki say they were providing a military escort?" Koyama asked suddenly, and Kame's eyes jerked back to the vidview in surprise.
"Yes," Kame answered slowly, "As a matter of fact, he did." The size and firepower of the force necessary to take out the convoy just jumped up a few times over.
"Do you think they were here when this happened? Did something draw them away from the freighters, or did something get them all?" Koyama hypothesized. Kame shrugged. There was no way of knowing, not with the information they had now.
Jin toggled the comm unit to the gunnery stations on either side of the ship. "It doesn't look like anything's moving under its own power out there."
"Understood," Nakamaru answered. Stay sharp, Jin meant. This kind of wreckage was perfect for small fighters to lurk unnoticed. Kame knew both Nakamaru and Junno would be scanning the sky carefully for any hint of change in the inertia of the debris field. Kame went back to his monitors and scans. Edging further into the field, they were coming up on some larger pieces. Kame could only hope someone had survived.
On to Part 2