Olympus Beckons Pt 05

This story takes place in the universe created by fellow writer T.C.Vega. Not sure if I'm allowed to plug other sites here, but you can find details of her website in my bio, and I recommend giving it a visit.

"Olympus Beckons - Part 5"

Zesta Station was a typical outer rim shithole. Though, whether it was actually

on

the Rim was a matter of some debate - the Teraxans would insist it wasn't - but it sure as hell wasn't among the core worlds either.

It was bigger than most, busier than most, a trade hub for this sector of space. But all in all, it was still an ugly and ungainly collection of shipyards, industrial megafacilities, automated factories, foundries and refineries that had grown to service the mining ships and traders that swarmed about the place like flies around a giant turd in space. The habitat rings were held together mostly by spit and duct tape, and were crowded with every flavour of humanity come looking for work, a new start or some other hopeful escape. Every hopeful colonist, pilgrim, wildcat miner, trader, con merchant, hustler, hooker and thug, all living together cheek and jowl, while the whorehouses, bars and casinos in the retail sector sparkled and sang their discordant siren songs as they offered every service and vice imaginable to entice those same people through their doors.

Corruption was rife, as was poverty and squalor, indenture and penal slavery, and sometimes the only escape was to either starve, or turn to crime. Many chose the latter.

But that was life out on the Rim.

After the mass slaughter of the Thorian War, the major navies had retired back to the core worlds, all but abandoning the Rim to its own devices. The provincial navies, undergunned, undermanned, usually flying older, cast-off or salvaged ships, were left to take up the slack, and many folded as pirate warlords, or mercenary outfits staked out entire systems for themselves.

Out beyond the Rim was the Frontier, where there was only anarchy and lawlessness. Vast, near empty sectors of space where anyone with guts and guns enough could stake their claim, and if they were hard enough, tough enough, they might even manage to hold it. While, here and there, a few colonies and worlds, those with money enough to hire mercs, survived, offering safe haven and sanctuary, for a price.

Captain Frances Frobisher looked out the viewport at the harsh steel landscape of Zesta and sighed,

"Dark satanic mills indeed."

Pouring another mug of coffee from the jug she turned back to the others in the briefing room, "Apologies, continue, please."

The XO eyed the steaming, tar-like substance the woman was drinking and shuddered, "That stuff looks positively toxic. It can't be good for you."

From another seat, the engineer looked up with a grin, "Just don't spill it. It might eat through the deckplates."

Takin another sip, the Captain gave an uncaring shrug as she muttered, "Hopefully it's strong enough to kill that fucking cornbread."

She sniffed and took her seat, "So, where were we?"

The briefing room was busy enough with her department heads and a few assistants crowded around the table, but despite their murmured conversations and the mountain of paperwork waiting for her attention, she was distracted, thinking on the thoroughly clandestine and entirely unauthorised operations she had already set in motion. Setting her cup down, she squared her shoulders and forced her mind to focus on the present.

As usual, she started with the most junior officer present, "Right, Midshipman Abara, sorry to spring this on you at short notice, but Helen's engaged in other duties today, so in addition to being my Yeoman, you're back to being temporary morale officer," she gestured, "what've you got for us?"

The young man grinned, "No probs, Captain, it's not like I wasn't morale officer before she arrived. Anyway, I've not much to report. The usual grumblings about rations and other mundane matters, but nothing of real note. I've managed to tie into the port systems and uploaded the latest bunch of movies, books, magazines and entertainment vids, and once they're screened for viruses, spyware and whatnot I'll be able to punt them to our ship's library. I also managed to restock the ship's commissary with smokes, candies and other incidentals. And, uh," he shifted nervously, "I've been asked to pass on a request from the crew."

Frances shook her head, "I'm trying to get us better rations, Aadan, but the Commodore's being a pri... er... he's, um, how do I put this? Well, let's just say he's giving the request his utmost consideration."

There were a few chuckles, but despite his smile, the Midshipman shook his head, "It's not that. It's, well..."

"Out with it."

"There's been a request that we paint a skull and crossbones on the bow, to mark the pirate we bagged."

She glanced across at the young officer, who was manfully stifling his grin, "This is from the gun crews, isn't it?"

"Well, ma'am, I maybe shouldn't say, but yes, mostly."

She considered, "XO?"

Damon shrugged, "Nothing against it in regulations."

Shaking her head, she sighed theatrically, "Okay, do it, but please, don't make it twenty feet across. I mean," she grinned, "we have to leave room for all the rest we're going to get, right?"

"Yes, ma'am!"

The Quartermaster held up a finger, "Er, ma'am, I might have something for young Aadan there."

"Oh?"

"Yea, well, I managed to get my hands on some new ration packs. They ain't exactly Navy issue, but they're s'posed to be pretty good. I, uh, couldn't get as many as I wanted, there were quite a few other folks after them, and they had to be shared. But I got some."

She sniffed, "How many, and, hmm, now don't think me ungrateful, Chief, but why didn't you mention it earlier?"

The craggy non-com made a face, "Well, maybe about two weeks' worth, or, if we're careful, we could have one day a week of pretty decent grub for quite a while, maybe a whole deployment."

"Like Sunday dinner, maybe?"

"I guess."

She turned to the Midshipman, "Aaron?"

"Well, that would give the crew something to be looking forward to, and go a long way with morale, Captain."

"Very good then," she grinned, "and the other thing?"

The man didn't blush or anything, he was far too seasoned a character for that, but he stroked his chin thoughtfully before he spoke, "I guess I didn't want you to be thinking I'm a ghoul or something."

"Huh?"

"The ration packs were to resupply the "Clementine", a transport ship doing the run between here and Kilpatrick, but it didn't make it; got taken by pirates someplace out near the Snowball Nebula about two weeks past."

"Survivors?"

He shook his head.

The room went quiet for a moment, and then she sighed, "Waste not want not, I suppose, but maybe try and keep it from the crew. They might get superstitious about eating a dead-man's dinner."

"Yes, ma'am."

The rest of the reports were fairly mundane, concerning matters of duty rosters, maintenance, repairs and routine resupply, but before they broke up, she took a thoughtful sip of her coffee, and, as if by an afterthought nodded across the table, "Uh, Snipes?"

The Chief Engineer blinked, "Yes, Captain?"

"I was walking through cargo two a while ago, and I couldn't help but notice a handful of sealed crates, all stacked up in one corner and covered by a plastic tarp," she sniffed, "almost as if someone didn't want them noticed, but hadn't had time to hide them properly yet. Think maybe you can shed some light on that for me?"

The man's face went blank,

"Oh shit."

He swallowed, "Well, uh, I was out with Bill," he pointed at the Quartermaster, "you know, doing the rounds of the onshore storage bunkers to see what we could get, when we saw these crates, and well, turns out the Pork Chop is an old mate of mine, and so I, uh, introduced Bill, and well we got to drinking and..."

She shook her head, "Oh, for fuck's sake, what did you steal?"

Almost instinctively, his expression took on an aggrieved look, "Steal? Why, Captain, we never stole nothin', did we Bill?"

The Quartermaster shook his head in agreement as he gave her his most innocent smile.

"Then why is cargo two full of badly hidden crates? And you still haven't told me what's in them, have you?"

"Uhhh..."

"Talk," she leaned forward and tapped a finger on the desktop, "now."

"It's four fighter drones."

She blinked and sat back, "What?"

"Remember those long-range combat drones they used to use during the war? I hated those fucking things. Well, there were four of them just sitting there, still packaged up. Probably been there for more'n a decade. They were s'posed to be spares for one of them robot carrier ships, but nobody builds 'em anymore, and there's not been one out this far in years. Well, you keep saying you wouldn't mind something with a bit more range, and each one of those sneaky bastards can carry up to four fighter missiles, or a single torpedo, so I thought..."

"That you'd just steal them?"

The man scratched his nose, "

Requisition

, Cap. I put the forms in and everything."

"Forms?"

"Yup, DD Form 1140, all filled out right and proper. Put them in his office and everything."

Her eyes narrowed and her voice was incredulous, "

Paper

forms? Who the fuck uses paper forms these days?"

"Uh, wouldn't like to say, ma'am."

"How drunk was he?"

There was a grin, "Oh, very."

The Commodore is going to have a heart attack."

"Doubt it. Like I say, they've been sitting there gathering dust for the better part of a decade and a half. The supply officer was glad to finally be rid of 'em, well, probably."

"But," she shook her head, "how would we launch them? What do we arm them with? And come to think on it, do we have anyone even qualified to fly the bloody things?"

The engineer pursed his lips, "Well, I could modify the probe launcher, that should work to get them into space, and uh..." he shifted in his chair, "Bill might have gotten hold of a couple of missiles that might fit."

She turned to the Quartermaster, "A couple?"

"Uh, sort of, ma'am."

"Sort of?

The man averted his eyes as he mumbled something.

"How many did you steal, precisely?"

He cleared his throat, "Forty-seven."

"What the fuck? You stole forty-seven missiles? And then smuggled them aboard ship?"

The Quartermaster sniffed, "Would have been fifty, but three looked a bit iffy, so I left 'em."

The engineer nudged his arm, "Not helping."

By now her head was in her hands, "Oh, dear God..."

A voice spoke up, "You know, my dropship pilot and her crewman could probably fly them, if you have a remote rig we can use."

She looked at the Marine Captain, who was sitting with something of a speculative look on his face, "Seriously?"

He shrugged, "Yea, probably, I mean they'd need to train up, but I'd bet it could be done, or at least I can't see why it couldn't be done."

Her fingers drummed slowly on the tabletop as she swiveled in her chair to peer out the viewport, "Quite a bit of work before we could use them..."

"Uh, yes, ma'am, but the actual engineering requirements wouldn't be that hard, and I'd get right on it once I'm done with the current job."

Nodding, she looked back, "So, how long would it take to make the modific..."

She paused, "What current job?"

"Ma'am?"

"You said you'd get right on it once done with the current job. What current job?"

He cleared his throat awkwardly, "Oh, that..."

...

Midshipwoman Helen Kristianson had been in the Teraxan Navy for all of six months, and she'd spent twenty weeks of that being run absolutely ragged in Officer Training School on Dreadmouth, a high-gravity world with probably the worst climate she had ever seen, where the only thing more miserable than the awful cold in the barracks, had been the absolutely terrible rations. Classwork had been heaped on the candidates like it was going out of fashion, the PE and hand to hand combat instructors could have given tips to Inquisition torturers, and a full night's sleep had been a laughable pipedream.

Discipline had been rigorous, with uniform and other infractions being dealt with by giving the candidates a choice; the lash, or some grueling session of extra PE. Most chose the lash. They just didn't have time, or energy, to waste on any extra running about.

She'd loved every minute of it.

Graduating, even if in only the middle of her class, had probably been one of the proudest moments of her life. Her father had served in the war, and while he might have grumbled about "Navy Pukes", she thought he wouldn't have been ashamed to see her in uniform.

Her first day when she reported aboard ship had been more than just moderately terrifying. At the OTC, when she excitedly told some of the instructors about her posting, a couple had walked off, shaking their heads sadly, while another had just laughed.

Being marched to the Captain's cabin by the stern-faced officer of the deck, and then waiting at the door to be called in, had wracked her nerves, and she remembered nervously straightening the tunic of her dress uniform and picking imaginary bits of fluff from her sleeve until there had been a whisper from the sentry, "Psst."

Her head had whipped up, eyes wide like a startled deer, but the marine, a gnarled towering figure in light armour, had grinned, whispering from the side of his mouth even as he kept his eyes fixed forward, "Relax, kid, you'll do fine."

She would have smiled her thanks, but at that precise moment the door chimed and slid aside, revealing the dragons' den beyond. The marine gave her a sly wink, "Good luck."

Swallowing the sudden rush of fear and squaring her shoulders, she stepped inside, barely managing to utter a whispered squeak as she passed the man, "Thanks".

The woman seated behind her desk had dark hair, cut short and combed back in a severe style. She was compact, not overly tall, but with the athletic figure of someone who clearly thought of her body as another piece of military equipment, one that required proper maintenance to function according to spec. Her cap sat on the desk at her side, and her face was impassive as she ran her eyes over her newest crewmember. Yet, even sitting there, there was just something... A certain poise that she had seen in a couple of the instructors at the training school, the ones who had seen combat. Some of the vets she had met had looked wounded inside, like they had seen and done things that had left a mark. But there were others, like this woman, who looked distinctly...

predatory

.

But what struck Helen was just how young she appeared. The woman, who bore the four gold rings of a warship Captain on her skinsuit and was thus clearly only marginally less powerful than God as far as her crew were concerned, looked younger than her mother. That is, until she looked up and Helen saw her eyes.

Those eyes were definitely

not

young, and Helen swallowed,

"She's a regen."

She barely remembered what followed. She had snapped to attention and saluted, identifying herself and presenting her orders as regulation required, and if the Captain's lips had quivered slightly at the nervousness in her voice as she did so, she made no mention of it.

There had followed the usual questions and comments about duty and family, but she had been too terrified to later recall much of them. She had stumbled over the age-old query that always seemed to get asked, "Where do you see yourself in five years?" offering the usual platitudes instead of giving the answer that immediately came to mind.

From the gleam in the Captain's eyes, it was obvious she needn't have bothered. She knew.

Eventually, the cursory interview was concluded, and the Captain gave her a slight nod as she was dismissed, and while her voice hadn't exactly been friendly, it wasn't harsh either. Helen barely managed to hide her sigh of relief, though from the way the Captain's arched brow raised slightly, she was pretty sure it had been noticed anyway.

Helen had saluted again but then paused, as the Captain, instead of returning to her paperwork, rose gracefully from her seat. Lifting her cap from the desk, she had placed it precisely on her head before returning the salute with something of a strange smile on her lips as she then held out her hand, "Welcome aboard the Zeus, Miss Kristianson."

Her mind shifted back to the present.

Sergeant Lopez turned to her as she pulled the various bits and pieces of equipment from the seemingly innumerable pockets concealed beneath her civilian jacket.

They were crowded into the back of a battered old mag-van that Sergeant Callahan had acquired from... well, from somewhere.

Lopez looked at her, "Right, you heard the Major's briefing. These fucks are slavers, and there's nothing the Captain would like more than to use a kinetic charge to turn this shithole into a smoking crater, but blowing a hole in the side of the station is probably a bit much, even for her, and besides, there's stuff we need to find out first."

She sniffed, "First, the Captain of that bucket we blasted says he sells his cargo here, but this isn't the final destination, and there's no way they march a coffle of kidnapped women through the streets to get here. Zesta is a dump, but even here, that would attract attention. So, they're probably usually hidden in a container in the cargo docks for later pick-up. So that's point one. We need to know if there are any victims still here, and if so, where they are.

"Point two - Up until now, these fucks have managed to evade all our patrols, anti-piracy sweeps, and customs checks. Now, with customs they could just be paying off some local yokel, but to avoid our patrols, they would need access to military deployments. That means we have a mole in the mix, and the Captain really,

really,

takes exception to that. So, we need to find out who that is so she can murder them."

Helen blinked, "Murder?"

The sergeant shrugged, "Okay, 'shoot them'. That better?"

"Uh..."

She grinned, "Never mind. Anyway, thirdly, this isn't the final destination for the slavers. It's a pick-up point. The poor bastards they've snatched will get picked up for transport to some hellhole for 'processing'."

"Processing?"

The marine grimaced, "They'll be abused until they break and basically tortured until they learn to obey every order these vermin give them, no matter how fucking depraved it is. It's... It's a filthy business, Helen."

Callahan turned in the driver's seat, "And that's why we're going to do very bad things to them when we find them."

She blinked, "Bad things?"

The marine grinned happily, "We're going to kill them all."

"But, uh, shouldn't we try and bring them back for trial?"

"Nope."

"Nope? Just nope? I mean, we're the navy. Surely..."

"Helen, these people are murdering scum, and we're it. There's no-one else. Nobody, save maybe a few mercs, who give a shit. And, in case you missed it, space is like really fucking big. We can't be everywhere, but..."

Selene looked round from the minicomp she was fiddling with, "But our reputation can."

Lopez nodded, "Every time we ship out, every time they don't

know

where we are, these guys should be absolutely shitting themselves. Just in case that maybe, just maybe, that faint blip appearing on their sensors isn't an echo, or an anomaly, it's us."

Selene grinned, "There's an old saying, Helen, 'There's no justice, there's just us'."

"Oh."

Lopez grunted, "Right, back to business. We want to find out which ships are doing the transporting, where the victims are being sold, and who to, if we can. Also, somebody's fencing all the stolen shit from these ships, so it wouldn't hurt to find out who that is as well."