The crews of the Behemoth class trade ships Trifolium, Cynáreae and Taraxacum were gathered in the small but spacious rented briefing room in Daltas Hold, the attention focused on the grey haired man in front of them. It had been a long briefing thus far and the poor quality of the chairs was starting to have an effect on the audience. Still, they remained focused on the man as he described the entire route from Daltas Hold to Detus Watch in Serco space. After all, they would be going through the most pirate infested wormhole in all of known space and even if the main pirate guilds had shown themselves to be rather sporadic as of late, it never hurt to agree beforehand on what the different members of the ships were supposed to do. The old man in front, lieutenant Crumbuldt, turned to his by now restless audience,
"All this aside, we have a standing insurance policy with the Xang Xi corporation and this means that is we are attacked by pirates I am authorised to pay up to three million standard UIT credits in ransom for our safe passage."
He smiled at seeing the relief on their faces; even if they ran into some of the most experienced pirates they would be able to buy them off.
"We will have launch in one hour so please be ready at that time gentlefolks. The rent-a-cops will be ready then. That is all, move out."
The crews got up and adjusted the snappy flight suits they had been issued form their parent trade company, the Daltas Free Shipping Company, before moving out in small groups to their respective Behemoths.
The ships had been painted in the bright neon colours of DFSC just days before and were still in completely perfect condition. The Behemoths were not completely new but prime second hand and had been worked over extensively by the Daltas hold mechanics during the last week. They functioned as good as new ships and the crews were proud of them. After the pre-flight check the pilots launched according to plan and flew towards the jump point at 160 meters per second. A small warning came up on the HUD from the fighter escorts, a single Centaur III but nothing that alerted any of them. No pirates had been detected so far. The all go was given for the warp jump to Sedina B-8, the wormhole sector. Lieutenant Crumbuldt activated the jump drive and let the extremely complicated machinery push his Behemoth through nether space and into the targeted sector.
The single Centaur that had jumped into the sector seconds before they had arrived moved towards the convoy at full speed. Crumbuldt opened his radio and sent a signal across.
"We are friendly traders. Peace be with you."
No reply. The Centaur kept boosting towards the convoy and at the 350 meter mark fired a full spread of flares.
"No, please desist. We will pay ransom."
The flares exploded 28 metres from the first Behemoth, bathing the cargo ship in sheets of flame tearing armour plates to shreds and forcing the ship into a different direction from the other ships. The following set of flares was impact fused and hammered into the side of the Behemoth, penetrating the armour and exploding it. Crumboldt looked in horror at the Centaur as it turned its front towards the next Behemoth and unleashed a new set of flares coupled with the machine gun-like firing from the Gatling turret. The gunners that manned the heavy gauss turrets started firing at the Centaur to no avail as the flares exploded on either side of the Behemoth that was targeted and the ship shook from the violence of the force. The following Gatling shots smashed the armour and tore the ship into a thirty tonne expanding ball of scrap metal.
Crumboldt swore and focused on getting away from the Centaur but could only impotently look as the following ship moved into the slipstream of the Behemoth ignoring the wasp-like Vultures that tried to get a firing solution. They were continuously foiled at the random movements of the Centaur and failed to hit it at all. The Centaur, on the other hand, fired a set of flares expertly up on each side of the Behemoth that detonated with an enormous explosion that made the heavy trade ship ring like a bell. Crumbuldt adjusted his helmet that had slipped down over his eyes and was worried by feeling the crushed heavy-duty plasteel that had protected his head from the impact with his control panel. Apparently the control panel was made of something very durable and only a coloured smear showed where his head had impacted. He checked his radar and saw the twin tell tale yellow radar echoes approaching with a sense of dread. Here was his death, arriving unseen but not unnoticed. He closed his eyes as the proximity alert went from rising single beeps and turned into a continuous tone.
Having smashed the convoy completely, the Centaur twisted lazily through the wreckage and dispatched the life pods with single shots of his Gatling turret. Once secure that none of the UIT traders had survived, the pilot turned the heavy ship around and left his tell tale message to the non-attentive emptiness of space:
"I cut them Janice, I cut them good."
###
Asteroth was lying on his bunk, his feet raised on a set of pillows with his hands behind his head and his eyes closed enjoying some light reading via his brainpal. He should probably be worried but had discovered an inability to care lately. He couldn't affect the decision of the military court anyway and so had decided to stop bothering. He chuckled at a particular funny part of the latest Adventures of John Eldritch, Coolant Merchant Extraordinaire when there was a hard sound from the door. Asteroth disconnected and looked over towards the opening door where an immaculately clad Master Chief had entered, the distaste painted on his face like an abstract work of art.
"Sir, it is time."
Asteroth nodded and got up from the bunk smoothing the wrinkles in his plain black and red uniform that was empty apart from the obligatory rank indications on his collar. He was not allowed to wear any medals or ribbons at the court, nor any unit marks.
"You don't look happy Chief Ziegfeldt."
"Sir, you know I am not allowed to comment. But no Sir, I am not."
Asteroth smiled at the disregard for the court that Ziegfeldt displayed by that last remark.
"It could have been worse Chief; they could have sent a young unknown officer instead of you."
"Maybe that would have been for the better Sir."
Asteroth chuckled at the chief's comment.
"Maybe so, maybe not Chief. It would have been final for sure."
A young officer would have carried a neural disrupter as well as a thin gun with only one shot in it and would have been an indication that the court had decided that the verdict had been death. As an officer he would then be given the option of the "honourable" solution before being sentenced and thus killing himself as an innocent man with full honours. So, he was not going to die from this but he was in no doubt that it would be a harsh sentence.
"Right Chief, I am ready."
Ziegfeldt nodded and placed the silvered pacifier collar around Asteroth's neck before leading him out of the cell into the harsh sunlight of Sol II.
###
She opened her eyes. And then opened them again. Nothing, no difference between opened or closed eyes, only the pitch dark of nothing. She tried to move her hand up to touch her face just to confirm that her eyes were open but couldn't move her arms. Or her legs, or any other part of her body. She opened her eyes and saw nothing. She felt nothing, no gravity, air, temperature or anyth... wait, there was something there. Like a rhythmic sound repeating faster and faster; ding, ding, ding, Ding, Ding, Ding, DIng, DIng, DINg, DINg, DINg, DING DING DING. She recognised the sound, it was from somewhere that was very intimately known to her; it was from her cockpit, it was the radar lock warning. She opened her eyes in panic, nothing. She recognised where she were now, she was inside a life support pod that was powered down and the warning was from someone pinging her with a targeting radar. The pod was pushed hard to one side and she could feel her arm getting warm and then very cold. A stinging sensation was felt in her little finger. She opened her eyes, she opened her eyes...
...and sat up in the bed completely confused, the alarm clock showing 0602 standard time and the chime softly pinging. She grabbed her arm and felt the cold from where the glass of water had spilled all over her hand. Cat rubbed her eyes with both hands before slamming the heel of her hand down on the alarm clock. She hated that dream. She had dreamed it several times before with different endings but always with the feeling of claustrophobic helplessness. She knew who had flown the ship that in the end killed the pod; it had been herself. She looked at the clock and cursed, she was ten minutes late. She jumped into her flight suit and scrimmaged around for her combat boots before bolting out of the door. No breakfast today either. Rather that than being late for her assignment. She arrived at the office with a minute to spare and moved into the locker room for her flight gear. As the only female employee, she had the entire twelve-person locker room for herself and with the minuscule amount of kit she had it looked empty.
Cat grabbed her helmet and walked down to the briefing room along with the other two active members of Helios Securities Convoy Service, HSCS. It had been hard for her to find a job in grey space that didn't involve a military screening, which she could not afford but eventually she hit upon this one. The pay was not too bad but she kept on thinking back on her crèche and the training partners she had had. She missed the buddies instead of these rent a cops that went home every night. It was lonely, but it was a job.
The trio sat at the briefing and listened to the monotone voice of the briefing bot as it explained the destination and size of convoy they would be escorting. Cat had a hard time focusing, everything was already uploaded to her brainpal, why did she have to sit it through with these.... she almost thought hunorms, the Serco derogatory slang for unmodified humans, but stopped herself. She was forced to live among them after all. The commander of the flight rose after the briefing.
"Right, so Tjulekso, you'll fly point with me and Ms. Plissensky will take the rear."
She flinched at hearing her last name instead of her usual callsign.
"Just Cat will be fine Aliec"
"That is Mr Xusio Ms Plissenksy. You will be three, Tjulekso two and I am lead. The cargo ships are alpha one to three for the Behemoths and bravo one and two for the Centaurs"
Cat was about to come with a reply but decided against it. She didn't know why this Aeolus born brat hated her guts but he did his utmost every time to annoy her. She couldn't afford losing the job however, the money in her account were disappearing at an alarming rate. And it didn't matter that she had probably killed more capitol ship than Aliec had total kills either, he was the boss and made sure she knew it every time. She shrugged mentally but didn't change her appearance at all. Which the useless prick obviously decided was her submission and with a slight smile he turned and walked out expecting Cat and Tjulekso to follow. Cat looked over to Tjulekso who merely shrugged apologetically before getting up to follow.
"C'mon Cat, we have a job to do."
She rose and walked out to the launch bay for the semi-solitude of her Serco Vulture Guardian.
###
The bright pink Centurion Rev C flew close to the debris that was the only remains of a Behemoth heavy class transport and stopped in relation to it. A thin laser beam emanated from the lens that was installed under the cockpit and hit one of the barcodes, reading it before skipping to the next. Some four hundred metres away another Rev C, this one neon blue, flew overwatch.
"Says here it belongs to a voy out of Daltas hold Retract. But we have no recordings of any CLM pirate taking it out so it must be a freelancer."
"You are probably right Azumi. But why did he or they leave the cargo? And why did he kill the crew?"
"Don't know. My scanners show that the event happened about a day ago, we can jump out and intercept the radio event?"
"Good call, we need to figure out who this is. Lets go"
Azumi tore through the debris with little regard to the remains of the crew of the transports; they were dead after all. At a safe distance away from the debris she engaged the jump engine and tore through reality to a place in deep space a light day away. Retractile arrived seconds later and together they boosted towards the location of the slaughter, their radios scanning the full spectrum. Eventually they intercepted the signals and stopped to make some sense of it. Azumi listened to the screams of the traders with little or no emotion, she had heard it thousands of times before. It was only the last sentence that made her uncomfortable, the message sent with such hatred and despair that the small hair on the back of her arms stood up.
"I cut them Janice, I cut them good."
The message was followed by the random cracklings of space.
"That is one sick cookie Az. We need to find him."
"I was kinda afraid you would say that. Let us get back to HQ with our findings first."
The two Rev C's jumped out again for the safety of CLM HQ.
