Birthright: Battle for the Confederation- Crusade Read online

  On Callidor, Commander Tash was at odds about a decision he’d made months ago. He had known that Ples Damar, Senator Dennix’s Priman handler, had been killed during the Senator’s escape attempt. They’d had high hopes for Dennix as a mouthpiece for cooperation with the Priman occupiers. In fact, when they realized Dennix was about to be rescued, they’d gone to great lengths to ensure Dennix made it off planet. By that time, they were convinced that Dennix would somehow end up trying to run the Confederation, and having him in their pocket was almost as good as having a fleet parked in orbit.

  However, things had changed. He’d assumed that, sooner or later, Dennix would contact them through the channels Damar had established. The Priman case officers had assured Commander Velk and all the Representatives at the time that Dennix needed guidance to make the leaps to power that they were going to encourage him to make, and that even if he ended up by himself, he would seek out new assistance.

  Instead, he had cemented his position at the head of the Governing Committee, the body responsible for running the Confederation. Tash could see all the possibilities open to him if he could just get Damar back under control. He seriously doubted the man would stand up to what Tash could offer, whether it was power and influence after the Primans eventually took over, or the accelerated destruction of the Confederation itself.

  He had ordered an agent sent to Delos to initiate contact with Dennix, and knew the woman would be there within twenty hours. Then it was just a matter of finding out what the Senator thought he could get away with, and reminding him who was really going to be calling the shots from now on.

  Chapter 7

  Senator Zek Dennix sat at his large, ornate desk, hunched in front of his monitor as he signed documents and made decisions only he was capable of making, at least in his eyes. The desk had formally belonged to the Chairperson of the Voting Committee, a large, revolving body made up of the many classes of Senators from all the Confederation worlds and major interests. Since Dennix had only recently helped reconstitute the Senate’s membership, there had yet to be a formal reinstatement of the members or rebuilding of the various committees and Cabinets. As a result, Dennix and his Governing Committee continued to coast under the radar, making the actual decisions. He felt that, as a result, the delicately carved desk, made of an ancient and incredibly tough wood, should be in his use.

  The problem of the day was the Talarans. He’d guessed that, since their government and economy had essentially evaporated, there would be nobody to question Confed’s holding of Carlor after its’ recapture from the Primans. That thought had been squashed earlier today, however, when he’d received another communiqué from a Talaran diplomat. Apparently the man had been stranded on a Talaran colony world with a moderate force of warships, and they’d fended off a low-powered Priman raid in the first hours of the Priman’s revised course through their space. Since then, this particular system had been central in trying to reorganize and rebuild the Talaran Collection, if not in reality then at least in spirit.

  The man had first congratulated Senator Dennix and the Confed Navy on freeing Carlor from the Priman captors, then asked about hammering out a timetable for getting some of his representatives on-planet to help organize. When Dennix had Mr. Shae send his reply stating that, for security reasons Confed was going to hold the planet, the man had called Dennix on it. He was most likely not perfectly suited to diplomacy, because he had very rapidly accused the Senator of empire building and demanded a timetable for return to Talaran rule.

  Today’s message had held more of the same, including mention of a petition to several interstellar organizations that monitored abuses of government action, both against their own citizens and others.

  If only the Talarans were as easy to deal with as the Enkarrans. Those that hadn’t been killed, captured, or fled to the other side of the galaxy were now dispersed throughout the Confed fleet, no more a concern than anything else in Zek Dennix’s day.

  The next morning, Loren woke up first and went to the overpriced hotel restaurant to grab some things to bring back upstairs for breakfast. When he returned, Halley and Web were seated together, poring over the computer terminal while talking softly to each other. Their closeness and obvious respect -more likely outright affection- for each other made Loren pause. He wondered if he’d ever get to have another moment like that with Cassie again. Something simple like sitting together and reading a news article, debating where to go for dinner, or their lighthearted game of picking out wildly inappropriate names for their future kids were things that he took for granted, and may never do again. He had gotten to the point where he put all his hopes into this single mission. He knew there were plenty of other Confed people doing similar research all over the place right now, but to him, this was the prize. This was the one that would pay off. He would see to it, and nobody had better try to stop him.

  “Breakfast is served,” he said with false cheer. He placed the bag of pastries and light breakfast sandwiches on the kitchenette table along with a tray containing three large cups of the local stim-caf.

  “So, how did your programs work?” Loren asked Halley as he took a sip from his cup.

  “Pretty well, actually,” she replied happily. “I’ve identified two bar/restaurant locations where the Primans seem to hang out. It looks like they’re officially sanctioned by the Primans, because they have a handful of sentries in the area, and there are often transports that drop off or pick up personnel from them. That’s good and bad. Good, because we’re guaranteed to find Primans, bad if something goes horribly wrong and we need to run for our lives.”

  “And a Fixer?” Loren prompted.

  “I’ve got that lined up, too,” she replied easily.

  Loren showed her a surprised face. “What, they advertise in the directories?”

  “Not entirely, though remember that many of them technically don’t ever commit illegal acts, they just help people that do such things go about their business. But in any case, Fixers have ways of being found, you just have to know the business to know where to look. That’s part of the process, as well. If you don’t know what you’re doing, you can’t be counted on to hold up your end of any bargains you might strike, and you’re not going to find one. Anyway, I looked for one that does business at one of the bars we are targeting. Now, if Garrett were here, we could probably ask him to vet the guy for us, but I don’t want to risk off-planet comms to call and ask, so I’ve set up a meet for myself at lunch.”

  “Not us?” asked Web.

  “No,” said Halley, “we don’t want to scare him off. I’ll tell him I have associates who are part of this, but one on one is the way to go for a first meet. Trust me, I’ve done this before.”

  Lunchtime at Gassy Gappo’s was crowded. Despite the oddball name, Gappo ran a shipshape operation. She had a decent menu, the place was clean, and the patrons, if a bit loud at times, behaved themselves. It was located in an open air plaza along with a handful of other restaurants, an electronics shop, and a few clothiers.

  Halley had gotten there early and staked out a table at the rear, so she could sit with her back to the wall. She knew how many steps it was to the front door and the kitchen, where a short hallway lead out to the service street behind the building. Despite the fact that it would be hard to explain if discovered, she carried an SSK in the waistband in the small of her back. She wouldn’t use it unless absolutely necessary, but she also believed in planning for everything.

  She noticed the Fixer enter the bar and stop by to talk briefly to the bartender, who pointed out Halley in the back. The man smiled, handed the barkeep a money chip, and headed back to meet her. So far he’d displayed good habits. Hopefully that would make him a reliable and useful contact.

  “Good afternoon,” he said as he walked up to the table. Halley stood up and extended her hand, which he shook. “I’m Cutter Sarn, though I suppose you know that already since you found my information,” he said good-naturedly. His profession was
not without obvious risk- you simply followed the rules, and most times everything went well enough. If not, the pistol in the shoulder rig and the holdout blaster on his ankle provided an extra shot of confidence.

  “Kira Malix,” Halley replied, recycling a false name she had given Garrett Drayven at their first meeting. “Can I get you anything? I’ve just called up the ordering menu,” she indicated the datapad she was holding, which was connected to the table with a decorative but incredible strong length of thin cable.

  “Just ate, actually, but a water would do nicely,” he replied. Halley typed in some items, set the pad down, and folded her hands on the tabletop.

  “So, Ms. Malix, you are interested in the services I can provide. I can help you accomplish almost anything, but the riskier or more illegal the task, the higher the fee, I’m afraid. What are you looking for?”

  “Well, I work for a shipping company that does business here, among other places of course. I get to travel all over the place setting up offices, contacts, not unlike what we’re doing right now, actually. This is pretty much a normal day for me, so far. However, I started finding odd invoices and records a few months back. It took a while to put it all together, but I started seeing a picture. We were getting shipments from planets that were taken over by the Primans shortly after those shipments left. Those shipments went all over the galaxy, mind you, but there were a half dozen major drops right here on Anderson. Now, that all stopped when the Primans took this planet as well, but if you sit back and look at the pattern, my company was shipping things here from planets that were about to be captured. Those shipments never left, so it’s all still here.”

  Cutter Sarn tried to put all this together. It seemed like this Ms. Malix had a good head on her shoulders. She had identified something that her company was probably paid very well to keep quiet: clients shipping away and hiding things they didn’t want the soon-to-be-invading Primans to take. Even for companies rich enough to have their own starships, it was impossible to move more than a small percentage of any planet-bound inventory. She appeared to have stumbled upon a very organized effort to smuggle and hide items the Primans might find valuable. Good for her. Now, her motives…

  “So what do you aim to do with this information,” he asked, “should we think of something who might value it?”

  “Sell it, of course,” she replied bluntly. “Look, I’m a realist here. My company is done. We’ve sold off half our physical assets, our cash on hand is gone, and we’ve laid off a third of our staff. The invasion has killed our interstellar shipping. Now, I know that overall the Primans seem to be leaving commerce alone, but the problem is most of our clients were government sponsored, and those convoys were always interdicted. Our clients stopped shipping, went out of business, or turned to smugglers and privateers who were ready and willing to operate in ways we couldn’t. I told you I was able to dig through many of our files? I found another one containing the termination letters for the rest of us. I only have a week left on the payroll, and they don’t plan on showering me with a generous severance package. Plus, those cargo shipments we’re talking about are from the clients that let my company die when they stopped doing business with us, so I have no reason to safeguard their information. That’s why I’m here, Mr. Sarn. I need to fund my retirement account.”

  It was a good argument, delivered with both anger and passion. It was actually a marvelous opportunity, as well. The items probably weren’t guarded, and the parties involved were almost a nonfactor anyway. Ms. Malix definitely had some good information. The problem was, who did she think would want it?

  “So, did you have any ideas what you want to do?” he asked neutrally. Generally, the less experienced people who sought him out had the more half-baked ideas on how they wanted to handle things, but it was always good to hear what they were thinking. “We could try to find some rival shipping companies, maybe competitors of the companies whose shipments are here?”

  Halley nodded thoughtfully, then did her level best to hide her smile as she dropped her bombshell. “I want to sell it to the Primans.”

  Cutter Sarn was glad he wasn’t taking a pull on his water, because he would have choked. That was the last thing he would have thought of. In fact, it was the last thing would have though of. Why the Primans? Wasn’t that just about the most dangerous of all her possible options? He had to hear her reasoning for this, so he asked.

  Halley, for her part, was amused at his response. Through her contact lenses, she could see his temperature rise, as well as his heart rate and several tension indicators. He was probably thinking involving the Primans was a bad idea. She subtracted a few points from his competency score; Garrett would have been all over this deal.

  “Actually, Mr. Sarn,” Halley continued calmly, “it makes perfect sense.” She held up her left hand and pointed to her fingers as she listed ideas. “First, they have a track record of not messing with noncombatants. Second, by all accounts they’ve been at least marginally fair and honorable in the contracts they’ve made in conquered territories, (she decided he didn’t need to hear about the rant from the traffic controller at the mining platform she’d talked to on the way into the system) and Third, I know exactly who would want this information.”

  She made him wait for it, staring at him with the fourth finger poised to flick upwards to join the rest.

  “Alright,” Cutter conceded, “I’ll bite. Who do you know wants this?”

  “They call themselves The Keepers.”

  Now Cutter really knew that this lady knew her stuff. The Keepers were a well guarded secret, as was their mandate. He knew this because he’d heard from other business partners that The Keepers were interested in exactly what Ms. Malix was talking about. Their goal was to acquire technology and information from captured powers and return to their own space to have it catalogued and inventoried. He’d just never had occasion to attempt such a sale before.

  “And how would you know about The Keepers, Ms. Malix?” Cutter asked. “They are a fairly well guarded secret.”

  “Obviously not, or you and I wouldn’t know about them,” she smiled in return. “Like I said, I do shipping and arrangements. During the Primans’ occupation, I’ve run across a handful of contractors and shippers who mentioned the name, though nobody knows exactly what their whole story is. I brought along a copy of some of the invoices from those shipments my company dropped here,” she slid a datachip across the table, which held some falsified shipping manifests that she’d doctored to look intriguing but not overly revealing, “so they could check it out. If they like it, I can go dig up more. But the clock’s ticking, Mr. Sarn. I only have one week of employment left, and since my job on Anderson is technically already done, I don’t know how much longer I will be here. I have an associate who could help if I’m called out, but I would think you’d prefer to deal with me. Time is of the essence. Can you get this done, right now?”

  She was so sincere, Sarn figured she must be desperate for the money. Or maybe retribution. Either one could be a powerful motivator. “My fee is thirty percent of their offer, which covers meetings, introductions, and the rest of the legwork. Bribes or expenses are usually billed back to you, but it doesn’t seem like this will require much of that.”

  “Good,” she replied. “How soon can you get this set up?”

  Sarn pondered this for a minute, then rapidly built a timeline in his head. “I think I can meet with the right party for you tonight. I will call you in the morning. They’ll want you to be there personally at the meet, of course. By the way,” he asked off handedly, just to see what she said in reply, “you never mentioned your company’s name.”

  “Of course I didn’t,” she replied reasonably. “Otherwise you wouldn’t need me anymore. In addition, the company didn’t store those pallets under their own name locally, so trying to track it simply by looking at arrivals and transfers won’t help either. They were good at what they did, before everything went down the toilet. My local com
m is in the notes section of that datachip. Please hurry.”

  Sarn took this as his cue to leave, so he got up, as did Halley to see him off. She seated herself again after he’d left and started building her profile of him. All signs pointed to him being reliable, at least until after their first meet. Some things about him would make her wary in the long run, but since there wouldn’t be a long run, there was no need for concern.

  Krenis Terek, Data Procurement Technician, settled down onto the seat at the bar in Gassy Gappo’s. The Priman was there with his shipmates, though at the moment they were absorbed in trying to learn some sort of local bar game that involved throwing sharpened darts at a board on the wall. The wall bore the pinprick holes of many incorrect attempts, but they were a persistent bunch. He was the thinker of their group, and while he considered himself a bit of a loner, they all accepted him and considered each other a family. Technically, they were; having grown up in the same Sector of their mothership together, they had spent their entire lives in each other’s company, including their official induction into military service. The five others had been disappointed at first when they’d learned that they would be assigned to crew a Keeper ship, but Krenis had been overjoyed.

  Unlike some of his people who were downright fundamentalist about the religious angle of their occupation, Krenis didn’t see it that way. He saw people who had evolved, grown, albeit with help from his own people, but their reluctance to submit to Priman authority was understandable, if misguided. They had no idea how organized and rewarding life could be. He truly enjoyed traveling the conquered domains, searching out anything that could give him and his people insight into how the inhabitants of this galaxy worked and thought. They were really not that different than Primans, if a bit wilder and reckless. Still, sooner or later they’d see the sense in joining willingly. If not, he had plenty of brothers and sisters who would try to convince them of the error of their ways.