Alien Courage (Rise of the Empress) (67 page)

“Oh this is nothing like I imagined,” Cassy said
frustrated at having burnt the rice twice. “This galley is designed to prepare
food for some of the weirdest tastes in the Confederacy. I think we should
activate an android for this,” she added blowing her hair out of her eyes.

“I agree,” Peter said quickly, but I have an idea.
“The Administrator is clever with all sorts of things, especially electronics.”

“Oh I like that!” Cassy said with a mischievous grin.
“He owes me anyway. You ask him to see me then go busy yourself with something
else, OK?”

“You bet!” Peter said and hurried off to the Bridge.

A short time later the Administrator entered the
galley and looked at Cassy. “Peter said you needed my assistance with an
electronic machine. Is it was playing up or something?”

“Yes. I seem to have trouble understanding how to
relate the food in the canisters with the procedure of those,” she said
pointing to a bank of machines with over two rows of six doors each of
different sizes with separate cooking compartments with dials and levers, all
controlled by a central computer. “Could you please work out how to do this,”
she said sweetly and handed him a small hard plastic card with a recipe of game
bird with seasoned rice.

“I’ll see what I can do,” he said and scanned the card
and then the machines with his arm console and opened the file on the computer.
“There’s nothing wrong with either the electronics or the cookers. They are all
operational.”

“Oh, wonderful, would you please work out how to start
the recipe procedure. I just have to tend to Torquay. I’ll be back shortly,”
she said smiling and quickly left the galley. The Administrator stood there
open mouthed with a recipe card in his hand. He smiled as he realized why the
others had avoided the galley. ‘So you want seasoned rice hey? I can arrange
that,’ he thought as he rolled up his sleeves and got to work.

The galley was next to a master stateroom where they
all sat down to the Administrator’s prepared meal. He surprised them all with
the quality of the reconstituted food but they hesitated when he presented his
schedule of cooking and cleaning duties. He would not serve the second course
without their consent. They all agreed after their second glass of wine and
smelled the food. The Administrator chuckled to himself as he got their
agreement and presented them with data discs with their cooking schedules and
cleaning duties, ‘silly to leave the administration to me,’ he thought. ‘I
never lose in that department.’

They all relaxed in the stateroom and sipped sweet
liquors that previously none of them could afford or even consider drinking,
except Cassy who had previous access to such beverages. Toormis cleared his
throat and looked at each of them one by one. “I have decided a new course of
action which I feel is the only course which makes any sense with the resources
we have. It is dangerous but anything we do is dangerous but I will not sit
back and allow Irrimus or any other Confederate location to be bombed with
fusion bombs when there is something that I can do about it,” he said
seriously. The others all sat back silently in their seats and waited for him
to continue.

“With the help of Torquay deciphering the Smuggler’s
Almanac and the Trigeal schedule, I can modify the scanners to pick up
radioactive or nuclear materials. I intend to patrol the area of the Volen
smuggler’s route or the delivery point of the nuclear weapons, destroying them
using the Starfighter in the ship’s hold. I can do so at some distance from
Traveller so as not to endanger her. I’m sure we can work out a suitable base
point with which to launch such operations,” he said and looked at the
Administrator. “I know you wish to return to Norfis and I agreed to assist you
but Norfis won’t be available or probably won’t even exist if there is a war
between the Houses. Her resources will be stripped by the first House who needs
them, Trigeal blockade or not.”

The Administrator unfortunately understood this and
saw the sense of his words. He nodded agreement as he sipped his drink.

Toormis continued. “I have already discussed this with
Cassy and she is in agreement we must do what we can to avert a disaster which
affects everyone in the Confederacy. It is also fitting we have Traveller to
initiate such a response. Peter, all I ask of you is just be you. Your actions
to date have surprised us all, will you join us?”

Peter looked at his companions around the table one by
one. “It would be an honour to serve with you. The more I understand what these
Trigeals do the more I wish to stop them. I would however, like to return to
Zion when the opportunity presents itself with enough stores to continue
trading with those people. They rely on that trade for their existence. I feel
Irrimus has a responsibility to look after them and I would insist upon that.”

Cassy got up from her seat and moved over to Peter and
kissed him lightly on the cheek. “You are more than welcome to insist upon that
and I would like to welcome you as an Irrimus citizen. The people of Zion I
know would welcome you, they are all Irrimus citizens too.”

Peter felt a wave of strange emotion flow through him.
Toormis stood up and raised his glass, “To Peter of Irrimus.
A
quick death to good enemies!”
He said and drained his glass; both Cassy
and the Administrator stood and drank to Peter.

Peter looked up at them, and then stood up quickly,
snapped to attention and saluted in a fashion none of them had seen before
except for Toormis when the Old Warrior died on Zion. He raised his open right
hand and stiffly placed the finger tips at the corner of his right eye then
flashed his hand forward in a sharp chopping motion, letting his hand fall back
to his side.

The Administrator and Toormis knew instinctively what
any soldier does to show respect and loyalty. They both put their glasses down
and returned the salute in formal Confederate style. A tear of pride ran down
the cheek of Cassy as she witnessed a union of fighting men from different
parts of the galaxy united in a common cause.

They all sat down and Toormis refilled their glasses.
“OK, the first mission is one which must be done immediately. I have studied
the Smuggler’s Almanac and located the position of the Volen Earth land base.
There is probably more than one but this one is marked so it is safe to assume
it’s their trading point. It needs to be destroyed and possibly the Earth
facility which manufactures the weapons. Earth is in a fairly typical system
with one sun and a string of planets. It has one small moon which doesn’t
rotate and there is no atmosphere. We will hide Traveller in a good observation
point on its moon and I will launch the attacks with the Starfighter once we
assess the field situation.
Any questions?”
Toormis
said.

“Will Earth retaliate? They will not be happy getting
their bases blown up.” Cassy asked fearful of Toormis’s safety.

“Earth is well behind in space technology. That is why
it is so attractive to the Volen smugglers even though the Trigeals banned
trading or raiding there. I will need to assess the base once we get a look at
it. I should be able to destroy it from outside the atmosphere with any luck.
It should be a simple ground attack Cassy,” he said trying to reassure her.

“What about Trigeal defences?” Peter added, “You said
Earth raids were banned by the Trigeals. Surely they have some sort of
monitoring action to back up their laws.

“Good question. There’s nothing about that in the
Almanac that I could find which makes me conclude the smugglers have easy
access but we’ll just have to observe the planet and see what we see.” Toormis
said. “Also, Earth is similar in size to Ennack and rotates at approximately
the same speed. Their time frames are called days which are broken up in two
segments of twelve unlike ours which are in two groups of ten. Its inhabitants
are all descendants of former members of the Great Houses numbering about four
billion
souls
and speak a multitude of languages. Our
objective is simple and we will avoid all contact with any people from that
planet.” Toormis explained.

“How long until we get there?”
Peter asked.

“In hyper drive it won’t take long at all.”

“Oh, let’s hope we have Torquay awake by then,” Cassy
interjected.

“Yes. I hope he isn’t too affected and can talk to us
before we initiate actions against the target,” Toormis said.

They finished their meals and drinks and returned to
the Bridge. Toormis closely monitored the sector of space in which Earth was on
the extreme edge. The Administrator sat in the co pilot’s seat and ran scan
after scan in every frequency and every spectral range available to be run.
“There has definitely been space travel through this sector recently. I cannot
pin point who or exactly when but there are traces of exhausted fuel particles
and carbon dioxide,” the Administrator informed Toormis.

“Yes, I suspected that. I’m beginning to believe the
Smuggler’s Almanac,” Toormis replied. “Luckily there are no hyper drive
signatures which indicate Starfighter or Confederate military activity in the
recent past either. I have Earth on long range scans now. There is a large
amount of shortwave and high frequency transmissions emanating from that
planet. I’ll put the image up on the screen and the sound over the speakers.”

The image of Earth materialized on the main screen.
The blue green planet shone an iridescence hallow and the oceans and land
masses stood out.
“Cassy and Peter, report to the Bridge.”
Sound erupted from the speakers and as Toormis alternated the frequency the
sound changed from voices in strange unfamiliar languages to interference to
what must have been Earth music. Toormis set the frequency on a pleasant noise with
a fast beat being transmitted from the surface of Earth.

“Oh isn’t it a beautiful planet?” Cassy said entering
the Bridge, is that Earth?”

“Yes and so is the sound. I think it’s some sort of
entertainment frequency,” Toormis replied.

Peter stopped dead in his tracks when he entered the
Bridge and the Administrator stood up seeing him freeze at the entrance to the
Bridge. He slowly and casually walked over to Peter and asked quietly. “You
know that place, Peter?”

Peter didn’t reply but a smile curled at the edge of
his mouth. “I like the tune,” he said and he made a clicking noise with his
thumb and middle finger in time with the music.

“You seem to enjoy that,” Toormis said and looked at
Cassy who shook her head in amazement that anyone would consider that
entertainment!

Toormis suddenly shut the sound off as he read the
pulse reading on one of the instruments on his console. “That’s a standard
Confederate satellite pulse. Earth has a Confederate satellite in its orbit.
We’ll need to avoid that completely. I know this ship can hide from that pulse
but at close range it can read our electronic output. I would feel safer in a
Starfighter being around that thing.”

The Administrator returned to his seat and scanned the
pulse. “Yes and it has a number of relay probes in orbit. It can read
all of the
planet at once. You are right Toormis; it would
read the electronic signature of a vessel this size. Maybe we could approach
through an atmospheric disturbance such as a storm if we have to enter the
atmosphere,” the Administrator reported.

“We shouldn’t need to take Traveller into Earth’s
atmosphere. I’m checking on their moon. I’m getting a metallic reading from the
surface. There aren’t any satellites in orbit but the metallic signatures are
in a grid pattern. Probably automatic ground surveillance stations as there’s
no atmospheric interference, satellites aren’t required there.” Toormis said.

“Is it safe for us to go to their moon?” Cassy said
feeling worried.

“Yes, the moon is uninhabited and I can get us to its
surface undetected. It’s not a standard Confederate monitoring system there,
more likely Volen. They can use the moon as a staging platform for operations
without being seen by the Earth satellite or whatever Earth uses to tactically
monitor their atmosphere and immediate space. Even if Volen was aware of
another ship from the moon I doubt if they would respond unless they had a
particular operation in progress and in that case I would have picked up on
their activities by then anyway,” Toormis replied and saw that Cassy was
getting confused. “It’s OK Cassy I know what I’m doing. It’s this ship I must
hide as a priority from that satellite. If it recognizes this vessel we will
have trouble and I will not allow that to happen.”