Family Law 3: Secrets in the Stars (2 page)

After releasing a sample of their atmosphere in the hold the aliens duplicated it. They laid out trade goods and exchanged some items, both sides displaying divergent tastes and technologies. The biggest thing learned was that they were segmented invertebrates. With multiple eyes and manipulating tentacles around their mouths and face. Very unlike any race encountered before. They made no progress on translating the spoken language however.

When the
William
was returned to the Little Fleet and released the big alien didn't leave, staying and observing them. The locals, Badgers and another race they named Bills were sending four ships back with the Little Fleet to Derfhome and beyond. Their other races didn't have the resources to join in. At least not on this frontier and on short notice.

The
Murphy's Law
and the fast courier
Road Runner
were left behind to guard the frontier station against reprisals by the Biters, and secretly to obstruct the bureaucrats from the Badger and Bill home worlds from sending delegations after the fleet who might undo their arrangements.

When they left the Badger's frontier world, Far Away, to return home the giant ship of the strange caterpillar-like aliens followed and soon passed them. Jumping out ahead on the same bearing they were all following. Lee immediately predicted they would escort them all the way back. Others weren't so sure. Thor, however, had been so sure he had proposed a bet against it happening with Lee. In any case they had no way to ask and little say in the matter.

The journey out had been profitable and successful, only taking six months although they had been prepared to go much further. They intended to go back by a slightly different route. Starting back along the outer edge of the sixty degree cone opening toward home the aliens were likely ceding the Humans and their associated races. At some point along the approximate thirty degree divergence from their outbound course, they would angle back toward home. That might add another month or two to the trip by going home the roundabout route. It would be worth it if they found claims as rich as they had on the outbound trip.

Chapter 2

When the stars blinked and made a new pattern with the brighter target star straight ahead, Lee made a little hum of delight. Gordon let out a sigh of relief.

Brownie their navigator said, "Clear sky. No artificial noise. Our new friends seem to have synchronized with our clocks acceptably. None of them are out of position." He was all business and too busy with it to have any relief or wonder that they'd made it again safely.

"Any sign of our escort?" Gordon asked of the big ship.

"Not a thing. No drive signature straight ahead. Nothing on radar at the frequencies we've seen them use," Brownie said.

"Use the
Retribution
radar to ping the system hard. We'll transit the system slowly and give the ping time to come back to us before choosing a star on the other side. Take us on a bearing that will let us look behind this star too," Gordon instructed. The
Retribution
carried military grade radar with many more units in the array on its bigger hull. It could throw a lot more power than the smaller ships.

Nobody had anything to say for a bit, all of them watching the screen. Brownie quietly issued instructions to the other ships how they would move and sent the data set to them. The star out the front viewports was unremarkable. The ports darkened just enough to keep it from offending the eye but not enough you wanted to stare straight at it for long.

Unless the
High Hopes
was in orbit around a planet or much closer to other ships, the viewports were pretty useless. But they had yet to find a sentient building starships who wanted to sit in a sealed box depending on a screen which might fail for all their information about the outside universe. They had even identified viewports on the front of the Caterpillar's ship. They were unfortunately too dark to peer inside. Not for lack of trying.

To Lee's left Ha-bob-bob-brie sat looking even more alert than his usual hyper active self. The bridge was new to him still and he was keen to observe what everyone did and how they interacted. Lee felt good about him being there because she had suggested he be promoted to bridge crew. It was one of the few suggestions that touched on command she'd made to Gordon and probably the riskiest. She'd been relieved when he didn't reject it. She felt each such opinion or suggestion was still added to his mental files on whether Lee would ever qualify for command – at any age.

Ha-bob-bob-brie was a singleton. Their other three Hinth in the Little fleet were a family threesome. That was a breeding group and normal to their species. A male, a female and a nest sitter. They were uncomfortable discussing their biology, even more so than humans. The nest sitter did not stand watches. They regarded Ha-bob-bob-brie as insane to be able to live alone and were very uncomfortable around him. It seemed to amuse him. They were just as happy not to be on the same ship, serving over on the
Retribution
.

Lee had thought not assigning the sitter watch duty might be cultural bias more than biology, until she finally met them while orbiting Far Away, the Badger world. She didn't think that anymore. The nest sitter was a different color, much more drab and patterned, and the best Lee could describe it was scatterbrained. It was smart, but in a human it would be regarded as obsessive compulsive and manic compared to merely hyperactive. Yet the other two needed it to stay what they considered sane and would never have left it home to undertake a long voyage.

Lee had met Ha-bob-bob-brie long before she conceived the idea of the Little Fleet. They had stopped at Derfhome on the way back to Earth to register their claim on Providence. Before going down to visit Gordon's family and clan they’d docked at Derfhome station. Gordon took Lee to a spacer bar to fulfill the custom of a service to lost crew. Ha-bob-bob-brie was sitting in the bar drowning his own troubles in cheap vodka. He was the first Hinth Lee or Gordon had ever seen. They fact it was her mother and father lost touched him deeply when Lee made her toast. He shared his name and granted her to look at him directly, an uncommon honor.

Ha-bob-bob-brie walked the corridors now barefaced, indifferent to stranger's stares. An adaption the threesome still hadn't made fully. They still wore the traditional Hinth mask hanging on their chest, its inscriptions explaining who they were and how they occupied themselves – if you could read it. Lee had never seen Ha-bob-bob-brie with a mask. But then he was insane.

"The ping from the
Retribution
shows a very light asteroid belt out unusually far from the star," Brownie said. "We've seen a large enough arc of it to assume it goes all the way around. This whole system is light on planetary material. There is one small planet in close to the star we've found in the optical survey. A tentative small gas giant on the other side of the star that barely shows a disc from here. No artificial returns from fabricated reflectors."

On the voyage out they'd found simple corner reflectors in a couple systems, marking obvious mining claims because some had been worked. They didn't have the tech to date the reflectors, but they were ancient given the micro-meteor corrosion. Why the sites were abandoned and who had worked them was a mystery. Whoever they belonged to was obsessively neat. Thorough searches had yielded one screw-on cap as the single artifact.

"Nothing to stop for here. When you have enough lateral movement to see behind the star, please suggest a new target star on our approximate vector," Gordon ordered Brownie. "Thor, you have the comm until shift change. I'm going to go get a sandwich and attend to reports in my cabin. If anybody needs refreshment have the galley see to your needs."

"I have the comm," Thor acknowledged out loud. They didn't follow strict military discipline on the bridge or the command circuit tying in the department heads and other ships, but it wasn't full of idle chatter either. Once Gordon had needed to tell a fellow that cracking a joke once in awhile was fine if nothing critical was happening, but not while a serious discussion was taking place. That had been sufficient.

Chapter 3

A long slow burn across their entry vector revealed nothing surprising behind the star during the off shift. The radar had time for them to get returns from two thirds of the system and they'd see most of the rest on their run to jump. Everyone had a chance for hot meals and restful sleep that you couldn't do at higher acceleration. The Badgers were used to slightly less gravity so they boosted at point nine five G for them. The second shift crew retired to enjoy their off time and Gordon and his bridge crew came back on duty.

"Do you have a target star picked for our next jump, Brownie?" Gordon asked.

"Yes, there were three good candidates close to our intended route. I picked this one because it has an unusual spectrum and I'd like to see if it has a different planetary system too."

"Very good. Inform the other ships and send them your data set. You may alter our course and set acceleration to suit your planned jump when you please," Gordon said.

"Our oversized friend apparently whizzed right through, Lee," Thor said.

"Yes I noticed. I wonder if we can't develop sensors that could read the drive residues a ship leaves behind and reconstruct the line it took to leave the system?"

"Ask engineering," Gordon suggested. "I wouldn't mind having such a thing."

"Lee, you could buy back your bet with me if you'd rather not have it hanging over your head," Thor suggested.

"I wasn't thinking about it. I'm certainly not
concerned
," Lee said. "It wouldn't surprise me to see them again. How much of a discount were you going to offer me to settle my bet early?"

"Discount? Just the peace of mind from having it settled," Thor said.

"In your dreams!" Lee scoffed. "I'll offer you the same deal so
you
don't have to keep thinking about it."

"These Fargoers are a bad influence," Gordon declared. "I never knew before this trip how crazy they are about gambling on
anything
."

"You really think they could find us again after we transit this system?" Thor asked Lee. "I should ask you if you want to double down on the bet."

"Thor,
you
were the one who said at first that we shouldn't bet because I have so much more money than you it wouldn't matter to me if I lost. I admit I suggested five percent of our worth as a equitable bet. But do you really want to lose ten percent of everything you own over a bet? I could lose half and still have more than I could ever spend. I don't want to lose you as a friend over some stupid pointless bet."

"The little one is wise beyond her years," Ha-bob-bob-brie said from his seat. He said it so
seriously
.

Thor looked like he was going to say something in anger, calmed himself and looked at the alien. "Yeah, you're right. I don't suppose
you
want a piece of the action?"

"You do not want to bet with Hinth," Ha-bob-bob-brie warned Thor, waggling a single digit in a gesture he'd picked up from Humans. "In our society there has never been such a thing as what the Fargoers describe to me as a
friendly
bet. Before Humans came, long before there was even a world government on Hin, our regional rulers would bet each other
extravagantly
. The losing side might be a impoverished for a generation to pay it off – or simply decide going to war was cheaper. Betting has always been a form of aggression on Hin."

"Yeah, that's what we'd call a poor loser," Thor said. "I'll be sure to remember that story."

"The Derf have no tradition of gambling?" Ha-bob-bob-brie inquired.

"We are a tribal society. It wasn't common for individuals to use money until very recently. Money was exchanged between tribes. Copper was our most common money but often weighed and not coined. Trade was as often in other goods or food," Thor said. "About the only bets I heard as a child were for covering somebody's chores or ribald bets directed at somebody by a disgruntled suitor who still had a grudge. We did have a cub who would compulsively bet his desserts. He was skinny."

"And keeping everyone broke kept them under the Mothers' thumbs," Gordon added. "When I left the clan keep I had to walk to town and find work to get the first cash money I'd ever held, before I could go on to a bigger town."

"The Hinth also can be very controlling," Ha-bob-bob-brie admitted. "but even as a young child I had coins almost as soon as I could name them. Our close family has more control over you than the tribe or trade groups. They, or at least the nest sitter, often have your whole life planned out while you are still in the egg. If you let them."

"I never experienced that side of Human culture," Lee said. "I see similar things in Human videos though. Domineering parents who want to relive their childhood to better effect through their children, and mothers who manipulate their children with guilt. But who knows how much of it is true, and how much is dramatic license? When I lived briefly with my cousins on Earth it wasn't anything like the videos. But then I've recently seen a few videos set on space ships, and they are so ridiculous I thought it was deliberate comedy when it wasn't. We all seem similar in little ways, but the new folks in the big ships, I wonder if we will find any similarities? They seem so different."

"Well, Captain Fenton assured me they saw rank displayed in their actions. The one who seemed junior was physically shorter too. Now whether that is a mark of age or being of a different sex or even a sub-species is open to question. But that individual had fewer segments in the body. It would be interesting to see if it will add one and how," Gordon said.

"Entry burst!" Brownie interrupted, surprised. "A big one and deep in system." He read the raw numbers and let the computer work, everyone waiting for Brownie to read the solutions, casual conversation forgotten.

"They are crossing our nose on the far side of the star before we'll clear it. It doesn't appear they are slowing so they will exit before us. Emissions indicate they are our Caterpillar escort. They had to change vector completely in this system and then double back, or make a loop to reenter on this heading. That would require even better acceleration than what we've seen them do."