Penny

Star Crossed: The Duke's Rebellion

Rene lowered his rifle with considerable relief, returning it to the attachment point on his chestplate so it hung muzzle down across his body at patrol rest. Everything they had seen of the man suggested he was clever and careful, and now they were beyond the moment of initial confrontation he would likely realize that his only real option was to go along with his new situation.

"...spacer...able spacer... Savachev..." came a whispered croak from the injured woman. All eyes turned towards her as she moaned feebly, her eyes fluttering open. She was in her mid thirties and had the muscular frame that one often saw on people who worked out to avoid the loss of muscle mass that accompanied extended periods in space. Her hair was dark, cut short in regulation fashion and, like the rest of her body covered in sweat.

"Sir... regret to..." the effort of speaking seemed to be almost more than she could bear and the hazed unfocused look of her eyes spoke to the delirium the infected burns had induced. Rene glanced into the corner to see an improvised waste bin filled with pieces of surgical cloth that had been used to wipe away pus and sera. Bouradine had expended the meager supply of antibiotics in his pods first aid kit, but the kit was only really intended for treating cuts and scrapes, not second degree burns. Several half spent doses of painkillers suggested that Bouradine had been rationing the pain killers in an attempt to keep the spacer comfortable as long as he could. That wouldn't have been much longer, but the delerium might have taken some of the pain away. The sap he was using appeared to be some kind of local antibiotic, but there was no way to deliever it to an infection that had already penetrated the tissues.

"Sir... report the loss off..." Savachev continued her breathing growing more labored. Rene stepped to the womans side, laying a hand on her shoulder.

"Save your energy spacer, you can tell me all about it once we get you patched up," he told her in what he hoped was confident tone.

"If you move her, she might die," Bouradine objected, concern for the injured woman overwhelming his fear of his current situation. That spoke well of him in Rene's mind. A few pieces of the puzzle began to click into his head. Bouradine had arrived in orbit, probably with the intention of going to ground and waiting to be picked up by another trader or smuggler, only when he arrived in orbit he had picked up the distress beacon from the navy pod and put down beside it to try to help. That certainly banished any lingering thoughts of kidnapping as there was no need for him to put himself at risk.

"If we don't move her, she dies for sure," Rene responded, lifting his hand as Savachev lapsed into unconsciousness once more. Thanks to Ten's not entirely selfless generosity, the freighters medical suite was well stocked, and if they could get Savachev there in one piece she would live, the problem was that she ran a real risk of going into shock while she was being carried. In some regards it might be easier just to bring the Bonaventure here but the walking back and then flying here simply added time to that which it would take to carry the stricken spacer. Rene pondered several unsatisfactory choices in his mind, and then a rumble of thunder outside made the choice for him. Beyond the shelter of the pod, black clouds were gathering with ominous speed, seeming to spiral together almost like smoke. There was another peel of thunder and then heavy rain began to fall, first in a patter and then in an increasing downpour.

"We can't move her in the rain," Rene stated, "We need to bring the ship here asap." There were several things wrong with this plan too, but none of them could be helped.

"Yarue, head back to the ship and bring it here, as close as you can comfortably get," he directed. The Syshin blinked in consternation.

"I have had only a few lessons Si... Rene," he began correcting his use of the formal title to which Rene had no legal claim in any case, "I don't think I can fly the Bonaventure, perhaps Lady Solae..."

"We need her to retrieve Bel'sian, none of the rest of us can understand Kalderi," he interjected. Technically Bouradine could, or at least Rene presumed so, but although his misgivings about the trader were easing, he wasn't about to put anyone in a situation where they had to rely on his translations.

"There is a ground effect mode you can use, Mia will be able to help you, it is much simpler than lifting and landing the way we do when we go to orbit," he explained. That was stretching the truth a little, it was much simpler than a powered decent, but it would be no picnic in the rain. With Mia's help though, it should be possible.

"Get going," he ordered and the Syshin gave Solae a startled look before turning and vanishing into the rain which by now was an opaque grey sheet. Rene unslung his rifle and set it aside and began to peel of his armor.

"The armor has integral first aid gear," Rene explained as he cracked open the breastplate and wiggled out of it. The first aide suite was emergency field medicine, little more than hemostatic drugs, but it also contained adrenaline and antibiotic systems, designed to keep a soldier functional during what would be a crash for an unaided human.

"Bouradine, give her what is left of the pain meds if you will, strapping this on her with her burns won't be fun," he directed the trader. Rene's confidence seemed to infuse the man and he stepped quickly to the drug injectors and began to combine the doses. As soon as it was done he knelt and thrust the injector into a vein on the spacers left arm, dispensing the entire dose with a hiss of air.

Cinnabar Forever! (RCN)

The system was surprisingly busy, with two dozen or more small craft operating in a relatively tight space. Sabatine narrowed the plot position indicator and located the tramp freighter. Its high drive had cut off, an easy thing for sensors to register given the noisy electromagnetic signature of matter/antimatter annihilation. She frowned, that was an odd action so far from any obvious landing zone. The frieghters transponder identified her as the Brother Kamal, without a logged home port.

"Sir, I think the Kamal is about to enter the matrix," she reported a second before the ripple reported on the sensors and the ship vanished into the infinite bubble universes that surrounded the sidereal.

"Velocity at time of exit was too low for them to be going anywhere," Sabatine continued. Velocity could be multiplied by taking advantage of different constants of mass and energy, but you needed to have something to multiply to make the effort worth while.

"A local tramp spooked by the arrival of a warship, nothing more," Captain Micha replied. They were speaking over the command channel, a necessity given the noise of a warship under high drive acceleration, but she hadn't been aware Micha was monitoring the conversation though she shouldn't have been surpised.

"No flight plan sir," Sabatine reported her voice not quite a challenge but definitely disagreeing. Micha snorted.

"Please Lieutenant, this is the sticks, its a wonder anyone files anything at all," the captain replied.

"Aye sir, but he spotted us within second of our emerging from the matrix, pretty good sensor watch for a backwoods freighter," she countered.

"Probably just spooked because of the reports of pirate activity," Micha responded with a trace of asperity in his voice. That was a possibility of course, though it had been the only ship to react in such a fashion to their arrival. Sabatine let it go, in all likelyhood the ship would emerge from the matrix in the next few minutes a little abashed but better safe than sorry.

"Yes Sir," Sabatine responded with a shrug. Perhaps the captain was right, but there was something about the situation that sat poorly with her. She fought down a grin, maybe she was just as eager for action as Ottis was.

Cinnabar Forever! (RCN)

5 Days Later...

"Extracting," Sabatine reported, wincing for a moment as the inside of her eyelids were stretched over her entire head. The RCS Viceroy slid into the sidereal universe after its four day voyage. Sensors reported they were within a light second of the Bromley Belt, which was a damn fine piece of astrogation on Micha's part. Sabatine rubbed her eyes as she reviewed the sensor returns. Bromley was a minor mining system in the Raleigh Stars notable only for the iridium it produced. Iridium was an ultra dense ultra heat resistant metal which served for, among other things, the high drive thruster linings of starships. It was rare enough that its refining was profitable though in this case unpleasant. Bromley was a moon of a gas giant that rejoiced in the name of MXD-41. The giant's gravity had trapped an asteroid belt of unusual mineral wealth, which had lured humans to an otherwise unprofitable system. Bromley itself was an ice ball, its few settlements located around geothermal vents which sank deep into the worlds core, small starships collected asteroids, or blasted them appart in orbit and then hauled the rocks back to Bromley where industrial smelters reduced the rock to the marketable ore. Often enough the miners were family operations, a few extended households operation a couple of leaky tubs and installing a refinery in a crater in the ice sheathed surface blasted by a meteor.

"Multiple contacts ma'am," Ottis piped up, following procedure even though all the officers were no doubt studding the sensor feeds now they were back in sidereal space. Following the incident at their last planetfall Ottis appeared to be making an effort to smarten up, or perhaps the training at the academy was finally kicking in. Perhaps to the realisation that his crew wasn't going to leave him hanging had improved his outlook. Sabatine glanced sideways to where Kaiden sat at his console, monitoring the ship. They had spent most of the past five days in each others company, she had been surprised that Micha had set him to the anchorwatch as well, given the Captain's usual attitude towards the aristocracy, but Kaiden hadn't complained or sulked, merely done his duty as effectively as he could. Things could still grow tense between them, particularly as they settled into their new roles, but she no longer felt the flare of anger when he walked into the room she initially had. Of course this made her all the more aware of the shame she felt for her own part in the aftermath of their break up. In some ways she missed the anger, it had at least been easy to categorize.

"Mostly tramps, five hundred tons or less, one heavy ore mule, two thousand ton Marie Delgado out of Cofkan's World," Sabatine reported. The called up the sailing directions on Cofkan's World and was unsurprised to discover it was a world in the Sack Cluster, a group of worlds in which the Alliance and Cinnabar had little interest. The third rate power of Novi Svirdlosk claimed loose sovereignty over it, but Sabatine would have been surprised if anyone on Cokfan's World had ever hear of Novi Svirdlosk.

"Any sign of the pirates that were reported Sir?" Ottis asked looking hopefully towards Kaiden. That was the nominal reason for their village, though in truth it was more to keep mobile and provide a difficult target for a sudden Alliance incursion, but Sabatine couldn't blame the boy for being eager at the chance for action.

Penny's Pencils

Cinnabar Forever! (RCN)

"No, wait!" Otis shouted, he had to pull himself physically from his superior officers grip before darting across the room to one of the men Kaiden had shot. He tore open the mans vest and pulled a small electronic device, a personal data unit from the thugs belt. Shouts sounded from one of the corridors and Sabatine raised her impeller and fired three rounds in the general direction, the shriek shattering masonry and a cloud of vaporised plaster filled the air, hopefully encouraging any would be reinforcements to consider their choices. Otis ran in a crouch his head down scuttling back passed the officers and stumbling towards the kitchen as Kaiden shoved him. Sabatine's opinion of Otis rose several notches. His ship handling might be crude and his astrogation might be little better than the standard computer solution but the RCN would always have a place for officers who could keep their heads when the shooting started.

"Time to go," Kaiden announced and Sabatine turned and ran back into the kitchen. Contrary to orders, several of the spacers were in the basement door, including Higgs who grabbed Otis and half guided half shoved him down the stairway. As soon as he saw Kaiden and Sabatine moving he turned back down the stairs.

"Clear the lock!" he shouted at the riggers below and the thunder of feet told Sabatine that the whole detachment had been in the stairway, ready to rush forward if needed, but the bosun's shout cleared the way as effectively as a plasma blast would have. Wary of fouling Kaiden Sabatine jumped up and let her momentum slider her along the stainless steel table like a skatter taking a high speed fall on ice. She slid of the end and broke her momentum by slapping her back against the wall beside the door, her impeller pointed back at the dining room. Kaiden arched an eyebrow but didn't delay to insist she should go first, simply running down the stairs with the surety of a man who has run companionways a thousand times before. Sabatine stepped through after him pulling the door closed. She thrust the barrel if the impeller through the locking bar as an improvised bolt and took the stairs two at a time to the guardroom below.

"Thank the Gods," Tilda breathed as Kaiden appeared. It turned out that a few of the spacers had hung back to keep the reporter out of the way as the XO had instructed and to guard the prisoners. That was good, not that Sabatine cared if Kaiden tossed the chit out on her nicely rounded ass, but she would certainly have been trampled in the rush at the stairway.

"Move out!" Kaiden ordered and they began to doubletime back down the access pipe two abreast. Colby, an engine wiper who had the sour look of a man who had been away from booze long enough to be resenting it, hauled one of the prisoners to his feet.

"Ma'am what do we do with these?" he asked. The question probably should have been directed at Kaiden but Colby wasn't the brigtest star in the firmament and his longer familiarity with Sabatine made her the obvious choice. Sabatine glanced at Kaiden who shrugged.

"Press'em," she ordered decisively. Colby laughed and hauled the prisoner to his feet, another spacer did the same with the other survivor. Impressment was a time honored tradition in the RCN, though normally the victims were merchant spacers rather than random thugs.

"I doubt any of these lot know an airlock from their asshole," Colby commented, not questioning the order but in nasty humor at what the RCN's newest recruits could look forward to over the next couple of days.

"Well that is why the Gods gave us Bosuns Colby," she agreed as the group got moving heading down the tunnel at a jog. And if the worst thing these thugs had to look forward to was being beaten half to death by Higgs while they learned the ropes, then that was better than the deserved.

"Besides," she said with a dark grin, "there is a war on."

--------

"Lieutenant Hickoring," Micha snarled through clenched teeth, "What in the name of the Gods possessed you to pull a stunt like this!" Kaiden and Sabatine were in Micha's day cabin. A small 8x8 foot space that adjoined the captains bunk. It was luxurious by the standards of a starship, which meant that any civilian would have thrown their hands up about living in such a tight space. They had made it back to the Vickie without further incident, and had dispatched Ottis to the medicomp for a full scan. Micha had not been pleased, both at their delayed return and at the fact that Sabatine had effectively circumvented his authority. For her own part Sabatine hadn't had a chance to clean up and was still covered with masonry dust, giving her utility uniform an odd leporous cast under the lights of the day cabin. The small hairs on her right hand had been burned away and there was a slight grey sheen of redeposited metal from the impeller slugs she had fired.

"No excuse sir!" Sabatine replied, her eyes fixed at a point just beyond Micha's right shoulder. It was the academy answer and Micha's grinding teeth were all but audible. He glared at her for a long moment.

"I don't hold you to blame Lieutenant Caladwarden, you are new to the ship and doubtless were unaware that I had told Miss Hickoring to let the local authorities handle it," he told Kaiden his voice holding a touch of deference to his aristocratic better even if his rank gave him power of Kaiden.

"Until I say otherwise you are on permanent anchor watch Hickoring, and be thankful that your gallivanting didn't cost us more than it has already." Sabatine wasn't sure what her 'gallivanting' had cost them, seeing they had Ottis back more or less in one piece and the wogs would know not to fuck with the RCN in future, but there didn't seem to be much advantage to asking.

"You sounded the recall sir?" she asked, glad to change the subject. Micha blinked as though surprised.

"Ah yes, there was an extraction on the fringes of the system that the customs boat picked up, the ship wasn't identified and we think it may have been an Alliance scout."

"I see sir," Sabatine said in a neutral voice. She didn't really, more than likely the extraction was merely a merchantman taking star sights and in an hour or so they would jump close enough to the world to approach on high drive. Even if it was, they were in a secure harbor protected by anti-ship batteries, there was hardly any cause to recall the spacers mid liberty.

"We will be lifting in two hours, we can't risk being caught on the ground if the Alliance has declared war," Micha concluded.

"Sir." Sabatine responded without inflection. That seemed to draw Micha's ire as his eyes blazed and he seemed on the verge of another outburst.

"You are dismissed Lieutenant," he snapped instead, and Sabatine turned on her heel and marched out of the room, leaving Kaiden alone with the Captain.

Star Crossed: The Duke's Rebellion

Rene watched through the binoculars for several minutes. Finally a man, clearly Bouradine from the video they had seen, emerged from the treeline in the direction of the ruins. In his arms were bundled several strange looking stalks of a greenish brown root of some kind. The trader walked over to the millitary pod and then knelt down and began to peel the root with a small powered knife, he held each length over a small plastic bucket, allowing sap to drip from the root into the bucket before vanishing into the escape pod. Of Bel'sian there was no sign.

"Well we might not get a better chance," Rene said turning to regard his companions. For a moment he struggled with how to proceed balancing different skillsets and temperaments.

"Rosaria, you are up front with me, Dasin and Yarue the two of you stay behind us and either side of Solae," Rene ordered. Rosaria smiled broadly, no doubt thinking that Rene's choice reflected confidence in her. Realistically he would rather have the girl running point beside him where she couldn't accidentally shoot him him in the back as keyed up as she was. Armed with the tranquilizer gun Solae had prepared, it wasn't going to be a problem if she accidentally shot Bouradine full of sedative and she was young and keyed up. That was the right type of person to have on point. Both of the Syshin were steadier by far, but their natural inclination would be not to shoot, which could be a problem if it really needed to be done. In some ways Solae would be a better choice for the lead, but if he put an Imperial Duchess on the point of an assault team a marine drill instructor would materialize from the ether and rip his intestines out on general principles.

"What are you smiling at?" Solae asked him with a cocked eyebrow. Rene forced the grin down with some difficutly.

"I was just thinking, that no class on small unit tactics I ever took involved deploying two Syshin, a teenage girl and a Sector Duchess," he admitted, feeling unexpectedly ebullient.

"Alright, lets go."

They moved across the open grassland in a loose diamond formation. Rene and Rosaria at the front with Solae at the rear. They didn't quite move at a run, Rene didn't want to outdistance his companions, but it was a brisk jog. He resisted the urge to tell them to spread out and maintain their distance. It was a natural tendency of all groups in dangerous situation to close ranks, that had probably been a good move on the ancient savannah of Old Earth, but it was less so in the age of automatic weapons. Still this was no time for him to be teaching fire and manuever techniques. Bouradine had not emerged from the pod by the time they reached the camp. It was clearly improvised, built from supply crates which must have been stuffed into Bouradine's original pod. A catalytic cooker and some fold out chairs sat in a loose circle beside a trio of solar powered refrigerator/condenser units which held food and water. The short grass had been flattened in tracks that showed where foot traffic tended to occur, mostly between the two pods and with a third track leading away towards the ruins. Rene guestured to Rosaria to stick close to him and unslung his rifle, brining the stock to his shoulder as he approached the door of the pod. He held up three fingers, tapped his hand three times and then stepped through the door, still a heart beat ahead of Rosaria who, at least, didn't jostle him as he made his entry.

Inside the pod he found Bouradine crouched over a woman in Imperial Navy fatigues, the legs had been cut away and burns disfigured the woman's lower body. The trader looked up at them in frozen surprise, he had a sponge in his hand which he had clearly been using to bathe the awful burns that leaked sera and smelled faintly of suppuration. Bouradine's eyes were wide and shocked to be suddenly confronted by a soldier in battledress and a jumpy looking girl.

"Don't move," Rene instructed, not razing his voice to emphasize the threat of the barrel of his plasma rifle. Bouradine had a pistol on his hip, but it clearly hadn't even occurred to him to draw it until Rene spoke. The spacer moaned deliriously, clearly too out of it either because of infection or whatever analgesics she was being dosed with. The trader began to tremble in fear and the sponge fell from his hand.

"Who...who," he stammered.

"I'm Colonel Quentain of the Imperial Marines," Rene said, raising his elbow to gesture to Rosaria without moving the bore of his rifle so much as an inch.

"This is Rosaria, and both of us would like it very much if you would put that pistol on the ground and then kick it over towards us."

The MECHnificent Seven(a mech Rp in the Lancer system)

Its an interesting mix of trad and story elements that is for sure.

The MECHnificent Seven(a mech Rp in the Lancer system)

Yeah that utopian antifacisim is just the worst!

Penny's Pencils

Dogs of War: Old World Mercenaries

"Well it couldn't happen to a nicer group," Emmaline muttered as they swung up into the saddles of the two most promising horses. Emmaline drew a sword from a saddle slung scabbard and slapped the rumps of the other mounts, sending them running back towards Delbertz. If any of Vandershute's men did survive, there was no point in making it easy to pursue them. Not, by the sound of the roaring troll, that survival seemed a likely outcome. Without further discussion they drove their heels into their already skittish mounts racing down the forest path away from the trolls and their grisly feast.

The sun was well sinking toward the horizon by the time the reached the town of Mittleweg. Located at a crossroad of the Middenheim road and the northern arm of the River Delb it was a prosperous looking place. With tall steeply pitched roofs and pallisade walls. Several river barges were pulled up at warves where goods were being loaded and unloaded by sweating stevedores. A broad belt of farmland surrounded the city proper keeping the towering Drakwald at bay. A temple to Ulric stood upon the small hill at the center of town, the wolfhead banners snapping in the autumn breeze. They had ridden their horses hard and the beasts were almost played out as they passed through the city gates. Emmaline's legs and bottom ached from the unaccustomed activity. For the hundredth time she swore she was going to sit down and have a long conversation with a certain carpet about its limited endurance. It was possible that Vandershute's thugs might pursue them, but by the time they found horses it would be dark and only a complete idiot would ride the Drakwald by night. Even if they did they would arrive to closed gates and have to search the city for the pair of them. A thankless task in the dead of night.

"I promise I shall keep my mouth shut about beastmen this time," Emmaline said as the trotted through the streets. At least this time she was properly dressed and not attracting undue attention.