Tales from the Inbox: Criminally Inconvenient Timing

2953-10-22 – Tales from the Inbox: Criminally Inconvenient Timing 

Eddy Rothbauer scanned the lightly populated Rennecker’s dining space. Mari Robertson ducked her head down as if reading something on her wristcuff in her lap, but it was no use; he noticed her in moments, waved, and headed for her corner booth. 

Cursing under her breath, Mari set down her sandwich and waved back tepidly. Eddy couldn’t avoid noticing something was up if he stayed long enough. Mari’s only hope was that he knew to keep his trap shut in front of his unfortunate choice in friends. 

“I thought I might find you here.” Eddy slid into the booth across from Mari, while the two figures in the brown cloaks remained standing, arms folded and heads down. “This lot’s hiring, and it’s going to be more than I can handle on my own. You want in?” 

Normally, of course, Mari would have leapt at the prospect of a high-budget, semi-official gig funded by the deep pockets of alien diplomats. Today, however, she wanted nothing more than to beg off. She opened her mouth to offer the first excuse that came to mind, but hesitated. Would denying such an offer be considered suspicious, when the investigation over the missing data-pack started? “I’d sure consider it, Eddy, but I don't really want to talk business while my food gets cold. Have them send over the terms and I’ll let you know by the end of the shift, okay?” 

“Sure, sure.” Eddy looked up to one of the robed figures, who nodded without looking up. “This is, uh. Time sensitive.” 

Mari took a bite of her sandwich to make hiding a scowl less noticeable. “It... usually is.” She pointedly spoke with her mouth full, to remind him that she was supposed to be eating. The ersatz beef in the sandwich tasted fine, but as usual, she found herself wishing it was the real thing. The added need to eat as casually as possible when she was on edge didn’t help the experience, of course. 

Eddy, overly observant oaf that he was, noticed right away that something wasn’t to Mari’s liking. “Something wrong?” He gestured to the food. 

“Eh.” Mari shrugged and set the sandwich down. What could she do to give Eddy the hint without raising suspicions from his new friends? “How uh. How time sensitive are we talking?” 

“I was hoping to have an answer already. These guys want something moving right away.” Eddy shrugged apologetically. “It’s all right if you’d rather not. I can probably get Orrie to -” 

Mari winced. Orrie was competent, but she was also Eddy’s recently separated ex, and she knew he hadn’t recovered from that mess. But how could she go right to work for the Glitters while she was still carrying something she’d lifted from them? She’d have to stash it. “Okay, fine. What’s the job?” 

“It’s, ah. Apparently pretty delicate.” Eddy glanced up at the two figures standing over them, “These guys have some... let’s call it grey-market business they’ve been doing, and their partners up and vanished with a lot of money. They want us to find out what happened, and to try to get anything back we can.” 

Mari ate as Eddy talked, trying to ignore the two figures and attend only to him. She nodded along, then let the silence hang in the air when he finished for several seconds. “And they need this done fast?” 

“By this time tomorrow, more or less.” 

Mari sighed. She couldn’t really be herself if she let this pass her by, especially if it meant sending Eddy back into the clutches of the woman who’d only recently jilted him. It wouldn’t pay as much as the datapack, but it would pay out far more quickly. “Can you give me half an hour? I’ll run some queries and meet you over at the Songbird.” 

Eddy glanced up at his associates, one of whom nodded imperceptibly. “Okay.” He slid out of the booth. “Thanks, Mari.” 

The two aliens followed Eddy out of Rennecker’s, and only when they were gone did Mari breathe a sigh of relief. Half an hour wasn’t much time, but she knew plenty of places on the station to drop something like a datapack where it would still be there the next day.  

The easiest, of course, was right where she was sitting. The benches used in Rennecker’s booth seating were hollow rectangles of extruded metal tubing with a thin veneer of textured wood-grain polymer applied for decoration. It was a matter of only a moment to slip the datapack out of her pocket once more and into the gap where the bench had been pushed against the subtly curved bulkhead at the back of the diner compartment. 

The little device made a clunking noise as it landed inside the bench, but nobody nearby paid this any mind. Mari breathed a sigh of relief, then turned her attention to the rest of her meal. If Eddy was right about the time pressure, it might be the better part of a full day before she had time to sit down and eat again. 

For the same reason Strand spacers are regarded as disreputable, they are also often sought out for particular tasks, for which their (on average) relative willingness to do jobs of questionable legality. This is at least as true on the Sprawl station as anywhere else, despite the vast distance between this location and the nearest part of the Silver Strand. 

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Tales from the Inbox: The Perfect Crime

2953-10-15 – Tales from the Inbox: The Perfect Crime 

Obviously, the position of this embed team and Cosmic Background generally is anti-crime; that is, if you are so stupid as to victimize your fellow sapients, there should be a penalty for these actions. 

That being said, crime and fraud has become a way of life in some systems, especially those of the Silver Strand region. Spacers who hail from the Strand are notorious for having checkered backgrounds, and those from elsewhere who ply those lanes for too long often pick up a similar reputation. Culturally, crime just seems to be seen as another way of life in that region, one that needs to be guarded against, but whose participants one can hardly blame. 

Obviously, this reputation makes Strand-native spacers rather unpopular in some circles, but so many of them have made their way to this side of the Gap looking for wealth or meaning that it has led to a number of interesting altercations on the Sprawl and other habitats. 

Mari Robertson crept into Rennecker’s Diner, passed her usual table, and slid into a corner booth at the back, near the kitchen doors. The Sprawl had become a big place in recent years, but today, it felt small, cramped, and intimate. Anywhere she went, she could run into someone, but going somewhere she normally avoided would be no better; it would be obvious for anyone actually looking for her that something was up. 

Normally, Mari summoned one of the wait-staff using the call button and asked about specials before ordering, but this time, she punched in an unassuming order for the chef’s “famous” prime “rib” sandwich. Real beef was of course not an ingredient in this dish; the meat was actually that of a fish-like creature from one of the colonial target worlds nearby, prepared to mostly resemble tender beef. The creature had taken well to growing in captivity, and nearly a square kilometer of Sprawl deck had been converted over to producing this ready source of protein for both locals and spacers. Mari didn’t particularly like it. She’d actually had real Earth beef once, and nothing really compared to it. It was better than meat-textured food-fab slurry, but only a little bit. 

Because it was one of the most commonly ordered items on the menu, one of the kitchen staff darted out with the food and a bottle of cheap synthetic beer barely three minutes after she’d ordered. It was still so hot she couldn’t eat right away, so she cracked open the beer and took a drink, eyeing the trickle of patrons in and out of Rennecker’s main entrance. Fortunately, it was the slump in the middle of a shift; less than a third of the seats were occupied, and those mainly by people hunched over slates, distractedly sipping coffee or nibbling at fried finger-food. 

When none of the staff were in view, Mari slipped a hand into her pocket and pulled out the datapack she’d lifted a few hours before, looking down at it. She’d sworn off pickpocketing years ago when she’d been on the run out of Cardona’s, but when an alien diplomat left a datapack unattended for so long, it was simply impossible to pass up.  

She didn’t try to access it. Most likely it was encrypted, and even if it wasn’t, it might have read-logging. No, there was no point trying to get the data until she was ready to destroy the original immediately. It was the only way to be sure the theft was untraceable. 

There was of course some possibility the security feeds had seen her brush against the bag which the xeno diplomat had so casually tossed the datapack into, but she knew how to make sure there’d be nothing concrete from any angle. As long as nobody caught her before she’d destroyed the original, she’d get away clean, but she also needed to avoid doing any suspicious computer activity for a few hours. That way, anyone else who did any bulk data copying would be the first suspects, while she was on the feeds going out for an unassuming lunch, drinking a beer, and generally doing nothing indicative of a big score. 

Acting casual was, of course, nerve-wracking, and any of her associates would be able to tell something was up if they talked to her too long.  

She’d considered taking her little runabout out for a run to one of the mining installations, but this too might draw suspicion. No, the best thing would be to brazenly go about her business, but to avoid her usual crowd. Most of them would understand, if they knew. 

Fortunately, the datapack itself was a standard unit, nearly identical to two others she owned. She could hold up one of those if at any point someone did have her on record holding a datapack shortly after the theft – as long as the questions didn’t reach her before she’d actually stashed or destroyed this one. 

The food finally cooled enough for Mari to start eating. As she raised the ersatz beef sandwich to her mouth, though, she hesitated. The trio who’d just entered Rennecker’s made her blood run cold. One of them was Eddy Rothbauer, a fellow fugitive from the Strand region who she’d done a lot of work with on the Sprawl. The other two were slim, elfin figures in brown cloaks and hoods. The long-boned hands that showed at the cuffs of those robes were a distinct golden color. If these weren’t the diplomats she’d just stolen from, they were more of the same kind. 

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Tales from the Inbox: Kel’s Undeniable Contract

2953-10-08 – Tales from the Inbox: Kel’s Undeniable Contract 

“Well.” Kell rubbed his claw-like hands together. “This is a marvelous business proposal. Do send over the particulars, and we will talk it over.” 

Kel stood, seeming to think this would make Commander Daseta return to Cour-de-Lion. After an awkward pause, though, Sadek Sherburn realized the woman in the black uniform had no intention of going anywhere without a decision – the right decision, by Sovereign standards. 

“The contract was sent over the moment I stepped aboard.” Daseta looked at each of them, but she seemed to let her gaze linger on Sadek the longest. “Take all the time you need to read it. The particulars can be... adjusted, if necessary, but I read everything myself. You will find it quite generous.” 

With that, she sauntered over to the far end of the lounge, where the compartment abutted Traveler's transparent outer hull. Only an inner layer of transparency-adjusting smart-glass added during the refit protected the crew from the heat and radiation of nearby stars; Kel’s people hadn’t seemed to think this feature necessary. The view she framed herself in was quite spectacular as ever, with the ruddy twin stars of the nameless star system on whose outskirts they drifted glowing in the center of the thready haze which showed the paths of two concentric asteroid rings. 

Sadek watched the Sovereign officer for a few moments while his human shipmates pulled up the contract on their wristcuff screens and Kel did likewise on his slate. She stood uncannily still, hands clasped behind her back, and her wispy mane of hairlike plumage cascading past her shoulder blades. Again, he wondered at the extensive surgeries required to make an alien look and move that human. How much had all that cost? What had she agreed to it for? Could it possibly have been worth it? Surely her own kind no longer looked at her as one of their own, but no human would ever regard her without some uncanny discomfort, no matter how attractive the surgeries had made her. 

Sadek glanced to the others, then gestured with his head to Daseta. They would obviously be uncomfortable talking over the contract while she was within earshot. Sadek, who had never been even a strong recreational reader, would be of little help parsing through a predatory Sovereign contract, or devising a plan of escaping it if Kel desired. 

Kel and Elliott Deadman looked back at him blankly, but Alicia Powers seemed to understand. She smiled slyly and nodded her head encouragingly.  

Sadek stood up and cleared his throat. “Commander Daseta, while my boss goes over the contract, would you like a tour of the ship?” 

Daseta spun on her heel. “Are you sure you wouldn’t rather read it for yourself?” 

“I trust my shipmates’ head for legal language more than my own.” Sadek shrugged. “It’s no trouble at all.” 

Daseta met Sadek’s eyes and smirked. She seemed almost to see through him and guess his intentions in that instant, but then she nodded and gestured toward the corridor. “Lead the way, Mr. Sherburn.” 

Sadek, wondering how inefficiently he could give a tour without the mercenary catching on, headed forward to the astrogation compartment. The view there was better than anywhere else except the bridge, though now it would be blocked in large part by the bulk of Cour-de-Lion alongside. It would also be the logical starting point for any tour of a ship whose compartment layout was vastly unintuitive to any human spacer. 

Daseta surveyed the compartment with a glance. “Very nice. I would have made this the bridge, on a ship like this.” She stepped into the center of its semicircular deck, which was sloped like half of a shallow bowl. 

“Auxiliary astrogation.” Sadek muttered, gesturing to the backup navcomputer console off to one side. “Kel says his people like to keep this space clear, but he never said why.” 

Daseta turned back toward Sadek. “He won't tell you because this is where the Iatarans put weapons. When they want them, anyway.” 

“Weapons?” Sadek frowned. “Inside the hull? How do you know that, anyway?” 

The red-skinned woman laughed. “Not much of a tech, I suppose. That’s all right. Truth is, we don’t know it for sure, but it’s obvious if you think about it a bit. Their hull material is almost totally transparent to visible light and some forms of radiation.” 

Sadek frowned. It took a moment for him to realize the implication of this. “They can mount their lasers inside the hull. Brilliant.” 

“Except it doesn’t protect them from return fire either.” Daseta shook her head. “Poor bastards, when they go to war, burning each other to cinders inside these hulls, then towing the glowing derelicts home for re-use.” 

Sadek, who hadn’t seen any warlike inclination of Kel or of the two or three others he’d met on their brief visit to Iataran space, shuddered at the notion of those glassy ships unpacking laser cannons from the cargo hold and setting them up on gimbals in every open space aboard. It would be a crude and inefficient way of waging large-scale war, but for sudden, sharp border squabbles between the mercantile factions that seemed to be the main power brokers of their society, it made perfect sense. 

Daseta, of course, didn’t fail to register the reaction. “Did you think dear Kel was as harmless as he prefers to let on?” She smiled coldly, and her broad mouth gave her face a momentarily shark-like aspect. "Or that the Iatarans were free of Incarnation control simply because they were too insignificant?” 

Sadek shrugged. “I never thought of it that way, Commander.” 

“That’s no surprise.” Daseta took a step towards Sadek. “What is a surprise is, what you were thinking about instead.” 

Sadek started at this, but then he shook his head and rolled his eyes. “With all due respect, you don’t know anything about what I’m thinking about.” He’d seen a few bargain-bin mentalists in his day; it was always part hyper-observation and part bluff, and it was almost a relief to find Sovereign officers trying to pull such simple tricks to put him off his guard. 

“I’ve seen your dossier. And it paints a pretty clear picture, if you know how to look.” Here she held up three fingers. “You knew Kel was more trouble than he let on, but here you are, even though you couldn’t see how.” She put one finger down. “You gave that little tech Deadman a chance, even over more experienced candidates.” The second finger dropped. “And you spent so much of my little presentation feeling sorry for me for no damned reason – yes, I could tell – that you haven’t even now realized we’re offering to make you lot rich, entirely legally and above board.” 

Sadek stared for a moment. “Feeling sorry for you?” Was that really what he had been doing? He supposed one could look at it that way. 

“The picture I get from your dossier is that you’re too conscientious for your own good, Mr. Sherburn.” Daseta held out her hands. “You do things because it’s good for other people, not because it’s good for you. Letting others get ahead before you put you on that hulk of a mining ship all those years, but it also got you in with Kel. My advice is: don’t change that.” 

Sadek coughed. “Did I ask for a psych eval? Commander Daseta, you just met me. I don’t need your advice.” 

Daseta smiled and ran one delicate, red-skinned hand through her hair. “Trust me; where we're going, you really do.” 

“If you say so.” Sadek turned away. “Wait. We?” 

Commander Daseta, according to Sadek’s account, was attached to Traveler’s crew more or less permanently. To my knowledge, she is still aboard now; at least, Sadek’s recent account of the circumstances of their falling in with Sovereign does not hint at her departure later. 

I have found this Daseta’s datasphere profile; she’s from an Atro’me enclave in the Herakles IV system and has academic credentials as a psychologist specializing in human-xeno social interactions. She seems to have worked for one of the passenger liner firms on screening mechanisms for both crew and prospective passengers before Sovereign hired her on. Why she has a military rank with them (Sovereign has parallel internal civilian and military hierarchies) is unclear.  

As with most Sovereign-affiliated spacers, her profile goes pretty dark after the date of her joining the company, but posts before that seem normal enough. 

[N.T.B. - Kel’s crew would be an interesting case study for someone with that specialization, though being part of the case study as a xeno on the crew rather spoils any research benefits.] 

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Tales from the Inbox: Kel’s Contribution

2953-10-01 – Tales from the Inbox: Kel’s Contribution 

The Blade Dancer, though produced in some numbers and shown off in many corporate press releases, has not made its combat debut, at least, not in public announcements. If its practical performance is anything like what Sovereign claims on paper, it may change the small craft warfare environment in this war considerably, assuming they can build enough of them. 

Kel hushed Sadek’s concerns before he could voice them, then keyed his comm. “Cour-de-Lion, we have been docked some minutes. Is there some difficulty?" 

Sadek could hear the clipped-tone response easily because the human-made earpiece did not fit well into his alien ear canal. “No difficulty, Traveler. Commander Daseta is en route to the airlock.” 

“Oh. I have not yet met this Daseta.” Kel made a hoarse, chirping noise. “Captain Lemont is otherwise occupied?” 

There was no response, at least not one Sadek could hear. He winced, then cleared his throat. “Something wrong, Boss?” 

“Oh... probably not.” Kel waved one three-fingered hand. “When I last spoke to my friend Lemont, he told me he was expecting a new command. I’d assumed this was his ship, and that he’d come down to see all I’ve been able to do with his help.” 

“I don’t think people who work for Sovereign are allowed to have friends.” Elliott Deadman shook his head. “They’re cutthroats, Boss. One of their top execs is literally a pirate who thought mercenary work would make more money. Probably right about it, too.” 

“Nonsense.” Kel made a throaty sound that was his best approximation of a chuckle. “They are professionals. They do business. They would hardly earn an official contract with your government otherwise.” 

The three human members of the crew exchanged a few nervous glances. Wherever Kel had gotten this vast confidence in the above-board nature of the Confederated government and military, it would be hard to cure him of it – if they got a chance. It was entirely possible Sovereign had arrived to throw Traveler‘s crew in a brig and put their own crew in charge of Traveler to suit their own business needs. They probably wouldn’t put four civilian spacers out an airlock outright, but only because covering it up while keeping the ship would be too expensive. 

A clanking sound like someone knocking on the airlock from the other side prevented the horrified silence from growing too long. Kel excitedly jabbed at a control on his wrist, and a moment later the airlock irised open. 

Cool, slightly higher pressure air from Cour de Lion billowed out around the lone black-clad figure standing in the short umbilical walkway, causing her wispy white hair to swirl around her face and shoulders like clouds around the summit of a mountain. Undeterred, the woman stepped across the threshold, her shiny boots clicking loudly on Traveler’s deck plating. With her left hand pushing the hair out of her eyes, she raised the other in a crisp salute. To Sadek’s surprise, that hand was blood-red, and the fingers slightly too long to be human. He’d never met an Atro’me before, but he knew immediately this was one. 

“Captain Kel.” The woman succeeded in pushing the bulk of her white hair out of her face, revealing piercing yellow eyes and features that were almost human, and distressingly beautiful. “I am glad to meet you at last. I have heard so much about you and your ship.”  

Sadek couldn’t help but stare. He’d heard of Atro’me going under the knife to appear more appealing to humans, but he’d never imagined such alterations could be so successful as this.  

Next to him, Deadman made a quiet noise, as if he’d almost spoken up but thought better of it at the last moment. 

Kel, barely humanoid as he was, was unfazed. Perhaps he didn’t even realize that she wasn’t human, or perhaps he didn’t care. “I presume you are Commander Daseta? You have some advantage over me, because I have heard nothing about you.” 

“Anazj-Haare Daseta.” The woman stepped forward and lowered her saluting hand in an offered handshake to Kel. As she did, her eyes flicked over the xeno’s shoulder and momentarily met Sadek’s. There was intent in the set of those vertical-slit pupils, but he couldn’t begin to guess what it was. “Captain Lemont sends his compliments, but corporate has assigned me to handle this matter going forward.” 

“What matter?” Kel took Daseta’s hand in his clawed fingers and shook it gently. “Is there some trouble?” 

“I will explain.” Daseta gestured into Traveler. “But we need not stand and talk here. I understand this ship has a lounge?” 

“Of course.” Kel nodded, his head bobbling at the end of his long, arched neck. “This way.” 

Sadek’s sense of danger had not been allayed by the mercenaries only sending one officer to talk with them, and that one obviously no physical threat. Daseta was a perfect distraction in case Sovereign meant to pull tricks, because the eye was so easily drawn to her. The alterations were more than her face – Sadek knew that Atro'me had quite different skeletal structure and musculature from humans, making it impossible for their females to have the curves of a healthy human woman. Even though her uniform was not cut to accentuate it, it was obvious Daseta had gotten this, too, altered. 

Idly, Sadek wondered what the surgeons had done with her chest. Atro’me, being loosely analogous to Earth’s avians or reptilians, lacked mammary tissue, but Daseta certainly had more than pectoral muscles underneath that uniform. Was that extra weight really worth carrying around everywhere? How much of her was a natural organism? Despite being unable to keep his eyes off her for long, he shuddered. A human who’d had that much work done would disgust him, but this was not a human, and it didn’t seem right to apply the same standard. Especially if the result was so easy on the eyes. 

A minute later, Kel had led Daseta and his little crew into the lounge. There was of course plenty of seating around the central holo-projector which got most of its use hosting strategy game contests between Deadman and Powers. Sadek and Kel had tried their hand at these games a few times, but the rules had proved far too complex to pick up easily. 

Daseta gestured for the crew to be seated, and waited with her hands folded behind her back until they were all comfortable. “Now, Captain Kel. It has-” 

“Please, just Kel.” Kel interrupted. 

Daseta smiled at him, as if to conceal annoyance at the interruption. “As you please. It has come to the attention of my superiors that your people have agreed to sell strike-scale hull systems to Confederated interests. Sovereign would like to become a partner in this business venture.” 

“Partner?” Alicia Powers raised one hand. “You mean, help us move and sell Iataran hulls?” 

“You are.” Daseta shook her head, and that wispy cloud of hair once again started floating in front of her face. “Sovereign would like to be the exclusive buyer, starting immediately with what you have in the hold right now.” 

“Exclusive buyer?” Kel made a strange noise in his throat. “You wish to be the distributor?” 

“No, of course not.” Daseta tossed her head. “We wouldn’t sell a single one.” She gestured to the projector in the floor. “May I?” 

Kel released the device to her control with a tap on his wrist. Daseta extended the screen on her wristcuff and flicked a symbol toward the projector. It came to life, displaying a familiar spacecraft schematic. 

“This is the Confederated Navy Puma.” Daseta gestured to the hologram. “Fast, powerful, agile. A proven design. Sovereign and other mercenaries can’t get them, not even for war purposes.” Daseta flicked the screen again, and a slightly smaller, sleeker craft replaced the Puma. “We buy cometing platforms like the Savitri Cutlass, but they just don’t have the same performance.” 

Another flick on her wrist screen exploded the craft on the display into a thousand component parts. “We have a license to build most of these parts. Why shouldn’t we put them together into a new package?” The components started coming back together in a new configuration. A few new ones, highlighted in bright green, appeared, and a few vanished into haze at the edge of the display. “The moment Captain Lamont sent his report about this ship up the chain, our engineers started working out what we could do with something like it.” 

The parts came together into a flattened ellipsoid shape, and a translucent shell surrounded them. The diagram was without labels, of course, but Sadek could tell just by looking at it that this was something highly unorthodox. Strike craft just didn’t look like that.  

“We call it the Blade Dancer.” Daseta smiled. “And with your help, it will give Sovereign a strike rig that will make the Puma obsolete.” 

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