This is a story that had been forming in my head for at least couple of years. Finally having few hours of free time I managed to write it down.
Usually the books and movies are about extraordinary people. I have played with idea of writing a story about a character that is totally opposite of how a hero should be. I hope you will enjoy reading my experiment.
When Khaak make their appearance, the Argon Federation Navy is stretched thin trying to provide protection from Khaak raids happening all over the Federation territory. At same time the Navy is acting as the deterrent against those that would take advantage over the Federation’s momentary weakness. On the top of that, nobody knows what the Terran intentions are.
Having no other option, Argon Navy decides to call in the last reserves. One of those that are called in is Paul Olhand, a capable trader and talented smuggler but not much of a soldier and even less a patriot…
Story is set in X-Universe, just after X3: Reunion ends. I have slightly departed from canon regarding the game’s weapon systems (in my story they act more like today’s weapon systems or are more advanced). Not that an average reader would notice this.
Honor among the Thieves
Metal Beauty was everything else than an esthetically pleasing ship. Of the original red color only few patches remained and its hull was marked by numerous scorch marks and dents from many close calls. Small gaping holes and pieces of melted metal evenly spaced over the entire hull witnessed about the fact that her owner often did deals in pirate infested sectors. Protruding wires and evidence of many hasty patching of the hull were everywhere. Inside the ship the situation was even worse. The stench of many sweating individuals and just as many long forgotten unpleasant smelling cargoes mixed together in the warm and unventilated air. The floors had thick layers of dirt and dust, while walls had evidence of rust. If one was not careful and watched his or hers step, one could easily fall through holes in the floor. Maddening, never ending, buzz of misaligned shielding field projectors was present all over the ship.
Many spacers would also easily agree to the fact that technically the “Metal Beauty” was just as appealing as her looks suggested. The photon cannons that Split installed in any ships that had the power plant to power them, had been removed and the cannon turret was replaced with a false tube that was supposed to fool pirates. Many former crews, of those that were still alive, could testify that the false tube fooled nobody. The three main engines that provided huge acceleration in theory, making the Elephant the fastest ship in its class, were at most 70 to 80 percent efficient - on good days… Original sensor and analyzing software had fallen in disrepair and it had been jazuras since the last time missile banks’ reloading system had worked properly. The command and control systems were non existent – the command network that allowed the ship to be controlled from the single command computer on the bridge was long gone and her captain had to use the com system to control systems onboard the ship as they did in humanity’s childhood. All in all, it was a miracle that “Metal Beauty” was spaceworthy ship at all…
Many Argon captains would say that her captain and owner reflected the ship’s dubious appearance and performance. Of all the citizens of the Argon Federation, there was certainly no man or woman less willing to sacrifice themselves or their credits for Federation or for that matter any noble cause, than the skipper of the “Metal Beauty”. Paul Olhand had grown up in the so-called independent space and had neither any patriotic feelings nor any love towards the federation of human race. His only love and lust in this life were credits. Good old electronic credits.
Paul did many sacrifices in name of credits. He became citizen of the Federation he held in contempt because the sales taxes were lower for Federation citizens if one did deals in Argon space, which Paul frequently did. He even became part of Argon Militia reserve. Again – because of the even lower tax rates and subsidies many sectors gave militia members in starting their own business.
When Khaak attacked, Paul did not worry as many of Federation’s citizens did. Instead the hardships everyone expected the new war would bring, he saw the opportunities the Khaak war created. The military would be in need of freighters for their logistics and Paul with his contacts and his ownership of an Elephant TL would be the prime candidate for juiciest deals. However the things did not work out the way Paul planed…
One day, totally unexpected for Paul, he received a message telling him that he had the honor of being mobilized in the defense of the Federation and the Argon way of life. He did not even know what these words meant but as he read the rest of the message he understood the implications - the Federation had figured out that Paul would be a prime candidate as cannon fodder. As if that was not enough, his “Metal Beauty” was to be mobilized too. As an escort carrier, whatever that meant. Finally, to add salt to the injury, Federation’s sadists in the Recruitment Board had decided that Paul himself would turn over his TL at Light of Heart in order for his ship to be refitted to war duty.
This was not the way things supposed to work. Paul sent complaints to the Navy, War committee, Recruitment Board and just about every committee he could remember and all of them kept sending his messages back with sterner and sterner warnings of what would happen if he disobeyed. Seeing that his pleas for release from military duty were going nowhere, Paul changed his tactics asking for reassignment to the Boron border, a duty where he saw least risk for his posterior.
Finally, after twenty such messages the Navy figured out that Paul may be the most likely first deserter in coming Khaak war. Even more importantly to the Navy, he may also take his TL ship with him. Their eons old traditional reaction was to send a four member MP team onboard the “Metal Beauty” to ensure that Paul would take “the right choices”. Officially, Paul was told that four MPs were supposed to travel with him to Light of Heart system where their unit was stationed but Paul immediately realized why the MP soldiers were aboard. Paul may have easily escaped from MPs in the huge Elephant TL with its numerous escape hatches and loading bays. However, he couldn’t take his beloved “Metal Beauty” with him. And without “Metal Beauty” Paul had no way of feeding himself.
“When are we supposed to leave the sector, Captain Olhand?” asked Corporal Maria Kowalski, the commander of the military police group asked. The usually tight lipped woman was dark haired, had a bosom that bended the gravity and pair of green eyes that could melt asteroids. And she told Paul that she had boyfriend when he made the mandatory pass on her. Paul doubted that she spoke the truth but he had no intentions on pursuing a lost battle. Since MP group’s arrival, the corporal had been keeping guard on Paul with remaining three MP soldiers always being close by. Immediately from the start the Corporal Kowalski meddled in Paul’s affairs regarding the ship, ensuring, among other things, that he followed Navy’s rules for conduct. Which led to the present problem…
“Well, if we had slipped the flight control lady couple of gifts, we would have been sent on our way by now. However, since you insisted on following some r******* rules…”
“Navy regulations are not r*******,” Corporal Kowalski interrupted him, “and if you fail to follow them once enrolled into the Navy, you will find that Navy will deal with your indiscretions harshly”
“Couple of chocolate bars and once our flight leader gobbles them down and,” Paul snapped his fingers for effect, “we have priority and would be on our way. A chocolate bar is a gift. Hardly a bribe…”
“This is not the way Navy operates”
Paul snorted, “Yeah, I am sure the admirals never pull their rank…”
After that they were both silent, watching the passing ships. Their silence was interrupted by pair of heads poking in through door, one Argon and one Teladi.
“Skipper, why aren’t we flying?” the human asked, the ship’s current XO, sensor officer, navigator and every other role Paul decided to assign to the man.
“We are awaiting our turn Perry…”
“What!? Didn’t you slip couple of …hmmm…”gifts” to flight control personnel?”
“Oh, no,” Paul said with venom, pointing to the MP Corporal beside him, “that’s against the Navy regulations…”
Perry’s mouth dropped, “You kidding me!? Oh, that’s just great! Why don’t we join Goner cult since we are in idiocy mode today!?”
The Teladi mechanic, equally shocked by this unnatural behavior, just stammered one word - “P...Pervertsss!”
Paul pointedly looked at the corporal, pointing out once again to his crewmen, who in the room was really to blame for their situation.
The corporal just gave them all a frosty look, not deigning to respond.
Teladi repeated his statement, “Pervertsss,” and the two crewmen stormed out again. The swearing spread throughout the ship as ripples in water as the rest of the crew heard about the reason for delay. The three MPs in front of the door leading to the ship’s bridge checked their weapons nervously, sensing the crew’s desire for lynching them.
Next seven stazuras passed in hostile silence, with Paul swearing that entire Argon Prime’s population had decided to take a trip through the gate to the Home of Light system and that the flight control had been giving them all priority over his TL.
Two decks below, on the auxiliary bridge, the ship engineer Perry was having pretty much same thoughts as his captain. Every time when there was lull in ship traffic Perry hoped that the “Metal Beauty” would get the clearance to leave the Argon Prime. And every time his hopes were dashed. Scrolling the news feed about ships that went missing after Khaak raids, Perry began having second thoughts about signing up with Paul. Everyone in any of Prime’s watering holes frequented by spacers knew that Paul’s tax evasion scheme had finally backfired. The Metal Beauty and her captain were both enrolled in Sector Militia reserves, the Federation’s auxiliary navy. In peacetime, they were exempted from docking fees on public Trading Stations and paid lower taxes. Paul’s bad luck was that peace was over and now he and his ship were both on the way to Light of Heart sector. The outgoing merchant traffic from Light of Heart sector had been light since the Khaak attacks began and chances for finding new job on a ship from there were low. Paul had been forced to give triple wages just to maintain the minimal crew. Perry knew that Paul was even more furious about that than the fact that he was virtually prisoner onboard the ship. Even the dopeheads among the crew had figured out the real reason four the MP team to be here. Perry had been one of those crewmen that had been lured by high wages. According to the news feeds, the bets on him to live long enough to get payment for this job were stacked against him. He tried to console himself with fact that news feed had habit of preaching that end of universe “the very next Friday” every wozura…
The next moment intercom crackled, “Perry, fire her up! We got the damn clearance! Start the engines before the flight control changes their minds!”
“Yes, Sir! Firing her up,” Perry said, his right hand pushing already the commands on his computer. He didn’t bother with preflight check. Just so that rest of the crew would get the seriousness of their situation, Perry activated the master alarm. Engines started within few moments. The Teladi mechanic that everyone called Wozzy, had probably rigged the plasma engines for cold start. Good thinking, Perry thought with a grin on his face. He signaled the bridge that captain had control and leaned back.
Paul watched the sensors closely as the engines accelerated Metal Beauty to her assigned speed in an instant. He followed the assigned course carefully. He did not want the flight control to find any reason to withdraw his clearance just because he strayed to inches away from the assigned course.
“Slow down to 59 and then left turn to 98 degrees on my mark,” flight control instructed him.
“I got it.”
“Prepare for change in flight vector…Now!”
Paul changed his course as instructed.
“This is Flight Control to “Metal Beauty”. Shut down your engines. We got instructions from Argon One that you are to take aboard some Militia fighters and logistics materials.”
“What!? Flight control, we will have mutiny here if I have to wait for some farmer pilots that cannot even perform docking with moving object.” Paul didn’t add that it would be him that would be leading the mutiny. On his screen a sentence appeared, a message sent from someone in the crew, “claim communication problems Cap”. This excuse had been used by every skipper in eons past as solution to a multitude of problems. But with Navy MPs onboard there was no way Paul could use that method. The corporal was already resting her hand on her laspistol. Just to remind him of her role on the ship. So he growled an affirmative answer to the flight control and shut down his engines. He could distinctly hear the Teladi mechanic several levels below yelling out his not-so-flattering opinions about the entire human race.
In addition to the freight and the new passenger Paul was awaiting impatiently, his orders were changed. Because of deteriorating situation in the pirate sectors, instead of making direct run for Light of Heart system, the Metal Beauty was supposed to rendezvous with 203. Task Group in Danna’s Chance system, which was supposed to provide the security rest of the way.
Paul shook his head. The orders were probably made by some Navy desk jockey that never ventured out in space, Paul thought. Even a superficial glance on the navigational chart would told that fool that once the Metal Beauty reached Danna’s Chance the TL would have already have left the most dangerous part of the trip.
Well, nothing one could do about that, Paul thought, focusing instead on the slowly approaching group of Militia fighters led by a freighter.
The Navy freighter carrying twenty torpedoes and eighty two missiles of various types docked deftly with the TL under three mizuras. Not bad, Paul thought. With little luck, the delay would not be as long as he feared.
And then the twelve fighters managed to use almost entire stazura before they finally all succeeded to dock with Metal Beauty with many almost disasters during the docking. Paul was sure that twelve pilots were recruited to Sector Militia from Federation’s institutions for “citizens with special needs”. No one could be that bad at piloting. He wanted to voice his opinion to the MP Corporal when Perry’s voice came from the com, “Cap, one of them yokels wants to speak with you”
“Why?”
“No idea, really”
“OK, let him use the level four com”
Next moment a voice of very young man could be heard on the com, “Is this thing on…Oh…Sir, this is Reserve Ensign Tommy reporting, Sir! Sir, I and my unit are ready to serve the Argon Federation and to...”
Paul decided that Reserve Ensign Tommy had nothing important to say so he broke the connection. He might have been enlisted in the Navy but he was not part of the system yet – he had no intention of suffering fools before the Navy forced him into a uniform. Corporal Kowalski raised her brows but did not say anything.
On the level four a confused Reserve Ensign was fiddling with the intercom, “Hello? Hello? Is this thing working?...”
The trip through Home of Light system was uneventful and boring, most of the time lost waiting, once again, for the clearances to travel through the gate. Paul and rest of the crew ignored the new comers and the young militia pilots eventually stopped trying to make contact with the captain and his men. From what Paul saw they seemed to be the type of young men that had the typical glorified perception of the war that one could get from watching to many action h-films. Militia recruiters exploited this in their recruiting drives, doing nothing to dispel young men’s illusions. Apparently the training had been given didn’t do it either. But when the ship finally entered President’s End system, the realities of the war finally started to sink in for new comers.
The formerly busy system was now a ghost system with dozen of destroyed stations drifting together as the only reminder of how bustling with activity the system once was. Despite the fact that salvagers have removed anything that could be salvaged, the remains of the battle were everywhere – drifting pieces of metal from stations and ships, dangerous unexploded missiles drifting around after their chemical fuel supply emptied and sad remains of destroyed escape pods. The young recruits realized that most of the destroyed ships belonged to the milita and the AF Navy.
Few Boron corvettes were patrolling the system. Not that there was anything left to patrol and protect, Paul thought as he steered away the ship from the worst of the wreckage. He monitored sensor readings from the instruments that could pick up the small telltale el-fields. If the emissions were small and yet near enough to be picked up by the sensors, it was a good guess that the source was electronics in unexploded missiles’ warheads.
The ship’s crew and passengers were quiet as the ship passed through the dead system.
In Split Fire system a group of ships traveled in what would seem to an untrained eye the loose and disorganized formation, the type that was associated with untrained and undisciplined bands of pirates that usually roamed in the string of sectors from Hatikvah’s Faith to Farnham’s Legend. The impression was enhanced by the fact that the group flew wide variety of ships.
However, an observant Navy captain would quickly realize that the different ships augmented each other perfectly and that, unlike the typical pirates, this bunch kept their ships in top notch conditions. In the center of the group was an unusual ship for a Pirate clan – a Cobra class “superbomber”. The ship’s appearance had been heavily modified, going so far as to exchange modern ship plates with inferior materials. The typical sharp edged shapes, typical of Split designs, were made round and less protruding. Unless one knew what to look for, it would be very easy to assume that the ship was a TL superfreighter produced on some of the independent worlds.
Other predators in this lawless system gave the unknown ships wide berth.
The Split special detachment force “Kor’ta”, named so after its commanding battlemaster Kor’ta of the Family Njy advanced slowly towards the gate leading to Elena’s Fortune.
The sensor officers vigilantly observed ship traffic in the sector, especially of ships heading towards the Elena’s Fortune gate. Battlemaster Kor’ta stretched in his chair, massaging with his one hand the wound on his scalp that he had received on the knife training few wozuras ago. With his other hand he changed between the onboard camera views showing his crew. They preformed, as always, their duties flawlessly. Nevertheless, Kor’ta watched for any imperfection that could give him reason for punishment of a crewman. In Kor’ta’s opinion, ship crews needed to be reminded from time to time the consequences of a failure.
After searching for few mizuras, disappointedly he sighed, not finding anyone he could punish. Still, inside he felt proud. He had done good job weeding out the weak. The crew was well prepared for the task awaiting them.
Argon Federation, main rival of Split race and obstruction to Split ascendancy, was in dire straits. Challenged by the Paranid plots, beset by insurrections in several border systems, weakened in costly battles against Khaak, Argon Navy found itself spread too thin trying to fulfill its twin task of defend their sparsely populated systems and propping up the weak Boron Kingdom. Despite the problems Navy faced, politicians faced by an electorate demanding that the Federation remains first among the nations, embarked on a territorial expansion programs, colonizing empty systems and pushing the borders of the Federation. With Argon doctrine calling for fleets led by large battleships being screened by corvettes and frigates, created a time window before new ships were created, while at same time much of the fleet was supporting the colonization efforts, battling the Khaak or being refitted with new technologies. This time window, where many of the Federation systems were practically undefended, was a golden opportunity to Split.
Kor’ta task group was one of three groups covertly operating as pirates and being tasked with raiding the undefended Federal systems in an operation dubbed “Rage”. The ultimate goal was weakening of the Federation’s industrial base, trading routes and convincing the population that their government was not capable of defending them. Battlemaster Kor’ta had one more task. Onboard the missile frigate was 140 millions Credits, intended to be distributed among the pirate clans and various terrorist and separatist groups in the Federation. This was the capital needed for intelligence operation Bloodfeud, the mirror of the Rage operation. Kor’ta didn’t know details of the operation, his only knowledge being that he was supposed to bring the money to a smuggler base in Atreus Cloud system after Elena’s Fortune raid. He didn’t like the fact that the money operation “Rage” depended upon, was transported on a ship that, despite Kor’ta confidence that it wouldn’t happen, could be destroyed in coming battle. But that was not his concern so he focused his mind on intel reports about Elena’s Fortune.
Only 600 meters from the jumpgate, the sensors screamed with warning. Four hundred meters in front of the “Metal Beauty” a Khaak cluster jumped in and split apart into individual fighters.
Paul reacted quickly, his left hand activated the impact alarm and right hand opening a channel to Perry in engineering, “Give me full thrust, IDS off and brace for impact. Reinforce forward shields!!!”
Perry didn’t ask what the captain planed. Paul’s tactic of dealing with frontal attacking pirates was often the subject of the conversations in every spacers bar he had been in.
The gigantic ship lurched forward and everyone onboard lost their balance. The attacking Khaak were suddenly faced with 2500 tons of accelerating metal. There was no time to react. The Elephant went right through the swarm. Paul saw how the forward shield projector overloaded and failed and then hull breach alarm sounded. He opened the channel to the dock section where militia pilots were staying.
“Make yourself useful and deal with that leak!” he snarled.
The left and right high energy plasma thrower emplacements opened fire, taking out even more Khaak ships. The surviving raiders seemed paralyzed as Metal Beauty went by, not giving chase to the aggressive TL. Perhaps I have taken out their commander, Paul speculated. If Khaak had anything resembling a command system.
“Bold action,” Corporal Kowalski commented. The Boron task force had finally reacted, hurrying towards the remaining Khaak.
“Let us hope that next cluster would be just as dumb,” Paul responded, fully aware that he had been incredibly lucky. The shield projectors were old and frankly speaking simply too weak for the ship, barely stronger than those installed in previous generation of freighters. If there had been more physical mass out there, we would all be sucking vacuum now, Paul thought.
He commed the Teladi mechanic, “How is repair team working out, Wozzy?”
“We isssolated the damaged forward sssection and shield projector is online once again. Nothing more we could do before we get her to a shipyard. I would take this opportunity to tell you that thisss teladi have a cousin in ship repair businesssss…”
“Yeah, I am sure you do and that she charges a reasonable rate where only small percentage goes into your pockets… Anyway, it seems we got clear from Khaak this time, they are engaging the Boron task force. Make ready for jump, we are only mizuras away from the gate”
“Will do captain, Wozzy out.”
He opened channel to Perry in engineering, “Are engines still puffing?”
“Yeah, Cap” Perry answered, “The old lady is in good mood today. They are operating at 78 percent efficiency. Weapon energy power plant on the other hand…well, let us just says that you should hoist the white flag really quickly if we run into an unfriendly neighborhood”
Paul snorted, “Yeah, right. I am sure there is some Navy regulation about that. Fighting to death and everything”
“Yeah, I forgot about that, Cap. I am going to prepare escape pods then”
“Not bad idea, but do it after we leave Elena’s Fortune. That system at least hasn’t been hostile territory to federal registered ships after Federation snatched…” he looked over at MP officer beside him, “I mean liberated it from foul pirates”
“Ok, Cap” Perry acknowledged closing the channel.
Paul sat down on his chair, closed his eyes and listened to the computer counting down the seconds before the jump event.
* * *
Edits:
- Added poll to see whether people like this type of stories
- Added part 2
- For those that would like to read other stories I have written, I have added links to them below:
A Mecenary Affair - Story of mercenary pilot that tries to make her ends meet in a harsh X-Universe. The story is similar in style to the one you have already read above.
War Dogs - Dark war tale from X-Universe but this one is told from ground combat perspective.
My first short story "Last Trade Run" can also be found here (not that great reading to be honest).
The feedback is welcomed and appreciated, even a critical one.
Honor among the thieves - a short story by Warenwolf
Moderators: TheElf, Moderators for English X Forum
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Honor among the thieves - a short story by Warenwolf
Last edited by Warenwolf on Tue, 12. May 09, 23:06, edited 5 times in total.
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I am happy that you liked that. A year ago, I have written a story in similar venue, A Mercenary Affair - perhaps you'll like it too.
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- Joined: Wed, 13. Apr 05, 04:22
I have added part two of the story. It starts from the "The trip through Home of Light system was (...)" - so if you have already read through part one, just search in the text for the line above and you can start reading from there.
I am sorry about the formating of the text. Either there is a trick I haven't learned or (more likely) there are limitations in forum code but what looks alright on my main computer looks horrible on my laptop. I don't know how to fix that...
Anyway, part 3 (the last part) should be posted around Friday.
edit: I am sorry about the delay in posting the story. I loaned my laptop to a friend of mine and her three year old son managed to crack the screen. Since the story was written on the laptop...
Well, since I have no idea how long time a laptop repair takes, I cannot make any firm promises about when the full story will be released.
I am sorry about the formating of the text. Either there is a trick I haven't learned or (more likely) there are limitations in forum code but what looks alright on my main computer looks horrible on my laptop. I don't know how to fix that...
Anyway, part 3 (the last part) should be posted around Friday.
edit: I am sorry about the delay in posting the story. I loaned my laptop to a friend of mine and her three year old son managed to crack the screen. Since the story was written on the laptop...
Well, since I have no idea how long time a laptop repair takes, I cannot make any firm promises about when the full story will be released.