4.1: Zeandin
The interesting point about Zeandin and its habitable planet Zeneel is that no humanoid lives there. Instead, due to its watery mass, only fish, whales and dolphins exist. The intelligent life upon the planet is therefore water influenced. However, it has not stopped The Council from setting up communications with the creatures. They agreed to maintain a trading base off planet, exempted from all taxes from all powers.
Therefore, perfect for a bank from the neighbouring star system Zeanlia, to move to, so it can avoid paying taxes to the Federation; but can still operate there as it continues to run normally, but having its head office and resources elsewhere. Anyone could read such planetary facts, about Zeneel from their schoolbooks, and it was of no interest to the would-be bank robbers, as they arrived via hyperspace, and managed to gather outside of Andrew’s Station.
The place was quiet, not much business was passing through this somewhat odd outpost which was not on any trading route. It was occasionally visited by large, slow safe craft, who could afford the Zeneel technology, that was developed and produced, with the assistance of The Council, in huge quantities.
This included, mind transference and reading devices as used by restaurants, robot controlled bars and hotels throughout the galaxy. Some of this technology has been used to track hyperspace jumps – this technology, the four had endeavoured to avoid, with their jump from Diso. Anyone with a ship with hyperspace facilities could purchase the application from any garage in the known galaxy, except from some rogue planets, whose authorities saw this as a prying device into their somewhat shady business dealings and had banned the sale and use of them.
‘Good, we have all made it,’ said Rackham, broadcasting on their pre-selected frequency generally reserved for rescue ships and deep-space traders. ‘No tracers detected on my system.’
‘Nor mine,’ said Avery.
‘Mine neither,’ said Bonny.
‘Just one,’ said Phillips.
‘Can you trace it?’ asked Rackham.
‘I’ll try . . . . It’s a Wild Cat NX. Looks like it has jumped some minutes after us, along the same coordinates. It should be appearing in our vicinity,’ as Phillips said the words, ‘about now,’ the craft appeared out of hyperspace. A few seconds later, it made contact with Andrew’s Station, in an attempt to dock.
‘Looks like a copycat trader; probably trying to sniff out a good trading route,’ said Avery.
‘Let’s hope so,’ said Rackham.
‘In any case, there are four of us and only one of them,’ added Bonny.
‘Okay everyone, let’s focus on the job in hand,’ rallied Rackham. ‘How long until the fleet arrives Phillips?’
‘Due to arrive, by my calculations, at midnight local time: we have thirty minutes.’
‘Okay, let’s take up positions behind the local moon, the one closest to the planet. Then, when I give the order, we attack. Two fighters each, we should be able to take out one fighter apiece without any fuss, if we use the element of surprise.’
The small party took up their positions, and waited; counting down the minutes that seemed like hours. Avery hated these situations, and decided the best way to fill the gap, was to make a hot cup of coffee: no good wasting time, he figured, and a coffee would keep him in optimum alertness for the coming action.
As he sat at his consul, with a hot, steaming cup of black coffee, sourced from the only place in the known universe it was available from, 1°4774. No one was quite sure where this system was, and The Coffee Company kept it as a secret, in case anyone tried to take over their operation. This was one place, which implemented the ban on the use of hyperspace detectors, and could only be accessed by another such place.
Therefore, rendering it impossible for it to be located. The company owned all traders; all staff lived, worked and died on the planet, or trading space station, comically called Aroma I.
As Avery was thinking about how he could find this elusive place, he was taken out of his meditation by the light and sounds of something big, coming out of a hyperspace jump. It was a similar sound to metal on metal, as if something large and cumbersome, was stretching space and time, and was doing it as subtly as a brick enters water.
‘Wow! Did you feel that?’ asked Bonny.
‘I think the whole planet did!’ replied Phillips.
Avery, gulped his coffee down, and waited for the order. The fighters accompanying the ship took another couple of minutes to arrive. There was no point attacking until they were all through hyperspace, as that would spoil their surprise tactic. As they did, Rackham gave the order:
‘Go, go, and go!’
They targeted a fighter each, with a guided missile, fired it so close, that there was no way the escorts could have take evasive action: all four took out their first targets.
‘Okay, pick your closest ship,’ ordered Rackham.
There was a dogfight on, from all four. The other escorts had clearly been alerted by the loss of their colleagues, and their backs were clearly up.
‘Watch your tail Avery,’ called Phillips across the channel.
‘I see him,’ said Bonny, firing off a volley of laser-fire, taking out Avery’s pursuer.
Phillips had managed to destroy two more, with his powerful military issue lasers.
‘Good shooting!’ said Rackham. ‘Four verses three: let’s finish them off.’
‘I’ve got one in my sights,’ said Phillips, ‘I can take this one myself.’ Phillips fired a military heat seeking missile, right into the back of the fighter. ‘Wahoo! This is far too easy!’
The final two fighters had made a dash for Andrew’s Station.
‘I’ll get them,’ said Bonny, as she took up the chase.
Avery felt the need to follow, but figured that Bonny would make a fix on one, fire and return. However, as he observed, Bonny had targeted one whilst the other peeled off, righted and came up behind her.
‘I’m going in!’ said Avery. ‘Watch your tail Bonny!’
‘I’ve got him in my sights!’ replied Bonny.
As Bonny fired off and took out the target, a volley of fire came from the pursuing fighter, taking a heavy toll on Bonny’s spacecraft.
By this time, Avery was in position, behind the offending fighter and had pummelled the craft before it exploded.
‘Come in Bonny . . . can you hear me? Come in!’ called Avery.
‘Yes I hear you Avery. I’m fine a bit of drive damage but nothing too serious.’ replied Bonny.
‘Do me a favour Bonny. Don’t go off like that again. Next time, there may not be anyone to take out predators.’
‘Okay Avery, I thought they were both on the run. I did not judge that right.’
‘You two save it for later, we have work to do,’ interrupted Rackham.
The freighter had continued towards the surface of Zeneel - hoping to slip into the atmosphere, whilst the pirates kept up their pursuit.
4.2: Bank Job
There was not much time to loose, before the freighter with its vast wealth entered the atmosphere, rendering hyperspace impossible. This was due to the restrictions programmed into all hyperspace devices, and the time required to turn such a huge vessel around, giving it the required thrust, would take hours: in which time the game would surely be up.
‘Move everyone! Avery and Bonny, take the starboard entry points. Phillips, follow me and take the larboard side. We have to stop this crate and back it up. All in?’
‘Following you,’ said Phillips.
‘On our way,’ said Bonny.
As the four ships docked at the entry points, the freighter tried to make a sharp tilt from one side to the other: but it was far too late. All ships had fixed themselves firmly, where fighter vessels would have docked to gain entry.
‘Meet me at the dock door Bonny, you’ll have to fight your way across the gantry to get alongside me,’ said Avery.
‘Avery? I’ve never fired at anyone at close range before, only from the safety of my own sh
ip. I don’t know if I can do this.’
‘Just imagine that they have your father hostage and if you don’t fight your way through them, they are going to torture and kill him.’
‘Alright I’ll do it, I have no choice do I?’
‘No,’ was Avery’s short but pointed answer.
Bonny took a deep breath and opened the entry door, which led to the gantry and found herself, confronted by a guard at the end of the passage. She fired her laser gun and shot him between the eyes. Moving along the passage to the gantry, Bonny came across another guard climbing up the steps, from the lower deck. He fired and hit the railings, which brought him to her attention. She raised her gun, fired it, hitting the rail on the stairs. Before Bonny could fire again, she was facing the man less than 10 feet from her. She backed up, raised her gun at the same time he did, Bonny fired off a fraction of a second before he could. It struck him on the shoulder sending him spinning around, falling down the staircase. She joined Avery, having a gun battle with two guards, which were standing in front of the entry to the control deck.
‘What took you so long?’ said Avery. ‘You take the one on the left I’ll take the one on the right!’
‘Two minutes to atmosphere entry,’ said an automated announcement.
Bonny and Avery appeared from behind the pillar, they had been hiding behind, and shot wildly at the two guards who returned fire. One guard fell, whilst the other put a hand up to the door entry scanner.
‘Come on let’s go!’ ordered Avery.
As the two ran, a sliding door started to close off the control deck; Avery squeezed through the shrinking gap, pulling Bonny through by her hand.
‘Everyone freeze,’ said Avery, as he and Bonny got to their feet. The guard dropped his gun. ‘I want full reverse thrust, and a new hyperspace coordinates set for the Sol System,’ said Avery as he flicked his gun towards the control hands.
‘Why that’s out of bounds to all ships!’ protested the smartly dressed man in red, who appeared to be the captain.
‘Just do it!’ said Bonny.
At that point, Avery heard a knocking on the door and the voices of Rackham and Phillips.
‘Let them in,’ said Avery.
Bonny moved to open the door. As she did, the ship’s captain went for a weapon in one of his pockets, and took a shot at the men as they entered.
‘That’s no sort of welcome,’ said Rackham, raising his weapon and discharging the laser charge, taking the captain clean off his feet and killing him before he hit the ground.
‘Who’s in charge now?’ said Avery.
A timid looking vice-captain raised his hand and said, ‘I guess it’s me.’
‘Right, round everyone up, and get them into the escape capsule as we no longer need your services,’ said Avery. ‘Reeves’, he said to Phillips, ‘escort the crew to the escape capsules, and see them on their way.’
‘Okay you lot, let’s get you off this vessel and safely back to normality,’ said the vice-captain as he initiated the evacuate ship message over the computerized system.
Phillips shoved the Vice-Captain with the point of his gun as they left. He followed them down to the escape capsules, and saw that they were all aboard before pressing the fire buttons, sending them down to the watery world of Zeneel.
‘Where are we at?’ said Rackham to Avery.
‘We are on full reverse thrust and the hyperspace drives have been set for Sol.’
‘Good work Avery - we got a little held up fighting off those guards.’
‘Well, the good news is, that we all made it in one piece,’ replied Avery.
‘How long until we can make hyperspace?’ asked Bonny.
‘The solar indicators state that we are warming up nicely, Charges at 50% and rising, estimates at around three minutes until ready to hyperspace,’ replied Avery, scanning the control panels. ‘Let’s hope no forces are going to attempt to retake this freighter from the space station, using hyperspace inhibitors,’ he said as he looked out of the windows towards Andrew’s Station.
‘There’s no police force stationed here,’ said Phillips as he returned through the now open doors of the control deck. ‘This is bounty-hunter territory. By the time anything could be organized, we will be far gone from here and Sol, before anyone can reach us, let alone launches an attack. Besides, no one would be mad enough to take on four seasoned fighters on their own.’
‘Alright, how near are we to hyperspace?’ asked Rackham.
‘75% and rising,’ replied Avery.
‘Check all sensors; I don’t want anyone to follow this crate to Sol, regardless of the restrictions,’ said Rackham.
‘85% and rising. . . Nothing out here but us.’ announced Avery.
‘Okay, here are the maps of the Sol System,’ said Rackham handing them out, then spread his over an existing interplanetary star chart in the control room. With a fat index finger, which had a large gold oversized ring on, he indicated the ship’s destination. ‘Here, this is planet Earth; currently under construction. Near to this Earth, is its only moon. I say we leave the ship there to avoid detection, after we have loaded on Earth, so that we can make a quick getaway.
‘My other idea was to put it on autopilot and fly it into the sun, but that would take too long, and would probably be detected by The Council: any questions?’
‘Can’t we just leave the ship on Earth, as it will take more time to transfer it to the moon?’ asked Avery.
‘Yes, why don’t we do that?’ said Phillips in support.
‘Okay, let’s vote. All those in favour of leaving the ship on Earth, raise your hands.’
Phillips and Avery’s hands went up, whilst Bonny’s hand slowly lifted, when she realized, that Avery was prompting her to do so.
‘I see.’ said Rackham gravely. ‘That’s that then, we will just have to take the risk of someone finding the vessel in the near future, rather than in a few hundred years.’
‘100% power, hyperspace initiated!’ announced Avery.
4.3: Sol System
The freighter arrived with an almighty boom, which would have awoken any human residing in the neighbourhood, but at present, there were none. Various indicator lights flashed on the control panels and from the speakers came an automated message in a female voice.
‘This is The Council of Intelligence; you have entered a restricted system. Please reset your course and do not return or face the wrath of The Council. I repeat: this is the. . .’
‘Can’t you switch that thing off?’ asked Rackham.
‘I can only turn the thing down!’ shouted Phillips.
‘That’s better,’ said Bonny.
‘Let us act fast, Phillips, head towards that blue and green planet over there, with the single moon.’ said Rackham.
‘Okay, coordinates set,’ replied Phillips. The vessel slowly began to turn right, lifted, and adjusted to lock Earth on its scanning equipment. ‘We should reach our destination, in about two hours.’
Meanwhile, in Andrew’s Station a bulletin had been put out across all channels, for a FF2,000,000/ID3,500,000 (Imperial Dollars)/EP1,000,000 (Empire Pounds) bounty for the capture/destruction of the raiding party, per infiltrator.
A certain Wild Cat, had just left the station, and picked-up the message as it investigated a large hyperspace trail, that took her interest.
‘Sol System!’ said Captain Reed, with a little concern, transferring her instruments to send, ‘Captain Reed in Wild Cat NX, requesting Council permission to enter Sol System in pursuit of rogue pilots.’
‘Permission requested,’ came back the automated male voice. Within seconds the reply came. ‘Permission granted. We have received intelligence from Diso, that one of the robbers is a well-known rogue, Captain Avery, and another could be the equally notorious, Captain Phillips. Proceed with caution. We must also ask you to sign this document on your screen, to say that you will allow us to wipe your memory, on your return, so you do not relate anything that you see there
to others.’
‘Agreed,’ said Reed, with a certain amount of scepticism, signing her name with a light pen.
‘Proceed,’ said the automated voice.
And in a flash of light, the Wild Cat had followed the freighter to the Sol System.
‘Where shall we land?’ Rackham asked himself and the others.
‘How about in the centre of that large island?’ replied Bonny.
‘No. Looks too hot there, no vegetation,’ replied Rackham.
‘What about that place further north, that large landmass? It looks milder, so easier to work there, just on that plateau, near those huge snow covered mountains.’ suggested Avery.
‘Looks as if there is probably life there, if anywhere,’ added Bonny.
‘Do you think this is a good idea?’ asked Phillips.
‘Nonsense, there are no life forms that can do us any harm, or report us to The Council,’ replied Rackham.
‘Whatever you say, but there maybe creatures as big as your ship. I’ve heard stories about the water planets, having some massive creatures living in their depths,’ returned Phillips.
‘You’ve been reading too many comic books!’ interrupted Avery.
‘We’re getting close, look there, it looks like smoke. Where is that coming from?’ asked Rackham.
‘It looks like a volcano,’ replied Bonny.
‘Are you thinking what I’m thinking?’ Avery asked Rackham.
‘What’s that?’ asked Phillips.
‘We fly this crate into the mouth of the volcano. What we do is this. . .’
The Wild Cat popped out of hyperspace, and the onboard computer system, analyzed the readings on her sensors.
‘Sol System. No information. Out of bounds,’ announced the computer in synthesized copy of Reed’s voice.
Where would they go? Reed thought to herself. She was, until recently, a reformed bounty hunter, and had spent her youth following her mother around various spaceports and space stations, all over the galaxy, learning her trade along the way. Her mother, had amassed a small fortune from her life of revenge killings, and Reed’s farther, was now living a luxurious life, in a villa, in the wine region of Sigma Draconis.
Now she was on the edge of a major payday, if she could take one of the four - that would do it. Best not be greedy, thought Reed. 3,500,000 Imperial Dollars, would do nicely. Put it towards buying a place like her father, finally give-up this dirty business, of killing for money, instead start growing some great varieties of grape, to rival his. Yes, that is the dream, thought Reed.
‘Now, where would anyone go here? A life sustaining planet would be obvious,’ said Reed to the computer.
She flipped a switch that brought up a heat sensor program, she had picked up from Andrew’s Station, some years ago. It allowed her to locate any heat source, within a star system, such as a ship on a barren planet, which was attempting to hide.
‘Let’s see now . . . ah yes, there’s heat enough emitting from two planets: that red looking one and that blue and green one just visible. It would have to be one of those two.’
‘Okay, have we located a volcano large enough to take this beast?’ asked Rackham.
‘Sure have. There’s a massive one, on that small island: should take a ship this size, and burn it to molten metal, very quickly,’ said Phillips.
‘Setting loading bay robots to transfer the contents of the hold to our four ships,’ announced Avery. ‘Why we did not think of this before, I don’t know,’ he said after.
‘The reason we did not think of this before, was because we didn’t realize they had robots on board to do all the heavy work, once they docked at Andrew’s Station.’ replied Rackham. ‘Once all the loot is loaded into our four ships, we can simultaneously launch, sending this tub into the heart of that volcano!’ he laughed.
Reed was scanning the surface of what would later be known as Mars, without getting any reading of life.
‘Nothing here; must be that watery looking planet.’
Her thrusters cut in: she was on her way to Earth. As she got closer, she realized that there was land and life.
‘Wow, this place is coming on nicely. I wonder if there is anyone living here yet? Or, have they started the life introduction program yet? None of my business - I’m not going to remember a thing anyway!’
She checked her sensors, heat measurements appeared all over her monitor.
‘This place is teaming with life, with what looks like, large creatures roaming around!’
4.4: Showdown
The warning signal could be heard above the silence, as the new crew of the space freighter, edged their way into the atmosphere, of this beautiful planet.
‘Almost loaded,’ said Phillips, as he came back into the control room. ‘Each ship is going to be carrying 1,500 tones of goods, enough to buy a small planet if we required!’
‘How long until we can let this hulk fly?’ asked Rackham.
‘Five minutes, I reckon, until we can safely say, we’re all good to go,’ said Avery.
‘Okay, keep an eye on our sensors, were not out of the woods yet,’ returned Rackham.
Reed, had entered the atmosphere, and was skimming across the surface, taking in the landscape with wonderment. Large birds flew through the sky, and giant, grass eating creatures, walked the plains.
‘It’s going to be difficult to locate anything here, with all this life.’
‘Okay, we’re loaded and ready to depart. We don’t want to waste anymore time,’ said Phillips.
The four left the control room and headed for their ships.
‘Where are you heading?’ Rackham asked Phillips.
‘Not too sure yet, want to find a safe place to deposit my cut before planning anything,’ replied Phillips.
‘Don’t want to say too much myself, just in case one of us is caught, and has their mind read,’ added Rackham.
‘It’s been good working with you again. Not knowing where we might be, I’ll say my goodbyes now,’ said Phillips.
The men gave each other a warm hug, and patted each other on the back.
‘I’ll follow you back to Diso,’ said Avery to Bonny.
‘No. Not a good idea. I suggest we lay low for a while. Sell our ships, take on a trader and meet each other that way,’ said Bonny.
‘Okay, let’s go our separate ways, meet-up at your father’s, in one month’s time. Two ships loaded with gold and other precious goods, arriving together, would set-off alarm bells.’
Reed decided that the best way to find the assailants was to wait for them to make their getaway. Therefore, she exited the atmosphere, headed for the moon: a good hiding place.
As the doomed freighter, headed towards the mouth of the volcano, the four ships left the sides, jetted off in the opposite direction, towards the bright, yellow, sun. Once they had reached space, each punched in their destination:
Avery: Eta Cassiopeia.
Rackham: Sigma Draconis.
Bonny: Diso.
Phillips: Veedfa.
In a quad of flashes, they were gone.
Reed had picked up four ships on her sensors, and was heading towards the source, but when she arrived in the vicinity, all there was were four hyperspace trails.
‘Well,’ said Reed, out loud to herself, ‘I can’t follow all four now can I, which one makes sense? Ah . . . Diso, that was mentioned by The Council, earlier I’ll follow that one.’
And so she typed in the function to replicate the jump; and was in a flash, heading through hyperspace, to Diso.
Bonny was pleased to be back in familiar territory, with the dual suns shining somewhat brighter than she remembered; or was it just that she was carrying more riches than she could possibly spend in a lifetime? No, make that three lifetimes, she thought and smiled, thinking that just a week ago, she was plying her trade, as a sky-taxi driver.
Reed had entered the Diso System, minutes later, her ship’s sensors had identified that the ship, was heading for
the main planet’s spaceport, Diso City.
There was no way that Bonny could have noticed, a seemingly inoffensive craft travelling some distance behind, heading innocently, towards the only spaceport on the planet. Until, Reed, had launched a high-powered heat-seeking missile.
At that moment, Bonny knew that she was being pursued, and launched a similar rocket, which attached itself to the heat of the incoming one, exploding halfway between her ship and Reed’s.
‘Dam,’ said Reed. ‘That was far too obvious,’ as she reverted her trigger to laser, to try and shoot Bonny’s ship into space dust.
‘How the hell did they find me? Seemingly a bounty hunter, by the looks of that ship. Not your average have-a-go pirate!’ Bonny cursed.
Bonny swung her ship around, to face her pursuer, and headed towards the Wild Cat, weaving erratically so that the bounty hunter could not get a clean shot at her, firing wildly as she went, hoping to scare off her adversary.
‘There’s fighting spirit in this one,’ said Reed to herself. Laser shot swept over the bow of the Wild Cat, but Reed held her nerve. She had managed to lock a missile on the Puma, and was waiting until it was close enough to launch, without the pilot noticing. The Puma was just about to pass to the starboard. Reed fired.
It took a second, at most, for the missile to make contact with the hull of the Puma, hitting the fuel tanks, creating an explosion, which shook the Wild Cat off course and spinning out of control.
When Reed had gained control of the ship again, only small particles of golden dust, which sparkled against the light of the twin suns, made a sad, but almost magical end to Captain Marie Bonny’s short, but potentially profitable, career as a space pirate.
Reed headed towards New Station, so she could have her reward transferred to her account. She could almost taste the first wine, from her yet un-purchased vineyard, in the Sigma Draconis System.
Captain Avery had not been in Eta Cassiopeia long, when he heard that one of the bank robbers, from the audacious Zeandin System job, had been killed. He was sitting in a café, drinking their exclusive drink, still trying to think of a way to find The Coffee Company’s location, when he overheard a couple of well healed city types, discussing how much was taken; the percentage blown to smithereens, in the Diso System and was there a technique, for collecting gold dust from space?
Avery finished his coffee, strolled to his hotel, sat on the balcony, watching day turn to night, contemplating what might have been, and how he could make amends for luring Bonny, into such a dangerous world, when she had been, a simple sky-taxi driver.
There was only one thing for it. He would have to go back there to visit her father, offer some form of compensation. A lonely tear, rolled down his cheek. He had actually fallen in love, not for the first time, but this time, it was for real.
In the previous weeks, Avery, had spent his time depositing modest amounts of money, in as many trans-galactic banks as he could find, so to spread the deposits of gold, silver and hard cash, to as many corners of the galaxy, as he could, to avoid detection.
He had a modest amount of money on him, but thought it best to eat and drink in average places, so not to appear to have suddenly come into a lot of money. Therefore, Sky Restaurants were definitely off the menu, for now.
He paid his parking fees, at the spaceport Cleopatra, and launched his now somewhat lighter ship into the atmosphere, proceeded to the safety of space, before hyper-spacing to Diso.
New Station, was bustling with traffic. Avery knew that many a bounty hunter, would be sitting in cafés and bars, waiting to hear anything, even remotely relevant, to the whereabouts of the other members of the gang, that were reported to have come from Radian.
He landed in Diso City, in his now somewhat travel worn Lion S Class, a ship so respected, that no one would suspect that a pirate would have one; let alone participated in, the most profitable bank robbery, in galactic collective memory. To some, Avery was a hero, to others, just a no good, pirate.
5 FORGING A PLAN