In the early afternoon they all met for lunch before their duty shift.
Aunt Sleak’s lead ship, The Slipper, which they currently served on, was only the third largest in this particular Clan Maeris Merchant Fleet rated at 500 tons. But it was the newest, the fastest, and, ton for ton, the most advanced and heavily armed of the fleet’s five main ships.
With a complement of 230 working crew, and some of their clan families, The Slipper was home to more than 300 souls.
It’s oval, domed mess hall comfortably sat and fed about a hundred people at once, so the crew and their families ate in rotating shifts.
Now that the ship was out of jump and proceeding through sub-space in system, they could see the other ships of the fleet in tight formation nearby. The mess hall had its blast screens down, so it was possible to look out across a stunning 360-degree vista as they continued, on course to Irpul-4. This was just one leg of the fleet’s major trade run through Triax Gigacorp space.
Naero spotted their sister ship, The Shinai, slightly behind them on their port side, protecting their flank–rated 600 tons, 300 crew.
Right behind them were the fleets’ two smaller trading ships: The Nevada, 300 tons and 80 crew, and The Ardala, 200 tons, 60 crew.
The massive Dromon, a planetoid vessel, brought up and protected their rear. At 300,000 tons it obviously couldn’t enter a planetary atmosphere, but it carried a crew of 1,200 and had nearly unlimited hold space, as well as more firepower than a ship of the line battleship.
The mess hall on The Slipper currently had about 60 people in it, coming and going, eating, communicating with the other ships, watching the news on INS, the Interstellar News Service feeds from various sectors, feeds primarily controlled and manipulated by the sixteen Gigacorps.
Even a decade after the last Spacer War with the Corps ended in 2585, the old tensions remained strong in many places in the Alpha Quadrant.
Old hatreds did not fade easily, and the driving force behind most of the Gigacorps to dominate and control everything and everyone, remained relentless.
Only the Spacers and their staunch ally Joshua Tech–the only Gigacorp to side with them–remained independent and free.
When the other fifteen Gigacorps weren’t fighting with Spacers, they fought amongst themselves for dominance, or even within their own systems.
Naero stared at her lunch tray while they shuffled along in line, still feeling queasy from her morning ordeal. Usually the chow was okay.
She ignored INS, having little interest in interstellar politics and spin today. She still struggled to accept the fact that she was a nud, and not mope about it. What else could she do but push on?
She also had a busy duty shift ahead of her.
The only bright point in her birthday was her master plan.
By lunch time it was working perfectly.
Tyber checked the table and benches they were about to sit at with their food trays with his scanner. So did Zhen.
“I don’t detect any traps,” he said. “Nothing sticky.”
“No nanoglue or stungel,” Zhen added. “It’s okay to sit down.”
“Guys, just eat your food. Seriously. I didn’t do anything. I’m not going to do anything. You’re my mates.”
“Yeah, you’d like us to think that, wouldn’t you, N?” Chaela said. “Then we let our guard down, and wham!” She hit the table so hard that their trays jumped, as did some other Spacers nearby.
“That’s when you strike. You’re just waiting to pounce on us all. So go ahead. What are you waiting for? We know you wanna play some clever trick on us. Just get it over with already.”
“Saemar, look me in the eye. Tell them how dumb this is. They’re getting all paranoid for nothing.”
Saemar stopped waving and flirting and winking at the entire male half of the crew and looked into her eyes.
“You’re absolutely right, sweetie. I do know you.” Then she looked at their trays.
“Oh my gosh, I figured it out. She’s done something to our food. Nobody eat anything! I bet the servers are in on it.”
Everyone stared and gaped and dropped their spoons and forks in midbite as if on cue.
“I bet it’s laxatives,” Saemar said. “That’s what I’d do. By tonight we’ll all be shitting ourselves inside out like Lorlduvian sky whales. Don’t eat nuthin’.”
“Okay, okay,” Zhen said. “Everyone just glacier. If Saemar will shut up for five seconds I can scan everyone’s food.”
Tyber looked over at her. Naero just grinned innocently.
“She’s smiling at us,” Tyber said. “Oh, hell. Why is she smiling at us like that?”
“I’m just so happy to be with all my good friends.”
“Dammit. Saemar’s right. I already ate some. I feel it going through me already. I’m going to die. I’m going to detonate like a shit bomb. Damn you, Naero.”
Naero held up her hands. “You’re not going to shit yourself, Tyber. I didn’t do anything.”
Zhen turned off her med scanner. “Relax, Ty. She’s right. No poisons.” She glared at Saemar and shook her head emphatically.
“No sooper laxatives. Everyone go ahead and eat. Just another false alarm.”
Awkward silence passed for a minute.
Saemar blurted out. “Well, it’s a good thing. You don’t want to mess with those extra-strength laxatives, ya know? I know a guy who took some, cause–you know–he was all plugged up inside. Well, he takes too much. Next thing thing ya know, bawoom. He’s crapping his teeth out his ass. The guy had to get new teeth, I swear. True story. It liked ta killed him.”
“No way,” Tyber said. “No one can shit their teeth out. It’s impossible.”
Gallan threw his fork down again and pushed his tray away in complete disgust. “I don’t think I can eat anymore.”
“The question remains,” Zhen said, licking her spoon and then waving it at Naero. “What is she going to do, and how and when is she going to do it to us all?”
“You guys are being silly,” Naero told them.
“We’ll never see it coming,” Chaela said. “She’s probably already set it up and is just waiting for it to blow up in our faces. That’s the way she usually does it.”
Tyber pointed a finger right at her. “You know, one of these days, Naero, someone’s going to pull one over on you–a real work of art. And all of us are going to be right here to see you go down in flames.”
“Hey, here’s a disturbing thought,” Gallan said. “I know her better than any of you. What if this time her master plan is to simply do nothing?”
“Nothing?” Zhen said. “That’s not her style. She’s going to do something, you can bet on that.”
“Right,” Tyber added.
“Think about it, ”Gallan said. “All she has to do is sit and look innocent while the rest of us squirm and flip out and get all paranoid, watching and waiting and fretting about something that could happen at any moment. She can drive us all crazy for free. That way, we keep doing it all to ourselves.”
“Nahhh…” Saemar said. “She’s got something planned, all right. Just look at her.”
Naero stretched leisurely and stood up, grinning all the while. “I don’t know about you guys, but I gotta go get ready for work. You guys comin’ along for the ride?”
All five of her friends turned as pale as moons.
“She’s going to get us on the job. Can she do that to us?” Tyber asked the others. “Isn’t there a limit to what she can do to us while we’re on duty?”
Saemar gasped for air again. “Check your EV-suits for hidden suppositories. She could still get us with auto-suppositories. Bungo! Right up the escape chute. Our suits’ll fill up with pressurized poop. We’ll all choke on it.”
Zhen held up her hands as if they were claws, dragging the corners of her mouth down and gnashing her teeth in frustration.
“You total moron. Will you shut up about the laxatives already? What an idiot! She’s not going to get us with laxative
s. Nobody in their right mind would ever do something like that, except maybe you! It’s not. Going to be. Laxatives.”
Everyone stared at her.
Saemar had to have the last word.
“Well, it could be laxatives. How do you know?”
“Aauughhh!” Zhen abandoned her tray and the table, and stalked away, her fists clenched and her arms straight down stiff at her sides.
Tyber went after her.
“Time to go to punch the clock,” Naero said, struggling not to giggle.
Then Jan walked into the mess hall, his face ashen.
He focused on her, swallowed hard, and came straight for her.
“Hey Jan. Why so glum? One of your bimbo’s stand you up?”
“N-N-Naero, there’s no good way to say this, so just listen. Mom and Dad’s exploration fleet has been…wiped out in deep space. They’re all gone. Dead. Mom and dad…they’re dead.”
Naero gaped for a minute.
Then she started laughing. She turned back to her friends, who all looked dumbstruck, completely unable to speak.
“Okay, I see what’s going on here. Nice try, guys. Good one. You almost had me, but I’m not falling for it. Real smooth. My birthday, old April Fool’s Day. Getting Janner to play along with your little scam?”
Gallan stood up and lifted his hands. “Naero, this isn’t a scam. Your brother just said something terrible happened to your parents. I think you need to listen to him.”
Naero backed away slightly, shaking her head. “No, no. It can’t be. Tyber just said you’d all get me back for all of my tricks. That you’d all be there to pull one over on me and see me go down in flames. They can’t be. My mom and dad can’t be–”
Janner slapped her. Hard.
Naero gaped, taken completely by surprise.
“You think I’m kidding? Haisha!” Jan sobbed. “You think I’m making this up?”
An INS bulletin cut in over the regular feeds on all screens.
We have disturbing, breaking news. A deep space exploration fleet has been completely wiped out in the far regions of the Spacer Extents. Spacer sources have thus far released few details concerning the incident. It is not known whether the fleet was destroyed by some dangerous phenomena or perhaps a heretofore unknown, advanced alien threat.
All that is known is that thousands of Spacers are now dead. All ships and all hands lost. There are no known survivors. Stay tuned for more information concerning this tragedy as the facts unfold. All of the corporate governments and navies have offered their sincere condolences and their complete cooperation and assistance to the Spacer authorities.
Does some grave new alien threat lurk beyond the boundaries of known space?
Gallan tried to put his arms around her.
Naero pulled away and floated out of the Mess Hall…
In complete shock.
5