Chapter 63 Emergence of the Starry Shore
01
The Starry Shore, 131 (actual) days out of Despar Reef, ended its voyage within missile range of Plyra's guard station to await the arrival of the quarantine boat.
'Busy place,' I said to Lilm, viewing the holographic radar displayed on one of the bridge's view-panels. Plyra consisted of dozens of warehouses, shipyards, and factories clustered loosely around a small, hollow asteroid. In addition, the radar showed eight large CTC freighters and twice as many drifteer tramps plus hundreds of smaller traders, ore barges and mining craft orbiting the asteroid station, with scores of small boats scurrying between them.
'Far busier than I remember it ever being,' she replied, 'But that was a century ago.'
'Perhaps they're refugees of the drift war... Ah, dare we hope?' I added, as the speck of a small boat separated itself from the guard station and headed our way.
It was, indeed, the quarantine boat, which proceeded to make the usual robotic health inspection of crew and ship – a procedure critical for the small, enclosed world of a hollow asteroid. We passed and waited for the port official, which would be our first big test.
We're now the Starry Shore, 221 days out of Boscone according to our official log record, thanks to Rafe, Kie and Botts.
Starry shore is a poetic description for the edge of the nebula where you can see the stars of the rest of the universe. Molaye wasn't fond of the name. 'We'll be known as the Sorry Sore you just wait and see,' she protested. She wanted something like the Dragon's Bane or some such thing. I told her we weren't drift pirates, or at least not yet.
We concocted a story to go with the altered log, which we rehearsed over and over these last four and half months so it seemed more real than our true story. We'd new names as well. Each different, but to avoid confusion, each could be shortened to our familiar ones. I was Nives Wilcrofter, shortened to “Cap'n Wil”. (Molaye wanted me to get Pax into my name, but I had to draw a line somewhere or she'd be running this ship, so I borrowed ol'Cap'n Crofter's name just to be defiant.) She's now Bry M'Ley. Rafe is Ralf Hugou, Ralf being pronounced Rafe, Kie is Kylan Balino, Illy is now known as Illan Lantra Myes is now Haz Mytin, Riv is Drimoch Riven, Lilm is Leelem Cardim, Lili is Lila Tan, and the Drays are now Barjour and Saemin Astry. Astro is Astro, Orbit is Orbit, and Ginger is still known as that Neb-blasted cat. I'll continue to use the old names and spelling, except in dialog, to indicate our new status.
Plyra is a drift trade center on the edge of the Inner Drift and the Azar Rift. The Azar Rift is the main space lane between the two stars, Aticor and Amdia. The Rift is a long, narrow gap of clear space between the Myzar Drift and Inner Drifts, that allows ships to travel at interstellar speeds. It was our first port of call because Rafe and Kie needed to establish our new identity prior to our arrival in the Unity, which meant a call on a drift station important enough to be in radio contact with the Unity so he could contact... Well, he was rather vague about that.
'You don't want to know, Willy. The less you know, the less the Guard or Guild mind probes will tell'em,' he said with a wink.
Yes, I decided, I didn't need to know. All I needed to know was that they'd need several days and a small fortune for radio packets to get the job done.
Lilm, who had sailed on ships calling on Plyra in her youth, suggested it, since it offered both the necessary radio access and possibility of picking up a cargo for Baidora in the Amdia system, which was a big draw for me. I'd rather not return to the Unity, cap in hand, as an out of work tramp.
Since we'd be well within St Bleyth's operating sphere, erasing every possible link to the late Lost Star was an absolute priority. As it turned out, our first, and possibly best, line of defense was arriving at Plyra Station 30 to 40 days before any ship could have been expected to arrive from Despar.
'I believe I can minimize the risk of discovery,' Botts said during our first meeting after our escape.
'How?' I asked, turning to it, its eyes glowing softy in the dark.
'We still have an operational drone. Working with plans I have in memory, we can print out and install a class 4 AI chip in the drone. This will give the drone AI power to analyze its sensor data and directly alter the ship's course rather than merely relaying that information back to the ship for the pilot to act on. It saves seconds and increases our safety margin – which translates into increased potential velocity. And if you're willing to trust me to pilot, we can run one third faster than any human piloted ship. I would suggest that if we arrive far sooner than seemingly possible, our enemies would not even consider the possibility that we might be the Lost Star.'
'And how sanguine are you about that estimation?' I asked, warily.
Its eyes brightened. 'Oh, I'm very sanguine. It was the common operating procedure in the old days. I always had class 4 drones ahead when I sailed the Viseor Entrada.'
'Right. And, just so I'm clear on this, a class 4 AI is also illegal.'
'In the Unity, yes, Captain. However, we can switch back to its standard AI chip near the end passage, if you're uncomfortable with it.'
'And I gather, you're proposing to pilot the ship the entire passage?'
'Yes. That is well within my operational parameters. Indeed, it is my prime function. I hope you will excuse me for saying this, but as long as I'm a member of your crew, I can manage the bridge functions unsupervised. Maintaining engines and ship systems still require my shipmate's active participation since your service bots are not of sufficient quality to do the work, but acting as sole pilot and lookout for the entire passage is well within my designed parameters.'
'Well, I'm in no position to call you a liar,' I admitted. 'And well, we've plenty of work to do to keep the rest of us from getting bored,' I added, remembering all those amber lights.
So we made a 131-day passage from the Despar Reef, likely the fastest passage up the Azar Rift in the last 11,000 years since it was accomplished by using an illegal class 4 drone and an illegal class 8 pilot, full fuel tanks and no cargo. Of course our log showed something quite different – a 221-day passage from Boscone – part of our plan to distance the Starry Shore from the Lost Star in every way possible.
As I've said before, we're a pretty nondescript cargo ship – thousands in its class operate in the Nebula and unless you're a spaceer who's familiar enough with a particular ship to recognize its auxiliary features – its boats or its markings or its collection of dents and scars, they all look much alike. Our passage through the reef had sanded off the last of our rusty red hull coating, and had added scores of new scars and dents, erasing the old ones in the process, hopefully making it impossible to recognize her, even with detailed photos.
Our first priority was fixing the heat exchanger before the long acceleration, and then in mid-passage, we spent a month in our heavy duty space suits working on the hull, repairing the cargo hatch, constructing and attaching replicas of the balancing engine cowlings that had been destroyed, so we would at least appear to be undamaged and, thus, unlikely to have sailed through the Despar Reef. We also spent considerable time pounding out the last major scars from the Lost Star era in the hope of fooling even the Patrol's identifying algorithms.
Rafe, Kie and Botts crafted a new log, a new history, and then shoved the real one into yet another data black hole. Botts, being a machine itself, made the job far easier and far more thorough than even Rafe could've done alone. The new log was a scrambled history of the Lost Star and a short nondescript account of a voyage from Azminn to Aticor, after which there was one voyage to Boscone, escaping the reef just ahead of Despar's first attack and then a long passage up the Azar Rift in search of less dangerous trading conditions. A bland story, but close enough to reality that I hoped everyone could keep it straight, even when not strictly sober.
Still, I fretted and paced as I waited for the port official to arrive, which she did, several hours after the quarantine boat.
I met her on the landing stag
e with Molaye, Astro and Orbit.
Welcome aboard,' I said walking forward, as she swung out of the airlock at the end of gangplank.
'Thank you, Captain. Sorry to keep you waiting. We're rather shorthanded these days,' she said, shaking my hand while Molaye kept the hounds in check. 'Batta Ty,' she added.
'No matter. I'm Nives Wilcrofter, my first mate, Bry M'Ley, and the hounds, Astro and Orbit. Sorry, they insist on greeting all our guests,' I said, adding, 'My first time here, but my chief engineer tells me she's never seen it so busy. Refugees like ourselves from the troubles down Despar and Boscone way?'
''Some. But most are here for our Founding Festival. Everyone from every rock within five aus visits Plyra during the festival. It's a two-week party and we're only two days into it. Hope you're not in a hurry since not much gets done during the festival,' she said as we drifted up the access well to the ship's office.
'Actually that sounds rather inviting. We can use a bit of a party – it’s been a long, dreary passage, and I don't suppose a few days more will make any difference in how my owner feels...'
'I gather from your initial report you've sailed from Boscone.'
'Aye. We originally hail from Azminn, but the trade slump sent us to Aticor and the drifts,' I said, 'It's been an experience. I'll have some tales to tell in my old age, if I reach that port.'
'I see you arrived hollow,' she said as I showed her into the ship's office.
'Yes. Except for a quarter box of trade goods. Cha or something stronger?' I asked.
'Cha will be welcomed, I am on duty,' she replied.
'Right. It's been a long and quite unprofitable voyage, I'm afraid. I'm not looking forward to hearing from my owners,' I said, as I went about fixing two mugs of cha.
'I gather you ran into trouble down Boscone way.'
'Aye, though I've been catching up with the news since we arrived, so I guess I shouldn't complain too much. We must've got out before the real fighting started. Still, it's a big change from circling Azminn twice a year. We never had to run from privateers in the Azminn trade.'
'I can imagine,' she prompted. 'Welcome to the drifts.'
'Ah, the drifts, they're even more... Well interesting than I'd been lead to expect,' I said and launched our new history. 'We're a Calissant owned tramp, you see. And rather than lay us up, our owner sent us to the Aticor system to look for work. There, we were leased to a LaTrina ship operator, Dyzran Tan & Co. and dispatched to the Boscone Reef with a mixed cargo.
'Arriving in the Reef, we had a radio packet waiting for us, ordering us to off load and get clear without delay. It seems Tan had gotten word of the trouble brewing and wanted us clear of Boscone without waiting for a cargo. So we offloaded our cargo, and sailed. On clearing the reef, we crossed orbits with two Despar commandeered drifteer tramps turned privateer. They ordered us to surrender. I declined since I could outrun them, and did, but it left us heading away from Aticor. The chase used more fuel than I had budgeted, so I hadn't enough left to make the course correction needed to make LaTrina. So, with the whole of the Despar-Boscone drifts likely caught up in the conflict, I decided to sail for Plyra instead. We were hailed by a couple of other privateers as we made our way through Despar claimed space, but we had enough velocity to ignore them and make a long, uneventful passage up the rift.
'I've not been captain long, but long enough to know that my survival will not be welcomed news on LaTrina. We'll have been missing for almost half a year, so I wouldn't be surprised if we're already owned by the insurance company. It might help if you could tell me that your warehouses are bulging with boxes for the Amdia system.'
'I won't say they're bulging, but we've seen a jump of boxes coming our way because of the Despar war, so you may be in luck. But don't expect to get any on board until after the festival ends.'
'A prospect for cargo and a two-week holiday – I don't think I'll complain. I'll leave that to my owners.'
We talked some more about trade and Plyra and the festival, before we got down to work. We went over the rules and customs of Plyra and were assigned a buoy after I'd paid our harbor fee.
An hour later we saw the port official off and even as we edged our way to our assigned buoy in the busy space around Plyra, Rafe, Kie and Botts were engaging a private com channel to send the encoded radio packets needed to establish our new identity. Plus, they set up a shadow cyber-bot owner on LaTrina to give the impression that we were in communication with our fictional charter party should anyone doubt our story and have the ability to snoop.
03
Molaye swung into my office. 'Ready, Captain?'
I looked up. My tall, willowy first mate, dressed in a form fitting black uniform with a short jacket with her big pirate piece darter on her hip, stood in the doorway grinning.
Though Molaye had been first mate for a little over four months, she was already looking the part. Not in any obvious way. The ship's wheel symbol on the badge on her cap had a circle around it, indicating a chief mate, but it was more in attitude. She was more grown up and more unguarded in her rather cocky air of competence.
The first mate's job aboard ship is basically every job aboard ship. Not that they have to do every job, they just have to know what's to be done and see that it is. Aboard the Starry Shore it's a pretty cushy job, as I well know, since everyone does their job properly without being pushed. Still, one has to know every job to know that. Molaye tackles any task competitively – with her full attention and abundant energy – and mastered the mate's shipboard position with ease. Shore business on Plyra would be her first lessons in the other half of the position's duties.
In addition to mastering the first mate's job, she also mastered the pirate piece on her hip as well. Rafe, in his distant youth, seems to have been a bit more dashing than he is these days and is still an old hand with darters. Under his tutelage, Molaye had, with constant practice in no. 4 hold, become competent enough, that, in Rafe's opinion, she could wear it downside. Openly wearing a darter spoke to drifters in a way that tended to invite an exchange of (mostly) non-lethal darts. You needed be very good to wear one if you didn't like waking up with pounding headaches. She likely was good enough, but I was having none of that today.
'Lose the pirate piece, First,' I said.
Her eyes narrowed, ever so slightly, and she stood a little straighter. 'Why? Rafe says I'm good enough.'
I could've gone on about just following my Neb-blasted orders, but she knows that. So I said, 'Because we're going out on ship's business and we're a mild mannered, Unity Standard, Neb-blasted Guild certified tramp freighter, down on its luck, cap in hand, seeking cargo, any cargo – not some drifteer pirate on a holiday. That's why. It's all about image.'
'But we're still in the drifts. Everyone carries a darter.'
'Carry your sissy, if you can find a pocket were it won't show and can still get at it,' I said, twirling my finger and pointing to the door.
Her eyes narrowed a little further, but she turned around and slowly headed for the door. At the door she paused, and turning towards me with a bright smile, said, 'Sorry, Wil. I wasn't thinking.' before dashing out to collect her sissy.
That's my First. A rather unnervingly quick learner.
Molaye piloted us – Riv, Lilm, Myes, Bar, Say and myself – across the busy near space to the bottle blown asteroid of Plyra. Plyra is a hollow, 5x15 kilometers cylindrical asteroid formed by being completely melted and then, with carefully designed explosive charges, blown and rotated to form a hollow cylinder. Its outer surface was largely free of buildings since it rotates to create a centrifugal pseudo gravity for its interior inhabitants.
Plyra's boat harbor is an off-shore, spider-like space station whose long legs are lined with docking airlocks for small boats. Molaye carefully maneuvered the gig through the press of boats to our assigned lock amongst the many legs, and aligning our hatch to the airlock, gently nudged us in.
I turned to everyone before I cracked ope
n the hatch, though I looked straight at Molaye. 'Right. Are we in character?'
She smiled. 'Oh, yes, Captain Wilcrofter. You're just a poor Captain Crofter sort of character who's had your fill of the lawless drifts and desperately wants to get back to the safety and routine of the Unity's planetary trade.'
I'd settle for that. 'Yes, I've my character down pat. But do you know yours?'
'I'm a bright, though inexperienced first mate, who finds the drifts rather exciting...' she replied brightly.
'We're not really acting, are we?'
Her smile widened. 'No.'
'Right. The rest of you, look around, get a feel for things, but remember – I'm looking at you Riv – this is just a scouting expedition, not shore leave.'
'Aye, skipper. Scouting it is. We'll have a full report on all the dives by the time you're ready to lift.'
A quick jump via a shuttle pod took us across to the entry lock, located at the center of the asteroid's nearest end. We felt the shuttle skid a little as it touched down the rotating surface, which created the asteroid's .2 gee gravity.
A lift carried us down to the Promenade, a kilometer-wide park that runs along the top of a large metro complex. Plyra was like a moon crater community – hot and lushly green, until you looked up to find yourself looking down on the promenade and out over the whole interior as it wrapped around the inside of the asteroid. A bit disconcerting. The avenues under the wide spreading trees were crowded – youths lopping along, kids hopping about, their parents strolling sedately along, everyone stopping in small crowds at gaily decorated booths, temporary food carts, cafes, and entertainments. It all seemed all very civilized and carefree. No doubt wilder celebrations could be found elsewhere, if you cared to look, or you could just follow Riv, who'd find 'em without a chart.
Plyra had two cities, one at each end, Metro and Resi. Metro was the more commercial one, similar in many ways to the massive reef of buildings that form the crater rim between CraterPort and CraterCity on Lontria. It rose in terraces to the kilometer-wide promenade and circled the inner circumference of the asteroid as one massive building riddled with long multi-story malls and lush atriums.
We strolled out to the edge of the Promenade and looked out over the ten kilometers of farmland, parks, and ponds that wrapped around the asteroid’s interior surface, lit by four large, bright, plasma globes set in the cross-hairs of four support columns. The greenness of the Plyra was, like the crater communities, designed not only to feed the inhabitants, but to keep the atmosphere as passively fresh as possible. At the far end we could see Resi, Plyra's residential city.
Since this was a scouting expedition, I was allowing only four hours to look around, so we took an express lift down to the spaceers' row section of the Metro – on the 741st level. (They counted them down from the Promenade.) It was a deep, rather low, dim-lit section of the city, half a dozen blocks long. The few cross streets leading to the green interior bought in a little light from the distant interior, but for the most part spaceer's row was just a two story, 15-meter-wide corridor illuminated by gaudy signs, with the business offices on either end, hardly lit at all. All the offices were dark and closed on account of the festival.
Molaye and I pushed on to find the Master's Club, which was located amongst the shipping offices rather than the spaceers' row proper. It was crowded with owners, agents, captains and mates and reminded me of the Tenth Star on Calissant. Captain Miccall used to take me around to the Tenth Star Tavern, just off Star Gate Boulevard – though only after I became his first mate. Anyone could – in theory – wander into the Tenth Star, but unless they had a star, or a wheel with a circle on their cap badge (and the first mates were only tolerated when accompanied by their captains) I doubt many stayed for a second drink. The dark glares would've driven even the stoutest-hearted drinkers to more friendly environs. For, you see the Tenth Star operated as the private club of the Calissant tramp ship owners, the place where they spent their days doing business over drinks – which often amounted to stabbing each other in the back at every opportunity with greatest affability.
Still the festival air had infused the Master's Club. We found a slot at the bar, and within minutes Molaye had struck up a conversation with the CTC ship captain next to her and we jumped into the flow of shipping and trade gossip intermixed with spaceer reminiscence, factual and fictional. Molaye and I were soon spinning the yarns of our close call with Despar privateers and our hard luck with our distant owners with other captains, owners and agents. They said I was lucky to escape Boscone even hollow, for if we had surrendered, we would've ended up pressed into service as a Despar privateer, or dead. They held out hope for a decent cargo to Baidora, the main drift-trade world in the Amdia system – but only after the festival was over. All in all, things looked hopeful. Assuming, of course, St Bleyth wasn't on to us.
I'd be giving the wrong impression if I neglected to mention St Bleyth. They may not be omnipresent, but I was certain they had agents on Plyra, since it was a major distribution point for the drifts. Rafe says that the destruction of the two drones and the Sister Sinister could leave traces that could be picked up over the static in the reef, but he doubted that they'd be able to identify exactly what happened or find any trace of our escape. Still, our escape couldn't be ruled out either. So the question was – how would they react? They've paid a steep price in lives and equipment already. Would they decide to cut their losses and write us off, or would they double down and expend even more resources to make certain we were dead? Would they monitor Min & Co and our families for radio packets to see if we contacted them? Would they have all their agents and offices investigating every ship and crew of our general description? While it would be very hard to identify us as the former Lost Star, if they were searching down to individual crew members, our new names alone wouldn't disguise us.
I've grown a short beard which, I think, gives me a more rakish, drifteer air. (Molaye says I look like a young ol'Cap'n Crofter.) It might fool an agent, but not a security machine. So the question was, what sort of effort, if any, was St Bleyth making to discover our fate? Plyra was going to be a test of that question, since if they identified us, they probably could do something about it here. And if they did something, I could only hope they did it to me. It was an unavoidable risk that I'd have to live with.
04
'Hi Captain. I confirmed our participation in the Florka's Bonanza Cup Race,' said Molaye, looking into my office after returning from Plyra several days after our arrival.
'Huh? What?'
'Said of course we'd participate in the Bonanza Race. You know, the race where all the captains and their first mates race tri-bikes against each other. Remember? We received notice several days ago. Some of the captains at the club were wondering why we hadn't confirmed our entry, since it's only three days away. Told them you'd a lot on your mind, what with dealing with owners who had hoped we were lost and all. Probably just forgot to reply.'
I had, indeed, conveniently managed to forget about it. 'And you said, yes?'
'Of course. It's an ancient tradition for every ship, large and small to enter. Every other ship, even the CTC liners have entered. It'd look bad if we didn't. So of course I apologized and signed us up.'
'Was your com link out of order, or didn't you think I needed to be consulted?' I asked, deciding to cut to the heart of the matter.
She pantomimed thinking about it for a moment and then said, 'The latter. It's a local tradition and everyone expected us to participate. I knew you'd not want to appear unsocial or unsporting in front of them, and all those shipping agents with boxes for Baidora. Don't want to give anyone the wrong impression. And I could hardly give some lame excuse about having to consult you when it's a given that we'd enter, like everyone else. Honor of the ship and all that.'
'Did you happen to mention that you're a semi-professional moon buggy racer, junior moon buggy champion, rocket sled racer, and who knows what else? It might not be fair fo
r us to compete with a professional racer,' I said, half seriously, looking for a way to slide out. I was the other half of the team and had no desire to race tri-bikes.
'Gosh Captain, you're right. Didn't occur to me at the time. But then, I've never raced tri-bikes. Complete amateur in that sport, so I'm sure it's ethical. Anyway it's too late to back out now. And since you've brought it up, Riv asked me to remind you that, ethical or not, it's probably best that you didn't say anything about my racing experience. You'd not want the other captains getting mad at you...'
'No... of course not,' I sighed. 'I don't suppose I have any say in this, do I?' I asked with hard look which only made her smile wider.
'Of course you do. I just cut to the chase and said Yes, as you would've. Eventually,' she explained patiently. 'Besides, we'll show these drifteers and CTC cargo liner poshes what tramp ship captains and mates are made out of!'
'Is there any chance that we might really show them what we're made of? I seem to recall moon buggy racing was pretty cut-throat.'
'Pfff! They're just the usual two seat tadpole bikes you see on any moon. A few bumps and bruises, maybe a broken bone if you land wrong. Nothing to worry about. I had a chance to race them when I was 7, but they're too slow and boring to bother with.'
The two and four seat tri-bikes are a popular form of transportation in low gee moon societies. It has a T frame with two steerable wheels in front and the seats slung on either side stem of the T and the trailing rear wheel. Both seats have pedals driving the forward wheels. The starboard seat has a steering wheel, gear shifters and brakes. The port seat occupant just pedals. It has two light roll bars and slight fenders on each side that would offer some slight protection if one tipped over.
The race course was a trail snaking through a hilly, wooded section of the central park that wraps around the interior midway between the two cities. The trail isn't much wider than two bikes and is paved with a soft mesh giving it something like a dirt feeling. It was built for thrills, with lots of humps and bumps to set you soaring in the light gravity. We spent an hour getting to know it the following day. Between the lightly built tri-bikes and the light gravity, we could clip along, even up hills – for about ten minutes. After that my legs started to ache and I was drawing deep breaths, silently cursing Florka and his Bonanza Cup.
There were plenty of captains and mates out for a spin as well, so we were quickly schooled in how the race is run – very much in the spirit of those moon buggy races on Lontria. Which is to say, with good-natured mayhem. If there are any rules at all, they ended just after outlawing weapons and outright murder.
Molaye was, of course, in command of the tri-bike. Our hour of practice provided all the insight she needed to chart our course for the race. All that remained was to get in shape. We had to last the four races if we wanted to win and Molaye – surprise – wanted to win. She insisted on a rigorous course of training on the ship's recumbent bikes for stamina and taking extra electro-simulant treatments to strengthen our leg muscles. I stopped in at the medic bay after each session to dull the aches.
On race day we were not in the first several heats, so we had a chance to watch the races. There were twelve tri-bikes in each heat and within seconds of the start, several were flying through the air. The race consisted of two laps, with the first six advancing to the next round.
I was standing about, captain-like, hands in my jacket pockets, watching Molaye go over our bike, making sure it had been properly attended to after the last race, when Captain Jyn Storie of the Astro Prince, one of the CTC ships, wandered over.
'Have your race charted, Wil?'
'Aye. Close my eyes and pedal like the blazes. I'm signed on as chief engineer for this cruise. Or rather, the engine. My First will pilot us.'
She gave me a searching look, 'Word has it you only practiced once. You don't seem too concerned. You're either pretty cocky, or you don't care.'
'Well, I'm pretty indifferent, and I doubt practice will matter much.' I replied with a shrug. 'We entered only because my First said it was expected – most likely to serve as a target, seeing how the race is run. Don't need practice for that. My strategy would be to get banged up quickly and then safely trail the pack. However, I doubt M'Ley here will let me chart that course.'
'I should hope not! We're Guild ships and we've Guild honor to uphold. You'll not let these drifteers intimidate you, will you?' she said, half seriously.
'Well, yes, maybe. I've been in the drifts long enough to discover their taste for feuds. I'm not anxious to ruffle drifteer feathers.'
'Well, if you don't they'll take merciless advantage of you. Besides, this is all clean fun. Any feud stays on the course, to be settled next year or the year after that...'
'Neb forbid! I'm hoping this is a one-off appearance.'
Captain Storie shook her head, 'You need some more of that Unity gloss rubbed off you, Wil.'
'I've had enough rubbed off already,' I replied glumly. 'But like it or not, I'm certain to get a bit more rubbed off shortly.'
'Aye, you will,' she laughed. 'Just remember, the Guild sticks together in these races. That's expected. It's us against the drifteers.'
'Aye. Did you hear that M'Ley?' I asked turning to Molaye. 'Drive Captain Storie's bike off the cliff with the greatest reluctance.'
'Yes, Captain,' she replied brightly. 'I'll be ever so polite, and even call out Sorry! as they go over.'
Luckily, the warning horn sounded for our race, sending Storie back to her tri-bike with a rather insincere 'Good luck'. We donned our gear and climbed aboard.
The race started from the tri-bike lot, with the twelve bikes lined up in a row. The access drive to the track was only as wide as the track – two bikes wide, so there's an initial sorting right out of the starting gate.
'Hold back, a second,' muttered Molaye. 'Give everyone a chance to clear before we move.'
'Ah, good. Taking my plan to heart. That's the spirit.'
'Oh, to some extent...' she replied with a cheery grin, as the flag went down.
We didn't move as the line surged ahead, aiming for the narrow access drive ahead. As soon as the bikes had cleared to starboard, Molaye said 'Now!' and we surged ahead, steering not for the pack at the access drive, but for the far corner of the lot.
'Off course!' I exclaimed, but she ignored me.
The shallow curb had us airborne for a bit, but we quickly crossed the grass median to strike the track, nosing our way into the thin line of bikes as they trickled out of the battle royal in the access drive.
'Was that allowed?' I asked, as we surged down the track.
'Nothing in the rules says you can't,' she replied as we bounded along the track in a thin cloud of dust raised through the mesh roadbed by the bikes ahead.
'The race has rules?' I gasped, pedaling away.
'Some. Save your breath. You're going to need it,' she replied tartly.
We found ourselves third or fourth – up with the leaders anyway. The pace was pretty easy – those behind the first six fought to improve their position, but the first six just kept their places – first or sixth didn't matter in this race. By the end of the first lap, the contenders had closed and were nipping at our heels, as Molaye wove along, taking our half of the track out of the middle to keep them at our heels.
The race heated up in the final lap as everyone started making their move. It got wild in the back half of the course, where the track snaked through wooded hills and rough ground. The surviving bikes had all closed into a tightly packed scrum, bumper to bumper, and as we soared off of the series of steep bumps to land five, ten meters down course, the drivers began using their bikes as weapons, trying to hit their rivals to send them soaring out of control and off the track and into the trees, bushes, or ravines – whatever happened to be handy. Everyone tried to take their half of the trail out of the middle, weaving back and forth – so to get by them, you either had to bump them off or steer around them whenever it was brief
ly free of the trees, high banks and steep ravines and bump'em off the track when you came back in again. The old hands knew the course blindfolded – just where you could go off the track to get by a competitor, and they turned those stretches into a wild melee of flying bikes.
My share of the race involved holding tight to the bar in front of me, shifting this way and that to keep us upright, and doing my share of the pedaling. Molaye steered, braked and played the game. When you weren't soaring over the bumps big and small, the other bikes were knocking you about so much that I'd have been tossed clear if it wasn't for the seat belt. As for the roll bars and bumpers – they were simply weapons to brush you aside, and when they didn't work, elbows and hands were used to muscle you out of the way, or to grab your steering wheel or arm to send you into the ditch, or a tree. Short of murder, everything was allowed. Which was all viewed with wild abandon by the spectators – spaceers and natives alike – who lined the track beyond the rope barriers as it wove through the forested park, cheering and jeering the racers as they passed. A larger crowd had gathered in the open picnic areas near the start/finish line who watched the race on large screens. Everyone gambled on every heat, but I was told the final was heavily wagered – since many of the likely contestants were regulars whose form was known enough for odds to be set.
One good thing was that the pace of the race was pretty mellow – more of a battle royal than a race, so we kept pace, weaving back and forth to defend our position, but making no effort to advance. Since we were in the first six, I suspected, Molaye was playing her old game of keeping expectations low. We were in fourth place at the start of the final lap, and fought off all but one contender – Captain Storie's bike – who managed to slip by us towards the end of the hill section, slamming into us with a desperate lunge as we crested a small bump. We landed off the track, but luckily avoided the trees, and Molaye had us back on the track before another bike could get by, keeping us in fifth place. So much for Guild solidarity. She allowed one final bike to pass us on the final straight, as we raced flat out, but not, I think, at the optimal gearing, so it looked like we were going at our max, but weren't. We finished sixth – just enough to continue on towards the championship race. Captain Storie finished fourth.
There were ten heats in the initial round, the hundred and twenty teams narrowed to sixty, and then pared down to thirty in the second set, which we also survived – just hanging on in the final stretch to get sixth place again, and we weren't holding back on that one. There was nothing to hold back, by then. The semi-final involved fifteen tads instead of twelve, of which only the top six would advance to the finals, which, in a way was easier since the pack was bigger and the fighting more intense – behind us, as we still took the short cut at the start of the race, though now we weren't alone in doing so. Molaye had taught them a new trick – the ones that were paying attention, anyway. Once again, we managed to finish sixth.
A very dusty and disheveled Captain Storie also made the final – I'm sure I looked just as disheveled or worse. We were the only two Guild ships left in competition.
'Your run of luck runs out, this race, Wil,' she said. 'Most of the regulars made it, so you'll be lucky to finish.'
'Then it's a good thing we're in this together. Guild honor and all.'
'It's an honor to have made the final,' she replied, grimly. 'Just stay out of my way.'
'Of course,' I replied, under the watchful eye of Molaye, guarding the sporting interest of our mates.
We started at the farthest end of the line, and as the flag dropped, we shot straight ahead, over the curb and on to the track – but then, so did everyone else, so we ended up in eleventh place, which is where we stayed until half way around the first lap, when the pack ahead started fighting it out in earnest. We kept out of that brawl. The final was a grueling three lap race, so we had more time to move up, past the bikes in the ravines, and took it. The team following us, also adopted this strategy, so we weren't pressed, and by the time we emerged onto the long straight speedway that ended the first lap, we'd passed two bikes, one in a ditch the other deep in the brush, so we ended the first lap in ninth place. During the second lap, we carefully began to move up. Molaye deftly put a bike in a ravine with a sharp bump and we passed another bike, riding on an almost vertical steep bank, (it seemed, anyway). She didn't knock them, instead, keeping them on the track to shield us (as Molaye explained later) from the five bikes that were now trailing us.
By the time we started the final lap, we were close behind the leading six. It'd be a dog fight from here on in. I was little more than a thoughtless motor running on pure adrenalin, but Molaye was keenly in the game, so we would surge ahead when Molaye saw an opening, using her extensive moon-buggy racing skills to hit the bike at just the right moment, sending them flying in the light gravity towards the woods or ravines. 'Now!' she'd pant and I'd put what little reserve I had into pedaling – clash, bang, an elbow to the shoulder and the opposing tri-bike would be spinning behind us, half the time to be hit again by a following pack.
As the end loomed, we were in fifth place, with the four leading bikes weaving back and forth, nose to tail, looking for an opening, but saving what extra oomph they had for the final straightaway where there'd be no time for a comeback. We were tapping the fourth bike's bumper looking for an angle as we careened down the final hill. The bike's pilot, Captain Storie, glanced back to see who was making trouble. I grinned, or at least grimaced.
Storie, like all the drivers, took up half of the trail, weaving to try to prevent a competitor from slipping around by going off the trail, especially when there wasn't a steep hill, a sharp ravine, or trees close alongside the trail, which wasn't often. The last straightaway was open on both sides, so the lead bikes could race side-by-side, though the advantage would be to the bikes on the trail rather than in the surrounding grass, which is why the leaders were content to just keep on each other’s tail until that final sprint. But Molaye wasn't.
We made our first move at the second to the last turn, which briefly allowed a bike to leave the track entirely to get around a bike before it closed in again before the final bend and open straightaway. Molaye feinted a dash to the inside of Storie's bike, and when Storie weaved inside to block us, we braked briefly and shot alongside on the outside. We were wheel to wheel for a second as the trees loomed, but managed to bull our way back onto the track and slip our two forward wheels ahead of theirs. Storie and I were shoulder to shoulder and working our elbows to try to push each other off, until we reached the straightaway, when Molaye pulled out the last of her reserve energy and the sprint began with a gasped 'All out Captain!'
She steered us onto the grass and flew, as the three other leaders spread out in the final sprint. We had a little lead over Storie next to us, so Molaye began to edge in to cut her off, forcing her to edge in as well. We were ahead of her for fourth place, but that wasn't enough for Molaye, since the three leading bikes were only a nose ahead. Ten meters before the finish line, she pulled her old moon buggy trick, turning sharply into the leading bikes, locking wheels as every leading bike crunched together, the pack unable to edge away, which swung our edge of the pack just enough ahead to carry our starboard wheel over the finish line half a meter ahead of the tangled pack.
Judging from the loud remarks coming from the tangled pack, I was far from certain the rules against murder – if they existed at all – still applied. Molaye wasn't intimidated. She was delighted. She'd add the Florka Bonanza Cup to her collection. If we lived. Molaye, however, possessed a certain hard-edged jauntiness that gives everyone, including her captain, pause before crossing her. She ignored the simmering hostility and, with her cheerful good spirits and tales of her moon buggy racing exploits, brought them around to accepting their defeat – at the hands of a pro. This proved to be enough of a balm for their bruised egos that they were standing her celebratory drinks after the award ceremony. I found, however, that reminding Storie that our victory was a G
uild triumph, did nothing to brighten her mood.
'Next time, Wilcrofter, it'll be in the ravine at my first opportunity,' she said grimly. 'Guild solidarity be damned.'
'There won't be a next time, Jyn, if I can help it. I'm keeping the festival dates on my calendar, just to be certain.'
We departed Plyra six days after the end of Founder's Festival with 77 containers, bound for Baidora. We'd sold half of our remaining trade goods at a handsome profit and there'd been no sign of St Bleyth, so I was feeling pretty braced – once we cleared Plyra without an Order frigate on our tail. Bound for the Unity, at last!
Riv, Lilm, Myes and Botts finished constructing Botts II during the passage. It was interesting to note how easily Botts now fits into our little society. If it's not sentient, it certainly has a first class pseudo-sentient interface, since it acts like and is accepted as just another shipmate. It certainly helped that it was always lending a hand to everyone in their tasks even when it was conning the ship. Plus, it can converse with you on any subject and has an endless supply of almost believable yarns from its spacefaring days of old. We certainly didn't need new crew members, with it on board, but if I wanted to continue operating as a Guild ship, I'd have to add at least two to meet Guild requirements. Finding the right two was going to be a challenge.