Rote To Dzuerongvoe

[The Pakkrat]

* * *

Hew Hollowton had thought the skimming went well. But the delays in finding Far Orbit only gave Capt. Gankinra more time to survey and map the mainworld below the Safari Ship. It took two planetary Ship’s Boats as his guiding wingVargr to get a proper final approach vector for atmospheric reentry. By that time, Shaa was glaring at the Ursa. He sank deeper into his brown pelt as he pushed the controls down for the ride through the ionosphere of the Twilight Zone mainworld.

But the time the Visor displayed the Oesar Gin Due Valleyport on its boards and his heads-up display, the Vargr escort were trading Human jokes because they had assumed Shaa was the only race aboard the Safari Ship. The Vilani had to endure racial slurs and doubts of Humaniti piloting because of his stick mismanagement.

“I hope the Computer thinks you’ve improved at helm control by your birthday, Mr. Hollowton,” remarked Shaa with a jab from Hew’s right.

“I do too, Captain,” agreed Hew. The helm station was his only rated position other than damage control. If he was to continue as Shaa’s helmsman, he needed to log some time in simulations.

Into a hangar facing the sunside from the western face of a mountain, Hew planted the Panas Gankinra to the giggling escort of the Ship’s Boat pilots. By the time the Comms chatter had died down, even the Tower Traffic Controllers were belly laughing from all the Human jokes shared over the airways. It was a devious loss of communications discipline. But with little to no interstellar traffic to manage, everyone on the ground knew everyone in the skies and in orbit.

The humor at Capt. Gankinra’s expense did gloss over the Law Level background check which of course yielded nothing of use against Shaa and her ship. Hew went to pop the airlock open to the hangar and greet the giggling ground crew hooking up umbilical power from the Tech 8 systems.

Guidance for the final approach costed the ship extra, totaling Berthing all the way up to an equivalent of Cr6000 which earned Hew another silent glare from Shaa.

Standard Atmosphere a little on the muggy, warm side greeted the Ursa as he extended the balcony for Passenger disembarking. Shaa and a mute Qithka were present to thank the Middle Passengers for flying with the Panas Gankinra. Hew could not keep a scowling threat from his face as the merchant Oung was discharged to the hangar deck.

All four of the Low Passengers were revived by the doc and given their disposable travel mug of a warm drink for discharge. Hew noted that the Cym-Vargriform had not yet lost a sleeper since he was consigned to the Panas Gankinra. A small measure of envy for Zhem rippled through Hew as he put feet on the deck to help Qithka unload the ship of Freight and speculative cargo. This time, he made sure Qithka strapped on her Combination-10 (a Respirator and Filter mask) to ward her from any residual Attractant that had set her on a mating prowl.

Sunlight broke through the raging clouds to the west as beams of light played over the mountain face. To the north and south were seen the turmoil of raging water cycle storms. Everywhere else was coated with ice fields breaking off icebergs and setting them floating west to melt on the dayside.

As weird as this Twilight Zone mud ball was, Hew was glad to breathe fresh air though it was warm and humid. He was joined by Zhem as Hew and Qithka offloaded Quality Foodstuffs and the hated pheromonal Attractants.

Hew wanted but failed to despise the Vargr race as a whole if it took pheromonal aromatics to get their females in the mood, even if a population needed to grow. It seemed disingenuous to the Ursa. But then, who was he to judge since he’d allowed a disguised Human Solomani to seduce him? With the Freight hauled out of the hangar by hired claws, Hew Hollowton was glad to be rid of the stuff. He took time hosing down the cargo hold that had contained the leaking concentrated aromatic. He did not need to see Qithka in that state ever again. Just the night he’d brought her the metal folding fans had been enough. Innocent and in her undies was where Hew would draw the line.

Given liberty to walk the undermountain Terminal with his Peacekeeper slung, Hew surprised the joking Vargr of the Downport on his way to find a restaurant. Oesar Gin Due was a Captured world so Qithka had said. Some Governor had been given the reins on this mud ball. While Capt. Gankinra was conducting local Trade and Qithka sought out information on the relationship of this non-aligned, conscripted world, Hew sat down to his first of three entrees. The Vargr around him paused their meals to see an Ursa for the first time sitting on the floor instead of breaking a Vargr chair.

Thankfully, the menu offered from the waif of a Vargr girl waitress had pictures. A few points of his claw for his selection sent her off to the kitchen. He needed to learn Gvegh or get a translator or endure a Wafer Jack implant or something.

 

[The Pakkrat]

* * *

“How come Hew gets liberty alone and I have to bring Zhem with me?” asked Qithka with an edge of complaint to her voice at Capt. Gankinra. She and the Vilani had spent the last few hours in the Commons, both online with the local planetary network. The Tech 8 net had a much better response time than Kfolaell at Tech 7. Shaa had landed 120% on the Quality Bulk Foodstuffs and still was unhappy about it. She had scored Ki57,600, Kings being the Aegadh denomination and a holdover from centuries of occupation by the Thirz Empire. Aegadh had simply not changed the name of their currency.

When Shaa did finally look up from her Portable Controller linked to the Ship’s Computer linked to an outside line via the umbilical power and supplementary connectors, Qithka asked, “Is it because I’m young or maybe female?”

“Yes and yes,” answered the Human grandmother. “There’s still ten tons of concentrated sex gas out there and you’ve proven susceptible to it already. You take Zhem with you. Step off this boat without him and don’t come back, Qithka02 Cannagrrh. Using her full name shot Qithka backward through the centuries since the Dame’s dam had been the last parent to call her by her full name, adding 02 only adding weight snapping her back to the present.

Qithka had gotten nowhere with the net, inquiries to Administration, requests to the local bureaucracy, and laughs from Vargr over her antiquated accent. She needed information on Aegadh from Oesar Gin Due. Qithka huffed in frustration. Logic had won out. “Fine. I’ll take Zhem with me.”

“And your Pistol, girl,” added Shaa.

“What are you, my dam?” Qithka barked.

“I’m your Captain and those are my rules, Freightmaster,” reminded Shaa who closed down her Portable after sealing the deal of the day’s inbound trade. Qithka had learned by now that Shaa liked to sell goods on one day, sleep on it, and then take on outgoing trade the following day.

Qithka turned with a growl only to hear the Vilani grandmother call after her, “And put on more clothes!” Qithka had put poncho over her lilac unitard since it was a wet and warm day on the Green Band with the hangar blast doors closed. She had intended to stay undermountain and go to the local Lone Star, the gathering tavern for spacers, Travellers, merchants and other off-worlders.

“Fine, dam!” She stepped into and zipped up her Quilt-9, an improved version of ballistic Cloth-8 of which featured the Panas Gankinra insignia and logo, branding Qithka did not want right now. Over her Quilt was slung the lavender poncho for good measure. Lastly, Qithka fitted Malice onto her belt at the small of her back. About the time she was through changing outfits, Zhem met her at her Cabin door as if he had an appointment.

Making sure to pass the gatekeeper Vilani, Qithka and Zhem departed the Safari Ship when she received an approving nod from Shaa. The hangar crews parted like an earthquake to see the gleaming Vargriform dressed in a Heavy Duster, kilt and a hat. Though the Wilds were still space-worthy out of Oesar Gin Due, Robots that wore clothes were a disturbing sight that drew attention rather than caused Qithka to be ignored.

Tunnels from the Concourse of the Downport Terminal connected the Startown which was partially domed in the side of the mountain while side passages led to residences, entertainment and the upstairs Naval Base with military hangars for spaceships. Qithka read the signs and then chose the Startown. Once she reached the cavernous warren, she noticed the polarizing dome darkened to opaque or lightened to transparent depending on a Vargr Personal Day number of hours. This was an adaptation for new settlers from Aegadh to acclimate to a Twilight Zone mainworld with a bright Red homestar.

Legwork was on Qithka’s itinerary. Following the somewhat concrete lettering in current Gvegh fonts, Qithka took Zhem with her to the Lone Star just inside the warren half-dome in the side of the Downport mountain. Already present was a post work shift crowd, a healthy population with which Qithka could work for the answers she sought.

Though alcohol was denied Qithka, she played the part of a bright-eyed teenager with a Robotic hulk for a chaperone by adding a Big-Chug soda pop.

 

[The Pakkrat]

Qithka soon learned that there was an unseen partition between in-system workers, pilots and business that pushed aside interstellar Travellers. Most in the Lone Star were polite to a young Vargr and willing to small talk with her tower of metal shadowing Qithka.

Qithka had to remind herself of this Pastoral Age, a time where, the Wilds are not worth it. Stay home, stay safe was the attitude. It took some digging in the establishment before Qithka was able to scrum up data on Aegadh. Rather than sit down and scrutinize the UWP, Qithka sat at a barstool and watched the crowd. This was when she learned that there was an element of pocket resistance of Dzen Aeng Kho loyalists incensed that non-aligned Aegadh had taken Oesar Gin, occupied and developed the world, and renamed it Oesar Gin Due. From what Qithka could remember, this new occupation was an upgrade even if it bit a little on her patriotic tail.

"Are you and your Robot looking for work, miss," asked one Gvegh Vargr, a rather vainly dressed Rogue. Qithka's inner Dame spotted the charismatic outfit color palette. The Traveller Qithka felt a Patron opportunity and stayed to listen to the pitch. Her Entertainer field correspondent wanted a piece of the action as well.

"Maybe," said Qithka before sipping her Big-Chug through the Vargr straw like a teenager that she was and was not.

"Innocent job really," said the Rogue who sat upright and more formal now that he had young Qithka's attention. "I need a lost UPP Card. Two days ago, the Society Resistance hit a VIP snowtractor headed along the dusk edge of the Band." Qithka reminded herself that the duskside meant colder temperatures on this Hot and Twilight Zone world. The 'Band' was short for Green Band, the ring of tolerable temperatures on Oesar Gin Due. When the Rogue pitching the job saw he had not lost Qithka's attention, he continued the mission, "It's not mine, but the Resistance killed everyone on that snowtractor. I only want the UPP Card of the former Starport Admin Exec, the former Warden."

"You want his access codes before they get changed," nodded Qithka. Her response drew a blush under the tawny facial fur of the Rogue. He held up his claws in a hushing gesture. This was now a secret and timed mission, Qithka gathered. She nodded in understanding. Hush-hush.

"Nothing illegal mind," backpedaled the Rogue. "A UPP Card needs to be recovered and it looks good on public paper to recover it. I'm offering Ki17,000 if you can go out to the snowtractor wreck, poke about and see if you can find the Card. The Society Resistance took just about everything else, but they did not know who was riding inside it."

Seventeen-thousand Aegadh Kings sounded a bit much for a high-tech piece of plastic owned by a dead Warden. The codes the former Warden must be worth ten times that much.

Qithka turned the Patron job over in her head, letting the gears grind. Was this Rogue part of the Society Resistance or someone in the pay of the Governor trying to recover sensitive access codes? Whose side was he on? Who would benefit from the codes on the lost UPP Card? She asked, "Are you sure the Card is still at the site?"

"These resistors scavenge what every they can find, but the codes have not been used yet telling me that it's still out there on the ice shelf coast. The road is moved east every so often when the shelf fractures. So, I have little time before that snowtractor gets dumped into the waters."

He was Government. The Entertainer interviewing spotted the clue leaked by this Patron. The codes had not been used yet. Who in the resistance movement could know that?

Qithka could not know the exact position of the lost snowtractor unless she accepted the mission. She received no response from the monolithic Zhem standing behind her and watching the exchange. This must be new to the Cym on a personal, face-to-face encounter. She could not know the Cym's history in whatever previous forms the meta-identity took before his Move to a Vargr Robot chassis.

A UPP Card could not be hacked. It was a Read-Only device by swipe scanners that confirmed a sought-after digit on the long identity string of its owning sophont. There would be no copying the codes from the UPP Card.

"Just the Card, right?" asked Qithka.

"I only want the UPP Card of the former Warden," nodded the Rogue Patron. "Anything else you see is fair game."

"This sounds easy enough for you to do the task, sir." Qithka added the sir to keep up the act of an adolescent being hired for guttersnipe retrieval of a single piece of high-tech plastic.

"Yeah, I know," agreed the Patron. "But I'm a little high-profile, my Ship's Boat is not usable and I don't want any publicity or this to hit the local news nets. Quiet Card-fetch, is all. Perfect for a young white-pelt, eh?" The Traveller in Qithka said for her to avoid trouble. This was local and could land Qithka in jail if she handed over the Card to just anyone offering Kings and desiring confidential results.

"How long before the Downport Admin changes the local codes?" asked Qithka. The question seemed probing, but Qithka was the Traveller and could always walk away from this opportunity. She did not need the money, but opportunity knocks only once in a while. The Panas Gankinra would not lift again until Shaa had conducted outgoing Trade if she could.

"I've got about 48 hours left before some desk jockey gets around to updating everyone's codes here." The Rogue was starting to see young Qithka with a new appreciation for a teenager with this line of questioning. "You ever done this kind of work before, miss?"

"Maybe," answered Qithka with a pouting voice she now knew to be heavily accented to the ears of the Pastoral Age.

Qithka ran over the logistics of such a mission. She had no vehicles though she could kit for a walkabout along the colder edge of the Green Band on Oesar Gin Due. The Patron was not going to give her the coordinates of the wreck until she agreed to the mission. And it sounded like the attack site was less than a Day from the Downport along the ice shelf. The Rogue before her needed the rest of the time to actually use the dead Warden's UPP Card for whatever nefarious access he had in mind or keep it from being used.

The Grav-ball game displayed on the overhead sports monitors was in the first quarter and drawing the attention of the locals enjoying after work dinners and drinks. Amid the cheering of an early goal, Qithka agreed to the Patron mission. A ride out on the ice shelf sounded like a diversion from interstellar travel. Zhem behind her did not protest. The Cym was seeking any kind of new experience as a walking, talking sophont.

Clasping claws with Qithka, the Rogue panted with his tongue lolling out amid the team chants at the goal on the screens, "Thank you, miss. Meet me at Hangar C-1 to deliver. My Boat is there." At that, the Patron slipped out as the crowd watched the next serve to begin another play. Qithka hit the Ladies Room to reset herself before returning to the Terminal with her gathered Aegadh data.

Returning to the Panas Gankinra, the adventurer in Qitha02 Cannagrrh surfaced. Instead of in-town wear, she took a cue from her great uncle Gevaudan. With a trigger-happy resistance movement that could not see the good the Aegadh occupation was doing for Oesar Gin Due, a colder side environment and a fragile ice shelf soon to fracture within a month, Qithka decided on her AHVSV-13. The Advanced Heavy VaccSuit for Vargr she had been fitted for on Tech 16 Pandrin was indicated. Qithka knew that though the mainworld was on the Hot edge of the Habitable Zone, it was still pretty cold on the dusk edge of the Green Band on a Twilight Zone planet Locked to its homestar. Armor was heavy but Qithka would rent a snowtractor for a faked commute to a worksite.

When Zhem could not fit in the passenger seats of the snowtractor, Qithka had him crouch in the cargo bed. She took a small delivery load in the vehicle to Marker Three South, just a World Hex short of the mission wreck. She could have the workers offload their needs and then continue south along the ice shelf. The plan fell into place though Qithka received incredulous looks as a teenager and her pet Robot sought a day job employment in delivering equipment and supplies to the site.

The very visible, off-worlder Vaccsuit also caught attention labeling Qithka as a Traveller. Who local owned an AHVSV-13 and wore it planetside? Qithka brushed off the stares and hushed questions as a light blizzard blew more snow easterly and onto the ice shelf. Temporary and movable road markers were bright chemical lights alongside the path through the snow. Windshield wipers swished repeatedly like a cadence as Qithka drove the snowtractor. Outside and on the emptied cargo bed was Zhem likely watching the horizon for trouble. She had never asked him for his Sensors capabilities.

Keeping the sickly industrial yellow chemical lights between the snowtractor and the coastline, Qithka murmured the old mantra of Zhevra's, "Gev's HEV is Orange. His eyes are ocean blue." The saying had no real meaning, but voicing it anyway was comforting. It had been the anchor for Zhevra Cannagrrh to hold it together. The mantra had done so for Qithka01 Cannagrrh too. Today on the road south, Psion Qithka02 Cannagrrh gave the saying voice.

 

[The Pakkrat]

The Artemis Group used to snicker or laugh at Senior Scout Gevaudan Cannagrrh for his constant dress loadout in his Hostile Environment Vaccsuit Vargr-14. As a spacer, the Scout wore it everywhere and heedless of dress codes, mainworld Tech Levels, polite society, or environment. The now great uncle had been saved by the chosen armor more than three times in his adventures during the Fifth Frontier War. More painful memories...

Soon enough past the worksite delivery, Qithka and Zhem spotted the snow-covered wreck of the attacked snowtractor.

The Society Resistance had been thorough. The wreck was a skeletal hulk of what could not be hauled off now covered in a bank of snow on the windy side facing the coast. Hills and snow dunes dotted the landscape further inland toward the nightside with the Frozen Lands on the horizon.

Pulling over and off the trench road being filled with blizzard snow, Qithka and Zhem dropped from their snowtractor and approached the wreck. It was the same model as her rental. But when she reached 50 meters from the derelict vehicle, she was confronted by a single Gvegh Vargr male dressed in Mesh-7 and a Heavy Coat-2 against the winds coming off the ice shelf coast. A Body Pistol was in the scavenger's claw, drawn and pointed at Qithka.

"Th-that's close enough!" called the older Vargr. He looked older to Qithka, though she knew that inside she had the scrounger Citizen by centuries. "I'll shoot if you come any closer!" He had to yell above the winds and the snowfall.

"No trouble!" answered Qithka through the gusts of wind. "Take what you want," she added. "We're just passing through." She hoped the lie would get the male to lower that pistol. Zhem however was having none of that. The gleaming, frosted Vargriform interposed his duster-draped chassis between Qithka and the scavenger.

Qithka misread the male's threat. Hoping to close the gap to the wrecked snowtractor, she saw the Body Pistol aimed at her behind the robotic cover. Perhaps she was misread as an easy, roadside mark, a teenager in an expensive Vaccsuit with an available rental vehicle to boot.

When the older Vargr pulled the trigger on the Body Pistol, catching both Qithka and Zhem flat-footed, nothing happened. The weapon was not Cold Insulated, the frost jamming the slide bar. The weapon never fired.

Before Qithka could act, Zhem charged the scrounger. A combination of running leap aided by the Vargriform's integral Lifter put the Burst Mode hulk before the surprised male. Zhem seized him by the Heavy Coat and lifted him well above the snow drifts as he crunched down next to the derelict snow.

Qithka had to wade through the hip-deep snow while drawing Malice her Accelerator Pistol. It too was not Cold Insulated and she guessed she would get only one shot before Malice might complain of the environment. "Malice," she voiced aloud to unlock the weapon's safety usage option. But the encounter was largely over before she could aim the claw-cannon.

"Don- don't kill me!" whined the scavenger.

With Zhem dangling the male in his manipulator grasp and claws extended from his free 'hand' becoming deadly Vargriform claws, Qithka shouted, "Just hold him, Zhem." She then diverted to search the wreck.

The Society Resistance had done a thorough job in the attack. The wrecked snowtractor was stripped of every system, component and spare parts available. Qithka found what she was looking for under the very back passenger seats. Below the bloody and frosted bench was a shattered Comm device, a belt pouch containing the Warden's photos, a worry stone, a wallet opened and emptied of cash Kings. But cast aside were business cards, Starport meal chits, and his UPP Card. Qithka pouched all these items then exited the derelict.

Zhem had the scrounger up high, too far to let the poor elder stand. The Body Pistol had been wrested from Vargr to Robot. "What about him?" asked the Cym.

Qithka dug out her cash Kings, the remainder of her Lone Star spree. She gave them to the old local once Zhem lowered him. "The wreck was picked clean already, codger," explained Qithka. "Here's for the gun and your trouble. Go home or back to work. This is ambush country."

The hundreds of Kings cash stunned the scavenger whom the pair left in the blizzard. The drive back north through an icy sleet storm following the blizzard made Qithka glad of the vehicle heater.

"He could have shot you, Qithka," complained Zhem when the pair turned in the rental vehicle to the bay in the foot of the mountain housing the Downport.

"Yes, but his gun jammed in the cold," agreed Qithka. "The rating of the weapon was never going to penetrate this Vaccsuit, Zhem. The old one did not count on meeting an off-worlder in high-tech armor. I knew I was safe, safer with you being so brave." The last bit was voiced damsel-ish from Qithka though Zhem knew that she had three lives inside her pelt as indicated by her tail rings.

Zhem tried another tail wag. She could not tell if the Cym-Robot was truly complimented or simply trying more emotes routines.

Qithka handed over the UPP Card to Zhem and said, "Here. Take it to Admin. The Warden's family will want his things. I'll go to the meeting and forfeit the mission. Let the cops jump us and arrest us if they have to, but get the Warden's stuff to Admin."

"Are you sure about this?" asked Zhem receiving the pouch of wallet, Card, and sundries.

"It was an outing," nodded Qithka. "Now if the Resistance had showed up, maybe the compensation would have balanced the repair or medical bills. I guess we'll never know."

"That...that is logically very altruistic of you, Qithka," judged Zhem aloud. Then the Cym-Robot trudged off to the Downport Administration and Services office adjacent the actual Terminal. Qithka parted and made way to the meeting hangar.

Finally away from Zhem, Qithka detoured to the Panas Gankinra to deposit Malice, the Body Pistol and empty her pouches of anything that could be confiscated. Law Enforcement had a way of keeping their finds after an arrest. She decided to be temporarily bankrupt of Kings for the coming rendezvous with the Patron now that she had bought off the scavenger and surrendered the mission target to proper authorities.

Qithka managed an in-and-out of the Safari Ship so that she could stealthily bypass Granny Shaa. The Vilani was likely taking a sleep since the ship was quiet of both her and the Ursa Hew Hollowton.

Qithka pretended to wipe her claw palm across her brow when she was truly performing her somatic to open her Psi-Perception. Through the personnel blast door of Hangar C-1, she focused the Psi-Sense.

There sat a Vargr Ship's Boat, the kind of spaceship pilots with a system license flew. Air and orbital space had plenty of traffic on Oesar Gin Due. Just no interstellar traffic. The craft looked like any other space commuter.

From the portside airlock walked the Rogue Patron. The swagger and paralanguage telegraphed an incoming swindle. He was the only sophont, the only lifesign Qithka registered.

In Qithka's free claw she held her own UPP Card, carrying it as if it was the dead Warden's ID. Seeing her claw holding it, the Rogue Patron looked hopeful. Qithka found herself hoping the cops interrupted before the transaction.

"Did you find it?" asked the Roguish Patron. He looked eager to use the access codes stored on the dead Warden's UPP Card. Qithka could not see any cash Kings in his claws, the Ki17,000 he had offered for the mission.

"Maybe," answered Qithka adopting a teenager's gait, voice and bounce in her stance. "Is this it?" She offered up her own Card. Eagerly, the male pilot snatched up the ID.

Qithka watched as the Patron read her UPP Card. A look of confusion blossomed on his canine features. The tawny pelt furrowed brows in deeper confusion.

"This isn't the Warden's Card," said the Rogue. "This-, is this your Card?"

"Money first?" suggested Qithka with a childish bent to her question.

Looking at the Card in his claws, the Rogue looked at Qithka, then to the Card, and a last time at Qithka. "Is this you, little sister?"

Then the cops overrode the Personnel blast door to Hangar C-1. In poured Vargr Security with weapons drawn. Behind them trudged the hulking Zhem.

"More like your grandmother seven times over," finished Qithka as her claws came up in surrender before the cops taking firing stances and barking commands to fall prone to the deck at Qithka and the Rogue.

The Rogue raised his claws after dropping Qithka's UPP Card to the hangar deck. The arrest went according to standard operations from there. Lady cops arrested almost-minor Qithka while the heavier troops clapped the Rogue in restraints.

"You tricked me!" howled the Rogue who was hauled out of the hangar first. Though Qithka was never going to be paid in the promised Kings, she had bought her freedom through Zhem who had fed the entire story to the authorities. For the first few minutes, Qithka looked like any other minor under arrest for shoplifting or vandalism or other misdemeanor. The Rogue's Boat was impounded. Qithka was escorted in restraints all the way back to the Panas Gankinra, keeping up appearances that she was to be processed. Behind them all trudged Zhem towering over the lady cops.

 

[The Pakkrat]

"Try not to do that again," moaned the female Sergeant. "But thanks for recovering the Warden's things. His family will be thankful though his body was likely tossed over the shelf and into the sea." Qithka's UPP Card was returned.

The only thing left for Qithka was to explain herself. Capt. Gankinra stood at the top of the balcony before the airlock of the Safari Ship. Lady cops regarded the Human Vilani and the high-tech starship as the Sergeant freed Qithka of her restraints. The ruse was over and Qithka was released to Shaa Gankinra. Zhem and Qithka spent the next hour telling Shaa the story.

"...but at least I got the data on Aegadh," offered Qithka in an attempt at damage control.

"And she did a nice thing," added Zhem. Capt. Gankinra paid more attention to Zhem than Qithka as if the family robot were more honorable than the itinerant teenager, (who was mentally older than anyone aboard the Safari Ship).

"Go to your room and update the starchart, young lady," commanded Granny Shaa. Qithka noted the quirky half-smile of the Human as she boarded the starship and retreated to her Cabin for the task and a sleep.

 

[The Pakkrat]

* * *

Shaa Gankinra did her next-day trading while Qithka slept. Four hours sleep and the Relict Clone was bright-eyed and literally bushy-tailed. At 53, Shaa envied the adolescent Vargr for such vigor. Though she was an early riser, Shaa was not a Morning Person. Coffee and breakfast saw the Vilani grandmother to the table to wake up with the first cup. But Qithka had better have that starchart ready for her Captain when she next stepped from her crew Cabin. Shaa hurried through breakfast set out by Zhem who never slept and was all the more enviable. Shaa buddied instead with Hew Hollowton. The Marine finished off what Shaa could not as well as his own plate. The two then hit the Freight Yard and the Cargo Market together. There was not much conversation though the Ursa did not distract Shaa from her trading. Incredulous looks were aimed at the Brown Bear ethnicity rather than the Human for a change. Vargr everywhere marveled at the sight of Lt. Hollowton.

Shaa landed twelve tons of Freight that was again a load owned by one of her Passengers. The Quality Echostones were novelties for their mineral properties to echo sounds seconds to minutes after exposure to them. Contained in soundproof packing the crystalline beauties were conversation pieces that looked like shiny, porous scoria or pumice stones. How the Echostones caught and repeated sounds was a mystery to Shaa Gankinra, but she signed on the harmless Freight anyway.

With only eight tons available in the cargo hold, the remainder of the hold taken by emergency goods for probing the Wilds, Shaa discovered unsold Quality Meson Barriers. Who had a Meson Gun or Deep Meson Guns or Meson Communicators this far coreward and into the deep Wilds? But that was what was on the menu in the Cargo Market, so Shaa took in the eight tons out of need to fill a void. Crew tended to play microgravity handball in the cargo hold if she did not find a way to fill it.

The Low Passengers were glossed over as Vargr popsicles of no concern once they were laid down for cryo-sleep. Shaa consulted the Middle Passengers who she had sold passage. Three male Vargr and one female, and only one was boring enough to call a general passage. The owner of the Quality Echostones was the female Gvegh Scrounger with a bushy tail. Pretty, Shaa guessed for a Vargr with confident Vargr Charisma. The long-eared chap looked eager to leave because he kept looking over his shoulder and then checking any nearby clocks. Shaa wondered what the listener was avoiding. Finally was the cringing, low-Charisma, corporate, Contingency Expert returning to Aegadh, likely for having made wrong choices. As Captain of the Panas Gankinra Shaa would learn more at First Meal.

Shaa welcomed aboard the Middle Passengers while Zhem laid down the Low Berth sleepers. She was inwardly glad to finally break even with Passenger Demand for once. She had begun to believe that a Safari Ship was viewed by the Wilds as too adventurous for an interstellar commuter.

Across the Galley-Commons on the lower deck, Shaa spied yawning Qithka02 Cannagrrh emerging from her Cabin. Portable Controller in her claws, the antique mind in a teenager’s body nodded in greeting to Shaa. Also presented was the updated starchart. Meeting in the Galley partition, Qithka warmed a breakfast while Shaa looked over the updated data on Aegadh two parsecs distant.

“Course for Aegadh innermost Gas Giant pathed, Captain,” reported Qithka. “Aegadh is not the Temple world it used to be, but it will be worth the extra jump.”

Where did she get all that energy? While the Personal Day for Humaniti lasted longer, Vargr flagging after only twelve hours, it took only a couple of four-hour naps to revitalize the canids. And as a teenager, Qithka was practically sparkly upon rising. She had slept, updated the starchart from her info run yesterday, and had Astrogation pathing submitted to the Ship’s Computer for confirmation. To be so young again!

Shaa was doing good to choke down a painkiller with the last of her coffee as she stepped forward and upstairs to the Bridge. She had to signal Tower Vargr that she intended to lift soon. Behind her, Qithka was bowing and greeting the Middle Passengers. “Welcome aboard, Honorable Aerrghrrue.” Shaa could never get the rolling ‘rr’ of the Vargr perfected, but the Relict Clone had no trouble with her antique Gvegh accent which sounded so much more formal and proper, a regional accent out of time.

This was Qithka’s space, but it was not her time. The Relict Clone received interested stares from the Middle Passengers as Qithka did her Steward best alongside Zhem. For Shaa, talking to the Tower was more technical and official. “Tower, KFK-BL333 Panas Gankinra loading hold and Passengers for outbound to jump point, destination Aegadh. Lift window?”

Hew Hollowton stepped all-fours onto the Bridge and took his usual helm couch to activate his Control Console. “Pre-Flight Checks this time, Lieutenant.”

“Aye, Captain.”

Shaa spotted Qithka and Zhem using electric powered jacks to load the sound insulated crates of Freight and the packaged speculatives into the cargo hold. The pair were outside the ship when Shaa heard the ship’s Power Plant start up. Qithka was using her Portable Controller just outside the ship while she aided in positioning each cargo container. Multitasking, Qithka was again accidentally showing her true age beyond her surface teenager seeming.

As she waited for a clearance window of sky traffic above the mountain Downport, Shaa pinged the Active Sensors and had her moment to shine. Through her own skill at SensOps-Astrogation, the Vilani found every VTOL, aircraft, aerodyne, Lifter, and Gravitic signature in the skies above the Downport all the way out to Far Orbit. It was a beautiful thing to catch that many targets at once with a single Active ping of the various boards at her disposal. It got the attention of the Tower finally.

“Lady, your ship is due to lift within the hour. Try not to be so loud on Actives please.” The Sensors Array had complained to Tower of the starship on the ground pinging before lifting.

Shaa smiled to herself. She had target locks on everything that floated, flew, and hovered off the ground.

Hew whistled through his ursine teeth when Shaa slid the Sensors results over to his HUD above his Control Console.

“M-Drive is online, Captain,” reported Hew once he saw his throttle was Green and ready for thrusting. Shaa nodded. More of Qithka’s multitasking as the thump of the closing cargo hold could be heard.

“We’re in and sealed, Captain,” called Qithka over the ship’s crew intercom.

To Shaa, the crew was finally getting the groove of how she wanted her starship run. No so much Vilani traditional mind, but Shaa was happy to see results. Qithka was not cutting corners as allowed by her Portable Controller, but she was showing her true age. The Ursa next to Shaa looked over at her, waiting for the word. The vibration of the Drives invited her to give the command to lift. Soon the skies began to part as craft of all makes opened a traffic hole for the only starship in town this week.

“KFK-BL333 Panas Gankinra, Tower, you are clear to lift for next thirty minutes,” came the call over the Comms.

“Acknowledged, Tower,” said Shaa with some confidence. There was no orbital traffic on Sensors. She took a snapshot still of the boards anyway. “Slow lift only, helm. Take us up friendly and scenic, Lieutenant.”

“Leisure lift, aye,” rumbled the Ursa who grabbed up the Control Console sticks.

The skies before the forward viewport transpex were blessedly clear, the radar showing a part in the water cycle storms to north and distant south. Beams of daylight reached down to the mountain Downport and the ice shelf frozen around it.

From the mountain hangar, the Panas Gankinra glided out and up from the deck and into the skies. Clouds sank below the climbing Safari Ship. “Cell to Space Sensors,” commanded Shaa. Then she used the World Sensors to snap stills of Oesar Gin Due as it grew smaller to aft of the thrusting vessel.

“Compliance,” answered the Panas AI. “Cell to Space Sensors. No contacts.”

Twilight zone world sky spectra gave way to the starry field of space when the Safari Ship attained orbit.

“Helm, take us toward the local Gas Giant,” commanded Shaa. “We don’t need to skim, but we can burn some time as the confirmation calculates by appearing as if we need to skim for fuel. Any Corsairs will see our vector for the Gas Giant and assume such.”

“Gas Giant vector, aye,” answered the Ursa turning the ship in an arc toward the blue-green Giant on the Scopes data fed to his Heads-Up Display.

 

[The Pakkrat]

The trip outward from the Red main sequence glare would take 22 hours, burning most of the time to hear an answer from the Panas AI, a scenic system tour and a ruse for any Wilds pirates to stage an ambush already foiled by full fuel tanks. Qithka’s pathing allowed for a jump at 70 Diameters from Oesar Gin Due attained in only eight hours. In a pinch, Shaa could order jump without the confirmation if needed.

Hours later along the in-system commute, Qithka appeared on the Bridge with refreshments on service trays from the Galley. Shaa brightened to the arrival of snacks and fruit drinks. She was beginning to favor the mango iced tea. Swapping boards with the AI, Shaa continued to complete the map of the world-system as the Panas defaulted to World Range Sensors with nothing to report.

Shaa secretly watched the white-pelt Vargr serve to Hew in the helm acceleration couch. The Vilani knew why Qithka had detoured to Aegadh instead of directly plotting for a world more coreward and at three parsecs. Aegadh must be home to another Psionic Institute. While the Panas Gankinra “turned over” for deceleration, Shaa took time to consult what Qithka had learned of Aegadh. True to the Relict Clone’s memory, Qithka had recalled that Aegadh was once High-Population, prime location for attracting students of the weird disciplines that science still could not accept, not fully.

But was Aegadh still home to an Institute here in 1902? This time, Shaa meant to buddy with Qithka when they arrived on the declining mainworld after a week out back.

 

[The Pakkrat]

* * *

Qithka was finally approaching a series of settings she would multitask on her Portable Controller. She sat in the Commons after delivering trays to the Bridge for Hew and Shaa.

The long ears of Middle Passenger, Hon. Thikh seated across from Qithka were well-groomed. She did not approve of the three earrings per length on the Gvegh male. To the elder, inner-Dame's eyes, it made the jacketed Thikh look effeminate though he was handsome. Thikh was visibly working up the nerve to talk to his Steward Qithka. It did not take a Telepath to see a slightly older male measuring his Vargr Charisma against Qithka trying to hide hers.

"The uh- the ship smells new," Thikh opened in saying. "Nice for Humaniti design. I like it."

Though the Safari Ship had no High Passengers, nothing said Qithka could not be pleasant to Middle Passengers. Socially approachable might mean gratuities at journey's end.

"You must not read Anglic, Hon. Thikh," answered Qithka. "The Panas Gankinra is only months completed, very new."

With the initial exchange in Gvegh, both Qithka and Thikh had read each other's Charisma through vocabulary and suffixes. They were near equals in Vargr Charisma.

"Is the Captain hiring? Seems roomy for a starship."

"I can broach the topic at First Meal if you like Hon. Thikh," offered Qithka who continued to monitor the Engineering boards on her Portable.

Thikh’s tail wagged a little while he laced his claw digits in studying Qithka. The way he kept looking over his shoulder, his ears flaring to each visitor through the compartments told Qithka that he was hyper vigilant for some inner reason. “I’d like that,” he admitted. Thikh continued to look out the forward observation viewport from the Commons. Ahead was the innermost Gas Giant, growing as the ship commuted outbound.

A minute later while Qithka gently listed the more public details of the Panas Gankinra, in ambled Hew Hollowton on his way from the upstairs Bridge to the crew Common Fresher. Thikh’s ears shot up in alarm to see the massive Brown Bear form on all-fours thumping his foot falls on the lower deck in a break from his position at helm.

Thikh’s jaw fell open in surprise. His eyes became gostritch eggs in beholding the huge Ursa traversing the Galley-Commons. When Hew disappeared into the Common Fresher, he asked, “What in the Ancients was that?”

“That was our Pilot-Security Officer, Marine Lieutenant Hew Hollowton,” nodded Qithka at the door which closed on the Common Fresher. “He is an Ursa, Hon. Thikh. Have you never encountered an Ursa?”

“N-never,” stuttered Thikh. “Claws. Is he a carnivore?” Fear mixed with curiosity echoed in Thikh’s voice.

“Ursa are omnivores,” said Qithka. “I think Lt. Hollowton prefers spiced megasalmon, but he does enjoy a good Vargr steak with me in restaurants. Salads too.”

“D-do Ursa eat Vargr?” Thikh worried aloud.

Done with his Fresher interface, Hew Hollowton appeared again to cross the compartment where Thikh and Qithka sat. In his all-fours walk, Hew craned his head to nod at Qithka, a Security nod asking if all was well. Qithka half-waved a claw and wagged her double-ringed tail in return. Then she struck.

“Lieutenant! Did Ursa ever eat Vargr in the distant past?” The question shocked Thikh into dread of the answer. He looked positively flustered at the spoken question from Qithka.

Hew stopped his lumbering, four-legged gait to consider the question, much to the horror of Hon. Thikh within earshot. Hew was analyzing Qithka’s outdated Anglic accent before answering. Scratching his right ear, the Ursa then answered, “We can I suppose, if things get desperate enough. But I don’t recommend it.” The deep, rumbling voice of Hew Hollowton answering in intelligible Anglic, further took the long-eared Gvegh Vargr aback. This was no trained pet capable of helm control. The Ursa was a sophont.

Then Hew continued to the hatch to climb up a ladder to the upper deck next to the Bridge. When he was gone from sight, Thikh let out a gasp of frightened breath.

“I don’t think broaching the topic with your Captain will be necessary, Steward Qithka,” whimpered Thikh.

He was handsome, but he lacked the Traveller Gene, the bug that drove sophonts from their homeworld. Qithka watched as Thikh picked up his lounge items and retreated to his Passenger Stateroom.

 

[The Pakkrat]

The blue-green Gas Giant of Inner System Oesar Gin Due hung like a ornament decorating the starry sky before the Panas Gankinra. Hours after her prank, Qithka’s Portable Controller lit up with a jump pathing confirmation from the Ship’s Computer. The onboard AI had accepted Qithka’s calculations with indications Green for jump. Already well beyond 70 Diameters of any other star or planetary body, the Panas Gankinra was free to transit out back. Qithka called on the crew intercom, “Captain, we are confirmed by the Panas for jump.”

“About time,” answered Hew over his own Portable Controller.

“Jump protocols, crew,” commanded Shaa Gankinra, her voice sounding Tired to Qithka’s ears.

Qithka returned to Engineering and waited by the holographic Operating Console. “On station and ready,” she declared.

“Vectoring for jump,” added Hew from the Bridge. He had put down his Portable Controller. The laptop-sized devices were capable of controlling many devices aboard the Safari Ship, but actual manual sticks were beyond them.

“Sensors still clear of all objects,” reported Shaa. “Standby for jump once helm has us pointed in the right direction.”

A mesh of blue lines netted the outer hull of the Panas Gankinra as its jump grid lit up to capture a bit of reality with it before the brilliant Size 9 Flash signaled to no one but a sentinel Gas Giant that the Safari Ship had transitioned to jumpspace.

“What does the computer estimate our time out back?” Capt. Gankinra asked now that the crew had waited for the confirmation.

“172 hours, plus or minus one hour, Captain,” answered Qithka from Engineering. She began the routine to stand down the compartment as the jump drive held back the hugging quicksilver jacket about the ship. The Panas Gankinra was only meters from whatever was beyond that undulating, mercurial barrier.

“Sensors confirm us out back,” called Shaa. “All viewports are closed and locked. We are standing down the Bridge.”

Zhem piped up from the intercom, “Dinner, crew?”

“I’m too whupped, doctor,” admitted Shaa as she worked to close down her station.

“I’m starvin’,” admitted Hew Hollowton who was first out of the Bridge from closing down the helm.

As a Steward, Qithka helped Zhem invite the Passengers to a meal though it was not First Meal. With Hew gobbling up his share and polishing off the pre-sleep nibbles of the Vilani, Qithka shooed the Ursa to his Cabin as Zhem brought out the frightened Middle Passengers. They too had caught glimpses of the Brown Bear form moving through the compartments.

Of the four Passengers, Qithka found Thikh hardest to extricate from his Stateroom. The only female of the four was Honorable Aerrghrrue, a tawny Gvegh Vargr with a bushy tail. Though the other males were slow to come to dinner prepared by a hulking Vargriform, Aerrghrrue seemed invited by Qithka looking at home in the Galley adjacent to the Passenger Commons. It did not bother her that Zhem stood towering over them and watching reactions to the Cym-Robot’s cooking.

Aerrghrrue as Qithka found while chatting amicably with the Vargr, had listed herself as a commodities Scrounger as well as a Lady Trader. The twelve tones of Quality Echostones were hers to sell on Aegadh. By her upright seating and polite table manners, Aerrghrrue was both successful and Charismatic. She had everyVargr under her seated height including Qithka. She ate first followed by the others and set the first topic by asking in Gvegh, “This is a ship of Travellers, yes?”

“It is, Hon. Aerrghrrue,” answered Qithka02 Cannagrrh. The Dame inside raked Qithka’s innards to outshine this rock peddler, but Qithka02 simply did not have the wherewithal to exude a dead Entertainer’s seeming at the table.

“Pity your Captain retired so early,” said Aerrghrrue as she nibbled at her cubed steak. “I might have a job for a simple pluck on Aegadh.” The Lady Trader had Qithka’s attention but only so much as Vargr Charisma demanded. Politely, the Freightmaster worked on her meal so she had an excuse to leave the table soon.

“Perhaps Capt. Gankinra might hear it at First Meal, Hon. Aerrghrrue,” offered Qithka. Inwardly, Qithka did not want to delay her return home any more than an interlude to a Psionic Institute she hoped remnant on Aegadh. But if Shaa needed something to do for the week, perhaps she might hear Aerrghrrue out.

“It’s nothing much more than a slow-cooled meteor that holds more Echostones, an easy scrounge that fell on rural Aegadh.” The Scrounger teased with another pitch at Qithka. Qithka had let out too much of her own Charisma to clue the Trader that she had Shaa Gankinra’s ear. It was in the paralanguage that most Vargr had to consciously tamp down to hide such clues.

“I won’t be able to join in,” excused Qithka, “but perhaps the Captain might lend service for the right price.” It was polite to leave an answer open ended by tagging it with potential negotiation. With that, Qithka took up her tray and began her turn at dishwashing.

Zhem was across the compartment and taking feedback from the flat-eared, low-Charisma, corporate Contingency Expert who was returning to Aegadh after being sent home by his superiors. Zhem had talked up the poor guy intimidated by a talking, gleaming Robot with a personality inside.

Later, Qithka made her rounds about the compartments. Rather than pressurize the cargo hold and step inside, Qithka checked that she was alone while Zhem watched the lounging and digesting Passengers entertaining themselves. Looking both ways down the corridor, the Psion swiped her claw palm over her eyes in her somatic to Perceive the hold just meters away.

There was not supposed to be a living thing in the cargo according to the Captain’s cargo manifest. Shaa had done the trade on Oesar Gin Due as Qithka did legwork and a personal mission. The doors, bulkheads, walls, and framework became dim to her Perception the ambient Poice lowered to a life force behind her. Before her in the cargo hold was no living auras, satisfying Qithka that no stowaways or critters were hiding in the containers or among the emergency goods taking up half the hold. Only the quiet of inanimate objects were detected by Qithka’s Perception.

About the brightest thing in her field of Poice-view was her own aura. Sliding her claw back down over her eyes, Qithka shut herself off from Psi-Perception, closing her Third Eye as it had been described on Ankhir.

 

[The Pakkrat]

* * *

Nothing had broken. No one got on each other’s nerves. The lift from Oesar Gin Due went according to Vilani tradition and Standard Operations. Shaa noted in her Captain’s Log that she was pleased with the performance of the ship and her crew in departing the mainworld. The deep sleep she had enjoyed was proof of it. In her years as a Merchant-Captain, Shaa Gankinra had much choice in her crew and she had been picky about who to hire. Now in 1902 and in stepping off, the grandmother had to cut corners in taking on a Relict Clone, an Ursa convict, and a Cym-Robot. Such a breach in Vilani culture had taken its toll on Shaa. Then, with just a little give, she found each had so much to return across the table. The arrival on Oesar Gin Due had gone smoothly. She had conducted trade and passed through Vargr red tape more easily. The lift was beautiful under Red primary skies parting as if the Dakhaseri had made way for the Safari Ship. Shaa found herself happy to rise for the first Day out back. Though still not a Morning Person by far, Shaa was not her usual achy, sour, grump of late.

With no notifications on her Portable Controller, Shaa Gankinra dressed in her Cloth-8 ship uniform and took the slung Controller with her to morning coffee. The Vargr were sound asleep at this hour, the excitement of jump novelty worn off by now. Zhem patrolled the corridors with his usual heavy cadence of ped-falls. Instead, she met Hew Hollowton in the crew side of the Galley-Commons. His big paws were making a mess of coffee preparation. Shaa took pity on the Pilot by tagging in and brewing two huge, strong pots of joe.

Only three of the four Middle Passengers joined the table for First Meal, the traditional dinner hosted by a Vilani ship Captain. Hon. Thikh sat as far away from Lt. Hew Hollowton as he could even though the Ursa was enjoying a salad bowl tonight. The female with the bushy tail, one Qithka named as Hon. Aerrghrrue sat between Qithka and Shaa. This was the merchant who owned the Quality Echostones in the hold. Next to Hew was the shamed corporate Contingency Expert being sent back to Aegadh from Oesar Gin Due.

“…and if the meteor is truly a fallen star of Perfect Echostones, I’d like your ship to go the rural impact site and procure it for me. The locals do not know what they may have on their lands nor should they care. Ranchers and grazing landowners mostly. What do you say, Capt. Gankinra?”

“Tell me,” side-tracked Shaa to Aerrghrrue next to her, “What is so valuable about ‘Perfect Echostones’?”

“Quality Echostones are novelties,” explained the Scrounger between meaty ribs in dry rub, “but Perfect Echostones can capture sounds and voices up to a week old. I’d like to get my claws on that meteorite and process them to determine if Perfection can fall from the stars.”

Shaa’s training in Diplomat and Liaison told her that this was no ordinary Scrounger. The Vargr paralanguage was all wrong. Every salvage Vargr Shaa had ever met was of lower Charisma, opportunistic and territorial, and finally secretive. The way Hon. Aerrghrrue sat upright like a Human at the table with delicate table manners told the Vilani grandmother she was dealing with another identity under the outer Scrounger.

Applications for porous, slow-cool minerals that were both visually pleasing and acoustically enjoyable listed in Shaa’s head as she continued to entertain Middle Passengers. Since she had all week to consider more of Aerrghrrue’s Patron mission to unearth a meteor, Shaa turned her attentions to the other table guests.

Poor Thikh with his ringed ears complimented the Captain for the friendly interior design of the Panas Gankinra. But those same long ears flattened when he heard the deep rumbling voice of the Ursa Hew Hollowton. The Gvegh was afraid of the Brown Bear at the end of the table and sitting on the floor to be short enough to eat and converse in his Anglic. Most of the talk was in Gvegh, so the Pilot was forced to chat with Qithka’s bygone Anglic accent.

Because Qithka would buddy with Hew Hollowton, a side trip with Dr. Zhem to dig up a huge meteorite and load it into the Ship’s Boat might be both lucrative and keep the Relict Clone safe. It was Hew’s turn to follow the out-of-time female around planetside. Zhem had already seen Qithka train in Stage Two of her Psionics, unlocking the Extra-Sensory Perceptions. The Dame in a teen’s body was hiding her use of the disciplines well. Was she holding herself back? Was psionics a bad thing back in her first life?

Everyone at the table thanked Qithka for the dry rub ribs she had prepared at different levels from rare to well done. As a Steward, the white-pelt had polled for preferences, listening to the desires of the crew and Passengers. Hew and Qithka picked up after First Meal. At the sink and washing trays and cookware, Hew thanked Qithka for the salad. It had taken the teenage body both claws to carry the huge bowl from the Galley to the table. Zhem had stood silently in a corner, observing the gathered biologicals take in fuel and a moment to socialize informally. The Cym was still to learn that meals were also times of communication.

Over a post-dinner holovid, a plague outbreak story about some kind of red fungus that could reanimate the dead corpses of sophonts, Shaa decided to put Qithka on trade and commerce while Shaa and Zhem saw to this side interlude mission on Aegadh. It would fill Qithka’s days before and after a week of training. This in turn would grant more time to Shaa and Zhem to dig up the impact site for the meteor, Echostone or not.

 

[The Pakkrat]

* * *

Yeah. Things were settling into a pattern for Hew Hollowton. The Ursa was finding a comfortable niche amid the crew and Passengers. Though that long-eared fop was still deathly afraid of him, Hew simply let it be that Vargr’s problem. He spent free time in the Makershop, cranking out simple metal bases or stands for Echostones samples brought to him by Hon. Aerrghrrue. He slept s quite a bit over jump and had missed his share of holovid nights. The side mission briefing brought to him from Capt. Gankinra was intriguing but he stuck to his guns that it was his turn to buddy up with Qithka. Dig up a meteor or gain first-claw knowledge of what they really did inside a Psionic Institute. Dirt or psychic dirt? Let Zhem have the fun of exerting his metal chassis for once. Hew had dug his fair share of foxholes.

Hew washed dishes three nights a week out back. He disassembled, cleaned and reassembled his Peacekeeper Shotgun in plain sight of Hon. Thikh so the ear-ringed Vargr could see an Ursa engaged in intelligent behavior other than wolfing down huge salad bowls or Fifth Night megasalmon spiced just right.

Finally, Hew was resetting himself with the drill of getting into his Improved Medium Vaccsuit (Ursa)-10 for breakout. He had not retained that standard operation the first few times aboard the Panas Gankinra for lack of gear suited for his ursine size and shape. But today, the Marine stepped onto the Bridge to begin reactivating his Control Console. Already jump rumblings were intensifying. Fresh from a sleep, the Ursa had gulped down his coffee when he first felt the stirrings of the decaying jump field jacketed about the hull.

With his Portable Controller set in his lap, Hew monitored systems for which it was assigned. Boards lit up, Heads Up Display aligned with the last known vectors, and the Visor displayed a dull, silvery gray of jumpspace just outside the Sensors. The roiling mercury outside the ship did that when more than one sophont was observing it, Sensors included. Just how the quicksilver knew to go gray was still a mystery to Jump Technologists to this day.

Shaa Gankinra stepped onto the Bridge. She was dressed in her Human Advanced Heavy Vaccsuit-13. Strange to Hew was that there was no designator for any gear that should have otherwise been labeled by a preferred race. Shrugging, the Ursa watched as the Vilani sat down at SensOps-Astrogation and began bringing up her boards, activating the Operating Console there. He nodded back to the Captain as she opened Space Sensor after Space Sensor. Jump rumblings continued to grow.

“Engineering up, ready for Jump Drive cooldown, and M-Drive,” called Qithka over the crew intercom from Engineering.

“Breakout eminent,” announced Shaa. “I can see the field has pockmarks.” Hew grabbed up the sticks at his station and waited until Qithka gave him the Maneuver Drive. “Breakout! We’re Flashed and…no contacts out to 5000km. We’re clean, but I want to continue sweeping.”

On his Visor board laid over the HUD, Hew could see the melting, corroding or shrinking remnants of the dying jump field. Ahead lay normal space, welcome stars of a night sky field. It was refreshing to the Ursa to see normal reality again, even if the ship’s exact location was being confirmed by Shaa working her hands over the Sensors boards.

“M-Drive available,” called Qithka. “Jump Drive on cooldown and we have fuel for more than a week since this was a two-parsec jump.”

“Still glad we targeted the Aegadh Gas Giant. Fuel is free when you do it right.” Shaa was shaving any expense she could off the route.

On maximum zoom was the Gas Giant in question. It was a banded pink-and orange affair that was grossly organic to Hew’s eyes. The dot was in his Visor’s range.

“You hit 100 Diameters on the head, Astrogator,” congratulated Shaa. “Space 7 from the Gas Giant and all clear out to 50,000 kilometers. Helm, call the ball.”

“Three gees ahead, Captain,” answered Hew who shoved the throttle in his left claw all the way forward, easing into the grip giving way to his huge paw grasp.

The Panas Gankinra pulsed a blue glow, core to the fading Jump Flash of the breakout. From this pair of lights came the Safari Ship on a four-hour commute approach before fuel skimming. With only two-thirds of the jump fuel expended, Hew knew that wilderness refueling would take less time before the longer, in-system track to mainworld Aegadh.

Next to Hew, Shaa Gankinra was taking stills, footage and building a system map of Aegadh / Dzen (Gvurrdon 1317).

Looking at the generating map as he watched over Shaa’s virtual shoulder, Hew could tell the in-system flight was going to be just over three ship-Days at maximum thrust. Better n-space than jumpspace to Hew’s thinking. He could hear the forward viewports opening across the Safari Ship while the Bridge transpex de-polarized to transparent adding more enjoyable space to see with one’s own eyes.

“Helm, we have fuel for more than two weeks,” explained Capt. Gankinra. “Don’t feel rushed to skim. Just take her leisurely and safely down and out. A quiet dip in the clouds.”

“Cautious skimming, aye,” nodded Hew.

On the filling system map of Aegadh, Hew saw a Yellow main sequence primary star sharing its Stellar Hex with a dim Red main sequence. A secondary system had been caught by the Yellow and resulted in an eccentric or oval orbit about the Inner System. But with the Red out in Orbit 16, it might as well be a microjump away from the mainworld. Both Yellow and Red divided up the four Gas Giants and the two Planetoid Belts. A green dot in the distant Red sub-system gleefully indicated a Hospitable planet in its Sub-Orbit 0. There was a sub-mainworld out there in the same Stellar Hex. This sparked curiosity in Hew, but not enough to detour from his given route on the HUD.

“Mainworld hail,” declared Shaa a deck square between her and Hew. “Aegadh System Traffic Control, KFK-BL333 Panas Gankinra at Orbit 7 Gas Giant for skimming then inbound to mainworld. Can we trade strings?” She was then talking on her headset and microphone over the Comms.

Shaa then had to repeat the request in Gvegh language which Hew understood now only a few words this many jumps after stepping off into the coreward Wilds. He heard Panas Gankinra but everything else was a Human growl to the Ursa.

Signals took some minutes to exchange from Orbit 3 out to Orbit 7 where the Safari Ship sailed toward the pink and orange Gas Giant. Hew held his course and watched on maximum zoom for any satellites. The Gas Giant Size Q held three moons, one of which was transiting the Jovian body.

More mapping placed Universal World Profile strings upon Hew’s Visor board and HUD. Shaa was snapping up any information on Aegadh that the ship’s Sensors could capture. A Gas Giant Q meant that the Panas Gankinra could coast at a minimum of 0.6 gees of thrust and still be able to skim for fuel. So long as he avoided any big storm pockets, the refueling should be Turbulence-free.

Soon enough, Shaa relayed her end of the exchanged strings from Aegadh in Orbit 3. The mainworld on her system map lit up with a label of C737877-9.

An Average Downport with a shattered hulk in orbit, a graveyard of a Highport picked clean by the space-worthy system. Just under Terra size Aegadh unfortunately had a Very Thin Atmosphere. Vaccsuits, Respirators or Combination masks it was then. Seventy percent oceans was a good sign to Hew. As more extension digits filled out with the building string, Hew saw a population figure, 700 million.

Qithka must have been monitoring on her Portable Controller, when she called on the crew intercom, “They’re down from ninety billion. Something must have happened.” Hew had to remind himself that Qithka was a Relict Clone, an immigrant from a bygone era. Ninety billion would have been High-Population, but for that Very Thin Atmosphere keeping it from becoming Industrial. This world had never tainted their skies.

Qithka saw the confirmation of her guess simultaneously with Hew. Aegadh had become Balkanized. A destroyed Highport, reduced Population, and Balkanization. “They’ve come down in Law too,” added Qithka. “Something did happen and it wasn’t either of the Breaks. It must have been after the Collapse and into your Interregnum.”

“They’re not fully Pastoral,” countered Shaa Gankinra next to Hew. “They’re colonizing and developing Oesar Gin Due. There is that to consider.”

 

[The Pakkrat]

* * *

With her Portable Controller slung, Qithka stepped onto the Bridge. She was still monitoring the Drives as the talk continued over Aegadh. The mainworld had fractured to Balkanization from a remembered Religious Autocracy under the Vargr supremacist religion of the Church Of The Chosen Ones. Qithka made sure that the Ursa and the Human understood that the name was in all-caps to fill the ego of the higher interpretation of the religion. It was believed that the Ancients who uplifted the Vargr from Terran wolves had a reason to do so and that reason, shirking Humaniti on Terra was that the Vargr were meant for greatness. Back then, homo sapiens were still dragging knuckles and carrying rudimentary clubs. The higher interpretation or sect believed with fervor that the Ancients chose the Vargr over Humaniti, placing on them the responsibility of dominating Charted Space. Qithka made sure that the others knew she did not hold this belief. The Dame had not and neither did her Pattern mother. Qithka’s beliefs stopped at personal responsibility with a sprinkling of Gevaudan’s Runetha Saetedz the Ascended Hero. There would always be some inkling of the Vargr paragon archetypes, but Qithka’s lives had been too adventurous for religion. She had been too busy as the Dame and as the Merchant-Captain Qithka01.

Qithka continued to warn the others that while the main COTCO religion may have Balkanized on Aegadh, sub-sects were likely nodes of varying faith among the Factions to be found on the mainworld. The extension string Acceptance had fallen from holier-than-thou Xenophilic to a more Pastoral Aloof. The Interregnum had done its damage to the Resource Units now in the negative. Aegadh was going hungry, thus Oesar Gin Due. The Temple world was in the red.

But Aegadh was not out of the interstellar picture. Maintaining a small fleet of Jump-1 ships utilized for colonization, Aegadh quietly held the stellar cluster as its own.

“In the crevices, valleys and trenches is where you will find the Downport,” said Qithka as she pointed out the Atmosphere on the mainworld. “The air pressure thickens down low. Temples will be underground affairs, cathedral warrens with acoustic properties for the chants and praise howls they used to sing…back in the Dame’s day. She thought it amusing enough to write a musical comedy, one she never published.”

“You said there was more than one interpretation of this Church,” reminded Hew at the helm controls. The Gas Giant Q was getting bigger on his Visor.

“Yes,” nodded Qithka02 Cannagrrh. “The lower interpretation is less supremacist. It holds that the Ancients uplifted the Vargr to be the servants of the Ancients and that the Vargr were abandoned as a failed experiment, Chosen but then forsaken. This is depressing to say, but the Vargr in this sect hold that there is nowhere but up from such a lowly, misplaced status.”

Qithka brightened to say, “But in any case or sub-sect, the Vargr are the only Major Race to be Chosen, for whatever reason. Humaniti may have been transplanted across Charted Space, but the ethnicities of Lair were given some kind of purpose by the Ancients. What that truly may have been has likely fractured Aegadh the Temple world. We may be looking at the results of jihad or civil war.”

Shaa Gankinra had been studying the Law Level when she spoke next, “You say their Law Level has come down. They’re still not allowing Pistols or Shotguns. Open Blades only, no concealing. I’m strapping on my cutlass. You youngsters have your claws.”

Hew and Qithka looked to each other’s claws before putting them back on the helm controls or hiding them behind backs. Who knew if Humaniti other than the distant Republic of Regina visited Aegadh? They would likely get an earful of the rhetoric and leave. Qithka pointed this out to her Captain.

“You see one religion,” said Shaa, “you’ve seen them all.” Crossing her arms defensively, the Vilani woman held her own as mapping on the Sensors continued.

Qithka agreed with the Human and said, “Sophonts need their beliefs, even if they have to write them down themselves.” She did not press the topic.

“Let’s take this approach carefully and leisurely,” ordered Shaa. “Their Downport has degraded to Average, repairs only. We do not need a repair bill inbound.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Aye.”

Qithka stood with her back against the Bridge iris valve door as Gas Giant fuel skimming began. Hew dipped into the upper H2 atmosphere deck of the pink-and-orange planet. Though there was minor buffeting at this upper altitude, the cautious command was heeded as fuel was scooped at a slower rate. The entire time, Shaa was watching Sensors and talking in Gvegh to the mainworld in messaging delays.

In under a lonely hour, the Panas Gankinra finished the atmospheric plunge and rose once more with full fuel tanks, the liquid hydrogen fully purified and pressurized in the partitioned tanks. Hew at the helm pulled back on the sticks causing the Lifting Body hull of the Safari Ship to press higher in altitude until it attained low orbit.

“Space-worthy yet no traffic,” wondered Hew aloud as he re-vectored for a parabolic rendezvous with Aegadh in Orbit 3 and aided by a track fed to him from Shaa’s Sensors.

“It is Importance that determines how much traffic a ship captain can expect,” reminded Shaa. “I saw that too. Their Importance is a flat zero. Ships are either commuting in-system, microjumping to the Habitable Spaceport at the Red in Orbit 16. Fewer still are the interstellar ships colonizing for this Church world.” Qithka did not remind her Captain that the designation in the Dzen Aeng Kho had been Temple world. Shaa may have simply picked a lesser vocabulary in Anglic.

“Looks like they have their own microcosm here in this parsec,” nodded Hew. “Two systems for the price of only one parsec.”

“They still have mouths to feed,” added Qithka. “With 700 million, we will see deserted cities and towns. They lost tens of billions to exodus, sect war, civil war, aftermath, and recovery. Their hunger has stopped the fighting.”

“We will be careful not to rock the boat,” assured Hew. “I’m with you this time, Qithka.” A little surprised but not unwelcome, Qithka looked to Shaa for confirmation. The Vilani grandmother nodded her assent to the Vargr. She was to be escorted by the Marine planetside.

The in-system commute from Orbit 7 to the mainworld in Orbit 3 took over three Days at three gees of acceleration. Qithka spent her free time fan dancing for the Middle Passengers. She thought the long-eared Hon. Thikh was going to have an attack of heartbreak at her motions with the metal fans snapping open and waved about as she swayed.

Hew and Shaa took turns on the Bridge once the course was locked in and only required watches with Portable Controllers synced to Sensors. With space largely empty of traffic, the Safari Ship remained inbound and unmolested.

Though Shaa was correct in saying Qithka had natural weapons, her claws, the Relict Clone took a cue from her Pattern mother Qithka01 in that she belted her sheathed Great Big Knife, nigh a gladius to the small of her back where Malice usually rode. The visible weapon was just within Law to be allowed off the Safari Ship once it touched down. Shaa approved though the Vilani was seen with her Naval Cutlass as the mainworld grew from a speck on the Scopes to a small dot.

The Panas Gankinra was granted a window of final approach once it was admitted that the Safari Ship held Vargr crew and Vargr Passengers from Oesar Gin Due. Red tape parted and did not adhere. Hew woke from a slumber, received his morning Ursa-sized mug of coffee before detouring to the Bridge. Qithka made sure the mug had his Ursa sippy spout so he could drink one-pawed.

It was long-winter over the Aegadh Downport, a deep chasm rent open by slowly separating tectonic plates. The crevice reached so deep that the light snowfall had melted to sleet and into light rain as the Panas Gankinra glided down through the wintry clouds. Air traffic was grav-based as two COACC fighters took up three- and six o’clock positions as wing escorts into the chasm. Hew noted each as Shaa analyzed their weapons load outs.

Walls of the chasm counted off kilometers in increments of five as the Safari Ship dipped under the sea level altitude. Here the air grew thicker and buffeted the intruding, wide wing of the ship. At such a low altitude, the atmosphere became Standard and breathable. Qithka knew from the Dame’s adventures, that her Combination-A would still ride her belt, suit-and-tie style.

Touching down in a chasm wall hangar to the welcome of guide lights and the navigation beacon, Qithka began the protocols to stand down Engineering as Hew did similar with the helm on the Bridge. Shaa Gankinra emerged from her sleep in the Captain’s Cabin. The Vilani wore her Quilt-9 under her Heavy Coat-2 for the insulation against winter temperatures. Taking Qithka’s lead, Shaa had her Combination headgear on her utility belt next to her cutlass.

Hew had only his Vaccsuit and wore it both for its armor and respirator, but also to advertise that he was a sophont spacer and not some ship’s pet. Qithka and Shaa were at the airlock when the Ursa ambled on two hind feet to allow the airlock to match pressures and open. The hangar was external but had a swinging gantry arm that had mated to the outer airlock door.

“Thank you Honorables, for flying with the Panas Gankinra,” said Qithka as she bowed to the disembarking Middle Passengers.

 

[The Pakkrat]

* * *

It was his first loss of life for Zhem. He stood in the Low Berths compartment adjacent to the Med Console and the Clinic as the first three Vargr cryo-sleepers woke and slowly rose. The fourth did not. Zhem waited and waited. Still the male in Number Four refused to wake. When he took vitals once the body temperature was of normal, he found his first death under his care as a Certified doctor. It was his first death as a Ship’s Medic.

The Cym’s Pathos rose to 89%, though he tried to refuse it with a doctor’s objectivity. Surely, there was a first for everything in this new life in a robotic chassis.

Zhem was still contemplating biological death when Capt. Gankinra found him in the compartment, a sentinel of fading hope that the fourth sleeper might rise against death. The Vilani laid a hand on his armor.

“It happens, Dr. Zhem,” said the Human. “This was significant, yes?”

“My first loss,” answered the Vargriform.

“Low Berth Passengers know the risks of this kind of travel,” nodded Shaa. “It happens, and it will happen again no matter your skill as a medic, Dr. Zhem.”

That extra percentage of Pathos climbed to 90% labeled sorrow. He did not know the deceased, but it fell to Zhem to prepare the corpse for disembarking. Graciously, Shaa helped the oversized chassis lift and prepare the body to be given to the Downport authorities.

When the encased corpse was surrendered to Starport Security and its attendant Warden, Zhem turned to Shaa and said, “Teach me how the Vilani mourn, Captain Shaa Gankinra.” The gray-haired woman nodded and led the Vargriform back aboard the Safari Ship.

Zhem watched in the Galley as the grandmother cooked a simple bowl of brown rice. The act was deliberate, slow, prepared with care and solemn precision. The Human carried the bowl of rice to the table with a full setup of instruments. Zhem was invited to take a place at the table with the gesture of a hand. Before Zhem was a single, small glass of distilled water completely devoid of anything but H2O.

“You know that Vilani Dakhaseri means ‘audience of the stars’,” Shaa began knowing Zhem had command of any language he wanted to download. “Through our bonds of love, so fine as to be undetectable yet so strong as to be unbreakable, we Vilani are observed by the deceased from on high, the audience. They may try and influence the living, though we quick are too busy to listen most of the time. We Vilani mourn the departed for the living, for the dead have no concern having left for the Dakhaseri. We then must mourn, but for the balance of the living. In this fuel intake, food we show our respect for the loved one with a simple meal without distractions of pleasure, but with a promise to continue living as we might. I consume a bowl of simple steamed rice. You take in only water for your Fusion-Plus. Let us release the deceased with this promise to continue our lives as they watch.”

It was Zhem’s first meal in this new life of a Vargriform Cym. As Shaa sat and began a simple teaspoon of brown rice, the robot manipulator lifted the shot glass of water carefully so as to not spill a drop. Deliberately, Zhem lifted the water and poured it gently into his mouth where it would catch and refill what little water he had lost over the months. He saw Shaa nod her head approvingly. She spooned down her brown rice with the same slow gesture repeated.

And true to her word, Zhem felt his Pathos begin to reduce in short increments. By the time Shaa was done with her bowl and smiling up at the standing Cym-Robot chassis visual sensors, he registered a lowered percentage of 20% sorrow. “I am not completely relieved,” he admitted.

“Welcome to the sophont condition,” nodded Shaa sagely. “Time will heal the rest. Remember your promise to the deceased to continue on.” The Vilani woman then rose to wash her bowl and implements. Zhem did likewise with his simple shot glass.

* * *

The listed 8 in the Acceptance extension string exchanged back at breakout claimed Aegadh was ‘Friendly’. Qithka took the warren hangar gate gantry into the Terminal Concourse in search of the Cargo Markets. She and Hew Hollowton had already offloaded Hon. Aerrghrrue’s twelve tons of Quality Echostones and were paid by the lady. It was time to sell off the eight tons of Quality Meson Barriers Capt. Gankinra had purchased on Oesar Gin Due.

Walking slower than a usual Vargr lope allowed towering Hew to amble on his two hind feet, tall and proud to be an Ursa over the shorter Gvegh Vargr. The imposing mass cut a social swath through the throngs at the gates of the Concourse. This of course made Hew beam with pride to be a giant among little people. He strode around behind Qithka until he cracked his head against a low support beam.

“Ow,” complained Hew as he rubbed his head where he had smacked it against the beam.



“Watch where you’re walking, Marine,” warned Qithka. “You may be the biggest sophont these Gvegh have seen, but you’re gonna rack that brain and ego if you don’t look out.”

Taking the warning seriously meant the pain was enough to make a change. Hew dressed in his Ursa Vaccsuit, looking every bit the armored off-worlder dropped to all-fours and caught up to Qithka. The two continued into the growling chaos of the Cargo Market.

With a pretty, young face of a white-pelt, ocean blue eyes, and a hulking monstrosity behind her, Qithka called out her commodity amid the cacophony of barks, whines, growls, Infighting and claw gesture signals. Naming her initial price already in the hole against Shaa’s Cr46,400 buy of the Quality Meson Barriers, the negotiations began. At first there were few buyers, but the more the voiced applications to such protections were listed, the buyers came running. Eight tons could protect an entire Downport and the PADS nearby. That the pretty Qithka with an attractive yet antique accent, even for current Gvegh selling, the price rose. Bids for the Barriers increased.

The price rose Qithka out of the hole from around KCr38 upward, past the original Cr46,400 price Shaa had paid. At last, Qithka settled with a buyer who swiped his UPP credit chip through a borrowed floor reader to end up Cr78,560 for the eight tons. A courteous bow to the elderly merchant reminded Qithka that she was the oldest mind in this pit market. This too reminded her to take her Broker’s cut of ten percent. She would need the Cr7856 to help pay for her training if there was a Psionics Institute to be found on Aegadh still.

The transaction came with the required Concourse Gate number for the buyer to pick up his Meson Barriers. Qithka took a different tack from the Cargo Market. She headed directly for the local Startown outside the chasm wall hangars. She and Hew donned their Combination-A masks or Vaccsuit helmet to stand on a moving conveyor belt floor and hand holds. Like a flat escalator, the two rode the side belt leisurely to the Extrality Line before the Startown.

Greenery was taking over the outer suburbs of the chasm valley. The Startown, like every other major civil hub was being usurped by nature. Aegadh was not the population center Qithka remembered. Down to 700 million from 90 billion showed how significant the drop was as the Vargr and the Ursa rode the pedestrian belt down the slope and dipping into the tree canopy. There was a city here and it was bustling. But to Qithka who remembered a bygone Aegadh, this Far Far Future Aegadh was under siege by the flora spreading into the outer, abandoned neighborhoods.

Qithka was looking for a Psionics Institute, bringing her street smarts from a previous life to bear. Now began the hunt for the elusive training for Stage Three and mapping out her Extra-Corporeal Manipulations abilities. What would she be able to do aside her new Psi-Senses? The question was still on Hew’s ursine face. She still had no answers for the Bear.

 

[The Pakkrat]

* * *

Qithka spent the wintry afternoon searching for her Psi-school. Hew followed behind the Vargr Relict Clone, hoping dinner was coming soon. The Marine had watched the Yellow star primary rise over the chasm east wall and beaming down into the valley. There was no grav-taxi that could fit an Ursa, so the pair had searched the Startown for clues to Qithka’s next step in the weird ways of the Psion. Everywhere were the sounds of vehicles and Vargr voices in their daily routines. Hew spotted at least one Infight with witnesses encircling to make sure the spectacle did not become murderous.

“What were they battling over?” Hew asked as the warring parties were split up after a yield yip was cried out. The winner was patted on the back and marched off to a nearby pub-in-the-wall. The loser of the Infight was helped off the floor by a pair of loyal friends.

“T’were a diff’rence of COTCO interpr’tation, a challenge o’ faith and o’ Charisma,” explained Qithka in her accented Anglic. By the look of Qithka’s paralanguage, she did not have faith in this Church Of The Chosen Ones. Hew walked all-fours behind the Vargr girl in thought.

Religions should be like genitalia. You can play with it if you want but keep it in your pants. Hew smiled to himself at the thought while he followed Qithka. Then the pair was accosted by Marine-counted eleven priests of the high sect of COTCO. Led by a female in clashing palette of colors that screamed confetti war to the Ursa, the Vargr spoke first to Qithka. The entourage of robed priests backed up their leader with nods and gestures and tail wags. A pack of priests pontificating their prose pre-proposition. Hew had to stifle his chuckle at the exchange he could not understand.

Hew thought he and Qithka were going to get off light with some blessing or gestures, but no. The lead priestess turned to Hew and spoke in contemporary Anglic, “You Ursa, whom young Qithka names Hugh. Do you accept that the Ancients Chose the Vargr?” Uh-oh. With a world full of Balkanized sects of the same religion, this was a hot topic.

But neatly, Hew answered plainly, “Yes. The Ancients chose only the Vargr, leaving the rest of us sophonts to take the long road.”

The answer caused the lady priest to tilt her head curiously, translating Anglic in her head to native Gvegh. Tails stopped but then returned to wagging when they heard their leader speak next.

“Good to hear, Mr. Ursa,” nodded the priestess wagging her tail and perking her ears up brightly. “Here are some materials for your contemplations on this truth. Good day, you two.” Hew took into his claws the light book of COTCO and the other pamphlets and flyers given to him and Qithka. He had to rear up to his full height to do so which shooed away the swishing priests down the street.

Hew looked down to his new handouts. Then he pocketed all of it into his Vaccsuit hip pouch, the largest mounted on the side of the Ursa model.

“Yew don’ ‘ave t’ keep thar nonsense, L’tenant,” suggested Qithka. “COTCO is Vargr supr’macist a worse, a leg up from low Charisma a best. So, why yew keepin’ thar campfire kindling.”

“Two reasons,” nodded Hew Hollowton. “One, I can ward off the next gaggle of believers with these already given me. Two, that’s one less unit of handouts they have to distribute, even if it’s going in the rubbish can when I get back to the Panas Gankinra.”

“Yew not off’nded?”

“What’s to be upset over? Those priests think they are helping me with this stuff. Their intent is good though the process is laughable.”

Qithka blessed Hew then with a truly genuine Vargr smile, her tongue lolling out. “So wise, so patient.”

The search for Qithka’s friendly local Psionics Institute continued through the Day. Hew smiled over his shoulder when he produced his COTCO book for another patrol of priests who became curious as to the huge Ursa in a Vaccsuit and whether Hew was a sophont or some kind of huge, trained pet of Qithka’s. It was not until after a lunch break under the valley tree canopy Startown that a single priest tagging along with a third patrol ushered along by the local cops stopped, (to stop them from harassing citizens too often). Qithka was out front and asking questions of a coded nature.

Hew was ready with his Church materials when the robed Gvegh Vargr waved his claw, dismissing the Marine. This priest did not stop and question Qithka or the Ursa who could not speak Gvegh yet. There was a quick exchange between the Relict Clone and the single priest. Hew thought this out of pattern because the priests tended to move in small packs, either for cohesion, sect interpretation accuracy or for protection. But here was a single robed priest, alone and before Qithka and Hew. Just to make sure this was on the level, Hew rose up on his hind legs and stood sentinel behind shorter Qithka.

Two nods of lupine heads was encouraging to Hew. No difference of interpretation this time. Qithka turned to Hew and spoke in Anglic, “Psions kin hide in plain sigh’, L’tenant. S’fer protection a’ times. Vargr psionics have interp’tations too. Zho psionics a’times ain’t welcome.” Hew did not understand that explanation. He thought all psionics was the same, mental disciplines in some super-science that no one race could accurately codify for public consumption to the satisfaction of the scientific community. That there was a mindset gap between the Zhodani and other racial psionics was new to Hew. He nodded his ursine head and lowered to all-fours and followed Qithka and this robed priest.

“How’d he know to ask you?” Hew questioned the shorter Qithka. On all-fours, Hew’s shoulder was still slightly taller than most Vargr.

Qithka pointed an index claw digit to her head before saying, “He were unabl’ t’ read me, and so pick‘t up our goal from yew. Thanks.”

“Happy to be of service?” answered Hew.

The three boarded a mag-lev streetcar powered by a track that ran just under the pavement. Yellow starlight beams filtered down through the Startown canopy as the public vehicle swayed a little the moment Hew Hollowton added his mass to the load. This drew surprised stares as paralanguage stopped from seated Vargr. To compensate for disturbing the commuters, the Ursa moved to center his seated form on the deck of the streetcar dead center.

“Yew’re showin’ great patience, L’tenant,” encouraged Qithka who laid a gentle claw on his arm.

“When in Rome…”

Hew observed the architecture as the streetcar sped past wards of the Startown at a faster pace. His training in archaeology told him that this city was older than many of the Vargr worlds. Here and there were antique buildings of a bygone era that spoke more of Vargr Charisma than the newer structures. Conversely, there were crumbling towers that were so drab as to reflect a time when Aegadh was still newly colonized, in the Second Diaspora according to Qithka when Hew asked her. Aegadh was one of the oldest Vargr settled worlds in Gvurrdon Sector. That explained much when Hew began to believe that he could not throw a stone without hitting a Church or Ancients shrine or blessings outpost wash basin.

Hew’s assessment of the architecture grew into something he kept silent. The Ursa deduced that all it would take to unite the Vargr remaining in Charted Space was for a single Ancient to show up, make itself known, and confirm or deny the beliefs of the religious Major Race. It did not matter if the Vargr were Chosen to rule Charted Space or chosen to serve the Ancients as Chosen servants. If a single being, Vargr-formed or not, was confirmed, it could spark a religious revival so big as to be a threat to the remainder of Charted Space. Scratching his chin as he rode the mag-lev streetcar, Hew inwardly projected the effects of such a confirmation from the absent Ancients. Perhaps the Ancients knew this and chose to leave well enough alone.

Looking about his seated form at the commuters in the streetcar, Hew caught the lone priest escorting Qithka staring at him. Was the Psion in disguise reading his mind? Were there Vargr who had come to the same conclusion over the absent Ancients, and deemed it a better thing for questions left unanswered? The Psion gave the Ursa a friendly, toothless smile by turning up the corners of his mouth. Yes, it was better to keep such insights to oneself. Let each come to their own conclusions in personal search for the truth. The Psion staring at Hew wagged his tail and turned to continue talking with Qithka in Gvegh language.

Hew made another private decision for himself, and possibly for Capt. Gankinra. Should Qithka come away from this training able to read minds, privacy of thoughts was going to be a necessity. It was not that Hew harbored fears or secrets now that his troubles of the past had been aired. Hew felt that his mind wandered occasionally and could use a veil at times to keep prying minds from his. But such technology was Tech 12 or higher. Hew needed to consult with Shaa Gankinra over the starchart and speak with her about this. Could Qithka, a borderline suicide be trusted with mind-reading abilities? What else would the white-pelt be capable of if her homeworld was not there when they reached Gvurrdon 1413?

 

[The Pakkrat]

While the streetcar ride stretched on toward the north end of the valley and into deeper, thicker foliage, Hew pondered if Zhem the Cym-now-Robot was susceptible to mind reading. Could Cyms be tested and trained? Did they have thoughts or simply computations about incoming sensory stimuli? What would Qithka’s relationship to Zhem be like if she could not read the doctor’s silicon or whatever?

Would Qithka be offended if Hew and Shaa were to begin wearing Psi-Shields around the Relict Clone Psion? He decided to ask Shaa first and then come to Qithka about this mental privacy issue. Scratching behind his left ear, Hew decided that this line of thinking might not become an issue if Qithka learned she was not a reader of minds. But would she tell the others if she was or was not? And therein was why Hew had buddied up with the Vargr teenager. He needed to know.

 

[The Pakkrat]

* * *

Qithka sat next to the COTCO priest named Arriknoesa who was actually a local Psion instructor. She listened to his history telling in Gvegh language while Hew looked out the mag-lev streetcar scenery. She wanted to know about how psionics and Psions had survived the centuries of the Interregnum after the Collapse.

“…and after the last King of the Thirz Empire abdicated on his deathbed, there was no heir. The Thirz too Collapsed into confused member worlds, Aegadh on the furthest border, the Edge as you call it Miss Qithka.” Arriknoesa continued when he saw the teenager attentive. Qithka was allowing the Dame inside her to interview the Psion, milking him for all she could gain of Aegadh citizenry. “The Oruelaen, the King’s psionic secret service found themselves without agency and without support from the Thirz Empire. The Zhodani had already fallen into disarray what with the second Break, the ‘Mind Tsunami’ as you said.” Qithka had asked how the Psions of the Virus Era had managed to survive the Mind Tsunami. Some had jumped the Wave. Others like Uthka Varzeekh had buried themselves in nested and shielded Vaults to sleep through the Wave, a technique that was imperfect when ships could not fit another passenger.

“The Oruelaen tried to keep their membership up, but when Institutes started suffering raids and witch hunts from local citizenry blaming the Zhodani and the King for the Breaks, neither having sufficient answers, it all went down in a Collapse inside interstellar society’s collapse. Some Oruelaen tried to band together on a world and offer private detective work or forensics in law enforcement, but many courts could not accept Psions in the criminal justice sector. As populations dropped over the centuries, so too did psionic instruction decline. And to protect what Gvurrdon Psions had remaining, some like our school had to hide inside other agencies, ours being the Church Of The Chosen Ones. The religion has been up and down with its supremacy, tempered by falling numbers after the Civil War here on Aegadh. Lines of faith interpretation were drawn and we Psions quietly rode each regional temple, sharing what we had left and quietly offering our services to bolster the Church but also attract lesser Stages like you, Miss Qithka.”

Qithka remembered the Oruelaen, agents of the Thirz King from back in the Dame’s era. The Oruelaen back then were puppets of that King who himself was a buffer monarch between the Gvegh Vargr of Gvurrdon and the Zhodani Consulate. With the Mind Tsunami, the psychohistory backing of the Consulate depleted, leaving the Thirz Empire to think for itself for a change. Apparently to Qithka, that had not done so well over the centuries of the Interregnum. Now, the Thirz Uerra was a footnote in history, just as the shotgun pattern of the Dzen Aeng Kho too was breathing its last.

The Oruelaen had tangled with Zhevra Cannagrrh and met with some resistance. The Suedzuk had taught them a lesson. Never mess with a Red Pelt, not when unconditional love was on the line. In recovering her mate-husband, Zhevra had put some hurt on both the Oruelaen and their patron Zhodani seeking the secret to Gevaudan’s Jump, a stunt that was never repeated that the Dame or Qithka01 ever heard about.

“Do the Oruelaen still consider themselves loyal to their ideals?” Qithka asked of Arriknoesa.

“Some do, but it’s more an afterthought, nominally held after Stage Four training, the morality examination.” Arriknoesa was referring to the examination of the Psions of Stage Four who then had enough personal experience to be measured for their moral fortitude and have those results pointed out to them, either for voluntary adjustment (to the betterment of all Psions as a whole) or to congratulate the Stage Four Psion for not going overboard with their Aptitudes, Extra-Sensory Perceptions, and their Extra-Corporeal Manipulations.

Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely, thought Qithka. Since she was only a teenager in body and a bicentenarian in mind over two previous lives, Qithka could only hope that she would not turn into some holovid villain, some scantily-clad, sexualized, Psion mastermind of a plot that would attract heroes of the story against her. The dramatization would cause the Dame to turn over in her grave.

The skeletal remnant of an arcology on the eastern ridge of the chasm and valley stood above all. The superstructure had been salvaged for its innards, metal plating, polymers, and just about everything that could not be removed without demolition. The framework marked the valley warren entrance far below the arcology, down in the Standard, breathable atmosphere. Qithka saw the centuries old remnant, knowing that Aegadh had more than a few of such monuments to a higher population. The girders and pylons of the mountain of rusting metal were slowly being overgrown at its lower floors by the flora capable of thriving in thinner atmosphere above the chasm valley.

Thin clouds hung on the upper tip of the superstructure, a funeral shroud to Qithka’s eyes as the mag-lev streetcar came to a terminus station. This distant ward too was being overgrown by the vegetation. Occupied residences were devoted more to agrarian occupations among fruit tree groves, lines of vineyards, and of course ranching. The warren entrance in the side of the chasm wall below the arcology hulk led to another temple dedicated to the Church Of The Chosen Ones hiding Aegadh’s only remaining Psionic Institute. Arriknoesa explained as the trio disembarked the streetcar that this sect interpretation held that psionics was a tool meant for the Vargr though free will meant a Vargr could test and train if they desired. Options given the Vargr from the Ancients meant that the uplifted race was to decide for itself how best to follow in the Ancients’ footsteps.

The Temple was nestled inside the warren, a massive cavern realm that was once a small city ward to itself. Now only priests and the faithful came up the wide steps for guidance. Qithka and Hew Hollowton had not climbed this many steps in a while and had to break at the top before entering a side tunnel leading to the Psionic Institute proper.

 

[The Pakkrat]

* * *

Per the side mission Triangle, World Hex, Terrain Hex and Local Hex coordinates, Zhem and Shaa touched down the Panas Gankinra Ship’s Boat two triangles from the Aegadh Downport. Grazer land stretched to the horizon, the livestock mowing the grasses on short and thick trunk legs. Air/rafts crewed by Vargr herded the grazers called woolpuffs translated from Gvegh to Anglic. Not only were the beasts valued for their off-white wool, but they were also a food source for the carnivorous Gvegh Vargr. At Tech 9, Aegadh tech falloff was not unfamiliar with aerospace craft and spaceships, the ranchers and farmers still took double-takes at the arriving Ship’s Boat granted commuting permit to circumnavigate Aegadh to this countryside for a landing at the meteor trench.

The target meteorite had soft landed in a field that was already feasted upon by the herds of woolpuffs. A deepening trench of burned and hollowed grasslands marked the final resting site of the meteor. It was long and had torn up much of the ranch land.

While Shaa fitted her Combination-A mask by adjusting its belts about her head above and below her ears, Zhem opened the airlock and stepped out onto the gently rolling, grass-covered dunes. A fair wind pushed on his wide brim hat forcing Zhem to remove it before it flew off on the breeze.

Densitometer readings pinpointed the exact position and depth of the meteorite contrasted with the local geology, topsoil, and grasses. Zhem noted the nearest herd and their attendant Vargr ranchers watching both the spacecraft and him. He tried a friendly wave of his arm and manipulator. He was still dressed in his wide leather duster, utilitarian kilt, wafers belt and pouches, and carrying a digging shovel in his free hand.

Shaa Gankinra then joined Zhem as the pair began a careful descent into the ripped earth trench. The Human was dressed in her armored Vaccsuit with her helmet off so she could wear her mask instead. The Advanced Heavy Vaccsuit-13 would certainly insulate the Vilani woman against any residual radiation if present and the armor would protect her from a fall the deeper into the tear they walked.

 

[The Pakkrat]

* * *

To Shaa, it had happened so fast-forward. It was only in the aftermath of the battle that the Vilani could process what had occurred, step by achingly slow step in comparison to the silvery lightning of Zhem's attacks and dashes across hundreds of meters.

Zhem and Shaa had freed the meteorite from the earth, ready to roll it out of the crater at the end of the impact trench. Then the Vargr Hunters pack struck. From behind nearby grassy dunes they fired as one volley into Shaa and Zhem's position. Only after the rout did Shaa learn what firearms had been employed against her.

The Hunters had shot Shaa twice in two separate chest and abdomen locations, the high caliber slugs failing to penetrate her AdvHV-13 armor. The slugs still hurt worse than getting gut punched by a Groat kick threatening to put her flat on her back.

Zhem took a round to each of his arms, one in the forearm and the second to his opposite upper arm. Then he became a streak of metal across the field of fire. In that motion, Zhem charged the leader of the first of three groups, the leader of the closest dune.

His attack was too fast to see. A punch to the gut of a Hunter going flying to roll down the opposite hillside was Shaa had to deduce.

Zhem had his Burst Mode active, and like a silver bearing in an archaic Terran pinball game machine, the Cym was darting to another group leader. Shaa was only able to get a wild shot off from her Accelerator Pistol as she clambered out of the crater after Zhem.

Two Hunters were sent sprawling before the second volley rang out. Misses rained down about Shaa as she drew her Navy Cutlass-15 and raked its edge over the Meshed abdomen of a Hunter next in command of the first group attacked by lightning fast Zhem already across the field again.

Shaa was hit in the back and the momentum shoved her next attack harder forward, her Cutlass biting into a second Vargr. Across the field, Zhem suffered a miraculously unlucky hit to his lupine cranium, destroying an ear and an eye sensors. Still in a blurring Burst Mode, another Vargr Hunter fell to a punch to the center mass.

By the time Shaa fit in a third Cutlass attack, Zhem had routed the subordinate Hunters into a break-and-run retreat.

The Vilani was about to impale a downed leader type Vargr, a finishing down thrust when she heard Zhem slow from Burst Mode to yell, "Do not kill!"

Catching her senses up to the battle finished before her fourth strike, Shaa saw Zhem collapse into a folded-over chassis in a crouch, motionless. The remaining Vargr ran from the scene as fast as dashing Vargr could. Others crawled and howled in pain. The fight was over before the Merchant-Captain had truly drawn blood.

Checking herself first, Shaa found her hits had failed to penetrate though the grandmother knew bruises would show up soon. It was immobile Zhem that concerned her. "Zhem!" she called to the hulk 60 meters away and on the ground.

More quietly as Shaa arrived at his fallen form, Zhem said, "I think this is when I say 'ouch'."

"I'll go get the toolkit. Where are you hurt?"

"My arms myelofibrins are severed. My right visual and auditory are offline. I have more Yellows than I want. Yes. This is what it means to be in pain."

Shaa rushed to the Ship's Boat to retrieve the Mechanics Toolkit she had brought along for this mission. Zhem still could not move.

It was a hybridization of First Aid with a Mechanic's eye for damaged actuators. Shaa worked on Zhem over a hot five minutes. She managed to restore the connections to Zhem's pelvis, but the bouncing hunting jezzail slugs had ripped through Zhem's insides. Nothing vital was damaged. But the Cym-Robot was not going to move on his own.

Though Zhem's integral jumping/swimming Lifters, Shaa was able to push the floating chassis across the battlefield and into the Ship's Boat. Then she hauled the cargo netted meteorite aboard. By then, the injured Vargr had crawled from the scene. Zhem had not killed a single foe.

"How many times is it appropriate to verbalize pain?" asked Zhem as Shaa lifted off from the crater site.

"As many times as you want," answered the Vilani. "We're off the deck and vectored to the Downport. Just sit there and self-assess."

"Ouch."

Shaa had to assume that she and Zhem had intruded on country bumpkin territory, provoking an attack. The Hunters must have assumed Zhem was a Vargr in battle armor and focused their fire on the Cym.

Throttling the Ship's Boat, Shaa broke the sound barrier on the flight back to the Downport. At least a Robot could not bleed out. That was a thing.

"You were struck," said Zhem. "Are you injured, Captain?"

"Just my pride, doctor," answered Shaa. "Triage yourself first. I'm okay."

"Ouch."

* * *

Do not kill. That had been written in the Robot Behavior laws when he had Moved into this chassis, a new life against rising Onwee. But now, with his Vargriform kneeling on the deck of the Ship's Boat, Zhem took stock of his esoteric self:

Logos: 100% alive and enthralled with survival

Causal: 75% guilt for violence

Pathos: 80% fear for self and Shaa Gankinra

Chassis:

Yellow warnings across his Vargriform pulsed like angry synapses Zhem assumed must feel like pain. His right eye was blinded and offline. He could no longer triangulate sounds because the slug had sheared off his right ear after hitting the eye sensor.

With a list of damaged and offline systems and sensors, Zhem had to rate his current Chassis at 50%.

"Ouch."

"Keep talking, doctor," said Shaa who was busy docking the Ship's Boat to the Panas Gankinra. "Stay with me, Zhem."

One question kept returning to Zhem's central processor, his Cym mind: why had he obeyed Robotic Behavior Law when he was truly a Cym and could override such inhibitors?

 

[The Pakkrat]

* * *

Hew Hollowton sat on the temple floor and observed as Qithka experimented with and trained in the Extra-Corporeal Manipulations. He wanted to know the teenager's capabilities rather than ask her and receive the same answer as before on Ankhir. He received strange stares from Church faithful who were present to glean spiritual guidance instead of psionics training.

Hew took up his text and pretended to read the doctrine of the Church Of The Chosen Ones. The belief that the Ancients had selected the Vargr for anything more than experimental uplift or the need for lab assistants was making Hew chuckle. But if this campfire kindling helped a lowly wolf up out of the mud, it was just as good as a coin or the bottle.

Inside the temple, psionics was seen as learning gifts the Ancients had already blessed the Vargr with, meant to be unlocked at personal priority and free will. At least there was that, Hew decided.

For all their bluster of self-importance, the Ursa was glad that free will was stressed in this temple sect of the Church. The seated ursine looked about him to make sure he was not being telepathically influenced. He was strangely comfortable here in the temple. Maybe it so because it was an underground cave warren complex hollowed out millennia ago.

Across the main cathedral warren, Qithka and another student were practicing the ECMs with instructors.

Hew watched as Qithka carried about items much too large for her teenage frame simply by maintaining a touch contact with the load. Echoing pop! noises sounded when she squealed in delight to 'jaunt' in short, line-of-sight teleports. Qithka utterly failed any application of Energy Shift or EShift ECM. It just was not in her hand of cards this life.

Cubs playing in the valley creche were marched into the temple. Each had bruises, cuts and other boo-boos for which the priests healed via The Touch, to which Qithka was invited to "lay on claws" to attempt a simple healing application. Those ocean blue eyes filled with tears to discover she could mend the flesh though it made the younger cub hungry and thirsty after an acceleration of metabolism through that ECM.

Hew tried to keep his nose and muzzle buried in his text and remember to turn pages to appear attentive to the doctrine. At that time, Qithka brought the Ursa three meals and sat down next to the Ursa to eat. She looked a little fatigued and in need of refreshment. Next up was Out Of Body, projection, or dreamtime, walkabout, or whatever else a sophont wanted to name it. After the meal, Qithka sat or lay on a futon to attempt that ECM. We die daily, had been the encouraging advice from the instructors. OOB was simply doing so while aware of it and maintaining grasp of the physical while "walking about".

She looked peaceful laying there. Out Of Body looked like a snake oil ECM to Hew. Qithka looked asleep rather than projecting her esoteric self and taking her psionics with her.

But Hew wisely kept his mouth shut and stifled a chuckle at the next chapter in the Church on evangelism to all sophont races over Vargr supremacy about being Chosen of the Ancients.

Some sects felt it charismatic to spread the good word that the Vargr were among other sentients, that the Chosen would lead all intelligent life to greatness. Other sects took being Chosen as domination and full control of non-Vargr races. Only the Chosen of the Ancients should make the path for Charted Space.

Hew played a few ideas of what might happen if he became the next target for Chosen evangelical treatment. His imagined kennel for such overt religious spread caused sleeping Qithka to giggle next to him. Had she read his mind from somewhere nearby but while walking about? The Ursa looked about himself but did not see any ghosts or silvery cords or shimmery outlines. A plethora of other holovid dramas over topic played in his mind as he sat vigil over sleeping Qithka, if she was actually sleeping.

Then the integral Comm in Hew's Ursa Vaccsuit chimed an emergency sound. He answered it by getting to all-fours and walking to a distant corner of the main cathedral.

"Hollowton," he declared.

"Lieutenant, Shaa, I need you back to the ship urgent. Zhem is damaged by weapons fire. His core, power, and Wafers are okay, but he cannot move, lost an eye and an ear. Return immediately!"

"Calm down," growled Hew. "He's not going to bleed out if his power is still active. I'll gather my things and get on the mag-lev."

Qithka was still in her trance-thingy, so Hew left her a message through her instructor. He had to return the ship to "repair a robot". He did not mention that Zhem was that Cym-Robot.

Stepping onto the mag-lev streetcar at its terminus, Hew's Marine Tactics training warned him. Eyes were upon his armored form, and not in a good, welcoming manner. The Mora Peacekeeper was not on him. Hew felt himself rolling up his arm coverage and stuffing his gauntlets into his hip pouch.

The long gap between two distant stops was when and where Hew Hollowton was attacked by a streetcar full of Vargr from another Aegadh Faction. Hew knew now the score on this mainworld. The Faction controlling the Downport was next. That Zhem and Shaa had suffered an attack out in the backcountry should have warned the Marine. The Ursa was just a loose bystander caught up in changing politics. Can't have some dumb Bear in the gears of regime change.

What Hew truly feared was not for his own safety. He had just left Qithka alone in the temple.

Claws and teeth were bared on both Ursa and Vargr, a fight the Marine fully embraced as a good way to earn a worthy death.

In Anglic language Hew challenged his mass of foes aboard the streetcar, "Show me your Charisma, pups!"

 

[The Pakkrat]

* * *

Qithka had psi-heard Hollowton’s side of the emergent call on his Vaccsuit in the corner of the cathedral. Like a disembodied consciousness, her projected, esoteric body listened to the Ursa talking into his suit Comm. She had left ear physical ears behind on the futon but had taken her Psi-Senses with her in this Out-Of-Body exercise. Zhem had been damaged and Hew needed to leave to repair the Cym-Robot. That worried Qithka, but in psi-seeing Hew’s calm in relaying a message to her instructor Arriknoesa, she finished the exercise after the Marine had departed. Because it was an emergency call, she doubted Shaa Gankinra would be angry at the pair for splitting up their BuddySystem here at the temple.

Though her physical form had been resting on the comfortable futon, Qithka woke to her full complement of senses but without the normal rest of sleep. That was a thing then. No rest for the wicked, she thought while sitting up and picking up after Hew’s discarded meal trays, all three of them.

The darker, but still tawny pelt of Arriknoesa welcomed Qithka back to her post-trance body. There was concern written on his paralanguage. His tail did not wag and his claws were flexing though not at Qithka. “We may have trouble soon,” warned the instructor. “One of the other Factions here on Aegadh has risen up and begun a government coup, a drive to the Downport. Since we are on the outskirts of the city, we may not see much. However, this Faction is using some imported misinformation about us. They claim we’re still using Zhodani-brand psionics and are thus ‘tainted’. We could be attacked soon.”

“How can I help?” Qithka asked while gathering her items, belting on her Great Big Knife-6.

“This is not your fight, Traveller,” said Arriknoesa shaking his head in the negative. “But you may have to defend yourself in returning to your ship. Here.” Into Qithka’s claws was pressed a Memclip, a Data Wafer. She looked at it and noted it was a Library of information in the palm of her claw. “If the temple gets attacked, something has to survive. We’ve endured Purges before. Take a copy with you, Traveller Qithka. May the Ancients smile on you, miss.”

The priests of this warren temple became rustling robed monks seeking to protect the laity, their Psionic Institute and themselves. The temple itself might suffer damage, but life was more important. Qithka was left on her own to seek a commute back to the Downport. Pocketing the Library Data, she drew on her Heavy Coat-2 as an overcoat to her Quilt-9 and her lavender poncho. Drawing up the hood, the lives of Qithka Cannagrrh demanded their due in the teenager’s head. What bad timing to end this life!

Since the citizenry of the Temple world Aegadh had been denied Pistols, Shotguns, and were instead limited to non-concealable Blades, Qithka guessed correctly that this was going to be less a nuclear war and more a quick and dirty shooting war on small scale skirmishes, enough skirmishes to win the Downport and take over the government Balkanized as it already was.

The Relict Clone wished she had followed suit with Hew and worn her Advanced Heavy Vaccsuit-13. With it, she could enjoy more protections and not have to buckle on her Combination-A mask to breathe should she have to climb out of the north-south chasm valley and up into the planetary Very Thin Atmosphere.

All about her as she made way to the temple entrance steps, Qithka saw hordes of locals filing into the underground warren tunnels, many placed along the walls of the connecting tunnels by the priests when the cathedral and naves began to fill. Here and there were Personal Computers synced with the local SysNet and displaying news reports of the coup. Echoing through the temple were the supersonic booms of aerospace fighters dogfighting in the skies above the Downport and Startown. Qithka wondered what she would find on the ground level should she brave going outside and forging a path back to the Panas Gankinra.

The wintry daylight outside the suburban temple was spiked with columns of fires streaming up into the thinning atmosphere. Clipping on her Combination-A a respirator as well as a filter mask, Qithka knew that riot gasses and irritant chemicals might be utilized by both sides of the coup catching the citizenry in the middle.

Across the chasm valley, Qithka witnessed stray bolts of Pulse Laser fire from aerospace fighters as they rocketed between the chasm wall faces. Their supersonic pressure waves beat at the crowds, knocking more than a few prone.

City alarms blared a slow siren clarion. Public announcement nodes warned all locals to seek shelter in homes and hunker down in place. The Startown and Downport were announced as locked down and military rule until the coup was repulsed. This was immediately followed by a hacking transmission from the insurgents who urged close to the same thing, promising to limit damage to the city and inhabitants if all complied with the takeover.

Against the flow of foot traffic seeking shelter against the battles intensifying toward the Downport, Qithka weaved through the crowd to the temple steps she had Hew had climbed together.

Qithka tried to hide herself among the throngs of escaping refugees as she eased herself cautiously down the steps against the flow of foot traffic. She tried to look about for insurgents or local defenders be they cops or homeguard Soldiers. Failing both, she was singled out at the bottom of the wide steps up to the temple. She had almost made it to the streetcar terminus, not that it was functioning what with local infrastructure hacked and shut down either by the defending Faction or the attackers.

“That’s one!” shouted a Gvegh Vargr armed with a Space Axe-9. Qithka’s eyes grew wide at seeing the lightweight weapon usually employed in space. The Dame had seen at least one Space Axe during the Fifth Frontier War and often wielded by Aslan warriors employed by the Third Imperium. Most Humaniti preferred Cutlasses or Bayonets on the end of shooty weapons.

The coup insurgents assaulting the temple wore Shemagh head coverings and cobbled-together Jack armors. The simpler Vargr wore makeshift Shield-2 and either employed their natural weapons for Infighting (to climb the Vargr Charisma ladder) or had a farming Machete-3 to wield.

So, it was a Purge here at the temple despite the main force drive to the Downport for a takeover. In covering many such regime changes, the Dame had seen more than a few in her time. Qithka02 let much of the Dame’s memories take over in recognition of what was to come for the teenage Relict Clone. She wished she had snuck Malice her Accelerator Pistol off the Safari Ship. This was going to be a melee.

Two Insurgents and an Inquisitor (as Qithka named them quickly) closed to within meters of Qithka as the panicked crowd ran away from the brandished weapons and the sudden battle to the death to come evidenced for them.

“Another Psion head for the pikes will earn us promotions!” growled the Inquisitor with the Space Axe-9, clearly the person in charge if not the tactically proficient warrior. Decapitation was a trophy then to these Psion hunters.

The fight three against one lasted seven eternal minutes for Qithka. The two Insurgents and the single axe-wielding Inquisitor were drawn from pitiful Careers that had not taught them to fight. Complacency in the military, Qithka guessed. As an Entertainer and later a Merchant-Captain, Qithka was not much better at claw-to-claw fighting. This proved itself when the Inquisitor reared back his Space Axe-9 and accidentally threw it far behind him, the weapon landing with a clatter that did not break its handle or head. But too far away now, the Inquisitor had to rely on his natural weapons. The circling, feints and maneuvering of the Insurgents was a little more opportunistic. Qithka was not all the much smarter in throwing all her planned attacks in all-out offensive Touchport attempts to lay her claw palm on a combatant who approached too close.

Qithka purposefully drew the trio away from the fearful crowd. Machete swings missed but tore at her poncho hood, seams ripping it off from her head. Stances and weight shifts continued as she danced about, a teenager against adult Vargr.

Qithka knew she might never penetrate the Jack and Shield armors of the Insurgents and wanted nothing to do with the Inquisitor who had humorously lost his decapitator weapon. But she danced away from repeated near misses. Every other minute of battle dodging swinging Machete blades, Qithka let loose with a cautiously spooled Touchport. Her first attempt failed and a wave of nausea struck her in the solar plexus though she sucked in air to swallow down the climbing sensation. Psionics was not that easy!

Miss after near miss tore at Qithka’s poncho and her Heavy Coat. Into the fourth minute of enduring the attacks slowly fatiguing the trio of foes, Qithka’s patience paid off. An overly committed Machete attack pushed the Insurgent too far into her personal space, such that Qithka had only to reach out and touch the Gvegh male on the shoulder. A loud SNAP! sounded as he was jaunted 500 meters into the wintry, overcast sky above the streetcar terminus station. Qithka did not have time to see her victim begin a fall from such a height.