Federation Reborn 2: Pirate Rage (79 page)

The skull-faced man turned to him, glowering. “You wish to contribute something?”

That was usually all the warning a lackey had to stop second guessing him and shut up before he did something nasty to them.

“Yes. I think instead they should be given a low level mission. Have them prove their worth in other ways. That way you get a positive, and they gain experience. This … blood sport teaches them to fight, but it teaches them that their own teammates are the enemy.”

“You wish to foster
trust
,” Skeletor hissed in amusement, one finger propping his head up. He seemed suddenly amused by the idea or the man.

“Not so much that as … putting this to use. Even those who fail can be of some use. Robbing a bank or acting as a spy for instance.”

“If they do not have what it takes and get caught, they will give us away,” Jitsu said, looking at him coldly.

“Anyone can give away information. I just came from a place that specializes in squeezing it out of you. The Feds do it the nice way, but they get some results. I figured out they were using truth detectors and other stuff on us right off,” he said sourly. “The rest I guessed at. Fortunately, they never used babble juice or anything else on me.”

“Fortunately for you,” Skeletor echoed.

“Sir. I recommend you give me a small detail. Let me throw them at a target. Give them minimum intel and training, a safe house to stage from, no other contacts—compartmentalize. I send them on a mission to prove themselves. If they fail, then they weren't worthy. But if they succeed …,” he rubbed his arm.

“They will have proven themselves. You don't mind losing a few?”

Sharky shrugged. As if he cared about losing locals. “If they get shot or caught, they weren't worth having. If they are wounded, I'll finish them myself. The same for myself to keep from getting caught,” Sharky replied. “Better than sitting in a cell.”

“Right,” Skeletor drawled. “How loyal of you,” he said, eying the captain. “Where did all of this information come from?”

“I've been around the sector a few times. I've also read and watched a lot of stuff. And I've been talking to your people. Well,” he grimaced, “I also came from a gang in my youth.”

“Ah.” Skeletor nodded. “I will find you a target.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“But the blood sport will continue. They need to learn to fight and take a hit,” the leader said, waving a hand dismissively. “Or they are of no use to me at all,” he said.

Sharky nodded. It was too much to ask for to get his entire way and he knew it. “Yes, sir.”

---<>))))

“Boss, are you really going to go along with this?” Trapjaw asked once the Horathian was gone. He was feeling threatened by the new guy and didn't like it at all. His own position seemed to be in jeopardy. It sucked, he'd done the job, and this was his payment for a job well done?

Skeletor's reddish eyes turned to his best field commander then away. “I think his approach is … a fresh one,” he said. “I am considering it carefully.”

“Proving themselves I agree with. And yeah, the blood sport is … a waste,” the cyborg said, catching himself when the scared leader turned a sharp glare his way. “But the risks involved …”

“Find ways to minimize them then,” the leader said.

Trapjaw nodded once. “I suppose we can use disposable people. Disposable safe houses … but the gear isn't so easy to replace.”

“Then we'll find a way to deal with that as well.”

“How? They know we are organized now. They are taking the threat seriously. They rolled up half of our coastal safe houses and 20 percent of our people. I'm surprised none of them have rolled and given them more.”

“Which is why we've moved underground,” Skeletor stated. He rubbed his jaw. “If we can't get the good stuff, well then, we'll have to think outside the box. You said they've stepped up security on the armories?” The cyborg nodded. “That includes the police armories and stations?” Again a nod. “Well, then, what about the hunting stores? The gun stores?” the man asked.

Trapjaw rubbed his bald head. “It's possible I suppose. I can look into that.”

“You should have done that before,” the scared leader scolded with acid in his voice. Trapjaw winced. “But I suppose what is done is done. The man has a point. Compartmentalizing things is a rational approach I suppose,” he said quietly. He turned and drummed his fingers on the arm rest of his chair. “And I do like your idea of disposable troops,” he said with a grin in his voice.

His eyes lit as a new malevolent thought came to him. “And I have a few targets in mind, yes I do. Let's see who we can use, then we'll call him in here and go over the target list and get his input too. You can handle half the list, and we can test him by having him handle others,” he grinned. “Consider it a baptism of fire if he survives it.”

Trapjaw nodded coldly.

---<>))))

Skeletor laid out his plan to hit the target hard and fast. “No more pussy footing around. Irons is too hard to catch. We kill him then, quick and fast.”

“Now you're talking,” Trapjaw agreed with a tight nod. He had received his own briefing. He didn't like the idea of delegating some of the smaller jobs to some of the other subcommanders but recognized the need to keep a distant eye on the assassination team. His handpicked group would sit back and let them do the work. Should they fail, they would use sniper rifles or other means to take them out before they squealed and became a danger to the group.

He was actually hoping they would so he could shoot the Horathian bastard and remove his threatening rising star forever.

“I'm in,” Sharky replied, flexing his bandaged arm, “if you'll have me.”

“Can you fire a weapon as well as you can handle a ship, Captain?” Skeletor asked, eying him coldly.

“Give me a weapon if you want me as a shooter. I'm fine with that as long as I get some payback,” Sharky replied with a brief smile. “Or I can help in the planning stages, your choice.”

“Very well. You can prove yourself with Trapjaw later. For the moment, I have a list of resources and times we know we can get a team near Irons. I want you to come up with a plan for each of them. I'll compare them to mine, and we'll make a decision from there,” Skeletor said.

Sharky nodded, face impassive despite his growing excitement. He knew he was never going to be able to get out of the star system, just getting off the damn planet was impossible with all the ports being watched as they were. But this was a way to hit back, possibly do a body blow to the so-called New Federation. One that they may not recover from he thought coldly. “Yes, sir.”

---<>))))

Admiral Irons took a step back to look at the big picture and some of the players involved.

Investments were starting to pour in. Industry was sprouting all over the Federation. With the industry came interests in medicine, education, and civics projects that had been distant memories for centuries. Some had faded into obscurity and near myth.

Governor Saladin was still struggling with his capital colony while also trying to rein in the desire to reform Eden in some form. His accent to the governor's mansion had created a policy shift and backers were still trying to get a handle on things. The changes were also due to the corruption charges that were still sending shock waves through the political and business establishments.

It was interesting that Governor Randall's government had voted down building a skyhook yesterday, the admiral noted. A lot of money from various supporters had been spent advertising it and lobbying for it. The beanstalk would have been great to move freight up and down the gravity well efficiently and economically but with so many spaceports cropping up all over the planet in the coming years, it wasn't needed or desired. A part of healthy self-interest had gone into the political calculus, but Irons was fairly confident they'd made the right decision in this case. The skyhook would have served as a cheap means to get cargo up and down the gravity well, but it would have also served as a bottleneck at some point and he didn't need nor want that. Nor did Governor Randall apparently.

Boss Tweed from Tammany Hall had risen through the ranks of surviving mayors and county leaders to become the nominal governor of Epsilon Triangula … at least until their next scheduled planetary election. The man seemed good at his job and had been doing a workman-like job handling the ins and outs of being a statesman in a reconstruction time period. He was a synch to win the governorship in the next election as long as he kept his fat fingers out of the till.

Jed Clampett he knew vaguely. Oh, he knew the man's back story; the man had made his fortune in oil when he'd been a backwoods hick. He was a down home man, simple but incredibly wise. He'd risen to politics using his fortune as his war chest and had an air of simple honesty about him.

Governor Harper he'd finally met face-to-face a short time ago when he'd given the Neochimp his upgraded implants. He'd also heard good things about newly elected Governor Parvati Das, the governor of Seti Alpha 4. She was a human female and apparently a friend of Doctor Duello McFile and his wife. He'd seen her image, and the one time he'd spoken to her over the ansible, she'd lived up to her tall and curvaceous, dark-haired reputation. She'd been flirty with him, but he knew the distant image had hidden the scars on her face and heart. She had been scarred by a barn fire at a young age. The doctor had saved her, and his wife had helped to nurse her back to health. She had become an understudy, first as a nurse, midwife, and then as a paramedic and traveling doctor. When the doctor had been kidnapped, she'd done her best to fill in for him. She had gotten a healthy and respectful reputation from the area she had served.

When the doctor had returned with Io 11, she had been instrumental in helping to divvy up the supplies and see to the patients. Since she had done such a good job, she had been referred to do it again by various people when the Federation had come calling.

She had initially refused treatment, but her friends had talked her into it after the worst cases had been taken care of. She had received dermal abrasion and regeneration treatments to restore her beauty. That had gotten the boys to start taking a new notice of her. After a short period of time, she has gained a following among the local towns, schools, colleges, and camps, and by acclaim was elected leader.

According to the piece the local Knox News affiliate had wrote, she had reluctantly agreed, simply because no one else had been up to taking the job properly. Despite her new lofty rank, she still remained humble, never forgetting that only a few short years ago she had been the scarred, ugly woman that few had the time for but now the males are clamoring for.

According to Prometheus's report she had been in the background and had helped push her people to request a military base and had even gotten the mayors to agree to give them the land for free.

Governor Wynona Lane was another female human and governor of Gaston. The woman was in her midfifties with dark skin and dark hair. In her youth she had served as a midwife and barber, and the local busybody since barbers were the center of town and regional gossip.

She knows everyone and had an engaging personality. Her looks hadn't faded, and it's clear from the images he had seen that in her youth she had been quite the looker.

Undoubtedly she knew that since she was a bit of a flirt, even over the ansible. She had been among the first to get and use some of the trade goods the admiral and
Io 11
had brought to the planet. She and her allies had used the devices to garner and trade favors with other people of power.

Her elevation had allowed her to sit as the senior trade delegate with cargo ships that came through the star system. Her ability to get what was needed had cemented her leadership ability in the eyes of the natives. She held out the hand of friendship to the admiral and the other governors, but he knew she was fishing for more favors and connections. He had to respect that.

He flipped the tablet's tab to another governor, Farvalis Weng of Senka. He was a human male of Asian descent. From the image he had very pale skin, almost alabaster as a combination of genetics and time aboard space stations and ships. His family owned a pair of large mineral refineries, the last two in the star system before Irons had sent a repair ship in to help rebuild the star system's industry and colonies.

His was one of the first families to recover from the Xeno war apparently. He was known as a shrewd businessman, ruthless in the boardroom, but not entirely uncaring about the people in either his employ or under his rule. According to his bio, he had been the former manager on the small Shenguo Shi, (Life Stone) colony before venturing into the political arena and leaving the day-to-day running of the family business to his son.

The governor of New Texas, Beam Piper was a Chimera known as a Fuzzy. The small but strangely magnetic being stood at only sixty-seven centimeters tall and was covered in golden fur from head to tail. He was known to smoke a pipe and play with his tiny six shooters. He looked like a child's stuffed toy, but no one was foolish enough to say that to his face. Even kids were wary of him.

He got his position due to pure cussedness; he was a former cow poke and rancher who had ridden large dogs to manage his herds. Rumor had it that he was a gunslinger par excellence which helped with New Texas's unique take on political discourse.