The Province Of Terrans 2
A Starshatter adventure
(Art source unknown)
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Index: Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Chapter 14 Chapter 16
Chapter 15
Her mind’s blade
The audience witnessed Lady Taia and Northstone of then, exploring FSS Bird Of Hope’s armory. There, the Spacer had stored a whole array of spare parts and upgrade kits for different armaments. An alcove, one of supreme high Terran tech was where the explorer’s elaborate spacesuit rested. Stocked high there were maglocked ammo boxes, once full of spare power packs, now somewhat depleted, and various specialist tools. The crafting implements he took and proceeded to show Taia a choice of different weapon construction diagrams, so she could decide her armament of choice.
There was no need to use the Shelter’s nanoprinter yet since what the lady priest needed most would be a simple piece of jewelry or two. Rings, bracelets, tiaras... these Northstone made as a child for his sisters and a good number of them to boot. This he could now craft with ease and though the items would be made from forged megasteel, they’d probably be on par with the works of professionals.
“Gifts fit for a lady priestess of yore, so she could best the enemies of now.” – said Northstone with a smile, while Lady Taia proudly displayed said items and with such grace, that many of the patrons gasped, marveling at their beautiful craftsmanship.
Her silver tiara in the shape of a sacred Egyptian falcon, with its scintillating eyes of lapis lazuli, the audience already saw. A ring there was also, a thread forged from hair-thin megasteel and braided into an intricate rope-like circle. What appeared to be a crystalline chip from classic 1960s Terran starcraft mainframes beautified it, and glittered as if it had a life of its own.
“Indeed, and forged with much love, that I was so greatly emboldened!” – and the lady priestess bowed, first at her husband and then the audience – “Please, my lord star-walker, do tell the story of how you crafted and I poured my mind into them.”
Following a bow of his own the Spacer kissed her hand, and proceeded to upload a couple of new files onto The Roundabout’s holoprojector. These showed what none had seen nor heard of Northstone Firehand’s more private side. As he worked with his tools on a small workbench in his ship’s armory, the Spacer answered a myriad of questions by Lady Taia. Though it was painfully obvious that some of these were cut from the holo-footage for reasons of personal safety, still, patrons became enamored in the shortish tale of the renowned Spacer’s childhood.
“You ask dear lady, what is the early life of a Spacer?” – the audience witnessed Northstone deftly operate his many tools, shaping the metal wings of the falcon-shaped tiara almost like they were not megasteel but paper, as he answered Taia’s timid question – “In this world of ours, following the 1969’s brutal invasion, Humanity has changed much. Children, though they do still have many and carefree days, all have to study and train so their future maybe free and their own progeny, numerous. As a Spacer, I was lovingly instructed and taught many a life-saving survival skill, from as early as three years old. By the time I was six, I could craft simple items, maintain fire and beamarms, perform mundane repairs on a spacesuit, even knew the basics of piloting and stellar navigation.”
To illustrate his words, Northstone had then projected a number of his early childhood holo-slides. Some displayed him, little face emitting great focus, tinkering over a smallish laser pistol, successfully forging a spare part for one of his family’s spacesuits. Others showed the boy pilot his childhood’s space shuttle, together with one really successful hyperspace jump. For those among the Star Blood who knew of Terrans, they were not surprised that Human younglings had such realism-centered upbringing, though even they marveled at how extensive the Spacer training was.
One became quickly and painfully aware that, all those with invading or slaving intent would have little chance dragging Terran little ones away, for the latter would answer any subjugation attempt with walls of railgun and laser fire. That those children would fight to their last shot, saving it for themselves lest be sold into bondage, their self broken via drugs, mind control chip, or outright wiped by some vile telepath. People looked in Lady Taia’s eyes and they could clearly see that the Egyptian was now made keenly aware of this reality.
Yet what had perhaps been the lady’s favorite image of her future husband’s childhood, was little Northstone crafting toys. Small cars, trucks, a colorfully painted shuttle, and a sailing ship, nevermind that he was a little boy, everything he did showed great attention to detail, devotion to form and function combined.
“I remember, my older brother, he had carved a simple boat out of wood for me to play with in the river. Once, the winds pushed it so far away that he had to swim for an hour to catch it.” – whispered lady Taia and her eyes watered – “But, I find your childhood full of hard work and many chores, inspiring. After all, had you not learned these things, then you wouldn’t have explored this gloomy place and spared us a grisly fate!”
The Spacer sighed.
His face on the holo showed him donning one of his hope-forging smiles when he said – “All Human boys join the fight for the salvation of our kin from as early as they can. I shot my fist enemy dead shortly after my ninth birthday and with that very same laser pistol you saw me craft earlier.”
“Oh, how did this happen?” – asked Taia, her sadness gone, as she wiped her tears with the vacfoam handkerchief he gave her – “Where were your parents?”
“It was my older sister, Corina and her husband Lorn, and they watched over me like hawks!” – said the man and showed Taia the wings of her future tiara, nearly complete – “My parents traveled at this remote alien port on a trading expedition, deeper in the Fringe space expanse, which was a largely neutral star station. However, just like most places over there, one could bump into crimmies of many kinds.”
As she watched the footage Jenn snickered and the lady priestess gave her a smiling look before this one interjected, the holo temporarily paused by Northstone – “Lorn is one of my bikar brothers, from our SMC. I always remember the stories he told me how he dealt with these full of themselves alien crimmies.”
Jenn made sure to show a holo-slide of her own, this one displaying her as a wee girl, sitting on the shoulders of a huge, burly man. Armed to the teeth, this otherwise scary-looking bikar had calm eyes, which nevertheless emoted his iron-willed determination, a wholesome to behold protective brutality, so prevalent in Human men aliens of the Star Blood and alien tourists had met.
The priestess nodded to the chief bartender – “I did not know that my husband’s sisters were so many or that they had acquired such strong, warrior husbands.”
“Oh, you won’t be idle for long, good priestess,” – said grinning Jenn and gave Taia a wink – “if you know what I mean.”
Lady Taia returned the smile with a graceful nod, her tiara adorned fiery head shrouded in a wholesome to behold halo. She and Northstone shared another long look, the Spacer continuing his story with a longing sigh.
“What is... crimmies?” – inquired Lady Taia from the resumed holo-footage – “Another kind of monster?”
With a nod, Northstone continued, as he spindled the thinnest metallic wire from a single block of megasteel – “Those who, if not dealt with in a most permanent manner, become parasites upon your community. I am, of course, not talking about unfortunate individuals who, abandoned or mistreated as children, steal a loaf of bread in order to keep deadly hunger at bay. No, I and my family members helped many such orphaned, broken youths find their own way in life. I am talking about are those who murder, rape, and steal the futures of innocents.”
“Our Temple guards beheaded these!” – exclaimed the lady priestess, her eyes aglint with old memories when she spoke – “The foulest I remember was some vile crone who murdered children with poisoned sweets. It was me, a novice at Temple, who peered into her evil thoughts by chance and saw... things... foul things that I shouldn’t have!”
“Now I am curious,” – said the Spacer, the audience marveling at his masterful use of metal, as he used the wire he’d just spindled to merge the tiara’s base with its wings, and weave a simple ring soon after – “how did this encounter end?”
“Why, just as I have been taught by my priestly teachers, an immediate thought for aid I sent to the nearest Temple guard. The man came so quickly and punched her in the face with such power, that the murderous hag spat out whatever teeth she had left. It would appear that, in my childhood ineptitude, I had sent all the things I saw inside her foul mind alongside my plea for aid. That guard... he had six children and... I made him cry.”
Northstone again paused the footage and addressed the audience with a polite gesture – “Dear friends, I know that your time is quite valuable, therefore a decision was made to have bonnie lady Taia tell a tale, one star-month after now. Please, if you wish to save tables or seats at the bar, ask our lovely Jenn, she will make all arrangements for you!”
Not waiting for them to employ PDA or their words, the Spacer continued his childhood tale.
“In my case, I had two guards and they were seconds away. However, it was not me who was attacked, no. Later I learned that racketeers had been accosting local small businesses on the station’s promenade deck. What I saw was a bunch of beefy thugs beating people and one of them, he... no...” – the Spacer told her his story as he stopped for a second and his eyes became like burning steel – “it was crushing a baby boy’s head into the floor-plating.”
Lady Taia of then took a deep breath – “What did you do?!”
“I did not waste time and try to convince the creature to stop, because that babe most probably wouldn’t have survived a few seconds, let alone longer. Calling the adults to aid, I simultaneously fired my already drawn pistol flying at the scene, my spacesuit’s engines screaming. From point-blank range, I hit the monster’s head and fried it with a single shot, then my fast flying body pushed the filth so I could shield the baby and administer a life-saving dose of medigel.”
“From what I remember about thugs in my lifetime, I doubt they remained placid for long. By the grace of Great Hor, my dear star-walker, I hope you were able to save that baby!” – from the holo-footage the lady priestess did indeed sound quite concerned, as if she expected Northstone to tell her of that child’s inevitable demise.
“You are correct, dear lady. The monster’s fellows dropped what they were doing, mainly beating the life out of said babe’s unfortunate parents and attempted to end me. My shield soaked but one grazing beam hit, which would’ve handily slain the babe, before my sister and uncle Lorn took them down. As for the child,” – said the Spacer and showed a single holo-slide, which depicted him as a grown young man shaking hands with an alien kid – “Minzk grew up to be quite the successful surgeon. We still meet on his home star station, once every star-year or so.”
The lady priestess nodded, a much wider and happier smile on her face before she thought of something and her brow became troubled – “I suspect this was not the end. These... the crimmies you call them, they had allies, right?”
“True, but my parents and siblings acted swiftly. Since the locals had been oppressed by these many gangs and for years, their own cops... erm... guards, they were corrupt and did not protect them, my family offered to lead all those who wanted a restoration of normalcy.” – explained the Spacer and showed a holo-slide of him and a bunch of alien children, holed up in the cargo hold of a Terran starship.
“Me being a kid, I and those my age were sent to guard the children of those locals who took up arms to recover their freedoms. While I told the kiddies stories, dad, mom, and my siblings, followed by parents who wanted not their kids growing up as slaves, wiped the star station clean of gangsters and corrupt cops. Only those who ran away survived.” – told the tale Northstone of then and, as he polished the tiara, added with a sad sigh – “Of course, those in love of their parasitic paradise, they came back, a bunch of their crimmie friends in tow.”
“In the dark of space, my kin showed them what they truly were—trash to be disposed of.” – said the Spacer and his emote became that of steel – “Bullies will keep on taking, until one day, you are living a life of quiet death.”
Northstone had completed most of her new tiara and was looking for gems among his crafting supplies, while Lady Taia, her head tilted in a most adorable way, picked something up, lodged between the crafting table and tool cabinet. It was the same tiny crystalline chip, a dodecahedron, which the audience now saw on her ring.
“It makes me happy to learn you, lord star-walker, have been protecting life since early childhood.” – said she with a smile and held onto the chip, boundless curiosity in her eyes.
“Wait, where did you find this chip? I was looking for months, even scanned the armory countless times and still couldn’t find it.” – exclaimed the Spacer of then, his crafter’s eye measuring that said chip would be a perfect fit for the ring he’d just woven together.
“I know not. Looking down at the floor for a chance and just it caught my eye. Now, what is a chip and... may you use it for my new ring?” – asked lady Taia with a sparkle in her eye as she gave him the item.
“This is one of the spare crystalline memory chips for her mainframe.” – the Spacer pointed his ship with a smirk, as he explained his future wife what one did – “You see, the machine is operated by a device which, much akin to our wondrous human minds performs mental tasks, like calculations for example, and it requires a working memory.”
“This one was once part of her original configuration, but I later replaced it with a bigger, much better chip. Kept this one just in case since it worked so well and us Terrans dislike throwing useful things. Rest assured lady priestess, my Bird Of Hope has all that she needs to operate and at peak efficiency!”
Northstone examined said chip and for a few seconds his gaze was lost in its twinkling depths. He shook his head and made sure the item became part of Taia’s new ring, melting another piece of the wire, encasing it in an extra secure web of megasteel threads. Glittered it did as soon as he had completed the ring and the Spacer cast his ever so curious gaze at his new creation. A scan, which the explorer made sure to add the results of to his holo-footage, proved said chip was just that, a plain, inert chip.
Before he placed it on Lady Taia’s finger, Northstone made sure to complete the last touches on her tiara. With the lapis lazuli eyes polished and installed in their sockets, the falcon assumed his majestic stewardship of the tiara throne. Which, coincidentally was the end of that piece of holo-footage and the Spacer, having taken a short break already, continued the tale:
“My friends, like many of you, I was aware of the telepathic powers and their wondrous applications, both in everyday life and on the battlefield. However, I knew little when it came to how their artifacts were made. Of course, one, even someone as mundane like myself could forge the items out of whatever materials they had at hand, yet the process of transforming these from trinkets into mighty conduits of telepathic might was a mystery. Lady Taia told me and with the same terminology she learned at Temple, which to me was an even better explanation.”
There was a lull while the lady priestess concluded a shortish, but quite elegant demonstration. She focused through her ring and for a few moments manipulated the liquids in all cups. Amid a choir of happy gasps and cries, they floated, assuming the shape of Northstone, spacesuit and all, before gently landing back inside glasses, pints, or whatnot.
“As my good lady told me, by focusing their power of choice and pouring every bit of telepathic prowess into this item, a telepath is able to forge a link with it. While Taia’s ring was to be a conduit for aquakinesis, the wondrous tiara would greatly empower her concentration, vastly improve her energy reserves, and even give that ability to fold space a buff. The armored spacesuit I gave her was easily upgraded with all the spare parts I had on hand and she could imbue it with telepathic defenses. These marvelous feats took her and me more than a couple of days to achieve, yet while she meditated safe and sound aboard FSS Bird Of Hope, I could stretch my time and focus on other tasks. Chief among said tasks would be the refurbishing of our transport shuttle. After all, if alarms rang, my lady could fold space if or I should rather say, when the Jaern attack.”
That is, once more, a matter of choice dear reader! What kind of tasks should Northstone commit his precious time to? It goes without asking that the Jaern and their zealous leader would attack...
(One) “Luck was with us! Though Niv and his soldiers patrolled our perimeter, taking turns to train the Egyptians, we had not suffered a single Jaern attack. This is why I finally decided to take those mummies down and make use of their combat gear. I couldn’t keep the sight of Saksulan raising all those skeletons, who then promptly armed themselves with all kinds of weapons. Whatever the reason of the Jaern delay, they would inevitably attack. Dying of hunger was not in their list of things to do, nor was becoming a pitiful fallen hunter, feasting upon corpse meat.”
(Two) “Since I doubted the Jaern would leave us along long enough to craft everything I needed to battle them into oblivion, I decided to focus at one aspect of combat. The power core I had so far been using to power the Shelter and operate the big nanoprinter, it could be used to energize something else—a portable shield generator. Yes, and this quite powerful dome could not only protect my hastily armed with vibroblades, spears, and magnetic crossbows Egyptian kin from Jaern particle-beam weapons, but wraiths too. Behind it, I and Niv’s soldiers could together greet the filth with a wall of devastating beamfire, forcing the enemy into a fight of our choosing and terms.”
(Three) “Time was a precious resource and no matter how much I wanted to do, I could only achieve so much. In a situation like this, when we could not spare long enough to toughen our brave Egyptian farmers and fishermen, transforming them into a proper fighting force, nor build upgrades and better weapons for Niv’s soldiers, I had to think of simpler solutions. Booby traps, jury-rigged IEDs, and automated turrets fitted with looted Jaern beamguns, all of this could be done for cheap time, so to speak. A line of defenses around the Kosmovoi’s nursery, such that did not sleep nor could be hacked, these would bite into the Jaern numbers, while keeping our people safe.”
(*_*_*)
Dear reader, please do not forget to post your pick in the comments below, and elaborate upon why you think our protagonist should do so.
Ooh, option 3! You had me at booby traps 😎
I fear I'm late since, but I would have picked #3.
Automated defense systems are a wonderous way to help you focus on other urgent tasks.