A Planned Improvisation (25 page)

“The missiles weren’t enough?” Ronnie replied. “Main drive is down, but I think we can bring it back up in a minute. A module blew out there.”

“What about our weapons systems?” Park asked.

“Out of missiles,” Iris told him, “but we still have phasers and gravity cannon.”

“According to my read-outs we only have port side and rear-view cameras too,” Ronnie added.

“And no radio antennae,” Park told her.

“No?” Ronnie asked. “That shouldn’t have been affected. We use the forward hull itself as an antenna for all frequencies unless…”

“Unless what?” Park asked when Ronnie trailed off.

“Could be we hit that dark ship so hard, its own hull material is coating our ship’s nose.
 
Ronnie replied. “That stuff is weird and blocks all frequencies I’ve tried to analyze it with. I’ll put someone on that. We should be able to rewire the radios to use the wings instead. Stand by.”

“Stand by?” Park asked, but the connection had already been broken. “Trag, angle us around so we can see what’s happening out there.”

“Aye aye, sir!” Tragackack clacked his response.

“I think we got ten of the dark ships,” Iris remarked, checking her scope. “Counting the one we rammed. Admiral Ginalo’s ships are chasing after the rest. I think they’re trying to run for it.”

“Radio’s back!” Marisea reported. “The admiral sounds frantic. Stand by, Admiral, Switching you to Captain McArrgh.”

The worried face of Ginalo suddenly appeared in front of Park. “I thought we’d lost you Pirates,” he admitted as he stepped away from whatever passed as a camera on his ship and they could once again see his whole body.

“No,” Park smiled. “You don’t get rid of us that easily. I understand we rammed one of those dark ships.”

“It looked like the other way around,” Ginalo corrected him. After those missiles of yours went off, I think they got desperate. You managed to kill nine ships outright and damaged another three. We would have liked to take those three alive – see what sort of people we’re dealing with – but they went down shooting. We had to kill them. The rest were already running for the outer system. They’re beyond our ability to actually catch up to them before they reach the
Stierdach
limit, but we’ll make sure they leave the system. Don’t want them sneaking back in. Your ship doesn’t seem to be moving as well as she could. Are you in need of assistance?”

“My engineer assures me she has that under control,” Park replied. “We’ll continue on to Owatino as soon as she waves her magic wand.”

“Her what?” Ginalo asked, lost at the allusion.

“Sorry, just an expression,” Park apologized. “My Chief Engineer is a bit of a miracle worker and we like to joke that she works by magic.”

“Ah, I see,” Ginalo nodded. “I understand some engineers claim divine inspiration is the source of their talent. Would that be similar?”

“It might even be true,” Park shrugged. “We’ll see you on Owatino?”

“Eventually,” Ginalo promised. “And, McArrgh, thank you. We couldn’t have done this without you and your fellow Pirates.”

“Not to mention the Mer and the Atackack,” Park added. “Earth is one big happy family.”

Independent
landed smoothly at Yawksley Interstellar Spaceport
 
on Owatino half a day later only to find crowds of spectators there to watch them land. The local law enforcers were hard pressed to keep those spectators behind the safety fence. As
Independent
rolled up to the terminal, the crew could see thousands of people lined up along the windows of the concourse. A long flexible tunnel that looked like a jetway rolled up to the side of
Independent
and nested against the main hatch so that when Veronica opened that hatch, she found a level walkway leading into the terminal.

“Coming with us?” Park invited Ronnie.

“No thanks, Skipper,” she replied. “I have a lot of work to do here, especially if you plan to fly home in the same ship you arrived in.”

Lord Rebbert was waiting at the other end of the walkway when Park and his crew left the ship. “This way,” Rebbert told them, indicating a side door that led outside rather than into the terminal. “We’d never get past the crowd in there and we need to get you to the Diet Chamber immediately.”

“It can wait until we’ve washed and changed into more appropriate clothing, can’t it?” Iris protested. “I imagine most of you wear business suits of some sort.”

“And most of us could use the chance to rest,” Sartena added.

“Later,” Rebbert replied. “Sartena, your planetary representative wants a word with you
 
as soon as possible in any case.”

She looked a Park and chuckled, “I suspect I’ve done something wrong again. Ambassadors are probably not supposed to volunteer to navigate on pirate ships. Who is the planetary rep these days?”

“Niraxus,” Rebbert replied. At Sartena’s puzzled look he added, “leader of your Homeland party, I believe.”

“I hadn’t heard the conservatives were in charge these days,” Sartena sighed.

“I wasn’t aware anyone was actually in charge on Tzantza,” Rebbert smiled and they climbed down a tight set of stairs to the paved surface. Park noted he might normally have called it the tarmac, but macadam was not normally navy blue.

“We like to say we’re each in charge of ourselves,” Sartena admitted, “but some of us are more in charge of ourselves than others. If the Homelanders are speaking for us, I suppose my fellow Tzantzans are worried.”

“The whole Alliance is worried just now,” Rebbert replied. He led them through a ground level door and into a long corridor that ran below the normal concourse. “Or at least I imagine it is. We’ve been cut off here for weeks. So our ships got to Earth, did they?”

“One did,” Park replied.

“Oh,” Rebbert was suddenly more serious. “That’s why you came here in your own ship then. I had wondered, especially when I specifically advised you to keep your star drive quiet for the time being. Well, that’s past. Admiral Ginalo already reported your heroic role in breaking the siege here. The Diet is anxious to recognize Earth as a full member of the Alliance. Well most of it is.”

“Surely not the Premm,” Park commented.

“No, not the Premm,” Rebbert replied. “They are threatening to walk out of the Diet should anyone from Earth actually be allowed to enter the chamber.”

“Perhaps we should hold off then,” Iris told him. “We did not come here to disrupt the Alliance.”

“As far as I am concerned the Premm have not truly been a part of the Alliance for a very long time,” Rebbert replied. “Maybe they never truly were. They have repeatedly claimed their goal is to cleanse the Earth and Earth is within Alliance territory. If it were not, I suppose it is unlikely they would have had anything to do with the rest of us.”

“Considering their religion teaches them that they and they alone are truly human,” Sartena added, “I’d say that is a valid supposition. Good riddance to that lot.”

“Tzantza has never been particularly tolerant of the Premm and their religion,” Rebbert noted.

“Considering we have a reputation for being among the most liberal of people,” Sartena countered, “that probably ought to tell you something.”

“And yet your conservatives are currently speaking for you,” Rebbert remarked.

“Our conservatives would be radicals on worlds like Felina,” Sartena laughed.

“Felina?” Park asked. “Isn’t that the world that Grintz fellow came from? Whatever became of him?”

“He’s in the Diet these days,” Rebbert replied. “Frequently on the opposite side of any debate from me, but he’s fanatically loyal to the Alliance of Confederated Worlds.”

“Good to know,” Park nodded as they came to the end of the concourse’s lower level. There were two men waiting for them by a door that led directly outside where a large round floating object was waiting for them.

“Ground-effect vehicles are standard for travel on Owatino,” Rebbert explained as they stepped up and into the floater, “but we use floaters like this when we need to get somewhere in a hurry or in this case to avoid the press.”

“Oh?” Park asked. “Are we avoiding the
paparazzi
?”

“The who?” Rebbert asked. The floater began to hum loudly as it lifted gently away from the ground.

“Back in the day,” Park explained, “celebrities used to be hounded by so-called photojournalists who would do their best to get exclusive, candid and, if possible, embarrassing photographs of them. They would sell those pictures to tabloid… uh… sensationalistic newspapers and magazines. The more sensationalistic or unique a picture was, the more it was worth, so those photographers went out of their way to get shots of those celebrities at home, on vacation and anywhere else my might happen to be.”

“Sounds familiar,” Rebbert remarked. “We have that sort of thing here too. I had to have a photographer thrown out of my hotel suite just last month. I wanted to throw him out the window, but instead I allowed my guards to escort him out of the building.”

“That’s it?” Park asked. “He kept his camera?”

“Of course,” Rebbert replied. “I’m not a thief. Beside the camera had already relayed its pictures to the man’s video and data storage service, so before he left we tracked it down and erased his entire database.”

“Where I come from, that would still be deemed a destruction of personal property,” Iris commented.

“Here too,” Rebbert agreed, “but he had a choice. Sue me for that and face the charges for invading my privacy or shrug off the loss. It would have cost me a fair amount of money, but it would have cost him several years in prison and about twice the money in fines and he still would not have had his picture. Well, never mind that, you should be enjoying the view from up here.”

“It’s amazing!” Marisea told him. “I’ve never seen a city like this! Everything is built so tall!”

“The population of Owatino City is almost ten times the size of the largest city on Earth,” Rebbert explained. “In order to get this many people together in a reasonable area the city had to be built vertically. Of course, this is the only major city on the planet. The rest of the world is either used to produce food for the people in the city or else is a vacation resort.”

“I’ve seen cities this size before,” Iris remarked, “But I must say the architecture is unique in my experience.”

“I would venture to say that it is unique to anyone’s experience, Iris,” Rebbert told her. “When Owatino was chosen as the seat of government for the Alliance, Owatino City was designed from scratch by a team of the top architects of the day. They considered a multitude of designs, most of which were derivative of a number of styles prevalent on the major worlds of the Alliance in various combinations. Naturally, any worlds that felt their characteristic styles were being left out objected, so they eventually developed a whole new style that existed nowhere else.”

“It’s the way each floor is shaped that catches my eye,” Iris admitted. “Each building is different, but all seem to be a combination of shapes. Layers of round, square, hexagonal and more. Some wall are convex and other concave or vertically straight.”

“And the colors,” Sartena added. “None are especially bright or garish, but they are all iridescent and each floor is a different color. I’ve been here before, but you never get used to it.

“Some buildings are capped with spheres or cubes or some other shapes, I don’t have the words for,” Marisea noted, unable to stop staring at them. “And none of these buildings have been copied elsewhere?”

“Nowhere,” Rebbert assured her. “I think all member worlds appreciate that this city is unique and want it to stay that way.”

“What’s that big white building way up ahead?” Marisea asked. “It’s not as tall as the others, but it’s so wide, like someone sat on it and squashed it all out.”

Rebbert laughed. “That is the whole reason for the city being here. That is the Diet Chamber. It’s also where we are headed.”

Park looked forward to see the building. It bore some resemblance to the rest of the city, but Marisea was right. Where the other buildings were high, strangely shaped spires, the Diet Chamber was only five stories tall but as wide as any twenty of the towers. “Why is it so large?” he asked.

“It needs to hold seven hundred and twenty-eight planetary representatives,” Rebbert replied, “Seven hundred twenty nine now although possibly not for much longer – along with their staffs. The building not only contains the actual chamber we meet in, but many smaller meeting rooms and offices.”

“And not a window to be seen,” Iris noted.

“Not from the outside,” Rebbert told her. “The finish of the walls is such that you cannot tell the windows from the walls during the day. At night it looks very different with the illuminated windows forming the symbol of the Alliance.”

There was a wide flat landing on the broad stairway that led up to the magnificent front doors of the Diet Chamber, large enough to hold several vehicles like the one they were in and it was there that they landed. As they exited they could see crowds of people being held back behind a security line at street level, but Lord Rebbert did not give them much time to look around. “Up the stairs,” he directed.

Below the people were cheering. Marisea impishly waved to them and the cheering grew somewhat louder, although Cousin, who had taken the flight here in stride, climbed up to her shoulder and hugged with an almost strangling hold. “I don’t think Cousin likes being out in the open like this,” Marisea commented.

“She’s a burrowing animal by nature,” Park pointed out. “You know she prefers enclosed spaces.”

“No handicap-friendly access?” Iris wondered as they climbed the twenty-two steps.

“We are all well enough to walk up a few stairs,” Tragackack pointed out. It was the first thing any of the Atackack had said since leaving
Independent
. Park suspected they were even more awed by the city than he was.

“There is a ramp access to either side of the stairway,” Rebbert replied. “Some of our representatives are incapable of climbing the stairs either by injury or their natural shapes. Many use hover devices similar to the ones the Mer use to get around on land.”