LOCATION: Y6X-3H2-4
SYSTEM: Y6X-3H2
DATE: 2398
Martinez sipped his cup of caff, or what passed for caff on Eden’s End. He longed for the real stuff, but no self-respecting Captain came this far outside STO space. And he was glad for that. It's why he packed up his family and came out here in the first place. He was sick of all the bullshit and rules the Solarians and the other core worlders forced on them. All to benefit the rich.
They still had rules out here past the fringe, but it wasn’t the same. People here knew what mattered and what didn’t. But man, he still wished for a real cup of caff. As he was pondering the few things he missed from civilized space, his screen beeped.
Martinez set his mug down and sat up. The old research facility’s sensors were as decrepit as everything else in the facility, so sometimes they gave false positives. Sometimes they didn’t. Those times are why someone had to man the sensor room at all times.
The job wasn’t terrible, mostly just a lot of boring sitting around. They did occasionally get pirates that came through though. Most just kept going, the facility looked like a very unappealing target with its dilapidated exterior. The few pirates that were dumb enough to land and try their luck quickly found themselves cut off and outnumbered.
He punched in the codes to run a follow-up scan. The passive sensors wouldn’t give them a very clear picture of what was out there, but it would alert them if something was indeed out there. Martinez waited and soon a ping came back.
He cursed under his breath and rolled the old computer chair over to the alarm station. He entered another code and the entirety of the interior was bathed in yellow flashing lights. This would be repeating itself across the enormous structure, wherever lights still functioned. Thankfully someone had figured out how to disable the audio portion of the alarm long ago. He swore he still had ringing in his ears from the times that damn thing went off.
After a dozen minutes or so, a group clomped up the stairs to the security office.
“What do we have, Martinez?” Damien asked.
The shorter man was nominally in charge of Eden’s End. Not because he was large or intimidating, but because he didn’t take shit from anyone. He was also the primary reason the station wasn’t a haven for criminals. Anyone who fucked around quickly found out at the end of Damien’s fist. The man had been a championship martial artist back in the core before he gave it all up for some peace and quiet out here.
“Hard to say. It hasn’t moved since the original scan. But the system keeps flagging it, so it’s definitely real.”
The next scan showed three more ships had joined the first. Damien didn’t say anything, But Martinez felt the man’s grip tighten on the back of the chair.
“You think someone wised up?” another man asked.
Martinez didn’t know this man. Probably one of the people who helped man the security room like him.
“If it was pirates, they would’ve been coming in full tilt. They wouldn’t have waited for their allies. Sharing isn’t in their nature.”
“So who then?” Gabriella asked.
Martinez made sure to keep his eyes from straying to the former fitness instructor. Even if she wasn’t Damien’s girlfriend, if his wife found out he looked at another woman, he would never hear the end of it.
“We won’t know until they get within visual range,” Damien stated. “Are the asteroid cameras up and working?”
Martinez shrugged. “Haven’t had a chance to check em.”
“I’ll do it,” the unnamed man said enthusiastically.
Martinez just rolled his eyes at the man’s eagerness.
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“Three, four, five, and seven are working. The rest are offline.”
“It’ll have to do. Send a laser comm to the units and get them oriented in our visitor’s direction. I want to know who’s knocking on our door.”
It took hours to get a visual picture of the ships. They were taking their sweet time moving deeper into the system and toward Eden’s End. Or as the old records cataloged the planet, Y6X-3H2-4. Martinez didn’t know who coined the new name, but he was glad he didn’t have to call it by that old designation constantly.
“Those don’t look like pirate ships,” Gabriella said.
The lead ship was a massive hulk that easily outweighed the other three ships by at least twice over. Martinez may not have served in the military, but he had seen something similar before. “I think that’s a troop carrier.”
He felt all the eyes in the room turn on him, and he swallowed thickly.
“You’re sure?” Damien asked.
“I- I’m not positive. But it looks similar to one I saw once as a kid.”
“Fuck!” the wiry man cursed.
“So it is pirates?” a few of Damien’s hangers-on asked from the background.
“Worse,” the man spat. “It's mercenaries.”
“Mercenaries? What would Mercenaries want all the way out here?” Martinez’s question was answered a moment later as every terminal in the room secured itself at the same time.
“Shit!” the excitable man who had checked the cameras squealed as he ran over to another terminal and began furiously typing. “They have the master override code!”
“I thought you said you disabled that?” Damien demanded as he strode up behind the man.
“No, I told you I bypassed it. Maybe you’ll listen to me next time when I tell you we need to replace the core, Brother.”
Brother? Well, that was news to Martinez.
“As if we had the parts to do that. Just work your magic.”
Damien’s brother gave an exasperated laugh. “There is no magic. The entire system is locked down. They have full control over everything from their ship.”
To prove his point, the overhead speakers crackled to life.
“Squatters of the Y6X-3H2-4 research outpost. This is Captain Matthews of the Hawks of Ganos. The facility you are residing in has been legally purchased. You will submit yourselves for inspection. Failure to comply with this order will result in your arrest on suspicion of criminal activity. This will be the only warning you are given. Captain Matthews out.”
The room went quiet after the statement. The sweet silence didn’t last long as it was broken by some babbling idiot in the back.
“W- we have to fight!” the man declared.
Damien casually walked over to the man who was enthusiastically bobbing his head up and down because he thought Damien was agreeing with him. The former martial artist cuffed the idiot upside the head. “Shut the hell up.”
When the room went quiet again, Damien spoke. “They specifically called it an inspection, not a relocation. I’ve heard of these Hawks of Ganos. If it’s the same company I’m thinking of, they should treat us properly.”
“You can’t be fucking serious!” another man stepped up, his voice laced with anger. “You want us just to let them into the facility? They’re just going to evict us, leaving us without a home. Are we just supposed to beg for a ride back to STO space or try to eke out a living on the surface?”
Damien just looked at the man. “What did you expect would happen? That you would just live out your life in luxury in a place that didn’t belong to you? We all moved into here knowing none of us owned this place. It was only a matter of time until something changed. Either someone would have purchased it, the STO would have expanded its borders, or the place would have decayed to the point it became uninhabitable. So I suggest if you want that ride back to civilization, you don’t do anything stupid. Hell, maybe we can even negotiate to stay here.”
To Martinez, it didn’t sound like Damien believed that last bit but it sounded like a better option than the alternative. Fighting off a small crew of pirates was one thing, but fighting off a troop transport filled with well-trained mercenaries was another. He sure as hell didn’t want to go down fighting. If he had to die, he would prefer to have it happen in his bedroom doing something far more engaging with his missus.
***
“Sir, is there a reason you didn’t notify the people in the facility below that we would be leaving them on the planet and only arresting those with warrants?”
It was a good question from his first officer. “Never let a possible enemy know your next move. Sure, we could have told them. And they may have lined up all nicely, only to wait until we were in the middle of the search to ambush us. This way, they are unsure of our motives and it will likely bring the rotten elements to the surface. While it may not be the most respectable way to handle this situation, it is the safest.”
“Won’t that endanger the drop troops?”
“No. They know better than to trust unknown civilians in a hostile environment. I suspect after my little speech, at least a few people down there will try something. Others will probably hide and hope we overlook them. Now that we have full access to the station's sensors, the few that work anyway, hiding won’t do them much good. We already have the crew down in the computer core crunching the information. They will be able to give us an accurate count of how many people are down there and their activities for the last twenty hours.”
“I see,” his first mate nodded.
She was young, but she was starting to get the hang of tactics. He would make sure to pass along all of his knowledge to her. Eventually, she would replace him as Captain of the Talon when he retired. And he would be damned if he left without ensuring a suitable replacement for his position.
Matthews sat back in his chair as the ship came alive with the sounds of soldiers hurrying to their drop ships. He never got tired of hearing it.