Throttle Forty-Three

“And they’re off! The Tyrant Cracker has begun, and a full hour earlier than it was supposed to!” Yu shouted. The alien was twisting and wiggling about as though caught in the throes of a seizure.

Diana grinned. The situation was deteriorating in a spectacular fashion. Racing ships were firing everything they had, engines and guns. Most were rushing to the nearest jump ring, moving as quickly as they could to slip into the relative safety found past the tunnel.

Some, though, were clearly airing out grievances and taking out the competition before the race actually started.

With the number of rings present, the racers here would have been split up into a dozen or more groups before swooping down onto the planet where the race took place. That would give even the most bloodthirsty of them the opportunity to fight only a few other racers.

Here though, with everyone packed in close?

Diana didn’t know if that corvette’s goal was to cause this much chaos or not, but she saluted them on their success.

“Should we fight?” Zil Rossi asked.

“No,” Diana said. She winced as something ricocheted off their shields. They were down a full two percent from that. “We’ll jump first, deal with any trouble on the other side once we get there. I’m willing to bet that the jump will serve to cool tempers down a little.”

“How much are you willing to bet?” Zil Rossi asked.

Diana hummed. “I don’t know, not much. I’m not familiar with half the species involved in this race, they might hold onto a grudge longer than a human would.”

She spun and kicked up the thrust to one side, sending the Cerberus reeling around a smaller vessel that was bleeding air and fire into the vacuum.

The nearest ring wasn’t too far off, but Diana didn’t aim for that one. “ChaOS, give me numbers. How many have entered each ring?”

Numbers flashed onto her display, a clean indication of which ring was currently the most popular. She aimed the ship’s prow towards the least popular then punched the engines to full.

The Cerberus was still accelerating as they slipped through the ring and shot out into space.

“That was something,” Diana said as she relaxed.

Zil Rossi coughed. “I… I couldn’t breathe there, for a moment.”

“Ah, sorry,” Diana said. The added acceleration was probably a bit much for the ktacha. She was connected to her seat, and had received an immediate cocktail of stimulants to negate the worst effects of the acceleration. “Once we’ve arrived in-system, we’ll burn a little slower until we arrive near the planet.”

“Thank you,” Zil Rossi said.

“ChaOS, want to bring up what happened back there?” Diana asked. “I didn’t expect everything to break apart so suddenly.”

“It seems as though the Bolgian vessel arrived in-system a little late. I don’t believe the organisers had any actual security in place, though a few of the vessels that lingered near the station were repainted decommissioned Federation warships.”

“Those are actual Federation ships,” Zil Rossi said. “The captains of those will be getting a nice bonus to keep their mouths shut about it, and no one will give them a second look. They’re at the starting line to provide security, which I think they did.”

“I guess so,” Diana said. “Could have handled that better, I guess, but in the heat of the moment. Well, whatever. Go on, ChaOS.”

The AI took a moment to reply. “Setting aside the contents of the data-packet the Bolgian corvette sent, its initial attack damaged two of the rings. Subsequent shots were aimed back at the Federation vessels. They seemed to specifically avoid firing at media vessels or racing ships.”

Diana worked her jaw. “Interesting. Did they want to be seen?”

“That is possible. Do you want a full break-down of the subsequent events?”

“Just a tally of the lost ships,” Diana said.

“Twelve vessels were damaged beyond the ability to continue in the race,” ChaOS said. “An additional twenty-nine were hit, though most damage was absorbed by shields, or are what I would deem as purely superficial in nature.”

“That wasn’t a bad move then,” Diana said.

“What do you mean by that?” Zil Rossi asked.

Diana gestured vaguely in the air before her. “I mean, the corvette’s attack. One corvette’s worth of resources for a dozen ships. Not to mention the damage to the rings and the animosity between the racers. The way a lot of racers turned on the others around them is going to be bad press too.”

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“It’s the Bolgians’ fault,” Zil Rossi said.

“To some degree, yeah, but I’m pretty sure some ships opened fire on others who weren’t a threat. They tossed a spark into a fuel tank.”

Diana adjusted a few things on her command chair. The quick fight had made it clear she needed to be ready to act at a moment’s notice.

“Mistress, you might want to look over some of the documentation the Bolgian corvette sent.”

“Anything interesting?” Diana asked.

“Some things, yes. The corvette sent a large data-packet. After scanning it for any potential electronic viruses and finding it clean, I have begun to archive and work through the contents. It isn’t too much, likely owing to the package only having a few seconds to transmit. What is here details a long series of aggressions carried out by the Federation against Bolgia. The planet paints itself as a bastion of free speech, open opinions, and a few other things that are generally seen by the galactic community as positive.”

Zil Rossi made a noise not unlike a snort. “Propaganda,” she said.

“Indeed. Though the footage and evidence against the Federation is questionable.”

“You’d believe them?” Zil Rossi asked.

“I have no reason to believe them over the Federation,” ChaOS said. “They are both equally untrustworthy when it comes to displaying matters in their own best interest.”

Diana hummed. “Anything real interesting?”

“The Federation approached the planet with delegates some twenty years ago, offering temporary membership to a program that rehabilitates a world for better integration within the Federation. Within one year of the offer’s refusal, there was a six thousand percent increase in piratical behaviour around the system.”

“That’s one hell of a coincidence,” Diana said. “Did they provide any proof that the pirates were Federation?”

“The Federation doesn’t employ pirates,” Zil Rossi said.

Diana laughed. “Then the Federation is dumb. Why wouldn’t you employ pirates, especially if they’re going to exist anyway?”

“There is further evidence, though it will be difficult to verify at this time. The Bolgians have noticed this same pattern being used on other worlds, frequently involving a Tyrant Cracker race once Federation propaganda has successfully painted the system as ruled over by tyrants. They have a list of other systems, as well as dates where such a set-up was used.”

“That’s nonsense,” Zil Rossi said.

Diana shrugged. “Why? I mean, I’m not an expert, but I’d think it somewhat uncommon that a system goes rogue once a year. How many systems that hosted the Tyrant Cracker became Federation systems a few years later?”

“A few, but usually only after the locals overthrew the regime holding them down,” Zil Rossi said. “I don’t like this. You shouldn’t believe what they’re saying, not when they’re clearly enemies of the Federation.”

“But I’m not an ally of the Federation,” Diana said. “I don’t know, and because I don’t know, I’m going to verify. Or at least, get ChaOS to verify.”

“I will do my utmost, Mistress,” ChaOS said. “Although I’m afraid that I won’t be able to discover much until such a time as we’ve returned to a system where I can connect to a greater network.”

“Check out Bolgia’s infrastructure,” Diana suggested. “If they’ve falsified stuff, we might be able to figure out what was faked and how.”

Diana glanced at the timer. Barely half an hour to go. The starting line really was close to Bolgia.

“Hey, do the Bolgians have jump rings?” she asked.

“They shouldn’t.” Zil Rossi said. “Or if they do, they’ll be ancient ones. Not very effective. Why?”

Diana shook her head, dismissing the thought. “Just wondering where that corvette came from. I wonder if it flew all the way over under its own power. The Federation security back there should have been checking out every ship jumping to the system from an official ring, right?”

Zil Rossi was quiet for a long while. “I do hope this doesn’t mean that we’re going to arrive and find a prepared enemy.”

Diana grinned. “Who knows? ChaOS, do we have a list of objectives?”

“We do. It was transmitted as soon as the first ship crossed the ring. Someone was paying attention, I suspect.”

“Good! I’d hate to arrive at the party and not know what to do!”

***