EPISODE 3
PIRATES PART 1
UESS ENTERPRISE BS-65A
DEEP SPACE
The Mercury Class starship Enterprise was slowly crossing the sky but her size and the distance between the stars disguised her true speed.
On the starboard flight deck of the Enterprise sat a ship about sixty-three meters long resting next to the tubes with air hatches. It had two wings each mounted with rustic looking thrusters. The ship had a long neck with the ships cockpit located in the pit of the neck. On the bow painted up on one side of her neck were the words Enola Gay. On each side of the ship's back was a Raptor connected to the air hatches. The ship had a rounded almost oval stern. The Enola Gay was resting on its' sturdy four legs that easily supported the weight of the great ship, the ship was positioned next to the tubes with air hatches.
In the cockpit were two consoles well separated from each other, each had two officers dressed as civilians. A blond woman with long hair tied in a ponytail and brown eyes sat in the pilot's seat and a man with short brown hair and blue eyes was in the copilot seat.
Colonel James Malone entered the cockpit from behind them and quietly asked the women at the console:
"Commander Spade, are we ready to go?"
Commander Samantha Spade turned in her chair to answer Colonel Malone with a simple:
"Yes, sir"
Malone looked at the man sitting in the copilot's seat and ordered:
"Lieutenant Fitzgerald, contact the Enterprise, and tell them we are ready to leave."
Lt. Martin Fitzgerald nodded, he spoke into the microphone of the headset that both he and Samantha were wearing.
"Enterprise, this is the Enola Gay requesting permission to depart"
"Enterprise here, you have permission to depart, and Enola Gay … good luck"
Fitzgerald gave a smile and then said:
"Thank you, Enterprise, Enola Gay out" then he looked at Spade and Malone, with just a moment of hesitation he nodded.
Spade slowly and evenly pushed up two of the levers on the console causing the ship to shake violently as the two main engines on each wing engaged. Outside the engines rotated to a more horizontal position launching the ship into the cold, dark of space. As the ship pulled away flying across the deck under the curious eyes of the spacesuit clad maintenance crew, its four legs folded up and locked into place in the underbelly of the ship.
The ship left the flight deck and then sped away on an arc that carried it away from the Enterprise, Malone looked at Spade and Fitzgerald then said:
"Well, now our little mission begins, Fitzgerald prepare FTL for a jump to Tauron"
"Yes, sir," said Fitzgerald opening a console that had a panel of numbers and a red button.
Malone grabbed a hand set that was located from the ceiling and crisply announced:
"Attention! All crew attention this is Colonel Malone. I know many of you have been working hard to ready your selves for this mission. I don't need to tell you that this mission will be dangerous, we don't know everything that we will be facing all we can do is rely on our crew mates and our training. On that note we must always stay in character, we must behave like out worst enemy, we must think like them, act like them, we must even…Fraking swear like them. In short people we must become Colonial.
Fitzgerald looked at him and then said:
"FTL Jump coordinates are set and we are ready to go, sir"
Malone nodded, and then said:
"Well, what you waiting for, Jump"
Fitzgerald exchange glances with Spade, but said nothing because after all, Malone was an army officer, not a pilot, Fitzgerald pressed the red button, then reality expanded and stretched around them.
The Enola Gay was gone in a flash of light.
PLANET TAURON
ALFA SYSTEM
The planet Tauron was the fourth planet orbiting the star Helios in the Alpha system of the larger Cyrannus system. Tauron's rocky surface was covered with many mountain ranges and dotted with countless lakes both large and small. Accompanying Tauron on its' journey around Helios was the habitable moon Minos. There were several unique features to Minos. First it was the largest moon in all of the Cyrannus system. Minos also boasted a ring of asteroids.
Tauron had two great cities, Tauron City which was the capital of the world and Hypatia. The planet was known not only for its ongoing rivalry with Caprica, even after the political and military unification, but for also being the birthplace of the infamous Ha'la'Tha (love for the soil in Tauron) a criminal organization that spanned all of the Twelve Colonies. The organization originally had been composed of rebels against the former military regime in Tauron, but now that the regime was no more, they continued on as a purely criminal organization.
Because of the risk involved if they were caught by the Colonial Fleet the Enola Gay's infiltration plan called for them to blend in with the civilian ship traffic that flooded the space around Tauron. The Enola Gay eased into the traffic pattern and held an approach vector that would bring them to the Metro in Hypatia.
Hypatia's metropolitan area rivaled that of Caprica City. Hypatia was nestled deep in the mountains between two large lakes, the city itself was divided by a small river. Like Caprica City, Hypatia had skyscrapers that almost reached the clouds and a lot of vehicular traffic on the streets and aircraft in the sky. Malone could not take the risk of landing in the city itself, since it only had public space ports, so they had to land on the outskirts of the city and would enter via the car that they had brought with them.
The Enola Gay landed in a small clearing deep in the mountains. The cargo doors smoothly opened and a ramp extended out to the ground letting the car out. It moved quickly toward Hypatia. The black haired Major Daniel Alvarez kept his brown eyes peeled for oncoming traffic as he drove. in the passenger seat was Malone and behind them both sat a woman with brown hair and brown eyes, Sgt. Elena Delgado.
MINOTAUR BAR
HYPATIA
Several hours after they had left the ship Alvarez pulled the car into the parking of a seedy looking dive. Peeling paint on the front named the place The Minotaur. Located in the center of the city, the basement bar was well know to local authorities as a hangout and meeting place for assorted low lives and career criminals.
Malone, Alvarez and Delgado walked down the short flight of stairs and opened the heavy wooden door. They entered the small smoke filled bar filled. The air was heavy with the smell of drug snuff at the bar, as they ordered drafts of Ambrosia from the surly looking bar tender, Delgado said, looking around:
"This place is so welcoming" her voice dripped with sarcasm.
Alvarez and Malone looked at her, but said nothing, then Alvarez ask:
"How we recognize our contact?"
Malone looked at Alvarez and replied:
"I don't know; let's find a place to sit." He nodded his head towards a table in the back.
They sat around a table against the wall, which allowed them to see the entire bar. The other guests, men and women alike, were taking drugs and drinking, ignoring them as if they did not exist. The atmosphere of the place was heavy and every instinct of the three soldiers were shouting that they had entered a dangerous place.
Suddenly three tattooed men wearing matching black coats, pants, and boots approached the table. The leader had cold, hard eyes with a voice to match.
"You're not from around here, are you?" he asked as he slowly looked them over.
Malone looked back at the man and then he said:
"You can say that, how do you know?"
The group's leader ran his hand over his black hair, which he had tied back in a ponytail.
"Everybody knows everybody here, if you're not from Tauron, everyone is able to recognize it, because you stick out like a sore thumb."
Malone nodded, and then said:
"I understand, if you'll excuse us, we're waiting for someone"
The man with the dark eyes looked at Malone and with a cold smile he said:
"I think I know who you are waiting for" he said. Looking at his partners who shared his smile, "but the question is whether he wants to do business with you"
Malone realized he was face to face with the person he wanted to talk to,
"You speak for the Gautrau"
"Maybe" the man said "Even if I do that doesn't mean Gautrau wants to talk to you. He really doesn't know if he should trust you, we know nothing about you"
Malone looked at the man and his partners suspiciously. Malone cleared his throat and decided to try and ease the level of distrust in the air.
"We are new here, we are not policemen," he said, looking to the thugs in front of them "We are here to do business if at all possible."
The man gave him a cold hard look, then pulled his gun from his waist and pointed at Malone motioning him to get up from his chair. Behind him Malone could sense that Alvarez and Delgado had drawn their guns. The other thugs drew theirs and in short order everyone but Malone was pointing a gun at someone else.
After a few moments of thought the leader of the gangsters said:
"Perhaps you're just testing us," he said pointing between his eyes to Malone "the Gautrau does not like people from wasting his time."
Malone had not moved from his place, nor did he seem even a little intimidated with a gun pointed at him. He calmly got up from his chair, and then said an icily cold voice:
"We have traveled from afar to do business, nothing more, you can tell Gautrau that there are a few batches of weapons waiting for you outside the city," Malone paused for a moment before leaning slightly forward, "high-caliber military weapon."
The gangster could see that Malone was not a bit afraid the gun or him. Malone's eyes were cold and expressionless, as if he had seen terrible things that had cost him part of his humanity, the gangster knew that it matter if he shot or not, this man could kill him in the blink of an eye, the thug look at Malone and then asked:
"You ex-military or something?"
Malone gave him a hard look and then said:
"Why do you ask?"
"Your eyes look like the eyes of someone who has gone through a war and lost"
Malone replied in a soft voice:
"Yes, I am a former military man, my entire group is former military" he lied easily.
The thug looked at him for a long moment, studying him to see if he was telling the truth; after a tense minute the gangsters slowly holstered their guns. Malone looked at Alvarez and Delgado, and they reluctantly did the same thing.
The thug gave him a suspicious look, but then held out his hand and said:
"Okay, the Gautrau will be happy to do business with you"
Malone nodded and grasped the other man's hand as he said:
"Wise decision my friend, wise decision, we're only here to do business."
The thug nodded although he still had doubts in his eyes.
Enola Gay
OUTSIDE
Some time later on the outskirts of the city, two trucks arrived to take the arms shipment that was stored in the Enola Gay's cargo hold. The mobsters stacked the crates of weapons in the large beds of the trucks with the help of the crew of Enola Gay they then covered them with tarps. Malone kept a close watch on them as the worked. Sensing someone approaching him Malone turned to see the mobster who he had met at the bar walking towards him. He was carrying a bunch of cash in his hands. Coming to a stop the gangster said:
"Here, fifty thousand cubits for twenty crates of weapons."
Malone said, looking at "not bad for first delivery"
Malone made a show of carefully counting the money.
After he finished the mobster pointed to the name painted on the side of the ship.
"Enola Gay, what does it mean?"
Malone then smiled mysteriously and said:
"It's about war, it is the name of a ship that gave us the victory, long time ago"
The thug nodded accepting Malone's explanation even if he didn't understand it, in this business you learned to not talk too much about yourself if you didn't want to end up dead in the street.
"And now where are going?" said the mob.
Malone crosses his arms and then he said:
"Hibernia, we have business to do there too"
The thug nodded, but did not ask what kind of business, it was better not to know certain things.
After the thugs finished loading the truck lots, Malone and the others turned and walked back to the ship. A few moments later the Enola Gay took flight and soared to its next destination, Hibernia.
Malone had a hunch that the next bunch of mobsters, the Celtans, would not be as easy to negotiate with as the thugs of Tauron.
He still had a long journey ahead, because after Hibernia, they had to get supplies for the Enterprise, it was going to be a long, long couple of weeks.