(turkey)
The signal came in their hotel room on Olyokin. "Hey, we're hot," Agent Adnan said, shaking his partner awake. "Didja hear me? I said we're hot! Let's get moving, dumbass!"
"Whah," mumbled Karpusi. "God, it's what, four AM?"
"One in the afternoon, Rip Van fucking Winkle. I am so amazed you can sleep through that," Adnan spat, referring to the Eavesdropper practically pissing itself with excited chirps. "Now get a move on. They're taking to the skies, we gotta follow her."
"Little Wing or Big Bird?"
"Dunno if they've made any changes to Big Bird," Adnan said, and it took awhile for proper airship changes but Alpha through Epsilon were insanely efficient so he just never knew with them.
But it was the stealthship - Little Wing - the Eavesdropper had picked up on, from the vid feed placed at Nunat airspace outskirts. And that was dangerous, because Little Wing was fast, about as fast as the agency viper, and if they didn't move now, they'd lose her before they'd begun.
And Karpusi was still half-fucking-asleep. Goddammit. "We can grab a coffee on the way back at an anchorage but for now we really gotta go," Adnan reminded.
"Fine," Karpusi said, climbing into the cockpit of the viper and belting himself in. "You're driving."
"Yeah no shit I'm driving. There's no way I'm letting you do it," Adnan replied. "Fuckin' narcoleptic," he said, as Karpusi leaned against the side window and dozed off again.
Although he remembered clearly - and fondly - being a young boy who was fascinated by the white smoke trails in the sky from Halleri sea-level, the feeling of piercing the clouds and atmosphere was, by now, completely lost on Agent Adnan. All in a day's work, so he thought nothing of ripping the throttle back, nosing the viper up, keeping her steady so that her fragile wings didn't get clipped by the speedy currents of Olyokin's atmosphere. There was not much joy in it anymore, for him, and neither was there much joy as the blue slowly gave way to indigo, navy, and finally black, dotted with far-off points of light.
He flipped the switch for the anti-glare. One would think the view would be amazing, from space, but truth was, they were still so close to the Sun - and an ice ball like Olyokin gave off one hell of a nasty reflection - that even with the anti-glare, all he could really see were a few particularly bright stars and the tiny specks of the other planets in the system.
And, of course, off in the distance, a tiny, twinkling, fading light, which he couldn't see (but his controls could) which was their target - the group of five's stealthship, rapidly escaping.
He gave some thanks to the god of celestial mechanics that Olyokin was so close to Nunat these days. If Olyokin had been on the other side of the sun - or slightly more than an eighth of an orbit away - there would have been nothing he could've done. They were outer planets, Olyokin and Nunat, so their orbits were big enough that an eighth of an orbit was an incredible distance to cover. Something the group of five's stealthship could outrun easily.
He kept a careful distance behind, with the lights off. Karpusi would probably be happy with that; no nightlights to keep him awake (not like that ever stopped the guy from napping anywhere, anywhen). They travelled about four hours - still only a fraction of Nunat's orbit, to say nothing for Olyokin's - radially outward from the sun, into the Cloud, until their ship showed a sharp speed decrease on the controls.
Shit, he thought, they've spotted us! But then he remembered. There was an old anchorage that hardly anybody used anymore. Glorified space junk with the bare necessities in the way of biosystems; pressure monitor and oxygen feed and a little bit of warmth, and that was about it. The pirates weren't dumb enough to go near it, it was a damn death trap waiting to happen.
So of course, that's where the stealthship headed. He pulled up in plain view and watched as they docked, clicking all engine systems off, retracting the shiny reflective panels and floating dead in the water. As good as cloaked as you could get.
Karpusi chose that time to wake up. "Mmh, we there yet?"
"Yeah, we're here," Adnan replied. "Ever been here before?"
Karpusi looked around. "What the hell is that?"
"That's an anchorage, believe it or not. At least two centuries old, maybe older."
"The hell are our boys doing wandering around these parts?"
"That is a very good question," Adnan mused. They watched in silence for about thirty minutes until - "hey, check that out. Over there."
To their right, by Karpusi's side, there was a much larger ship approaching - so large and near that they could just make out its overall shape visually. Karpusi took out his telescopic spyglass from his inner coat pocket and expanded it. "That's a frigate," he said. "Mercenary, judging from the flag and figurehead."
"Do you recognise her?"
"Not quite..." he expanded the spyglass more and fiddled with the focus a bit. "Yes, that's the Great Delivery. The shape looks familiar. And the pattern of lights on the side; Kirkland has a thing for chevrons," he decided. Karpusi collapsed the glass confidently and put it back in his pocket, removing something else - yesterday's newspaper. "I knew the shape looked familiar. That's her there, too," he said, pointing to the inset pictures in the article. Adnan took the paper to read it more closely.
INFORMATION REQUEST IN NOVA RAIDS
Constables and federal agents from the New Joplin Security Control, as well as the Bonds Service Protection Agency, are looking for any information in regards to identification of the above pirate vessel which appears to be a frigate. The pictures are being released with extended thanks to the Nova sector Border Control, whose video feeds captured the images below from the recent raids on the Nova dwarves. If any individual should have information, please contact Major Constable Hassan of the New Joplin 118th Police Squadron.
Until further notice, all mercenary vessels class schooner and above are not permitted in any of the following airspaces: Hallar, New Joplin, New Sainte-Dolitte, Tenickson, Marigon and Bast. No comment yet from sources on Veshna, Schlessen, Nunat or Olyokin. Any vessels with these qualities found in these spaces will be detained for questioning.
"Oh for fuck's sake," he said. "So our little group is in talks with Kirkland and his crew."
"I don't know what they're doing together," Karpusi said. "I'm willing to bet quality naptime it's not legal, though."
"Betting quality naptime!" Adnan snarked. "Watch out, we got a bad ass over here."
"Oh what, you want money on this? I can do money," Karpusi retorted, "since I'm the one Foster gave the promotion to."
"I'll get mine in three months, then we'll see who's laughing. In fact, I bet you the Qualla case Kirkland's helping our group of five."
"They'd never do it. I bet you the group of five is actually part of Kirkland's crew."
"You bet me what, your quality fuckin' beauty sleep?"
"No, ass-breath! The fucking Qualla case." The Qualla case, which had been promised to one of them, and only one of them, if they didn't manage to get any headway on the Nunat money launderers in the next month. The other would have to complete the damn Nunat money laundering case with Agent Metzger (who was a prick, which Karpusi and Adnan actually agreed about).
Adnan glared. "You're on," and they shook on it.
They watched on the controls as the Delivery's light spawned a second - probably a shuttle - which attached itself onto the ancient anchorage, and sat in stony silence for about fifteen minutes thereafter. "Are there any auds or vids on that thing?" asked Karpusi.
"Are you kidding me? That thing predates aud technology." A shame, though.
A short time thereafter both ships left. "Okay, they're definitely in cahoots," Karpusi said.
"We should split up," Adnan decided. "You go back and track the group, see what's up with the Janowska girl, I'll take the pirates."
"Hold on, we only have one viper! What if I have to trail the group back to Nunat from Olyokin?"
"You can get one with your clearance from the Vehicle Service DC in downtown Skuratchky."
"I - what? Really? Since when?"
"Uh, since always?"
"You mean to tell me I've been able to get my own ship for over two years now and instead I've been trekking around with you?"
"Hey, I'm not the one who slept through the debrief."
"I can't believe - ugh. You do realise with two vipers we might've stood a chance at, oh say, maybe surrounding our friends here?"
Oh, shit. That was true. "Frankly I think you'd be better off with something a little tougher to crash, Sandman, like an armoured heavy raider or something," Adnan bit back.
"Tease the guy with the sleeping disorder, sure. That's imaginative as fuck as usual, asshole. Lemme know when you think up something legitimately decent, if that's even possible."
And their bickering continued along that manner for the majority of the ride back to Olyokin. By the time they'd gotten back to their motel and cold cups of tea, Adnan was fully convinced it was better they spend some time away from each other, so that they didn't wind up with a double homicide on top of money laundering.
There was just something about Karpusi's face that made him want to punch it really hard. They'd have to keep in contact obviously, but they could do that through mail. The mailers took stealthships these days, and made the trek much faster - Hallar to Olyokin in about a day, compared to a new airship (a day and a half to two days) or an old airship (four days best case scenario). It'd cost them a pretty penny in stamps but the Agency'd reimburse them, and he suspected they'd both work a lot better with more space.
Well, there was nothing like a solar system full of planets to get some space.