The Pilots and the Frontier
By
UCSBdad
Disclaimer: After all this time, you know what this means, right? Rating: K Time: About three years after my story the Pilots and the Passengers.
"By the Gods! What a grip! You'll be a warrior princess of your race when you're grown."
Richard Castle, who had been dozing in the sun, by the beach, opened one eye. Then he opened the other eye. This is something you don't see every day. He thought.
His daughter, Lily, was hanging onto his friend Skinny's massive thumb with both hands. Most humans thought of a Kzin as eight feet of sudden death. Lily thought of him as Uncle Skinny.
"Look. Unka Moe make ice cream." Lily said, releasing her grip.
True, Moecious, known to Lily as Uncle Moe, was making an ice cream sundae. He was as tall as the Kzin, but more slender. While the Kzin were a warrior race descended from something resembling Earth's tigers, Moecious' ancestors on the planet Vorlag had descended from something wolf-like. However, Moecious was a peaceable tavern owner, but he was capable of violence.
Castle heard a familiar laugh to his left. It was his wife, Kate, talking with her two BFF's, Simone and Jane. The two women were free lance spies of some sort who apparently worked for the Empire, although they were very closed mouthed about their activities. Simone could have been Kate's twin sister, if she'd had one. When first they met, Simone had had whitish blonde hair and green eyes, then, later, darker brunette hair and blue eyes, and now had hair and eye color much like Kate.
Jane was tall and slender with long shiny black hair and dark eyes. She didn't change her eye or hair color as Simone did, although once when the two had come back from a mission, their hair was dyed in an orange and green checkerboard pattern. When Castle had asked why they'd done it, Simone had replied, "So we didn't stand out."
He was happy that Kate had friends. She had grown upon a planet that had been wrecked by the collapse of the Commonwealth. When he had crash landed on her planet, she was known as Bent Leg from an improperly healed fractured leg and devoted her life to killing some religious extremists known as Head Choppers. The Choppers had killed her mother as part of their religion. But, Kate's world, as it was now known, was being reintegrated into the Empire. One day it would be as peaceful and prosperous as the rest of the Empire.
To his right were three more women: Freeladies Gina; Andine; and Lindane. Gina had been the proprietress of a brothel at the Sky Cave, a lump of rock that had been the hideout of all manner of anti-social types for thousands of years. Currently, it was outside of the Empire's domain, but not beyond its interest. Gina was young and voluptuous to the extent that Castle was sure she'd had some sort of work done. Andine had been the star attraction at Gina's and her youth and voluptuousness was a product of her DNA, diet and exercise. Lindane was Andine's daughter. Now in her mid-teens, she was beginning to show that she would one day match her mother's beauty. That said, Lindane was a brilliant girl. She had been accepted into the Imperial Institute of Technology and had been given and internship at the Imperial Labs, both on Earth. That someone would get both simultaneously was unheard of.
Another female was sitting a good hundred yards from the sea. That was Marie, a grasshopper-like alien who'd been Moecious' assistant at his tavern, the Jolly Spacer, until a thug called Wha An had taken over the Sky Cave and the Jolly Spacer. Marie would sink like a stone in water, so while she wore a conservative one- piece bathing suit, she stayed far from the water.
The last member of the group was the Quinncunx. He, she, or it, no one was sure, was a biological key to a vast mining facility far, far from the Empire. The facility mined stable transuranic metals. Most of those very valuable metals could be made in minute quantities at enormous cost in laboratories. A series of cosmic coincidences had left some now long vanished race with an entire planet made of the metals. They had built a huge mining complex and disappeared many eons before. Despite problems elsewhere, the Empire had dispatched a newly formed fleet to secure the facility.
The Quinncunx stood up. "See the C. Inwards the drowning banana floods."
The odd little pink thing could speak, but only once had it made sense. Castle felt that it was like some birds and animals that could mimic speech without any comprehension.
As for Castle, he was quite happy. Not only was he happily married, but he loved his job. He was a fighter pilot, and after a couple of unpleasant jobs with Imperial Navy Intelligence, he had the best job of any pilot in the Empire, or anywhere else. He was the test pilot of the hottest space ship there was, a combination of recovered Commonwealth technology and advances made possible by the discovery of the super metals, as the stable transuranics were called. Oh, he was still technically assigned to intelligence, but that was because intelligence was a part of the group that built the Pika-Don, his ship. And as far as Castle was concerned, it was his ship.
"The ice cream sundae is ready." Moecious announced.
As far as food and drink were concerned, the furry tavern owner was a believer that nothing succeeds like excess. The sundae was served in a silver bowl a good two meters across and was filled with scoops of ice cream of every color and taste. Over the ice cream had been poured candies, nuts, fruits, sauces, whipped cream and other delights that Castle couldn't identify, but knew he'd like.
Everyone gathered around as Moecious handed out spoons. Castle thought the Vorlag had made too much, but decided that either Moecious or Skinny could finish the whole thing and still ask for seconds.
The Quinncunx snuggled up next to Lindane who fed him (?) ice cream. She seemed to have adopted the little pink thing as her pet, and had even taken it to Earth with her.
"Ice cream! We all scream for oiled deciduous carbuncles." The Quinncunx said happily.
After finishing the sundae, most of them went swimming. Moecious, however, brought out his surfboard and surfed.
"Cowabunga, dudes and dudettes." He yelled happily as he rode the nose.
As the sun began to sink, Castle and the rest headed back to the base. Because of Moecious' and Skinny's size, they had been allotted the largest quarters on the base and there was room for everyone.
As Castle walked in, he saw that his office communicator was blinking. When he had seen the message from the base, he went to tell the others.
"We just got a message from the base. We're all supposed to report to the base commander's office at 0900 tomorrow morning. Kate and I as well as Skinny are to be dressed in our Class A uniforms and it is strongly suggested that everyone else wear appropriate formal wear, including Lily."
"Why do they want all of us?" Kate asked.
"They didn't say. But, they even said for the Quinncunx to come along, although I have no idea what appropriate formal wear for him would be like."
"He's formal enough as he is." Lindane said.
As soon as she said that, the remaining women began deciding what they should wear the next day. Rick was a bit sad that Kate had to be in uniform as she had really enjoyed getting all dressed up for events.
The next morning, Kate and Rick came out to find Skinny and Moe all ready to go. Skinny wore a Kzin Space Navy uniform that was nearly identical to the black Imperial Space Navy uniform except for the red trim where the Imperial Navy used silver.
Moecious was dressed in something he called a clawhammer coat, with matching black pants and a frilly white shirt, set off with a floppy blue bow tie.
"Are the ladies ready?" Rick asked a bit too loudly. "The vehicle from the base will be here in ten minutes."
"We'll be down in a few minutes." Gina called down.
They were down in three minutes, by Castle's timepiece. They stopped on the stairs so they could be seen and admired. The women were all dressed in similar, but not identical gowns. Gina was in light blue, Simone in yellow, Jane in black, Andine in red, Lindane in orange, Lily was in pink and Marie, in spite of her non-human shape was in white.
"Very impressive, ladies. But, I can see a small bus headed this way. I'm betting that's our ride." Castle said as he took Kate's arm.
Not to be outdone, Skinny took Lily's tiny hand in his massive hand.
Cattawrayannis Base on the planet Llynathawr was the headquarters for the Imperial Forces in the Glimmer Reach Sector, which included over a hundred inhabited worlds and thousands of uninhabited and uninhabitable worlds and moons. It was also the local base of other uniformed Imperial services, the Imperial Express Service, the Imperial Corps of Engineers, the Imperial Constabulary, the Imperial Medical Service, the Imperial Survey Service, the Imperial Central Intelligence Organization and many other less well-known organizations.
The headquarters building covered nearly four-square miles and rose over a mile in the air.
Castle identified himself and his party to the Marine guard on duty who directed them to an express elevator.
"You're going to Topside, sir. The very top of the building. Must be pretty important, as I've never had anyone under the rank of vice admiral go up before."
Castle wondered what that meant as the elevator car shot upwards.
"Do you suppose we're in trouble?" Skinny asked.
Castle shook his head.
"No. They'd be taking us to the basements if we were."
"Unless they want to watch us fly. Or try to." Skinny said softly.
Arriving at Topside, Castle decided that they were not there to be punished. The room, which took up only part of Topside, was magnificent. The floors were an iridescent stone covered by hand woven carpets that were scattered about. There were comfortable looking couches about and a few chairs, arranged facing each other. One wall was covered in a mural of a space battle. From the ships, Castle guessed the battle must have been fought over fifty years ago. The other walls had portraits of famous Imperial commanders with the first Emperor and the current Emperor being given pride of place.
A small orchestra was playing softly in the background as live servitors walked about with food and drinks on trays. Rick noticed Moecious paying close attention to the food and drink being offered.
Scattered around the room chatting in small groups was more brass than Rick had ever seen in one place before. As far as he could tell, the next higher-ranking officer to Rick was a Vice Admiral.
The Quinncunx must have been impressed.
"Very impotent people swim darkly upstream." The little pink thing said softly.
In one corner were a group of Kzin. Rick had learned a bit about the ranks of the Kzin Navy from Skinny and he was sure that these Kzin officers were as high ranking as any Imperial officers there.
Then one of the Kzin, doubtlessly the most bemedaled, broke off and headed right for Rick's group. Rick did note that he had a blood red sash across his right shoulder, and that the whole Kzin entourage was heading after him.
He heard Skinny gasp, and then throw himself down, exposing the back of the neck to the newcomer. He knew that this was a sign that the newcomer vastly outranked Skinny. He wondered if he should drop and bare the back of his neck to the newcomer, but decided that coming to attention would have to do.
TBC