Ben got used to bursts of song and nonsense talk from his shipload of crazy girls but save for that he didn't see much of their loony side. Maybe keeping them busy helped, just as Sonya had said.
He'd been a little worried about how the craziness would affect Cody but the ten year old took it right in stride. If Keri or Kimi suddenly started jabbering non-sequiturs at him whilst they were playing he'd just say right out; 'that's crazy talk, remember what we're doing?' which seemed to have a good effect. Ben tried it himself with equally fine results. Making the girls focus on the here and now seemed to 'solidify' them as they put it.
Even so taking to the Black with a shipload of admitted head cases didn't make a whole lot of sense but there was no walking away from them. No decent man could let five pretty young things like these wander the outer worlds alone. To many wolves slavering for just such little lambs.
Only occasionally did their odd side cause real problems, like when it came to provisioning: "No Blue Sun products. Not any." Sonya told him firmly.
That took him aback some. "What, Why not? They're just the biggest provider we've got on this rock."
"The suns watch you, get inside your head, they'll help them find us."
Ben tried his usual line. "That's crazy talk. We need to provision this boat."
"Not with Blue Sun." Sonya said firm and loud.
They were on the bridge with Jade nearby working on some wiring. She overheard, "Blue Suns?" she asked, big eyes getting even bigger with fright. "Where, where are they?"
"You can't let them onboard!" Sonya said, an edge of hysteria in her voice. "You can't!"
"Where are they? Where?" Jade began digging frantically through the wires, tearing the com unit apart looking.
Ben hurried to grab her hands. "They're not here." he said. "They'll never get on board, I promise."
Both girls sagged in relief. Ben made a mental note: No Blue Sun.
...
Alliance Moon, Five Weeks Before:
The Academy looked nice enough on the surface, even beautiful; a big, rambling castellated structure built around three quadrangles, one enclosing a carefully kept sand garden, the whole surrounded by green lawns with a little wooded park on one side and a lake on the other. All the pain and nastiness was hidden away in the cold, sterile levels hollowed beneath the picturesque school buildings.
Five girls sat in the stone gazebo at the center of the main quadrangle. Five when there should have been six. River was gone, her brother had gotten her out and her parents were furious. Sonya could feel them - angry and scared - a floor up behind the big stained glass windows of the Headmaster's office. Matthias felt angry and impatient but he couldn't show it - not to the Tams, they were way too important to offend. The five girls, could hear every word spoken in the office - though not with their ears.
Mrs. Tam was crying, hopeless choking sobs that she couldn't stop no matter how she tried.
Mr. Tam's panic fed his fury: "How does an obsessed boy just walk into a government school and take his sister without a hand raised to stop him?" he snarled at Matthias.
The doctor had much bigger worries than the Tams, but he was under orders to sooth them down as best he could. He tried: "Dr. Tam was her brother, sir. The staff saw no reason why he shouldn't be allowed to visit River. I assure you he was not given permission to remove her from the campus. However it didn't occur to us to set a guard over them."
"Simon would never hurt River, I know he wouldn't." Mrs. Tam sobbed.
"Of course not, sweetheart." her husband said quickly, hiding his own fears. "But he's likely to get them both into all kinds of trouble the way he's been acting these last two years." he turned back to Matthias. "My son is a very disturbed young man," he said with dignity, refusing to let his heartbreak show. "Maybe we pushed him too hard..." his voice trailed off.
"He was never the same after River left." Mrs. Tam managed. "I don't think we ever understood what she meant to him."
"He became obsessed with getting her back." Mr. Tam continued. "He read things into her letters, claimed she was in some kind of danger -"
"Oh now really -" Matthias began, alarmed.
"His delusion became so strong he started consorting with criminals, trying to hire them to kidnap his own sister!"
"We should have done more than we did." wept Mrs. Tam.
"What more could we do?" her husband demanded frustrated. "Simon's an adult, he moved out of the house, we had no control over him!"
"I assure you every possible effort is being made to find both your children." Matthias said quickly. "Every law enforcement agency in the Alliance has been alerted. We're sure to hear something very soon."
Sonya's lips quirked in a cynical smile as she pulled herself back into her own head. So the doctor hoped but Simon Tam had been smart enough to get River out, there was a good chance he was smart enough to keep her safe.
"They're coming." said Moon.
Sonya nodded. "Places everybody."
Yellow Jade headed for the door to the east wing, Moon to the wrought iron gate leading to the second quadrangle, Sonya stationed herself by the front door, the twins stayed in the gazebo. Pretty soon there were footsteps and the Tams emerged accompanied by Matthias' assistant.
Sonya intercepted them. "Dr. Han," she said to the escort, catching and holding his eye. "Kimi and Keri are in trouble again." she pointed at the gazebo. "They need your help."
Muttering an excuse he went. She looked at the Tams. "Hello. My name is Sonya, I'm River's best friend."
...
His girls handed Ben the real shocker over breakfast one morning, early in the refitting:
"Weapons!" he sputtered. "What do you want weapons for?"
"To kill people with of course." said Moon.
"We need to defend ourselves." Sonya explained
"We want beamers -" said Keri
"And shooters." her twin finished.
"Shiny!" said Cody enthusiastically, not helping at all.
"And a defensive screen." said Jade anxiously. "Don't forget the screen."
"Right." Sonya agreed. "We want two of each kind of gun and we'll mount them them in turrets up top, one set facing forward the other back."
Ben was floundering in a sea of dismay. "You serious about turning pirate?"
"Yes." said the twins in chorus.
"No," said Sonya. They glared at her. "Well maybe from time to time to keep the kids happy." the twins beamed. So did Cody.
"Angel's a freighter," Ben said forcing calm, he'd learned the hard way that getting excited only made his girls 'liquefy' faster. "We can make a good living hauling cargo." A bit of an exaggeration that.
"We can do that to," Moon said, just as calm.
"Mainly though we'd planned to sell ourselves," said Jade.
Ben choked sending caff spraying all over the table. The girls giggled.
"Not that way!" Jade laughed.
"We got skills," said Sonya.
"Hacking and spying and stealing and killing," said Moon, counting them off on her long white fingers.
Killing?
"We purpose to make as much trouble for the Alliance as we can," Keri explained
"Any way we can," Kimi added.
"And we got a lot of ways," said Moon with a sinister smile. Sonya and Jade both nodded agreement wearing that same smile.
"Making the Alliance bleed should be agreeable to you," said Sonya.
Ben swallowed carefully. "It is. But why -?"
The five girls looked at each other then Sonya, who usually spoke for them nodded. "We know your reasons so it's only fair you should know ours."
...
Alliance Moon, Five Weeks Before:
"Simon isn't crazy," Sonya told the Tams earnestly. "He got River's message. They hurt us here and she wanted out." The two grown-ups stared at her blankly. Sonya pointed to a tiny puncture in the middle of her forehead. "That's how they inject drugs into my brain," she showed the multiple needle marks on her arm. "And that's where they feed me the psychotropics that open me up to them."
Mrs. Tam was clutching her husband's arm but she'd stopped crying. Mr. Tam stared at the little wounds in dawning horror.
"Make them stop." said Sonya. "You're too important for them to just kill like they did Moon's parents. Stop them for River, or she'll never be able to come home." Jade and Moon came up behind her as she was talking. "Look, we all have them and River did too. We're the top class, the ones they've done the most to. River was the star, they want her back alright but for them, not for you."
"You'll never see her or Simon again as long as this place stands," said Moon.
"Or maybe even if you bring it down," that was Jade. "We're the top class, we're too important to them. They'll never let us go."
"But it's not too late for the others," Sonya pleaded. "They can still go free - if you stop Matthias."
...
Ben had thought he'd plumbed the depths of the Alliance's evil on Shadow. He'd been wrong. He listened in mounting horror as Sonya calmly unfolded their story, with the help of her classmates.
"You had to be very special to get sent to the Academy, not just super-smart but a little bit psychic."
"Nobody's more than a little - naturally that is." said Jade.
"It was a training school for operatives. Very special operatives." Sonya continued. "At first I wasn't adverse to it -"
"None of us were - at first." said Moon.
Sonya nodded. "They taught us to do all the stuff Moon mentioned; to hack and spy and steal and fight and kill. That part wasn't so bad but then they started doing things to our brains, to make us more psychic."
"And that's when it turned horrible." said Kimi as her twin nodded violent agreement.
"They made us crazy," Moon said coldly, "because you can't be sane and psychic at the same time."
Ben swallowed. "What good are crazy operatives?"
"Dr. Matthias claimed he could fix that little problem." Jade said bitterly. "Truth is he liked playing around with people's brains and didn't much care about the results."
"Why all girls?" Cody asked.
"Oh there were boys at the school." Sonya answered. "Lots of them. But push 'em past a certain point they go psycho psycho and then catatonic."
"Dr. Matthias was going to fix that too - when he got round to it." said Jade.
"We were the top class, the best of the lot." said Sonya.
"And River was the best of us all." said Keri.
"That's right. River Tam was the star, Dr. Matthias' pride and joy, until her brother walked in one day and took her away."
...
Alliance Moon, Five Weeks Before:
A patter of feet on the stairs preceded the breathless arrival of Dr. Matthias. "Sonya, my dear," he said, struggling to look kindly and avuncular, "whatever are you girls doing here?"
"We were studying in the gazebo," Sonya answered innocently. "We wanted to tell Mr. and Mrs. Tam how much we liked River and how we miss her."
Matthias turned apprehensively to the Tams. Regan buried her face in her handkerchief but Gabriel made a heroic effort and produced a smile. "It's good to know River was happy here. She never had any friends at home, you know. That's one of the reasons we sent her your school - to be with children like herself."
The doctor was not a sensitive man. He believed it and relaxed. "Allow me to see you to the gate." he looked around. "Where is Han anyway?"
"In the gazebo." said Sonya. "The twins weren't well, he went to help them."
Mrs. Tam lowered her handkerchief. Her eyes were red but determined, she leaned forward to kiss Sonya right on her puncture wound, then the other two in turn. "Thank you, dears, for everything."
...
"The Tams are good people. They believed me right off, I didn't have to make them."
"They'd been having doubts, all they needed was proof." said Jade.
"What do you mean, 'make them'?" Ben wanted to know.
"We've all got a special talent on top our basic psychic-ness." Sonya explained. "Mine is 'persuading' I can generally make people do what I want them to."
"Like sign aboard your ship?" Ben asked, suddenly suspicious.
She shook her head. "Wasn't necessary. You decided our way all on your own. Just like the Tams."
"We got away with talking to them so easy it gave us other ideas." said Moon with an icy, reminiscent smile.
"Yeah." said Sonya, and they all made smiles that chilled Ben inside.
"What kind of ideas?"