Vengeance
By
UCSBdad
Disclaimer: For the last time! I do not own Castle. Rating: K Time: In an AU future.
"Do you think I could have a drink of that rum, Captain? That is, if it wouldn't be fraternization."
Castle opened the bottle and got two glasses out. "We don't stand on ceremony here. The Tarkai are a tribal people and this is now their tribe. I'm the boss, but if I started putting on airs, they'd laugh at me."
Rick and Kate shared a drink and then another. She talked about her life on Earth. He talked about his life as a mercenary, but said nothing of his life before that.
The next day Castle took the equipment he'd acquired to Jules'. As always, Jules was happy to see him. "Captain Castle. How are you this fine day?"
"Quite well, thank you. I have some weapons and equipment that I'd like to sell and I have a bit of money to buy a few things." Castle had the men he'd brought with him place the weapons and gear on Jules' counter.
"Business all in good time, my friend. But first we should have some coffee. And some for your lady as well?"
Neither Rick nor Kate was exactly sure as to how to characterize their relationship, so both allowed the term "your lady" to stand. Rick and Kate sat with Jules at his table while the Tarkai, who didn't enjoy coffee had some lemonade.
After a cup of coffee and some discussion of trivialities, they got down to business.
"Earth made weapons. Very nice. Can you get me more?"
Rick shook his head. "This is all I was able to acquire."
Jules knew a man who ran a small deep reconnaissance insertion team who was always looking for Earth made weapons. He didn't tell Rick that, of course.
Eventually, between trade for the weapons and gear and his new found cash, Rick left with 50 more Model 71 carbines, more ammo, and some other gear he'd been hoping to obtain, but had been afraid he'd never be able to afford.
Sergeant Major Saava greeted Rick back at the company headquarters with a smile. "We've got good news and bad news, sir."
"I'll take the good news if you please, sergeant major."
"We got a message from the Pink Zephyr. She's picked up her last cargo and is headed back to Transit. She'll be here in five days."
"Good. I'll be glad to get out of here and on our way. What's the bad news?"
"Not what, sir, but who. Private O'Hara is here. He needs a job."
"Good morning, sir." A shaky voice said from underneath a desk. O'Hara rose from the desk looking much the worse for wear. His uniform was torn, and missing any kind of heavy coat or jacket. He was unshaven, dirty from head to foot and had the remnants of a black eye and cuts on his face. He was a big man normally, but looked a lot skinnier than the last time Rick had seem him.
Rick looked him over. "I'll assume alcohol was involved. As for the rest, was it someone else's woman, a game of chance, or something shiny that belonged to someone else?"
"Cards, sir. They accused me of cheating. I had won a lot of their money. I didn't cheat, sir."
"I'll believe you, O'Hara. You're not good enough to cheat anyone at cards when you're sober and you're hopeless when you've had a few. I assume they caught up with you?"
"No, sir. I grabbed a pool cue and let them have it."
"Then how did you get in the state you're in?"
"The only way off planet in a hurry was on a Nebeldian freighter. They hate humans and treated me like shit. If It'd taken me any longer to get to Transit, I'd have landed as a corpse."
"Given that I know you and what a colossal pain in the ass you can be, why should I sign you on?"
O'Hara smiled. "You have mortars and one recoilless rifle. You know I can work wonders with those weapons. I know your heavy weapons troopers, and they're pretty good, but not as good as me. I'm an artist."
Castle thought for a moment. "So you are, Sergeant O'Hara, so you are. You'll be working for Lieutenant Popho who is in command of weapons platoon. As I'm sure you know, we're doing this job on spec, so we don't get paid unless and until we win."
"I understand, sir."
Castle turned to Saava. "Take him and get him clothed and equipped, cleaned up and fed and them take him to Lieutenant Popho and give the lieutenant the good news."
The Pink Zephyr
The first night out of Transit, Castle had been invited to dine with Captain Coleman in her quarters. Coleman had a smooth, unlined face, perfect teeth and a cute little nose. Her boobs, which were on display were firm, pert and perky. Except for her silver hair and eyebrows, she looked too young to both own and command a spaceship, even a tramp freighter prowling the less travelled space lanes looking for anything that would make money.
The food was better than any he'd had on a transport before, although not up to the standards of the Commander's Club, but very few places were. The wine with dinner was very good and the after dinner brandy was excellent. Castle wondered if Coleman treated all of her guests like this, or if he was somehow special. He suspected the latter and wondered what might make him special.
"Are you sleeping with the brunette?" Coleman suddenly asked.
"Corporal Beckett? No, I'm not. Why do you ask?"
"If your plan works out, we'll be doing business together. I like to know the people I deal with. Corporal Beckett seems to spend a great deal of time with you."
"She's from Earth and went to university there. I spent two years at a military college in the UK, and one of my lieutenants spent a year in an officer's training unit. The rest are what we call mustangs. They started as privates and worked their way up. Corporal Beckett is the only one in the unit with a handle on the paperwork involved. Even a small unit like mine requires more paperwork than I had imagined. I really don't do paperwork."
Coleman nodded. "Better her than the redhead. That one is used to the finer things in life. She's looking for a man with a nice, tidy fortune. If she sleeps with you, it won't last. I think Beckett is interested in you."
"It's not a good idea to get romantically involved with your subordinates." Castle said stiffly.
"Almost your whole company are Tarkai. When they get home, they'll get back together with their wives and sweethearts they left behind. Or they'll find new women for themselves. You've said you're as much a tribal leader as a mercenary unit commander. Your tribe will expect their chieftain to take a wife and have children as other chieftains do. You won't have a great choice of women where you're going. You could do worse."
"Corporal Beckett has a choice in this as well, you know."
Coleman poured some more brandy. "That she does, but we need to talk business. Right now, the pricks in the Geiser Corporation don't see me as enough of a threat to justify the money it would cost to keep me away from Tark. Consequently, I come in once or twice a year and pick up raw Golden Life leaves. I make enough to make it worthwhile and the Tarkai get weapons and ammo from me." She took a long drink of brandy. "Geiser really has the planet sewed up tight. They control the only spaceport, limiting trade to their ships or ships like mine than can land and take off from anywhere on a planet. You want to borrow money to buy a plantation? Geiser has the only bank. You need to buy necessities or luxuries? Geiser has the only stores. You want to sell your crop? You can only sell to Geiser, at their prices. You want a damned drink? Geiser owns the only bar."
"I want to change that." Castle said, softly.
"I know you do, Sport. But if you start protecting the Tarkai tribes so they can gather more leaf, and if you start raiding the plantations to "liberate" the product and their Tarkai slaves, and killing off people, Geiser is going to have to do something about you. And they'll want to stop you from getting any off-planet support. That means stopping me. My ship is fast and I'm not unarmed, but if they put a couple of small warboats around this planet, I could get my fine white ass shot off."
Castle held up his hand. "First, I'm going to organize first. I'm not going to rush into battle the first damned thing. Raiding parties from the plantations have pushed the Tarkai tribes back a couple of hundred miles. Geiser won't know I'm gathering the tribes, increasing the collection of leaves and getting arms until I'm ready to strike. Then they'll have so much trouble they won't have time for you."
"I sure hope you're right."
When Castle got back to his quarters, he found Beckett there. "Did she want to sleep with you?" She demanded.
"No, but she did ask if I was sleeping with you."
"What did you tell her?" Beckett asked suspiciously.
"I said I wasn't."
She smiled at him. "Liar."
The next day Castle gathered all of his troops together in one crowded cargo space to brief them on what was ahead. "Some of you know some of this, some of you know all of it, but I'm going to tell everyone everything so we're all on the same page, so to speak." He took a deep breath. "I was born on Tark. My father had been hired by the Geiser Corporation to get the commercial growing of Golden Life going. My family had to contact the tribes to arrange for workers, hire human managers and then independent planters, arrange for seeds, fertilizer…A whole lot of things. My dad insisted we treat the Tarkai fairly. We paid them well, my mother ran a school for the children and even did some research on giving them medical care. Things went fine for a number of years. But then there were problems. A few of the independent planters complained about having to pay what they considered too high wages. They complained about having Tarkai away from work to go to school, or to be treated for sickness. More and more of the planters began to complain. When I was ten, I snuck away from a family gathering to play with my Tarkai friends in the woods. A man named Demming showed up at our place with the other unhappy planters. They told my father they wouldn't follow his rules any more. He reminded them that they were under contract to do exactly what he told them to do. That's when Demming made his move. He shot my father and killed him. I heard the shots and came running. Luckily, a Tarkai woman who worked for us ran away and caught me before I could get home. Otherwise, I would have been killed. But while we hid in the woods, I watched my sisters being raped and then murdered. My youngest sister was only eight. My brothers were beaten to death."
He stopped for a moment, unable to continue. "The Tarkai took me to the spaceport, hoping I'd be safe there. I was lucky. There was a recruiting team there from Black Jacques Schram's Brigade. Even then, Tarkai were renowned as scouts and trackers. I told them I wanted to become a soldier so I could kill the men who'd killed my family. At first, they laughed at a ten-year-old boy wanting to be a soldier. But, they decided that a human who spoke the local Tarkai language and knew their customs, might be useful eventually. They took me away, and Schram had me put in a Forces school. A military school. Eventually I went to a two-year reconnaissance officer's training school. "
TBC