Chapter One
“It’s the wee hours of the morning. Lone Star’s still shining bright as ever. Damn satyrs are polishing their horns and reaching for some popcorn while all our ships jockey into position. We asked them for help and they just spouted a bunch of non-interference horseshit. Punchline, this is our fight and we'll face it alone. Oh well. Guns are loaded and us troops are geared up to storm all nine hells if that’s what it comes to. These NTA scum think they can steamroll us and take our land like it’s nothing. We’ll show ‘em.”
–Excerpt from the combat diary of Sergeant “Roach” Thompson, TCL Marine.
Houston—not the Ancient Earth city, Houston, but rather the frontier colony world located in the Sola Stella system, that Houston—was something of a shithole planet nowadays. Wasn’t always. Once upon a squandered yesteryear, Sola was once on track to being the fourth major Terran system in the galaxy. An up-and-coming bright point along the trail of places to be. The kind of star system that gets recognized and talked about even on the far end of whatever pitch black heart lay at the center of this galaxy. Economy was booming, the jump gate always had traffic, and things were looking downright peachy for the inhabitants of the Sola Stella system.
But nothing lasts forever.
To trim a long and painful story down to a concise soundbite, this world was ground zero for one of the bloodiest conflicts in the Colony Wars. After centuries of banding together against alien threats, Terran space dissolved into yet another civil war, this time played out on a galactic scale. A tale as old as time with a familiar ending. The little guys lost, the powers that be remained, and all the little backwater planets like poor old Houston paid the void-cursed price for their little failed rebellion.
To have risen just high enough to glimpse Olympus, only to have that much further to fall.
Even all these years after the fact, almost a generation now, her scarred surface was a no man’s land flooded with some nasty radiation and the unmistakable scars of orbital bombardment. What remained of the system’s economy lay primarily in salvage or in the massive orbital terraformation rigs. Even with today’s technology, the world wouldn’t be habitable again for another eighty years. It was about as far from the hustle and bustle of the mainstay Terran systems as one could get.
Most runners would never come out this way.
Luckily for Mister Montgomery, the cyborg standing in his office was not most runners. He dressed the part of a space cowboy, and had the accent to match. A black-as-void leather duster, a curious pair of hand cannons slotted into his holsters, and an honest-to-Lith stetson atop his head. The man looked to be hovering around his late thirties. He bore red hair, a sun-kissed complexion that made his freckles stand out all the more, and a lean musculature. His one good eye was a soft brown, and he already bore some deep laugh lines despite his relative youth.
“Mighty fine station you got here, Mister Montgomery. Little avant garde for my tastes. But to each his own,” the cyborg said. His manner was friendly enough. “But where are my manners? Name’s Duncan. Friends call me Deadeye, on account of the obvious,” the cyborg gestured towards his prosthetic eye, which glowed a menacing red that failed to match his otherwise cheery disposition. “Clients call me Mister North.”
Some people do their job out of obligation or desperation. A rare few, however, find for themselves a perfect niche to fill. Those are the types that love the work they do. The cyborg clearly fell into the latter category.
Today’s client inclined his head. “Charmed. Nolan Montgomery. My friends call me Monty. Pardon me for being presumptuous, but I’m going to go ahead and call you Deadeye, hope you don’t mind. Today I’m your client, true, and it can stay that way should you like. But you should know I am in the habit of making my friends rich. Very rich. Trust me, you’ll want to be my friend by the end of this.”
Duncan quirked his good eyebrow. “Color me intrigued, but hold the steak dinner for now. I should point out that I am already a rich man, Mister Montgomery.”
“Oh? And how did you make this fortune?” Nolan inquired politely.
“Location, location, location. All you old TCL holdouts had to have some deep pockets to stand against the NTA. Considering how that fight went I figured there was plenty of krets lying around that hadn't been scooped up yet and, without all the commerce coming through here, you folks haven't got much to spend it all on. Flying out to these distant nests off the beaten path and offering my services has proven mighty lucrative.” Duncan paused, shaking his head. “You know what they call you in most of the orbitals I frequent? The ‘Forgotten Houses.’ Coulda been the Greats, just chose the wrong side. Damn the NTA, amiright?”
Nolan’s polite expression faded somewhat. “Damn them indeed. But twenty-twenty hindsight doesn’t do me or my House any good now, Mister North. Future’s flowing in the wrong direction to get hung up on such regrets. I choose to keep my focus pointed forward. To that end my aim is to put Houston, and the Montgomery name, back on the map. You’re gonna help me do it.”
Duncan placed his hands on his hips and rocked back a step, pondering. “All that, huh? What’s the gig?”
“Don’t tell me you’re having second thoughts already.”
“About the job, no. About the pay, however. ‘Putting Houston back on the map’ sounds like a tall order. I want to make sure I’m not getting paid a pittance to help the galaxy’s next star-king take his throne.”
Nolan sighed. “Let me put it this way. You help me with this job, you’ll never need to pull another score or plan another heist as long as you live. There’s rich for a runner, and then there’s rich. You read me?”
Duncan shrugged. “I’d read you a lot clearer if you spat out some actual numbers there, friend. I want to know how many krets are gonna light up my MODAC when all’s done and dusted. Other than that detail, yeah, I copy what you’re selling. ‘One last score.’ Heard it before. Skip ahead a ways, tell me what’s different this time?”
Nolan leaned back in his leather chair. His office space took up the observatory deck of a sleek orbital station. The best and most modern model krets could buy, at least in Terran space. But his desk and his chair were old. Ancient Earth, B.E. (Before Exodus) old.
“Location, location, location. Pop quiz. You’re a ship’s captain, and as such I’d imagine you’re plenty familiar with star charts. Tell me. What do you see when you look up the Sola Stella system on your MODAC?”
Duncan drew a small object from his gunbelt. A standard seven-by-five-centimeter rectangle with blunted corners and a rubber case around it. A Mobile Data Access Card, or MODAC for short. With a practiced flick of his thumb, Duncan triggered the device’s holographic projection mode. It spat out a gleaming view of the Milky Way Galaxy that slowly rotated above Nolan’s desk.
Stars beyond counting, specks of dust caught in a slow-motion dust devil, lit up the space between the two men.
Lines denoting the Dorian gate network slowly spread out and connected some of these bright points together. The strands of a spider’s web.
“I see a tiny spoke of a mighty large wheel,” Duncan commented wryly.
“Ah, but that tiny spoke just so happens to float between Helion and Mauris. Excuse the history lesson, I’ll keep it brief. But back before everything went to shit, Sola was a boomstar. On the verge of being named the fourth major system in Terran space. It’s a far cry from the Hissak’s seven systems or the Kintar’s eight, true, but four is a respectable number. It would’ve put us in spitting distance of contending with the likes of the Maur and their five major star systems. And with Sola Stella so close to Mauris itself… how do you think the big cats felt about that?”
Duncan deactivated his MODAC and folded his arms. “I see what you’re angling at, and I feel the need to point out I got not one but two Maur on my crew. They won’t be thrilled to hear we’re taking krets from a man who buys into that old conspiracy theory. The Maur Federation had fuck all to do with you losing your little civil war, friend.”
“Agreed,” Nolan stated firmly, robbing some of the heat from the cyborg’s words. “The Federation was not to blame. But, and this is hard fact not mere conjecture, there are a few fringe tribes of Maur who simply loathe humanity. The Waugro Tribe, for instance, believes we are the Maur’s final test. One last obstacle on their path to ascension. If they can defeat us, they will get to join the High Council races, and all three of their mighty gods will smile upon them and grant great blessings. Or so they believe. Likewise, the Obaguar and the Munako tribes still hate us. Though, their reasons have less to do with blind zealotry and more to do with an eight hundred year old grudge from that nasty first contact incident.”
Duncan winced as a mental image sprang up from the bowels of his memory. An old fashioned nuke with the words “Bad Kitty” painted on the side dropping down towards a different colony world.
Another day, another shit show.
Once upon a time, Terrans were still the new kids on the block when the Maur found them in much the same way the Terrans once found the Kintar. Entirely by accident. The resulting skirmishes weren’t pretty, and without Dorian intervention things likely would have escalated much, much further. Ancient history as far as most people were concerned. Emphasis on most.
“Thought we were skipping the history lesson here. Fast forward to the payday, if you please.”
Nolan rolled his eyes. “Fine. I have spent my entire adult life collecting data points and knitting together the story of what went ,own the day Sola fell. Punchline is, there’s a Maur vessel who leapt in-system six months before the NTA arrived, and never left. A whole lot of effort was put into faking an exit less than a week later, but that ship never actually transited through the jump gate. Ship’s registry claims it was a cargo frigate. One of the big bastards, too. But registries can be faked a helluva lot easier than jump hate transits. I don’t think it was a frigate at all. I think it was a stealth craft sent in to wait for tensions to escalate so they could fire the first shot. And I think I know where it is. I want it. That’s where you come in. I need a crew that’s used to the unexpected.”
Duncan’s arms unfolded and fell at his sides. “Just what do you hope to find?”
“Proof of intent,” Nolan said the words like a mantra. “I want to clear my father’s name, reinstate the Montgomery family to its former status, and put Sola back on the map. I know it’s a shot in the dark and you can scoff all you want, but it's like you said. I’ve got deep pockets. And I’m damn determined. I’m doing this with or without you. You get on board, it’ll be the last time you ever need to work for someone else.”
Sounds plausible enough, Duncan reasoned.
“I can live with that. But my crew and I get paid no matter what we find on that ship of yours. Deal?”
“Always about the money. You lack vision, ‘Deadeye,’ but so be it. If krets are all you’re after, this should suffice.” Nolan made a pinching gesture and a holographic image leapt up from his desk, displaying the balance of two separate bank accounts. One belonged to Mister North, and one to Mister Montgomery. The larger of the two amounts had just as many zeroes as the smaller one had total digits, and a few more to spare besides. With a lazy twist of his wrist, the figurehead of a Forgotten House transferred a full third of his remaining inheritance into the hands of a hired gun.
“You can keep that if the answer’s yes, and you’ll get double that amount when the job is done. If you say no, or try to book it before the job’s finished, you can kiss those krets goodbye. How’s about it, Duncan, you in or out?”
Duncan stared at his account in shock, counting up the numbers and running down a mental checklist of all the things he could do with such a monumental sum.
Like the man said, there was rich for a runner and then there was rich.
“Count me in… Monty.”
