-Ferris-
02-09-2004, 09:53
-----Somewhere, Inner Sol System-----
By the time the High Road dropped back into the normal three-dimensional universe, Arnau Velasco's Ghosts had got themselves into every part of the ship's system that would take them, including the Reliquaries of the crew.
For his part, Estéban Carrasco stayed on the command deck, overseeing the drop into normal space - the Possessed crew might have once been a top-notch jumpship crew, but the Corporeal Liberation Front Ghosts possessing them were better revolutionaries than starship crewers.
Excellent work, friend Carrasco! As always, the Ghost of Velasco himself was buzzing around in Estéban's own Reliquary, a malignant nuisance. Estéban fervently wished that the CLF leader had followed his own anti-digital dogma and stayed dead.
Such a busy little system this is, friend Carrasco. The High Senate will never find us here, look they as hard as they will. Isn't that just wonderful?
Estéban said nothing; Velasco knew just what he thought of that. The sooner the High Senate of the Ferrisian League tracked down the High Road and the surviving CLF "freedom fighters", the better. Small chance of that, though, given the seventy lightyears - seven days - between here and Thukat. Still, the High Senate - and more importantly, the League Star Command - wanted to find Velasco very badly indeed.
I've done what you wanted, you bastard. What about your end of the bargain?
Your Natalia? Not quite yet, friend Carrasco - this Reliquary, and this ship, are much too useful to the cause, after all, no matter how morally repugnant the situation may be to the both of us. The end at which we aim is surely worth any price!
Which was true, although the truths differed for Velasco and Carrasco; Arnau might be repelled by his continued existence in a form he'd decried for three decades and more, but his unwilling host was repelled by the means - killing, hijacking, mindjacking - to which Velasco was willing to resort. And while Velasco's aim was nothing less than the destruction of digital sentience, Minds and Ghosts both (and presumably the destruction of the Lightgate networks also), Carrasco's was simply to have his Ghost back; the one he'd been assigned upon his majority, not the one currently residing in the Reliquary chip at the back of his skull. Futile though it might be, he'd discovered he'd come to love Natalia Marquez, the bickering old woman.
Damnit, Velasco you bastard, you promised, and I hold you to your word!
Now Estéban began to realise just how badly he'd blundered; Arnau might continue to hang the carrot of Natalia's return before him as long as he needed Estéban and the High Road, but as soon as the CLF leader no longer needed him, he'd do away with "unnatural" Ghost and "Mind sympathiser" both. Carrasco let out a helpless groan of anguish; the Possessed command crew neither noticed or cared, more mechanical than organic under the control of their subverted Reliquaries.
My word must serve the cause, friend Carrasco, as must all things! Steady now, friend Lozano is about to send the message.
Zacarías Lozano, Velasco's favoured disciple and captain of the mutineer cruiser Righteous Cause, had pulled the cruiser ahead a few hundred kilometers as soon as the High Road dropped back into normal space, as was standard Star Command practice to avoid an alert and lucky system patrol cruiser wiping out taskfleets with a well-placed fusion drone.
Now Lozano would broadcast the message he and Velasco had worked out before reentry; if it worked, it would gain the CLF protection from any Star Command taskfleet which might be hunting them. If not, well, the Sol system was big enough to go to ground in, message or no message.
Broadband Unencrypted Communications
This is the cruiser Righteous Cause of the Corporeal Liberation Front. We are the last survivors of the organic resistance against the opressive evil of the Digital Sentiences of the Ferrisian Star League, our comrades having been cruelly massacred by the digital opressors in the Thukat star system.
We request sanctuary of the powers of the Solar System; the jackbooted enforcers of the League Star Command will assuredly be hunting us at this moment - and they hunt with the patience of machines, and will not give up until every last member of the Free lies dead.
In the name of Liberty and the martyred leader Arnau Velasco we entreat you; save us from the machine!
- Captain Zacarías Lozano, CLF Cruiser Righteous Cause
It was lies all through, of course, or at least truth severely skewed by the Corporeal Liberation Front; but the inhabitants of this system, a good seventy lightyears from Thukat and the other systems of the League, would have no way of knowing that.
-----Elsewhere:-----
Nothing here either, Epsilon?
That is correct, Admiral Fernandez. We can locate neither the Righteous Cause or the High Road in this system.
Eleanor Fernandez sighed, fingering her Admiral's pips absentmindedly. Even with ten jumpships - eight Exploration Vessels, two taskfleets - combing known space for the CLF terrorists, Velasco could not be found, and every day which passed since the Haven Rock massacre at Thukat decreased the likelihood of it ever happening. Although they'd been rumors that Velasco might have been on the Solidarity when it's reactor containment failed; if so, it was Lozano, not Velasco, that they had to find. That they would find; the League Star Command was not in the habit of allowing people who killed fifteen million civilians to escape.
Tell the captains, Epsilon - this one's another blank. We go onwards.
Ave, Admiral. Fleetmind Epsilon disbanding; Flagship Epitaph systems relinquished to Mind Callisthenes. Send the order to pull back to jump formation?
Yes, Callisthenes - all vessels enter jump formation around Epitaph. The sooner we find Velasco, the sooner Haven Rock is avenged.
OOC: Come one, come all! The CLF message is an unencrypted radio transmission, and even if you don't get it, the High Road's FTL drive has a very high "virtual mass"; that is, it masses much more than it should, given the materials it's made out of. This makes jumpships like the 'Road very slow indeed at sublight speeds, and also very easy to spot with gravitational sensors.
By the time the High Road dropped back into the normal three-dimensional universe, Arnau Velasco's Ghosts had got themselves into every part of the ship's system that would take them, including the Reliquaries of the crew.
For his part, Estéban Carrasco stayed on the command deck, overseeing the drop into normal space - the Possessed crew might have once been a top-notch jumpship crew, but the Corporeal Liberation Front Ghosts possessing them were better revolutionaries than starship crewers.
Excellent work, friend Carrasco! As always, the Ghost of Velasco himself was buzzing around in Estéban's own Reliquary, a malignant nuisance. Estéban fervently wished that the CLF leader had followed his own anti-digital dogma and stayed dead.
Such a busy little system this is, friend Carrasco. The High Senate will never find us here, look they as hard as they will. Isn't that just wonderful?
Estéban said nothing; Velasco knew just what he thought of that. The sooner the High Senate of the Ferrisian League tracked down the High Road and the surviving CLF "freedom fighters", the better. Small chance of that, though, given the seventy lightyears - seven days - between here and Thukat. Still, the High Senate - and more importantly, the League Star Command - wanted to find Velasco very badly indeed.
I've done what you wanted, you bastard. What about your end of the bargain?
Your Natalia? Not quite yet, friend Carrasco - this Reliquary, and this ship, are much too useful to the cause, after all, no matter how morally repugnant the situation may be to the both of us. The end at which we aim is surely worth any price!
Which was true, although the truths differed for Velasco and Carrasco; Arnau might be repelled by his continued existence in a form he'd decried for three decades and more, but his unwilling host was repelled by the means - killing, hijacking, mindjacking - to which Velasco was willing to resort. And while Velasco's aim was nothing less than the destruction of digital sentience, Minds and Ghosts both (and presumably the destruction of the Lightgate networks also), Carrasco's was simply to have his Ghost back; the one he'd been assigned upon his majority, not the one currently residing in the Reliquary chip at the back of his skull. Futile though it might be, he'd discovered he'd come to love Natalia Marquez, the bickering old woman.
Damnit, Velasco you bastard, you promised, and I hold you to your word!
Now Estéban began to realise just how badly he'd blundered; Arnau might continue to hang the carrot of Natalia's return before him as long as he needed Estéban and the High Road, but as soon as the CLF leader no longer needed him, he'd do away with "unnatural" Ghost and "Mind sympathiser" both. Carrasco let out a helpless groan of anguish; the Possessed command crew neither noticed or cared, more mechanical than organic under the control of their subverted Reliquaries.
My word must serve the cause, friend Carrasco, as must all things! Steady now, friend Lozano is about to send the message.
Zacarías Lozano, Velasco's favoured disciple and captain of the mutineer cruiser Righteous Cause, had pulled the cruiser ahead a few hundred kilometers as soon as the High Road dropped back into normal space, as was standard Star Command practice to avoid an alert and lucky system patrol cruiser wiping out taskfleets with a well-placed fusion drone.
Now Lozano would broadcast the message he and Velasco had worked out before reentry; if it worked, it would gain the CLF protection from any Star Command taskfleet which might be hunting them. If not, well, the Sol system was big enough to go to ground in, message or no message.
Broadband Unencrypted Communications
This is the cruiser Righteous Cause of the Corporeal Liberation Front. We are the last survivors of the organic resistance against the opressive evil of the Digital Sentiences of the Ferrisian Star League, our comrades having been cruelly massacred by the digital opressors in the Thukat star system.
We request sanctuary of the powers of the Solar System; the jackbooted enforcers of the League Star Command will assuredly be hunting us at this moment - and they hunt with the patience of machines, and will not give up until every last member of the Free lies dead.
In the name of Liberty and the martyred leader Arnau Velasco we entreat you; save us from the machine!
- Captain Zacarías Lozano, CLF Cruiser Righteous Cause
It was lies all through, of course, or at least truth severely skewed by the Corporeal Liberation Front; but the inhabitants of this system, a good seventy lightyears from Thukat and the other systems of the League, would have no way of knowing that.
-----Elsewhere:-----
Nothing here either, Epsilon?
That is correct, Admiral Fernandez. We can locate neither the Righteous Cause or the High Road in this system.
Eleanor Fernandez sighed, fingering her Admiral's pips absentmindedly. Even with ten jumpships - eight Exploration Vessels, two taskfleets - combing known space for the CLF terrorists, Velasco could not be found, and every day which passed since the Haven Rock massacre at Thukat decreased the likelihood of it ever happening. Although they'd been rumors that Velasco might have been on the Solidarity when it's reactor containment failed; if so, it was Lozano, not Velasco, that they had to find. That they would find; the League Star Command was not in the habit of allowing people who killed fifteen million civilians to escape.
Tell the captains, Epsilon - this one's another blank. We go onwards.
Ave, Admiral. Fleetmind Epsilon disbanding; Flagship Epitaph systems relinquished to Mind Callisthenes. Send the order to pull back to jump formation?
Yes, Callisthenes - all vessels enter jump formation around Epitaph. The sooner we find Velasco, the sooner Haven Rock is avenged.
OOC: Come one, come all! The CLF message is an unencrypted radio transmission, and even if you don't get it, the High Road's FTL drive has a very high "virtual mass"; that is, it masses much more than it should, given the materials it's made out of. This makes jumpships like the 'Road very slow indeed at sublight speeds, and also very easy to spot with gravitational sensors.