"In Search of Eden"

[Joe Manning 0]

A large transparent partition had been erected in Verbistul storage room 8-B, transforming one corner of the room into a makeshift brig cell. The two raiders who'd surrendered were sitting against one wall, their protective body suits stripped away. Francis Holstrum was seated against the other, still wearing his Xorax engineer uniform. They all looked up when Joe entered the room.

 

"Stand up, Holstrum," he said, his voice firm but not harsh. "You and I have to talk."

 

The raiders' man-on-the-inside looked unsettingly like a ghoul. All of the raiders looked the same way, though it was harder to tell through the fur of the Caitian recovering in the infirmary. Their appearance backed up the stories Joe was hearing from Pher, Ethan, and Byblos. Holstrum seemed to be carrying the weight of exhaustion and defeat as he slowly rose and walked over to the partition. Joe met him on the other side.

 

"Your friend over there had a lot to say," Joe nodded toward the raider who'd been captured on the Bridge. "About why you folks are doing this. About something called 'Eden.'"

 

At that last word, Holstrum snapped a look back at the raider, whose head dropped. "Too bad he doesn't know what exactly Eden is," Joe continued. "But he pointed out two people who would know -- you and your Captain. Since your Captain lost his head in the engine room, that leaves you to explain why I nearly lost a very substantial paycheck."

 

"No one is supposed to know about Eden," Holstrum whispered, looking back at Joe. "It's the only chip my people have left, and the only one I ever wanted! I never wanted to hijack this ship! Diklyt--"

 

"Yes, yes," Joe raised a hand to stop Holstrum. "All I've heard is how reluctant you folks were to go along with this operation, how Diklyt went crazy, how none of you wanted to hurt innocent people. Yet here you are, with this ship in one piece only because my people were able to disarm the bomb you strapped to the warp core. For how much you were all against Diklyt, you were awfully willing to follow him into the fire."

 

"Diklyt had earned our respect," Holstrum replied with less conviction than he was aiming for. "He'd commanded our fleet since the beginning. He was there when we looked for a world to colonize in the Expanse. When raider activity started picking up in the region, he defended Noretia -- our colony -- on numerous occasions. We were perfectly content to keep to ourselves while the other colonies turned to piracy and infighting; Diklyt was a strong part of that, always advocating a peaceful, insular existence cut off from the chaos that kept growing in the Expanse. This is going back fifteen years; many of us trusted Diklyt and considered him a good friend. But things have changed a great deal over the past year."

 

"What happened?"

 

Holstrum's head lowered slightly and he peered up at Joe with frightened eyes. He answered in a hushed voice. "The Horde happened."

 

Joe felt a chill run briefly up his spine, but he did not let it show on his face. "I've heard that name a few times now. Not much in the way of solid information, but I know they've become the big dogs in the Expanse lately, and they're one of the main reasons that the raiders have been more active near the Hyades cluster."

 

"They're all getting desperate," Holstrum nodded. "Some of the raider bands have joined the Horde willingly. The ones who resist are captured or wiped out. But a few, like our colony, just flee outward, away from Horde territory, which just keeps growing. Most are fleeing in the direction of Klingon space and the Hyades cluster. We certainly can't flee across the Expanse -- even if all our ships could make the voyage, Gorn space is on the other side."

 

"So now you're all camped out in Bull's Head's backyard," Joe smiled grimly. "Which explains why raider attacks have been picking up over the last year. I'm guessing it explains why Diklyt the Brave changed from Colonial Defender to Terrorist?"

 

"Noretia was a world that was ideal for habitation," Holstrum replied. "We did not have much luck finding a replacement. Our new world has a breathable atmosphere, but the topsoil is too hard for anything to take root. After we counted the food stores we'd brought aboard our ships and put together a rationing plan, we projected that we couldn't last more than a year. And we certainly couldn't afford to have Gaia Prime ship food so far outside the Hyades cluster. Our only recourse was to turn to piracy. Since I was the colony's agriculturist, there wasn't much use for me anymore; they sent me to the cluster to seek out employment and feed information back to the colony about food shipments."

 

"Verbistul is not carrying a food shipment," Joe pointed out. "It's a science vessel on an archaeological expedition."

 

Holstrum gave Joe a wary look and started pacing around the makeshift cell. "I managed to get a job at Xorax colony. It was the ideal position for me to find out if any research projects were being conducted that could somehow help my colony -- advanced terraforming techniques, perhaps. I found out about Eden, even worked on it for a few weeks."

 

"What is it?" Joe asked.

 

"A ship," Holstrum answered. "A big one, bigger that Verbistul. And it's lined with hydroponics bays. It doesn't require a lot of crew, just enough to shuttle it from world to world. Essentially a giant roaming garden. You can understand how beneficial such a thing would be to Xorax colony, and why the administrators would want to keep it a closely guarded secret."

 

"With a fleet of Edens, they could threaten Gaia Prime's monopoly on the food trade."

 

"Oh, it goes deeper than that," Holstrum said. "Gaia Prime doesn't have any ships. They rely on the Guardians to shuttle their food shipments throughout Bull's Head, and the Guardians gets a significant cut of the profits. The hydroponics vessels would be product and shipping all in one little package. The Guardians would not be needed."

 

Joe crossed his arms. "I can see that they'd have some objections to that."

 

Nolstrum grinned. "It gets worse. Gaia Prime has several science teams conducting various research projects in Xorax facilities. The Xorax administrators overseeing the Eden Project have been stealing research data from those scientists -- a blatant violation of the confidence that Xorax clients place in the colony. Gaia Prime has been unknowingly contributing to a project that would ultimately screw them.

 

"I tried to convince Diklyt that threatening to go public with details of the project would be enough for Xorax colony to give us the prototype. Diklyt thought otherwise. He wanted a show of force to back the blackmail attempt up. So he planned to set up an exchange -- Verbistul and its crew for the Eden prototype, with the extra threat of blackmail thrown in. And now, sure enough, the hijacking has blown up in our faces and we've lost everything. You see now why none of us have spoken very well of a Captain that had earned our respect. This operation was a terrible mistake."

 

"Fortunately for you," Joe replied. "Nobody on my crew or Verbistul's crew paid for it."

 

"So ... what happens to us?" Holstrum asked, hopeful for mercy from his captors.

 

"That is a difficult question to answer," Joe said. "We still have an expedition to complete; your botched attack did not derail it. Bringing you all back to the Hyades cluster would be too much of a delay. We don't have the provisions to shelter four extra people for a month, and I doubt Captain Maxwell would want to keep you around any longer. I'm sure some of my crew would suggest ejecting the whole lot of you out an airlock."

 

Holstrum's face turned even whiter than had seemed possible. Joe continued, "I think that's a bit extreme myself. I recognize that your people are desperate, and taking out your leader makes you less of a threat. My preference would be to arrange a rendezvous with your Constellation ship and release you all."

 

"You would just let us go?" Holstrum's eyes widened.

 

Joe raised a finger, "Not without a price. We do this pirate style, minus the plank-walking. I return you and three of your friends to your ship, but I keep one of them. I'm in need of crew, and I think I can afford to support one extra body during this mission."

 

Holstrum quickly blinked, "I'm sure Petrovic would be open to--"

 

"My choice," Joe quickly cut him off. "Petrovic is the human we took down on the Bridge, right? He didn't exactly make a good impression on my security staff. And that was -before- a disruptor blast that there's no guarantee he'll survive. I want the one that got shot up in engineering, the half-Caitian."

 

Holstrum did not seem pleased with Joe's choice, but he simply sighed. "So we turn him over to you and the rest of us can go?"

 

"There's more," Joe answered. "And this is where it gets a bit complicated. You see, my crew doesn't have much in the way of allies in the Expanse region. And this Horde sounds like a threat that will be reaching the Hyades cluster before it goes away. I think we could do well to forge a relationship with your colony. We can't help you with your food shortage problem now or within the next month ... but in time we'll look into it. And when we find a solution for you, you and all of your people will be indebted to us."

 

"Indebted how?" Holstrum gave him a wary look.

 

"We'll discuss that when the time comes," Joe replied. "For now, consider this the groundwork for a deal. You're far more likely to get help from us than you are to get ahold of that Eden ship. Hell, we might even find a way to get the ship for you ... after our current contract with Xorax colony is up, of course. But believe me when I say you want us on your side, Holstrum. So no funny business when we return you to your ship. Make it clear to the rest of your raider band that you blew your chance to hijack Verbistul; you won't get another one."