Sliding Reality: Chapter 8 Part 3 of 7 (Patreon)

“The Federation Inspectors are moving back to their ships.” Sally said.

Brad let out an exhale.

“So down to three factions,” Stuart pressed his head against the back of his chair.

“Two, officially Li Wei is in the talks as our representative.”

“Though she talks for all of the corporations?”

“More like she can get enough of the corporations to follow her, to pressure the others into doing the same. Sally, is there any information you can give us on the ship that the Federation Cruiser engaged?”

“I can extrapolate information from what was gained in the sensor readings. The scout ship that they engaged was born only a few months ago.”

“Born?” Stuart sat up and looked at her.

“Yes, this ship type is fully organic and is a living being. The missiles it fired released a kind of spore when detonated.”

“Can you extrapolate from the stars coming through the wormhole which system they came from?”

“I cannot identify a specific system, but it could be one of three dozen.” A map appeared showing Sol in the middle, with settled and empty systems in a web around it, and a ovaloid of systems marked possible.

“Look at them in relation to Orion system.” Stuart said.

“A line leading right to us, are they following you Sally?”

“No.” She’d gone tinny again.

“God we need to get through these talks and reach tier one,” Stuart stood in a rush, wobbling in the zero-g fighting to get himself back under control.

“Federation marines exiting destroyers.” Sally was back to normal.

“What?” Brad felt blood drain as a projector showed cameras from the shipyards the two destroyers had been parked in.

A flood of Marines rushed out of the ships, passing the inspectors coming the other way. The cameras changed to a hallway.

The bots had been quietly and discreetly following the Inspectors withdrawl were met by the Federation Marines and cut down.

"Wormhole established."

Another hologram showed a navigation plot as ships appeared at the lagrange point, heading for Sphere World.

“This is a coordinated attack, they’ve been planning this since the beginning,” Brad didn’t need to see the ship markings to know where they came from.

“The hell do we do?”

Brad rested his hands on the table, taking in the striations of processed metal. He took in a deep breath, and closed his eyes.

“If we don’t fight back then they will take and control Sphere World. We’ll be giving them everything. We’ve seen what they will do for their own ends. We need to defend Sphere World, we can’t let them take her.” Brad stood.

“But then,” Stuart ran a hand through his hair. “Fighting?”

“Sally move bots to engage the marines exiting the destroyers. Bring all weapon systems online and target the Federation ships. Move all shuttles out of the Federation ship’s path and warn other ships to stay clear of the lagrange. How long until they are in weapons range?”

The navigation map changed, showing bubbles around Sphere World.

“They are already in range, they jumped in close to the station.”

“Brad you want to fight the Federation?”

“Its either this or we turn the station over to them!” Brad looked to his best friend.

Stuart closed his eyes, pressing his lips together.

“Warn them that they have thirty seconds to stop accelerating or we will open fire on them.”

“Understood, Administrator Martin, do you agree with these actions?” Sally asked.

“Stuart.”

“I know Brad, I know, god, why does the thing we have to do be the thing we don’t want to do.” Stuart looked at him.

Brad’s face softened. “Sometimes there are only bad choices and shit ones, and you have to pick the best of the worst.”

“Controlling all of the weapon systems of Sphere World, I will not be able to fight with the bots I have as it will overtake my processing cycles.”

"Stop managing the remote sites, production and shuttles to increase cycles." Brad said.

"It will still not allow me to control the bots. I am unable to shut down production as it is against primary mission. Incoming transmission."

"I was hoping that you would see how dire the situation is for humanity, Mister Lee and Mister Martin power down Sphere World’s defenses and surrender to my Marines so that this transition might continue peacefully. I do not want to see anyone die over this." Walker said.

“Stuart?” Brad asked.

“I agree.” Stuart set his jaw.

"Administrators decision made, parameters set."

“You have thirty seconds to stop accelerating towards Sphere World or we will open fire. Have your Marines retreat to their ships or we will be forced to defend ourselves. I don’t want to see anyone die either. But I will not let you take command over this station.” Brad said.

“Communications channel cut.” Sally sounded like she was talking down a steel pipe.

“Even if we get their fleet to turn back their marines will tear us apart, that Destroyer must have been filled with them,” Stuart studied the cameras as Marines continued to disembark.

“We need help. We need someone to pilot the bots.” Brad pulled out his screen and started dialling.

“Who are you calling?”

Brad held up a hand to Stuart as the call connected.

"Dad, did you get the files?"

"Yes and I kicked out the federation. They're attacking us now.”

"Marines are accessing the elevators, I have lost internal control," Sally said.

"Lock down everything." Stuart yelled. “They’ve got a group heading for the ship on shuttles and five others moving through the rest of the station. You think they figured out we’re in the command post?”

“They’ve got marines inside Sphere World and a fleet on the way." Brad girded himself against his next words. "Your Legion friends, do you trust them?"

"Yeah, why?"

"Cause we need your help."

***

Luke checked the seals his space suit as they approached Dalimar station in the Korzh system. It orbited a habitable moon, the original habitation sections of the station spreading out into refineries, storage areas, docks and a shipyard.

"We're being hailed." Joey said, looking around.

"Seems they're expecting us," Stephen said, shifting in his seat slightly.

"Put it on the speakers." his mother said, adjusting her grip on her controls.

"Ah, Georgin, we have been expecting you. Slip seven is ready for your maintenance and overhaul. Raffi has organized things for you. Hope you have good day. You do spacer proud. Make sure you get those transponder codes active." The communications officer had a thick clipped Eastern European accent as he cut the channel.

"I, there's something in the transmission," Joey worked his console. He let out a breath. "New transponder codes, now I'm looking at it, we're getting jammed as soon as we came in, no one can read our codes."

"Raffi," Stephen grinned.

"Georgin," Adeline shook her head.

"What is that?" Luke asked.

"Russian for Dahlia. Altering course for slip seven, Joey change the transponder codes."

"We can do that?" Joey asked.

"Takes a bit of messing around. Here let me help you." Stephen moved over to his console and pulled a panel off of the console and rooted around inside of it and then flicked something.

"Asking for input?"

"Type in the new codes."

"Isn't it supposed to be impossible to change your transponder codes?"

"It's wired into all transmissions and information, but, if you know where to look and you just rig up a re-coder," His dad grinned and shrugged.

Luke raised an eyebrow.

Stephen raised his hands in surrender. "Hey I'm as pure as driven snow, I married in with the smugglers."

"Hey!"

"Your mother and father were great patrons of Raffi and they had their own trade going. Not like they're ten anymore, I think they can take learning about their smuggler roots."

"It's not smuggler routes, just a few hidden trades!"

"Are we going to be safe?" Marissa asked.

"We should, it looks like Raffi has some major pull with the station for the communication officer to cover for us and to get us a berth."

"What do we need a berth for? We did most of our maintenance."

"Get the rest of the maintenance done, new skin and alterations," Stephen looked through the main screen. "That way we won't match any of our old scans and we can hide in plain day. The transponders and the name will fool people who can't get a scan of us, a few alterations at the yard will show a different ship than the old Dahlia we will become Georgin."

"Bad luck to rename a ship, but if she's just getting a translation, that should be fine with her," Adeline patted her armrest, as if calming the ship.

Stephen and Joey checked everything was good with the codes and altered the registration of the ship based on the information packet.

Luke flipped through his feed, he'd sent the files out through a dummy account that would trace back to some snack bar in Coalition space. Once he sent the messages he'd logged out and purged the information from his screen.

The call from Jynx caught him by surprise.