PMF Sneak-Peek and General Update (Patreon)

Hi all!

Posting a little late this month and bringing an additional late notice here. The monthly short story is gonna be a few more days. It's moving along and nearly done, but I had an appointment or some other obligation pretty much every day last week, including the weekend. I'm also kicking this one over to my editor, so... sorry for the delay there.

My plan right now is to get the story posted and move directly into the rest of the stories for the year. I've got them all outlined already.

In happier news, I've made good progress on the next Poor Man's Fight. Like I said in the last sneak-peek, Tanner and Alicia have been roped into going on a delicate mission with a Union Fleet special ops team. This means working with people from all over the Union. It turns out there's some feelings about the Debtor's War that make for tension in the galley at breakfast, while Tanner has some feelings about "special" operations...

“I haven’t been to Fairhaven in fifteen years,” said Dean. “Way before Archangel took hostages and occupied the planet.”

Tanner’s brow went up and his mouth bent with something close to amusement. Living outside Archangel had gotten him used to this. Though Alicia saw it often enough in the media, she didn’t have the same experience. Her voice ran cold. “They weren’t hostages. They were the leadership of an invading enemy.”

“Civilians,” said Dean.

“Every civilian who wasn’t an executive or a voting shareholder got released within hours,” said Alicia. “We only held the people who could end the war. We didn’t mistreat them and we didn’t hurt them.”

“Except for the guy at the top. Malone ran down Anton Brekhov and killed him. Hey, you were there, too, right?”

Even the most in-depth media coverage of the incident lacked that detail. From their expressions, Obyke and Parekh knew it, too. Alicia held her tongue. Tanner’s wry frown remained. “The galley sure got quiet.”

He wasn’t wrong. No one had shouted, and yet they had everyone’s attention. Not all the onlookers turned away when he mentioned it, either.

“You afraid to talk about it, Malone?” asked Dean.

“Seems like there are two elephants in this room. One of those shots sounded kinda personal. Do you wanna talk about the war, or about me?”

“Funny how the subjects are kind of the same,” Dean answered. “This started with you talking about not being special. You, the bigshot hero pirate killer. A whole pirate ship all by yourself, and then all those battles—in a war about what, exactly? Not paying your bills? Kidnapped a whole bunch of civilians for that, and then you talk about ethics?”

Tanner leaned forward, elbows on the table. He didn’t expect any appreciation for his patience, and so he didn’t mind if anyone detected a hint of irritation behind it.

“I am not special, Dean. They trained thousands like me. That’s how we won at Raphael and how we won the war. All those things I did—if I hadn’t done them, someone else would’ve figured it out. I’m not special. I’m the product of a system.

“The war was also the product of a system. All those big companies took over the schools a long time ago. They set up a racket to rob us all so badly we’d be in debt for the rest of our lives. They robbed probably everyone in this room and on this ship. We found proof it was a scam, and told them we're done with it, and so they sent an invasion fleet to rob us some more.”

“It’s not that simple,” said Obyke.

“It really is,” said Tanner. “NorthStar occupied my planet for two and a half years and looted it the whole time. Mass incarceration, violent suppression, the whole bit. There are folks from my childhood I’m never gonna see again. All because we told the robbers to go away and stop robbing us.” He shrugged. “All those shareholders backed that. We’re not talking about ordinary citizens who might disagree with a dumb government move. They literally invested in the company that did all that. We occupied Fairhaven for less than a month to get them to stop, and hardly took anything with us when we left.

“If it makes you feel better, Dean, I did see something wrong with the plan on Fairhaven. I saw how ugly that could get. So did the people who planned it, which is why they had three Masters at Arms on the team, including the guy in charge, and more in the back-up team that didn’t make it to the site. They all knew it could turn into an atrocity. I signed on to prevent that. In the end, it didn’t happen, because we all knew the rules and we didn’t think we were special.”