The Rebel Faction

Project Terra Nova Firma Outpost, Belsus surface, Anoat System


“I'm just saying, if the atmosphere down there is garbage, and the atmosphere up there is also garbage, why do we have to maintain pressure seals while we're working?”


Bill jumped in place, flying a good meter higher than should be possible. “Cuz the pressure diff'rential'd blow us thirty meters in the air for one, ya idjit. The tunn'ls are almost at stand'rd pressure now.”


“Oh,” Ted said absently, scratching his head. “But why . . . how come they pressurized the tunnels already, if we could have worked without the pressure seals otherwise?”


“Ah said fur one, dammit! Don't you ever list'n ta me? Them weeds down thar need good pressure ta' grow, ya idjit. Ever'thang's not 'bout wut you wount.”


“Oh, sorry.”


“Pluuus, air's diffrn't.”


“Huh?”


Bill nodded his head. “Yup. 'S diffrn't air down thar. Cain't have tha air mixin', might not be good fur them weeds down thur.”


Ted nodded too, more to copy Bill than out of actual understanding.


“Pardon me, Sir,” a robotic voice croaked unexpectedly, and Ted shuffled out of the way, bewildered by the weird, giant metal ant carrying a huge canister meant for . . . something.


“Humid'fier,” Bill said, having noticed the stupid look on Ted's face. “Gunna keep tha' local humid'ty optimized fur tha plants 'n wutnot.”


“Oh,” Ted said, the first spark of real understanding he'd had in . . . well, let's just say in a while. “They're greenhouses!”


“Agrifarms,” Bill corrected, saying the word like he'd just learned it from someone else, which he probably had. “Big 'ole tracks runnin' on the surface, sealed again' the outside atmosphur, connect'd to tha underground. Enough to feed tha whole pop'lation. You mean you didn't know?” Bill moved in real close to Ted as he asked, eying him all crazy-like.


Ted shook his head, finding it easy to ignore Bill's shock, because he didn't register it. “I mean, I knew there was a lot of plumbing to inspect, but dang, this is just crazy! We better get back to it, then!”


“Righ'?” Bill agreed, waiting until Ted started moving before he kicked off the wall and followed, making sure to stay real close. That way, if one of these droids did happen to make a mistake (which was really, impressively uncommon), Bill would catch it, because the Maker knows Ted was more likely to break something on accident and not even notice than he was to catch a genuine mistake.


* * *


Project Terra Nova Firma base ship, in geosynchrous orbit around Vinza, Anoat System


“It will work.”


Khelk turned first one eye, then the other, toward the speaker. These visits had been getting more frequent, and with each one Amarata was pretty sure she was figuring out how to read the fish-lady better. This look was . . . annoyance?


“I don't care.” Disregard. Close enough.


“But, it will work,” Eff said again.


Khelk set down her datapad and gave Amarata her undivided attention. “Your design, while quite innovative and impressive, I'm sure, will not be deployed on Deyer. The risks are simply too great.”


“When I said 'it will work',” Eff reiterated, “implicit in that statement was the assurance that it would not destroy the local populace.”


“I still don't care,” Khelk said, still looking at Amarata. “Now take your boyfriend and get out of my office.”


Amarata gasped in shock. “Boyfriend? What, no, I . . .” She looked to Eff, helpless and stunned by Khelk's choice of words.


“My assessment of the Captain's design and deployment procedures are made purely on the basis of my professional expertise in related fields.”


“Aren't you an automation specialist?” Khelk asked, one of her eyes looking over to the droid before returning to Amarata.


“I have been upgraded,” Eff explained.


“And did Captain Amarata, here, assist in that upgrade?”


“. . .”


“Yes,” Amarata said glumly, knowing this would end the debate.


“At my request,” Eff clarified.


“Indeed,” Khelk said darkly. “As I said: take your boyfriend and get out of my office.” She pointed for the door.


“So much for 'come by any time',” Amarata muttered, her head still hung low as she left the room.


“Cam, you have associates within the Ryn fleet in-system, correct?”


“You think just because I'm a Ryn, I have Ryn friends?”


“No, I-”


“I mean, you're a droid; other than the droids you own, and the one that built you, how many droids you hang out with?” Why was she so bitter all of a sudden? What was her problem? Stop it, stop it, Amarata!


“No, I recall an anecdote you shared approximately a month ago, involving a game of sabacc with a human and a Squib, among others. From context, I inferred that these two individuals regarded you favorably.”


“Oh yeah, uhh, right.” Stupid, stupid, Amarata! “So . . . what were you asking for?”


Eff sped up a little bit, turning his head to catch her attention. “Our subversion of official authority was quite successful in progressing the primary objective of this project. Might that general methodology be adapted to this situation as well?”


Amarata smiled, her mind racing with the possibilities. “We go around Khelk, use the Fleet's contacts to ask the Colonials directly.”


“My assessment of Colonial history indicates that they are a rash, arrogant people who are not at all cautious in considering the possible ramifications of new technologies.”


Amarata nodded along. “Yeah . . . hey! Are you saying it won't work? Because it will work!”


“I do not doubt the efficacy of your design, Cam, only the compliance of Deyer's tectonic plates.”


“Oh . . .” she said, walking along in silence for a few seconds before what he said really registered. “Hey! Did you just anthropomorphize tectonic plates?”


“That was my objective, yes.”


Amarata smiled, flicking her tail and bumping his arm with its end. “Good job . . . I think.”


“Thank you, Cam.”

Project Terra Nova Firma Base Ship, Gentes Orbit, Anoat System


Amarata walked the long, gently curving corridors of the massive vessel alone, though the corridors themselves were bustling with morning activity. She was all but shaking from the cold, a chill that reached down to her bones, and it wasn't coming from the recycled air.


It would help not to dwell on that right now, though. The best thing she could do was focus on the task at hand, let her mind wander if it could manage, and wait for an update from Eff. Yeah, that was a good plan . . .


“Oh.” The sight stopped Amarata cold. Huh, cold: somehow, that made the whole situation a little more amusing. A crooked smile formed on Amarata's lips as her mind wandered with the coincidental thought.


“Cam?” the old man asked.


She snapped back, her introspective amusement turning to nervous jitters. “Uhh, hi, doctors.”


“Is everything alright, Cam?” the old woman asked.


“Oh, no . . . I mean, yeah. Y'see, I was looking for you,” she pointed to Doctor Surhum, then shook her head vigorously. “I mean, I mean: I was looking for you,” she pointed to Doctor Linne, “because I couldn't find you,” back to Surhum. “Hence, the me coming to your quarters,” back to Linne. “I just didn't, uhh, well . . . I just didn't expect to find both of you, you know . . . here.” She pointed at Linne's quarters, out of which the pair of doctors had only just stepped.


“What can I do for you, Cam?” Doctor Surhum asked, not at all amused by the Ryn's fidgety display.


“And where's Eff this morning?” Doctor Linne asked. “You two, well, we hardly see you apart these days, is all.”


What was that look he was giving her about, anyway? And hadn't they learned by now not to ask her more than one question at a time? What was she doing here, again, anyway? Oh right: “Well, uhh, Doctor Surhum, I know you haven't had much to do around here . . . uhh, professionally . . . for a while now, and well, you see . . .”


Out with it already! “Eff thinks I don't spend enough time around 'people' and Khelk is mad at me because I'm behind schedule on the Lucrehulk refit because of all the prototyping work I keep volunteering for and I'm trying really really hard not to think about all those beady Colonial eyes staring at me when I stumbled through my presentation for the Deyer project and I thought I had a viable refit plan for the relevant technologies that we've already confirmed that was flexible enough to incorporate future equipment but . . . but . . .”


Calm down, Amarata. Stop rambling. Take a moment, collect your thoughts, and move on. Like a person does. “Sparky thinks my proposed refit will compromise the structural integrity of the ship, and I could really use some help.” Very good, Amarata. Verry good. “Because structural design is super booooring.” Almost. You almost had it, Amarata. You were really, really close this time.


“Also, I'm not really supposed to be telling people that we're planning to equip the Lucrehulk for permanent terraforming work, but since we've already broken those kinds of rules together before, I thought talking to you about it wouldn't get us into any more trouble . . .


“So, uhh, interested?”


* * *


Ithorian Herdship Ursmal, Deyer Atmospheric Deployment, Anoat System


It was going to work. The Ryn had been right, her design was solid, and it was going to work.


Dammit.


At this point, Khelk almost wished the whole thing would backfire for the Colonials. She'd been forced into this agreement by Amarata's amateur and completely uncharacteristic maneuver, but the clever Mon Calamari official had still managed to secure a contract that protected the project from liability.


Unlike the other worlds they'd selected to serve as test beds for terraforming technologies, Deyer already had a sentient population, meaning a failure here could leave the ocean world's tectonic plates unstable and its inhabitants vulnerable to frequent and massive seismic sea waves.


But it wouldn't fail. I was going to work. It was going to work, because that damned Ryn had made it workable. Then, because she had no sense of the political or social ramifications, she'd gone and meddled her way into a meeting with some Colonial official or another and gotten them to start poking around themselves.


Now, both to save face and keep her true motivations hidden, here she was, one of the most powerful people in the Western Province, doing a favor for these alien-hating wannabe Imperials. Just once, just once it would have been nice to make them pay cold hard credits for the benefits their Coalition membership got them, but no, not even that small measure of justice would be allowed now, because Amarata the Ryn was too eager to see her latest toy get turned on!


“It is a fine ship.” The tiresome, monotone comment came from Khelk's side.


“What are you talking about?” Khelk grunted, hardly sparing a glance at the Confederation droid.


“I was remarking on the design of this vessel,” E4-2F explained. “Its functionality as a mobile, closed micro-biome is minimally compromised by the extensive aesthetic considerations implemented in the design.”


Khelk turned and walked away from the droid.


“I was attempting to engage you in 'small talk',” he explained, following after her, “as you are currently exhibiting a number of stress indicators which several psychological models indicate are best alleviated through passive, distracting social interactions.”


She made a weird sort of snorting sound, intended to show her derision though she had no reason to suspect the fool of a droid would understand that. “So you're a psychologist now, in addition to a geo-engineer and robotics specialist?”


“I have expanded my formal interests to include the scientific study of sentient organic psychology, yes,” he said, still following her around the circular skyway that ran the perimeter of the disc-shaped vessel's nature preserve.


Lucky for her, the converted observation platform was just ahead, packed with project specialists and monitoring equipment. Surely one of them could distract the droid.


“Khelk,” one of the Alliance specialists regarded her as she approached, guiding a colleague aside to make room for her.


“What's the status of the operation?” she asked stiffly, eying her prospects for ditching the droid.


“All platforms are deployed, all drills ready, and all barriers active. We have permission from Seven Cities Control to begin.”


“Then what are we waiting for?” she barked.


“The order to begin, ma'am.”


Suddenly Khelk had an idea. “E4-2F,” she said, turning back toward the droid, “you've just been promoted to operation lead. Congratulations, and get on with it.” She shuffled out of the way, toward the edge of the gathering and away from the mission-specific equipment running along the front of the platform.


“Engage Group One,” he ordered, not even acknowledging the unexpected change in leadership. “Power to seventy percent, and double the data-checks on their coolant systems. Inform me when the first platform reaches twenty percent of its thermal tolerance.”


It was an ambitious project, manipulating the subduction zone of an active plate boundary to simultaneously raise the elevation of key regions on both plates. Because that wasn't difficult enough already, some of the target zones were already host to Colonial population centers, meaning a single mistake could endanger millions of lives. To protect the locals and their infrastructure, a double-redundant network of modified mag-con fields had been deployed around the inhabited island chains, generating a temporary seawall strong and tall enough to withstand extended bombardment from seismic sea waves.


It was all quite exciting and perilous for the nerds, she was sure, but Khelk still couldn't see past the wasted opportunity. They could have made the Colonials pay!


* * *


Cornucopia Resource Ship Alchemist II, Vinza Orbit, Anoat System


Thinning the atmosphere of Vinza was a fine first step, but more drastic action would have to be taken if the Coalition intended to begin settling the planet on anything like a reasonable timescale. The problem was that the planet was just too hot. Total thermal intake was unbearably high due to its proximity to the system's primary, leading to a rather unusual development plan. Population centers would be concentrated near the planet's poles, where the angle of incidence for incoming solar rays was sufficiently oblique to deflect the majority of them out into space. As for the rest of the planet: well, they were going to paint it white.


The surface of the world was already dotted with the first wave of seeded microbes, a hardy, fast-growing species whose colonies appeared as white splotches on the dull surface of the world. They would supplement the atmospheric transformation of the world even as the cumulative effect of their reflective cell walls lowered the temperature of the planet, eventually dropping it below the tolerance levels of the microbes themselves.


The massive die-off would provide the food source necessary to fuel a second wave of similarly-tailored fungi, which would serve as a permanent thermal regulator for the planet, stretching across approximately half of its total surface area. Atmospheric wind and pressure patterns would confine the majority of the world's water to its poles, resulting in two distinct habitation zones.


And Alchemist II would be here to see it through. While the Cornucopia-class didn't have cloning technology as sophisticated as the future terraformer now under simultaneous development and construction, its on-board systems were more than capable of handling this task load. Like clockwork, every four hours a new payload of seeders was launched from the vessel, each specialized torpedo deploying more than a dozen new microbial colonies onto the surface of the world.


It was a beautiful sight, indeed, watching a planet transformed from a barren wasteland into a cradle of life. The fact that similar transformations were going on throughout the system only added to the wonder and grandeur of their endeavor.


* * *


The Dome, Gentes


More garbage pile than government capital, the hodgepodge of starship parts, bombed-out buildings, prefab construction materials, and recycled trash had accumulated quite a few neighbors in the past months. Some were little domes themselves, others squat boxes, still others cute little pyramids. All of them, though, every one, was property of the Ryn Fleet.


Ahh, the Ryn fleet. Someone really needed to get around to changing that name, because it wasn't a fleet of Ryn at all. Not anymore. Out here in the West, specifically, the Ugnaughts wanted that known. That, and they wanted their homeworld back.


For fifty years now, Gentes has lain all but uninhabited, its native people culled from the world and forced into the shackles of slavery. Now, with the political and economic force of the Ryn Fleet at their backs, the free Ugnaughts of the galaxy were reclaiming their world in the name of the Galactic Coalition. Their time away had changed them, however, and they could not turn from the plight of other desperate souls even as their own dreams were achieved.


That was all well and good for the touchy feely types, but from the perspective of planetary engineering, it was a nightmare. The Ugnaughts were well at home in the putrid swamps of their volcanically active home, with geysers of noxious fumes spewing out of every crack and crevasse. The people they were inviting along, though? Well, that would kill most of them just as sure as a blaster bolt to the head.


The solution? Partitioning! Huge stretches of the planet were being turned over to the Coalition for development, but far from all of it. There were general concessions, of course, mostly involving atmospheric toxicity and the management of water resources, but for the most part: there was Ugnaught Gentes, and then there was Everyone Else Gentes, and the two were destined to look very, very different from one another.


For the fancy science types with their lab coats and whatnot, that was sure to be a heck of a hurdle to overcome. But for Ugg, the Ugnaught machinist turned point man for the Ryn Fleet's contribution to the project, that meant good old fashioned elbow grease.


His convoy was heading out to one of the planet's largest volcano fields, a rough, noxious region that Ugnaughts had avoided for the entirety of their history. It was a bona fide wasteland, making it prime real estate for the blinky gadgets and orbital rays those fancy types liked to show off. There was just one problem, though: the fumes were poisoning the air for their weak, underdeveloped lungs. So what was Ugg going to do about it? Heh.


He was going volcano plugging. The thermal collectors would dry up the magma chambers while providing a cheap, reliable source of power. Power he would own. Power he could sell to the Coalition's works projects that were sure to crop up once the terraforming was complete.


Yeah, for the first time in a long time, it was good to be an Ugnaught on Gentes.

The Mid Rim Alliance had offered the design specifications of its own terraforming starship and the technical expertise of its top specialists in exchange for a copy of the final terraformer design. It was a straightforward deal with minimal complications, though no one was sure if they wanted the designs to build their own terraformer, or to sell off to some outside party. They were all pretty tight-lipped about their own future plans for the tech.


The Coalition and Confederation, on the other hand . . . well, their agreements with one another were more involved, and not quite so clear-cut. While the Alliance had brought a ready-built terraforming platform to the collaboration, the Coalition and Confederation had brought individual technologies, each applicable to the overall project but requiring a good deal of specialization to optimize their value to the final design. These refit technologies had needed to be tested, operational procedures established, designs optimized, and so forth. It had required a test environment, one with sufficiently diverse planetary bodies to allow for the deployment of the full range of terraforming procedures and technologies.


That environment had been supplied by the Galactic Coalition in the form of the Anoat System, convenient enough given its relative proximity to Minntooine. With the projects in the Anoat System drawing to a close, however, the Coalition was left with a sort of implicit debt to the Confederation. While all three nations had gotten the schematics for the new vessel, the Coalition and Confederation had contributed significant labor and resources to the development of that vessel, and for its labor the Coalition now had a whole solar system teeming with life. What did the Confederation have to show for its dedication to this project, though?


Nothing. Nothing but the hope that the ship they'd spent so long designing would actually work.


And there was the Coalition's solution, the way for it to repay its debt. While the systems of the Verne-class had been tested in Coalition space, and the Coalition had reaped the spoils of that endeavor, the ship itself would be tested in Confederation space. Both of them.


The Verne-class Terraformer Jules dropped from hyperspace in the middle of the Rearqu System, a small fleet of Coalition support ships and escorts at its flank. What kind of name is “Jules” for a terraforming ship, you ask? I don't know. Ask the fish-people on Minntooine if you're so interested; they're the ones who built the thing!


“Find the Verne and message the Confederation commander,” the captain said, a rough looking human fellow with a few long, light scars on his face and neck. “Request orders for our deployment. We've stepped into their house, folks; they're running the show now.”


* * *


Project Terra Nova Firma Base Ship, Gentes Orbit, Anoat System


“I'm sorry those Colonial jerks wouldn't let you on their project,” Amarata said awkwardly, fumbling to move some empty food containers she'd been piling up at what was now Doctor Surhum's work station. “Figuring out those tectonic manipulator platforms seemed close enough to starship design for me!” Amarata smiled lightheartedly as she stumbled away with a tower of previously discarded containers, looking for a new place to stash them.


Her painful efforts at socializing didn't seem to be having any effect on the old Confederate, though, and her cheery smile soon dissolved into a weak, insecure frown. She tried to distract both herself and the doctor by tossing the pile of rubbish into a corner of the room, a loud crash punctuating the action. “I think Khelk rerouted the cleaning droids,” Amarata said when she noted the other woman's discomfort with the loud noise. “Trying to punish me for going around her to the Colonials, I'm sure,” she added as she made her way to the main control console for the Lucrehulk refit. “She should be back anytime now, too . . .”


Amarata trailed off as she lost herself in navigating the ship's modified design specs, trying to track down one particular problem in the sea of error messages and warnings. “Oh!” she exclaimed, jumping back in surprise, shocked by her own exuberance. “I heard from Eff,” she explained, turning back to the Confederate. “Khelk put him in charge of the project, you know?” She didn't wait for Surhum to answer. “Anyway, he said everything's going well . . . well, he said 'all systems are functioning within acceptable tolerances', but, you know, that's just how he says everything's going well. Anyway, he said the Colonials are wanting to take over the project as soon as it's out of the high-risk stage, so he might be back soon.”


Why was the old woman staring at her like that again? Amarata tucked her head down a little so she wouldn't have to meet Surhum's stare, then turned back to her work and started typing away again. “I just thought you might want to know,” she muttered, still feeling those unkind eyes on her.


This whole thing had been such a terrible mistake! Why couldn't she have just kept her head down, stayed firmly buried in her work, and left the Confederate to . . . whatever it was she was doing these days?

Pew.


Pew pew.


Pew.


The weak autoblasters of the Jules continued to chip away at the frozen surface of Triton as the plasma drills designed for asteroid processing cast up huge plumes of vapor. An orbital magnetic containment grid, vaguely reminiscent of the Cooperative's Testudo orbital defense system, ensured that the resulting atmosphere and thermal waste heat wouldn't bleed off into space. It would take a tremendous amount of energy to melt the entirety of the planetoid's ice sheet, but the terraforming ship's primary concern at present was with drilling shafts down to the moon's rocky core for Triton's gravity generators. Once they were in place, the artificially strong gravity of the moon would be sufficient to hold its atmosphere without further assistance, allowing the mag-con grid to be dismantled.


Until the Jules completed that task, the pair of Cornucopia ships in orbit were in charge of Triton's thermal regulation, using their own manufacturing capabilities and those of their support ships to churn out hundreds of solar reflectors. The Jules would take over for them as soon as it was done with its own objective, but until then the terraformer was simply feeding them sensor data on total thermal energy output, allowing the supercomputers of the Cornucopias to continually optimize their reflector deployment plan.


The joint terraforming operation was making good progress, the Coalition's initial assistance on Perspherone proving its competence to the Confederation project leader, Doctor Jansen. Eventually the good doctor had decided to split the two groups, though it seemed to many in the know on the Coalition side that the real decision had been made by the Confederation's military commander in-system, Captain Dufrane.


It wasn't hard to see why, for anyone paying attention. The two groups' operational protocols were just different enough to spook a proper military man like Dufrane; every orbital correction or flight launch was an opportunity for a misstep by one side or the other. With over two dozen ships belonging to each group, all of them crowded around a single planetoid, a swarm of orders shooting through two separate chains of command, tripping over each other every now and then was an inevitability.


Neither group was here to iron out the particulars of joint fleet deployment for nonstandard mission roles; they were here to get a job done. The simplest, most efficient solution was to separate the two formations. With so many targets provided by the Moons of Rearqu, that was easy enough to manage.


They were still sharing resources and passing off specialty ships between the two groups as needed, but putting some space between the two main formations of vessels cut potential surprises down to a minimum. After getting to know him a little, minimizing surprises seemed like the kind of thing Captain Dufrane couldn't pass up.


It was probably for the best. The more Captain Reese learned about his Confederate counterpart, the more Dufrane felt like a mirror of himself, like the kind of man he could have become if only circumstance had allowed it.


Reese had more than his fair share of scars from war, though; a few of them were even physical. It wasn't good for him to have to work so closely with the Confederate officer. Splitting the two groups was good for everyone, at least for now. He could respect Captain Dufrane's military command without suffering the pains of being subject to it.


The Coalition captain relaxed into his chair, confident that his crew would handle their objective just fine. Reese had had his misgivings about the mission, but his personal discomfort with the military tint of this operation notwithstanding, their work here had won him over. The potential of this ship to restore damaged worlds and returned scattered civilizations to their lost homes could not be underestimated, and the collaboration between the Coalition and Confederation in its development and testing might open doors to closer relations in the future.


It was an honor to be a part of that, to foster that spark of hope in these dark times.

Vinza, New City One


“We'll take it.”


“Really? It's that simple?” The Coalition official couldn't believe what he was hearing.


The Kadrillian representative nodded his (her?) head, gently patting the wall of a prefab building at his side. “The heat will do us good,” the turtle-esque creature said, “and it's not like we're unaccustomed to the hardships of colonization. It would be our honor to break ground on this world, after all the hospitality the Coalition has shown our people.”


The Rattataki official was surprised by his reptilian counterpart's amicable demeanor. A large group of Kadrillian refugees had been taken in by the Eastern Province shortly after the Reaver outbreak. They'd been subsisting on Teth ever since, but the project in the Anoat System offered them an opportunity for something more. Them, and billions like them.


“It's not going to be easy,” the Coalition official warned.


“Nothing worth having ever is,” the other replied with a resolute nod. “We will make this world worthy of us, and of those who follow after.”


It was refreshing to hear the representative acknowledge that his people were just a piece in a larger mosaic, that Vinza was not to be their world alone. The path ahead was a grueling one, filled with toil and sacrifice. The terraforming process was far from over, but it was moving into a phase best managed by whole societies, not strategically placed individuals. The Kadrillians, and those brave enough to stand with them, were the first of a new generation of settlers, of refugees-turned-citizens, of men, women, and creatures of every sort who would take back the hope of a better future.


In the volcanic swamps of Gentes, beneath the sealed crust of Belsus, clustered around the cooling poles of Vinza, these first seeds of new civilizations would soon grow and blossom into a vision of future Coalitions not yet dreamed.


* * *


Project Terra Nova Firma Base Ship, Vinza Orbit, Anoat System


The solar reflectors here were pointing away from Vinza, not toward it. These were long-term structures meant to permanently modify the planet's ecology, like the reverse of the massive solar arrays deployed around Coruscant to warm the cold heart of galactic civilization. It meant that greater care had to be put into their construction and deployment, that higher quality materials and equipment had to be allocated for their assembly. It meant that this was one of the only jobs in the system that the project's old Lucrehulk was still well-suited to perform. Its specialized systems were either powered down or dismantled, in the midst of a massive refit to turn the ship from a mobile test bed into a genuine terraforming platform in its own right.


It would be the crown jewel of the Coalition's technological prowess, a world engine with the power to conjure civilizations out of dust. The Verne-class was a technological wonder to be sure, a fusion of Coalition and Confederation environmental technologies, but this ship was simply more. If the Verne were a destroyer, this would be a battleship.


Ugh, Amarata hated naval analogies! Couldn't she have just left it at “more”?


The door slid open and Doctor Surhum walked through, a datapad in hand and her attention occupied by its contents. “The C-7 bypass was approved,” she noted offhand, taking a seat at a terminal. She switched from the pad to the computer screen in a fluid motion. “We're in the home stretch now.” Either Gabe was familiar enough with her work patterns now to anticipate her needs, or she had filled him in on the way here. Either way, the Doctor seemed to have acclimated to the ship's Guardian quite well.


And Gabe was the ship's Guardian now. A full file transfer had duplicated the AI from his original back on Minntooine. Amarata still hoped she'd get a crack at optimizing Gabe for civilian work, but that wasn't looking likely. Gabe was here to keep an eye on them; any help they got out of him was bonus points.


“Eff's coming back soon,” Amarata said, trying her best to sound casual. “The Colonials finally took over the Deyer project; he said he'd be happy to help with the scaling problem on our scalable assembly line's internal AI. Heh, 'scalable scaling'. I never thought I'd see the day, but we might just have too much tech packed into this ship.”


Was she even paying attention?


“Uhh . . . so anyway, I was wondering . . .”


Doctor Surhum huffed, clearly making a show of her frustration. It brought an awkward smile to Amarata; it meant the Confederate woman was going out of her way to overcome the socially hopeless Ryn's obliviousness. “What is it, Cam?” The doctor sat back in her chair and spun to face her.


“Technically, the terms of the Coalition and Confederation agreement restrict the use of any shared technologies to terraforming and related environmental repair.”


“Is there a question you forgot to include, or should I just keep staring at you until you feel the urge to finish your thought?”


Amarata fought back the growing unease. Maybe she had misjudged Doctor Surham's earlier behavior . . . “It's just that the Verne was designed to be basically incapable of use in a military context. This Lucrehulk, on the other hand; well, it's going to end up being a big, scary beast, and its existence isn't covered by the original agreement.”



“I'm not concerned with Confederation reprisal for my assistance here, Cam, if that's what you're getting at. Is that what you're getting at?”



Amarata chuckled nervously. “No, no. That didn't even occur to me, really.” She shrugged, only getting more uncomfortable now. “I was just thinking that in situations such as these, the concerned party – that'd be the Confederation, of course – often requires the offending party – that'd be the Coalition, in this case – to host an official, an observer or inspector or something of the sort, to ensure none of the involved technologies are . . . uhh, misused.”



“Gods, Cam!” Surham exclaimed, spinning back in her chair and getting back to work. “If you want Eff to stick around so bad, just ask him already!”



It took Amarata a good five seconds to recover. The initial outburst had been surprising enough, especially coming from the normally mellow and more passive-aggressive (the worst kind of aggressive, for someone with Amarata's particular psychopathology) Surham. But the second part, well that was just . . .



“No, no, no. That's not fair. You and Dr. Linne need to stop with all of that!” It seemed to catch Surham's attention again. “Yeah, that's right; I have eyes. I can see. I hear your snickering and whispering! I'm not a complete idiot!”



“We never called you an idiot, Cam -” Surham was sounding a little hurt now, but Amarata was not having any of it.



Besides, if she paused long enough to give the doctor a chance, her own fear and dread would probably drown her. “My interest in Eff for this are completely justifiable and entirely professional!” she continued, her voice squeaking a little as she got worked up.



“Oh, Cam. Honestly -”



“He has extensive technical skill and personal experience in essential fields, making him an asset to the ship and its crew that the Coalition can't afford to pass up. Plus he's a droid, so he can be upgraded with security safeguards to protect the Confederation's interests and ensure he isn't compromised. He's above reproach and a genius; what more could anyone involved ask for!



“Oh,” quieter now, “hi.”


The door had just opened, and waiting on the other side, treads ready to roll, was E4-2F. “Greetings Cam, Dr. Surham. What did I miss?”