close – I must have either that ship or Montgomery. We will do whatever is necessary to achieve this; do you understand me Mister Wong?”
There was a long silence behind him, and then he felt the ship captain bow.
“I understand completely, Lord Azure.”
#
The stolen cruiser orbited the Lagrange point for another forty minutes, and then vanished in the energy burst of a jump.
Alaura Stealey, Hand of the Mage-King of Mars, watched it for the entire time it was in the Excelsior system. The Tides of Justice had arrived barely twenty minutes before the unidentified ship, and they’d gone completely dark the moment she’d realized the cruiser wasn’t flying a Navy beacon – apparently, quickly enough they’d gone unnoticed.
“She’s a Minotaur class armored cruiser, ma’am,” Mage-Lieutenant Harmon told her. She’d joined him and the ship’s Captain on the bridge for this approach, hoping they would find the Blue Jay in Excelsior. “Her hull number’s been scrubbed, but we’re running her drive harmonics now. We may be able to identify her if they haven’t changed the engines too much.”
“Lieutenant, ‘ Minotaur class’ doesn’t mean much to me,” the Hand admitted. “Details?”
“An older class of cruisers,” he explained. “First built forty years ago, there are twelve left in the Navy but most have been retired and broken up for scrap.”
“But not this one.”
“I presume, Lady Hand,” Mage-Captain Judy Barnett interjected calmly, “that this one is listed as having been scrapped. That’s why I want to identify her if at all possible. We need to understand how one of our cruisers ended up in the hands of pirates.”
“It appears that the Blue Star Syndicate may be more dangerous than we feared,” Alaura agreed.
“How do you know it’s the Blue Star?” Barnett asked. The Mage-Captain had never quite seemed reconciled to being a glorified chauffeur to the Hand, but the sudden appearance of a rogue Navy cruiser had brought about quite the transformation.
“The Blue Star Syndicate has been pursuing Captain Rice for some years,” Alaura explained. “No other organization would be willing to commit such a vessel, if they had one, to such a wild goose chase.”
“ Ma’ams!” one of the sensor techs suddenly interrupted. “There’s another ship in the cluster.”
“Where?” Barnett demanded. “Show me.”
The sensor tech highlighted a region of the asteroid cluster, almost half-way across the clump of rocks from where the pirate cruiser had been.
“She’s hiding hard, tucked up right next to an asteroid the inhabitants of Graveyard had mined out,” the tech reported. “Without our sensor upgrades, we’d have missed her completely!”
The Tides of Justice , Alaura reflected, was the newest and most advanced destroyer the Navy had. She remembered something in her briefing on the ship about her being equipped with the latest breakthroughs in sensors and scanners from Legatus – something to do with magnetic field resolutions.
“Hail her,” she instructed sharply. Barnett threw her a cross look, but the Captain held her tongue.
“ Recording now,” a communications tech told her, and Alaura faced the recorders.
“ Unidentified vessel, this is Alaura Stealey, Hand of the Mage-King of Mars,” she said sharply. “Please identify yourself and explain your business in a quarantine zone.”
There was no response for a moment, and then the tech threw a video channel on screen. A young handsome man in a deep red shirt faced the camera with a twisted smile on his face.
“Lady Hand,” he greeted her. “I am Captain Nathan Seule of the Luciole . You are known to me by reputation, and I assure you that I am simply passing through.”
Seule . Of all the ships and all the captains to show up here, it had to be Nathan Seule.
“ You are known to me as well,” she said bluntly. What rebellions in the Fringe that Stealey had dealt with that hadn’t involved Keiko
There was a long silence behind him, and then he felt the ship captain bow.
“I understand completely, Lord Azure.”
#
The stolen cruiser orbited the Lagrange point for another forty minutes, and then vanished in the energy burst of a jump.
Alaura Stealey, Hand of the Mage-King of Mars, watched it for the entire time it was in the Excelsior system. The Tides of Justice had arrived barely twenty minutes before the unidentified ship, and they’d gone completely dark the moment she’d realized the cruiser wasn’t flying a Navy beacon – apparently, quickly enough they’d gone unnoticed.
“She’s a Minotaur class armored cruiser, ma’am,” Mage-Lieutenant Harmon told her. She’d joined him and the ship’s Captain on the bridge for this approach, hoping they would find the Blue Jay in Excelsior. “Her hull number’s been scrubbed, but we’re running her drive harmonics now. We may be able to identify her if they haven’t changed the engines too much.”
“Lieutenant, ‘ Minotaur class’ doesn’t mean much to me,” the Hand admitted. “Details?”
“An older class of cruisers,” he explained. “First built forty years ago, there are twelve left in the Navy but most have been retired and broken up for scrap.”
“But not this one.”
“I presume, Lady Hand,” Mage-Captain Judy Barnett interjected calmly, “that this one is listed as having been scrapped. That’s why I want to identify her if at all possible. We need to understand how one of our cruisers ended up in the hands of pirates.”
“It appears that the Blue Star Syndicate may be more dangerous than we feared,” Alaura agreed.
“How do you know it’s the Blue Star?” Barnett asked. The Mage-Captain had never quite seemed reconciled to being a glorified chauffeur to the Hand, but the sudden appearance of a rogue Navy cruiser had brought about quite the transformation.
“The Blue Star Syndicate has been pursuing Captain Rice for some years,” Alaura explained. “No other organization would be willing to commit such a vessel, if they had one, to such a wild goose chase.”
“ Ma’ams!” one of the sensor techs suddenly interrupted. “There’s another ship in the cluster.”
“Where?” Barnett demanded. “Show me.”
The sensor tech highlighted a region of the asteroid cluster, almost half-way across the clump of rocks from where the pirate cruiser had been.
“She’s hiding hard, tucked up right next to an asteroid the inhabitants of Graveyard had mined out,” the tech reported. “Without our sensor upgrades, we’d have missed her completely!”
The Tides of Justice , Alaura reflected, was the newest and most advanced destroyer the Navy had. She remembered something in her briefing on the ship about her being equipped with the latest breakthroughs in sensors and scanners from Legatus – something to do with magnetic field resolutions.
“Hail her,” she instructed sharply. Barnett threw her a cross look, but the Captain held her tongue.
“ Recording now,” a communications tech told her, and Alaura faced the recorders.
“ Unidentified vessel, this is Alaura Stealey, Hand of the Mage-King of Mars,” she said sharply. “Please identify yourself and explain your business in a quarantine zone.”
There was no response for a moment, and then the tech threw a video channel on screen. A young handsome man in a deep red shirt faced the camera with a twisted smile on his face.
“Lady Hand,” he greeted her. “I am Captain Nathan Seule of the Luciole . You are known to me by reputation, and I assure you that I am simply passing through.”
Seule . Of all the ships and all the captains to show up here, it had to be Nathan Seule.
“ You are known to me as well,” she said bluntly. What rebellions in the Fringe that Stealey had dealt with that hadn’t involved Keiko
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