ZARED
Harper spotted me about the same time as I picked out her shapely form in the group across from the entrance to the cargo bay. As she walked toward me I wasn’t sure whether she would be upset at what might have happened and didn’t or so glad to see me that she would just be grateful it wasn’t worse. I was relieved that it was the latter. I also sensed something else.
I was intrigued to learn about the Narovian male we had rescued with our people. It had seemed unlikely that Earth was in another galaxy from this one. Now we had possible confirmation that it was so. Though the exact location was unclear, it seemed that it was likely farther away from Consortium territories than our people had ever ventured.
I wanted to talk to him, but he had slipped away.
“Nora’s missing, too,” Harper said. “He said that she was his fated mate. He called her meomee. It sounded a lot like solmatu.”
“But you finished interviewing everyone?”
She nodded.
She learned there had been a few from Earth, three women. They had been killed. She was not merely upset that they had been sexually assaulted and murdered. She was angry. Considering how many we took out, those murderers were probably dead. A quick death was probably more than they deserved.
Harper was equally distressed at the number of Farseekans were also killed. That was in addition to the estimated half million on Farseek.
I could see that Harper was tired. She hadn’t slept well the night before the mission and it had been almost twenty hours since we left our bed. I was still filled with energy from the stimulant injected when I was injured.
I was actually just there to collect Harper and return to our quarters. It was clear that she was trying to slip away unnoticed but she is so attractive that she is hard not to notice. When I looked up across the cargo bay it seems like everyone was looking at us expectantly. They needed reassurance and encouragement after everything they had been through. Senior staff thought it would be useful for the Earth women to check in and interview the people we rescued.
They recorded information about their origins and family lines through their microlink to the ship’s AI. Although it could have been done by the AI alone, we thought it would be helpful to their morale to be attended by sympathetic and compassionate people who understood their plight. It was good for the women’s morale as well.
With the planet secure, Admiral Degatu sent down teams to scavenge material and supplies from the mining operation. In our haste to get to Breskaa, we didn’t take time to prepare accommodations for the people we were rescuing for the journey back to Farseek. Dread Eight also sent a team. While we would never appropriate goods from our own citizens or the Consortium, we had no qualms about taking everything we might find useful from the Sargan Empire. The ten million credits from Guryon wouldn’t go far for what lay ahead of us.
Therefore, we decided we would appropriate what we needed from the Empire whenever possible. We had not only become mercenaries, but pirates as well. Despite our doubts and suspicion that some in the Consortium had betrayed us, we remained loyal to the Consortium. As a Farseek Warrior, I still held fast to my honor and loyalty. Our first loyalty was to Farseek and our people. We owed nothing to the Sargus Empire. They would never give us what we were owed for what they did to our world, so we would simply take it whenever the opportunity arose.
Guryon was investigating the events that led to the destruction of Farseek. He was a powerful man, and he owed us far more than the aurinium he paid us. I felt certain that he was a man who paid his debts.
I kept Harper’s hand in mine and we walked over to the rescued people, drawing their full attention immediately. I wasn’t even sure what I was going to say to them until I started speaking.
“Welcome, to the Dreadnaught Seeker. My apologies for our lack of accommodations for you. I’m afraid they will not be much improved from what you had on Breskaa. This is a war ship, not a passenger transport, but we will make you as comfortable as possible for the journey to Farseek. The good news is you don’t have to work in the mine anymore.”
“What is left for us to go back to on Farseek?” someone asked.
“The first shipments of modular housing should arrive on Farseek before we do,” I told them. “It’s going to take years to rebuild Farseek into the world we knew. No one will be forced to return there. We will pass by many Consortium protected worlds on our way there. Many will offer basic food and shelter for those who lost everything on Farseek.
“Know, that the loss is not yours alone. I lost my own home and my family. So did many of the warriors that serve you. We can’t even determine who or how many were killed and how many were taken as you were. But we have made it our mission to find as many as we can and free them from the Empire.”
There were murmured ‘thank you’s’ then questions about sanitary facilities, food and sleeping arrangements. Until the salvage teams returned with the bunks, the only place for them was on the deck. With that in mind, we had them all bring their blankets with them.
While I was answering their questions, an autocart arrived with protein bars and drinks for them. There were two stockpiles of raw food in the mining compound. Food for the guards, and food for the slaves that was barely fit for humanoid consumption. We took the guards’ food and left the survivors the slave fare. We also took their main food processor to install in the cargo bay for our rescues.
I assured them that the salvage teams were working as fast as possible and were due back aboard by the end of the day. It was only a matter of time before the Empire discovered their battle cruiser was missing and contact with the mining operation lost. Our sensors hadn’t reported any ships approaching the system. That could change at any moment. We wanted to be far away before they discovered what we had done.
It was evening for us when the salvage teams returned with the material they confiscated from the mining colony. Dread Eight’s teams were just finishing, so we waited for them to get back to their ship before we left the system in case there was trouble.
The rescues had made pallets of their blankets on the deck of the cargo bay and many had gone to sleep. Our morning was soon enough to start retrofitting the cargo bay to quarter our rescued guests for the journey back to Farseek.