A LOPER TALE

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Harry Johnathan
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Harry Johnathan »

I really like the way you make dialogue just as exciting as action scenes. Snappy, quick and always set in interesting locations.
Sarah was afraid, so she lied and said, “I did not laugh.” But [The LORD] said, “Yes, you did laugh.” - Genesis 18:15 (NIV).
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Welsh Halfwit »

Rydr Warklub wrote: Mon Sep 06, 2021 10:33 am I really like the way you make dialogue just as exciting as action scenes. Snappy, quick and always set in interesting locations.
Unless you want to do info-dumps *Cough*Dan Brown*cough*, it's a good way to bring out the characters.
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Amazee Dayzee »

I love this chapter a lot also! I am hoping that the part about the joke including "low-hanging fruit" ends up coming up soon.
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Welsh Halfwit »

19

TARGETS

Sheriff Barley held his breath as he fired at the shadows moving in the window as Jasmine started her run. He was intent on ending this and hoped there was no-one innocent trapped in there but he supposed they’d have used them as a barrier before now. Things weren’t adding up. The Mican knew he needed words with his old friend afterwards. He almost held fire as she took a shot to the leg but he breathed out as the dazzling lights started up around the Chief and the Detective, indicating they’d moved thousands of kilometres from the battle zone.

He was thrown back as the sewerhole cover exploded upwards in a blast of pyrotechnics and flame as the road itself cracked and blossomed upwards and out like a flower. He felt but didn’t hear the other two nearest sewer entries detonate, one after the other. A small chunk of road caught his cheek, drawing sharpened rivulets or red out into the air, where it stained his fur. Only his goggles kept the dust from covering his eyes. He coughed out some dust from his throat and painfully propped himself up on an elbow. “Rep...Report,” he stammered, probably louder than he thought as Ginny , stooped low, tried to pull him backwards to better cover. He watched as a spike of energy ripped into her arm, near taking it off at the elbow before he pulled her down besides him and held her close, trying to stop her going into shock. One of his officers, possibly Merrim, took their own initiative and Barley saw their car cross swiftly past his eyesight, mount the kerb as shots fired into it, crash through the fence and impale itself in the window at speed, tearing a gash in the front of the house ten foot wide before it came to rest in the dining room. As his people moved forward, the firing ceased and medics took the chance to get to him and his wife, injecting her with a sedative to ease the shock and working on the arm. He needed to… He needed to… He needed to re-orient himself.

Merrim stepped up. It seemed she’d locked off the accelerator in her car and pointed it at the house before getting out and watching it go. “Dawkins and Raleigh are down,” she said, possibly quieter than normal. “Their sewer entry went up as they went in. No chance,” she sighed. “Elgin was a few seconds back. He’ll make it.”
She looked up as the Sergeant who’d taken on the assualt phase came over. “Four dead inside,” he said. “The family that lived there were killed some time ago. One hostile ended… and a remote controlled auto assault weapon destroyed.”
“They were targetting us,” Barley commented darkly as his wife was taken into the ambulance.

Raven stood on the bridge of the Loper and stared down the image of Admiral Roebuck as it appeared on her screen. She was allowing Dawton to leave the line open so the Militia ships around them could see exactly what she was saying. Paranoia was running high and the identity of the Rayvon Admiral wasn’t helping their impartiality clause. She’d been quickly briefed by Jaqui on the situation on the surface and, after seeing the live feed of the explosions, agreed with Chiefy (as she sometimes called her) that the sheriff’s team had been targetted. So she’d called to advise him. “Have you had anything similar happen at your end,” she asked after relaying the gist of it.
<”Nothing that I’ve been made aware of, Lieutenant Commander,”> he replied, <”but I’ll make sure the necessary people are alerted to the possibility. You really think someone might try something?”>
“I think that whoever’s behind this wants at least one of your governments destabilized and they don’t care which one it is. War or general disorder will do that. Anyone agitating on Rayvon?”
<”Oh, the usual powerful individuals that I don’t dare name. In fact I don’t even think it. They’re all one hundred percent loyal to their ideas of what’s best for the colony. As am I.”>
Raven nodded sagely. The response of a politician. More or less exactly what she’d expected. She’d felt Roebuck hadn’t been entirely on the level with them and she was pretty much sure of him keeping things from them now. The question is were the things relevant or just important to him? <”Have you found anything to indicate who’s behind the Micannan computer problems?”>
“We have someone on it.”

Harvey Winsome sometimes enjoyed his work, the feeling that millions of codes and lives were his to play with as he sat at his keyboard or engaged the VR drive on his goggles to take his avatar into cyberspace to fight the good fight in spectacularly grey area of legal ways but finding one entry point in a newspaper’s digital server whilst trying to keep it from their I.T. department that he was there was not much fun. Their walls were good, almost to his level and he had the feeling they had the mark of Djaka, an experienced Chipmunk hacker, about them. They’d locked him out three times and it had taken him the best part of the afternoon to slip by the main wall by putting a single digital ‘breadcrumb’ in a e-mail to someone in the janitorial department that contained a link to a new vid from a Felis based comedian and he’d snuck in when that was opened. He’d have to tell Sarah about that later, he decided. She’d smirk at that. Anyhow, here he was, dressed up in his virtual world as a Knight with a chain mace and shield, walking around in the forests of infotrees, staling the one with longer roots and, possibly, bigger branches whilst security quadrupeds stalked him. It was slow going. He’d managed to scale a few trees and evade a time or two – which was partly why he’d chosen this setting – but they were still closing in and…

...There it was. A Blackthorn tree in the middle of Oaks. That had to be the odd one out. Smaller than the others too but leaching off them in Harvey’s fertile imagination as he crept towards it. The quadrupeds were close now, he could almost feel them. He had to get up to the intruder tree and infect it with his own spike program. Easy as…

…The tree sensed him coming closer, turned to look at him and protected itself by turning into a giant digital Snake. “Well, within the automobile,” Harvey said, ducking aside and realising he’d just called out to the security programs. “Right. Time for a deep dive.”
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Amazee Dayzee »

I am really enjoying this! Please post more!
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Welsh Halfwit »

20

A STEP. FORWARD OR SIDEWAYS?

“So this isn’t just a ‘debriefing’, is it,” President Leith mused aloud. “You want permission to take over the investigation into all of this, don’t you?” He spread his arms wide. “Why not just come out and say it?”
“Because it’s all circumstantial,” Colleen replied smoothly. “There’s no actual proof that any of this is linking back to Calavix, just a lot of co-incidences and planning that seems unusual.”
“Strikes against your space fleet and your Police goes well above the scope of most normal criminal activity,” Stikka agreed.
Hawle looked from one to the other and back to the President. “All we’d need is permission to investigate. That can come either from a federal warrant – which would be really annoying and insulting and I don’t want to do that – or simply by you granting the permission to investigate in however we see fit.”
“And what if it doesn’t lead to Calavix?” This from Coldstream.
“Then we’ll deal with that. Anything involved in this situation we’ll send to the Sheriff. Anything that’s political we’ll bury in so much red tape wouldn’t come up in a century of Sanctamas giftwrapping. Internal politics is nothing to do with us.”
The President shifted slightly in his seat. “I’m not sure if that’s supposed to be reassuring or not.”
Hawle smirked. “Neither. If we foul up, you blame us. If we succeed, you win.”
“Then I suppose you have my permission. I’ll have the document printed in five minutes.”
Coldstream stepped over to the console. “And I’ll have the Warrants authorised in about the same time.” He glanced at the Loper members. “Some Vixen on Celica came up with a way to speed request warrants a year back.”
“Good,” Hawle replied, “and we’ll probably have results on computer traces in…” He checked his comms clock function, “...about ten minutes.”
Coldstream smiled a mirthless smile as he typed away. “Meaning you already have someone doing computer things and want to make it legal?”
“We can neither confirm nor deny things I have no knowledge of,” Colleen said.

Ten minutes later, and looking kind of bedraggled, Harvey Winsome appeared on the bridge, holding a printout. He tried his best to get his breath back. “Lunatic…” he breathed, “...tree…”
Raven looked at him. “What the heck happened to you,” she asked before realising the mistake. “No,” she said, holding up a hand, “it has to do with hacking you didn’t do and computer things that I wouldn’t understand so don’t bother. Dawton, get him some water before he collapses. Match, book him some time on the holo exercise program. The run up here shouldn’t have him this knackered.”
Dawton vacated his seat to get the water from the nearest machines and Harvey took the post, thinking it was unfair. He’d been working for hours with nary a break and he’d run quickly to get the information here fast. He accepted the water from the Human and gulped it down, wondering if it would have been better if he’d brought air instead. “I’ve…” He swallowed. “I’ve got the location the intruder came from,” he said, waving the paper in the air. “It’s, uh, the computer of Jake Portree.”
“Well,” Raven said dismissively, “we knew that anyway. Jaqui updated me whilst Fuze was operating on her.” She shook her head. “She’s too like me for her own good. Anyway, proving it was his terminal still doesn’t prove he DID it.”
“Yes, but, uh, I have the legit proof? And exactly when it was uploaded.” Harvey straightened up, rising to her unspoken ‘prove yourself’ challenge. He’d fought the ‘tree’ for a moment or two before he realised he really hadn’t needed to. The news agency firewalls would now recognise and attacking program when they got close enough so they’d fight it. That would keep it active so he could trace the source, which he had done. On Pandera or Caldera it wouldn’t have worked. Too many hubs they could bounce the signal off. Here, though, there were only a dozen or so. “Their own security cameras should tell who was, uh, at the terminal at the time?”
Raven nodded. “Sounds right. Get the information to Jaqui. I think she’ll want to let the Sheriff know.”

With the Detective still under Barleycorn’s care and the universe still deciding if it wanted him in it or not, there had been little for Jaqui to do after her leg had been patched so, replete with crutch, she’d arranged a teleport back down to Harleys’ office and arrived in a secluded spot a few minutes stagger away from the main entrance. The atmosphere in there this time was sullen but co-operative and Merrim was first to approach. “How… How’s David,” she asked, referring to Detective Brunton.
“Our Doctors are still working on him,” Jaqui said uncertainly. “They, uh, got the medical records sent up but… It’s touch and go at the moment, Kella.” She glanced up to look the Deputy in the eye for a second. “Sorry. Uh, how’s things here?”
Merrim sighed and helped Jaqui to a seat. “The sewers went up. We lost two officers. Things went mad, Ginny took a shot to the arm. A bad one. Sheriff’s with her at the hospital but… They probably won’t be able to save it.”
Jaqui closed her eyes. “I’m sorry.”
“So,” Merrim said, “want to fill me in on what’s going on? The events of the past few days are kinda mounting up, you know?”
Jaqui nodded. “I do indeed. I received notification that the Loper has been given control over the investigation into who’s destabilizing the colonies.”
Merrim turned away. “I heard. Best of luck with that.”
“We’ve found where the person got into the newspapers’ system. We have the warrants to seize their security feeds.”
“What’s that got to do with us?”
“I think the events are directly linked, Kella. I want someone from my team to work with someone from yours.” She leaned forward and wished she hadn’t. “There’s no way I’m keeping this department out of this. You have a right for revenge.”
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Amazee Dayzee »

Keep up the good work! This is very enjoyable!
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Welsh Halfwit »

21

HOT ON THE PRESS

Jaqui waited in the Sheriff’s office whilst one of her officers, paired with Deputy Merrim, made their way to the News Agency office to bring back evidence and, possibly, a suspect to the events that had rocked the colony over the last few hours. She played with the cradle of steel balls on the table and gave passing thought to how things developed in much the same ways on different worlds. The same thing, always describing the conservation of energy and momentum,, developed on a dozen worlds or more and always with different names. Newt cradles on Earth, Kovan Cradles on Cana and so on and so forth. After physicists, scientists, inventors and all that. It passed the moment. She checked the Gazette’s news page to find it containing several stories about the Police action and the explosion. They already had an editorial condemning the atrocities and the assault on the forces of law and order. They demanded action from the President immediately and suggested that any failure to act immediately would count against them in the next elections. Jaqui smirked slightly. She wondered if they’d had it ready to go? The next one would tell of the President opening up investigations to the Council crew. For good or ill?

Deputy Merrim and Officer Colesford – from the Loper – pulled up outside the Colony Gazette office and got out of Merrim’s car. She’d decided they needed to travel ‘undercover’ so they’d used her own, nondescript, vehicle to travel and Merrim had spent the entire time assuring the brownfur Mican that it had nothing to do with Police vehicles being targetted. Colesford had simply demurred. There was nothing to gain from arguing the point. The Deputy led the way – or, rather, refused to let Colesford lead – up to the reception desk. “Need to speak to the person in charge,” she told the receptionist before they’d even donned their fake smile. “Now,”

A moment later a slim Mican female offered herself up at reception. She offered a hand to Merrim. “Sigourney Sinclair,” she asserted, “Deputy Editor.”
“Kella Merrim,” Merrim replied, taking the hand, “Deputy Sheriff. This is USC Security Officer Colesford. We’re here on a joint operation.”
Sinclair frowned. “And how can we help? I take it this is to do with the terrible events of this morning?”
Merrim shrugged tightly. “Possibly tangentially. We need access to your CCTV from 2630hrs last Marcanna. We’re investigating those false signals that were being sent out?”
Sinclair sighed deeply. “We got those feeds directly from Space control,” she admitted. “I don’t know what you might find here…”
“You may have got the feed,” Colesford stated in his honey dark tones as they entered the security feed room, “but it wasn’t direct from Space Control.”
Sinclair looked a little shaken. “It wasn’t? But… why?”
“That’s what we’re here to find out,” Merrim stated as Colesford started operating the system and pulled up the CCTV. “Someone left a hole in your system that enabled someone to feed you the fake information. We want that person. And the information that it may be connected is as off the record as it gets. It might be completely unconnected.”
“Just two separate, almost crippling, disasters happening to our security services at the same time,” Sinclair remarked. “I can see between the lines, Deputy.”
The trio watched as the evening shift zimmed by on the screen and headed into the midnight shift. The agency still needed people on station around the clock as the people came and went until the time Harvey had specified and Merrim stopped the playback when a young Mican was sat at the terminal. “That’s the person left the hole,” she said, “according to our specialist,” she added, glancing up at the Deputy Editor. “It’s them we need to speak to. Are they here?”
The Deputy Editor peered at the screen and grimaced. “That’s ‘Pookie’ Portree,” she replied as Merrim cut a copy of the CCTV. “He’s here. I’ll call him…”
“Better you take us to him,” Colesford declared intently, straightening up his shirt. “Ready for him to run,” he asked Merrim quietly.
She unbuttoned her holster and kept her hand close to the weapon. “Ready for him to try,” she muttered back.
“We do need him alive,” Colesford reminded her.
“Good job it’s set to stun,” Merrim warned. Colesford wondered if he’d just gone down in her estimation.

He saw them coming from across the room and started working to delete the contents of his hard drive faster than… Jake Portree frowned. The Computer was saying it couldn’t delete the files until the previous command to copy the database was completed. Huh? He… had no time to wonder about that now. They were m from the front so he was going to head out the back. He didn’t even bother to grab his coat as he made quickly for the fire escape, opening it to start the alarms off as he ran down the metal stairs and found himself face to face with a deputy who slammed him, face first, into a wall to cuff him as… was that a Jondahl? He’d never seen one before but it certainly looked like one of the tail up brigade tapping away at a palmtop computer by the server cables. “Oh, this is all legit,” Harvey told him, looking up from the computer screen for a moment. “Well, my actions are. Not sure about some of your files, Jake.” He wagged a finger as Merrim, Sinclair and Colesford appeared at the top of the Fire escape. “Naughty fictions about your work colleagues? Really? That’ll get you into the ‘Workplace stalking’ seminars.”
“Was there any of that stuff on there,” Colesford asked after the Sheriff’s officers had put Portree in the car. “Really?”
“He’d never be dumb enough to put workplace stories on his computer,” Harvey confided, unplugging the palmtop from the main system and closing it up after saving his work. “But it made him wonder and she’ll probably sack him now. I REALLY hate that spike he put in.” He closed the laptop. “If you’re going back with the captive, I’d better go with yours.”
“Better run,” Colesford said. “I don’t think she’ll wait.” Harvey rolled his eyes and started running.

Several million miles away, rocks the size of villages hung quietly in space, untouched by anything close to dangerous. Until something burst into their midst, its’ speed not decreasing until the absolute last second. The featureless ship started running its scans over the mineral rich rocks. It ignored the efforts of the warning buoy to alert them to the possibility of danger until a mine blew, shattering the rock nearest to the ship and knocking it off-line...
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Amazee Dayzee »

I hope that ship is gonna be OK then. They really should be more mindful of space mines.
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Welsh Halfwit »

22

WORKING LUNCHTIME

Jaqui Pangal had the interrogation room set up for Portree when he was brought back to the Sheriffs station, protesting that they had nothing on him. Merrim had him put in the room, cuffed to the table as protocol dictated and went looking for her temporary… well, not ‘boss’ exactly… She found her in the lavatory area, washing her hands. “We’ve got the Portree guy in the interrogation room if you want to sit in,” she advised.
“Did you bring him in front or back,” Pangal replied, waving her hands over the dilapidated ‘insta-dry’ machine.
“Uh, back, of course,” Merrim queried, thinking it a very strange question. “That’s where the cars park.”
“Pity, in a way,” Pangal replied, “if you’d brought him in the front way we might have got a reaction from the spy in the coffee shop across the way.”
Merrim stopped for a second. “The what?”
“When I arrived here this morning,” Pangal explained, “a greyfur was sat at one of the window seats. He’s still there. I had Yarkin bring over some of their coffee and,” she snorted a chuckle, “it’s not worth staying all day for.”
“I wonder if I’d know him,” Merrim pondered.
“Send Colesford on a drinks run with a spy camera,” Pangal advised, heading for the door. “I’m sure you and Harvey can deal with Portree for the moment.”

Things were quiet for once aboard the USC Fallir and the Canine in charge, Lieutenant Commander Grovan was getting into the swing of things for the day. He had thirty officers and non-coms under his control and he wondered if the liked him. He didn’t wonder too much as, as long as the did as commanded, he didn’t truly care. He stepped onto the small excuse for a bridge and took up the single seat in the command section. No room for First Officers on a ship this size. He HAD one, of course, but he was in charge of the tiny science station on the bridge, near to the back left corner. He pulled up his latest orders from Postlethwaite and picked his teeth as he’d been seen doing before when something unexpected came up. “Helm,” he ordered, “set the course I’m sending you, would you?”
“What seems to be the trouble,” Science Officer Martin asked.
“Seems my old ship found some good looking rocks. They left booby traps and warning buoys for reasons not in the communique. Something’s ignored the warning and set off one of the devices.” He sighed. “Better check the weapons,” he advised the Human.

“I think that went rather well,” Hawle mentioned as the trio of himself, Una and Stikka were released from their audience with the President.
“You mean we didn’t get charged with any offences,” Colleen remarked. “We’ve still got the heavy lifting to do on Rayvon,” she warned as they walked back to the car.
“Oop,” Stikka said as the driver appeared, “discretion and sports talk advised.”
“You could be right,” Hawle supposed. “Where’s the best restaurant in town,” he asked the driver.
“Uh… Am I allowed to say ‘at the spaceport’,” he grinned hopefully.
“We’d have to give a bad review for lying,” Hawle replied, wagging a finger. “We’d go from there back to the port, of course.”

Ten minutes passed and the trio found themselves in a booth, contemplating vegan cheddar and other pieces of local interest that wouldn’t interest Cedar. The room rang with a general hubbub as Colleen asked why they were there.
“Well,” Hawle advised, “if it’s Calavix, they already know we’re involved. We can’t act in a way they’d predict. Would anyone think we’d go from that meeting to here?”
“I certainly wouldn’t,” Stikka remarked, trying to pull some melted cheese apart and failing miserably.
“If they prepared for us, the spaceport’s probably bugged. So we discuss things here, where we show we’re not afraid of them.”
“Where we can be shot,” Colleen grinned.
“Oh, only if we’re really unlucky. So,” Stikka asked, “how do you plan to raise things with the Rayvons?”
Colleen stabbed her bread with a fork, dipped it in the cheesy liquid and took a bite. “It’s why we started here,” she remarked after chewing and swallowing. “It often allays the fears of the paranoid if you’re seen to be taking their side seriously.. We’re seen to be investigating the Micannan side and it can loosen their tongues.” She carefully took another bite. “Not bad but no threat to Chef Kirkwall. When you get the reluctant paranoid talking, who knows what they’ll say?”
“Cedar’s a reluctant paranoid,” Hawle asked, earning himself a flick in the face with a cheese dipped bread square. “Ack! Assault on the Captain,” he called out as Colleen laughed and it fell off his face, leaving a pale yellow line on his fur.
“You know that’s not what I meant,” she protested.
“You did rather set the line up though,” Stikka commented, swallowing his food with a bitter grimace. “He’s got nothing much to fear from here.”
“One other thing I don’t get,” Colleen asked.
“Hmm,” Hawle muttered.
“I get why we didn’t use the shuttle port and everything but… Why didn’t we use the teleporter?”

Twenty minutes, Merrim mused. Twenty minutes was all it took to get Portree to confess that his Uncle had convinced him – in a ‘do it or else’ type of way – to install the backdoors into the newspaper systems. He, of course, hadn’t been aware of what his Uncle had been planning and, by the time he was, it was too late to back out and who’d believe him and what proof did he have and why couldn’t he stop talking and he was sure he didn’t want to say any of this and it was all on record now. They’d taken a few minutes afterward as Merrim readied the squad. “First thing we do is deal with the spy across the road,” she remarked. “It’s not someone who’s come across my attention before but, according to the ident scan we are in luck. His car’s parked illegally. It’s been in a 2 hour slot all day. So I’ve called up AJ and he’s going to arrive in a few moments to have it towed. THAT ought to get his attention whilst we slip out and pick up Minchin.” She noted Pangal talking to Winsome at the back of the room as she continued. The Lappinean looked almost annoyed. She’d have to find out what that was about. “Baffles,” she continued, indicating a patrol Officer, “you be ready to assist AJ if things get… rowdy. Rest of us, ready in five?”
They assented and Merrim tried to hear what was being said in the back, between Pangal and Winsome. Her Lappinean lipreading skills were extremely rust but she thought she caught “...if I ever find out you convinced him to talk…” before her attention was taken by an officer walking across her. What, she wondered, was that about?
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Amazee Dayzee »

Enjoyed reading this! Though I think he should have been hit in the face with a bread square drowned in cheese.
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Harry Johnathan »

Amazee Dayzee wrote: Fri Sep 10, 2021 2:45 pm Enjoyed reading this! Though I think he should have been hit in the face with a bread square drowned in cheese.
Are You not entertained?
Are You not entertained?
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Sarah was afraid, so she lied and said, “I did not laugh.” But [The LORD] said, “Yes, you did laugh.” - Genesis 18:15 (NIV).
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Amazee Dayzee »

Just be glad you don't do any one-on-one roleplays with me or else you would be massively scarred. :shock:
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Harry Johnathan »

Amazee Dayzee wrote: Sat Sep 11, 2021 3:03 am Just be glad you don't do any one-on-one roleplays with me or else you would be massively scarred. :shock:
You have an unhealthy interest in slapstick.
Sarah was afraid, so she lied and said, “I did not laugh.” But [The LORD] said, “Yes, you did laugh.” - Genesis 18:15 (NIV).
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Welsh Halfwit »

Rydr Warklub wrote: Sat Sep 11, 2021 10:58 am
Amazee Dayzee wrote: Sat Sep 11, 2021 3:03 am Just be glad you don't do any one-on-one roleplays with me or else you would be massively scarred. :shock:
You have an unhealthy interest in slapstick.
Slapstick can be fun. If properly used.
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Amazee Dayzee »

To me properly using it is making sure that everything is spaced apart. Which might not do much to help the problem that I have. :|
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Welsh Halfwit »

23

THINGS GET WORSE

Hawle and his companions were walking back towards the car when it happened. The power blacked out. Being the middle of the day, they didn’t notice until Colleen pointed out that the lights on the junction had gone out. Stikka looked down the road towards the crossing they’d passed on the way in and commented that they were out too. The first jams started almost immediately as vehicles trapped each other at junctions and the sounds of crashes echoed in the midst of a larger explosion to the west of the city. “Crud,” Hawle swore before getting on his comm. “Hawle to Loper, come in!”
<”Reading you, sir,”> Raven replied, after taking over from Dawton. <”We’re reading a small explosion to the west of you. We think it’s the power plant.”>
“File that under confirmed,” Hawle advised. “Get an emergency repair team down there with some security! And get some security to the hospital! We’ll head there ourselves!” he turned the comms off. “Drat it. Should have anticipated this.”
“What,” Colleen queried.
“They’re attacking the infrastructure,” Stikka replied. “First the Militia, then the Police. Now the power…”
Colleen looked horrified. “Then the Hospital?”
Hawle nodded slowly. “Best soft target in the world. Places me in a dilemma.”
Colleen looked confused. “How so?”
“Their target, in the long run, is President Leith. They want to make him look impotent and unable to stop this. If I call in the Council, he looks just as though he’s admitting he can’t control the situation.”
“It’s still not a dilemma,” Colleen replied, getting into the back of the car. “The USC keeps out of politics. You’re here for the people, Aldair. And they’re under attack!”
Hawle considered it as he ordered the driver to head for the hospital.
“Not the, uh, spaceport,” the Driver asked, trying without words to remind them that they’d promised. “I mean, shouldn’t you get..?”
“Nope,” Hawle remarked, “take us to the hospital before they strike there. Fast as possible, please.” He contacted Raven on the comms again. “Raven, get onto Talvary, tell them we need emergency support here.”
<”Understood, sir,”> Raven replied. <”Just to add to the troubles, one of the mines we left on that asteroid range has been detonated. Postlethwaite sent the Fallir to investigate.”>
Hawle sighed. “It never rains but it pours. Right ho, Hawle out.”
“What are we going to do when we get there,” Colleen asked.
“You,” Hawle advised, are going to help the Doctors and administrators keep everyone calm. Stikka and I will take some maintenance people…” He sighed. “...and go looking for any device.” Hawle fell across Stikka as the driver, now fully apprised as to why they were headed to the hospital at speed, swerved at speed around the cars blocking the road.

Merrim had just started the arrest of Minchin when the blackout hit the building. She hadn’t been in the first team and she was glad about that as they were now stuck between floors in the elevator. She’d called in and, to her surprise, Pangal had answered the call and relayed what she’d been told by Officer Berwick. Merrim had said she’d head over there but Pangal had advised her not to and to concentrate on whatshe was doing now. Merrim was unhappy but she could see the logic. A few deputies and the fire department would be best at first. She’d go up there later. Right now she had three flights of stairs to go up. She huffed her way up to the floor and was about to open the door when an energy blast carried it from the frame and clattered it against the wall. She flinched back before one of Pangal’s people tossed a small canister through the door. Merrim waited until the cloud of grey had flooded out from it before diving across to cover as the better armoured of her associates took the high ground and charged though to take up positions. “This is the Micanna City Sheriff’s department,” Merrim called, “Lay down your weapons and surrender!”
Their reply was to fire on her position, taking a chip out of the wall next to her head. “Heat detection sights,” she reckoned, accounting for their accuracy. “OK,” she called as her side fired back, “be like that!” She kind of hoped everyone who wasn’t a gun toting psychopath had already left the office before all this had started. Perhaps he’d given them the afternoon off?

The car pulled up outside the hospital and Hawle led the way into the main office, flashing his ident at the receptionist and stating they needed to speak to whoever was in charge right now.
“It may take some time sir,” the receptionist replied, “we are dealing with an influx of patients right now, due to the blackout and…”
“And,” Hawle snarled, “if we don’t start dealing with the situation NOW, other hospitals around the colony may have to deal with the ones from here! Now, get someone in authority!”
He huffed whilst the Medical assistant made the call and apologised for his strident words after she replied that the Chief executive was on his way down.
“Great,” Hawle muttered, “a bureaucrat.”
“Ahem,” Colleen remarked.
“Aw, you’re OUR bureaucrat, Colleen.”

Hawle delegated responsibility to Colleen in the talks with the Chief Executive and listened as she smoothly managed to convince him on the situation. “So what should I do,” he asked after seemingly accepting the situation.
“Stikka and I will start searching with your security to see if we can… Hang on.” Hawle put his finger up to indicate the pause before activating his comm and calling Raven. “Raven, teleport a coupe of shokprods and pistols – in holsters – down to our location, would you? Thanks.” He closed the link and put his hand down. “As I was saying, Stikka and I will work with security to see if we can find any rogue devices…”
“Meaning bombs,” the Executive said, slightly shocked. “What’s with the, uh, weapons?”
“Saboteurs rarely come in hands free mode,” Hawle finished. “Can you and Colleen co-ordinate with the other hospitals on the colony? Don’t actively close the hospital yet – they might accelerate their plans – if they’re hitting here,” he added, looking to Colleen as though she’d been about to say it. “But you might want people ‘encouraging’ the ambulance drivers to take their next patients to other hospitals?”
The Executive nodded. “I’ll get Sheriff Barley to help. He’s already here.”
“Right,” Hawle said, standing up as the two guards Raven had sent materialized in the room with Hawles bandolier and the requested weapons. “She knows my style,” he stated, putting the bandolier on. “But I have to change the entry code to my cabin! Come on, Stikka,” he added, “let’s get security and go bomb hunting!”
“Can you not say that so loud,” the Executive asked desperately.
“Or so enthusiastically,” Stikka added.
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Amazee Dayzee »

Really love the way this is turning out! Good job!
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Re: A LOPER TALE

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24

A&E

Doctor Barleycorn huffed at her patient as she started closing up the worst of the wounds. They’d had the details from the records to assist her and her nurses but it was still touch and go after repairing his lung, dealing with his blood loss and restarting his heart twice in the last two hours. The last invasion she’d made had been to recover a piece of gravel that had hidden itself behind his kidney the first time they’d gone in. Leaving it in there wasn’t an option for various reasons, the worst of which was it rubbing against the self same kidney. Barleycorn sighed and looked down at Detective Brunton. “Do me a favour, Detective,” she sighed, “stop trying to die on me, yeah?”

Merrim moved forward as the combination team fought from office to office. “How many of these ******** are there,” she called.
“I’d say about eight,” one of the Lopers’ troopers replied as one of the others fell aside, a hole cut into their shoulder by the impact. The trooper who’d spoken dropped into a firing crouch and fired a short burst before moving on. “Four down, by the way.”
Merrim, a little irritated, headed for Minchin’s office.

“Do you think the power’s going back on anytime soon,” Portree asked Pangal. He had a smirk on his face that indicated he knew exactly what was going on and was playing for time. He leaned forward. “The old estate is coming down,” he told her proudly.
“The old estate still has a number of punches in it, Portree,” Jaqui replied, waving a hand. “It’s taken money and power to organise all this. You’re a very small cog in the wheel.” Now she leaned forward. “But you ARE the cog that’s going to get crushed under the wheel. You’re the one we’ve got and, quite frankly, you’re our link to a major interplanetary conspiracy. We’re not letting you go.” She smirked. “If we need to, we’ll even have you teleported to the Loper and taken to federal prison.”
“You can’t do that,” he fussed.
“Wanna bet,” Jaqui asked. “Federal crime, federal prison. Now, in view of you going to prison on Celica for twenty years, what can you tell me to mitigate?”
Portree fiddled with his hands. Things were getting a little out of hand here. He hadn’t planned on this leading back to him and him being imprisoned. When they talked of interplanetary conspiracy, did they mean his Uncle’s new friends, he wondered? Perhaps he’d better tell the Rabbit about them? She might go easy on him if he did.

In the observation room, Harvey Winsome couldn’t help but agree. He couldn’t normally pick up thoughts like that from this distance but Portree was practically shouting those thoughts right now. Even a bog standard, low level, telepath like him could pick up these thoughts. The whole place seemed to be on edge right now, he reckoned, the few remaining people rushing about the ‘bullpen’ – or whatever they called it – as they tried to deal with all the chaos. He could sympathise but at least Groal and his team had got the power back on relatively quickly. He’d just kept the power low in the interrogation room for effect. Now he indicated to the deputy at the door that he should put the lights back on. He then stepped around to the door and knocked.
“Enter,” Pangal remarked.
He opened the door. “Message from the power station, Chief,” he reported, “Groal says the power will be back on shortly…” He glanced upwards as the light came back on. “Right now, it seems.”
Pangal nodded. “Thank him for me.” She turned back to Portree, who looked even more uncertain than before. “Now, as you can see, the attack is failing. The ‘old estate’ is being helped to stand.”

Stikka and a Hospital porter had started checking the medical supplies room in case something had been slipped in with the deliveries this morning. The Racon had noted the lack of efficient protection on the doors to the main stockpiles of chemicals and medications. A less responsible Racon would make use of the recon chance he was being given here to come back later and pilfer but Stikka was far more honourable than that. He was just memorizing the tapped in codes in case, was all. He put his hands into the laundry and rummaged around in an extremely unscientific display of searching. “He looked around. “I don’t think we’ve got anything devastating in this room either,” he told his compatriot.
“We should have called in as many hands as possible,” the guard replied. “It’d make the search go faster.”
Stikka shrugged. “They’re all busy,” he argued. “Until we find an active device we’re hunting a supposition. They’ve got actuality out there.” He sighed. “So we get no help. Next room it is.”

Working over the landline comms, Colleen and the Executive had managed to alert the hospitals in the two nearest towns to the situation as one of the janitors gave the information to the incoming ambulance drivers. They had to start taking the patients to Niddrana and Covax hospitals dependent on which was nearest and they were to tell other drivers they met face to face, not over the comms. Even from the office, Colleen could see the drivers weren’t taking it very well. “Yes,” she told the person on the comm, “I know it’s not optimum and I know you’ll have to call in medics on overtime. I would suggest you do so. It should only be for a short time. Hopefully. Yes. Thank you. It is appreciated.” She hung up. “Nedworth Hospital can take ten,” she told the executive.
“Good,” he replied, offering her a plasticated tumbler of water. “Water? It’s only from the dispenser but it’s quite drinkable. Didn’t have time to get to the kitchen for tea or coffee.”
“Thanks,” Colleen said, taking the ‘glass’. She lifted it but paused. “This is from a water dispenser,” she asked, without sipping. The Executive nodded. “When was it changed?”
The executive waved a hand. “About…” he froze. “About three hours ago,” he finished. “Same as all the others.”
Colleen put the water down. “I’d suggest no-one uses dispenser water today, hmm?”

Hawle worked his way down through the rear loading dock, where the hospital took in deliveries. He examined a palette truck and hand trucks. “Get any deliveries the last couple of days,” he asked.
“It’s a hospital,” the person with him replied.
Hawle chuckled and rolled his eyes. “I mean anything BIG come in? Out of the normal?”
The other shrugged. “Just the norm,” he said. “Except that scanner over there,” he added, pointing to a large box that stood in the corner of the room. “Radiology’s been waiting on that for months.”
“Why’s it in a sealed box?”
“It’s moderately radioactive. They use it in small doses in a sealed environment. You’d need lengthy exposure to get harmed, so they tell me. I’m not going near it.”
Hawle, however, decided he was going to. He stepped across to the corner, took a look and walked back. “Can you pass me that handtruck,” he asked, gesturing to the thing.
“Why,” the other asked as he handed it across.
“Well, it might be an idea to get the massive barrel bomb away from the radioactive object before it explodes...”
Last edited by Welsh Halfwit on Tue Sep 14, 2021 1:30 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Amazee Dayzee »

Hope Hawle doesn't get massively irradiated while doing this. The rabbit/canine hybrid kids he and Elena are gonna have will be very weird enough. :P
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Welsh Halfwit »

Amazee Dayzee wrote: Mon Sep 13, 2021 4:03 pm Hope Hawle doesn't get massively irradiated while doing this. The rabbit/canine hybrid kids he and Elena are gonna have will be very weird enough. :P
True, true.

25

BOOM

The security guard grimaced as he strained and pulled the edge of the barrel up so that Hawle could move the bottom of the hand truck underneath it. He half expected it to blow right now and he took pains to lower it gently onto the truck. “Careful,” he heard Hawle urge as it stayed put on the truck.
“Is… is there a reason we’re mo...moving this,” he asked, getting his breath back after the effort.
“There’s no time to try and defuse this and, frankly, if I tried, it’d explode.”
“How can you tell there’s no time,” he asked as Hawle took the strain to lift the tuck back, “there isn’t a timer.”
Hawle put his foot on the lower bar as his colleague steadied the top and began pulling the incredibly heavy container away from the scanner. “That’s… how we can tell there’s… no time,” he gasped, straining as he pulled the device across the room. “No… timer means it’s going to go off in… five seconds from now!” He gasped as they neared the main door to the loading dock. “No… time to evacuate so we… gotta move it! Out there,” he added, keeping the strain on as he went. “Oh, I’ll be feeling this in the morning,” he moaned.
“Provided we have a morning,” the guard added.
“Yeah, yeah,” Hawle replied. “Don’t poop the… party! No-one is dying to...day.”
“This,” the guard strained, “is a hospital. People die every… hour!”

The pair strained the truck out into the brightness of the late afternoon winter and Hawle wondered quite how that worked as he pulled the device away from the building. If there was a sniper, he thought, he was going to be so much Rabbit meat in a second or two… No shot? His ears twisted around and changed angles a few times to test. No shot. “This’ll do,” he advised, stopping about a hundred yards out and starting to push the handles up to stand.
The guard helped bring it to rest and stand still. “Alright, now wha..?” He noticed Hawle wasn’t there. He looked around to see the Lappinean halfway back to the loading dock doors.
“LEAVE THE ******* HAND TRUCK,” Hawle yelled back as he hurtled for the main door. The Mican took the hint and joined him in a flash. “How..,” Hawle gasped, indicating the roller door,” do we get that down?”
The guard sprinted to a key in a lock on the one wall and turned it to start the roller.
“Hawle to… Stikka, and… Una,” the Commander gasped into his comm as the room darkened thanks to the lowering door. “Found… a device. Moved it to the loading zone… parking lot. Get everyone… huh… away from the windows on… that side.”
<”Acknowledged, sir,”> Stikka said, <”But I don’t think Ambassador Una has her comm on .”>
Hawle rolled his eyes. He couldn’t recall seeing it either and she hadn’t replied so…
“247 to 127,” the guard said into his own radio. “Advise all personnel moved away from the west facing windows. Problem with the glare. Over.” Hawle didn’t hear the reply. “Yes, the glare. The sun may be too bright at some point in the near future.” Hawle knew the guard was trying to avoid talking directly about the bomb, in case the enemy was listening in. He could also tell it wasn’t working. “Oh, for… The bomb is in the loading bay access area!”
Hawle smirked slightly. He liked this Mican. Were his arms the same length as they’d always been? He flapped them, just to make sure.

Two of her team dead. Merrim was going to have nightmares about this day for years. That was something she was sure of. But she’d got him. Minchin had tried to fight. He’d even managed to pull a weapon on her but she’d been rather too fast, taking out both his knees with stun shots to drop him to the floor. Being stunned there wouldn’t kill him, obviously. But he might take months to recover from the damage to his joints. She hoped it took longer than usual and had cuffed him and was forcing him to try and walk down the stairs after the firefight subsided. She’d had to get him some help after the first flight as it was either carry him or drag him down and break his legs. She might not be able to explain that. She’d cautioned him whilst guards and deputies were present as she didnt want word to get back to Barley or Pangal that she’d ‘forgotten’ his rights. “You’re going to tell us ALL about it,” she warned. “Trying to kill deputies and federal guards? You’re looking at forty in a Feline jail.” She pushed him in the back of her car and slammed the door to walk around the car to the front. She opened the door and wondered about the spatter pattern on the inside of the car win… “Sniper,” she yelled, throwing herself back, away from the car and the dead Mican inside. She tried to work out where the shot had come from and worked out that it had to be around the second floor of the building directly behind her car. Now she had to work out how to get there quickly.

“So what is your name,” Hawle asked the guard as the moments ticked by. They’d been helping shift patients in beds away from the walls and windows nearest the bomb and they were doing that now
“Fowle Prenton,” the Mican replied. “I’d say ‘Officer’ but, after I talked to my superior like that,” he continued, making reference to what he’d called the boss after telling him about the bomb, “I’m probably going to get the sack!”
“Ah, no bother about that,” Hawle said, pushing an elderly Micans bed – with the elderly Mican still in it – to where a Doctor was gesturing. He parked the bed up as Prenton moved the drip stand beside him. “If they fire you, you’ve got an in with the Council.”
Prenton rolled his eyes. “After an afternoon with you? Can’t I go to a Feline world?”
Colleen and Stikka, for their part, were now doing something else. After the phone work, Colleen had decided she knew where she’d wanted to be and, as soon as Aldair had moved the device, had enrolled Stikka on the way. He’d just finished checking for devices and had found nothing so they were entertaining the children on the Children’s ward. They’d gotten the gist that there was something bad happening and Stikka had noticed their becoming fearful. One thing he knew about scared children was they simply got in the way so they needed non essential people to keep them calm so he’d come up with an idea. After introducing themselves, Colleen had declared him the ‘amazing’ memory Racon and challenged the kids to test him by letting him flick through books in print or on pads and challenging him to remember words on pages and lines of text. They’d been reluctant at first but had begun to get into the play of it when they realised Stikka was quite happy to repeat ‘naughty’ words that had Colleen putting on a ‘shocked’ face and putting a hand to the end of her muzzle.
“Page 17, word five of ‘Miss Mica goes to town,” one girl called.
“Uh,” Stikka replied, whizzing through his memory. He nodded to her. “I’m coming up blank,” he said, eliciting a fist pump from her. “As in there’s only sixteen pages in the book,” he added, grinning broadly as the pump stopped halfway down. “Good try,” he added as Colleen produced a pack of cards one of the nurses had given her. “And, for his next trick, Mr Stikka will memorize this deck of cards and call out each one AFTER I’ve shuffled it…”
Stikka cocked his head to the cries of ‘impossible’ and wondered if the were right. He’d done this once or twice before but with…
...the room shook as the bomb outside exploded. Glass shattered elsewhere in the hospital and alarms started blaring in the distance as dust fell from the ceiling. “Don’t be concerned,” Stikka told the children, “you’re quite safe. Now, who reckons I can do this..?” About three hands went up as he kept the attention of most of the youngsters.. Despite himself, he felt happy. He’d give it a go. “First card...”
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Amazee Dayzee »

"Don't poop on the party?" Seriously Hawle? You need to work on your lingo. I would have thought that you were better than that. Something him and Elena will have to work on. :o
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Welsh Halfwit »

26

QUIET WORDS

Hawle sought him out, taking advice on where he might be from the Executive as he blocked off the last of the water coolers for the moment, until someone could run tests on them. The alarms still sounded outside and people were still in a sense of panic, trying to calm down the patients in the wards and save the patients in the ICU’s. They’d called in as many of the off-duty personnel as were available and they were heading off the attacks with the assistance of Militia troops and Jaqui’s guards backing them up in strategic locations. Hawle had been happy to let the Militia lead in the recovery and securing phase of the operation as he didn’t have enough guards to do it properly and the Mican he was looking for didn’t have the physical power either. What he DID have, however, was the symbolic power and that’s what Hawle was needing him to use now. He knocked on the closed door. He heard a not entirely happy reply from inside but opened the door anyway.

The door opened on a pair of Micans. One male, one female. One sat in a chair, one ling in a bed. One awake, the other still under. One looking placid, the other annoyed with a bandage around his head.. “I said later.”
“I don’t give a darn,” Hawle said, letting the door close behind him. “Your people need you.” He waved a hand. “Oh, I get why you’re here, Sheriff, I really do. But your wife is safe here. She’s being made comfortable and resting after surgery. Same for your detective aboard my ship. Your populace needs you now.”
“What can I offer?”
Hawle stood by a window overlooking the street. “Come over here,” he told the Mican, “and look at this.” As the Sheriff joined him, he indicated the armed guards in the street. “Those are Militia troops,” he said, “on your streets. The Army has the city under lockdown. They’ve been assisting my security guards and relieving them. I don’t have the power to countermand them and, frankly, if the removal of the president is the overall aim of this attack, this will do just as well as the attacks themselves, won’t it? People really respect a President who lets the Military run riot on the streets and has to rely on them to enact Law and Order. It’ll mean they win.”
“Merrim can take over in the meantime,” Barley said, looking back at his wife.
“Merrim, according to Jaqui, is currently searching for a sniper in the north quadrant. They had the businessmican but he was shot out of their possession. The nephew, however, is still in the cells. The public need to know you’re still in control, even if just barely. Believe me, the mere appearance of you, in public, will do more to reassure those out there than anything I can do.”
Harley could tell he was right but he still… He sighed. “You’re.. you’re right.” He closed his ees. “I’ll be there in ten.”
“You’ll need to take a deputy’s car,” Hawle advised. “Yours got a bit exploded.”

Hawle left him to it and went looking for Stikka and Colleen. They, it turned out, were still in the children’s ward and Hawle sat and watched his usually unsure and unconfident second officer playing pattycake with a young Mican for a minute as Una read to some others and a few looked out of the broken windows down at the blast crater as an elderly nurse made sure they didn’t hurt themselves on the glass or fall out. Eventually, he moved in, doing his best to cover his sidearm. “Everything all right here, Stikka,” he asked the Racon.
Distracted, the Racon accidentally got slapped by the Mican child with a tube up her nose and she giggled as he overacted, reeling to the floor and getting up. “All under control, sir,” he flustered. “It was, uh, Colleen’s idea to keep them occupied.”
“Ri-ight,” Hawle said languidly, nodding his head as the girl sold Stikka out by shaking her head and pointing at the Racon.

The Fallir slowed close to the asteroid patch and engaged forward thrusters as Grovan’s communications officer sent the disarm code to the remaining mines. Particles and debris were blotting out most of the sensors for the moment, the price of detonating a large space rock. They had the rough location of where the mine had been so Grovan ordered the shields raised and he took the ship in carefully, wending his way through. Visually, he kept getting glimpses of something metal through the rocks but it wasn’t quite… Than it WAS quite. Grovan sucked in a breath. “Golten,” he advised the young Celican on comms, “start transmitting Jamming code ‘Theta Epsilon.” The weapons officer, the only member of the bridge crew who’d served on the Fallirs’ first flight, gasped. Like Grovan, he’d recognised the sleek, near featureless shape of the drone that had given the three ships leaving Varkonian space such a hard time a year ago. His hand wavered over the firing controls. “Golten,” he added, “I need to speak to Sector Command as priority. Send it through to my ready room.” The Collian stood up. “Martin,” he continued, “take the chair. Call me if that thing twitches.”
“Sir,” Martin replied, changing locations with Grovan as he headed to his tiny office. He’d barely sat down behind the fold out table and brought up the console when the link to Talvary station cleared, Golten having threaded a line through the jamming signal. Grovan peered slightly through the visible interference until he got used to the slight snow effect. “Sir,” he said, “We’re at the location marked by the Loper and…” He paused. “It’s the battle probe from last year, sir,” he confided. “Or one identical to it.”
On screen, Henry put his hand to his chin. <”lovely day,”> he said bitterly. <”We can’t have them here, in Council space. From what I’ve been told they’re extremely acquisitive and hostile.>”
Grovan nodded. “Yes, sir. And we can’t know how long the jamming signals will be effective. They’re going to find a way around it sooner or later.”
<”Probably sooner, knowing our luck.”> The elderly Mican on the screen sighed, the sound coming through as rustling paper. <”A Council science vessel is coming through from the central colonies in the next day. I think I’ll request a warship accompany her. I’d want you to stand on guard until they get there, of course but...”>
“But, sir,” Grovan prompted.
<”You may not want to.”>
“Sir, I can’t disobey your…”
<”I know,”> Postlethwaite interrupted. <”That’s why I’m not making it one. You may decide you should be elsewhere. Like Micanna. I’ve been getting reports all afternoon from Commander Raven regarding the ‘diplomatic incident’ rising between them and Rayvon.”>
“Raven making reports,” Groal snorted. “Things must be bad.”
The image of Henry Postlethwaite nodded. <”It seems things have altered significantly under perceived influence from outsiders. It’s becoming a major event. Hawle can handle it but he may need back up. Of course, in case it’s just internal politics, I can’t order you to go.”>
“Uh, of course not, sir.” Grovan thought for a second. “We’ll stay here, sir,”
<”Good. Out.”> Henry cut the line.

Grovan stepped back out onto his bridge. “Helm, take us out of here. Golten, when we’re clear, reactivate the mines and leave a buoy to broadcast the jamming signal.”
Martin heard the ‘ayes’ before he vacated the seat. “Where are we going, sir,” he asked.
“We are definitely not ordered to go to Micanna, Paul, and we’re not to help my old ship save a planet.”
Last edited by Welsh Halfwit on Wed Sep 15, 2021 12:39 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Harry Johnathan »

Welsh Halfwit wrote: Wed Sep 15, 2021 8:39 am "People really respect a President who lets the Military run riot on the streets and has to rely on them to enact Law and Order. It’ll mean they win.”
Do I detect a hint of sarcasm?... ;)
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Welsh Halfwit »

Harry Johnathan wrote: Wed Sep 15, 2021 11:39 am
Welsh Halfwit wrote: Wed Sep 15, 2021 8:39 am "People really respect a President who lets the Military run riot on the streets and has to rely on them to enact Law and Order. It’ll mean they win.”
Do I detect a hint of sarcasm?... ;)
Who, moi? Innocent.. :twisted:

I'd meant one of those words to be in italics for emphasis...
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Amazee Dayzee »

This was a really thoughtful chapter! I like it a lot!
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Welsh Halfwit »

27

EXHAUSTED

Hawle yawned and gave a passing thought to getting a pair of automatic, wheeled, boots as he headed down to the science department on the Loper. After an extraordinarily long day, he’d been back up on the ship for all of ten minutes and had barely had the time to grab a coffee from the replication systems because Zowaix wanted a word. As was usual, the Brockian had phrased it brusquely but with a bare minimum of respect that the Commander figured had been due to a visual appeal by his assistant, Goole. He stepped into the sciences department and put the replicated mug into the atom scrambler. The device scanned the item to make sure it wasn’t organic and completed its business to leave a clean pad where the container had resided. “Put one of my own mugs in one of those once,” he told Colleen before he recalled she was still down on the planet. “Caused trouble at the next… oh, right.”
“Talking to yourself is the first sign of insanity, Captain,” the academic advised, stepping into the room.
“I’m a Lappinean, Doctor,” Hawle replied, summoning a little enthusiasm, “I’m hardly ever alone.”
“Sounds like you need to hit the hay more than anything.”
Hawle tapped his foot. “Why am I here, Professor?”
“Oh, that. Yes. I took a look at the samples from the water Colleen had sent up. It was chemically altered.”
Hawle leaned in to examine the slides under the microscope. “How so?”
The Brockian put his hands on his hips. “Do you really understand those slides or are you just being nosey? No. The chemical composition is interesting. It’s a mild sedative that shouldn’t have been.”
Hawle peered at the scientist and twirled a finger towards his temple. “I’m a bit slow of thinking today, Professor,” he admitted, “but I don’t know what you mean.”
Zowaix tutted. “The only way this mild sedative can be made is by deliberately adding Aquitarum to Ricannan toxin. Makes it interesting, doesn’t it? Someone in the organisation might have a conscience.” He looked at Hawle, who seemed half asleep. “Oh, for…” He hit his wall comm. “Zowaix to Barleycorn,” he said.
<”Barleycorn here.”>
“Oder the Commander to take a few hours would you? He’s out on his feet and I don’t want to die simply because he’s asleep on watch,”
<”Hawle to the medical bay,”> Barleycorn said, not cutting the line. <”Now. Escorted by a grumpy scientist if need be.”>
“Nuuurgh,” Hawle replied drowsily.
“He’ll be there if I have to CARRY him,” Zowaix warned.

Hawle came around on the medical bed next to a Mican he didn’t know. He bleared and blinked and thought he should recognise the leathereen jacket and cotton trousers that had been fashionably holed by… Oh, right. This had to be the Detective. He…
“Ah, sleeping beauty rises,” Barleycorn chided. “Two hours you were. Seems you’ve had quite a day.” She indicated the other. “Not like Detective Brunton here. He’s been asleep most of the day. Induced and all that. “
“Can’t believe I fell asleep,” Hawle remarked, almost sorrowfully.
“Oh, it’s quite normal. You’ve been active under a lot of stress most of the day. Ironic for someone in fishing kit,” she snarked, referring to the off-duty outfit he was wearing. “Presidential meetings, all that running around searching for a bomb, then running around WITH a bomb. Then more running around to get people clear.” She tutted. “I’ve seen one person who could cope with that. HE was a Equinnan/Mican cross. You’re not. Medical order means you’re off duty for the next two ho…” She looked at Hawle looking down at himself. “EVEN MORE off-duty for the next two hours. Go. Get food. Get a shower. Call Elena. Let your head explode with frustration. Something. Then send Raven down so you can take the bridge for a while…” She caught his enquiring look. “That last is a recommendation, by the way,” she added quickly, “not a medical order.”
“I’ll take it under advisement.”

Ok, he thought, as he sat in his chair on the bridge two hours later, it wasn’t such a bad idea. He’d called Elena and talked to her for ten minutes, letting her know what was going on here and wondering what the listening Micannan fleet thought about ‘Run for your Wife’ and making lunch dates for whenever he got back and news of colonists having babies and passing away and getting together and so on and perhaps it had been more than ten minutes. Possibly half an hour. He’d sent a scrambled transmission to Talvary as regards his day and he’d taken the time to replicate a salad sandwich with vegan butter. It was a day that had been enough that he was actually contemplating asking Night or Bazil for the drug that allowed a pure bred Lappinean like himself to eat meat without shutting down his esophagus, despite the unpleasant effect it might have later. It was that sort of bad day that couldn’t be made much worse. But then he remembered he was going to be on bridge duty and you can’t do that from the restroom. So salad it was. “How’s Polva,” he asked Chapston.
“He’s quite fine, sir,” the Human said, circling around to face the Commander for once. “He’s been doing the general maintenance work on the replication systems these last few days.”
Hawle nodded. “I know Groal values him,” he admitted. “Seen it in the reports. The better the maintenance is…”
“...the less engineers need to repair it, yes, sir.” Sarah grinned. “The Lieutenant Commander has said it a few times.”
“I think he says it to all the maintenance staff,” Hawle admitted. “But he means it. That’s the interesting thing. Um, had any thoughts of… furthering the relationship?”
“You mean marriage, sir?”
Hawle spread his arms.
Sarah grinned. “Or the other thing. We’ve spoken of them, sir. I’m… You know I was married once? On Earth?”
“Only what you’ve told me, Chappers. I know you’ve said it didn’t work out to the stage you felt you had to leave the planet. And that’s all I needed to know.”
Chapston nodded. “Aye, sir. It were bad. I worry it’d get the same with Dalmar.”
“You’ve been sharing the room with him for six months, Sarah,” the Commander commented, ignoring the few others on the bridge. They were all studiously pretending to ignore the conversation anyway. “No-one’s reported any arguments. From my point of view? You’re a fine couple. Raven hasn’t had to break him once!” He grinned widely. “The first month or so, I think she was almost disappointed!”
Sarah chuckled. “I’ll make sure we keep disappointing her, sir. Can I ask how Councillor Davees is?”
“You may. Elena’s in fine fettle, thank you. And we’re… Needing to look forward, I’m afraid…”
He looked up at the screen where a Council clipper ship had just arrived. “Dawton, tell the Militia not to shoot and hail the Fallir!”
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Amazee Dayzee »

I need to figure out what a fettle is but i'm sure she would appreciate the compliment! Yeah I don't think Elena will become Mrs. Aldaire Hawle just yet though. :lol:
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Re: A LOPER TALE

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28

CAMEOS AND LINKS

Groal had watched over the repairs he’d done to the city’s power station like it was his own cub - or Sallas – until he was convinced the local operators could take it over and he could relax. He’d had to wait until the fire service Micans had doused the fire before he could begin locking off systems and installing emergency ‘patch’ generators to take the load. It had been difficult work, teaming his five with the emergency response team and, occasionally, telling Katara not to try and strangle the Fire Micans examining the site for the cause of the blaze whilst they were working. Generally they managed to stay out of the Fire teams’ way as much as possible with Jan the Human up in the control centre with one of the local officials, organising the rerouting of power in the absence of Groal’s deputy. He’d been ordered to stay aboard the Loper as Groal wasn’t having both of them off the ship at the same time. “Not a bad job,” he said, more to himself than anyone.
“Seen worse,” Katara said, dusting herself off as she stepped outside. “For a Chief you’re actually better than competent.”
Groal smirked. “I hope you appreciate exactly how much your approval means to me, Hanna.”
“Stuff all?”
“Exactly. I just do the best I can in my job.”
She sighed and plonked her toolbox on the floor. “I get that, Chief. I also plan to hold you to it.”
Groal held a finger up. “Good, Hanna. A champion is only of value if the challengers push them. I’ll make mistakes, sure. So will you. I’m where the buck stops though. When I make a decision, it’s final – unless the Captain over rules. If you think I made a mistake? Tell me afterwards and in private. Fair?”
Katara shrugged. “Sure. And I’ll try not to punch you out.”
Now it was Groal’s time to shrug. “You’ll try.”
She chuckled. “I’d probably succeed, sir. Not that your physique’s not impressive – coz it is but I rarely fight fair. Rules of the hunt don’t apply out here.”
“We’re agreed on that,” Groal admitted, offering a hand.
She looked at the large, clawed, mandible and sniffed the faint grease smell before accepting the warm hand in hers and shaking it. “You are a very odd Celican,” she grumbled.

Hawle trotted down to the shuttle bay, leaving Match in charge up of the bridge, and waited outside the room as the shuttle from the Fallir docked. They’d managed to convince the Micannan admiral that this wasn’t anything to be concerned about, just one ship checking in on another, but Hawle had to admit he was curious about what the familiar smaller ship was doing here. The light next to the door went blue, indicating the shuttle was in and the atmosphere barriers were back up and popped to green when it was safe. Hawle opened the door and stepped inside as the pilot guided the small craft to a stop on the deck. The side door opened and the perfectly uniformed Collian out ono the deck. “Permission to come aboard, Commander Hawle,” he asked correctly.
“On this ship,” Hawle replied with a smile, “YOU never need to ask that, Harper Grovan. But, if you want formality, permission granted.” He stepped forward and offered his old 2nd officer a handshake that the Collian accepted enthusiastically. “What brings you out here, Harper?”
“Oh, you do, sir,” Grovan replied lightly. “I have absolutely not been ordered to see what sort of a mess you’ve gotten in.”
Hawle groaned. “I’ll tell you about it in the conference room,” he said, stepping back. “Shall I show you the way?”
“I think I remember, sir,” Grovan deadpanned, heading out of the room.

Ten minutes later, Grovan wished Hawle hadn’t given Kirkwall permission to go down to the colony with a portable oven to make lunches for the Hospital children. He needed a drink and a lunch roll. It was quite a lot to take in. He’d not been involved with the Calavix incident a few months back but he’d been briefed. His team of security guards had tightened the screening on new staff and online gambling but this… A trap to take out at least one fleet. The deaths of dozens in the main, colonial, city due to bombs, power losses and shootings… All it needed was a political assassination to be an espionage thriller. “That’s… quite a day,” he admitted.
Hawle, who had been spending the last ten minutes walking around the table and gesticulating as he spoke, finally decided to sit down. “And we can’t prove any of it is Calavix,” he admitted. “All we can say for certain is that someone decided to have a bomb and assassination party across the city on the day we happened to arrive.”
“Assassination,” Grovan repeated, his ears twitching to show his interest in the word.
“Oh, yeah. There’s been one of them. We found a Mican businesstype who seemed to be fronting the operation here. The locals, backed by some of Jaqui’s, apprehended him. The team leader, a capable Deputy by all accounts, put him in the back of her car, walked around to get in the driving seat and found someone had splashed his brains all over his windscreen from roughly two hundred yards. So,” he finished, “at the moment half my engineering section’s making sure the power station works and most of my security force is backing u the Militia and the Police in investigating the crimes, preventing any more of them and making sure half the people don’t go looting! Even flaming Harvey’s down there!”
Groals’ eyes opened wide. “Winsome has gone outside,” he asked. “On the streets?”
“Investigations being what they are, our best cyber operative needed to be down there.”

Unaware people were talking about him, Harvey sipped a coffee with added bran and coughed. They’d not warned him about the additive and, frankly, they’d been lucky he wasn’t allergic. He wondered if he should complain but decided not to. It would seem a bit petty, even to him, as he worked his way through the comm records of Portree and Minchin. But he’d stopped now. He’d found several scrubbed records on Minchin’s accounts and he’d worked to reconstruct as much of the detail as he could. Now he was just waiting for Pangal to pop in so he could deliver on what he’d found. Unfortunately it wasn’t like the vids, where the scientist or specialist made the discovery and the investigator walked through the door, asking him or her what they had. It wasn’t as though he could comm her either, as he’d left his comm on the ship. He decided that he should take the nettle or whatever and go ask someone. He was just about to turn the handle when Sarina Raven opened the door and looked down on him. “What do you have, Winsome,” she asked.
“Yes,” he said, fist pumping.
“Apart from insanity?”
“Just always wanted someone to say that, Commander,” he explained, pulling up his computer. “Well,” he continued, pulling up files that flooded the screen. “After several hours of non stop file munching and poring over…”
“Pretend I don’t know what you’re wittering about and straight line it, Harvey.”
“OK.” He pointed to several duplicated sets of numbers on the screen. “That’s a location identifier for someone calling him several times over the last few months. He tried to scrub the details but I got most of it back. That number,” he finished, “is on Rayvon.”
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Amazee Dayzee »

Nice work once again! I am running out of things to say about how good the story is!
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Welsh Halfwit »

29

PREPARING TO LEAVE

“This day,” Hawle grumped into a mug of coffee in his ready room, “is never going to end.” He looked up, heavy lidded as the sleep break was losing effect, and contemplated what Stikka had just relayed to him from Raven. “The conspirator on Micanna has a conspirator friend on Rayvon? Someone who was encouraging him to make the Rayvonians actually look guilty? Am I just befuddled or is this sounding a bit whacko?”
“Yes, you are and yes it is,” Stikka replied. He’d had several showers to wash off the milky smell of hospital kids but found he could still hear their calls in the silence between words. It wasn’t that he didn’t like them, per se, it was simply the fact that, like everyone he met, he had to try really hard to forget them. Glimpses into their lives were stored on audio files and visual records so, they were always there somewhere, even when he downloaded the files at the end of the day. So he could hear the faint echo of the laughter of the girl with the tubes up her nose as he’d finished the card trick right now and spoke again. “What exactly are we going to do, sir?”
Hawle groaned. “Right. First I need a pep pill to clear the cobwebs. Second, we’ll need to tell Admiral Whitcombe…”

The tall Mican looked down at the suited Lappinean from the main screen, giving the impression of her being at least fifteen foot tall as he told her that “...Lieutenant Grovan’s going to be leading the Council contingent here from the Fallir as we need to follow up some leads discovered in the investigations of these crimes. The initial problem’s been handled and he’ll ready to back up the Militia forces where needed.”
<”Does he accept that I’M in charge?”> Whitcombe growled.
“He’s been told to consult with you as well as you with him. He has fewer crew than I do but they’re no less trained. Where he needs to lead, he will. As confirmed with the President yesterday. Controlling the panic below is mainly a job for Micannan forces, civilian, political and Militia. They’re he’ll respond as asked, according to priorities.”
<”What ‘priorities’?”>
“Not a clue. He’ll set them out himself. I’ll be recalling my people immediately for the off. Hawle out.”
He immediately closed the link and Grovan stepped from the side of the bridge, where Hawle had asked him to wait. “What ARE my priories,” he asked knowingly.
Hawle tapped his foot. “Two fold,” he admitted. “Helping out where needed is certainly ONE priority. The other..? The Sheriff’s department weren’t able to find the sniper when they searched,” he admitted, “but the scans picked up faint traces of a teleport signal.” Hawle sat in his seat. “It could have been short range or…”
Hawle waited for Grovan to finish the line as so many others tended to do for him once they caught up with his thinking. When it didn’t happen, Hawle turned a palm towards his old second and stared at him. “Oh,” Grovan said, finally getting the hint,” it, er, might have been a Militia craft?”
“Rather rude,” Hawle mock grumbled, “not interrupting me like that.” He smiled lightly. “The Militia’s starting to take over emergency control until the civil authorities can take over. I don’t know about the Council but I’m not too fond of military coups. With the Fallir around, that’s less likely to happen.”
Grovan smiled grimly. “They do outnumber me,” he pointed out.
“But you have faster legs. And firing on a Council ship will get them in deep. They’ll think twice about doing that. Just don’t go look into any distress calls from freighters.”
Grovan nodded. “With my people on the surface it’d be unwise,” he agreed.
“Good call.” Hawle tutted. “You headed back to your command,” he enquired. “I’ve got the fun of getting everyone else back up here.” He craned his neck so he was looking more towards the ceiling than anywhere. “Dawton, that’s your cue!”
The Human started making the calls as Grovan started to say he was, indeed, about to head back before he noted that Hawle was still looking up. He looked up himself to see what Hawle was looking at.
“I rarely look at my ceiling,” Hawle said absently. “There’s dirt up there. How is there dirt on my ceiling? I’ll have to get someone from maintenance to get up here with a telescopic brush to clean that.” He looked back down and rubbed his neck. “Got to stop doing that,” he complained as he noted Chapston holding her head in her hands. He allowed himself a grin. “I think I know which one to ask, too…”

It wasn’t exactly the sort of call Technician Polva was used to, being told to take his brush up to the bridge but the Russellian was up for it. Anything to take a break from the replication machine rota. So his tail was wagging as he arrived on the command deck and, for the first time, walked into his beloveds actual place of work. “Sir,” he asked Stikka, who’d taken over as Hawle had headed down to his cabin, “What seems to be the issue?”
Stikka pointed upwards. “Believe it or not, Dalmar, the Commander found himself looking at the ceiling a short while back. He wants it cleaned.”
Polva looked up and frowned as he extended his cleaning brush. “Has anyone been thrown against the bulkhead recently,” he asked.
“I think we’d have noticed that, technician,” Stikka deadpanned.
“Then,” Polva asked, raising the brush to the ceiling, “how does this dirt get up here? Yesterday we went at speeds that shook the paint off the walls in some of the passageways.” He poked his tongue out as he strained to his maximum length. His brush started shifting the dark mass on the ceiling. “I’m.. not sure this is dirt,” he said as his vision began to swim from standing at maximum stretch for too long.
Stikka looked up. “What do you mean,” he asked, zooming in on the patch. The technician was right. It was peeling…
Polva juddered as what was hidden under the self created sheath unleashed a stunning charge straight down his brush nad into his arm for a handful of seconds before the power sparked, creating a tiny flash explosion on the ceiling as it and Polva dropped to the ground.
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Amazee Dayzee »

Always great to have more Hawle in this story! Nice work!
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Re: A LOPER TALE

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30

DOWNTIME

A mild shock, Doctor Fuze had said. If the… whatever it was hadn’t short circuited it could easily have been much worse. The Raitchian prodigy reckoned Polva would have some trouble controlling the muscles in that arm for a short while whilst his body got over the effect but there wasn’t much need to keep him in the medical bay, especially as Match had caught him before his head hit the floor. Reactions of a Raitchian, Bazil had said with mock pride. So he walked, his good arm around Sarah’s waist to ‘keep balance’, especially as it would have a similar but lesser effect on the rest of that side. Hawle, called back to duty immediately by the mere attempted murder of one of his crew, had immediately called up the evening shift helm officer to replace Sarah so she could go with Polva and she mentally thanked him for that as the Russellian’s lips brushed her skin and she felt the soft, warm, touch of his tongue dab her neck. “Not able t’ control it, Dalmar,” Sarah questioned wryly as they neared their quarters.
“I was thinking about doing it when I wake up,” he replied with mock drowsiness. “Guess my brain thought I’d dozed off for a few seconds.”
“Ooh, don’t,” Sarah urged, using her free hand to open the door onto their small domain. “At least until I get you sat down.”

They entered into a small living room area with a light blue carpet on the floor around a fixed three piece suite and she put Polva down on the sofa before heading to the replication machines. “What would you like,” she asked.
He thought on several responses to that but eventually decided on a Canid Milkshake. “Needs to be cold,” he admitted. “This arm jerks with a hot drink…”
Sarah grimaced. “Back to medbay with second degree burns. Yeah.” She sighed. “You’re lucky the thing blew up,” she continued, taking the drinks from the machine. She’d also ordered herself one of the Milkshakes. It wasn’t exactly designed or formulated for Humans but she’d checked with Barleycorn and the occasional one would be all right.
“I don’t really want to think on it,” Polva replied, taking his drink with exceptional care with his wrong hand. “Like lightning…”
Sarah sat next to him. “I was frightened for you, I can say that much.”
She took a quaff of the marrow enhanced milk as he looked at her from the corner of his eye. She’d gagged the first few times and he was proud of how she’d managed to stop that and even look pleased with… His arm jerked and he was reassured by how he’d chosen to hold the glass with the other hand. “Does this mean I end up with another day off,” he asked, trying not to focus on how his hand had smacked down on the armrest.
“We’ll have to ask Karlavan later,” Sarah replied. “After your recent sickness, this might put you close to your annual sick days. But he’ll probably agree.”
Polva drank his drink and awkwardly transferred it to his damaged hand to put the drink down on the table. The muscles jerked again and the glass fell to the carpet. “Blast!”
Sarah put her own glass down and knelt to pick up the glass. “Let me,” she said softly, leaning over him to put the glass down. A quick thought occurred to him and he used his good arm to pull her down so she was atop him, nearly face to muzzle tip. “Your breath smells of milkshake,” he told her before kissing her, gently holding her in place by her back. A few seconds later, she took a hold of him and kissed back as his tail thumped the sofa.

“Is everyone back,” Hawle asked Stikka as the two spoke in his room.
“Yes, sir,” The Racon replied as he stood, hands behind his back, near the closed door. “Commander Raven’s looking after things on the bridge and… May I ask a question, sir?”
Hawle huffed. “One moment.” He activated his comm. “Hawle to Raven.”
<”Raven here, Captain,”> the mighty Burman replied.
“Get us underway to Rayvon would you please?”
<”Absolutely, sir.”>
Hawle broke the line and looked over to Stikka. “Now, what… Oh, for goodness sake, Stikka, relax would you? You look like a statue I wouldn’t care to own right now. You’re on down tie, I’m on down time. Relax and sit if you like but just ask.”
“Um, OK,” Stikka said, sitting precariously on the edge of the chair and wrapping his tail over his lap. “Is it right to leave Lieutenant Grovan back on Micanna and not bring him with us?”
“As I told him,” Hawle replied, “I want him there to keep an eye on the Militia and he’s someone I trust to do so with care and intelligence.” He shrugged. “I trained him.” He noted a slight smile on the Racon’s face for a few seconds at that. “Tell me about the bug,” he ordered.
Stikka took a few seconds to go over what Winsome had told him when he’d gotten back on board. Then he took another few seconds to translate the Jondahl’s excited witterings into something approaching normal speech, utilising his spell check program where needed. “According to Technician Winsome,” he started, “the device had only been in place for a day or so at most. It was ‘earwigging’ on everything said and done on the bridge.” Stikka shifted in his seat. “It hadn’t transmitted, though. At least nothing that Dawton could find anyhow.”
“No,” Hawle muttered, “it wouldn’t. It would probably wait until we were in communication with the person who put the bug in place. That way it wouldn’t be easily spotted.”
“Which does suggest someone, doesn’t it,” Stikka asked as the pair felt the ship accelerate to velocity two. Twelve hours to Rayvon, if Hawle remembered things right.
He nodded. “Yeah. The stealth tech’s Raitchian,” he admitted. “There’s a circular in the ‘Captains eyes only’ files from last year describes it. It’s used by their special services for surveillance duties. I hadn’t figured they’d use it out here.” He smacked the arm of his chair. “I hadn’t figured they’d use it on me! And I CERTAINLY didn’t figure it’d be a ‘friend’ that did it to me!”
“Steady, sir,” Stikka counselled. “The whole point about being a spy is nearly no-one knows you are one.”
Hawle stood up from his chair and paced the room. “I KNEW there was something wrong about Roebuck, I KNEW it! But did I act on it?”
“Have you had time to act on it,” Stikka asked innocently.
“No, I…” Hawle realised that, although he was actually continuing his own rant, he was also giving an answer to Stikka’s question. He blinked as he leaned against the wall of his cabin. “It’s really only been a day, hasn’t it? Wow. That’s… that’s quite something. You’re right. No way to know. Know what I’m going to do now, number 2?”
Stikka decided to make a joke. “I hope you’d never tell me if that was the plan, sir.”
“Ew. No. I’m going to settle down. Watch a documentary on Rydran or some other artist as Corrin Matcheltov always sends me to sleep and, when I wake up, I’ll be prepared to face my old friend.” The face changed into a stern scowl. “And string the sod up!”
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Harry Johnathan »

Ooh, the alien artist version of me is back again. I wonder what kind of life he's led to justify getting a documentary to himself.
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Amazee Dayzee »

I understand Hawle is ready to lynch Roebuck after what he pulled. Quite honestly I don't blame him but that is only because I believe Hawle can do no wrong. XD
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Welsh Halfwit »

31

DROPPING IN

Seven hours passed before Hawle managed to take himself back to the bridge after sleep, shower and coffee. He got a fresh uniform out, the blue jacket with the red trim and epaulettes, the lighter blue trousers that almost matched it. The brown, folded top boots and bandolier that completed the look. In other words, exactly the same outfit he usually wore. None of it was quite the regulation uniform but, being parts of the historical uniforms, all were available to wear if the Captain of the ship decreed it. After donning his uniform (with underwear), Hawle left his fluffy slippers behind and headed up to the bridge, taking a breakfast biscuit with him to save some time. He wanted to be in position asap. “Cawthorpe,” he said to the duty officer on comms, “cut the transponder signal, would you,” he asked before taking a nibble from the oaty block.
“Aye, sir,” the Cervidan replied, doing as instructed whilst Hawle took the command chair from the Night duty Officer.
Hawle waited for a few seconds, until the officer said ‘done’ to indicate he’d complied. “What,” Hawle asked, “no curiosity as to why I ordered you to stop sending out our location, Cawthorpe?”
“No, sir. You’re the leader.”
“I am indeed,” he replied, “but you must be curious, Ravel? I’ll answer the question you didn’t ask anyhow,” he continued, tapping away at his armrest controls. “I don’t want them to see me coming.”
“Any particular reason for that, sir,” Raven asked, knowing the comm officer wouldn’t as she entered the room, looking immaculate in her version of the uniform. She took up her seat and looked at him. “Polva’s recovering,” she said.
“How’s..” Hawle started before noting his Executive Officer had answered him before he’d asked. She was smirking at him.
“Chapston will be up here in a few,” Raven continued. “She has a few bruises.”
“From wh..? Oh, close contact during the night?”
Raven grumbled under her breath. “Some automatic reflexes,” she said. “I’m sorting her a cot for tonight.”
Hawle nodded. “She won’t use it but it’s probably best.”
“Hmmm,” Raven grumbled again. “So, what is it you were talking about when I came in, sir?”
“Oh, just my plans for when we get to Rayvon,” Hawle breezed. “It’s a surprise.”
Raven looked down at her armrest console. “You’ve turned off the transponder,”
“Oh, yes,” Hawle remarked ominously. “Want to know why?”
“I heard you. You don’t want them to see us coming. Why?”
Hawle paused for a second to get a mint from his armrest before remembering he was still eating breakfast.
“He doesn’t want them to know he’s coming,” A voice said from behind them. Colleen’s voice, in fact. She stepped around to Stikka’s seat and perched in it. “I was listening,” she said. “Simply put, Sarina, Aldair here is still mad about Polva, the bug and his old friend doing it to him. He knows the Admiral will duck him if things are normal now. So he’s making things abnormal.”
“Right,” Raven said uncertainly.

“I have one question,” Pangal said as she waited in the medical bay as Night finished up some notes on recent cases. She tapped the bed next to her when she knew she had her best friends’ attention. “What is Detective Brunton still doing here?”
Night sighed and stood up. “Doing his best to not prove me a liar and die, I believe. I didn’t fancy his chances if we sent him down to Micanna again so I deigned to keep him here.”
The Mican took that opportunity to groan. He’d meant to say ‘your bedside manner is appalling’ but his throat wasn’t working properly.
“Hello,” Night said, gently shoving Jaqui out of the way, “the Sleeping Policeman’s coming around.” She started checking the computer readouts for levels and blood pressure. “Don’t try to come around too fast, Detective. You’re safe but you lost a lot of blood. And part of your kidney. I replaced an elbow joint and…”
Jaqui snorted a laugh. “That’s Doctor Barleycorn saying she’s great,” she told him gently, moving around to the chair on the other side. “Can you hear us? Give us a sign if you can.”
He responded by moving a finger slightly as Night injected something that would help him come around faster. “I need the bed,” she told Jaqui. “Even if he is quite cute, it’s never the same after you’ve been in their chest.”
“Y...You s...sound li...like a ma...d sc...sc...scientist,” Brunton rasped, sounding like scratches on leather. He still hadn’t opened his eyes.
“I’m the sweetest mad scientist you ever saw, Detective,” Night replied, moving away.
“Detective Brunton,” Jaqui said softly. “I’m Jaqui Pangal, Security Chief of the U.S.C. Loper.”
“Lo...loper?” Brunton replied.
“You were wounded,” she advised. “We had to bring you up here to save your life. You are safe.”
The tiniest curl of a smile appeared on the Detective’s Mican muzzle. “I’m in a small met...metal box in safe… in space. You call that safe?”

The ship slammed down into the middle of the Rayvon fleet and came to the spacial equivalent of a halt with its shields up. “Send out an immediate message,” Hawle commanded the recently returned to duty Dawton. “Tell them our transponder is currently experiencing problems.”
Dawton did as asked and Hawle waited. “They’re going to want to communicate,” he told Colleen, seemingly not caring that ten ships had weapons trained on them. "By raising a panic, I imagine it’ll be Roebuck’s ship that gets in contact…”
The minutes passed before Hawle got bored and decided to put out the general hail to see who answered. He smiled as the face of his ‘old friend’ appeared on the screen. <”We almost shot you,”> Roebuck said bitterly.
“That would have been unfortunate,” Hawle admitted, “but we can stand down now, can’t we?”
Roebuck smiled. <”I suppose so,”> he admitted. <”On three?”>
“Why not?”
On the count of three, both of them dropped shields with a button push and the Rayvon fleet powered down their weapons. “Sorry to cause a flap,” Hawle said.

“Not a problem,” Roebuck admitted from the bridge of his own ship. He cut the link and shook his head. “He’s still crazy,” he opined before letting Captain Kell have the helm and retreating to his command room.

He jumped as the door closed and Raven stepped from the darkness, with one of Pangal’s security team. They’d beamed in the instant Hawle had pressed the button and had been waiting for Roebuck. “Commander Hawle wants a word with you, ‘Admiral’,” she growled, “and you’re coming with us. If it’s as a guest or as someone under arrest for espionage is your choice.”
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Amazee Dayzee »

I would think it would be better if it was as a guest. You probably wouldn't be able to come and go as you please if you were charged with espionage and most likely thrown in the brig. Great new chapter!
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Welsh Halfwit »

32

CHATTING UP THE ADMIRAL

Roebuck sighed theatrically and put the padd he was carrying down on the table. “He always likes to complicate matters, doesn’t he?” He stepped around to his desk. “I take it he told you I keep a weapon in there,” he added, indicating the desk.
“And one in the plant,” Raven grumbled.
Roebuck looked at the slight mess around the potted plant in the corner of the room. “Made a mess there. How are are you planning to sell this to my people?”
“Temporary Officer exchange,” Raven told him. “I’m the security because it means you’ll be sent back.” She picked a file from her pocket, shucked out five mighty claws for effect and began cleaning them. “And I promise not to harm any of your officers.”
The door booped. <”Sir,”> said a voice from the other side. <”We believe the Loper may have beamed someone aboard this ship. Are you alone?”>
“Nope,” Roebuck replied happily. “I’m discussing things with Commander Raven and…” He looked to the guard who didn’t bother to reveal his name. “...one of her guards. It seems Commander Hawle would like to talk with me and has sent his First Officer as a guarantor. Their guard goes with me and someone stays here to guard Raven. That right?” He looked to Raven who gave him a ‘thumbs up’ with claw still extended on the thumb. The Admiral nodded to the guard. “We’d best go.” The guard indicated for him to go first and he opened the door to the bridge and stepped through first.

The Admiral looked around at the primed Officers on the bridge and huffed. “What about the words ‘I’m going with the guard’ is confusing to you,” he asked as he noted two guards ready to ambush his escort. “This Celican is my escort! Stand down. You,” he added, indicating one of the guards, then swinging his arm towards his office. “Get in there and watch the Commander. Don’t let her access any files.” He took a few steps before adding “but let her use the replication machine if she wants Coffee.”
The Celican guard watched the Raitchian crew carefully, the mind of a hunter analysing the threat. His eyes flicked left to right and back again as he walked with the Admiral to the teleport pads, keeping back those who came too close with a twist of the lip and a low growl where needed. They entered the room and stepped up onto the dais after he laid in the co-ordinates for the Loper. “Let’s go,” the Admiral told the teleporter officer and the pair of them…

...Found themselves in the respective room on the Loper, Hawle watching them with a guard or two in attendance.. “With me, Admiral,” Hawle said dismissively. “After disarming, of course.” He waited whilst the guard patted Roebuck down, removing his holstered weapon and the blade he had hidden in his belt. “Boots too, Cafferty.” The guard retrieved a slimline credit card blaster from the left boot. Hawle gestured and the Admiral walked from the room up to the conference room. When there, Hawle bade the Admiral sit and shooed the guards out of the room. As the door closed, Hawle stopped pouring water from the jug on the table into his glass. “You bugged my bridge, Artie Roebuck,” he said simply. “One of my people got electrocuted when he discovered it!”
“It wasn’t set to kill,” the Admiral insisted, reaching out for a glass.
“I know that,” Hawle retorted, taking up a seat opposite. “It’s the only reason we’re not having this conversation in my brig! When it happened last night I was ready to kill you for betraying me. You should know that.”
“What changed your mind,” Roebuck asked, pouring his own water.
“A very boring documentary on Rydran. Matcheltov drivelled on about how you needed to look for the hidden meanings in the canvas and the brush movements… before I fell asleep. But I ended up thinking of things after waking up. As you said, this,” he continued, tossing the remains of the recording device over to Roebuck, “was dialled down so as not to kill. It’s also made by Raitchian Intelligence. For their exclusive use.”
“Can’t be,” Roebuck said, smiling to show his incisors. “Or how do you know about it?”
Hawle waved a hand in the air. “Our spies are spying on your spies. Probably. Just like yours are on ours. Honestly, it’s all stupidity and elbowing people. I can’t be doing with it. But what was true, until this morning, is that Raitchian Intelligence do NOT have a presence in the patch!”
Roebuck took a drink of water. “Of course we do,” he admitted. “I told you a few days back, we’re a paranoid people. It’s not like we’d tell you, is it?”
Hawle nodded. “So, when you left the Council, you went to work for Raitchian Intelligence.” Roebuck nodded. “Low bar,” Hawle jibed.
“Ouch! No,” Roebuck replied, “not so low anyhow. I had to show I could live and work with those who knew nothing of my true intents. It takes a lot, you know?”
“And the Admiral position out here?”
Roebuck put his glass down. “Hmm,” he said thoughtfully. “you think I work for our intelligence services out here?” He shook his head. “I RUN our intelligence services out here. And I can tell you that freely because…”
“...of the device in your left pocket that jams all recordings?” Hawle smirked. “I should have had someone in here taking notes.”
“Probably. But that’s why I left the device, by the way. If you didn’t find it, I’d learn all about the things you’d discussed with the Micannons and, if you did, I knew you’d want to talk face to face.”
“Where I have no proof that anything you say is true,” Hawle pointed out.
“But, also, you can’t prove it’s a lie. Here’s something else for you to believe or not. Calavix is operating in the shadows on Rayvon. Same as they were on Micanna.” He pointed a finger. “You’ve got a fair obstacle to peace there, y’know?”
Hawle put his feet up on the desk. “Oh, don’t I know it. What do you know of the last few days down on Micanna?”
Roebuck nodded. “That it’s probably a good thing you were there. A lot of destruction and death averted and the President saved!” He mimicked waving a little flag in the air. “All good press too.”
“Hmm. Suspicious minds might suggest that, if anyone benefited from that, it was us, hmm?”
“Oh, you said it. Such a shame someone shot the prime suspect, isn’t it?”
“Not the only suspect,” Hawle advised. “Not the only lead, either. I’m going to need what help you can provide to try and sort this out, Artie.”
“You’re trusting me?”
“Might as well. I know you. But,” he added, dropping the light tone. “I KNOW you. I remember some of the tricks you used to pull way back. I know you’ll try to spin this to your own glory if it suits you. So long as it doesn’t inconvenience me, that’s fine. More power to your paw. If it endangers my people though? Then I’ll make you bleed.”
Roebuck shrugged. “Fair enough. What do you have?”
“A lead that I need to chase and the expert on Minchin in my sickbay. Shall we go see if he’s got any information about Rayvon links?”
The Admiral looked eager for a few seconds but relented. “NO. I think it’s best if we limit public interaction. We’re not allies. But I’ll sort out the clearances so you can chase leads.” he stood up. “I presume my escort is outside?”
“Of course. Oh,” Hawle added, “send Raven back, will you?”
“Of course.” He grunted. “Wonder if she’s got the guard drunk yet?”
“Heh. Possibly. Out of interest,” Hawle added, “who would you suspect is leading Calavix on Rayvon?”
“The Minister of Trade. Who really IS over charging the Micannans. It just never reaches his accounts.” With that, Roebuck exited the room to find his guards for the trip back.

And Hawle turned off the extremely old fashioned tape recorder he had under the table.
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Amazee Dayzee »

Hawle really is able to foresee any complications that can come up can he? Hopefully that doesn't extend to him getting hit with dessert or falling in stuff. :mrgreen:
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Re: A LOPER TALE

Post by Welsh Halfwit »

33

RAINY DAY SYNDROME

Hawle sat behind his desk and looked up as Raven, now unaccompanied by any guards, entered after he allowed her entry. They were still waiting for Roebuck to come through with the permissions they wanted to investigate leads. Still, though, he had hopes so was preparing the groups to go down there. Once again, he was needed to attend the President with Colleen but, this time, he didn’t want Stikka with him. Or Raven for that matter. He put down his Carrot tea and decided to tell Cedar there was no way he was ever trying that again. There was a reason Carrot tea hadn’t been invented by the Lappineans and that was that it tasted awful. Raven sniffed the air as mug hit the table.
“Carrot tea,” Hawle explained. “Apparently one of the Children mentioned it to Cedar in the hospital and he thought he’d try it. If he makes it again, I think I’ll try him for offences against taste.” He sighed. “I want you to be leading an away team to the investigations, Sarina.”
“Establishing contact with the local Police and other agencies?” Raven frowned. “Wouldn’t Jaqui be better at that?”
“Yes, that’s why she’s doing it. That should take her a little time, bedding in and convincing them. So your team can investigate the leads more freely.”
Raven extended a hand. “Wouldn’t a Raitchian be better served..? Oh,” she added, reaching into her pocket and pulling out a small info-stick and passing it over.
“What’s this,” Hawle asked.
“Resume of my guard,” Raven replied before producing a half grin to show her left side teeth. “I still have it, sir.”
“Wasn’t aware that was ever in doubt,” Hawle admitted, filing the resume for later examination. Where were we? Oh, yes. Match is too honest, Fuze is too naive and Night isn’t a Raitchian and is quite likely to start a fight with the first one that comes on to her. It’s got to be you playing tourist with a team, Sarina. Go, select one and go down.”
“And the reason you’re not sending Stikka, sir?”
Hawle paused. “Two reasons. One. He did the last one. Two. He doesn’t like the rain.”

Raven grumped as she turned the collar of her coat against the rain. She and her team were all wearing the usual undercover armours in various shades of blues and greens and reds and were as much like tourists or business types on a bender as they could possibly look like. From security she had the Celican Cafferty and the Feline Oster, sciences had provided a Raitchian called Ochoa and Engineering had provided Januvitski and Katara because Januvitski apparently knew how to use computers to a level Harvey Winsome didn’t mock her over it and Katara worked well with her.
The area was quite quiet due to the rain and their target was a building to the left of the the road they were currently on. The calls to Minchin had come from an office on the fourth floor and the Commander was thinking of ways to get up there.
“We don’t,” Katara said, nodding to the building opposite. “We go up there.”
“A car park,” Januvistki said as a hover vehicle made its way through the entrance.. “Public area.” She looked at the Vixen. “Are you thinking of microwaves?”
“Not just that,” Katara admitted. “I can read Raitchian lips.”
“That’s not in your files,” Raven said, wishing she’d brought a hat as the pools of water started puddling around her feet.
“It’s more of a hobby,” the engineer admitted. “We can set up on floor four,” she advised. “Me in one corner, the surveillance device elsewhere?”
“First we need to lock on to where the comm came from,” Raven reminded them.
“I, um, I could… do that,” Ochoa said hesitantly. The Sciences Officer had been briefed on the mission before they’d come down and wanted to put her experiences to use. “I mean, I’d need to buy some clothes but I could get past the guard?” She brightened up. “And I have theatre training.”
“Which IS in your files,” Raven advised. “What’s the plan?”
“Um… Pizza delivery?”
“Pfhah,” Oster scoffed, “do people ever fall for that stupidity?”
“On occasion. It’s mostly so stupid so no-one expects it.”
Oster shrugged. “You’re the one saying Raitchians are stupid.”
Before Ochoa could protest, Januvitski piped up. “And I’m the one saying we should go spend a bit of time in that diner.” She nodded down to where a light blared hopefully in the weather, shining through a glass door onto a roughly clean and tidy insides with plastic tables.

The group slopped inside and took up seats as the Raitchians serving watched them. A male made his way over to them. “What are you having,” he asked Ochoa, pointedly ignoring the others. Ochoa ordered after everyone else had had the chance to check the menu and he went away, only to come back a moment or so later. “Your accent’s not local,” he said before indicating the others, “and they’re certainly not. What brings you to Rayvon?”
Ochoa hoped her lies were effortless enough to succeed. “We’re setting up a tour group on Pandera,” she said, “exploring the lesser known worlds and seeing the sights. Today it’s Rayvon.” She half chuckled. “Chose the wrong day, didn’t we?”
He snorted. “Wrong planet, more like. Barely anything here worth seeing.”
He presented the receipt but Ochoa directed him to Raven. “Sarina’s the finance officer,” she advised.
Sarina grumbled but paid from her personal account. Hawle would have to recompense her after. She had the feeling he’d also need to recompense her for all the clothes Ochoa was going to buy. She chuckled inwardly, though. It didn’t half prove Ochoa was a Raitchian.

Two hours later, and dressed in a jacket and skirt she’d found in a small boutique with shoes and shoulder bag from a charity shop, Ochoa stepped into the foyer and, after claiming she had an interview booked in at ‘Puttman Clan investments’, she entered the elevators.
Commander Hawle. U.S.C. Loper. By the talented DDeer.
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