Black Dawn (30 page)

It had been awhile since Lamont had called a White meeting
this large. Every commander and department head, as well as a few
bridge officers was present. Coy looked out over the group. The cream
of the crop. It smiled to itself at Butler’s comment if he ever heard Coy
say that again.

“
Ladies and gentlemen, once again I need your help. We have
the facts lined out as we know or surmise them. I need some fresh insight on how it all fits together. That is why some of you are here that
haven’t been before.” Coy turned on all their screens and watched
them peruse the information. “Our current main line of reasoning is:
Our Boogeyman owns all of the shipping lines. However, he is attacking same said shipping lines. What is he gaining by this?”

“
Is he attacking himself or some newer lines trying to cut in on
his monopoly?” someone asked.
“Good question. The only way to know that is to find out who
owns the newer companies. Venn?”
“There have been several companies spring up in recent years.
The one who made the colony ship the
Karasu
was escorting is a good
example. Small, privately owned. They have been hit a lot, but not only them. And not all of them directly.”
“How indirectly?” Rebel asked.
“The minister of commerce was threatened on one planet when
he was considering using a new company.”
A few more voices rose with questions, but Coy put up a hand
to stop them. “Say that again.” It ordered Vennefron.
Venn looked briefly at Butler to make sure he was supposed to
literally repeat it. Ken nodded. “I said the minister of commerce was
threatened when he wanted to use a new line.”
“He didn’t want anyone going over to the competitors,” someone else voiced Coy’s thoughts.
‘What line was the minister in question using?”
“Ahh,” Vennefron scrambled through his notes. “Here it is,
Betalines. Been around as long as the Beta Region has.”
“Has it indeed. And who did he want to change to?”
“You got an idea?” Butler asked wondering at Coy’s expression.
Venn dove back into his files. “I did make a note of it, even
though it wasn’t considered the target in that instance. Here it is, Estar
Transport.”
“Find out who owns it and Betalines and match them to the
owners of the other lines.”
“Whoever owns Betalines is the Boogeyman?” Drake asked.
“If only it were that easy,” Coy said a bit wistfully. “But back
to question one, what is he gaining?”
“Hanging onto current customers by scaring away the competition.”
“Getting new customers when the new lines seemed unreliable.’
“Selling ships all the time to replace the ones destroyed by the
‘pirates’.”
“Keeping the profit from all of those things since the pirates
were paid off in whatever they were collecting on the jobs.” Suggestions came from all around the table.
“Sort of a win – win….win scenario,” Butler commented.
Coy looked again to Vennefron. How many layers does Betalines have between them and the real owner?”
Venn blew out his breath and shook his head. “I’m guessing a
whole lot. This guy is not going to be easy to trace. There could be a
hundred phony companies and names between here and there.”
“Is there any other direction to try to trace him from?” someone asked.
Coy shook its head. “Not unless one of you can think of one.
Looking for other directions is what we have been trying all these
months.”
“The only other lead that we could follow up on is the explosive that we found on the
Karasu
,” Bon put in.
“And the trouble
with that is
that it probably would only lead to whatever scum put it on board – not
all the way back to the Boogeyman himself.”
“Seems like any line is worth investigating,” Hendricks said.
Coy nodded agreement. “We don’t want to get excited about
possibly having a solid lead after all this time and miss something obvious.”
There were several more comments and quite a few intelligent
suggestions before the meeting was dismissed. Everyone left feeling
very good about the advances they had made, which was a rare thing
for these “Boogeyman Meetings.”
One person however, seemed less than enthusiastic about it all.
In fact the longer they went the more disturbed he appeared. But since
he didn’t offer any ideas Coy left him alone while everyone else was
there. It was not surprised, however, when Aziza asked for a private
word. Coy waved Butler and the others out and sat back down.
“What is it Dev?”
Aziza sat back down as well, looking down at his hands for a
moment before straightening up. “I never really told you much about
my family, did I , sir?”
If Coy was surprised by this line of conversation, it didn’t
show it. “Nothing more was necessary. I respected you when you came
on board, as I do now, for having the integrity to walk away and make
a respectable life for yourself.”
Aziza blinked. You sound as if you already know what
they…are.”
Coy smiled as encouragingly as it could. “I have a pretty good
idea. What brings it up now?”
“Well, I was thinking as you were talking about whoever is
pulling the strings in all this and how there must be another angle to
track him from.”
“Yes…”
“And I was thinking this guy is real dirty. And real secretive.
And real powerful.” He grimaced. “Just like everyone in my….my father’s circle.” He took a small breath. “He, my father I mean, might
know who he is – or know how to find out.”
Coy hid its sigh of relief. It was terrified Devyu had been going to say he thought it
was
his father. “I see,” Coy said carefully,
“What exactly are you proposing?”
“Well, basically, just asking him.”
Coy raised a brow. “At what cost to you?”
Aziza looked down again. “I don’t really know. But I know we
need to find this guy. And this could be the best way.”
“The fastest perhaps,” Coy agreed, “But not necessarily the
best.” It paused and thought for a few moments. “I can’t express my
appreciation of this offer or the courage I know it would take to do it. I
will keep it as a contingency plan. But,” it leaned closer to Dev for
emphasis, “if this in any way endangers you or your life here we forget
it and carry on as we have.”
“At the risk of how many lives?” Aziza asked. “No, I’m not
pretending having anything to do with him or that whole business is
comfortable or appealing. But if it’s necessary – it’s necessary. We’re
here to help people, right? Not to be safe and comfortable.”
Coy could only smile. “Alright. I will consider it. And you
consider it. Come back to me with the way, when and how of contacting them and we’ll go from there.” Coy stood up so Aziza did likewise.
“I thought I was incredibly fortunate two years ago when you walked
in here with just the skills I needed up on the bridge. I didn’t know
then how fortunate. Thank you, Lieutenant.”
Aziza saluted proudly and left to return to duty.

“
The mafia!” Butler exclaimed when Coy addressed the issue
with its inner circle of advisors. “I never knew Aziza was mixed up in
that!”

“He’s not,”
Coy reiterated. “He walked away from all that.
And he’s only offering to have anything to do with them to help us
out.” Coy paused. “It would be a little like you asking your brother for
help.”

Butler’s head jerked up in anger. He was about to retort in the
same manner, but Coy cut him off.
“I only mention it to put his offer in perspective. He could be
putting himself in real danger doing this.”
“Himself and the Fleet,” Bon added.
“The Fleet?” Butler asked, still a little disgruntled.
Bon nodded. What if they want something in return for this
information? Do we really want to end up owing a Favor to them?”
Coy leaned back in its chair. “I admit, I didn’t think of it that
way. That is definitely something to be weighed carefully. But as the
lieutenant reminded me, we’re doing this to help others, not to be safe
and comfortable ourselves.”
Bon shrugged. “I just don’t want to see us sacrifice the integrity of the Fleet if we don’t have to. I vote to keep on with the angles we
discussed and use Dev as an absolute worst case scenario.”
“Don’t be wishy-washy, Raeph, how do you really feel?”
He glared at Butler. “Maybe you’ve never dealt with the criminal underground, Ken, but some of us have. It’s no laughing matter to
get tangled up with them.”
If Butler didn’t figure out to leave it alone at that, Coy was
ready to step in, but fortunately , he did.
“I agree with your concerns, Raeph,” Coy told him.
“We will
not use this line unless everything else is a bust – or unless the Boogeyman turns the heat up any more and we really can’t risk losing another ship full of passengers.”
Bon nodded reluctantly, and pushed himself up from his seat.
“I’m going to go compare notes with Venn on investigating that explosive.”
Butler watched him go. Coy watched Butler, watching him.
“Leave it alone, Ken,” it commanded.
“You’re not curious?”
“As curious as everyone in the Fleet is about everyone else’s
story.”
“Yeah, but you know, don’t you?”
Coy shook its head. “It’s not something he has ever entrusted
to me.”
“Ah.” Ken looked thoughtful. “This command thing is quite a
balancing act isn’t it? Knowing when to push people and when to back
off.”
“As I’m sure you found out.”
Butler shuddered dramatically. “What I found out is that I’m
not ready to do it yet. The only way I got through it was that I reminded myself everyday that you would be back.”
“And if I hadn’t…”
“But you did. And I don’t want to even think about the ‘if you
didn’t’.”
Coy looked at him with a mixture of, still unaccustomed, emotions. Pride, gratitude, friendship…and a little concern. “I never meant
to make myself indispensable. I meant to choose people who could
and would take over as needed.” It paused to word it right. “I need to
know that if I were blown away in the next battle, my…the Fleet
would not die with me.”
Ken sat up straighter and lifted his chin a little. “I never meant
to imply that I would ever do less than my best.”
Coy smiled. I never meant to imply I doubted it.”

Tryon decided to break his silence after only a few days. He
opened up and talked about everything but the issue. Loudly. His accommodations. His food. The profits he was losing. Several old girlfriends.When he branched out into his opinions of Coy’s mentality his
guards got a little testy and threatened to cut off his air supply.

The Tac Com crew, when not in actual battle situations, had
become Vennefron’s I&S team. Broken up into units, they spent most
of their working hours on the main areas of investigation Coy had decided on over the months: tracing the
Raven’s
and/or
Blackbird’s
movements before coming into Coy’s possession; and discovering the
connections of all the various shipping and related companies. Both
were tedious, time consuming ventures. But the added staff coupled
with the urgency everyone was beginning to feel, began to pay off.

Venn
’s excited voice broke through Coy’s dreams and brought
it to a sitting position instantly. “Lamont. Go ahead.”
“Sir, one of my teams has made some interesting discoveries
about the
Raven’s
locations during the last couple of years.”
Now Coy was up and halfway to the door. “I’m on my way.”
“Shall I call Captain Butler?”
It slowed for only a second in thought. “No. Show me what
you have now. He’ll be up before too long anyway and we’ll brief him
then.”
“Be up..?” Vennefron’s voice trailed off in embarrassment.
“I’m sorry sir, I didn’t think about it being your sleep shift.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. We’ve been waiting for this type of information for months. I would only have been upset if you had waited
to tell me.” By now Coy was dashing down the corridor on the way to
deck ‘G’. “I’ll be there in a minute.”
True to its word, in less time than Vennefron would have
thought it possible to run to the lift and drop three decks, Lamont appeared at the door to I&S. The only concession to having been woken
from a sound sleep was that its uniform jacket was unfastened and its
hair was loose instead of pulled back as usual.
“Alright, Lieutenant, what have we got?”
Vennefron and his assistants led the way into the Tac Room
where the holographic map of local space had been enlarged to show
major portions of the Beta Region. Vennefron pointed to some highlighted areas. “We’ve been using all of the various means of tracking
that we’ve discussed before; shield frequency signatures, missing technicians, and a few random sightings. And this is what we’ve put together.” Three areas became brighter at some assistant’s command.
“These three spots seem to have been visited more often than any other. Here out beyond Tai Han, here in the Regional “south” in the
Thrackston Nebula, and in the asteroid fields beyond DeGalle. The
nebula seems to have been visited slightly more often and for longer
periods than the other two. But all three are definitely more often than
anywhere else in space.”
Coy took control of highlighting the areas over and over again
as it thought. “Bases,” it finally said. “They’re bases of operation.” It
continued to highlight and think for a few more minutes. When it finally straightened up, its face was set with determination. “Good work,
Commander. And to your crew.” Coy nodded at each of them in turn
before facing a very proud Vennefron.
“Yes, sir, thank you, sir!” he exclaimed, saluting.
Coy returned the unnecessary salute with a straight face. “I’ll
announce your new rank at the White meeting when you announce
your findings.” It took just a moment to shunt the information to its
office computer. “And now I think you all deserve some down time
yourselves.” They all grinned or nodded in agreement. “Until White
Meeting, Commander.”

As Coy expected there was a great deal of excitement at the
news of the, assumed, bases. Now the questions became, who exactly
was at each of the locations? And were they even still operational after
all this time?

“
We need some eyes and ears in each of those areas to keep
track of who comes and goes,” someone suggested.
“Who and how?”
“Transit portal stations?” Butler asked/suggested.
“Maybe
someone like our bartender buddy on Alluria.”
Coy agreed with the line of thinking. “Vennefron has a few
contacts here and there who have given us information from time to
time. But this would have to be someone who understood the risks
they would be taking.”
“So do we plant someone of our own, or hire someone already
there?”
“I would vote against using someone already in place. We
need loyalty we can depend on absolutely.”
“Sir,” Asch spoke up.
Coy nodded at the unexpected gesture from its steward.
“If you recall, when I was rescued, there were a lot of grateful
people willing to repay the Fleet.”
“Yes, I do recall that,” Coy gave a small smile at the comment.
Asch more than anyone besides Butler himself had daily contact with
Lamont’s perfect memory.
“One of which was a performer of sorts. A singer, I believe,
although not of the highest quality.” He made a slightly pained face to
emphasize this fact. “Someone like that might be able to secure a position at a station bar or club.”
“Hmmm. A possibility,” Coy hesitantly agreed.
“How would we find him?” Butler asked. “Do we know his
name or anything?”
“Taylor Dickenson,” Coy ‘recalled’ instantly. It turned to
Vennefron, but he was already digging into his computer in search of
information.
“We’ll find him, sir.”
“When you do we’ll arrange a face to face meeting. I don’t
want anyone going into this not fully understanding all that we may be
asking of them.”
“What about our other lines of investigation? Anything on the
company owners? I would have thought that it would have been easier
than tracking the
Raven.”
“I would have thought so too,” Venn agreed. “But every time
we think we get something we hit a wall of non information. But we’ll
keep trying.”
“That pretty much confirms that we are on the right trail as far
as I’m concerned,” Coy said. “A company or two covering up some
less than ethical business deals with some smoke would be understandable. But not this number of companies. They can’t all have
something to hide.”
“Which makes the ones that aren’t hiding anything cleared of
being connected to the Boogeyman?” Drake asked.
“ Assuming they really aren’t hiding anything and are not
simply more clever than the rest,” Butler said.
Vennefron moaned slightly at this thought. “I was all set to
classify them as clear just to triage if nothing else.”
“Go ahead,” Coy told him. “We’re already working with a lot
of assumptions or we wouldn’t have discovered any of the facts that
we have. If we second guess everything we’re going to be at this a
very long time.”