Wandering Engineer 6: Pirates Bane (15 page)

Sprite plotted each mentioned world on a star chart. They made
sense, well most of them. OTBP, or 'Off The Beaten Path' was a cul-de-sac agro
system that was indeed, off the beaten path. Apparently the Horathian's were
being thorough.

“No doubt they've rolled right through them as well. No one has
any defenses,” Sindri rumbled, shaking his head.

“I heard Hinata and Konohagakure both put up a fight, but not
much of one. All they had were a few antique gunships.”

“Like spitting in the wind,” the dwarf rumbled. The others nodded
and murmured in misery. “They've already started,” he turned his head and spat.
“Cleansing procedures on those worlds. Aliens and Neo's rounded up in
internment camps for processing. Genocide, all neat and tidy,” he growled.

“Admiral, ask them about this fleet they mentioned,” Sprite urged
as the Admiral struggled to keep his poker face. Rage raced through him at the
idea of killing millions.

John cleared his throat. Some of the murmuring dropped away.
“Yes?” the dwarf asked.

“Ian, you mentioned a fleet?” he said, turning to the Captain.

McGuyver nodded. “Two,” he said, holding up two fingers. “Task
forces. One headed east from Horath under the command of a Rear Admiral
Cartwright. The other is this one. They have been sweeping up ships and
colonies as they go. They don't seem to be in a hurry though.”

“Maybe someone gave them indigestion,” Sindri rumbled.

“One can only hope,” John murmured. He turned frowning for a
moment. “The thing is, I remember one ship here, the one that attacked me.”

“The rest aren't here. Something about in Beta 101a1.”

John hid a flinch, knowing what they were probably up to. Sprite
was right. He waited for the 'I told you so' but she merely nodded on his HUD.
Pursing his lips in thought, Admiral Irons tapped his implants and tentatively
felt out the area once more while listening to the others explain the
situation.

“Are they supposed to meet up or something?” Sprite finally
asked. She plotted the progress of the two phantom fleets on the map. “Do they
have any information on the makeup of the fleets?”

John cocked his head. He used his text file. “Not now,” he
replied cursedly and then returned his attention to the briefing.

“As I said, they are short handed. We're the slaves. We are
required to perform scutt work periodically, usually cleaning gangs or work in
the waste recycler. They don't trust us with anything dangerous,” Ian said,
smiling a sour smile.

John nodded.

“Even high radiation work from time to time. I've gone out into
the dark a few times, and a couple of our guys were tapped to play bot inside
Anderson's reactor before they yanked it out. That didn't work out for them.”
He looked away bleakly.

“Two of our people have died from radiation sickness, the last
one Oro died a week ago. They left him in here a couple days before they
finally spaced him,” Sindri said.

“We've got another guy, Merlo over there,” Ian waved to a bald
skeletal male near the head. “He's had a high dose, but we think it wasn't
fatal so he is recovering. Don't mess with him; he's been through enough. And
when the cancer's kick in...” he shook his head.

John glanced at the male, scanning him. He had cataracts forming
over his eyes, tumors boiled under his skin. He was alive, clinging to life for
some reason. He'd lost all his hair and over ten kilos in weight but had lived
through it.

There was one medic, a spacer with first aid training. He was
Horathian. Two of the surviving officers
had first aid training but they left that duty to the Horathian
since he could get supplies out of the guards, they couldn't.

Admiral Irons picked up that the ship’s crew was short handed;
they had captured four other ships earlier. Those ships were gone; apparently
they had used the materials from the recent captures to get them off to who knows
where.

The four prize crews that had been sent off had cut the crew down
to a skeleton watch. There was the single squad of guards, six of the bridge
crew, a handful of engineering officers, and thirty eight of the original one
hundred enlisted remaining. Plus about a dozen trustees, men and women who were
not from Horath but had professed an interest in the Horathian view. Those
numbers didn't include the eight guards and one officer on each of the prison
ships.

Most of the trained personnel were off on the prizes; those that
remained were either draftees from the prize ships or people with questionable
skills.

“That's insane. Why would a Captain willingly give up good
people?” Sprite commented.

“Perhaps they needed them in order to man the prize ships. Now he
had dregs,” the Admiral replied through the text chat, trying to focus on the
other prisoners.

“So, everyone works? Including them?” John asked, pointing a
finger briefly to a Horathian.

Franx looked to where he was pointing and his face soured. “Course
not.”

“Ah,” John replied thoughtfully. “Now I see an advantage to their
being in the brig.”

The other Captain looked at him as if he was crazy. John shrugged,
smiling crookedly. “Think about it. They get to sit on their racks all day
while everyone else busts their but
ts.”

“True,” Franx replied, but there was no humor in it. He shook his
head.

“They are spread thin, with so many ships to man. The crew of one
ship was never meant to cover seven, now eight ships,” Franx explained.

“They have no one on Anderson and Jaw-te right?” the Admiral
asked.

Franx shook his head. “The constant short crews is making the
current crew work double shifts, and some of us prisoner slaves have even been
drafted to fill in when there was a hole in the schedule or someone was
injured. Four of the enlisted were down with a flu bug they had picked up from
one of the prizes, and the exec had them isolated in sickbay to prevent
contamination of the rest of the crew.”

“Lovely.”

“The problem, at least from their viewpoint, is that they can't
trust us. So, they have to have someone watching us at all times, and going
over whatever we do. Which pretty much makes having us man critical functions
out.”

“True,” John replied.

“The flu... they blame it on us,” Ian said darkly. “I wonder
about that.”

There was some dark talk about the illness, was it really the flu
or an STD, or worse.

“It doesn't matter,” Franx said firmly, waving a hand to cut the
discussion off. John nodded. Discussing that wasn't productive.

“Do your job, whatever they assign you. Don't muck around, and
don't drag ass. They are just looking for some excuse to beat the crap out of
you,” Franx said, turning to John. “You're going to get beat a lot the first
week, just to show you who's boss. Get over it. Don't hunch up or it'll go
worse for you. Try to protect your head and torso as much as you can.”

“John nodded.

“The bastards love to find something, anything to use as an
excuse to torture... I mean
punish
you for some transgression.” His face
went bleak and angry for a moment. John noted the long lines and crow's feet.
He revised Franx's age upward by at least a decade. “Whipping is a favorite way
of dealing out discipline to the slaves and crew. It depends on the guy doing
it. Some sick bastards...” he shivered ever so slightly and wiggled his ass.

John winced, not sure he wanted to know more. Hell, certain he
didn't.

“Admiral, the two fleets act like a probe in force; sent out to
steam roll the sector. If they hit anything hard enough to stop them, like oh,
Pyrax, they send back word,” Sprite interjected in the lull. “We need to warn
Pyrax.”

“Speculation,” he texted back. “Later.”

He listened as the prisoners described some of the tastes of the
Horathians.

The pira
tes
raped the crew on their off time, men and women alike. Fortunately they hadn't
had any off time in two weeks. The pressure was building up, Irons realized,
when they did finally get the go ahead to unwind, it would be ugly for the
prisoners.

He listened to them relate some of the things that had happened; glad
he had cybernetics to hold down his gorge.

Most of the aliens and Neo's were used as toys for the sadists.
Any who refused to play were either tortured or were thrown out an airlock. By
now there were only a couple of neo chimps and two genie humans left on the
prison ships, or so they had heard. Some of the victims had given up hope and
managed to go out on their own terms, committing suicide in one way or another
to deny the Horathian's the satisfaction of watching them die. After one chimp
had killed a Horathian and then committed suicide, they had taken out their ire
on the survivors, making it a point that if any prisoner harmed one of them ten
of the prisoners would be tortured to death.

Refusing to eat was a slow death. “There are plenty of others here
who would gladly take your food. A few were refused food for one reason or
another. We watched them die,” Franx said.

“Yeah, that's not happening,” Sprite, said to the Admiral.

“Happy accidents are another way. But you have to be sure it won't
leave you alive,” a man next to Franx said. “Had that happen to a guy. Welsh.
He tried to fry himself. He survived, but his arms were baked. They dumped him
in here, all stinking of burnt flesh. It took him days to die. It was horrible
to see him. I wished they'd put him out of his misery,” he said roughly,
turning away. “We all did, but they wouldn't.”

The casual sadism from some of the Horathians was the only fresh
entertainment on the ship. Apparently the crew took bets on fights and other
acts. Betting on how long a victim would stay conscious as they were beaten or
tortured was a favorite.

Flogging was a favorite punishment. So strapping a furry Neo or
alien with fur or feathers to an X frame and then shaving them or forcing
another slave to pluck the victim's hair one at a time. Then they would either
be left to recover to start the process all over again, or they would go on to
even more sadistic things.

They had quickly learned not to help their alien or Neo brethren.
Any who did was labeled an alien lover and was brutally punished. Sometimes
they were forced to watch or participate in the tortures, or were subjected to
them themselves if they protested.

What got to some of the prisoners was that over time a few of
their former comrades went over to the other side. Some willingly went, some
reluctantly. The Horathian's were keen on skills. They also liked anyone who
parroted the party line. But they'd draft anyone who seemed young enough and
then subject them to their own form of indoctrination.

Apparently the draftees didn't start out sadistic bastards, they
were usually sick during such encounters, at least at first. But then, a
combination of social pressure, drugs alcohol, and time seemed to wear their
sense of right and wrong down. Eventually they cheered on as well.

He could understand the psychology in a way; they were trying to
fit in to survive. To keep a low profile, not stand out. If everyone was a
sadist, then be a sadist. The one eyed man wasn't king here. The man with a
conscience here didn't last long.

“So, why the MC? Why brig a master Chief? He really had to have
stepped in it.”

“If you are thinking the enemy of my enemy is my friend, don't
bother. It's not like that
.
They are heavy on discipline,” Sindri rumbled.

“When the flu or whatever first broke out, the ill enlisted
Horathians had been initially denied medical provisions, just like the
prisoners, something that had stuck in the craw of the master Chief. He had
been overheard acidly making comments about it and wound up here for his loose
insubordinate talk. He had no problem with denying the draftees or the slaves
supplies, but not their
own
people. Reserving the best supplies for
officers only hadn't set well with him either.”

“Oh.”

“The exec had even requested a formal court martial the officers
commented, but the current Captain had turned him down and performed a
Captain's mast. He's here for another week or 'until he changes his tune'. They
put the MC in charge of the prisoners.”

“Right,” John replied. “So, confronting me was supposed to be his
way of what? Establishing his authority?”

“Yeah,” Ian said. He smiled crookedly. “You messed that up.”

“High school self defense class,” John said when Franx looked at
him curiously. “It's saved my ass in a few bars and on the docks a couple of times.”

“I see,” Franx replied. “Well, you certainly put the cat amongst
the pigeons as my father used to say. Expect a call from the Captain soon
enough,” he said.

“Lucky me,” John replied dryly.

Hearing Bard return to consciousness, John turned his attention
to him. The big man was back on his feet, glaring at John warily. John returned
the stare with a courteous but blank face, making the MC turn and cover his
disquiet with a cough.