Space Mercenaries

by A. Bertram Chandler

Genres: Science Fiction; Sci-fi Action & Adventure; Alien Contact

Synopsis

Her ex-Imperial Highness of Outer Space had developed a conscience. With a well-armed space cruiser on her hands, she didn't want to sell it to just anyone - that is, anyone under Empire control. So the former Empress and her ex-space captain husband became mercenaries for GLASS - the Galactic League for the Abolition of Suppression and Slavery. Their first assignment was blockade-running, to bring antibiotics to the plague-ridden humans on Antrim, besieged by the Halicheki bird-people and ignored by the Empire. Only, this would be a ticklish business for they could not fire one shot at the Halicheki without being legally termed pirates. And although the ex-Empress and her husband were open-minded enough to try all sorts of devious tricks, the prospect of being hanged for piracy by the Empress' successor did not appeal to either of their natures...

Release date: November 26, 2015

Publisher: Gateway

Print pages: 123

Sample

I LIKE MONEY,” remarked the ex-Empress Irene. “I have always liked money. But I possess a conscience. A luxury,” she added thoughtfully, “which I can now afford to indulge.”

“Mmph?” grunted her husband, as he made a fractional adjustment to the gain control.

“When I was Empress,” she went on, “things were different. I could do, or order to be done, things that now would make me shudder. As a private citizen I can weigh the consequences—the immediate ones, I mean, not the long-range ones. It’s no longer my concern what will work out best for the Empire a hundred or a thousand years from today. But I am concerned with the effects of any action of mine upon the ordinary people now.”

Trafford sighed, and straightened up from the chart tank with which he had been tinkering. It was obvious to him that he would not be allowed to work undisturbed. He turned to look at his wife, to look up at his wife. He was a small man, compact and wiry, a typical naval officer of his day and age, while she, like all of those selected, through the years, to occupy the non-hereditary throne of the Empire, conformed to the standards imposed by the Committee, the so-called talent scouts. She did not need a crown to elevate her, physically, above general mankind. She was tall, but too beautifully proportioned ever to be described as big. An illusion of imperial robes hung about the plain business suit that she was wearing, and her gleaming hair, in which a single bright jewel rested, was a natural coronet.

Trafford regarded her not without appreciation, then demanded, “Just what is biting you, Irene?”

She collapsed gratefully into one of the control room chairs. “To begin with, Captain, you shouldn’t have to ask me. In any properly organized merchant vessel it is the Master who goes ashore on business, while the Mate stays aboard to look after the ship.”

“In the Navy,” pointed out Trafford, “business is the concern of the Paymaster Commander.”

“You aren’t in the Navy any longer. You resigned your commission. Remember? And we don’t run to a Purser in this wagon.”

Trafford sighed again, then put away his tools. He went to one of the other chairs, swiveled it so that he was facing Irene when he sat down. He filled and lit his pipe, deriving a certain pleasure from the fact that it was no longer necessary for him to request permission to smoke in the Imperial Presence. To begin with, Irene was no longer Empress. Secondly, she was his wife. Finally, she was on the Articles as Mate, while he was Master—monarch (in theory) of all that he surveyed.

He said mildly, speaking through the self-generated smoke screen, “Suppose we get all this division of responsibility ironed out now, my dear. You may be the Mate—but you are also the owner. Wanderer is your property. Therefore, it is only right and proper that you do the dickering with the ship brokers.”

“Legally speaking,” she told him, “the Master has the power to sell the ship.”

“But it’s not legalities that have you so worried. What was all that about your conscience?”

She laughed ruefully. “Yes. That’s what’s worrying me. It all seemed so simple—to hand off this alleged yacht to anybody wanting a relatively cheap warship, and then to blow the proceeds on a nice, economical little star tramp. But this is the trouble, Benjamin. The only reasonable offers for the ship are from people to whom I wouldn’t dream of selling so much as a peashooter. And it’s so damned obvious what’s behind it all. That blasted Committee has been pulling strings and dropping hints and dispensing back-handers. For example—the Empire does not, officially, approve of the Duchy of Waldegren, but the Waldegrenese have their uses. Just by behaving as they always have behaved—and always will behave until they’re taught a lesson—they deter their neighbors, the semi-autonomous Tashkent Commonwealth, from screaming too loudly for full autonomy. As Empress I had to play along—but as a private citizen I’ll see those stinking pirates in hell before I sell them my ship!”

“H’m. So that’s why the Navy was never allowed to take really strong action against Waldegren and one or two other pirate nests. …”

“Yes, my innocent Benjamin. That’s why. Of course, we had to make noises of disapproval about such things as piracy and confrontation—but we never did anything. And there were always ways and means of seeing that the more unsavory planetary governments never went short of arms and ships. …” She slumped deeper into her chair, frowning heavily. “So it looks as though our learned friend Dr. Pettigrew pushed off an urgent, top priority spacegram to his fellow Committeemen as soon as we berthed—and then, flashing his identification, demanded an audience with the Planetary Manager and dropped him a few hints. Then the P.M. did some hint dropping in his turn—to the bosses of Dolkar Hulls Incorporated, the only firm of ship brokers on this hick world. The word has been passed that the Empire will not, repeat not, be pleased if Miss Irene Smith sells her armed yacht to any buyer not approved by said Empire.”

Trafford relit his pipe. He said thoughtfully, “I wasn’t happy about this business from the start. Don’t these people think there’s something odd about a private citizen owning a vessel that’s practically a light cruiser?”

“You should know, Benjamin, that they think that every damn thing about Terrans is odd. A reptile just does not have the same thought processes as a mammal. But they realize which side their bread is buttered on, make no mistake about that. They know that they, as citizens of a frontier world, are well advised to remain on friendly terms with the people on the other side of the frontier.”

“But the Lady Eleanor is officially Empress now. Couldn’t you persuade her to put a spoke in Pettigrew’s wheel?”

“Give the wench time to recover from her brain-washing. She had a far rougher time on that hallucinogenic world than either of us. It’ll be months before she’s anything more than a puppet.”

“So what do we do?”

“Have you any suggestions, Benjamin?”

“We could lift ship and proceed to Llinifarne. …”

“Only to find that a spacegram has beaten us there, and that the brokers have been warned to play ball with the Empire, or else.”

“We could gut the ship of her armament and convert her into a cargo carrier.”

“And who’ll pay for it, Benjamin? I have, as you know, a considerable private fortune—but there wouldn’t be much of it left after a conversion job. We should have no reserves whatsoever—and we shall need reserves. I know that a small, independent operator, bucking the old-established shipping lines, is licked before he starts unless he can afford a freight war. You people in the Navy don’t know the first thing about ship management for profit. You’re far too used to signing a requisition form and then getting everything you asked for.”

“Not all the time, Irene,” protested Trafford. “Some of those petty pen-pushers in the Bureau of Supply …”

“Somebody has to look after the taxpayer’s interests.” She smiled grimly. “But all this bickering is getting us nowhere. Let’s just face the facts. We have on our hands a ship that’s at least as good as any light cruiser in your precious Navy—and the only people willing to take her off our hands, at a fair price, are a horde of bloody-minded pirates of whom neither of us approves. We also have on our hands a bunch of highly-skilled technicians who are merely on loan to me from the Navy until such time as we sell the ship. I’m surprised that they haven’t demanded that they be given passage on the same liner as Pettigrew and the prisoners. Except in times of crisis, the Navy’s not used to be being away from home for more than a week at a time.”

“Lay off the Navy, can’t you? But if it’s any comfort to you, Metzenther and Bronheim are incurable bachelors. And young Tallentire is quite happy to stay with the ship as long as Susanna’s here to hold his hand.”

“So we can keep our Engineer, our Communications Officer, and the Gunnery Boy. That’s good to know. Especially about the Gunnery Officer.”

Trafford looked at her, trying to read her expression. She was not, he decided at last, being sarcastic. But what was she driving at?

She went on, “I wonder if your friends would be willing to do the same as you—resign their commissions?”

“We can use a first class engineer, and a trained telepath. But a gunnery specialist?”

“Just an idea …” she murmured. “Just an idea. But suppose you get out of that uniform which, after all, you aren’t entitled to wear any longer, and dress up like a respectable shipmaster having a wander ashore, and come for a pub crawl with your Mate. …”

“But this chart tank …”

“The calibration’s not all that important. Come on.”

Irene was no longer Empress, but she could still give orders. Anything for a quiet life, thought Trafford, and went to his quarters to change.

FROM THE Terran viewpoint Slithila City had little to recommend it—but a climate congenial to reptiles is not likely to appeal to mammals. Trafford had made Slithila his first port of call after lifting from the planet of the hallucinogens, for only one reason: it was the nearest world with a regular service of interstellar passenger liners. He had wanted to get the prisoners off his hands—and Dr. Pettigrew, that overly conscientious Committeeman, out of his hair—as soon as possible. Too, according to the Directory of Port. Information, Slithila City boasted a reliable firm of ship brokers, No doubt the Imperial Bureaucrats still regarded Messrs. Dolkar Hulls in that light. …

A cab summoned by Susanna on the ship-to-shore telephone was waiting at the airlock by the time Trafford was ready. He was pleased that Irene—who was something of a fanatic on the subject of healthy exercise—had decided not to walk. The sky was overcast, as usual, and the thin drizzle that drifted between the low spaceport buildings and the wet, gleaming hulls of the berthed ships made the day seem far colder than it actually was. The mist hung in gray, ragged curtains from the fronds of the huge tree-ferns, condensed in clammy drops that spattered down to the apron from cranes and gantries, from the overhead structures of machines that still functi. . .