Just Missing in Action

[Velok the Younger]

Wren'Goa Station
Hypori Orbit
CIS/ASA/ACA Territory

"I want to buy this station," said Rave.

Selka Ventus took a long look around. Wren'Goa Station was the definition of unprepossessing, a conglomeration of ships and modules and lesser platforms. It expanded frequently. There were also legal and jurisdictional issues between Alli Wren and Gerion Ardik. It was, in short, a bad investment. "Seriously?"

"No, I just figured if I said it loud enough, Wren would hear me and have a heart attack."

"At which point you could acquire the station for a song."

"You know the old adage," said Rave. "War is good for business. Well, there's a corollary. Death is good for business."

 

[Ashin Varanin]

She'd worn something professional, attractive, and nondescript, her favorite sleeveless gray business dress. Even that was dressing to the nines compared to Wren'Goa Station's average denizen. "I'll have to ponder that corollary," she said, shutting the Lethewalker's airlock peremptorily. They made for the innermost parts of the station on foot, long walk though it was. "I have the feeling I could supply some evidence in one direction or the other."

Rave grimaced; Selka caught it. No further comment resulted. After a few hundred metres of pungent free trade zone, Selka cleared her throat.

"So the one hundred seventeenth. You know mental influence won't be a factor, correct?"

 

[Velok the Younger]

"As it happens, I'm not sure you're correct about that," she said to Velok Selka. "You were there and all, I accept that, but acquired resistance to a Phobis Device at close range doesn't necessarily guarantee that the one-seventeenth -- or this sample of it -- are immune to every other kind of Force-based mental and emotional influence. Not that we need it. Banners change so often around here that stability's our best selling point. Well, that and access to the discontinued gear."

"Mass-produced alchemy," said Selka, voice dry. "Irresistible."

Rave shrugged eloquently. "I bought three of the largest shipyards past the Mid Rim with my leather coat money."

"And containment contracts, and investors..."

"Point stands. Demand exists, supply just tanked; I'm still in a position to offer very good incentives to veterans, now more than ever."

 

[Ashin Varanin]

As they approached the meeting room, Selka stretched out her admittedly feeble senses to their contact. She flinched but kept walking. "I don't think incentives like that are going to make much of a dent on what's in there, Rave."

They took their seats opposite a nondescript blue-collar man in nondescript blue-collar clothing.

"Pitch it," he said without preamble.

"Pardon?" Selka asked.

"You want to hire me and fifty thousand of my closest friends. Pitch it."

 

[Velok the Younger]

Rave offered a slow nod and a handshake, which the nondescript man accepted. "All right."

She took a second too long to gather her thoughts, but when she started, she started strong.

"You and your friends are veterans, some on disability, some dishonorably discharged, many suffering from PTSD, from the one hundred seventeenth assault fleet of the Confederacy of Independent Systems. Two government upheavals in six months have left your friends wondering where their next reliable check is coming from.

"I'm here to tell you that your friends' pain is a marketable asset if I train you right. I've tested your friends at length, Commodore. The events of Polis Massa may have given your friends more than their share of trauma, but I'm certain that those events have given you, all of you, resistance to what you faced there."

 

[Ashin Varanin]

Rave pitched her situation containment services, as Selka had watched her do half a dozen times. There might be a vast difference between Akure Executive Interstellar's standard containment targets and fifty thousand former Confederate soldiers -- a fraction of the 117th, but many others were still in active service -- but Selka had to admit that AEI could probably pull this off. They'd have to contract a minor army of psychiatrists and Force healers, and Rave certainly had her own ideas about how to treat Phobis Device trauma, but the light at the end of that tunnel was a fleet whose crew was, in large part, immune to Phobis Devices and various kinds of hostile mental influence. Selka kept quiet, listening to Rave, relaxed with ankles crossed. Her attention stayed on the Commodore (a jumped-up captain who'd lost a leg and his psych rating). She quantified his responses as best she could. Torn up he might be, but he could keep a poker face in front of a Dark Master, and that said something.

 

[Velok the Younger]

The conversation turned to medical bills. Prosthetics, among other things.

"As it happens," she said at one point, thinking fondly of [member="Jared Ovmar"], part-owner of ICE, "we've worked out a preferential deal with NeuroSaav for the best prosthetics on the market. All NeuroSaav wants is the chance to recruit from your friends." Just about any corporation would kill for the chance to hire some personnel with demonstrated resistance to Phobis Devices and, to some extent, most kinds of offensive mental influence. And since ICE fell under the umbrella of AEL's fleet, it remained in Ovmar's interests to see that the bulk of the veterans wound up where Rave and her people could work with them.

"We'd need all this in writing," the Commodore said.

"Commodore, I didn't get Akure Executive Interstellar to this degree of influence by leaving important things to verbal contracts." Well, except when dealing with alchemists and others who didn't care about the legal system. "As a measure of my commitment...well, here."

She passed him a datapad.

 

[Ashin Varanin]

Selka had the immense satisfaction of watching the nondescript man's nondescript eyebrows rise through the roof. "And this is the maximum, or the guaranteed?"

"Guaranteed, Commodore," said Rave with a comparable level of satisfaction. "For families and dependents. And if you'll...here." She gestured, and the datapad flipped to a certain page. "I served, myself. I understand how important it is that nobody gets left behind."

"Rehab facility-"

"Fully funded."

"Recruitment station-"

"Here. Yes."

Selka stayed quiet throughout.

 

[Velok the Younger]

"As I said. Nobody gets left behind. If you turn to page thirty-nine, you'll see the leniency clauses, treatment timeframes..."

The presentation went on from there, and Rave became keenly aware that the Commodore was not the only listener. His eye, she sensed, was artificial, and included a holocam. He was transmitting, presumably to the other leaders of the veterans, insofar as they had leaders. She sensed no duplicity.

She did, however, feel his growing certainty that this was too good to be true.

"Your first missions would be shakedown cruises, getting you used to the ships. We fly a variety of ships from Mandal Hypernautics, Iron Crown, Silk Holdings and Santhe/Sienar. Our fleet composition is...here. Selka?"

 

[Ashin Varanin]

"Here we are," she said.

3x Corvette Interception Wing: 610m (1,830m total)
-2x Nebula-class Corvette: 180m: Speed 4/10: Hyperdrive 2: +Brawler
-5x Winter Eagle-class Recon Cutter: 50m: Speed 4/10: Hyperdrive 1: +Tiny, +Brawler

2x Frigate Interdiction Wing: 720m (1,440m total)
-1x Privateer-class Frigate: 280m: Speed 4/10: Hyperdrive 1: +Interdiction
-2x Haran'uliik-class Frigate: 220m: Speed 4/10: Hyperdrive 1.5: +Vulcan

2x Battleship Assault Wing: 2,300m (4,600m total)
-2x Keldabe-class Battleship: 750m: Speed 6/10: Hyperdrive 2: +Brawler, +Flak, +Ewar
-2x in Hanger Tegaanalir-class Patrol Ship: 50m: Speed 4/10: Hyperdrive 2:
-1x Wasp-B Heavy Cruiser: 800m: Speed 6/10: Hyperdrive 1: +Ewar broadsides, +Boarder
-6x in Hanger Okyaab-class Freighter: 90m: Speed 4/10: Hyperdrive 0.6:

1x Escorted Star Destroyer: 2,950m
-1x Permanence-class Battleship: 1,600m: Speed 8/10: Hyperdrive 1: +Carrier, +AA,
-3x Krayt-class Light Cruiser: 450m: Speed 5/10: Hyperdrive 2: +Interdiction, +AA
-2x in Hanger Tegaanalir-class Patrol Ship: 50m: Speed 4/10: Hyperdrive 2:
OR
-2x in Hanger Winter Eagle-class Patrol Cutter: 50m: Speed 4/10: Hyperdrive 1:

1x Star Destroyer Recon/Assault Wing: 1,620m
-1x Attrition-class Light Star Destroyer: 1,200m: Speed 7/10: Hyperdrive 1: +Stealth
-1x Seroth-class Frigate 'Defiance': 210m: Speed 5: Hyperdrive 1: +Artillery, +Brawler
-2x Penumbra-class Corvette: 105m: Speed 3.5/10: Hyperdrive 1: +Interdiction

 

[Velok the Younger]

"I'm sure you and your people will want to discuss all this," said Rave as the Commodore examined the assets list. "At length. But I should also mention the catch -- the mission I need you for. There's a nebula I know where entire ships, flotillas, get lost. I'm fairly sure it's because of an effect similar to what you faced at Polis Massa. I say similar; what I mean is, of the same magnitude. But not based on fear. I would never ask your people to go through that again; in fact, AEI never willingly exposing them to the effects of a Phobis Device will be in their contracts. But I believe a fleet crewed by your people can get into that nebula safely, so I can contain a very serious threat. You'll be fully briefed on the particulars if you accept a position with AEI."

Two weeks later, the deal was done. The recruitment center on Wren'Goa Station, the initial push of twenty thousand, the thirty or forty thousand to come, the prosthetics, the investments -- all well on its way.