Collision of Worlds - Chapter 13

Oliver watched his friend disappear into the garishly decorated hover car with his new bride, waving at the wedding guests who cheered them on. Jim was smiling. Oliver tried to think back to another time he’d seen his friend so happy and realized he couldn’t. Jim Crater might be entering into a sham marriage, but he was thrilled about it.

And why wouldn’t he be? He was getting what he really wanted, which was a new fleet of Galleon Class starships. They were old, bulky and poorly designed, but they flew. Right now the crews were at half capacity, which meant Jim would be able to hire on virtually anyone he wanted to build his own naval force. Jim had already put Oliver in charge of half of the fleet and taken the largest vessel as his flagship.

But even that paled in comparison to everything else that had happened in the preceding three months. Ever since Margaret Cortet announced the upcoming marriage and support for Admiral Jim Crater, they had been receiving daily requests for other ships to join their fleet. It seemed that now, when things were on the rise, everyone wanted to be involved in the new Admiral’s business. People that would have laughed—and did—at Jim nine months ago were pledging ships and a lifetime of support. For many, it was their second pledged lifetime.

It had taken Oliver a few days to convince Jim to let him handle the negotiations. They would be tricky at best, and having an angry man in the mix wouldn’t help anyone. Jim’s gut reaction was to blow those merchants and nobles off for making a mockery of him before the sudden turn of events.

What would he want their support for? They had proven themselves unreliable manipulators at best, struggling to upend his operation. But finally Jim had acquiesced and Oliver was left to negotiate with the nobles and bureaucrats. Now their small fleet was growing almost daily. It was already numbering at forty warships and a combined crew of almost nineteen thousand men and women.

Oliver was thrilled about the turn of events. Now he held a seat of power on the third most powerful fleet in the Indeil Kingdoms. They couldn’t begin to compete with the other Admirals militarily, but that didn’t matter. The other Admirals had no interest in taking jobs for profit, feeling it was a lesser endeavor left to lowlifes and scum.

Oliver, with Jim’s blessing, was already setting up their ships on weekly trading routes, moving goods. He’d even begun picking at his contacts in Terminus to try and set up long term trade deals that could make a fortune. Suddenly, his business possibilities seemed only limited by his imagination.

The thought made Oliver smile. He had quite the imagination.

Now that the bride and groom were off on their honeymoon—Oliver was mildly curious what that would entail…evidently Margaret had spoken of a desire to have children, though perhaps through a surrogate—the party quickly dispersed.

People headed for their own hover cars while a crew of sixty went about the business of cleaning up. Oliver made his way toward the exit, pulling his pipe out of his pocket and struggling to ignore his own depression.

Elizabeth had been at the party as one of the bridesmaids, looking elegant and wonderful in a silken green dress that matched the bride’s hair. Unfortunately, her brother was also at the wedding, and she had no choice but to leave as a member of his entourage. She’d had no problem, he noted, pretending he was a bug underfoot.

The thought made him bitter, and he tried to remind himself that he didn’t love her anyway.

You were never good at lying to yourself, part of him whispered. That same part told him that Elizabeth would be the only woman he loved from this point forth. He knew that she had some feelings for him, but he couldn’t imagine a way of making the relationship last. At least not with Hektor Menschen in the picture. Oh, how he hated that man. I’d kill him, if it would let me have his sister…

Instead he offered the advice of making Hektor groomsman. Politically it was a brilliant move. The offer was a powerful gesture of mending fences and building alliances. Yet he wasn’t disappointed when Jim refused. There were some fences that could stay broken.

At least Jim had been willing to deal with the other Admiral. Brutus Volt had never really objected to Jim’s position. He was a quiet man, older and more seasoned. He avoided politics like the plague. Oliver convinced Jim to make Brutus his best man. Jim tried to refuse Brutus, as well. Best man, Jim claimed, belonged to Oliver and Oliver alone.

But Oliver had been insistent. This was the time to create bonds of friendship that would last a lifetime, and offering the position of best man to Brutus was a generous offer.

And Brutus clearly appreciated the honor. He gave Jim an expensive wedding gift: an Urca Class starship; a huge hulking behemoth incapable of fighting but with triple the cargo space of any other ship they had.

Oliver paused at the exit of the enormous auditorium, aware that someone was watching him. It was a short man with scrawny arms and legs and a big belly sitting at a table on the other side of the hall. He beckoned for Oliver to join him.

“What’s this now?” Oliver mumbled softly, walking across the hall.

The lights dimmed in the hall, casting them in gloom.

The cleaning crews were making the rounds, but otherwise the place was empty. There were still enough people that Oliver doubted he was in danger, but he had a butterfly knife in his pocket nonetheless.

His solid-bottomed boots clicked against the auditorium floor as he strode to the table. He sat down without acknowledging the other man and lit his pipe. The building was virtually covered with no smoking signs.  Oliver had a habit of ignoring those signs. He was a member of the upper echelon now. Such signs didn’t apply to him.

Or at least that’s what he told himself. In either case, no one ever brought it up. He inhaled a puff of tobacco and sized up the man sitting opposite him. He wore an expensive suit, but the pants hung too low around the ankles while the sleeves were too short. A rental. Definitely not sized properly. Up close, he seemed nervous and out of sorts, refusing to make eye contact. Not a noble.

Oliver scanned his memory of the invitation list. The security teams were diligent, so no one whose name wasn’t on that list could get in. Most guests were either part of the Royal Family or close friends, which meant there were only three people who weren’t noble born—excepting himself and Jim, of course. One guest he knew well from his time on the streets, and another was a woman. That left one possibility.

“Antonio Rolins,” Oliver said, leaning back in the chair and crossing his leg at the knee. The man made no move, but the tensing at his shoulders made it clear Oliver was correct.

“Have we met? You must have an excellent memory,” the man said softly.

No, and my memory isn’t very good either. But I am very, very good at what I do, Oliver thought. Out loud: “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“I was asked to give you something,” the man explained, pulling a data pad out of his pocket. He passed it across the table to Oliver. “I represent a man named Victor Foley. Vic for short.” Oliver set his pipe between his teeth and scrolled through the images.

“What am I looking at?” he asked through his teeth.

“The first three images are of a meeting between Sir Rodrik Fulk and another man at Sir Rodrik’s estate on Geid. The other images are from a luncheon those same men had three days ago on Immis. Sir Rodrik showed up to the meal in disguise. The other man, we’ve learned, is a member of the Planetary Union.”

Oliver set the data pad on the table. “I’m assuming you have another reason to hinder my sleep than to show me a few pictures,” he said.

His unaffected attitude had the desired response, putting the man further off guard. Antonio had come here specifically to show Oliver those pictures, but the conversation wasn’t going how he intended.

The images did bother Oliver, but he wasn’t about to admit that. Not yet at least. He had a fairly good idea why this man was here, but he didn’t want to allow an assumption to sneak up and bite him in the ass. There were too many times in the past that had happened.

“They…um…the Union is trying to…invade…” Antonio struggled for words.

“Invade a diner?” Oliver asked, adding a note of incredulity to his voice. “In fact, I think I recognize it as Freemont’s Café,” he added, picking the data pad up and scrolling to a particular image. “If they do invade, we can only hope they kill the baker.”

“Please take the...uh…data pad to Mr. uh…Sir Crater,” Antonio mumbled, standing up. “We have begun forming a resistance movement to keep the Union out of our kingdom, but…”

“You need money,” Oliver finished for him. The man hesitated and then nodded firmly, regaining some confidence.

“Yes, we need money. And from everything I’ve heard, Jim Crater is quite sympathetic to our cause.”

Oliver waved his hand dismissively and stood up. “Different times my friend. It’s one thing to run warships out of our system and quite another to spend money needlessly against a never-ending conspiracy.” Oliver picked up the data pad and slipped it into his pocket, then offered his hand to the man. “But you have my word that the information will make it to my friend.”

The man shook his hand and reached into his jacket pocket, trembling slightly. “Well if he decides to uh…we will call you in a few days—”

“If we decide anything, we will contact you,” Oliver affirmed, his tone making it clear that there would be no debate on the issue. The man looked like he wanted to object—it was clearly not the parameters he was sent to negotiate—but he didn’t dare to.

Oliver nodded to the man and strode out of the auditorium. He felt more than a little annoyed by the entire situation.

He’d been expecting something to happen. The Union had shifted tactics in the last two years. They didn’t return with warships, but a number of tradesman had shown up on the planet with unheard-of weapons and trinkets. Oliver hadn’t signed any deals with them—the Royal Family declared anyone who did a traitor, and he couldn’t afford to get caught—but he knew it was a thriving business. And it would only grow. People could say what they wanted about national pride, but everyone had a selling point.

But he was a little bothered that it was happening so quickly.

He would have to look into the details before passing the message on to Jim, but he was already sure what the truth of the matter was: The Union was biding its time for another big push, and the Royal Family wouldn’t stand up to them. Jim would, though. Hell, he might ask to run the resistance group.

Oliver sighed. He might as well start making plans for it in the budget.