New Edit: Chapter 39: Interlude 4: Flowerchild

Chapter 39: Interlude 4: Flowerchild
The head waiter most likely was a Stellaris, judging him by his chrome metallic shimmering skin underneath the perfectly tailored tuxedo. Hafez Safar's slightest gesture was noticed and the waiter came over to his table. "I hope you enjoyed your pan seared Ilasian goat filet."

"Very much so!" Hafez agreed and wanted to order desert. The waiter snipped his metallic fingers and a Garbini flowed to the table on its lower four walking tentacles, clearing the table and preparing it for desert in a spectacular ballet of tentacles and with speed and accuracy. Hafez wondered how long it took for the auto dresser to figure out how to alter a Tuxedo to fit a Garbini. He ordered the Tiramisu and leaned back. From his table and across the candle and brass lamp lit, old Terra décor restaurant he had a spectacular view into deep space and the famous incredibly beautiful Horse Head Nebula in the Orion Constellation. The restaurant was inside a Deep Space Way station between the Orion and the Sagittarius Arm and still 79 light years away from that nebula, just at a perfect spot to see it in its entire size with the naked eye. No one, so it was said could look at the nebula and not have a religious experience. Hafez agreed it was beautiful but to him the fine meal and the bottle of wine were much more important. The best part of it he would be on Para-Para in a few days, relaxing on the white beaches and under the double sun, with his new name and eat fine meals for the rest of his life. Thanks to the 5 million Credits now on a cash equivalent Credit strip he carried in his pocket.

Only six weeks ago he would have been able to afford such a meal perhaps once a month and was slaving for Megabix Corporation in a close to the ground fourth floor office with thousand other GalNet Network Engineers supporting the enormous popular Virtu Emotion Game Series. A Game series that was so successful, it catapulted Megabix only five years ago into the top twenty list of the Ultra Gig Corps. It was a pure chance that the security system was down and he could slip in the otherwise off limits test lab, snatch the latest, not yet released version and sell it to Bootleg-It, a company on Sin 4 where Union Law had no meaning. That his theft had cost Megabix billions of credits in revenue and caused more than two thousand employees lose their jobs, was unfortunate but it didn't concern him much, he was rich now and that was the only thing important. He had purchased a new ID and CITI after getting such services via a Connector.Hafez paid for the meal and strolled with no particular hurry down the main concourse of the station. The luxury clipper that would take him to Para-Para was not due till late tomorrow. He planned his escape well and crisscrossed around Union space now for the last five weeks and no one would be able to find him.

He purchased a High Res Holo Print and a T shirt from a souvenir shop and watched a human female struggle with a broken heel of her stiletto shoes and since he was human as well he found the blonde hourglass shaped girl with the dangerously short tube top dress quite alluring and walked over. "Nice shoes!"

She smiled at him and had gorgeous blue eyes. She was exactly his type! She almost looked like Annie the girl he dated in VirtuEmotio. Anna was a simulation. That girl looking even better was flesh and blood and even smelled good. "Oh if you can help me hobble to my room. I think I strained my ankle a little. That would be great."

He offered his arm and her skin and touch felt warm and soft and while Anna was all these things, to know the girl was real was enticing. He followed her instructions down a short side corridor and then she suddenly pushed him, across a yellow and black striped section on the floor. She was much stronger than she looked and he stumbled three steps, a hissing sound behind him as an Ultronit partition shot up, He saw the blonde through a transparent panel and he heard her voice through a field speaker. "Do you really think you can get away after what you did?"

"Well so arrest me! I know my rights."

"I am a Solution Provider and not the police. Bye, bye Mr. Safar formerly known as Jim Hollwarth. I wonder how long that brandy you had after dinner will keep you warm out there!"

Now he realized where he was, this was an emergency air lock. "You can't do that! That is murder!"

"Exactly Mr. Hollwarth, I am glad we agree on that, since this is what I got paid for to do!"

The wall before him disappeared and there was nothing he could hold onto. The coldness was so instant it felt like burning him! His lungs expanded, the water in his eyes froze and so did the saliva and moisture in his mouth and throat. Hollwarth saw the blonde waving with a cold smile before his vision blurred out.

The blonde watched the bloated body carried by the initial momentum float towards the Horse Head Nebula. She found it funny he still held the Holo and wore his new T shirt. It was quite conceivable Jim would make it there by the time some of the new stars forming in that celestial dust and energy cauldron became real suns.

Satisfied, she returned to her own rooms at the station’s Hotel, she had no trouble now walking in her heels and the stiletto extension was once more firmly attached. In her rooms however, she tossed the uncomfortable shoes onto the bed, along with the long blond wig and the bio-flex mask, shook the long silver hair open; then after a shower, she slipped into a fluffy robe and sat before the GalNet Terminal.

Her genetic data and her menta-print accepted, she was now connected to the highly secure Comm Exchange of her guild. She used to be a freelancer but for six years now, she was an active Solution Provider for the Violent Mothers Association. Sure she was not as independent anymore but the VMA made up for it with steady work contracts, guaranteed pay and no hassle with customers. You got your mission, completed it and cashed in. In addition to good travel arrangements, access to a weapon delivery network and nice costumes and fun entertainment at the annual company picnic.

She uploaded the recording of the last execution and moments later the visual of VMA One appeared. The beautiful large eyed creature with almost impossible long flowing hair and delicate facial features and the flimsy dress was of course a virtual generated avatar and the First Mother looked completely different in real life, but then her Image displayed at the other end was equally misleading, she had chosen the Avatar body of a talking Flower as it fit her handle Flowerchild well.

The delicate Elfin creature spoke. "Well done Flowerchild. I have transferred your bonus."

"It was simple this time. The fool left a trail so wide a blind Nul could follow."

"Are you ready for a break or do you care for a new mission?"

"The last one was not very exhausting and I am saving up for a Red Ferrari Rosso Speciale. So what do you have?"

"Your client, a patriarch of a family business, on Union world Nilfeheim. It is an open end service contract and might include a few neutralizations. It's a Type 191 P, so I thought of you that should be right up your alley."

"Standard pay?"

"Standard plus 5 percent."

"Make it Standard plus 12 and we got a deal"

"That leaves me no profit at all. Take eight or I send it on to someone else."

"You are the shrewdest pixy this side of Disney Planet. Alright send the details. I take it."

Brunar already had a female scientist working for him, so he didn't mind dealing with another one. This one came prepared, he had to admit, she wore the dress of a Freewoman and had her hair done the local way. He was even more impressed as she talked in the distinctive Nilfeheim dialect, Union Standard heavily laced with Ancient Nordic and pronouncing the "r's" and "s'es" much heavier than most Off-Worlders did. At first he thought she was indeed a local but he did not only pick her up at the Xchange where she had arrived inside a shipping crate along with two Anti Tech projectors and a few other Off-World things he decided to order to protect his business. Any doubt that she was a local vanished as she installed the projectors in no time in two of his subs. Despite her local appearance she had the flair of someone who got things done and without scruples.

She had listened to his troubles and then suggested a course of action he also agreed upon. She was expensive and charged by the day, but she was worth it!

Ulfred Lindbergh stood in the tiny control room of Sea Snake Three, the newest and biggest Hunt Sub of the Lindbergh clan. New was of course a relative term as this boat did already more than fifty years of service, but Subs were very expensive and only perhaps thirty clans still had Hunt subs. The boat was a reliable piece of New Sweden technology. Like most subs on Nilfeheim it was kept clean and scrubbed and the boat owners prided themselves to always have the boats well painted. On the other hand real engineers were rare, Clan sons did not want to learn Off-World technology and get their hands dirty with manual labor and Freemen did not go to any further schooling after basic school was completed, so the technical knowledge was usually handed down in a practical apprenticeship. Not that there was really much to do. The reactors were guaranteed to produce power for 500 years and most sub accidents happened when the boat hooked a big Tyranno, and not hitting the mark, but even that was rare.

Normally the Sea Snake should be on her way to the Uhim grounds and hook a few Tri Fins or a Tyranno or two, but instead of going south they went north east towards the Bendixen grounds. There was nothing really special there so it seemed. The Bendixens fished and harvested crabs and shellfish for generations and never been an important or rich clan, but ever since Brunar had taken over that had changed. That upstart arrived at the last Clan Leader meeting in a brand new Saab Lux-454 flier, and purchased no less than five brand new Submarines in only ten years. Not hunting subs but models with manipulator arms to tend their underwater crab farms. Everyone knew the colorful catalogs displayed at the Xchange Café with the latest Submarine models one could order. Those Manipulator boats cost almost 2 Million Credits each. All this sudden wealth and the generous gifts Brunar had showered the Elders with to get his father elected went along with the Bendixens asking the Circle of Elders to declare the Bendixen grounds legal real estate. He already had set up buoys in the Bendixen colors and banners warning trespassers. Oceans on Nilfeheim were free and no one was allowed to declare a part theirs.

If this would be allowed, then someone else could claim the Uhim Grounds private!

There had to be something there that explained both the sudden wealth and the wish to keep others away. Adolph, his father, told him to take a closer look. Today he would not back down and float all the way to Bendixen Rock and check out what was so special about the ocean grounds there.

He was now less than a klick away from the first Bendixen buoy. The computronic enhancing the sonar images to a clear two dee read out showed three of the five manipulator boats busy with cage boxes. The Bendixens had leveled the rocky ocean floor and large Duro-Crete foundations with even rows of hundreds of pillars on each. Some of these concrete pillars were encrusted with shellfish and immobile crabs. The light flickered and the Sonar suddenly went dark. Now the light went out completely! He didn't even know they had emergency lighting until now as the red lights came on. "What in Odin's name? Who of you idiots leaned on the light switch panel?"

Magne the forty year old Freeman who was the boat’s engineer came up the ladder. "The reactor is out! We have no power. The red lights flickered now and then it was completely dark. Ulfred and his small crew suddenly felt fear. There were no emergency procedures; no one had ever drilled for an emergency evacuation procedure. They weren't even deep enough to be really dangerous for them. They all were Neo Vikings and even though some of them had not taken a dive since their childhood, they still had gills, but not even the Engineer of the boat knew that there actually was an emergency exit. The handle for it had been cut off and hatch painted over with many layers of paint, there even was an emergency blow out valve that would release pressurized air into the ballast tanks. It was a mechanical valve and not affected by any electronic system failure, but the purpose for the red painted hand wheel had been lost with the engineer’s handbook ever since the previous engineer threw all manuals out, as he didn't like to read and the manuals took room away.

The boat sank towards the ocean floor. Even though it was not very traditional, Ulfred had a modern PDD connected to GalNet. PDD's that could connect to GalNet from anywhere in Union Space were very expensive, almost unknown on Nilfeheim. The Elders considered the uncontrolled exchange of Off-World ideas the worst threat to Nilfeheim Culture and prohibited the use. Ulfred could not explain why this reliable piece of tech was as dark as the rest of the boat. Magne remembered that the air system did more than just make the air cold or hot; it also refreshed it with oxygen and removed Carbon monoxide.

Ulfred and his small crew suffocated about six hours later, shortly after that the lights came back on.

Bendixen had to bite his lip to prevent the gleeful smile creeping on his face as he landed his at the exchange, a large crowd had gathered by the wharf. One of the Olafson subs had towed in the white and red painted Sub of the Lindbergs. It was one of his boats who had reported the drifting sub on via Nilfeheim Radio.

He counted eight Elders and at least nine Clan Chiefs among a throng of Freemen, Low Men and workers. Adolph Lindberg and Isegrim Olafson stood in the first row as men carried the five bodies on shore. Bendixen suddenly realized that he went too far, as he saw the faces of the suffocated men. One of them was Adolph's Firstborn. The Tech Stop had worked just as promised, he expected the men to escape and swim to the surface. He wanted the Lindbergs to lose a boat or two, not five men. But then he steeled himself inside and thought business is business and he wanted to play with the big boys from beyond the clouds. It was their fault for snooping so close. The plan he had agreed upon and paid the Off-World woman to execute had just unfolded and he knew these were only the first dead in a new war, not fought openly and with honor, but underneath the surface with Off-World tricks and tech.

Adolph Lindberg's face was as hard as the rock he lived on and then looked in Bendixen's direction and all he did was cramp his fist around the hilt of his sword.

Brunar walked over and wanted to offer his underarm and offer his condolence, but Adolph turned his back. But Isegrim Olafson, who was even among his peers a very powerful presence, spoke. "Five men died like magic and without apparent reason not very far from what you claim your waters. We will investigate and if this is anything else than an accident be assured we will find out."

Brunar did not feel as gleeful as he left the gathering and went back to his flier, but he decided to sink a few more Subs of the Olafsons and the Lindbergs and anyone else coming close, just this time he would not leave any evidence behind.