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Post by Evangeline on Sept 1, 2008 20:56:53 GMT -5
The pirate boat had sailed out from the south shore of Indonesia, making its course to the stretch of ocean between Australia and New Zealand. It had been perhaps fifteen years since the caldera blew, with its catastrophic effects all over the globe. Only in the southern hemisphere did much of human, animal and vegetable life persist as they had prior to the disaster. Of course, the destruction of superpowers and any central authority had given rise to the inevitable human predators who took advantage of other survivors.
The twenty-odd men on the old trawler were stone-eyed veterans of numerous raids - looting, rape and murder were as routine to them of a morning as breakfast. With money now of little value, their interests went to provisions, material, and slaves, for a thriving trade in all three had sprung up in the lawless regions bordering the dead zones to the north. Australia, New Zealand, Patagonia and South Africa had all come to fear such reavers.
About mid-morning, amid calm breezes and unusually good visibility, the lookout clinging to the top of the mast signalled to his fellows. A ship! He yelled down the approximate heading and screamed to the rest of the crew to arm up. If it was what it looked like, it could be a bonanza!
The "captain" throttled up the engine, hoping that the lookout was right, because he hated to waste precious fuel for nothing. After a minute of straining his eyes on the horizon, he spotted the looming shape, something he thought he'd never see again.
Container ship. BIG one. Not derelict. He screamed at the others to get ready and to man the .50 gun mounted on the trawler's bows as the helmsman set an intercept course. These things took ages to maneuver. They were sitting ducks! The rest of the crew went for guns, machetes, ropes and grappling hooks as they drew nearer.
Just then, a noise they hadn't heard in years dopplered in from the distance. They wrenched their heads around as a helicopter - a damned helicopter - swung in on their stern from the west. The captain remembered what it was.
A Pave Hawk. Cabin open, several men waiting inside with their own guns. But about the helo itself, there was something VERY anomalous... in place of open cockpit space and glass in the front, there was only opacity. The "windows" were white and topped by highly mobile and flexible shades. Two cold blue dots moved in them.
Like... eyes.
A ship's horn sounded, not that of the cargo vessel.
Dammit, a FRIGATE!
("Let's get out of here!") the pirate captain shouted. ("We're gonna get f***ing killed!")
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Post by elizar on Sept 1, 2008 21:07:30 GMT -5
"Lazaro!" Aron bounded up the stairs to the bridge. Though it was not what one would imagine it. There was for instance a lack of controls, and most of the instruments were readouts.
"Marisa just confirmed, it's those pirates the NZ Coasties warned us about." Aron flipped on few monitors to get the short-band video signal that was transmitted from the helicopter, Chief Petty Officer Marisa Yoland. "Sailing under Islamic flag, I guess things have changed since we were here last time.
"They're rabbiting." Aron said as registering the slight movement of the boat. "Think it's worth the chance to pursue them?"
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Post by Evangeline on Sept 1, 2008 21:16:56 GMT -5
Lazaro's eyes were like black ice. "I don't like pirates." He listened to Marisa's report on the radio. "Don't think she cares for them either. Wants to let the guys have at'em." He went to a phone on the readout console. "Captain Urqhart?"
"Here." the frigate's voice answered. "Chrylser, that tub is reeking, I can smell that stench all the way downwind. Anyway, I have no objections to you blokes doing a public service, but if we can catch at least a few of them alive, we can find out if there's any others."
A forklift hailed the men. "We can get the inflatable ready for you."
Lazaro turned back to Aron, his voice low and deadly. "Wanna bounce heads?"
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Post by elizar on Sept 1, 2008 21:26:11 GMT -5
"I'm just hoping they are cowards enough not to resist." Aron crossed his arms. He had for the past five years practiced with firearms, and only once he had gotten the chance to use it against a live person. It had been much easier than he thought.
"Alright, let's do some brownnosing for New Zealand." He said as he checked the safety on his sidearm. "If things have really regressed, they are not only after loot and treasure, they are after slaves as well." He looked at Lazaro. "Just repeating something you probably know already. So we have to make sure what's in that boat."
"And here I was hoping this trade agreement could go smoothly."
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Post by Evangeline on Sept 2, 2008 11:30:51 GMT -5
There were thirty other humans assembling on the main deck with their weapons, armor and gear. Mostly young they were, mere children at the time of "the blowup" and the process that took their refuge over to the Carsverse, which was still not fully understood even by those that initiated it. It had taken an Amberite's assistance to bring this expedition back over to the ruined earth to scout for any remnants of civilization. The two nuclear subs initially guided across reported signs of life in the southern hemisphere, though considerably reduced from pre-blowup levels. And, inevitably, the breakdown of civilization encouraged human predators to come out and play. To Lazaro, dealing with such miscreants was in the same category as dispatching mad dogs, an unpleasant but necessary task.
"No such joy this time," Lazaro shrugged in response to Aron. On his way out of the "bridge", he responded to the radio transmission. "Marisa, if they so much as look cross-eyed at you guys, feel free to splat a few."
"Understood."
The frigate, Captain Colin Urqhart of the Royal Australian Navy, was heaving to, his upper lip curling back in distaste at the stench blowing from the trawler. A part of his mind wondered what those wretches aboard the inanimate vessel were making of him and Marisa, right now. At this distance, his true nature would become evident to the pirates, and how would they react to a ship whose bows boasted great jaws and rows of sharp teeth? He could crunch that hulk to fragments with those alone, never mind the bow guns. But if they had to catch some of these sapient vultures alive, so be it.
Aboard the old trawler, eyes were widening as they fixed on the frigate. Like the helicopter, it had eyes and jaws, like something out of a child's storybook, but the look in their eyes and the show of their teeth revealed explicit and deadly intentions.
The pirate captain turned as he heard a burst of fire from his own vessel's bow. One of his crewmen wasn't waiting to see what would happen next, but was slinging a volley with the deck-mounted machine gun.
The response came from the men riding in Marisa's open cabin, in the form of chattering gunfire from three suppressor-shrouded muzzles. In a few short seconds, there was very little left of the gunman. Panic ran through the rest of the brigands like a wave of sick terror. Some were scrambling for the much-patched Zodiac lashed to the aft deck, some were firing futilely into the air, one went overboard.
On Urqhart's deck, as the inflatable was being lowered, Lazaro smiled humorlessly at the scene playing out before him and turned to Aron. "Ready to party down?"
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Post by elizar on Sept 2, 2008 12:38:49 GMT -5
"No one's really ready for battle." Aron replied. "But I'm sure I'm ready as I can be." Aron donned on his Kevlar vest. He checked his ammo and his gun, sure of that it would not jam. It was just half year old, fabricated just for human use. It had taken some trial and error, but they had finally gotten a working model which was then manufactured. It was an assault rifle designed for human use, higher powered while maintaining a compact design. It was for the humans to hunt down any wild animals pestering them, and the rifle had seen its uses.
Aron went down in the inflatable after Lazaro. A glass guard made of bullet-resistant glass was between those aboard and the trawler, but it looked like no one was noticing the small boat approaching, as the pirates were either focused on getting inside for safety or trying to bring down Marisa. The inflatable approached to the end of the boat. The trawl doors were open, either by incompetence of the pirates or a byproduct some sick idea of theirs of punishment. There were few pirates by the end but they were focused on the loud noise from Marisa to have noticed their extra visitor. That distraction paid dearly as the occupants in the boat opened fire.
The boat was heaved up while others stood watch, and once it was secured, they came to the deck and opened fire. An opportunistic sniper was on the docking bridge, but was spotted long time before he could prepare his rifle. Eyes scanned the deck, and "Deck Clear!" was shouted by several men as no threat was left on the deck.
Aron looked up at the bridge but didn't see any movement. He was near Lazaro, even though it was more logical that someone at his age would be sticking to the younger men. "We're not done yet." He said. "It can't be all of them."
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Post by Evangeline on Sept 2, 2008 13:10:31 GMT -5
Lazaro scanned the deck again. Seven unquestionably dead, four wounded, six unhurt, but surrendering frantically in the face of overwhelming force. "There were twenty on deck. That leaves three."
A second group of humans poured on board to secure the deck, pilot house and prisoners while the first group tossed CS canisters into the hold and below areas to flush the holdouts, then entered with gas masks on and weapons at the ready, shouting in phonetic Indonesian, Thai and Chinese for the last three to surrender.
Capt. Urqhart continued to observe the operation, confiding to the other ships in the line, "Never thought I'd have good things to say about tear gas, but it sure beats what it was smelling like before."
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Post by elizar on Sept 2, 2008 14:13:46 GMT -5
Aron helped with tying up the surrendering pirates as the last three came out with their hands in the air, followed by some of those in Aron's team. He lifted up his radio to speak to communications at Urqhart.
"We have nine pirates who surrendered, four injured, rest dead. We need to call New Zealand to find out what they do with pirates." Aron said. The thought that the pirates are executed on the spot did come to his mind. But even in the old days of cutters, pirates that surrendered had been arrested, brought to land to trial and most of them hanged on land.
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Post by Evangeline on Sept 2, 2008 15:45:07 GMT -5
"I'm sure the folks there will be very glad to see them." Urqhart answered. As they spoke, the surviving pirates were being bound hand and foot, lying face down on the deck beneath the guns of the boarding party. Others were searching other compartments and holds that the CS gas hadn't reached, shining gun-mounted flashlights into very dark, putrid-smelling corners.
"Other people here." a young woman called out. Her light shone into the faces of several women, asians ranging from early teens to mid-twenties, all chained short to the bulkhead. They had no clothing to speak of, and their bodies were rife with bruises, filth and what appeared to be cigarette burns One was missing an ear and two fingers. Two of them regarded the boarders with wide-eyed, indiscriminate terror, as if they expected the end to come any minute. The mutilated one seemed oddly calm. The hold itself apparently hadn't been cleaned out in ages, and the stink of sweat, excrement and fear was now as overpowering to the humans as it was to 'craft.
Lazaro waved a hand before his face as he surveyed the scene. "I've seen some g*ddam sick sh*t, but this takes the f*cking cake."
A smaller powerboat from the Carsverse version of the New Zealand coast guard federation prepared to take the pirate vessel in tow. She too grimaced in disgust as the rusty hulk was buttoned on. The pirates would remain on board for the time being. No one wanted to bring these savages onto Urqhart's well-kept decks.
"Hold on a sec, Casey." A man with shoulder-length blonde hair, clad in fatigues, leaped easily from the rescue boat's aft deck to the trawler's gunwhale. Some called him "Fabio" behind his back, but "young Julian" as his relatives back home knew him, was no lightweight. Standing up, he regarded the dead pirates as a rancher would view dead varmints. "Quite considerate of you to leave the NZ'ers enough to hang."
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Post by elizar on Sept 2, 2008 16:07:17 GMT -5
"Home isn't how we left it." Aron said to Lazaro. "I knew that the Coasties warned us about the pirates when we first told them we were coming over, but a part of me hoped not to see this." He waved to the scene.
"There's something off about this." Aron looked at the captives. "All females, but zero kids. Did we just hit a sex slave ring?" He stretched, though it was nothing much to look like. He had gone past his forty year old birthday, which generally marked the decline of human body.
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Post by Evangeline on Sept 2, 2008 16:28:29 GMT -5
"Not enough to qualify as a "shipment." Julian said to Aron and Lazaro. "Probably a few survivors from their last raid that they'd keep alive long enough to enjoy until their next big hit." Even the Amberite, with his broad experience, looked profoundly disgusted. Two were being carried out of the hold, still paralyzed with fear and shock. The third was on her own feet, standing as straight as she could as she emerged from the compartment's sitting-room confines. That was the one with the missing ear and fingers again. She paused as she came on deck, staring down at her bound captors. Then, she spit at them.
"I like the spirit of that one, she can come aboard any time." Urqhart remarked through his comlink. Cameras were recording the takedown and transmitting the event to be shared among the whole fleet.
Lazaro was in contact with the sickbay aboard Urqhart. "We've got three women here, malnourished and dehydrated, appear to have superficial injuries except for one of them missing an ear and fingers. They speak Chinese, which dialect I'm not sure."
"Got that." a woman's voice answered. "We'll be ready for'em."
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Post by elizar on Sept 2, 2008 16:50:57 GMT -5
"Well, one could hope." Aron said. His radio squaked, Marian making a general announcement that no other ships were in the area. Whoever those pirates were, they were dumb enough to be on just one ship. Apparently oil was still too expensive for each company to maintain more than one boat.
"I can't wait until we get to NZ."
By one of the restored docks, a radio operator named Anthony Todd within the Coast Guard was listening on. He had been told of that a new trading partner would come, and they had offered oil, some exotic fruit an seeds, and open to offering more if asked to. It did sound like a dream, so the general word was to be vary, but generally be good so that they wouldn't be scared away.
And now they had taken down one of the pirate ships. The speed of it had been surprising, along with professionalism.
And they were due in few hours. Frigate, cargoship, and even a helo. Where have you been the last few years?
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Post by Evangeline on Sept 2, 2008 17:44:02 GMT -5
"Amen to that." Lazaro cast his eyes towards the southern horizon. The north island would be visible in a matter of hours. The NZ coastie set herself to the unpleasant task of towing the stinking hulk, wanting to get it over with as quickly as possible.
Brett Seligmann was fifteen years older than he was when he'd first scented humans on a cool March night, but the Blackhawk, now a sergeant-major, represented the US armed forces along with his twice-removed Pave Hawk cousin, a USCG cutter, his sister-in-law Bree LeVasseur, a small squad of Army ground-rollers and the two submarine scouts. The navies of carsverse Australia and NZ had also sent emissaries, along with volunteers from their coast guard federations.
He stood atop the heliport attached to the superstructure of Park Jin, the Korean container ship who had been recruited for the expedition, who besides an aircraft carrier was the biggest g*ddam living thing that Brett had ever met in his native universe. Park also carried the army contingent, a number of scientists and technicians, and a mixed platoon of humans and 'taurcats, the latter natives of an ice age-climate world that Julian and his mother had located some time before. Even if those pirates had managed to board, they would have still received a nasty and final surprise. Some aboard were even somewhat disappointed that the commandos with Urqhart had gotten to them first. Well, maybe some other time. The Blackhawk opened a radio channel, taking stock of all the chatter between boarding party, frigates and volunteers.
"Marisa, Brett here." Brett was close enough to his relation to drop any concern about rank, especially between services. "What's the story on those pirates, now?"
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Post by elizar on Sept 2, 2008 18:08:44 GMT -5
"You know, even for the stories, I expected them to be armed to take us down. Brett." Marisa replied. "I got few dings and bruises from the potshots, but nothing serious. As for those pirates, they were heading to a raid. Easy to figure as the cargo hold is empty and only 'entertainment' on board."
"The locals say that the pirate party was of average size." Marisa said, even though for the last fifteen years her kind had been called Locals by the humans. "No one in our team died, if you were wondering. I protect my people good."
Aron climbed back into the Frigate. Captain Urqhart he reminded himself. Most of the strike team were now laying out a table to clean their weapons. Aron put his weapon in the queue, not quite certain he would do a good job of cleaning it.
Anthony held the piece of paper like if he had a Dear John letter. He had asked the Morse Code operator to redo it twice, and the operator had also asked the one on the other end to repeat few of the details. He knocked on the doors of his regional commander's office, Leroy Wells, who was to conduct the first part of the negotiations. He got to enter the office.
"Tony, your mate has already told me about that our new allies have found and dispatched of pirates." Leroy said as he saw it was Anthony.
"I know, but I just got this." Anthony said and put down the transcript. "They just sent it through the shortrange radio, Morse code.
"Makes sense, few pirates know the Morse." Leroy read through the transcript. "You are not shitting me here, are you?" He said as he was done, but already begun to read again.
"No, they started to show some sympathy when we asked them the third time to repeat the part about the cattaurs."
"We will get some of the ships nearby to rendezvous with them until they get to the dock. They aught to be able to tell if this is a joke or not." Leroy stood up and walked outside to relay that command. "Go back to your post."
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Post by Evangeline on Sept 2, 2008 19:41:20 GMT -5
"I know you do, kiddo." Brett answered. "So about this "entertainment" dare I ask? How many and in what shape?"
With the boarding party safely back on board, Urqhart blew the stink out of his capacious nostrils and went underway again, taking up the point position in the fleet. His RMNZ counterpart, Commander Rachel Lowes, brought up the rear. Between the two carsverse ANZAC class Frigates, there was more than enough firepower to put off any attackers short of a full naval group - highly unlikely now. Casey Sullivan, the volunteer rescue boat who had the unenviable duty of towing the trawler with prisoners, guards and bodies aboard, still bared her teeth with revulsion and tried not to look at the mess. Casey had been in the organization for a year now, still a baby in service terms. Turning this floating pile of junk over to the locals would be a great pleasure.
Now, as for what the locals were like, she had little idea except that they were, well, human.
"Here's the big cheese." Laurie Wieseman called out as Aron followed Lazaro into the wardroom that served as a temporary armory for the human complement. The 5-foot 11-inch redhead, best described as "statuesque", moved aside to allow him elbow and table space. Or bounced, rather. The sight of this genuinely big-boned amazon doing her good-mood "Tigger bounce" gait was enough to put pause in any man, even before he'd seen her tackle a pirate with the scruff of his neck in one hand and a pistol in the other, planting his face in the deck. The muscles developed from a lifetime of wrestling cattle and recalcitrant horses were put to good use. Presently, she cleaned her duty weapon with the elan of a stout victorian washerwoman, singing something almost irritatingly cheerful as she worked.
"Ladies, gentlemen and crew," the frigate's voice was piped in, "We've established contact with the native NZ authorities, and we expect to make landfall at 1730 hours, at which point we will rendezvous with representatives from the mainland. I would strongly recommend that certain personnel be on their best behavior. You know who you are."
It wasn't the first time that Mairi TeKani had hung by the door of the radio room to catch any tidbits of information she might glean. The clerk, a twentysomething woman of Irish-Maori ancestry, lifted an eyebrow in bedevilment at the mention of "cattaurs". What in hell was coming down the pipe here? Stepping away from the door, she re-entered the office that she shared with two other workers, doing what record-keeping there was to be done in the dusty, shambling building and cursing at the wobbly chair.
"It sounds like they've gone mad in there." she said to the other women.
"What now?" Penelope Swain, the closest thing remaining to an office manager, rolled her eyes to the ceiling as she leaned back. "How do they know it's not just another bunch of raiders?" Her hand went to the old service rifle leaned against her desk. Few shore workers went completely unarmed these days.
The third woman raised her eyes from the antiquated typewriter in front of her. If she was still nostalgic for the days of ample power and computers, she had learned to muzzle it. No one had time for reminiscing.
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