===A7340334=

Audacious Space Traders

Episode 01: The Snow Queen of Babarossa

But before that was re-entry. As usual, the navicom beeped to engage automatic pilot, but Kaelis tabbed it off. Where was the fun in droid flying, anyway?

"Morningstar Traffic Control, this is A7340334 Crest Eagle, transmitting current flight plan and request permission to land."

Kaelis spoke as though he was a thousand times more boring. And he definitely left out the little detour he made to Beta Persei from the flight plan. This is why he had 3 navicoms: one for the official story, one for his work, and one for when either broke. None of them linked to each other or to his commset, or as hackers would call it, the Crap Gate. Because if you want shit in your systems, link them to the Crap Gate.

"Crest Eagle, Tower Four of Morningstar Traffic Control," a deep but feminine voice came on. "Flight plan accepted. Maintain present heading and flight level. Morningstar turns Crest Eagle over to Chow Men Dock Control at this time."

"Roger, Tower Four. Thank you," Kaelis replied then shut off the line. However, something else nagged at him.

"Why did that controller sound like Blaster Ririka?" Kaelis wondered aloud to his silent friend.

With no reply, the pilot shrugged the question off. He dialed his radio to a pre-programmed holo channel while shifting down the throttle stick. The inertial dampeners then sapped momentum until Crest Eagle was cruising at Mach 9.

"Chow Men Dock Control. A7340334 Crest Eagle transmitting current vectors," Kaelis said as he swiped across his navicom screen. "Estimate Chow Men one-five minutes. Chow Men special approach and landing permission, Big Man Kaelis, this date. Request approach and landing."

Kaelis did not have to wait long for a lovely sweet voice to get back to him.

"Chow Men Dock Control. A7340334 Crest Eagle. There is no such thing as Big Man Kaelis."

The holocom came on with a tall beauty of a woman, rolling eyes at him. Kaelis grinned back for it truly warmed his heart; he had been on a drought of mission right up to this, and then he found this ravishing specimen advertising on the Galactic Trade Network for an "errand runner". For example, a person like him, the best trader in the galaxy. So not only did he get his fill of wanton destruction, he's working for a looker of a boss, and he was now going to reap the rewards.

Hell yeah, this was living!

"Won't you cut me some slack, Meiling? I nearly died for you back there!"

There was a sigh.

"At least remain professional until you grind landing gear before forcing your ego on me?"

"Fine by me, Darlin'"

"Pfffp." Meiling stuck her tongue out. "Chow Men grudgingly clears A7340334 Crest Eagle to approach. Just land where you can and haul jets in here ASAP. Papa's about to blow a fuse."

"A7340334 Crest Eagle understands there is a private parking lot for me, and I've already left an impression on your pops."

"Dock Control, Crest Eagle. Can't be bothered with you."

Meiling tugged an eyelid at him, then switched to voice only.

Kaelis shrugged smugly to himself, then turned his attention back to the wispy blue planet rushing to meet him, and just waited. If the Crest Eagle was coming from some other part of the system, he'd have to adjust his angle of approach. But he programmed his navicom to drop the Crest Eagle out of hyperspace right in the sweet spot of 6.5 degrees, and his dearest did not disappoint. Humming another of Samia's tunes, Binville checked the altimeters and the relative planetary velocity, counting down each and matching the timing of both to [Seikan Hikou]. Outside, the navigation shields glowed of gold, as the superheated thin air burned against it, crackling every so often as plasma discharged from shield to cooler charge-induced air.

The utility of humming became apparent, as the Crest Eagle fell below 2970 meters per second, and 0.8 of Earth standard atmospheric depth just as the pilot took a breath for the chorus. It was cue for the next shortcut, and Kaelis pitched the craft down to 47.23 degrees. He coasted some more and ignored the rapidly rising Kelvins being fed back on to his instrument readings.

"Powering up forward concussion and omni-deflector shields," Kaelis reported as he tapped on a screen. The burning ozone was shoved aside as the force fields came on, then resumed burning at lower intensity. The temperature remained stable as the Crest Eagle fell towards the ground with a tail of shining fire.

The sensor transceiver buzzed. Someone had just actively scanned him.

"Dock, Crest Eagle. What the hell are you doing? You're going to burn up."

"Watch, and admire, my lady,"Kael replied as he tapped on a portion of his crystal displays, changing the arrangement of his instruments to a custom user interface he had programmed for ultra-fast re-entries.

The altimeter fell below 0.7 Earth standard depth, and Kaelis tapped on another graphic button.

"Extending spoilers."

The trailing ends of the Crest Eagle's broad wings began lifting as the servo drivers whirred them out to half a perpendicular off the control surfaces. Those extended as they moved, and by extension, so did the shape of the defensive fields. The frontal surface area increased as the electric flames shifted from ovoid to cylindrical. This created an effect of making the vehicle grab more air as it descended, a move aptly named 'shuttlecocking'.

The effect could be seen from the inside, as Kaelis' instruments read a brief spike in temperature before forward velocity and shield heating fell at a much faster rate than before.

"Before auto-pilot, inertial dampeners, and warp drives, when people flew through space with one thruster, this was how they returned home."

"You don't say…"remarked Dock Control.

Binville swiped at the air, calling up a holographic HUD to overlay the canopy, highlighting all jet streams, turbulent pockets and regions of excessive space debris in his path. Even though the ship was at Mach 6, running into something as small as a sub-orbiting loose bolt or as light as wind sheer in the wrong direction could hurt as much as a stray blaster shot.

Kaelis took his time nudging his craft around the invisible obstacles, gently decaying his speed with each bank. At Mach 5 and 20,000 feet above sea level, Binville leveled his craft out. The Crest Eagle tore over cruising ships and ocean glittering in the balmy summer morning. He left no sonic boom, as the navigation shields saw to it that air passed over them without accelerating past Mach 1. It was an expense, but one demanded by the idyllic planet-hopper hub that was the [Ocean of the Morning Star]. Other uses included sneaking over manned outposts as high speed, and that would be paid for by the job.

Kaelis dropped another 2,000 meters as he zipped over the Greater White Atoll. There were smaller ships drifting through the current here, and those moored had their passengers snorkeling through prime coral. Another feather in Morningstar's over-burdened tourism hat, Kaelis mentally noted as he banked into a new heading.

The sea below quickly changed again, as the glass-bottom ferries were replaced with gondolas. The Crest Eagle cast a flitting shadow over a junior undine practicing in smoother channels, and she looked up at the majestic craft coasting towards shore. From the cockpit, shining blue became a motley of Neo-Venetian architecture criss-crossed with channels and bridges as the Crest Eagle soared overhead.

Kaelis read off 4,000 meters above sea level and held the ship's altitude steady, before slowly poking power back into the inertial dampeners. That acted like a gentle air-brake, bleeding the momentum down from Mach 3, to 2, then 1, when Kaelis let go of the touchscreen button and powered down the dampeners.

He left the leisure spots behind as he made a bee-line for some cranes and towers dotting the horizon.

Chow Men Star Dock
Private Lounge

The whir of servos drifted through the doorway, then in came a tiny robot. It had a cat-like body, its plasteel tail waving fluidly as it rolled on ball-feet towards the dining table.

[Beep-beep twooop,] bleated the machine for attention.

"Mei, huh?" rumbled a balding mountain of flesh wrapped in loose tunic as he stepped away from the table and followed the droid towards the main systems display. "Give me some good news for once."

"Sorry, Papa," a crackled voice came through as the droid began holo-projecting the Crest Eagle's flight plan. "He just breached atmosphere. Intact."

Papa Chow groaned and took another swig from his mug of scotch.

"Gah. Let's make the best of it," Chow said after clearing his throat . "What did you say the Crest Eagle was?"

"A Kestrel-class, Caldari Fleet Systems," the droid relayed as the projection changed to an isometric simulation of the incoming craft.

Chow watched the spinning model as the computer highlighted various parts of the ship and threw up squiggles of readouts. The ship was shaped like the hand of a metal rocker's fan, its one-deck-thick port wing jutting out like a thumb, a twin beam turret peaking out from under its furthest blunt tip. It merged into a long tapering spire and ending with what seemed like the head of a bird of prey, the broad panel filters corresponding to visored eyes sitting atop a sharp clawed beak. This block was connected by reinforced bulkheads to the body comprising of an even thicker section shaped like three erect fingers. Each finger was tipped with a tapered missile launcher, and afted by a thruster each. That held on to the starboard block that was shorter than the port command block, but it was far stubbier and its twin engines spewed forth a volumous contrail of pure dihydrogen oxide exhaust. A thick, short wing jutted out horizontally from starboard of the engine block, one deck below the rest of the craft.

"Based on the transponder and chassis..." Meiling continued broadcasting by proxy through the astromech, the annoyance in her voice very evident. "Its a model from the KT-1300 run."

"30 years old. Caldaris sure are built to last..."

Chow knew what was coming, but right now he did not feel obliged to stop his daughter mid-rant.

"He's probably shaved centuries off this poor girl's lifespan," Meiling replied thick with sarcasm. "I mean, look at the engineering block."

The hologram highlighted starboard section and zoomed in on the stubby wing carrying a twin cannon turret on its furthest topside surface.

"He flattened the starboard wing and added a gun! That beast! How could he do such a thing?"

Chow nodded along even though he never quite got it.

"Oh yes, how could he..."

Mei, still out of view, shifted focus on to the rest of the block, calling up calibration specs of the long spindly gravpulse sensor antennae sticking forward of support prisms attached to the large block.

"Those engines! They're way too big for a KT of any age. Combined with the other four..."

The holo moved out, highlighted the aft engines on the mid-section and zoomed in.

"These are thrusters rated at over three times the maximum limit of a Kestrel class released last year." Meiling cried. "How does the Crest Eagle even hold herself together?"

The hologram zoomed out again.

"And then look at the cargo block."

The hologram outlined then homed in next on the midsection of the wide-bodied freighter. It boxed up on the 3 fingers and highlighted the launcher nozzles.

"Kestrel launchers do not ever look like this. And what's with all these itty-bitty stuff hanging off the hull?"

More nods from Chow.

"We still have the passenger block!"

The image outlined the final fusalage and wing component. Mei remotely overlayed the original schematic of the stock KT-1300 on the wing and the aft engine bulkheads, and it was certain that the Crest Eagle's owner had the wing thickened and the aft engine enlarged to stuff another oversized engine.

"The poor little thing..."

The hologram flipped over and the underslung double turret on the wingtip came to view.

" Ugh, not another chop-shop turret. What does he intend to do with these 2, point defense? With that miserable energy output? What a waste."

Chow thought a bit when he heard that line. Then something clicked in his head.

"Mei, zoom out and highlight the missile launchers together with the passenger block turrets."

The image did as it was told. And the man they call Bits smiled. For a moment, his approval for this Kaelis Binville rascal rose just a little.

"This is no Kestrel." He declared smuggly. "Its a Manticore!"

"What?" Mei squealed.

"Look at the lay out of those weapons," Chow continued, dabbing the 2 dorsal launchers opposing the midline launcher on the ventral side, drawing lines between them and forming a triangle when viewed from the front.

"And then those 'anti-meteor turrets.'"

Chow swiped across the screen and laid over the hologram with the schematics of the Manticore-class frigate. This time, the launchers, mods, turrets, everything except for the missing wing, all lined up.

"So... It's an old stealth bomber in disguise..." Mei said, sounding rather impressed.

Chow found himself having to admit that Kaelis has got ability, not to mention guts, to register this ship as something benign, and then practically get away with murder at all. He quickly got rid of that sentiment, and made another mental note to not let Binville realize it. He hoped that this would assauge his pounding headache a little.

"Well?" He waved the small droid, and its distant controller by remote, away. "Show & tell's over. Go welcome him."

"Oh I will. Warmly."

On that note, the astromech skittered out of the room. Chow on the other hand rubbed his temples a little more, thought for a while, and decided he still needed another glass.

===Author's Note===

Hello everyone! It's Meister and I'm back for more Sci-fi action in the pioneering piece of Moretsu Pirates fandom, Audacious Space Traders!

Pardon the self-praise. In order to write Kaelis Binville, I had to get into character, and lately its starting to cling to me. ^^;

In case you are wondering, Audacious Space Traders is a parallel side-story of Moretsu Pirates, told from the perspective from an illegal merchant. There is such a thing as an illegal merchant? Well, tit-for-tat, we're watching a show about legal pirates, aren't we? ;)

That's what got me started, and before long, I ended up with a neat idea that I just gotta share.

So here's a big dose of action, adventure, and loads of space opera thrown in for a good measure. Good or bad, leave a review or subscribe for more! I'll be updating this fic as more lore details emerge.

So until next time, See You Space Cowboys! :D