All That Glitters Ch. 40

SSP Martin Green,, HD-137982 Unnamed Star System

The SSP Martin Green, Capt. Charles Byron commanding, was the designated psychological hospital ship. Those who had been diagnosed with severe mental fatigue, severe anxiety disorders, or more serious psychological disorders were sent to this ship. Three of the nine five-person triage teams on the ship were composed of members from Hollanders World, their empathic abilities coming to the fore to help those sent to the ship.

Of the fifteen empaths, only three were GMEs and that is where the problem began. While the fifteen members were all more senior empaths, they did not have the power necessary to do all that they wanted, not even when working as a Congress of fifteen. As more people with anxiety disorders came to the ship, it became much more difficult for empaths and non-empaths alike to help them or even control them. Things were getting out of hand.

Another shuttle had landed in the bay with another sixty people for the Martin Green. However, these people were much worse off than any of the others currently on board. As soon as they boarded the Green, they began to break down. The crew swiftly moved them to the deck where all those with more severe disorders were being treated but it was no use.

Panic began to set in, started by the newcomers and soon spreading to all those on the main deck. The three GMEs attempted to link with the other empaths to bring calm to the unruly patients but could not do so with the backlash of severe panic now occurring. Things were swiftly getting out of hand.

The large monitor on the wall suddenly lit, showing three beautiful women, one holding a strange multi-stringed instrument, the other two holding young babies in their arms. All the women were wearing long, silky looking gowns that had sleeves to their elbows.

The woman with the instrument began to play, her fingers expertly plucking the strings in a complex set of harmonies and reverberations. The sounds were pitched to catch the human mind and did just that, briefly stopping the build up of panic.

The woman began to sing, in a language that nobody could understand and wasn't being translated by their comps. Her voice was cultured, controlled, and hauntingly beautiful. Once more, the sounds of music momentarily caught the interests of those who were panicking.

Then something profound happened. The empaths felt power on a scale they had never felt before. The woman on the screen was projecting peace, calm, and motherly love, which somehow seemed to fit in with the strange song she was singing.

The wave of calm, peace, and love swept over the patients and instantly comforted them, allowing the medical staff to do their thing and ensure that the patients were seen to.

The empaths noted that the woman playing was wearing a Council of Empath's medallion at her left breast. She also had a green armband with an unusual symbol, Ɵ~Ɵ, on her right sleeve near her elbow.

The woman began playing another song, this one was a children's lullaby from Anuura, which was promptly translated by the worker's comps. The soothing lullaby brought peace to all who heard it, including the two children held in the arms of the women behind the singer. The children tucked their heads into the breasts of the two women and promptly fell asleep.

All over the extended fleet, Junelliya's image was transmitted, her singing instantly bringing peace to those who needed it. She sang for over an hour, then silently smiled into the camera and wished everyone a pleasant dream. Instantly, those who were panicking and who had not yet fallen asleep, dropped into a dreamless sleep.

The empaths were shocked at the display. They had never seen its equal.

"We need that woman with us on this ship," one of the GMEs stated.

"I'm sure that statement is being made on a lot of different ships right now," Dr. Maya, GME and head of the group, quipped. "Let's see to the needs of our patients while they are a little more controllable."

Maya would look into the situation over the next few days but what she found left her with even more questions. First, the woman was broadcasting from the other side of the fleet, several thousand kilometers away from the Martin Green. Second, her broadcast had included all of the ships with panicking patients onboard. Maya knew of nobody who could seek out the minds of the panicking and calm them in such a manner, never mind from such a distance or spread out amongst other patients who did not need the intervention.

Second, was the immense amount of power that each of the empaths onboard the Martin Green and other ships had reported feeling. It tied in with what she herself had felt.

Lastly, sending only those who were panicking to sleep. That kind of precision was unheard of in such numbers, even in the ranks of the Councillors.

Maya made some inquiries, the answers of which almost made her question what she was learning. The woman was Junelliya Herlan, a relatively new empath of immense power who only manifested her powers within the last two years!

She had to meet this woman but had no means to contact her as she didn't even know what ship she was on. Her address was linked to at least nine different ships, ships like The Wanderer, The Dewfall, The Persephone, The Trine, The Kologn, The Kennedy, The Churchill, The Betelgeuse, and The Orion.

Maya recorded all that she found and sent a message to Councillor Petronellaya on Hollander's World. The Council of Empaths needed to know what was going on.

Adenomere Main Estate, Planet Adenomere, Adenomere System

Two days after the raid, when it started becoming clear of what was the actual losses in slaves that the Alliance had suffered, Jaar Adenomere had called a meeting of all House Adenomere, even his brother Elliot was in this meeting despite being on the outs with most of the house.

"This has become a major issue for House Adenomere," Jaar began looking from the face of one brother to the other on the monitors. "With the number of slaves the Alliance has lost, we have no means of gaining back the required manpower to keep our house afloat fiscally. We cannot buy from other houses as many are in the same predicament that we are in and those that do have slaves for sale are asking enormous prices for them.

"As such, I have called this meeting in order to solicit suggestions from the House leaders. If you have any thoughts on this issue, now is the time to speak," he finished, waiting for an answer and not sure what he was expecting.

"We need to cover our loss of manpower with money," Antonius Adenomere stated. He was Jaar's younger brother and head of the Second House of Adenomere. Of the three elder brothers, his house was the most fiscally assured. However, like the other elder brothers, his house too was in trouble. "That means we need to go after those who have contracts with us that cannot be fulfilled now, especially those who have promised us slaves.

"House Gordon comes to mind. I know this will be an issue for your house, Jaar, considering that Marius is to wed Aurelia Gordon, however, business must come to the fore in this issue," Antonius ended.

Things went back and forth for several minutes before Jaar looked at his youngest brother, Elliott, head of the Fourth House of Adenomere and currently not a favorite with Jaar as he was refusing to give the main house any tribute, thus contributing to the Adenomere problems as far as Jaar was concerned. "Any thoughts, Elliott?" he asked.

"You know my position in the fiscal management, or should I say mismanagement, of the House of Adenomere, Jaar. I will say this, this is a good opportunity for House Adenomere to follow my lead and start divesting itself of its heavy reliance on slave labour.

"I have done quite well with the reduced numbers that I maintain in comparison to the other Adenomere households and in fact, many other Alliance Houses. This situation is going to get much worse, starting with the price of slaves going up considerably more than it already is, and ending with a possible blockade by the Union. You would be wise to follow my lead and prepare for a better use of your manpower," Elliott finished.

"What makes you think that the Union will blockade us, Elliott?" Peotre Adenomere, the head of the Third House of Adenomere, asked his brother.

"It is inevitable, brothers," Elliott started. "The Union wants its citizens back. Rumour has it that they have taken more than 200,000 slaves. How many are actually Union citizens is still to be determined, though I am sure that the Union will let us know in a couple of days, or rather, let its citizens know.

"How many Union citizens are actually being held by the Alliance as slaves, brothers? I'm sure that the number is considerably more than what the Union has taken from us in this raid. Rumour leads me to believe somewhere upwards of 500,000.

"The Union will want those citizens back as well. If the slave issue is a problem now, what will happen when we lose even more? The only way that the Alliance will give up another substantial group of slaves, is from the kind of pressure that a blockade will bring. Nothing else will budge us," Elliot said.

The brothers said nothing, thinking long and hard, however, Elliot was right. Greater problems for the Alliance were on the horizon and House Adenomere was a major leader in the Landstradt, which would expect them to act...

In Orbit, Planet Varus, Clément System, Forty-Eight Light Years from Terra

After two days, the rescue ships began to jump into the respective support systems, sending their passengers down to the Navy bases on both planets. The media had already been advised of the raid and were at the shuttle pads in numbers as the rescued landed and Navy personnel helped them into carts that would take them further into the base.

Unlike at most media scrums, when the media saw the state in which many of the slaves appeared, there was only silence from the watchers, the Navy had carefully chosen those they wanted the media to initially see.

Images of the arriving rescued were flashed all over the Union. People were shocked at what they saw. Almost every former slave was emaciated. Some had uncared for wounds on their bodies, others were missing limbs, a few were missing an eye and had only a patch to cover what was missing, something that you only saw in hospitals in Union space, or on the poorest of planets.

Public opinion suddenly took a hard turn against the Alliance. Vengeance was on the lips of many of the citizens of the Union, war was a word that was being bandied about. The Senate suddenly found itself under immense pressure...

************

Audette Laquois was sitting on a couch in front of two reporters, the thin, young woman holding her child on her lap. Only two reporters were allowed in the room for her interview so as not to cause further trauma to the woman, their report intended for all networks. Audette was being asked a series of questions about what had happened to her since she had been taken by pirates. Other, similar interviews, were taking place in other locations on the base.

"Because I was young and considered good looking, I was chosen to be part of the 'breeding program', a program designed to breed more slaves. Most of those in the program consisted of more recently taken slaves, who were in much better condition than those who had been in the system for any amount of time.

"Breeders were fed much better than other slaves, and we were allowed access to our children at all times, until they reached age five. Then, they would be taken away from us," she told the reporters.

"The newer, better looking women, were bred by the house Masters themselves. Other women were usually bred by more senior slaves. Some women were chosen to be bred through artificial insemination; embryos with specific genes being placed in their wombs in order that certain traits could be passed on.

"I had been chosen for the breeding program not long after I arrived. I had already been in captivity for nine months by that time, having been kidnapped in late 2483. I was traded twice by the Great Houses until I arrived at the Gaetan Breeding Residence.

"I was personally bred, in one all-night session, by all of Emile Gaetan's four sons. I have no idea which son is actually the father of my Angeline. She was born nine months later and is now just a little over one year old. She is my first child and she is innocent of the acts of her fathers. She will remain with me and will never know her father. Sometime in the future, when she is much older, I will tell her what happened to me. I hope we will both be in a better situation then," she finished.

"What happens when it was discovered that you were pregnant?" one of the reporters asked.

"Once it is determined that one is pregnant, she is moved into a barracks for pregnant women. This is a special barracks that has its own medical staff and a maternity ward.

"We have work to do there, menial work but not work that is physically intensive. We are fed much better than other slaves while we are in the program but much better is a relative term when you consider how little food the average slave received. The food in the breeding program is to ensure healthy babies, not necessarily healthy moms. We needed to be healthy enough to produce and breastfeed our children, nothing more.

"A woman is allowed to become pregnant every three years; the children being removed from her care after five years.

"After three pregnancies, and the third child is taken from her, a woman is returned to the general slave population, unless she garners the attention of one of the Masters. Then she may become the personal property of the Master and may become a house slave at the estate.

"Women who become the Mistress of a Master, can eventually earn their freedom. This is rare, but not so rare that it is unusual. Generally speaking, these women are the playthings of the Masters. They can be and are traded for a time as favours between friends, though they are usually never sold to another once they become the favourite of one Master.

"While it is degrading to be the mistress of one of the Masters, it is a coveted position among female slaves as the life of a mistress is infinitely better than the average slave," Audette finished.

There were more questions and she answered them as best she could. It was a bit of a catharsis for her, getting all of it off her chest. She would remain under the care of psychiatrists for years to come but her healing had begun this day...

Adenomere Main Estate, Planet Adenomere, Adenomere System

Aurelia was trying to make sense of the issues that had occurred since the raid. She knew that all the Adenomere estates had been hit heavily by the raiders. However, they were not the only estates targeted. A little over 18,000 out of 32,000 slaves had been taken from the Adenomere estates. More were taken from other estates on the planet. Rumor had it that over 70,000 slaves had been taken from Planet Adenomere as a whole and many more had been taken from the other Alliance planets.

She had been working for over a day now, trying to piece together the numbers. But they were much too vague. Numbers between 100,000 to 400,000 were being bandied about. She needed to bring down those numbers to something more realistic. She worked hard to that end and finally thought she had most of the numbers down but those numbers were unsettling.

Her best guess gave her numbers around 220,000 from all Alliance planets. Those numbers did not originate on Adenomere, but on New Hadria. She still had her Gordon family computer account and was able to use the central link from Adenomere City. Like all Great Houses, the Gordons kept a computer server on Adenomere, where the Landstradt often met. With her family account, she had access to that server. What shocked her the most was that almost half of all the slaves taken from the Gordon family estates were Union citizens, many recently taken by pirates.

The raids had targeted estates that had large numbers of Union citizens, their purported targets. Of course, slaves who were not Union citizens lined up to be freed, resulting in some Minor Houses being completely stripped of their slaves. Despite the fact that there were over a billion slaves on Adenomere alone, the loss of 70,000 slaves was having a serious effect on the economy of Adenomere.

The economies of many of the Great Families were now in jeopardy. Worse, was the fact that the Union had confiscated all Alliance family funds held in Union banks, intending to give those funds to the freed slaves as compensation. While the overall economy of the Alliance had taken a hit, the economies of many of the Great Families were in desperate affairs, including House Adenomere and House Gordon, as they could no longer access their off-planet resources.

House Gordon had contracts to House Adenomere that they couldn't complete. While some of their clients were happy to accept the fact that there was little anyone could do, others were not so forgiving and demanding compensation.

Seven of the Great Houses of the Landstradt were now in a serious situation, their status as Great Houses in doubt. Three of these were not necessarily House Adenomere supporters. They included House Gordon from New Hadria, House Pendar from Erden, and House Palay, from Planet Surdend. House Adenomere was using this incident to get back on those houses that had not supported it in the past. These three houses could lose their status as voting members of the Landstradt.

Her father, Armstrong Gordon, was seeking to mend the rift between House Gordon and House Adenomere, which was why he had promoted the marriage between herself and Marius, hoping to cement an alliance between the houses.

It is probably too little too late for House Gordon, Aurelia thought.

The Adenomeres were pushing the most for compensation from other houses. Aurelia now understood why. The Adenomeres themselves were having serious money flow issues of late, even before the raids. This was principally due to the extravagant spending of the senior Adenomeres and the sons of each house, especially Jaar Adenomere and his son in the main branch of the family.

The only Adenomere house that was in the black was the Fourth House of Adenomere, run by Elliott Adenomere, which was the only house that refused to send tribute money to Jaar. He was a fiscal moderate and, while he had kept the family name, he had distanced his estate from the downward financial trend of the other Adenomere estates.

With her back door access to the Adenomere computers, Aurelia had watched as the Adenomeres had plotted and planned to take out the three rival Great Houses of the Landstradt that were having problems. Aurelia was sure that the pressure now being put on those three Great Houses, was payback by House Adenomere for their previous lack of support to the Adenomeres.

She wanted to look into Jaar's accounts but had to be very careful of when she did it. Lately, he had been on the computer at all hours. It would not be good for her to be digging around his accounts while he himself was doing business on the computer.

She would have to bide her time, acutely aware that her time was running out. The date of the next Landstradt had been moved up, due of course to the recent incident with the Union. Fortunately, the date for her wedding had also been pushed back, the effects of the Union raid disrupting things equally.

Everything was in a state of flux at the moment while the Alliance tried to sort itself out. Aurelia needed to find all that she could fast, without being caught and, for her, time was swiftly running down, the next Landstradt was only days away...