Melinoe Ch. 26-30

Teffa saw the table was set for seven, then pursed her lips. She hadn't yet broached the subject of Agatha with Zuki. Teffa wasn't really worried, but at the same time, she didn't want anyone to get upset. Just at that moment Zuki turned her head and beamed a smile at her.

Teffa's heart melted.

Lakita smiled broadly, large incisors showing, "Hi Teffa."

"Hey, Lakita... How are you?" Teffa asked politely.

"I am very good." Lakita said in excellent Slarmian, "Zuki and I introduced ourselves earlier and I helped her with some of her stuff."

Teffa blinked.

Zuki's eyes went wide, "Oh shit, was I not supposed to?" Teffa immediately waved four hands in a calming gesture, "You were!, I mean it's wonderful! I just hadn't heard it said outside of my own brain, and... It sounded amazing."

Lakita made a goofy grin.

Zuki sighed in relief, "Okay good... I don't want to screw anything up."

At that moment four Hands of Agatha brought out dinner, it was a veritable feast. Teffa saw the dishes and of course recognized them... It was a Slarmian welcoming/housewarming feast. She had made most of those dishes for Paula, Vika and Agatha. There were even Blintzes and Cannoli... Teffa started tearing up, recognizing Agatha was welcoming Zuki into Teffa's life as well as her own.

The First Secretary of the Terran Embassy smiled at Teffa, then gave her a hug. "You did very well, Teffa... Good job." Agatha smiled.

The Embassy family gathered around the table and started on the feast. Teffa glanced at each Hand at the table. Agatha smiled knowingly, "I brought Zuki up to speed on my nature and my duties to the Ambassador."

"Oh, oh good." Teffa replied, still a little nervous.

Teffa and Zuki shared a look and Zuki nodded, "Once Agatha explained, I remembered where I had first seen her and it all made sense."

Teffa smiled, she was relieved, "You know that information isn't for public consumption?"

Zuki nodded, "Don't worry, Teffa, I know how to keep my mouth shut."

Agatha nodded, "That was essentially why she lost her job with Machii."

Teffa blinked, "What?"

"Samira had requested Zuki not mention the conversation they had on Depot03, and she didn't, not at all." Agatha explained. "The Machii manager asked her what happened, she wouldn't elaborate, so he fired her."

Teffa stared at Zuki, "Oh, that was cruel of him."

Zuki shrugged, "I think I got the better side of that exchange, after all was said and done."

Teffa smiled, she bit her lip, "So do I."

The feast was delicious, everyone had plenty to eat, and Zuki and Teffa were now sharing an apartment, Agatha was not a secret to Zuki and everyone was content. "Oh... Zuki, I'm going to need you to fly one of my Hands to Dau." Agatha informed politely.

Teffa looked at Agatha with surprise.

Agatha smiled, "Just a little... Redistribution."

0o0

The family finished another of Agatha's magnificent dinners.

Tonight, Max insisted on doing the dishes, it had been forever since she'd done them, and the simple task felt comforting. Max could just feel the edge of combat stress creeping into her body. From what Agatha had projected, they were about twelve hours out from Freeport.

Max was going over scenarios in her head, trying to take it all into account. They would need to recon and surveil the hell out of Golamar before they did any kind of offensive operation. Both Vika and Agatha would have their work cut out for them. Even Samira would be needed to get Agatha into the small but important cyber-net that had been retrofitted into the platform at some point.

Agatha had all the structural and electronic schematics and projected the entire platform layout into all of their memories. Everyone now knew a version of Golamar as well as they did Deirdre. There was a running conversation as to what they might find and what the likely actions should be.

But like someone once said centuries ago, "Everyone has a plan, until they get hit in the face."

They were going to have to deal with what they found after they found it.

Going into Freeport with too many restrictive protocols might hurt the operation instead of focusing it.

The objective was simple: kill the pirates.

They didn't know who was a pirate or how many there were. Agatha was going to have to find out for them. That meant at least one sleep cycle, and Agatha would need to go through every one of them.

So, what did they do with non-pirate residents of Freeport?

They were still working on that.

Max had finished the dishes in the Galley just as she felt a pair of arms wrap around her waist. "I don't want to interrupt your KP, but Joon was rather insistent I stay on top of the queue." Paula said quietly.

Max turned around in her arms, then smiled, "Yes, I understand, she is very tenacious."

Paula smiled up at her Captain-wife.

"What would you like?" Paula asked.

Max nodded, "I want to turn in early and get a good night's rest, tomorrow will be busy."

Paula smiled, "That sounds like a great idea."

The brunette led Max past everyone still sitting and chatting at the Mess and then to the CQ. They both stripped off and climbed into bed. This time Paula laid Max on her side, resting her head on her inner thigh. The fellatio was gentle but still insistent and Paula was rewarded with sweet creamy vanilla dessert: Max and Paula cuddled up together.

Astrid and Samira returned to Engineering as they wanted to get at least one Combat drone finished before they went to bed. Joon and Vika, however, made their way onto the huge bed; they too cuddled together. Three Hands of Agatha crawled into bed with them.

Hours later Astrid and Samira washed up quietly then flopped on the bed passing out. They had finished the first and put a substantial dent into the second Combat drone. Agatha gathered them all together into the now expected shared dream experience.

0o0

Paula awoke to lovely soft voices having a pleasant conversation in her mind. For a split second she thought someone was watching a show on the holo-net except she recognized every voice...Paula was now a part of the family telepathic network! *Morning!*Paula thought to everyone. She was immediately celebrated by her family in grand telepathic fashion and Paula was soon overwhelmed with mental kisses and hugs. She sat up, her generous breasts swayed as she turned to look at Vika next to her. Joon and Vika lay next to her, facial expressions indicated they were having a telepathic conversation.

Vika was turned away from her, but Paula could see the side of her face. The tiny redhead now had long sideburns, they were the same bright-coppery color of her dreads.

Vika turned her head and smiled at Paula. Those sideburns went halfway down the edge of her jaw, leaving her chin bare, they blended in nicely with her complexion. Paula nodded her approval, Vika's sideburns looked really good on her, it didn't make her look any less feminine.

Vika bit her lip staring into Paula's eyes.

Paula needed to check if the kisses would be fuzz free. So she did: Paula and Vika kissed, then deeply so. The voluptuous brunette wrapped herself around her short muscular wife. *Oh, Vika...* Paula thought to her passionately.

*Yes, me, too.* Vika answered as the kiss continued.

Joon was now being spooned by Max as they watched Vika and Paula. Astrid and Samira rolled out of bed and headed to the bathroom and Agatha went after them. Max and Joon soon followed.

Paula and Vika did follow... But not immediately.

The morning routine continued but there was a palpable level of anxiety in the air. Max tried very hard to let the stress leave her during the kata, but it wasn't easy. Agatha did her best to keep everyone on an even keel, pushing calm into her family. That and the hot showers did wonders for relaxing the crew and no one was feeling inclined to anything amorous.

Uniform of the day was battle dress, even Samira wore a set of Agatha's BDU's. Breakfast was light but nutritional, a vegetable and sausage scramble with fruit juice. With an ETA of thirty minutes, the crew of the Deirdre sat in the Mess with tea and coffee.

Agatha gave last minute updates on the feelings of the Captain and crew of the freighter. Then as one unit, Deirdre's crew ascended to the Bridge. Max gave Vika a brief mental query, she only responded with a sigh and a head shake.

Within minutes of Agatha's ETA the bulk-freighter Ghusmik Urr dropped out of hyper-warp.

0o0

The system was just as bare as Agatha had described, only a ring of rocks around a red dwarf star. Those rocks had already been scoured by Golamar more than a century earlier. Deirdre's sensitive passive sensors picked out the massive transteller strip-mining platform immediately. Everyone on Deirdre's bridge knew exactly how big Golamar was but seeing it on sensors made it more impressive and real.

The Ornalith three hull design formed a hollow prism shape. Golamar's primary hull was twelve kilometers in length, two kilometers wide and a quarter of a kilometer thick. It contained a massive stepped loading dock capable of accommodating twenty bulk-freighters and included two separate habitation complexes for workers with commercial space in between with Luxury resort accommodations for management and visiting executives.

The two industrial hulls were individually only slightly smaller in dimensions than the primary. They contained the colossal industrial complex that was the heart of the project. The hollow core of the platform allowed waste material and unrefined rock to exit the slowly moving structure. Astrid explained the use of tractor beams and mining lasers, while rock-tug's would pull smaller asteroids into Golamar's maw.

Joon mentioned a basking shark, everyone saw the similarity after a quick image search. Then Deirdre's alarms flashed as Golamar scanned the incoming bulk-freighter. Readings indicated a penetrating scan that was more powerful than anything used in the TFN.

"Fuckmuffins" Astrid cursed, "That is one beast of an active sensor array."

Agatha reminded all of them that Golamar was designed to find and extract the riches of entire systems.

Max raised an eyebrow, "Could that sensor find Deirdre?"

Agatha and Astrid shared a look.

"I don't think so," Astrid replied.

Max nodded, her lips thin.

Astrid swallowed, "But, let's not test that theory if we don't have to."

Max Intel: Melinoe

Chapter 27 - Freeport

Agatha brought up an expanded view of the Golamar platform technical data and highlighted the areas that could facilitate a covert entry. There were more than a dozen locations with the highest percentage of success located at points where industrial hulls connected with the platform's primary hull.

Max chose one of those four. The target location she chose was relatively close to the starboard worker habitation complex.

Agatha announced a twenty-minute ETA to Golamar as she started receiving status data on Golamar from the passive sensors that picked up individual ship emissions which were docked with the platform.

Joon raised an eyebrow at Max, she looked anxious. Max smiled at her with an easy confidence, gently squeezing her hand.

"Whoa." Samira said softly; she was staring at the results on her own screen. Agatha put the raw results up on the main holo-display. Nine cruiser-sized ships and twenty-two destroyer-sized ships were crammed into the stepped docks. A few were uniform, nearly every other ship was built by a different manufacturer. Two cruiser-sized and four destroyer-sized ships were iridescent-green and appeared to be identical, Max pointed them out to her crew.

"Kintark..." The Captain narrowed her eyes. A TFN Cruiser was nestled among the flotilla of docked warships, making Max clench her jaw. Max then spotted another type she recognized among the cruiser-sized ships; it was black with purple ribbing. Max's lips thinned. "...and Drakkar."

One entire corner of the cramped docks held a huge ship, its dark, heavy hull barely fit the slip to which it was moored. Its similarity to a Bract Clipper was no coincidence.

No one could miss the distinctive two-kilometer starship, it was a Bract Galleon.

There was a single vacant berth adjacent to it. The bulk-freighter Deirdre clung to altered course to dock at the open berth.

Agatha carefully gauged the timing of her release maneuver and where she needed to go. Max observed Agatha's incredible skill as she slipped the corvette gently off the freighter. She deftly threaded Deirdre through exterior industrial protrusions on thrusters alone, still maintaining the enveloping sensor-baffle matrix. Agatha guided the tiny warship in, Settling carefully in the shallow depression of her Captain's target destination.

When Deirdre gently shuddered from contact, there was an audible exhale from every human on the bridge. The magnetic grapples locked the stealthy corvette to the exterior of the massive industrial hull, very close to where it connected to Golamar's primary hull.

"Remora maneuver complete." Agatha reported.

Astrid tapped at her holo-screen, "I've replicated the color and texture patterns of this location onto Deirdre's skin, she will be difficult to visibly distinguish her from her surroundings."

The Hand of Agatha at navigation stood up, "Just ahead and to port is an 'S' shaped maintenance corridor that allows passage from the Primary hull to this Industrial hull. The schematic shows exterior access, but I fear that it was functioning only during manufacture and it has since been sealed." Agatha diligently relayed.

Astrid listened closely then looked at Max, "I can cut our way in, do you want it quick and dirty, or slow and careful?" Max smirked, "I think you know the answer to that, but, we also need to get the lay of the land." The Captain nodded to Agatha then shared a smile with Samira.

Samira nodded, "Local cyber-net, here I come." She stood and headed up to the Comms Hub.

Astrid pursed her lips, "Uh, Captain, I cannot be completely sure just how much noise I'm going to be making."

"Okay..." Max glanced at Vika, "Let's get an agent inside to spot for you."

"Yes." Vika nodded, then hopped to her feet.

"Gear up, ladies." Max stood, giving Joon a nod as the towering Captain and the diminutive Operative quit the bridge, heading to the armory.

Agatha looked over her shoulder where Joon, Astrid, and Paula were left on the expansive command couch.

Joon smirked, "Ready for this?"

Paula and Astrid glanced at Joon. "Anyone want to help me carry equipment?" Astrid asked.

"We can do that." Paula replied with a nod.

0o0

Samira didn't quite trot into the Com Hub; though she was moving pretty quickly.

The Hand of Agatha closest to the corridor looked up and smiled. "Hello Samira, are you ready for reconnaissance?"

Samira nodded, she sat in the dive chair. "Are you expecting any difficulty?"

Agatha turned in her chair to focus on Samira. "None at all, I would like to follow the same protocols we used at Haeguss Enclave on Dau."

The Cyber-specialist took a deep breath, then tilted her head. "How many avatars can you make now?"

Agatha shrugged, "I am not certain, but, if my initial hypothesis of parameter limitations are accurate..."

Samira quickly did the numbers in her head, "Forty-six?"

Agatha nodded, "Precisely."

The hawk-nosed woman smiled, "Okay, let's do this, I will be as quiet as possible."

Samira's datajacks slithered out of her arms and connected to the interface of the dive chair. "Showtime," she mumbled as her head lolled back into the padded cradle.

0o0

Joon, Astrid and Paula walked past the heavy, open door of the armory. The three ladies paused, seeing an odd expression on Vika's face.

Max was holding a pair of the dark-grey nanoweave coveralls.

Vika looked... Perplexed.

"What do you mean?" Max asked Vika concerning her body language.

Joon leaned against the open doorway, Vika's body language was off. Paula and Astrid stood behind Joon.

"What's wrong?" Joon asked.

Vika turned to look at Joon, "I'm on the edge..."

Joon blinked, "Discovery?"

Vika nodded to her Lady-wife then pointed at the nanoweave apparel.

"It was triggered by those."

Joon shared a surprised look with Max.

"Do what you need to do," Max nodded, "We got you."

Vika took a deep breath, she tilted her head far to one side as she tugged on her dreads: everyone heard a soft popping sound and the small muscular woman sighed with relief.

Vika stood up straight and flexed her hands at her sides. She then stood very still... Like she was listening.

Max, Joon, Astrid and Paula observed as Vika slowly lifted her hands in unison. She lifted them up, back over her shoulders and behind her head. Her hands looked like she was grasping something. Then she moved her arms like she was pulling a hood up over her head.

Vika faded from view.

There was a collective gasp. "Vika! Are you still there?" Max asked the empty air.

"Yes," Vika's voice said.

"Fuckmuffins!" Astrid muttered softly. There wasn't a blur or visual distortion like the effect associated with nanoweave. The Ability wasn't optical camouflage, it was 'magical' invisibility.

Joon nodded in understanding, "What's it called?"

Vika faded back into view. Her hands were behind her head, like she pulled back the same hood. Vika smiled with a crooked grin... "Cloak."

0o0

A swirl of color swarmed around Sami-faun as Samira's consciousness coalesced into Golamar's cyber-net. Sami-faun didn't move or adjust her facing: Samira only did a passive scan.

The node was dark and gloomy, with hundreds of rib-like basic constructs frozen in place, it looked like the interior of a vast shipwreck.

Samira changed her perspective and did a quick look at the whole Golamar net... It was just under three hundred nodes. This cyber-net was colossal for a mobile network, but tiny for a static planetary system. Its unusual size was a patchwork of utilitarian styles, oddly stark with little elegance in some places.

While in others it was detailed and ornate, showcasing the influences from programmers of various cultures. Samira did not sense a single user.

She shifted back to first person perspective. *I don't sense any activity.* Samira thought to Agatha.

*May I join you?* Agatha politely asked.

Samira chuckled, *I don't remember you asking the last time we did recon.*

*Last time, Miku's life was hanging in the balance.*

*Touché... Yes, of course you may join me.* Samira braced for the staggering volume of energy that she was expecting. This time however, only two Avatars coalesced. A pair of fluffy ethereal cats shimmered into existence in front of Sami-faun.

*Are you okay?* Agatha inquired.

*I was expecting a huge wave of ghost kitties.* Samira replied.

The fluffy cats tilted their heads at Sami-faun, *I can still do that, if you wish.*

Samira giggled, *No, it's okay... I like the sedate approach, it's a lot less stressful.*

*I will produce two at a time, at a 'sedate' pace.* Agatha giggled softly, the haunting sound felt very comforting to Samira. Agatha's first two cyber-avatars scampered off into the dark gloomy environs. Samira stared after them, but they were swallowed by the digital proximity graphic limit.

Another pair of fluffy ethereal cats shimmered into existence and scampered off. Every ten nanoseconds Agatha produced another pair. *Is it safe to explore this node?* Samira wondered aloud to Agatha.

*I would prefer you refrain from doing so, at least until I have concluded my exploration and assessment.*

Sami-faun nodded, as another pair of Agatha's avatars shimmered in and scampered off. Samira peered closely at the skeletal framework in the gloomy node. *I don't want to seem terse, but, I have already noted many undocumented structural changes.*