Chapter 3

There is an old, old saying. "The best laid plans..." I can't remember the rest, but it means that you plan for something, trying to cover all eventualities, but then something comes along and cancels out all your preparations.

I had planned on departing early this morning, but a warship of the People's Union (or "PU") broke out of hyper and threatened to destroy any ship that was moving in system other than those that were already on an inward or outward track.

I frowned when I heard of their break out from hyper. The PU was a thinly disguised, totalitarian form of government masquerading as a religious organization. Unfortunately, they had a lot of power.

The last I had heard, the PU was seven planets strong, and two of those planets were very high tech in nature. Producing and supporting a warship of this size was no problem for them. They had arrived at this station in a very large, heavy cruiser, that was named the "St. Mathew."

I watched with interest as the St. Mathew slowed from a very high rate of speed to a more sedate closing speed. This was the way that warships normally operated. Come in fast to try to beat any incoming fire. A good tactic, but not necessary in this case.

The captain of the St. Mathew finally decided that no one here was going to try to blow his ship out of space, so he allowed the station's space control to resume ship movement. By the time this decision was made, it was late afternoon, local time. I was curious now, and I decided to put off my departure to another day, as I wanted to see what was going on.

I was still connected to the station's dock, since I had only begun to bring my ship's systems on line when I was stopped because of the order from the St. Mathew. As a final readiness test, I now brought my power core to full output, and I started to bring all the remaining systems on line.

"Sensors indicate a military grade scan is being done on the Misty," stated the voice of my AI.

I acknowledged the statement and then continued to power up systems and bring others back on line. I was almost done when the AI announced an incoming communication from the St. Mathew. I raised my eyebrows at this. There was no reason for them to be calling me.

I told the AI to initiate contact and soon I was looking through the communications view screen into the control room of the heavy cruiser.

"Captain Connor?" A serious looking young man asked.

"Yes? How may I help you?" I asked curiously.

"Please stand by for the Captain," he said and my view screen shifted.

"By the beard of the prophet! It is you!" said a man in a Peoples' uniform and tightly trimmed beard.

It took a moment, but then I remembered him! We had met a number of years ago when I was a Captain in the Terran Marines. He had been the liaison officer for a joint operation in which our nations were involved.

"Jamal Orman? And a Captain now? Congratulations," I told him.

"Alexander Connor, my bridge crew tells me that you are powering up to leave this system. Yet when I query departure control, they cannot tell me exactly where you are going. Surely you can stay a while and reminisce with an old friend?" Jamal told me in a tone that said much more then his words.

I sighed. "Give me a few minutes to place everything on standby. Do you wish to meet me on station here? Or did you want to send a gig for me?" I asked with some trepidation.

"Let us meet on my ship! I wish to show you my command. Then we can take my gig to the station and you can show me which den of iniquity has the best drinks on this god forsaken station!" he told me jovially.

"Well, I have only been here a couple days myself. So we might have to explore a bit to find the best one," I replied.

He laughed and slapped his knee. "I had heard of you leaving the Marines. I have watched afar your rise in the circles of finance. You have done well since I last saw you ten years ago," Jamal told me.

"I'm surprised. I realize that we had become a bit friendly, but to pay that much attention to me?" I said with some surprise.

"Come, Alex. You were an officer in Special Operations! Of course we would pay attention to you. Don't worry, we know you are not active, and that you have had no more than cursory contact with anyone of interest," he said.

"You do? Well, it's nice to know that I was important at one time anyway," I said a bit ruefully.

A short time later, my ship was powered up but on "Standby", which was a higher level of readiness than before. I now found myself watching the gig's forward view screen as we approached the St. Mathew. God but that ship was huge!

The gig moved into a cavernous opening that was a shuttle bay, and docked. A tube was run out to the airlock and when pressure was equalized, the hatch opened and I went out, through the short tube, and into the ship itself. Everything sealed behind me as I had passed.

"Gig will depart in two minutes. Shuttle returning in one hour and 30 minutes," I heard over the department intercom.

"Mr. Connor? If you will follow me, the Captain is waiting for you," a young ensign told me.

I nodded and told him to lead the way. He did, and it was a bewildering trip to say the least. After about 15 minutes, we arrived at a door marked Officer's Wardroom 2. We entered and I was met by Jamal

"Alexander Connor! It is good to see you again, my friend," Jamal said and his hand was reaching for mine. I found myself trying desperately to keep up with his handshake.

"Nice to see you again Jamal," I answered with more reserve.

"Come, let's sit and talk a little. What have you gotten yourself into that brings you way out here?" he asked straight away.

"Well, I decided to qualify for my pilots certificate, and I decided to do some exploration. The, 'World of Finance, ' as you called it, got to be boring," I said to him.

He went to the huge coffee urn, and poured two coffee's. He put two spoons of sugar into mine.

"Two spoons of sugar, right?" he asked belatedly.

I nodded. "You have a very good memory," I said with undisguised astonishment, while accepting the cup from him.

"Ah, but I was told to memorize everything about you. You were a bright and earnest officer in the Terran Marines Special Operations. We were very impressed by your actions on our behalf," Jamal said.