5. Fenrir Revisited
The cockpit closed about the three men, left little room for movement, and even less consideration for safety. But Jack had insisted that all three of them be present for atmospheric entry of Fenrir. Rath thought the company might calm his nerves; at least he hoped it would. It didn't. When the scout began to shake at the violence of entry, he broke into a cold sweat. The lack of space compounded his discomfort, and when he felt the lurch of gravity taking hold, he almost vomited.
"Do you always get this upset on reentry?" Jack questioned.
"It's not usually this bad," Rath gasped, struggling for control of his innards. "It's just a little close in here. I'm used to being alone."
A heavy shake throughout his body closed Rath’s mouth.
"But your body doesn't like this type of motion, does it?" Jack pressed.
Rath took a moment, swallowed hard. The taste of whatever was in the back of his throat burned going back down. Finally, he found the voice to respond. "I guess not, but like I said, it’s usually not this bad."
Outside the viewshield, the orange flares finally died away and the sky turned a bright blue. The stars disappeared as the atmosphere of Fenrir swallowed the scout completely. Flight controls brought the vessel to a slow descent, and the great turbulence of atmospheric entry ceased.
The council coordinator turned to Lar. "How about you, do you feel bad?"
"No, not really." Lar looked more lost than sick. "I don't get to experience this that much. I don't know what to expect." And indeed, he peered out the viewshields with a newfound curiosity. He almost ignored Jack's continued questions.
"How about air sickness? Do you ever feel uncomfortable in a shuttle or a skimmer?"
Lar just shook his head.
"So this is no real problem for you?"
"No, I guess not."
Jack turned a critical eye back to Rath, but spoke loud enough so that Lar could hear. "Your concentration is not the best at this moment is it?"
Rath was indeed paying more attention to his own problems than to Jack's questions. "Huh?"
This nonsensical word highlighted Rath's discomfort as well as his mixed concentration, and Jack nodded to Lar. "That may explain some things."
Rath wiped the beads of sweat from his forehead. He fought off a final wave of nausea with a sense of indignity. "What things?"
"You don't like reentry and you seem to have a fear of heights. During your first scout, these factors could have caused you to miss something."
"I checked my screens," Rath argued. "I always check my screens and the viewshields. It's part of my job."
"Yes, I won't argue that, but that's not really my point. You seem much more concerned with your own discomfort. I'm not saying it's a crime, but it could have caused you to miss something."
The height of the craft still left Rath far from comfortable, the possibility of losing power and falling continued to strike at his consciousness like a loose shutter in a windstorm. But Jack's accusations found their way through the fear, brought out an anger which flushed his face.
"How could I miss something like life on a planet? I mean it's there or it's not. If I look out and see nothing but rock, what else am I supposed to look for?"
Jack scanned the nav coordinates. "Take a quick look now, both of you. What do you see?"
Rath pointed to the brown and yellow landscape. His voice held a tone of vindication. "The same thing I saw when I first scouted this planet, nothing."
Lar nodded his head in agreement.
"This is exactly what I saw before," Rath continued. "I don't care how sick I feel, there's nothing down there to see."
Jack smiled. "Of course this is what you saw before; I brought you in at an orbit to mimic your first scout. This is the same flight path. What you see now is exactly what you saw before you initiated automatic landing. But I would like to point something else out. At a higher altitude, more of the surface would have been visible. If we checked the view screens at that point, the view might have been different."
Rath shook his head obstinately. "But I'm sure I made a visual check at initial entry during my first scout. Even if there was something to see then, I would have noticed it."
"Are you certain?" Jack questioned almost sternly. He did not press with hostility, but he offered his own explanation with a degree of confidence. "Remember how badly you felt. You probably did check you visual screens, but how much attention did you give them? Surely if this planet was covered with plant life, you would have noticed, but based on your discomfort, even you would have to admit that a small pocket, a trace anomaly compared to the full expanse of the planet surface might escape your attention."
Rath wasn't so sure. It sounded plausible, then again it sounded impossible. If there was life on this planet, he was certain he would have spotted it.
Jack interrupted with a stern command. "Set your ship for automatic landing sequences, just as you did during your first scout."
More out of instinct than obedience, Rath ordered landing site selection and approach. The Boscon Props shook the vessel as they gently lowered the craft for landing. Rath exhaled as he welcomed the sensation of the props beating against hard ground. When the ship settled into touchdown, he wiped the last few beads of cold seat from his head. Quiet settled into the cockpit as Rath shut off the engines.
Jack stared intently at the pilot.
"What?" Rath responded uneasily.
"Complete your check off and take us outside."
Rath shrugged, checked the atmospheric readings, and prepared for disembarking. He led Jack and Lar out of the starboard hatch. This time, he didn't hold his breath or run from the craft. He stood beside it, smelling the cooling metal. It threatened to bring back a touch of nausea, but he fought off any further sickness.
A lifeless desert welcomed them. Jagged brown rocks jutted up from the horizon in every direction. The surface was parched and hard. Dust, sand and rock; nothing more.
"Certainly not the garden spot of Fenrir," Jack admitted.
"I'm not convinced there is a garden spot," Rath countered.
Jack just smiled. "Take us on a walk. I'm sure you normally do a foot scout."
"Absolutely, but you're just going to see what I see now. Oh by the way, my portable is scanning for life signs. There's no reading. Nothing."
"I don't doubt that at all," Jack responded, sounding anything but defeated.
The three ambled for some time through the barren landscape. The scenery held rugged beauty, but no indication of life. Finally, Jack made his last request.
"Take us to the point where you obtained your load of emeralds and rubies."
Rath frowned and did not move.
Jack waved his hand almost apologetically. "Don't worry. I'm not trying to obtain any kind of evidence against you. I just want to retrace your trail. It's an order from the councils. It's the last step in verifying why you didn't find the Fenrites on your first scout."
Rath huffed a heavy breath but finally conceded. He brought them to a small pit where he had used the laser miner to scratch away the rock surface. He watched Jack carefully, still unsure of the coordinator's motives.
Jack just scratched an eyebrow. His narrow features appeared to thin even more under the heat. "Why don't we get back to the ship? It's hot out here and I'm getting tired. There's still much for us to see."
#
"Considerable challenges, considerable challenges indeed." Dr. Sinclair took a handkerchief and wiped the side of her neck. Warmth in the council room didn't create her perspiration, questions and concerns over the Fenrites raised her anxiety and the layers of flesh simply did the rest. "I suppose we should examine the most obvious problem. The growth rate of the Fenrites is expanding exponentially. The gestation period is much shorter than Dr. Eurobian estimated. Multiple births also seem to be the rule rather than the exception. Colonies are teeming with newborns and growing infants.
"For those of you that worried of the immediate repercussions of overpopulation, I have a leading report which puts some of those concerns to rest. The Fenrites will not starve. To their credit, they have found their own solution to the restricted food supply. They have examined the plant life instilled for them and found the crop which grows the fastest and provides the greatest nutrition. They are using this food source to its greatest potential. Our scanners are already picking up extensive tracks of land utilized to support current as well as future population growth. As they deplete that which was initially provided for them, the larger than anticipated harvests will more than compensate for the loss. In effect, the Fenrites are adapting to their explosive growth by farming much larger areas of land than we expected.
"This will of course alter Dr. Morgan's planned ecosystem. A much larger percentage of Fenrir's surface will be changed from desert into farmland. A small consequence. We have many scanning reports which will provide enough data to assert our claim of Fenrir's desert like conditions before this alteration. This new phenomena will simply be attributed to the stage of development the Fenrites achieved upon our discovery of their civilization. It will be considered part of their evolution and nothing more.
"Perhaps even more interesting, the Fenrites show particular skill toward utilizing the surrounding lands as efficiently as possible, but with a mind to future needs as well. While their main objective is to create a sufficient, reliable, and quickly available food supply, they are not ignoring other alternatives. They seem to be instinctively avoiding our own ancestor's agricultural mistakes which led to the potato famine and the dust bowl. I would theorize that they have actually retained a far greater percentage of the agricultural knowledge planted within their memory than we would have imagined. There is little else which would explain their instinctive actions to refrain from over burdening the soil and relying on a single crop. Perhaps their simple-mindedness and lack of independent thought allowed for such absorption, like pets learning a new trick."
Dr. Sinclair folded her hands and a frown creased her lips downward. "But now to the problem. We are uncertain as of yet as to the true life span of a Fenrite. Dr. Eurobian gives us some insight as to an estimate, but nothing that we can count on with any great reliance. Even if we take the short end of the estimate, the Fenrite population will still grow at a staggering rate. If such growth continues, they will eventually reach a point where there is simply not enough land to cultivate. While it is nothing that threatens them in the near term, in the long run they will face food shortages.
"Some of my associates have offered solutions, none of which I can support. From the ill-conceived notion of creating a predator to the vastly more compassionate, but no less damaging alternative of supplementing the Fenrites with food shipments from our own ag-planets. I assert that we must allow the Fenrites to find their own solutions as they have already shown a propensity to achieve. Let them deal with the problem and let us learn from it. That, after all, is the basis of this entire experiment.
"Food shortages may lead to other events which our colleagues from different councils are eager to watch. Monitoring riots, war, and the political development stemming from such calamities is just another form of understanding our own past. We must allow the different branches of the scientific community to observe their fields of interest.
"Remember, we are not here to solve the Fenrites' problem. A problem I must remind some that does not exist nor will exist for some time. We can make all the projections and estimations over what might happen a century or two from now, but that does not alter the basic intent of our experiment. We merely must watch how they deal with critical junctures in their own development. The variations and similarities will tell us a great deal about our own historical decisions. We did not create this organism to dictate its lifestyle. We proceeded with this grand experiment to watch the internal development of an alien civilization. To interfere, even with the best intentions, is to break the foundation which is the cause for the Fenrites very existence."
"Now, for some good news." She rubbed her hands together as she took a surveying glance around the council chambers. "We have the scout pilot that made the initial investigation of Fenrir, the only human to physically explore Fenrir before Inception. Due to some genuine luck, achieved by the forthright decision to have the Authority secure the system, the pilot was caught attempting to pirate gems from the planet. He never turned over his report to a local Exploratory Commission, and thus, there was never a need to intercept the planet from the Council of Colonization. We have detained the pilot for some time; even allowed health officers to conduct extensive tests to satisfy their own fears that there are no communicable diseases on Fenrir. Now, a close associate of mine is debriefing the scout pilot and clearly removing any threats that he might represent."
#
"Alright Mr. Scampion," Jack pointed to the flight controls, "why don't you get us airborne, but don't take us into orbit. I want you to keep us in the atmosphere for a little aerial reconnaissance."
Rath grimaced. "What altitude?"
"Set it for 15,000 meters. That should be high enough."
Rath voiced the order and the scout rumbled with life. The Boscon Props
powered the craft into vertical lift off, then propelled the scout into a standard flight path at the proper altitude.
"Now, let's take a look at these terminal screens, shall we," Jack requested. "Please activate all exterior cameras and use them to scan the surface."
Rath grudgingly activated all viewing cameras and the far reaching landscape of Fenrir filled the monitors. A touch of vertigo struck him as each terminal flaunted their position high in the sky. He swallowed hard to beat back the growing unease. The only comfort he found existed in the drab appearance of the landscape. Brown and orange rock formations filled the terminal screens. The desert surrounded them and surpassed the limit of the camera range.
"See!" Rath nearly shouted. "There's nothing out there." He paused for a moment to let the display screens accent his point. After nodding his head, he let his anger flow freely. "What the hell is this all about? You tell us there's a life form down there, some kind of ape-lizard thing, and there's nothing here."
Jack said nothing. He just watched the screens.
Rath grew even more annoyed with the silent response. His anger allowed him to forget his discomfort. "How long are we going to stay up
here? There's nothing down there."
Jack waited a few more seconds, and then looked to Lar. "What about you Mr. Smiel? Are you convinced there are no life forms on this planet?"
"I guess so," Lar confessed. "I don't see ... wait! What's that over there?"
"Where?" Jack asked calmly.
Lar pointed to a corner of the view screen. "That."
Rath turned his gaze to the point of contention. He stared at a spec of green. He blinked, but it remained.
"Can you zoom the lens anymore, Mr. Scampion?"
Rath stuttered. "A little."
He adjusted a control and the green spot filled a larger portion of the view screen.
"Why don't you change course and head in that direction? Keep your altitude at 15,000 meters, for now anyway."
Rath didn't respond. His attention remained fixed on the monitor.
"Mr. Scampion?"
"Yeah, I'll adjust the course."
As the scout vessel veered toward the anomaly, the green area began to grow, to encompass more and more of the landscape. Within moments, the shadows of plant life filled the entire lower portion of the bow camera angle.
"Gentlemen, let me introduce you both to alien life."
There was no true definition to the picture at this point. They were both too far and too high to determine what kind of plant life nestled itself into the soil, but the existence, as well as the spread of the anomaly, was no longer debatable.
Rath shook his head almost violently as he argued the obvious. "This isn't possible." He switched off the aft and starboard cameras and diverted monitors to sensor readings. He pointed to the screens with renewed vigor. "Look, there's no reading on the sensors. They're not picking up anything. This is some kind of trick."
"Widen the array," Jack advised.
"I am shooting a wide pattern array. I always ... this isn't right." He fumbled with the controls. He matched the board setting with the readouts. The manual controls indicated they were indeed on wide focus, but the sensor patterns themselves indicated a narrow band.
"What's wrong?" Jack asked with a look of concern.
"The sensors are shooting a band that doesn't match the controls."
"I don't understand," Jack noted innocently
Rath frowned before he explained. He slapped and twisted a few more controls, even requested computer analysis. "Check sensor integrity. Analyze beam pattern."
The computer replied instantly. "Sensor reflection within normal parameters. Wave structure uninterrupted. Beam pattern ten square kilometers."
"That can't be." Rath looked to Jack. "The sensor waves are only rebounding off a fraction of the planet surface."
"Can you increase the width?"
"Damn it, I have. I've got the controls on maximum. On these settings, I should be getting half the planet. There's nothing else for me to turn up. Wait, I can turn control over to the computer." He voiced the order. "Computer override on sensors. Ignore manual controls. In fact, shut down the cockpit board. Maximum scan of the planet for living organisms." "Insufficient data. Unable to match readings."
"Readings? What do you mean insufficient data?"
Jack nodded. "That was the first reading received by an orbital scanner five star systems from here. An anomaly."
Rath barely choked out one last request of the computer analysis. "Define existing readings within known standards, ignore unrelated material."
"Chloroplasts. Carbohydrates. Amino Acids. Located within numerous complex organic compounds capable of metabolism."
Jack grinned ear to ear, but still his teeth did not show. "You see gentlemen. Alien life. That's why the computer couldn't relate its initial readings to anything within its data base. The most prevalent theory points to life which is quite similar to our own, but with slight differences in genetic makeup. Understandable actually."
Lar peered deeply into the view screens, trying to understand the magnitude of what he was seeing. "That's a lot of green down there."
"Well," Jack offered, "it's actually a good deal more than what was there a few standard months ago. It seems the inhabitants of Fenrir are going through a phenomenal growth stage. They appear to be learning new farming techniques, irrigation and other agricultural processes. It's not unlike what are own civilization experienced during certain times of new invention. They are farming more and more of the land, turning desert into the green fields we now see. We believe that is why the orbital scanners finally picked up the anomaly a few months back. If the Fenrite population had remained static, we might never have found them until after we colonized this planet."
"Why didn't I find them?!" Rath demanded.
Jack spoke with a reassuring tone. "We don't blame you. Stop torturing yourself. You put your vessel on automatic landing and the computer picked out the safest place. It would be like landing in the Sahara Desert on earth. You would have found no signs of life there, either. The problem was simply a sensor control. We'll have maintenance check it out when we get back in orbit. The Council of Technology wanted to take apart your ship about three months ago, but a decision was made not to. We wanted to run this test, but we wanted to run it with you. We had to have conclusive proof as to why your first scout didn't reveal this anomaly.
"You see, due to your somewhat unethical decisions to return to Fenrir, some councils believe you knew that there was alien life here. They believed you simply wanted to steal the emeralds despite the finding. A good deal of rebellion in a society will create that kind of cynicism. A review of your logs, however, indicated you never found the aliens despite your landing. This, of course, created a debate as to what happened. But we have our answer and there is no need for us to worry about your motives any longer."
Rath bit his bottom lip. He supposed he should have been thankful for the remark, an absolution of blame, but his emotions lie elsewhere. He stared at the growing sections of green on the view screens. He had been to so many planets. They were always the same, rock and dust, empty lands waiting to be raped by miners and colonists. He never returned to the planets he scouted because he didn't want to see the change. He didn't think he wanted to see the desolation forced into something different, something that was perhaps never meant to be, but he was seeing it now.
An alien.
Alien life.
That's what caused this change, or so he thought. He explored and scanned so many planets, investigated barren worlds. He never found anything beyond rocks and lifeless oceans of water. He was a scout; it was his mission objective to search out alien life. Here it was before him, and he was truly not prepared for it. A hundred new questions bit at him, a hundred new thoughts confused his previous convictions.
An alien!
Jack spoke as if he could read Rath's mind. "Would you like to get a closer look?"
#
Dr. Sinclair entered the following note into her portable:
Jack:
After you're convinced the jewel distributor no longer has doubts, send him home. Tell him he should remain silent in the interests of Regency Security. I've checked his profile, and I believe he will remain quiet and simply go back to his business on Janus. He may be an asset we can utilize in the future, but for now, it is better if we return him to his daily routine. He’s been away from his business for a very extended period of time. Offer him whatever assistance he needs to quickly return to his life as it was.
As for the pilot, I'd like to keep him with us. He is motivated by money and a man like that can be dangerous. All it would take is one religious zealot with deep funded pockets and this scout may turn on us. Use your best judgment in convincing him it is in his own best interest to stay on.
I have one last request. A minor branch of the Council of Galactic Agriculture wants a sample of the Fenrite crops. Two members of the main department of agricultural are well aware that the samples will provide little benefit, but they do not wish to stall the request, fearing their reservations will appear suspicious. Please advise the Health Council to place a ban on the transportation of plant life until further study is conducted.
As always, treat this memo with proper security procedures. Deepest Regards, Dr. Elizabeth Sinclair
#
Rath glared uneasily. "Is this a good idea?"
"I have clearance for one low pass." Jack replied.
"How low?"
"Pretty much as low as you want. I was only authorized to land in the
desert where you made your first scout, so we can't land again. But if you really want to get a good luck at our newly-discovered galactic neighbors, that shouldn't be a problem."
Lar perked up. "You mean we get to see the alien?"
"We'll be able to pick them up with the cameras on full zoom. What do you say, Mr. Scampion? Care to take us down for a look?"
Rath grunted, but he fixed on a grouping of the complex organic compounds as described by the computer. He punched in a low flight path, not the safest altitude for a scout, more like a skimmer route, but for one pass, they'd be alright. He gave one last command to the shipboard computer.
"Fix all cameras on the unclassified organisms, range four kilometers, bearing zero point zero five. Maximum magnification. Display on forward screens."
Jack glanced at the images every now and then, but he focused on the reaction of the two men with him. He smiled.
Lar sat wide-eyed and amazed. "Will you look at that? This is unbelievable. They're like two legged, walking lizards. They got faces like monkeys, but they're all covered in scales. I don't see any tails, do they have tails?"
"A few colonies in a different region have been reported to include tails," Jack said.
Lar's eyes darted about the many forms moving about the small compound nestled in a crescent of medium-sized trees. Small huts of branches, tall grass, rock and mud dotted the backdrop. "This is unbelievable."
Rath stared dead in the center of the screen. He said nothing. He thought of the last time he was here, on Fenrir. He remembered how he felt when he kicked that lonely rock. He thought he was alone, but apparently he wasn't.
#
The Fenrites couldn't ignore the hum of the scout vessel. At first, they sought cover. Some dove behind the cluster of trees which protected their village, others darted into their small huts. In time, however, they all grew curious. They moved about in search of the strange noise. Finally, they looked to the sky, to an area where they had never seen anything but clouds and stars before. There were no birds on Fenrir, but there was something flying toward them now.
They watched the craft sail by, they looked with an eye for detail, and they remembered what they saw.
#
Dr. Sinclair frowned at her associate. "You've seen the reports, haven't you? Of course you have. You know what's going on."
She shook her head as she glanced at the notes before her. Before her fellow council member could speak, she announced her own interpretations.
"Dr. Eurobian, you created the genetic makeup for the Fenrites. I'm looking at your own notes as to why you elected the DNA patterns of the gorilla and the skink. You were certain they would form a societal group similar to that of the human species with only subtle differences to strengthen the presentation of alien origin. If that's true, then I want you to explain what the hell is going on down there. There have been no battles, no skirmishes. No conflicts over land or resources. In fact, our scanners show that these creatures are banding together whenever possible. Why are the Fenrites forming this kind of community at such an early stage of development?!"
This time, she didn't even pause to let him answer. "I've got anthropologists crawling up and down my back, complaining about the lack of tribal conflicts. I've got sociologists abandoning their research due to the conformity of colonies placed thousands of kilometers away from each other. They say there's nothing to be learned here, no similar pattern to that of earth in the pre-industrial age. This is not want I want to hear.
"Let me see if I can make you understand. If enough councils decide that this experiment has become tainted, we'll be left swinging on the line with only one pin to hold us down. It's your responsibility to analyze your work and offer some explanation as to why this has occurred. I also want you to pose fundamental questions for the sociologists to study. I don't care what kind; just give them something to keep them busy."
#
Jack directed Rath to dock with the Intersystem Propelled Planning Station which had taken anchor to study Fenrir. The large, oval shaped craft included several docking bays for small craft landing.
Rath accepted the instructions with equal amounts of relief and hesitation. He would no longer be kept locked up in the freighter, a ship he had grown very tired of, but he wondered what waited for him in this, one of the Authority's top of the line vessels. Surely, sophisticated holding cells lined detention blocks, and if they didn't want to lock him up here, plenty of transports zoomed in and about the station ready to take him to a local jurisdiction.
He said nothing, simply landed the ship and waited for Jack to make the first indication of what would happen next.
As the coordinator disembarked, he was approached immediately by a courier officer.
"Dispatch for you, just came in on last shuttle while you were out, sir."
Jack took the casing, inspected the seal, and opened it. He downloaded the contents to his portable and read through the note in but a split second. He spoke as if reading from the message.
"I have some good news for you, Mr. Smiel. You're going home."
Rath folded his arms across his chest. "I guess that also means I get to stay."
Jack chuckled. "Mr. Scampion, you're going to have to learn to relax. When are you going to realize we're not out to get you? You can leave if you like, but I think you should listen to an offer."
The statement echoed through the docking bay and rang with an inviting tone, especially to the scout. "What kind of offer?"
"There's going to be a good deal of investigation going on the next few months, probably even years," Jack responded. "Most of the studies are occurring here, in orbit, but we will eventually be sending scout ships for reconnaissance. Perhaps even a few landings and sample gatherings. That means we will need scout licensed pilots. You're here. It seems like a good fit."
"The Authority has its own scout pilots," Rath rebuked very harshly. He didn't want to remain a prisoner, even if it was under the guise of some kind of working permit.
Jack just shook his long narrow head. "Dubious to the end, eh?"
"Is the end near, my end?"
"Dubious and concerned. Interesting traits for a scout pilot. But, since you are being so open with your feelings, I will not hide the true reasons for us wanting you to stay. You are the first person to land on Fenrir. That is going to give you a place in the history books, like it or not. Oh, we'll cover up your reasons for coming back, but we'll be forthright with everything else. We've documented your initial scout and the failure to uncover Fenrite existence. We're not going to blame anyone for that. We've already proven the cause, but rest assured it is an interesting point. Anyway, even though you found nothing, you are still the first human to walk on Fenrir. That means you were the first to enter the Fenrir atmosphere, the first to be exposed to the Fenrir environment, and the first human to walk on Fenrir soil."
"I've been the first to walk on a lot of different planets."
"None of them had an indigenous life form," Jack countered with a tone steeped in the gravity of what that meant. "That's why we want to keep you here. Not because we want to hold you prisoner, but because of your role here. Don't you understand that?"
"I understand that I'm going to be cooped up with the Authority and a bunch of lab coats for the next few months, at the very least. That's not going to pay the bills, and it's not going to bring me any quicker to retirement."
"Ah, but it is," Jack grinned. Here, the coordinator relied on his own savvy, his ability to read others. "You will be treated as a contractor, which means you will receive payment for your time here. I have been authorized to offer you pay at an Authority Master Sergeant's rate for every standard hour you remain with us in this system and cooperate with our investigation."
Jack had been given no true authorization, but he knew he would obtain it once he asked. He waited and watched for the scout's reply, measuring the depth of reluctance.
For Rath, it sounded good, except for one word. "What do you mean 'cooperate'?"
Jack rubbed his temples, but ended up chuckling to himself once more. "You're a trying man, Mr. Scampion. I mean that you will be available for any media conferences, that you will not reveal your original intentions of piracy, that you will allow us to use your likeness in any presentations involving the initial scout of Fenrir, and that you will follow the rules and regulations for civilians aboard Authority vessels. It does not mean that you will be coerced into work you do not wish to do, or that you will be asked to behave in a fashion against your morale standings or beliefs, unless you believe you are above lying about your desire to steal emeralds from this planet."
The last held a slight bite of sarcasm. Rath accepted it, he deserved it, but he remained skeptical of his true financial gain. "The pay sounds good, but what about my scout ship. You said something before about technicians wanting to take it apart. What about that? A Master Sergeant's pay isn't going to make up for that."
"Well, that is another matter." Here, Jack hemmed and hawed, played up his own concerns. "We do wish to take the scout ship. We want to analyze it as well as eventually archive it to a museum as the first craft to land on Fenrir. It deserves that. Don't you agree?"
"I agree it's a big loss to me."
The coordinator rubbed his chin. "It's a problem. They're not going to give up that ship. And they're going to say that you forfeited it when you came here illegally. But you also have a freighter. They don't necessarily want that. That ship never landed on Fenrir. I'm sure I could convince them to leave the freighter in your possession. There would be no forfeit of that vessel."
"The scout's mine, too," Rath argued. "And I'm not going to promise anything unless you promise to do something about that loss."
"Fine," Jack sighed. "We'll replace it. Top of the line Authority model, but with no weaponry. Agreed?"
Rath considered the full merit of the proposal. Pay for sitting around an Authority station, and a new scout. It sounded too good to pass up.
"Agreed."