So you must’a heard how once upon a time, Zeedae Genset‑D done got herself into a heap’a trouble and landed in a Perilous Eventuality Subsector detainment hexa-cube.
You ain’t heard? Huh. Maybe you ain’t from around these parts?
Here’s the thing: them Genset‑D boys and their DNA-affiliate kinsperson Zeedae was always gettin’ on the wrong side of the Subsector Enforcement Authority, and especially of its leader, Boss Hrrrgh. Ol’ Boss Hrrrgh done had it in fer them boys since they left the recombinator birthin’ unit, on account of they’d been adopted by Mentorbot JSE Genset‑D, against whom Boss had a deep and longstandin’ grudge.
Now ol’ JSE, he was a fine mentorbot, dispensin’ affection in such a way as to evoke the neuro-emotional development that leads to sound and balanced adults. But somewhars along the way, Mentorbot JSE’s self-conception A.I. went a little haywire, and he took to distillin’ off-market Navjuice.
Now everyone knows ain’t nobody permitted to man’facture and distribute Navjuice but with a license, and you can bet your bottom Galactic Exchange Unit that ol’ JSE Genset‑D warn’t gonna have no truck with them Subsector Authorities, corrupt as they were. He done struck out on his own and I’ll be goldurned if his Navjuice warn’t just as good or better than the Authority-licensed stuff, with a tangier flavor, and leavin’ the navigator feelin’ high as a super-orbital omnisatellite to boot. It was on very rare occasions known to cause blindness, but that was easily reversible with space-age opti-medical treatments.
And how did Zeedae get herself tangled up in all that mess with the Authority? Well, if you ever heard anythin’ about the Genset‑D boys, you know they’ve a great fondness for hotroddin’, runnin’ the less-trafficked interplanetary and interstellar routes at speeds that ain’t, strictly speakin’, legal. Well what’s true of them boys is also true of their DNA-affiliate Zeedae. She’s pretty as a moon risin’ acrosst the Butterfly Nebula, but she also has a taste for speed, and the odd dose of Mentorbot JSE’s off-market, off-kilter Navjuice don’t help that none.
Why, three shots of that Navjuice and she can make Q-space calculations an’ burn quantum-improbable routes just as well as them boys or even better. And hoo-ee, Zeedae had near as many run-ins as them Genset‑D boys theirselves with Briscoe T. Ponetrain, the Subsector Magistrate — the Sub’strate, they call him for short. Many’s the time that ol’ Sub’strate Ponetrain and his dep’ty-bots thought they done catched a live one, only to be left in Zeedae’s spacedust or tricked out of issuing an Enforcement Citation Chit by her allurin’ charms.
This time was diff’rent, though. Zeedae had been spotted but evaded capture three times in one Lunar Circuit, and Sub’strate Ponetrain had lost patience. Story is that it was a setup: Zeedae’s Spinrunner started leakin’ fusion protoplasma as she was makin’ a hotroddin’ run, and seein’ as no one seemed to be tailin’ her, she done stopped for a refuel at a service module. But the Sub’strate and his dep’ty-bots were lurkin’ right there at the refuel station, right on cue — awful suspicious, almost as though they know’d just where she’d have to stop when she run low — and they done popped her into a field-capture magnetipod on the spot, afore she could bring her considerable feminine wiles into play.
What’s more, when they opened the hold of her Spinrunner, they done pulled out a quantity of ol’ JSE’s Navjuice, enough to warrant proceedings for smugglin’ and off-market traffickin’. Now Zeedae and them Genset‑D boys wouldn’t never transport JSE’s Navjuice in any quantity across jurisdictional lines for just this reason, so one could speculate that plantin’ those quantities in Zeedae’s storage hold was part of the setup.
Whatever the case may be, Zeedae done wound up locked into the detainment hexa-cube back at Enforcement Authority headquarters, and the Sub’strate himself saw fit to sit in as part of the security detail to make sure she stayed there until proceedings could be held.
At this point they done had Zeedae dead to rights, them E.A. types, and it was startin’ to look like an open fight might be the only way to free her, though that hadn’t never been the Genset‑D boys’ style. No, they always preferred subterfuge or sh’nanigans when it come to stickin’ it to the Enforcement Authority, or else pure vehicular speed and finesse.
So there’s Zeedae, despondent, waitin’ in the cube, with the legal game rigged against her as it always was for that Genset‑D family. And to top all, ol’ Boss Hrrrgh shows up. He come in, and he’s physically nothin’ but a big space-slug with a vaguely human-lookin’ face; in he slinks, mainly for the purpose of gloatin’ over finally incarceratin’ a member of the Genset‑D kin.
There he were, with the hexa-cube door open, in order to better gloat at Zeedae from close quarters, and Sub’strate Ponetrain’s right there beside him in case she should try to make a run fer it. Now you’d think that with the Sub’strate standin’ shotgun while ol’ Boss runs his mouth, a gal with that amount of charges and evidence stacked up against her, she’d have no choice but to play up to them in hopes of gettin’ fair treatment and proceedings. One might think — but that would be one who don’t know Zeedae.
“Well, well,” says Boss Hrrrgh, “if we ain’t got Zeedae Genset‑D right here in our own little detainment hexa-cube. By rights it ought to be the entire Genset‑D gang in here, the whole criminal lot, but this surely is a start. JSE Genset‑D’s smugglin’ operation has been a thorn in my side for too, too long, and here we have ourselves some evidence to start bringin’ it down.” Now he done leaned in at Zeedae in revolting giant space-slug fashion, and went on.
“I think we all know, my dear, sweet girl, that you’re not to blame here. No, it’s obvious that your old Mentorbot, old JSE, must’ve talked you into carrying his contraband cargo in that Spinrunner of yours. Now sure, the way you’ve got it souped up for speed is technically unlawful, but that — why, we can chalk that up to youthful indiscretion. It’s the bootleg Navjuice that’s the real concern. Now that: surely an innocent young sweetheart like you was carryin’ it all unawares, or was manipulated into doing so by that conniving ol’ Mentorbot JSE?”
It’s a known fact that space-slugs can’t wink, but if they could, Boss Hrrrgh surely would’ve, at this juncture. He’d offered Zeedae a way out, plausible deniability, and all she would’ve had to have done was to return the figurative wink, and reach out and take the bait. It was partly true anyway: the Navjuice they’d planted in the vehicle was in fact a sampling of Mentorbot JSE’s bootleg product, which they’d confiscated elsewhere. And Mentorbot JSE was indeed the brains, the heart ’n soul of the bootleg Navjuice operation. Zeedae and her kinspersons the Genset‑D boys only got involved in rare emergency circumstances; JSE Genset‑D done his best to keep his young wards out of all that, to keep their noses clean.
All Zeedae had to do was admit to two things that were in fact true: Yes, the substance they’d pulled from her storage hold was Uncle JSE’s legendary off-brand Navjuice, with its distinctive odor and taste; no, she hadn’t put it there herself nor had any awareness of such a thing bein’ there. That would’ve been enough for Boss Hrrrgh to have Sub’strate Ponetrain send his dep’ty-bots on over to arrest Mentorbot JSE for conspiracy to transport unlicensed Navjuice across interplanetary lines.
But even if she only had to tell the truth, Zeedae weren’t no snitch, nor was she one to ever, ever betray her own kin. And Boss Hrrrgh and ol’ Sub’strate Ponetrain, why, that stuff about “innocent young sweetheart” might’a been mostly hyperbole and persuasion, but my oh my had they underestimated this particular sweetheart.
“Boss and Sub’strate, sirs, I will most surely consider your offer,” said Zeedae, batting her gen-mod long eyelashes at them both. “But I’m hoping that, right now, the two of you could help a poor girl out.”
She turned to the bunkside table in the hexa-cube and bent over to pick up a tablet and light-stylus she’d been writin’ with before they came in. She held the tablet up to show them, the sweetest and most ingenuous of looks on her face. She’d been calculatin’ Fibonacci probabilistic travel branchings, as all jump-navigators must, and when she asked it to graph her equations, hoo boy — the curves she shown ’em on that screen! Boss Hrrrgh’s eyes, already large as saucers, went wide as a starship egress-hatch, and ol’ Sub’strate Ponetrain puffed up his cheeks and blew out a hypercharged breath. Hain’t neither of them seen curvature like that before, and from a woman to boot; the Sub’strate blushed bright red, and Boss Hrrrgh’s slug-cheeks turned a puce-like shade of magenta as Zeedae passed the tablet with them scandalous curves into their hands.
Did I mention they had misunderestimated Zeedae? Now, in their moment of distraction, she done slipped by them, kicked Sub’strate Ponetrain in the rump with her stylish magneto-heel to knock him fully into the ’cube with ol’ Boss Hrrrgh, then slammed the phase portal shut, activatin’ the Parabola of Silence as she did. Both of them, realizin’ they’d been duped, hollered for all they was worth, but the sonic dampers done drowned out their voices entirely.
Still, Zeedae couldn’t dilly-dally. There were two dep’ty-bots patrollin’ around somewheres, and it was only a matter of time till they glided in. She held up the Sub’strate’s T-com — she’d pilfered it right from his pocket as she slipped by — and whispered a pirate override code into it.
“Aries Two, Aries Two, you got your aural transmission implants on? This here’s Wayward Ewe, puttin’ out my thumb for a little pick-me-up. You read me, Aries Two?”
A voice come back, crackling with Q-space interference, and as it spoke the Sub’strate and ol’ Boss Hrrrgh done pressed and bumped their heads against the phase portal, hollerin’ and carryin’ on like nobody’s business, though with the Parabola of Silence ain’t a peep could be heard from ’em.
“Well, now, Wayward Ewe, ain’t your voice just music to the ears. We just happen to be in the neighborhood, about 17,000 kilometers straight up, fixin’ to skim right past your current location. You wanna skitch a ride along with us?”
“Roger that, Aries Two. Zap me your Q-space paratrajectory; reckon I can find a way to hop on board.”
Once she’d secured the paratrajectory fix on the Sub’strate’s T-com, Zeedae poked her head out into the hallway. One of the dep’ty-bots was there, but was turned around facin’ the other direction. She made a dash for it. But the sensory scanners on them ’bots had been recently upgraded, so it done detected her, and immediately registered the escape and begun firing its plasma-blaster. So there’s Zeedae, a-dodgin’ and a-skippin’ like gangbusters, down that hallway, and I’ll be goldurned if one ’a them plasma bolts ain’t scorched her shoulder somethin’ painful afore she dived ’round the corner to where the dissolution transporter, what you and I’d call the D-jumper, was located.
She’s still clutchin’ the Sub’strate’s T-com, with that paratrajectory loaded into it, and just as the D-jumper is firin’ up, the dep’ty-bot comes glidin’ around, plasma-blaster to the ready — not one but two dep’ty-bots now. They done paused to stare down Zeedae just as she’s steppin’ onto the D-jumper pad, and she could’a been fried into plasma-broiled fricassee by them guns — if not for the brand new snap-judgment ethics-ometer that had newly been installed in the dep’ty-bots along with their sensory upgrades. That ethical-judgment algorithm done took a fraction of a second to make the call, so that at the very moment the plasma-blasters spat out their phase-shifted hot death, they hit only the empty space where Zeedae had been standin’ a millisecond before.
• • •
Aboard the ol’ Gen’ral Grant, Lau and Buuk Genset‑D and Zeedae were now a-huggin’ and a-kissin’ cheeks, but their rejoicin’ didn’t last long.
“Buuk!!” Lau had noticed the proximity monitor flashin’, which couldn’t mean nothin’ good.
Buuk squinted at the display. “Enforcement Authority orbital drones, right on cue.”
Zeedae looked to one, then the other of her kinspersons with them puppy-dog eyes. “Boys y’all know how much I love the way the Gen’ral Grant handles. Can I drive?”
“Why, all respect for your aptitude, Zeedae, but it was your drivin’ that got you into this fix in the first place!” said Lau with a guffaw.
“Fasten them spacebelts,” said Buuk. “Things’s about to get bumpy!”
Buuk threw hisself into the pilot’s seat as the others strapped in, and his fingertips tapped all over the equation screen quick as a Grebtak rodent fleein’ a seven-legged Snarlepticus. Them orbital drones, flashin’ red on the monitor, loomed closer and closer, and a plasma-beam shot past the bow — a near miss.
“It’s now or never, Buuk!” hollered Zeedae.
“All right, Gen’ral G,” Buuk whooped, “do your thing!!” He swiped an open palm across the equation board and the familiar rosewater-and-phosphorus smell of Q-space entry suffused the cabin.
“Buuk,” said Lau, “Why’s the Gen’ral all a-shakin’ and a-shimmyin’ like this?”
And indeed it was. Molecular stability in Q-space travel is by no means a sure thing, so this was a disturbin’ sign.
Buuk shot the others a mischievous grin. “Well, I plotted a slingshot Q-space jump around and out of the planet’s gravity well, rather than a standard-curvature paratrajectory, to give them drones a little surprise.”
Now the cabin was a-rattlin’, a-vibratin’, and a-rumblin’ something awful. The three exchanged a look and all held their breath: their attractive young faces bent and warped as the probability stabilizers strained to keep ’em all in one piece. Then all the distortion halted abruptly as the good ol’ Gen’ral Grant rounded the planet and made the jump clear of its gravity well, into the smooth sailing of less-bent interplanetary space.
Zeedae unstrapped and leapt over to the monitor just in time to see them drones fail to make the jump. They skimmed down into the planet’s atmosphere and crash-landed right into an ocean, from which it was gonna cost Boss Hrrrgh a pretty Galactic Exchange Unit to have ’em extricated.
• • •
Buuk had busted out a vial of ol’ JSE’s Navjuice and poured ’em each a generous thimbleful when the transmission monitor done begun beepin’ like all get out — on two channels at once, no less.
Lau tapped the first channel, and up come a holo of ol’ Mentorbot JSE, large as life in 3.5-D full-rez.
“You boys manage to bust out Zeedae?” he asked.
“They sure did, Uncle JSE,” says Zeedae, but Buuk couldn’t never let that stand.
“Naw, JSE, Zeedae done busted her own self out; all we did is skip by and give her a lift up out’a there.”
“That’s my girl,” said JSE. “Them Enforcement Authority types oughta know that messin’ with one of the Genset‑D kin is sendin’ the hounds up against the wrong pack’a repli-possums. Reckon I’ll see all y’all back at the ranch in just a few blinks of a Gardozian Blizbop’s eye.”
“Roger an’ out,” said Lau, then tapped open the second beepin’ channel.
And durned if it weren’t Boss Hrrrgh and Sub’strate Ponetrain, in holo form, right there in the cockety-pit of the Gen’ral Grant.
“Why Boss,” said Zeedae, “whatever could you be callin’ up little ol’ us for?”
The Sub’strate craned his neck and leaned forward, as though not aware that his image was bein’ recorded globo-holistically from all sides and broadcast in 3.5-D.
“I’m gonna git you Genset‑D boys, and you, Zeedae, and that Mentorbot of yours, the ringleader of the whole unlawful crew.”
“Now, Sub’strate, Boss,” interjected Buuk. “Y’all know we love you two. We Genset‑D boys never did mean ya no harm. It ain’t our fault we been in trouble with the Enforcement Authority since the day we was spawned. Ain’t ya never gonna cut us a break?”
“I’ll show you a break,” sputtered Boss Hrrrgh. That space-slug in all his 3.5-D glory was a sight to behold, or more like a sight you ain’t never want to behold twice, if you done seen it once. “We’ll break up that smugglin’ ring of yours, and when we do, you are all going to fry!”
“Aww,” says Zeedae. “Generous of you to invite us over for a cookout. I do love me some deep-fried Q-transit Protein Supplement, but I believe we’ll have to decline, with regards. Maybe another time, Boss.”
“Or maybe never,” threw in Lau, and flicked the screen to obliviate the unpleasantly lifelike holos of their unpleasantly lifelike nemeses.
“Well, we all know,” said Zeedae, “that we ain’t heard the last of the Sub’strate and ol’ Boss Hrrrgh. For one thing, I’ll be goldurned if I let them keep my poor Spinrunner in impound one Galactic Standard second longer’n I have to.”
The three, Lau, Buuk, and Zeedae, each raised another vial of Navjuice, swigged it down, and off they went, exceedin’ the Q-probability strictures for metaspace travel, the ol’ Gen’ral Grant kickin’ up a large fishtail of quantum spacedust in its wake.