The Vixen: Discovery And Opportunity
Cast
The Vixen- Duchess of the Foxkin, an Outlaw. A tall well built woman with a ruddy complexion, green eyes and strawberry blond hair.
Major Wesley "Hank" Archer- The Vixens chief of intelligence He is about five six with light brown hair, brown eyes and pale skin
She had just come on the bridge balancing her control pad with a cup of coffee and a pastry when Major Archer came over and spoke with her.
"No hurry ma'am but I have interesting information for you when you are ready."
He took the coffee cup and walked beside her to her command desk.
She put the pastry down and then plugged in her console. It allowed her to control the ship where ever she was and call up information from any incoming signal or stored data The console was hooked by wireless to the ships controls but plugging it in saved power and reduced the chance of a error in transmission.
The full command desk had many features the console didn't including several screens and many separate displays.
She took the coffee back and sat down.
"Ok hank, what have you got." She asked.
"Scout Nacte 129 has found a red dwarf M9 star with a nomadic encampment around it. That in itself is not unusual but this group from the configuration of the ships would seem to be a Shrike tribe."
"Very interesting indeed." She said in a low thoughtful voice.
She called up the report on the monitor and scanned quickly through it.
"We have discussed this possibility before Ma'am. An alliance with another nomadic group would resolve many of our problems. One with a Shrike might go beyond that."
The Vixen again nodded deep in thought.
Her ‘nation' had fled the cluster northward having been declared outlaws. The nation was a nomadic one with 235 homes ships, many times that number factory and mine ship and a formidable war fleet.
They had been traveling now for over four months and had made 250 light years in the process.
That travel time included several stops where they dropped from K dimensions airy sea into real space to mine and refine fuel and supplies.
They avoided any organized inhabited planets and stuck to small dim stars and brown dwarfs.
Very soon they were going to have stop and set up something more permanent.
They were in an area unknown to their own cluster but inhabited and one like most inhabited areas roamed by nomadic nations.
Such a nation -since it would be closer in size to theirs- would make a good ally if things could be arranged.
"It is not clear to me from this report they are Shrike." She told ‘Hank'
"That is a deduction on my part, Ma'am. As you know I am a student of our common ancestors and love their history and lore."
The Vixen and her nation had been an experiment by King Bruce of the Black Forest. He had decided that he would ‘build' a security force to enable that nation to easily take over areas that were not ethnically of the Forest people.
The shrike were a race of powerful telepaths. At one time they had threatened to take over all of the inner clusters but most of the elites of those clusters grafted Shrike genes into their children.
Not enough genes to make them full shrike but enough to give them resistance to to the shrike.
But when Bruce died the other nobles led by her own unaltered brother had decided that this group was a threat to them. He had plotted to arrest and kill them all.
But the Vixen and her husband the Fox had discovered the plot and had gathered as many of the ‘kin' as they could and fled. Many others died but the core of the kin had set up shop as a nomadic nation.
Since then they had been hunted by the Black Forest and had preyed on it themselves.
"They are going to be more powerful on average then we will be." She remarked.
It was something they all knew when they had discussed this possibility of encountering the Shrike.
Their mental powers were diluted and less powerful then the ‘pure breed'. To be sure they were still largely immune but only the elete of the Kin was as powerful as the average Shrike.
"So why do you think they are the Shrike?" she asked Hank.
"The Shrike Home Ships only had 2000 aboard each one- about a third of the usual size- they were designed to run rather then fight and ‘sail' rather then propel."
The K dimension was a vast expanse of air. It had currents and winds. If one was willing to forsake speed one could use those winds to propel a ship without fuel. Fuel was then needed only when one dropped out into real space to find resourses or inhabited locations.
She looked at the data again and nodded. This distance of the recon made it hard to be sure but overall the ships did look smaller.
"Well even if they are hun, cain or Ka kaf we won't run into another opportunity like this for some time." She told Hank.
"That was my thought." Said Hank. "you want to call a council?"
She shook her head. "Set course for the system."
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Cast(new)
The GoldFox- The Vixens son. He is Taller still then his mother with her complexion, eyes and hair. A sturdy and well built man..
Dona Serena- envoy She is a Powerfully built woman with auburn hair, green eyes and a ruddy freckled complexion.
(Some days later)
"Not only have they not ruin so far, they have a ship out toward. It's a three point and it seems not to be a warship." said Hank Archer.
"The Shrike have historically not needed powerful warships to defeat enemies." remarked the Goldfox.
"True enough. They probably expect a non telepathic nation." said the Vixen.
"I am getting a signal including a visual." said Hank.
He put it on the main bridge monitor.
"She is speaking Anglic C." said Hank.. "That was the lingua franca of the east cluster during the Shrikes heyday. It is close enough to our own Anglic K that we should be able to follow it. But let me try something first."
The Vixen nodded.
Hank replied in the main Shrike language. He was much better at it then the Vixen but she understood it even if she was a slow speaker.
The woman looked startled.
"Give her visual."
"Yes Ma'am."
The woman looked relieved. She relied in Anglic C "I am Dona Serena and an envoy for the Dominique. We desire not trouble but would ask you to camp clear of our own industrial complex if you seek to re-fuel. We will hold a fair if you have something to trade or are interested in buying our wares."
The Vixen spoke carefully trying to remember the accents and vocabulary of Anglic C.
"I am the Duchess of the Foxkin. I am called the Vixen. We would indeed like to camp and hold a fair. We are strangers to this cluster and so would want also to trade information. We seek local allies and would like to discuss that as well."
"I see, I will inform the Dominique of that. Will you permit me a Question Duchess?"
"Of course, there is no reason to put off the exchange of information."
"How does your shaman speak Shrike?"
"we are descendents of the Shrike though not in any way part of the Shrike assembly." Replied the Vixen. "My Shaman is an expert on that part of our roots. He notes your own language is far from the main dialect of the shrike, Why so?"
"Like you we are not part of the Assembly though much of our society is similar. Our Great Kin are the Thrush."
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