113: The Daughters of Ceto – Four
Even before the Pelekys had been part of their plans, the crew of the Gorgon hadn't been alone in their fight against the Thalatte. Hundreds of Kith ships had already signed up for this particular mission - some to track down the ships containing slaves, others to hunt the ones who had done the enslaving, and yet still more to join in the assault on the Mercatus. A hundred different plot lines running simultaneously, some crews running solo, others collaborating, and it was into that field of spinning plates that the Pelekys had to find its place.
The attack would be easy - shoot at the Mercatus until the Mercatus was no more - but finding their niche in the collaboration would take a little more care.
"Well you'll definitely be in cahoots with us, that's for certain," Leto laid out after they'd gone over the plan of attack, "I see a long and friendly future between our two crews. But we gotta figure out how our alter egos are going to join forces, because hand waving that kind of thing is lame."
Humming in thought briefly, her mechanical fingers tapping on the now empty screen in the Gorgon's meeting room, Pryseia eventually said, "Well, we did come to you on Shinju of the Salsica's recommendation, for the purpose of sending a message to the Thalatte that we are not to be trifled with, so we should be able to build off of that."
Selene briefly checked over something on the data pad she pulled form her jacket before saying, "Yeah, looks like Naginata and her cohort are back on for hunting down some of those slave carrying ships. She'd had to drop out before due to her crew being indisposed."
"They'd been snatched by a Thalatte slaver party," Nevara explained, "And we helped her get them back."
"Fuck, I had no idea," Leto gasped, "She got that all sorted out so fast that I thought it might have been a bender that went on a little too long that took her crew out, and she was just saving face for them."
"No, Usys had snatched them, but like we said before, we took care of that." Malakh said.
"So coming in on the Salsica's recommendation will make things easier, we've got a good on-screen relationship with them, even if our crews present themselves very differently." Phoebe added.
Elytra barked out a laugh at that. "I'll say! I went through some of your back catalogue yesterday, and you're all a lot more stoic in character than you are out of it! But I think that should work out with our own characters, as we're pretty stoic ourselves."
Scooting forward in her seat and bringing up a writing program on her data pad, Yarvela perked up, "Fantastic! With Naginata's referral allowing our paths to cross, we should stage a meeting where your crew requests to fight alongside ours. We've promotional material for this assault that those participating have already posted to their sites, so we can get that forwarded to you as well. Nothing mentioning that it's the Mercatus we're going after, of course, just that a strike against an Enlightened force has been planned. There's Zymeth and Necupole footage in there to throw off the scent further."
"Clever." V'tala said, a single eyebrow raised.
"Never hurts to keep one's enemies guessing, eh?" Sara scoffed, "Easy enough to confound Thalatte command, their intelligence department bloated with those who got in thanks to their parent's influence, rather than their own skills. But still, enough clever sods in that lot to make letting our guard down a bad idea."
"It'll be weeks before the Thalatte find out what our actual target is, and by then it'll be nothing but wreckage," Phoebe said, before turning to Pryseia, "If you and your crew are free, we can probably get your intro to this whole thing filmed today. Get that out of the way so we can figure out more of our joint narrative."
"I don't believe there would be any objections to that?" Pryseia said as she turned to the rest of the crew of the Pelekys, but all of them looked eager to get this particular ball rolling.
Nodding over to Elytra, Yarvela said, "I did my own research into your crew as well, so I think we'll have no problem hashing something out. This is going to be fun!"
Against the velvet black of the void, the Gorgon was a glittering beacon of white. Its engines idling, the dull amber glow of them etching gold across the stern of the ship, which was clearly waiting for something… but what?
Then, like an eclipse, a dark shape began to obscure the Gorgon, something as black as the empty space around it.
The Pelekys.
Within the bridge of the Gorgon, its crew sat arrayed at in a semicircle before the main view screen. Each seat looked as though it had been carved from marble, scintillating white, though they were veined with subtle capillaries of colour to match the armour of those seated upon them. On the walls behind the crew, bracketed by columns, lit by some unseen source of warm light, were graven some of the exploits of this infamous ship.
The destruction of Tricinus Station. The liberation of Kartus-12. The duel against the Exeter. The race through the Allamannen Nebula.
But the crew were unmindful of these past victories, now that a new unknown was pinging their comms.
In the middle of the semicircle, as masked and armoured as she always was, sat Stheno, captain of the Gorgon. Over a deep, emerald green flexible under armour, the protective plates of her spacesuit resembled the archaic armour from her people's Bronze Age, as marble white as stone, shot through with that same dark green. Her helmet had been made to look like the face of a woman, as beautiful as she was terrifying, lips pulled back over a fanged maw, wreathed by not hair, but snakes. At her sides sat her sisters in identical armour, save for their colouring. At her left in sapphire blue sat Euryale, while to her right lounged Medusa in ruby red.
Reclining back further in her seat, Stheno lifted a hand as she commanded, "Deino, answer their call."
"At once." The AI said, the flickering grey smoke of its avatar fading away as the shadowed bridge of the Pelekys swam into view.
"Lochagos Stheno." The crowned deupazing on screen greeted with a nod of her head, Chancellor Bathory leaning against the throne, grinning like she knew a secret.
"Queen Kaizoku," Stheno returned, "What has brought you to this corner of the galaxy?"
"Captain Naginata of the Salsica," Kaizoku told her, the fingers of her mechanical arm clacking against the armrest of her throne, "She informed me that you have made yourselves a thorn in the side of the Enlightened. We, too, wish to draw their blood."
Beside Euryale sat two identical figures, their armour mostly obscured by dark grey robes, one tinted very subtly ochre, the other a whisper of lavender. Their helmets were identical as well, resembling drama masks from Terran antiquity, though the lavender one - Enyo - was without a left eye, and the ochre one - Pemphredo - without a right. At the admission of Queen Kaizoku, these two glanced at one another.
"There are many in the galaxy who would wish the same, so I must ask you, are you willing to throw yourself into danger? The Enlightened are not passive foes." Stheno asked.
Letting out a low laugh, Bathory told her, "We are more than willing. They have decided to hunt us for sport, and so we wish to show them just how foolish a notion that is."
Next to Medusa sat a figure in ornate armour - heavy armour - veined in a rich, antique gold. Their helmet looked like the snarling visage of a dragon, a cloth-of-gold cape tossed jauntily over one shoulder. Turning to them, Medusa asked, "Ladon, have you any intelligence to corroborate these claims?"
"I do, indeed. My contacts had much to say on the matter of the Pelekys." Ladon said, leaning impudently back in their seat, "Why, it was only days ago that they laid waste to a mercenary fleet that had been contracted to eradicate them. An impressive feat, for a single ship."
"We are more than just a single ship. We've a compliment of Hyttan mechs at our disposal." Kaizoku said, a knowing smirk gracing her features.
Stheno's form shifted as she let out the slightest of laughs. "Good, because our enemies hoard them for their own use. Where we are bound for, there are sure to be plenty of Odazaen to throw your own against."
The Chancellor caught her Queen's eye and shared smirk of her own before she told Stheno, "We will be more than a match for any that should cross our path. So tell us, when is your next assault planned against those who think themselves our betters?"
"That is not something that should be discussed over open channels, no matter how secure they might be," Stheno told her, waving a hand through the air briefly, "Meet us at these coordinates in a day's time. We can go over the matter in person then."
Giving her a slight nod, Queen Kaizoku said, "We shall see you there." before cutting the line.
Stheno shifted in her seat, crossing one leg over the other before placing her clasped hands against her knee and asking, "Thoughts?"
Ladon twisted enough in their seat to face her, saying, "From what I've been able to gather, they're formidable. We'd do well to have their arms and armours fighting on our side instead of against it. And if they're coming to us on a recommendation from Naginata, then she'd be able to vouch for their character."
"Call her up, then. Given what we're to be facing, we'll need all the firepower we can get." Stheno told them.
Giving a lazy salute at the command, Ladon stood and strolled from the bridge to do just that.
On the view screen, Deino's smoke-like avatar reappeared as it said, "I've taken the liberty to collate what information I could find on the Pelekys and her crew for you. I've forwarded the files to your cabin."
"Thank you," Stheno said as she stood, turning to Euryale as she said, "Head for the rendezvous point. We don't want to keep our new allies waiting."
"Understood." Euryale told her with a nod, pressing a button on the side of her chair. It, and all the other seats in the room, then moved to come to rest at their designated stations, the yoke emerging from her console once Euryale was close enough.
While the others remained behind, Enyo caught up to Stheno, asking, "Do you want the mines ready to go, just in case they're drawing us out under false pretenses?"
"Can't be too careful," Stheno told her, "Better we have them and not need them, then need them and not have them."
In the Pelekys' rec room, Elytra and Yarvela were sitting on the ground in front of the low table, its tabletop screen overflowing with open editing programs, as well as stills and clips from their various video projects they'd made over the course of their Kith careers.
"This is such a striking look," Yarvela said, dragging over footage of the massive Hyttan mech with suns for eyes, the whole scene blindingly white, "It's infrared, is it not?"
"You're the first one whose caught that!" Elytra beamed.
Grinning back at her, Yarvela told her, "I had a bit of a Hyttan phase when I was younger, and I'd read an article that hypothesized that the Hyttan were only able to see in infrared, as everything they produced was devoid of colour, something that cannot be seen under that wavelength. Twin suns is an interesting touch. What was the inspiration for that?"
"The model looked a little silly when it just had the one eye," Elytra told her the lie they'd all settled upon if anyone asked after where they'd gotten the idea, "And since we have no idea where their homeworld actually is, we figured we'd be safe taking some artistic liberties."
"And what artistic liberties these are," Yarvela marvelled as she pulled up the greyscale rendering of the massive mech in the centre of the Hyttan stellar system, "I freely admit that the thought of a being this massive not only seeing but acknowledging me enough to reach out to me was existentially thrilling! Tell me, have the people on your forums accused you of taking mind-altering substances to come up with your visuals?"
Groaning, Elytra confirmed, "They sure have. I can't operate like that, though. Anytime I'm on a mind-altering substance, even something as mild as alcohol, I completely lose my ability to focus! If I'm on something, I'm off my game."
"We're one and the same on that front," Yarvela scoffed, "There is a crew out there in the Kith's ranks, the members of the Viertwintig, who have made a career of carrying out their endeavours while inebriated on something or other, but they tend to stick to soft targets and rely on the patronage of their audience in order to make ends meet, as their efficacy in combat leaves a lot to be desired."
"So they won't be joining us on this upcoming mission?" Elytra asked, all sarcastic disappointment, which got a laugh out of Yarvela.
"Thankfully no. Gimmick crews like that stick to gimmick jobs. There's a place in the economy for that, but our niche - as preformative as we are about it - is quite a bit more authentic."
Bringing up a blank document, Elytra asked, "Speaking of performance, we've never been part of an operation with this many crews in it. Would you recommend a broadcast or a recording?"
"Definitely a recording," Yarvela told her, "Something this size, there's bound to be things happening that we don't want our audiences to see, and that's even excluding any potential security leaks getting out to our intended target before the attack begins. As a general practice, the more crews involved, the less you should be broadcasting."
"Makes sense," Elytra said as she made a note of that, "Your crew has been on a lot of bigger missions like this, then?"
"We've certainly had our fair share," Yarvela said, her mandibles flaring in a cocky grin, "The Mercatus had two sister stations - the Quintana and the Circumforanus - and we were there for when they were both brought down. Those were sizeable gatherings of Kith, but neither were the largest. The dubious honour of that was a battle against a Pi - a Threat Level Green Leviathan. That took the combined forces of the entire Kith fleet at the time, around five hundred years back, and it nearly wiped out the Kith as a whole. This all happened in the core, so the rest of the galaxy remained - and still remains - blissfully unawares of what happened. Quite a bit of the protective casing on the Quanvengier came from that Pi."
Elytra blew out a breath at that. "I had no idea. Every day it just feels like there's more and more about… well, everything, that I had no idea about."
"I'm more than a century old, with all but unrestricted access to the entire interstellar information network, and I encounter new pieces of information every single day!" Yarvela said with a laugh, "There's no way anyone could learn all that the galaxy has to offer. You just have to let yourself be receptive to new information at all times."
Shrugging good-naturedly, Elytra said, "I'm trying to be. But along that line of thinking, I did want to ask you how you recorded the footage during this fight with the Lacero. It didn't look like it was altered in the editing process."
"Good catch!" Yarvela said as she dragged over a video file, "It was quite close to a pulsar, and so the emissions played havoc with our quality, and the results ended up being what you saw. The only thing we had to do artificially was dub over what we said, because it completely nullified any of the sounds we'd recorded live. And that is a skill that is needed more frequently than you'd realize!"
In the Pelekys' bridge, Sara sat at the pilot's seat, glancing over a readout of the ship's systems with a low, rattling whistle escaping their throat.
"This is certainly a far cry from the ships I'd been assigned to during my service," they said, shooting Rhea a look, "And I can all but guarantee that you'll never see a ship like this again come from a Thalatte dry dock. They're loathe to build anything that isn't tried and true, and so a stealth ship that was stolen by slaves? Enough black marks all around to ensure that the Pelekys will remain an only child."
"Well, even if they did build more, they wouldn't be like her," Rhea said as she patted the console she was leaning on fondly, "We've put a lot of upgrades into this baby to really make it our own."
"As any Kith worth their commendations should," Sara said, though their grin turned conspiratorial as they asked, "Though I've a feeling that you aren't just giving me a grand tour of the ship for the sake of cooperation between our two crews. Unlike the Pelekys, you've got siblings, and I've been around those three long enough to know when they're after something they don't want to make obvious. So I'll cut the waffling and just come out and say it - Why did you really want to speak with me alone, Rhea Marinos?"
"Oof, the full name. You really have had to deal with my sisters for decades, huh?" Rhea tried to evade, but Sara just stared her down, a knowing smirk crinkling their eyes.
Huffing out a laugh, Rhea finally relented and asked, "Okay, fine. I coulda looked it up on the network, but I'd much rather hear it from a not-impersonal source. What are thalatte weddings like?"