Solarian Down

She wasn’t sure what they’d find out there so she dug through her supplies and pulled out a suit of Warden’s armor for Ben. It took a little bit to show him how to use the communications in the helmet but it was much lighter than his furs. He liked it very much.

“W What do these w w white shoulder pads mean?” He was pointing to the white paint on the armor that covered the right ball of his shoulder and ran to the base of his neck. “I noticed you have b both but your men have w w one on the left shoulder and one on the r right.”

She answered as they put on their helmets and walked to the sled. “The white shoulders and black uniform is the mark of the Warden’s Arm. Plain white on both shoulders means he is a Senior Warden. He will have two men under him with a plain white left or right shoulder. You will notice the ones you have seen have a bold red border around the edge. This means I am a Low Warden with 1000 men under my command.”

“W Wow. So your in the military?” He said as they climbed onto the sled.

“No. You would call us police? I think is the term.”

“Ah, St St Still. A thousand men. You must be proud.”

“Yes well, because of the war it is closer to 350. Anyway, if the shoulder’s border was green that would be a Mid Warden, like my father.”

“Your f f father is a Warden?”

“Mm hm. Many of my family is. It has been that way for generations.”

“S S So what’s above a M Mid Warden?”

“OH! So a Mid Warden has several thousand Wardens under them and they answer to the High Warden. His shoulders are black with a bold white border. He answers only to the High Lord himself.”

“And I t t take it the High L Lord is your king?”

“Mm, of sorts. He is elected by the Lords of the High Council. He leads but ultimately answers to them. They are elected but answer to the Mid Lords. Who in turn handle most of governmental administration. They are elected by and answer to the Low Lords. Who lead most of the governmental interaction with the people.”

“H How do you b become a L L Low Lord?”

“The community elects you.”

“Soooo an elected few few feudalism?”

“Yes... Why!? You got a better idea?!”

“L L Like true d democracy?”

“...Is not there where everyone tries to scream above everyone else in the auditorium to be heard. Because there is no leadership to direct the meeting?”

“Yes,” She could hear his smile. “M M Make those bastards w w work for something for w w once.”

She was still laughing as they pulled up to the crash site. “It looks like something tore up what little remained.” She commented.

“Yeah. Go Gorilla bears pro probably.” It looked like some large thing had come and lifted up what was left of the two destroyed shuttles. Then shook loose whatever was inside before tossing them aside. The area was strewn with blood covered snow and broken equipment. “C Came for the smell of b blood. Ate w whatever w was left of the p pirates before moving on.”

It took Lenaga a moment to collect her thoughts.

“...I want to check the pirate shuttle to see if there is anything useful.”

“S Sure.” Ben replied before nudging the sled over to the ruined vessel.

Looking at the devastation she was grateful she brought Grumpy. She shrugged off the mild fear and dropped to the ground. “This is horrendous.”

“Yeah, th those gorillas are n n not nice. W What are you l lookin f f for.” He asked as he hopped down next to her.

“We need to look for anything we can salvage but mostly, I want to know why it blew up.”

“I th thought you blew it up.” He asked as he turned on the metal detector in the helmet and began to scan the ground.

“No. I shot one of the pirates and a second later, “boom.” She answered as she walked into the wreck.

The shuttle was on its side at an odd angle due to how it landed in the snow. She carefully made her way to the front

“Is it possible your shot ricocheted into something on the vessel?”

“I did not see that… But I did fire four shots.” She replied as she began to pick through what was left of the pilot area. His seat was empty but covered in blood. “Something’s been in here.”

“Probably. W We’re on a planet of car car carnivores.”

“It looks like it tore the straps apart to get to him.”

“St Stop tryin to s s sound like you’re in a horror movie. He w was dead after his sh sh ship blew up.”

“But what if we are not alone on this planet, Ben!”

He could hear the humor in her voice. “I t t tremble in t terror.” He replied without emotion. He caught a small laugh from her. “What w w was it like growin up with y your dad bein a cop?”

“Like anyone else, I suppose. We lived in a small town just outside of Melloreth so I grew up in a town where everyone knew everyone.”

“W What’s Mello r reth?”

“It - is - like your L.A. but with no movie stars.”

“So, o overpriced with sweltering heat?”

“Alight.” She smiled. “Maybe it is not like your L.A. But it IS about that size. It is also where the High Warden’s Tower resides. All of the Mid Wardens are stationed there.”

“Sounds n nice. Gr Gr Growing up with family b b but able t to go into th the city when you w w want.”

“It was actually.” She smiled at the memory. Lenaga had been listening to metal clinking on metal while they were talking. “Ben? What are you doing out there?” She heard another clank.

“Y Y Using the metal detector to f find scrap metal and m m making a pile.”

“Now, that is interesting.”

“It is! Fr From a certain ang ang angle it could even be art.”

“Not the pile! This hole.”

“Holes can b b be art.”

“Ben!?”

“F F Fine. Tell me about your hole.”

“..............”

“I d didn’t m mean it like that.”

“Uh huh. I have a fifty millimeter hole in the side of this shuttle. Looks to be the side that would have been on the far side from me.”

“S So you w w wouldn’t have seen what m made it.”

“Correct.”

“OK. so w what’s special ab bout this hole? I mean, the ship exp p ploded. It should be full of holes. Right?”

“True but this hole is fluted in. All the others are tares or fluted out from the explosion.” She could hear more metal hitting metal but he was silent. “You know of anything that could do this?”

“N No. I’m wrackin my b b brain but. You sure it’s 50 millimeters? I assume the e e elven metric system,..” He heard an exasperated sigh. “...is d different from ours.”

“It comes up as 29.4 zik. Not a number we would naturally use. That is why I switched over to the… “Inferior...” she said distinctly. “...system.”

“Heh! Alright. Well, I g g got n nothin. It’s fluted which m means a pro projectile of some k kind. Still sounds like us. B B But 50? I know of 10mm, tw tw 25mm and 40mm but I c can’t think of anything that f fires a f fifty millimeter round.” Now she was silent. “C C Could it be something the p pirates p picked up?”

“You thinking one of their own blew up the shuttle?”

“N Not sure.” They fell silent as Lenaga went over the possibilities. She wandered out of the ship and watched Ben collecting scrap metal. He had a large tarp on the ground that he was tossing the stuff onto. She walked over and began helping him. Eventually he popped open the visor of his helmet. “J J Just say it.”

She popped open her visor and sighed. “Someone killed those men. I know it was not me. But passed that…” She shrugged.

“F F For me to h have killed them I w w would have had to h h have know who they w were. Or wh what they were.”

“Yes… -and- you would have to know what a Warden’s gunboat looked like.” She watched him.

He pointed at her wreck. “That is a gunboat!? You You You said it was a shuttle!”

“No. No -you- said it was an escape pod and -I- said it was “-more- like a shuttle.”

“Uh huh.” He crossed his arms. “Any of the w w weapon systems on that b b bird about 29.4 z z z z zeek in diameter?”

“No.” She said insulted.

“Are - you - sure?” He asked slowly.

“Yessss.” She menaced.

He grumbled as he took the hoops in the tarp and secured them together at the top of the pile. Once he had a large bag of metal he went to the sled and retrieved a gravpad before securing it to the top of the bag. “Any of the weapons on that - Gun - Ship - useful to us?” He asked as he maneuvered the bag to the back of the sled and lowered it there.

“We should probably check.”

There were several generators and missiles that Ben said he could salvage. But they would need to discuss what to do with them first. Much of the electronics was salvageable with the equipment he had at his cave.

Lenaga asked as they drove the sled home, “What did you want to discuss about the weaponry?”

“M Mostly the m missile ex ex explosives. I can remove it but w w what do we do with it? Store it? F F For what pur purpose?”

“Maybe we just store the missiles themselves. Just to make sure someone doesn’t steal them.”

`Ben nodded and drove them on to the garage where he stored the bag of metal in the machine shop. Lenaga closed and cross barred the garage door before following him inside. She watched as he removed the armor and set it on a shelf before going into the kitchen. She could hear him working in there as she finished taking off her own gear.

She was about to go talk to him when she saw him bring two cups of coffee to the table and sit down. She joined him at the table and prepared her drink.

“So, I n n know I didn’t do it, And you know y you didn’t do it. The pra pra problem is w we don’t know each other didn’t d do it.”

“True. And if you did it, you would lie. And if I did it. I would lie.”

He nodded. “...Except…” He shook his head. “If you had d d done it, you you wouldn’t be stupid enough to mention the h h hole.” She nodded in response. “Too easy to m m miss.”

“Which brings us back to you.” She said as she took a sip.

“OK. S S So what does that t tell you?”

“You knew we were Wardens and you knew they had attacked us. You killed them because you did not want them to kill us.”

“M Maybe I just w wanted to spend s s some time with a h happy little elf.” He said before he took a sip.

She smiled and shook her head. “Not enough time to know I was on the ship before the decision was made to shoot the pirates.”

His eyebrows went up as he nodded. “Ah… So I have to n n know What W Wardens are, W What they do and g g give a damn.” She nodded. “B But how could I know that? H How could I know th they were pirates and that th they attacked you?”

She looked around the room. “You would have a sensor suite of some kind.” She kept looking.

“If I w were par par particularly crafty I w would have stuck it up Frank’s ass.” His brows went up as he nodded and took another sip of coffee.

“I -doubt- that Frank is -that- well trained.” She smiled before having another sip. “It is not out here or the garage or Frank’s cave or the bridge or the kitchen or the shop…”

“Yes?” He asked with a big smile.

She couldn’t help but return the smile. “Stop it. The only part of your home that I have not seen is your bedroom.”

He was nodding. “W W W W WE should investi g g gate right now!”

“No.”

“W Why not?” He almost whined.

“You want me to too badly. It is obviously not there.” She smiled.

“M M Maybe it’s just an act?! To th throw you off!” He was nodding. A lot.

“You are not that devious.”

“I - really - am!”

She shook her head. He sighed and sipped his coffee. “What is for dinner?” She asked eventually.

“Not elf.” He said under his breath to the table.

“Sorry?”

“Beef.” He said with perkiness.

“Sounds good.”

She was enjoying his disgruntled act.

The rest of that day was spent finding a good hiding spot for the missiles. They decided upon a portion of wall between doors in the hall to Frank’s room. The next two days were spent cutting a spot in the wall to hide the weapons with a large block of ice to cover them. Then they spent a day hanging more gorilla fur to make it look like any other insulated part of their home.