across a guild of privateers and mercenaries. They were the original band that defeated Captain Wyld. Once Wyld realized the power of fear, a secret treaty was formed for pirates to parade as an opposing army of Calvaria so that the funding for Wyld’s research would grow. Wyld found a way to satiate his desire to conquer and expand. Every time he suffered a mock defeat, his budget doubled. He fed countless numbers of his own soldiers into deathtraps for the sake of his charade… And then there were the bombings.
Sabra had found Spyral’s order packet. Impressive since Spyral was supposed to be the only one who could access those orders. The bombings had been initiated by General Wyld as a means by which to gain unquestionable power through martial law. The bombing at Wyld’s was supposed to happen when nobody was there. The logic was sound. Blow up your own place with a near miss to the family and seem like one of the other targets.
The attempt on Starshine’s life was supposed to send me into a rage that would cause me to unquestionably carry out an order to deliver WMD’s to Calvaria, assassinate their leadership, and then lead a permanent siege on the planet. It almost worked. If I wasn’t so worried about finding her, or gotten into a fight over something as stupid as a haircut, I would be flying there now.
They planned on using the bombing to report me as dead to the world. This would outrage the public by having their old Laser Ball hero murdered by the “evil” Calvarians. That part of the plan they were still able to salvage more believably than they would have hoped with the actual loss of my teammates. Enlistment numbers had gone up thirty-five percent.
After the bomb was prematurely detonated, likely by accidental tampering by Checker just trying to sneak some cake, and Starshine and I were injured, Wyld’s plans were delayed. He had to watch me recover from a distance so as not to garner too much attention.
Wyld had no other candidates lined up back when this first started, but in a few letters I scanned I detected apprehension about choosing me after the fact. He was fearful about not being able to control me. He referred to me as an “unstable element” in one transcript. In another he cited my “questionable origins” to be cause for concern. It was the unknown scientist that pushed him to keep me going in their little lie. Sometimes he even did so with threatening undertones toward Wyld and Starshine. I was the source of more than a few heated exchanges between the two. It was because of that I was worried when Sabra found a quiet protocol Wyld was working called Rogue Contingency .
For Sabra’s almost god-like omniscience that came from all the quick routing around through Wyld’s entire life, there was only a brief mention of it. She was coming up with nothing. That either meant that they didn’t have the plan ready, or records were scribbled on a stone back in a cave somewhere technology didn’t exist.
In addition to the ability to dig through every electronically transmitted message, ever, Sabra’s info gathering techniques included spying through archived surveillance camera footage. If someone had a phone call or penned a hand written document within their recording gaze, she could grab it. She was even able to read lips on some of those recordings that didn’t have audio. She was scary. Still, with all those abilities, she couldn’t find specifics on Rogue Contingency. That probably meant it didn’t exist. Hopefully .
I tracked everything that had happened to me. Some of it made sense in light of Sabra’s findings: Why I was allowed to be barely military. Why I had such a “charmed” life getting onto a pro Laser Ball team. Why General Wyld had that old fashioned policy where his daughter could only marry an officer.
As I retraced my steps, and I saw how the pieces fit, I let my mind drift to the frightened scientist in the weapons lab. Something about him was
Sabra had found Spyral’s order packet. Impressive since Spyral was supposed to be the only one who could access those orders. The bombings had been initiated by General Wyld as a means by which to gain unquestionable power through martial law. The bombing at Wyld’s was supposed to happen when nobody was there. The logic was sound. Blow up your own place with a near miss to the family and seem like one of the other targets.
The attempt on Starshine’s life was supposed to send me into a rage that would cause me to unquestionably carry out an order to deliver WMD’s to Calvaria, assassinate their leadership, and then lead a permanent siege on the planet. It almost worked. If I wasn’t so worried about finding her, or gotten into a fight over something as stupid as a haircut, I would be flying there now.
They planned on using the bombing to report me as dead to the world. This would outrage the public by having their old Laser Ball hero murdered by the “evil” Calvarians. That part of the plan they were still able to salvage more believably than they would have hoped with the actual loss of my teammates. Enlistment numbers had gone up thirty-five percent.
After the bomb was prematurely detonated, likely by accidental tampering by Checker just trying to sneak some cake, and Starshine and I were injured, Wyld’s plans were delayed. He had to watch me recover from a distance so as not to garner too much attention.
Wyld had no other candidates lined up back when this first started, but in a few letters I scanned I detected apprehension about choosing me after the fact. He was fearful about not being able to control me. He referred to me as an “unstable element” in one transcript. In another he cited my “questionable origins” to be cause for concern. It was the unknown scientist that pushed him to keep me going in their little lie. Sometimes he even did so with threatening undertones toward Wyld and Starshine. I was the source of more than a few heated exchanges between the two. It was because of that I was worried when Sabra found a quiet protocol Wyld was working called Rogue Contingency .
For Sabra’s almost god-like omniscience that came from all the quick routing around through Wyld’s entire life, there was only a brief mention of it. She was coming up with nothing. That either meant that they didn’t have the plan ready, or records were scribbled on a stone back in a cave somewhere technology didn’t exist.
In addition to the ability to dig through every electronically transmitted message, ever, Sabra’s info gathering techniques included spying through archived surveillance camera footage. If someone had a phone call or penned a hand written document within their recording gaze, she could grab it. She was even able to read lips on some of those recordings that didn’t have audio. She was scary. Still, with all those abilities, she couldn’t find specifics on Rogue Contingency. That probably meant it didn’t exist. Hopefully .
I tracked everything that had happened to me. Some of it made sense in light of Sabra’s findings: Why I was allowed to be barely military. Why I had such a “charmed” life getting onto a pro Laser Ball team. Why General Wyld had that old fashioned policy where his daughter could only marry an officer.
As I retraced my steps, and I saw how the pieces fit, I let my mind drift to the frightened scientist in the weapons lab. Something about him was
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