Chapter Text
Athena lay at her work desk. It wasn’t an actual office, but she didn’t have a team to work with yet, so she was secondary in the eyes of her project managers at KDFY. Being a space station, the ones in charge were very picky about how to use space. It was her bedroom, which she tried to take up the least amount of space possible, because it wasn’t even her’s only. She shared it with another person.
Karl was his name. He was a Merician, born and raised. Space was where he spent most of his days. She knew he was busy, and often tired when he got home, which they bonded over. Her tiredness was a different kind than his, though.
The words of the presentation she’d constructed rolled past her eyes as she made sure there were no typos for what felt like the hundredth time. She finally had an idea for her superiors to listen to, and that they might actually give her attention for. Just to refamiliarize herself with the material, she watched one of the videos she had linked to the presentation in the few minutes remaining until she had to start moving to the conference room.
The camera feed of the CSV Arbitrator began playing. When she’d been setting this up, she was worried how she’d get footage, but it turned out that her stepsister who she hadn’t spoken to in five years had served on that ship and lived to tell the tale, and gave Athena some of the optical sensor data.
The ship moved like a drunk man, swinging the camera around like it was on a carousel, until it steadied in an instant. It zoomed in on a flotilla of Frontier warships. These designs were especially unique compared to CDF ships. With two bare-bones engine pods and a small midsection, their target profile compared to contemporary ships was unmatched. Their speed, a certainly deliberate product of their design, made them extra dangerous. Around the Arbitrator , CDF ships exploded from a hail of missiles launched by the outriders. Long streaks of plasma left from the thermal energy of rounds accelerated to mind-boggling speeds blinded the feed for a second, before return fire from the approaching force raked the ship. The outriders flew past, spraying down the ship with octuple-barrel swivel guns. Eight barrels!
The Arbitrator was then boarded, crew taken prisoner, only to be released a week later when the revolutionaries were defeated. Still, Athena felt that the performance of the outriders against superior ships could not be overlooked. Her alarm sounded, and she hurried out of her room to make the meeting.
***
The room filled up just a minute after she got there and prepared the screen. KDFY functioned like a well-oiled machine. A brief wave of her hand which elicited similar responses, and she was off.
“We all know the might of the CDF is in their heavy volleys of electromagnetically-accelerated rounds,” she started. “But what if that isn’t necessarily all there is to warfare?” No reactions yet from the businessmen- and women- around her.
“During the recent revolution of the frontier, we should know that Centrum prevailed out of numbers rather than strategy. The best example of this would be this film.” She played the clip of the Arbitrator . A few of the people around the table took notes, others simply kept staring. “Clearly, the coilguns on the Centran ship weren’t enough to stop these ships. Why?”
“These are fast-attack ships, or outriders as the revolutionaries called them. Ones that Centrum could learn lessons from.” She turned the slide to one with a load of images of outriders in varying states of completion. “These ships have very favourable manoeuvrability, speed, and slim bodies that leave less and less to be hit by an enemy’s weapons. They also have underappreciated and expertly employed weapons, like missiles and swivel guns. From what we saw at the Fairfax Ravelin Wharf, the hit-and-run tactics using all these weapons at their disposal proved very effective for them.”
“Proved very costly for us,” she heard a man at the front murmur under his breath. She elected to ignore it, but felt that she didn’t hide it that well.
“These ships do have downsides. In a sternchase where they are chasing, the current models suffered from a lack of inertial dampeners. They also have a lack of long-range armament, and missiles are famous for running out in the heat of battle. Nevertheless, these shortcomings would be easily solved by the other ships in the CDF.” She smiled. “The outrider isn’t meant to brawl or chase. I think the CDF would benefit from these ships, and that is why we should produce and sell them.”
Anxious minutes crept by as the people around the table feverishly took notes. She noticed that three of the eight had various CDF artefacts on their person, and wondered if their involvement in the CDF would cloud their judgement. She hoped not.
“First question,” the man at the front on her right said. He was an obese white man with white hair that was receding like low tide. “Cost?”
“Florencia-class outriders are just modified Linford Island-class coastal defence ships. Those cost 1.25 billion clarion to produce, and given that Florencias are stripped- down versions, they’re likely cheaper still. Indrias cost only a little over 1 billion clarion. Very affordable compared to the similarly-sized Protectress-class.”
The board talked amongst themselves, their tones elevated. She could tell a big concern of theirs was cost. Typical KDFY.
“Next, I would like to know how you know we’d profit from selling these to the CDF,” a man on the left of the table asked. He had more tanned skin and a ponytail, and was in his CDF uniform with so many medals Athena wondered how he could stand up. “We’re in the shadow of the Micheala Colette Fleet Modernisation Program. We have a corvette type that seems to be in the role you speak of. Why would the CDF want another one?”
“The outrider is exactly the type the CDF needs, even if they don’t want it,” Athena spoke with conviction. “The Protectress is a wonderful class, don’t get me wrong, but it lacks things the outrider had, like manoeuvrability, and oh, I don’t know, missiles ? The current corvette doesn’t work in the role I am suggesting. The CDF needs an outrider for the job.”
The project managers spoke amongst themselves yet again. She worried for a second if her tone was a mistake, but perhaps her passion would go in her favour.
“Yes, the CDF at large could probably benefit from these outriders,” a blonde woman in the back with a patch from the CSV Diamantina accepted, “but the admiralty wouldn’t buy them. They just won a war that proved the adequacy of the Protectress-class. Even with the state of the CDF transparent and effort being done to modernise the tactics they use, there’d be no reason to assume the officers of the fleet would even use these ships right, or at all.”
Athena opened her mouth for a second before shutting it again. The woman was right. The Protectress had won the conflict. The CDF wouldn’t pour money into a new type of ship when, at this moment, Athena knew of twenty corvettes being built on the docks.
“Anything to say, Ms. Atkinson, or should we wrap this up?” the man to her right asked. She nodded.
“We’ve come to the conclusion that despite the preached benefits of the outrider, it would be highly unlikely that the CDF would commit to a new program of sloop when a current class fits the niche you describe.” the man with the medals spoke. “Also, respectfully, analysing your inexperience in ship design makes me curious how you expect to engineer a new ship type. This proposal is denied.”
The man- a flag captain, she recognized- spoke fairly and frankly. Despite that, her mind raced like her legs did as she sped out of the room. How could they deny her proposal before even consulting further in the CDF? How could she even get any experience in engineering if she was never given a chance to work on a project? She’d need proof of her potential, of her idea’s potential.
The idea came to her like an electrical signal lit a lightbulb.
“Karl, cmon pick up Karl,” she hissed as she dialled his number from memory.
“Hello? Hey, Athena, how’s it going?” his cheery Merician voice answered the call.
“Not good. Project managers just cancelled my idea. Ninety-nine percent because they weren’t sure it’d be profitable, one percent because the CDF wouldn’t benefit from outriders,” she lamented.
“Ah, sorry to hear that,” he replied. “Couldn’t that wait until later?”
“I have a plan for how to convince them it’ll work, but I need a ride to Southeastern Tantalus. You free?”
“Well, my job as a bus driver is taking a back seat. Nobody needs to be brought anywhere for the next three months, so I’d just be doing clerical work.” Athena didn’t need to be good at psychology to tell he wasn’t excited for that. “I’d be up for a little excursion. You mind explaining it to me once I log a request for a trip?”
***
“The idea is simple,” Athena said as she and Karl walked through the airlock and boarded the transport yacht. It didn’t even have a name, just a designation. “We search the Frontier for who at the Kādarīn Dorai or Senjin Wharf engineered the outrider, and we recruit them to KDFY.”
“So we’re scouting them like in a sport?” Karl asked from the helm. “Doesn’t sound like your forte, Engineer Atkinson.”
“I haven’t had a chance to engineer something, Helmsman O’Neil. You in or you out?”
“Thought I made that clear.” He chuckled as the ship detached couplings. “Laying course for the Keeper’s Dance-Centrum Drift Gate.
Athena dreamt of a giant, towering humanoid creature holding her and spinning her around in his hands. Making her dizzy and sick. He then hurled her through the air, and she hung in the air, never hitting the ground on an endless trajectory. At first it was alarming, then it was mildly uncomfortable, then she just wanted to be on the floor. A floor never came, though.
“Hey Athena, are you good there?” Karl asked from the helm. She stirred from her sleep, and opened the curtains to her bunk. The yacht had one room which had everything for comfort, and a small engineering chamber for maintenance. People back in the day really liked their tiny ships, she guessed.
“Yeah, was I moving a lot?”
“Don’t think you strapped yourself down right while I was manoeuvring through Atamara. That system gives me the creeps, so I stormed out of it as fast as I could,” Karl explained. It also explained her dream.
“We’re enroute to Mizudori?”
“The one and only,” he confirmed.
Athena pulled up the display of the yacht’s location on the table in the centre of the room. Mizudori was a gas giant which the moon Teldrin orbited around, which in turn had its own satellite, the Kādarīn Dorai. Their target.
“It’ll be a few days of burning and deceleration, so just sit back, put your tray tables back, and enjoy the flight.”
***
“Athena, we have a problem.” Karl roused her from her dreamless sleep. “Athena. Athena!” He finally succeeded. She flew off the bunk and just hung there for a few confused seconds before her brain realised there was no thrust.
“What is it?”
“This,” Karl let a message play. “This is the CSV Sojourner. Recent events have led us to locking down the space around Teldrin. You may not enter, KDFY transport. Divert to a different destination. Sojourner out.” Karl looked at her grimly, opening his arms wide, letting her decide their next move.
“Stay on course,” Athena urged. “It’s not like they’ll fire or board a simple transport. We aren’t even going to Teldrin.” Less relaxed by her excuses, Karl remained at his seat and restarted the drive.
Anxiety grew over the next several minutes. Despite her attempts to comfort him, neither person was truly convinced they were safe, disobeying orders from the CDF. A radiation receiver lit up on Karl’s console.
“Crap, crap, Athena! We’re being painted by a targeting radar! It’s coming from a Matthew Cormier-class!” Athena was under no illusions now. “Divert to the other drift gate! Now!”
Karl swung the ship violently, throwing Athena off her footing. The yacht sharply turned to Maialan drift gate. They’d have to go to the Senjin Wharf.
“Food for the guest of honour,” Karl proudly announced as he laid a plate down on the table for Athena. He was being extra, but his accent made it cute. “Made with passion and the finest cheese I had.” The meal he was hyping up for her; a grilled cheese sandwich. The stores of food had been running low, and it was doubtful the supply convoy enroute to Maiala’s Rest were to offer them anything. Karl was making basic rations for her.
Her taste buds erupted in ecstasy as she bit into the bread and melted cheese. “Holy shit, Karl, this is great,” she tried to be unimpressed and failed, but it made Karl blush. “How’d you make this? I didn’t hear the microwave or anything.”
“Ah. Heatsink.”
She nearly choked.
“Heatsink?”
“Heat. Sink. Where the heat goes when the radiators are a bit choked up. This yacht was made back during Halpern’s, when my people were still stuck in Mericia, so the radiators aren't up to modern standards. KDFY would rather scrap the ship than upgrade the radiators, though, so the heatsinks are constantly warm.”
“But, why?”
“A little Merician tradition, dear. Back in the day, when Adam Meric was still alive, he was a tough nut. He was spacewalking in his senior years. One day, he went out, and by the time anyone knew, he had died from microwave radiation exposure. Burns all on him. From that day forward, we Mericians have never liked microwave ovens. It’s sort of serious, sort of an inside joke.”
Athena was still confused. “How does that tie into cooking grilled cheese on a heatsink?”
“Ah, right.” He seemed caught up in his people’s history. “It’s sort of a rite of passage. We Mericians have to be able to make due with whatever we’ve got on a ship. To prepare us to be able to cook in awkward conditions, your parents make you learn how to cook some sort of food on an internal heatsink. For me, it was grilled cheese. Some other people made really impressive things. Girl I knew from secondary school baked cookies on a heatsink.”
Athena took another bite of the sandwich. Grilled cheese wasn’t that hard to make, but to make it on a heatsink? She’d never wrap her head around some Merician traditions.
“Glad you know how to make this stuff. To a good journey?” She raised her sandwich like she was toasting a drink. Karl laughed, but did the same. “To a good journey.”
Dalstaff had much less action during the Frontier Revolution. Aside from the uprising on Dalstaff II and a flotilla of warships produced by the Senjin Wharf, the system had largely been quiet. A week after it started, word had spread that the revolution was over, and after a CDF battlegroup came and destroyed the shipbuilding ability of Senjin Wharf, they moved on to Maiala. Afterwards, the Centran parliament still let the Dalstaffians of Dalstaff II have their independence.
“Senjin traffic control just gave us permission to dock. Coming in for a landing,” Karl reported. Athena stepped onto the station with apprehension, aware of her status as a Centran, and waited for Karl to accompany her.
“Hey!” she yelled to a dock worker. She looked over with a blank expression. “Where’s the chief of this place?” She pointed down a hall, and mouthed something Athena couldn’t hear. Athena raised a thumbs up. She hustled down the hall and knocked on the door the dock worker had specified. A man’s voice answered, “come in.”
“What can I do for you?” the chief engineer of the dock asked. Athena entered, Karl opting to stay outside. The chief had dark chocolate skin, a crest of hair, and a badge to prove his title. A little electrical tape censored something on the identification, probably some title the Frontier Union gave him.
“I’d like to be introduced to your team of engineers who worked on the outriders,” Athena requested. Her instincts told her to get out of this place, that it wasn’t safe for a Centran. She had to fake confidence to get her way.
The man laughed right in her face. “Typical tourist. I’m not giving you a damn thing. Centrans have been coming to this place, critiquing it, telling me what I did wrong and what I did right. Y'all don’t belong here, so scram,” he dismissed her. He stared silently at her, trying to will her to move. She really wanted to, but she had to do this. Someway, somehow.
“I’m not just someone who wants to gloat.” She pulled out her KDFY ID. “I promise I’m here for good reasons you should consider.” He lifted an eyebrow, which she took as permission to speak again. “I want to meet your team of engineers because I believe if they were employed at KDFY, it would be a real benefit for all involved. I really think your engineers did a good job building those warships, and I want ‘em to build for KDFY.”
“No way.” he blankly said. “I need them here. They’re my employees. No, they’re my friends.”
“Here is falling apart. Since the revolution, you haven’t been getting business. I’ve seen your stock plummet. Your friends would get money working for KDFY.”
“Still no. You know social relations have been strained ever since the revolution. How am I supposed to believe that my friends will be safe and welcome in Keeper’s Dance?”
“I promise I will make sure nothing happens. Nothing ever happens in Keeper’s Dance.”
“How many frontier folk do you know are employed there?” he retorted, then sighed. “If it’s what you want, I can arrange a meeting with the people you’re asking for. Not like they’re busy designing warships right now anyways.” He flatly sent out a call for a dozen engineers by name for a meeting in a conference room. “Follow me.”
***
“What is this, a trial?” a woman with a collage of tattoos joked. She took a seat at the front of the table, next to Athena and the chief, who’d introduced himself as Hoss as they walked down. The other eleven people around the table, she’d been told, were everyone Hoss knew that worked on designing outriders. He admitted that she’d have found more people at the Kādarīn Dorai.
“No, this is a job offer.” Chief Hoss said sternly. Athena got the impression that he didn’t do that terribly often. “Everyone, this is Ms. Athena Atkinson. She’s from KDFY, and she’s giving you all a chance to work somewhere not in the ass-end of nowhere.” That last comment aroused a few chuckles from the group. A bunch of jokers, she could tell.
“Get on with it!” a man at the back with an asymmetrical haircut exclaimed, eliciting more laughter.
Athena stood up. All the confidence she had had to be summoned here. “I am exactly what Hoss said I am. I want to offer you all jobs at KDFY because I watched the revolution like the rest of the cluster, but I saw the effectiveness of the outrider. I want KDFY to produce ships like the outriders, but I would need your expertise for that.” She awaited their responses with bated breath.
“Guess we won the revolution after all, ey guys?” a tanned woman in the back joked. A man in what looked like the most uncomfortable business suit ever asked her in a more respectful tone, “can you explain your plan to us?”
“Yes, uh,” she paused, trying to find a nametag on him. He understood. “Tamir Brezinski.”
“Thank you, Tamir. I intend to create an engineering team at KDFY in which you twelve can create designs for the CDF. In particular, I would very much like to know what sort of unorthodox ships you could come up with, because the Centrans really only have one style, and that is slapping coilguns on a lozenge.”
“So we’re poisoning the CDF with our larger craniums? Count me in,” the man with the weird hairdo chuckled. The tanned woman next to him agreed. Tamir nodded, and soon the entire table was in agreement. A few of them were talked into it by the promise of KDFY’s higher wages.
She turned to Hoss. “Looks like they’ve made up their mind.” Hoss nodded. Athena left the room as he said his goodbyes.
***
“Woah, we can’t just fit four people in my yacht! It’s a three-person yacht model!” Karl exclaimed as Athena led back a third of her group.
“There’s eight more getting their things,” she said grinning.
“What!”
“Don’t worry, they’re taking their ship. The Haderah. ”
“How’d you do it?” Karl asked.
“Promised that we’d get to annoy the admiralty with our better designs,” the joker- Julio Yarsen- answered. The group were all jokers, but they were competent engineers who understood that working at KDFY was a better future than Senjin.
“What?” Karl hadn’t learned this group’s way of talking. “Nevermind it. Alright you lot. Put your stuff in the lockers on your right, claim a bunk on the left, and strap down. If any of you have dirt on your boots, let me know so we can leave you behind.”
Athena stood in the conference room at KDFY again. This time, it took two minutes for the project managers to file in. They curiously looked at the man next to her, but otherwise took their seats like they had before.
“Thanks for coming and humouring me with another meeting.” she graciously mentioned. “This is Tamir Brezinski. I found him and eleven others you all might have received a job application from. These people worked at Senjin Wharf during the revolution, and have real expertise in engineering,” she focused that bit toward the flag captain. “On the way back from Dalstaff, they designed a ship class mostly to stay sane on the way. Still, it’s a hundred percent serious. Tamir?”
“Thank you. As you can see, the Titikei-class outrider is sort of like an enlarged longboat or a miniature Indria- or Protectress-class. It’s got the swivel guns to be an even more effective escort than, say, a Protectress-class or Andilet-class brig, but it also has the missile armament to be able to contest a flanking enemy. Lastly, it’s got the manoeuvrability of the other outriders it's based on.”
***
Athena lay in her bed. The plan for the Titikei-class outrider had been approved. Infact, her group of engineers had even been given their own dorm. It was about the end of their recreation shift, so she had the chance to go over before the sleep shift, which she took. Even outside the metal door, she could hear the boisterous bunch.
Inside, Julio, Kahna, and Jamiel were playing a sort of Frontier board game Athena’d never seen before. Tamir welcomed her in, followed by the rest of the group waving. She had one thing she’d come down here for, then recreation if she felt like it.
“You need something?” Tamir asked.
“Yeah,” Athena said. “Do you guys want a collective name? You’re sort of known to the project managers just as ‘the frontier engineers’. Want something better?”
Tamir’s face lit up. “We talked about this over a game of Pentad. We’d like the name Lichenworks.”