The Privateer

"That was terrible."

Lissa was wearing her Homestar dress. Yvian didn't know how the Peacekeepers had made it, but it was the second most amazing piece of clothing she'd ever seen. The fabric, if it was fabric, showed a perfect holographic image of stars in the void. In the center of Lissa's chest, right over her heart, was Pixa's Homestar, bright and burning and beautiful. Lissa's hair had been done up in an elaborate style with lots of curls. She'd looked regal giving her speech. Like a ruler from the days of old. Now she just looked annoyed.

"I told you I don't do speeches," Yvian reminded her. The pixen was wearing her own Homestar dress. Hers showed a crystal city under a clear blue sky. Like Lissa's, her dress had the Homestar centered over her heart, but this time it was the view from the ground. Normally wearing the dress made Yvian feel pretty and powerful. Today it made her feel like a fraud.

"Yeah, I can see that." Lissa frowned at her. "You sound like you're reading off a prompter."

"I am reading off a prompter," Yvian frowned right back. She pointed at the holodisplay behind Lissa. It was the one from the kitchen. Mims had decided against bringing them back to New Pixa, so the crew had set up a studio in the cargo bay. Sort of. Really, it was just a podium and some recording equipment, but Lissa had looked official enough.

"Yeah," Lissa acknowledged, "but you're not supposed to sound like it. You're supposed to sound natural."

"I don't know how to do that!" Yvian snapped. She grimaced. "Sorry. This is just frustrating." She'd tried recording the speech six times now. "I shoot things for a living. I'm not made for public speaking."

"She really isn't," Scarrend agreed. The Vrrl lounged comfortably atop a cargo container, his head propped under two of his hands. He was armored. Mims had grudgingly agreed the pixens needed to dress up, but everyone else was combat ready.

"You're the one who wanted to start a country," Lissa told her. "You're going to have to speak in public from time to time."

"I know," Yvian grumbled. "I know. It's just... can we take a break or something? Maybe give me time to memorize the speech?" It was a good speech. Lissa had wrote it. Yvian just needed to figure out how to say it with feeling. She didn't think memorization would help, but it was worth a try.

"It is pretty close to dinner time," Captain Mims noted. "We could make some stir fry."

"Negative," Kilroy disagreed. "This unit told the citizens to expect a statement from Mother Yvian. The statement is scheduled for fifty three minutes and nine seconds from now." His eyes flashed yellow. "Also, this unit is enjoying the show."

"Of course you are." Lissa sighed. "This was a bad idea."

"Maybe we need a different approach." Captain Mims stepped in. "Have Yvain just... I dunno... talk about what she thinks."

"Mother Yvian has shown she can can speak well when she is speaking from the heart," Kilroy concurred.

"It can't be much worse than what you're doing," said Scarrend.

"I don't know about that," said Lissa. "You remember Zenla Station?"

"We don't talk about Zenla Station," Mims chided.

"What happened at Zenla Station?" Scarrend was curious.

"We don't talk about Zenla Station," Mims repeated, more firmly this time.

"Alright," Yvian hurriedly changed the subject. "Alright. I'll speak from the heart." She paused. "Um..."

"I'm gonna need a beer after this," Mims muttered.

"Quiet Mark," Lissa ordered. "Or I'm gonna make you give the speech."

"No you're not," the Captain told her. "You're not the boss of me. Besides, I'm human. No one cares what I think about all of this. It'd be like Scarrend giving a speech."

"I can give a speech if you want," the Vrrl volunteered. "Attention pixens, you are all fools. You are rioting over a database. Your culture is absurd, and watching you makes me glad I'm bound by treaty not to prey on your kind. I could never risk eating one of you now, for fear you'd somehow infect me with your stupid."

Lissa gave Scarrend a level look. "You worship people that enslaved your species. People," she pointed out, "that you literally ate out of existence."

Scarrend growled, half rising. Then he glanced at Mims and went back to lounging. "It was a terrible mistake," the Vrrl admitted. "Now there are no more gods to eat."

"You don't know what it's like," Yvian told him. "When you're a pixen... All we have is each other." Yvian could see the Vrrl didn't get it. "Our parents. Our community. They're everything. The only thing. Everyone else..." She stared at nothing, remembering things best forgotten. "Everyone else just takes. Other pixens are the only ones that love us. That help us. When Yasme disowned me..." She shook her head. "When she struck my name off the Registry, I didn't just lose her. I lost everyone. Everything. People I'd known since birth hated me now. They would kill me if they got the chance. I had no one but my sister, and I only had her because she loved me more than she loved being part of society."

"Even now, after Kilroy..." Yvian barely caught herself in time. Telling all of Pixa that the Peacekeepers had threatened and tortured Yasme into lying for them wouldn't go over well. "After we found what really happened..." Yvian shook her head. "I can't be comfortable around other pixens. It doesn't matter if my Mother didn't remove me by choice. I'm still motherless. I know I'm not welcome."

"Yvian..." Lissa started.

"That's what everyone lost," Yvian pretended she hadn't heard her. "It's not just a database. Being on the Registry of Families meant you were a pixen in good standing. It meant there were people who cared about you. It meant you were good enough. It's part of your identity. Now that part is gone, and everyone's feeling lost."

"I know what that's like." Yvian addressed the holo-imager directly. "Better than anyone. You feel like outcasts. But you're not. Not like... Not like I was. Your parents didn't reject you. Pixa did not reject you. You did not lose your place in Pixen society. You just lost the Registry. Our enemies broke it hoping that it would break you. But it won't. It doesn't have to." Yvian took a breath and closed her eyes. She borrowed a line from the speech Lissa had written. "We're all motherless now. Every one of us. And if everyone's motherless..." She opened her eyes, hoping she didn't sound as corny as she felt. "If everyone's motherless, maybe no one is." She crossed her arms, looking down. It was a lie. She was lying. She was still motherless. "At least..." She would always be motherless. "At least not from this."

Yvian forced herself to look up, to look at the imager again. She groped for more words, but they wouldn't come. "I guess..." She swallowed. "I guess that's all I have to say."

"Not bad, Sis." Lissa turned off the holo-imager. "I think we can work with that."

"Affirmative," Kilroy agreed. "Your statement was acceptable. This unit will upload it at the specified time."

"Good," said the Captain. "Let's go make dinner." He started walking. "I'm hungry."

"There is another matter that requires our attention," Kilroy reported.

"Ah, hell." The Captain stopped. "What is it now?"

"An agent of the Extraterrestrial Reconnaissance Organization has used the riots as cover to stage an escape." Yvian half expected the Peacekeeper's eyes to turn red, but they remained unlit.

"A spy?" Lissa frowned at him. "There aren't any spies in the Technocracy."

"There are hundreds of spies in the Technocracy," Mims told her.

"Sixteen hundred and thirty four," Kilroy confirmed, "that this unit knows of."

"What?" Lissa didn't want to believe it. "How? The only people there are pixens and Peacekeeper units."

"XTRO's been recruiting people to keep tabs on the Confederation for over a century," Mims explained. "Pixens are prime targets. Exploitable refugees that no one pays attention to, and most of them don't like the Confed anyway."

"But that's the Confederation," Lissa argued. "Why would anyone spy on the Technocracy? Against our own people?"

"They started out in the Confed, but it's not a surprise they were sent here once the Technocracy got going. As for why? " The Captain shrugged. "Lots of reasons. Doesn't matter. What's important is we have spies, and one of them got away." He turned to Kilroy. "Who was it?"

"Myrsa Trin," said the Peacekeeper.

"Myrsa?" Lissa shook her head in denial. "No. No way."

"Who's Myrsa?" Yvian asked.

"One of my assistants," Lissa explained. "She was in charge of coordinating refugee placement."

"She was also a spy for the humans," Scarrend helpfully added.

"Not her," Lissa was sure. "I knew her. Know her. We're friends. She's the only one that never said anything about..." She glanced guiltily at Yvian. "She can't be a spy."

"Myrsa Trin accessed and downloaded multiple databases before boarding a gladiator class ship," said Kilroy. "She left the sector eight minutes ago."

"You didn't stop her?" Yvian didn't see how a single ship could make it's way past the Peacekeepers. The Queenships alone could disable anything stupid enough to try, and they were backed by a million Stinger units and millions of Military vessels captured from the Federation and the Confed.

"Negative," Kilroy confirmed. "Myrsa Trin activated her jumpdrive without leaving the shipyard. Units were unable to target her in time."

"Crunch." Yvian was tired of bad news. At least this time wasn't as bad. The Peacekeepers didn't keep a lot of sensitive information where people could get it. She doubted that Myrsa could take anything that would really matter, even if she was one of Lissa's... Oh, shit. "Wait." She stared at Lissa with wide, worried eyes. "Did you say she was your assistant?"

"One of my best," Lissa confirmed. She glanced from Yvian to Mims, then to Kilroy. "I really trusted her."

"Trusted her enough to give her a Lucendian implant?" Yvian asked.

Lissa stared for a moment. Then she said, "Oh, shit."

"We have to go after her." Scarrend jumped down from his shipping container. "Before she brings the implant to the humans."

"We don't know where she went," Yvian pointed out.

"But we know where she's going," Scarrend countered. "If we jump straight to Wet Sector, we can destroy her ship before the humans can retrieve her."

"Negative," said Kilroy. "Killing Myrna Trin would be counterproductive."

"Counterproductive?" All three of the Vrrl's eyebrows furrowed. "Why?"

"Alert." Kilroy's eyes turned red. "Unusual energy reading detected. The reading is similar to a Klaath portal. It is coming from a Federation vessel docked in Tenril Station."

"Destroy it," Mims said immediately. "Try not to blow up the station."

"Affirmative," said the Peacekeeper. "Second energy reading detected. Aldara Sector, in the asteroid belt."

"Destroy it," Mims repeated. "Destroy them both."

"Negative," said the Peacekeeper. "The second energy source is out of weapons range. First energy source destroyed. The Federation ship is disabled. Tenril Station has sustained minor damage."

"How soon can you take out the other one?" The Captain's fists clenched.

"The asteroid is on the far end of the asteroid belt," Kilroy reported, "on the other side of Aldara's Homestar. It will take twenty three hours, four minutes for Peacekeeper Stinger units to enter weapons range."

"Shit."

"Alert." Kilroy's eyes flashed brighter. "Klaath clusters detected in Tenril Sector."