I, Scoba

How it happened, exactly, I don’t quite know. As a matter of fact, it’s a bit embarrassing. Normally, I have a sixth sense for things like this. Or at least a redundant secondary bus overlap ether redundancy circuit. As a Scoba-make pseudopod eftyelship, I’m fast, stealthy, and used best for things you don’t know about – or don’t want to know about. But you knew that.

We came in fast to Farron-space, and intended to get out just as fast. My owner, one Nestor Rennie, late out of Cambodia, New Earth, near Nearfar but far from even the saddest-sack tertiary galactic trade route, Ren had to make a pick up. Odd that it was at a Science Outpost, but, hey, so be it; I trust Ren and he trusts me.

Symbiosis: man and machine.

Problem is, as is always the case coming in fast to any system’s-space, you tend to attract attention of an unwanted nature. But we’re aware of that; I’m aware of that. I’m a Scoba, right? We have measures to avoid detection. Indeed, we were coming off a semi-lucrative Vess run (not the hard stuff they execute others for – this was soft metals for some very grateful, very wealthy buyers). You know what going into Vess is like. Kind of like a blind Gaagan mega-millipede trying to negotiate its way through a flasshock minefield. And no one in Vess Imperial Enforcement knew we were ever there.

The first thing that materialized on the holoscreen was a Farron Destroyer. “Crikey!” Ren cried (he was an Old Earth archaeohistorian in a previous life, and a daffadowndilly Australiophile, or so he told me), “Full fathom five! Full fathom five, Scobes!”

But, truth be told, it was no use. They had our protoshadow long before we dropped in to ourspace. Locked and targeted. Wisely, I counseled we go to the cover stories. Every stealth jack o’ trades has a dozen; Ren has six hundred and forty-two on file. I scanned the libraries and suggested three as most probable on the Reality Index.

Half-a-minute in realtime ourspace, Ren decided on Scenario #299: my master was now Gerhoovius Von Zaylzbarga, a wandering Bectoit preacher, pursuing a life-wide mission questing for new converts. Farron was a highly conservative system, very law-and-order, very legalistic, and though it did ascribe to a liberal death penalty policy, it was fairly proud of its tolerance of thousands of galactic-wide belief systems – so long as the believers followed the rules.

Ren tapped his forehead, his right then left temples, then in alternating sequence from the top center of his head down to his neck. Activating his psychotropic training, purchased so long ago at so great a never-quite-forgotten cost.

“Unidentified Scoba! Unidentified Scoba! Shut down your engines and broadcast your registry codes immediately!” The metallic voice, tinny though authoritative through my two-dozen speakers, repeated itself twice, then gave me a sixty-second window to comply.

“Send ’em 299,” Ren mumbled, frantically scavenging my innards for anything incriminating. While I transmitted the “Von Zaylzbarga” backstory coordinates, my boss gathered up maps, books, ID chits and any personal artifacts traceable to a Nestor Rennie. Seamlessly, I caused my skin along the underside of the main physio-locomotive panels to part. Within was a Stasi box, better known to the general public as a “now-you-see-it-now-you-don’t” box. Unless that Farron Destroyer was armed with Vess Sighters – highly doubtful, due to the cold distrust between the two systems – those personal items would be undetectable once sealed up.

You could almost guarantee a multi-frequency scan in situations like these. Less likely, but still possible, would be an actual boarding and inspection, following a forced docking.

Whatever can happen will happen, in some form or another. That was this Scoba’s motto.

Several minutes passed in silence as I monitored my inertia and angular momentum and Ren became a Bectoit preacher. Then, a different voice on the transmission: same tinny timbre, put a slightly higher pitch. “Scoba A2297-11K4J-MM432: Scoba A2297-11K4J-MM432: There, ah, appears to be, ah, a discrepancy with your Registry.”

Ren cocked an eyebrow. I did the equivalent with a needle on my Mood Meter, located adjacent to the Chronosphere and above the Yaw, Pitch, and Roll Tri-Three-Sixties.

“Everything appears in order on our side, Brothers,” Ren – rather, Gerhoovius – replied, bending the transmittal mike closer to his mouth. “Could you elaborate?”

I scrambled the signal and again, inexplicably, there was that long patch of silence as we drifted. Seventy thousand four hundred kilometers in nine minutes. Hmmm. I made a note to squabble the retro flaps to bring down the inertial momentum. Permission pending, as the Destroyer’s thousand canon were presently sighting us.

And you’ll never guess what happened next. “Scoba A2297-11K4J-MM432: Proceed to Science Outpost 771664 – ” the Destroyer’s C&C brain relayed me the coordinates – “and land immediately. Contact 771664’s C&C for detailed landing authorization instructions.” Again, the message was broadcast twice, following which I sent acknowledgment.

Ren flashed me a wide-eyed look of pleasant surprise. A military escort to our original destination! What could be safer! Yet – what could be more dangerous, if my master wanted to smuggle out what he came for. And once my master sets his mind on a score, we get it, or we go down in flames trying.