Port No Port: The Bounty Hunters Guild


[INDENT]Let the Guild hereafter be unto you as your mother and father.
Let this house stand with you as a friend in need.
Let this home forever take pride in you as a lover who delights in your prowess.

He who in friendship stands by your side may slide the blade in all the easier.
She who shares your sleep may seek to strangle you in it.
After all forskae you, only your Guild shall remain to fortify and protect you.
Only your Guild understands exactly who and what you are, and dares to care about you just the same.[/INDENT]

The young huntress looked up from her ships tactical display. She toggled her scanners to active.

“This is Lancia Blight of the starship Tungsten to port control, please respond.”

Her eyes searched the long range receiver beacon for any sign of life anxiously. The young Arkanian woman was growing weary of this slow, isolated crawl across towards the Outer Rim with her ships damaged sublight drives.

She repeated the transmission.

“Reading you loud and clear, Tungsten,” answered the distant voice of a port control officer. He sounded human enough. “Do you need assistance?”

Lancia double checked her damage read out though she really had no need to do so. Days ago she had committed the manifest to memory. It was not like she had anything better to do.

“Roger that Port No Port,” she confirmed. “My sublight drive is bogged; I hit a dense patch of ionic gasses a few light years back. My ship skipped across lightspeed about a dozen times before dumping me a few light years from here. I managed the micro-boost.”

“Sounds lucky,” said the voice non-committal. “May I ask how you managed to locate the station? This isn’t a highly public stop-over Tungsten.”

She knew going in that this was going to be a problem. Likewise, she had been warned that the locals were a very secretive bunch.

“I got lucky, I guess.”

Nothing.

She sighed into the microphone, “Tell Hasan-IIV… Tell Sabah Hassan the IIV that…”

Oh well, she thought. Here goes nothing.

“… The dragonfly and hummingbird beat their wings too fast. If on butterflies wings cause hurricanes then on eagles wings split mountains.”

The receiver was silent for a few long moments, followed by, “Tungsten you are cleared to land. The High Sabah Hassan IIV awaits you.”

“Roger that,” she smiled. “Roger that, Port No Port.”

Port No Port, home to the Hasheeni, had long been the domain of the Hasan dynasty; a neo-religious warrior sect who, long ago, abandoned the fragile ways of civilization and struck out in search of a new frontier. They had made it to the very edge of known space before their movement lost its momentum. There, on the edge of civilization, the Hasheeni built Port No Port.

Over the centuries, though little known, the remote port developed a something of a reputation. The place tended to attract the very dregs of society. Smugglers, pirates, and criminals who had pushed too hard and found themselves exiled from even the remote areas of known space ended up here. A certain breed of “spacer” in particular, those extremists operating on the terminus, eventually came to call the place a regular port of call, as had a similar variety of criminals who, from time to time, needed a place to disappear entirely. The Hasheeni were only too happy to welcome them.

The Hasheeni themselves were a race of dark skinned humans who were once known to inhabit various desert planets closer to the Core. They had been known as religious fanatics who adhered to a strict code of moral behavior, which had been, by and large, impossible to reconcile alongside the ideals of an upstanding Republic. As time wore on the Hasheeni found them persecuted for their beliefs. Eventually the majority of their people would abandon their fanatical ways in favor of the new standard. A small few, however; refused to accept this new mentality.

Somewhere around a thousand years ago, just prior to the formation of the old Republic, a number of Hasheeni extremists set out on a voyage to discover their prophesied homeland. Five hundred years later, after a slow migration away from the Core, the movement had been reduced to some million or so devout followers. Much of their history, between that five hundred years and two hundred years later when Port No Port formally opened its doors, has been lost or deliberately destroyed.

For the past three hundred years the Hasheeni had been on a slow decline.

At this point they had digressed into a shadow of their former selves. This new breed of Hasheeni began calling itself a ‘secret society’ and proclaiming themselves the protectors of some forgotten or unknown truth. Their moral code changed during this period as well.

Today the Hasheeni number less then ten thousand with each one calling Port No Port home.

“Welcome to Port No Port,” said the Hasheeni escort sent to meet Lancia at her shuttle in heavily accented basic. He bowed at the waist, bobbing his turban wrapped head. “The High Sabah would greet you in the Garden of God.”

“This way,” he indicated her to follow.

Though ornamentally dressed in flowing silks of scarlet and azure Lancia was not inclined to challenge the man. Two similarly dressed individuals appeared at his sides each brandishing long, curved weapons that seemed to combine the deadlier aspects of both vibro-blade and blaster rifle.

“You follow me now,” he suggested in a good-natured, albeit hard to understand, tone of voice.

Lancia found herself immediately drawn to the man, which was odd in that she tended to go for the higher-up bread earners rather then their menial go-to men. His well-developed body, rippling with shaped musculature, was barely hidden beneath the long robes he wore. Unlike the two guards, however; who wore the perfunctory grimace typical of hired muscle, the man did not carry a weapon or wear any protective headgear.

He smelled of patchouli and sandalwood.

Lancia forced her leering stare away from his swaying behind.

Port No Port itself was unlike most remote star ports she had seen in her life. The Hasheeni had paid careful attention to botany, incorporating long, coiling vine plants and tall trees into the construction. Sand, odd for a contained facility, was everywhere; on the floors, piled in corners and, occasionally, seeped down from the higher levels.

Small starships were required to land under their own power in a vast assembly area that, in truth, had more in common with a small desert then a star port. As if this wasn’t tricky enough, star pilots then had to contend with the various livestock animals that seemed to have free run of the star port.

Residents lived, for the most part, in a sprawling shantytown that looked as though the builders had simply transplanted their previous ghetto neighborhoods here without any real consideration as to where, exactly, the people would live.

“Wow,” said Lancia honestly shoving to get past an obstinate bovine that refused to move.

Port No Port sustained a barely viable trade-based economy and it showed.

The star port itself was constructed on the spiraling remnants of what had once been a luscious, habitable world, which the Hasheeni believed to be the last piece of a heaven that was long ago torn asunder by their angry deities. The chuck of planetary debris had long ago shed the last of its incredible momentum and now sat between the stars somewhere on the extreme edge of the Ado Sector.

A small moon with no planet to orbit, Port No Port was, quite literally, in the middle of No Where.

“How big is it?” Lancia asked nonchalant. “I mean, how many people can live here?”

The Hasheeni beamed. He tugged at his moustaches.

“In the great days we have over one million,” he opened his arms wide. “Now less then ten thousand lives here, mostly Hasheeni.”

She nodded. “Mostly, you say?”

“Yes,” he explained. “Many are aliens who live here and have left the galaxy behind. Some come, some go, some do both. We are many businesses.”

Puzzling at his phrasing and shifting dialect Lancia pushed on curiously, “How big is the place size-wise? My scanners were unable to penetrate your sensor masks.”

“Is the idea, no?” He smiled again and added, with a wink, “We are moon sized.”

Information, all of it, was valuable to Lancia. Alongside her primary objective this was a fact-finding mission. Everything she learned here would be invaluable in the coming weeks.

“I am amazed at the scope of these caverns. It must have taken years to dig this deep into the rock.” Lancia turned her eyes towards the ceiling once they had entered a corridor that seemed to be zoned residential and commercial alike. “Decades even.”

“Longer still,” put the Hasheeni man. He offered Lancia a hand into the hover-car that pulled up alongside the quartet. “Come, this is faster.”

The two guards bowed but remained dutifully behind.

Once alone the man looked over to Lancia from the seat of their conveyance and, offering her a hand, said, “You may call me Hassih. I am of the Sabah circle.”

Unsure if that was supposed to explain anything, Lancia simply nodded.

Their hover-car shot down the corridor at speeds an outsider would think unsafe. Despite the speed of their vehicle a crowd of onlookers followed behind. For the most part they would chase for a few dozen meters then, seeing it was hopeless, give up only to be replaced by two more curious Hasheeni citizens. Lancia could not help but note that they did not purport themselves as paupers, however; but rather more like children with an intense curiosity.

When the speeder passed over a seemingly useless but amazingly well manicured series of gardens which appeared between every different district they seemed to pass through Lancia turned to Hassih and asked how it was that, this far from a sun and natural resources, they managed to maintain such elaborate decorations.

“It is of faith,” supplied Hassih by way of an answer. “And it is of devotion. We people waste nothing, not even the light.”

Lancia shrugged. It seemed like she would be doing that a lot more in the days to come.

It was more likely that the Hasheeni had merchant contracts with the various smugglers that operated out of Port No Port. This would explain their supply of sand and water but not how they managed to pay for such necessities.

According to the information she had been supplied with prior to departure Port No Port represented a considerable portion of the areas breadbasket industry, which implied that, somehow, the Hasheeni had managed to develop a profitable form of agriculture.

“Is there anything to eat?”

Hassih nodded, “Soon. We make much of what you see here. There will be feasting in your honor.”

At this Lancia looked surprised.

“My honor?” she asked.

“Of course. Are you not the herald of Pike?”

Lancia blinked.

“Yeah. Yeah I guess I am.”










What have you gotten yourself into?

Lancia struggled against the ropes bound about her wrists and ankles. The water was rising too quickly. She would soon be out of room and out of time.

The thing below reached up and closed its wet claws around her chest.

Lancia tried to scream but nothing came out. In stead, her mouth open to shout, she ended up swallowing more of the salty liquid swelling up around her nose.

Will you try to kill me?

The voice echoed from somewhere inside her own skull, pounding against the walls of her cerebrum like buckshot. Caught between realities, the words repeated inside her head.

She was going to die; she was as good as dead.

And then the world opened up below her. A rush of luminescence and warm air reached up to embrace her and race across her flesh.

Falling, she breathed out and found herself getting lighter before remembering that her eyes had been pressed shut. Lancia struggled to force her eyes open.

A green meadow greeted her. No, not a meadow, she realized; a garden.

In the center of the garden, surrounded by a swarm of birds and butterflies, sat a man. He smiled at her knowingly and all of her fear went away.

In this place, he said, you are without burden.

Lancia fell to her knees and wept though she knew not why. The man, his radiant eyes watching her with all the love of a parent, reached across the garden to carry her into his arms. His skin, dusty brown like the others, was warm to her touch.

Held in his arms, her head pressed against his breast, she realized his size. Somehow, and she cared not how, he held her in his hands like an infant.

Had she always been this small, she wondered?

Or had the world always been that big?

Quiet now, the man suggested in a voice that sounded like the slow ocean waves of her home world. The sound of birds and insects, the sound of life without sentience, filled her perceptions. Her breathing fell into time with his and his in turn fell into time with life itself.

You have found it; the man bowed his head over her and kissed her forehead. His lips burned like the surface of a million suns.

Lancia opened her third eye and beheld him again, this time with understanding.

You will find it again; he brushed his fingers across her face. It felt to her as though the heart of beauty had touched her.

When? She asked.

You already know, he answered in her own voice, with her own lips. His answer told her that, insider her own self, she knew the answer.

How? She asked.

Through faith, he responded though now his voice was different but somehow familiar. You must trust it.

And now you must go.

The man kissed her again, once on each eyelid.

Open your eyes.


The drug, its effects fading, began to abate.

Lancia sat up, confused, and looked around.

She found herself naked, sitting in a small bedchamber furnished in throw pillows and lengths of crimson silk. The soft folds of a blanket under her bottom told Lancia that she was in someone’s bed but she could form no recollection as to whose.

The last thing she recalled with any clarity was being offered a beverage by Hassih.

No, there had been something before that, something she simply could not put her finger on. She vaguely recalled someone having mentioned a feast to precede her introduction to the Sabah himself.

And then…

Something cold brushed against her leg, or rather, in stretching her limbs, Lancia brushed up against something clammy and cool. She threw back the covers.

Lying on his stomach, a knife buried to the hilt in his back, was a dark skinned Hasheeni man. Lancia pushed him on his side, the head lolling unhealthily to the side indicative of a broken neck.

An image flashed in front of her eyes.

The Sabah! She had killed the Sabah…

… But something about that did not seem entirely wrong. In fact, looking upon his cold, dead corpse she felt a certain sense of accomplishment that she remained unable to place.

Whatever drug they had fed her was doing a serious number on her memories. She struggled, like a blind woman in the fog, to make sense of it all.

“Sabah,” asked the voice of Hassih from beyond the bedchamber. “Is all well? I am coming in.”

Oh shit, thought Lancia. Nothing like getting caught with your pants around your ankles in a dead mans bed.

Some time earlier…

Beff Pike, President of the Bounty Hunters Guild leaned toward the holo-display. Locked away in his private chambers aboard StarForge station the unassuming man was deeply engaged in negotiations.

“You understand what I want in return,” he said, speaking to the digital rendering of a dark skinned human. “This is going to cost you significantly.”

The man to whom he was speaking appeared to be in his mid thirties. His head, wrapped in a turban, bobbed up and down irritatingly whenever he spoke. Frequently during their conversation he would reach up to tug at his beard, a sign of nervousness.

“My father will never make me Sabah,” the man was saying. “This is the only way to be sure.”

Pike nodded.

“You have a female, I assume,” asked the man uneasily. “It has to be a woman.”

“I have one that will do just fine. Explain the details again.”

“He has a weakness for women. Your hunter will lure him into the bed and slit his throat. They will try to kill her for it but I will claim her as my own.”

Pike nodded again, “It cannot be connected to you?”

“Not at first. Once the Sabah is mine it will not matter. This is the way of our people.”

The man on screen, distracted, turned away from the camera and barked an order at someone behind the scene. There was a brief exchange in a foreign language during which the man appeared to become frustrated. A string of insults, Pike assumed, followed shortly after.

“Your woman will have to stay. She will be kept well and as she wishes.” The man looked as though he enjoyed giving orders. “I will give you what you ask in return.”

“Agreed,” Beff Pike replied. “One months time then?”

“Yes,” snapped the man. “We are agreed. Good. End communication.”

The channel snapped shut from the other end. Beff Pike did not immediately shut of his own screen. He was lost in thought, considering a world of options and variables. After a few moments he unfolded his fingers over the key board and tapped in a few commands.

A dossier appeared on screen. On the cover was pictured a man not unlike the one with whom Pike had just been speaking. The file name, “Junior” appeared in bright red letters under the image. He began flipping through its pages.

Everything he found, accumulated from the Guilds rudimentary intelligence network, seemed to agree with his initial impression of the man in question. Aside from a notable capacity for deception, he had no obvious redeeming features at all. None of the available information provided any counter point to his analysis.

President Pike grinned.

Indeed, he had just the woman for the job; a powerful female with an uncanny ability to manipulate the minds and will of men and deadly seductress who could kill without remorse while pretending at infatuation with all the convincing skill of a professional actress. She had tried to kill Pike once and though she failed, horribly, the act alone had brought out something all together new and unique in her. He now considered her one of his top assassins.

She would not accept live capture contracts.

Beff Pike pressed a key on desk, “Contact Lancia and tell her I have just the job for her.”

At first they had wanted to kill her, to string her up by her entrails and let the children throw stones. It was not as though she could have resisted them anyhow.

When the door gave way they stormed in and, without missing a beat, began physically assaulting her, driving her to the point of unconsciousness. The drug had still been too strong in her system so she could not mount an effective defense against their onslaught. In hind sight she imagined it was probably a good thing she did not fight back as they would likely have killed her. From there she had been dumped in a cell.

Various interrogations followed that. Though talented their tortures and their methods were antiquated compared to those she had previously experienced. She managed to make it through these interviews without giving up too much. In fact, towards the end, when even her guards had given up any hope of breaking her, she had been able to coax some of the locals into conversation. Each chat, no matter how long, had revealed some vital bit of information. It was enough to keep her fighting through.

The Sabah had been killed by an infidel woman sent from the outside, they said. The elders had been crying for her blood since the murder but, somehow, one of the Sabahs oldest sons had been able to delay her execution for some time. He even managed to dissuade the council from giving her a trial, suggesting that it would only spread her insidiousness through out the community. She was thankful for this as, having dealt with such fanatic peoples before, she knew it would be little more then a witch hunt, a perfunctory measure before her execution.

On the third week of captivity, the son of the dead Sabah came to see her.

“Sorry about your dad,” she offered with a shrug. “If it makes any difference, I didn’t mean to do it. He gave me something… I had never been so high in my life… It felt surreal. Anyway, I am sorry.”

“I am Sabah now,” he said.

“Oh,” Lancia shrugged at this, she really had no idea what to say.

“Thank you.” The new Sabah bowed. “You are not alone in your blame. The Hashshashin is a powerful narcotic which connects the soul with heaven. Maybe God told you to kill him.”

“Um,” Lancia groaned and struggled to her feet. Her dirty cell, caked with blood and human waste, felt as though it was spinning around her. Defeated, she fell back onto her bunk. “What now?”

Suddenly it struck her. It was the same man who had met her when she had first arrived but he had somehow managed to change the inflection of his accent. He had also grown a thick beard of curly black straw.

Lancia abruptly found herself wanting for a shower and clean clothes.

Despite the adversity presented by her current appearance Lancia contrived to look distant, yet available. She failed.

“You become my wife, one among many or you die. I can only save your life by asking you to give it to me. You will never be allowed to leave, but you will be alive.”

Lancia said nothing.

“Who knows,” Hassih ventured toward the cell. In his voice was the tone of genuiune concern. “In time you may come to love me.”

“You have done me a great honor by removing the obstacle; my father. I understand you must be very confused by our culture and these new developments, not to mention my accent and appearance. I would like the opportunity to explain these things to you, but I cannot do that if you are dead.”

She could not decide if he was playing her for a mark or not and her only hope was in keeping him just as confused.

“I don’t suppose I could have a shower, freshen up and think this over can I?” Lancia tried to appear nonchalant but her swollen left eye and bottom lip complicated matters. Nearly naked, save for a few simple strips of cloth, she could do very little to retain her dignity under such undignified conditions.

“No,” Hassih answered without any trace of amusment.

“Well then, I guess we’re having a wedding aren’t we?”

Hassih looked relieved, or so Lancia imagined. She did not get long to read his features before the Sabah turned to bark a few harsh commands at his subordinates in a language she did not understand.

With that, he left.

Minutes later a group of heavily scented and scantily clad Hasheeni women came to retrieve her from the cell. They moved in a furious swarm of giggles and short sentences spoken in the same language. Once satisfied, for reasons Lancia did not understand, the cadre of young women escorted her out of the cell.

Shortly there after Lancia found herself immersed in a gargantuan bath thick with scented bubbles. The women fussed over her, fixing her hair and cleaning her nails with an attentive concern that Lancia herself had never experienced.

Too worn from her ordeal to offer any kind of resistance, however; she found herself reclining against their attentions. Somewhere between treatments, Lancia fell asleep.

Lancia settled herself down in front of her private holo transceiver. She keyed in a private communications code.

At first there came no response. After a few minutes she considered giving up and going for a coffee but then thought better of it. Seconds later, on the other end, the face of Beff Pike appeared.

He smiled.

“Speak of the devil and she shall appear.” Pike chuckled, the act alone sending a warm chill down her spine. For a moment she dreamed of her home among the Guild but quickly dismissed the day dream in favor of her new, under the covers, reality. “I hear that you are a married woman now, peanut.”

“I am a Queen now,” she laughed, “and you have to call me Highness.”

“Do not loose your edge,” he warned though with a look that said he had understood the joke but simply not the humor of it. “You are still on the job, you are always on my clock.”

“Of course I am, Beff.”

“Just remember, it beats the alternative. This is twice now you have dodged death for your passions.”

She rolled her eyes, “You’ll never let me forget that.”

“I still wake up with a pain in my side where you stuck that blade, Lancia. I will never forget so why should you? After all, it was your life. Not mine.” Pike leaned closer to the camera on his end as though he were studying her image on the other end. “There is nothing wrong with what you are doing. It will be a matter of a few short years and we will not need them at all, and then, peanut, it is all yours… more or less.”

“But mostly less, right?”

He laughed, “Of course.”

“I married the Sabah. Hassih is a good man, but I’ll get my claws in deep soon enough. I think that a few of his wives are going to have to meet with untimely accidents though. Can you believe they praise that? As long as it’s done according to their rules, you can do almost anything here.”

“The Hasheeni are a very special people, Lancia. Try not to forget that. I spent a good number of years with the grandfather of the man you are now married to. He taught me many secrets of their way. You have the time now, I suggest you immerse yourself in their culture while you can because, in all truth, their future is uncertain.”

“Our future is not,” she countered, referring to the Guild. “Hassih has authorized your payment and mine. Your interests at Port No Port are guaranteed so long as he is Sabah or so long as the Sabah remains in power.”

“Excellent. You will be responsible for our advanced administrative duties at first. I will dispatch a crew to assist you within the month but I do not want you wasting any time.” Pike appeared to be tapping at his key board. “I am sending you a list of what we need and when. I want you to scout locations and begin purchasing the items on the list.”

Lancia went silent for a moment, researching the data file quickly. Most of what Pike had requested was fairly standard but some of it would require more time. None of it seemed pressing enough to mention in detail so she simply nodded.

“Should not be a problem to set up most of this. How many are we talking about anyway? Room for five hundred to a thousand or more?” She called up the local residence manifest. “Blocks would be best.”

“More,” responded Pike with a wink. “If things go according to plan I want to move a good portion of our non essential personnel out that way to work on production. The warehouse and manufacturing space is important, but I really want you to spend your time working on those agricultural concerns.”

“No problem. When are we going to see you out here? Hassih is eager to meet you. I think that with the right influence he will be the perfect Sabah for your needs.”

On the other end, on the distant StarForge station, Beff Pike shrugged.

“When the station makes it back around to that edge of the cluster I will be attending New Underground for a period before, if all goes well, making my way through to Port No Port.” He paused.

“I have work for a squad of fifteen lined up,” with a flick of her wrist Lancia uploaded the request list. “It’s a clean up job for the Sabah and one of the investors from The Rig. Hassih will use his contacts to open trade negotiations on your behalf if the Guild can attend this matter.”

“Your impression of the job?” he asked.

“It’s a cake walk and not a fake walk neither. The deal is genuine, worth fifty and the contacts as a bonus. I’m not kidding. This is a total grab.”

Contemplative for a moment, Pike did not reply immediately.

“It sounds good. I will get back to you with more information within the next forty eight.” He added as an after thought, “You are okay out there, peanut?”

“Why Beff,” she started with mock concern in her voice, “I had no idea you cared. Of course I’m fine. I’m doing what I was trained to do, the way you taught me. Hassih knows as much as we do, or thinks he does. He’ll be easy to control. There’s no doubt in my mind that, within your year plan, Port No Port will be the exclusive domain of the Guild and our affiliated interests.”

“You are a charm,” commented Pike. “The Guild stands with you, Huntress Lancia.”

Finally, the promotion she so deserved… delivered over secret channels a million billion kilometers from home had been given her. The title of Huntress, a full member of the Guild, was now hers by right and claim.

Hassih could call himself Sabah.

Lancia could call herself Huntress.

And Beff Pike could safely call one more distant port home for his ever growing Guild.