House of the Silent Moons Read online

  House of the Silent Moons

  Star Lawyers - Book 4

  Tom Shepherd

  Book Bag Press

  Kansas City, MO / Tucson, AZ

  Free Bonus: Short-story Prequel “Knife Fight at Olathe-5”

  Bookbag Press

  Kansas City, MO / Tucson, AZ /Geneva, Switzerland

  Star Lawyers Book 4

  House of the Silent Moons

  Copyright © 2018 Tom Shepherd

  All rights reserved.

  Original cover art by Christian Kallias.

  https://www.christiankallias.com/

  ISBN-13:

  For Jerry

  Who read the first science fiction book

  I ever wrote and said he liked it.

  I was twelve.

  He was my friend.

  The book was awful.

  But it got good reviews.

  (One, actually.)

  I’m glad my books are better now.

  And that Jerry is still my friend.

  And Dave, Ed, Nate…

  (If you don’t see your name on the list, write it here.)

  ____________________________

  Previously in Star Lawyers

  It’s the thirty-second century. Mega-corporations dominate political life in the far-flung Terran Commonwealth. These vast business enterprises field private starship fleets to explore unknown space, establish colony worlds, and laser-mine asteroid fields for rare metals. Jump Gates, many so ancient no one knows who built them, allow instant travel across hundreds of light years. Governmental, commercial, and personal travel is safe and relatively quick. Starships with the correct bookmarks for Jump Gates ahead—plus up-to-date Faster-Than-Light propulsion to traverse the distance between Gates—can literally cross the galaxy in a few weeks.

  Cargo vessels, pleasure craft, diplomatic and business traffic flows among widely scattered ports of call, linking sentient, spacefaring races in a web of commerce and cultural exchange. A safe, quick journey.

  Except for the bad guys roaming the wilderness. And in a galaxy of 300 billion stars, most of which remains unexplored, there is plenty of wilderness.

  Pirate gangs, who fancy themselves privateers, stalk the exit points at remote Jump Gates to fall on lightly armed prey. Cargoes unloaded, the seized merchant ships become fodder for salvage or resale, while survivors are rounded up for transport to remote slave markets operated by predatory star nations. Then the attackers disappear to secret bases or friendly ports, where no one cares how visiting crews earned the Galactic credits they spend on local amusements.

  To combat individual marauders and war parties from scattered hostile worlds, civilized star nations and big, interstellar corporations have built fast-moving weapons platforms to patrol shipping lanes and maintain the balance of power. Currently, the Terran Commonwealth is one of the dominant nonaggressive powers. And within the Commonwealth, Matthews Interstellar Industries commands the greatest combination of fleets, resources, and colonies.

  Capitão Flávio Tavares has lived a checkered life. Sometimes a patriot, sometimes pirate, he has served the Matthews Family for more than three decades as an intelligence operative while maintaining his cover identity as freebooting commander of the aging starship Henrique.

  When he apparently switched sides at the battle for M-double-I’s Alpha Gate, Noah and Bianca Matthews put a staggering price on his head. However, the Free Enterprise League—euphemism for Pirates, Inc.—rejected the bounty as cover story and arrested Flávio on charges of betraying them.

  No wonder the request from home struck Tyler Noah Matthews IV like a collision of worlds.

  "Take your Star Lawyers, go to Pirate space, and defend that rogue who betrayed your family," Admiral Bianca Matthews told her son.

  In Book 4 of the ongoing series, Star Lawyers Corporation must defend this known criminal in Pirate Court to prevent ancient technologies from falling into the hands of expansionist star nations, which will lead to a new era of galactic war. Only the pirate Capitão Flavio Tavares, who faces terrible judgment by his peers, can lead Tyler Matthews to a derelict starbase abandoned long ago by the collapsing Galactic Empire. The House of the Silent Moons orbits a remote gas giant amid hundreds of planetoids and asteroids.

  Aboard this massive structure, where defenders expected to return victorious from an apocalyptic struggle with ruthless enemies, the doomed Imperial forces stockpiled powerful weapons and tech modules more advanced than anything available in Tyler's thirty-second century. Star Lawyers must locate the starbase quickly, because the clock is ticking. Aggressive forces hostile to the Terran Commonwealth also seek the lost trove of technology. Especially their arch-foe, Hideki Tsuchiya.

  Welcome back to the Patrick Henry. But don’t get comfortable, because the trail to the House of the Silent Moons will keep you moving at FTL speeds.

  Out beyond ideas of wrong-doing and right-doing there is a field. I’ll meet you there.

  Rumi

  One

  Burl Cain Confinement Facility

  Mae Jemison City

  Commonwealth Territorial Port at Gagarin-3

  77.5 light years from Terra

  Thursday, 14 July 3104 TCE

  7:10 A.M. Local Time

  “Put down the blaster, Mr. Arrupt,” Tyler Matthews said. “You’re not getting past that forcefield.”

  The bony Dengathi prisoner pressed the unconscious guard’s weapon against Tyler’s cheek, and it was cool and hard and fully charged. Tyler peered into the large, protruding eyes of his dark green captor, who had the flat nose, and webbed hands typical of amphibians.

  Humans called them Frogs, because of their uncanny resemblance to Pelophylax esculentus, the common green frog of Earth. The Dengathi referred to Homo sapiens as Dirt Monkeys.

  Neither was a term of endearment.

  “I already kill one guard,” Arrupt rasped. “They not let me live.”

  “The guard’s not dead,” Tyler said. “But he will be, if you don’t let a doctor treat him for shock.”

  He glanced at Quirt-Thymean Tertiary Sub-Prince Zenna-Zenn—called Mr. Blue by teammates at Star Lawyers Corp—who stood against the visiting room wall. As usual, Indigo appeared undaunted by the danger. Tyler chalked it up to the blue attorney’s fuzzy worldview. Priority one was food. Everything else was negotiable.

  Zenna raised a blue hand. “Mr. Dengathi Pirate, please end this soon. Otherwise, we might miss Second Breakfast.”

  Tyler frowned at his blue co-worker. “Couldn’t you have chosen better words than end this?”

  Weapons on full stun had the power to kill if the target stood too close to a blaster’s neural-numbing discharge. Sometimes hearts stopped, more often victims went into shock.

  Arrupt twittered. “They beat me, almost dead. Allza time. They feed worm cake and dry spiders like bug man Yegosian, I not. They say I pirate, bad Frog, fry like cantina food.”

  “You were captured when the pirate fleet attacked Jump Gate Alpha—”

  “I not pirate!” he croaked. “Fix bulkhead damage. Seal hull crack. Patch up damage. Apply quickie-patches, make crack go away. Save lives! I not make damage nothing. Fix-up job.”

  “However, Friend Arrupt,” Mr. Blue said, “you were also a very efficient back-up navigator and helmsman aboard the notorious pirate ship Howling Tadpole, which captured or destroyed many—”

  “Indigo, please shut up,” Tyler groaned. He’s got a fucking weapon pointed at my head—don’t argue! “Lower the blaster, Mr. Arrupt. We’ll talk about your case.”

  “Why talk? I dead. Guards kill dead. Better dead than beat allza time.” He shivered. “They freeze, then kill. They cowards.”

  Ectotherms, the cold-blo
oded races, needed external heat, so the guards beyond the cellblock forcefield had immediately dropped the temperature below zero Celsius. In a few minutes Tyler’s teeth would chatter, but Arrupt would fall unconscious. And when he felt himself sinking into hypothermic coma, the Dengathi amphib might blast away at his environment, starting with Tyler Noah Matthews IV and Mr. Blue.

  After all, it was Tyler’s mother—Admiral Bianca Solorio-Matthews, supported by elements of the Quirt-Thymean fleet—who defeated the pirate armada near Suryadivan Prime and arrested all hands in the hostile force. She never condoned mistreatment of captives, but Admiral Mom was the reason this poor schmuck languished in the Territorial Confinement Facility at Mae Jemison City. She sent Arrupt to MJC’s notorious Burl Cain, where according to his account men and women who staffed the prison complex had routinely beaten and abused him.

  “Mr. Arrupt, I’m an attorney. Let me speak with the guards.” Tyler kept his voice calm. “If they’ve hurt you repeatedly, I can argue self-defense. Even after what you’ve done today. Let me help make things right.” You water breathing dumb-ass.

  “Why I believe you?”

  “Because you’re not a bad Frog, and I’m not a bad man, either.” Relatively speaking.

  “Virgin Mary only good human. Maybe Jesus and Joseph.”

  Okay, that’s an odd starting point, but what the fuck? Tyler smiled as warmly as he could with an instrument of death jammed against his skull.

  “So, Phibby, you’ve studied Christianity?”

  “Yes-no. Not Christianity. Study Catholic. I become Catholic.” Arrupt shook his hairless head. “You Catholic, too?”

  Tyler’s mouth dropped open. Okay…now we’re seriously down the rabbit hole. Or is it under the lily pad? Or ring around the Rosary?

  “Yes, sir. My whole family are confused Catholics.” Tyler nodded to the amphibian, who was still jamming a weapon against his face. Okay, that’s technically true. But don’t press me for details.

  Arrupt glanced at Prince Zenna. “You join Holy Catholic Church, too?”

  “Sadly, I am not a papist,” Mr. Blue said. “As a Quirt-Thymean, I respect all religions equally, since all are equally—to use friend Tyler’s word—confused.”

  Arrupt croaked a few words in Regalik, primary language of the Dengathi Stellar Lagoon, which Tyler did not comprehend. His sister, Rosalie, was the linguistic savant. She could probably discuss religious philosophy in Frog-speak.

  The Dengathi removed his stolen blaster from Tyler’s temple but kept it aimed at the human lawyer. He returned to pidgin Terran Standard.

  “Nobody to talk here. So, talk Father Cárcel. Him good priest for Dirt Monkey hologram. Him say I good person. God love allza creature great and small. Nice God. So, I join Church. Hail Mary, allza time.”

  Father Cárcel was the ubiquitous, holographic, Church-sanction Roman Catholic Priest programmed into most Commonwealth starships and government-related facilities, along with representatives of all major faiths, plus a few dozen alien religions. Copies of the whole religious library were available free to any requesting entity. Tyler had the complete set aboard the Patrick Henry.

  The Fr. Cárcel program at Matthews Trade Embassy on Suryadivan Prime instructed Tyler’s bio-energetic fiancé, Suzie, in the requirements for conversion to Catholicism. There weren’t many obstacles these days.

  All right. Let’s meet in the narthex after Mass. “So, my brother Catholic, would you mind pointing the weapon away from me?”

  He lowered the blaster. “I getting cold.”

  “Let us speak with them. Star Lawyers can represent you.”

  “No trust lawyers.”

  Now there’s a new idea. Tyler smirked. “I understand how you feel.”

  “You speak true? You good Catholic?”

  “Yes-no, Mr. Arrupt. I’m not really a good Catholic. That’s my brother, J.B.” Tyler relaxed for the first time. “But yes, I speak true.”

  “Ah, yes. Tyler Matthews usually does, friend Arrupt.”

  “You son of big, pirate-killer demon lady, Admiral Bad-anca Matthew?” Arrupt grunted. “I dead. Sleep now, Matt Junior.” He handed the blaster to Tyler, sank to the concrete floor, and entered cold-protective hibernation.

  “Indigo, when will you learn the value of a well-intended lie?”

  Tyler punched open the force field, and guards in prison-blue coveralls spilled into the interview room. They pulled Arrupt to his feet, but the limp ectotherm had gone into sleep mode. Two guards held him erect while a third slapped neural cuffs on his thin wrists and ankles. Tyler picked out the senior corrections officer by the silver wreath with gold star over his chest pocket.

  “I’m Mr. Arrupt’s attorney. He surrenders peacefully. He will not be answering any questions when he awakens.”

  “Are you okay, Mr. Matthews?” the ranking prison guard said. He was medium height and a little pudgy, a fifty-something Terran with silver hair, probably color-enhanced. His face had an Eastern European look. He glanced at Mr. Blue. “Prince Zenna, were you harmed by this creature?”

  “We’re fine,” Tyler answered. He looked for a name tag but found none. “Your officer took a stun blast in the scuffle, Master Chief…”

  “Ivailo Vodenicharov. It’s Bulgarian. They call me Warden Vee.”

  Warden? Of course—the gold star of a Naval Commodore. It’s been a long time since I visited a client in the clink. Prison staff hold military rank equivalents. This guy isn’t a Chief Petty Officer, he’s OIC at Burl Cain, the largest confinement facility in the Terran Commonwealth.

  “Come with me,” Vodenicharov said.

  “I’d rather see to my client’s rights.”

  “Rights? This Frog has been particularly annoying,” Vodenicharov said. “I’ll make sure he isn’t harmed. You have my word,”

  “I have some questions. Can we talk?”

  “My office. I’ll brief you.”

  “Do you have a food dispenser?” Mr. Blue said.

  They followed Warden Vee down a forcefield-lined block of individual cells filled with men and women of the pirate fleet. Primarily humans—Terrans, Mindorians, Segerians, and others from colonial worlds settled by people from Earth.

  But aliens, too, waited among the condemned. Mostly humanoids—the familiar star-5 configuration with head and four limbs, which repeats endlessly in the Cosmos, as if evolution favored this particular arrangement to solve the problems of survival on a multitude of habitable worlds. Tyler noted the diversity as he followed Warden Vee down the long row of cells.

  Rek Kett humanoids, who looked like dried mudballs. Forest green Kolovites, whose photosynthetic epidermis indicated their odd biology as humanoid plant-people. Zenji dog-men, who walked upright but bent to run on all fours. Barrel-chested Durijest humanoids from a world in the Perseus Ring with a low O2 atmosphere.

  And the non-humanoid, weirdly serpentine, warm-blooded Yak Na, whose four arms and four legs. Gifted by evolution to evade two-legged predators on their homeworld, the extra appendages made Yak Na helmsmen some of the best pilots in known space.

  But the largest contingent of alien pirates came from the Dengathi Stellar Lagoon, like Mr. Arrupt.

  Warden Vee’s glass box workplace faced a cellblock corridor on level four. The office smelled of stale coffee. In the distance a pair of guards in prison blues methodically tapped each cell’s forcefield with expandable truncheons. The transparent barriers sparkled and shimmered but held tight.

  The Warden closed his see-through door. “Please have a chair.”

  “Does my sister know what just happened here?” Tyler said.

  “No, sir. Can I get you or the Prince something?”

  “Four cheese omelets and matching toasted bagels, please,” Mr. Blue said. “And mint tea with—”

  “Nothing for us, thank you.” He glared at his Quirt companion. “We’ll eat later.”

  Zenna-Zenn frowned. “I would have shared.”

  “Coffee, perhaps?” Vodenicharov
said.

  “Just a few good answers, please.” Tyler sat in a synth-leather recliner, one of three positioned in front of an ancient, gunmetal desk.

  “Of course. Your father messaged us, requesting we cooperate fully with your investigations.” Vodenicharov flopped in a metallic chair, augmented by a black, heart-shaped cushion. “I admire what your Family has accomplished, sir.”

  And like most bureaucrats you’re scared shitless of The Old Man. But Dad isn’t the only power-broker you need to worry about.

  “Thank you,” Tyler said. “Burl Cain is a huge facility. Must be quite a challenge to manage it efficiently.”

  The Warden nodded. “I have good men and women working for me.”

  “Are you aware that some of your ‘good men and women’ have been abusing the prisoners?”

  Vodenicharov’s shoulders hunched. He paused a moment before replying. “I don’t tolerate mistreatment of prisoners. What evidence do you have of this alleged abuse?”

  “Mr. Arrupt reports dietary neglect, beatings, verbal abuse, threats—”

  “Your only source is a Dengathi pirate, who shot my officer and held you at gunpoint?”

  “He stunned your man, and I believed him when he told me why.”

  “Mr. Matthews, you cannot assume—”

  “Is it correct to assume that most guards in this facility have lost friends or loved ones to pirates over the years?” In Tyler’s mind, that didn’t make prisoner abuse right, but made it comprehensible.

  The Warden nodded. “Most of us in the Commonwealth services have reason to hate piracy. That doesn’t mean my guards abuse the inmates.”

  Tyler took his datacom from a pocket to make notes. “What are the charges against Mr. Arrupt, and when is the trial?”

  Warden Vee shook his head. “I’m sorry, sir, but apparently you haven’t been briefed about the disposition of the detainees.”