Star Missions - Book One - Part I

Chapter 5 - Extermination

Governor Victor Belter's Hydra Base office was spacious and uncluttered. Some had called it practical, but it had everything a Head of State would need. In the room was an executive-sized desk and chair at one end of the room, and a conference table to accommodate meetings when necessary in the center. For video communication with those under his direction, there was a large screen on the wall to his left. The exterior wall to his right boasted two large windows that provided a breathtaking view of Hydra's landscape of lush forest and sparkling ocean. Photographs and awards he had received as a young astronaut and diplomat covered the wall behind him. Included was the official picture used for the commemorative postage stamp with him and Eanex discovering Angel's Gate. There were also a few small pieces of art displayed throughout the office and a handful of plants. All carefully curated by his wife, Beatrice. He'd only allowed her to make the additions after she'd complained that his office looked like a warehouse.

Still, the simplicity of the office helped Victor to better focus on his many administrative duties. There were no distractions, save for the beauty of Hydra outside the windows. The part of him that preferred flying through space and exploring new frontiers had faded. These days, the older, more experienced Governor knew that this office allowed him to enjoy life in space, if one could call it that, while still permitting him time to see his wife and children daily, and that was enough adventure.

Morning and afternoon, Victor was engaged in the task of reading reports and requests from all over the Strolla System. He waited for news regarding the alien shuttle. That would have been a welcome distraction. Already close to noon, he forged on with the tedious paperwork, trying to shorten the workload before taking a lunch break.

Most of the paperwork was routine. It came from mining companies asking to expand their worker allotment, or permission to add to the current cap on ships. There was an abundance of resources they'd extracted, both on Nova and several mineral-rich asteroids they operated on, and needed to move the resources and merchandise through to Terra.

A large portion of the stack was from one corporation, Emerson Enterprises, which was the largest company as well as the most demanding in the System. It had exclusive rights to mine the Rock, a dwarf planet-like asteroid that shared the same orbit as Hydra and Nova. Although the Rock had no atmosphere, the elements and metals on the giant asteroid were so dense that its gravitational field was as strong as either of the two planets, helping to maintain the orbit around Strolla and an equidistant relationship between the two more massive planets.

Victor sighed and copied the Emerson requests to the approval list. Michael Emerson, the company's man in charge, has pull with the Leadership Council, more than anyone else in the System, and he wasn't averse to using it. Sure, Victor was Governor, but it was the Leadership Council that made the decisions for the colonies. He knew that he was only there to help maintain the successful implementation of other people's agendas; the Council's, the contractors', and the people's. It was a balancing act, one that he was proud to have managed without incident for the last fifteen years. It kept him humble.

Requests to change the allocation of food resources, ship, cargo, and personnel transport requests passed across his desk every day. He wasn't going to let the appearance of a strange alien spaceship slow down the torrent. Besides, he had to get some of the work done before he left in the morning for Nova Station. Nonetheless, when the monitor on his wall chimed with a familiar melody, he welcomed the diversion. Victor pushed a button on his desk to activate the screen.

"Colonel Hand to Governor Belter."

The screen relayed an image of Colonel Hand in a white-walled room with people in lab coats walking around in the background. It appeared that he was calling from inside the lab complex.