Five years ago, when Riyad had first assumed the reins of the organization, there had been a marked improvement in attack strategies and their resulting profits. Everyone was making money, and the every-growing ranks of pirates would do anything for their beloved leader.
Not so anymore. Since the Juirean raid on K’ly, Riyad had changed. It seemed as though running the Fringe Pirates was more of a nuisance to him, and he spent most of his time aboard his ship, engrossed in research.
“How long is this going to take, Captain?”
Angar hid his frustration with Riyad; he knew that at any moment, Riyad could literally rip his head off. “Not long. There is a piece of gold ornamentation that is worth most of the bounty. Mnnlee insists he should get it all since he initiated the attack. Jolaa disagrees.”
As they walked to the meeting hall, Riyad appeared to be even more upset than normal. “How have you proposed settling this?” he growled at Angar.
“I suggested a trade,” Angar answered between gasps for breath, as he struggled to keep pace with his fast-walking leader. “Mnnlee to give up some of his take so he could keep the entire ornament.”
“And?”
“Captain Mnnlee says he should have it all to begin with, so giving up anything is unacceptable to him.”
Riyad stopped in his tracks and stared at Angar. “Unacceptable? To him?” Angar shivered in the presence of the stare. Then Riyad resumed his stride.
In the hall, the two captains sat at a large wooden table surrounded by a couple of dozen or so of their crews. It was an amazing menagerie of creatures, many not from The Fringe, but drawn to the frontier sector of The Expansion in search of wealth and freedom. Like pirates everywhere, they each carried a rebellious gene within their make-up that made it virtually impossible for them to exist in normal society.
Riyad Tarazi was one of them, even if he had never actually been a pirate back home on Earth. He had, however, gravitated to the more radical of views, more-than-likely the product of his Muslim upbringing in the slums of the Gholeiry municipality in southern Beirut. Not as fervent a believer as some, Riyad found more satisfaction in the leading of men and the formulation of strategies, rather than religious devotion. Even in the games they would play as children in the streets surrounding the ruins of the Camille Chamoun Stadium, he was seen as a natural leader and a master tactician. The willingness of the simple-minded made his fellow street urchins easy converts to his own brand of fanaticism. Whatever it took so others would follow…
At the not-so-tender age of 15, Riyad had been recruited into the fledgling Al Qaeda organization, and sent to Pakistan for training. In the intervening years, except for brief meetings near the Beirut airport and his attendance at a soccer match in the rebuilt Stadium, Riyad never returned to conduct operations in his native Lebanon.
Instead, Riyad was sent to America for schooling, spending time as a Gator at the University of Florida in Gainesville. His major was chemical engineering, a field that came in handy when instructing young, radical recruits on how to construct roadside IED’s in Iraq and Afghanistan. He rose quickly in the ranks, although he never once set a single bomb himself. He was, however, responsible for five confirmed kills of traitors-to-the-cause from within their own ranks.
After the killing of Abu Musab Al-Zwari in June of 2006, Riyad was sent to Pakistan to help coordinate the rising resistance movement in Afghanistan. The Americans had placed most of their emphasis on Iraq by that time, leaving Afghanistan ripe for a resurgence of the Taliban. It was just a matter of time before they would regain power. Time was on the side of the resistance — and of Riyad Tarazi as well.
Or so he thought.
Riyad remembered walking with the guide through the cold and desolate mountain passage high in the Hindu Kush. The landscape was a consistent and stark gray, and nothing grew this high in the mountains. It was nearing dusk and they would camp in a small cave not too far up the trail and meet the driver the next morning for the trip down into Kabul.
But it never worked out like that. He clearly remembered the flash of hot white light — and the next moment he was waking up in a cold metal cell, covered in hay. His first vision had been that of an Indian man named Patel. The next was of an alien creature wearing a black leather vest and covered head-to-toe in a thick, black fur. At first he thought it was a small bear in costume, but when it spoke and struck him with a whip, he knew this was something else.
After a couple of weeks in hellish conditions aboard the slaver’s ship — during which two of his three other Human companions died — he was sold to a gang of pirates, who apparently then marked up his price and tried to make a quick profit on the spread at another slave auction.
By then, Riyad had gained a feel for his surroundings, and managed to rip the binding cords from his feet and hands and crush the necks of two of his pirate-capturers, before being subdued by an electric bolt of some kind. It hurt like hell, but he found out later, the shot was meant to kill.
A gruff alien with two droopy appendages just below each ear, then approached him and asked if he could control his anger long enough to listen to him. The fact that Riyad could understand anything he said was a shock, until the alien explained about the translation device that had been embedded behind his ear while he was unconscious on the slaver’s ship.
The alien — Hawcwin was his name — explained that he was part of an informal privateer organization called The Fringe Pirates, and that they were always looking for new recruits and strong fighters. The fact that Riyad had survived a level-two bolt meant that he was something special. Having someone like Riyad in his crew would greatly enhance Hawcwin’s reputation — and power — among his peers.
Riyad had little choice but to accept the invitation to join the crew, and nine months later shot Hawcwin dead in a challenge for his captainship. Then a few months after that, Riyad fought the supreme leader of the Fringe Pirates for his position. In a spectacle designed to elicit maximum shock and cement his authority, Riyad made easy work of the lizard-like Rigorian, in hand-to-hand combat, and to the death.
Riyad’s position and reputation were secure, and he immediately set about transforming the rag-tag gang of renegades into an efficient and feared fighting force.
Riyad Tarazi had fulfilled his childhood ambition of leading a band of warriors, yet he had done so with a force of over 500 aliens, rather than Muslim freedom fighters.
Fate acted in mysterious ways…
The captains rose from their seats when Riyad approached. “Greetings, my General,” Captain Mnnlee said, beating his counterpart to the punch. Captain Jolaa just nodded and squared his jaw, while shooting Mnnlee a deadly glare. They both went to claim their seats again “No! Remain standing,” Riyad stated firmly. Both of the alien captains stumbled slightly, breaking their drop into their seats. “This won’t take long.”
On the table lay the offending gold ornamentation, a meter-long crest of some kind depicting a rider on a thick steed and holding a lance. The shimmering gold looked new, but that was the lure of the precious metal, no matter what civilization one belonged to. The object could have been a year old, or a thousand; only an expert could tell the difference. Yet to the pirates, all they saw was a weighty piece of precious metal that could be melted down and sold in the markets of Silea. Of course, Riyad would get his cut, equal to ten-percent of the selling price. The rest would be split between the crews. An object of this size could bring as much as 8,000 Juirean credits.
Riyad looked at the object, then at his two feuding captains. “Throughout the years, I have made it possible for the two of you to share in dozens of bounties greater than this. What makes this one so different that the two of you would fight over scraps?”