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Tabitha’s Vacation
by Michael Anderle
What you thought you knew about vampires is wrong... so very, very wrong.
Over a thousand years ago, the first human stumbled across a crashed Kurtherian alien ship, and was enhanced to help the alien race fight a war. Unfortunately, he left the ship confused, in pain and incompletely modified. His next twelve centuries and beyond created additional changed humans... what folklore called Vampires.
Bethany Anne, chosen as the final Matriarch to be charged with the responsibility for all Vampires, helped clean up issues between Vampires and Werewolves and prepared for the defense of Earth. Now, she has taken the fight out among the stars. She created a group to enforce the law—enhanced humans to track down and exact justice in her name. And one time, Ranger Tabitha was told to go on a non-vacation, vacation.
Because sometimes the only way to rest is to get rid of restless energy.
CHAPTER ONE
One Problem, One Ranger.
I WALKED INTO Rossini’s Bar on Planet Bectal with what my boss calls a physical ailment—a short temper and a bad case of I-don’t-give-a-shit. I was grumping to him for the third monthly meeting in a row about nothing to do when he came to check on me in my area of the sector. As my doctor, he prescribed a two-month vacation.
My boss knows me too damned well.
He isn’t going to lose my services for the three months. It’s three because I need two weeks travel both ways, and he knows I know he’s still getting work out of me. So, he can kiss my ass on the actual travel time. I booked that on the nicest, most expensive luxury liner on this side of the Galaxy for my vacation, everything else was going to be work. Perhaps fun work, but work nonetheless.
Here on Bectal’s world, I would just be doing my job. Some vacation. Poking the alien equivalent of anthills, looking under disgusting rocks and kicking over dilapidated buildings to see what maggots from the local equivalent of the criminal world squirmed away. Hoping to be faster than I could figure out what the hell they’ve done wrong and if necessary, shoot them.
My usual area of responsibility was two solar systems back and one up and damned if it wasn’t getting too boring. It had taken me thirty years, but I’d finally gotten most organizations to understand The Queen Bitch’s Rule for her Rangers which is ‘One Problem-One Ranger.’ The corollary to it, from my boss, is Rangers have no limits for our backup, it just can’t be another Ranger.
One time, on the Sver’an planet, I got into a shouting match with the equivalent of the local Warlord. I hadn’t wanted to lay waste to half a city just to pull out his good-for-absolutely-nothing second cousin from his whatever-the-hell the third parent was called in their family group.
So, in front of him and his men, I told him I would call for a battalion of the Queen Bitch’s Guardians if he didn’t produce the miscreant.
That rat-faced POS just stared at me and called my bluff. He didn’t know us Rangers very well. So I did.
Call, that is.
Because as a Ranger, we have a direct link to the Queen Bitch herself, Bethany Anne. The conversation back then went something like this:
“Tet’gurky, you will produce your psychotic murdering little prick from god-knows-what-you-call-the-baby-momma or I’ll call in a battalion of the Queen’s Guardians to pull his useless ass out of this city.”
I was rather angry at the time. It was my third time to this hellhole of a planet, and those living here were having problems with the Queen’s version of justice. Which is to say, ‘be nice to each other, or else.’ Some alien species had a real problem with the nice part. Oh, it isn’t that they don’t understand the concept, it is pretty universal, it’s that they have lived so long on the, ‘those who have strength rule,’ corollary that when someone comes along with more strength, they have to test it.
A lot.
All the damn time—it was starting to piss me off. Sure, the first time a people test Bethany Anne’s rules I get it. By the second time, I’m wondering if this area just didn’t get the memo (and I call to make sure the PR department sent the damn memo.) By the third time, it’s just a case of who is backing down first, them, or me.
It sure the hell isn’t going to be me.
So, it was my third time speaking to Tet’gurky so I figured he had to have read the memo, and they had done the research, and the rumors about Bethany Anne’s Guardians had to have made their way around the planet from the fighting two solar years back.
But the little prick answered me, “Do it, Ranger Tabitha.” He waved his furry little arms around his Warren with the other fifteen leaders of his clan, “I don’t think we are so significant to the Queen Bitch that she would waste such valuable resources as a battalion of her finest soldiers to locate one little problem child.”
“He’s not a child, Tet’gurky, he’s created his own little psychopaths with baby mommas,” I answered.
“You say psychopath, we say the strongest is always right. He was the strongest.” Tet’gurky’s sibilant laughter spread to the fifteen little rat-faced throats around him, and it pissed me off.
It wasn’t my job to kill them all, no matter how upset I was at being laughed at. My job was bringing the little bastard to justice for killing someone on the world under my jurisdiction. So, fuck’em.
Bethany Anne?
Hello, Tabitha!
Do you have a second to chat? I asked. While she is a friend, she’s still the Queen and even after a hundred and fifty years, I treat her as my liege first, my friend second.
Yes, I’m en route to check on a diplomatic impasse. We’re in the middle of a transition, recalculating the heading. I fucking hate this shit. Some of the ships with us are so damned slow.
Well, if you didn’t ride in the fastest chariot, perhaps you wouldn’t be so impatient.
Yeah, well, some things don’t change with age. But, enough about me, what’s up with you? You rarely call just to say ‘hi.’
Sorry about that. Bethany Anne was right. I did rarely call just to chat. I’ve got a problem here on Sver’an where I’m trying to pull out a POS. I either need to get help from the local Warlord, who is related to the little creep, or drop a lot of shock and awe to make them produce the freak. Or actually tear apart this city to get to him. So, I told him to produce, or I’d request help.
He called your bluff, did he? Bethany Anne laughed.
Yes! Little turd-magnet says he doesn’t think his little cousin-or-other is important enough for you to support me.
Tabitha, have you changed your body recently to grow red hair? she asked me.
No, why? I responded, confused.