The President's Bride

Plot Points:
Captain Fredricks' daughter was to marry the hereditary President of the Coreen Republic. The crew aided Robert Schriever in rescuing his true love. They were married in the Empire.
The crew now have official ranks in the Imperial Navy.
The Republican President keeps a suit of full combat armour in his office.
The artificial intelligence on the Klarg Star was an Iraari program altered by the Kaa. Once activated, it would kill everyone aboard, and take the ship to the nearest Kaa vessel. The program was transferred to another terminal, and the weapons removed.

Synopsis:
The crew, onboard the Righteous Indignation and escorted by two Empire Frigates, ambush a small Republic squadron. They destroy two of the vessels, and capture the third. Upon returning, the Emperor introduces them to Robert Schriever, a defector from the Republic, and asks them to undertake a difficult mission. The President of the Khoreen Republic will soon be marrying Fredricks' daughter, with whom Schriever is in love. The crew agree to help in the rescue attempt.

In order to enter the Republican Palace, the crew arranges to be hired as carnival performers. The final plan is an elaborate scheme of sheer lunacy. Meliar plays a sharpshooter, Schriever the Sword Master. Kress acts on a comedy team with Merlmer, who doubles as the trainer for K'yrth's dreaded "Quagaar" monster. Ramirez rounds out the company as manager. They arrive at the Republican homeworld in stock freighter carrying K'yrth's fighter.

After a stunning display of athletic prowess, and a brilliant two alien rendition of "Who's on First," the Quagaar breaks free from his cage. Just then, the sonic grenades in the shooting targets also go off. Meliar also accidentally drops several of the glass balls he was juggling, which releases the knockout gas they just happened to have within them. Meanwhile, the crew (previously immunized and earplugged) break out the weapons from the bottom of the Quagaar's cage, and retrieve (daughter). The President, mysteriously immune to the grenades and gas, manages to escape to his suit of Combat Armor. The Eye of Wisdom, remotely activated, arrives at the palace and literally blows the front doors off. The crew race into the ship and blast into orbit, narrowly avoid Khoreen pursuit.

Back at the Empire, Schriever and (daughter) are married. The crew are given official ranks within the Imperial Fleet. Ramirez completes his investigation of the Klarg Star's artificial intelligence: it was an Iraari AI reprogrammed by the Kaa. It would remain dormant, until the ship received a specific signal from a nearby Kaa vessel. At that point, the AI would activate, and kill off the entire crew, either by nerve gas, or by blowing the living quarters open to space. Imperial Bomb squads remove both the gas and the explosives. Kress, having seen "2001," orders the AI be downloaded to a separate mainframe, which is then less then surgically isolated from any output device except an old tele-type printer. The crew activate it, and question it at length, but it remembers nothing, and was horrified at the code it would have executed. Merlmer nicknames it Rx-373b, and Kress eventually downloads information about current history/politics for it to peruse.

The crew also meet a Professor of Archeology, Anthony. Prof. Anthony claims to have discovered a Precursor Star Base in a nebula in inter-Alliance space. The crew agree to take him to revisit it.

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