by A. K. DuBoff
So far, Kaen hadn’t heard anything that would support leniency, should they be court martialed. They had been acting in accordance with a moral compass, but they’d still violated Guard procedure and were a security threat. Kaen wasn’t happy that he would have to make the decisions that would dictate the fate of their lives when he was done with his investigation, unless he could determine for sure that their minds were under someone else’s control. More importantly, he had to find out how to remove the foreign control.
“I hope this guy’s got some better dirt,” Olvera commented while she looked in the tiny viewing window into the holding room.
“Don’t hold your breath.”
Olvera flashed a smile. “You might be surprised what kind of crazy shite comm techs overhear.”
He chuckled. “Want to take the lead on this one, Major?”
The security officer shrugged. “Yes, sir, I’ll give it a go, if you don’t mind.”
“Be my guest.” Kaen held out his hand for her to enter the room first.
The suspect, Alan, was seated at the table with his hands already cuffed to the securement bar. He watched Olvera and Kaen enter with wide-eyed distress. “Sir, ma’am, what’s going on? They’ve been holding me for over a day, and no one will explain.”
“I apologize for the delay in this conversation,” Kaen began while gesturing for Olvera to take the sole chair across from Alan at the table. “We deferred this chat to see if any contrary evidence would surface, but I’m afraid the leak stopped as soon as you were in custody.”
Alan swallowed. “I don’t know what you think I’ve done, but I promise you I haven’t done anything to hurt the Guard.”
“Nothing is that isolated,” Olvera said, taking over. “What may be innocuous to the Guard could have greater implications for the Taran Empire. That’s why we have a chain of command. Break that chain, and there are problems.”
“I’ve never broken chain of command, at least not knowingly,” Alan insisted. “This must be some kind of misunderstanding. What do you think I’ve done?”
“No need to put on a show, Alan. We know what you did.”
“I…” The helpless man looked to Kaen when he realized Olvera wasn’t going to budge. “Sir, you have to believe me. I haven’t done anything wrong.”
Olvera folded her hands on the table. “Then how do you explain your user account being tied to secure Guard information being transmitted outside of our network?”
Alan’s eyes widened further. “What? No! I’d never!”
“We have a record of the action, so that isn’t up for debate. What we’d like to know is why you did it.”
The comm tech shrank back in his chair. “I’d never betray the Guard like that. Either you were looking at the wrong thing or someone is trying to set me up.”
“Can you think of anyone who’d want to frame you?” Kaen asked.
Alan shook his head. “Well, no… I mean, I’ve tried to be friendly, you know? We’re family here. I try to get along with everyone.”
A nice sentiment, but he’s lying about something. He must be. Kaen crossed his arms and scowled at the captive.
The comm tech continued drawing into himself. “Who did the information go to? Maybe they could tell you more. They’re the ones you should be going after!”
“It was routed to an MTech facility,” Olvera revealed. “Do you have any ties to the organization?”
Alan thought for a moment, then shook his head slowly. “I’ve heard of them, of course, but I don’t think I know anyone there. I’m not from that system.”
“Have you ever visited there?” Kaen asked.
“No, never.”
Olvera glanced back at Kaen then returned her attention to the suspect. “Do you have a history of memory loss?”
Alan paled. “Whoa, hold on! You’re not suggesting that I did this and don’t remember? That’s crazy! I’m telling you, someone must have set me up.”
“Answer my question, please.”
“No, I don’t have a history of memory loss. And you’ll see I have a great service record and have always done my part for the Guard. I’m one of the last people you should be investigating.”
Perhaps we do need to vet the evidence further. It is possible someone else was using his credentials. Kaen nodded. “We’ll take your statement under advisement. Please understand that we’ll have to hold you until this matter is resolved.”
Alan worked his mouth but then bowed his head, shoulders rounded. “Do what you have to do, sir. But let me know when you find the real culprit, because I have a thing or two I want to say to them about messing with me like this.”
Olvera stood. “We’ll get to the bottom of this.”
“Please hurry,” Alan pleaded. “I’m going crazy cooped up in that cell.”
“We’re doing our best,” she acknowledged, and then followed Kaen into the hall.
The two sentry guards entered to retrieve Alan while Kaen and Olvera stepped down the hall to debrief.
Olvera frowned. “You know, I think he honestly believes he’s innocent.”
“I didn’t detect any deception, either. That doesn’t change the fact that the data was transmitted using his credentials.”
“Could someone have hacked his profile?”
“You know more about the security safeguards than me.”
She nodded. “Well, it’s unlikely, but certainly within the realm of possibility that someone used his account without his knowledge.”
“Is there any way to confirm it was actually him?”
“There are internal cameras in all the communication rooms. We could pull up the feed covering his station and see if he was the one sitting there.”
“Do it,” Kaen ordered.
Olvera led him back to her office. She slid into her chair behind her desk to pull up the footage while Kaen remained standing.
After three minutes of navigating menus and searching through the security archive, Olvera located the right feed and displayed it on her main screen.
Kaen shook his head. There was no mistaking that the person working at the terminal was Alan. “It bothers me how easily he lied.”
Olvera released a long breath and leaned back in her chair, steepling her fingers. “Like I said earlier, he does honestly seem to believe he didn’t do anything. It doesn’t come off like a lie if he thinks he’s telling the truth.”
“But he did it.” Kaen pointed to the screen.
“What if he has no memory—or an altered memory?”
“That is the question, isn’t it?”
“I didn’t say there was a straightforward answer, Colonel. We have three events, each connected to politically charged situations that won’t be easy to smooth over. Discovering these leaks was just the first step.”
“The pattern, though…”
“Colonel, I’m no longer convinced there is a pattern. A few details line up in two of the cases, but that alone isn’t enough to make a compelling argument.”
“I’ll give you that,” Kaen agreed, “but those details also add up to more than I can ignore.”
Olvera smoothed her hands over the pants of her uniform. “I want there to be a connection, too, because then it will all make sense. But sometimes, people just act for themselves. What I said when we started this investigation may be wrong—it really might just be coincidence. These could be three separate incidents that just happened to come to a head at the same time.”
“Even if that’s the case, how do you explain Alan’s lack of recollection of his actions?”
“Maybe he was drunk-subterfuging?”
Kaen scowled at the security chief.
She laughed. “Sorry.”
“I can think of half a dozen ways to explain memory issues, and none of them paint a very good picture. Someone wanted this covered up.”
“It’s like some evil alien overlord is messing with us tiny humans, just to see how long it takes us to go mad.”
Tha
t’s it! Kaen leaned against the cool, metal wall. He shook his head, letting out a weary breath.
“I’m joking.” Olvera’s brow knitted. “Wait, what is it?”
“These incidents all seem disconnected, but that was by design—you’re right, we weren’t thinking big enough. The commonality is that each deals with one facet of the system containing Mysar, Valta, and Elusia. Each incident addressed one of those planets.”
“Okay, I agree that there are connections to the three planets within the same system, and that probably is a factor. But we still don’t know what it’s about.”
“That system, of course.”
Olvera sighed. “Well yes, but what about it?”
“If there are two opposing forces, then the target is most likely what’s caught in between.”
“Valta?”
“All the signs point back to that planet. We’ve known for years it’s special.”
“It is—no debate. How do the incidents connect? It might just be two sides playing political games against each other.”
“No, after what I’ve seen, I think this is the work of a third party.”
“Someone on Valta, perhaps?”
“No, more removed than that,” Kaen said.
Olvera raised an eyebrow. “I really was joking about evil aliens.”
“I won’t rule out any possibility just yet. Somehow, that might be better than a rogue telepath mind-controlling Guard officers”
She nodded. “I don’t get the motive. Why would these aliens, or whoever, be after Valta? Why fuel a civil dispute between Mysar and Elusia?”
“That is what remains to be seen,” Kaen replied. “But Valta, for the time being, is the center of the action.”
— — —
Monica strode into the observation room deep in the heart of D Wing. Looking around at the monitors, she noticed that Jared had gone to speak with one of the subjects in an interrogation room.
Just as well. I have an overdue chat of my own. She strolled into the corridor with the line of holding cells and stopped in front of her latest acquisition.
The man was in his thirties. With his thin build and prematurely aged skin from too much unprotected time in the sun, he hardly looked like someone with the fortitude to withstand the trials to come.
He inched back on his cot. “Why have you brought me here?”
“For some very important work,” Monica replied, depressing the door control to slide it open. “Come with me.” She telekinetically pinned the man’s arms behind his back.
He gasped when he realized what she’d done, offering no resistance when she compelled him out of the room.
She directed him to an experimentation room with a clear outer wall and no furnishings. A thick, heavy body suit was laid out on the floor. Claw marks along the right wall gave clues to the room’s previous occupants, and the man quaked on his feet, hugging himself. “What are you going to do to me?”
“Make you better.” Monica extracted a syringe and the vial of nanites she’d been carrying in her lab coat pocket since morning. “Dress.” She nodded to the suit.
“Why?”
“Do it,” Monica commended, both aloud and his in mind.
He complied.
While he was dressing, Monica drew the nanite solution from the vial into the syringe, what amounted to no more than four drops. As small a quantity as it appeared, when administered directly into his bloodstream, it contained enough nanites to permeate his body in half a day, so long as there was adequate fuel to aid in the replication. The specialized bodysuit would provide just that.
Gripping the clothed man in a telekinetic choke-hold, Monica inserted the needle into his jugular. She exited the room, releasing him from the telekinetic restraints when she pressed the door controls to seal him inside.
The man reached for his neck. “What was that?”
“Hopefully, the next phase of evolution.” She smiled at him.
He held his hand over the puncture site and stumbled back toward the far wall. He collapsed against it then slid to the ground. Within seconds his hand had dropped from his neck, and he curled up on his side, falling fast asleep.
There were other ways to dose a recipient with the nanites, but the alternate methods took much longer to take effect. She didn’t have any time to spare with this experiment. By morning, she’d know if the residents of Valta would be as useful as she hoped. While the nanites should be able to transform anyone, any opportunity to maximize those returns would be well worth taking.
There was nothing more to do with the man until then, so she headed back toward the observation room.
After five steps, her comm lit up with an automated security alert: someone had accessed restricted files. She had no doubt who it might be.
— — —
“Is it finished yet?”
“No, Kira. For the fourth time, the analysis is not complete. I’ll let you know as soon as it is,” Leon groaned.
Kira scooched back under Leon’s desk with a huff. How freakin’ long does it take to analyze a bunch of nanoscopic technology that no one has ever encountered before? She frowned. Even she knew she was being unreasonable.
“I’m sorry, Leon,” she murmured. “I just want to get out of here. I keep expecting an army to walk in and grab me any second.”
“Maybe you should go,” he suggested. “I can finish up here and then meet you back at the cottage.”
“No, absolutely not.” She tried to give him a firm look of superior finality, but it was decidedly difficult from her hiding place on the floor.
Leon smiled down at her. “You’re kinda cute when you’re trying to be all tough.”
“Trying to be? Let’s not forget how I dropped you.”
“I think you have some pent-up aggression you need to release.”
Kira thought about it. “You know, this is the longest I’ve gone in a very long time without sparring with one of the soldiers on my team. That makes for one exhausting workout.”
Leon’s smile faded. “That isn’t some sort of euphemism, is it?”
“What? No! No, no, no. Those guys are like brothers to me.” She tilted her head, eyes narrow. “Why?”
“Nothing.”
A little jealous, eh? Kira concealed her smirk.
Leon came to attention. “Analysis is done!”
“About time!” Kira emerged from her hiding place just enough to view the computer screen.
“Oh… this isn’t good.” Leon paled.
Kira stared at the information on the screen, but it may as well have been alien code. “What? I have no idea what I’m looking at here.”
Leon touched on some sequences in the analysis. “Okay, so I’m not a nanotech guy, right? I don’t have a clue about how to break down the machines to their components and analyze what they’re supposed to do. So what I did was something of a workaround. We have the different divisions of MTech, each with their own specialization. But we’re an integrated company, so we need to know how those different components interact.”
“Right, what about it?”
“I tricked the system. I told it I was working on a genetic model and needed to know how these nanites would impact my patient, since it would influence my genetic therapy treatment plan.”
Kira sat back on her heels. “All right, that was creative.”
“You can stroke my ego later. If this analysis is right, we have a huge problem.”
“Lemme guess… alien hybrids with telekinetic abilities.”
Leon’s jaw dropped. “How did you…?”
“There were suspicions based on some information we gathered at another MTech lab. And when I saw that they were holding telekinetically gifted people here, it was pretty much guaranteed that it was all connected. I also maybe sorta mind-read one of the secret researchers a little bit ago.”
“Kira!”
“The details aren’t relevant. This analysis is exactly what I need to get to the Guard so they can m
ove in. Can you save it on an external drive?”
“They’ll be looking for any drives leaving the facility. Those security arches work both ways.”
“What about the hard drive on the cloaking module?”
“Yes, that could work.” Leon reached for the device. “Stay hidden—and quiet.”
Kira pinched her thumb and index finger and drew them across her lips while she tucked back under the desk.
Two agonizing minutes passed while Leon synced the module’s hard drive and established a link to transfer the complex model. It was unlikely they’d be able to access the information on just any old computer, but Kira was confident the Guard would have the means to reassemble the data packet.
“Got it!” Leon whispered. “We can leave any— Oh, shite.”
Kira frowned. “That sounded like an especially bad ‘oh, shite’.”
“The system just sent up a red flag. These sequences must have been marked to send a notice if they were accessed.”
“What does that mean for us?”
“A bunch of really big, well-armed security guards are headed straight for us.”
CHAPTER 14
“Oh, fok! Fok, fok, fok!” Kira scrambled to her feet.
“We can’t be here, Kira,” Leon said, his voice pitched with fear.
Kira pulled herself together. “Grab whatever you need. We need to get out of here!”
Leon shut down the equipment in his office and then they began marching as quickly as they dared toward the exit. No more than four meters outside Leon’s office, they were stopped by one of the techs on Leon’s team—Marty, based on his ID badge.
“Heading out early?” Marty asked.
Is he a stall tactic or just lonely? Kira didn’t care to find out either way. “Sorry, I just came down with a major migraine and Leon is taking me home.”
“Yeah, I’ll drop her off then be right back,” Leon said, playing along.
Marty frowned. “That’s what’s going on, huh? When I saw you crawl under Leon’s desk, I thought something else was up.”
Leon blushed. “Uh…”
“Maybe I worked myself into a headache.” Kira wished she could have waited around to see Marty’s reaction, but she took off at a brisk walk toward the exit.