Op File Sanction

by J. Clifton Slater

  “He seems to have stepped out,” Manola commented.

  Warlock stood and stripped off her goggle. Eiko reached out for her arm but she shook off his hand.

  “He knew my call sign. As a matter of fact, he used it before recalling my name and rank,” Warlock informed the special agent. Then she placed both hands on the Admiral’s desk. “Sir, I’m going to ask you a question. All it requires is a simple yes or no answer. Do I have your permission?”

  “Ask away, Sergeant.”

  “Thank you, Admiral. Then I’m going to ask you to repeat a single line. Again, are you okay with this?”

  “It’s highly irregular,” commented Manola, “But for the sake of brevity go right ahead. Eine! I can’t figure where the Commander has run off to.”

  By being solicitous of the Admiral, Warlock caught a good baseline. Now it was time to see if he was the spy or even involved.

  “Manola. Are you spying for the Constabulary?” demanded Warlock.

  The Admiral jerked back as if he’d been hit by a right cross.

  “Well I never,” he blustered.

  “Yes or no!”

  “No. And Sergeant, I resent the implications.”

  “Repeat after me. The Empress loves me.”

  “The Empress? That bloody witch.”

  “Admiral, just say it,” Eiko urged him.

  “The Empress loves me,” the Admiral spit it out like venom. “What is the meaning of this?”

  “Thank you, sir. Eiko time for some of your Realm famous tact,” Warlock directed as she spun from the Admiral’s desk. Then she tapped her earbud. “Poet. Find Commander Mikka for me.”

  The Admiral was yelling and Eiko was trying to calm him down when Warlock ran from the office, sprinted through the aide’s office, and burst into the passageway. She slid to a halt and looked both ways. There was no sign of Eine Mikka.

  ***

  “I’m searching for him in the system. Doesn’t do much good looking for a person when you don’t know what they look like. And I’m not familiar with the Commander,” Poet informed her. “Okay, I caught a glimpse of him.”

  “Give me a deck,” Warlock ordered. She dug in her back foot, pushed off, and sprinted towards the lifts. Then she suggested. “I’d head for the flight decks and escape.”

  “With a little notice, I would have his packet downloaded and already have him tagged. Stand by. I saw him again,” the researcher announced. “Two decks down. Use the stairs.”

  Before reaching the elevators and the Marine guard, Diosa veered out of the passageway, slammed the hatch open, and took the steps. Jumping down the risers three at a time, Warlock reached the conference room deck.

  “Where is he?” Warlock demanded as she shoved the hatch open and emerged on the deck. “Come on Poet. Strap in and work your magic.”

  “I am rewinding video from the deck and reviewing the last few minutes,” he pleaded. “This isn’t easy.”

  “Apparently capturing a spy isn’t either,” Diosa commented. The retired Marine bounced on her toes while swiveling her head from side to side. “I want a living spy to question not a corpse to identify.”

  “Commander Eine Mikka is from a politically connected family. His uncle is an adviser to the Galactic Council and his father is mayor of his hometown. He graduated from a private university paid for by his mother’s family,” Walden recited. “The Mikka’s own six estates on Planet Uno and have relatives on Dos and Tres.”

  “Why the biography?”

  “Because I don’t believe he will off himself,” Walden surmised. “But if you don’t get him to confess and he escapes to planetside, the authorities will have a hard time finding and convicting him.”

  “Gee Poet, the jawing and tossing theories back and forth really is fun. We should do it more often,” Warlock snarled. “How about for now, we find the turncoat?”

  Her researcher went silent and she feared his feelings were hurt. But he came back almost as soon as the thought crossed her mind.

  “He entered a corridor to the left. It’s passed the two conference rooms on your left,” Walden directed. “He’s heading in the direction of the station’s core.”

  All space stations used a three-silo construction style. The center and largest was an enormous tube for air flow and utility lines. Along its length were hatches to every level plus maintenance rooms. If Mikka reached the core, he would have numerous hiding places and access to every level. But the flight decks and escape were over one hundred and twenty levels away. Obviously, he wasn’t planning an immediate exit.

  “Where is he going?” Warlock asked as she opened the door and stepped into a narrow corridor.

  “I’m sure I don’t know, Master Sergeant,” Walden replied.

  “Give me a guess?”

  “That would require me to formulate a theory,” he stated. “As I was recently informed, theories are frivolous.”

  “You have excellent manual dexterity, don’t you Poet?” inquired Warlock as she reached the end of the corridor.

  “My fingers are a gift for the ladies and lightning-quick manipulation of keys,” Walden bragged.

  “Enjoy them,” threatened Warlock. “Because when this is over, I’m going to make a choice.”

  “A choice?” he asked.

  “I’m going to break one off and leave a bloody stump,” Warlock promised as she opened the door at the end of the corridor. Entering a circular passageway that wrapped around the core, she added. “Unless you stop the stupid and make with the smarts.”

  “I’d bet he has the receiver stashed in the core,” Poet replied ignoring the warning or maybe reacting to it. “As an Admiral’s aide, no one would notice him lurking around the conference room deck or pay attention to his comings and goings.”

  “Thank you, Poet,” Warlock said as she placed her hands on a circular hatch.

  “Does that mean I get to keep my finger?”

  Diosa stepped through the hatch and onto a small platform. Rungs to a wall mounted ladder led to the upper decks and down deeper into the station. A wind blew strong in the silo and she placed a hand on a rung to keep from being blown off the landing.

  “Not only do you keep your finger but you have a pass for the next time I lose my temper,” Warlock assured him. “I’m in the core. Up or down.”

  “Up. The maintenance storage room between decks would be a good place to hide a receiver and hard drive,” Poet informed her. “Another room higher up and across the core isn’t a likely place for the equipment.”

  Warlock began to climb. A few minutes later, she noted another landing about three meters above her. A pair of dress shoes and the trouser legs of a Navy duty uniform stepped from a hatch.

  “Commander Mikka. You can’t get off the station,” Diosa called up. “Let’s get out of the wind and talk.”

  Mikka leaned far enough over the small platform, Diosa was afraid he’d jump. To keep from pressuring him, she ceased climbing and gave him a pleasant smile.

  “Master Sergeant Alberich, or should I call you Warlock?” he shouted into the wind. “If it had been any other agent, I’d have taken my chances with the data pad inquiry. But the net is full of questions about the infamous unrestricted agent.”

  “Which net?” she asked.

  “The Constabulary is curious about you and the reports are slim on details,” Mikka informed her. “Imagine my delight and apprehension when Eiko called for Warlock and Poet to come to Command and do the investigation.”

  “I suppose you passed along my bio?” she ventured while stepping to a higher rung with her legs. Her hands remained stationary to hide her intention. “The next time you call home, tell Admiral Nesta 4th Deallus I’m looking forward to meeting him.”

  “Unfortunately, I didn’t have the opportunity to send my report,” Mikka informed her. “I will later. You can be assured of that.”

  “Commander. There are more comfortable places to talk,” suggested Diosa. “You pick the deck.”


  Eine Mikka slid a strap over his shoulder and allowed a pack with the outline of a box pressing against the fabric to hang from his neck.

  “You have to catch me first,” challenged Mikka.

  The words sounded as if they were his last. Diosa shifted a leg snaking it over the rung and anchoring herself between the ladder and the wall. Her mind ran through the dynamics of a free fall catch. Usually it was for a Striker reaching out for help. Or more difficult, a comatose team member tumbling and helpless. Strikers drilled for the catch. But snagging a body that’s fighting off your grab could prove impossible. She braced, ready to try.

  Mikka jerked forward and Diosa allowed her body to swing out from the ladder. Then the Commander laughed and began climbing.

  Surely, he was joking, thought Warlock as she pulled her body in and untangled her leg from the ring. If Mikka knew anything, it had to be her prior specialty. Strikers climbed. Inside ships, outside them, through passageways in all configurations, Strikers were experts at navigating obstacles. With the leg free, she began to climb rapidly after the fleeing spy.

  Warlock closed the distance, judging she’d need another minute to catch him. They had passed the deck with the command staff’s quarters and continued upward. While Diosa felt fine, Mikka showed signs of tiring. He even missed a couple of rungs as he scrambled up. Then unexpectedly, he stepped onto a narrow catwalk that crossed to the other side of the silo. The walkway met another landing and that seemed to be his destination.

  “Poet. The second maintenance room,” she inquired. “Why isn’t it a likely place for a receiver?”

  “The room is not maintenance storage. It’s the power room for the command deck. When active, the electrical resonant coil transfers electricity from the transformer to the current transducer,” he explained. “The current wouldn’t allow a receiver to pick up any signals.”

  “Realm that up for us common citizens,” requested Diosa.

  “There are live open currents between the transformer and the transducer that sends electricity down the fiber optic cables,” Poet answered. “In short, no one goes into that room while the current is flowing. It’s deadly.”

  On the flat walkway, Mikka ran across the silo reaching the hatch for the power room before Diosa arrived at the opposite landing. In a way, she almost understood the difference between suicide choices. It was over a hundred decks with the chance of painfully smacking into a few walkways on the way down. But strolling into an electrical storm wasn’t exactly a good weekend on Singapore Station either. Both methods of ending a life were abhorrent.

  Warlock stepped onto the platform and gazed at Mikka. The spy held the hatch open as if waiting for her to get into position. Now that she had a view of his next moves, he smiled.

  “I know you want my network. And most of your evidence against me is circumstantial. If you want me and my people, you’ll need this,” he offered. He held the pack with the strap hanging below it. Then he swung the pack and box causing the strap to fly up before he turned and launched the pack into the power room. His underhanded throw caused the box and strap to arc up where the strap caught on the overhead. “Here’s all you need to prosecute me, my network, and my contact. Good luck, Warlock.”

  The spy jumped on the ladder and scrambled up in the direction of the last few decks on Command Station. Figuring he couldn’t get far, Diosa marched across to have a look in the power room.

  “Poet. How dangerous is it inside the electrical chamber?” she asked. A nut and bolt held the edge of the strap. At the end of the strap, the pack swung back and forth over crackling currents. Lightening, Diosa thought as she peered at the display of raw electricity.

  “No electrician would enter that room in a double arc flash suit,” Walden warned. “Why do you ask?”

  “Our evidence is hanging over the arcs and is about to drop into oblivion,” she described.

  “The coil causes a spectacular display. But what you’re witnessing isn’t the real danger. Although, it will hurt you,” Walden explained. “But an arc flash event causes ionization of the air and expels temperatures close to the surface of a sun. It’s brief, spontaneous, and always fatal.”

  “So, I have a chance?” Diosa inquired.

  “There are positives,” offered Walden.

  “What positives?”

  “You won’t feel a thing and it’ll be a closed casket affair.”

  Diosa glanced up to see Mikka high above nearing the dome at the top of the station.

  “Where are you going?”

  “I’m right here,” Walden replied.

  “Not you, Poet. The commander is at the top of the station,” Diosa reported. “Where is he going.”

  “Command has four escape shuttles staged there,” Walden said quickly. “If I had Talon Two, I could prevent his launch.”

  “And if I had the receiver box, I’d go after him,” Warlock sympathized. “Call station security and see if the light cruisers will intercept him. I’ll get back to you shortly.”

  “What do you mean back? Where are you going?”

  But retired Master Sergeant Alberich didn’t answer.

  From the hatchway, Warlock studied the arcs and the overhead. Beams crossed the roof of the power room and the strap hung from one of them. The rocking of the pack slowed as the momentum dissipated but, the strap had walked to the last thread on the bolt. At any second, her evidence and the way to clean up the spy’s network would plummet into the arcs. Frying Mikka’s receiver and the Striker in an arc flash event if she attempted to retrieve it.

  Diosa thought of honor, courage, and commitment. At this instant, of the three core principles of the Marine Corps, the only one tearing at her was courage. Honor and commitment were covered by her standing inside the hatchway facing the arcs. Her knees shook and her hands clinched and opened. Then she smiled and relaxed. Marines were deployed to win battles swiftly and aggressively.

  “There you go,” Diosa mumbled as she raised her hands over her head. “Swiftly and aggressively.”

  She jumped up and forward. As soon as her hands touched the bottom of the beam, her fingers closed. But Warlock didn’t hang and rest. She arched her back and tossed her legs to the rear. Then she flexed her abs and drove her legs forward while stretching out. Her body extended outward and Diosa could feel the heat from the arcs as her shoes passed into the electrical storm.

  Current shot through her body stiffening it as her nerves fired. But it didn’t stop the forward motion. Her foot hooked the strap and her quivering body rocked back dragging the strap and box with it. Despite the artificially enhanced grip from the electricity coursing through her, the weight of her body pulled the fingers free. Diosa went into free fall.

  ***

  “Warlock. Warlock,” something buzzed in her ear. She couldn’t make out the words. With a throbbing headache and trembling arms, Diosa pushed up from the landing. Blood poured from her face and she stared at the red liquid trying to figure out where it was coming from. Raising her head, she looked through the hatch at the bright crackling arcs. “Diosa. Warlock. Oh please, I beseech, beg, implore, plead, come back, please.”

  “Poet. Not good,” she mumbled when she understood the bleeding was from a busted nose and a gash in her lip. The realization came to her that her rearward momentum had carried her unconscious body back through the hatchway. Although safe from the electricity, she’d made a brutal faceplant on the platform. So weak she could barely hold herself up, she dug deep, and attempted to reply. Then she coughed and it felt as if a dagger was shoved into her right eye, through her mutated optic nerve, and deep into her brain. “Need medical.”

  Chapter 21 – The Best Play Hurt

  “You are insane Diosa Alberich,” a familiar voice carried to her through the cascade of colors, unidentified sounds, and images flashing through her mind.

  Fighting to separate reality from her hallucinations, Warlock opened her left eye. Swirling shapes floated in front of her. By focusing, she picked o
ut the forms of Eiko and Walden.

  “Did we get him?” She whispered.

  “Commander Mikka wasn’t well trained in his craft,” Walden informed her. “He had all of his instructions and contacts stored on the receiver’s hard drive. We pulled the data and have been rounding up his network.”

  “That’s nice,” Diosa mumbled. Communicating with the outside world was taxing her mentally and physically. “Nap.”

  “What’s wrong with her?” demanded Eiko.

  “Besides being electrocuted, having a knot on her forehead, a busted lip, and a cracked nose,” Walden replied. “She’s probably just exhausted.”

  “Let me know when she wakes up,” Eiko ordered. “The Admirals want a firsthand report from her.”

  “I will most assuredly, positively, unquestionably, without a doubt, contact you, Mister Eiko,” Poet lied. “You run along and tend to your special agent duties. You can count on me to do the right thing.”

  “Great operation by both of you. You should be proud,” Eiko said as he walked to the door in the hospital room. “I guess we can lift the mission sanction now. The lack of accountability is making a lot of people nervous.

  “That’s not up to you,” Walden corrected him. “And it’s not my call either.”

  “Then who decides?”

  “She sleeping, right now,” Walden pointed out. “The mission is not over until Warlock says it’s over.”

  “She looks pretty done in and over to me,” Eiko stated.

  Diosa twisted and turned in her sleep. Each change of facial expression came with a flinch from the pain.

  “Warlock will let you know,” Walden assured him.

  “Call me when she wakes up,” Eiko said from the doorway. Then as he stepped over the threshold, he added. “We need to wrap this up.”

  Once the special agent was out of sight, Walden Geboren picked up a cup of water with a straw. Then, he leaned down and smacked Diosa’s shoulder.

  “Drink,” he ordered.

  “How did you know?” Diosa inquired as she reached for the cup.

  “You don’t travel and fight with a partner without learning things about them,” he explained. “Care to tell me why you didn’t want to talk with the special agent?”