"Stop fidgeting," Doc admonished. "You're supposed to be a professional assistant." Twingo's retort was cut off as the receptionist walked back out and made some show of sitting and arranging himself before turning back to Doc.
"She just happens to have a few moments to spare, Doctor Ma'Fredich," he said. "Very fortunate for you as she is very much in demand and has a tight schedule."
"I can imagine," Doc said, his voice heavy with disdain as he made a point to look around the cramped office with its faded wall coverings and worn furniture. "Shall I just walk back there?"
"Please do." The receptionist didn't bother looking up, just waved them around towards the door behind him. Doc bit off his response and walked around the desk and through the doorway, finding himself in a small office loaded with clutter from floor to ceiling.
"And who are you, exactly?" a brittle voice called out from behind a stack of actual printed sheets and ancient-looking bound books. Doc moved to peer around the stack and saw an elderly pru woman plugging away at a modern computer terminal.
"I am—"
"I know the name you gave my witless assistant," Nace Ba'an said. "I asked who you are. Who you really are."
"Distrustful, I see," Doc said and sat down in the seat across from Ba'an when she didn't offer. "My name actually is Jorvren Ma'Fredich, and since I did not yet provide the reason for my visit I would say I've not been misleading with anything so far."
"Ma'Fredich," Ba'an repeated, looking up from the terminal to peer closely at Doc. "I don't recall ever having dealings with any nebhu, not that it would mean anything given your peoples' level of integration within the ConFed."
Doc was surprised that she correctly identified his species but kept his face impassive. "I'll get right to the point, Counselor," he said. "I am looking for living relatives of a pru named Noyut Vulban who died on Pinnacle Station, a hub located in the Tycho Corridor. I have credible information that you helped them immigrate to Zeta Vandor-6."
"I'm certain I have no idea who or what you are talking about, Doctor," Ba'an said, but Doc could tell she was rattled even without being fully aware of pru body language.
"That's unfortunate," he said. "I need to speak with—"
"I think I've heard enough," Ba'an said, standing quickly enough to send her chair back into the shelves behind her desk. "I've already told you I cannot help you; further dissertation on your problems would seem to be a waste of both of our time, would it not?"
"I suppose so," Doc said, also standing. "Good day." He walked out and motioned to Twingo to follow him as he left the office without even a nod to the receptionist, who was apparently fully engrossed by something on his terminal.
"How did it go?" he said quietly.
"She's locking up the front of her office," Jason said, his voice coming through the discreet earpiece Doc was wearing. "She also looks rushed and worried. Okay, Kage … you're up."
"SHE'S ACCESSING an anonymous messaging service," Kage said. The Veran's eyes were half closed as he concentrated. He was sitting near a local public network junction and using his neural implants to slice in and track every move Ba'an made on her terminal to see if she'd cough up any actionable intel now that Doc had rattled her.
"The message she's leaving isn't very specific and it's just bouncing to another anonymous address, but I think she's arranging a meeting."
"That's too coincidental for it not to be what we're looking for," Jason said. "Any way you can backtrack that receiving address and get a name or general location?"
"Working on it now," Kage said. "The service purges the accessing node's address after each session, but there's always a chance there's something floating around in a buffer somewhere."
They had known Nace Ba'an, if she was even the slightest bit competent, wouldn't have divulged the information they wanted just because they asked for it. It was also unlikely that Kage would be able to go into her system and ferret out what they needed without any real frame of reference. Instead, they decided to create a situation in which Ba'an was made to focus on what they wanted and then track her actions from there.
"She's now accessing the ConFed Nexus and doing a wide search on Doc's name," Kage said. "She even managed to spell it right. We scrubbed his records from public searches years ago, but I've pointed her towards one of the profiles we keep that lists him as an actual respectable doctor."
"He is an actual respectable doctor," Crusher said. "He just keeps poor company."
"You know what I mean," Kage waved him off. "Now be quiet. This isn't as easy as I make it look."
"Just don't get too cute," Jason warned. "We don't want to spook her and she's not stupid. Don't make things too obvious."
Another two hours passed before Ba'an closed up her office and left. Kage stayed where he was with Crusher and continued to comb through her terminal to see if there was something he missed while Jason left and began following the lawyer from a distance. As he'd hoped, she appeared oblivious to all except what was directly in front of her. Her reactions so far told Jason not only was she not trained or accustomed to this sort of cloak and dagger routine but that they were likely the first ones to come around sniffing for Vulban's family. Both of those facts left him optimistic that they'd be able to secure the objective without too much trouble, but then what? It was as likely as not that any of Vulban's offspring or distant family wouldn't have a clue about the data cards left in his crypt.
"Captain, a confirmation just hit that message account," Kage's voice came over the com. "She's heading to a residency unit on the outskirts of a city called Deltiri, seventy-five kilometers from where we are. I'm sending the location to our com unit."
"It looks like she'll be using public transport," Jason said. "Lucky, come get me in the air car and we'll be waiting for her there."
"Acknowledged," Lucky said.
"Twingo and Doc, you guys are done," Jason went on. "Head back to the Phoenix and make sure she's prepped for a quick launch if needed. Crusher, start heading towards me … you're coming with us."
"On my way." Crusher's relief was evident in his voice. Jason didn't really need the big guy for questioning a few civilians, but Crusher had been complaining of being constantly “left out” for the entire flight to the Zeta Vandor system so he figured it wouldn't hurt to let him ride along in the air car.
It didn’t take long for Crusher to track him down, and Jason could only roll his eyes as he saw the towering warrior plowing through the crowd making a direct line for him. Apparently the terms “discreet” and “inconspicuous” hadn't quite sunk in when he was giving the mission brief.
"Over there." Jason pointed to a drop-off area the next street over where he could see their rented air car settling down among dozens of other similar vehicles.
"You think this trip will have been worth the trouble so far?" Crusher asked.
"You have something better to do?"
"Not really," Crusher said with a shrug. "It's just been boring as hell so far. I'm sure there are some more exciting jobs we've passed up to keep on this one. Playing detective isn't exactly our strong suit."
"This could be the end of the road," Jason said. "Either way we owe it to Lucky to chase this thing to the end."
14
The housing complex they arrived at was another of the ubiquitous, cheap, synthetic block structures that popped up on nearly every hastily colonized world in the ConFed. They were also efficient and scalable, the type of building that made perfect sense when trying to prop up an infrastructure from scratch. The others didn't even seem to notice them, but Jason found each one profoundly depressing for some reason.
Part of his disdain for them was that they were never replaced with something more permanent once a world's economy became self-sustaining and there was a steady influx of immigrants and industry. Instead they simply fell into disrepair and, inevitably, became slums. He'd never been near one that had stood longer than a decade that looked like it was even remotely safe, and the one before him now wa
s no exception. Entire sections of the outer cladding were missing, showing the alloy lattice structure beneath, windows were broken out and replaced with whatever could be secured over the opening, and trash was piled up into nearly every corner.
"Lovely," Crusher rumbled. "Which one?"
"It's the furthest section of the campus." Jason pointed to his left. "The slightly less rundown building there with only two stories."
The trio tried to keep a low profile and stick to the periphery as they walked around the complex, but they were noticed almost immediately.
"You three! You look like you have some credits to spare." A leering alien stepped onto the footpath with four others. Jason had seen the species before but couldn't remember where. Maybe Colton Hub?
"We're flat broke, my friend," he said flatly. "Just passing through."
"Well that's a problem," another alien laughed. "You must not know there's a tax to use our path." The small group moved to surround the three of them so Jason stopped, sighing at the inevitable.
"Trust me when I tell you this isn't what you want to do," he said. He was more concerned about drawing too much attention while they didn't know what their target looked like than he was about the risk of the five idiots actually hurting them.
"Listen to this pink little slug talk down at us!" an alien with pebbled, tough-looking skin said. "I'm tired of listening to his—" It tried to surprise Jason by swinging a short cudgel in midsentence, but the human had seen the move coming long before the arm even moved.
He stepped to his right to make sure he didn't back into his friends and lunged forward, grabbing the offending wrist in his left hand and wrapping his right arm around the other's at the elbow. Jason was strong enough that he was able to stop the swing, leaving the alien gaping at him with its arm held high.
"I warned you," Jason said and yanked down with his right arm while pushing with the left. The move slammed the weapon into its owner’s face with a wet crunch. The alien didn't even cry out as it slumped in his arms. Jason shook it free and let it fall to the ground just in time to meet the rush of its friend. Behind him he could hear that the others in the group had moved in on Crusher and Lucky and felt a momentary pang of sympathy for what was about to happen to them.
Lucky, completely preoccupied with his own mission, simply thumped one on the head with a closed fist, knocking it unconscious. Crusher, having been deprived of any real sport of late, grabbed the first of the two squaring off with him and threw it as far as he could before turning to face the larger remaining alien.
"Show me what you've got!" he snarled, spreading his arms wide. The attacker was either utterly fearless or just a slow learner. As Jason smashed a fist into the side of the neck of his second opponent, he could see the bulky alien come at Crusher, arms spinning wildly. The Galvetic warrior batted aside both of his opponent's hands with negligent slaps and delivered a stout headbutt that staggered but didn't incapacitate it.
"Oh come on!" Crusher taunted. "All that muscle and all you can do is wave your arms at me? Get up!"
"Lucky," Jason said and pointed to the alien Crusher had tossed, now slowly getting up and looking to run. "Don't want him getting any friends."
"May I have that, please?" Lucky indicated he wanted the cudgel Jason had picked up that had belonged to his first opponent. Jason handed it over and watched as the battlesynth launched it with a high, arcing toss until it hit the fleeing alien right at the base of the skull.
"He will likely survive that."
"I'm good either way," Jason said. "Just want this over with quickly. Crusher! Let's wrap this up." Crusher had no such plans as he tossed the now-bleeding alien to the ground and continued to taunt it. Just when Jason was about to intervene they heard the telltale sounds of local law enforcement, and recon drones began zipping around the area, shining lights on those they found walking around and issuing commands.
"Shit! Let's go, now!"
Crusher quickly finished off the last of the would-be stickup gang and followed after his friends at a flat sprint. Jason was surprised to see that the big warrior was lagging behind quite badly by the time they leapt over a retaining wall and continued towards their destination in a shallow drainage runoff. Could Crusher really be that out of shape from sitting around on S'Tora so long?
"I told you to hurry up!" he snapped as Lucky motioned for them to halt. Crusher was huffing like a leaky bellows and shaking his head.
"I did … right after you said something," he finally managed to get out. "Someone must have called the local security force as soon as the confrontation began."
"I can see our objective from here," Lucky said. "The unit is three hundred and forty meters across a storage lot. The law enforcement presence has also cleared out all of the locals, so we will not miss Nace Ba'an when she arrives."
"See," Crusher smacked Jason's arm. "I knew what I was doing."
They sat in concealment for another ninety minutes before Jason's patience could take no more. Law enforcement had cleared the area, so there was no way they would have missed Ba'an approaching from the direction of the public transport station to the east of their location. Did Kage give them a wrong address?
"Something's wrong," he said, standing and stretching. "She should have been here by now. Kage … any ideas?"
"Stand by," Kage said over the open channel.
"Could she have gone in the back entrance?" Crusher asked.
"It wouldn't do her any good," Jason said. "These units have external exits and we're looking at the door for the unit that Kage said was the right one. Even if she went out of her way and came in from the north side, she'd have no choice but to come down that hall to the door."
"It is also getting dark," Lucky pointed out. "None of the interior lights to that unit have come on."
"Captain, she's a bit craftier than we gave her credit for," Kage's voice came back. "She's deactivated any personal coms that I would normally use to track her with, but her transport pass account was easy enough to access. She switched mag-levs halfway to your location and backtracked here. There's no activity at her office so I'm checking to see if there are any other places she might have access to for a meeting."
"Stupid," Crusher muttered.
"Actually she seems to be pretty on top of it," Jason argued.
"I meant us. Or more specifically: you."
"We're coming back to you, Kage," Jason said, ignoring Crusher. "Find her before we arrive." He terminated the open channel since the operation was no longer active and it was an unnecessary security risk.
"I think we should probably investigate the residence before departing," Lucky said.
"Breaking and entering? Like common criminals?" Crusher snorted. "I like it."
The motley group quickly covered the half-kilometer to the building, Crusher huffing and puffing again, and set up a hasty perimeter while Lucky analyzed the lock on the door. Apparently he decided that it wasn't worth the trouble to be subtle, so he grabbed the handle and cranked on it until metal could be heard cracking within the door. With a hard shove it popped in and swung away on a set of parallel-style hinges Jason had rarely seen used.
"I could have done that!" Crusher hissed. "I thought we were being sneaky and underhanded."
"We were … but with you panting like a Restarian argle cat having a seizure it's not like they didn't know we were here. Maybe if you—whoa!" Jason cut himself off mid-rant as he stepped into the main living area and his ocular implants switched over to low-light mode.
"I'd say we're in the right place," Crusher said when he shouldered Jason out of the way. "And I'm in the same physical condition I've always been in!" Lucky looked over at this, but said nothing.
The room was awash in imagery, and even scaled models, of synths and battlesynths. There seemed to be no discerning theme or effort to organize it … just a chaotic jumble that filled the cramped room from wall to wall.
"So what do you think, Lucky?" Jason asked. "Is this guy connected
to the synth program somehow or is he just a fan?"
"There are schematics and technical specifications here that would not be easy to obtain," Lucky said, sifting through some material on a corner table. "Some of these depictions are of unit types that were never produced, some not even prototyped to my knowledge. I would have to surmise that this individual had some connection to Khepri beyond being an enthusiast."
"Okay, we don't have long … let's do a quick once over and then get the hell out of here," Jason said. Crusher and Lucky wasted no time going through all the material that was in hardcopy form while Jason searched the cramped sleeping area for some clue as to who actually lived in the apartment. By the time they were leaving they still didn't have a name, but Jason was certain that this person was somehow attached to the synth program in some capacity, or knew someone who had been.
"The door lock is not able to be repaired quickly," Lucky said.
"Weld it," Jason said. "Whoever lives here can worry about getting in after that, and it'll keep him from being robbed in the meantime." A few quick bursts from Lucky's cutting laser and the door was welded into the frame at three different spots. Jason felt a pang of guilt at having destroyed the door and ransacked the place so he wanted to make sure they didn't leave with the place hanging wide open. They were almost back to the rented air car when Jason's com unit pinged.
"Captain, we might have her," Doc said. "Kage was able to track a single payment for a lease on a storage unit in an industrial district on the outskirts here. We're heading there now."
"We're on our way," Jason said and broke into a run. He could hear the heavy footfalls of his friends behind him as he set a blistering pace for the three-kilometer run back to the vehicle.
"IT'S A LITTLE CLICHÉ, but still not a bad place if you want to avoid scrutiny," Jason whispered. "You sure that's her in there?"
"It is," Kage insisted. "She'd have kept it hidden if it hadn't been for a single time two years ago when the biannual lease was paid through one of her own accounts. When I backtracked the unit from there it showed years of payment via credit chit and hand receipt."
Omega Force 09: Revolution Page 11