"She won't?" Twingo asked, clearly surprised.
"Well ... I didn't actually ask," Jason admitted, "but in the debrief she made it pretty clear she was siding with Crisstof on this. Here's the problem: if I ask and she says no, we'll have tipped our hand that we're about to try something. Why is this network so hard for you to get in and out of without being seen?"
"It's not the network," Kage said. "It's the connection from the network to the prison. There isn't much traffic on it so they have the luxury of sniffing every data packet that comes and goes without choking throughput. If I have legitimate access codes, however, I can be in and out and they won't know until the logs are audited. By then we'll be long gone and I can create enough havoc they won't know what I was actually looking for."
"Would it be possible to steal the codes from Captain Colleren?" Doc asked. "No offense intended, Captain, but we're racing the clock right now. If Crusher's still alive we don't have long to find out where he is and try to extract him."
"No offense taken," Jason said. "I happen to agree with you. My relationship with Kellea is secondary to getting our crewmate back, so anything short of actually harming her is on the table."
"She has a terminal in her quarters that is connected to the Defiant's central core, right?" Kage asked.
"I believe so," Jason said. "I've never seen her do anything but check her messages with it, but I would assume she has the capability to check on the ship's systems from her quarters. I know I would want that if I was in charge of this tub."
"I can gain access to the Defiant's network from that terminal and then extract the codes from there," Kage said confidently.
"That's all well and good, but how are you going to get in there?" Jason asked. "She locks her quarters when she leaves and it would be a bit odd for me to show up with you in tow later this evening."
"There's another possibility," Doc said, looking uncomfortable. "I could give you something to dose her drink with. It'd knock her out for a few hours, Kage gets in and gets the codes, and she wakes up none the wiser."
Jason almost bristled with indignation at the thought of drugging Kellea, but as he considered it he had to admit the plan had a certain elegance to it.
"Could you develop a counter agent I would be able to administer once numbnuts—"
"Hey!"
"—has the codes and is out?"
"I don't see why not," Doc said. "I have her bio scans on file so it's just a matter of synthesizing the compounds. Why not just let her sleep it off?"
"For one it would arouse suspicion," Jason said. "She doesn't drink, so passing out for the night with no memory of what happened would cause her to get a full workup in her med bay. That would likely expose the traces of whatever you want me to give her still in her system. For another it's too dangerous to leave the captain of the Defiant incapacitated. I need to be able to bring her out of it quickly." As he spoke, Jason couldn't believe he was even considering the plan, but he needed something to work with and he needed it fast. Crusher's life was likely hanging by a thread, if he was even still alive, and he owed it to his friend to exploit any advantage he had. He knew in the back of his head that this was going to have profound ramifications down the road, but he shoved the thought aside and concentrated on the present.
"I'll get to work on it now," Doc said, hopping up from the galley table and rushing towards the infirmary.
"And I'll get my stuff ready," Kage said.
"I can't believe we have to resort to this," Twingo said once they'd left. "Why won't Crisstof help on this? I'd say he owes us at least that much."
"I don't know what's going on with this project he's involved in, but he seemed distracted at the debrief," Jason said. "Once he'd learned the package we'd been hired to get out of De'Moltia was killed he became completely disinterested in anything else I had to say, including the fact Crusher is now MIA."
"Always nice to know where you stand with people, I guess," Twingo said. "I'll start getting the ship prepped for launch. I have a feeling we'll be leaving in a hurry."
"I will assist you," Lucky said and followed Twingo out of the galley. Once they'd gone, Jason began rubbing his temples with the palms of his hands, trying to alleviate the stress headache he could feel coming on. Crisstof had been distant, almost cold towards him and his crew for some time now, but Jason was still mildly shocked at the man's seeming indifference to the fact that Crusher hadn't come back from an extremely dangerous mission that had been at his request.
With a snort of disgust he pushed away from the table and headed towards his quarters to get cleaned up. He wasn't at all looking forward to the deception he was about to play a part in. His feelings for Kellea were complicated, to say the least. They rarely saw each other in person, they weren't even from the same species, and there were times he felt she was embarrassed about being seen with a hired gun no matter how laudable his missions might be. Be that as it may, he still felt grubby at the thought of drugging her so he could steal confidential information that she wasn't willing to give to him freely. But he knew Crusher would do no less for him if the roles were reversed, so he squared his shoulders (figuratively) and pushed all doubts out of his mind. Whatever happened would happen, but he would always know he did everything in his power to save his friend.
****
"You seem a bit distant tonight," Kellea said as Jason twirled his drink glass in his hand. As soon as the words left her mouth he could see the regret etched on her features. "I'm so sorry," she said. "It was completely selfish of me to ask you here when Crusher is still down on the surface in that prison. I apologize, but we get to see each other so rarely that perhaps my judgment was clouded."
"It's fine," Jason assured her without much enthusiasm or sincerity. "Unfortunately, there's nothing else I could be doing right now without knowing what happened to him. The person we were hired to smuggle out of De'Moltia was killed and dumped as a statement ... but I'm not sure what that means for my guy on the inside."
"I wish I could do something," she said, putting her hand over his. "But Crisstof hasn't felt it necessary to tell me what is going on down on Faulli. He's sequestered himself in his own suite and seems to only come out and go directly to the hangar bay where his shuttle is on alert around the clock."
"Seems very mysterious," Jason said. "Did he even give you a hint how much longer you'd be here?"
"Not directly," she said. "He intimated that with our contact now murdered the Defiant should be ready to break orbit at any time."
"I see," Jason said. "I guess we'll need to come up with a realistic plan of attack soon then."
"I wish there was something I could do," Kellea said for the second time in just as many minutes.
"I don't suppose you'd allow me to access the Faullian network through your downlink?" Jason asked, holding his breath. It was a risk exposing his intentions in such a way, but he felt she deserved a chance to help him on her own terms before he took drastic and underhanded measures to get what he needed.
"You know about the connection we have to the capital on the surface?" she asked with a frown. "That was protected information." Jason sighed inwardly. If she had any intention of allowing him access to the link she would have said so. Instead, she was more worried about internal security leaks on her end.
"I'm not sure where I heard it," Jason said with a shrug. "I want to say it was part of the initial brief we had before we inserted Crusher into De'Moltia."
She looked at him suspiciously before continuing. "The downlink is being carefully monitored on both ends," she finally said. "There's no way I could allow you access to it without analysts on this ship alerting Crisstof and the Faullian government detecting it on their side."
"It was just a thought," Jason said. "It would have simplified things, but we have other means available to us."
"I'll get you another drink," Kellea said, snatching the glass from his hand and walking to the small bar. Steeling his resolve, Jason pulled a small ta
b, not even the size of a pinhead, from under his left thumbnail and, while never taking his eyes off her, dropped it into her tea mug with a seemingly negligent toss. The tab instantly dissolved as it hit the hot liquid, not leaving so much as a bubble in its passing.
"There is every possibility that Crusher has gone to ground if he witnessed our contact being killed," she said, handing Jason another strong whiskey-type drink. "It could just be a matter of time before he makes contact and you can figure out a new plan to extract him."
"That is a possibility, but I'm still going to need some type of confirmation that he's still here on Faulli or still alive before I decide if we're going to stay or not," Jason said. He rose from his seat and walked over to the plush sofa that lined the wall facing the tall window, wanting to get Kellea away from the table and in a comfortable seated position as quickly as possible.
As he'd hoped, she grabbed her steaming mug and walked over to join him on the couch. They sat in comfortable silence, each lost in their own thoughts. By the second sip of tea Jason could tell the drug was beginning to take effect. By the third sip her head began to loll back and forth and he was able to deftly catch the mug just as it slipped from her grip.
He placed the tea on the small table in front of them and gently positioned Kellea so that her body was in a natural, relaxed position and her neck wasn't bent at an odd angle that would make her breathing labored as it slowed. He quickly went to the door to her quarters and keyed it open. After he signaled with his com unit Kage could be seen coming quickly up the corridor a few minutes later.
"You don't have long," Jason said as the Veran walked into Kellea's quarters.
"I don't need long," Kage replied.
"The terminal is in there," Jason gestured to the small attached office as he closed and locked the door. Kage wasted no time setting up and directly accessing the secure terminal by patching directly in via his neutral implant.
"I'm in," Kage said with a distant look on his face. "That was a lot easier than I thought it would be."
"I doubt there's much security on this end," Jason said. "Just hurry up."
"I just uploaded my query bomb. They won't know where all the requests came from or what we were actually after. It will be just a second and I'll download the responses we need," Kage said. "I'll analyze it on the Phoenix."
"I'm aware of the plan," Jason said in exasperation. "Just get on with it and get out. If anyone spots you up here it won't take them long to figure out what we've done."
"I'm so underappreciated," Kage muttered. "I've got it. I'm backing out now and removing all the evidence from the local terminal. It'll take their analysts a while to figure out the traffic spike on the downlink originated from the Defiant ... if they ever figure it out."
"That's great," Jason said. "Now get down to the ship and start breaking that down. I'll wake up Kellea and then we'll launch as soon as possible without arousing too much suspicion."
"I'm on it," Kage said, rushing for the door. "Hopefully I'll have something by the time you get back."
Once he was gone, Jason gave the office another onceover, wiping off Kage's carelessly placed handprints on the desk before walking out to check on Kellea.
She was as he'd left her, on the couch and still sound asleep. He grabbed his own drink and dumped it down the drain before taking special care to scrub her mug out thoroughly. Unfortunately, she had her own blown glass tea mug that she reused so he had to clean it rather than just toss it down the chute to be sent to the recyclers. The fact he'd cleaned it might cause some suspicion, but it was far less of a risk than leaving the laced tea inside of it.
Once he'd cleaned it all up in what he hoped appeared to be a natural-looking scene, he pulled another tab out from under his right thumbnail and gingerly pulled Kellea's lower lip down and placed it inside. He then quickly sat down and put his arm around her, assuming a pensive look as he stared out on Faulli circling below them.
"Did I fall asleep?" she asked suddenly, almost startling Jason. The speed at which Doc's concoctions worked was impressive.
"Just for a little bit," Jason said, his stomach twisting into knots as he lied to her. "You seemed tired so I just let you sleep."
"That's a bit disturbing I can just pass out like that with everything going on," she said, sitting up and looking around. "Thanks for staying with me."
"Of course," he said, forcing a smile. "But I should probably get going. I'd like to have a meeting with the guys and then we're going to have to decide what we're going to do. Since Mazer and his people report to you, I'm going to dump off the unpleasant task of telling them about Crusher on you."
"How noble of you," she said sarcastically.
"Burdens of command, Captain," he said with a laugh as he stood up. "I'll try to keep you in the loop as to what we're doing."
"I appreciate that," she said, moving in closer to him. "We never seem to get any time for ourselves when we meet up anymore."
"Maybe that can change soon," he said, mouthing the empty platitude as he knew the chances of him ever seeing Kellea again were quite slim. He didn't know how, but he was sure she would eventually learn about what he'd done and it would mean the end of whatever they had.
****
"Tell me some good news," Jason said as he walked up onto the bridge of his ship.
"I know where Crusher is," Kage said, looking like he was pronouncing a death sentence.
"Judging by your expression I'm going to guess it isn't someplace close or easy to break into," Jason prompted as he took in all the grim faces around him.
"It's Duat," Doc said quietly.
"Fuck me," Jason muttered quietly, feeling the blood drain from his face. Duat was a notorious prison that made De'Moltia seem like an all-inclusive vacation resort. It was on an average-sized planet that had an exceptionally long orbit around a main sequence red dwarf star. As a result, the planet was dark and very, very cold. The prison itself was deep within the crust where it took advantage of the small amount of geothermal energy and heat available. Not only did Duat have a reputation for brutality and short life expectancy for its guests, it also wasn't a place that was easily accessed. For obvious reasons a frontal assault wouldn't work, and gaining access through back channels was usually just as hard.
"He was included in another prisoner transfer and sold to the Watchers for six million credits," Kage said. "He wasn't mentioned by name, but the description leaves no doubt it was him."
"This might be completely unrelated to our package being dead," Jason said, rubbing his chin. "Those animals that run Duat don't give a shit about politics on any level. In fact, someone may have recognized Crusher, or just recognized what he is, and he was the reason the contact was killed, not the other way around."
"If they paid that much for him we can assume it wasn't just because they wanted a Galvetic corpse," Twingo said. "This means his chances of being alive still just increased exponentially."
"But not for long," Jason said as he slid into the pilot's seat and began bringing the individual systems online. "I've heard some rumors about what they do for fun in that hellhole. Even as good as he is, Crusher is still in serious, serious trouble. Get the ship ready to fly. Kage, get our departure clearance taken care of. We're out of here as soon as possible."
"Good," Kage said. "I can't guarantee how long it will take them to untangle the mess I left behind on the Faullian networks."
As it turned out, not long at all. The Phoenix had no sooner cleared the upper orbits of Faulli when the com panel lit up with requests that they either return to the planet or return to the Defiant. Jason ordered his crew to ignore all of them and continued to push out towards the edge of the system as if everything were normal and he simply hadn't received the incoming messages.
"The Defiant is breaking orbit," Doc said after a few more strident messages hit their com node. "She's coming about and looks to be pursuing."
"So much for being long gone by the time they found out," Jas
on said.
"Don't blame me," Kage said. "I can only do so much. There wasn't enough traffic on that downlink to hide in. They were always going to find out I'd been there."
"I wasn't blaming you," Jason said. "Instead of whining about it, why don't you get our slip-space vector ready and I'll get the drive online."
Jason could see on his display that the Defiant was making a good show of trying to catch him, but Kellea knew her ship didn't have a chance of running the Phoenix down. Given the headstart they had on the battlecruiser he assumed they were just trying to make it look like they'd done everything in their power to catch the fleeing gunship.
"Course is ready and locked in," Kage said.
"Let's go get our boy," Jason said and slapped the control pad near his right thigh. With a slight shudder the Phoenix jumped into slip-space and far away from the trouble they'd caused in the Faulli System.
Chapter 5
Jason walked back into the com room and shut the door, dreading what was coming next. He'd seen from the pilot's seat that there were two messages waiting in his queue, each from a familiar com node address. He selected the least distasteful message first.
"Captain Burke," Crisstof greeted him cordially though his face showed a barely contained fury. "I'm not going to pretend I don't sympathize with your situation nor am I particularly surprised by the extreme nature of the action you've taken ... but I hope you fully understood the ramifications of those actions before you took it upon yourself to violate the trust of myself and my ship's captain.
"You have destroyed our negotiations with the Faullian government. I won't bother going into what that means since you quite obviously do not care about the larger scope of things around you. As of now I am cutting all ties with your organization. Your operational accounts are suspended, all our resources will be made unavailable, and all my carefully cultivated contacts across the quadrant will be notified that you no longer represent me or my interests." Crisstof paused, looking away from the camera as if collecting his thoughts.
Omega Force 7: Redemption Page 4