by Thomas Webb
There was nothing remarkable or particularly memorable about the man. White hair, thinning at the top. Grey stubble on loose jowls. A paunch. He was dressed like a local, wearing thin, loose-fitting brown clothes to combat the heat. A scarf that could easily be flipped into a head covering to protect him from the sun curled around his neck. He kept his head down as he sat alone. He stared down at the holo screen of his comm device, occasionally taking a sip of the amber whiskey in the less-than-clean glass. Hale noted how the old man positioned himself with a full view of the place, but out of direct line of sight. It was exactly where Hale himself would have sat. The old man had to have made him and Kris as soon as they walked in.
If this wasn’t their guy, Hale would eat his cloak.
Hale sauntered over. “These seats taken?” he asked the man.
The man didn’t take his eyes from his holo screen. “It’s a free system,” he replied. Then he looked up at Hale and grinned. “For now, at least.” He gave the prior service Marine an appraising glance. “You must be Silvio’s guy.” It was more a statement than a question. “You’re no case officer,” he added. “And you’re not with The Company. Not with those shoulders.” He narrowed his eyes, bushy grey brows furrowing. He nodded to himself. “Military. Yep-for sure. I’m thinking North American. Probably an operator, if I had to guess. You with the teams?”
Hale looked hurt at the suggestion that he was a SEAL. “I’m a Marine.”
“Ah—Recon.” He nodded to himself. “Makes sense.” The old man’s keen brown eyes darted around. “Silvio said there’d be three of us at this meet, so I’m guessing the pretty Tauranian sniper over at the bar’s with you?”
Hale leaned back, impressed. “How’d you know she was a shooter?”
The old man shrugged. “Tauranians are warriors. And oddly enough, for most bipedal races the females of the species tend to shoot better than the males. Figured if she was with Lima’s outfit, she’d have to be pretty handy with a rifle. Also, that pointer finger in her right glove’s missing. Better trigger sensitivity that way, most likely.”
Now Hale really was impressed. “You got all that from a glance?”
“You don’t live long in this business without being a keen observationist, kid.” It brought to mind a saying Hale had heard somewhere.
Beware the man who grows old playing a young man’s game.
Lima’s contact stuck out his hand. “You can call me Ron.”
“Good to meet you, Ron.” Hale took the hand and shook it. “My name’s Trace. And my partner is Kris’nac. Guessing you already knew that, though?”
Ron chuckled. “Yeah. Mebbe.”
Kris’nac arrived, handing Hale his drink. When she came over, Ron stood up on creaky joints. To everyone’s surprise, he took Kris’nac’s hand and kissed it. “Pleasure to meet you, Kris’nac. I’m Ron.”
Kris bowed her head. “I . . . the pleasure is mine, Ron. How did you know my name?”
Kris’ cheeks turned a shade darker. Was she blushing? Now that was something Hale had never banked on seeing.
Ron smiled, showing off a set of surprisingly nice teeth. “Lucky guess? And besides—I never pass up the chance to greet a beautiful woman. Especially at my age.”
Kris retreated deeper into her cowl.
“Right,” Hale said, attempting to get the meet back on track. “So tell us why we’re here, Ron.”
“Better if I start at the beginning,” Ron said. He wet his whistle with a drink before he spoke. “I was sent here on assignment a few weeks ago. I was originally supposed to be monitoring a split amongst the Separatist factions. Seeing if there was anything there that the Company could capitalize on.”
“Yeah,” Hale said. “I hear tell there are a shitload of Separatists on this rock.”
“You said you were originally sent here to monitor them,” Kris said. “What changed, if I may ask?”
Ron smiled. “Of course you may ask. What changed is we got wind of a particular faction that wants to derail the upcoming talks.”
“The peace talks?” Hale asked.
“Well, the potential peace talks,” Ron corrected himself. He took another swallow of his drink, grimaced, then set his glass down. “Like I said—the UNIA’s had me embedded here for a few weeks. Since my mission parameters changed, I’m just keeping an ear out. Mostly taking the temperature. . . keeping an eye on the weather, if you will.”
“So what’s the weather like?” Hale asked.
“Nasty storm front coming,” Ron replied.
“Hope the forecast improves.”
Ron held up his hands. “Ok—enough with the weather metaphors. How is my old buddy Silvio these days?”
“Good,” Hale answered. “Still mysterious as hell.”
“Still wearing those nice suits?”
“Definitely.”
“Yeah,” Ron said. “Lima always was really dapper. So what’d he have you come all the way out to this shithole planet to see me for?”
“He wanted us to ask if you have heard anything recently,” Kris said. “Perhaps something you may have picked up in the course of your work here?”
“Right. Silvio knows I don’t talk shop over comm waves.” Ron raised a brow. “Let’s say my interest is piqued. What might I have heard something about, possibly?”
Hale sipped his whiskey. “A big-ass arms shipment, maybe?”
Ron sat back, rubbing his stubbled chin. “Yeah. . . Maybe I have heard something from a source of mine, now that you mention it.”
Hale got a warm feeling. Like being on a fishing trip and hooking a big Velusian swordfish. Now to reel it in.
“Would this information possibly have any connection to United Les Space?” Kris asked. She’d taken the words right out of Hale’s mouth.
Ron’s eyes went wide. “It’s not often I’m surprised, young lady. Even less often I show it.” He moved closer to them in the booth. “How did you know that?”
Hale and Kris looked at each other.
“A fortunate guess,” Kris said.
Ron held his glass up in a toast. “Touché’”
The three of them clinked glasses and drank.
“Any way we can we talk to them?” Hale asked. “Your source, I mean?”
Ron shook his head. “Not sure that’s such a good idea, Trace. That’s not really how this works.” He must have seen the look on Hale’s face. “Don’t go getting your feelings all hurt, Marine. I can do you one better than that.” He leaned in again, lowering his voice. “Listen . . . you didn’t hear this from me. And I’m only sharing because I owe Lima a favor from way back in the day. This is pretty hush-hush, as you might imagine.”
“Of course,” Hale said.
Ron glanced around the empty bar. “Given the recent troubles of United Les Space, you can see how someone flipping on them might want to keep a low profile, right?”
Both Hale and Kris assured him they did. For the next few minutes, Ron filled them in on what he knew.
“We got it,” Hale said. “Thanks.”
Hale and Kris downed their drinks and stood to leave. Ron’s comm device chimed, indicating an alert of some sort. He checked it, then raised his head. His eyes met Hale’s. He looked as if he’d seen a ghost.
“What is it?” Hale asked.
“Normally I wouldn’t tell this to someone I just met, but seeing as how we have a mutual friend and all . . .”
“Go on,” Hale said.
“As part of my job, I also monitor some of the less savory backchannels. Sometimes they advertise hits and sanctions.”
“You are referring to assassinations and contract killings?” Kris asked.
Ron nodded. “Yeah. I’ve just been alerted to some chatter on a new contract. Not a small one, either. We’re talking enough credits to purchase a small planet. The job was advertised, and someone recently took it.”
Hale’s eyes narrowed. “Why are you telling us all this?”
“Trace. . .” Kris said. Somet
hing about her tone sounded like a warning.
“Who’s the contract for?” Hale asked.
Ron looked up at Hale. “It’s for you, son.” The old spy looked from Kris to Hale, then back again. “It’s for all of you. It’s for Silvio Lima and his entire team.”
-15-
Silvio Lima had never been one to screw around.
From the killer instinct he displayed at the futbol camps when he was younger, all the way through his years at university. Those same qualities followed him, naturally, into his recruitment and tenure with the UNIA.
They further developed with his work for Cynthia all those years. Conducting interplanetary paramilitary operations, assassinations, and cultivating galactic intelligence assets—if you could think of a dirty job, Silvio Lima had done it. Then, the Separatist Wars happened.
In all that time, Silvio had always considered himself a cut-to-the-chase kind of guy. Not that it hadn’t cost him. One very brief, very failed marriage was part of that cost. The love had been sufficient to make the marriage work, but the time had not. No time for his spouse, no time to have the children she’d wanted. It was the missions that took precedence. Always the missions. Always the United Nations and the interests of Earth, above everything. Lima had made his choices. Making choices and not having regrets, however, were two vastly different things.
Karl didn’t bother to knock on the office door. He simply walked in, interrupting Silvio’s memories. He and Karl went too far back for simple courtesies like knocking. After all the newly installed protocols at the outer gate, the hangar deck, and in the hanger itself, knocking on Lima’s office door would have been a moot point anyway.
“Looks like a damn war happened out there,” Karl said, before flopping himself down into the chair on the opposite side of Lima’s desk. Karl grinned. “You mind if I have a seat?”
Lima laughed. “Looks like you already have. And yes—I suppose you could say it was a war, of sorts.”
“Yeah.” Karl pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his forehead. “Damn. I forgot how hot it is down here.” Karl stuffed the soggy handkerchief back in his pocket. “You got anything to drink around this place?”
“Of course.” Lima keyed his comms. “X37—could you bring in some refreshment for our guest, if you please?”
The AI came online in an instant. “Right away, Mr. Lima.”
A moment later the drone came in bearing a tray with a bottle, ice, and two glasses.
X37’s drone beeped online. “Gin on the rocks. Is that correct, Mr. Forsyth?”
“Yeah,” Karl replied, giving X37 the side eye. He watched with suspicion as the drone poured their drinks, then quietly exited. When the AI was gone, Karl took a long swallow of his gin. “That thing is something else,” he said, shaking his head. “Gives me the creeps.” He hooked a thumb toward the door where the drone had exited. “It cost as much as I’ve heard?”
Lima shrugged. “Probably more, with the upgrades.” He thought back to how useful the drone and AI package had been. “It has been worth every credit, though.”
“Yeah.” Karl took another drink. “You’re talking about that thing back on Mios, huh?”
“Definitely,” Lima said.
X37 had saved the lives of the entire team, as well as the KRG operative-turned-journalist Anesu Chewasa. The value of that act alone was incalculable.
“So how has it been,” Lima asked, “acting as Cynthia’s go-between?”
Karl looked offended. “Go between? I think you must have me confused, old friend. Right hand man, maybe. Second in command, more like. But go between?” he shook his broad head. “Never that, minha amiga.”
“Of course not. My apologies. And your Portuguese still sucks.”
They laughed. “So how is my old boss?” Lima asked. The one who I thought may have betrayed me last year.
“Busier than a one-legged Andarian in an ass-kicking contest,” Karl said. “Conducting due diligence on these upcoming talks is no joke. She’s even got me running around the galaxy on this thing.”
“Have you spoken to her lately?”
“No. I have a few holo messages waiting. Nothing marked urgent enough to supersede what she has me doing. I’d planned to check in with her right after you and I get done.”
“Huh,” Lima grunted. “So these peace talks? They are genuine?”
“Far as I can tell? This is the real deal.”
“So there might truly be a chance for the Wars to come to an end?”
“Some major players are coming to the table on this one, Silvio. From both sides. If all the parties play nice?” Karl shrugged. “All I’m saying is, this may or may not be it. But it’s as good a chance as we’ve ever had at anything even remotely resembling peace.”
Lima absorbed that for a moment. What peace would mean. To the United Nations. To Earth. To the Outer Colonies. The lives it would save. Then it was time to address the five thousand-kilogram Delosian mastodon in the room.
“Why did you ask to meet with me, Karl?”
Karl took a moment, searching for the right words. “Look Silvio,” he began. “This thing with ULS? Pardon my French here, but it’s turned into a real shit show. The Agency wants no part of this. Especially not now, with the talks coming up. Not to mention the fallout we’ve already seen. You have any idea how hard it was, smoothing all that shit from the attack over with Brazil?”
Lima nodded. He still had friends in the local government, and had pulled in every favor he was owed to help with the smoothing process. Ironic, since Lima and his people were the ones who’d been attacked. “I have some idea of the level of difficulty, yes.”
Karl frowned. “Look man—I know what this seems like, me showing up like this. But if you plan on doing what I think you plan on doing?” The heavyset man tugged at his lower lip. “Then, oh my God. . . UNIA will have to completely disavow. If we get caught with our hands in this. . . you know how much blowback that would be?”
The question seemed rhetorical, so Lima stayed quiet. He watched his old friend go through the motions. Karl shook his head in disgust. “You know, Silvio. . . I take some of the blame for all this. This mess is partially our fault.”
Lima raised a brow, amused. “Our?”
“Yeah. For letting the dogs off the leash without a proper damn whistle.”
Lima thought it best to let Karl get it all out of his system. Let him blow off the pulse energy before he clued him in on what he and Cynthia had discussed and, more importantly, what he and the team had discovered. Lima leaned back, calm, a smirk on his face.
Karl shot him an evil look. “You seem awful damned smug for someone who could cause the breakdown of the biggest peace talks in the history of mankind. You know that?”
“Are you done?” Lima asked.
“Yeah muthafucka,” Karl shot back, dismissing Lima’s question with a wave. “I’m done.”
“Good.” Lima’s smirk split into a grin. “We got it, Karl.”
Karl sat up straighter. “Got what?” he asked.
“The evidence we needed.”
“Come again?”
“We have a hardcore link to ULS. We have everything. We have them dead to rights.”
“All of it?”
It was almost comical, the look on Karl’s face. Lima nodded slowly, as if reassuring a child. “All of it. Invoices, documents. Receipts. . . everything.”
Karl’s eyes grew wide. “Everything?”
“Are you going to repeat every word I say?”
Now it was Karl’s turn to break into a grin. “Well shit-why didn’t you say so in the first place, Silvio?”
Lima nodded and sat back. “Good. I trust this changes the math on how the UN and the agency plan to proceed?”
“Changes the math? Hell yeah it does. This is some arithmetic-to-galactic trigonometry-level changes the math. Still . . .” Karl paused. “Given what you’ve told me, I think a command decision is in order.”
“Is th
at so?”
Karl nodded. “It is. I know they hit you hard. I read the reports. Saw the damage outside for myself. And I know you, my friend. They put you, and more importantly your people, in some serious harm’s way. There ain’t no chance in hell you’ll let that slide. And since there’s no reason to pretend you wouldn’t be doing this anyway? You might as well get paid for it.”
“So you will be contracting Soluções Avançadas Incorporadas to bring the ULS leadership to heel?” Lima asked.
Karl rolled his eyes. “Not like you didn’t know we wouldn’t. But yes-that’s what I’m doing. We got a sweet slush fund parked in an Andarian banking conglomerate that we can use to bankroll you. Should be a nice payday for you and your people.”
“And a nice way to distance yourselves in case this goes sideways,” Lima added.
“Of course!” Karl said. “What do you think you’re dealing with here? Amateurs?”
Lima raised a brow. “You have the authority to make this call without Cynthia’s approval?”
“You let me handle Cynthia. Don’t worry—she’ll be onboard. This is exactly the kind of thing she loves.” Karl flashed a million-credit smile. “After all, she didn’t make me her second in command for nothing.”
-16-
The OC soldier, a young one, smiled up at him. “The general will see you now,” she said.
Seemed like they were getting younger every day. Or maybe he was just getting older? Thirty-five standard years of age wasn’t very old by anyone’s reckoning, but he felt every one of those years.
Ramsey gave the young attaché a nod as he walked into the office. The battered desk, the worn file cabinet, the lack of anything on the walls other than a torn unit flag. The place screamed ‘field expediency.’ The entire Separatist military outpost was just as spartan as the general’s office. It was exactly what he’d expect from his old commanding officer.
Ramsey’s former CO sat behind the desk, holo screen up in front of her. There was a little more grey in her dark hair than he remembered from when he’d served under her command, but she was still fighting trim. Her fatigues were still pressed and neat, the creases peristeel razor-sharp. The OC Special forces emblem, the same emblem Ramsey had once worn, still sat prominently above her left uniform pocket. When she looked up, the smile reached all the way up to her tired eyes.