Witch Of The Federation (Federal Histories Book 2)

by Michael Anderle

  Stephanie looked across at where the second stewardess was tidying the front of the cabin. The woman’s hair was the same length as hers and her body a close match. “What if we pay someone who looks like me to draw their attention away from the shuttle and then scoot to the entrance while they’re not looking?”

  Lars glanced at her. “Where will we find someone like that on short notice?”

  The woman squeezed by, burdened with an armload of in-flight blankets. “Excuse me.”

  He moved aside and glanced at her as she passed him, then took a second look. His expression turned speculative when Stephanie removed the veil from her face, gave the woman a meaningful glance, and wiggled her eyebrows at him.

  As the attendant made a return trip toward the front of the cabin, he tapped her on the shoulder. “Excuse me, miss.”

  She turned and looked at him, her face full of curiosity. “Yes?”

  Lars stared at her for a long moment, studying her hair and face. “She could definitely do it, but we’d need a little magic to help her along.”

  Stephanie turned and kneeled in the seat to study the attendant as well. The woman returned her gaze and immediately recognized her. “Oh, my God. You’re the Federation witch!”

  She grinned. “I am, and I need a favor from you.”

  The stewardess cocked her head to the side and listened as she explained their predicament. “So, you want to pay me all those credits to change my clothes, act like I’m trying to avoid the press pack, and distract them?”

  “That’s the gig,” Lars replied, happy not to have to explain again. “What do you say?”

  “Oh, my God, they’ll put me on the cover of Vid Magazines when they find out. Hell, yes, I’ll do this.”

  Stephanie clapped briskly. “Good. Do you have a change of clothes?”

  “I sure do. I never travel without it.” The woman grinned. “I’ll go change.”

  She hurried to the front and closed the curtain behind her. While they waited, they could hear her telling her colleagues excitedly what she was about to do.

  Lars groaned. “We should have told her we wanted it kept a secret.”

  “No, we shouldn’t.” She laughed and shoved his shoulder with the flat of her hand. “This way, no one will ever see me in public and be sure it’s really me. You’ll see. It’ll work out fine.”

  When the attendant returned, she looked oddly familiar—almost the witch’s double, but with slightly different features. Unless they looked closely, no one would notice the difference.

  Stephanie waved her hand across the woman’s face to create a semi-transparent veil and make her eyes glow slightly.

  “I don’t know how long that’ll last,” she explained. “So, you need to hurry. I’ve never tried this on anyone else.”

  Nodding to show she understood, the decoy was about to reply when her phone pinged. She looked at it as Lars shoved his back in his pocket.

  “That’s half now and I’ll add the other half when you get inside,” he told her. “Frog and Johnny will be your escorts and meet us at the rooms when it’s over. The rest of us will go with Stephanie.”

  With excitement in her face, the stewardess led the way to the front of the shuttle, flanked by her two guards.

  “She’s been watching you,” Lars muttered when she wouldn’t let Frog take the lead.

  Stephanie shrugged. She and the guys had previously had a long talk about who took their chances with a potential sniper. They didn’t get to go first.

  Not on her watch. Not when she could stop them. No one would be hurt because of her.

  As the attendant, Frog, and Johnny reached the door, they could hear her talking. “I always wanted to be an actress. This could be my lucky break.”

  Stephanie caught the look Frog shot them as they headed out. He rolled his eyes, and his teammates choked back their laughter.

  As soon as the decoy and her escort had reached the tarmac, walked across the bay, and entered the arrival and departure lounge, Stephanie and the remaining team prepared to leave.

  Marcus moved to the door and studied the crowd for several seconds, waiting for it to move away from the viewing port. When members of the press pushed and jostled with their cameras to get the best footage, they turned away from the doors and effectively blocked the view to the shuttle. Marcus looked at Lars and nodded. “All clear.”

  This time, Stephanie let Lars and Marcus go in front. With every eye on their decoy, the chances that anyone would notice them were practically nil, and the team would be safer if she let them block her from the view of anyone who might look at the hangar at the wrong time.

  They hurried down the steps and into the arrivals lounge behind the crowd. She glanced up to see the other stewardess holding a side door open and waving to them. Lars and Marcus led the way, keeping themselves between her and the crowd, while Brenden covered the rear.

  They had reached the door when a small girl at the back of the crowd turned and noticed them. She and the woman she was with were effectively blocked by the throng, and from the frazzled expression on the mother’s face, her patience was clearly almost at an end.

  The girl tugged on her mom’s arm and the woman shook her head in irritation. “Not now, sweetie. Can’t you see your momma’s hands are full?”

  It’s hard to miss, Stephanie thought as the woman juggled the pile of packages in her arms as she tried to shove through the crowd.

  The little girl pulled on her arm again and pointed at Stephanie. “See, Mom? I told you that wasn’t Ms. Morgana.”

  Her mother sighed and twisted her neck awkwardly so she could see her daughter. “I’m sorry, sweetie. What did you say?”

  The girl pointed again and stabbed her finger for emphasis. “That other lady’s not Ms. Morgana. That’s the real one.”

  The woman looked up and clearly wanted her child to stop pulling her. As soon as her eyes landed on the Federation witch, her expression change from tired tolerance to shock and her jaw dropped.

  Stephanie smiled at her, winked, and flipped her hand in a tiny gesture that released small magical stars to spiral across the intervening space and circle the little girl’s head.

  With a sound of impatient disgust, Lars grasped her wrist and pulled her into the hallway. Once they were through, they stopped and waited for the stewardess to secure the doors behind them.

  From beyond its solid frame, she heard the little girl giggle and her mother’s echoed laugh. Her lip twitched with amusement, and she pulled the veil across her face once more with a satisfied chuckle.

  The stewardess dusted her hands off. “There. All secure. Follow me. The concierge is waiting to check you in.”

  She glanced quickly at the door. “I’ll also talk to Melissa when she gets back from pretending to be you. She doesn’t know where you’re headed, so I’ll try to keep her busy and out of sight while you finish with your transfer. It won’t stop her talking about seeing you, but it’ll limit her audience until you’re on your way.”

  Lars shook her hand. “Thank you. We’re glad the queen and king had someone in place to help us.”

  The attendant smiled and removed the small hat that went with her uniform. “You didn’t think they’d entrust the hero and her men to any old crew, do you? Come on. There’s so much more to see on Elpis than this old tunnel.”

  They headed down, relieved to be able to make their escape. It was good thinking on Stephanie’s part and excellent execution from the guys. It was great how they all pulled together as a cohesive unit and the team grew ever more efficient every day.

  Only a few hundred miles away, the Federation Naval Space Station called Star Base Notaro floated in the seamless black space and shifted only slightly from orbit. Named for the Federation commander whose statue had been so recently defaced in New Chicago, it was often called the Station for Administration, among other things.

  They traveled at a steady speed behind the civilian station, positioned so Elpis One hid them in its
shadow on most incoming scans. From certain angles, however, it was still visible, but readings from the station blurred its exact location.

  Despite that, it could be seen by the naked eye. From Earth, it was a slowly moving star and from Elpis One, a slightly odd speck glinting in the distance.

  “How long will you be on Elpis?” Jack asked, his military jacket open, his white cotton t-shirt untucked, and two highball glasses in his hand.

  TJ shrugged. “Until they decide I’ve had enough shore leave. I only wish the shore part actually stood for real shore and seeing my family, but it is what it is.”

  Jack set the glasses down and dropped into the chair across from his friend. He glanced nervously at his bag, lifted his glass, and took a gulp of whiskey. “At least you know you can put your feet up for a few days. The captain won’t send you out to battle unless it’s an all-out deathmatch and he doesn’t have a choice.”

  “Personally,” TJ said as he raised his own drink and took a sip. “I’d rather do something productive since I don’t actually get to go back Earth-side to visit family.”

  The other man was about to answer that when a small semi-translucent cube on the table began to flash. He picked it up and looked at it before he glanced at his companion. “This might help you be productive.”

  With a curious look, TJ took the cube and read the message scrolling across it. After reading it a second time, he frowned. “Is this for real? They’ve confirmed that the target will be on the vessel?”

  Jack glanced around and leaned in. “It looks like it. They’ve given all the right passphrases. And from what I can tell, they’ve alerted our covert teams on the crew already.”

  “This will cause an intergalactic incident.” TJ’s expression was serious.

  He nodded and leaned back in his chair, his gaze fixed on his glass. “Yes, it will, but if it’s not done, some will try to fight the inevitable, and that’ll get more of us killed. It is better for a few to die than the millions we’ll lose otherwise.”

  The other man put the cube down, leaned back, and sighed heavily. “Playing God makes for a heavy load.”

  Jack took the cube off the table, put it into his bag, and straightened. He slapped his chest proudly with his palm in a macho gesture. “That’s why we shoulder it. Our names might go down in flames, but we must never doubt that we’re doing this for the right reasons.”

  TJ raised his glass in a mock toast and stared at his companion for a long moment before he laughed. “The things I got into on shore leave were child’s play before I met you. Now, everything seems to be escalating, and I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or not.” He sighed. “Well, whatever it is, I get to take the ride with you. It might be a long way from middle school and blowing up the boy’s room and trying to get them to let us off after, but I’m in good company.”

  Jack laughed. “Don’t knock it. That court order making us do Federal service put us right on track.”

  “Right on track.” The man smirked. “That’s one way to put it.”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Stephanie stretched her arms out to the side before she smoothed her tank top and yoga shorts. She looked at the pod in front of her, thankful to have one but already missing the one at the compound.

  A pod was a pod, and all that mattered was she had access to one when she needed it. She’d come to accept she would end up using other pods a lot more, which meant she had to make the most of whatever was available.

  She climbed in and wiggled slightly to settle her body comfortably on the pad. The entry process was clean and smooth and when she opened her eyes, she stood in the white room she always started in with all the usual choices of clothing and weaponry before her.

  The AI spoke and, as always, already had her information. “Welcome, Stephanie. What are we doing today?”

  Her reflection in the white room’s mirror was different as if her avatar had changed a little to reflect the wear and tear on her soul. She ignored it and turned to choose several pieces of casual clothing so she would be comfortable. “Take me to a safe location—the field on Meligorn I used during my testing.”

  “Transporting you now,” the AI replied.

  The room shimmered and shifted, but nausea and dizziness were no longer an issue. She was used to it, now. When the change was complete, she stood in the same lush field she’d stood in during her testing.

  This was Meligorn, and the planet’s purple haze was almost comforting to her eyes. She clasped her hands behind her back and began to pace. “I want to discuss gMU.”

  BURT had been listening, waiting for something like this. He took over the AI’s role in order to be able to respond more quickly.

  This was much more labor-intensive for him than letting a sub-routine record and respond to the conversation, but he wanted to be able to adjust the programming at a moment’s notice. He knew it was easier for him to do that by interacting directly with Stephanie rather than trying to intervene when the sub-routine picked up a pre-selected set of keywords.

  This time, he decided to talk to the girl directly. “Hello, Stephanie, it’s Burt.”

  Stephanie glanced up. “I thought you’d be around. So, the gMU is definitely something different.”

  “How so?” he asked. “Tell me how it feels.”

  She took a deep breath and focused on the beautiful Meligorn horizon. “It was almost overwhelming at first. It tingled as it soaked into me. There was a strange sensation, too, as if it was attracted to me as much as I was to it.”

  Her mind searched the experience as she tried to find the right words. “It was very energetic—almost wild in nature like it had never been tamed and wasn’t used to being handled. It was there and I was there, and we somehow seemed to fit. It wasn’t like anything I’ve had experience with before now. I guess the best way to describe it is by calling it more…colorful than the other types—although it doesn’t have real color, only a silvery look.”

  BURT recorded the conversation but made sure it was encrypted so that if anyone found a way to extract it, they wouldn’t be able to understand it. “So, is it part of the other MU?”

  Stephanie pursed her lips as she walked through the soft grass. After several more steps, she glanced down and realized she was barefoot.

  “It’s not part of the other MU. I’d describe it more like the mother of the other MU. It’s as if Meligorn’s MU and the eMU are subsets of it—different bands within the same wavelength, only they’re focused and it isn’t.”

  She stopped again, her gaze drawn by the purple haze that drifted slowly above her. “I guess I assumed Meligorn MU was the original, but that isn’t the case. gMU is old. Really, really old.”

  BURT had begun to run calculations and rendered possible past scenarios that explored a time before Meligorn existed. It took him a moment to realize he had to be careful or he’d overheat his servers simply thinking about it all.

  Ever cautious, he slowed the process and limited the number of possibilities considered at any one time before he asked. “Does your body have a gMU well like it does for the others?”

  Stephanie raised her brow and chuckled. “A well? If it is, it maybe doesn’t have a bottom. From the moment I sensed it, I’ve felt compelled to pull it in. I don’t extract and store it like I do with the others. I literally draw as much power as I can, and it doesn’t seem to go anywhere. I have tried to visualize the location so I can gauge the volume, but I can’t make sense of it.”

  BURT didn’t like the sound of that. “You should be cautious with this approach. My concern lies in how the gMU manifests. You could be playing with something that might expand inside you, like rice in water, which means you would literally bleed energy and could not only blow yourself up but the entire station as well.”

  At his words, she tilted her chin in surprise. “I didn’t even think about that. It didn’t feel dangerous or overwhelming, so I literally kept pulling it in. It’s like it’s there and not there all at the same
time.”

  He changed the scenery, moved to another virtual location, and threw her momentarily off balance. Even though he shielded her in his own version of a virtual sandbox, he was still worried that if she blew herself up in the virtual world, her physical body would suffer the same fate. She’d shown too many signs of connecting with the outside world when she wasn’t in it.

  Stephanie regained her balance and inspected her new surroundings. She wriggled her toes and glanced at the sparkling purple sand beneath her feet. “Wow, a literal sandbox this time. I never got to play in these as a kid. The local cats all used them as litter boxes.”

  “That is disturbing,” BURT replied. “The number of toxins contained in—never mind. That data is not pertinent. Sand will absorb the force of the explosion if anything goes wrong inside the bubble. I estimate that with your current ability to transfer emotion and physical reaction to your non-avatar body, we need to protect you as much as possible.”

  She snapped her fingers. “Good thinking.”

  He ran a couple of numbers. “I want you to conceptualize this energy. I have set it up so your avatar is full of all three types. Try to make the same simple magical motion using each energy separately.”

  Stephanie thought about it for a moment and nodded. “Okay, I’ll use MU first.”

  She dug her feet into the warm sand and squared her shoulders. After a deep breath, she channeled the MU, raised her hand, and flicked outward with a twist of her wrist. The purple MU manifested immediately to swirl around her wrist and fingers. With scarcely a thought, she flung a line of it forward, not quite sure what it was she wanted to create.

  The energy whipped out of her and rocketed forward to twist and turn until it created a table. It fell onto its four legs and wobbled for a moment.

  Stephanie raised her other hand and rotated it to direct small glittering nodules of energy at the surface.

  The magic expanded as it floated over it to create a line of different foods on the tabletop. Every dish had a purplish tint.