Old Man Dar started walking again, forcing Trent to walk to keep up with him. “Nobody wants your boy to die in the field, Peter. That’s not what we’re going for here. But the Council wants to make an example of Neffy and it might not be worthwhile to fight them on this one.”
“Oh, you don’t think so?” Trent said coldly.
Dar laughed. “I never thought I’d live to see it. Peter Trent…the sentimentalist!”
Dar’s basic cruelty was on display, but then again it had never been a secret to Trent in the first place.
Dar pointed his cane in the direction of the cherubs. “But I think you get my point, and there’s no need to belabor it if it causes you discomfort. Just look at this fountain, all these beautiful carvings. Three centuries old, based on a design much older still. It’s a beautiful day in old Vienna, far too nice for these distasteful…backroom dealings.”
The old man chuckled, clearly amused by his own comments. Backroom dealings were their stock in trade, and in the dark underworld of Federation politics Old Man Dar and Trent were nearly equals. He finished chuckling, then said, “Good day, Peter!” and walked away.
Trent stayed where he was and watched Dar’s departure, his eyes as cold and calculating as they had ever been. He had been watching Dar for his entire life, and he knew exactly what the man was capable of.
Dar knew Trent was watching, so he waited until he had turned a corner to bring up his holo and send the e-DNA message he needed to send. This message could change everything and for that he needed privacy.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Ensign Walters was tall but slightly-built, not as physically imposing as the typical New Atlantian warrior. Her relatively small size matched her disposition, which came across as a combination of natural shyness and outright fear. For whatever reason, the failure of their attempt to steal the Drewdonian device had left all the New Atlantian women deeply dispirited – unless what was really bothering them was the knowledge that they had been forced to commit a major crime.
Her head was bowed, and she seemed unwilling to look up when Neffy spoke to her. “Ensign Walters, we want information. We know you and the other women were being coerced.”
She nodded her head vigorously but didn’t say anything. She definitely seemed to want to emphasize this point. Neffy waited a moment, but when it became obvious that she wasn’t ready to say anything else yet he went on.
“We also know you were the only one who met with the person giving the orders.”
A quiet, uncertain voice. “Yes…”
This was not a small point to confess to. It made her look guiltier than the other women.
Neffy inserted some sternness into his voice. “Can you identify that person for me?”
She took a deep breath and straightened her spine. “It was Captain O’Shea.”
Exactly what Corey had said. “Captain O’Shea, callsign Xena?”
She was starting to lose her fear a little now that she had started talking. Telling the truth seemed to give her courage. “Yes. She’s the one who ordered us to steal experimental technology from Drewdonia. I’d never met her before that day, but she gave me the details so we would know what to look for.”
Ensign Walters shifted uncomfortably, and Neffy saw the marks on her wrists from the tight restraints. He turned to Brad. “Ensign Walters is now cooperating. Do you think we could loosen her restraints?”
“I’m sure Captain Dunham would agree to that. I’ll go get the keycode.”
Neffy brought up a holo of Xena while they waited for Brad to come back. “Is this the woman you met with?”
If she made a positive identification, then Captain O’Shea would be charged with treason and a host of other crimes as well. It would probably allow them to wrap the case up, as far as the law enforcement aspect was concerned. But Ensign Walters only looked confused. “No, that’s…that’s not Xena. Is it?”
Neffy sat back for a moment and thought about it. If the woman Walters had met with wasn’t Xena, then she had to be someone who knew enough about Xena to assume her identity. He had a hunch. He flicked through the personnel records and pulled up another picture. “Was this the woman?”
Ensign Walters lit up. “Yes, that’s the one! When we first got the order to steal the tech she was downright frightening, but when I finally met her in person she wasn’t so bad. She even asked us not to harm the hostage.”
Neffy wasn’t aware of any hostage. “What hostage are you talking about?”
“Some engineer…Sacre, I think?”
So Sacre had been kidnapped. That ruled out the possibility that he had been trying to sell the technology to the New Atlantians, or foolishly giving it away to some New Atlantian agent for romantic reasons. “And where is he?”
“We were keeping him in the generator building a few kilos from here. We didn’t want to risk him tampering with the device – sabotaging it or even setting it off.”
Brad returned and entered the keycode to loosen the restraints on Ensign Walters. As soon as he stood up again, Neffy pulled him aside.
He spoke in a quiet tone, but not quite a whisper. “Zahra Hidalgo was posing as Xena.”
Brad frowned. “Zahra Hidalgo? So she’s the one behind the plot?”
“It’s hard to say. Either Hidalgo wanted the tech herself to sell on the black market, or she’s working for someone else.”
“Her employers could be the ones who took the device. They might have been trying to slip it away before we got it back. Like that old saying, you know? If you want something done right…”
Neffy agreed. “If that’s the case, we may be able to find out more by searching through her communications records.”
“Makes sense to me. Are you going to brief Xena about her assistant, then?”
That last sentence was a bit too loud, and Ensign Walters seemed to perk up a little as if she’d heard it. Neffy glared at Brad, willing him not to give away any more potentially useful information to their prisoner. Brad mouthed the word Oops! and shrugged.
Neffy gave him a stern look, then continued quietly, “Dr. Sacre is the only engineer who really knows how the device works, and Ensign Walters just told us where to find him.”
“Then let’s go get him! I’ll go talk to Captain Dunham.”
+++
The generator building was smaller than the bunker, and even less suitable as a defensive structure. Captain Dunham’s team was once again in formation, ready to storm in and extract Dr. Sacre.
Sergeant Lovisa Corey was there as well, along with Ensign Walters. The two women seemed contrite, eager to undo whatever harm they might have caused through their participation in the theft and kidnapping. Brad was up on the sand dune behind them with his rifle ready, providing cover against any sudden breakout attempt from inside the building. They weren’t aware of any other participants in the plot, but it paid to be cautious.
Captain Dunham gave Neffy a serious look. “Captain Klingerman, you’ve been an asset. But I need you to fully understand the situation. This is my command, and you are absolutely to stay back.”
Neffy threw up his hands in mock exasperation. “I stayed back last time just like you asked!”
“So you did. Please do it again.”
Dunham turned away, leaving Neffy somewhat mystified at his sudden change in attitude. Had Dunham received orders to guarantee his safety? It was going to get hard to do his job properly if Trent was always trying to assign him babysitters.
The Captain went over to the New Atlantian women. “Do you have the door code? It would save us a lot of trouble if we don’t have to use the battering ram again.”
Walters rattled off a number, and Dunham called it out to the men at the door. It hissed open almost silently. The soldiers of the Federation ground team ran in with their weapons ready, leaving Neffy and the New Atlantian women to wait outside.
This is the part I hate most, thought Neffy. Then he remembered the part he hated even more, with people
shooting and screaming and dying. Waiting was not so bad, compared to that.
Just like at the outpost, all was quiet for several minutes. This time there was no wind, though – just the near silence of the reddish sand dunes. The calm continued, stretching out for what seemed far too long. Brad didn’t move, but kept his weapon trained on the door. Things stayed quiet just long enough for Neffy to wonder what could possibly be taking Captain Dunham and his team so long. When the holo-call came in, he was so relieved to hear the word “Clear!” from several voices that he jumped up from the sand dune and ran straight for the building.
Neffy went in through the door with Walters and Corey, heading for the spot where Dr. Sacre had been held. Ensign Walters took the lead. She seemed almost eager, which Neffy took as a sign of remorse for her role in this fiasco. They went down a corridor and through another door into a large, but almost empty room with a pipe running along the back wall. Captain Dunham and his team were there, but they didn’t seem to know what to do with themselves.
Ensign Walters stopped short, staring at the pipe with her mouth open. “He isn’t there!”
Neffy wanted to yell. This mission was the biggest clusterfuck he had ever been involved in! Why couldn’t anything go the way he planned it, not even once?
Captain Dunham pointed at the pipe on the wall. “I take it you had him chained to that?”
Ensign Walters sighed. “Yes! But he seems to have gotten out of his restraints somehow. He can’t have gone far, we never leave him alone in here for very long.”
Dunham turned to his team. “Okay, you heard her. The doctor managed to escape on his own, but he must still be nearby. The man is hardly likely to have just run off alone into the New Atlantian desert. Fan out and conduct a complete search of the building first. If we can’t find him in here, we’ll ask the ship to scan the desert.”
The soldiers left, searching every room in the generator building for some sign of the doctor. Neffy was still too frustrated and angry to do anything other than pace back and forth, swearing under his breath every now and then. I’m starting to really hate this job, he thought – but then stopped short. He suddenly became conscious that he was staring directly into the barrel of a gun. Someone had crept up on him while he was distracted by rage, and now whoever it was had the drop on him.
A voice called out from behind him. “Stop bouncing around like a pet poodle and put your hands up.”
Having no other choice, Neffy put his hands up slowly – but as he did so, he pretended to absent-mindedly scratch an itch on his arm. He might have been captured, but a tap on his holo had just summoned the cavalry.
Where did these guys even come from? As Neffy stood there feeling stupid, the mysterious gunmen marched a chastened and disarmed Captain Dunham in. The rest of his team filed in behind him, looking distinctly embarrassed. They had just been surprised and disarmed without a shot by a bunch of mercenaries, who must have been hiding all over the building.
Due to distraction or just plain amateurishness, the mercenary team didn’t take Neffy’s gun. They might have assumed he didn’t even have one, since he wasn’t carrying a long weapon like the Federation soldiers. He briefly considered an attempt at escape but realized they would all be dead by the time he killed even one or two of these men. He would have to wait for a better moment, assuming a better moment ever came along.
To Neffy’s eyes, the attackers seemed to be divided into two groups or possibly factions. He couldn’t immediately tell what the distinction was between them, but they clustered together in two bunches like separate teams. He thought he detected a hint of friction, like the chain of command was less than clear.
All he could do at the moment was to hope and wait. He had activated the audio on his holo when he pretended to scratch his arm, and if Brad heard what was going on in here he would call the ship and bring reinforcements. Of course, there was much more likelihood Brad would understand what was happening if Neffy talked with their captors.
First he had to clear his head, though – Neffy’s anger at the situation had become anger at himself. With all his training, blundering into captivity so easily should never have happened. The whole point of Academy training was to make you competent in a wide range of situations. Peacekeeper training was even more intensive. His tendency to rush in ahead had gotten him in trouble yet again.
Neffy took a deep breath, willing himself to get back in the moment. Save anger for later; use your training to save the mission.
The man holding the gun on him waved his weapon in the general direction of the pipe. “You’re probably wondering where Dr. Sacre is…”
The gunman was bearded and short enough that he had to look up when talking to Neffy. His eyes were dark, and Neffy got the impression that he was not only chatty but emotionally sensitive. A potentially volatile individual. Some of the other men glanced in his direction and did not look impressed with what they saw there.
Neffy looked at the man’s gun. “Dr. Sacre wasn’t the first thought on my mind, to tell you the truth.”
The man smiled humorlessly. “I heard all about you and your smart mouth.”
This was not encouraging, but Neffy decided to play it cool. “Okay, I’m curious. Why don’t you tell me where the engineer is? It sounds like you want to get it off your chest.”
Part of his goal in acting nonchalant was to provoke the man into saying something useful. This was not a safe game to play, but the options available to him were limited. By acting like he didn’t care too much about the gun, he might be able to make the man feel small. This could lead him to give something away in an attempt to sound more important – or it could lead to him just shooting Neffy in the face.
The man’s chest swelled a little as he threw his shoulders back. “Don’t you worry about that. We have Dr. Sacre well in hand. Delta Team always gets its man.”
Neffy made a big show of looking around. “Well, I don’t see him. Are you sure he didn’t just…slip away somehow?”
Somebody laughed, though it sounded more like a short, sharp bark. All around the room, men were shaking their heads. One of them said what all of them were obviously thinking, “He’s got your number, boss.”
This man is no mastermind, thought Neffy. He’s just a mid-level enforcer type. And his men have no respect for him.
Time to push the game a little further. “What are your bosses going to say when they find out you’ve lost him?”
The gunman was getting agitated as he realized how much face he was losing. “Hah! We haven’t lost Dr. Sacre at all. He’s somewhere safe.”
“Well, that’s certainly comforting. I’d sure like to be somewhere safe right now. Are you planning to take us somewhere safe like Dr. Sacre, or are you just planning to shoot us right here?”
From across the room, Captain Dunham was staring at Neffy like he’d lost his mind. Why would anyone deliberately antagonize their captors into simply killing them all?
But the gunman had his orders. He puffed out his chest again and smiled a cruel smile. “Oh, you’re going somewhere else. You can count on that. Someone wants a word with you, smart guy.”
“Your mother finally agreed to another date? That’s wonderful news!”
A quiet wave of snickering passed around the room, although one of the men said, “Just shoot him, boss. Don’t take his shit.”
His men would probably respect him more if he did just that. But Neffy didn’t de-escalate the tension. Instead he cranked it up.
“You know, at first I was kind of inclined to look down on you a little. Just your basic Federation prejudice against mercs and other make-believe soldiers, you know? But I think you probably made the best career choice you could have, under the circumstances. The Federation has height minimums, after all. Let me guess, you’re from the Pyotr system?”
The Pyotr system was well known for its unusually belligerent and stubborn inhabitants, as well as for being the single most boring place in the entire Federation. Py
otr 4 was known as “the Swamp Planet” and people who came from there generally didn’t advertise it.
Neffy didn’t actually care about the man’s height or upbringing. He was just trying to buy time while introducing some chaos into the situation in case it somehow helped him. Captain Dunham looked absolutely horrified. He must have thought Neffy was trying to commit suicide-by-mercenary.
That was almost what happened. The man he was talking to suddenly shoved the barrel of his gun up under Neffy’s chin and pushed back hard. “You really think you’re smart, don’t you? Let’s see how smart you are with your brains all over the fucking wall!”
Something moved in the corner of Neffy’s eye. Was the cavalry here? As Brad ambled into the room with his hands held high, Neffy realized that relying on this man to rescue him was not exactly the best plan he had ever come up with.
How could anyone look that casual while walking into a potential gunfight?
Brad looked around. “Aw, man! Looks like I’m missing the party.”
The man with the beard turned away from Neffy to get a look at the newcomer. “Who the fuck are you?”
Brad treated the man to one of his friendly smiles, which looked exactly as sincere as Brad’s smiles usually did. “I was just in the neighborhood; called in for backup when I noticed things were getting interesting. I didn’t want to miss out on all the fun, you know?”
What the hell was Brad doing?
The bearded man had the same thought. “What the hell are you doing?”
Brad’s smile never wavered. “The thing is, Boris…you don’t mind if I call you Boris, do you?”
The man started to turn, obviously planning to aim his gun at Brad – but then stopped and turned it back toward Neffy. He looked deeply confused.
Neffy was just as confused, but he played along. “Is his name really Boris?”
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