HidHop-I1

==Interlude – End of Vacation==
<<Next Chapter - Return to Story Index - Next Chapter>>
----
===Holidaying in the Skies===
08/20/3051 | Venus, Sol
Aerostat Nahid ‘flew’ through the clouds like a Manta Ray through water, the massive semi-rigid airship’s flattened form provided lift and control. Hydrogen gas ballonets in the envelope provided additional lift and pitch control through the dense atmosphere isolated by water storage from the breathing gas inside its intricate yet elegantly articulated frame.
Flexible screens within the walls made it seem like Precentor Martial Photon Brett and his wife were on a bed was drifting through the sky together. She brushed up against him then reached around him, “What are we going to do tomorrow?”
He gently caressed her arm, “Keep enjoying our family vacation,” she nuzzled him before drifting back to sleep.
Morning brought a new round of colorful clouds as the Aerostat drifted on the planetary jet stream such that it circled the planet every four days and because it was Thursday that meant they would leave before it would complete another circuit. Photon pointed starboard as his stepson and daughter looked through binoculars at a similar Aerostat resort. “That’s the Sholpan kids.”
Elnara, his ten-year-old daughter dipped the binoculars to look at him, “That’s what our ship looks like on the outside papa?”
“Not quite. Ours is bigger but has less people in it and more pretty things to look at.”
“What do all of those people do if they can’t look at flowers all day?”
Photon looked toward Farah staring at him from their table and pulled on his collar, “You’ll find out when you’re older, by reading about it.”
Another contact blip appeared on the window’s HUD off to port, Photon breathed a sigh of relief, “What’s that one?”
“A floating robotic greenhouse.”
“It’s so small.”
“They are only good for a decade before the coating breaks down from acid rain, but they spend that entire time in sunlight, so the plants grow big and strong. Some of the food we eat might have come from there, but Venus feeds a lot of people throughout the Solar System.”
More people arrived in the restaurant, unlike many of the aerostat resorts the Nahid was invitation only. In this case it meant one needed to be a COMSTAR member to stay aboard it. It was also much tamer than the others with a semi-permanent ROM detachment onboard. 
Doctor Rajesh Moreno, Chief of Kappa Branch, was here with his family after giving a presentation on space medicine on Aphrodite Station. Carlos had taken a liking to his daughter Silvia and she him since they were the only people in the same age range onboard. His stepson disappeared and she peeled away to a corner booth with a good view of the clouds outside, he passed her the binoculars and pointed out interesting features he had learned about through the week to impress her. Elnara found it all very interesting and snuck away to listen in on her half-brother’s conversation.
Walking in with the aid of a lower body exoskeleton Doctor Janice Calderon, a Kappa Demi-Precentor, followed by her brother Ian, also a Demi-Precentor but of COMSTAR Space Command. With CSC based above at Aphrodite Station Delta branch officers frequently found their way into the clouds below while on leave with their paramours or families. Since Sol was also COMSTAR’s headquarters members from across the Inner Sphere were always visiting as well and some wanted to experience Venus’ eight day cloud cruise packages for themselves while they undertook their rites.
A woman passed Photon a note and whispered, “you should read this,” into his ear before departing the restaurant. Farah watched her depart with her customary furious passion and almost got up to follow her before he put a hand on her shoulder. “I’m sure its work related, and she wasn’t looking for a hookup with the Precentor Martial and his wife.”
“You never know with this planet. I know what happens here.”
“Venus was the goddess of love and beauty, but she has nothing on you” Photon dipped down and kissed her now blushing cheek as he unwrapped the note. 
‘End of Mission confirmed on Elissa. 
Planet invaded by outside, unknown powers. 
Be ready for a call from the Primus at Aphrodite Station for consultation on next actions pending additional information.
CS, Dieron’
Farah watched him shred the note, “What was it?”
“Work related, looks like we will have to enjoy the vacation time we have today. I will be deployed shortly, for possibly a very long time.”
-----
===Seeking Missing Hounds===
08/27/3051
Five motorcycles cut through wide open grasslands and rolling hills where one could take in the musky smell, thunderous sound of hooves, and sight of immense herds of migrating animals reaching out to the horizon. There were almost no paved roads on Elissa but there were seasonal rivers and lakes that along with dirt and paved runways provided landing strips for planes and small shuttles.
A Rim Worlds Republic flag flew above the sign marked ‘Sourwater Station’ creaked in the breeze above the gate as the motorcycles pulled under a photovoltaic shade. Their riders dismounted slinging shotguns from their scabbard over their back before plugging the machines into charging ports. Upon seeing the heavily armed riders the man looking over the horses, motorcycles, trucks, and a small helicopter stayed in his rocking chair keeping his hands visible, and off the rifle in his lap.
The saloon bars opened revealing the profile of figures in gray fatigues, boots, and sunglasses with olive drab plate carrier bearing a snake head insignia. On their belt was a stiletto style knife and pistol along with other pouches. Their leader walked past the staring eyes of rough looking and pistol toting stockmen. On the other side of the bar was a man with the look of weathered leather, she took off her sunglasses to reveal graceful brown eyes and a slender tuft of hair slipped out from her shemagh.
“How can I help you, young lady?”“We Steel Vipers require provisions and information.”“Well, most information is free if you ask nicely, but provisions cost something.” He looked her over and lingered on her armor and belt, for some reason, “Have you anything to trade?”
Saloon customers looked nervously at the Steel Vipers behind her. She slammed her stiletto deep into the wooden bar top worryingly close to the barkeep’s hand as she drew him toward her by the collar. “Do we look like Merchants to you!” 
Customers rose to draw their iron but immediately faced a quartet of automatic shotguns pointed back at them and thought better of it.“My mistake, please accept my apologies” slipped the barkeep’s lips. She released him to his and the customers relief. “I accept your surkai, but do not make the same mistake again,” she pulled the knife up and pointed it toward him, “or I will take an ear,” then sheathed it.
“Steel Viper? Are you a new plains gang?”“Neg, Do not mistake us for a gang of Dark Caste. We are Warriors of Clan Steel Viper and seek the escaped Kell Hounds and little else from you.”
They looked around at one another, “Never heard of ‘em.”
She paced around with an Avenger CCW on her hip observed the regulars while two of her men manned the door and another pair searched the premises “Your ignorance is rather convenient considering we tracked their stolen shuttle to this region.
Lots of places to hide on these plains and people willing to help them.
Surely some of you know a few of them and would rather we not stumble upon whatever it is you want to stay hidden in our search or would seek to avoid the punishment we will mete out to their accomplices.”
“We don’t ask questions of folk round here.”
Something about this statement drew the Viper leader to the man who recoiled as she neared him, “Then begin to lean into your inquisitive side. 
For your own sake, as well as the others.”
Her knife came out again to carve a radio frequency and ‘Perimeter’ into the wooden paneling to the horror of the barkeep and saloon customers. “If you happen to find out where the Kell Hounds are hiding, this is my number and handle.”
This final display resulted in each customer choosing to pay their tabs and depart. While their provisions were gathered the Steel Vipers enjoyed a hearty lunch of stewed meat and vegetables washed down with glasses of beer at the bar. Each of them received a small satchel, bottle of spirits, and filled canteens. Their leader tied her shemagh and donned her sunglasses once more, “The Steel Vipers look forward to your continued cooperation.”
“Its…my pleasure.”
“As it should be.” 
The Vipers departed the Saloon into an empty town square, they looked up at the Rim Worlds’ Republic flag flying above it and then to one another. One of them jogged away then returned with folded flags. They set the RWR flag on fire and raised the Clan Daggerstar and Steel Viper pendant beneath it giving a sharp salute before returning to their motorcycles. Shotguns were returned to their scabbards and maps were pulled out.
“Where are we going to next, Diana?”
Diana consulted the topographic map created by their orbiters, “I think South. There are more hills that way, and probably caves they might be hiding in.”
“That is brilliant, Team Leader.”
“My mother was a Scientist. Was there any doubt?”
-----
=== Running Gun Battle ===
08/16/3051
An ST-46 shuttle touched down just as Elissa’s moon Miranda dipped below the horizon and its blue-white sun rose over the horizon. It taxied to a vacant hanger and eleven Kell Hounds disembarked into the twilight dawn and trio of tanned men armed with lever rifles.
“What do you think you Stargazers are doin’? Doesn’t matter that King Grimm gave your boy the planet for a hundred million after working my daddy to the bone in the mines. We was here first.”
Phelen looked at the tail of the shuttle which as marked with the titular One Star of the OSF. The Hounds with weapons kept them at the ready. “We’re not with them.”
“Well, who you with then?”
“We’re Mercs and looking to make a deal.”
“What kinda deal?”
“Mutually beneficial.
You want this shuttle?”
Their leader eased his grip on the rifle, “It’s been a while since the Hansa free trader arrived. Our shuttles are grounded for lack o’ parts.”
“You can have it, but we need supplies: food, clothing, medicine, and transport.” He looked toward the Rim World’s Republic flag waving in the morning breeze. “We need to lay low somewhere until our friends arrive from off-world.”
“We’ll hide it under some brush in the glade before Kenny can get to it with the chop saw. 
I’m Eli by the way, and these are my brothers.”
Eli extended his hand and Phelen took it, “Wolfgang.”
“Fancy name. What happened to ‘ya boots boy.”
“I just broke out of COMSTAR jail and killed a few giants in the process.”
“Now that sounds like a story I don’t need to know, Wolfgang.”
They looked at the shuttle once more, “How do you like your grits? And what size boots you want?”
“Plentiful, and forty-one.”
Morning passed with six very upset women and teen girls cooking breakfast as Daniel, the youngest brother, galloped to the trading post to return with a wooden cartload of sundry dry goods pulled along by a mare. Phelen never realized how much he appreciated boots until he had been without them for a few weeks. He bumped into one of the girls while putting on the rough, homespun shirt knocking her over and upsetting her bonnet. “Sorry. Rebecca, was it?”
He reached down to pull her up, “You remembered.”
“I’m pretty good about that. Thanks for breakfast, I know we kinda dropped in on you and your folks without warning. What are you doing over here?”
She fixed the bonnet to her blonde hair again, looked aside, blushing, and kneaded her apron, “I just wanted to make sure you were fine. Are you really from off-world, Wolfgang?”
“I am.”
“What’s it like out there?”
“Different.”
“Better?”
“Just different.”
“I was just curious. We don’t get many visitors from off-world round these parts.”
“Which is a darn shame, because it seems to be a fine, hospitable place.”
“Thank you,” Phelen waited for her to return to the group, but she just stood there eyes slightly down, hands folded, “You should go ahead, if we come back together people might ask questions.”
A moment passed before he nodded, “I see, just curious huh?” 
----
===The meaning behind the Flag===
08/21/3051
Phelen reached back to touch the sleek laser rifle slung over his back, “I have perhaps the most powerful laser rifle in the Inner Sphere on my back.” He pinched himself to feel something different on his increasingly numb and chaffed legs, “yet I am on horseback wearing homespun wool clothes, eating jerky, dry beans, pan bread, and homemade preserves over a campfire under the stars.” 
Lieutenant Tang was apparently listening in, “Bit of a different sensation ain’t it? 
I’m still thinking about that jam and fresh baked bread though.”
He whispered to Jackson, “Rebecca snuck it into my bag.” The two exchanged a nod and then spoke up to fight the increasingly aggressive wind, “This wasn’t the way I expected our Elissa mission to go.”
“No but if we make it back even your uncle will appreciate the story that comes out of it.”
“If we make it out. 
What do you think happened to the Captain and the others?”
Jackson got quiet, it was something they had avoided over the past few days, “If they’re alive, we’ll find and bring them home, but that’s a different set of problems. 
I am going to stay focused on our group, tomorrow, and what we can do to change it. 
I expect you to do the same.”
“Roger.”
“How’s your bruised ribs?”
“Pained.” Horseback riding hadn’t made it better, but a place in the group’s two light wagons was hardly more stable, “You get kicked by one of those Elementals and tell me how you feel.”
“I’d rather not.”
The Kell Hounds worked their way through a wide expanse of grasslands and rolling hills heading southward four of their eleven with parts of the Mausers had their own horses. Dusk arrived with Sourwater Station looming ahead of them, positioned with a commanding view of the countryside lit with brilliant hues of orange and red. A photovoltaic panel was mounted on a wooden scaffold with enough space to pull the wagons into driving a pump and water purifier that filled a cistern which in turn emptied into the trough by use of hand pump. Hooks for saddles and ties for bridles lined the beams. 
An old man rocked in a chair nearby, one hand nudged a star hat up with the other gently resting on a double barrel shotgun, “You fellas are ahead of the big drive.”
They looked around at each other and forgot for a moment that they looked like natives, “Like cattle drive?”
“Sure do.”
“We’re actually prospectors.”
“Oh, heading to them haunted hollers down south? 
That vein’s been played out for thirty odd years now. 
I should know I worked it back when King Grimm was living up to his name.
Kept enough gold to keep my teeth.”
He smiled a jagged smile, gold caps shone in the dusky light. “Don’t jump anyone’s claim ya hear. Everyone’s armed here but they shoot first down there.
You fellas spending the night?”
Phelen and Jackson looked around at their crew, “Depends, you take Lyran Kroner?”
“Sure do. Talk to my boy Johnny at the bar. It ain’t gonna be five stars, but a roof under your head and bath is a nice treat after spending days under the stars. 
This is gonna be the last free night we have for a couple weeks so you’re just in luck. 
Don’t worry ‘bout your animals they’s safe with Ol’ Amos.”
Saloon doors opened as the sun settled below the horizon and Miranda replaced it. Inside was roughhewn wood and men. Four colorfully dressed women fanned themselves in the corner watching the Kell Hounds as they walked in and whispering to one another. They took up seats at the bar, “You Johnny?”
“Sure am, you fellas want a room, drinks, or both and maybe more.”
“Both and maybe more,” the Mercs emptied their pockets of the Kroner coins and bills that the Ghost Bears neglected to take from them. Even tossed in their Kell Hound blood chits pulled out of their uniforms before they went into the fire behind Eli’s house.
“I’ll take your coins, but not your chits. 
A round of drinks, a bottle for the road, one night under roof, some fodder, stabling, bathes, two hot meals, and a good map. Best offer.”
They looked at the accumulated cash the group had on them; a sizable sum but worthless without someone to take it. “Deal.”
Night passed and the sun rose again on the grasslands of Elissa illuminating the Rim Worlds Republic flag that flew in the town square. One of the locals stood beside, Phelen, “Beautiful ain’t it?”
“I don’t mean offense, but why do The Inheritors fly the Rim Worlds’ Flag? Amaris committed terrible atrocities.”
“How many were committed by Hegemony troops or fleets in the name of Kerensky, the Camerons, and McKennas that we don’t hear about before him? or since?
 
Stefan Amaris ended the Star League so we could be free to decide for ourselves what we wanted to be and not live under Terra’s thumb. 
Some of them chose to be animals, 
The Succession Wars are proof of that.”
----
===Reflectless Pursuit===
09/05/3051
“Reminds me of Tokasha, quiaff?
Diana stared through her range-finding binoculars at the tortured landscape of these ‘Haunted Hollers’ whose hilltops had been removed by the Oberon Confederation to extract their minerals and between which grew a gnarled tangle of woodlands. The hollers themselves were filled coarse unstable soil from which trickled putrid orange water.
“At least we do not need respirators to breath the air. It remains to be seen what lives within and what threat it poses. There are also less fires.”
“We will not have giant anthropods at least.”
“The smaller ones are more dangerous. I almost died as a creche because I did not check my boots before going outside. Fortunately, we had antivenom on hand.”
“Your mother’s outpost was one of the most remote, I never had trouble with little bugs.”
They returned to their camp where large flexible photovoltaics were plugged into their motorcycles. A charred tin percolator popped over the campfire. She checked her watch and set up a satellite dish while one of her team poured a bitter black liquid into her cup. Diana spit it out and dumped the rest, “Better than last time, Caresh, but I still cannot swallow it.”
Caresh poured out the rest of the sad brown fluid, “This object does not come with instructions Diana. It will require experimentation,” he lifted a small burlap sack of mysterious beans, “yet we have limited raw materials.”
“Perhaps its owners should have thought better of firing warning shots at us then. They might still be alive to show us how it works. We have limited everything but be silent I must contact the Star Captain.”
The monitor attached to the dish showed the prime meridian time and an approximate position based on its own INS. A circle represented the signal strength from the few orbiters the One Star Faith had established for their own use, but which had been acquired by her Clan when they took over the garrison. Signal strength increased enough that Diana donned her headset and activated the transmission equipment inside that would link with the Star Captain’s Goshawk or their dropship.
“Star Captain Kearny, are you there?”
<<“Aff, sitrep, Diana.”>>
“We are still in pursuit of the Kell Hounds and are closing on their position.”
<<“You said that last week and every day since.”>>
“And it was true. They continue to evade us.”
<<“Are you certain you have enough Warriors?”>>
“There are only a dozen of them, I have four Warriors under my command. That is sufficient. 
End of transmission.”
Diana bristled at the Star Captain; her fists clenched white with rage despite the tan from living out in the wilderness for weeks. She wanted to stand up and scream it out over the desolate valleys. Nothing she could do as a freeborn former Jade Falcon would be enough for the ‘true’ Steel Vipers. A nearby stone caught her attention and was immediately tossed over the edge of the rocky defile into the valley. 
The Kell Hounds would be caught, or she would die trying.
----
===The meaning behind the Flag===
09/12/3051
A flutter of bird wings snapped Diana awake, her pistol pointed out from the sleeping bag towards trees and the wispy smoke of a dying campfire. She cleared her eyes and saw Melanie sitting with her back to her motorcycle, limply holding a shotgun in the waning light of Miranda as it slipped down to the horizon. The others slept fitfully within their own bags, “You alright Team Leader?”
She cleared her eyes, switched her pistol to safe, and wiped her forehead. “I have a fever.”
“We all do. The water here is making us all sick. 
We need replacement water filters, warmer clothes, and more food. 
Our supplies are gone and since everyone has started avoiding us so there are no more leads on where the Hounds disappeared to or options to take what we need. They could have moved on to a totally separate region in the weeks we have spent here.”
“I am not going back to Illusha until I find the Kell Hounds! 
They are here I know it. The locals manage, we can too.”
“They are from here Diana, we are not. If the Hounds are here, they are getting help and all we are doing is making more enemies while losing our strength. 
We will die or get ourselves killed if we stay out here much longer. They will not even need to lift a finger. I’m not sure we can make it to the nearest trading post without local Dark Caste intercepting us or one of us collapsing off their bike. 
Please ask Illusha to send backup and medivac.”
“No, I will not give her the satisfaction of seeing me fail. 
I told her we could do it and we will.”
“Diana, you know that I would fight alongside you in a Trial to the death. We have lived alongside one another since Sibko. This is not the way Falcon Warriors die, of deprivation, and disease, in the wilderness, on the dawn of the Clans’ great project. 
Illusha has treated us like Solahma. We should not give her the satisfaction of killing us like them.”
----
===Wake up Call===
09/14/3051
“Rise and shine Steel Vipers!”
Diana felt something hard push into her ribs through the sleeping bag and raised her hands in surrender. She looked through delirious eyes at the dawning sun illuminated a group of bearded men clad in local attire with bandanas over their faces standing with their legs on her team’s chests, pointing their own guns at them. “How did you sneak up on us?”
<<“In case you didn’t know we are a Recon Lance, the Kell Hounds are legendary for a reason, and I was trained by Seventh Kommando.” >>
A bit of bile burned at her throat as much as her forehead. “Phelen Kell?”
<<“Aff as you Clanners say.Don’t move now, I’ve seen what this can do to a woman twice your size. It’s not pretty.”>> 
He unzipped her sleeping bag and stripped her gun belt before passing it off to one of the other men who snapped it on. “Get your skinny ass up and don’t try anything crazy.” 
She rose from the sleeping bag and was suddenly acutely aware of how much slack was in her belt after more than month hunting the Hounds only to get jumped by them instead. “Where were you hiding?”
<<“You’ll find out soon enough. Until then it’s not as important as your microwave uplink.”>>
“What about us?”“If I wanted you and your team dead, we’d have just shot you, taken it, and let the vultures pick your corpses.”
“However, that didn’t seem very hospitable of us. It would be a shame for you to have come all this way to die of dysentery or get lynched by the locals. Apparently, most folks round these parts aren’t too keen on restoring the Star League.” 
“Now get your hands behind your head and feet moving. We’ve got a bit of walk ahead of us.”
----
===Chit-chat between Captive and former Prisoner===
Diana woke up laying on a bedroll within a dimly lit subterranean cage. Her hand raised up to remove the formerly damp cloth on her forehead then she crouched over to the wooden wash basin as the ceiling was too short to full stand and splashed some of the cool fresh water onto her face. She looked down at her hastily patched and baggy fatigues that showed signs of wear and tear from wilderness travel.
“Feeling better?”She went up to grab the shoring timbers connected with interlocking staves that formed a primitive but effective barrier. “I would feel better if I were not confined by the enemy.”
Phelen Kell appeared from around the corner, indistinguishable from the photo she had of him while he was in Ghost Bear confinement. “Self-declared. I would too, but until you prove you’re not a threat there you shall remain.” 
Her eyes narrowed as he lifted her metal codex necklace and a bracelet with jade and polished tropical hardwood beads and a vial charm, “Team Leader Diana.”
Something inside her felt violated, and fury rose in its place, “Give them back! Or I will break out of this cage and take them.”
“You could just say please.”
“I will not lower myself to such behavior.” she commented
“Politeness is lowering yourself? You have one screwed up culture if that’s the case.”
“You are the one that took them off me.” Phelen told her
“Well, you were almost incoherent for a day. We had to use some of our limited medicine on you and your team to ensure you all made it through the night. If you didn’t, we needed to know what to put on the grave marker and maybe pass on to any relatives.”
Her fury abated only to be replaced by sincere confusion, “Why would you do that?”
“It’s what I would want someone to do for me.”
“Since you are better now, you can have them back.” He put them in a small box and pushed it through along with a cup of slightly yellowish liquid and bowl of stew.
Phelen sat opposite her on a wooden bench just out of arm’s reach and like her his utensils and vessels were made of smoothed wood. “What do you want from me, Phelen?”“I was hoping for an interesting lunch conversation, and for you to not die.”
Diana sat cross-legged on the earthen floor, her knees sticking out from her damaged clothing, “So you are keeping me alive, but captive for your own amusement? What does that say about your culture.”
“Fair, I suppose a lot more than I had anticipated. Better than running from you or watching you hang.”
“More will come. The Steel Vipers will not trade my team for the rest of your men. If they are even still on this planet or have not died in the stockade.”
“How many were left?”“Twenty. Last I heard. Most of them died when their shuttle crashed or shortly before we arrived.”
“Why won’t they trade you?”“There are two hundred and fifty million freeborn in the Clans' Touman. We are merely five and the Steel Vipers treat us all with equal contempt. To them we are all expendable to save even one trueborn, others disagree but that is our fate as Steel Vipers.”
“On the codex that I took from the Ghost Bear Elemental I killed it mentioned a decant date, but you have a birthday. Why is that?”
“That is the difference between freeborn and true, I have parents even if my father died two years before I was born. Trueborn have geneparents. They are,” Diana paused for a moment, “manufactured as needed to specifications, like my parents were,” she twisted one of the jade beads on her bracelet which held an inlaid symbol of a bird, “back when Clan Jade Falcon existed.”
It was a lot to take in for Phelen, “How was it that your father died two years before you were born?”
She flicked the vial on her bracelet, “My mother is a Scientist and she likes to flaunt the rules.”
----
===Having Faith in an unusal Talent===
09/21/3051
The Kell Hounds gathered around a wooden table nailed onto an old barrel with a ceramic jug with three ‘X’s’ painted on it in the middle and lantern above. “We’ve had these Vipers here for a week. What’s the plan, Lieutenant?”
Jackson Teng like the others was hardly recognizable through weeks on the run or in captivity. “Our plan remains the same, unlock Diana’s microwave transmitter so we can hear the rescue party and talk back.”
Roy and the techs looked distraught, “I can’t get past the encryption, it’s intelligence grade.” 
Another tech chimed in, “What if the Vipers have already lifted off with the Captain and the others?”
“We have no control over that, Vince.”
“I still think we should have just killed them.”
Phelen stepped into the circle, “That’s short-term thinking, we are getting good intel out of them that we can take back to command when we get rescued.”“For all we know they have already taken Tharkad, Arc-Royal, and dozens of other worlds. What do we do then?”
“We hand them off to the locals.”“You just don’t want to get your hands dirty, Phelen. This is a war we are in now, it’s not just a job.”
“Don’t talk down to me Vince just because you’ve had a dozen years under Patrick in the Second against the DCMS. I respect that, but I did not spend all that time at the hands of the Ghost Bears to be treated like a child.We shouldn’t make that call if the locals are the ones that will bear the consequences, because you know that is exactly what would happen if Diana and her team were confirmed killed. We heard how she acted with the locals where they were merely indifferent. A full insurrection would bring down the wrath of Clan Steel Viper onto this community that has helped us so much.”
“How do we know that even if she gives us the code it’s not just going to broadcast an SOS and bring the Vipers right on top of us?”
“We’ll just have to get her on our side.”
Lieutenant Teng interrupted the conversation, “Look we all know that Phelen’s best talent is surviving complex, life threatening situations caused by random women he meets. Have faith,” Jackson poured out shots into the small cups gathered in the circle, “and a drink.”
----
===Who they are working for===
09/25/3051
“You seem nervous Phelen. Have our discussions troubled you?”
Phelen sat cross-legged across from Diana who did the same in her patched fatigues with her now long brown hair braided neatly.
“No.”
“You seem rather confident that your allies will come for you. What will you do if they don’t?”
Her face registered a slight displeasure, ‘Now I am talking like them too. Savashri!’ but quickly regained its composure. She hoped he hadn’t registered it in the dim light.
“There is at least one homesteader’s daughter that thinks I might make a fine husband. I suppose I’ll take her up on the offer.”
“What will you do with us?”
“Find the Sheriff and hand your team over to him.”
“What stops you from doing that now?”
“I don’t want the Steel Vipers to burn the town down to get you.”
She paused and finished the last bit of her stew, “It would happen eventually.”
“How long until your Commander comes looking for you?”
“Illusha Kearny is not my Commander, merely the highest-ranking Steel Viper officer on world. I do not report to her directly. We are merely attached to her unit, so she believes she controls us.”
“Who is your Commander then?”
“Ultimately, Loremaster Kael Pershaw.”
“What is a Loremaster?”
“The Khan’s Left Hand.”
“That explains why your microwave transmitter is locked down with intelligence grade encryption. How long until Illusha begins looking for you?”
“It has been ten days so far?”
“Aff, as you say.”
“Two more and she will assume we perished and send a Star of Goshawks and scouts to look for us, and you. They will not be as gentle and understanding as I have been.”
“What will it take for you to send a message to prevent that from happening?”
“You want me to lie to a trueborn Star Captain of Clan Steel Viper?”
“Yes.”
Diana nudged closer to the bars, “My price is that you let me and my team out of these cages.”
“What will you do after that?”
“What I agreed, keeping you and your team out of cages, for now.”
“How long?”
“I can’t say, Phelen Kell. We might both end up in them sooner or later anyway.”
A faint eye twitch betrayed her displeasure once more.
----
===I have a plan===
“You can’t be serious, Phelen.” Jackson said as he loomed over the assembled team which all cast sinister shadows on the bare stone walls, “How do you know she isn’t playing you? 
That letting her and her team out won’t end up with them having knives to our throats?”
Phelen felt the pressure of twenty eyes on him, “I don’t! 
I don’t know for sure! But we don’t have great options to get off this world and can’t hide forever.” 
He paced around the room, “If they find out she lied to the Star Captain she’s basically committed treason.
If they find us and find out that we captured them, they are likely heading to a penal unit and this whole region is going to suffer reprisals for aiding us.
“There’s only one way out for both of us.”
The Kell Hounds stared at one another, “NO! 
“HARD! 
“NO!
“Taking them with us is just as bad as releasing them.”
A conspiratorial hush settled over them all, “How do we know that is not even what they want?” 
“Maybe they have orders to be sleepers and will betray us later.”
“She basically admitted to being a spy already.”
“What if she does cooperate with us though. One treason is enough perhaps the second one will be easier. We want to get the others off-world, right?”
Ten heads nodded, “Maybe she can help us all make it out. If we take her and her team with us.”
Lieutenant Teng sighed, “It’s a terrible plan, Phelen. I don’t trust her.”
“Fair but do you have a better one?”
“I sorely wished I did. How much time do you think she can buy us?”
“Hopefully enough.”
----
===Moral Dilemma===
09/26/3051
Diana lowered the headset and retracted the transmission antennae as the sun set over the wild hills. She looked out over the ridge for the first time in almost two weeks but appeared melancholy.
“What’s the matter?”
“I thought it would feel different.”
“What would?”
“Betrayal, Deception. No, I might as well be honest about it. 
Treason. 
I have committed Treason by aiding you and if Illusha finds out about it all our lives are forfeit.”
“How much time did you buy?”
“A week maybe slightly more. After that I will have to bring you in, or they will come and do it themselves and take me too.”
“I suppose we should come up with a plan then.”
“Yes, we find ourselves in dual dilemmas. For better or worse we are intertwined from this moment onward, Phelen.”
Phelen looked over to see her fiddling with her bracelet as they walked away, “What does it feel like Diana?”
“Treason?”
“Yes.”
She halted and held the vial on it with her fingers. “Hollow.”
-----
<<Next Chapter - Return to Story Index - Next Chapter>>
I1