Board Thread:Times Past/@comment-24866242-20140602014630

Ben Stinel posted August 27, 2004 01:01 AM

Ben found Kat sulking in the darkest corner of the dingiest bar in the bad part of the free trade district of L'Riahan City. It was the first place he looked, and he wasn't surprised to find her there. One thing about Kat, if she was bored she usually ended up sulking somewhere where she wasn't likely to stop being bored.

Ben sat down across from her in the cramped, shadowy booth, sliding all the way up against the wall. He put one leg out along the bench and one elbow on the table.

Kat didn't say anything.

Ben noted the tankard sitting on the table in front of her. It looked like it should be holding beer or ale, especially considering the setting, but Ben knew from experience it held coffee.

“Hey.” Kat had spoken first. It was a good sign.

“What's cooking?”

“Nae much.”

“Ah. This place sucks.”

“Aye.”

“Why are we here?”

“Dunno.”

“Wanna go someplace else?”

“Nae really.”

“Right.”

Kat took a sip of her coffee.

They sat and watched the bar for a few minutes more. A waitress was assaulted about ten feet away but the bouncer put the drunken offender down before anything really happened. The drunken man's friends laughed and picked the guy up between them before heading towards the back door. Most likely they would rob him then take him home and put him to bed.

Ben watched Kat watching this and noticed how she unconsciously twitched before the bouncer bonked the guy on the head. It was unlawful to carry a weapon into any premises which served alcohol in L'Riahan City, but, knowing Kat, she had a pistol hidden somewhere. Based on her twitch, Ben guessed it was in a holster just behind her back and high enough not to be seen below the line of her jacket.

Kat took another sip of her coffee.

“No trouble yet tonight?”

“Nae yet.”

“Not ready to start some of your own?”

“Nae yet.”

“Ah.”

Kat waved at the waitress and pointed at her tankard. The waitress nodded and came back a moment later with a coffee pot. Kat lifted the lid of the tankard for her while she poured.

“This place still sucks,” Ben said when the waitress had gone.

“Yep.”

“You're sulking.”

“Am nae.”

“Are so.”

Kat glanced at him for the first time since he had sat down. “Maybe so.”

“Want to go someplace else?”

Kat sulked.

“Kat?”

Sulk.

“Yoohoo...”

Sulk.

“Hey, you with me?”

“I'm thinking!”

Ben made a point of looking elsewhere, lest he break her concentration. After a minute or two of rolling the thought around her head, Kat stood up and headed for the door. Ben was left scrambling to catch up. He didn't actually make it to her side until she was about half a block down the street from the bar, considering he had checked his weapons at the door and she had no such restraint.

He was still buckling his gun belt around his waist when she stopped and peered at him with that one eyed gaze of hers. He took the moment to make sure the belt was secure and catch his breath before acknowledging her.

“So where to?” she asked him.

“You hungry? There's a sushi bar not far from here.”

Kat grimaced.

“Not hungry?”

“Not sushi.”

“Hmm... Well, you've gotten us kicked out of most every other place that has anything decent. There's a burger joint a few blocks from here. How 'bout that?”

Kat nodded and they started walking. The neighborhood got a little bit better after they crossed the first set of tracks and a lot better after the second set. Before they got that far Ben spotted a few people that looked like they might have tried mugging them if not for the pistol on his belt. They probably would have tried Kat if she'd been alone. Taking down a mugger or two might even have gotten her out of her funk, Ben mused.

Not this night. They made it back into the “good” part of the free trade district with no significant interference. The burger joint was still two blocks away.

“So what's got you so twisted up tonight,” he asked after walking most of the way in silence.

Kat walked on his left, putting him on her right. Her “blind” side. She had jokingly told him once that she only let people she trusted stand to her right. He had thought it a joke at the time, but now, as she turned her head to look at him, it occurred to him that she had gone out of her way to keep him on her good side until they had known each other for some time. Experimentally, he closed his right eye.

“Wha' are ye doin'?”

“Nothing.” Ben opened his eye and tried to look innocent. “Are you going to answer my question?” he asked, changing back to the subject she was evading.

Kat sighed. “It's nae anythin' important,” she said eventually, “it's just... ye know I d'nae like dealing wi' clients.”

“Ah, that.”

“Aye, that.”

They walked a few more steps. “You know that wasn't my idea, right?”

“Aye, it was Tarin's.”

Another few steps.

“And you know it wasn't my idea to hire her, right?”

“Aye, it was mine.”

“A good one too,” he pointed out. “Unless you want to go back to the way things were before.”

“No!”

About four months prior, Kat had brought a pretty young woman into Ben's office and introduced her as the company's new business manager. Ben had his doubts as to her age to experience ratio, but they were assuaged when in the first month she brought in over a dozen new clients, got the company's finances in order, and managed to purchase three new ships for the same price Ben had been about to drop on a single slightly used one. Tarin was a godsend.

The benefits to having her running things at home were clear. It had stopped Ben going out of his mind, for one. Now he was spending less time at home running the business and more time in space, actually taking care of business. Not only that, but Kat actually spent less time dealing with clients now than she had before. This week was less than typical though. Hence Kat's mood.

“It's a big contract.”

“Aye, I know.”

“And smuggling is your department.”

“Aye, I know.”

One of Tarin's most amazing achievements had been setting up a dual bookkeeping system that actually managed to explain away the extra income produced by Kat's “Department of Clandestine Acquisitions and Covert Transportation”. Something that had defeated Ben at every turn.

Kat stopped. Ben walked a few steps further before turning to face her. She had an ashen look on her face.

“Kat?”

“I-” she stopped practically before she started, then seemed to steel herself for the rest. “I saw him again.”

Katrylle Morgahn posted September 15, 2004 12:35 AM

Days before…

She’d been wandering for hours. With no real destination in mind, she was simply killing time until her next meeting. The hotel was seedy and a bar just didn’t feel like a viable solution for a change, so she simply wandered.

Near the waterfront, she discovered “Old Town”, a nicely restored section of the original buildings first built by settlers. Most of these quaint little buildings had been converted to antique stores, though the question of how they competed with each other and stayed in business crossed her mind more than once. Silently, she threaded her way in and out of doors, picking up a knick-knack here and there.

As she considered the time, she was suddenly stopped cold by the display in a window at the end of the street. Leaning in the corner looking quite dejected was the most beautiful sight she had seen in a very long while… a classic Everly Brothers Customized J-185 guitar circa Earth 1962. Dusty and need of a good cleaning, it was missing 3 of its 6 strings, but was otherwise in decent condition.

The shop owner could “see her coming” as Kat was fond of saying. Perhaps it was the long moments she lovingly stroked the curved ebony wood. Perhaps it was the way she had told him she’d take it even though he had yet to quote a price to her. The end result was her paying at least twice its actual worth. She didn’t mind. Once it had been restored, she was sure the tone alone would make it well worth the money.

As she stepped out into the bright sunlight, the neck of the guitar firmly in her grasp, she glanced down the street to get her bearings. Suddenly, the smile of contentment froze to a grimace of disbelief. Blinking, she was sure the movement from darkened store to stark sunlight had caused her to see things. Absently, she rubbed her eye with the back of her free hand then searched the street once again.

He was there. No questions. She watched as the man slipped around a corner and from her view and, in an instant, she was sprinting in the same direction, intent on catching him.

As she rebounded off the corner of the last building, she stopped and searched for him again. It wasn’t hard to find him. Disbelief flooded her once again. It couldn’t be Jack. He was dead. But… if that were so, then who was the man making his way around yet another corner away from her?

Three blocks later, she lost him. She wasn’t sure how it could have happened, but his nearly white hair was nowhere to be seen above the crowd. The tolling of the clock tower in the town square was the only thing to pull her from her reverie. Shit, she was late. Glancing once again at the crowd, she turned and made her way back to the warehouse district and the meeting she should have been to 10 minutes earlier. Ben would be annoyed.

@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#

Kat had never been prone to fits of imagination so normally ghosts were not something that either did or didn’t bother her. Most times, she never even gave them a second thought…. or a first, for that matter. That had suddenly changed of late.

She had finally concluded a grueling meeting with the client…the same client who made her wish she had never gone legit…. not even partially legit. Out on the street, she threaded her way through the crowd of weekend window shoppers, the events of a couple of days previous all but forgotten. Tired and missing Ry and the kids fiercely, she could only wish they were with her. She still had another day planet-side to get blubber-boy to sign the friggin import contract… though shooting him and hiding the body was beginning to look much more desirable. Out and out stealing the goods was her next choice.

Glancing through storefront windows, she had decided to buy souvenirs for the kids when a reflection caught her attention. Foot traffic was heavy this late in the afternoon, yet amidst all the unfamiliar faces, one seemed clearer, more defined than the rest. Spinning quickly away from the window, she nearly knocked down a little old lady. Absently, she made a grab for the woman, holding her until she once again regained her balance, barely hearing the verbal abuse the old woman hurled at her as she frantically searched the crowd for the face.

It hadn’t been the first time she thought she had seen Jack Morgahn. In truth, however, this was really quite impossible given that the man had been dead for near on 7 years. Still, as she had the previous time, she shoved her way through the throngs of pedestrians, frantically seeking the man who had quite literally made her what she was today.

Rounding a corner, she caught a glimpse of his graying head above the crowd and nearly a block away. At 6’4”, Jack had always been at least a head above most people and apparently, nothing had changed since his… she shook her head. Once again she denied it was him and this time she was determined to prove it.

Sprinting through the crowd, she watched as the leather overcoat slipped around yet another corner. Frustration mounting, she nearly ran over a man who had been unfortunate enough to step from a shop doorway right into her path. Cussing, she side-stepped him and continued her dash in search of the ghost who was currently haunting her.

As before, she once again lost him. She was furious now. Cussing once again, she slapped the brick wall next to her, the stinging pain in her hand calming her only slightly. The mood remained long into the evening and, as she sat across from Ben, she couldn’t help the small tear of frustration that found its way silently down her cheek.

Donovan posted September 18, 2004 09:55 PM

Ben sat across from Kat as she finished the story she had begun a block down the street. This time of night the burger bar was getting ready to close its doors but they had slipped in at the last moment. They were the only patrons and, their meals already served, the waitress leaned casually against the door to the kitchen, flirting with the cook.

Kat, across from him in the booth near the front window, was on the verge of tears. There weren't many safe paths to tread. According to everything she had ever told him, it couldn't be Jack Morgahn she had seen, but to tell her this when she was in this state of mind would not be helpful to either of them. Besides, he had never seen the body. Who was he to say?

Kat looked out the window at the street beyond as a train kicked dust down from the tracks above.

Neither of them had done more than toy with their food as she told her story and now Ben took a bite of his sandwich, more to give himself time to consider than anything else.

“Well?” Kat looked at him across the table as he chewed.

Ben took a sip of his drink and swallowed his food before speaking. “Well,” he ventured. “You said yourself you only saw the back of his head...” Immaterial. Kat's intuition was what she was relying on here. It wouldn't mater if she had seen him or not. She would have felt something, even if she didn't know what.

Kat wasn't inclined to argue about it. She looked back at the window, turning her good eye away from him, but not before he saw the tear escape down her cheek. Ben didn't think he had ever seen her so frustrated.

He looked down at his plate and pushed it away. His appetite was gone. He reached across the table and squeezed her shoulder. A mistaken glimpse wouldn't be affecting her like this. And here he was making her doubt herself.

He let go of her shoulder and leaned back, not sure what to say. They sat that way for a few minutes until the waitress came and quietly cleared away their barely touched food. She returned a moment later and refilled Kat's coffee. “Do you think he saw you?” he asked eventually.

Kat shrugged, but what she said was in no way uncertain. “Aye. I think he was followin' me.”

Axin posted September 18, 2004 09:58 PM

The guards standing in front of the double doors to the office go white as they see an obviously angry Axin storming toward them. They both realize they only have a few seconds to make a life-altering decision. Stand in his way, or get the hell out of it. As guards one would think it an easy decision. Their jobs, after all, were to protect the boss from anything hostile, and Axin certainly looked hostile. Plus the boss did express quite clearly that she was not to be interrupted, but Axin seemed to have special privileges where certain things were concerned. In the end, one of the guards decides it wouldn't be wise to stand in Axin's way and dives to one side. The other guard, however, takes a step forward, holding an arm out.

"The boss is in a meeting and does not want to be interu.... " Axin abruptly stops the guards proclamations by planting a hand on the mans chest and launching him through the double doors.

Within the office Jos sits on the edge of a large black conference table in the center of the room. Her legs, crossed at the ankles, are clad in knee length, blood red leather, steel tipped stiletto heeled boots. A short black suit skirt hugs her tightly, rising teasingly as she leans back to place her red leather gloved hands (a matching set to the boots) on the table near her blaster. She’s smiling to the group of businessmen standing in front of her while they struggle to keep their minds on the deal they were there to make.

The double doors swing open so violently, one of the doors crack, the other coming off one of its hinges as the guard sails through the air, covering the distance from the broken doors to fly over the desk and crash into the wall behind it. The body connecting to the wall is so brutal that every person in the room knows the guard is dead before he ever hits the ground. In that instant, Caed, who had been kneeling “in her place” on the floor beside the desk, jumps to her feet and is between Jos and whatever had caused the doors to explode, a growling snarl clearly heard through the room. Her tension eases and her defensive pose shifts to a more relaxed position as she sees the reason for the assault… Axin.

Jos jumps to her feet, her hand reaching for the blaster until she realizes Axin strides through those broken doors. Furious at his interruption, she leaves the blaster where it lies and storms towards him, even as he turns to walk toward her. The businessmen scramble to get out of the way as the two imposing forces barrel towards each other. Caed, having seen these little scenarios play themselves out more than once returns to her kneeling position beside the desk and quietly watches.

As Axin closes in on Jos, she rants at him about barging in and interrupting her meeting. In a swift motion, too fast for most to anticipate, he grabs the front of her blood red satin shirt and lifts her off the ground, swinging her around to slam her back against the wall. Pinning her with his forearm against her throat, a hand still twisted into the now torn satin of her shirt, he growls in her face menacingly. Partially from instinct, partially from rage, she swings a knee towards his groin, a move he anticipates and blocks by turning his hips away from the onslaught slightly. The knee rebounds harmlessly off the rock-hardness of his thigh.

"Ya had her killed! Th'slave girl I ordered!!" he growls as he holds her steady. "D'ya know 'ow hard, an' expensive it is t'get yer hands on a Knieran slave girl!? Bred into, and trained from birth!!?" Jos knows struggling wont help much so she grabs onto Axin's arm with both hands, pulling up as best she can to alleviate some of the pressure to her throat. She glares at him fiercely, letting off a growl of her own.

"You… don't get… to play... with your own… toys." She speaks through gritted teeth, partly from the pressure against her throat, partly from the rage that had been welling inside her and partly from her battle to suppress other feelings this… bastard… sends through her. "You're.... lucky.... killing that bitch is all... I did. You're mine, Axin dear, and.... no one... fucks with what's mine... without my say so." She manages a bit of a smile, glancing over Axin's shoulder for a moment. "Besides… you should have... seen how… your little delivery ... hurt our Caedy's feelings." Her breath suddenly catches in her throat as Axin pushes his weight into her, tightening his grip on her shirt and pressing her against the wall harder. Neither noticed Caed bow her head lower, the blush hidden by her ebony fur as she feels the businessmen’s eyes shift to her.

"I'll fuck wit whoever I bloody feel like! I belong to no one." He leans into her, bringing his face close to hers. As she begins to writhe from the added pressure, a grin curls up the side of his lips. "If anythin’, Joslynne dear, you belong to me."

Twisting her hips sideways, she manages to bring a leg into position and lunges. His hold on her suddenly loosens as the steel tipped stiletto heel of her boot plunges deep into the side his upper calf. She quickly withdraws the thin heel and lunges again, connecting for a second time nearly in the same spot. Surprised, Axin stumbles back, his hand moving to grip his bleeding leg. As she’s released, Jos falls to the floor. Rising to her feet, she coughs as she places a hand against sore throat.

"One thing's for sure... you... wont be fucking your little Knieran slave girl!" she moves to stand in front of her desk, taking a long second to glare meaningfully at the remaining guard before turning that glare on Axin. "And if you EVER barge into MY office again when I'm conducting business I swear I'll cut you into little pieces myself!! Get out!!"

Axin, recovered from the booted attack stands straight. His hand and pant leg are stained red with blood and he growls low in his throat as he moves toward Jos slowly, like a great cat stalking its prey. She stands her ground, her gaze narrowing dangerously as he nears. She’s unable to stop her deep heavy breaths or her body’s shaking. She is charged with adrenaline from a mixture of rage and, as much as she’s loathed to admit it, fear and excitement of the man before her.

"Get out... I'm in a meeting." The tone in her voice drops a bit, her words sounding hollow and she silently curses herself for it. Axin's glare doesn't hold as he nears her, instead, he lets it slide over her body in the most provocative and possessive way. Slowly, his eyes travel from her sweaty brow, to the front of her torn shirt, down to those wicked boots as if inspecting a piece of meat. “Why?” He wonders to himself. “Why does he put up with her shit?” Turning his head to the side slightly, his eyes never leave her as his next comment is directed towards the businessmen cowering in the corner.

"Meetin's over." He turns his head back to Jos as she opens her mouth to form an angry protest. He quickly interrupts anything she might have said with a quick shove. Jos stumbles back, banging into the onyx desk before falling back onto it. She moves to get up but Axin is immediately there, one hand on her chest to pin her down, the other hand moving to the waistband of her skirt. She feels the silk being torn from her body even as the sound finds its way to her ears. Squirming, she tries to throw a punch at his chest as her panties are also shredded. She curses him under her breath, and then curses herself as her body betrays her and an uncontrollable moan escapes her lips.

Caed, having been witness to this more times than she can remember stands, quietly picks up the dead body and ushers the confused businessmen out of the room. Dropping the body to the hallway floor, she turns and wanders off to fetch her mistress a change of cloths, the number to their repairman, and a medic.

Lenits posted September 18, 2004 09:59 PM

The door opened and Dylan Micheals strutted in. Lawrence didn't look up. The other man had decided that Lawrence was his project for this month and had been trying to get him out of the office ever since.

He resisted.

“No.”

Dylan stopped in mid strut. “Dude, you haven't even heard it yet!”

“Doesn't matter, I'm busy.”

Dylan resumed his strut and leaned casually against a rack of equipment. “You're always busy. Tell me something new.”

He had given up trying to keep Micheals out. The guy had clearance, along with an uncanny ability to get around locked doors.

At least he knew his files were secure. Micheals would never get past his encryption.

“I've got a meeting. I have to give a briefing.”

“A meeting, huh? Sounds important. With who?”

“With me.”

Lawrence looked up. The doors hadn't closed behind Dylan and another figure was silhouetted in the light from the hall. He glared at Dylan for not closing the doors. He knew better than to leave a secure room wide open, even if it was in the “cleared only” area of the ship.

“My meeting's not with you,” he told the figure, looking back to his work.

“I've told you to move this equipment several times now. When's it going to happen?”

Lawrence glanced over at the racks along the starboard wall and squinted at Lantis Pirin, Jos' administrator. “Move it where?”

“You know my rules. No transmitters within ten meters of computer terminals, no receivers within one meter of computer terminals, no comm cables within six inches of power conduits-”

Lawrence held up his hand to stop the tirade. He had heard it before.

“I can't do it this week, Mein Netzführer. Why don't you send down some of your Network Nazis on Monday to move the shit around the way you like it and I'll bill you for whatever they break?”

He logged out and grabbed the padd he'd transferred his data to before brushing past Pirin and into the hall. He heard a low whistle from Micheals as the door closed behind him but he kept walking. One thing he didn't need to worry about from Pirin was him taking this back to the boss. He'd learned that lesson early on. She didn't care. The first time he'd complained about Pirin's harassment he'd received a suggestion that he kill the other man. It hadn't come from Jos, but she had laughed at the notion and then made it clear in no uncertain terms she didn't want Pirin dead. The man was “indispensable”. Even so, he'd gotten the impression, correctly, that anything else was fair game. She liked to watch her people fight it out amongst themselves. Since Lawrence had come here Pirin had watched his own reports on Vextis slowly being supplanted by information acquired by Lawrence, not only on Vextis, but on New Oregon, Stinel and Katrylle's whole operation, even on Jos' own people.

If there was anything Jos' inner circle feared more than anything else it was that they might cease to be “indispensable”.

The “Cleared Only” zone was the most heavily shielded area of the ship. It was neatly sandwiched between the ship's twin computer cores and had only one point of entry. All processing of sensitive data happened within its boundaries and guards checked everyone that came in or out.

It was the proximity to the computer cores that had Pirin's panties in a twist. Theoretically his equipment could cause processing errors in the core. Theoretically secure data from the core could be transferred to his transmitters via induction. Theoretically a person could spontaneously combust, but the odds of it happening weren't even worth mentioning.

Lawrence stopped at the checkpoint and showed his color coded badge to the guard and handed over the padd. The guard plugged the unit in and double checked the encryption before returning it to him.

“Going to see the boss?” The padd was keyed to reveal its contents only to Jos. “Put in a good word for me, will ya?”

Lawrence frowned and took the padd. “Watch what you wish for.” It still amazed him that anyone would intentionally try to bring themselves to Jos' attention. If he'd known what he was getting into he... No, he wouldn't change anything. Jos would help him get to Stinel. That was worth whatever she put him through.

He made his way out of the bowels of the ship, barely noticing the bustling crew members that walked the halls, rushing about their business. Most of them had no idea what sort of business they were in. Jos' flagship was the centerpiece of her “legitimate” business. It was also the focal point of her criminal operation. All of the big decisions about everything happened here. Some companies had buildings as their corporate headquarters. Jos had a starship.

The lift took him through legal, past accounting and up through the depths of human resources. When it reached the outer hull the glass on the wall of the compartment depolarized and he could see down the length of the ship as it carried him up to the executive offices.

The doors opened and he stepped out. This late in the ship's day most of Jos' executive corps had gone back to their quarters, but there was still a good deal of activity. This was the seat of power. On other ships it was the bridge, but Jos rarely deigned to interact with the actual crew of this ship. The captain of the ship was just an employee with a small office who's job was to make sure they didn't crash and that they got where they were going on time.

In a sense, this whole area was Jos' office, not just the large room looking down from above through one way glass. This was Jos' interface to any part of her business she didn't trust anyone else to run for her. Lawrence made his way to the stairs which spiraled up to a large balcony outside her office. He climbed them and paused outside the large double doors. He knocked once.

“Enter.” The voice from inside sounded annoyed. He turned the handle and pushed the doors open, thinking to himself, not for the first time, that hinged doors on a space ship were a bad idea, although he wasn't sure just why that was. He noticed that the doors pushed aside small piles of sawdust near the hinges... Recent repairs it seemed.

The office was dimly lit and as the doors swung shut behind him it took his eyes a moment to adjust. The room was about sixty feet long and forty feet wide. The only thing in the room that wasn't black was the carpet, which was white and looked out of place. Everything else, the display stands, the walls, the furniture, was as dark as the temperament of the woman who possessed them.

He stood at one of the “narrow” ends of the room looking down towards the large ebony desk at the far end. Jos was not at the desk.

The wall curved at both ends of the room and there was a bookshelf to his left which he knew concealed a hidden doorway. He had been through that door only once, when he had first been brought on board as a prisoner. The guards had escorted him and the other castaways from the Pandora's Shame through that door rather than alarm the office staff below. Behind Jos' desk at the far end of the room was a wet bar and another door but it sat slightly ajar and the lights inside were extinguished. It would not have been polite to go into her private washroom looking for her anyhow.

The windows looking down onto the offices were polarized to block out the light of the offices below and ran the length of the wall on his right. A matching set on the opposite side of the room showed a view of space. That scene faded and was replaced with a lush and beautiful waterfall a moment later. The effect was utterly eye deceiving and couches were set in sunken areas on both sides of the room to allow relaxed viewing of whatever Jos' might be in the mood for. The raised floor ran the center of the room, from where he now stood to Jos' desk, and was wide enough to accommodate a large conference table which matched the rest of the room. The conference table was not always here when Lawrence came, but how Jos got rid of it when she didn't need it was something he had never asked.

Antiques were displayed prominently throughout the room on ebony stands. Recessed lighting above the displays kept them in view even though the rest of the room was dim.

It was in the sunken area with the view of the waterfall that he finally located Jos. Caedwynn was with her and the feline woman glared at him for a moment before she licked her lips and began cleaning her face. Jos seemed to be adjusting her clothes. They were reclined on one of the black leather sofas, and Lawrence guessed they had just finished. Jos didn't mind letting him squirm while they carried on and wasn't likely to stop just because he had arrived.

“Lawrence, you're late.”

So that was why she was annoyed. She had wanted to carry on while he watched. “I was interrupted, ma'am.” Trying to explain the trouble with Pirin would be pointless. “I won't let it happen again.”

“Good.” She stood and stepped around the couch and up next to the table. Caed continued her cleaning, licking her clawed hand and rubbing it across her face just like a cat.

“What do you have for me today?” Their meetings were a weekly affair ordinarily, but when he found something special this afternoon he had called her to bump this week's session a couple of days early. “And it better be good.”

He handed her the padd. “I have Stinel and Katrylle. Alone with no one but their business manager and one other listed associate.”

The look of annoyance on her face disappeared as a slow smile spread across her face. She dropped the padd on the table and sat down in one of the chairs. “Tell me.” This was typical. She would read the information thoroughly once she was alone, but she preferred to get her information orally first.

“I obtained a current assignment roster. It was posted on their external network in error. It shows Katrylle and Stinel's current location as L'Riahan City on Kroy.”

“That's not far from Pelvar is it?”

“No, ma'am. Less than a light year.” The significance of this was lost to him.

“What are they doing there?”

“Solicitation. They're bidding on a transport contract.”

“For who?”

“Sehcnas Import/Export Limited.”

“I know that pleeb,” she paused. “It would be simple to get this contract away from her.”

“There is a note from their business manager showing their low bid, ma'am.”

She glanced at the padd but didn't ask what the bid was. “If she's there the contract is probably under the table...” she trailed off, and pressed both hands to her lips thoughtfully. “What's the penalty for murder on Kroy?”

An off topic question, but Lawrence was prepared. He pulled a second padd from his back pocket and sent the query to legal. The answer came back quickly. They were efficient.

Jos stood and walked around the table while he read, waiting for his answer. The smile on her lips grew wider as she watched his look of distaste.

“It's... unpleasant.”

“Tell me.”

He read aloud. “The traditional form of execution involves a public display of repentance followed by ritual bleeding. The criminal is suspended inverted in a steel cage while-”

She threw her arms around him, cutting him off in mid-sentence and laughing as she pressed herself against him. “Perfect! Oh how lovely. I want front row seats. I want to remember every moment so I can save it for someone special.”

“A frame up?” The voice came from the opposite side of the room from Caed. Jos' other “pet”, Axin was sitting in the shadows there, watching the entire exchange. “It can't be that easy.” Caed purred at the sound of his voice and lithely padded her way across the room to him.

Lawrence glanced back at the padd reluctantly when Jos pulled back. “You'd be surprised. They put very little stock in trials and it's guilty unless proved innocent.”

“The frame up won't be the hard part,” Jos told Axin, waving her hand absently as she schemed. “Katrylle has a short fuse and she's not a people person. I'm surprised Stinel even lets her come to these things. I'll have to kill the client myself, of course. Make sure there's at least one witness... The hard part is making sure Stinel doesn't find some way of keeping her in the clear.”

This last was directed at him. He rose to the occasion. “I can take care of him,” he said forcefully. He'd been waiting for the chance for the last six years.

“If you fail, Lawrence, be assured that Katrylle's fate will be yours. I will see to it personally.”

“An' Ryax?” Axin's eyes stayed with Caed now as she purred and insinuated herself into his lap. “Y'really think he won't make a trip t'save her?”

“He will need to be dealt with, but not killed,” Jos declared. “I want him to suffer in a completely different way.”

“Acording to their files he's not close, but Vextis is fast,” Lawrence said. “If he catches wind of what's happening he'll show up.”

“How do we neutralize him?” Jos asked, this time directing the question to Axin.

“Distract him. Draw him away. Far enough that he won't get back in time t'help.”

“Specifics,” Jos demanded. “I need specifics!”

“He has been known t'go off on little missions o'mercy,” Axin said, tracing his claws over Caed's head and down across her cheek.

“Can you set one up?”

“I could get him away... but I'm jus' so tired o' th'whole thin'. Besides, he's grown weak from what I hear... Won't be much fun.”

Jos walked towards him, her eye cold. “You'll do it though.” She turned back to Lawrence. “Any other variables?”

He considered. “Axin should use jamming to keep word from reaching them... I'll get you the frequencies they use,” he told the felinoid. “It shouldn't start until the last possible moment so you don't tip them off.”

Jos nodded. “And?”

“And the shape shifter.”

Jos scowled. “The shape shifter.”

“She not listed as being with them but Kat never seems to go anywhere without her close by. She should be taken out of the picture. Medical might be able to come up with something for her unique physiology but it may be easier just to capture her. I bet they'd like a new guinea pig.”

Jos smiled again, this time at Axin and Caed. “Take care of the details, Lawrence. I want us there tomorrow.”

Lawrence took that as a dismissal and left before the tangle of flesh in Axin's chair grew by one more. When he got back to his lab, Micheals was still there, waiting for him.

Dylan Michaels posted September 28, 2004 12:21 PM

Larry was an ok sort of guy… in a nerdy kind of way. It was Dylan’s opinion, however, that Larry needed some serious chick action. Too much time around computers was bad for the dude’s image. He smiled when he thought of the “girls” he had lined up for this evening. Dylan was going to make sure Larry made this date... kicking and screaming if need be.

Dylan sat at one of the consoles and began punching keys, searching for some sort of game to amuse himself as he waited for Larry to return. He figured that, being a computer geek, Larry had to have some righteous games somewhere on these systems. Unfortunately, being a computer geek, Larry had some seriously bogus password encryptions enabled.

Always up for a challenge, Dylan considered various possible passwords that Larry might have used. Birthday…nah, he didn’t know that. Girlfriends… no brainer…doubt he knew what a girl was. Cat? Probably not. Alright fine… start with the basics…last name backwards... S… T… I… N… E… L

It was his first try so he was surprised when he didn’t immediately get kicked back to the password prompt. He wasn’t exactly in though.

Only one thing came up on the screen… a file with a picture of Larry on the front page. This wasn’t what he wanted so he tried to get back to the main system. Didn’t work. Everything he tried was blocked. There was no way to get to anything else but this file. So despite his best efforts he found himself looking at the file.

Next to the picture was a name; Benjamin Lawrence Stinel. That wasn’t Larry. Well, it was partly. Lawrence. But now that he thought about it, that didn’t look exactly like Larry. Not as pale. No glasses. Hair was shorter. Maybe it was an old picture. He read on.

The majority of the information was basic personnel stuff. Born; New Oregon January 23, 520... one brother and one sister…blah, blah, blah. He was about to close the file and make another attempt at breaking into the system to search for games when a name jumped out at him.

Under “Known Associates”, a listing for a Katrylle “Kat” Morgahn. It wasn’t so much the Katrylle that got him. It was the odd spelling of Morgahn he’d seen only one other place. This was how Jack, his father’s friend, spelled his last name. Reading further, Dylan discovered that Katrylle was this Stinel’s sister-in-law as well as business partner. There was no mention of Jack’s name anywhere in the document. He’d have to remember to ask Jack later if he knows this Katrylle broad.

Closing the file, he was about to return to his search for the righteous video games he was sure were hidden somewhere in the system when he heard Larry’s voice talking to security down the hall. Sighing heavily, he left the chair and hopped up on a nearby counter.

“What are you still doing here?” Larry asked as soon as he came through the door.

Lenits posted September 28, 2004 12:22 PM

“What are you still doing here?” he asked as soon as he came through the door.

“Guarding your stuff, dude.” Dylan hopped down from his perch on one of the counters Lawrence used for soldering and put on a grin. “After you left I thought Señor Pirin was going to have a fit and start ripping stuff out himself.”

Lawrence looked around, momentarily alarmed, but realized after a quick check that everything was intact. He nodded to Dylan grudgingly. “Thanks.”

“Think nothing of it, amigo.” Dylan beamed. “My pleasure, really. Dude's got an inferiority complex if you ask me. Seems kind of threatened by you, don't ya think?”

Lawrence pulled a chair back over to his terminal and sat down. Dylan sidled up and sat on the edge of the desk.

“Now I've gotta ask myself,” Dylan continued, “what a guy like Lantis Pirin would be so afraid of you for.”

Lawrence didn't show any expression as he logged in. “I don't know what you mean.”

Dylan laughed and hit him lightly on the arm. “Sure ya do. Any time someone says 'I don't know what you mean,' all coy like, it means they know exactly what you mean. You ask me, Pirin's on the way down, and you, bright guy like yourself, you're on the way up.”

Lawrence didn't know how to argue with logic like that, so he stayed quiet and fed Jos' destination orders into the computer. They would be in the captain's hands momentarily. Late tomorrow afternoon they would be in orbit around Kroy. He'd have all day tomorrow to plan the next moves.

He logged back out of his station and leaned back to look at Dylan. It occurred to him to wonder just what it was the other man did. He made a mental note to check into it.

“I'm not after his job,” he told Dylan.

“Hey, why not, dude? It's gotta pay more than whatever it is you do down here. And the power? Do you know how much that turns on the chicks?” A knowing look passed across Dylan's face.

Lawrence shook his head and stood up. He made a quick round of the room, making sure his equipment was set to record and to shut down anything he didn't need up. Dylan stood up and followed him. “Hey, speaking of the ladies... How'd you like to get hooked up tonight?”

Lawrence stopped and turned to face the younger man. This he hadn't been expecting. “Hooked up?”

“Yeah. You know.” Dylan tapped his arm again. “Got a couple of girls lined up for tonight. Met this girl down in cybernetics. Got a body like a fembot, man, but she's got a brain like one too. I told her to bring a friend, you know, and I was thinking maybe you could field the technobabble for me. You and me, Law. Couplea lady killers, whatdya- Hey, you feel that?”

Lawrence glanced at his watch as Dylan looked up.

“Feel what?” Lawrence asked, knowing perfectly well what. He'd just fed the course change order to the captain three minutes ago. Not bad time actually. The captain was on top of things tonight.

“We just changed course.” Dylan was watching the ceiling as if he could see the path the ship was taking.

Lawrence watched Dylan for a moment as Dylan spaced. He didn't know just what it was but there was always something a little off about Dylan. Almost like he was playing dumb. Lawrence had a feeling he saw a lot more than he let on. It wasn't anything specific about him really but ever since Lawrence had met the man he'd felt compelled to “play dumb” himself more than once, just to keep the other man guesssing. Maybe it was that dynamic between them that kept Dylan coming back. It was almost like a game.

One he didn't have time for right now. Jos had given him a task, even if he did have all day tomorrow to work on it.

"Look, shove off, will you? I've got work to do."

Dylan Michaels posted September 28, 2004 01:09 PM

Larry found his way back to his console and plopped down in the chair. Without looking at Dylan, he called over his shoulder “Look, shove off, will you? I've got work to do.”

Not to be deterred, Dylan leaned against the desk, crowding Larry’s arm. “Righteous babes they were too...never get another chance...”

As Larry threw a withering glance in his direction, Dylan stood suddenly, his hands up as if in surrender. “Alright, alright.... I’m leaving.... but don't come cryin’ to me when you're horney and dateless...”

He stalked to the door and disappeared through it only to reappear a half second later. “I mean, these babes are willing to put *out* man...”

Dylan heard Larry’s frustrated sigh from the door even as the other man locked his machine, stood and made his way over to stand barely a foot away. His best threatening look on his face, Larry put meaning in each word as he repeated, “Shove… OFF”

Dylan shook his head sadly. “Dude.... your loss man... righteous chicks.... puttin’ out... won't cost much...they're already willin...”

He had him. Dylan could see the annoyance change to interest. “What do you mean... cost?”

Smiling in triumph, Dylan begins again in earnest “I mean, ya won't have to buy them too many drinks, man.... They're WILLIN! ”

The frustration on Larry’s face returned, but instantly transferred itself to resignation as he realized there was no getting rid of Dylan until he got his way. Perhaps if Dylan thought he’d meet them at whatever rendezvous, he’d go away happy. Larry didn’t have to make an appearance. He could deal with the fall-out from Dylan later. Throwing his arms up in surrender, Larry growled, “Okay, fine. Where and when?”

Instead of answering Larry’s question, Dylan grabbed his arm, dragging him out the door and down the hallway in the direction of one of the many lounges shipboard. “KEWL...you wont regret it dude! Best night of your life!”

Ryan Swets posted September 28, 2004 10:32 PM

The bastard had vanished again.

Ryan sighed and sat back against the door of dismal project building he'd chosen for shelter, drawing a thin blanket tightly around his hunched form as he watched the rain in its torrents battle to wash decades of scum from the buildings and streets of the L'Riahan Highlands. Few of the city's more affluent residents ever risked coming to this part of town, and the rain had driven even the most desperate of the slice-fiends and muon junkies indoors for the night -- it should have been child's play to track the man down and confront him.

Instead, he'd fucking evaporated. Again.

Who the hell was this guy?

Ryan had first noticed him a week ago: tall, graying, and loitering near the gates to the hotel while trying hard to look like he wasn't loitering. Waiting for someone, maybe? Except that anyone with legitimate business would have an appointment and clearance. Ryan had asked Security to see the man off, but the guards who swept the gate area reported that the streets were clear. He hadn't thought anything of it until the man began appearing regularly, always with the same air of faux complacence and always gone before the staff could get to him.

On the fourth day, Ryan discovered that the stranger was a ghost. Or, at the very least, one who was immaterial from the perspective of a Jedi. He had spotted the man again, skulking this time near one of the side doors that Kat and Ben preferred to use when they didn't want to be noticed coming or going by the gossip-mongers who lived or worked with a view of the hotel's main gates. Ryan had decided to speak to the man personally, reaching through the Force to dull his mind and hold him at the door, but the first mental touch was like plunging into a rancid pond. The currents of the Force avoided the stranger completely, parting around him like water around... around a foetid, stinking corpse.

The thought rushed unbidden into Ryan's mind and he shut it out with a vicious snarl. As the initial shock faded, he realized that the man was more of a void than anything else, a phantom in the web of thought which connected all things. And then, abruptly, the void was gone and the Force rushed in to fill the vacuum its departure left. Ryan wasn't surprised to find the streets empty when he arrived at the gate.

Since that day, he'd caught what he thought were brief glimpses of the same man. Both times the phantom stranger had been shadowing Kat through crowds in the streets as she returned to the hotel, and Ryan began to assume that she had gotten herself into trouble... again. Force-null investigators, assassins, and agents-for-hire were not unknown, although such individuals tended to charge a premium for their services. Ryan grinned slightly at that thought: you could almost put money on the fact that someone, somewhere wanted Kat dead at any given time... it was part of what made her the likeable young lady that she was. He wasn't sure if Kat knew about her latest mystery stalker, but her tightly wound body language suggested she did.

The second time she was tailed back, Ryan went to her room to see if she knew any more than he did. The door was unlocked but she was nowhere to be found, and he knew better than to go searching for her if she wanted privacy, so he left a note on her desk.

"Kat: You're being followed. There's something very wrong about him. Come see me as soon as you can. And please be careful. Ryan."

He was turning to leave when a chill ran down his spine with intensity of ice water. The Force was parting around a void on the other side of the door.

Ryan flicked a hand and killed the lights, dropping into the defensive stance of the form VII lightsaber technique as his mind cleared into a singular focus. A faint scraping from the hallway, and the door slid silently open. Ryan recognized the man instantly in the backlight from the hall -- remarkably tall, greying hair, and an aura of otherworldliness that made the skin crawl. He was pocketing a hacked keycard and he moved with an unsettling familiarity as he turned to find the light switch. Ryan's lightsaber hissed to life, casting bizarre violet shadows against the walls of the room.

"Big mistake, friend."

Startled, the man lashed out with a long, heavy weapon that had been hidden under his coat. Ryan cut it in two with a stroke that left an angry glowing ten-inch gash in the wall above the bed and ducked under the man's backswing, dodging the remaining half of the thing and bringing his saber up in a guard to fend off any further surprises.

Except the man wasn't there. Heavy footsteps were already pounding halfway down the hall.

Cursing, Ryan launched himself through the door and sprinted after the stranger's retreating back, tapping the comm on his lapel. Someone in security answered, a young sounding girl on the hotel staff that he hadn't met, and Ryan cut her off.

"Security! Lock this hotel down! Now!" The girl, confused, was obviously checking her station. "But sir, there's no one in the building without current i..."

"NOW! Don't ask questions, just do it! And triple guard the doors! I'll answer for it personally, pay for it even, just GO!"

The low bass of an alarm floated distantly through the rush of blood in his ears as he followed the phantom through the passage to the common area and out into the main lobby. The man kicked through the exterior doors and flew out into the courtyard. Ryan was dropping slightly to ready himself for a roll to avoid the worst of the falling glass when the lobby elevator gave a cheerful "Ding!" and the doors opened.

Ben stepped directly into his path, facing away from the doors and the man beyond, his eyes widening slightly in surprise as Ryan charged down on him.

"Ryan? Wha..."

The Jedi sent him back into the elevator with a Force push that took him off his feet. Breaking out into the sunlight with a faint tinge of regret, Ryan caught the ghostliest glimpse of a leather duster already disappearing over the impossibly high security wall of the hotel and growled with frustration, leaping up with a boost from the Force to grab one of the topposts between razor wire strands and flip himself over in pursuit.

The chase had led him here to this dingy corner of hell in the city before the trail went cold. Aggravated but more determined than ever, Ryan had settled down with a few thin scraps of cloth over his Jedi tunic to blend in with the local indigents and prepared for a very long wait.

A Jedi, after all, must be patient.

Lenits posted September 29, 2004 02:50 AM

Lawrence had never been in any of the various lounges on the ship. He knew they were there, of course. Jos liked to keep her people happy. At the end of any given duty day most of her employees ended up in one of the many bars, pubs, or dance clubs dispersed within stumbling distance of the habitat areas of the vessel.

This particular lounge was a hybrid pub/dance club. They served food and drinks of the alcoholic variety. There was dancing. There was a live band. Lawrence was out of his element.

Beside him in the doorway Dylan was almost twitching. He shifted his feet and looked in at the club. The bouncer waited patiently for them to enter but Dylan stalled as he moved with the music from the band.

“Alright, kid. Inspection time.” He turned and looked Lawrence over with a frown before reaching up and taking his glasses off of his face.

Lawrence squinted.

“Stop that. Drop a couple of buttons on the shirt, dude. Damn you're pale. Uh.... Hang on...” Dylan reached into his pocket and pulled out a pocket knife. With one quick motion he'd turned Lawrence around and cut the rubber band out of his pony tail before Lawrence even knew what hit him. “That look's for body builders, dude. You don't fit the bill. Yeah that's better. Common, don't give me that look. It wasn't long enough anyway. You look goofy with half your hair pulled back and the rest hanging in your face. And stop squinting. I suppose it's too late to do anything about the shoes...”

Dylan grinned again and walked into the club with Lawrence's glasses, not waiting to see if he was followed or not.

Lawrence did follow. To get his glasses back if nothing else. The dance floor was in the center of the room and just inside the door a ramp led up to tables and a bar on the left and a few stairs led up to more tables on the right. A railing separated the dance floor from the other areas. Dylan went to the right.

Lawrence managed to trip on the fourth and final step as he followed Dylan to a crescent booth about halfway to a second, smaller bar that Lawrence hadn't noticed from the door. The girls Dylan had alluded to sat together at the back of the booth and smiled as Lawrence approached. He was momentarily thankful that it was dark because he was certain his face was as red as the hair of the girl on the left. She whispered something to her friend as Dylan introduced him. Lawrence was certain they had seen him trip. This was why he avoided this type of situation.

“Ladies,” Dylan smiled at them. His voice oozed charm. “This is Larry. Call him Law. Law, this is Lauren Dramnal and her friend?”

The girl on the right stopped playing with her hair and smiled at Lawrence. “Daisy,” she said extending her hand. Still not in his element, Lawrence shook it and smiled dumbly back at her.

Dylan on the other hand took her hand and smiled warmly into her eyes, holding on a bit longer than necessary. “It's a pleasure to meet you, Daisy. You look ravishing this evening.”

The red head, Lauren, cleared her throat pointedly. Dylan's smile never faded. It merely redirected itself to his previously planned target. He sat down and tried to slip his arm around her. She deflected.

Lawrence couldn't help but mentally applaud her as he sat down next to the blond girl, Daisy.

“So what do you do, Law?” This from Daisy.

Lawrence winced. Dylan would pay later for introducing him that way. Larry was actually dignified compared to this. He unconvincingly turned to his “official” title. “Uh, I'm a Computer, Network, Switching, and Cryptographic Systems engineer.”

Next to Dylan, Lauren perked up, interested, “Cryptographics? What sort of keying schemes do you use?”

Daisy groaned. “You two aren't going to go all geek on me, are you?” she asked, looking back and forth between Lauren and Lawrence.

Dylan laughed and tried to slip that arm around Lauren again now that she was leaning forward. He was moderately more successful this time.

Lauren laughed regretfully and leaned back, pinning Dylan's arm in what looked to be an uncomfortable fashion against the back of the leather seat. “I'm sorry. I'll save my questions for later.”

“I don't think I've ever heard that job title before,” Daisy said, looking at Lawrence.

“How big is your department?”

“Daisy works in Personnel,” Lauren interjected.

“Hey, you must know everyone,” Dylan said, leaning forward as much as his pinned arm would allow.

Daisy grinned impishly at Dylan, “I know that you make just over ninty a year, prefer boxers over briefs and have been reprimanded twice in the last three months.”

“Ouch!” Dylan clutched his chest and fell back against the back of the bench again, “she strikes home.”

“Oh don't be so dramatic. Your boss is Lantis Pirin, right? Only two reprimands in three months in his department is the same as a glowing recommendation from anyone else.” Daisy turned her attention back to Lawrence, “but we were talking about you, weren't we? Do you work for Pirin too?”

Lawrence glanced at Dylan then back to Daisy. “Not exactly,” he said carefully.

“Larry's a contractor,” Dylan put in and leaned forward conspiratorially. “Nobody down in SI actually knows who he works for.” He put a finger up against his lips as if to indicate it was on the down low.

“Really?” Daisy was entranced. She leaned forward, the better to aid Dylan in his “secret” telling.

“He's always going off to these high level briefings and meetings. Just this afternoon he told off Pirin. I thought old Lantis was going to have an embolism.”

Lawrence's expression shot daggers across the table at Dylan.

Dylan didn't notice.

Daisy turned to Lawrence with an look of awe on her face. “Wow, you must really be up there, huh?”

“Not really,” Lawrence said sheepishly.

The waitress came and saved him by taking their drink orders. The conversation took other lines until she returned. As the drinks were placed in front of them, the band changed songs. Lawrence suddenly found his arm being clutched by Daisy. “Oooh! I love this one. Do you want to dance?” Daisy was looking longingly out at the dance floor.

“Er.... I don't really-”

“I'd love to dance.”

Dylan was already standing up and had a hand held out to Daisy. She all but pushed Lawrence out of the booth before taking Dylan's hand as they both headed for the dance floor. Lawrence plopped back down in his seat and slid over far enough that she wouldn't expect him to get up to let her back in. This was how he found himself sitting next to Lauren.

She watched Dylan and Daisy go with a vaguely shocked look on her face. “How do you like that?” she turned to Lawrence. “I think we've just been dumped.”

Lawrence shrugged and half smiled, downing the drink the waitress had brought him before starting in on Daisy's untouched cocktail. “I'll let you in on something. It's not the first time for me.”

Lauren smiled at him, not holding back the way he had. “Me either.” Now she pouted, “see if I ever ask her to double with me again though.”

Now that he was closer to her he could actually see her. Dylan still had his glasses and between the blurriness and the dim lighting he hadn't been able to make out the details that were now visible. She was pretty, he realized. There is a fine line with natural red heads, which he now realized she was, between pretty and plain. Her smile managed to light up her face and set off features she'd only minimally enhanced with makeup. Her hair was pulled back and he now saw light freckles on her forehead and cheeks.

He held her eyes for a few moments before she looked down and he realized he'd been staring.

“So,” she said. “Law. Have you known Dylan long?”

“Lawrence,” Lawrence corrected her. “Even Larry would be better. And I've known him too long.”

She smiled. “How long's that then, Lawrence?”

He thought for a moment. “About eight months.”

She laughed and he found himself smiling more broadly.

“So anyway,” she said. “Now that miss anti-geek is gone. Seriously, what kind of keying schemes?”

They talked for the next twenty minutes about whatever came to mind. She laughed at his jokes. He laughed at hers. He realized suddenly that he was having the most natural conversation he'd had with anyone since.... since ever.

About that same time he realized her eyes were following someone to the door. He turned around just in time to see Dylan and Daisy slip out past the bouncer.

“There they go,” Lauren said. “It's official. We've been ditched.”

“Damn,” Lawrence said. Dylan still had his glasses. He turned back to Lauren. “Do you want to go someplace quieter?”

They made their exit even faster than Dylan and Daisy had.

Jack Morgahn posted October 04, 2004 07:33 PM

It had been six years since he had tasted freedom and now, a week out of prison, he found himself still trying to stay one step ahead of the cop who had put him behind bars. It wasn’t that he had broken out of prison or anything. He had served his time and was released all right and proper like. The cop… Reily… was after the others who had been involved in the “incident” and had been tailing Jack ever since his release.

Seven Years Previously…

For about the tenth time Jack verbally… and violently… cursed Brandon Michaels… aka Joke. As usual, Joke’s timing sucked six ways from Sunday.

The job had been planned damn near to the microsecond. Each person involved had his or her assignments and each was crucial to the plan. Now, the plan and the job were nearly in shreds because of Joke.

It had started innocently enough, but then with Joke, that’s the way it always started. The night before, they had been in a local bar on the small planet of Haulk’Tan. There was the usual reserved excitement the group always felt before a big job. Perhaps the bar hadn’t been a great idea. Perhaps they should have just left Joke at home. Either way…

They had been drinking for an hour or so and the noise was getting slightly out of hand when Joke caught sight of the girl at the bar. In an instant, he was on his feet and swaggering towards the poor girl. The fact that everyone at his table had gone suddenly and completely silent should have given him some hint that something was up. Chick-magnet he imagined he was, however, couldn’t see beyond the pleasures the girl’s body promised. He was the only one of the group who hadn’t realized that promise had already been made to a gorilla of a guy who was currently in the men’s room brushing the hair on his knuckles.

The fight that eventually ensued was short-lived and only involved King Kong and Joke. Unfortunately, for Kong, Joke held a double black belt in an obscure but effective form of Martial Arts known as Mantae. Unfortunately for Joke, the local gendarmes didn’t take kindly to assault and wanton destruction of public property. Delia won the pot (the Raiders had taken bets on how long it would take Joke to put Kong down). Joke never got the girl.

So now their demolitions expert was blowing time in the town jail and the judge wasn’t due back from his fishing trip for another week. Jack was very tempted to let Joke rot, but if the job didn’t happen tonight, it never would and ten million creds in uncut Cepheian Hawk’s Eye was just too much to let slip away. Joke was the only one who could blast the vault at the World Gemstone Council Headquarters in Haulk’Tan.

So, yet another scheme was hatched… one that involved breaking Joke out of jail with minimal attention, if any at all… and getting to the Council Headquarters before the gems were taken from the vault and shipped off planet.

The jailbreak didn’t exactly go off without a hitch. Jack, Kat and Delia were the primaries with Kat and Delia disguised as “ladies of the night” while Jack was their arresting officer. Though they succeeded in getting Joke out and getting to the Council Headquarters in time, Delia had wounded a jail guard who had caught on too quickly.

For a year, Reily had doggedly pursued the Raiders. He arrived on Pelvar just after the Raiders had been ambushed by Darrak’s forces and had barely missed Kat when she left Jack’s ranch. Using his ship’s scanning, Reily discovered faint life signs emanating from Jack’s body in the grave Kat had buried it in at the ranch.

Placing Jack in stasis, Reily returned to Haulk’Tan where Jack was eventually nursed back to health, stood trial and was sentenced to 7 years in a planetary prison.

Once out, Jack immediately began searching for Kat. He had found her on the little rat-hole of a planet and was about to approach her when he had spotted Reily. Suspecting the reason for the cop to be on the same planet he found himself, Jack followed his head rather than his heart and left her where she had been gazing in a shop window. Unfortunately, he didn’t realize she had caught a glimpse of him.

Jack had tried on several occasions to contact Kat, but Reily thwarted nearly every attempt. The man in Kat’s room was a complete surprise and, feeling the mental attack, Jack quickly reverted to survival skills he had taught himself in prison… the mental projection of evil. It had kept the more notorious of the inmates at bay.

Frustrated, he found himself back in his own room wanting nothing more than to completely obliterate the place. Hopefully, tomorrow would be a better day… yeah, right.

Lenits posted December 03, 2004 09:13 PM

Lawrence woke up. That's the simplest way to put it. The complicated way of putting it would be to say that he came to consciousness surprised to find himself in the arms of a red head who was nuzzling his chin. Lauren.

It had been some time since he had woken up with someone else. The girl from the Pandora's Shame had been the last. He could barely even remember her name now. She had been sleeping with his bunk mate and he had come out of the shower his first morning on board to find her getting dressed. They'd spoken briefly at the time and later she'd introduced herself at breakfast and offered to show him around. There was no chance for that. After the Pandora's shame had been attacked and destroyed by Katrylle, she had been one of the survivors who had been “rescued” by Jos. Lawrence had been held in a separate area until he managed to win a limited amount of trust. Shortly after he and the girl had been reacquainted. He had always been fuzzy on the details of that. She was the only crew member from the Pandora's shame he had ever seen since and he had found out recently that Jos had had everyone from the ship liquidated shortly after they had been brought aboard. Everyone but the girl. Megan, he recalled now. He wouldn't be surprised to find out that Jos had asked around among the crew to find out who knew him and pulled her out of the bunch to keep him... busy. It hadn't lasted long. What relationship started that way could?

Lauren stirred in his arms and insinuated an ankle around one of his. Her skin was like silk. He tilted his head to see her face and found her eyes looking back into his. She smiled and slipped away, taking the sheet with her as she headed for the bathroom. He watched her disappear, wondering at the fact that she was suddenly being so modest. Was that a good sign or a bad one? Maybe she was just cold.

They were in his quarters. Sometime last night they had decided they should come here since she shared an apartment with Daisy and Daisy was most likely fucking Dylan's brains out by that time. It would have been awkward. Lawrence, on the other hand, lived alone.

He stretched and reached over to the nightstand drawer to retrieve his spare set of glasses. He looked around at the mess they had made. Her clothes were scattered around the room along with his. He had a vague memory of her removing his socks with her teeth.

He had let his guard down with her, he realized as he pulled on a t-shirt and boxers before making his way into the kitchen. They'd walked through one of the ship's parks and she'd told him about her family and he had admitted that he didn't know anyone from his family. He suspected he had the same family ties as his duplicate, Stinel, but he couldn't be sure. He told her a few things about his childhood, growing up in the slums of the Empire as an orphan, learning he had an aptitude for computers when he'd started tagging along with a slicer who made his living ripping off ATM machines. It hadn't taken him long to realize he was already better than his mentor and he'd gone into business for himself until he'd hooked up with the Doom Bringers. He managed to avoid revealing every last detail about where he came from and who he was, but as the night wore on he was realizing he was telling her entirely too much. And he didn't care. He wanted her and she seemed to want him.

He glanced at the clock and left the bedroom. He knew on some level that his quarters were larger than what the typical employee rented from the company. He'd never considered it before last night. He didn't spend much time in them in any case. When he was here he was in the study. He made his way there now, stopping in the kitchen (which had surprised Lauren more than the fact that he lived alone) to order coffee from the food dispenser.

He sat down at his desk and switched on his terminal, sipping while it connected to the ship's network. Today's work would all be on public networks and was best dealt with from here rather than his lab. He should have gotten started hours ago but he'd been occupied. There was still time until the ship arrived at its destination, however. He would have a few surprises ready for Stinel when they got there.

Lawrence got to work pulling up the electronic files which he would use to keep Stinel out of Jos' way when they arrived.

“That's not a very good picture of you.” He hadn't heard Lauren get out of the shower or pad through the thick carpet until she was leaning over him, her arms around his chest and her cheek next to his, looking at his screen. “Are you going somewhere?”

It was a copy of Stinel's electronic passport she was looking at.

“It's not, is it,” he commented and closed the file before she could see that it wasn't his name. No mater how much he had told her already, Jos wouldn't be happy if she found out he'd been sharing her plans with anyone Jos didn't personally bring in. It wouldn't be pleasant for him and it could be lethal for her. “Not going anywhere special,” he told her. “Want to come?”

“Hmmm, just you and me? How can I say no? Will we be traveling under an assumed name? Mr. and Mrs. Stinel?” She was observant.

He turned and pulled her into his lap. She pretended to struggle for a moment before laughing as he kissed her.

“It's not a very good pseudonym you know,” she giggled a moment later. She was wearing his bathrobe and his hands were roaming. “It's just Lenits backwards, isn't it? If you're such a skilled hacker I'd have expected you to come up with something better.”

Well at least she was off the trail somewhat. “You doubt my abilities?” he asked with mock outrage.

“Yes. You're going to have to prove yourself.” She turned so she could see his screen and situated herself between his arms so he could type around her.

He thought for a moment and snapped his fingers before going to work. “Got it,” he told her as he started accessing ship's records. After a moment he had a list of Dylan Micheal's transactions from the previous night.

“Hey, those are restricted! You could get in trouble for that.”

“Scared?”

She turned her head slightly, her face inches from his and looked in his eyes, not seeing a trace of mocking in them. She shook her head slightly and he nodded to the screen.

“They didn't go back to your apartment after all.” He pointed at the last charge. One of the ship's visitor hotels. The rooms were available for anyone who wanted to use them and it looked like Dylan and Daisy had. Lawrence brought up a command window and after a few lines of code he was connected to the hotel terminal. When he brought up the hotel register Lauren laughed.

“Look, they checked in as Dylan and Daisy Micheals!”

Lawrence smiled slightly but was thoughtfully considering what they were looking at. He looked at Lauren and she looked back at him. “Do you want to get back at them for last night?” he asked.

She leaned back against him. “Get back at them? I'd like to thank them.”

He smiled. “We'll send them a card. But they deserve a little bit of payback, don't you think?”

She couldn't help but agree and said so.

He started typing. “Did you know,” he told her while he pulled up several new connections, “that under interstellar law traveling as man and wife is considered to be sufficient to show legal intent to marry? And that if the records ever get to the right people the marriage is recorded officially?”

Faster than Lauren could blink, he had forwarded the hotel records to the recorder's offices of five systems along the Midnight Angel's regular route. She turned and breathed conspiratorially into his ear as her hand moved down his side. “So should we tell them?”

It was another hour before he got to work, and then only because Lauren had to go to work herself. She was going to be distracting but he had decided he didn't care. It wasn't just that she was beautiful, or that she was interested in him, two things that were rare enough when put together, but she was smarter than him too. When you threw that into the mix she was one in a billion. She had let him show off, but he knew from their conversation the night before that she could follow most of what he had done. If she hadn't known how to do some of those things before, she knew now.

It had been in the park that they'd transitioned from intellectual to physical interaction. They'd been talking about the systems she was using to program her cybernetic neural nets and the next thing he knew they were in the bushes.

He shook his head, trying to focus on the task at hand. Now was not the time to be distracted. There were only a few hours left now before they arrived and Joslyn would want to begin immediately. If Ben wasn't out of the way there would be hell to pay. He smirked to himself as he realized that rhymed.

“Let's start with his passport,” he said to himself as he pulled the file back up.

Katrylle Morgahn posted June 07, 2005 07:40 PM

The ebony body glittered in the dim light of the seedy hotel room. Once a damp rag had been taken to its curves, the Everly Brothers Customized J-185 guitar showed very little signs of its age. Lacquer chipped in a couple of spots at the bottom, she was otherwise in near pristine condition. Whoever had previously owned this classic had cared for it lovingly.

Kat had strung the guitar hours ago and, after fumbling a few times through songs she had thought she had forgotten, she found herself back in a time when life was happier. Though her fingers hurt, she smiled softly as she lost herself in the music.

The pounding on the door caught her completely by surprise. Carefully, she placed the guitar on the bed before making her way across the small room. Again the pounding sounded against the flimsy wood and she felt the first stirrings of anxiousness flutter in her chest.

“Who’s it?”

“Open the door! It’s the police.” Her eyebrow shot upwards at the announcement. Slowly, she reached for the knob even as the pounded resumed. Old instincts reared and, for an instant, she was tempted to race out the window before she remembered that she was (technically) legit on this rock.

As she turned the knob, the door was roughly shoved open from the other side, causing her to stumble backwards into the room.

“Katrylle Morgahn?” The first of the two officers facing her was mostly made from flab. Short and balding, his great gut made him look wider than he was tall. Impatient, he again demanded to know if her name was Katrylle Morgahn.

“Aye. How may I help y’boys?” The second officer, taller, thinner and much younger moved around to her left and, again instinct took over as she reposition herself to keep both officers in line of site.

Again, the first officer spoke. He appeared to be the senior officer, content to do the talking while his partner did the physical work. “Katrylle Morgahn, you are under arrest for the murder of Nelton Peel. Turn around and place your hands behind your back.”

She nearly laughed in their faces. She hadn’t liked Nelton Peel…. Lord knows he had been a pain in the past week as they negotiated the import contract…. But if she had killed him, there wouldn’t have been cops knocking at her door over it. As the younger officer continued to move closer, she continued to back up, gauging how she would get through the window and down the rickety fire escape before “long and lanky” could get his hands on her.

The slight smirk that played across her face didn’t sit well with the older man. From his side, he pulled a Labit 590 blaster. “I said turn around and place your hands behind your back…. NOW”.

“Long and Lanky” must have realized what she was thinking. As she dove for the open window, he lunged for her. She had almost made it, but his size gave him a reach advantage and, before her foot could slip over the windowsill, his fingers clamped tightly around her ankle. Without the use of that foot, she landed hard on the wooden planks and, cussing loudly, she spun onto her back intent on implanting the stiletto heel of her free boot into what ever portion of his body it came in contact with first. Unfortunately for him, his hand was the first thing she caught sight of.

His scream of pain accompanied the sudden release of her ankle and, scrambling as fast as she could, she found the first rickety stair. Tucking a shoulder in, she rolled down the first flight, coming to her feet at the bottom before taking the rest of the stairs two at a time.

She bypassed the last steps by jumping over the handrail, tucking and rolling to break the fall. The shouts from above her head and the rattling of old wood let her know that her head start was a small one…and getting smaller by the second. The alley was empty and no source for a clean getaway. She knew that the street running past the front of the hotel would be crowded this time of night with locals winding their way home from work. Her decision made, she made a dash for the closest outlet. So intent on escape, she didn’t see the man blocking her way. She didn’t notice the flash of cuffs. One moment she was slipping past him, the next she was on her face on the pavement, hands unceremoniously locked behind her back, the ratcheting click sealing her fate.

“Katrylle Morgahn. You are under arrest for the endangerment of an officer performing his duty on Haulk’Tan, for conspiracy in the escape of a jailed citizen and for aiding and abetting of said escaped citizen. You are also charged with robbery, breaking and entering and various other charges implied by the royal prosecution of Haulk’Tan. You have the right to remain silent…..”

Ben Stinel posted June 08, 2005 10:07 PM

Ben didn't get any indication things were going wrong until it was already too late.

Nelton's secretary had called him late that afternoon to let him know that Peel wanted to meet with him again. She didn't sound particularly happy to be making the call. He figured Nelton was in one of his famous moods, so he had hailed a cab in front of the hotel and endured the twenty-plus minute ride to Nelton's offices, hoping to smooth over whatever provision of the contract was throwing him into conniptions this time.

The streets of L'Riahan were busiest this time of day. They were busy most of the day, in fact, but rush hour didn't help. By the time they were two blocks from their destination traffic had ground to a halt. He leaned forward to tap on the glass and handed the driver his credit chit as payment. The transaction processed quickly and he slipped it back into his pocket as he climbed out of the cab and starting walking down the street, easily overtaking the gridlock.

It wasn't until he was almost right on top of the building that he had seen the flashing lights. By this time it was getting dark and the lights were illuminating the sides of the urban canyons that were L'Riahan. Traffic accident, he assumed, until he saw the stretcher being carried out the front door. He joined the crowd of onlookers that were gathering at the edge of the police barricade and watched nervously as an officer led Nelton's sobbing secretary to a waiting patrol vehicle. He was more supporting her than leading her, Ben realized, and he noted that she was placed in the front seat and was not handcuffed.

Near the door three plain clothes policemen were talking with a man who appeared to be giving them a statement. Ben watched as a fourth, uniformed officer approached and handed one of the plain clothes a small bundle which was subsequently handed to the man being questioned. The man's ID was returned to his inner jacket pocket, but Ben was amazed to see him remove not one, but two pistols from the bag before handing it back to the plain clothes. One went into a holster under his jacket strapped behind his back above his waist. The other, smaller pistol went into an ankle holster and was quickly concealed by the leg of his pants.

The interview concluded, the three interviewing officers dismissed the man and he quickly disappeared into the crowd. One of the plain clothes reentered the building while the other two walked towards a waiting vehicle and started to cut their way out of the traffic, lights flashing.

Ben decided it would be best not to linger and starting walking back the way he had come, hoping to hail another cab. Traffic seemed to be going a little smoother the opposite direction but he was on the wrong side of the street now.

As he walked he thought about what he had just seen. L'Riahan had the strictest gun control laws in the sector, which wasn't saying much, but private citizens were not permitted to carry concealed weapons. That left two possibilities for the man he had just seen: cop or bounty-hunter. The man was obviously not Kroidian so that left the second option. Bounty-hunter.

But who was the bounty? Nelton? The man's dealings weren't precisely legal, but Tarrin had assured them he had no outstanding warrants. Besides, when a bounty-hunter killed a mark there were questions to be asked and paperwork to be filed. The police wouldn't have simply handed him his weapons and sent him on his way.

A witness by chance, perhaps? Ben doubted it. A witness shouldn't be allowed to go either, but the legal system on Kroy was funny at best.

Time to let Kat know what was going on. They'd need to call home as soon as possible. He pulled out his comm and triggered open the channel. “Kat.” He waited for her to answer. They had gotten most of the day free because Nelton had wanted to review the latest batch of contract concessions they had offered him the day before. Kat had been back to the shopping districts in the “Old Town” again today and hadn't returned yet when he had left. Kat didn't answer. Had she left her comm in her room?

He glanced at his own comm and realized it hadn't even sent a signal. He tapped it a couple of times, a futile gesture given the solid state nature of the thing. Nothing. He hadn't really expected there to be, but now he was really worried. He reached the intersection just in time to cross as traffic came to a stop. There was a passenger cab waiting for the signal with the rest of the stopped cars, and he reached the door just in time to fight over it with a Kroidian man who reached it at the same time.

“We can share, yes?” the man said, not really asking. Ben actually had to grab the man by the collar to prevent him from entering the cab before him and slipped in himself just as the signal changed and the cab started moving again.

The cab pulled in across the street from his hotel seven minutes later. Less than half the time it had taken the first cab to make the same trip. “Twenty,” the cabbie said curtly. Ben handed him his credit chit, as he had done earlier and the cabbie put it in the machine to process. Ben waited impatiently, as the cabbie rang up the charge. He looked across the street at the hotel and realized that there was a police cruiser parked a short distance from the front door. That wasn't especially strange. This wasn't exactly the best part of town. What really got Ben's heart racing was that he realized the two men who were getting out of the police cruiser were two of the officers he had seen interviewing the man in front of Nelton's place.

“Declined.” He glanced back at the cabbie who was holding the offending credit chit up as if it smelled bad.

“What?”

“It's no good, man. Says it's canceled. You got cash?”

Another cab pulled up to the curb in front of them as Ben reached in his pocket looking for the few bills of local currency he had stuffed in there somewhere at the start of the trip. He pulled them out and handed the wad to the cabbie.

“This is only fifteen.”

That was when Ben saw the bounty-hunter get out of the cab in front of them. The other man paused for a moment, looking at the hotel as the officers walked through the front door before jaywalking across the street himself. Ben's eyes followed him as he stopped in front of the hotel then glanced right and then left before turning and going around the side of the building.

Ben automatically reached for the door and turned the handle as soon as the other man was around the corner but the cabbie's hand shot through the hole in the plexishield between them and pulled him back before he could get out.

“Hey! You still owe me five, man!”

Ben slipped off his watch and tossed it at the man through the hole. He escaped when the cabbie let go of him to catch the watch. Ben dashed across the street through traffic as the cabbie leaned out the window to yell after him.

“What am I supposed to do with this?” the man's voice pursued him as he headed for the alleyway where he had seen the bounty-hunter duck out of site.

He wasn't halfway there when the bounty-hunter slipped back out of the alley and leaned casually against the wall. Ben slowed to a walk and casually unhooked the loop from the stock of the blaster on his belt. Kat could handle a pair of local cops, by not being there if she was smart, but this bounty-hunter was an unknown equation and represented the higher risk.

There was a sudden sound of rapid footsteps from the alley and the man reached into a pocket inside his jacket, turning towards the sound. Ben had seen where he had placed his pistols only a few minutes before and so knew the other man wasn't reaching for a gun, but began to draw his own blaster just the same. He had just pulled the muzzle clear of the holster when a burst of hair erupted from the alley. Kat.

The man reached out and the hair continued to flow forward as Kat was roughly pulled to a stop. There was a flash of metal as one cuff was clamped to her wrist. Ben's blaster was halfway up. The bounty-hunter spun her around roughly and planted her face into the pavement as he quickly manacled the other wrist behind her back. He moved at the speed of lightning. Ben started to dash forward, blaster all the way up now and pointed at the bounty-hunter. The man was saying something to Kat, but Ben couldn't make it out above the sudden frightened noise of the crowded street.

He came to a stop about two and a half meters away, out of reach of those lightning reflexes. “Take your hands off of her, mister.”

The man's back was to him and he stiffened for a moment. “Stinel or Swets?” he asked. “Either way, I think you should think carefully about what you do next. This woman is about to be arrested by the local police for murdering a local businessman with ties to the smuggling community. I don't know if you know much about the local laws but things will go much better for her if she's in my custody before they get a chance.”

“Murder?!” Kat's voice was muffled by the pavement. The man hadn't let up the pressure on her back, even with Ben's blaster pointed at his head. “Thought y'said I was under arrest for breakin Joke outta jail back on Haulk'Tan. Wha' fuckin' murder y'talkin aboot?”

Ben didn't look down at Kat. He kept his focus on his target. “I don't see how being in your custody is going to help her any. Bounty-hunter? Let's see some ID. And don't try anything funny. I saw where you put your guns and your wallet back at Peel's place.”

The man reached inside his jacket pocket and tossed his wallet to Ben over his shoulder. Ben caught it with his free hand and glanced at the badge inside. “Detective Reily. Says here you're with the Haulk'Tan Marshal Service. Why don't you tell me why the police would think Kat killed Nelton.”

The man didn't miss a beat. “Because I told them what I saw.”

There was a muffled sound of cursing from the alleyway and Ben again heard the sound of footsteps rushing towards the street.

Reily turned and looked him in the eye for the first time. “Here come the locals. I've already told them why I'm here. You, I think, are on the verge of being arrested for aiding and abetting. Not to mention armed assault.”

Kat managed struggle against Reily enough to turn her head and looked right at him. “Bloody fuckin hell... Ben... Git!” She didn't speak her next words aloud, but they were the ones that made him holster his weapon and turn away. She still had the knack, even if he didn't, to project her thoughts. {Ben, y'gotta go... Y'cannae d'annathin ifin yer in jail wi' me. Leave me. Find a way to fix this!}

Reily hauled her to her feet in time to see Ben slip around the corner onto the next street. The local plain clothes chose that moment to emerge from the alleyway. If it hadn't been for Reily, she'd have been long gone.

Joslynne ZyThyrn posted June 11, 2005 11:32 AM

It had been too easy. Everything worked exactly as she had planned. Peel’s secretary had only made a halfhearted attempt at preventing her from bursting into Peel’s office for the unscheduled appointment. Having worked for Peel too many years, the woman had seen this type of confrontation many times before to be concerned.

She had shot down Peel’s rage at the interruption with her own, shouting at him and accusing him of trying to over-pad the deal, costing her far more than the entire arrangement was worth.

“You won’t be robbing anyone ever again, Mr. Peel” The blaster cleared its holster nestled under her jacket. She gave him a moment to realize that he was truly going to die and then, as his eyes widened with the realization, she shot him, clean and clear, between the eyes.

She had turned for the office door…. the one she had left partially opened to give the secretary a perfect listening advantage. As predicted, the stunned woman stood on the other side, the confusion on her face turning to horror as Peel’s body finally crumpled to the floor. Within an instant, the horror became terror as the poor woman realized she stood face to face with a killer.

“No…don’t… Please…”

Jos simply looked at her, holding the terrified woman’s gaze for a long second before heading for the front door. Leaving a witness who could clearly identify Katrylle as the murderer was the crux of the entire plan. A small smirk played across Jos’ lips as she stepped into the sunlight and flicked open her comm.

“Axin, it’s done. I’ll be back to the ship in an hour. The rest should take care of itself quite nicely”

She clicked the com closed and headed for the space port she had docked the shuttle in. In her haste, she didn’t hear the shout behind her. She didn’t realize how close she had come to having her entire plan trashed in an instant of misidentification. It was only sheer luck and the large crowd in the streets that saved her….and cost Katrylle.

Detective Reily posted June 11, 2005 01:58 PM

For seven years he’d been tracking her from spaceport to spaceport, always missing her…. sometimes by mere minutes. He thought that, once Morgahn was released from prison a few months ago, capturing her would be easier… that Morgahn would lead him right to her. He hadn’t counted on Morgahn being paranoid. He hadn’t realized until recently that she didn’t even know Morgahn was still alive.

Now, as he stood across the street from the shipping office his reports had told him she had been frequenting, he wondered if today would be the day he finally caught his fugitive. He glanced up at the clouds as if searching for some form of divine intervention just moments before the shot rang out. The sound bounced from building to building, making it difficult to determine its direction of origin, but instinct had spoken to him.

He had grabbed for his gun, crouching as trained officers who had often been in the line of fire do, his movements carrying him forward just as the fugitive exited the shipping office. There couldn’t have been more than a few seconds since the gunshot, but time had slowed drastically, sharpening so everything that happened next was intensely detailed.

She appeared before he made it to the middle of the street. He trotted forward, barely catching the conversation she held with whoever had been on the other end of her com-link. So intent on his quarry, he didn’t notice the taxi barreling down on him until the blaring of the horn and the shouts from the driver drew his attention. In that instant, she had rounded a corner and disappeared in the crowd. Cussing, he nodded to the cab driver and made his way around the front end of the car to the sidewalk.

Indecision made him pause, causing him to question the route he should follow. Knowing he wouldn’t be able to catch her…or even track her…in the afternoon rush, he stepped through the door of the shipping office.

Peel’s secretary was on the link, presumably calling the local police force. The opened door to Peel’s office revealed the body within. He had already registered with the locals… Fugitive Recovery laws requiring him to let them know he was planet side and what his business was. His being here would only be a minor inconvenience but, as he had been a possible witness to what appeared to be a murder, he sat down in one of the waiting room chairs and simply…. waited.

Ten minutes later, he was giving his statement to two detectives. His guns had been confiscated until his identity had been confirmed, as he knew they would be. Though he hadn’t seen the actual murder, his identity of the murderer coincided with the secretary’s statement.

Within the hour, he was on the front street once again, the detectives returning his weapons. They had reluctantly agreed to let him be on the scene when they arrested Katrylle Morgahn, but he was to find his own way to her hotel and he was not to interfere in any way with their arrest. Only when their charges had been satisfied with the magistrate would he be allowed to claim his fugitive.

No one had anticipated the way the arrest would go down. He had arrived after the detectives had already gone in, but just in time to hear the shouts coming from the alley. Having glanced around the corner of the hotel, he confirmed that she was running in his direction… the only thing left was to bide his time.

The catch was neat. She didn’t even know he had been there until she was face down on the ground, hands cuffed behind her back. The man’s approach caught him off guard, however, and, for a moment, he thought he would be killed right there on the spot. He took the chance that it was one of the two he knew were planet side with her…. and they were reported to be reasonable men. Reports could be wrong, however, and he did not relax until he had been convinced to move along.

He had stood her up and was facing the alley when the detectives barreled around the corner, nearly colliding with the fugitive and her captive. Before they could utter the angry retorts he could see forming on their faces, he simply shoved her forward into their arms.

“Your fugitive, gentlemen… and I expect those handcuffs returned to me.” Without any further ado, he stepped aside, placing his back against the wall of the hotel and watched them hustle her into their car. He was in no hurry now. He knew where they were taking her. It was only a matter of time until he had fulfilled his mission.

Jack Morgahn posted June 11, 2005 02:07 PM

He was too late. He had rounded the corner and was striding up the street in the direction of the hotel when he caught the end of the commotion. Two men…. Detectives, he surmised… were loading Kat into the back of their car, Reily watching from the sidelines.

He didn’t understand where the detectives had come into the picture. Something must have happened to make Reily give up his prisoner. For the first time in a very long time, Jack felt panic… unsure of where to turn and what to do. Silently, he slipped back into the crowd, aimlessly making his way through the streets, unsure of his destination until he walked into the bar.

He knew the bar. He’d followed her here often enough. His confusion flashed across his face for an instant until he realized the reason for his being here. He was looking for help. He was looking for the men who were here with her. He wasn’t sure he could trust them, but she did and that was all that counted.

Katrylle Morgahn posted June 11, 2005 03:56 PM

Haulk’Tan?! She hadn’t been there in years. She’d pretty much forgotten about that desolate rock.

Hours later, sitting in the small interrogation room of the constable’s station, she had had plenty of time to contemplate the current situation. The cops had mentioned murder, but no one had been in since she was placed in this little room to give her any further information.

She had tried a few times to reach for Ben with her mind, but there must have been some sort of shielding in the room. So she sat.

Yet another hour past before the door suddenly opened to admit two uniformed constables. Without a word, they lifted her from her seat and escorted her out the door, down the hall and up a flight of stairs to a rather large set of double doors. Through these, she found herself in a courtroom. The gallery was fairly empty, containing only 2 other people. Peel’s secretary dabbed at her eyes with a man’s handkerchief. The cop from Haulk’Tan sat stoically next to her.

The judge sat behind a large wooden desk on an elevated platform. She craned her neck to get a decent look at the man as he began to speak.

“Katrylle Morgahn. You are charged with the murder of Nelton Peel, resident and business proprietor of L'Riahan. In the commission of this murder, you have illegally transported and discharged a firearm, both in strict violation of L'Riahanian law. Valued witnesses to these transgressions have provided testimony and, at this time, I pronounce you guilty of all charges and hereby sentence you to the maximum sentence for such crimes; death by bloodletting. This sentence is to be carried out immediately. So sayith the courts.”

She struggled… saints how she struggled. The guards must have been through this type of proceedings before. Their grip told her that under no uncertain terms, she was in their control.

“Y’bloody heathens! I git n’say in this? I dinnae kill th’ wretch. I was n’where near him when he died!”

The judge banged his gavel several times on the wooden desk. “SILENCE! Guards, remove the prisoner to the waiting station until the preparations have been made for her execution!”

Cussing and yelling, Kat was literally lifted between the two burly guards and carried unceremoniously through yet another set of doors. In a different room, she found herself thrown into a cage and the door locked behind her. In a panic, she threw herself against the bars, straining to reach for either of the guards, hoping in vain to gain access to anything that she could use on either the lock to the cuffs or the cage door.

The guards exited the room without a scratch, closing the door tightly behind them. Still, the scream of frustration could be heard well into the courtroom. Within the hour, that scream would be silenced… forever.

Ben Stinel posted June 15, 2005 09:15 PM

In his mind's eye, the confrontation on the street in front of the hotel played itself out for the hundredth time, and he pulled the trigger.

Why hadn't he pulled the trigger? Things would be simpler if he had just pulled the trigger.

The back streets of the city were relatively quiet compared to the busy commerce districts and Ben took advantage of this fact. He had been searching for Ryan while trying to stay out of sight as much as possible. Ryan, unfortunately, seemed to be doing the same.

Ben paused next to the barred window of a pawn shop and looked at a barely functional vid screen on display there. The low rez video was showing clips of footage from the scene of the murder and a clip of Kat being escorted into the police station, her arms bound behind her. He couldn't hear what was being said, but when the scene changed he winced.

It was a police sketch of himself and Ryan. His was much better. The cops had about fifteen eye witnesses from the street in front of the hotel who had seen him pull his weapon. Plus they probably had a description from Reily. So far no good photos of either of them had been uncovered, but Ben expected their passport pics to be plastered on the screen for all to see soon. The vid screen replayed the hotel security footage of Kat's capture again. It was a bad angle and it didn't show his face very well, but it showed Ben holding his pistol on Reily.

He and Ryan were both listed as “persons of interest”.

Reily was a puzzle. There had been no mention of him in any of the broadcasts. There was only the grainy image of him in the hotel video and he was never identified.

He heard footsteps start echoing down the street and he moved on. There had been two close calls already and wasn't looking to have a third.

The first had been at the consulate. Their passports were issued by the Trade Federation, a quasi political group that facilitated the paperwork required to move freely among the stars. Most shippers and free traders were members of the organization. Chances were that if your home planet didn't have relations with the planet where you were trying to do business, the Trade Federation did.

Ben had gone there almost immediately, only to find that his passport had been revoked. The woman working the counter had accidentally tipped him off before the consulate guards could arrive to detain him. Something about associations with well known smugglers. Bullshit. Kat wasn't that well known.

Well... she wasn't when he had been at the consulate. That had been before the news stories had begun. It occurred to him to wonder if the locals had something to do with this, but he dismissed that out of hand. One, they didn't seem that well organized, and two, the whole point of membership in the TF was legal assistance in situations like this. That was why he had gone there in the first place! Hell, at least thirty percent of their membership was full or part time smugglers anyway.

The second close call had been at the hangar where their shuttle was birthed. He had hoped to send a message back to The Company, or Vextis, or The Colorado, letting them know what their situation was. The frequencies were jammed. The comm panel in the shuttle had showed extreme levels of interference on all of the default frequencies. Desperate, he had reconfigured the panel to transmit on an open channel, but he had little hope the message would be received by anyone who would care.

He started transmitting but wasn't able to finish. In fact, he was only able to get out about four words. “Urgent! Ben Stinel calling-” Two things happened. The first was a sudden burst of jamming on his chosen channel. That made him stop. The second was the sound of police sirens approaching his location. That made him leave.

And now here he was. He looked up and saw a flickering neon sign that was familiar. He was in the bad part of the free trade district of L'Riahan City. Out of options, he entered its dingiest bar and headed for the darkest corner to sulk.

Lenits posted July 04, 2005 04:59 PM

Lauren returned to his quarters after her shift, but he wasn't there. She hadn't really expected him to be, but she needed to see him so here she was. She hadn't even been back to her own quarters since the night before. She didn't want to go back. Her mind hadn't been on her work today. She'd left a part of herself here, with him, and that part demanded her full attention. And it was frightened.

There was a part of Lawrence that hadn't been fully honest with her but she had sensed that it wanted to be. The picture in the passport was him... and yet it wasn't. She didn't know how to explain it, but there was another man looking out at her from the computer screen when she had put her arms around him this morning. It was more than just a name. It was as if the picture had been backwards somehow. Counter to the man who's bed she had shared the night before. And then he had lied to her.

No, she told herself, he hadn't lied. She had given him an out and he had taken it. He hadn't been quite ready to share and this morning that was something she was prepared to accept. But if she was going to continue she needed to know everything, and she needed to hear it from him.

She started moving away from his door and found herself on a lift, descending into the middle of the ship. He worked in SI, but that was all she really knew for sure. She wasn't even sure how she was going to get in. It was a restricted area and she lacked the clearance she would need to get past the guard. Lawrence wasn't even expecting her and she didn't know what she would say to him if she did get past to see him.

The lift stopped and the door slid open. Cautiously she stepped off the lift and came face to face with what should have been the end of her little trip and forced her to go back to her quarters to wait. But she couldn't go back to her quarters. If she turned back now she didn't think she would work up the courage to ask him later and the mystery of the man in the picture would be between them. She couldn't let there be any secrets between them.

The guard looked up as she approached and frowned. He sat at a large desk with various security monitors in front of what looked almost like a vault door. After a moment she realized it was exactly that. The guard didn't recognize her, she knew. She pushed on and smiled at him when she reached his desk. “I'm here to see Lawrence Lenits.”

“Could I see your ID, miss?”

She produced her card and handed it to him. He looked at the name and slid the card into his terminal. He removed it a moment later and handed it back to her. “I'm sorry, ma'am,” he told her as he shook his head apologetically. “You're not on the visitor list and you're not cleared for this area. Visitors are supposed to be logged in twenty-four hours in advance. Was he expecting you?”

“No, but-”

“Then I'm sorry, ma'am, but you'll need to get back on the lift. Return to your duty station and contact Mr. Lenits through the comms system. If he needs you to be granted access he'll need to go through the proper channels.”

Behind her she heard the lift doors open. She turned around, thinking the guard had opened them and took a step forward before she realized there was someone getting off. She was glad when she saw a familiar face, even if it was Dylan Michaels.

“Lauren!” He glanced nervously behind him and looked about to bolt back on to the lift but it closed behind him and he was trapped. At least he had the decency to be ashamed of what he had done.

She crossed her arms in front of her and tightened her lips into a thin line, playing into his shame. “Dylan.”

“What are you doing here?” He glanced at the guard then grabbed her arm and pulled her back towards the lift door where it would be harder for him to overhear.

“Look, about last night-”

She shook off his hand and waved away his apology. “You're off the hook, Dylan. I'm not here to see you, I'm here to see Lawrence.”

Dylan's expression ran through the gamut of emotions, passing from shame to relief to realization of what she meant. He smiled broadly at her and pulled her into a hug. “You and Larry? That's great! Daisy really wasn't right for him, was she.”

“She was good enough for you though...”

He let her out of the hug and shrugged ironically at her. “Why did you come down here though? You could get in trouble just for coming down here. Why didn't you just call him?”

Her accusing air dropped as she realized what he was saying and decided she should explain herself. “I... I needed to see him... This morning I-” The beginnings of a leer entered his expression but she pressed on, “This morning he was working on something and I saw it on his computer when I went into his study. It was a passport and it was his picture, but...”

The leer dropped from Dylan's face and he suddenly looked different than she had ever seen him before... It seemed that under the playful, careless facade there was a serious person carefully hidden. She wondered for a moment if anyone down here was what they seemed to be.

“But it wasn't him, was it?” Dylan asked softly.

She shook her head.

Dylan looked into her eyes, weighing something in his thoughts before guiding her back to the security desk. “Charlie, I'm signing her in,” he told the guard as he reached over the desk for the visitor log.

The guard was genuinely surprised. “But, sir, she's not on the list. You know the rules. Visitors are supposed to-”

“Twenty-four hours notice, I know. Don't worry, Charlie. In about five minute's she'll have been on the list for twenty-four hours.”

“She's not even on the list now-”

“Five minutes, Charlie. Don't worry, your ass isn't on the line.” Dylan looked at the guard and Charlie sat back down. Charlie looked Dylan in the eye and pushed the button to open the heavy doors to SI.

Dylan stepped through the doors and glanced back at Lauren. She looked from him to the guard, who looked visibly shaken and followed him in. The doors closed behind them.

SI looked like any other part of the ship with a few exceptions. The doors were all of a heavier variety than those in her section. There were very few people walking through the halls and there were flashing red lights at regular intervals along the ceiling. Those people they did pass looked at her suspiciously.

“Those are for you,” Dylan told her, seeing her looking at the lights. “Ordinarily they would be steady green. The guard changed it when he opened the door.”

She nodded dumbly and followed him until he stopped at a turn in the passageway. He glanced around the corner and waited for someone further down to disappear into one of the many offices before turning back to her. Again she observed the change from his usual personality. She didn't think she had ever seen him without some sort of little smirk on his face and the change made her worry.

“Larry's office is just down the hall from us,” he told her. “Before I take you there, I need to know something. The picture you saw... the name was Stinel.”

It wasn't a question, but she nodded her head anyway.

“Did you see anything else? Any other names?”

“No... He turned it off before... Is he in some sort of trouble?” She knew who Micheals worked for and she was suddenly worried for Lawrence.

Michaels shook his head and smiled at her, suddenly back in character. “Never mind,” he told her. “Common, I'll take you to him.”

Dylan led her a short distance and stopped next to one of the heavy doors. There was a keypad next to the door. Dylan waved his badge in front of the pad and punched in a four digit code. The door slid open but Dylan didn't enter. He motioned for her to go in.

The door closed behind her but he hadn't followed her. Lawrence turned in his chair to see her. She saw the hard expression on his face for only a moment before he realized who she was and it instantly softened. She stepped towards him and he got out of his chair to do the same. They met halfway and she was in his arms. The tension which had been steadily building up since she had left him this morning flowed away as their lips met and she melted into him. No one had ever made her feel like this before... Nervous and frightened and aroused and in love, all at the same time. She never wanted it to stop.

The kiss broke he looked down at her, a question in his eyes, but no words came to either of them for a moment.

“Hi.”

He smiled. “Hi.” The question was still there, waiting to be asked.

“Dylan let me in,” she answered the unspoken question.

He glanced at the door then back to her eyes. “He shouldn't have done that. There are things that happen down here that you're better off staying clear of.”

She searched his eyes, looking for the deceit she had imagined before, but all she saw was concern for her. “Does this have anything to do with Stinel?” she asked. The expression on his face told her she was right. “He's not you, is he.”

“It's hard to explain... My name was Stinel. I changed it.” Lawrence frowned, trying to think of a good way to explain it. “Do you believe in time travel?”

“Not really...”

“Neither do I, and I've done it...”

Ryan Swets posted July 12, 2005 01:11 PM

From thirty thousand feet, the City could nearly pass itself off as something other than a shithole. The dance of the intricate living web of light and life that spread out below was a serene thing when detached from the carnality of the first person, and Ryan found himself granting the city a certain artistic appreciation, shithole or no.

Although, he reflected, thirty thousand feet was fast on its way to becoming a shithole of its own.

The fighter he'd stolen from the LDF was brand new, a late-model tandem seat interceptor equipped with state of the art weapons and sensor systems. The local air base, fast recovering from the chaos he'd sown during his little invasion, wanted it back, if the military comm channels were any indication. So did the Fleet, for that matter, but he'd had the good fortune to catch them on the sunward side when he liberated her, leaving the possibility of dodging airbursts from orbit out of the immediate future. The exact timing of their arrival was thrown into question when one of the more promising LDF officers on the ground instructed the comm servers to lock his ship out of the military system and rescrambled the codes, preventing further eavesdropping, but he was fairly certain that he had ten or fifteen minutes if he was lucky. He'd certainly been lucky while absconding with the interceptor, although he was covered in second degree burns and bleeding in several place from wounds collected during a mad dash that had been necessitated by a lowly Airman recognizing his face from a recent newscast.

Ben, however, seemed to be running out of luck. Thanks to a lack of communication between the military and the various L'Riahan civil services, the fighter still retained access to all nonmilitary networks, allowing Ryan to follow Police action in the city from the perspective of an incident commander. With all forms of civilian transportation locked down by emergency gubernatorial order, the police had established a painstakingly comprehensive dragnet which forced Ben to run ragged through an ever-closing web of officers. The search was now confined to a relatively small area of the free trade district, which was flooded with plainclothes officers and unlikely to provide refuge for any length of time.

The net was closing. Ryan suspected that Ben had sought out some sort of common house to blend into and buy a few minutes, but which one? The free trade district was known for "trading" three things: sex, loud music, and alcohol - payment in the form of hard cash. The place was an oppressive maze of narrow streets and cramped, dingy structures containing thousands of such establishments. The prospects of finding one person with only minutes to spare in such a neighborhood were bleak, even for a Force user.

The police solved his dilemma by doing the hard work. Acting on a hunch that suggested he was likely to find Ben in the building that was being surrounded by dozens of units, Ryan set the fighter over on a wingtip and let her fall to within a few hundred feet of the establishment before cutting in the repulsors to hover silently overhead. Below, thirty officers tensed on signal and rushed into the building as the main entry blew open under a well-shaped charge.

The effect was impressive. Three hundred of L'Riahan's most desperate criminal scum immediately exploded from every conceivable exit, flooding into the streets and alleyways only to run up against an impressive array of police muscle. Ryan kept an eye on the building as vicious fights broke out up and down the street, counting on the fact that Ben was smart enough to wait for the initial stampede to taper off before trying to escape in the confusion. Sure enough, he spotted Ben's lithe form emerge several seconds later, cutting a direct line for a manhole in the street that led to the sewers below. Unfortunately, a pair of plainclothes officers noticed as well and began fighting to gain the attention of their colleagues.

Fuck it, thought Ryan. They reinforce the undercarriage on these things for a reason.

He dropped the fighter to just above street level in front of Ben and thumbed a pair of Morningstar missiles into the main concentration of police vehicles, setting off a spectacular chain reaction that threw a sizeable collection of heavy machinery several blocks distant. A five-second burst of cannon fire in the wake of the missiles sent a solid wall of brilliant Nitrium shards downrange and did an impressive job of clearing soft targets from the immediate area, opening a small window of time to work with.

Now or never.

The fighter settled the remaining ten feet to the ground, crushing another vehicle before coming to rest at a slightly canted angle. Ryan popped the canopy and tossed the backseater's helmet to Ben, motioning him up with a relaxed grin and a lazy salute.

"Heya, Ben! Did you know that we're 'persons of interest' in this slum?"

"Hey. How long has it been since you got to play WSO, buddy? This probably won't be one of the smooth rides I pride myself on."

It didn't take military comm access to know that the gig was up. After pointing the interceptor's nose the sky and burning into orbit with spine-crushing acceleration, Ryan immediately noticed the distinctly unwelcoming silhouettes of two dozen Fleet destroyers making to box in the immediate sector with a withering blanket of fire. The formation was nearly complete, leaving the lesser balance of a minute before the neighborhood became decidedly hostile to life.

"I think we're through here, Ben. If you know of somewhere else we should be, name it now. We've got about thirty seconds to line up a jump or we die." An azure bolt the size of a city bus blew through the vacuum in uncomfortable proximity, followed by two more which came close enough to boil paint as Ryan sent the fighter into a nauseating spiral roll.

"Make that fifteen. No pressure."

Jack Morgahn posted July 13, 2005 04:46 PM

Fifteen minutes into his wait, he had decided the whole idea was a waste of time and was making his way across the crowded bar to the door when one of the men he had been searching for entered. It wasn’t so much that he actually saw him slip through the door, it was more that the lively conversations that usually made ordering various liquors quite difficult, dulled quite suddenly. All heads had either turned or were turning to the door and if the man had hoped to slip in unnoticed, he had failed miserably. Still, the man made a decent attempt at ignoring the pointed glances and made his way to the darkest corner of the bar.

For a moment, Jack just watched him, torn between saving Kat and trusting someone he didn’t know. It didn’t make him easy to be amongst the low life crowd in the bar either. Most would have nothing to do with the local authority, but there were a few in the room who would not have second thoughts about turning in their own mother, provided they knew who that woman might have been.

Cursing under his breath in a language he had learned from a wee, black-haired lass so many years before, he strode for the table. Without so much as a preamble, Jack pulled a chair out and sat down, placing his hands in clear view. “Name’s Morgahn.”

Upon Jack’s arrival across from him, the man’s hand slipped under the table, presumably to gain possession of some weapon. He had just opened his mouth to say something when all hell broke loose. The door slammed open, hitting hard enough against the wall to crack wood even as a voice shouted, “COPPERS!”

The translation of the single word did not, in this particular case, mean a form of metal, unless, of course, in relation to the badges the local law carried. The frenzied rush that single shout created tore the two men from each other’s company as tables and chairs toppled in correlation to the rapidly exiting throng.

He tried to keep an eye on the man, but the confusion of fleeing bodies swallowed him up whole. Again, the cussing slipped from his lips and he turned, fighting upstream to the stairs that led to the second floor. It was almost certain that the entire building would be surrounded and then, after the commotion had settled, searched. He highly doubted that the rooftops would be covered as stringently as the ground level and he fully intended to be far from this area of town by the time the cops had even begun their door-to-door search of the building itself

He was furious by the time he gained the rooftop and he took his frustration out on the door that had provided that access. Screaming his rage, he pounded the wood repeatedly with his fists, stopping only as he realized his own blood was gradually painting the door. His fury spent only slightly, he paced the rooftop, making sure not to be seen from the ground as he searched for a path of least resistance. Judging the roofs to the north provided the easiest route, Jack took a running jump, clearing the void of the small alley just as the first explosion shook the neighborhood.

He didn’t stop to see what had caused the initial explosion or the ones that quickly followed. Jack had never been a man to waste a good distraction and, with each rooftop he gained, the explosions became quieter. By the last roof of the block, Jack had regained his composure, straightened his duster and exited the building as if he had every right to be where he was. As was his fashion, the 6’3” man slipped silently into the crowd and disappeared. 