Seven
Greenspan
Geez, is it just me or are we… running around in circles? I'm pretty sure I've seen that rock over there before. I throw a look at Winslow and Forsberg who keep trudging through the rain and then to Evan, trying to catch his attention. Something isn't right here; at least that's what my gut tells me.
But he doesn't react so I turn my eyes to Strathen who has his eyes firmly on his signal… thingy. Every two steps or something he manages to trip over something on the ground but considering he doesn't take that many looks at his surroundings he's doing remarkably well. Well… if it wasn't about the slight inconvenience of not getting anywhere, that is. Seriously, am I the only one seeing it?
And… wait… am I the only one who just saw something flicker on that little thing in Strathen's hand? I'm pretty sure it wasn't a trick of the steadily coming lightening but a real change. A new blip appeared and it had a different color. However… Strathen doesn't seem inclined to tell us about it… or hasn't he seen it yet? No… no, he's… hiding it from his commanding officer and the rest of the team, all senior to him.
Uh…
Fuck.
This can't be an unlucky coincidence. I've had to do too much with the NID and the rogue Marines to underestimate them, at least this time. After everything that happened to us I'm suddenly positive that Strathen is Rimmers' accomplice. Or one of Rimmers' accomplices. Now I just have to find a way of convincing Evan that I'm not seeing ghosts. Without Strathen noticing anything. Dammit, I'm a doctor not a goddamn spy, Jim. Tom. Whoever.
Anyway, trying to catch Evan's eyes ag… "Strathen?" Nope, doesn't sound very pleased, our good Major Lorne. Could it be… I haven't been the only one noticing we're not really getting anywhere?
"Yes, sir?" If I hadn't seen that blip… I'd still believe Strathen was just a little beside himself and not fit for duty on an SG team but otherwise an average soldier. For a moment… I'm not quite sure if I'm seeing things indeed. But then I see Evan motioning us to halt and… slightly shifting his G36, with his finger creeping a little closer to the trigger and the muzzle pointing just a little more… towards Strathen. And now I also notice that the way Winslow and Forsberg have positioned themselves is everything but coincidental. Wow… surely takes some really rigid training to get your people this far. Have to talk to Tom about this.
"Would you mind stopping leading us on a wild goose chase here and actually get us somewhere useful?" He's said in it a totally casual tone, even conversationally but one must be really daft to not hear the menacing undertones.
"Well, sir, I'm not sure… I…" Impressive. Even now he still tries to play at being innocent. He nearly had me fooled… if he hadn't tried to shield his signal detector from Evan's eyes.
Evan must have seen it as well as he raises the G36 a little further and trains it a little more accurately on Strathen. "Lieutenant… I'd strongly recommend you to hand the detector over to Lieutenant Forsberg and then dispose of your weapons. All of them." And by "strongly recommend" he means 'That's a fucking order, Lieutenant.'
Strathen seems to realize that his cover obviously has been blown. "And if I don't?" Why, is that a sign of dangerous desperation? Let's sure hope not since nobody could be as stupid as to try anything when being outnumbered four to one.
And yeah, that was the wrong thing to say for him since now Evan and the guys have openly trained their weapons at him, with me following suit just a moment later. "I'm sure you know the consequences of that, Lieutenant. Now, weapons on the ground, detector to Forsberg, hands in the air. Move it."
Very, very carefully Strathen puts his G36 to the ground, pulls the Beretta out of his holster and puts it beside the G36. He gets up again, showing us his empty hands but Evan doesn't seem very convinced. "All your weapons, Lieutenant." He's starting to get really annoyed and I just bet that part of annoyance is directed at himself for letting Strathen fool him for so long about his real allegiance. Evan always prided himself in being really good at reading people and looking behind their façade and this must irritate the hell out of him.
Strathen allows himself a rolling of his eyes and Forsberg's and Winslow's fingers just creep a little closer to their triggers. The traitor seems to have seen it and grits his teeth, unsheathing his knife and pulling something from inside his left boot. After a few more – precious – minutes and a few… strange hiding places Strathen straightens up and smirks. "All done… sir." The way he just said that… Tom would have rammed his muzzle right down Strathen's throat for that tone. Evan just nods over to Winslow.
"Search him. I don't trust the rat." And he trusts himself even less anymore that much I can see. I can also see that Winslow is just this close to remind Evan that time is of the essence now but that he thinks better of it and starts methodically searching Strathen who makes a show of being slightly bored. If I were you, boy… I wouldn't overdo it. Evan might have a long fuse… but once it's burned up, the damage is usually considerable.
Once Winslow is done, Strathen finally gives his detector to Forsberg who takes a look at it and… looks like he can't trust his eyes for a moment. Then he looks at Evan. "Sir… the detector can't find either of the two implants… but it says it found another signal that it can't assign to anyone or anything. Looks like… a radio signal." Mh… does that look on Strathen's face say that this was something he certainly did not count on to happen?
Evan looks at Forsberg, thoughtful, Strathen momentarily forgotten. Then he says, "Tune that thing to another frequency." He gives Forsberg a few numbers, Forsberg does as he is told… et voila, at least accounting to the expression on his face.
"Got it, sir. It's a radio alright." Relief and a little bit of satisfaction appears on Evan's face.
"That's Lieutenant Reece's emergency radio. Follow the signal but don't call her. Winslow, make a nice package out of the little rat here. Forsberg, you go to the front, Greenspan right behind him, Winslow, you and I guard the package. Let's go." Ah yeah, the joys of seeing one of the Academy's finest – at least in his class – in action. But good to know that we finally have a track we can actually follow.
DeLisle
I don't like this. I really, really don't like this. But yeah, maybe finding something is still better than finding nothing. Anyway… if I read this e-mail correctly… Laura might be in trouble. Well, Laura and Major Lorne and basically the rest of the team… apart from Strathen because he might be the one causing the trouble. I'm not worried. No… no, I'm not. I'm just a little… okay, I've got a bad, bad, bad feeling about this and the thought of Laura probably not knowing who it is that's accompanying them makes me… almost sick.
I know I should contact them but if I do – if I even get through the chaos of that thunderstorm outside – I might get them into more trouble than they are in right now. And the odds are still four on one and the team is led by Major Evan Lorne so she should be fine.
So now that I found out who's Rimmers' accomplice my work here should be done since he's out there and setting out all on my own would be stupid and probably also against orders. What do I do now? Lean back, enjoy the sights and wait until my team mates are back?
I think… not. Something tells me… there's more to it so I decide to dig deeper, even on the danger of raising suspicions in Captain Dearing. But then again… I had the distinct feeling that he wasn't that disappointed to see me leave earlier. So I go through Rimmers' last e-mails, each and everyone.
He's been very careful with the rest of his stuff but the fact that I found one from Strathen – a guy he shouldn't have had to do anything with, since there should have been really no connection between them – in the whole bunch tells me this might be his weak point. There has to be something in here… I check Strathen's e-mail again because I realize it was something in there that gave me the feeling that it wasn't over for me yet.
Very carefully – even more carefully than the last time – I read it again… and yes, there it is. Give my regards to our dear three letter girl. What – or rather who – the hell did he mean by that? Has to be someone on the Beta site since Strathen was in the SGC when he wrote that. There aren't many women here… in fact, if I recall it correctly from the list Dearing gave me access to, there are only five women here. Two Marines, three Air Force… and one of them one First Sergeant Catalina Noruega… who had worked – or is still working – for the CIA.
No. No, I'm seeing ghosts here. Seriously, I'm jumping to conclusions. I'm not being rational now. The only reason she springs to my mind first is that I was rattled up by her presence and by the fact that I had no idea I would meet her here. There's a perfectly sensible explanation as to why she's here and it's most probably something that hasn't anything to do with the NID or the rogue Marines or anything else remotely close to the case I'm working on. It's just a coincidence that she's here.
Okay.
Right.
Who am I trying to kid?
If there's one thing you can't say about Catalina Noruega it's that she appears in a spot of trouble by coincidence. She's got a nose for trouble and usually, if she is at a spot of trouble, she's got her hands in it and deep. Should have known that the first moment I saw her… or at least the moment I met her in the corridor outside Rimmers' quarters.
Alright, so I know that "three letter girl" could be some very, very intricate code for something that has nothing to with Noruega, not even with a person at all but my instincts tells me I'm on the right track. And I would have been dead a few hundred times over if I hadn't learned to trust my instincts a long time ago.
Okay, Sergeant, it's time to get moving again. Ten to one that she's the head of this little NID op and like hell I'll let her get away with it. This is really the last time she ever gets in my way and this is personal now. Before it was usually only professional but if she did her homework right – and she always does her homework right – she knew from the beginning whose team it was she would be trying to harm. We're done, Noruega. For good, now.
Deliberately I set off two of the traps Rimmers – or Noruega – installed on his laptop, shut it down and ready myself for a little cat and mouse game. Let's see what it takes to kick Noruega's survival instincts into full gear and if she changed her strategy or if she still does everything by her book. I'll have to watch my back now twice as carefully as when I started this but this is worth it. No one does something like this to my team.
A/N: Like I said, I haven't forgotten about the story and the team. SG10 just are a little slower to write than Laura and Evan in the PAS series. I really, really hope I haven't lost all my readers (well, apart from mac, that is) for their stories due to my rather irregular up-dating schedule :S
