Title: Rescue Run

Author: Lady Rheena

Genres: Alternate Universe, Action/Adventure, Romance

Rating: R

Disclaimer: If you recognise it from a fandom, I probably don't own it. That includes the world of The Matrix, all its characters and the concepts it entails. The idea of the Fleet and the Planetary Coalition are technically my own, but you'll probably recognise bits and pieces from various sci-fi media.

Chapter notes: Urk. Bridging chapters are a pain.

Part 20- Soirée

'Now that's a reception,' muttered Ghost as the gate began to close behind them. It indeed looked to Dena like most of Zion had turned out in the dock to cheer them in. From the look of it most of the docks were filled too; nearly all the ships had come in already. Even the Nebuchadnezzar. She manoeuvred the drop-ship Churchill deftly down onto a vacant pad and took the engines offline. Fully expecting the Logos crew to make straight for the hatchway, she was surprised to turn around and find them in fact looking at her.

'You have to walk from here,' she said dryly.

'Sure thing,' Niobe replied. 'But you lead us out.'

'Niobe-'

'Go on, Dena,' Sparks said with a smile. 'I think you've earned it.'

'And so say all of them,' Maloney interjected quietly, raising one eyebrow. Dena took a deep breath which turned into a heavy sigh and then reluctantly unstrapped herself, rising to go to the back of the ship and palming open the hatchway. Immediately a deafening cheer rose up, increasing in volume as the others came out. It died away when Commander Lock stepped forwards and raised his arms for silence, then extended one hand out to Dena with a broad smile on his face.

'Captain Reese.'

'Commander,' she replied, shaking firmly.

'Congratulations,' he said simply, and then turned to Niobe. Much to Dena's amusement, the other captain threw him a salute.

'Commander.'

Grinning, he gave her a nod. There was apparently a conspiracy about since Sparks and Ghost reacted exactly the same way to his scrutiny. But then he reached Maloney and glanced back at Dena.

'Who's this, Captain?'

'Commander.' Maloney gave him a smart Fleet salute, eyes dead ahead and fully at attention. 'Lieutenant Kerry Maloney of Psi Corps reporting for duty, sir!'

A murmur of wonder ran through the assembled and then there were sounds of a scuffle from the back. They ceased abruptly when Maloney looked in that direction and Dena guessed he'd issued a mental instruction to Neo to stay put and keep his mouth shut. She shot Kerry a look and thought as loudly as possible about the dispersion of the crowd. He glanced back, picking up on her, and gave a barely discernible nod. Immediately people began to drift away, still chattering excitedly, until the dock was empty except for the crew of the Logos, the two Fleet officers and Commander Lock. He glanced back in obvious puzzlement at the abrupt cessation of enthusiasm from the populous.

'Don't worry, Commander,' Maloney said. 'Psi abilities have their uses. Crowd control, for instance.'

'You mean you just-' Lock exclaimed in disbelief.

'I introduced a tacit suggestion that it would be a good idea to leave right about nowish,' Maloney said with a grin. 'I'm only grade three ESP, Commander. Although I must say your people were remarkably agreeable to what was technically only a weak TP evocation.'

'My people are accustomed to following orders, Mr Maloney.'

'Ah. That would explain it, sir.'

Shaking his head briefly, Lock returned his attention to Dena. She opened her thigh pocket and withdrew several data disks, handing them over to him.

'Full evac plans and procedures, Commander. We'll have to alter them slightly to deal with the unusual circumstances down here, but those files should give you the basic idea. I had the head ops officer on the Voltaire copy them onto these-' meaning the disks '-since our usual data slides won't be compatible with the hardware down here.'

'Excellent.' He accepted them with a nod of thanks and turned to hand them to his lieutenant, except the man of course wasn't there. Dena smothered a grin but he somehow made it seem as though he'd known that all along- the mark of a good commanding officer, she thought, never losing control of the situation- and then looked down at them thoughtfully.

'You said it would be twelve hours until the resources from Phobos would be ready?'

'Yes sir.'

'Then I suggest you all catch a couple of hours of sleep. I'll expect both of you, Captains, in my office at-' he consulted his wrist chrono briefly '-fifteen-hundred hours. We'll begin adapting this procedure then. As for the Lieutenant…'

'Sir, I respectfully request permission to speak with the crew of the Nebuchadnezzar,' Maloney said. If Lock was surprised at this he didn't show it.

'I'm sure that can be arranged, if you'll come with me.' He nodded to the others. 'Until fifteen-hundred, Captains.'

I see what you mean Dena heard in her head. The man's mind is like my mama's spice rack- all sensible lines and related items stacked neatly nearby.

Dena grimaced. She hated it when Psi poked around and stuffed messages in her head. Especially without her permission. Even more especially when she was having enough trouble making sense of her own thoughts at present without externals complicating matters.

Sorry there, Diz. I'll stick to verbals after fifteen-hundred, kapeech? Oh, I see. Well that would explain a lot.

He was gone with Lock before she could demand an explanation. What would explain a lot of what?

'Bloody Psi,' she muttered under her breath.

'Some shuteye sounds great about now,' Niobe said. 'But I don't know how I'm going to sleep.'

'Tell me about it,' Ghost agreed. 'I've half a mind to go jack myself into the construct for a while so at least my eyes stay closed.'

'Now that is a good idea,' Niobe said.

'Yeah, well not all of us can just go plug ourselves in and meditate in some virtual garden,' Sparks shot back with a tangible amount of acid. Grinning openly now, Dena looped her arm through his and tilted her head up to whisper in his ear.

'And you can't think of any other way to kill three hours when we're both too hyped up on adrenalin to sleep?'

He gave her a mildly astonished look and then a shrug of compliance.

'Your words, not mine.'

'See you at fifteen-hundred,' Dena said to a half-laughing Niobe as they headed out along the walkway for the elevator down into the residential level.