Chapter Twelve. Welcome to Mars.

Welcome to Cydonia Mr. Woolsey" Saotome Nabiki said formally adding a small bow. She had come to meet the UN delegate at the airlock. She was dressed in her combat fatigues, deliberately going for a military look, to back this up she was also wearing a pistol in a shoulder holster. Mr Richard Woolsey, the delegate, was dressed in a borrowed flight suit and looked significantly worse for the wear. The pilots had not given him an easy trip and he was a man used to far more creature comforts than the X-Com craft allowed.

"Actually its Dr. Woolsey" he corrected with an insincere smile. He was tall, in his late forties, balding and bespectacled. He had about him the air of the over-educated but it was mixed with the face of a political pragmatist. Normally he wore expensive suits and was rarely without a tie even on his days off. He prided himself on his efficiency and dedication and quietly hid a real ambition for recognition. He had been assigned this mission as a result of that ambition and was determined to make it a success.

Even from his first look around he was intimidated. His calling was accountancy and politics, and it had in no way prepared him for a trip to space, let alone landing in an alien base. The flight had been a nightmare and the landing worse. Every step brought home that he wasn't on Earth anymore, the lighter gravity playing havok with his balance. He knew that part of the disturbing experience was pure tactical, they hoped to keep him off-balance and quietly slip their dirty secrets by while he looked elsewhere. He also knew it was working.

This base had none of the feel he expected of a permanent settlement. The direction markers were stencilled on the walls which were themselves of uncompromising alien stone. The representative sent out to meet him while indisputably beautiful had a hard cold edge to her that was made all the more unsettling by her complete composure in these surroundings. He shook her hand perfunctorily and kept his eyes scanning the room. Behind her had appeared two other agents who looked every inch the cold hearted killer he had been led to expect. As his eyes swept the area he made out numerous recessed cameras, and more than one weapon barrel.

"Dr Woolsey" Nabiki called to him, beginning to lead him deeper into the complex. "You will no doubt wish to freshen up, Corporal Lancer here will show you to a room that has been set aside for your use." She continued. "I will look forward to meeting you more formally later." And with that she turned away down a side corridor, her own agent in tow. Richard Woolsey turned to his guide and gestured for him to lead on. Soon he was struggling to keep up as he was led though the complex.

"Just how big is this place?" he asked.

"So far its only about the size of a large stadium," the corporal replied "but with the mining it grows larger every day."

"Mining?" Richard asked. The corporal nodded.

"The manufactories here and the orbital workshacks all require a lot of raw materials and the aliens must have chosen this spot for the same reasons," Lancer explained.

"What are you building?" Richard asked.

"All sorts of things Sir," the corporal replied.

"Like what" Richard pried. The corporal hesitated before he answered.

"I'm not sure" he replied, "I know we are making interceptors, rifles, armour and scuttlebutt says a new mass driver cyclotron Is going up, but other than that, well I don't ask."

"You don't ask?" Richard enquired.

"What I don't know can't be tortured out of me" Lancer replied as if such talk was normal.

"And do you expect that to happen?" Richard pressed, a hint of fear rising.

"Nah, we should have enough warning if they are going to take the bas," Lancer offered.

"Warning for what?"

"To set off the nukes and take the bastards with us" Lancer replied with more than a hint of viciousness. Richard looked at him wondering again what drove men to become like that.

"No surrender?" the doctor asked.

"No Way!" the corporal replied, whitening, "If it came to that I'd beat me own brains out. You don't know what they do to prisoners, and if you're lucky you never will!" Wisely Richard dug no further.

-

Three days later Richard was ensconced in an office doing some accounts, hindered by the infuriating constant codes. Simply put he had seen less intricate lace. He could smell something big though. The figures were done with an expertise he rarely encountered but they were definitely cooked. There was enough truth here to throw off a lesser man but he could just make out the hint of false patterns.

"I wouldn't bother with them" came a voice, Mrs Saotome. She had walked into his office and sat down without him noticing. Now however he sure noticed her, she had been working out and her coveralls were tied at the waist, revealing a stretch top that was hugging her heaving chest, and that in turn showing a generous amount of cleavage. Richard's brain knew it was no accident but it was hard to tell the rest of his body that. He tried anyway, concentrating on the fact that this naive woman was his opponent in this investigation.

"Why is that?" he asked, tearing his eyes back to her face, her slightly smirking face.

"Because they won't tell you a thing," she replied, "we only keep them around to give infiltrators something to see."

"Oh really," he asked dubiously, "and do you get many infiltrators?"

"None yet" she replied, standing up.

"So where should I be looking?" he asked

"Anywhere you like," she answered, "From the reports I have you have already come to a decision and I have absolutely no interest in helping you back it up." He felt his anger rise, nobody treated him like this.

"Look young lady," he stated, voice raising "I am here as a special envoy of the UN! You have a duty to help me. A duty to the people that founded this organisation and a duty to the people of earth! You will do your duty or I will break you!"

"Sit down Doctor" she said calmly, he hadn't even notice himself stand. "I'll see you at dinner." She added, standing. He slumped into his seat, confused. She opened the door and went to walk out but stopped and turned back to him. "I do have a duty to Earth, I intend to do my duty and you will never raise your voice to me again." Then she was gone.

Richard sat there confused, somehow this girl had got to him, made him lose his comportment. She had made him look like the amateur. The shame of it cut through him like a knife. "Very well" he told himself, "she wants to play hardball. Two can play at that game".

-

Most of the command staff had chosen to eat together tonight. They were gathered in the mess hall at a later hour than normal so they could get some privacy. Richard had been told the dinner was to celebrate something or rather and so had put on his dinner jacket for the occasion. When the corporal called for him he proceeded to the hall with a quiet confidence. Not only were dinner parties one of his fortes but under his arm he had just the munitions he needed to deflate that Nabiki woman. He walked into the lounge next to the hall with an extra little bounce in his step, one that quickly faded when he saw the other occupants. They were dressed in a wide variety of costumes, from doctor to engineer, to soldier. The other 'dinner guests' were dressed in their ordinary working clothes, they had no doubt done this deliberately.

"Look out it's the Penguin!" shouted one voice with a Scottish lilt. Richard tried to smile. But failed when another voice responded

"Get him Batgirl!" the man called. Far too many people laughed to leave Richard in any doubt as to where he stood in these people's eyes.

"Forgive my husband and his sidekick," Nabiki said, extending a hand and hiding a smile politely. "And forgive me for not being more specific in my instructions. I had not realised you had brought a DJ with you. I would have imagined you to have needed the weight for far more important things." Richard declined to answer, again forcing a smile. Indeed he had had to leave all sorts of things behind to bring his tuxedo and now she was telling him it wasn't needed he was justifiably miffed.

"Nevermind Nabiki" he replied, internally cursing her and the horse she rode in on. A frown crossed her beautiful face.

"I am sorry Doctor but I think my husband might object to that level of familiarity," she said, apparently sincere, "His mother is very traditional and calling another man's wife by any name without an honourific is very familiar in Japan."

"I am sorry Colonel" he replied with a formal bow, recognising both the ploy and the seriousness of his blunder. Once again she had rattled him and it was really annoying him.

"Have you met my Ranma?" Nabiki asked, no doubt knowing full well that he had been unable to speak to the elusive agent. She spotted him over to one side of the room, drinking from a beer bottle and chatting with a small group of extremely well built soldier types. She beckoned to him and he first put on an expression of pleading and then put his hands together, veritably begging her not to make him. When he started over it was with extreme reluctance. It made Richard very glad indeed to see this woman didn't have the complete control she pretended. At last he was scoring some points. But instead of being put out she laughed.

"You must forgive him" she leaned in whispering "he's not good with strangers."

"Nearly all of them are trying to kill me" Ranma said as he came over. "An' that ain't it an' you know it Anata" he added.

"I'm sorry Ranma," she answered him "but the good doctor here needs some backup or he will end up looking quite silly." Richard recoiled as if slapped, you just couldn't say such things. It just wasn't done. "Now if youll excuse me I'll just check on Kimiko one more time," Nabiki added and then sashayed off.

"Whatcha doc" the man said sticking out a hand "How's it hangin'" he added, breathing alcohol over the doctor. Richard was far more used to this and found his feet by smiling and shaking like a good politician.

"Nice to meet you Colonel" Richard said politely.

"So what sorta doc are ya?" Ranma asked in an attempt at small talk.

"I'm surprised you weren't briefed" Richard replied sniping.

"Nah Nabs don't bother me with shit like that" he replied, once again managing to shock the envoy. "Unless you need killing I don't really need to know that much about you."

"And why would I need that?" Richard asked.

"Cuz you were insecure" Ranma replied with a smile. "Safe Secure Secret or insecure and in the gound."

"So how do you know I'm secure?" Richard asked, trying to get a handle on this man's character.

"She says so" Ranma answered. "She trusts you so I trust you."

"I think perhaps you overestimate the depth of our relationship." Richard replied still trying to gauge the man.

"Nah," Ranma replied "If she didn't trust you would have had an accident already."

"You really think she would kill a UN envoy?" he joked. He reckoned he had the measure of the man already. Like many 'I'm just a soldier' types the man equated blunt with honest and prided himself on his honesty. The type were easy to manipulate, accomplished politicians did it with ease every day.

"Hell yeah" Ranma replied, "You threaten what we built here and she'd choke the life out of you with her own hands." Richard was genuinely shocked, he had assessed her a cold but here was her own husband saying she was capable of treachery and murder. "See its like this doc" he continued "lots of good people gave their lives so that this base could be built, so that Earth could have this chance at survival and them that's left sort of take it personally when anyone threatens their memory."

"Anyone?" Richard asked

"Even me!" Ranma replied a little drunkenly "Some bug-ass alien gets in my head and boom, I'll clean him out with an eight gauge. Richard smiled his secret smile, the amateur had just given him everything he would need to twist him to his cause. A few whispers a dose of jingoism and the idiot would be shouting 'how high.'

They were called into dinner and for once the doctor was pleasantly surprised, the smells that greeted them as they walked into the hall were divine. He had begun to fear the worst but they had obviously gone to some trouble. They had even covered their tables, he had been starting to think these philistines wouldn't have been able to find a single tablecloth in the whole base.

He was led to a seat near the centre, unfortunately next to Saotome's wife not him. Nevertheless he could feel his pulse quicken in anticipation of the game to come.

There was a clear ringing noise as Nabiki tapped a spoon off of a glass; "Ladies and Gentlemen" Nabiki began, calling them to order. "Ladies and Gentlemen" she repeated, "and soldiers" she added with a smile, "We are gathered here to commemorate All Hallow's Eve, the night of the dead and the official occupation of this facility. Near this place, not so very long ago, the first free man on Mars took his first steps towards a brighter future. We are gathered to thank those brave souls that made those steps possible," she was interrupted by cheering, "and honour those who paid the final price so the rest of us could live free." Once gain there was a round of cheering. It only let up when Nabiki again rang her glass, "True to the Tradition of X-Com there will be no more speeches, no sombre minutes of silence, no military memorial service. Their absence, their silence is mark enough. Every child born free is a monument to their sacrifice." Even Richard managed to be moved by this.

"Ladies, gents and the rest of you, our toast," she called raising her glass, "X-Com!" Every throat in the place answered her call, repeating the name at the top of their voices.

Then from further down the table came another cry "Alpha undefeated!" which was also echoed by almost everyone.

A challenging cry came from the same side "Bravo, Second To None!" When it too was echoed a sinking feeling settled into Richard's gut.

It was far worse than he expected. The toasts went on for ages, and even continued all through the meal. The food was fantastic, the wine strong even if it was very bland and his company beautiful even if she was a conniving traitor. By the time the main course had been cleared away some of the tables had already been shifted and two idiots were jousting along the top of them with chairs instead of horses and lances. By the time the last course was cleared away his head was splitting from a truly evil headache. So for the first time he abandoned a dinner party early, knowing that he was wrong to do so but sure that his head would never forgive him if he didn't.

As he left he heard the Scottish woman shout "Nice one Gos!" and another round of cheering.

Unfortunatley for X-Com it was while he was poking around early the next day he finally found a reference to Project Nemesis.