Chapter 9
Plan of Action
Disclaimer: Yeah, Landmark owns it all. This is the same disclaimer you read all over the internet and web. Let's be truthful, though – this could have been a great show that Landmark and Mattel let slide into oblivion. Shame on them for being before their time in the entertainment business.
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There was a quiet knock at the door before it opened. Hawk's head appeared. "Jon?"
Power looked back and motioned for him to come into the room. Matt closed the door quietly behind him, careful not to wake Pilot.
"How is she?" he asked.
Jon gave a cautious smile. "She's better. She woke up a while ago, but Tobias says it'll still be a few hours before everything is back on track."
Hawk rubbed a hand through his hair and blew out long breath. "I don't want to take your time with her away, but we need you. We can't activate Mentor without two senior authorizations. And without Mentor, Scout can't get a handle on what to do about the jumpgate situation."
Jon did not mind. "She'll be out of it for a while. We need to get that system secure before Dread decides to go global on us."
He followed Hawk out into the hall and into a new section of Sanctuary where they found Scout in a computer lab. Banks of computers that looked like relics from another century lined the horseshoe console. Like many of the rooms in Sanctuary, the lights were at a minimum, which Jon assumed was an effort to conserve as much as possible from the generators.
A tall, dark-haired woman sat next to Scout. Jon recognized her as one of those who had attended the meeting in the briefing room. Scout rotated his chair as he heard them enter.
"Good to see you again, Captain," the sergeant said in greeting.
Jon signaled a greeting. "You too, Scout. What's going on?"
"First, let me introduce you to Master Sergeant Meredith Kasich. She's Sanctuary's datahead in charge of their computer core."
"Sergeant," Jon said in her direction.
She gave an acknowledgement of his greeting. "Sir."
Jon's attention was drawn to a terminal, where Mentor's image – that of Stuart Power – filled the screen. Mentor was silent, as if awaiting instructions.
"What's the problem with Mentor?" Jon asked.
Scout swiveled back to the console. "Security lockouts. Mentor's bolted all the doors until you and Hawk give authorizations. Hawk's already entered his, but Mentor is insisting on yours. Could be that the interface with Sanctuary's core is a little shaky. Mentor is expecting to be reactivated on more familiar turf."
Sergeant Kasich pointed to an adjacent terminal and screen. "Sanctuary's systems will support Mentor, but they're put together piecemeal. They're nowhere near as sophisticated as your former core."
Jon felt frustration at the obstacles that were rising in front of them, though he chastised himself for not remembering that some of those difficulties had been intentionally put in place. They needed Mentor if they wanted a shot at getting inside Volcania and completing the mission. Mentor did, indeed, need his voice pattern and authorization code to be reactivated. Stuart Power had installed the failsafe, and Jon now knew why.
"Are we ready to try?" he asked the sergeants.
Scout pushed away from the console to allow Jon room. "All yours, Captain."
He stepped closer to where he could see Mentor's face on the screen more clearly. "Mentor, reinitiate program, authorization Power, Jon, Alpha-five-Beta-one-four. Execute."
Immediately, Mentor gave a bow of his head in welcome. "Greetings, Captain. Major Masterson, Sergeant Baker," it acknowledged.
Scout returned to his operating position. "Mentor, we need a systems check to make sure you're okay."
"All systems are nominal," Mentor reported, "although this environment is not yet familiar."
"Welcome to Sanctuary," Kasich said with heavy sarcasm, in irony of the Sanctuary's patchwork of equipment.
Mentor accessed a personnel file. "Master Sergeant Meredith Kasich, Sanctuary systems engineer."
"Hello, Mentor," she greeted carefully, a slight smile of what Jon thought was wonderment forming on her lips. "You've been granted full access to our core, what there is of it. Unfortunately, you'll be limited to access from terminals instead of a main holotank."
"Thank you, Sergeant," Mentor replied politely. "I am able to make adjustments in my programming to allow that."
Jon took comfort that the backup Pilot had made of the system seemed to be intact. "Mentor, we need all the data you have on Volcania's layout after the Icarus impact. We'll also need the new data Pilot brought to you."
"I'm sorry, Captain," Mentor said, "but the data disc Corporal Chase had analyzed contained no information."
Hawk glanced at Jon, his face betraying the cold shock they both felt at the possibility they had lost everything for nothing.
The major immediately voiced the question on their minds. "What do you mean it contained no data?"
"The disc was blank."
Hawk's fingers curled into a fist. "That son of a bitch," he growled quietly.
They had been double-crossed by Locke, their informant. Suddenly, the details of betrayal began to take form. They had been set up for the ambushes, but it remained unclear how Dread had known. On the other hand, Jon reasoned, Locke was the kind of person who would sell parts of his anatomy if he thought it would make a profit.
Jon's feelings of guilt over having sent Pilot alone in the first place welled up again. His common sense screamed that he could not have known what would happen, that risks were a part of war, as Hawk had reminded him on the jumpship. Despite Hawk's wisdom, he could not get the image of Jennifer, injured and dying for their cause, out of his mind.
He brought his attention back into focus, knowing he had to command, not be sidetracked by emotion. There would be time to grieve, time to be angry later. The future always had a placeholder for that. Some day, he would sit down at the table and take it up on its offerings.
"Scout, analyze the files on Volcania and see what the possible access points are. Take into account outside patrols and double security inside. We need to make it quiet."
"I'll give you a status report in about an hour," Scout assured.
"Good." Jon looked at Hawk, muttering quietly to him, "We need to talk."
The captain turned on heel toward the hall, well aware that his movements were tense and not lost on his second-in-command. An adjacent room was empty. He led Hawk inside and closed the door.
"From the look on your face, I'd say there's something on your mind," Hawk began.
Jon crossed his arms, not caring that it conveyed his annoyance. "You got that right."
"Let's have it."
"It seems that everyone has some sort of history with Tobias but me. I would like to be let in on the details."
Hawk sat down at the table and leaned back in his chair. "My unit was tapped to take her out of commission during the early days of Dread's play for power. The Joint Chiefs knew then how dangerous she was and decided that taking Tobias out of the game would give us a fighting chance against Dread. Tobias was developing weapons for him faster than we could combat them. We were ordered to assassinate her at the earliest opportunity."
"She says you missed."
"I did," Hawk said with disdain. "I had the shot, took it, but it was off. Barely missed her. By then, the Dread Youth closed in around her. We were told we couldn't inflict collateral damage. So, off she went down some tunnel."
"How did she know it was you who took the shot? She knew who you were right away when we got here."
Hawk shrugged. "I had the rest my unit hang back in support. A patrol was on my location before I could get out of there. They were taking me in when the unit bailed me out." He turned somber. "The no-collateral rule meant we couldn't shoot the kids in the patrol. We stunned them, just to get away. They must have made it back to Tobias and let her know who the gunner was."
Jon's weariness returned, but his anger was offsetting it, making him feel wired. He sat down at the table and studied Hawk's game face. There was no emotion for the tale told, no defense of the acts. Jon was not as controlled. He could feel the heat rising in his face, but he maintained his composure. He was in command of the unit. As commanding officer, he had a right to all operational knowledge of everyone in it. Hawk, of all the members, was the one who should have been most mindful of this fact. For that reason, Jon resented being kept in the dark.
"When were you going to tell me this?"
"In case you haven't noticed, you and I haven't exactly had the opportunity to talk one-on-one lately."
"You knew who she was when we were locked up. You should have said something then."
"I wasn't sure it was her at first."
"How could you miss the leg and the head?"
"She didn't have it when I was assigned," Hawk explained. "Whatever gave her all that happened after the mission."
Jon fingered the wood grain in the table. He could feel his agitation punching at him, adding to the stress he felt.
"I have to be able to trust you, Hawk," he said quietly. "I can't waste time wondering if you're holding out on me. We're too strung out to not be able to trust one another."
"Even if I had told you, how much difference would it have really made? If anything, it might have complicated it. Imagine what would have happened had I been wrong."
Jon rolled his eyes in raw frustration. "And the three-act play in the briefing was any better? Matt, we're trying to form alliances, not put the past on trial."
"Have you ever seen the evidence of what she did?" Hawk asked bluntly.
"It doesn't matter."
"Yes, it does!" Matt shot back hotly. "She butchered them. And she wasn't discerning, either. Men, women, children, young, old – she used them like lab rats. You have no idea of the things she did to them. Her work made the Metal War casualties look pleasant. She's a monster, Jon, and that's the way I'll look at her every time I see her."
Jon was quiet, trying to let Hawk's anger pass. In truth, Power had never seen the evidence of Tobias's war crimes and had no idea what she could have done that was so terrible. That was not to say Matt was wrong, but it was difficult to apply the same sense of revulsion to the woman as Hawk could.
"Even if she is," Jon said, "we need these people. Right now, we need everything they can give us to stop Dread's transfer."
"Working with Tobias is like making a pact with the devil, Jon," Hawk contended. "This will come back to haunt us. Trust me on that."
"I'm not saying you're wrong, and it's best to keep an eye on everyone at this point. But we have to start trusting them if only for the moment. Look," he said, trying to reinforce his point, "if they were going to doublecross us, they'd have done it by now."
Jon's effort to calm his second-in-command with reason did not work. Hawk's ire and contempt were still there.
"And what if they haven't gotten what they're after yet? What if it's Mentor or the ship?"
Jon accepted the possibility that what concerned Hawk could very well be true, but their options were so limited with Pilot still in danger. The only course of action was the one they had been taking thus far.
"We can only go by what we know, " Jon told him. "If you find something that changes the situation, then we'll act on it. With Pilot's condition, we have no options. She can't be moved, and we're not leaving her here."
Jon saw Hawk restraining his frustration at the command decision given him. He knew that a compromise would at least satisfy his first officer for the moment.
"I'll check with Mentor about Tobias and see what's there," Jon said in conciliation. "If there's something to be found, Mentor will see it."
Hawk considered the offer. "Fair enough, because I'm sure Mentor has the files," he said, "but you're not going to like what you see."
"Maybe not, but knowing the truth is better than living lies. Right now, I need you to work with Scout and see where we stand on getting into Volcania."
For the first time in a long while, there was a palpable tension between them, a disagreement between a commanding officer and a subordinate, a friend and a friend.
Hawk stood and headed for the door. He stopped just before leaving the room and turned one final time toward Jon.
"Do us all a favor, Captain," he said, "watch where you place your trust. We got burned by Locke, and that nearly got one of us killed. Don't let the same happen with Tobias."
Then Jon was alone, listening as Hawk rejoined the others in the core lab. He wanted to go to the lab and privately confer with Mentor over Tobias's record, but the presence of Kasich and even his own team would have made that difficult. He recalled Kasich's mention that Mentor was now available on multiple terminals, but he needed to be alone, free of prying eyes. More than that, he needed to know all he could find about Tobias and those on her team. For his own team's sake, he needed every advantage he could find.
The medical ward was capable of providing that kind of privacy. There was a terminal in there. He remembered seeing it. He was confident he would be left alone under the guise of visiting his wounded corporal.
He found himself navigating the halls of Sanctuary with freedom. No one stopped him, and no shadows lurked in his periphery as he walked toward the medical ward.
He was admitted to the room without question by the staff on duty. He closed the door behind him and stopped as he caught sight of Jennifer in the bed. She was unconscious and assisted by the ventilator. Her color seemed better, though, a stark contrast to the pallor of her skin the first time he saw her. He neared her and adjusted the blanket around her.
To the left was the terminal. He sat down in front of it, aware that he was about to do something he might regret. Hawk's admonition about Tobias's past was salient, though, and it was important that Jon knew what all the facts were if Mentor could provide the details.
"Mentor," he called quietly.
Almost immediately, Mentor's face appeared on the screen.
"Captain," Mentor greeted. "How may I help you?"
"Is anyone aware that you're being accessed on multiple terminals?"
"Negative. I have secured all authorized transmissions."
Jon felt a brief sense of relief. "Good."
Jennifer stirred, drawing Jon's attention to her.
"Jennifer Chase's condition is improving at a steady rate," Mentor informed.
"So I've been told," Jon said, watching as she settled back into a deep sleep. Once she was quiet, he said, "I need all the information you have on Helene Tobias."
Mentor paused, as was its custom when searching the database.
"Doctor Helene Tobias, born zero-eight, mark seven, 2095. Died, zero seven, mark nine, 2145."
"That's what you think," Jon muttered.
"Are my files inaccurate, Captain? Should I prepare to update them?"
"Later. Continue."
Mentor returned to its report. "Doctorate in biomechanical engineering from the Global Technology Institute. Doctorate in medical sciences, Harvard University."
The profile was impressive. It explained how Tobias could be so versatile within Sanctuary's domain.
"What's her connection to Dread?"
"Upon receiving her doctorates, Doctor Tobias applied to and was accepted by the United World Coalition Research Facility as a research fellow. She was assigned as an associate to Lyman Taggart."
"That means my father knew her."
"He knew of her, but it is unlikely they ever met. Doctor Tobias was assigned to a secure auxiliary research facility."
"What did she do there?"
"According to prosecution records, she was accused of conducting unauthorized research under Lyman Taggart's supervision. It was thought she was she was instrumental in Overmind's completion."
"She helped Taggart bring Overmind across the line of sentience?"
"There was dissention among the Joint Chiefs as to her level of participation. Some members cited her benevolent medical research as a defense. However, at the conclusion of the Metal Wars, before Taggart assumed power, it was proven that Doctor Tobias's research was bringing about changes in Taggart's attempts at world domination."
"And Hawk's unit got assigned to take her out," Jon added.
"Correct, Captain. Before her location could be ascertained, Dread's forces had gained significant advances against human forces. Much of the military organization that had convicted her of the charges had been destroyed. Major Masterson's mission was one of the final efforts to gain a foothold against Dread's advancing fronts."
Jon could easily follow the train of events. Dread's rise to power had been swift, annihilating most human armies quickly and decisively as the machines rolled over most of the planet. That did not explain one very pressing matter.
"You list a date of death. If Hawk says he missed, how did she die?"
"According to intelligence records, there was an internal conflict between Lyman Taggart and Helene Tobias."
"What was the problem?"
"Unknown. However, it was severe enough for her to be executed by Taggart's own hand."
The words shocked Jon. Tobias was not in their midst by the graces of luck. Taggart was notorious for being thorough in such matters.
He had promised Hawk he would view the evidence of Tobias's crimes. He requested Mentor's available files. Images began cycling on the screen. Occasionally, Mentor added an explanation to enhance the presentation. There were mutilated bodies, one after another. Mechanical parts were embedded in human skin in an attempt to mate man and machine. With each passing moment, he understood why Hawk had been assigned to assassinate Tobias. The pictures sickened him to the point that he had to look away.
"That's enough," he said quietly.
The images disappeared, and Mentor was once again in full view.
He watched Pilot again, thinking of her own involvement with the machine regime. He was unable to fathom how she could have been two very different people in her short lifetime, how she could have been witness to the torture and murder of so many. By her own admission, she had been an integral part of Dread's organization. If she had not found her way out of there, there was no telling how far she would have advanced in the echelon of Dread's empire. Somehow, some way, she had seen the truth, seen the light that led her away from hell and into salvation.
It was all madness, and he felt overwhelmed by the confusion of all the players in the game. Moreover, he felt duped – an unwitting participant in a sideshow of dramatic eloquence on the part of Tobias. She had a gift for words that somehow managed to lessen how dire a situation really was, and she used that same gift to exert her authority. Maybe she really was a monster, as she had told him. If that were true, then it meant there was more to learn about her and what it was she really wanted or needed.
The images of Tobias's "patients" played through his mind at a rampant pace as he sat there. As a commanding officer of a team, he had no idea how to begin to sort them, how to order them into something that he could use in order to save lives. That, after all, was his responsibility. His father, who knew the dangers that lay coiled in the dark recesses of scientific research, had handed it to him. Jon's role, though, dealt with the aftermath of science gone awry. He found the dead and buried them. He saw those who were still alive who prayed for a quick demise from their own personal hell of hunger and thirst.
Jon could only conclude that Tobias was a monster in her past. Her present and future, however, were the real mysteries. He could not say what she had become. He dared not make any assumptions lest it cloud his instincts. He had to be prepared for betrayal with Sanctuary's crew, as he should have been with the likes of Locke and his people. He longed for the trust he felt with his team to be shared with just one outside contact. As it stood, they were always vulnerable, always in danger of being compromised.
Jennifer stirred once more, and he smoothed the hair on her head to calm her. She was beautiful to him and always had been, even if he had only recently come to realize it. He had put her in that bed by his command decision. Nothing Hawk or Tobias could say would change that feeling. Some day, perhaps, he would be able to reconcile his guilt. Until then, he would carry it in his heart, welcoming the brandishing pain it caused.
Tobias had been seeking atonement. He realized he would have to do the same when all was said and done.