Tennokiken Voyagers: Thirteen

Later within the space station itself, a hasty meeting was being held. "No way in hell," Rio said fiercely, the black haired officer shaking her head as she continued, "there is no way Fleet is involved with the Raiders."

"Your innocence is so refreshing," Victoria Donovan answered dryly, the dusky skinned, curly black haired officer leaning against the wall.

Siobhan Ward watched Victoria coldly, but she quietly said, "Someone in Fleet tried to cripple or kill me so under the circumstances I'm not THAT surprised."

Kelly Miles raised a hand, stilling the side comments even as a few more of the others began to trickle inside. All around the large chamber men and women listened, as well as warily watching several of Donovan's people who had come aboard. Ifurita, Alielle and Fatora stuck by their mistress Victoria, while the crews of the Venture and Revenge sat around in various places.

Maya Ibuki sat slumped in the center of the room, improvised restraints holding the brown haired young woman fast to a chair. The story that she told had shaken them all, revealing that a sizable faction of their own Fleet had sponsored and armed the Raiders with military grade weapons, sending them out against the outlying sectors of space.

"What I don't get," Dan sighed, "is why?" The brown haired younger man shook his head, "What motive could someone in Fleet have?"

"Chaos," Fatora noted coldly. The slim brown haired woman continued her intelligence analysis, "The Raiders provide a excuse to move ships and crews, while the figure behind all this is gathering his forces under the pretext of hunting them down."

"I still can't believe who's behind it," Lucille muttered, " Colonel Brendan O'Rourke?!"

"Drydock is the largest Fleet base in the area," Rio noted reluctantly, "his being in command there would put him in a excellent position to pull this off."

"But O'Rourke has a sterling reputation," Shane noted from where he sat beside Sylvie, "how could he be caught up in this?"

"You damn fools," Maya looked up blearily, "we're not the criminals you think we are." She took a breath, "The corporations that run our government are bleeding the outer worlds dry, destroying lives just for the sake of profit."

"And a lot of the survivors came into Fleet because they had no where else to go," Siobhan noted softly, studying the young woman.

Maya nodded slightly, "It doesn't take long for stories to be exchanged, people realizing how much they were being abused and then coming together." Her eyes glittered, "But the Colonel is going to change all that."

"This sort of insurrection could break the government," Kelly quietly said, "the government we all swore our oaths to defend."

"And have they lived up to their responsibilities to us?" Maya demanded of the group fiercely. "I don't think so," she weakly muttered before exhaustion finally took it's toll, slumping unconscious in her chair.

"So what do we do now?" Jessie asked, the blonde perched on a inactive control surface, boot tapping against the side.

"If there is anything we can do," Dan said, expression just a bit shell-shocked, "with three ships up against everything he has."

"Make that four Ships," Victoria corrected him crisply. As everyone looked over at her in surprise she shrugged casually as she explained, "If I don't act, the authorities may assume I'm tangled up with O'Rourke."

"Trying to defeat the Raiders directly is impossible with our forces," Isis noted, "but we do not have to do that." She looked over at Kelly, "In the rush of events I did not have the chance to reveal that I had cracked the Raider's computers."

Kelly jerked up, looking at her in admiration. "What did you get?" she asked.

"Mother," Isis smiled just slightly, "I have decoded encrypted messages sent from Colonel O'Rourke, identified by his personal access codes."

"So we've got confirmation," Siobhan murmured, "too bad, I was almost hoping the was all a con by Victoria."

"Me, too," Rio conceded.

"Also, O'Rourke's central command post for his operations is Drydock, and therefore may be his one point of vulnerability," Isis continued calmly.

There was a moment of silence as they digested what she was saying then Alielle blurted out, "You're proposing we attack Drydock?!"

Shane blinked, but his expression was thoughtful as the older man considered, "The base's defensive shells of firepower can be maneuvered through, especially since we know how they're set up." He looked over at Dan, "You up to it?"

Dan puffed a breath out but his voice was firm, "Of course."

"You're both nuts," Ai murmured but she looked at Dan with unmistakable affection.

Ifurita stood near Victoria, keeping a wary eye on the group as the amazonian white haired woman asked, "Is it possible?"

"If the pilots are good enough," Victoria admitted, "and while our Alielle couldn't do it, Wisner and Llewellyn are both reputed to be quite good."

"It could put you in substantial danger, Mistress," Ifurita said, concern in her voice.

Victoria looked at Ifurita curiously, surprised by that tone of voice. 'I didn't program her for that,' she noted before saying aloud, "I don't have much choice, my being command rank at Drydock means I may be included if he is brought down...."

"Unless you assist in stopping him yourself," Ifurita finished.

"Before we get too far into this," Kelly stood up from where she was sitting, "I need to talk to Donovan, Ward and your command staffs."

Siobhan nodded, "I've got a compartment that should work well." She hesitated, "But... in five minutes, please?"

Kelly raised a eyebrow but nodded, "Of course."

Siobhan strode over to Donovan, meeting the shorter woman's eyes. "I want to talk to you in private," she tossed a look at Ifurita, "and you can leave your guard dog behind."

"Mistress," Ifurita cautioned.

Victoria studied Siobhan a moment then nodded slightly, "All right, Ward." Together they walked out of the room, a odd pair indeed.

"Think we should have let them go off?" Sylvie asked softly.

Shane shook his head, "No way Siobhan would kill her and be caught at it."

"That's not too comforting," Sylvie sighed wryly.

Siobhan led the way to a glass portal, the two of them looking out at the stars on the velvet background of space. They stood there a moment, silently, then she quietly said, "You know what I want to ask?"

"Speaking purely hypothetically," Victoria chose her words very carefully, "it could be that whomever set the explosion to injure you was unaware of your resistance to medical regeneration technologies."

Siobhan clenched her cybernetic hand, eyes flashing, "I ought to kill you."

"Whomever set the explosion probably had two plans," Victoria continued, "either you'd fail to stop the explosion and be hurt, or you'd not reach the device in time and be accused of negligence. Either way, you would be removed."

"Why are you telling me this?" Siobhan demanded.

"Your death would have profited me nothing, and your disappearance caused an investigation that shut me down for months," Victoria explained. A grim smile, "Whatever else I am, I am not a murderer."

With that Victoria walked away, leaving Siobhan staring after her thoughtfully....

To be continued...

Tennokiken Voyagers: Fourteen

Commander Ritsuko Akagi paused at the door, the tall, black haired woman's expression grim. She pressed the chime and waited, then the door slid open silently. Ritsuko strode up to the desk and saluted as she said, "Reporting as ordered, sir."

"Ease up on the formality," Colonel Brendan O'Rourke turned from looking out of the port. His brown hair was neatly trimmed, but his set of old fashioned glasses slid down occasionally from his blue-gray eyes. "How badly are we compromised," he asked seriously.

"Nearly completely," Ritsuko sighed as she sat down across from him. "Maya was head of a primary cell, it's why she was chosen to go after Donovan in the first place," she said grimly, "and she knows about the inner circle."

"We're not ready to be revealed publicly," Brendan sighed softly, "are you certain Donovan captured her alive?"

"Donovan took out her personal transport two and a half hours after the attempt on her life, along with her command staff," Ritsuko reported, "and Maya hasn't reported in." Quietly, "She believes in the cause, there's no way she'd turn."

"Fair enough," Brendan acknowledged, "so are we completely exposed?"

"Maya was inoculated against standard truth drugs," Ritsuko said, "but..."

"Donovan probably has access to more exotic means of interrogation," Brendan finished.

"The situation isn't quite that bad," Ritsuko pointed out, "they have Maya's data, but they do not have hard evidence to back any of it up."

"The Reliant hasn't reported in," Brendan shook his head, "they're already trying to crack it's computers, you can bet on it."

"Which will take weeks," Ritsuko said confidently, "and we've already got false evidence trails in place leading right to a fall guy."

"Where is Captain Misato Katsuragi?" Brendan asked after a moment's thought.

"Fleet maneuvers," Ritsuko answered, "she's getting the new wing of ships broken in."

"All right," Brendan nodded firmly, "then I want her to bring all of her ships over to this sector, as well as any ships locally with local Captains. To explain the movement of ships we're going to circulate the cover story that the Raiders are moving more aggressively, and that we need the additional ships for anti-piracy patrols."

"Do you think it's time to move?" Ritsuko asked.

"No," Brendan conceded, "but we may have no choice."

"And what about our Raider forces?" Ritsuko looked at him curiously.

Brendan looked down at his desk top a moment, his expression contemplative. "Stop all of their pirate activities," he said softly, "and instead concentrate on finding and destroying both the Revenge and Venture."

Ritsuko cautioned, "That'll confirm their suspicions."

"Trying to maintain full cover at this point would just be foolish," Brendan sighed softly, "not to mention a waste of time." A grim smile, "Put the word out to loyal officers to try to make it to this sector, as soon as possible."

"It's time?" Ritsuko asked.

"We've been hoping to have some more time to build up our forces," Brendan shrugged, "but if our estimates are right we already have at least parity with the loyal Fleet units. I'll talk to the sector Governor about it first, but if he agrees then it might just be time to officially declare our independence from the Commonwealth."

"A day we've all been waiting for," Ritsuko smiled. She got up, tiding her uniform as she said, "I'll put the word out." She walked to the door before she hesitated a moment, "Do you think Maya is all right?"

"They're Fleet," Brendan said reassuringly, "they won't hurt her." He sighed, "I don't know if we'll be able to recover her, though."

Ritsuko clenched her hand, her eyes closing, but she kept her voice steady. "Maya knew the risks," she said, leaving the office quietly.

The corridors of Drydock were busy as Ritsuko walked towards her own office, the science and engineering department. As she went Ritsuko found herself tallying the officers she passed, noting which were loyal to Fleet or their separatist movement and feeling mildly satisfied at how many of their people were here.

'Of course there are enough Fleet loyalist to make things messy if we move to take over,' Ritsuko thought as she entered her office, her lab coat fluttering over her regulation uniform. 'We'll need to get them out of the way, hopefully without giving them enough time to react,' she mused as she sat down at her desk.

Accessing the mainframes Ritsuko connected to the research telescopes on the far side of the station and reconfigured them, quickly setting them up as communications disks. Composing the message Ritsuko sent it out to the Raiders in a burst transmission that lasted barely a fraction of a second, then restored the system to it's default mode.

Then Ritsuko brought the regular communication systems on line, requesting a link to the starship Relentless. In seconds a familiar face appeared on her screen, the tough, black haired woman meeting her eyes calmly. "Commander Akagi," Misato said calmly, "this is a surprise."

"There's been a development at home," Ritsuko said, giving the code that they needed to communicate using a secure line.

Misato nodded just slightly and Ritsuko heard her inform her bridge that she would be in her office if needed. A few seconds later Misato reconnected, scramblers on that terminal making the transmission secure. "What's the situation?" Misato asked crisply.

"It may finally be go time," Ritsuko said softly.

Misato gave her a thoughtful look and noted, "You don't look as happy as I'd expect you to be, telling me that."

Ritsuko puffed out a breath, "That bitch Donovan has Maya captive."

"Shit," Misato bit out softly. She sat up in her chair as she asked, "Was Maya the one sent in to deal with Donovan?"

"Maya had the engineering skills to fake the emergency," Ritsuko sighed, "and I thought she could handle Donovan until back up arrived."

"You underestimated Donovan," Misato said, her tone helping take some of the sting out of her words. "Do you think she's taken Maya to Captain Miles?"

"That's what we're assuming," Ritsuko said, "Donovan has to know she can't trust anyone here, and Miles has a reputation for being squeaky clean."

"Unlike Donovan," Ritsuko muttered.

"This situation does make for strange bedfellows," Misato agreed. She looked thoughtful, "Do you want me to try to track down Miles? I could pretend to be a loyalist, maybe get her to turn Maya over to me."

"You have no idea how that tempts me," Ritsuko sighed, "but I can't risk our operations for one woman, even if she is my lover."

"There's always your insider in Mile's crew," Misato suggested.

"Our spy, yes," Ritsuko smiled slightly then she sobered as she continued, "but so far all we've asked the agent to do was pass on information, we haven't asked for anything that might go against the captain or her crew."

"Then maybe it's time to finally find out where our agent's loyalties really lie," Misato pointed out to her firmly.

Ritsuko considered it a moment from all the angles then she smiled. "All right, I'll send the burst transmission out to the receiver satellite," she said, "our agent can them download it from wherever they are and go to work."

To be continued....