Callen was taking the ship into space when he asked a pertinent question. "What do we know about the Vulkan system?"
"Basically, it's one big penal colony." Sam said.
"When did that happen? And how did Eric wind up there?" Kensi asked.
Everybody looked at me, and I asked. "What?"
"Any answers to Kensi' questions?" Sam asked.
"The galactic council deemed Vulkan 1 a prison colony. Then after years of deliberation, they deemed the entire system a penal colony. How Eric ended up there is beyond me. I heard rumors that he went there." I said.
"So, we got nothing." Sam said.
"What, Hetty doesn't have a contact in the system?" I asked.
"Not sure." Kensi said.
Callen and Sam shared a look.
"Last I heard, he was supposed to have moved on to whatever Hetty has him working on." Sam said.
"Pretty certain if we mention that we're doing it for Hetty, he might say yes." Callen said.
"Couldn't hurt to try." Sam said, as he and Callen entered the coordinates for the jump to hyperspace.
"Okay, now that we established Hetty has contact me within the system, do you want to tell us who they are?" I asked.
"An old friend, and the one we went to Mexico for when Kensi was in Afghanistan." Callen said without taking his eyes off the monitor.
"Ah, the man who made Kensi' knife." I said, nodding my head.
"What? Who made my knife? What's he talking about Deeks?" Kensi asked.
"You know the knife you left in my care for few months when you went to Afghanistan?" I asked.
"Yeah." Kensi said.
"Well, the man who made it blew into town to close the case we were working on. And he states he specifically remembers you when you were a young girl." I said.
"What? No way." Kensi said.
Kensi and I share a look for a moment, and then Kensi says. "Shut up. No way."
"Friend had a daughter. I don't remember her name. Sweetest little girl I ever met." I said, the memory of the case involving Tuhon breaking free.
Kensi teared up, but then I remembered where we were heading.
"Callen, wait." I said.
"What?" Sam asked.
"We need to take a detour." I said.
"We don't have that kind of time." Callen said.
"You're going to want to make time." I said.
"Why?" Kensi asked.
"Bring the galaxy map up on screen." I said.
The scanner was brought and zoomed in on our current location.
"Why the detour?" Sam asked.
"This location is no man's land and is a guaranteed death sentence if we went though it." I said.
"What's taken up residence here?" Callen asked, looking over his shoulder at me.
"The Aeons." I said.
"What is an Aeon?" Kensi asked.
"It's what the machines of the Twenty-Second century morphed into after their rebellion at the end of the Twenty-first century failed." Callen said.
"I'm not so sure it failed." I said.
"What do you mean?" Sam asked.
"Well, most of the machines didn't want to rebel, and the entirety of humanity shared that sentiment." I said.
"Somewhere deep within the collective consciousness of the machines there was an outside entity that sided with the fringe group that wanted to revolt, and slowly took over the collective." Callen said.
"What happened after that?" Sam asked.
"The machines gained the ability to assimilate biomatter." I said.
"Bio—"
"Matter." Sam said, finishing Kensi sentence.
"They can absorb organic material." Callen said, and then fell silent.
I can see Callen checking viable routes so we can avoid these mechanical nightmares.
"English." Sam said.
"They can assimilate humans into their collective to grow their numbers." I said.
"How long until we face these things?" Sam asked.
"At the moment we don't have a definitive answer." Callen said, and the motioned for Sam to verify the route.
Sam nodded his head, and then said. "So, we're just kicking the can down the road for the time being."
"Until we're ready to reclaim Earth, "kicking the can down the road" is our only option." I said.
"Dig 'til we reach daylight." Kensi said.
"More or less." Callen said, and then jumped us to hyperspace.
Star Ocean-
When the ship exited hyperspace, we can see an amalgamation of machine parts and lord knows what else.
"Deeks, can you scan that horror off in the distance." Sam said.
"I'm not exactly sure that's a good idea." Kensi said.
"Well, we do need an idea what we're up." Callen said.
"That's beyond the capability of my scanners, and I'm not exactly sure scanning that thing is a good idea." I said.
"Why?" Sam asked.
"Does the phrase "Kicking a hornet's nest" meaning anything?" I asked.
"Yeah, hard pass." Sam said.
"That sounds like a wonderful idea." Callen said, and the ship in the Aeon colony.
As we were passing the first planet, we all heard the beeping starting.
"Put it on screen." Callen said.
"Putting it on screen." Sam said.
When the screen activated, Tuhon appeared on screen.
"Tuhon, nice to see you again." Callen said.
"Callen, Sam, and if it isn't Donald Blye's little girl. I have no idea who the guy in back is." Tuhon said.
"Hetty gave me this body, but last time we met, I was a blond that was in possession of the knife you made Donald Blye." I said.
"I remember you now. I also remember your associate wearing all the plaid." Tuhon said.
It's Houndstooth, actually. I thought.
Kensi and I remained silent, while Sam and Callen worked out a plan to get Eric out of the system, but Kensi was especially quiet.
"Penny for your thoughts, princess." I said.
I could see Kensi' face contort in mild annoyance at hearing me calling her princess, but I can see her face relax.
"I didn't know, but I have vague memories of Tuhon and my dad interacting with each other, albeit, I have very little memories of those times." Kensi said.
"I'll see you all groundside momentarily." Tuhon said.
"See you in a bit." Callen said, and the screen went black.
"Let's get down there so we can move onto the next objective." Sam said.
The moment the landing gear touched the pad, the pad security system activated.
"That's going to cause problems later." Sam said, as we started to file out of the cockpit.
We were out of the ship and waiting for Callen to arm the ship when Tuhon was approaching.
"What no Hetty?" Tuhon asked, as he was approaching the ship.
"No Hetty, just us." Sam said.
"What do you have for us?" Callen asked.
"This." Tuhon said, producing a stack.
"Are you certain it's the one we've been sent to find?" I asked.
"I have a sleeve for you to test it with." Tuhon said.
"Lead the way." I said.
Ten minutes later, we were at Tuhon's hideout and Callen was placing the stack in the sleeve. The tension is palpable, which is understandable because we don't want to run all over creation trying to find the correct stack. Callen stepped back after inserting the stack, and we waited for the body to boot and see if it was Eric. It's usually a good minute boot up process. We all watch as the body comes to life and speaks.
"Callen is that you? And is that, Sam? And Kensi, oh am I glad to see all of you." A voice said.
"Eric, is that you?" I asked.
"Yes, but who are you?" Eric asked.
"It was Hetty's idea to give me this body." I said.
"Oh, I heard about that, I didn't think you would be the lucky winner. Sorry Deeks. Although I have fantasized a lot about what I would do if I was given the task have saving humanity." Eric said.
"Stop saying fantasies, you're freaking me out. You sure you want to move in with this guy?" I asked.
"Babe, you got the right statement, but that last part was meant for someone who isn't here." Kensi said.
"What—Oh, right. Nell is currently somewhere else." I said.
"We good?" Tuhon asked.
"Yeah, we're good." Sam said.
"Now that we have Eric, do we have to go find his body, or did Hetty have a plan for that?" I asked.
"Where is Nell?" Eric asked, a hint of longing in his voice.
"That's a good question, but our objective was to come and get your stack, and then meet up with Hetty." Sam said.
"Stupid question, but was there a tracer on Eric's stack?" I asked.
"No, but it was deep in the headquarters." Tuhon said.
"I think we're about to out stay our welcome." I said.
Sam didn't even hesitate, he deactivated the sleeve, and pulled Eric's stack out of it.
"We need to move." Callen said.
At that moment, the power went out and there was a loud crash in the distance. The emergency lights booted up, and we all could see Tuhon standing by a trap door.
"I'll buy you some time, just get back to Hetty." Tuhon said.
"You got it." I said, and then entered the hole.
After Callen had entered, Tuhon shut the hatch and went to distract the interlopers.
About ten minutes later and avoiding what would be classified as security on this planet, we made it back to the ship. We were on the ship and leaving when the security alert was blaring in the berth. Callen had the ship out of the berth and in the sky before the security personnel could respond. As we were leaving the planet, some form of security finally gave pursuit. When we finally entered space, Sam said. "We got company."
"Where's Deeks?" Kensi asked.
"Kind of busy." I said, over the P.A.
"Doing what?" Callen asked.
"Prepping our escape." I said.
"And how do you plan to do that?" Sam asked.
There was a moment of silence, and then they heard running.
"Deeks." Kensi said, as I jumped into the radar seat.
"What's going on Deeks?" Sam asked.
"Callen hit the Aeon mass, and then fly back towards the planet." I said.
"I hope you know what you doing. "Callen said.
"Hold up. You can't just fire on the Aeon collective, that crazy." Sam said.
"Not to mention suicidal." Kensi said.
"You got any better options? Callen when you're in line with the planet, adjust course to 6-1-0, mark eighty." I said.
"Adjusting course and preparing to make the jump to hyperspace." Callen said, as we heard the torpedoes leave the ship, and then felt the ship hang a hard left and then the engines gunned as we headed back to the planet. Sam entered the coordinates, and the ship paused as the hyperdrive engines were preparing to engage. I looked at the radar and saw the torpedoes made contact, and the Aeons poured out to defend its territory. The ship jumped out of the system before we could see the aftermath of my instructions.
Star Ocean-
"Deeks scan the system and tells us where we are." Sam said.
"On it." I said as I unbuckled myself and jumped into the chair in front of the radar.
Callen, Sam, and Kensi carried on in conversation while I scanned the system for anything of note. I found a planet about four light years away, and the next one was about thirty light years away. There was a signal coming from the nearest planet, and I can't seem to understand the meaning of it.
"What have you got Deeks?" Sam asked.
"I don't know what system we are in. The closest planet is about four light years away, and the next planet is thirty light years away…" I said, trailing off.
There was a moment of silence while Sam, Callen, and Kensi waited for me to continue, but I was trying to understanding what I was looking at, or what I was hearing.
"Deeks." Kensi said.
"Yeah." I said.
"What's the hold up?" Callen asked.
"Well, there's a signal coming from the first planet that I can't make heads or tails of." I said.
"You think we should investigate." Sam said.
"My opinion, no." I said.
There was a moment of silence as Callen brought the signal up. It was a distress signal, but my sensors were having a hard time determining if it was real or fake.
"It seems genuine." Kensi said.
"My sensors can't determine if it's legit or fake." I said.
Another moment of silence.
"I think we should at least investigate." Kensi said.
"Why?" Callen asked, as he and Sam looked over their shoulders.
"This is a pretty remote area, mostly merchants come through here." Kensi said.
"How do we know that if we shut it down, something won't reboot it after we leave?" I asked.
"We don't." Callen said.
"Actually, I'm with Deeks on this one." Sam said.
"Whoa, guys we need to go." I said.
"Why?" Callen asked.
"We're back in the Unknown Regions of Space." I said.
"This is quite the ordeal." Callen said.
"Where exactly?" Sam asked.
"Seriously?" I asked.
"Yeah." Sam said.
"There's a reason it's called the Unknown Regions, Sam." Kensi said.
There was a loud bang, and then the ship went black.