Chapter 4

Sepia star system, inner system.

Sepia Prime, Silvis Province capital of Foris.

"Anything new?" Said Sarah as she popped into the room, sipping from her hot chocolate mug. It was good, although unfortunately being on the job meant she couldn't spice it up with some stronger stuff of the alcoholic variety.

"Not much just yet. Contact information, drop off points, that kind of stuff." Said Hector distractedly as he looked at the displays to the interrogation room. "Still trying to find the keywords."

Sarah nodded. Modern truth serums were very good, but in loosening the subject's will they also more or less obliterated the person's ability to answer complex queries. As such a modern interrogation was a complex process of slowly digging through their memories and finding keywords that slowly unraveled the whole puzzle. It was kind of like memory exploring through hypnosis in some ways. It was also a delicate and somewhat slow process.

You could also just slice open the suspect's head and feed their brain into an interrogator machine, or use mind-reader implants, but those were generally frowned upon...and banned by the Infinite Systems Federation constitution. The kind of ban that allowed their navy (or their member state's) to enforce it outside of their borders on whoever they damned please. Which meant that it was effectively illegal everywhere and part of 'universal law', a judicial standard considered the absolute minimum for any government to run, and usually assumed to apply everywhere. A Federation ship wouldn't come to hunt you if you used them of course, but if you were discovered using it you were toast, because most governments would not take the risk. A single bunch of mercs using banned tech was not something worth even a Federation cruiser captain's attention. An interstellar government effectively turning a blind eye to such practices was. At least in this case the Imperial Frontier Fleet usually followed Federation protocol and just started slapping economic sanctions and at worst restructuring governments, and not flatten everything like they did for slavery.

"I'll leave you at it then." She took another sip, then stepped out of the room, the door sliding smoothly out of the way.

"Ma'am. The usual idiots want to thank you for helping save their people from the SLF." Said Elteria without preamble as she just...appeared in the middle of the hallway.

Sarah wasn't even phased. She just took another, deeper sip.

"I assume you sent them the usual platitudes?"

"I would have, except that the governor is among them and she wants to talk to you directly."

Sarah looked reprovingly at the hologram.

"Our client is not one of the 'usual idiots', Elteria."

"My apologies. In any case, she is waiting on the line for you."

"Already then. My office. Full regalia."

"I'll have the background ready."

*****

"You wanted to meet with me governor?"

"Yes, miss...Sarah." The governor smiled, clearly remembering the captain's insistence to use her given name. "I wanted to talk to you, in private."

Well, good luck with that, thought Sarah, as Elteria was monitoring all incoming and outgoing communications on the entire ship. And was in fact actively micromanaging her background as they spoke. Her office was a bit too cosy to make for a proper mercenary captain's background, so the AI had to edit it out and replace it with something more...appropriate.

"Well, here I am."

"Indeed...." The Governor paused, clearly marshalling her thoughts. "There appears to be traitors in the highest levels of my government and legislature."

Sarah didn't even blink.

"You...aren't surprised, are you?" Continued the governor after fruitlessly waiting for a reaction.

"No offense ma'am, but it was quite obvious. An insurgency cannot operate for this long or at this level without high level contacts funneling intelligence their way."

"Right. Well, I am informing you of this because it appears I am at fault for the attack you suffered today."

Sarah blinked.

"Excuse me?"

"I...had taken the liberty to organize a gala to celebrate your recent victories with high ranking members of my government and some of our parliamentary supporters, and openly announced there that you had been tasked with eradicating the SLF, and in fact were getting very close to finding some of their camps, thus why you had departed for Foris." The governor coughed. "A slight exageration to help with morale I'm afraid. But my security teams were able to intercept a transmission we knew was in SLF codes coming in from the facility the party was housed in, although they weren't able to narrow down potential recipients by much, despite it being a directional transmission. It was sent to the decryption services, and only now have I received it's contents. It was an urge to move quickly against you, as well as your destination. Given what happened...."

"Not much of a stretch to imagine why they attacked." If that was the case, it was an impressive speed to put together a strike team like that. Or they had one already assembled for something else and just threw it at her in panic. "Thank you for the confirmation governor, it is highly appreciated." Since the woman clearly wasn't going to apologize for painting a target on her back. Then again, she was paying her very well.

"It is my pleasure captain. Given the results you have brought so far, you truly are our best hope to put an end to these murderers. If there is anything me or my government can do to help, you need only to ask."

For a split second, Sarah was tempted...but decided against it. Any 'help' they got would probably either be awestruck or deeply resenting that their incompetence required her people's presence, if they weren't outright riddled with spies and traitors. The only people she could rely on completely was her crew, and she rather doubted the governor would furnish her in what she wanted to keep her crew in top shape: lots of exotic food, and some....charming and well compensated young men and ladies to keep them company.

"Of course."

The governor nodded, and cut the connection, and Sarah sat back in her chair.

"Still think she shouldn't be included in the 'usual idiots'?" Said Elteria as her avatar materialized on the captain's desk.

Sarah didn't even dignify her executive officer/ship's AI with an answer.

*****

"They killed Sarlec and his people."

The silence around the table deepened as the man, ensconced in the military fatigues he was no longer entitled to wear, sat back down. His face was heavily scarred, and he looked tough enough to chew a ship's hull plating and spit the nails out. If ship still used nails anyway.

"How many-" Started a young, white haired woman.

"No survivors. These guys don't leave anyone alive behind them." Sharply interrupted another young woman, this one with raven black hair...and so alike her twin in every other aspect the hair color was the only way to tell them apart.

"Yes, that does seem to be the case." Agreed the man in a business suit, and the last person around the table. "Which is fascinating. Even our dear old governor wanted some intelligence out of our people."

"And she's soft." Added the raven haired twin. "These....mercenaries." She almost spit out of the word. "Are anything but that."

"Agreed." Said the military man. "They are brutal and effective. Exactly what our good governor needed in short. I admire their methods and their efficiency, if nothing else." He shook his head, his eyes hardening. "But they will pay for what they did to our own."

"Couldn't we just...hire them away?" Hesitantly said the white haired twin. "I mean, they're in it for the money, right? Couldn't we just....pay them off?"

"That wouldn't work." Said the business man. "They're mercenary board contractors. If they betray their contracts, the penalties will be...severe. Too severe, I suspect, to make it even remotely worth it, no matter how much we throw at them."

"Why?"

"Because the most precious thing a mercenary has isn't their firepower, it's their reputation." Answered the military man. "No one wants to hire unreliable fighters after all."

"...I guess that's fair. So...what do we do?"

"Our options right now are limited. With Sarlec gone, that's the last of our heavy strike team in Sylvis out of the picture. And we're going to need far, far more than that to take out these mercenaries."

"Can we even do that? I mean...their ship has to be Dominion military grade to have reacted this quickly to the attack." Said the business man nervously. "I don't know about you, but I don't think we have anything that can take out something like that."

"There are more than one way to skin a cat, my friend." Said the military man with a nasty smile. "For example, their soldiers have to come out to interrogate people, or follow leads....And besides, you might be surprised by some of the things our friends have funneled over to us." The military man nodded at the twins, who nodded back. The two young women -girls, really, compared to the burly veteran- weren't exactly most people's mental image of interstellar arms smugglers and the representatives of a vast revolutionary movement...which was exactly why they were so effective at their jobs.

"Well, let's hope it doesn't come to that." The business man smiled. "I'd quite like to avoid escalating it that far anyway. Would launching operation couperet be an option?"

The military man and the raven haired twin shook their head simultaneously.

"Most of the equipment is still in transit." Answered the raven haired twin. "Some of it will take up to a month to arrive....if there are no delays." Unspoken was that there were always delays. "Besides, even then the original plan wouldn't work. An air assault on the governor's palace would be....counter indicated, even if that ship is on the other side of the planet."

"Indeed." Followed up the military man. "Although I do have some options there. Some of our friends have offered to-"

"Excuse me, sirs and ma'ams?"

Everyone turned their head as a soldier opened the door slightly, poking her head through and saluting no one in particular.

"Yes lieutenant?" Said the military man.

"Sir!" The soldier snapped him a much more precise salute now that she had a clear interlocutor. "We have received news from our cells in Foris." She shook her head. "They're....not good."

*****

"So, we've got them?"

"To some extent." Answered Hector as he skimmed through his holographic data pad. "We got a lot of data off of her, including the location of several camps. According to her however, most of those are abandoned. It looks like the SLF just...packed up and left. There is, however, one camp that is still fully in operation. According to her it even has a small group of grav APCs to serve as a heavy strike force, but..."

"We already accounted for those. Probably." Sarah stretched. "Alright then. Gear up sergeant, and get your men ready. We're moving out within the hour. And since these people have proven...difficult to deal with, you get to go to level yellow. Force recon gear only however, light power armor and the works. We already killed their armor, no need to bring in the railguns."

Hector smiled. Level yellow was the point at which every weapon in their arsenal that wasn't of Near Verge technology -and thus horribly hard and expensive to replace- was on the table, including some seriously destructive weaponry like plasma guns and man portable railguns. Force recon wasn't necessarily optimal, but they need to hit hard and fast to prevent the destruction of critical data, so the light recon power armor and associated weapons would have to do.

"I'll tell my boys and girls. They'll be very happy to be able to kick some teeth in ma'am!"

"Good. Just make sure they aren't the one getting their asses kicked."

"Of course. Ma'am?"

Sarah gestured at the door, and Hector saluted and left.

The captain sighed, and leaned back into her chair, looking up at the ceiling....only to meet the eyes of her AI's avatar.

"Yes Elteria?"

"I'm getting everything ready to depart ma'am. I do have a question though."

"Shoot."

"Do I get to use the battle laser?"

"No."

"Darn."

Sarah smiled and shook her head. Her AI would never change apparently.

"It's a rebel camp, not a freaking frigate. Besides, you know as well as I do what it would do to any evidence we would try to gather. As satisfying as blowing them to kingdom come would be, I'd rather get enough information to root the SLF for good."

"Fiiiine. I'll get the missile launchers loaded. Pure atmospheric support missiles of course." Mainly because you had to be thoroughly insane to try and fire one of their dimensional interference drive missile in atmosphere. It was by far one of the most efficient ways to propel a warship or guided ordnance, and it was a pain in the ass to detect on even high tech scanners, but if the drive interference area, which was like a drive plume for a fusion or chemical rocket, crossed with any significant amount of matter....

Bad things could happen. To the missile, whatever matter got caught in the drive interference area...and anything remotely around them. It wasn't bad enough to make it a viable weapon on it's own, notably because shields could stop it pretty handily, but it did make for an interesting set of anti missile tactics.

"Good. Oh, and make sure to run a deep scan of the area before we drop our marines in. I'd like to know what they're in for....and get a good look before they trash the place."

Elteria chuckled.

"Will do. Well, the drives are online, and our dear sergeant is currently busy yelling at his men to get to their lockers. Shall we take off?"

"Yep. Make us go on a course towards the planetary capital until we're ready. Then punch it and get us on top of them."

"Aye aye. One hot delivery of pain to some terrorist bastards coming right up."