14

Repercussions

Stephen had been right. Janet was furious. She was busy letting him know just how furious she was during his examination aboard the Kl'Deesius.

"Stephen, if you think I'm going to sit still for a minute while you give me a bunch of bullshit about how nobody got killed or seriously injured," she snapped at him. "You're out of your fucking mind."

He was reeling from her verbal onslaught, even though he knew she wasn't really angry at him. "Come on, Janet. It could have been so much-"

"DON'T," she snapped back at him, stepping right over to loom over the bunk where he was sitting with his arm wrapped after treatment. "Don't even think about telling me it could have been so much worse. That's my point!"

"Well, my point is that it didn't become worse!"

"It could have been-"

"But it wasn't-"

"You got lucky this time!" Janet seethed.

"NO!" Stephen barked. Janet reeled back in shock. It was rare for him to raise his voice like that. "Miradima and Davidson are both military experts. They planned the assault that took down the kidnappers. They made sure it didn't get any worse. It wasn't luck, it was planning! The kidnappers didn't get away with it!"

There was a knock at the door.

"WHAT?!" Janet roared. It took a few seconds for whoever was behind that door to open it, probably because they didn't want to face her wrath. "Right," She said more calmly when she realised it was Helen. "What's the story?"

Helen had changed slightly in the last four months or so since the lunar base was evacuated. Her pregnancy with Marlon's child was now in its 2nd trimester, and she was beginning to show signs. Stephen didn't think of those changes, much less speak them aloud, merely noting they were normal for child bearing. Still, she was now reaching a point where things were going to get slightly more difficult over the remaining four or five months. She sat down in one of the provided chairs. "The kidnapping was a diversion," she said with a heaving sigh. "Several prisoners were broken out of their holding cell while all of the security detail were busy trying to defuse the hostage situation."

There was a moment in any stormy situation where you could sense a quiet. The calm before the storm, so to speak. Stephen intimately knew that he was facing such a situation right now, as he watched Janet's blank expression. She stepped away from the two of them, and approached a bulkhead adjacent to the corridor, leaning against it, almost too still.

Stephen knew what was about to happen. He climbed out of his bed, and approached. Thankfully he wasn't wired up like last time, given he was only slightly injured and this time it was just his wrist, but despite that, he was still too slow to stop what was about to happen.

One moment, Janet was leaning against the bulkhead. The next, she slammed her fist into it so hard, that it dented the paneling, and blood smeared the paintwork. She was about to do it again, when Stephen gripped her arm and pulled her back. The look of sheer fury on Janet's face was enough to make anyone recoil, but Stephen pushed through with what he knew he needed to do. Maintaining a vice-like grip on her arm, he pulled her away from the wall. She struggled against his grip, which was frustrating because of his inability to use both hands, but mainly because she was so much stronger physically, than she had been six months earlier. She very nearly escaped his grip, though where she had intended to go was anyone's guess.

"No," Stephen told her. "Janet, no!"

"The fuck is your problem?" she demanded. "They could have killed you, and for what? A fucking distraction?"

"No-"

"They could have killed you!" she seethed, her face reddening, her breathing quickening, and she looked around wildly, as if trying to find a target for her next attack. "Just to cover someone else's escape!" She could find no such target, and so she turned in on herself, and started thumping her own leg. "They could have killed you, and then you'd be dead, and I'd lose you, too!" The last she wailed piteously as she completely broke down. Helen had intervened at that point, grabbing her fist and trying to make soothing motions across her hand, while Stephen held her close as she sobbed loudly and uncontrollably. She went from trying to punch herself in the leg, to grabbing a hold of Stephen and wrapping him in a fierce hug that was so tight, it threatened to cut off his circulation. In response, he wrapped both arms around her as they both sunk to the floor.

Helen was still in Stephen's view, and she nodded toward the back of the med bay. He nodded imperceptibly so as not to disturb Janet any more than she already was, and held on to her, gently rocking her back and forth.

After some minutes, silence descended upon the room, punctuated by the occasional hiccup. Janet was no longer shaking uncontrollably, nor was she struggling to fight against an uncontrollable unknown. She had exhausted herself and was now lax in Stephen's arms. He moved to stand, and she squeezed him tight. Not wishing to distress her any further, he remained where he was.

Stephen didn't quite know what to make of this.

While he understood her distress and recognized the fear behind it, the reaction had seemed excessive. Was there something else happening that Janet was not telling anyone about? Stephen wanted to know, but had no idea how to ask.

Some minutes later still, Helen approached the pair once again, this time carrying some bandages and medical agents. Stephen made to take Janet's arms, and she responded with a weak protest.

"Let Helen take a look at your hand," Stephen said quietly.

Janet responded by removing her injured hand from Stephen's back, but she tightened the grip of her other arm and buried her face more deeply in his neck. She clearly wasn't interested in anything other than hiding herself in his arms.

Helen worked quickly, cleaning the swollen, bruised knuckles on Janet's hand, eliciting an occasional hiss when she rubbed antiviral and antibacterial gel over broken skin. It took very little time, and Helen was a professional medical doctor, so knew exactly what to do with these kinds of injuries. Once she was done, she rubbed anaesthetic over the wound, wrapped it up in a waterproof bandage, and then ensured everything was good and tight so as not to come loose later. "That should be good for the next twenty-four hours, after which we can look at it again."

Janet gave muted thanks. Her voice was almost child-like, which didn't surprise anyone given she was barely in her twenties if anyone's guesses were accurate.

Stephen nodded his thanks as well. "You OK?" he asked Helen, who nodded. "Sure?"

Helen sighed. "Just a little tired. Who knew carrying a baby would be this exhausting?"

Stephen had no appropriate comment, so changed the subject. "Can we talk about... You-know-what... Later?"

"Probably a good idea," Helen replied, standing with a little difficulty. "Have you been assigned any quarters for today?"

Stephen shook his head, so Helen approached the exit to the med bay. Outside, she saw a member of the crew, and approached, leaving Stephen in the med bay alone with Janet.

"You want anything?" Stephen asked her.

She shook her head in his arms. "Just you," she said quietly.

This was very unusual, Stephen thought. Janet had been forced to be practical her whole damned life, and this had extended into their time within the colony on Midinia. This degree of almost needy affection was at odds with who she showed everyone she was. Stephen didn't object, he was fairly demonstrative in his affections as well, but until now, he had held back because she had seemed not to enjoy it.

Maybe he was wrong? This should probably be talked about.

Helen stepped back in. "Three Juliet in this section when you're ready," she told him, and then left again.

Stephen began to rise, Janet resisting.

"Come with me," he told her. "We're going somewhere we can be alone."

* * *

Davidson had just arrived at the holding facility on Midinia. He and Mira had just been told that the hostage situation appeared to be a diversionary tactic. There was a dead guard here, the only one who had remained behind to look after the holding cells, and every prisoner that was being held here was gone.

It didn't matter to Davidson that only a handful of detainees were released this way. Even a single one showed contempt for everything they attempted to do here.

The implications were worse than that, however. Davidson understood, just as he was sure Mira did, that this action clearly revealed the existence of an organized dissident movement actively trying to undermine what they were doing here, and in doing so, putting everyone's lives at risk. By undermining what they were trying to build, and by spreading rampant xenophobia, these people were placing humanity and their new allies at risk against their enemy, the alien lifeforms known as the Possessors.

Davidson had never seen one, but he had seen the footage from the away mission on Earth's surface, and he had heard Stephen's reaction, seen it in his eyes whenever he spoke of it. There was no doubt in his mind, that this enemy of theirs was lethal if not anticipated, and had probably been responsible for the old Earth's final failure to survive. The survivors needed to be united and prepared for the eventual return, because if there was one thing the Tau Cetians had made clear, is that their enemy had an unnaturally insistent desire to take over every planet in this sector.

For what purpose, Davidson could only guess. Mira was not in a better position to know either, as she freely admitted any time the conversation came up. Still, the reasons, their motivation, that was all secondary to the fact that they were willing to put vast resources to the task, and it had only been recently that the Tau Cetians had been capable of routing the enemy to begin with.

Yet with all of this pointless bullshit that certain human groups were doing, it was taking their focus and their efforts away from preparing against this enemy. Davidson should have been setting up a military academy and setting the foundation for a space navy, not investigating a murder in a holding cell and a dissident movement trying to throw them all under a very dark and cold bus.

The repercussions for this were going to be disastrous if something decisive was not done soon.

"Who is our dead officer?" Davidson asked of the Tau Cetian guard in charge of the area.

"Dantir, a Sub-Officer in charge of the holding facility," the Tau Cetian replied. "He had me and my team sent to the hostage zone to try and control the situation," he stopped, frowned, and gripped his hands into fists, his knuckles turning white. "I should have suspected something might happen. It was the perfect opportunity."

Davidson could indeed understand that reaction. He felt exactly the same way right now. "I should have seen this coming," he told the Tau Cetian in commiseration. "Have you spoken with the security Sub-Commander for this colony yet?" he asked to distract the man.

"No," came the reply. "She is on her way now."

Davidson nodded. He struggled to recall her name.

Within moments, he recognized her, and she had John in tow. "John?" Davidson asked, surprised.

"Yeah, I'm here as a witness to the HT, and as someone who knew at least one of the prisoners who escaped," he replied in an answer to Davidson's unspoken questions. "Mephecia here asked me to come along."

"I did," she added in Tau Cetian. "I will begin investigating why only one guard was left to watch the facility. It was a critical weakness that should never have been left for anyone to exploit."

Davidson could tell by the tautness of her body language that she was angry, and was keeping a lid on it. He merely nodded. "John, who was the prisoner?"

"Jason Mensar," he answered with obvious distaste. "Edward's son."