“I'm sorry I lost my temper, Karen.” She looked at her friend apologetically, “It's just that it's my mother that we're trying to track down and I'm worried that something will happen to her if we don't act fast. If the possibility of there being slavers involved, every second counts.”
Karen nodded her assent, “But Lor, that was just too much... you can't treat any OS&C employees without the respect they deserve, and I most definitely can't let anything like that happen again. I have obligations to my employer as well.”
Loreleii gave a sheepish smile, “But you have to admit, it did work. We got the name of the person we have to look for next... and I did said thank you.”
“Not funny, Lor.” Karen gave her a authoritative look as she crossed her arms on her chest, “I'm not kidding, promise me you won't do that again, or we're done. I can and will shut down this investigation if I can't count on you to be civil to all of the members of the staff on Diogo or where ever else we end up.”
Lorleii studied her friend's face for a few seconds, and seeing that she was serious, replied, “Ok, fine... I'll be on my best behaviour when dealing with your people, I promise.”
“Good, thank you.” A wave of relief swept across Karen, relief from having reinforce her jurisdiction as an employee of OS&C to her friend, and relief that she had done it with out alienating her either.
“But know this, when it comes time to deal with my people, a bit of intimidation goes a long way to get what you need.” Lorleii, hoped Karen would understand what she was talking about as she continued, “We're bound to run across some people that wouldn't have any qualms enslaving us, or worse, getting us hooked on Cardie.”
“So what you're saying is...”
Lorleii interrupted, “What I'm saying is, if I have to rattle some skulls to protect us, I'll do it without a second thought.”
Karen thought for a moment, “And you want me to be good with it.”
“No, what I want is for you to understand there may be a time I'll have to do something that you might not approve of.” She looked at Karen intently, ”And I'll have to do it quickly because it might just save our lives.”
“So follow your lead when we deal with anyone other than Orbital staff.”
“Correct, and I'll make every attempt to do the same when we're dealing with your organization.” Lorleii smiled to her, turned and started walking towards the passage leading away from the warehouse area, “And K, one more thing...”
“What?”
“You're dead sexy when you're mad.”
Karen felt the color rise to her cheeks, “C'mon, we still have to find this Anderi.”
The control center was crowded with desks which were covered with flimsies and displays that showed a constant stream of technical readouts from a myriad of locations. Various beeps, tones and alarms filled the background with a constant stream of sounds as various pieces of surveillance equipment came on or went off line.
Through it all the three person staff of the command center took notes on their datapads or spoke into com-links. Moleigh could only assume the data was being sent to agents of the organization that were inbound to or departing the resort above. The whole atmosphere of the room reminded her of a scientist's laboratory that she had seen in a holo-vid documentary.
As her escort and her descended a short flight of stairs into the room, one of the agents looked up from what they were doing and greeted them, “Hey Anderi, good to see you in one piece, who's your girlfriend?”
“She's not my girlfriend, she an old acquaintance of Roemer's, Suzi.” Anderi turned to face the person who addressed him. She was a pretty, petite, short haired blonde who was making her way through the chaos of the control center to get closer to where they were standing by the stairs. He continued, “Apparently, they did some business together in the past. I found her locked up in a cryo-cylinder outbound off planet. As I figure it, she must have gotten on the wrong side of someone.”
“And they wanted me out of the picture...”, Moleigh took a step around the large man and addressed the woman, “...names Moleigh. I used to run guns and other freight with Roemer quite a few years ago during the war.”
“Ahh, I'm Suzune. The lugs around here call me Suzi.” She gave Moleigh a knowing look and smiled, “So you're a smuggler too, eh? Don't worry, he's already told us about his past life. So who wanted you out of the way? Hackers? Rogues? Hessians?”
“That's just it, I'm not completely sure. I was running a business packet to the OS&C main offices here on Curacao when I got an unusual transmission on my comm. Whoever it was said they represented the Confederation of Unaligned Worlds leader and I needed to meet with them immediately. If I didn't it would go bad not only for me, but my daughter's new transportation company as well. Normally, I wouldn't have bothered, but they used my old title, and seemed to know just a little too much about my prior association with the CoUW.”
Anderi spoke up, “So how did you end up in the cylinder? Looks like you didn't go in there by choice.”
“I didn't, trust me.” Moleigh looked at each of them in turn, wondering if she could really trust either of them. For all she knew they were both involved with the same people that had kidnapped her and put her in stasis, out bound to who knows where. Footsteps grated on the stairs behind her, when she turned Roemer was coming down them.
“We know that much. We've seen the footage of your abduction, you put up one hell of a fight.” Roemer said as he descended into the room. “What we're looking for now is your take on what happened.”
“Well, I was sitting at the bar at one of the resorts considering my options before I did anything rash, when in walked my Don... Nihil Siva.”
“Nihil still lives?” Roemer looked a little shaken.
“Apparently so. Anyways my being there surprised him almost as much as I had been to see him walk into the place. So I got up to go and greet him but as I got close some of his goons intercepted me.”
“And that's when the fight started.” Anderi grinned as if it was his own private joke.
She looked Anderi in the eye and deadpanned, “Yea, something like that... you should go on stage, you'd be more entertaining.” It was Moleigh's turn to smirk as the smile faded from his face. She then turned back to Roemer and Suzi and continued, “Anyways, the last thing I remember was being spun around and having something sprayed in my face.”
Suzi added, “And then you woke up here. What's that...?” She tapped on the comm that was in here ear, “We might have some trouble, two women are asking questions about where Anderi is, looks like they might be guests at the resort, but one is armed.”
“We have a video feed?” Roemer asked.
“Nothing yet, boss... we're working on it. They're between two of the holo-cam locations, can't get a good image yet.”
“Stay on it, let me know when you have something.” Roemer ordered. “Anderi, go back to the freight docks and get back to work. Let who ever it is find you, but stay in sight, don't go off with them anywhere. We'll figure out who they are and deal with them one way or the other. We've got your back.”
“Aye.” Anderi said as he leapt up the stairs two at a time and into the passageway, out of sight.
“So, what you want me to do?” Moleigh asked.
Roemer thought for a moment, “Stay close to me, if it's some of your friends come looking for you, it might be a clean-up crew. You still shoot straight?”
“Of course.” She said as patted her DM-40 slug thrower strapped to her thigh.
“Good, now let's...”
“They've just come in range of a recorder... patching the holo through. Sounds still a little fuzzy, they're too far away still, I'm at max gain on the image.” Suzi interrupted as the image snapped onto the flat screen that was hanging from the ceiling.
“It's my daughter Lorleii, but who's that with her?” Moleigh announced, then with a worried look on her face added, “Roemer, how long was I in cryo?” She pointed at the screen, “Lor wouldn't be here if I was out of contact for only a few days.”
“Based on the freight pod's bill of lading, it's been a ten-day minimum, but probably closer to being over a fortnight.” He paused while studying the display, then continued, “Unless you were meant to be found, to draw the two of you together at the same place... but why...or better yet, who?”
”If I was to put creds on it, I would say her father, Nihil, had something to do with it.” She paused to let Roemer fully understand what she had finally admitted to him after all these years. Once the shocked expression faded from Roemer's face, she added, “We know as the leader of the Coalition, he's was a crafty business man, with his own agenda, legal or otherwise. I'm sure that over time since I left him that hasn't changed. If he wants to have a “family reunion”, I'm sure that he has something else in mind than having dinner and watching old holo-vids.”
“So Lorleii is being watched and might be in danger as well.” Romer thought about it for a moment, “Suzi, buzz Anderi, let him know the situation has changed. Have him meet Lorleii and her friend, and get them out of sight. Be ready for some fireworks.”