"Obviously, we did what we could on the Freeport. I wasn't given an objective once we delivered the supplies, aside from providing medical assistance to the wounded, so I had our weapons turned in the station's defense." He seemed to grit his teeth a bit, the part ensuing still fresh in his mind, even if it happened just over a year ago. "The Core came for an investigative patrol, which I guess to them consists of a Mako and a fighter escort, and proceeded to order us out. I followed my given orders and held my ground, which they didn't seem to care about, not to mention the passive zone that I'm certain they could care less about.." He took a few deep breaths, his mood rising, anger clearly present but, for once, not aimed at Sader. "They opened fire, hit the ship bad, and left us adrift. It took me and my crew.. three.. days.. to get the comms back online.. It took another week for some friends I had to arrive and haul us to relative safety.."
"Well, in the event you couldn't tell, my friends have ties to the Order. By that, I mean some of them still follow Orillion's original goals, and they took us to the main base at Carthage to fix up the ship." He sat up, reaching forward and pulling the other sandwich towards him, truthfully a little hungry himself. "It took a damn long time, I'm guessing since they have other things to do than repair ships that don't belong to them.. The crew and I were offered some amenities through some... 'friendly persuasion', but the repairs took so damn long.." He took a bite of the sandwich, sitting back and chewing with a rather noticeably satisfied smirk on his face.
The framed picture on the wall Sader would be looking at seemed unusually placed for it's locale. The ship, funnily enough given the Fleet's new transfer, depicted an artist's rendition of the Osiris decloaking and opening up on the L.N.S. Omaha.
"It took nearly a year before they finally let us go, but the repairs are, as you can clearly tell, sketchy at best. She survived the trip back, though, and we only really had that transponder to worry about. I'm still impressed that they had a year, and shes still a mess.."
He was about halfway through his sandwich before he stopped and looked up. "Pardon? They're tied to the Order. What else can I say about them?" He seemed to get somewhat defensive about the topic, but then again, they were close friends to him.
"Some of them are old vets, some of them are just kids, but they're still friends to me. It didn't suddenly become illegal to be friends with 'labeled terrorists', did it?" He held one of his hands in the air, making sarcastic air quotes with it and then subsequently lowering them.
An operative knocks at the door shortly before entering. "Admiral, information from Agent Nova." The operative left the datapad on the table where Sader sat and departed.
The datapad contained the following information. 'According to the patch jobs, and various affects found inside the CO's quarters one would easily conclude that they were working with the Order. However, according to testimonies from the XO and a couple crew members, Hemlock had called in a few favors from friends inside the Order to conduct a repair job, but from the looks, a sloppy one.
I have also found an alien artifact within Hemlocks quarters, which... spoke to me. It's origin is unknown, and I'm conducting further investigation into it, however I need the keys from Commander Hemlock to get my hands on it.
P.S. Give me a little more time Admiral, I need to finish my investigation before you lock anyone up ~ Nova'
"Contraband? You're joking, right?"
He finished his sandwich, crossing his arms and looking towards Sader. "I wasn't aware impending research material was considered 'contraband'."
