Installment #12

Chapter 20

Adrian was conflicted. While he sat there holding Maria's hand, he tried to decide whether he should tell the other member's of the team about was Maria had overheard. He doubted whether any other team members were aware of the double-cross he suspected, but he didn't want to take any chances. If someone else was part of the "plan" and found out that he and Maria knew about it, they might be triggered to act prematurely. And Adrian needed all the time he could get to try to figure out what the exact plan was, and how to derail it.

While waiting for the OK to enter the station, Adrian had used his communicator to send an encrypted message to a colleague at the mining colony on Io. He hoped that Algon received it, and would be able to help, if needed. Algon had been a wildcatter and a co-worker for many years before he had lost his arm in a horrific accident on Poseidon Colony where a group of disgruntled workers had sabotaged the beryllium processing plant. Algon had been the first into the plant and had been right at ground zero when the bomb went off. No one had thought that he would survive. But modern cyber-surgery had been able to put him back together again, except for that arm. He had a prosthetic installed, but the nerves had never regenerated properly, and his right arm had very limited mobility. Certainly no enough for a wildcatter. As a result, Algon had taken a desk job. They hadn't seen each other for years, but Adrian hoped that their friendship still meant something to Algon.

After what seemed like hours (but was in fact no more than 10 minutes), the grunt came back on the intercom. "Mr. Masters, we have secured the station and it is safe for your people to get to work."

Adrian had almost forgotten their purpose in being there. He had been totally absorbed in thinking about how to defend himself and Maria against whatever Snyder had planned, and hadn't been thinking about why he was hired – to locate any other members of the restart team that might still be alive and to bring back Campbell's daughter, dead or alive. The soldier's voice snapped him back to reality. But he knew that in addition to his original assignment, he had to keep his eyes out for Snyder's other plan – to kill his team once they had completed their job.

Adrian stood up and called to his team, "OK, guys and gals, time to do this. Make sure you have your weapons at hand. Who knows what we may find in there. And we can't depend totally on Snyder and his men to defend us. They have their own priorities. Ours is to get in, find the restart team, and get out."

The team members all strapped on their backpacks and holsters. Adrian had everyone take extra clips of ammunition, just in case. Maria seemed to have pulled it together. Adrian hoped that her experience and toughness would overcome any emotional distress she was suffering. He needed everyone on the team to be at 100%.

They walked down the gangway toward the station entrance. Although the gangway was sealed against the wind, Adrian could still feel the cold, and could smell the ammonia in the atmosphere that had penetrated the seals – albeit in extremely small quantities. He was happy to be through the airlock and into the station.

The place was even worse than the soldier had said. Every piece of furniture and equipment in the entry hall had been destroyed. The multiple burns along the walls and ceiling attested to a hell of a gun battle that had taken place. And there were several large pools of dried blood on the floor. One of the soldiers had already set up a portable testing lab and was running tests on the dried blood. Two other soldiers were standing guard at the exits from the hall. The rest of the soldiers, as well as Mr. Strong, had already left the hall.

Adrian walked over to the soldier working at the portable lab. "Soldier, anything you can tell me?"

The grunt looked up from the screen, smiled at Adrian, and looked back at the display. "Not much. I have tested all of the large blood stains. All of the DNA matches reference samples from members of the restart team. So far, no evidence of any unknowns – like offworld pirates or 'aliens'."

"What about Carla Campbell?", Adrian asked.

"Nothing yet. I have samples from two small areas that will be testing next. I'll let you know."

Adrian walked over to the soldier who appeared to be in charge. "Sergeant, Adrian Masters."

"Good to meet you, sir."

"Do you have a map of the facility?"

The soldier pulled a small projection device from his pocket and hit a button. A holographic blueprint of the site appeared in front of them. The soldier pointed: "We're here. The computer center where Lt. Col. Snyder and Mr. Strong went is here, four floors down in a hardened core area." Adrian scanned the rest of the plans quickly, as he had done on the space station in preparation for the initial meeting. He didn't see anything unusual.

"Sergeant, if you were a young woman looking for a safe place fairly close to here, where would you go."

"Sir?", the soldier responded with a questioning look on his face.

"My primary mission here is to find Carla Campbell, Mr. Campbell's daughter. She was part of the restart team. She wants her back dead or alive. Looking around here, it looks like the restart team was ambushed. Probably on arrival, but perhaps later as they were trying to get away. I'm wondering where a young, frightened civilian might have gone for refuge."

The soldier just shrugged. Adrian continued, "Have you seen any other parts of the facility?"

"Not yet, sir."

"I was just wondering if fighting took place anywhere else but here?"

"That I couldn't tell you, sir."

"Well, have you heard anything from Lt. Col Snyder since he left?"

"Nothing yet."

"Isn't that unusual?"

"Well, let's just say it's not usual. But it's up to the Lt. Col. to make the call. I'm sure he has a good reason for not checking in."

"Yeah, I'm sure," Adrian responded. He wondered whether the soldiers knew what was really going on, or whether they were are in the dark as he was. He suspected the soldier was only told that he was to help secure the facility. The concept of "need to know" would have made it unnecessary to tell the grunts anything beyond what Adrian had been told.

Adrian walked over to a comlink and pressed the button. "JENNI, are you there?" After a long silence, a pleasant, slightly metallic female voice responded: "Yes, I'm here. Who is this?"

"This is Adrian Masters."

"Just a moment please," JENNI said. Then silence. After about 10 seconds, she came back. "Mr. Masters, it is good to meet you. Now that my antenna was repaired I can access the databases again. There is a lot of information about you. You are apparently a very interesting person. I am pleased to make your acquaintance. What can I do for you?"

Adrian was surprised that she was able to access his files so quickly. The antenna was just an interim measure to provide a link with the outside world, but didn't have the bandwidth of a full-sized antenna. Apparently, the speed was sufficient to transfer the data in a couple of seconds. While he was used to working with 'JENNIs' -- as all of the computer networks on virtually all of the Juno Mining sites are called -- he just didn't like having the 'person' (he couldn't get used to the idea of talking to a machine) he was talking to knowing more about him than he knew about her.

"I am heading up a team to find a group of people that came down here about a week ago. What can you tell me about them?"

"Oh, yes. There was a group of people that came here after the storm. It was nice to have someone to talk to after so long."

"Yes, the group of people that were here. What happened to them?"

"What do you mean, 'what happened to them'? They came, we had a number of nice conversations, and then they left," JENNI responded. "And then another group came today. You are with that group?"

"Yes, JENNI, I am with that group. But let's focus on the previous group. What can you tell me about what to them."

"I do not understand your question, Mr. Masters. They came, they stayed here for exactly 23 hours and 37 minutes, and then they left. There is nothing significant to report. They said they were here to evaluate the station. They did so, and left."

"What can you tell me about the battle that obviously took place here in the entry hall? I would think that would have been viewed as 'significant.'"

"What battle," JENNI replied. "I have no record of any battle?"

"JENNI, do you have any video devices operational in the entry hall?"

"Yes, certainly I do. In fact, I can see you right now."

Adrian looked around and saw at least three video cameras all oriented in his direction.

"Good," he replied. "Now, can you scan the entry hall and tell me if anything looks out of the ordinary to you."

He watched the cameras slowly moving from right to left, and then up and down.

"If I might say so, Mr. Masters, the entry hall is a mess. What happened?"

"That's what I'm trying to find out. Can you tell me what happened?"

Silence. Then JENNI said, "I have no memory of anything unusual happening in the entry hall. I have reviewed all of my databases. Nothing looks out of the ordinary. I will send some bots to clean up the entry hall and repair the damaged equipment."

"JENNI, don't worry about cleaning up right now. What I need to know is do you have recordings of what happened during the time the prior group was here?"

"Of course. That is part of my job, to document everything that takes place on Site 209."

"Well then, JENNI, could you please access the videos for the arrival and departure of the prior team?"

"Of course."

". . . And, could you please play back the first five minutes of the arrival and the last three minutes before the departure?"

"Of course. Would you like for me to play them back now?"

"Yes JENNI, now."

[Words in this installment = 1,791]
[Total words to date = 20,116]