The Ring of Acies

Chapter Nine: The Mathematical Duet

When Terrine and Argentum returned to the station. Argentum decided to give the squad another hour of sleep. At 1100 hours, Argentum wakes the team up. He hands out bulbs of freshly brewed Nicelolyn tea. Nicelolyn is the closest inhabited planet to Acies, and the tea that Argentum brewed arrived on Initium that morning. Theta helps Argentum hand out the tea and help the less awake members of the squad out of their sleep cells. Theta walks over to Terrine's sleep cell and gently rocks it until Terrine wakes up. He helps Terrine out of her sleep cell. As she puts on her shoes, Theta hands her a bulb of tea.

"Good morning Ms. Zafas. Would you like a bulb of Nicelolyn Tea?"

Terrine stands up and accepts the bulb of tea.

"Thank you, Theta. Have a good morning."

"I will have a good morning. Thank you, Ms. Zafas."

Terrine leaves the briefing room as Theta takes down the sleep cells. She joins the rest of the squad in the break room. Everyone is there except for Argentum, Sabago, and Catram. Several team members float in the air with their shoes turned off while they drink their tea. When Argentum enters, those floating turn on their boots, lock them to the floor, and stand at attention.

"Good morning, Squad," Argentum says. "Where the hell are Synth and Yonge?"

"Where do you think?" Hetra responds.

Argentum storms out of the room and heads to the locker room.

"I swear to god. I will get Tobin from HR up here to deal with you two!" He says as he leaves.

Terrine walks over to Hetra as the squad waits for Argentum to return.

"What the hell was that all about?" Terrine asks Hetra.

"Catram and Sabago have been having not-so-secret sex ever since Zekris' squad showed up." She responds.

"Oh."

"Yeah. So anyways. How did those headphones work out?"

"They were fine. Still couldn't sleep after what happened."

"That's understandable."

"Where did you get those recordings?"

"A buddy of mine was going through the early archives in the Duodecant Centre. His superiors let them copy them."

"Well, thank you for letting me borrow them."

"Oh hey, I found a volunteer electronics engineer. She's coming in this morning."

"Great! What's her name? I might know her."

Hetra pulls out her tasker.

"Umm... Ms. Orisan, Nevistri Orisan."

Terrine feels a surge of excitement and joy as Argentum comes back with a loosely dressed Sabago and Catram.

"Good morning, squad...." Argentum begins.

After Argentum finishes his morning briefing, the squad returns to their desks. Terrine walks back to her desk she sees something strange. On her desk, somehow being held down despite the station not having gravity, is a bloody Station Security ID card. She takes a tissue out of the box on her desk and wipes off the blood. The card belongs to Surveillance Captain Rhobus Natri. She cleans the blood off her desk. She has no idea where the card came from, but it is what she needs to gain access to the security footage. She quickly opens the program on her tasker that is looking through security footage. She enters the ID number on the card and scans the barcode along the bottom. The program accepts the ID and continues running. She hears laughter coming from Detective Hetra's desk. Terrine walks over to investigate.