Incursion Vector

035

[▲] Volga Station, Sol System Terminus Shock

Drumming his fingers steadily on the padded arm of his chair Leopold Wills calmly waited for the commodore to finish his rant. On more than a few occasions Simon Porter's tirades were meaningless venting from a man who knew his mood swings meant he had reached his retirement pay grade, but this was one of the rare instances where he had a valid point. Wills would put up with almost anything, provided the argument was legitimate and backed up with proof and not one of the 'entitled to my opinion so there' speeches he usually put up with from Senators and special interest committees on a weekly basis.

No one was entitled to voice an opinion. People were only entitled to voice perspectives they could defend. If that had been written into the Unification Treaties the mechanics of society would run infinitely more smoothly, as far as he Wills concerned. Unfortunately, that still wasn't how most things worked in the galaxy. People let their feelings get involved, and feelings tended to screw things up.

Had Alexander Ironside not stormed the station demanding access to his son Rungran would have been able to get the drop on Malory and put an end to the entire situation he had uncovered in just a few short days. Instead, Ironside's massing of a mercenary force and none-too-discreet inquiries into the illicit habits of the project leader had driven the former Rear Admiral of Naval Intelligence into hiding. Likely the only reason Commander Maro had been placed in such a position was because he could easily be killed in an "unfortunate dispute" with his drug dealer in order to leave Malory's own hands clean. Tossing Maro to the wolves while he made his escape was the next best thing.

Normally Ironside was a great deal more cold and calculating. Passionate people-motivated outbursts were completely out-of-character for the man who normally had the same spectrum of emotions as a ship's internal bulkhead. Before Wills would not have believed him capable of caring about anyone with a pulse, but obviously he was willing to go to insane lengths to find and rescue his youngest son. He didn't give a damn about the rest of his family, the Command Admiral knew that much.

He was curious as to exactly what it was about the First Lieutenant the man had latched on to. If he could find that out, Ironside could be made much more amenable to working for them instead of doing whatever he fancied at the time.

Eventually Porter calmed himself and his hologram showed him sitting back in the tall chair behind his desk. "Do we have any idea where he is now?"

Having taken up trimming his nails while Porter went about his tirade Rungran shook his head, not bothering to set aside his nail clipper for the sake of at least appearing professional in front of the Command Admiral. "Malory designed this operation well. Each cell has no idea of the other's existence. Each one was given identical objectives, resources, and the same number of comparably skilled personnel. The one I destroyed was the only one using an Alliance front, however. So far my crew has extrapolated three separate locations where this research was taking place, one of which is operating beneath the umbrella of a legitimate Colonial veteran's hospital. Funding was acquired from independent barter-only sources, never from within Alliance banking systems save for the paychecks being cut to the men working on our station."

"Barter? With what, exactly?"

"Decent sums of rare metals and radioactive isotopes exchanged hands, along with the ships transporting them. It also appears he orchestrated a deal with a blacklist cybernetics developer using the pre-Alpha Elevated System Interface schematics as collateral." A cheshire grin exposed Rungran's perfectly-tended teeth. "Too bad I never actually left the real ones laying about. Whoever ends up trying to manufacture that thing is going to reinvent the brain freeze."