Living in the Fray

Chapter 26

If the crew of the Osiris had gone through the Dharma plan once, then they had gone through it fifty times already. The ship and all the other crew who weren't Krieger or Ronson, were absolutely not allowed on Dharma at all. The plan was for them to stay on the nearby trade station of the Outer Fray Collective, known as Avalon. It was a popularly held belief that the face of the Outer Fray Collective, Richmond Bellefontaine was in to his Arthurian legends. Turns out, he was just a really big fan of Roxy Music.

The station itself was built in to a gargantuan lump of broken meteor that was originally just drifting around the system, minding it's own business like space debris tends to do. The Outer Fray Collective was a semi-legitimate organisation, that ran several of these stations where the slightly dodgy individuals and companies of the new galaxy could trade gear and equipment; both legal and black market. Ships and companies could refuel or repair and upgrade parts and even lay low for a while if they were on the run. Michael was particularly happy about visiting as he had never been before and apparently the street food you could get on Avalon, was out of this world.

The crew would dock the Osiris for an undetermined stay length and check themselves in to a moderately decent hotel, moderately decent for the station anyway and get a little r and r, make some repairs to the ship, restock on weaponry, sundries and just generally doss about until Krieger and Ronson were ready to make their return. Hopefully in one piece.

Krieger and Ronson themselves had been and got a few cybernetic upgrades, courtesy of the Galaxy Police. They didn't know what to expect of Muller and his goons on their home planet, so they requested they got access to some of their most current cyberware, that would aid them in their hopefully not, but apparent suicide mission. Assuming the entire planet of Dharma was going to be monitored by Muller's crew of gearheads, Krieger and Ronson opted for some covert ware that was near enough guaranteed to avoid detection by most cyberscanners.

The first was a two way NFC comms device that was installed in both Krieger and Ronson, allowing them to communicate with each other within a certain but short range, without using their wireless neuralmod through a public network. This was key as they would be airgapped from public networks, completely shutting off their neuralmods from wireless and hardline connections. Essential for when you didn't want some gearhead poking around your brain or making your augments go haywire, or frying your brain. That was one of Krieger and Ronson's worst nightmares. They knew being as heavily cyberised as they were, made them just that little bit more tempting to hackers and gearheads. Ronson had even suggested during their trip to the Galaxy Police augment clinic, that they even upgrade their personal intrusion prevention systems; especially as they weren't paying for any of it.

Krieger and Ronson were now waiting in the docking bay. Muller was sending up an auto-shuttle to the orbiting Osiris, which would collect them and take them down to Dharma. Krieger surprisingly only had one holdall with her stuff in, while Ronson had two absolutely full to bursting point cases along with his ridiculously large overnight bag; the overnight bag containing all of his grooming gear. Krieger could only hazard a guess as to what was in the two cases. Not just any old cases, Louis Vuiton of course.

The rest of the crew; minus Zach who was busy minding the office back on New Edo and probably trying to get in the pants of any woman with a pulse, were standing around in the docking bay waiting for their Captain and Vice Captain, to be taken down to the planet owned by a psychopathic eco-terrorist. Their good byes were short as she shuttle had arrived and was busy going through the automatic docking procedure with the Osiris.

'We've set it so we'll all be notified if you use the emergency beacon. I doubt we'll be able to get anywhere near Dharma's atmosphere unless you take down their planetary defences or something.' Justin spoke directly to his bosses. 'But knowing you two, you'll probably blow up half the planet if anything happens.' Justin mused.

'Ah you know us so well.' Ronson said to Justin as he slapped his hand on his shoulder.

'Seriously though guys.' Tony spoke up. 'I mean we would like you both to, y'know... come back in one piece.'

The crew surrounding nodded.

'I think it's time we had a group hug don't you all think?' Devin said with a grin on his face. Everybody crowded round Krieger and Ronson engulfing them with arms and tight squeezes. Krieger began screaming "ARGH NO!" as she attempted to escape the swarm of bodies surrounding her and Ronson, who himself was cackling and laughing his head off. Satisfied they had all bothered and embarrassed Krieger enough, everybody let the duo go.

'Really boss, you gotta come back alive and shit.' Jess stared at Krieger.

'Yeah, you can't leave us as the only two women here. Seriously.' Faye added, also staring at Krieger.

The whole crew knew how dangerous it would be for both Krieger and Ronson to just even go down to Dharma, never mind be personal security for Ethan Muller; so they were concerned of a sorts.

Krieger and Ronson had been having some interesting conversations of their own; attempting to plan on how to despatch Muller, which was proving difficult for even them to figure out. Normally for regular targets they could get away with slicing someone up or just putting a bullet between their eyes and on the odd occasion, they could hack someone's neuralmod or augments and cause them to crash or fritz out entirely. No, Muller needed a different and more elegant method. Or a messy one. Whatever got the job done Krieger thought. She figured the best way was having Muller become collateral in some kind of incident or something. Ronson thought she could use her feminine wiles to lure Muller in as he knew he was quite the fan of her. He told Krieger this earlier, saying that she could get his guard and possibly his pants down, before doing something worthy of the best femme fatale assassins and poisoning Muller, or "strangling him with her fat thighs or some shit like that." Krieger answered that by lighting a cigarette and letting out a massive fart.

Krieger and Ronson eventually said their proper goodbyes to everyone. Tony, Justin, Devin and Michael were going to make sure the Osiris was repaired and fully restocked, ready for them to come home; Michael even saying he'd make their favourite chicken curry and cheeseburgers for their return. Jess and Faye were given their tasks to do, namely upgrade whatever instruments needed it up on the bridge and to keep Zeke company. Zeke was given a special task, he was to monitor the private encrypted channel between both Krieger and Ronson whenever they managed to get a message out to the Osiris. The message would also be coded.

'Zeke will let you know when we communicate. He knows the cypher.' Krieger told the crew.

'And what is the cypher?' Tony asked, intrigued.

'Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. Nobody in their right mind would read that fucking book.'

The shuttle had eventually finished docking and pressurising. With a last wave, Krieger and Ronson boarded the shuttle with their bags and gear; the doors closed firmly, leaving the remaining crew of the Osiris staring at the shiny panels.

'Seriously, what do we do now?' Tony announced to everyone. It was weird not having their bosses and ultimately, the biggest banes of their existences aboard the ship, making noise and generally being weird and disruptive.

'We keep ourselves occupied and do what we can't get done when they're around.' Justin answered.

It took a moment for everyone to register that Krieger and Ronson weren't there. They all hesitated before realising they could just, go and do stuff. Without any racket, fuss or Krieger farting and Ronson laughing like a maniac. It was quiet.