Hero stuff

Posted on Sat 6th Mar, 2021 @ 10:45pm by Exo-Comp EXQT
Edited on on Sun 11th Jul, 2021 @ 9:11am

1,404 words; about a 7 minute read

Mission: Business Not At All As Usual
Location: Harrington's Vessel

-Start-

{Ex-IKS Vessel- SuvWi'}

Jaren begged to a room that wasn't listening. It was dark, with a single point of light above him. The table had been covered with papers. He had written and joyfully cooperated in creating these papers eager to show his knowledge. Once his answers became stale the papers and people left until it was just his chair, the handcuffs, and the steel table. Now he realized this was not a debriefing, but the moment of his execution. The enormity of his failures were displayed in the holo cube before him. The simple keeper of a ledger, with one job, told to keep a low profile. He had thought using an old mining bot for this purpose had been clever. The outcome now revealed that was not the case.

At first they had questioned him, gotten the details of the transaction, plying him with compliments so he would divulge willingly. Then they had plumbed the depths of the memory core he had pulled out of the bot. It was damning evidence, a diary of crime able to indict some very prominent figures. Then they had more questions, the same questions repeated, then the violence started. Jaren began to realize this room was a death room, no windows, all metal wall and floor, no comforts. Just chains linked to a small table. He would never leave here.

Once he had realized this he offered money, wept, plead. Masked men held him down and cut out his tongue. They also lasered it back on, but it flopped loosely, a stranger to him now.

A simply dressed man, in all black apparel moved deep in the shadows of the room. The goons which held him never showed their faces under the cloth masks, but this man wore only pants and shirt, tightly fitting. They had moved on from friendly interactions some time ago.

The voice from the shadows spoke softly, "I'd like to know you understand why we have to know all of this Mr.... Psykgraf. Or rather Mr. Bentley I should say." The voice, and the sole light of the holo-cube was all Jaren could see. "Do you understand why this has come to pass? I find it helps you to endure the pain of what we do if you agree with why it must happen."

Jaren screamed, "Why must it happen? I didnt betray you!"

"We went over this already don't play dumb. We tried to stay cooperative but you aren't answering our questions."

"I've ashurred everything."

"Not really, Convince me you have then, or we have to keep escalating. I'm afraid our autosuture isn't perfect when it comes to full limbs being amputated. We've left people hobbling in agony the rest of their lives. And it goes up from there, all the way to the skinning."

The body of some poor soul was dropped on the ground next to Jaren, skinned alive. He screamed, existential doom overtaking his emotional center. Strong hands clamped over his nose and mouth, and he found himself praying to be killed so mercifully. As darkness swirled he felt the pressure release.

"Cooperate Jaren, if you've made a mistake we will simply kill you. There is a far worse fate for you should we not be satisfied, or if you lie."

Jaren swallowed, his life, shabby and wretched playing out between his ears. "What else is there?"

"Like I've asked already twice... There were no hidden caches, no duplicates, no copies of any kind?"

"NO! God I tol you no, kwidtm computeds cant be copied. Why I used her."

"It was one of four correct?"

"...yes?"

"The four of them are listed in this SysLog, they communicate on Quantum bandwidths, were you aware?"

"Yes they use subpace comms, but only one of them had memory capacity and the kwidtim procezr. Ther other ones cant remember."

The man shook his head, "Even if the other three do not have the data, you are a fool. Four cores, sharing data, this one unit will have three copies of the data."

Jaren felt the deepest pang of fear yet, he had looked, the bot had blanked its memory. Then a small portion of his brain reminded him how tricky the bots were, and that Peggy had always had 8% of its memory capacity on lock, despite Jaren's feeble attempt to undo it. He had assumed it was operating stuff and never really tried as the four cores were more then enough storage for anything he needed. The black book ledger of a Criminal syndicate was well protected but now the doubt began to really set in. Jaren realized he had messed up and they had noticed.

The voice confirmed this by saying, "That bot should have had all its circuits cooked in a reactor. We are compromised thanks to you. For a meager profit?"

"I needed the coin, I pulled the unit and wiped the other three-"

"You were planning to sell the data and covering your tracks, but couldnt pass the opportunity to make a little extra."

"No! I swear-"

The voice was angry and not even listening, he cut Jaren off without noticing. "-We must find this vessel now and recover the other three data modules. Clean up anyone who knows. This one too."

Jaren tried to talk but a hand clamped over his mouth, "No more words for you in this life. The blood we shed now is on your hands. We will find them and erase this unpleasantness from history. For this we do not need you."

The lights shut off, and the man disappeared.

Jaren screamed for his last time as something moved in the dark.

***

Myto Hohn of the Second Sons outfit stood by as Jaren was eaten alive by Targs. A Human might find life among Klingons intolerable but they were a piece of his own mind. Operating out of Federation space was very hard for Klingon raiders. They had to use subterfuge, hidden assets, bribes to gain access to intelligence for planning their next raid. A K'vort Heavy Raider, cloaked and armed to the teeth had already picked up the ion trail of their quarry, and this killing was just a part of the trail to keep their outfit secure.

Jaren had made bad choices, but selling the unit which contained the ledger of his operations was deadly stupid, or the mark of a traitor selling out. He was one of five assets they used to get in and out of Federation space. The data would have been catastrophic in Starfleets hands, even worse in a competitors.

"Second Hohn, sir?"

Myto stood near the Captain's chair, afraid to even seem comfortable near it. He turned to see the young Cardassian stammer out, "W-we have an intercept c-course plotted."

The targs still snacked on the wailing man, they had decided to keep the prey alive as Targs sometimes do. It was clearly affecting the young woman. Tanvi had murdered her master and burned his house to the ground before joining their outfit, so this was an odd color for her.

"Thank you Tanvi. I'll go inform the Captain, we will likely head out right away."

The small wardroom adjacent to the bridge was the Captain's prerogative to occupy, leaving the ship in its officers hands. H'tek was behind the doors already standing, aware of the moment. The old Klingon was insane, but had a wily wisdom that had turned circumstances to their favor many times.

"Captain, we have located the warp trail, permission to pursue?"

H'tek said nothing. His long silver/black hair laying open on his broad shoulders. After a very uncomfortable silence, he croaked in a low voice, "The Second Sons are in danger of being exposed."

"Yes, sir."

"Is that annoying Human fed to the Targs, as I asked?"

"Yes, sir."

"Then get us underway."

Myto swallowed, and repeated again, "Yes, sir."

Grateful for a normal exchange, Myto turned to leave. H'tek stopped him, "Rally the Dogs, strike away! Burn them in space."

Myto stopped walking, dreading this decision. "The Dogs" were a unit the Second Sons deployed to take ships in space. They had also been killed to a man a year ago trying to take a prize outside their ability. H'tek was losing it, but expected these orders to be carried out or someone else would be fed to the Targs.

And so Myto only said, "Yes, Sir."

-End-

 

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