The door chimed to the secretly rented apartment of Cennoth Plabaru. He got out of his bed, and shuffled towards the door. He wondered who it could be, he wasn't expecting anyone at this hour. In reality, he wasn't expecting anyone, period . Nobody were supposed to know where he was staying. He had used a good deal of the money he had received for planting that practical joke in the NAVCOMCENT of TPG to ensure he couldn't be found for some time. He opened the door, and looked at the non-descript person clad in a jumpsuit with the rising phoenix on his chest.
"Mr. Plabaru? Mr Cannoth Plabaru?" the man asked, reading from a tablet.
"Ehm, yes, but who are, ehm, how do.." Cannoth was cut short by the angry buzzing of accelerated aluminium ions emanating from the top of the tablet. The man outside had aimed the tablet at Cannoths head, and the ions punched cleanly through the top of his skull, spraying the room behind in an interesting new colour called hint of brain. The man looked at his victim, took a photo with the tablet's camera, sent it to his employer. He then touched a couple of buttons on his tablet, tossed it into the room and moved on down the corridor.
When he had walked about thirty paces, a small explosion sounded from the room, and the fire alarms started blaring. He walked into the main corridor, turned to the closest restroom and went inside. He took the cubicle furthest down and unlocked the door with a coin. Inside was a duffel bag with a set of clothes. He changed and removed his wig, fake nose, fake chin and contact lenses. He tossed the jumpsuit and extras into the bag, exited the restroom and went to the nearest garbage collection point, where he dumped the duffel bag down the chute to the nano eaters. Mission accomplished, he went to grab something to eat. Even professional anarchists have to eat he mused.
Just as sudden as the combat had started, the fighters from CLM started to drift off. Only Azumi, Swag Man and tramshed kept coming back. Ecka was satisfied that the two combat flights had kept the attention away from the convoy. They should by now be safely docked at Remley Orbital.
"Tangerine, break off and disengage. Reform on Remley Orbital," he sent on the combat net. He could follow on the radar as the highly disciplined fighter pilots broke off and start boosting for jump distance.
"Purple stays on station for as long as it takes. We'll show these pie rats," Strat forced out between clenched teeth, as his light fighter made a 5 G turn to line the guns up perfectly on tramsheds fighter. The hard beams of neutron fire and explosion. With less strain in his voice he called Ecka again.
"If we are finished with the mission, I shall now recall the team from B-6. We can use them here." Ecka agreed, and Strat turned to watch the swirling combat 1800 meters away. Damn, he cursed silently. Han Shick and Vehement exploded silently under the combined guns of Swag Man and Azumi. Targeting Swag Man, he and Phaserlight boosted to engage. He sent an order for team Seta, the team at B-6, to jump to O-12 for combat mission. The battle was still wide open, but that would change once Seta Ralel and Maso arrived.
Inbound for docking at Remley Orbital, Ecka keyed the SSCU and asked for status from Hortan. They should all be docked now, and the cargo should be unloading as planned. No contact. Very odd he thought, and tested the system thoroughly. No faults. He sent a hail message to Hortans SSCU, but again, no contact. Slightly puzzled, he was about to ask Surbius to hail Hortan, when a red flagged priority message ticked in. He acknowledged, and the very agitated face of the trade councillor for TPG popped up in his HUD.
"Huh?" Ecka cursed himself for answering the call with such eloquence. But the councillor was not who he had expected on the SSCU, to say the least.
"Mr. Estenk, care to explain why I have 38 pilot lying here in the Immediate Recovery facility? Unless they chose to unload their cargo by exploding their ships that is?
"But, the, what?" Och, nice Ecka thought. Maybe I should find myself a shovel and dig a hole I could crawl into. Or maybe I should just get the foot out of my mouth.
"I have no clue. everything was proceeding as planned. I have had no messages about that at all. I'll investigate immediately and call back." Ecka cut the holo and turned his ship, signalling to the rest of the flight to follow. He opened a link to the TGFT Immediate Recovery facility and asked for a status. No pilots in. Right.
"Tangerine flight, we are now officially a Search and Rescue team. Surbius, refurbish with an EVA salvage team and an EVA paramedic team. Vardonx, you get a scanner and cover him. The rest follow me to sector M-9. We are looking for at least 38 exploded ships, and Hortans XC."
Eventually they found the remains of the convoy, and Hortans XC. It became apparent that something was seriously wrong when they had searched M-9 for about an hour without a single trace. Doing a spiral search from there was time consuming, but essential. More and more TGFT and VPR pilots joined the search until after eleven hours Creyn called in with a trace of xithricite dust in a roid field in K-12. After another hour they tracked down an ass over head tumbling TGFT green Behemoth XC. Fearing the worst, Surbius sent over the EVA paramedics to get Hortan out. The salvage team started securing the XC to the two Tunguska mining Marauders for tug boat duty back to TGFT HQ in Dau K-10. The paramedics cut the emergency door out after making an inflated bubble tent seal over it, thus making sure not to expose the pilot to the vacuum of space. When they drilled the first hole, the bubble tent collapsed inwards, as the vacuum inside the ship sucked the air out. When he saw that, Surbius cursed and looked down at his hands. He had promised Hortan that it would be ok, the young man had trusted in him, and now he was dead. He made a silent promise to pay the ones responsible back ten-fold.
"The XC is empty, no pilot." The voice of the paramedic crackled across the short distance. "The seat and mountings are gone as well. We'll wrap up here and seal for the forensics guys."
Ecka leant back and folded his hands across his chest, closed his eyes for ten seconds. Silent meditation, always worked best for thinking he felt. That and a wee dram. Och, he could do with some of that Phylatis Delicht Moda kept in the secret stash behind his R&D console. Slowly the wheels turning inside the ancient miners head started clicking into place, and with a sudden cry of "Shait", he literally punched the SSCU. The radio was filled with concerned voices that had heard the commander over the open net, but he ignored them completely.
"This is Moda's automatic reply service. I am currently busy with some very important research, leave topic and preferred times, and I'll call you"
Ecka focused all the power he had learned at TGFT command school, and growled into the SSCU. "Moda, you pick up now."
As proof of the respect Ecka commanded, Moda picked up almost immediately, his holo picture showing him in a flightsuit lightly covered in oil. "Sorry, Sir, I was changing hydraulics oil when you called, Sir."
"Did you use Hortan as testpilot on the EAPRS?"
"Affirmative Sir, that I did. Why?"
Ignoring the question and the unusual use of Sir, Ecka continued "Where is the recovery facility for it?"
"Ehm over in the back of the shop somewhere. I have meant to have it shipped down to Imme..."
Ecka cut him off with a very low voiced question, "Would you mind terribly, to shuffle over there and tell me what you find inside?"
"Sure Sir, stand by."
Ecka leant back. He hoped he was right on his hunch.
"Sir, Hortan is lying inside, he is sedated and out cold. He has some wicked looking sores on his hands and his head. I am requesting medical attention as we speak."
Ecka breathed a sigh of relief, maybe the young man was going to make it. At least now they could give him help. He cut out the SSCU and reached for the small emergency bottle to the left of his seat. After a wee dram, he called to the assembled pilots.
"Hortan is found. He is back at base, status unknown. I want all evidence here scooped up, and I want it delivered to Moda ASAP. The Guild will meet at 0800 station time tomorrow. No excuse possible. Surbius, with me, now."
Now he had to go to TPG and tell them that the convoy had been spattered across the vacuum. Not exactly how he fancied spending his afternoon.
