Chapter 618: Interlude

According to my research, the most common cause of death for spies is due to direct kinetic action.

Having studied modern spycraft, I have come to the conclusion that to engage in direct kinetic action is taking the risk that your opponent is more highly skilled, through cybernetics, natural evolutionary gifts, bioware, or just plain willingness to drive through injury and pain.

This should be the reason that all options should be examined while engaged in espionage activities.

--Ba'ahn Ya'ahrd, Lanaktallan Unified Executor Council, Espionage Division, Senior Most High Agent

The office was comfortably lit by outside light. The smartglass windows were opaque to anyone on the outside, reflecting any known wavelengths back into the office, preventing the interior from being shown, while letting in warm sunlight from outside. The windows vibrated slightly at a high frequency to prevent laser microphones from listening in as an extra little bonus. The windows even enhanced incoming light so that the light of the two moons at night made the office nice and cozy.

The office was comfortably appointed. The massive desk that doubled as secure workstation, several flat 2.5D screens on the walls, artwork, three holotank projectors, and nearly a dozen comfortable chairs on the side. The carpet was thick and rich, comfortable to walk on in shoes or bare foot pads. The lights were cunningly hidden in case the occupant didn't want to use the ambient nanite light.

It was late, past working time for most people. A glance out the windows showed that the majority of the taller buildings, rarely over 15 stories, were dark or just running maintenance and standby lighting. The streets were largely empty, the vehicles from the rush home after work already safely parked in garages and recharging.

The office only held four people.

Two non-descript security agents stood against the wall on either side of the door, dressed in government standard suits, their hands folded and at their waists, mirrorshades hiding their eyes, and a visible earpiece as well as their datalink.

Another Telkan sat in a chair in front of the desk. He was the type of person that was easily overlooked, forgotten about even before someone looked away.

He was also the Assistant Director of the Telkan Intelligence Agency.

The final person present was usually known as the Planetary Director of Telkan-2, a female Telkan who's vision and leadership got the people of Telkan-2 through the terrible Dwellerspawn War over five years prior. Despite her wishes she had been re-elected to serve again and the people were confident that she'd carry through with the electorate's wishes as well as do what was needed for the Telkan people to thrive.

Brentili'ik stared at the report on her desk, the screen beneath the smooth smartglass surface dark under the paper. Not plas, not smart-paper, plain old paper. She read it again, then a fifth time, before looking up.

"You're sure?" she asked.

"As near as we can be," the male Telkan stated.

"Could it be a glitch in the voting system? Some kind of tabulation error?" she asked.

The male Telkan shook his head. "No."

She tapped her front teeth with one claw for a moment before looking down at the paper again.

Two months ago, when her husband had been working with Lady Keena to overcome difficulties from his last deployment, Brentili'ik had sent up a law to be ratified to the Confederate Senate. It was a minor piece of legislation, nothing ground breaking or earth shattering, just a confirmation that the Telkan System would abide by Confederate Interstellar Trade Statutes.

The vote to confirm the legislation by the Senate had only taken roughly an hour.

Now she had the vote tallies in her hand, so to speak.

She had instructed, via diplomatic courier, that the Telkan delegates vote "Present" only "in order to remove any question of conflict of interest" and then waited.

The three delegates had done just that. No confirmation with her office, no request for clarification, just voted "Present" and that was all.

It was then double-checked via datalink real time voting with the Telkan population, to ensure that the Telkan people agreed with the legislation.

That was what Brentili'ik was looking at.

Vote totals, as well as who voted how, was highly secretive. Something in the Terran's history had made it so that the fact that nobody, not even elected officials, could look up how any being had voted. As far as Brentili'ik was concerned, whatever it was had been so traumatizing that the voting results were more heavily guarded than even military databases. The voting rolls were supposed to be classified, but the Telkan Intelligence Agency was allowed access to see who was eligible to vote as well as who had voted.

Just not how the being had voted.

She looked at the paper again.

100% of the Telkan people had voted.

Except, that wasn't quite true.

100.92% of the Telkan people had voted.

"They're still on the voting rolls," the Telkan male said. "My office had the Legislation Administration do a 'proof of life' check, via datalink, for nearly a thousand Telkan who have died of old age in the last six years."

"And?" Brentili'ik asked.

"Any of them who have died in the last four years replied with proof of life good enough that it takes major suspicion and a court order to demand they show up in person to validate their status," the Telkan said.

"So... the dead are voting," Brentili'ik said. "Not just the Terran dead, but all the dead."

"Yes, Madame Director," the agent said.

Brentili'ik sighed and sat down, tapping between her shoulderblades with her tail, a nervous habit she'd developed in the shelters during the Second Telkan War.

"And proof of life was determined sufficient?" Brentili'ik asked.

"Yes, Madame Director. Knowledge of current events, imaging taken in real places that corresponded with records, proof of System Identification Number, date of birth, and last place of employment," He gave a sudden slow smile. "However, we did find out one thing."

"What's that?" Brentili'ik asked.

"They are all employed by Tempus Archive and Record Systems, a Rigellian registered company that hooks into multiple other companies," he said. He smiled. "All of the deceased are employed by the same company, once you get through the shell companies and the proxies."

"Are they being paid?" Brentili'ik asked.

The male nodded. "Yes, Madame Director. Bank accounts, the whole thing. Bank accounts that were opened in their names after their estate handled all their debts and assets," he said.

"So, somehow, the dead are still voting and are employed, aware, and capable of action," she said. She tapped the paper. "How long until the dead outnumber the living?"

"Barring a major disaster, my office estimates, using doubling time mathematics and current birth/death ratios, that the dead will outnumber the living between one hundred and one hundred and fifty years. However, the voting dead will outnumber the voting living within seventy years," he said. He shook his head. "That means..."

Brentili'ik never found out what it meant as a section of the wall exploded inward, throwing her backwards. A chunk of armor from in between the layers of the wall hit the Senior Agent like a meat axe, ripping him in half and spraying blood and viscera across the room.

She hit on her back, her vision blurred, her ears ringing.

Shapes came through the sudden smoking hole in the wall, short squat shapes in armor and carrying weapons.

The two security agents were shaking their heads, one down on one knee, the other thrown against the chairs and trying to get his eyes to focus.

The weapons in the attacker's hands hissed and Brentili'ik realized she could hear the mechanisms click as they subsonic magac rounds ripped into her guards before they could get it together.

Brentili'ik opened her mouth to scream, to call for more security, or maybe just to breath better.

She was aware the back of the chair was on her tail.

One of the figures stepped forward. The visor was blanked and all Brentili'ik could tell was that the figure was bipedal and only a few inches taller than a male Telkan. It looked at her, nodded slightly, and lowered the barrel of the weapon down to point it at Brentili'ik's face as two others moved up next to the first one and two other ones came around the other end of the desk.

Looking into the muzzle she could see the mag coils, see the faint threads of electromagnetic energy along the rails, see the faint heat distortion of the barrel. She could see the light above the trigger was green, that the weapon had no stamps or markings, not even the legally required serial number stamp of a weapon run off by a nanoforge.

She knew she was about to die.

Brentili'ik raised her chin slightly, lifting her upper lip, and stared at the opaque black visor.

She wouldn't close her eyes. Wouldn't give them the satisfaction.

The wall paper seemed to come alive, pulling away from the wall and into a kaleidoscope pattern as it moved forward. Brentili'ik could see it, over the armored figure's shoulders, as it pulled itself free of the wall, burning red eyes suddenly visible. An arm went up and a knife suddenly extended from the blurred and fractured glass looking limb.

Before anyone could react, the figure was on the armored troops. A blurred hand grabbed the forearm holding onto the front of the SMG from behind, pulling it upwards. The blade sunk into the neck seal of the armor and pulled free so fast that the mag-coils hadn't finished energizing.

Brentili'ik stared, frozen, as the figure turned, stuck the knife through the side of the helmet and yanked it free, then repeated it on the second one.

The squirt of arterial blood from the first stab wound was less than a foot long.

The knife stabbed into the side of the head of the third one twice, both times with crunching sounds that overlapped.

The SMG was only two inches over Brentili'ik's head when it went off with a whispering sound.

The forearm, covered by black armor, broke in the middle, under the blurred and prism-like hand, and went to the side.

Brentili'ik was still inhaling, blood was still squirting from neck wound, when the one being held was whipped around so hard that she heard bones break inside the armor.

The knife flew from the hand, whipping through the air with an ear-splitting whistle, to punch through the center of one of the armored figures that had moved around the other side of the desk, neither of which had begun to react.

Brentili'ik's nameplate was snatched off the desk in a blur that resulted in it whipping through the air before the knife had impacted. The crunch of the nameplate punching through the visor was loud and the figure flipped in mid-air even as the other one slammed against the wall.

The two stabbed through the helmet sagged and began to collapse.

The prism-effect vanished and Brentili'ik saw one of the short women with pale skin, black hair, and grey eyes staring at her as they crouched down and drew a pistol in a smooth motion.

The three that had stepped up to look down at Brentili'ik finished collapsing.

"Confederate Intelligence Services," the Terran woman said, her voice calm and unruffled as if she had not just killed five beings in less than three seconds.

Brentili'ik just nodded.

There was a dull thumping sound from inside the five suits of armor then the armor suddenly dissolved into black powder.

"Inversion charges. Disintegrates the body. Nanite armor, it's how they got close," the agent said. "Stay down."

Brentili'ik just nodded.

The agent put her index and middle finger against her own temple, still looking around the room. "Attacks across your office building. Attack at your manor."

"My podlings, broodcarriers," Brentili'ik gasped. "My family."

"My sisters made the attackers before they could engage. Telkan Intelligence got your family to the panic room in time," the agent said. She looked around. "Still attackers here. They know that you weren't eliminated."

Brentili'ik blinked. "How long have you been here?"

The agent blinked slowly and for a second Brentili'ik could see data streaming across the woman's retina. "Since you returned to take charge of the refugee camp after the first Telkan War."

Brentili'ik stared. She felt useless, but it was like she was frozen. She could faintly hear weapon fire in the distance.

"Telkan security can't hold them. They're bringing in heavier weapon, Madame Director," the agent said. She shook her head. "Panic room here is compromised."

"What... what do we do?" Brentili'ik asked, licking her lips with a dry tongue.

"We do nothing. You will hide under the desk and I will protect you," the Terran woman said. She handed Brentili'ik a small device. "Get under the desk, turn that on. Do not turn it off, it can only be disabled by myself or one of my sisters."

"Give me a gun," she said.

The woman shook her head. "No. That would pose an unnecessary risk. Perform your duty and follow my commands, Madame Director."

Brentili'ik nodded, taking the device and scrambling under the desk. She activated it and the space she was in suddenly had glowing hexagons lining it, the room blurring and sound receding.

She stayed there, curled up, for long minutes. She kept tapping herself between her shoulder blades as well as licking her nose like she was a podling.

She wished her husband was there.

Not to fight, but to hold her, so she could hold onto him.

I hate this. I hate being helpless, she thought. She started to protest having to hide under the desk while a Terran did the job of protecting her.

Then she remembered that a single Terran female, without power armor, had killed five armored mercenaries in less than five seconds with nothing more than a knife and her nameplate.

She opened her mouth to ask if it was safe yet when there was a faint rumble through the floor beneath the hexagonal energy field beneath her knees.

The desk was shattered, whipped away, and the hexagonal pattern went from blue to yellow for a moment while the device hummed in her hand.

She closed her eyes, waiting.

After too long the device beeped three times and she opened her eyes. For a second nothing happened and then the hexagons vanished. There was a slight glimmering aura around her as the device shifted what it was doing.

She was instantly soaked by what she thought was rain at first. The sprinkler system was going in what was left of the room. She realized that the sprinkler system, made from battlesteel in accordance to construction laws, was all that remained of the ceiling. She could see straight up to the fourth floor. The wall behind her and to her left was gone, revealing the lawn of the Planetary Director's Hall.

The Terran female stood there, in her black suit, her hands folded in front of her at her waist.

"The threat has been neutralized, Madame Director," the Terran woman stated, her voice calm and even.

Brentili'ik turned and stared. The grass was on fire here and there, some of the bushes were smouldering. A pair of grav-lifters were crashed on the lawn and burning. There were burning LawSec vehicles beyond the fence.

"All of this?" Brentili'ik asked.

"They were most insistent that you not be allowed to survive the attack, Madame Director," the agent said.

"My security," Brentili'ik started.

"Were all eliminated in the first one hundred eighty seconds of the attack," the agent said. "It was coordinated, prepared, and rehearsed. Multiple teams, each with overlapping objectives, with air and fire support."

"The military?" Brentili'ik asked.

"Are arriving as we speak to secure the area," the agent said.

Brentili'ik looked around again at the carnage. "Then who?" she looked at the agent. "Just you?"

The woman nodded slowly. "Yes, Madame Director. They were ignorant of my presence and thus unprepared for my counter-assassination efforts."

Brentili'ik moved over and sat on a chunk of debris that she recognized as being part of the roof grav-lifter pad. "Who? Do you know who did this?"

The agent had moved with her, standing three paces away. She was silent for a long moment before nodding. "Yes. Not based on evidence from this attack, but other intelligence gathered over a period of time."

"Who?" She asked. "Is it something to do with..."

"Do not finish that sentence, Madame Director," the agent warned. "If they think you represent a threat to them they will escalate their efforts to eliminate any threat you may pose."

Brentili'ik looked around at the burning debris. She could see military grav-lifters dropping down, troops in power armor jumping out, search lights panning the grounds.

"Escalate?" she asked as power armor troops jogged forward.

The agent raised her hands, her hands open, her feet shoulder width apart, a black billfold held in her right hand and open, showing a badge.

"They consider a planet cracker reasonable escalation in the face of a threat of full discovery, Madame Director," the agent said.

"TELKAN MARINES! ON YOUR KNEES!" the lead power armor troop shouted as two others moved to either side of Brentili'ik, bringing up their protective screens.

The agent got down on her knees, still holding up the billfold.

Brentili'ik just stared as she held up her hand. "She's Confederate Intelligence," she said.

The agent just smiled.

--------------

Brentili'ik sat in the bedroom, staring at the wall. It wasn't her manor, not the Planetary Director's manor.

It was on-post housing on the Telkan Marine base.

Outside, security troops made a steady sweep. She knew at least two satellites were watching her. She could hear grav-strikers, hear the whining of power armor, hear the thudding footsteps of robot combat power armor. Knew there were six Telkan Marines outside her house and Telkan Intelligence Agency agents inside her house.

The broodcarriers were asleep behind her, the podlings, even the older ones that normally would be too old, were asleep in the pile of blankets.

They had been urged into the panic room by security. They had been nervous, the broodcarriers distressed, during the two hours they were in the panic room.

Once the area was secured, they were moved to the house that Brentili'ik now resided in.

It had taken her a long time to soothe her two broodcarriers.

It hadn't soothed her.

"I know you're in here," she said.

The wall didn't answer.

"Thank you, and thank your sisters for me, for what you did today," Brentili'ik said. She stared at the wall. "I can't stop my investigation. It's bigger than me. If I stop, Telkan not yet born will pay the price."

Silence.

"But I'll be more careful now," she said.

She laid down and pulled the covers over herself, snuggling up to her broodcarrier.

"An attack upon one is an attack upon us all," Brentili'ik quoted.

The wall didn't answer.

It just watched.