By David C. Daoust
The room changed suddenly. ‘Changed’ was the only way Dakota could explain the difference. It was the same white lab she’d been working in for the past two days, the same white lab that matched every other lab she’d ever worked in, though when the men burst into the room, firing fully automatic rifles, it was no longer the same old lab she had grown up in, which was how she considered every lab she’d ever spent any time in. The room ‘changed’; Tense, loud, and ugly.
Colin grabbed her, and pulled her under one of the examination tables. Dakota caught sight of Margo as she threw her indestructible body in front of the unconscious form of Mari.
Dakota noticed that the Red Faction soldiers, who had accompanied the Commissar and Colin into the room, did not react to the assault at all. In fact, they seemed to raise their weapons and aim them at the doorway, ignoring the obvious threat of blazing weapon fire entirely.
It was then that the hologram flickered, then that it sunk into Dakota’s head that none of the men that charged the room, nor any of the bullets fired, were real.
It was all a scare tactic.
A scare tactic meant to shake those in the room, possibly allow those ‘outside’ access to the room before those ‘within’ could get their bearings. Clearly, a scare tactic the Red Faction soldiers were familiar with, it was not until the head of the enemy squad leader peeked around the door jam, that the soldiers within allowed a burst of weapon fire to leave their weapons, forcing those outside to abandon their plan of taking the room during the confusion. Red Faction soldiers did not make another move until the hologram vanished fully.
Dakota watched as Margo, or rather whoever was in Margo’s form, realized that the bullets she tried to shield from Mari never made any impact. The bot pushed Mari from the table, her body slipping off the far side to hit the floor. The small girl quickly followed behind.
Dakota knew that the war hero would be out for some time, the healing technology of the doctor’s cane only sped up the woman’s natural healing processes. Ultimately, the technology used an unnaturally high level of the woman’s energy to instantaneously heal something that could take days or weeks under normal circumstances. This energy had to be recuperated, which led to those healed in such a way, well, it left them in a deep sleep that could last hours.
While Dakota would not suggest dropping a recovering patient on the floor, it was better than what may happen to the woman if the soldiers followed the mock attack with a real blazing charge of weapon fire.
Many of the medics peeked out from where they had taken cover as well. Dakota, while relieved that everyone was alright, found her hands shaking… and the heart pounding in her chest was a source of momentary confusion. Colin seemed fairly calm as he crouched near her, sharing the same cover.
“Hold your fire!” the Commissar rasped, not only to the men within the room, those outside as well. “We are clearly at a stand still! Who are you? And what do you want?”
Once again the head poked around the door jam, the soldiers within all tensed visibly, though not a man fired a shot once the Commissar had given his order. The squad leader had his hand on his ear bud as he silently studied those within the med bay. He confirmed something to whoever was on the other end of the communication device in his ear, then with a quick flip of his hand, a beam of light shot from a device attached to one of his shoulders, the light flickered quickly and wove the form of a dark haired woman with mottled skin.
“Suzanne!” Dakota said silently, startled as she recognized the holographic woman.
“Commissar Ivan,” the woman said directly to the Red Faction’s political officer as she seemingly strode further into the room, “Funny… didn’t I just have a conference with you last week on Jagger’s Rift? and yet here you are again… in the flesh…”
“Ms. Otomo,” the Commissar said briefly, ignoring the woman’s buried implications. “You dare risk war sending soldiers into our capital ship?”
“War?” she answered, “As though I represent the Consortium?”
“You think we don’t know the Otomo’s ties to Consortium’s intelligence agency…”
“I am a private citizen…” Suzanne said slyly, narrowing her eyes.
“Indeed…” Ivan mused.
“Though let us say for a moment that I am a Consortium rep… Dare I?” Suzanne asked, unworried, “You hold one of our citizens within this very room.”
“I can only imagine you mean the good Doctor Sun,” Ivan answered fluidly, “She was caught stealing on one of our moons…”
Suzanne laughed haughtily and muttered, ‘One of’, before continuing.
“How could she steal from her own company? Is she not under my employ?” Suzanne asked simply. “I don’t remember filing charges against her.”
“…the matter of the land speeder then?” Ivan shot back.
“Seems to me someone else was charged with that crime.”
“Charges dropped, only through OUR agreement…” Ivan said flustered.
“Sounds like a matter for the Judges if I’d ever heard it,” Suzanne finished, “What rights have you to coerce our citizens?”
“I assure you, no one was coerced.” Ivan’s raspy voice seethed.
“It’s true, Suzanne, I agreed to the terms freely,” Dakota said angrily, gripping her cane tightly, as she strode out from the cover she’d taken. “And I agreed fully in the hopes of thwarting your sick little plans to profit off these nanites…”
“Sick little plans?” Suzanne asked sharply, “You have made quite enough of a mess already, Dakota!”
“Why are you here Suzanne?” Dakota asked straight forward, having had enough of this back and forth banter that went nowhere. “Why would you send armed men in…?”
“To stop YOU!” Suzanne said angrily, “to stop you from frying all those nanites in one foul swoop.”
“Why?” Dakota almost yelled, shocked, “Why would you want to stop these people from being cured of this affliction.”
“Oh Dakota… Why can’t you just trust me?” Suzanne almost whined in frustration.
“Trust you?” Dakota said. “You can’t even answer a simple question.”
“I do not answer to you, Dakota,” Suzanne said, “I can’t!”
That was the first time Suzanne said she ‘can’t’, rather than won’t. Why can’t she? What is stopping her? Never before had Dakota ever heard of any connection between the Otomo family, and the Consortium’s intelligence agency… until today.
“Well it’s too late Suzanne…” Dakota said holding up her cane, gesturing to a switch under its head. “I triggered the device as soon as your ‘soldiers’ charged the room, guns blazing… I wasn’t going to allow any more deaths due to the black lung nanites… not on Twin Crown.”
Suzanne absorbed the information and suddenly turned to talk to someone else. Someone who wasn’t there that Dakota could see, though was with Suzanne physically wherever she was in the Onion.
“The whole moon is black…” Suzanne confirmed. “And they’ve already punched through?”
“Major Sims,” Suzanne averted her gaze from the invisible people to stare directly at the squad leader that was currently projecting her image, “How many times do I have to fire you this week?”
A squad leader that Dakota recognized as the security guard she’d wrestled the phone away from in that hotel on Twin Crown, he rolled his eyes in response to the dark haired woman’s sudden reprimand.
