Friday. 10:05 Main Concourse – Jewelry District

John had been walking around the shopping area somewhat aimlessly for the last two hours. He had hoped Andern would’ve joined him, but he was being useless sleeping in. Alice’s team had done a piss-poor job, her words, managing their time, and weren't due back to arrive until 22:45.

He was on his best behavior and hadn’t purchased anything. Despite ogling at several watches. John didn’t want to have any arguments with Alice, nor did he want her to give him that disapproving look.

The next store he walked into was a general goods store, the name of which escaped him. He swore there were at least six of these stores in the commercial zone. The employees all wore a hideous shade of green shirts. John walked back to the fridges that stored the drinks along the back wall of the store.

There was a commotion at the front of the store as John pulled out a soft drink. He turned to see three masked idiots brandishing guns. Internally John sighed at once again being dragged in unwillingly to bullshit.

“Get on the ground! C, get the worker on the till secured.”

John casually grabbed a bag of sugar candies and sat on the floor. He was already working on a plan. Though the plan could go sideways quickly if he couldn’t secure a gun. The only one that looked like he’d be able to get the gun off them easily was the one working on the till worker, who was too far away to attack.

John looked outside and saw two police offers cordon the area outside of the shop. One of them was talking into their radio, obviously calling in backup and likely a negotiator. He sighed once again and opened the bag of candies.

The muscles of the group came over and pointed his gun at him, “Who said you could eat?”

John casually pushed the gun slightly to his side as he ate a candy, “Please don’t point that at me. Why don’t you fetch your leader? I need to have a conversation with them rather urgently.”

The man was dumbstruck. He was genuinely taken aback at the casual disregard John was showing him. This disregard continued as John set the bag of candy on the lower shelf next to him and proceeded with opening his soda.

John shook his head, “Did I stutter? Go get your boss for me.”

The audacity of John was enough to get the man to fetch the leader. John could hear the two men argue. Eventually, their leader came over with a pissed-off look on his face.

“Oh good, the boss is here. I’m gonna stand up now,” John stood up and leaned an empty shelf talked in a quiet voice to the robber in the other row, “What’s your end game here? Because I’ve been wrapping my head around that along with trying to come up with a way to disarm the three of you. Gotta level set with you, I am way smarter than the three of you combined and I don’t see any positive outcome for you. Oh, and I can’t find one where I don’t kill at least two of you in saving myself and the other hostages.”

The robber’s attitude changed from anger and a general annoyance to mass confusion. His face contorted in ways that John found quite humorous, though he didn’t show it. After a moment he regained his composure.

“What the hell do you mean?”

John stood there straight-faced, “Which part?”

The robber looked like a fish out of the water, “I don’t even know where to begin.”

“Well let’s start with your end game then. What are you trying to do?”

“Get lots of money then get the hell away from here.”

John nodded, “Ok, are any of you pilots?”

“Well no.”

“Any of you know how to scrub a credit chit of any monitoring software?”

“Uhm, no.”

“You really didn't think this through. Whatever money you get out of the till can be cleaned pretty easily. Any money you get in trade for any hostages is going to be useless. They’ll be able to track the credit chit physically, and should you try to cash it they will know exactly where the money goes. It’s actually hilariously difficult to clean that money, even if you know the right sources.”

The robber began looking worried, “None of that really happens, does it?”

“But then you and your buddies are on the fucking moon man. How are you getting off?”

“Well, we’d demand a shuttle.”

John noddle, “Which you can’t pilot or set up the VI to pilot for you. Let’s say you demand one and they have a pilot in the cockpit for you. They can lock the door and pipe in knockout gas to the cabin.”

“Good call, we’ll make sure we have one guy in the cockpit so they can’t do any funny business.”

“You realize the onboard VI can basically pilot the shuttle, right? They can program the VI to knock everyone out, dock somewhere and still arrest you before you wake up,” John continued to whisper, “Look, at no point do you win here.”

“Wait, you said you were planning to attack us.”

John nodded, “Look, I really don’t want to kill anyone. I say that all the fucking time but that is god’s honest truth in this situation. I already iced a couple of people out on the sea because they attacked us a couple of days ago. Look, I can go out and talk to the cops and basically try to work out some sort of deal where they downplay the charges.”

The man was having a hard time grasping everything and was shaking his head, “It wasn’t supposed to go this way.”

“My man, you and your pals were dumb as fuck for doing this. Don’t compound that mistake any further. Y’all are young and there is some future for you. But, if you guys do anything more, then there literally isn’t going to be any hope left for you lot.”

“They have to let us go. We have hostages,” the man implored.

“True, their ability to take you lot down is compromised somewhat, but it isn’t brought down to zero. Strictly speaking, the loss of a hostage’s life is acceptable in most cases from a police viewpoint,” John leaned in, “Obviously the media loves when shit like that happens because they can do their worst against the police. But I digress, at some point, you have to give up your hostages, and even if you don’t and take us with you. You are still stuck with the same problem, no pilot.”

“Fuck,” the man mumbled as he began pacing, “Fuck fuck fuck. It wasn’t supposed to be that way.”

“Convince your friends to give up leave the guns with me and walk out. I’ll talk to the police on your behalf after I make them safe.”

“What makes you so sure you can do that?”

John smiled, “Search for the ‘Hero of Sol.’ When you see the picture, you’ll reason your neck deep in shit.”

The man wore many emotions on his face, annoyance and frustration being the two most common. He went over to talk to his co-conspirators in this robbery and hostage-taking action. The other man, that had been covering the register, looked resigned to his fate. The bigger guy, to whom John gave absolutely no respect nor any regard to, looked infuriated.

The man’s voice rose and could be heard throughout the store, “So I was fucking being lied to? Why the hell did I follow you, T?”

“Because shit has worked up to this, but now? Fuck I screwed up this time.”

The taller man looked over at John and pointed his gun in his general direction, “This motherfucker went and fucked with your head.”

John shook his head and looked at him square in the eyes, “Can’t do that shit anymore. Besides, if I could the three of you would be drooling puddles on the ground the moment this shit started. I’m actually trying to help you dipshits out of the hole you dug. You should accept my help graciously.”

“We’re going to get the money, then get on a shuttle and…”

John interrupted the man, “Bitch, do you even know how to pilot a shuttle?”

He was taken aback both by the attitude and the specificity of the question, “How hard can it be?”

“You know there are literally three hundred buttons in the cockpit of a standard shuttle. There isn’t a button or label that says ‘Power On’ anywhere. You actually have to be trained to know how to turn on everything. And then more buttons to engage the VI to program it.”

“Fine, then we get someone…”

“To turn it on for you,” John was holding back laughter, but his sarcasm was bleeding into his tone of speech, “Great plan. Do you know how to fly it manually? Program a flight plan in? Close the doors? Heaven forbid you decided to land on Earth, nothing like eyeballing a reentry path into the atmosphere. Real simple shit you simpleton.”

Two of the robbers looked at each other and nodded. The larger one, despite his insistence to the contrary, acquiesced. They then walked over to John and handed him the weapons. There was some hesitation on their parts to walk out the doors together but eventually, they overcame it and walked out. Police hurried toward them and apprehended them.

John dropped the magazine and racked the slide as he covered the ejection port of the first gun he picked up. The process was repeated two more times as the other hostages left the store. He set the guns on the front table and exited the store.

He went over to one of the waiting police officers to let them know about the gun. He noticed the worker and interrupted the meeting and handed the man a credit chit to pay for his candy and soda. John whispered that the man could keep the change and treat himself to a nice meal to help him calm down as there were several hundred extra credits on the chit.

True to his word, John found the lead detective on the case and plead for leniency for the three idiots. Ironically, in ways that John didn’t quite comprehend himself, that the hero of the Sol sector pleading for leniency actually meant something. Initially, the detective was contemplating cutting them loose right there.

John didn’t like that as they had actually done that, and one of them pointed his gun at him twice. His recommendation was a work release program tied to a multi-year probation plan. Were they to complete that without issue, then this incident would be written off their records. If they couldn’t stay on the straight and narrow path, they deserved to have this follow them in the future.

The detective smiled and thought that was a sound plan if a bit too easy on them. John shrugged but said they were clearly down on their luck and idiots trying to score some quick cash. Not career criminals without a moral center. They appeared to be redeemable, though whether they would be or not would ultimately be up to them.

As the conversation ended John grabbed his tablet from his front pocket and answered the call, “Damnit Cadet Lief, how many times do I have to call you?”

“Ah, Commander Chloros, you have my apologies. I was a hostage in a smash and grab robbery, and I was just talking to the lead detective. You will be happy to know that I didn’t try to resolve this situation with violence. I did it with words.”

That comment caught the commander completely off-guard, “Uhm, congrats? I’m not sure why you feel that you should be congratulated for doing that though?”

John started to chuckle at himself, “Oh right. You don’t really know me that well. Well, that was awkward.”

“Ok, whatever. The hostile in the skimmer has requested to speak with you. Naval Intelligence didn’t want you involved but we were able to convince the commander of the field office here to give you an opportunity to speak to them.”

John chuckled again at that, “Yeah, Intelligence and I went through a pretty awful divorce of sorts. You know, all sorts of finger-pointing. You got hurt so your useless. You got a team killed so we really don’t want you. Standard bullshit.”

“Uh-huh,” Commander Chloros had identified one cadet that he didn’t want anywhere near his chain of command.

“Do we have any intel on this cat?”

“Her name is Marissa Park. Born on New Brunswick, Mars in 2235. She was identified as a level 2C telepath who refused training. Joined the Martian Merchant Marines straight out of high school. Been a vagabond since 2254, where she seemingly vanished.”

“So, we got jack and shit on her then. And I doubt she vanished by accident. She had connections to someone that could do that.”

“Who could do that?”

“Well, I can think of around a hundred people in ConFed space alone that could do that. Not sure I could actually talk to all of them though,” John smiled as he was running the names through his memory, “That said I’m not that far from the Naval wing of the base.”

“I’ll get things set up for the top of the hour.”

“Do me a favor. Have our interview be on the third floor, then make sure no one is any room 2 floors above or below it and six rooms in every direction.”

“That’s oddly specific.”

“Ask the Psi-Corp for a blank device. Obviously, keep any friendly TPs away from the interview room.”

“Cadet, I’m not…”

“Commander, with respect to your rank, I wasn’t asking. If you can’t make that happen, then the interview won’t happen.”

“Very well Cadet. I don’t understand why you insist on all of this, but I’ll try and get the device.”

“Well sir, the reason for the oddly specific space is to ensure no friendly telepath gets near that device when it’s activated. It’s an unpleasant feeling like someone is blaring a siren right in your ear.”

12:05 Naval Intelligence Conference Room 3-15C

The blank device was turned on twenty minutes ago. Marissa looked agitated as she sat in the bright room by herself. John then walked in casually with a lunch tray, smiling as he shut the door with his leg. He then walked over to the far side of the desk from her and sat down.

“Good afternoon, I hope you don’t mind me having chow in front of you. Some assholes made me almost miss lunch and then I got called into duty,” John speared some green beans and took a bite, “And apologies for the less than formal attire for this thing. So anyway, you wanted to speak to me. What about?”

“Why are you guys doing this to me?”

John smiled and shrugged, “Doing what?”

“I can barely hear myself think.”

“Weird, you were supposed to take meds to block those abilities of yours,” John smiled as he ate some potato wedges.

Marissa’s face contorted, then she shook her head and focused on John, “Why can’t I read you?”

“I’m a level 4A telepath with some exceedingly good blocks in place to prevent people like you from getting inside. I wouldn’t bother trying that again. Now, why did you want to speak with me specifically?”

“Is it fair to assume that you were the one that killed my comrades?”

John nodded, “Yeah, that’s a pretty safe assumption to run with. Go on.”

“You have made a lot of enemies.”

John laughed then took a bite of his sandwich, “Girl, making enemies is like breathing to me. I have a true talent in that.”

Marissa was confused at his reaction, “Most people would wonder who their enemies were. Not laugh or disregard it.”

“You just made a statement to me that is along the same line as ‘water is wet’ or ‘snow is cold’ to me,” John speared the last of his green beans, “For that to register you're going to have to add a level of specificity to your comment.”

“Dr. Norman…”

John set his fork down and interrupted her, “Is an unethical mad man hellbent on the uplifting of a species that neither wants nor needs it. One of his two most vaunted success stories was killed by my hand and the other one likely is in a permanent coma. Two assassins are also dead that he hired. God willing, I hope to put an end to that fucker in the next year or two.”

Marissa grinned and started to laugh, “So it wasn't bullshit then, you really are acquainted with him. My crew ran odd jobs here and there for them. Transportation of dry goods mostly. He had a kill contract open on you, which was odd, but we figured we’d take it.”

“Smart plan. Don’t suppose he gave you the full picture of what you were up against?”

“No, and his intel was shit too. A fat lot of luck this got.”

“My guess is you’re going to rot in a cell for fifteen years. That’s if you’re lucky. Since you’re a telepath that probably rules standard prison out. If you think that noise is annoying, get used to it.”

“I don’t owe that crazy old fuck anything, but now I know for sure I have a bargaining chip.”

“Which is?”

“Intel. Intel that you don’t have.”

John took a bite of his sandwich and walked over to the window and knocked on it with one of his knuckles, “So the bitch woke up.”

Marissa sat in her chair poker-faced. John nodded then walked over to the door and exited the room when it opened. He was in the hallway with Commander Chloros and a field agent he didn’t recognize.

“How sure are you that it’s her?” Chloros asked.

“One hundred percent. But more than that I want to know where he is. We can…”

“The Mercantilist Union has rebuffed our requests to kill him in their territory. While you and General Mizrahi share a like mind in eliminating this man, we cannot move on him at this time. The location of where he is has limited use.”

“But it’s still valuable nonetheless,” John said, “Can we remove psychic jail from a possibility? Have her in a special wing?”

Chloros looked disgusted by the suggestion, “She doesn’t deserve that.”

“I’d prefer to put a 10mm between the eyes, or airlock her, but apparently there are regs preventing me from doing either. We need this intel.”

“We can bring in Psi-Corp to verify the information. If they corroborate it, then we can make the deal. If it’s false or it’s implanted, then she gets what she gets.”

John nodded and headed back into the room. He sat down and took two bites of apple-crisp and drank some milk. He then leaned back in his chair and smiled.

“Nice curveball. What are your demands?”

“I go free.”

John laughed, “Yeah that isn’t happening. Strike one.”

“Reduced sentence, I need to disappear when I get out. No psychic jail.”

“That's reasonable, but it’s going to be contingent on a full mind scan. If this is a planted memory or you aren’t telling the full truth, then the deal is ripped up.”

“This is no planted memory. I know exactly what I saw.”

John leaned back onto the table, “Let’s see your hand.”

“The girl twin, I don’t know her name. She was practicing in some suit of power armor in the warehouse we were unloading. A box grazed a newbie that we picked up on the rim. Damn near tore the kid's leg off,” Marissa paused, “He got up and shouted something at her. She picked him up like a ragdoll from so far away. Then impaled him with icicles that formed out of nowhere.”

“How did you avoid the same fate?”

“We were too surprised to speak. We just finished offloading and left. It wasn’t until we came back a month later that we saw the kill order and figured what the hell, it was worth enough credits to retire on.”

“You and your comrades were cold mother fuckers, literally, to see your crewmate get speared by magic ice and not freak out for that. Dumb as hell to then take a hit job from the very same people. Thanks for the intel, if it is confirmed then you get your deal.”

John stood up to see Marissa smile briefly. He grabbed his tray and headed to the door. As it opened, he turned back and asked one more question.

“What was the cargo ship you were on?”

“The Virmire.”

John handed his tray to the ensign that was holding the door open for him. He opened his tablet and ran a scan for any cargo. A smile formed on John’s face as he turned to look at his attacker one last time.

“Marissa, as dumb as you were for taking on this job, you were the lone lucky one. The Virmire was destroyed, with all hands, six days ago in Merc territory. No doubt on Norman’s orders. Enjoy prison, and you better hope I kill that asshole before you get out. Otherwise, you’re going to end up just like your friends and crewmates.”