Ajeet looked at the warrant, he had scanned it three times and he also recognised Tela. She had at least thirty odd full battle clad soldiers, phoenix team as he suspected.

  “I’ll have to verify, this we are the ii after all.” Ajeet handed it back to Tela. He had been expecting something different but not an official warrant. He was beginning to suspect the war games above were simply a rouse so the AGO could issue this warrant. He was alone up here.

  “That’s what I thought you’d say.” Tela nodded with a sigh.

  “What do you mean by that?” Ajeet frowned with barest of hint of concern in his voice. This was now about politics.

  “Colonel, please find away in, you have full use of required force to execute this warrant.” Tela stepped back.

  “Now hang on just one minute!” Ajeet stepped forward.

  “Yes?” Tela raised her hand.

  “This is one of the most secure bases in human kind.” Ajeet pointed out.

  “I am the attorney general mister Ajeet Gupta, and this is a high level security cleared phoenix team, step aside.” Tela moved right under his chin, causing him to take a step back.

  Ajeet paused for a moment, it was stalemate. He rubbed his chin and looked around, it wasn’t like they were going storm the facility. “No.”

  “No?” Tela now stepped back. “No?” Even in her active field days hardly ever anyone said no and never with this much back up and a warrant.

  “Colonel, take this facility, keep causalities to minimum.” Tel turned her back. She hoped she was right or her career was over and possibility a jail sentence.

  “You a good to go, take out the outer compound and wait for further orders.” Jackson gave the command via his secure com. He was still coming to terms with a raid on the ii facility, it made him extra cautious. He was happy enough that Tela could not see his concerned look as she secured her own battle helm. He pulled out his sonic shotgun and stepped forward. The ii guards looked to Ajeet.

  “Wait, wait wait.” He waved his hands, “You can’t do this.” His brain was not processing what was going on.

  “Order your people to holster their weapons and step aside, I doubt they have the capacity to penetrate our battle armour. If your security forces resist we’ll have not choice but to use lethal force, do you understand sir?” Jackson stood in front of Ajeet, he sonic shotgun raised at him, his men had their non lethal weapons raised at the ii security detail.

  “You wont shoot colonel.” Ajeet held his chin up in defiance. He hadn’t even bothered to secure the outer facility, nobody, simply nobody would dare to storm a ii facility.

  “You have a go.” Jackson nodded.

  Ajeet finally woke with his hands cuffed behind his back. He was sitting in a chair with still armour clad Tela in front of him and probably the phoenix colonel. Looking around he recognised his own command centre.

  “Well Ajeet, you have one more chance, order your central security force to step aside or we will use lethal force.” Tela frowned, but this was lost on Ajeet from behind her helm.

  “You have taken my command?” Ajeet shook his head to clear his thoughts. “They’ll not listen once the base is compromised.”

  “This is an official warrant.” Tela was desperate to avoid loss of life, “Those men will die for nothing.”

  “We protect secrets.” Ajeet found a defiant grin.

  “From your own government and its people.” Tela answered coldly.

  “Ma’am?” Jackson tilted his helmet.

  “Lets talk to them first.” Tela took a deep breath.

  “I don’t think they are the talking type.” Jackson noted.

  “By god I will try before I order their deaths colonel, it’s the least I can do or I am not better that piece of shit Ajeet.” Tela spat. “Patch me in to the Guardian base commander, it will be a woman, Colonel Papason.”

  Colonel Papason looked at the reinforced titanium door, her three hundred battle clad soldiers covered the six possible entries into the core base. She had hoped common sense would prevail but apparently not. She always suspected one day the AOG and ii would have a show down, she had just hoped it wasn’t on her watch. She was out numbered and she had to cover six areas where as the phoenix team knew which area they would attack. Worse still it was Jackson, that was Phoenix team one, she was unlikely to win this one. Not only that they had a destroyer hovering above, no doubt to punch a hole through the facility core. She had no large scale offensive weapons against a ship. Where on earth were those ii frigates?

  Clearly Ajeet had been stalling for a political solution, but not whilst they were being jammed. She had seen the footage of Tela, Ajeet was dick if he thought Tela wasn’t going to raid hard and fast. Her men were good but the phoenix team was also good, plenty of men would die today to prove a point and worse still, technically they were all on the same side.

  “Ma’am, there is a knock on the door.” Her captain pointed at the main door.

  “They’ll ask us to surrender.” Carol Papason nodded. She opened the visual com.

  “Colonel Papason, this Auditor General Tela Montague, you know who I am and you have been forwarded the warrant. We avoided deaths today but that will change if we are required to use force going forward. It’s a tripartite order Carol, there is no greater power.” Tela almost pleased.

  “You know I cant do that Tela.” Carol was almost apologetic in her answer.

  “You know you cant win, we can blast at least two entrances from space, you will suffer casualties.” Tela pointed out.

  “Yes, I am well aware, but we have sensitive data to protect.” Carol nodded.

  “From your own government and people?” Tela let the barest hint of annoyance enter her voice.

  “I think we both know this line of questioning is not going to solve this stand off.” Carol took a deep breath.

  “Make no mistake its not a stand off.” Tela now gritted her teeth. She walked away for a moment, looked at Jackson and lowered her head. She needed to avoid blood shed, she was better than this. “Fine, then let me in alone, I’ll be under your control, I’ll fulfil my inspection and then you can make a call. If I don’t answer back within an hour, Colonel Jackson here will pull the base apart.”

  “Don’t.” Jackson stepped forward.

  “Not you call Colonel.” Tela raised her hand.

  Carol seemed to consider this. It brought them both time, she really didn’t have anything to lose at this point.

  “So be it.” Carol nodded.

  Tela was a head shorter than Carol but Carol always felt that Tela was more intimidating. They played in the same moonball league, low gravity modified football. Tela was a tenacious player with their team, the AOG Rebels, second only to the all ii Patriots.

  Tela took the calculated risk of taking off her helmet, she was fairly well out numbered and figured it wasn’t going to make a difference.

  “Carol.” Tela nodded. Carol slowly took off her own helmet.

  “Tela.” Carol answered.

  Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.

  “You have a gen7 here, artificial AI, make no mistake the only reason I am here is to beg you not to destroy it, we desperately need it to communicate the Resolute on the other side of the worm hole.” Tela felt she had nothing to lose.

  “I am sure that offer has been made already.” Carol shrugged.

  “This is a decision for all mankind, not ii. I know that Kahn will more than likely blow the unit then allow the UNF to take it, it can only incriminate him but nor can we allow the ii to control what happens to mankind on the other side of the wormhole, its simply not your decision.” Tela shot back.

  “There is no harm in waiting till the tripartite and Kahn himself arrives then.” Carol lifted her chin calmly.

  “And I can’t trust the ii not to destroy sensitive information, already we have captured the data logs today that show this base has had communication from the Cube on the wormhole incident only hours after the event. We where already investigating you before this event, I desperately need that AI intact.” Tela glared.

  “I told you, it’s not my call.” Carol shrugged. “You are free to go back out and wait. You know ii keeps technical and the Guardians separate, we have no knowledge or control over what the ii base, we are here to protect its assets, its simply not my call.”

  “God dam you Carol, we know you have another one at the Cube, which is being raided as we speak plus a third on Zeus. This one goes down and those other two are destroyed, likewise Gerald fails to capture the one intact on the Cube and this will be destroyed, they are the standing orders. You can not allow this to happen to the human race.” Tela was once again pleading.

  “You are right, the moment you attack this core, the central gen9 will go into self destruct mode.” Carol shook her head.

  “We have a gen7 on the Resolute right now, we had a mission to expose the ii gen7 on the Cube, we also know that ii had at least one implant into the Resolute, Gagan Khan, Nigel Kahn’s cousin. ii cannot survive this and we can not let the human race be held to ransom over contacting the Resolute by ii. We can secure the AI now and let the UNF take control of the Resolute or lose contact with the Resolute and the human race suffers.” Tela took one last effort. Carol at least seemed to consider this.

  “Look Tela.” Carol stepped closer. “Two hundred meters away is the very item that you wish to inspect, now I really don’t have any idea if what you have just said is true or not, that’s not my job but I do have orders by Nigel Kahn not allow this base to fall to anyone, even the UNF, in case you yourself have been compromised.”

  “My department was created to stop that from happening.” Tela shot back.

  “Nigel doesn’t trust you.” Carol nodded.

  “We truly area fucked up race.” Tela finally managed to smile, even if it was some bitterly. “Fine, then let me inspect the unit and keep me here.”

  “You said that Jackson will attack within the hour, 38 minutes now if you don’t show.” Carol shook her head.

  “Fine, let me go back out, stand them down, come back in here and view the unit.” Tela fired back. Carol paused. It was that or face destruction of the base, providing that they carried out their threat.

  “No.” Carol shook her head. “You don’t understand, the computer is locked down, not even I can access it. That is how we work so no one group can compromise the base. You can wait and take your chances ii will comply from Earth or you can attack the base, kill my people and the ii will detonate the core.”

  “Fine, take me back.” Tela started to put her helmet back on. “When I get back, I will take out one of the far nodes of the core, I suggest you pull your people back, I will make the offer once more then take out another node, after that we will storm this core.”

  “As you must.” Carol calmly nodded. She watched Tela leave and then turned to face the central computer room. She put her own helmet back on and walked towards the door.

  “This is Colonel Papason, open the door.” She ordered. She turned back to her captain. “Pull everyone back from the nodes and wait for me.”

  “Yes ma’am.” Her captain saluted. Carol then headed to the front of the complex with Tela.

  “Where are you going?” He looked back.

  “To risk my career.” Carol headed towards the exit.

  This time Tela was puzzled, here was Carol outside of the core, still in her battle armour, and certainly not taking off her helmet, but outside of the core.

  “You know I can just take you now.” Tela pointed out.

  “Makes no difference.” Carol pointed out.

  “Why.” Tela shook her head.

  “The moment you hit this base, and I do believe you will, we are tracking the destroyer positioning itself now for that hit. They will blow that AI.” Carol pointed out. “You come in, kill all my men and no one will win.”

  “Let us in then.” Tela sighed, this was getting them nowhere.

  “I can’t. But pull out, open up our com’s and vacate this base allowing Ajeet back in command.” Carol suggested.

  “Why on earth would I do that for?” Tela frowned.

  “Ajeet will open up the central computer room where this AI is kept, then I can take control of it.” Carol explained.

  “You can let us do that now.” Tela pointed out.

  “No I can’t, not even I have access to that area. You want that AI intact, then you’ll need to walk away.” Carol countered

  “And why should I trust you?” Tela raised an eyebrow.

  “Either way its stupid to destroy that AI. If its gen7 then you win, if its gen9 then ii wins. Its that simple.” Carol answered. “Something has gone on here that is way above my pay grade and clearly I have to make a call. It’s easy for a career soldier to follow orders blindly and in this case the Guardians are a deterrent. We are meant to die. But what if ii is wrong and we do harm to the human race and my people not only die for nothing but die stopping the human race from having a fighting chance.

  “Again, how can I trust you?” Tela repeated as she nodded. Clearly Carol was having a hard time of this. If she did this then she was showing just how ineffective the Guardians were as deterrent. Right or wrong there wouldn’t be a military organisation in the UNF that would touch here after, they would have all expected her to die following orders. That is what good soldiers do.

  “You’ll be there.” She offered.

  “I’ll be there?” Tela frowned.

  “Strip off your armour girl and put on a Guardian battlesuit, we don’t have all day.” Snapped Carol.

  “I don’t like it.” Jackson pitched in.

  “She’s right though.” Tela conceded as she started to unbuckle her suit. “Fine, lets do it.”

  “I really caution against this.” Jackson stepped forward.

  “Point taken.” Tela nodded, “Its my op.”

  Ajeet was angry, and his head was sore, his people were busy assessing the damage of what was stolen. He’d make the bitch pay.

  “Sir.” It colonel Papason, apparently he had her to thank for out bluffing them into blowing the base. The woman scared him, he was so sure Tela had been bluffing.

  “What is it.” Ajeet paused and snapped.

  “You need to warn Cube of what is going on, only you have the codes?” Carol pointed out.

  “Fine.” He snapped again knowing she was right. He headed towards the central core, Carol shadowing him. He stopped. “Yes?”

  “I am not going to let you out my sight until Kahn gets here.” Carol pointed out in a way that indicated negotiating this point was not an option.

  “Fine.” He mumbled as he walked up the main secure door. “Ajeet here, open it.”

  “Will require a minute sir.” Came the response. The door slowly opened and Ajeet walked in followed by Carol and another six of her people, she was taking this seriously. But he supposed he had her to thank. The secure door closed once more.

  “Secure the place.” Carol waved her hand.

  “Won’t be necessary.” Stuart Hanson, shook his head, he was chief of core security. He had only fifteen men in light body armour. Battlelite 8, popular with tactical response cops. It could take a couple of rounds from small arms fire but was light enough to wear all day with out augmentation. They carried SR9 compact light sub machine guns, fifty five rounds each. They would take Battlelite 8 with enough rounds but would have trouble getting through the Guardian Battlesuit. Not that it really mattered by the time intruders got this far it was unlikely he and his men were going to stop them anyhow.

  “Really Hanson, you’d have blown this if I hadn’t pull it back.” Carol was all over him and in person Hanson cowered back.

  “Fine.” He raised his hands.

  Tela, dressed in the ii battle suit made her way to the mainframe. She had seen this before during a normal investigation, this time she walked the rear and prized open the rear panel with the enhance battle suit. She could see the organics inside and held her breath. She had been right, it was a gen7.

  “Secure.” She set her intercom and closed the panel.

  “Copy.” Carol responded.

  “Sir!” came the response from the panel. “The phoenix team have re-engaged and are trying to retake the complex.

  “Lock down.” Hanson moved towards the command panel. He was flung across the room by Carol and her soldiers moved around to protect the control panel, they started to fire their non lethal weapons into the milling ii workers.

  “Destroy the AI!” Ajeet screamed out as a thunder blow hit his jaw shattering it, delivered by the battlesuit enhanced Tela. She stood in front of the AI and pulled out the battle suits GERF4 lethal weapon. The battle suit took four bursts from the SR9, as she turned and returned lethal fire, killing two of the ii security detail.

  Then it was quiet. She could hear herself breath, the burst from the SR7 on the battlesuit had made a deafening sound and looking down she could see they had easily peeled off the outer layer. More sustained bursts would have eaten through the armour.

  She looked across as Carol.

  “What ever happens to me now, just let me know it was worth it.” Carol nodded.

  “Please sit down.” Amanda waved her hand. “We have just received notice that Tela Montague has taken the ii base on the moon and confirmed the presence of a gen7.” She looked at Nigel who groaned. “Unfortunately it scrambled its data but luckily it is intact, it will only take a week or so to get operational.”

  “Words?” Alfredo offered a hand to Nigel.

  “None.” He sighed. “I don’t regret what I did, only how I handled it, I meant for the best.” He was conceding. He was not sure how they managed that, clearly the security measures they had taken had been compromised. When he did find out what had happen weeks latter he was at first disgusted his Guardians turned, particularly Carol.

  “That is regrettable.” Gandhi looked at Kahn in an attempt to distance himself from both Nigel and Yvonne.

  “Kahn.” Duncan stood up.

  “Yes.” He nodded, “Its over, I understand the gamble and I lost, human kind should not lose, you have full cooperation from me.” He glanced at Gandhi. His career was shot, Gandhi may survive this but he’ll be damaged.

  “Melinda,” Amanda looked across the table. “Could you please take the shuttle up to moon base and relieve Tela.”

  “

  Yes madam secretary.

  ” Melinda smiled, still unsure.