From: Nai Lara (nai_lara_at_internode.on.net)
Date: Mon Sep 15 2008 - 01:01:53 PDT
"Zero Hour" (cont from Erik's 'Martial Law') Location: IRATHI SD: 2.80915.1352 Slipping into the Irathian Resistance was easier then Catherine could have believed possible. It had just required an approach of a known resistance member and very quickly she had been conscripted. In a matter of hours Catherine had been introduced to the rest of the cell. It was tiny. Neven who was Catherine's initial contact, along with Rayle, Cassin and Toren who was the leader of the small cell. Who Toren reported to however was the mystery. But that's that Catherine was here to solve. "Toren?" Neven knocked on a door of a non-descript house in the outer suburbs and pushed open the door. He and Catherine had just come back from pulling a heist at a local university. The packs on their backs bulging with goodies for the mission. "You brought it?" "Easy enough to swipe in the current environment." Neven dumped the bag onto the table so Toren could go through the contents. "You are a wonder." Catherine shrugged off her bag and set it beside the other. "So what are you planning to do with all of this stuff?" She leaned against the wall, her arms across her chest, playing the bad girl routine to the max. "We've planted explosive devices at several nodes in the geo-gas refinery network." Geo-gas was a combination fuel source. Geothermal heat combined with a natural gas. It was an efficient form of fuel but one that had its drawbacks. Like any power source, it had a tendency to explode in some situations. "You're going to blow another building?" Catherine smiled. Toren nodded as he closed the bag up again. They would have to move quickly now. "The government and the Federation think we're too small and unorganised to be a concern. This will prove them wrong." He shrugged. "Anyway, it will give my people a chance to stake their claim. Blowing it up is a last resort. We just want to secure our claim as a legitimate government." Catherine fixed a smile on her face while her mind raced. She needed to learn two things. Firstly, the location of the bomb so she could direct Kenta to organise an evacuation. Secondly, the time line to zero hour. "Let's do this then." =/\= I made the cardinal mistake; the one that I keep drumming into the marines in training sessions. Never underestimate your enemy and never overestimate yourself. I screwed up and I paid the price. =/\= She learnt the location of the bomb -- after all, she had helped in constructing it and planting it under a massive pipeline. Of course Catherine had rigged it so it couldn't detonate but for all intents and purposes it looked like a functioning weapon. All she had to do now was communicate with the Patriot and find out the time to detonation. But something Toren had said alerted her to something that was a whole lot more sinister. He had let slip that there were another six cells operating in the city. Catherine linked that knowledge to the location of their bomb -- attached to a main gas line and she realised that they weren't just going to blow up another building....they were going to blow up the city. First thing was first...she needed proof. It was the dead of night when most people were asleep in their beds that Catherine broke into Toren's office and the computer. Her face was bathed in the pale blue glow from the screen as she navigated through the system. There wasn't much that wasn't encrypted, and the woman didn't have the time or the means to decipher the information. All she could do was data dump all the information onto a storage chip. There was only one thing that she could see without running any advance decryption protocols. It was a schematic map of the capital with six little red dots. All at major geo-gas junctions. And one of which Catherine had already visited. Even she was disturbed by the diagram. If the bombs were triggered to explode then the entire city would be destroyed. While there was no countdown she could determine the explosion would be soon, maybe in a day or two. Any longer would risk someone stumbling on the bomb and alerting authorities. There was no time to evacuate the city. The Patriot would have to disarm the bombs or prevent their activation somehow. Catherine slipped the storage crystal into a small pouch sewn to the inside to her belt. Now to contact the Patriot and get the information to them. She turned as she heard the door open. Toren stood in the doorway, backlight by the corridor light. "What are you doing?" He demanded; his hand on the butt of his weapon. Caught red handed Catherine turned around and rose onto her feet. "You're going to blow up the city?" "What does it matter to you?" "I understand a building. Makes an impact but damage is contained to one point. But a whole city?" Maybe she could salvage this, let Toren think that she had cold feet or something. At the moment, anything would be better then being found out as a spy. "You're crazy." "Destroy the city, we will forever remove the past and the world will be forced to start afresh with a new government to lead us into the future!" Toren stated. "You are going to kill tens of thousands of your own people!" "It's our last resort." Catherine snorted as he gave her the party line. "You know it's going to happen!" She snapped back. "You going to pull out your cell or do you expect us to die here as well?" "We will pull out in due time." "When?" =/\= There comes a time when you realise that the ebb and flow of the universe is bigger then you. Your actions are really meaningless in the grand scheme of things. The battles we fought believing they were so important as to sacrifice everything to win eventually fade from history's pages. The rise and fall of civilisations are forgotten. The universe just keeps on being. Uncaring, unknowing and meaningless. I realise that now. There is no grand scheme to life. But still, I guess human nature is just that. Always trying to make a difference when in the end it really never matters. We cling to the hope that we can affect change; that the universe can be a better place. It's the illusion we give ourselves to help us. Just because the universe didn't really care, doesn't mean we don't have to. =/\= "When Toren?!" Catherine roared. "Why do you care?" He sneered as he counted her rage with his. "What's the difference between a building and a city?" "A lot more lives." Their argument was interrupted by a communication. [[Neven to Toren.]] "What?" [[We're at the primary site. The Federation is conducting an evac.]] Toren's eyes went glacial. "Understood." His intense gaze bored into her trying to read Catherine. "How convenient." His voice was soft, and dangerous. The jig was up. "I couldn't let you kill civilians." "So you're one of them?" "Yes." Catherine nodded once. "I knew it...I knew it was too good to be true." "I was thinking the same thing." =/\= Remember how I said I broke my cardinal rule? I underestimated Toren. I didn't think he would shoot me. And I overestimated myself. I thought I could move quickly enough. Turns out I was wrong on both counts. =/\= Toren didn't miss a beat. He didn't hesitate, he didn't even telegraph his next move. The phaser beam hit her full in the chest, catapulting her off her feet into the wall behind her. She hit the wall hard, before falling to the ground with a large thud. Sterling groaned and panted for breath. She couldn't move; the pain rolled over her in waves of fire. All she wanted to do was breathe but even that was impossible. Dimly she could hear Toren rounding the desk. The dirt crunching under his feet as he moved. She didn't have the strength to cry out when his foot shoved her shoulder pushing her onto her back. Her hands pressed against her chest. "Bye bye." Toren aimed the phaser at her head and the world went white. =/\= See...told you I screwed up. =/\= The transporter beam snatched her up with microseconds to spare. Everything after that became a big hazy. She caught glimpses of sickbay as she flicked in and out of consciousness. Minutes or hours could have passed, she didn't know. She didn't care. All she knew was that the pain stopped. She sensed someone standing over her and forced her eyes to open. Daniel. Catherine whimpered as she moved. Geeze it felt like she had been pole axed. He tried to tell her to stop moving but she couldn't until she had given him the storage crystal. "Information. Give it to Kenta." Her voice croaked as she gave him the chip. "Catherine." He was crying. It just confirmed what she suspected. She was dying. "You're not going to leave me," he used his free hand to wipe his tears. "I can't lose you," he whispered brokenly. "You never will," Catherine reached up and stroked his cheek fondly, removing a tear as she looked up at him, looking at his face as if she was seeing it for the first time. She then gently wrapped her fingers around his free hand, pulling it close to her. Daniel could feel her breathing slowly become more ragged and her heart beat slowly become fainter and with a sudden depressing finality he knew for certain that she didn't have very long to live. Modern medicine could heal a dissecting aorta, but not hers, not without using one from one of her kin and they had none. "I've lived longer than most Order soldiers," she said, smiling. "And my life has been a good one, because of you." "I never said it very often, because I didn't know how to put it into words," it was a struggle to breathe. "Being married to you, these last couple of years have been the happiest of my life." She coughed a couple of times, her voice becoming weaker, but she continued, determined to say what she wanted to. "Nothing in this universe could express how much I have loved you and how grateful I am that you came into my life. Because of you I learned what life is really about; I've learned how to live, and I've learned how to love." "My only regret..." her words were interrupted by another fit of coughing. "My only regret...is that I won't get to live a longer life with you...my Asha'Rali." Daniel was at a loss for words, only able to murmur his love for her as tears fell from his face in large numbers. "There is something you can do for me," Catherine said. "Anything," Daniel answered. "Live a long and happy life...for me. I want you to promise me you will do that." "I promise," Daniel said sadly, looking down at her. He leaned down to her, gently pressing his lips against hers. Before they parted, the last vestiges of life left Catherine. Her hand that was holding his relaxed and he felt her lips slacken. He pulled back, looking down at her and knowing with absolute finality that his wife was dead. "Oh God," he said softly, pulling her limp form to him and burying his head in her shoulder, the tears flowing freely as he cried harder than he had in his life, mourning the loss of his true love. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ NRPG: Well...it was a blast. Ten years is a lot time to be involved in anything but I'm afraid it is time for me to exit stage right. Just wanted to say thanks to one and all for being a pleasure to write with. I'll still be around, on MSN and email so feel free to drop me a line. Good luck Nai From HyperNews_at_youth.net
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Wed Nov 19 2008 - 03:11:41 PST