Suspicion

The *Firefly* landed back in the space port of Lake Town, their current home base. The crew were glad to finally be “home”, for they had been through a gruelling last few days. The vessel had also suffered, but luck had been on their side and they had managed to evade the Federation cruiser that had been waiting for them without sustaining too much major damage.

As the crew disembarked off the vessel, Carmichael was waiting for them. It had been Klaas who had sent them off on the job, which he had assured the Captain it would be an easy pickup. The job was a simple one, travel to the Vega Alpha system on the border of Federation space and make contact with one of Klaas’s colleagues. Over the past month, the *Firefly* had done several similar job, but this last one was the first where they had run into trouble.

Captain Jack Stryker was the last to leave the ship and as soon as he saw Klass waiting he walked calmly over and once within striking distance took a swing at Klaas. Jack’s fist connected with Klaas’s jaw, knocking him to the floor. It was only Klaas’s years of training and his reaction to the incoming fist that saved him from receiving the full force of the knock-out punch.

“What was that for ?” Klaas enquired, rising to his feet and assuming a defensive stance.

“Your contact is dead.” Jack replied, the anger in his voice very clear. “But not before a team of Federation heavies arrived to greet us. They were obviously pre-warned of the meeting.”

“And you suspect me ?” Klaas suggested.

Stryker said nothing.

“I’m sorry that things went wrong, but I had nothing to do with it.” Klaas continued. “Did you at least manage to get the package ?”

“I got your package.” Jack replied, pulling an iso-linear chip from the pocket of his jacket. He slapped the chip into the palm of Klass’s hand and walked away, still fuming.

“Don’t take him too seriously.” Beka said from behind Klaas. She’d obviously been watching and waiting for Jack to finish. “So long as we get paid, he’ll be fine.”

“Already done.” Klaas stated. “So what happened ?”

“We arrived at the rendezvous point without any problems.” Beka explained. “Your contact arrived about ten minutes after we did. We didn’t notice at first, but he was very nervous, constantly looking around. Once he’d established that we were his contact, he passed Jack the chip. That’s when the strike team arrived.”

“Strike team ?” Klaas exclaimed.

“Six man team, split into two groups. They came into the building through both exits and headed for our location.” Beka continued. “As soon as the firing started, our contact ran. Unfortunately he ran straight into one of the teams and was shot dead, these guys were not about to take any prisoners.”

“How did you manage to escape ?” Klaas asked.

“Through the floor.” Beka replied. “As the two teams came up the stairs, Harper blew a hole in the floor and we dropped down, smart thinking. We managed to shoot our way past the support team stationed around the perimeter and get back to the *Firefly*. However, there was a Federation cruiser in orbit and as soon as we broke out into open space, they were onto us, even though we were cloaked. We used every one of Harper’s gadgets in an attempt to shake them off, but they just kept coming. They didn’t get close enough to be able to perform a detailed scan, but they sure know that there’s a cloaked vessel working for their enemy. We finally got luck when one of Harper’s little toys got in the way of a phaser blast. It caused a massive burst to delta radiation that blinded their sensors; we jumped to warp and were not followed.”

“This sounds serious.” Klaas admitted. “Maybe there’s something in the data that could shed some light on what happened, I’ll let you know.”

With that Klaas headed away from the ship and back to Serenity City. What he had just heard he didn’t like the sound of. Federation strike teams with a shoot to kill directive could only have been one group, Section 31 black ops.

Klaas arrived back at his shop and immediately summoned Quinn to join him. When Quinn finally arrived, Klaas was already running the data on the chip through the decoder system.

“What’s the panic ?” Quinn asked.

“We could have been compromised.” Klaas replied. “Fredricks is dead. There was a black ops assault team waiting for him and the *Firefly*.”

“Did they get the package back safely ?” Quinn enquired.

“Yes.” Klaas answered. “I’ve just finished the decoding.”

They both took a seat around the small console screen and watched the message.

[Hello guys it’s been a long time since we were all together.] The man on the screen stated. He was one of their former colleagues and a good friend. He was also the leader for the most important cell within the group. [I have some grave news; Samuelson and Baker were both captured last week on Risa. Only Fredricks was able to escape and return to Earth. I have my suspicions that someone from within the cell is either working for S31 or is at least passing information back to them. I can no longer trust any of the cell members, so I’ve decided to call in a favour from an old friend. I need off-world ASAP.]

“So Pollard’s got himself into a little trouble.” Quinn remarked, pausing the message. “Do you really think we can get him out ?”

“I don’t know, but he’s called in a favour and I’m honour-bound to help him.” Klaas replied. “He did after all save my life. Let’s see what else he has to say”

[I’ve decided to go into hiding and set a trap for our S31 friends. I’ve entrusted each cell member with a copy of this message, with strict instructions not to inform the others of their mission. Each message has the location of a safe-house encoded into it. They are to contact you and arrange a rendezvous to pass this message on; hopefully one of them will get off Earth and to you.] Pollard continued. [If any of the safe-houses are compromised, then we’ll know who the traitor within our midst is.]

“Sound’s like a good plan……” Quinn remarked.”….but with one drawback. Which safe-house does he use ?”

“None of them.” Klaas replied. “There’s only one safe-house on Earth where Pollard could go and know he’d be safe, all the others were set-up by either SI or S31 long ago. He’ll monitor each of them and see what happens, but he’ll be safe.”

“So why haven’t we heard from any of the other couriers ?” Quinn queried. “Surely we’d have heard from at least one.”

“Most likely because they’re either dead or captured.” Klass answered sadness in his face. “Whoever the traitor was, they’d have informed their handler of the message immediately and each of the couriers would be detained and the messages analysed. The traitor would be the only one who got out and made contact, which in this case was Fredricks. Pollard would have realised that or he’d have never revealed that there were co-ordinates hidden in the message. ”

“So what next ?” Quinn asked.

“We go to Earth and get Pollard out.” Klaas replied.

“How ?” Quinn continued. “Sector 001 is under a level one security alert, the *Firefly* would never get anywhere near it, even cloaked. A commercial flight would be out of the question because both our DNA profiles are on file and we’d be identified as soon as we went through the security scans.”

“Pollard isn’t the only own who’s owed a favour.” Klaas remarked. “Go back to Lake Town and find Captain Stryker, tell him to be ready to leave first thing tomorrow, whatever he asks for in payment give it to him.”

“Why send me ?” Quinn asked. “You’re usually the one who does all the dealing; I just do all the dirty work.”

“I’m not the Captain’s favourite person at the moment.” Klass replied, rubbing his still sore jaw. “It might be best if you go see him this time.”