To The Point

Posted on Fri Jan 17th, 2020 @ 6:42pm by Passenger Kol Wescott-Fitzgerald & Commanding Officer Mickey Serendipity

Mission: A Shadow On Velvet
Location: SS Albatross, Trans Mars Injection Orbit
Timeline: After Problem Solving

"Hey." Mickey connected with the deck hatch and his mag boot's clunked to life, securing him to the correct plain. He gestured to the UNIB agent. "We'll be going under thrust in a bit, so anything you've got floating about is either gonna hit the floor or you if it's not stowed," he said by way of beginners conversation starts. "We never got much of a chance to talk, back on Eros, figured now would be a good time for us to do that without the rest of the crew crowding in."

He held out his hand.

"Mickey Serendipity and this is my ship," he said and held out a hand bearing three brass rings.

Kol grabbed his terminal and placed the device into his pocket. With that tended too Kol had stowed the entirety of his possessions. He had stuff back on Earth but he'd lost everything on Eros. It reinforced his passenger status and had left the agent feeling a familiar uncertainty with regards to what his future could hold.

"Special Agent Kol Wescott-Fitzgerald, UNIB" Kol introduced accepting Mickey's outstretched hand. "Sorry for being a bit of a ghost, thought it best to stay out of the crew's way whilst you worked" he explained.

"For a special agent that's a very smart move on your behalf," Mickey said, giving the hand a gentle squeeze. He gestured to the compartment they were in, "Not exactly the High Hilton on the New Bangkok Orbiter, but it's got a crash couch and a personal head. It's as good as it gets out here. Speaking of which..."

Mickey took his hand back.

"Might want to keep that Special Agent badge of yours in your pocket. Due to Eros Station's dock masters being stingy bastards, we only have enough water and reaction mass to get us to Mars. And given the UNN and MCRN are still rattling their sabres, I can't see them as giving you a particularly warm welcome. That's and we'll be saying we left port on Hygiea. Biggest medical complex in the belt, explains where we got the Doc from," Mickey looked at Kol through narrowed eyes. "You understand why telling folks we're fresh out Eros Station is a bad idea?"

Kol nodded, what happened on Eros was no accident and there was no way to tell who had their fingers in it. They couldn't trust anyone until they could. "I won't say a word," he promised, "I'll likely limit my time off the ship. I'm familiar enough with their surveillance network to know they'll make me if I create even the whisper of a stir" he explained. If they made him, they'd take him in and he wasn't so sure how he'd stack up against their focus drugs.

"Just, you know, act casual. You peg their radar before we're off the docks and down the stalk, you'll get my entire crew pinched. They are my responsibility, more so now," Mickey said and then pinched his nose with a shake of his head. "Hey, look. Rough times okay? Way I see it we all lost people, and given all of our accounts just got frozen due to this ProtoGen thing. I just want us to dock and get on with things. You can get passage back to wherever it is you want to go. Me and mine, we're going hunting."

Kol went to speak then took a pause. He wasn't sure he even had anywhere to go. He could return to Earth, but he imagined that once he got there and once he'd been briefed, he'd have been sent back out to the Belt. After everything that had happened he wasn't sure he was ready to be sat behind a desk again anytime soon.

"I wouldn't mind joining you for hunt" he said finally, it seemed the best choice. "If that's okay with you. I'd like to be a part of getting some justice and I doubt the UNIB would let me join in once I'd returned and been briefed" They'd bench him because of his first hand experience.

"That's not just going off the reservation, that's going rogue. Not sure your handlers in the UNIB would like that too much," Mickey mused for a moment. "Then again they're going to assume you're on Eros being turned into a neon blue puree. So you have the advantage of running silent until we have to make some noise."

Mickey thought about it for a second. Right now his toolbox was pretty handy: he had a tool that could take him places, a tool that could hack apart anything with a superconductive processor, a tool with military experience. A tool that was also an investigator would be useful, help turn on some lights and flick the buttons needed to progress to the next clue when they found the first.

But first, they had to get through the room filled with Martian Marine Corp sniffer drones and gun sites/ Go through a room like that too fast, with ill caution, and you'd end up getting eaten by it.

"Let's go talk to Wulf, see about faking you up some paper's that won't get you sent to a Earther internment camp out on Utopia Planitia," Mickey said with a nod.

Kol let out a sigh of relief, Mickey's opening line in response had him worried his offer might be declined. He was pleased Mickey decided to accept his offer, "Sounds like a plan, as far as I see it the UN showed me what value I had to them when I was shipped off to Eros for trying to do my job. After realising how unprepared we were for the situation on Eros it's clear the UN's interest in the UN doesn't go beyond their economic benefit, I don't trust them to check the avenues we will" he said honestly.

"Reckon we could get rid of this before docking too? Hiding it is too risky, they might not find it and we'll be fine" he said, pulling his UNIB ID out, "but they might find it and stop all of us from achieving anything". As he waited for Mickey to reply he refused to look at the leather wallet containing his badge and UN ID pass. He'd worked hard to own it and had thought he'd have it till the end of his days. It was necessary but he couldn't help but feel like he was destroying a part of his legacy.

Mickey reached out and took the billfold, opening it to reveal the holofoil badge and id within. For a few seconds, he tapped it against his fingers and then closed it.

"Well, let's see about changing that then eh?"

Kol nodded, his eyes never leaving hid badge. He had no idea what would come next but he was resolute in being a part of the justice. If that meant leaving behind all he knew it was a price he'd pay 10x's over. Perhaps it would all be worth it in the end.