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Long Black Road
Protection

Protection

"Wecome to the Benning Continental, miss. How may I be of service?"

The pleasant dark-skinned man smiled at her as if she was a long lost friend. Gabby was getting seriously cold feet about this whole business. The hotel was much nicer than anywhere she'd ever stayed in her entire life. The lobby was almost deserted save for a few people scattered here and there among the luxurious, leather-clad surroundings. She had felt their eyes on her as she'd walked in. There was definitely the feel that she was trespassing into somebody else's territory.

She put on a brave smile. "Hi, I hope I'm in the right place. I was told to meet somebody here."

The man nodded his head. "Of course. May I know their identity? I could page them."

Now she felt like an idiot. "Well, I'm afraid I don't know the specific name. I was told to get here ASAP."

"Hmmm. A bit of a conundrum, I'm afraid. You see, miss, we are a bit of an exclusive hotel. I can't let you simply stay in the lobby while you wait for your friend."

Gabby drummed her fingertips at the edge of the marble desktop. Dammit, maybe she'd have to give a call to Hackett. That would look so great, not even making it to her destination before having to ask for help.

Next to her, a hand with neatly manicured nails laid an ornate gold coin on the desk. "It's all right, Minos. She's with me." Gabby started and looked at the lean woman next to her. It was as if she had simply appeared out of nowhere. She was about a head taller than Gabby and had dark brown skin. A neat ponytail of silver-white hair fell below her shoulders. It was difficult to guess her age; she could have been a mature-looking young woman or an well-preserved elder. Gabby could see a faint white scar along one of her cheeks. She was wearing a plain gray suit that looked to be made of silk.

The man behind the desk gave a little bow. "Of course, Ms. Bast. Forgive me. Shall I book a room for you?"

"No, we're heading out," replied Bast. She slid the coin over to Minos. "Our destination is Sur'Kesh. Can you arrange for transportation?"

"Of course, ma'am. The usual bookings?"

Bast nodded and turned to Gabby. "You're Gabriella Daniels?" The woman's eyes were as brown as her skin. She smiled at Gabby, but her eyes remained flat and neutral.

The engineer nodded. "Yes. Call me Gabby, though. Only my mom calls me Gabriella."

Bast smiled wider, and now her eyes did get involved. "Of course, Gabby. Shall we have a drink while we wait for our ride?" The woman gestured off towards the bar.

"Sure," said Gabby. "Thanks for coming to my rescue there. I'll pay for the booze."

Bast gave a little laugh as they walked over. "Sorry, but your money's no good here. Literally." She gave a man at the entrance to the bar another of those large gold coins, and Gabby followed her to a table tucked off in one corner. The bar was just as ornate as the lobby had been. Gabby set her bag down and sat across the table from Bast as a waiter appeared at her elbow.

"A Suntory, please. Neat," said Bast.

"Um, a rum and coke," added Gabby. The waiter nodded and vanished. Gabby looked around with even more trepidation at her luxurious surroundings. This was clearly not anything involving Alliance Intelligence. Was Hackett involved in some sort of criminal enterprise? Had she monumentally screwed up by agreeing to his offer?

"You're safe, Gabby," said Bast. "Especially here. No business is conducted on the Continental grounds."

"I'll take your word for it. It's just, I thought this was going to be something different. Something more like an Alliance-"

"Ah, sorry," interrupted Bast. She held up a hand with a gentle smile. "No details, please. It's better if I don't know. My job is just to get you to your destination."

"And where is that? I guess the planet is Sur'Kesh, but where exactly?"

"Don't worry. I have the exact coordinates, and I'll get you there no problem."

Gabby looked down. "Okay. I'm sorry, I'll try not to be too difficult a piece of baggage."

Bast gave another little laugh. "You're not baggage, Gabby. You're my Ward." Somehow Gabby could hear the capital letter in the word.

She looked up at the silver-haired woman. "What's that? It sounds very um, definite and final."

"It means that I have accepted a contract to protect you to the best of my ability. And that ability is significant, I assure you. Anyone who tries to mess with you is in for a world of pain." Bast leaned forward. "And in the highly unlikely event that someone does kill you and I am still drawing breath, then it is my sacred duty to pull out the still-beating heart of the one who killed you." Bast clenched her right fist, and Gabby suddenly saw a stubby triangular blade projecting out between the two middle fingers of that fist. The woman gave her another gentle smile and opened her fist; the punch-dagger vanished.

Gabby sat back. "Got it. Thank you. Although I hope you understand if I don't want you to have to follow through on that last part."

Bast let out a louder, full-throated laugh. "Who would?" Their drinks arrived, and Gabby started to relax. This was weird, but she figured that she would go with the flow unless somebody asked her to do something truly criminal.

"So, how are we getting to our destination?"

"Minos knows how I like to travel. He's already set up our tickets. I'm guessing you're used to the no-frills type of transport."

"Oh, yeah. Hot-bunking and all that." She looked up at Bast. "I'm guessing this will be nicer?"

The silver-haired woman nodded. "You better believe it."

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Plush was the only word which Gabby could use to describe it. The limousine to the spaceport, the shuttle up to their liner, and the trip to Sur'Kesh had all been plush. Bast had pretty much spoken only when spoken to for the most part, which had made the liner trip a little long for Gabby. The woman was perfectly polite and seemed glad to talk, but when anything strayed into either her background or Gabby's she shut the conversation down with finality.

The door to the shuttle slid open, and the moist atmosphere of Sur'Kesh rolled in. Gabby began to sit up, but Bast gave her a gentle push on the shoulder to indicate she should stay seated. "Hang on a bit. Let me check." That had been par for the course. Bast had always insisted on being first in and last out of any unfamiliar territory.

Gabby resisted the urge to roll her eyes as Bast stepped down out of the shuttle. Having somebody as her shadow during this whole trip seemed a bit much. This trip was supposed to be a big secret anyway, so why would anybody be following her or trying to kill her?

The woman in gray flicked her quick eyes over the surroundings, then nodded at Gabby. The engineer grabbed her bag and hauled herself out of the shuttle. The tarmac was littered with other shuttlecraft as well and among them teemed the short slender forms of salarians. The sun beat down on them, and that plus the humidity was already making Gabby sweat.

Gabby hiked her bag up on one shoulder. "Where to now?"

Bast consulted her omni-tool. She wasn't sweating, of course. "We're meeting them close by. There's an access tunnel that we can take."

Gabby walked at Bast's elbow as they moved to the edge of the landing zone. The access tunnel turned out to be more like a utility corridor, with pipes overhead and metal grating underneath. It was even hotter than the tarmac, and Gabby felt a few trickles of perspiration begin edging down under her collar.

A few salarians passed them in the tunnel, and then they went through a little 'dog-leg' section, As they rounded the corner out of that section, Gabby saw a brief glimpse of human forms further down the corridor. A glimpse was all she got, because Bast shoved her back against the wall, out of sight of the newcomers. The woman suddenly had a gun in her hand and cracked off two quick shots before joining Gabby against the wall.

Gabby was about to protest when she hear an answering gunshot and saw the bright spark of a ricochet near Bast's head. Suddenly the taller woman's insistence on safety didn't seem so ridiculous.

"Ten of 'em, got two," said Bast. Her eyes now looked set in stone. "Hang on, don't move." She did another two quick one-handed shots around the corner. It was answered with many more shots as she ducked back. "Seven left. They're moving in on us."

Gabby almost suggested retreat, then looked up. Hmmm...standard color-coding indicated that one pipe in particular might help. She dropped to her knees and crawled around Bast's legs.

"Gabby, stop!" said Bast, just as Gabby took a peek out in the corridor. Sure enough, there were seven humans dressed in plain worker's coveralls. They were moving carefully towards the two women, and Gabby saw three more of them stretched out and leaking red behind them. She glanced up...there it was. She ducked back just as another two shots rang out.

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"No!" yelled one of their attackers. "No shooting that one!"

So it was a kidnapping instead of murder. Still, not a good situation. Gabby pushed herself up along the wall and met Bast's furious gaze.

"You foolish-" began Bast, before Gabby interrupted her, talking very fast.

"Shoot the valve, ceiling above them. On the red-and-black striped pipe. It's a live steam line."

Bast blinked. "You're an evil woman." She grinned and showed all her teeth. "I like it." She made one more shot around the corner and there was a huge clang and hiss followed promptly by hoarse screaming.

"RUN!" yelled Gabby. "You don't want to be anywhere near that!" And sure enough the already-hot corridor became stifling as thick fog began billowing around their corner. As they ran back the way they came, Gabby could still hear one man screaming. The scream died away to a gurgle.

"How far is that going to spread?" asked Bast, her voice calm and composed even though they were running flat out.

Gabby panted her response. "Automatic...detection of pressure drop...steam should shut...off soon." And sure enough, the fog didn't follow them. They stopped two hundred meters down the corridor and looked back.

"We should try to get to them," said Gabby. "The bodies, I mean. We can maybe figure out who did this." Whatever she was involved in, she knew that the more knowledge they had the better.

Bast shook her head. "Not my department. I'm to keep you safe, and that includes preventing you from running back into an active crime scene. Come on, I've got to get in touch with your pickup and set something else up."

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Mackie strolled along the path in the nature preserve. It was nice, if you liked jungle. The broad green leaves around him dripped with condensation in the humid air. He caught brief flashes of birdlike animals flitting among the trees, and every so often larger forms moving through the underbrush. Supposedly they had actual large predators in the preserve. Of course, this was a salarian nature preserve and so the paths were perfectly protected. He occasionally saw one of the flitting animals try to cross the barrier between path and jungle, only to get repulsed by the brief flash of an automated mass effect field snapping into place.

Around the next bend in the path should be his quarry. And sure enough, there was a little alcove next to the path with a worn stone bench. On one side of the bench was a woman with short, mousy-brown hair and a look that screamed 'What Am I Doing Here?'. It was a look that Mackie could sympathize with. The other woman was taller and dressed in a very snazzy looking gray suit. The woman in the suit gave him a dead-eyed appraisal that Mackie had come to know all too well. That was a 'John' type of look. This person was one of them. He made sure to keep his hands in plain sight at all times as he addressed them.

"Hi! I'm Mackie. Do you mind if I sit? Been hiking through here a while."

"And how far have you been hiking?" asked the taller woman.

"A long ways. Since Earth, a little town called Barcelona."

The woman nodded. "I've heard of it."

Macke smiled. "Good to get that code word stuff out of the way." He turned to the mousy-haired woman. "Shall we go?" He offered his elbow.

"We are all going," said the taller woman, and stood up. "She is my Ward until she's on board your ship. And you better be the one we're waiting for. Otherwise you're in for a bad day."

Mackie just nodded. Oddly, he didn't feel scared. Hanging around John made threats of gruesome death and violence just another day on the job. He indicated the path back the way he'd come, and they set off without another word.

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"This is a turian ship!" exclaimed Gabby.

"Yep," replied Mackie. "Our little home sweet home. Welcome on board the Helen of Troy." He touched a control and the lower airlock door hissed open.

Bast gave Mackie a flinty glare. "You go first. I follow. Gabby, you stay here until I give the all clear, okay?"

Gabby nodded. She hoped that this was the last of the spy-running-around nonsense and that she could get to some actual engineering work soon. Mackie went down the ladder without further comment.

Bast looked up at Gabby. "If I say 'all clear' then you run like hell, got it?" she whispered. "If I say 'green light' then it's okay." She snaked her way down the ladder and out of sight. After a little bit, Gabby heard her call out "Green light, Gabby."

Gabby wondered what she really would have done if Bast had said 'all clear'. Running was always an option, but where to? She lowered her bag through the hatch, followed by herself.

The captain (or at least owner) of the boat was a tall man with dark eyes and hair to match. His demeanor reminded Gabby of Bast. He was shaking hands with Bast as Gabby reached the foot of the ladder.

"Thanks again," he said. "Sorry you had a bit of a time getting her here."

Bast shrugged. "It was a little easier than it would have been, thanks to some quick thinking by Gabby. I have to go report in. Mrs. Carmichael is going to have some digging to do to try to find out who our playmates were. Take good care of her, Mr. Hadlock."

"We will."

Bast turned to Gabby. "And you take care, Gabby. It was a pleasure having you as my Ward."

Gabby shook hands with her. "Thank you. No offense, but I hope you never have to do it again."

The silver-haired woman winked at her and climbed back up the ladder.

After getting her gear stowed - and she had a separate cabin! All to herself! - Gabby took a quick tour of the rest of the vessel and met the others. They made it as far as Engineering before it all came to a halt.

"Who the hell configured this drive core?" demanded Gabby. She planted her fists on her hips and glared at 'Hadlock' and Mackie.

Mackie looked at Hadlock, who said nothing. He looked back at Gabby. "Umm, the guys who did the refit. It's been fine so far, Cammy hasn't reported any problems with it."

"Yes, because you've been cruising around sedately and never been putting any pressure on it."

"We did check it out." The young man looked almost hurt by Gabby's dismissal.

"And it would do fine for a few stress tests, but if you really thrashed it long-term it would've fallen apart on you. Thank goodness you never got into combat." She blew out a breath and looked around. "Right, I've gotta get started."

"Wait, we still have the rest of the ship to show you-" began Mackie.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm sure it's really nice. But I have a lotta work to do, and no you can't help. Now shoo, both of you."

Hadlock and Mackie looked at each other.

"Shoo!" repeated Gabby, flapping one hand at them as if scaring away birds. Both men obligingly left. Gabby took another tour around the drive core department, getting it set in her mind how she was going to proceed.

Finally she stopped and placed a hand on a support beam leading to the small pulsing light of the drive core. "Hello, Engine. I'm Gabby Daniels." She patted the beam fondly. "Don't you worry, baby. We'll get you feeling much better very soon."

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"I see. Thank you, Bast. Please hold position until I get back to you." Mrs. Carmichael broke the connection and leaned back in her chair. Her office was tiny, tucked away like an afterthought in the bowels of the Hotel Metropol. She hated large offices. Mrs. Carmichael always felt like she was rattling around in them like a loose pea.

She rubbed her face tiredly. "Jackson, would you come in here a moment?" The office suddenly felt even tinier as Jackson squeezed his bulk in through the door.

"Ma'am?"

"Problem. Ms. Daniels made it to John's team safely, but they were set upon en route. Ten humans on Sur'Kesh, clearly lying in wait for them. It sounds like a kidnapping attempt."

The huge man nodded. "So somebody was tracking Bast and Ms. Daniels. They must have picked them up at the Continental on Benning."

"Why track Daniels, though? She's not a target of interest for anyone. Just another Alliance engineer who resigned. Whoever it was must know that she met with Hackett." She thought further. "Hackett is savvy enough to prevent anybody from listening in on their conversation, but somebody must have known about the meeting itself. Somebody is tracking everything that Hackett is doing."

"That's not surprising," said Jackson. "He's an important figure. They must have wanted to get ahold of Ms. Daniels and find out what the meeting was about."

She leaned forward. "I don't like that the ten attackers were all humans. No other races. And they were trying to pass as workers on the salarian homeworld, which would have made them stand out. So whoever it is prefers using humans."

"Not only that," added Jackson. "But why ten of them? That's a lot of personnel for a simple kidnapping. That implies they knew about Bast's capabilities."

Mrs. Carmichael smiled. People usually tended to think of Jackson as simple muscle, which is why she liked having him around. He was a lot more observant than most gave him credit for. "Well," she said. "Using humans only, and knowing about Organization personnel. That narrows it down quite a bit."

"Cerberus," said Jackson with finality. "They're in open conflict with us, then?"

She nodded. "It seems my message wasn't received. I think I'm going to have to speak a little more loudly. Please have an account opened with Ms. Bast as the beneficiary. An open-ended account. I am going to have quite a bit for her to do."

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Gabby walked into the rear cabin. It was bigger that hers, but also clean and spartan. It looked almost military in its formal neatness. Mr. Hadlock stared out the sloping rear window at the green-and-white expanse of Sur'Kesh below them.

"Reporting, sir," she said. "The Helen's drive core is now available to provide full military power. We're all set to leave."

The man didn't respond for a moment, then shook himself a little and turned away from the window. "Sorry," he said. "When...where I come from a view like that was only available to a few people. I'm still getting used to it." He opened his omni-tool. "All set, Cammy. Let's head out."

"Tell her to thrash it," said Gabby.

Hadlock gave her a look, then shrugged. "And really put the spurs to her," he said to the pilot.

There was a pause, then a surge of blue light from their engines. The planet began to recede with significant speed, and Gabby could hear a distant whoop of joy from the front of the ship.

Hadlock smiled. "It sounds like Cammy approves. Thanks for helping us out, Ms. Daniels."

"Of course, sir. It's my job."

He nodded. "As you may have guessed, this is not an Alliance operation. We're not big on formality here, so please call me John."

"Sure, John. And please call me Gabby. Can I ask, um..." she trailed off, not knowing where to begin.

"You want to know what our motley crew is up to, right?" said John with a smile. "It's simple. We're working for Hackett and tracking down a man with information that could cause very serious problems for humanity. Our best lead is in the Terminus systems, so we needed an engineer along in case of trouble. We asked Hackett, and he provided you."

"I see." Gabby wasn't sure she liked the notion of being 'provided', like she was some kind of commodity. "So what's the story with Bast? Or is that something I'm not supposed to know about? That whole deal was seriously weird."

John shrugged. "Bast and I belong to the same, ah, club. That club got involved in this whole effort, and that's pretty much it."

It sounded like there was a lot of story getting left out, but Gabby figured that was all she was getting for now. "Understood, John. May I leave? I need to get my things squared away."

"Of course. Thanks again, Gabby."

She made her way back to her cabin, only to have a clawed hand rest gently on her shoulder as she opened her door.

"Sister, you can sure as spirits cook," said the turian looming over her. Gabby had dealt with only one turian previously, a stuffy male named Viblius who had been on the Perugia as part of a cultural exchange program. She had kept her distance from the armored alien, although Marcus had seemed to take a shine to him. There had even been an impromptu drinking contest between the two men at one point which had ended in a draw. A very aching and vomit-streaked draw.

Now she was face-to-mandible with a turian, and the ominous-looking red tribal markings on the turian's face was not making Gabby any less uneasy. "Um, thanks?" she replied, hating that there was a little squeak in her voice.

"You are very welcome. Seriously, it's a good thing for Nalack Kin that he's too far out of the way and that we're under a time constraint. Otherwise I'd head back to Earth just to throttle the squat little bareface myself. I wish I had caught it."

"It's not your fault. Like I told John, it was fine for normal use."

"So can I ask what you did?"

She seemed honestly interested, and so Gabby launched into an explanation of power couplings and propulsion system resonances. And she was surprised that the turian's eyes didn't glaze over like most people when she got too technical. Instead she asked a few more questions which Gabby answered, and within a few minutes they were chatting like old friends and she had completely forgotten her uneasiness.