I held my breath as we jumped to the Sol System. The meeting with Bruiser had gone exceedingly well. He agreed to get us in and out of the UAC facility at Tosh Station on Deimos where Christian was studying in exchange for a favor at a later time. He was quite distracted with Kasey; the woman had been in a sorry state, beaten and bruised; she hung upside down by a chain wrapped around both ankles, naked and with her arms chained to her side. She swung side to side in small circles with the tips of her hair just brushing the floor. I was very much against the way she was being treated, but it was also not my business or place to say anything. Later, I realized Bruiser had brought me in there to do business so I would see what was happening to her. He had wanted to subtly remind me not to cross him.

My home sun burst into life on the screen and we rotated, heading for Mars. The red planet is a third the size of Earth and doesn't have any space stations but still boasts a population of over one and a half billion people between its five major cities and three hundred and some underground boroughs. Phobos and Diemos, the two moons, each held Starforce military bases and military research facilities owned by the United Astronautical Conglomerate, a private civilian run company.

I breathed a sigh of relief as we broke through Mars’ thin atmosphere, we’d been unchallenged on our trip in. Taimia brought us down over Olympia Planitia, very near the north pole. From this latitude Phobos and Diemos wouldn’t have a direct view down on the ship and the nearest inhabited city or borough was far enough away that ground travel to the ship wouldn’t be feasible. “Taimia, can you connect to their network and monitor communications without being noticed?”

“I can try. But the planetary network probably won’t connect to the military communications network directly.” she said, as she gently set the ship down on the planet's surface.

"Do what you can. I mostly just want you to be aware if you are spotted and they send someone to investigate." I said as I stood.

"I feel obligated to point out that Deimos has a roughly thirty hour orbit. They will be on this side of the planet within the next eight hours; though they will not have line of sight of me in this valley due to the latitude. That also means we will not have communications until then." Taimia said, with more concern in her voice than I would have thought possible.

It still shocked me just how human she could be. "Don't worry." I said, "we can take care of ourselves. I've grown a lot since we've met and Madison’s a badass in her own right." And when I gave the raven-haired girl a wink she blushed slightly at the complement. I held my hand out to her and she took it, then we made our way down the lift and into the cargo hanger.

The Iroquois sat waiting for us. Taimia had moved it out of storage and placed it into launch position. It was silver/gray in color, with a long rectangular body and two pairs of short stubby wings.The open ramp on the port side sat between the wings. I climbed aboard with Madison right behind me. Inside, on my right was an empty area with rings on the floor for straps and on my left were several rows of seats with a sectioned off area at the front for the pilot and co-pilot. The two positions were mirrored and it didn't seem to matter which seat was controlling the craft so I took the seat on the right and Madison sat beside me.

"Can you fly this?" Madison asked, when she noticed that I was looking over all the controls and not touching any of it.

"I think so." I said. But that didn't seem to reassure her in the slightest. Then it happened with a rush, just like the Fajani shuttle, awareness and understanding flooded my body and mind. My hands moved from what seemed like muscle memory as I reached up to the panel above my head to flick multiple switches and the shuttle came to life as the systems powered up. I flicked a switch on the center console between Madison and myself to transfer helm control to me and another to close the hatch. Then I opened communications to Taimia. "Iroquois to Tempest, we're ready to head out."

"Good luck." Taimia replied, and the cargo hanger door opened.

I closed the channel and wrapped my hands around the dual sticks and placed my feet gently on the pedals. I gently pressed down on the left pedal and we lifted off the deck slowly. Then I pressed slowly on the right pedal and held the left in place. The shuttle moved forward slowly and soon we were free of the Tempest. I pressed down harder with both pedals and pulled back on the dual stick, engines flared and we rocketed out of the valley towards space.

Madison was clutching the armrests of her seat but I let out a loud woop as we were pressed back into the seat by the g-forces. The Tempest was an amazing ship but the inertial dampeners take the joy out of simple stuff like this sometimes. Once we cleared the atmosphere I eased back on the throttle.

"Fuck me. You're just as bad as Steiner was." And I couldn't help but laugh at Madison’s discomfort.

"Not a fan of dogfighting?" I asked

"Just don't do any spins or there will be a lot more color in here."

I laughed again and looked out the window. We were on an arc over the pole and in the middle of the icy landscape below I could make out a moister refinery. That was one of many such facilities that were slowly terraforming mars. Converting what liquid water the planet had into various gasses, some released into the atmosphere, others used by the people that lived on the planet. It was already a multi-generation effort, they had been at it for over a hundred years and there were still several hundred more to go before it would be possible to walk on the surface without protection.

A beep on the console caused me to look up and there before, I could see Deimos rise above the red planet. It was a gray color and the sight of it shriveled my stomach, though I didn't know why. It was named after the god of terror and dread but I highly doubted just that association would put butterflies in my stomachlike this.

It took us nearly thirty minutes to reach the moon and I immediately contacted Tosh Station. The moment I opened coms, a nasally feminine voice practically assaulted me. "Who is this?"

"This is the Iroquois, I am scheduled to meet with Dr. Raymond Karala."

"Hold". She said before I had even finished saying the man's name. Madison and I waited in silence for what felt like forever before the woman came back. "Fine, you're cleared to land on pad eight inside dock two. You have three hours to do your business and leave. Stay with your escort at all times, if you lose your escort or stay beyond three hours you will be arrested, do you understand?"

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I blinked at the rapid yet flat way she said everything, trying to comprehend it all. "Do, you, understand?" She asked again with each word spaced out and frustration evident in her voice.

"We understand, yes." I said back. And the call ended abruptly. "Nice woman." I muttered and I saw Madison nod out of the corner of my eye. Realizing that our clock was already ticking I got us moving and in a short time we were entering the smaller of two docking tunnels. It opened out into a large dome with 16 landing pads, I found ours quickly and landed. Madison got up and headed for the door as I shut down the shuttle.

As I walked down the ramp a short man with flat dull hair and an odd limp shuffled quickly towards us. He was wearing a lab coat and when he got close, he motioned for us to go back up the ramp and get back on the shuttle. Once we were all on board he hit the button to close the ramp and watched it begin to lift. When I opened my mouth to speak he held up a finger for me to wait. Finally after the door fully shut he turned to me. "This pays off my debt to Bruiser right?" He looked between Madison and I, then kept speaking, "I mean while I am grateful that he helped me save my wife and daughter's lives, I can't do this again. The UAC will be suspicious."

"Look Dr. Karala, I don't know anything about your business with Bruiser. We are here because I need to speak with a friend that works here."

"Why didn't you just ask them to sponsor you?" He asked, confused.

"I am wanted and I didn't want his name to be associated with me."

"Oh great, so instead I will be the one associated with a wanted man. Curse that Bruiser and his favors." He clutched his head with both hands and the sight was almost comical. "As bad as Bruiser is, the UAC is ten times more terrifying. We must not let them find out who you are or why you are here. Now, who is this friend?"

"His name is Spaceman Christian Munchunken, he's military, very new."

The man grumbled to himself for a moment and then looked back up to me. "About this tall, blond and really skinny?" He asked, holding one hand slightly above his own head.

"That's him."

"Okay." He scratched at his chin for a moment, then looked down at his watch. "It's about lunch time, we'll go to the cantina the military kids like to go to. Hopefully he spots you and comes to us. It would be odd to observers if we were to approach them."

"Observers?" Madison asked.

"Yes honey, observers. While the UAC is civilian owned, this is still a military facility. In fact, this facility handles a lot of the darkest secrets that the Starforce has. Naturally, they are very paranoid about everything, including what happens within these walls." He pointed to me. "Most cameras are high up, so keep your face angled down and don't look directly into any video screens. All we need is for them to snap facial recognition of you." He huffed a sigh and said "Look, I'll do my best, but if they come for you expect me to vanish. I cannot and will not be arrested for helping you."

I didn't point out the fact he already had by getting us onto the base, but I figured I would just watch him for now. I hit the button to open the door and the three of us walked down the ramp and through a large shielded door that stood open. The halls were hospital white and spotless with white tile floors and spackled ceilings. The UAC logo was everywhere. It was spaced out every twenty feet on the walls, it was on the side of every light sconce or piece of equipment we passed. It was even on the hard helmets and overalls of two technicians we passed who were working on a light. The only sounds we could hear were our footsteps, the droning of the old life support system for the facility and the two engineers.

The whole thing felt eerie and disconcerting. Which made it worse because I couldn't figure out why. There was nothing about our surroundings that looked menacing. I looked to my side and Madison was rubbing goosebumps from her shoulders as if she was cold but the temperature was fine. She was feeling it too. After a time we passed through an automated door and sat in what looked like a tram. The moment we were seated it shot down a tunnel on rails and stopped less than ten minutes after. The entire ride I felt like someone was breathing down the back of my neck but when I turned and looked, Madison and Dr. Karala were the only ones onboard with me. It didn't feel like I was being watched, more like I was being stalked, by a predator. At that thought goosebumps rippled up my own arms.

As we exited the tram I exchanged a glance with Madison and I could see in her eyes that she had been having the same thought. We needed to make this fast. We followed the doctor down a few halls then down a ramp into a cafeteria. Several groups of military were sitting around the room chatting. I spotted Christian in one and he looked up. We locked eyes and his grew impossibly large, then he got up and came over. I stepped back into the hall and he followed me out of the cafeteria. "Jon, how ya been? What are you doing here man?" He asked with an embrace.

I patted him on the back and took a step away. "You look good, I need your help." I looked at Madison, "and we're in a bit of a rush."

"Want me to get Michael? He's right in there." Christian said motioning with a thumb over his shoulder.

"No, you're the one I'm here for. I need you to translate something for me. I didn't dare send it over a comline." I turned to Madison and she pulled the diary from her pocket and handed it to me. I quickly turned to the last page and showed him the Trinity script. He took the book and I heard a startled inhale. Dr. Karala was staring at the book with horrified dread, plain across his face.

Christian didn't notice, absorbed into the book as he was. "Wow, what a find. What is this?" He asked

"It was my mother's diary." Madison said.

"Your mother?" He asked surprised, "she was a Seraphim?" Dr. Karala gasped and Madison nodded.

"Then yeah you're in a rush. You should never have come here. This place develops the tech and soldiers used to hunt down any remnants of James Malaki and his tech. You guys are in a lot of danger here. You could be arrested just for having this and if your mother passed down her abilities to you, well, I just pray she didn't. You guys got to get out of here."

"Wow." I said as Madison and I exchanged looks. "We will, but I need you to translate what that says first. This is the whole reason we're here."

He looked back down at the book in his hands and studied it for a minute and began to speak slowly. "Angel, if you need help, go to Gliese six four nine. They will direct you. Your father and I love you with all our hearts. I don't regret anything." He looked up, "that's all it says. It's written weirdly. Usually a lot of the superfluous words are cut out, but not here. It actually made it harder to read."

"Gliese six four nine? You're sure that's what it said?" After he nodded, I said thanks and turned to Madison whose eyes were a bit red and puffy but she was quiet and holding it together. "Christian you should forget we were here. You never saw us."

He nodded. "Look Jon, whatever is going on; Michael and I are here if you need us. Tell you what. If you ever need us, send me a message of somebody saying something mundane. Don't try to put any code into it, but make it exactly one minute and eighteen seconds long. If I get a message that long, I'll take Michael and we will go see Basher on Luna. It'll be a lot easier to get in to see him."

"Thanks man". I turned to Dr. Karala to have him take us out of there, but he was gone. I looked around but he was nowhere to be seen. "Oh shit. Christian, get out of here." I grabbed Madison by the hand and took off into a sprint.