Milo and Kayla walked into the automatic door into the small cabin. Ronald Bohr was inside, unshaven and looking tired. He put his glasses on and took a look at them, and gave a surprised look.

"Clay said he needed me to meet with two agents. He could've told me it was the two of you" Bohr said.

"We made Senator Tinker promise not to tell you it was us" Kayla said. Bohr looked to both of them, still surprised to see the two of them in his presence.

"The two of you shouldn't have come here. They probably know you're here."

"We got some help from Zorthia and Tinker for our transportation" Milo said.

"You got help from Zorthia?" Bohr's eyes widened, seeming surprised. "What's going on?"

"She apparently controls the Hominid Defense Directorate" Milo answered. "They have already apparently allied themselves with the Singed Leaf Clan and the Network against Goddess. Avistra has apparently activated the conduit to her."

"I see" Bohr said staring straight ahead, now in deep thought. "Now things are starting to make a little more sense."

"Roman told us about Greenpeace and their connection to the Hominids for Sustainability. Why didn't you tell us what our mission was really about?" Kayla said with a definite hint of annoyance in her voice.

"To protect the two of you" Bohr said with no hint of guilt or hesitation. "I needed to ensure you had complete plausible deniability that you were searching for Snedecor and not get carried away doing something that might've been very dangerous."

"But you didn't at least explain it to us after the mission?" Kayla asked. Bohr let off a small sigh. "What's with all of the secrecy about this mission?"

"I didn't want to take any chance of Alamore or any of his loyalists in the CIA to know what it was we were really doing. There is a reason that they are after the two of you, and it's not vengeance for embarrassing Henry Alamore."

"Why then?" Milo asked.

"I'm getting to that. When I sent you to monitor the sustainability conference, I wanted to try and uncover financial ties between Greenpeace and Avistra's fiefdom. But in your quest to find Matt Snedecor you uncovered something in the wreckage of Icarus Beed's last stand that was more valuable than anything you could have gotten at the conference."

"What's that?" Kayla asked.

"Documents. Records of highly suspicious financial ties on the computers of Beed's command ship exactly as I suspected. The Greenpeace organization has apparently been getting gifts of bullion form sketchy mining guilds in outworld to fund the entire political machine centered In the Greenpeace organization."

"So go public with this and bust Them!" Milo remarked.

"We don't really have enough to bring down the entire apparatus" Bohr said.

"Entire Apparatus?" Kayla echoed. "What are you talking about? Are you talking shadow government here?"

"It might very well be true."

"Ronald, are you serious?" Kayla said, referring to him by first name for the first time Milo could recall.

"I'm quite serious. You told me what Commodore Beed's apparition said…he wasn't surprised Henry Alamore had turned into a political dynasty, and it was no secret he was a supporter of surrendering to the elves. And many suspect there were motives for selling out Beed and his men other than political help." Milo could not believe what he was hearing. As long as he had known Bohr he had seemed to be a level-headed, phlegmatic guy, but suddenly he seemed completely on edge and paranoid.

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"Listen" Bohr said interrupting breaking up their attempts to process what they were hearing "the longer the two of you stay here, the more risky it is. I've got a favor to ask you."

"What is it?" Milo asked. Bohr hesitated for a brief moment, as if it were something not easy to say.

"I want you to place a worm into the Singed Leaf's clan's fleet network, just to keep an eye on them." Milo's jaw dropped a little bit.

"You think think they're working with Avistra?" Milo remonstrated. "But they're opponents of Gaia and have been helping Zorthia and the Network!"

"Being an adversary of Gaia doesn't make them our friends, Agent Greene" Bohr said suddenly addressing Milo in the formal. "And their preference for non-violence does not mean that they aren't going to undermine the interests of the Union. Peaceful clan or not, they are still Nal'Larak and Prudasaur himself still unequivocally states he opposes human civilization beyond our home sector.

"Have you actually met any of the Singed Leaf Lizards, Bohr?" Milo asked.

"I'm sure they're likeable and that they like you as well, but very few who have contempt for another race can fail to find a single member of that race that they don't like."

"Have you got any proof of this?" Milo asked?

"Icarus Beed's own diary said that they intercepted several Singed Leaf frigates containing tons of bullion. I'm not asking you to kill them or cause them any harm, I just simply want a trap door to keep an eye on them." Milo shook his head.

"This just seems so far-fetched" Milo said.

"I cannot stress to you how important this is. We might very well have had our government commandeered at the highest level! We have to follow any leads that we can. As I said before, the agency doesn't give loyalty to any president or foreign power, only to the Union."

"I'll do it" Kayla interjected sounding convinced.

"What?!" Milo said surprised. "You're going to go along with this?!"

"It's done, then" Bohr said handing a small computer cartridge to Kayla. "And if the two of you would pardon my brusqueness, both of you should see yourself out, and be as discrete as possible." Kayla got up to leave. Milo just let off a sigh and followed her out the door. Neither said much on the short trip away from the space station and back to the surface of Earth.

It wasn't long before they got back to Milo's apartment. Milo sat down on his couch, his computer in hand, looking for an article he was intent on reading. Milo expected to gather her things up to go back to her place, but she sat down next to him.

"Milo" she said as she sat down. "I don't want to seem nosey, but my curiosity is overwhelming me. Ever since I got back from helping Clyde and Lexi get settled in, you've been…different somehow. I was told that you went somewhere with Zorthia's pilot. Where did you go?"

"Kayla, I'm sorry if I seem really quarrelsome-"

"No, don't be sorry" she said moving her hand a little higher up Milo's arm. "I like it that you're sticking up to me and making me rethink my sometimes…impulsive decisions. My kind of man…" Milo could once again see that look in her eye…the same one she had when he got back from his visit with Lina Hest.

"I don't know, I don't really feel different" Milo said not able to come up with a convincing fib. He wasn't about to tell her that he got tricked into opening the conduit to Gaia and what he got in return. Kayla removed the computer from his hands and put it on the floor. She pushed Milo on his back, sat on his hips, and locked their lips together. After a moment of exchanging some mouth germs came mutual removal of clothing followed by a full workout. All at once Milo forgot about his anxieties. His bargain with Lina Hest appeared to have been vindicated.

When they were done, she got off him and lied down top of him with her head and beautiful but sweaty red hair on his chest.

"You think Nadarska is working his tricks again here" she asked.

"He told me that trick was something he had to concentrate on and couldn't make permanent. Do you feel the same sense of shame you did after the first time?" he asked.

"I didn't feel shame then" she said. "Just kind of … awkward. I don't feel that now. So where exactly it was that you went again? We never finished that conversation." Milo had to think for several seconds.

"I went to go hear a talk by Lina Hest" he said. "Wasn't overly interesting." Kayla gave him a look that seemed almost deliberate as to communicate she didn't buy the explanation, but said nothing more. They must've talked for about a half hour before Kayla finally got up. "I'll be heading back to my place now" she said starting to put her clothes back on. Milo didn't remember what else really went on that night. Normally, his mind would've been bustling with many different thoughts about what Bohr had said. Instead, he became overcame with a very content tiredness and fell asleep.