39
Three hours later, Rev, Tomiko, and the lieutenant stood off to the side as a team of hazmat-clad sailors maneuvered the Centaur into the waiting shuttle. Two-and-a-half hours of that time had been in waiting for the team to make it to the scene. In the last thirty minutes, in a display of professional efficiency, a team of Seabees had cleared a landing zone, allowing the shuttle and more sailors, supervised by another hazmat-clad figure without rank insignia, to land. The Seabees spread out in a security perimeter, with more toward the west, where the Frisians were still patrolling.
The command had told the lieutenant to limit the number of Marines at the site, so it was only the three of them there when the Seabees dropped in. A lieutenant ordered them to step out of the way, but other than that, they were ignored, even after the shuttle arrived.
And that kind of pissed Rev off. They were the ones who had found the Centaur, after all.
After a perfunctory inspection, the Centaur had been foamed, then wrapped. If Rev didn’t know that it was a Centaur, he would never guess what was inside the package. Now, with a mobile lift-crane, they were edging it into the shuttle.
“Who’s the boss, do you think?” Rev asked. “The OD?”
“Safe bet,” Lieutenant Omestori said.
With an OD in charge, that was a pretty good indication that the military was going to be shouldered aside. Internecine politics would make sure of that. But for now, the OD needed the Navy to get the Centaur to wherever it had to be.
“I still can’t believe this,” the lieutenant said. “A damned riever. First, you bag a paladin, and now you capture a riever.”
“Didn’t capture anything, sir. It was dead when we got here.”
“Yeah, but it was you. I’m going to call you the Centaur Whisperer. You too, Reiser,” he hastily added.
“Both of you, you’re going to get noticed. You got screwed last time, Pelletier, but this is even bigger, and I’m going to make sure you get something.”
Rev didn’t say anything. Like the lieutenant said, he’d been burned once before, and given the secrecy in what was transpiring, he thought that this might get buried.
At a minimum.
It wasn’t that he didn’t trust the government, but there were always rumors that the OD sometimes acted on their own, and shutting off the potential for leaks—for the good of the Union, of course—wasn’t beyond the realms of imagination.
“Kinda sucks for the Frisians,” Tomiko said. “I mean, they’ve been good shits, bleeding alongside us, and now we’re cutting them off.”
“Don’t even think about that,” the lieutenant said. “You did good, Pelletier, putting the report on a delay. If the brass wants to share that with our allies, that’s up to them, not us.”
The Centaur edged up the ramp, the mobile crane contracting to fit through the hatch. With all that foam and wrapping, the riever was twice the size it had been. But it fit easily enough and disappeared into the cargo hold.
“Well, I guess that’s that. I’m going to need you two to make a report on everything that happened,” the lieutenant told them.
Only it wasn’t over. The OD agent finally deigned to notice them and came striding over.
“Which one of you was first at the scene,” he asked, his voice crisp, words clipped.
“I was . . . uh, sir.”
Rev wasn’t sure how to address the man, but using sir was usually a safe choice.
The man brought out a recorder and said, “I’m going to have to download your feed.”
Supposedly, the government’s access was limited, but he wasn’t sure he could trust that. Now, he regretted taking the selfie. What if they found out about that? Was his ass going to be in a sling?
The download was quick, and the agent took a quick look at the readout. “It shows me that you deployed a Gnat?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Give it to me.”
At least his AI had confirmed that the selfie had been erased. He handed it over.
Next was Tomiko. She wasn’t asked to give up her Gnat.
“Alright, now that we’ve got that done, I need the three of you to board.”
“Why?” the lieutenant asked, his face twisted in concern. “I’ve got my company here.”
“Someone will take over, but you three need to come with me for a full debrief.”
“Can’t you just do it here?” the lieutenant asked.
“I won’t be doing any debrief, so, no. That will be done elsewhere.”
“But—”
“You have to board now, Lieutenant.”
The OD agent’s tone brooked no argument, and with a melodramatic sigh, the lieutenant pulled out his Gnat.
“What are you doing?” the agent asked, putting his hand over the little drone.
“We still don’t have comms, and I need to let my command know we’ll be leaving with you.”
Rev glanced at Tomiko, who grimaced. In their excitement they had forgotten that the Gnats could be used as messengers instead of having Tomiko run to track down the lieutenant.
“That’s a negative, Lieutenant,” the agent said, hand out for the Gnat. “We’ll inform your command.”
The lieutenant wanted to argue, Rev could see. He didn’t want to be separated from his Marines. But what choice did he have?
“What about the rest of the team?”
“They will be rounded up and segregated from the rest. We’ll take care of that.”
The lieutenant shook his head, but he knew this was too big for him. He started toward the shuttle. Rev and Tomiko followed.
“At least no more useless patrols,” Tomiko whispered to Rev.
“This one wasn’t so useless.”
Tomiko stopped, then broke out laughing. “Guess you’re right at that.”
The three stepped into the shuttle. Once inside, the Centaur wasn’t taking up that much room. It was being secured to hooks in the deck, but sailors were already taking seats along the bulkhead. The agent pointed to webseats up near the bow, and the three Marines sat down.
The Seabees started filing in, and the agent said, “Just relax. We’ve got a long way to go.”
“What’s going to happen, sir?” Tomiko asked.
“Debriefs, a lot of them,” the agent said with a laugh. “So, gird your loins for that. Your battle buddies will be removed too, so that will take some of the load off.”
“You’re taking Pikachu?” Tomiko said, her voice high in alarm.
“If that’s your battle buddy, then yes. But it will be returned. Don’t worry.”
“They’re taking you?”
<It would seem so, according to what the Omega Division agent just said.>
Rev leaned back in his seat as the ramp pulled in and the hatch started to close. He wasn’t bonded to his AI like Tomiko was, but he suddenly wasn’t sure he wanted it to be taken from him.
But something told him that he wasn’t going to have much say in the matter.