Exiles

  * * * *

  Jasper dismissed Alice from his quarters and sidled into the shower to freshen up. They were now only a jump away from Nova-7 and he needed to focus. There’d been too many slip ups of late. He’d forgotten the most important lesson of that whole fiasco on Anobar a few years back, that in the final analysis the only person you can really trust is yourself. Now he was going to have to clear up another mess that others had created for him, eliminate that fool Captain Scott and Governor Clarkson before they went public on his involvement in the meat run. Never mind the loss of his own personal percentage that he'd skimmed off the top of that deal, the use of the Nova-7 for R&R and the Scorpion Nebula as a safe house and dry dock for the Fury.

  “Fools, one and all.” he muttered under his breath, as he stumbled back out of the shower, his cybernetic eye clicking and whirling frantically. His scar glowing an angry, incandescent red, as he rubbed himself down with a towel.

  The screen on his desk was flashing, indicating he had an incoming message. He punched it up, dropping the towel on the floor in the process. It was Jackson. He gave a cruel, humourless laugh, at his surprised expression and bent down to pick up the towel. “Don’t tell me you never seen a real man in the buff before, you must have spent hours poking around those Draconion marines I gave you to play with in the lab.”

  A thin, taut smile, crossed Jackson’s lips. “You grossly over estimate your ability to shock me.” he tapped the side of his head beside his eye, mirroring the place on Jaspers face, where his cybernetic implant and scar met. “Besides you forget I’ve poked around inside your head and seen more of you than you than you ever will.”

  Jasper curled his upper lip up almost snarling. “Don’t waste your pseudo-intellectual insults on me, save them for someone who appreciates them. I assume you’ve called to tell me the package I requested is ready.”

  Jackson nodded. “I have three primed and ready to deploy, each programmed with a specific target. All we have to do is load them into the delivery module and launch it.”

  “Good, I take it you’ve identified a suitable entry point from the Nova-7 schematics.”

  “Frankly, their security is appalling. I was rather spoiled for choice. So that side of things won’t be a problem.”

  “Just make sure it isn’t, I’m sick and tired of clearing up after those who let me down.” Jasper snapped. “And join me on the bridge as soon as your done, it’s time we paid some old acquaintances a visit.”

  Angelica cast Alice a side-long glance as Jasper took his seat on the captains’ dais. “Have you seen the latest news reports?”

  “No, I was otherwise engaged, but I’m sure you’re going to enlighten me.”

  “There are at least a dozen crews from all the major news channels converging on Nova-7. Apparently Ford and Admiral Faiz, from that bucket of bolts the Sultan, that gave us the slip in the Dracon system, are claiming to have uncovered a major conspiracy, implicating certain parties in the recent attacks by the Anterian flesh eaters. They’re going to reveal all at a press conference on the station.”

  “Well then, what are waiting for? We don’t want to be late for the party now do we? Execute the final jump to Nova-7.”