...And Into The Fire

                            By:

                         Fox Cutter

    Chapter 15

I yawned a bit, still tired, not really able to get any
sleep for the hour or so I tried. With another yawn, I
pushed my way into the control room.

Inside Rachel was sitting at the video control board,
flipping through different cameras. In front of the audio
board was a what looked like a dragon, and sort of sitting
off to the side was a lion-morph.

The lion looked at me, and raised an eyebrow. "Hello."

Rachel and the dragon turned. "Page," Rachel said. "I though
you where sleeping."

I sighed, sitting down. "I may have gotten a few minutes of
sleep, I'm not sure. Now, who are those two." I tipped my
head in the general direction of the pair, "and where is
Kalie and Marn."

She grinned a bit. "The dragon is Ken, the lion is Steven."

I nodded. "The Ken Kalie was watching?"

"The same."

I glanced at Steven. "And you must be the friend she
mentioned. Now, not exactly to pry, but how the hell did you
get here?"

Ken grinned at me. "I got lucky, and made a spell to work
around the jamming."

I blinked, remembering what I had read about the spell to
block the floods. "Even with techno-magery?"

He slowly nodded. "Yes, even then."

Nodding, I gently started to wring my paws again. "So where
are the other two."

I heard a chuckle behind me. "Getting somebody."

Instantly I recognized the voice, turning I saw, leaning in
the doorway, Fox.

I didn't say anything, instead I jumped out of my chair, and
have him a hug. "I was worried, after I found your t-port
curtain down."

He hugged back. "You were worried?"

I grinned, and let go. "Where's Oriana?"

She poked her head over Fox's shoulder. "Right here."

Taking a step back, I waved for them to come inside. Fox
came in, and Kalie after him. Oria and Marn stayed outside
the door, as the room was about as full as it could easily
get.

Fox propped himself up on a unused control board. "So, how
did you guys find me?" He asked.

Rachel grinned a bit, her right shoulder looking terrible,
deep black through her fur. "It was Marn's idea."

Fox looked over at him. "Oh?"

He grinned himself. "Well, it was a simple idea, we didn't
know exactly what channel number the guard was using, so we
sent a ping down all of them."

Fox raised an eyebrow. "How did you know about the guard?"

"That was my fault." Steven said. "We had turned on the
cameras in the Council Room, and where about to shut them
off when I saw an animal go accost the floor. Pausing a
second we saw you show up, and then we just watched."

I heard Oriana giggle a bit. "Yes Fox, he definitely knows
more the us."

Everyone in the room gave Fox a look that said, 'what does
she mean?'.

He shook his head. "I'll tell you later. Now Marn, you said
you had sent a beep down all the communication channels?"

Marn nodded. "Yes, we watched for when you reacted, that
narrowed it down to about ten, as we weren't sure of the
exact time. Then we beep down each one, one at a time, until
you responded."

He nodded. "And then when you started to tell me where you
were, Kalie realized that it was an open channel."

Marn crossed his arms. "Exactly," he said, apparently not to
happy about not thinking of it I guess. I wasn't to sure
about what had gone on myself to be truthful.

Fox looked over at Kalie, who was sitting next to him. "Nice
clue you gave me, though Oria cracked it before I did."

Kalie shrugged. "I knew it was something you would figure
out."

Fox nodded again. "Ok, now that we've gotten that
explanation out of the way, any luck on your searching
Rachel?"

She shook her head. "I've gone over every camera, nothing at
all."

"Are you sure?" I asked.

She nodded. "Double checked it, I went over every camera on
the list."

That statement suddenly steered a memory. "What about off
the list?"

Rachel blinked. "What?"

"The cameras for the old trade floor for the Geza
Cooperation."

The Geza Cooperation was a larger company, that spanned
three united verses (in there own universe, each was about
ten light years apart, and they only had one council
member). The Geza Corp was a joint venture here on Prid to
make trading easier, as there universe didn't support the
physics of the known faster then light drives. About five
years ago they went bust then a major war broke out, and
apparently sent all three cultures back to the iron-age.

"How would I look at that?" Rachel asked.

"Allow me." I said, moving over next to her. Punching a few
buttons, I manually typed in the camera numbers. "They
should still be there," I explained, "as it's a pain to
remove them."

I pressed a few more buttons, and the screens switched to a
semi-large room that had been divided into cubicles, and
there was a lot of people in there, moving around, doing
things.

"Two points Page," Fox said, "that has to be them."

"Where is that exactly?" Kalie asked.

"5th level, office address w2718."

Fox looked around a bit. "Question, is there anyplace we can
go to? It's a bit cramped in here."

I stood up, "Well, I think there might be a conference
room." The I moved pasted everyone, and out of the room,
after a quick walk over to a largish room nearly opposite of
the one and only door into the Communications Center.

Opening the door, I flipped on the lights. "Bingo." I said
to the others, who had followed me. The room consisted of a
table with ten chairs around it, and a couple computer
consoles on one wall. The only other thing in the room was
some papers scattered over the table.

We all moved into the room, each taking a seat, both Kalie
and I turning ours backwards as was normal for us.

"So, what do we do know?" Steven asked.

Fox grinned a bit. "Don't worry." He said, then whipped off
what looked like a blue print from the table. Holding it up
he announced. "I have a plan."

I happily joined in the course of groaning, as well as
throwing some of the paper laying around at him.

* * *

I bravely withstood the bombardment of small bits of paper,
not that it was that hard, the only really thing I was in
danger of was a paper cut.

Setting down the blue-prints, I crossed my arms. I didn't
have a plan per-say, but I did have an idea. I was banking
on Kalie's experience to help we with most of the details.

Finally everyone stopped throwing things at me, and relaxed
a bit. "Ok, first things first. What exactly are our assets
here?"

"With the gun that Steven brought over, we have five total."

Page paused, then fiddled a bit with what looked like a chip
controller that she had strapped to her wrist. Taking it
off, she set it on the table. "That's the Matrix chip,
though the power on the controller is dead, I'll need to
find out a way to recharge it before it can even be
removed."

I chewed my lip a bit, that Matrix would help some, but I
wasn't sure how much. "Anything else?"

"Well," Rachel said. "We have the ship to space dish, we can
control that from here. If we can get it locked onto a
satellite, we could send a message out."

"And tell then what?" Steven asked. "I doubt anything we can
say won't fit nicely in with what the HammerHeads have
already leaked out."

I saw Ken slowly tilt his head a bit. "Well then, maybe we
could send out the truth."

Page looked at him. "How do you mean?"

He slowly rubbed his chin. "I seem to remember reading
someplace that all the Council meetings for the past fifty
years are recorded. I assume the last one was as well. If it
is, it should clearly show the true order of events."

"Maybe Ken," Rachel said, "but how do we keep it from being
called a fake."

Page looked up. "The archive encoding, it includes the date
and time it was recorded, and is normal transmitted along
with any rebroadcast."

"Well that's all fine and good, but is it in the archive?" I
asked.

She stood. "Let me check." Then ran out of the room.

I nodded to myself. "Ok, now that we know that. Who can use
a gun, out side of Kalie of course?"

"I can," Marn stated. "I'm rather good at it."

"I should be able to as well." Rachel said, "Though I will
be less then perfect, as I'm better with my right paw, which
right now hurts to much to lift."

Ken spoke up next. "I have some training, but none of the
guns you have will work for me, wrong shape, size and
balance."

"Steven?"

He shook his head. "Give me a target fifty feet wide, and
I'd have a fifty, fifty chance of hitting it at point blank
range."

Nodding a bit, I finally turned to Oriana. "I've never asked
you."

She shrugged. "I have some experience, I can usual hit my
target."

"That about covers me too." I said. "Anyone know about
Page's skill?"

There was silence for a second, then Rachel spoke up. "I
remember her once saying that she never bother to learn."

I nodded. "Ok, now that we know that, the big question.
What, exactly, is are objectives here?"

"Get that transmission out." Steven said.

I nodded. "That's an easy one, though I'm sure you will have
this place flooded with guards in ten minutes from the time
you first send."

"Not to be to insulting," Ken said. "But even if we get that
message out, what would be the point?"

"Are you kidding?" Steven asked.

"I don't think so," Marn said. "If you think about it, it
makes perfect sense. Even if we get the archive played, and
it gets passed along to everyone on Prid, the HammerHeads
are still safe in here, and they still are jamming the
folds. The only way the rest of the multi-verse would know
about what is going on would be what ever information they
sent out."

"Which makes one of are priorities to shut down the field."
I said.

"Something that we have no idea about where it's at." Kalie
stated.

Ken shook his head. "It's in the control room."

Kalie looked at him. "How do you know?"

He paused. "Fox, remember me telling you I had done some
spell components for the HammerHeads."

I nodded. "Yes?"

"One of then was aimed at interface with technology, though
a control board that was mounting inside the control room
the Hall."

I grinned a bit. "Along with the door controls."

He nodded. "I would suspect so."

I tapped my chin a bit. "Alright, that is an advantage.
Anything else?"

"Rescuing Rathal." Rachel said.

I paused. "You did say he was being taken to see Jenner."

She nodded. "Last we heard."

I nodding my head once, over exaggerating it a bit. "Well
that, that does proceeded to take care of it's self then
doesn't it."

"What do you mean?"

I ran my hand over my chin. "The number one priority is
capturing Jenner."

"Are you crazy?" Rachel asked.

I shook my head. "Kalie, I'm sure you can explain it better
then I can."

She nodded. "Well, if I understand what you're saying. Then
general understand is that Jenner has been planning this for
a long time. There for it would make sense for him to have
multiple escape routs planed. He would show up again a short
time later, underground of course, and starting working with
the rest of the escaped HammerHeads to try this again."

"There for we need to either capture or kill him, even if it
does appear that we will have to go after him in the center
of the current HammerHead base."

I leaned back. "That explains it."

There was a pause for a few seconds, then Page came back
into the room, and sat down. "It's all on record, from the
original motion, to Rachel's escaping."

Rachel rubber her should. "Well then, I think we have a
plan."

I licked my lips. "Not fully no. Page, can you use one of
those computers back there to check out cameras at the
HammerHeads base?"

She moved over to one of the computers, grabbing another
chair on her way. After a few moments she announced, "yes."

"Good, play around, I want to know exactly where Jenner is
staying, and the nearest door to his location."

"Got it." She said, and went to work.

I turned back to the rest. "Ok, we have three things to do,
we need to split up for that. The first obvious choice to me
is that I'm going after Jenner, Page stays here, and Ken
goes to shut down the spell jamming the folds."

Kalie nodded, this statement was souly aimed at her, and she
knew it. "I say that Rachel stays here, with her arm in that
condition she would be useless on the move. Though she
should be able to defend the door easily, there are a few
good positions. Along those same lines, I say that Steven
stays here, he's a none combatant right now."

"That makes sense, I do want you with me of course."

"Of course." She said, grinning a bit. "Then I say that Marn
goes with Ken."

I nodded. "And Oriana?"

Kalie paused for a second, chewing her lip. "Well, I would
rather have three people with us, as we will be the most
open team. She comes with us."

I glanced at Oria. "Anyone have any objections to there
position."

No one said a word for a few seconds. Then Marn spoke up.
"What about the subject of communication?"

I pulled out the walky-talky from my jacket pocket, and set
it on the table. "We have this, and Page has the system as a
whole."

"There is also the guards wristcom." Page said, not looking
over her shoulder. "Now that I know the channels there
using, I can but it back together and one party can use it."

"You keep the hand unit." Marn said. "I'll take the
wristcom."

I nodded one more time. "Now, one final thing, what is the
exact timing?"

"I've already come up with that." Kalie said. "I think it
would be best we all get into position, and Ken and Marn
act's first, they open the folds, and the Hall's doors if
they can. Then Page starts the transmission, and we take on
Jenner when it hit's the local media."

I blew through my teeth. "Think we can do it?"

Everyone around the table slowly nodded.

Standing, I suddenly realized that what ever I said next
would probably go down into the annals of history, and be
quoted for centuries to come (at least if we won).

"Well then, let's go."

I don't like to be quoted.