Mindshard (ON HOLD)

Back on the Hunt

     The lean officer sighed tiredly.

  “And that’s why we need to move quickly, so we don’t lose it, Ixim.”  She rubbed at her face.  Battle fatigue was quickly catching up to her now that the adrenaline and endorphins in her bloodstream were starting to ebb.  Along with her natural stimulants and painkillers’ failure came the return of the dull ache in her shoulder, reminding Vaughn of just how close she came to joining the untidy heap of bodies on the floor.  Which also reminded her;

  “Where’s Brin?”  She looked sharply about.  “I left her by that column over there, after you healed her but I don’t see her anywhere.”

     Pausing in the act of connecting his com link, a lozenge of silver-blue and green about the length of his little finger, to Isivir Command, Ixim shrugged.

  “I’m not sure, colonel.”  He admitted.  “I did see a team of healers pull her out of here shortly after you instructed Qint in the policing of the fallen.”  Then he was lifting the com back to his mouth.

     Undaunted Vaughn strode to where Qint was directing traffic.  The ISD agent was remarkably efficient, already seeing the survivors up and gone and now directed agents protected by translucent energy fields in their removal of the bodies.

  “Colonel.”  He nodded in greeting when she drew up in front of him.  “Liaison is on her way, clean-up team is right behind her, survivors have been evacuated to the Sith’anur Tactical Base just outside of the city, which has a full-service medical facility, and I’m having the bodies removed to a temporary morgue set up at the local ISD office three leagues from here.”

  “Good work, Agent Qint.”  Vaughn acknowledged with a smile.  “Did Agent Brin go with the survivors?”

  “Yes, sir, she did.  While she had the benefit of an extraspacial healing, the healers that triaged the survivors indicated she’d need a dunk in a green tank for a couple days to bring her back to full capacity.  I authorized her transfer myself.”

  “Very good.  Now, could you authorize transportation there for myself and Agent Ixim?”

     Part of the massive military infrastructure that helped the bureaucrats hold the Pax together, the Sith’anur Tactical Base was carved into the mountains to the north of the city, a brooding presence overlooking the urban forest that was Ven Cor’brin.  Despite being chiseled out of the weathered granite, the base managed to maintain the organic feel every Sidhe structure had: a sinuous series of interconnected chambers and passages open to the sun and filled with green and growing things in between machines of mass destruction.

     Nestled in the largest of the chambers hollowed from the belly of the Mountains of Silver was the base’s medical complex, an intimate cluster of domes grouped around a central stalk that provided administrative and transport connectivity.  It was to one of the southwest facing domes that base personnel guided Ixim and Vaughn after their arrival via Fleet shuttle.  Being a military facility, Sith’anur Control only allowed access by cleared military vehicles.  His procurement of transportation so quickly and easily on a military shuttle was an indication of how powerful Qint and the ISD was, Vaughn realized.  Hopefully she’d made an ally in the agent instead of an enemy with her seizing control of the archive situation.

     Regardless of what she left behind, her and Ixim were now on the base.  She paused at the oval entrance leading into what base healers were calling the ‘tank room’ to take in what now unfolded before her.  Like most Sidhe structures, the chamber appeared to lack any significant corners, a smooth flowing of ceiling into wall and down into floor, all in subtle hues of pale green and blue.  Besides their organic origins, the colors were also soothing to both the eye and the mind.