Freeport's were the last place you'd really want to be if you were a federal agent, but thankfully this new installation hasn't attracted the array of crooks and unwanted parties that were usually found in the more deep space bases. It's position within controlled federal territory was enough of a deterrent to warrant alternative station choices for the criminal elements.
Enfield probably didn't expect to spend his birthday here on Freeport 8 looking as if he was casually dressed to waste the day away in a scruffy manner, but it was the perfect excuse to recluse himself from work as it was a normally the day he'd go quiet from the agency itself. Although the bartender is usually paid off enough to turn the other way, there are quite a few faces that would have him contemplate breaking the fragile peace that this bar holds. The bar counter was obviously not the best place to start off the day but he'd been kicking for a drink ever since he cleared Sektor-7 at the early hours of the morning, he'd had what sleep he could get and was enjoying the calmness that lasted by monitoring the room with a face behind a pint of Rheinbier and some music playing in an earpiece. "Hey." The bar stool beside him was suddenly occupied by a very-friendly face. "Mphm-" Was the best response he could offer as he was taking his next swig from that ice-cold stein. "He should be here soon, I think he should realize by now that there aren't many women around here that brave to sit alone." He wiped off the small foam-stashe he had around his lips and put his beer aside. Zeal sat there gazing at him with her legs crossed and one gently rocking side to side as she toyed with the zip around the neck of her flight-suit, Enfield in return passed her a true smile as they both continued to smile and gleam at each other's appearance. "Why does it feel so--" "--Magical? Ask your neural chip. Or maybe we'll just never know." They allowed a few minutes to pass, with the occasional giggling and chuckle escaping the pair of them...
"Time." She turned around and stared at a secluded booth seat behind a support pylon, a dimly lit table along with pair a curtain to hide away faces. "You think they--" "--Probably, but we're not catching any artifact deals today." She got her purse off the bar counter and took the briefcase that rested under Enfields bar stool. "Is everything in here?" "Yes, I double checked." "Hopefully this will get him off our backs or better yet, get him on our side." "Good, I'll sit here and drink like I wanted to, ping me on my info-comm when you want me to make my theatrical entrance." Even for a android she seemed unsteady, even if her breathing was merely a simulation of such, she gave off a staggered breath to ready her composure. She gave her flight suit a courtesy brush down before pacing herself over to the other side of the establishment to the secluded booth. She kept the curtain open to at least give a gleam of her platinum hair as a giveaway to those who knew while Enfield took one last stare before turning himself around back towards the bartender and ordering another beer. "Well... Happy birthday to me. Not the present I was expecting."
Fifty milligrams. Inhale deeply. Hold for ten seconds for optimum circulation.
Exhale slowly.
The personally tailored specifications of a theraputic dose of cardamine, converted to the specifications of his body mass.
After holding that breath, he reached for the inhalation breather and let out the remainder of the orange vapor within, to be recycled. Much more conscientious towards other occupants of the Titania, considering very few of them desired an involuntary airborne addiction anytime soon.
Erich Klugmann had turned from the bridge and stowed away his orange paraphernalia, and was about to step towards the autolift towards the modular hold. Mhairi Rathburn halted him. "Sir -- Erich. This slate will explain my admittedly abridged briefing on this social outing." - She said, sneering. "Whatever this is about, I can't imagine it bodes well. Losing you would be a critical blow to our organization, regardless of your vocal distaste for centralized lea--"
He cut her off, only partially able to conceal the slight light-headedness in his tone from the orange dose taken moments before. "Do you... Do you know what the term 'Mutually Assured Destruction' means?"
"Yes, it was a term coined on Old Earth between the predecessor-states that would eventually coalesce into the Alliance and Coalition, specifically regarding their stockpiles of strategic nuclear--"
"A 'yes' could have sufficed."
She pressed her lips together in the fashion she was wont to do when the desire to argue or debate was barely secondary to the task at hand. Erich patted the contraband weapon at his hip, whose classification could be surmised as somewhere between the terms of 'heavy revolver' to 'elephant gun'.
"My point is that Hargreaves will be on the deck with Schultz and Rei with him. You know better than I do where they've seen boots-on-the-deck combat."
Rathburn conceded sooner than he'd have thought. "Of course, Erich." He offered her a brief, slight smile. "Still have five Osmium slugs. Unless they have a battlesuit made of industrial magnets, I'll be fine."
He allowed that to linger in his mind as he made his way to the Titania's primary airlock and loading ramp. The cardamine rush had mellowed out into the hyper-awareness and, in some, slight paranoia. What if they did manage to make some sort of hypermagnetic battlesuit in some farflung, overfunded skunkworks in the Westerwald? His worrying was cut short by his com-bead implant gently vibrating. "Herr Klugmann, it's Schultz. Rei and myself are having a drink at the sleighted meeting-point. There's an android in a booth seat. At least from what I can tell, she doesn't have any assassin's augmentations. Would advise keeping her fingers away from your jugular vein regardless."
"And Hargreaves?"
"One guess."
Erich pinched his brow as he mumbled into his wrist-mic. "He's posing as a maintenance worker and is waiting to explode out of a shaft panel, again."
No confirmation was needed. Hargreaves' Leeds-gang upbringing - And its habits for self-preservation - had outlived the planet itself.
He stepped inside the establishment, pointedly avoiding making eye-contact with the Rheinlandic man and Kusari woman at a booth promising a commanding view of the room. Without explicit invitation, he made his way towards the android, seating himself with his left forearm propped against the table. He spoke stiffy. "Start talking."
![[Image: tAaApkJ.png?1]](https://i.imgur.com/tAaApkJ.png?1)
She blinked... Several times infact and she shook her head. "Hello? How do you do? Nice to meet you and so on..." She had sarcasm in her, no doubt about it as she looked away to regain some sort of composure before she began talking to Erich again, she gazed at him up and down and observed his hand that leant atop the tableside. "You seem tense... I'd ask if you were followed but I doubt you would have seated yourself if it was that way. Underground life does has its skills..." She had a glass of Iced water beside her which seemed odd, although it just made the scene a little more natural for anyone looking on. "Before I even start talking about anything else, please tell me you're at least watching the news... Buro press reports, federal news releases or anything on the underground. I don't want to talk about a topic that someone has fallen behind on because otherwise we'll be here all night."
Enfield was sitting pretty, taking the last few swings of his beer before all that remained was a falling streak of foam to the bottom of the glass. He waved his hand up to get another but he paused as soon as the bartender approached his seat... Up, up, up and he gazed at the top shelf. Not exactly the most expensive of choices but these days he hardly buys himself anything luxurious. "You know what... Give me... The--" He pointed to the rather odd prism shaped bottle which held a golden liquid, it gleamed directly under the light which lit up said shelf. "-- whatever that is." "A special occasion this morning?" "Does turning twenty--" Enfield froze for a moment, it's like his age either was forgotten or something that spooked him slightly. "Christ uhh--- turning twenty eight!" "Mein gott, I'm sorry to say but you had me going for above thirty. along with some rough history." Enfield laughed while scratching the scars under his neck, quite enough to become the loudest thing in the room for a few seconds... Once everything quietened down and he'd shurgged off the uncormfortable feeling if looking older than he is, for a bit Enfield looked at the shallow glass with a large ice cube before taking a sip. "Who--ooa... Fragrant~" "What did you expect, its the cheapest single malt on the shelf."
Erich closed his eyes for a few moments, mentally recalling the dozens of news sources clamoring for his attention daily. He saw an orange haze as the afterimage of the android faded. But while he considered the drug to have dramatically increased his focus and memory, Rheinland proper had not been the priority for quite some time.
If anything, he realized that the Flotilla was merely a conscientious pirate fleet, raiding all manner of Guild and Rheinland-corporate assets in the Sigma cluster for quite some time, now. Those were at the forefront of his mind.
That, and the Ostara.
Still, there was ample opportunity to continue being snarky and sardonic towards this MND asset. It was the very least they deserved for radicalizing and putting Klugmann on his long, seditious road in the first place.
"Hashtag Enfield is a Nomad, comes to mind." He said. "Various Federal assets hinting that they don't think domestic and foreign policy is pragmatic and authoritarian enough, even in light of the Bundesrepublik's history."
The revolutionary scowled, right hand resting lightly on the pistol-stock at his hip. "What about it?"
As soon as she heard that slogan grace her ears, she almost instantly returned with the biggest smirk on her face, passing of a laugh under her breath and placed her fingers over her mouth in a shy attempt to cover that smile. "No, sorry... Give me a moment." She had to cross her legs and hold her chest too in an attempt not to really lose it in such a serious situation, almost as if her attempt to contain herself was a physical approach. "Okay... So, its been a while since I've heard 'Enfield is a Nomad' and I no matter how many times I hear it. I can only just get this close to pissing myself laughing. Mmm- So..."
"Just to say if that were to ever happen, even close to having his humanity stripped from him by those slimy blue fucks, he'd electrocute himself until he looked like a chicken cooked in a microwave for three days." She give herself a minute to get the image out her head, but the probability of such an event still worried her enough to have that smirk slowly fade into a worrying mentally distant look... Even with those synthetic eyes. But she couldn't keep her worrying going on for much longer while having this chat, she got the briefcase she carried and placed it on the table nicely in the view of both of them to assure Erich she wasn't hiding a gun in there. "Call it a hunch but I do believe that you need this now. You left a nice scene back on the star-colony, although it wasn't nice of those MND agents to smash up your reserves." When that briefcase opened, several vials and pressurized canisters presented themselves to be neatly packed in protective foam. "Not a honey trap... Trust me."
"The concept of 'niceness', I'd been led to believe, was considered a disqualifying characteristic among the MND." Erich stated, somewhat coldly. He looked over the pressurized contents of the briefcase. " - And the only thing I can trust the MND's assets for are their methods and means. What's in these, and if they're not some sort of honey trap, why are they unlabelled?"
At the sound of Erich's grumbling irritation, the Rheinlandic man and Kusari woman paused their own conversation, going silent.
Still resting his hand on the pommel, he waited, clearly impatiently, for elaboration.
"If we went around roughing up everyone for things we wanted. We shouldn't be actually have standing relations with the many organizations we have well respected contact with. Its strange for you to think this, but believe me when I say that a very, very large majority of us aren't sadistic demons that have torture dungeons we visit to entertain ourselves." She placed a vial infront of him, stood it up and let him gaze at its contents, thankfully the blinds of the booth stopped anyone else seeing it. "Cardamine, within a liquid form, and these are your regular whole-sale price Cardamine inhaler capsules... Freshest you can get without the shit the Rouges throw in their mixes." She waved her hand over the rest of the briefcases contents in a presentation-like manner. "I hold no opinion on your dependancy of Cardamine, some people I know are on similar situations with different substances. Mainly anti-rejection supplements for cybernetic augmentations. Want to be better? pay a price."
She sat back and affirmed her seating posture, a straight and narrow manner with her legs crossed. "Anyway, now that I've shown I'd rather have you alive. Shall we get back onto why I'm asking if you've paid attention to the matters concerning the Federal Republic of Rheinland?" She reached up the the lid of the briefcase, opening a compartment that contained several documents but she was quick to move them within her arms out of Erich's reach and held them within a protective manner.
Enfield was starting to feel those last two pints kicking in, and he really couldn't just sit around waiting for her to finish her conversation. "Bustin' for a slash, you mind watching my drink?" Asking the bartender for guarding duty was met with an affirm nod as he was polishing his glasses. Enfield swiveled around in his chair but was quick to start walking while rubbing his face while scrunching up his eyes with a very less-elegant walk than what he came in with... the perfect reason to cover up his face to presume a drunken state. He managed to do so until he walked out the main area and carried on until he reached the corridor.
Feeling as if there wasn't any eyes following him at this point he carried on towards the mens bathroom, he walked past a sort of maintenance zone where panels were being stripped off by a mechanic. As he walked past he fancied a look inside the maintenance panel himself and gazed in at it with a little curiosity while not slowing his pace, he only took a second before he noticed that his staring was met by another of the maintenance worker... Enfield being himself, passed a huffing smile and a friendly nod before turning a corner into the mens restroom.
"Well, we've established that you're under the assumption I can be bribed. That's where we're at thus far." Erich said. "With cardamine, no less. Yes, I've paid attention. Get to the point."
Hargreaves blinked a few times as he tapped his commbead and murmured. "Mates, I think that was Enfield. I've seen him on the CNS before." Aware, at least, that his compatriots weren't able to simply have a secret chat with the Bretonian in the open, he didn't wait for a reply. "Turns out he goes to the toilets like a human would. Fancy that."
He paused, before adding - "I've got the alarm systems ready for suppression in the event of them being tripped by an altercation. That doesn't mean to start one."
Rei beeped out a confirmation to his words, cautiously resuming her prior - Perhaps rehearsed - conversation with the former Unioner before her. The important part was to listen, not look, at where Klugmann was speaking.
"Bribe? Alright, You can leave with it regardless on how this conversation ends was my intention." She opens a few of them, placing them out upon the table laid out in dating order. Images of a familiar place, a dark and quiet place that not many would have graced their eyes upon. "Eight-Oh-One After Settlement, lots of explosions, lots of dying... Nomads took a proverbial kick to the nuts by a small raiding party; and per usual, none of it ever happened." She pointed out those 'things' out that sat within the drydocks that glowed their un-natural hue that almost illuminated the entire area. "I think you know how this one ends, but lets rewind a little." She points to the document on Erich's far left, namely not just one from the MND but held insignia from the upper tree of the BDM. The title read - Risk assessment: RFSC-827-Final - that donned the accompanying classification stamps and inside it was documenting a group of politicians, military heads and individual commercial figureheads. "These people... Well, they're not really 'people' at this point. But these were the ones that fell quickly, and gave the Nomads the edge they needed at pulling strings around Rheinlands resources. Any mainline political resistance, crushed or went missing. Re-militarization skyrocketed and expansion was something similar to blowing up a balloon to its limits... Military are sticking their fingers in every pie possible, Republican, Daumann, Kruger and even the police which was honestly once the shining angel of all our federal divisions. At this point I don't know if I'm talking about what happened in Eight-Oh-One or whats happening now." She gave him a moment to absorb their pair of documents she laid out for him, before placing an almost immediate clone of the latter one, just with different faces, different names and different dates. She sat back herself, seemingly also trying to think to herself. She was, she didn't know what to do beyond waiting this out to see if these risk assessment documents were becoming reality.
He'd only managed to just buckle up his triage of buttons, zips and belt before walking over to the sinks to was his hands. While scrubbing away nicely with what little soap remained from the dispenser, he looked up into the mirror just to give a routine look... But the Bartenders comments had re-drawn his attention to the scars creeping along his neck line. He stretched down his hoodie down a little to have a closer inspection. His wet hands slowly caressed over the scars that remained only to have the remnants of water channel themselves down the groves of his combat-souvenirs, he needed to let himself see the rest again. He unzipped his hoodie and placed its cheap fabric aside, lifting up his plainly branded t-shirt to see an collage art-piece of battle scars; Some more frequent that others. "Shit." It was the first time in a while since he'd given himself the chance to remember where each one came from. Some from Omicrons, but a majority from Weimar but all of that was apart from three that sat on his lower abdomen and two on his remaining arm... "Bundestag." He never liked where he got these. "This is exactly why I wear a helmet." He added on, finding humor in the situation.
Klugmann let out a contemptuous grunt as he looked over the pair of documents he'd been given. "I'm of course to assume that the Buro and MND at large had no hand in this, despite the reckless usage and research of Nomad tech?" He paused a moment, before stating somewhat more coldly - "You sound surprised and alarmed that in protecting the Republic's oligarchy, you've repeated the mistakes of the past. Were I a little less optimistic about the human-" - He paused, reminding himself that she wasn't fully in the purview of his comment - "-The human spirit and conscience, I'd assume that the MND's gotten exactly what it wanted all along, and now realized it's spiraled out of their control."
He punctuated that monologue with one more statement. "If only someone had attempted to stop them."