It takes a great amount of skill to move through an active battle zone unnoticed, since all sides are on alert. Luckily for Nickels, he had the sly skills of subterfuge, and managed to move through Eta without so much as seeing a single Corsair. All a matter of knowing patrol routes, timing, and how to fly above or below the basic plane. Most people are blind if you're not where they expect to see ships.
He jumped to Omicron Alpha without real incident, but once inside a wing of Sabres intercepted him just outside the jump hole.
"Unidentifed ship, you are entering restricted space. State your intentions."
"Tranmitting codes now," Nickels responded, sending a Blood Dragon transponder. It hadn't come with the ship, but he knew the number/letter combination by heart.
"Authenticating... roger that, you're clear to proceed. Good flying."
Now it was a simple matter to get to Malta and wait for Josh, or better yet find him waiting.
Josh stared with an exasperation at the crashed ship on the Malta landing pad. He continued to look at the cut on his arm that the medics stiched up. Another scar for the ladies to stare at. Josh sighed and laughed it off and he walked into the bar. A few people looked up at him with accusing eyes, others looked at him briefly and then went back about their business. Jess sat in the corner staring at a strange looking drink. Josh set down next to him and the two sat in silence before Josh broke the silence.
"Lets never do that again." He said.
"Agreed." Jess said. "Any sign of Liberty?"
"Not a thing. Though I did have some persisting Bretonian bastards chase me from Leeds to here though, even though the Kusari onslaught seemed to be pretty brutal. The Dragon didn't take the beating too well, while the Outcasts kept the Bretonian *******s off my tail, I lost control soon as I entered the planets ionishpere and crashed here. Lucky for me I used to have a friend here whose memory kept me out of trouble."
"A friend?"
Josh laughed at the memory of Zachary. "Yeah a friend."
"So what next? We lay low?"
"Nah, I've got another friend here that might be able to give us a bit of a hand." Jess looked at him with one eye and a suspcious glance. Josh only smiled. "Well you have your Dragon friends, and I have my Outcast friends, maybe we know more about one another than we really do."
"Lets move then, I don't want to stay in one location long."
"Agreed, lets bounce." Nails said and moved towards the door.
"Josh, old friend!" said the man bearing the wing-pins of a 101st pilot. "It's been too long. Where've you been?"
As they talked, Nails and the Outcast clasped hands and pulled together briefly in a semblance of a hug.
"Here and there," he responded, keeping his cards close to his chest. "This is my brother, Nickels or Jess, whichever you prefer."
"Pleasure to meet you, I am Giovanni Cordova. Please." He greeted Nickels in much the same manner of handshake.
"What can I do for you? I haven't forgotten Omicron Eta, old friend..." he trailed off into silence, remembering why he owed Josh the question 'What can I do for you?'
"We need a place to lay low old friend. I cannot give you the details on why we have to lay low, but I can only tell you it involves Liberty and Rheinland." Nails said. "You cannot let anyone know we are here. I fear there may be spies about. We've been tracked down on more than one occasion somehow, and I'd like to keep it that way."
"I understand ya Nails. I'll get you two setup a room near the downtown of Malta, that should keep you out of harm's way."
"Thanks Giovanni, I owe ya one."
"You don't owe me anything Nails, I'll get that room for you, be right back."
The man walked off towards the landing bay and Nails looked to his brother who was looking elsewhere thinking to himself.
"What're you thinking about?"
"Something that Shan said." he replied. "She told us we're in trouble...do you know anything about that Josh?"
Josh looked to his brother and shook his head. "Nothing of the sort...we're being chased all over the damn Sirius systems, but nothing to be worried about, I'm sure they'll forget about us eventually."
Jess nodded and walked away thinking to himself while Josh stayed laid against the wall next to the pad.
They'll never stop looking for it you idiot. You carry a case labeled "Codename Abaddon", they'll never give up.
Giovanni returned about twenty agonizing, dragged-out minutes later. Time slowed down when you knew you had been hunted, and that in the near future you might be hunted again, and that any second that hunt might resume. As they heard his footsteps approach, they naturally tensed, expecting the worst. So their lot had been in the past few weeks. He simply motioned them to follow him, and then led them straight to a run-down apartment complex.
"It may not look like much," he said over his shoulder, "but it's secure. No questions asked, and you don't go on any record as boarding here."
Giovanni led the brother to the third floor of four, up rickety stairs and to a plan, unassuming door. "Here I must leave you. Good luck."
They opened the door via a key they had collected without a word at the front desk. Inside were two beds, narrow, with a bare kitchenette to their right. A door directly opposite them led to what they assumed was a bathroom.
Nickels dumped his bag on the bed closest to the door and asked the question that had been weighing on their minds this entire time.
"That's the million dollar question isn't it?" Josh said grimacing at the thought. They'll find us.
"Seems like it, so what? We pick up jobs at Outcasts? Get addicted to Cardi and marry some spanish brides?" he added sarcastically walking over to a window and looking out. "We can't lay low for long, they will-"
"They will find us." Nails continued and pointed out the window at the unmarked fighter landing on the tarmac. "And I think they already did. Get your things together and get ready to make a break out the back landing." Nails cocked the small handgun as Nickels threw the bags down to the landing below and took up a position near Nickels.
"So, you ever going to tell me what the hell is going on? I know when you lie Josh. When I asked you what Shan meant when she talked to me, you hesitated. They're after you aren't they? I won't ask for what, I just want to know that they're after you and not me."
Josh looked at his brother and nodded his head. "They're after me. But if you try to leave without me, they'll capture you and try to get me to bend to their will. We're stuck with one another until this is over."
"I don't mind. Gives me something to do." Jess said with a smile. The fighter opened up and a man was shoved out and onto the ground. He looked like he hadn't shaved in a few months, his hair was torn up and long, he looked like he hadn't seen sunlight in a few months either, but the two brothers still recognized the man through out all these horrible images and they both said his name together.
Jess started forward as if to jump out the window and help him, but Josh grabbed him.
"Don't be stupid! Why would they do this if not to goad us, or freak us out..." he trailed off, doubting his own advice for a moment. Their father knelt there on the tarmac, deep, ragged breaths visible from this distance. He was practically in rags. They hadn't heard from their dad, the legendary freelancer, in ages. There may have been a few scathing words on both parts, but time mends all wounds. And family is family, after all.
"We gotta do something. We gotta." Nickles tried to peer into the darkness of the fighter, but he couldn't find the man that had shoved him out.
"Go around the tarmac, stay low, and on my signal get ready to hit whoever it is as hard as you can. DON'T BE SEEN!" Nails sent Nickels running in a crouch, out the door, down the stairs, and behind some buildings for cover. Josh prepared himself for what was gonna come, then walked down the stairs.
I stared at the case for a few minutes. This stupid thing is what they were after...I reached down and opened the case, reaching in and grabbing a semi-automatic handblaster. I then reached forward and pulled the sheet off the artifact that sat in the case, the very same one father told me to keep close to my person at all times. I slammed the case shut and dropped it over the balcony into the dumpster in the alley below. I quickly turned and ran low, close to the wall, Jesse ran along the opposite wall and ducked low when he saw me stop. I slowly poked my head up over the wall. My father looked straight at me.
For a moment I could make out a hint of a smile. I nodded and ducked back down. He knew we were coming for him.
"Get down there and move him inside now! What the hell are you waiting for?" someone on the ship said and a man rushed down the tarmac. He was big...as big as me and he picked up my father by the scruff of the neck. "Get him inside you oaf!"
No on my time. I brought up the semi-auto and fired a burst shot at the big man. The shots hit him square in the neck. The impact sent him reeling into the side of the ship. He dropped my father who ran straight for Jesse. Jesse covered him with a sheet and ran him down the opposite alley. I continued to fire supression fire at the ship as it's engines warmed up to chase Jesse and my father...a sudden barage of weapons fire from another ship lit up from across the tarmac and destroyed one of the ships engines. The ship faltered, shuddered, and lost power. It crashed into a building near the tarmac. I looked to who had saved their lives and saw my old friend Giovanni hovering in his Sabre.
"You ok Josh?" he asked over the intercom.
"I'm fine old friend. Thank you for the help."
"Anytime, we have to clean up this mess and question that man...after that we'll talk more later. I can see if they'll let you question him too, I'm sure you have questions for him."
I nodded and the ship turned and flew back to the tarmac. I caught up to the two hiding behind a dumpster.
"It's clear." I said and immediately hugged my father. He returned the hug in full force. It had been many years since I had seen him and his face was welcome, no matter how raggity it was.
"The case." he croaked. "Where is the case?"
"Safe." I replied.
"What case?" Jesse asked.
"You didn't tell him?"
"I thought you were dead and...I couldn't live with the fact that I had-"
"Nonsense. I'm a Reynolds. I don't 'die'. Get the case, we need to get Jesse caught up."
They walked over to the dumpster, led by Nails, while a few Outcast police ships arrived to cordon off the tarmac as a crime scene. They could see a few officers talking to Cordova, but they Reynolds didn't pay them any mind. Their father leaned on Nickels heavily as Josh led the way, and as they got to the dumpster he fished around for a moment before coming back with a suitcase.
He motioned them to come back to the apartment room they had recently got. "This place is too... exposed. Don't want the wrong ears hearing or eyes seeing this, I think."
Jess just nodded and followed him through the door and up the stairs.
Once we made it back upstairs to the appartment, our father sat the case gently down on the table and popped the tabs open. The spring in the case opened the lid by itself, and sitting in the middle in it's glory was an artifact. An artifact that looked like no other...and it was active.
"Bloody hell..." Nickels said. "You've had this with you the entire time?!"
"I have. I kept it from you in order to keep you safe, for who ever knows about it seems to wind up dead, or missing."
"But you're alive." he said. "And so are you dad."
"But we're being hunted." my father interjected.
I explained the situation to him.
"Project Tundra, named after the missing ship in Alaska. It was an attempt to discover the truth about the alien artifacts discovered on Manhattan when we first arrived in the New York system 800 years ago. Soon after all this happened however, it was ranamed to Project Frostblight. That was what it's intention was, until they discovered similar artifacts on Stutgartt a few years ago. The standard protocol was of course brought into play, but somehow it was leaked to dad, I'll let him explain that part. Now dad is a brilliant man, as you and I both know, both in science and research. Instead of shutting him up, Rheinland decided to bring him in on the project. Dad was a Liberty National just like you and I are, so naturally, Liberty didn't like that. I was only 19 at the time, and dad wanted me to see the project, Rhienland agreed and brought me in as well to research what they had found. Two weeks later dad didn't show up for one of the work days, and got the officals worried. I was detained for questioning and released a few days later when no evidence of dad had turned up. Rhienland had said that with out a doubt all information and records of me being on the project were wiped clean and the project renamed to what it is now. Apparently the Rhienland government has a rat in the highest tier of their system, and ratted my name out to them. That's when you and I took the job in Rhienland, Jess. When that Liberty offical died, I knew s*** was about to hit the fan...I didn't say anything though, assuming that they knew you weren't in on the project and would let you go when they caught me."
Jess listened and raised one question. "What does this have to do with the case?"
"This isn't any artifact Jess. This is an ACTIVE one. Similar to the one Trent used to rid most of the Nomads from Sirius."
"Who...what?"
"It's classified." my father interjected. "Most Artifacts you find these days are dead, deactivated because of the time they've spent in the dirt, but this one was active, buried deep in an ancient temple buried deep underground, so deep infact it was right next to the planets core. I knew your brother wanted to follow in my footsteps as a scientist for a while, so I brought him in to help me. Rheinland agreed to my surprise and we worked on it together. A few months later, a Black Ops Liberty detachment kidnapped me from Rheinland and then on the way back to Liberty, we were attacked by an unknown faction, and I was taken there, where I've been since."
"Do you know who they were?" I asked.
"No idea. They said they were followers of the...I don't remember what they said. I'm assuming the Nomads."
"Followers?" Jess said with a quizical look on his face.
"People worship the Nomads, believing that they are the cure to our problems. So it's only natural they would want this Artifact, I think it's a mighty big deal to the Nomads..."
"So we just killed a bunch of their worshipers...that means the Nomads could be on their way." I said facepalming.
"Very well possible. We might want to get off Malta while we still have the chance." my father said.
"That doesn't explain how you got the bloody case!" Jess said almost yelling.
"I stole it." I said. "After father vanished, we discovered this artifact, it was glowing blue. Most of the artifacts glow red or orange. Never blue. I took it and placed it in a case. When asked about it, I said it vanished into thin air, which wasn't surprising considering we were dealing with alien technology. I snuck it out of the compound, and just now I assume they've discovered I took it."
"And that's why who ever it was are playing Liberty and Rhienland against the both of you. To get you caught, so the members that are still infected in the highest forms of government can steal the Artifact back, and unlock the mysteries of their creators."
"Bloody hell..." Jess said. "We've gotta get off Malta..."
"My thoughts exactly. I'm going to dig in here. Hide with your friend Gio. I know a man in the Special forces of the Outcasts. His name is Chavez Velencia. If you need to contact me, contact him first, he will be able to help you. Good luck boys."
Our father gave us both a hug and patted us on the head. He looked to me.
"Get that Artifact to someplace fortified. There is a freelancer station in Coro-"
The ground rocked as a ship exploded on the tarmac near us. Screams could be heard as we looked out the window of the appartment.
"Go! I'll find Chavez and take shelter. Get that Artifact off the planet!"
I braced the case against my chest and ran down the emergency stairs. Jess ran down behind me. We both dropped to the alley and started running towards a transport vessel getting ready to depart. We jumped in the back and slid the compartment closed. It sealed and the ship took to flight.
"You know, you could have told me...I wouldn't have hated you Josh." Jess said out of the blue.
"I didn't want to take a chance...you're one of the only family members I have left...I couldn't take you hating me..." I replied.
"I'll never hate you...you're my brother, and nothing will change that..."