Captain Robert Eglin’s efforts to catch the renegade USS Stavanger had been thwarted at each turn.  Either the Captain of that ship was being fed information from within Starfleet or they were extremely lucky; whatever the case, Eglin needed to change the odds more in his favour.  That meant tracking down an old acquaintance, one that would probably be far from happy to see him, but at least they’d agreed to meeting, which was a good sign.

Reliance was a city in name only; what it was though; was a ramshackle sprawling slum of a town.  A place where people came to loose themselves, their money and their lives; if not sometimes all three.  It was a place of thieves, pirates, murders, muggers and drunks.  And those were the nice inhabitants.  So it was hardly the place you’d expect to find a Starfleet officer, even if he was dressed in shabby clothing with a dishevelled looking face.  Eglin wore knitted gloves to cover hands that clearly had never seen hard graft and would have given him away as an imposter, to anyone that cared to look at them.

The sights, sounds and smells, assaulted him from all direction.  Here was such a diverse range of down at heel, hard done by people, all going about their daily lives.  These were the forgotten and the helpless, mixed with those that used them and exploited their plight.  Eglin felt sick, and not just from the foul stench of the particular district he was walking through.  No, it was the mere fact places like this existed.  Would there ever be a time when they didn’t?

He’d been to places like this before, as part of his old job.  The cloak and dagger, hush hush things that most people realised must be happening, but chose to ignore.  Those magical four words that let you get away with so many sines, all in the name of peace and protecting the Federation; ‘At your own discretion’.  Those four words had both protected him, and hung him out to dry, when things hadn’t gone to plan.

The person, he’d come to meet; and person was a subjective term in this case, had been part of that dark and shadowy world, though unlike him, not through choice.  Eglin had been surprised they’d even answered his message; using the old secret code to communicate. A message that millions would have seen and read, but hopefully only the one it was intended for could understand and act upon.  They owed him nothing and the universe even less, so this meeting if nothing else was a good sign.  He had once been their handler, the one they reported to during their many and varied secret missions; he was also the one who’d aided them in escape, a move that had cost him his position.

Presently he found himself standing outside a machine repair shop, at the coordinates he’d received to meet; a dilapidated wooden shack and a couple of filthy tents in fact.  The large wooden sigh nailed in place above the door, with white hand painted writing, read ‘Norman Edward Body – Expert Repairs’.  Eglin chuckled to himself; so the master of disguise and mimicry was being literal in their message when they said ‘I could be anybody’.

He approached the large, slightly overweight gentleman in his mid-forties, who he assumed was the proprietor and aforementioned Mr. Body.  Whatever piece of equipment the man was currently working on, looked old and probably well past its original life expectancy.  The owner of the item had entrusted this man with the task of repairing it and squeezing a few more years of life out of it. “Mister Body?” Eglin asked politely.

The man replied in a rasping voice, but made no effort to turn around. “Who’d like to know?”

“The names Guy, Guy Burgess.” The captain announced, using a previous alias from his covert days.  He would have said more, if it hadn’t been for the pointed and more dangerous end of an unidentified weapon pressing into his back.

“Make any sudden movements and I run you through.” Came a male voice from behind. “Nod if you understand.”

Eglin nodded; then added. “He’s not you is he?”

“You catch on fast” Said the man quietly. “Don’t worry Norm, I’ll deal with this guy.”

The large man acknowledged with a simple dismissive wave of his hand over his shoulder and continued with his work as if these sort of things were a common occurrence.

Eglin was marched into a makeshift corrugated shed around the back, the blade of the weapon enough to convince him to keep walking until the destination had been reached.  Once ordered to sit on a small wooden chair, the Starfleet officer got his first chance to look at the person he hoped, this time was the one he was seeking and not just some random guy about to rob and kill him.  A blonde headed man, short stocky and around thirty; viewed him with mild amusement. “You’re getting sloppy in your old age.” The younger man spoke softly, but waved the Klingon kut’luch in the Captain’s direction.  “I wasn’t sure whether it would be you or the message was a trap.”

“You’ve been safe enough so far, haven’t you?” Eglin questioned.

The young man pondered for a moment then nodded and sheathed the weapon. “What made you think the big guy was me, anyhow?”

“Because when you went undercover you loved to pick weird names for yourself.” Smiled Eglin. “It just seemed right up your street!”

The young man laughed, may be Eglin had a point about that.  Though it was hard to decide if it was just showmanship and bravado, or a deep down wish to be caught and killed, so it could all come to an end.  If it was the latter, then why had they chose to run when someone had been sent to kill them?  The memories left a bitter taste in the mouth, Chameleon by name a chameleon by nature, genetically engineered, with the ability to change form, a tool to be used and then discarded.  And they had been well and truly discarded.

“You’re on the hunt for that stolen ship, aren’t you?” The man asked.  The Captain nodded.  “The Orion Syndicate is far from happy about it.”

“About me?”

“No, they’re worried about the ship.  They fear that once the Federation gets back on its feet, you’ll come down on them heavy.  The Orion’s can’t afford a war.”

“So who’s in charge of this operation, if the Syndicate aren’t the ones pulling the string?”

“A female Orion by the name of Navaar Orci.  Don’t know a lot about her, she’s basically sprung up out of nowhere and set up her own organisation.  Wants to make a name for herself and doesn’t care who she crosses to do it.”

“So she’s basically, very dangerous, unpredictable and stupid.”

“She is far from stupid, you haven’t caught her yet.”

“Ouch! If you’d seen what I had to work with, you’d understand my difficulty.”

“There is only one reason I’m going to help you, on this one.  Armitage.”

It was a name Eglin had not heard in a long time.  William David Armitage, former Commander, long term colleague and best buddy.  Also, he was a cold blooded murder.  The Captain felt a shiver rundown his spine, as he recalled what had happen and that his friend was now working for the enemy.  Yes, he’d been involved in some questionable acts in his covert day’s; his own closet was full of skeleton’s and ghosts, but what the then Commander Armitage had done, went far beyond anything that could be just swept under the carpet.  He’d ordered his ship’s crew to fire on an Orion transport vessel, even though he’d been told several people were being held prisoner on-board.

“We both know he knew about the prisoners hidden in the shielded hold, there is no way he knew the two of use where aboard, or about the explosives?”  Eglin tried to sound confident in his statement.  “Otherwise he’d have held off, and found another way.”

“You really think so?” Was all the young man Chameleon said.

Eglin stood up, grabbed the chair he’d been seated on and threw it against one of the walls in a fit of rage.  “I’ll kill him!  I’ll hunt down that ship and blast it into a million pieces.” He yelled.  “Find out what you can about where they are hiding it.”

Chameleon stood there watching the act of fury; and the Captain storm out of the shed a moment later.  They did not know why Armitage had turned traitor, or whether the seeds of his deceit had been sown before or after the incident which had seen his dishonourable discharge.  The faces of all those innocent people, many of which had been killed in the initial blast, others dying as they tried to escape.  Trampled on by fellow prisoner or shot by the Orion’s as they prevented anyone but themselves from getting into the escape pods.  They and Eglin had managed to overpower one of the last guards on the ship and take a pod along with six others.  It was impossible to know if anyone had been alive amongst the heaps of bodies, and there’d been no time to check.

When the pod made a rather bumpy landing on the nearest ‘M’ class planet, Eglin had told Chameleon to run; he would say they were dead.  The Orion ship was in so many pieces now, either spreading out across space or falling like fiery rain on the planet’s surface. So no one could ever prove the Captain was lying.  Not using conventional means at least.  But he’d lost a valuable asset, and therefore in the eyes of his superiors was not fit to stay in the intelligence serve.  They were safe in the knowledge that he’d never divulge the entire secret goings on; he was in too deep for that.

‘We are angels and demons in equal measure; both blessed and cursed with every breath.  Honoured and tarnished by every deed undertaken.  We are an instrument of salvation and destruction.  At last we will see both justice and revenge.’