‘They know we’re here,’ said Cassidy, gesturing about the Rooks’ briefing room. ‘But they don’t know about Blackbird. They’ve no idea of the resources we’ve got. So there’s no way they’re prepared.’ He turned to Falaris and nodded. ‘Lieutenant.’

She stepped to the main holographic display and with the press of a button summoned the sensor feed of Kanem’s compound. ‘They’ve various forms of shielding around the compound itself to block transporters and sensors. Certainly we can’t just beam into their office and out, but I’ve been able to calibrate our sensors to get a more complete image of the facility than they’d like.’

‘Nice,’ said Nallera, eyes lighting up as she looked at the sophisticated scans of the facility. ‘Starfleet sensor technology wins the day again. Guess we should thank the scientists, huh?’ She elbowed Aryn lightly, but his wan expression didn’t shift much.

‘Starfleet sensor technology gives us a good start to the day,’ Cassidy said, voice clipped. ‘It’s let us make a plan. We’re the ones who gotta execute it.’

Rosewood leaned back in the comfortable seating littered about the Rooks’ meeting room, and listened as Cassidy elaborated. In a pause, his eyes flickered from Cassidy to Falaris, and he raised a languid hand. ‘Can we really hack their computer systems that well from here? This isn’t a soft target. This is an expensive and professional operation.’

Falaris blinked, clearly not expecting the challenge. ‘Oh! Uh, there are some particular gaps in the software, is the thing…’ She looked down at her PADD and began to scroll. ‘Most of the systems in the facility are what you might call “locally sourced;” that is, acquired right here on Oltanis IV.’

‘How sustainable,’ drawled Nallera.

‘Which means that the basic software is Federation in origin. Modified and updated and with various other programmes plugged in,’ said Falaris, nodding quickly. ‘That’s actually a really smart move by Kanem because the encryption protocols are second to none. But they’re also fifteen years old – so, Federation systems segment their networks into modular subroutines to compartmentalise data, but the older models don’t have the adaptive feedback loops the new ones do, and if I inject the right data strings through a legacy API they never patched -’

‘Okay!’ Cassidy waved a hand. ‘Point is, you can bust open their systems, and Rosewood ain’t actually qualified to question you. Is he?’

Rosewood sighed deeply. ‘I wanted to check,’ he said tersely, ‘because if the lieutenant can’t get in, then this entire plan is bust.’

‘She can get in,’ said Cassidy bluntly. ‘Any other questions?’

Ranicus had been standing by the door the entire time, and raised a hand sharply at this. ‘One: is this legal?’

A silence fell over the room. Nallera turned her head after a beat. ‘Uh, it’s a chop shop for xBs. They put out bounties on them to be brought in alive, before they cut them up, rip out their implants, then murder them, and modify and sell.’

‘According to whom?’ Ranicus’s expression didn’t move.

‘I mean, Gravik told us,’ Nallera said.

‘We don’t need Gravik’s testimony,’ Rosewood butted in. Cassidy’s methods for extracting intelligence off Gravik could be glazed over in a report explaining how they moved on from lead to lead. It wouldn’t stand up to the scrutiny of a legal inquiry.

‘Then what do you have?’ said Ranicus. ‘Lieutenant Falaris identified clustered life-signs that might indicate detainees on the sub-level, but you -’

‘I saw them.’ Rosewood looked Ranicus dead in the eye. ‘When we were on the factory floor.’

This was a lie. There had been the suggestion of remains. Stains that might have been blood, might have been oil. Devices that definitely were implants taken from a body, but potentially acquired from elsewhere. A cluster of evidence that mounted up to treat Kanem’s operation as a chop shop for the purposed of intelligence and investigation. Not enough to give the order for a strike.

Seeing it for themselves was something else.

It was unclear if Ranicus believed him or disbelieved him. She stared him down for a moment, then looked at Cassidy. ‘If that’s all in order,’ she said, voice holding a clear warning, ‘then I’ll get to the bridge and identify a dense patch of atmo we can park ourselves in to run systems hot enough for transporters and transmissions without getting noticed.’

‘Good,’ said Cassidy.

But Ranicus paused again, and looked at Q’ira. ‘There is no way she can participate in a deliberate assault on a target like this. You know that, right?’

Cassidy’s hands came up. ‘I’m not an idiot, Commander. I’m not arming and equipping her to go into a shootout with these guys. There’s things I can justify on Kalviris in a pinch. This ain’t that kind of pinch.’

‘It’s not,’ Ranicus agreed. ‘I’ll let you make your preparations.’

Once she was gone, Cassidy turned back to the other four. ‘She’s right that we can’t screw this up. We pull it off, and we’ve taken a bad player off the board to acquire critical information. We get it wrong, and we’ve gone off-mission to start trouble with whatever consequences we stir up.’

‘Not to mention,’ said Nallera, ‘we’re completely screwed in finding Aestri.’

‘Not to mention,’ Cassidy agreed with a brisk nod. ‘Get some sleep, Rooks. Mission launch is 0100 local time.’

Rosewood waited until the others had left, staying lounging back on the seat. Cassidy clearly noticed this, and stood with his arms folded across his chest, glaring right up until the doors shut behind Nallera and Aryn.

‘What now?’ Cassidy growled.

‘I just lied to justify this op.’ Rosewood stood. ‘Because Ranicus is right: this is impulsive and we’re in danger of going way out of our mission parameters.’

‘You’re doing what you have to for the team.’ Cassidy’s shoulders eased. ‘That’s what a Rook should do.’

‘You mean I’m covering for you.’

Cassidy scoffed. ‘Don’t act like this is just for me.’

‘I don’t -’

‘You’re Mister Smart “I Read People” Good,’ Cassidy sneered.

‘First of all, that’s a terrible nickname -’

‘Because you’re being shit at it. Take an ounce of that talent and put to good use.’

‘How?’ Rosewood’s jaw dropped. ‘So I can figure out how Kanem feels when we take his entire operation off the board?’

Cassidy grabbed his PADDs and turned off the holodisplay. ‘No,’ he said simply, calmer now, colder. ‘Completely wrong direction.’

Then he left, and only once Rosewood had been stood on his own for about three minutes did it click.

When Aryn opened the door to his room, he looked worn, tired. He’d shucked the outer layers of his field gear, stripped down to the base t-shirt and work trousers, tops and jacket and boots ditched in a pile. ‘What?’

Five minutes ago, Rosewood would have been taken aback by such an uncharacteristically terse response. Now, veins fizzing, he all but pushed past Aryn so the door could shut behind him and give them privacy before he turned and said, ‘You’re an xB.’

Aryn froze. Rosewood had been sure he was right, but the hesitation, the visible calculation of whether to deny, gave him all the answers he needed. ‘Cassidy didn’t -’

‘Cassidy didn’t say shit. But it’s true, isn’t it? It’s why you hated being in there. And it’s why…’ Rosewood rocked back on his heels. The spark in him wasn’t anger or betrayal, but the sense of putting a puzzle together. ‘I thought your record was weird – why would you go from R&D to field work? But I assumed you’d been recruited during that section that’s massively classified, but you were assimilated –’

‘John, I wasn’t trying to lie.’ Aryn’s voice came in a rush, eyes widening. ‘Most people don’t know. And I did my homework before you came aboard, and I know your father was gunned down on Frontier Day -’

‘My father,’ said Rosewood, now a little light-headed, ‘was replaced by a Changeling.’ When he’d told Tiran – or who he’d thought was Tiran – it had felt like he was dragging the words out of him. That felt like a million years ago, though, and now the truth spilt more freely than he expected. ‘So if I’m going on a roaring rampage of vengeance, it’s not against you.’

‘Oh.’ Aryn’s shoulders dropped. Then, ‘I’m sorry. That’s really awful.’

‘It is, isn’t it?’ Rosewood’s nose wrinkled. Voicing feelings was often painful, forcing them to the light where he had to experience every sensation, every anguish of them. But there was a simple power to having that pain acknowledged he often underestimated.

It still didn’t mean he wanted to linger, eyes raking over Aryn. ‘How come – I’m sorry, I’ve barged in here to make accusations, and it’s none of my business.’

‘No, I suppose… I need to get a better poker-face. I’m the one who’s been lying. Ask away.’

‘How’ve you been able to hide it?’

Aryn sighed, eyes going to the ceiling. ‘I was one of the lucky ones. Highly responsive to treatment, possibly due to Ardanan maturity rates. Doctors were able to regrow a lot of what was… replaced. So there’s no visible implants. Some scarring. I sleep normally. I’m not sure I’d be in this job otherwise; it’d just make me a target.’

‘But going back to R&D wasn’t an option,’ Rosewood surmised. ‘Not with the level of clearance they’d need to give you to do it like you used to.’

‘There’s that,’ said Aryn, rolling his shoulders, ‘and I’ve got debts to pay. It was Cassidy who got me out.’

I got you out of that forsaken lab, I got you out of that inquiry where they were gonna hang you out to dry, I gave you purpose when the galaxy was about to spit you out, Rosewood remembered Cassidy snarling at Aryn in the dark on Kalviris. Perhaps Aryn did mean Cassidy had been instrumental in freeing him from the Collective. But that was probably not the whole of it.

Rosewood let out a slow breath. ‘I’m sorry I was going to make that deal with Kanem.’ He meant it, he thought. But it wasn’t the whole reason he said it.

‘You didn’t know,’ said Aryn with a shrug. ‘You may think Cassidy’s going off the deep end. But he does look out for us, you know that? I don’t know if he’d have asked me to be party to that.’

Or, Rosewood mused, he gets to do what he wanted anyway, but pretends it was out of respect for you. ‘Does Nallera know?’ Aryn nodded, and Rosewood’s lips twisted. ‘I bet Q’ira doesn’t.’

‘No,’ said Aryn lightly. ‘I didn’t tell the Syndicate runaway my darkest personal secret.’

‘Hey. I didn’t either.’

Aryn gave a gentle, wry scoff. ‘It at least explains why you’re wound so tightly. I understand. But Kanem… I don’t need to explain why what he’s doing is disgusting, I hope. He may not be our mission. But there’s no reason we can’t do a little bit of good along the way.’

‘Good,’ Rosewood echoed. ‘It gets easy to lose sight of that, doesn’t it, sometimes? The outcomes of our missions. When we’re right in the middle of the dirt, there isn’t good or bad, there’s just… objectives.’

‘I find that’s a time for trust. Trust in leadership. Trust in the team.’ Aryn looked him up and down. ‘You should try that.’