Special Investigations Division
Withdrawal
by Travis Anderson
(michelluthien@hotmail.com)

Withdrawal

Phaser blasts scorched the corridor walls. Sparks and molten fragments of metal fell to the floor. Thick smoke filled the narrow walkway. Two figures were barely visible through the acrid fog as they returned short burst of return fire.

"Well, this is great." Brin Macen grumbled as he ducked back behind the corner he was sheltered behind. Phasers lit up the hallway, filling it with more smoke.

"It could be worse." T'Kir yelled at him from across the corridor, "They could have captured us by now."

Macen wasted a scornful glare that she couldn't see. He watched as T'Kir stepped out from behind her corner and released a volley of fire at their pursuers. The response was far more vigorous than previous attacks. Their opponents were growing more confident. T'Kir rattled of a string of particularly nasty curses as she wheeled back around the corner. She brought her hand up to her mouth and tried to moisten a fresh burn.

Macen snapped of a couple of quick shots before retreating. He studied T'Kir for a moment. Her wound seemed superficial enough. He shook his head while wearing a wry expression.

"What?" T'Kir mumbled while still sucking on her hand.

"Wouldn't it be stupid if this is the mission where we finally get killed?" he asked.

T'Kir snickered. She could see the irony behind his question. They'd survived as rebels in the original Maquis fighting the Cardassians for several years before the Dominion drove them into Federation space. Decades before that, Macen survived the assimilation of his homeworld by the Borg. She'd survived the slaughter that decimated the pioneer colony of her youth; a world made up of Vulcans and Romulan defectors.

Macen had been revealed as an operative for Starfleet Intelligence. After their capture, he'd been shuttled off to participate in covert operations against the Dominion while she'd languished in a mental hospital. They'd been reunited two years later when Macen had been recalled to conduct a raid into Romulan space to confirm or deny the existence of a secret prisoner for Federation dissidents. Macen had then agreed to participate in a new Special Investigations Division of Starfleet.

T'Kir joined him. Their very first mission had nearly ended in disaster. As it was, Macen had discovered that the new Division had been created to try and curb Section 31's appetite for a greater role in shaping the Federation. That knowledge had spurred his team on to overcome greater challenges.

That role had brought them here. Not that this particular here held any attraction for Macen. Frenip VII was a harsh, forbidding world. Oppressive overlords had ruled its citizenry for nearly five centuries now.

A bleak world with no remarkable industries or natural scenery to speak of, the only draw for off-worlders was the mere fact that as long as the native government was given a percentage of the profits, any activity was legal. Various criminal enterprises made Frenip their base of operations. The Federation, and most of its allies, wanted these criminals stopped. Since Frenip had no official ties with any of them, there was no legal recourse to turn to.

Starfleet Intelligence had long dallied with the idea of planting agents within the various organisations and having them deliver comprehensive lists of allied holdings. These holdings would then be seized. This would cause the criminals a great deal of grief and hamper their operations while they tried to recoup the losses as well as plug the security leaks. The manpower required would have been staggering.

With the Federation Council screaming for action as a result of a well-publicised and embarrassing theft of a colony supply ship, these plans had been reviewed again. This time, however, Admiral Amanda Drake of the Special Investigations Division had been privy to these discussions. She'd forwarded all the notes to Macen and let his team chew on it for awhile.

When Macen had sent his team's appraisal and recommendations a week later, she'd laughed at the simplicity of the thought process that had led to their conclusions. The problem had always been that Starfleet always looked at the various organisations and enterprises as separate entities. They wanted to collect the data and collate it back at Starfleet HQ in San Francisco. That was unnecessary since the Frenipian government had already compiled the data.

In order to insure that they received an accurate slice of the profits, the Frenipians insisted that the various cartels file complete records of their various holdings, both on and off planet. Drake had been amazed by the notion until she read the attached file regarding an old Earth bureaucracy named the IRS. She shook her head and breathed a prayer of thanks that modern Federation economics, though far from simple, had at least done away with the tax collectors.

Further evidence that we may actually be an enlightened society, she mused to herself. She'd shrugged off the thought and resumed reading. Macen's contention was that a small team would penetrate the Frenipian's Tax and Treasury Building, copy the necessary files, and depart. It would have to be a physical extraction since transport inhibitors shielded the entire capital.

The inhibitors originally resulted from a cultural bias against converting flesh to energy and vice versa. It contaminated the lines between flesh and spirit. These seemed to be surprising sentiments from a culture dependent upon forced labour and the taxation of alien criminals. Drake knew better than to judge the planet's ethics from her own native bias. The Frenipians had their own reasons behind their beliefs and foreign disapproval generally cemented these positions rather than loosening them.

Macen had originally balked at conducting the raid himself. Drake had persuaded him his team was the best equipped. They had experience and the means. No one in Starfleet could match T'Kir's skill at cybernetic manipulation.

Macen and his team had come to Frenip on the premise that they were looking for new clients for their blossoming cover careers as privateers. They'd arrived a week ago. The first part of the week had been spent in endless hours of meetings with various government and cartel officials. Macen and his second, Rab Daggit, had attended to the meetings. T'Kir had used that time to access the information she needed for this raid and planned it with the assistance of the newest team member, Radil Jenrya.

Macen watched T'Kir as she fired off another salvo at their pursuers. Observing her in action illustrated Vulcan's past. Except for the smoothness of her brow, she could easily be mistaken for a Romulan. Not many could explain the genetic drift that caused Romulans to have a more pronounced forehead then their Vulcan cousins but its lack was the only obvious indication that T'Kir was Vulcan rather than Romulan.

"What?" she demanded as she spun back around the corner, noticing his scrutiny.

"You should have expected a secondary alarm." He replied.

"How was I supposed to know?" she growled.

"You're the hotshot cyber genius." He retorted, "You're supposed to expect things like that."

"The rest of their tech base is a joke." She shot back angrily, "I didn't think they'd have an AI guarding their tax records."

"Considering how paranoid they are about these records," Macen said wearily, "I expected stronger security then we've hit so far."

"Then what are you complaining about?" she demanded as she angrily snapped off a couple of more shots.

Macen turned around the corner and fired off several bursts. The pistols were outwardly identical to those issued to the Bajoran Militia. The Militia had been more than delighted to equip Macen's team with pistols and rifles.The phaser could be set on the typical "stream" fire pattern, or with the flick of a switch, converted to a pulse pattern. A third setting allowed the weapon to fire plasma blasts.

He checked the chrono at his wrist. Everything should be set now. The only delay now was gauging what their adversaries were up to. He depressed the release button on the side of his phaser's grip and the nearly expended powerpack slid out of the butt of the pistol.

He slapped a fresh pack in as T'Kir announced, "More company's coming."

He knew her information was derived from more than her incredible hearing. T'Kir was an incredibly sensitive telepath. Being denied proper training in how to deal with that gift had resulted in the mental instabilities that had plagued her throughout her time in the Maquis. Adding a Vulcan's natural emotional turbulence to the mix had only heightened her confusion and exasperated the problem. Once the war with the Cardassians ended, Macen had finally had the time to do some research and stumbled upon both the root and a treatment for her problem.

The original treatment had been herbal. Now, he and T'Kir spent a great deal of time together bolstering her mental shields. She had melded with him and discovered the source of the mystique that El-Aurians seemed to exude. Macen's people could sense shifts in the time-space continuum.

As with Vulcan, El-Auria had a past steeped in the blood spilled by those that abused this ability. As with Vulcan, the El-Aurians had rejected the actions and philosophies of the past and had forged ahead with a pacifistic mindset. That mindset had attributed to their assimilation by the Borg. Now a few thousand survivors were scattered across the Milky Way.

Macen pulled a cylindrical device out of one of the thigh pockets of his pants. T'Kir winced, "That's going to be loud."

He depressed the arming mechanism, "Brace yourself."

He threw the cylinder down the corridor. It landed with a metal "clank" and rolled down the hallway. Its progress echoed as the guards ceased firing and stared at it in bewilderment. Behind their corners, Macen and T'Kir crouched as low as they could and plugged their ears.

A blinding flash of light filled the corridor followed swiftly by an energy wave. The noise was tremendous, rattling their teeth. The entire building shook as a subsequent shock wave passed through it. Macen and T'Kir rose from their crouches as soon as the building stopped vibrating.

"Damn." T'Kir muttered, "That was certainly loud enough."

"It was also very effective." Macen commented sombrely, surveying the damage wreaked by the bomb. It was expected that Daggit and Radil would be excellent demolition techs, it was part of the "augmented" training Angosia had indoctrinated him with and her Resistance upbringing had naturally included explosives. In addition, the team engineer's enthusiasm for building such devices was frightening to behold since it produced unorthodox weapons like the one just used.

Hal Dracas had utilised a technique first pioneered by his people while mining on Ardanna IV. The bomb was essentially a sonic emitter with a nuclear battery as a power source. Equipped with a gyroscope, it could direct its output towards any selected direction no matter how thrown or placed. In this case, they'd aimed it downward.

Macen and T'Kir stepped into the corridor and briefly gazed at the gaping hole carved through the building. A hole had literally been punched through it, descending past ground level. It was a dramatic, one use weapon that Macen was suddenly relieved no one else had conceived of yet. T'Kir's whistle caught his attention.

She had an awe-struck expression in her face, "Wow."

"Tell me about it." Macen agreed ruefully, "C'mon, we'd better get going."

"Hopefully the computer's still working," She commented, "because I think we just blew all the other exits up."

Macen covered the corridor with his phaser while T'Kir pried an access panel out of the T-junction where they'd made their stand. The two dead-end stretches merely led to storage closets. The access panel possessed the controls for a "hidden" rooftop exit. The panel was dented by the blast and Macen just hoped it was still functional.

T'Kir pulled a padd out of a utility pouch on her belt. She stretched a fibre optic cable to a dataport. She began typing furiously. A few scant moments later the door's lock clicked as it released.

"Piece of cake." She said smugly.

"Don't get cocky." Macen warned, "We never did get solid numbers on how many guards could be stationed on the roof."

"If they haven't peed their pants by now after that explosion, I think the sight of us charging at them with phasers drawn should discourage them from being overly aggressive." She said confidently.

"You've already underestimated them once today." Macen reminded her, "Don't get shot doing it again."

She stuck out her tongue at him and turned back to the door, "You ready?"

"I'll be right behind you." He assured her.

She gave him a wink and pressed the button that opened the door. The door disengaged with a hiss of pneumatic pistons pushing it away from its recessed place in the wall. It swung open on massive hinges. The light outside was bright.

T'Kir waited a moment while her secondary eyelid dropped into place. With her eyes prepared for the ambient variance, she stepped through the door with her phaser cradled in a two handed grip. She took several steps out and then spun and fired at the ledge above the door. A Frenipian groaned and fell.

Macen stepped over the still form. His eyes and readied phaser swept the rooftop. His comm badge beeped. Macen ignored it. He was only to speak if they had to abort the pick up.

He could see two Federation Type 19 shuttles approaching the rooftop. Both of them had their boarding hatches open. The inability to use transporters had forced them to utilise shuttles for the extraction. The plan was based on the pursuit and required precise synchronisation to work.

The lead shuttle stopped and hovered thirty metres over the rooftop. Radil stood in the hatchway. A harness kept her tethered to the shuttle. She cradled a large phaser rifle in her arms and her features bore a hungry expression.

The second shuttle came in on an approach. Daggit began to lower himself from the hatchway using the same harness Radil wore. Unlike Radil, Daggit only wore a sidearm and it was holstered. He needed both of his arms in order to accomplish his task.

T'Kir began running for the edge of the rooftop when the first phaser blast whined through the air. A dozen or more guards were emerging from a rooftop hatch. Several had already fanned out and were firing at the exposed privateers. Macen thumbed his phaser to staccato mode and returned fire in pulse like bursts.

Radil opened fire from her shuttle. The heavy rifle was also designed to fire in burst patterns. Its greater power gouged swaths into the roof. Debris flew into the air around the guards.

T'Kir stopped at the edge of the rooftop and waited with her arms outstretched. The shuttle bore down on her. Daggit glided mere centimetres above the rooftop straight for her. She went limp just moments before he collided with her, swooping her up in his arms.

The shuttle's pilot, Hannah Grace, immediately began to pull up from the building and accelerate the shuttle. The human worked with precision despite her concern over her Vulcan friend's safety. The team's medical officer, Kort activated the motor on Daggit's harness and reeled them back in. The burly Klingon then helped them back intro the shuttle.

Kort used a tricorder to inspect T'Kir for injuries while Daggit took the data crystal she'd copied the records to and headed for the shuttle's co-pilot station. He plopped into it and fed the crystal into the computer. With a grin he announced the data was intact. Grace returned the smile and pushed the shuttle's impulse engines to maximum velocity.

"Now!" Macen yelled at his comm badge, "Bring the shuttle in now!"

The shuttle lowered itself towards the rooftop. It was level with the roof but several metres distant from it. The pilot was Hal Dracas. The engineer began his piloting experience by building his own impulse craft as a youth. Macen idly wondered when they'd discover any limits to Dracas' uncanny abilities.

Radil ceased fire and stepped out of the way. The guards' view was still obscured by the debris cloud. Macen ceased fire as well and broke out into a sprint for the shuttle. He leapt off the rooftop ledge, landing safely in the shuttle.

Without waiting for orders, Dracas powered up the impulse engines and began their ascent. Radil closed the hatch while Macen scrambled for the co-pilot station. The sensors revealed what he'd expected, and dreaded. The Frenipians had scrambled atmospheric impulse craft after them.

"Don't worry." Dracas reminded with a carefree grin, "I flew raiders like that for years as a kid. I know a few tricks to get away from them."

Macen nodded already hearing about some of the Troglyte's youthful exploits. He could almost hear Radil's anxious desire to fire upon her pursuers. The Bajoran was an ardent supporter of the "offence as defence" strategy. The problem was that neither of the minuscule shuttles had any weaponry. They had basic shielding, but nothing that would withstand a beating.

The hawk-like interceptors were faster and more manoeuvrable in atmospheric conditions. The wedge-like shuttles would be at disadvantage until they cleared the planet's gravity well and employed their stubby warp nacelles. Even with a maximum speed of only Warp 2, they'd quickly outpace any sub-light craft. They just had to survive that long, or have another plan.

Macen checked the sensors, "Just give us five minutes of breathing room."

"Would you settle for three?" Dracas asked wryly.

Macen grinned despite himself. Dracas began a series of evasive manoeuvres. They weren't designed to elude the pursuant craft, only prevent a long-range weapon's lock. A few of the more impatient pilots released a few volleys, but to no avail. With luck, they would pass the barrier before the craft could effectively target the shuttle.

The shuttle lurched as the first phaser blast assaulted its shields. Macen ignored it, remaining focused on the sensors. Another blast followed another. Warning klaxons began to sound. Macen remained absolutely still until the sensors gave him the readings he'd waited for.

Sporting a victorious smile, he slapped his comm badge; "Macen to Defiant, beam up all personnel."

The shuttle's passengers disappeared in a shimmering glow as their molecular structures were converted to energy. The shuttles exploded shortly thereafter as the pursuing Frenipians scored lethal hits on the computer operated shuttles. They were informing their superiors of their victory even as their quarry broke orbit.

Macen and his teammates materialised in the starship's main transporter room where Lieutenant Ro Laren of the Bajoran Special Forces and the current Head of Security for DS9 awaited them with a triumphant smirk, "Made it I see."

"What'd you expect?" T'Kir joked, "We're just too damn good for our own benefit."

Macen noted Grace and Kort's enthusiastic agreement alongside Daggit and Radil's cooler reaction. Dracas nodded but his eyes burned with intimate knowledge of the price of mistakes. His vile treatment at the hands of Andergani pirates had been a direct result of underestimating their abilities. The chirping of his comm badge ended Macen's mental berating of his errors over the course of that mission.

"Macen here."

"Frenipian Custom cutters have surrounded the runabout you left in orbit." Elias Vaughn's voice reported, "Do you want to employ the fallback contingency?"

Macen smiled thinly. Elias Vaughn had served in Starfleet's Special Operations and as a Strategic Operations Specialist for as long as Macen had been with Intelligence. The difference being Vaughn was human. An unusually canny human to have survived so long in such a dangerous speciality.

"Yes." Macen replied, "Blow the ship."

A slight pause prefaced Vaughn's next comment; "The ship's destroyed." Another pause and then, "Two shuttles and a runabout, this is well above your usual damage tally Macen. You must be slipping in your old age."

Macen grinned, "Must be."

Vaughn and Macen had had a solid working relationship for decades. The easy camaraderie they enjoyed had come as a slight surprise to Vaughn's latest superior, Colonel Kira Nerys. Kira had not been as surprised by Macen's friendship with Ro, knowing of their mutual exploits with the Maquis and behind the lines during the recent Dominion War.

The good Colonel had been annoyed to discover that she was not cleared for the details of Macen's mission. Macen suspected that her annoyance stemmed more from Ro's involvement than any lack thereof on her part. The uncomfortability between Kira and Ro came as no surprise to Macen. The recent years had affected quite a change in the Colonel, causing her to regard her own past with the Resistance as something to be whitewashed.

Ro presented a living reminder of Kira's own days as a terrorist. Coupled with Ro's natural aversion to authority and personal charisma, she immediately posed a threat to the fledgling authority of the newly appointed CO of the station. Macen knew that Ro had come to a crossroad of her life and merely needed time to adjust to her newfound circumstances. He hoped fate would grant the time needed for two such indomitable women to reach an accommodation.

"So," T'Kir asked with a tinge of impatience, "are we done here or what?"

Ro rolled her eyes as Macen grinned, "We're done. After action reports are due, but not until we reach DS9."

Some under the breath grumbling came in response to that news and Macen retorted, "What? That still gives everyone...."

He looked expectantly at Grace and she quickly offered up, "We won't reach the station for a minimum of fourteen hours. At proscribed regulated speeds the transit time is increased to twenty-six hours."

Macen smiled at Grace's bright enthusiasm, "See... plenty of time to rest up and get bored enough to write up your reports."

"And what exactly will you be doing?" T'Kir asked with an arched eyebrow.

"Exchanging technical data with colleagues." He replied simply.

Her expression soured somewhat but she shrugged, "Okay." She turned to Grace, who'd been assigned her cabin mate on this trip; "I get the shower first."

"Whatever."

"Hey, who did all the physical work here?"

"Not you."

Macen grinned at Ro as the voices descended down the corridor. The rest of the team followed, offering their observations and comments. Ro shook her head after a time. She gave Macen a dubious look.

"I can't believe she's still with you."

Macen's eyebrow rose, "Why is that?"

"Besides the fact she once tried to kill you?" Ro remarked smartly, "She's unstable and disloyal."

Macen frowned, "Most of her instability stemmed from her uncontrolled telepathic abilities. Having every person in sight broadcasting his or her thoughts like a loudspeaker would drive me little insane as well. That's being treated."

"Blocking her ability may produce a short-term solution, but it doesn't do anything for the long-term problems. Her psyche has to be scarred from enduring not only the savagery of the Maquis struggle but enduring everyone else's trauma as well." Ro stared intently at him, "She should be institutionalised."

Macen shrugged, "She was. It didn't seem to be doing any good. At least with the team she seems to want to address those issues."

"I wish I was worried about just her issues." Ro admitted, "I'm more worried about you."

"Me?" Macen asked warily.

"What is there between you two?" Ro opted to forgo subtlety, "Are you sleeping with her? Are you attracted to her? Is she just a fling after Lisea or what?"

Macen's visage darkened, "She's a friend Laren, like I thought you were."

"Brin, I'm asking because I'm your friend." Ro explained, "We've lived, laughed, cried and spilled blood together side by side. I know what your like and how you can get. Without someone to ground you, you're a loose torpedo seeking a target."

The anger slowly melted from his face and he nodded, "I know that. T'Kir is a comrade that's all."

"That's not what Lisea thought." Ro reminded.

"She never spoke of it with me." Macen said, "I only knew after she left for the Daystrom Institute. She merely told me she was tired of the life she was leading and she had to make a change."

"That change was either the absence of T'Kir in your life or hers." Ro explained.

"She has that absence now."

"She would have preferred to stay." Ro informed him, "But under those terms."

Macen shrugged, "I don't know if that could have been arranged."

Ro shook her head, "Your sense of loyalty is going to leave your miserable. You're no longer in Starfleet. You can direct your own future here."

"I've lost the sense of where it's going." Macen admitted, "I'll have to think over what it is I want to have happen."

"Just remember the universe isn't just going to wait for you to make up your mind." Ro said, "Life is going on while we're sitting here. Be sure of what you want and that it's still available."

Macen nodded soberly then grinned, "That being said, how's your job on DS9 going?"

Ro rolled her eyes, "You going to throw my words back at me, aren't you?"

"Could I possibly resist?"