Personal Log - Commodore Levine-Grant, Dani, Zett, Smith - Preparation - Earth, XI

Posted on Sat Oct 4th, 2014 @ 9:43am by Commodore Andrea Levine PhD & Danielle Atarah

1,038 words; about a 5 minute read

Mission: Are You Touched?

"Listen to me, Andrea, this is really important," Dani approached the sitting woman carefully and crouched in front of her, pulling the dead screen away gently. For a moment, it didn't budge, held strongly in the older woman's hands as if it was her tether to reality. In some ways, it was. A better reality, a reality that if Dani's plan goes well enough, will come true.

"I know you're angry at me, and I know you're scared," Dani continued, finally plucking the screen away, putting it aside, insisting on grabbing Andrea's gaze. The Commodore took a breath, closed her eyes, wiped the tears away, and relented, looking at the young engineer with weary eyes and a fair amount of mistrust.

"I know that you're worried," Dani swallowed, trying to hide just how much that mistrusting gaze hurt her, how much it broke her heart all over again. How much she knew she deserved it.

"But this is important. There are things that are about to happen -- big things -- things that will change everything else, and you have to get ready. The children have to get ready."

The mention of the children finally snapped Andrea back to reality. Her eyes opened wider, almost angrily, as she glared at Dani intently. Dani had to control herself from recoiling.

"Here's what is going to happen, and what you need to do," Dani began, and despite her mistrust, and reservations, weariness and worry, Andrea Levine-Grant listened.

* * *

"Holy fucking crap."

Half a day passed, the sun climbing up to the center of the blue skies and making its way downwards again, slowly, above the brilliant glass hue of the city, before Zett, Dani and Smith met again, privately, in their secure shuttle.

Once again the shuttle whooshed by in a twisted circular path, and once again, machinery hummed, signaling the place was secure from eavesdropping.

They each proceeded with their own piece of the plan independently for most of the past few days, and today was the start of the end. Whatever they did up until now is either going to work spectacularly, or fail disastrously.

There was no turning back.

Smith lowered his hood completely to expose a sardonic smile that pierced through Zett so bluntly, she had to grab for the co pilot's chair and slump into it, her eyes wide.

"Well. That worked," Dani commented, a lopsided smile decorating her face. At least one thing did.

"I finished the pieces we needed on Cardello's computer core," she continued, pulling out a bag full of PADDs. "To be honest, I didn't really need to plant anything major. Tommy there was a busy bee. Half the things in here would get him in trouble with ninety percent of the syndicate, and the rest would damn him forever with at least three other organizations. There was one particular interesting piece that could get him in serious trouble with the Orion Syndicate," Dani shook her head, almost impressed, "but we can decide if we want to take it that far."

"Whatever we need," Zett muttered, still staring at Smith in disbelief. Smith seemed to enjoy the attention, and his successful execution of his side of things. "I'm glad you approve, Kalina," he gestured, and the smile that spread on her face was so horrified, it could have been featured in a 21st century horror flick all on its own.

"Kal, how were your meetings?" Dani prompted. Like Smith, she found Zett's response amusing, but they had much more urgent things to accomplish, and very little time.

"I, uh," the Trill stuttered, then shook her head to clear her thoughts. "I've met with a good contact from the Orion Syndicate," she scratched the left side of her forehead, and Dani wondered if the word "good" and "Orion Syndicate" should ever go in the same sentence. "Let's say he was very inerested in what I had to tell him. He took our encrypted PADD, in any case, and will show it to his bosses. I can't say he was too surprised, though."

Dani snorted. "Taking down Cardello seems to be easier than I thought. All we had to do, really, is just help him take himself down."

"Sure looks it," Zett nodded, but not entirely happily. She worked for the man for the past 15 years, and was one of his quite notable deputies for the better part of the past ten. If anyone knew about the dirty laundry, it was her, and very very few other people. They've shared a strong connection with him as teenagers, almost as a fatherly figure, but they were not teenagers anymore, and Cardello was no longer the criminal he was a decade ago.

The man had more skeletons in his closet than a sexually repressed politician. But it seemed that for Zett, the one thing that truly turned her off the man who played such an important, and rather fatherly, place in her young life, was his actions in the past five years.

He became ruthless, greedy, and narcissistic. His loyalties, seemingly intact, were what kept the syndicate as a whole from crumbling, and yet they were trampled on, repeatedly, by his whimsical need of control.

"The Ferengi Alliance doesn't seem to give a crap," Zett continued. "They were burned by him twice before, but their dealings were still profitable, so as far as they're concerned, they don't care who's up top. I'll be meeting with The Triad tomorrow morning, but we'll have to prepare a few more things for them. Same goes to the Crimson Eye, and the others."

Dani nodded, and then gestured at Smith with a smile. "That's his bit."

"Yeah," Zett nodded, and then shook her head. "I can't believe we're doing this."

"We are going to revolutionize the syndicate, Kalina," Smith smirked, and Dani recoiled, unused to the expression on the face in front of her, "you just wait and see."

"Yes," Dani agreed, taking a breath, and some confidence along with it. "Yes, we are."

And it all starts tomorrow.

* * *

Commodore Andrea Levine
Professor, Starfleet Academy
Dean of Astrophysics
Tenured Researcher, R&D, Starfleet Command
Federation-controlled Earth

Danielle Atarah
Grifter / Thief
Earth

Kalina Zett
Captain
Bristol Supply ship
The Cardello Syndicate

 

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