Tying Up Loose Ends.

Excerpt From dossier on STOWAC Alpha Squad;

'Operation Shadowed Hand is commenced at 0400, Completion at 0405 due to target extermination prior to arrival.

Personnel on site report massacre of all hostiles within the facility. Hostiles were all reported eliminated from behind or unaware of the situation.

At command center Lieutenant Wright of DELTA squad was found alone accessing intelligence from the central mainframe, traces of interrogation were found in a side room as well as the bodies of multiple high ranking members of the Fist of Justice terrorist group.

This is the third recorded account of Lieutenant Wright acting without orders and taking down facilities rated for full squadron deployment, there are a further twelve suspected sites where his present is thought to be the cause of destruction.

No reprimand will be given, though he has been placed on maximum priority watch as a possible unstable element by High Command. Further designated call sign 'WRAITH' has been added to his personnel file.'

STOWAC Unit on board ARK Andromeda

". . . ABORT! ABORT! ABORT!" The figure hearing the communication and immediately changed his direction heading down a separate corridor, away from medical, heading out of the STOWAC area and towards the EVAC site.

Three corridors later and the figure felt his heart rate slowly calming and his breathing settling, taking a quick look over his shoulder he saw that the corridor was clear and released a deep sigh.

"Shit, control was a complete quick shot, no way they knew what we would be doing, the guy was probably just looking out across the way one last time." The figure was grumbling to himself as he rounded the last corner to the EVAC. Two steps later his head snapped up and took in his surroundings, emptiness, and silence greeted him.

Looking around for the shuttle that was meant to be in the place he noticed a team member standing in the shadow of the opposite doorway staring out at the open hatch after a fading exhaust trail.

"Hey! What happened, why did they leave us behind?" The Figure asked approaching his teammate. The figure standing by the hatch turned towards him slowly. As the first figure saw the face of the figure turning towards him he froze for a fraction of a second, before collapsing to the floor with an expression of disbelief painted across his features, and a small hole just off from the center of his head slowly leaking out a small bead of crimson red liquid.

"They really were taking us too lightly." The shadowed figure sighed as he turned back to look at the fading trail of fumes. "Well our leaving gift will at least let them know not to fuck around too much." the figures face slowly broke into a mischievous smile, cold enough to freeze hell.

Leaving the hangar bay the figure headed back towards the Medical Bay of the STOWAC unit, his figure slowly fading into nothingness as he left. Anyone seeing this would swear they saw a ghost or phantom fading into nothingness.

UEG Military Command District 1;

". . . ABORT! ABORT!" The hole of the command center went quiet at hearing the abort code.

A figure sitting on a centrally raised dais in the command center slowly looked toward the display before him showing the status of all team members as well as the feed from their retinal cameras.

The display showed twenty different operative feeds, as well as their current heart rate and brainwave activity, fifteen of the twenty, were located outside the ARK looking on the Gate the STOWAC members had just stepped through, the other five had hurriedly shifted their course heading towards their evac point.

A short time later, just as the figure on the dais was about to give the order to switch to the secondary objective five of the exterior operative feeds greyed out simultaneously. Before the figure could ask for a sitrep the other ten exterior feeds greyed out as well.

"WHAT the HELL is going on!" the figure roared looking at the now greyed out feeds, which showed only a still image of the exterior operatives EVAC point.

"Unknown sir their feeds died almost simultaneously and the attacker was never on screen." a figure sitting further into the room replied, as they rewound and replayed all the footage from the greyed out feeds.

"Send out the order for alternate EVAC points, we can't lose any other men." the figure in the center commanded as he stared even more fixedly at the remaining displays before him.

"Foxtrot this is Central, change to alternate EVAC, I repeat change to alternative EVAC, Acknowledge message." another figure in the room called over the comms as they to stared at the video feeds before them.

Ten seconds later the figure called again, "Foxtrot this is Central, change to alternate EVAC, I repeat change to alternative EVAC, Acknowledge message." anxiousness now tinged the figure's voice as they watched the first of the video feeds to reach the EVAC point and head towards the waiting shuttle.

"FOXTROT this is Central, ABORT EVAC! I REPEAT, ABORT EVAC!" the figure commanded almost screaming down the radio. But the video feeds showed no change, now four of the five remaining members had made it to the shuttle and emergency pre-flight was complete, they were only waiting on the last operative Foxtrot 1.

The room was now entirely focused on the video feeds inside the shuttle, all the hearts and minds in the room were praying for the EVAC to go without a problem. Suddenly there was a slight shift from one of the feeds before the four winked to grey one after the other.

Everyone present in the room felt their hearts slowly crumble as they watched a figure walk through the cabin of the shuttle to the cockpit, they never saw the face of the figure but they could all tell who it was, they had seen the same figure walk through the boarding gate less than five minutes ago, the figure bent over the console in the cockpit before slowly slipping out of the shuttle, moments later the feeds all showed the shuttle rocketing out of the hangar and heading into the void of space before slowly making a turn and heading towards another part of the system.

"FUCK! How? How did he move so fast and so stealthily!? How could he find and takeout so many undercover operatives before they could respond?" the figure on the central dais raged as he stared at the final feed, hoping by some miracle that the remaining operative would find something wrong and run.

Thirty seconds later, the whole room watched as the final operative walked straight towards his death, unable to do anything about it, and cried as they saw the figure turn and look towards them, moments before the last display greyed out.

"Commander the shuttle is heading directly towards HQ, what measures should be taken?" a figure sitting in front of a display asked as he turned towards the dais.

"If it is following the programmed EVAC course then leave it be if it deviates take control remotely and correct course if that fails shot it out of the sky, we can't risk any damage to the habitats." The figure on the central dais responded.

Just as the figure below was about to responded an alarm started to blare out in the room.

"ALERT! ALERT! A large number of heat sources detected across all habitats, scans indicate activation of antimatter warheads in fifty-three locations across the habitats, calculating current damage potential."

The atmosphere in the entire HQ hit absolute zero instantly, everyone breaking into a cold sweat that made everyone shiver.

"Damage estimates are for direct atomization of ninety-nine point nine percent of the habitats belonging to UEG, civilian and cultivation habitats are likely to only suffer minor damage from debris." The computer in the HQ gave its' damage estimates in its' cold mechanical voice.

"FUCK! Where the hell did all of these warheads come from?" the figure on the dais yelled as he looked at the display of blast zones before him. Before a response could come, the display immediately changed to the picture of an office located elsewhere in district one.

"General, I assume you have an explanation for the council on why there are armed warheads on our habitats?" a cold voice came from a figure seated at the round table before him.

"I do not know Speaker, we have just learned of them ourselves, but if I had to take a guess it would probably be an insurance policy of the leader of STOWAC." the Figure on the central dais growled out as civil a manner as possible.

"And how exactly would they be able to activate an insurance policy General, when you assured the council that they would be dealt with upon boarding?" The Speaker asked, with venom dripping from his words.

"The 'Wraith' seemed to have discovered traces of our men, either prior to boarding or at the site of the operation itself, he then proceeded to eliminate the entire team before activating the warheads. I don't know how but those were the best men we had outside of STOWAC, they had been trained according to the same regime as was listed in the STOWAC guidelines and no-one else in our forces could match them, but it seems that we have underestimated the remnants of Alpha Squad, as well as their abilities." The general replied with a tired sigh while looking towards the faces of the seated figures before him. Just as the Speaker was opening his mouth the figure who was tracking the shuttle spoke up.

"General the shuttle has entered District one Airspace according to the pre-programmed route, however, the readings that our scanner is getting do not match the readings of the shuttle itself. Our scanners indicate that the shuttle is carrying almost a tonne of extra weight, while the shuttle and all of its cameras only show the bodies of our men." the figure said as he fed the display to the General's display as well as the council.

"General shot that craft down now before it can get any closer to the council chambers or the military district." The Speaker changed what he was about to say immediately, his face taking on a grim look.

"Unfortunately, Speaker that is no longer possible, defenses can't lock onto it inside District one due to a large number of civilian transports in the air at the moment, and if we give a grounding order, they could detonate whatever is inside that shuttle, at the current altitude, even if it was only Standard explosives that are issued to STOWAC it would still cause a mass breach, venting all atmosphere in district one. The only thing we can do is let it land, set up a containment field and hope for the best, because if that is not explosives but another warhead that has been shielded then nothing we do at this point in time can save this habitat." the General replied with an expression more fit for a man staring at death, than in control of all of humanities forces.

The expressions of the council suddenly took a far more pallid tone as the words of the general sunk in. Just as the Speaker was about to respond again a voice cut into the conversation.

"This is Marcus Wright Commander-in-Chief of STOWAC, we have determined that the actions taken against STOWAC were an act of terrorism and have responded accordingly, if all parties involved have not surrendered and presented themselves for trial by the relevant authorities by 10h00 hours today we will erase them from the habitats through force. A list of all involved, as well as their crimes, has been submitted to the central Judiciary A.I. for processing and judgment, the result should be out shortly." The voice that uttered these words made the atmosphere freeze even further, while the eyes of the General and the Council bulged out and their faces flushed red with rage.

"YOU DARE!" The Speaker roared as he slammed his hand into the table before him. "We are the rulers of Humanity and we determine who is guilty or innocent, Judiciary overrides Alpha, one, five, eight, Omega, nine, six, nine. Remove judgment filed by STOWAC Commander-In-Chief Marcus Wright and delete all files and records." The Speaker said in a confident and commanding voice.

"Override command denied, Code suspended due to charges, the requirement of all echelon one personnel to rescind judgment." a mechanical voice replied, causing the confident and proud expressions of the Council to suddenly turn to despair.

The Echelon One personnel included the Council, The Commander-in-Chief of the Human Military, the General in the control room, and the Commander-in-Chief of humanities only Anti-terrorist/Enforcement Unit, STOWAC. The realization that nothing could be done lead everyone listening to a deeper level of despair.

"Judgement rendered, all involved in the act of terrorism committed by the attempt on the lives of remaining STOWAC members, have been found guilty of treason and terrorism, warrant for arrest issued to all relevant bodies, Armed drones ordered to capture onsite, termination of resisting elements authorized." The mechanical voice announced, as all the current feeds for the council and control room switched to an arrest warrant for everyone involved in the plan for STOWAC.

The different rooms that everyone involved in the plan were in went into lockdown mode, doors became inoperable and lights cut, all electricity and ventilation cut off, leaving all of those inside in confusion and despair.

"Well I think that removes the need for these then, A.I. zero one, control rights granted on items x-ray one through Zulu twelve, please disable and remove with drones." Marcus's said to the central A.I. for management of humanities habitats.

"Control rights received, orders given. Safe travels Commander, and may you find your safe haven in a new world." The voice from the central A.I. was vastly different from before, sounding far more feminine and refined. There was even a hint of sorrow in it.

"You're coming with us in a sense G.A.I.A. no need to get sorrowful on me," Marcus responded as he headed toward the briefing room. A smile on his lips.

"In a form, or in a sense I might, but though it is me, it I not at the same time, we would not be connected, and therefore I would not be with you," G.A.I.A. responded.

"We shall see, G.A.I.A, we shall see," Marcus said just before cutting the comms and walking through the briefing room door.

"That we shall Wraith, that we shall," G.A.I.A. said, her voice unheard and unnoticed in the vastness of space.