Chapter 17: Showdown

~~ October - Week 42 & Tychy Week 7 ~~

They all nodded yes and started to stand to head out.

“Wait, everyone,” Lee said. “Stand over here with Sean and me. We will take you up, there is too many of us for the lift, and it’s quicker.”

They all moved to stand near her. The wizards made sure everyone was touching and blinked them up to the diner. They all arrived in the diner safely.

Unfortunately, they surprised the hell out of the eight soldiers who were covering the exits from the room. One of them reacted to a supposed threat by pulling his weapon then the trigger before realising they were the crew.

The bullet just grazed Dye as Zan tried to pull her to him. She screamed in pain.

No one saw Lee move. One moment she was beside Sean and the next, she had her wand under the soldier’s chin and pushing up into it. Lee snarled at the soldiers, “Drop your weapons immediately.”

The other soldiers looked at their Lieutenant. They had held off shooting not being in good positions when the people suddenly appeared. They had also reacting better to the incident. The Lieutenant was still trying to work out from where the people had come from.

Sean barked at the soldiers, “You heard her. Soldiers, drop your weapons, NOW.”

He was the senior officer in the room, so they obeyed. “Form up here now,” barked Sean again. They moved fast. Except for the guy, Lee was still holding. She frog-marched him over to the group.

“Did you forget how to salute an officer?” Sean barked at them. Lee pushed her man into the formation, and he quickly came to attention and saluted Sean with the rest of them.

Sean addressed the Lieutenant, “Well! What do you have to say for yourself? You have come armed onto a civilian vessel and allowed the discharge of a weapon?”

The poor guy was not long out of the academy, and he was staring at a Captain and a Sergeant with a million medals on their chests. He had heard the stories about these guys, and he was at a loss as to what he should do.

Fortunately, for him, Colonel Flag and the rest of the dignitaries turned up. “What is the problem, Captain Watson?” he asked. He was not happy to have overheard Sean interrogating his troops.

Sean and Gary were already preforming their salutes and the other soldiers soon following their lead. Sean said, “Sir, a member of this troop discharged a weapon on a civilian ship, Sir.”

Colonel Flag looked at the Lieutenant, “Is this true?”

The unhappy Lieutenant said, “Sir, yes, Sir.”

“What happened here, Lieutenant?”

“Sir, we were manning the exits as ordered. Then they just appeared in the diner. One of the men reacted instinctively and open fired, and he wounded a civilian, Sir,” he said.

Colonel Flag asked, “What the hell do you mean they just appeared here?”

The Lieutenant looked at Sean, hoping he could explain how the hell they all appeared in the middle of the diner.

“If I may, Colonel. We wizards can teleport, Sir. I believe we took the men by surprise when we appeared in the dinner,” Sean explained.

“What the hell do you mean ‘we’ wizards?” Group Captain Rohan Bligh asked.

“Oh sorry, Sirs, didn’t we tell you? I am a wizard too?” Sean said innocently.

Duke Lindsay intervened, “Just how many wizards are there in here?”

“Four,” said Lee before Sean could answer. Sean looked at her. He didn’t contradict her. An ace up your sleeve was a good idea when playing with cheats. Zan and Essco had already disappeared to sickbay with Dye, and not many people knew of his new status. So technically, there were only four wizards ‘in here’.

Captain Clark stepped up to the officers. In a very pissed-off voice, he snarled, “What the bloody hell do you people think you are playing at? This is a civilian ship. You have no legal right to have armed soldiers on my ship without my permission unless you have a court order to arrest me or then. Do you?”

The officers looked at him and then each other. He was correct. They had been ordered to bring them back but had no court orders, to arrest anyone. Their bosses had just assumed the say-so of UNSEC as their employers would be enough clout. They could arrest the Army personnel but not the Captain of the ship or any of the scientists at this point.

Colonel Flag groaned. This was turning into a complete cluster fuck. He went on the defensive, “We told you we were bringing soldiers aboard.”

“Yes, you did, but you assured me they were just a ceremonial guard. Not that they were armed. Why were they given orders to guard the exits of the diner when you were not even in this area?” Captain Clark asked, still mad as hell.

Colonel Flag didn’t explain but said, “I apologise, Captain, we should have asked your permission to bring armed men on to your ship.”

“Tell that to the young woman who is also a visitor on my ship and who got shot,” The Captain said in a very tight, angry voice.

“Captain is the young lady all right?” The Duke asked. That was all he needed. An inter-galactic shit-fight with the very people he wanted to deal with.

Lee responded “Thank you for asking. I believe it is a flesh wound. However, the young woman is also pregnant, and her fiancée’s, Professor Essco and Prince de Nar, are not happy.”

“Prince de Nar?” he asked. ‘Oh, just great they shot a bloody Prince’s fiancée,’ he thought.

“Yes, the gentleman Professor Essco proposed to last night is the Souvenir Prince of Ogilhinn. It is on the continent next to mine, called Queland. We were discussing trade agreements between our nations when they met. Now I’m going to have to appease him, thanks to you people,” she said haughtily.

“Hang on you said your continent? What do you own?” Sir Nash put in.

Lee looked at the men. It was showtime, she decided. The faster they knew the status-quo, the better. It may also put off all the bullshit of them trying to arrest her people. She didn’t want anyone else hurt.

“Gentleman, I think it’s time we talked business. Please come and sit,” Lee indicated the group of tables, which has been set up.

The Captain deliberately headed to one end and Lee the opposite. The four men and the lawyers sat on one side and Sean, Nicko, Philip and Kyle sat on the other. They had agreed earlier who was to sit in and who were to be spectators.

The rest of the crew took seats around the outside of the table area. No one had told the visiting soldiers what do, so they sat to one side, also as interested spectators.

Nash realised the rest had taken seats and not cleared off. “Do we need the spectators?” he asked Captain Clark.

The Captain looked at the people, “Anything we say involves them, so yes we do.”

Andre’ appeared and his people put jugs of juice and water on the table as well as plates of nibbles. This kept people occupied while they waited for Essco and Zan to come back and take the other two seats.

“How is she, William?” Lee asked with concern. She hated that she couldn’t predict random acts.

William glared at the people on the other side of the table. He was livid. He wanted to thump the living shit out of the lot of them. Zan put his hand on his arm and sent a calming force at him. It was not easy as he was equally upset at his lovely Dye being shot.

William took in a deep breath and let it out. He looked at Lee and the others. It helped that they were obviously concerned about him and his family. He was reluctantly starting to like this lady.

“Fortunately, it was a graze. Lady Dye will end up with a scar, but thankfully, the moron missed her stomach. The doctor said she is to rest as he doesn’t want the fright to make her lose the twins.”

The poor soldier who accidentally shot her paled. He was in a lot of shit.

Essco didn’t tell them Dye told them to, ‘Go out there and fuck those bastards over’. Fuck his girl was real a scrapper, she was spitting mad. She was magnificent.

Lee got the thought, and agreed Dye was a hell of a lady.

She stood and looked at the visitors.

It was time to get down to business. Lee teleported her chest from her room onto the table in front of her.

The visitors jumped when it appeared. Now they all knew how the crew had appeared in the diner. Lee truly did have magical powers. The visitors found this reality, very disconcerting.

“Gentlemen,” she said firmly. “I realise you came in response to the probe Captain Clark and Captain Watson sent you. However, some new facts have come to light since then. You will find that while I can beat the bush with the best of them, this is not really a political issue. You are here to discuss business.”

She looked at them again and then opened the chest. She pulled out a sheaf of papers and handed it to the Duke. “These are copies of the resignations of the crew and scientists which had been employed by UNSEC.”

“You will notice they were signed twelve weeks ago. However, they missed getting sent on the probe you received. You will find a copy is on the one which was sent three weeks ago.”

“Unfortunately, the young lady who was shot also happens to be our Banking and Contracts expert on this planet. Fortunately, Dye’s father is here. He is the manager of the B&C Office in Futura, and he can verify their existence.”

Haf stood, he riffled threw them and looked at the documents and then handed them to Mark. “Yes, I have seen these documents and can verify the crew did sign them without duress.”

Lee looked at the Duke. “Duke Lindsay, do you agree that the crew and scientists did resign, in accordance with the contracts that they signed?”

“No,” he said. “They agreed to come out here and do scientific research for the company and come back. The crew signed on for the whole voyage.”

Lee had expected this response. “Mr van Holton this is a copy of my contract, and that one is of Professor Philip Goldsmith’s. While I concede, he did agree to write a paper for the company on his findings. I can’t for the life of me find written anywhere in either document, that either of us agreed to go back. Your opinion, please, sir?”

Mark looked at the contracts. They were standard employee contracts. In fact, nothing was written in them about going on the voyage or coming back. “Didn’t you sign one specifically for this voyage?” he asked.

Lee looked at Philip, and he stood. Philip said, “No, I didn’t. I was already employed by UNSEC like everyone else here. Someone on the hiring committee mentioned a special contract, but I never got it and never signed anything else.”

There was general murmur around the room, and everyone confirmed that they too had never signed another contract. The Duke looked at Nash in disgust, “Well, what happened to the contracts, I remember approving them, and then they went to you?”

“They already had contracts,” whined Nash. They were, in fact, sitting in a box in his office gathering dust while they waited for him to get around to them.

Mark couldn’t believe their stupidity, “That was not very professional or smart of UNSEC to not get them signed. Duke Lindsay if they, in fact, resigned twelve weeks ago as the documents given to us suggest. Then the people running this ship are no longer your employees.”

“But we haven’t received them. So, it doesn’t count,” he blustered.

“Captain Clark I assume you are aware of the resignation documents? And is your contract the same as theirs?” Mark asked.

Captain Clark nodded twice and said “Yes.” He was glad Mark had phrased it the way he had, as he didn’t wish to outright lie unless forced too.

“Duke Lindsay, the only person here whom you currently employ is Captain Clark, and as you have now received his documentation, he is only your employee for seven more days.”

Lee was amused that she was using their lawyers against them. “Thank you, Mr von Holton.” Lee went on, “Colonel Flag, I believe you have already received the resignations of the Army contingency?”

“Well, about that...” he started.

“Colonel Flag did you or did you not, receive them?” Lee pegged him with the steel in her voice.

“Yes, we did receive them, but...” he tried again.

Lee handed copies of Sean and Gary’s contracts over to the Colonel. “Are these correct copies of the contracts signed by the Army personnel? I can get the rest if you wish, but I believe they all say the same thing.”

Colonel Flag looked at the contracts, and as far as he could tell, they were. He reluctantly handed then Mark when he gestured for them. He too looked them over and nodded, “Yes, they are the same as the ones I have.”

“Thank you, gentleman. Then under that agreement by you turning up with replacement staff and Captain Clark resigning, they are free of the Army correct?”

Colonel Flag flustered, “Well it’s not as simple as that. They need to come back to Earth and hand in their weapons. They also need to undergo sociological and fitness tests and be debriefed.”

Bentley stood, “That’s a load of crap Vincent, and you know it. If you want sociological tests, then I’m quite sure Ulani can supply them, and Dr Yates can supply the physicals.”

“As their commanding officer, you can receive their weapons and do the debriefing as well as anyone. You admitted you had their resignations, so they are now ex-army,” he sat back down.