TSD: 3049-10-04 — Local: 17:28
Galatea, Galatea System — Continental Route 7 (Rolling / Post-Choke Cut Security Formation)
The convoy moved again, but it moved like it had teeth now.
Spacing tightened. The security arc stayed disciplined. Engines held a steady, controlled pace instead of the jittery surges of frightened drivers. Dust hung in the late afternoon light behind the trucks in a long, muted ribbon that made the whole column look like a single organism crawling across bad land.
Kel kept the Zeus at the rear anchor—last in line, door shut behind the convoy.
He didn't chase Coda. He didn't hunt the retreating silhouettes on the ridge.
He held the shape of the convoy and made sure it stayed unbroken.
Because the only thing worse than an ambush was a panicked convoy after an ambush.
"Mara," Kel said over comms, voice calm. "Status."
Mara's reply was crisp, controlled. "Decoy crate secured and resealed. Not opened. Prisoners are contained in the command van's rear compartment. I'm pulling data from the node and the truck transmitter now."
Kel: "Good."
Hess came in, voice tight. "We're bleeding time."
Kel answered evenly. "We're buying clarity."
Hess didn't like it, but he didn't argue again. That was progress.
Elin's voice cut in, cool and practical. "One prisoner has a burned hand and shock symptoms. I stabilized him. If you want answers, don't let him spiral."
Kel: "Copy."
Sienna's voice came in last, from the left flank, wind noise faint behind it. "Coda stayed with the ridgeline for another two klicks, then broke west. He's keeping distance. He's not running hard."
Kel's tone didn't change. "You saw his pattern."
"Yeah," Sienna said. "He checks. He commits. He withdraws when it stops being clean."
Kel: "Good. Fall back to flank. Don't overextend."
Sienna hesitated—just a fraction—then: "Copy."
Kel cut the channel and let the convoy's noise fill the cockpit again: the hum of his fusion plant, the gyro's steady whisper, the faint complaint from the left hip actuator that Tessa kept watching like a heartbeat.
He breathed once, slow.
Then he moved from holding the line to tightening it.
"Convoy," Kel said on the main net, calm and absolute. "We do not stop again unless I call it. Drivers stay in cabs. Security maintains formation. Hess—keep your men quiet."
Hess replied through clenched professionalism. "Copy."
Good.
Now came the part Kel trusted less than armor.
Words.
---
TSD: 3049-10-04 — Local: 18:04
Galatea, Galatea System — Continental Route 7 (Command Van / Rear Compartment)
The command van's rear compartment was cramped, hot, and meant for equipment—not confessions.
Two grab team men sat cuffed on the floor with their backs against opposite walls. One kept his eyes forward like a training manual. The other kept glancing down at his bandaged hand like he couldn't believe it had betrayed him by hurting.
Frey sat on a folding bench near the door, guarded, small in his own skin. He looked like a man who'd learned the difference between "easy money" and "dying for someone else's plan."
Elin stood near the injured man, arms folded, gaze sharp. She didn't threaten. She didn't comfort. She simply existed as a fact: Stay alive long enough to talk.
Mara sat at a small bolted-down table, tablet connected to the transmitter node by cable. Her stylus moved in short strokes. She'd built a map of signals and timestamps like a spider building a web—silent, patient, lethal.
Hess hovered, restless, trying not to look rattled in his own van.
Kel's voice came over the internal comm speaker from the Zeus—no heat, no impatience.
"Start with the simple thing," Kel said. "Who hired you."
The uninjured grab team man didn't answer.
Kel didn't react.
He let the silence stretch until it became uncomfortable enough to feel like pressure.
Then Mara spoke, still looking at her screen. "Your truck node has a payment routing code," she said. "Not a name. A routing code tied to a shell account. That shell used MRB-style structuring to hide the payer."
The man's jaw tightened.
Kel's voice remained calm. "So you're not here for Vantrell's cargo. You're here for someone else's."
Still silence.
Elin's gaze shifted to the injured man. She didn't touch him, but her presence made his breathing hitch.
Mara tapped her screen once. "Your node's handshake format is… deliberate. It mimics ComStar discipline without being ComStar. Whoever built it wanted it to look like a clean system."
Hess finally snapped, unable to hold it. "Is ComStar involved?"
Mara didn't look up. "I said it mimics them. That's not proof."
Kel's voice cut in, steady. "We don't guess. We confirm."
The injured man finally spoke, voice rough. "We were hired through a broker."
Kel: "Name."
The injured man swallowed. "No names. Dead drop instructions. Timing windows. Pickup point."
Kel didn't push emotion into it. "Where."
The man hesitated.
Elin's voice went flat. "If you don't talk, your hand infection will be the least of your problems."
Hess grimaced. "That's—"
Elin didn't look at him. "It's true."
Kel's tone stayed even. "Answer."
The injured man exhaled, defeated by the fact that none of them were bluffing for ego.
"Galaport City," he said. "South side. Cargo district. A cold storage warehouse. Code phrase at the door."
Mara's stylus paused. "Code phrase."
The man's eyes flicked to her. " 'Window still open.' "
Mara wrote it down without comment.
Kel's voice stayed calm. "Who gave you the phrase."
The injured man hesitated, then said quietly, "Coda."
Frey made a small sound—like a sob stuck behind his teeth.
Kel spoke next, and his voice didn't soften, but it didn't sharpen either. "Frey. Look at me."
Frey flinched, then forced himself to meet the comm speaker like Kel was physically in the room.
Kel continued, "You're going to testify to the MRB liaison that you were approached by a man calling himself Coda and told to adjust timings. You're going to say it cleanly. You're going to say it once."
Frey's voice shook. "They'll—kill me."
Kel's reply was immediate, calm certainty. "No. They won't."
Frey swallowed. "How do you know?"
Kel didn't explain. He simply gave structure. "Because you're not alone anymore. You stay inside our perimeter until this contract ends, then you go straight into MRB protection. Mara will file it. Hess will validate it. You follow instructions, you live."
Frey's eyes watered. "O-okay."
Hess muttered, almost bitter, "MRB protection isn't a fortress."
Kel's voice stayed level. "It's better than the open road."
Mara finally looked up. "Kel," she said, controlled intensity in her eyes, "I've got something."
Kel: "Say it."
Mara turned her tablet so Elin and Hess could see.
A list of timestamps, bursts, and routing hops. Then one line highlighted.
REFERENCE TOKEN: HARROW-ENGAGE / ADDENDUM-6HR
The compartment went still.
Hess frowned. "Harrow… that's you."
Frey looked like he'd been punched.
Elin's expression didn't change, but her eyes sharpened hard.
Kel didn't speak for a full breath.
Then, calmly: "Explain."
Mara's voice stayed professional, but the weight underneath was real. "The node stored partial token strings. Whoever programmed the system labeled the operation with internal references. One of them matches the timing of your father's addendum filing—six hours before engagement. And it uses your family name as a tag."
Hess stared. "That could be coincidence."
Mara shook her head slightly. "Not in machine labeling. Not with this formatting."
Kel's voice remained steady. "So Coda's operation isn't new."
Mara nodded. "It's connected."
Kel felt the cockpit around him tighten—not physically, but in meaning. His father's last job. The addendum. The lien. The trap.
And now a professional grab team using the same internal reference pattern.
Kel spoke with the same calm as always, but something colder had settled behind it.
"Coda didn't choose this convoy randomly," Kel said.
Mara's reply was quiet. "No."
Hess exhaled through his nose. "Then what's in the real crate?"
Kel didn't answer him.
Because Kel didn't know.
And because admitting ignorance was acceptable—guessing wasn't.
Instead, Kel asked the only question that mattered.
"Why use my father's tag," Kel said.
The uninjured grab team man finally spoke, voice low, resigned. "Because it's an inheritance problem."
Mara's eyes narrowed. "What does that mean."
The man swallowed. "Someone wanted the asset tied up. Kept in dispute. Kept… contained."
Hess barked, "The Zeus?"
The man didn't confirm it directly. "The pilot. The machine. The name. Doesn't matter. They wanted it unavailable."
Kel's hands stayed loose on the controls. His breathing stayed steady.
But the answer hit like a slow, heavy step.
They weren't just stealing cargo.
They were shaping a future.
Mara looked back down at her tablet. "Kel," she said, "there's one more token."
Kel: "Say it."
Mara highlighted another partial string.
CODA / GALATEA-MRB / ARBITRATION-SPOOF
Hess went pale. "They were planning to spoof MRB arbitration?"
Mara nodded once. "Or claim they did. Either way, they're using merc bureaucracy as a weapon."
Kel's voice was calm. "That's how they killed my father."
No one argued.
Because no one could.
Kel continued, quiet and controlled. "We finish the contract. Then we go to Galaport City. Cold storage warehouse. 'Window still open.' "
Hess snapped, "That's outside the contract."
Kel's tone didn't change. "I'm not asking Vantrell to pay for it."
Hess stared at the comm speaker like he was looking at a man he didn't understand. "You're nineteen," he said. "You should be scared."
Kel replied, calm certainty. "I am. I'm just not ruled by it."
A long silence.
Then Hess exhaled, the sound of a man accepting reality. "Fine," he said. "But if you drag my company into a war—"
Kel cut in, gentle but absolute. "Your company is already in it. You just didn't know."
Mara's tablet chimed softly again—data continuing to unravel.
"Kel," she said. "The receiver vehicle Sienna tracked? If it pings again, I can hard-lock the direction."
Kel: "Do it when you have it."
Elin finally spoke, crisp. "And keep the prisoners alive."
Kel: "We will."
Then Kel's voice shifted to the convoy net—still calm, still dominant, still controlled.
"Convoy," Kel said. "We're moving. No delays. We finish clean."
And the trucks kept rolling, unaware that their escort contract had just become something else entirely:
A thread tied back to a dead man's last job.
A name on armor.
A trap that hadn't finished closing.
---
Investigation Log (Mara Saito — Continuity)
Grab team admits brokered hire via Galaport City cold storage warehouse
Code phrase: "Window still open"
Node tokens recovered:
"HARROW-ENGAGE / ADDENDUM-6HR" (links to father's last contract timing)
"CODA / GALATEA-MRB / ARBITRATION-SPOOF" (suggests planned manipulation of MRB/arbitration processes)
Assessment: Operation is part of a longer-running scheme involving legal leverage + controlled interdiction