Space Odyssey: Spectre-Chapter 151: Next Lead

Jace frowned after the ship lurched. He shook his head in disappointment. It was such a waste. Those stations were not just Requiem technology. They were pieces of technology that had existed before the Requiem were wiped out. Not even right before but years before, that was how old the technology was. ƒгeewёbnovel.com

The Requiem probably did not even notice the stations that were still in the system. He would have to ask Solisa about it at some point but from the schedule on the station it appeared to have been evacuated prior to the eradication of Requiem. That means the technology in those stations were not as advanced as anything else they had encountered that the Requiem left behind.

Pockets of technology the Requiem left behind were mostly weapons and other things useful for war. But this was some of the first technology that was not intentionally left behind that they found.

Jace began walking past the recovering workers who had fallen. He walked out of the hangar. He had many things to do. But for now he had to start with what he obtained from the station. From the residual data to the schematics of the station, he had to get the info out of his armor before he removed it.

As he walked through the halls and passages of the ship he encountered a few unconscious crew members. People were getting up or waking up as he passed by them.

Eventually he walked into the Ready Room where Taylor was sleeping. Except now she was picking herself up off the floor while rubbing the side of her head.

"Ow ow ow. What the hell was that? One second I was sleeping peacefully, the next I was on the floor." Taylor complained and then looked over as Jace walked in. "What are you doing back here? I thought you left for the station in the anomaly system."

"I did." Jace pulled off his helmet. He looked at Cain who was sitting on his haunches by the holotable. There was the holo projection of the system he was just in was being displayed. But instead of it showing the blackhole that was there it was instead showing a glowing white oval with lines of white going toward the oval from other parts of the system. "What happened after we left the anomaly system?"

"I am still trying to figure it out. But I have sent all the data we collected to Solisa. She might know what is actually going on." Cain informed Jace while ignoring Taylor. "The only other thing I have to report is that Taylor was only able to get about thirty minutes of sleep before the rapid warp woke her up."

"Rapid warp? What happened in the last thirty minutes? Why is Jace back?" Taylor asked as she stood up.

"Go to your room and sleep. We have the time for the moment." Jace told Taylor as he walked up to the holotable and started looking through the data and information he had collected. "I doubt Solisa will know much. As far as I can tell this will be a new phenomenon even by Requiem standards."

"Is there anything else I need to do?" Cain asked as he stood up. "Ember is going to need help with the aftermath of the rapid warp."

Jace condensed a digital file and put it in a hardware disk. Then Jace handed it to Cain, putting it in Cain’s mouth which he opened up. "Those are possibly corrupt files. Use caution, when browsing them. There was a virus on the station that Lord Hoodwink left behind."

Cain nodded and quickly moved out of the Ready Room, followed quickly by Taylor who was quietly trying to ask Cain more questions. But Cain kept telling Taylor to get some sleep first.

Now that they were gone, Jace decided to focus on what he needed to do. Setting aside the schematic of the station in his personal folder in the ship’s systems. It would be useful later when they developed a new station. But for now it was of no use aside from studying it for inspiration.

What he needed to do was find a lead on Lord Hoodwink. So far they had been following a lead that the Inquisitors managed to pull together while Jace was training. But now it was his time to take all of the information they had accumulated and find a new lead.

He pulled up the data and information they obtained from their investigation. The first was the info from the smuggler on Nymph, the various orders that he was involved in. The next was all of the information they had stolen from the Labyrinth. Unfortunately he did not have access to the rest of the stuff that Director Fenrir was collecting. Then there was the information they had collected from the Requiem Station, but he would not be able to use that until Cain cleared it all.

All of the information filled the holotable. Jace absentmindedly began removing his armor as he looked over the information. For the next several hours he sorted and connected all of the information. At some point the engineers came and collected the armor. They took a moment to yell at him about the damage to the internals of the armor. But Jace just waved them off while he continued to work.

After several hours he yawned and looked at Taylor who walked in. She was wearing a goofy pair of pajamas. She was not the only one to come in. Vana walked in with her along with the captain of the Anvil, Hammers.

"Hey, thanks for coming." Jace waved at them. He had contacted them earlier because he had organized the information and found a lead. So he had Taylor waken up and had the others brought here as well.

"Jaaacccceeee." Taylor groaned. "Why did you wake me up? I did not get enough sleep." Taylor stumbled into a seat and hunched over. "I should go back to sleep."

"You can afterwards." Jace told her and turned to Hammers who sat in the front row next to Vana. "What happened to the Judas?"

"The forced rapid warp caused severe damage. They are on route to get repairs. Then the plan is for them to come back and observe the aftermath of the collapsed system." Hammers answered.

"Okay, well then it will just be us." Jace nodded and tapped the holotable console and the image changed from the complex interconnecting chart to a picture of a man of asian descent. "This is our new lead. His name is Qwan Lee, he is a former member of the Vexical Military Commandos based out of the Vexical System."

"Why is he relevant to our investigation into Lord Hoodwink?" Vana asked as she leaned on one of her arms. Memorizing the image on the holotable.

"Qwan Lee, did not quit. He was dishonorably discharged. Then he was supposed to be arrested but he fled the country. He was suspected of assisting in the kidnapping of several citizens and killing the officers in charge of investigating the crime." Jace began explaining.

"So he ended up being the culprit?" Taylor asked half heartedly.

"Yes, but he fled the country. But from the information I have gathered he is one of the contacts of Lord Hoodwink. He is currently based out of the Oda Empire, apparently working as the head of a gang." Jace told them.

Hammers frowned and growled. "We are going to the Oda Empire aren’t we?"

"Yes we are. I know we are tepid allies with their current monarch. So we are going to have to ask permission. Fortunately he is not the only resource that Lord Hoodwink has there. From what I know he has several other contacts. But Qwan Lee is the only one we can legally arrest and detain." Jace explained as he sent an order to Hammers communication device.

"Good, I will get this started. It looks like you need some sleep yourself. Was there anything else that you needed to tell us?" Hammers asked.

"Actually," Jace nodded and hit the buttons on the console a few times. "While I was working the director reached out to me. What she found was more troubling than what we ever thought."

Vana frowned, "how bad is it?"

"We thought he was only some mad scientist. But he is a former royal of the Imperium. One that decided to make our nation’s his playground. Along with this information, several corpses and bodies of children were found in the Labyrinth. The bodies are not just from one race. Woltar, Leonair, human, Uris, just about every race we know about aside from those of the Victorium." Jace pulled up another picture and they sucked in air.

"What a fucking monster." Vana cursed with a look of disgust on her face.

"So what tortures should we do to him?" Taylor asked, she completely woke up. It seems seeing the pictures woke her up completely.

"Nothing, I will just kill him." Jace responded.