The Information Broker

Posted on Sun Jun 23rd, 2019 @ 6:55pm by Jaeih Dox-t'Aan & Az'Prel

Mission: Fractured Fairy Tales
Location: the Artan Family Fortress
Timeline: 2396 - After the Tribunal

Information brokers tended to be enigmas in the galaxy. Hard to find yet always available when you need them. And Jaeih Dox needed one now.

It was only a little over a week ago that her sixteen plus year sentence as a "guest" of Starfleet Intelligence had come to perhaps the most unexpected ending she could have imagined. The seventy-plus-year-old Romulan woman had been many things in her life leading up to where she now found herself. She had been a scientist. A soldier. An agent of the Tal'Shiar. A prisoner of her own people for betraying her government when she could no longer overlook its crimes. A smuggler seeking redemption. A mother. An indentured servant to Starfleet Intelligence for her knowledge of Romulan intelligence and Cloaking Technology. And now an independent operative of that same organization.

But in her heart, as she affixed the customized comm badge in the shape of the Romulan sigil of Al'hindor she had been given by Rita Paris over her left breast, she served not Starfleet Intelligence, but rather the crew and Captain of the U.S.S. Hera.

The Hera was her daughter Mnhei'sahe's ship, and in a very short period of time, she had grown to greatly respect the ship and her crew. Her Captain, Enalia Telvan, shared a long history with the former smuggler and had expended considerable effort to secure a pardon for Jaeih. The Hera's Commander, Rita Paris, placed her trust in Jaeih, and the elder Romulan woman greatly wanted to earn that trust.

So when Paris had asked if Jaieh could investigate the machinations the former Queen of the Artan pirate family might have in play against the Hera and Enalia, Jaeih volunteered on the spot. It was a worthy mission with a good purpose. She would use her skills to help protect her new and admittedly unlikely family.

As such, she found herself walking with purpose through the lowermost decks of the massive Artan family fortress with a purpose. Dressed in a black leather tunic and pants with a black overcoat covering her badge, Jaeih was seeking out an old friend.

And by 'friend', she meant the Bolean information broker Mornar Reian. In her days as a smuggler, she regularly paid Reian for information about Romulan and Klingon patrol routes that might impact her smuggling operations. And for the right price, he had never let her down. She hoped that that hadn't changed.

He wasn't expecting her, but the travel manifest she had hacked into on the station said he was there, and she hoped that he would be glad to see her. Or at least not shoot on sight. He was staying in a secured wing of the lower levels on deck 2,673. And as she approached, her hands balled as if carrying something, the room clearly had guards. Two massive and somewhat dangerous looking Naussican mercs were standing outside his door that she didn't recognize.

"Hold!" The taller of the two shouted down to her in broken standard. "Off limits, Romulan!"

"Not to me." Jaeih replied matter-of-factly as she walked up to them showing no signs of any fear. "I need to speak to Mornar Reian. My name is Jaeih Dox. He knows me, and I can make it worth his while. And I can make it worth your while to relay my request."

Years as a smuggler provided the elder Romulan with a sizable account of Latinum that had been sitting unused for years until just recently, when she reopened her hidden finances onboard the station. But the irritable Naussicans weren't in the listening mood.

"Go away. Or we MAKE you go away!" The second, slightly shorter brute growled in Jaeih's face. While she was sorely tempted to collapse his extremely vulnerable trachea that was just above her hands, see decided that tact was what was called for here, regardless of how awful his breath was.

With an exaggerated wince at his breath, she held her hand up and to the side towards the face of the taller guard, never breaking eye contact with the second. Opening her hand, she revealed ten strips of Latinum. "A simple transaction. You simply press the button and ask your employer of he will see me, and it's yours. I'm not asking for betrayal or any compromise of your duties. Just tell him I'm here."

The second guard straightened back up to tower over Jaeih as she folded her fingers back over the strips of Latinum and, in a smooth and controlled gesture, brought them back down and deposited them in her jacket pocket, where she subtly switched to something else that was hidden there.

The taller Naussican thought hard on the offer before bristling back. "GO AWAY OR DIE!

Rolling her eyes, the straight-faced Mrs. Dox let out an exasperated sighed.

Seconds later, from inside the chamber, Mornar Reian was startled awake in his private chamber by a flashing noise followed by the sound of two large forms falling to metal deck plates in the corridor outside. Leaping from his bed, Reian was a slightly portly Bolean wearing a dark gray robe as he pulled a disruptor out from under his pillow. After a brief moment, there was a buzzing sound as the security panel shorted out and the heavy blast door to his chamber groaned open.

"If you're ready to die, then by all means, step inside!!" The nervous information broker shouted from the darkness of his bedchamber in the windowless interior room on the Artan station. Jaeih stood with her arms at her sides, rimmed by the lights of the hall.

"I'd rather not die today, Mornar. I have plans this afternoon," the elder Dox called in to the chamber calmly.

For a long moment, Mornar Reian knitted his brow, locked on the familiar voice. Then, raising his weapon a hair higher, called back. "Dox? Is that you?"

As he spoke, he fumbled for the pad on the wall that turned the lights up in the chamber revealing the salt-and-pepper haired Romulan woman. Her hands crossed in front of her so he could clearly see the small hand stunner she was holding. An impact-based weapon that could incapacitate most with a light touch for a few minutes.

Looking, his eyes went wide and a slight smile crept up as he lowered his Repulsor slightly. "JAEIH DOX!" He shouted. "I heard you were here! Come in, come in! But put that on the table in the foyer there, if you will."

With a slight smirk, Dox placed the stunner down gently and stepped in and gestured with her head to the two sleeping guards. She had 4 more weapons hidden on her person that were far more useful than the stunner anyway. "I offered to pay them to let you know it was me, but they were adamant on being difficult. But they'll be fine. Eventually."

The Bolean lowered his disruptor and sighed. "Their loss. That seemed quite reasonable. They're… dogmatic… in their duties. But also usually better at it than that. Of course, you aren't exactly your average visitor, are you Jaeih? Look at you! Starfleet custody hasn't slowed you down, it seems."

"Well, I'm no longer in anyone's custody these days. But I never let my skills atrophy, if that's what you mean." The elder Dox walked over, hands folded behind her back as she slowly walked around the room.

"Well, as you may imagine, I have heard things. A little bird told me that you're running with the Princesses crew these days. That you worked with her to bring down the Queen Regent." The Bolean commented in a matter-of-fact fashion as he took a seat at a small table near the back of the room, gesturing at an empty seat opposite him.

Staying standing for a moment, Jaeih paced slightly. "It serves my purposes and secured my freedom. Plus, that woman tried to have my daughter assassinated. As you may imagine, that was somewhat motivating in regards to my wanting to see her head on a Pike."

Then the stern-faced Romulan say down, tenting her fingers before her. "Suffice it to say, I am happy she is no longer an issue."

"Well…" the Bolean information broker scoffed, "Don't expect to make many friends here with that attitude. The Queen was very good for the very worst kind of business. Some very shady individuals are… not enthusiastic for an Enalia Telvan rule."

In a mocking tone, Jaeih chuckled mirthlessly. "Oh… will you need to work a little harder to keep profits up and stay under the proverbial radar? What a pity."

No longer enjoying the exchange, Reian's tone got more serious and less playful. "So… vapid pleasantries aside… this clearly isn't a social call. What do you need from a… humble salvage dealer?"

Playing at this game is something Jaeih Dox did very well, and it was clear that nothing much had changed over the last sixteen years. "I need to find out what you may have… salvaged regarding the Queen's holdings. The princess has a vested interest in ensuring that there are no rugs about to be pulled out from under her."

The Bolean had a skeptical expression as he sat back, so Jaeih sweetened the pot with a very well concealed lie that she hoped she could convince Paris and the Captain to make into the truth later. "And she is… prepared to make certain… concessions and allowances for those that help her protect her interests."

Crossing her hands on the table, Jaeih leaned in slightly. "Which means that anyone in such a position would have a much greater flexibility in how they do business once the family is restructured. Or can you see no advantage in being the information broker that Starfleet looks the other way for?"

Thinking on Jaeih's words for a moment, Reian leaned in as well. "Promises for what… might happen… have little value with me, my dear. I would need something a bit more… tangible… to jog my memory here."

Leaning back, Jaeih slowly pulled back the lapel of her jacket showing her badge. As she did, Reian put his hand over his Repulsor cautiously. He was wary, but also nervous. He knew that if she wanted to kill him, that disruptor likely wouldn't say him. But he still tried to maintain at least the illusion of control.

As he watched, she tapped her badge three times in sequence and there was a light chirrup. "There. Check your account, Mornar."

Hesitantly, he leaned back and pulled a small data PaDD out of the pocket of his robe and began calling up information. After a moment, his eyebrow raised as he smiled lightly. Before he could say anything, Jaeih spoke.

"Your NEW Queen, Enalia Telvan, has resources beyond your imagination, Mornar. That is simply a good-faith down payment to ensure that information you may have on the former Queen Regent ends up in my ears." Jaeih leaned back over, her hands now closed on the table. The money that she had transferred with a pre-programmed comm signal was her own, but it was enough to convince the Bolean that she was serious.

"Is that… tangible enough for you?"

There was a moment of silence between the two before the greedy Bolean replied. "On launch pad 76 on the ventral port docking bay, there's a shipment that might be of interest to you. But you didn't hear about that from me."

"I have no idea what you're talking about, Mornar. I was never here to have heard anything, anyway." The two had played this game before, though not in many years, but little had changed. With nothing more to be said, Jaieh pushed back from the small table amd stood up with a professional nod. The Bolean information broker returned the nod and smirked slightly.

"You were missed, Jaeih. I'm glad to see you back." Mornar commented casually as Mrs. Dox made her way to the door to the chamber where the two Naussicans were just beginning to stir. Picking her hand stunner back up and slipping it back into her pocket, Jaeih looked over her shoulder and replied with a smirk not unlike the one her Daughter flashed at times on the Hera. "See who back?"

"Kreldanni feanna." Jaeih muttered, insulting the two pathetic guards in her native Rihan as she walked out past them. A few moments later, she was in a turbolift making her way to the level below Launchpad 76. From her back pocket she pulled out a small PaDD secured from the Hera's Intel department. Untraceable and monitoring the microdot transmitter she had placed under the small table she had been sitting with Mornar at. It had been nearly ten minutes, and the transmitter hadn't picked up any transmission from his quarters, meaning unless he woke the two Naussicans up and had them hand deliver a warning, he had not betrayed her, which was good. She would hate to sully her first official mission for the Hera by going back to beat Mornar Reian within an inch of his life. Mnhei'sahe and Rita might frown on that.

Probably more Rita than Mnhei'sahe, really.

After studying the stations shipping manifests, or at least the public ones, she arrived at a lonely, empty corridor beneath the the Launchpad in question, Jaeih used the small PaDD to perform a cursory scan of the level above her which revealed an inordinate amount of security and a magnetic shield to prevent beaming In or out for what, on the official station manifest, was nothing more than a shipment of industrial grade durasteel shuttle plating.

Pacing about for a few minutes, her curiosity was spiriling. Commander Paris was convinced that Arenara Artan had, no doubt, a plethora of schemes and plans put ib place in the event of her loosing the Tribunal, dead or alive. And based on the hint given, there was likely something of great interest on that cargo freighter set to depart that very evening.

As such, the recently freed Intelligence operative had little time to concoct a plan to get on that ship to find out why it was important. Making her way to one of the station's many data access ports located throughout the complex. Meant to simply provide basic information, she used her PaDD to manually patch into the stations schematics. It was data she could likely get Captain Telvan to get her, but in the moment she was operating on old but still sharp instincts and she was admittedly anxious to prove herself and her skills to Rita Paris. So instead of asking, she meticulously navigated the station computers security system and after nearly thirty minutes of avoiding firewalls and circumventing digital tripwires expertly, she had downloaded a map of the stations access tunnels, electrical conduits, ventilation systems and even waste systems.

Unlike a starship,some parts of the station were antiquated enough to still use plumbing. But Jaeih had no intention of crawling through Hnaev for this mission. Not when the cargo freighter was parked in a cargo bay with three ventilation shafts and two maintenance access tubes.

The scans she had made revealed no security sheilds in place in any of the bulkheads as that would show up on security scans and let the Artan security know that something secret was afoot. And while she couldn't walk in the front door, she could hack her way into the maintenance substation one deck above the hangar bay. And after a quick message back to the Hera, she was on the move.

Changing her cloths for a pair of maintenance coveralls in a locker in the maintenance substation, which was currently unmanned, it was simple enough to squeeze her slender frame into the maintenance tube and climb down a deck and see her way into the secretive hangar bay. She moved slowly and quietly, careful to not trip any sensors or alert anyone to her presence. Sitting in the near totally darkness as she observed the four guards walking in a tight pattern around the shuttle, memorizing every detail she could see. Their height, speed and more importantly, their very lethal disruptors. But she had no intention of fighting anyone this day.

As Jaeih watched, she heard a chime.come from the main hangar entry doors that captured the attention of the guards that stopped slowly circling the ship as they began to move towards the door. Jaieh smirked as the fruits of her call to the Hera had clearly arrived.

The four guards on duty, one mamoth human-looking male, two burly Andorian men and Bajoran, all wearing matching black unkforms, made their way to the hatch, checking the camera feed from the corridor. Arguing among themselves, they were clearly trying to convince the visitor to leave but after a minute of arguing, the guards opened the door, revealing a slim Vulcan woman dressed professionally as a station security administrator with a data PaDD in hand. But she was no Artan administrator. It was the Vulcan refugee and resident freedom fighter of the U.S.S. Hera, Az'Prel.

From inside the maintenance hatch, even Jaeih's delicate Romulan ears couldn't quite hear what Az'Prel was saying in detail, but from how flustered the guards looked and how much the Vulcan intelligence operative was talking and making them look at paperwork on her PaDD, she could imagine it was an intense amount of mind numbing legal double-speak. And it was doing its job as the transport was marginally unguarded for the moment.

And it was a moment that the stealthy Romulan took advantage of. Quietly removing then replacing the hatch cover, she slipped into the transport through the rear hatch. Scans showed that the ship itself was empty as she tip toes in near total darkness into the ships cargo hold.

A small light in hand, she quickly circumvented the cargo doors security hatch almost as if it wasn't there. No alarms were sounded and she worked her way through, hoping Az'Prel was still keeping the guards busy.

After a moment, she found herselfin a large cargo hold with, by her visual count, 65 sealed medical grade refrigerated crates. All identical. All individually shielded. And none what one would use for shipping durasteel shuttle plating. Pulling out her PaDD once again, she hardwired into the access panel on the nearest crate and began running a program to find the access codes.

It was an algorithm that took nearly four minutes to find the right code to unlock the cargo safely. Four minutes longer than Jaeih was comfortable with. By this point, she couldn't imagine that Az'Prel was still able to keep distracting the guards and they were likely back on their standard floor patrols, so she was hoping that she had found something actionable.

And after a moment, the hatch was unlocked and she had her answers.

Biomimetic get. Hundreds of liters of biomimetic get. Used in medical experimentation, advanced healing, genetic modification and cloning, the sale of the substance was highly illegal. And extremely expensive. It has cost her a mind fortune to have secured enough to make the genetic modifications that she had performed on her daughter, Mnhei'sahe, all those years ago to hide her Romulan heritage and DNA fron detection. She knew what it was capable.

And on the Hera at that exact moment, was the info clone of the now deceased queen Regent of the Artan's, Arenara Artan. And in the crate, was also a small packet of frozen biomaterial. Blood amd DNA samples. A genetic template.

A quick scan confirmed her suspicions. The samples were those of Arenara Artan. In the hold of this ship was enough material to create hundreds of clones of the mad queen, as needed. Maybe thousands. A thousand back up plans. A thousand escape routes just in case. And a thousand violations of interstellar law on an epic scale.

She wouldn't have to fight her way off this ship. This was Exactly the kind of thing Rita Paris sent her out the find. And acting with the Authority of the Artan ruling family, the Hera was authorized to conduct random searches of the cargo ships leaving. It was.time to call this in. Resealing the crate and tapping her comm badge, a specially designed Intel model that could send subspace communications largely undetectable by scans, she whispered in the darkness with a smirk.

"Operative Dox to Commander Paris. Send a security inspection team to launchbay 76. I found something the Captain will be very interested in seeing."