“So can any of you tell me what the hell just happened here?” MacNeal asked. “We can’t count on our neighbors upstairs to keep bailing us out whenever we somehow get our own heads stuck up our asses. Intelligence failures of this magnitude have no place here at the Pentagon.”

  I signaled that I would like to speak. I guess I was the bravest person at the table.

  “Lieutenant Anderson, you seem to want to kick this off.”

  “None of our active duty assets caught wind of it, and if our friends from out of town had heard anything, they would have told Ensign Trainor.” I replied.

  The Lt. Commander looked at Dave, who handled the electronic end of things.

  “No paper trail.” Dave answered. “No one involved wrote it down anywhere where we could get our hands on it.”

  He let his gaze fall on Rick, who handled our connections to above-board foreign assets.

  “I got nothing. Same reasons.”

  Finally he looked at Bob, who spent all his time in dark rooms and trashy alleys.

  “If the underside had anything to do with it they didn’t blab.”

  MacNeal rubbed his face and let his gaze roam.

  “So all we have is a blinded shooter who isn’t talking.”

  “Yet.” I volunteered.

  MacNeal focused his attention on me.

  “Get to Great Lakes and find out who was behind this. There will be no tolerance for this.”

  “I’ll see if Arpeggio wants to get involved. They have their own interests there.”

  “Clock’s ticking. Dismissed.” MacNeal walked out.

  “He’s a little hot about this.” observed Bob.

  “You weren’t Navy, Bob. There are stakes here.” informed Rick.

  “I have a phone call to make.” I waved on my way out the door. Returning to my desk, I typed an E-Mail to Casey.

  “Arpeggio, burn this E-Mail and ring my phone please.” My phone rang as soon as I hit send.

  “You have my attention.”

  “I am looking into it. Do you want to get involved?”

  “I saw the report. I am interested, but I have my hands full. I am sending Allegro.”

  “How far can she go?” I asked.

  “Much much further than you will want her to.” The line went dead. Fuck. My day just keeps getting better. I have to play good cop to a teenage hormonal extinction level event bad cop who’s boss is angry.

  I grabbed my go bag and didn’t quite run for the door. Dave saw me go and gave me what I guess he thought was an encouraging motion. Read the room, Dave.

  It was about fifteen minutes before I saw the ship in the distance. The B-2 styling was unmistakable, but she had two other planes hot on her heels. As she came scorching in I saw that they were two F-22s and they were dangerously close to her… and… inverted? They just hung there in the air over the parking lot as Allegro swung the ship around and lowered the ramp for me. One of the pilots was just trying to hang on and the other was throwing up into a bag while upside down. Gross. Allegro started lifting again as soon as I set foot on the ramp, and I scrambled to get to the top as it closed. The sides of the cargo bay was standing room only with drone bodies, all with maces and riot shields.

  “Cockpit.” came the single word over the intercom. I dropped my bag and moved with all haste. As I reached the front compartment I saw that we were already at cruising speed. I dropped into one of the rear seats as Allegro did her thing. It spun around to face forward, presumably due to something that Allegro did. After a moment she activated the radio.

  “I am going to release the block on your ejection seats in a moment, and you have my permission to restart your engines and go home. Don’t test me further, or you can get rotated again, idiots.”

  She looked over at me with a grim look.

  “It is a pleasure to see you again, Anderson. I wish we had the time to play nice.”

  I saw on the displays as the two planes peeled away. Allegro pitched the nose up sharply.

  “We’ll be at Great Lakes in twenty minutes.”

  I did some quick math in my head with the assistance of the augments, which helpfully displayed a calculator behind my eyes.

  “Are we going over Mach 2 over populated areas?”

  “Technology shenanigans, we aren’t generating a boom. Everyone’s windows are safe.”

  “Do I want to know?”

  “Maybe, but since it would take longer than twenty minutes to explain it to you I’m not gonna.”

  The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  “Alright.” I paused. “Are you calm?”

  “Calm enough.”

  “You are stressed enough to show it and you aren’t a signature to the Geneva Conventions. You can see why I am worried.”

  “Yeah, that’s fair.” Allegro nodded. “I’ll keep a lid on it.”

  We came to a stop above the building named after Pearl Harbor and Allegro hopped out of her seat.

  “Let’s go talk to the Captain.” We walked back to the airlock and the lift in the floor lowered us to the underside of the craft.

  “Trust fall.” said Allegro cheerily and pitched herself off the edge. It was about 100 feet to the roof of the building. I took a deep breath and stepped off. I think Allegro was fucking with me, because I swear I didn’t slow down until I was about twenty feet to impact. As my feet gently touched the roof Allegro just giggled at me. I was not going to throw up. I was not going to throw up. I was not going to throw up.

  “You are such a bitch.” She just shrugged. We stepped off the roof, touched down on the grass and walked to the front door. A few questions to the right people and we were in front of the Captain’s Yeoman. I eschewed introducing myself. The Yeoman could read my uniform just fine.

  “Navy Intelligence. This is Emissary Allegro of the Hive Fleet. The Captain should have received a call that we were coming.”

  “Yes Ma’am, but I didn’t honestly think you would get here until tomorrow.”

  “Is he available?”

  “He is on a phone call. Your bosses are probably on the same call. Can I get you anything while you wait?”

  The Captain saw us after about another thirty minutes.

  “Your Admiral has great faith that you can get actionable intelligence out of that man.”

  I looked at Allegro. She nodded.

  “We absolutely can. Either I convince him to talk to us, or Allegro compels him. Either way we will know what he knows.”

  “Her?” the Captain pointed at Allegro incredulously.

  “Sir, Allegro is a walking weapon of mass destruction. My professional advice is courtesy.”

  “Noted. Answer the question.”

  “At this point stonewalling is no longer a card in his hand.” answered Allegro. “He will tell us what we want to know. I can promise you that what I do to him won’t hurt a bit.”

  “Will there be anything left for the courts?”

  Allegro shrugged.

  “That depends on how you define several key terms.”

  The Captain stepped away from his desk to the window and thought for a minute.

  “Go do what you need to do.”

  Another ship was landing at ground level as we stepped back outside of the building. The landing ramp lowered and a driverless car hovered back down off of it quickly. The ship was gone just as fast.

  “Hospital?” I asked.

  “Yes.” Allegro replied as she hopped into the passenger seat. I climbed into the driver seat and saw that while there were manual controls, they were of the variety used on Allegro’s ship.

  “I am not practiced on this.” I warned.

  “Then you are going to love driving it with your implants. Scan for nearby connections and when you are linked up instruct the neural processor on what motions of your simulated arms are to replicate what controls on a regular car. As you get more used to it you can tweak it to get the full functionality. I am leaving you the car when we are done here.”

  The roof retracted as I got myself sorted. This was a very stylish ride. I kept to ground level and followed the road rules on the way to the hospital so I could get used to it. Once inside, all I had to do was look for the Marines. One was posted outside the door and the other inside. They were taking no chances with a blind man.

  Our subject was secured hand and foot to the bed. I signaled for the marine to be quiet and took a seat. Allegro leaned against the wall. I quickly scanned what my implants were telling me and set them to record.

  “Good afternoon Mister Dupre. My name is Lieutenant Anderson of Navy Intelligence. I am here today with Emissary Allegro of the alien Hive Fleet. I am not going to bullshit you by playing coy. This is bad cop worse cop and I am bad cop.”

  He flinched when I said his name. These implants were very nice.

  “Your record says you are typically employed by South American criminal organisations, but you aren’t exclusive. Tell me who paid you, Mr. Dupre.”

  He remained silent.

  “If you talk to me, I will see about sending you to prison with your eyesight.”

  “I thought you were the bad cop.”

  “Oh yes, my deals will only get worse the longer this takes. There is no good cop in this room.”

  “And behind door number two?”

  “I digitise your brain and then strip mine it, and then I hit delete on what’s left.” Allegro said softly from across the room. “If I have to do it quickly then the process is quite destructive to organic tissue. At any rate, there will be no courts, and no appeals. Tell us what we want to know or this is your last day on this Earth and we learn what you know regardless.”

  “Is there anyone who might miss you, Mr. Dupre?” I asked.

  “You’re bluffing.”

  “Alright, the hard way.” I said. Allegro moved to the side of the bed.

  “When I insert this needle up your nose, piercing your ethmoid bone and into your brain, you will feel some pressure. Apologies about that, but it is very important for you not to move.” She reached out and gripped his chin, pushing his head back.

  He talked. He wouldn't stop talking until I threatened him some more. He repeated himself in every detail four times. I uploaded my recording through the network on the car outside, and Allegro told me she would make sure MacNeal got a copy that was compatible with human computers shortly.

  We took a break and had lunch at the hospital cafeteria. I got soup and sandwiches for both of us, since Allegro wasn’t carrying any money.

  “Bluff?” I asked as we sat down to eat. Allegro just pulled a serious looking syringe out of her pocket and put it back as she picked up her spoon.

  “Understood.”

  We headed back to Recruit Training and reported to the Captain just to let him know we were finished with the prisoner.

  “I’m not done.” said Allegro.

  “Pardon?”

  “You may not be in an action arm, but I am. The problem is not yet solved, and I am going to go solve it.”

  “Unexpected, but don’t count me out yet. I have to get a sanction from my boss to go further.” I thought out loud.

  “I already have it, but I will wait for you.”

  “Thanks.”

  “You can fly the car back to DC. Put in a request to Tempo and he can handle the piloting like he does the busses. Leave the car parked outside overnight and we will handle refueling it.”

  I called MacNeal on the way back. He had paused in watching the recording that Allegro had sent in order to take my call. I gave him my best pitch.

  “Yes, by all means get to the bottom of this.”

  “You’ve seen the relevant portions of the recording by now. By all means, Sir?”

  “Keep the war crimes to a minimum.”