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Chapter 12

Once they exited Jump, Jack checked all readouts and saw that he had used up a majority of their fuel and that there was a leak. He cursed to himself as he used maneuvering thrusters to gain momentum as he flew towards the Leben defense grid. He tapped communications open. "This is the Argus, sending a mayday out to Leben Defense Grid. Fuel leak and are currently enroute to Leben but no way to slow our descent once we hit the atmosphere. Anyone copy?" He said into it. Leben was growing bigger and bigger by the second.

"Argus, this is Leben Defense Grid, we copy. Dispatching tether ships to your position however you will enter the atmosphere in less than thirty seconds. Be ready for a rough landing." Responded a gruff male voice.

Jack sighed and acknowledged as he saw a wave of heat start to appear in front of the Argus. They had definitely entered the atmosphere now. They continued their descend, alarms blaring at him that the Hull was about to break apart when he saw several large tether ships appear next to the Argus.

Chapter 12

Once they exited Jump, Jack checked all readouts and saw that he had used up a majority of their fuel and that there was a leak. He cursed to himself as he used maneuvering thrusters to gain momentum as he flew towards the Leben defense grid. He tapped communications open. "This is the Argus, sending a mayday out to Leben Defense Grid. Fuel leak and are currently enroute to Leben but no way to slow our descent once we hit the atmosphere. Anyone copy?" He said into it. Leben was growing bigger and bigger by the second.

"Argus, this is Leben Defense Grid, we copy. Dispatching tether ships to your position however you will enter atmosphere in less than thirty seconds. Be ready for a rough landing." Responded a gruff male voice.

Jack sighed and acknowledged as he saw a wave of heat start to appear in front of the Argus. They had definitely entered the atmosphere now. They continued their descend, alarms blaring at him that the Hull was about to break apart when he saw several large tether ships appear next to the Argus. There was a sudden jolt as they locked onto the Argus and began to decelerate her. They began to guide her down towards a docking yard in the outskirts of the city Ecrin, the sun rising to the east over the plains with a large storm brewing with flashes of thunder and lightning. At the docking yard, Jack saw armed personnel at attention, waiting for the ship to land. "Joy." He muttered under his breath as he unstrapped and walked back into the living area where Terra and Kyle sat, both looking like pure hell. "I'm sorry about Williams." Jack said to Terra who stared up at him. It was a no brainer that Williams had died a horrible death, there was no need for Terra to explain to him what had happened. He had seen enough horror to last him for a while. He took Kyles paw and held it tightly, staring into the man's eyes and smiled, glad that he was alive and then pulled him up from the chair he sat in and hugged him tightly. He whispered "I'm glad you made it...." Into Kyle's ear and then kissed him gently. After a few more minutes of him and Kyle holding each other, the three of them decided to walk out and when they did, they saw a Pelzigan Fox, his black fur with a white stripe going down his center wearing a black BDU with no insignia or identifying markings on his uniform stood in front of the hatch.

"My name is Alex, I work with the Overwatch Division, Section three." He said, extending a paw towards Jack. "I was asked to meet you here shortly after your transmission to the Leben Defense Grid."

Jack stared at the man, then at the armed personnel behind him who had their weapons out, but not focused on them. "Overwatch Division Section Three?" Jack asked. "Never heard of them."

The Fox chuckled. "The way we want to keep it. My supervisors want to have a few words with you. They have a general idea as to what happened on the Aura Station, but they want to debrief you immediately."

Jack examined the man, then asked "And if we refuse?"

Alex grinned, "Let's just say we can officially label you and your friends dead, then we can have our way with you and get the answers anyways. But we'd rather avoid that scenario." He said to Jack.

Jack glared at the man, "What guarantee is there that we will be ok?" He asked.

Alex shrugged, "Well, we have a business proposal for you in all honesty. With the incident at Aura Station being one of three separate incidents in which those things have appeared as of late, we will need to make a rapid response team, and the supervisors want you to help lead it seeing as you had to actually deal with the issue. Come, they do want to speak to all of you. I'll make sure the Argus gets fixed, Admiral Whitcomb's fleet seems to have done a number to her."

Jack sighed, he knew they had no real option. Whoever this guy was, or his organization, they wouldn't be able to escape, nor would he allow them. "Fine." He said looking at Kyle who stared back at Jack's eyes. "Let's go meet your people."

Location: Epsilon Indi System, third moon orbiting the planet Elaria.

The shuttle slowly descended through the atmosphere, a torrent of rain making it next to impossible to spot the shuttle as it approached the base. The third moon of Elaria was Minshara Class, breathable atmosphere, some vegetation, but was otherwise nothing but constant bad weather. Doctor Levin grinned as the shuttle landed and his two guards escorted him out onto the pad where Admiral Whitcomb stood with his detachment of guards. Doctor Levin extended a hand out to the man and said, "Sir, it's good to see you."

Admiral Whitcomb nodded to him, showing no real expression on his face. "Project L arrived before you did, Doctor Yuri is currently watching the boy. I am glad to see that you made it off the station Doctor Levin."

Doctor Levin nodded in agreement, "I have all the data we need on the parasite, however I believe Section Three knows about our plans. As I was traveling here, I noticed point to point transmissions from several Bats and I believe they are gearing up to try and stop us." He said as he pulled out a data crystal.

Admiral Whitcomb grimace at that, "I hope they don't know of my involvement, allowing you to get your hands on the parasite."

"As far as I know, they don't. I need to check up with our informant within the organization, but as far as I know they don't suspect you at all." Doctor Levin responded.

Admiral Whitcomb nodded to the man, "Keep me apprised of Project L. If it is successful, then we have a viable mean of having soldiers capable of taking on the Guardians." He said to Doctor Levin.

Thunder boomed as lightning streaks across the sky, the facility behind Admiral Whitcomb lighting up as the exterior lights came online. "Ah, seems like we are in the clear now." Doctor Levin said. On their approach they noticed a Bat sitting in orbit over Elaria and deactivated their transponder and running lights and went silent on their approach. Doctor Levin knew the base also went silent when they noticed the vessel exit Jump above the planet. Doctor Levin was glad to be back on solid ground, and was looking forward to working with Lupin. With luck, he'd be the first Human-Pelzigan Hybrid capable of using Guardian like abilities. Admiral Whitcomb motioned for Doctor Levin to proceed and he did so, walking straight into the facility.

Location: Leben, Classified Site Overwatch Division Section Three

Jack, Kyle, and Terra were all escorted into a large oval room with a desk in front of them and and individual sitting behind it, lights behind the person made it hard to make out who it was. "Welcome to our little hideout people." Said a soft Woman's voice, "As Alex has stated, we are Section Three of the Overwatch Division. We work completely separate from the Unified Galactic Systems Military, completely out of their jurisdiction. Our operations are only known to Admiral Harper, and even then, he's kept in the dark." The woman, or at least Jack hoped it was a Woman, If not, then a man with a voice modulator, motioned for the three to sit down in front of her where three chairs were. "Please, have a seat." She said.

They all sat down and the Woman took a deep breath. "The incident at Aura Station wasn't the only incident to occur as of late. Over in the Epsilon Caelum System and the Epsilon Dor System we had reports of similar outbreaks. We had to completely destroy the outbreak locations with Mass Plasma Drives to avoid further contamination to the other populations. Granted the UGSM doesn't fully know who destroyed the towns that were obliterated and believe it to be Insurrectionists, Harper wasn't too happy with that but allowed that information to continue. We need a response team Jack, we want to reactivate the Special Tactics and Assault Teams, or STAT."

Jack knew of the original STAT, a government organization that dealt with rogue Guardians and difficult to handle Insurrectionists while the rest of the government bodies focused on maintaining control. They were eventually shut down after the Aria Asylum Incident due to the negligence of the situation and allowing a rogue Guardian who had the ability to manipulate individuals minds escape and cause a string of terror within Wachter. This offer had him curious. "Excuse me ma'am." He said. "But we just barely escaped that station with our lives. What makes you think we are willing to go back into that hell?"

The Woman chuckled, "Well, good point. If you refuse we will only wipe your minds of the last three hours and send you back to the docking yard. However, you accept, you can help avoid similar situations such as the Aura Station from occurring. STAT would be dedicated to handling outbreak scenarios and you'd have an entire fleet at your disposal along with an Admiral Tyler to assist you. In no way would we send you directly into the outbreak areas unless you chose to. On top of that, the pay would be good." She said to him.

Jack looked over at Kyle, then to Terra and motioned for them to say their minds. Terra stood and cleared her throat. "I'd like to agree to this. For one, I have nowhere else to go, on top of that by accepting this position I'm certain you can keep whoever had Doctor Levin under control from coming after us. On top of that I can research more into these things and possibly find a way to keep them from infecting other people." Terra said, her thoughts still on Williams. If she could research these things, find out more about them, she could keep the same thing from happening, and knew that it was what she was suppose to do.

Jack looked from Terra to Kyle, who moved his paw over Jacks' and smiled. "I'll go where you go Jack." He said to him.

Jack smiled, "Like Terra, we have nowhere to go. So I guess I'll accept this. However I want to keep the Argus as my personal ship." He said to the Woman.

The Woman clapped her hands and nodded to the three. "Then it's agreed, of course the Argus will need to go through major refits to be serviceable with the rest of the fleet. Now, as for my name, you can call me Osman. I'll be your employer from here on out, you will report to me or the subordinates I tell you to. Am I clear on that?" She said to them.

They all nodded, and like that, they were now a part of the newly formed STAT.