Focus

[Chirakis 1]

Focus

 

The word pawn came to mind, as it had several times during the last decade, especially since her assignment as Executive Officer of Sky Harbour Aegis. Though it was entirely possible that coincidence brought Captain Halloway and Commander Brown with their respective ships to Aegis, Kirel could not help wondering if there were higher powers at work, if perhaps, unbeknownst to any of them, someone had orchestrated this whole charade to accomplish their own ends.

 

It was the height of paranoia and Kirel forced the thoughts aside to focus on what they did know and the concrete facts that surrounded the present situation on Aegis.

 

Fact: Captain Halloway was investigating Breen space. Fact: Commander Brown was investigating the disappearance of Captain Savage. Fact: whether orchestrated or coincidence, they were here at the height of the station's current internal crisis.

 

Fact: if the current internal crisis were interrupted by a full-force attack from the Athra, neither Yorktown nor Odyssey nor an entire fleet of starships could put a dent in the firepower that would come against them. Aegis had succeeded in repelling them twice, but each time they had adjusted to Aegis's defenses with frightening accuracy. But was that fact? Or supposition?

 

The Athra's bodies integrated with their craft, they maneuvered and communicated via telepathic link with each other and the base ship. If the Athra believed, as Commander Brown suggested, that Aegis was the base for Savage's raiding parties, they would surely attack again, probably sooner than later, and with more force than ever before. If Kirel were in their position she would do the same.

 

Supposition.

 

As Commander Brown continued to outline his plan for Kirel's defense, her head spun again towards paranoia.

 

Focus.

 

Brown rose to leave. As security moved Kirel from the interrogation room back to her cell she noticed Dr. Feretti and SrLtn Le Morte exiting theirs, and the word sickbay in the security guards' clipped conversation. A glance down the corridor revealed Centurion Dabi still in his cell. So long as the guards' lips remained loose, she and Dabi would be kept up to date with the latest gossip. But she needed more than that.

 

Focus.