PART II

As we moved into our positions in the assembly area, I noted more than the usual amount of activity in one section near us within the perimeter. A constant stream of flitters kept moving between one area and part of the HQ complex. I went over to see what was going on, and was stopped by a dour-looking guard. "Lockdown," he said. "The whole unit is in lockdown. Isolation, really; they found something big, and Command is keeping them isolated until debriefings are completed."
I watched for a bit. It was a company-sized unit, MEK apparently--a special operations intelligence unit. It looked as though they were cycling everyone through debriefings at HQ perhaps four at a time. At the pace they were going, though, it would be hours before the lockdown was over. As nothing else was happening, I decided to return to the press camp area.

Later that night, I went over to the field lounge nearest the MEK company, thinking that if they had been let out of their encampment, some would be there. (I will say this--the level of amenities provided KZK forces has definitely gone up over the last two years; some might say too much. Central Command seemed to have wasted no time in turning the assembly area on T-Snit's surface into a veritable rec camp.)

Sure enough, I found some members of the MEK unit in there; most were pretty quiet, but one--I'll call her "Petra"--was willing to speak freely. Turned out she was right, as this wasn't something that could be kept quiet indefinitely. A lance corporal in Special Intelligence, she is a veteran of the Great War.

"Originally I was in rear area support services after the SAM assault; after about six weeks, I asked for a transfer to one of the Kovaleva Units. Turns out it was good timing on my part; losses after I joined were bad--I'd say about half of us didn't make it--but almost no-one who was in the line the first two months of the war made it all the way through.

"I'd been a Third Year student in biology when I joined. I'd been looking forward to returning to studies after demobilization, and after we were mustered out at the start of the year I gave it a go for a bit. But it just didn't seem as interesting. So I went to one of the recruiting stations, and checked to see what the chances were of getting back in. After looking at my background and some testing, they decided that this was the place for me--lance corporal, Special Intelligence, xenobiology branch. I'm happy with it; it gives some excitement, and I can use my training. And they give us more training that should let me get my formal degree in another year, if I ever decide to get out.

"We were one of three forward detachments; our mission was to get into the city during the initial air attacks and try to secure the colony research facilities as soon as possible--in order to keep them from destroying their research when they saw the battle going against them. We knew that Tir-na Nog'th was a research colony, but we had no idea what project they were working on.

"The other two detachments got held up. We're pretty light--we can handle troops and light tanks, but that's about it--and all we can try to do is bypass any resistance if we run into anything heavier. They weren't able to find a bypass, and got bogged down in the outskirts and had to call in air to blast away the defenders. They made it through OK, but it cost them time.

"We were able to find good routes, though, and were able to infiltrate into the center pretty easily. Security crackdown was zero; as we got further in, half the people we saw thought that we were Marshall Whispers' troops.

"We entered the research campus with little incident, and secured the "high security" part of the facility easily. A passcard system aren't too good for keeping out a MEK unit willing to blow doors off. We bagged a lot of the research staff; they hadn't thought to run, thinking we wouldn't get that far; once we did, they didn't think of trying to destroy their files or anything. A few tried to get out, but we stopped them pretty quick. We herded them into an auditorium and posted guards by the exits. They didn't look like the types that wanted to go barehanded against some MEK.

"The rest of the company set up a defense perimeter outside, and then the other "xenos" and me went to work inside. Our job was to try and download as much data as we could; even though we'd gotten in pretty easily, there was nothing that said they couldn't send a tank column out to try and recapture or destroy the facility. We were pretty surprised that they didn't, when we realized what we'd found."

Petra hesitates for a moment. "They were working on a project they called 51.198.03, termed Samillian/KZK Biological Research. Goals of the research, according to the abstract data we downloaded, included Using workers in non-SAM/KZK colonies, and/or biological warfare.

"As you can imagine, we thought they would have to try and destroy evidence of this--either they were planning on waging war on the SAM and/or KZK, or else they were planning to enslave them. I knew the KZK, at least, wouldn't look on this too kindly.

"There were all sorts of experiments involving genetic material, as well as culture dishes. We'd heard the radio traffic that a few hundred drones had been discovered being held on two of the ships in the starport; we figured that they had been the source of the genetic material.

"We found more, though. The research abstract stated that during the course of the project, a Hive Queen would be "consumed" --how's that for a euphemism? As well as other "subjects".

"We were reporting all of this as we were finding it. First we were sending reports every half hour, but as soon as we found what projects were being pursued, they gave us a priority uplink to the Creative Nonviolence, which was the command ship for the operation until an HQ was established Snit-side. Needless to say, the drones up there were not amused. First we find evidence that Marshall Whispers was preparing a capacity to enslave or wage biological warfare against samilloid lifeforms; then we find out that he was planning on murdering a Hive Queen in order to do it. Yes they were mighty agitated up there." Petra didn't say very much after that (at least not dealing with T-Snit).

So there we have it--the ugly secret of Marshall Whispers' research.