Starship Armstrong - Season 3

Part 39 - Family Ties (XVII)

Mitzner's earpiece came alive.

"I have some good news and some bad news," said the voice of the Queen.

Deja Vu.

"What's the bad news?" asked Mitzner, touching the earpiece. 

"Your little engineer friend appears to have sabotaged the relativity drive. She didn't just shut it off."

"What's the good news?"

"We found the relativity drive."

"Great..." mumbled Mitzner.

"We looked into it," continued the Queen, "and we don't have the equipment to bore a hole in that wall fast enough to get you out before you, you know, die of thirst. We also don't have any spare relativity drives lying around. So we're going to have to try and repair this one."

"What do you think the chances of that are?"

"Good. I have my best people on this. We're getting you out of there."

"Thanks. Keep me updated," said Mitzner.

"What'd she say?" asked McAfree.

"The relativity drive's busted. They're trying to repair it."

"The what?"

"Oh yeah. It's this whole thing. It's actually kind of clever in an insane overkill sort of way. They're using a relativity drive to get in and out of this place via space/time tunnel. There's no other exit."

"I hate that I love that idea so much," said McAfree.

"How did you braying jackasses ever get so well equipped anyway?" Mitzner asked the surviving kidnappers. "You had memetic cannons, portable tractor beams, hoverbelts, coolsuits, a damned relativity drive."

"We're funded by patriots," said Delili, defiantly. "Powerful benefactors. You don't know who you're messing with."

"Do you even know who these patriots are?" asked Mitzner.

"Even if we did we wouldn't tell you," said Delili.

Mitzner covered her eyes with the palm of her hand in exasperation. She couldn't believe she hadn't thought of this earlier.

"Let me guess:," she asked, "the patriots made themselves known recently? Like in the past few days?"

The look on Delili's face told Mitzner everything she needed to know.

"What do you know about us?" asked Delili.

"That you're stooges," said Mitzner. "I just figured it out though."

"We're not stooges," sneered Delili. "We're freedom fighters."

"Oh no you're definitely stooges," said Mitzner. "You're working for the Queen and you don't even realize it."

"She's just trying to get inside our heads," Delili said to Gar. "Like the other one."

"That's fine it doesn't matter if you believe me," said Mitzner. "None of this absolves any of you of any of this, it just makes things more complicated for me."

Delili did her best to look haughty.

"Just out of idle curiosity what do you think happened?" she asked.

"Someone approached your group anonymously, told you about the Queen's little party for offworlder guests and not much else. Bought your trust by setting you up with this safehouse, providing you with equipment, and a bunch of extra people for the operation. Only you don't know any of their names or faces. It's better that way, right?"

Delili had a look of dawning realization. Gar still looked confused.

"The operation was basically planned around you by the new people. So it finally goes down and you went after any high value target you could find. Only you weren't going to get either the Queen or I, not with our natural abilities. So who did that leave? My guest. The extra Foundation member that the Queen invited here unprompted despite her hatred of the Foundation."

"What would the Queen have to gain from any of this?" asked McAfree.

"Me," said Mitzner. "She wants me out of the Foundation and living here instead. She intended to use these stooges as a boogeyman, keep me distracted with a wild revenge-goose chase so long that the Armstrong couldn't possibly wait for me. Something like that. It almost worked too, would have worked if it had been the me from 20 years ago. The Queen and I may have identical DNA but we've led very different lives."

"How could you possibly claim to know all this?" asked Delili.

"Let's just say I'm familiar with the Queen's thinking."

"So what are you going to do about it?" asked McAfree, unable to hide her worry with her usual mask of bravado.

"I'm going to wait until she gets us out of here," said Mitzner, "then she and I are going to have words."