Sun Mi was decidedly nervous. Not long after Michael had left her cell, a couple of armored troopers arrived and escorted her out. Warily eying their shock sticks, she'd been amazed when they had brought her to her old quarters and left. She remembered wondering what was going on and what she'd done to warrant such an upgrade.
Checking her terminal, she'd been astonished to realize she could still access the ship's network. She knew this wasn't an oversight --from what she'd seen, her captors didn't make mistakes. Not able to resist the temptation, she hastily typed a message to her father letting him know she was okay, but that her situation was undetermined. Sun Mi was unable to access any navigational data and a number of other areas were locked out. It was clear that she was still being watched... that she wasn't 'free.'
Her heart sank when she realized that all of her files had been altered to remove all of the sensitive data she'd stolen. They weren't deleted --no, that'd be too easy. It would have taken less than a minute to destroy or replace the memory and storage components in her terminal. Instead, they had chosen to break into her system and locate all of her hidden files, each with their own encryption programs, and go through them -essentially line by line due to her embedded text- to purge the system of just that particular information and nothing else.
No hacker likes to have their systems cracked, but the speed and ease in which this was done made it seem like they were laughing at her. Her carefully planned defenses, which would have been a nightmare for her to even consider penetrating, were casually brushed aside. The completely functioning terminal that remained was almost a challenge as they told her, 'better luck next time.'
Inspecting the pocket of the foam mattress, Sun Mi saw that the memory stick she'd hidden had been removed. The other one she'd had on her when she'd been captured was already confiscated. She sighed and looked around the room. Her eyes fell on the entrance hatch and she nervously approached. Expecting it to be locked, she almost let go of the button which cycled it open in surprise. She cringed as she expected armored troopers to rush in. When nothing happened, she curiously poked her head out into the empty corridor and frowned in confusion. Not quite brave enough to go exploring, she ducked back into her quarters and waited.
Now, a day and a half later, she was still waiting... She feared they'd lock her back up in a cell if someone came looking and found her missing, but with nothing to really do, she was seriously considering going out. The problem was that every time she convinced herself to leave, her imagination would run wild, conjuring up disturbingly graphic images of diabolical tortures and slow deaths.
It was becoming harder to associate her initial capture with the situation she presently found herself in. Meals had been delivered to her room and she had been left to her own devices in an environment she had felt quite at home in for over a month. She was actually starting to wonder if they had forgotten about her. Her mouth set into a fine line as she considered it. 'No... NO. They wouldn't have the audacity to- oh what am I saying... of course they would.' Sun Mi blew out her breath and slapped the top of the desk. 'Fine,' she thought with finality. 'Whatever happens happens.' She got up and marched towards the hatch.
She let out squeak of surprise as the hatch opened and Michael stepped through. Ignoring her 'hand in the cookie jar' expression, he handed her a cute champagne-colored dress and a pair of black pumps. "Aki picked them out," he told her with a smile. "Get dressed and be in the forward hangar in twenty minutes."
Sun Mi gaped at him. After all the waiting and nerves she'd had to deal with, she hated that he sounded so normal. 'Doesn't he have any idea what I've been through?' she wondered, miffed. "For what?" she managed to say.
"We're going to a party," he answered, already turning to leave.
"Wh-What?" she exclaimed, desperate to make some sense of this.
He mused aloud without turning, and by his tone she could tell he was smiling, "We could always find something to do that didn't require you getting dressed..."
"Twenty minutes," she agreed hastily, not caring where they were going so long as he stopped that line of thought.
Nodding, Michael exited and her shoulders slumped in relief. At the agreed upon time, she took the lift down and was amazed at the sight before her as she stepped into the open space. The enormous bay doors were wide open, revealing a clear blue sky. Walking up to the edge, there was a knee high barrier that was part of the frame which housed the internal shield that protected the hangar when it was open. It was currently deactivated and she looked over the edge, seeing a huge lake below that held pristine water which reflected the sky.
Wind blew through her hair and she felt invigorated by the icy air she breathed as she saw a ring of snow-capped mountains all around. Curiously, the lake wasn't frozen and there even appeared to be people swimming in it. "Pretty, isn't it?" she heard a voice to her right say. Sun Mi jerked in surprise, so preoccupied had she been in the view that she had failed to notice the approach of Admiral Lindström who stood next to her, looking over the side as well.
Nodding guiltily, not knowing how to face her boss who now knew she had been a plant, she asked, "Where are we?"
The admiral pursed her lips and answered, "An undisclosed location. It will be the site for the new Embassy of Extraterrestrial Affairs. It actually has its own shield system and will be considered a separate country outside of the Council's influence. Since we control the Aegis system, we figured we might as well control the first stop visitors to our planet will arrive at."
Sun Mi bowed her head in sadness, knowing she didn't deserve to be trusted with information the Council would obviously want to know about. "I guess they're not happy about having to go through you to have dealings with the aliens." she surmised. "I had no idea you guys had this much power."
Aurora scoffed, "They can go screw themselves. And it's not about power, it's about control. We're going to be gone for who-knows how long. We just want to make sure we have a home to come back to. Copies of Pandora will be monitoring Earth to make sure some self-serving authority doesn't try and collapse what we've worked so hard to maintain. We're even growing a new AI to handle the planet's defense if it comes to another attack. Our factories are extending further and further into the Oort cloud and production is increasing exponentially, just in case we meet a new hostile race that takes offense at our existence."
