The Divine Sedition [Complete]

Chapter 13 An Explosion in the Science Bay

Markus Bauer was eyeing through the classified files about Keila that Bjorn had given him clearance to view. While they contained interesting information about a fascinating character, it was not the files he was after. He was after the reports that should have been written at the same time when Keila’s DNA was collected. Markus was looking at the corpse one more time. She looked familiar, and he could vaguely recall seeing her escorted to a cell some years ago. But the problem was the accuracy, he could not recall the date he had seen her, and Markus could not be sure of meeting her, but he did remember whispers about a missing prisoner around the time that Keila’s DNA was collected.  

Markus opened a file regarding Keila’s family history. He could see why this section was classified as the DNA backtrack analysis revealed that Keila’s father was a prominent Terran with the name of Mahmoud Rashid, who was disowned by his wealthy family for running off with a non-approved lower cast woman, who was originally sold as a s*x slave to Mahmoud’s grandfather, Ibrahim Rashid. Markus searched for Mahmoud Rashid. He was born the same year as Bjorn Muller and died many years ago. Was it possible that Mahmoud and Bjorn had been friends and Bjorn had helped his former friend’s daughter to escape her imprisonment? This was pure speculation of course, and Markus realised that he would be better off keeping this thought for himself.

He looked at a photo of Keila and the date that her DNA sample was collected. Markus had a flashback; he was sure he had seen Keila passing by him in the corridor escorted by Bjorn Muller on that day. He also recalled an escape pod missing a few months later and a prisoner that was deleted from the prisoner checklist.  Considering that Bjorn Muller’s grandfather Hans Muller was assassinated by Keila a few weeks later, everything showed that Keila and Bjorn were conspiring against the leadership of House Muller and against the Terran Council.

Markus realised that this was explosive stuff and posed a severe threat to his life. He needed to find the right people back on Earth and make sure that his transmission was encrypted, so Bjorn would not realise that Markus was dobbing him in. Unfortunately, staff members were not allowed to bring encrypted messaging devices onto the ISS Supreme Earth, except of course for Bjorn Muller himself, who had a private encrypted phone. Stealing Bjorn’s phone without him noticing would not be easy, but it was the only way to set things right.

Suddenly Markus saw a display flashing, “Contamination detected, Science bay to disconnect in 30 seconds”. Panicking, Markus ran to the door, but it was sealed shut. Acting instinctively, he grabbed the memory unit and an oxygen tank and jumped into an airtight safety-capsule. Seconds later there was a small targeted explosion, and the Science Bay was dislodged from the rest of the ISS Supreme Earth.