Shelly Reed's Story

"We already recovered the girl," Shelly remarked as she gave him a curious look. "I'm actually here for another reason," she explained.

She moved to open the folder, skimming some of the pages with her eyes.

"I've been following your case for a long time. Fifteen years you've been at this."

She folded her hands under her chin thoughtfully as she continued to watch him almost inquisitively.

"You could say that you've become something of a fascination for me. Theft, assault, drug dealing, murder, human trafficking - both prostitution and slavery - and yet not a one has been pinned on you. Two officers were put under cover, and still you kept one step ahead of us. That displays quite a mind for crime."

"You haven't recovered her. I sold her off planet. You couldn't have gotten her back that fast." O'Leary sneered at the officer in front of him. There was no way they'd gotten her back only a couple of weeks after she'd been sold. No way. No one but he knew who she'd actually been sold too. Not even the men that had driven them to their destination.

He couldn't help but smirk as she spoke about his past. "I'm the best there is. And those undercovers that you sent did a shit job. We found them and killed them. Several years ago, in fact. So like you said, I have a mind for crime. A great one at that. And you might have me now, but I'm always one step ahead. I am, even now."

To know that two undercovers were sent though was disturbing. He had really only had one found and killed, but he wasn't about to let them know that. He'd only been thrown for a second. But whoever the second undercover was, had likely leaked a lot of information and there were two suspects straight in his head. Josh and Bray. But there was no saying that the undercovers had joined at the same time. Though Corey had been proven to be undercover and killed for it, didn't mean that Bray too had been undercover. No the man had killed Corey without a second thought. That left Joshua, the man that had come in a few years later - probably to try and find Corey.

Josh fucked everything up. Big time.

"So, what is it that you've come here for? Obviously you know everything about me already. That's a pretty big file you have there." Kenneth nodded.

"Well yes," Shelly replied. "But you see, there's one thing I keep coming back to that I just can't make sense of. Fifteen years, and you botch this whole operation on this one girl? I mean kidnapping a foreign diplomat was a pretty dumb move on your part," she remarked.

She was intentionally goading him at this point. Inflate his ego, and then give it a prick.

"So I just can't help but wonder what was going through your head?"

The change in O'Leary's expression was easy to see.

"That wasn't me. It was your stupid fucking undercover. He's the one that took her. Thought she was unique. And being as he was your undercover means that he did it intentionally to try and get this to happen. Joshua fucked things over completely by taking her and it all makes fucking sense now." O'Leary snapped.

"But I fixed it. I sorted it all out so that she's disappeared never to be found again. And you better make sure you hide your undercover real well, because I'm going to be sending my men for his head. The traitor." He growled. "But just know, that I didn't take her so it wasn't my fuck up. If it wasn't for that idiot taking her, I'd still be in business and you'd still not have found her."

It was a start.

"But don't you mean, your fuckup?" she asked. "I thought you said you killed them both years ago. That he was still alive means you fucked up."

She raised an eye to him.

"I don't think you much like the idea that you made a mistake. I think when you're slapped with life in prison, that failure is going to eat at you every day of the rest of your likely long life. I think you want to make sure the assholes who fucked you over are sitting in there with you. You give us what we need to put Bray and Joshua away, and a Jury might look favorable on your cooperation."

She didn't think the temptation of a lighter sentence would sway the man, but a chance to put away the people who had slighted him? That just might do the trick.

O'Leary sat there quietly for a few moments mulling over the woman's words. For a while it seemed like he wasn't going to say anything. That nothing was going to work to make him speak and tell her what she wanted to know. But finally, just before all hope seemed lost with the man - while it seemed that he was willing to go down for crimes he didn't commit because of idiots, he spoke.

"I didn't kill the undercover." O'Leary smirked. "I was better than that. Corey was introduced to me through Bray. When it was found that Corey was undercover, we suspected that Bray was as well. So I gave him an ultimatum. Either he kill Corey to prove that he wasn't undercover also, or to be tortured along side his friend. It would have been a win win for me, either way. But Bray shot him without even a moment's hesitation. So that showed me that he wasn't an undercover and I hired him as my right hand man. At least he saved Corey and himself from days of torture. Doesn't matter now. He's ran off with my wife. Where ever they both are, I hope they die suffering. And that bastard son of theirs."

O'Leary then frowned. "But it was Joshua that really fucked everything over by taking that diplomat. When he turned up with her I nearly killed him myself. He's lucky that Bray wasn't around. That probably saved his life. It's him you really want. He's the one that took her from the street and he was so happy with it. He was gloating about it to everyone in my estate. So you better get him. But you won't find her now. She's not even on Terra anymore. She hasn't been for at least a couple of weeks now." He smirked once more.

Even if he rotted in prison, in his mind he hadn't failed. He'd gotten rid of her still.

"It seems to me Corey did what was necessary to save his friend from torture," Shelly remarked thoughtfully. "And Joshua... well he was just doing his job, right?" she asked.

She hadn't disillusioned the man to his belief that it was Joshua who was under cover. Better to let him think there was a chance that Joshua could walk away from all of this. She didn't make any claim that he was the undercover, but in an absence of correction no doubt O'Leary would continue to assume.

"You want a jury to hear your side of the story to make sure any of this sticks, then you tell us where you sold the girl. You do that, and I assure you that Joshua and Bray will be enjoying their time right along side you. You're going down either way at this point, you have nothing to lose. The girl won't change anything for you, but it'll get us what we need to put Joshua away. Unless you want him enjoying a comfy retirement off your hard earned money while you rot in jail for his fuckup."

"Corey was a fool thinking he could come in and infiltrate my activities to the WCPD. I don't even know why they thought it would work. Solinus has it's own police department. Wing City shouldn't have gotten involved. It's their fault that their man died. You can make sure Bray goes down for his murder and for the fact that he fucked my wife and claimed my kid. Make sure he knows that he's going to regret it. Big time. I'm making sure of that." He smirked, as if he knew some big secret that no one else knew.

O'Leary sat there once again thinking about everything, mulling over his options.

"As for Joshua, that traitorous little fuck. I don't know where he is. And I don't know where that ship was going. I didn't ask questions. I just wanted my money. Honestly I don't care where they go. I promised I wouldn't give any names. It was part of the deal. I'm sure that bitch will make sure Josh goes down when you do find her though. I can tell you the make and design of the ship I sold her on, though. I never promised them I wouldn't speak about that." O'Leary thought he was being so smart.

He went on to give a description of the ship and it's make. He knew his ships well due to his business of selling slaves. And for years now he'd hidden under the pretense of a shipping business. Nobody had known up until now, that the people had been the cargo.

"Answer me one question though. How does it feel to know that they put two officers undercover that did shit jobs? I mean, Corey got himself killed a year into serving me. He did a good job at begging as he was beat though. Told me all about living for his children. That his children needed a father. So much that did him. And now Joshua is going to go down for the kidnap and harm of a diplomat. Are all their officers really that shitty?" He laughed.

He wouldn't get his answer as Shelly stood up from her chair.

"We'll have someone in shortly so you can get all of that down in writing," she told him as she retrieved the folder from the table and left to join the rest of the team and the Taiyou in the neighboring observation room.

"Who says I'm going to fuckin' repeat it?" O'Leary laughed again.

He didn't care if he got his answer or not. He didn't give a damn what happened. Bray and Joshua were going down on this sinking ship with him. And that was good enough for him.

The ISSP Detective shook his head as he observed the entire interrogation take place. The ISSP Agent then crossed his arms over his chest and he frowned.

"I think.. we could have had less of the disrespect. We do not tolerate that sort of attitude back home." He commented, and then brought his gaze over to Shelly as she entered the room.

"Are you satisfied with your questioning? I believe he is still withholding information. But I took the liberty to run the make and model of the ship. It was spotted by our patrols leaving the Sol system. It's also registered in Aschen systems as a sanctioned slave transport in and out of something called the Cryo Sector. I'll have to investigate further."

"The information he's withholding isn't overly relevant. The man you're looking for is named Kane," she explained. "He wasn't lying though when he said he doesn't know where she was taken. Last he saw of her was when he sold her to a Cryon slaver who was taking her off planet."

She pulled a warrant out of the inside pocket of her jacket and showed it to the ISSP Detective. It was a warrant for mind trawling. The little bits of information that O'Leary had been withholding wouldn't hold up in court on her word alone, but they had enough other evidence on him already that it didn't rightly matter.

"We have enough to put him away for the rest of his life, and you have your ship and the name of the Captain to find your missing diplomat. If they took her to Aschen space, it's out of TNG jurisdiction. She's not one of ours. If you want to question him further by all means, but I don't know what else you hope to get out of him. And he stays here. Your extradition request is still being processed."

"Political bullshit? Yeah ok, we can do this." Wei felt relieved that O'Leary was going to get his own dose of mind games, but hunting down a slave ship was a whole nother' kettle of sushi. Wei leaned back against one of the nearby walls and shrugged. "You're right, we're not going to get anything more out of him, one trick crim and all."

Wei leaned back in his chair in the viewing room. "What do you boys think, O'Leary got any more info to give us?"

The Taiyou agent nodded. "You're right, I'll need to focus my investigation elsewhere now that I have all the relevant information. Though I fear that the Aschen Imperial Government will be less than cooperative in our efforts to extract the diplomat." He said, turning to the window to watch O'leary.

"To bring closure to the NPA in the Joshua Mattrix case, the Shogunate has Joshua in their custody, and he's slated to be publicly executed by beheading in Narita Square." He explained, turning around to face Shelly and the other officers.

"Not a typical punishment in Shogunate or Taiyou law for a crime of that nature, but the personal nature of the offense has prompted the Shogun to take an interest in the matter. The Shogunate has refused our requests for extradition and punishment, wishing to personally punish him for his crimes." He said, turning to the window once more.

"More than likely, the Volarian matriarchy will want to extradite O'leary themselves, we had filed our extradition to keep him on ice, given your governments... past misgivings with wanted criminals." He added.

Randin grinned with carnal satisfaction as Mammon was driven off under the combined force of three different attacks. The screaming and explosions rocketing inside the department came to a chilling halt as the possessive energies left the precinct. Once again, the demon lord had been defeated.

The detective frowned. No. Not defeated. Driven off. Forced into a retreat. He'd be back. Next time, perhaps, with bigger armies, with broader schemes... and with him would come even more widespread death, destruction and chaos. As Randin holstered his magnums in the misty wake of the battle's aftermath, he found himself swearing to bring the Demon Lord of Greed to justice once and for all. It was not the first time he'd taken such an oath. He prayed it would be the last.

Bounding into action, the detective ran first to Slim, determined to help his friend first and foremost. He looked warily at the cultists kneeling in submission on the street and at the recently-freed Ted Ellison writhing on the asphalt. His brows knit. Had there been a real man beneath Mammon's favorite facade this whole time?

"Slim!" he shouted, racing to the torn-open police cruiser and quickly taking inventory of the alien's condition. The blood was clotted somehow, thank God. "Slim you goddamn... cocksucking..." A flurry of emotions raced through Randin's head. Most of them came out of his mouth as profanities. "...cunt-mongering... bitchfucking...." He sprang into the car, opening the dashboard and retrieving a medkit. "That was absolutely... reckless... fucked up..." His spat the words out with livid anger as he removed a canister from the kit and began spraying biofoam on Slim's stump. "This is exactly, EXACTLY..."

'What I would have done.'

The realization hit Randin like a sucker punch. Good God. This was EXACTLY the sort of action-movie heroism that was so commonplace in Randin's everyday life. Fighting insurmountable odds... charging evil head-on despite near-certain death. On one hand, he was furious at Slim for making such a foolhardy advance against Mammon without backup. On the other hand, he was absolutely in awe of the Scythian's courage.

"You're just..." Randin shook his head, his heavy tone softening slightly, "...you're just a goddamn..." He shook his head. Just a goddamn hero.

A small squad of officers quickly followed Randin. Though beaten and battered from their battle with hell's legions, they nonetheless rounded up the surrendering terrorists with remarkable efficiency.

"Hands in the air!" one of them shouted to Ted Ellison.

Randin turned and watched Ellison out of the corner of his eye.

The Maia, now convinced the threat was gone. Went to where Slim laid against the cruiser, holding h is severed arm in one hand, the mystical creature went to the aliens' side and carefully took in his injury. "Don't move" the strange creature said. She then clasped Slims injured shoulder in one hand, and with the other she lifted the severed arm, and gently, yet with enough pressure to prove painful, rejoined the severed appendage. Putting her healing magic to work.

The only problem was if Slim was going to remain still long enough for the healing to run its course.

The other problem was that the Maiar spirit was recently woken up to her true powers.

Inside the station hell literally came to a halt. Well, this was something indeed. John took in the carnage, a shit load to clean up he could see that clearly. his radio chirped. "Dagger to Fondue Fork" The voice of Dirk said from upstairs at Homicide "Alls quiet and clear up here. " John smiled, well, the gang was safe, his team was safe, that was what counted as far as he knew.

He turned to the Chief, The man seemed more or less at a tense ease. John knew not to relax too soon. But this was something else indeed. He knew there was something weird in the energy drinks, but there was no idea for sure what exactly there was in the things.

"Hey, hey, hey, don't panic, a'ight? Yo' dog's gonna be fine." Saiga rose up on her feet with the bleeding dog in her arms. She didn't like this situation very much, but the guy was going berserk about the animal.

And, all at once, again, things just... died down. A lot of things just stopped. The attacks ceased. Saiga gave the gore-splattered office a gander, then a cringe.

"Hey, we should take it slow, a'ight? We get to a vet quick. But the second he's in the vets hands we need to come back and take care of everything here, m'kay? You got that?"

One fucking dog. It whined in her arms.

"We've got injured officers here, and who the hell knows what's up with all the innocent civilians outside..."

Alex looked around as everything just stopped. Silence. No more corpses coming after them, no more fighting. No more evil it seemed. No more hellhounds trying to kill them. Nothing at all. Alex was on edge at first. It was like in the movies. Things got a lot worse before they got better. Silence was usually a sign that something bigger and badder was coming. But nothing. Not a single thing happened. Alex kept his gun ready though, just in case and listened to the chaos. He was prepared. Well, as prepared as one man could be against the supernatural.

Saiga then spoke and Alex frowned. "I respect what you're saying. But Benji is an officer here too. He probably saved a few lives because he could detect the hellhounds. I know that my comrades are injured and worse, dead. But he's just as much an officer as they are. You can just take him out to the car. I'll drive him to the vets, get myself stitched up and come back to help." He told her.

He didn't care if they didn't see Benji as an officer. He did. Benji was his partner and he was going to make sure the dog got the best care possible. He couldn't quite help with his arm anyway. So while he was at the vets, they could stitch him up too.

"Shouldn't the focus be the girl here?" Rick, who'd been standing within arm's reach of Wei, thought out loud. "A Cryon Slaver is going to be a tricky hunt. From what I've gathered, Cryon law enforcement is even worse than Wing's, hell the natives even make the Aschen pause to think. Not to mention the terrain is perfect for someone who wants to disappear."

Aries had taken up a spot in the back of the viewing room. He had two reasons for that position. The first was that he hated having his back exposed and sitting where he was at the moment meant his back was against a wall. The second reason was it allowed him to have his phone out and text his sister without anyone realizing what he was doing. Sure, he listened in on the interrogation, but figured they wouldn’t get very far with the bastard. He wasn’t really paying attention until Wei asked if they thought O’Leary would give up any more info. Pausing in the middle of his in-depth conversation, Aries glanced over towards Wei and shrugged a bit.

“Probably not.”

Returning to his conversation, he half-listened to what was probably going to happen to O’Leary. In his mind, it wasn’t any of his concern what truly happened to him, but he was a little worried about those that had been victimized by the bastard. Luckily, Rick asked what Aries had been thinking and at that question, he turned his full attention to the situation at hand, putting a quick be right back as a note to Nicci. Stretching a little, he was curious to see what was said on the subject. All he knew was that if his baby sis was missing, he would want everyone to do all they could to find her.

“I’m with Rick. We should try to find the girl before something terrible … or more terrible happens to her.”