Episode 11 -- The Intruder

Andy Jackson, a former Earthforce marine demolitions expert, believes he can 'earn' his way on the team if he proves how resourceful he is. Sneaking onto the jumpship and then into the base, he learns that not only did he not impress the Power Team, but he endangered their existence by compromising the base. When his partner's life is endangered by a biodread, Jackson has to ask the Power Team to help rescue him. The problem comes when the team isn't certain if they can trust him.

~*~*~*~*~

Problem #1:
An intruder unlocked the hatch and sneaked on board the jumpship.

Jennifer Chase's Security Rule #1:
No one should be able to sneak on board the jumpship.

Problem #2:
An intruder bypassed the security system.

Jennifer Chase's Security Rule #2:
No one should be able to bypass the security system on board the jumpship.

Taking all of that into account meant that the team had one very annoyed, very angry pilot on their hands. Jennifer did not like the idea that anyone could break in to the jumpship by accessing their security system given how intricate the programs were. If someone like Andy Jackson could do that with the simple device he had, what could someone with access to more advanced technology do?

Overriding Jumpship Security Rule:
Do NOT mess with Jennifer's jumpship or else.

That was the one rule the team knew well -- do not mess with the jumpship. It wasn't just the Power Team's jumpship any longer. It was Jennifer's jumpship. She took meticulous care of it. Someone broke in? The team was guaranteed several days of recalibrating equipment and reprogramming computers to make sure that didn't happen again.

Sitting in the pilot's seat, Jennifer and the jumpship had a bit of a one-sided conversation that amused the rest of the team as they listened.

"Now let's get one thing straight," she said to the console, "you don't let anyone in here unless it's one of us or someone with us, okay? What if Jackson had been the enemy? He might have flown away with you. We would have never seen you again and there's no guarantee anyone else would take care of you like we do. You can't trust just anyone who wanders by and unlocks your hatch, you know."

Hawk laughed. Sitting in the co-pilot's seat, he could only agree, but someone had to stand up and defend the jumpship. "I'm sure she didn't mean to let a stranger in. There has to be a perfectly logical explanation."

"And I think I found it," Scout said as he completed a diagnostic on the ship's systems. "The device Jackson used ran on an older operating system. It's compatible with one of the systems we use on the jumpship. Basically, his device used subroutines similar to one we use in the buffer to confound the Dreadheads. That one system recognized the similarity and let him in. It didn't recognize the device as a foreign computer."

"That's not good," Jennifer muttered.

"What does that mean exactly?" Jon asked the resident computer experts.

Jennifer slowed the ship as they approached the landing bay of the base. "We run certain older programs in our detection and security arrays to keep any Dread forces from gaining access to our primary systems since their equipment don't have the ability to breach them. At the same time, we run programs more advanced than anything they've got so we can monitor them without their being able to trace us," Jennifer began the descent. "Scout and I wrote a series of buffer programs that allow the two basically incompatible systems to work together. Jackson was able to access one of the older recognition programs in the buffer and have it tell the more advanced security program to unlock the hatch."

Jon didn't like that. "How do to correct that?"

"For a start, we'll have to reprogram the buffers," Scout said. " Jackson 's device was very similar to some of our own equipment. Dread doesn't have anything like it because he doesn't use the military equipment from the Metal Wars like we have to, but he could improvise."

Jennifer sighed. "That means reprogramming some of our equipment as well."

"Good thing you and I didn't have any plans for the next few months," Scout told her. "If we work straight through nights, weekends, free time, we could have the reprogramming finished by your birthday."

"That's not until January," she reminded him.

"Yep, and it might take that long," Scout joked.

"Maybe it's time we got a new, updated ship?" Jon teased, knowing Jennifer's opinion on that subject.

Hawk teased back. "It's bad luck to switch ships if you haven't named your current ship, and Jennifer hasn't done that yet."

Jennifer just shook her head and smiled. She patted the console. "Don't pay them any attention, sweetheart," she said to the ship. "They're just trying to annoy us."

~*~*~*~*~

Tank pulled the circuit board from the door-lock of the jumpship and handed it to Pilot. "I had a feeling that biodread wasn't destroyed at Haven. It's going to cause us trouble."

"He's tougher to put down than Soaron is. His aim is better, too," she added as she hooked the wires from the diagnostic computer into the circuit board.

"Does that thing even have a name?" Scout wondered aloud as he monitored the diagnostic readouts. "We can't keep calling it 'it' or at least call it something we can say in polite company."

Hawk laughed. "We're polite? Since when?"

"I didn't say us," Scout joked. Then he let out a low whistle. "Jen, I think we got off lucky."

"What is it?" she asked as she moved behind him to see the readout.

"He used an algorithm that basically went through a process of elimination to find the right program. All we have to do is --"

"Re-modulate the security programs in the buffer," she finished for him.

"Looks like we'll be finished in a couple of days," Scout almost crowed.

~*~*~*~*~

Jon listened as they discussed the various forms of modulation programs that could be loaded into the buffer, the additional security protocols that could run concurrently between the opposing systems, the multiple... actually, he lost track of the conversation after that. The jumpship was in extraordinarily good hands, and that usually meant everyone else was in the way.

He cleared his throat. "So what can we do?" he asked Jennifer and Scout.

"Not much," Jennifer answered as she began to bring up the buffer programs on the monitor, "unless you can code a program in a binary language which can be translated --"

"Uh, no, I can't do any of that," Jon smiled as he interrupted her quickly, hands up as if he were surrendering. "Anything else?"

Scout and Jennifer looked at each other, then both shook their heads. "No, Captain, I think we're good. It's just going to take time," she explained.

"It could take a couple of days to go through all the programs and load the correct re-modulations," Scout added.

"Then a couple more to test them," Jennifer informed them.

"Then we have to make sure no one can bypass the base's security system," Scout mentioned.

"Which means a complete rewrite of some of our security arrays in Mentor 's computer systems," Jennifer finished.

Jon, Hawk and Tank stood silently for a moment, then Hawk asked, "So we're in your way?"

A quick glance from Jennifer, a bemused smile, an indulgent nod, and the three of them left the jumpship in good humor.

As they walked across the landing bay, Hawk shook his head. "I didn't understand any of that," he told the other two men.

"Be glad those two did," Tank said. "They're always trying to find ways to outsmart Dread's computers. It's like a game with them."

Jon agreed completely. "Don't give them any ideas; at least, not today. I think they've got enough on their plate."

"Speaking of plates," Tank headed off toward the kitchen, "it was Scout's turn to cook, but I don't think Pilot is going to let him quit work just to feed us. I guess I'll take kitchen duty tonight."

Alone, Hawk and Jon walked on toward the control room. Jon could sense that Hawk needed to speak to him about something. "What is it?"

Hawk shrugged. "Nothing. Just... what did Jackson mean when we left -- that you needed to explain something to Jennifer?"

Oh, that. "I think Jackson overheard one of Jennifer's conversations with Mentor ," Jon told him. He was NOT going to tell anyone exactly what Jackson had said. "I think it had something to do with a literary point made in a book. Maybe Jackson thought that a computerized answer might not be the best explanation."

Besides, what Jackson had suggested that Jon explain to Jennifer was hitting too close to home. He wasn't certain he could be all that objective.

~*~*~*~*~

Standing in the control room. Jon listened to the quiet whirring of the systems. He knew every panel, every control, every button. The control room was a home to him -- or as much of a home a headquarters could be. He'd spent many hours in the control room listening to reports, reading incoming Intel, formulating attacks, playing chess with Jennifer...

The base itself was more than a mass of steel, rock and electronics. It was a home full of memories and friendship and moments that made life special. As important as the walls and consoles and framework were to him, it was those moments that Jon treasured most. It was talking with Hawk about everything a teenage boy wants to know as he grew up. It was learning new things about computers while watching Scout rebuild and reprogram old, defunct electronics. It was listening to Tank and Hawk pick on each other good naturedly, the two of them recalling times that Jon barely remembered. It was watching Jennifer as she made each new discovery of the world that Dread had stolen from her.

An intruder in the base, an intruder bent on destruction, would have destroyed the chance for them to create more memories inside the base.

Could Jon have blown it all up? Could he have ordered the self-destruction of the base and demolished everything in it to keep an enemy from gaining access to even a single computer chip?

Would he have had the courage?

He thought he could, but he hoped he'd never have to find out.

Yet the thought kept gnawing at him. There was an evacuation plan if he ever ordered the self-destruct. Download Mentor onto a portable hard drive, get the spare power suits, take anything not nailed down and could be used establishing another base, and get the hell out. That last part was the most important. More suits could be designed, a base could be built, even Mentor could be duplicated to some extent, things could be replaced but a human life couldn't. Their lives were more important than anything else, even Mentor .

Thinking back, Jon reflected on how Jennifer and Scout had worked tirelessly to save Mentor when the biomech's head exploded. Mentor was more than a computer, more than the image of his father. Mentor was the foundation of the base, the one individual who any of the team could speak with and talk to about anything and receive a rather Stuart Power-ish answer. He was their sounding board, their wealth of information, their steady guide during late night conversations. He was even the occasional onlooker, advising Jon which chess piece to move. One day, Jon was going to learn to listen to him if he ever hoped to beat Jennifer in a game again.

Mentor was important to all of them. He was the sixth member of the team. If the base were destroyed but they still had Mentor , then the intent of what his father hoped for would still live on in the complex programs that made up the interactive hologram. The dream to free the world of Dread would still be there as long as the team was together, had a place to operate from and Mentor was there to act as their keel.

No, he could lose the base, but what he didn't want to lose was anyone from his team. That was a sacrifice he didn't want to make.

As a soldier, he knew that nothing was permanent. Many times, a soldier had to sacrifice what was important to him, destroy what he loved in order to win a battle or stop the enemy. If they had to destroy the base, their home, then they would. Jon would rationalize the need as part of the war and push the button without a second thought. He'd mourn the loss later. Hawk would have done it with a quick last look around. Tank and Scout? Either one of them would push the buttons without thinking twice because it was something they had to do, but they would salute its memory later on. Jennifer would follow the order because she knew better than anyone the risk of allowing an enemy access to the base, but she would feel the loss in a way the others couldn't. She'd be destroying the first home she had ever known. It was the place where she learned what the word home meant. It meant a place where people cared about her and worried about her, who took care of her if she was wounded or sick, who laughed with her and talked with her. Home was more than just a mere four-letter word or a place with four walls. Home was where your heart was.

That was when the truth became apparent. Any one of them would have destroyed the base if they had to, they were soldiers and accepted the risks, but none of them would want to because it was home.

That realization made, Jon had a bigger problem to ponder -- Andy Jackson.

~*~*~*~*~

Jennifer watched the readouts as the onboard computer isolated the specific programs Jackson 's device randomly searched through to give him access to the ship. Regardless of what she and Scout had said, this was going to be a little more involved than just modulating security programs in the buffer.

Jackson 's method of sneaking onboard the jumpship hadn't been an obvious one. It wasn't the type they could have anticipated. Accessing the buffer programs? Basically, no one could access the buffer programs. Only going through the two main systems could do that, but in order for Jackson to get to the main systems, he had to access the buffer programs. It was maddening in a catch-22 sort of way.

What was worse -- if Jackson had been a bad guy, they might have had to blow up the base to keep it out of enemy hands.

The base...

The idea of losing their home wasn't one Jennifer liked to think about. They all knew that the self-destruct was the last option and that one day, any of them might have to use it. Still, to lose the base, that would be difficult. The rest of the team viewed it as a military base as well as where they lived, but Jennifer saw it as her home. It was odd -- she'd never heard the word home when she was growing up. All her life, it was return to base, return to barracks, report to your duty station. The first time she heard the word was before she was an official member of the team. She had been allowed on a few missions with the team, one helping relocate some villagers to a safer location. The mission lasted several days, and when it was completed, Hawk sat down in the pilot's seat of the jumpship and said in a very loud voice, "Where to, everyone?"

Scout had answered, "Home sounds like a winner."

Jennifer had never heard of a settlement or a sector called Home. She wondered if it was one of the various towns that sprang up quickly in the wastelands. She didn't ask. She wasn't certain how to ask since everyone else seemed quite happy to go to this Home. She was surprised to find Hawk flying into the landing bay at the base. So the base was called Home? That was its designation? She thought it was called the Power Base.

The captain had given her limited access to Mentor , the interactive holographic computer. Mostly, it was for information purposes with a lot of information still off limits to her. As it was, Mentor 's knowledge of life outside the Dread Youth had interested Jennifer more than any information dealing with war issues.

When she was alone with Mentor , she would ask all sorts of questions about life before the wars, about people, about how things used to be. Sometimes, she felt awkward asking the others. They seemed surprised at her lack of knowledge, but they never used it against her in any way.

That night, she went to the control room and switched on the computer.

"Hello, Mentor ."

"Hello, Miss Chase," he smiled down at her. "I trust the mission was successful?"

"It was. I wanted to ask a question, but I don't know if it's classified."

The hologram looked down at her, a patient look on his face. "You've asked very few questions that I have been unable to answer."

That was true. Very few of her questions had been about anything to do with the war. "After the mission was finished, Hawk asked where did we want to go, and Scout said Home. We came here. Is Home the name of this base?"

"No," the hologram shook his head. "This base is home for the team. This is where they live."

He obviously saw her confused look. "Have you never heard of the word home?"

"No. I first heard it today. I thought it was a location we were flying to."

"Home has many meanings. In this particular case, a home is a place where one lives, a residence; a physical structure such as a house or, in this case, a base. It is a dwelling place where a family or a social unit lives and provides an environment that offers security and happiness. It can also be the name of a headquarters, often referred to as a home base. That term, however, would allow us to cross over to a sport called baseball where a home base is part of the game, but I think that particular discussion can wait until another time."

Jennifer considered that. "So home is the term for where you live?"

"In some respects, yes, but it is much more than that. The word itself encompasses an emotion, a state of being. Home is where a person is loved and cared for, where one feels safe. It is where one is welcome. There are sayings about home such as home sweet home, home is where the heart is and there's no place like home. Others include a house is just a building, it takes people to make it a home."

Jennifer had lived in Volcania most of her life, yet it didn't feel anything like the way Mentor described the word home. It hadn't been home. It had been where she'd been billeted, that was all.

It took time, but she learned what the meaning of the word home meant for them. The base was more than just walls and floors and elevators. It was the life that all of them together forged inside those walls that made it a home and not just a base.

For Jennifer, the base was the first place she could call home. For Jon, it was much more. The base was his father's legacy. It was a place to fight, a place to find refuge, a place to remember what used to be. Every room had something that Jon could look at and see his father's influence. Blowing up the base would mean Jon would lose all that. Jennifer didn't want that to happen.

She was going to do whatever she could to see that he didn't lose the base.

That meant no more intruders on the base.

"We need a failsafe," she muttered, mostly to herself but Scout heard her.

"No arguments there, but all the ones we've tried before have caused more problems than they've solved." Scout began typing new commands into the program.

More problems. That was the truth. Given the diverse nature of their programming style, some failsafes were incompatible with other programs. "Unless..." Jennifer began to say.

"Unless?"

"What if we put in a program that recognizes our particular patterns in addition to the usual security protocols?"

Scout stopped typing. "DNA... well, we know our fingerprints and voiceprints could be easily duplicated."

"Which was proven very well when that biodread copied Jeb's voice," Jennifer told him. " Jackson knew it wasn't him because of what was said, not the voice that said it."

"To get past a DNA analyzer, they'd only need our blood or a bit of tissue."

"True," Jennifer stood and slowly paced as she thought about what they could do. "What if we use a program that's similar to the one our suits use to recognize us?"

Scout leaned back and considered the possibilities. "Our suits are basically blank slates when they're first designed, each suit downloaded with the same programs. The first time they're worn and powered on, the activators use the electrical impulses traveling between our synapses to imprint itself with our specific brain patterns. The suits become specifically geared to the particular abilities of the wearer. That's why Hawk flies and Tank can bust through walls." Scout thought some more. "Our suits will only power on if the wearer touches the badge and vocally orders it to power on."

Jennifer saw that he realized where she was going with the idea. "Just because our suits are specific to its wearer, that doesn't mean that they're not interconnected in a way that gives some control of each suit to another wearer. Now none of us can wear another suit and get it to power on, but we could power another one down if, for instance, the wearer were unconscious. We've had to do that before."

"And that's all the control another wearer has..." Scout's mental gears were turning as well. "The program that allows someone's suit to recognize a wearer of another suit... we could use a program like that!"

"Exactly!"

"Think the captain would let us use it?"

"Not that one specifically, but we could write a program that's similar that only recognizes our patterns the way our suits do."

"Okay... but you get to clear that with the captain. When it comes to anything to do with suit technology or the suits' programs, he's pretty particular about what gets used."

~*~*~*~*~

Jon sat down at Mentor 's console but didn't start up the hologram.

Jackson had said a few things that were still bothering him.

Putting another person on the team? Yes, there was room for one more, but they had to be careful about who they chose. They worked with a lot of people, but to be on the team itself? To be entrusted with a power suit? To be trusted with the lives of the others? That was not something easily decided. As a team, they had to be able to work with each other, and more importantly, to understand each other. The various backgrounds of the team demanded it.

Yes, Jackson was good at what he did. Yes, he had the experience and the drive to fight Dread, but there was an edge to Jackson that just didn't fit in with the team.

Scout could be irreverent but was never insulting. Hawk could be sarcastic but usually humorous. Jackson hid veiled irreverence behind innuendo and sarcasm, and he didn't seem to care exactly what he said or who he said it to.

Who was he kidding? Jon didn't like the way Jackson talked to Jennifer. He certainly didn't like the way he looked at her or flirted with her in a crass sort of way. That was a game Jennifer had almost no experience playing. Yet there was another factor that put Jackson out of favor -- not a single member of the team would ever have mentioned anything about any conversation they might have overheard between Jennifer and Mentor . That was taboo for them. Jon saw the embarrassment on Jennifer's face when Jackson said what he did. It wasn't just the fact that he had overheard the conversation, it was the fact he blurted out what the conversation was about. There were times when Jennifer felt far behind everyone because of what she didn't know. Having it flung in her face like that, taunting her with it -- it was something that wasn't done on their team.

That kind of behavior would not get him an invitation to join.

Moreover, at the very core of it all, there had to be respect and honesty for the foundation of any team. There had to be an honest trust. Jackson had deceived them, had tricked his way inside -- that wasn't an honest meeting and he hadn't been very forthcoming about who he was from the very beginning. True, they all had secrets and no one could fault an individual for that, but when working as a team, each had to know that they could trust the others.

That was what it boiled down to. Trust.

Trust was something that was built over time or circumstance. Each member of the team had a different history, but each had proven their value and worthiness in different ways. Jon had known Hawk all his life. He'd grown up with Mitch and Katie; Joanna had been like a second mother to him. Hawk was like the endearing uncle who was a bit overindulgent but kept him from getting into too much trouble. Jon had met Tank when he was protecting villagers as they moved to a new town. The surprising patience and calm temper of this giant of a man had impressed Jon. He was even more impressed when he saw Tank slam a biomech down with just his fist. Tank insisted on telling Jon that he had been engineered at the Babylon 5 facility before agreeing to join the team. Scout was a young, brilliant computer technician who loved to blow up clickers and Dread facilities. He was living on the fringes, no family, no real home, fighting biomechs on his own with a great deal of success in overriding their programming -- not to mention a sense of humor that just didn't stop -- there had been no doubt. They needed him on the team. With a smile and a handshake, he was happy to join the team. Then there was Jennifer. She was honest about who she was and what she'd done since the day they found her out in the wilderness. She wanted to atone for her actions even though she hadn't known the truth.

The day they found her...

Jon remembered every moment of that day. He remembered the moment when he heard Hawk's voice come over the radio. He remembered the first time he looked into those gray eyes...

January.

Wintertime.

The day was a dreary gray. There was no snow falling yet, and very little sunlight shone through ever-present pollution. Winter had them in its icy grip, and there was no expected break in the weather. The cold wind bit through Jon's uniform, sending a shiver through him. He needed to get better cold-weather gear for the team somehow.

The jumpship had failed on them again. Hawk managed to land near a wooded area so they could have some cover to make repairs, but lately, they spent more hours making repairs than flying. The jumpship wasn't going to last much longer.

"All finished, Captain," Scout closed the engine cover. "Just needed to recalibrate the sensors. That lightning storm we flew through knocked them off line. Unfortunately, the heating unit is still down. We're just going to have to be cold."

Hawk packed up the tools, sighing loudly as he did so. "So we're ready to go?"

"As ready as we can be," Scout told him. "This old ship has more problems than we can fix. We need to get a new one."

Tank walked into the ship. "You find out where we can find a new ship, and we'll go get it."

Jon shook his head. "Right now, it's the only one we've got, and as long as it's still flying, we're stuck with it. Let's get this patrol over with and get back to the base where it's warm."

Hawk sat in the pilot's seat, trying to get the jumpship to lift off carefully. The ship jerked and jumped as if it wasn't happy to be back in the air. Scout was right. They needed a new ship. This one was ready for the scrapheap. "Sector four, coming up in two minutes," Hawk announced, his voice showing the strain of flying the faulty ship.

Scout listened to the comm system, trying to differentiate between what was normal static and what could be enemy communications. Something was going on...

"I'm picking up partial signals from biomechs," he said. "Something about tracking someone... heading them off... last bit sounded like the word surrounding."

Jon turned to Tank. "Anything?"

Tank adjusted a control on his console, "I'm picking up a life sign in the woods. Clickers advancing on his position."

"Any sign of another patrol?" Jon asked.

"None. Sensors are picking up weapons fire."

"Good enough reason for us to check it out. Hawk, take us as close as you can."

Jon saw Hawk eyeballing the area. "We'll have to set down in a clearing. I'll fly in, you guys use skybikes."

As soon as they landed, Hawk took off in the general direction of the commotion. Within a few minutes, the rest were in the air trying to find the person. Eventually, Jon heard Hawk's voice come over the radio.

"Jon, she's holding off the clickers. Get here fast!"

She?

They flew over the dead treetops toward Hawk, seeing clickers advance toward a spot in front of them --

Then Jon saw the individual in question. She was behind a fallen log, firing repeatedly on the biomechs as they made their way slowly up the rocky terrain. Hawk was standing behind her, guarding her back and destroying the biomechs as they broke cover.

Simultaneously, Jon, Tank and Scout swooped in and gave Hawk cover fire, flying further over the woods and demolishing every mechanical monster they could target.

Just as they finished off the last biomech, Hawk's voice sounded over the radio. "Jon, she's one of Dread's soldiers. Bring a med kit. She's hurt."

They landed nearby, and Jon saw one of the most surprising sights he'd ever seen. The girl was leaning against a fallen log, holding her side where she'd been shot, looking as if she could fall over unconscious at any moment. One quick glance at her gun showed that she had no rounds left. She was fighting to the last of her ammo and the last of her ability. She was defenseless and in the presence of the enemy -- at least, the enemy from a Dread soldier's perspective. She seemed to be trying to back away from Hawk but just didn't have the strength to move. Jon could see that her soggy, ragged uniform was that of a Dread Youth, but the gray eyes he looked into were not the hateful eyes of a Dread-raised soldier. They showed pain, fear, confusion, uncertainty -- it was a look Jon had seen countless times by survivors of the wars, but never in the eyes of a Dread Youth.

No Dread Youth had ever broken the training or the conditioning. How was she out there? Why was she being chased by clickers? There was something unique about the girl.

Hawk was kneeling near her, not touching her, not approaching her. He stood and walked over to Jon. "The only thing I've found out so far is that she ran here from the north."

The north? He thought about the geography in that area. That meant she had crossed a river -- which was why her uniform was wet -- and climbed up rocky terrain, the incline lasting maybe over a mile? Her clothes were ragged and torn, certainly not thick enough to protect her from the winter cold. "Do we know who she is?" Jon asked.

"Not yet. Bring the med kit?"

Jon handed the Hawk the small box and watched as the older man returned to the place where he had been and powered down his suit.

Scout walked up beside Jon and whispered, "That's not just a soldier's uniform. Look at the emblems. She's with the leadership. Maybe a youth leader."

A youth leader? Being chased by biomechs? The very ideas were diametrically opposed. "Let's see if Hawk can get her talking," Jon whispered back.

"Hey," Hawk said, his voice as friendly as possible, "I know you don't know us... I'm Hawk, by the way. Well, I'm called Hawk. That's my call sign. My real name is Matt Masterson."

The girl -- no, it was a woman -- looked at Hawk as if not understanding his words. Then she looked at Jon. He saw her eyes -- the gray eyes of a Dread Youth soldier -- only they looked scared and tired. She understood the words. What she didn't understand was the intent. Of course! Jon wanted to slap his head. She was Dread Youth; they were Resistance. They were supposed to be enemies, and it was well known that the Dread Youth didn't aid the enemy. Why would an enemy help her?

In an uncertain move, Jon powered down his suit as well, an action that surprised the woman. He could see her shivering -- sometimes, Jon knew he was a complete idiot, and this was one of those times. It was wintertime, she had swam through a polluted river and fought off biomechs, she was going to freeze. Immediately, he removed his coat and very slowly moved near her, but not too close to her. "It's cold, and you don't have a coat. You need this." He held his coat out toward her and waited, letting her decide whether or not to take it.

She seemed to consider them one by one, sized them up mentally, and for whatever reason, she reached out and took the coat. Her hands were torn and bloody, shaking from the cold, from her wounds, probably from the adrenaline rush of the battle. What Jon did notice is that her eyes never left him. He helped her wrap the coat around her shoulders, but every muscle in her body was tense, as if she was expecting an attack from them.

Okay. Now what?

Hawk hadn't moved. She hadn't indicated in any way that she was going to let them near her. Maybe introductions were in order? Jon pointed toward Hawk. "Well, you've met Hawk. He's our pilot when we can get that flying junk pile of ours in the air." He saw her glance warily back toward Hawk. "The big guy behind me is Tank, the fellow on my left is Scout, and I'm Jon." Her eyes returned to him.

"You're Captain Power?" she asked, her voice unclear by disuse.

At least she knew who they were. "Yes, I am. Can you tell us your name?"

She seemed to debate whether to answer or not, then in her tired, hoarse voice, she said, "Jennifer Chase."

Jennifer Chase. They were making progress.

"Hello, Jennifer," Hawk spoke quietly in his most dad-like voice. "Look, you're hurt. You've been shot, and you've got a lot of exposed wounds... scratches... you're bleeding pretty badly. They need to be tended to or they'll get infected. If you'll let me, I'll do what I can to help."

She was still unsure of them -- and why wouldn't she be? Jon didn't think that Dread taught his soldiers anything about trusting people.

"Why?" she asked, her voice strained and hoarse.

"Why what?" Hawk wanted to know.

"Why would you want to help me?"

Hawk smiled at her. "One reason is because you need help. You're hurt."

"I don't deserve any help," she whispered.

Why would she think that?

Jon heard something -- it was her stomach growling. That was when he took a good look at her. Her eyes seemed sunken with dark circles under them. Her lips were dry and cracked. Her clothes weren't just torn and ragged -- there were holes worn in areas from hard, recent abuse. Exposed skin was scratched and bleeding -- whoever this Jennifer Chase was, however she got this far away from any hint of civilization, she had gone through the ringer.

Jon took his water bottle from his belt and handed it to her. "Here you go. It's water," he told her. "Sip it slowly."

It could have been ambrosia from the gods given the look on her face when she took her first sip. She hadn't had water in a while.

"Why do you think you don't deserve any help?" he asked, noting that she would be unconscious in minutes from the blood loss where she had been shot.

She took a deep breath -- Jon could tell that it hurt her. It was possible she had injured her ribs. "I've done some unforgiveable things," she said. "You should have let the biomechs have me. It would have been a fitting punishment."

Punishment? "What do you mean?"

When Jennifer looked at Jon again, there were tears in her eyes. A Dread Youth that could cry? Was that possible? "I was at Sand Town ," she told him.

Sand Town. She didn't have to explain that, but Sand Town was attacked weeks earlier.

This time, Jon answered her. "That's part of what we do. We help people."

That was their first meeting. Odd questions, stilted answers, guarded looks and complete confusion. Hawk assured him that part of her confusion was exhaustion, exposure, lack of food and water and the fact she was wounded and ill. Even with a low-grade fever, she had fought the biomechs. She had used the last of her energy fighting the clickers; so much so that she had no energy left to stay conscious for much longer after their initial conversation.

They took her to a mobile medical facility operated by a friend of theirs, Doctor Greta Royston. That was their first indication of just how stubborn Jennifer was. She almost died within those first 24 hours, but Greta pulled her through.

"It wasn't me," Greta told Jon. "It was her. She pretty much refused to die even after all that."

"What can you tell us about her?" Jon asked.

"A youth leader who found out the truth," was all Greta told him. She refused to elaborate. The rest, the team had to learn on their own.

If Greta hadn't been able to save her, if Jon had never had a chance to get to know Jennifer...

Gaining Jennifer's trust hadn't been easy. Over time, as more and more details of her life became known, the team learned just how precious that trust was. Soldiers trusted each other, family members trusted each other, but the Dread Youth never trusted, never cared about another human being, never placed their lives in the hands of others. It was something Jennifer had to learn, so was it any wonder that once you had proven yourself to Jennifer, once you had earned her trust, you had it for life? She did not give her trust easily or willingly, and to earn it was one of the highest prizes life could bestow.

That trust they built between the five of them had one very strong foundation stone: honesty. Jennifer had been lied to all her life, so honesty meant more to her in a way the others couldn't appreciate. If someone was deceitful, then trust was lost.

It was that simple and that complex.

That reverence for honesty and sacred trust meant Jon was not going to 'eavesdrop' on any of the conversations between Mentor and Jennifer. He wasn't going to intrude on her privacy. Yet what Jackson said... it concerned Jon. Life was full of mysteries the human race was still discovering, but he didn't want life to be an unknown mystery to Jennifer. Mentor was a good technical guide for some of it; however, should there ever be a need to explain something that Mentor 's more computerized view didn't fully clarify, maybe knowing the topics they were discussing but not the content would help.

Jon quietly checked Mentor 's logs. There were a lot of conversations logged between him and Jennifer, starting almost as soon she had joined the team. Parental love, friendship, sibling rivalry, pets, possession of items and the emotions connected with owning inanimate objects -- that had to be around the time Hawk had told her about people naming their cars -- the topics were widely varied, but then Jon noticed the time signature on the files. They coincided with their missions. Something had happened or something had been said on a mission that she didn't understand and she came to Mentor for a deeper explanation of the 'technical details.'

Chess, poker, holidays, birthdays... birthdays? Again, he noted the date. It was about four months after she had joined. Hawk's birthday. Jon remembered -- Jennifer had seemed a bit confused, she even seemed a bit dismissive about it when Scout asked her when her birthday was. She said that she didn't know and she'd never seen any reference to her birthday or even her age. Right then and there, Scout declared that the day they found Jennifer would be her birthday since she didn't know when it was. After all, he said, everyone has to have at least one birthday a year.

He kept reading. The topics ranged from the deeply philosophical to the merely mundane.

"Can I help with anything, Captain?" Mentor 's voice asked.

Jon pressed a button and the hologram appeared. "No, thank you, Mentor . I was just curious about something."

"May I ask what?"

"Our intruder, Jackson, made a comment and I was investigating the truth of it." Jon waited a second, then asked, " Mentor , I don't want to pry into any of Jennifer's conversations with you, they're private, but do you ever get the impression that she might need to discuss a topic with another human and not a computer?"

"I believe there are a few subjects that she would gain more perspective if speaking with someone who has experienced them; however, I believe she is curious about the definitions of such subjects before wishing to experience them herself."

That made sense. She wanted to test the waters before jumping in the deep end.

"Other discussions are clarifications or explanations of daily activities or conversations she's experienced but has no context in which to understand them."

"So much had to be new to her when she first left the Dread Youth," Jon muttered, mostly to himself.

"Indeed, it was," the hologram agreed. "When you first brought her here so she could recover from her escape from the Dread Youth, we discussed many topics. I suggested reading certain books that depicted various subject matters we discussed. I believed reading would be a method that would help her relate situations to characters in a much more emphatic way that went beyond our discussions."

"And she does love to read," Jon said. "I wish we had more books."

"Corporal Chase did mention that herself not long ago," Mentor told him. "Her birthday is in a few months. I understand that personal possessions were not allowed in the Dread Youth, so I believe that giving her several books of her own would be a welcome gift."

Jon could only smile at that -- Mentor wanted to give Jennifer a birthday present.

"Finding books isn't always easy, Mentor."

"Unfortunately, the books that Corporal Chase has shown a recent interest in reading are not in my databanks. However, I have perused some databases that are not connected to any of Lord Dread's computers. I have found one of the books and downloaded it. It is still in binary form. I wish this to be a surprise, so I am only using minimal power and a small amount of storage space to translate it."

"We don't have any paper to print it out on or any way to bind a book," he pondered.

"I believe that we could manufacture the necessary material from resources now available to us. I have performed an analysis of existing and obtainable materials." Words appeared on the monitor, and Jon immediately recognized that all were materials discarded in the cities and towns. They would be very easy to get.

"How much would you need, Mentor ? When?"

The image appeared to think for a moment. "I have no data to establish a time line or a quantity required. However, if you were to collect a few samples of these items, I could process them into paper and binding and ascertain how much would be needed."

Simple enough.

"Mentor , you do know that a birthday present is to be a surprise, correct?"

"Of course, Captain. That's why I am translating one book and looking for others using very little power or storage space so Corporal Chase will not see any anomaly in any of my files when running routine diagnostics."

Sneaky hologram!

"May I ask about the intruder? Was he dealt with sufficiently?"

Even Mentor wanted to know about him. "We helped him rescue his partner and let them both go."

"Is this wise?"

Jon had been asking himself that question all day long. "I hope so. He honestly thought that by breaking in to the base, it would impress us enough to put him on the team."

Mentor seemed to consider that statement. "Would he have been an asset to the team?"

Asset? Well, maybe if Mentor dropped the last two letters... "He's a demolitions expert, but I honestly don't think we could trust him as a team member. He didn't seem to understand that there are some lines you don't cross. We might have blown up the base, might have lost everything because of what he did. And what he said? He was... he said things he shouldn't have."

"Such as his comment that roused your curiosity of the topics Corporal Chase and I discuss?"

Jon nodded his head. "Yeah, that. I know you and Jennifer talk about a lot we take for granted and don't even think needs explaining, but Jackson overheard something in particular. I don't want Jennifer put on the spot again like she was today. It made her uncomfortable."

"I believe that is why Corporal Chase talks with me about many topics."

And it was hard to be uncomfortable around a computer that did not judge or embarrass.

"I suggest we no longer discuss this, Captain. Corporal Chase is approaching."

Jon looked up as Jennifer walked into the room. "Captain, Scout and I may have another way to secure the jumpship."

"Good. How difficult will it be to implement it?"

"That depends," she said, then paused.

Ah. "Depends on what?"

"We'd like to incorporate a program that allows the jumpship to identify us the same way our suits recognize another wearer, at least to power off."

Jon sat back and thought about it. It was so simple, it was ingenious. "How difficult will that be to load?"

"We have to write it first," she said as she sat down at the console and looked up at the hologram. "It should work on Mentor 's security arrays if we can get it working. We use the same basic concept but not the same program. If we use the buffer programs that Scout and I have installed as the --"

"Jennifer, wait," Jon interrupted her, "I wouldn't understand the technical details. Let me just ask you this. Will this program keep someone like Jackson from sneaking on board the jumpship again the same way?"

Jennifer smiled and nodded her head. "If it works? Yes."

"Then do it."

Jennifer seemed somewhat confused. "Are you sure?"

"Absolutely," he told her. "I know how much you love that jumpship. Anybody breaking into it had better run for the hills. Even we wouldn't do that unless it was absolutely necessary."

"It would mean needing access to part of the program that governs our suits to learn how it works so we could create a program that does something similar only within our buffer system."

Jon nodded his head. "I know. At least, I think I understand. It's a great idea, and besides, I trust you."

Trust -- that simple, that complex. In all honesty, there were few people in the world he trusted as much as he trusted her. Jackson thought Jon would make a better explainer than Mentor about love, but how could Jon explain that to her when he needed to find a way to explain it to himself? Jennifer was the only one he wanted to trust with his heart, but no matter what Jackson had overheard, no matter what he had said, the time wasn't right to explain that to anyone but himself.

The End

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