[centre][b]Vates – Somewhere Northish of Sovereign[/b][/centre]

After about thirty minutes of flight Vates found a clearing and set down the transport shuttle; he was confident that by then there would be a big enough gap between him and any pursuers. There were a few things that needed to be sorted out immediately, notably the corpses in the cockpit. Vates also wanted to release the other prisoners and sweep the ship for any standard tracking devices; he had both planted and disabled enough in his time and knew roughly were to look. [b]“Are you sure you want to release them?”[/b] queried Janus, his voice finally back to the calm and composed tone that Vates was used to. 

[i]“Yeah. I can’t think of why the Mercs would pose any sort of threat. I’ll be cautious with the woman though.”[/i] Vates got up and made his way to the cargo hold. The three captives were clearly awake as they all turned their heads to the sound of Vates’ footsteps. “Right, let’s get you out of these cuffs then” he said, wanting to reassure them that he was no threat before trying to handle them. 

“Thank the maker!” sighed one of them as Vates removed the sack from their head, “I thought we truly screwed! It’s nice to see there’s still a few Mercs left, I’m Kansas and to right here is Benny” 

“Nice to meet you. I remember seeing you on battlefield.” Vates tried not to waste too much time with idle chit-chat and instead focussed on quickly releasing the two mercs. Once they were up Vates silently signalled for them to grab weapons, wanting to be prepared in case the mysterious woman tried anything. 

“Are you going to let me out? Or are you just going to stand there gawping at me?” The woman’s condescending tone could be heard even through the burlap sack. There was something oddly familiar about the voice but Vates couldn’t quite put a finger on it. Without replying he gave a nod to Kansas who then removed the sack. 

Vates’ mouth dropped as her face was revealed, “Sierra?” 

“Hello Vates. Long time no see” she straightened her back and smiled, glad to finally be in the presence of someone she didn’t want to kill. It took a few seconds for Vates to really register her, but then he beamed a smile back in return. He wanted desperately to wrap his arms around her but he knew better than to randomly hug an international assassin. “So…” Sierra cocked an eyebrow “are you going to release me or what?”