Editing Episode 507: Harem-Scarem

<span style="color:#800000">'''''Episode basically done.  This was an action heavy episode, not so much with the talking.--Maer'''''</span> <br> <br>

We return from our trip to the towns of Del Marin and Lochmyre of Verbena and set up base outside of Pottersville, there to plan our op to get Lanie free.<br><br>

We spend the balance of the week until the Wednesday night prior to Bannon’s regular Thursday night outing to get everything in place: explosives to simulate an attack and to sow confusion, a scanner to capture and replicate the control signal on the girls’ collars, finding the source of the control signal and concealing the scanner/capture near it to cop the signal, make a replica of the control device Bannon takes with him to allow Lanie to leave the property with him, observing Bannon long enough to allow Joshua to Borrow him.  Surveillance of the man at work suffices and Arden was able to get the footage himself.<br><br>   

Joshua sleeps the balance of the night in Bannon’s bed and gets up, goes to work in Bannon’s place and generally lives the man’s life until it is time to go pick up Lanie.<br><br>   

The hour approaches.  Kiera and Rina install themselves at their watch points for the remote-controlled explosives.  Arden stands by with our flatbed mule outside of town, waiting for the call to come pick up the girls.  Joshua as Bannon goes back home to primp and pick up Lanie.  In the brothel, Nika is carrying out her housekeeper duties and watching for anything that might ruin our plans.<br><br>

The Baron makes his appearance in the evening and Joshua arrives.  He has the faux controller in his jacket pocket and when Lanie comes down the stairs, the Baron slips him the real one.  Joshua stows it in a separate pocket to avoid mix-ups.  Lanie pauses on the stairs, sensing something is off about Bannon.  Throughout the day, Joshua has been deflecting queries from people by saying he didn’t sleep well the night before—true enough—and that he’s a little off his game but basically fine.<br><br>   

Joshua takes Lanie down the steps of the brothel and hands her into his car and they drive off.  When they are out of sight of the town, Joshua reveals he’s a double and he’s impersonating Bannon to rescue her from the brothel.  Lanie takes this in and then tells him to turn left.  Joshua does.  After all, he’s good at following orders.  They drive for a while and Lanie asks him just what he’s really after.  Joshua convinces her it’s not a trick, that he’s on the level and we’re in place to mount an op in the morning when everyone’s either asleep for the day or at the mill.  In fact, we need her to circulate amongst the other women in the brothel to see who wants to go with her—we won’t leave a woman behind who wants to leave.  That seems to tip the scales for Lanie and she agrees…but first she wants to see our ship.  Joshua told her we’re flying Jing Jing Bei’s ship and she wants to see it.<br><br>

What follows next is an odd but mostly silent tour.  Joshua drives up to the ship, mikes Beglan to open the cargo doors, and he escorts Lanie aboard.  He lets her set her own pace and Lanie goes slowly, stopping and staring and touching things as she goes.  One can only imagine what she must be thinking and feeling at this moment.  She goes up the stairs to the passenger deck and stops at the door of one passenger cabin, stares into it for a long time without speaking. Joshua stands back and gives her room.  She finally turns and asks if he has any makeup.  Her mascara a runny mess from her tears.<br><br>

Joshua uses his XO override to unlock Kiera’s cabin.  Lanie finds the cosmetics she needs and spends some time making herself presentable.  As before, Joshua gives her the space she needs.  When she’s ready, they leave and drive around some more to keep up the illusion that they are the real Bannon and Lanie on their regular Thursday night tryst. During the long ride, Lanie tells Joshua what she knows of the guard complement inside and outside the house, the shift changes, the staff, and so on—in short, filling in any of the tactical information Nika wasn’t able to get for us. Joshua takes her back to the brothel. Lanie will get the girls in the house ready to leave in the morning. Joshua enters and takes his leave of the Baron. Lanie is friendly with the guard on duty and slips the man the false remote for the collars. <br><br>  

Nika notices that Lanie has got all the girls to go along with the plan, because she can see that under their house robes they’re wearing street clothes and street shoes—oops! Bad idea, if they’re supposed to be faking being rousted from bed.  Nika tries to warn one of the girls to cover up with her robe but is stopped by the Matron.<br><br>   

There are nineteen people aboard this thing and it’s a definite strain on the mule.  Rina does that voodoo she does so well and the mule slowly picks up speed.  Like a train leaving the station, we go faster and faster and faster until we are flying along at a decent clip all the way to EQ.  We mike ahead to Beglan to open her up and we fly our flatbed right into the cargo bay.  While one of us gets the doors closed, Nika flies up the stairs to take the pilot’s seat.  Kiera hustles the girls to the passenger level and gets them secured in the rooms.  Lanie cannot bear to be on that deck and instead gets installed safely on the crew deck.  Rina gets aft to engineering with Beglan and Joshua joins Nika on the bridge.<br><br>   

Our sensors blare—incoming!  We’ve got two missiles heading for us, courtesy of the ASREVs. Nika jinks and swerves, zigs and zags.  One of the missiles goes wide of us, faked out. The other one impacts on our hull at an angle—we shudder under the impact and the explosion.  Such a hit would have crippled ''Summer’s Gift'', but ''Equinox''’s hull is armored and our ship remains intact.  We make our pulse point, Joshua punches in the last set of numbers, and Nika goes to pulse, kissing the bastards behind us good-bye.<br><br>

The girls settle into the ten cabins on the passenger deck, save Lanie.  Arden kindly offers the woman his cabin and takes himself off to the med bay’s bed to sleep for the duration of the trip.<br><br>  

We arrive into port and set about getting ourselves refueled and restocked.  We have twenty souls on board who need to be housed and fed and while we had the stores to carry us from Verbena to Angel to Beaumonde, we do not have much more.  Lanie wants to go home to Greenleaf in Red Sun.  That’s a considerable journey—two weeks if not more—and we’ll need to restock our food for the trip.  After dipping into our coffers for that, we’ll need more money and money means we need cargo.  We cannot take in more lucrative jobs transporting passengers—we have no room for them.  The girls we’ve rescued are our passengers for now. And there are the repairs still going undone—the missile hit from ANS at Parker Strip Station and the more recent hit from the ASREVs. We have money for food and fuel, but not for our repairs. <br><br>  

With the sense of things finally falling into place, we set off for Red Sun on the 19th to deliver the cargo to Paquin for a payday and Lanie to Greenleaf, where another payoff will be waiting.  Given the years gone by and the life Lanie had to lead to survive them, we can only hope it is a good one. <br><br>