Jaxon looked down at Francisco, unsure what he was talking about. Something must have happened on Delta Station, but what? "You got it, Clay. Consider it done." He only hoped that he didn't just promise something that he couldn't deliver.

Francisco opened his eyes and smiled up at Jaxon. Then, his head rolled to the side and his eyes glazed over as his last breath passed his lips.

"Dammit, Clay," Jaxon muttered. He dropped his hands over Clay's eyes, closing them gently. "You weren't supposed to die. Nobody was supposed to die."

Jaxon stood and rushed to the side of the dead guard and secured his plasma rifle. He returned to Francisco and hoisted him up and over his shoulder before heading for the exit.

As Jaxon opened the lower level door, a new alarm and warning began to blare.

"Warning: Station implosion imminent. Hull breach irreversible. Locate escape path immediately."

"All right, dammit. I'm on my way!" Jaxon said as he stepped into the familiar corridor that led through the central thoroughfare and toward the station's docking bay.

59.

Jaxon rushed into the berth, and found it mostly deserted. Rightfully so, he mused. The space station was about to explode. Thankfully, there was one ship remaining, and it looked strangely familiar. It just happened to be the ship that brought him on board. Praying that his companions had secured it for their own departure, Jaxon charged ahead and right up the boarding ramp.

Once in the main hold, Jaxon lowered Francisco onto the flight couch and covered him with a shipping blanket before heading for the cockpit.

Stepping in, both Oliver and Camille stared at him expectantly.

"Cutting it a little close, aren't you? Francisco on board as well?" Camille asked.

Jaxon nodded. "Yeah, get us out of here."

"What about Guzman, boss?" Oliver asked.

Jaxon took Francisco's station behind Camille and looked ahead. "He's about to get his just dessert."

Oliver fired the engines and drove the throttle ahead to full.

As the ship approached, the bay doors flashed a warning before slowly parting open. He knew their ship was compact, but Oliver was accelerating much faster than he was comfortable with.

"So ... Miles. Everything good?" Jaxon asked, not questioning his piloting skills outright.

Oliver remained silent as the ship jetted ahead. The closer they got, the more apparent it was that the outside edges of the ship were going to collide with the opening doors. Then, suddenly, Oliver adjusted the pitch of the ship sideways, and it shot out into space, just meters to spare all around.

"Jesus, Miles," Camille exclaimed. "What are you trying to do? Give us all a heart attack?"

Jaxon leaned back and smiled. He had the sudden recollection of his own escape from Taloo Station and was absolutely confident that Oliver was the right man to pilot.

Suddenly, proximity detectors began to blare, and Camille quickly brought up the sensor array on the main view screen.

"My God, they have us surrounded," Camille said. "Hold on. Those appear to be our own ships! Those signatures are GSA standard frequencies."

"Looks like they got my message," Jaxon and Camille said in unison.

"Your message?" They both asked, again, at the same time.

"I ... sent a message to the director right before landing on Delta Station," Jaxon said.

"And I sent a message to the assistant director right after you were captured," Camille said. "Assistant Director Evans practically demanded a multipoint check on all personnel."

"Strange. Director Howe asked me to keep him updated at every point along the way as well. He asked me to contact him directly and in private."

"Huh, same here."

"I don't give a shit what's brought them out here, I'm just thankful that they're here," Oliver said as he throttled back on the accelerator.

Then, the lead ship in front of them fired a warning shot across their bow.

"What the hell?" Camille asked. "Don't they know it's us?"

Jaxon already had his control panel queued up for the ship's stealth device. He activated it, reducing the ship's shields to minimum.

"Well, the ship's insignia and classifications are that of the Guzman family, so as far as they know, we're not even on this ship," Jaxon explained. "Miles, why don't you divert our course down and away from the surrounding ships? Stay as close to the space station as you can."

"You sure, boss? That station might explode at any moment."

"Well, if we're lucky," Jaxon said confidently.

The surrounding GSA ships remained in their positions but ceased firing. Oliver steered the ship to the back side of the space station and hovered just meters away from the exterior wall.

Within minutes, the space station began to self-destruct, the explosion beginning at the top and working its way down the center shaft. Jaxon sat at his controls with his hands at the ready. As the explosions neared their location, Jaxon quickly deactivated the stealth device and put all of the energy into the defensive shields just as the station exploded right next to them.

The blast jettisoned their ship outward, along with massive chunks of debris. As soon as they were clear of any collisions, Jaxon reactivated the stealth device, minimizing the shields once again.

Both Camille and Oliver turned in their chairs and stared at Jaxon, dumbfounded.

"What? It's a little maneuver I recently used-"

"Why not just radio them and tell them who we are? Why all the cloak and dagger again?" Camille asked.

"Because our mission isn't done quite yet. We have one more stop to make before we head home," Jaxon said.

He proceeded to tell them about Francisco and his final request. Neither Oliver or Camille cried outright, but they were both shook up at hearing of his demise. Camille explained the entire ordeal that Francisco witnessed. They all agreed that the next stop was unavoidable.

60.

Jaxon, Oliver, and Camille walked through the hand-carved wooden doors of The Pleasure Gauntlet. As they entered, Madame Elina looked up. She first saw Jaxon and smiled. Then, upon seeing Camille and Oliver, her happiness turned to worry.

"Ah, Marty. It's been so long. Where have you been?" Madame Elina asked, stepping around her podium and walking directly up to Jaxon.

Jaxon made no action to divert from the approaching Madame but glanced nervously toward Camille, who was giving him a questionable look.

Jaxon accepted a brief hug from the Madame then pushed her away. "My priorities in life ... have changed. Quite some time ago," Jaxon said. "We're actually here on another matter."

Madame Elina looked at Jaxon cautiously before returning to her podium. "If it has anything to do with these two, I have no idea what you're talking about," she said.

"It's about your girls, Madame. I know that Pablo Guzman is behind your operation, and I'm here to inform you that there's a lot of changes coming your way," Jaxon said dutifully.

Startled by the mention of Guzman, Madame Elina straightened her posture. "I have no idea what you're talking about. Who's this Pablo ... Guzman fellow anyway?"

Jaxon sighed. "Oh, Madame. Let's not waste each other's time. I know that he's behind your operation, and he's been trafficking girls throughout his entire network. I'm here to tell you it's over. Guzman's dead and I'm here to save the girls."

Madame Elina smiled nervously before she lunged toward the control panel on the side wall. Her fingers were millimeters away from the security call button when Camille stopped her.

Jaxon stood by, motionless. "Why must you make this difficult? We know they're here, so why don't you save us both a lot of heartache and just tell us where they are?"

Madame struggled with Camille but was incapable of escape. Camille gripped both of Madame's arms and twisted them behind her back, driving them up into her shoulder blades, perilously close to snapping.

"Ah! You don't have to be so rough," Madame Elina cried. "Suppose you're right and Guzman is my main benefactor. Why should I believe you that he's dead?"

"You can believe me or not, lady. I just want the girls, then we'll be on our way."

"Well, you're too late. There're no girls here. Just leave now and I ... promise that I won't tell Pablo about this incident."

"You want me to kill her, boss?" Camille asked.

What's with this boss thing? Jaxon wondered. Oliver certainly had started something.

"No, we might need her. Hold onto her while Oliver and I go look for them. If we're not back in ten minutes, you're more than welcome to take care of Madame Elina in any way you see fit."

"I swear!" Madame Elina said. "They're gone. The girls aren't here."

Jaxon and Oliver stepped past the women and into the cordoned off pathways of pleasure. "Which way were you guys when Francisco ... left the room?" Jaxon asked.

"This way, boss," Oliver said, leading the way to Gigi's room.

Down the hall and to the right, Oliver stopped in front of the third door. "We were in here," Oliver said, motioning toward the door.

"And did Clay say anything else? Which way he went when he left the room?"

"Sorry, boss," Oliver said.

"Looks like we're going to have to do this the hard way. We're going to have to start knocking on doors-"

Before the words were out of Jaxon's mouth, Oliver walked up to the next door in the hallway and burst in.

"Sure, let's just throw discreetness right out the door," Jaxon said, catching up to Oliver.

Walking into the room, they found an aging man tied to the bedposts with a velvet rope. He only wore a pair of silk boxers. The prostitute in the room was wearing a satin-stitched horse head with leather straps around her neck. She completed the ensemble with a horse tail protruding out from between her butt cheeks.

Normally, Jaxon didn't react so adversely to the perversion of others. But he felt a little flush in the face at the sight. "Sorry, wrong room," he said before pulling a reluctant Oliver back out into the hallway.

"From now on, let's just crack the door open and peek in. If they're having sex, we move on. The room that Francisco described earlier was at the end of the hallway somewhere, isn't that right?" Jaxon asked.

"Yeah, something like that."

They continued down the corridor, popping their heads through doors randomly, witnessing various states of sexual promiscuity along the way.

Finally, at the end of the hallway, they came to a door that was different than the rest. "This has got to be it," Jaxon said, opening the door and walking in.

The room was pitch black, and both he and Oliver fumbled for a light switch. Finally, Jaxon found it and flipped it on. There were more than two dozen cages lining the side walls, stacked two high. Unfortunately, they were all empty.

"Sonofabitch!" Jaxon exclaimed. "She was telling the truth."

Before returning to the front, Jaxon and Oliver exhausted their search in the room, looking for a possible secondary exit. Coming up blank, they began to retrace their steps to the lobby.

As they walked down the corridor in silence, Oliver began to slow his pace. "I got an idea, boss."

Jaxon stopped and turned to face his companion. "Go ahead."

"I think we should stop and talk to Gigi. I think she was into me enough that I might be able to get some information out of her. Maybe, just maybe, she knows something about those girls."

Jaxon considered Oliver's suggestion before nodding his head. "It's worth a shot, Miles."

They retraced their steps a few doors before Oliver knocked and walked in.

Gigi was kneeling at the foot of the bed, stark naked and wearing a strap on dildo. Her pleasure companion was not a male, as expected, but a female, which was a rarity in itself. Both Oliver and Jaxon flushed red at the embarrassment of the situation.

"Ryan, what are you doing here?" Gigi said as she climbed off of her feminine patron.

"Sorry to just burst in like this, Gigi, but it's important," Oliver said, averting his eyes away from the naked girls.

Jaxon pulled out the last of his paper credits and handed them to Gigi's client. "Hey, sorry about this. Here's enough to buy you two more sessions later, but we need to talk to Gigi now."

Awkwardly, the woman dressed and bolted from the room.

"What's all this about?" Gigi asked.

"We're looking for some girls," Jaxon said.