"Let's Go Shopping"

[Kansas_Jones 0]

06.09.07

ISS Agincourt ICC-81762

“Let’s Go Shopping”

 

JoNs smiled a fanged smile as she observed the last of the marine’s retiring from the NNC general area for the night cycle. She repressed the urge to chuckle – how in the name of the Predator Bird did you *not* realize there was an intruder directly above your head? Then again, not everyone was gifted with feline senses. It would have served the jarheads right if she just dropped down and beat the snot out of them.

 

She waited an extra thirty minutes just to be on the safe side, not making a sound or moving, and then entered the necessary security commands to place the cameras in the NNC on a fifteen minute loop. The tric screen flashed once and the upload screen indicated that the cameras were out of commission for a bit. She moved quietly through the various Jeffries tubes and ducting, making her way to the marine equipment room. Once above the target area, she removed a section of the grating and emerged from the venting, her feline body moving sinuously. She grasped the edge with her paws and flipped forward and down, landing without a sound on the decking, immediately going into a crouch. Her fangs gleamed in the half lighting as her green eyes took in all of the equipment.

 

“Oh yeeeeesss, let’s do some shopping.” With a low, happy growl, Kansas started doing her “inventory”, removing the pack she carried on her back. She was an equal opportunity looter; it didn’t matter if it was the marines or sciences, if it wasn’t bolted down in your department, it was considered fair game. That reminded her - she needed to unload those engineering gel packs soon. It felt good to engage in a supply run.”

 

Right now, the feline chief was mainly interested in the weapon energy cells; both the marine and security departments had the top of the line models, but the Caitian wasn’t about to go shopping in her department. The black market would pay handsomely for some Imperial Fleet merchandise, and the cells were small enough to smuggle off the ship without any fuss.

 

She started with the phasers and then moved onto the rifles, removing the energy cells and replacing them with the next model down. The charge was the same, and the energy output was the same; these cells were just the civilian version of the fleet ones. Kansas had had them sitting around forever tucked in a corner in the cargo bay after she had been paid off with them. But, when you used the fleet models regularly, what good was it to have the civilian version? Therefore, might as well “borrow” some of the good marine ones and put them to good monetary use. Even better, the serial tracking numbers had been filed off of the replacement cells, so they couldn’t be traced and there was no way to tell that they were in fact non-fleet.

 

Gods, she loved this. The payment turnover for this job would be a handsome one, and her account would be very fat by the time all of this was said and done. At two hundred credits a pop, the bootleg cells would fetch quite a good price. Her buyers – average income homesteaders on some backwater planet that were having a problem with rustlers – were asking no questions, and that was how she liked it. And to top off a perfect situation, she had no partners for this op, and didn’t have to worry about splitting the fee. Life was good.

 

 

Ten minutes into her ‘little shopping trip’, she had fifty brand new marine cartridges all neat and tidy in her travel satchel, and fifty replacement cartridges looking as if they had been there all along. If anything, the marines should be thanking her; the rows of weapons were neater now.

 

The Caitian tossed the bag back up into the ducting, and leapt up after it, catching a paw hold on the exposed edge and hauling her body into the medium sized opening. She closed the grating again, and made her way back the way she had came. Once she reached the common of the NNC again, she reactivated the cameras with the tricorder.

 

A few minutes later, she emerged in an empty side corridor, casually slung the bag over her shoulder, and looked for all the world like she was heading to the gym for some workout time.

 

Mission accomplished.