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Cassie Granger

Pandora (Morrison-Granger)

“Pandora”

A Morrison-Granger Log

 

Hal Morrison’s small cabin high in the Canadian Rockies seemed to get smaller as the storm raged outside, banking snow solidly against it with a driving wind. He and Cass had come here for relaxation, but after their encounter with an armed intruder who seemed to be looking for something and the advent of the snow storm it had turned into something else. Now his father’s box occupied their attention.

 

Morrison had no idea if any of the items in the box meant anything, but by the look through the window it seemed he had the time. Better to lay the contents out on the table. "Seems we have some time to explore the contents of the box," he said to Cassie and himself.

 

"Looks like," she replied, eying its contents.

 

"You know," he said with the box in his hands, "You don't have to stay for any of this if you have more pressing engagements. I mean this was supposed to be just a simple get together...relaxation." Maybe this level of excitement kept her going.

 

"'Fraid it's a little late for that," she said somewhat reluctantly. "Guess I should bring you up to speed.”

 

"Me? Up to speed?" He let out a sigh. "More mysteries?"

 

Arms crossed, she blew out a breath. " That intruder? Reason I left was to track him. Definite amateur. I wanted to see if he'd lead me to his handler or handlers. I was too late. Sniper took him out not too far down. I came back," she jerked a thumb over her shoulder toward the windows, "set some surprises around the cabin, and came in to see what it might be that they want."

 

“I would think the fact they could take us out. Can we even leave the cabin?” He looked away at the fire and thought of the consequences the intruder represented. “Great, the danger I put you in.”

 

“Nothing we can’t handle. What bothers me is the sniper. Why sniper? Why not a phaser, or even a disruptor. And it was a professional hit, a clean head shot from about 500 meters. Used a suppressor. But why not a more modern weapon... unless...” her face clouded and she glanced around at the storm-shuttered windows. “You got communications up?”

 

Nodding, Morrison answered. “I have a somewhat old transmitter that can reach ships in orbit, will that do?”

 

“Anything like that. Power it up and see if you can contact.”

 

He placed the box back on the table and went to the kitchen. The power came in through that room, so it seemed like a good place to put the transmitter. His father placed it in a cabinet to the right of the refrigerator. An array of buttons and knobs greeted him, then lights as he powered it on. Late 23rd century designed flirted with randomly blinking LEDs. “This may take me a little while.”

 

“While you’re doing that I’ll check the perimeter.” After a brief hunt in her kit, Cass produced a small rectangular device. Her face paled. “We’re dead in the water. You have a crawl space under this thing?”

 

“Yes, running east and west through the middle of the structure.” He still struggled with getting a signal from any orbiting platforms. “Not even civilian bands.” His face contorted. “What do you mean dead,” he asked.

 

“I mean that the sensors I placed around the cabin aren’t transmitting. Either there’s a dampening field jamming everything or the storm has taken out electronics for a while. That happen very often around here?”

 

“On occasion when the conditions are right. Aurora borealis naturally.” Morrison grunted loudly. “Damn...this thing is useless.” He gave the sides a light hit with closed fists. Pounding on it would not help, no matter how much he wanted to punch it further.

 

“Nothing’s absolutely useless, sir. We can always use its component parts. Right now, we need to consider our options, put everything we have on the table. First, the storm’s not letting up, so leaving is probably not the best option. We need to find the most defensible place in the cabin. What would that be?” Cass had already begun to suit up.

 

He gave the question some thought. “This place is on a slope of about ten or so degrees, the slope goes down the path to the road. If an attack came from the path then either of the front windows. I’d attack from the back of the cabin frankly, the top of the hill is about 300 meters away.” All of those years at this cabin and he never thought he’d be pinned up here. “We need to sure up the rear facing wall. Keep away from those windows.”

 

She nodded, pulling on her boots, “Weapon status?” A stomp to seat each boot and she looked up expectantly. “What kind of weapons do you have here, Commander?”

 

“None of that Commander stuff. Name’s Hal. Simple Hal.”

 

“Hal it is.”

 

“Anyhow, that non-working pistol, a pulse rifle made in 2153. Pre-Federation stuff. I may have two of those. Packs a punch. Let me get them.” He walked into the hallway, reflexively stooping down. He pulled a tall mirror toward him, revealing an equally tall safe. Spin, stop, spin spin, then click. The safe opened. He pulled two rifles out and a black case. He closed up the safe and headed back to Cassie.

 

When he returned, Hal noticed that Cass had cut a door from the cabin to the woodshed and was hauling wood to the wood stove and the fireplace. “We need to make the place as warm as possible,” she explained as she dropped a few logs on the fire and stacked the rest nearby so they would warm. Then she moved to the wood stove, checked the flue, and fired it up. “If they have thermal imaging, the hotter it is inside the cabin, the harder it is to spot bodies.”

 

She turned to face him. “What’d you find?”

 

Holding a weapon in each hand, but thinking of how warm the cabin would get, “Two Pre-Federation era pulse rifles, a precursor to the ones Starfleet uses today.” He handed one to Cassie.

 

It was old, but it looked serviceable. “Your dad took good care of his weapons,” she said as she began to strip it down. “Ammunition?”

 

“I presume that’s what this heavy case is for,” Morrison said as he dropped the case on the table with a thud.

 

“Sounds like,” she said, checking the plasma weapon’s innards, “pull ‘em out and see what we have.”

 

Within ten minutes they had the ammunition set out and the plasma rifles operational. Within thirty they had planned their defense, positioned their weapons strategically, and gathered several everyday objects and cleaning materials to make effective IEDs. While Cass worked with those, Hal investigated the crawl space as a last-ditch option for escape. If need be, they might tunnel out of the dampening field under the meter plus of snow that had accumulated, or at least make it far enough away from the cabin to escape pursuit. The one thing they had going for them was that whoever the attackers were, they probably wanted what was in that box, so burning the cabin down was not an option.

 

Still, they really weren’t entirely sure of anything. Call it an educated guess.

 

Hal remained below in the crawlspace beneath the cabin. The cold was striking. The insulation kept the now rising heat in the living space. He felt unsettled in such a small area, like the small attic before. Having Cassie there made the experience bearable. He crawled back to the opening at the end of the hall, then closed the hinged door.

 

“I think the crawlspace will work for us. A bit cold, but we’d be in something warm already.”

 

“Aye,” said Cass. “Now we wait.”

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