Mission: Planet Biter (Veslor Mates #4)(56)
Trowly sat on the far side of a round table when they entered the room. A man and woman dressed in business attire were seated on each side of him. Both appeared in their mid-fifties and displayed stern expressions.
The woman spoke first. “Thanks for bringing us our employee. Now leave. This is a private matter.”
Roth’s hold on Vera’s hand tightened. “We are not leaving Vera.”
“These are the Veslors I was telling you about.” Trowly motioned for them to take seats. “They are all a part of Miss Wade’s protection detail.”
The man in the suit scowled at Trowly. “You’re saying that one of our employees isn’t safe on one of the biggest battle cruisers in your fleet? Especially inside your own security offices? Some of the things we need to go over are classified. The last thing New Worlds needs is a bunch of gossip circulating about what in the hell happened on that planet. I understand that you have to be here because fleet stuck their nose where it didn’t belong, but I want those men to leave while we question our employee.”
“Don’t be insulting, Mr. Danver,” Trowly snapped. “These men were in your facility as part of the rescue detail. They saw the result of the sabotage. And we answered a distress hail. Be thankful for that, or every employee would be dead and you’d have no one to question. I’ve opened my files to you about our investigation results so far, and informed you of what happened to Miss Wade in the bar. You haven’t been so forthcoming. Who has the most motivation to murder your entire survey team?”
The woman cleared her throat. “Gentlemen, enough.” She stared at Vera. “Miss Wade, tell your security to leave right now. Then take a seat.” She reached down and withdrew a data pad. “The fleet has demanded that we interview you in front of their lead investigator. We have no time to waste. Our pilot is ready to depart in an hour.”
Vera didn’t like the woman’s rude tone or the fact that she had just ordered her to make Roth and his grouping leave. “What is your name, and what do you do for New Worlds?”
The woman narrowed her eyes, studying Vera shrewdly. “I don’t think that’s relevant, but I’m Marcy Piers. I am a station resources manager. This is my associate, Ted Danver. He works for our legal department. We were the closest to your location. We’ve both been authorized to handle this unfortunate event.”
“Unfortunate event,” Vera repeated. “Wow. That’s what you’re calling what happened on Biter? Someone sabotaged our pods habitat, we were all being drugged against our will by stuff that made us lose our minds, and pure hell went down, up to and including murder and suicide.” Tears filled her eyes, slipping down her face, but her voice remained strong. “It was a living nightmare none of us could escape. My team just kept dying, one after another. Unfortunate event doesn’t begin to cover it. Try calling it a fucking nightmare that there was no waking up from. Put that in your report.”
Both New Worlds representatives gaped at her.
Then the woman’s job description sank into Vera’s mind. “Station resources?”
“Yes,” Marcy Piers admitted. “I just said that.”
Vera suddenly had a suspicion. “You got here pretty fast. I’ve heard something about station resources before… Did you hire temporary workers from a space station to assemble our pods habitat on Biter? I know the freighter made a stop at a station right before we reached the planet. We were told it was to refuel…but did they also pick up people? There are rumors that New Worlds does that sometimes to save money. You wouldn’t have to pay one of our assembly teams to travel all the way from Earth and back. Is that what you did?”
“Have a seat,” Danver ordered. “We’ll be asking the questions. Not you.”
“Vera?” Roth’s hand tightened on hers.
She turned to look up at him. “It makes no sense that someone on my team would willingly drug everyone. They were trapped on Biter, too. And you told me where those canisters were hidden, where they weren’t easy to access. Do you know who could have put them there? The people who assembled the pods habitat.”
Vera glared at Marcy Pier. “Did you risk our safety by hiring non-vetted stationers? Did you even run background checks on them? New Worlds does extensive checks on full-time contracted employees. They’re highly motivated to make sure every project is successful, since higher-ups get annual bonuses if profits are—”
“Sit down and shut up!” Marcy Piers snapped. “I have the authority from New Worlds to fire you. You will be heavily fined as well.”
“Answer Miss Wade,” Trowly demanded. “Did you hire stationers, giving them access to the planet? You gave me the impression your job was simply to buy food supplies from nearby space stations. And the list you provided of employees who were part of the delivery crews—who had access to your dead employees and the job site—were all from earth.”
Vera’s anger spiked. “If she said that, she’s lying for sure. All our food comes from the same distributor on Earth. It’s marked on all the boxes in our kitchen storage. You can send someone back down to our pods facility to look yourself. A good portion of our food boxes are still sealed, since we hadn’t even reached the halfway mark on completing our job. There are four storage areas in the kitchen pod. Two are for shelf-stable supplies, one is for cold storage, and the fourth is a freezer.” She paused. “It doesn’t even make sense to buy food from a space station. The prices would be much higher. My company buys directly from the same place every time. It’s always Krongon Foods.”