Per 
"Well that's anticlimactic." Xeno's disappointed voice broke the monotone beats of David's boots against metal deck.
Getting aboard an aircraft carrier was easier than David thought.
He had prepared a set of SCUBA gear, in case he had to sneak in from underwater and use the riftgun. Instead, he slipped through the crowd of off-duty GOC personnel, and easily gained access to the interior of the UNCC Heritage with only a counterfeit uniform. A particularly observant officer might've recognized the subtle differences between the GOC Black Suit and his normal fabric, but so far nobody had spared second glance at him.
"You tell me. All those time wasted spent routing…"
"Simplest answer and all that. If I have to spend six months of my life on floating hunk of steel, I would probably be too tired to care, too." Kyle chimed in, interspersed by slurping sounds—chocolate milkshake, David recalled. "I'm more surprised that the UN apparently has an air force."
David suppressed his annoyance. He had assigned Kyle to guard the small hideout where he kept his underwater gears. Now that Kyle's plan had rendered his redundant, the least he could do is let Kyle enjoy his newfound free time.
"The GOC has a lot more than just air force." Moving briskly, David followed the layout he memorized, trying to find his way to the ballast tanks. His boot echoed as he descended a set of metal ladders.
"No, not the GOC. The mundane UN Peacekeepers. Theoretically, when Peacekeepers ever needs an air force, they would employ member nations' assets just like the ground forces. But the Heritage was commissioned and registered as direct UN asset."
"That doesn't sound right. The GOC got several vessels that resupply with mundane military bases periodically. but they're all registered as the respective bases' national assets. Something smells…fishy." Kyle groaned audibly.
"Do you think it's a honeypot?" It would make sense, anyone looking for the GOC would check the first obvious abnormal UN assets.
"The secret data server in the ballast should be real, even if this ship itself is not actually used for GOC operations."
"How is it that I have not heard of this in the briefing?" Having reached the array of ballast tanks, David waved around an infrared thermometer—the device actually measured densities of the object it's pointed at, useful for finding something that doesn't belong in a large array of identical objects.
"Sorry, that's a hundred percent on me. I saw Japanese and American names on the crew manifest and just assumed that they're with USFJ."
"Nah, I should've asked you to triple-check it. Well, moment of truth." One of the ballast tank showed deviation from the other tanks—almost double, in fact, from the normally water-filled tanks. Using a hydrogen-oxygen torch, he melted the locking mechanism before forcing a small hatch open.
"Xeno, this is supposed to be a data backup server, right?"
"Supposed to be, yes."
"That is not a data server."
In the cylindrical ballast tank, suspended in its center with a web of wires, was a miniaturized nuclear warhead.
D.C. al Fine wore unusually modern appearance in David's screen, presenting herself as Carrie-Anne Moss. A pair of dark sunglasses hid her eye, but David still felt the piercing coldness from her eyes. Coupled with her black dress, David can't help feeling like he was attending his own funeral.
"The good news is, the honeypot worked. Without additional knowledge of how your organization normally operates, an external attacker would suspect the Heritage first and foremost. Our finding further reinforces that."
"But a honeypot is worthless if attacking it is sufficient to inflict major harm to us."
"Indeed."
"What would you suggest us to do, Mr. Keyes?"
"I would suggest doubling down on the Heritage. Tighten the security details, make a big deal over the discovery of the warhead. Use it as a smokescreen to investigate the culprit."
"Of course, this is all without revealing your team's involvement."
"Unless absolutely necessary, yes. I do not believe that any publicity is good publicity, especially if it is to a nuclear-armed terrorist."
"If I may give you suggestion myself, Mr. Keyes, your team would be far safer in our protective custody. There are not many nuclear-armed belligerents that would wish to harm the Coalition, but they are all very dangerous."
"Tempting offer." Kyle chimed in. "Would've been convincing if not for the three White Suits that Susan said coming in on us."
"This is not what we agreed on."
"The term of our contract states that the Coalition would protect Ravensgate Incorporated from any potential harm that might arise as a result of Ravensgate Incorporated fulfilment of the contract."
"The terms of our contracts also mentions that both signatory of the contracts would consider each other as equal. Detaining us would void this. We will be safer on our own than any of your prison." The Under-Secretary General for UNGOC removed her sunglasses; David could almost swear he saw thin layer of frost creeping on his screen.
"I have mentioned that Coalition has dangerous enemies. I said that as a friendly warning, as our enemies would indubitably seek to harm you as much as ourselves. But to resist the Coalition would turn us into the most dangerous of all your enemies." The screen went blank, smoke coming out of the encrypted thin client. David's radio equipment claimed that Kyle and Xeno were out of range, he could only hope that they had escaped before him. Susan was better at hiding than him, so he tried not to worry about her as he grabbed as much of his equipment as possible. He opened a portal and threw everything into it, but the seamless walls of their temporary base of operation exploded just before he stepped in himself.
He kicked the portal generator away and raised his arms, allowing the Strike team to detain him.
"I fucked up. I fucked us up."
The room that David's team was kept aboard the Heritage was by no way a brig, more likely that the suite was dedicated for civilian priority guests. Bunk beds in the corner were clearly shoved in as last minute addition, over jarringly vivid carpet with telltale marks of bigger bed once occupying the space. The rest of the room could otherwise pass for a mid-range apartment in mildly populated city, with a fridge and even a decently furnished bathroom. Windowless steel wall and gentle rocking waves were the only reminder that they were currently aboard a ship.
Xeno had commandeered every available pieces of cloth from shower curtain to the bedsheet so she could cordon off a section of the room, filled with what equipment she could smuggle. She almost fought the White Suits just for her mechanical keyboard.
"We all make mistakes." Susan landed on David's shoulder. "Remember that one time I almost got eaten by an iguana?"
"Yeah, that was before the riftgun." He smiled. "Damn, that felt like a lifetime ago. Hell, it was a lifetime ago."
"We're supposed to pull a heist on a Wilson's capybara. Instead, I led you to a zoo a couple block away and got locked in the reptile exhibit."
"I expected you to quit right then and there."
"Bah! And then what? Go spend my life in a terrarium?"
"Gotta be better than wandering around with a failure like me."
"What is life without skirting death every now and then?"
"Well, peaceful?"
"Touché."
They sat in silence for a while, only broken by the sound of keyboard clacking in Xeno's makeshift station. Some distance away Kyle was setting some kind of antennas, no doubt recruited by Xeno to try and connect to outside world.
"You do have a plan right?"
"A contingency in case one of the largest paranormal forces in the world turned against us?"
"Yeah."
David chuckled. "Why would you assume that?"
"Because you always have a plan. Especially for things like this."
"Well, I can't say I haven't thought about if we accidentally angered them, every now and then. I don't know if you could call them a plan though."
"Oh? Are we going to steal a fighter jet?"
"What? No! That's a horrible idea. None of us have any pilot training, much less one sophisticated enough to weave through all the AA weapon that would be up our asses."
"Aww. I was eager to see you being the one narrowly evading iguana tongues for once."
"What we have to do is simple. We get the ship to broadcast a dozen SOS signals for every emergency and organization we know, as well as triggering every internal alarm. Then, we use the confusion to escape."
"Escape where? We're in the middle of the ocean, the Heritage left the port almost immediately after the report. And none of us have our portal generators, the White Suits took them away."
"Well, remember when we did that Horizon gig? The one with the florist who turned out to be a Hand?"
"You mean the girl you flirted with and decided to omit from the report? I think you still have the ash tree bonsai she gave you in the temporary base."
"Flirted? Ha, no way. She actually gave me the ash tree with an instruction to make a single-use Way, in exchange for not snitching her to the Horizon guys."
"That sounds awfully convenient. What's the catch?"
"Like I said. It's single use, the tree withers after being used as exit. And it could only be used from the same dimension. And it can't be used within iron enclosure above certain purity. And the knock needed this and that. There's a lot of limitations, as with a lot of convenient tools."
"Why haven't you used it until now?"
"The pocket dimension is more convenient and less restrictive. I mostly only kept the bonsai tree out of courtesy at this point, who could've guessed we'd need it to escape from a ship in the middle of the ocean?"
"I can give us ten minutes window tops. How are we going to do this?"
They all gathered in front of the door, Xeno's hand ready on her modified Galileo nano computer, keyboard strapped to her back.
"I can't knock the Way anywhere onboard this ship. Preferably we riftgun out, but that's not an option right now so we'll have to jump overboard."
"That's a crazy idea."
"Yeah. I'm open for suggestions."
"I have none." "Me neither." "I'm in."
"Well. It's been fun. Get the boat rocking."
With a press of a button, chaos filled the Heritage.
"You know, if we can hook up a power generator and some real computers inside the pocket dimension, I bet I could get our comms to do FTL."
The three humans and a dragonfly appeared with a flash of light in the ransacked temporary base, soaked from head to toe with seawater. David had been able to open the Way right as their bodies slammed the ocean, and a volume of salt water followed them through, drenching generously among all things the withered ash tree bonsai.
"What, do you want me to take a job in space next?" David looked around and under the furniture to find his portal generator, miraculously missed by the Strike team.
"We would be making history if we could pull a heist in space. We know the Foundation people have bases on the Moon."
"I feel like it would be more hassle than it worth. Besides, we're testers, not thieves. There's no point in provoking them."
"One thing for sure though. No more ships."
"No more ships."
"Amen to that."
Not gonna lie, I'm kinda dissatisfied with how I ended this tale, so here's a random Ravensgate logo I made in the last minute. Sorry!
