With a tremendous crash, the small side door of the warehouse burst open. At the same time, the rear doors were also breached. Officers in black tactical gear swarmed inside, weapons drawn. “Entrances secure!” They reported in before fanning out to sweep the rest of the building.

“Only one civilian present ma’am!” One of the officers said, dragging forward a short, wiry man in an old, ugly and ill-fitting suit. The man scowled, muttering under his breath. His expression soured even further as Commander Denali came in through the breached doors. Normally, he had nothing against tall, statuesque redheads, especially one whose figure was amply shown off by the black bodyglove she wore beneath the standard tactical armor vest, but this particular leggy redhead and he had a history…

“Commander, I really must protest!” The civvie whined. “You’ve got nothing on me! I’ve kept my nose clean this time, I swear!”

“Stow it, Flickie!” We both know that’s a load of organic fertilizer.” Commander Denali shot back, returning his sour look with a scowl of her own. “You’ve been throwing a lot of credits around lately, and we both know you aren’t making that kind of cash with a warehouse full of spark plugs and low quality toilet paper.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “I want to know what other merchandise you’ve been moving through here, off the books. I want to know where it came from and where it’s going.”

Flickie tried to look as defiant as he could, pulled on his tiptoes by the grip of the burly security guard beside him. “All the goods in here are 100% legitimate. All the paperwork’s in order! I’ll have your badge this time, for hassling an honest businessman for no better reason then prejudice for some indiscretions he may or may not have done when he was younger!”  

“Yeah, a whole week younger maybe.” Denali said, skeptically. “You may have gotten those charges dropped but we both know those weren’t Bibles you were shipping.” She nodded to her officers. “Search this place top to bottom. He’s got to have something illicit here...”

With a nod and a word of affirmation, the officers, save the one watching Flickie who stayed by the Commander, keeping a tight grip on the squirming businessman, went to work with a will. Shipping containers were flung open, revealing packed interiors full of standard boxes and pallets, loaded with auto parts and paper products, exactly as written on the cargo manifests.

“Search all you want, you won’t find anything because there’s nothing to find,” Flickie continued to protest. “I’m completely legit now, I told you! So why don’t you call off the stormtroopers. I’ll have enough headaches getting all this cleaned up before the trucks arrive tomorrow morning!” He nodded to the mess they’d made at one of the containers where a pallet had been upset, spilling bottles of motor oil and lubricants onto the floor, rolling every which way.

He trailed off as another officer came into the warehouse. She was dressed in the same tactical armor as the other officers, though half the size and still seemed too big on her short, slight frame. She also had no helmet, revealing a round, pale face topped with an unruly mop of pale blonde, nearly white, hair. Her large round eyes were a pale gray and seemed to swim in and out of focus as she looked around the warehouse.

“Commander, I must protest!” Flickie shouted, hurriedly thinking up an earworm to occupy his thoughts. “You know damn well thoughts read by psikes aren’t admissible evidence!”

“You can relax, Flickie. I’m sure she’s not interested in anything going on in your dirty head.” Denali replied with a barely concealed smirk at his distress. The psike girl had meanwhile continued into the warehouse, part the other officers who’d moved from the shipping containers and were now turning out cabinets and lockers looking for any hidden goods. Unerringly, she headed to one of the containers they had already checked, the doors opened to reveal a solid wall of cardboard boxes whose brightly colored fronts advertised their contents as a new wonder gadget for making the perfect hard boiled egg, as seen on tv.

“In there.” She said in a soft voice, raising a finger, pointing forwards.

“You sure?” Commander Denali, striding over in a dozen long paces. The other, blank faced security officer followed, dragging Flickie along, sweating heavily and threatening all manner of complaints with sympathetic council members over this whole affair.

“Definitely. Ten voices, mostly quiet, but a few a strong.” The girl answered.

Denali called over two of her men from the office desk they were checking. “Empty that out.” She ordered. They promptly obeyed, digging into the container. Boxes of “Eggcellent Wonder Tools” clattered to the floor, eliciting howls from Flickie over how long it would take him to get them packed up again before that container shipped out next Tuesday.

“I think you’ll have more to worry about then that, Flickie.” Denali told him. Behind the third row of boxes, the officers came to a wall, about a meter inside the long container. Steady excavation showed it extended the whole length and height of the inside sealing off the bulk of the space. In the center was a small hatch reaching almost to the floor with only a short lip.

“Get it open.” Denali said, “But check it first.” She added, glancing over at Flickie who was already loudly announcing that he had never seen that secret hatch before in his life, that he’d had no idea it was there. “Flickie’s not usually the type for booby traps, but no sense taking unnecessary risks...”

The two officers in the container drew their scanners from their belts and quickly waved them over every square inch of the wall and hatch. “It’s clear Ma’am...opening now.” One of the officers said when they had finished. He found the touch pad on the hatch and pressed his commlink to it. The police grade software quickly overcame the meager security of the cheap, civie electronic lock. It gave an affirmative chirp and with a quiet hiss, the hatch slid back a quarter of an inch, breaking the seal, and began to slide to one side.

“Mmmppphhh!”

From inside the newly revealed space, a chorus of plaintive whimpers escaped. The officer nearest the hatch switched his flashlight on, lighting up the dark space and revealing the source of the moans. A dozen figures sat on benches along either side of the container. All of them were female and all young and strikingly pretty; wide curvy hips and perky round breasts, both easily visible as none of them had a stitch of clothes on, if you didn’t count their restraints.

Each of the girls had her hands shackled behind the back, feet locked in cuffs. The chains were hooked to rings bolted to the container’s walls and floor. Steel collars circled each slender throat, likewise chained to the wall. Finally, thick rubber hoods completely covered the captive’s heads, save a small opening at the nose to breath through and another at the back through which the captive’s dark hair spilled out. From the muffled whimpers that escaped, the hoods must have covered, or incorporated gags of some sort.

Those moans turned from plaintive wails to something approaching hope as the captives realized, slowly due to the disorienting effects of the hoods, that the people standing outside the container were not their captors, but were security officers.

Commander Denali glanced over at Flickie. “Let me guess? Bunch of hopefuls out of Neo Hong Kong, promised them jobs over here?” She grinned, watching the man squirm as he continued to deny knowing anything about them.

“Maybe you’ll have more luck selling that to the judge...Ok boys, move ‘em out!” Denali ordered, pulling out her pad. A moment later, the officers left the container, leading behind them the line of young women, still shackled and hooded, now linked at the collars in a short chain. The girls murmured in confusion, as it slowly dawned on them they wouldn’t be released any time soon.

“There you go...” Denali said, sending the document over to Flickie’s communicator. “One citation for importation without a license. You can pay a 500 credit fine and surrender the illegal goods or take your chances in front of the judge. Till then, they’ll go into impound. If they’re not returned, they’ll be sold at the next city auction.” He accepted the ticket with an annoyed grumble.

“Next time just pay the licensing fee and the taxes.” She chided him. “Speaking of which, I’m sure Revenue will want to go over your books after this...” She grinned as another round of annoyed howls slipped out of the angry civvie. “Ok boys, let’s clear out!”