"I'll get to it," Jackson said, looking down at where his children were still playing. "You staying for a while? We're eating in the upper observation lounge."

"I'll be heading out after this briefing," Pike said. "You need to spend time with your family."

"This was a long way to fly out to hand me something that could have come over a Bluebird data dump."

"There is one more thing, something that can't be sent over our com networks." Pike leaned in, and then looked over where Gillian sat.

"I'll get them cleaned up, and we'll head to the observation lounge," she said, taking the hint.

"Take Barton with you," Jackson said, squeezing the hand she placed on his shoulder before she turned and herded the children towards the hatch. Jackson watched them go, a sharp pang of regret hitting him as he realized his kids were growing up without him. Not an uncommon thing for a career fleet officer who served aboard starships, but still painful to realize how much had happened in his absence.

His son, Daya, smiled and waved. His daughter, Celesta, did not. Both of the children were named for officers who had served with Jackson aboard the Blue Jacket during the first encounter with the Phage, an alien species bent on their eradication. Celesta Wright had come through the war in one piece, Daya Singh had not.

Daya Wolfe was a bright, happy boy who immediately forgave Jackson when he reappeared in his life after months of being deployed. Celesta Wolfe was a quiet, serious little girl who made him work for it, not so quick to just shrug off what she saw as regularly occurring abandonment.

Jackson's wistful stare didn't go unnoticed by someone like Pike.

"Why are you still doing this, Wolfe? This isn't the old days where there just weren't any other combat-hardened officers who could handle the job. Barrett can finish off Vadim Kohl, so why don't you just step away and spend the time with your family?"

"One more job, then I'm done," Jackson said. "Once Vadim Kohl is in custody, this ship goes back to the CIS black site, and I'm turning in my stars."

"Sure you are," Pike muttered. "Anyway…the reason I flew my happy ass all the way out here instead of just sending this over Bluebird is because we need to assume all channels of communication are compromised to some degree."

"Like the CIS operative using a Bluebird unit to give Kohl updated intel?"

"Precisely. Bluebird has been too widely deployed—at least in my opinion—and that means it's too difficult to monitor every station, every transmission, and every operator. Even the AI systems brought online to filter through the jabber can be fooled," Pike said. "The orders packet I gave you will have more detailed com protocols your taskforce is to operate under, but I've also been asked to give you a set of supplemental orders from the very top."

"Asked?" Jackson laughed. "This should be good.