Chapter 243 243 Counter Scheme

Kasandra needed to hear the words that Avery had just said. For someone to absolve her of the guilt she had been feeling all of this time.

Perhaps it was somewhat self-serving, since it was obvious how Avery would respond. Still, having him reassuring her helped to put her mind and heart at ease.

"Thank you, Avery." Kasandra said as she leaned her head against his chest. He felt sturdy and comforting. Like he would be able to protect her from anything.

For a few minutes the two of them simply stayed like this, until the door to the room swooshed open.

Fortunately, it was Jasmine, and she was hardly surprised by the display she found. In fact, there was a hint of envy in her eyes as she looked at Kasandra nuzzling against Avery.

"I guess this means our time it up."

Kasandra pulled away from Avery and the vulnerableness she had been displaying had completely vanished from her expression. She was back to how she usually was.

Seeing that they were ready for business now, Jasmine read out the report that she had gotten from Ezra and Olivia.

Despite it not having been an entire day yet, they had done an excellent job collecting information on Strozen.

"He's the Chief Marketing Officer at Storren Corp. and he's definitely been trying to use his position to undermine you. So far, none of the promotional material that the corporation has put out so much as mentions you." Jasmine said, sending some digital posters and short videos over to Avery.

His ship was certainly featured, since it was to be Storren Corp.'s entry, but neither Avery nor his crew were in any of the material.

This made it clear that Strozen was still hoping to find a way to get rid of him. He figured that otherwise, Storren Corp. would be happy to publicize that they had a five star mercenary acting as their pilot for the competition.

'Well, it's not like it really matters. I don't care about getting my name out there now, and when I do participate, I'll get plenty of publicity anyway.'

As far as Avery was concerned, this was a form of petty harassment at best. It had little to no bearing on him.

"For Storzen's allies within Storren Corp. he's got the support of most of his team since they can't really go against him, and some in middle management positions. None of the other chief officers are apparently backing him at least. They haven't gotten behind Ardesen and Dorris either, but Ezra and Olivia believe that they'd rather not stir up any more trouble. The worst-case scenario would be the ship getting destroyed or badly damaged in the process of trying to take it back."

A more disconcerting bit of information was that Strozen had met with several groups of mercenaries and tried to hire them without going through the Mercenary Association.

Of course, no one took him up on the offer. None of them wanted anything to do with attacking another mercenary. Especially considering Avery's rank.

He had also apparently had meetings with some criminal elements here in the Dramid System, but the outcome of these clandestine rendezvous was unknown.

Avery scowled at this, but they already needed to be cautious considering the people after Kasandra and Kaiden.

'We'll have to avoid any places that leave us exposed. That's going to put the kibosh on any leisure trips.'

The capital system had a lot to offer in the way of recreation, but such places would be prime opportunities for their enemies to attack them.

Since they were here for work anyway, they would just have to put all of their focus on the missions given to them.

'I'll have to focus on the coemption instead, but I should at least meet with the assembly member from Azade once to get things set up.' Avery thought.

Now that his team had checked in with the Mercenary Association and been by Storren Corp., their only other pressing matter of business was dealing with the request from Regina.

That one was bound to be a lot of trouble considering it involved investigating corruption within the Alliance's central government.

Normally this would be beyond the purview of mercenary work, but Jasmine's mother had paid them well and was setting them up with the resources and authority that they would need.

Once Jasmine had finished giving the report received from Ezra and Olivia, he asked her if there was anything that they could do within the Alliance's laws to stop Strozen from doing as he wanted.

"Hm, that would be tough. When he tried to hire other mercenaries, he only stated that he needed a lost ship returned. Of course, he had to give them a target, and when the mercenaries looked into the possibly shady job, they found that the ship he wanted back belongs to you. Since nothing really happened and he did not explicitly say to harm you or to steal the Dauntless, there's no actual crime. Maybe you could try for a civil complaint, but that likely would not stop him."

As for his meetings with criminals, the way that Ezra and Olivia found this out was through mercenary informants.

There was no evidence linking Strozen to any crimes, and while the people he met with were undoubtably up to no good, on the surface their business were legitimate and they had not been caught and charged yet.

"So, we don't have anything to use against him?" Avery asked.

"Well, I would not say that we have nothing." Jasmine replied.

In their investigation, Ezra and Olivia had come across some highly humiliating security videos featuring a very drunk Strozen in a casino.

While none of it was particularly damning, it was embarrassing to say the least. Someone in his position would certainly not want these videos to be spread around.

Apparently, Olivia had paid one of the employees of the casino a decent sum of money for the clips when they learned about the incident.

"That's not exactly what I was looking for."

Avery was noticeably conflicted about using dirt that Ezra and Olivia had dug up on Strozen.

Jasmine felt similarly as doing so would be unethical at the very least.

"Have them send the video files to Dorris, discreetly. I don't want to use them, but I'll leave it up to her to decide if she wants to."

This was the best compromise that Avery could come up with. Under normal circumstances, he would not have even considered doing so, but holding back against someone that wanted to kill him would be foolish. Sometimes it was necessary to tread into gray areas.

"I understand." Jasmine said, not looking particularly happy about the prospect.

What they were doing essentially amounted to assisting with blackmail. An obvious crime. Still, she knew that what Avery was trying to do was neutralize a threat before it bared its fangs against them.

With the competition growing closer, Strozen might grow desperate and try something drastic to get the Dauntless back.

Of course, maybe he would finally realize that there was nothing he could do and give up. But Avery felt that his luck was not good enough for that. It seemed like every time something amazing happened to him, some problem associated with it would come around to make things complicated.

'I suppose that just keeps my life interesting. Until everything is resolved, I'll just have to keep fighting back and winning.'