The lid of the crate dropped to the metal grill with an ominous “doom-doom” that echoed off of the high ceiling of the cargo hold.  Pale golden light shone up from the stark black crate, a gleam reflecting in Kaylee’s eyes.  She took a deep breath, almost as if she was afraid of what sound might escape her as she reached in.  Set within the case was a long glass cylinder containing countless dozens of small glass spheres suspended in a kind of amber fluid.  Seeing the shadow of something towards the top, Kaylee ran her hand along the surface of the canister, wiping away a thin layer of condensation from the cold surface of the case.<br/><br/>“Oooooooooooh . . .<i>shit</i>.” she breathed slightly, seeing a green and gold shield emblazoned with the sign of a rearing gryphon flanked by the distinctive silhouette of I-9 Phased Pulse Rifles.  There wasn’t a soul on Desul-8 who wouldn’t recognize the name Zouf embossed along the bottom, “They actually did it.”<br/><br/>The Zouf family was one of the bigger losers of the First Sphere War, new-age aristocracy who’d backed the Core Worlds bid for sovereign control of the Fringes before the ICTA went “neutral party”.  Lacking support from their neighbors, the entire line was supposed to have been wiped out during the war, leaving the planet Kargel incapacitated with its own succession war and miring one of the key access roads to the Fringer’s trailing flank with constant infighting.  In a recorded message sent out from the final bombardment though, Ezekiel Zouf swore his family would return from the ashes, reclaim their birthright, and take revenge against those responsible for their fall.<br/><br/>And now she was looking at a storage case containing the genetic material for at least a regiment of clones modified with some absolutely<i>obscene</i>soldier boosts.  Nine to one, their basic template was built on the Zouf family’s own … the Zouf’s had probably made provisions to allow their army of inheritors to have legal claim on the family’s ancestral lands.  Still, the embryos would need to be thawed out, grown, trained … TESLA might be the only organization with the facilities to let the little monsters grow to their full potential.  The question was, were they trying to honor a deal with the ghost of the Zoufs, or trying to cover up their involvement in this mad scheme?<br/><br/>Either way, Kaylee was disinclined to have the Zoufs back in the land of the living … it was<i>their</i>ships who’d blockaded Desul-8 in her youth.  Years of curling into dark corners, eating grubs, and filtering warm rusty water with a few layers of cloth so she could drink it without gagging tickled at the back of her mind.  Diane’s voice chimed breathlessly in her ear … she sounded hurt.  Kaylee bit her bottom lip and hesitated a moment before answering.<br/><br/>“Yeah.  Yeah, I’ve got it.  Shit.”  She hissed, “Seed for a crop of gene-modded soldiers.  We can make do without the crate, but the core unit is pretty fragile.  Any stray fire and the whole crop could be contaminated…” she gripped the edge of the box tightly.<br/><br/>“I hate to leave money on the table, but maybe we should drop a grenade in the box and cut our losses.”