“Not quite the police in the normal sense. We have international and interplanetary authority for criminal investigations that involve World Treaty citizens or organisations.” Piet released the hand. “We have a bit of a situation, and we’re hoping you and your people can help us. You know Ms Rowanberg was abducted?” He waited for Dylan’s acknowledgement. “Good, you’re clued in on that, but what’s less well known is that eight murders are linked to her abduction, possibly more, and several other matters we believe are connected.”
Glancing at Ms Dysson to take his cue from her, Dylan nodded. “Of course, I’ll do what I can—within the law, Commander. We’ll need to consult our legal advisers.”
“Of course.” Piet smiled. “I’ll send our authorities across, Ms Dysson, Mr Raddeck. I’ll be in touch.”
“Bastards had no intention of anyone getting clear of this area and probably hoped the Captain would get caught by one on his way in.” The team leader studied the device attached to the wall. It was cleverly disguised, and only their careful scanning for devices and traps had revealed it. “A porcupine. Nasty device, it fires a spray of poisoned needles, though if they wanted him alive, this one was probably fitted with a paralysing nerve agent.”
“First one I’ve seen deployed,” Felicity commented. “We trained on them during our Anti-Personnel Devices Module. As you say, nasty things. Can we disarm it?”
“Not without getting in closer than I want to.” He grinned. “Besides, we don’t need to save the damned thing, so I’ll use this little beauty.” He removed a small device from a pouch and tossed it in the direction of the porcupine device. “One of our latest toys. We call it a bumblebee. Weapons Branch developed it specially for these. Light enough and small enough not to trigger a response, but we should move back just in case.”
Felicity watched as the mechanical bumblebee sprouted fast moving wings, hovered for a moment, then buzzed toward the porcupine.
“What’s it do?” she asked.
“Watch. It’s a useful little bugger.” He grinned. “All it needs is a target. It would be even better if it could find these things in advance, but the range is a bit limited at present.”
Felicity used her helmet optics to watch the device as it hovered inches from the trap then closed in and landed on it. A moment later, the porcupine was wrapped in a web of electric sparks as a wisp of smoke curled from the casing.
“That’s it. The control unit is fried. We can move.” He signalled the rest of the team. “Move on. Check and double check, people. Three of their agents are still on the loose.”
And they might have Captain Heron. Felicity chased away the dreaded thought before it could rattle her nerves and distract her focus. Clutching her weapon, she moved with the team, her training taking over even as she promised herself she’d settle a few scores the moment she had the chance.
Bast studied herself in the mirror, tugging and pulling at the poorly tailored garment. “I guess it’ll do,” she sneered. “Really, these working people live such crude little lives. And these horrid clothes! I wouldn’t be caught dead in them.” She chuckled at her little joke as she coated herself with the preparation for her latest identity then dressed in the dowdy outfit. With a final check that she had the DNA switch and fingerprints correct, she left the cramped accommodation. “By the time they find her, I’ll be long gone.”
She took the service lift to the Fabrication level and smiled with smug satisfaction. This was going to be too easy. She’d chosen her latest victim with care. A loner with no friends and employed to supervise a fabrication unit that needed someone to monitor the progress of the production and not much else—in this case neural components for an AI system—it was the last place anyone would look for her, Bast, and she would be alone at her station, which gave her the privacy she needed to check on her team.
The lift stopped and she stepped out, fed her stolen ID into the reader, applied her falsified fingerprints and walked into the unit. “You’re relieved,” she snapped to her coworker, adopting the abrupt mannerisms of the woman she’d killed.
“Have a nice shift to you too.” The man stood, stretched and yawned. “All yours. Oh, the platinum alloy feed needs watching. It has an intermittent fault. I’ve reported it.” He made for the door. “Enjoy yourself. Maybe something exciting will actually happen during your shift.”
Keeping in character, she snarled, “Get stuffed.”
She settled into the seat, gave the displays a cursory glance and planned her next moves. She still needed part of the specification of the key element of the Vanguard’s particle beam weapon. She had an idea who had it, and she would find a way to get it, once she was certain that everyone thought she’d left the station. Oh, and she’d deal with that Dysson woman and perhaps Captain Heron as well. She smiled at the thought of that conquest.
Chapter 23
Payoff
Marcus Grover looked up, his welcome smile fading when he saw who his visitors were. “What is it this time, Hurker?”
“Your son. He’s been involved with a group of undesirables in Pangaea City.” The speaker was a burly man in the uniform of the Colonial Defence Corps. “We believe he’s been sending you classified information.”
“You really believe that? With Hurker overseeing all our shipping and packing? Or do you think he’s transmitting messages? How is he supposed to have done that? You’ve shut down all our voice and holo links, plus you’ve stopped all shipments out of here, and precious bloody little of what we need gets in!” Marcus let his anger show but stopped before he went too far. He loathed Hurker, but knew it wouldn’t serve any purpose to provoke him or the goon towering over his desk at a height of at least 6 feet 5 inches. Had they arrested his son? Fionn had, against his wishes, teamed up with his wife’s uncle, and Marcus knew that was a dangerous proposition.
Hurker interjected, and took a disgustingly patronising tone. “Marcus, you know that we can only ship what we can fit into the containers, and we can’t export as much as we’d like. We have to prioritise. We all have to do our part, and that includes you.”
Marcus groaned audibly.
Hurker showed his petulance. “You lot order far more than you need anyway!”
“We think you’ve been getting classified information and sending it out.” The goon glowered at Hurker and stepped forward. “I want to search your house and your production domes,” he said to Marcus. “Now.” He slammed an official search order on the table. “There’s my search authority.”
“So you can plant the evidence to frame us? Like hell! You’ll wait until I have witnesses here to accompany you—people I trust to make damned sure your goons don’t somehow find incriminating evidence while they search.”
“You can’t do that—”
“I bloody well can! It’s the law here, and Hurker knows it even if you don’t, so you can damned well wait outside until my witnesses get here.”
“So you can remove the evidence? No chance.” The officer broadened his stance and fingered his holstered weapon. “I’m staying right where I can see you and your wife while we wait.”
Petra Grover had stepped out of a back office and joined her husband when the discussion grew heated. “Why are we surrounded by Defence Corps, Marcus? What are these gentlemen here for? Good morning, Mr Hurker. I sent you the latest accounts.”
“They’re accusing Fionn of spying. They say he’s been sending us classified material.” Marcus shifted his weight in his desk chair. “Even if he was, what we’re supposed to be doing with it or how we would use it seems to be beyond the intellectual capacity of our visitors. They want to search for evidence—plant it more likely.” He glared at the visitors. “I’d like you to get Heike, Fred and the others in, so they can watch these bastards while they search.”
“You won’t get away with this, Grover,” the security officer snarled.
“I’m not the one trying to get away with anything. You came in here, accused my son of communicating infor
mation you don’t approve of, and now you want to find something you can use to incriminate us.” Marcus held the man’s glare. “You know damned well we haven’t got any coms access to anything outside of the town, not even between here and my fungi farm and fruit orchard, so what do you think you’ll find, a hypercom transmitter? A satcom link? Only if you plant one, and you know it.”
Looking nervous, Hurker intervened. “I’m sure there’s nothing like that going on here, Marcus, and no call to be so suspicious. Our security people have a job to do. They’ve had a report from the Governor’s office that your son is keeping some bad company, and they have evidence he’s involved with the rebellious miners.” He stopped as Heiko and several more of Marcus’s employees entered.
Hurker folded his arms and looked straight at Marcus. “You’ve got your witnesses now—can we let Commandant Cameron get on with his work?”
Captain Heron consulted his schematic of the tunnels again and realized that he was close to his entry point. Switching to his scanning mode, he studied the walls, the ground surface and the ceiling, and noticed again the dangling cables he’d originally thought were evidence of fittings removed. He blasted it into a fused mass.
He sent the spider scuttling ahead of him again, looking for any signs of traps.
“Captain Heron?”
The voice in his comlink sent him diving for cover into a shadow along a wall. He activated the spider’s visual sensors.
“Identify yourself,” he demanded.
“Code Victor Four, sir. Lieutenant Johnnes and team.”
The Captain smiled. “Victor Four, confirm status colour.”
“Status colour is green, sir. Mr Brown’s compliments. He’s recovered one package and lost the messenger.”
James Heron wanted to laugh. “Give me your location, Lieutenant. Watch your step. I can account for three opponents, but there could be more.”
“I have a location fix on you, sir. We’ll be with you in three minutes. There are six of us. We’ll approach from your direction of travel with our identifiers active.”
“Come ahead.” He moved to a shallow alcove from which he could see anyone approaching. He didn’t intend to lower his guard until he was sure his people were approaching. He made another check of the schematic. A door opposite his position gave him another option. He moved quickly, got the door open and surveyed the space beyond. Excellent—it had a backdoor if he needed one.
The light increased in the tunnel. “Captain, we have our lights on, sir.”
“So I see, Lieutenant. Kindly turn to face the way you came. I’ve no wish to be dazzled, thank you.”
“Certainly, sir.” The light changed and the Captain checked, using his night screen. Four of the team had their backs to him and two knelt flanking them with their lights off but their weapons ready.
“Very good, Lieutenant. Covered that well.” Captain Heron walked forward. “You’ll need to get some medics down here. I’m afraid I destroyed two members of the other side’s team, and shot one at the other end of this tunnel. I don’t think Bast is here, but I can’t be sure.”
The Lieutenant smiled at the Captain’s brevity. “We’ll deal with them, sir, and Bast isn’t here. She was on Vanguard, but the Boss is annoyed. They lost her.” He paused. “Going to need quite a team to clean these areas out. We’ve a transport at the end of this tunnel. And, you might be interested to know that Ms Rowanberg is waiting in it, sir, alive and well.”
It took some effort for James to keep his expression professional and neutral when every fibre of his being wanted to shout for joy. “Ms Rowanberg’s with you? Good, so you got her out. How is she? “ He didn’t realise that his flurry of eager questions were a definite tell, but the Lieutenant pretended not to notice.
“Annoyed, sir.” The Lieutenant chuckled. “She was looking forward to taking out her anger on her captors, but I’m afraid we denied her that privilege. The five we got are not answering any calls now.”
“Good,” James spat, and under his breath he added, “F*cking bastards.” He thought no one heard him, and he didn’t see the Lieutenant struggling not to grin.
So he’s one of us after all, mused the Lieutenant.
James climbed into the transport vehicle, and the moment Felicity’s eyes met his was practically charged with electricity, the attraction was so strong. Her smile was just the balm he needed.
“Here I am, Captain, alive and well, never better. I think I even lost a few pounds in my enforced confinement!”
“Felicity, good to see you. You look great as always. But I have to ask, do you usually resort to such extreme measures when you want to stand up a partner for a dinner date?”
She saw the tease in his eyes, and she smiled at him. “Only in exceptional circumstances—or when someone leaves me no option.”
He grinned and winked. “I must have really annoyed you then, for you to go to such an extreme to avoid my company.”
Her peel of laughter made everyone grin. “Well, maybe you annoyed me just a little, Captain!”
Everyone guffawed at this comment, and James sneaked in a quick hug around Felicity’s waist and scooted her closer to him on the bench seat when no one was looking.
Petra Grover held her husband’s hand as they watched the Defence Corps team depart. “Do you think they’ve caught Fionn?”
“No. If they had, that bastard Hurker wouldn’t have been able to stop himself taunting us with it. They’re worried about something. Do you think they’ve figured out you’re monitoring and fixing some of the stuff the bank is doing? Any hint about Peter?”
“Nothing. As you said, if they had caught him, they’d be talking about it. And no, they aren’t onto my link into the bank system.” She squeezed his arm and wiped away a few tears. “With no news other than the mundane updates they approve, it’s so difficult to know what is really happening.”
“True. Hurker keeps trying to get me to divulge the process we use—says he could make us rich beyond our wildest dreams. Make himself rich, more likely.” Grover frowned. “I’d love to know what they are really doing up the hill. I just bet it is something far nastier than they let on. They call it research, but research into what? Why be so secretive about it? And where have they managed to get those lizard people? What are they using them for?”
“Hurker’s wife knows. She likes everyone to think that she is in on the research up there—for the benefit of the human race, she says.” Petra laughed. “If you believe her story, she’s one of the people running it. Truth is she’s a temp clerk but a very well connected one. Her family are very well to do.”
Marcus smirked. “All for the profits of the shareholders and directors. Any benefits to the rest of us will come with a big price tag, that’s for sure.” Marcus kissed his wife. “I wish I knew what Pete and Fionn were up to, but knowing where they are is a good start.”
“We’ll just have to hope they’re safe, my love.” She paused. “I wonder if Peter manages to get any of the information to Fleet? I hope so—it would be such a waste of effort and their lives if he didn’t.”
Giving his wife a hug, he said, “We won’t know until Fleet show up and take these goons apart, so I’ll hold on to the belief that he has contacted them, and that he’s still in a position to pass on more information.” He stepped out of the hug and looked into Petra’s upturned face. “I know he didn’t get the last two deliveries I sent because one was still attached to the container when it came back, and I retrieved the last one when the consignment was cancelled. But at least that means the goons in Pangaea City didn’t get them either.”
“True,” said Petra.
Marcus hesitated as a thought occurred to him. “I’m going to start looking for ways to make things awkward.” He snorted in derision. “They want cooperation? Okay, we’ll give it to them, but it’ll be our interpretation of what that means.”
As soon as she entered her passcode, Yelendi Dysson knew that someone had been in her suite. She had se
veral small passive and very difficult to detect security devices installed, and all of them were signalling an unauthorised entry. The intruder was no longer present or the signals would be very different, but she was still cautious as she checked for any theft or devices.
Bast had been thorough, though a little rushed, when she entered Yelendi’s suite to capture her voice pattern, some hair from her hairbrush, and to lift some of her fingerprints.
Yelendi was equally thorough. Alerted by her informant in Fleet Security—who seemed to be in possession of a lot more information than any ordinary operative, a matter that bothered her somewhat—as to how Theresa Hollister’s safe had been opened, she found the planted recording device, and the discovery sent a chill down her spine. So Bast was still on the station, and worse, Yelendi was her target. What could Bast be after? What might Yelendi have that the assassin needed? The only thing she could think of made her shudder—her identity.
“We’ll see about that, bitch,” she murmured. “Time to call in the cavalry.” Striding to the workstation in her living room, she secured the entrance door and changed the lock settings to signify that she did not wish to be disturbed, not even by a service droid, and she disabled all access. Then she contacted her Director of Operations, the Consortium’s Head of Security.
“Yelendi? What’s happened to make you call at this hour?”
“The Chairman’s team have gone rogue. They kidnapped the Fleet Admin Chief, a woman named Felicity Rowanberg, then set up some sort of game on the surface—a hunt, they called it—with the Vanguard’s Captain Heron as the prey. Their operation failed, and most of them have been captured or killed—two of them disguised as members of the Vanguard’s fitting out crew.”
“That’s bad. Are we exposed by it? Did they get the spec the Chairman wanted?”
“Possibly, on the spec. That’s what Bast and her sidekicks were doing on the ship. The men they killed didn’t have any data chips on them, so Bast may have it.” She hesitated. “I don’t think we’re in danger of being involved now, but did you know that this Bast is an expert at genetic manipulation? She takes a victim down and does something with their DNA that allows her to adopt it as her own while disguising hers. She’s so thorough that she can pass security checks with no questions asked.”
Captain James Heron: First into the Fray: Prequel to Harry Heron: Into the Unknown of the Harry Heron Series Page 25
