The Criminal Streak

by Joan Donaldson-Yarmey

  The Criminal Streak

  Book One

  Cry Of The Guilty, Silence of the Innocent

  By Joan Donaldson-Yarmey

  DIGITAL ISBNs:

  EPUB 978-1-77145-600-5

  MOBI 978-1-77145-599-2

  PDF 978-1-77145-598-5

  Print ISBN

  978-1-77145-601-2

  Published By:

  Copyright 2015 by Joan Donaldson-Yarmey

  Cover art by Michelle Lee Copyright 2015

  All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the publisher of this book

  Ten thousand years ago, our ancestors evolved from being hunter-gatherers to growing and harvesting their own food. They also began inventing tools to make their lives easier. This two-book story could be one explanation as to why.

  Prologue

  Two asteroids collided out in space. Both were bumped out of their orbits and one broke into pieces. Two of those pieces soared towards an occupied planet. One hit land, throwing a thick layer of dust into the air and starting countless raging fires which consumed towns and cities. The other landed in an ocean, creating massive tidal waves on most shores. The waves submerged islands and swamped half the land on the continents, drowning all people and animals in its path.

  The dust formed a blanket and the plants on the land not hit by the waves died for lack of sunlight and moisture. The masses of inhabitants who survived the fires and tidal waves choked to death or died of starvation. When the water finally subsided it exposed the islands, now bare, and left huge lakes on the continents. It took months for the people living on the untouched areas of the planet to assess the destruction. One third of the planet’s former landmass was under water or covered by a dust mantle and half of the planet’s population had died.

  During that time the true horror of the catastrophe done by the asteroids was revealed. The bump occurred when the planet was in its equinox and that was how it stayed. The middle section or equator permanently faced the sun as it rotated. Over the next few years the hotter rays burned off the ozone layer at the equator. The sun shone with a brilliant white light and the land for long distances on both sides of the equator could no longer support life.

  Great bands of habitants trekked north and south looking for a new place to live. Fences, patrolled by armed guards, were erected around the towns and cities in their paths, but they were hungry and angry and could not be stopped. Thousands were killed as they swarmed through the towns and cities, looting stores for food and water and clothing, and setting fires. But when that was over there was still no place for them to go and no food for them to eat and hundreds of thousands starved to death before tent cities could be set up and meagre rations of food distributed.

  Fear, and the knowledge that this may be their only chance, drove all the countries of the planet to join as one large Global Alliance. Leaders worked together to find the best way to save their species. To the north and south, where the ozone layer was thicker, the weather was more temperate. The alliance decreed this land was to be used to grow grains, vegetables, and domesticated animals sufficient to feed the people.

  In what became known as the Great Change, twenty mega-cities known as megalopolises were built on huge tracts of arid land close to the farmland. They consisted of levels dug into the ground and ones rising above ground. Once they were completed, all the people who weren’t farmers were moved to the cities where they were given jobs and provided with rent-free apartments until they could afford to buy.

  The villages, towns, and cities were then demolished so the land could be turned into more farmland. Special forests were planted for the cultivation of medicinal plants as well as for the small percentage of air purification they provided. It took years for the farmers to kill the remaining plants and work the land for seeding. They went as high up the mountain sides as trees had been able to grow and claimed the edges of the deserts through irrigation. What was too rocky or had substandard soil was turned into feedlots or pasture for the animals. Any other species of animal not of direct benefit to the dominant race was exterminated.

  Scientists developed new strains of grains and vegetables that grew faster and larger so that six crops could be planted in a year. Animals were fed growth hormones and were ready for market in half the normal time. Great fishing farms were set up in the oceans and lakes.

  At the same time there were purges. The Leaders decreed that everyone must have a job. So began the Tech Purge. Technology that had been developed over hundreds of years, first to make life easier and then to increase company profits by eliminating the worker, was banned. Walled in industrial parks were erected beside each megalopolis and any company that wanted to move there had to convert back to people power. Soon, the equipment that had taken over assembly lines, the apparatuses that had mixed and built, and the computers that had done the thinking were thrown into Tech Dumps. Residents ran the looms to make cloth, used the scissors to cut the patterns, made the garments. They worked in the assembly lines that built everything, they filled the ledgers, and they made the bread.

  When a walkway in the megalopolises had to be repaired, the residents mixed the moon dust compound by hand and carried it in buckets to the repair site. When the streets needed sweeping, they were out in force with brooms. When a new level was to be constructed they carried the materials, mixed the moon dust, poured the bricks, and built the apartments. Everyone capable of working had a job and everyone earned enough to look after his or her needs. It was only where the lift and carry was too heavy for the workers or the distance of transport was too far that limited machinery was used.

  Some remnants, such as telephones for communication and television for in-home entertainment, had been kept. Only government run agencies had computers. Education, especially history, was encouraged.

  During the Corruption Purge, it was decided that anyone who committed a crime was not to be tolerated. All first time convicted criminals, no matter what they had done, were sent to the Fringes, former cities near the megalopolises, for five years. What they did there was of no concern to the justice system, but if they were caught back in the giant cities during their term, their sentences were doubled and they were sent to the Orbital Prisons. Anyone in the megalopolises who committed murder or sold drugs, which included tobacco, was automatically jailed in the prisons. Those sentences ranged from ten years to life.

  Present life was good. The population was growing slowly, the food supply increasing. The one drawback, though, was crime. It, too, was increasing and they were running out of room to house their prisoners.

  Chapter One

  Jawn stood on the step of the last car of the commute-train. It had backed up to the huge doors to let him and fifty other convicts off. To his right and left were the thick, brick walls protecting the four storey high Megalopolis One. Ahead of him, through the doorway, was the Fringe.

  Like everyone else, he had learned about the Fringe as part of grade school history. Before the asteroid hit their planet, it had been the capital of a prosperous country. Now it was used to house prisoners from Megalopolis One. Fear had been building since he’d been found guilty of robbery and sentenced here, and it held him now … for he’d also heard the horror stories.

  Jawn glanced back. The guards stared at him, their hands clasping their stun guns. They waited for him to go through the doorway so they could close the massive doors and be gone.

  Jawn looked beyond the walls. The c
onvicts were a straggling line as they headed across the open ground that separated the protective walls from the remains of the old buildings of the former city. The dust kicked up by their feet rose around them then settled again when they were past.

  He picked up his bag and, with a deep breath, stepped off the train and into the Fringe. The door clanged shut behind him, but he didn’t look back. After five years he could apply for readmission to Megalopolis One. If his application were approved he would be given a job sweeping or repairing the walkways or mixing soil into bricks at construction sites. There was no hope of finishing his education and getting the job he desired.

  The sun was searing, the air dry. He’d been given a hat as he’d boarded the train.

  “You have no hair to protect your head from the sun so wear it when you go out in the daylight,” the person told him. “Or your brain will swell from the direct heat on your head.”

  In spite of the hat he was sweating before he made it halfway across the open ground. He walked to the street and looked up and down. He wasn’t sure what he’d expected, stepping from one zone into the other, but nothing happened. There were no swarms of people fighting and killing and burning everything in sight. No gang surrounded him, no crazed person attacked him, and no shot was fired. The only activity was the convicts ahead of him. They had spread out along the broken and crumbling sidewalk.

  Some stared in bewilderment at the mess around them while others referred to the metal notes they had been given by a group called the Association for the Ethical Treatment of Prisoners. If the newly sentenced had a friend or relative in the Fringe, that group made an effort to locate the person and give the information to the new convict. They believed it helped with the transition.

  There were no street names or numbers. Jawn, like the others, stopped at the old man sitting in the shade of a doorway. Up close, Jawn realized he wasn’t as old as he’d first thought. The man looked up at him with one eye. The other was an empty socket with the lid hanging limply. Jawn glanced down at name that had been carved into his silver metal note as he set his suitcase down.

  “How do I get to the Troll?”

  The man pointed. “Go down this street until you reach the bridge.”

  Jawn turned his head. The street stretched into the distance between dilapidated buildings. He saw no bridge.

  “After you cross it turn left and go to the end of that street.”

  “How far is it?”

  “Further than it sounds.”

  “Do you sit here every train day and give directions?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Why?”

  Instead of answering the question the man shook his finger. “You’d better get there before dark. You don’t have the survival look to you and this quiet lasts only until the sun goes down.”

  Jawn picked up his suitcase and started along the street, which was almost empty again. The other convicts had gone down side streets or into buildings out of the brightness of the sun. If not for the man’s warning, he’d have hidden in one of the doorways out of the stark sun until evening.

  The megalopolises were built on dead land as close to the farms as possible. They had enclosed levels to keep the inhabitants from the sun. The Fringe, however, was left as it had been before the asteroid had hit. None of the wooden buildings constructed before overcrowding had plagued the planet, had survived the two centuries since the asteroid. They’d been torn apart for cooking fires by the first prisoners. Glass and metal that had also been used in them was heaped in the streets. It was the buildings constructed when the tree supply dwindled, that had withstood the constant heat. They’d been made from bricks formed by mixing chemicals with moon dust. Many of them, however, stood at odd angles or were slowly collapsing. The only shade in the Fringe came from these buildings.

  There were no utility companies or police or mayor in the Fringe. Some of the residents had tried to set up a government of sorts, but very few of the others were willing to obey the proposed rules. There was no power, and no repairs were made to the sidewalks, streets or buildings. Ownership of anything consisted of being able to fight off any attackers or intruders.

  His bag grew heavy and he kept switching it from hand to hand as he walked. The first convicts sent here had stayed in the area nearest the megalopolis, but as more and more arrived, they’d had to move further into the old city until most of it was occupied. The heat was oppressing and he understood why he was the only one in the streets. He tried to walk faster but the past two days of being processed for his trip to the Fringe were beginning to tell. Fatigue slowed his steps.

  There were no windows in the buildings he passed, just holes, which appeared black when viewed from the brightness. Occasionally, he saw someone at an opening either dozing or watching the street. He didn’t make eye contact. He wished he’d taken after his father’s side of the family and was tall and strong like them. But he wasn’t. He was short and skinny like his mother.

  Finally he reached the bridge. The long structure had once spanned a wide river but now the riverbed was empty, its cracked surface a dull mixture of brown, black, and grey. During the building of Megalopolis One, the planners had diverted the water for the city’s use. When the Corruption Purge began, the one necessity grudgingly meted out to the convicts by the planet leaders was water. Spaced throughout all the Fringes outside the 20 Megalopolises on the planet were water pipes.

  Jawn saw one of the pipes in the riverbank. Rusty water slowly trickled into a pool on the ground. Jawn looked at the water. He needed a drink, badly. He slid down the well worn path dropping his suitcase before reaching the muck. He bent over and drank greedily. Then he removed his hat and splashed water over his head trying to cool down. In spite of the old man’s warning, he had to rest a few minutes. He climbed up the embankment and sat beside the bridge. He leaned back and closed his eyes.

  Suddenly, he was jerked awake by a hand grabbing his shirtfront and pulling him upward. His eyes flew open. A scarred face leered at him. Something sharp pressed against his neck. Momentary confusion was replaced by a quick and deep fear. The horror stories were true. He was going to be killed his first day.

  The thing against his neck moved and pain shot through him. The fear held him so tightly he could do nothing to defend himself. Not even beg. He stared helplessly into the eyes of the man holding him.

  “You newcomers are all alike,” the man rasped disdainfully. With a snort, he let go of Jawn’s shirt and shoved him against the bridge. He bent and picked up the suitcase.

  Jawn watched him walk away with it. That bag had contained the few pieces of clothing he had been allowed to bring but right now he didn’t care. He took a couple of deep breaths then gingerly touched his throat. It was wet and when he looked at his hand it was bloody.

  Hopelessness overwhelmed him. He felt like crying. What was he going to do? How would he survive the rest of his sentence if he could be so easily robbed and threatened now? Maybe his brother would help, would show him how.

  He rose and slowly crossed the bridge. Somehow it didn’t matter if he was out after dark. What more could be done to him? He turned left at the next street. His instructions had been to go to the end of the street so he trudged on. As daylight turned to dusk, more and more people appeared on the street. Their clothes were torn and dirty and the collective unwashed smell was overpowering. Some jostled into him and he could feel their hands searching his clothes. He didn’t react, just plodded on.

  He thought about his brother who had been sent here three years ago. Had he gone through this? Had he been robbed on his first day? Jawn doubted it. Georg was tall and husky and wasn’t afraid of anyone.

  Just as darkness settled in, Jawn came upon the Troll. He sagged against the doorless entrance in relief, but not for long. A man bumped against him and he toppled through the doorway. Conversation inside stopped.

  The room was dim. Candles flickered in the hazy smoke from the tobacco pipes. He could make out figures ar
ound the cement blocks used as tables and along the bar made from scavenged bricks. All of them looked in his direction. Jawn nodded as he leaned on the nearest table. Within a few moments conversation resumed and he was ignored. The bartender poured a drink and handed it to the server who carried it to one of the tables. Laughter came from a back table and one of the women left it to walk to the bar. She said something to the bartender and he filled a glass with a green liquid and gave it to her. She went back to the table.

  This was the name he’d been given by the Association for the Ethical Treatment of Prisoners. Georg worked here. Jawn hadn’t seen his brother for three years, but he was sure he’d know him. After all, how much could a person change in that amount of time? He ruled out the bartender and the men at the tables and was just about to head to the bar to ask the bartender when the server dropped a tray of empty glasses.

  “That’s going to cost you,” the bartender yelled at the flustered server who bent to pick up the broken glass. “Leave that alone and take these drinks to the back table.”

  The waiter stood and hurried over to the bar.

  The bartender pushed open a door behind him and hollered. “Hey. There’s a mess here for you to clean up.”

  Jawn stared at the man who came through the doorway, the man who was being ordered to clean up the broken glass. Georg was so different. He was skinny and his face was scarred as bad as the man who had robbed him. He looked like the rest of the people in the bar, the people on the streets.

  Jawn dropped his head into his hands. He still couldn’t believe his life had changed this much, that he’d been so stupid. Just a month ago, he was attending classes in his final year of university. Of the three jobs open to him, he’d decided on Depository Manager Assistant and would be starting at the bank as soon as his exams were over. His life was going as planned and then his father had died. The jobs his parents had worked at only gave them enough money for rent, groceries, and taxes with a little left over for his university studies. He’d lived at home and worked in a store to make up the difference. With his father gone, what little money they had saved now had to go to help support his mother and that included the fee for his final examinations. Without the money, he couldn’t write the exams that would give him his degree and, without the degree, he couldn’t work at the bank.