Exodus: Tales of The Empire: Book 2: Beasts of the Frontier.

by Doug Dandridge

  Deveroix killed the com and looked over at his Enforcer. “What do we have in St. Martin?”

  “Three of our boys, plus some local gang members that sometimes work for us.”

  “Get our men on a transport out there as soon as fucking possible. And send a search and destroy team from here to St. Martin. They’re to wait on word of the location of the little fuck, then go after him.”

  “You don’t think the three guys we’re sending will be enough?”

  “I don’t want to take any chances. Centari said she wanted him, now, and I’m not about to get on her bad side.”

  The Enforcer nodded in understanding, then got up and left the room so he could get the teams moving. Deveroix knew the man could have accomplished that task in the room with him, but most of his people didn’t like someone looking over their shoulder while they took care of business.

  The little fuck should have stayed in the city, where he would be the only casualty, thought the Chief Enforcer. Now he’s going to get his family killed along with him.

  * * *

  It was a short hop by aircar to Uncle Timothy’s house. Timothy had brought his own car in, along with a couple of his sons, Jacob and Stephen. Stephen was flying them back out, while Jacob, the oldest, stayed in town to keep an eye on his father. Timothy had been a Ranger, with all the talents and skills of those elite troops. Matthew couldn’t think of a better man to be watching his dad, though he had some reservations about Jacob, who was only nineteen years old, not even an adult. Still, he had grown up in the Swamp, with Uncle Timothy as his mentor, and that meant he was as self-reliant a young man as there was in this wilderness.

  The Swamp passed by below. The tops of trees covered much of it, with open water in places. Animals running from the sound of the car that they associated with a dominant predator. A large trope, a carnotropus which was at least nine meters in length and had to mass six tons, looked up at them from a patch of dry land and croaked a roar. They went over a boat a mile further, moving down one of the streams at a good clip on its impeller engine.

  A large flying predator swooped low, its leathery wings booming as it caught the sonic repellor of the car on its nose. The low gravity and high oxygen content of this world allowed for large flying creatures, capable of lifting an adult human into the air an dropping them to their deaths. Most avoided objects like aircars, but some of the larger ones saw them as prey, hence the automatic repulsion systems. They were still a danger, especially in numbers, since the repellor system could only engage one at a time.

  “We’re almost there, Aunt Fara,” said fifteen year old Stephen, who like most teens on this world could use a number of vehicles and devices that teenagers on most civilized worlds would be forbidden to touch.

  “You’re what, fifty miles from town?” asked Matthew.

  “Fifty two point six, to be exact, Cousin. Half an hour at cruising speed. Considerably less if I push her flat out.”

  Stephen looked forward for a moment, then pushed a few of the panels on the dash. The car started to drop, though there really was nothing that looked like a landing site. It moved down to a hover about twenty meters over the ground, then slid forward under the trees. And there was the landing pad, a construct of hardwoods, plastics and metals. The car extruded its landing gear and lowered itself, coming to a stop with a gentle thump.

  “I always thought Timothy was the crazy brother in Tobias’ family,” said Fara, looking out of the car’s bubble dome to what looked like more wilderness.

  “Dad says a lot of people think that,” said Stephen as he opened the dome. “Now it looks like he wasn’t all that paranoid.”

  They climbed out of the car, the sounds of the Swamp, thousands of animals and insectoids, almost deafening them. The sonics from the car kept the buzzing creatures away, which, unfortunately, could find nutrition in human blood and tissue. A lift appeared on the solid ground about twenty meters from the pad, the doors opening to reveal a cab about two meters square. As soon as they were away from the car it started to lower through the pad, taking itself and their luggage down into the dwelling’s garage.

  Most people living in the wilderness wanted their dwelling to be seen from the air or orbit. They wanted the watchers to be able to see them from above, and see if anything was wrong. Uncle Timothy was different. He preferred to depend on himself and his family, and not have rely on the eye in the sky to watch over him. He had taken a refurbished cargo container from a freighter, thirty meters long by fifteen meters wide, by ten high, a total of four thousand five hundred cubic meters. With the addition of the garage unit, a smaller cargo container, and a mechanical attachment that provided water, power and environmental, it was a very comfortable house for a large family.

  As the lift opened onto the vestibule that led into the main living area the memories came flooding back for Matthew. He had spent eight summers in this house, when he wasn’t out on the Swamp with his Uncle, who had taught him how to survive, how the harvest the largess of the continent, as well as how to feed himself. Part of that learning experience was the use of weapons, everything from particle beams to hand made spears.

  “Matthew,” called out his aunt, Timothy’s wife, Sarah Kelvin, running over with open arms and wrapping them around her nephew. She gave him a hug, then repeated the gesture with Fara. “It is so good to see both of you again. We have the guest rooms ready. Matthew, you will have the bed you used when you stayed with us. Fara, you can have the VIP suite.”

  Matthew smiled at that last. All of the rooms of the house were serviceable, with the metallic walls that had been installed to separate the spaces. They had all the modern amenities, but would not rival any of the luxury hotels in any of the larger towns.

  “I’m so glad you’re safe,” said Sarah, putting an arm around Matthew’s shoulder.

  “I screwed up, Aunt Sarah,” said Matthew with a grimace, shaking his head.

  “You wouldn’t be the first, son,” said the small woman. “Plenty of people have tried to get easy money out of the Swamp. The important thing is that you’re safe.”

  “Thank God for that,” said his mom, a concerned expression on her face. “And the sooner this blows over and we can get you off planet, the better.”

  She’s worried about dad, thought the young man. And so am I.

  “I’ve got their bags,” said Stephen, coming out of the garage annex with a large bag in each hand, his two younger sisters manhandling a bag each.

  “You know where they go, son,” said Aunt Sarah. She turned back to her guests. “Why don’t you both get comfortable. Dinner will be ready in an hour.”

  Matthew smiled when he heard that. His aunt was a much better cook that his mom, and he hadn’t noticed how hungry he was until she had mentioned food. He went ahead and stowed his clothes and effects in the room that had been his during visits, an ample chamber three by four meters, with a large closet and its own bathroom. Space was plentiful on this world, and the only restriction on building size was the wealth of the builder. And Uncle Timothy had been a very successful swamp prospector.

  I hope dad’s OK, he thought as he sat on the comfortable bed after putting everything away. His father didn’t know these people, and probably didn’t really understand them. They wouldn’t care that his father was a well-known and well respected member of the community. They would only care that he had information they wanted, and they wouldn’t care about his rights or wishes, only that they could force him to tell them where his son was.

  I should have stayed in town and faced them myself, he thought, laying back on the bed and regretting the decision that he had made that put everyone at risk.

  * * *

  Lorenzo McManus really didn’t like the Swamp, like most that didn’t live there. But when Deveroix told him to jump, the only thing he could do was to tense his legs and spring into the air. So now he was sitting at the village’s one diner, waiting to get the word from his informants that their target was located. H
is two enforcers sat at the table with him, sipping their coffee.

  The snitch they had paid to recon the village came through the entrance, eliciting some sour looks from the locals in the diner. Lorenzo guessed the man was not well loved in this community, one reason he was willing to work with the Mob.

  “Matthew is gone, sir,” said the snitch, sliding into the one open space at the table. “Some people saw him get into an aircar earlier today and fly to the southwest.”

  “Dammit. And your sources have no idea where he went?”

  “No. And his mother went with him.” The snitch looked around for a moment, trying to see if anyone else in the diner was listening, then turned his attention back to the Enforcer. “But his father is still in town. Still working out of his clinic.”

  Lorenzo thought for a moment. They could go to the clinic, but there might be other people there. It was too public. “What time does the clinic close down?”

  “That depends,” said the snitch, who knew enough about every business in town to know when they were open or closed. Africanus was on a twenty-four hour clock, each hour sixty-three minutes. “Most nights they close down about five. Sometimes a little later, depending on what’s going on. And an incoming emergency could make them open up at any time, day or night.”

  “Then here’s what we’ll do,” said Lorenzo, motioning for his people to lean in so they could hear him.

  * * *

  Tobias Kelvin walked up to the door to his house and let the security system look him over for a few moments before it opened. The system linked with his implant and told him that nothing had entered the house since he left, and he waved to his brother before entering. Timothy waved back, then turned to go on the intelligence gathering mission he had talked about earlier, seeing if any strangers had come into town.

  As soon as the door closed behind him he knew something was wrong. He could feel a presence in the house. But that was impossible. The security system was state of the art, and it was guaranteed to either foil any attempt at intrusion, or at least let him know that someone had defeated it.

  “It is so nice to meet you, Doctor,” said a voice from behind him, where the kitchen was located. “Now, keep your hands in the clear. I would hate for there to be any misunderstandings.”

  Tobias raised his hands and slowly turned, to see a pair of men standing at the kitchen entrance, and another out of the corner of his eye in the hallway to the bedrooms.

  “What do you want?”

  “We want to know where your son, Matthew, is,” said the man who had to be the leader, the only one without a weapon in hand. The other two had pistols out, one that looked like a standard magrail, while the other had the look of something much more deadly, like a particle beam.

  “I don’t know where Matthew is,” protested Tobias, hoping they would believe the lie and just leave, though he knew that was unlikely.

  “I’m monitoring your pulse rate, Doctor,” said the leader of the trio. “I know you’re lying. And I understand your concern. But we mean the boy no harm. The Boss just wants to talk to him.”

  “And now you’re lying,” said Tobias with a grim smile. “And I don’t need a remote monitor to tell that you are.”

  “Well, you got me, Doc. Now, tell me where your son is, or you’ll regret it.”

  “Not for anything in the world. Unlike you bastards, I’ve got a conscience.”

  “We have the means to make you talk, Doc. Don’t you doubt that for a second that you’ll tell us what we want to know. And then you’ll be dead, your wife will be dead, and any other relatives trying to protect Matthew will join you.”

  Tobias shut his mouth. He didn’t think anything he had to say would help, and he was sure they would eventually make him tell them what they wanted to know. If only Timothy were here, he thought of his older brother. While Tobias was not afraid of using a weapon, he was not a warrior like the former Ranger.

  “Very well, Doctor. The decision is yours, and will be the consequences.” The leader looked at one of the men, the one with the magrail. “Bind him. We’ll take him out of here and back to the city.” The leader walked closer to Tobias as his man pulled the Doctor’s hands behind his back and bound them with a plastic strap. “We’re taking you to our car, Doctor. If you yell out or try to catch the attention of anyone, we will kill them. Understand?”

  Tobias nodded, staring into the eyes of the man and knowing he was a born killer.

  “Then let’s go.”

  * * *

  Timothy was walking back to the house with Jacob at his side after asking down at the diner and a couple of the shops about strangers in town. He had the descriptions of some newcomers who had seemed overly curious moving around town, both at the diner and at one of the stores. He had talked to the constable as well, and let him know what was going on. Or as much as he could tell him what was going on without getting Matthew in trouble.

  What the hell, he thought as he watched his brother being led down the street toward a parking platform with a large airvan parked to one side. Tobias’ hands were behind his back, and one of the men had his hand under a jacket. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that his brother was under duress. Nor to figure out the reason why.

  “Get up on that roof and cover me,” he told Jacob. His son nodded and took off, running for the door of the two story building that was the town’s hotel, hunting rifle in hand.

  “We have an incident happening near the parking platform,” said Timothy into his com link to the Constable. “They have my brother, and are taking him to a van.”

  “Don’t do anything, Timothy,” ordered Constable Farrell. “I’ll be right there.”

  “And they’ll have taken my brother away by then,” hissed Timothy, unsnapping his pistol holster and striding toward Tobias and his captors. “Hey, you. What are you doing with my brother?”

  The three men turned toward him, a second one also putting a hand in his jacket, while the one in the best suit, the obvious leader, moved in front of Tobias. They didn’t say anything, but then what could they say?

  “Are you in position, son?” he asked over the com link.

  The acknowledgement came back, and he hoped his son was ready to shoot at least one of the kidnappers. The boy had been well trained, but had never taken a human life, and Timothy knew from experience that it was not an easy thing to do. Since his life, and that of his brother, might depend on his son pulling the trigger, he hoped the young man could do it. The one thing he didn’t need to do was to put more pressure on the boy.

  “I asked you a question,” he roared at the kidnappers. “What the hell are you doing with my brother?”

  * * *

  McManus didn’t like the look of the man that was coming toward them. He definitely resembled the man they had in their custody. A little larger, older. And moving with the grace of a dancer, or a martial artist. And holding one hand just off the butt of a very large pistol holstered at his side.

  He’s fucking augmented, thought the Enforcer, who had spent time in the Fleet, shuttling Naval Commandos around. This guy moved like them. Naval Commando, Force Recon or Army Ranger? It really didn’t matter, they all had similar abilities. And this guy carried that gun on his side like he knew how to use it.

  “Wait just a minute,” he told the enraged man, flashing a hand signal by his side to his companions. “We can talk about this.”

  His two men moved as soon as the last word left his mouth, pulling their weapons from underneath their coats and swinging them to bear on the man. At the same moment the augmented’s hand moved in a blur, the pistol flying from the holster, the particle beam leaping from the barrel while it was still elevating, burning a slash through the walkway and it the body of one of the Enforcers. Part of the man’s leg and his groin region flashed into vapor, while the gunman swung the pistol onto the second target and the beam flared again, this time vaporing the thoracic region.

  As fast as he was, he couldn’t take all t
hree of them before one of them got a shot off. As he had planned, McManus was the last target, and the leader’s pistol was almost lined up on the Tobias’ head. Before he could pull the trigger something heavy slammed into his shoulder and spun him around. An instant later his skull exploded as the particle beam in the augmented’s hand intersected his head.

  * * *

  “Dammit, Timothy. I told you to wait until I got here.”

  “And if I had waited, Constable, they would have gotten away with my brother,” said Timothy Kelvin, holding his particle beam and letting the weapon cool before he reholstered it.

  Farrell shrugged his shoulders and looked down on the bodies, which had been left where they had fallen. Tobias had already taken DNA samples, and the drone cam had taken pictures of the two who still had recognizable faces. Their bodies were a mess. That’s what happened when a fraction of a gram of protons came in at relativistic speeds. Nothing like the speeds that major weapons systems used, but still a lot of energy. Those protons blew through the matter of the target, in this case merely clothes and flesh, then converted their energy to heat, vaporizing large regions of the body. The third man didn’t have a head, much less a face.

  “What’s done is done,” said the Constable. “But this won’t be the end of it. You both know that. They’ll send more people until they get what they want.”

  “I know,” said Timothy, looking over at his son, who looked like he wanted to throw up as he stared at the bodies. He turned his gaze back to the Constable. “That’s why I’m going to take my brother with me out into the Swamp.”

  “I have my work, Timothy,” protested Tobias. “Who’s going to help the local Swampers if they need medical aide?”

  “And who do you think is going to help them if you’re dead?” countered Timothy, glaring at his brother.

  “Your brother is right, Doc,” said Farrell, pointing his finger at Tobias. “I don’t want to be standing over your body when the Mob comes back. Or, even worse, wondering what happened to you after you disappeared.”