Galaxy Spies

by Philip R Benge

Chapter Eleven

  Octavius

  Colonel Michaels had decided to head for the small town of Henin and their friend Octavius, with the hope that he would be able to conceal them for a few days until the clamour died down a little, and the others had agreed that this was a good idea. Colonel Michaels thought that the chances of Octavius being able to find a hideaway for them to rest up and plan their future course of action were good, for he had not only taken to the man during the short time that he had known him, but thought him quite able to look after their interests.

  Luckily, they were able to get a good start before Captain Hans Kroeber realised that he was not going to find any bodies in the still hot ashes of the two houses that had gone up in flames following the explosion caused by Colonel Michaels. Captain Kroeber then decided to have the other three houses searched, for they seemed to be the most likely place to find the fugitives, and this took up a further twenty minutes as his men were finally reduced to looking into every nook and cranny that they could find. Finally, Captain Kroeber had to admit to himself that he had been outsmarted by the space marines from Earth; they had escaped his clutches as if by magic. The word was put out across the airways again that a watch should be kept on all routes out of Rouen and he set up roadblocks around the immediate area. It was twenty minutes later that a staff car was found to be missing, so the search was expanded to include the whole county and those adjoining it, Kroeber knew that his superiors would not be pleased by his bungled attempt to apprehend the fugitive earthmen, but he had done everything possible to capture them, it had just not been good enough.

  Peter Summers could have been a rally driver, for he drove the staff car as it was never meant to be driven, along a country lane filled with large puddles of standing water from the downpour, and skirting the debris blown onto it by the strong wind that had suddenly sprang up from nowhere. By the time, Captain Kroeber had finally decided to put out a nationwide alarm for the fugitives they were almost one hundred miles away from the village of Rouen, and after another thirty minutes they were entering the outskirts of Henin, and well outside the ring of hastily erected roadblocks.

  “Turn right here Peter, this is the road that we came up on, we thought it better to return by a slightly different route which would hopefully throw any searchers off our tracks. Pull into a narrow track that should be along here somewhere on the right, if my memory is still working. That should leave us about a mile away from the local state police headquarters, and Octavius lives near to them. I hope that we can rest up until dawn tomorrow, and the start of the working day for the enslaved people on Lyren. At least it has stopped raining for the moment so hopefully we will be able to find Octavius and his family without getting too wet.”

  Colonel Michaels` memory was not defective, as the track was just where he had said it was, and Peter Summers pulled off the road and took them as far along the track as he could go. Then he drove the car off the track to pass under a large oak tree and to stop between two large shrubs that should help hide the car from any casual passer-by. He turned and looked at the others who were smiling with relief to be somewhere that was relatively safe.

  “I`m glad that bit is over as I was getting rather tired, we should maybe conceal the car a bit more with whatever material we can find to camouflage it, just in case a Lyren comes along and not your friend Octavius.” Peter Summers suggested.

  “Good thinking Peter, let`s do it now.” Colonel Michaels said in agreement. He then got out of the staff car and went to work cutting and then pulling vegetation towards the vehicle.

  “Let`s get stuck in team, there appears to be plenty of material at hand to do the job well.”

  They all got out of the car and began the work of hiding their vehicle. They spread parts of fallen trees over the car and then cut down bushes with their knives to add these to the camouflage around the car. Peter tried with some success to disguise the tracks the car had made as it had moved off the track and over the wet muddy ground around the tree, that should do it, he thought to himself when he had finished, for no one was going to be looking for any tracks. They then all got back into the car from the side furthest away from the track, they had purposely left this side clear to allow them to be able to use the car for shelter. Although everyone got a little damp from the drops of water falling off the trees, and from the wet ferns and other plants that they picked up for use as camouflage.

  Colonel Michaels decided that they ought to inform Jonas of their hurried departure, as he could easily be implicated once the state police began to investigate the owner of the burnt house that they had left behind them, and when he told the others of his decision, no one disagreed.

  His message told Jonas of the state police surrounding the house and of their own escape, he also warned Jonas that a subsequent investigation would probably bring the owner`s identity to light. Even if that was well hidden, then someone had looked after the house when it was not in use, such as the newspaper proprietor, and his identity would be known and everything he knew would soon be in the possession of the authorities. From there it was only a matter of time before the names of the local members of the freedom movement were discovered and after that, the trail might soon reach his doorstep. If there was a possibility of this happening then his family and that of his brother were welcome to escape on the Jeanette, which would soon have to leave anyway, what with the war moving ever nearer to Lyre. Jonas would know all this, but it did no harm for someone else to echo his own thoughts.

  After sending the message they all tried to get as much rest as was possible, and the blankets and rugs that Ray had thought to bring along helped to keep out the worst of the cold, although it was still a cold uncomfortable night that finally ended with the rising sun. Their luck appeared to be holding, for as Ray Connors ventured out from the staff car on his mission to find Octavius, he bumped into Isabella almost immediately, she was collecting wood blown down by the storm for use as firewood after it had dried.

  “Ray what are you doing here, and where is your friend?” Isabella said, surprised to see him.

  “He is with some other friends of ours; we came here Isabella in the hope of eliciting your help this time.”

  “You know that our help is freely given to you Ray, tell me what we can do to help you and it is done.” Isabella said very happy to help the two men who had saved her from hell.

  “We are on the run from the authorities Isabella, after we freed the man we came to Lyre for, we were betrayed and only just escaped with our lives, we need somewhere to make our vehicle disappear, and somewhere to use as a hideaway while we plan our next move.” Ray said hoping that his new friends could help them.

  “Show me where you are hiding Ray, so that I know where to bring my father, he will make everything that you require, happen.”

  Ray took Isabella back to the staff car and introduced her to the others. After greeting them and promising to help in whatever way she could, Isabella left to fetch her father. Somehow she seemed to have aged since they last saw her; just like Jean she had lost her innocence and was now a woman, and in Isabella`s case at a very young age. Ten minutes later Isabella returned with her father, accompanying him was his brother Jason and his friend Linus.

  “My friends, I am glad that it is to me that you have turned too in your hour of trouble, for now I can repay in some measure your own deeds that you carried out without a thought for your own safety. First my brother and my friend will help you to dispose of your vehicle and then, we will find a place for you to stay without the Lyren scum finding you.” Octavius said proud to be of assistance to his friends from Earth. “One of you must operate the car while Jason and Linus direct him.” Octavius said.

  Peter Summers took it upon himself to be the driver, and getting into the car turned the engine on. Jason and Linus who had never been inside of a car before were extremely happy to jump into the car and direct him to a high cliff above a large lake, one that had once been a quarry. There they got out
and told Peter to help them to hide the car until midnight, when the two would return to push the car into the lake, to do so any sooner would be foolish in the extreme, for a Lyren might see the act and report it to the state police. Jason who was a duplicate of his brother, but a little younger, began to gather more ferns and the branches of fallen trees to hide the staff car for a second time. Linus was much shorter than the two brothers were, but he always seemed to have a smile upon his face, now more than ever as he helped in this small battle against the forces of evil. They soon had the car hidden behind a wall of vegetation; they then hurried Peter back to the others. Their eyes constantly searched for signs of a Lyren, for a slave is never free to take time off from his work, they have to be constantly on the alert for signs of their master’s presence or suffer for it.

  Octavius and his clan were not like the other slaves that lived on Lyre; ever since Ray and Colonel Michaels had showed them the way they had begun to plan their revenge on their Lyren masters, now they would make more of them disappear, and woe betide any Lyren who dared to harm one of Octavius` family or friends. Octavius took the friends to the rooms that his people shared and told them to stay hidden until the night.

  “For the night,” Octavius said to them, “has become the time when my family can meet up with other proven friends to discuss how best to push the Lyrens for more freedom. Some of the slaves think we should be careful not to alarm the Lyrens too much, for they fear that this could result in making our situation even worse. My answer to those who fear to fight is that the Lyrens will not begin to treat us better until we fight for our rights. We should make plans to begin a planet wide revolt that will make the Lyren monsters come to dread the setting of their sun, for then the slaves will be able to move around more freely, and turn from slaves into freedom fighters.” Octavius was no longer a slave; he was a man who was leading the slaves’ revolt in this part of Lyre.

  “That supposes that the Lyrens don`t chain you up at night to prevent you from threatening them, and then bring in overseers to take charge during the day.”

  Octavius looked up at Ray and grinned. “Others have mentioned that this could happen but I find that I am adept at picking locks, and they will not stop me from acting to free my people. Now I have to return to work, to become a slave again, but as I said, it is only for the daylight hours.”

  Left alone Colonel Michaels turned on their computer and tuned into the Lyren news programme, it was full of the latest events, both on and off Lyre. The first part of the report went on to report that the space fleet of Earth had surrounded a third planet and as before nothing more was heard from the Lyren forces based there, it must now be assumed that Earth was landing massive land forces and capturing or killing all Lyrens found on the planet. The second part of the report referred to the rumours that were sweeping across the planet. It stated that teams of space marines from Earth were thought to be operating in many areas of the planet. One had recently freed an Earth spy from the Wallachia Fortress, and another team are thought to be behind the fire in the village of Rouen, where a squad of them had escaped the clutches of a complete company of the Lyren state police. Reports of further sightings were coming in from all over the planet, the two state policemen missing for almost a week from their headquarters in Henin are also thought to have run into a squad of the marines.

  It was just about now that they received a message from Jonas, he told them that their freighter the Jeanette would leave Lyre for Apraxia that afternoon, it would take with it his family and that of his brother, and that the two of them had now gone into hiding. He saw from the news that they were still keeping an ultra-low profile.