by C. R. Daems
RED ANGEL
Book V: Coup d’État
By
C. R. Daems
Red Angel: Book V: Coup d’État
Copyright © 2019 by C. R. Daems
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or by any information storage or retrieval system, without the permission in writing from C. R. Daems.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
ISBN-13: 978-0-9983251-5-6
ISBN-10: 0-9983251-5-5
Check out all my novels at:
crdaems.com & talonnovels.com
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
A New Beginning
CHAPTER TWO
First Day in a New Galaxy
CHAPTER THREE
UnCab: Concerns or Problems
CHAPTER FOUR
Typhoon Anna
CHAPTER FIVE
The Murders
CHAPTER SIX
Lots to Learn
CHAPTER SEVEN
Searching for Answers
CHAPTER EIGHT
UnCab: A New Approach
CHAPTER NINE
Shades of the Past
CHAPTER TEN
Aide-de-camp
CHAPTER ELEVEN
A Few More Women Would Help
CHAPTER TWELVE
Understanding the Problem
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Following Bread Crumbs
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
A Flexible Opponent
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Following the Bread Crumbs
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Chasing Ghosts
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
UnCab: An Elusive Target
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Black Water Gambit
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Searching for Ghosts
CHAPTER TWENTY
UnCab: Kill Paulus at All Costs
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Vanishing Crumbs
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
A Game of Guesses
TWENTY-THREE
UnCab: Emergency Meeting
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
The First Mistake Loses the Game
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
UnCab: So Close Yet So Far
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Time to Plan
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
A Deal too Good to Be True
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Now or Never
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
The Eye of the Storm
CHAPTER THIRTY
Wedding Bells
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Annoy the UnCab
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
UnCab: A Thorn in Their Running Shoes
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
Partial Answers
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
Oasis: A Starting Point
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
Black Water: Garbage In, Garbage Out
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
New Zheng: It’s Personal
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
Sutan: A Real Pain in the Ass
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
Stone Ring: At Last
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
The Agreement
CHAPTER FORTY
UnCab: When at First You Don’t Succeed
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
Eastar: Home at Last
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
A Going Away Party
United Alliance of Stars Space
PROLOGUE
Three men and a woman sat in the living room of a five-thousand-square-meter country mansion on the outskirts of city. The building was over a hundred years old but the interior was modern. A stone fireplace was flanked by two sets of floor-to-ceiling French doors, which led onto a stone patio that looked out toward a grove of mature oak and maple trees. The cottage’s white plastered walls supported a variety of oil paintings of twelfth-century villages and landscapes on old-Earth.
“Harold, I liked your idea from the beginning but I thought it an impossible dream,” a tall man in his fifties said as he lifted his crystal glass and sipped the fifty-year-old scotch they had been served. For his age he looked in good physical condition, his short brown hair showing no signs of gray. His angular face had sharp features and the look of a man of action.
“That’s because you are a man who believes in striking the enemy hard and fast. You’re good at tactics. I on the other hand am a strategist and take the long view. It’s taken two years to get the pieces in place. I think we can consider phase one complete and the reason I asked for this meeting. It’s time to implement phase two,” Harold said.
Steve, though ten years younger than Harold, had silver-gray hair. His face, round with a full beard, made him look like a college professor or a friendly grandfather. He wouldn’t be considered fat but he had at least ten kilos of extra weight for his average height and small frame. “Maria, are you ready for phase two?” he asked.
“I have two three-person kill-teams ready.” Maria’s neutral expression never changed, nor did her black eyes express any emotion. Harold shuddered internally as he gazed at the woman. Like a Venus flytrap, beautiful, tempting, and deadly. Maria was the youngest member of the group, in her late thirties with a trim, athletic frame, short curly auburn hair, and a pleasant heart-shaped face. “They are expensive, but trustworthy and skilled.” Her eyes scanned each of the men for their reaction. The third man smiled.
“I’ve had reports from my contacts at each of the planets. We could be approaching the end game in less than two years,” Ryan said. He was tall with a handsome round, clean-shaven face. Wearing a dark gray suit, he looked like a typical CEO of a large corporation—the man in charge. “If you will look at the television monitor,” he said as he took out his tablet and typed on an icon of a box wrapped with a large red bow. A matrix appeared, depicting each of the fifteen inhabited planets and the names of the current United Alliance of Stars Committee delegates and their party affiliation.
“Let’s start with Eastar…”
CHAPTER ONE
A New Beginning
I stood staring out my office floor-to-ceiling window at the city. The view from my eighteenth-floor office was spectacular even though many of the buildings were ten to twenty stories higher. Eastar was the oldest planet in the Alliance, more than five hundred years old with a population of five million, and the buildings reflected that evolution.
Standing there high above the city streets, I couldn’t help but reflect on the events that brought me here. My father, mother, and I had contracted the deadly Coaca Virus. They died and I lived because a red-headed krait saved me for no reason anyone can to this day explain. He sought me out in the winter when he should have been hibernating. Now he stays with me night and day, and won’t feed off another with the virus. Our relationship is symbiotic—he lives off my blood, and the poison from his bite keeps the virus dormant.
Magistrate Bellona saved me from becoming a government lab rat by adopting me when foster and private homes proved unsafe and research failed to duplicate the krait’s poison that keeps the virus dormant. That led to a loving home and a college education at the prestigious Naval Academy.
Then Commodore Stauffer noted my ability at ciphers and saved me from the difficulty I would have had finding meaningful work—not many wo
uld hire someone with a venomous snake attached to her twenty-four/seven—by offering me a position with the Naval Intelligence Agency, NIA. And there, Lieutenant Sinclair helped to look after a very naïve young girl.
Admiral Lulltrel further helped by insisting I take the Eastar NIA office when the project team I was on was disbanded. Otherwise I wouldn’t have taken the position, as I automatically resist change because of people’s reactions to a young girl with out-of-zone promotions and a krait for a companion. For that reason, I would not have done well at one of the remote NIA stations.
I had been very fortunate. Without those individuals, my life would have been a living nightmare. I owed them much.
My musing was interrupted when there was a knock on the door and Master Chief Stamm entered the office with Lieutenant Banner, my aide-de-camp.
“Well, Carl, what kind of a boring day am I in for?” I asked. According to Vice Admiral Lulltrel, my boss, admirals weren’t supposed to work. They assigned work to others and were there to provide the occasional critical decision only someone with their knowledge, experience, and skill could make.
“Ma’am, your schedule has been cleared…you have an appointment with the President of the United Alliance of Stars at eleven hundred hours,” he said, looking nervous, which master chiefs seldom did. My aide also looked concerned.
“I guess it’s too late to tell him my schedule’s full,” I said, but like them, I wondered why he wanted to see me and why Lulltrel hadn’t mentioned something to me. She must know…or did she? “I’m not that bored.”
“Ma’am, I notified your security. I thought you would want to go home and change into a dress uniform,” Carl said as my aide collected my jacket from the coat rack. I was currently in khakis, assuming it would be another uneventful day. Red, my ever-present krait, didn’t seem excited even though my adrenaline was active. He probably already knows what it’s about, I mused.
I had long ago realized Red wasn’t a normal krait. I thought my higher than average intelligence, as well as my ability to sense other people’s emotions, was due to his presence. He knows friend from foe, saved my life more than once, and warned me about danger several times. Psychologists would have many explanations for my feelings, but I’ve had many years of experience and too many instances for them all to be a coincidence or my imagination. I knew in my heart he wasn’t an ordinary krait, but I had yet to determine what he was.
“Carl, please tell Admiral Lulltrel. She doesn’t like surprises. Besides, she has a right to know,” I said as I headed for the door with the jacket David handed me.
“Yes, ma’am. I suspect this won’t be a boring day after all,” Carl said and gave me a wry grin.
“Ma’am, do you want me to come along?” David asked as he followed me out the door.
“No. But stay available. I have no idea what he wants. Unless he’s also bored and wants to chat about venomous kraits,” I said over my shoulder as my two marine security guards fell in behind me.
I was so engrossed wondering why the president of the UAS Committee wanted me, the ride to my home seemed to take only seconds. As I dressed, I decided it had to do with my Priority One Authorization, P1A, and Admiral Webb’s comment that the authorization was more or less permanent as the Committee considered me their troubleshooter. But I thought that applied to problems best given to the NIA. However, in that case, the notification should have come through Admiral Webb or Lulltrel. By the time I reached the Committee complex my mind was in chaos. Red lay wrapped around my neck with his little red head lying on my shoulder—asleep. I wanted to shake him. I’m nervous so you should be too, or at least doing something to calm me, I felt like shouting.
The Committee complex consisted of a massive domed structure that rose five stories and had seating inside for several hundred delegates and their aides. In front of the building were fifteen obelisks, each twenty by two by two meters tall, where each planet had its flag and designs etched into the granite depicting the planet’s history and uniqueness. The dome connected to a round reception building which connected to the rectangular building that housed the delegates and their staff from the fifteen Alliance planets. The building was actually three stories, but two were underground as a precaution to an attack or natural disaster. Each planet had its own secure area in the rectangular building. The current Core group members—the president, the majority leader, and the minority leader—had offices in the Committee’s domed building. Both buildings were only accessible via the reception building.
When I entered the reception area, I was amazed at the massive circular room and the number of guards and the people coming and going. I walked up to the rectangular marble counter, which had six stations with overhead monitors showing the service each provided. I saw one indicating Core Group Meetings and entered the roped off lane. No one was waiting so I approached the counter, where a young man flashed a smile as I neared.
“How may I help you, Admiral?” His eyes scanned my uniform and name tag and then looked to a monitor on his right. “Yes, I see you have an appointment with President Bennett.” He reached under the counter and fetched a plastic card, which he handed me. “If you will present this at inspection booth one, they will direct you to the correct room.” He pointed to my left, where a scanning device and several individuals stood along with armed guards in black fatigues. Behind the reception counter were five other inspection booths, but booth number one was the only one blocking the entrance to the domed building. The others granted access to the lobby and the corridor to the planets’ individual areas.
I walked up to booth number one and handed the young woman the plastic card with my name, picture, and a small embedded chip. The woman slid the card into a slot on her monitor and the screen filled with my picture and general information. To my surprise, the light on the scanner switched off. The woman turned to face the three guards standing behind the scanner.
“Sergeant Winston, the Admiral and her escort are cleared to see President Bennett and permitted to be armed,” she said loudly and waited for him to nod. Then she handed my card back to me. I noticed that none of the guards had identifiable military rank or insignia.
“Thank you,” I said and walked through the scanner. Neither the man identified as a sergeant nor the other two guards off to the side saluted. Their attention remained on us and the general area.
“Admiral, if you and your escort will get in the cart”—the sergeant nodded to a small electric cart which could seat six passengers—“Corporal Willis will escort you to the president’s office.”
I entered and sat in the first row, and my marine escort took the seats behind me. The cart moved at a good speed down the long white marble corridor. The walls on the left were a pale blue and empty except for monitors every twenty meters which were currently turned off. On the right were two large doors which I thought led into the domed Committee meeting room. According to my notes, the Committee members and their staff entered via a monorail on the other side of the building that ran along the back of each of their areas and only they had access. The corridor ended at a large reception area where three secretaries sat at large wooden desks and two guards stood next to each office entrance. The cart stopped in front of the middle desk, where a middle-aged woman sat staring at us. When I rose and stepped down from the cart, she spoke.
“Admiral Paulus, your security must remain here.” She looked like a no-nonsense woman who wasn’t impressed by admirals, but her stalwart demeanor did show signs of cracking as her eyes drifted from my multifunctional weapon, Mfw, strapped to my thigh, to my face, which didn’t look old enough to be a full commander, and finally to Red, who was now awake on my shoulder and staring in her direction. She rose quickly and walked to the door, knocked, opened the door, and entered. The two guards at the door looked very attentive. A few moments later she exited and held the door open for me. “Admiral Paulus, President Bennett will see you now,” she said and gave me a brief smile.
I entered
and braced to attention, not sure if he required a salute or what to say. As I tried to decide, the president rose from behind his desk. At the same time, a woman and man rose from large wing-backed chairs sitting on either side of his desk.
“Relax, Admiral Paulus,” he said, smiling as his bright gray-green eyes evaluated me and Red. President Bennett was a tall man with a full head of gray hair that was almost white and hung over his ears. His smooth, angular face and penetrating eyes gave me the impression of a strong-willed individual. “Let me introduce you to my two companions, Mrs. Scherer, who is the majority leader on the Committee, and Mr. Glaser, who is the minority leader. Together we form what is called the Core group and are empowered to make independent decisions for the Committee.”
Mrs. Scherer was a tall, thin woman with a serious, narrow face and a hawk-like nose that gave her a predatory look. Her eyes scanned me from head to foot but lingered the longest on my face. Mr. Glaser was a sturdy-looking man with a square face and a body to match and was several kilo overweight. His gaze was fixed on Red.
“We, the UAS Committee, have a problem,” President Bennett said and waved to an empty chair that put me in the middle of a semicircle with Mrs. Scherer to my left, Bennett in the center, and Mr. Glaser to my right. I sat, feeling like a bug under an electron microscope. “There is a group calling itself WEP, which is short for We the People, that are insisting we revise the constitution of the UAS. They threatened to kill delegates who oppose WEP. At first, we didn’t take their manifesto seriously since we get more than our share of crackpot letters every month. But three months ago, they killed the delegate from Westar, then the next month the delegate from Amend, and two weeks ago the delegate from Holy Star.”
Bennett paused for effect, or for me to comment. I presumed they wanted me to find WEP and shut them down, and said as much.
“Yes.” He nodded. “We would like you to find and shut them down, but we know you’re not going to do that in a week, or a month, or maybe a year, during which time delegates will die.”
I thought that a very realistic view. A murder now and then didn’t give a lot of data points for evaluation and destroying an organization was harder than finding a wacko. But there was a catch. His two statements, while reasonable, were a dichotomy. Confirming my feeling, Red weaved his way into my hair as if waiting to hear it.
