by Andria Stone
Gina nudged her mother. “It’s Mark, Mom. It’s what he does.”
“He’s a scientist. In Canada.”
Mark looked like he didn’t want any part of this conversation, so Axel answered for him. “Well, not exactly.”
“I knew something wasn’t right.” Leslie Warren narrowed her eyes.
“We’ll finish this when we get you inside.” Axel used his best sergeant’s voice, hoping to discourage any more of her questions.
Leslie Warren didn’t seem happy, however, she stayed quiet.
The rambling two-story house sat on a quiet cul-de-sac, with a grove of trees sheltering the backside. In stealth mode, the shuttle descended into the Warren’s large backyard. All the armored soldiers exited and made quick work of securing the property, then faded into the shadows to monitor the perimeter. Axel grabbed two duffels from under his seat. He ushered the last three people out of the shuttle and into the house through the back door, while the shuttle returned to the hospital.
Leslie Warren went straight to the liquor cabinet, chose a fine bottle of whiskey, along with three glasses. She set them on the dining room table. She sank into a chair, poured herself a stiff drink, then motioned for everyone to sit.
“I don’t know what was in that shot your doctor gave me, but I’m thinking very clearly right now. Somebody better tell me what’s going on. Why is the Terran military involved in my husband’s assault?”
Everyone filled their glasses half full. Gina abstained. Axel looked at Mark, who shook his head.
Axel turned to watch Leslie Warren, swearing to quit if she showed any signs of stress. “Mrs. Warren, about three weeks ago, Mark’s Canadian installation was attacked. My unit suppressed the incursion. That’s when I met your son. His lab partner—a woman—had planned it so she could steal classified military data from Mark and another scientist. She escaped. We’ve been searching for her ever since. In the meantime, Terran military transferred Mark and the other scientist out of Canada so we could keep them secure.
“This woman is hell bent on acquiring their research. Using it for her personal gain. She is clearly pathological. Now she’s resorted to using force against the scientist’s families to coerce Mark and Eva into giving up their data. I apologize in the name of the Terran Military Defense. I’m sorrier than you’ll ever know that harm came to your husband.”
“The other injured person they brought in…was that a soldier—a female?”
“Yes.”
“What kind of data?” Leslie Warren finished her drink.
Several moments of silence passed.
“Cybernetics and terraforming,” Mark whispered, before emptying his glass.
“My god, she wants to terraform moons and inhabit them with cyborgs.”
“Yes,” Mark said.
“We were leaving for the awards dinner until I got the emergency call. So you’re telling me Gina and I would have been attacked, too?”
“Unknown,” Axel said. “The most likely outcome? Yes.”
“I don’t imagine she was the one who assaulted my husband tonight—so she has others doing her dirty work—right?”
“Affirmative.”
“That’s how your soldier got hurt?”
“Affirmative.”
“I’m going to assume not everyone has lived through these attacks. How many have died so far?”
Mark blurted out, “One hundred sixty-eight…that we know of.”
“Well, find that bitch and kill her!”
“Yes, ma’am. First chance I get.” Axel drained his glass.
***
Upstairs, Axel had been assigned Eric’s old room. After tossing his duffel on the bed, he got in the shower. He needed to purge the night’s events from his system, cleanse all the raw emotions from his mind. Scarlotti’s death still weighed on him. Kamryn was in the ICU—directly because he had recommended her for the operation. At this moment, he wanted to pound his fist through the wall—over and over again—but he wouldn’t. Instead, he turned the shower’s temperature all the way to cold, letting the icy water chill the hatred for his adversary into stone hard logic. Without realizing it at the time, the answer he had given to Mark’s mother was the truth. He would not arrest Beth Coulter. She wasn’t worth turning over for prosecution. Given a chance, he would kill her. Period.
To minimize the military’s presence in the Warren’s house, Axel decided the leather clothing would be a better choice, at least for today. He toweled off, pulled on the black pants, just as he heard a light knock on the door. He opened it to see Gina wearing a fuzzy bathrobe over blue pajamas.
She pushed her way in, shut the door, and then poked him in the chest with her finger as she spoke. “This is important. I need to tell you something about my brother. You must promise never to let him know I told you. Do you promise?”
Axel took her finger off his chest, led her to the bed, pushing on her shoulder until she sat down. He sat cross-legged on the floor so he could look at her. “Yes. I promise.” He continued to hold her hand as she spoke at a break-neck pace in a hoarse whisper.
“I was a dancer—ballet—and I hurt my knee. I never stayed off it long enough to let it heal properly. It got to the point where I couldn’t stand on it anymore, much less dance. I had surgery to fix it. Long story short, I became addicted to the meds. Went all the way down the rabbit hole.
“Mark was away at college in Washington. He didn’t know how bad I was. My parents called him. He came home. Went out alone—and found me in the worst place you can imagine—in the worst condition you can imagine—and I was being raped. My brother almost killed three guys. With his fists. After he brought me home, he locked me in my room for three days. When he opened the door to let me out, I told my parents I wanted to go to rehab. Then Mark went back to college and aced his finals.
“One of the guys that Mark maimed has had facial reconstruction—and do you know who he is? Our current sheriff. I’d bet that’s the reason no deputy came to the hospital to take a report from the Lambert sisters.” Gina slumped, as if she’d exhausted her last ounce of energy.
Axel spotted similarities from Mark’s violent behavior in saving his sister, to his fierce actions in the lab on Luna. Good to know.
“This is a classified military incident, Gina. Which means it’s preferable the local law enforcement not be involved.” He grinned. “But I can fix the other thing.”
“You can’t let Mark near the sheriff.”
“If it happens, I’ll be with him. I’m his wingman.”
“I’m twenty-five and still living with my parents.” Her eyes brimmed with tears. “Because I'm afraid one of those guys might…come back. Mark asks why I stay here. I tell him because I’d feel guilty leaving Mom and Dad alone. I could never tell him the truth.”
“If you give me their names—it won’t ever happen.”
She scuffed across the room in her fluffy blue slippers. Hovering over Eric’s desk, she wrote on a slip of paper, came back and handed it to him.
“Consider it done.” Axel tucked the note in his pocket.
“Now, what about my dad?”
“Maj. Torance has been saving soldiers, myself included, for as long as you’ve been alive. I have complete faith in his ability to heal your father and my friend, the soldier in the room next to his.”
“You’re not going to tell Mark—anything.”
“Never.”
“Okay.” Gina threw her arms around his neck, giving him a long hug, before disappearing out the door.
Axel stretched out on the bed. He covered his eyes with his forearm, but he couldn’t get the look on Gina’s face out of his head. Today he’d witnessed a different side of her, compared to the first time he’d seen her. On the Luna vid screen she’d been bright-eyed, gorgeous in her yoga togs, high-spirited while talking with Mark. Since arriving in Portland, he’d seen her crying, haunted by memories of past abuse, and fearful not only of losing her father, but her brother’s safety as wel
l. She was tormented. Axel felt duty-bound to remove as much of her pain as possible.
Axel sat up and commed Ohashi. “How would you feel about doing some personal cyber sleuthing for me?”
“Are we catching bad guys?”
“Three.”
“Oh, goody. I’m in.”
“I want to know everything they’ve done wrong since the first grade, especially if it involves abuses of any kind against women. I have a feeling these scumbags are repeat offenders. And leave no trace.” He gave her the three names, then turned out the light before closing his eyes.
***
Mark awoke at zero six hundred, on the dot. There were no messages on his tablet. He showered, dressed in leathers, t-shirt, shoulder holster, and gun. The second he opened the door, he smelled steak. He ran downstairs, taking three at a time, breezed into the kitchen to see Axel cooking—in a red BBQ apron.
Gina sat at the breakfast bar, in black floral yoga togs, drinking coffee and chatting with him as if they were old friends.
“Steak?”
“Coming right up, Sleeping Beauty.” Axel flipped three sunny side eggs onto a plate, added a nice thick slab of beef from the fancy indoor grill, and slid it down the counter top.
“I didn’t know you were so domesticated.”
“I have many excellent qualities. Most will remain a secret.” Axel winked at Gina.
Mark saw it. “Has anybody checked with the hospital?”
“I commed the major about an hour ago. He says Kamryn’s nanites have kicked into high gear. She’s off the critical list and on the mend. They might be transferring her back to the base tomorrow. Your dad’s neural readouts show his nanite protocol is progressing nicely. We’ve been ordered not to go to the hospital before ten hundred because Torance is taking a cat nap.”
“That’s excellent news.” Mark felt lighthearted as he poured a mug of coffee. He sat next to Gina, sliced off a hunk of steak, and stuffed it in his mouth. “Umm, good. When did you learn to cook?”
“I spent the last three years of high school summer vacations as a fry cook.”
“What’s in the pot?” Mark pointed with his fork to an industrial-sized soup pot on the stove behind Axel.
“Chili for the troops. All they brought were energy bars and MREs. Those get old quick unless you’re in combat.”
“That’s not going to feed all of them.”
“I can make more. Your mom’s pantry looks like a grocery store.”
“Well, good morning boys and girl.” Leslie Warren smiled from the doorway, dressed in a gray tweed jacket over black pants. “It’s wonderful to see my kids in the kitchen again. You, too, Axel—oh, what smells so good?”
“He made steak and eggs, Mom. I told him you wouldn’t mind. Soldiers need a hearty breakfast.”
“Axel, I officially give you the keys to my kitchen.” Leslie kissed both her children on their cheeks. After pouring her coffee, she leaned against the counter watching everyone. “And thank you for sending the major’s update about Dave’s condition to my tablet. Yesterday seems like a bad dream. I know it’s not over, but things look so different this morning.
“We need to contact Dave’s associates to let them know he’s on emergency leave. His patients will have to be rescheduled or switched to another doctor. These are children and their parents. None of them are going to be happy about that.
“I don’t want to put a damper on things, however, I have a few more questions. I wasn’t prepared for what happened yesterday. If I know what might happen, then I’m better able to handle it—going forward.”
Leslie looked at Axel. “Last night Mark told us the person who attacked his father had been caught. Will this woman continue to send people after us? Could Gina or I still be in danger?”
Mark started to answer.
His mom held her hand up to stop him, while continuing to gaze at Axel.
“Well, ma’am, I don’t have a crystal ball…my guess is there’s a fifty percent chance another attempt will be made. That’s why we haven’t left.”
“I won’t put myself or my daughter at risk. However, I also have a practice, patients, employees. Gina has a business, with classes and clients. What are we supposed to do?”
“I’ve already sent a situation report to my commanding officer, Maj. Buchanan. I’m certain she’s in a meeting right now hammering out a plan to provide security and keep everyone safe until the threat can be neutralized.”
Mark had hoped the morning would start out better than last night had ended. It had, but not by much. His father’s injury was only the beginning of events that morphed into the military’s ongoing Operation Pandora. With the apprehension of an enemy cyborg attacker, followed by an accomplice who tried to murder an NCO, Mark’s family was now under the protection of armored troops. Since he wasn’t running this operation, he had no say in what happened next. Somewhere in a far-off location, a major, or colonel, or general would make decisions directly impacting his family. Mark didn’t like this situation. Not one damned bit.
An alert pinged on both men’s tablets.
Axel caught the message on his first. He turned away from the women, sent a hand signal for Mark to be silent.
Mark glanced down, except he didn’t understand what the five stars showing on the screen meant.
“I think the lieutenant outside might need a break. Let’s go see what she wants.” Axel tossed off the apron, moved toward the back door while grabbing his jacket.
Mark followed Axel across the backyard. “Five stars?”
“Someone on the Wanted List has been spotted. You get one guess who.”
“Are you sure it’s her?”
“Why would they be sending us this alert if it wasn’t?”
A female soldier stepped out of the tree line on the backside of the house. Her armor reflected the camouflaged colors of the wooded surroundings.
“Lieutenant Inga Nazarova, this is Capt. Mark Warren. His father was the one attacked last night. His mother and sister are in the house. Did you get the alert?”
“Affirmative, Sergeant. Follow me. We’ve got a little vid conference set up back here with two of our commanding officers from the base.”
A small vid screen had been wedged in between a tree fork. It showed a split image of Harben and Buchanan in their respective offices.
“Sirs, Sgt. Von Radach and Capt. Warren reporting.”
Harben wasted no time. “Our facial recognition software caught an image it flagged as Beth Coulter leaving the Space Station just hours ago. She was almost unrecognizable because she was wearing the disguise of an older man with a beard, who we’ve since identified as a station employee. Using his account, fingerprints, and ID, she booked passage back to Terra, with Las Vegas as the destination. We must assume he has met with foul play and have initiated a search of the Space Station. The private transport craft has already landed on Terra. We are searching every database for any trace of her there, and on any flights leaving since she arrived.
“There was one anomaly. After her flight had left, people started getting sick on the station. Some bug was going around causing diarrhea. From the highest concentration of victims, they traced it back to a pathogen spread through the air ducts. It’s been identified as RD-59. Capt. Warren, you have an extensive chemical background. Can you offer any explanation for this?”
“Sir, the first thing that comes to mind is RD-59 induces diarrhea, but RX-59 causes delirium. These are not street drugs. Depending on where and how they’re stored in a lab, it’s possible an inexperienced person might mistake one for the other. Without knowing what else Beth Coulter might have access to, an immediate inventory of the military’s Special Pathogens Laboratory would be mandatory. And I guess we all know air ducts are her preferred method of delivery.”
“Thank you, Captain. I’ll forward this information to Gen. Dimitrios at HQ right away.”
“Sir, I need to know what’s going to happen to my family.”
&nb
sp; “I fully understand your concern, Captain. The plans are being finalized. You will be notified soon, in person, not by electronic means. Harben out.”
His image disappeared from the screen, which held the expanded view of Buchanan.
“Nazarova, I want to reiterate your direct orders to provide protection to every member of Warren’s family until you are relieved. Am I clear?”
“Yes, ma’am, Maj. Buchanan.”
Chapter 15
At ten hundred on the dot, Torance welcomed the Warren family into his patent’s room. Dave’s coloring had returned to normal. His small contusions were about seventy-five percent healed. He had a day’s growth of beard, and his hair had started to grow back, courtesy of the nanites.
Axel excused himself to visit Kamryn. The shadow of an armored soldier stood guard in a corner of her room. She lay motionless, eyes closed, peaceful as if sleeping, except for the extensive bandaging that covered the left side of her neck. The machines at bedside were busy with readouts of her neural, heart and nanite functions. Axel gently grasped her arm in a warrior’s greeting.
She squeezed his arm a little in return. Her eyes fluttered, opened to slits, blinked, then opened half way. She focused on him, trying to smile.
“I’ve signed you up for a marathon when we get back to base. So don’t get comfy here.”
She chuckled. “Drugs.”
“Oh, yeah. The major’s got some good ones. Battlefield drugs are the best. They make you feel so good you don’t want to get well.”
“Uh-huh.”
He bent over, whispering in her ear. “I’m so sorry, Kam.”
She pinched him.
“Okay. No more emotional drivel.”
“Sitrep?”
“Well, Mark’s father is improving. Oh yeah, Beth Coulter was flagged leaving the Space Station in a man’s disguise—using his fingerprints—so he’s dead. She landed in Las Vegas. What do you suppose she’s going to do there? Play a little roulette? Maybe see a show? Or, commit another murder, assume a new identity and hop the next shuttle to Portland?”
