Earthman Jack vs. The Secret Army (Earthman Jack Space Saga Book 2)

by Matthew Kadish

  Jack gazed up among the commotion and saw the man who was attacking. He had dark purple skin, green hair, and fierce yellow eyes. He had a worm jutting out from the back of his neck, which hissed at Mourdock as the man continued to fire.

  “Look out!” Jack heard someone cry. He turned to see another purple-skinned man aiming a small carbine right at Mourdock. A plainclothed Royal Guard had rushed forward and grabbed the gun, pulling it upward just as it fired. The blasts flew out, striking the level of the club above them, causing more people to scream. The second assassin elbowed the Royal Guard in the face, pushing him away with his shoulder and firing into his chest point blank, dropping him.

  Mourdock darted toward the man who was firing at him, expertly deflecting each plasma blast that was loosed his way. The man tried to back up, but Mourdock moved too quickly. He lashed out with his sword, cutting the muzzle off of one of the pistols and thrusting his shoulder into the man’s chest, hard enough to cause him to drop the other gun.

  “Protect Lord Skyborn!” Jack heard someone yell as more Royal Guards showed up. From the chaos of the crowd running for cover, a third assassin emerged, holding another carbine which he used to fire at the incoming re-enforcements, catching them off-guard before they had a chance to react.

  Jack looked at the plasma pistol, which the assassin Mourdock was fighting had dropped, and crawled toward it. He reached it just as he saw the man’s partner aim his carbine right at Mourdock. Jack quickly aimed for the assassin and fired, his bolts missing completely, but causing the assassin to dive for cover.

  I really gotta learn how to shoot. This is pathetic, thought Jack. Jack turned just as the third assassin took aim. “Mourdock! To your left!” he cried.

  Without hesitation, Mourdock flung his sword. It whipped around like a spinning disk, propelling itself straight toward the would-be killer, slicing the man’s head clean off before he could fire and then de-manifesting into nothingness. Jack watched in shock as the assassin’s head hit the ground, rolling toward him with a surprised look frozen on its face. The worm jutting from the back of its skull cried out as it withered and died.

  The assassin with which Mourdock had been engaged took that opportunity to lash out, blades springing from wristguards hidden beneath the sleeves of his coat. Mourdock avoided the assassin’s strikes, his own arms lashing out defensively, knocking aside each blow the assassin attempted to land.

  Jack saw the other assassin pop up from his cover, this time taking aim directly at him. Jack scrambled to his feet and dove behind an overturned table as the assassin fired. Not fun, not fun, not fun! he thought frantically as he gripped his pistol while his cover shuddered with each impact from the enemy plasma carbine.

  Jack raised his pistol over the edge of the table and fired blindly in the direction of his assailant, hoping he’d hit something.

  Mourdock seemed to be making short work of the man he was fighting, landing some well-placed blows that sent the assassin stumbling back. If Jack hadn’t been so worried about getting shot at that very moment, he might have been extremely impressed with Mourdock’s expert fighting skills.

  “Take him down!” Jack heard someone yell. He peeked out from his cover enough to see more Royal Guards, in full armor and with their rifles at ready, rushing up toward the VIP area. They blasted away at the assassin who was firing at Jack. The assassin turned to engage the guards, but they wasted no time in shredding him to bits, their barrage of plasma blasts almost completely melting him as they tore through the man.

  Mourdock struck his assailant in the throat, then spun, kicking him in the chest and sending him flying backward, cracking the glass wall of the club as he smashed against it. The assassin crumpled to the floor as the Royal Guard surrounded him, plasma rifles at the ready.

  Jack got up and watched as Mourdock walked forward, towering over the killer and looking at him like a piece of trash stuck to the bottom of his shoe. “Surrender,” Mourdock said. “We have you surrounded.”

  The assassin chuckled. “Not for long,” he replied.

  Suddenly, a shuttlecraft descended into view of the glass wall behind the killer. Jack gazed wide eyed as the cockpit opened and the pilot stood up, brandishing an extremely large assault rifle.

  “EVERYONE RUN!” Jack screamed as he turned and began to put some distance between him and the maniac with the huge weapon.

  Mourdock was the only one to react in time. He dove to the floor as the pilot of the shuttle opened fire, the massive plasma rifle firing a spray of large bolts of death in rapid succession. The glass wall of Club Cristo shattered as the bolts tore through it, striking the Royal Guards who had gathered to come to Mourdock’s assistance.

  Jack leapt over the railing of the VIP balcony to the dance floor below just as plasma blasts started to streak by him. He hit the ground hard and tumbled over as those on the dancefloor were rushing around in a panic.

  Jack gripped his pistol and looked up. Mourdock’s still up there! he thought as he scrambled back to his feet. Partway up the stairs to the VIP area, he was able to get a view of the scene. He saw the pilot sit down in the cockpit of the shuttlecraft, its canopy closing once more. The assassin got to his feet, sneering at Mourdock. Mourdock stood back up, as well, manifesting his sword and standing ready to attack.

  Rather than fight, the assassin turned and leapt out the shattered wall of the club and onto the wing of the hovering shuttle. As soon as he was onboard, the shuttle began to pull away from the building.

  Wasting no time, Mourdock ran forward, dramatically jumping out of the opening. He soared through the air, stabbing his sword into the rear side engine of the shuttle as it began to speed away, dangling from it as the vehicle made its escape.

  You gotta be kidding me! thought Jack as he witnessed the amazing display of awesomeness Mourdock had just pulled off. Not only does the guy look like a freakin’ supermodel, he’s a total action hero to boot!

  Partly because he was jealous, and partly because he wanted to help, Jack made the decision to follow Mourdock and make sure the man didn’t get himself killed. Jack turned and ran to the exit of the club, shooting his plasma pistol in the air to clear the way as he pushed through the panicked crowd. “Excuse me! Pardon me! Coming through!” shouted Jack as he emerged from Club Cristo’s main entrance and frantically ran through the masses of onlookers outside who were still gawking at Mourdock’s spectacular exit. Jack finally made his way to the valet area in front of the club where he saw a convertible hovercar in line, it’s driver already out and watching the assassin’s ship fly away.

  Jack hopped into the car and strapped himself into the driver’s seat. I can fly a spaceship, he thought. How hard could a car be?

  Jack’s thoughts of rushing after Mourdock in a heroic and dramatic fashion were short-lived when he abruptly bumped the hovercars on either side of him as he awkwardly tried to pull out onto the street, all the while attempting to get used to how to shift the hovercar’s gears.

  “Hey!” cried the car’s owner. “What are you doing???”

  “Sorry!” yelled Jack as he floored the accelerator. “I’ll try and bring it back in one piece!”

  Jack peeled away, the hovercar swerving as Jack struggled to get used to the controls. He could hear the car’s owner yelling after him and felt really bad about stealing the guy’s ride, but he’d feel even worse if something happened to Mourdock and he could have prevented it.

  It didn’t take Jack long to get the hang of driving the car. He’d played racing video games in the past, so he was already somewhat familiar with what it took to drive a vehicle. He could feel adrenaline pumping through his veins as he sped through the streets with the wind in his hair, swerving to avoid the traffic.

  He looked up and saw the assassin’s shuttle in the air with Mourdock still hanging onto its side. It looked like he was involved in a fight with the assassin on its wing. Even as the shuttle banked and weaved, Mourdock seemed able to pull off all kinds of sweet combat mov
es as he fought his assailant.

  Show off, thought Jack, as he turned a corner and punched the accelerator, trying to keep up with the shuttle.

  By the time Jack had gotten another good bead on the ship, it appeared as though the assassin had gotten the best of Mourdock somehow. Jack saw that Mourdock had lost his footing and was hanging precariously off the shuttle’s wing, the assassin lording over him.

  Crap! Crap! Crap! thought Jack as he reached for his pistol. He tried to keep the car steady as he took aim at the bad guy. “Please don’t hit Mourdock!” he told the gun before he started firing.

  The pistol’s plasma blasts went wide until Jack corrected his aim. His shots didn’t come close to the assassin, but they got close enough to get his attention. Jack could see him back off from Mourdock, yelling to the shuttle’s pilot. Just then, Jack saw something drop from the undercarriage of the shuttle. It looked like a small barrel of some type, falling down toward the street right in front of him.

  Uh-oh, he thought. That can’t be good!

  Jack swerved to avoid the barrel just as it hit the ground, creating a massive explosion which violently rocked the car. Jack cried out as he momentarily lost control of the vehicle, which careened and swerved around the street. He could hear other cars screeching to a halt around him and honking as he narrowly missed crashing into them. Jack looked up and saw more barrels had been dropped from the back of the shuttle, just as it began to bank left past the roads and away from the edge of the stratum Jack was currently on.

  Jack barely had time to avoid the first barrel that impacted the street before him, his ears ringing from the loud BOOM. The force of the explosion briefly tilted the car up slightly to its left side. Sparks flew off the side of the car as it scraped along the barrier that lined the edge of the stratum.

  The second barrel hit in the distance, taking a chunk out of the stratum’s barrier, just before the third barrel hit, right beside Jack’s car. Jack cried out as he felt the flames from the explosion lick at him, and the car swerved right for the breach in the side of the stratum that had just been created. Before Jack had time to react, he felt the car shudder as it ran over the wall’s debris and soared through the hole and over the side.

  “OH, CRAAAAAAAAAAAAAPPPP!!!!” screamed Jack as he felt himself go weightless in his seat, his stomach feeling left far behind as the car soared through the air. The stratum below slowly began to rise up to meet him, and for the briefest of moments, Jack was paralyzed with fear.

  Then, something in his brain reminded him that he was in a hovercar. Jack looked at all the strange buttons on the dashboard and began pressing them frantically. “Fly! Fly! Fly! FLY!!!!” he yelled as he quickly searched for whatever it was that engaged the car’s hoverfoils. The radio stations changed. The windshield wipers wiped. The friendly voice of the GPS asked him for his destination. But he kept on falling, and the stratum below was coming up fast.

  Finally, Jack looked down at the gear shift at his side. He noticed that one of the options was a big “H” within a circle, which made it stand out. He grabbed the lever and shifted it to the “H.” Jack felt the car hum as its tires turned into hoverfoils, and a friendly female voice said, “Hover mode engaged.”

  The steering column suddenly extended from the dash, giving Jack control over pitch and yaw. Jack quickly pulled back on it. The hovercar was angled downward about to impact the ground when Jack pulled it out of its dive and accelerated into the air. He came so close to skimming the ground, he could have sworn he’d heard the tail end of the car scrape against it.

  “WOO-HOOOO!!!” cried Jack, celebrating still being alive.

  “Warning,” said the car’s friendly voice. “Entering restricted airspace. This is not an approved skylane.”

  Jack ignored the warning and kept climbing until he was high enough to see the assassin’s shuttle not far off. Hang on, Mourdock! I’m coming! thought Jack as he angled to intercept the shuttle, flying down straight toward it as fast as he could.

  As he got closer, Jack could see smoke billowing from the sword slash in the shuttle’s engine. Mourdock was back on the wing, fighting the assassin with his sword. His opponent seemed to be using some type of energy shield from his wristguard to fend off the blade, firing at Mourdock with a blaster, which Mourdock deflected with his weapon. It looked like the shuttle was losing altitude as the engine Mourdock had damaged struggled to stay operational.

  Come on, come on, come on! thought Jack as he gritted his teeth and accelerated the car as fast as it could fly.

  Jack was homing in on the shuttle just as the damaged engine blew, causing a brief fireball that caught Mourdock off-guard. The shuttle wobbled as its remaining engine kept it in the air, knocking both Mourdock and his assailant off-balance. The assassin wasted no time, though, and rammed into Mourdock with his shield, knocking him off the side of the wing.

  “NO!” Jack cried.

  Jack quickly pitched the hovercar into a wide corkscrew that had him accelerating around the shuttle and leveling out underneath it, right in time for Mourdock to land on its hood. The hovercar dipped down from the impact, and Jack struggled to keep it level. Mourdock looked up, surprised, but smiled once he saw Jack behind the wheel.

  “Nice timing, Earthman!” he exclaimed.

  “I couldn’t let you have all the fun!” Jack yelled back.

  “Follow that shuttle!” Mourdock said. “Don’t let it get away!”

  Jack leaned to the side and looked past Mourdock, to see the shuttle had suddenly turned and was headed right at them, the assassin on the wing now securely hooked to the vehicle and sporting a very big plasma rifle.

  “CRAP!” Jack shrieked as he banked to the side just as the assassin opened fire.

  Mourdock gripped the hood as he struggled to keep from sliding off, the assassin’s plasma blasts hitting the side of Jack’s hovercar as it sped by. “I don’t think they have any intention of letting us get away!” Jack yelled as he tried to level out the hovercar.

  Jack could see Mourdock gaze behind him. Jack checked the rear display on the car’s dashboard viewscreen and saw the shuttle coming around to pursue them. Mourdock climbed over the windshield and into the passenger’s seat.

  “Turn the car around,” he ordered. “Get me close to them.”

  “Close?” squealed Jack. “What are you going to do?”

  “I’m going to bring that ship down,” Mourdock said.

  “And just how are you going to do that?”

  “Turn around, and you’ll see,” Mourdock replied. Jack grimaced. His instinct was to get away while the getting was good. Mourdock looked at him and smiled. “C’mon, Hero,” Mourdock said. “Trust me.”

  Jack sighed. Despite his better judgment, he pulled the hovercar around and began heading directly toward the assassin’s shuttle.

  “Slow down,” Mourdock ordered.

  Jack decelerated slightly as the shuttle in front of them continued to close the distance, the assassin on the wing aiming his rifle once more.

  “Accelerate as soon as I jump,” said Mourdock as he crouched on his seat, manifesting a new sword in his hand. “Be sure to catch me.”

  “As soon as you what?” asked Jack.

  Without replying, Mourdock leapt over the windshield and ran down the hood of the car before catapulting himself high into the air – higher than Jack would have ever believed possible – heading right toward the oncoming shuttle.

  Are you freakin’ kidding me??? thought Jack as he punched the acceleration, pitching the hovercar downward to avoid crashing into the speeding aircraft.

  Jack glanced upwards seeing Mourdock spin in the air. Plasma blasts were flying all around him from the assassin’s rifle, barely missing him. Mourdock reversed himself as the shuttle flew by, slicing at its wing, which his sword cut into like a hot knife through butter.

  The wing separated from the shuttle, fluttering off into the air as the shuttle careened, the smoke from its damaged engine billowing behind
it. The assassin strapped to its side abruptly dropped his weapon and hung on for dear life.

  Mourdock continued his forward momentum as Jack aimed to bring the hovercar right in front of his trajectory. Mourdock landed in the back of the hovercar, sending the vehicle dipping down with a jolt.

  Holy crap that was awesome! thought Jack, amazed at what he’d just seen.

  “Not bad, eh?” said Mourdock with a smile as he climbed into the passenger’s seat.

  “Yeah, y’know… it was alright I guess,” muttered Jack.

  Jack turned the hovercar to follow the damaged shuttle. It was falling fast. He and Mourdock watched as it crashed through the barrier of the nearby stratum. Jack saw the assassin on the side of the shuttle leap from it, falling to the ground right before the shuttle impacted. The vehicle ripped apart as it skidded across the street before exploding.

  “Take us in,” ordered Mourdock.

  “Dude, shouldn’t we let the police—”

  “No,” said Mourdock sternly. “If that assassin is still alive, he won’t be by the time the Peacekeepers arrive. And I intend to find out who sent him.”

  Jack nodded. He angled the hovercar to the crash site, bringing it down not far from where the shuttle had breached the stratum barrier. As soon as they had landed, Mourdock hopped out. Jack followed behind him.

  The assassin was close to the opening in the barrier, face down, his legs broken. He was trying to crawl using nothing but his arms, pained grunts coming from him.

  Mourdock manifested his sword again, the white-hot blue blade shimmering. The look on Mourdock’s face was all business, so much so it made Jack kind of nervous. Jack glanced at the man as they approached, the worm sticking out of the back of his neck hissing and snapping at Jack as he got closer.

  Mourdock stood over the assassin and rolled the man over with his foot, leveling the tip of his sword at the man’s throat. The assassin gazed up at him with a pained but contemptuous expression.