by Jake Elwood
Star
Raider
SEASON 2
THE COMPLETE SERIAL
JAKE ELWOOD
This is a work of fiction. A serial. Totally made up. Any similarity to actual persons, places, orbiting cities or kidnapping plots is purely coincidental.
Copyright © 2015 Jake Elwood
All rights reserved.
Episode 1 – Night Battle on Zemoth
Chapter 1
There was something inappropriate – something downright wrong – about using a school trip to plan a robbery, but the opportunity was just too good to pass up.
Lark Carmody strolled through the Grand Hall of the Kingstown Opera House on Zemoth, surrounded by a crowd of her fellow ten-year-olds. The class was on a week-long field trip to the capital city, trudging through a selection of natural and man-made wonders while a lot of pompous and solemn adults did their best to bore the children into comas.
Just now the class was viewing the Orb of the Stars, an artifact almost five hundred years old, seldom taken out of its vault. Interesting in an abstract sort of way, Lark admitted to herself, but the actual orb was a featureless marble just smaller than her head. She'd seen it in holos. She didn't need to gawp at it in real life.
But a rare chance to see a priceless artifact was also a rare chance to figure out how to nick it. She did her best to keep a bored expression on her face as she scanned the cathedral-like expanse of the opera house, trying to figure out how the marble could be spirited away.
Miss Grimsby was droning on about the Landing and the first settlers, how they'd left their pampered lives on Skyland to carve a colony out of a harsh wilderness planetside. She made it sound like an act of generosity aimed at them personally, the descendants of the settlers half a millennium later.
But Lark wasn't born on Zemoth. They weren't her ancestors. And she was pretty sure the settlers had moved groundside because they wanted to live outside, not as some noble sacrifice for their great-to-the-umpteenth-grandchildren. She could, she decided, steal the symbol of those ancient hopes and dreams with a mostly-clear conscience.
The heist wouldn't be easy. There were scanners at the doors, and cameras everywhere, and inert security robots lining the walls. The orb sat on a pedestal at the front of the stage, in view from every part of the room. Grabbing it would be tough, and escape would be nearly impossible.
Well, she was long overdue for a real challenge. Lark smothered a grin and reminded herself to look bored.
An inkling of a plan bubbled away in the back of her mind, but she faced too many unknowns. Collecting more data was the first order of business. She needed detailed scans of the huge room. Of every part of the opera house, if possible. Scans taken over time, so she could see the pattern of movement of people and machines.
With that in mind, she opened her fingers and let her cup of blueberry ice fizz topple to the floor. She let out a squawk of dismay as the drink splattered across the carpet, and endured a dirty look from Elly Doctorson as sugary blue ice splashed the girl's shoes.
"Oh, for pity's sake, Lark!" Miss Grimsby bustled over, as if there was anything useful she could do, and stood over Lark with her hands waving in agitation.
"Oops." Lark gave her a contrite look, clasped her hands in front of her, and slipped a small camera from the pocket of her skirt. It was a sophisticated little device, available from a number of network stores, and it had cost her less than a month's allowance. She'd spent several hours tinkering with the programming, and she'd added a peel-and-stick adhesive patch. When she heard the hum of electric wheels approaching, she pulled away the paper covering with her thumbnail. A little cleaning robot worked its way through the crowd, and Miss Grimsby lowered her twitching hands, relieved to finally have something to do. "Children! Make way. Let the cleaning machine through."
As the robot started vacuuming up the ice fizz, Lark said, "What a pretty robot," and reached down to give it a friendly pat. There was nothing pretty about the little machine, and she hated to touch it, but the camera was now stuck in place. It seemed glaringly obvious to Lark, a black lump the size of the end of her thumb on the shiny green top of the robot, but no one else gave it a second glance. She straightened up, her heart beating rapidly, and endured a brief lecture from Miss Grimsby about touching things. It was Lark's first concrete action toward committing a crime, and she was startled by how frightening it was.
The class moved away from the spilled drink, Miss Grimsby gesturing at murals on the walls that showed the establishment of the first groundside settlement. It took steely self-control to keep Lark from looking back at the robot. Her nerves were stretched so tight she wanted to scream. She didn't know how Cassie had ever made a career out of larceny.
"This is awesome," whispered Millie Vanderstars. "I've seen pictures of the orb all my life, and now we actually get to see it up close." She looked genuinely excited, too. "We get to see it before the princess does."
She wasn't a real princess – not technically – but Kaia Highstar's visit to the surface of Zemoth was the reason the orb was out of the vault.
"Lark would like the princess," Elly Doctorson sneered. "She thinks she's a princess, too." Groundside settlers tended to think the Skylanders who orbited above them were a lot of pampered, elitist snobs. Lark wasn't from Skyland, but she was from off-world, and that made her an object of suspicion.
"What do you think she's like?" Millie said, ignoring Elly's interruption.
"She's just a girl," Lark said. "So her father's the president of Skyland. So what? It doesn't change her." Lark's own father had been a man of considerable wealth and power, a fact she was careful never to mention to her classmates. She would have much preferred to be born poor.
"We're coming up to the orb now," Miss Grimsby said. "I expect you all to behave like proper young ladies and gentlemen."
Why in space would you expect that? Smirking at her own wit, Lark shuffled along behind Millie, climbing a staircase to the stage and passing within a couple of meters of the pedestal.
The orb was the color of dirty milk, a featureless and completely uninteresting sphere of calcified plant matter. It was really old, and it was the most interesting thing the first explorers had found on the surface of a lifeless world. It hardly seemed to deserve all the mystique that had accrued to it over the centuries. Lark gave it a quick glance, then turned her attention to trying to figure out how big the force field was that had to be protecting it. The generator would be in the pedestal. How could the power be cut?
The rest of the day passed in a blur of art galleries and government buildings, displays and speeches. At last they returned to the university dormitories where the visiting students were staying. Lark endured a final warning from Miss Grimsby about being out after hours, then retreated to the room she shared with Millie. The other girl pulled a VR helmet over her head and promptly forgot that Lark existed.
Lark opened her PAD and downloaded a burst of data from her spy camera. She was watching the ceiling of a storage room, waiting for something interesting to happen, when a chime alerted her to an incoming call. She tapped an icon and the head and shoulders of a blond man with a rugged jaw and a cleft chin appeared above the machine.
"Jerry!"
He smiled. "Hey, kid. How are you enjoying your field trip?"
"Oh, it's good. We met a government minister today. He was really boring, but you should have seen his office!"
They chatted for a few minutes. Jerry had been off-planet, collecting a bounty. "I let her go," he admitted, looking rueful. "I know I shouldn't. But they were going to lock her up for not paying her debts. How's she supposed to earn any money in prison? When I found her she was about to leave on a deep-space surveying mission. I al
most took her in just to keep her from going. Those missions are dangerous." He shook his head. "They pay really well, though. Well, the hourly pay isn't great, but you work really long hours and there's nowhere to spend your money. So she'll come back with enough money to get herself out of the hole."
"You did the right thing," Lark assured him.
"I hope so. I hate being a sucker."
He hated it because it happened a lot, she knew. Despite a career that took him among the dregs of humanity, he insisted on seeing the best in everyone. When the target had committed a serious crime he was relentless and merciless, but debt dodgers stood an excellent chance of wheedling their way out of his clutches.
"You gave her a second chance," she said, "just like you did with Cassie and me."
His face brightened. "True. That worked out well."
That was an understatement if ever she'd heard one.
"Now it's your turn." He gave her a stern look. "What's on your mind?"
She gaped at him, startled. "Nothing?"
"Don't give me that. You're preoccupied, and you want to tell me, but you think you shouldn't."
She glared at him, annoyed. She was working on being inscrutable. It seemed like a good trait for a thief to have. Jerry, however, was vexingly perceptive.
"If it's none of my business, that's fine. Just say so. Otherwise, spill the beans."
She glanced over at Millie, who was still oblivious, then at Jerry's holographic face. She knew that telling him was a bad idea, but somehow the words just came pouring out. It was all jumbled together, her rudimentary plan, the simple steps she'd already taken, her dream of following in Cassie's footsteps, her fear that Cassie would be furious if she found out.
When she was done Jerry just stared at her, looking as if he'd been punched in the stomach. Finally he said, "I think Cassie's a bad influence on you."
A wave of fury washed over her, and she opened her mouth, trying to find words scalding enough. The angle of his face changed, and she realized he was instinctively leaning back.
"Whoa, hold on. I know how much you owe her. I owe her too. And I know she takes really good care of you. And if she knew what you were planning, she'd probably fly out here and then kick your butt all the way home."
Lark felt her indignation draining away. It helped that Jerry was the kind of guy you just couldn't stay mad at. "Probably," she said. "You won't tell her, will you?"
"Of course not!" The offended look that flashed across his face warmed her. He didn't see her as some little kid whose feelings didn't matter. He took her seriously, in a way that few adults did.
"It could actually work," she said. "I was just looking at the video I got from the spy cam. Look at this." She tapped the PAD and sent him a copy of the file.
"Look, I don't want you trying to steal anything, okay?"
It was hardly an unexpected reaction, but she still felt herself deflate. "Okay."
Jerry looked as if he was hiding a smile, but then his face went serious. "There's a price you pay when you walk in the shadows. And I don't mean prison, either. Even if you don't get caught, you pay. You have to be frightened all the time, but that's not the worst part. You have to lie to your friends. Pretty soon you don't have any. Not the kind that are worth having, anyway."
Lark gulped and nodded.
"It was creative," he said. "You showed some impressive problem-solving abilities. You might have a future in, I don't know, maybe security consulting. Theft prevention. Something legitimate." His expression hardened. "Something honest. Understand?"
She thought of the almost sickening fear she'd felt just sticking the camera onto the cleaning robot and nodded. "I understand, Jerry."
"Good." His features relaxed back into their usual geniality. "You're the most interesting ten-year-old I know, Lark. I'm impressed with what you've come up with. And I'm glad you told me."
He was handling her, she could tell. He was saying what he thought he needed to say to get her cooperation. He was doing such a good job of it, though, that she found herself smiling at him. "Thanks, Jerry. I won't do anything I shouldn't."
"Good girl. I'll see you in a few days."
She broke the connection and started getting ready for bed. It was a relief to have shared her secret, to know she wasn't on a path to prison. Her shoulders felt lighter. There was a hint of disappointment mixed in with the relief, though.
Stealing the orb would have been pretty cool.
Chapter 2
Jerry O'Malley leaned back in the padded chair that filled one corner of his hotel room. Ironically, after travelling more than two dozen light years in a matter of hours, a paltry four thousand kilometers still separated him from home. Kingstown had the biggest spaceport on Zemoth, and there wasn't a flight available until the next day. The trip across the planet was going to take longer than a trip between the stars.
There was no point in trying to sleep. Home was on Severnaya Plateau, seven hours behind Kingstown. Sleeping now would just make the transition harder. He brought up the file Lark had sent, played it at high speed, and sat in bemused fascination watching the view from the robot as it raced back and forth across the floor of the opera house.
The spy camera was a neat trick, but it probably didn't mean much. Anyone could go into the opera house, after all. He opened a local information feed to verify it.
And whistled. The opera house was locked right down. It had been since the day before the orb was taken from its vault. Very few people were allowed inside. Schoolchildren from halfway across the planet were a rare exception. If he were actually planning a heist, Lark's file would be absolutely priceless.
Not that he would consider something so rash. Of course not. But he opened the note folder that was attached to the video. Just to satisfy his curiosity.
The opera house was almost a hundred years old, a historic building and a fixture of Kingstown society. As such, some surprisingly detailed schematics were publically available. He found floor plans, blueprints, and illustrations. And Lark's rudimentary scheme for getting her hands on the orb.
The opera house had nearly a thousand windows and an elaborate system of vents. The vents came in a bewildering variety of sizes and shapes, and they lined the edges of the roof on every side of the building. The roof itself was a jumble of peaks and domes and dormers and gables, with vented surfaces facing in every direction.
Every possible air current had been mapped out. The building's sensors constantly measured wind volumes and air temperatures, opening and closing vents to optimize air flow and keep the building at a comfortable temperature without making it stuffy. The whole system was a marvel, an invisible work of art constantly adjusting itself high above the performers and patrons.
There were no wild birds on Zemoth, and no flying insects. The vents were much too small to let a prowler through. There was no reason to protect them with screens or force fields. A person could stick an arm through and pelt the audience with eggs, if he was so inclined.
Lark's plan, Jerry saw, was to slide a flying cargo robot in through a vent and send it drifting down to the podium containing the orb. The emphasis of the building's security was on ground-level attacks, and keeping out human beings. A small flying robot could be inside and hovering above the orb without attracting the slightest attention.
Probably. There were a thousand unknowns that could spoil the plan, security features not mentioned in the blueprints, measures not visible to visiting schoolchildren, extra security brought in when the building was closed.
Jerry glanced at the high-speed video from the spy camera. That would tell him a lot about what went on in the building after hours. The plan could still fail in countless ways, but the amount of information available to him was remarkable.
There would be a force field, small but powerful, protecting the orb. That was a problem Lark hadn't yet solved, though she mentioned it in her notes. Jerry, though, had penetrated a few security systems in his time, in the pursuit of high-va
lue bounties. With a standard delivery robot and a few semi-legal components he thought he could take care of the force field.
He returned his attention to the blueprints. There would be sensors on the roof. Otherwise it would be too easy for thieves to cut their way through from above. There were rooftops on either side, though, with direct line of sight on the most promising vents. A man with steady nerves could run the entire theft from next door.
The window to his room showed nothing but darkness outside. Zemoth had no moon, and the street lights were all close to ground level. The top of the opera house, and the buildings around it, would be completely dark.
He would need night-vision gear for the job, then.
Jerry blamed insomnia for what happened next. He stared at the ceiling of his hotel room until he couldn't stand it anymore, and then he got up and rummaged through his travel kit. He didn't have a flying delivery robot, or the explosives he would need to disable a force field. He did, however, have a spyder. The tiny remote-controlled machine was often useful for checking defences before he burst in to capture a fugitive.
He put on an antigrav harness, covered it with a jacket, and tucked the spyder into his pocket. He left his gun behind. There would be no one to shoot, and if he had to face security guards or police he wanted to look as innocent and harmless as possible.
Even though he wasn't planning to steal anything – not really, and certainly not that night – he felt a pleasant tingle of excitement as he walked through the heart of the little city. There was a time when bounty hunting had given him the same thrill, but it had long since become routine. If Cassie felt like this on every job, he was beginning to understand the allure of larceny.
Of course, she was going straight these days. If a whisper of this got back to her, he'd be lucky if all she did was bend a frying pan over his head. If she thought he was encouraging Lark he'd have to flee the planet.
In a shadowy alley a block over from the opera house he powered up the harness and let himself float up to rooftop level. He gained the roof of a shopping complex four stories above the street and walked through a forest of vents and chimneys, a layer of insulating sand crunching gently under his feet.
