Children of the Void (Rogue Star Book 2)

by James Wisher

  She went out the busted window and half fell half climbed down a pile of rubble. She ran toward an open construction site a short distance across the street. It occupied a full block and according to a partially defaced sign would soon be home to a twelve story apartment building. She needed to find a place to hide where she could spot anyone approaching and have several options to run. Near the eastern edge of the site a massive crane held a steel beam suspended fifty feet above the ground. It appeared the construction crew took off in the middle of the day, probably due to an evacuation order. Iaka climbed into the cab of the crane and scrunched down out of sight. She retrieved her comm and sent a message to the star. Solomon could track her signal and tell Marcus where to find her.

  ***

  “Marcus, I found her.” Solomon delivered the good news a second before Marcus planned to run the security barricade.

  He sighed. “Where?”

  “A construction site ten blocks east of your position. I can’t get any more exact.”

  “Did you get a visual on her?”

  “No, no cameras in the area. The whole place is a slum. It looks like they’re tearing it all down and starting fresh. The guy in the mask is headed that way. He’s four blocks south and blasting his way through the local law enforcement community. I can’t figure out why they don’t get out of his way.”

  “Their job is to stop him. They can’t just stand aside.” Marcus revved the engine on his bike. He needed to find Iaka and get the hell out off this planet.

  “There’s something weird in the camera system, like a virus lurking in the background. The code is unlike anything I’ve seen.”

  “What’s it doing?”

  “That’s the thing, I can’t tell. It’s driving me nuts.” Solomon’s frustration came through loud and clear.

  “Is it a threat?” The location data finished downloading to the bike’s nav system.

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Then leave it alone. We need to focus on the mission. Watch the cameras nearest Iaka’s location and let me know if that masked guy or anyone else enters the area.”

  “Roger, good luck.” A click signaled the end of the conversation.

  Marcus put Solomon out of his mind and studied the map on his screen. According to their information he had to run one checkpoint then he’d have a clear path to the construction site. He spun the bike around until it pointed east and hit the jets.

  Short minutes later the checkpoint loomed ahead of him. He had an idea how to handle it. Marcus goosed the throttle until the bike hit maximum speed. The security guards raised their hands and waved at him to stop. Marcus ignored them and twenty feet out he fed power to the antigravity generators. The bike leapt over the barricade with feet to spare. Before the guards turned around he’d roared out of sight.

  Marcus slowed when he got close to the coordinates Solomon provided. He hadn’t exaggerated about it being a slum. Graffiti covered, half torn down buildings dominated the neighborhood. Piles of rubble awaiting removal provided convenient hiding places. Marcus kept his head on a swivel, expecting to get jumped at any moment.

  Marcus parked his bike outside the construction zone and activated every defense mechanism built into the thing. If anyone tried to steal it they’d get a nasty surprise. He powered up the weapons module on his gauntlet and started into the only open space in the whole neighborhood. Marcus jumped at every little sound. It felt like a trap.

  “Marcus?” He about jumped out of his skin when Solomon spoke through his comm.

  “What?”

  “I hacked a spy satellite. I can see you now. That weird code is this system too. I checked the recorded data. Iaka’s in the cab of the crane to your three o’clock.”

  A massive four story tall crane towered over the clearing. Five steps led up to the cab, it made a good place to hide. She’d be able to see anything coming from a ways away. Of course if she saw him why didn’t she come out? Marcus jogged toward the crane, eager to get Iaka and get off this rock.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  They landed late in the afternoon at a small private airport outside Nashville. Oliver had set up a bolt hole in the basement of an arcade years ago. He owned the building through a shell corporation that leased it to the arcade company. He and Celine waited on the jet while Max rented a vehicle for them. With the alert out neither he nor his granddaughter dared show their face in public any more than necessary.

  Fifteen minutes later they roared away from the airport in a plain, brown four door hovercar sporting tinted windows that would keep the curious from seeing inside. The arcade sat in the middle of the entertainment district, between a restaurant and bike track half an hour west of the airfield. Max drove around to the back of the building. The employee entrance had a keypad to restrict access, but Oliver knew the master code and typed it in. The door popped open and Max went through first with one of the guards. Max gave the all clear signal and Oliver joined them inside.

  They walked down a short hall the ended in a T. Max looked back and Oliver pointed to the right. A couple steps brought them to the manager’s office. Max and the first guard rushed through the door.

  “All clear.” Max said.

  Oliver entered the office and found the soft, middle-aged manager sitting, wide eyed, behind a cluttered desk. Oliver smiled. “You must forgive my bodyguards zeal. I require access to the basement.”

  “Just who the hell are you?” The manager had regained his self-control and with it the presence of mind to ask questions Oliver wasn’t at all interested in answering.

  “I’m the owner of this building. A portion of the basement was set aside for secure storage behind a door you lack the code to access. It’s all in your contract.”

  “I remember the lawyer mentioning that, but I’d forgotten. Nobody’s gone in that room in the twelve years I’ve been running this place.”

  “Good.” Oliver’s patience was wearing thin. “Everything should be as I left it. We’re going down, please keep any staff out of the basement until we leave.”

  Oliver left the manager in his office and guided the team to the steps leading to the basement. At the bottom he typed in the master code and the door swung open. Inside the basement they found a clutter of boxes, a busted, half disassembled, bumper car, and piles of miscellaneous junk. The variety of trash people hung on to astonished Oliver. None of the rubbish scattered around the space appeared to have discernible value save perhaps for scrap metal.

  Oliver picked his way over to a dust covered keypad beside a heavy steel door on the far wall. Once again the master code gained them entrance. Max pulled the door open and held it while the rest of them entered. A layer of dust covered hard plastic containers stacked to the ceiling on the right hand wall. Folded up cots leaned in another corner. Up against the wall opposite the containers rested a desk with a secure comm unit.

  Oliver turned to Max. “Get the crates open, take whatever you think we’ll need, and get the car loaded.”

  Max and the guards set to work while Oliver sat in front of the comm. He motioned Celine over to join him. “We need to contact Arnold and have him get a team together to deal with Voidwalker.”

  “Do you think he’ll believe you’re you and not an assassin?”

  Celine rested a hand on his shoulder and a thrill ran through him. Oliver crushed his body’s automatic reaction with brutal control. He would not allow crude physical responses to control him. “I’ll contract him on our secure, private line. He and I are the only ones with the access code.”

  Oliver powered up the comm unit and typed in a ten digit code that would connect him to the office of the assistant director of extra-planetary affairs. It didn’t take long for Arnold’s jowly, puffy eyed face to appear on the monitor. His number two man looked rough.

  “Arnold, we have matters to discuss.”

  Arnold’s scowl deepened the lines of his face. “The director warned me you might call on the secure line. I don’t know who you are
or how you found the access code, but a team will arrive shortly to take you into custody. Please resist as your corpse will require a great deal less paperwork.”

  The line went dead. Oliver leaned back and closed his eyes. Voidwalker knew everything, all his secrets, all his agents, everything. How? His eyes popped open. “He didn’t just transfer my memories. He copied them.”

  “What?” Celine asked.

  “Voidwalker, when he transferred my consciousness to this new body he copied my memories. That’s the only way that reanimated husk could pretend to be me. I never even considered the possibility.”

  Oliver bounced to his feet. If the masked lunatic thought he could get the best of Oliver MacDonald he made a tragic miscalculation. He’d see Voidwalker brought down if it was the last thing he did.

  ***

  “Are you certain you’re okay, Oliver?” Earth Force President Pierre Surinyac walked beside the wizened shell of Director MacDonald through the halls of Earth Force Star Command in Washington D.C. The president had rushed to Washington from the Earth Force’s civilian headquarters in Brussels the moment he learned of the attempt on Oliver’s life.

  Voidwalker watched the interaction through his puppet’s eyes. It always amazed him how natural the cybernetic automaton acted. If you didn’t know you spoke to an animated corpse, maintained through the use of advanced technology you’d never have a clue.

  “Never fear, Pierre, My people handled the matter with their usual skill. Will you be returning to Europe or staying until the midyear review?”

  “I believe I’ll stay, it’s only one week after all.” The president looked at Oliver for reassurance that he’d made the correct decision.

  Voidwalker shook his head, this human was even more pathetic than MacDonald. Still, he had a part to play and it would be necessary to replace him for a short while.

  “That’s fine, Pierre. I look forward to talking with you again.” Oliver held out a wrinkled hand. On the middle finger he wore a special ring with a fine needle built into it. Pierre took his hand and gave it a gentle shake, as though afraid to hurt the ancient human. If he’d known the alterations Voidwalker had made he’d have no fear of damaging the hand he grasped.

  The president gave no sign that he noticed the needle puncturing his skin. He released the puppet’s hand and left him hovering in the empty hall.

  Voidwalker had seen enough. He cut the connection and his view-screen went blank. The puppet Oliver knew its tasks and would carry them out with computerized precision. Voidwalker had his own work to do. A courier would arrive tonight with the DNA sample and he needed to have a protoform ready to accept it.

  He left his small, private workroom and entered the main lab. A dozen humans floated in cylinders, each in a different stage of transformation. The prototype had worked out well and he’d sent the transformed prisoner out into the field for testing. Dorn floated beside an empty cylinder. His assistant worked at the control panel, altering the controls from healing to cloning.

  “How are we doing?”

  Dorn typed in a final command and thick fluid rushed into the cylinder. “Finished, my lord. The quick clone protoform will be ready in ten hours.”

  ***

  Oliver held his head in his hands. The jet hovered forty-thousand feet above Nashville in stealth mode. The pilot needed a destination, but Oliver had no idea where to send him. He’d been in a daze ever since learning the old him had contacted Arnold over the secret channel. They’d fled the arcade with all the equipment that would fit in the car and rushed back to his jet.

  “We can’t hang here forever, Grandfather, they’ll spot us.”

  Oliver looked up into his granddaughter’s eyes and the answer came to him. “You chose, Celine. Somewhere I know nothing about.”

  Celine frowned. “There is one place. I bought an apartment building outside Chicago to keep as an investment. It’s under renovation, but a few rooms should be done.”

  “Perfect, tell the pilot.”

  They reached the apartment building two hours later and just as Celine said found two suites complete. Utterly exhausted and unwilling to think further about the mess they were in Oliver went straight to bed. Maybe he’d dream up a solution to their problems.

  Oliver woke to a dark room and a splitting headache. No brilliant idea had come to him in his sleep. There was no where on Earth he could go that Voidwalker wouldn’t find him. That stopped him cold. No where on Earth, but he didn’t have to stay on Earth. If he reached the colonies, word may not have spread there yet. He hated to cede Earth to the Void, but he saw no way around it. Fortunately he had one more asset in the wind he could call on.

  Now that he had a plan Oliver felt energized in a way he hadn’t since he saw his old body speaking on TV. He hopped out of bed, walked to the curtains, and threw them open. Hints of orange colored the horizon. He’d slept the whole night away. He threw on his wrinkled cloths and went out into the living room. Max’s eyes popped open the moment Oliver stepped into the room. He started to get out of the recliner where he’d been sleeping, but Oliver waved him back down. He needed Celine to make a call before they moved out.

  Oliver tapped on the door to the second bedroom and a minute later a bleary eyed, sleep rumpled Celine opened it. “Grandfather? What time is it?”

  “Time to get up. We’ve got work to do.”

  Celine scrubbed her hand across her face and smiled. “You sound better today.”

  “I feel better. I’m sorry about yesterday. I lost my way for a little while, but I’ve got a plan now. The first part requires you to make a call.”

  Celine nodded. “Let me get ready. No one would recognize me like this.”

  The bedroom door closed. Oliver suspected he had at least fifteen minutes. He needed to get the secure hypernet link set up. They’d have to bounce it around the civilian system since he assumed Voidwalker would have the Earth Force network monitored. “Up and at em, Max. We’ve got work to do.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Between the two of them he and Max got the connection up and running in ten minutes. He’d only managed six reroutes, but that should do as long as they kept the call short. A couple minutes after that Celine emerged from her bedroom, looking as beautiful and poised as he’d ever seen her.

  “Who am I calling?” Celine asked.

  “Adam Wright.”

  “Adam? You’d trust our lives to that screw up?”

  Oliver smiled. Celine never liked Adam. “We’re short on options. The reason I didn’t have him hunted down after the Alpha incident was in case I needed a desperate man for a dangerous mission. I think this qualifies. He also has a ship and crew that I assume haven’t stayed in contact with Earth Force.”

  “I see your point. What do you want me to tell him?”

  “He needs to come to Earth and pick us up ASAP. Make sure he understands it’s under the radar and not to contact headquarters.”

  “Where should I tell him to pick us up?”

  Oliver looked over at his driver. “Max, where’s the nearest private landing strip big enough to handle a space shuttle?”

  After a quick search of the net Max said, “Collins Field, three hundred miles west.”

  Celine nodded and sat down in front of the comm station. She activated the connection. A minute passed, then another. Oliver clenched his teeth. What was taking so long? Adam should have answered the instant he received a call with that priority code.

  After a full five minutes Adam’s face appeared on the screen. He looked like hell, his cheekbones jutted out above sunken cheeks and dark smudges under his eyes spoke of a lack of sleep. He blinked, obviously expecting Oliver and not Celine.

  “Ma’am? I never expected to get a call with this code again.”

  “Adam, things have taken a turn for the worse on Earth and we require immediate pick up. How soon can you get here?”

  A deep scowl creased Adam’s exhausted face. “I assumed after the Alpha incident I wasn’t welc
ome in Earth space.”

  “Why? No kill order went out. We didn’t rescind your authority over the ship. Grandfather kept you at a distance in case his most recent plan went sideways. You’re the wildcard Adam. I thought you’d appreciate that.”

  Adam’s expression softened and Oliver knew Celine had him. She had a gift for saying exactly what people wanted to hear. She was a genius manipulator. Almost has good as him.

  “I’m not even in the system now. It’ll take a day for me to make the trip. Where do you want to meet?”

  “Collins Field, it should be in your computer. Send a burst transmission when you arrive in orbit. We’ll be waiting.”

  “Understood. I guess things went sideways.”

  “You have no idea.” Celine severed the connection.

  The conversation hadn’t taken long. Oliver had to hope no one noticed it or had time to get a trace. He hated relying on hope. It was only a shade more reliable than luck. “Let’s get out of here. We’ll camp out near the field.”

  ***

  “I guess someone was listening after all.” Oliver and Max lay at the top of a hill overlooking Collins Field. Four masked Void assassins stood beside a sleek, black shuttle.

  “We can take them, sir.” Max accepted the binoculars back from Oliver. “We’ve got plenty of firepower now.”

  Oliver patted Max on the shoulder and motioned back toward their car. When they crawled back out of sight Oliver stood up. “Glad to hear it, but we need to wait for Adam’s signal. If we take them out now we’ll end up fighting reinforcements.”

  “When do you expect him to make contact?”

  Oliver shook his head. “Any time now. Your guess is as good as mine.”

  They rejoined Celine and the three remaining guards by the car. Oliver related the situation.

  “So we just wait?” Celine asked.