by Smith, Glenn
When the tram pulled into his Manhattan stop a few minutes later, Min’para made sure he was the first one to the door. Once it came to rest at the passenger platform and the door opened, he made his way quickly to the escalator and down to the busy street below. Then he stepped aside, just as he’d done at J.F.K., and waited for the other passengers who’d gotten off behind him to walk by and go on about their business. That way he could be sure that none of them were following him. He might still have been acting paranoid, he readily admitted to himself, but as the Terrans liked to say, it was better to be safe than to be sorry.
Now he needed to ask someone for directions.
As though on cue, a rather scruffy looking child with fairly long and wind-blown sandy-blonde hair stepped out of a store to the professor’s left and slammed the door closed behind him. Probably in his very early teens, or perhaps her very early teens—Min’para couldn’t decide whether the youth was a boy or a girl—he or she was dressed in faded and tattered denim jeans and a multicolor striped tee shirt that looked at least two sizes too large for him/her. Thus Min’para’s quandary.
“Excuse me, young...one,” he said, noticing the odd looking pair of hard-shelled boots the child was wearing. The child stopped and looked up at him. His/her lips were stained bright red, no doubt from something he/she had just had to eat or drink. “Can you tell me how to get to the Federation Building from here?”
“The Federation Building?” the child asked, squinting against the sun. The voice was that of a boy. At least, it sounded more like a boy’s than a girl’s. A boy then, Min’para decided.
“Yes, that’s right. The Federation Building.”
“I’m really sorry, sir. I’m afraid I don’t know,” the boy answered politely. But then his entire demeanor suddenly changed and he shouted in a loud and ear-piercing voice, “Try running for political office, asshole!” He laughed as obnoxiously as he possibly could have, then kicked his heels together, floated a few inches up off the sidewalk, and raced away, apparently skating atop a cushion of air.
Min’para sighed and shook his head. “I should have expected that from the youth of this city,” he reminded himself as he watched the young...boy...disappear around the corner. “Why did I even bother to ask? I’ll do better trying to find it myself.” He looked to his left and then to his right, up the street and down the street, then picked a direction at random and started walking. A few minutes later he crossed paths with a local police officer who sent him off in the right direction. He hoped.
About half an hour after that his cautious faith in the officers of the New York City Police Department proved warranted when he found himself closing to within two blocks of his destination—the site of the original United Nations Headquarters, now New York City’s Vincent Giovanni Federation Building. But as he drew closer to it, that uneasy feeling that someone was watching him suddenly struck him again. But who, and from where? This was New York City, after all. There were a lot of people around.
He kept walking but looked around as discreetly as he could, being careful to maintain his same casual pace. People walked in every direction all around him, but no one was following very closely behind him that he could tell. In fact, the closest person to him was actually...
The woman who’d been walking ahead of him for the last three blocks—the woman on whom he’d slowly but steadily been gaining ground until he could almost reach out and touch her—suddenly whirled around and pounced on him and jabbed a syringe into his chest, but he managed to grab her wrist and bend her arm back at the elbow, withdrawing the needle before she could depress the plunger and inject the contents. He twisted her wrist until she dropped it and then forced her arm up behind her head as he stepped forward, between her legs, and threw his body into hers, pinning her against the front fender of a parked car. Then, as she continued to struggle, he got his first good look at her face and recognized her as the young woman he’d seen welcoming her ‘daddy’ home at the aerospaceport. Gods! She hadn’t changed her clothes or tried to alter her appearance in any way! Why hadn’t he recognized her earlier?
She was obviously much younger than he was, and given his advanced age chances were she was physically stronger as well. But the advantages of weight and leverage were clearly his, so now that he’d pinned her she had no chance of escape. So he took a moment while she continued to struggle and glanced into her mind, and saw exactly what he expected to see. She wasn’t alone! She had backup nearby, and they had orders to stop him at any cost!
Regret flashed briefly through her mind as she realized she’d blown her chance to take him down quickly. And then a word... No. Not a word, but rather an idea took form. An instant passed and a firm decision followed.
She grabbed hold of the front of her own blouse with her free hand and tore it open, then screamed at the top of her lungs, “HEEEEELP! RAAAAAPE!”
“Hey you!” someone hollered in response to her cries, much too quickly for it to have been a mere coincidence. “Stop! Let her go!”
Min’para looked up. Two men in business suits—the same two men, the only two men he’d seen since leaving J.F.K. who’d actually been wearing their coats—were running toward him from down the other side of the street.
“Leave her alone!” one of them yelled. No surprise, it was her ‘daddy.’
That second of distraction almost proved to be all the reprieve the young woman needed. She raised a leg and planted her foot firmly against Min’para’s chest, but before she could even try to push him away he let go of her wrist and knocked her foot aside with his elbow, then swung his arm down and around her leg and lifted, dropping her the rest of the way onto the hood of the car.
“Let her go!” one of the men shouted again.
Min’para grabbed up her other leg, pushed her away, and slid her off the car’s front end, dropping her shoulders-first to the pavement. Then he grabbed the syringe and took off running toward the Federation Building’s front doors.
“Stop! Police!”
He reached the building in less than half a minute and pushed his way through both sets of smoked-transluminum double doors faster than they could open for him on their own, then stopped suddenly near the center of the lobby when he spotted a pair of uniformed security officers approaching him with their hands on their sidearms.
“Hold it right there, sir!” one of the guards yelled as he drew his sidearm and aimed it at him. The second guard drew his and took aim as well, and two United States Marines in dress blues—a sergeant and a corporal if he wasn’t mistaken—stood by not far behind, no doubt ready to assist should he give them a reason.
“What’s that in your hand?” the first guard demanded. Still gasping for air, Min’para held the syringe out for him to see. “Drop it on the floor, now!”
Min’para complied.
“Who are you,” the second guard asked, “and where the hell do you think you’re goin’ in such a hurry?”
Min’para bent forward and rested his hands on his knees, huffing and puffing, still barely able to breathe. “My...My name is...” he began between labored breaths, “...is not important. I’ve got... I’ve got to see...Chairman MacLeod of...of the Earth Se...the Earth Security Council.”
“You got an appointment with him?” the first guard asked.
“No, sir,” Min’para answered, shaking his head. “No I don’t. But it’s...vitally important that...that I see him.”
“I’m sure it is, sir, at least for you. But I can’t let you go up there unexpected. If you ain’t made no appointment, you’re gonna have to leave.”
“Leave?” the second guard asked his partner, being careful to keep his weapon trained on the old man. “We can’t just let him leave. He ran in here with some kind of needle! Maybe he came in here to kill somebody! We gotta hold him for the police!”
“We ain’t got that kind of authority,” the first guard replied. “All he did was run in here. He ain’t broken no law yet for us to hold him on. All we can do
is maybe confiscate that needle as drug paraphernalia.” He started inching cautiously toward the old man. “Step back, away from the needle,” he ordered.
Min’para straightened and held his arms out to show they were empty. “You do not understand,” he told the advancing guard, breathing easier now. “I must see...”
“I said step back!” the guard shouted. Min’para backed away and the guard continued forward until the syringe lay right at his foot. “You got him covered?”
“I got him,” the second guard answered.
The first guard holstered his sidearm and then squatted down and picked up the syringe.
Gambling, literally betting his life that the guard who had him covered wouldn’t actually shoot him, and that he was fast enough to get passed the two marines, Min’para suddenly dashed forward and made a run for the stairs. But the guard squatting in front of him reacted faster than he’d anticipated and grabbed him by the arm, stopping him almost before he could get started. “Whoa, buddy!” he shouted. “You ain’t going nowhere!”
“But I must see Chairman MacLeod!” Min’para insisted as he tried unsuccessfully to free himself from the less than eloquent guard’s iron grasp.
“Not without an appointment!”
“I didn’t have the time to make an appointment!”
“Well you’re just gonna to have to make the time to make an appointment,” the guard responded, tightening his grasp on the old man’s arm and pushing against his chest with his own forearm, “because you ain’t gettin’ up there without one!”
“Wait a moment!” Min’para cried out, struggling against the guard’s efforts to push him back toward the front doors. “Stop! Please!”
“I said leave!” the guard demanded, pushing harder. “Now! Or we will call the police!”
“But I must see him now!” Min’para cried as he finally started pushing back. “Before it is too late!”
The second guard holstered his weapon and hurried to his partner’s aid. He grabbed hold of the old man’s free arm, and together the two of them more easily muscled the belligerent old man backward, toward the exit. “It’s already too late for you, old man,” he said.
“No! Wait, please!” Min’para pleaded as he struggled. “You do not understand! I must see him! There is a... There is a conspiracy going on in your Solfleet! It is a matter of your world’s security!”
“Not without an appointment! That’s for the chairman’s security!”
“Let me go!” Min’para roared, struggling more violently. Somehow he managed to break free and he made a second run for the stairs.
“Marines!” the guards yelled in unison.
The marines dashed across the lobby and tackled the old man to the highly polished hard tile floor in such a way as to avoid injuring him too seriously...hopefully. Then they grabbed him none to gently by the arms and hauled him back to his feet.
“Let’s go, sir,” the sergeant said as they practically dragged him back toward the exit.
“No!” he yelled. He tried to break free again but quickly realized that his efforts were in vein—that he didn’t stand a Cirran’s chance on Sulain against a pair of United States Marines—so he decided to try a different tactic. “Wait a moment, please, sir,” he pleaded in a much calmer and quieter tone of voice. “There is someone out there. Two men. They have been chasing me. They are trying to kill me!”
“We might kill you if you don’t get the hell out of here,” the corporal told him. And with that they dragged him out through the doors and pushed him away from the entrance.
“And if you even think about coming back in here, sir, you will be arrested,” the sergeant advised him.
If he even thought? Could the sergeant read his thoughts? “But I...”
“There he is!” someone shouted. Recognizing the voice, Min’para whirled around to find those same two men walking quickly up the sidewalk toward him.
“Police!” the older looking one, the ‘daddy’, yelled as they approached. “Stop right there, old man!”
Min’para ran at the marines and tried to force his way past them, but they stopped him easily and held onto him for the civilian officers.
“Look, mister!” the sergeant said sternly into his ear as he and the corporal waited for the two policemen to take him off their hands. “I’ve had just about enough of you! Whatever kind of trouble you’re in, you’re not bringing it into our building!”
“But I did not do anything wrong!” Min’para desperately cried as the marines suddenly twisted his arms up behind his back and held them there while one of the two policemen fought to cuff his hands together.
“Of course you didn’t,” the corporal replied sarcastically.
“Honestly, I did not!” Min’para insisted as he continued to resist. “Do you not see? These two men are not really police officers!” He felt the cuffs lock around both of his wrists. They had him.
“Of course they’re not,” the corporal responded. “They’re just a couple of average guys who happen to carry handcuffs who picked you at random because they thought it would be fun to chase someone through the city streets and pretend to arrest him!” To the policemen he said, “He’s all yours, gentlemen,” and then he and the sergeant allowed them to take control.
“No!” Min’para shrieked as he struggled against their grasp.
“Thanks for holding onto him, Marines,” one of them said. “He’s a lot stronger and a whole lot slipperier than he looks.”
“No problem, Detective,” the corporal responded.
“He is not a detective!” Min’para shouted as they started to haul him away. “They are not police officers!”
“Shut up, old man, before I knock you out!” the younger of the two suited men hollered. “You’re under arrest! Deal with it!”
The men turned him away from the building, but he kept on struggling against them and looking back and shouting at the marines. “They are not the police!”
The younger man suddenly belted him across the mouth hard enough that he would have fallen to the ground had they not been holding onto him. “I said shut the fuck up!”
But the professor continued to resist as violently as he could, even as they hauled him back to his feet. “You are going to have to report this to your commanding officer, Sergeant!” he cried over his shoulder, spitting blood as they dragged him away. “What are you going to tell him when he asks you if you verified the arresting officers’ identification?”
The sergeant gazed at the old man and saw, perhaps for the first time, the unbridled terror in his violet eyes.
The look did not go unnoticed. “Go on, ask them!” Min’para begged. “Ask them for their identification! Please!”
The sergeant exchanged doubtful glances with the corporal, then looked back at him just as he started to do what was probably the oddest thing he could possibly have chosen to do at that moment. He started to sing.
“From the halls of Montezu—uma to the shores of Tripo—li. We will fight our country’s ba—attles on the land and on the—sea.”
“Gentlemen!” the sergeant barked, interrupting the old man’s song as he started following them toward the street. “Excuse me for a moment, but the prisoner is right.” Following his superior’s cue, the corporal started forward as well. “I do need to see your identification. I’ll need your names and badge numbers for my incident report.”
Min’para stopped struggling as the men on his arms stopped and looked back.
“We’re in a bit of a hurry, Sergeant,” the older one said.
“I just need your names and badge numbers for my report, sir. Then you can be on your way.”
“Fine. I’m Detective Lieutenant Mark Smith, badge number two three seven zero, and this is my partner, Detective Sergeant Paul Winters, badge number...”
“Three one one two,” the younger man supplied.
“I’m sorry, Detective, but just telling me isn’t good enough,” the sergeant advised him as he closed the d
istance between them. “Regulations require me to physically check both you and your partner’s credentials.”
“I’m sorry, Sergeant, but that’s going to have to be good enough. The fates just dropped a felony investigation into our hands and we’ve got to get a positive subject identification from the victim before she’s taken to the hospital.”
The sergeant rested his hand on his sidearm, and his voice suddenly grew deathly serious. “Show me your credentials, sir, and you can be on your way.”
“You’re outside the Federation Building now, Marine!” the maybe-detective reminded the sergeant. “Outside your jurisdiction!”
“That gentleman extended my jurisdiction when he forced me to drag him out through those doors behind me, sir,” the sergeant explained. A real policeman should have been aware of that fact. He adjusted his grip on his sidearm. “Show me your credentials, now!”
“All right! Fine! We’ll be right back after the victim makes her I-D.”
The men turned away in unison, but before they could take another step, both marines drew their sidearms and took aim, and the sergeant hollered, “I officially request that you show me your identification now, sir!”
The older of the two men—the one who’d called himself ‘Smith’—the one who’d done most of the talking and who was clearly the senior partner whether they were policemen or not—faced the marines again and hesitated just long enough to draw a deep breath and sigh, then said calmly, “Very well.” He let go of his prisoner and reached inside the back of his jacket as he stepped toward the sergeant. Then, in one sudden fluid motion, he sidestepped the sergeant’s aim and pulled out a pistol. But the corporal fired first, a double-tap, striking him in the center of his chest with both shots and dropping him to the sidewalk, very likely dead.
The sergeant dropped the other man an instant later after he’d thrown the prisoner to the ground and tried to draw his own weapon. Bystanders in the street screamed and ran for cover, or dropped straight to the ground and covered their heads with their hands, like ostriches burying their heads in the sand.
