by Jason LaPier
Jax again began to feel the pull. The allure of just letting go of the incident at block 23-D and staying right there on Terroneous. The large moon was not in ModPol jurisdiction and they might never bother to look for him if he just laid low. He imagined getting a job at the d-mail facility – the site was remote, but to make up for it the people there worked in shifts of one month on, one month off, still collecting a paycheck. The place was like a hotel for most of them who had their own homes in different cities and towns only a few hours away by plane.
Whenever he looked at Runstom, Jax knew he had to keep going. He could see the officer carrying around the deaths of those innocent people, the hunger for justice. The deeper they got into this case, the more hungry the man looked. Every lead was an appetizer for the next course. It was infectious, that hunger. That desire to find this bastard “X” and put him away for good.
They spent a few hours there at the d-mail facility, and Jax had plenty of time to scope out the drone he was interested in. It was an interstellar drone from the Sirius system. After Jax had a little more time to enjoy the company of fellow tech-heads, they said their goodbyes and took a mag-rail to the nearest city with an interstellar port.
Two days later they were in cryo-sleep in a long-range passenger vessel, headed for Sirius-5.
CHAPTER 16
“Alright,” Moses Down said, his voice resonating deep. “Slow the hell down, 2-Bit. Tell me what happened. From the beginning.”
“Right, right,” Captain 2-Bit said. The aging gangbanger took a deep breath. Even over the low-res vid-screen he was visibly antsy. “We’re out in my cruiser, right? Just took off from Terro with a load of that dark Terro beer that the boys all love, right? I mean, we cleaned ’em out – got a couple dozen barrels of—”
“Get to the point, Captain.”
“Right. So we left Terro and we check our contacts before Xarping, just as normal, right? And what do we see, but hello, that personnel transport that went missing during the raid on the prison barge. You know, when y’all sprung me and Johnny Eyeball, right?”
“Yeah, you told me that already,” Down said, motioning with his large brown hands. “So what happened? You went after her? Did you get ’er back in one piece?”
“Well, see, I sent two fighters out after her, right? I told those boys, take out her thrusters so she can’t split, right? Then we can hop aboard, grab anyone we find, and take back our ship, right?”
Down nodded. “Good thinking, 2-Bit. So they took out her thrusters?”
“Yeah, they did,” 2-Bit said, getting a little excited. “She didn’t even know it was comin’, right? They get on one side of her, one boy does a flyby, real quick-like, and they got her surrounded.” He tried to model the scene with his hands. “She doesn’t even react to the flyby, right? So the boy, he comes back around and BAM! Takes her thrusters out, perfect cluster.” He poked at one hand with the fingers of his other.
“Nice,” Down said, grinning wide, stretching the short, curly beard that framed his jaw. “You’ve trained your boys well, Captain.”
“Right,” the captain replied, then followed with a sigh. “See, my boy, he’s thinkin’, the ship can’t go nowhere now, and they don’t know how to work the weapons on it or somethin’, because they didn’t put up no fight. He comes up on her real slow-like, right? So’s he can board ’er. But he’s bein’ careful to make sure she’s not gonna fire back.”
Down’s mouth turned downward. “But not careful, enough,” he said. 2-Bit didn’t reply right away, so he prompted him. “Is that right?”
“Well, he got right up on her. And outta nowhere, the auto-turret – you know, those personnel transporters we lifted from that Sirius Navy outpost – they got this beautiful auto-turret, right? Dumb as a rock, but that sucker packs a punch, right?”
“The auto-turret dusted your fighter,” Down guessed.
At this, Captain 2-Bit took his hat off and held it over his heart. “Aye, boss. Complete disintegration.”
“Okay,” Down said after a grimace and a moment of silence. “So then what happened? You tell the other fighter to take him out?”
“Well, sure, I thought about it. See, the transport had no thrusters, and my boy could fly circles around her. Plus she shot most of her power away with that first shot.” 2-Bit looked grim. “But some ModPollies came out of Xarp right then. Patrol vessels – same trajectory – I think they was followin’ the personnel ship.”
Down growled, a deep and guttural sound. “Goddamn ModPol motherfuckers. They got no right comin’ anywhere near Terro.”
“So I tells my boy, come on back,” Captain 2-Bit continued. “But these boys are like dogs, right? He could smell blood, and he wanted to finish off that transport. But the transport, we armored the hell out of that sucker, right? He blasts it, but it’s strong, and after a minute or two those cops are getting closer. So he tries to peel off, but the ModPollies was on him with torpedoes.”
“Goddammit,” Down muttered. “Those ModPol wanna-be cops, they can’t even fight you in a straight-up dogfight. Fucking torpedoes.”
“Yeah.” 2-Bit looked down at his hat again for a few seconds, then looked up with a smile. “But get this, boss. After they waste the fighter, the ModPollies get too close to the transport and the auto-turret goes and starts poppin’ at them!”
“What? No shit!” Down’s face brightened ever so slightly. “What’d they do?”
“Well, they’s cops, right? They get shot at, they shoot right back. Torpedoed the sonova bitch. Smacks it right in the behind, the transport goes flyin’. We tracked it down to the surface of Terro. Cops got no jurisdiction there, so I guess they either figured the crew for dead or not worth goin’ after, cuz they Xarp out after that.”
“Goddamn ModPol motherfuckers,” Down muttered again.
“Yeah, so we went down there after a while. Checked out the wreckage, right? The transport, well, she’s taken a beating, and now she’s on the surface and no way to get her back up into orbit without a lift-ship. Not much worth salvaging, ’fraid.”
“Did you find any bodies?”
“Nope,” Captain 2-Bit said. “No bodies. The ship had its shocks stuck out the bottom, so they must’ve survived the landing. A bunch of stuff was looted out the ship. We took the guns and armor they left behind.”
“If they walked away from the wreck, they must have left a trail,” Dan said, speaking up for the first time in the conversation. He was standing next to Moses’ chair. “Did you track them?”
2-Bit was quiet. Down prodded him. “Did you track them, Captain?”
“No, boss.”
Down frowned. “You’re still in orbit around Terroneous, right, Captain?”
“Aye, boss.”
“Okay. Wait there. I’m sending Bashful Dan, Johnny Eyeball, and Dava to meet you. Now listen.” Down leaned in toward the vid-screen. “Dan is the best tracker we got, so you pay attention to his advice. And Johnny spent some time on that prison barge and got a good look at all the ModPollies that were on it. We know it was one of them that took the transport, so he might be able to recognize them if he sees ’em. But you gotta keep him sober, 2-Bit.” He paused. “You understand me? Keep Eyeball outta the bars and outta the bottle.”
“Right, boss.” The captain hesitated. “Do we really need Dava?”
“I want to make sure this gets done right,” Down said. “You got it, Captain?”
“Aye, boss.”
“Good.” Down closed the connection and turned to Bashful Dan. “Can you still track them?”
“No problem,” Dan said. “People don’t respect a trail these days. Space covers all tracks, they think. Those guys who crashed the transport, whoever they are, landed on Terroneous. No doubt they had to walk through tall grass, probably dropping ration wrappers the whole way. Probably went to the closest town, got themselves a hotel. Stuck out like sore thumbs, like tourists.”
“Dan,” Down interrupted. “If they slow you down �
� 2-Bit and Johnny E, I mean – you just ditch ’em. Don’t let the trail go cold.”
“Aye, boss. I’ll find ’em.” Dan was quiet, then asked, “Why are we taking Dava?”
“Because whoever these guys are, they’ve already killed a couple Wasters stealing that transport,” Dava said from behind him. He nearly jumped out of his waxy orange skin.
“Fuck me,” Dan coughed. “Do you have to do that?”
“And killed another Waster outside Terro,” she continued, ignoring the tracker’s question and pacing around the shorter man like he was soon-to-be dinner. “And not only that, you’ve got ModPol all over your asses on this one. Someone has to protect the li’l boys.”
“That’s right. Just remember,” Down said, waggling a finger at Dava. “I’d like at least one of them alive. I want to find out how they did it. You know how I get,” he said with a toothy smile. “We learn from our mistakes. We practiced that prison barge break-out scenario over and over, and didn’t anticipate that someone might get one of our ships out from under our noses. So if you can get one alive, do it. But if you can’t, then just waste ’em.”
“Mmm. Aye, boss,” the assassin said, with a long, lightly-curling smile.
“Go get prepped, Dan.”
“Yes, boss.” Dan nodded at Down and gave Dava a hesitant look, then tripped his way out of the comm room.
“He might be a good tracker, but he has zero situational awareness.”
“Dava,” Down said. “You should be nicer to them.”
“Sorry, Moses,” she said. He had a way of making her feel like an admonished schoolgirl at times.
“It’s okay. I just want you to get along.”
She frowned and turned away from him. “I know. But I work better alone.”
“No, you don’t,” he said firmly, placing a hand on her shoulder and turning her to face him. “When I found you, you were alone.”
“Moses,” she murmured. She didn’t want to be reminded of those days.
He let go and laughed then, his inexplicable amusement jarring her. “Dava, Dava,” he said. “You’re like that ExpandoKnife you love so much. Constantly puffing up and then shrinking back away again.”
“You gave me the damn knife,” she said.
“I know. I’m starting to question whether it was all that good of an idea.”
She frowned at him. “You taught me to be an assassin. Can’t I just do that? Why do you have to bitch at me for not playing nice with the others?”
He sighed and gently shook his head. “You’re more than an assassin, Dava.”
“Right,” she mumbled. She wanted to make for the door, but she could feel his presence rooting her to the spot.
He reached up and stretched his arms, which practically touched the ceiling, then brought them back down. “Why did we go after the prison barge.”
It was a question, but it came out like a statement. She felt like a schoolgirl again, now being quizzed. “To rescue Johnny and 2-Bit,” she said, guessing he was testing her camaraderie.
“Why else.”
She thought about it. There wasn’t anything of value on the barge. They didn’t leave with anyone but some prisoners. “Fresh meat?”
He grinned at her widely. “Yes, that’s true too. 2-Bit did well, finding six quality cadets. Future Wasters.”
“Yeah, he did okay.” There would have been seven recruits, but she chose to leave one behind. She wanted to vent to Down about the racist asshole – because he would understand – but she didn’t want to revisit it. There was nothing to gain from it.
“Why else.”
She narrowed her eyes at him, not getting the game. “I don’t know. Sure as fuck wasn’t anything worth stealing.” She bit her lip in thought, then added, “I guess we got to fuck with ModPol a little.”
He nodded, his grin fading. He seemed to be inspecting her, searching her face for something deeper. Something that wasn’t there, because she didn’t know what he was looking for.
“ModPol,” he said. “They’re only half the problem. A massive industry based on security. Based on what should be a human right. Exploiting people that just want to live in peace. People who want peace so badly, they won’t invest in police or military. ModPol exploits them for having a dream.”
She huffed. “Kind of hypocritical coming from a crime lord,” she said with a smile.
He grinned back, but only mildly. “Yes. They’re naïve to have that dream, but I admire them for it anyway.”
“What’s the other half of the problem?”
The grin melted again, this time into a full facial scowl. He turned and paced as he talked. “Some of these dreamers, these utopia-seekers. They see the path to the perfect end – to peace – they think it can only be accomplished through a kind of cleansing. See, the exploitation goes both ways. They use ModPol as a way to export their criminal element. These peace-thinkers, they looked over the history of civilization and they seen a pattern. They seen the prison-system cycle. Small-time crime, do the time, but when you get out, you’re worse off than you were before. And you got no means but to do more crime. The cycle.”
She watched his deliberate and slow strides around the comm room. “So they outsource the prison system.”
“That’s right,” he said, turning to face her. “Out with the system, out with the cycle.”
“Why did we attack the prisoner barge?” She knew the answer, but she asked anyway. She wanted to hear him tell it. She wanted to know there were people like Moses Down in the world.
He stared at her silently for a moment before launching in. “These people want to systematically eliminate scum like us from their happy little supermall lives. But they underestimate us as much as they loathe us. We are resourceful. We are organized. And we will break their fucking toys. We are the stones that clog their perfect machines. We are the grime that refuses to be washed out of the universe.”
CHAPTER 17
“Well, now what do we do?” Runstom said as they tried to stretch themselves awake after disembarking from the long-range space-bus.
“Blarg.” Jax rubbed his eyes. “I need coffee.”
“First time in cryo, eh?”
“Merf.” Jax flexed his fingers. “My hands feel like oatmeal.”
“Come on, let’s get out of this terminal.” Runstom grabbed Jax’s suitcase and passed it to him. He picked up his own suitcase and nodded toward the exit. “There’s always a few good cafes right outside these places.”
A few minutes later, they were pouring coffee down their throats as fast as they could without scorching themselves in a little cafe that was packed to maximum capacity.
“So anyway,” Runstom said. “What’s the next step?”
“I feel heavy.” Jax lifted his arms experimentally. “Is this the effect of the cryo? Is it going to wear off?”
“That’s gravity-lag. You didn’t complain about feeling lighter on the superliner or on Terroneous.” Jax gave him a furrowed look. Runstom continued, “Anyway, gravity is heavier here than it is on Barnard-4. It will take some getting used to. Probably a couple of weeks.”
“Fuh, I hope we’re not here that long,” Jax grumbled.
“Which brings me to my original question. What’s the—”
“I heard your goddamn question,” Jax snapped. It felt like his brain was running on rusty gears that were caked in mud. He frowned and looked at the officer. “Sorry, Stanford. I guess I need more coffee.” He took another gulp and sighed. “This damn coffee is hot. Why is it so hot?”
Runstom grabbed his arm. “Come on Jax, snap out of it. We have to figure out our next move.”
Jax pulled away hard, almost knocking over his coffee, catching it at the last minute and pulling it close like it was a precious loved one. “Well,” he said, closing his eyes tightly for a second then reopening them. “The person who wrote that program is somewhere here on Sirius-5.”
He looked out of the window of the cafe and into the streets o
f Grovenham. It was a domed city, the largest on Sirius-5. Buildings rose into the artificial skies all around them. The streets were packed with people. Most of them were white-skinned, like Jax, being born and raised in a large dome where the cost of living was “economical” and therefore featured low-end solar filters, though their white skin was different than his. Sirius is a white star, or technically a pair of white stars, whereas Barnard’s Star is a red dwarf, so no doubt that difference accounted for the slightly more beige color of the local skin, making Jax’s look pale gray by comparison. The people were, on average, stouter than B-foureans, who were often tall and skinny. Probably a side-effect of the higher gravity.
“Shit,” Runstom said, his voice rising, pulling Jax’s attention away from the streets. He sounded surprised about something. “That’s all you’ve got, isn’t it? You dragged us from one star to another and our only lead is somewhere on this planet!” he said, waving his arms around as if to encompass all of Sirius-5.
“Well, you’re the cop! You tell me what we should do—”
“Oh, I’m the cop now?” Runstom said, standing up and pointing to his chest. “I get to be in charge? Are you sure you don’t want to just walk out onto the street and start bullying people? Like the little stunt you pulled with Markus Stallworth?”
“Yeah, well, if it wasn’t for me we wouldn’t have even found him. I—”
“Oh yes, I see.” Runstom nodded his head vigorously. “The unappreciated genius that is Jack J. Jackson. Thank you, Professor Doctor Jackson for narrowing our next lead down to a single planet. Just let ol’ Officer Stanford take it from here, no fucking problem!”
“Yeah, Officer Stanford. Officer.” Jax felt like he was listening to himself, his voice acting on reflex, but he didn’t stop it. “That’s what I’m dealing with here. Of course you don’t know what to do next. Why would an officer know what to do?”
