by Sid K
“Alright, but where do we get the money for it,” Yytar said. “I don’t want to just take it from old man Zyf, a native of Coldwoods for all of his seventy plus years.”
“A cantankerous, but jolly, old coot,” Rydar said.
“Take this—my army identification card,” Sthykar said. “Tell him the army is purchasing his store and at the marked prices, we won’t negotiate down. We officers have the authority to make such purchases when urgently needed in the training or in the field. The House of War will send him the check later.”
Rydar took the card and put it in his inner coat pocket. “I hope he believes us.”
“Take me with you,” a young man that had arrived with Yytar jumped in front of them. He had been apparently listening to their conversation when Zyf was mentioned. “Zyf is a friend of an uncle. I can convince him.”
Sthykar patted him on the back, “Take this boy with you, Rydar, and definitely buy me some explosives, even if you have to drive into the town for it.”
“Will do,” Rydar said. “But I know Zyf has some sticks in his store. We will be back in no time.”
“We are going to wait for you here,” Sthykar said, “Felptar and Hayett and I are going to give a quick overview of warfare tactics to everyone here.”
Rydar, Yytar and the young man took off in Rydar’s car, driving up the road at an accelerating pace. Sthykar asked for the rest to assemble in a circle for a quick lesson on jungle fighting.
* * *
Old Man Zyf’s gun store was located a few turns up the road from the Coldwoods police station. It was a wooden, one room store with a single window and an electric sign advertising ‘Zyf’s Guns’ hanging from it. A car was parked in the lot. The store was located in an isolated place; however it was very accessible to the hunters who stopped by for ammo on their way into the woods.
When the three of them walked into the store, Old Zyf himself was at the glass counter alone. He was an old man with full beard, a few front teeth that had been lost, a big slumping belly down the middle, and an old worn hunting cap on his head. As soon he saw the young man, he pointed at him and laughed.
“How’s your uncle, boy?” Zyf asked.
“Great,” young man replied. “These here are—”
“Oh I know them fellas. That’s Ryder over there—he got fired from the police, and that’s Yytar—he got the boot from the army,” Zyf chuckled.
“Zyf you haven’t changed,” Rydar guffawed.
“Haven’t seen you in a couple of years and we live in the same crummy cold town,” Zyf said. “What’s the matter, you got no use for me?”
“I got no use for your guns, because as you put it, I got fired from the police,” Rydar chuckled.
“Well, what do you folks wanna buy?” Zyf asked.
“The whole store,” Yytar said.
“Say what? You didn’t decide to drop by here to have some humor at the expense of old Zyf, now did ya?”
“No joke,” Yytar said and put Sthykar’s army card on the counter.
Zyf picked up and studied it. “Colonel Sthykar?” Zyf guffawed. “You don’t fool me none.”
“He is in town and he wants to purchase your whole store,” Rydar said. “He has the authority to make purchases and the House of War will write you a big, fat check for it. We will buy at the marked prices and won’t try to haggle them down even a star.”
“Now you better not be running a con at me,” he said, picking up a shotgun lying at the far end of the countertop. “If you are, you will hear from me and my shotgun and that might just be the last thing you hear.”
“Serious, old Zyf,” the young man said. “You can trust me. We have a big problem and Colonel Sthykar needs these guns.”
“Alright, square with me now,” Zyf said putting down the shotgun. “What’s going on here?”
Rydar and Yytar looked at each other and then decided to let him in on the recent events in the town.
* * *
Just as Sthykar finished talking to the group, two vehicles, one car and one half-sized truck rolled in the station parking lot. Rydar and Yytar got out of the car; old man Zyf and the young man got out of the truck with Zyf carrying his shotgun on his shoulder and walking with a big open grin, showing his half fallen teeth and moving his huge, portly belly.
“Honor to meet you, Colonel Sthykar,” he said walking up to Sthykar. “Keenly read your battles in newspaper, myself. By the way, we got my store in that truck, everything you wanted, repeaters, pistols, knives, even explosive sticks.”
“Luckily we didn’t have to go into the town,” Rydar said, “Zyf, here, had enough explosives.”
“Grateful. Just want to assure you that the House of War will pay cash for all of it at your price,” Sthykar said. “What’s the inventory?”
“My whole store: fifty eight repeating rifles, a hundred and forty two hunting rifles, fifty four pistols, fifty some knives, a dozen bows and a couple hundred arrows and two boxes full of explosives,” Zyf said.
“Got all the ammo as well,” Rydar said. “He didn’t have a count, but must be at least ten thousand rounds for rifles and a couple thousand for pistols.”
“I am not going to sit there and count bullets, policeman,” Zyf said. “And before you get smart and tell me to read the factory receipts, let me tell you there are some odd folks in this town who reach in the ammo box, grab and buy an odd number of bullets.”
“Well, that’s alright,” Sthykar laughed. He turned to the entire crowd. “Listen up now. Guns are in that truck. Take all the repeaters, take only fifty hunting rifles, I don’t want you to get heavy and awkward in a gunfight. Take all the pistols, they will be light to hang on your belts; take a few knives, we don’t need bows and arrows. I will take one box of explosives, you folks take the second.”
Everyone walked over to the truck and went to open the back door. Zyf stood back and then laughed. “Unless you boys mean to shoot it open, I got the keys.” He dangled them in the air and then tossed them up into the crowd. Three or four hands reached up to grab them.
“Alright, let’s hurry up unloading here,” Sthykar said. “We have to give Mr. Zyf his truck back so he can leave town.”
“Oh, I am going with you boys,” Zyf said. “That was my condition to selling my goods on trust.”
“We had to tell him,” Yytar said walking over.
“I am not going to stop you, but it is dangerous.” Sthykar told him.
“Colonel Sthykar, you retired me today by buying my whole store...don’t got nothing more to do,” Zyf said. “And I may get retired for good from my life today as well. Certainly will be some end to this damn rat of a life; retire from the work and retire from the life on the same day.”
“Don’t say that, Zyf,” a Coldwoods townsman said. “Some of us have much life ahead.”
“Tell you that remaining life not gonna turn out better than what you have,” Zyf said. “Take it from me, it gets crummier every year, till you are a backcountry old coot, hoping some snake will do you in your sleep. But if you are so worried, hide behind my tummy; it can cover any two of you.”
A lot of men laughed and Zyf himself was smiling and slapping his shotgun on his palm.
“Colonel Jontvyk,” Sthykar said. “Take your team; wait a hundred meters from their wall till our chopper arrives. I will contact you on the army radio frequency.”
“Follow me,” Jontvyk said. His group crossed the road and was off into the woods. Only Sthykar, Relkyett, Pelyett and Tulkar remained behind.
“Let me guess why you got me with you,” Tulkar said, “it’s because I am a mechanic.”
“No surprise there,” Sthykar said.
“A car mechanic!” Tulkar said, “I don’t know jack about the choppers. Besides you are a mechanical engineer.”
“Now now, I can’t do the fighting and the repairing at the same time, can I?” Sthykar said. “That’s why I got Pelyett too. I can fly but I can’t do the fighting and the flying at the s
ame time, can I? He is a pilot and will do best behind the stick. If we need any repairing, I will tell you what to do; I just need someone mechanical who can move around the machine parts.”
“Hope we don’t have to repair,” Tulkar said.
“Ready?” Relkyett asked.
“We are the only four left,” Pelyett said. “Jontvyk took twenty-two with him. What if we are ambushed?”
“We got Sthykar,” Relkyett grinned.
“The forest is too big, for them to spot four men.” Sthykar said, “Alright, let’s go.”
They crossed the road and disappeared into the woods. Relkyett led the way towards his helicopter-owning neighbor’s lot.
chapter 20 – the clouds on the horizon
09/08/958
Two Ranx Rangers escorted chief detective Sayett to the second floor and shoved him inside a room. Slyntya turned around quickly when the door opened and gave a relieved smile when she saw Sayett.
“How have you been, Slyntya?” Sayett asked.
“Alright,” she said. “They haven’t harmed me. Just locked me in this room and only come inside to give me three meals a day. There is a bathroom attached as well.”
Sayett looked around the room, it looked much more comfortable than the cramped small cells he and his guards were locked up in underground. There was a sofa, a large bed, a table, a chair, nice lush carpet and a lace curtains on the window looking out into the open.
Sayett walked over to the window and looked out. He saw the maze and the compound wall and forest beyond that. He did not see any humans, but he remembered seeing guards on the front gate on their way in—not visible from this room.
“I thought you had escaped into the woods,” Slyntya said, following him to the window.
“I had, even got a big team of SPASI guards ready,” Sayett said, “but we were ambushed again. We really underestimated them.”
“What do they want?” Slyntya asked.
“I think we are about to find out.” Sayett said. “The rangers who brought me here said their boss wanted to talk to both of us at once.”
“Did you know Sthykar is here somewhere,” Slyntya said wide eyed. “I mean somewhere in the southwest.”
“Yes, you told me,” Sayett said. “But this is quite a large region. We don’t have any means to get a message to him.”
They heard faint footsteps walking down the stairs at a distance and hushed down.
“Two of my men brought the detective to lady constellar’s room,” Suka said. “Why did you not want the town police chief brought there as well?”
“Starfire police chief is just a five year appointee by their government,” Boss Hantex replied. “Just enforces the laws given to him, there is not much decision making in his hand. It is not like Ranxian police chiefs who have a district with multiple towns under them.”
“Those posts are in great demand in Ranx,” Suka said.
“Don’t have to tell me about it,” Hantex said. “When the Ranx Rejuvenation Party came to power more than twenty senior policemen visited me, requesting me to put in a word for them for the police chief posts. Now this Coldwoods police chief has only seventeen policemen under him; the sergeants of my city commanded a bigger force than that.”
“Do SPASI detectives have more power?” Suka asked.
“Seems like it because they have nationwide authority. Suka, you and the two guards follow me into the room and keep an eye on that detective,” Hantex said. Capitan Suka was alongside him and two guards with the Ranx rifles were behind them.
“Let them stay outside,” Suka said. “I can handle the detective. Besides he is unarmed and I have a pistol.”
“That damn scientist made a run for it,” Boss Hantex said. “This detective is a great fighter you told me.”
“That’s why he won’t make a run for it,” Suka said. “The scientist didn’t know better, but the detective is a seasoned veteran of fights, so he knows his chances of escape are none. You don’t want to give an impression that you are afraid of them.”
“No, definitely not. Why would I be afraid?” Hantex said, “You watch the detective, the other one is a woman. I am not concerned about her.” He turned to the two guards as they reached the door, “You two stay outside.”
Hantex opened the door and Capitan Suka walked in first followed by Hantex. Sayett and Slyntya turned towards them from the window.
“I take it you are that Constellar woman,” Hantex said to her. He turned to Sayett. “And you are the chief detective who wanted to negotiate with my corporal?”
“I am, and are you the general?” Sayett asked.
Suka Manx let loose a loud rip roaring laughter. Hantex shook his head.
“I am a businessman,” Hantex said. “He is the Capitan of the troops. He is the highest ranking officer and the second in command after me.”
“I am Constellar Slyntya,” Slyntya said. “I can negotiate on behalf of our government. What do you want to negotiate?”
“Your surrender of your government to my authority.” Hantex shot back with laughter,
Sayett chuckled but quickly stopped. He did not want to make them angry when they held the upper hand. “Forgive me, but you expect our entire nation to just surrender?”
“I know I sound like a madman,” Hantex said with a smile, “but wait till you hear what I have planned. A Storm Machine that can create hurricanes and storms to knock out entire armies. I will give you two a look at the machine later. I just came here to tell you what your role is going to be. You are going to sign a paper acknowledging my demands and we will make a tape recording of both of you attesting to my ability here. That will be delivered to your government along with photos of each of you to show that you are in good condition.”
“There is no machine like that,” Slyntya said.
Hantex looked at Sayett with a grin and said. “Tell her; you must know state secrets.”
“Well, actually there might be,” Sayett said looking grimly at Slyntya. “Both Starfire army and Narducat Empire experimented with storm making machines. We both stopped further progress under a treaty, but the device is theoretically possible.”
“Not just theoretically, you fool, but practically, right here, right now,” Hantex shouted with joy. “Now our photographer is getting the dark room ready. We will be back in an hour. Suka, take the detective back for now. I don’t want them plotting anything.”
Hantex exited the room. Suka stayed back and spoke when the boss had left, “Detective, come with me.”
Sayett nodded to Slyntya and walked out of the room followed by Suka who ordered the two guards to escort him down below the tower while he caught up with Hantex on the third floor.
* * *
SPASI Chief Yucker returned to the House of War and walked into the central conference room along with one of his detectives in tow. Along with Supreme Commander Krratyk, Commanders Byter and Tybett, the King himself had arrived and was sitting in his royal seat at the head of the table. Supreme Commander, whose chair was right next to King’s at the head of the table, was standing with a book in his hand.
“King, Supreme Commander,” Chief Yucker greeted both of them. The official decorum called for the Head of a House to be saluted, but the House of War had two heads—King and Supreme Commander—and each had to be acknowledged and greeted by an entrant.
Supreme Commander Krratyk closed the book around his finger as a bookmark and held it up for Yucker and said, “Our book report on the Storm Machines runs more than a thousand pages—heavy technical details; I can’t understand much of it and have called for our arms workshops to send someone who does.”
“This is Chief Detective Avyk Wyt, head of SPASI’s spying and counter-spying division, which is tasked with keeping tabs on the foreign powers,” Yucker said, “He has been working around the clock to produce a preliminary picture of Ranx politics. He is ready to give the first overview.”
“Let’s get to that then,” Supreme Commander said taking
his seat and looking at the King who concurred.
“My division is responsible for spying on the foreign countries,” Avyk said, “Unfortunately; we have focused our attention on either the major powers like Karx, Napp and Otto or on our historical enemies, the seven southern countries; and then Sayett’s Counter-Imperial Division spies on the Narducat Empire. We don’t have any spies in Ranx; they have never been hostile to us, nor we to them. Thus my information comes from eclectic collection of sources, but I won’t bore you with details.”
“Oh no, on the contrary, even the smallest detail could be important,” Krratyk said. “Please don’t leave anything out.”
“Alright,” Avyk said. “We had only the basic profile on Ranx nation and its politics in SPASI files, mostly concerning its military strength. So I thought who would be the best source for more and I realized that any of our companies that export there would have done significant research on them. So I got the list from our trade board of Starfire’s top exporters to Ranx and called the company on the top of that list, a car company that sells one particular type of car very well there. I asked its owner to give us all the research they have on Ranx and told him that SPASI owes him a big favor that he can cash in the future. Then I had my junior detectives go through old newspapers, magazines, travel and tourism guides, history books to piece together a picture of Ranx politics. Here is what I have.”
“Avyk wait a minute,” Yucker said. “Wouldn’t it be better to wait for the other commanders to arrive?”
“I have sent them away in different parts of the country,” Krratyk said. “I don’t know if this storm machine works or it is just in Coldwoods. They could have built more than one and if the Capital comes under a storm and we can’t contact our armies, I want army officers with highest level of decision making authority available to deal with the problem. They are on radio contact with the House, though.”
“I will begin then,” Avyk said. “There is this political outfit called Ranx Rejuvenation Party that came to power in Ranx for the first time a while back. Their ideology calls for the restoration of the old Sanguine Empire with Ranx Nation serving in place as the new empire that will reunite under its rule all the former lands of the old empire. Since the Ranx Nation is the location of the old, destroyed city of Sangunira, the imperial Capital of the Sanguine Empire, they consider themselves the inheritors of that imperial tradition.”
