Learning the Hard Way 2

by H. P. Caledon

  “Okay,” Mike said. The physician rigged the IV while Keelan tried to think up a plan. Mike looked at him pleadingly. He wouldn’t let them take him in if all they did was toss his ass back in jail, would he?

  As night fell, Keelan refused to fall asleep. Samantha had been ordered to sleep on the couch so she wouldn’t call anyone, and Keelan sat straight up on an uncomfortable but modern dining chair, watching her sleeping figure. In the faint light from the corner of the room, he could see that she looked like Mike. The same nuance of hair and eyes, but he noticed they didn’t have the same ears. Mike had nice ears. The curve of the shell. Samantha’s ears didn’t have that. She had a pretty mouth, but Mike’s curved—Keelan broke that train of thought, sad that he’d refused to sleep. Staring at a woman and thinking her brother was hotter was probably not healthy for a man who also viewed himself as a heterosexual.

  With that thought came thoughts of Danny. He missed the warmth he’d felt when Danny would spontaneously hold him. He thought about his and Alice’s night together, and with that came thoughts of their child.

  Keelan looked around the living room, trying to find something else to think about.

  The physician sat in a chair and slept very lightly. He certainly opened his eyes a lot—however briefly. The two soldiers slept more heavily.

  How could the bounty hunters know the name of our target? And why did they follow Mike? They must have had the same target as us. Did the fucker hire two teams? It was the contact... the contact’s wife’s brother’s girlfriend... something. Could both the contact and the brother have hired a team without having known the other one did, too?

  Clusterfuck!

  And Mike was already down when he was shot the second time. Did he fall because of the injury I caused? The one that causes his leg to set out once in a while?

  Perfect. Then that’s my fault, too.

  Keelan went to stand next to Mike. His skin finally had a warmer tinge. Or was it just the light?

  “Thanks,” Keelan whispered and put a hand on his forehead. The fever had broken.

  The physician moved and looked at a display on his arm which lit up. “Spec Edit is in orbit. We gotta go.”

  The soldiers got up and packed. Their rummaging about stirred Samantha, who sat up and looked around, confused.

  “What’s going on?” Her gaze went to Mike.

  “We’re taking Mike to be treated. You would do wise to not contact anyone or tell anyone of our stay here and especially don’t mention anything about him,” the physician said and pointed at Keelan. “If you do, you will destroy any opportunity Mike has for a life outside a maximum-security prison. Do you understand?”

  “And him?” She pointed to Keelan.

  “Is Mike’s ticket out.”

  Keelan did not like the physician’s choice of words. “What exactly does that mean?” Keelan asked, but received a look that made his gut twist. “Hell no! That transfer is not being seen through!”

  “Did I say that?”

  “No, but you’re not exactly saying anything to imply any different, are you?” Keelan knew for a fact that he was being sent back to jail. Discreetly, he reached for a blade.

  The physician sighed loudly. “If you went to jail again, then all of this would have been in vain. And if I know Mike the way I think I do, then he’d just spring you again. He’s not exactly in any condition, is he?”

  “So I’m not going to jail?”

  “Doesn’t seem to be the plan.”

  “Seem? Doesn’t seem to? Not good enough!”

  The front door opened and soldiers flooded in. All of them armed.

  Fantastic. Keelan sheathed the knife with an abrupt and not so discreet movement.

  One of the soldiers held out shackles. “Do you want the honors yourself or should we help you?”

  Keelan counted heads. Fifteen. With a lot more weapons on them than he had.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Once again, Keelan found himself shackled, staring at a bunch of uniforms. The physician sat next to him, and Mike was strapped down securely, still in a deep sleep.

  Ten minutes later, he felt the bump as the ship touched down, and a voice called an all clear over the loud speakers. The soldiers unbuckled, and Mike was the first to be carted out by the physician and the two soldiers who had arrived with him. Four soldiers fell around Keelan and escorted him onto a huge dock. Keelan gaped and stretched to peer around the soldiers around him. There he saw their ship, from which two soldiers exited.

  “What section do you want him in?” a soldier asked.

  “Two,” the physician said. “Walk him through the procedures, but leave again.”

  “Yes, sir.” The soldiers walked Keelan to an airlock, where he was told to hold his breath. A gas was pumped into the room, then sucked out. It took about thirty seconds. A hatch next to them opened.

  “Put all your clothes and weapons in there. They have to be disinfected before you get them back. Change into the clothes you find in the shower room after you’ve scrubbed down. Use all three kinds of soap in the order they’re numbered. The physician will be by later and give you your injections. Got it?”

  Keelan looked at the soldiers. “That’s going to be difficult while shackled.”

  A soldier chuckled and pressed his thumb on the lock. “You’ll be released in sixty seconds. They go in there with your clothes.”

  The soldiers backed out the way they came.

  Keelan looked at the shackles that, after the sixty seconds, clicked and fell off. “Nifty,” he mumbled and looked into the compartment where he was asked to put his things. It didn’t look like it could be opened from any other side, so he put everything in. A glass plate slid in place and a yellow gas was released, sucked out, and replaced by a red gas. It continued like that.

  Keelan continued into the shower and took his time, savoring it, because he didn’t believe the physician. They were going to throw him back in prison. Why else shackle him? Or throw him in isolation?

  When he felt like he’d washed about three layers of skin off, he stepped out and dried off. There were several red jumpsuits, so he found one that fit. He then found a bed in the adjoining room, which had four beds, four closets, a VID, and a glass wall in both ends.

  The VID beeped and blinked, so Keelan pressed the blinking button.

  The physician appeared. “Have you settled in?”

  “What do you think?”

  “Yeah, not much to do in quarantine. You can watch VID, but that’s about it. A physician will be by shortly to administer some vitamin and mineral injections. Without them, you will not be let out.”

  A man showed up at one of the big windows. He looked like a physician. He even smiled as he pointed to a small box on Keelan’s side of the window. Keelan went to press the button.

  “Hello, my name is Dr. Lawson. I’m here to give you a few mandatory injections.”

  “How?”

  “You put your arm in here and grab this handpiece loosely.” Dr. Lawson pointed to a see-through tube that went through to his side of the window. Keelan did, and the doctor put three small vials—one red, one green, and one yellow—into the chambers. The needles injected Keelan’s arm at the same time.

  “Have a nice day, and remember to press that button.” Dr. Lawson pointed to the box before he left. Keelan pushed the button and glanced back at the VID.

  It was inactive.

  Keelan tried to use his time constructively, but he had no idea how long he was supposed to stay there all alone, because no one had been by to talk to him. At least there was more room than in Delta Zeich isolation, and there was a fridge with water, energy bars, protein bars, sandwiches, and some kind of cream. Even the coffee dispenser had more than one choice, and Keelan had, to his delight, discovered that the coffee/chocolate kind seemed to be connected to a never-ending tab.

  What irritated Keelan the most, though, was that no one had been by to tell him how Mike was doing. Other than having seen
him rolled by his window shortly after he’d had his shots, he knew nothing.

  A man around Keelan’s age had been by and looked through the window. Keelan didn’t know the ranks from looking at them, but the many stars and bows and the intensity of the man’s eyes probably meant he was a high-ranking officer.

  The big windows made Keelan feel like he was on display, but he overcame the self-consciousness enough to spend some time training. Like trying to break his personal record doing pushups. Seventeen short of his PR, someone knocked on the window. Keelan looked up and saw Mike smile. Keelan jumped to his feet and pushed the button—his record forgotten.

  “What up?”

  “It worked, but left arm needs more treatment,” Mike said and tried to lift his arm. It looked difficult. “The other one is healed.”

  Keelan felt relieved by the news. “So now what?”

  “Now you get out. But you have to behave.” Mike laughed.

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about. So what? I go to jail again?”

  “I don’t think so. But you stayed in here because C.O. isn’t very pleased with me at the moment. He says I’m a troublemaker, and he doesn’t like troublemakers.” Mike looked amused, so the situation couldn’t be that serious. “So put your clothes back on, but not the weapons. They go in here.” Mike held up a bag.

  Keelan found his disinfected clothes and put them on before he gathered his weapons in his hands. The door next to the big glass wall slid aside and revealed Mike and the bag.

  “You certainly brought enough weapons, huh?”

  “You never know what you might need.”

  “Right.” Mike shouldered the bag.

  “Want me to carry it?”

  “I’m not an invalid.”

  “Okay,” Keelan muttered and followed Mike from the quarantine units and into a lot of identical halls. “At least there are no symbols on the walls.”

  “What? Wait a second.” Mike changed direction and flagged down two soldiers. Keelan couldn’t hear what they said, but he wasn’t too thrilled to see them walk off with the bag.

  “Where are they going with my bag?” Keelan asked as Mike met up with him again.

  “Putting it on the ship. You and I have to go see Lewis. What was that about symbols on the walls?”

  Keelan told him of Irgang on the rather long walk. Half an hour later they arrived at an office where the man with the intense eyes sat behind a desk and looked focused.

  “Welcome out of quarantine. I’m Lieutenant Commander Lewis. As a guest on my ship, I expect you to not abuse my hospitality, Mr. Hunter.”

  Keelan stopped himself, then answered yes sir and nodded.

  “Please, sit. I’ll be done in a minute.” Lewis returned his focus to whatever he’d been doing.

  Keelan and Mike took a seat at a conference table.

  “Can he make everything sound like an order?” Keelan whispered.

  “Yes,” Mike said, grinning. “I think it’s a gift or an ability one earns, the higher one’s rank is.”

  “What are you?”

  “Was... not high enough ranking to get it.”

  “Mr. Hunter—”

  “Keelan,” Keelan said, not liking situations where he was called by his last name for the simple reason it sounded authoritarian.

  “Keelan,” Lewis said and smiled. He pointed to the thermos next to Mike, as he took a seat across from them. “Did you help yourselves?”

  Mike smiled at Keelan and poured them both a cup with a lot of difficulty. But Keelan didn’t help—Mike had already made it perfectly clear that he didn’t want to be treated as an invalid, so he and the lieutenant commander waited patiently for Mike to fight his way through pouring three cups of coffee.

  “I’ve spoken quite a bit with Mike since you two arrived,” Lewis said and nodded, smiling at Mike when he handed him a cup. “I’ve known a lot of troublemakers in my time, but the two of you take the fucking cake!”

  Keelan glanced at Mike, who had a silly grin on his face, but enough sense to keep his focus on the table. Keelan looked at Lewis, and his expression or the look in his eyes didn’t tell Keelan whether he was finding it amusing or was so pissed off that a smile on his face was the last guard from losing his temper and sending them in front of a firing squad.

  “And do you know why I don’t like troublemakers?”

  “No, sir,” Mike answered.

  “Because I get to clean up after them.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “Don’t laugh, Sergeant,” Lewis said and smiled a bit.

  Mike chuckled. “No, sir.”

  “There’s one piece of information that I’m really interested in,” Keelan said.

  Lewis looked at him expectantly.

  “Am I being shipped off to prison?”

  “No. But I’d expect you to want to know how we’re going to secure that?” Lewis asked.

  “Do I ever!”

  “Here’s the plan. It cannot be changed, because we have already spent the past two weeks fixing the details. Mike, for the past three months, with the exception of your time on Motáll, you have been working close with Ratkins. You have been tracking a target together—Lou Krautz. Have you heard of him?”

  “Sadistic rapist. No priors, not even a ticket. Now a mass murderer with a twenty-five thou bounty on his head. Still no official sightings... unless I missed something the past two months?”

  “You did. Two possible places, which is why Ratkins called you in. You were on Motáll, Ratkins on Kanakoon. When Mathers picked up Keelan in Irgang, you were on Verion four with Ratkins. After that, you split up. All log files have been changed.”

  “And Mathers?”

  “Is a bigger problem, since he had contact with numerous people, even while you were using his identity to break Keelan out. The prison Keelan was supposed to be transferred to is right now being reviewed. As it turns out, they’ve been keeping prisoners alive on the books only to get more funds. Keelan, your corpse was officially identified on Motáll. Your death occurred during your capture sixth in eight, twenty-six-fifteen.”

  “Who died in my place?”

  “Mathers, among others. He fucked up on a hunt, which is why we hurried up to take control of the scene and put you in there instead of the mark who also died,” Lewis said. “You’ll be given a new identity.”

  “Difficult unless I also get a new face.”

  “If you would not interrupt me, you would come across the necessary information much quicker,” Lewis said.

  Keelan kept quiet and drank his coffee.

  “You are now Kaleb Hunter, registered born and found alongside Keelan Hunter. You are foundlings on Verion four. You are identical twins, and that’s how names are given there. Keelan Hunter’s profile has been given new retinas and prints—yours has been transferred to your new profile. You are both Churchburrow. Since every file in every system is updated through SWIS, then that information has been corrected through SWIS and last but not least... do you two have any idea how big a favor you owe me?”

  “And what would that favor be?” Keelan growled.

  “No, no, Keelan!” Mike said and turned. “Not like that. You don’t have to pay like that.”

  “Aha.”

  “You two need to lay low. For a long time!” Lewis said.

  “And my rap sheet?” Keelan asked and put a hand over it.

  “Will be removed.”

  “It can still be scanned. Something in the ink.”

  “Yeah, it’s very clever, but it can be done. The procedure is very time consuming and costs about a million credits... a tab I get to pick up.”

  Keelan gaped while Lewis just looked dissatisfied. His eyes didn’t hold much ill will, though.

  “Keelan, if we need to search the databases for... it has to be now,” Mike said.

  “For what?” Keelan asked.

  “You know... your...”

  “Just say it. He seems pretty well-informed.”

&n
bsp; “Your child.”

  Lewis threw his arms out, and the calmness in his eyes was gone.

  “You could have told me about that loose end a little sooner, Sergeant!”

  “It’s not a loose end. The child was borne by a fifteen-year-old girl inside the Churchburrow Institute. Do you really think they registered the parents? You’d be able to find out easily enough by looking up the name of the so-called rape victim!” Keelan pointed to his arm.

  Lewis sat back and drummed his fingers against the table. Then he activated the screen in the table.

  “No child under you. What’s the mother’s name?”

  “Forget it!”

  “I’m going to have a hard time helping you, then. But that information might also be what gives us access to secure your new identity even more. For us to keep that secret, the Churchburrow is bound to be cooperative in putting in a Kaleb Hunter next to Keelan Hunter in their records.”

  “You can access them?”

  “Some of them.”

  “But no child?”

  Lewis shook his head. “Go see the physician and start the procedure of getting that tattoo removed. You both have to be ready to leave in two weeks.”

  “Yes, sir,” Mike said and got up, but his leg gave in, and Keelan caught him. Lewis looked worried but nodded.

  “Guess I’ll just have to search all foundlings on Verion four then,” Keelan said as they left the office.

  “That’s about a quarter of all births, Keelan.”

  “Yeah, but you’re lacking information I have.”

  “Which is?”

  “I’ll tell you later. When we’re out of here.”

  “Why not now?”

  “Because I said so!”

  “Oh, wait, we might be able to get Lewis to check it. Let’s ask. If he says no, then just mimic me, okay.” Mike laughed and turned back to Lewis’ office.

  Lewis sat behind his desk again with his nose buried in work. He barely glanced up. “Did you forget anything?”