“How very disappointing. We have six out of seven ayes at the moment,” Maar said. “Would the ascension of the value of your shares not compel you to vote the way your conscious tells you?”
“No, it would not.”
Maar nodded at Kaoz and returned to the chair at the head of the table, “That’s a pity.”
BLAMMM!
Samuel’s chest opened in a hail of blood and fragments of flesh and bone. He slumped to his knees and clutched at his heart, bringing Kaoz’s smoking gun to sight a few feet behind him.
The board members gasped in terror and kept their arms in the air.
Samuel slumped face-first to the ground, dead.
“Six for six. A unanimous decision,” Maar returned to his chair and folded his arms, “Anyone got a problem with that?”
The board members shook their heads with great enthusiasm.
“Good. You can put your hands down, now.”
Crain looked up from the desk and winced at the executed corpse bleeding across the floor. He felt like throwing up as he distributed the papers along to each person around the desk.
“My colleague, Crain, here, would like you to sign these NDAs,” Maar said to the board, “If anyone discovers my whereabouts, I will know it was one of you who told them. There will be ramifications for violating these non-disclosure agreements.”
The board members could barely keep their hands still as they signed the papers.
“Sign them.”
They jumped in their seats as Kaoz hovered over them, “You want me to start executing them one by one, Maar?”
“Kaoz, bad doggy!” Maar joked. “Be nice to our friends.”
Each board member signed the document without reading a single word. It was either that or risk getting shot.
“It’s unlikely we’ll all see each other again, of course,” Maar nodded at Crain to collect the papers. The old man did as instructed and collected them up from each person.
“Sorry. Can I just take this, please?”
Maar watched as he moved on to the next board member, “My colleague, Kaoz, will escort you back to your cars. If you’re feeling nervous about your association with USARIC, then fair enough. I can’t say I’d be surprised.”
Kaoz rounded the six board members up and pointed at the door, “Move.”
“Yes, okay,” they hastened over to the door, hoping not to get killed.
“See you idiots later,” Maar rubbed his hands together and looked at Crain at the other end of the desk, “Good?”
“Good.”
“I’m going insane cooped up in here, man,” Maar kicked the table.
Crain jumped in his seat with fright, “I know y-you are, Maar.”
“You have no idea.”
“You do realize that you’ve just contravened every rule in the Infinity Clause, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“And rendered the Bering Treaty practically useless?”
“Yes.”
“If any of this gets out it might star War World Four.”
“It won’t get out.”
“There are six chances making their way to their cars right now,” Crain slammed the signed documents on the desk. The feeling of guilt tugged at his insides.
“Ah, when Charlie returns with the goods and we’re celebrated as heroes, I’m sure their stock going up by three points at least will dampen the blow.”
“Who else knows what’s going on? Other than them, and you and me?”
“Just this imbecile,” Maar kicked Samuel’s bloodied body, “I don’t think he’s going to open his mouth, though.”
“I want you to know something, Maar Sheck,” Crain backed up to the door, “I knew nothing. Don’t you involve me in this. If anyone asks, I’ll tell them you put me up to it.”
Maar chuckled as he watched Crain exit the room, “Fair enough. Oh, and by the way, can you send some lackey down here to clear this corpse away before it stinks the room up?”
“You’re a madman,” Crain slammed the door behind him.
***
Kaoz watched each of the six board members climb into the back of their waiting limousines. He held his mouthpiece in his fingertips and watched the first two cars drive off.
“This is Kaoz. Do you read me?”
“I read you,” Oxade’s voice came through Kaoz’s earpiece, “Have they left yet?”
“Yes, they’re leaving R&D, now.”
“Good. How did it go?”
“All good. We got a unanimous decision to go and blast Opera Beta into the next multiverse…”
USARIC Headquarters
Cape Claudius, South Texas, USA
“Yes! That’s amaziant,” Oxade punched the air as he made his way into the animal compound. He clutched the grip on his rifle and held out his glove to the panel on the wall.
“Signatures all down?”
“You know it,” Kaoz’s voice beamed into his head.
“How did he get them to agree?”
The door to the animal compound slid open. The illuminated control hub loomed in the middle of the room, “I guess you could say it was his persuasive personality.”
“Ha. He’s got bundles of persuasion, that guy.”
“Look, don’t play around,” Kaoz continued. “Maar wants the team assembled within the hour. Some new recruit is joining you. You’re leaving one week ahead of schedule.”
“Good. Let’s get this show on the road,” Oxade reached the central control deck. He made eyes at a tall woman in a lab coat. She pressed her forearm against a plate glass surface turned to Oxade. A bizarre-looking telescopic monocle took place of her right eye. It somehow complemented her bright purple lipstick.
“Nutrene, where are the subjects?”
“Just loading the capture data into the bank. They’ll be here any moment now,” she looked up at the panel and observed the green light loading across the screen.
“How much damage did the protesters cause?”
“They nearly got everything. If it hadn’t have been for the intervention, they’d know everything.”
Oxade glanced at the technicians at their computers. They turned away and continued working, hoping to avoid contact.
“Yeah, that’s right, you lackeys. Keep crunching those numbers.”
SCREECH! WAIL! GRUNT!
A dozen chimpanzees slammed against their cages in the right-hand corner of the compound. Oxade did his best to block out the noise, “Those damn monkeys, man. I swear to God, I dunno why those activists didn’t just shoot them all.”
“Why don’t you put a bullet in the back of their heads?”
The chimpanzees hopped around, snarling and wailing at Oxade as he made his way past their cages.
“Hold on, good buddy,” Oxade turned to them and clanged the butt of his shot-gun along the cage bars, further antagonizing the animals, “Hey! You vicious turd bags. Shut the hell up.”
Kaoz’s chuckles flew through the earpiece, having heard his colleague’s malicious taunting.
Oxade arrived at the second of three doors, “Byford?”
“Don’t call me by my surname. You’re not the boss of me.”
“Not true. I’m your new captain, sweetheart.”
“Really? We’re on?”
“Yup. Now, let’s get these little critters returned to their cages.”
Nutrene’s monocle twisted at the console as she hit the green button. The wall by the computers slid into the ground, startling the staff at their workstations.
“Right, good people. Keep back. Let the vehicles in, please.”
The wall opened out into the delivery area of the parking lot. Two forklift trucks rolled in on their conveyors. Each carried a metal cage rammed to the brim with captured felines.
Oxade approached the second bay and pulled the door across its sliders, “Offload them here.”
The trucks stopped by the main console and lowered their forks to the ground.
SCHWUMP.
The driver of the first truck hopped out and kicked the cage off the metal grid, “Thirteen in this one, and I think twenty or so distributed in the others.”
“Be careful with them,” Nutrene counted the cats. She scored the numbers off on her forearm with her fingertip, “So, that’s eight… nine… ten—” she arrived at the tenth cat. An angry-looking, white Japanese bobtail. They caught each other’s gaze.
Oxade moved next to Nutrene and nudged her on the shoulder, “Everything okay?”
“Yes, it’s just…” Nutrene couldn’t tear her eye away from the ball of white fluff, “That’s Suzie Q-Two. One of the finalists in the Star Cat Project.”
“So?”
“I didn’t realize USARIC was keeping her here. She should have been returned to her owner after it was all over.”
“Who cares? Let’s get the ugly balls of fluff back in their cages.”
Nutrene looked at the driver with suspicion, “Did you make physical contact with any of these felines?”
“No,” the driver nodded at Oxade, “When he caught ‘em, we just bundled them up.”
A dozen lab coated USARIC officials pulled the cages from the first truck and moved them to the second bay.
“Damn it,” Nutrene scanned the cages on the second forklift, “I’m only seeing a couple dozen here. Where are the rest?”
“We couldn’t find them,” Oxade said. “We had ten units out scouring Port D’Souza. This is all we could find—"
"—All you could find? There’s at least thirty unaccounted for.”
Nutrene’s monocle focused on the cats in the second set of cages. Her Heads Up Display scanned each of their faces. The bottom-left corner of her lens displayed the total - 48.
“So, forty-eight there, and twenty-two in the first set,” she recorded the number on her forearm with her lit-up digit, “That’s exactly thirty missing subjects.”
“They’re out in the wild,” Oxade said. “They’ll never survive on their own. If they don’t starve, the freeway will take care of them.”
“Are you out of your mind?” Nutrene caught the tardy pace of the workers removing the cages to the second compound, “Hey, get moving. I want them bundled up and stored. Faster.”
She returned to the console and pressed her forearm to the glass panel, “These aren’t your ordinary, everyday subjects. We need those missing thirty accounted for, dead or alive. Preferably dead.”
“Why, what’s wrong with them?”
Nutrene closed her eyes and ignored the question outright. The panel absorbed the ink from her forearm and fed it onto the screen, “We’re leaving in a week’s time.”
“So I’ve heard.”
“We need to find the escapees and bring them back.”
“Why? What’s wrong with them?”
Port D’Souza
South Texas
Somewhere near Interstate 35
An elderly man named Glenn Logan enjoyed a bottle of Rollneck Kojak beer on the porch of his bungalow. He’d been drinking for a few hours by now. The effects of the alcohol kicked in a while ago.
The full moon hung in the air along with the stench of hops from his umpteenth bottle of beer.
There weren’t many cars at this time of night. The occasional lorry passed by. On the rare occasion an Individimedia GPS failed to work, he’d have lost drivers knock on his door asking for directions to Houston. Or the nearest gas station.
Tonight, something caught his eye in the middle of the road.
“Huh? Wassat?” he tried to focus on the thing fifty feet from his porch, “Is th-that roadkill or somethin’?”
He staggered to his feet and tipped the remainder of the bottle into his mouth. Nary a drop produced, he threw the glass in the direction of the thing lying in the middle of the road.
“Gaw, nuthin’ but damn roadkill,” he burped and wiped the end of his sleeve across his wet lips.
The thing shifted around and slapped its tail to the ground.
Little did Glenn know that the animal in the road was an Egyptian Mau. The moon bounced off its pupils and projected a sliver of green light at Glenn.
The Mau whined and continued to slap her tail against the tarmac.
“Hey, you,” Glen shouted at her and took hold of the porch railing for balance, “Get off the highway. Y’all gonna get yersel’ killed.”
“Muuhhh…” Mau murmured as a white light enveloped her face. A pair of headlamps from an approaching car folded over the bump in the road.
“What the hell?” Glenn blinked a few times at the oncoming car, “Oh Jeez, no. Hey, you. Pussycat, get off the road.”
“Grrr….” Mau returned to the surrounding trees and licked her paw.
The headlamps belonged to a purple SUV which sped along the freeway. The driver blared his horn, trying to coax the cat off the road.
Glenn looked left and then right. The Egyptian Mau was ten seconds away from getting mauled by the tires of the SUV.
“Hey, cat. Move it.”
Mau pressed her front paws to the tarmac and lifted her behind into the air, determined to take the SUV head-on, “Meeooowww…”
BEEEEEEEP!
The driver slammed on the brakes, throwing the car to a screaming stop inches away from the Mau’s nose.
“What the heck is goin’ on around here?”
The lone driver kicked his door open and planted his feet on the ground. He looked over the roof his car and spotted Glenn watching the scene from his porch.
“Hey, mister. Is this your cat?”
“Nu-huh”, Glenn shook his head in a fit of inebriation, “She ain’t mine.”
The driver turned to Mau and tried to shift her away with his boot, “Go on, get outta the way, you dirty little varmint—”
A cacophony of violent "meows” whirled around the driver’s head. They appeared to be coming from the trees.
“Huh?”
One by one, a variety of felines trundled out from behind the trees and made their way onto the road.
Mau extended her claws and scraped them along the road, gearing up to attack.
“Grrrr…”
“What in the hell is going on here?” The driver stood still on the road as the cats swarmed toward him like an angry and fluffy virus, “No, no. Y’all stay away from me, ya hear?”
“Screeeeeeech,” The Mau launched into the air with her paws out. She buried her claws through his shirt and clung as hard as she could, kicking and gnashing away at his face.
“Ahh, gerrof me!”
The cats meowed as they swarmed the still-running car. Two white American bobtails bolted into the driver’s side. The remainder hopped through the window and swarmed around the interior of the car.
Glenn squeezed his eyes shut in disbelief. He looked at the half-full bottle of beer in his hand, “Jeez, I drink too much.”
The driver did his best to fight off the Mau but it was no use. His behind slammed against the car as she ravaged his face, “Roowwaaarrrr!”
VROOM! VROOM!
One of the white Bobtails pressed her front paws on the gas pedal, forcing the car to shunt forward.
“Meow,” Mau climbed onto the driver’s seat, leaving its previous occupant screaming on the road.
She ran the side of her head along the stick shift, signaling three of her tribe to push it into first gear.
The car jolted forward once again.
“My car. They’re taking my damn car,” the driver pushed himself to his knees, “Someone call the cops.”
An intense whirlwind of squealing and meowing came from inside the car as it rolled forward.
Mau wrapped her claws around the sticky steering wheel. She meowed at the two white bobtails to apply the gas. Two silver Siamese cats joined them and threw their weight onto the pedal.
The car bolted along
the road as Mau held the steering wheel in still, “Meeeooow…”
The car picked up speed and threatened to veer off the path. Fur spat into the air as the wind rolled through the opened passenger window.
Trying to stave off the effects of drunkenness, Glenn stepped down his porch and made his way over to the driver, “Jeez, did you see that?”
“Of course I saw them,” the driver picked himself off his knees and cupped his bleeding eyes, “Call the police. They’ve taken my car.”
Glenn threw his left arm into the air and pulled his sleeve back. He spoke into his Individimedia ink, “Hello? P-Police?”
The ink swirled around to reveal STPD - South Texas Police Department.
“Thank you for contacting the STPD,” a friendly voice came from the pinpricks in his wrist, “Your call is important to us. Please wait while we find you an agent.”
The purple SUV’s rear lights shot off the road and into the fields in the distance.
The driver brushed himself down and pushed Glenn by the shoulder, “Why didn’t you stop them?”
“Why didn’t you s-stop them—?”
“—This is the STPD. How may I direct your call?”
“Ah, I, uh—” Glenn swallowed and waded around on the spot, “P-Police?”
“Yes, caller. This is the STPD connecting on your Individimedia channel.”
SCH-PRRAANNGG!
The SUV crashed against a giant tree. A cloud of smoke billowed out from under the battered hood. The left indicator blinked on and off as the cats made their escape.
“Caller?”
Glenn couldn’t believe what he was seeing.
He double-took and looked at his forearm, “Uh. You’ll never guess what’s j-just h-happened. A bunch of cats has c-comm—” he spluttered and tried to keep from laughing, “Commandeered a… c-car.”
“Very funny, caller,” the voice sounded extremely put-out, “Please stop wasting our time. Good evening.”
Chapter 4
Pink Symphony
The tree that wasn’t a tree had grown in size since its re-emergence from the ocean. Standing one thousand feet in height, it sprouted a second stump and root and now resembled a nightmarish hell of pure black.
Star Cat: The First Trilogy (Infinity Claws, Pink Symphony, War Mage) Page 49
