by Chris Hechtl
“You shot at me!” Arkangel said indignantly.
Dom rolled his eyes. “I just said, if I'd wanted to kill you, you'd be dead. You're hardly inconspicuous wearing white in the bush you know!” Dom said, shaking his head.
“I'll keep that in mind,” the man in white drawled. It made sense now; the trucks had been Santini's primary targets. He wasn't sure if the old man was quite ready to pull the trigger or not. He talked a big game but …. “Still, you owe me a new suit.”
“Send me the bill,” Dom replied with a snort.
“Don't worry, I will,” Arkangel replied, indignation finally in check. “Now, if that's all settled, can we get down to business? I can't be out too long. They are keeping tabs on me.”
“Which makes me wonder why I'm here at all. I'm still trying to work out if I can trust you or not. You have some of your self-interest in mind; I know that. But you have turned a blind eye to some of our activities. And you obviously found me, so you know more than I'd like yet you didn't tell them. At least I'm assuming that.”
He grimaced. “I might be assuming too much,” he said.
“Dom, it's time you came partially out of the cold so to speak,” Arkangel said, wrapping an arm around the man's shoulders. Dom let him guide him over to a table to sit. He took the seat and was amused to see the man in white take the seat across from him.
“I had my people bring some things in. I'm glad they left them alone,” the man in white said, picking up a bottle off the floor and setting it down on the table in-between the two cups. Dom snorted.
“I'll pour,” Arkangel said, pouring the drinks.
“I'll pass,” Dom said, putting a hand over his glass. Arkangel looked at him. “I've got to keep a clear head when I fly,” he said.
The man in white nodded. He finished his pour and then took a sip of the drink. “Not good without ice, but it is okay I suppose. I do miss whiskey. I'd love a good belt of that over the vodka that our homeworld loves to make,” he said.
Dom wasn't certain if the man in white had provided the alcohol to ply him with, to drug him, or to poison him. Either way it didn't matter. The show of drinking it didn't matter much either; he knew the glass itself could be tainted.
“I love the weather. I like the winter, but from time to time I prefer to be some place tropical when it runs for too long,” the man in white said, holding his glass before he took another drink. He finished it off and then poured himself another.
“I like the winter too. The cold air makes it easier to fly,” Dom admitted.
“You mean the dirigibles,” Arkangel said, as he finished pouring. He set the bottle down and picked his drink up again. “I think you and I both know with tech returning they are going the way of the dinosaur again. You yourself were fazing them out before this recent unpleasantness presented itself,” he said as a pointed reminder.
Dom grunted and then nodded. “True,” he admitted. Santini Air had six left. Well, four, he thought sourly; two had been commandeered by the pirates. The others were kept on the outreaches of the pirate control but only barely. “I wasn't ready to sell off my entire fleet though, nor the basing facilities,” he said.
“Of course not. I believe you were looking into ways and means to apply modern tech to update them and bring them into the modern world. A laudable goal. We all cling to some of our traditions. Why not this one if it still works?”
“The problem is, grav emitters are almost useless with a dirigible. I know the flying city sucks most of them up …,” he shook his head.
“It did. It's gone now,” the man in white said. Dom looked at him sharply. The man in white raised an eyebrow in inquiry. “You didn't hear? The pirates took it out or at least tried to do so when they moved in. Something about tearing it apart for parts. The people there broke the city up into parts on their own to make it harder to hit them. Some went to ground. Others were forced down by the pirates or when they realized they no longer could rely on others to help keep them aloft,” he explained.
“Damn,” Dom murmured. He always loved visiting the flying city. At one time, Protodon had two of them. They were a collection of grav emitters and power supplies, solar panels, and a nice place for a dirigible to dock. He had holdings on the city. He frowned. Operative word there he thought, had.
“So much for that,” he said, staring into the fireplace.
“To business then,” the man in white said.
“Yeah, we are burning daylight. So, whose side are you on?” Dom demanded. “I'm guessing you are on your own side or a mercenary on the side of the highest bidder.”
“A bit of all of the above and more I'm afraid, Mister Santini,” the man in white said calmly, knocking back his drink again. He put the stopper into the bottle's neck. “I know it is hard to believe now, Dom, but the Federation isn't a pipe dream. It is coming. Eventually,” Arkangel promised. “The barbarians will be beaten back.” There was something there, the surety in that statement, something in his eyes …
“And you know this … How?” Dom asked carefully, eying the other man.
“Just trust me, I do,” Arkangel replied. Dom grunted. “I know, I know; trust has to be earned,” the man in white said with a flick of his hand.
“It does,” Dom replied with a nod, crossing his arms in front of him.
“Let's just say, the enemy of my enemy is my friend. And well, keep your friends close but your enemies closer,” Arkangel said. “Sometimes you have to do things you don't like, things you'll hate, to get ahead. To win,” he said.
Dom nodded once. He'd taught that to the kids and his employees often enough. His willingness to roll up his sleeves and pitch in with the dirty jobs made him an effective leader.
“I have a list of targets you can hit, as well as some supplies,” Arkangel said, pushing a piece of paper with a long list of targets on it over to Dom. He waved a hand broadly to a stack of crates and boxes on the other side of the cabin. “They are yours, a gift between friends. A small token of my appreciation, let's say.”
“And what sort of gift do you want in return?” Dom asked warily.
“I want you to do what you're doing of course. But make certain I don't get caught up in the crossfire next time,” Arkangel said.
“I'll think about it,” Dom said humorously. “Why still comes to mind though. Why you are doing this. The risk of getting caught …”
“The risk has its own rewards. I know you and a couple other groups are the best means to hold the pirates at bay or at least to throw them off balance,” Arkangel replied. He turned a thoughtful look to the ceiling as he sat back. “They've obviously done this before. I don't know how often. Logic would say they've done this in Garth, Dead Drop, and other star systems with habitable planets in their neighborhood. What I'm now wondering is, did they bite off more than they can chew here? They sent in a battalion, somewhere between four and seven thousand personnel, not all of them shooters. They've got material support as well and then there is the Fifth Column they've gotten help from,” he said.
“Yeah, them,” Dom growled.
“I'd say they've got about another ten thousand troops there, most untrained. They've been conscripting as well, right now just able-bodied human males.” Arkangel frowned thoughtfully. He turned to look into the fire. “They've divided themselves between their 'cleansing mission' and securing the planet. So, your resistance effort is something they didn't plan on. It's throwing them off balance and sapping them a bit. So is the terrain and tech level of the planet.”
“I see,” Dom murmured.
“You've taken out about a hundred of their troops and about two dozen of the Fifth Column people or conscripts by my estimates.”
“More or less,” Dom replied indifferently.
“Quite a bit more than less I believe. I can't get hard numbers though; if I press too hard, they'll start to wonder why I'm asking,” Arkangel said ruefully. He shook himself and tapped his fingers on the edge of the table. “Can't have that. I c
an't and won't jeopardize my cover,” he said.
“You do realize, if they ever catch me, you could be blown that way?” Dom asked.
Arkangel eyed him for a moment. “Something tells me you're not the talking type, Dom. You'd try to take as many as you could before you went down.”
“Definitely,” Dom growled.
“But accidents do happen, and I've said enough I suppose,” the man in white said, rising to his feet. He picked up his hat and put it on, then picked up his cane. “Miss Santini, would you like to come out and introduce yourself before I leave?” he asked humorously, turning to look at the hidey hole she was in. “Or your Neocoyote friend?” he added.
Dom stiffened in alarm. Thoughts of how the man had seen them, known they were there whirled through his mind.
“No matter. Another time then,” Arkangel said. He tipped the tip of his cane to his hat in a salute to Dom, then to their hiding spot, then left. Dom turned and watched the man go through the door and outside. After a moment, he heard a motor rev and he was gone.
“So much for not knowing we were here,” Jo said in disgust as she came out of her hole. “How the hell did he know?”
“I thought you were going to cover the outside?” Dom asked, looking from Jo to Ed.
“Arturo has the outside with Caitlin. I thought I'd stick around here,” Ed said.
Dom grunted as he rose from his seat. He was a bit stiff; his joints cracked. “Check the gear.”
“He certainly was generous,” Ed said, looking warily at the crates. “I'm wondering about explosives,” he said. “I'm not smelling anything, but that might not mean anything.”
“How the hell …,” Jo repeated herself.
“Later,” Dom said, rolling his shoulders. “Work on it later.” He had his suspicions but wasn't ready to voice them out loud. “Scan that lot for explosives as well as transmitters,” he growled as Corgi came into the room.
“Gotcha,” the electronic tech said, pulling out a handheld wand scanner. He ran it over each package. When he cleared it, Ed took a peek inside.
“Damn, .50 caliber ammo? Where the devil did he get it? Explosive tip? He's got explosives here … detonators …”
“But not wired to each other,” Corgi said. “Nothing's hot. But I did find something interesting,” he said, pulling a pencil-sized device out of a crate labeled as MREs. He held it up. “Transmitter. I'm not sure about the range though,” he said.
“Let me see that,” Dom said, taking the wand and device. He turned the bug around in his hands, then ran the wand over another crate, this one labeled electronic parts. He got another hit.
This one was harder to run down and harder to get out of the crate. As he tried to yank it out, he set the wand down. It reacted when he bumped it. The sharp beep made him pause. He ran it over his arm but it didn't start beeping until he got higher up.
“I'll take that,” Jo said, taking the device. She swept his arm and shoulder until she narrowed down the exact spot where the bug was hidden. “Tricky,” she murmured as she peeled something off of him.
The careful inspection narrowed it down to his right shoulder, right where the man in white had wrapped his arm around his shoulders Dom remembered.
Dom snorted as she peeled the thin, centimeter-sized tape and hair-thin, black wiring off his shoulder. “What are we doing with that? It's obvious the man can't be trusted,” Corgi said, indicating the three transmitters.
“Just destroy them,” Jo said. “I'm sorry I let him talk me into this meet,” she said, shaking her head.
“Don't be. It's a good thing to meet the enemy. Or in this case, the enemy of my enemy who's occasionally a friend,” Dom said, staring at the device. It was pretty complicated, something he hadn't expected on the planet. The question was, where had the man gotten it? And to casually use it … his thoughtful frown deepened.
“He's an information broker. He might not want to turn us over now, but if he's pushed into a corner, he might just to get out of whatever trap he's fallen into. He's a rat,” Corgi growled.
“But he's gotten us supplies so he's a useful rat,” Dom said, eying each of the devices—sophisticated, each a different shape. He wondered what the ranges were. He was pretty certain they weren't Horathian standard issue. He had thought the man in white was the equivalent of Horathian intelligence, but his comments made him uncertain of that … for the moment.
“Fair is fair, we hid when this was supposed to be a come-alone meet,” Ed mused, breaking into Dom's train of thought.
“Trust,” Dom grunted. They looked to him. “I don't know his game. We'll leave these where we can watch them—where you and Arturo can watch them,” Dom said, looking at the Neocoyote. “If the Horathians come, well, we'll have our final answer.”
“Gotcha,” Ed said. “It's nice to be the one laying a trap,” he said. Jo nodded, but she didn't look convinced it was a wise idea. But she didn't say anything in objection to it.
>}@^@{<
They left the transmitters out for a trap in a flat landing spot near a vacant cave. After a week of superstitiously watching and waiting, the man in white and a woman came to the clearing. He turned in place, looking about him until he found the transmitters. “He didn't sweep for them either, just looked around and picked them out. I spread them out too,” Ed said shaking his head as he gave them the report.
“What did he do then?” Jo asked.
“Nothing. He picked them up, stuck them in his pocket, said something about 'well played' or something to that effect, and then turned to me. He seemed to know right where I was. He tipped his cane to his hat, bowed a little, did the same to where Arturo was, then got on the back of the bike and took off.
“Tricky, tricky,” Jo murmured. “I want to know how he knew they were there?” she asked.
Dom sniffed in amused disdain. “Remember his limp? His eye patch? When I swept him for weapons, they didn't go off, but when he laid his arm around my shoulders I noticed it was heavier than normal. I'm betting he's some sort of cyborg,” he mused, rubbing his jaw. “Yeah, it fits.”
“The question is, how he got the implants. Is he a sleeper, you think?” Ed asked.
“I don't know. I'm not sure it's wise to ask him either,” Dom said. “He didn't turn the information over to the Horathians; he actually checked it out himself. Now, did he do that to show us up? Or to show he could trust us not to shoot him?”
“I damn near did,” Ed growled.
“Something tells me I'm glad you didn't,” Dom said. He looked down at the paper list of targets. “I think we've got some more scouting to do,” he said, holding it up and waving it, “and a bit of work to do.”
The others nodded.
>}@^@{<
Over the course of the spring, Arkangel provided them with small parts and more importantly, accurate intelligence. With the intelligence came a list of targets. Dom didn't trust it; he insisted on checking each with his own resources before he acted. Sometimes the intelligence was time sensitive; this he either let slip by or traced but didn't act on. He refused to be rushed into something. “I'm not going to be stampeded into making a mistake. Into a trap,” he adamantly said when Jo protested his letting a shuttle land unmolested.
They raided the Horathians and their helpers at almost every opportunity. One thing Arkangel's intelligence did was alert them of traps. Dom would ordinarily steer clear, but he wasn't sure he wanted to compromise Arkangel's position. They could deliberately feed him intelligence in order to find out if he was a leak or not.
So sometimes he would have Ed set the trap off at a distance. Usually with a sniper shot, though occasionally they'd set up a pit trap or dead fall if they had the time and opportunity.
His group did all their fighting in the outback, avoiding the city and spaceport as much as possible. Along the way, he heard stories of other resistance groups out in the outback. Some were good; some were brutal. The kids who loved to leave “Wolverine” tags were both. So were Shale
and Yun's groups.
Each of them had to hit the targets the man in white specified anyway since many had necessary supplies like food, ammunition, and fuel. Dom tried to trade with the groups. But many hoarded their goods, and those groups who were run by Neos or aliens definitely didn't trust a human.
He frequently had to send Ed to do the negotiating, usually with Arturo or another Neo or alien as backup. On two occasions Orin or Edna backed Ed up. With them Ed ranged out beyond their “territory” to make contact with Red of “El Diablo” fame, but unfortunately, or fortunately depending on how you looked at it, no actual meeting took place. Red put out the word through Ed to stay out of his territory or else. Ed had been pretty shook up but refused to talk about the meeting so Dom took the warning to heart.
Arkangel provided critical need-to-know intelligence that the hills and area around the base had SAM sites. Ed confirmed the intelligence during one of his scouting forays.
“It still doesn't mean he can be trusted,” Ed said when he finished his report. Corgi and Arturo nodded.
“No, but from small things trust can be built upon,” Dom murmured thoughtfully. “He hasn't steered us wrong yet.”
“He did leave tracking devices that first time,” Corgi warned. “He could be building us up for the long drop, lulling us into complacency,” he warned.
Dom nodded. “I think he was getting cute, but I don't know if he'd turn the intel over to the enemy or not. It might have been something of a test; I'm not sure.”
“Ask him.”
Dom snorted. “Pass. I'll probably get a glib answer. We'll call it even,” he said. “Start fresh. But we're definitely not leaving our guard down.”
“Definitely not,” Arturo agreed with a nod. The others nodded in support.
“Glad that's settled,” Dom said, knowing it was nothing of the sort. “So, next target,” he said. “I'm not willing to dance to the man's tune exclusively. If we have our own list, I want to act on it. If the two lists coincide, all the better,” he said.
