The phone rang in his ear piece. Donovan imagined Nona at home, sitting at the desk with her computer, getting down her last thought before picking up.
The skycar rose from the ground and floated out of the parking garage. The driver, whom Donovan couldn’t see due to a dark partition, kept to the speed limit of ninety-five miles per hour while they were within the city. They were on a private military channel. Donovan could tell because there was no one flying at the same altitude as they were for miles around. The driver kept at a steady speed without once having to slow down for other skycars.
Finally, Nona’s voice came through his earpiece, sweet and friendly but a little raspy.
Donovan explained the situation to her.
“Okay,” she said, keeping the same upbeat tone.’ “Be careful. Please.” Donovan knew the cadences of her voice too well. She was trying to sound calm, unworried, but he could hear the stress behind the façade. She knew that this was big. Who knew what danger he was flying toward?
“I will,” Donovan assured her. “I don’t know how long I’ll be gone yet, but I’ll let you know as soon as I find out. Within…”
“Within limits.” Nona finished the sentence for him. “Call me as soon as you can.”
“Okay. I love you.”
“Me, too.”
He was about to hang up when he remembered what else he’d wanted to say. “Take some more of those immunity boosters!”
The call disconnected. He wasn’t sure she had heard. He decided not to call her back—she needed to concentrate on her work. The sooner she finished, the sooner she could focus on getting better. Besides, Nona knew how to take care of herself. She had grown up in the slums of Bakersfield where advanced technology was scarce. In that city she had been exposed to all kinds of things—the least of which were bacteria and viruses. Her family couldn’t afford Liao Inserts with iMed, so they often got sick. It was a dangerous life, but it made her immune system strong.
Donovan released a long breath. Nona would be fine. He was more concerned about the fact that she was beginning to hate his job more and more. When the kids were still in the house it wasn’t so bad. She was always busy with them while he was away. Now he frequently left her to an empty, lonely home.
Nona tried to hide it, but Donovan knew. She wanted him to work a desk job, but he was too young—only sixty-five. He had at least another eighty years ahead of him. He couldn’t spend all that time shuffling papers. He needed air. He needed action. It put Nona in a state of almost constant worry, but Donovan knew he would be okay. He was the best at what he did. He had yet to let a target escape. Donovan had hoped that the Santa Monica terrorist case would last long enough to really patch things up. Then this.
On an impulse, he called his oldest son.
“Hey, Dad. What’s going on?” Jason asked.
“I’m getting pulled from Santa Monica for an assignment. I don’t know how long I’ll be gone. Your mother’s sick. Can you check up on her while I’m gone?”
“Yeah, I can do that. You sure everything is okay?”
Jason must have heard something in his voice. “Yeah, everything is fine.”
“When are you going to get an Insert old man? You know how it looks, working for Liao and my own father won’t even buy my designs?”
It was the same thing Jason said every time they talked.
“You’ll get over it,” Donovan said. “I already told you I’m not getting one. I can’t be that accessible.”
“Honestly, Dad. They’re harmless.”
“You talk to your brother lately?”
“Not since last week.”
“Get in contact with him while I’m gone, too,” Donovan said. “I need you to make sure everyone is taken care of.”
“All right, Dad. Is that all?”
“That’s all. I’ll talk to you later.”
“Okay, ‘bye.”
Donovan hung up the phone and breathed a sigh of relief. He couldn’t leave so suddenly without knowing that someone would take care of Nona if she needed it. She would be too prideful to call one of the boys for help.
Once the skycar got beyond the city limits, the driver slowly increased speed until they were going as fast as the car could take them. Donovan tried getting more information from the two soldiers, but they wouldn’t say anything more.
I apologize, sir. You’ll just have to wait until we get to the base.
I’m afraid I can’t tell you anything more, sir.
Always so respectful and polite but never spilling a single word of what they knew, which was probably nothing, anyway. They were only Corporals.
Donovan settled for looking out of the window at the vast forest below. There were always lush natural environments between the human cities. He thought he spotted a group of bears somewhere down there, but they were too high up for him to be sure.
When he tired of the scenery Donovan swiped his finger over the screen on his watch, occupying himself with science articles online. He expanded the screen so that the tiny projector turned on and gave him a bigger, vertical version of the site. The articles floated just above the watch, measuring about two-by -our inches.
He was just beginning to read a piece titled Commercial Human Teleportation: The Technology Exists, so Why Doesn’t the Product? when they reached their destination. The trip had taken only fifteen minutes. They were one hundred miles outside Santa Monica. At first, they couldn’t see the military airport, though the skycar’s scanners could sense its presence.
The driver hovered over empty space for a moment as the security team on the ground deactivated the Mirage Builder technology. The perfect image of a patch of forest in the middle of nowhere gave way to a large clearing. The airport was utilitarian to say the least. There was one wide strip of cement to mark the runway and a couple of brick buildings for the military personnel to complete their work.
There was a jet positioned at one end of the runway, engine humming quietly. Donovan was ushered up its steps. His escorts departed then and he was left alone with the pilot. Donovan left the woman to fly the jet in peace. He didn’t feel like talking. He was too busy wondering what could be going on. Thankfully, she offered him no conversation.
General McGregor had pulled him away from home for missions with little to no notice before but never without reason. He was almost tempted to call him and demand an answer, but he knew that would get him nowhere. It may even get him killed, or, at a minimum, fired. He had to be calm and rational, as his job always demanded. He took a deep breath and forcibly relaxed his muscles one by one.
Could it have something to do with the case he was already working? Was Giovanni’s cell larger than they had thought? Had they unwittingly discovered a link to the nationwide underground network of x5 terrorist they’d been hunting for so long?
The thought of it filled him with excitement. It was the rush he always felt when he discovered a clue that would lead him to his target. It was like the euphoria one felt, after working on it for so long, when a puzzle or enigma is solved through a sudden stroke of genius.
Yes, maybe that was it. It would certainly warrant the immediate summons. After thinking about it for several long minutes, Donovan concluded that the terrorists had to be the answer. There was no reason for General McGregor to call him away from his current case. Donovan was the best Brigadier General in the Army, but there were plenty of other qualified soldiers of the same rank.
Donovan found himself relaxing a little. He let his mind wander over the events of the night before. He couldn’t think of any details about the boy he had captured that gave any clues as to who specifically he worked with. The x5 terrorists never carried I.D.—no technology whatsoever unless it was a homemade weapon—and they never showed up in the databases either.
The Organizers—those that kidnapped children and handled the bureaucratic side of x5—raised the Attackers—those that were sent to blow up buildings and assassinate important government officials—in secre
t from the government. The organizers led ordinary lives on the surface, but in their basements and attics they brought up little terrors who, if they survived their missions, would grow up to be menaces to their fellow citizens.
What had Giovanni said to the interrogators to get the General so riled up? Donovan knew he’d made the right decision about him—you couldn’t give criminals second chances.
But still he wondered, who was the boy’s family? Had he been born into x5 or had he been snatched? Was there a couple out there somewhere still grieving for the disappearance of their child, wondering how they could have let him out of their sight, even for a moment?
Donovan knew the condition they kept the child Attackers in. He had raided enough of the places—they had rags for clothes, leftovers for meals, and drugs to make them docile or angry as needed. In less than a few years the Organizers could make a child’s brainwashing absolute, but underneath the numbing confusion of drugs, their spirits were utterly tortured.
Donovan had to admit that he felt deeply sorry for those kids. He had advocated for treatment over punishment harder than anyone. The military had tried rehabilitation for terrorists under the age of thirty, but it had never worked. When he was out in the field, Donovan had to harden his heart.
Bitterly, he remembered what had come of his old acts of kindness, of sympathy. The first time was twenty years ago, when he was a Sergeant Major. He had worked x5 cases then, too. In the room temperature atmosphere of the jet’s cabin, he could recall the cold night so clearly that it gave him goose bumps.
The fog had been thick in the city of Bakersfield that night.
He could barely see three yards ahead of him. It was late, but there were still people on the streets, hanging out, drinking, gambling, or selling their bodies for housing and food. From the sidewalk the cars on the street were mere shadows unless they drove past in the right hand lane. Streetlamps were almost useless.
Donovan walked the avenues of the giant slum city, pulling his hoodie tight around his cold ears. His brand new, army-issued sneakers squeaked with every step. It made him feel exposed, not only because of the noise, but because they were so uncomfortable. Would he be able to fight in these if he needed to? He couldn’t believe that people spent money on these in real life.
He scanned the streets for his target, doing his best not to look too hard at any one person. He was after a young girl—an attacker. She was only a baby, really—the person who had filed the report with the army described her as nine years old. That anyone could hold this girl hostage and load her with drugs was sickening.
Donovan had convinced his superiors that he should capture her alive and take her to a psychiatric ward. They had agreed. For the first time he was eager to find his target because he wanted to help, not harm, the person. As far as the army knew, she hadn’t committed any crimes yet—had not been set on innocent people like a trained dog.
The informant had given the army an address. Donovan navigated his way to it using his watch, which was strapped higher up his arm, hidden beneath the sleeves of the hoodie, and his usual tiny speakers. People around here couldn’t afford skycars, let alone watches, or even the older technology of cellphones.
Though the United States outlawed groundcars in all fifty states, they had to make some exceptions for those who couldn’t do better—the city of Bakersfield was littered with them. The few skycars Donovan had seen belonged to the Bakersfield Police Department. The houses, too, reflected the general squalor—they were all one or two stories, no more than five or six at maximum. These people took up a lot more space than they needed. The whole place was a boiling pot of pollution and inefficiency.
Donovan closely observed the groups that walked past him, just in case the little girl was out tonight. He could easily miss her. There were tons of kids drifting around despite the late hour.
Finally, Donovan arrived at the rundown house where the girl supposedly lived. The structure looked as if it were on its last splinter—most of the houses did. It might tumble to the ground at the slightest breath. Someone had boarded up the windows. If he hadn’t been informed beforehand, Donovan would have thought that no one lived there at all.
The informant had said that she was the only child here. These Organizers were recently initiated and weren’t fully trusted with the care of attackers just yet. Donovan glanced quickly around himself. No one seemed to be paying him any particular attention. He seized the moment and darted into the shadows on the side of the house. Luckily there was no gate and no dog.
He tried to find an opening in one of the windows so that he could see inside the house. The boarder had done a perfect job—he could glean nothing of the interior.
Donovan shrugged to himself.
Well, guess I’ll have to go it blind.
He wished he had some kind of backup. Even an inexperienced Private would have done fine. But, along with the rest of the military, the Army and Space Force had done nothing but shrink in size since the peace treaties of 2085. War was obsolete and by extension, so was the military as it existed at that time. The U.S. Army had now adopted the Space Force—the part of the military that dealt with threats via satellite hacks and space ship attackers. Soldiers were few and far between. And they had the hardest job—finding terrorists, anarchists, and developers of biological weapons who didn’t work under the authority of the government.
Donovan was often forced to work alone. It wouldn’t be so bad to go in first if there were people waiting to back you from the trenches. When you were the first and last person to enter enemy territory, anything could happen. Donovan had to rely primarily on stealth. He had to get in and out quickly. Any delays could see him killed.
With a calming, deep breath, Donovan rushed the back door and kicked the area above the knob with all his might. Despite the decrepit look of the house, the door had been secured with several locks. Donovan’s powerful kick sent the door sailing several feet into a big dark room.
A rustling sound came from somewhere ahead of him. From the way the sounds echoed around the walls, he guessed that there were people in a back room. He turned on the light on his e-gun, shining it rapidly into every dark space, eyes scanning his environment quickly and efficiently. The place was completely filthy. Broken dishes and torn furniture lay everywhere.
Form the back room came a hulking shape. It was a man twice Donovan’s weight. Heavy flabs of stomach rolled down the front of his body. He was mostly bald, with only a few strands of hair clinging to the side of his face. His large white t-shirt was covered in greasy stains.
The man held an old fashioned .32 caliber revolver. Donovan wasn’t sure who he expected to hurt with that thing. He pointed it vaguely at Donovan while he used the other hand to cover his eyes from the light. This man was an Organizer?
“Who are you?” he said in a wheezy voice that he strained to make loud. “Come any closer to my family and I’ll shoot!”
“Where’s the girl?” Donovan said evenly. “Give her to me.”
“What girl? There ain’t no girl here! Get out of my house or I’ll shoot.”
“I’m not going anywhere until you hand the child over. I know you have her. You stole her from a family on the west side.” Donovan held his gun steady, ready to fire if he sensed danger.
An older woman’s voice came from behind the man’s girth. She sounded like she smoked a lot of cigarettes. Donovan could just barely see a piece of her through the doorway. “We ain’t got no kids here. Please, man, don’t kill us. Just leave our house. We won’t even complain about the door.”
Suddenly doubtful, Donovan took a step back. “Why would someone tell me that the girl was here?”
“We don’t know!” the woman said, desperate. “People ‘round here always stirring up some trouble. Maybe they thought you’d kill us and then they could have our stuff.”
Donovan raised a skeptical eyebrow. “Got a boatload of diamonds do you?”
The man looked at the woman angrily. �
�Shut your mouth, girl,” he whispered.
It was instinct.
Donovan acted on his most basic nature. Something just wasn’t right. He rushed forward and hit the man solidly in the throat, crushing his windpipe. The gun dropped from his fingers and he slid along the wall to the floor, landing on his side. He clasped his throat as if that would reopen the airways.
The woman was quick—she dove for the gun. She raised it above her, shooting wildly toward the light of Donovan’s gun.
The bullets landed in the walls and ceiling. The woman found herself out of ammunition.
Donovan kicked the gun from her hand. Instantly, she reached for another weapon, and her fingers clasped around a shard of glass.
She lunged forward. In one swift movement Donovan slid his foot forward, unbalancing her, and used her own weight to push her to the floor.
Donovan tackled her, holding the arm with the weapon away from his face. She was surprisingly strong. She screamed and kicked at him, her rancid breath blowing into his face.
“You dirty bastard! You killed my husband! You kidnapping bastard, trying to come for our little girl!”
It was the smell more than anything that almost made Donovan let go.
He held his breath and pushed his full weight onto her. He was too heavy on her chest for her to breathe. He risked releasing the weapon-free hand.
As soon as he let it go, she reached for his face.
But Donovan was a highly trained soldier. He was too fast for her. Before she even knew what was happening, he pushed two fingers firmly into the side of her neck, knocking her out cold. She wouldn’t wake up for a couple of hours.
Donovan rolled over onto his back, sweat dripping over his face. He allowed himself only two seconds to recover. He jumped to his feet, waving the light of his gun back and forth over the house. He turned full circle twice before he decided that no one else was going to attack him in the main room.
He edged down the hallway, stepping over the fat man who was still struggling to breathe and keeping his back to the walls. He searched each room, the silence pressing down on his ears as he crept around.
The Legend of Things Past (Beyond Pluto SciFi Futuristic Aventures Book 1) Page 3
