Unclear Skies
Page 22
“Easier for everyone,” Jax mumbled. Everyone but himself.
He continued to stare at the box, but nothing else came out. Had the search begun? Or was someone outing him at that moment, talking to ModPol about where he might be? If they really did search the whole place, would they come down this far? Would they crawl through tunnels to get to him? They’d already come farther than they should have by coming to Terroneous, so there was no reason to expect them to leave empty-handed.
It was quiet for a few more minutes, then the speaker barked back to life. “This is Sergeant McManus again, folks.” Through the distortion Jax could make out a taunting, matter-of-fact quality to the tone. “I just thought you should all know that we’ve arrested Director Warpshire for obstructing justice.”
There was a brief pause and Jax’s head felt light. “Warpshire was seen with Jackson in a holofilm that was shot here on Terroneous. Additionally, she has tried to prevent us from entering the facility. We had no choice but to assume she is aiding and abetting the fugitive.”
Jax tried to stand and found he had to grip the desk for support. They were arresting Lealina. How could they arrest Lealina?
He swallowed, his throat felt dry. He put on the headset and pushed the all-call button.
The line was answered quickly. “Hello?”
“It’s Jax. Tell them I’m ready to give myself up.”
“Oh … okay. Are you sure?”
He didn’t even know who he was talking to. It didn’t matter now. “Yes. But only if they agree to release Lealina.”
* * *
“What is that thing?” Thompson asked.
“ModPol,” Dava said.
They lay in the sand at the top of a dune in the middle of the hot wasteland, Bashful Dan’s shimmering invisi-screen wavering in front of them. The device allowed them to see through in one direction, cloaking them from the opposite line of sight. What they could see was a black mar on the white desert sand, a jarring hole of titanium. It was hexagonally shaped and a few dozen meters long.
“It’s a Black Maria.” Dava glanced back at Lucky Jerk. He shrugged. “You know, like a prisoner transport kind of deal.”
Thompson huffed. “It looks like a damn tank.”
“It’s built like one,” he said.
“Stay behind the shield, jackass!” Thompson swatted Lucky as he edged around closer to the top of the dune.
“Okay, sheesh,” he said, slinking back.
Dava shushed them with the closing of her fist and turned her attention back to the ModPol ship, scanning the area with a pair of binoculars. The entrance to some underground facility was barely visible as a gray bump coming up out of the sand. The rear of the Black Maria folded down and a figure stepped out, a rifle held crosswise against his chest with one hand, the other hand on his earpiece. He came down halfway and then stood sideways. The door to the facility opened and three figures came out. One was bound, hands behind his back.
“Here they come,” Thompson whispered. “That our man?”
“Tall, skinny, white as snow,” Dava said, watching the prisoner through the optics. “Gotta be Psycho Jack.”
“How many Pollies?”
“Three that I can see,” Dava said as they walked Jackson up the ramp, his head down, his gait a defeated shuffle.
“Probably a pilot inside,” Lucky said.
“Let’s assume there are a couple inside,” Thompson said. “What do you think, Dava? Should we move on ’em?”
“No fuckin’ way,” Lucky said, too loudly. He lowered his voice to an intense whisper after a look from Dava. “You see the turret on that baby?” he said, pointing at the top of the Maria. Four large barrels mounted on a cone, two to a side. “You go running across the wide-open desert spraying that Tommy-Gun, they’re just going to get inside and lock ’er up. Then they warm up those cannons and turn you into dust.”
Dava sighed. “He’s right. It’s too wide open here.” There was nothing they could do other than a dead run at them, and there was no cover whatsoever.
“I suppose you got a better idea, flyboy?” Thompson said.
Lucky sat up and crossed his arms, then looked down at the Maria and resumed his prone position behind the screen. “Yeah, I do. We go back to the dropship. Up to the starhopper. Tail the Maria out past the gravity field of B-5. They can’t go into subwarp until they clear gravity. Then I pop out in the dogfighter.”
“We only have two dogfighters on the starhopper,” Dava said. She thought back to the argument she had before leaving the secondary Space Waste outpost in Sirius. 2-Bit had been preoccupied with some special cross-system training program that Jansen had cooked up. The captain had refused her request for pilots and ships to bring to Terroneous. Not that she felt she needed them, not for the Misters. But she needed at least one pilot and one interstellar ship to get from Sirius to Barnard, so 2-Bit allowed her that. “And we only have one pilot.”
Lucky huffed. “I can fly circles around that Maria.” He leaned in closer to them and smiled. “And I know its weakness.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Thompson said.
“It looks like a tank but it’s not a war machine,” he said. “It’s a transport. Made to keep its occupants alive above all else.”
“Well, that’s good,” Dava said as she began to slide back down the dune. “Because we mostly want Psycho Jack alive.”
* * *
Even having come out of a cramped, airtight, underground facility, where the air was anything but fresh, the smell in this place was worse. It wasn’t just that it was lived in, that it too was airtight. There was another foulness that Lealina could detect, and it made her want to quit breathing altogether.
She absentmindedly reached for her face to scratch and itch, forgetting she was bound at the wrists momentarily and yanking her own hand painfully. “Dammit,” she whispered. She wanted to cry, but she narrowed her eyes and tightened her face. Her hands flopped back down into her lap.
She was seated on a crate in the middle of a small storage room. All the walls were cabinets, and she briefly entertained the idea of rooting through them, but from the looks of the small slots on each of their doors, she guessed they were locked anyway. It was convincing enough to keep her stuck to her crate. What if she found something in those cabinets? What would she do? No matter what she found, there was no good answer. At best, she might find a weapon. No; that would be at worst. She could get them both killed.
The only door to the room lay tauntingly wide open in front of her. She could see the shoulder of the man on guard in the corridor beyond.
She stared at her hands in the dim light.
What would they do with him?
The ModPol cop who called himself Sergeant McManus came through the open door and she looked up. The man’s frame was large, blotting out the narrow exit. She refused to let him intimidate her. He had the pink skin of a pampered B-threer.
“Seems my hunch was spot on,” McManus said with half a grin. “Jackson likes you. He gave himself up once he found out we’d arrested you.”
“You have no right.” She tried to make her voice firm, but it wavered. A mix of fear and anger. “ModPol has no jurisdiction here.”
He took a step forward, looking down at her. “And who does have jurisdiction here, huh? Who? We’re out in the middle of fucking nowhere.”
“We have a government—”
“You’ve got shit.” He shook his head and turned away from her, as though looking into the distance. “A bunch of councils. Loose treaties. Local constables.”
“But no ModPol.” She was feeling her determination slip away, and her voice got quieter. “ModPol has no authority here.”
He turned to face her again. “ModPol has authority to go wherever the fuck it needs to go.” He jabbed a finger in her direction. “You were harboring a wanted criminal. Wanted by ModPol.” His hands turned up. “And when we’re chasing a fugitive, we go where we damn well want.”
She heard him huff a few times, then laugh, but it sounded less than genuine. He grew so quiet, she looked up to see if he was still there. His face bunched up and he spoke in a low voice. “Lady, we’re all guilty of something.”
She sensed a small opening. “Why can’t you let him go? The real murderer was arrested. Just go back and … and report that you searched Terroneous. Report that you searched, but you never found him.”
He stared at her for a long time then, his eyes seeing something else, something distant. Then he reached for her hands. She flinched and leaned back, and then realized he was deactivating the restraints on her wrists.
“Come on,” he said. “You should say goodbye to him.”
He turned and went to the door. She blinked, unbelieving that he was going to let her go at first. He started down the corridor and she broke the mental locks on her legs and stood and followed him.
They reached another door that opened into a wider space, some kind of cargo bay. Jax stood at the far side, his back to her, facing a row of stasis chambers. A young woman crouched next to him, pressing buttons on a panel. Lealina took a step and McManus put out an arm as she came through the door.
“That’s as close as you get,” he said quietly. Then he raised his voice. “Jackson, turn around.”
Jax’s head lifted slightly, then turned. His eyes locked with hers and he turned fully to her. His fallen face read defeat, but even across the room, she could see the smallest change when his eyes met hers.
“I’m sorry, Jax,” she said. The bay grew quiet. The young woman at the stasis controls carefully stood and stepped away from him. McManus lowered his arm, but put out a flat palm, ordering Lealina to stay where she was.
“Lealina,” said Jax. His throat was dry, breaking his voice. “Are you okay?”
“I’m okay,” she said quickly. “They’re going to let me go.”
“Good.” On this, his voice sounded firmer.
“I’m sorry,” she said again. “I don’t – I don’t know what to do.”
“Don’t do anything,” Jax said. “You did everything you could. I just want you to be safe.”
And she just wanted him to be safe. She just wanted him to be in her arms. She wanted to kick and fight and scream and make them let him go, but she could not. She felt weak. Useless.
She shut it all down. What he needed was not her pain, what he needed was her support. He’d given himself up to save her; he needed to know he didn’t make his sacrifice in vain. “It’s going to be okay, Jax. I’m going to be okay. I have contacts with the Terroneous government. I’ll find a way to get you released. Back to us. Back to Terroneous.”
Back to me.
His mouth opened slightly, forming the barest hint of a smile. “Thank you,” he said, though she knew it was not to thank her for her promises. Those were futile and they both knew it. He was thanking her for their short time together. He was thanking her for saying goodbye.
The air on her cheeks turned cold, and she realized they were wet. McManus gestured at the door. “Okay, that’s enough. Time to go.”
She felt so weak she couldn’t walk, but soon she was stumbling into the hall. McManus hit the door latch and the cargo bay slid from view.
“Damn you,” she managed.
“Listen, lady,” he said. “I’ve got orders. So spare me the waterworks.”
He had one of his men escort her out of the ship in a blur. Then she was standing in the sand, staring at the massive black cube that obstructed the view of the desert. She couldn’t even see any ModPol designations on it. It was just a box. An inexplicable structure that had materialized out of nothing to imprison him.
Within minutes, she heard machinations emanating from the thing. Outer doors sealing, exhaust doors opening, engines powering up. The stupid black cube, blurred through her tears, whining and shuddering to life. Stirring the desert sand into clouds of yellow around it.
She never felt so useless, so helpless. Terroneous was a force of nature; life on the moon was a constant struggle against odds. Everything was a fight for survival. But every struggle could be overcome, every fight could be won. This time there was no way to win, because there was no way to fight.
Or maybe there was a way to fight, and she just didn’t know how. But someone out there did.
When the billowing sands became too much, she finally heeded the shouts from the co-workers behind her and sought shelter back inside the TEOB outpost.
CHAPTER 18
McManus sealed the hatch on the prisoner transport module. Jackson was sedated and wouldn’t be coming out of his box until he reached the ingest bay at Outpost Gamma, where he’d be unwrapped like a present.
He sighed. All that running, only to give up so easily at the end. He expected more of a fight, maybe a chase. It just solidified that the whole ordeal was all Stanford Runstom. Without Runstom, Jackson rolled over like a dog.
The room shifted and he buffered himself against the wall with a grunt. The paddy-wagon had no artificial gravity, which was hard enough to deal with, but Katsumi’s erratic piloting made it worse. He secured himself with the handholds on the wall and picked his way to the bridge.
“What the hell, Cadet?” he blurted as he came through the hatch. “Your driving is going to make me lose my lunch.”
“Just getting into position, Sergeant,” she said, head down, hands busy jumping between controls. “We’ll be ready for sub-warp in twenty-eight minutes.”
“Good.” He picked his way to one of the rear chairs. “The sooner the better. Any contacts?”
“No, sir.” She turned momentarily. “Is the prisoner secure?”
McManus huffed as he strapped in. “How about me? Ask me if I’m secure?”
“Sergeant, we’re going to go from sub-warp to full warp. Prisoner transport regulations—”
“I know the damn regulations, Katsumi. The prisoner is secured in his module and fully sedated.” He lowered his voice and muttered, “Unlike me who has to sit here awake and have my brain fried while we cheat God.”
“You didn’t tell me the target was going to be Jack Jackson.” Her head was down again but her voice was loud and clear.
He grunted. “Why should I have to tell you who the target is, Cadet? And how do you know it’s Jackson?”
She laughed mirthlessly. “A B-fourean on the run? Who else would it be?”
“Don’t worry about it.”
“Plus his girlfriend called him ‘Jax’.”
“I said don’t worry about it.” He could’ve done without the blubbering girlfriend. Not that he cared whether poor Jackson’s heart was broken or not. It wasn’t his job to care. And it wasn’t Katsumi’s either. He decided to focus his energies on berating his pilot. “I brought you on this mission because I needed someone I could trust.”
“Trust, sir?” She turned to look at him. “Then why withhold information from me?”
“Trust to keep to the mission parameters,” he growled. “Which includes keeping your goddamn mouth shut. Cadet.”
She shook her head and went back to her work. “I don’t understand why we’re arresting Jackson. Seems like Officer Runstom proved that Jackson isn’t guilty.”
He considered ignoring her, but heard himself answer anyway. “Innocent men don’t run from the law.”
“They might if they’re chased,” she said, barely loud enough for him to hear.
He scowled at the back of her head. He didn’t give a shit about Jackson. The man was a fugitive, plain and simple. It didn’t matter if he was innocent of the murders, he was guilty of plenty else. And so was Runstom as far as McManus was concerned, but since Runstom was being paraded around like a hero and getting promotions, he would have to settle for the next best thing: arresting Jackson.
He scratched his thigh and tried to tighten his strap, damni
ng the grav-free chairs. It was true that everything about the mission was tight-lipped. His orders had come through on a secure message. He hadn’t spoken to anyone in person. But he was promised a bonus for completing it. An instant promotion to sergeant just for accepting it. And he was given orders to choose his own crew. The paddy-wagon had already been checked out for him, not under his name, but under a code. Finding a few grunt-officers who wouldn’t ask questions was no trouble, but finding a pilot was more of a hassle. In the end he settled on Katsumi only because of her low rank and obligation to subservience. Plus he had to admit, even if she was a bit hard on the controls, she was a damn good pilot.
None of that mattered, he decided. The job went without a hitch. In less than thirty minutes, they’d hit sub-warp, and then warp, and before he could scoop his brains up off the floor they’d be at Gamma and he’d be counting the Alleys all the way to the bar.
“Umm.” Katsumi cocked her head and tapped at her controls. “Sergeant McManus. Contact.”
Probably a ship inbound for Terroneous. “Is it in the database?”
“Yeah,” she said, drawing the word out. “Actually it is. Interstellar-capable ship, Klondike Sailor Mark Three-B. Registered to Nadia Gravitas, a shipping merchant headquartered on B-3.”
“Must be making a delivery,” he said with a yawn.
“This Klondike was reported stolen about sixteen months ago.”
“Uh-huh,” he said, still fiddling with his strap. Then he looked up. “What the – what?”
“Stolen—”
“Prep for evasive action,” he interrupted. “How soon are we going to hit sub-warp?”
She tapped. “About twenty-two minutes, sir.”
“What’s the trajectory—”
“Sir, another contact.”
“Is it hostile, Cadet?” McManus leaned forward against his strap, trying to decide whether or not to relocate.
“It’s a Drake Quadwing 4505. A single-pilot fighter.” She whistled. “Man, look at the specs on that thing. She’s a mover.”
“Yeah, no kidding.” McManus had seen a demonstration of the Drake 4000 series about a year ago when his precinct was considering upgrading the patrol fighters around Outpost Gamma. They’d gone with a cheaper manufacturer, but the Drakes flew circles around everything else.