Mars Colony Chronicles (Books 1 - 5): A Space Opera Box Set Adventure

by Brandon Ellis

  Ozzy pushed her hand away, and glared at Lyra. “Of all the people you could have hired, you hire her?”

  Lyra licked her paw and wiped it on her neck. “She was the only one who would do it. Everyone knows you’re the most wanted man on Mars and—”

  “What do you mean I’m the most wanted man?”

  “Jonas Moon has every MMP Agent looking for you on Mars. He put you on the most wanted list the moment he found out you didn’t kill every Dunrakee on Earth. He then raised you to first on that list after you escaped your death sentence.”

  Ozzy shrugged. “That’s my life in a nutshell.”

  The cavern opened up and the butterscotch sky came into view. Zeld pushed the throttle forward, and they shot into the sky.

  A large city was upon the horizon, glowing the many blue hues the city’s graviton domed shield gave off.

  Ozzy cocked his head to the side. “That’s Gale Crater City.”

  “Sure is, sweet-lips,” responded Zeld. “When you gonna give me a taste of your lips, anyway?”

  Ozzy ignored her. “Why are we going back to Gale Crater City?”

  “That’s where your brother is right now,” replied Lyra. “But one thing: I’m not sure he’s going to want to come with you. It may take some convincing.”

  Ozzy figured, since his brother had changed, most likely at the hands and experiments of Jonas.

  They approached the city quickly, and it loomed in front of them.

  Static came over the com line. “S-4 Jumper, what is your ID and passcode?”

  Zeld slowed the craft into a hover just in front of a red concrete structure attached to the graviton dome’s cleaning ports.

  “Sonya Zeld is my ID, and passcode is Sexy994.”

  Ozzy reached forward and muted the com line. “Why are you giving your true identity?”

  “Copy that, Sonya Zeld. You’re clear for landing.”

  The cleaning port opened, and Zeld eased Relic into the wide and tall port.

  Ozzy v’d his brows. “You’re a criminal. You shouldn’t have access with your own name.” Something wasn’t right. But what was new?

  “They changed things. If you were around me more, you’d know how all the forbidden archaeologists besides yourself have been pardoned by Jonas Moon from any crimes and punishment,” said Zeld.

  Ozzy snorted. That was nonsense. Yet, Zeld didn’t show any sign of joking. “Lyra,” inquired Ozzy, “Is that true?”

  “Yes. He did it shortly after he became the High Judge, mostly to help you, Ozzy. He wasn’t expecting you to return from Earth without completing his mission.”

  Relic shuttered when Zeld landed in the cleaning port. The outside doors slammed shut, echoing across the structure. Water, like a shower, sprayed the craft to rid it of any radiation perchlorates. Anything and everything that was cleaned off the craft were swallowed down the floor’s many drains.

  The door into the city opened, and people were walking in and out of the flyway port, minding their own business.

  “Where do we go from here? You have my brother’s location?” asked Ozzy.

  Zeld pressed the ramp button and it extended, clanking when it hit the ground. Zeld then stood, and elbowed Ozzy out of the way. She hurried passed him and out of the cockpit.

  Ozzy clapped his hands. “Hello, Zeld?” She was acting even more odd than she usually did. “Are we following you? Is that the plan?”

  No response.

  She climbed down the ladder. Ozzy walked out of the cockpit and leaned over the second deck’s railing, watching her move quickly toward the exit ramp.

  “Zeld?” he bellowed.

  She disappeared out of the ship.

  Ozzy turned. “Lyra, where is she going?”

  Lyra stood, her ears drawn back. Never a good sign. “I don’t know.”

  Something was amiss.

  Lyra walked out of the cockpit and halted next to Ozzy. She eyed the open ramp. “I don’t know where she went, but I’ve been tricked and so have you.”

  “How was I tricked?”

  “You don’t see it? She led us into a trap, that bitch of Orion’s goat.”

  Ozzy shifted his eyes to the ramp. He went rigid. “Lyra, of all people, I can’t believe you trusted her.”

  Lyra took out her weapon, pointing it at the ramp. “I’ve been double crossed.”

  Ozzy pulled out his sidearm. “Don’t let it get to you. It can really sting if you do.”

  Jonas Moon was walking up the ramp with several MMP agents in front of him, and Lou in the rear.

  22

  Tagus Valles, Mars

  “Lou,” hollered Ozzy. “What are you doing?”

  He didn’t know what else to say. Lou hadn’t only turned on Ozzy, he’d essentially turned to the criminal side, helping the very man that wanted Ozzy dead.

  Lou stood beside Jonas, his eyes forward, his face expressionless. Ozzy eyed the rest of the agents, and they too were stoic, expressionless, and stood like statues, their muscles as if chiseled by the greatest artist Mars had to offer.

  Those weren’t MMP agents. Those were warriors, and from the looks of them, they were trained to kill. These soldiers were nothing of the likes Ozzy had ever seen.

  Jonas stared at Lyra like she was a demon from the Martian underworld. “I trusted you.”

  Lyra hissed, her eyes like daggers. “You’ve become a politician, Jonas. When that happened, you should have realized the crime syndicate’s trust in you faded like gas in the wind.”

  Jonas threw his arms out, clearly angry at Lyra’s comment. “I’m an acting politician. I’m here for the people, Lyra.”

  Lyra let out a chuckle. “Oh, darling. You are far from acting. When I showed you that the Dunrakee were well on their way to Mars and with fleets that will easily topple your race, you ignored it.”

  Jonas’s eyes narrowed, his eyes beaming white hot hate. “I didn’t ignore it. I am in the process of creating a counter to their attack with these new soldiers I’ve enhanced. There are many more like this.”

  “A hundred of your soldiers would last ten minutes against the amassed Dunrakee fleet. You need to take the Martian Marine fleet and get every human off this planet, and now. You don’t have much time,” yelled Lyra, her fingers squeezing the railing.

  “We will stay. We will win.” He glanced at the troop around him. “Everyone, kill Lyra. And Lou, kill your brother.”

  The warriors opened fire. Ozzy grabbed Lyra and dove into the cockpit, landing chest first. Lyra fell next to him. Photon blasts rang loudly, pinging the walls.

  “This way,” said Ozzy, crawling quickly toward his cockpit seat.

  Lyra crawled after him. “Darling, you’re crazy. We’ll be sitting ducks in here.”

  Boots clanged on the storage bay floor on the deck below. The enhanced warriors were running toward the ladder.

  Ozzy punched in a code on a panel at the base of his chair. He pushed the seat and it slid backward, exposing a hole. “Hurry,” said Ozzy, motioning for Lyra to jump down a tube.

  Lyra’s eyes went from Ozzy to the hole, and back to Ozzy. “An escape?”

  “Just get in.”

  Lyra rushed toward Ozzy, and placed her feet in the hole and her hands on the edges.

  “You’ll slide down the tube to safety,” informed Ozzy.

  Lyra lifted her hands in the air and scooted her butt off the edge, and disappeared down the tube into darkness.

  Boots clanked on the upper deck.

  The soldiers were coming closer.

  Ozzy dangled his legs inside the tube.

  A man rounded a corner and aimed his weapon. Ozzy dropped into the tube just as a bright light flashed from a rifle’s muzzle.

  Ozzy slid at a quick pace. He brought his jump suit’s cuff to his lips. “Relic,” Ozzy said, “close cockpit chair.”

  The chair moved back into position and clicked shut.

  Ozzy let out a sigh of relief. His was safe, for now.

  He pu
t his head back, the smooth slide cold against his back. A moment later he launched off the slide and crashed into Lyra, and tumbled onto a soft mattress.

  Lyra pushed him away and stood next to the mattress. She sniffed her arms and hands. “My Mars, Ozzy. Would you ever consider washing the mattress?”

  Ozzy pushed off the mattress, and smelled his hands as well. “Yeah, it’s been a while since I’ve been down here.”

  Lyra looked up the tube. “And there is no way they can get down here?”

  “They could get a diamond tipped jigsaw and cut their way through the base of the chair, but the code? They’ll never hack those numbers and letters.”

  Around them were tools, wires, pipes, and the landing skid wells.

  “What do we do now?” questioned Lyra.

  Ozzy strolled to a wall. He pounded it with a fist. A long and wide drawer popped outward. He reached in, pulling out a rifle and tossed it to Lyra.

  She caught it, and studied it. “A PR-14, Photon Rifle.” She gave him a snarky look. “Are we hunting birds?”

  “Trust me,” responded Ozzy, taking out a second rifle. “These hit you and they hurt.”

  Her lips curled in dissatisfaction. “But do they kill?”

  “Yeah.” He shrugged. “You know, squirrels and mice.”

  Her shoulder’s drooped. “So when they get down here, we’re dead. We’ll shoot, and they’ll laugh at the welts and bruises these weapons will cause them.”

  “Ozzy,” came Jonas’s voice.

  Ozzy jumped. “Where the hell did that come from?”

  Lyra grabbed Ozzy’s wrist. “Your cuff.”

  “You’re shitting me.” Ozzy brought the cuff to his mouth. “How did you get this com channel?”

  “You turn yourself in. We kill you, and your daughter lives,” said Jonas. “And maybe your brother.”

  “What did you do to Lou, Jonas?”

  “Nothing you need to know.”

  Ozzy spit on the floor and scuffed the ground with the toe of his boot. “Jonas,” said Ozzy, pausing for an instant. “What happened to us? We used to be buddies.”

  “You’ll always be my buddy, Ozzy. But things have changed, because you have changed. I would have killed the Dunrakee on Earth and saved my damn people. And it never occurred to me that you would become a traitor and choose the Dunrakee side over your own race.”

  “You would have done the same. They are people.” Ozzy’s face hardened. “They face a shitty government controlling them even worse than here.”

  His voice rose. “Now the Dunrakee are on their way and I have to deal with a coming war, and also figuring out how to kill your lying, turn-coat ass. And you took my money and ran,” reminded Jonas. “That’s personal.”

  “Zeld took it. She conned me out of it. Go after her. Not me.”

  Ozzy turned his com line off, knowing his last statement would go no where.

  “Follow me.” He shouldered his rifle, and pushed himself through a makeshift hole in the wall.

  Lyra followed, letting out a groan of annoyance. “Where to now, darling?”

  Ozzy pointed forward, and smiled.

  She frowned. “That’s an Odyssey.”

  An Odyssey was a small go-cart. It wasn’t meant to be a go-cart, but everyone referred to it as such. In fact, kids were more prone to ride these things than archaeologists, to which they were made for.

  “But it’s fast,” said Ozzy, sitting in it, and patting the small seat behind him. “Hop in and buckle up.” He pulled the strap over his hips, and clicked it in place.

  Lyra shook her head adamantly. “And then what? Drive through the wall in front of us?”

  “The wall opens into a ramp. We drive down, escape, and get out of here.”

  “That simple?”

  “That simple.”

  “I find it odd that I trust you so well, Ozzy.” Lyra stepped into the Odyssey and sat behind Ozzy.

  He glanced over his shoulder. “You trust me?” That was a first.

  She strapped in. “More than you know.”

  Ozzy turned on the Odyssey. “Well, you may need some therapy, but right now, trusting me is what’s going to keep you safe.”

  He hoped.

  The odyssey vibrated harshly and hovered into the air.

  “Perfect,” said Ozzy, bringing his cuff to his lips again. “Relic, buddy. Open the hiding ramp, and close it once we exit.”

  The craft shuddered, and the ramp opened.

  An MMP agent stepped into view. Ozzy floored it, and the Odyssey lurched forward. flying through the air and jostling, shaking back and forth, screaming past the agent. A photon beam shot over Ozzy’s and Lyra’s heads.

  “Aim your weapon ahead, Lyra.”

  A handful of agents were near the exit door that led into the flyway port. They heard the shot, but were clearly taken off guard by the oncoming Odyssey; some backing away, others fumbling to get their guns.

  “Shoot at them, Lyra,” screamed Ozzy a second time.

  He knew the photon’s that Lyra was about to spray wouldn’t be more than a distraction, but anything they could do to startle the guards was a major plus.

  Lyra rested her rifle on Ozzy’s shoulder. She took pot shot after pot shot, sending nothing more than bee sting penetrating photons the agent’s way.

  “Move out of the way,” Ozzy yelled, pressing the pedal harder into the floor board.

  They flew through the flyway port, passing working stations and couches where people sat, dodging columns and potted treas.

  Up ahead was the exit.

  “You probably have plenty of hiding spots in this city. Point me to one.”

  “I don’t have any hiding spots,” said Lyra, continuing to shoot, sending agents running and ducking.

  Ozzy’s eyes bulged. “What do you mean you don’t have any hiding spots? You’re crime boss.”

  “There is more to the stones that you haven’t told me. I need to know what you’ve left out of the translation.”

  “What does that have to do with finding a place to hide?” They were coming up on glass pane doors. A photon blast sent an empty bench into a hot mess of tinder and embers.

  “All you need to know is that I need to know what the Gaia Stones say in their entirety, do you understand?”

  The glass pane doors opened, and an agent jumped out of the way, avoiding a collision.

  Ozzy closed his eyes.

  Kishish!

  Glass shards rocketed outward as the odyssey slammed into the glass doors. Ozzy drove drove onto a road and turned sharply.

  “Fine, you want to play that game?” yelled Ozzy, over his shoulder. “I won’t tell you until you help me take my brother from Jonas’s grasp,” responded Ozzy. “You have connections. Use them.”

  An MMP hovercar’s lights blared from down the street. Ozzy twisted his driver’s wheel and pulled into an alleyway and behind a large hoverbin.

  “What is the rest of the information?” growled Lyra.

  Ozzy turned off the car, and the Odyssey descended in its hover, landing on the ground.

  An MMP vehicle zoomed by them and down the street Ozzy had just turned off from. “You aren’t going to get off that easy. You have connections. Find us a place and we’ll hide. And then I’ll give more information? And at that place, you can help me come up with a plant to get my brother.”

  “He’s lost Ozzy,” replied Lyra.

  Ozzy let out a laugh. “Not to me.”

  “Darling, there are other things in play that are more important than your brother, like alerting your population of the fact that the Dunrakee aren’t scouting anymore and are going take Mars from them soon.”

  Ozzy crossed his arms, and heaved in a deep breath. “Get us some place safe.”

  Lyra lifted her wrist toward her lips and whispered something into her bracelet. The bracelet buzzed and she nodded. “Follow my directions.”

  “Thank you,” said Ozzy.

  MMP warning lights bounced off the
walls in the alley. Ozzy turned, his nightmare staring in his eyes; two MMP cars entering the alley and approaching him.

  23

  Tagus Valles, Mars

  Ozzy glanced over his shoulder, driving the oddysey at a break neck speed. “Contact one of your guys or something and tell them to get these MMP’s off our ass.”

  “Take a left,” screamed Lyra.

  Ozzy rolled his eyes. She wasn’t cooperating, as if she wanted to get caught. He yanked the wheel, turning it down another road, and pressed on the pedal. “Notify your damn syndicate.”

  Ozzy veered his car to the right, zipping down a side street and passing a hovervehicle in the process. The vehicle honked and swerved out of the way.

  “I didn’t tell you to take a right,” growled Lyra, sitting in the back seat.

  The MMP’s sirens echoed off the buildings and skyscrapers Ozzy flew by.

  “I’m trying to lose them and—”

  A loud crunch of metal against metal and the Odyssey vibrated and dipped closer to the ground. Ozzy lurched forward in his seat, tagging his head on the top of the steering wheel.

  He eyed his side mirror. A police hovercar impacted Ozzy, swerving into his lane, connecting well.

  Ozzy cranked the wheel, turning down yet another street. He glanced in his rear cam holodisplay on his driver’s console.

  Smoke was swirling in the air a ways behind him and the MMP vehicle that rammed him was t-boned into another car, his hood bent upward and smashed.

  Yet more MMP were in pursuit, tearing down the road, speeding just as fast as Ozzy.

  “Good,” yelled Lyra.

  “Good? What’s good?” Nothing seemed good about any of this.

  Ozzy zipped down another side street, avoiding several civilian cars, zig-zagging around them.

  “We have some friends about to join us. We’re setting something up now, and congregating in one place.”

  “What friends?”

  “You asked for my syndicate, so this is my gift to you.” She pointed to the right. “Down that street.”

  Ozzy did as asked.

  “Now, that street.”