She put her arms around Ron. He held her as the sobs wracking her body gradually lessened. It was a long time before Lexi said, “They made a game of it, Ron. Some of those people they hunted down one by one. We promised them we would be back for them. We failed. Now all we can do is avenge them.”
He held her tighter, letting her talk, while thinking, We kept our promise. It just wasn’t good enough. He and Geena had been affected by the atrocity as well, but seemed to be dealing with it better than Lexi. Urania seemed pragmatic about the deaths. He had a disturbing picture forming in his mind of a winged Lexi, wielding a flaming sword, like an avenger out of myth.
“That’s not the worst of it, Ron,” she said. “It must have been a resupply, probably a delivery of fresh slaves or an ore collection. Probably both. Kraft was never worried about us, not even at the end. He never launched a message drone to call for reinforcements. They must have standing orders on how to deal with a security breach. Destroy everything and everybody. It always bothered me that the overseers killed the slaves in their bunks rather than holding them as hostages. That action still doesn’t make sense, but now I think I get it.”
Ron stroked her hair. “It happens, Lexi. Geena told me about your comparison of space-threading civilization to your country’s West a couple of centuries back. There truly is no law enforcement in the Accord to speak of outside of the civilized planets. There can’t be. Space is too big. The degree of cooperation that would require just isn’t sustainable. There’s nothing we can do about it.”
She pulled back from him so that she could see his face and he hers. What he saw chilled him to his core. She somehow managed to push the grief to the back and only the fury remained. And it was clearly fury; ruthlessly controlled fury. Her voice soft and firm, with tears drying on her cheeks, his mythical avenger said, “You’re wrong, Ron. We kill them all.”
Thanks for involving yourself in the ongoing adventures of Lexi Stevens and the Aeolus Investigations team. I hope you’re as pleased as I am that she can now stop bitching about ray-guns. If you enjoyed this experience, please leave a review at Amazon.com. Your reviews help me be noticed, give me a thrill and encourage me to continue my pursuit of literary excellence. Yeah, right. But really, reviews are appreciated. I’m on Goodreads! Now that I’m there, I’m keen to put in the blurb “with over 5000 5-star reviews …” So, I need your help with that.
Please take a minute to check out my website RobertEColfax.com and let me know what your thoughts are concerning Aeolus Investigations Episode 2, Avenger. I’d love to read your comments. Honestly, learning to set up that site is proving challenging, so some functionality may not behave. I’m working on it.
While you’re there, I welcome you to sign up for my email list to receive notification of additions and changes to the schedule. No spam. That’s a promise. I feel about spammers the way Lexi feels about pirates.
Episode 3, Paladin will be available in early 2020. I’m targeting late January/early February. It’s already in post-production (I need to verify the time line, proofread it for the thirtieth time, and check that all of the titles are pretty). I invite you to join Lexi and the team in their first space battle when a remodeled, weaponized Urania gets the chance to flex her muscles. The team fights their way out of a pirate base and discovers a race unknown to the Accord that hires them to recover their missing artifact. Lexi gets over the top angry. Fun!
I am concurrently working on another, three volume series, called Beyond the Divide. You can find out more about that one on the website.
Paladin, Chapter 3
Aeolus Investigations Episode 3
Eight days before leaving Cardin for Ackalon, Lexi visited the shop where she purchased her comm-gear and weapon-simulator the last time she was in town. She wasn’t shopping for anything specific this time around other than silencers for the team’s Glocks, but it was fun browsing and who knew, maybe something new had come in that would pique her interest. Sometimes she felt like a kid let loose in a candy store. With Daddy’s credit card.
This visit, she also had some serious questions for the shop’s proprietor, such as why he hadn’t sold her silencers with the guns in the first place. She told him what she expected to be doing with them. She also wanted to press him on why he decided to notify the authorities on Naragene Nine it was her team responsible for the recovery of the Rose of Light. Both Jis and Jadkin denied having anything to do with that. It had to be Pete. There wasn’t anyone else.
The shop was owned by Pete Isher, an interesting middle-aged man who, frankly, thought a lot like she did. He kind of reminds me of Dad. She suspected that he had been a detective, a criminal, or maybe a spy in his younger days. Maybe he still is. She had been developing a cordial relationship with and mutual respect for the him since the first time she entered his shop. “Hello, Miss Stevens,” he said as she walked to his counter. “Looking for anything in particular today? I have upgraded software for the firearm simulators I think you should look at.”
“Maybe,” she said. “And please, I’m Lexi, remember. Not Miss Stevens.”
He replied, “Yes. I remember. Sometimes formality conveys situational information that can’t be spoken aloud.” He smiled. “Who knows, you could have a listening device on your back.”
Lexi frowned, wondering what that meant. “Listen, Pete, I was recently in a situation where I think I might have found body armor convenient. To be blunt, people were shooting at us. I took a bullet in the shoulder. What’s your opinion on that?”
“Even a shoulder wound can be fatal. We’ll fit you with body armor while you’re here.” He hesitated a moment, seeming distracted. “My opinion is don’t put yourself in front of a bullet. Armor can be pierced. I really want to sell you this software upgrade. I think you’ll be impressed. You’re one of my few customers, you know, who not only appreciates what I have to offer but can also handle yourself in real-life, dangerous situations. I’m very impressed with your success going up against the pirates on Hepca. Step over here with me a moment if you don’t mind. Do you have your contact lens in?”
Puzzled, Lexi moved to stand next to him behind his counter. How did he know anything about what happened on Hepca? Why did he refer to the criminals we dealt with as “pirates”?
He asked, “How far along are you with the current version of the target range software?”
“It’s not much of a challenge anymore,” Lexi admitted. “And yes, I am wearing the lens.” The contact lens component of her comm-gear allowed Urania to see whatever the wearer was watching. It also gave Urania the ability to supply maps and information updates by means of optical overlays. It took a little bit of getting used to, but was a fantastic enhancement to the team’s effectiveness when Urania could hack an enemy datanet and transmit floor plans to mobile assets. It proved its worth when they were hunting down the guards in the chalet on Hepca. The pirates in the chalet on Hepca? Depending on the types of sensors deployed on the enemy base, Urania should also be able to pin-point the locations of hostiles in real-time.
“That’s good,” Pete said. “It’ll help you follow the action in the simulation I want you to watch.” While she was still wondering what he might mean by that, he handed her a Glock, fully loaded and ready to be fired in his simulated range. In weight and feel, it was indistinguishable from the real item. When fired, both the kick and noise would be completely convincing. She had a set of them they still practiced with on the ship. As he picked up one for himself, he said, “Take a look at the detail. This scenario pits you against three armed men with questionable intentions who follow you from the street into a shop much like mine.”
She glanced down at the countertop display as three armed men appeared at a glass doorway of a storefront. What she didn’t see was the green LED dot that should have been visible on the base of a simulated Glock in the gun’s reflection in the highly polished countertop. One of the men was just now outside the door, about to walk through the doorway into the store. T
wo others were close behind him.
When the door’s chime sounded at the same time the man in the simulation walked in, she suddenly realized Pete was setting up an ambush. She didn’t know what was going on, but she trusted Pete. For one thing, he just handed her a live weapon. If something was about to go down, they were on the same side. The Glock she was holding was not one of the simulated pieces. At least she hoped it wasn’t. It was nearly impossible to tell the difference until you pulled the trigger and someone died. They were that well designed.
“Allow me to reset the simulation to the start. It won’t take long. Why don’t you go take a look at the camo gear over there while I do that,” he suggested. Realizing that would put the men he was concerned about in their crossfire, she walked to the far corner of the room. Through her lens, she had the same view of the shop as was on his display. I’ll have to have a talk with Pete about that. He isn’t supposed be able to hack my lens. What kind of connections does he have if he knows about what went down on Hepca?
As the first man to enter the shop approached him, Pete said, “I’m helping another customer at the moment, sir. Is there anything quick I can do for you?”
The man chuckled and drew a gun from inside his jacket. Pete was fast, but not fast enough to beat a much younger, experienced mercenary to the punch. Lexi’s reaction time was another story. She took out both the man threatening Pete and the second man who entered the shop while Pete was still in the process of bringing up his own hand gun. Pete shot the third man while he was still outside of Lexi’s line of sight. Unlike Lexi’s kills, his man didn’t die instantly. Unfortunately, he expired less than a minute later. “Dammit,” Pete said. “We really wanted to question one of these guys. Words to the wise, Lexi, don’t always be lethal. This wasn’t an attempted robbery. These guys followed you into my shop. Do you know why?”
“No,” she admitted.
“Well, let’s see what we’ve got then. Check them for ID. I’ll run them through the datanet.” At her raised eyebrows, he admitted, “I have access to the Planetary Police datanet.” He gave her a conspiratorial wink and added, “Don’t tell anyone.”
She frowned back. “How about removing the bug on my back. Or did you make that up?”
Avenger Page 19
