The Soldier: Final Odyssey

by Vaughn Heppner

  “Don’t bother,” Cade said, “not unless you’re willing to free me.”

  “That was your second mistake, sir. I do not recommend you engage in another.”

  Cade eyed Monitor Varo. The man was acting like a prig. The dark eyes belied that, however. They showed ruthless intelligence, which would have little truck with such formalities. Therefore, he was playing a part, putting on an act. There was a two-way mirror, after all. That indicated others were likely watching.

  “Okay,” Cade said. “You win. If I kill you, what happens?”

  “You will experience a slow and painful death.”

  “Now I know, and now you know I know. What’s next?”

  There might have been the faintest of smirks pulling at the man’s lips. “I suggest you change your behavior, and fast.”

  “Fine,” Cade said. “Consider it changed. What’s next?”

  Varo glanced at the two-way mirror and then back at Cade. “It would be a simple matter to use a mind scanner or inject you with truth serum. Would you prefer that?”

  Cade raised his powerful hands and set them on the table. He examined them before looking up at Varo. “I would not, Monitor. Can you tell me why I’m here?”

  Finally, Varo pulled out the chair and sat at the table with Cade. He took a small tablet from his leather coat, setting it on the table and turning it on. He looked up afterward.

  “I’m a monitor in the Patrol. That makes me an intelligence officer. We know you originally worked under the alias of Jack Brune, a supposed Anza Drop Trooper of Earth. In reality, you were an operative of Group Six of Earth. You pretended to be a bounty hunter but conducted several clandestine missions for Earth. Your latest was dropping onto Avalon IV, a proscribed planet. You worked in cooperation with a secret tech company. Together, you sabotaged a space station in orbit around Helos, a populated planet in the Rigel System. The sabotage included detonating a nuclear weapon. Several million people perished on Helos—”

  “Let me stop you there,” Cade said. “Some of what you say is true. Some is off. For instance, I never detonated a nuclear device on the space station. An android or robot working for the secret tech company likely did that.”

  The smirk returned. “Mr. Cade, we know so much now. And do you know why?”

  “Dr. Halifax?”

  “Precisely,” Varo said. “Thus, your lies have become—”

  “Monitor Varo, has it occurred to you that Halifax might be lying?”

  The smirk lost some of its power. “Of course I have considered that… But why would Halifax do so?”

  “It’s called blame-shifting. For instance, I did not operate as Jack Brune, at least not originally. Brune himself did that until Rohan Mars, the android, killed him. At that point, Group Six woke me from stasis—”

  “Mr. Cade, do you mean cryogenic freezing?”

  “No. I mean stasis.”

  “That is Old Federation technology we no longer possess.”

  “Look, Monitor,” Cade said, leaning forward. “I’m an Ultra from the Old Federation. I fought the cyborgs over a thousand years ago. Group Six is using Ultras, as they found an ancient sleeper ship full of us in stasis. Group Six techs put a cyborg obedience chip in my brain. A Web-Mind on Avalon IV extracted the chip. In the end, I destroyed the Web-Mind.”

  “I don’t understand. Why destroy your benefactor?”

  “Because the Web-Mind wanted the chip for other uses,” Cade said. “I fought those things in the past. Do you think I was going to let one of them bad asses remain alive in his era?”

  Varo sat back as he eyed Cade anew. “Why did you two choose the Therduim System?”

  “We didn’t. Our Intersplit engine gave out. We barely repaired it enough to get us here. Therduim III was the closest port of call. We had no other choice, as we were lucky to even make it this far.”

  There was a click over a loudspeaker. “That’s enough,” an exasperated woman said. “I’ve heard more than enough.”

  Cade noticed motion to the side and glanced at the two-way mirror. It had become a window. There was a tall, narrow-faced woman on the other side. She wore a long leather greatcoat just as Monitor Varo did and the same kind of black military hat. Five security personnel in their black-armor and Aarn-6 stunners stood behind her. Dr. Halifax stood with them. He wore his stylish garments with his hands shoved in his pants pockets.

  Varo shoved his chair back as he stood at attention. “Up, up,” he told Cade.

  “It doesn’t matter,” the woman said. “Halifax predicted his false answers. It’s time to use the mind scanner.” She switched her focus onto Cade. “We will discover the truth, sir. You can count on it.” She sneered at him.

  Halifax was busy staring at the floor as hard as he could.

  Try a different method, Cade told himself. The way you’re playing isn’t working.

  Cade scraped his chair back as he came to rigid attention, saluting the woman. “Ma’am,” he said. “Permission to speak?”

  The sneer left her face. She nodded.

  Halifax must have noticed because he scowled.

  “May I ask why you didn’t use the mind scanner first?” Cade asked politely.

  “Obviously you know,” she said. “The scanner will leave you a blank, a retard at best. The mind scanner is old cyborg technology, one of the more interesting items we’ve excavated from the Pit.”

  “Pit?” asked Cade.

  The woman huffed. “Come, come, you’re not going to pretend you don’t know. It was the reason you selected Therduim III…the Concord’s greatest secret project.”

  Cade closed his eyes as if in pain. Talk about bad luck. When had Halifax figured that out? Or...had the doctor sabotaged the engine in order to land here at this planet? The man was devious enough…

  Cade opened his eyes, and he noticed the doctor giving him the barest shake of the head.

  Is that little bastard trying to signal me?

  Monitor Varo laughed. “Arbiter Drang, you were correct about these two. I just saw the weasel Halifax trying to communicate clandestinely with Cade. The doctor shook his head. They’re in collusion as you suspected.”

  “What?” Halifax said, his head jerking up. “No, no. You must be on guard against Cade. He’s extremely dangerous. He told you he’s an Ultra. Do you have any idea what that means? Don’t take your eyes off him for a second.”

  “Arbiter,” Varo said. “Halifax has his hands in his pockets. He’s clearly hiding something there.”

  “Security,” said the woman—Arbiter Drang. “Restrain the doctor.”

  Two of the black-armored personnel slung their stunners over their backs. They stepped forward smartly, each of them grabbing one of the doctor’s thin arms.

  “The glass between us can’t hold Cade,” Halifax shouted. “Don’t you understand? You’ve threatened to erase his mind with the scanner. He’s going to go berserk, steal a ship and flee to the jungle planet.”

  “No more, Doctor,” Arbiter Drang said.

  Cade got it then. Somehow, Halifax had screwed up, misjudging and making trouble for himself with these people. Now, the slippery doctor was trying to bargain with Cade by telling him the facts. They were going to use the mind scanner on him. His only hope—

  Cade acted without hesitation, slugging Monitor Varo across the small table. The man’s head jerked back and he crumpled to the floor. Cade flung the table aside, picked up Varo with two hands, military-pressing him above his head. He charged the two-way mirror, and with all his considerable Ultra strength, he slammed Varo against the mirror. The mirror splintered. Cade wrenched Varo back and flung him against the window a second time.

  On the other side, Arbiter Drang screamed. Three of the security personnel backed up as they aimed their stunners at the cracked window. The two holding onto Halifax jerked him out of the way.

  At the third blow, the mirror shattered.

  “Shoot him!” Drang screamed.

  Cade had expected that,
ducking low and crab-walking to the small table as security fired, the clots of force hissing over him. When they paused, he rose and picked up the table in one motion, hurling it through the shattered window. Force-clots struck it as security fired again. But that didn’t matter. The table sailed through, catching one of the security men, knocking him backward.

  Cade vaulted through the broken window, with one of the chairs in his hands. He flung it at Arbiter Drang, knocking her out, perhaps killing her. A force-clot hit him. He grunted. Then, he was moving faster than the security personnel must have anticipated.

  He hit one in the face, kicked out the feet of another and took a second force-clot in the gut. Then, he was on that man, breaking his neck with an Ultra move. He whirled around as the last two let go of Halifax. One of them got a small penknife in the kidney from Halifax. The other went down from Cade’s fist, and then he finished the one screaming from the penknife.

  Cade whirled toward Halifax, roaring, “You little bastard!”

  “No, no, listen to me, you have to listen,” the cunning, desperate doctor said with his hands up as if he could block the Ultra. “I was tricking them all along, trying to signal you! You know what to do to get away. It’s our only chance for staying alive. You do want to stay alive, right?”

  Cade looked around at the work of his mayhem and then at the falsely smiling Dr. Halifax. He grabbed a stunner, threw it away and tore a pistol from one of the belts of an unconscious security man. A quick check showed him it was a gunpowder weapon. He grabbed two more, collecting extra ammo.

  “Well?” Cade said. “What’s your grand plan?”

  Halifax gave a brittle laugh before saying, “Follow me.”

  Chapter Eight

  Cade grabbed the doctor by the arm as the little man tried to race away. “Not so fast. What about them?” Cade indicated the people lying on the floor, some of them stirring.

  “Right,” Halifax said, not attempting to tear his arm free. He studied the people before glancing at Cade. “Kill them. It’s the only way to cover our tracks.”

  “Murder?”

  “If it’s them or us, I’d rather it be them. Surely you agree.”

  Releasing Halifax and stuffing several of the pistols in his belt, Cade picked up a stunner. He checked the setting, gave it a brief consideration and then shot the stirring people in the head. That might cause bruising or concussions later, but they’d still be alive.

  “Now—” Cade said.

  “Wait,” Halifax said. “I just had an idea. We should take a hostage. Arbiter Drang is probably the best choice, as she’s the highest ranked. We’re going to need a way to get past checkpoints.”

  “What’s your idea?”

  Halifax gave Cade a significant stare. “Look. These guys are playing rough. They were going to use a mind scanner on you. That’s as good as killing you, and why? Merely for some information.”

  “You betrayed me. Why should I trust anything you say?”

  “Don’t,” Halifax said. “Trust what you heard them say. Drang was going to use the mind scanner on you.”

  Cade nodded.

  “We can’t just stand here gabbing, though,” Halifax said. “We have to do something and do it fast.”

  “Do what?” said Cade. “We’re trapped on a space station at a Concord secret site.”

  “Right, right,” Halifax said, as he wiped sweat from his upper lip. “What are our options? Not too many, I’m thinking. We can’t take the Descartes, as it’s broken down, and I doubt we’d get far in a Concord military vessel, even provided we could overpower the crew. That leaves the planet.”

  “Running to the planet traps us even worse,” Cade said. “They could recapture us at their leisure then.”

  “Maybe not. The planet is rough. I mean, really rough with some sick mutants harassing them. I haven’t learned too much, but I have been listening. The Patrol is having trouble with the mutants, asking for more troops. Right now, all the Concord controls on the surface are the spaceport, several outposts along the road and the Pit. Some of their workers rebelled, too, hating it down there, dying to predatory wildlife.”

  “And you want us to flee down there?”

  “Do you have anything better in mind?”

  Cade eyed the unconscious personnel. He didn’t like any of this.

  “There is something else you should know that could help us,” Halifax said.

  Cade squinted at the slippery doctor.

  “There are smugglers trying to extract the old cyborg tech. Maybe we could catch a ride out with one of them.”

  “Explain that.”

  “Cade, come on, we gotta get off the space station. We’re dithering. Look, this place is mostly a military post for the Concord.”

  “Mostly?”

  “That’s right. Cade, we have to run now if we’re going to make it. Jawing about it won’t get us shit.”

  The doctor had a point. Precious time had already passed, but Cade needed to know the lay of the land, at least to an extent. “How do you intend we get from here to there?”

  “Shuttle or hauler,” Halifax said. “How else do you think? We have to haul ass while we have the chance, though. This isn’t doing it for us.”

  Cade stared at the doctor and moved, hanging the stunner over his back as he strode to Arbiter Drang. She appeared to be breathing, was still alive. He picked her up by the shoulders, shaking her none too gently.

  Her head wobbled back and forth. She smacked her lips, groaned, mumbled as if in her sleep and let her head wobble some more.

  “Do I have to slap you?” asked Cade.

  Whether his words had any effect or not, she groaned, louder than before. She opened her eyes, but they were unfocused.

  “Arbiter,” Cade said.

  Her mouth moved, with drool spilling out.

  “Herr Drang,” Halifax said sharply. The doctor had moved closer. “You’re under arrest for sedition to the Concord. We know you’ve been selling secrets.”

  “That’s a damned lie,” she slurred.

  “We also know you’re working for the Bremen military,” Halifax said.

  Drang squeezed her eyes shut, muttered low under her breath and opened her eyes to glare at Halifax. Her head jerked back, as maybe she recognized him for who he really was.

  “You,” she said.

  “There you go,” Halifax told Cade. “She’s alert. Give her the pitch.”

  Cade held her with one hand and pressed the barrel of a pistol against her forehead. “This isn’t a mind scanner, but it will leave you dead if it goes off. Do you want to be dead?”

  Drang opened her mouth, but maybe thought better of what she was going to say. She looked into Cade’s eyes, no doubt seeing death in them, that here was a practiced killer not afraid to blow her away, if that was what needed doing.

  “Remember,” Halifax told her. “We have nothing to lose.”

  “Enough,” Cade told him. “Arbiter, I want to reach a shuttle without anyone trying to stop us. If we can, I’ll let you live. If not—” He shook his head.

  “The Patrol will catch you if you head for the Asteroids,” Drang said. “I suspect that’s where you want to go.”

  Cade tightened his grip. “You’re arguing with me, which wastes time. I have no more time to waste. Good-bye, Arbiter Drang—”

  “Wait,” she said, breathing faster, her focus on his trigger finger. “Will you please wait for just a moment?”

  “If you’re going to tell me something,” Cade said, “it had better be worth my while.”

  “Yes,” she breathed, her face turning pale. “I understand. I know how we can get you onto a shuttle.”

  “Don’t tell me about it,” Cade said. “Tell me how.”

  Arbiter Drang started talking.

  Chapter Nine

  The space station was divided into several areas of control, two of those areas run by the Patrol.

  The Patrol recruited from many different Concord worlds and was
theoretically the protector of the general whole instead of any particular world. Halifax had touched a nerve with his Bremen military remark, as Bremen was the richest planet and system in this part of the Concord.

  The Concord consisted of most of the Old Federation worlds, minus those star systems near Old Earth and those still in the grip of barbarism. It was a loosely run alliance, with the Patrol and the IPO being the two most important unitary arms and the Concord Customs Union being the third. The Patrol had more power than the old U.N. peacekeepers of Earth before the Space Age, but politics did play a part. Seven uniquely rich star systems effectively ran the Concord, thus the Patrol, with Bremen being one of the wealthier systems.

  The Bremen military, in fact, controlled a small area of the space station. It did so to aid its space-going merchant marine, which was one of the largest in this sector of the Concord.

  Arbiter Drang led the two fugitives through maintenance corridors, bypassing the checkpoints. So far, there hadn’t been any station-wide outcry for them, as likely none of the subdued party had regained consciousness except for Arbiter Drang. It would only be a matter of time, though, before one of the people awoke or someone stumbled upon them and raised the alarm.

  “Through that hatch,” Drang said, indicating the one ahead.

  “Where does it lead?” asked Cade, who kept hold of one of her arms.

  “The main docking bay.”

  “Uh-huh, and I just walk through, get into a shuttle and fly away?”

  “It might not be that easy,” Drang admitted, pausing and facing Cade. “You won’t make it to the Asteroids. You surely must realize that by now. They’re too far for a shuttle to reach unnoticed.”

  “We’re well aware of that,” Halifax said.

  Drang frowned, and then her eyes widened. “The Pit,” she whispered. “You want to see the Pit, maybe get into it.” She shook her head. “I admire your gall and persistence. Earth has relentless operatives. But how will that help you here? Patrol Intelligence will recapture and mind-scan each of you. You cannot believe you can walk around the Pit and reach Earth with the information.”

  “Arbiter,” Cade said. He stopped as a distant klaxon began to blare.