by Beverlee
“Mars could have been a second base of operations for Coulter. Isn’t this where she was headed
with her clones and mercenaries when she captured you and Axel? Who better to trust with the
keys to your off-world kingdom than family? Also, there is a cyborg on this station. Just one? I
think not. Where there are cyborgs, clones can’t be far behind. So, where are the rest of the bad
guys?”
“Well, damn,” Axel drawled, smoothing the stubble on his jawline. “That sounds like a whole
herd of elephants to me.”
For Mark, the trip to Mars hadn’t been an easy one. He’d been unable to shake the anxiety
growing in the pit of his stomach as they’d approached the expanse where he’d killed Beth Coulter.
In the vastness of space, he couldn’t be sure of the exact location. It didn’t matter. He felt a chill,
which wasn’t going away anytime soon.
Coulter had sabotaged the Terran Space Command’s mission to Jupiter, killing his brother,
Erik, as well as 151 other scientists on the Europa Mission. Not to mention the dozens she’d
murdered afterward. As a result, he’d taken her life in retribution.
In his heart, he’d known her death wouldn’t be the end of it. Her insidious plan of world building
with metal cyborgs, clones, and reprogrammed neural implants wasn’t over yet. It should be no
surprise he’d come face to face with Coulter’s Phase 2, tucked away on an unsuspecting Mars. His
gut had been tied in knots since finding the dead body today. Although the red cuff marks were
gone, he still sensed the presence of the restraints on his wrists. He might never rid himself of the
cruelty she’d inflicted.
The original purpose for this trip had been to provide support for Eva’s terraforming experiment
on the surface, while the others celebrated a group holiday, but those thoughts were fading fast.
He wanted to start turning over every rock on the planet until he found the Parkers, or Königs, or
whatever they called themselves, along with every secret they were hiding. However, now he must
consider the welfare of five other people. Which meant he’d have to do things differently than
before.
***
After a delicious Italian dinner at Nero’s for Maeve’s birthday, Axel strolled hand in hand with
his lady around the Green Level of the space station. The Tyson Gravity Field environment, both
here and on the planet, enabled normal living without the assistance of grav boots. They found a
secluded garden spot for some quiet time with a splendid rotating view of the dusty red planet
offset by a galaxy of stars. The day’s events monopolized their conversation for most of the
evening.
“I could see it in Mark’s eyes the minute I walked in,” Axel said. “Panic. He controlled it, but
it was there. It had to be the cuffs. Coulter restrained him like a lab rat on her medpod for hours.
She injected him with a shitload of drugs while trying to get the human augmentation data out of
him.”
“Yes, I saw it, too, in his tone of voice and body language,” Maeve agreed. “Sometimes, people
develop phobias after a traumatic event. It’s been about five months since the incident. You need
to make sure he gets plenty of heavy workouts to keep his mind as well as his body healthy. He’s
not like us.”
Axel gazed at the amazing woman sitting next to him. Moonlight shimmered in her pale hair
and danced off the crystal gems in her indigo jacket. As a sergeant in the Terran Military, he could
never have been with Colonel Maeve Sorayne. Thus, his life would never have been complete. He
didn’t know how long this would last; he was savoring it one day at a time.
When he’d found Mark being tortured by Coulter, he’d surrendered to prevent her mercenaries
from killing Mark, and they’d shot Axel twice in the process. No good deed goes unpunished,
they’d shot Axel twice in the process. Having been a soldier for years, he’d suffered injuries before.
That time, however, the damage had been too severe. He’d undergone augmentation surgery for
his arm and leg, the same procedure which had saved Maeve’s life after her battle wounds years
ago.
Due to upgraded regulations, neither he nor Kamryn could return to their armored unit. They’d
both joined Mark in his unending hunt for the remnants of Coulter’s holdings. As equal partners
in his MAVREK venture, the combined four ships plus the valuable BioKlon medical equipment
commandeered from the TMD made them wealthy. Axel found he liked having money and
traveling in well-appointed spaceships as opposed to bare bones military craft, especially with a
weapons locker full of new toys.
He’d give it up in a nanosecond, though, if he had to make a choice. He’d even trade in both
cyborg limbs for metal prostheses and live in a shack with a dirt floor if it would make Maeve
happy. She made it all worthwhile. Axel laced the human fingers of his right hand through the
augmented ones in her left hand, as he bent over to kiss her cheek. “Happy birthday, my love.”
Chapter 2
Their esteemed team member, Dr. Eva Jackson, had been invited to Mars for a Terraforming
Symposium. So, they’d all traveled 34,000,000 miles to the rusty colored dust ball of a planet,
where Martian days were 24 hours 37 minutes long, with a solar rotation of 687 days. As a result,
most inhabitants celebrated two birthdays a year. Three surface domes and a Tyson Gravity Field
allowed humans to live without the assist of exoskeleton suits or grav boots. Although a
pressurized environmental suit with oxygen was still required outside.
Under Aurora’s tri-layered dome in the northern hemisphere, sixteen scientists observed the
first terraforming or “worldhouse” experiment in a biosphere, on a non-Terran planet. Their
enclosed habitat overflowed with a heavy military presence, VIPs, and a plethora of electronic
monitoring equipment. To her credit, Eva Jackson had experienced a modicum of success on her
homeworld with terraforming selected desert environments. Today, she sat in a front row window
seat, unable to control her excitement.
Although Mark, Axel, Kamryn, and Colonel Sorayne accompanied Eva, they stood against the
back wall, their height giving them a clear view over most everyone’s head. After the initial
ceremonies were over, they filed out to talk among themselves.
Mark said, “I want to make a donation to the family of the man who died yesterday, Carl
Ivarsson. Do we know if he was married or had children? Did he live on Terra or here on Mars?”
“I’m glad you brought it up because I have news.” Sorayne guided them to a quiet spot away
from the activity surrounding the habitat. “He was an undercover detective for the MPLE, which
is the reason no prints or ID came up when they scanned him. Since this information surfaced, the
bakery owners, the Parkers, have gone missing. The shopkeeper and baker are gone, too. Mars
now believes they’re all complicit in his death.
“The MPLE’s backtracking the leads Ivarsson might have been working on, trying to figure out
why he was there in the first place. The prevailing theory is smuggling. So, you’re off the hook,
Dr. Warren. As far as the MPLE’s concerned,” Sorayne said, “you were an innocent bystander.”
Unless he wasn’t. Mark wanted to believe the whole wrong-place-at-the-wrong-time
scenario.
The churning in his stomach, however, told him just the opposite. He couldn’t shake it. Back on
Luna, he’d started trusting his gut feelings. It hadn’t steered him wrong yet. It’s why he still kept
a knife in his boot, wore a ballistic proof vest and carried at least one gun. “I’m glad they’ve
dismissed any involvement on my part. But I’m not convinced he wasn’t mistaken for me.”
Axel stared at him for a long moment. “All right, Mark. We’ll work your angle while the MPLE
works theirs. We’ll put our cyber sleuths on it.”
All three MAVREK partners received emergency comm messages from their pilot.
“There’s a problem at the ship,” Kamryn blurted out, spinning around to leave.
Mark grabbed her arm. “Eva,” he said, looking from Axel to Sorayne.
“Go,” Sorayne said, waving him off. “Take my shuttle. I’m sending reinforcements to your
ship. I’ll stay with Dr. Jackson.”
The trio sprinted down to the underground docking station, straight onto Sorayne’s waiting
shuttle.
Within minutes they were up on the space station running through a maze of airlock tubes to
the MAVREK-II. True to her word, two of the colonel’s troops were stationed at their ship’s
entrance.
Petra stood between them, prepared for action, or spoiling for a fight, wearing two sidearms
with one of Axel’s new pulse rifles in her hands. “Nobody’s hurt. We detected a surveillance drone.
Ohashi disabled it. She’s dissecting it.”
They boarded the ship, making straight for the ScienceLab, which also doubled as their
MedLab, if necessary.
At the far end of the lab, Ohashi hovered over a small spider-like metal drone. She wore a
headband with a magnifying visor, her short-bobbed hair tucked behind her ears, blue wrist length
gloves covered her hands. She worked with microelectronic tweezers, dismantling the circuitry.
Ohashi glanced up. “My new security system picked up an intrusion when an object breached our
electronic barrier.” She resumed her examination. “We identified it. Sent out rogue commands for
it to land. Made it think our ship was its home base. Petra flashed her boobs at a dock worker and
got him to fetch it for us.”
“I did not,” Petra protested.
“All the data’s been downloaded to an old tablet, in case it blows up.” Ohashi pointed a blue
finger to it on her workstation. “Flight logs are being decrypted.”
Kamryn stepped forward with hands on her hips. As a six-foot-tall, 175-pound brunette, with a
well-defined figure, she commanded attention. “Okay, somebody has to say it. Mark was the target.
There’s no question about it now.”
“You were right.” Axel spread his hands, leaning back against the counter, with one ankle
crossed over the other.
“This is one of those times when I don’t enjoy being right. It means they mistook the detective
for me.”
“No, not necessarily.” Petra braced her rifle against Ohashi’s workstation. “It means your two
paths converged. You were both moving toward the same point. He just got there a few minutes
before you did. Axel, weren’t you law enforcement before you became a soldier?”
“Yes, four years in Phoenix.”
“Would you waste time tracking down a lead if you didn’t think it had merit?”
“No.”
“Kamryn, you were DEA before joining the TMD?”
“Yes, in Vancouver. I know where you’re going with this. So, no, we didn’t have extra resources
to spend chasing down false leads.”
“My point, exactly. The MPLE agent either had proof, or was working on getting proof these
people were guilty of a crime. If they weren’t guilty, why run? I also think they must’ve learned
about the terraforming experiment on Mars from the media, figured we were coming and were
waiting to spring a trap. For Mark and Eva.”
“Eva’s planetside—”
“Don’t worry, Mark,” Petra said. “We commed Sorayne with an update. She’s providing
security for Eva.”
The tablet sitting next to Ohashi rumbled to life with the sound of an Old Earth race car engine.
“Decryption’s finished.” She kept working. “Let it sit for a while, make sure there’s no self-
destruct protocol.”
The men went to work out in the small gym onboard. Everyone else wandered around the ship
for the next hour until the data had been compiled. In the meantime, Eva returned with Sorayne.
They met in the conference room.
Ohashi began her report. “The drone was custom built on Mars. The satellite-based tracking
program located its original home base as the same address on record for the Parker’s residence—
I checked. An MPLE tour of the premises might be in order. Brother and sister lived together.”
She muttered, “Kinky, if you ask me.”
Eva waggled her fingers at Ohashi.
“Wait,” Ohashi said, raising her hand to halt any questions. “That home base was overridden
with one on this station, about here…” She spun her screen around to provide everyone with a
schematic view of the space station. Flipping through the different levels, she narrowed it down to
the Command & Control section. “The C'n'C is responsible for traffic in and out of the station.
Someone in the Tower with Clearances and Security Codes had access to this drone.”
Kamryn pointed to the electronic remnants scattered across the workstation. “How many legs
did it have?”
Ohashi looked up. “Six, why?”
“Anything with more than four legs is not your friend.”
Petra gave her two thumbs up.
Ohashi resumed. “And just so everybody knows, I haven’t been off the ship since we arrived.
I’m leaving the ship to go shopping, plus have dinner on the station tonight, then tomorrow I’m
going planetside even if I have to buy a shuttle ticket.”
“Me, too,” chimed Petra.
“Me, three,” said Eva, not to be left behind.
Axel slapped his hands on the mahogany table, grabbing their attention. “Not without escorts,
you won’t.”
Mark nodded. “I’ll go with them.”
“No, you can’t,” Kamryn said. “You and Eva are not allowed to be outside this ship together.
It’s against every rule in the book. I’m sorry if it sounds heartless or calculated, but we can’t afford
to lose both of you at the same time. It’s not how security works.”
Sorayne stood. “I’ll furnish armed guards. No one leaves until they get here.”
Mark walked her to the entry hatch. “In case you haven’t noticed, Axel and I are outnumbered
here. It’s important we keep these ladies happy. I’m going to put in an order for their escorts. One
of Eva’s boyfriends was bronze, beefy and super smart. Petra likes mature men. Send a guy with
a sense of humor for Ohashi. But make sure they can shoot the eye out of a moving cyborg. You’ve
got two ships full of testosterone over there. It shouldn’t be hard to fill that order. Right, Colonel?”
Sorayne chuckled, shaking her head. “I’ll be back with three prime specimens. While they’re
gone, we can map out a plan to bring down the rest of Coulter’s Martian network.”
***
Time dragged on as Axel sat at the conference table listening to the pros and cons of going
public versus keeping their information a secret a
nd acting on it themselves. The arguments were
civil for the most part, not counting a few flare ups; a foregone conclusion with four alpha
personalities in one small space without a referee.
“I still don’t think bringing the Martian authorities in on this is the right way to go,” Mark said,
asserting his opinion for the third time.
Sorayne played devil’s advocate. “If we don’t, some or all of you could get arrested for
subverting their laws. Dr. Warren, you barely escaped that fate the first fifteen minutes you were
here. Martian Law Enforcement is very militarized. We’re not in Terran space anymore, we’re in
their space, which means we need to tread lightly.”
Anger flushed in Kamryn’s cheeks. Unable to remain seated, she paced around the room. “We
don’t know who to trust. The Parkers—or Königs—are dirty as hell. Their two employees are
either dead or dirty. At least one high-ranking person in charge of this space station is in league
with them. Plus, there’s a murdering cyborg on the loose. God only knows how many more. And
does anyone really think no clones are hiding on Mars? Damn,” she said, “we’re up to our armpits
in shit this time.”
Axel reached out to Mark with an encouraging clap on the shoulder. “I understand why you
don’t trust other people to make the right decisions when it pertains to Coulter. We’re not on Terra,
or even Luna, where we’d have contacts or friends to pull our butts out of the fire. The best way
to proceed is to bring our data, along with our suspicions to General Dimitrios at HQ on Terra.
From his position, he will know who to contact here, as well as how much of the classified
information to share about Coulter, BioKlon, the cyborgs, and clones.” Axel put his human right
palm down in the center of the table. He looked up at Kamryn standing across from him, hopeful
she’d agree with his assessment.
After an awkward moment, she moved to put her hand over his.
They looked at Mark. He acquiesced, placing his hand on top.
Sorayne sealed the decision with her augmented hand.
The stress evaporated as they reached an agreement.
“Thank you,” Sorayne said, breathing a sigh of relief. “I didn’t relish having to bail any of you