Prisoners of Paradise

by Brandon Lars Erikson

  “But, but I can explain…”

  Van Dien didn’t listen to what Clarke had to say as he pushed a button on his com, and heard a loud popping noise on the other end of the line. Van Dien smiled as he realized that an electronically ignited, plastic explosive in Clarke’s com had just blown the right side of his head off.

  “Or was Clarke left handed?” Van Dien couldn’t remember. “Damn it, and because of that, I just made more work for Cindy, my favorite morgue technician,” Van Dien thought, “Nice girl, that Cindy. She is always so polite.” Van Dien dialed a few more numbers, and listened to the ringing again.

  Van Dien pushed a few more buttons on his com, and hung up as he stopped walking, and peeked around the corner of the green, tiled wall he was standing against. He looked across the hallway, through a large plate glass window, and into a laboratory, where Cindy was speaking into a red com. He pressed a few buttons on his com, and put it up to his ear. He heard her speaking with a bit of happiness and enthusiasm in her voice.

  Cindy seemed excited as she said, “Yes, Agent Winters, I’m telling ya that this new test might be something useful to your murder investigations. Yeah, I can squeeze it into my schedule. I’ll be honest with you, I’m the sort of person who gets bored real easily, and a lot of the people down here like to take coffee breaks that last up to an hour, I could easily get some core samples from those bodies for you and test them for residual radiation…it shouldn’t be a problem, and I can have the results to you real soon.”

  Van Dien frowned and turned off his com as he thought, “My dear Cindy…apparently you are falling back into your former habits of being an ego driven overachiever…just like your old biochemist friends that are now in jail for Cutz addictions. I guess that means right after you use your expertise to help me bring Kalapana to his knees, I might just have to come visit you again much sooner than I thought. But not now, it is time for the next stage of my plan…I need to go and find someone else I can put between a rock and a hard place.”

  Location: Assistant Director Bauman’s Office.

  Ailanian Standard Time: 1700 Hours.

  “Bauman here,” Jack’s voice was irritable as he answered his com.

  “Agent Bauman,” The familiar voice said. “I was just wondering how your murder cases were coming along?”

  “We’re getting nowhere,” Jack said as he made a fist and hit his desk out of frustration. “So far we have found nothing that links these murder victims to Makula Pilikoa or Marco Giraudoux…those leads you gave us turned out to be nothing, this is getting quite frustrating.”

  “Believe me, Agent Bauman, I know how you feel,” said the soothing voice. “Young men, such as yourself, no matter how bright and talented you are…always seem to have put up with the bullshit of some arrogant superior, who got to his place on the totem pole…simply because he knew which ass to kiss…that’s the way it is here on Ailana.”

  Jack bit his lower lip for a few moments as he felt the tension working itself up his spine. He narrowed his eyes and said, “By the way, who are you? And how did you get my number?”

  “Trust me, Agent Bauman…I am on your side. I don’t have all the answers you seek…however; I do have a few more facts that might help you find those answers. I’m sending your office computer a few things; I suggest you get to work. And Agent Bauman, I understand that there is a new technique designed to detect radiation in humanoid tissues, it allows people to be tracked in a way, I suggest you convince your boss to read up on it…it might be the key to solving this mystery of the Prisoners of Paradise and why we would not want to wake them up if we can avoid it.”

  As the voice hung up on him, Jack nervously thought, “What the hell is going on? What is this all about?”

  Location: The Malawanii Kaku’o Apartment Complex…Downtown Polynea…Ailana.

  Ailanian Standard Time: 1730 Hours.

  “Come on you piece of shit…work already!” Herb Swanson said as he pressed a few buttons on his handheld electrograph. “Goddamn it!” He cursed as he fumbled through a few settings and removed two wires from the unit. Herb cursed again as he plugged the wires back into the wall mounted console and flipped a few more switches on the electrograph.

  The wall mounted console began to blink and Herb jumped with fright as his com rang.

  “Shit!” He cried out as he reached into his pocket and answered the com. “What in the hell do you want?”

  The voice on the other end seemed calm, yet stern. “Herb, buddy…calm down my friend. I just thought I would check in and see how things were going for ya.”

  Herb was irritated as he said, “Goddamn it, Jhett! How many times do I gotta tell you that the MENIX codes on this shitty planet are outdated and you should have provided me with a better servo-dialer? Well, at any rate, pretty soon the security cameras in the Walawai Building won’t see you.”

  Jhett said, “I’m so glad you are able to help us out under such dreadful conditions, Herb. However, I just want you to do your job so that I can do mine.”

  “Yeah, well hold your horses, you mechanized son of a bitch! I’m doing this as fast as I can!”

  “Calm down, Herb…all I want to know is if you could possibly get to those codes in the next buildings that we have to visit done sooner than later? We gotta hurry this operation up, my friend…if you haven’t noticed, the shit is starting to hit the fan and some people, who we have no interest in, are being killed for reasons we don’t fully understand. But we should pay close attention to these strange unforeseen events, since we don’t want to be around when the long arm of the law starts to reach for someone to slap the blame on.”

  Herb shouted into the com, “You tell Marco, that I want get out of here just as bad as the rest of us, so he’d better just cool his engines and get off my back! I’m doing the best I can here!”

  Herb hung up his com and started muttering obscene words under his breath as he tried to get back to the complex task he had been struggling with before he had been interrupted. The wall mounted console blinked rapidly and Herb’s ears detected something behind him. There was the sound of metal scraping against metal, almost as if a sword was being quickly drawn from a scabbard.

  “Oh…shit…”

  Herb heard the sound of heavy boots stepping slowly onto the concrete floor of the maintenance room he was in. He slowly looked over his shoulder and felt his hair standing on end as he saw the silhouette of a tall man with a broad brimmed hat. In the light coming in from the door, Herb could see a knife blade shining as the man in black made his way closer and closer.

  “Damn…” Herb said quietly and swallowed the fearful lump in his throat. “I guess this means someone didn’t pay up…and you don’t waste any time with the repossession process do ya?”

  Location: The Walawai Apartment Complex…Downtown Polynea…Ailana.

  Ailanian Standard Time: 2130 Hours.

  Jhett and Bloke walked slowly down the hallway, concerned that their footsteps might alert someone, who they wanted to catch off guard. Jhett stared down at the handheld computer with intense eyes that became pleasantly surprised when a red light began glowing in the corner of the screen.

  Jhett said, “We’ve got someone…and I think that they are just a few more doors down.”

  Bloke looked around the hallway and noticed that the red lights on the security cameras were not glowing, which indicated that the cameras were no longer operating, thus no one would know that they had even been here. “That was a good idea to cut Herb in on this operation. Things tend to go a lot smoother when ya don’t have to worry about the cops showing up while you’re in the middle of a business transaction.”

  Jhett smirked as he said, “I almost wished we would have just saved our money…Herb whines and complains too much for my taste…and I’ve come to the conclusion that the cops on this planet couldn’t even catch a cold…so why we hired him i
s beyond me at this point.”

  Jhett noticed the red light on his small computer had begun flashing just as he stepped close to the front door of an apartment labeled G-1209. Jhett smiled as he said, “Looks like someone is home…I sure hope they haven’t heard the news about Donny Sparks.”

  “Let’s get this over with,” Bloke said as he knocked on the door. “I’m getting hungry.”

  A few moments later, a human male, with bloodshot eyes answered the door in his sweatpants. He appeared as if he had been sleeping for the last few days and hadn’t eaten anything in a week. Jhett felt his stomach feeling sick as he realized how bad the man smelled.

  Jhett narrowed his eyes and said, “Ya know, Cutz addiction is not a pretty thing. Do you remember the little business deal you made with Marco? Please tell me you have what we came here for…my patience with you people…is running a little thin.”

  “Marco? But Donny told me that Marco was a goner…Donny told me to…”

  Jhett raised his arm. The man in the doorway screamed as he saw the blade emerging from the cyborg’s large fist.

  Location: the Halawalachek Mountains…Kamalama Ridge…Sacred House Reservation.

  Ailanian Standard Time: 0630 Hours.

  The young Kupano man held his breath, as he peered into the rifle scope, and sized up his targets. He felt his heart beating faster as how saw how the men were walking in a single file line as they made their way down the rocky slope and back towards the valley. The young lined the cross hairs of his scope with the man who was walking in front of everyone else. His eyes narrowed when he saw that everyone walking down the trail was of Kupano decent. As he peered through the scope, he noticed how some of the men had gang tattoos. He exhaled slowly when he noticed that a few of them appeared to be breathing quite heavily as if they were not used to walking in the forest.

  “They are not our people…” The young man thought as he remembered how little children had been crying when he had last seen these men in his village. He remembered how the man in the front of the line had pushed a teenage girl to the ground, while the other men had been collecting a bunch of small packages from her father’s hut.

  As he lined the man up in his crosshairs, he remembered how the man had held a knife to the young girl’s throat as he shouted at her father, “you’re holding out on us! Don’t cheat us, old man! Now get in there and give us the rest of the stuff we came here for!”

  He sneered as he remembered how the other men had been putting what appeared to be dozens of packages into their large backpacks that they were now hiking down the hill with. The weight on their backs appeared as if it were about to kill them. He remembered how the teenage girl cried as blood gushed from her nose. He felt a shiver go up his spine as he remembered the look of terror she had given him after these men had left her father bloodied and bruised even after he had given them what they had demanded.

  “Just a bit closer you sons of bitches…” The young Kupano man thought as he eyed up the men, and noticed that they were slowing down. “You assholes have no idea who you’re messing with…the revolution is at hand…we’re declaring our freedom and ridding ourselves of those who oppress us.”

  As he peered through the rifle’s scope, he saw a how a tree had fallen across the trail. He smiled as he realized that it was big enough to make getting over it difficult, and the men, with the backpacks, seemed unsure of what to do as they stopped dead in their tracks in front of the obstacle.

  “And with your deaths…our freedom lives…” The young man whispered angrily as he placed his crosshairs right in the middle of the man’s chest and pulled his trigger. He was ecstatic to see the man fall over the large log.

  “Go to hell!” He shouted as he noticed how the rest of the men were in perfect position and scared out of their minds. Their frightened voices echoed through the jungle as he pulled his trigger twelve times and laughed as all the men below him fell to the ground after their chests exploded into red mist.

  After he was sure that none of the men were going to move again, he took out his com and began dialing it. A voice from the other side of the mountain range answered, “Yeah?”

  “I’m running out of ammo…we need that stuff you guys are carrying.”

  “We’re trying to get there,” The voice on the other end said quietly. “We’ve got someone with us with a bad leg…his limp is slowing us down.”

  “Please hurry…I know more of these pricks are coming…and we need to be ready to finish what we’ve started here.”

  Location: The Mele Entertainment Corporate Headquarters…Uptown Polynea.

  Ailanian Standard Time: 1900 Hours.

  The angry voice poured out of the monitor, “Why should we vote for you? Wasn’t it your ideas that got us into this mess in the first place? We’ve had a real good look at what can happen when the private sector screws up the planet’s economy…and you want us to vote for people, who wish to limit the size and scope of our government, which could protect us from the financial destruction, that your preferred way of doing things has been known to cause? Do we look like idiots to you?”

  There was the sound of a crowd clapping and cheering.

  The angry voice continued, “Well, how about if we the people…it is still we the people, right?”

  The cheering of the crowd became louder.

  The angry voice became even more passionate as it shouted, “What would happen if we the people, took over the government and governed the planet, with the intent of doing some things that would benefit the people…and not just you for once?!”

  With a press of a button, the volume of the cheering crowd became less and less noticeable.

  “This one…the guy you just saw speaking,” Loko Kalaheva said with a drunken slur, “he was my favorite.”

  Grant poured his intoxicated boss another drink. He looked over Loko’s shoulder and saw the picture of a handsome Bontune man on the monitor Loko was watching.

  Loko was melancholy, yet delighted as he said, “this guy, he was a real Liberal idealist.”

  Grant said nothing as he handed Loko his ninth scotch and tonic for the day.

  “I tell ya, Grant…you don’t get anywhere in this business if you have ideals or values…and ya better be prepared to sell your soul…if you’re gonna be an entertainment empire…emperor…whatever…ya know what I mean,” Loko said as he took the glass from Grant’s steady hand and tried not to spill it as he took another drink. He sighed as he set the glass down on his desk and then immediately picked it up again.

  Grant remained stoic as Loko took a long sip. Loko then reluctantly put the drink down. He looked almost dazed and confused as he said, “When this guy was campaigning for the High Senate, he wanted to break up The Hydroplantations and return the land to the organic farmers. He wanted to regulate and tax big business…he wanted to level the playing field for the small time, Ailanian entrepreneur. He supported legislation that would have overturned many of the Moral Codes in an attempt to give people more freedom…he wanted to improve the world, and make it better…by setting it on a different course.”

  “Sounds like he had a lot of support at the time, why didn’t he get elected?”

  “Because I had one of our female reporters get him drunk one night at a fund raising party and I got shots of him taking her up to his hotel room. The next day…huge headlines! I had a story about a promising politician having an affair! It killed his political career and helped Wram Karamotzain win a tenth term in the High Senate. That’s what we do, Grant, we protect the status quo!”

  “Yes…sir,” Grant said with fake enthusiasm. It was becoming harder and harder for him to keep up this act. “I love that we are doing our part to protect our people from their potential mistakes.”

  “Grant?” Loko said with a soft, somber voice, “did I tell you…that I made a huge mistake?”

  “Sir?”r />
  “Oh, not you of course, you are solid. You are the best Vice President a man could hope to have on his side. When I recruited you from the University, I knew I was getting the best man for the job I could get. But there is a reason why we do the things we do, at this great television network.”

  Grant narrowed his eyes as he said, “And that is…sir?”

  “What is Ailana, Grant? What is it all about?”

  “I don’t understand your question, sir.”

  “Oh come on, Grant! Everything in life is based upon an idea…a dream…an ideal, a philosophy or a belief. There are those who believe creative people, intelligent people and intrinsically motivated people should be rewarded for their efforts. There are those who believe that only people of high moral character should be in charge of things. It only stands to reason that those who work hard should be rewarded. It should make sense that people…who work hard in order to fulfill their desire to be creative should be rewarded. In a perfectly moral world, only those people, who follow their passions with integrity, and don’t use their fellow man as the means to an end should reap the rewards our society has to offer, such as money, prestige and power.”

  Grant simply gave his boss a stoic gaze.

  Loko said, “There is a reason for everything on Ailana…there is a system that has to be kept in place. There are people, who have to be kept in power, not just because the system, which we currently have in place, makes old men, like me, rich beyond our wildest dreams. We do things on Ailana, not only because the system allows young men, like you, to benefit from the wealth I create…we do, certain things, on this planet…because there is something more important out there than ideals, dreams and beliefs. Progress must be protected…and chaos must be prevented at all costs.”