Curious Sols (The Sol Principle Book 1)

by Myron Smith III

  Glennay gave an innocent smile as they both continued to work on the computer stations.

  Kyle also had efficiently put his time and skill to use. Though John's leadership and close quarter combat skills were renowned, Kyle had been recruited for his specialty in military weaponry and tactics. The two of them together made a habit of overcoming the odds during several “police actions” before joining MARC.

  Looking over the Martian landscape, Kyle nodded approvingly. With the number of automated mines and turrets he had set up, anyone hoping to mount an offensive on the mining complex may as well be reenacting Pickett's Charge. Now if John would hurry up and bring their prisoner back, they could bug out and leave his defensive grid in the hypothetical.

  “How's it looking up there?” Kyle asked his eyes in the sky.

  “Clear as starry night under a boab tree,” Tyler replied. “I can see a tick making air biscuits on the back of a cattle dog from two clicks out.”

  Not quite certain how to factor the range, Kyle replied. “Just give me a heads up on anything moving out there with a plasma cannon on it. I'm not so worried about the ticks.”

  “Nothing but the good oil. Got it, mate,” Tyler acknowledged.

  Jessica spun in the navigator's chair to face Tyler.

  “Do you always talk funny?” she asked.

  “I'm speaking in genuine English,” Tyler replied. “But you shouldn't brush off a heads up for bities, especially those paralyzing ones... you can end up playing scarecrow in a corn field that way.”

  Jessica laughed at Tyler.

  “You're pretty funny,” she said. “Maybe you can teach my dad how to tell jokes.”

  The two of them laughed together.

  At the same time, a flashing light and warning sound emitted from one of the ship's screens. Tyler forced himself to focus on the alarm at hand. He brought up and enlarged the mini screen on the larger vidcomm. Jessica squirmed over in her seat to get a better look.

  “Kyle,” Tyler paged.

  “Go ahead,” Kyle responded.

  “Look sharp, mate,” Tyler warned, “we have two dozen armored ground cars leaving the dome on your side of town.”

  Kyle ran to the make-shift command bunker he had dug in front of the mining complex.

  “I'm linking us with Ashley,” Kyle informed him. “Give us a run down.”

  Kyle added Ashley and Glennay to their comm channel. Then he jumped over the waist high wall and down into the pit on the other side. Recovering from his jump, he walked over to the workstation he had set up to defend the area. Working quickly, Kyle brought his defense net up to full alert and activated his mine controls.

  “Okay,” Tyler began, “looks like New China has twenty ground cars positioning outside. They're sporting light armor and plasma cannons in the back.” A few second later Tyler added. “More bad news, looks like they're rolling out six heavy armored vehicles too. A dab of good news though, those heavies are a couple generations old. I don't see any fliers right yet.”

  “You got that, Ashley?” Kyle asked.

  “Yes,” she replied. “We're hoping to whip up a surprise of our own, courtesy of Ms. Glennay, but we're still cooking it up.”

  Meanwhile, a series of warning alarms went off on the duck's vidcomm and Kyle's workstation.

  “I guess the Ex wasn't kidding,” Kyle added. “I'm showing multiple plasma turrets charging up on the dome's exterior.”

  “Tyler can you get an ETA on the vehicles?” Ashley asked.

  “They haven't left the base of the dome so far,” Tyler explained, “but I'll get one if they start in a direction.”

  “Just keep those eagle eyes trained on them,” Ashley reminded him.

  Turning to Glennay she asked. “So, is my best friend, the coal miner's daughter, going to have some southern hospitality ready or not?”

  Glennay seemed too busy to notice, but then replied without looking Ashley's way. “If you start singing Loretta Lynn so help me I'm going to throw a wrench at you.”

  “Then I guess you'd better work faster,” Ashley said as she made a mental note to research Loretta Lynn on her Ksync.

  “Don't worry,” Glennay replied. “When it comes to dishing up trouble, my grits are to die for.”

  #

  When the pain had stopped pulsing through his head, John realized he was back in the mines. He vaguely recalled the trip back, being thrown into a maintenance vehicle from the processing center and driven into the lava tubes. His other shoulder hurt too as he remembered being kicked off the side of a vehicle by Dominic's thugs.

  He wasn't sure why he was still alive or why they had bothered to give him a re-breather. John knew how easy it would have been to dump his body out here without being found.

  “Paying off any last debts?” he asked rhetorically. “You should have spent more time watching Bond movies with me and my grandfather. Never let the good guy out of your sight.”

  John took stock of what he did have at his disposal, which boiled down to his re-breather and the flimsy toga he was still wearing. He didn't have his Ksync, MARC suit, and worse yet his neuroband.

  What sight he had, came from a light farther down the lava tube. A source of light was also a source of danger if there was a mining group there. He ears told him that was unlikely as the pulses of the drilling machines could be heard at this distance. He struck out for the light hoping he wouldn't be recognized by his first impression.

  #

  Stephanie’s insides were being ripped apart. She sat as far away from Elizabeth as the cell would allow. Her eyes were locked forward refusing to see Liz. The confession had poisoned their short-lived happiness. For years her heart had cried out for her mother. The walls she had built and the people she had kept at bay were for naught. The drawbridge to her heart had been lowered and the heartbreak snuck right in. How could you abandon a child to satisfy your own aspirations?

  The truth smashed the fanciful image she had built of her mother. Her crutch of self-righteous indignation had been kicked away. Without hope and without pain she was left with the void of a broken heart. As the tears rolled down her face, Stephanie slowly looked toward the ceiling of her cell. A distant memory found its way into her thoughts. It was a memory that worked to comfort her.

  Elizabeth had been a leader, a negotiator, a peacemaker, but rarely a mother. The hundreds of bargains she had made and problems she had solved were a useless script for speaking with her daughter.

  "Steph," Liz faltered before continuing, "Stephanie I won't insult you with excuses. I failed you as a mother once and now I'm failing again. My voice must be the last sound you wish to hear, but we must talk one last time. We have to prepare. Dominic will come. He will come and I am terrified of what he will do. "

  Tears joined Elizabeth's plea for an audience with her daughter.

  "You must live," Liz continued. "Don't think of your hate for me, think of your father. Think of that precious sister you have. Live for them."

  Stephanie heard another voice. A little voice inside her head had been speaking so softly that she hadn't heard it. Its volume increased until Stephanie could no longer hear her mother's words. Her voice was no longer little, and it delivered a clear message. She couldn't trust her mother. She had to trust herself. With decisive strength, Stephanie fought her way through the crushing emotions to clarity.

  Stephanie deciphered the facts that were woven into the duplicitous words from her mother. Dominic had been cruel. Moreover he was smart. Somewhere beyond the walls of her cell, Dominic threatened everyone who had genuinely loved her. It was a list of people that had grown over the years, yet she could not appreciate their love until now. Stephanie saw the faces of all the people on the list: her father, Jessica, Captain Sterling, and even... Ashley. A strange smile crept its way onto her face as she pondered the irony. Here she was locked in a cell with the person that she had dreamed about finding for years only to realize the person she should have cherished was with her all along. />
  Stephanie ran her hand along her toga. Finding what she had hoped the guards overlooked, she drew strength from an unexpected opportunity. Abruptly turning to face Elizabeth, Stephanie rose from her crouched position and stood tall.

  "We'll talk," Stephanie answered confidently. "I'll detail the plan and you can listen."

  Liz was taken aback by the vigor of her daughter's comments. The little child that hid behind her legs from strangers was replaced by a confident young woman.

  Stephanie used her newfound strength to take the first steps of her new life.

  "You'll always be my mother," Stephanie explained. "I've let my anger run my life for too long and it's not going to anymore. No matter how you justify it you sold me out... sold us out. I finally understand the pain I've seen in dad's eyes all these years. "

  Stephanie paused to compose her thoughts into words.

  "I spent more than a few angry hours sitting on a pew, next to a fighter pilot, who struggled to fill in for a mom I didn't have. I heard over and over that I was supposed to forgive others for their sins. I never blamed you for not being there. I blamed dad, my sister, my step-mother, and most of the world for my anger, but I didn't blame you... until today. In some strange way I couldn't believe you would have left us by choice. "

  Stephanie fought off the emotions threatening again to take her prisoner.

  "I forgive you," she blurted out while she could. "I want to be so angry but I can't. I can't be angry and get through this. So I'm going to find a way to forgive you and you're going to find a way to be a mom."

  Elizabeth crumbled from her daughter's charge. The words struck harder than any weapon could injure. From her wound bled the buried tears of her child's lifetime. Liz shook as her remorse crumpled her body and spirit.

  Stephanie stood paralyzed in action. Although her path had become so clear, she was clueless how to respond to her mother. Stephanie remained locked in position as seconds felt like hours. Her mind failing her, Stephanie's heart took over as she slowly knelt down and sat next to her mother. She reached out to her mother in a gentle embrace. It was a time for them both to start upon a new path.

  #

  With a wave of his hand he opened the door to her cell. Sitting in the corner of the small room was Dr. Elizabeth Stanton. She was once a friend, a colleague, and a person he had presumed dead.

  “I have to thank you for disguising yourself on the way in,” Dominic greeted her. “If people had thought their O-Sophia was alive and well, that would have required a creative explanation on my part. Since you’re here, I feel the need to ask a very important question.” Dominic cocked his head and asked, “Didn't I kill you already?”

  He sat down on a bench in her cell trying to find a comfortable position.

  “If I had known about the genetic drinks you had been serving to your wise-men down here, I wouldn't have so carelessly abandoned you,” he said.

  Elizabeth stared blankly at the wall refusing to acknowledge him.

  “Don't care to chat, I see,” Dominic gave a disappointed look. “Well I should tell you, I really didn't want to kill you back on the Argo. You had to push me. You had to be curious.”

  Dominic stood up and walked back to the open cell door.

  “Though you may be curious as a cat, I can assure you of one thing,” Dominic paused.

  Taking a plasma pistol out from underneath his tunic he shot her twice in the head at point blank range. Elizabeth's emotionless face seemed to freeze as her body slumped against the wall.

  “Your fruit cocktail juice doesn't give you nine lives,” he finished.

  Dominic placed his pistol back in his robes and walked back down the prison corridor with a sense of satisfaction.

  As the clank of the shut prison door reached them, Elizabeth and Stephanie took deep breaths.

  “It worked,” Stephanie said. “He didn’t see us at all.”

  “I don’t think he knew to expect your amazing gift,” Liz replied. “Though I almost screamed when he fired those shots.”

  Elizabeth turned and looked at the marred wall.

  “I don't think Demosthenes had this in mind when he spoke of double jeopardy,” she joked.

  Stephanie stood confused at her mother's comment.

  “It's in your fifth amendment dear,” Elizabeth added. “You can ask your father all about it later.”

  She went over to Stephanie and gave her an uncharacteristically warm hug.

  “Thank you, you saved my life,” she whispered as a large smile swept across Stephanie's face. “Now let's find our way to your father and perhaps my friend if he's still alive.”

  Elizabeth rubbed the neuroband on Stephanie’s head that had been hidden in her toga. “Can you use that on people you can't see?”

  “I couldn't before,” Stephanie hesitantly volunteered. "I've never been able to do any of this during my training with dad. It's like a switch has been turned on for me.”

  “Just keep eating those fruit snacks of yours,” Elizabeth said as the two walked down the corridor together. “I'll explain it as we go.”

  #

  Approaching the light source, John slowed his steps. As it had in his earlier travels, the light illuminated the entrance of a lava tube branching off from the main corridor. He leaned around the corner, hoping to get a glimpse of the room without being noticed. Inside he saw a few mining machines, but nothing like those used in his previous encounter. The room was otherwise empty, except for two small people standing beside a far wall.

  The two were taking a round piece of rubber and bouncing it off the wall. Their peculiar speech reminded him of laughter as it ricocheted in various directions before returning to them. John wasn't sure, but it looked and sounded a lot like a game of handball.

  The people didn't notice John until an odd bounce carried the ball in his direction. Seeing him, they froze as the ball rolled to his feet.

  John said in a soft voice. “I don't suppose either of you speak English? I should have studied Chinese at the academy, but I was too busy chasing after this slightly crazy woman. You might know her, she seems to call herself O-Sophia around here... whatever that means.”

  One of the two repeated the name O-Sophia with an Asian accent. The two then quickly turned and ran toward a small opening in the wall.

  “No, no, no!” yelled John as he saw the two running off. He watched as a chance of seeing his family again could be running away.

  “A king's ransom for my Ksync translator,” John thought he could kick himself. He continued muttering now imitating an old woman’s voice. “Take three credits of Chinese, you'll need it later in life…” He finished speaking in his own voice. “Yes ,Mrs. Wendell you were right. You must have known I’d need to talk with Martian miners with huge claws that only spoke Chinese.”

  John decided to forage for something useful now that the room was empty. He rummaged through various junk parts, rocks, and machines. The gear, however, must have been thirty years old or more. What wasn't rusted didn't prove useful at all.

  Taking another look at the hole in the wall, John sized it up.

  “Well it’s bigger than the vents back on the Columbus,” he joked to himself. Trying his best to imitate a worm, he crawled his way into the opening. He bumped and banged his knees, elbows, and arms as he travelled along the rough tunnel.

  “Why do the miners always have to be short people?” He continued to muse to himself. “How about a few eight feet tall dwarves, Mr. Tolkien? No…it had to be the elves with the long legs.” John bumped his head on a low hanging stone saying. “At least Moria had tall ceilings!” After a few more feet, the small crawl space opened into another room. Unlike the last area, however, this one was filled with the clangs, thuds, and banter of many people.

  *

  Chapter 45 Old Friends and New

  Elizabeth led Stephanie into a forgotten pathway through the city. The corridors were cramped and dirty. In some parts they had partially collapsed.

&nbs
p; “How did you know these even existed?” Stephanie asked.

  Elizabeth thought for a moment how she was going to answer her daughter's question.

  “The MARC program established all the dome cities years before I arrived on Mars,” she began. “From what I've gathered, the domers worked hard at making your great-grandfather's dream a reality here. There were years when this place floated on a sea of hope and optimism about what could be.”

  The two of them continued crawling down the small corridor. Elizabeth paused a minute as they avoided a grate in the middle of the shaft. Revealed through its small slits was a room beneath them. As they quietly passed by it, she continued.

  “Regrettably, when your grandfather passed on and others took over, his hopes turned into poisoned dreams,” she explained. “By the time I arrived, the people in the dome were just a means of gathering resources for Earth. Their rights were suspended due to the “State of Emergency” that existed back home. Just a convenient way of tossing aside the freedoms that exist in a democracy by the real power base, an Oligarchy.”

  “Mom,” Stephanie interrupted, “this sounds more like one of dad's history lessons than an answer.”

  “Fair enough,” Elizabeth agreed. “Let's just say after years of working behind the scenes, many spent days crawling through these dirty little crawlspaces. My organization quietly set the stage to change the entire city. One night the people went to sleep forgotten subjects of a world far away. The next day they woke up as citizens in The Order, led by those who would see them prosper and thrive once again.”

  “So you led a revolution in this place?” Stephanie asked.

  “Of sorts, I suppose,” Elizabeth agreed in part, “but it was a peaceful exchange of power. The soldiers that wore MARC uniforms, traded in their suits for tunics. Even my general was once a commanding officer for them. In the end, only a handful of people resisted including the governor. They were given fair trials by The Order and punished justly.”

  Paying too much attention to their conversation and not to their surroundings, Elizabeth smacked her arm on a pipe.