Legacy Universe: Gentle Reminders (Book One in The Rosewell Sequence)

by Martin Perry

  When he reached the heart of the light, he immediately understood why he had been led there. Where the rest of the facility was constructed of the thick black blocks, this one wall was not. It was only a single storey tall, the end of a short extrusion from the bigger body labelled 'Warehouse Nine'. Maur thought it might have been a hastily closed door, patched over with whatever piece of material had been lying around at the time.

  Despite his familiarity with the weapon that inhabited his body, it still surprised him sometimes. That it spotted this opportunity from so far away was something to marvel at, and he indulged the impulse to continue in return. The impressed grin that spread over Maur’s face helped ease his thumping nerves.

  “Impact. Collide. With. At. Central. Middle. Point.”

  The Legacy’s instructions were simple, much like the rest of this mission had been. Pleased with himself, and feeling as though he was getting one over Kerra, Maur began to step back from the wall. He counted ten paces, shuffled himself in line with the centre, and then spread his feet apart. He breathed deeply, unconsciously sending a warning through his body to prepare for the impact.

  The ten paces were taken in five great leaps. As the last was taken, Maur brought his arms up to protect his face. It was instinctive. With a throb across his skin, just like that which he felt when standing in front of bullets or mortar rounds, he sprinted into contact with the wall.

  It did not bear the weight of his attack. Fragments of white concrete shattered around him in a blaze of red light and a loud roar from the pit of Maur’s stomach. He had never used his body like this before; as a blunt weapon rather than an impenetrable shield, but it felt good. With the shattered wall still falling around him, Maur dropped to his knees and let out a blast of hot air from his lungs. It clung to the dust in the air, and created a sticky haze around his face. He was still smiling.

  “And who the fuck are you?”

  Maur didn’t recognise the voice, but its tone was not welcoming. He brought his head up. The grin fading from his face, yet his reply was still infused with the confusion his feat had earned him. In front was a squad of Plasterio employees.

  “I am... wait...”

  They did not wait to investigate exactly what Maur’s purpose was, instead the men and women in front of him gripped their hands around his arms and dragged him forward. Their aggression, and apparent indifference to his explosive entrance, told him that even with the strength of the Legacy on his side he should keep his mouth quiet.

  With his knees dragging along the floor of the factory, Maur was pulled past stacks of Plasterio’s ordinary goods; blocks, sealants and construction materials. The place was dark inside, its age and dilapidation showing. Strips of natural lighting ran around the perimeter of the rooms. They weren’t all functional, some flickering and others entirely burnt out. The beams flashed into his eyes, which seemed to be aggravating the Legacy more than him.

  As each dirty wall passed, and each corner was turned, the power gave a new suggestion as to how he might overcome and kill his attackers. He ignored them though, realising that his decision to ignore Kerra’s instructions had placed him in this position of jeopardy. More importantly, his actions had put the mission at risk.

  He could feel his suit vibrating, the audio broadcasting equipment announcing an incoming call. Maur knew who it would be, and did not feel comfortable ignoring Kerra.

  His captors pulled him toward a hastily stacked assembly of Plasterio’s large black bricks, an opening left in the middle where a different colour of block had been used. Maur and his captors waited for a few moments, messages being babbled across audio systems while they stood in front of this construction. Eventually the central piece shifted, and a passageway came into view. It was dug into the ground, the ageing factory giving way to even older earth. He could see struts put in place to hold the tunnel up.

  Only two of the large group flanking his transport through the facility stayed with him and dragged him down into the ground. They remained silent, as did Maur, the opportunity for greater discovery promising the potential recovery of his currently failing operation. Still his chest buzzed, and still the Legacy barked suggestions of retaliation and attack.

  The tunnel led to a plastic panelled, low roofed area. It was wide open, and bright lights reflected against the white plastic. It wasn’t divided in any way, and the bulk of its contents consisted of chemistry and manufacturing equipment. Masked men dressed in the standard yellow Plasterio jumpsuit, milled away at these stations, producing whatever substance the man named Mitchell was in charge of.

  It was Mitchell, Maur guessed, who he was closing in on at the centre of the room. He stood tall, skinny, and dressed in the same yellow uniform. It was adorned though. Bands of colour on his shoulders denoted his managerial role but the bright, golden necklace suggested this operation was providing him with funds far beyond the salary that position would offer. His hands were behind his back, and two jubrayans stood at either side of him.

  The jubrayans, who cleared his height by a good three feet, had their thick arms crossed across their chests. Deeply orange, reptilian skin flexed and throbbed, the glowing ridges along their faces pulsating in time with the anger causing their chests to heave up and down. Their eyes flickered, steady and in time with each other; their second pairs of eyelids moved quickly too. It was the jubrayan on the right who spoke first, to Maur’s surprise.

  “I assume you have been contracted by Plasterio,” he said.

  “I have,” Maur replied, without hesitation. There was no need to cover up why he was here, he’d already been found out.

  “I would also assume then, that they suspect us of foul play,” the jubrayan continued.

  “Yes. Looks like they were right. Shouldn’t I be speaking to Mitchell?” asked Maur.

  “You are speaking to Mitchell," he said, offering Maur a further surprise.

  “Oh.”

  “Oh, indeed,” replied Mitchell, newly named.

  “Well Mitchell, I should probably give you a bit of advice.”

  “I’m not sure I’ll appreciate it.”

  “I’m not sure that’s relevant,” said Maur. “Your employers have already lodged a complaint with UNAPT, and felt they had sufficient evidence to do so. I was only sent here to confirm the operation, make sure they didn’t cost themselves any damage that wasn’t avoidable. Any action against me will only damage your case buddy.”

  “Do you think your employers will appreciate you breaking down one of their walls?” Mitchell asked, ignoring the threat of police action as if it didn’t warrant consideration.

  “I’m sure that can be explained away. Although, admittedly I wasn’t supposed to get caught.”

  “You should have thought about that before breaking through the wall then.”

  “I suppose you’re right,” Maur said.

  Mitchell broke away from the other jubrayan and the human Maur had previously assumed was the ring leader. He walked towards him, and let his tongue flick out over his lips as he approached. The air in this place was dry, and Maur felt inclined to do the same.

  “I’ll admit, you’ve made things very difficult. However, I think that given you were unfamiliar with this factory, and moving around within it without the correct safety equipment, it might not be difficult for us to manufacture an accident to explain your death,” said Mitchell. With every word he leaned in closer, until his hot breath filled Maur’s nostrils.

  “Hmm,” Maur replied, edging his face closer too.

  “Hmm?”

  “I’m just thinking,” he said.

  “About what exactly?” Mitchell replied.

  “About how I might explain away your death as an accident funnily enough. It’s going to happen pretty soon after all,” said Maur, stretching out his words to mock Mitchell.

  With that, he forced his forehead up into the jubrayan’s nose, breaking it and driving the cartilage back into his skull.

  Chapter Two

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  Mitchell's nose streamed black blood, and panicking hands smeared it across his skin. He screamed for retribution, curdling the air with rage. Maur, unchained except for the hands of the two men at his side, willed the Legacy into action. Both of his arms extended out with unopposed force, sending both of the men across the length of the room. They tumbled through the air and crashed into the white walls, cracking them down the centre and taking much of the bubbling chemistry equipment with them.

  The men and women assembled within the room began to descend upon him. Maur was already standing straight, flexing the Legacy's power through his muscles and mind. It scanned over the crowd, assigning statistics to each and indicating their potential for damage. They all ranked low, except for the jewelled human and the other jubrayan. Maur could not yet see why, but as they turned and ran towards a distant door, he relegated them and focused his attentions elsewhere.

  The ringleader, Mitchell, was the first to retaliate, running forward and swinging a fist down into Maur's face. His fingers broke on contact, the skin around his knuckles burning. Smoke sizzled up from the burned flesh. Maur's senses picked up the scent, and it spurned him forward. The Legacy filled his mind with strategic options and routes of attack, yet Maur's next action was brutal in its simplicity.

  He brought the sole of his boot up into Mitchell's chest, crumpling his ribs and catapulting the heavy man forward. His right hand men were long gone, while others closed in bearing knives and blunt objects scavenged from the production equipment. They were a sea of anger, desperately sprinting forward to protect their illegal livelihood.

  “Kerra!” Maur shouted, tapping to open an audio channel. “Kerra! I need some support here! The mission is fucked! I repeat, the mission is totally fucked!”

  No response came. The men he had overheard outside had spoken of Plasterio's inability to observe what was going on here. Whatever measures had been put in place were blocking his link with the Jump Cannon. He was alone in a room of murderous narcotics manufacturers.

  Maur made it clear to the first subsequent attacker that he was not to be trifled with. With a thundering crash, he lifted him into the air, a hand around his throat, before dropping him on his back onto the hard surface covering the ground. A cloud of dust and crumbling debris burst into the air, Maur's fist cutting through it into the waiting face of the next aggressor.

  In a sequence of punches and kicks, Maur disabled a further half dozen men and women before stopping to breathe. The Legacy urged him on, but the retreating stance of so many of the armed production workers prompted him to halt for a moment. By now, Mitchell had regained his footing, still clutching at his chest. Blood bubbled around his lips as he seethed.

  “Why are you all standing still? He will tell Plasterio everything!” Mitchell screamed. “Do you really want to go to jail just for this idiot?”

  The screaming voice of their elected leader spurred them forward again, but Maur had already made plans of retreat. It was as he began to jog backwards that he saw the first signs of explosives. The room was rigged, apparently, and blinking silver disks burst into the air from newly opened holes in the ground. They were already giving chase, but the appearance of the explosives pushed all of the Plasterio workers, even the wounded, into a sprint towards his position.

  With his feet pounding into the ground, Maur darted back into the tunnel and headed up towards the surface. As he did, the extent of just how badly this mission had gone began to dawn on him. The group of armed workers who met him at the top promised that things would not be improving soon. He could still hear the stomp of boots coming up behind him.

  Within moment of his arrival, the human and the jubrayan who had disappeared from the facility below walked forward with sizeable laser cannons slung under their arms. He had just enough time to hear the increasing whirr of the weapon's energy cores before the first shot was fired.

  He pushed his feet against the ground, and jumped into the air above him, rounds of laser fire passing under his feet. Maur extended a hand and gripped a hanging chain, swinging his body forward over them all. As the gunfire caught up with him, one shot singeing the exterior of his flexible suit, he dropped back down behind them. The position offered him an advantage, but in the mêlée the Legacy counted that four had already died as victims of friendly fire.

  Crouched on the floor, looking up and lazily deflecting the shots that barely tingled against his skin, Maur saw the cannons of Mitchell's most potent pair re-appear. They were throwing co-workers aside, sometimes into the line of fire. Maur thought he might have underestimated their ruthlessness. He came to the conclusion that, one way or another, he had to dissipate the danger. Plasterio had not hired the Jump Cannon to kill their employees, whatever crimes they were committing in this place.

  Before the mob leaders could fire upon him once again, Maur leaped up onto one of the towering stacks of Plasterio products. He tapped his fingers against his chest and called for Macson, who, he hoped, was still hovering high above in the scout.

  “Macson!” Maur shouted, ducking his head away from an incoming shot and watching closely as the crowd below prepared to topple him. A quick ring signalled that his broadcast had been received.

  “Isn't this supposed to be a covert mission?” Macson replied.

  “Yeah, that hasn't gone so well. I need a distraction, I need you to draw them out into the open.”

  “How do you propose I do that?”

  “I don't know, you've got weapons don't you?” Maur replied.

  “Urgh. This is not how this mission was supposed to go Maur,” said Macson. “We should have brought more men if you were going to fuck things up.”

  “Just do it!” shouted Maur in response, annoyed by this unfamiliar man's over-familiarity.

  “Incoming,” Macson said. “Just make sure you're ready to get aboard. This is going to get very hot, very quick. Macson out.”

  Maur looked down on the crowd below. They had given up on firing at him, and were instead placing small explosives at the base of his structure. It was entertaining, at least for Maur, knowing that the impending blasts would inflict precisely no pain upon him.

  The Legacy warned him that the scout was hovering closer now, and cries from outside of the warehouse told him that Macson had already been spotted. A countdown appeared, and the first rounds escaped from the Jump Cannon scout. They roared down to the ground, creating loud rumbles that shook the facility to its core. Below, the men and women began to scatter.

  In a timely leap, Maur vaulted from the centre of a large explosion. The detonations at its bottom sent the stack of Plasterio goods up in flames, coinciding with the hellish din created by Macson's fire. Triggers were pulled in his general direction, but in a riot of noise and destruction he was no longer the focus of a coordinated attack. Every one of them was trying to escape.

  As if all of this was not enough, the silver plated devices that Maur had seen appear in the facility below, finally detonated. Chemical fumes leaked up through the floor and into the warehouse; greens and purples mixed in heavy smoke, all of it toxic. He was sprinting now, tumbling over falling towers of blocks and plastic products.

  Maur approached the entryway he had created for himself before when he spotted the human man who had flanked Mitchell and fired the cannon. He was injured, the Legacy informing Maur of a broken leg that was bleeding heavily. Partly in a charitable gesture, but mostly in an effort to undo some of the damage he had done, Maur swung out a hand and grabbed the man. He was soon scooped onto Maur's shoulder, and safe of the gasses when his saviour broke out into the sunlight.

  After getting a safe distance away from the warehouse, hearing it continually explode, Maur dropped him in a heap and turned to the sky to watch Macson at work. His rate of fire was intimidating, especially for those still running away from the disaster that had now unfolded around Maur. He tap
ped against his chest once again.

  “Macson, you can stop now.”

  There was a lengthy wait, and nothing was said in return. Still rounds cracked down from the sky. Each missed any of the few remaining escapees, but they still created volcanic bursts of flaming dirt from the earth which they hit.

  “Macson! Stop!”

  “Are you sure?” came the response, finally.

  “Yes, I said it twice!”

  The firing finally came to a halt, and Maur was able to hear the man groaning at his feet. He was trying to mumble words of surrender and apology, but they were ignored. Maur paced backward and forward, trying to search for a potential solution to all of the calamity he had caused. Even the Legacy was without any suggestions, and instead just offered him statistics on the amount of damage, and the likely cost of repairing it. The numbers were impressive, Maur gave the Legacy that much.

  “Fuck.”

  “No, the term is 'fucked up', or, its long form, 'I have fucked up', which you certainly have.” Macson offered, still strafing from left to right in the sky above. “You should see it from up here. Looks like you started a bonfire in a grenade factory.”

  “Macson...” Maur said, contemplating a stream of insult, but deciding against it in light of the facts. “Look, just get me...”

  “Maur,” Macson interrupted.

  “Yes?”

  “Why is there a bloodied jubrayan trying to heave a rocket launcher up onto one of the roofs?” asked Macson, starting to sound less calm than he had up until now.

  “Shit.”

  He could see him from here. Mitchell had somehow made his way to one of the other, less damaged warehouse units, and was struggling to lift a weighty rocket launcher up a set of ladders. They were barely clinging on to the wall, as was Mitchell. His feet kept on slipping. Maur almost felt sorry for him, but he imagined that Macson was most likely feeling less relaxed about the situation. This really was a complete fuck up.