by Terry Mixon
“Even if they do, I have a get-out-of-jail-free card. This is Commonwealth business. I want at least a few kilometers between us and the mall before we get out of the car, just in case Chandra’s people managed to trace our rental.
“After we get out, we’ll take the slideway back to the warehouse district. We’re not going to wait until dark to make our move, either. That’s when they’d expect us.”
“How sure are we that they are even looking for us in this part of the city? They might not have even found the first hotel room yet.”
“We can’t count on that,” she said with a shake of her head. “While paranoia is generally bad, it makes perfect sense when you know they really are out to get you.
“If a mole in Randy’s organization did leak our presence—which it sounds as if they did—then we have to assume that Chandra’s people have already accessed port records and seen what we look like.
“It’s a very short step from that to using the facial-recognition software security uses to locate us in the hotel records. You can be sure that he has people in security on his payroll for things like that.”
Brad hadn’t been aware that their images were saved during hotel check-in, but this was the Inner System. It shouldn’t have been so surprising.
The mall probably had similar security functions. Most public areas likely did, now that he thought about it. They’d have to stay away from places that security might have a camera watching.
“Can we evade Chandra and security long enough to get where we need to go? Aren’t the slideways monitored?”
She smiled. “Sure, but I picked a destination to help us with that. There are some disguises we can manage that mess with facial recognition. That’s yet another aspect of our training. We’ll be fine once we get out of this car and get some new clothes and other props.
He opened his mouth to ask her exactly how that worked, but the corridor car suddenly changed direction and sped up. The locks in the doors clicked.
“I’d say this means someone called security after all,” he said as she cursed. “I certainly hope your get-out-of-jail-free card is effective. And that Chandra’s people don’t find us first.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
“How likely is security to send someone out for us?” he asked.
“They’ll direct the car to the nearest security substation.”
“Then we’re getting out of here.”
He opened his jacket and drew his pistol. He used the bottom of the grip to smash the window. It was surprisingly tough and took several strikes before it cracked, then several more before it came apart.
“We’re going a little fast to jump out,” she observed.
“I hope they taught you how to tuck and roll in the academy,” he said as he grabbed the door. “We’re not out of the populated areas, so I can’t see them racing us through intersections. While I doubt we’ll stop, we’ll almost certainly slow down. There’s no traffic on this side of the car, so use it.”
Traffic control there in Olympus Mons City wasn’t exactly an obvious sort of thing. The corridor cars didn’t need signals, and the pedestrian traffic directions were facing so that he couldn’t see them.
Brad holstered his pistol, climbed out of the car, and hung onto the window, earning more than a few stares and even a few shouts. He expected the car to slow as it approached the intersection, but it accelerated.
He jumped anyway and slammed into the ground as if he’d run into a wall, rolling into the intersection. His bad arm hurt like hell, even though he’d tucked it in for protection. Then a corridor car coming in from the side almost ran over him, swerving only at the very last moment.
Unsure from what direction the next threat might come from, Brad scuttled to the side of the road as quickly as he could. A good idea, since a car from the other direction only barely missed him as obstacle avoidance systems belatedly recognized his presence.
Several of the pedestrians grabbed him, pulling him up before any other vehicles came along to run him down.
A man stared at him in amazement. “Did you just jump out of a moving car?”
Brad clearly heard the unspoken you idiot added to the end.
“There was a malfunction.” That sounded lame, even to him.
“I’d better call security,” the man said, obviously unconvinced.
Falcone walked calmly across the street, seemingly not bothered by her landing. “I’m security,” she said sternly. “Thank you for apprehending this petty thief. I’ll take him from here.”
Brad wasn’t certain whose look was less believing, his or the pedestrian.
“Really?” the man asked. “Who are you people?”
She presented her identification. This time, it was an official looking badge and holographic ID card. It looked real, even if she only held it out for a moment.
Without waiting for a response, she tucked the badge away and grabbed Brad by the arm. The good one, thankfully.
“Thank you, citizen,” she said. “I have another vehicle meeting us.”
Though Brad wasn’t certain the explanation would satisfy the pedestrian, the man wasn’t actively trying to stop them as they walked away.
It only took them a minute to get out of sight. Falcone released him and they sprinted away from the area.
He had no idea where they were going and he didn’t care, so long as it wasn’t into the arms of Olympus Mons Security or Chandra’s goons.
Her path seemed random, but she slowed after a few streets and ducked into a side corridor. There, she slowed to a walk.
“Are you okay?” she asked. “That was a pretty rough landing.”
“I’ve had better,” he conceded. “It looks as if you managed yours fine.”
He hoped his jealousy came through.
It must’ve, because she laughed. “You could say that. Once you jumped, the shove to the car made it slow down because it thought it had hit something. I didn’t even have to roll.”
“Figures,” he muttered. “Do you think security will be able to catch up with us? Will the guy call it in? And what was that ID?”
“It’s my Agency ID. He didn’t see it clearly enough to know anything other than it was authentic-looking. As for him calling it in, I have no idea. We’ll find out if we start hearing a lot of sirens.”
They walked in silence for the next twenty minutes. No sirens. The man must’ve decided not to get involved.
Security would be annoyed when the corridor car made its way to them without the thieves they expected. By then, someone would have video of them stealing the car. Their pictures would be out before long, if they weren’t being distributed already.
“We’ve got to get off the street,” she said. “There’s a neighborhood bar over there. Let’s duck inside and let things cool off for a while. We’ll have to adjust my plan now. No helping it.”
He trusted her, but he wasn’t sure the two of them needed to be planning a solo assault on the warehouse now. Chandra was expecting them, and now security was hunting them too. This had gone bad fast.
The bar turned out to be cozy and dark. Just the sort of watering hole where people didn’t want to be bothered. Perfect.
A large screen on one wall had most of the patrons watching some kind of sporting event that looked less organized than a brawl but possibly more violent.
Falcone headed for the bar. Brad started after her but saw a couple of men in one of the booths, wearing enlisted Fleet uniforms. That gave him an idea. One Falcone probably wouldn’t like, but that was too bad.
He diverted to the table and cleared his throat. “Excuse me, gentlemen, but are you assigned to Eternal?”
Eternal was the Fleet battleship in permanent orbit around Mars. It acted as the central point of the Fleet presence around Mars. Brad had been aboard her once and knew some of her officers.
The two men looked up, obviously surprised at the interruption to their private conversation. One of them started to say something, b
ut the other man held up his hand.
“Can we help you, sir?”
“Yes. I need to contact Commodore Angel Bailey. Discreetly.”
The man laughed. “As if I’m calling the Commodore when some guy in a bar asks me to. I’ll give you the main number and you can call her yourself.”
“This is official Commonwealth business,” Falcone said, presenting her ID. This time, she held it so the man could read it. “Fleet’s assistance would be greatly appreciated.”
The look she shot Brad wasn’t exactly appreciative, but they needed the help.
The man read her ID and then studied her face. “This is outlandish, but that looks real. Real enough for me to call my lieutenant. You can try to convince him to call the commodore.”
The man brought up his wrist-comp, called someone, and apologized for disturbing them. He then briefly explained that he had some civilians with badges asking to talk to their CO.
“He wants to talk to you,” the man said after a moment, extending his wrist-comp toward Brad.
The image on the screen was of a slightly older man in civilian clothes. He frowned at Brad.
“My name is Lieutenant Ibrahim Al Jabari. I understand you’re looking for help. Who are you and why don’t you call Eternal’s main contact number?”
“I’m Commodore Brad Madrid,” Brad said. “Your CO knows me. I can’t afford the wrong people figuring out where I am, so I’m doing this through you. My associate is with the Commonwealth Investigative Agency.”
The man looked as if he wanted to tell Brad to stop bothering him but examined Falcone’s ID when she presented it. After a long moment, he sighed.
“I’ll call her, but it’s on your head if you’re screwing with us.”
The image vanished from the wrist-comp. Sixty seconds later, it signaled an incoming call. The man wearing it leapt to his feet when he answered.
“Commodore!”
“Pass the man the comp.” Brad recognized Commodore Angel Bailey’s voice.
The Fleet man almost threw his wrist-comp at him.
“Commodore, it’s good to see you again,” Brad said once he could see her.
“It really is you,” she said, sounding more than a bit surprised. “Is your companion really an officer of the Commonwealth Investigative Agency?”
“She is and we need your help.”
“In regards to what?” she asked, sounding more than bit wary.
“The same sort of thing as last time. Only with that bigger organization we talked about.”
The last mission he’d worked with the woman on had involved the slavers. She would know the larger group was the Cadre.
“You have my undivided attention,” she said with a cold smile. “Can you come to my office?”
“Actually, we can’t. I don’t want to get into details, but we’ve annoyed Olympus Mons Security, and action is going to be here on the surface. I’ll pass the wrist-comp back to its owner and he can tell you where we are.
“I need your very discreet assistance in the form of some people that can assist us with getting into a secure area under the control of that group. They’re aware we’re in the city and know what we look like. They probably want to do unfortunate things to us.”
“I see,” Bailey said dryly. “And having met you, I can sympathize. It’ll take me a few hours to get some people together.”
He nodded. “That works. We suspect everyone at this point, so if you could keep this quiet—even from the people coming—that might help.”
Bailey nodded. “I’ll take care of it.”
Two hours later, they were in the back room at the bar. The two enlisted men were at a small table in the corner, keeping to themselves. Commodore Bailey had just arrived, alone, dressed in civilian clothes.
Bailey shook Brad’s hand firmly. “I have to confess I never expected to see you again, Madrid. Are we really after the Cadre?”
“We are. Commodore Angel Bailey, this is Agent Kate Falcone. She’s assisting me in this matter.”
Falcone raised an eyebrow. “I’d have said he was helping me, but that’s substantially accurate. I was here last time, Commodore, but we never met.”
“As I told you on the com,” Bailey said, getting to the point, “I’m at your disposal. What are you looking for assistance with?”
Brad gestured to a table on the far side of the room from the enlisted men who were watching the commodore with poorly concealed dread.
Once they were seated, he told Bailey everything from Blackhawk Station to the present. She listened without comment until he got to them stealing the car. At that point, she laughed before motioning for him to continue.
“Actually, that’s about the end,” he admitted. “We got out of the car and made it here. The bottom line is that we have to get into the warehouse and they’ll be waiting for us.”
“Are you going after that Mader fellow?”
He shrugged. “I originally thought it was a bad idea, but circumstances have changed. If I can get him, I’ll make him talk. The problem is getting in without them destroying all the evidence. If we call security, Chandra’s people will know. They’ll purge the data and Mader will vanish.”
She nodded. “I can provide the manpower and skill to get inside the warehouse, but the odds of getting into a firefight are pretty high. What happens when it all goes to crap?”
“This has become a make-or-break mission. We need to get Mader or Chandra, I think. No one lower in the organization will know where the base is.”
It was a terrible risk. If Mader got away, the odds were exceptionally good that bad things would happen to Michelle. The Terror would know that Brad was coming then, for certain. He’d lay a trap and the base’s defenses would be on high alert.
“I figured that would be the case,” Bailey said. “Just based on your general comments, I took the liberty of gathering some men and equipment. I can’t move a lot of people without raising suspicions, but I have two platoons of Marines quietly filtering down here. We can get equipment now that I know what the mission is.
“I’ve taken the precaution of stripping them of coms. Only the senior officer has one, and he’s under constant watch by two other men I trust implicitly. There will be no untoward messages.”
Fleet Marines were tough. The criminals might have better weapons than Brad, but the Commonwealth military could deal with them.
Bailey turned to Falcone. “I need to understand what your authority is in this matter, Agent. The use of Marines on Mars like this is going to raise havoc. Is my ass covered?”
Falcone smiled coldly. “It is. Give me your com code and I’ll send my orders and authorizations to you.”
Moments later, the Fleet officer was reading. She started nodded a few moments later.
“I can work with this. Still, I think it might be best if we have a little local cover. I’ve made arrangements.”
She made a call from her wrist-comp and smirked. Moments later, the door opened and two people walked in. One was Captain Weldon Shelby, Eternal’s chief engineer. The other was Detective Margaret Huddleston, Mars Security.
“Well, well, well,” the security officer said, her eyes cool as she took Brad in. “I saw an order for your arrest a few hours ago, Mr. Madrid. This is going to be an unexpected pleasure.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
“Detective Huddleston,” Brad said as he stood. “This is a surprise.”
“I’m sure it is,” she said dryly. “And it’s Detective Lieutenant Huddleston of Mars Security, not MOSO Security now. Goodness, but you’ve been a busy man.”
She walked slowly around the table and looked him over with cool eyes. “Criminal trespass of private property, grand theft of a very pricy corridor car, destruction of said private property, unlawful representation as a Commonwealth official, and fleeing arrest.
“I’d wager you were carrying illegal weapons during the commission of your crimes, too. All of that adds up to a lot of time in custody.�
�
“I never said I was a Commonwealth official and had no illegal weapons,” he said primly. “Besides, I can explain.”
“I can’t wait to hear you try to tap-dance your way clear of charges when this all sorts itself out. Your face is known to us now. Good luck getting off Mars without having to answer for your heinous crimes.”
The woman smiled a little. “That being said, Commodore Bailey said this meeting had to do with the Cadre when she abducted me—a somewhat more serious crime, I feel the need to point out. Being the generous sort of person that I am, I’ve decided to give you all the chance to explain yourselves before I start arresting people.”
“Since I’m forcing you to do all sorts of things you shouldn’t be doing,” he said with a smile, “can I coerce you into accepting a drink?”
“I couldn’t possibly keep you from forcing a glass of wine on me,” she said as she took a seat beside Falcone. “Who might you be?”
“The purported false Commonwealth official,” Falcone said, extending her hand. “Which I actually am, by the way.”
Huddleston took Falcone’s ID and examined it closely. “Not the security badge the witness claims someone showed him, but I suppose eyewitness testimony is questionable for a reason.”
She handed Falcone her badge back and took the glass of wine Brad had poured for her. He had no idea how expensive the bottle was, but it would be worth it in the long run. At the other women’s gestures, he poured two more. Captain Shelby grabbed two cold beers, one for himself and one for Brad.
Now that they were fixed for alcohol, Brad went through the explanations again. The detective listened closely, interrupting to ask clarifying questions as he went. Once he finished his story, she took him back through it and made him repeat sections in greater detail.
Only once she was seemingly satisfied did she lean back in her seat, frowning. “This is both good and bad. I’m pleased that I won’t have to put the pair of you in prison for your crimes, though the Commonwealth Investigative Agency will be paying restitution for the damages.