by Clay Moore
“Only way to keep the weight off her.”
“I see. Your suit needs the garage when you get back.”
“It might work itself out. Now I got to get my men and the others out.”
She pointed at the four other men and then led to the wholly collapsed mine entrance lip. It is evident that she was ordering her people to move the detritus from the entrance. The police officers joined in. Together the Marines and Police uncovered the opening to find two Marines over the two police officers protecting them from the dirt and rubble. The police officers dusted off the Battlesuited Marines. The Marines then picked up the two police officers. There was no medic among the police, so one of the Marins had to get out of her suit. All the police had never seen this evolution performed. She squared putting her hands down as if she were trying to jerk weights. There was a slight hiss as the back panel opened. Then she stepped out of her suit wearing only a blue undersuit. She reached into her Battlesuit and pulled out her medkit.
Brian knew that he was going to need autodocs out here. Marines might have a medical shuttle operating with the maneuvers. He put himself on the Marine channel. “This is Penda.”
“Go Penda.”
“I need autodocs out here. I have three casualties that had an avalanche land on on them.”
“I have a single transport with two autodocs. There is a full doctor on board. Will that is enough?”
“How long?”
“Ten minutes.”
“Send it,”
“The transport is Mike Tango 1291. She has a resupply crate for the Marines. Should that be deployed.”
“First at green smoke. Land anywhere near the mine.” Brian dropped a green smoke
“I got us some Autodocs with a Doc on board. Sergeant, I got you a resupply crate.”
Felicity walked up. “A demolition team is coming. Headquarters say we have the entire contents of the operation. I smell good with the brass. Later tonight?
“How do you feel about Sardy’s.”
“Now you made me hungry. Make the reservations for eight PM. I’ll be at your place after the debrief.”
“I’ll have the transport land on Headquarters. We have a full-scale hospital. Least we can do. From there I can walk to my apartment. I’ll get to the shower before you. Save you a seat.”
PARTIAL DEBRIEF
Brian did indeed ride down with the medical transport. They landed on the roof. The medical staff of the Secret Service hospital brought three gurneys. The autodoc did an excellent job of removing the cheap armor. It also stabilized as it could the individual patient. When the transport landed on the rooftop of the Secret Service building, he waited for all of the casualties to be removed. Then he walked off the transport. He knew that he needed to get out of the equipment he was wearing. He went down to his office. Julie looked at him with a slight smirk on his face. He ignored her going into his office.
He removed the gear and put on an extra suit he kept in the office. He put the submachine gun in his briefcase. He took out the Slate. He dropped his Slate in the outside suit coat pocket. He settled the pistol in the holster
He went back to the top. He entered the office suite for the Director. Carla was there waiting for him. She said nothing but guided him to the door. Then she walked with him into the office. The director was facing the door this time. The director pointed to the chair in front of his desk. Carla left. She knew the gist of what was to come.
“When I agreed to you going with the police, I thought I was sending you on a picnic. You took jurisdiction when you saw a splatter of gold not far from the smelter site. You also called down a Marine drop. Followed by a medical transport which landed on this rooftop. You take a lot on yourself.”
“That’s why I was given the authority, I thought. To use my judgment and resources to complete my mission.”
“That is why you have the authority. You are not going to have that authority on another world. You won’t be able to whistle for a Marine Drop. You will only have the resources you came with. I don’t want to hear from you, or what you did from the news. That’s enough on that.
“One of the many things that you succeeded was gathering information. The police were flummoxed by the data you dumped on them. They appreciate it.
“Normally you will submit a report and then we will do face to face debrief. Now I want to give you the continuation of Gold Rush. We have been aware of the people operating mines on our planet and taking it off the world for at least nine months. We want to know who is behind it all, and Who might be behind him.
“To do this, you must scare this man enough, so that he takes flight and goes back to his boss.” The Director put on the picture of a man
Brian looked at the man. He was chubby with four days growth of beard. He wore a hat called a Bowler. His clothing looked threadbare and was of a varicolored hue.
“Who is he?”
“Harry Witherspoon. He’s clean on Eridani so far. We think that there is only one mine left. It is coincidentally next to your next mission.
The director took a sip of water. He brought up a map on the screen facing Brian.
“This is Todd Meyer. He is the leader of a group of Homesteaders who applied through the Emir directly. This grant directly from the Emir gives them a lot of power. They don’t use it. Instead, another group is running ads on the entertainment channels calling the group free love fornicators. That is going to be enough to get about sixty percent of the religions in this world with their knickers in a knot.”
Brian chuckled.
“Some essays have been circulated that purport to be written by Todd Meyers. These essays are critical of the Emir and his policies. He wants to know if these are truly written by this man. He wants to know who is doing this.
“You have to do two jobs here. Work with the Children of the Wind, find the Mine Engineer, and make him run. You may also defeat the mining workers and guards. You will have the use of Action Squad 3. Save them till the end. Keep us in communication. Take your car. I Know that you will lose it. It will be replaced. Give Felicity my best when you see her tonight.”
“Sir?”
“Didn’t I mention that she is my daughter. She can’t stop talking about you. Thank you. Chris’s death in the line of duty brought her down. She’s now near where she was at his death.”
CHAPTER THREE
Children of the Wind
CHILDREN OF THE WIND
Brian did something idiotic. He wanted to Know more about Chris. Felicity just clammed up and did not speak for the rest of the night. When she came to bed, she was wearing sweat clothes. Today he had to go to the Saddleback mountains for a river called Currant current. Those ancient settlers were real cards.
He was currently flying at ten thousand feet. This was a 3-hour flight at subsonic speeds. Three hours meant that some of his resources may not be able to get to him in time. He would suggest prepositioning them on his next update.
The Saddleback Mountains were just ahead. They were two hills with a swayback ridge between them. This Mountain Range has ten of the Saddleback Mountains.
As he got closer, he could see the grasslands with scrub, and trees in the depression. Then he saw the snake-like meandering of the Hattie river. Then he saw the twenty-eight white buildings on the flatlands leading up to one of the Saddleback. Then he took notice of the illegal mining camp down amid the trees and grasses of the depression. No one was operating the mine right now.
Brian made a full right turn. The people could see that the Aponte was going to land in the dirt road from the highway 101. They made room for him to land, which he did He walked to a knot of people He found Todd Meyer. He extended a hand to Todd who took it with a firm grasp.
“My name is Special Agent Brian Butler.”
“Get away from him. He’s a government Assassin. At least that what they say at Four Corners.”
“Believe me. If I wanted Todd dead, Todd would be dead. There is not one thing that you could d
o to prevent it.”
“Then why are you here?” asked Todd?
“I am here to ask you a few questions. The Emir is a little perturbed about what he is hearing. He wants to know the truth.”
“Ask me. I will give you the truth.”
“Good. Did you say something to the effect that the Emir does not care about the marginal citizens of his planet.”
“Yes, that one I did say, but I had provocation. I believed that one of my men was killed and no one in the government did anything.”
“That was five days ago. Sometimes it takes a while for it to get to the correct government agent.”
Todd’s eye opened wide. “Why now.”
“It took me a day to find out that it all was about gold. That gives me the authority to resolve this.”
“I beg your pardon, but you are just one man.”
“Those five men behind me look like they don’t like me. Tell them to come on.”
Todd nodded at the men. The first three men flew in three different directions. The fourth man was knocked out by a tiger paw to the head. The last man standing pulled a blade making Brian pull out his carbon nanotube blade. He managed to cut the edge off at the hilt with his knife. Brian stood crouched waiting for the men to renew their attacks. After a while, Brian stood up. He handed his Blade to the man whose blade he cut in half.
“I trust I proved myself.”
“Very much so.”
“I am a Special Agent of the Secret Service.” He showed his badge to the ever-increasing crowd of people. “My Main task is dealing with the illegal gold mining going on at your neighbors. I’m going to do that by helping you. It’s not too often that I get to kill two birds with one stone.”
Brian and the crowd chuckled. Brian could feel the tension run out of the community. Then Brian heard the familiar noise of Twin Radamite jets laboring to keep a heavy car flying. It was an old Busford Family Grav-car. With two submachine guns attached to the Car. The Busford turned a slow left turn. Brian pulled out his sub-assault rifle Van Lantern gun. This gun was more of a short assault rifle than a submachine gun. Brian fired three times. Three flechette darts were fired. The Windscreen disintegrated. Then the pilot’s heart was gone. The grav-car crashed into the ground.
Brian told everyone to get back while he ran to the Family car. He knocked on the pilot’s head and heard no response. .He found the tank. The tank was three-quarters full. He tore off the safety grill. He twisted four quick release catches on the tank. That allowed him to pull out the Radamite tank. What he saw there were a full two weeks of power generation for the Town. He handed the container to a community member. That community member trotted toward their storage building with the radamite tank.
Brian looked at the fuel pump that was dangling. He knew that the fuel pump was a submersible design and it was able to handle Radamite, the dry liquid. The pump just would not be enough to move water. He found digging tools and a variety of knives. Then he noticed two ammo bags with ten magazines. He went to the forward section. He was glad that they mounted the weapons near the pilot. He cut off the cord. The Weapons dropped to the ground. He found the two slings for the submachine guns.
He spent a few minutes reattaching the slings to their weapons. Then he wondered about his body. He went over the inventory of things in his car put there by an accommodating Quartermaster. Then his mind hit on the idea that might work with the body, Telignite. That was the thing he used to cut through plascrete walls or even through metal doors. Telignite burned hot, hot as Radamite, five thousand degrees hot. That should render the body to ash quickly.
He pulled the body out through the broken windshield. He drug the body ten feet away. He searched the body. He came away with a bag of nuggets. The majority of the chunks were the size of his little finger’s nail. He fired the telignite on the body. He walked back to his Aponte. He saw Todd walking to intercept him. Brian tossed the leather pouch to Todd.
Todd opened the pouch and poured out a few of the nuggets into his hand. “What is this?”
“That’s what the pilot was paid to fly the car with the guns on them.” Brian dropped the two submachine guns on the ground along with the ammo bags. “Now you got weapons. Nobody fires them until everybody has been oriented to them. We start having Night watch. Starting tonight.”
“You sound like a military man with some authority.”
“I left the Marines as a Gunnery Sergeant. Something you don’t forget how to do. Do those lights that I see around your compound work?
“They should work. Our generator was destroyed. We could not replace it.”
All I can do is get your power up in my car. And with help from my limited resources give you a submersible pump. Power tonight, and waterworks tomorrow?”
“If you can handle that then I’ll call you a magician.”
Brian smiled. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his personal communicator. Brian set it for the scramble circuit. He dialed the watch commander.
“Penda.”
“Penda Acknowledged.”
“I need a 120 volt submersible one hundred gallon per hour pump capability. I need a firehose line about thirty yards. I need Standard power extension line, about twenty yards.”
The duty officer repeated the order. “How would you like that delivered?”
“Airdrop midnight on a wrecked car my operational area.”
“Anything else?”
“Inform command authorities I have proof of gold mining by the neighbors. Penda out.”
Brian spent the rest of the day teaching all of the Children of the Wind to fire and change magazines, The radamite tank was brought out. No one could sleep. Precisely at midnight, a high flying transport dropped the goods that Brian ordered from his operational funds. Three white parachutes brought the products down. AS soon as the goods landed, the community brought them to Brian.
They were about to cut the Parachutes away from the presents when Brian stopped them. “Hey, don’t cut parachutes off. The Chutes make great waterproof clothing. The line is rope. Try to maximize the cord you keep. You never know when it might come in handy.
Brian reached into the backseat. He pulled down the back support and took the plastic case He opened the case and took out the cover wrench. Brian then put the cross-connect bar across the two terminals from the Auxiliary power units. He tightened the cross-connect bar. Brian plugged his grav-car into the electrical distribution system.
Brian hopped into the driver’s seat. He fired up the Auxiliary Power Units. Brian pointed to Todd
Todd ordered the main breaker closed. He saw raw lights wave and then all blink on. From the river, you could hear the submersible pump. Then when enough pump head was developed, then it started through the system up into the gravity cistern. There were general cheering and kissing.
Todd came up to him extending his hand. “The last time we shook I was tentative. Not this time. I believe that you are here for us as well as other things.”
“Speaking of that It is almost half past six. The watch should be two. Anyone who has been through the gun refresher.”
“Micah and Serndon. A husband and wife team came out of the group. Up and down the lane. You put the lights correctly for patrol.”
“I did not want to drive a grav-car on this track at night without lights.”
“Okay, as the watch you are supposed to give us early warning. The best way to do that is to shoot someone. The oncoming watch always relieves the off going watch thirty minutes early. Off-going has to tell on coming all the interesting things that happened. Use a Slate if you have one. Now go on watch.”
Todd held his arm out to Brian. Todd guided Brian to Todd and Melody’s house. As he walked, Brian could see the men throwing a baseball around. Some of the women were throwing the ball along with the men. Brian was getting a different vibe from the group as if marriage was not necessary.
Lord knows that Brian was no prude. He just wanted to know the social dynamic.
He keeps misreading some of the stares he was given by some of the women. Melody was making biscuits. She was also making gravy from the leftover dripping from a feral hornbeast. She was the one who was disrobing Brian with her eyes
Brian walked into a single room house. There was one room in the entire house. The bed and kitchen were on opposite sides of the house .The kitchen were over in the north-west corner. The bathroom consisted of a shower and a toilet with a sink. There was one closet that has to store both partner’s stuff.
“What is going on here?”
“What do you mean?” asked Melody?
“I keep getting this feeling that I am being sized up like a pound of meat in the store by the women. I don’t mind that. I just like to know what it is all about.”
Melody was going to answer, but Todd prevented her.. “We don’t believe in ownership of people. So traditional weddings are not done. Two people who want to live together. They announce it to the community. Only she is allowed to depart a relationship. She also has the privilege of shopping around.”
“So the weird feeling I was getting was because some ladies would like to know me better.”
“You say it so delicately. Men like it because he might have one or two other encounters, but keep his current Partner.”
“There are some partners who are paired so perfectly that they are married in the traditional sense.” Said Todd.
“Meghan and Kayvin,” said Melody, “were the model of fidelity and love. Until Kayvin went out on his hunt. He was killed on the other side of the saddleback. His son was learning the trade. They both were killed. We did not see who killed them.”
“I’ll try to add that on to my mission.”
“There is one thing, Meghan is particular about her men. They all have been gifted of a certain size.”
“As you can see I am pretty tall,”
“Um, no, more of a private thing on you.”
“Oh, you mean that! I am somewhat gifted in that respect.”
“I have to see before I suggest what I am suggesting.”