Broken Wings (John Hardesty Z04 Book 3)

by Clay Moore

  The new coffee pot that she purchased for the house was busily churning away when he got up and came into the living room. He sat up on the breakfast bar, drinking his coffee and eating his pastry. The first touch of coffee woke him up.

  Mrs. Murphy said that she was the replacement for Iris Jernwel when Iris could not be there. He knew what she meant. Coffee and pastry were one of her absolute passion. John got his slate. He opened the slate to the newscast that he liked the best. At this time a day, they were mostly about giving you the weather forecast, or giving you which of the skyways were full of traffic.

  Then a site occurred that you actually had to stop to appreciate. Iris Jernwel completely naked leaned up against the door jamb, and she partially folded her right leg. It accentuated her back of her forward. That was a sight to always behold.

  Jernwel lost much of her shyness as it came to her body. She was dealing with a man who had been a Marine and had worn the undersuit that is required for a Marine wearing a battle suit. The undersuit showed you're the complete body. There was no getting around it. So it took the boot camp people about a week to get the recruits through that part of the training. Iris had no training as a Marine. She still had all of her inhibitions. It was a massive thing for her to do to saunter into his living room naked.

  He knew what she wanted. He wanted the same thing, but A had insisted that he come to his office this morning. John had an idea what was going to be up. When John was not normally operating as Z level agent, he was working as a high-level sieve. There was a lot of stuff in the dispatches that were just junk. What John did was remove the gold and send that onto whoever was the high-level poobah. So, it mattered that he saw all of the reports coming in from some of the places. John wanted to be there to make sure that he got the call to deal with that thorn in the service ’s side.

  “Are you absolutely sure that you have to go into the office today?"

  "Did you have something else in planned?"

  Iris came from behind the breakfast bar. She held her right hand on the breakfast bar and did her best female modeling pose that she knew. Primarily the curve of her body and the lines of her body now emphasized a part of female genitalia. John did not know that a woman who held back from displaying all could stir him to heights of passion.

  “Oh, do I want to stay home today. A has called me into A's office. There is only one reason for him to do this and that is to assign someone to deal with Anton Hecton."

  "Then I'm afraid that all we have will be last night. I have to join my fleet in the afternoon."

  "Will you meet me at any planet?"

  "No. And I know how you feel about it, but we have to deal with Corrigan, some of the disenfranchised workers have been taking property away from the Lord's. I believe that your brother is one of these lords. I think he's the most intransigent of the lot. So I am to display the flag and growl to get everybody to come to an agreement. From what you said about Corrigan, I know my job is not going to win."

  "Are you going to go down on the surface?"

  "Yes. That's the problem of diplomatic. I have to meet those disenfranchised workers To be diplomatic with them."

  "You just need one of the Lords to take your side. The Lords are the world's worst at staying on a team.”

  “How do I get him to essentially talk to me."

  "Go to my brother in his place of power. Tell him that you and I are bedfellows. Then you tell him that I told you that he allowed me to continue with my plan to murder my father. Then you need to tell him that you have a solution that will let the Lords keep their titles and everything else, but allow people some land for them to work.”

  "How are you going to do that bit of magic?"

  "Each of the Lords owns at least the better part of a continent. In that continent, there are many places that you can grow crops. The lords have not yet gone into those places. Those people who want to take on the pioneering risk can be taken to those places, and they can build a house, community, and crops. Make sure that you inform him that he will only be allowed to collect the rent from the crops that have been gathered. Not crops that should be gathered, only those that were able to be gathered. So if somebody was able to harvest 100 bushels of corn. His taxes would be 10 bushels of corn. My brother will like this. He still owns the property if the person does not perform well he can dispossess them."

  "You know something, eliciting to you talk diplomatically it just makes me wet. Too bad you don't have a few minutes."

  "I better be there because it might be the end of Anton."

  "If I come back and they allowed to sleep outside of my ship can I come back to your apartment."

  “Please do. You might even bring Angela. I can imagine your keeper and my keeper getting together.”

  Iris laughed at the joke. I think Shakespeare said it best when he said parting is such sweet sorrow.”John took a good long look at the woman who had captured his heart. John had overs consider4ed himself a class person. He always laughed at himself when he tried to act high-class to get the woman to look at him. He Was still something having to do with the size of this attribute. Quite a few ladies seem to enjoy John's quality. Where was their high-class nature?

  John took the exit through the carport. He found his luxury sedan in its location. The car was usually started without anybody in the rear areas. He fired off his vehicles Radamite jets. He drove off towards the Secret Service building. When he got there, he pulled into the private parking lot. John got out of his car and went to the back. There he opened up his trunk. From the chest, he took out his attaché case. He walked from his car through the door and into the area that belonged to A. The new secretary for A was a young thing whose name was Miss ample. John heard some of the not so flattering things that the other agents and technicians were saying about her. What they said was probably the same as what they said about him.

  The worst thing was that her name brought out the little kid and everybody. I mean Miss ample was indeed very well endowed. It is evident that some of the men were expecting him to make a plan for her. That, however, was not likely. John had the right faith when it came to Iris. He only felt this way once. That was to Vivana. Now he was getting a second chance with Iris. He would not risk what he had with Iris.

  He arrived at A's office. Ms. ample new John by side which told him that other people have been saying her about him. She indicated that A was a little behind. John looked around the office and discovered that it looked like a veritable convention of agents. Some of the agents were not Z level agents. He looked around and wondered why there was this waiting period.

  John dissented to ask a known Z level agent a question. "How long have you been sitting here waiting for A to become available?"

  "About an hour.”

  “That's not usually about A. He always tries to fix it. I'm in a look in."

  John went to the door and opened it. He looked down the small hallway. He could see A behind his desk and no one in front of his office.

  “Hello Z04. Come in come in. I don't know why but all of a sudden nobody's coming to see me. That is not likely considering that everybody gets their missions from me."

  "Is your secretary your choice?”

  "She's highly efficient. She keeps me very well organized."

  “I don't think she knows how to operate the switches that indicate when you are available. The green and the red buttons."

  “You might be right."

  Well since you're here, let's go ahead and let's get your debrief done."

  “We've noticed that you have taken to the Admiral lower half. I assume that you have continued this relationship?”

  "Yes, sir. Is that a problem?"

  "It's only a problem if it becomes a problem. Some of what you have to do is to seduce whoever needs to be seduced. If the admiral cannot live with that, then she needs to break this little duo up."

  “We had a discussion concerning how I do what I do. I have told Irix that sometimes I must take one
for Eridani. I want to get done with my missions so that I can get to see her quicker.

  That is precisely what I wanted to hear. Goodness knows you are one of my fastest working Z level agent. You do like a little of that killer instinct, that means that some of the people that you would typically have killed you converted to our cause. This is the case in which that is not allowed. The man, Anton Hecton has earned the death penalty from every civilized world. It is that fact of the matter that we are putting you on Snake Eyes. That world is not educated. Yet, it brings in billions and credits to the corporations and gangs. A single band with a small casino can actually bring in tens of millions of credits and profits."

  An open.A file titled broken wings. John noticed it, and he rolled his eyes at it.

  "You have a problem with how we title the missions?"

  "No, I don't have a problem with how they are titled. It's just that the last two missions that I went on the title was very familiar with what the mission was. I think I'm going to lose operational security if it continues."

  "How is there a problem with a destruction of Anton Hecton being called broken wings."

  "Because Sir there is up home about flying as a starship pilot. The recovery of my ship is too close to broken wings for it not to be noted by those in the know. I don't know that Anton Hecton is not in the know. He is the one person in the galaxy who believes in having intelligence and then using it."

  "Codes assures me that all of your codes are legitimately picked from a selection of words. Central Codes Leader suggests that you are reading into the codenames things that are happening to you. He wishes that you stop doing that. It is getting to them at codes that you don't appreciate their codenames."

  "How on earth did he expect me to take fallen Angels when it dealt with to hyper twinned genetic robots. Now I am getting my ship back in the mission is named broken wings."

  "I tell you what. You go on the mission, and I will have a little session with codes. I will have it out with them each while you have it out with Anton

  "You will need some backup on the world. We have a station there, called station SE. They were warned that you are coming. They know that you are going to be a Z level agent. And they know what that means as far as making their operations follow yours their operations to your needs. If you'd like to know what station SE has two offer we can print out inventory for you."

  "I prefer actually need to get that information from him, the station chief. It looks too much like a Z level agent throwing his weight around if he came in knowing what I had.

  "Besides most station chiefs that I know of have some additional equipment that they don't tell the boss about. This is stuff that likely will be appropriated from them because they were useful at other locations."

  "Have you seen the existence of some of this material?"

  "Of course. In one station I needed approximately 12 bricks of that plastic explosive. The station chief didn't mention it because when the station chief did mention it it was all sent back to Eridani."

  "That's fine then. I like it when Station rats have initiative."

  A raced up to another one of his folders from the top of the stack of folders. He opened the folder. John was trained not really to look until A has turned it around facing it towards him.

  "We have noticed an increase in the number of Z level complaints concerning the weapon that was selected. Command was merely looking at the expense of a larger caliber blaster versus a smaller caliber blaster. What command had forgotten was that the need was for something that also was intimidating. The small caliber pistol just was not intimidating enough. We look for other regularly produced weapons that were intimidating in and of themselves. We discovered that a 12.5 mm blaster is extremely intimidating. If the intimidation was not successful than the 12.5 mm blaster bolt would get the point across. You, John, have won your argument."

  A reached over and pressed his intercom switch." Mrs. Murphy, please bring in the armorer."

  The armor walked into the office carrying a wood box. By its size and configuration, John could tell that this was a 12.5 mm blaster pistol. The shield put down the table and threw up the lid. With John song something like the 12.5 mm blaster that he had seen on faraway.

  "That looks like a stripped down version of my 12.5 mm."

  "This version is, in fact, capable of being held in a shoulder holster. It is extremely quick out of the holster, and the trigger pull is so smooth that you will fire before your use to it. I would recommend that you work with this pistol before you go out on a mission."

  "You need not worry about that. The mechanism doesn't seem able to handle the full size 12.5 mm round."

  "Yes, this is the 12.5 mm short round. The full round could actually reach out and hit someone out to a couple hundred meters. This one is good to hit at about 100 m."

  "Yes, with what strength?"

  "At 100 m you're talking about a thousand degrees. That's more enough to burn your target and to cause the target's clothes to erupt in flame.

  "I have a shoulder holster here." He showed the shoulder holster that he had.

  John took off his jacket and removed the shoulder holster for his 7 mm pistol. With the armorer's help, he put on the new shoulder holster. John moved about with the shoulder holster on. He liked the fact that the gun's holster did not move around even when there wasn't a gun. The bottom of the shoulder holster was a tab that could be put onto a button at the beltline of his pants. That lock thing down even better. John picked up the blaster he injected the magazine. Then he jacked the single round out of the firing chamber. Then without any ammunition, he put the blaster into the shoulder holster. He put on his jacket. He buttoned up his coat by one button. Then he moved about giving both men enough time to see the shoulder holster.

  "We didn't have enough time to find the right cloth materials to use as the shoulder holster. This was the actual shoulder holster that the gunsmith sold with the soul shoulder holster."

  "No need to apologize, armorer. I think it was Mr. Hardesty's discovery of this gunsmith that brought it to our attention. I take it that the gunsmith has no problems in making rather unusual weapons for us."

  "I take it that he would like for us to be beholden to him enough to buy most of his weapons. I've seen enough of his gunsmithing skills to understand that he is excellent. We will learn from him, and he will learn from us."

  "Very good. Well, Mr. Hardesty, you have a mission. When you go on the mission is entirely up to you. However, you might want to consider leaving as soon as you can because the Emir wants to know what happens to Anton."

  "I'm not taking a new plaster pistol into the field without giving it a chance to fire at least 100 rounds here. Also, a big part of this mission is my ship. I have been estranged for my ship for almost 18 months. I need a few days of flight, and performing preventative maintenance to get the ship down."

  "If you want to have a few last minutes with Admiral Jernwel, then you need to make sure you do them today. Midnight tonight she has to move her fleet to Alphacent. This is a large way of saying to everyone in Alphacent that we have one large fleet."

  "Oh shit. That kind of grandiose statement is going to get a lot of people dead."

  "Then kill Anton Hecton. Get his information. If you have everything, then you are given permission from me as of this moment to hyper into Alphacent and board her ship. Give her the evidence that you find. Let her control the sensitive situation."

  "Is this a request by the military?"

  "Actually no. Admiral Jernwel saw fit to give me information as to what her job was. She knew that you were going to go and deal with Anton. She knew your skill. She wondered if you could find evidence. If you see that proof, you need to hyper com her, and then you have to hyper directly to Alphacent. As you enter Alphacent, you are to give her all the information you have using one of the standard communications keys that we have in common with the military.