Blood of the Scarecrow: Book 3: Solstice 31 Saga

by Martin Wilsey

  ***

  “Hearn, we are a go, as soon as you are here,” Matthew said over comms.

  “Acknowledged,” Hearn said, as he initiated the command sequences.

  ***

  When the AIs were destroyed, the auto-tracking on the security system stopped working. Vittori manually brought up security cameras that showed the inside of the warehouse that held the prisoner. He was oblivious, still reading his book. Unable to do anything else, she grabbed her sidearm and ran.

  The doors opened to the command center, and the alarm echoed through the compound. The noise was loud and covered the sound of her running feet as she moved through the complex. She went down six levels and all the way across the complex without seeing anyone. All the stupid drills suddenly seemed to be less than stupid.

  Kristin skidded to a stop at the warehouse entrance, and to speed things up, she set her gun down on the console shelf.

  As she pounded the last character into the access sequence, she hit enter.

  From behind, someone grabbed the back of her head and smashed her face into the console as the doors slid open.

  ***

  Slowly, Vittori became conscious as she was dragged by her heels. Her feet dropped and her head lulled to the side, trying to make sense of what was happening. She saw Turkot read the final page of the book and, after closing the cover, tossed it to the floor. He casually moved to brace himself in a corner.

  The forklift sped into view and crashed into the cube, spearing it with its two tines. The tines spread and the cell shattered. Turkot landed neatly on his feet.

  Vittori watched him walk out as a woman fell in step with him.

  “Hello, Wex. So very nice to see you.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR: When It All Goes Wrong

  “The Solstice 31 War began here.”

  --Solstice 31 Incident Investigation Testimony Transcript: General Patricia Chase, senior member of the Earth Defense Coalition.

  <<<>>>

  “Station, I am passing to you the ident codes for a ship I need to contact,” Barcus said to the station AI, as he walked down an empty corridor. “Here are the general coordinates.”

  “That’s in the belt, Barcus. A dangerous section of the belt,” AI~Station replied.

  “I know, that’s why I need to contact them,” Barcus replied.

  “Is that Cook?” Po knew better than to even mention the word Memphis.

  “Yes.”

  Barcus stopped and leaned over to put his hands on his knees. He looked like he was going to throw up.

  “Go for the Winton,” AI~Station replied, using the new ident for the Memphis.

  “Cook, this is Barcus. The Station has gotten too hot. You need to go with Charlie Delta,” Barcus said, as he leaned on a wall.

  “Charlie Delta. Excellent,” Cook said, with a smile in his voice. “Rendezvous as specified, we will be eating steak and drinking cold brews until you arrive, asswipe. Don’t be too long. I’m not sure I can hold Beary off much longer.”

  Barcus heard laughter in the background.

  “Save the best bourbon for me, dipshit,” Barcus said, turning with his back to the wall, tears welling in his eyes. His hand covered his mouth.

  “You should save that for Hagan. He has the short stick,” Cook said.

  “Stay sharp,” Barcus choked out.

  He slid down the wall.

  Po knelt before him. “What’s wrong?”

  “This is hell. What did I do to deserve this?” he said, wiping his face with his sleeves. But he could not wipe away the knowing.

  Po knelt before him and saw his despair. “I did this. Wex warned me it would happen and I did it anyway. She said you’d…it’s all my fault…”

  Po didn’t even see him move. Suddenly, she was off her feet and up against the wall. Barcus held her there by one hand, gripping a handful of her flight suit.

  “Don’t you ever say that again,” Barcus growled into her face.

  Po was helpless. When she clutched at his wrist, it felt like iron. He was so much bigger than her. She had forgotten. There was no use struggling. He might as well have been made of stone.

  “I will say whatever I please,” she whispered.

  His grip squeezed her lungs.

  “She told me something else you need to know.”

  Barcus looked confused. Realization dawned.

  “You are not the monster. You are the witness. I don’t know what it means,” she said, as she let go of his wrist and placed her hand on the side of his face.

  In his mind, he watched her die. Over and over and over. He punished himself because now he knew that what he saw was not always the truth.

  He couldn’t stop any of it and deserved to be punished. No other image was as vivid in his memory. Fidelity increased with the pain of it.

  He watched her die. Again and again. He knew the day. The moment. The anguish amplified as he focused memory on a tear that would slide down her cheek after her last breath.

  She wrapped her legs around his torso and drew him toward her with her heels. Barcus allowed it. She wrapped her arms around his neck and clung to him. She was the strong one. He knew.

  He watched her die. Again and again. And in his mind, the most terrible horror was yet to come. He saw it.

  Worst of all, he knew that he would learn to live without her.

  He also knew that she was the monster.

  ***

  “Echo, did you hear that? Delta Charlie,” Cook said, as he set a course for Earth.

  “Affirmative,” AI~Echo replied.

  Karen Beary waited until Cook was done setting the course, before she asked, “OK, Cook. What the hell is a Delta Charlie?”

  “We head to Sri Lanka, but we time it for a night drop so Echo can land in Oklahoma. Wes has some contacts there.

  “We find a quiet hangar and rest tight on these data stores,” Cook said. “These will be all they need to prove that Chancellor Dalton was behind the destruction of the Ventura and God only knows how many other ships.”

  “Do not forget the genome project,” Echo added. “That alone will ruin him, politically.”

  “Why the hell would he do that? What was to be gained? To be honest, I don’t give a shit about the politics of the whole thing,” Cook said. “I just don’t want to be looking over my shoulder the rest of my life while working as a shuttle pilot for some backwater colony.”

  “I trust Worthington, but how is this going to play out?” Muir asked, knowing that Cook was more clued in.

  He just did as ordered. He liked it that way.

  “Jimbo is a Boy Scout. He will follow regs, orders, and chain of command. You know it’s true.”

  Cook turned and looked at Beary and Wood, in turn.

  “He will report to Admiral Kreiger, and Kreiger will figure it out from there.”

  “What about us?” Shaw asked.

  “We can expect weeks of debriefing while Kreiger sorts through the data from Echo and Bowen,” Cook added.

  Beary held her hand up.

  “What about all these nukes, the Warmarks?”

  “That is why I am glad it’s a Delta Charlie. All that will be in the DS Sariska when we drop her. A stealth night drop in the desert.”

  “The pinnace-class ship, the Winton, will land in the largest, busiest spaceport in the universe. Freshly salvaged from a yard on Mars with full idents and back story.”

  Cook laughed.

  “Hell, it even looks salvaged.”

  “We park and lay low. We order in food and pay in cash,” Cook said.

  “I think we should rent an apartment as an off-ship base and move the data store there,” Beary added.

  “That way, if data inspectors show up, let them inspect,” Muir said.

  “I would like to add an extra item to this plan,” AI~Ben said. “We should remove my AI module and house it with the data store. I could be traced back to the EM on the Memphis.”

  “Excellent plan. I will even fly
it into the Sri Lanka spaceport on manual. That feeds the Winton salvage story.”

  Cook sounded pleased.

  “I’m going with Echo,” Dr. Shaw said.

  “What?”

  Cook was surprised.

  “I’ll be useless, watching you all getting tans and trying to stay drunk all the time,” she said. “You won’t need me. Jimbo and Barcus will need me, knowing them,” Shaw said.

  “It’s Barcus that will break this plan. We need to be ready for that,” Beary said.

  Cook looked at everyone nodding but not saying anything. When Echo spoke, her avatar appeared first.

  “Barcus is now a…Scarecrow. Just like Wex.”

  ***

  Po got to the airlock marked for the Latha before Barcus. The name appeared on the control panel. The new ident was from a crashed STU that had been on Mars for a decade, slowly being stripped for parts.

  Barcus marveled, once again, at her ease using the technology.

  Wasn’t she a starving, ignorant girl just moments ago, he thought.

  That, in turn, made him think of Olias.

  It isn’t just the future that causes me pain.

  Zimmerman stood at the door to the med bay, holding a Frange carbine, making himself look larger that he actually was. It was an attempt to distract anyone entering from looking at the four tarps covering the Warmarks.

  “Jack, meet Barcus,” Kuss said, as she stepped around him. “He only one on this station can kick your ass. No shoot him with that. Make him angry. Not polite when angry.”

  Kuss gestured. “And this is Po. No touch her. No med bay exist that could fix you.”

  Barcus extended his right hand to shake, and said, “Officer Jacob Zimmerman. You’ve gone by Jack since you were a child. You were a decorated Ranger in the Expansion War but don’t like to talk about it because you feel like you were on the wrong side. You’re smarter than you look and have an advanced degree in Theoretical Physics.”

  Their hands remained clasped.

  “You like people to underestimate you by your cultivated, crass manner. You enjoy physics and engineering but prefer hands-on peacekeeping to theoretical physics. You are a faithful Vedic, but tell no one of this. You own nothing but tools and uniforms. You live a Spartan life.”

  “Who the fuck are you?” was his only reply.

  “I’m Barcus. Maintenance guy number 42.”

  “Am I supposed to be impressed by that little speech?”

  Barcus knew Jack was taken aback by the amount he knew of him but didn’t have time to explain. He released his hand.

  “No. If you had been, you would not be the man Captain Everett thought you were.”

  “I don’t know if anyone has noticed, but this is all shit, escalating pretty fast. We need to move, before they get organized and make us disappear,” Zimmerman said.

  “I agree,” Barcus said. “Stu, prep for departure.”

  Barcus walked into the med bay and asked Kuss, “How is Hudson? We are going to need her.”

  Tawana Hudson was in the med scanner, sleeping. Kuss brought up the status display for Barcus.

  “I sedated her. She has many nanites fixing hip. Drive her crazy, if awake,” Kuss said, pointing at the real-time progress in the area on the scanner.

  “What about Worthington?” Po asked.

  “He has his own problems to solve. We are splitting up,” Barcus said.

  Po realized then that none of the people onboard were part of Jimbo’s command crew.

  “Kuss, we are going to drop you and Hudson off to hook up with Hagan and Shaw. The rest of us are going to meet with Kreiger,” he said, moving toward the ladder to the bridge. “Jack, you are going to arrange the meet in Mexico City.”

  “How did you know he was in Mexico City?” Zimmer asked, sounding annoyed.

  “It’s where the second largest space catapult is located that is big enough to hold the military traffic he is required to manage. The one in New York is smaller and only handles passenger traffic. And only to Freedom Station.”

  “Departure in fourteen minutes,” AI~Stu informed them.

  ***

  It was just after midnight, Station time, when Barcus contacted Worthington.

  “The girls are finally asleep. Bobbie had to lay down with them. They’re all asleep now. Are you sure they will be safe here?” Jimbo asked.

  “As safe as can be expected. We will be back tomorrow to get everyone,” Barcus said. “You have a long night ahead. Chancellor Dalton has hidden a nuke on FS. You need to find it and jettison the damn thing, before he can decide to use it.”

  “How the hell am I supposed to do that? You know how big this place is,” Worthington said.

  “Get Pho Pete to help you. He knows how to smuggle undocumented containers onto Freedom Station.”

  “Pho Pete?”

  “Yes. Pedro Morales, the soup guy. Why do you think his soup is so good?” Barcus said. “You have Rand and Hume. You got this. Station will help you.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE: The Chancellor

  “Dalton was recording his meetings so he could use them as blackmail later. He intended them to be leverage, not evidence.”

  --Solstice 31 Incident Investigation Testimony Transcript: General Patricia Chase, senior member of the Earth Defense Coalition.

  <<<>>>

  “Chancellor, retreating to the Isle of Calf at this time is politically unwise. The Senate and the United Council of Colonies are at each other’s throats. Any additional restrictions on people trying to immigrate to the colonies at this time will be met with harsher measures,” said Senator Kendall.

  Chancellor Dalton sat at the head of the conference table in his private office suite. He was slightly elevated with a wraparound console before him. There were ten men around the table. All looked grim.

  “Times have changed,” a man said, with a North African accent. “I remember when we forced people off-world to thin our populations. Prisoners and undesirables. To the Harvesters and the colonies. Separated the wheat from the chaff.”

  “The colonies no longer need Earth, for anything,” another man said. “Tourism is the only reason anyone comes here.”

  “Even the Sol Treaty has failed. We can’t even keep control of the colonies and outposts in our own goddamn system,” said the youngest looking man at the table, frustrated as well as angry.

  “Why are the spaceports and catapults still in private hands?” another man demanded to know.

  “These people are too full of self-interest to do the right things,” Senator Kendall almost yelled.

  “What do you recommend we do that we are not already?” Dalton asked. “The Harvester prison ships are already full of the petty violators we have created, full of our political adversaries. We have more laws than lawyers. We have disarmed them. We have diluted and disbursed the military, so we have nothing to fear there,” Dalton replied. “We have even used more unorthodox means to clear the senate floor of these fools that value the many, less than the individual.”

  “How can we stop these bastards from taking their work and wealth and talent off to the colonies? We can’t continue without their taxes.”

  “Enough.”

  Chancellor Dalton slammed down his fist.

  “Everyone out, except you, Kendall.”

  They all filed out, and the doors automatically closed behind them.

  “There was a time, not long ago, when we had the opposite problem,” Dalton fumed at Kendall. “All this petty bickering is to blame.”

  “Actually, your Excellency, your policies are to blame. You do understand this, don’t you?” Kendall said. “The Earth has emptied about as far as it can without collapsing in on itself. Sure, there is 100% employment, and housing is plentiful. I’ve seen the vids. But the best and brightest have gone elsewhere before you could stop them, and now you can’t afford to buy them back. No one needs Earth, not even Freedom Station.”

  “I hate that name, that place,” Dalton spat
.

  “Because it’s true,” Kendall replied.

  ***

  Dalton’s personal shuttle landed on the end of the old-style runway. Most of the Isle of Man had been turned into the chancellor’s base when he took office forty-one years before. As the gull wings opened, he saw the only company of soldiers Atish had managed to breed, train, and deliver, running information their way.

  He stood and waited with Kendall and his personal security detail.

  A perfect formation of ten by ten came to a halt and stood, at attention, for inspection. They all wore black flight suits and tactical vests. Ninety percent of them were women. The men all had shaved heads and the women all had long hair, French braided.

  Dalton walked to the center of their ranks and stopped. He inspected one of them closely.

  “Are you ready to DIE TODAY?” he called out.

  “Sir, yes, sir!” they said, in unison.

  He walked to the front again and pointed at a random woman in the front row.

  “You. Front and center.”

  She complied, without hesitation.

  “Strip. Now,” Dalton ordered.

  He didn’t smile, until he looked at Kendall, his back to the troops.

  In moments, she was completely naked and standing at parade rest.

  “Put your arms over your head and don’t move. Don’t lower them until I say you can lower them,” Dalton ordered.

  She obeyed.

  “Company! Knives out,” Dalton ordered.

  Dalton stood before the naked woman. She was short but ultra-fit.

  “You will not fall until I allow it.”

  “Sir, yes, sir,” she replied, stoically.

  “When I say ‘GO’, each of you will stab her and return to formation. If she drops before the last of you returns to formation, we will start again. Knives UP for inspection. Before and after.”

  All the knives were raised above their heads.