After three rings, he answered. “Falcon.”
“A source of mine suggested that we go immediately before Thomas reacts to something that might change the dynamics of the extraction.”
There was a slight pause before Falcon’s deep voice asked, “Do you trust your source?”
“With my life. Without his help I wouldn’t be standing here today.”
“Good enough for me. Jax and I can be at the rendezvous in ten minutes.”
Stephanie punched in the coordinates into the nav-computer of her skimmer. “I am en route as we speak.”
“See you soon. Falcon out.”
Even as the line went dead, Stephanie pondered the cryptic messages once more. She had the bad feeling that she was overlooking something. She was positive about that but what was it?
That one question haunted her the whole ride to the Cathedral.
* * * * *
Jennifer was sitting at Ryan’s bedside when the call came in.
The contact codes were blocked but that wasn’t unusual in her line of work. Every reporter gets anonymous tips, most are simple red herrings but some do pan out. It was all part of the package of being a famous correspondent.
“Is this Jennifer Moody, the reporter from the Daily News in a Flash?”
She didn’t recognize the voice. It was kind of husky, yet quiet and held the tone of someone used to authority.
“This is her.”
“You and Ryan need to get off Titan before midnight.”
“But we haven’t finished our interviews.”
The mysterious voice replied. “Choose; your interviews or your life.”
“Why? What’s going to happen?”
“One way or the other, after tonight the situation in the Saturn system will be completely different.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“I hope you heed my warning Jennifer. I would hate not to see your smiling face on the Daily News.”
Click.
Jennifer leaned back to contemplate her situation. Warning her off a story usually just drove her forward but if she decided to investigate, she would be doing it solo. Ryan had received a severe concussion and the doctors had ordered five days of bed rest. As much as she wanted to follow up on the call, she decided that the voice was right. She needed to leave Titan. If anything else bad happened to Ryan because she decided to run off on some wild goose chase, she would never forgive herself. Within five minutes, she was packed and waiting for a taxi. With the cabbie’s help, they loaded Ryan in back and soon were on their way to the starport.
* * * * *
Through the starport cameras, Kālikā watched as the reporter and her assistant boarded the first outbound transport off of Titan. He was pleased that she had heeded his warning. They were two pawns he didn’t want to lose…at least not yet.
He’d learned over the centuries that some pawns were more valuable than others. Some you forfeit right away for nothing more than a simple distraction or to see how your opponent will react. However, certain pawns were best left to be offered for sacrifice at a later time in the game, where their loss would hinder his opponent’s plans. Personally, Kālikā had no qualms about sacrificing his pieces. He also realized that he favored some more than others. That didn’t mean he wouldn’t sacrificed them, he just had to make sure it was the proper time.
When he spoke to the darkness, his voice was quiet and slightly husky.
“Your move old friend.”
Chapter 17
Jax pulled the stolen skimmer into the parking area of a mansion two blocks away from their target. The house had a for sale sign in the yard and no lights on at the moment. And since the skimmer was a stretched limo, it didn’t draw any attention from the neighbors or if it did, it would be the right kind of attention.
Once they were out of the vehicle and out of sight of the road, Stephanie led the way. She easily vaulted over the fence and made her way through the backyard. As the two men struggled to follow her, they were both pleased that Titan had less gravity than Earth since it aided them in keeping up with the nimble thief. Several minutes later when they caught up to her, she was perched on the ledge of a wall and studying the layout of the yard before them.
DJ pulled himself up to the ledge, he noticed that a junction box nearby had been pried open and the wires spliced. “Alarm?”
Stephanie nodded. “One of three. This one powered the motion control sensors and cameras in the garden area.”
Jax scrambled up to sit next to them. “How’d you know about it?”
“Let’s just say that I’ve had my eye on this mansion for several weeks.” She flashed them both a mischievous grin. “Now comes the tricky part. We have to cross the garden without alerting the dozen or so Battle Bots Thomas has roaming around.”
Jax cocked his head to the side. “Battle ‘bots?”
“Think mechanical guard dogs that can’t be bribed with food,” answered DJ.
“Oh,” was all the Jax could say.
Stephanie pointed at a beautiful birch tree about ten feet away. “That is our first lily pad.”
“Huh?” the men said in unison as she launched herself through the air. Landing gracefully in the crotch of the birch tree where the trunk split into three boughs. However, she didn’t pause. Leaping like her namesake, El Gato landed on the base of a marble statue then sprang through the air to land on the eaves of the roof. Both men shook their head in disbelief. She had made the transition from wall to roof in a matter of seconds.
“Well, now we know how she got her name.”
DJ nodded. “Something tells me, it won’t be as easy as she made it look.”
Jax snorted. “No kidding.”
“Here goes nothing.” Taking a deep breath, DJ launched himself to the tree. However, he’d forgotten about the enhanced strength his CSA armor gave him and overshot the tree by twenty feet. The AI of his suit quickly calculated that his current trajectory was even going to take him past the statue and displayed this fact on his HUD. Reacting out of instinct, DJ tucked his head and executed a flip in the air. Once he was feet down, he fired off his jump jets in his boots and boosted himself up to the roof.
Stephanie nodded. “Not bad, not bad at all.”
DJ decided to play the poor leap and recovery off. “Thanks. I’m not as nimble as you.”
Stephanie nodded toward the garden. “True, but that was very effective.”
“Thanks,” DJ said as they turned back to watch their companion make the first jump without any problems.
It was on the second leap was when Mr. Murphy decided to show up.
Jax landed on the statue base without a problem but since he was travelling so fast that he grabbed the statue to stop his progress. Instead of stopping, the statue broke off from its base and they both tumbled into the garden. Shaking his head to clear it from the fog of the hard landing, Jax’s first thought was is anything broken? Not feeling any stabs of pain when he moved, Jax rolled over and prepared to stand up. That was until he saw the gleaming metallic body of a battle bot less than three feet from his nose. Instinctively, he froze.
Battle bots come in a wide variety of shapes and sizes. The one directly in front of Jax was shaped like a three foot wide crab with treads on each side and buzz saws in place of one of its pincers. Battle bots are intensely limited in their programming and are not burdened with the Three Laws or a morality code. They just follow their directives without variation or exception.
Jax knew nothing of this as he stared at the red eye of the battle bot which was only a few feet away. It quivered as if it was in anticipation but failed to move forward. Of course, the image of the buzz saw ripping through his flesh or the foot long pincer closing on his leg ran through his mind. Suddenly, a rope wrapped around his waist and yanked him up. Jax looked up to see the Red Falcon reeling him in with some sort of rope that had come out of his left gauntlet.
“Thanks,” was all he could manage.
“N
o problem.”
Stephanie just shook her head and led them around the rooftop to a window on the third floor. Like the pro she was, El Gato disarmed the alarm and slid open the window.
DJ nodded. “You have done your part and gotten me here, thanks.”
Stephanie flashed him a wicked grin and said, “You aren’t home free yet big boy. Come on,” she crawled through the open window. “I’ll show you Kaitlyn’s room.”
DJ turned back to his companion and tapped at his helmet. “Keep watch and let me know if you see anything.”
Jax nodded. Fitting the mic and ear bud in place he said, “Roger that.”
Turning back to the dark house, DJ’s armor automatically shifted to night vision which took the ambient light in the area and enhanced it, allowing him to see. Everything was colored green but after his years in the Corps, it was nothing new. The low or no light didn’t seem to bother El Gato and she led him unerringly to the staircase down.
Moving up close she whispered, “Kaitlyn’s room is at the bottom of the stairs and at the end of the hallway on your left. Good luck.”
DJ nodded and watched as she faded into the darkness of the third floor. Using all grace he could muster, DJ crept down the stairs. He was almost to the bottom when he slipped and struggled to regain his balance. He had fallen about three steps before he righted himself. It wasn’t much but he was certain he’d made enough noise to alert the household. But after several minutes when no one came to investigate, he continued.
Finding Kaitlyn’s room was easy. It was right where El Gato had directed him. Not wanting to scare his daughter, he took off his helmet and opened the door. Whatever he was expecting, the mess that confronted him was not it. Of course he’d expected to find a messy room, what teenager doesn’t have one but not like this. This was beyond messy. It was destroyed. Posters had been ripped off the walls, shelves knocked over, books torn apart and the broken body of UR-L8 but no sign of Kaitlyn.
Dropping his helmet, DJ rushed to the boxy android’s side and pulled it into an upright position. Judging from the scorch marks, he guessed that the babysitter ‘bot had been zapped with a stun baton or something close to it. Popping open different panels, DJ found the reset button and toggled it on. UR-L8’s lights blinked on and off as it went through its standard system diagnostic. After a couple of minutes, which seemed like an eternity to DJ, the android completed its booting up process.
“How may this unit be of service?”
“UR-L8, where’s Katy?
“This unit does not know. Searching memory banks. Current time seems to be ten minutes past ten o’clock. The last data entry was at twenty-five minutes past nine. This unit has no knowledge of what happened in the forty-five minutes that it was not in service.”
DJ tried to remain calm even though he wanted to destroy something, anything. Taking a couple deep breaths, he asked, “What’s the last thing you remember?”
“Mistress Kaitlyn was packing. She received your message and was having trouble deciding which clothes to take when the door burst in and three men in uniforms rushed in. One of them hit this unit with some sort of electronic scrambler which overloaded this unit’s circuits.”
“What did the uniforms look like?”
“This unit can show you.” Turning its head, UR-L8 focused its holo-emiter onto the table and replayed the last thirty seconds before it was shut down.
Just like the little android said, three men in SIS uniforms burst in and tried to grab Kaitlyn. She fought like a wildcat, flipping and rebounding off the walls as she struck them several times before a dwarf with a stun baton zapped her. As she fell unconscious, the same Jovian approached UR-L8 and used the baton on it. The problem was that DJ recognized the dwarf. It was Pridgen, the bouncer from Mocha Delights. But if he was wearing a SIS uniform then that means he was working undercover for Kassinger the whole time he was at the casino, probably gathering intel for the corrupt Sheriff. Somehow he stumbled on this information and was now using it against him. The question remained if he or Kassinger had figured out that he was the Red Falcon.
It was at that moment a crazy question popped into his head. “Where’s Megan?”
UR-L8’s head moved side to side. “This unit is unaware of the parental unit’s location.”
“Are you going to be okay?”
“This unit needs several minutes to run more intensive diagnostics but estimates that this unit is operating at less than forty percent of normal functions.”
“Run your diagnostics. I’m going to find Megan.” DJ patted the bot’s head like a pet and without another word, the ex-marine left his daughter’s room. Armed with knowledge that the SIS had been in the house, DJ pulled out one of his Graver Mk7s and powered it up. Moving through the house like a ghost, he did curse himself for leaving his armor’s helmet behind. Although seconds later when he entered the main room, he decided he didn’t need it.
He’d found his ex-wife.
* * * * *
Stephanie moved slowly through the Admiral’s office. She had no need of a light due to the cybernetic implants in her eyes. They allowed her iris to open wider than normally possible allowing more ambient light in and permitting her to see in extremely low light situations. The procedure is commonly referred to as gaining cat’s eyes.
The office was nearly exactly how she imagined it to be with several monitors sitting on his desk hooked up to all the cameras in the house and grounds. From here, she could see that the Red Falcon was moving through the house without his helmet with his gun drawn. There was no sign of Kaitlyn. Scanning through the cameras, she saw the same thing the Falcon did and knew that she was running out of time.
Ignoring the drama unfolding downstairs in the main room, she located the safe and put her skills to work opening it. Pulling out several specialized tools of her trade, she went to work cracking the safe. It was state of the art, three years ago, and only slowed her down by about two minutes. Once it was opened, she emptied the safe. She did make a mental note of the bundle of cred-stix, three diamond necklaces and the package she had been sent to liberate. Now according to the plan, she was to set off her bombs and level the house, thereby hiding her theft. Stephanie paused, gazed at the monitors and weighed her options. If Megan was holding what Stephanie thought she was holding, time was against them.
She keyed her mic. “Jax.”
“Go for Jax.”
“We have a developing situation here. Can you get back to the skimmer without touching the ground outside?”
There was a pause before he answered. “I’m not sure.”
“Go around to the south side of the roof. There’s a cable that runs to the neighboring house. Use your belt and slide across.”
“How do you know about that?”
“I told you I’ve been casing this place for weeks. Now hurry. The Falcon has a situation in here that could turn deadly any second.”
“Roger that, I’m gone.”
Stephanie took one last look around and headed down the stairs. Something told her, that the Red Falcon was going to need her skills very soon.
* * * * *
When DJ stepped into the room, his ex-wife looked up from the bomb she was holding and nearly dropped it in her surprise. “Holy shit! Scott! What are you doing here?”
DJ slowly entered the room and studied the situation. It wasn’t good.
“Well? What are you waiting for? Get this thing off of me!”
“Why?”
“What do you mean, why? I’m your wife.”
“Ex-wife. You left me for the bastard who did this to you and now has our daughter.”
That stopped her.
Whatever she had been about to say was lost as that one thought resonated through her alcohol induced haze. He could see the gears turning. He guessed that up to this point she was under the impression that it had been agents working against her husband who had been responsible for the attack but now, she doubted that.
“Are you
certain Roger did this?”
DJ shook his head. “Technically, no he didn’t but it was his men, of that I am certain. And they would not have done this without his explicit order.” DJ gestured to the trap his ex-wife was in, “Why else would you be in that situation?”
Megan forced herself to look at the layout of the trap she was in. She had been made to hold a proton grenade with both hands after the trigger had been pulled. If she let go, the bomb exploded in three seconds. To make sure she couldn’t just throw it away, they had tied a line from the grenade to the large dining room table that they had turned over and placed on top of her legs. She couldn’t slide out or lift the table without using both hands. If she tried to throw it away, the line would make sure it didn’t fly too far. It was actually a rather simple but ingeniously deadly setup.
“Now don’t move. I’m going to move a bit closer to get a better look.”
As he started to move in, El Gato entered the room. “I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”
DJ froze and Megan looked up. “You look familiar? Do I know you?”
El Gato ignored her and focused her attention on the Falcon. “Don’t get close to the bomb or you’ll set it off.”
DJ backed up. “How do you know that?”
“I’ve seen this before. This is the handiwork of Pridgen, Kassinger’s pet dwarf.”
“I’ve met him.”
“Well, he likes to kill people in such a way that there is lots of collateral damage.” She pointed at the device. “If you look closer, you will notice that it is not a normal grenade. It is actually a proton bomb with at least three different triggers; the standard pin, a mercury switch and a proximity trigger.”
“I understand the first two triggers; the pin, when released, starts the timer and it blows. The mercury switch would make it useful for a trap and probably overrides the timer but what would the proximity trigger be for?”
“Once the timer is engaged, it checks to see if the handle is still attached. If it is, then the mercury and proximity triggers activate. If the bomb moves, it blows. If the proximity trigger reads an increase in body temperature around the device, it detonates.”
The Last Spartan 2: DJ's Mission Page 17