by Dave Lemel
Li stared up at Jack for a few long seconds and then shrugged. “I guess I had pretty much accepted I would be dying soon anyway, so why not go out with a fight?” He walked over to Todd and Simon and shook their hands. “I am Li,” he said. “It is a great pleasure to meet you, and I am honored to die alongside two star marshals.”
Todd clasped Li’s hand between both of his own and looked him right in the eye. “It’s great to meet you too, buddy. As long as the four of us in this old rust bucket Jack calls a ship stick together, we are all leaving here in one piece.”
Li smiled and patted the back of Todd’s hand with his left hand. “Oh, I am not worried about how many pieces I am in. Just would like if one of them is still alive.”
Chapter 21
The new gang of four sat in the living quarters of Ol’ Gertie and discussed a strategy. Todd and Simon were seated at the table, while Jack and Li sat on the couch. Li had explained that once the Vikards had arrived, they immediately seized control of the colony and all facilities. The few who had tried to resist were brutally tortured and killed in front of the others as an example of what would happen if they dared to step out of line.
Li described the beginning as frantic. It seemed like ships were showing up constantly for days, each one bringing more Vikards and more supplies. They took most of the Chinese miners and their supplies and headed down into the old mine. The few miners that had remained up top had no idea what was going on below. Li was certain, though, based on the equipment and shear number of workers that had gone down, they must be building something.
As Li finished relaying all the events he had seen, Simon asked a question. “Does anyone ever come back up once they go down?”
Li shook his head. “No. At least none of the humans have. There is one of them that comes up every other day or when the leader shows up.”
“The leader?” asked Todd. “Who’s that?”
“There is a ship that has shown up twice. Different than the rest. Smaller and looks much, much newer. It arrived two days after they first showed up. Then again a few weeks ago. Both times it came, it sent our captors into a frenzy. A small crew emerges and goes down; I am guessing to check on the progress. A little while later, they come back up and leave. There is one from that group who is clearly the leader.”
“How do you know?” asked Simon.
“The way he is dressed, for one. That ship they are in is another. Mostly, though, it is the fear he causes among the other jerks. They are visibly terrified of him. He has to be the leader.”
Li stood up and walked over to the door. “I have to go back now, or they will get suspicious,” he said. “I will tell them I need to bring you a couple of parts so that you can make a repair and be on your way. I should be back in ten minutes or so.”
“Good luck,” said Jack as Li stepped out the door and Jack closed it behind him.
“I hope you guys have a good idea, ’cause I get the feeling we don’t have much time here,” said Jack. Todd looked down at the table and rubbed his forehead while Simon stared up at the ceiling. “You’re not giving me a lot of confidence here, fellas,” said Jack as he stared at the two marshals, awaiting a response.
Finally, Todd looked up. “Okay, Jack. I need you to pack up as many of the strongest charges you made that you can comfortably carry.”
Jack jumped up. “I’m on it,” he said as he disappeared through the door to the back.
Simon looked down from the ceiling at Todd, “What’ve you got? ”
“Nothing, yet, but having him stare at the side of our heads wasn’t helping. I figure no matter what, we’ll eventually need those charges.”
Simon smiled. “True. On both.”
Simon stood up and paced as he spitballed. “I don’t see how we can get Li and Jack away without it being noticed. Maybe we just need them to run distraction while you and I sneak down to have a look.”
Todd nodded and said, “I was thinking the same. It would be much better if we could have Li with us because his knowledge of the facility would be a huge asset, but I just don’t see how.”
“And besides,” said Simon. “Originally, we were just talking about stunning him and keeping him hidden while we snooped, so this won’t be much different.”
Jack popped back through the door with a duffel bag under each arm. “This should be enough to blow up half the moon,” he said as he tossed them onto the floor in the middle of the room.
“That’s good,” replied Todd. “’Cause I’m starting to think we may need to.”
Jack anxiously looked back and forth from Todd to Simon. “So…what’s the plan?”
Todd responded, “We don’t see any way you and Li could sneak away unnoticed. We think it would be best if you two run distraction while we head down to see exactly what is going on down there. At that point, we’ll have to come up with a plan of action based on what we find. ”
Jack nodded. “That makes sense. From the way Li described it, I don’t see how the heck his disappearance would go unnoticed. I’ll show you how to activate the charges while we wait for him to return.”
Jack unzipped one of the bags and took out a black cube about the size of a baseball. “One of these is quite powerful. If you link them,” he pulled a small green tab on the side of the cube and a small black wire followed, “like this,” he continued as he pulled a second cube out and touched the green tabs together, joining them, “you can create incredibly massive and devastating explosions. Once linked, they will automatically detect the perfect time to explode in sequence to create a resonance effect. Each cube you add to the chain greatly increases the effect and therefore the magnitude of the blast.”
Simon walked over and grabbed one, turning it over and over in his hand. “Okay, so how do we set them to detonate?”
Jack turned the one he was holding so that Todd and Simon could both see what he was doing. “This green tab, as you now know, is the linking wire. This blue button you hold down and then press the cube to any surface you want it to attach to, and it will affix itself to that surface. This red button under the square grey tab in the middle activates the timer. Once linked, you only need to activate one in the chain and they will all be activated.”
Just as Jack finished his demonstration, the door flew open and Li jumped in, gasping for breath.
“What’s going on?” asked Jack .
“They…” Li started before stopping to catch his breath. “They here!”
“Who? Who is here?” asked Todd.
“Leader. The leader’s ship just showed up and is coming down to land right now!”
Simon’s eyes opened wide. “In this garage?” he asked.
“No. No, not this garage,” said Li. “They always use the one on the other side, closer to the control room and farther away from the lava flow.”
“Okay…okay,” said Simon. “This is bad, but it could’ve been worse.”
“Hang on,” said Todd.
“Hang on what?” asked Simon.
“Maybe this isn’t bad news at all.”
“What are you thinking?” asked Simon, intrigued.
“Well,” said Todd, “maybe we could use this. Li said when the leader arrives, even the other Vikards are whipped into a kind of frenzy.” Todd turned toward Li. “Right?”
“Oh, yeah,” Li replied. “They get all freaked out.”
Todd turned to face Simon. “What if, instead of having Jack and Li run distraction, we use this as our distraction? All four of us could go right now.”
Simon pointed at Todd. “I like where you’re going with this.”
“Li,” said Todd as he turned back towards him. “Do you know any alternate ways to get down to the old mine besides the main elevators? ”
“Yes,” replied Li. “There are two other ways. There are two long shafts with conveyers that we used years ago to carry material to the surface to be picked up. They emerge at outposts a little ways from here, although one of them was engulfed and par
tially filled in by a lava flow a few months ago.”
“Well, then I guess we’re using the other one,” said Todd.
“We can take the cruiser out there, but we’ll need to time this just right,” said Todd. Simon grabbed the duffle bags and ran to the back. He threw them in the trunk of the black and chrome vehicle and ran back to the group. Todd continued, “They should be totally focused on the arrival of the leader. We will wait until right when his ship is entering the other garage, and we can fly right out the service door of this one. Hopefully, they won’t even notice. By the time they start wondering where Li and Jack are, it’ll be too late, and they’ll be too scared to draw attention to it.”
Chapter 22
Li watched Jack putting his suit on and suddenly realized he was underdressed. “Uh, you guys maybe have an extra space suit? The jerks took all ours when they got here.”
“Sure thing,” Simon said. “Hang on one second. We got a few spares in the cruiser.”
“What the hell?” said Jack. “You guys have a bunch of spares and you don’t even offer me one?”
Simon looked up from the compartment that housed the spare suits in the trunk. “Well, you were so proud of your original Reggie Hart suit that I didn’t think you would want one of our silly new ones.”
“Plus, you look so good in it,” added Todd as he winked at Jack.
“I do look good in it, don’t I?” said Jack. “And it is a classic. That’s just it, though, man. I love it, but it is so old.”
Simon emerged from the trunk and handed Li an older version of the star marshal suit. This one was emerald green, black, and grey. “Tell you what, Jack,” said Simon. “We all come out of this alive, you get a fancy new suit.”
“All right! Now you’re talkin’,” replied Jack. “Can I have one like Li’s? I look goooood in green.”
“We’ve got like twenty back on the Henrietta . I’m sure I can scrounge up another green one big enough for you.”
Simon helped Li seal the suit and showed him how to deploy the helmet. “Okay,” said Li as the helmet covered his head. “You guys get yours on, too. I will go open the service door. Once I open it, you start your little black vehicle and go, go, go. Get it out of here, up to me, and then out of the garage for us.”
“Where exactly is this service door?” asked Todd.
Li walked to the back of Ol’ Gertie and leaned out from under the open rear hatch. He pointed up near the corner of the massive garage door eighty feet above their heads. “In that corner. It is a big hatch door. It will be a tight squeeze, but I am sure your vehicle will fit.”
“Sounds good,” said Todd. “I’ll be watching from here, and when it opens, we’ll go.”
Li ran from the back of the ship, across the garage, and to an open-sided freight elevator. He jumped in and looked back towards the other three, giving them a thumbs up. He started the elevator’s ascent, and Jack said, “You guys should get in the cruiser now so we can go, go, go, as Li put it, once that hatch opens.”
Simon climbed into the backseat of the cruiser. Jack walked over to a pad by the rear door of Ol’ Gertie and began typing into it.
“What are you doing?” asked Todd.
“Setting the door to close after we exit and telling the ship to lock itself down at that time. I don’t care what happens down there, I am coming back for her.”
“Well, hurry up,” said Todd. “Li is at the top. ”
The elevator carrying Li stopped. He opened the gate and ran down the catwalk high overhead. When he reached the corner, he climbed a small ladder to a platform. Once there, he looked up through what Todd guessed was a window of some kind. A long minute passed, and Todd heard something approaching from over the garage above the surface of the moon.
Li ran to the other side of the platform, flipped a large lever, and began furiously cranking the giant wheel next to it. A loud alarm sounded in the garage as the service hatch started to rise open. EHHH! EHHH! EHHH!
“I guess that means go!” Todd yelled as he jumped in the driver’s side door and fired up the cruiser. “Now, Jack!” Todd screamed through the open passenger door. Jack typed one last time on the keypad, then dove in the cruiser and into the backseat. Out the back of Ol’ Gertie they went before Todd rotated them 180 degrees and accelerated upwards toward the open service hatch. Once they arrived at the platform, Todd leveled the cruiser alongside it and opened the passenger door.
“Care to join us?” Todd yelled to Li, who ran over and jumped in.
“Once you exit, stay as low as possible and head straight out from the base as fast as you can,” said Li. Todd nodded and steered the cruiser through the small gap in the ceiling. As the cruiser passed through, Jack looked back out the rear window at Ol’ Gertie and suddenly wondered if it was the last time he would ever see her .
The cruiser blasted over the charred, cracking surface of Io as the base disappeared behind them. “Past that lava pool,” said Li as he pointed out the windshield. “And on the other side of that volcano there. That is where you need to go.” Todd nodded as he adjusted course.
Like Callisto, Io was in tidal lock with Jupiter. Unlike when they were cruising over the surface of Callisto, here they were on the side facing away from Jupiter. The dominant light source was the reddish glow from lava below and the stars above. Occasionally, flashes of brilliant blue auroras from the interaction of Io’s volcanos and Jupiter’s magnetosphere would flare up overhead.
“So when we get to this outpost,” began Todd, “how do we get down the shaft? Is it steep?”
“No,” replied Li. “Not steep. Very long. Very big. It is more like a tunnel. I think we should fly in and then park near the bottom. Much less walking. Plus, if we need to leave in a hurry, this thing is fast.”
Todd smiled. “Yes, this thing is fast,” he said before asking, “Is the shaft just open at the top or what?”
“No,” replied Li. “I will have to get out and open the door. There is a landing area on top of the building for shipping containers to park and fill from the conveyer. You land there and I will open the door. Once that door opens, pass-through gel fills the top of the shaft, so we fly through that and then down we go.”
Todd banked the cruiser around the volcano, and Li pointed to a speck in the distance. “See there?” he asked. “That grey building?”
“I see it,” replied Todd. “You sure the shaft is still there?” he asked as he looked from the grey outbuilding back over his shoulder in the direction of the main facility behind them. “If it runs straight from there to the main mine, it went right under that new lava lake. Maybe it got filled in, too, just like the other shaft.”
“It should still be there,” replied Li. “The shafts are lined with very tough stuff. It is a slightly flexible, structural coating that fills the cavities right behind the drills as they create them. It’s lavaproof and can withstand the stress put on it from the intense forces here. Everything we built underground was lined with it.”
“Well, then what happened to the other shaft?” asked Todd.
“New volcano formed too close to it at the surface. Covered the whole top very thick. Like on the side of the base where we lost three outbuildings. Io is a very volatile place.”
The cruiser slowed as they approached the outpost. Todd landed it on the platform just as Li had described. “This will only take a second,” said Li. He opened the door and jumped out. Li walked over to the edge of where the door for the conveyer shaft was located. He bent down and flipped two levers. A four-foot-tall control panel rose from the deck. Li entered a series of commands, and the large panel door slid out of the way, revealing the shaft to the mine below. The top of the conveyer rose through the now open door as pass-through gel covered the opening behind it. Li jumped back in the cruiser and said, “Go slow.” Todd nodded as the cruiser rose slightly and hovered into position over the opening. “And quiet. As little noise as possible. Have not been down in the mine for months. I have no idea what
may be at the other end of this shaft now.”
“You sure we shouldn’t be walking down?” asked an increasingly anxious-looking Simon from the backseat.
“I am sure,” replied Li. “It is like ten kilometers long. To be safe, we can stop with a kilometer or so left and walk from there.”
“I think that’s a good idea,” said Todd as he pitched the cruiser down and slowly entered the shaft.
By the light shining from the cruiser’s headlights, the tube appeared to have originally been a clean white all the way around. Now it had a thick film of grease and soot. The white shown through from underneath in speckles here and there, like stars on a partially overcast night. The conveyer was a twenty-foot-wide black belt running straight down the bottom of the shaft as far as the eye could see.
“You guys have anything to defend yourselves with when we get down there?” asked Todd.
“The jerks took all our weapons when they arrived. I do not like guns, anyway,” said Li. “I am a pacifist.”
“That’s all well and good,” said Todd, “but what are you going to do if things get messy? Shout that you’re a pacifist?”
“Hide behind one of you,” answered Li with a smile. “You all are much bigger targets.”
“I’m good,” said Jack from the backseat .
“What do you got?” asked Simon, looking him up and down. Jack reached down to his right thigh where a long, thin pocket had been retrofitted to his suit. He unsnapped the top of it, pulled out a marshal wand, and held it up.
“Where did you get that?” asked Simon.
“After I was recruited, one of the marshals gave me this and said it would blow my cover real quick, so it was absolutely only to be used in an emergency. Like life or death situations type stuff. The night before we left, I took it out of hiding and attached a pocket for it to my suit. I had a feeling this was going to be the kind of situation they gave it to me for.”