Ozzy held the photon pistol at another approaching guard.
The guard went for his sidearm.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” warned Ozzy. He tipped his gun. “Get on the floor, and put your hands behind your head.”
The man kept his hand over his sidearm, breathing heavily. Ozzy could tell the guy wasn’t experienced in combat, let alone confrontation. In a place like Briault, that was strange. It was a free-trader, black market city, and the best place Ozzy sold his finds and a city where confrontations were normal.
Ozzy stared the man down. “Don’t.”
“Percy, take your hand off your weapon,” said a woman. “It’s not worth it.”
The guard moved his hand away from his weapon and nodded, getting on his knees. He laid on the floor and put his hands behind his head.
Ozzy reached for the man’s gun and pulled it out of its holster, holding it in his other hand. He turned and pointed both photon pistols at the young man and guard behind the counter.
Blood oozed down the guard’s lip.
“Get my stuff,” Ozzy ordered.
“It’s in the bag room,” answered the young man.
“Then go to the bag room and get my things.” He shoved both pistols forward. “If you don’t come back in a few minutes, then people will die.”
He was lying, but no one in this hospital ward needed to know that.
“Yes, sir.” The young man jabbed a thumb over his shoulder. “It’s right there. It won’t take long.”
“Then I suggest you get moving while I start counting,” came Ozzy, the smell of hot food cooking in the hospital kitchen wafting to his nose. His stomach growled.
The young man rushed to another room and came out a few seconds later, holding a black duffel bag.
Yep, this was Briault. They probably shoved the contents in the bag, figuring Ozzy was a drug dealer, a smuggler, or worse yet, a crime syndicate member from one of the families that ran Briault’s underground. The hospital was most likely about to sell the bag to the highest crime boss bidder.
The young man rounded the registration desk and handed Ozzy the oversized bag.
“Drop it on the ground,” demanded Ozzy, his eyes narrow, his hands clasping the guns’ grips a little too tightly.
The man dropped the bag and backed up.
Ozzy bent down and unzipped it, seeing everything he wanted—the briefcase, his rifle, Indigo, and even the food bars. Hell, it even held his EVA.
“Thank you. Any of you follow me, you’ll be shot. Understood?”
They nodded, and he shoved a gun in the bag and bolted to the glass doors that displayed Briault Emergency Care. He kicked them open and threw the bag over his shoulder.
He hustled into a hovercar parking lot, hearing the soft buzz of the graviton shield’s power coursing around the metropolis.
A security hovercar zipped around a corner. Its police lights circled the many shades of red and yellow in the color array. Its sirens blasted for all the world to hear.
Ozzy backed up.
Another security hovercar flew over a large moss-covered patch with a park bench planted in the middle of it. The bench was graffitied with gang markings. The car came to a quick halt.
Ozzy rushed between them as they descended in their hover. The guards were too slow getting out of their vehicles, and Ozzy dashed down a sidewalk, his legs moving as fast as they could take him.
He knew he looked silly and stood out like a sore thumb. His hospital gown waved in the wind while civilian hovercars drove by him down the streets.
He took a left, jumping over Martian red shrubs, and hurried toward an alleyway.
A police siren blared.
Ozzy glanced behind him, seeing an MMP hovercar heading his way.
“Dammit.”
He jumped over a curb and raced down an alleyway filled with garbage bins. Broken boxes, food, and dirty clothes were strewn over the bin’s edges, making a pile against the sides of the containers. Rotten food and the smell of vomit floated to his nostrils.
The cities garbage services weren’t run by robots like most cities, and it wasn’t odd for the human-run garbage companies to miss routes for weeks or months on end in Briault.
He waved his hand in front of his nose and continued to run. The alley was lined with five- and six-story tall buildings and he leaped onto an outside hoverelevator—the type without any walls.
He pulled on a rusty lever on the elevator’s platform.
He moved up one floor, then two, then three…
A hovercar pulled down the alleyway, stopping in front of a garbage bin. An agent’s voice crackled over a speaker, “Sir, you are under arrest. Please stop the hoverelevator and put your hands up.”
Ozzy pushed the lever to neutral, stopping the elevator on the fourth floor.
“Sorry. No can do.” He jumped onto an overhanging deck and slid open a glass door. He had a daughter to get to.
He skid to a halt, his mouth open, his hands up. Crap, he just walked into the wrong room.
18
Briault, Mars
Ozzy sighed loudly, and his shoulder’s slumped forward. “Figures.” He wanted to scream. Why was he being held back from seeing Lily?
“What figures, you psycho-ward hospital-gown-wearing freak?”
Several men, all glowing in tattoos that lit up like black lights, held large rifles and aimed them at Ozzy.
Ozzy glanced down at his gown. He looked like a loon in that thing. He peered into the biggest guy’s eyes. “I’m looking for Jonas Moon?”
He wasn’t, but bringing up the biggest underground crime lord and black market dealer in East Mars might earn him a “don’t-shoot-me” card.
One man lunged forward, pressing the muzzle of his rifle against Ozzy’s forehead. “Yeah, I don’t care for the fella. Jonas killed my cousin, Vinny.”
“Ah, perfect.” Ozzy sighed again. He really needed to get to his daughter. Dealing with these thugs was slowing him down. “I have auric credits and lots of them.”
Right now he didn’t care what he gave them, just as long as they let him walk out of this apartment.
“Yeah?” said one of the men. “Proof?”
Ozzy dug into his bag.
“Slowly, dumbass,” said another man.
Ozzy nodded and calmly pulled out his hexagonal wallet. “This has millions of auric credits.”
A small rollbot—a bot shaped like a ball about the size of an Old Earth bowling ball—ran into his foot. Ozzy lifted his leg, startled. A light shot out of it, scanning Ozzy. “All clear,” it said and rolled away.
“You’re not a Ministry agent,” said a thug, swiping for Ozzy’s auric wallet.
Ozzy pulled it back.
The thugs lunged toward him.
Ozzy took a step backward. “Whoa! I need to explain, my friends. One, this is all I have, so I need you all to get me safely out of this apartment. Two, leave me enough to buy a ship to get me to Gale Crater City.” His voice wavered as he thought about his daughter. Sadness filled his eyes.
The big guy’s demeanor changed a little. Most people wouldn’t have caught it, but Ozzy could tell there was a brief hint of compassion. The guy may have actually felt Ozzy’s pain, and more importantly, he must have understood that emotional pain was emotional pain no matter where it was coming from.
“You are a loony,” one of the men replied, running his thumb and index finger through his spiked Mohawk. He pressed a button on his gold, tight-fitting collar, and the man’s long, black, puffy sleeves rolled up on their own, revealing thick biceps. “You want to travel to a city that is being decimated by the Martian Plague? I doubt that. I think you’re lying, buddy.”
“My daughter is there. Her name is Lily.” Ozzy turned and looked out the sliding glass door from where he had entered. “I don’t have much time.”
“Alright, then give me the wallet.” The leader eased the barrel of his rifle away from Ozzy’s head. “And we’ll see if yo
u’re lying.”
Ozzy held up his wallet. It was a golden hexagonal metallic device no bigger than a coaster.
The leader looked at it. A nose earring hung past his lip with a sword dangling from its end. He sat down on a couch, pushing random auric credit wallets off of a coffee table. Several crystal skulls lined the table, many Ozzy recognized. They’d apparently liked what he had found on his digs and must have bought the skulls on the black market, or stole them.
They probably had no idea he was the finder and the seller.
Nonetheless, he wouldn’t inquire.
Police lights reflected off the buildings outside and through the sliding glass door, coloring the apartment walls. No one seemed to notice but Ozzy, or they were so used to police in this neighborhood that they didn’t give two shits about it.
Ozzy bit his fingernail. “Can we hurry it up?”
An auric card machine sat next to a holocomputer. The thug tapped Ozzy’s auric card on the device. Instantly, a number popped up on the holoscreen.
All the men leaned back, their eyes aglow.
“Whoa.” The big thug gave him a long, hard look. “Who the hell are you?”
The elevator outside clicked and descended. Someone was about to get on it and most likely head to this apartment.
A man with long hair and a glowing dragon tattoo on his face stepped outside onto the ledge, glancing down. “It looks like we have some visitors, and they’re of the police variety.” He came in, grabbed a rifle off the rack on the wall, and pressed a photon energy clip into its magazine. It revved up like a tiny motor and quieted a moment later. “Ready.”
“Dragon,” said the thug. “Show this man our escape route.”
Ozzy was getting antsy. He didn’t want to get caught in the crossfire. “Not until you give me my auric wallet back.”
The thug leader snarled. “Didn’t you say I could take your money in return for your safety?”
“Yes, take what you want, but leave me with some for a ship.”
The elevator was getting louder, which meant it was getting closer to this floor.
“The escape is over here.” Dragon walked backward, heading toward a wooden door. He held his gun out, pointing at the sliding glass panel, waiting for the police to show their pretty faces.
Ozzy extended his hand. “The card, please.” Sweat was beading on his forehead. Time was slipping away.
“Duck down,” yelled Dragon as he went to a knee and fired. His shoulder bounced against the rifle’s recoil, blasting a blue flame of hot photon death toward the elevator outside, shattering the glass door into a thousand shards.
The thug leader raised his gun, his eyes widening. Return fire echoed in the room, and the leader’s head whipped back. Blood splattered over Ozzy’s chest and chin. The guy went limp and fell to the floor, his weapon and Ozzy’s auric card flopping to the ground.
Ozzy dropped to the floor, reaching for the card and grabbing it. He twisted and dove for his bag, hearing the whining of gunfire. Plaster and chunks of furniture flew in the air as the police sent as many volleys into the apartment while the thugs shot everything they had back at them. Burning material from the couches and chairs floated and filled the room while smoke swirled uninvited to Ozzy’s nose.
Ozzy kept his back and head low, quickly crawling toward the escape door. He tossed his wallet into the bag and grabbed for the doorknob, wrapping his fingers around it and twisting.
Pops and more breaking glass reverberated off the walls, and a chunk of ceiling lathe fell on him.
He pushed it off and crawled forward.
A thump and the floor jostled next to him. He turned. A thug with his eyes wide open and blood dripping from his mouth lay next to him.
It was Dragon, and he wasn’t breathing.
A scream and another thug was shot.
More firing, and more yelling.
The wall next to the escape door blasted inward. Smoke instantly rose from the scorched hole with black singe marks lining the orifice.
He pulled the door open, seeing a gold pole similar to what fire departments used back in the twenty-first century.
He threw the bag’s straps over his shoulder and grabbed hold of the pole. He pulled himself onto it and squeezed his arms and legs around it. He eased up on his grip and slid down.
As he was sliding, he looked up. A Mars Ministry Police officer stood in the doorway, peering down at Ozzy.
Shit.
The MMP agent pulled out a gun and pointed it at Ozzy.
Double shit.
Woopah! Woopah!
Two photon balls expelled from the MMP’s gun.
Ozzy released his grip and went into a free fall. The photon bolts zipped by him. He flailed his arms and legs, knowing every bone in his body would break the moment he crashed to the floor.
With a thud, his feet hit the ground, and his knees buckled. He grunted and rolled through an opening.
He checked his ankles, shins, and knees. They tingled from the shock of the impact, but nothing major was broken.
A light turned on, and he froze, waiting for photon slugs to riddle him full of holes.
Nothing happened.
His eyes darted around the room. It was walled in with red concrete and was empty. It was lined with three doors—one for each wall not including the opening he just rolled through.
He threw off his hospital gown and shuffled through his bag. He pulled out his jumpsuit, leaving the EVA inside, and quickly dressed. He placed his communication cap on to provide somewhat of a disguise.
He doubted it would work, but it was better than nothing.
He closed the bag and froze, listening intently.
Someone was sliding down the pole.
He rushed to a door and pushed it open. The Mars day greeted him with a bouquet of sunshine.
He rushed down a side street and quickened his pace, keeping his head down and his eyes forward.
A police hovervehicle flew by, then a second one, and a third.
“Ozzy, can you hear me?”
Ozzy stopped, his face screwing up. He turned around, not seeing anyone he recognized, except for a few attractive young women who would never pay him any mind.
He kept walking.
“Ozzy, are you there?”
He put his hand over his ear, feeling the cap on his head. It was coming through his com line. “Who is this?”
The voice sounded familiar, but it couldn’t be Jozi. She was either dead or penned up in a hospital room under lockdown.
“This is Jozi.”
She was alive.
19
Briault, Mars
He turned a corner and leaned up against a wall, staring at a sea of spiked plants in pots hanging next to a hydroponic store.
“What’s my daughter’s nickname?” he asked the voice, resting his chin on his knuckles, breathing heavily.
He had to be sure this was Jozi.
“Lily-bug,” she replied. “Now, where are you? Why are you breathing so hard?”
He glanced at the street sign. “I’m on the corner of Columbia and Collins Crest.” His heart was racing. “Are you at the hospital?”
“I checked out of the hospital a few minutes ago. I showed them my MMP I.D., and they let me out. I told them I’m on a case and…”
Police hovercars drove toward him. He had to go.
“…and that was that,” Jozi was continuing.
Ozzy walked down another road.
With a jumpsuit and an EVA cap on, Ozzy stood out more than he realized.
“Anyway,” Jozi said, “I’m standing out front of the hospital. Come and meet me. We’re behind schedule. And thanks for staying at the hospital for me, you prick.” There was a bit of sarcasm behind her words and a bit of truth, too.
A siren blared. The police raced down another street. Maybe they had thought they found a suspect that matched his description?
It didn’t matter, though. None of this did. Staying here was jus
t delaying everything. Right now the only thing that mattered was Lily. It had been three and a half days, no one able to communicate with Gale Crater City, and people were probably dying left and right.
Ozzy’s hope of seeing Lily, let alone keeping her alive, was diminishing by the minute.
Getting to Dawes to find the cure was now a vanishing dream. He had to see his daughter before she died.
“Ozzy, are you still there?”
Ozzy nodded. “Yes, meet me across from Vika’s Hydroplant Extravaganza.”
“What? Just come back to the hospital.”
“Uh…no can do.”
“Why?”
Ozzy huffed. “You ask a lot of questions. Just get here, and then we can be on our way.”
“Alright. I’ll see you soon.”
An MMP agent ran across the street, heading in Ozzy’s direction. The agent held out his gun and was pointing it directly at Ozzy.
Ozzy went to turn, then halted. Another MMP agent was coming from a different direction. He twirled around. “Shit.” A third agent was rounding a corner.
They were surrounding him.
He stepped back. MMP hovercars pulled up out of nowhere, stopping near the closest curb to him.
Ozzy was trapped.
He unzipped his bag and grabbed Indigo. He dropped the bag on the sidewalk, squeezing Indigo tightly in his arms.
“Stand back,” Ozzy growled. “This is a Mitsubishi G4M Betty Bomb.” Ozzy knew there wasn’t such a bomb, and that the G4M Betty was a World War II Japanese bomber, but the Mars Ministry Police wouldn’t be up to date with useless history. “If I detonate this, the city block will go up in flames, including everyone on it.”
An MMP agent stepped back, clearly confused. He targeted Ozzy, putting his hand out for the other agents to halt. “He’s got a bomb.”
“Yes,” yelled Ozzy. “I have a Mitsubishi G4M Betty. It’s a bomb that can tear you several new assholes.”
An agent walked forward, his gun pointed toward Ozzy’s chest. “I don’t buy it. There’s no such bomb with that name in distribution and never was.”
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