The Soldier: The X-Ship Page 7

  ***

  As Quillian lowered her binoculars, she hid her astonishment. Beside her, a black-clad sniper frowned heavily even as he cradled his big rifle.

  The two-man team that had fired the missile was dismantling the launcher.

  “He survived,” she said.

  “Son of a bitch,” the sniper said. “That’s impossible. No one was supposed to survive.”

  Quillian had acted with supreme brutality, using a missile with a tiny amount of antimatter in the warhead. She’d worked for Group Six and the Director long enough to know that brute force solved most problems. With Clarke coming for Brune so openly—especially with Halifax dead—it had been clear the entire mission was blown.

  “Brune survived,” she said, “and it looks like he won’t get caught.”

  “Should I finish him?” the sniper asked, raising his rifle suggestively.

  Quillian thought about that. It would be easier all the way around. She’d learned about Halifax’s death. Now, though, Senior Lieutenant Clarke was dead, too. The Director had said if there was a chance Brune could get to Avalon IV…

  “I could splash him easy,” the sniper said.

  “No…” Quillian said. “Let’s see what he does next.”

  “But you said it had turned into a screw up and that we—”

  Quillian rounded on him with lizard speed. “What did I just say?”

  The sniper nodded as he paled. “I guess we helped him by scratching Clarke, huh?”

  “So it appears,” she said. “Make sure your team gets rid of everything. Then, we’ll stay in a safe house for a few days until this blows over just a little.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  “Brune” lay on grass well outside city limits. It was dark with stars overhead.

  He’d walked here, staying in deep shadows until the sun went down, using the dark to head into the countryside.

  His stomach rumbled as he lay with his hands behind his head. He was damn hungry and thirsty. He couldn’t stay out here. He didn’t have enough fat reserves yet to go without food and water for days.

  What did that mean for him?

  Clarke had come to murder him, using the power of the local IPO to do it. Clarke had lost his nerve at the last second, which had been pure Clarke, at least according to the Brune memories. In any case, that implied Halifax had gone to see Clarke and—what had happened between them?

  Brune flat didn’t know, but could probably guess. Likely, Halifax was dead.

  He gazed at the stars. The constellations up there were foreign to him even though he didn’t know what his home constellations looked like. What he did know was that the twinkling stars up there were not his. That meant he was on a strange world. That made sense, too, as he had Jack Brune’s memories. At least, the Jack Brune memories had pride of place in his thoughts. He had other sensations that he trusted more than the Brune thoughts.

  The soldier grunted. This was a tangled web.

  Still, he was a soldier. He would do what soldiers had done throughout time—survive in the moment. That meant he needed water, food and likely shelter. Since he had the Brune memories, maybe he ought to use them in his quest.

  “What do I want?” he asked aloud.

  As a soldier, he wanted to know what he had to do in order to win. He would think of his desires as his victory conditions. His first victory condition was staying alive and free. His second victory condition was regaining his memories. How could he do that?

  In some fashion, he believed finding the woman who had woken up from stasis would… He didn’t know what. Finding her was important, though.

  “Why is that important?” he asked.

  His heart began to thump. It was important. He knew it, but didn’t know why. Thus, in lieu of anything else, he would seek the woman who had escaped the clutches of the hidden tech company, of the people Rohan Mars served.

  He closed his eyes. He was supposed to be Jack Brune, was supposed to have survived the head wound two and a half years ago. According to his Brune memories, he had an ex-Patrol scout in DMR. Delbough & Macron Repairs was up in the space station. Should he try to collect the scout? He didn’t have any ID. Maybe he needed to go to his old office in the city. Would anything be there after two and a half years?

  Maybe he should seek out Juan Graff. Then again, Graff had owned the attacked complex that housed the bunker. Maybe the IPO had Graff under investigation.

  He would leave Graff alone for now.

  The soldier closed his eyes. He would sleep here tonight and walk to the city tomorrow. He would see tomorrow if he could merge into Helos society. He had little to go on, but it was more than anything else at the moment.

  ***

  He was ravenous upon waking. The main Rigel star peaked over the horizon, the dawn light showing newly sprouted fields around him.

  Brune stood, inspected himself, rubbed away dirt and dusted off his clothes. The blast, and too much crawling, made him look like a bum. He had no doubt his dirty face wouldn’t help matters.

  With a shrug, he started for the city. He could see the tallest towers in the distance.

  He walked, his stomach constantly rumbling. Surprisingly, he knew the way to his office building. He did not allow himself to stagger or show any fatigue as he marched along the city sidewalks.

  After three hours of walking, he reached the office building, one of the skyscrapers. Twice, police cars had passed him, the officers inside studying him closely. He had kept his eyes ahead as he strode resolutely. That must have been enough for the cops, as the vehicles had driven off each time.

  He entered the building through the main lobby entrance along with many other people. He suspected cameras watched him. Two security people did. He continued to walk resolutely. This time, it wasn’t enough.

  A stout man in a guard uniform hailed him.

  Brune stopped, turning, watching the man approach. The partner held a comm unit, maybe reporting him or maybe just getting ready to.

  “Who are you?” the stout guard said as he neared.

  “Brune, why?”

  “I’ll ask the questions. Brune who?”

  “Jack Brune.”

  “What’s your business here?”

  “I have an office on the tenth floor.”

  The stout guard squinted suspiciously. “I haven’t seen you before.”

  “You must be new.”

  “Listen, pal—”

  “Jack Brune. Tell your friend to look it up.”

  The stout security guard eyed him, dropping his gaze from Brune’s intense stare and maybe realizing the other was scary tough. “Why do you look so scruffy?”

  Brune laughed. “Bub, if you’d been at the party I was at last night, you’d look ten times worse. The women—” Brune laughed in a lewd and knowing manner.

  The stout security guard blushed. “All right, all right, I don’t want to hear about it. I’m just doing my job. We keep out the riffraff.”

  “Bully for you,” Brune said, playing in persona.

  The guard started back for his partner, shaking his head as he did.

  Brune headed for the elevators. He rode up alone to the tenth floor and moved like a sleepwalker. He eyed the stairwell Rohan Mars had leaped over two and a half years ago. The man—android—would have plummeted ten floors down to the lobby.

  The soldier shrugged, turning to his office door. Would it still belong to Brune? Surely, after two and a half years, someone else would have the space. He went to the door and saw the stenciling: Jack Brune, Locating Service.

  He tried it. The door was locked.

  What was the best way—?

  He whirled around and walked down a hall. He reached a janitor closet, opening it easily enough when chemical smells hit him. Holding his breath while heading to the back, he reached under a bottom shelf and felt around, ripping away old tape so a key dropped into his palm. He went out, expelling his breath as he closed the closet door.

  The memory had
served him.

  Soon, he unlocked the office door. The place smelled dusty and looked dingy. He left dust tracks as he walked across the floor.

  The desk drawers had some old protein bars. They tasted awful, but he ate them anyway. He found some bottled water and guzzled it. In one drawer, he found the heavy, short-barrel WAK .55 Magnum and bullets for it. There was an extra shoulder harness.

  Well, well, well, this was good.

  He found clothes in a closet and tried them on. They were a little baggy, but he was underweight. Best of all, he found a wallet with an ID. He studied it and looked in a mirror. He needed to wash up and then he might pass for Brune.

  He found credit bills in the wallet and a credit card.

  The Brune memories had proven useful after all. Could he keep pushing forward as Brune?

  He shrugged. He would push all right. Halifax, or whomever Halifax had worked for, had kept paying the bills. Since they had planned to palm him off as Brune, he would assume any Brune papers would still be in order.

  He sat in the chair behind the desk. This was too easy. Clarke was dead. Someone had blasted an IPO lifter with a military-grade missile. Halifax was gone. Wouldn’t the IPO be searching for Halifax? It would depend. How did Halifax get an IPO officer to do his bidding? The Brune memories suggested Halifax blackmailed Clarke.

  There were secret games going on around him. He didn’t understand everything. Maybe he should stick to his goals. That meant reaching Avalon IV. He needed data on it, but he believed he also needed the scout. That meant going to the space station.

  He’d eaten, washed up, and had a weapon, credits and an ID— he stood, pitching the key in the air and catching it. He’d tape the key in the same spot. Then, he would get a shuttle ticket to go upstairs and see what happened next.

  Chapter Fourteen

  The soldier peered out a shuttle window, studying the planet outside. It was green, blue, white and brown the way Earth used to look. It wasn’t exactly the same, but with its own continental, ocean and icecap patterns. The patterns matched his Brune memories.

  He shifted in his window seat and peered outside the other way, eying the space station. It was as ordinary as you could picture, a giant wheel with spokes and a long center cylinder. The wheel spun around and around to simulate gravity inside. That was cheaper than using power-draining and expensive gravity controls.

  He saw spaceships and shuttles, too, more than he’d expected.

  The Brune ID and credits had worked at the spaceport, although the credit card had expired. He hadn’t put it in the slot, as the attendant had detected the expiration date. That’s when he’d noticed a greater police presence at the spaceport. They were watching for something or someone. IPO agents had rushed into the main terminal building. Of course, of course, the missile and downed IPO lifter had likely created a shit-storm. Maybe this was a bad time to head up to the space station.

  Figuring it would look suspicious if he left, he’d taken out credit notes, paying with cash. Despite his qualms, he’d had no trouble boarding the shuttle.

  He was glad he’d put the WAK .55 in a cargo box. He’d leave it there when departing the shuttle.

  He peered out the window again, watching, wondering what the future held for him. He was a cipher in a complex game of others’ makings. He wanted to break out of that—and do what exactly? Find the woman on Avalon IV. That was his goal. He didn’t know why it was so important to him, but he felt certain he would learn if he kept plowing through all obstacles.

  Soon, the shuttle began its final approach to a space station docking bay. His stomach tightened as gray bulkheads passed before the window. He had a feeling that getting the ex-Patrol scout would prove much more difficult than he expected.

  The missile and downed IPO lifter might have put local Concord and Helos officialdom on high alert. How would they view such a thing? He didn’t know. He would plow ahead and hope for the best.

  ***

  His Brune memories told him DMR was a huge outfit, taking up an eighth of the giant space station. DMR serviced all kinds of spacecraft, including IPO escorts and Patrol scouts. It was one of the reasons the original Brune had brought the ex-Patrol boat to them. DMR had the knowledge and skills to repair the spacecraft.

  There were a few IPO agents in the exit area. They were scanning people leaving the shuttle. He put a blank look on his face and walked with the largest group. No one stopped him, which surprised him. What were they looking for?

  He exited the docking terminal and headed into the widest space station corridors. Surprisingly, he knew which way to go.

  After a brisk walk, he moved through glass doors with a DMR sign overhead. He stepped into a vast lobby with over a hundred milling people and service reps. He put his newly acquired Brune ID into a reference slot and received a number. He took that to a bank of chairs, sat and waited one hour and seventeen minutes, while becoming increasingly nervous. He thought about leaving, deciding he would make his exit in another ten minutes.

  A slim young woman approached where he was sitting. She gave him a mechanical smile with no warmth in her brown eyes. She wore a jacket and skirt ensemble, the badge on the jacket indicating a corporate vice president. She looked too young to have made it so high already. She either had brains and ambition or had slept her way up the ladder, or maybe both.

  “Mr. Brune?” she asked.

  He nodded as he stood.

  “Could I see some ID, please?”

  He pulled it from the wallet, showing it to her.

  She leaned nearer, studying the picture and then him, doing it twice as if suspicious about him.

  “I’ve lost weight,” he said.

  “Yes. That might explain the difference.” She straightened. “Excuse me, but there have been irregularities with your account. I was instructed to make certain it was you.”

  “Are you satisfied?”

  “The computer said you died two and a half years ago.”

  “A computer error,” he said. “You see me in the flesh and here’s the ID. I was badly wounded back then, though.”

  “I see. Errors of such magnitude seldom happen… I must clear this.”

  He shrugged even though her words made him uneasy. The missile and downed IPO lifter weren’t helping him any.

  “A moment,” she said, walking away, pulling a blue communicator from a jacket pocket. She spoke quietly, glancing at him several times, nodding and frowning as she did.

  He didn’t like it, expecting IPO people to rush into the lobby and arrest him. But what could he do now? He couldn’t very well run. He was on a space station, one probably on high alert. Had he trapped himself coming up here?

  She frowned more, speaking rapidly until she clicked her communicator closed and replaced it in the jacket pocket. She returned to where he was standing.

  “I’m Tara Alor, head of the Repossession Department. You’ve been gone a long time, Mr. Brune. But I have been instructed to proceed with your claim. It appears there must have been a computer error after all concerning your death. If you would follow me, please.”

  “Sure,” he said, noticing a small device in the hand that had been holding the communicator. Was that an alert button? Or perhaps a microsecond shield generator? If the latter, those were expensive and hard to come by. Just who was this “vice president” anyway?

  He blinked, surprised at his thoughts. How did he know about a microsecond shield generator and that they were hard to come by? He shrugged. He seemed to know. He didn’t see any reason to discount the thought.

  Tara Alor turned away and led him out of the lobby into a corridor. She had nice legs and a beautiful walk. He wondered if her beauty was supposed to distract him. He thought it possible.

  She led him through a maze of corridors, turning, climbing stairs, turning again. It might have been confusing, but he had an excellent memory concerning routes. This must have been the long route, as the walk took much longer than he expected. Finally, in wh
at seemed like a remote region, they entered a large office with a huge window showing Helos surrounded by stars and one of its orbiting moons.

  He studied the window. It wasn’t a projection, but the real deal. Would a vice president of the Repo Department get an office with a view like this? He didn’t think so.

  As he sat in a chair in front of the desk, he noticed small security cameras on the ceiling.

  Tara Alor cleared her throat and folded her hands on the desk. There was no evidence of the small device anymore. She didn’t smile, and there was no fear in her eyes at being alone with a brute like him.

  “Mr. Brune,” she began, “Delbough & Macon Repairs has been quite patient with you, awaiting payment for extensive repairs to your ship. We thought you were dead, and would have auctioned off your vessel to recoup our losses, but there was an IPO request for us to ‘hang onto’ the scout for a time. Did you contact the IPO perchance and request this?”

  “No.”

  “Hmm,” she said. “Well, whatever the case, we will proceed. The two-and-a-half-year docking fee added to your repair bill…” She clicked a unit so a small screen rose from the desk. She studied the screen before looking up in surprise. “According to this, you only paid the initial fee, and none of the repair bill.”

  “Are you sure?” he asked. “Maybe that’s another computer error.”

  She looked at the screen, shaking her head as she regarded him again.

  He gave her what he hoped was a winning smile. It felt like a Brune thing to do. It also felt as if it was time for some swift action. He had a sense that he needed to leave the Rigel System. First, he had to secure the scout and plenty of fuel.

  “You people have been more than patient with me, and I appreciate that. I’m not one to forget such things. How much do I owe DMR?”