Chapter 22
Jack threw on his helmet and Betty fired up as he mounted. “Blake, you got me?”
“Yeah, we’ll have comms while we got line-of-sight for the next while. What’s the plan?”
“I was thinking of getting the hell out of here, how ‘bout you?”
“Amen to that. I’ll lead, the Coffin can take more of a hammering than that glorified penis you ride.”
Blake started up and headed out of the car park, gunshots echoing from behind. It was the front desk guard, but they were already moving too fast for him to be a problem. As they started down the hill, there was a fairly clear view of the road, nothing so far, but it was the stuff they couldn’t see that would be a problem.
As they hit the first switchback, Blake saw a turret thirty metres ahead, right on the edge of the road. The screen in the car flashed up with warnings, and an overlay appeared showing potential risks, the turret being the first. As it started firing projectile rounds, Blake swerved off the road and ran right over it.
“Sin’s gonna kick your arse for that one Blake.” Jack gave a laugh, broken by his concentration required to keep Betty on the road through the carnage.
“Gotta give you something to look forward to, other than the dozen other turrets the Coffin has pegged down this road; I don’t wanna have to run over all of them.”
“They must use some kind of proximity sensor, surely Sin has something in that thing to jam them.”
Blake looked at the screen and saw another turret on the apex of the next switchback. “There is so much junk on this display, I don’t know where to start.” He tapped the screen and the turret glowed on the screen. When he was forty metres away, a Pulse cannon from the Coffin fired on it, the turret burst into flames instantly.
“The hell was that?”
“Dunno, but I like it. A lot!” Blake proceeded to tap the next three turrets, and as they powered down the long straight the cannons blazed the turrets with surgical precision.
Jack saw the next switchback coming up. Sitting at the end of it were two assault vehicles. He brought up the targeting system with TLM and painted multiple positions on both vehicles. As Blake passed, the vehicles opened fire on the Coffin. They had Electric-charge weapons designed to fry vehicle electronics, but the Coffin absorbed the energy and Blake swept around the corner and away.
Betty fired a salvo of darts at the vehicles tires, lights and vision screens as Jack was fifty metres out. He dropped the bike hard putting it into a power-slide and accelerated out of the turn. His visor came up with impact warnings, and he looked over his shoulder to see both vehicles bearing down.
“Blake, you there?”
“Yeah Jack, you got company?”
“Yeah, and I don’t think they want to sit around and chat. On the next switchback, I want you to run thirty metres down the road and spin around. I’m going to come around and push the bitch as deep as I can.” He paused, focussing on a bright blue flash coming at him; he swerved up onto the grass bank as a pulse blast whisked past.
TLM was going nuts with warnings. Jack wondered if it had some kind of targeting EMP bombs. His visor flashed “EMP spikes charged”. He engaged them, and a pocket near the tail of the bike flipped and dropped five small glowing tubes. One of the vehicles ran one over and instantly went dark, swerving across the road and off the bank. Blake looked ahead and hit the brake as the vehicle busted through the armco, tumbling across the road in front of him. He spun the car and activated the pulse cannons.
The other attack vehicle had swerved around a few tubes and its light arrays stuttered, but it kept coming. Jack saw the corner coming, forty, thirty, twenty metres, he didn’t slow, instead dropping his right knee and accelerating. The bike swooped, tail out, but didn’t hit the ground. Jack felt it correcting the power delivery, and the handles twitching around him, the G’s stacking up instantly almost made him vomit. Pulling out of the turn at 130 kilometres per hour, the bike corrected as he straightened and accelerated to two hundred by the time he got to Blake.
Blake turned as Jack screamed past, then looked back to see the chaser coming around in a less than glamorous rolling drift. He tapped the highlighted outline on his windshield and tapped again. The pulse cannon fired three shots just as the vehicle was straightening out. They hit simultaneously, the vehicle bursting into a huge fireball. Blake watched the burning wreckage roll off the cliff, glowing up the rocks and shrubs as it tumbled down.
He spun around and accelerated down the hill, catching the faint glow of Jack’s bike disappear around the next corner, no lights on. How the hell can he ride like that?
Ten minutes later they met at the rendezvous point. Cindy had comms back up, and good news. It seemed that the facility wasn’t well armed and their engagement had taken out the only defence they had in the immediate area. The Feds had squads out searching, but Ping was giving them ghost images all over the show, and was also calling in false reports of speeding vehicles heading all over the place. All they had to do now was play it cool, get back without any drama, and they could start putting the rest of the puzzle together.
So as not to draw too much attention, they agreed to drive back at a reasonably moderate speed. They had evasive measures should they be engaged, but didn’t want to need it. The slow drive also gave them time to hear Ping talk about where the research was going with Biotronics.
There were a few areas of the technology Ping thought were most valuable for the technology. Primarily it was ideal for defence applications, as it could be configured to suit a wide range of applications, was resistant to EMP, and had multiple redundancies from the fact it didn’t need to have a clear circuit path and could operate connected through a ‘membrane’; therefore no need to worry about severed wires or bad solder joints.
Most of these attributes also lent the tech to the other main area he was interested in. The fact that it could also be engineered to be radiation resistant and solar energy absorbing with ninety-five percent efficiency, made it ideal for space exploration. Of course Wing’Tan didn’t give a toss about being the next Captain Kirk (Cindy copped a barrage of abuse from Ping for asking who that was), they wanted exotic minerals. Asteroids were already showing promise for materials that weren’t available on earth, and had excellent physical and chemical attributes.
“Yeah, but Wing’Tan couldn’t afford that, could they?”
“No, Jack, you’re right, not yet. They did have growing political connections and influence though, and not the least of which was through the Alphas. The tech would allow send and return rockets to mine near Earth asteroids.”
“Wait,” Jack interrupted. “Alphas? That Tyrol guy was an Alpha, I’m sure of it. You reckon he knows about the Biotronics?”
“It’s possible. Seek and Trina had it top secret, but there is no reason they wouldn’t discuss it, at least conceptually, with outsiders to gather interest and funding.”
“That sneaky little bugger. I bet that’s why he helped us. Get some terriers to snare the rabbit.”
“Then shoot the dogs?” Blake added.
“Yeah, but that arsehole hasn’t seen this dog bite,” Jack said with a growing anger.
“I think we should take a step back,” interjected Cindy.
“What, why do that?”
“Listen, Jack. We don’t know Tyrol from a bar of soap, and rightly don’t trust him. But he also doesn’t know us. He doesn’t know how many of us there really are, or how we’re organised. Which gives us the upper hand.”
“Keep going.”
“Let’s just play with him and see where it goes. He may be able to get us the people we need for answers about your set-up, and help clear you.”
“Well if he sniffs the wrong arse, I won’t be asking any more questions.”
“Atta boy, action man; I love it when you talk tough.” Cindy gave a giggle and cut her comm.
Ping directed them through the in
land area, the coast road was ablaze with Fed and local cop activity now, so best they didn’t try their chances. It meant with their lower speed the trip back would take around four hours. Both Jack and Blake were physically stuffed and asked Ping to find them somewhere off the main road for some food and drink. The Feds would be trying to work out their travel speeds and routes anyway, so the more they mucked about, the greater chance they wouldn’t be looking when they slipped through the net.
They ended up a small town called Gravesend. Ping bored them for the next ten minutes detailing Gravesend’s illustrious history as a farming community, and in later years bio-enhancement facilities for increased cultivation yields, not to mention the ever exciting industry of exporting clean water from the Gwydir River. Neither Jack nor Blake got the bonus points for spelling the river correctly.
They arrived in town, if it could be called that, to stares of disbelief from the locals. It looked as though the town hadn’t changed in the last hundred years by the look of it, and Jack had thoughts of an old hillbilly movie his grandfather made him watch. It was called ‘Delivery’ or something or other.
“Hey Blake, you ever watch old fashioned movies when you were a kid?”
“Nope, my parents didn’t believe in any of that rubbish. I was out being a boy solider, learning how to kill stuff.”
“Dear God, whoever gave you a badge needs their damned head read!” The two of them laughed, it was the first real stress relief either of them had had.
“Hey Jack, this town doesn’t look so bad, what say we just set up shop here. I’m sure there would be a few local girls we could court.”
“Looking at the ugly buggers staring at us from outside that pub, I’d say the offspring won’t hold a lot of hope.”
They pulled up outside the local tavern, which had a tired looking holo advising happy hour now coincided with opening hours. Bonus, thought Jack, cheap beer and lovely locals. Blake got out of the Coffin and closed up, activating the security. Blake just dumped his helmet on Betty, where the hell was someone going to go if they stole it? They were a hundred k’s from anywhere right now.
They walked into the smoke filled room, old furniture scattered the floor, obviously contra-band was optional here. The two of them walked over old carpet, past older furniture. They had been in there ten seconds and Blake was already feeling sorry for himself. There were a dozen locals sitting around a large table who all looked over at the same time, their eyes focussed on Blake and Jack as they walked to the bar.
Blake turned to them. “It’s OK, we’re human.” He beamed a smile and put his arms out, realising they both still had their nano-suits on. The men at the table shook their heads and turned to the table again. Blake looked at the bar, he tried not to look too hard, and lifted his hand when it nearly stuck to the surface. There was a rack along the back wall with more whiskeys than he had seen in a long time, most of them moonshine by the look of it. But in the middle, there it was, a bottle of twenty-year Glenfiddich.
He looked for a barman and saw a curvy body at the other end of the bar. She was facing away and had the most amazing arse wrapped in tight pants. He tapped the bar, and she turned. Blake had to stare for a second, she had long blonde hair, bright blue sparkling eyes and a stunning smile. He started to smile back, and he heard a grunt from his left.
“What do you want spaceman?” Blake’s stare was interrupted by a clothed gorilla stepping into his vision.
“Uh, yeah. A single malt there for me and my friend.”
“Sure thing captain. Eighty credits.”
“What the hell? I wanted two glasses, not a case.”
“Yeah, out of towner charge. You drive a flash car, you pay eighty.”
Blake dropped a hundred on the counter. “Keep the other twenty for a shaver to sort that back of yours.” The barman grinned showing both of his front teeth and not a lot else. As he turned back with the bottle, he saw Jack chatting to the bar girl.
“Hey, arse-wipe, leave my girl alone or you’ll end up with a face like mine.”
Jack looked over. The barman had lost almost all of his teeth, a dozen scars and what looked like a glass eye. “Hell buddy, you get run over by a freight truck?” Jack gave a smile and walked over. “Name’s Jack.” He reached his hand out. The barman just grunted and shoved a glass across the table.
“Chatty bunch here, huh?” Jack replied to Blake.
“Settle down sunshine, we’re just here for a drink and to kill a bit of time, no need to start drama.”
“Well we screwed that one up.” He nodded across the room. Blake turned to see four men entering the bar and walking straight towards them. They were all around six foot tall and fairly well built, not body-builders, but definitely in shape.
“For Christ’s sake, what is this, the Wild West?” muttered Jack.
“Dunno about geography, but you got the wild bit right.” They both knocked back their whiskey and turned around to face the men, still sitting on their seats.
The four men walked straight to the bar, two each side of Jack and Blake. Jack saw most of the other patrons, including the sweet bar girl, all looking at them now. Something was definitely going to kick off soon, he could feel his heart rate starting to rise.
The man next to Blake ordered drinks, for the four of them, whatever the house ale was all round, then looked to Blake. “What can we get you mate?”
“Oh, I’m all right for now. Thanks.” He glanced between the two men beside him, the guy on the far side was smiling like he had just won a game show jackpot.
“Well, that’s not so polite. Usually when someone offers you a drink, you’d be insulting them not to accept.” They stared at each other until one of the men from the other side broke the silence.
“Say, buddy,” he tapped Jack on the shoulder. Jack’s heart rate jumped and the nudge of adrenaline started changing him, the man’s hand appearing slightly red as he withdrew it. “What’s in the bag?”
Jack forgot he even had it on him. “Oh, nothing much, brought a picnic lunch. Y‘know, apples and stuff.” He tried to appear casual, but was tensing up for the impending fight. He didn’t want to react too fast in case there was one last chance they could get out without causing a ruckus.
Jack looked at the bar girl. “Hey love, could you pass the pitcher of water, I’ve got a bit of a dry throat.” She brought it over and put it in front of him.
“Mind if I take a look inside?” The stranger pressed on.
“Actually, I do, there’s not really enough to share with everyone.”
The stranger slowly rose from his chair, Jack and Blake followed suit, followed by the remaining three at the bar. The bar girl backed away, the barman ushering her out back. “Now listen here you lot.” The barman sounded jittery all of a sudden. “I don’t want no fight in my bar. Just go outside and sort your business there.”
Jack looked over at him and grinned.
The next few seconds played out in slow motion for Blake. He grabbed the pitcher with his right hand and swung it around into the head of the man next to him. At the same time he grabbed the back of his hair and drove the remainder of the jug and the attacker’s head into the bar, then pushed him straight back into the middle of the floor. The man on the far side of him started to reach into his coat as he registered what was going on.
Jack had kicked the chair of his neighbour hard into his thigh, causing him to lose balance forward, and in doing so hit his forehead on the bar. Jack used the momentum of his kick to push him into the man on his far side. He then jumped forward, raising his knee into the chest, but stumbled and tripped over the falling body onto the other stranger. The three of them were now in a heap on the floor.
Blake got to his second attacker a split-second too late, a knife came out and at his torso. It ricocheted off his suit, and the following stab stopped dead on his heart, but didn’t penetrate. The sudden stop caused the attacker’s hand to sl
ide forward, cutting his fingers deep. Blake drove his elbow in an uppercut, spun around the attacker and hit him again in the back of the head with the same elbow, and then swept him by the legs flat on his face.
Blake looked up to see the barman with a sawn-off shotgun taking aim. He drew his gun twice as fast and shot at the barman. Blake swung to the side as he shot, not sure how, but looking down saw a shotgun ball fall to the ground from his flank. As he spun he saw the ricocheting shotgun pellets hit one of the men sitting at the table in the face. The impact was soft due to the brunt of the force taken by his suit, but was enough to look bad, all of the men at the table dived for the floor.
Jack heard the gunshot and looked around. As he looked back, he got a knee in the side of the head, then a punch from the other side. He was thrown over the attacker’s body and rolled out of it, jumping to his feet. As he turned he saw a blue flash from his right, and ducked; he instinctively spun his right arm across in front of him and his forearm connected with the anticipated hook. Jack’s momentum was barely slowed as the suit took the impact. He continued turning and wrapped his arm behind and around the attacker’s neck, at the same time falling backwards, taking them both down. He heard a crack as he hit the ground and rolled off to see a blank stare beside him.
Blake rushed over and grabbed the last conscious man out of them, ripped up his sleeve and saw his Autohacker bio-pager. “Bloody Runners, Jack!”
“Yeah, figured that. How the hell did they know we were here?”
“I dunno, but we’re gonna find out.” Blake started dragging the groggy would-be thief out of the building.
Jack heard a noise from behind and turned with his gun trained on the barman. “You were missed once today arsehole, but that won’t happen again.” Jack had a cold stare that the barman took as legitimate. He slowly placed the gun on the bar. Jack walked over, not taking his eyes off him.
“Now.” He was almost shouting. “Has anyone here seen any of these four arseholes before?” He looked around the room, and people were looking at the floor, not making eye contact, a sure sign something was going down. He walked over to the bar girl and turned to get a good angle on the room.
His voice was tense and he could barely hold back from shouting. “I’ll ask one more time. I’ve had a crap day, so don’t test me. Has anyone seen these guys before?” He looked to the ground, then raised the pistol and shotgun together.
One of the men from the table stood with his hands up. “Uh, yeah.” He cleared his throat. “That one you draggin’ out came in a few minutes before you. Told us all to shut up while his friends arrived, and we’d all get two grand each.”
“Did he say why?”
“No, just said you were fugitives, and they was agents.”
“He was half right. We are fugitives, but they aren’t agents. They’re runners come bounty hunters, and you don’t want to meet their boss. I’d suggest you all go home, and pretend you weren’t here.” He turned to the barman and girl. “I’d suggest for your own safety you say we came in with helmets, attacked these men and left without you seeing us. Understand?” They both nodded.
Jack walked outside and saw Blake tying the man to a post, sitting with his legs out front. He got up and turned to wink at Jack. “Get what you want?”
“Almost, except this buggers’ boss.” He kicked the man in his calf, causing him to wince at the pain.
Blake walked up to him and pulled out a short curved blade. “Right arsehole, you have one chance to tell me who your boss is, or you’ll need an eye transplant in the morning.” He raised the blade to show him he meant business, then whispered in his ear, “Just a name.”
The now lucid man looked at the knife and mumbled, “I don’t have a name.”
Blake turned the knife and slowly touched it to his face, dragging it to his ear, leaving a faint cut that was more to intimidate than hurt. “What do you have?”
“He’s an Alpha. Runs Autohacking. It’s where he found us. Said twenty grand each to bring the bag in.”
“What does he look like?”
“Don’t know, didn’t see him.” Blake moved the blade right in front of his eye, the man started shaking. “Accent, he had a dickey accent. And he was from the Twin Cities.”
“There, that wasn’t so hard, was it?” Blake stepped back, and Jack came from the side, launching his boot into the man's temple, knocking him into an unconscious lump. They both turned to each other.
“Tyrol?”
“Has to be.”
“How the hell did he know we were here?”
“He was either tipped or we’re tracked. Either way Cindy or Ping were involved.”
Blake looked concerned. “If it was Sin, she’s been duping the both of us for a very long time.”
“And if it was Ping, he saved my arse only to try and get it shot off again.”
They decided to play it out, as there was stuff all they could do until they confronted them. Besides, if someone hadn’t already called the cops, they soon would. They decided to split up to get back, it would be less attention, although their vehicles were hardly discrete.