CHAPTER ELEVEN
The next day, Joey did some exercise on the cliff that overlooked some of the city. Dressed in nothing but his underpants he did abdominal crunches with his foot hooked under blocks for support.
When he was finished doing one hundred of them, he got up, expecting to see rippling abs that Lezura, S’us, Tylin, Yeltsa and the inn keeper would be drooling over. Instead his gut only felt tight and looked flat.
“I guess it doesn’t work after one session,” Joey said. I guess that’s why they say you have to practice this stuff.
Next on his agenda were pushups. After fifteen he fell on his face in the dirt. “Damn,” he said, “this stuff is hard man…”
The door to the inside kicked open, slamming into the wall, and out stepped Tomz, wearing his same suit as yesterday.
“Time to go little-man,” he said, smiling.
Joey found the strength to stand up just then. He thought of witty remark to say, but he could only find these words; “I’m short, but I make up for it in other places!”
Tomz grimaced, recoiled and turned a sideways glance at Joey, “Oookaaay…” he said, “Just get some clothes on and let’s get going…” And Tomz went back down stairs.
Joey quickly rinsed off with some water from the pan, dried himself with one of Yeltsa’s tights and put on back his clothes from yesterday. Reaching the stairs he found Tomz waiting for him. The man didn’t carry the big mean rifle, instead he settled for a lance-pistol that he kept his hand on. The weapon was nycarman modeled silver blue with and narrow at the front end and grip.
“Try anything stupid behind my back and I’ll throwback my spikes in your face,” Tomz said.
“Killing you wouldn’t get me anywhere,” said Joey.
Tomz looked Joey up and down. Joey expected a remark, but Tomz turned down the metallic staircase with Joey following.
Tomz led Joey down the building by another staircase. They came to a dimly lit hallway of brown-green walls that was stained in the corners of the ceiling with holes as well. Insects scurried across Joey’s feet as he walked. He idly stepped on some of them with a pleased grin at each crunch.
He saw a bug as big as his head with large mandibles walking by, and reconsidered screwing with it.
Tomz pushed the metal door and a column of light slowly spread over them, increasing as the door got wider. The air didn’t smell as clean as it did in the forest, but it sure was a hundred times better than the musk inside.
Outside in the rocky yard, half of it shadowed by a nearby building, Joey saw Yeltsa waiting on him with twelve other men including those from her main attack force.
Some sat on junk scattered through the yard; old vehicle parts and broken down household appliances like refrigerators.
He saw Yeltsa seated on the top of a car rusted until it was completely orange and brown. She was wearing a thicker leather jacket, with a green under shirt and black jeans. She had sleek black glasses over her eyes, and upon seeing Joey coming she lifted them up and grinned at him with flesh-shearing teeth.
She leaped off the car and landed with surprisingly little sound for her huge frame.
Joey fiddled with the translator in his ear and said to Yeltsa, “You better give me my stuff when we’re through.”
“I don’t double-cross people,” Yeltsa said.
“Sure,” said Joey, “you got this far being an honest hardworking woman, huh?”
“It is hard work,” said Yeltsa. She gestured to one of the men, Kane. “Give him his things.”
Kane handed Joey his bag and his bat. Joey checked his bag to see that everything was there still there. The painting of Blinchi, his acorn, a packet of cocoa and his cage of gassappers, though they were moving weakly from hunger.”
He checked that no damage was done to his bat, and put on his bag and said, “I’m ready…you?”
Yeltsa smiled, she admired his spunk, but she didn’t let outsiders talk to her like that in front of her men. She dropped her knuckles across Joey’s head. He staggered whimpering. He looked up her with a disgusted face.
“Sure thing,” she said smoothly. She turned and snapped her fingers. The men followed her with Joey in the middle. Joey didn’t have to guess that one of the men had a gun pointed in his back in case he tried any heroics. All the men carried firearms. He noticed that aside from the lancegun and the lance-pistol, one of the men, a lazhinian, carried a jet-black rifle. It was shaped like a loaf of bread with segments on the top with iron-sights at the end of it. The stock of the gun was a little tinged with grey, and the barrel was short and thick.
This was a single fire, high-powered rifle known as the Malcer, holding thirty 40.caliber rounds.
Kane and Bonner led the front, with Yeltsa and Tomz behind them. They led them through the junk where Joey picked up a rancid, rotting scent.
Looking around for the source of the ghastly stench, he saw a skeleton lying in a pile of garbage. Small, like a geckoid, with the bones picked clean and only bugs hovering over the remains. Near the corpse he saw the partially eaten body of a huge alien like a yautgan. Joey felt his stomach bubble and crunch. He clamped down on his mouth and swallowed back his vomit.
The corpse was infested with bright blue maggots, and a small carspi-worm fed on the flesh off the feet.
Joey exhaled in relief when he passed the scene. Now he had a new outlook on this woman named Yeltsa. She might be calm and pretty, but she wasn’t someone to cross on any bright and sunny day.
Joey’s thoughts about kicking her ass were kicked back by a fear for her, and he was hoping that Lezura had her plan ready when he got to the place.
They went up the stairs of another old building and across the roof, taking the pipelines across. Joey stepped out of the center of the crowd to the side where he got a glimpse at the front. They reached a massive, dark tunnel in a structure that led into the ground.
Just a few meters in and the place was stark dark. Cold wind howled in the hollow. Bonner and Kane produced a flashlight and lit their way. Joey could see that large stones provided their footing down the steep path. There were neat hollows in the wall that were once the storage for equipment and machinery. Minutes later they fell down a hole three meters down, one by one, not bothering to use the ladder.
“Where the hell are we?” said Joey.
“Old pipeline,” said Node behind him, “dried up a few years back. The old gangs use to use it to go outside the dome.”
They walked pass a sealed-up section of the pipeline and came upon a huge hole that appeared to have been burnt into it. They went down a steep path, finding themselves in a cave of pinkish-brown soil and scattered rocks. Large bat-like bugs flew over their heads soundlessly, and tiny bugs darted in the air across their faces.
Joey saw bioluminescent mushrooms sprouting up about the place like tiny wonderers into the vast cave. Some of them were attacked by long, fat, slime coated black-blue worms, which assimilated their bioluminescent chemicals to the sides of their body and the end of their tails to make a lure for bigger prey.
The worms lit the cave wall and ceiling with green and blue dots of light. But the further they went they saw the mouth of the cave.
Suddenly the men hurried up to where there were large leathery tents above crates of various sizes and three vehicles.
Careful not to break an ankle over the rocky surface, Joey hurried up to see what they were doing. From the crates he saw them taking out some metallic cylinders of explosives; dark green colored with dull circles at the sides and a red cork at the top. They were seven inches long. As the men tied some of the explosives together Joey heard a loud hum that went up and down into a low, steady sound.
He turned to see the vehicles starting up with drivers already behind the wheel. They looked like jeeps, only with thick slates of silver at the front and a three metal arches over the tops. They had six huge wheels incased in dirt, and the sides of the vehicles had visibly thick sheets of metal. They also had green and blue patterns with a splash of the brown.
Yeltsa said, “Kid!”
“What?” Joey said
“You’re riding with me.”
Joey went over to her and the drivers pulled the jeeps out of their tents. Probably I’ll get to squeeze her boobs and say it was an accident, Joey thought, trying to plot some kind of revenge for the numerous poundings the woman gave him.
A man walked up to Joey and pressed a vest against his chest. Joey took it and studied it. It was a sewing of various metal plates connected by stretchy, pink leather so it could fit over various body sizes.
“You guys sure this thing can work against bullets?” Joey said.
“It’s the best we got,” Yeltsa said, hopping into the front of the jeep next Tomz behind the wheel. Joey went to the side and climbed into the back between to arch. The inside had only strips of wood at the sides which acted as the seat. He balanced himself on one of the benches and put on his vest. As he did the lazhinian with the Malcer came into the back along with Worm. They sat on the opposite side, each giving Joey snide looks. Joey showed them his middle finger, saw the confusion on their faces and looked away with a satisfied grin.
“Roller one, ready,” Tomz said.
“Roller two, ready!” said Bonner in the other jeep, with Node at his side and some others in the back.
“Roller three, ready!” said Sperks, with Node beside him and the last men in the back.
“Alright,” said Yeltsa, standing up in her seat and holding onto an arch at the back, “Roll out!”
One by one the jeeps pulled out of the cave speedily and bumpily. Joey nearly fell out of his seat over the side. He gripped one of the arches as the Roller went through a thing forest. Creatures scattered out of the way of the hellish assortments of metal that roared pass. It wasn’t long before they saw in the distance the green-blue mountains miles away that curiously poked the sky. They came on a dirt road riddled with stone and small rocks, but the wheels of the Rollers easily overcame them.
They came to a stop, and the thugs casually got out and looked around. Joey followed them, walking forward across the great stretch of bare land that barely nurtured any plants apart from some shrubs. Yeltsa stopped just a few feet from the railway. Joey observed it; it looked much like any other urban railway back in New York, chipped and rusted by the elements a little though, but it still held its place firmly as nature battered its defenses.
The clouds gracefully drifted beneath the sun and blocked out its lights with silver linings. But the twin moons peaked out through the patches with purple-tinge light on the lands. Beyond the railway Joey could see small trees stretching like a green wall all the way down both sides.
Joey looked down both ends and saw nothing.
“What, we’re just goanna wait here on the train?” he said.
“Yep,” said Yeltsa. She turned to him and smiled before walking away. “Make yourself comfortable.”
Outside the dome, Lezura waited on the arrival of the train on Redbolt’s back. She was a few yards from the northern entrance to the dome, and had gotten outside with the help of her species. Being a nycarman, she argued that she had the right to travel anywhere on her own planet; that was the argument that she had put forward to the security forces.
They really couldn’t argue with that, and had to let her out of the dome on her own free will. It wasn’t a ploy that Lezura particularly enjoyed using, but circumstances demanded that extreme measures be taken to secure Joey and the key.
Not only was he amongst gangsters, but the train had its own armed security. And with Joey not being a nycarman, they wouldn’t hesitate to kill him along with the others. Either way, if Lezura didn’t get Joey, he was going to die today. Not to mention that they key would be lost!
She wore a dark blue tunic with silver flakes on the shoulders and upper arms, and black tights, along with her new black, narrow boots that she bought. She left her data-scroll back in her apartment in case it would get stolen or lost out here, and carried only her combat knife, spear and some of the sleep inducing chemical she powdered into a wrap. Over all of this she wore her leaf-patterned cloak.
Redbolt stood amongst patches of grass and red flowers. The clouds had drifted away with the winds that bobbed the flowers, revealing the sun and its showering light and the twin moons. Though the light was bright, the air still carried the lingering coolness of the early morning. Lezura inhaled the clean, crisp air that revitalized her lungs. She relaxed her muscles and freed her consciousness juts a bit to savor the feeling. She felt the energy of the plants, the tiny animals, and the police officers in their cars way down to her right.
Being a natural faery, Lezura was able to sense the life-energy given off by the living organisms around her. She had the ability to gain some power from it, but at her current stage she could only manage to harness a small amount; say, a teaspoon of it from a pool. Lezura had heard of more experienced faeries who could bend and manipulate nature energy to their will, even manipulating the elements to some degree.
Lezura knew a lot of things, but not how to achieve such great tasks as her predecessors have.
But those thoughts soon hit the back of her mind when Lezura heard the train approaching, the sound of the massive engine unmistakable in her sharp ears. She used this advantage to get a head start before the officers.
I hope you are okay, Joey, she thought.
Lezura dropped her goggles over her eyes. She gave Redbolt a kick, said, “Forward!” and rode off.
The train blazed down the track like a hyper-speed snake, its large, narrow front slicing through the air with sharp precision. It wheels churned over the track in a scream of metal as it went, leaving a trail of black sot from its two chimneys. There was no definite shape to it; some sections were large and more rounded than others, but it had a dark blue-grey color all over except for the silver head and the black of the metal components near the wheels.
Since the Prestige Kingdom and their usual harvest of people, Ugatin had to conserve their fuel for defenses against invasions, and for medical emergency transportation. What fuel they did use on the train was actually coal. As primitive as it may seem, Sangetsu was a planet noted for its massive jungles and forests much like Gammuo. They had more abundant plants than the largaph homeworld of Narz had acrilium mineral. Taking advantage of this, most nycarman nations such as Ugatin used coal as a usual fuel source.
The train bore many scars from the numerous attempts to rob it of its goods, from plasma burns, bullet chips and bomb dents and scorch marks, leading to its nickname Old Chippy.
Yeltsa and her gang waited for Old Chippy to pass near the railway. They had prepared themselves upon hearing the old machine coming down the track. As it blaze passed them Node stuck out an x-ray scanner, sending a wide beam of light that scanned the train from the head down to each segment. What he was looking for were the sections that housed all the important goods. Old Chippy had seventeen segments, but Node found a few that were their mark.
“We got goods in the seventh, twelfth and fifteenth section this time!” he said.
Sperks; who sat beside Node, took up the radio and repeated this information to the other Rollers. After listening to their findings Yeltsa took the radio from Tomz, opened the channel to the other two Rollers at the front and said, “Then what are you all waiting for?”
Within a moment of saying so all the Rollers started up with a lurching motion and chased their long, segmented, metal quarry. Tires churned dust beneath them as the Rollers picked up speed.
Yeltsa looked back at Joey, saw the nervousness on his face, and said, “Don’t get shot now, kiddo!”
Joey frowned and said, “Don’t worry about me, lady. Just make sure you give me back my damn compass!”
Yeltsa smiled and turned around.
Joey and the men in the back stood and held onto the arches for support. No sense you were sitting down like a lazy lump when the shots started ringing. Growing up in the ghetto had thought Joey that.
Surprisingly, as the vehicles closed in Old Chippy like gufders on a greshku, the thing that knotted up Joey’s guts wasn’t the faces of the nycarmans that suddenly appeared in the open hatches from the sixteenth and fourteenth segments. It wasn’t the lanceguns they poked out and aimed at them. It was the fact that he wouldn’t be able to hold up his end of the bargain. Lezura was counting on him to get the key. But in a situation like how would the find the right moment?
Then make it, jackass!
The train security came right from the military of Ugatin. They wore black, square-shaped caps with flaps at the side that covered the ears. Their uniform was grey leather and incorporated black metallic epaulets and dark purple trim. They had goggles, similar to Lezura’s, with green tinted lens and motion sensors that could zoom in or out or change to nigh vision depending on how the eyes moved.
The men had been preparing for a raid on Old Chippy. Even though the raids didn’t occur all the time, they were still conditioned to be on high alert.
The captain among the few dozen officers on the train was at the sixteenth section, his upper body looking out the hatch at the top of the section and his weapon trialed on the Roller at the back. He rolled his eyes clockwise once, and the goggles zoomed in on the vehicle.
He spoke into the microphone, “Section fourteen, fire at will on the enemy vehicle at the front, over!”
“Copy that,” said a young man’s voice in his ears.
A cacophony of bullets riddled the Roller driven by Bonner with flashes of sparks all over. Bonner steered the Roller from near the train with roaring tires. A largaph in the back seat got hit in the shoulder before he could open fire.
“Thorno’s hit,” said Kane emotionlessly.
The other two men in the back opened fire at the soldiers. The shots were inaccurate, but it was enough to push the soldiers away from the hatches.
While Bonner was preoccupied with the front, Yeltsa was busy with the gunfire coming from the captain as his four men from the rear. Joey hit the bottom of the Roller as gunshots zipped over his head.
“Crap!” he said. “Please don’t let me get shot again!”
Worm hit the floor with him.
The lazhinian stood up and took aim at the captain. He took a bullet through his metal armor in his gut, but he just grunted loudly, responding with a squeeze of the trigger. The rifle bucked against his small frame, slapping out rounds and popping large holes in the captain’s chest. The captain flew back, dropping his firearm and slid into the train.
“Shoot them, you damn kid!” Yeltsa said.
Joey simply got up, fired two misshapen Bluebursts at the train and dropped back down. One blast whizzed pass a soldier’s head, startling him enough for him to duck.
The lazhinian fell down in the truck, covered in bullet holes and gasping for breath.
In the center of the caravan Sperks tried to get his Roller close enough to the fifteenth section without getting shot in the process. But his efforts proved futile, as a soldier, cautious of what the Roller was doing, fired from his Malcer repeatedly at the vehicle. The bucking shots thumped up the front of the roller until three rounds popped holes into Sperks’ chest. Sperks jerked with each shot and slumped onto the steering wheel. Node and another dracoid in the back quickly pulled Sperks’ body off the wheel as the Roller steered near the trees.
Node quickly took back control and steadied the Roller, as the men in the back opened fire at the soldiers, then ducked beneath the counter payload of bullets.
Tomz said, “Sperks is”—a bullet pinged on the door next to him, startling him—“Sperks’ dead! Node’s driving and can’t get it open!”
“Worm!” Yeltsa said.
“On it!” said the geckoid.
Yeltsa stood up in her seat, lifted two lance-pistols from inside her coat and turned to the train. “Closer!”
Tomz inched his way to the train. Joey pointed his hand up above the side of the Roller and fired a blast at the train, hitting the air.
Yeltsa fired two rounds that snapped back a soldier from the port. He uttered a quick yelp before he slouched outside his port lifelessly.
Yeltsa took a round to the chest, but it wasn’t deep enough to pierce her skin. She just winced and fired again, sending the nycarmans for cover.
Worm quickly leaped on to the side of the Roller the moment he saw them nycarman’s disappear. He leaped onto the train, splaying his hands and feet as he hugged the surface. With astonishing speed he climbed across to the fifteenth section.
A soldier popped out of his port and saw the geckoid. Both of them shrieked in shock instantly, and as the soldier was about to shoot, gunfire from the Roller in the middle silenced him. Worm moved off, reaching to the section’s door where he put himself on ground level against the edge of the section. Just one step back and he would fall off to a nasty death; crushed right under Old Chippy.
As he took out a small explosive, Node tried to align his Roller with the section while still trying not to get his head shot off.
“There!” said one of the nycarmans who spotted Worm. Suddenly all the gunfire from the soldiers ceased and they disappeared from sight.
Yeltsa dropped back in her seat. Knowing fully well what they were going to do, but she couldn’t turn back now after losing so much men.
“Get a bomb ready, Tomz,” she said as she stared expectantly at the section’s door.
When the gunfire ceased Joey peeped above his cover. Glancing around him he rose up, holding onto an arch.
“What’s going on?” he said to Yeltsa. She didn’t answer, and Joey thought that now that she was focused with the job was the time to strike.
A dracoid from Node’s Roller leaped onto the side of the section just two feet away from the lock in the center.
And the next few seconds just happened in a blur.
Worm put the bomb on the lock and scurried far from it. The blast was loud, small with flaming debris spewing out like a large firecracker. The dracoid hooked a crowbar in the hot hole and dragged the door into the side of the train while he held onto the top of the doorframe.
And there waiting for him where four crouched soldiers, who instantly opened fire at the dracoid. The bullets practically tore him to mush, pushing him off the train. His bloodied body fell and his foot got caught under the train. And like an angry beast enraged by years of torment, Old Chippy sucked him under and chewed him up, spraying him in tiny pieces all over the place. An Oikumi twisted in all direction in contemplating how to gather the soul from all the body parts.
Joey felt a hot, sticky wet thing slap against his cheek. “Holy—”
The moment the dracoid had pulled open the door Yeltsa twisted the cap on the bomb in her hand and stood. She held it for a few seconds until the explosion was close in time to blow her up, and as one of her men fell to be gobbled up by Old Chippy she threw the bomb at the soldiers.
The timing was good; the bomb exploded but not in the train, and the force was strong enough to knock back the soldiers.
“Go! Go! Go!” Yeltsa said.
In a haze of dust the Rollers tried to huddle together. Worm crawled from the top down into the train. Tomz brought the Roller close to the train. Joey held his breath thinking it was about to collide into great big fiery explosion, but it was only close enough so that’s Yeltsa could step closer to the edge, right over Tomz’s head. In one bound the huge woman reached into the train.
The moment reminded Joey of a scene in the movie King Kong, and had him wondering if everyone on this planet were doing stunts for a living.
The last man in the back of Node’s roller entered as well.
Inside were the green crates of a light metallic material, labeled as medical equipment and stacked on top of each other. Yeltsa knew the soldiers weren’t so stupid to put everything in one place, and probably had certain things mixed up with the medical equipment.
One of the soldiers weakly pointed his rifle at her from on his back. Yeltsa rushed over and stepped in his skull, caving it in. “Take crates at random!” she said.
A soldier was already on his feet, Yeltsa moved towards him with her pistol raised. Virtually pissed beyond belief the soldier unsheathed a tempered steel blade from off his chest and twisted out of the path of the bullet. In a downward motion he cut Yeltsa in the soft flesh between her arm and chest, opening it with a gush of reddish-purple blood.
Yeltsa grunted and whirled, grabbed the head of the soldier and used her momentum to slam his face into the wall.
Satisfied with the cracking sound and the two men behind her lifting off crates, she took up the man’s body and held it before her, walking down the aisle as the door slid open and two men appeared and opened fire. Using the body as a shield she charged forward into the men.
Startled by the charging alien they ceased fire to retreat, and that was when Yeltsa dropped the body and took a sideways stance.
She augmented her hand with the Hiradokou, and plowed her misty blue fist into the soldier’s chest with an explosion of blue. Bones splintered into his heart and killed him instantly, the force of the punch sent the soldier flying back into the other one, breaking a rib or seven and knocking them way down the aisle.
Worm threw the crate into Joey, who took it like a punch to the chest and fell back in the Roller. The lazhinian was still recovering on his back, but Joey just shoved the crate onto him and stood up to catch the other one.
Joey set his arms to catch the crate, but something out of the corner of his eye got his attention. He looked ahead of the Rollers and saw something coming towards them fast.
It was a mynamather.
“Lezura!” he said, and the crate knocked him down.
“Go!” Lezura said, kicking Redbolt to go faster like she was switching gears. She could hear police vehicles coming up behind her, and before she knew it they blazed pass her with a cloud of dust swept back at her. Luckily her goggles shielded her eyes from the tiny pebbles that stung her skin.
“Come on…” she said to herself. She had to get Joey from the thugs before the police caught them.
Once the cars, and Lezura, were close enough to incoming train, all of them made a U-turn, now going in the same direction with the other vehicles and slowing down so they could fall in line.
Already she heard the gunfire of three parties that was gaining upon her and Redbolt. With a glance she saw that a police car and a Roller where right on her tail, and that she would end up between them. Behind them she saw Joey struggling with Yeltsa; an alien three times his size.
Lezura gasped. “Bloody Hell!” she said.
“The police are here!” Tomz said into the train.
Worm and a lazhinian froze, then dropped the crates and scurried out.
“Boss the police!” Worm said before scurrying out onto the top and leaping down into the back of the Roller.
Yeltsa turned and ran, with the soldiers coming from the other section with a steady stream of gunfire. Two shots hit Yeltsa in the back, piercing her armor but reduced enough to only lodge in her skin. It was the wound under her arm that was giving her hell.
How ironic that I’m stealing medicine, too, she thought with a grin.
One look outside and she saw the catastrophe. Allied with the soldiers the Suride Town police force was gunning down her gang. The Roller with Bonner and Kane was under heavy fire, and Kane suddenly got a few rounds slapped into his head. Yeltsa bit on her lip, and reached out with her arms to hold onto the top of the door frame and leaped out. She landed perfectly in back of the Roller, the vehicle swerved slightly under her weight.
Worm and the lazhinian were waiting for her. And as Yeltsa’s mind crossed on the small alien, Joey leaped on her back and wrapped his arms around her neck.
“I’ve got you now you bitch!” Joey said, whacking Yeltsa in the head with his bat. “That’s for punching me in the face!”
Yeltsa tripped over the crates and staggered to the edge of the Roller, tilting it onto its side briefly and making Tomz’s eyes widen with fright. Worm dragged up the fallen lazhinian and him to the back and out of the way. Yeltsa flailed with Joey and rocked to the other side, tilting the Roller that way too.
“Cut it out, boss!” Tomz said with a worried face.
“I’m busy here!” was Yeltsa’s curt reply as she reached over and dragged Joey’s hair, ripping out a patch of it by the middle. Joey screamed, slipped his hand down Yeltsa’s blouse and touched her breast.
“What the—”
“Just looking for my compass,” Joey said.
Joey felt his hand brush against it between her breasts. Unfortunately he couldn’t even get his fingers over them; Yeltsa gripped him by his clothes and threw him over. Joey landed into the seat next to Tomz. The largaph’s first instinct was to whip out his pistol a put a round in Joey’s skull, but he pushed it back in order to drive.
“Joey!” said a voice.
Joey looked forward to see the Roller reaching up to Lezura as she ran outside the police car and the Roller shooting at each other. She came beside the Roller, reached out her hand and said, “Come on!”
“The key—”
“Leave