CHAPTER TWELVE
Joey and Lezura were both left in the interrogation room while the officers went to discuss the matter with their superiors. They had been given small bowls of porridge to eat, and the empty bowls lay on the table before them.
Lezura could sense that at least two guards were stationed outside the room, and she didn’t have to speculate if they were armed.
“Do you think they’re goanna let us go with them?” Joey said, repeatedly lifting his hand and pretending he was shooting a Bluebolt.
“They do not have a choice,” said Lezura with her arms folded across the table. “We are the only two who know the location of their gang and the layout of the building to some extent. Joey, how many men does Yeltsa have under her control?”
Joey dropped his hand and said, “I saw seventeen inside the building while I was there. And I think about five or six of them died today. But if she really is the crime lord for the neighborhood, then the people living around the place might be on her side too.”
Lezura arched her back in shock. “Are you certain of this?” she said.
Joey raised his eyebrow in surprise. “Not all of them,” he said, “but of course some of em gotta be armed. You said that she controlled the neighborhood, right? She can’t do that with just that number of guys she had around her. I’m guessing those must be the close bodyguards or something. I thought you would’ve known all of this since you knew the place, Lezura.”
Lezura only visited Suride Town two times, but never had she gotten so deep into it. The fact was that until the Prestige System, Lezura lived a grandiose life far away from crime and violence. But then again, there was her mother.
The thought made Lezura shift uncomfortably in her seat, and her back started to hurt.
“You okay, Lezura?” Joey said.
Lezura forced a smile. “Yes…yes I am fine, Joey,” she said.
Joey held her gaze for a moment, contemplating asking her again. But he decided to drop it.
The door to the interrogation room opened, and the lazhinian woman entered. “Okay,” she said, “let’s get going.”
Joey slammed his hands on the table. “Alright!” he said.
“Wait, before we do,” said Lezura as she got up, “we need to make a stop at the inn so we can get some equipment.”
Yeltsa and her surviving attack force were back at their hideout. All were gathered in a storage room, stacked with similar crates to the ones they got off the train and other boxes. Bright florescent bulbs illuminated the room, showing tattered walls, large iron shelves that supported some of the equipment, and some tables where the items were taken out and examined.
Yeltsa had only manage to get eleven crates; four out of which were dummy crates, as she had expected, revealed by Node’s x-ray scan. Two of them had nothing but black gravel, one had in some toys and another had in a dead, rotting tapike with a note that read “We can get down and dirty too!”, written and signed by the captain that had been killed on the train.
As it turned out the tapike’s flesh was also injected with some nasty bacteria. Bonner was the one who had handled the open crate to get rid of it in the furnace, and luckily was the only one to get infected.
It was a gruesome sight—well, not for Yeltsa. Bonner got welts and sores all over his body, he convulsed on the ground with foam frothing from his mouth and his eyes reddening. His breath came in ragged, raspy gasps, and finally he stopped moving. During all of this, Yeltsa was silently applauding the soldiers for such a neat trick.
Getting killed from a virus hidden among medicine—what irony! These guys are getting better by the minute!
Three other guys put on protective gear over their hands and faces and threw Bonner’s huge frame into the furnace before which he had died.
Yeltsa sat on a table in the corner, observing her men as they examined the real goods they had stolen. Then out of the corner of her eye she saw Tomz, the lazhinian who was in the Roller with Joey, named Sokika, and Worm.
“You know we’re in trouble, right?” said Tomz.
Yeltsa didn’t seem surprised; she knew what he was talking about. Their little alien recruit got captured by the police, and with enough interrogation, threats and deal making, he would eventually spill the fruit punch.
“Don’t worry,” she said calmly, “I’ve already put a few guys on look out at the end of the avenue. They’ll let me know when the police are coming.”
“That still won’t be enough,” said Tomz. “We only have thirty or so guys left; the police have over a hundred people in their force. If those guys decide to come down here now with guns-a-blazing we can’t do shit against them!”
Yeltsa’s cool composure was warming up with annoyance. “I said I got it under control, Tomz. Don’t you think I already thought about what would happen if I let that little punk in on what we were doing?”
“Then why did you?” said Sokika. “Why’d you let that kid come with us in the first place?”
Worms saw the glowering look on his boss’ face. He turned to Sokika and said, “Hey, you need to take it easy—”
“I think you’ve gotten soft, Yeltsa!” said Sokika.
Tomz and Worms froze, so did the others in the room. Basically they had just heard the equivalent of someone telling a nycarman they’re deaf.No one insulted the boss like that, and on top of it to get familiar with her by calling her by her real name?
Knowing what was coming next Worm and Tomz ran out of the way, just as Yeltsa flew off the table and grabbed Sokika by the throat. She hoisted off his feet and slammed him into the wall. She put her face up to his and said through her menacing teeth, “You don’t know shit!”
Yeltsa hooked two fingers in Sokika’s jaw and yanked it off. She dropped Sokika and let him search madly for his jaw, making horrid gasping and gargling sounds as his tongue flapped out of his mouth. She turned to the rest of the timid men in the room. “None of you idiots know anything!”
Her voice had the quality of an explosion and made everyone flinch.
Sokika found his jaw and reattached it back to his head. He flexed it with a painful grimace. “Ouch…” he said.
Yeltsa took the compass from around her neck and held it up for them to see. “I bet none of you idiots even know what this is, do you?”
Fear crippled the voice of a few men, but some whispered to themselves with uncertainty.
Yeltsa slowly shook her head. “If you geniuses would read a book once in a while, you would all know that this thing is the damn key to the God Titan!”
The shock of it silenced even the thinking of the men in the room. Then after the force subsided they began to babble about the key.
“Boss,” said a largaph, “no disrespect, but are you sure that’s the damn key?”
Yeltsa lowered and hand and looked at the man like an idiot just tried to say something smart, making him look like twice the idiot. “Genius,” she said with a sarcastic smile. “Think about it; some strange nycarman woman and an alien just happen to waltz in the city from nowhere who can use honoi. The alien kid told me that he needed this thing, or else people would die. He came with us all the way on a dangerous mission just to get this thing back. And I can bet right now he’s on his way with the police.
“And you idiots would have known it was the key had you read the reports from two hundred years back about the woman who used it. She was an arrogant tramp that loved to show it off to everyone!”
The men around her resonated with excitement. One said, “Boss, we could sell that thing and live like kings; each and everyone one of us!”
He was backed up by an uproar of approving cheers.
Yeltsa tuned out the noise and looked at the key. Glancing at it showed her two possibilities. She could keep it to herself, sell it to the leaders of the Prestige Kingdom and buy her way into it, achieving fame and glory for the rest of her life.
Or she could give it back to the Rakai, and allow him to do whatever he was do to do with it. Since he was a non-nycarman, it could be possible he was fighting against the Prestige System. If so, he could probably free the other species from the System, making not only her, but others have opportunities for a better life.
She couldn’t make the decision yet. Not with this just popping up in her face like this.
And that was when her radio sounded.
“Boss? Boss, come in!” said a man’s voice.
Yeltsa said to the others, “Hey! All of you shut up!”
Silence quickly followed. Yeltsa took the radio off her waist and answered it. She had taken the radios back from the Rollers and given one to Tomz and another to her man in the community. “What is it?” she said as the others around her strained to hear.
“The police are on their way!” said the man. “They’re coming down the street right towards us!”
Yeltsa said, “Quick, go tell the kids around the front I’m keeping a Candy Treat! Tell them to hurry and get in here or else I’ll eat it all! And tell the other lazy-assess to get up here!”
“Got it, boss!” and the channel cut off.
Yeltsa said to the others, “Get ready.”
S’us was travelling through the city on a greshku. It was not quite out of place, as there were other people travelling on animals as well. This was normal and accepted, provided that you cleaned up after your animal if they messed up the place. So people, as S’us had done not too long ago, would give their animals some bitter-bush, a plant that worked like a laxative in flushing out the bowels.
S’us was dressed in her best tight, dark blue blouse with bright green spots on in the arms and shiny leather paddings around the collar, along with her thick grey tights and her sandals she had washed clean this morning. She had her head wrapped in red and white bandanna, and her knife sheathed all under her thin cloak.
With permission of her group’s leaders, S’us was permitted to visit the Rakai. Today was supposed to be his last day here, and she wanted to bid him farewell herself. She was hoping that it would have been possible to stay with him and learn more about him, but her duty to her clan came first.
Still, it was nice to have gotten to know the Rakai.
Seated on the beast’s back, S’us had various small scrolls in her lap. In her hands she wrote down a special rune in the scroll using ink from a canister she had strapped across her upper arm.
Basically, how the rune system worked was by opening a portal to another space using special seals activated by honoi and storing various kinds of matter there. To retrieve what was stored there, the user of the runes had to open it using a seal-release rune. But it was not specific, meaning if you wanted a stick, other things would come pouring out as well.
So special rune symbols are developed which meant a specific thing.
If one wanted to store and retrieve fire, then a fire rune would need to be written onto the surface from which it was being called from. This surface also had to be very durable so the rune didn’t easily get erased, so ink and paper were usually effective. Runes could also be carved into surfaces like stone and metal, and a very few people even managed to effectively tattoo and use these runes on their own bodies.
But S’us wasn’t educated in how to make runes on the body work, so she settled for creating her runes on scrolls. She wasn’t even well versed in the origins of the rune system either. What she did know, was that the practice of using runes had been around on her homeworld several centuries now.
But during the space travels her people made, and interaction with other species outside the solar system, news had been brought back that the rune system was being used elsewhere.
She didn’t even bother to think that, if these things were being stored in other dimensions, why didn’t the reapers find this trespass interfering with their laws.
“Probably it’s because people aren’t the ones really going inside that dimension to anywhere else,” her sister I’us had once said.
Once again, S’us didn’t bother to find out. Not that she was lazy to do so or didn’t want to, but because her most determined desire was to find her sister’s body.
“So why’re you going to visit this Rakai guy?” said I'us in her head.
“There’s no special reason,” said S’us, finishing the atmospheric rune and putting it in a holster on her belt. She took up another scroll. “I just want to see him off, that’s all. I do consider him a friend.”
S’us pictured I’us grinning, a face very much like hers. “You know that Joey likes you, right?” she said.
The thought made S’us miss a stroke in the fire rune symbol and ruing it. She put it down and took up a fresh scroll. “Nonsense,” said S’us defensively. “I know the kind of like you’re thinking about, sister, but that’s not it. I like him too, but not that way.”
“Stop pretending!” said I’us. “I’m your sister. I’m in your head. I know how you feel about him.”
S’us sighed, and said, “No, I’us. You want it to seem that way, so you can see the reaction on Lezura’s face.”
I’us gritted her teeth. “That stuck up, long-eared tramp!” she said.
“Lezura isn’t stuck-up,” said S’us. “She’s just confident in herself.”
“Same as being stuck-up,” said I’us.
S’us said sternly, putting down her equipment, “Look, I’us, I really need to concentrate right now. So could you please save this conversation for later?”
I’us scoffed. She folded her arms and said, “Fine!”
And all the while S’us was having the conversation with her sister a few people were staring at the woman; who was talking to herself like she lost her precious marbles. But not once did S’us give them her attention as they pass their remarks. She didn’t have time to waste with those who didn’t believe thata part of her sister’s soul was still with her.
When she arrived at the inn, she found five police vehicles stationed outside and a few worried and curious onlookers glancing at them.
“What’s going…?” she whispered.
She got off her beast and pulled it behind her as she approached one of the onlookers, a yautgan man.
“Excuse me, sir,” she said, the man turned, then looked down at her, “do you know what is happening here?”
The man shrugged. “I couldn’t tell you if I tried, little lady,” he said. “I just heard that the police went inside with two people. For what, I can’t tell.”
S’us nodded at him and moved on. Her greshku was too big to move through the crowd, so she found one of the street lights and tied it to it. She picked her way through the crowd, only to be stopped by a police officer.
“You cannot come beyond this point,” the geckoid man said.
“What is happening inside?” S’us said, a bit demandingly.
The officer wouldn’t have normally answered a civilian, but seeing this nice young woman of his own species, he said, “The police are in a joint operation with some supposed fugitives. They can use honoi really well, so we’re taking precautions.”
“May I ask who the culprits are?” said S’us.
“Some nycarman woman and a short alien with brown hair, peachy skin and a big head,” said the officer.
“That’s Joey!” I’us screamed in her head. S’us didn’t dare speak that she knew the aliens in fear of being taking in for questioning. S’us said, “Another alien species, wow!”
“You said, it,” the officer said, “This galaxy really is full of life.”
It was just seconds after the officer’s words that S’us saw Lezura and Joey leaving the building. Joey was wearing the orderran helmet he had stolen, and Lezura was urging him to stopping jumping up and down. They entered the back of one of the police cars and the rest of the police officers loaded into the others.
The crowd made way for the police cars to reverse and drive away in a steady line.
S’us quickly went to her beast and untied it. She knew that whatever was happening with Joey and Lezura, if they were being blamed by the police for criminal activities she had to find out what it was. She nudged her beast for it to go, and followed the police vehicles.
Lezura went back for the rest of items for her utility belt, her spear and her data-scroll. Joey went back for his sword and his helmet. Escorted by the police, they entered and left the building with eyes glued on them.
“You better not be leading us into a trap,” said the largaph who’d spoken to Joey earlier, now revealed to be Captain Nesten.
“We will not,” said Lezura as she followed them back to the police car. “We have a good reason to stop that woman too.”
“All for a silly compass?” said Lieutenant Coenter, the lazhinian woman, as she entered the back of the vehicle.
“It’s not some silly compass,” said Joey, pointing the bat at the woman.
Coenter slapped the bat out of her face with her rifle. “Don’t make me have to shoot you in public!”
“You—”
Lezura slapped Joey in the back of his neck and shoved him over and into the vehicle. “Shut up now, man!”
Lezura entered and sat on beside Joey. Both were sandwiched by officers. Coenter sat across from them while Nesten sat in the front beside Corporal Dinon, the dracoid in the interrogation room with Coenter.
In addition to Joey and Lezura, they police jeep held seven people, as did the others, numbering in total to thirty five in the group. All except Joey and Lezura were armed with lanceguns, lance-pistols and Malcers.
“Move out!” said Nesten.
Their vehicle was the first to go, with the others towing behind. Lezura led them to the location using her map and the signal being sent out by the key within little over twenty minutes. The sirens were set on max; a kind of whooping sound that reminded Joey of a monkey.
When they reached the mouth of the avenue they noticed some sudden movement. It wasn’t unusual for people in the ghetto to run when they saw the cops coming, but they had to take this scenario as the enemy anticipating their arrival.
Nesten had a standard radio communicator tied to his wrist. It looked like a thick silver bracelet with an egg-shaped pendant containing a speaker and a built in mic. There was a large dial that changed the channel and a small screen to show it—hence its name a wristphone.
Nesten held to his to side of his mouth and said, “Squad Five, I want to you to stay back and provide security for an exit.”
“Understood,” said the other side.
The rare police car stopped meters into the community along the side walk, and the occupants quickly exited the vehicle. They saw a woman approaching on a greshku and stopped her, telling her that the community was now under siege.
People scrammed into their houses, knowing bullets were going to fly from all angles. As they neared the gates of the building, however, they noticed that there was steady activity inside. Lezura looked up with her goggles; she zoomed in, and saw a woman standing at the side of the rocky cliff on the tenth floor. It was silhouetted against the light of the sun, but Lezura could not mistake that it was Yeltsa.
She turned and walked out of sight.
Approaching the rusty, huge old gates to the yard, they all saw women and children having a small party. Sweet treats were being handed out to the mothers who then passed it on to their children.
“What the hell is this?” said Dinon
“She must have known we were coming,” said Nesten with a scowl pasted on his face. “She ordered the women and children in there so they could get in our way.”
“She really is awful…” Lezura said glumly.
“That’s not goanna stop us,” Nesten said, then he said in the wristphone, “Squad Four, stay out here and provide security. Make sure no one enters the premises.”
“Understood, Captain…” came the reply.
The police vehicles stopped and they all exited.
“Showtime!” Joey said as he leaped out with his sword drawn.
“Just keep in mind that we are to just retrieve the key and leave,” said Lezura as she climbed out.
Coenter leaped out and said, “I thought you said it was a compass…”?
“Forget that lieutenant and focus on the job!” said Nesten. He kicked in the gates to the old yard. Most of it was covered with dirt with tufts of blue grass. Nesten pointed his lancegun in the air and fired two rounds. “Everyone leave the premises now! This is a police raid! Get out now! Now!”
Some mothers dragged their children while others lifted them up like bags under their arms and over their shoulders and ran off. But some were heading inside in the building as well as out the gate.
“Dammit, idiots!” Dinon said, fighting the waves of people running into him as he made his way with the others to the doorsteps.
“Stay sharp, people!” Nesten said, lifting his rifle to his eye, crouching and creeping towards the door.
Lezura dragged Joey with her back to the rear of the party. Though they wore Teflon, they didn’t have any guns to counter attack.
“This is so cool!” said Joey. “It’s like that TV show Cops!”
“Lezura snarled. “Would you keep quiet?”
Nesten took position at the left side while Dinon was on the right. His scaly hands Dinon possessed a gun looking like a pale purple cucumber with the front half large and narrowing to a wide black barrel. The clip was inserted just before the trigger guard, and the top was equipped with shock absorbers in the form of squishy orange rings that reduced the recoil of the shotgun. It was popularly known as a Sputty, holding ten rounds in the clip.
“Where’s their boss, nycarman?” Nesten said loudly, so she could hear over the noise inside.
“She is on the ninth floor!” Lezura said.
Joey tightened his grip on his sword.
Nesten nodded to Dinon, who nodded back. Both of them popped inside with guns trailed down the wide corridor.
The people screamed and hit the floor, exposing a man who didn’t seem too afraid. As Nesten was about to fire the lazhinian lifted up a small geckoid child in his hands and fired over his shoulder.
The shot hit the wall near Nesten’s head. Unfazed, he carefully took his aim just pass the crying geckoid boy’s ear, and fired.
The bullet hit the man right between the eyes and he fell.
“Go!” Nesten said, taking point. “Squad Three search the rooms!”
The officers in the rear broke up and went into rooms and small corridors. There was enough lighting for them to see their way. Nesten shouted for the people to grab their kids and get out. As they did they glimpsed some armed men going up the staircase from a corridor leading outside.
And officers behind Nesten fired a booming shot from his Malcer that made Lezura’s ear’s flick with pain. She dropped on her earmuffs instantly. The bullet hit the metal railing with a flicker of sparks, and the men kept on going.
As Dinon neared the staircase gunfire rained down on him and forced him back.
He winced. “Crap!” he said.
Nesten saw blood on Dinon’s shoulder, but he was moving without hindrance, and Nesten didn’t bother to ask.
Dinon aimed with his Sputty up the railing that ascended to the second floor, he waited on the men, slowly going up the stairs, and as one man looked over with his rifle Dinon fired. Most of the pebbles bounced off the railing in sparks, but enough pebbles hit the lazhinian to make him holler and reel back.
Dinon led the way up. They could still hear the screams and of children and figured that the gang boss had even manage to get them where she was.
On the second floor there was a corridor branching off to the rest of the floor on the left and a small portion on the right.
“Go straight down and take a left to the stairs!” Lezura shouted over the heads of the others.
Dinon took the lead with his Sputty, perfect for these fine spaces. His eyes followed the pink droplets of blood to the right corridor, and as his eyes darted there the lazhinian popped out with guns blazing.
Dinon dropped to the floor, the shots hit a largaph corporal behind him and sent him crumpling to the floor in a mess if blue blood. Dinon fired the Sputty twice, the shots ripped open the Lazhinian’s chest, and the second blast blew a hole in it, slamming him into the wall. Not even a lazhinian could recover from suck trauma.
Squad One hurried into the corridor with Joey and Lezura while Squad Two advanced.
Suddenly children came running out. The officer at the front hesitated, and it was long enough for the small geckoid mixed in with the kids to open fire with his lance-pistol, shooting down him and another officer.
The one behind the two fallen officers fired twice from her Malcer, knocking the geckoid back across the floor. The others hurried to secure the wailing children and ushered them behind them and down the stairs.
As Lieutenant Coenter hurried to the mouth of the left corridor, Worm opened fire at her from two lance-pistols. The shots hit home in Coenter’s chest. She gasped and dropped to the ground. But wasn’t dead. She lifted her rifle and fired wildly at the Worm. To her disbelief the geckoid was quick enough to slip into the room next to him.
Another officer came to her side and opened fire just as a yautgan was stepping out to shoot. It took nearly ten rounds from his lancegun to fully drop the man.
“Everyone go, now!” Coenter said.
From around the corner Nesten ordered everyone to move. It was a quick motion as they and the other members of Squad Two walked pass Coenter and the officer providing cover fire. Without a moment’s hesitation to the mission they made up to the third floor.
It was a different layout with the corridor snaking around, but Lezura guided them through the place.
Surprisingly they weren’t met with any resistance, but they did see some civilians. A yautgan woman and her young child in her hands ran out of a room and into them. Dinon quickly shot a hand up to her mouth and muffled her scream. She shoved her back into the room and ordered her to close the door. They heard some gunfire from below where Coenter was, but kept on going.
They made it to the fourth floor were they saw three men hurrying around a corner. Dinon took point with Nesten and a lazhinian officer, both carrying lanceguns, peeping from behind. Joey stuck his head out from the group to get a look at the action. Half of him was upset because he wasn’t getting a piece of the action, the other was luckily because he wasn’t getting shot at.
But this isn’t being a hero, he thought.
As Dinon turned into the next corridor he caught movement from the corner of his eye in a room. He spun to the open door, where in the room lit by sunlight through the window were two largaphs. Upon seeing Dinon they tensed. Node was in the room, and subsequently went through the window while the other prepared to shoot.
Both fired simultaneously, two Malcer rounds him Dinon, twisting his body and throwing off his shot. The blast tore apart the hardwood of the door in a jagged whole.
The largaph went to follow up on his success with another shot when a little figure like a kid came in his way. Instinctively he hesitated, then his criminal nature got the better of him and he pulled back on the—
Joey fired a whopping Blueburst that knocked the man back against the window frame like a car crashing into a wall. He fell on his knees. His eyes rolled into his head. His shirt ripped and his chest ghastly bruised. The gun fell from his grip and he fell on his face.
“Joey, stay back!” Lezura said.
“Screw this!” Joey said, unsheathing his sword and running down the corridor. “Where’s that bitch with my compass?”
Joey drew her knife and ran after his disappearing from around the corner.
“Can you stand?” Nesten asked Dinon as the others moved up, slumped against the wall with huge pools of blood soaked in his coat.
“Just go get the damn woman already!” Dinon said with blazed eyes. He lurched forward and spat up blood on the floor.
Nesten reluctantly left Dinon and followed the others.
Joey ran into a largaph girl, spotting the large lollipop in her hand he snatched it from her. “Gimme this you little brat! Bwaa-ha-ha-haaa!”
The girl cried as Joey hauled her off her feet into the nearest room and closed the door. Behind Lezura and the rest of the officers followed him as he navigated the corridors. Joey shoved the lollipop towards his mouth, only to realize he had on his helmet.
“Dammit!”
Lezura spotted ahead of Joey two thugs breaking the corner with their rifles. Sensing the officers behind her would fire Lezura fired a low powered Blueburst at Joey’s foot and tripped him on his back. Lezura hit the deck as well. The hailstorm of bullets from the officers dropped the thugs within a second.
They went pass Lezura and Joey and up to the sixth floor. As Joey got to his feet Lezura quickly pulled out her map and checked the location of Yeltsa. She gasped.
“She is heading this way!” Lezura said.
Joey took a quick glance around him as he went after the others.
But something from the ceiling fell on him. When he was knocked flat on his back it was only then he could look up and identify the culprit as Worm. He was covered in different colored blood, but he didn’t seem harmed.
“Yuh na’ni toos