Planet Eaters (Galaxy Mavericks Book 8) Page 11

  A flatscreen television was playing a romantic comedy movie.

  With a voice command, Mary muted the television.

  Miller took off his fedora.

  “Please forgive me for intruding, especially after Christmas. I'm sure talking to GALPOL is the last thing you want to do right now.”

  Mary folded her arms.

  “I was a social worker for fifteen years. You don't have to dance around me.”

  He sat down.

  “Gotta tell you, that's a relief,” he said.

  “What’s going on?” Mary asked. “Why are you here?”

  “I’m looking for your daughter, Miss Williams.”

  “Why don’t you just call her?”

  “That’s the problem. She hasn’t returned my calls.”

  “Glad I’m not the only one,” Mary said. “Is that a GALPOL thing?”

  “I can assure you that it’s not,” Miller said. “If my mother was still alive, I’d call her every day.”

  “I know she’s not dead because I just spoke to her, so is she in some kind of trouble?”

  “Ah, when did you speak to her?” Miller asked.

  “Earlier today.”

  “Did she say where she was? Where she was going?”

  “I asked you if she was in trouble.”

  “I don’t know,” Miller said. “I don’t know if she is, Miss Williams.”

  “Then what do you want?”

  “There was a murder,” Miller said. “And we found a murder weapon.”

  “Okay,” Mary said, nodding.

  Miller pursed his lips. She wasn’t following him.

  “We found your daughter’s fingerprints on the murder weapon, Miss Williams.”

  Mary laughed.

  “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  “But here’s the thing,” Miller said. “I’m not so sure that she did it. There are some other things that don’t add up. I would be lying to you if I told you she wasn’t a suspect, but right now I’m just at such a loss for evidence that I need to talk to her. She’s the critical piece in this investigation. The longer she stays in hiding, the worse this is going to get.”

  “How do you know it’s not an undercover investigation?” Mary asked.

  “Miss Sharma is not in our special investigation unit,” Miller said. “I checked.”

  “You expect me to hand over my daughter to you?” Mary asked.

  “No. I know that you wouldn't do that,” Miller said. “But you need to talk to her and tell her to call me. If she's innocent, I can protect her.”

  “Bullshit.”

  Miller leaned forward. “Miss Williams, I don't need to remind you that your daughter is a GALPOL agent. It's bad any time someone commits murder, but when a cop does it—it's ten times as bad.”

  Mary folded her arms and looked away. She was fighting back tears.

  “I've been an agent for a long time,” Miller said. “And I reviewed your daughter’s work. The projects she's done. The cases she’s closed. She's got a lot of potential, Mary. You know it.”

  “Of course I do.”

  “It'll all vanish overnight if she did this,” Miller said. “But if she didn't, I swear to you that I will do everything in my power to restore her reputation. It's an unspoken oath in GALPOL. We help each other.”

  He reached into his shirt pocket and handed her a business card.

  “I'm available any time, even in the middle of the night. If you talk to her, call me. If you want to talk, call me. I won't bother you again. But the investigation will continue, Mary. Maybe you can help.”

  He put on his hat and tipped it to her.

  The Labrador puppy blocked his way out of the room.

  He bent down and groomed the dog behind the ears.

  Then he stood, sighed, and walked outside into the windy sunshine.

  21

  The GGC Horizon descended into a goldenrod skyscape. The ship passed through through a set of thin, red clouds, and steered toward a hexagon-shaped building in the middle of wavering fields of grass. All around were other tall, flat-roofed buildings.

  Michiko instantly recognized them.

  Lectern University, her alma mater that would never be. The number one nursing and medical school in the galaxy, with an entire healthcare system behind it.

  She had applied to the nursing school there out of formality because her mother made her. And they had rejected her quickly, for her grades and work experience weren’t good enough. They only took the best of the best.

  Getting rejected from Lectern had been such a relief. Her mother took it harder than she did. In fact, Michiko went on a victory run after receiving the rejection email, pretending to be sad so that her mother wouldn’t suspect her true feelings.

  Her parents stood next to her, watching the medical campus as the ship neared it.

  “It’s a pity,” Reiko said. “If only you had been accepted here, I wonder how things might have turned out.”

  Michiko pursed her lips.

  “It would have turned out the same, Mom,” she said. “I probably would have dropped out the first week instead of the end of the first semester.”

  Reiko shouldered her handbag and brushed off the comment.

  “Well, you never know,” she said. “It’s easy for you to say, but there’s no telling how things would have turned out. Maybe you would have met a boy that persuaded you to stay.”

  “Mom.”

  “Mr. and Mrs. Lins, we’ve got an envoy waiting to take you back to Asiazil,” Will said. “They’re going to meet us when we land. They’ll ensure you get home safely.”

  Will winked at Michiko, and she winked back, glad for the relief.

  “Thank you,” Reiko said. “But I’ve been thinking that maybe we should stay with Michiko.”

  “No, not going to happen,” Michiko said. “It’s too dangerous.”

  “I would echo Michiko’s sentiment,” Beauregard said from behind the steering dashboard. He navigated through the clouds and spun the ship toward a landing pad in the grass. “She’ll be safe with us.”

  Arthur Lins put his arm around Reiko’s shoulder. Then he brought Michiko in with his other arm.

  “We love you,” he said.

  “We do,” Reiko said.

  “I love you guys, too,” Michiko said. “And I'll be back. I promise.”

  They shared the final moments of the descent together, watching the orange sun blazing in the goldenrod sky.

  A small, green corsair lifted off from the Lectern spacepad.

  In crisp, autumn air, Michiko watched as the ship blasted into space.

  Her parents were gone.

  She was all alone now.

  Not that she'd ever been alone before, but something about this felt different.

  She felt liberated.

  Clark swirled around her, making a gobbling sound.

  “Just you and me now, buddy,” she said.

  “Michiko,” someone said.

  Devika waved to her from the other end of the launchpad. She and Keltie were waiting.

  Michiko took one last look at the ship disappearing in the sky. Then she ran to catch up with Devika and Keltie.

  The Lectern Facility for Military Research was a three-story, drab gray building with Greek columns and golden, tinted windows. It looked like the kind of place the government would safeguard, and not at all the kind of place Michiko would have ever seen herself working in.

  There were security guards at the entrance and metal detectors and bomb sniffing dogs in the foyer.

  The guards met Beauregard, Will, Keltie, Devika and Michiko at the front door, asking for their names and identification to match the security clearance given. They looked at Clark incredulously, and the alien hid behind Michiko.

  “He's okay,” Michiko said.

  Beauregard nodded and agreed, and the group passed through the metal detectors into a classical rotunda with marble floors and a tall, tall ceiling covered in gold.

  A
doctor in a white coat greeted them. She had cropped brown hair and was slightly overweight. She had a military badge sewed onto her coat. She looked like a military type, but had the air of a doctor.

  “I'm Dr. Tabitha Jonesworth. Commander Ponty told me you were coming.”

  “Nice to meet you,” Beauregard said.

  Jonesworth’s eyes went to Clark.

  “I'll be damned,” she said.

  Then she turned and started walking quickly.

  “Come with me.”

  They took an elevator several floors down into the sub basement level.

  “This is where all the fun happens,” Dr. Jonesworth said.

  She opened the elevator’s wire door and led them into a green hallway with a long observation window at the end. The hall was dark, brooding, sterile.

  “You've all been briefed on the security clearance,” Dr. Jonesworth said. “You all know what it means, right?”

  Everyone nodded.

  “Okay,” Dr. Jonesworth said. “Follow me.”

  They followed her to the observation window. She touched a control panel at the edge of the window sill and entered a passcode.

  A shutter on the opposite side of the window receded, looking into a rectangular, white room with padded walls.

  A Planet Eater floated inside, swirling in place in the center of the room. Its eye was closed and it looked like it was sleeping.

  Cameras in the ceiling watched the alien’s every move, and another control panel under the window monitored oxygen levels in the room.

  Keltie sighed. Michiko put her hand on Keltie’s shoulder.

  “Are you okay?” Michiko asked.

  “Seeing it brings back some painful memories, that's all,” Keltie said. “I'll be fine.”

  “I'll be damned,” Will said. “It's like watching a zoo animal.”

  “A zoo animal that doesn't do anything,” Dr. Jonesworth said. “It might as well be a statue. It moves maybe two or three times a day. Opens its eye, looks around, then closes it again.”

  They watched the Planet Eater in silence.

  “It doesn't respond to anything,” Dr. Jonesworth said. “We've resorted to desperation. We've tried to prod it, poke it, yell at it, talk to it, change the lighting, starve it of oxygen, you name it. Not even Arguses are this stoic. We just can't figure it out.”

  Dr. Jonesworth turned to Michiko.

  “Looks like you've had some luck.”

  “Hardly,” Michiko said, “but Clark does respond to my orders.”

  “Do you speak to him?” Dr. Jonesworth asked.

  “Clark understands tones,” Michiko said. “At least, I think he does.”

  “Like a Crystalith?” Dr. Jonesworth asked. “Hmm, I don't think we ever thought of that.”

  “Let's go ahead and start,” Beauregard said. “Time is of the essence.”

  22

  One by one, the stars blinked into the desert sky.

  As Smoke watched the sky, he noticed the absence of stars. There weren't as many as he was used to—like the skies were diseased.

  A cool night breeze blew, and he rubbed his arms, grateful for a bomber jacket he'd found in one of the settlement raids.

  He slid down a dune toward a group of men who were gathered at the base of the dune.

  His men.

  His gang.

  A ragtag group of criminals who he'd never asked for names.

  They wore jackets as well and carried knives on their belts.

  “Nice night, eh, boss?” a man with blonde hair that Smoke dubbed Most Likely to Renounce the Gang.

  “Just beautiful,” Smoke said. “You. Come here.”

  Renounce the Gang walked over. Smoke gestured for him and then put his arm around the man’s shoulder. The move creeped Renounce the Gang out.

  “You've been a member of this gang since the beginning,” Smoke said. “It's only fitting that I reward you.”

  The man smiled. “Hell yeah.”

  “Would you sacrifice for me?”

  “You got it, boss.”

  “Would you kill if necessary?”

  “Yep, just name who.”

  Smoke tightened his grip on Renounce the Gang’s shoulder. Then he leaned in.

  “You sure?”

  “Yeah. I'm ready. Just name it.”

  “You're ready to be my right arm man.”

  Renounce the Gang looked at Smoke with satisfaction, like a weak school kid who finally got accepted by a bully.

  “I'll do it, Boss.”

  “Good.”

  In a fluid motion, Smoke twisted the man’s arm out of its socket, flipped him to the ground, and stabbed him in the shoulder with a knife.

  “Aaaagh! Aaah! Aaah!”

  “There's the sacrifice,” Smoke said.

  “You motherfucker!” Renounce the Gang cried, falling into the sand. “You said I was going to be your right hand man!”

  “Arm,” Smoke corrected pointing to the man’s right arm, which was bleeding profusely now.

  Renounce the Gang looked at his wound, then fell back.

  “Screw all of you!” he cried. “I hope all of you die in the jaws of lampreys, you motherfuck—aaaagh!”

  Smoke put his boot on the man’s sternum and pushed.

  “Stop, oh God—”

  “Listen up,” Smoke said. “When they come, you say nothing. You tell them it happened in a gang fight.”

  “Who? What?”

  “Follow instructions,” Smoke said, brandishing another knife. He widened his eyes to look crazy. He saw his bloodshot eyes reflected on the blade.

  Renounce the Gang turned away.

  Smoke took his boot off the man’s chest and pointed to two men standing next to a spotlight staked in the sand.

  The men turned it on, Smoke watched as it shone brightly into the night sky.

  23

  “Maybe we ought to hang back a little, Eddie,” Grayson said.

  He and Grayson zoomed through hyperspace.

  On the star map, the Zachary ship continued its journey toward Defestus.

  “The closer we travel to that planet, the more nervous I get,” Eddie said.

  “You and me both,” Grayson said. “I cannot for the life of me think of why they're headed to Defestus.”

  Eddie pulled the ship out of hyperspace and the brilliant purple outside faded to black.

  The ship eased to a stop.

  They were in the middle of dark space. No planets. Only distant stars.

  The ship’s engine quieted.

  Grayson had a bad feeling in his stomach, like something bad was coming.

  A Galactic Guard officer’s intuition.

  They watched the star map. Other blinking red dots joined the Zachary ship in interstellar flight.

  “They're gathering,” Grayson said.

  “Are they going to attack?” Eddie asked.

  “Doesn't make sense,” Grayson said. “They're not military ships. They'd never stand a chance against the police ships that surround Defestus.”

  Grayson shook his head. The police would shoot those ships out of the sky without question. For a maximum security prison, they shot first and asked questions later. The Zachary ships were headed for sure death.

  “Let's wait a little while and see what they do,” Grayson said. “Once they gather, we can move in. But I don't like this, Eddie. I don't like it at all.”

  “That makes two of us,” Eddie said.

  24

  The police ship descended through the desert sky like a fallen star.

  Smoke and his gang stood on the top of a dune and watched it hurtle down.

  The flames dissipated from the ship's heatshield and it swung wide over the valley, circling the sands before locating the spotlight.

  The ship was a massive, brown husk that reminded Smoke of snakeskin. It was armed with weapons, and from the looks of it, seated at least four men.

  Smoke liked those odds. He could handle four men.

  �
��Aaaaagh!” a man screamed.

  Renounce the Gang lay at Smoke’s feet, clutching his bloody shoulder. The dune was covered in blood.

  “Quiet,” Smoke said.

  The ship passed over them and shone a spotlight on them, highlighting Smoke and his men.

  “Drop your weapons,” an intercom on the ship said. “And put your hands up.”

  Smoke unlatched his knife from his belt, held it up high for the police to see, and threw it in the sand.

  “Gather them in one place,” the intercom on the ship said.

  Smoke and his men threw their weapons into a single pile on the sand.

  A metal arm from the bottom of the ship lowered and covered the weapons with a mesh net weighted down with ten-ton weights.

  Smoke knew the material.

  Indestructible.

  He narrowed his eyes.

  That net was going to make things harder.

  The ship flew toward the men, circled around the navy sky one more time, and then touched down on the ground. The lights stayed on Smoke.

  “Don't move,” a voice said.

  The bay doors on the ship’s airlock opened and two men in camo emerged with rifles aimed at the men.

  Smoke put his hands up higher.

  “Get down! Get down!” the men yelled.

  Smoke dropped to his stomach and put his hands on his head.

  Boots crunched the sand near him, and he looked at the black boots of one of the men. He wore black tactical glasses and a helmet.

  Shit.

  These guys were dressed like soldiers.

  Almost flawless execution.

  “What's the problem?” the man asked.

  “I'm the problem!” Renounce the Gang screamed. “Don't you see my bleeding arm?”

  The other man looked at Renounce the Gang and spoke into his headset.

  “What happened?”

  “I…uh…got in a fight.”

  “With who?”

  “He ran off.”

  “Bullshit. Who did this to you?”

  “It was him…”

  Smoke cursed. He expected a bullet in his back.