The Clones of Mawcett (54 page)

The_Clones_of_Mawcett

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While digging through the ruins of a long dead civilization on the planet Mawcett, a team of Terran and Nordakian archeologists find an underground tunnel leading to a door in such extraordinary condition that it could have been fabricated as recently as that morning. They labor throughout the day, using every modern device available to them, but are unable to gain entry.

Then, in the early hours of the new day, seemingly in response to the screams of a frustrated, over-tired scientist, the door slides noiselessly open. Upon passing through the entranceway, the archeologists are stunned to find an elaborate complex in pristine condition. Summoning the courage to venture further, they enter a large circular chamber lined with strange electronic equipment, and immediately become engrossed in examining strange symbols etched into the floor near the center of the room. Suddenly, they're bathed in a strange light that paralyzes them where they stand. They watch in frozen terror as a clear, circular wall rises up around them. When the enclosed area begins to fill with a dense ocher gas smelling of persimmons, the dig site laborers, who had witnessed the activity from the periphery, run screaming for the entrance.

The_Clones_of_Mawcett

(special preview)

Trader Vyx

Chapter One

~ October 4th, 2272 ~

He strained to hear the slightest of noises above his own laborious breathing. They were still out there, somewhere in the darkness. He was sure of that now. Three times during the past hour he’d thought that he’d lost the ones who hunted him, and three times they’d turned up again at his back. He needed to rest, but the relentless pursuit wouldn’t allow it. To stop was to die, and he wasn’t ready to surrender up his life just yet!

He sensed, rather than consciously saw the movement, and immediately flung his agile five-foot eleven-inch body sideways into the blackness of the abandoned building! The rotted wood of the old doorway frame where he’d attempted to conceal himself just a second before, exploded into hundreds of tiny pieces as three lattice projectiles struck it! Twisting as he flew through the air, Vyx tucked in his head and curled into a tight ball so he could execute a quick roll. A plume of dust and dirt erupted upwards as he landed hard on a sagging wooden floor covered with years of accumulated filth. His roll left him crouched in position to spring again, and a swift look around was all he needed to choose his direction of flight.

As he sprinted towards the rear of the building, and the only other doorway illuminated by the soft rays of diffused moonlight outside, he strained to see the path in front of him. He couldn’t afford the time needed to pick his way slowly through the building, so he desperately hoped there were no gaps in the flooring, or accumulations of trash left by former building occupants that would trip him in the darkness.

Emerging at the rear of the deserted building, he flattened himself against the outside wall, gulping the hot, dry air of a peaceful summer night as quietly as possible. He didn’t have the luxury of standing in the doorway while he slowly scanned the street. He’d have been clearly outlined in the moonlight for any that had followed him into the building. The wall offered a modicum of protection from visual scanning, but it offered little concealment from a thermal scanner. When nothing moved in response to his sudden appearance, he made a dash for the end of the street. The buildings on this block were all occupied by local citizens, so he couldn’t seek shelter here. On the Gollasko Colony, bursting into an occupied house would earn you a quick trip to the Body Disposal Depot. For that matter you might have your ticket punched early by disturbing the wrong party in an abandoned building. Like the nineteenth-century American west at its wildest, people shot first and questioned later. Justice was dispensed from the fastest gun, and everyone here had an irrevocable license to kill.

Making it to the end of the street without seeing anyone, and more importantly without drawing fire, gave him new hope. If he could just make it back to his hotel, he might be safe. Armed guards patrolled the lobby, and sensors linked to automatic weapons safeguarded all other possible entrances to the building after dark. If only he hadn’t lost his weapon so early in the fight he might have been able to reduce the odds by now. He knew that there were at least three of them, and that they had to be using some kind of electronic tracking device. If he knew what they had, he might be able to give them the slip, but it could be thermal, infrared, auditory, or olfactory. It might even be a combination of all four. The newest devices, used by the Space Marines, did employ all four sensory systems, and the arms merchant employing these hunters usually had the latest and best for his own people.

Instead of trying to hide, which would be a waste of time, he sprinted down several streets and then ducked into a doorway to catch his breath. Nothing moved behind, but his pursuers had appeared from nowhere before, so he didn’t spend any more time there than necessary. No sense giving them a stationary target to lock on to. As soon as he was able to breathe easily, he ran on; his hotel still being at least eight long blocks away.

It took less than ten minutes to cover the distance to the hotel, but he was again breathing with difficulty when it came into sight. Rather than making an immediate dash for the hotel's front entrance, he stayed in the shadows of a building across the street and observed the movements of pedestrians as he filled and refilled his lungs with air. He was just about to step out when he caught a glimpse of almost imperceptible movement several doorways down from the hotel entrance. Pulling back, he stared intently at the recessed entrance of the closed shop.

It was another fifteen minutes before he saw any additional movement. When you stare into a darkened area for a prolonged period, your eyes and mind begin to play tricks on you, but he was sure that there was someone there; someone who didn’t belong there; not at this hour anyway.

Other than the front doors, all entranceways to the hotel were barred after dark, so he didn’t have a chance of getting to his room and reaching his backup weapons. If he had a weapon, he’d make a run for the hotel entrance, relying on his skill with a pistol to get him there. Without a weapon he was about as dangerous as one of the painted targets on a weapons practice range.

He backtracked a block without exposing himself to the watcher in the doorway so he could think and plan without danger of being spotted. He hated being weaponless, but the arms merchant that he had met with tonight would have been suspicious if he’d come wearing all of his hardware. They’d allowed him to enter with one laser pistol only because there were seven heavily armed bodyguards in the room during the negotiations. He had several blades hidden about his body, but they were of little use in the current situation.

Shev Rivemwilth, an Alyysian trader and arms merchant well known in the illegal arms trade, rarely left the sanctuary of the Gollasko Colony, and never ventured into Galactic Alliance regulated space where his arrest would ensure he never saw free sky overhead again. It was widely rumored that he was a front man, in the loosest sense of the word ‘man’, for the giant Raider organization that had become the scourge of the galaxy. The ugly creature neither acknowledged nor denied an association with the Raiders.

As members of a race that had migrated in non-FTL ships from many thousands of light-years across the galaxy, Alyysians claimed no home world in Galactic Alliance space, although small colonies existed on several different worlds. Their unique physiology allowed them to be frozen solid and then thawed out and revived when they reached their destination. Typically about four-foot six-inches tall when standing upright, they looked a bit like erect versions of Terran toads. They all wore the same dark gray cloaks that covered most of their yellow skin. Being neither male nor female, the Alyysian were true hermaphrodites that could reproduce without contact with another of their species.

The meeting had started well enough. Vyx had set his translation device for Alyysian and they had gotten the pleasantries out of the way quickly. Then Vyx spelled out what he was looking to purchase. After a bit of haggling, and an examination of a merchandise sample, an agreement on price was reached. Shev Rivemwilth specified that payment would be required in two parts, half before, and half upon delivery. Vyx had just agreed, and stood to leave with the promise of returning tomorrow with the first half payment, when a convicted Tsgardi killer named Recozzi, entered from the corridor.

A race more closely resembling Terran baboons than humans, Tsgardis often file their normally sharp teeth to sharper points to make their appearance even more menacing. Immediately recognizing Vyx as a Space Command undercover operative, Recozzi uttered a profanity and grabbed for his weapon. Vyx managed to pull his first and, with a slight sweep of the weapon, sliced off the top of Recozzi’s head just below his eyes. Shev Rivemwilth leaped for safety behind a sofa as Recozzi’s body, now almost lifeless, continued firing his automatic weapon as he fell. An errant shot hit Rivemwilth in one of his two hearts and putrid yellow-green blood began spurting over floor and furniture. Recozzi’s fire also caught two of the bodyguards, who let loose with their own weapons as they fell. By some miracle, Vyx was only hit by a burning graze from someone’s laser weapon. Diving for the open door as weapons fire continued the light show inside the room, he lost his pistol as he tumbled. He decided it wouldn’t be prudent to re-enter the room in order to retrieve it.

Vyx literally ran for his life, and made it safely to the street after descending the single flight of stairs in just three leaps. He was half a block away when the first shots were fired in his direction. Over the next hour, he played a game of cat and mouse with the Shev’s bodyguards. It's no fun being the mouse.

The first light of dawn found Vyx still alive,and still on the run. Long shadows were his only companions as he loped down deserted streets. Although no fire had come his way since the earlier shot at the abandoned building, hours ago, the hairs on the back of his neck continued their erect stance. He felt sure that the hunters weren’t far behind. It was the first time since he'd come dirt-side that he appreciated the shorter diurnal cycle of this planet. A twenty-two-hour forty-minute daily revolution meant that the sun rose that much sooner, and with the coming of the new day, the odds that he might actually survive increased dramatically. He’d be able to purchase a new weapon as the stores opened in a couple of hours. People moving about on streets mostly abandoned after dark, would provide him with some welcome cover. Armed and less conspicuous, he might yet have a chance to reach his hotel room.

It cost Vyx three times what it usually fetched, but the old laser pistol was worth every penny under the circumstances. The shop owner generously threw in two extra power packs, both fully charged. Vyx tucked the pistol into his belt and warily exited the dilapidated pawn shop. The owner could probably take the rest of the week off on what he had made from the sale of the pistol.

Walking cautiously towards the hotel, Vyx mingled with the early morning pedestrian traffic on the sidewalk. It would seem a surreal sight to someone accustomed to life on most civilized planets, but every person on the street, except for the smallest of children, was carrying a pistol or rifle. Amazingly, there was very little violent crime in the colony. Occasionally a drunk would be rolled, but no vandals broke into homes here. The ones that had tried it, had long ago been delivered to the Body Disposal Depot, and with the entire citizenry armed, the surviving lowlifes were too smart to attempt it.

He got to within eighteen meters of the hotel before one of the hunters from the previous evening stepped out of the doorway where he had waited all night, and opened fire. Prepared for any movement from that location, Vyx dove for cover behind a waiting taxi as the first shot came his way. The second went wide as well, and it was the last 'free' shot that the killer got. Before he could fire a third time towards Vyx, the local citizenry opened fire on him. He must have only recently arrived in the colony because he was apparently unaware that you never fired a weapon on a crowded street here. The populace wasn't specifically trying to protect Vyx; it was just an automatic reaction to an ignorant fool firing into a crowd.

For several seconds, lead, lattice, and laser fire poured into the doorway from every direction. When the killer fell to the ground, he had more holes in him than a brand new box of data rings. His two shots had missed Vyx, but two colony citizens were down. One was dead from a lattice weapon blast to the chest, while the other had received only a grazing laser weapon injury to his leg. People crowded around the hunter’s body to see if they recognized him, but no one claimed any familiarity. It was further testimony that he was new here.

Vyx made it into the hotel while everyone’s attention was diverted and before the sanitation truck arrived to pick up the two bodies. The guards in the lobby were on heightened alert as a result of the shootout in the street, but they didn’t stop Vyx from proceeding to his room after he flashed his keycard for the door.

As soon as the reinforced ferrocarbon alloy door of his room was closed and locked behind him, Vyx took a deep breath and released it slowly. He then retrieved the backup pistol from his suitcase’s hidden compartment, and slipped it into his empty holster. The pistol that he had just purchased was placed on the dresser and he would carry it in his belt when he left the room again, but first he had to report in.

Another pocket in the suitcase yielded a miniature radio transmitter. He stuck the three-centimeter wide satellite dish against the window pane and aligned it using its audio locator capability. The RF signal from his radio would be transmitted to a tiny satellite, about the size of his fist, which he had placed in geosynchronous orbit around the planet upon his arrival. The satellite would then compress the encrypted message before re-transmitting it on a designated IDS frequency. It would take almost seventy hours to travel the two-hundred-ten light years to the Intelligence Section at Higgins Space Command Base, so it would be at least six days before he received a response.