Humanity Unlimited 1: Liberty Station (18 page)

Jess stood on the stairs above them, a pistol in her hand, looking as though she were going into shock. “They went after the preservation room,” she said. “They used a stun gun on Sandra.”

The man working on Allen shook his head. Dammit.

“Rex, grab Sandra and get Jess clear. Everyone else is with me.”

“Your brother said he was leaving a gift in the room,” Jess said over her shoulder as Rex hustled her down the stairs. “Be careful!”

A Rainforest security man lay dead a few feet down the hall, his head shattered. The team moved as a unit past him to the open door. Three—no four—dead men lay scatted around the room. There was no sign of the two scientists.

There was also no sign of the alien gear recovered from the tomb, at least not in plain sight. And he didn’t have time to go looking for it.

A small stack of plastic explosives sat in the middle of the central table. A helpful timer indicated there was less than two minutes remaining before the device exploded. Not enough time to exit the building.

That was enough explosives to bring the hotel down. The device almost certainly had some kind of anti-tamper protection, too.

Harry pondered his range of options. The bomb’s sensors would know if he moved it, but there was some play. Otherwise, even minor shaking would set the thing off.

“Hold it steady. Lift it just a little.”

Two of his people held the bomb while he cut the straps securing the explosives. He held his breath and slid the lower packages to the side. The ones on the edges of the top layer also fell away. Leann tossed them out the broken window.

That reduced the scope of the explosion enough to spare the building. Maybe. At his gesture, they set the bomb down carefully and ran like hell.

* * * * *

Rex hustled Jess out the side door of the hotel just as a helicopter took off from the roof. It had medical markings. She saw Nathan through the open door. He waved at her.

She was tempted to take a shot at him, but she knew she wouldn’t hit anything.

Dammit.

Less than a minute later, the side of the hotel blew out. Debris showered around them even as Rex dragged her behind a parked minivan. Something heavy landed on the vehicle, crushing the roof.

She screamed. Who wouldn’t?

When the rain of debris finally stopped, she stared at the devastation. The hotel was mostly intact. It had a huge divot in the side and it was on fire, though. Steel and concrete littered the parking area. Every car alarm within a mile seemed to be going off. The stench of the explosives made her nose itch. And her ears were ringing even louder.

She turned to Rex. “Is Harry okay? Did he get out?”

The big man nodded grimly. “He made it down a few floors. It sounds like they’re okay.”

“I saw the mercenaries. They flew off the roof in a medical helicopter.”

“They won’t get far, but it’ll probably be enough to slip away. Dammit. That’s twice that assclown tried to kill some of us, and this time he did it.”

His eyes shifted toward the hotel. “At least we took one of them out.”

“Two,” she said as she watched fire engines pull up to the hotel. “One of the Rainforest people was a traitor. He zapped Sandra. I shot him. Then I used Allen’s weapon to kill the mercenary in the hall.”

He blinked in surprise, but said nothing.

She knelt beside the sniper and was happy to see signs that Sandra was waking up. Since slapping her cheek seemed like a very bad idea, Jess just waited.

The other woman sat up abruptly, reaching for her weapons. Jess held the rifle down. “Whoa! The fight is over.”

Sandra blinked and felt the back of her neck. “What happened?”

“You know where you warned me that trouble could sneak up when I least expected it? It did. Allen didn’t make it. I’m sorry.”

The sniper said something particularly foul. “Help me up. Rex, what’s the situation?”

He filled her in while they watched the building. Jess was happy to see other people streaming out of the damaged structure, including the two scientists from the preservation lab. They must’ve gotten the hell out of there right after the explosion at the launch pad.

Jess didn’t relax until she saw Harry and his remaining teammates come out. Then she allowed herself to cry in a mixture of relief, terror, and horror.

* * * * *

Harry held Jess when the reaction set in. He wanted to ask her exactly what had happened, but this wasn’t the time. He stayed with her until he saw his father climb out of an SUV. Harry passed the wrung out engineer to Sandra and headed over.

His father looked at the building. “This was Nathan, wasn’t it?”

“Yes. He made off with some of the artifacts, but not the scientists. Or Jess. He killed a bunch of your guards, too. One of my people died in the stairwell, but it looks like he dropped one of the enemy and allowed Jess to escape. Rex said he flew off the roof in a medivac helicopter. What did he blow up?”

“The fueling station for pad 3. He killed some of the staff. Security said the helicopter landed outside the fence and they climbed into some vans. They’re gone. The police are scouring the city, but it wouldn’t surprise me if Nathan had some cops in his pocket. I’ll put out a massive reward for their arrest, but don’t hold your breath.”

Harry considered the hotel while he thought. The fire was spreading quickly. It might be a loss.

“Nathan knew,” he said after a moment. “He must’ve gotten a look inside that second chamber and saw the ship. The race is on now. What next?”

His father turned toward him, his expression as cold and hostile as Harry had ever seen. “We make them pay. If we want to stop Kathleen from derailing our plans completely, we need to act quickly.

“I know corporate contracts are supposed to be almost incomprehensible with legalese, but we don’t have time for that luxury. If I write out a short deal swapping an ownership stake for access to the items already provided and anything recovered in the future, will you accept my word that it will be good? You can send it to your attorney for confirmation.”

“On one condition. Mother has obviously compromised your organization. I want to be in charge of all security operations for Project Liberty. That includes the upcoming missions because your guy is fighting me on it.”

“Done,” his father said immediately. “Once your mother gets a chance to think this through, she’ll realize what we’re doing. You need to move the Paris timetable up.”

Harry shook his head. “Your guy’s plan feels like a trap. There’s something going on there. We need more information about the facility and what they really have planned.”

His father considered that. “I have a man in your mother’s IT department. He was supposed to get me the final plans on this and a number of other secret projects, but he’s gone quiet. She must’ve picked him up. If he got the data, it would be very helpful to retrieve it. And it would hurt her badly.”

Harry smiled coldly. “Get me what you have and I’ll see about returning Nathan’s visit.”

Chapter Seventeen

Jess turned down the doctor’s offer of something to calm her nerves. She needed her wits about her. Mister Rogers had presented her with a ridiculously short contract that matched what they’d discussed in astonishingly plain language.

Harry had already run it past his lawyer and she’d found no issues. The company would own the finds—past, present, and future—and profit from them. The ownership was unambiguous and Jess would have her say in the new company, Humanity Unlimited.

Clayton was the chief executive officer, she would be the chief operating officer, and Harry would be the chief of security for the organization. Each would share the profits according to their stake.

Harry had said he’d sign it if she did. Time to do her own check. She looked up the number for her college friend and dialed.

“Dawson and Treadwell, Aaron speaking. How can I help you today?”

“Aaron, this is Jess Cook. How’s it going?”

“Jess! I was just thinking about you the other day! Things are great. I made partner last year. Are you still building bridges while dreaming of space stations?”

She smiled at the joy in his voice. Aaron had always been a happy one.

“Actually, I’m working in space. In fact, I wanted to see if I could beg a favor about that.”

“You need me to come up and turn a wrench? Bad call. My wife won’t let me do home repairs due to liability concerns.”

Jess queued up the contract on her tablet. “I made a find that the owner thinks is worth a lot of money. He made me an offer and I need someone I can trust to look it over.”

“Sure. Do you have my email address? Send it and I’ll take a look. I can probably have an answer for you in a couple of days.”

Jess sent the contract. “Things are moving pretty quickly on this end. If you could just take a peek, I’d appreciate it.”

“Contracts are nothing to skim,” he said seriously. “The devil is in the details. One little word in the boilerplate can change the whole…Wait a second. This isn’t complete. It’s only one page.”

“That’s it.”

The silence on the other end of the line dragged on as her friend read. “This is pretty plainly stated. You cede control of the listed artifacts to the company, as well as those discovered in the future, and you get an ownership stake in the sole entity that will profit from them: Humanity Unlimited. This list of items you found seems pretty pedestrian. Wrenches, a book, and…wait. A crashed spaceship? Is this a joke?”

Sometimes, it seemed like it. One on her. “Nope, completely serious, though I need you to keep the details confidential. I’ll send the general assets list for the company, too.”

Once he had it, he continued. “This says the company owns a spaceship constructed from the ISS2 skeleton. It lists tens of billions in assets. And you’re getting an outright stake of thirty percent? Jess, I’ve never seen a contract so straightforward. I don’t see any gotchas.”

“That’s what I needed to know. Remember, keep it under your hat and watch the news over the next few weeks. I owe you one.”

Jess hung up and signed the contract. She sent a copy to Clayton, Harry, and herself.

They’d relocated to the spaceport proper. To say that security was heavy was an understatement. Several of Harry’s special operations teams had arrived and all of them seemed to be keeping an eye on her. And the building they were in, to be fair.

Sandra was back on her feet and mad as a wet cat. For her, that meant brooding silence. The rest of the original team was off doing other tasks. The room Jess and Sandra were in had four men standing guard, armed for war. Four more stood in the hall outside.

“Sandra, I’m sorry about Allen.”

The other woman looked up with cold, hard eyes. “Me, too. He was a good man. It’s not your fault. It’s mine. I let that traitor get behind me and almost lost you, too.”

The sniper visibly shook herself. “Sorry. My mind is already on payback. That’ll come in time. Allen took them out and got you free. That’s what matters.”

“Actually, no. I wish he had.” She gave Sandra a rundown of what had happened.

The other woman’s eyes widened as she listened. “Oh, God. I’m sorry you had to do that. To see that.”

Jess shrugged. “I didn’t have a choice. They had it coming, but I’m going to have some bad nights. I just know it.”

“You need to talk to someone,” the sniper said firmly. “If not today, then soon. PTSD isn’t a joke and you don’t want to let something like that take over your life. I don’t know if you’re religious or not, but you might see someone there, too.”

“I will. When I have time. Harry’s figuring out what we’re doing next. I need to be part of that.”

“Then what the hell are we doing sitting here? Let’s go.”

Sandra stood and keyed her radio. “Scotty is on the move.”

“Scotty? Seriously?”

“Harry suggested it. You want a different call sign? Pitch it to me and I’ll see what I can do. It’s like a nickname, though. Sometimes you don’t get to pick the one you like.”

“That sucks.”

Several of the mercenaries stayed at the office while the rest formed up around Jess and Sandra. The Rainforest guards wisely got out of the way when they saw them coming.

Harry was in a conference room in the basement of the security building with one of his guys and several Rainforest types. He had a satellite view of what looked like a college campus up on the screen. He paused what he was saying when she came in. “Jess, I hope you’re feeling better.”

“I’m riding the tiger.” She picked out the most senior looking Rainforest guy and held out her hand. “Jessica Cook.”

“John Cradock, chief of Rainforest security operations.”

Part of her felt sorry for him, but the rest wanted to slap him for hiring traitors. “I’m sorry you lost some people.”

He grunted as though someone had punched him in the stomach. “I’m sorry one of them turned on you. That’s on me.”

The large man gestured to the screen. “We’re planning on returning the favor. Mister Rogers—the elder—told me about the change in organizational structure. The younger Mister Rogers is in command of these operations going forward. As a minority stakeholder, you’ll have input, too.”

Harry gestured toward the chair beside him. “Have a seat and I’ll fill you in.”

Jess sat down while the mercenaries took up places against the wall. “Did you sign the contract? I signed mine just before I came down.”

“Not yet.” He pulled out his tablet. “Let’s get that out of the way so this is official. Done. It’s off to my father. God help me.”

He pointed to the screen. “That’s BenCorp headquarters in the US. My mother’s flagship company.”

She leaned forward and examined it closely. “Is this a retaliatory raid? Do we have time for that?”

“We always have time for payback. In this case, though, it actually has some relevance.” He touched the controls and brought up the image of a skinny man. “Meet Vincent Cruz. He used to work for my mother as the assistant IT manager of BenCorp.”

“Used to?”

Harry nodded. “Right up until the moment she found out he was spying for my father. Now he’s almost certainly a prisoner. He was supposedly in the process of stealing a trove of classified information that he never had a chance to turn over, including detailed plans for the facility where they built the reactor. We need them, so we need him.”