Progeny (The Progenitor Trilogy, Book Three) (67 page)

              ‘Alright!  Might come in handy if the Shapers come calling,’ said Maria, a broad grin splitting her face.

              ‘More to the point, we can use them to launch small hit and run raids,’ said Steven.  ‘If we manage to locate Haines, maybe I can use your people to either help get him out, or cause some sort of distraction.  I’m not talking about starting a full scale guerrilla war, we don’t have the people and I suspect that it would expose us to too much risk, but we do have the option to undertake small raids here and there.  Now, if Haines is in or near the capital as you say, then we need to get inside the city and melt into the general population.  I take it we don’t just walk in there, these days?’

              ‘You thought right,’ said Maria.  ‘Fucking PDF and police got that placed patrolled day and night.  I dunno how many of them are enslaved, but they take their orders from Morgan, and he’s been filling their heads with propaganda, not to mention that any who don’t do as they’re told tend to disappear.  We’ve heard stories.’

              ‘Do you have people inside the city at the moment?’

              ‘We sent a few people down there to sniff around after we first arrived.  There’s roadblocks on all the main roads leading into town, and cops and troops everywhere.  Morgan keeps saying that it’s business as usual, but if you step out of line, you get squashed.  Our guys saw people being snatched right off the street in the middle of the day.  People just stood and watched, they said.  They looked too frightened to do anything else.’

              ‘I need to see everything you have,’ said Steven.  ‘I need to get in there, find Haines, and get him out as quickly as possible.  We may not have a lot of time.  I’m sure you’ve seen that thing in the sky.’  Maria and Baldwin nodded. ‘Well whatever it is, it’s bad news.  If we need to bust Haines out I may need backup, so I need your people trained and ready to go if that’s the case.  We’ll also need an escape route.  Using Captain Isaacs’ ship looks like the best option so far to get us off world.’

              ‘Figures,’ said Isaacs.  ‘I’m the only one of you who knows how to really fly.’

              ‘Cal’s ego aside, the
Profit Margin
has the stealth module and it’s far faster than anything else we have or are likely to be able to steal,’ said Anna.

              ‘Just a second,’ said Maria.  ‘Who put you in charge, Mr Secret Agent?  You show up here and start giving orders...’

              ‘Well I believe Commander Baldwin is the ranking officer here,’ said Steven.  ‘As long as she’s happy with what I have to say. Commander?’

              ‘Fine by me,’ said Baldwin.  ‘I’ll get my people licked into shape.  It’ll give them a boost to know that we’re going after the Admiral at last.’

              ‘So your people can do what they want,’ said Steven to Maria.  ‘I don’t have any official authority over them, but I’d like it if you tagged along. I was under the distinct impression that you wanted to get even with the Shapers.’

              ‘Got that right.  We gonna kill some of those motherfuckers?’

              ‘Undoubtedly.’

              Maria nodded in agreement.  ‘Alright.  I’ll talk to the others.’

              ‘The cargo of weapons inside Captain Isaacs’ ship ought to sway them somewhat.  Meanwhile I need to figure out how to get into Bolivar City unnoticed.’

              ‘You gonna need any help once you get there?’ said Isaacs.

              ‘What sort of help?’ said Steven.

              ‘Well, Anna and I used to work out of Bolivar City in the past a fair bit.  We still have a few contacts from those days I could look up.  These are the sort of people who tend to have their ear to the ground on what’s going on around here.’

              ‘Such as?’

              ‘Organised criminals, smugglers, corrupt local officials, bent coppers and port authority people - the sort of people who will have no love of Morgan’s crackdown.  Some of them might have heard things.  Some of them might be willing to talk, but they’ll talk to us, not you.  You know how things work.’

              ‘Yeah I do.  No-one trusts a new face.’             

              ‘Exactly, and you don’t have the time to earn their trust.  Plus, I think I know a few places we can use for a safe house in the city.  There’s a few “no questions asked” type hotels near the spaceport that should do us nicely.’

              Steven looked thoughtful for a moment and folded his arms across his chest.  ‘Okay, maybe I could use some assistance.  But we do things my way.  No heroics.’

              ‘Fine by me,’ said Isaacs.

              ‘First we need to figure out how to get there and start sniffing around without getting ourselves noticed.’

              ‘Come with me and talk to some of our people,’ said Baldwin.  ‘They can fill you in properly.  Captain Isaacs, perhaps you and Captain Favreaux might show Ms Velasquez here where you’ve stashed all the weapons inside your ship and her people can start unloading them.’

              ‘Sure.  One other thing,’ said Cal.  ‘Is there anywhere in this place I can have a shower and get something to eat that approaches actual food?’

              ‘I’m less sure about the latter, but yeah, we can fix you up,’ said Maria.  ‘This place has all sorts of home comforts.  You’d be surprised.  Come with me.’

              There was a makeshift mess hall of sorts, further inside the hill. Somehow, at some point in the past, the Hidden Hand had acquired what looked like a portable Army kitchen from somewhere and had set it up inside one of the large chambers.  Isaacs and Anna, clad in a fresh change of clothes, sat at one of the long trestle tables and demolished plates of fried food.  At first Isaacs had felt guilty about the amount of food they had been given, assuming that the Hidden Hand would be short on supplies, until the cook had explained that they had ample food supplies in refrigerated storage that had been pilfered from who knows where.  After weeks of ships’ rations, it came as a welcome relief.

              Isaacs, having cleared his plate, sat with a mug of tea in his hand and beatific grin on his features as Anna slowly finished the last of her bacon and eggs.

              ‘That hit the spot,’ he said and belched.

              ‘Charming,’ replied Anna.  ‘I have to admit though, risking my neck does help me work up an appetite.’

              ‘Maria’s back already,’ said Isaacs and nodded towards the door, where her purposeful figure could be seen striding towards them.  Maria grabbed a glass of water on her way and sat down next to them, a sheen of sweat on her brown skin.

              ‘Man, you weren’t lying ‘bout those weapons.  Admiral Chen must be filling in for Santa Claus,’ said Maria and took a long gulp of her water.

              ‘Ah yes, that’s what I always wanted in my stocking: a high powered assault rifle,’ said Anna and chuckled.

              ‘We just offloaded the last of them, unless you think we missed any.  We got more guns than people now.  They’ll certainly come in useful.’

              ‘Glad to hear it.  I hope you’ll put my ship back together once you’re finished.’

              ‘Yeah, yeah.  Don’t worry about your precious baby.  We’ll take care of her.  So, you guys are headed into the city with Agent Harris, huh?’

              ‘Cal and I have been talking about this.  We feel that we can help him out.  Both of us know the place quite well,’ said Anna.

              ‘You need to watch yourselves,’ warned Maria.  ‘Harris is SOC, you knew that, right?  There are some real nasty things on this moon.  My bet is that he’s going looking for them.’

              ‘We’ve fought the Shapers before, Maria.  We know what to expect,’ said Isaacs.

              ‘No, no you haven’t.  You’ve fought their agents, their slaves and their ships.  But there’s a rumour going around that they are actually here, on this moon.  One or two people claim to have seen them in the jungle, or heard from people who said that they had.  They kind of look like...’

              ‘I’ve seen them before,’ said Isaacs, cutting her off.  ‘I used to see them in my nightmares for about fifteen years.  Remember?’ he added, casting a look at Anna who nodded slowly in acknowledgement.  ‘So if Steven is going after those things to get Admiral Haines out of their clutches, then I’m in all the way.’

              They found Steven in one of the makeshift offices, poring over a screen displaying a map of Bolivar City.  A number of points had been marked on the map and certain major roads picked out in a livid red.

              ‘Come up with any sort of plan, yet?’ said Isaacs, as they entered the room.

              ‘Yeah, I think so,’ replied Steven, without looking up from the display.  ‘I’ve been talking to Maria’s people.  They’ve given me some useful insights into the situation down there.’

              ‘And?’

              ‘Oh, I think we just drive straight in.  Shouldn’t be too difficult.’

              ‘Excuse me?’ said Isaacs, incredulously.  ‘Did the whole thing about police and army patrols, not to mention the lurking threat of the Shapers and their agents not get through to you?’

              ‘Yes it did, which is why we shouldn’t attract attention.  Mingling with the crowd is our best option.  In fact we’re more likely to get pulled over if we try and enter by the side roads.  Apparently they have roving patrols in the suburbs stopping anyone who looks like they might be trying to sneak into town. Okay, look.  These roads leading into the city are all major arteries,’ said Steven jabbing a finger at the highlighted roads on the map.  Morgan has shut down the air routes in the name of security, so everyone is having to drive the old fashioned way.  There are manned checkpoints on the main roads, but there’s far too much traffic for it to be practical for them to search every vehicle that’s going in and out of the city, especially since Morgan’s trying to pretend that it’s “business as usual”.  They’re just scanning vehicles as they pass by and pulling over anyone who gives them room for suspicion.’

              ‘I think a car loaded with guns might do that,’ said Anna.  ‘I’m assuming that you’re intending on taking some.’

‘The Hidden Hand have a truck that we can use.  We modify the rear compartment and replace the floor with a double layer of that stuff the Navy used to hide the guns in your ship, since we don’t need it for that anymore.  We hide the guns and other gear between the layers.’

‘And if we do get stopped?’

‘If we do get stopped, then we stick to the cover story.  I’m a businessman in the import-export field here to do a few deals in the city, and you two are hired security.’

‘So what were we doing out in the countryside?’

‘I was staying with friends and got stuck here.  Look, it’s easy.  The fake IDs will confirm everything.  If they ask us questions, just follow my lead, and stay calm.  If we look nervous, even the dumbest cop in the city will know something is up.’

‘Fine, okay.  When do we leave?’ said Isaacs.

‘Well, we need a little time to make the modifications to the truck and a few military craft have over-flown the area in the last hour, so I think it’s best if we leave things until tomorrow morning.  We’ll head into town with all the other morning traffic.  Okay?’

‘Makes sense to me,’ said Isaacs.  ‘Okay, let’s do it.’

High above Orinoco, flashes of light in the night sky illuminated the upper cloud layer as more harvested asteroid material was fed into the maw of the vast Shaper vessel that hung there.  Crushing energy fields shattered the metal rich rocks, rendered them molten and funnelled them into the waiting ship where they were separated into their component minerals as Shaper craft goaded yet more captured asteroids from across the system and beyond into that hungry mouth.  It was a process which had been repeated every few hours for the past several days and nights.  Now, loaded with millions tonnes of refined metals, the five great arms of the ship began to move and lengthen, coming together mere metres apart from one another.  Primordial energies began to crackle along the inner surfaces of those two-hundred kilometre long fingers and then, like a spider constructing the beginnings of its web, the great ship began to weave something out of the materials that it had gathered in its belly.

The sun was just cresting the horizon when the chunky, four wheel drive vehicle snuck out of a secondary entrance of the Hidden Hand’s refuge and made its way down through a meadow to the rough track that ran through the jungle in the direction of the nearest paved road.  Electric wheel motors whining, it bounced over the rough terrain before reaching the unevenly surfaced track and heading off in a cloud of dust.

‘Jesus!’ exclaimed Isaacs, in the front seat, rubbing his head where it had collided with the roof.  ‘Could you at least slow down at little?’

‘Sorry,’ Steven replied, his gaze fixed on the road ahead.  ‘I’m trying to get us away from the base as quickly as possible in case someone sees us.’

The track reached a sharp bend, flanked by tall, overhanging trees.  Steven neatly drifted around it, keeping the truck perfectly lined up all the way as foliage whipped by on all sides.  Straightening up, he gunned the engine and powered the vehicle down a long straight section that.

‘Where the hell did you learn to drive like this!?’ cried Isaacs, hanging on for dear life and the truck bounced and rattled over the bumps
.

‘Same place you learnt to fly, I guess,’ said Steven, grinning.  And with that, the car raced onwards into the jungle.

Eventually the dirt track became a narrow, metalled road, and as the trees began to thin and gave way to cultivated fields and rice paddies, it broadened into two lanes.  Steven reduced their speed and drove more sedately so as not to attract attention and they began to see other traffic on the roads – mainly agricultural vehicles – which became more frequent as they headed out across a broad, fertile plain. 

By the time they reached the main highway into the city they were amidst five lanes of swiftly moving traffic.  There were a number of police and army vehicles among the hundreds of other assorted cars and trucks and PDF gunships and police AG shuttles periodically flitted overhead.  There were also an unusual number of police vehicles parked in lay-bys and slip roads where the occupants appeared to be monitoring the passing traffic.  Steven stuck to the speed limit but refrained from handing control of the truck over to its automatic navigation systems – all the better to make a quick getaway should the worst happen.