Hunters Ch. 03

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The steady rhythm of heavy breathing and flesh slamming into a sand-filled leather bag filled the air. Max was alone in the workout room, and he was in the center, working the heavy bag with a vengeance. Every punch was delivered with a look of concentrated fury, every kick landed with a grimace of hatred. His naked torso and arms were glistening in a sheen of sweat. Every blow on the bag caused a shower of moisture to cascade off Max's well-muscled body. He had been at Robinson's almost a week and a half and he was worried that he would be getting soft. He just hoped that the stitches would hold up.

A few more solid blows landed and Max heard the squawk of the paging system.

"Morgan to the tower. Morgan to the tower," Jen's voice said loudly. Her voice sounded tinny over the speakers, but there was an under current of fear in it, and that made Max put a little hurry into his step. He toweled off a little, put on a light cotton workout jacket and grabbed his cigarettes. He struck his lighter and inhaled the fire, savoring the taste after his hour and a half of pounding on the bag.

The cool air of the main building hit his skin like a tidal wave crushing an unsuspecting surfer. He loved it. He paused for a step and just enjoyed the feeling; it was like jumping in a lake after being in a sauna. He sighed happily and continued on his way to the control tower. He didn't bother knocking as he got there, he just walked in. Inside he saw Jen, Robinson, and the ambassador who had escorted him off the Megalodon. The seat before the radar and communication screen was empty, but the screen showed an old man in a suit sitting at a desk. Max sighed very deeply and pulled the chair out with a defeated look on his face.

"Major Morgan," the man in the suit said plainly, his face revealing no emotion.

"Sir," Morgan replied and saluted half-heartedly.

"Dispense with the attempted formality, Major. Your government needs your help."

Max took a long pull off his cigarette and nodded. He slouched in his chair and looked into the screen. "My former government, sir. I stopped being a member of your citizenry two years ago."

"Be that as it may, you still are in the Martian Military and you will do as your told this time or I will take it upon myself to give the order to destroy that little piece of rock you're on," the man said, still no emotion showing on his face. The radar screen left of the screen Max was talking at light up along the edge with at least 30 blips on the radar and alarms started sounding and lights started flashing. Robinson leaned forward and flipped a toggle switch; the alarms stopped, but the blips remained on the radar and the red lights still flashed angrily.

"Max," Robinson said calmly.

"Fine, what do you need?" Max said, clearly agitated.

"Major, we need you to go back to Earth and rescue a political prisoner. Corporal Anders is being held at the prison in Rotterdam. The charge and conviction was for piracy and we need Anders returned to us safely."

"Corporal Anders? One of yours?" Max questioned non-chalantly.

"One of ours. Until your dismissal fr. . ." the man started. Max cut him off.

"Court martial. Say it with me, sir; until my court marital from the Martian Special Forces."

"Until your dismissal from the Martian Special Forces, Anders is still under your command as well, Major."

Max nodded. "What's Anders' specialty?"

"Piloting. There isn't a ship in the system that Anders can't fly; makes you look like a grandmother driving to church on Sunday morning, Morgan," the man in the suit said. Morgan, Robinson, and Jen all raised their eyebrows simultaneously. The ambassador stood in the room as stoic as ever.

"Fine. I'll do it. What's in it for me?"

"First of all, you will return your stolen Mako. Second of all, you will receive a full pardon from the Martian government and you will be processed without any necessary appearances by yourself as having a discharge under other than honorable conditions. Third, we will drop our portion of your bounty, lowering it by 5 million. Furthermore, if you accept we will pull our ships back except for one and we will not incur further trespassing on Thomas Robinson's legally held space."

"As opposed to if I refuse and you'll blow up this rock and probably double the bounty on me if I escaped somehow."

"I have no doubt you'd escape in the Mako; that's what she's designed for and that's what we trained you to do. However, the other 50 of Thomas Robinson's employees will not be as fortunate."

"Like I said, I'll do it. Now what's this business about pulling back all but one ship?" Max asked, leaning back in the chair and taking a deep drag on his up-to-this-point neglected cigarette.

"The ship that will remain is the Twilight. She is a two-seater and she's the ship you will use for the mission. It is an experimental ship that we have 5 of, and she uses some of the modifications that you brought forward while you were still active. You will fly out alone in the Mako and a trade will take place between you and the pilot of the Twilight. When you return with the Twilight, you will drop the ship off at the base in Alva City along with Anders and then we will process the concessions that I mentioned."

"Done. When do we make the exchange?" Max asked, moving to sit up straight in the chair. Max was getting very tired of this dialog.

"One hour, Major."

"Done," Max said and flipped a toggle switch. The screen went blank.

"You realize you're going into a trap, right?" Robinson said grimly. "They're never going to let you out alive."

"That's just what my girlfriend said before I joined the Corps," Max laughed. "Besides, what do we have here, thousand to one odds? That's just getting this Corporal Anders. Then I have to get out of a military held prison and through God only knows what for defenses while avoiding the Black Dragons, the Consortium, and trying hard to not piss off the Red Dragons while I'm at it. Then I have to get back here without getting killed and drop a ship off at another military base and then get out of there." Max shrugged. "Sounds like my kind of deal," he said smiling. Max stood up and walked out the door. "The Mako ready?"

"Has been since we gassed her up when you limped back here," Robinson replied calmly. He patted himself down for his cigarettes and pulled them from the inside pocket of his coveralls. He stepped out the door after Max and lit a cigarette.

"What about the 'Don? She gonna be ready by the time I get back?" Max asked, taking the last pull of his cigarette and flicking it out into the shop toward the Megalodon.

"Maybe, I won't promise shit, Max."

"You never do. That's what I like about you, Robinson. Try to have her ready; I have a feeling I'm gonna need her before this little job is done." Robinson only nodded in reply. Max headed for the barracks so he could shower. The shower was faster than Max would have liked, but he was filled with a sort of giddy nervousness. He was excited about finally getting the military off his back, but part of him was already sadly missing the chase. Time seemed to fly by. The shower, getting dressed, getting in the Mako and the fast trip to the rendezvous seemed to take minutes to Max.

The switch went fast, too. Max tethered himself to his pod and he floated over to the Twilight and the pilot in there, some Private, Max noted, seemed awfully frightened and very relieved to get out of the Twilight. "Yup, that confirms it," Max thought. "She's got a bomb in her; probably an ELR Transponder, too. Gonna have to fix that when I get to Earth." He watched as the shuttle pilot got into his Mako. Max watched the other pilot pull in the tether, lock down the pod and blast away. He got a horrible sinking feeling that was the last time he would ever see her again.

"Get a move on, Major," sounded a voice over the speakers in the Twilight.

"Is that you, L.C. Upton?" Max said as he buckled in. He started looking around the cockpit figuring out where all the buttons and indicator lights were.

"Colonel Upton actually, Major. Move that thing, we're on a schedule here," Upton shot back agitatedly. Max buckled his harness into place and he grabbed the control sticks and put his feet on the pedals.

"Wasn't told we were on a timeframe here, Colonel," Max said and brought the ship around. The smooth handling and response of the Twilight impressed Max immediately. He also noticed something quite happily; when she was moving, she had an artificial gravity field. That had been one of his recommendations. If they had gotten that one down, he wondered what else they might have gotten figured out.

"At full speed you have 4 hours to parole Anders after reaching Earth," Upton said emotionlessly. Max's left eyebrow rose. He kicked the Twilight down and the Martian ships were only a twinkling of afterburners after a few seconds.

Max couldn't help but play with some of the buttons and switches. The Twilight had an auto guidance system set up to go through gates, get in lines at the toll stations, and even had specific destinations pre-programmed into it. The artificial gravity steadily increased up to Earth's 1G. The plane was constantly under the cockpit, Max noted, and it never shifted. The Twilight could turn tighter and faster than any other craft designed; until it hit a gravity well like a planet and then it was up to the toughness of the pilot to not pass out. She was armed with two missile launchers and twin 40mm Vulcan cannons. The magazines had 100,000 rounds in them at maximum capacity. Max noted that right now, all the magazines were empty. Max got so caught up in fiddling with things in his new toy; he barely realized the time that it took to get to the Mars gate. He could make out Alva City on the dark side of Mars before he realized where he was. He flipped the VOX on and rotated the station to the comm. channel that the gates operated on. Instantly noisy chatter filled the air; most of it sounded like long-haul couriers.

"This is Major Morgan of the Martian Marines, I am enroute to Earth on a military emergency. Clear the gate or I will blow it clear," Max said in a rushed voice. He brought the Twilight into a tight turning spiral and veered sharply toward the gate. The chatter on the radio picked up dramatically with the scattered expletives of truckers and commuters. The gate controllers seemed to be amazingly calm through the whole thing, directing traffic as best they could. Max was actually impressed with the efficiency that they worked. Holding true to his word, Max didn't even slow down. He hit the gate aperture at the maximum speed of the Twilight, skimming a mere 3 feet from a long chained freighter. Max hit the hyperspace of the gates and was gone.

The trip to Earth was taking about half the time it took with the Mako, but that was still fine with Max. He made sure the autopilot was locked on to Rotterdam and sent a communication through the gate system to tell them that he wasn't going through the tollbooth on the other side and that he wasn't slowing down when he was out. They were to make sure the route to Earth was clear. He was sure there wouldn't be any problems and he went to sleep.

Max awoke later, only two hours before he got to the gate at Earth. He started pulling up what information he could about Rotterdam and the prison there. The more information he got, the less happy he became.

Rotterdam had fallen into decay in the last 50 years. It had been pounded by falling rocks from the gate accident and it had turned into the slum of Europe. The prison there wasn't a prison, but it was a para-military controlled base of a group calling themselves The Fourth Reich. They sought to reunite Europe and build defenses to take out the incoming rocks before they hit the Earth, allowing them to rebuild. Unfortunately, they also wanted to establish Earth as the predominate power in the system again, which meant they wanted an all out war with Mars. It seems that they had been gathering men and weapons and ships for the last 10 years and were on the verge of taking over several of the cities in Europe. That meant that they had lots of people that were highly trained and this wouldn't be just a smash and grab run. It also meant that Anders wasn't being executed for piracy; Anders was being executed for espionage.

Max kept trying to look up information on the location of where Anders was being held and he kept coming up with blanks. His research lasted until he blasted through the Earth gate and found quite happily that it had been cleared as requested. The Twilight was on approach to the planet when the viewer screen turned itself on and a man in a uniform popped up on the screen. Max recognized him immediately as his former commanding officer, Colonel Upton.

"Morgan, there's not a lot of time here, so I'll be brief," he said and seemed to shuffle papers around on a desk.

"It's night time in Rotterdam right now. We have a way in and out of the place where Anders is being held; the laundry service. They're friendly to us and have helped us out on previous missions in Rotterdam and in other cities in Europe. Our people on the inside already have you signed up for a job. You start in 2 hours."

Max was liking this less and less all the time. He had been lied to consistently so far. He didn't have 4 hours; he had 2. Anders wasn't in some prison, Anders was in a military held building. Anders wasn't being executed for piracy; she was most likely being executed for espionage. The whole situation was spiraling rapidly out of Max's favor, and he didn't like that. He wasn't even sure anymore that he was supposed to get Anders out. Or even that there was an Anders. He was given no description, only a rank and a name.

"The landing coordinates are preset. You are going into hostile territory and you are going to encounter heavy resistance. Furthermore, the metal detectors in the facility will not allow you to carry a gun, and they have strict rules that will be explained to you when you show up for your assignment. Just show up at the Über Sauber washing service and you'll be given instructions on how to act, what to say, and where to go once inside," Colonel Upton said. When he was finished, he sat back in his chair. "Any questions, Major?"

"I don't speak German," he said plainly.

"Du sprechst nicht Deutsch? Auch, das tut mir leid," the Colonel said with a broad smile.

"Gesundheit," Max said with a scowl. "I wasn't joking."

"Neither was I. It is too bad you don't speak German. You'll have to improvise, Major. Being a marine, I suspect you know how to do that. This is Upton, out," the Colonel said and Max's viewer went blank.

"What a bunch of sanctimonious assholes," Max muttered as he started to penetrate Earth's atmosphere. The automatic guidance took over and Max just sat back and enjoyed the ride. Whoever programmed the mono-system in the Twilight did a hell of a job. It glided down into the city and parked itself on the ground floor of a multi-storied hanger. The display screen popped up with a list of directions to Über Sauber and a contact name of Heinrich. Max followed the directions and within minutes of walking through the slums, he arrived at the business. The scent of urine, death, and decay in the slums was overridden by the powerful smell of bleach from the laundry, and Max was almost glad to have that stench burn into his nose instead of the other scent oozing into his skin.

Inside, Max saw a number of people milling about, most of them trying to look busy, and almost all of them doing a very non-convincing job. The place seemed to be fairly well automated, and Max quickly surmised that while the machine was going through its cycle, there probably wasn't a whole lot of work to be done unless something went wrong with the machine itself. A few heads turned his way when he entered, most went back to minding the machines, but one man stepped forward.

"Kann Ich helfen Sie?" the man said, the words pouring out of his mouth so fast that Max barely understood what they were; not that he could translate them anyway.

"Heinrich," Max said plainly. He looked around casually, but kept his eyes sharp, continuously keeping track of the workers without really looking at them.

"Moment, bitte," the German said and wandered toward the back of the laundry. Max wasn't sure if he had just been insulted or not. He was thinking that he wasn't, but it was hard to understand the words exactly and he kept translating them into English as best he could. "Moment" seemed pretty self-explanatory, but "bitte" sounded too close to "bitch" for Max's taste. He let it slide and waited.

The first German came back with another man, standing about 6 feet tall with a good build on him. He was wiping his hands off on a towel tucked into his belt. He reminded Max more of a waiter than a laundry worker.

"Gutten Tag, mein Herr. Ich bin Heinrich," the new German said and extended his hand to shake.

"I'm Morgan," Max said clearly as he took Heinrich's hand. The Germans exchanged a quick glance at each other and looked back at Max. Max with drew his hand after a firm shake. "Du sprechst nicht Deutsch?" Heinrich said slowly and clearly. He recognized it from Upton saying it earlier, he was pretty sure that "nicht" was night and he knew that Deutsch was the German word for German.

"I don't speak German," Max said after a moment's pause. Heinrich and the first German exchanged another quick look and Heinrich motioned to the back with his head. Heinrich looked back at Max and clasped his hand to Max's shoulder.

"Do not vorry, mein Ionian freund. Ve vill tell you vhat you need zu know," Heinrich said in his thick accent. A smile crossed his face and then it quickly faded. "Aber, time ist short, zo ve must be quick. Kommen Sie mitt," Heinrich said and turned to go in the back. Max followed and they got to a small room in the back of the laundry that appeared to be a small office. There was an actual television set up with a disk reader. Max saw the first German fire it up and move a chair a few feet from the small screen.

"Bitte," he said, gesturing to Max and then to the chair.

Max sat in the chair and Heinrich shut the door behind him. The screen on the TV went to a 4-panel gray-tone with a dialing count down in the center. Max watched the 5, 4, 3, and 2 all disappear and the screen faded to black.

"Welkommen!" a voice said in a friendly manner. The word "Welcome!" came across the still-black screen in all white letters. "Das ist ein Deutsche Lection für das Aulander," the voice said. The words "This is a German lesson for the foreigner," faded into view and "Welcome!" faded out.

"Papieren, bitte," the voice said again. "Papers please" flashed up on the screen. It showed a little play-acting between a man in a flannel shirt and a man in what looked like a police uniform. The man in the flannel produced what looked like a passport and handed it to the officer. The scene faded to black.

"Wo bist du? Ich bin John," the voice said again. The voice was beginning to get on Max's nerves, but this was at least a little entertaining. It reminded him of the typical infomercial voice actor. The words "Who are you? I am John," flashed up on the screen. Again, there was a little play-acting between the man in the flannel and the cop. The cop asked, the man answered. Max was taking careful mental notes and trying to mouth the words.

"Was bist du machen? Ich bin hier zu arbeit," the voice said again. "What are you doing? I am here to work." flashed up on the screen. The scene was acted out, with the officer becoming more direct and threatening and the man in the flannel backing off a little. The picture faded to black.