Hello all. I used to write when I was younger, now that I am older and a bit functionally disabled it is much harder. However I've think anyone could jump off from this one. Hold a sec it has a pretty picture.
And here goes...
***
Chapter 1: Cassandra Complex
God loves everyone equally, which is to say it is an expression of love most, if not all men are incapable of understanding. The Living God's love is for every particle of every being and every bit of knowledge held within. Naked we are exposed. Mankind turned the satellites back on themselves and I'm fearful. Fate is murder. Fate is burnt. Calliope is dead. - Jonathan Seal's Manifesto, the Duck Hunter's Papers Ch. 3 Lines 8-11.
From overhead inside a skyscr on the 160th floor oozing black poured through a doorway into a sea of red. Half the hostages were gone now and the blood was so thick the floor was damp. Jon was standing holding his own daughter, 17 year old Raegan Seal, and the order was to open fire as soon as the situation went dynamic, regardless of the girl.
“Drop the girl.”
“This world doesn't matter, you're a killer. You've got snipers to do that. I ain't -”
“Drop the girl for brains or we drop you!”
“Pallum, they will end you!” Jon said.
To the assault team's astonishment a single detective clad in a black coat created a wall between the hostages, the officers, and the gunman. His weapon trained on Mr. Seal he was – half a glass of whiskey in and at the moment desperately trying to think up any relevant religious quotations that might calm Jon down.
“Jesus Jon that's your daughter!” screamed Detective Pallum.
“God only likes the hot and cold man. He spits out the lukewarm!” Said Jon, tensing his hand.
With a silent red puff Jon's face exploded. His expression looked like one of dead horror for seconds as his jaw detached from the left side. When a second round impacted his head the skull completely shattered opening at the nasal cavity, killing him instantly. He couldn't even pull the trigger. His daughter screamed. Her hot burning red eyes, and flashes of their life, and suddenly a bright light of her own ran through her. Slowly and deliberately she knelt down next to his body, weapon still pressed at her cheek. The assault team quickly spirited her into a waiting car. And with that Raegan was really completely alone for the first time.
“Pallum you're a eating son of a , what did you do, take the stairs?”
“Oh the testosterone club can tell us detectives what to do now?”
“Respectfully, sir, you could have used backup.”
“Clear the crime scene you Ape.”
Pallum dusted his coat off and looked for blood residue. He stood in the same stance, in the same position as he had when he had fired at the suspect. Forensics need but microscan the room and everything would be intact. A lifescan back at the station would record the incident into computer memory, mostly for things like aural ballistics and a height map production of the scene, but chiefly the bits from the officer's biomonitors, the camera, the pulse sensor, and the EEG.
Hours later Raegan sits in a quiet room at the police station. A door opens. A man walks in, his name tag reads Inq. Spaatz. An inquisitor? Raegan could not believe it. The military now, she thought. She recognized what her father is, or she guessed, 'had been'. But if his ghost could speak the truth, what her father would tell would be so different than what she knew.
Chapter Two: Nicknames.
"I think we're screwed." He said, unbuckling his belt and heading into the cargo bay.
"They just started the scan, it takes at least 8 seconds."
"You're in a type si-"
"The Magic School Bus" The pilot countered."
"I'm sorry you're in a 'yello-"
The engine cowling snapped open and the battery retainers dumped. A huge burst of speed accompanied by the whine of finely tuned motors both pinned the men to their seat, and caused a Pavlovian response to start sweating. High G maneuvers in space aren't necessarily a thing a gravity dampened ship would need a five point harness for. This pilot had one. This pilot also had high grade alcohol loaded throughout the ship. Including in his cup holder, and about 2 quarts in a camping water-pack in the mini fridge on the second jumpseat.
"Just squeeze her through." The ship blasted past the speeding klaxons in a blink, their Doppler return sounding something like a distressed cat. Then, full engines reverse. Ice slid off in sheets. Forward thrusting jets extended out about 20 feet, casually frosting a few windows at the rear of the bay. Upside down now with his landing gear extended, the pilot descended onto Dock 43. The radio controller boomed over the intercom during the flyby, so a signature dusting of jet blast was sent his way while the ship positioned in for landing.
A gray and almost lifeless man appeared from behind a cargo door and crouched down into the cockpit.
"Cargo's shifted a bit." The lookout said.
"That's to be expected with some chop." The pilot returned.
"Right, that was 'some chop' and, to be honest, I'm really feeling like a mino-"
"Get that off this boat as fast as you can." Said the pilot.
"No, what I'm saying is you'r-"
"Fill this."
The pilot handed the lookout a black bag, inside were nearly a dozen flasks.
"My cut." He grumbled.
"You know you're some piece of work Hash. I knew when Galahad sent me to look after our shipment you'd pull some fancy flying and almost get us killed.” Said the lookout.
You're a washed up, ex-militant jingoist piece of trash." He added.
"Hey if I am, so is Galahad, right? So watch your damned mouth!" The pilot snapped.
"Yeah well, I'll be telling my boss."
"Said the ." Hash retorted.
Finally some action, he thought as an expertly honed net cutter approached the tip of his nose.
"I'll kill you, if I want, and the boss will cover it. Clean it up for me. Make me look the victim in court." Said the lookout.
"You wouldn't dare." Said Hash.
As calmly as Hash spoke, he could still hear Galahad's men moving about inside the back of the ship. They were ready to unload the cargo. The lookout will have to give them the all clear. The lookout is essential to the mission. Or was he? Besides Hash was a little drunk, always a setback in a fight. He needed a handicap. He reached down towards a button next to the gear indicator on his flight computer marked "Hydro Fluid Release". He pressed it.
Suddenly the ship dropped ten feet. The gear rapidly expelled hot air and boiling fluid, then smashed it's full weight against the trusses. In the back there was distinct swearing.
After a moment or so the cargo door opened and Hash had some bad news, the lookout had been killed in the gear malfunction. Smashed his face against a bottle resting on the console.
"May the worms make dirt." He said, then turned to leave.
"Hey, we're going to need that body, his parents will want to have him home." Said a dock worker.
"We send all buried from this war home - with money." Said another.
"Well that's great. He's a hero." Hash responded.
"Oh, and he said leave a barrel in here for me, just before he died."
The cargo hatch slammed and secured. The pilot, calm, walked out toward the back.
“Hey why do they call you Commander ShoeHash?”
An echo of a voice returned as it strode out of range, “Because when I used to smuggle I used to hide weeds in my shoe. They'd be compacted into foot shaped bricks so the guys started calling the compressed and blackened weeds shoe hash.”
As Hash left the platform the man stood for a bit completely perplexed.
“Did you tell him we had injuries from the Hydraulic fluid?” A dockworker asked.
“Yeah, I told him 'You've got injuries here man' and he just responded with how he got his stupid nickname.” Said the other.
“Guy's drunk and probably on the way out.”
“Looks like it to me,” commented the first dockworker, still perplexed.
Chapter 3: T.R.U.S.T. (telepathy restricted under specific testing)
“Let me ask you about your youth.”
“Dad's dead now. Mom's gone. Hey, where are the therapists?
Raegan began to strike the nano fibers in the room. Causing sensors to spike and flicker the lights.
“I'm 16 and I don't know how to cope with the fact I'm playing nice with the guys who killed my father!”
Raegan had not stopped crying since her father died six hours ago. She had been in a windowless room with only a standard outdoor scene to look at for about five of those hours. It had a red barn, a fence, and some cow that roamed around in a loop. For some reason it made her sad.
“Your father was about to kill you.” Said Inquisitor Spaatz.
“Oh yeah right, after your ships tried to gun him down, killing all those people!”
Inquisitor Spaatz sat up and looked directly at Raegan. “There was no other ship. Just a police rescue ship. We never fire on civilians. Your father killed those people.”
Raegan began to tuck her legs into her chest. The lights flickered on their own.
“You're – lying?” Raegan was puzzled. “Why?”
“How does it affect you? Look at yourself on the monitor.”
Raegan looked, coughed, sniffled, and coughed again.
“That's me, talking. Was that earlier?” Raegan asked.
“Let's turn on the audio.” Inquisitor Spaatz suggested.
Raegan was stunned. The digi-mesh boomed. She was confessing to the murders of everyone in that building, including her mother and father. At first she thought they were just changing the audio, but were those her lips in sync?
“You replaced the audio? Wha- What? What are you doing?”
Inquisitor Spaatz looked two feet taller with deep black eyes now. 'It was just something I had to accept', Raegan spoke like a zombie. She began to hear music. It was airy, like a harp or – more. She strove to listen. It was beautiful. She began to cry happy tears. It was as if she could see something, but she didn't know what it was. Then, like a hard slap with a dead fist – a gunshot.
An officer lay dead in the middle of the room.
“Raegan!” Someone said. “Dive!”
At that very instant a laser cut through the wall severing her left hand. Before Raegan could scream she blacked out and collapsed through a glass fixture in the floor. But the police station sounded like a war zone now. Gunfire in the halls, a trained listener could tell you where the enemy was in the building from the reports of each. Pallum stood beside a corner at a ninety degree to a hallway, and was taking taking pot shots at three men standing up over a wall. Two other detectives, Uller and Clerk, were unarmed and unfortunately, the last ones alive in the police station. Their radios crackled to life.
“All open flights, all open flights. This is the uh Papa Sierra over on Sydney Johnson Platz., requesting all available flights inbound for evacuations.”
“ Anyone tell me what's happening there?”
“Uh – camera footage was released of uh a police drone killing those hostages.”
“Can someone uh, tell me the status of the Papa Sierra there?”
“It's burning to the ground.”
“Confirm multiple fires is EMS is in route.”
“Uh consider uh, EMS delayed.”
“ETA on EMS?”
“Consider that a permanent uh – delay.”
Hash sat back in his cockpit listening to chatter. Papa Sierra was simple, Police Station. Without saying it they were referring to a sudden civilian attack on the police force here in -
“God damnit, I never know where the I am.” Said Hash, popping up a starmap and violently flinging e-paper around.
“Got to get off this rock.” He said.
He glanced out his window briefly and saw an image of the most beautiful Raven. He thought of nothing in particular.
“Don't stare, I'll go.” Hash mumbled, and boosted his craft out of planet-side repair base and towards the police headquarters.
And here goes...
***
Chapter 1: Cassandra Complex
God loves everyone equally, which is to say it is an expression of love most, if not all men are incapable of understanding. The Living God's love is for every particle of every being and every bit of knowledge held within. Naked we are exposed. Mankind turned the satellites back on themselves and I'm fearful. Fate is murder. Fate is burnt. Calliope is dead. - Jonathan Seal's Manifesto, the Duck Hunter's Papers Ch. 3 Lines 8-11.
From overhead inside a skyscr on the 160th floor oozing black poured through a doorway into a sea of red. Half the hostages were gone now and the blood was so thick the floor was damp. Jon was standing holding his own daughter, 17 year old Raegan Seal, and the order was to open fire as soon as the situation went dynamic, regardless of the girl.
“Drop the girl.”
“This world doesn't matter, you're a killer. You've got snipers to do that. I ain't -”
“Drop the girl for brains or we drop you!”
“Pallum, they will end you!” Jon said.
To the assault team's astonishment a single detective clad in a black coat created a wall between the hostages, the officers, and the gunman. His weapon trained on Mr. Seal he was – half a glass of whiskey in and at the moment desperately trying to think up any relevant religious quotations that might calm Jon down.
“Jesus Jon that's your daughter!” screamed Detective Pallum.
“God only likes the hot and cold man. He spits out the lukewarm!” Said Jon, tensing his hand.
With a silent red puff Jon's face exploded. His expression looked like one of dead horror for seconds as his jaw detached from the left side. When a second round impacted his head the skull completely shattered opening at the nasal cavity, killing him instantly. He couldn't even pull the trigger. His daughter screamed. Her hot burning red eyes, and flashes of their life, and suddenly a bright light of her own ran through her. Slowly and deliberately she knelt down next to his body, weapon still pressed at her cheek. The assault team quickly spirited her into a waiting car. And with that Raegan was really completely alone for the first time.
“Pallum you're a eating son of a , what did you do, take the stairs?”
“Oh the testosterone club can tell us detectives what to do now?”
“Respectfully, sir, you could have used backup.”
“Clear the crime scene you Ape.”
Pallum dusted his coat off and looked for blood residue. He stood in the same stance, in the same position as he had when he had fired at the suspect. Forensics need but microscan the room and everything would be intact. A lifescan back at the station would record the incident into computer memory, mostly for things like aural ballistics and a height map production of the scene, but chiefly the bits from the officer's biomonitors, the camera, the pulse sensor, and the EEG.
Hours later Raegan sits in a quiet room at the police station. A door opens. A man walks in, his name tag reads Inq. Spaatz. An inquisitor? Raegan could not believe it. The military now, she thought. She recognized what her father is, or she guessed, 'had been'. But if his ghost could speak the truth, what her father would tell would be so different than what she knew.
Chapter Two: Nicknames.
"I think we're screwed." He said, unbuckling his belt and heading into the cargo bay.
"They just started the scan, it takes at least 8 seconds."
"You're in a type si-"
"The Magic School Bus" The pilot countered."
"I'm sorry you're in a 'yello-"
The engine cowling snapped open and the battery retainers dumped. A huge burst of speed accompanied by the whine of finely tuned motors both pinned the men to their seat, and caused a Pavlovian response to start sweating. High G maneuvers in space aren't necessarily a thing a gravity dampened ship would need a five point harness for. This pilot had one. This pilot also had high grade alcohol loaded throughout the ship. Including in his cup holder, and about 2 quarts in a camping water-pack in the mini fridge on the second jumpseat.
"Just squeeze her through." The ship blasted past the speeding klaxons in a blink, their Doppler return sounding something like a distressed cat. Then, full engines reverse. Ice slid off in sheets. Forward thrusting jets extended out about 20 feet, casually frosting a few windows at the rear of the bay. Upside down now with his landing gear extended, the pilot descended onto Dock 43. The radio controller boomed over the intercom during the flyby, so a signature dusting of jet blast was sent his way while the ship positioned in for landing.
A gray and almost lifeless man appeared from behind a cargo door and crouched down into the cockpit.
"Cargo's shifted a bit." The lookout said.
"That's to be expected with some chop." The pilot returned.
"Right, that was 'some chop' and, to be honest, I'm really feeling like a mino-"
"Get that off this boat as fast as you can." Said the pilot.
"No, what I'm saying is you'r-"
"Fill this."
The pilot handed the lookout a black bag, inside were nearly a dozen flasks.
"My cut." He grumbled.
"You know you're some piece of work Hash. I knew when Galahad sent me to look after our shipment you'd pull some fancy flying and almost get us killed.” Said the lookout.
You're a washed up, ex-militant jingoist piece of trash." He added.
"Hey if I am, so is Galahad, right? So watch your damned mouth!" The pilot snapped.
"Yeah well, I'll be telling my boss."
"Said the ." Hash retorted.
Finally some action, he thought as an expertly honed net cutter approached the tip of his nose.
"I'll kill you, if I want, and the boss will cover it. Clean it up for me. Make me look the victim in court." Said the lookout.
"You wouldn't dare." Said Hash.
As calmly as Hash spoke, he could still hear Galahad's men moving about inside the back of the ship. They were ready to unload the cargo. The lookout will have to give them the all clear. The lookout is essential to the mission. Or was he? Besides Hash was a little drunk, always a setback in a fight. He needed a handicap. He reached down towards a button next to the gear indicator on his flight computer marked "Hydro Fluid Release". He pressed it.
Suddenly the ship dropped ten feet. The gear rapidly expelled hot air and boiling fluid, then smashed it's full weight against the trusses. In the back there was distinct swearing.
After a moment or so the cargo door opened and Hash had some bad news, the lookout had been killed in the gear malfunction. Smashed his face against a bottle resting on the console.
"May the worms make dirt." He said, then turned to leave.
"Hey, we're going to need that body, his parents will want to have him home." Said a dock worker.
"We send all buried from this war home - with money." Said another.
"Well that's great. He's a hero." Hash responded.
"Oh, and he said leave a barrel in here for me, just before he died."
The cargo hatch slammed and secured. The pilot, calm, walked out toward the back.
“Hey why do they call you Commander ShoeHash?”
An echo of a voice returned as it strode out of range, “Because when I used to smuggle I used to hide weeds in my shoe. They'd be compacted into foot shaped bricks so the guys started calling the compressed and blackened weeds shoe hash.”
As Hash left the platform the man stood for a bit completely perplexed.
“Did you tell him we had injuries from the Hydraulic fluid?” A dockworker asked.
“Yeah, I told him 'You've got injuries here man' and he just responded with how he got his stupid nickname.” Said the other.
“Guy's drunk and probably on the way out.”
“Looks like it to me,” commented the first dockworker, still perplexed.
Chapter 3: T.R.U.S.T. (telepathy restricted under specific testing)
“Let me ask you about your youth.”
“Dad's dead now. Mom's gone. Hey, where are the therapists?
Raegan began to strike the nano fibers in the room. Causing sensors to spike and flicker the lights.
“I'm 16 and I don't know how to cope with the fact I'm playing nice with the guys who killed my father!”
Raegan had not stopped crying since her father died six hours ago. She had been in a windowless room with only a standard outdoor scene to look at for about five of those hours. It had a red barn, a fence, and some cow that roamed around in a loop. For some reason it made her sad.
“Your father was about to kill you.” Said Inquisitor Spaatz.
“Oh yeah right, after your ships tried to gun him down, killing all those people!”
Inquisitor Spaatz sat up and looked directly at Raegan. “There was no other ship. Just a police rescue ship. We never fire on civilians. Your father killed those people.”
Raegan began to tuck her legs into her chest. The lights flickered on their own.
“You're – lying?” Raegan was puzzled. “Why?”
“How does it affect you? Look at yourself on the monitor.”
Raegan looked, coughed, sniffled, and coughed again.
“That's me, talking. Was that earlier?” Raegan asked.
“Let's turn on the audio.” Inquisitor Spaatz suggested.
Raegan was stunned. The digi-mesh boomed. She was confessing to the murders of everyone in that building, including her mother and father. At first she thought they were just changing the audio, but were those her lips in sync?
“You replaced the audio? Wha- What? What are you doing?”
Inquisitor Spaatz looked two feet taller with deep black eyes now. 'It was just something I had to accept', Raegan spoke like a zombie. She began to hear music. It was airy, like a harp or – more. She strove to listen. It was beautiful. She began to cry happy tears. It was as if she could see something, but she didn't know what it was. Then, like a hard slap with a dead fist – a gunshot.
An officer lay dead in the middle of the room.
“Raegan!” Someone said. “Dive!”
At that very instant a laser cut through the wall severing her left hand. Before Raegan could scream she blacked out and collapsed through a glass fixture in the floor. But the police station sounded like a war zone now. Gunfire in the halls, a trained listener could tell you where the enemy was in the building from the reports of each. Pallum stood beside a corner at a ninety degree to a hallway, and was taking taking pot shots at three men standing up over a wall. Two other detectives, Uller and Clerk, were unarmed and unfortunately, the last ones alive in the police station. Their radios crackled to life.
“All open flights, all open flights. This is the uh Papa Sierra over on Sydney Johnson Platz., requesting all available flights inbound for evacuations.”
“ Anyone tell me what's happening there?”
“Uh – camera footage was released of uh a police drone killing those hostages.”
“Can someone uh, tell me the status of the Papa Sierra there?”
“It's burning to the ground.”
“Confirm multiple fires is EMS is in route.”
“Uh consider uh, EMS delayed.”
“ETA on EMS?”
“Consider that a permanent uh – delay.”
Hash sat back in his cockpit listening to chatter. Papa Sierra was simple, Police Station. Without saying it they were referring to a sudden civilian attack on the police force here in -
“God damnit, I never know where the I am.” Said Hash, popping up a starmap and violently flinging e-paper around.
“Got to get off this rock.” He said.
He glanced out his window briefly and saw an image of the most beautiful Raven. He thought of nothing in particular.
“Don't stare, I'll go.” Hash mumbled, and boosted his craft out of planet-side repair base and towards the police headquarters.
