Matt & Michelle 1: The Fugitive Heir (19 page)

“Yeah, I will. I’m gonna beat you to death, boy.” Hector balled his fists and raised them into a proper boxing stance. His gaze locked on my jaw and his eyes gleaming with anticipation, Hector took a step toward me.

I pulled the taser from my pocket and shot him. Hector’s eyes widened, then the dart hit him in the chest. He convulsed once and then collapsed to the ground.

Pocketing the taser, I turned around and grinned at Michelle. Her fist hit me square under the jaw. “Don’t you
ever
do something like that again! God, Matt, I thought you’d lost your mind.”

“Ouch.” I rubbed my jaw. “I’m sorry, Michelle. I just snapped. When I realized it was working—that Hector wasn’t shooting me—I ran with it. I’d have told you if I could.”

“Idiot.” Michelle bent over her pad, scrolling around the sector map. “You took Hector out, hero, you get to carry him.”

“Let’s just leave him where he is.”

“So he can chase after us when he recovers from the shock?” Michelle pointed down a side corridor. “No thank you.”

“You mean he won’t be out for hours?”

“Try five minutes, Matt. GenCo makes tasers, why don’t you know that?”

I groaned lifting Hector and throwing him over my shoulder. Staggering after Michelle, I said, “Tasers never interested me. Uh, where are we taking him?”

“There’s a security door down here—high level access is required to open it from either side.” Michelle flashed a predatory smile over her shoulder. “Unless Hector has an ID chip we don’t know about, he’ll be trapped.”

“Who will be trapped?” Greg’s voice sounded from the comm.

“Weren’t you listening, Greg?”

“Sorry, had to slip out for a minute. Security just brought John to HR and Nora wanted to try putting the fear of God in him before he saw me, too.”

I filled Greg in as Michelle waved her hand before a reader. The security door beside it slid open. I dropped Hector inside the door and took his blaster. Michelle shut the door and we started back to the main corridor.

“Did that work? Is John talking?” Michelle asked.

“Not quite yet, but Nora’s working him over good. Oh, she just waved me in. I’m muting the comm but can still hear you.” With a click, the comm went silent.

“Do you think they’re going to get anything from him?” Michelle asked as we resumed our walk toward ship maintenance.

“Maybe. I think John is good at hacking computers, but he’s no criminal mastermind.”

We walked in silence for a while before Michelle spoke again. “So, stun or kill?”

“Huh?”

“Hector’s blaster. Is it set to stun or kill?” Michelle affected a casual tone, but I detected plenty of underlying tension.

I looked behind us and, seeing we were alone in the corridor, pulled out the blaster. “Let’s see… It’s set to kill.”

“Apparently God
still
watches out for fools—that’s good to know.” Michelle held out her hand. “Give. I’m a better shot than you.”

“True.” I put the gun in her hand. “You ought to give me the stun stick, then.”

Michelle nodded, let the stick drop out of her sleeve, and offered it to me stun end first.

“It
is
turned off, isn’t it?” I smiled, taking the stick without waiting for an answer.

Five minutes later, we crossed into ship maintenance. My heart beat faster. A few more minutes and we would stand before the door. What, besides my parents, lay beyond it?

“Greg, this is Matt.” I spoke into the comm. “We’re in ship maintenance now. The door is nearby. If you’ve got anything for us, share it now.”

The comm clicked and we heard sounds from Nora’s office. “John claims he doesn’t know much. He says he gave himself the extra permission because he could, but he doesn’t know what it does.”

“Do you and Nora believe him?” Michelle asked.

Greg sighed, “Yeah, we do. John’s one of those stupid smart kids. You know the type.”

Michelle turned a brief glare on me. “Far too well.”

“He’s in way over his head. He gets his orders from Cummings and the system traffic control manager, Arthur Jewel. We’re checking on him, now,” Greg said. In the background, I heard Nora say something to Greg. “Hang on, Nora wants the comm.”

Nora’s voice came on. “I think we’ve got everything we’re going to get from John, but he did have one last interesting bit of information. There’s someone else involved in this who isn’t from Pegasus Station. John has no idea who the person is, just that they have every permission imaginable, including a couple John can’t trace.”

“You figure that’s the person in charge?” I asked.

“Either that or they report to the person in charge. The thing is, John thinks that person is on station right now.” Nora took a deep breath. “Matt, I know you’re afraid something bad will happen if we call security, and you may be right. But once you go through that door, I’m giving you thirty minutes to come back out then I’m calling security.”

I opened my mouth to protest but Michelle spoke faster. “I agree with Nora. If we can’t get in and out in that time, we’re going to need some serious help.”

I closed my mouth and nodded. Then we rounded a corner and stood before the door. I waved my hand across the reader. With a soft whoosh, the door slid open.

“Nora, start your timer,” Michelle said. “We’re going in.”

Michelle and I stepped through the door and into…a simple storage area. The room was maybe five meters wide and seven deep, with crates stacked against the right and left walls. A few more crates were scattered in the middle of the floor. And that was it.

Michelle poked me in the back. “Don’t just stand in the doorway, Matt. Go in so I can shut the door.”

I did as she asked and heard the door quietly whoosh shut behind me. My face obviously gave my thoughts away. Michelle came around in front of me and took my hands in hers.

“Nora’s timer is running, babe. If you don’t want station security crashing our party before it begins, we’ve got to get started.” She released one hand and turned, letting her gaze sweep the room. “I wonder where it is.”

“Where
what
is?” Annoyance or despair—maybe both—crept into my voice. “There’s nothing here, Michelle.”

“Were you expecting a big, blinking arrow saying
‘This way to Matt’s parents’
?” Michelle let go of my hand and walked to the back wall. “Cummings and Morgan spent hours behind this door and I doubt they whiled away the time stacking boxes. Look for hidden controls or doors or both.”

Michelle ran her hands over the back wall, staring at it from different angles. After a few seconds, she looked over her shoulder at me. “It’s a big room, Matt, I could use some help with this.”

I gave myself a shake and joined my wife at the back wall. “You’ve got more training in this stuff than me, Michelle. What should I look for?”

“Minor differences in coloration, narrow lines indicating seams, fingertip-sized shiny spots, that sort of thing. Check everything from multiple angles. Differences in reflection show up better that way.” She continued running her hands over the wall while instructing me. “You might pick up a seam by touch, too.”

I mimicked her techniques. “What about the crates. Could what we’re looking for be inside one of them?”

“It’s possible, but if anyone unauthorized ever did get in here—a thief or customs inspector, say—they’d check the boxes and ignore the walls.”

“All right, that makes-”

With a gentle jerk, the room began moving down.

“What did you do?” Michelle and I both said to each other.

Our gazes locked for a second. Michelle recovered first. “We’ve got to hide!”

“Check the crates.” I ran to the closest one. “Maybe some of them are empty.”

The few crates scattered around the floor had packing material up to their lids. I hopped on the row of boxes to the right and Michelle took the ones to the left. How long did we have before the room stopped moving? My parental pointings never really pointed down, so it couldn’t be long. I threw open the lid to the first crate. Packing material again.

“I’ve got an empty one over here, Matt.”

I leapt down and dashed across the room as Michelle climbed into the crate. I bounded up and climbed in next to her. The fit was tight but I knew we’d manage. I squatted, pulling the lid down on top of us. Just after the lid closed over us, the room stopped moving.

Seconds later, footsteps echoed in the small room. Whoever was out there walked across to the wall we’d been examining. A click sounded. A few seconds later the room started up. Another click sounded, then the footsteps headed back toward the door.

Suddenly, Michelle stood and threw back the crate’s lid. I hastily stood next to her. An extremely surprised, muscular man in his late thirties stared at us. More accurately, he stared at the blaster Michelle aimed at him.

“Federation Bureau of Investigation, Mr. Morgan.” The blaster and her businesslike tone sold her bluff far better than her appearance did. “Down on the floor.
Now!”

Morgan crowded closer to the door. With the room still moving up, I don’t know what he hoped to accomplish with that. Michelle moved her aim slightly and fired. The blaster bolt scorched the floor between Morgan’s feet.

“The next one burns your leg, Mr. Morgan.”

Eyes bugging out, Morgan dropped to the floor.

“Agent Atwood, restrain the prisoner.”

I climbed out of the crate, careful not to jostle Michelle or get in her line of fire. Jumping to the floor, I removed the belt to my coveralls and pulled out the stun stick. Waving the stick before Morgan’s eyes, I circled behind him. “If you try anything, Morgan, I’ll ram this stick down your pants and leave it on until its charge drains out. Now, put your hands behind your back.”

With another gentle jerk, the room finished its ascent. I tucked the stun stick under my arm and wrapped the belt around Morgan’s right wrist. With considerable strength, Morgan pulled his right arm over his head, jerking me off balance. The stun stick fell to the floor as I tottered. Morgan rolled over and kicked me in the chest. He grabbed the stun stick as I fell backward. Staying on the floor, Morgan jabbed the now-humming stun stick at me.

Crack! Crack!
Morgan writhed as two blaster shots hit him in the back. The stun stick rolled from his grasp and I kicked it across the room. With a sigh of escaping breath, Morgan settled onto the floor.

“Are you okay, Matt?” Michelle still stood in the crate, the blaster trained on the still form of Morgan.

“Yeah, I’m fine.” I fetched the stun stick, never taking my eye from Morgan.

Keeping the blaster ready, Michelle climbed one-handed from the crate. “Can you help me down, honey?”

I lifted Michelle down and together we approached Morgan. Keying the stun stick on, I touched Morgan’s leg. It jerked, but nothing else happened. Cautiously, I checked his throat for a pulse, finding nothing.

“I think he’s dead, Michelle.”

“Okay.” Michelle pocketed the blaster and returned to the back wall.

“How are you doing? I mean, I know what shooting Paco did to me.”

“I’m okay to keep going, if that’s what you mean.” Michelle began pushing spots all around the back wall. “I’ll let it bother me once this is over.”

A click sounded beneath Michelle’s fingers and a small panel popped open in the back wall. She pulled it open, revealing a button and another chip reader.

“Before we do anything else, shouldn’t we hide Morgan’s body?” I asked.

Michelle nodded and we spent the next several minutes wrestling the body into the empty crate. Then Michelle returned to studying the panel.

“Why don’t you push the button?”

Michelle sighed. “We’ve got two controls. I don’t know whether we use both in a particular order or if one is a decoy. Either way, I bet doing it wrong sets off an alarm somewhere.”

I joined her, studying the panel. “I bet it’s the chip reader then the button. Or just the chip reader. But the chip reader should be first because it tells the system you’re authorized to use it.”

“That makes as much sense as anything.” Michelle waved her hand before the reader. Nothing happened. She pressed the button.

With a gentle jerk, the room began descending.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

A Big Surprise

I stared at the door, trying to imagine what I’d see when it opened. Maybe a small apartment with an attached workshop so Dad could work for his captors? Maybe prison cells and a torture chamber?

Michelle pressed up against the wall to the left of the door. She pointed to the space on the other side of the door. “We don’t know what we’re going to find down there, Matt, so get out of sight.”

With a nod, I abandoned my speculation and mirrored her position. Michelle drew her blaster, holding it up and ready. I did the same with my taser.

“The first thing we do when the door opens is lean back from the wall and take a look.” Michelle’s intense gaze caught my eyes. “Don’t put your head in front of the opening until we’ve seen what we can from both angles. Okay?”

“Got it.”

The room stopped moving. With a gentle whoosh, the door slid open, letting in unexpected sounds and smells. Men called to one another, the echoes indicating a vast open area. Machinery thrummed and whined and hammered. The odor of lubrication and fuel and ozone tingled in our noses.

“What the hell?” I whispered, leaning toward the door to find out what lay beyond.

“Matt,” Michelle hissed. “Remember what I said?”

With chagrin, I nodded and leaned back from the wall. The angle cut off two thirds of the view through the door and what little I could see wasn’t interesting. “I’ve got a wall two meters to the left of the door. What about you?”

“I’ve got…a lot more than that.” Michelle blinked wide eyes a couple of times. “I think it’s safe to risk a short look out of the door.”

I looked through the door and immediately understood Michelle’s reaction. The chamber beyond the door was huge, at least three hundred meters long and another hundred meters deep. Our door was tucked into a dark corner, accessible by a catwalk. Hundreds of men swarmed on the floor far below us. Machinery of all shapes and sizes lined the walls, with more rolled out into position on the floor.