Forbidden sanctuary, p.1
Forbidden Sanctuary, page 1
part #2 of Star Lawyers Series
Forbidden Sanctuary
Star Lawyers - Book 3
Tom Shepherd
Book Bag Press
Kansas City, MO / Tucson, AZ
.
Star Lawyers Book 3
Forbidden Sanctuary
Copyright © 2018 Tom Shepherd
All rights reserved.
Original cover art by Christian Kallias.
https://www.christiankallias.com/
One
Galactic Shelter Hotel
Deiro Yord
Capital of the Suryadivan Sacred Protectorate
Friday, 22 March 3104 TCE
Early Evening
Wrapped in a black robe with a hood, Naca Jen, or Night Storm in Terran Standard, stepped from a lift at the thirty-sixth floor of the Galactic Shelter Hotel. She listened for foot traffic before prowling the empty corridor to scan for signatures of ectothermic aliens.
Ectotherms—the cold-blooded races—need a constantly warm environment, so they often jack up the temperature in lodging spaces. Human-sized, cold-blooded creatures in a living space behind these walls would show as silhouettes moving within an elevated room temperature.
When she found the Dengathi, she intended to kill them all.
Naca Jen quickly located two adjoining suites, each with multiple bio signatures which displayed no thermic deviation. Suryadivans are warm blooded marsupials with gills, so these were not locals. She sharpened the sensor scan and verified their life signs as Dengathi, the cold-blooded killers she was hunting.
Night Storm jerked open the clasps and drew a pair of high-impact kinetic blasters from under her robe. Without bothering to unlock the suite, she shattered the door with two shots and marched inside.
Four Dengathi males—green-faced with large, protruding eyes, flat noses, and cheek gills—bent over a cluttered, improvised bomb-making workbench. Darkening mountains showed in the windows behind the mercenaries.
She killed them with four precise shots to the head. A fifth amphibian emerged from sleeping quarters, waving a Meklavite energy blaster. She dropped him with two rounds, one through each heart.
By now his neighbors had heard the shooting, and when she knocked down the connecting door and stepped aside, a hail of thermal rounds slammed into the wall behind her from the weapons of seven more mercenaries.
One of the bolder Dengathi stuck his head through the splintered doorway and reported the adjoining room was empty, except for dead comrades on the floor. Fire climbed the wall behind the bodies, ignited by hits from Dengathi blasters.
As they moved to secure their bomb makings, the door to the second suite exploded behind them. Naca Jen fell through and rolled across the floor. The dispatcher mercilessly fired into the crowd from the prone position. Dengathi dropped like shooting gallery targets. Two of them got off shots in shrieking confusion but missed.
When it was over, she scanned the thirty-sixth floor for any signs of stirring guests or rushing hotel staff. No movement within two hundred meters, horizontally. Some guests stirred above and below, probably frightened by the sounds of blaster fire. The Dengathi suite was silent, except for flames that licked the wall and ceiling in the adjoining room. Emergency responders would arrive shortly, but she was not finished here. Night Storm checked the walk-in closet to be sure there were no survivors. It was full of hanging work clothes and assorted weaponry, and against the far wall a young Dengathi cowered behind a pair of dark brown coveralls. He sobbed softly.
She spoke to him in Regalik, the primary Dengathi language. “Were these your kinsmen?”
“Nay, I am slave.”
“Tell the Lords who hired your masters—Night Storm did this.”
He nodded jerkily and wiped his face with the back of a gray-green hand, a gesture which crossed the wide gap between their species.
“Cover your eyes, close your gills,” she ordered. “I must discharge a substance that could injure you.”
He nodded again and did as told.
Before departing the scene of the crime, Naca Jen went to the first suite where the blaze had spread to the ceiling. She reached into her robe’s lining and withdrew a fire-suppressant aerosol. One quick spray froze the blaze. Satisfied the innocent hotel guests were safe and the guilty ones were dead, she tucked away the extinguisher and took out four small balls, tossing two into each suite. They exploded with a little pop and scattered white mist which quickly filled the rooms.
Listening, she heard roo-boo-roo-boo in the distance. She peered from the window at the late evening cityscape and saw throbbing lights flying low over the city, several avenues away.
She left the hotel without further incident and faded into the night before the first police skimmer arrived.
* * * *
Aboard the Patrick Henry, the Star Lawyers team gathered at the oblong table in the executive conference room. J.B. asked Mrs. León to call the roll, but she refused, insisting she could see everyone was present except Rosalie.
“She’s in bed,” Dorla said. “I gave her a cup of warm tea and toast, but she only took a sip of tea.”
“Chief León, is our disease prevention hardware working properly?” J.B. said. “Rosalie passed through the bio-filters after returning from the Gobikan, but she still got sick.”
“I checked out the health scanner after you returned from that embassy party,” Paco said. “All diagnostics check out perfectly.”
“Any reason to run a diagnostic after the party?” Tyler said.
“Yes, sir,” Paco smiled nervously. “Strange readings.”
“Like…?” Tyler made air circles with a hand.
“This is crazy, Boss, but you and your brother came back totally healthy. Totally healed is a better way to say it.”
“What are you telling us, Chief?” Tyler said.
Paco took a breath. “Makes no sense, but the bio-scan found no indication of previous injury or disease. Even the DNA markers for Bowman’s Flu—which your med records say you both caught as kids traveling with your father. All traces gone. The vestigial scarring from your encounter with the big crab?—gone.” He turned to the older Matthews brother. “Even the tattoo on your—”
“Gone,” J.B. said. “I knew that, Chief.”
“So, not a problem, right?” Tyler said. “The PH bio-filters and decontamination shower must be functioning at super-high efficiency.”
“You could say that. But here’s a piece of the health puzzle I can’t place.” Paco shook his head and continued. “You’re both about fourteen months younger than you oughta be.”
“Excuse me?” J.B. said.
“Most life forms have a bio-clock,” Chief León said. “Yours has been set back approximately one year and two months.”
“Did everybody come back from the party healed and younger?” Mr. Blue said. “I still have my—”
“See, that’s the crazy part. Only the Boss and J.B. had their bio-clocks reset. Inspector Platte, Yumiko-san, Rosalie, and Mr. Blue all returned unchanged.” Paco scratched his head and looked at Tyler. “Did you two drink some native hooch the others didn’t?”
“I sampled a lot of weird food and drinks.” Tyler shrugged. “Haven’t a clue.”
“This is fascinating, but we need to move on.” J.B. asked Dorla to galvanize her office staff to run a quick survey of departing and arriving starships. When she left the conference room, he continued. “Demarcus and I contacted the RPs about your bomb makers, but the duty officer said somebody already took them out.”
“Took them out, how?” Tyler said.
“Twelve Dengathi mercenaries were killed tonight in close fighting at the Galactic Shelter Hotel. Wasn’t a police raid. In fact, the killer whacked the last Frog before the Suryadivan cops arrived. One survivor—young Dengathi slave—described a black-haired female dispatcher, who identified herself as Night Storm.”
“Why did she spare the slave?” Mr. Blue said. “It seems inefficient to leave a witness.”
“Actually, it’s consistent with her values.” Tyler said.
“Values?” J.B. said.
Tyler nodded. “She killed slavers on Sedalia, now spares a slave on Suryadivan Prime.”
“Can’t say I fault her choice of targets,” Demarcus said. “But why did this Night Storm follow us from Sedalia?”
“She apparently was on Riley’s World before that,” Tyler said. “The only member of our team with connections to all three locations is Esteban, who’s as likely to employ a dispatcher as the Pope is to hire a hooker.”
“Bad analogy. Her Holiness is happily married,” J.B. said. “Ready with the police video, Demarcus?”
“I need to warn you, this isn’t video.” Inspector Platte tapped in a command. “Everybody, please stand up. The entry can make you dizzy.”
Rosalie appeared at the conference room door. Her eyes were clearer, and she had combed her hair. “May I watch with you?”
J.B. rubbed Rosalie’s shoulder gently. “Run the simulation.”
Everything around them—oblong table, plush chairs, and conference room walls—swirled briefly and morphed into a holographic replica of a suite at the Galactic Shelter. Tyler realized why J.B. sent the squeamish Dorla León to run an errand. Quick, fierce combat took place here recently. Heavy soot clung to the wall and ceiling near the hall doorway. A sheet of melted plastic dangled oddly away from the air vent, like loose skin with a charred underside.
The holography was so accurate they could smell smoke in the air. Thermal blaster hits pocked the ot her walls in a random distribution to suggest panicky firing. Several shots melted through the city view windows, and in the silence before anyone moved or spoke, Tyler heard wind whistling through the thumb-sized holes. Looking up, he found two punctures in the ceiling and wondered about collateral damage to guests snoozing peacefully above this war zone.
Four Dengathi lay near a table crowded with low-tech bomb-making materials. Triggering devices, blocks of explosives, and open tool boxes cluttered the tabletop. Demarcus checked out the operation and whistled.
“Enough bang to level half the city, if it went kaboom all at once.”
“I’m amazed the Frogs didn’t blow themselves up,” Tyler said They’re about the dumbest spacefaring species I’ve encountered.”
“Racist.” Rosalie frowned at him.
“Realist.”
“Can you taste the ash? The comprehensive hotel could have burned up. Or is it burned down?” Mr. Blue said in his odd, Quirt-Thymean phraseology. “Glad tidings the emergency squad quelled the fire in a timely manner.”
“Excuse me, Blue-san,” Yumiko said. “Fire squad not stop blaze. Look at black edges, marking its spread. See white residue? Someone spray fire with frost device. Stop heat instantly. Local Suryadivan fire fighters use chemicals, snuff out oxygen.”
“Check the bodies.” Demarcus knelt beside a victim. “Four killed by single headshots. She took out the fifth, over there, by two precise shots—one through each of his hearts.”
“All the targets were moving,” Tyler said. “My God…who is this dispatcher?”
Yumiko bowed slightly. “We track a grand master ninja.”
“Unlike Sedalia, the Frogs returned fire,” Demarcus said. “Panic shots. No evidence they hit anything except the wall and ceiling. Let’s check the next suite.”
They found seven more bodies scattered across the floor and a similar wall-ceiling pattern of wild shooting. This time, the Dengathi fired kinetic rounds that pierced the opposite side of the main room, easily explained by the blown-off door leading into the suite from the hallway.
“Night Storm slipped out the first entrance, scooted down the hall, and came at them through the back door. The remaining Frogs massed at opening to the other room, where their buddies took blaster rounds,” Demarcus said. “Caught them with backs turned. It was a turkey shoot. Oops…look here. She hit this amphib in the face. Poor dope tried to duck and she overcompensated, aiming for the head but—”
“Demarcus, please,” J.B. said. “We get it. Ragged hole between his cheekbones tells the story.”
“Just trying to be clinical,” he said briskly.
“What about forensics?” Tyler said. “Any DNA traces?”
Platte laughed. “Yeah, there’s DNA. Suryadivan police reported at least five million samples, over ten thousand sentient species.”
“Five million?” Tyler gawked.
“DNA bomb,” Yumiko said.
“A what?” Tyler said.
Yumiko explained. “Professional killers sometimes detonate bio-grenade to contaminate every surface with millions of DNA samples.”
Platte walked to the window and peered into the city at night. “No possible ID. If by some miracle the dispatcher’s DNA comes to light, he—make that she—can argue it was planted among millions of others.”
“Wicked but brilliant,” Suzie said.
“That must be what happened on Riley’s World,” Tyler said. “Dead Tsuchiya executives, too much DNA evidence.”
“How about external views of the hotel?” Tyler said.
“Public security devices were disabled for a sixteen-block radius,” Demarcus said. “Except for one standard surveillance cam.”
“Show us,” Tyler said.
The crime scene disappeared and they were once again at the oblong table of the staff conference room. This time, a small screen appeared over the table with identical projection on both sides. Everyone took their seats to watch as the two-dimensional camera caught street traffic and the occasional floater descending from higher lanes. No guests or visitors exited or entered the Galactic Shelter.
After about ten minutes of fast-forward, stop, fast forward again, J.B. called for a longer pause. “Zoom to the lighted transit platform across the street. Somebody has been standing there too long.”
Platte slowly maneuvered the image to center screen and magnified incrementally, maintaining the quality with each closer look. When the shadowy humanoid face raised to the light, all members of the Matthews family gasped.
“What the fuck,” Tyler said. “Julieta?”
“She’s supposed to be on Adao-2,” J.B. said. “Lox Aspi told Esteban she planned to disrupt the Sacred Hunt.”
“Apparently, she isn’t there anymore,” Suzie said. “That is not a hologram, and we have the only shape-shifter on the planet.”
“Run this on a loop,” Tyler said. “Go closer. Her lips are moving.”
“Is she speaking to an accomplice?” Mr. Blue said.
“No, she’s facing the camera,” Demarcus said. “She wanted it recorded.”
“I believe I can read her words,” Rosalie said. “I think she’s speaking a Mindorian dialect.”
“Naca Jen, kellit’ na alloyzu. Lox Aspi na greza Adao gak,” Suzie said in perfect Rampaki.
Rosalie translated. “‘I have information from Night Storm about Lox Aspi. Meet me on Sacred Adao.’”
“Let’s forget for a moment that setting foot on Adao is a death offense,” J.B. said. “Do you really believe Julieta anticipated we would find this silent movie, read her lips, and understand a dialect of Mindorian?”
“Yes,” Rosalie said.
Suzie nodded. “I caught every word.”
Mr. Blue concurred. “Her body language suggests direct, purposeful communication. Unless that is different among Terrans.”
“No, you got it,” Tyler said. “She’s talking to the camera.”
“Did Julieta say where we’re supposed to find her on a heavily forested planet larger than Terra?” J.B. said.
Rosalie bit her lip. “No…”
J.B. threw up his hands. “So, what’s the point?”
Rosalie said quietly, “She sent me the coordinates.”
“And you didn’t tell us until now?” J.B. snapped.
Rosalie flinched. “I didn’t know what it meant until now. The message gives a numerical sequence plus a date on the Terran calendar. It wasn’t signed.” She started to cry.
“It’s okay.” J.B. embraced his sister. “You did nothing wrong.”
She sniffled. “I like the gentle Bear better.”
“So, Cousin Julieta is the dispatcher?” Tyler said.
“Not necessarily,” J.B. said. “Julieta acquired information from Naca Jen about Lox Aspi.”
“Working with the dispatcher, or dodging the dispatcher?” Tyler said.
Mr. Blue said, “Or scouting for the dispatcher?”
Tyler turned to Platte. “Dee, what in the Universe is going on here?”
“Boss, I’ve been an investigator all my adult life.” Platte paused. “And I’ve never been this confused about a case before. If you told me the Easter Rabbit was a suspect, I’d drag his furry ass in for questioning.”
“Now we have two compelling reasons to visit Adao,” J.B. said. “To ring back Lox Aspi to exonerate Esteban, and to find out why Julieta is risking her life to stop the Hunt.”
“Here’s a third,” Tyler said. “I suspect Adao holds the secret behind the Suryadivan effort to shut down the Alpha Gate. We need evidence.”
“With no warrant to search their sacred planet.” J.B. sighed. “Well, there goes the rule of law.”
Tyler put a hand on his brother’s shoulder. “Jefferson said, ‘If a law is unjust, a man is not only right to disobey it, he is obligated to do so.’”
“Thomas Jefferson wasn’t Suryadivan.”
“Neither are we, Bro.”
Two
Tyler invoked his Dad-given authority to order an immediate departure. Instead of the much faster Patrick Henry, he decided to take the Sioux City, reasoning his scout ship threw a slender sensor shadow compared with its frigate-sized parent ship. To further obfuscate their intentions, J.B. suggested moving the PH from her temporary location at the public landing field near the center of Deiro Yord to Sweet Adventure Starship Safeport, a private, long-term hangar facility on the outskirts of the capital. Terran-speaking visitors irreverently tagged the sprawling starport Sweet Ass Field.
