Fallen Angels (John Hardesty Z04 Book 2) Read online

  FALLEN ANGELS

  Clay Moore

  Copyright © 2017 Clay Moore All rights reserved.

  ISBN: 1975626621 ISBN-13:978-1975626624

  Ian Fleming, inspiration Other works by Clay Moore Hardesty Logs Series Collision at Faraway Stealing Saturn

  X04 Missions Serie License Secured Fallen Angels

  CHAPTER ONE ALL GOOD THINGS...

  Doris stopped her sifting of the trash heap to look up at the sky. In Settlement, the township of Faraway, it was always cloudy. The big brain people explained it as part of the terraforming. She didn't know much about that. What she did know was that the sifting that she did of the trash heap was more productive than usual. That could be a good thing, or it could be a bad thing. For her, it was a good thing. For the population of the planet that was a bad thing. Something spooked the good citizens. They were leaving. When one leaves one throws away things one does not need.

  She felt the small drops of mist. She shrugged her shoulders and sealed her raincoat against the water. She continued her walk about halfway up the trash pile. There were the usual number of dolls, balls, and even complete maglev train sets. When she found one of those, she put it in her bag. She could resell the maglev train set for about 50 credits if it was complete.

  * * * Nobody bothered her while she was in the trash heap. She was doing the community a service. She was recycling what could be recycled. She did not do any actual recycling. She was looking for goods in the trash heap that could be sold as is, or with a little cleanup. Little did she know that fate was about to take place.

  There was another man who went through the trash heap, but he was looking for precious metals of all kinds. He had a metal detector. He wasn't here today. Doris guessed that he had been chased away by the mist. She was working a little bit out of the line that she was working today. Something above or on the pile was glittering. She doubted that it was anything valuable, but if you don't investigate you will never know.

  She took a tentative step going towards the shiny object. Ever since she had a broken bone in her left leg from not watching where she walked, Doris never put her foot someplace where she did not trust it to hold her weight. It was slow going. As she climbed up the trash heap, she was making at most two steps per 30 seconds. Finally, she reached the level on the garbage heap where she saw the glittering object.

  She reached down and grabbed the glittering object. It was a plain old snow globe. It was a beautiful snow globe of a Christmas scene. The clear stuff around the snow globe was crystal. The case for the snow globe was real wood. Just the two facts, glass globe, and a real wood case made this find worth a lot more. She might even put it in her stall this Saturday at the swap meet.

  * * *

  She looked where she had picked up that snow globe hoping for a similar rich man's item. She noticed that when she removed the snow globe, it had upset the balance on a metal sign. She reached down to the metal sign because any kind of metal could be sold to the recyclers. It did not look like she was going to find anything worthwhile. When she removed the sign, she saw four pairs of human legs.

  That was all she was going to do. She ran off with a heat knowing that she might be another broken bone. There was nothing to worry about she had enough money saved to weather an another round of a broken bone. She ran past the man who was the guard for the trash heap. He wondered what lit a fire on her to get her to move this fast. She ran to the police station that was about a block away from the trash heap.

  She opened the door into the police station. She moved to the desk sergeant, sliding in her shoes so that she had that grab his pulpit of a desk. The desk sergeant had seen her working in the trash heap. She had never come in before. He knew what she did, and approved. He felt like he had some of what she recycled in this house. What he had before him now was not the kindly spirited old woman who always had a jaunty song on her mind. What he had in front of him now was a woman that had been scared out of her life.

  “Doris," said the desk sergeant, "what is the matter? I have never seen you like this before."

  * * *

  "I have never seen a body before. Especially a dead body." "Doris, you're a lovely lady, but every body that you might find in the trash heap is going to be dead. I'll get a couple of officers to come with you. Can you show them where it was?"

  "Of course I can, the question is do I want to go back." "All you have to do for us is to show them where you found the bodies. Once they have the bodies found you can go home if you want."

  "You were always an understanding soul, Rick." Rick picked up the handset for his communicator. He used his communicator as an ID of sorts. By putting his communicator in a specified socket his communicator was being recharged power, and it gave information to log them into the desk.

  He dialed the number for the fast patrol. The fast patrol was a group of police officers who could be sent anywhere in the settlement. Patrol officers had their beats. They had to stay on those beats unless called away by an emergency. He spoke to the fast patrol's duty Sergeant. The duty Sergeant picked up two police officers and sent them to the front desk. They arrived and escorted Doris back to the trash heap.

  * * * The two police of ficers looked at each other with commiseration. They were going to have to step through that noisome pile. At least they were allowed to pick up their raincoats and galoshes. Their new highly polished shoes would not take a beating this time wearing the galoshes'.

  They had trouble staying up with Doris. The trash heap squirrel, as she was called, probably knew the trash heap better than they. In fact, probably everyone knew the trash eat better than they. Yet, it seemed that they spent hours in the garbage collection. With only one place to dispose of trash, the trash collection had to be searched whenever someone went missing.

  From what they were told they did not have to find the bodies because the bodies had already been discovered by Doris. The two police officers following her wondered if she had some sort of mountain goat to her family. They heard every strange tale concerning genetics, because their world was a Home world of genetic concepts. The idea was that you could give your self-traits from the animal world by using genes from the animal world. To the two officers that seemed like an unsupported supposition. Yet, there was Doris and her ability to climb this worthless pile. Finally, Doris stopped. She did not point at the two bodies because it was not required.

  The two police of ficers flanked the two bodies. There were murderers on Faraway, but they had never seen murderers of two women who look exactly alike. Almost at the same time, they came to the same conclusion. They looked at each other and nodded. Suddenly this murder took on political dimensions that had far-reaching repercussions. That meant that they had to "make the call." The police officer with the full privates Chevron stood up and pulled out his communicator. He dialed a number that he never hoped to ever dial at all.

  "Planetary director, this is he speaking." "I am a patrol of ficer Darren McCluskey. I am at the scene of a body disposal. The two bodies that are in this disposal area look exactly the same — exactly."

  "I assume this is in the trash heap?

  "Stay where you are. I will be sending you some help, and then I will be there." The help that the planetary director was going to send took only 15 minutes to get to the trash heap. The help was the Faraway Secret Service. This was not the first time these two police officers rubbed elbows with the Secret Service. The Secret Service are not spies or assassins like it was on other plants. The Secret Service had all of the scientific equipment, training and wherewithal to handle all of the legal need of the world. Perhaps at some future time, the Secret Service will also have spies.r />
  The Secret Service agents were always very polite to the police organizations. The first thing the Secret Service wanted to know was who found the bodies. The two police officers, both, pointed to Doris. For the police, she was a very well-known face. What surprised those two police officers was that some Secret Service agents knew her, and she knew them. After they had interviewed her, they asked to be taken to the bodies. As they came up on the bodies when they got to the point that they could see the bodies all of the Secret Service agents took in a sibilant breath.

  At that time the planetary director arrived on the scene. He looked down at the two bodies. He wasn't feeling sad for the people that those bodies belong to. In fact, nothing about their existence belonged to them. These two individuals were genetic robots. He crouched down and touched both of the genetic robots on their cheeks. He could feel the slight difference between a real person's skin and the genetic robots approximation of human skin. Then he stood and gave orders.

  “Once you have all the forensic evidence that you need here, I want you to place each of these bodies in a body bag. I want you to use a yellow tag which should keep everybody from trying to open it up. I want a genetic comparison exam taken between the two ladies. I want all of this done in the as fast manner as you possibly can. Secret Service, you may use these two police officers in whatever way that you may need until you no longer need them."

  Caldwell Johansson closed his long coat pressing together the seals of his jacket. He started the slow walk down the trash heap. He walked all the way to where his Driver had parked his limousine grav-car. His driver opened up the right side back seat door. Caldwell said nothing to the driver. That was not unusual. There were a lot of people that Caldwell Johansson knew very well that could give him the appropriate strategy with this new development.

  "Where to, sir?" The driver had managed to get into the car without Caldwell noticing. That told the driver all he needed to know.

  "My office, as fast as you can go with this thing." The driver had just been given permission to run as fast as he can get that limo to move. There was only one thing that prevented him from doing that. It was that this was a limo and not a sports grav-car. He touched an earpiece which turned on his communication system. He called the police and informed him that he was going to be violating the speed limit getting the planetary director to his office. Then he started the two Radamite jets. He had the car pull up the struts. Then he sent the car back to the planetary office.

  Caldwell Johansson entered the of fice building for the planetary government. Someone was waiting his receptionist office. He signaled to him that all meetings were now canceled. He did it with a cutting motion with his finger. His receptionist understood and apologized profusely for the gentleman's wait. He then asked if the gentleman could reschedule. Caldwell did not hear the rest because he went into his office. Planetary Director Caldwell pulled out his Hypercom. Caldwell turned it on and waited for it to find a carrier signal. Then Caldwell dialed the number of a relatively new government office for Eridani. He knew that he was an ally of the Eridani government. The man he was calling though was a schoolmate from years ago.

  The man known as "A" came on Caldwell's receiver.

  “Caldwell, you old fark."

  "Not as old as you are, —"

  "No names, please. If they knew my name that would make me too big of a target. What can I do for you?” "You always were able to read my moods. I was presented with two things I never wanted to see again. I believe that someone is making genetic robots on Faraway.”

  "If I authorize the complete eradication of whoever is doing this and their money would that satisfy the other planets."

  “I assume that you don't want to be visited by a fleet. What you want is someone who is particularly nasty, and has a reputation of killing without emotion."

  "You have someone like that?" "You know him. When his wife was murdered, he joined my organization as one of only 4 Z status agents. He's going to come in undercover, and when he is ready, he will move."

  "God dammit, A who are you going to send to Faraway?”

  “As soon as I can track him down, I will be sending John Hardesty.”

  “Do you think that's wise?" "I believe that it will be very wise."

  CHAPTER TWO MAKING PAR FOR THE COURSE

  John was taking practice swings with his number one driver near the starter hut. John was always amazed at how many people were able to golf In the afternoon. He was also amazed at the individuals who were talkigmg to the starter for this country club. The Starter must have the patience of Job. Not only must he tell formed groups when they could step on the tee. He must also help members who arrived with no other people in their group. John had come without a full foursome. In fact, his foursome was just himself. He noticed a woman doing the same thing he was taking practice swings. Finally, it was John's time to take to the tee.

  "I hope you won't mind, sir. There is another member who would like to golf today. I was wondering if you would go ahead and form a pair. Normally we like to run full foursomes, but that's not to be today."

  "Who is it?” * * * "It's our newest member. Her name is Kandi Kane.”

  "You have got to be kidding."

  "I tell you sir that is her name. We checked it out." John picked up his clubs and went out to the first tee. He grabbed a ball from his club bag. He then waited for Ms. Kane to arrive at the first tee.

  Ms. Kane arrived at the tee carrying her own bags. Kandi wore shorts that could be mistaken for a skirt. Her shirt was a light blue, and she bore a cloth visor over her eyes. She set the bag next to John's which rested against the bench seat. Kandi had her club and a ball in her hand.

  "How do you want to determine first honors? You want to flip for it?" "That's as good a way as any." He reached into his right pocket and produced an Eridani gold coin. "Call it in the air." He then tossed the coin into the air.

  "I'll take heads." John followed the coin down to the ground and noted that it indeed landed on heads. He pointed at the standard tee. Kandi nodded. She stepped up to the norm tee line. Kandi pushed a tee with her ball into the turf. Then John had the time of his life watching Kandi’s backside. It was like looking at a complex machine do all the movements necessary Mixing a drink. When she hit the ball, it was straight, true, and had average distance. John knew that he could do better. He lined himself up on the first tee. John put the ball and inserted his tee into the ground... He addressed the ball and swung for the fences.

  John managed about 180 m for his drive. John's drive beat Kandi by about 40 m.

  “Nice ball.” She said to him. The game is played over eighteen holes.

  “That's all I can do pretty much hit beautiful drives. It's when I get on the green that I fail."

  "You get the yips?"

  "I do the weirdest thing possible. I seem to rim the cup. Then I feel like taking out my blaster and shoot the ball." Kandi picked up her bag laughing at what she thought was a joke. When she turned around to look at him again, she realized it was not a joke.

  “You mean to tell me that you are armed? Even here?" "It is part of my employment that I will be armed at all times. I have a lot of cash. I mean the amount of money that you could get from a spaceport’s sales of Radamite."

  Kandi looked at John and then looked at his bag. It would be the perfect place to hide cash. No one would suspect a businessman of carrying cash in his bags. Kandi wondered just what kind of business he was in that required him to take money.

  At the next hole, she watched him tee off. If he indeed was carrying a blaster, she could not see it when he swung. Now she was a little more than interested in John Hardesty.

  As they progressed through the game, it turns out that they were exchanging winning holes. By the time they had reached the ninth hole, they were even four holes piece. At that point, John's communicator went off. John rolled his eyes at Kandi. She just laughed. She never expected a business call in the middle of the game of golf. One
just did not do that.

  John picked up his communicator. On the other side was A.

  “Where are you, Z04?"

  "As it happens I'm in the middle of a round of golf with a new friend." “What is her name?" A knew that John had little trouble making the acquaintances of the ladies. He did not expect him to respond.

  “Her name is Kandi Kane." A couldn't help it. At the mention of Kandi's name, he started laughing. Then he noticed that John had sent him a picture from his communicator. It was an image of a charming woman. Then John sent a copy of the scorecard.

  "That's an accurate indication of her gol fing ability, then I can see why you are upset with me cutting your game short. Yes, I am cutting your game short. I need you here at Radamite fuels as fast as you can. I can't really tell you over the communicator why I need you."

  John Gave Kandi his card. Then he walked off the course, and into his new grave-car.

  Mrs. Edelstein waved John into A’s office.

  “Is this going to require me to do any travel off the planet?”

  "What are you saying?" "I know that there are going to be missions on Eridani, but that's a majority of our missions are going to be off the world. I like to be one of those active agents going off world."

  A looked at John. So far John had been an excellent agent. The only quibble that he had with John was how we handled Hutch Hutchinson's death. Hutch deserved death just as anybody else did. However, he did not shoot Hutch with his blaster. Instead, John crowded Hutch into a corner on a cliff. Hutch found himself with nowhere to go, and he slipped on the cliff edge. Public opinion was against Hutch, but they did not like the kind of death he had. A and John did not mind that there was one less homicidal maniac.

  A said: "Be careful of what you wish for." A reached for the first available folder on his stack of folders. He showed John what was written on the front of the folder. This had the top secret designation. What really got to John was the name the folder, “Fallen Angels."