These rallies are not fast affairs. It’s good we got Harris out when we did because this place is wall-to-wall people now. The parking is jammed with, I would guess, five thousand people and now the bigwigs are filling up the inside.
“Primaries are on a plane ride for home,” announces Al.
“You’re not with them?” I say.
“Gunther and I are on the bounce for the rally hall. Sean reports it’s a big rally and once that plane left the ground we couldn’t do much with the hostages anymore. We’re ground pounders, Franky, and we’re here to back you up.”
“… Makes sense … in a really stupid sort of way,” I chuckle. “OK. Station yourselves in the big, dark field to the north of the rally. What’s the secondary extraction plan?”
“The same lonely airfield that the hostages left from. Sean is there. He’s commandeered a chopper.”
Finally our man Martin comes up to the lectern and starts his speech. He’s good. The crowd is hot and he pumps them for all they’re worth. It’s ole time religion … really ole time religion!
“They’ve started the bonfire out front. There are three to toast,” says Al.
“Anyone we know?”
“Locals as best I can tell. Probably still burning traitors from the invasion.”
“OK, my move comes up shortly. Folks, get ready to bounce.”
“… and the fires of Ka-sharma will protect us and make us strong!” Martin shouts to the ceiling. Clearly the media is moments from cutting to the burning in progress outside.
“They will?” I bellow back from the ceiling, just as loud as the loud speakers. The translator output is now set to maximum eloquent. To the crowd I should sound like a well-trained classical actor.
I rappel down fast on a rope. Martin is standing there with his mouth open. Good. If it shuts and he starts looking around I will drop instantly and grab him. But his instinctual sense of drama is good. He stands while I land. I grab him by the throat but I face the audience.
“Is Ka-sharma protecting you now?” I bellow. I shake him a little. “Who am I?”
Someone in the crowd screams. “Kull the Conqueror!”
I face Martin and shake him again. “Who am I?”
This time it’s Martin who quietly answers. “You are Kull.”
“Louder!” I bellow. This is classic drill sergeant stuff. I’m in his face and squeezing just a bit … and I could almost forget where I am and follow “Louder” up with “Trooper!”
“You are Kull … Kull the Conqueror!” There is genuine fear in his eyes.
“Has your Ka-sharma protected you from me?” I’m still in his face.
“… no.”
“LOUDER!”
“No.”
“Louder! THEY can’t hear you.” I point to crowd. “Has your Ka-sharma protected you from me?”
“NO … NOOOO!” I let him go, and he slumps to the floor, sobbing. If he doesn’t get the planet’s top acting award this year their entertainment industry is myopic.
I face the audience again. “People of this planet. Your ‘prophet’ here …” I kick him lightly “is false. He will lead you to ruin. The Interstellar Age is upon you. If you turn your backs on that fact, you will all surely burn in bondage.
“Open your hearts and open your minds. You are on the threshold of a golden era … if you embrace it.”
“Look to the stars!” I point up for a dramatic moment and then I start bouncing. I bounce off walls until I get into the rafters.
“Out the air conditioner, Chin!” My small lasers are starting to fire—which means weapons are being brought to bear … Good, nothing fires but my lasers and I’m now deep in the rafter rat’s nest. Maybe we won’t get into revenge killing here.
Chin beats me to the air conditioner door by two seconds. She opens it and finds a crush of six people on the other side. They seem to be coming down the stairs from the roof to witness the excitement. None seem to be armed so she simply climbs over them and I follow. There will be some broken bones but no bloodshed. Some may remember there are two of us but they may not.
From the roof we bounce off in the direction of the loading ramp to rendezvous with Gunther and Al.
“Bad news,” I hear from Al. “Sean reports Smallet’s abandoned car has been surrounded by police at the other end of the airfield. So he’s powering up right now.”
“Tell him to meet us halfway,” I say.
We left headed north, now we curl west. The four of us rendezvous without incident and find ourselves bouncing through a low-rise residential area. Our luck holds; all the residents seem to be inside watching the surprising turn of events at the rally. What people don’t see they won’t report to the local police and our rendezvous with Sean becomes more probable.
“I’m off and headed east,” Sean reports. “The police were driving my way as I lifted off but they were still too far away to interfere.” Two minutes later he says, “I see a schoolyard I can land in. I’m flashing landing lights.”
He’s close enough now that we can see him and we bounce his way. In another two minutes he lands and we’re on board and in flight.
“Where do we go now?” I ask Sean.
“Well … that’s a bit of a problem, now. Thanks to your performance at the rally we’re now in a sea of alert hostiles. Not that your performance was that bad …” he grins, “but it kind of took me by surprise to see you up on stage there.” He pauses for a moment.
“Going to the secondary I planned on to fly us back will kill that person now,” he continues. “We’re too hot.”
I wait for the gears in his head to grind some more.
“OK … here it is. We still have a coffin, right?”
I look back in the cargo section. “Yes.”
“The closest fast jets to here are at a major air cargo hub. It will be guarded, but if they haven’t shut it down jets fly out of there all the time and for everywhere. If we can stow away or hijack one of those … I see that as our best option.
“We’re going to have to land a long way off and move fast. Ideally we can be on a plane before the military comes to full alert over news from the rally. To get there fast you’re going to have to carry me in a coffin.”
“It won’t be comfortable.”
“It’ll beat getting caught.”
“True. So … we bounce in and scramble on one of these jets? Will you have any idea which one?”
“Not really … except that given our time constraint it’s likely to have to be one taxiing. And if it’s taxiing, it’ll already be sealed up. You’re going to have to rip the fuselage open. And once you do that, I’ll have a hard time if we try to fly at normal cruise altitude. Unless we can seal the rip up again pretty effectively.
“The other choice is to try and sneak on one being loaded and wait for it to take off. The hazard with that is if we take too long the government may shut down flights and start searching planes.”
“Will they do that for a simple kidnapping?”
“… No, not likely. … It’s your performance at the rally.” The gears are still grinding in Sean’s head. “… OK! Here’s what we can do.” His hands start working over the command console at a furious rate. He talks as he enters orders.
“There’s a military airfield sixty kilometers south of here … I’m giving the autopilot a course that will obliquely approach that field … fly another ten kilometers … and descend to sea level. That’ll crash this beast but it should get shot out of the sky before it gets that far.
“The military should make the connection between the craft and us, concentrate on that base, and be slow to disturb the civilian field.”
“Sounds good,” I say.
“You still have to deal with civilian security and they’re habitually more alert. The shipping companies don’t like stuff ‘falling off the plane’. … If we’re going to do this we need to jump this ship now!
“Watch me,” he says and fingers a switch. “Flip this switch back when the back bay reaches full open.” He flips the switch down, slips out of the seat, and heads for the cargo area. The big back door starts opening.
“Coffin me, baby!” Sean says to Al as he hops into one. Al puts a lid on him. The wind from the back is now rising to a roar. The bay door stops, I flip the switch up, and we all bounce out as the door rises.