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  The boy was now face to face with the MP140s’ gang leader. Ah yes, one of the twins—both heartless punks. Babar stepped closer to the precipice. Even though his third-story perch was close to forty feet above the ground, he was certain he could make the leap down without injury. He’d been trained for such maneuvers.

  The two groups merging together were now heading off. Only one twin remained behind: Harland. He raised an object, perhaps a metal pipe, so the boy could see it, and be adequately intimidated. Before Babar could move, the first strike came. The boy, doubled over, clutched his midsection. With no further thought, Babar leaped.

  Even before hitting the ground and rolling, his eyes locked on to the developing mayhem ahead. Bolting to his feet, Babar sprinted some forty yards farther on, then leaped high, easily clearing the seven-foot-high chain-link fence. Crouch-landing onto the sidewalk, his heart rate was constant and his breathing slow and steady. All Parians had the ability to track the lapse of time far more accurately than humans, and Babar knew it had taken him thirteen seconds to arrive at the scene. Even in that short amount of time, Harland had inflicted another three strikes with the metal pipe—two on the boy’s back and one to the side of his head. Babar suspected that even one more strike from the metal pipe might end the boy’s life.

  Babar sprang forward, landing between Harland and the boy, now lying prone and looking semi-conscious on the sidewalk. Again, Harland raised the metal pipe high over his head, its downward thrust gaining momentum. It was a blow Babar easily caught in his outstretched hand. A loud clap echoed in the night as the curved metal slapped hard into his palm’s flesh. Babar tossed the pipe away—it clanged onto the sidewalk and rolled into the gutter.

  Harland assessed Babar, and his lips drew back into an angry snarl. “Big mistake, man . . . should have minded your own fucking business.” Harland pulled back his arm, the muscular bicep billowing and stretching the upper sleeve of his sweatshirt. A white-knuckled fist came up, in preparation for what Babar surmised would be the throwing of a haymaker punch. Babar immediately stepped in with lightning speed while planting a hard jab into Harland’s chin, which staggered him backward.

  Babar hesitated. He didn’t want this to escalate out of control—he certainly didn’t want to seriously injure the big man, no matter how vicious his intentions clearly had been. But Harland didn’t go down. His eyes watery, full of hate and fury, both his fists came back up, and Harland charged. Babar side-stepped him, his movements now going from reserved and calculated to automatic, a natural response derived from decades of training. Babar spun to his right, taking hold of his own right fist, then delivering a pile-driver of a right elbow into the bridge of Harland’s nose.

  He heard an audible crack as cartilage snapped and crumbled from the powerful blow. Now Harland teetered, his eyes losing focus. Copious amounts of blood were pouring down the lower half of his face. Finally, Harland dropped down to the sidewalk, and stayed there on all fours, swaying unsteady back and forth.

  But then, unfathomably, impossibly, he reached for the gutter—reached for the metal pipe lying there in the shadows, where Babar had discarded it. He sprang up with the raw power of an out-of-control freight train. The pipe, with its jagged and sharp end, was coming at Babar—poised to spear him through the abdomen. Babar had just enough time to grab the thing before being skewered. In one fluid motion, he twisted the pipe upwards and out of Harland’s grip.

  No longer thinking, only reacting, Babar spun the freed pipe over his head, readjusted his grip upon the cool metal shaft, and drove it deep into Harland’s midsection. Impaled, but still standing, Harland took a step backward, and then another. He cried out in agony, but the sound was obscured by another: the squeal of a 1981 GMC 7000 Tanker Truck. As the big 6.0L V8 engine roared closer, Babar held on to the metal pipe in a one-handed grip, easily twisting it free of Harland’s grasp. Taking sole possession of the pipe, with no hesitation, he thrust the metal pipe’s sharp ragged end into the gangster’s abdomen.

  Again, shoving it even harder, he drove the pipe all the way through the middle of Harland’s back. The gangster stared back at Babar. His eyes conveyed both shock and dismay at what had happened to him—what was still happening. Releasing his hold on the pipe, Babar shoved Harland backward and into the street. With a few thousand gallons of diesel fuel sloshing around within its attached oil tank, the oncoming truck was running both full and heavy. Even if the driver could have braked in time, the vehicle’s forward momentum would have made stopping fast enough well outside the laws of physics—at least as humans understood them.

  Harland’s harpooned-body was struck by the forty mile-per-hour tanker truck’s grill—out of view of the vehicle’s bug-splattered windshield. Babar took in the driver’s frantic expression, his look of impending dread as his brakes screamed and his tires skidded. The driver didn’t know the young hoodlum had already been dead. Smoke from burning rubber filled the air.

  Chapter 3

  Justin Trip

  Bridgeport, Chicago

  Justin awoke within the confines of a fast-moving ambulance. He heard a siren whine outside and the vehicle’s roaring engine. He tried to look about him but was unable to move his head—only then realizing he was strapped atop a backboard, secured in place. He was aware that the others nearby were attending him. A drip line dangled from a saline pouch above, and a plastic oxygen mask covered his nose and mouth. When he tried to speak, pain shot through his cheek and lower jaw.

  A woman’s voice by his ear, said, “Don’t try to talk. You’re going to be okay . . . I know this must be scary for you.”

  You think? Justin tried to remember what had happened, how he got here. He last recalled being at school, doing his homework in the library. He heard someone relaying information into a radio—the driver? “10-4 dispatch . . . transport in progress; patient is stable and semi-conscious; possible internal injuries. Confirmed . . . we are en route to University of Chicago Medical Center, over.”

  Perhaps he’d been in a car wreck? Justin tried to sit up. Did Garrett pick him up at school and then crash? Oh God . . . or was it my mother who picked me up? Is she okay? He tried to look around, see if anyone was lying next to him.

  “Try to relax . . . it won’t be long now,” the female EMT said.

  “My mom . . .” His words underneath the oxygen mask came out distorted—he had to speak through clenched teeth.

  “Yes . . . she’ll be there waiting.” She gave Justin a pat on the shoulder. Relieved, he relaxed some.

  “Is Garrett okay?”

  The EMT’s face came into view above him. “Don’t talk. I don’t know him, who you are referring to . . . the truck driver? He’s shook up some, but otherwise he’s fine.”

  Truck driver? Justin tried to remember, but any events pertaining to the crash kept coming up blank. He closed his eyes, the jostling ambulance coaxing him to sleep.

  He awoke when the vehicle’s rear doors flew open. He heard new voices—a male doctor, or was it a nurse, barking off orders. Once again, Justin lost consciousness.

  The next time he awoke, he found himself lying flat on his back on a hospital bed, a ceiling-to-floor curtain drawn so he couldn’t really see anything. Still, he knew it was the ER—just listening confirmed that. A baby was crying somewhere nearby. And a trauma team was trying to resuscitate someone—he heard a heart monitor alarm droning on, not an encouraging sign.

  Justin, moving his head around some, found that even though it hurt like hell, it was possible. He tried to move his jaw, and tentatively opened his mouth. That hurt too, but it seemed to operate as nature intended. At some point, he’d been garbed into a hospital gown. He wondered if he’d done it, or if someone else had had to perform that job. Two pouches hung from the IV stand: saline and morphine drips. That explained why he wasn’t feeling all that bad.

  Suddenly, something strange popped into his head. Not a memory—more like . . . what do they call them? Oh yeah—a false memory. He couldn’t smi
le, his jaw hurt too much for that, but just thinking about the high school janitor . . . what was his name? Mr. Jabar? No, Mr. Babar! Yeah, like the storybook elephant. The man was deep into Kung Fu fighting—had jumped in to help him from God knows where—oh shit. Justin then remembered. At least he now could recall some of what occurred—why he had decided to walk home from school, his trek along the dark street, the streetlights suddenly coming on, then being surrounded by a shitload of gangbangers. Justin placed a hand upon his cheek, recalling the punch. Bandaged, he could feel sutures beneath it. Great. As if I’m not hideous enough already.

  He remembered being left alone with Harland, then soon after that, the gangster swinging a metal pipe at him. That explains the sutures.

  Loud voices could be heard just beyond the drawn curtain. “Where is he? He killed him! He killed my brother! Where is that motherfucker?”

  “Security! Get him out of my ER!” a doctor yelled out.

  A scuffle ensued. Justin could see some of what was going on through the gap underneath the curtain. Someone lay on the ground, thrashing about. Multiple pairs of legs wearing scrubs and hospital shoes encircled him.

  “Hold him down!” a man yelled out.

  “Let me go! He killed Harland!” the desperate voice screamed out between labored sobs.

  Justin let that sink in, thinking about the heart monitor’s endless-droning death-tone, then about Harland’s final seconds alive, lying on that darkened street—and the look in his eyes.

  Blubbering, soft murmurs were coming from the other side of the curtain. “I’m gonna’ kill that son of a bitch . . . that freak . . . I swear . . . I’ll find him . . . I’ll kill him . . .”

  Justin wanted to yell through the folds of plastic curtain that he wasn’t the one who’d killed his brother. He wasn’t the one who drove that metal pipe into his brother’s abdomen. And he wasn’t the one who shoved Harland into the path of that oncoming tanker truck either. No! He was sure of it now—It was the janitor, Babar, or whatever his fucking name was.

  Properly subdued, Justin listened as security took Lewis away. No more yelling, spewing out promises of revenge. But he was certain that wasn’t the last of it.

  The curtain suddenly flew open. An older nurse with an ample bosom, wearing blue scrubs, bustled into the confined space. “Sorry, hon, that you had to hear that. Don’t pay any heed to what he was saying.” Removing his oxygen mask, she checked Justin’s IVs first, then the heart monitor. “My name is Gladys.” Placing a few fingers on Justin’s chin, she moved his head a couple degrees leftward and then toward the right. “Hurts, huh?”

  “Yeah. Like I got hit with a steel pipe.”

  “You want some water?”

  As Justin nodded in assent, Gladys placed a plastic straw in his mouth. Sucking in, he gratefully swallowed the container’s cool water.

  “Is the doctor going to see me?” he asked.

  “Been there, done that already, sweetie,” Gladys affirmed. “You’ve been x-rayed and cat-scanned, poked and prodded. Dr. Mullin says you’re lucky to be alive. You have a mild concussion, two cracked ribs, and assorted abrasions and lacerations, but you’ll live.”

  Justin nodded. “My mom?”

  “Yes, Kilian was called as soon as they pulled your school I.D. from your wallet. Honey, she and I go way back . . . at least ten years. Work different shifts these days, though.”

  “That heart monitor . . . before. Is he—”

  “Let’s not worry about that right now, okay? You have a visitor. You up to seeing somebody?

  Visitor? Maybe Garrett? he thought. “Uh, sure,” Justin said.

  Gladys left his bedside just as quickly as she’d arrived, leaving him alone again. He tried not to think about Harland. The curtain opened wide again—it wasn’t Gladys..

  “Hi . . . Justin,”

  “Um . . . Hi.”

  Aila looking about the small space, spotting a stool with wheels. Sitting on it, she rolled a tad closer to his bed while nervously smiling.

  Justin’s mind raced, trying to resolve her presence here.

  “I was in the car. The first one on the, ah, accident scene.” She held up her smartphone. “I called 911.”

  He stared at her, probably a moment too long. God, she’s beautiful. “You were in the library,” he said.

  “Yeah . . . wasn’t sure you noticed me.”

  Are you kidding? “Thanks for checking on me. You didn’t have to . . .”

  “No, I wanted to. That was pretty intense. Fucking intense!” she added with a laugh.

  Justin laughed too and regretted doing so—feeling a sharp pain in his jaw. “So, did you see . . . what actually happened?”

  “Oh yeah, the whole thing played out right in front of us. The dude with the metal pipe sticking out his back getting run over by that big truck . . . un-fricking believable.”

  “How ‘bout right before that?”

  Aila stared at him quizzically, then gestured outward beyond the curtain. “Some of it . . . I just finished telling the police all about it.” Placing a hand on his knee, she added, “I was emphatic—you didn’t push that guy. You were splayed out on the ground.”

  “So, you saw him? The one who jumped in . . . and saved me?”

  “We really didn’t get a good look at him. But, boy, did he move fast . . . like a ninja! You do know he saved your life, Justin. Right?”

  He nodded, loving that she knew his name. “Wait, you said we.”

  Her expression turned more serious. “Oh, yeah. I’d gotten a ride from . . . a friend. Someone you know!”

  “Knock knock,” came a deep voice. Garrett, smiling, stood by the now-opened curtain. Justin wondered how anyone could possess such perfect posture. His smile was warm. He looked as if he could audition for the next Superman movie, whenever they next rebooted it.

  “Hey man . . . this is all my fault. I got your voicemail. Already told your mother, bro, that I was supposed to pick you up. I’m so sorry, I got my wires crossed.” Garrett and Aila’s exchanged look explained everything: the two were an item. Of course they were. The two most perfect people on the planet—it made total sense.

  “Your mom’s talking to the police right now. I guess they’ll want to talk to you too.”

  “Okay, that’s fine,” Justin heard himself reply, realizing Aila had removed her hand from his knee. Strange, he could almost feel it there still.

  “Did you hear me, dude?” Garrett asked.

  “Sorry. What?”

  Again, longish eye contact exchanged between Aila and Garrett. “There’s some kind of gang contract out on you. The police are assigning you your own protective special detail, like the president has.”

  Terrific. As if I don’t feel pathetic enough. Now the whole world is going to know how big a pussy I am. Justin let out a tired breath.

  Aila, as if reading his thoughts, shook her head and said, “Justin, that gang is one of the largest in all of Chicago. You’ll need the protection.”

  “I’ve got your back, little buddy. I promise you that,” Garrett said, just as Justin thought he couldn’t feel any worse.

  Chapter 4

  Harrage Zeab

  Demyan Empire Museum of Calico, Broudy-Lum StarStation

  Harrage Zeab stood alone within the stark grey walls of the Encore municipal facility. Tall and slender, impeccably dressed in a long-coat and matching trousers—made from the finest threads of Tholgian silkworm larvae—he was a most severe-appearing individual. Zeab’s hair, as black as obsidian, was worn long and pulled back into a ponytail. His dark eyes, always inky-wet within their sockets, betrayed his bleak, often hateful, mindset. He pursed his moist, worm-like lips.

  The floor was strewn with litter—packing materials and part of a shipping crate, and an intentionally left behind rolling furniture dolly. All, of course, were props. With today’s gravpallets, no one needed a rickety old rolling dolly. No, the items had been placed in here during the heist in order to mislead the inevitable in
vestigation that would follow. The caper had certainly been bold. Zeab had to admit that. Placing a foot upon the dolly, he rolled it back and forth for a while as he considered the impact of this brazen act. The loss of the four stasis-tubes was beyond devastating. Thousands came here daily to view the Empire’s prized trophies. So many visited, in fact, that it was the reason the captives were to be transported to the Museum of Calico, where the Dom-Dynasty’s reigning aristocracy—the Magistor and Magistra Pietra, along with their two wretched teen offspring, Prince Markus Pietra and Princess Lena Pietra—could be more adequately viewed. Millions of dalshacks had been spent on that intended display—a multimedia extravaganza.

  Zeab, hands on his narrow hips, surveyed the scene. He’d spent many an afternoon standing just where he was standing now—gloating. For it had been Zeab himself who had masterminded that family’s deep space abduction, four years prior. Granted favor with the Emperor, Zeab had been promoted to Chancellor of Broudy-Lum StarStation with its billion inhabitants—the largest spatial structure within the Demyan Empire.

  Zeab spotted Constable Gilmie, along with his team of inspectors, lurking in the shadows. “Come . . . do your crime scene analysis,” he urged.

  As the investigative team began their work in earnest, Zeab moved away from the crime scene. Deep in thought, he had zero doubt about who had orchestrated the heist: Loham Babar, Noble-Fist to the aristocracy and Protector of the Realm. Reflectively, Zeab touched his left earlobe, or what was left of it. No one had ever bested him before with an arcblade until that day. And now this . . .