STOWAWAY TO THE STARS

Larry and Karen sat in a secluded bar back on Earth, not far from the one where they’d had their first fateful encounter. Larry was fully recovered from his injuries. The scars had almost faded, though his right hand and arm still itched where the cloned tissue had not yet fully matured.

The night before had yielded results in their search for Rachel’s boyfriend. Larry had shown her picture to every barman in the district, and the man in this bar had immediately become evasive. That was all the clue Larry needed. He told the barman to pass a message, to whoever he was scared of, that Larry was looking for him and would be in the bar the next afternoon.

Now here they were, waiting to see who might turn up. They both wore face molding disguises provided by the contact on Drazen. Larry’s disguise was a simple affair that changed him enough to be unrecognizable. Karen looked like the identical twin of Rachel, even down to contact lenses to change the color of her eyes and compensate for glasses that were Rachel’s own. They also both wore flesh-colored micro-thin gloves to avoid leaving any fingerprints.

Their patience was soon rewarded as two burly men ambled in. They paused in the doorway to stare arrogantly around the room, then looked meaningfully at the barman. The latter nodded his head slightly in the direction of Larry and Karen, and the men headed straight for them. One had his hand deep in his coat pocket with an obvious bulge, and without preamble he said, “Okay you two, outside now.”

Since this was exactly what Larry wanted, he strolled out with them, but he was curious. “Would you really shoot us in such a public place?”

“You’d better believe it,” grunted the other thug.

The parking lot happened to be deserted, which suited Larry even more than the two hoods thought it suited them. As usual the men were also walking much too close to him and Karen.

This was a good opportunity to turn the tables. He called to Karen in Universal, “When I say, go for the gun arm of yours. NOW!”

Larry’s target was big and heavy. He doubtless relied on the intimidating effect of that bulk in his normal dealings with victims, but it made him slow. For a trained agent like Larry the same bulk could be used against him. In his brief and one-sided contest Larry was able to watch out of the corner of his eye as Karen whirled on her man.

She clearly remembered the training Larry had given her. Use the hardest parts of the body, feet, knuckles and elbows. Strike fast and keep it simple. Now she put all the practice to use. Her knee came up first, then the momentum transferred to her foot as it lashed out at the man’s arm holding the weapon in his pocket, almost breaking his arm and forcing him to let go of the gun. He was within range, so she next rammed her elbow into his face. As he fell backward she brought her other foot up as the first came down and kicked him in the crotch.

Larry chuckled inwardly as he caught sight of Karen’s last blow. Women always go for the crotch. It must be a female thing.

He disarmed the two men and said, “We’re taking you on a ride. We’ll use your car.”

In the car, Karen demonstrated again that she had remembered her training. She kept her pistol pressed into the ribs of her companion, who sat slumped in the driver’s seat. In the back Larry grilled thug Number Two.

“Right, I want to know what your instructions were on how to deal with us.”

“Go fuck yourself.”

“Wrong answer,” snapped Larry. He extracted a tiny needle gun from his usual hiding place and jabbed it in the man’s arm. Truth drugs in the Union were far more advanced than on Earth. Number Two became drowsy and limp, but could still speak.

“Let us try again. What were your instructions on what to do with us?”

“We was to beat the truth outa ya about why you were nosin’ around the boss’s son,” he mumbled. “Then we had to phone the boss with the story, and he’d tell us whether to kill ya or letcha go.”

“How kind of him.” Larry pushed him away and he slumped into the corner of the car, unable to move until the effects of the drug wore off. Larry turned to Number One.

“There has been a change of plan from your original instructions. You are going to drive us to the boss where he and I can have a little chat. You have seen what one of my little potions has done to your companion. I have a different one for you, if you decide to argue like he did.”

“I can’t do that,” spluttered Number One. “No one gets to see the boss without his say-so. Even I can’t turn up uninvited.”

“No problem, I just invited you. Trust me, it is an invitation you cannot turn down. Once I am sure you have taken us to the right place I will let you make a run for it – on foot that is. Now, do you want a preview of my little potion first?”

Number One looked at Number Two, slumped in the corner with his mouth hanging open, and shook his head.

Larry opened the far door and unceremoniously pushed Number Two out onto the parking lot. “Okay, take me to your leader, as the alien said to the Earthman.”

Karen’s lips twitched as Number One reluctantly started the car and moved off.

The journey lasted about a quarter of an hour. They left the town and drove out into leafy suburbs with large houses well-spaced out along either side of the roads. They arrived at the barred gates of an imposing, isolated house. Number One pulled up beside the intercom outside the gates and announced himself.

A low male voice said, “Are you mad, coming here?”

“Tell the boss he really will want to see these two I’ve got with me.”

“You’d better be right about that or I wouldn’t want to be in your shoes. The gate’s opening now.”

Number Two drove up to the main entrance of the house and stopped the car. Larry took the car keys and said to him, “Right, I’m convinced we’re at the right place. You can vanish before we introduce ourselves.”

The man was on his way back down the drive before Larry had finished speaking. He walked up to the front door with Karen. It opened before they reached it and two men stepped out. They could have been twins of Number One and Two, and as soon as they saw Larry and Karen alone they whipped out guns.

Larry ignored the weapons. “This is my friend Rachel. She wants to see her boyfriend, who seems to be ignoring her these days.”

“Get inside and shut ya mouth,” snarled Number Three.

They were pushed inside roughly, and entered a large living room.

****

Karen wondered if this penetration into the lion’s den could possibly be wise, but she had complete faith in their training and the advanced technology that they both had at their disposal. The stun gun strapped to her arm and the stun grenades tucked into each cheek were surprisingly comforting. She was still very inexperienced in their use, but she was pleased with how she had applied her training so far.

A heavily built, middle-aged man lounged in an armchair, but he sat bolt upright when he saw Karen. “Shit, you’re the girl my stupid son was messin’ about with. But that’s impossible. I thought you died of an overdose. What the fuck’s going on?”

Larry made no immediate reply but looked at Karen and raised his eyebrows. The ball was in her court. She hadn’t started her main IEP training yet, but if she wanted to be an IEP explorer she would have to take the initiative and think on her feet when the occasion demanded it.

“Maybe I’m back from the dead,” she ad-libbed, “or maybe you didn’t do such a good job as you thought. I didn’t like the way your son treated me. I want to see him again.”

“Grant!” shouted the Boss. “Damn it, where is that useless, stupid son of mine? Henry, go and find Grant. He can see what a mess he’s made of things with this girl.” He glared at Larry and Karen. “You two stay exactly where you are.”

One thug disappeared but the other remained behind them with his gun at the ready. Henry reappeared, with a much younger man who looked vaguely familiar to Karen. This had to be the man who had been Rachel’s supposed boyfriend.

When Grant saw Karen he went deathly white. “Oh shit, this is impossible. Rachel, you died.”

“Quite obviously she didn’t, you stupid little fool,” snarled the Boss. “Now they’ve seen this house, so I’ll have two bodies to dispose of from my own doorstep. I told you not to get attached to this posh little tart.”

Larry spoke to Karen in Universal. “Have you heard enough, darling?”

As everyone looked at him in surprise she responded in the same language. “Yes, thanks.”

He called the codeword, “FLASH,” slipped a flash/stun grenade out of the corner of his mouth, bit down on it and spat.

Karen squeezed her eyes shut and dropped to the ground, one hand breaking her fall while the other gripped her nose and mouth to keep them tight shut as she had practiced. Even with her eyes closed the grenade was as bright as a flashgun going off. The accompanying bang left her ears ringing, drowning the sound of the single reflex shot that rang out, passing harmlessly overhead.

But flash and sound were only for distraction purposes, and to enhance the gasp reaction. Like fireworks exploding in an array of stars and then the individual stars exploding again, tiny capsules flew out from the grenade, each bursting to produce another shower of microcapsules, that burst a third, fourth and fifth times, before the final burst released the stun gas into every corner of the room within a few milliseconds.

Karen heard the unmistakable sound of bodies slumping to the floor as she counted slowly to thirty. She opened her eyes, checked that the mist of the stun gas had cleared, started breathing again and looked around. As well as the two thugs, the Boss in his armchair and Grant, two more bodies were slumped in the doorway.

Once they were sure that there was nobody else in the house, they searched it thoroughly, finding a considerable number of incriminating documents, and a safe. The safe was of course locked, but a medium size mini-grenade made short work of it, and revealed a large amount of money and several big packets of what they assumed to be drugs.

Larry trashed the money and the drugs by emptying them all into the kitchen sink and mixing them with water and everything else he could find in the cupboards, including ketchup, coffee and beer. The documents he put in a bag to send off to the police later.

Next he planted several tiny bugs around the house so that they would be able to see and hear what happened when the Boss and his gang came round. His last act as they left was to call the police on the phone in the hallway and report a disturbance. They drove off in the car that they had commandeered from the first pair of thugs. Another mini-grenade blasted through the heavy gates at the entrance. After the short drive back to the bar they left the car in the parking lot and retrieved their own car.

Back at Karen’s apartment, Larry set up the receiver for the bugs so they could both see. They sat back, with a beer and glass of wine respectively, to wait for the fun and games to start.

The first thing they heard, faintly, was the sound of the police banging on the door. This lasted about five minutes, but then faded. The police obviously didn’t feel willing to break in, but with any luck they would wait outside, especially since they would presumably have seen the mess Larry had made of the gate.

It was another half-hour – and another beer and glass of wine – before they saw the inmates stirring. They started with a lot of cursing and groaning, because a side effect of the stun gas was a splitting headache. Arguments developed about what had happened and whose fault it was. The Boss remained unconscious at first, which was no surprise because Larry had been facing the Boss when he spat the grenade.

When the Boss came round the argument grew more intense, with a lot of shouting, doubtless fuelled by the headaches they were all feeling. Then Grant discovered the destruction that Larry had created in the kitchen. After that events got very confused. The Boss drew a pistol and pointed it menacingly at one of the thugs. A shot suddenly rang out, Karen was watching the Boss and didn’t see where it came from, but the Boss slumped to the floor, firing his gun at the same time. Several more shots were fired, and three of the thugs went down. Karen had a brief glimpse of Grant hobbling out of the room, and she didn’t see what happened to the last member of the gang. Then it went quiet apart from the sound of renewed banging on the door. After about a minute came the sound of the front door being broken down. Police officers entered the living room, cautiously at first and then in force, scattering through the room and examining bodies. Outside a siren started wailing.

Larry looked across at Karen. “Seen enough?”

She nodded. As he turned off the receiver she slipped her arm round his waist. “I’m not sure I want to know any more, although I expect we’ll find out a bit in the papers in a day or so. Are you sure there won’t be any repercussions from using your alien technology?”

“There is a small chance, but I don’t think so. They are a bunch of criminals and their stories will be confused and unlikely to be believed. They will also have to explain that it was done by the ghost of a girl they had killed. The stun gas leaves no trace and the bugs will self destruct shortly. It was worth the risk to get you some retribution for Rachel.”

“Thank you. It was good to finally track down the asshole that Rachel got mixed up with and find out what was behind the whole sorry affair.”

She put her arms round his neck and kissed him tenderly. But as he responded she felt a familiar tingle of anticipation, as she realized that this was going to be much more than just a kiss.