A Terran's Justice

Boom Town

“Long time no see,” Francis said to Harry as the masked vigilante removed said mask. Harry’s face was remarkably unmarked and he had a head of brown hair that hang around his head like a bush. “You kept your hair.”

“Being a P.O.W has its ups I guess,” the other man replied. Francis smiled and walked toward his friend, embracing him in a strong hug.

“It is good to see you.”

“Yeah, likewise.” Azaz’kul approached the duo.

“Good to see you have at least one friend in this dying universe,” she commented.

“Who’s the witch?” Harry asked.

“I am Azaz’kul,” she replied.

“Of what harvest?” the vigilante responded quickly.

“You are perceptive,” she remarked with a small twist of a smile. “Pale.”

“I guessed as much.”

“He certainly has a keen mind,” the Azrael commented. Harry pointed his shotgun at Jacque again.

“Hey!” the gambler shouted. Hannibal pressed the barrel of his disruptor to Harry’s head.

“Pull that trigger and I’ll paint the room in your insides,” the drone threatened.

“You have a history,” Harry said to Jacque.

“I paid the fines you i***t,” he snorted. Harry raised an eyebrow. “The authorities caught up with me years ago, your law enforcement offices are like half a decade behind at least.”

“That’s embarrassing,” the vigilante muttered, lowering his weapon. Jacque nodded to Hannibal who did the same. “So, let me guess… you need my help, so you used your friend’s out-of-date criminal record as a way to lure me out?”

“Pretty much,” Francis replied.

“I’m getting predictable… what do you need from me?”

“I have a job,” Francis began, “a job you might be interested in.”

“Sounds intriguing.”

“Yes, but we are a little pressed for time, so it would be great if we can sort this out quickly,” Azaz’kul said harshly.

“Listen woman,” Harry snapped back, “I’ve been up all night and I need some refreshment before I consider helping you lot. Fortunately I know a place not far from here that serves great tuna sandwiches. We’ll talk more then.”

The sun was beginning to creep up over the horizon as the five of them sat around a table in a little café. Harry casually put his mask on the table in full view and Hannibal stood beside Jacque in a very don’t-mess-with-me kind of way. Harry had ordered two tuna sandwiches and a coffee, Francis a coffee, Jacque a croissant and a tea, and Azaz’kul had merely ordered a glass of water, insisting the caffeine ‘upset her balance’.

“So what is this job?” Harry asked through a mouthful of sandwich.

“Well,” Francis began, but Azaz’kul cut him off.

“There is a small town on one of the moons of Azarg. Buried underneath it is a relic of an age long forgotten. It is a relic that they say can raze worlds, awake a star child in the genesis nebula, lead the faithful to salvation and the like. Anyway, The Order are going to tear up this town and retrieve it, the use it to judge the universe as a whole.” Harry shook his head.

“Right…” he said slowly, “let me get this straight. The Order are going to destroy a small town of innocent people, so they can dig up an ancient artefact that can destroy the universe?”

“Precisely,” the Azrael replied.

“Furthermore,” Francis said, “Sebastian Sharrack has been hired to exact the destruction of the town.” Harry stroked his beardless chin in thought.

“Well, if the needless oppression of the innocents and the potential universe-wide destruction wasn’t enough. I would very much like to help you bring down Sharrack. I only wish that I was there at Morrigon myself.”

“What exactly happened on Morrigon?” Jacque asked. Harry and Francis exchanged glances.

“We… ended the war…” Harry replied slowly, “unethically. And with great cost.”

“Yeah,” Francis concurred. Two men entered the café and walked up to the counter. Harry looked at them for a few seconds before returning his attention the rest of the group. He discreetly picked his mask off of the table and concealed it under his cloak.

“Listen,” he said quietly, “This city is about to blow.”

“What do you mean,” Jacque asked through a mouthful of croissant.

“I took out two of the biggest criminal kingpins last night. You must have seen the police in force this morning. Anyway, each gang blames the other and it’s gonna get real violent real soon.”

“Then we need to get off this rock,” Azaz`kul said.

“Those men look like they are waiting for something,” Jacque pointed to the two men who were just paying at the counter.

“I noticed,” Harry replied with gritted teeth. Francis eyed the two men in question, both humans. Each one looked like they worked as muscle for some crime family or another. “They each have an Azarkis tattoo on their arm,” Harry added. The two men picked up their coffee and turned toward the group.

“That was a pretty snazzy mask you had on that table when we came in,” the larger of the two men said.

“s**t,” Harry muttered. The following exchange happened so fast that an onlooker could have missed it. Harry kicked the table first, sending it toppling onto its side. He dived behind it, Jacque doing the same. Azaz’kul leapt backward, shattering the window as she did so, landing on her feet in the street. Francis reached for his twin pistols, the thugs reaching for their weapons simultaneously. Hannibal brought his disruptor up to bear and fired, the large bolt of plasma flying through the air and ripping through the chest of the leader before he could pull the trigger. Gore flew everywhere and he toppled to the ground. Francis pulled the trigger on both his guns and sent a shower of laser-fire toward the second thug, who managed to get one shot off before he was torn to pieces.

“Die!” Hannibal continued to scream long after the exchange was over. Jacque and Harry got back to their feet as Francis twirled his pistols in his hands and holstered them. The serving girl stared at them, mouth agape.

“Get out of here!” Francis yelled, “get somewhere safe!” She nodded and ran out of the back door of the café.

“Nice shooting,’ Harry said to Francis.

“Thanks.”

“Did I do a good job master?” Hannibal asked.

“Sure did,” Jacque replied. Azaz’kul re-entered the café.

“We need to leave this place,” she said sternly. “I can feel the tension outside, it echoes around the city, wafts off of the buildings. You can almost taste it.”

“Yeah, the witch is right,” Jacque said, “we gotta get outa here.” The five of them turned toward the door and walked back into the street.

“Hannibal,” Francis said to the drone,” Give us the fastest route back to the spaceport.” The drone looked at Jacque.

“Do it.” The drone stood still for a few seconds.

“Route calculated,” it replied merrily, “Follow me.” Hannibal began to stroll off into the city, the rest of them close behind him.

Another group of police officers ran past them.

“That’s the fifth squad we’ve seen in the last ten minutes,” Jacque muttered. The sun was just becoming visible over the tops of the buildings, bathing the city in its golden glow and causing an infernal heat to begin to rise up from the street. Suddenly, a series of explosions became audible from down the street. The clamour of battle began to echo from everywhere at once. Francis looked down the street and saw a large group of police enforcers caught in a crossfire between two rival bands of gangsters. The group quickly turned away from the fighting and headed in the direction of the spaceport. It did not take long for the fighting to catch up with them. As they rounded a corner they were confronted with a raging firefight between two groups of thugs. Francis quickly got his pistols out of their holsters and ran for a destroyed hover car, sliding beside the fallen machine. Harry was not far behind him, shotgun at the ready. Jacque quickly ran for a destroyed market stand and threw himself under it, Hannibal following behind him, but yelling insults at the thugs and firing his rifle into the street, blasting limbs from their respective bodies. Azaz’kul simply assessed the street. The thugs were completely unprepared for the additional combatants, each group quickly ducking behind their respective cover and waiting, the only sound in the street now being Hannibal’s excessive curses. Francis peeked out from behind the car. Azarkis’s gang seemed to be on the right hand of the street, whilst Kolohov’s gang occupied the left. Franics ducked down again and turned to Harry.

“I’ll take the left, you take the right?” He asked.

“Sounds good to me,” Harry replied as he put his mask back over his face. Francis nodded and the two of them burst out from behind the hover car. Francis charged toward the left, snapping his twin pistols up and spraying the thugs with plasma. He hit one man who had just leapt out of cover to fire off a shot, leaping over a barricade three other men were using, unloading his pistols into them as he did so. Francis realised that his guns were out of energy and cursed, dropping to his knees and fiddling about in his satchel for replacements. A large Xenoct thug got up and ran toward Franics, pointing two large atom-disruptors at him as he did so. A lance of energy suddenly shot out, imbedding itself in his chest before he could fire. Francis glanced back to see Azaz’kul casually walking toward where he was standing.

“You need to be more careful,” she scolded. Francis shook his head and finished reloading his pistols.

Across the street, Harry was charging the Azarkis lines. He made sure he was staying crouched behind debris and crashed cars as he did so. The vigilante leapt up and rolled over the bonnet of a crashed car, landing directly in front of two gangsters. He pulled the trigger on his shotgun and blasted the duo into multiple pieces. Another four thugs remained, each one starting to turn their attention to Harry. The vigilante charged toward the closest one, grabbed him with one hand and slammed his helmeted head into the other mans nose. Blood burst from the shattered cartilage and the thug became a little woozy. Harry noticed he had a grenade attached to hit jacket and flipped the switch. The countdown siren began to wail from the device as Harry shot his foot into the man’s chest and sent him back toward his allies. Harry leapt away from the crowd, ducking behind a fallen telephone poll. The grenade exploded, showering Harry in debris. When the dust settled the thugs were all dead.

“That was fun,” Hannibal commented, “you can come out now master Jacque.” Jacque gingerly removed himself from his hiding place and made his way toward the others.

“That was only a small engagement,” Harry commented, “we should expect a lot more.”

“Hannibal,” Jacque asked the drone, “how much further to the space port?”

“Oh, I would guess about one kilometre,” the drone replied.

“Good,” Azaz’kul interrupted, “Let us go.” The Azrael began to walk off down the street. The rest of the group followed soon after.

It did not take long until they had the spaceport in view, the issue was that a large amount of police officers stood between them and it.

“Looks like the police have put a ban on space traffic leaving this city,” Harry muttered as the group quickly entered a blasted old antique store that had obviously been hit by either looters or gang warfare. Azaz’kul and Jacque went and found some antique armchairs and sat down in them whilst Francis crouched by one of the windows and looked at the spaceport.

“I count about ten special forces officers and approximately fifteen standard police,” he said, “what do we do?”

“Well,” Harry replied, “The spaceport has more than one entrance.”

“How many?” Azaz’kul asked.

“It has a backdoor and about three other entrances, one for workers, one for supplies, and one for transports. The easiest one to use will be the workers entrance. I’m sure the drone can remotely slice the satellites and get you its location.”

“What do you mean ‘get us its location’?” Francis asked, “what are you doing?”

“This mask is wanted all over this stinking city,” he pointed to his concealed face. “I’ll run out and get the attention of the police whilst you guys sneak around and enter the spaceport.”

“Sounds good to me,” Jacque said, launching himself up from the chair, “Hannibal, get us the location of the workers entrance into the spaceport.”

“Yes master,” the drone replied. A few seconds later, “route calculated.”

“Thanks Hannibal.”

“No problem master.” Harry got up and made his way toward the doorway.

“I’ll join you,” he said as he loaded his shotgun with a new power shell.

“Wait a sec,” Francis said, “you gonna just kill law enforcement officials?”

“The police are all corrupt here as well,” the vigilante replied, “especially special forces.” With that, he ran from the store. Francis looked out the window and saw Harry charge the police lines, fire his shotgun once and run off toward a collection of buildings. The police began to shout amongst themselves and the entire unit of Special Forces officers ran off in hot pursuit of the masked assailant. The remaining officers drew weapons and began to assume more defensive stances, many of them getting behind crates of supplies as cover.

“Your friend has no morals,” Azaz’kul commented casually as she got out of the armchair she was occupying, “You must have known that. A man does not survive a war if he has a conscience.”

“I survived.” Azaz’kul only raised an eyebrow.

“Guys,” Jacque cut in, “let’s go before that fool gets killed and the Special Forces patrol gets back.” Francis nodded and got to his feet. The four of them casually left the antique shop and walked toward the spaceport.

“Hey!” one of the police officers yelled.

“Hey what?” Jacque yelled back.

“No one gets into this spaceport!”

“Oh, sorry bro, I didn’t know,” Jacque replied, putting on his best ‘sweet-and-innocent’ voice.

“Well you do now,” the policeman replied, “move along.” The four of them walked past the spaceport, Hannibal in the lead.

“The secondary entrance is right up here,” the drone said as they walked around the circular building. Sure enough, a small door became visible a minute later. Two Special Forces police officers guarded the door.

“Let me handle this,” Azaz’kul said as she walked toward the two guards. They noticed the approaching Azrael and turned to face her.

“Excuse me, but this place is off lim-” the guard was cut off as Azaz’kul telekinetically flung him and his partner into the wall, knocking them out in the process.

“Good work,” Francis said, running up to the door and throwing his full weight into it, breaking the lock in the process and allowing them access to the spaceport.

“Great,” Azaz’kul commented sarcastically, “now everyone in the spaceport will know that we just broke in.”

“How would you have solved it?” Francis snapped back, “use your space magic to blow it off its hinges?”

“Actually,” Jacque piped up, “I probably could have overwritten the locking mechanism and opened it quietly.” Francis glared at him, but conceded the point.

“Let’s just get going,” he grumbled as he turned on his heel and made his way into the building. They appeared to be in some kind of staff room and quickly made their way through door after door until they were in the main immigration section. A woman noticed them and ran toward them.

“Excuse me,” she said, “but you’re not allowed to be in here.”

“Ah you see…” Jacque trailed off for a brief second as he thought up a cover story. “You see… ah… we’re with health and safety and… oh forget it.” He nodded to Hannibal, who pointed his gun at the woman and opened fire, turning her into a pile of bloodied bones and skin on the floor. “Holy s**t!” Jacque cried, “I didn’t mean for you to kill her! I just wanted you to knock her out or somethin’!”

“Apologies master,” the drone replied, “next time maybe you should verbalise your orders instead of giving me a vague and useless head motion.”

“But what possessed you to… never mind, let’s go.”

“Yes, I suppose the entire building knows we’re here now,” Azaz’kul scolded.

“Apologies creepy lady,” the drone said. Francis picked up the pace and ran through the spaceport until he saw Nightbringer sitting on its landing pad just outside. They quickly made their way out to the spaceship and began to prime the engines.

Harry ran through the streets, the cacophony of the police forces pursuing him a grim reminder of how he needed to keep up the pace. A few shots whizzed over his head as he ran, the vigilante ducking down to avoid further fire. Harry reached into one of his pockets at retrieved one of his sticky grenades. With a grunt, he slammed it onto a nearby wall, pressing the activation switch as he did so. Harry ran with renewed intensity as he mentally counted down the seconds until detonation.

5,4,3,2,1. The grenade exploded, sending a blast of heat and debris showering over the street. Harry heard countless men cry out as they were blown to pieces. Harry turned around quickly, leaping backward as he did so. He saw that two of the Special Forces officers had made it past the grenade blast and were bringing weapons up to bear. Harry fired his shotgun at the first, bursting the man’s body as the projectile smashed into his chest and burst apart his insides. Harry landed roughly on his back, the second man’s shots flying over his head and connecting with a house behind him. Harry pulled the trigger again and burst the second officer like a party balloon. Harry quickly got to his feet and walked back toward the site of the explosion. He saw that his grenade had taken out six of his pursuers, leaving them in varying stages of completeness. One man groaned and stirred. Harry looked down to see that he was missing both his legs. The viglinate pointed his shotgun at the man and put him out of his misery. Suddenly, a laser bolt shot out the smoke and hit Harry’s mask, blowing it from his face. The mask was designed to be laser-proof, but it did noting to dampen the kinetic force that sent Harry tumbling to the ground. The two officers that had survived the grenade were stalking their way through the smoky alley, guns at the ready. Harry took aim at the man who had shot him and fired, blowing a hole through his chest and sending him flying away. The vigilante quickly rolled toward the second man, shot to his feet, and punched him directly in the jugular. The police officer spluttered and fell to the ground.

“I’ll let you live,” Harry said to the stunned man, “it’s my act of kindness for the day.” With that, Harry ran back toward the spaceport. He quickly made his way to the employee entrance, noting the two unconscious guards lying by the burst open door. He flew through the corridors, noticing a deceased woman lying in a pool of blood and liquefied skin as he did so. Harry almost made his way through immigration when two security guards ran toward him.

“You!” the overweight leader yelled at him. “Stop!” Harry came to a halt as the two men caught up. “What are you doing in here?” the fat man panted. Harry smiled and looked at the two of them.

“You know that vigilante that’s been roaming your streets for the last three years? Yeah that’s me. I just started a gang war to eradicate organised crime in said city and am about to leave this planet to go on another adventure to stop The Order from destroying this universe… Are you two really gonna try and stop me?” There was a brief pause.

“Well,” the second man began, “we are paid twenty five units and hour to provide security to this place, so if we want to keep our jobs, we have to answer yes.” Harry sighed loudly, then smashed his fist into the face of the fat man, sending him to the ground. He twisted his arm around the second man’s neck and pulled, cutting of the oxygen not enough to kill the guard, but enough to sending him into unconsciousness. Harry quickly ran through the docks until he saw the spearhead-class interceptor Harry assumed to be the nightbringer, judging by its obvious human design and the fact that its engines were primed.

“There he is,” Jacque said, pointing out the window. Francis craned his neck and saw the cloaked form of Harry running toward the Nightbringer.

“We have company,” Azaz’kul said, pointing to the far off doors to the landing pads where a squad of security guards were running toward Nightbringer as well.

“Nightbringer!” a voice rang out from the loud speaker, “Shut down your engines, you are not permitted to leave!” Harry ran up the ramp and into the ship, pressing the button to close the ramp as he did so.

“We’re off!” Francis announced as he pulled nightbringer up and out of the dock, heading for the upper atmosphere. A few laser bolts from the trigger-happy security guards followed them, but bounced harmlessly off of the nightbringer’s hull. The sky gave way to the star-filled expanse of space and Francis hit the button to jump into hyper-travel.

“Now that we have picked up another sorry life form, can we please head for Azarg four?” Azaz’kul asked impatiently as Harry made his way into the cockpit.

“That was close,” he panted, throwing himself into a spare seat.

“Alright, give me the coordinates,” Francis replied to the Azrael.

“Wait a sec,” Jacque cut in.

“Oh, what now?” Azaz’kull spat.

“Hey, watch your tone misses,” Jacque countered, “If you want me to help deactivate Sebastian’s drones, I need a few things.”

“What do you need?” Francis asked.

“I need a type XV-75 portable computer or better with a hyper-accelerate signal magnifier.”

“I also need supplies,” Harry added, “All I have left is this shotgun and one knife. I need at least two pistols, a sniper rifle, and preferably another blade.”

“And where do we find all these things?” Azaz’kul asked.

“Actually, I know a surplus dealer on the moon of Orion three,” Francis said, “he offers me discounts ‘cause I saved his wife during the war… he will probably have all we need.”

“Excellent,” Azaz’kul replied with mock relief, “And how long will this take us?”

“Like four hours,” Francis replied, “so get comfortable.”