Robots of Avery Five.

Chapter 15

“Hey, they told me you were in the library,” Alex slowed down at the end of the sentence with lowered brows. He positioned his hand on the door as he wondered why it wasn’t fully opened.

“I want you to help me contact my father again.” He positioned his left leg between the frame and the door.

To ease his suspicion, she widened the gap more.

“Of course.” She pressed her lips together.

At her unconvincing response, his hips forced the wooden panel open, and he walked around her.

“What is this?” He was expressionless as he recognized the woman with the swollen face.

Red Beard stood up with clenched fists.

“It’s okay, we should trust him.” Kimiora extended her palms at him.

She glanced at Yagoda and he gave her a small nod. Alex walked closer to the table. The tip of his index finger stroked the wax like texture of the paper rolls.

“Alex, we need to make sure the hunters won’t attack while we prepare ourselves to go back to Avery Five.”

“So what? You’re interrogating her?” Alex jerked his head toward Danielle.

“You’ve got the guns, but they leave you out of the loop?” Danielle turned her head to the side but kept her eyes on him to watch his expression.

“What’s all this?” Alex tried to open one roll of paper but Kimiora held his hands.

“Those are our mission plans. Mischa and I made some sketches on paper. Yagoda didn’t want them on the computer in case the Federation intercepted us.”

Yagoda pressed a button on his chair and he hovered over the table.

“This is a crucial moment in our fight for freedom, son. We have to be careful about whom we trust.”

“You don’t trust me?” Alexander found it absurd that they were planning without him. He turned to Kimiora. “I could’ve let the officers catch you in Avery or kept the armament’s location to myself, but I didn’t.”

“No, I know, and I believe you are on our side,” Kimiora replied. “I’m the one trying to make everyone else see what I see.”

Alex looked down at her hands when Danielle started laughing out of nowhere. The woman’s breasts bounced as her stomach shook up and down.

“Shut up,” Red Beard grunted.

The woman laughed harder with her mouth wide opened.

“Men think they are so strong and ruthless.” She looked at Alexander. “But a pretty woman is nice to them and they let their empire burn.”

The Earthian smirked. He loathed when others tried to guess the nature of his character, but he took satisfaction on proving them wrong.

“Shut up, I said!” Red Beard swung his hand back and smacked her so hard, she was thrown off the chair.

“Hey!” Alex stomped toward Red Beard and gripped his shoulder around. She was a prisoner of war, but hitting her was unnecessary.

The big man snatched Alex’s throat and brought his face closer to him.

“Don’t you ever touch me again, kid.”

Alex was running out of oxygen although he kept a hardened expression and tight fists.

“Okay, okay,” Kimiora unwrapped Red Beard’s fingers away from Alex’s neck. She stood between them.

Alex rubbed the redness under his jaw as the girl pushed him away from the scene.

“Why don’t you go get Cam, so that we can skim through the plan together?”

The Earthian was more focused on dismantling his aggressor.

“Alex just go. I’ll talk to him,” Kimiora kept insisting and dragging him back toward the entrance door.

Alex stood still by the door, gave Red Beard a menacing look, and left.

-------------------------------

“Moonlanding idiot.” Alex rubbed his neck again as he walked down the library hall. He reminded himself to give Red Beard a well-deserved beating after returning from Avery 5.

An old couple greeted him good day while they carried paper books toward the reception. A young boy sat on the floor by the Koi System as he flipped the pages of a picture book. His mother scanned the room from a reading table and smiled every time she spotted him. Another woman rolled her eyes, picking up her reading glasses from the floor for the third time. Behind her, Mischa of Russia entered the library.

“Alexander,” Mischa waved at him.

“Hey,” the Earthian grunted.

Mischa noticed the marks on his neck and pointed at them.

“Your damn friend,” Alex responded before he got to ask a question.

“Red Beard,” Mischa sighed. “Yeah, I’m sorry, that fool’s got anger issues. Between me and you, his wife left him for an Earthian, so he doesn’t trust you guys that much.”

Alex was about to make a statement of irritation, then his brain made his body stop. He held his chin, scratched his temple, and glanced at the floor.

“Well,” Alex grinned and patted Mischa’s shoulder. “Why make a big deal about it?”

Mischa nodded with a smile and dropped his arms to his side. Alex began to walk toward the exit when he squinted and turned around.

“Hey, Mischa, I’m kind of curious, when we bumped on each other in the space station, what were you doing there?”

“Ah, I was coming back from visiting relatives on Earth.” Mischa brought his hands over his head casually.

“Right, you are from Earth, Mischa of Russia. So if you are from Earth, how come you’re friends with Red Beard?”

Mischa crossed his arms in front of him and shrugged.

“That’s a good question.”

They nodded then their heads slowed down until they could hear the flipping of paper.

“I find it strange that on the day I arrived in Avery, you were in the same station where the hunters happened to attack me.”

There was no reaction from Mischa.

“So? Everyone knew the son of Hammond of Singapore was arriving at Avery 5.”

“You knew who I was from the beginning. You were there to watch me. You rigged the AI-way.”

Mischa sighed and rubbed the side of his pants. They both stared at each other through the corners of their eyes. Alex’s pupils dilated, and both men ran toward each other.

A faster Alex tugged Mischa onto the counter, but the stronger farmer sent blows at his body.

The mother scurried toward her child as everyone screamed. She pulled the boy up and dragged him behind a bookcase. The boy’s arm reached for the storybook he had left behind, but his mother yelled at him to leave it. The lady that kept losing her glasses smashed the plastic frame and fled the library.

“Get up, come on.” Red Beard pulled on Danielle’s hair and sat her back on the chair. “You’ve gotta make a call.”

Kimiora had a tablet on her hand and sent a holographic cube toward Danielle. The leader of the hunters spat blood in front of her.

“Loving your,” she took short breaths, “hospitality, uncle. Grandpa would be so happy that you got to meet me.”

“f**k you,” said Red Beard. Specks of saliva splashed the woman’s face. “Your father stopped being my brother when he left to the cold side.”

“You and Yagoda gave him no alternative. How can you wish to be part of that?” She aimed her head at the documents over the table.

“Yagoda’s plans will bring back humanity,” responded Kimiora.

Danielle pressed her lips together and lowered her head. She stared at everyone from under her eyelashes and voice became deeper.

“Don’t say I didn’t help you.”

She kicked her legs in front of her and sent her uncle across the room. Then, she reached for the chair behind her and bashed it against Kimiora’s torso. Yagoda tapped the buttons on the side of his chair. Danielle went behind him and locked his neck inside her forearm.

Alex banged Mischa’s head on the round Koi System table, making blood pour out of the farmer’s forehead. Seeing Mischa unconscious made him want to run back to the cabin and get Sadie out of that planet. But his mind continued to insist on opening those documents. The bystanders hugged their knees to the ground, and he turned back to that mysterious room.

His feet went faster as he cut through bookshelves and hallways. When he arrived at the door, the panel opened to a hostage situation.

The Earthian pulled out his gun and pointed at Danielle. He took a few steps toward Kimiora and helped her up.

“I don’t know how that thing works,” Danielle panted, “but I betcha I can snap the old man’s neck before you make a move.”

“Are you sure?” Alex was calm.

Danielle’s breathing became louder. Her eyes went everywhere. She looked at the papers on the table.

“Do you wanna know what those are? Tell your girl to show you what’s behind that door,” She pointed at the smaller door on the opposite side of the room.

With the gun still up, Alex moved toward the table and fanned one sheet opened. It was the blueprints for a large machine. Underneath it, there was an astronomical map from Koi to the Solar System. He opened another paper to thousands of coordinates.

Kimiora had lied.

“Alex,” she paced her voice.

The Earthian shifted the barrel toward Kimiora and Red Beard.

“Do what she said. Open the door.”

“Let me explain.”

“Do it!” He jerked the gun at her.

Kimiora gaped and her heart jumped. She scurried toward the smaller door, closed her eyes, and pulled it open.

Making sure no one moved, Alex took short steps to get a good view of what was inside. His jaw dropped. It was the same object from the blueprint,—a tear-shaped vessel with hundreds of cables connected to it.

“You’re sending that to Earth, why?” His hands began sweating.

“f**k, Kimiora, I told you to kill him,” grunted Red Beard. “You were too wet to do that.”

“You have five seconds to explain,” Alex ignored Red Beard and went closer to Kimiora.

“Let’s talk like civilized people. You can put the gun down, Alex.”

“I give the orders here,” he pushed the barrel over her forehead.

“It’s...it’s a hydrogen bomb,” Kimiora raised her hands.

Alex’s eyeballs popped, and he jumped back. His legs hit the edge of the table. They were working on killing millions of Earthians right under his nose and Kimiora was part of it.

“But hear me out, please,” the girl brought her palms together in front of her. “We’re not done building it yet, but this is the only way to end the Federation. If we destroy the manufacturers of the metabolic pill, the 20 planets will rise when hunger takes over. If we do this, women won’t die anymore.”

“You were planning on murdering my father, on murdering my people.”

“Please, don’t see it that way. This will end it once and for all. It’s difficult to see right now because you have a pure heart. Alex.” She took a step in front of her with tears in her eyes. “I was supposed to take your life that night at the ball, but I didn’t want to do it. The moment I saw you, I knew there was something special about you. I knew...I wasn’t gonna love another man. And after what we did; the way you touched me, I mean. I can’t be the only one having these feelings.”

The Earthian’s heart rate went higher the more he thought he might have been part of a g******e. Something like that would only make the Federation angrier and harsher on humans. Anyone found associated with such an atrocity would face the highest punishment. Millions in the 20 planets would see the death of their families. The hydrogen bomb was the beginning of the apocalypse—a world in which his child could not live.

“You don’t understand me at all, Kimiora. I don’t have a pure heart and you’re the only one having those feelings.”

He tightened his grip around his weapon and pressed the trigger. A bullet ripped through the girl’s skull. Red Beard dashed toward the exit and two more bullets caught his spine.

Danielle let go off Yagoda, whose fingers shook although his face showed no fear.

Alex aimed the weapon back at Danielle.

“I can get you out of here,” she raised her palms.

“I don’t trust you,” he replied.

“Right back at you, partners?” She extended her arm out.

“We’ll see,” Alex ignored her request for a handshake, but brought his gun back into his pants.