Jack And Anna - Back To Winnipeg

1. It’s My Turn to Drive-1

The city of Bekala: the jewel of the planet Ezryn. In less than ten years, its residents had transformed it from a ghost town to a thriving metropolis. At the heart of this grand community stood a pyramid with an enormous crystal on its roof. Shaped like a teardrop, the magnificent gem sparkled in the night, reflecting the lights of the nearby buildings in a thousand different colours. It was the crowning achievement of the Bekalan people; it was also the thing that drew criminals to their city.

With the growl of a rumbling engine, Jack Hunter’s motorcycle leaped from the crest of a hill and sailed through the air before touching down on the rough pavement. He barrelled down a gentle slope, chasing a thief who had stolen something very valuable. Short, white buildings rushed past him on either side, many with lights shining in their windows.

Jack’s quarry was a spindly man who rode an even larger motorcycle and carried a knapsack on his back. Frantic, the thief glanced over his shoulder and snarled when he saw that Jack was still on his tail.

“Are we close?” Anna asked, her voice nearly drowned out by the howling wind. She was clinging to Jack with her arms wrapped around his torso, hissing and cursing every five seconds. He could tell that she wanted to be the one to drive.

The thief yanked a g*n out of his belt holster, twisted around and pointed the weapon out behind himself.

“Hang on!” Jack yelled.

He leaned to his left, bullets whooshing past his right shoulder, striking lampposts and the faces of buildings. b****y hell! He had to put a stop to this guy before someone got killed.

Gritting his teeth, Jack narrowed his eyes. “Not gonna work!” He revved the engine for a little more speed.

An image crystallized in his mind: Spatial Awareness painting a blurry picture of the street behind him. It was one of the many perks of being a Justice Keeper. Another motorbike came over the hilltop, roaring as it rushed down the slope. He could just make out the shape of the driver.

This guy was big and burly with broad shoulders. Which meant he wasn’t one of Jack’s friends. Most likely, he was working with the thief. That suspicion was confirmed when the big man drew his g*n.

wasn’t“Jack! Jack! Jack!” Anna wailed. She could sense him as well.

Veering to his right, Jack hissed as a slug zipped past his arm. He drove along the curbside, his tires nearly brushing the sidewalk. The new electric lamps hung over his head, shining cones of light down on the road.

The big man moved to follow him.

“I’ll deal with him,” Anna said.

“You sure?”

“Yeah. I’m on it.”

* * *

Cursing inwardly – she knew she should have been the one to drive – Anna Lenai readied herself for the most ridiculous stunt she had ever performed. She could feel the big man behind her, feel his zeal as he cranked the throttle and tried to catch up. This guy was one of those jerks who would love nothing more than to brag to all his friends about the time he killed a Justice Keeper.

Calling upon the alien that resided in her cells, Anna screamed as power coursed through her body. With a thought, she manipulated gravity and flew out of her seat, shooting straight up into the air.

She grabbed a streetlight, swinging her body like a pendulum, flipping upside down above it. Completing her circuit, she let go and fell with perfect precision onto the back of the big man’s motorcycle.

She seized him by the shoulders, throwing him sideways onto the pavement. The poor bastard let out a squeal as he tumbled at high speed onto the curb. There was a decent chance he had suffered a broken bone.

Anna had to use another trickle of Bent Gravity to stabilize the bike while she scooted forward and took hold of the handlebars. The effort left a tingling sensation in her skin. Every time a Keeper used their powers, it put a great deal of strain on their alien partner. Too many feats of gravity-defying glory and both would collapse from exhaustion.

Working the throttle, Anna pushed the engine hard. She had never driven one of these things before, but she had piloted several different kinds of spacecraft. How hard could it be?

Accelerating, she moved up beside her husband, her engine rumbling like some enraged beast. Jack shot a glance toward her, blinking in surprise.

So, she stuck out her tongue.

Up ahead, the thief was scrambling to get away, swerving hard to the left and heading down a street that led to the spaceport. They would have to catch him before he got there. Assuming, of course, that his pals didn’t just decide to take off without him.

Sadly, as they rounded the corner, Anna realized that it wouldn’t be so simple. The thief was about half a block ahead of them. He pulled something off his belt, something that looked kind of like a ball. At this distance, it was hard to say exactly what it was.

He threw it toward the buildings on the north side of the road, and the ball exploded with a roar that made Anna’s ears pop. The blast produced a massive fireball that shattered the front window of a dressmaker’s shop. Flames swept over the mannequins and the frilly garments, consuming them in seconds. But that wasn’t what made Anna’s heart try to burst out of her chest.

The second and third floors of that building were used for apartments. There were people up there!

peopleJack brought his bike to a halt near the opposite sidewalk, orange light flickering on his pale face. His mouth fell open, and his eyes looked like they were about to pop out. “My god…”

Anna came to a stop beside him, breathing hard, sweat plastering red hair to her forehead. “We have to get those people out of there!”

The thief had played them perfectly. He knew that Justice Keepers would prioritize saving lives over catching bad guys. The son of a b***h was already two intersections away and accelerating with every passing second.

Well, he could go.

Anna wasn’t going to leave innocent people to die. Stolen goods could be recovered, but human lives were precious beyond measure.

“What happened?” a desperate voice asked through her earpiece.

Jack tapped his to activate the microphone. “Our guy used a bomb!” Blinking a few times, he tried to work through the shock. “Took out a shop on Rosalyn Avenue! I don’t think there were any casualties, but we’ve got civilians on the upper levels!”

“Go after him! I’ll deal with the fire!”

Smacking her earpiece, Anna grimaced and shook her head. “Desa, we’re not just gonna leave these people to-”

She cut off when a petite woman jumped from a nearby rooftop. Desa’s Gravity-Sink was the only thing that prevented her from splattering all over the road. Instead, she touched down with only the faintest scuff of boots on pavement.

Short and slim in a long, brown coat, Desa Nin Leean strode toward them with her fists clenched. Her face was grim, her merciless eyes daring them to argue with her. “If they escape with those crystals, people will die,” she said. “You’re not equipped to deal with the fire. I am!”

To prove her point, Desa yanked something out of her pocket – a coin, most likely – and threw it into the blaze. The flames died down somewhat, though it wasn’t enough to completely snuff them out.

Other Field Binders soon leaped from the same rooftop, descending to the ground like leaves in a gentle breeze. They all wore brilliant, white coats with prominent badges on the breast, each one landing in a crouch. One by one, they rose and hurled more coins into the fire.

Just like that, the flames were gone.

“We’ll get the people out!” Desa insisted. “You have to recover the crystals before they take them off-world! Now, go!”

Needing no further encouragement, Anna revved up her bike and took off down the street with Jack following close behind.

* * *

Peering through a set of night-vision binoculars, Jack saw the world in green. He was crouching on the roof of a warehouse, using that as a vantage point from which to spy on his enemies.

A fence of uneven wooden slats stood at the edge of the spaceport, and on the other side, three men carried a large crate across a field of gravel. Their ship was a dome-like craft with four struts extending from it like the legs of a turtle. A hatch in the side remained open with a wide ramp leading into the cargo hold.

He noted the presence of several large, metal shipping containers off to his right. Any number of hostiles might be hidden behind those things. From what he had been told, this ragtag band of smugglers wasn’t very large – six or seven men at most – but there was no way to know if the intel was good.

“What do you see?” Anna asked.

Jack lowered his binoculars.

His wife was a tiny woman: short with a slender frame and strawberry-blonde hair that she wore in a ponytail. Thin strands of it framed her round face. Her keen blue eyes searched the yard for threats.

Anna wore blue jeans and a black windbreaker over a Kevlar vest. Not the best armour in the galaxy, but it was all they could scrounge up now that they had “gone independent.” The Leyrian pistol on her hip was one of the few “luxuries” they had been afforded. Desa had given them a box full of guns when they arrived on Ezryn. Apparently, there were plenty left over from the last big conflict.

Leyrian firearms had multiple settings, including the ability to stun an opponent instead of killing him. Given Anna’s aversion to the use of lethal force, that was a major selling point.

Wrinkling his nose in distaste, Jack shook his head. “Three out in front,” he said, gesturing to the spaceport. “Don’t know how many are in the ship.”

“Can we find out?”

Rolling up his sleeve, Jack exposed the multi-tool on his wrist. The device consisted of two parts: a metal disk that contained the central processing unit and a screen of SmartGlass used as an interface. “Well, let’s see,” he said.

With a few quick swipes, he activated a drone that was parked on the roof beside him. Shaped like a saucer with a camera lens on one side, the Sentinel X-3 was designed to survey a battlefield before soldiers went charging into danger. That, too, had been a gift from a friend, one of the few he still had now that everyone had forgotten his existence.

After coming to life with a long, low beep, the drone floated upward and took off across the street. It passed the wooden fence and dipped low to stay out of sight, scanning the spaceport with an outdated sensor array.

Jack’s multi-tool projected a hologram that rippled into existence before him. He saw three vaguely human-shaped silhouettes and the large box they carried. The men he had spotted earlier were still toiling with that crate.

As the drone got closer, weaving in between the metal shipping containers, it scanned the ship’s interior. There were four more in the cargo hold, all men, all carrying weapons. “Seven,” Jack muttered.

Anna nodded once. “All right, standard one-two punch.” She pulled her g*n from its holster, grabbed a fresh magazine and loaded it with a soft click. “You set ‘em up, I’ll knock ‘em down.”