Red to Fade (9 page)

Joel says, “I don't think that Connor was working alone. Somebody had those cameras on the IT floor and in the main server room running on a loop. I know Connor; he's not a whiz kid with technology, but his partner Dylan is. Dylan used to work in the cyber division before he transferred to robbery and homicide.”

Joel pulls out his planet communicator and dials Dennis Crozier's cell phone number.

Dennis answers and Joel says, “Dennis, it's Joel. Bring Dylan Hart, Connor's partner, in for questioning. Try to find out what he knows about Connor's recent actions. Bug Dylan's house when you get the chance and have some agents follow him; he may lead us to Connor's whereabouts.”

Dennis replies, “Yes, sir.”

Connor finally makes it to Arlin Harbour. Arlin Harbour is about thirty miles away from the Hawthorn Bridge. Connor makes the RBM rise up to go above water. The RBM pops out of the water. Civilians on the harbour see it and are mesmerised by this new piece of technology. The RBM is now above water. Connor drives up to the wooden deck, which is joined to the harbour. There are loads of boats above water in the harbour. Most are empty and some have humans chilling out inside the cabins, while some have men and women drinking wine and beer near the stern.

Connor makes the RBM stop close to the wooden deck. He opens the door and walks out onto the deck. Connor throws his cell phone into the water. He thinks that Joel and his crew may be able to use it to track him down.

Connor speaks to see if Dylan is still there. “Dylan, are you there? Dylan? Come in,
Dylan
! Shit.”

The power of the Clandarian earpiece mic has run out; the mic needs to be recharged. Connor pulls it out of his ear and throws it into the water. Then he sees a guy with his wife on a boat drinking some beer.

Connor asks the guy, “Do you have a car?”

The guy replies, “Yeah, I do. Why?”

Connor pulls out his badge and says, “I'm an FBI agent and I need your car.”

The guy says, “No way, man, you can't have it.”

Connor says, “Sir, you have two choices here: you can give me your car with or without pain. Choice A is that you give me the keys to your car and choice B is that I shoot you in the ankle and take the keys off you.” Connor shows him his gun. “What choice would you like to make?”

The guy says, “I'll think I'll go with choice A.”

Connor says, “That's a very wise decision.”

The guy reaches into his pocket and pulls out a set of car keys and throws them to Connor. Connor catches the car keys.

The guy says, “It's the BMW parked in the car park in front of the Arlin Harbour restaurant.” The guy points to the restaurant, which is across the road from Arlin Harbour. There is a small car park behind the harbour.

Connor says, “Thanks, pal.”

He runs to the car park, and the guy's wife says angrily to her husband, “You gave away our only fucking car, you fucking dumb shit!”

The guy replies, “He was going to shoot me in the ankle,
bitch
!”

The guy's wife replies angrily, “
Fuck you
!” She walks into the cabin of the boat.

The guy says, “I'd love to shoot you in the ankle, you fucking cunt.”

Connor is now at the car park and there's not that many cars parked there. He sees the BMW and opens the driver's door with the car keys. Connor gets inside the BMW, starts up the engine and drives to Van Nuys Airport. He's taking a risk by going there; there could be agents waiting. Connor knows not to go to LAX and LAPTS. He knows that there will be agents there, waiting for him. Connor is an FBI agent; he knows how the operatives who are hunting him think.

He finally arrives at Van Nuys Airport and parks his car in the car park. Connor exits the car and walks over to one of the aircraft hangars where he sees a man fixing the engine of a plane. The man that Connor sees is called Jai. Connor walks over to Jai.

He pulls out his badge and asks, “I'm Connor Harper with the FBI. Are you a pilot?”

Jai replies, “No, but Tim is.”

Jai points over to a guy dressed in pilot gear. The pilot is called Tim.

Connor walks over to Tim and holds up his badge again and says, “I'm with the FBI. I need you to fly me to Cancun, Mexico, in a helicopter or a fully-fuelled jet.”

Connor wants to go to Cancun because he reckons that will be the last place the FBI will try to find him, and also because Cancun has a planet transport station. Connor says in his mind,
If this guy doesn't do what I say I'm going to threaten him like I did with the guy at Arlin Harbour
. Tim looks at the badge and then he sees Connor's gun in his holster and he believes that Connor is an FBI agent.

Tim thinks,
Even if this guy isn't an FBI agent I'm going to do whatever he says after seeing that he has a gun
.

He says, “What is this about?”

Connor makes up a bullshit story and says, “We have a possible suspect in a robbery case who may have flown to Cancun.”

Technically Connor isn't lying because
he
is the suspect who's flying over to Cancun.

Tim says, “There's a fully-fuelled helicopter on a helipad near Hangar 1.”

Connor says, “Let's go.”

The keys for the helicopter are in Hangar 1; Tim and Connor both run there to collect them. Tim grabs the keys and they both run to the helicopter. They get inside and Tim checks the fuel indicator of the helicopter to make sure that he has enough fuel to fly from LA to Cancun and back. There is enough fuel in the helicopter to make two trips.

Tim starts up the helicopter and makes the helicopter fly with the flight controls. Tim flies the helicopter to Cancun. After five hours the helicopter finally makes it to Cancun. They are flying over Cancun now. It is a beautiful tropical city. Connor tells Tim to find a roof to land the helicopter. They find a heliport on the roof of the Cancun Medical Centre. Tim lands there.

Connor thanks Tim for all of his help and exits the helicopter. Tim flies back to LA. Connor runs over to the rooftop door, opens it and goes inside the medical centre. Connor runs down a flight of stairs and sees a door for the top floor. He opens the door and walks inside. Connor walks around the top floor to find an elevator. Finally finding one, he presses the elevator call button and the doors open straight away. Connor goes inside the elevator and presses the button for the ground floor. The elevator goes down to the ground floor. As it goes, the elevator stops at different floors. Visitors, patients and doctors are getting on and off to go to different floors.

The elevator reaches the ground floor. There is a reception desk there. Connor walks over to the reception desk, flashes his FBI badge and tells the receptionist that he needs a taxi to go to Cancun planet transport station.

The receptionist picks up a phone handset and places it close to her ear and dials a number on an office phone to contact a taxi service. After speaking with a taxi dispatch operator and hanging up the phone, the medical centre receptionist tells Connor that the taxi will arrive in five minutes' time. Connor thanks the receptionist and waits outside the medical centre for the taxi. After six minutes the taxi arrives and Connor gets into the front passenger seat.

The driver asks, “Are you going to Cancun planet transport station?”

Connor replies, “Yes.”

The driver takes Connor to Cancun planet transport station. After fifteen minutes they finally arrive. Connor pays the driver, exits the car and walks to the entrance doors of the Cancun planet transport station. Cancun planet transport station is busy as usual, men, women, kids and morphian families arriving and departing. Connor walks to the space flight desk area.

The space flight desk area has space flight desks for all of the glacitone domes on Mars and on the moon. A space flight desk is where anyone can buy tickets to travel to Mars and the moon, and where passengers check in their luggage to be placed on the spacecraft they're flying on. There is a space flight desk for each glacitone dome. There is also a space flight cruise desk for anyone who wants to go for a cruise around space and see all of the different planets.

Connor walks up to the Red 2 space flight desk. He asks the receptionist, “When is the next flight to Red 2 and are there any seats available?”

Connor wants to go to Red 2 because he suspects that there will be agents waiting for him in the First Dome.

The receptionist replies, “There is a flight going to Red 2 in thirty minutes' time, sir, and there are seats available.”

Connor says, “I would like to go on that flight.”

The receptionist says, “Sir, would you like to sit near the aisle or the window?”

Connor answers, “I would like to sit by the window.”

The receptionist makes the booking on her computer and says, “That will be $1,000.”

Connor pays and the receptionist gives Connor the planet transport ticket and his change. Connor thanks the receptionist and walks to the security check-in. As usual, there are a lot of passengers queuing up for a standard security check before they board their planet transport ship. Connor queues up behind everyone. Minutes later, it's Connor's turn for a security check. He places all metallic items and belongings in a tray which is then rolled on a roller table through a security machine to be checked for anything illegal. Beside the security machine is a security detector on a computer, who examines trays for anything illegal from her computer display. Connor goes through the metal detector and passes through without any problems. At the end of the roller table there is another female security checker sitting in front of a computer. She picks up Connor's ID.

Connor's ID must be verified before he can take his gun on board the planet transport ship. On her computer she loads the FBI database system. She types Connor's ID into the database and his details appear on the computer. The security checker has verified that Connor is indeed an FBI agent. He is allowed to take all of his belongings and proceed to the gate from which his flight is departing.

Connor walks into the boarding area at the gate and sits down. There are a lot of passengers here, morphians and earthlings. Connor waits for the boarding call to be announced. After twenty minutes the boarding call announces that all passengers can board the planet transport ship to Red 2.

Connor and all the other passengers go on board the ship. The planet transport ship looks like a NASA ship. The colour of the planet transport ship is light blue. Connor is inside the ship looking for his seat. He finds his seat and sits down. When all passengers are inside the planet transport ship sitting down in their allocated seats, there is an announcement from the flight attendant over the intercom.

The flight attendant says that all passengers must wear their seat belts. When the passengers hear the announcement they put on their seat belts. The type of seat belt they put on is a four-strap seat belt. They have to wear a four-strap belt because of the speed the planet transport ship travels at. Planet transport ships in space can go faster than a stealth fighter aircraft.

A passenger beside Connor speaks to him and says, “Have you ever travelled on one of these ships to Mars before?”

Connor replies, “No.”

The passenger says, “You're going to love this, man; it's the best ride in the park.”

The pilot announces from the intercom, “Launch will initiate in five, four, three, two, one.” After the pilot says, “one”, the three thrusters in the back of the planet transport ship make a huge sound like thunder as they burst out blue flames. The g-force of the ship forces the upper bodies of all the passengers back on their seats.

The passenger beside Connor shouts with excitement, “Yeeehawww!”

The ship is accelerating at a fast speed along the runway. After the ship builds up speed it takes off and heads for space.

Now that the ship is in space it is travelling at a lower speed, but is still going very fast. Passengers don't have a g-force forcing them back in their seats anymore, and are able to talk to each other, eat food and watch TV on the small screens in front of them.

Connor has never been to space or Mars; he looks out from the window beside him and is mesmerised by seeing space and other planets for the very first time. After four and a half hours of travelling, the planet transport ship is very close to Mars' atmosphere. Connor looks out of his window and sees the Balaxian cruise and battle ships and is totally blown away by the sight of them.

He's seen Clandarian ships on TV, but never in reality. They look like the space vessels in Star Wars. Connor sees other smaller ships flying around the huge Balaxian cruise and battle spaceships. After another twenty minutes the planet transport ship is finally in the Mars atmosphere. Connor looks out of his window again and for the first time he sees Mars, the red planet, and its five glacitone domes. In the distance there are red, rocky mountains surrounding the glacitone domes. The RB-7 robots did a great job of levelling the Mars ground surface with construction equipment in order for the glacitone domes to be built.

He is totally mesmerised by looking at Mars and the glacitone domes. He sees five cities in five domes. He's never seen a suburban city inside a dome before… well, apart from on the TV. He sees activity in all of the domes, like cars and spacecraft moving around. He also sees spacecraft flying around Mars. He sees that there are planet transport stations connected to each glacitone dome.

There is a runway leading to every planet transport station. A planet transport station is like an indoor airport. Each planet transport station is connected to its glacitone dome by two glacitone tunnels. The tunnels are used to export and import food and supplies by vehicle and spacecraft. One glacitone tunnel is used to export and import food and supplies by vehicle and the other by spacecraft. The glacitone tunnel that is used to export and import food and supplies by vehicle is also used by people and morphians to travel to the domes and planet transport stations either by a car or a bus.

Connor sees vehicles and spacecraft moving up and down in the glacitone tunnels. Inside each glacitone dome there is a small spacecraft station at the end of every tunnel, which is connected to a planet transport station. These spacecraft stations are inside the glacitone dome and are used for spacecraft to collect or deliver food and supplies, and can also be used to allow spacecraft to exit the glacitone dome to fly to another dome or planet.

There are also glacitone dome tunnels connecting the glacitone domes, allowing vehicles to travel from dome to dome. The planet transport ship moves around the five glacitone domes and a new dome and planet transport station still under construction. Connor, still looking out of his window, sees millions of RB-7 robots working hard on building the new glacitone dome and planet transport station; from his perspective they look like ants moving around a hive.