Faces Of Janus: The Beginning: Janus Paradisi, #1

By Andy McKell

2091. The Earth is failing. But escape is possible.

Global warming, overpopulation, war, and terrorism are destroying the Earth. The Mars Mission is humanity's last hope. The global elites construct ten vast spaceships to escape the coming disaster. The plan is to ferry mankind to safety by colonizing Mars. But...

It is a lie.

It is the world's greatest corporate conspiracy.

Security agent Angel Flores and her lover, Zag Bishop, piece together leaked and stolen information to reveal the truth. They fight to become a part of humanity's greatest adventure.

Their world is one of double-dealing and betrayal. Success is uncertain. Death is close. Failure is not an option.

But danger comes not only from the outside. Zag's growing attraction to Katya Ulyanov, a damaged girl with a secret past, risks his relationship with Angel and the entire escape plan.

The hardest journey is the one on Earth. The stars can wait.

How can this broken team overcome the obstacles and escape to a paradise?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Imaginary Friends Lux
• Release date: Nov 6, 2016
• ISBN: 9781540143563

Andy McKell

Andy was abducted by science fiction pulp magazines and fell in love with classic noir in his teens. After graduating, he worked in marketing, franchising, and computing in London and Luxembourg before launching his own web design company. In 2011, he sold the company and retired early to write, act, and travel.

Book preview

2091

Earth

Chapter 1

CITADEL TRAIN

Arizona Desert, March 2091

The stained and pitted train sliced its way through the shimmering desert air. Below it, the silvery monorail trembled. Beside it and overhead, a handful of coffin-sized drones dipped and soared at the fingertip control of pilots in the Citadel enclave deep below the walled city of New Phoenix. In its wake, the desert dust rose like a gathering blood-tinged storm.

The arid wasteland now stretched almost from Atlantic to Pacific, spanned by a network of crumbling roads and monorail tracks connecting the decaying old cities and the newer walled enclaves.

Earth was dying.

The train guards were relaxed, smoking, playing cards, sleeping. They had shed their green Ironguard Security uniform jackets. The run was safe. It was a regular run. They carried food to the city. They were well protected. The satellite feed showed no suspicious activity from the dust-eater migrants and tribal raiders in the scattered rail-side camps. The leading drone’s camera fed back an open path ahead—no obstacles, no sand-drifts, no people... Nothing.

The line was clear ahead. No worries.

Far down the line, an audio scanner picked up a humming from the rail. Warning lights on handheld units blinked. Heads ducked deeper under camouflage blankets treated to shield them from infrared scans. They waited. They held their breath, even though the drones could not detect the sound of breathing over their own engines and the desert wind.

They knew the risks. But they were short of food. They were short of explosives. They had assembled all their remaining equipment stocks—stolen, smuggled and bartered. This last-ditch food hijacking had to work.

Under the blankets, the temperature rose, the tension grew.

The dust cloud trailing the train came into sight.

Nearer it came. They all depended on success today—the raiders here and their families back in the refugee camps.

They dared not move too soon. Waiting, waiting...

At the last moment came the yell, Now!

Raiders armed with shoulder launchers threw off their protective blankets and came to their knees to launch heat-seeking missiles at the drones. As they soared toward their targets, their leader triggered the explosives attached to the rail.

New Phoenix, Citadel Zone

JCorp Tower, Sub-level 10, Sentinel Level

At the end of the line, inside New Phoenix’s outer city walls, lay the Citadel: a walled enclave protecting the city’s government, commercial center and the homes of the very wealthy. Amid the extravagant towers rose Janus Security Corporation’s building. Ten levels below ground lay their surveillance center, Sentinel.

The drones’ flight commander called out, Monorail Three-Two under attack, Boss. Losing drones to missiles. Losing human assets.

Zag Bishop, lounging in the command seat, took a gulp of coffee. Use the drones, Harry. Take ’em out. He stared at the multiple screens displaying the views from the drones’ onboard cameras and the JC7 satellite far overhead.

He spotted maybe a dozen raiders before the displays blinked out one by one as the drones burst into flames. The train lurched into the air as the charges blew. The rail buckled and broke apart. The train crashed into the ground, smashing hard, its carriages jackknifing, crates of provisions tumbling out for the taking.

The raiders were now firing weapons into the guards’ compartment as the drones swooped and launched high caliber rounds at the attackers. The carriage burst open as a missile slammed into it. The attackers charged toward the broken carriage.

We lost internal visuals, Boss. I saw guards down. Running low on drones. Too many missiles. Hell, they’re well tooled. Gonna lose the cargo. Orders?

Through the confusion of flame and smoke from the train, the single remaining drone dipped and dived and spun, trying to survive to continue broadcasting. Its display was a roller-coaster ride of spinning and half-glimpsed images.

It showed fleeting, distorted visions of the chaos.

A blond woman standing atop the guards’ broken compartment.

Holding onto a green Ironguard uniform tunic, fluttering in the wind.

Rifle in hand, raised above her head, gesturing defiantly.

Raiders swarming over the wreck toward her.

Zag stared bleakly at the static-ridden screen. The girl’s had it. The food cargo’s lost. Deny them. Burn the train. He knocked back the last of his coffee and turned away, heading for the elevators to the upper floors.

Copy that, Boss. Burning the train.

A flowering of fire erupted from the train’s self-destruct charges, blasting each carriage in turn in a rapid and deadly sequence. The explosions blew the woman high in the air. Flames enveloped her body as she spun away into the nearby dunes. The last surviving drone flew into the inferno and the transmission ended.

Harry called out, Self-destruct sequence complete. Send out new drones to cover for the Recovery’n’Repair team. And someone bring me a coffee.

Someone yelled, Hell, Harry. Did you see that chick’s last stand? A bloody hero.

Sure did, Tom. I’ll ask PR if we should release it to the news services.

As the elevator door closed, Zag’s wrist communications panel buzzed. It was Angel Flores, Operations Director. He had liked her predecessor, but he had retired.

This replacement was intolerable. Her only saving grace was her ability. Even Zag could not deny that. He had read her profile when she arrived at JCorp.

Their beginnings had much in common. Both slum kids: she in a favela slum in Rio, he in the backstreets of New Phoenix’s lower city; she an orphan, his parents unknown. Then their lives diverged.

His experience came from the streets, the military, then an unlisted government department.

She was intensively self-educated, using what remained of the no-fee Web, then learning everything her boss knew before job-hopping to work for someone who knew a little more. It did not take her long to know more than her boss. The old man, Janus Sr., had recruited her just before he died. Now she was top dog at JCorp. How long before she moves on again?

There was nowhere higher to go within JCorp. Some day, she would be leaving. Some day, she would reach the stars. He chuckled. Reluctantly, he wished her luck, although he hated her. Ambitious, cold, patronizing... But, he had to be honest, she was damn good at her job.

Above her now was Janus Jr., a damned useless playboy. Zag snorted. They say an incompetent never hires anyone more capable than themselves. That man would never have hired her.

How long after Director Flores leaves before I move on?

At least the owner had overruled his son and brought her in before he passed. The elder Mr. Janus was a sad loss; the son was a waste of oxygen. Thank God the Division Heads guided by Director Flores were running the company, not him.

Zag glanced at the image on his wrist display. It was a pity he hated Angel Flores. She really was melting hot and still young. Man, she had a pile of frikin’ ability to get so high so young. And that fine-featured Hispanic-Asian face...

That face was speaking. Bishop, can you hear me? I just got the news. You lost the entire cargo. Plus the drones.

And the guards, Director Flores.

She was still grilling him. Why didn’t anyone spot the sapper work on the rail?

No idea. Check the feeds yourself. No one saw anything. All our hi-tech spotted nothing. They were good, damned good. He waited for her response but got none.

He changed the subject. Director, get me off this detail. I need to be in the field, not watching trains.

Experience, Bishop. And I just heard from Ironguard. Remember Ironguard, our clients?

Sarcasm comes easy to her, he thought. Director—

Bishop, we lost the drone contract.

The remote drone protection service was a project she had introduced. It was her baby. This was the trial run, and it had failed. The baby was dead. He returned to his personal beef. So now I’ve been through nearly every damned department we have. I don’t need more corporate familiarization.

You never know when you might need it, especially if you are to be my Operations Manager. The interdepartmental ignorance here is intolerable.

Just lemme do my own job. I need to be in the field. And let Harry do his job without me getting in the way.

I just told you, we lost the drone support contract. We no longer need an escort drone commander. Harry no longer has a job. She cut him off without another word.

Zag had a word for the JCorp top dog. Bitch!

* * *

Later, in his apartment on the executive living level of the JCorp building, he grabbed a glass of scotch and leaned back in his chair to watch the recovery operation displayed on his lounge holowall.

A flock of drones had arrived quickly to survey the scene, looking for survivors or a second ambush. They found neither from their vantage point.

In their wake, the recovery team’s train surged down the line as far as the damaged rail allowed. Heavily armed Ironguard officers in protective gear swarmed out and took defensive positions. Others searched for threats. They found none.

Given the all-clear, the engineers emerged cautiously, hiding behind their heavy-duty machinery as it rumbled down the train’s ramps. The line would be operational again by morning.

He was about to turn in when Director Flores called, in a cheerier mood this time.

That Ironguard woman, the blond train guard, she survived. But only just. Seems she’s a hero. She looked away as she checked the file. Provisional ID is Katya Ulyanov.

Yeah, I’m watching the newsfeed. I saw her standing there waving her rifle at the raiders. If she’d had any sense, she’d have played dead.

Cynic!

Survivor.

Well, she survived without your tactics, Bishop. The City’s Welfare Fund is paying their hero’s hospital bill. I doubt Ironguard could afford it. Amateurs. Hell, she’s a mess. Major surgery, treatment, and reconstruction. I’ve told PR to grab us some placement time in the reports.

Director...

Listen, we lost the contract. She’s a hero. We’ll ride on that. We need the PR, even though she wasn’t our employee. She was one of Ironguard’s, but what the hell?

Zag swore again. But he was somehow glad Katya Ulyanov had survived.

Chapter 2

DO NO HARM

New Phoenix Citadel Hospital, Arizona

Dr. Emmanuel Frost leaned over his desk, head bent, fingers stroking his forehead as if to massage away pain.

The holowall displays showed what he had known for six months. He could not rub away the knowledge. He could not doctor his own memory. The facts would not change, no matter how many times he reviewed them.

The girl had been lucky.

He snorted at the thought. Lucky?

She had lost no limbs. Just shattered and broken bones that he could repair. The main blast had been partly contained by the carriage roof.

She was unrecognizable, and the ID embedded in her wrist would have melted. Except she did not have one.

The press had leaped to assume she was a heroic train guard and not a desert refugee raider. It was easier for him to go along with that myth than to have the truth revealed about her. And about him.

Her last stroke of luck came when he was assigned the case; a man who had once been a volunteer aid worker among those refugees beyond the city walls.

Everyone has something they wish to hide.

He had consulted Katya Ulyanov’s medical record. As treatment progressed, he faced the discrepancies. DNA, blood type, facial bone structure, cranial bones...

The DNA check had shaken him badly. DNA does not lie. A doctor can.

Step-by-step, he found himself sinking deeper into deception.

Over a painful six months, his team rebuilt her body and healed her burned flesh. Reconstructive surgeons had built her a new face. A not unattractive one, he was proud to say.

The basal skin layers that create fingerprints were burned away; her retinas were flash-damaged. Now she wore lab-grown transplants.

He had spoken to her at length. She was smart. Very smart. He was pleased about that. Frost had planned what he would say at their next meeting. She had taken his hints about likely memory issues when meeting with the PTSD therapist.

If only she would pick up the hints he was about to give her.

* * *

The hero of the hour from a few months ago was resting on her hospital bed after a heavy workout session. Apart from a fine web of faint scars on her face and neck, she was in perfect condition. Her body was healed, she was well fed, her gym workouts were toning her body and her blonde hair had grown back, as Dr. Frost had promised. She had cropped it short, the way she liked it. A pool of sunshine poured from the holowall.

It showed a tropical island, her favorite playback. Blue waves broke upon a perfect sandy beach. Palm trees swayed in the warm, gentle breeze that flowed through the room, courtesy of the top-end Reality Experience Immersion program.

If only... she murmured.

Don’t get too used to this. A deep, warm voice cut through her daydreaming. She had been too absorbed to notice his arrival at her bedside.

Frost was tall, a little plump and authoritative, yet with laugh lines around his eyes suggesting a history of kindly humor.

The patient raised herself on one elbow and greeted him, delighted at his arrival. She felt safe with him in some deep way.

He called up her file on the wall display. Your wounds are healed, the grafts... He took her jaw in his hand and gently turned her head to left and right, examining her face in the artificial tropical sunlight. The grafts have taken well. These scars will vanish in time.

She felt at ease as his fingertip-touch ran across those scar lines. Katya was pleased with her appearance. She had seen images of the charred wreck she had been when they brought her here. I never dreamed I’d heal so quickly. It’s a wonderful job. She touched his arm.

You can thank modern medicine for the fast physical healing, he said, slowly moving back out of her reach, but let’s talk about your dreams. You still have the nightmares?

She looked away. They’re getting better. Less often. Less vivid.

Yes, they are. Just a little less often and just a little less vivid.

Your counselor tells me you are still holding back, reluctant to talk.

She fought down a rush of panic. It’s difficult. Painful. Like you warned me it would be. Thank God he gave me that PTSD cop-out. Hard to remember all kinds of everyday things. Broken up memories... Her voice stumbled to a halt. She did not know what to say to reassure him while keeping her secret hidden.

You had a terrible experience such as combat troops suffer. You might experience flashbacks, not just dreams, triggered by any stressful situation. They might even come out of the blue. You will have selective amnesia. You will find gaps in your pre-injury memories. That will make it hard to re-establish relationships or even to go back to your old employer.

She thrilled at that but kept her expression blank. Yes, I understand all that, Doctor.

I hope you do. She noticed a slight, odd emphasis in those words. I would like you to continue with therapy sessions if that proves possible. My department will cover the costs. Although this brings me to the bad news.

Again, she felt that now-familiar panic rise. Does he know?

He stepped back a little more. Your body is healed. It is time for you to go back into society. You are being released. The Citadel has lost interest in you and turned its hungry eyes to feast on other things. The news services aren’t even interested in your release.

Fine! Can’t wait to get out of here and back to the real world. She tried to sound positive but heard the uncertainty in her voice.

Frost spoke carefully, About your real world...

A cold shock ran through her. He must know. My time’s up. She held her breath and waited.

I turned away all visitors, as you requested, and they stopped coming. You had few friends, it seems. Even your employers stopped asking for progress reports a long time ago. Not a popular girl. The gentleness in his words of reproof and his warm smile were reassuring.

She shrugged, uncertain of how to respond. She had worried about discovery during the waking moments that her pain and medications had not blanked out all rational thoughts. Eventually, she just accepted what was happening to her and hoped for the best.

Now it was too late. Should I run? How can I escape?

Should she kill this kindly man and somehow destroy the records? The central databases were out of her reach; she had no idea how to access them, or how to use the interface.

The doctor sat on the bed and put on the serious expression she had come to know well. He considered her face for a moment, then took a deep breath. Due to the damage, your biometrics have changed. Your facial structure, your voice, even your fingerprints and retina no longer match those on Katya Ulyanov’s ID records.

She stirred, her eyes scanned the room, checking the distance to the door.

Frost ignored her growing agitation, continuing to speak in a calm, reassuring voice. In extreme cases such as yours, the hospital authorities can update Central Records. Accordingly, we had a new ID issued using your current biometrics. He withdrew a basic wristcomm from the pocket of his white coat. In the process, he paused, I discovered an error on your DNA record. I replaced it with your current one. Don’t lose this if you want to stay in the city. You can now pass everywhere as Katya Ulyanov.

He knows! A voice in her head screamed at her to run. But he’s covering for me. Why?

You are healed. Citadel had its hero for a while. My team gained additional kudos, which will enhance the fees we can attract. Everyone wins. Wearing a wide, warm smile, he held out the wristcomm to her. Welcome to New Phoenix, Katya Ulyanov.

His dark