Outfox

By Peregrine Wade

London, 2047. Hoping to eradicate crime altogether, Edna Stuart inaugurates an experimental police squad equipped with performance-enhancing technology. One of them, Howard Palmer, saves the life of Ruth Mackenzie, a small child with superhuman abilities. This is an act which will have greater ramifications than anyone could have expected, but meanwhile turns Palmer into a national hero and helps usher in the future of British law enforcement.

Twenty years later, Ruth is all grown up and has joined the London branch of the Enhanced Police Brigade, following in Palmer's footsteps. But on Halloween, things are about to take a strange turn as a group of mercenaries attempt a full-scale assault upon a corporation controlled by the world's smartest man.

As London turns into a battlefield, Ruth will have to finally come to terms with her true parentage if she hopes to survive. And Howard Palmer will finally come face to face with his greatest enemy yet : pure, unbridled anarchy.

[Comes with a short discussion guide for reading groups]

• Language: English
• Publisher: Peregrine Wade
• Release date: Oct 29, 2018
• ISBN: 9780463554715

Peregrine Wade

Peregrine Wade was born at the Portland Hospital, just in time for tea. He spent the first half of his childhood in London and the second half travelling about Europe, before his family finally settled down in France, where he currently resides. He speaks both French and English tolerably well, Though handicapped by a persistent hearing problem, he managed to forge his way through higher education and is currently working on a PhD in theoretical quantum optics at the Laboratoire des Matériaux et Phénomènes Quantiques in Paris. He lives with his parents along with two siblings, as well as a cat who persists in believing that it is, in fact, a dog.

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OUTFOX

Published by Peregrine Wade at Smashwords

Copyright 2018 Peregrine Wade

Smashwords Edition License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your enjoyment only, then please return to Smashwords.com or your favorite retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

The Martian

A World Of Payne

Happy Birthday To You

The Fall

The Vixen

Dawn Of Arnachy

The Two Towers

The Reckoning

About the Author

Connect with Peregrine Wade

Discussion Guide

THE MARTIAN

On the 23rd of August 2047, Arthur Mackenzie got up, changed his daughter's nappy, had breakfast and then turned on the transmitter.

It was something he'd managed to borrow from a friend of his, only a week ago, and not a day had gone by without him turning it on and tuning it to a special frequency, one which he knew by heart. And every day had been a disappointment.

He knew he couldn't keep on like this. Already his colleagues at London Imperial College were beginning to send him worried emails, asking him why he hadn't shown up at the latest symposium on noiseless intermediate-scale quantum technologies. His excuses were becoming feebler and feebler. And there was no one he could trust to take care of little Ruth. His only family had been his parents, and they were now both dead, their ashes resting somewhere on Mars City 4.

But she had been adamant that it was impossible for them to leave all together. The risk was too high. She swore she would contact him once it was safe for him and little Ruth to come and join her. And so he'd stayed behind, waiting.

Until now.

There was static, then silence. And then came the voice he loved so much, her voice, at long last. His heart skipped a beat. Little Ruth, still in her high chair, stopped eating at the sound of her mother speaking over the radio, and began to babble happily in recognition.

*

'This exoskeleton is a bit heavier than the model you've been training with, but that shouldn't be a problem,' the slightly plump but unsmiling woman said to the small handful of recruits now standing before her. 'Remember that today is officially the trial run for the Enhanced Police Brigade. That is not something to take lightly.'

There were five of them, three women and two men. Some effort had been made to emphasize 'racial diversity': Howard Palmer, with his unmistakeably dark skin, was there to show how successful those efforts had been.

After all those months of training, he was finally here, ready to go out in the field for the first time. He was already sweating under his bullet-proof, skin-tight suit that was webbed with a complex network of micro-electronic circuits. The exoskeleton on top of all that was not helping either, making him feel like he'd been dipped feet-first in starch and then left to harden.

But there was no way in hell that he was ever going to admit this, not to anyone's face. He braced himself for the day to come.

*

Stephen Hartwright was reading his newspaper, eyes completely devoid of any emotion as he leafed through the crumpled pages, completely oblivious to the fact that the bottom left-hand corner was currently dipped in his mug of rapidly cooling coffee.

The room was a pigsty, but Stephen's sense of smell had given up on life a long time ago and crawled into an early grave. The mouldy dishes were decaying in the dishwasher, which didn't work any more. His clothing was scattered in random piles upon the floor, and his gun was in the fridge next to a bottle of watery beer.

It was fairly easy to surmise that Stephen had made some pretty bad lifestyle choices. But he liked it fine that way.

Newspapers were dying, what with the advent of more economical methods of mass hypnosis. There was now only a tiny handful of gazettes, aimed at those without the necessary funds to buy themselves a smartphone. Most of them were shoddily edited, with more typos than actual news to convey.

But for men of Stephen's trade, they were still of use. The police never even suspected that long ago, the gazettes had been taken over by the London mafia for the purpose of sending out contracts on the heads of various inconvenient persons. The code was simple and to the point, allowing those acquainted with the system to find out who, when and where to strike, as well as instruction for transferring the pecuniary compensation.

Stephen, however, didn't give a shit about pecuniary compensation for his efforts. For starters, he couldn't spell 'pecuniary'.

Stephen just like the thrill of going out there, singling out his victim, and promptly dispatching them into the afterlife without a return ticket. Those were the only moments when he actually felt alive, as opposed to being an alcoholic arsehole with hygiene issues. Those were the best.

He found at last what he was looking for. The victim was going to be a Caucasian male, 36, 6 foot 4 inches, brown eyes, dark hair, a slight limp. He was a lawyer who'd unwittingly offended the wrong people, and with the aid of their blackhat hackers the London mafia knew that the lawyer in question was scheduled to take his girlfriend to a movie at Leicester Square at 11 AM on August 23rd .

Stephen glanced at his calendar.

'Shit,' he said aloud.

He glanced at his watch. 10:25 AM. If he was quick enough, he could make it there on time, assuming that he could avoid being noticed by the other hitmen who no doubt already had the unfortunate barister in their sights.

With surprising speed, Stephen tossed aside the newspaper, got dressed, took out the gun, loaded it, and went out the door. Seconds later, he rushed back into his apartment, and took his backpack from under the table. One of the things that this contained was a sharp knife, the only thing he had sharp enough to extract the microchips from his victim's necks, the microchips which nowadays virtually everyone had, replacing the now outdated ID card as a means of identification.

The one other thing the backpack contained was a mask. Stephen had bought it a long time ago. It was a Halloween mask, in the shape of a sly-looking fox with empty holes where the eyes should be, made in China by people working at far below minimum wage. Stephen liked it. It made him feel smarter when he wore it, and it did a good job of concealing his identity. Ski masks had always been too itchy for him.

Now fully equipped, Stephen finally set off on what would prove to be his last day as a hitman in the service of the London mafia. In less than an hour, his life would be over.

But he didn't know this, of course. And neither did he know that the car he'd stolen yesterday had belonged to a minor terrorist group, and that as a consequence the stuffing inside the seats had undetonated explosives inside.

Life can be harsh, sometimes.

*

After having carefully tucked little Ruth into a baby car seat in the back of his old Tesla, Arthur Mackenzie entered in the destination: the Mars shuttle station at Heathrow. The flight had already been booked online, and it had been a easy process because he had the necessary status and securtiy clearance as a 'Martian' British citizen. These flights were still quite rare, but the future had arrived a long time ago already.

Since the trusty vehicle was a self-driving model with an optional steering-wheel, Arthur got in next to his baby daughter, who tried to grab his nose playfully.

'Drive,' he said out loud.

'Checking available routes... route selected... seatbelts on...'

Moments later, the Tesla came to life, and set off on its perfectly planned out journey through the streets of London. If all went well, Arthur thought, they'd make it on time at the meeting point. He could hardly believe he was going to see Kina again, and he certainly could not have hoped for anything better.

And then their new life would begin at last. They would be a family once more, but this time there would be no hiding, no fear, no looming shadow to mar their happiness.

Ruth tried to grab his nose again. He tickled her gently with one finger, and she beamed up at him with a toothy grin. Not even a year old and she's got nearly all her baby teeth, Arthur thought.

'You're going to be just like your mama, aren't you?' he cooed. 'Roothie doofie doofie doo...'

Ruth made a third attempt to grab her father's nose. Much to her delight, she succeeded.

*

Joseph Calloway, Caucasian male, 36 years old, 6 foot 4 inches in height, brown eyes, dark hair, sporting a slight limp which did not mar his otherwise perfectly elegant demeanour, got out of the taxi and held the door open for his longtime girlfriend and recent fiancée, Deborah Jameson.

Leicester Square, at two minutes to eleven in the morning, was beginning to show only faint traces of the hustle and bustle it would become by nightfall. Joseph and Deborah had no trouble at all in making their way towards their intended destination, and no doubt they would have been queuing for their tickets to 'Kitsune Kill Kill' had it not been for an unexpected encounter.

'Who IS that, Joey?' Deborah asked, grabbing the lawyer's arm somewhat roughly. She was not the sort of woman who excelled at sublety.

The 'who' in question was none other than Howard Palmer, standing guard on the pavement, trying his very best to look both protective and poised, and failing at both. In his black and blue striped suit which was for the time being the unofficial uniform of the newly-created Enhanced Police Brigade, he was gradually turning into a humanoid puddle of sweat and angst.

Joseph glanced distractedly at this specimen of humanity. 'Honey, we really don't have the time – '

But Deborah had not paused to listen to her fiancé's reply. Walking right up to the rigid-looking and oddly-dressed officer of the law, she beamed at him and said:

'Excuse me, but would you terribly mind if I asked you something?'

As a rule, Palmer was rarely approached by supermodels in the street. He opened his mouth to talk but his vocal cords refused to budge in the slightest. In a last-ditch attempt to prove that he was not mentally retarded, Palmer simply nodded.

'So kind of you! I was wondering about that suit of yours. I've never seen anything QUITE like it, I'm sure...'

Stiffly, Palmer replied:

'EPB.'

'Eee what? Sorry?'

'I mean, I'm a member of the Enhanced Police Brigade,' Palmer continued, knowing only too well that he was now speaking too fast. 'It's a new thing. Future of law enforcement, you know? The suit is –'

'Debbie, we have to go,' Joseph interrupted, glancing at his smartphone. 'The movie's on in a few minutes, if we go now we might just make it –'

Then a lot of things happened.

A woman walking by, wearing dark glasses and a fashionable Panama, suddenly drew a gun from her handbag and pointed it at Joseph Calloway.

At about the same time that she pulled the trigger, her brain were blown out most unexpectedly by the bullet of a sniper atop the building opposite the cinema. This meant that the bullet intended for Joseph Calloway's skull ended up burying itself in Deborah's leg.

The two women fell down onto the pavement almost simultaneously, the first one dead before even hitting the ground, the second one still alive.

Before Joseph could come to his fiancée's aid, Palmer had sprung into motion. Thanks to his special contact lenses, he knew where the sniper was, and now he had to improvise, with the aid of one particular gadget which came with the suit: a small device which fired small, self-piloting missile which delivered a nonlethal electric shock upon impact. The sniper never even saw it coming. One moment he was about to pull the trigger of his rifle, the next moment something smacked him in the forehead and made him lose all interest in shooting people. Passing out unconscious suddenly seemed like a better idea.

The crowd had all had the instinct to cower at the sound of gunfire, and there was a murmur as they realized that the threat was now over. They eyed Palmer now, the stranger in the strange suit, the newly-forged figure of fear and awe.

Palmer was now finally understanding how much strength the suit gave him, but he was determined not to allow himself to be distracted by the sheer exhiliration of it all. With one hand, he gently lifted up the wounded Deborah, and with the other hand he gripped Joseph firmly by the collar. Now or never, it was time to prove that he was a good policeman.

'What – what the hell – what the –?' Joseph stuttered, his confident manner now utterly gone.

'I'm an officer of the Enhanced Police Brigade,' Palmer replied. 'You'll be safe with me.'

And without wasting any time, Palmer literally dragged the two civilians along with him, towards the cinema entrance, towards the nearest place in which to shelter from gunfire. There was only one zebra crossing to navigate. The traffic light was green. All should have been well.

But, unlike that of a machine, the human mind, although rich in possibilities, is far from infallible. It tends to shut out certain things which it assumes to be unimportant, and its judgement is rarely rational.

Which is why, although he heard the car approaching, Palmer did not make the logical deduction that should have followed. He did not realize that, instead of slowing down, the vehicle in question was deliberately speeding.

Which is why the car hit him right at the moment he least expected it.

*

Stephen had seen the events unfolding on Leicester Square from the relative safety of his stolen vehicle, stopped in front of a zebra crossing, blocked by an irritating red light. He had been mildly amused when the oddly-dressed black man had grabbed the victim's smartphone and hurled it at the sky like an Olympic throwing champion.

Stephen was relieved to see that the black guy didn't appear to be a rival hitman. He would not have been able to compete with that guy. If there were a contest for 'Britain's Most Badass Black Guy', that black guy would have won it with absolute certainty.

Stephen liked simplicity. Killing someone was already a treat. No need to add cherries to that particular slice of cake.

Stephen also was a lazy git.

With that in mind, he saw the black guy crossing in front of him, carrying the bleeding bimbo like a superhero, towing along the lawyer with somewhat excessive roughness, and he simply put his foot on the accelerator.

Sometimes, murder can be as simple as this.

There was a satisfying WHUMP as he succeeded in running over three people at once. The black guy disappeared under the car, the lady (the mafia hadn't put a price on her head, the sentimental old fools) went down under one of the wheels with a crunch, and Stephen actually heard the lawyer's neck snap as he bounced off the bumper.

What a hoot, he thought. Three for the price of one. This felt like his lucky day.

*

The impact knocked all the air out of Palmer's lungs. For a few seconds, the world spun, and then he landed on the concrete with a vengeance.

And then he was under the car as it went over him. Blindly, he grabbed out and caught hold of something metallic, and then suddenly he was being dragged at dizzying speed against the ground, sparks flying all around him in the darkness underneath the speeding vehicle.

Then the car stopped, giving Palmer the time to fully feel the burning sensation that was now seeping through his suit like acid. The pain hit him without prior consultation, and in spite of all he'd been taught, Palmer simply let go of whatever it was he had been holding, dropping down on his back, panting like crazy.

And then, before Palmer could react properly, the vehicle he was lying underneath started to drive in reverse, leaving him behind on the scorching tarmac, helpless and paralysed by the shock. Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw the car stop again, and he saw a man with a fox mask get out, gun in hand, threatening the crowd which had started to form around the two motionless bodies of Joseph Calloway and Deborah Jameson.

Some bystander made a lunge for the weapon, trying to disarm the masked man. Palmer felt his nerves shatter as he heard the gunshot, followed by the muffled sound of the bystander falling backwards onto the pavement. There were screams, and the crowd started dispersing as quickly as possible, giving the man with the fox mask all the room in the world to continue his task unmolested.

Palmer willed himself to move, but the exoskeleton refused to allow him to budge more than a fraction of an inch. The horror of it all began to hit him then for real. He was trapped inside this suit, the one thing that was supposed to help him stop crime with greater efficiency than the average policeman.

Right now, he couldn't really appreciate the irony.

What he could appreciate was the fact that a masked murderer was cutting out a microchip from his victim's neck and that there wasn't a single thing he could do about it. The stupid crowd, too frightened to call the police. Wasn't it precisely because people had stopped having faith in the normal police forces that an Enhanced Police Brigade had been created in the first place?

With growing anger and frustration, Palmer saw the murderer get back into his car. It wasn't even electric: where the hell had that bastard found one of the few remaining fuel-driven monstrosities? Those belonged in a museum, not out on the street in the hands of hitmen.

He's going to get away get away get away get away WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING HOWARD GET UP YOU GODDAMN FOOL –

Palmer wriggled onto his front, and then something clicked as if by some sort of miracle. The exoskeleton began to move once more.

He was free.

With enhanced agility, Palmer jumped back onto his feet and broke into a run, chasing after the murderer's car as it began to speed its way out of Leicester Square. He jumped straight over a passing vehicle without even stopping, a superman on the move. Like blue lightning he zigzagged between cars, his mind now in the zone. Right now, there was only one goal in Palmer mind: to catch that motherfucking killer and beat the living daylights out of him.

The crowd watched him go in silent amazement.

*

Stephen Hartwright glanced in the rear mirror, and his mouth went dry. Suddenly, what had previously seemed like a job well down was now looking like possibly the worst choice he'd made in his entire life.

The badass black guy was catching up with him. On foot.

Fucking steroids, he thought. That's not fair, mate. Not cricket.

Stephen gulped painfully as he saw the black guy jump effortlessly onto the roof of a van, still running at the speed of a car.

Then an idea came. Desperate? Definitely. Dangerous? Even more so. But he needed a plan, and he didn't have any time to come up with a better one.

You can do this, Steve, he told himself. And pushed hard on the accelerator.

*

Palmer jumped from the roof of the van, and landed right on top of the killer's car.

The metal that gloved his hands allowed him to find his grip, but now the driver was swerving more and more wildly down the streets. It was as if he was trying to literally shake off Palmer.

Whether intentional or deliberate, this had the effect of forcing Palmer to stay where he was, on top of the car, squinting to see where this was all going.

Being a born Londoner, Palmer didn't take long to guess where this guy was going. The car was headed towards the river. Towards the Thames.

What does he think he's doing?

As if in answer, the driver started shooting upwards, and several bullets narrowly missed Palmer. One grazed his cheek, causing him to curse loudly as some of the dripping blood got in his eye.

With one hand, Palmer tried to pummell a hole in the roof of the car, and managed to get his arm through the opening he'd made. The edges tore at his suit as he tried to grope around, hoping to grab the murderer by the neck or something. Hell, he'd be happy to rip his nose off, the way things were right now.

His fingers felt only empty air. Whoever was driving was managing to stay well out of Palmer's reach. And whoever it was, he had clearly run out of bullets.

So now Palmer was stuck again, with no option but to hold on and keep trying blindly, waiting for the moment when the murderer behind the wheel would decide to stop. He has to run out of fuel sometime, Palmer thought, and when he does I'll get him. I'll get him.

He'd entirely forgotten about the fact that, had he only thought of it, he could have used the micro-emitter in his ear to send out a distress signal, calling for backup from the regular police forces. The adrenalin had driven that right out of his mind.

As the stolen car roared its way down towards the river, only ten minutes away from Westminster Bridge, it was clear to both of them that Howard Palmer and Stephen Hartwright were at a stalemate. For now, that was.

It would have perhaps interested Palmer that his forceful landing onto the roof of the car had inadvertently activated a countdown. The explosives inside the seats were on a timer which had been paused but which now had started again.

There was no glaring red digital clock to helpfully signal to persons of a heroic temperament how much time was left. But if there had been such a clock, it would have told the world at large that there was exactly 10 minutes and 37 seconds remaining.

*

Nine minutes later, Arthur Mackenzie's trusty Tesla was in sight of Westminster Bridge. The meeting point was further south, on the opposite bank.

Arthur was feeling nervous. She'd explained to him how the system worked, why it took time to find the right place and the right time to make a passage. If he and Ruth missed their entrance, it might be years before they could be together again.

This niggling little fact was starting to gnaw at him, but he knew that he had to keep a stiff upper lip and not let it show, especially not with little Ruth right next to him, so utterly innocent of fear or doubt, implicitly trusting her father.

They would make it on time, he decided. The Tesla had never failed him, and it wouldn't fail him now. In fact, come to think of it, they were going to be early. Yes, he was sure of it, they would be ten minutes early and he would sing a little nursery rhyme to Ruth and then she would arrive, ready to welcome the two of them.

Never mind that he was daunted about meeting the father of the woman he loved. It was going to be all right. Yes, it was going to be just fine and he wouldn't have to worry about a single thing. He was leaving behind the world he knew – coarse, smelly, noisy, undergoing an uneasy transition towards an unrealistic utopia which was going to make a big dent in taxpayers' money – for a fairer one, a new world in which he could be allowed to find his place, where he wouldn't need to lie and pretend and work his ass off just to end up in a retirement home pissing through medical tubes.

And now Ruth, good little girl that she was, was having a nap, hugging her father's hand against one cheek. Arthur thanked the marvels of self-driving technology, which allowed him to keep watch over his little daughter while travelling.

And now they were on grand old Westminster Bridge, that monster of cast-iron and stone from a bygone age. Whether they would make it safely to the other side was a question whose answer would soon make itself clear, and that in a most terrifying manner.

*

Stephen's plan was to drive his car onto Westminster Bridge, as close to the edge as possible, and then jump into the Thames. As stupid plans go, this was pretty stupid, even for an intellect of Stephen's caliber.

He'd been having a hard time. It wasn't easy to drive as recklessly as he was doing now while at the same time dodging the repeated attacks of the crazy black guy's arm, which was now inexplicably poking out of the ceiling.

The bridge was coming up right ahead. Any moment now, Stephen would be able to jump out of the car and perform the most spectacular dive of his life.

It was now harder and harder to breathe inside his mask, but Stephen couldn't take both hands off the wheel for even a moment, as he'd ended up by some horrible mistake on the wrong side of the road and was now hard pressed to avoid a head-on collision with traffic.

And yet, with all this, it never once occurred to him that he would have done better to avoid pursuing a career in crime. Not even once.

Screw you, Superman, he thought, using a knife to stab the arm currently engaged in trying to poke his eyes out, while he continued to steer desperately with the other. Nobody asked YOU to save the day.

*

Palmer