in the ANSWER: action!

It’s just like old times in my new suit “Carla“. Chaos all around me. Space yapping his maximum alert. Drinks have been spilled. Shots being fired. Hostages taken.

“Paul you have to do something!” She looked gorgeous in the firelight. The bits of insulation fiber that hung in her hair give her a wistful quality. “They are arresting bystanders!” We could plainly see them moving people toward a pair of business suit wearing pamphlet wielding missionary types. Safest for the hostages is to convincingly convert, could come away with some furniture.

“The situation is under control Amanda.” The control of chaos and arbitrary fate.

With the pedestrians safely removed to be brainwashed Jenkins begins a suppressive fire into the dust cloud that was once the entrance-way connecting Tubular to Ring Three Promenade Crater View.

“You should surrender to them. It’s you they want Dvorak!” Moody’s bulk blocked a wide potential field of fire near us. I didn’t want him to bolt until we could get him between me and the Utah National Guard. He led them here with his making the dinner reservations in my name for this meeting/ambush. No budget for me results in no pay for him, so the buffet gets put on my tab. He can’t get another job out of the Great Eight so blames me for his low income. A senior clerk always has two senior researchers to tend, and Moody’s second researcher is the long lost missing unheard from presumed dead Johnny Bongard. No contact for years means a lowest low budget for even a senior senior clerk. I might not have a budget from the bureau but I do have super wealthy pants. Suit has offered him back pay and a hefty raise with a signing bonus to continue to clerk till Demarist reports. Keep your enemies close is what always happens to me. We tempted him up to the moon with cash and prostitutes and he led the Mormon army straight to us. I have to remind myself that I still need him. He might have betrayed me but I still need him.

“OK Reggie you go out there and tell them that I want to surrender.” I looked hard into his beady eyes to catch the spreading glee cross his face.

“Paul No! They’ll take you to Idaho and I can’t defend you there. They don’t recognize France Law in the Boise!” She clung to me.

“Thank God Paul.” Moody tries to warm up to me. I squirm away his attempt to comfort me with a meaty hand on my shoulder. If he gets a hold of me he might not let go and try to haul me to them. “I’ll handle everything. Negotiate for your life.” He seemed to snicker. I know mentally he counts his reward bounty money, money that must have been bid up even higher then my suit offered, in order to buy him so reliably, as he turns his subtly armored barn sized shuttle suit towards the combat zone. This should buy us some time. If they kill him not much time. They won’t kill him though, because that would hurt their reputation in the traitorous intelligence marketplace. I’m sure he’d provided them enough of a gushing testimonial of my evil anti-military industrialishness to justify their ultimate extravagance. Religions are notoriously stingy with their mercenary funds. Fanatics work for free. Traitorous clerks must be bribed.

Space Marine Gunnery Sergeant Major Jenkins is giving me a tilted head quizzical look that has me looking down at a quiet Space that is staring up at me with a similar tilted head questioning gaze. “Lets Get Out Of Here!” I shout as I rise to clamber in the Moody distracted lull to the crumpled wall behind us. Thankful of low-g, I go over it like a rat without waiting for Space or them, to slide down the debris of someones stylish furnishings into a partially destroyed tube flat situated between Tubular and Conical with connections to Ring Two Esplanade. Space is first to follow, Amanda struggles over the ruble to tear her scanty shuttle suit to even more abbreviation of a modest lawyers garment. Jenkins does his best to keep her clothed for combat using both hands by ripping the useless lami systems away right down to her power thong and belt. With her shapely perky dancers breasts this reveals the large Arma-Utile hardened particle launcher she has strapped to her left thigh. “Oh I forgot I had that!” She says as she chambers a warhead and checks the sights display. Now she's a fully weaponized lawyer. We move out into the corridor tube of Conical Two Ring.

We hear a rising angry shouting as the decomp door closes. I think I heard: “Moody you lying bastard!” I could have said that. I might have said that. “Moody you lying bastard!” That time I did say it!

“I knew you wouldn’t give up Paul.” Suit whispers in my ear. The brave man surrenders; the true coward runs away long before gunpoint surrender is the only option left. I must attempt to tune down suits Carla parameters. I think my pants might be in love with me.

Jenkins locks the door with a blast to its system lami that turns the heads of nearby pedestrians. The attack of the Mormons has been too sudden for the residents of Conical Two to have become refugees. The fine line between innocent Lunarian and fleeing civilian is the door we just exited. He calls for backup to his ship. Certainly we are now on Police vid monitors. Several cop carts weave their way towards us from the distance.

“Where do we go?”

“I need a drink!” A nice launch tanker of Marstini.

“Lets see if Armando’s is open.”