Dystance 3 Read online

  Dystance 3

  Edge Of Deceit

  Mark Tufo

  Copyright © 2019 by Mark Tufo

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Created with Vellum

  Dedications: To my wife thank you for helping me through this one!

  To my incredible beta readers: Kimberly Sansone and Amanda Walker for helping make this book a better version of its self.

  To the men and women of the armed forces, all you do and all you sacrifice will be something I am always grateful for.

  Contents

  Prologue

  1. Iron Sides

  2. Interception

  3. Buckling

  4. Attack

  5. Rescue

  6. Frost & Ferryn

  7. The Ogunquit

  8. Repairs

  9. Arrival

  10. New Friends

  11. Bristol

  12. The Traverse

  13. Three Years Later

  14. The Surprise

  15. War Council

  16. Decision Day

  17. Turning Point

  18. Reclamation

  19. The Hunt

  20. Cedar’s Deeds

  21. Winter’s Salvation

  22. The Arundel

  23. A Self Contained Force

  24. Reunited

  Epilogue

  AUTHOR’S NOTES

  Dystance The Series

  About the Author

  Also by Mark Tufo

  Also From DevilDog Press

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  Prologue

  Where does one start when there are so many beginnings? Do we venture back to Winter and Tallow’s discovery of the library? It’s as good a place as any; but should we travel further back? To Mike Talbot’s abduction from Red Rocks? Perhaps the chase and subsequent murder of Drababan’s family…but events were already in motion, long before any of those things happened. If one is really looking for a beginning, my best guess is the day the Progerians stepped out of their primordial stew. Seems that was the catalyst for all that followed.

  But that was another world; another Universe. For this story, maybe it is best to start with Earth’s involvement, our homeworld’s entry into a war that has spanned thousands of years and involved countless planets. We could lay blame for the destruction of the world as we knew it on Heinrich Hertz, but it hardly seems fair; he was the first to send and receive radio waves now the radio waves were out there. Picking them up merely opened a channel. Like answering a ringing telephone, it allowed a Progerian Scout ship to discover us and lead them back here like an ill-thrown breadcrumb trail. From that moment, we entered the fray, became victims in a war they’d fought elsewhere for millennia, and it all but guaranteed our end. With some outside help and an incredible degree of luck, humanity held on and finally persevered, in a fashion, and for a while, at least. Then an unfortunate series of events that came to be known as The Happening took place—an era so violent that humanity felt the only way to survive was to vacate. And so we fled from our only known home.

  Most left in ships designed to last for generations in space, but many could not escape. Others chose not to. This is the story of those people, the ones who fought on, even as everything around them collapsed. From the heights of our greatest technological advances, to something not much removed from the Stone Age, humans endured.

  And this is the story of Winter and Cedar; distant progeny of one of Earth’s greatest heroes, Michael Talbot, and, somehow, one of her most treacherous villains, Beth Ginson. When faced with a choice between giving their lives to create babies for the Dystance war machine or fighting for the freedom of Humanity, they chose to fight. An unlikely ally, Brody, a disillusioned Broker whose primary job was to keep the populace and any troublemakers in line, trained Winter, Cedar, and their friend, Tallow in the hope they would find some answers as to why they fought and died.

  Once in the War, they first fought against the Comanchokees and then befriended them. It seemed their situation had improved further when they allied with the powerful Klondike clan, until their leader, Haden, double-crossed them in a move to join himself to the despot, Mennot, the Hillian commander. Serrot, Haden’s second in command and others loyal to him, helped Winter and Tallow escape into a vast and unknown world. But escape wasn’t enough. Winter wanted to free the Comanchokees, a people that had suffered greatly from Haden’s betrayal. She went back through the deadly borderline, the Pickets, only to encounter a Bruton death squad. After defeating their leader, she advanced into that role and befriended Lendor, the squad’s second in command.

  She led the Comanchokees on a terrifying retreat from Haden’s thundering cavalry. Once through the pickets, she was able to use the full might of her army to capture Haden, subsequently killing him in a duel. Thinking the battle was over, they let the remaining Klondikes go, realizing too late that Mennot and the Hillians had followed and regrouped. Most of the battle took place near the downed pickets, and all might have been lost if not for the arrival of the strange flying ships that appeared to repair the pickets, taking no notice of the people below.

  Winter and Cedar, along with others from their group, decided to discover what and from where the machines were. They could not have begun to imagine the events that would unfold from that point forward, engulfing their entire world. If they had, perhaps they may have decided to pass back under the mountain and into the War. The Dystance way was not an easy life, but it was a known entity. Sometimes living with the devil you know is a better choice; sometimes we don’t realize that until it’s too late.

  As they searched for a place to call home and for answers to the strange ships, they learned about two species they had no idea existed: Rhodeeshians and Stryvers, bitter enemies who had fought against each other in the wars. Frost, the Rhodeeshian leader, discovered that there was a link between herself, Winter, and Cedar. As they ventured forward together, they discovered the old hangar where the Picket repair equipment was housed, along with a shuttlecraft. Cedar became instantly enamored with the idea of flying. She read and practiced relentlessly until she was ready to return to camp, a trained pilot. When she arrived, she found that a great battle had happened and pushed the group away to the mountains.

  She raced to get there, as Winter and the rest fought desperately for their very survival. Her flight, in the meantime, caught the attention of the Intergalactic War Ship Iron Sides, who was given orders to investigate. The commander of the ship took it upon himself to lend aid. But with one hand he gave, and the other he took. The Rhodeeshians, Frost and Ferryn, he held captive onboard his ship, while Winter and the rest were scheduled to be brought back to the planet’s surface…until the ship was attacked. They found themselves once again prisoners within a war, only this time, the scale was much grander.

  1

  Iron Sides

  “You have got to be kidding me!” I yelled angrily as the door closed behind me.

  “I know, right?” Cedar said from across the room. I turned to look at my sister just as she leaned over a small, brown, hinged box and opened it. “Look at all these bottles! You think we can drink what’s inside them?”

  “I was referring to us being locked up, Cedar.” I was exasperated.

  “I realize that, Winter, but there’s nothing we can do about it at this very moment. I’m just being practical.” She twisted the lid off a green-tinged bottle. It dropped from her hand when we all heard the escaping hiss of air; it sounded much like a snake getting ready to strike. Pale, foamy liquid spil
led across the floor. “Smells like citrus,” Cedar said, taking a step closer. She reached down and picked up the half-spilled remains. She placed the top under her nose and sniffed. “Smells good. Wish me luck!” she said. Before I could protest, she tipped the bottle up and drank a fair amount of what was left.

  Her eyes went wide and one hand flew to her mouth. “Are you alright?” Serrot asked with concern.

  She looked at each of us, her eyes seemingly getting larger with each contact made. “I suggest all of you should stay away from this.” She took another large guzzle, finishing off the rest.

  “This one of those baccoon things, or is she being serious?” Tallow asked. He was referring to the feast we’d had on a wild boar we’d killed in an underground hallway; Lendor had pulled off a particularly tasty portion and Cedar went nuts over it.

  “What do you think?” I asked, jutting out my chin to Cedar’s backside as she greedily began to hoard up the like-colored bottles.

  “Don’t you dare!” she said to Tallow when he went over to investigate. She sat down on the spacious bed and twisted the top off another. “Ahh.” Her face colored in embarrassment when she involuntary let go a small burp. “The bubbles…they tickle my nose!”

  “Sure they do,” Tallow said as he grabbed a reddish bottle. He sneezed when he opened it up, his nose too close. When he sniffed, the carbonated liquid went straight up his nostrils.

  “Serves you right,” she told him. She attempted, unsuccessfully, to stifle another burp, this one much bigger than the last.

  “This is all quite fascinating.” Serrot seemed angry. “But we have serious problems here.”

  “More than we might think,” Cedar said.

  “More than Frost and Ferryn being taken? More than us going who knows where? More than the fact that we are leaving all of those people behind?” I asked.

  “More.” Cedar stood. “Belnot said something that has me thinking.”

  “Him? He’s just a broker in another uniform,” Tallow said hotly.

  “Maybe,” Cedar said; she was thinking.

  “Cedar,” I prodded. While she was thinking, my heart was racing. I’d felt something I could not explain; had she maybe stumbled across an answer? I needed to know, though a whispered voice told me I didn’t want to.

  “He was talking about the weapon designed to kill the invading Stryvers. Said it targeted their DNA, or actually, any alien DNA.”

  “What’s that got to do with us?” Serrot asked. “I don’t even know what DNA is or how it pertains to us.”

  “I only know what I’ve read about it in my books; it usually revolves around what a criminal leaves behind at a crime scene…but my understanding is it’s an integral part of what makes us, us.”

  “Huh?” Tallow’s head was cocked to the side in confusion.

  “It is a substance inside of us, a hereditary material, a genetic make-up. If we had the know-how and the equipment, Winter and I would discover not only that we share our looks, but our very cells would show that we are related.”

  “Cedar, I don’t know what you’re telling us.” Tallow was lost, and I admit, I was on the same path he was; maybe not as far gone, but unsure where all this had her leading us.

  “These cells would all be unique in their own way, much like we are, but they would also share a commonality, just like we do.”

  Because we’re all human,” I said, jumping from Tallow’s track to something closer to Cedar’s.

  “You’re saying the people on this ship aren’t human?” This from Serrot.

  “What is going on here? How can they not be human? They sure do look it.” Tallow replied.

  “Cedar, your beauty is only rivaled by your smarts,” Serrot said as Cedar blushed.

  “Something I can understand, please?” Tallow asked.

  “Yes; Cedar could you Tallow it down?” I asked.

  “Funny, Winter, but I bet if I asked you a pointed question right now, you’d be as clueless as me,” Tallow said.

  Cedar was still rolling along. “The weapon targets alien DNA. If we were all the same, it would not target any of us at all.”

  “I saw the way they looked at us; it was much like how Haden and Mennot looked upon their enemies and even some of their underlings. As if those people were beneath them—hardly even of the same species. Is it possible these people see us the same way?” Serrot finished.

  “So much so that they would believe we are not even the same creature?” I asked.

  “What if Belnot was lying or just didn’t know?” Tallow asked.

  “That presents a whole other set of problems. Do we dare to test out this extremely dangerous and deadly weapon? And who among us do we designate as the test subject?” Cedar asked though she was continuously looking at Tallow.

  “You’re a funny one. If I’d known you were going to get so mad, I wouldn’t have stolen one of your fizzy drinks. I should have left it where it was.”

  “Now you know,” she told him.

  “Trapped by the truth or by a lie, still means we’re trapped,” Serrot said. “Seems to me our entire lives up to this point we’ve been trapped by lies, too afraid or too unwillingly to ever question them. I don’t want to live whatever time I have left like that ever again.” He strode to the door. He placed his hands upon it and pushed, then tried to pull, though there was nothing he could grasp. “What kind of door is this?” he yelled.

  Cedar seemed amused as she came up next to him; she pressed a button on the wall next to her. The door slid noiselessly open.

  “What do you want?” the guard outside asked. He had been leaning against the far wall in the hall but stood when he saw them staring at him.

  “We’d like to go home,” Cedar said, sweet as syrup.

  “Me too, come to think of it. Haven’t seen my girlfriend in two months,” the guard said.

  “Great, let’s get a ship.”

  “I don’t think you understand how this works. Even if you are half the pilot they say you are, they’d never give you a ship. And if you’re thinking about stealing one, don’t bother.”

  “They’re saying I’m a good pilot?” Cedar blushed.

  “Not really the point,” I told her.

  “Right,” she answered. We were now both in the doorway.

  “You should go inside.”

  “And if we don’t?” Tallow asked.

  “Last time I checked this thing,” he held up his rifle, “it shoots deadly plasma bursts. Not something you want to experience.”

  “Why are we being held prisoner?” I asked. “We’ve done nothing wrong.”

  “Don’t know, don’t care. They tell me to guard this room and make sure no one leaves or enters, that’s what I do. It’s pretty simple once you cut out all the rest of it. Now go.” He motioned with his hand. “You just being at the doorway could get me in trouble and now I have to call someone and figure out why it’s not locked.”

  Cedar pretended like she hadn’t heard one word he’d said and took another step out.

  “Do you have air sandwiched inside that pretty little head of yours?” the guard asked. He was getting tense; it was easy enough to see his arms tightening as he gripped his rifle.

  “You think I’m pretty?” She tilted her head and made some obnoxious braying sound that was more like a horse than my warrior sister.

  “Yeah. In a savages-gone-wild type of way, I’d say you’re extremely pretty. Unfortunately for you, it doesn’t look like you got much in the smarts department.”

  “What about my sister?” Cedar turned to me and winked.

  The guard was gazing over Cedar to get a better look at me. “I’m more of a redhead type of guy, but…” That was all he got to say as Cedar moved lightning quick. She kicked him square in the crotch and wrenched his weapon free as he bent over in extreme agony.

  “What did you do that for!?” He was still hunched over, wincing as he spoke, drool falling from his mouth.

  Cedar motioned for Lendor and Ta
llow to pull him into the room then checked both sides of the hallway before entering the room herself.

  “You think you could have maybe told one of us what you were planning on doing?” Lendor asked her.

  “Didn’t know I was going to do it until I did,” she replied. “How do you think this thing works?” she asked, looking at the plethora of buttons on the stock of the weapon.

  “What do we do with him?” Serrot asked.

  “Tie him up somehow; I’m sure we’ve got bunches of questions we can ask him, and if he doesn’t answer, I’ll just point this thing at him while I press buttons and turn dials until something happens,” Cedar said matter of factly.

  The guard swallowed noisily. Serrot held the man in place while Tallow ripped up strips of the bedding to use as makeshift bindings.

  “You’re all idiots.”

  “What’s your name?” I asked.

  “Why? So you’ll know who is accusing you at your trial?” he asked.

  “Try the gun out, Cedar,” I said.

  “Wait…wait.” He was gathering himself, still in a great deal of pain, his face red from it.

  “Manuel. Listen—if you let me go now we don’t even have to tell anyone what happened.”

  “You’d do that?” I asked.

  “You’re not thinking of letting him go, are you?” Tallow asked.

  “It’s an option. I’m sure he’d be in some pretty big trouble if it was found out we took him prisoner. Not sure I would have gone about it this way, but it appears our hand has been forced.”