BABYLON SHATTERED

THE OUTLAWed COLONIES BOOK 4

GAIL DALEY

GAIL'S OTHER BOOKS

SPACE COLONY JOURNALS

Options of Survival

Destiny Rising

Tomorrows Legacy

The Interstellar Jewel Heist

The Designer People

Alien Trails

Quantum Light

Soturi—A Novella*

PORTAL WORLD TALES

Rulari – Land of Myth & Magic

Federation Colonies & Civilizations

The Outlaw Colonies

ST. ANTONI – THE FORBIDDEN COLONY

Warriors of St. Antoni

The Enforcers

The Gaslight Bandits

The Portal Lawman

Cradle of Fire

The Clone Initiative

THE OUTLAWED COLONIES

Game Theory

Heirs of Avalon

Apex Predator

Babylon Shattered

Cloned Ambition*

MAGI OF RULARI TRILOGY

Spell of The Magi

Magi Storm

Paladin

NON-FICTION

The Complete Modern Artist’s Handbook

PAMPHLETS

Introduction to The Internet #1

The Hard Stuff – Handbook #2

Art Show Basics – Handbook #3

Framing on a Budget – Handbook #4

Are You Making Money? – Handbook #5

For Writers Only – Handbook #6*

*Working Title. Release dates TBA

COPYRIGHT © 2022 BABYLON Shattered by Gail Daley dba Gail Daley's Fine Art

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

E- Book ISBN:  978-1-68564-005-7

Print book ISBN- 978-1-68489-199-3

HB ISBN  978-1-68489-184-9

ASIN:

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Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction, and any resemblance to any persons living or dead is unintentional and accidental.

Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.

Book Babylon Shattered  Gail Daley—1st ed. Copyright © 2021 by Gail Daley dba Gail Daley's Fine Art

Cover Art Copyright © 2022 Gail Daley dba Gail Daley's Fine Art

The name Barsoom which is used as the name of a colony in these books, BARSOOM(R) is a registered trademark of Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc.  And Used by Permission.

ABOUT THIS BOOK

On a planet of psychics, Blackmail Sparks Several Murders In This Cozy Science Fiction Mystery

When Clemintine LaSalle steals her mother’s Indenture papers from the blackmailer’s safe, she accidentally gets his blackmail list too, and someone wants that list badly enough to frame her for murder...

Shangri-la was designed to be the next utopia. But it's flawed and someone is attempting to destroy it. A war is building between the Reformers who want to correct their flawed government and the Conservatives who want things to stay the same. Neither faction wants their schemes or their identities exposed. Unfortunately, a blackmailer knows the who the players are on both sides of the conflict. They have been paying him to keep their identities secret, but now he's dead and his blackmail information has gone missing...

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

GAIL'S OTHER BOOKS

ABOUT THIS BOOK

A WOMAN OF ILL REPUTE

I WALK THE LINE

IN A PIG'S EYE!

A TALE RICHLY SPUN

THIS MORTAL COIL

NO SPOT OF GROUND

MOTHER, MAY I?

CRAFTY MALICE

SUNSHINE & SHADOWs

NEXT OF KIN

ANOTHER DAY OLDER

COLORS OF REALITY

VEILED MENACE

THE KNIGHT OF SWORDS

JUNKYARD DOGS

A TANGLED WEB

THE LONG BLACK VEIL

BETWEEN TRUTH & LIES

DEAD IN THE WATER

DEEPER IN DEBT

RAINBOW’S END

LAUGHING MOUNTAIN - THE PORTAL YEARS

ONCE UPON A MIDNIGHT CLEAR

EARTH: GATEWAY TO OTHER WORLDS

HISTORY

CAPITAL CITY

SOCIETY VALUES

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

A NOTE FROM GAIL

GAME THEORY – BOOK 1

HEIRS OF AVALON – BOOK 2

APEX PREDATOR – BOOK 3

CLONED AMBITION – BOOK 5

PALADIN -BOOK 3

QUANTUM LIGHT

BONUS: SAMPLE FROM GASLIGHT BANDITS

BORN UPON THE TIDE

A WOMAN OF ILL REPUTE

CLEMINTINE LASALLE had committed her first burglary under her father's tutelage at the tender age of twelve. They had been living on earth at the time and once again he owed gambling debts to some bad people.

"This has to be our little secret," Gregory had told her. "Your mother wouldn't approve."

She had watched, fascinated as he pointed a slender tube about six inches long at the house across the street.

"What does that do?" she asked.

"It shuts down the security system."

"Isn't the door still locked?" she asked.

"Yes, that's why we're going around the back to get inside. I'm too big to go through the doggy door, but you aren't. Once you're inside, you can open the back door for me to come in."

"They have a dog? Does it bite?"

"The owner took the dog in to be groomed today," he said. "This is why it is so important to do your research on a job. Never, never break in on impulse."

"Oh," she said, satisfied.

She watched with interest as her father found the safe behind the painting. Using a code cracker, he opened it. It yielded a large stamp collection as well as one with rare coins. With the money from fencing the swag, he was able to stave off his creditors.

Lessons on code cracking, safe cracking and breaking other types of security systems followed. She also learned how to sneak around computer security systems, so the owner never knew she was there. This led to lessons on creating false identities. By the time she was sixteen, Clemintine was an accomplished burglar and identify thief.

Clemintine and her parents had emigrated to Shangri-La when she was thirteen. They had moved to one of the Outlawed Colonies because her father owed a big debt to the men who ran the illegal gambling on earth. When the loan shark enforcer suggested his wife and daughter work off his debt in one of the brothels, Gregory LaSalle had decided to run so far away they couldn’t find him or his family.

An old friend suggested he speak to an agent who recruited colonists to settle on the new worlds opened up by the Portal Authority, he jumped at the chance.

The recruiter had listened to his story in silence, then told him he would get back to him.

A few days later, a woman named Jane Sanders came to visit him and his family at their apartment. He owed two months’ rent and the Landlord was about to evict them.

Jane worked for Earth-Gov’s Portal Authority, but unknown to them, she had a sideline. For a price, she also recruited settlers to the outlawed colony of Shangri-La.

"I don't think any of the openings we have will suit you," she told the LaSalle family. "I checked your finances and frankly, you can't afford the emigration fee to a Portal Authority sanctioned colony. There are also records kept of all the colonists. It would be easy for your debtors to locate you on any of the colonies. Your gambling is also an issue because some of the colonies have a morals clause and consider gambling wrong."

Grace LaSalle sobbed into her hands. "Greg what are we going to do?"

"There might be an alternative," Jane said. "I don’t do this for just anyone, but I have a contact with one of the outlawed colonies. They require an emigration fee also, but you could sign up as Indentures."

"What is that?"

"Indentured Servant Contracts were used in Colonial America. Workers signed on to work for someone already living in the colonies who paid their emigration fee. On Shangri-La, the sponsor agrees to house and feed the Indenture for a period of five years while they work off the payment."

"We have a daughter, what about her?"

"I'm afraid any children would be included as Indentured servants as well. Children aren't assigned very arduous duties and a portion of each day must be spent on schooling."

"How much is the emigration fee?" Grace asked.

Jean named a sum that caused Clemintine's mother to look thoughtful. When Jane left, she walked her out to her vehicle.

"I don't want our daughter to be anyone's servant," she said. "Would it be possible to pay her emigration fee and myself and my husband sign the Indenture contract?"

"Yes, it's been done," Jane said.

"What happens to the child if she doesn't have parents looking after her?"

"Children who arrive without guardians are assigned to a foster home. The state pays the foster parent a stipend to care for them."

"Does the child have to pay it back?"

"Not if the child attends school and works to learn a trade."

"I see. How can we find out more about the colony?"

"I'll have some information sent to you. Your contact in the future will we a woman named Ann Reagan."

Ann had told them Shangri-La was supposed to be the next utopia. Hah! That was a laugh, Clemintine thought. She hadn’t been here six months before she realized Shangri-La was a world with double standards. Everyone gave lip service to contributing to the common good and sharing equally in the profits produced by farming and industry. There should have been enough to go around, but the harsh truth was the distributions barely covered a minimum existence. Everyone who could get away with it cheated on how much income they reported to the Central Controller. The usual way was to pay a ‘Washer’ to create a second or even a third identity so that one person was given two or three shares whenever Austin Wayne, the elected Controller, decided to share profits.

Her parents had investigated as well as they could since all their questions had to be done quietly without contacting any official sources. A friend told Gregory Shangri-La always needed people to work menial jobs, and if a person was willing to sign up in their indenture program, there wasn’t an emigration fee.

“It’s only for five years,” her father had said. “Then we’re home free.” So, her parents had emigrated to the ‘New Utopia’ as Indentured Servants. Both of them were accountants so their new owner put one of them to work on his own books and rented the other’s services out to others who needed it.

Gregory LaSalle had chosen Shangri-la because of its rehabilitation programs. Gambling was a disease; the recruiter had assured them. They could cure addictions on Shangri-La. He chose it rather than either of the other two open colonies: St. Antoni (no emigration fee but no support system either) or Lemuria which was reported to be the same, but it was harder to earn a living there.

Unfortunately, Gregory LaSalle was a confirmed gambler, and the addiction cure didn't work. He was soon in debt again to the men and women who ran Fortuna's illegal casinos and gambling halls. With nowhere to run, he used his skills as a bookkeeper and locksmith to embezzle from his employers and when that wasn’t enough to cover his debts, he turned to burglary.

Four years ago, he had been caught, and the rich and influential men he had robbed ordered him beaten to death. When his body was discovered outside his dwelling, the investigator, in accordance with Shangri-La’s policies of pretending violent crime didn’t happen on this colony, declared it had been a terrible accident; Gregory LaSalle had been run over by a robotic transport.

Trapp, who owned their contracts, had lost no time in informing Grace she owed him the rest of the time remaining on Gregory’s labor contract as well as her own.

“I need a hostess as well as a bookkeeper. I will provide you with better clothes and food. You will move into my rooms tonight.”

“No,” Grace said. “I contracted for work as a bookkeeper. Not as a whore.”

“You’ll do what I tell you,” he said.

When she didn’t turn up at his rooms, he sent two of his bodyguards to drag her there. They stood and watched while he raped her. Afterwards he sent for his housekeeper to assist the broken and bleeding Grace to his rooms. The woman, whose name was Marta Dominguez, tended to her cuts and bruises, giving her a small vial of liquid to drink. Marta was in her forties. She had once been a beautiful woman with a well-rounded figure. Her beauty still showed in the bones in her face, but her figure had acquired a matronly outline.

“What is it?” Grace asked.

“Morning after medicine,” Marta said. “Drink it. At least you won’t bear him a child.”

Grace chugged it down. It tasted vile. “Why did you help me?” she asked.

Marta shrugged. “He told me to come and take care of you. You’ll soon find it’s easier to obey him than to fight him. You aren’t the first and you won’t be the last,” Marta said. “It will only be for a few months, maybe a year, then he’ll find a new ‘bride’. You just need to tough it out until then.” She handed Grace a packet of pills. “Start taking these immediately. They’re to prevent pregnancy.”

Grace stared at her. “Is that what you did?”

“Me and a couple of others.” Marta replied indifferently. “He agreed to the birth control after a couple of us bore him children. It was too much trouble to raise them, so he made us give them to the state to raise.”

Grace’s eyes welled with easy tears. “I’m sorry,” she said. “That must have been terrible for you. What happened to your baby?”

Marta’s shoulders lifted then dropped. “I know who raised him. At least the state allowed me to name him, even if Trapp refused to let me give him his last name.”

“What did you call him?”

“Dorian. I named him Dorian. It means gift.”

She stood up. “I drew you a hot bath in your new quarters. I suggest you use it.”

“If I wash, the police can’t do a rape kit, Grace said.

“Sure,” Marta said. “You can go to them and make a complaint. And maybe they’ll do something and maybe they won’t. It won’t get you out of your contract. You’ll still have to come back here and face him. And he'll be mad. Trapp isn’t nice when he’s angry.”

“I see. Thank you for helping me,” Grace said. With Gregory dead, she had to stay alive long enough to see that Clemintine didn’t suffer for the decisions she and her husband had made.

When the LaSalle’s decided to leave earth, Grace had been determined her daughter wouldn’t share the burden of being an indentured servant. Over the years, she had hidden away a sum for emergencies and she used it now to pay the emigration fee for Clemintine. It meant that since Clemintine was underage, she was assigned to a foster home until she reached her majority.

Clemintine had been lucky; Josephine Valentia, her new foster mother, was both kind, and smart enough to recognize the girl's strengths and institute an education program to take advantage of those strengths.

Once she had taken the girls measure, Josephine introduced her new charge to Fortuna's extensive Shadow Market, where residents obtained all manner of things both legal and illegal. The Shadow Market operated in tandem with the legal 'Free' Market, a bazar where citizens sold food, clothing, utensils, clothing, told fortunes, and supplied other psychic services. Many of the regular vendors also operated in the Shadow Market. The most famous of these was an old man called Timothy Maddox. Ostensibly Maddox sold computer programs and repaired electronic devices, but he also had a side gig washing money for residents and creating second identities, usually for a percentage of the additional goods or funds obtained using the second identity. Discovering Clemintine was already versed in some of his skills, he gladly took her on as an apprentice.

Clementine wasn't the only child Josephine was raising. She also had custody of her grandson Archer Mason and four other children of various ages. Orinda Flanagan was about Clemintine's age, thin and tall for her age with midnight black hair and green eyes. Ariel Buckley was the youngest, she was six, chubby with freckles and an endearing smile. A happy little girl, she had been brought to Josephine when she was about three years old. Ariel was an empath. Her mother hadn’t felt she could give her the education and skills to handle her talent, so she had given her up to foster care. Ian Hogun was about Mason's age. A stout lad with curly brown hair, blue eyes, and a gift of gab. Neal McGinnis was eleven. Neal was pale, skin, hair, and eyes. He was also the most gifted; he had the gift of Pyrokinesis. As a baby, he had set fire to several places and the family who owned the indentured papers on his mother, gave him up for adoption. He had passed through several foster homes before he came to Josephine, who seemed able to control his gifts until he was able to do it himself.

Clemintine came to visit her mother the evening after Trapp had raped her. Clemintine worked as an apprentice with Old Timothy and with her foster mother, Josephine Valentia. Knowing her mother would be horrified, Clemintine had refrained from going into too much detail about what she actually did for Old Timothy. The work Josephine did was respectable at least so Clemintine shared that with Grace. Her foster mother was somewhere between forty and sixty. She made her living by telling fortunes with tarot cards and reading palms. In her spare time, she painted and created plagiarized papers for the students of the elite who attended schools of higher education.

Strangely, she was glad to pass on these skills to a willing learner. When she realized Clemintine was supplementing her income by committing burglaries, Josephine had introduced her to Timothy Maddox, the local Money Washer. Timothy, a dark-skinned, white-haired old man liked Clemintine, and he taught her how to create the false identities he sold.

When Clemintine learned what happened to Grace after her father died, she was furious, Grace forbade her to report the assault to the authorities. “I would just have to come back here,” she explained. “Apparently assault and rape aren’t sufficient cause to break an indenture contract.”

There was more Grace could have told her, but she hadn’t shared Martha’s entire story.

Marta had served as Trapp’s mistress for approximately three years, until another Indentured woman had caught Trapp’s eye. He sent Marta back to her regular quarters and assigned her to his housekeeping staff. At first she had been angry, but she soon found solace elsewhere. Marta like to walk along the cliffs overlooking the bay, just as the sun was setting. She could look out over the waves and dream. It was here that she had first met Niles Cooper. Niles was a thin, blond-haired man with the face of an ascetic monk. Niles hadn’t seemed to care that she wore the bracelet of an Indentured Servant. He had been friendly, and sympathetic, and they began meeting regularly. It wasn’t long afterwards that they became lovers. Sometimes she imagined that she and Niles were married, and Dorian was their child. Once, she had even shared with Niles that she had been forced to give a baby up to the state. He had looked thoughtful and offered to find out what had happened to the child.

Several years went by before Niles suggested buying out her contract, she told him she didn’t think Trapp would sell it; she was too useful to him in her present capacity. It wasn’t long after that Niles suggested a way to free herself from Trapp.

Marta hadn’t shared how she intended to free herself, and Grace hadn’t asked, but Marta’s tale had given her hope her ordeal would end sooner or later.

When she learned what had happened, Clemintine had agreed not to go to the police, but that hadn’t stopped her from concocting a scheme to get her mother out of Trapp’s house.

That was how she came to find herself in his study, confronting a scared sixteen-year-old girl over Trapp’s body.

“Tracy what are you doing here?” Clemintine demanded.

“He sent for me,” the girl replied. She was standing there with her arms around herself, shivering as if she was cold.

Clemintine looked her over thoughtfully. Tracy was tiny, with a lush figure, a honey-toned complexion, long dark hair, and dark eyes, just Trapp’s type.

“Did you kill him?” she asked.

“No!” Tracy gasped out. “I found him like that! I didn’t kill him!”

Clemintine glanced down at the body. Trapp had a little foam at the corner of his mouth but there were no overt signs of violence.

“Where’s the safe?” she asked.

“The safe? Why do you want to know that?”

Clemintine gave her an impatient glance. “We need to have a reason why someone besides you or me killed him. Where is the safe?”

Tracy swallowed. “Over there behind that painting.”

“Did you touch anything?” Clemintine asked over her shoulder as she swung the painting away from the wall.

“You’re touching the safe,” Tracy pointed out.

Clemintine took a small can out of her pocket and tossed it to the girl. “I already sealed up. Spray your hands.”

Obediently, Tracy sprayed the sealant on her hands, watching as Clemintine cracked the combination to get into the safe.

“That was fast,” Tracy said. “I thought breaking into a safe when you didn’t know the combination was harder than that.”

“I’ve had practice,” Clemintine said absently as she pulled the door open. She picked up a stack of papers, shoving them into a flap in the satchel she wore cross body. She pulled the bag over her head and held it open while she scraped all the cash and credit chips Trapp had stashed into it. She would get the money washed and look through the papers later. Hopefully her mother’s indenture contract was in there.

“Okay,” she said briskly, turning back to Tracy. “Here’s the plan. Wait five minutes and then back toward the door. Scream as loud as you can and don’t quit until someone comes. Tell whoever it is what you told me; you just got here and found him like this. I came in from the patio as you came in from the hall. After the cops leave, you go to Josephine Valentia’s shop and tell her what happened. She’ll help you. I’ll meet you there, but I might be late.”

“The fortune teller?”

“That’s right. She’s a friend of mine.”

I WALK THE LINE

IT WAS AROUND five in the afternoon when Clemintine arrived back at the hidden rooms she used to keep the items she stole until they could be fenced. She was tired. Ismelda, her pet Cinnamon Coati, greeted her with excited yips and much jumping around. Normally when visiting her mother, Clemintine would have taken her pet with her. Since she had also been planning to burgle Trapp’s safe, she had left her in the hidden rooms attached to Josephine’s house. The Coatis were native to Shangri-La. Clemintine picked her up and cuddled her, breathing in the faint smell of cinnamon. Coatis were about the size of an earthly mongoose with slightly longer legs and retractable claws for climbing. They were four-legged, with plush, lint-like fur in soft pinks and oranges, soft dark eyes, a pink button of a nose, and a pair of small sharp horns for defense against predators. In the wild, they lived in small family groups, building their homes in hollow trees. Although gentle with family members, they could be quite fierce in protecting pack members, and had a unique hatred of snakes. Probably because snakes often preyed on their nests. The first settlers were enchanted with their affectionate natures, adopting them as pets. They were omnivores and would eat anything their humans shared with them. Clemintine had acquired Ismelda shortly after coming to live with Josephine. A neighbor's pet had a litter of pups, and she was anxious to give them away. Josephine felt the lonely girl needed someone to love so she had agreed to Clemintine adopting Ismelda.

Clemintine's second office was in a secret room connected to Josephine's Craftsman style house through a series of caves. The area Genevieve Grame (the founder of the Augury, the group who settled on Shangri-La) chose to set her capital city of Fortuna was along a spit of land jutting out into the ocean. Now dormant volcanos had created warren like cave systems, and the rich soil and ample rainfall made crops easy to grow. The colony had developed the communal crop fields and a part of everyone's tithe went to buying seeds and drying and canning the crops. Since the peninsula where Fortuna was located had no large predators, sheep, cattle, goats, and pigs had been imported from earth and ran wild in the hills and valleys above the crop fields. A few Shepherds whose talents lay in animal husbandry tended the community owned herds. Most families also kept a few private herds of animals hidden from the controller, paying families of “Wilders” to tend them.

The area around the city was also home to an interconnected system of caves. Many houses such as Josephine Valentina's abutted the caves. Their cool darkness was great for food storage. The caves also provided many residents with handy places to hide items they didn't want to share with the socialist government.

Clemintine had discovered the room she used soon after she became one of Josephine's 'children'. She had spent several weeks creating the false wall that hid it from anyone searching the house.

She checked her time, it showed she only had a few moments before dinner. Hastily, she slid out of the mottled skin suit she'd had specially made for her breaking and entering jobs. She had paid a pretty penny to the woman who invented the special light-bending material to make it for her.

She donned her usual casual uniform of a pullover tee-shirt and leggings and unslung the satchel she had brought with her from Trapp's place and replaced it with her spare. Picking up Ismelda, she checked the vid-cam on the corridor outside the entrance to make sure it was clear before she opened it and stepped out. The security measures would automatically reset themselves, so she and Ismelda walked around the corner into Josephine’s Cheese Curing cellar.

Out of habit, she picked up a large chunk of the specially seasoned cheese Josephine made to sell at the open market, bringing it into the kitchen with her.

Everyone was just sitting down at the table when the doorbell rang.

"I'll get it," Orinda offered.

"No, you sit down and eat, dear," Josephine told her. "I'll tell whoever it is we can't be disturbed during a meal."

An impatient fist pounded on the door before she reached it. Josephine jerked it open, glaring at their unwanted visitor.

"It's mealtime," she snapped. "We ask not to be disturbed during our family time. Didn't you read the sign?"

"Well, you're going to be disturbed," a voice Clemintine recognized said. It belonged to her oldest enemy, Constable Jeanne Talent. "Stand aside, old woman. This is Official business. I'm investigating a murder. Move, I said."

"Who was murdered, and what does that have to do with us?" Josephine demanded, giving way.

Talent pushed her way inside the house. "Baxter Trapp was murdered in his home tonight. I intend to question Clementine LaSalle about it."

"It's alright, Aunt Jo," Clementine said, using the nickname adopted by Josephine's foster children. "I was there earlier to see Mom."

"Your mother would lie for you," Talent replied. "You were there in his study this evening."

"Yes, I came in from the patio at the same time Tracy came in from the hall. I left because I didn’t want to be accused of killing him."

"I don’t believe you. Trapp's safe was opened and all his papers are gone. I think you killed him and stole your mother's Indenture contract." She took out a small disc and handed it to Josephine. "My authorization to search these premises."

When another knock sounded on the door, Talent opened it to let in the five-man search team. "I want this place gone over from top to bottom. She didn't have much time to hide it," Talent instructed the team.

By this time, the entire family had crowded into the arch between the dining room and the library.

Talent spotted Clemintine's spare satchel where it lay on a table by the door and pounced on it, turning it upside down and dumping it out. A couple of handkerchiefs, her wallet, change purse, a hairbrush, some pet treats, a harness, and leash for Ismelda, all fell out.