Free Gabriel: Zero Point (Evan Gabriel Trilogy) by Steve Umstead

bounced and clattered to the floor. He took four quick strides, bumping the civilian out of his way, and stopped within inches of the captain.
    Biermann stood upright away from the desk and met Gabriel’s stare, having to look up a few inches into the taller man’s face. His arms stayed crossed, and a small smile crossed his face.
    “Something on your mind, Lieutenant?” he asked.
    Gabriel clenched his fists at his side, his inner turmoil raging. The pain from the through-and-through was starting to creep into his system, and his arm still throbbed. The blood on his face had nearly dried, and he felt the sticky substance crack and stretch as he worked his jaw. But all of those sensations were secondary to his anger, which was now directed squarely at his commanding officer.
    “What was this, Captain? Some sort of… test?” He spat the last word out in disgust.
    Biermann stared at Gabriel for a long moment, then turned away and walked back behind the desk. He waved the shorter civilian out of the room. Gabriel saw that Knowles had her eyes lowered and wouldn’t look back at him.  
    “Of course it was a test, Lieutenant,” Biermann said. “I’m not going to buy a weapon without trying it out first. I’m sure you’ve test-driven cars before, right? Think of it that way.”
    “No one died when I test drove a car,” Gabriel said. “Sir,” he added through clenched teeth.
    Biermann looked off to one side, his eyes unfocused. “They chose their fate long ago.”
    Knowles turned from the desk and slowly walked towards the back wall of the room, her head down. Gabriel watched as the slump of her shoulders gave way to a posture of frustration as she put her hands on her hips. He could almost feel the emotion radiating from her. The same tangled web of thoughts he was experiencing.  
    He stared at Biermann, whose gaze remained on the far wall. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
    Biermann looked back at him, and Gabriel saw a flash in his eyes. “What that means, Lieutenant, is that those people were nothing but criminals. Each of them a murderer, or rapist, or traitor to the Federation.” He stood up and fixed Gabriel with his stare. “They chose their fate long ago. Every one of them has given up their right to be a member of society, and every one of them was sentenced to death. We give them a chance to reduce their sentence, to change their fate, by participating in a test. This test. A test you passed, Lieutenant. Otherwise you wouldn’t be standing here.”
    Gabriel’s head spun. Images flashed across his mind: the barrel of the pulse rifle smashing into a man’s face, blood spurting from his wrecked nose; burn holes in the back of a woman’s body armor; the crazy angle of a man’s lower jaw.
    He leaned over and placed his hands on the front edge of the desk, breathing deeply, trying to wrest control from the emotions flooding his system. Two dead, another four injured, by his hand. For a test.  
    “Does that make a difference to you now, Mister Gabriel?” Biermann asked. “Now that you know who you killed?”
    “You bastard,” came Knowles’s voice as she turned back around. “That’s a loaded question and you know it. How can any of them who come through here answer that?”
    Gabriel’s head came up and he looked at Knowles, whose face was red. From anger or frustration, he wasn’t sure. He saw flashes of the emotion he detected in the lab. This was what she was concerned about. But why would she be caught up in this type of operation?
    He looked back at Biermann. “I don’t believe you.”
    Biermann pulled a folded sheet of hardcopy from a folder on the desk and read from it.
    “The two men who were sent to the lab. Falk, Walton H. Tried and convicted of murder in the first degree of a shopkeeper in the commission of a robbery, Denver. Bathory, Ian W. Serving a life sentence for rape, but killed two men in a Mexico City prison, so was sentenced to death.”  
    He opened the sheet to