The Unsung Frame, page 12
part #2 of The Synth Crisis Series
Aaron was the man now, and Aaron was more than eager to keep the relationship intact between hools and skiptracers. Aaron knew that he had an in with the Johns, which meant that there were potential deals within the grey region of the law. But Aaron couldn’t be everywhere at all times, and the synths in Ybor wanted him dead.
“I didn’t forget how hot it is down there right now, Lur, but what choice do we have in the matter?” he said. Lur slipped out of his arms, rolled her eyes, and gave him a weary look. “Time’s running out on us finding the truth, and if we wait until an ideal time there will be more dead people, more destruction, and the government may actually consider segregating synths, permanently. You know more than anyone else that I cannot allow that to happen. If you have any other suggestions as to how to catch up with Natalya, I’m all ears.”
Lur looked helpless, but she remained silent, and he tried in vain to work out what was going on in her mind. “I’ve jumped into boiling water my entire career, Lurita,” he said after a while. “I’m at my best when it’s crazy, trust me, and I won’t do anything reckless. I intend to call in some protection, wait for Natalya, and then corner her for questioning as soon as she shows her face.”
“I still think it would be better if I spoke to her, Dhata, but I understand why you have to do it,” Lur said.
They hung around the zeppelin for the remainder of the day, going over the evidence they had. By the time it was dark, they were no wiser on the details, and even Lur was forced to agree that they needed Natalya.
He drove out to Ybor in the early evening of the following day. It was Friday, and traffic was lighter than it typically was on the route towards 7th Avenue. Dhata drove manually so that he could stay distracted, but halfway there he got an incoming call from Ariana Garcia.
“Ariana,” he said, expecting bad news.
“Is this a good time?” she said.
“Best time, actually. I’m on the road. What do I owe the pleasure, detective?”
“I know that we only spoke a few days ago, Dhata, but I could really use something for next week,” she said.
“Let me guess, our mutual friend came in when I left, swinging pipe as if he owned the place.”
“Yup, and now I have the captain up my ass for whatever lies he’s telling.”
“I got you,” Dhata said. “Give me till Monday and it’s done. I’ll pull together what I have from my source, then send them over for you to see what you can do.”
“Thank you. I will feel better once I have it,” Ariana said.
When he got off the phone with her Dhata pulled up his tracker map, curious to see where Officer Cole would be spending his Friday evening. As expected he was at a bar, one of the only synth-operated businesses in Tampa. He filed this information away in the back of his head and then focused on the drive.
At the entrance to the 7th Ave strip, he parked the Buick, then reached into the back seat to collect his sawed-off shotgun. It would be his only protection against a city full of hateful synths.
One of the hools saw him and took off running, whistling loudly as he did. The streets cleared, all except the synths he recognized as Aaron’s men, and a few other stragglers who were bad enough to try him. As he neared the corner, several dirty, twitchy hools approached him, cautious enough to stay where he could see them.
He raised the shotgun and they stopped, and he looked around to see what was going on. “Don’t mind them,” said a voice, and a large, muscular hool pushed past the others to approach him. “They looking out for me, making sure you ain’t a jack boy. You here to buy, my human friend, or you here to try and rob Micah?”
“I’m guessing you’re Micah,” Dhata said, as he eyed the man up and down. He had to be the biggest synth he had ever seen, over seven feet tall, with solid bio-engineered muscles. The realistic texture of his ropelike arms was like nothing he had seen before. Micah had sold enough stims to purchase the arms, which looked to be expensive.
“Look, Micah, I’m not here for any trouble. I’m a skiptracer, but you probably know that already. You probably also know what I did the other night and are thinking about testing me.”
The big hool laughed. “You? You’re a John. Killing one of you is just about the dumbest thing any hool could do. Come on, John, why the games? It’s why you came walking down here like some sort of war machine. We won’t kill you, and you know this. Killing you would mean all the Johns in Tampa coming down here looking for revenge.” He sucked his teeth. “There ain’t no money on your head, John, so you don’t have to worry about me. Plus, personally, I don’t have a problem with the humes.”
Of course you don’t; we’re the ones buying your stims, Dhata thought, his patience waning with the talkative hool. “I can tell,” he said, then glanced at Micah’s left bicep, staring long enough for him to see. “How much did those set you back, anyway?” Dhata said. “Twenty-five, thirty?”
Micah made a face as if he smelled something bad. “Twenty-five … you high? Try one-fifty—”
“Thousand?” Dhata said in disbelief. He couldn’t believe what he was hearing. It had taken him a lifetime of mercenary work to barely save 90,000 UCCs in the bank. This synth burned more than that on muscular arms. How much is this clown making selling stims? he wondered.
“Thousand, John,” Micah said proudly. “So you understand now that I value my life. This synth intends to be around for a long time, officer. Now you coming down here swinging that old school cannon, you may have just stumbled into the wrong corner—”
“I didn’t,” Dhata said matter-of-factly, and brought the shotgun up to show his intent. “I came down here to see one of your customers, and I’m gonna need your help to catch up with her.”
Micah didn’t seem to notice the shotgun while he was busy admiring his arms. He would flex them and then smile, admiring the sweat that flickered on his skin like rainbows beneath the neon lights. “One of my customers, huh? What would make me help you out when we just met each other?” he said.
“How about a thousand UCCs?” Dhata said. “You can start working on the legs to go with your arms. Pretty soon you will be so convincing that you can move your operation to Bayshore.”
“I like the way you think,” Micah said. “A thousand UCCs … Which one of my customers are you talking about?”
“Dark-haired woman, bit of an attitude. I think you know who I’m talking about,” Dhata said.
“Oh, the troublemaker,” he said, laughing. “Yeah, I’m gonna need that thousand UCCs up front. I need the money right now, and then you will need to get lost so that I can find a way to catch her.”
“Alright, you got it. I’ll be in the bar across the street,” said Dhata. “Here’s your thousand UCCs,” and he deposited a chip into the big hool’s palm. “I’ll have another thousand for you when you bring her over,” he said.
Micah grinned, his silvery teeth contrasted against his dark tanned face. “I like the way you do business,” he said. “You’re a lot more than I thought, John.”
“You keep calling me John like you want me to be one, knowing that none of them will come down here. Well, none of them except one. Jackson Cole,” Dhata said.
Cole’s name seemed to spoil Micah’s mood, and he frowned and spat to the side. He shooed Dhata away and motioned for his hools, and then he shoved his large hands into his thick, brown leather jacket’s pockets.
Dhata slipped his shotgun down into a strap on his belt, then made his way across the street. When he entered the bar, he noticed that it was relatively empty. Lur’s gangster bartender from a few nights before was working the bar and he watched Dhata intently as he entered.
“What you having?” he said.
Dhata sat down.
“How about some cider?” the bartender said.
“Yeah, apple, I can do that,” Dhata said.
The bartender nodded and reached down to pop the lid off an apple cider bottle. Dhata took the drink and knocked it back, twisting so that he could see Micah out of the corner of his eye. He didn’t know how long he would have to wait, but he hoped that it wouldn’t be much longer.
“Staying out of trouble, detective?” said the bartender, trying to make some small talk.
“Not really,” said Dhata. “We got a thing, see, me and trouble. We’re at that point in our relationship where you won’t find one without the other.”
Dhata looked the bartender up and down, taking in his battle scars and makeshift appendage. “You know,” he said. “You know what bothers me? Take that piece of shit across the street selling stims to dumbass humans. Then over here, across the street, we have you, one of our veterans. Look, I don’t know your history, brother, but I recognize that tattoo, and you look like you’ve been in worse blenders than I have. I mean, look at your arm. It’s a crime the way you suffer over here.”
“Damn right,” the bartender said, wiping off the counter.
“Do you know that dude has arms that can pass as human?” Dhata said. “Those arms of his cost 150,000 UCCs!”
The bartender ceased his cleaning and looked at Dhata with what seemed like a look of disgust. “Come again?” he said.
“Those arms on that big, stim-slinging monkey out there. He just bragged to me that they cost him six-figures. Think about what you could do with six-figures. This bar, it could be on the human side of town, easily. You’d be serving rich assholes who would be tipping you enough for you to have an arm that is a million times better. Hell, you could even get some of that bio-engineered flesh grafted on there. Make the snobby locals feel more comfortable with you serving them. You left the service to make an honest living—I’m not saying that you’re squeaky clean, but we see what he’s doing, and he’s bragging about it … bragging about six-figure arms.”
“Yeah, there’s a lot of them around here like that,” the bartender said.
“What’s your name, soldier?”
“Jesse,” the man said, then reached out with his good arm. Dhata leaned forward and shook it.
“Hey Jesse does that, um”—Dhata gestured to his robotic arm—“does that hurt?”
“Nothing a good shot of whiskey can’t fix,” he said.
“That’s a shame,” said Dhata. “Tell you what, bro. That idiot is going to be bringing a woman over here for me to question. I’m going to do it at that table in the corner over there. It may get a little tense, but if you can hold me down, I’ll take care of you. I’m gonna make our friend Micah buy you a new arm.”
“You don’t have to do that, detective. I know that—”
“Jesse, no, I’m serious. It’s only fair. Since he has enough to brag, he’s going to pay for yours.”
Jesse laughed and poured himself a drink, then clashed it with Dhata’s glass and drank it down. “I just need your guarantee that you making him pay does not involve tearing up my bar,” he said.
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When Micah brought Natalya in to see Dhata, it wasn’t the violent dragging and kicking that he had anticipated. They walked in together, like old friends, and when he motioned to the table, she readily complied without objection.
Dhata sat down facing the door, and Natalya sat across from him. She was dressed casually in a loose blouse with jeans, and her hair was pulled back in a ponytail. Micah’s massive form consumed a chair next to hers, and he wasn’t doing a good job of hiding his impatience.
“Thank you,” Dhata said, and slid him another chip, “but I have another favor to ask.”
“You keep paying the way you’ve been, and you can keep asking me favors,” he said.
“Good, because this is a big one, and I need you to listen to me very carefully. Jackson knows about the money you’re pulling, and he’s been talking about bringing you onto his team,” he said. Micah’s face looked perplexed, as if he couldn’t process the idea. “We both know what happens when Jackson partners with synths. They conveniently disappear, replaced by one of his hools. He’s a fat, greedy pig, and he’s still trying to eat, so consider this a friendly suggestion to watch your back.”
“He can’t do that, I have protection,” Micah said. “If he comes down here trying to muscle in on me, he’ll have the A-Squad to deal with.” The A-Squad was what Aaron named his crew, so it took everything within Dhata not to smile.
I guess lady luck is still with me, he thought, as he shifted his gaze over to Natalya. “Aaron is in my pocket, Micah. I want us to remain friends, but friends, they trade favors, and I’m desperately in need of one. You do what I ask, and Jackson won’t interfere. There are plenty of other stim dealers for him to harass.”
Micah slatted his eyes. He knew when he was being threatened, but if he wasn’t willing to play the game he would have gotten up and left. “What do you need, John?” he said, his tone like painful surrender.
“Jesse, the bartender, he’s a really good guy. He took care of my girl and he takes care of me. Jesse’s a friend of mine, and after our chat, I couldn’t help but notice that his arm’s in bad shape. What’s 15,000 UCCs to a drug lord like you? Considering what you would lose to Jackson Cole, it’s chump change. Am I right?”
Micah looked to be having a stomachache, as the bully within him fought with the realist. Jesse strolled over to place another cider in front of Dhata, and the big hool looked as if he wanted to kill him. “Okay, John, I’ll hook him up, alright? Is that all you need? My corner’s getting cold, and with this new commitment I really gotta get out there and earn,” he said.
“Go make that money, big man,” Dhata said, “and thank you for hearing me out. I’m a good friend of Aaron, so I’ll be sure to let him know. Trust me, that fifteen is buying you a lot more than you think.”
Micah got up and cussed under his breath, then shot Jesse a glance that could melt solid steel. He pushed the door so hard that he almost broke the glass, and was back to his corner within a minute.
“You’re a very dangerous man, Dhata Mays.” Natalya spoke for the first time. “I see now that out of all the skiptracers I chose the worst one.”
“Shows what side you’re on to come to that conclusion,” he said. “What were you before the mods, Natalya? Sad human woman or synth?”
Natalya’s eyes widened as his words sank in. It was obvious that she hadn’t expected him to know that she was a cyborg. Her hands began to shake, and she tucked them below the table, but one came up to signal to the bartender. “Synth,” she said, “but you knew that. What human would want to burden themselves with our baggage? I was born a synth, and I am still a synth. I’m…” She paused, as if catching her breath. “…I’m offended by what you assert.”
“What am I to think? You’re practically human. I think that the only synth part left in you is your brain. That’s a lot of money, Natalya, for a … what do you do again? Listen, I know that you’re on limited time so you better be square with me.”
“Is this about Jordan?” she asked suddenly, her blue eyes wide with concern.
“You gave us a job, then your husband blew himself up. He almost took me with him, but you know that—”
“I don’t, didn’t, I didn’t,” she said. “I didn’t even know that he was capable of that. All those people … it’s terrible.”
“This the part where you cry and I hand you my handkerchief, Natalya?” Dhata said. “Your husband was a terrorist that killed a lot of people, yet you’re living with an FBI agent who takes you to buy drugs. I’m really, really trying here to understand how that works. What you could have done, as a grieving wife, I mean, to have government goons playing chauffeur.”
Natalya fumbled around in her purse nervously, then brought out a tiny pill. She balanced it as best she could on her trembling finger. “Do you mind?” she asked, staring up at him, her eyes unblinking and wide. He was amazed by how human her mannerisms were, with no awkward pauses like a synth. Even her eyes reflected life, not the standard dull expression. He caught himself staring and quickly sipped his drink.
“Sure, mount that horse, baby,” he said. It’s to my advantage anyway. You stim heads are notoriously truthful when you’re under.
She popped the pill, then quickly chewed on it, and he motioned towards his cider. Natalya grabbed the bottle and took a sip, swished it around and swallowed. “You don’t want to do this, Dhata,” she whispered. “What I am a part of is something that you and Fabiana will regret knowing.” Fabiana was the alias that Lur went by, and he could tell by her expression that she really did care for his Cuban girlfriend.
“I appreciate the warning, but we’re in too deep. Think about it. I know where you live, who you live with, and where to catch you. I also know that your husband was part of the military, a synth group of killers who took their killing beyond the lines of war. What I’m trying to understand now is why. You hired us under false pretenses to see if your husband was being unfaithful, then when he floors the shuttle port, you disappear into the ether.”
She nodded at him and looked around, and he could tell that she was probing for Jesse to bring her a drink. When the synth bartender caught his eye, Dhata motioned to her with a gesture. Natalya put in an order for a glass of red wine, then sat up with her hands on the table. He noticed that she was no longer shaking, and her eyes took on a brand new confidence.
“I’m not telling you jack,” she said, and her lips tightened as if she had been taken over by a stronger Natalya. “You need to move on with your life before someone you love gets hurt.”
“Threats, huh? That’s where we’re at, threats? How about, you’re going to talk to me or they’ll find your pretty, hybrid ass faceless in a gutter on the side of 7th. You deal with Micah, you know what he’s capable of, and I won’t even get questioned about it. You’re still a synth; you said it yourself. Who will care if I take you out?”
“Do it,” she said, calling his bluff. “Do you think I care what happens to me?”
“You care to get high, and blend in with humans. What are you to that agent and his family?”
