Exodus, page 70
The final result came in: the feature recognition search. They weren’t listed in any datacore he accessed.
“Okay,” Zikar said, waving his arm around at the workbenches with their microsembly rigs and stacks of fabrication furnaces. “This is where the magic happens. What sort of tech are you looking for?”
“Lifesaving,” the man said.
“You need to be a bit more specific.”
“We’re here to save your life,” the woman explained.
Zikar kept his face expressionless and triggered the safeguard. His view lens crashed, going blank. “Asteria’s arse.” Now the panic started to rise.
“No, really,” the man said. “You should listen to our offer. I don’t think you’ll last long without it.”
“Okay, I’ve got some treasury accounts I can transfer over. It’s not much.”
“Sir, are you offering a bribe to a police officer?” the woman asked.
Zikar stood perfectly still; his patch reported it no longer had a lnc with the city’s net. “I am responding to a threat against my life, er, officer…?”
“There was no threat made against your life,” the man said. “I am Officer Terence Wilson-Fletcher, and this is Officer Lućia Jørn. We are informing you there is a known threat against you, which is why we’re offering you police protection.”
“Nice shakedown. Like I said, I have some treasury accounts. So let’s all just stay calm. That way everyone can walk away from this without any excitement.”
“I don’t think you quite understand. There are three people on their way here, with orders to abduct you.”
“So…all right, thank you for warning me. I can pay them off. Yeah? And you’ll carry the money to them?”
His two tormentors exchanged a look of annoyance. “How is this guy a bioware expert?” Terence asked. “I thought you had to have functioning brain cells for that.”
“Beats me,” Lućia said.
“What the hell do you want?” Zikar demanded hotly.
“I wasn’t kidding,” Terence said. He held out his city police badge, which Zikar’s lnc patch could connect to; it seemed genuine. “We are central district police officers, and we are here to keep you safe. Those three people are part of Eleven Toxix. Have you heard of that gang?”
“Yeah, I guess.”
“The person who has put the contract on you was also responsible for what happened on Dearag Avenue a while back. Remember that? A lot of people hurt. Five dead—officially.”
Now Zikar really didn’t know what to make of this. If it was a shakedown, it was the craziest ever. “Yeah.”
“The Eleven Toxix team will take you from this place and interrogate you. Do you want that to happen?”
“Well, no. But what’s it going to cost me?”
“The answer.”
“To what? Come on, man, you’re freaking me out here. What do you want?”
“Your cooperation. I have a squad from the Armed Tactical Division in position at the back of these premises. So what I want to happen next is for you to leave with them. They will take you to a safe place while I intercept the abduction team. Once they have been taken into custody, I will ask you the question they were going to ask.”
“Huh? This is…insane.”
“Quite the opposite. You see, my real interest isn’t in you, it’s in whoever is paying them. And I’m hoping that both the question and the answer will take me closer to them.”
“Oh, man; I don’t know.”
“They are nine minutes out,” Lućia said. “We need five to get you clear. Make your mind up. Now.”
“And that, my friend, is a threat,” Terence told him. “Because if you run, they will come after you, and they are not going to stop until they have caught you. My guess is they won’t be happy with all the extra effort that’ll require.”
“And afterward? If I go with your squad?”
Terence shrugged. “That’s up to you. Live a good life as an honest citizen, or keep on supplying gangs with equipment that allows them to carry out acts of theft and violence.”
“Huh?”
“He means it doesn’t bother us,” Lućia told him. “Because either way, we now own you. We’ve saved your life, so maybe start showing some gratitude.”
“I don’t…I just…I can’t…This is too much.”
“Then run,” Terence said. “We won’t stop you. We’ll just move on to whoever their next victim is.”
“Shit!”
“Eight minutes thirty seconds,” Lućia said.
“Okay, all right, what do you want me to do?”
* * *
—
Sergeant Yelice was waiting outside the store’s rear loading bay, wearing light armor. Five of his squad accompanied him, closing in on a slump-shouldered Zikar.
“So,” Yelice said, “is this an official special op, or one of your special, special ops?”
Terence grinned at him. “Don’t know yet.”
“Typical.” He looked at Lućia. “Nice vampyries.”
“Thanks.”
Yelice handed Terence the case he’d brought. Zikar eyed with some apprehension the green wand Terence took out. “What’s that?”
“Just keep still,” Terence told him, and held the wand up in front of his face. The scan took about twenty seconds.
“Really?” Yelice said. “You’re actually going to use one of those?”
“The othervisor? Yes, I really am.”
“Nobody uses othervisors. They’re like Earth-basic crap.”
“So no one will be expecting it, then, will they?” Terence opened the case and watched the grid slowly extrude the flimsy mask. Yelice was right in that the idea was ancient, but the system Makaio-Faraji had provided used a sheet of synthetic biology cells; its inner surface was already shaped to fit perfectly over Terence’s face. The grid in the case was busy sculpting the outer surface to mimic Zikar’s features.
As it came out, Terence took his coat off; underneath he was wearing the same kind of trousers and T-shirt as Zikar had on.
“I thought those things took a couple of hours to produce,” Yelice said, peering at the othervisor.
“This is the new version.”
“Riiight.”
Terence took the mask out and carefully placed it over his own face. Lućia helped shuffle it around until the fit was perfect. “Good to go,” she told him with only a small smirk.
Terence sent a code through his lnc to trigger the adhesion. It felt like a chilly tissue had dropped onto his face.
“Yeah, okay,” Yelice said grudgingly. “I gotta admit, that actually looks quite good. Congratulations. What ten-year-old doesn’t want to play archons and anarchists?”
“Thanks.”
“So where do you want us?”
They settled on the small warehouse behind Zikar’s workshop. Yelice and two of his squad took up position amid the racks, with the door slightly open. Terence and Lućia went into the front shop to wait beside all the piles of andy detritus. His retina membrane played the feed from the flock of insect drones following the abduction team’s globecab. “Two minutes out,” he muttered.
The whole situation was almost a repeat of the events that led up to the Bopbe disaster. An informer that one of Lućia’s agents had placed into Eleven Toxix had missed the actual meeting where Zikar’s abduction had been arranged, but shunted the information out that three gang members had been given the task from Bersche, one of Eleven Toxix’s lieutenants. He wanted to ask Zikar a few questions. The CI had tagged that straightaway. Terence agreed. Zikar didn’t have any single gang association, but he was known to supply customized biotech to anyone who could afford it without prejudice; the whole thing was too similar for a coincidence.
His flock of synthetic biology insects showed him the globecab pulling up outside. “We’re on.”
They came in with a swagger—hard men with Lidon biotech muscle grafted into their bodies, giving them unnaturally wide shoulders. Terence was pleased he didn’t chuckle; that would have been way out of Zikar’s character. But the shoulders did make it look like they had too-small heads. One of them walked straight up to the counter Terence and Lućia were standing behind. The other two took out magrail guns with auto-pump magazines.
Lućia let out an authentic-sounding gasp and pressed up beside Terence.
“You Zikar?” the first one asked in an accent so thick and slurry Terence could barely understand it.
“I don’t want no trouble,” he said. “Please. I got some treasury accounts I can transfer over.” He could actually feel Lućia quiver when he said it.
“Don’t need it.”
“I’ll take his money—” the second gang soldier grunted.
“Shut it. You.” A finger was jabbed right up to the bridge of Terence’s nose. “You’s coming with us.”
“I’ll answer the questions,” Terence said. “Whatever Bersche wants to know.”
“Uh, wot?”
“Bersche,” Terence said. “He said I should come in to see him because he’d got some questions for me. I’ve been busy, that’s all. Nothing works in this city these days, so I’ve got a shit-ton of repairs. I wasn’t dissing him or nothing. Honest. Ask away.”
“Come wiv us.”
“Please, I’ve got four civic andys to get done before tomorrow. I can’t spare the time.”
“I doesn’t fooking care. Come. Now.”
“Oh, I get it, he doesn’t trust you with the questions.”
“He trusts us, shithead!”
“So what question?”
“It’s about Toše,” the second one said. “Have you ever done any business with him?”
“Shut it!” the first one said.
“Why? I want the money he’s got.”
“We ain’t here for that.”
“Just saying. Who’s gonna know?”
“Well, I would,” Terence said mildly.
“Fuck off.”
Terence’s retinal membrane showed him his target graphics aligned on the first man; he shot him with a nervejam bracelet that was covered by his shirt sleeve. Lućia’s shot knocked out the second one. Terence shifted his aim just as the silent man by the door realized something was badly wrong. The nervejam fired again. As the man fell, a kinetic from his magrail gun fired, blowing a big chunk out of the livestone ceiling. Terence and Lućia flinched down in unison.
Yelice and his two squad mates hurried in. He studied the three prone figures on the floor and lifted his helmet visor. “I hope you remembered to inform them of their rights?”
“Absolutely,” Lućia said. “ ’Course, they might not remember that part. What with the stress and all.”
Terence ignored them as he studied the data coming up on his retina membrane. His CI was searching for records on Toše; the man was a security expert who had first appeared in Santa Rosa a hundred twenty years ago. He was highly regarded by Traveler Dynasties, who had hired him for several flights. Dilated age estimated to be a hundred sixty years; biological age estimated at thirty-eight. Current location unknown. Last verified location was High Rosa embarking on the Cybele’s Eagle, three years previously; flight destination believed to be Lidon.
“Gotcha,” Terence announced happily.
* * *
—
The interview room down on basement level five was clearly having an effect on Zikar. He was squirming in his chair and constantly glancing around the room as if expecting it to change.
Terence and Lućia walked in and stood on the other side of the table where he was sitting, both with concerned expressions. Perhaps a tinge of worry on their features, too.
“What?” Zikar asked. “Didn’t they turn up?”
“Oh, they turned up,” Lućia said. “Apologies for the hole a kinetic blew in your ceiling.”
“Crap!”
“Tell me about Toše,” Terence said. He held up a warning finger. “And do not say: ‘Who?’ ”
“Nah, I get it. I did shape some items for him a couple of times.”
“What, exactly?”
“No weapons, if that’s what you’re looking for. You know I don’t do that, right?”
“Yeah, you’re top of our upstanding citizen list. What did you make for him?”
Zikar closed his eyes shut as if a bright light was shining at him. “Okay, first time was maybe twenty years ago now, though might have been longer. I don’t keep records, you know. It was a batch of standard perimeter drones, but with some added filters and thermal resistance. He was obviously off to some Remnant hellhole. Took some customized systems for his armor—processors with some heavy-duty decryption routines, so he could spy on comms signals he wasn’t included in, you know. Smart man; loyalties can get twisted out of shape when it comes to Remnant finds. Bounty-share agreements forgotten, that kind of thing.”
“Okay, and the second time?”
“Oh, yeah.” Zikar nodded in approval. “That was some neat work. I like me a challenge.”
“Good for you. What was it?”
“Drones, but with real high-quality sensors—I mean absolute top of the range. Heavy specialization.”
“Which is used for what?”
“Enhanced accuracy passive triangulation.” Zikar shrugged awkwardly at the looks he was getting. “Okay, so basically they’re used for target positioning. He had a weapon, see, a real beaut—a Remnant concluder. I’d never seen one before. I don’t think anyone on Gondiar has. But it’s real. Half of the performance comes from the rounds. They’re hypersonic and semi-smart; there’s all sorts of complicated tracking going on inside their tip to make sure they strike the point you’ve aimed at. See, with a sniper weapon, you can’t use laser illumination. Any half-decent defenseware will detect it and counter. So you need positioning.”
“You said you didn’t do weapons,” Lućia reminded him.
“Build them. I don’t build them…or supply them. This was like…augmentation. I mean it’s all fine and dandy having a weapon that can shoot a kinetic three or four kilometers, but even Remnant sensors have resolution issues over that distance. These drones he gave me were Remnant, too, so they can sneak through all sorts of sensors. You deploy them near the target, maybe half a kilometer out. They interface with the concluder’s targeting system; that was some of the sweetest work I’ve ever done. Took me a week to map the routines and code an interface it’d accept. Remnant gear, it doesn’t like giving up its routines, you know? I had to charge him a lot for that. But I did it. Use that concluder with my triangulation drones, and you’ll have the target’s position down to less than a millimeter. And their whole profile, not just the center of mass. You can choose exactly what part you want to hit with real precision. See, the concluder rounds have proton-boosted explosive tips, triple sequence, so they can hammer-blast their way through whatever kind of armor you’re wearing before they blow up inside you. But even then, if the target’s wearing armor, that might not be enough. With this, you can scope out where the joints are. They’re narrow, just a few millimeters, but they’re always the weak point. So you can go in at the neck. Or shoulder, that’s probably a bigger gap. Get a kinetic to penetrate the shoulder and detonate—man, the blast will purée half the torso.”
“Asteria, you are one sick little shit,” Lućia said.
“No way. I’m just tech support. I don’t shoot anyone myself.”
“That makes it all right, then?” Terence said acidly.
“This kind of thing, it’s for a battlefield,” Zikar insisted. “Kill or be killed. If you want to survive, you have to have the best equipment. I don’t discriminate who I build for. Everyone knows that. Don’t blame me because someone wants to make sure they live.”
* * *
—
Terence’s globecab picked him up from the central district police station in the middle of the afternoon. One of the advantages of his appointment as Director of Special Operations meant nobody questioned his office hours. The other advantage being his office itself: a discrete suite of secure rooms on the top floor of the block with an amazing view of the orbital tower eight kilometers away.
He settled onto the curving bench and told the cab manager to dim the windows. The vehicle set off for the Hovey train station, which was over in the Leishai district on the eastern side of Santa Rosa. There was a grin on his face that was impossible to banish; coming out of the operation left him exhilarated. He hadn’t been out in the field, not at the sharp end, for over seven years now. Admittedly, it hadn’t been that active a role, but still…he’d pulled it off. Better still, they’d actually got a name: Toše.
“Run the network structures for me,” he told his personal CI. After walking out on Zikar, he and Lućia had spent the best part of two hours refining their latest chart of the two archon networks that were operating on Gondiar. In his retina membrane, they were colorful diagrams of lines arranged like an inverted pyramid, with the archon at the bottom, then branching and multiplying upward.
“Call them archon networks two and three,” Lućia had said at the start of the mapping process. “After all, we’re number one.”
Number Two, then, was a standard network starting with the archon—who they didn’t know. Lućia’s guess was the Mara Yama, especially now that they had a fleet at Hoa Quinzu. Terence wasn’t sure about that, but couldn’t come up with anything more plausible. Besides, that was what Makaio-Faraji had speculated.
The first level above the archon were the operatives and couriers: individuals they’d identified bringing funds to Gondiar—a few from Anoosha but mainly off Traveler starships. In turn, their contacts were mostly councilors in Human Liberation, but increasingly Regal Democracy. That was inevitable. Josias was becoming more and more popular as his party grew, aided in no small part by numbers of Human Liberation switching their support to him. Like Terence, Network Two also had informants scattered across the gangs, but on a much smaller scale. Terence and Lućia now had more than two hundred people of Network Two identified, which was extremely satisfying; so many years of dreary observation and correlation had actually paid dividends.
