⊶ 2.19 ⊷

Third Party

I’m lying awake at the Royal Shingaza Hotel. The suite smells like TopSide but different than my own place. I find myself fighting a restless cagey feeling. Now that I’m finally lying still, my shoulder throbs, eclipsing the rest of my bruises. The pain weaves with my unease until I surrender to it and sit up.

I get out of bed, pull on my pants, and go to the window. Julie doesn’t move. Her soft snores continue uninterrupted.

As I slide the curtain aside, the opacity of the window adjusts automatically. Buildings resolve themselves out of the cream-colored fog of the glass. The view is north facing and looks into the Core. Myriads of windows spill their glowing light into the night sky and tint the humidity a bluish white. AlphaPlaza, with its pale towers, juts through the cluster of the Corporate Core. Spotlights accent architectural features along the towers’ glittering white walls. All of the columns of dazzling light vanish into the clouds as if they’re holding up the swirling heavens.

I toggle the window to display a different side of the building and then on impulse switch the glass to show a view of the city my abuelita was born in. The view-cam footage from the beach of the tiny harbor springs up. It looks like it’s a nice night in the Balearic Islands. The flush of dawn five time zones ahead of us makes the ocean seem dark and brooding. I think about everything that’s going to happen over the next twenty-four hours. The dark water becomes a mirror for my mood.

I look back at Julie. I can’t shake the feeling that none of this will work out.

Angrily, I toggle back to the real view.

There’s a soft buzz from my jacket where it’s draped over the arm of the low-backed club chair beside me. I reach over and pull out my dv. It’s a message from Sylvain. ‘Your parcels have arrived and are in storage.’

At least that’s something.

A City Utilities helo drifts past the window. I watch the play of its shadow on the neighboring tower. It’s an interesting pattern. I unfocus my eyes and watch how it warps and ripples across the texture of the building.

As that shadow moves away, a second larger, less distinct shadow drops along the building’s face. I flick my eyes upward to look for the vehicle casting it. There’s nothing there.

I frown and flip my optics to thermal imaging. There’s a faint prickling outline descending along the front of our hotel.

Optical and thermal cloaking. Military tech.

My belly drops with the realization that what I’m seeing is a combat-grade VTOL craft in active camo. It slows to hover outside our window.

The hair on my neck stiffens. A smash and grab extraction. My 12mm is in its shoulder holster with my jacket on the chair. The tension climbs, and I realize they’re waiting for me to move. If they were here to outright kill us, they wouldn’t be waiting.

This is a high-end hotel. Top-end CitOne level security, I picked it for that reason. I bring up the hotel’s info on my dv and dial the front desk. I turn to lean my back against the window. A slow sickening pressure builds across my shoulders.

“Julie,” I say into the room. “Julie, wake up. Julie, get up we’ve got trouble.”

Julie grumbles and rolls over. “Wah?” She taps the bedside light and rubs her eyes. “What’s going on?”

There’s a beep as the call engages, and then a mechanical voice says, “We are experiencing higher than normal call volumes, please hold…” I cut the line. The strike team is running full electronic countermeasures against the hotel. These people are deep into the building’s security system. This isn’t good.

“Get up. Get dressed.” I keep my voice calm and try another number. It rings. “There’s a strong possibility that a bunch of guys with guns are going to come through our window any minute.”

“What?!” She jumps out of bed and starts dressing. “How do you know? Who are they?”

“Moshi moshi,” Jimmy answers, groggy with sleep.

“Jimmy. In a jam. Room 2038 of Block F at the Royal Shingaza Hotel, TopSide. I’ve got a cloaked VTOL outside my window. Someone’s running a hack against the hotel.”

“Hold on, hold on. Hold on.” His tone fills with as much urgency as I feel.

“I don’t know how long I have here, Jimmy.” I carefully reach for my gun.

“Ahhhh … Okay,” Jimmy says. “I’m in the system. I know what room you’re in.”

“Can you get through to hotel security?”

“Maybe… Yeah. Yes.”

“Do it, Jimmy.”

The Royal Shingaza is a client of AlphaTek’s. The news of a hit team roaming the halls would have militarized rent-a-cops here in less than a minute.

“Tell them to get their asses up here.”

I hear the tick of something hitting the window. Shit. I glance over, and my optics read the heat radiating across the glass.

Cracks travel across the window’s surface with the sound of popping ice.

I have a second. I spend it grabbing my jacket, yelling at Julie, and throwing myself across the bed, half-dragging her down to the floor on the far side.

The extraction team bursts through the compromised window. My hand closes around the laser-jinx in my jacket pocket. I flip it open and stand, holding it in front of me as I fire. The laser dazzles across the room and staggers three guys in full combat gear. My 12mm hammers off three rounds into the closest guy. His armor absorbs the first two impacts, but the third drops him. I hit the next guy in the throat. Even if it doesn’t penetrate, it’ll slap his larynx closed, maybe slow him down.

Julie, the smart woman, is crawling to the door, G9 in hand.

The third guy recovers as I drop back to the floor. I hear the sharp tack of a high-powered dart hitting the wall behind me. A second one shreds into the mattress.

The dv is on the floor by my head. “Rico?” Jimmy sounds panicked. “You still there?”

“Strobe the lights, Jimmy,” I yell.

I shove my gun hand around the edge of the bed and blind fire into the room as all the lights start flashing. There’s a grunt as one of my shots connects.

“Rico,” Jimmy yells through my dv. “Hotel Security says they’re sending a team with a specialist to your floor.”

A sizzling, ripping noise tears over my head. Tight spiraling contrails lace the air.

Julie with the G9 from the bathroom, covering my retreat. I grab the dv and scramble to the main door as she fires twice more into the room behind me.

I pull the door open, yelling for her, “Come on.” I hold the door with a leg and shoot past her as she ducks through.

Three more guys land in the room.

The doorframe by my head dents, and a dart ricochets across my vision. I jerk my head back and fire twice more. “Keep going. Get to the lobby.”

I yank the door shut and backpedal. “Jimmy, the door!”

“It’s locked. It’s locked, Rico,” Jimmy says.

Julie is partway to the corner.

I back away down the hall, my 12mm trained at the dark panel. The instant I see the door handle wiggle, I unload four shots. The heavy rounds punch through. Someone on the other side yells. My magazine is almost empty.

There’s a heavy thwap of machine pistol fire, and the door shreds open.

Someone in the room lobs a fist-sized cylinder into the hall. Gas. I turn and sprint for the corner as the rapidly expanding yellow cloud fills the space.

Darts are slower than bullets. I hear the snap of a rifle behind me, and I throw myself to the opposite wall. The projectile zips past. Will the next shot be the machine pistol? I can’t let the thought fuck me over. I run like hell.

It’s a right-hand corner to get to the maglifts. They’ll concentrate their fire at the apex of my movement. There’s no way I’ll make it in one piece. Instead, I duck left into the recessed doorway for a maintenance room. A burst of machine pistol fire eats the wall where I would’ve been.

The tap of my grandfather’s medallion against my chest reminds me that I’m not wearing armor.

Pressing myself into cover, I clench my teeth. Four shots. That’s all I’ve got to slow them down.

Where the hell is security?

I crouch and blind fire once. I jerk backward as the corner next to my head comes away in chunks of wall, dust, and metal strip.

“Rico?” I hear Jimmy on my burner. “Rico, are you okay?”

The maglift glides open.

Julie shrieks in surprise. I fling the 12mm up, ready to fire at the new threat. A six-man AT security team in full gear rush out of the lift yelling, “AlphaTek Security! Drop your weapon!” One of the men disarms Julie and pushes her into the lift.

The door for the evacuation stairwell opposite the maglifts opens. A guy steps out. He could only be the security specialist Jimmy said was coming. He doesn’t flinch as I impulsively yank my gun to point at him.

He’s tall and very blond. The weapon he’s carrying is an older Russian-made service pistol. A high-capacity magazine juts past the grips. It’s a way bigger caliber than my 12mm.

He gives orders in a thick Russian accent punctuated with military hand gestures. Anything else he says is cut off by the extraction team’s suppression fire. The heavy thuds remind me I’m not safe yet, and I squeeze back as my cover continues to disappear.

The security guys form up, ready to counter-attack. Two of them heft foamed titanium shields and pivot around the corner. They crouch to one knee, firing around the slabs in controlled bursts. The second pair step behind the first.

One of the security team slumps as a bullet finds a way through. He’s replaced by a fifth team member. The sixth guy pulls the wounded man back around the corner.

The extraction team starts falling back. I can hear their panicked yells.

“You.” The Russian guy points at me. He steps into the corridor behind the shield wall. “Get to the lifts.” He ignores the incoming rounds that zing past his head. His hand with the hip howitzer comes up. He’s aiming single shots. His arm doesn’t bounce with recoil.

“Move!” His command cuts through everything else in my mind.

Someone yells, “Grenade!”

Morbid fascination freezes me mid-motion. I’m going to die here. I stare at the explosive as it rolls behind the shield wall.

The security team fling themselves against the walls. One of the men with a shield crams both he and I back into the alcove. Pinned into cover I catch a flash of movement.

The Russian moves so fast his cybernetics have to be one hundred percent military and one hundred percent illegal for anyone not in active service. He scoops up the grenade, still firing single aimed shots with his pistol, and hurls the explosive back down the hall. A single round from the assailants rips through his left bicep just before I feel the detonation through the floor.

The firefight stops as fast as it started.

In the same crisp manner, the Russian deploys his men. “You.” He designates one of the team. “Stabilize him, get medical here.” He points to a second man. “Escort Mr. Suarez downstairs. Do that now. The rest of you come with me to secure the area.” The blood flow from his arm has already stopped. Tattered synthskin from enhanced muscle weave peeks through the bloody gap in his sleeve.

“Are you hurt, Mr. Suarez?” He gestures at my throat.

I rub my fingers over the spot. They come away smudged with Julie’s lipstick. “No, I’m good.”

He nods once and ignores me.

The guy who is supposed to be my escort gets me moving. “Follow me please.”

The Russian slides a thin, gold chased dv from his breast pocket. “Morochevsky, filing report to Ops Room One…”

I get hustled into the maglift, and I remember Jimmy’s on the line. “Jimmy. We’re good. You did great.”

“What the fuck, man? I thought you were dead. You can’t leave me hanging like that. Don’t do that to me.” His voice climbs in volume. “That was shit, Rico. Shit. My first live operation and I’m scrambling. Scrambling for maps, for power information, for maglift hookups. And then I think you’re dead. Screw that. Next time. Next time I’m going to be ready, and I won’t care if you die. How’s that for you?”

“Jimmy.”

“What?” he snaps. “What?”

I say the only thing I can think of that will cut off his rant, “Thanks.”

“Oh,” Jimmy says, “uh, yeah, sure. Anytime.”

“There probably won’t be a next time.”

“There probably won’t be a next time…. My ass there won’t be. I know you better than that.” He winds down a little. “I’m glad you’re okay.”

“Yeah, me too.” I owe Jimmy big time. Too bad he’s not old enough to drink.

˜˜˜

We’re sitting in the hotel security office. They brought my clothes from our suite after they ran me through a full medical. I’m a CitOne; they wouldn’t want any insurance liabilities hanging over their heads because of this incident. The med-tech resealed my shoulder where the tracker had been removed and gave me a nano-patch to deal with the bruises. Now I’m good as new, fully dressed, and on my second bottle of water. Julie is sleeping against my arm.

I see the Russian guy through the glass wall. He comes in and starts with his grilling. “Do you know any of these men?” He taps a projector on the table. Still frames of the dead extraction team appear in the air.

Julie starts awake.

I don’t recognize any of the men in the frames. “Nope, never seen them before.”

“Look closer, Mr. Suarez. Are you sure?”

“Yeah, I’m sure. Julie?”

“No.” She shakes her head.

“They had this in their possession.” He taps the table, and the projector calls up a rotating full schematic of the Royal. It spins slowly and then zooms in to highlight room 2038F. The maglift, security codes, and passwords scroll down one side of the image. My face appears in one corner. My personal information glides upward beside my still.

As the faces and information scrolls along, I make sure my optics record all of it for later. I try not to frown at the lines in tiny print near the bottom.

“Look at the faces again. You are sure you do not know them? Mr. Suarez, as a former police officer, you surely made enemies, da?”

“I did my job. So the answer to that question is yes, of course I made enemies. But no, I don’t know these men.”

“You checked in at eight-forty p.m.?”

“Yeah.” I look at him. “You can access the hotel registry so why are you bothering me?”

He ignores my comment. “In under five hours, they pulled together a team, the needed equipment, and enough intelligence to do this.”

“And I’m telling you.” I keep my eyes on the projection display. “I don’t know these guys.”

“Someone spent a great deal of resources trying to capture you.” He straightens. “Why do you think they would do that? You must have some idea?”

I can guess, but I’m not in a mood to share.

I’m sure he can read me, but he can’t force an answer from me either. It doesn’t stop him from trying. He flips a different face onto the display. “Do you know this man?”

“No.” I shake my head. “Why?” The Russian must have something that connects the extraction team to this guy. “Who’s he?”

“One of the men we killed had this face in his recent memory.”

“That’s really gross.” Julie makes a face. “Picking a dead guy’s brain….”

I’m just thinking about the expense involved.

The Russian is unfazed. “This man is connected to PharmaComp Corporation.” He watches my reaction.

That one clicks. I have to look at my shoes and bite my tongue. PharmaComp is linked to the holding company that owned the lab. The other partner is Yoshimo Heavy Industries, which means these guys are partnered with the Arakida-kai.

If Ryo thought he was safe hiding behind another face, he was wrong.

“I told you, I don’t know anything.” I don’t look up as I shake my head. Out of the corner of my eye, I catch Julie’s sidelong glance. Even she knows I’m lying.

I lift my gaze. “I don’t know jack.”

“There was a fire at a PharmaComp facility in Nu Hong. You were overseeing the investigation?”

“No.” I meet his stone-flat expression. “The PD, when I still worked for them, turned the case over to the corporation who owned the building. I handed in my files. Case closed.”

“Nothing else?” He leans over me.

That kind of psychological shit never works on me.

He presses, “Was there not a body found in front of that building?”

I frown. Why did they care?

I roll my shoulders square and glare to back him off me. “It’s Nu Hong in the middle of summer. The rain always brings out the crazies. Bodies show up all the time. You’ve seen UnderCity, right?”

His lack of reaction draws more words out of me.

“I don’t know anything about what you’re looking for.”

He looks like he’s about to call me on my shit.

Instead he steps back with a short hard exhalation and says, “Very well, Mr. Suarez. AlphaTek takes our security contracts very seriously. Now that you are a regular citizen, you should consider becoming a client.”

I snort. “Thanks for the advice.”

The Russian narrows his eyes. Whatever he wants to say next is checked. In silence he nods and leaves us alone.

Julie whispers, “What the hell was his problem?”

“His boss,” I reply.

A manager from the hotel comes into the room. He comps both Julie and I with a free seven-night stay that includes three meals room service per day and limo service around TopSide.

When the manager leaves, Julie snatches the RF voucher tags off the table. “This is crazy. Do you know how much this is worth?”

“I can guess.” It’s weird to me that she calls me the uncaring one.

“What’s wrong?” She frowns and takes my hand. “Aside from those guys busting in here I mean….”

The attack was bold and decisive, hitting us hard where I counted on our safety. If I weren’t a brooding insomniac without booze, Julie and I would be dead.

Ryo’s contacts mobilized a lot of gear to get the job done. Maybe my threats were starting to get to him. Or maybe he was on some kind of timeline I couldn’t see. Either way, our agreement was broken, and I had to make sure he had cause to regret it.

In the small print from the bottom of the screen there had been explicit instructions regarding Julie: Kill her slow to break me and capture any unreferenced information.

I swallow my anger.

My next move would have to prove a point.

“They were supposed to kidnap us and kill you in front of me. You didn’t see that part, did you?”

“No, I missed that.” She stares at the hotel voucher tags clutched tightly in her hands.

I sigh. Now I feel bad for bursting her bubble.

We retire to a new suite where our possessions are already waiting. Neither of us can sleep.

I flip on the Infotainment news and then tap in my CitNumber and reset the InfoStream for the UnderCity newsfeed.

“…More buildings have been burned, and the death toll in this latest wave of yakuza warfare is rising….”

*****

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