Elite (science fiction noir)
Length: 5,500 words
Est. Reading Time: 22 minutes
This story is my crack at science fiction noir. I wrote it in the late 90s, shopped it around for years, but it never found a home. Interesting my take on portable data storage. At the time, I don't think USB drives existed and CD writers were expensive and rare. It was the 3.5 floppy, or, if you were a serious geek, a Zip drive.
Elite
by David L. Felts
I noticed the two men as soon as they entered. Heavies for Milo Carabine, a local data broker, they called themselves the Samoans, though their looks came from a lab and not their genes. Ethno-alteration was popular among those who could afford it. In Downstation, that wasn't many.
They stopped just inside the entrance, broad faces unreadable as they scanned the crowded club. I was watching them when someone bumped hard against me. I staggered a step and turned. Bright white skinsuit and a glimpse of short, black hair before she vanished into the mass of bodies on the dance stage.
When I turned back, the Samoans were on the move. I tapped my right arm against my hip, feeling the reassuring lump of the neural impulse disrupter--the NID--strapped to my forearm. The Samoans strode side-by-side, the crowd parting around them. They jumped onto the dance stage with surprising agility. I spotted the woman in white just as she pushed through a fire exit in the back corner of the stage. The Samoans headed in that direction.
Well well. And to think I'd been bored and ready to leave.
Climbing the stairs to the stage, I worked my way over to the door. The Samoans had already gone after the woman. I paused at the exit, took a deep breath, then pushed the door open and stepped through--
A narrow alley lit by one bright, bare bulb. The sour-sweet smell of decaying garbage from two overflowing refuse containers flooded my nose. The door swung closed behind me with a thump, muting the noise of the club.
One of the Samoans had the woman pinned against the far wall, one thick forearm pressed against her throat. With his other hand, he jerked open her belt pouch and dumped its contents.
The second Samoan stared at me, eyes narrowing. “Move on, McKenzie,” he said, black eyes unreadable. “Just because you've peeled for the boss a few times doesn’t mean we're friends. This has nothing to do with you.”
“Just need to take a leak,” I said, studying the woman. Her green eyes were wide, her face pale.
The Samoan stepped closer. “I said move on. Free-lance peelers disappear all the time in Downside, especially when they stick their noses in.”
I returned the huge man's stare. The Samoan was a few inches taller, a hundred pounds heavier at least. He smelled of hair gel and spice cologne. I didn't think the Samoans would kill me. Milo wouldn't want the heat. I’ve got a few legit clients too, and they’d miss me.
His voice low and menacing, the Samoan said, “Last chance.”
When I didn’t respond, the Samoan reached out, confident in his size and strength. The instant I felt the pressure of the man's fingers on my shoulder, I spun, slipping the NID from its sheath and slapping it against the side of the man's neck. There was the loud snap of electrical discharge followed by the smell of ozone. The Samoan collapsed as though his bones had turned to putty.
His partner whirled, reaching inside his jacket to pull out a compression pistol. With a sinking feeling, I realized my mistake. Whatever the Samoans were doing for Milo, they didn't care about consequences. Before I could react, the woman grabbed the Samoan's arm and yanked it down across her rising knee. The gun fell. The Samoan punched her in the stomach and she dropped, gasping.
I was already charging, crossing the narrow alley in three steps and slamming into the Samoan’s chest with my shoulder. The big man grunted, bounced of the wall behind him and went down to one knee. I kicked the gun. It skittered away. The Samoan sucked air, staggered upright. His block was too slow and my next kick caught him in the stomach. He went down again, to both knees this time.
The Samoan's round face was pale and twisted in pain. “You're dead, McKenzie,” he said between gasps. “You just made your last mistake.”
“I'm sure I'll make a lot more mistakes in the future,” I said, then hit the Samoan with the NID. The big man sprawled motionless on the duracrete.
I drew a deep breath to slow my pounding heart. If the woman hadn't grabbed the Samoan's arm.... I slid his NID back into its forearm sheath.
I heard a noise and spun in time to see the fire exit door shut. Well. She hadn't even thanked me. I checked the door, but she must have locked it. I considered going back inside to look for her, but didn't want to be around when the Samoans woke.
I eyed the unconscious men with a scowl, then spotted something among over by the wall. I picked it up, wiping off the grime. A personal identification card--PIC--for one Yuko Miller. I looked at the holo, staring for a moment at the tiny likeness of the woman I’d just saved.
I put the card in my pocket. Time to go. The Samoans would be waking soon, and they would be pissed.
###
Home was a two-room apartment at the local corporate long-term, a place with the not-so-creative name of Downside Inn. My current gig was real grunt-work--repairing control cabinets for a deep-shaft titanium harvester owned by Milkdyne Mining Resource Division. But a gig was a gig. I'd been working on different industrial control systems for the last two weeks without a break until today, so I'd decided to checkout Downside nightlife. Considering how the evening had gone, I should have stayed home.
As I took off my jacket, I noticed something hard in the left front pocket. A data card--a thin, glistening, multi-colored wafer about half the size of a playing card. How the hell did I get that? I remembered the girl bumping into me at the club, before the Samoans caught her. She must have planted it.
My curiosity aroused, I finished changing, then settled into the plastic chair by the term. I slipped Yuko's personal identification card into the slot built into the chair's arm and jacked the tiny fiber optic cable from the term into the plug behind my right ear.
The room faded as the wetware in my head took over. A mountain forest campsite shimmered into view. Coffee boiled over a crackling campfire to my left, a small canvas tent sat near the flames, and a stream gurgled nearby. It was a custom interface I’d commissioned a few years back after a big peel had left me wallowing in cred, testament to a childhood fantasy I’d never had time or opportunity to indulge.
A stump jutted up in front of me. The wetware made it feel as though my fingers rested on a cluster of gnarled lumps on the surface of the stump.
Yuko's PIC allowed easy access to her personal space in the datasphere. Her profile floated in the upper left quadrant of my view. As my fingers danced over the stump, more data blocks appeared, expanded, and disappeared. I quickly found out she was an Escort, experience classification four. There were the normal medical records, employment history, transaction accounts, and other information. Nothing unusual.
I unplugged long enough to remove Yuko's PIC and replace it with the data card I suspected she’d planted on me, then went back in. Bill-board sized error messages waited for me. Major-league encryption. I severed all links between my private space and my workspace. A really nasty card could garble the peeker's data so bad it could take weeks to fix. I ran the normal decryption keys and wasn't surprised when they failed. I tried a few industrial strength ones I was privy to, and then, in a last effort, used a sequence my friend Alex had given me. Still nothing.
Back in my personal space, a message icon blinked. I tapped it, not surprised when Milo's scowling face appeared.
“Listen Cameron, I know we've done business, but that doesn't give you the authority to meddle in one of my ops. I advise you to contact me. Immediately.” The message ended. Milo's tone left little doubt as to his mood.
I was considering making the call when a red alert icon flared. A quick scan showed one of my financial accounts under attack. I quickly emptied the account, transferring the creds. That done, I kicked off a sniff on the intruder. It was probably Alex, screwing around again, playing her stupid hacker games. She said she did it to keep me on my toes.
When the sniffer was squashed, I blinked in surprise. That wasn't Alex's style. She liked me to know who'd penetrated my files. Then the intruder vanished. Fast and good, whoever it was.
Anxious, I began checking the integrity of my data, and found a new file. I scanned, and, when it showed clean, opened it. When I saw it, I couldn't help but smile. It was an image, glowing orange letters on a black background.
Hi Cam, how about lunch? Meet me at Joe's at eleven tomorrow. Kiss, kiss--Yuko
I was impressed. Except for Alex, no one had ever tagged me like this. If she was an Escort-4, I was the CEO of MacroDat. After another scan to make sure she hadn’t left anything else behind, I decided to repay her kindness. I used her PIC to freeze her accounts for twenty-four hours. Bust my space, would she? I had a few tricks myself.
Once done, I unplugged and headed for the bedroom, thinking about Yuko. I was looking forward to meeting her.
###
Joe's Diner was pure retro, based on a decor popular on Earth three centuries past: chrome and steel, red vinyl booths, white Formica inlaid with glittering gold specks. Yuko sat in a booth beside a window. She still wore the white skinsuit, though it showed some stains. A few other tables and booths were occupied. Two waitresses with big hair and wearing some sort of shiny, uncomfortable-looking blue uniform with large white collars hurried about. Behind the counter, an unkempt, overweight man in a greasy white shirt and a floppy white hat sweated over a blackened grill. If Joe's had anything, it was atmosphere.
“How'd you kill my sniffer like that?” I asked as I slid onto the booth opposite her.
“Trade secret,” she replied, offering a cheerful smile. “You don't expect me to tell my secrets on our first date, do you?”
I liked her voice. “Is that was this is?” I asked.
She shrugged and managed to look innocent. She was good at it.
The waitress arrived and we ordered. After the waitress left, Yuko leaned forward, reaching out to rest her hand on my forearm. “Thanks for the help last night.” She stared into my eyes as she spoke. “I don't know what would've happened if you hadn't come along.”
I shrugged, noticing how green her eyes were, her dark, long her lashes. “I should thank you. Grabbing his arm saved my ass.”
“Let's just say we owe each other then.”
The waitress returned with our shakes. Yuko took a long drink, full lips pursed about the straw.
“I never expected to find a Samaritan in Downside.” Her tongue flicked to get a spot of vanilla off her upper lip.
“You know my favorite thing about Joe's?”
Yuko smiled. “The shakes?”
I shook my head. “No. My favorite thing is that Milo never eats here.”
She raised her brows, questioning. “Milo?”
“Yeah, Milo. Those were his goons after you at the club.”
“Really?”
“Come on, Yuko.” I took the data card out of my pocket and set it on the table between us. “You slip me this. The Samoans pull a gun on me. Milo leaves a nasty-gram. And now my first lunch date in two years. Want to tell me about it?”
Yuko reached for the card, but I laid my hand over it. “Tell first.”
She chewed her lower lip a moment before speaking. “I was with Milo last night and I slicked it, thinking to scam some creds, only I couldn't crack the card. I figured I'd get off planet and find someone to poke it. If it's corporate, I might be able to sell it, or the information on it. But the Samoans were waiting at the orbital port, so I ran and they chased me. I ended up in the club, and there you were, so I dumped it.” She raised her chin defiantly. “That's it, okay?”
I doubted that was the whole story, but it sounded plausible enough. I picked up my hand, but she left the data card where it lay. “Whatever it is, it must be damned important,” I said. “The Samoans were serious. Shooting holes in people serious.”
“You handled them easily enough.”
“They knew me, weren't expecting me to get physical. I was lucky. And like I said, if you hadn't grabbed his arm....”
“You ought to give yourself more credit,” Yuko said as the waitress brought our food.
“Any idea what's on the card?” I asked as we ate. Joe’s makes a mean grilled cheese.
Yuko shrugged. “Like I said, I couldn't crack it. But that doesn't matter anymore.” She lowered her voice. “I need help, Cameron. I think Milo wants to kill me.”
The waitress stopped at our table. “Anything else?” When we indicated no, she left the bill. Paper. How quaint.
Yuko snatched it. “Lunch is the least I can do after you rescued me. Of course, I'll need my PIC back.” She smiled innocently.
I handed it over. “You knew I had it?”
“I saw you mucking about my space. I traced you back and left my message.”
“Did you know who I was when you saw me at the club?”
Yuko hesitated, then nodded. “I, uh, know a few names in systems tech, and you're one of them. “
An Escort-4 who knew names in systems tech? I studied her while she offered her PIC to the waitress to pay the bill. The waitress ran it and, seconds later, informed Yuko that the transaction had been declined.
I smirked.
“I take it you're the cause?” Yuko asked.
“Trade secret,” I said. I pulled out my PIC. “I'll cover.”
“Don't bother.” Yuko smiled sweetly. “Yours is frozen until you appear for a retina scan.”
Damn. “I saw you poking and transferred everything to a new account.”
Yuko's smile grew wider.
My anger dissipated and I laughed. Escort-4 my ass. “Pretty smooth,” I admitted. Yuko winked and blew a kiss.
The waitress cleared her throat.
I pulled out a wad of blue bills and handed some to her, making sure I gave her a good tip. “Sorry. All I've got.” The young woman looked as though I'd handed her a chunk of vat meat. Milkedyne corporate script. Somebody'd have to go redeem it, and it would probably be her.
“Ready?” Yuko asked as she stood. I followed as she left the diner. She threw a glance over her shoulder, eyes glittering mischievously. She grabbed my hand. “Come on.”
###
It was three in the afternoon when I woke. Yuko still slept, head on my arm, leg thrown across my waist. Asleep, her face had a childlike innocence. She looked young, but that didn’t mean anything. If you had enough cred, gentech could keep you young forever.
My arm was asleep. When I tried to move it, she woke, yawning.
“Hey.”
“Hey yourself,” I replied. I stroked her shoulder with my fingernails, feeling pleased with myself when I made her shiver. She rolled on top of me and I stroked her back, enjoying the smooth feel of her skin under my fingers. She was tall, only a few inches shorter than me, with medium breasts and dense, flat muscles, the kind that came from working out, not from a lab.
Half an hour later, I lay on my back, watching Yuko put on one of my T-shirts. The bottom hung to the tops of her thighs. I got out of bed, pulled on some shorts, and followed her into the tiny kitchen area. When she reached for the coffee grinder, I glimpsed the smooth half-moons of her naked buttocks beneath the bottom of the shirt. Yuko grinned at me and started the coffee. I didn't have anything to eat except some flash-frozen breakfast entrees. I heated two.
After eating, Yuko sat on the couch, drinking a second cup of coffee while I plugged in. She was quite a sight, T-shirt pushed up, revealing her muscular thighs.
“I can't crack the card,” I told her a while later. I unplugged and sat next to her. “I know someone who probably can, though.”
Yuko nodded. “I guess we need the help. Who is it?”
“Someone who likes her privacy.”
“I'd like to tag along.”
I shook my head. “My friend's not fond of strangers. She's weird, but the best I know. If she can't break it, I don’t know anyone who can. I'm sure she can get you past Transport too, so you can get off rock. “
Yuko reached for Cameron's arm. “Will she help?”
“She'll help,” I assured her. “We're good friends.”
“When are you going?”
“The sooner the better,” I replied, standing.
###
Alex lived seven levels deep in an abandoned storage area previously used sleepers--cryogenic modules with animals and people bound for deep space. I trudged through twisty corridors that had been blasted out solid rock over a century before when Polson had first been colonized for mining.
When I turned the final corner and found myself facing a battered metal door, Alex's voice crackled through a tiny speaker set near the ceiling. “Come on in, Cam.” There was a click as the door swung open.
Alex's workshop was a vast converted storage space. Workbenches along the walls failed to hold the piles of computer boards, chips, wires, components, and countless other bits and parts. Thick cables twisted across the floor like long, multi-colored snakes and a low electrical hum harmonized with the whir of dozens of cooling fans. The odor of burnt solder and plastic hung in the air.
Describing Alex as odd was an understatement. An attractive woman in her mid-thirties, she rarely left her lair, having all food and goods delivered by trusted businesses or her few friends. On this trip, I’d brought some cleaning supplies and two orders of yakisoba purchased from a street vender.
Alex sniffed the air appreciatively, smelling the stir-fried chicken and noodles. “Yakisoba, huh? Thanks.”She sat on a rickety white plastic chair gone gray.
I set the cleaning supplies on the floor and the noodles on a workbench.
“So what've you got?”
I gave her a condensed version of the story.
“Slicked Milo's card and cracked your space, huh? And put a retina scan hold on your accounts?” She laughed.
I nodded.
“Sounds like someone with potential.” She got serious. “And it also seems you’re thinking with your dick. You don’t just slick a card from Milo and la-dee-da go on your way. Milo may be local, but he’s worked some heavy gigs.”
I shrugged. She was right. I was more than a bit taken with Yuko, even though I knew there was more going on.
“Anyway… not like you’re going to listen to me anyway.” She rubbed her hands together. “Now let's have a look.”
I gave it to her. Alex slipped it into a reader and plugged in. After a few minutes, I looked around for a place to sit. I found another plastic chair, trying to get comfortable as it creaked under my weight.
I was half-asleep forty-five minutes later when Alex unplugged. Eyes glazed, she looked frustrated and excited. She groaned as she rubbed her temples.
“I got it. Nice encryption too. They used a combination of quantum worm logic coding and--”
I cleared my throat, assuming a blank look.
Alex made a face. “Sorry. Anyway, I cracked a file listing.”
“And?”
“Heavy stuff, Cam, just like I said. Milkedyne corporate stuff, division level at least.” She pointed at the card. “This card holds next fiscal year’s strategic plans for the Mining Resources Division.”
“Like budget sheets and time cards?”
“Naw, man, I'm talking investment strategies, acquisition targets, contract vehicles, stuff like that. Top-level, top-secret corp shit. You could make a fortune doing insider trading with this. You could also screw MMRD's bottom line in a major way if you had the resources.”
I ran a hand through my hair “Maybe someone hired Milo to get the card, a Milkedyne competitor maybe? Or was he hired get it back?”
Alex shrugged. “Whatever the case, this is the kind of stuff people end up in a box for.”
“Would you be able to screen transport so she can get off rock?”
“I could, but I won’t. I like you, Cam, but I’m out on this one. Sorry. Take my advice and get out yourself.
I knew she was right. But Milo was already onto me. He knew I had the card. In for a penny…. “I'm going to talk to Steve. Maybe he knows something.”
Alex was plugging in again. “Maybe.”
“Don't forget your noodles.”
Alex didn't reply. I let myself out.
###
The Security Corps complex was in Sector F, near the space port. The plush offices were decorated in chic corporate style--personal workspaces, light gray walls, short-pile tan carpeting, and mild fluorescent lighting.
Steve smiled when he saw me. There was a new aquarium on the left wall, where the couch had been. The couch was now on the other wall, and the two ugly chairs previously there were gone.
“Nice aquarium,” I said, stooping to look at the colorful fish.
“Thanks. Sleepers from a canceled order. It's relaxing, watching them.”
“I bet.” I dropped onto the couch. Steve and I’d been partners, working a long term gig for Polson Propulsion. He’d met the right woman and, with the assistance of her father, gone corporate. Judging from his office, he’d made the right call. He’d offered me a spot more than once, but I liked making my own hours.
“How’s Nikki?” I asked.
“Good, thanks. We just celebrated our fourteenth.”
“Already? Nice.”
“Time flies, right? So what’s up?”
He’s always been to the point. “You heard anything about Milo and Milkedyne?”
Steve's eyes narrowed. “Nothing official.”
“How about unofficial?”
After a moment, Steve said, “I've heard that Milo was doing a job for them, but I’ve no idea what it is.”
“Milo seems small time for Milkedyne.”
“He’s local and knows the landscape.”
“True.” I hesitated. Should I bring up Yuko? I doubted she’d want to be on the radar of a security official. Better safe than sorry though, and as long as I was here....
“This have something to do with you two pounding two of Milo’s goons last night?”
Of course he’d know about that. “Maybe. I met this woman--”
“Anyone I know?”
“I hope not. She's an escort, but I'm pretty sure she's more than that.”
“What’s her name?”
“Yuko Miller. At least that’s the one on her PIC anyway.”
Steve swiveled in his chair, turned on his system, plugged in and accessed the ‘sphere. After a moment he unplugged and motioned me over. “Take a look.” I plugged, saw the holo, and nodded.
“That’s her.”
Steve plugged again, eyes closing as he worked. “Seems consistent,” he said, a few minutes later. He unplugged and swiveled back to face me. He hesitated.
“But?” I prompted.
“Here's my gut feeling,” Steve continued after a moment. “Her history's too pat. No loose ends, no unresolved references, no lost time. And the license, certification, and credit incidents are all minor; missed bills, expired escort license, medical testing delays. It's like she wants people to see them and not dig any further. It's just too... neat.”
“Could it be fake?”
Steve shrugged. “There're a billion bits of data on each of us floating around out there. It takes a lot of time, effort and expense to gin up a thorough fake identity. It's possible, but it takes heavy help. More help than anyone would want to give an escort. You'd have to be sponsored to get access to those kind resources.”
“What if she did it herself?”
“She'd have to be damn good, and she'd still need the access to do it. Which takes us back to sponsorship. No freelancer's going to walk in and use a government AAI server and bang out a fake identity. Not without a lot of doors being opened.”
“Can we go to the lab?”
Steve looked puzzled. “What for?”
“DNA check. She can’t fake that.”
“And how are we going to get her sequence?”
I grinned. “Just tell your lab tech to be careful.”
“A DNA pull is going to require some justification.”
I shrugged. “Think how good it will look if this is something big, and you cracked it. Wouldn’t hurt to have Milkedyne owe you one”
Steve chewed his lip. “Dammit.” He sighed. “All right.”
The lab tech, a woman, found two pubic hairs that didn't match my own, as well as flakes of dried vaginal secretions. The results were back in Steve's office and on his system within an hour. Steve initiated a search based on sequence, and ended up with a file on Winslow Oliver, Division Vice President of Milkedyne Gravitonics. Several employment documents identified one of his data consultants, a Susan Chen, as a match to the DNA.
“Well,” said Steve. “There’s your heavy behind her. But why would Milo be after her?”
I told Steve about the encrypted data card.
He slapped his palm on his desk. “Dammit Cam, I wish you’d told me about that earlier, so I could have told you to get the hell out. Last thing I need is some corp coming down on me!”
“Sorry, Steve.”
He glared. “You need to drop this, Cam, like right now. Whatever's going on is above your head. Mine too. There's no percentage for a win in this one.”
Steve was right, but I wanted to know more.
He sensed my reluctance. “This is no shit, Cam. I can't help you. I’m just a local security director. It's high level shit if this Oliver character is involved, and that puts me on the sidelines. Maybe Yuko still works for Oliver. Or maybe she took the data for from him. Whatever the case, he’s not the kind of guy you mess with. Let it go. I can calm Milo down.”
“Alex,” I said.
“Huh?”
“Alex cracked the card,” I reminded him.
I commed her. No answer. I left a message for her to contact me as soon as she could.
“I'd better get over there,” I said, heading for the door. “She could be in trouble if Milo knows I contacted her. The Samoans were ready to kill me to get that card.”
Steve nodded. “This is a bad idea, but at least take this.” He went to a coat rack in the corner, removed a white shirt that draped like silk in his hands, and tossed it to me. “You can't be too careful. Bring it back.”
I caught the smartfiber vest, stripped off his shirt and put it on, then put my shirt back on over it. “Thanks.”
“I can't give you a weapon. Someone turns up with a slug in them and the gun would rack back to me.” He stared at me intensely. “You go after this, I can't cover you. Understand?”
“Yeah. But if you don't hear from me....”
Steve nodded. “Be careful.”
###
I cursed as I hurried along the tunnels. As I approached the door to Alex' warehouse, I expected to hear her voice call out a greeting. Nothing.
I paused by the door, waiting. Still nothing.
Adrenaline sharpened my senses, made my heart pound. I was glad I wore the smartfiber vest, but wished I had a better weapon than my NID.
The door was unlocked. My anxiety slipped up a notch. Alex never left her door unlocked. I inched it open and peered in. The first thing I noticed was the smell; coppery, thick, sort of sweet. I'd smelled it this strong before, twice, and had never forgotten it. Blood. I spotted a motionless lump on the warehouse floor, next to a white plastic chair.
Alex, blonde hair dark with blood. Shit. My fault.
I didn't see anything else, didn't hear anything. I slipped in, creeping silently toward Alex's body. A flicker of motion to my left. I whirled.
Yuko. She was emerging from a doorway to a back storeroom. I gaped at her. What the hell…? When she saw me, her hand went to a pocket in her oversized blue coveralls and emerged with a high-powered compression pistol.
“Well,” she said, looking surprised. “I didn't expect to see you again.”
“What are you doing here?”
“No loose ends,” she replied. She indicated Alex's body with her gun. “She cracked the card.” She raised the gun. The barrel looked big as a tunnel. “Sorry, Cam.”
The gun went off with a noise like someone spitting. The smartfiber stopped the slug, but it was as though I'd been kicked in the chest. I spun, falling face down, sliding my left hand up my right sleeve, gripping the NID. I heard footsteps and cracked my lids, peering through the slits.
As she walked past me, I rolled and hit her legs, knocking her down. The gun went off again, something streaked past my cheek. I got the NID out, slapped it against her leg. The thick cloth diffused the charge. Not enough to knock her out, but she spasmed, hand opening, dropping the pistol. I dove for it, got my fingers around the grip. I sat back, leaning against a battered cabinet, breathing heavily, wincing at the pain in my chest. She blinked, momentarily dazed, green eyes slowly coming back into focus.
“Stay right there,” I said, keeping the gun aimed at her.
She twitched, groaning, rolling on her side. Her foot lashed out, caught me in the head, knocking me sideways. She was on me instantly, shaky but still strong, knees battering, clawing for the gun with one hand, my face with the other. I twisted, protecting my crotch with my free hand. Her fingers raked my cheek, searching for my eyes. I got the pistol pointed at her and pulled the trigger twice, not even hearing the shots.
She fell back, mouth open, gasping, right heel thumping the floor. She coughed blood and convulsed before going completely slack. Two dark spots on the front of her overalls slowly grew larger.
I ran a shaking hand down my face, it came away bloody. My cheek stung. When I tried to stand, I fell. Two tries later, I finally made it up and staggered out.
###
I used the comm in my room. The secretary looked uncertain. “Just tell him my name,” I told her. She told me to wait.
Oliver was an intense looking man with very dark eyes. “I understand you've come across something that belongs to me, Mr. McKenzie.”
“Yeah.” My breath wheezed and my ribs ached.
“I have someone on-site. He'll arrive shortly.”
“Okay.”
“I appreciate this more than you can know. You will be well compensated.”
I nodded and broke the connection. Alex. Dammit, I’m sorry.
I poured myself some whiskey and sat in the chair facing the door, wincing with every breath. I’d taken off the smartfiber vest. The center of my chest had a swollen blue and purple bruise as big as a fist.
Two cards rested on the arm of the chair; the data card and Yuko’s PIC. I was tired as hell. The doorbell buzzed about fifteen minutes later.
“It's unlocked,” I called out.
The door swung open, a man stepped inside. Dark gray suit, plain face, brown hair. The kind of man who'd never be noticed in a crowd. His movements were sharp and precise, graceful as a dancer's. A genteched muscleboy for Oliver, he probably knew a thousand ways to kill someone with a cocktail napkin.
The man smiled without showing his teeth. “The card?”
I tossed him the data card. The man caught it easily.
“Thanks.”
“She killed someone. A friend.”
The man shrugged. “Sorry,” he said, not sounding sorry at all.
“What about Milo? He's pissed at me.”
“Milo's a little fish hired by the sharks. He won't bother you.”
The man left.
I picked up Yuko's PIC. When the holo had been taken, she'd been smiling slightly. Now it looked like a smirk.
I stood with a groan, got the bottle, and poured another drink. I downed it, poured another, and downed that one too, thinking of Alex. I locked the door, went to the bedroom, and got into bed.
The faint scent of Yuko's perfume still lingered on the sheets.
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Originally Posted by Dave
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