Insight

by Teyla Branton

  “What do you think?” Bay asked.

  Reese checked the data on her iTeev. “Forty-five people have entered in the past two hours, but none of them was Grogovit.”

  “Why go to work so late?” Bay wondered aloud.

  “To do nothing good, I’m guessing.”

  One of the perks of living in the CORE, at least according to the Elite, was the six-hour workday. While some people liked to work those hours in the afternoon, a night shift was nearly unheard of outside law enforcement and the colonies.

  “Let’s go in,” Reese said. She punched a command on her iTeev and brought up the universal enforcer code that would allow them access to the building. She broadcast the code into the handprint reader locking the door. Nothing. The only way that could happen was if the door had been programed to ignore enforcer override.

  Reese frowned. “Let’s go around back. Schematics say there’s a second entrance. Maybe the code will work there.”

  They went down the alleyway next to the building, found a gate, and climbed over it. Reese spied a private camera on the building, one that must be linked to Kordell’s private security and not the Teev feed. She activated a camera disruptor on her suit, which would interrupt the recording. Whoever was in the building, she didn’t want them warned.

  The override didn’t work at the back door either. Something was definitely off.

  “Now what?” Reese asked. “There doesn’t seem to be a way to alert anyone inside.” She banged on the door for emphasis.

  Bay made a fist, looking ready to help her break down the door through sheer force. But almost instantly he sighed and relaxed. “Now we wait.” He touched the iTeev on his sleeve, swiping a few screens. “At least a dozen people entered the building six hours ago. Whatever they’re doing here, I doubt people are working longer than that. Which means one of them is bound to go home soon. Or maybe someone will come out to see why their cameras aren’t working.”

  They waited, one on either side of the door. In only six minutes, a much shorter time than Reese expected, the door opened, a slash of bright light nearly blinding them. As a man stepped through the door, he glanced casually at Reese before doing a double take at her uniform. Color bled from his face. Nodding at Reese, he put his head down, moving forward quickly.

  But Bay was already standing in his path. “Sorry buddy,” Bay said, pointing his stunner at the man’s throat. “It’s not quitting time yet.”

  Reese stopped the sliding door from closing with her boot and peeked into the brightly lit hallway. The door obediently slid back open. No other employees were in sight, but she couldn’t count on it staying that way. “I’m going in,” Reese said, stepping through. She stopped the door from closing again with the manual override on the wall.

  Bay nodded. “Right behind you. Just going to take care of this guy.”

  “What are you going to do with me?” Panic spilled into the man’s voice.

  “Shut up. You’ll live to go to jail.” Bay snapped cuffs over the man’s wrists and shoved him into the building.

  That was all Reese saw as she sprinted down the hallway. The bright lights alone would have told her something was wrong, if she didn’t already guess. This was a building ready for business, a business someone wanted hidden from the outside world.

  She didn’t see cameras in the hallway, and that surprised her, but maybe they were confident in their security. Another corridor intersected hers, and she veered left, following a faint humming sound. She nearly blundered into someone, catching the sound of voices almost too late. She threw herself against a door in the hallway, pulling at the knob, grateful there was no handprint reader. The door gave under her weight. Leaving the door open, she crouched inside the room and watched two people pass her location. They were both dressed in white from head to toe, and their voices were weary. Reese couldn’t tell if they were men or women, but they could have been any workers at any factory. She felt a momentary concern that maybe her drawing had led her astray. Maybe this building was simply another readymeal packaging plant.

  No. Her sketches always portrayed whatever a witness believed he’d seen. And this afternoon her witness had been willing to incriminate himself rather than spill what he knew about Grogovit.

  Looking around, Reese realized the room she’d ducked into was an employee breakroom, complete with readymeal dispensers and lounging areas. The accommodations looked as good as those offered by her enforcer division, so obviously Grogovit wanted to keep his employees happy. Was that why they were willing to make juke for him? She didn’t believe it for a minute. Money had to be their motive for betraying the CORE. Then remembering Cruz’s fear, Reese wondered if maybe there was more to it than that.

  When the voices faded, she emerged silently from the room. Where was her partner? He couldn’t be all that far behind with only the one man to stash somewhere. Unless he’d run into additional trouble.

  Heads up, she texted to him on her iTeev. Two workers coming your way.

  The humming was louder now, and when she came to a set of double doors, she peeked into the glass window at the top, unsurprised to see the spacious factory room from Cruz’s second sketch—or the scene was so similar that she couldn’t tell them apart. Two long rows of white-dressed employees, their backs toward each other across a short aisle, stood working in front of tables. Behind those tables sat three-meter-tall, oblong machines that were wider than three police shuttles, end-to-end. Above each of the machines, dozens of tubes snaked down from the ceiling, like umbilical cords, disappearing into different areas of the metal surface. Likely a steady supply of drug ingredients, if she had to bet.

  There were roughly twenty-four tables and machines in each of those two long rows, so whatever the setup in the rest of the building, there was work for at least forty-eight employees in just this room, or probably quadruple that if they ran four six-hour shifts. Which meant more juke than Reese had imagined was being manufactured here.

  Checking to make sure her suit camera was on, Reese debated what to do. There was enough light in the room that the people working at the tables would see her immediately if she entered here. No way could she make it past them to hide behind the machines. She thought fleetingly of disguising herself as a worker, but giving up the safety of her suit wasn’t an option. She needed to find another entrance into the large room.

  She continued down the hall, checking the few doors that appeared. She had her stunner in her dominant left hand now, but her right was close to the nine mil. She didn’t want to hurt the employees, but she fully intended to stop anyone who tried to prevent her from getting the proof she needed.

  Finally, she opened a door to an office that was not much larger than her own tiny quarters back at division. The aroma of peanuts wafted out at her. The lights were on in the room and a Teev holoscreen hovered over the desk as if awaiting its owner. More important, however, was the door and shuttered window on the far side. If her sense of direction had it right, that should open up onto the factory floor.

  The aroma of peanuts intensified as she stepped inside the office. It wasn’t the smell of the real peanut paste served at fancy restaurants in town, but the stronger, cloying, oily stench of the synthetic version used in readymeals. A surge of anticipation spread through her. The factory might have at one time processed actual readymeals, but far more certain was the fact that in forty-five of the last sixty juke hypos they’d confiscated from students, synthetic peanut paste had made up part of the drug’s delivery system.

  In a few steps she reached the door on the other side of the room, easing it open far enough to peek out. The humming grew louder, but not unpleasantly so, as if the equipment was well maintained. As it had to be. Each finished drug hypo would be good for a couple of hits. If the contents weren’t mixed correctly, the user would die sooner rather than later, which would hurt their bottom line.

  The door opened behind the machinery, where the light was dimmer, and where it was unlikely that the emp
loyees, intent on their work, would notice her. Unless she called undue attention to herself. She emerged, moving slowly to the back of the closest machine.

  The smell of peanuts was less prominent in the larger room but still cloying. Her stomach tightened at the stench, and she began breathing through her mouth. She eased around the back and up the side of the machine until she could glimpse the worker on the next machine over. Methodically, the man used a sensor to check something on the hypos from his table before setting them into a slotted conveyer belt that fed into the machine. At the same time, boxed hypos, presumably ones the worker put in earlier, spat out on a higher belt, the boxes dropping into a huge cart next to the machine.

  According to the sketch from Crew’s mind, Grogovit had been here at least once, but that was no guarantee he had come here tonight. There were plenty of places people could hide if they went off grid, especially when they had underground connections. If Grogovit wasn’t somewhere in the building, Reese wouldn’t have a solid case against him, but she would at least shut down this factory, which would mean hundreds of thousands of hypos off the market. Fewer addicts would jump off buildings, attack their families or coworkers, or burn down homes. The long-term effect of continuous juke use was almost always death, but it rarely happened without hurting innocents along the way.

  She’d have to be satisfied with closing this factory and calling in backup, even if it meant not nailing Grogovit.

  Reese had barely started to retrace her steps down the length of the machine when a movement on the far row of workers drew her attention. She drew in a sharp breath as she recognized Grogovit towering over a white-dressed man who waved his arms excitedly as he spoke. Grogovit shook his head in response, his jowly face flushed red from the tips of his large ears to his wide chin. The smaller white-dressed man hunched his shoulders, making himself appear even shorter, but that indication of subservience didn’t halt his speech.

  Reese pressed herself against the side of the machine behind her. Vibrations spread through her body, seeming to whisper ominously. Her heart beat furiously. Grogovit was here. She’d gambled and won. Now she had to make sure he didn’t get away.

  Grogovit and his companion had already moved from her sight, heading down the aisle between the rows of workers. She had to catch up with them! Then she’d call in backup.

  She did pause long enough to text Bay: Eyes on G in the big factory room. You coming?

  Making sure no one was looking in her direction, she moved easily to the next machine, where she crouched for a few seconds before moving to the next, moving quickly with the idea of working her way past Grogovit and somehow circling around him. She caught sight of him again after three rows of machines, and after four more, she was sure she was ahead. When she reached the last machine in the twelfth row, the lack of vibration told her it wasn’t operational.

  Keeping close against the machine, she glided along it to the front end. In the wall to her right, she could see a black-draped window. Behind that drape, she knew she’d find the view of the building she’d drawn, the one the janitor at Kordell Corp had identified to send her here. Opposite her position, near the other machine at the end of the row, she spied a set of double doors, and she wondered if that was where Grogovit was headed. That machine was operational, but the worker who manned it bent intently over his table, his back toward her, and she was confident that with Grogovit nearby, he wouldn’t turn in her direction.

  She crouched near the table at the front and contemplated stepping out behind Grogovit as he passed, but his shoes stopped at the edge of the table. She risked a peek and spied Grogovit and his shorter companion standing with their backs toward her, with Grogovit almost close enough to reach under the table and touch his leg. A large, flat-faced man also stood several paces to Grogovit’s side, partway into the aisle between the rows of machines. Unlike Grogovit, he was pure muscle.

  Bodyguard, Reese decided.

  She could hear their conversation now, and she suspected they had chosen this location near the end of the room precisely because of the relative privacy and lower volume of noise. From how close they were to the nonworking machine, she was sure the worker opposite them couldn’t hear them. The man did look once over his shoulder at the group across the aisle before studiously bending over his work.

  “Will they come here?” asked the short man, sounding anxious.

  “No. I already told you—it’s taken care of.” Grogovit’s gruff voice held impatience. “That’s why I was late getting here tonight. I had my people set up just enough evidence to point to Cruz—and only to Cruz. Tomorrow the advocate will let him give the enforcers the location. It will look like a one-man operation.”

  “You sure they’re going to buy that? We’re the only supplier for the city. A small operation would only be able to supply a tiny percentage with our special mix.”

  Grogovit snorted. “It doesn’t matter what they think they might know. Cruz won’t say anything except what the advocate tells him. He’ll protect his family. You just keep production running smoothly here.” That statement told Reese the shorter man was the manager of this factory, or at least one of them.

  “Right, right.” The manager fiddled with his white plastic hair covering, glancing nervously at the back of the employee across the aisle.

  “I do want you to be on the lookout,” Grogovit added. “Just to make sure. If you see anything out of the ordinary, alert me on the secure channel.”

  “Okay boss. I’ll keep an eye on things.”

  “Good. And remind everyone about keeping their mouths shut. Make sure the other distributors don’t mess up like Cruz did. I won’t stand for it.”

  “Of course. Of course.” The way the manager spoke told Reese he had already reassured Grogovit various times. But Grogovit hadn’t gotten where he was now by being easily reassured. No, Reese was sure he’d be careful.

  Time was running out. If Reese didn’t act soon, she would lose the opportunity to take Grogovit red-handed. But where was her partner? She wasn’t worried about the employees’ interference when she took down Grogovit. With her weapons, they wouldn’t be much of a challenge, even if they stuck around instead of fleeing. She’d use the temper laser on them, which would make them compliable to her suggestions.

  But she did worry about the bodyguard. He looked like he might have enforcer training, and with her luck, he’d probably be among the one percent of the population who was immune to a temper laser. He was also likely armed, despite the CORE ban on civilian weapons. Guns turned up regularly enough from the underground for her not to discount the possibility.

  Bay, where are you? she thought.

  She typed out a hurried request for additional backup from division before realizing with a sinking feeling that none of her messages to Bay had actually sent. Something in this room had to be blocking her iTeev connection. Which meant Bay had no idea she’d found Grogovit or might need backup.

  “Okay then, I’m off,” Grogovit said, tilting his head toward the doors nearest them.

  Making an instant decision, Reese sprang from her hiding place and stepped out behind the men, pointing her stunner at them. “Stop,” she ordered. “Tadum Grogovit, you are under arrest for suspected drug manufacture and distribution.”

  The manager gasped as he whirled to face her, but Grogovit turned without hurry, regarding her complacently, perhaps even with a bit of amusement.

  “Please step away from Mr. Grogovit,” Reese told the manager.

  To her surprise, the manager didn’t obey. Instead, he launched himself at her. She side-stepped him and arced her elbow down on his back, slamming him to the ground, the close contact feature on her stunner finishing the job.

  She’d been quick, but not quick enough. As she righted herself, Grogovit’s bodyguard was at her side, a gun pointed at her head, the only part of her not protected by her suit. Her heart beat furiously in her chest, and every one of her senses seemed acute. The smell of peanuts was suddenly
overwhelming, her breathing too loud, and the sweat beading on her brow felt like a flood. Her mind was also clear. They couldn’t afford to let her go, and that meant she was excess baggage. Or maybe one more corpse that would be found in the river. But they’d ask her questions first, if only to make sure she was alone. There was still time. A few minutes.

  “I think it’s you who should put down that stunner,” Grogovit said with an arrogant smirk. “It’s no match for—”

  Reese fired from her hip with her right hand, and the bodyguard jerked as her bullet slammed between his chest and right shoulder. He grunted with pain as his gun crashed to the floor. Reese pointed her nine mil at Grogovit and her stunner at the bodyguard, who clutched at his wound. Blood seeped through his fingers.

  Reese smiled mockingly. They never looked at her other hand. They always assumed there was only one danger. Still, if Bay had been around, he would bawl her out for taking the shot. So much could have gone wrong.

  But it hadn’t. Not this time.

  “You were saying?” she said to Grogovit.

  His complacency vanished, a flush of anger taking its place. The vast room had gone still during their confrontation, but now employees ran in a disorganized flurry to the far door, casting fearful backwards glances at her and Grogovit.

  Grogovit didn’t try to stop them.

  The bodyguard, perhaps thinking her distracted, gathered his energy and lunged at her. She kicked out to keep him away and let the contacts on the stunner fly, piercing his skin. Convulsing with the electric shock, he fell to the ground.

  A sketch flashed into her mind—from Grogovit, she thought—the image of a dark-haired woman. Could it be his wife? She couldn’t see the woman’s face, only her long, slender, naked back.

  Grogovit took the opportunity to run. But Reese was ready. She wanted to fire, to eliminate this slut munching whore wrangler, but that would be letting him off too easy. No, he was going down.