“Okay. Do you have any idea who we’ve been working for on the last job?”
“I’d say, the company wanted its property back.”
“Close. Company people were in it, someone from the Air Force, and another party.”
“Who?”
“Couldn’t find out. I only know that they don’t want to let the current government—the Cartel—get it. Some secret service that’s still loyal to the old government.”
“Okaaay.”
“These people seemed to be pleased by the quick and, most of all, silent execution. Someone’s approached me again.”
“Why?”
“Because I was successful.”
“No—why should you want to work for these people? I mean, you’re rather standing on the other side of law, aren’t you?”
“That’s what I thought so far, too, Velvet. I thought there’s a big fish in the pond and many small ones, and enough booty for all. But the big fish wants it all. There’s no room to breathe left for us others. Either you align into the hierarchy, or you’re entirely out.”
“And you don’t want to align?”
“I know a few people who’ve aligned. First, they had a big mouth. Then, they became quieter. Then, they came with a hounded face and asked for help. Come, do that job for me. Come, I have to beat up a shop. Come, we’ll have to get the girl. Only to frighten the parents.” He lowered his gaze. “I didn’t go then. There are limits. Well, after a while they disappear and won’t be seen ever again.”
“So, now what’s it really about?” I prompted him out of his brooding silence.
“They also want the man. He must have left Vegas right after your visit. You must have scared him.”
“I didn’t meet him.”
“He felt safe. You’ve taken that feeling from him, I’d guess.”
“Maybe. Okay—why don’t they take him themselves?”
“Staff shortage, they said.”
“Or they don’t want to show up.”
“Possibly.”
“Or that mission’s too hot.”
“How that? If the guy has no train of bodyguards? And he’s hardly able to afford them any longer.”
“We’ll see.”
“You’re in?”
“Sure, Gomez. Who else is on the team?”
“Only the two of us. Recco and Grater took their share and left. They want to wait how the situation develops. Otherwise, I wouldn’t know anyone to trust.”
“Oh, thanks.”
“Don’t thank me. All others are more alien to me.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
“How do you plan to find him?”
If he had already left Las Vegas, we were in for a tiresome search. I wouldn’t want to jeopardize my job with Harold by not showing up for work on Monday.
“He considered himself clever. He didn’t take his company mobile along, because he had rightly feared to be traceable by it. He procured a new mobile phone with a new number—and couldn’t wait to check his e-mail first with it. So we know his new number, and I’m told his respective current location.”
“So we can start right now.”
“Actually, yes. The sooner we get him, the better. Last, he was in Houston.”
“Houston—quite some distance.”
“My car is fast.”
“Mmmm—let me do the first leg.”
“Why?”
“The night is my friend.”
Five hours later, I woke him. “Ey, Gomez, breakfast.”
“Where are we?”
“We’re approaching Albuquerque.”
“What, already? It’s just dawning.”
“Your car is fast.”
“Right, but—aw, no matter. We’ll grab coffee and sandwiches, then I’ll take the wheel.”
“That’s fine, so I can sleep.”
He granted me six and a half hours, and then it was my turn again. From Wichita Falls to Houston, I had four hours left—as I had to restrain myself around Dallas—then I woke Gomez. “Good evening and welcome to Houston. I think we need more precise directions now.”
“Yes, okay, I’ll ask next. In the meantime, would you fetch us something again, okay?”
“Sure. Any favorites?”
“Black, hot, strong.”
“Good.”
“Watch out, Velvet. Houston is no nice place.”
“I’m not nice, either.”
I left the car and walked toward the diner. Neither trucks nor bikes were parked here, only a lot of pickups. What kind of people met here on a Saturday night? I hadn’t been picky, had just headed for the first rest stop to come up.
A large dog barked at me from a cage on a pickup bed. However, I was more interested in the sounds coming from the diner. Jeers, encouraging calls, and more barking dogs mixed with gas horns, drums, and singing. My refined hearing identified the latter as speaker sounds.
Close to the door, the assault on my olfactory system began—male sweat, beer, and wet dog crowned by cigarette smoke. This was going to be fun!
The glass in the door frame was as blinded from a millimeters-strong dirt coating as the other windows. I took a last deep breath of fresh air, and then I pulled at the door and entered.
Okay, the question about the reason for assembling was clarified. All TV screens showed a college football game. The jeers, however, were directed at two scarcely-clad women on a table, who were wrestling together and didn’t stop at tearing each other’s checkered blouses apart.
Their owners could hardly keep the nervous, noise-aggrieved dogs from joining the fight.
This brawl wasn’t my business. I didn’t feel inclined to intervene, just the opposite, as the distraction allowed me to reach the counter mostly unnoticed. After a while and several failed attempts of both wrestlers to tear each other’s bra apart, one of the waitresses turned in my direction without really looking at me.
“Hello, Shortie, what do you want?”
“Two large cups of coffee to go, extra strong, no milk and sugar. One maxi steak burger with everything and extra cheese, one normal steak burger, all to go.”
“Coming. The steak will be made to order, how do you like it?”
“Rare, both.”
She turned away to start the coffeemaker. Shortie? I hadn’t been called this for quite a while.
The jeers increased when one of the bras gave in. Admitted, the woman had pretty, full breasts, but her wrestling style was simply horrible. She quickly returned the favor, thereby accepting the risk of being taken into headlock by her opponent.
Despite the show and despite the crowd, it was quiet around me. The men near me kept a cautious distance. I found them glancing behind on several occasions, regularly followed by a small step away from me. Did I look so threatening?
When one of the men noticed me watching him, he paled. Right then, he pushed his way through the crowd, away from me.
I glanced down myself. No, nothing to see. I still wore the high-necked black Velvet suit from Vegas with the skull buckle and the lace collar, formed by my suit nanos. There was no visible weapon and no place to hide one. Just the opposite, it looked so much like a second skin that it should attract male glances like a magnet.
Okay, there were the half-naked women on the table. The pants button of one of them had now given in, so that the robust jeans had slipped some way down and bared her naked buttocks. With tied legs, she was severely handicapped and fell on her back, whereupon her opponent pulled her pants further down.
The men’s cheer was limited and soon fell entirely mute. The women paused in their brawl and gazed around, irritated. Then their glances met me.
The designated winner looked down on herself in embarrassment, quickly gathered the remainders of her blouse over her breasts, slid from the table, and then hurried off. The men opened an alley for her, through which her opponent followed as soon as she had pulled up her pants.
Somehow I felt like a spoilsport, although I couldn’t t
ell why. Behind me, I heard a “Here’s your coffee,” so I turned around.
The young waitress flinched and turned away without a word. Briefly later she returned with a brown bag, the content of which smelled promising. “The steak burgers. Thank you, that’s on the house.”
“Oh. Okay.” Whatever might drive her to it, I gladly accepted the invitation. “Thank you.”
Then I grabbed my bag and the two cups of coffee and headed for the door. The men gave way widely. What was going past me here?
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Gomez stood next to the car and just tossed his mobile through the open window into the seat. “So that’s it.” He took one of the hot coffee cups and drank a long draft.
“What do you mean?”
“He’s managed to escape. Last, his signal was in Baytown, so he dared to enter the ZONE.”
“Yes, and?”
“Girl, I’m bold, but not crazy. I won’t go into the ZONE. A life won’t count that much there.” He snapped his fingers. “It’s the question anyway, how long he’ll survive there.”
“That depends on what he can offer. Such an intelligent guy won’t go into the ZONE thoughtlessly. He deliberately went to Houston, because he wanted to cross over from the start. And he must have something to offer, otherwise we wouldn’t have been sent after him. Right?”
“You might be right. But we can’t follow him anyway.”
“I’ll get him.”
“Velvet, no. That’s too hot. The radiation, the gangs—”
“Gomez, I’ll go. Now, tonight. Give me the address.”
“That’s Dragon crap.”
“Gomez.”
“Yes, okay. I’ll give you the address. South Baytown. Do you need my car?”
“Thanks, I’ll get along.”
“That’s thirty miles from here.”
“I don’t want to stand out, Gomez. If at all, I need a car with a Texan license plate.”
“Damn.”
“Don’t worry, Gomez. Tomorrow at dawn, I’ll be back.”
“I don’t know why I’m doing this, but okay, I’ll wait for you. Do you want my gun?”
I only gave him a stern look.
“You don’t even have a knife, Velvet.”
No, I went unarmed. Knives and guns only tempt you to seek confrontation, and my recipe for success was literally invisibility.
I had to dig in my memories. East of Houston, the second Jelly lander had set down. While one Lionheart daughter had sacrificed herself for the Asia lander’s destruction, the first invaders had spread out. The back-then only UN armor suits battalion, Stormy Sylvie’s Windwraiths, had stopped the millions-strong forces short before Houston. The American forces had helped, undaunted by death, but it was an open secret that Houston owed its continuing existence only to the determined approach of an entirely inexperienced unit. These soldiers in turn owed their success to their leader’s tactical genius, to the contribution of another Lionheart, and to the camouflage of their Frostdragon nano armor suits.
I wore a similar suit now, and that was a blessing not only for the camouflage. On the eastern shore of the drain from Lake Houston to Trinity Bay, the robust Jelly tanks could only have been stopped by heavy calibers. The uranium ammunition rounds had as much contributed their share to the area’s radioactive contamination as the fallout from the mighty nuclear bomb that had destroyed the lander.
Houston city had mostly been cleaned up. Just like in Belgium, all around the Bay, decontamination nanos were busy. But as in Belgium, the ZONE had long been outlaw territory. Baytown was located across the bridge, south of the Interstate 10 Eastern Freeway, and thus inside the ZONE.
I parked my newly acquired Martian in a lightly radioactively contaminated debris area north of the town. The car could withstand the radiation without trouble, the warning signs kept curious people away, and the low radioactivity didn’t matter for me.
I covered the last five miles on foot and camouflaged—a few minutes, and then I had reached the center of Baytown. Unlike in Europe, this town wasn’t professionally secured by all means. Instead, I recognized the more attentive human guards at the few open access roads. For me, they meant no obstacle—I simply walked through.
On many walls, the molten traces of plasma rounds and small craters from linear-accelerated steel bullets took turns, a sign of the armor suits having fought here. I had to suppress a shiver when I realized that I was walking in the Windwraiths’ footsteps as the first armor suit bearer after twenty years.
How must it have been, when the war raged here? How must a Windwraith in his protective suit have felt, when the ordinary soldiers around him had been grilled in the invaders’ fire?
On my way, I studied Baytown’s inhabitants.
There was the grim rocker type in his richly decorated leather jacket with classic revolvers and pump guns. There I saw the ghetto gang with their super-wide baggy pants, machine pistols, and long knives. I passed punks with bright-blue hair and assault rifles. The neo-gothic faction wore black with silver and hid the doubtlessly present pistols under long coats. Finally, I found out why I had frightened the diner’s guests so much. A group of four women stood high on a building’s corner, all in skin-tight leather dresses, with bulky golden skulls on their chests and at the locks of their thin necklaces.
The similarity couldn’t be denied, even if I wore neither the gold nor their weapons—throwing star and short knife seemed to be standard, but one of them carried a linear rifle around. Moreover, they wore soft-looking boots, so they were well prepared for silent appearances.
Cautiously, I retreated into the shadows.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Neither of these groups worried me, not even the girls, although they seemed to follow a more intelligent approach with their equipment. No, together they all cherished some cliché, probably copied from the relevant Hollywood movies. Only a group in camouflage suits with paramilitary attitude was missing. These were rank and file to deter the occasional visitor—including potential police patrols.
I had to worry about those people that I hadn’t seen yet. Those people for whose sake the military didn’t dare to come here. Those people that prevented the different costume factions from smashing each other’s skulls.
Those people with whom my target would enter business or already had, and who’d possibly protect him.
Well, first I had to find him. The mobile locator had identified the approximate living quarter where he had last been checked in, but I didn’t know the exact house yet. I might have to search them all.
No, I didn’t have to. Very obviously, he already had made contact. The men who were standing guard around one of the low buildings in my target area fulfilled only one cliché—no-nonsense professionals. They held their unlocked machine pistols with stretched index finger, so that no involuntary twitch could cause a burst. Their clothing was loose, offered freedom of movement, but had nothing to be entangled in. The most important hint was their stance—strictly attentive. There was nothing of the other gangs’ cool easiness.
It would be fun to deprive them of their booty anyway. But first, I had to see for myself that I was in the right place indeed.
So I snuck through between them at a respectful distance, enough to not let them feel any draft of air, and carefully watched not to kick any pebbles away or step on patches of grass.
The doors were guarded, the windows trellised. This again told of valuable content and at the same time convinced me that I wouldn’t easily get inside unseen. Well, I didn’t have to get in yet.
For now, I listened from outside whether anything was stirring inside, be it a sleeper’s silent breath or the fine scratches of mouse claws on wood. Yes, people were awake and active in the house, too.
“What’s our guest doing?”
“Sleeping. Somewhat restless.”
“What a fuss over such a rat.”
“They’ve sent someone after him.”
“So what? Nobod
y will come to here.”
“That’s what our guest thought in Vegas, too.”
“Vegas is large.”
“He’s been in the Flying Gardens’ VIP suite, and they got in there.”
“Man—they’ve taken on the Cartel, or what? That must have been quite noisy.”
“There hasn’t been any noise. They’ve got in and out, and nobody noticed. Nothing at all.”
“Oh.”
“Yes, oh. They must have sent their top man. Nobody simply steals from the Cartel. And nobody comes into the ZONE. You understand?”
“First, they have to know where that guy is. Then one of them must come here, and then he’s still a long way from leaving with our guest.”
No, sure. That was the most difficult part of my plan.
“Who says they want him alive?”
“Oh.”
I could tell you, I thought. But once you hear of my visit, it’s too late.
Chapter Thirty
It was pretty clear to me that I couldn’t remain undetected. Thus, it was as clear that I had to take the guards outside out before they could shoot at me or my man. According to my plan, the guards inside would come too late.
If I took the guards outside out too early, the ones inside might notice. No, I had to get my target out first.
The bedroom window was trellised, but sometimes for a short while out of the guards’ sight. That sufficed. Close to the window, I waited for the next opportunity, when the guard disappeared behind the house’s corner. Go!
With a sharp claw, I cut the bars. Should they puzzle later how that could be possible, just as easily I could push the claw through the window frames and open the lock. The window was open, I dashed in, served the sleeper a stunning clout, and dragged him out. The unconscious burden was heavy, but thanks to my enhancements, no problem.
Outside, I placed him down and ran off. The guard just came back. He collected his clout and dropped. I was at top speed, so his comrades fell like bowling pins before one of them could even bat an eye.
Lover Page 7
