Arena Book 6

by Logan Jacobs

  “Yeah, that’s what worries me,” she said through a small, half-hearted laugh. I could tell she was struggling to keep her emotions in check. She’d only been human for a couple of months, and the swirling morass of feelings that she had to deal with must have been almost unbearable at the moment. She was one tough broad to keep them at bay for as long as she had. “This is the real world, not the Crucible.”

  “Artie,” I said as I finished strapping down my armor. “You have to understand that there really isn’t much difference between the two for me.”

  “Hexagonal of one, sextet of another,” she nodded.

  “Six of one, half-dozen of the other,” I gently corrected. “But I think I like yours better. And hey, I’m taking every precaution I can.”

  The weapons locker opened up, and I pulled out modified versions of my Equalizer pistols. They weren’t the ones PoLarr had given me not long after our Soul Gaze, but were newer models that Darry had also helped upgrade. These were snub-nosed versions of the futuristic pistol that had been given selective fire capabilities. I could fire them in plain old semi-automatic mode, or with the flick of a thumb switch go to the three-round burst. The cylindrical magazines for each pistol held forty armor-piercing rounds. I loaded each one and checked the chamber to make sure a round was ready for action.

  Next on the tray was a double shoulder holster rig that would keep the slim-line pistols close to my torso in break-away sleeves. I loaded up the pouches on my belt with six extra mags for the pistols and then slid a spring-loaded serrated tanto point folding knife whose blade had been coated with concentrated venom from a very deadly scorpion-spider into my pocket. I grabbed my lightweight silk-bomber jacket and put it on so that my guns were completely concealed.

  “Are you ready to go, Marc?” Baba-Tadao asked. I could tell he and Fallon were getting antsy.

  “Yup,” I replied. “Right behind you.”

  “Are you sure you don’t want us as back up, sugar?” Aurora asked. She and the rest of my alliance mates had huddled around the command center.

  “I always love it when you back up,” I joked. “But not this time, guys. I don’t want to get you all involved any more than I already have.”

  “You’re letting those two go,” Nova pointed out. She seemed dejected that she could not go with us.

  “Yeah, they’re already criminals, so…” I said back. “It’s okay, guys. You all hold down the fort here in case there is any new info.”

  “How are you going to get to Neophor’s lair?” Chazz piped up. He’s been uncharacteristically quiet since Grizz had been led out.

  “Hover-Bike,” Fallon replied.

  “That will waste valuable time,” Chazz pointed out. “Let me teleport you.”

  “You don’t know where it is,” I said.

  “Tempest, may I?” Chazz asked very politely.

  “Sure.” She nodded her head in the affirmative.

  Chazz’s blue antenna glowed slightly. “I do now. Come on, let me do this. I’m not officially on Team Havak or in the Crucible, so it won’t matter if I teleport you to a horrible part of town where only illegal things happen. Or as I like to call it… Tuesday.”

  “It’s Friday, Chazz,” I said with a chuckle. “But you make a good argument. Fallon? Baba? You guys ready?”

  “Like, five minutes ago, slow poke,” Fallon shot back.

  “Let’s do it, Chazz,” I told the little blue alien. His antennae glowed brighter this time and then there was a poof of dark black smoke.

  When I opened my eyes, Fallon, Baba, and I stood in the entranceway of Neophors “office.” It seemed like forever ago and just yesterday when Grizz and I had come here looking for answers to a riddle we didn’t even know.

  “I guess Chazz decided to stay home after all,” Fallon shrugged.

  The place looked like it had been completely ransacked. Not that it had been super clean and tidy to begin with, but it had clearly been tossed by some folks desperately looking for something.

  “Looks like someone beat us to the punch,” I said with a sigh.

  “On the surface maybe,” Fallon said with a glint in her eye.

  She picked her way carefully around the detritus until she came upon Neophor’s chair. It appeared to be bolted to the floor and had been ripped to shreds. The vein like cables of green energy had all been pulled out and no longer glowed. They looked like dead worms. Baba stayed near the door but his eyes scanned the entire apartment like a radar.

  Fallon bent down and shoved her hand into the destroyed cushion part of the chair and began to feel around for something, her face scrunched up in a mask of concentration. She finally found what she was looking for and gave a good yank. When she did so the bottom of the chair popped from the floor and flipped back on hidden hinges. Under the chair, a shaft led down to a basement level with a metal ladder bolted into the side.

  “Sometimes you’ve got to look at the ugly underbelly,” Fallon continued. “Come on.”

  Before I could even make a move Baba-Tadao danced over to the shaft and disappeared into the dark.

  “It is all clear down here,” Baba’s voice floated up and then soft, blue light emanated from the shaft as he turned on the lights.

  “After you,” I said as I motioned for her to go. I was a little tired of ladders leading to unknown places. Fallon raised her eyebrows at me and then jumped into the shaft, not bothering with the ladder. “Show off.”

  Not being a lithe cat-person I had to go the slow, old-fashioned way, hand over hand on the ladder.

  When I got to the bottom, it felt like being in the belly of some overclocked, suped up, high end gaming computer. Cables, circuits, fiber-optics, and tons of shit that I didn’t even know what it was made up every single inch of the ten foot by ten foot room. Cooling fans were stationed around at strategic places and blew icy cold air into the room. I imagined this much tech would generate a ton of heat.

  “I’d heard a rumor that Neophor had a lair under her lair,” Fallon explained. “Where she did all her real business.”

  “Neophor was very well connected,” Baba said as he began to look over the computer controls. “Figuratively and literally. I don’t think there is a video feed or camera in the city that did not come through this nexus.”

  “You think we could pull up anything from around Darry’s workshop?” I asked, not really expecting a positive answer.

  “Hmm, let me see what I can do,” Baba said and hunched over a complex computer keyboard that had all sorts of strange alien symbols on the keys. He took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and then his fingers flew over the keyboard in a blur.

  “He’s a hacker too?” I asked Fallon.

  “Oh, Baba has many, many skills,” she replied with a wink.

  “Ninja-Hacker-Rat,” I rattled off. “Sounds like a show on Fox.”

  “I don’t trust Fox people, they’re sneaky,” Fallon said with a snort.

  “Okay, Fox racist,” I shot back. “So… How you been?”

  “Busy,” Fallon said, and I could see the strain of leadership on her face. “Rebuilding a philanthropic criminal empire isn’t as glamorous as it sounds.”

  “Oh, I mean, it sounds positively delightful to me,” I snarked.

  “I’ve missed that rapscallion wit of yours,” she purred somewhat seductively. “Among other things.”

  “Well, both my wit and other things have missed you too,” I said back somewhat seductively.

  “Maybe when this is all over, we could set up some play time?” She asked without a shred of decorum.

  “I’d like that,” I smiled.

  “If you two are done flirting, I think I have found something,” Baba-Tadao said without looking up from his display. He punched a few more commands into the console and a holo-screen display blazed to life. “This is a feed from a camera stationed across the street from Darry’s shop.”

  The image was a little grainy and from an awkward angle, but I could still make out the front
door to Darry’s. Nothing much seemed to happen other than a few hover-trucks passing by on the street but then a female figure walked into frame and stood in front of Darry’s door. A moment later the big, burly, bug opened the door to let his guest in, just before the figure went inside she turned to look around the street behind her.

  The blue-black hair and maroon lips were a dead giveaway. It was Trillium Vou. She disappeared into the shop.

  “Huh, well that’s interesting,” I said. “She didn’t tell me she’d actually been to Darry’s the night he was murdered.”

  “I would take whatever Trillium Vou told you and actually believe the opposite,” Baba-Tadao said with barely hidden disgust. He hit a few buttons and the footage fast forwarded for about twenty minutes. Then another figure, this one male, crossed the frame and stood in front of the door. This time the figure turned to scope out his surroundings before Darry opened the door.

  “Motherfucker,” I blurted out.

  “You recognize that person?” Fallon asked.

  “Yeah, his name is Toe-Massi,” I told her. “Vou said he was a stalker who had been terrorizing her for quite some time.”

  Darry opened the door and let Toe-Massi in.

  “That seems very strange, would you not agree, Marc?” Baba-Tadao asked.

  “Yeah, something is very rotten in Denmark,” I said and rubbed my chin with one hand.

  “We are in Valiance City,” Baba remarked.

  “Yeah, it’s from a play,” I tried to explain. “So, is there anything else on here?”

  “Watch,” Baba said and fast forwarded the footage ten more minutes. There was some kind of disturbance because the camera shook, and the footage went all wonky and staticky for a few seconds. Then a large, black, amorphous shape shot past the frame. “The rest of the tape is perfectly normal until the police show up a few hours later.”

  “So, no footage of Grizz entering the building?” I asked.

  “Not from this angle no,” Baba replied. “But I could not find any footage from the rear of the shop.”

  “Okay,” I nodded. “Um, what the hell happened at the end there?”

  “I believe the disturbance was from a very large scale energy expenditure within two hundred feet of the camera,” Baba replied.

  “Whatever the blast was that actually killed Darry,” I said as I thought about it. “That must have been one hell of a blast.”

  “Yes,” Baba remarked.

  “Can we get a copy of that?” I asked.

  “Let me try,” Baba replied and then his fingers flew over the keys again. “Yes… I think… Oh, oops.”

  “Oops?” Fallon and I said in unison.

  “I may have just tripped a security protocol,” Baba said, chagrined.

  The holo screen disappeared, and a holographic version of Neophor’s head appeared.

  “Nobody likes a snoop,” the Neophor head said. “Especially dirty little rat ones. Hope you got what you were looking for. I’d suggest you leave. It’s about to get very hot in here. Good bye.”

  The head flickered from existence and then all the cooling fans died at once.

  “We should probably get the fuck out of here,” Fallon commented.

  “Yeah, good idea,” I echoed.

  The temperature rose incredibly fast and some circuits began to melt in front of our eyes. Sparks began to fly as blue-green coolant leaked from several hoses.

  The three of us all bolted for the shaft. Fallon crouched down and then sprang up, nimble as, well, as a cat and was gone. Baba scrambled up the ladder as if he were on a mouse wheel. That left me to go once again hand over hand. Sweat popped out on my face and soon began to drip into my eyes as I climbed.

  Behind me I heard the sizzle and crackle of computer components frying and thick, oily smoke started to pour up the shaft all around me. It burned my eyes and made it hard to breathe. Then I heard the telltale whoosh of something very combustible catching fire.

  With all I had I pushed off with my legs and yanked with my arms so that I flew out of the top of the shaft and crashed onto the ground beside the chair just as a tongue of blue flame shot out behind me. I rolled on the ground and came up in a seated position flat on my ass. I had to pat my legs down to stop the smoldering.

  “That was very exciting,” Baba said with a grin.

  “That’s one way to put it,” I groaned and stood up. “You happen to know where Trillium lives by any chance?”

  “Of course,” Fallon said and winked at me.

  “Can you get us in undetected?” I asked.

  “Of course,” Baba-Tadao said and winked at me.

  “Let’s go pay that tabloid bitch a visit.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  “Okay, I know I witnessed how we got in here, but I still have no idea how we got in here,” I said as I stood in the foyer of Trillium’s floor. Yes, she had an entire floor. We were something like a hundred and twenty stories up, and all four penthouse suites connected. The foyer was a modernistic, and sparse, glassed in box that led right to the door of her apartment.

  “Ancient gangland secret, Marc Havak,” Baba said and smiled at me.

  “I mean, do you guys have like a neural scrambler or something?” I asked.

  “We will neither confirm nor deny,” Fallon purred. “Come on, enough with how we snuck in here without anyone detecting us, even you. The night is not getting any younger. Plus, I can’t wait to see the look on her face.”

  The three of us walked up to the door, and I knocked with four hard raps. A few minutes later Trillium herself opened the door and gazed out at us. She recovered quickly, but there was a brief instant of total and utter shock on her face. I began to understand why Baba and Fallon loved doing this so much.

  “I’d ask how you all got in here, but I doubt I’d get an answer,” Trillium said. “Looks like I’ll be firing a whole new set of security guards in the morning. Yay. What do you all want?”

  “You didn’t tell me you actually went to Darry’s shop the night he was killed,” I said through a scoundrel smile.

  “Why don’t you all come in?” Trillium said through a plastered on fake smile. She gave absolutely nothing away. I would hate to play poker with her.

  She moved aside and walked back into her apartment just expecting us to follow her. I shrugged at Fallon and Baba, and then we walked in.

  The apartment was opulent in an understated way. It wasn’t gaudy like Noor’Tun’s office. It was actually very tasteful and sparse. But what was in there was expensive as fuck. From the fine leather couch made from some exotic alien beast to the polished brass wet bar that took up an entire wall to the fancy paintings hung on the walls. It reeked of money. Tasteful money, but money nonetheless. And new money at that.

  “Have a seat,” Trillium said and motioned for us to sit on the couch. “Can I get you a drink?”

  Fallon and I sat while Baba took a position behind us with his back to the nearest wall.

  “Bourbon if you have it,” I said, because why the fuck not?

  “Andovian amber fire,” Fallon replied, and then turned to me. “Why the fuck not? Right?”

  “My thoughts exactly,” I said to her.

  Trillium pressed a few buttons on the bar console and soon enough our drinks magically appeared on the coffee table in front of us. I picked mine up and took a sip. A small sip. One, I was tired and wanted to stay as sharp as possible, and two, I didn’t put it past her to try and poison us. It was a very good single barrel whiskey that reminded me a lot of Knob Creek back on Earth.

  Trillium walked back over with a drink of her own, a clear liquid in a short glass with ice cubes that had actual orange flame on the inside of them, and sat on a loveseat catty-corner to where we were.

  “How about you answer Marc’s question?” Fallon said as she took a sip of her own drink.

  “I don’t take orders from low life gangsters, thank you,” Trillium said in true bitchy fashion.

  Fallon just chuckled.


  “Okay, I’ll ask it again,” I stepped in. “Why were you at Darry’s the night he was murdered?”

  “I told you,” Trillium said cooly. “He was working on something for me.”

  “Yeah,” I countered. “But you forgot that little detail when we spoke last.”

  “Must have slipped my mind,” Trillium smiled.

  “Nothing slips your mind, Trillium,” I shot back. “I know first hand. Except, you know, common decency.”

  “Charming,” Trillium smirked. “Yes, I went to Darry’s. He had finished a prototype of the nano-armor he was working on and wanted to show it to me.”

  “And did he?” Fallon chimed in. She had set her drink down on the chrome and glass coffee table after her first sip. Her whiskers twitched ever so slightly on the side of her face. I gave a quick glance back to Baba-Tadao. He had pressed himself up flat against the wall but was otherwise completely motionless except for the tiny back and forth flick of his pink nose. The hair on the back of my neck stood up then. Something was going on. None of us knew what, but all of our sixth senses were tingling.

  “Yes, he did,” Trillium said. It reeked of a lie. “But, it still had some bugs, so I told him to keep working on it and left.”

  “Nothing else happened while you were there?” I asked. I was trying to lead her into a misstep. I had a theory brewing in my brain. “No one else showed up?”

  “No, we were alone,” Trillium replied but her eyes darted to a hallway behind us that I assumed led to her bedroom.

  “Like we’re alone now?” I continued to press her.

  “What are you talking about?” She scoffed but her eyes darted to the hallway again. “Of course we are alone.”

  “We are not alone, Marc,” Baba-Tadao said as his gaze floated over to the hallway, which, unlike the rest of the apartment, was dark and coated in shadows.

  “You may as well come out, Toe-Massi!” I shouted over my shoulder down the hallway, as I very deliberately drew one of my snub-nosed Equalizers from the holster under my left arm. “If that is actually your name.”

  There was a long, tension filled moment, but eventually a shape oozed out of the shadows. It was the same guy from Trillium’s studio and the one from Darry’s shop. He dropped the facial scrambler and I saw that he was the same race as Trillium with blue-gray skin, black hair, and deep purple lips. His eyes were brilliant blue and darted back and forth nervously.