Concrete Chaos

by Earle, Michael-Scott

  "I know." He smiled. "But this isn't going to be a street race. We will be infiltrating a secured residential tower owned by one of the most powerful corporations in the world. We'll have only a handful of minutes to get into Paul Lefton's condo and discover what is going on there. Even if everything goes as planned, there will be an extreme amount of danger."

  "So, tell me how I can help then. I want to see this through." I stepped closer to him and held his gaze with my eyes. Maybe I was just really fucking tired, but I felt a connection between us, and this was the first time the two of us had ever been alone.

  "I know you do, but I want you to be safe." He smiled. "Go home, get some rest, we'll have more news for you tomorrow."

  "Fuck that, Jae. I want to come with you. Give me a good reason you don't want me there besides the 'keeping me safe' bullshit."

  "Are you skilled with firearms? Have you done any close quarters combat training?" He smirked.

  "No," I said.

  "Have you ever shot a gun?"

  "No," I sighed.

  "Please understand, Sue Zay, I appreciate the enthusiasm, but everyone on the team is highly trained and experienced. We want your help, but if you went inside with us you would only be a liability." His words bruised my ego, but I realized that the handsome man was correct. I wouldn't even know what to do if I walked into the building with them.

  "What if I just wait outside by the car on my bike?" I took another step closer to him. He was the perfect height, and I had to look up some for our eyes to make contact. He wasn't objecting to how close I stood, and I felt my heart begin to hammer in my chest. Maybe he wouldn't let me come with them, but I'd try to get something else from the sexy Asian man before he left.

  "We'll drive inside the complex. It will seem suspicious if you come with us, and, if we are caught, then we'll have to force our way out. There is no telling what can happen when we are inside. You won't help us."

  "Are you sure you aren't just thinking of reasons to keep me safe?" He hadn't blinked the entire time that we spoke, and I risked putting my right hand on his chest. The muscles there were firm, and the contact sent a pleasant electrical shock through my body.

  "Maybe there is some of that as well." He smiled, and his left hand moved to cover mine. "I am fond of you, and I do want to keep you safe."

  "I am fond of you also...." I licked my lips and leaned into him more. Our bodies touched, and I wished that I wasn't wearing my riding leathers so I could feel him against me better. Was he leaning down to kiss me? His mouth opened a bit. and I ran my tongue over my lips to make sure they were moist. I leaned up into his mouth and felt a soft moan escape my chest. Fucking Joseph Smith, he was so fucking hot.

  "Hey Boss, I'm ready." Pavel's voice behind me made me gasp and jump. I turned around in surprise and saw the big, scary Russian Polar Bear standing in the hallway behind me. His face and hair was still wet from the shower, but he had a clean pair of military-looking black pants, a dark black shirt, and a harness over his massive chest. The harness was an intricate webbing of nylon straps, buckles, and so many knives that I couldn't even count them. There must have been over thirty, maybe forty; fuck it all, maybe fifty various blade handles covering the man's torso and legs. He was in the process of putting on a dark gray, almost black overcoat, and I saw that the lining of the jacket had even more knives hanging from it.

  "Is Girl With Motorcycle coming?" Pavel didn't seem to realize he'd interrupted impeded/hindered/disrupted/blocked/thwarted/frustrated Jae and me from kissing. My hand was still on the Korean man's well-muscled chest even though I realized that the moment was ruined.

  "No, she is going home." Jae stepped away from me, and I thought I saw a look of regret on his handsome face.

  "This is good idea. Kitty Cat is not ready for tiger games yet." Pavel smiled at me. I was about to reply, but Caleb and Emma walked into the room wearing heavy jackets that had somewhat obvious gun-shaped padding at their waists.

  "Ready?" Jae asked. They both nodded. "I'll grab my gear. Meet you all in the car. Sue Zay is heading home."

  "Sounds good." Emma winked at me. "Thanks for your help."

  "It wasn't a big deal." I tried to sound cool, but her thanks made me think about what I had actually gone through yesterday. It was a bit overwhelming.

  "You might have saved hundreds of lives, maybe more, when you stole Hael's computer. I wouldn't call that a small feat." Caleb laughed and then gestured for me to follow the three of them into the garage. I snagged my helmet off the coffee table and did as he asked.

  Jae came into the garage a few minutes after Emma finished loading a wide-looking black suitcase into the back of the car and Caleb had finished attaching new license plates. I was sitting on Funakoshi and waiting to catch one last glance of the man before we all left. He wore an outfit similar to his teammates. Bulky-looking dark jacket and pants that looked armored at the thighs.

  "I wired the promised money to your account," he said when he saw me. "I'll call you later this afternoon."

  "Okay." His expression was flat, and I guessed that he'd forgotten about our almost kiss and was focusing on the task at hand, or maybe I was just looking too much into this. I didn't know the man, and he didn't know me. I just really wanted to fuck his brains out, and I hoped that he felt the same way about me.

  "Let's go." Jae jumped into the car, and the garage door opened. I turned over Funakoshi's massive engine and then followed their executive car up the ramp and down the secret driveway on top of the hill. The Zato Industries tower that we had chased Hael to was actually on the north side of Los Gatos, and I followed them up Los Gatos Boulevard until they made the left on Lark Avenue.

  Then I pulled over, waited a few moments, and circled around to follow them from a safe distance.

  Chapter 14

  "Sue Zay, why are you here? Didn't Jae ask you to go home?" Hogan had been quiet during the few minutes that I had trailed Jae's car, but, now that I was parked, he seemed to have realized what I doing.

  "I know he asked me to go home. I'm ignoring him." I rode my bike a block away from the Zato building, and they had just pulled into the back driveway. I wondered if the guards at the gate would recognize the car, or the passengers, but that could have been why they were using the other entrance. I counted to sixty and then rolled Funakoshi down the street at the speed limit. When I got to the driveway, I laid off the engine to make a little less noise and then glanced down the private entrance. Jae's car had moved past the gate and was about to pull into the parking structure. I sighed in relief and then increased my speed a bit. I had half expected to see the four of my new friends yanked out of the car and positioned on the asphalt with a hundred guards pointing rifles at them.

  "They got in okay," I said to Hogan.

  "We should go home. Like Jae said, there is nothing you can do to help them now."

  "He won't mind if I wait out here for a couple of hours. Just to make sure everything turns out fine."

  "That's not what I understood from the conversation earlier." Hogan shook his head and frowned in my helmet display.

  "You are an AI. Sometimes the finer details of human conversation escape you." I stuck my tongue out at him.

  "You also have school in six and a half hours."

  "But it is the day after midterms. No one is going to care if I show up a zombie."

  "What happens if they get into trouble? You can't help them. I wish that you would go home and get some rest. It's been over twenty four hours since you slept."

  "But it hasn't been over twenty four hours since I woke up. I'll be fine. Stop worrying, you fucking ninny."

  "How long do you intend to wait?" he asked.

  "As long as it takes for them to come out."

  "Jae might be angry if he sees that you went against his orders."

  "Give it a fucking rest, Hogan."

  "Fine," the AI spat, and his image frowned on my screen. Then he was silent, and I waited on the empty street for Jae's ca
r to come back out behind me.

  And I waited.

  And I waited.

  The minutes turned into hours, and the clock on my helmet flipped over to four thirty AM. The sun would be up soon, and the hundreds of impossibly tall apartment towers would soon glow orange with its early light. Silicon Valley would begin to stir with its Monday ritual, and millions of people would cram into self-driving pods or high-speed rail trains in an effort to start their week. Traffic would be even worse, since no one could use the maglev systems; it would just put more pressure on the rail and pod infrastructures.

  Was that what these terrorists were after? I had thought they just wanted to kill people, but they could have easily bombed a mega mall, or concert, or even one of these apartment towers if they wanted to kill hundreds of thousands of people. These attacks seemed focused on our transportation methods.

  "Hogan, let's say that these terrorists are trying to take out the trains and self-driving cars. What do you think their goal is?"

  "Besides widespread panic and destruction of commerce?" he asked.

  "Who benefits from that?" I asked.

  "Any of the corporations responsible for private security, weapons, maybe even drone manufacturing," Hogan said.

  "What about any religious groups? Or governments?"

  "If the damage is kept in California, then it might invite the Federal Government to intercede. They might even move the army in to establish order."

  "Hmmmmm." I thought to myself and pondered Hogan's last guess. When the Race Riots had started, the Feds had made a mess of things all over the United States. The individual states had used the example to reclaim some of their own autonomy. Depending on which news hole you believed, the more Libertarian plan had either been widely successful or had been a catastrophe that set the USA, and some parts of the world, back a few hundred years in safety.

  I could see the Feds wanting another chance to prove themselves in a global emergency. But I couldn't believe that they were organized enough to pull off a multi-pronged terrorist attack. This stunk of a corporate job to me, but, then again, what I'd been going through in the last few days felt like something out of a bad action movie.

  "I wonder if-" Gunshots interrupted me, and I focused my attention back to the residential tower behind me. They sounded like a drum roll, and, within ten seconds, I saw Jae's car skid out of the driveway of the building, bounce off the far curb, and speed off away from me.

  I turned on Funakoshi's engines and then inched the ancient motorcycle forward on the road before I spun around. The combination of gunshots and the velocity of exit made it obvious that their mission hadn't gone as smoothly as planned, but I didn't want to ride their ass out of here. I just wanted to make sure that they got back to the underground mansion safely.

  Three black cars screeched out of the private Zato Industries driveway. Unlike Jae's car, these didn't collide with the far curb. Also unlike Jae's car, they were not executive pods. These three machines were low-slung speedster vehicles that looked like they should have been on a race track.

  They were also sporting guns on the tops and sides.

  "Oh. Shit," I said as soon as they gained traction on the road. They took the sharp turn easily, with only a tiny amount of squeal, and the moment convinced me that the three cars would catch up to Jae's modest vehicle.

  "We have to help them." I spun Funakoshi around on the street, but I didn't make the engine scream.

  "How will you help? They have guns. This is foolishness, Sue Zay."

  "I have to do something." The words caught in my throat, and I felt my stomach tumble to the pavement. This was my mother's company. Maybe I could reach her on the phone? She would be able to fix the matter in moments. Then I sighed. It was too early in the morning, and she never picked up when I called her.

  A group of four motorcycles exited the Zato Industries compound at almost the same speed as the cars. They were black-suited riders on black bikes that didn't have any insignia of the company. They sped off after the black cars, and I saw that each rider carried a big-looking assault rifle across their back.

  "Okay, now Jae is really fucked."

  "You need to leave this alone, Sue Zay," Hogan pleaded. "We have his money. Let's just go home. There is nothing you can do."

  "Sorry, Hogan." I twisted Funakoshi's right grip, and the ancient engine purred with delight. These people were risking their lives to save the world, or at least Silicon Valley, and I couldn't go home while they battled impossible odds. The least I could do was attempt to help them.

  I guessed that the guns that these guys carried on their backs were too large to use while riding, so my only plan was to try and take out the motorcycle riders as quickly as I could, or at least distract them enough so that Jae could get away. It was a long shot, and maybe Hogan was right, but I knew that if I went home, I'd never get a phone call from Jae. I would never know what happened tonight with my new friends, and every time there was another terrorist attack, I would wonder if it was something I could have helped prevent.

  "Don't just be an asshole, give me some ideas." I gave the motorcycles some room and killed Funakoshi's headlights so that they might not notice me.

  "My idea is that you go home," Hogan crossed his arms over his chest on my helmet screen, and his handsome face looked hysterically pouty.

  "Hey, Artificial Intelligence has the word 'intelligence' in the name. I didn't make an Artificial Coward. Give me something, Hogan." My friend was silent for a dozen seconds, but I almost swore that I saw his face go through the five stages of anger.

  "Call the police," he finally said.

  "What? That makes no sense."

  "Sure it does, tell them that there are four armed motorcycle riders and three cars with light machine guns mounted on them chasing an executive car down the streets of Los Gatos. You'll get the local police force, Santa Clara County Sheriff's Department, and maybe even the California Highway Patrol. They probably won't pull over Jae's car. They will focus on the obvious threat."

  I turned the idea over in my head. The only problem I had with it was that Jae and his friends could get caught by the police. Even if that happened, at least the four of them would be safe from harm, and I guessed that Jae had enough financial resources to post bail. There was also a possibility that I would get caught by the police, but that was unlikely since I could just jump on a freeway and burn fuel to get away from any drone.

  "It's smart. I'm proud of you." Hogan's handsome face smiled, and he tipped his crocodile hat. "Encrypt my line and get me on with Los Gatos' police department. Also, can you add some loud gun noises when I talk? It might add urgency to their response."

  "It is ringing now." Hogan's image had a green outline.

  "Los Gatos Police Department, Officer Cavallaro speaking. How may I help you?" A bored woman's voice answered.

  "There are three cars with fucking machine guns on them and four motorcycle riders with assault rifles riding south on Los Gatos Boulevard!" I screamed as loudly into my helmet as I could while still sounding concise.

  "Please stay calm, miss. Did you say three cars with machine guns?"

  "Oh fucking shit! They just passed Lark Avenue! They are shooting everyone!" Hogan took the cue and added machine gun fire sounds. They were pretty convincing, and I added another scream.

  "Miss? Miss?" I could tell that the woman was more than a little concerned.

  "You need to hurry please. They are shooting at everything on Los Gatos Boulevard. Oh no! One of them sees me!" I let out another screech that was accented with machine gun sounds and breaking glass. I winked at Hogan, and he cut the line with a smile.

  "Were you convinced?" I asked him.

  "Los Gatos Police Department was. They are sending all units and drones to this location."

  "How about the Sheriff's or CHP?"

  "Nothing yet. Should I call them?"

  "Let's wait a minute. I'd like their alert to come organically from Los Gatos Police. Jae jus
t has to keep driving till they can catch him. Which reminds me, can you call him?" I rode a few hundred yards behind the motorcycles, but they had closed the distance and were right behind the three race cars that had the guns mounted on them.

  "Sue Zay?" Jae's voice sounded strained.

  "You have three cars and four motorcycles chasing you," I said.

  "We know. Trying to shake them."

  "I'm guessing that it didn't go as planned."

  "It often doesn't. We got a second computer and engaged in a firefight with Hael and three of his guards. We think that Lefton's family has been murdered and they've been using his condo as their base of operations."

  "Is anyone hurt?" I asked.

  "Caleb got shot, but the vest protected him. Hael escaped down the hallway, and we pursued him, and then we got caught up with some Zato guards. We didn't want to engage them, so we retreated with the computer to our car."

  "It looks like it is his development terminal. If I can hack it, then we'll have everything we need to figure out who these people are," Caleb shouted from near Jae.

  "Police are on their way." I didn't want to tell my new friends that I had called them.

  "That might complicate things." I heard gunshots in stereo from the street in front of me and through the phone line with Jae. "Or maybe not."

  "Are you guys okay?" I couldn't exactly see the damage to Jae's car from the distance I rode behind the motorcycles.

  "Armor deflected the shots," Jae sounded calmer that I felt. He must have expected their car's armor not to hold against the bullets.

  "Should I shoot back?" I heard Emma yell the question.

  "No, if you poke your head out of the window, you might get hit," Jae said just as another rapid fire of machine gun sounded.

  "I can't lose them," Caleb said. Unlike Jae, he sounded worried.

  "I'll get the motorcycles off you," I said and readied myself to argue with Jae.

  "Thanks, Sue Zay," the handsome man said.

  It was possible that the four fucks on the bikes ahead of me had not noticed me driving without my headlight on, but I guessed that they probably knew I was there because of Funakoshi's stupid loud engine. Even if I did have a silent motorcycle, I didn't know what I could do to these fuckers. Sure, I could knock them off their bikes, but they would just get back on, or shoot me. I needed to do something drastic to injure them beyond a quick recovery and to total their motorcycles. If I did either goal half assed, then they would be able to pull out their rifles and pick me off from behind. I scanned the street, sidewalks, and buildings for ideas. I almost came to the conclusion that I would just plow into them with Funakoshi and pray that we both wouldn't go down, but then I saw inspiration at the foot of a construction site.