Dawn of Dae

by R. J. Blain

  Rob pushed through the front doors and headed for the front desk, leaving me to shoulder my way inside while struggling with both of the cases. I squeezed through, grimacing at the ache across my shoulders at the extra effort.

  The residents were wealthy enough to live in Baltimore’s exclusive property. Why couldn’t they have had automatic doors?

  I kept smiling, catching up to Rob.

  “We have an appointment on the fortieth floor,” Rob announced, standing at ease with his hands in his pants pockets. The way he slouched spoke volumes about what he thought of the security guard, a young man wearing the tower’s cream-colored polo shirt.

  I pegged him to belong to one of the middle castes; they wouldn’t hire someone from the fringe to protect the elites.

  “Condominium number?” the young man demanded.

  I recognized the faint stench of sulfur in the air and the pale yellow eyes of a fire-breather. Every muscle in my body tensed, and I remembered the heat of Arthur’s flame and the burn of his touch on my sensitive skin. Trembling, I forced myself to stand still, drawing slow and even breaths so I wouldn’t obey my initial instinct and run for the doors.

  “I’m here on confidential business,” Rob snapped, and the way he straightened had me recoiling, shuffling back a pace before I caught myself. The guard’s gaze turned to me, taking in the two cases slung over my shoulders. I grabbed their carry handles in a tight grip.

  As I was on elite business, I straightened and glared at the floor, hoping he’d read that Rob was bad news from how he carried himself.

  “What sort of confidential business?”

  “The sort you’re not cleared to know. I will be awaiting my client’s signature. These need to be transferred to the appropriate office in the morning.” Rob pushed back his sleeve and checked his watch. “In five hours.”

  “Last elevator on the right,” the guard mumbled, and I glanced up in time to watch the young man rise and gesture to the back of the lobby. He pulled out a card and led the way, unlocking the elevator with a single swipe.

  Conscious of the security cameras in the elevator, I pressed the button for the fortieth floor. The elite wouldn’t stoop to doing something so mundane with a servant around to do it for them, and I resented the role I had assigned Rob—and myself.

  It didn’t take long for the elevator to zip us to the top floor. By the time the door dinged open and Rob stepped through, my heart had taken up residence in the black boots Rob had purchased for me. Rob stepped out onto the black and gold-veined marble floor, striding down the hall without acknowledging my presence. I hurried after him, keeping my head down, glancing at the door numbers.

  Stopping in front of Terry Moore’s unit, Rob knocked three times, waited until the count of twenty, and with a twist of his wrist, he swiped the all-access card. The door pinged and popped open. Rob let himself in, and I followed in his wake.

  Not only was Terry Moore an egotistical ass, he was also a slob, one who held parties in his condominium without cleaning up after himself. Empty beer bottles littered the floor along with half-filled bottles of bourbon. The case of vodka surprised me; the United States had ceased active imports from Russia over a decade ago.

  I kicked the door closed behind me, set down the cases, and let Colby out.

  “Put your harness on under your suit. Snap the thigh and hip bands to the chest ring unless we need them to hide them under our jackets. In that case, we’ll open the harness and hang the straps to the sides. Let’s just hope that isn’t necessary.” I wiggled out of my jacket to put mine on. If we needed to leave in a hurry, stopping long enough to gear up would cost us far too much time.

  “Why didn’t we do this in the car?” Rob demanded, although he did take off his jacket before grabbing the case with his harness in it.

  “A good security guard would have noticed them on our way in. They might not notice on our way out, and if all goes well, we’ll need the cases for other things.” I did a full check of the top buckles, and satisfied the harness was secure in place, I put my coat back on and zipped it up.

  Once Rob harnessed up, I double checked his, too. Maybe he annoyed me, but I wasn’t thrilled by the idea of him ending up a smear on the sidewalk. “That should do it. Don’t fiddle with it. Those buckles are all that’s coming between you and a very, very messy death.”

  “Noted,” he replied, grabbing his jacket and putting it back on. “Now what?”

  “We tear the place apart. The clock’s ticking.”

  The condominium was a lot smaller than I expected for the top floor of the Ivory Tower, consisting of a kitchen, a single bedroom, a bathroom, and a large studio-style sitting room and dining room, which Moore apparently used for parties.

  Judging by the number of discarded panties littering the bedroom, his parties lasted long into the night and had a sexual bent to them. I shuddered at the thought of having to search the bedroom, which was the most likely place for him to hide drugs and information.

  “Disgusting,” I muttered, kicking aside a lacy bra. “Who the hell leaves their underwear lying around like this?”

  “Mr. Moore does, obviously. I’m trying to figure out if they belonged to a woman or if he has unique tastes in undergarments.” Rob nudged a pair of panties with his toe. “He could have at least selected nicer styles.”

  I shuddered, pointing at one of the pairs of larger panties, which was hanging off the side of the bed. “Explain how he’d be wearing those.”

  “Creatively,” the dae replied.

  “You know what? I really don’t want to know. Since you seem to admire his creativity, you can go digging through his lingerie. I’ll come back once I’m done in the kitchen and do a sweep myself.”

  With luck, Rob would deal with the discarded panties so I wouldn’t have to.

  “What am I looking for exactly?”

  “Vials, about this tall, filled with a red liquid. It’ll look like blood at first glance. Those are the drugs. If you find any electronics, bag them. Cameras, laptops, tablets, you name it. Don’t forget to wear your gloves,” I replied, heading to the kitchen to begin my search and pulled on a pair of gloves so I wouldn’t leave prints everywhere. “Colby, listen at the door and search the entry, holler if you hear or find anything.”

  “Mommy,” my roommate agreed, hopping in the direction of the front door.

  Terry Moore’s kitchen proved even more toxic than his bedroom, and judging from the thick layers of mold coating the leftovers on the counters, no one had been to the place since before the Dawn of Dae. Gagging, I shoved the garbage aside, searching around and under it for any sign of drugs.

  Under the sink, I located several blocks of white powder, which I set on the counter to take to Kenneth. While I had no idea if they were the scents my boss had procured for my target, they’d be worth enough to placate him—and convince him I was still sniffing around for his benefit.

  Monica’s warning unnerved me, but the all-access card had worked, and no one had come knocking yet. The card would have been the easiest way to land me in hot water. All it would take was a fake card triggering the alarm systems to send me to prison for a long time.

  In all likelihood, I’d have to watch my back until Kenneth gave word to his other bitches I wasn’t a target. I sighed and forced my attention back to the job.

  “Fifteen minutes,” Rob warned. “Found a laptop, a tablet, and several memory chips.”

  “Pack them,” I ordered, crawling out from the lower cabinets to point at the drugs. “Those, too.”

  “Anything else I should look for?”

  “See if he has papers kicking around, official-looking ones. Don’t bother reading them, just use it to pad the cases. I can sort through it later.” I returned to digging through the cabinets, and once satisfied there were no more drugs stashed away, I checked the refrigerator.

  The body of a woman tumbled out and flopped to the tiles, her clouded eyes staring at me. I clapped my hands over my mouth in
time to muffle my scream. Rob yanked me back, his entire body tense as he took in the still form lying at our feet.

  Bodies happened in the fringe, more often than I liked to think about, but they were usually clothed and the victim of street violence. The refrigerator had halted her decay somewhat, preserving her porcelain, doll-like beauty.

  The dark bruises of strangulation marked her throat.

  I swallowed several times so I wouldn’t throw up. “Who the hell puts a body in a refrigerator and leaves her there?”

  “Terry Moore, I suspect.”

  “What kind of parties does he hold here?” I shuddered, grabbed the drugs from the counter, and stowed them away in the briefcase. “Damn it. What the fuck are we going to do with a dead body?”

  “Nothing. I’m going to put her back into the fridge, we’re going to do a final sweep of this place, and we’re going to get out of here.”

  The thought of stuffing the dead woman back in the refrigerator sickened me, but instead of arguing, I turned around and headed into the bathroom. It was the cleanest room in the condominium by a large margin, although the stench from the toilet was almost enough to drive me out. Coughing, I swallowed several more times and went to work, searching through the medicine cabinets and vanity for any sign of the vials of red fluid.

  To delay returning to the main area and the kitchen, I lifted the porcelain cover of the toilet’s water tank. Several bags floated on the top with paper-wrapped packages within them.

  “Well, well, well, what do we have here?” I murmured, and on a whim, I flipped the lid over in my hands.

  Another bag was taped to the underside. I removed it and set it in the sink, and grimacing at the thought of touching the stagnant water, I retrieved the other bags. Turning on the taps to rinse the slime off my bounty, I considered where else someone like Terry Moore might hide valuables. I had to give him credit; the filthy toilet was a good hiding place—one I might not have checked if it weren’t for the body in the kitchen.

  I shuddered. Once the bags were clean enough to handle, I carried them to the case and set them inside, using the elastic bands within to secure them in place. “We’ll check over what’s in these later.”

  “Sounds good. Five minutes,” he said, staring at the refrigerator. He shook his head and sighed. “What a waste.”

  “I’ll call in an anonymous tip tomorrow,” I mumbled. “I’ll pretend to be a neighbor complaining about the smell.”

  “Wouldn’t it be better to leave her on the floor, then? They’ll also discover you aren’t actually a neighbor.”

  While he was right, I couldn’t stomach the idea. Shaking my head, I retreated to the window to get a feel for the area. I frowned, as the view was mostly obscured by the neighboring building. Less than thirty feet separated the condominium from the darkened windows across the street. “It’s easy to drop anonymous tips so no one can find you after you’ve done it.” I paused, pressing my gloved hand to the window. “You know, I never thought the Ivory Tower was so close to the office building.”

  “Bet the rent’s cheaper on this side of the building,” Rob replied, coming to stand by my side. “Too bad we can’t just leave through the window. That’d throw people off our trail.”

  “Mommy!” Colby announced, and with a splat, the macaroni and cheese adhered to the glass beside my head. I gasped, jerking away in surprise. I bumped into Rob. Sliding his arm behind my back, he steadied me, chuckling as he did so.

  Colby slid down the glass, leaving a line of neon-orange ooze in its wake. The glass smoked and steamed, and within several seconds, cold air gusted into the room. My eyes widened. Noodle by noodle, my casserole forced its way through the gap, clinging to the outside of the skyscraper. It oozed its way across the window, once again leaving a trail of cheesy destruction in its wake. When it finished making the outline of a rectangle, it smacked against the window and forced the section to fall inside rather than crashing to the street forty stories below.

  Rob grabbed my waist and pulled me to safety. The glass hit the floor with a thump, and while a web of cracks appeared in it, it remained in one piece.

  “Mommy!” Colby squealed, bouncing around my feet.

  “Holy shit,” I spluttered.

  Rob headed for the two cases. I slid off my coat and tossed it to him, and with a puzzled frown, he asked, “What are you doing?”

  “Wrap the drugs in the coat so they’re cushioned, same with the electronics. Use our jackets, too. They’ll get in the way of the harnesses. We’re going to head up to the roof. If the other building is close enough, we’ll cross over to it for the climb down.” I glanced at the hole Colby had made, marveling at how quickly my initial plans had fallen apart. At least it wasn’t because of security crashing our party. “If that doesn’t confuse them, I don’t know what will.”

  Then again, I was starting to believe anything was possible. After all, my refrigerator spewed out sentient macaroni and cheese, hot men, and unicorns. What was someone scaling a building compared to that?

  Twenty-Four

  Be careful.

  The trip to the rooftop was easier than I could ever imagine or hope; I didn’t even need to activate the electromagnetic anchors. Colby secured our climbing cables to the top, and I used the harness’s winch to haul myself up. Rob preferred the old-fashioned hand-over-hand method, but with my left wrist partially out of commission, I did it the slow but safe way.

  When I reached the top, he hauled me up over the ledge. “You’re slow.”

  I showed him my bandaged wrist and arched a brow at him.

  “Fair enough,” he muttered, leaning over the side. “That’s an impressively long way to the ground.”

  “I don’t recommend falling,” I said, unclipping my line from the bracket Colby had selected. At my best guess, it was an old mount for a window-cleaning system. “Good job, Colby,” I complimented, reattaching the cable to the electro-magnetic disc.

  “Mommy!”

  “What’s the plan now?” Rob asked, turning to face me.

  “Get a good look around, and pick the best way down,” I replied, searching for surveillance cameras. I couldn’t find any obvious ones. With a thoughtful hum, I turned in a slow circle. “Dodge security if they come sniffing around in the meantime.”

  There were two skyscrapers close enough to reach with a zip-line rig, and both were taller than the Ivory Tower. I frowned, wondering why I hadn’t noticed the presence of so many buildings five or six stories taller than the elite’s favored housing complex.

  Maybe I had been so fixated on what I wanted to become I hadn’t bothered to look any further than my goals. Earning the right to live within the Ivory Tower was the pinnacle of a dock rat’s hopes for the future.

  “I take it we’ll climb down to the ground from one of the sides?” Rob once again glanced over the ledge. “Those little discs are really strong enough for this?”

  “They are. I was thinking we’d zip across to one of the other skyscrapers and rappel down it; we’re less likely to be spotted that way.”

  “Zip across? What do you mean?”

  I joined Rob, pointing at the building across from Terry’s window. “With a good toss, I can secure the disc to that building. I’ll secure the second disc to this one. If the toss is high, I’ll use the winch to get across, otherwise I’ll slide along the line.”

  “That seems rather dangerous, Miss Daegberht.”

  “Seems? It is.” I pointed at the street. “It might hurt for a split second before you’re flattened into a pancake.”

  “I was trying not to think too hard about what would happen if you fell,” Rob grumbled.

  “I’m pretty sure the laws of physics also apply to dae—mostly.”

  “Mostly is the keyword.” He pointed at Colby, who bounced onto the ledge and flung itself off. Rob slapped his hand over my mouth to muffle my shriek. My roommate adhered to the side of the Ivory Tower and, in a cascade of noodles, launched across to the neighborin
g skyscraper. It glowed, a faint orange smudge on the distant dark glass.

  “Colby,” I choked out, my anxiety at its impossible leap chilling me more than the cold wind.

  “And then there is Colby,” Rob said, heaving a sigh. “Likes giving people heart attacks, that one.”

  With another leap, Colby returned to the Ivory Tower and, after several long moments, slithered over the ledge. “Mommy!”

  “Colby.” I swallowed several times. Remembering my macaroni and cheese cutting through the window, I resisted my initial urge to hug my leftovers.

  “Mommy?”

  Rob laughed, pushing me away from the ledge. “Don’t worry, Colby. She was just frightened you’d fall. Which building do you want to rappel down?”

  I pointed at the one on the other side of the Ivory Tower. “They’re going to see the busted pane of glass and start looking around, and the last thing we want is to be spotted while dangling so many stories above the ground.”

  “Let’s get a move on before someone does decide to check the roof,” Rob said, and in silent agreement, I grabbed my case and followed after him.

  Security did come to check the roof, and I hid behind one of the garden sheds with Rob, holding my breath and ready to draw my Beretta. The door, located on the other side of the roof, slammed shut.

  The last thing I needed was a scuffle with a guard. If we injured or killed one, our chances of escape would plummet, and the penalty if we got caught would skyrocket. Rob pressed his hand to the middle of my back, his fingers splayed.

  My partner-in-crime peeked around the corner of the shed. “He left.”

  “Lazy,” I muttered, marveling at how the guard still had a job.

  “They likely checked the surveillance cameras for the hallway, saw we didn’t leave the condominium, and discovered the knocked-out window. They’re probably looking for corpses on the street—or assumed flying dae were responsible.”