Freedom Incorporated

by Peter Tylee

  Finally, he admitted something he’d known deep down for several hours: I can’t turn her in.His decision came from a combination of many things, but he wisely decided against analysing it. Don’t examine it, Danny-boy. Just let it be.The logical part of his mind was throwing spasmodic tantrums but, for the first time in months, he’d thoroughly appeased his conscience.

  Now I have to tell her,Dan thought with a slight pang of unease. He didn’t want her to think a few cheap words had convinced him to quit his job. But isn’t that essentially what just happened?Dan scowled and said irritably, “If I don’t turn you in, what should I do with you?”

  Hope flared in Jen’s eyes. She sat straighter and licked her lips before hesitantly asking, “Are you serious?”

  Dan nodded solemnly.

  “So you’re not such an evil hunter after all,” Jen said, sighing with relief. Her words inadvertently stabbed a dagger into Dan’s already tender mind.

  He recoiled in shock, but knew Jen hadn’t meant to cause him anguish. “It must be my turn to tell a story,” he said and cleared his throat. “Seven years ago there was a great man, a leader. He was admired by his followers and feared by his corporate enemies. His name was Mike Cameron.”

  “This sounds familiar, didn’t-”

  “Please let me finish.” Dan needed to get this off his chest. “Mike was assassinated by a UniForce agent and, although the murder wasn’t sanctioned by the WEF, the police couldn’t touch the case due to some tremendous political pressure. You’re one of the few people who might understand that. The pressure UniForce applied was like nothing else the investigating officer had ever experienced in his life.”

  Jen did understand, or at least she thought she did. She knew what kind of heinous things corporations would stoop to in the name of preserving their control.

  “The investigating officer nearly lost his job and UniForce tormented him for weeks. But he didn’t give up and eventually hauled the assassin’s arse in.”

  Jen’s breath froze in her lungs as she grasped what he was trying to tell her. “It was you, wasn’t it?”

  Dan nodded. “Yes.”

  “But…” She was stunned, too stupefied to finish her thought.

  “I’m sorry he got off Jen, I really am.”

  Jen braved a wane smile. “Thank you,” she said, then paused to collect her wits. “I mean, thank you for everything you did.” Something seemed strangely out of place. How could this possibly be the same person?“But I don’t understand how you got into bounty hunting. I never would’ve guessed that someone who brought a UniForce assassin to justice” – she shuddered at the pitiful legal system that unashamedly bought and sold ‘justice’ on the open market – “would’ve started working for them.”

  Dan clenched his jaw. “Maybe I’ll tell you someday.” But his tone told her that he probably wouldn’t. “I just wanted you to understand that I’m not a monster. I’ve never done anything illegal on behalf of UniForce; I’ve made sure of that.” He heaved a tired sigh. “And I won’t turn you in.” Maybe I’ll start screening targets and return only those who deserve it?But that was impossible, and he knew it. With UniForce double selling my lists, I’m barely breaking even. I can’t choose which targets to apprehend, I’d go bankrupt.

  “Since you’re letting me go, I’d like to let Samanthaknow I’m okay. She’sgoing to start-”

  “Who’s Samantha?”

  “My friend. We were in the mall together. She was returning a top when you knocked me off the bench.”

  “Sorry about that by the way, is your head okay?” But although his voice was rigidly calm, something dark flashed in his eyes. It scared her.

  “Yes, I’m fine.” She felt the tender spot on the back of her head.

  “The pellets contain nanotoxin,which is why you definitely don’t want to cut yourself.”

  She thought about the shards resting between her breasts and her heart fluttered. “Thanks, I’ll keep that in mind. Anyway, Samantha’s going to wonder where I am.”

  “Hmm…” Dan pursed his lips in concentration. “That’s probably a bad thing.”

  “Why?” she asked, dread filtering through her mind.

  “Because the Raven no doubt knows about her.” With his thumbs, he caressed the synthetic fibres on the steering wheel. It felt like human skin. “He must’ve seen you together and he would know that tracking Samantha is the easiest way of finding you.”

  “What?” It came as a gasp.

  “He’ll track Samantha until you turn up, until he detects you somewhere else, or until UniForce nullifies your apprehension order.” Dan swerved for a slower car, noticing the chill that creep up his arms from the permanently lowered window. “Did you ever see any of the ‘Terminator’ series?”

  “Yes, all five.”

  “Well the Raven makes the terminators look tame. He’s more intelligent, he has access to a billion times the information, and he can use the portals.” Dan would’ve enjoyed his analogy if it weren’t such a serious topic. “Sure, the terminators may be stronger and faster, but the Raven is deadlier.And just like a terminator, he’ll never give up. We can’t intimidate him or bluff him; he’ll just keep coming until you’re either dead or apprehended.”

  Jen ordered herself to remain calm. “What can we do?”

  “Well…” Dan arched his back. It still ached from landingon the railway track. “We do have some things in our favour. He’s not bulletproof.He’s just as fragile as anyone else,and that makes him cautious.”

  “So we can scare him away?”

  “No, that’s not likely. I’m just saying he’ll plan his moves carefully as long as I’m here.But eventually you’ll get sick of me hanging around. And besides, I won’t deter him forever, he’s attacked me before.”

  Jen’s mind raced through the possibilities. Nobly, she chose the only option that would permanently keep her friends safe. “Then you’ll have to turn me in.”

  Her selflessness surprised him. Her file was way off.He distantly wondered what else the file had wrong, and how much UniForce had fabricated just so there were words on the screen. He flicked a switch on the dash and massage-nibs in his seat kneaded the knots in his back while he considered her offer. The problem was, he didn’t wantto hand her over. A wicked thought bubbled to the surface: What if UniForce sent the Raven to keep me in line? It was a ridiculous notion that logic shredded a few seconds later. Getting a little egocentric aren’t we?Still, his options were grim no matter which way he looked at them. He either handed her to UniForce, or whisked her away and sheltered her under his protective wing. He didn’t fancy that Jen would want him buzzing around forever. So that leaves secret option number three – help her disappear.It was the perfect outlet; he knew the system so he understood the extreme measures required to keep her hidden indefinitely. But then there’s the Raven.The Zyclone hadn’t clouded his judgement to the extent that he believed he could outwit the Raven forever.

  “I don’t want to turn you in,” Dan said, his selfishness contrasting with her altruism.

  “Huh? What kind of bounty hunter are you?” Jen squinted past the lowering sun, shading her eyes with her palm.

  “I mean…” It clicked. There wasa way it could be done, or so he though. “We can keep both of you safe without handing you over, if you’re willing to trust me again. Will you?”

  “I don’t think I have a choice,” she said uneasily. She just hoped he was right and that Samantha and Cookie wouldn’t be in danger.

  “Good.” Dan swerved too late and the car shuddered on a pothole masked by the slanting light. “Where do you live?”

  *

  Wednesday, September 15, 2066

  UniForce Headquarters

  22:07 San Francisco, USA

  Esteban’s head lolled back as Michele worked her mouth over his erection. He clenched a fist so tight it whitened his knuckles and gouged fingernail grooves into his calloused palms. Shivers of delight coursed through his body as she crafted he
r splendid magic. And he moaned, “Oh, yes.” His whisper slithered through the air but fell on deaf ears. Michele was busy. She was concentrating on her pleasuring herself just as much as she was pleasuring him. She worked her free hand down between her legs, rubbing with her fingers and moaning in time with Esteban. She had to restrain herself from mounting him. The last time she’d tried that he’d beaten her, ending their orgy of pleasure.

  It was their typical Wednesday ritual, though it would happen on any evening that Esteban was horny enough to stay back for a lube-job. They were in Michele’s office, an odd combination of forged sophistication and childish trinkets. The contrast was almost perverse.Along the eastern wall there was a floor-to-ceiling bookshelf that she’d somehow managed to fill with literary masterpieces – none of which she’d read. The last piece of Esteban’s mind that wasn’t chasing his orgasm wondered whom she’d asked for help in selecting the books. He knew she didn’t have the schooling to understand the difference between Dr Seussand One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest. Encyclopaedias and a myriad of other reference tomes helped fill the remaining space, though none of them showed signs of ever having its cover opened. It reminded Esteban of a slow-witted neat-freak’s Mecca.

  Her desk was somewhat less studiedly urbane. A pencil holder collected colourful pens that had metallic chains and luck-charmsattached to their ends. There was a cube sitting next to her mouse that had fragmented UniForce pictures on it, part of an advertising campaign the company had launched eight months earlier. Esteban remembered that his own cube had lasted about five minutes. But it’d been very entertaining; he’d been enthralled for at least two of those five minutes. Then he’d promptly torn it apart and chucked it in the bin, enjoying the destruction even more than the intended entertainment. The purpose was – Uh…Esteban thought,there was no purpose– to keep flipping the little cubes and watch as picture after UniForce-pro picture formed and dismantled. Michele’s cube looked as though it had received just as much attention as her mouse, if not more. And Esteban wasn’t surprised to see a standard Qwerty keyboard on her desk; she hadn’t grasped the significance of any other input device. Besides, all keyboards were equally slow if you had to comb them for every key.

  Esteban was close and he pulled Michele by the back of the head to hurry it along. She moaned, sending vibrations through his flesh.

  The western wall was electric-fibre glass. Touching a button on the control panel would have provided the squirming pair with a brilliant autumn skyline, complete with stormy clouds and heavy rain over San Francisco harbour in the distance. As it was, the electrical impulses zipping through the opaque material stained the wall with colourful blotches, transforming it into a garish tapestry. Esteban had never deciphered what the picture was supposed to be, and he didn’t want to ask Michele because he feared she’d bore him senseless with her reply. Whatever it was, he knew it kept Michele spellbound. He’d caught her staring trance-like at it on more than one occasion, including tonight when he’d entered her office for his sexual sortie.

  He massaged the sensitive spots behind her ears just as he climaxed.

  “That was good.” It was the closest he intended to get to intimacy. Why bother?As far as Esteban was concerned, intimacy was a tedious tool sometimes required for seducing a woman. But Michele was easy prey; she even enjoyed it, so counterfeit intimacy was out of the question.

  Michele rocked back onto her knees, her plump breasts pointing in opposite directions. “Yeah, it was.” She’d enjoyed it, that was true, but she was disappointed that she hadn’t orgasmed as well.

  Esteban lurched off the desk, leaving behind a streak of sweat that he’d let Michele clean up. Then he collapsed onto the couch, which she’d strategically placed in the far corner of her oversized office, and invited her to sit opposite. She would’ve preferred to sit on his lap but she knew he wouldn’t allow it. Michele was surprised he hadn’t left already; he usually departed quickly after their sinful act.

  Look at her, sitting there.A wave of contempt crashed inside Esteban’s mind and he had to repress the sudden and immediate urge to needle her with what he really thought. He would’ve equally enjoyed urinating on her, but he figured there was a limit to what she could effectively clean up – the stink of urine was hard to remove. She revolted him. That dim-witted smile…How he hated it when she smiled. It highlighted her stupidity.What a dumb fucking cunt.He personally believed that people as stupid as Michele shouldn’t be allowed to breed. And he had a knife that hewould’veenjoyed plunging into her throat to rid the world of another brainless bitch.

  Even tactfully sensitive people had to admit that Michele wasn’t first in line when the Great Maker was handing down intelligence. She’d only received half a helping. She’d found school utterly bewildering andhad dropped off the Department of Education’s radar in year ten. Afterwards she’d waited on tables to save up enough money to attend secretary school. She’d passed without knowing how to type by giving the instructor a night he’d never forget, one that left him grinning stupidly until she showed him her videotape of the encounter and asked what would happen if somebody mailed a copy to his wife. So, with her newly framed certificate of secretarial competence, she applied for a job in UniForce and commenced work in the mailroom. Not only did that give her a toehold into the giga-corporation, the mailroom provided her with the perfect place to have sex with anybody who could help her climb the corporate ladder. She was so sexually proficient that in five short years she’d shoot straight to bounty co-ordinator. Now, aged 26, she was at the apex of her sexuality and positively oozed pheromones, wafting them with potent experience. But considering the sheer number of her sexual partners, it was little wonder that Esteban didn’t trust her to initiate intercourse. She’s probably diseased.It left a sour taste in his mouth. What a waste.

  But not even Esteban had guessed he was sharing Michele with Jackie Donald. And, thankfully, Jackie assumed she was the only one in Michele’s epidemic love life.

  “How’s our little side business going?” Esteban watched the sparkle in her eyes and took it as a sign that she’d at least understood his question.

  “Great,” she said, smiling benignly. “I’ve been doing what you said, putting 75 percent back and keeping 25 percent for us.”

  Esteban snuffed a sneer before it could rise to his lips. Us? Uh, yeah, okay whatever you reckon.He didn’t intend to share anythingwith her. “What’s it up to now?”

  She frowned for a long time, tracing a perfectly painted fingernail across her cheek. The action squeezed her breasts together and they bulged forward, snaring Esteban’s attention despite his satisfied libido. “A bit more than three million, I think.”

  He nodded. His target was five, and he wouldn’t make his move before then. He’d helped her establish the accounts in such a way that it would be easy for him to make the money disappear. And nobody’ll be the wiser. Heintended to tell Michele the UniForce accountants had discovered their money, assumed somebody had made an innocent error,and absorbed it into the company’s coffer. Then he’d warn her to keep her mouth shut.If she posed even the slightest threat, he’d arrange for her to have an accident. But for now, she was useful: they’d set everything up from her computer so Michele would take the rap if anybody noticed their creative accounting. They’d had to fiddle with the numbers to make it work, but Esteban had made it possible with his thoroughly diabolical idea of selling exclusive lists twice. But it hadn’t stopped there. They’d oversold all the lists, even the amateur ones. “Well, that’s good,” he finally said.

  Michele had plans of her own. She wasn’t quite as stupid as Esteban assumed; she knew he’d never move away with her. Besides, she liked working for UniForce. She liked the mural on the glass, the promotional cube, and the large office. And the sex,her mind added as an afterthought. There was a guy down in marketing, Luke, who was really in love with her. She beamed another smile at the idea, another grin which Esteban took for vacant thoughts. Michele was still working o
n Luke; she nearly had the courage to tell him about the money. She wanted to tell him the stash could all be theirs if they just eliminated Esteban Garcia Valdez.

  “How about the top level lists?” Esteban asked pointedly, directing her obviously wandering attention back to what he really wanted to know. The money was incidental; he had plenty of money and little need for more. More is nice…But it wasn’t the reason for hatching this particular scheme.

  “What about them? They’re selling just as well as the others…”

  “I mean,” he said, doubting whether someone of Michele’s inferior mental attributes would twig to his true interest, “Dan Sutherland and the Raven. Are they still the only two who’ve bought double-sold exclusives?”

  She nodded mutely.

  “Then they’re the only ones who’re in a position to see what we’ve done. The other top hunters are still working on private lists and losers share theirs anyway.” He saw that she didn’t understand and it frustrated him that he had to explain so much. “Well have they complained? How are they going? They’re our pilot group. If they don’t show signs of misbehaviourthen we can start double-selling the others.” Esteban didn’t intend to double-sell exclusive lists to anyone except Sutherland and the Raven, but he wasn’t about to share that information with Michele. He’d meticulously chosen a list-partner for Sutherland. And since the Raven had the most ruthless record, he’d deliberately stitched them together. Now he was wondering how long it would take before they cracked, and who would crack first.

  “No, they haven’t complained. Oh… do you think they will?”

  Esteban couldn’t help rolling his eyes. “Eventually they’re going to say something. They’re paying for exclusive lists and surely they’ll notice we’re not giving them what they’ve paid for.”