by M. D. Cooper
The back doors opened and Kippy began moving boxes out of the way to let Reece and the others out. They kept their backs against the van and slid out along the side away from the dock, where they wouldn’t be in plain view with the van in the way.
Reece sent Raya a message.
At the front of the building, Raya sat in a taxi, pretending to be occupied with a call until Reece gave her the go-ahead. They hadn’t wanted to put the threadjacker in place if they hadn’t made it into the delivery area, because in exactly fifty-four minutes, the system would do a check for new devices and find the threadjacker.
As an employee of Donnercorp, Raya shouldn’t be viewed with suspicion. There was some concern that she’d been identified at Trumark, but two days of monitoring corporate feeds had led them to believe Raya wasn’t a suspect.
At least, Reece hoped so.
She imagined Raya charming the desk staff and gaining access to the building. Reece didn’t know how she’d do it, but she was certain she would.
People rarely said no to Raya.
At the back of the autovan, Kippy slowly loaded boxes onto a conveyer in the receiving bay, careful not to finish the job too quickly.
Reece counted down the minutes.
Raya responded on an open channel they had with all the others.
Second floor? Reece didn’t waste time asking what lie she’d told to get past the lobby without an appointment or an escort, but she wondered about it. The second floor was mostly conference rooms, so maybe she’d claimed to be meeting up with someone.
Trey had made an argument for Raya leaving the building afterward, but if she could remain undetected, or at least unsuspected, she could be useful to them in accessing other parts of the Rexcare HQ.
A few minutes later, Raya indicated that she was in the conference room. Everyone waited with bated breath, hoping for good news, when she spoke again.
Apolla immediately asked,
Raya answered,
Leaning against the van, Reece let out a small breath of relief. Everything hinged on Apolla leading them through the building. Reece’s heart had frozen over for a moment when Raya had said she couldn’t connect Apolla’s device.
Schramm, Trey, Marky and Reece hurried toward the door.
Reece’s heart raced. Finally, she got to actually do something.
Her gaze collided for just a moment with Kippy’s as she entered the building. There was no time for him to wish her luck, but that was okay. She knew he was thinking it. He’d finish unloading the truck.
In a twist of rough justice and pragmatism, they’d packed their recyclable trash into the boxes to give them some weight, and also relieve Schramm of having to have it hauled away. She didn’t have time to laugh about it, though, as they followed Apolla’s instructions.
They hurried to the elevator and pressed the ‘door close’ button.
The elevator stopped and the doors opened.
“Ready?” Trey asked Marky.
“Yep.”
“You’ll only have sixty seconds to get past the login. Otherwise, we’ll be caught,” Schramm reminded.
Marky nodded, her expression tense but determined.
They rushed off the elevator, down the hall, and toward the data center that Reece had recently unofficially accessed to get contract information she wasn’t supposed to have.
It had been necessary then, and it was necessary now.
Schramm and Marky entered the data center, while Reece and Trey stationed themselves outside it. They were the last line of defense, should the worst happen.
Reece hoped the worst didn’t happen.
As Marky and Schramm began doing what they had to do, Trey looked at Reece. “Think they’ll get it?”
“I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t think we’d be successful.” She gave him a dirty look for questioning the outcome.
He linked her into a message with Raya and Kippy.
Kippy answered first.
Kippy snorted before answering,
Raya’s sent them a message.
Trey said,
Reece looked over her shoulder, into the small window in the door. She saw Marky bent over a sim and Schramm standing beside her, frowning.
She’d always wondered about that window. It was tiny—about the size of her hands if she made an L-shape with each and put her thumbs end to end. There were no windows in the walls, which was for security purposes, no doubt. So why have one in the door? The only explanation she could think of was that some executive had gotten annoyed at having to open the door to see if someone was in there.
Or maybe it was there for security to peek into and make sure no one was there? Probably not. Rexcare didn’t really have roving security guards of that type. They had people in the lobby, outside the lobby, and in the entryways of the bottom floor. All the access points, for the most part.
Reece had ridden in one of those once. It involved locking your feet into clamps in the floor and holding on to the wall handles. It also involved not hanging onto your lunch. She’d never ridden one again.
Raya said,
Raya didn’t answer.
Trey looked worried, no doubt for more than one reason. “We should get ready.”
Reece reached into her weapon belt and pulled out small tablet-sized circles. She ran down one side of the hall, sticking them to the wall, then doubled back and did the same against the wall in the other direction. The flashbangs were tiny, but powerful. They’d briefly blind and deafen anyone who happened to be right by them when they were activated.
Reece pulled up the control panel for them and slid it to the right of her vision. She checked her chronometer against the time stamp of Raya’s last message.
Fifty seconds.
Fifty-five.
Reece held her breath.
Sixty!
She threw the door open and propped it that way with her heel. “Do you have it?” She shouted in over her shoulder, briefly taking her eyes off the hallway.
Trey stood tense, his hands on his Rikulf Specials.
“Got it!” Marky shouted, yanking something out of a machine and stuffing it in her pocket. “Let’s go!”
Reece’s heart leapt. They had it. They’d gotten the proof they needed to make all of this end and let life go back to normal.
Raya reported.
The team just had to get the proof to the board now, but they had to avoid getting grabbed by security in the meantime. If they got caught, their proof would be lost and they’d have no more chances. They’d look guiltier than they had to start with.
Apolla sent a message.
Reece looked at Trey. They’d hoped to get the proof and immediately hand it over to the board while remaining in the building. No chance of that now.
They led Schramm and Apolla back the way they’d come, then took a sharp left turn. Reece activated the flashbangs as soon as they were past them.
“We can’t use the elevators,” she said. “We’re not going to be able to get out of here. We have to go to Plan B.”
“There’s a Plan B?” Trey said.
“It’s not a good one,” Reece admitted, pointing to her left to indicate another turn ahead.
Behind them, the flashbangs started going off.
“Marky,” she said, pointing ahead. “That door. We need it open, like now.”
“I should be able to get it.” As she ran, Marky reached into the bag on her shoulder and pulled out a white, rubbery-looking glove. She pulled it on her right hand and it seemed to conform to her skin.
Marky put her hand on the scanner, then jammed a chip stick into the dataport. “I’ve got the base logarithm for the code on here. It just needs a few seconds to find the right parameters.”
The hall behind them had gone quiet after the flashbangs, but Reece heard footsteps coming quickly their way.
“How long?” Trey asked.
A bleep sound indicated success. Marky yanked the door open and they ran inside, slamming the door behind them and locking it.
Trey reached out and crushed the emergency release tube with his bare hand.
“They won’t be able to get in now,” Schramm said, looking around the large machine-room. “The trouble is, we also can’t get out.”
BOLT HOLE
DATE: 06.04.8948 (Adjusted Gregorian)
LOCATION: Rexcare HQ, Ohiyo, Akonwara
REGION: Machete System, PED 4B, Orion Freedom Alliance
“That’s not exactly true,” Reece said. “They can get in via the air coolant system, if they tear up some of the ceiling panels. Then they can drop down on us.”
“Can we get out that way?” Marky asked, breathing heavily.
They were all breathing a little hard.
“No.” Reece looked up at the two-story height of the room. “Too high, and we don’t have the tools to cut through the metal.”
“So we’re stuck until they get to us,” Schramm said.
“Yes, but we have two things going for us,” Reece said.
“What?” Marky asked.
Reece didn’t immediately answer Marky’s question. She looked at Trey. “Those eyes of yours. Can you upload a direct visual to a live Link feed?”
Reece’s own Link allowed her to establish real-time visual contact for speaking to someone, but that had no recording abilities. Alternatively, she could record what she saw and upload it, but it would take longer.
“Yes,” he said. “Why?”
Marky rummaged in her bag and handed Trey a reader device. Then she handed him the data stick she’d taken from the server room. “Because you’re going to read this and broadcast it to the board. And if they don’t respond before Cooper Fields’ people get to us, you’ll put it out on the live Link for public consumption. If the board refuses to do anything, everyone in Machete will know what Cooper’s done.”
“Why would the public care if Cooper screwed Schramm over and stole his job? That’s how the corporate world works.”
Schramm said, “They’ll care about the other part of what we found. That Cooper’s been skimming money out of the company’s public works fund to pay off the people he’s been using to get me.”
Reece pursed her lips and blew out a breath. “Yeah, they’ll sure care about that.”
The one thing corporations had to keep the people from rising up and overthrowing the unbalanced system was that each corporation had a public works fund that they donated to Akon’s public services. How much they gave each year was published, and consumers paid attention. A bigger donation resulted in bigger sales, since people chose to buy products from companies that gave them more support.
Stealing from the public works fund would make Cooper Fields the most hated man on the planet. Further, Rexcare would suffer from public outrage that would likely result in boycotts.
A loud bang against the door made Reece jump and she turned to look at it.
“They’re not getting through that,” Schramm said. “It’s reinforced to withstand a level-three bomb. If they get us, they’ll come from there.” He pointed upward.
Trey stepped further into the cavernous room. “What is this?”
“Cooling room,” Schramm said. “Big datacenters pull a lot of heat. I won’t bore you with the details of siphoning the heat out while funneling in cool air and maintaining a balance between breathable air and a hardware-friendly environment.”
“Are you sure?” Trey asked. “Because I got a little bored just when you were saying all that.”
Marky snorted out a laugh, but Trey remained completely deadpan.
Schramm smiled. “You were the one who asked.”
Trey shrugged and fitted the data stick into the reader. “So, we’re doing this? It means blackmailing Rexcare’s board. Can’t say I love that.”
Schramm nodded. “We’re doing it. I don’t love it either. I’d wanted to simply give them the proof and let it speak for itself. But sometimes, in the corporate world, blackmail is necessary.”
“Okay,” Trey said. “Just making sure. Here we go. One message to the board of directors, marked highest urgency.”
Trey stared at the re
ader.
Reece looked to Trey, pretty sure he was the one Raya was asking about.
Apolla answered,
Reece looked to Schramm. If anyone knew about the structural limits of the building, it would be him.
He shrugged. “Don’t look at me. I’m an executive, not a structural engineer.”
Marky looked up at the ceiling, as if it might provide a clue. “I guess we’ll have to wait and see. Either the board will respond and call off the dogs, or we’ll at least see them coming.”
Trey looked up suddenly, his eyes focusing on them. “It’s sent.”
Schramm nodded. “All we can do is wait.” He straightened his shoulders. “What should we do to pass the time? I don’t suppose Marky brought her King Sweep set.”
Marky laughed. “Sorry, I didn’t know I’d need it while committing theft and fraud and whatever else we’ve done.”
Schramm grinned. “And I thought you were a die-hard gambler.”
“Well…” she reached into her bag and pulled out a small rectangular object. “I do have some old-style playing cards. Have you ever played something called ‘poker’?”
* * * * *
