Data Runner

by Sam A. Patel

  “Where is Dexter now?”

  “Running his cargo.”

  “So why did he give this load to you?”

  “Because,” I say, tapping the chip in the bag. “You know that thing somebody stole that’s so big it could bring down an entire megacorporation? The thing that’s so damning, the people looking for it had to go outside their own internal security and hire Ito and Gendo to disrupt it?”

  “If it even exists.”

  “It exists all right, and this is it. This is that cargo. Dexter handed me this load to secure while he lured Gendo away. I called you because I thought you might have more information about what it is, and because you told me not to trust anyone else out there.”

  Red Tail stretches the bag and reexamines the module through the film. It’s pretty clear she doesn’t know any more than I do.

  “You don’t know who Ito and Gendo are working for?” I ask.

  “Nope.

  “Do you have any idea what the cargo might be?”

  She shakes her head. “But Snake might. He can probably even reassemble the cargo, but we have to get the parity load in Dexter’s chip first.”

  “That’s not a problem. I’m meeting him tonight.”

  “Where?”

  “Back in Brentwood. The old library on Main Street.”

  “Okay, I’ll contact Snake and we can take it from there. In the meantime, you better get back en route and deliver your cargo. You’re still on the sneakernet right now.” Red Tail is already halfway out of her chair like she thinks we’re done here.

  “Yeah, that could be a bit of a problem.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “What do you know about the Outliers?”

  She sits back down. After that, I tell her everything. TerraAqua. Ms. Doyle with the beehive hairdo. The pickup for which there was no record. The nervous man in the sport coat. The elevator stop. Getting loaded up. Getting chased into the elevator by Blackburn.

  “And then?”

  “Then I went down to meet Dexter, and that’s when all hell broke loose with Ito and Gendo and this other cargo.”

  Red Tail considers my story carefully. Almost too carefully, like she’s considering angles I’m not even aware of.

  “I mean, it isn’t unheard of to be called in for a pickup without the company knowing about it.” I’m thinking of my very first run, where the security guy stopped me on the way out and told me it was against company policy to use data runners.

  “It isn’t unheard of, but it is highly unusual.”

  “What about these Outliers?”

  “What about them?”

  “Do you know anything about them?”

  “Such as?”

  “Who they are for one thing.”

  “They’re a rebel faction that grew out of the squatter settlements.”

  I pick it up immediately. All of a sudden Red Tail is playing that game. Answering a question with a question. Acting like she’s confused when in fact she knows exactly what I’m talking about. I know that game well. Martin did it all the time when I was a kid. Anytime I asked him anything about my mother Genie, he would play that same game.

  It’s pretty clear I’m heading down a road she doesn’t want me on. I’ll have to come back to it. If there is something at the end of this road, I’m not going to get there directly, so I change the discussion to logistics. “Okay,” I say, “so how am I supposed to make this delivery? Aside from not having a contact, I don’t even have a delivery point. All he said was to get it to the Outliers. He may as well have told me to get it to Old Kansas City.”

  That’s when I get an idea. “Maybe I should just call it in to Arcadian for their instructions.”

  “No, don’t do that!” Red Tail blurts.

  I have no intention of doing that. I only say it to see her reaction. And Red Tail’s reaction is very interesting to say the least. “Alright, what gives?” I ask. “I’ve trusted you up to now, but if you want me to keep trusting you, I need to know what’s going on. Why am I not trusting anyone else at the firm?”

  Red Tail sighs. She knows she’s cornered. “A few weeks before you started with us, Liddy intercepted an unauthorized transmission originating from the Arcadian node.”

  “Data?” I ask.

  Red Tail looks at me like I’m an idiot. “All transmissions are data, you dodo.”

  “What kind of transmission?”

  “Communication signal. Whatever it was, they used military-grade scrambling, but it looks like somebody on the inside was contacting somebody on the outside.”

  It takes a second for the words to sink in, and even then, I have to be sure I am hearing her correctly. “You’re saying that somebody inside Arcadian is a spy?”

  She confirms. “We know it’s not the Birdwatcher, since she found the signal. We know it’s not you, me, or Snake. That leaves something like thirty-seven runners suspect.”

  “Cyril?”

  “I’m pretty sure it’s not upper management either. No, it has to be a runner.” Red Tail’s expression turns serious. “One of our birds is a mole.”

  “So how close are you to finding this mole?”

  “Very. Snake’s working on that right now. If all goes well, we should close in within the next twenty-four hours. But until then, you can’t let anyone know about this.” She waves her hand over the entire table to include both cargos. “Any of it. You have to keep it all under wraps.”

  “What do I do about the cargo in my arm?”

  “I’ll ask the Birdwatcher. Liddy doesn’t make clerical mistakes. If she sent you there, it was for a reason.”

  “So until we get an answer I just have to lug this thing around?”

  Red Tail reaches into her shoulder bag and drops a few energy bars on the table. “I’ll try and have an answer for you by tonight. In the meantime, keep your blood sugar up.”

  Red Tail does a quick scan around the room before she gets up. “I’ll go out first through the front. If there’s a shadow on us, I’ll draw it away. Wait five minutes and then find the back way out. Got it?”

  “Yeah, I got it.”

  “And Carrion…”

  “Yeah?”

  “Keep an eye on your wing.”

  I hand Red Tail her shoulder bag that now contains the other part of Dexter’s parity cargo. “You too.”

  18

  I know getting on the train is risky. But then so is hoofing it around the tunnels when I have no clue what I’m carrying or who else might be after it. All I know for certain is that Blackburn will be looking for me, and depending upon how important this thing is, that could mean as little as two soldiers or as many as the entire Military-Alliance Complex. There’s no way of knowing. So yes, getting on the train is risky, but it’s a calculated risk.

  The crosstown train accelerates into the tunnel. Soon my train catches up with another train, paces alongside it for a few seconds, then dips further into the Free City underground.

  That’s when I see the expensive loafers perched atop the other train, and the perfect cuffs with the clean break that can only belong to one man. With the trains practically adjacent and barely a two-foot drop between us, he simply steps off. A split-second later I hear the muffled thud of a soft landing on the roof. No one else seems to notice it, or if they do they dismiss it as random train noise. I’m the only one who knows because I know he’s there for me.

  This time I haven’t pinned myself against the back doors with nowhere to go. This time I’ve done it smart, having already checked both cars forward and rear for immediate trouble. Both were clear, but just to be sure I stand by the forward door, giving me a clear line of sight straight through to the next car. Standing there also gives me instant access to the segue if needed.

  I throw open the door and enter the tight section between the two cars. The metal links on either side of me feel like pipe but hang like rope. They’re slippery on purpos
e, to prevent exactly what I’m about to do. I climb over the accordion cage and use the uppermost link to gain footing.

  My foot slips. I nearly tumble headfirst onto the steel grates bridging the two cars but manage to hang on. The second time I use my heel to lock on, which lets me push off and grab the roof of the car as my other foot propels me onto the top of the train.

  The top of a train is no place to be unless you have no choice. There’s wind, debris, sudden beams that can decapitate you in an instant, and a slippery rooftop with a convex bulge that can send you tumbling into oblivion with just one missed step. It’d be one thing if I were just going to lie on my stomach and ride it into the next station. But when I turn around and see Mr. Ito standing behind me—not kneeling, not crouching, not lying flat to hug the train—but standing straight up as if the dangers aren’t even of concern to him, that’s when I grasp the true peril of my predicament.

  Mr. Ito is facing forward, so I’m the one who has to constantly whip my head around to check for anything low coming up behind me that could take my head off. So far so good. The tunnel’s been wide open and clear. “You’re too late,” I scream over the barreling rush of wind, “I already handed it off.”

  He says nothing.

  “The cargo is out of my hands.”

  Mr. Ito smiles.

  “I’m serious.”

  “I know you are serious,” he says.

  “So what’s this about?”

  “The arm your friend gave you…is not the arm I’m after.”

  “You—” But I’m not sure what he’s getting at. “What?”

  “Yes, Gendo and I were out to disrupt that cargo. We’ve been looking for that cargo for some time, so finding it makes today a very good day. But that is only part of the contract. We have two cargos to disrupt. The first was your friend’s parity cargo. The second is the other cargo.”

  I look down at my arm, at the bird staring straight out at Ito, and I suddenly realize I am hungry again. “You’re after this…”

  The wide eyes and crazy grin are a clear indication that Mr. Ito is done talking. He unsheathes his Katana.

  “But this is Blackburn’s business. They’re the ones who are after this…”

  As Mr. Ito advances to the gap, I back away. That is when it all comes together.

  “You’ve been contracted by Blackburn! That’s the megacorporation this data could destroy.”

  “Bingo,” he says with a twirl of his steel. “Now you may want to bite a bullet or something. I hear amputation by sword is very painful.”

  There is only one direction to run. Forward. I turn to meet the wind head-on and make my feet work to put distance between us as I leap over the gap onto the next car. Mr. Ito is now only half a train car behind and closing. After all, that is how you do it, isn’t it? Half the distance at a time? Up ahead I see some beams that I could easily arm grab and dyno up to. That would put me out of Mr. Ito’s reach, but not out of the reach of his sword. I’d be a sitting duck up there, and I am quite sure that slicing through sitting ducks is Mr. Ito’s specialty. I let it pass and keep going. But for how long? I can’t see more than one car ahead through the darkness, and for now the cars keep coming, but it won’t be long before my feet run out of train. And then what?

  I breathe a sigh of relief as another car emerges through the darkness.

  I have to come up with a plan. I have to think of something fast. Turn around and engage my pursuer? It’s worked before. I keep going. If I hit the lead car I’ll have no other choice but to do that anyway, so I may as well keep going.

  A low beam. I dive forward and hug the roof. The wind ruffles my hair as it sails over me. I pop back up. A few steps later I turn and see Mr. Ito do a sideways somersault over the oncoming obstacle and land on his feet like a cat with his katana. I keep running. Faster.

  Another car emerges from the darkness.

  There’s no choice now. I have to get off this train or he’ll have me trapped.

  We enter a large track exchange, and suddenly I see the front of the train two cars up. More than that, I see the light of an oncoming train on the next track. It’s going to be close.

  The headlamp creeps closer.

  The wind begins to change.

  Until all at once, a second rush of wind from the side nearly knocks me off balance. Mr. Ito too, who has to swing his sword just to hold on.

  Two feet away the other train passes, and I wait. More than the distance between the trains, it’s the difference in speed you have to account for. That’s what will cause you to botch the landing and roll off the train to grave injury. That’s why I wait…wait.

  “Mr. Ito?”

  “Hai.”

  “Just let it all burn.”

  He furrows his brow with confusion. “Wakaranai,” he says. He doesn’t understand. He doesn’t know anything about this cargo. He doesn’t care to know anything about this cargo. He just wants to destroy it. For the money.

  Wait… until the time is just right.

  Mr. Ito approaches with raised sword. “Oyasumi, Carrion-kun.”

  Goodnight, young Carrion.

  I leap. Off the train and into the air like I’m jumping for the other train, but instead I grab the crossbeam over my head and muscle up. Throw my torso over the beam and retract my arm just as Mr. Ito’s sword strikes. It misses me by less than a centimeter, hitting the beam so close that I can feel the warm spark of steel-on-steel contact on my skin.

  Mr. Ito turns and runs against the train but soon realizes the futility. He stops and stands, sword by his side, tip pointing away from his ankle, a receding silhouette on top of the train. “See you soon, Carrion-kun,” he yells just before he disappears into darkness.

  When both trains are gone, I begin to move. It’s too dangerous to drop from where I am. If the ground was flat and I had room to roll out of it, maybe. But from this height, with all the rails and ties and bolts, not to mention the flood channel and the fact that I can’t even see the ground well enough to do a precision landing, it’d be way too easy for me to catch my foot on something and break my ankle. Or worse. So instead I use the beam to make my way over the tracks until I find a spot where the ground is more stable. Remove my bag and drop it down.

  I get to my feet, step off the beam and perform a Turn Down. My legs swing wildly to shake out the excess momentum as my strained fingers grip the rusted beam. Hanging by my arms, the drop is now only twelve feet. I release, land, roll.

  I check the time. I have to get moving. With Blackburn after me, the sneakernet is no place to lay low. I figure I’ll be safer once I’m out of the Free City and back in Brentwood.

  19

  The front door to my house is ajar.

  At first I think it’s just Martin back from his trip, but he would never leave the front door unbolted, let alone ajar. Never Martin, who at any given time has who-knows-what going on down in the basement; that’s how I know something is wrong.

  I push the door open. Wide open. Leaving plenty of room for me to make an escape if I have to. The first thing I see is the living room. It’s been ransacked. Every little thing has been turned over, every big thing toppled. Even the sofa cushions have been ripped apart. The high-end trans screen and entertainment stack that came with us from the Free City have all been trashed. Trashed instead of taken, which means this was no robbery. No corner was left untouched.

  No corner left untouched. The deductive part of my brain kicks on. Okay, it’s obviously not a robbery, so that means they were looking for something specific. And they wouldn’t keep ransacking the place once they found what they were looking for. So if everything—and I do mean everything—in the room is upturned, that can only mean one of two things. Either A: they found exactly what they were looking for in the very last place they looked for it, which was incredibly unlikely; or B: they didn’t find it at all. I go with B. Whatever they were looking for, they didn’t find it at all.


  Oh no, I think as it suddenly dawns upon me. Basement.

  I enter the kitchen. The first thing I notice in all the mess is the biometric entry system for Martin’s workshop smashed on the floor. They didn’t get in that way. I suppose that’s a good thing, since it’s already been established that dismembering a thumb is still the easiest way through. At the very least, it means Martin still has his. But that sense of ease disappears the moment I turn the corner and see the giant hole blown through the wall.

  Blackburn. Those singe marks. That ashy detritus. This could only have been done by a helio gun. And that means it could only have been done by Blackburn. I am sure of it.

  I race down the steps to find Martin’s entire workshop in upheaval, much worse than the living room upstairs. Everything is a mess. Whatever order there once was, whatever lines of separation once divided his various tasks and projects, it has all been put through a blender with the lid off.

  Then it hits me. Martin. Where is Martin?

  I start up the stairs to look for him, but halfway up I see something that halts me mid-step—something I have never seen before because it was previously covered by an old filing cabinet. But now that the filing cabinet is on its side, the thing hiding behind it can’t be ignored. I guess the soldiers from Blackburn who ransacked the place saw nothing strange about a heavy-duty cable running down the wall in a workshop like this. But to someone like me, or anyone with a trained eye, that isn’t just any old cable. It’s industrial-gauge optical fiber.

  I grip the railing with both hands, run three steps up and kick my legs over, push off and turn to land. It takes me a minute to wade through the wreckage of Martin’s workshop, but when I get there I follow the cable until it disappears behind the bottom of the filing cabinet. I kick aside the mess of files and slide the cabinet out of the way.

  “What the hell…”

  The cable disappears into the wall, which means it must go down through the floor. Down through a concrete floor? I clear aside all the papers and examine the floor. It’s barely discernable but it’s there. So faint you wouldn’t even see it unless you knew to look for it, but it’s definitely there. A seam. So now I wonder how I’m going to lift this thing. I’d need a suction cup attached to a handle to move it. But then I think about Martin, who would’ve had something much simpler in mind. Push instead of pull. I push down on the front corners. Nothing. I run my fingers to the back where it meets the wall and press down. Sure enough, the entire section of floor pivots back an inch. Just enough to get my fingers in there and lift away the entire section of floor. And when I do, I just stand there amazed.