by K. Gorman
Karin lifted her hands in a shrug.
Whatever she’s doing, it’s not my plan.
A glow of light distracted her. Cookie stood off to the side, closer to the Nemina’s front. She’d seen Nomiki talking to him earlier. Had her sister asked him to do something? They were, as far as she knew—and Nomiki’s body armor and gun aside—still just planning to ask the Seirlin people about the compound and Earth operation, but maybe Cookie could find a way into their network. The man had uploaded a virus to an Alliance cruiser—surely, a little corporate snooping wasn’t beneath him.
But then, Marc and Reeve arrived, and she forgot all about it.
“So,” Nomiki said. Though she had her back to her, Karin had no trouble picturing the bright, cheerful smile on her sister’s face. “What did—”
“You’ve got one hour,” Reeve said. “After that, I’m authorized to use force.”
That must have wiped the smile off Nomiki’s face. Reeve had stopped about two meters away, his arms crossed over his chest, feet planted as if he didn’t really want to be there, and a hard, wary expression on his face.
Marc, following in the background, watched the scene unfold with a cautious ambivalence. He’d veered out of the line of fire between Nomiki and Reeve, and, as he grew closer, his gaze shifted up from her sister to glance over the rest of them, lingering when it came to her.
She let out a breath and crossed her arms, mirroring Reeve except for her hunch. This was not how she’d wanted it to go. Hell, she wasn’t even sure how she wanted it to go. Her impression from Nomiki was that they would just go in and see if they could get the files, but it couldn’t be that simple, could it? From what they’d pulled from the net, this place was just supposed to be a modification clinic for the rich. A public subsidiary, branded under a different name.
But, if Nomiki truly thought it were that, why take the gun? And the armor?
“An hour, huh?” Nomiki said. “Guess we better get going.”
Seirlin Genomics. Not quite Seirlin Biocorp, but by the glowing posters that led down the company’s discreet alleyway, obviously tied. According to their net information, they specialized in a package mix of bio enhancements and low-key cybernetics, and the advertisements seemed to mirror that. She’d already passed a video of one man—large, fierce, and ripped—punching into a bag with an x-ray on his cybernetic muscle implants visible through his back and shoulders along with some sort of gauge that, by the way the video slowed on each hit and spike of its needle, she assumed must have been showing some impressive numbers.
Despite her massive experience of being part of a mad scientist facility, the actual biological changes that had been done to her and Nomiki remained a mystery.
Hence her need to visit.
The mid-size, multi-level building sat down an alley among Ellora’s high-end shopping district, surrounded on all sides by elite clothing stores, cosmetics shops, platinum star restaurants, and more spas than she cared to count. Behind them, the entire area held an edge of expense, from the polished fronts and gilded interiors of the shops right down to the street design. Gone were the grid-formed, straight-backed roads and the worn, buckled sidewalks that shaped her normal neighborhoods. The paths leading to Seirlin flowed together like a sculpted waterway. Even the corporation’s discreet alleyway, which butted into a circular drive with a few parking spaces to the side, gave off a moneyed feel. The brickwork copied a vague old-European style, designed with a tasteful roughness that looked like it got power-washed every week. Down the road, Seirlin Genomics opened onto its private sidewalk in an odyssey of lit, green-tinted glass.
The sight made her shiver. Especially with the way Nomiki was walking toward it.
A light jacket hid the harness now. Oddly, the combination of the jacket, loosely-fit workpants, and combat boots made her fit in more than the rest of them, as if, like Soo-jin, she’d tapped into a fashion subculture. Or maybe it was the confident, no-nonsense stride that made it work. Nomiki had never lacked in confidence. Karin, on the other hand…
Well, her sister had always been the perfect one.
As they paused at the edge of the drive, Marc brushed up to her side. “You doing okay?”
He’d been quiet during the walk. Watchful. Keeping his focus on Reeve and Nomiki, though she’d caught more than a few glances her way during the trip. Apart from a few netlink text conversations, they’d kept to themselves. He’d known about their plan to divert to Korikishiko. It spoke to his loyalties that he hadn’t informed Reeve. She doubted they could have broken off if he’d known.
Whatever Marc felt about the Fallon military, it looked as though he had finished with it.
“Yeah, sure.” She gave the building’s front a long study, then glanced up at him. With their height difference, her head only reached his shoulder. He stood close enough that she almost leaned into him, attracted by his warmth—despite the proximity of the sunlit area and its filtered daytime temperature, the twilight had a chill to the air—but she kept herself straight, maintaining the centimeters that separated them, and turned her glance back to the building. “We’re just asking for files, right?”
He snorted. “Right. And your sister isn’t carrying two guns.”
“Two?” She frowned at where Nomiki had stopped at the corner, her hands on her hips as she surveyed Seirlin’s entrance. She’d only seen the one on her torso harness, but she wouldn’t put it past her sister to have tacked another one on. Nomiki liked to be prepared.
“Second’s in an ankle holster,” he clarified. “File hunt?”
“Mhmm.”
“That place’ll have plenty of security,” he commented.
A shuffle sounded to her side, and she felt him shift, presumably joining her study of the front.
Yes, she’d surmised that, as well. So far, every place in this district had used shield generators instead of the regular security shutters she was more used to, and she’d seen a few security bots flitting around, along with personnel guarding the gates of the scattering of condominiums they’d passed. She doubted Seirlin would use anything except the best in that area, considering the clientele they advertised to on their website.
Fortunately, it seemed to be open. A seating area showed through the closest glass wall, hemmed in by a shallow water feature that trickled past the outside in a facsimile of a stream. The sidewalk extended to the front doors in a concrete bridge, with no lip to prevent anyone from falling in. Beyond, she caught a glimpse of another seating area on the opposite side of the entrance door, with the same immaculate, gray-colored sofas, asymmetrical coffee tables, and clean-cut, geodesic light fixtures, but the angle on the window, and the glow, prevented her from seeing much farther.
The entrance hall made her frown deepen. Separated from the rest of the area, each side had a wall erected to funnel people toward the reception desk inside. Constructed from what looked like full-length cuts of skinny riverwood, the warps and gaps made it seem permeable, but she knew a security feature when she saw one.
“We should let Nomiki go first,” she said.
Another snort came from her right. “How noble of you to suggest.”
Despite herself, a smile tugged at her lips. He didn’t believe her about Nomiki.
That was fine. Her sister was fairly unbelievable. Hell, outside of the compound, they all had been. Karin was a human flashlight, for crying out loud—and Brennan had brought things back from the dead.
“No, not noble. Practical. You need to stop thinking of her as a normal person.”
“She’s right. That woman is abnormal.” Reeve shuffled into view on Marc’s other side, the green-tinged light from the building illuminating the pale slopes of his face. His gaze, like theirs, had narrowed on Nomiki. “I’ve seen her fight, and I still can’t believe it.”
Nomiki, likely hearing them, turned and gave them all a half-smile. “Ready?”
Karin stepped forward. “Yeah, let’s do this.”
Chapter Seven
The doors opened without a sound, sliding back on smooth, gleaming tracks. Down the hall, hemmed in by the strips of riverwood on each side, the receptionist looked up from her desk. Catching sight of them—and, probably, Reeve’s uniform—the polite, half-bored expression switched to something stiff-spined and wary.
Karin’s heartbeat picked up as the building’s climate-controlled air, smooth quiet, and bright lighting wrapped around her, suddenly missing the nip of Korikishiko’s twilight. At least out there, she’d been able to run.
I thought I vowed never to leave the Nemina’s dashboard again. What happened to that?
Eesh. Nothing had happened yet, and she was already wishing she wasn’t there. What the hell kind of person was she? Scared of the receptionist at the end of the hall?
Gods.
She picked up her step, intending to catch up with Nomiki—her sister had managed to put several meters between them—but, just as Nomiki hit the midpoint of the hallway, a sliver of light darted down from the ceiling and dropped through her, creating a brief, blurry patch in the air.
Bioscanner.
Something clicked above. Her eyes widened. “Miki, watch out—”
Nomiki broke into a sprint.
The next few seconds happened very fast. Security gates crashed down on either end of the hall, trapping them in, and a hand grabbed her shoulder. Marc jerked her backward just as the ceiling ahead opened up and security robots dropped down. He and Reeve stepped forward to protect their small group. The building’s alarm sounded all around them, a heavy, screeching drone.
As she steadied against Soo-jin, she caught sight of the receptionist running from her desk and down a hallway toward the left.
Ahead, Nomiki had switched her attack. Drawing a wicked black blade, she lunged for the wall and wedged it between two slats of wood. A vicious crunch sounded as she levered them apart, and something screeched as she stabbed it through again, but a second later, she’d wrenched herself through the hole she’d made and was sprinting away on the other side.
Which left the rest of them alone with the robots.
Three of them had dropped. Unlike the spheres that had chased them, these had obvious aero technology. Three rotors gave them lift, and they each carried a camera and two guns, all six of which aimed down at their group as they floated closer. A shimmer to the air around them indicated at least basic shielding.
Shit.
“Get back, get back!” Marc threw a hand behind, ushering them toward the aft gate. “Cookie—can you do anything?”
“I’m not a motherfucking wizard.”
“CO-83 shielding. It’ll withstand a good amount,” Soo-jin observed. “Generator’s on the back.”
She sounded awfully cool for the situation. Granted, they hadn’t actually been attacked yet. So far, all the robots had done was advance—and even then, by only a few meters. Karin frowned. Those engines could fly faster.
“What if we don’t attack?” she asked. “I mean—this is a private facility, right? Doesn’t Fallon have laws about this sort of thing?”
She couldn’t imagine the media blow-out if this had happened to one of Seirlin Genomic’s high-paying clients. Just what had that bioscanner detected to set it off? She and Nomiki weren’t that different from the rest of humanity.
But, then again, this was the company that had designed them. She supposed they would be the ones to have that technology. And, considering her sister, they had a very good reason to use it.
It hadn’t quite served to contain her, though. Karin squinted at the gap Nomiki had made in the hall. A shimmer along the outside indicated a shield there, too. Her sister must have gotten out just before it connected.
“Fallon has very specific laws about this sort of thing.” Reeve, having fallen in step with Marc as they backed up the hallway, didn’t take his attention off the approaching robots as he answered her. “Where’d your sister go?”
“Hells if I know. Psychic links were not included in our drug programs.” Not unless the dreams she kept having meant anything. “Last I saw, she ran off after the receptionist.”
“I had a guy do that to me, once,” Soo-jin said. “Didn’t work out well for him.”
The drones had stopped about two meters from them, swaying in the air. Their bulbous underbellies hid their central processing units and the internal workings of the guns’ aiming systems, but a red light on their fronts gave a slow pulse as they waited.
Movement caught her eye from the other side of the wall. Nomiki reappeared, along with the receptionist and what looked like a security guard. Surprisingly, though Nomiki carried her blade at her side, no one seemed injured.
They walked over to the end of the hallway and out of sight behind the security shutters. A murmur of voices came from the other end, none audible enough to parse what was being said, but Nomiki’s came the loudest.
Everyone watched, waiting.
A few seconds later, the alarms stopped. The light on the fronts of the drones pulsed to green. With a roar of their rotors, they lifted back into the ceiling, shields dropping before they docked into their release hatches once again. A whine of winches sounded, and the security gates began to lift, rising much more slowly than they’d fallen. The shimmer of shielding along both walls vanished, taking with it a tinny, ringing sound she hadn’t noticed before.
Soon, Nomiki was waving them over from the end of the hall, her knife from earlier gone and a cheerful smile on her face. “It’s all right. Seems we triggered an old protocol. Come on over.”
Uh huh. Nomiki could spin bullshit with the best Nova Earth politicians, and that smile stretched a little too wide for complete sincerity. Just what had she told the two Seirlin people?
Whatever. The way was clear, and she wasn’t keen on sticking around in the hallway. That question could wait until later.
Their small group exchanged glances, the mingled tension and confusion mirrored in each of their taut expressions, but, after a few moments, Marc and Reeve relaxed from their combat-ready stances and re-holstered their blazers.
“Come on,” Reeve said, his face hard with a mix of anger and dark humor. “I’d like to know more about a company that attacks military personnel.”
He didn’t speak loud, but the cold, neutral tone of his voice and the hard, unappeased expression on his face gave a little flutter of hope in her chest.
He hadn’t been interested before, but Seirlin had just tipped their hand. She didn’t know how much weight he held in the military, but Nomiki had said he held more than he seemed. And, considering he’d been the only one sent to accompany her to find Karin, that definitely fit.
Seirlin’s security team wore a uniform similar to Reeve’s. Perhaps a bit more fitted, and with accommodations to include what looked like a modified netlink on the belt, it had nearly the same cut as Reeve’s. Alliance took a hard-line approach to anyone seen as mirroring their official uniforms and actively pursued such companies who did so, but the system was not small, and there was a long tradition of Nova Earth malls and companies dressing people up to look like police in order to intimidate others into behaving or using holding privileges that regular security did not have.
She didn’t know what Fallon’s laws were like, but she did see Reeve’s eyes narrow on the man as he took him in. An older gentleman, his close-cropped hair had a healthy mix of salt and pepper to it, creating a dark gray that contrasted well with his rich brown skin tone. With him standing at about a meter-seventy, the lines on his face suggested an even older age than the early sixties she’d placed him at, but his movements were smooth and strong, and Karin didn’t see anything in his manner that denoted a weakening due to age.
Was he alone in here? With a building such as this, she’d thought Seirlin would have upped their security regiment. But maybe they had more during the daytime.
Or, more likely, the Shadows had taken out the others.
He gave a small bow as they approached—a custom on Fallon in s
ome situations—and offered a smile, sweeping his arm to the side to welcome them in. “I apologize for that. They were supposed to have been disabled. My name is Dalajit Gill. I am in charge of the night-time security.”
“Why does a medical corporation have CO-83 shield drones, anyway?” Reeve pointed out. “Last I checked, they were restricted.”
“They weren’t when we bought them. And we disabled them after the restriction passed legislation. It was…” He paused, as if searching for the right word. “An old update that caused the sudden activity. We’ve been running on older, more active protocols than usual since the attack. Gretchen will be looking into it.” He turned to the receptionist with a nod. “She’s better at code than I am.”
Gretchen didn’t look all too happy to have been volunteered for it. For a moment, the lines of her mouth pressed together in a sour expression, but she was quick to replace it back with a professional neutrality. She gave a polite nod.
“Is there something we can help with?” Dalajit continued. “After the attacks, our staffing levels are somewhat short—hence the need for the older protocols—but if you wanted to book an appointment…?” His eyes wandered over them, taking in their group with a somewhat dubious expression.
Yeah, they probably weren’t the clients he was used to seeing at Seirlin.
Joke’s on him. Nomiki and I are the epitome of gene therapy and modification.
Hiding the scorn, Karin plastered a professional smile on her face and stepped forward. “We’re actually looking for information. We used to be part of Seirlin’s Earth facilities, but we’ve lost contact with some of our colleagues. And, well, with some of the stuff they were working on, there’s a chance that it could help with what we are currently working on.”
