A Dragon at the Gate (The New Aeneid Cycle Book 3)

by Michael G. Munz

  “They might not be here for us.” Even as Michael said it, he knew it was foolish to hope so.

  “We take that chance and we wind up cornered,” Jade said. “We’re out of here.” She grabbed Michael’s arm and tugged so hard he had to stagger to keep his balance.

  “There’s too much here, I can’t just leave it!” Even if Marc kept everything related to the AoA in a secure fashion—and probably he did—he couldn’t just abandon the only ally he trusted. Ignoring Jade’s protests, he turned to Holes. “Holes, can we get you out of here somehow? Copy yourself out to another computer on the Net or something?”

  “I am inhibited from self-copying by my internal protocols and the Bowman-Takashima A.I. Anti-Proliferation Act. I may enact a direct core transfer, however to do so over the Internet requires a suitably prepared destination server and sufficient time for the download, neither of which we possess.”

  “See?” Jade shot. “No choice. We go!”

  “A better option,” Holes offered. “Mister Triton has prepared a portable AE-35 processor platform here that I may transfer to, with your authorization, in roughly two and a half minutes.”

  Michael nodded. “Do it.”

  Jade growled her frustration and dashed out of the room.

  “The AE-35 processor platform is in the metal cabinet by the door behind you, on the top shelf. You must link it to my existing terminal beside the desk before I can begin the transfer.”

  Michael spun to open the cabinet. In the living room, Jade grunted in exertion as she shoved Marc’s couch toward the apartment door.

  “We’ll have to hold them off!” she called. “You got a gun?”

  On the middle cabinet shelf, beside two thick spools of heavy-duty cabling, Michael found the platform: a black, green-trimmed piece of equipment about eight inches square and half as high, with multiple connection ports on one side and a smart-screen and projection lens on top. “Just a Panther nine-millimeter!”

  “An auto-pistol? That’s all?”

  “I’ve been in a damn coma for three months!” He found the right port and connected the platform to Holes’s terminal. “How’s that? Are we good?”

  “I can conclude the process from this point,” Holes answered. “Mister Triton has developed protocols to destroy all local drives that contain sensitive information. Do you wish to enact these protocols?”

  “Good idea. So long as that doesn’t include you.”

  “It does not.”

  “Go for it.”

  In the living room, Jade leaned Marc’s coffee table against the couch she’d used to barricade the apartment door. Michael began to clear off a work desk to follow suit. “So I guess we’re not going out that way.”

  Jade’s only answer was a glare as she rushed to help him.

  “If they’re coming, they ought to be here any—”

  Three knocks pounded the door and cut him off. As one, they shoved the desk atop the couch and backpedaled into the living room. Jade waved him back further and pulled from beneath the back of her jacket what Michael recognized as a RavenTech Chimera-20 collapsible submachine gun. Michael ducked into Marc’s office. Sparks flared inside the cases of the two computer towers in the living room.

  Something heavy cracked the front door.

  Michael tugged open the metal cabinet in the office and grabbed the two spools of cabling he’d spotted earlier. “We’ll go out the window,” he whispered to Jade.

  The freelancers slammed the door again. He heard it splinter.

  “Work fast!” Jade fired a burst at the door from behind the corner of the hallway to Marc’s bathroom.

  Michael’s eyes darted through the room, looking for something secure. A closet door stood closed on the left wall. He jerked it open and began to wrap one end of each cable around a hinge. From the living room came a crack of wood. It sounded like they were pulling the front door apart, and seconds later, the desk, already poorly balanced on the couch, crashed to the floor. A spray of gunfire tore in from the living room to shatter the office window behind Michael. Jade’s return fire echoed back a moment after.

  “Holes, how much time’ve we got?”

  “One minute, thirty seconds, approximate.”

  Michael’s fingers worked the cables into a knot. He grasped both cables, tested the knots with a tug, and then began to spiral them together as best as he could. A glance over his shoulder showed only a small corner of the living room from that angle. There was no way to see the front door or Jade. “You okay out there?”

  Another exchange of gunfire was the only answer. Michael left the cables and drew the Panther on a rush to the office room door. Pressed against the tiny section of wall between the door frame and the cabinet, he peeked out to see Jade crouched against the hallway corner just ahead. The front door was torn away, though their couch-and-table barricade remained.

  Michael fired two shots’ suppressing fire out the door. The angle was awkward; he was on the right side of the office door and couldn’t bring his weapon to bear easily with his right hand while staying in cover. He ducked back just as two of the freelancers leaned in from either side of the main doorway and sprayed bullets into Marc’s apartment. Michael spun along the side of the cabinet to move deeper into the room as the firing continued. Covering fire, it had to be. Make him and Jade duck back, then force their way in.

  He shouted it as soon as the bullets let up: “Jade, get in here!” Staying low, weapon extended, he ducked back to the office doorway, ready to cover her retreat and knowing as he did so, she’d have to cross in front of him on her way.

  A freelancer wrapped in a flak jacket clambered over the couch and fired a compact assault rifle as he went. Movement soured his aim. Bullets shattered Marc’s kitchen. Michael took aim just as Jade rushed backward toward the office. She blocked his view, firing. Bullets took the freelancer in the thighs. He screamed and went down. Jade fell back into the office, took a standing position just behind Michael, and then fired another volley toward the door. Michael followed suit. The wounded freelancer writhed on Marc’s carpet, his rifle forgotten beside him. For a moment, none of his comrades followed. Michael couldn’t help but wince.

  Jade struggled to take cover in a way that would still let her fire but was having the same problem he did. The left side of the door was flush to the office wall. All they had was the right. “Shit!” Jade burst. “Of all the damn times not to be left-handed! Get back!”

  With a guess at what she had in mind, Michael backed off, firing two blind shots into the living room. Jade sent a burst after his and then slammed the office door. They rushed as one to shove the metal cabinet onto its side, blocking the door.

  “Won’t hold them for long!” he said.

  “Oh, ya think?”

  Michael went for the cable spools and pitched them out the window. They dangled and then unrolled toward the ground three stories below. If they didn’t hold his and Jade’s weight, the landing would not be gentle.

  Something jerked Michael’s shoulder; it was Jade, yanking him back from the window. Bullets pierced the office door and the spot by the window where he’d just stood. Michael gritted his teeth and crouched low, facing the door, weapon drawn again. “Holes?”

  Jade fired through the door. Michael followed suit. A grunt of pain and another hail of bullets both shot from the living room.

  “Transfer complete in forty-five seconds.”

  “Hold your fire! Hold your fire!” Michael shouted toward the door. He gave a shrug to Jade that he hoped would communicate his intent to stall. “Can’t we talk about this?”

  For a moment there was no answer, but then came, “Throw out your guns and come out! Slowly!”

  “What’s to stop you from just shooting us when we do?” Jade shouted.

  “We just want him, sweetheart!” one of the freelancers shouted back. “You get on your way and we won’t stop you!”

  “I don’t know, I’m getting a bundle to keep him safe! Going to compens
ate me for my losses?” She winked in a way that only left Michael uncertain about her earnestness.

  Michael pointed to the window and whispered, “Go! I’ll climb down after you when the transfer’s done.”

  “You go!” she hissed. “I’ll cover you and bring that thing with me!”

  “You shot Deets!” The freelancer’s shout aborted Michael’s reply, but he shook his head nonetheless. “You’ll be lucky we let you get away at all!”

  “Well Deets shouldn’t have rushed his ass in here guns blazing, then, should he?”

  “Look,” Michael tried, shouting again. “What do you want with me? Who are you?”

  “Transfer complete.” It came from the AE-35 platform itself. Holes was apparently savvy enough to keep his own volume low. Michael crept over and unhooked it.

  “Toss the gun! Come out slow like I said! Then we talk! You’ve got five seconds!”

  Michael slid the platform into his pack. “Okay, okay! Just give us a sec! The door’s blocked!” He pointed to the window. Seeming to understand his intent, Jade shook her head and motioned like an angry umpire for him to go first.

  “Five!” came the reply.

  Michael holstered his weapon and took hold of the cables. Naked pavement loomed in the alley three stories down.

  “Four!”

  Jade inched to the window, gun still drawn. With a silent prayer that the cables would hold, he swung himself out of the window and somehow managed to stifle a curse as the ground threatened below.

  “Three!”

  The cables tugged and pinched at his clutching palms as his own weight dragged them through his grip. He lowered himself, hand under hand, as quickly as he could. So far it was holding. He passed a second-story window and could no longer hear the count above. He spared a glance upward. Jade wasn’t there.

  He dropped farther, and another hail of gunfire echoed from the apartment. Michael took a breath and wrapped his arms around the cables. Gravity did the rest. The friction of the cable sliding through his arms barely slowed his fall.

  Concrete smacked his soles. Michael rolled with the impact and spilled up against the building’s stucco exterior. One hand scraped across the stucco; the other skidded across the concrete. Ripped skin stung his palms and his legs felt cracked, but he was on the ground.

  More gunfire jerked his attention back up. Jade swung out over the window sill as if in free-fall. Michael’s stomach clenched in anticipation of her plunge, but she clenched the cables and jerked to a stop a mere foot below the window.

  Then one of the cables gave way and she plunged another foot.

  Michael clambered to his feet, struggling for a way to catch her from a two-and-a-half-story fall. She glanced down, their eyes met, and she dropped.

  He had only a moment to realize she still had a loose grip on the cables—they rushed through her hands the way he’d let them slide through his arms—and then her body slammed into his chest. Michael dropped to his knees with the impact, arms tightening. The next thing he knew, they were in a heap on the concrete. Atop them lay the fallen cables, the ends of each now snapped.

  “Nice catch,” Jade gasped.

  “Thanks.” Saying it took all the breath he had left in him. He struggled to draw another as Jade clambered off of him and tugged him up.

  “Run!” she ordered.

  Michael nodded, still fighting for breath. Behind them, between Marc’s apartment and the neighboring building, stretched a fence that blocked their path. Jade pulled him forward, toward the street.

  They rushed the corner and Jade plowed straight into a man who rounded the corner at the same moment: the freelancer with the orange tattoo. Both of them startled, Jade fell back against the wall to steady herself. Michael rushed forward to hurl an impromptu punch at wherever he could hit. It took the freelancer in the stomach. Body armor met Michael’s knuckles. The freelancer doubled forward regardless, but in his rush to land the punch, Michael was off-balance. He caught himself on one foot and tried to spin for a second attack before the other could recover, but there wasn’t time.

  Draw his weapon? Try to block his counterattack?

  Jade lunged in and grabbed the freelancer’s shoulder faster than seemed possible. With a sizzling crackle swiftly eclipsed by a scream of pain, the freelancer spasmed as if jolted, and fell to his knees.

  Jade let go. As one, they looked around the corner toward the apartment entrance. The freelancer must have run down ahead when they’d been going out the window: none of the others had yet arrived.

  “Okay,” shot Jade, “now run!”

  “You’ve got a taser in your hand?” They’d paused in an alley next to a bar about five blocks from Marc’s apartment. Live music thrummed through the walls amid the acrid aroma of years of cigarette smoke. Michael could see no sign of the freelancers following.

  “Yeah, but you call it ‘handy’ and I’ll zap you in the junk.”

  “I’m good, thanks.”

  Jade peered at her right wrist, twisting her mouth into a scowl. “Only good for two shots before it needs a recharge. Used to be four, but the battery blows.”

  Michael nodded. “You okay?”

  “Takes more than falling out a window to stop me, ace. You just had to risk your neck to save your computer pal, eh?” Annoyance painted her tone, but the grin on her face seemed to imply it was less than sincere. “Better not have broken that thing on the way down.”

  Michael checked on Holes’s new home. Nothing looked damaged.

  “All systems remain in order,” Holes reported.

  Michael breathed a sigh of relief and closed the bag again. “Any idea who those guys were?”

  “Uh, lousy shots?” Jade shrugged and then peered both ways down the street before turning back to him. She slid a lose strand of red hair behind one ear. “Let’s not stand here discussing it. You can pick where we go, but let’s just go.”

  “I can pick? Gee, thanks.”

  “I’m magnanimous.” She slapped his butt. “Pick!”

  Momentarily at a loss for words, and with only half-formed ideas for destinations, he led her further away from Marc’s place. Jade caught up to walk on his right side. The sunlight was gone completely and the sky above them was lit only by the haze of Northgate’s light pollution. Cars passed on the street beside them. The bar’s music faded into their past.

  “Keep an eye out for a cab,” Michael said.

  “I’m scoping for threats. Cab’s your department.”

  He let it go, instead taking a breath and switching to, “Holes didn’t hire you.”

  She watched him out of the corner of her eye. It was a moment before she responded. “Didn’t say he did. We going to have a problem about this?”

  “I’d just like to know who did.”

  “Life’s mysterious. I’d tell you, if I knew.”

  “What’s your email address? And the address they contact you from? Maybe Holes can do some digging.”

  “You’re not hacking my email,” she said.

  “It’s not hacking, it’s—” Maybe it was hacking. Was it? “It doesn’t bother you, not knowing?”

  “They don’t want me to know, so I don’t know. Part of my fee pays for anonymity. I’m not jeopardizing that just so you can feel all warm and fuzzy.”

  “It’s not—”

  “Listen, guy, you’ve clearly got someone gunning for you. Yeah, you’re not helpless anymore, but don’t you want protection? Or have I drawn one of those really fun jobs where I get to protect a suicide case?”

  “I don’t even know who wants me dead,” Michael tried. “If I know who wants me alive—”

  “Not hacking my email.”

  Michael sighed. They paused on the edge of a crosswalk, momentarily alone aside the kaleidoscope of traffic. A garbage truck passed by, wafting its odor across Michael’s nose. “How long have you been a freelancer?” he asked.

  She eyed him with a moment’s suspicion. “Since I was nineteen. Got what you coul
d call ‘unofficial instruction’ before that.”

  Michael had trouble pegging ages, but that probably meant at least five or six years’ experience, if true. “It’s only really been about nine months for me.”

  “Including your three months unconscious?”

  The light changed. They crossed. A police drone, its lights flashing, flew above their path as it rushed toward some crisis elsewhere.

  “Yeah, including,” Michael said. “My first real job was with a mentor of mine. A middleman came to him with an anonymous offer to track down someone he claimed was an arsonist—the same arsonist, so he said, who’d just burned down our apartment. I wondered who the employer was. Diomedes didn’t care. He said it didn’t matter so long as the money was good.”

  “Diomedes was your mentor?” she asked.

  “You knew him?”

  “Only by his rep. And that hit in the Corporate District in August, right?”

  Should he tell her Diomedes was dead? No, stay focused. “This was before that, back in February. Our employer turned out to be someone who wanted both the arsonist and Diomedes dead, and the arsonist wasn’t even an arsonist. The employer was behind the fires. We found out before it was too late, but given things like that, how can you not care who’s hiring you?”

  “The guy hired Diomedes hoping he’d turn out dead? So his money wasn’t really ‘good,’ was it?” She smirked with a twinkle in her violet eyes that Michael found surprisingly pleasant despite the argument.

  “That’s not the point,” he managed after a moment. “If I don’t know who hired you, how do I trust your protection?”

  Jade heaved a sigh. Her words came in a growled whisper. “Because I’m a professional. And regardless of the rest of the employer’s agenda, protecting you is what I’m paid for, and I do my job! Geez, you’re a mess! I’ve told you all I know!”