by Lee Bond
Beneath all the usual electronic chatter literally swarming in, around and through Nickels' property there was a layer of thick digital encryption that begged for assault, yet no matter in which direction Chez levered his not inconsiderable techniques, said layer remained completely unperturbed. The blasted thing just slid this way and that, almost as if it were alive.
While Chez wasn't able to slide in or hammer his way through to find out just what it was that Garth Nickels was trying to hide so effectively, he was no fool. He knew a high-level security system when he was looking at one, and knew that should he try to set foot on that property without permission, all manner of buzzers and whistles and whatnot would start going off like it was High Tea with the Queen.
"Hardly sporting." Chez pulled on his chin, sensors detecting scrutiny from several fairly well armed gentlemen in the sorts of clothing that suggested quite strenuously to all visitors that they’d have no problems shooting at casually interested gentlemen simply loitering across the street.
A bright red dot appeared on his chest, swiftly followed by three more, all nicely clustered around his heart. Chez felt but obviously couldn't see an additional laser site sprout right in the middle of his forehead.
Opening his scanners a little wider, the assassin spotted a cluster of four snipers, all cunningly hidden across the top of the schoolhouse turned epicenter of technological genius and casual wastefulness, and the fifth -and most determined to put a hole in a lad's brainpain- high atop a crane buried deep on the property.
"Oh, that lad's got high marks, I warrant." The distance from the crane to where he was stood was nearly four hundred meters, on a rig that was surely swaying in the wind like a hammered ‘loader at DSB after a successful haul. Them as were parked on the building's roof had it easier, for certain, yet Chez was still mostly concerned about the mark on his forehead; there weren't were few in this world that’d leave him with lasting concerns, but a headshot?
Chez couldn't remember the last time he'd had his corpus collusum split further down the middle than it already was, but his mood after that fact was something they still talked about in Afrique's Barternics.
"Might as well see if these ..." the name of the company and their roster popped into his mind, one of the few things revealed during his entirely innocent data sweep, "Securicorps lads feel like chatting."
***
Gagachuk blinked, thinking he was maybe losing his mind. He looked over at Samantha, who was also mostly confused. "Is that guy coming over here?"
Sammy did not take her eyes off the tall, thin guy in the bright white suit. He leaked danger from every pore. "Yeah. Yeah he's coming over here. This is... not, uh, like … the other guys, but different… You think we should call Rommen?"
Gags pondered that, listening with half an ear to the chatter coming through the earbuds; the sniper team -Birchy being the most voluble because of course - was in the middle of an existential crisis and were all yammering for permission to lay down at least a single round of 'convincer fire' to assure the stranger that no, they weren’t in the mood for guests of any kind at the moment.
Naturally, their concerns were valid. Garth's impressive security system had gone off the rails a few minutes ago, pinpointing the man in the suit chilling across the streets as an 'undesirable', so naturally, they'd all deployed right there on the spot; there was no way to know why one of their employer's potential detractors was here instead of at the tech conference -because realistically speaking, there was only so much security that could go into a place like that before people started bitching about civil rights' violations- but that didn't matter.
An undesirable was an undesirable.
Birchy came through an earbud, yammering quite loudly. “Wot d’you reckon, mates? Our systems aren’t saying one thing or another on this arsehole other than our systems don’t want him on property. Do we drop him or what?”
There was just a hint of frantic nerves in Birchcreek’s voice. And with good reason. These days, they all of them had more than an inkling that Nickels wasn’t everything he seemed to be, and that difference attracted a very peculiar kind of enemy. There were the three Zigg-heads that’d been killed –by their employer, no less- on the roof of their parking structure, the still as-yet unexplained and unidentified owner of the drone camera, and the five other Ziggs.
Shortly after that, it'd been smooth sailing and quiet running, but if there was one thing you learned in the service, especially if you were eating foreign foods and learning local customs, was that the longer it was quiet, the longer it was smooth, the worse it was going to be when that other shoe dropped.
Shoes made great IEDs.
This man in the white suit … he smelled like a shoe.
Gags looked at Samantha, who shrugged.
Technically speaking, their mandate wasn't to drop bodies, it was to protect assets. The city of San Francisco had made it very clear it was happy that their resident tech-weirdo was out that day doing things to brighten his visual portfolio, but that they were also hoping it was a nice, normal day. Which was why the center was crawling with Feds and about eighteen different flavors of law enforcement and personal security task forces.
The team didn't care. They’d start dropping bodies if the man in the white suit sneezed funny, but, for the time being, the smile on his face said 'yes, I am a stranger and more than a little off-putting in my shiny suit, but I should like to talk, first.'
Maybe the situation could deescalate.
“I don’t want to do the paperwork on this unless it’s absolutely necessary.” Gags announced just as the man in the white suit made it across the street. “And since I’m down here and you’re up there, it falls on me. Unless … you’d like to pick up the tab on this one?”
Birchy’s sardonic laughter filled their earbuds for a second, then everything went radio silent.
“What a surprise.” Sam said drolly, eyeing the man in the white suit with the big smile. “Well, I’m going to be honest, Gags, I do not trust a man that smiles and this fella’s a smile for miles.”
“Must be why you avoid Birchy like the plague.” Gags shot a brief smile and a nod at the man in the white suit, made his rifle plainly visible to the man as he got closer still, then affected what he termed ‘Patient Yet Stoic Dealing With Idiots’ face. “How can we help you, sir?”
***
Benson Gagachuk’s military dossier flitted quickly through Chezzik’s HUD display, quickly followed by Samantha Rose’s, while those belonging to the snipers on the rooftop and dangling precariously from the crane remained unknown for the time being; he weren’t going to be dealing with them in anything other than the most peripheral of ways so it frankly wasn’t worth the effort.
Humming a tune from this era inadvertently sampled while mentally surfing the Internet for the location of Changetech and the ludicrously named Arcade of Awesomeness, Chezzik Elteren delivered an equally Spartan nod towards Master Gagachuk and Mistress Rose before introducing himself.
“How‘d‘you do?” Chezz smiled just a titch wider than ordinary human being were capable of, all for the shits and giggles. There was just the faintest hint of a squint from Gagachuk and a downright hostile scowl from the woman. “My name is Chezzik Elteren. And you are?”
“Without wanting to sound rude, what kind of name is Chezzik Elteren?” Sam demanded, coiling her hands around her rifle nervously. She’d seen something to put her on edge…
Chez shrugged whimsically. “I assure you, it is not the name I was born with. I … picked it up, along the way and down The Line. Now whom do I have the pleasure of addressing?”
Benson Gagachuk. Deployed throughout Iran, Iraq, a quick stint in Kuwait, with an aborted and terrible sequence of events outside Palestine one night leading directly to long-term –and less friendly fire-filled- service with Securicorps. Talented, but without the sort of drive one ordinarily associated with the kind of record he carried under his skin. A no nonsense character. The specifics
of that night were heavily redacted, which in itself said just how much Gagachuk had gone through under cover of night.
Chez saw that. Boring as hell, as well, and unwilling to spill even an ounce of information, sensitive or otherwise, so the assassin from the future turned his attention to the younger woman, Samantha Rose.
He could use that inexplicable mistrust she was harboring against herself, oh yes. Smiling just a little wider a second time elicited precisely the same response, complete with yet another adjusting of hands on rifle stock.
Samantha Rose. Not nearly as well-credited as her friend, she’d only done two tours of duty in Iran during the late 90’s and had a meager black op dustup with Soviet Forces in the Arctic Circle under her belt before abandoning the American ‘War on Everyone Not Us’ to join the far better paying private sector.
“Tell me your name, young lady, ‘tis such a small consideration.” Chez was bored. Bored as fuck. Traveled back to the 21st century as he had, wandering around looking for a man he was being paid not to kill, reduced to asking questions like some sort of common plebe …
Boring.
When the young woman refused, Chezzik planted another smile on his face, this one permanent, this one wide as all nature, and let his eyes do whatever the hell they wanted; with one freshly implanted cybernetic eye that only looked normal when he worked at it and an old organic one with some surprising bits inside, his countenance went decidedly off.
Gags was the first to break. He had his rifle up and aimed at the stranger’s weird head with no time to spare and young lady Samantha was hollering into earbud, commanding the snipers to move to better locations.
“Well now.” Chez said pleasantly, raising his hands as per the shouty Gagachuk’s even louder, even more shouted commands. “Isn’t this a bit rude?”
Inwardly, though, the assassin was pleased as Punch.
Young Samantha, screaming into her earbud along encrypted channels that were passing through the positively labyrinthine network surrounding Changetech’s property, had done him a proper solid, simply by doing her job; thanks to her precise command of the English language and protocol, an honest, abiding citizen from the 25th century –who so also just happened to be loaded down with all manner of devices- found himself finally locking onto the encrypted channel within just a few seconds.
It was a dirty hack, and not at as efficient as if he’d hacked the network himself, but Chez truly wasn’t going to be a beggar under these circumstances. He sectioned off a portion of his mind and told it to dig wherever it could in search of reliable data concerning one Garth Nickels and his whereabouts. Oh, he'd not forgotten what he'd heard and learned on the way over, it was just that in his experience, it was best to dot those 't's' and cross all those eyes.
In this case? The man … Nickels … he was fighting Baron Samiel. A legitimate time traveler. Man like that laid down blinds and traps and tricks all over the place. The fella over in the tech center could be a body double, a clone, a hologram … the sky was the limits.
Now, if he was on the property –which didn’t seem likely, given that so many of the man’s paramilitary murder-squad were loitering outside- Chez was determined to make his way in. The measly weapons on display would provide minimal stopping power for the Securicorps team. After they were all dead, a quick blip through both top and tails, just to see if the man was about.
If Nickels wasn’t around, well. There was a nice, simple fix to render the property silent as a graveyard, all keenly prepped and ready for the return of Master Nickels and his dashing, well-dressed host, Chezzik Elteren.
The portioned mindpiece confirmed it was in at the lowest levels of the heavily secure network, noting with interest that every single cellphone on the property was linked together through the aforementioned invisible system. It started rolling through those digital devices, emanating confidence that someone on the team wasn’t as rigid as the others, that someone had let something slip.
People. They were predictable.
“Rude or not, motherfucker, this is private property and you aren’t welcome. So bug out.” Gags gestured with the business end of his rifle.
Chez wiped sarcastically at the red dots finding purchase on his chest once more. The rooftop snipers had moved from their positions and were very much exposed now. He caught the bland expressions on both Sam and Gagachuk’s faces as he intentionally touched each of the bright red dots.
“Last I checked, sidewalks are not private property. I am aware that you Americans do a lot of things differently, but I do believe that is one thing that has remained constant. I am stood on the sidewalk, therefore, there is very little you can do. If I felt like dropping my trou … well, no, then I'd be publicly indecent, so. No. I'm here, admiring the … architecture."
All four snipers were vying for his attention, each demanding that they just drop the fool where he stood. Sam backed up a bit and drew her rifle, concentration so powerful on her face that it was no longer a surprise that a woman her age had risen so quickly in Securicorps’ ranks. She was a woman with whom you did not fuck.
Chez felt the first faint tugs of swooning on his inhuman heart. She’d shoot him in the head without blinking!
Where had she been all … right. Four hundred and some years in the past.
Gags waited for the noise in his ear to subside before talking; their invisible system had pulled up some data on the man in front of them. It wasn't complete, it was damned likely it wasn't even true, given the disparity of data, but it was something. “Chezwick Helderbren or whatever the fuck your fucking name is, you’re not wrong. The sidewalk is public property and you aren’t doing anything illegal by standing there, asking questions, but I’ll tell you something for free.”
Chez laughed quietly and applauded the absolutely vicious mangling of his name. That same system he was currently traipsing so quietly through had found him. Well, the him he'd been before becoming something much greater than anyone'd dreamed. Still. Best to play it off as incorrect.
“Chezwick Helderbren. That is brilliant. I had honestly completely forgotten all about that name! Hat’s off to you, squire! Now. Please. Usher forth your nugget of free wisdom, so that I might nourish myself upon it’s bounty.”
“This guy is a fuckin’ weirdo, Gags.” Sam reached down to her waist, pulled out a clip of heavier ammo, and rapidly unloaded and loaded her rifle. She didn’t like the man’s too white suit. It shone in the sunlight. So bright. So bright. It looked like it fit the man funny. Like there was more to it or to him than was immediately apparent. The new rounds weren't approved to be used on American soil -or even against people, really- and would put holes the size of Birchy's ego through damn near anything, including concrete. “Drop him. Drophimdrophim. Let’s just drop him.”
“We’re getting to that, Samantha.” Gags smiled behind his iron rifle sites. “You see, my compatriot here, she’s not wrong. We are getting to that point, Chez. We are going to shoot you if you don’t fuck right off because while this sidewalk is public property, our employer is one of the richest and most influential people in the country. Probably the world by now. He’s off doing a speech about just how important he is. So when we kill you, which will be soon enough, all it’ll take is a quick call to one of his new, powerful friends and suddenly, there will have never been a Chezwick Helderneren. Or. Whatever. The. Fuck. Your. Name. Is. Are we clear?”
Chez kept his eyes on young Samantha. He took a deep breath. The mindpiece found a text from the leader of their little security force –a fellow named Rommen deShure- confirming that he’d arrived with the package safely, and that the package was settling in nicely. The security conscious leader had even gone so far as to provide his team back at base with precise coordinates to the location.
“Well.” Chezzik said suddenly, throwing everyone off guard. “This whole conversation has certainly put me on my guard against asking Americans as to when establishments may or may not open to the public. I didn’t even have the
opportunity to get to that point in our little chat before out you popped with your automatic rifles and your sniper scopes and everything else. And I had heard so much about this Arcade of Awesomeness. Alas. I suppose I shall indeed toddle off and do something else with all my moneys.”
“What?” Samantha shook her head. “What the fuck did you say?”
“I said, young lady with the gun pointed at my head, that I was here to talk about the Arcade of Awesomeness, but I am no longer so inclined.” Chez retracted his mindpiece. Once it was back in ‘place’ inside his consciousness, the assassin chose his method of silently dealing with every single one of Garth’s terribly rude employees: viral killer.
Microscopic drones swarmed silently and invisibly from his fantastic organic eye, instantly targeting both Gagachuk and Samantha Rose. A few dozen for both the man and woman, their intent the radical unspooling of those very important bits and pieces that made people alive. It’d be painful. It’d be messy, considering these particular mites had been built to kill Samiel’s very difficult to kill Ziggs, but you used what you had to hand.
From there, the remaining deadly micro-machines would assess and identify the DNA of every other person they’d been in contact with –and there was a considerable amount of that- since the last time the two had washed up, and off they’d go, in deadly search of their prey.
Within the hour, everyone working for Master Nickels would be quietly dead. A nice, neat and most importantly, efficient way of doing for an entire building full of people, especially when you were going to need a place to store someone you weren’t murdering for money. It was a perfect solution; the man was a known recluse, after all, so once he was done with his little speech, Young Master Nickels was going to find himself back on the base for the rest of however long it took.
Chez reckoned it could be very much like one of those American situational comedies, if he did things right.
Chez stepped carefully backward until he was five feet away, deployed a very deep bow, then waved farewell to the nervous Nellies that worked for Securicorps.
