Desperate Measures

by Michael Anderle

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Ten minutes after landing, the field team plus Malcolm and Emma sat in the galley, the AI’s hologram in one of the physical chairs.

  Despite Erik’s mockery of the conference room in Penglai days prior, he couldn’t deny that sometimes it was good to have a place to sit and talk about your plans.

  The galley served the purpose well enough aboard the Argo, especially when they didn’t need the entire crew present. Lanara remained in the engine room, bossing Wei around. The cheerful man didn’t seem to mind.

  “I thought we should go over the ops plan once more,” Erik began, eyeing Anne. “So we’re all on the same page.”

  “Sounds reasonable,” Anne offered, her hands folded in front of her.

  Kant stifled a yawn. “What’s the play, brother?”

  “First of all, I don’t want to make any major moves without our support being ready,” Erik explained. He gestured to Malcolm and then Emma. “That means we keep it light while Malcolm and Emma take some time to familiarize themselves with the local systems and integrate where they can without being caught. If we’re going to go in hot somewhere, I don’t want a bunch of cops and colonial militia showing up.”

  Malcolm flattened the stubborn collar on his shirt. “It’s not like we can take over the entire city. I mean, I’m good, and Emma’s a goddess, but we’re not, like, omnipotent.”

  Emma snickered.

  “I get that,” Erik replied, “but the more prepared you are, the better it is when we need to kick down doors. For now, see what you can do about cameras and drones near this hangar as a first step. We’ll figure out what else we need once we know more. I’m not expecting to nail the local conspiracy base in the next hour.” He turned to Emma. “Emma, any updates from Alina we should know about?”

  “No,” Emma replied. “But I have received a coded transmission confirming your meeting with a local agent this evening. Everything appears to be in order.”

  “Good.” Erik swept the gathered people with his gaze. “Remember, the locals are here to assist us. This is our mission. If we screw it up, they’ll help us clean up, but we’re the ones who will take the heat.”

  Anne’s delicate brows lifted. “We better not mess up then, Blackwell. Alina has a lot of faith in you, and I’d hate to see her disappointed.”

  “Not screwing up is always my plan.” Erik reached down to his PNIU and brought up an image of two shipping logos, one depicting three stylized stars in a tight triangular formation. The other showed a woman in a pressure suit standing on an island beneath three stars.

  “Three Daughters,” he began, “and New Lands. Both are shipping companies that, according to the ID’s analysis, might have received recent shipments. Both are Ceres Galactic subsidiaries.”

  “Suspicious,” Kant replied in a sing-song voice. “They might as well have sent up a flare saying, ‘We’re evil. Come and take us out.’”

  Anne narrowed her eyes. “We only know this because of the intel Blackwell and Lin received from Barbu. It’s not impossible this is a sophisticated trap. They might have wanted to lure them away from Earth and take them out.”

  To Erik’s surprise, Anne sounded genuinely worried.

  Jia nodded with a thoughtful expression. “That’s occurred to Erik and me as well, but there are a lot of moving parts that have to work to take anybody down as a trap. I’m going to assign that a low probability.”

  “It doesn’t make it any less dangerous,” she added. “We all agree on that, but if we’re careful, it doesn’t matter.”

  Jia nodded for Erik to continue.

  Erik pointed to the Three Daughters logo. “For our first outing, we’re going to keep things simple—basic recon. Alina’s given Jia and me the toys we need to disguise ourselves. I presume you two have what you need?”

  Kant grunted. “Yep. I mean, it’s hard to hide that I’m a big guy, but same thing with you. Also, I don’t think Anne and I have the same profile with the conspiracy as you two probably do. It’ll be easier for us to sneak around.”

  “That’s what I’m counting on. Jia and I will get eyes on target at the primary warehouse complex for Three Daughters, and you two will hit New Lands.”

  Anne folded her arms. “If we get tagged, there might be trouble.”

  Erik shrugged. “Then I suggest you don’t get tagged. I’m not saying either team should enter the facility or get that close. This is an initial recon. I want us to scope it out and evaluate any obvious defenses. Anything out of the ordinary, that kind of thing. Like I said, we’re not moving until we know more and our support is ready, but I assume you are both experienced field agents, so you know sometimes the best thing to do is get to the area and check it out.”

  Anne’s mouth twitched. “Yes. It’s not a terrible idea.”

  Erik locked eyes with her. Playing darts with everyone wasn’t the same thing as trusting his command.

  “Alina told me you two were more than just muscle. I trust her judgment. We’ve just started working together and getting to know one another, so I figure the best thing to do is keep everyone together in their comfortable pairs while we do our initial checks. Or do you think that’s a bad move?”

  “No, Blackwell. I can’t fault anything you’ve suggested.” Anne looked and sounded surprised. “I assume we’ll take Lin’s flitter?”

  Jia’s brow lifted. Erik couldn’t see a problem with the suggestion, despite Anne’s mocking tone. They’d only brought two flitters, and wasting time renting one didn’t make sense. He looked at Jia for permission.

  “It’s not as upgraded as the MX 60,” Jia began, “but it's decent at taking small arms fire, and Lanara enhanced its maneuverability.”

  There was a flicker of surprise in Anne’s eyes. “That’s better than what I usually get in this kind of situation. Not bad at all. Don’t worry. If I’m doing my job correctly, none of that will matter because no one will come after me.”

  “That’s good to know.”

  “Okay,” Erik interrupted. “We’ll spend a couple of hours and do some recon, then meet back here.” He turned from her to give Kant a nod. “Once we’ve got a better feel for the area and have had a chance to meet with our local contact, we’ll figure out whose door, if any, needs to be knocked on. But I think we should all be prepared for disappointment.”

  “We should?” Jia asked. “Why do you say that?”

  “They might have shipped artifacts here, but those could already be gone or passed on to some third party without a trace. The more we can squeeze out, the closer we get to taking out the next yaoguai factory or Sophia Vand. I’ll take whatever I can get.”

  Erik stared at the Three Daughters logo. There were many unanswered questions about the mission, not the least of which was Barbu’s identity, and if his information could be trusted.

  The team hadn’t had a chance to find out and was now working on blind faith.

  Erik looked over his shoulder, surprisingly worried about his MX 60 in the distant parking lot. They’d changed the color to a rather unostentatious gray along with altering the transponder, but they couldn’t risk parking too close to the warehouse with that fancy a vehicle.

  It was stupid to worry. Emma remained in the vehicle and could easily protect it while working on her exploration of the local systems at the same time.

  Jia looked around, her features altered by her holographic disguise.

  They were wandering down a narrow sky bridge toward a warehouse controlled by Three Daughters. Small groups of men, most in uniforms, piloted cargo flitters or pushed hoverdollies along the edges of the sky bridge. Normal drones were almost nonexistent, but largo cargo drones clutching massive crates and shipping containers zoomed around sedately in reasonable numbers. There was something relaxing about the whole thing, compared to their landing and the constant flurries of activity at the spaceport.

  Erik walked with a map of the nearby area up, trying his best to look like a confused tourist who ha
d taken a wrong turn. His instincts kept yelling at him, but he wasn’t sure why.

  “No unusual activity in the cameras near your position,” Emma reported. “But I’ve taken the liberty of removing your presence from them.”

  “You’ve already got that level of control?” Jia whispered.

  “These are public security cameras with protocols and systems I’m used to. I don’t know if things would be as trivial with some of the private systems. I wouldn’t advise starting any firefights yet.”

  “Heard and noted.”

  Erik and Jia continued walking, occasionally sharing conversations about sightseeing, but no one took any notice. The pair didn’t take the turn leading toward the target tower, instead continuing past it for some distance before stopping.

  “Damn, dear,” Erik offered for public consumption. “We’re going the wrong way, and we’re not even in the right part of town. I don’t think this is what they want tourists to see.”

  Jia rolled her eyes. “And now you understand why this is the last time I let you plan a vacation.”

  When they turned around, Erik gestured as if he had just won a point in a hard game. When she turned around, he looked at her and raised his eyebrows as they continued their walk.

  Perhaps she would plan all of their future personal vacations. He wouldn’t mind that one bit.

  In the minutes it took them to follow the sky bridge and platform back to the MX 60, the unease grew in Erik, but he didn’t voice his concerns until they were back in the flitter. He’d finally figured out what was bothering him.

  “Three Daughters isn’t the only company in that tower and level, is it?” Erik asked.

  “No,” Emma answered. “There are multiple companies in the tower, including other shipping and related companies.”

  Jia looked at Erik. “You’re thinking cargo traffic is way too sparse considering the time of day and the location, aren’t you?”

  “Yeah, that’s exactly what I was thinking.” Erik motioned to the windshield. “This might not be Neo SoCal, but we’ve seen plenty of air traffic elsewhere, and the background information we got from Alina suggests this is a high-volume company.”

  “All public records suggest as much,” Emma confirmed. “I can find no emergency or local news reports to provide a reason for lower traffic at Three Daughters.”

  Erik nodded, forming and tossing out different plans in his head. He might only be seeing what he wanted to. They needed to be careful. If there were artifacts present and they raided the wrong location, they might doom their chance to recover them.

  “Let’s see what the others come up with.”

  Back inside the Argo cargo’s bay, Anne slipped out of Jia’s flitter with a frown. “We didn’t see anything unusual. It’s a busy commercial area with heavy traffic. It was easy to blend in with the crowd. We did notice some spots that might be concealed turrets, but there are potential gaps in the coverage.”

  Erik and Jia had been waiting in the cargo bay.

  “It was the opposite for us,” Erik replied. “Not as much traffic as we would have suspected, but we don’t know enough about the local situation to know if that means anything, or if there’s something more there we should care about.”

  “If I were going to hide something, I’d place it in the less obvious location,” Jia noted. She gestured around the cargo bay. “Which I’d think would be the place with more people and activity, not less. It’s easier to monitor comings and goings with less traffic.”

  Anne’s faint smile could almost be mistaken for approval. “I was thinking the same thing, Lin.”

  Kant lumbered out of the flitter, stretching his arms. “But we can’t be sure. We’ve all worked missions where the obvious answer is only obvious because we’re got an assload of intel pointing us to something suspicious, and it turns out that’s wrong.”

  “True.” Jia frowned. “It’s not like the local cops or ID agents had someone like Barbu giving them records. There’s no reason to be suspicious of these companies other than because of what we know.”

  If they had the people and time, a well-timed raid on both places might turn up more, but they still hadn’t established that Barbu wasn’t setting them up. They couldn’t make a move without something more concrete.

  Erik turned his head, stopping as he focused on an exoskeleton. Alina had supplied new agents, but not new exos. They’d need to remedy that in the immediate future.

  Sometimes a man needed to sneak around. Sometimes a man needed a grenade launcher.

  “Anne, Kant, you stand by here. Jia and I will see what the locals have for us, and we’ll go from there.”

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  August 5, 2230, Alpha Centauri, Chiron, Lumiere, Albatross Bar

  Erik told Jia that all places were ugly in the same way. She accepted the wisdom of that observation as they stepped into the dark hole pretending to be a bar.

  The dim red lighting provided enough illumination to keep people from falling over, but it maintained enough shadows for them to drink for hours with only the barest awareness of what was going on around them.

  Loud, unpleasant music filled the air, necessitating a shouting match between anyone not drunk enough who wanted to talk.

  Those same conditions made it an excellent meeting place. Even if anyone was aware they were in town, Erik and Jia would have been difficult to pick out in the packed bar.

  They continued making their way through it, ignoring the occasional angry scowl from a drunken local as they followed the exact directions that had been sent to Emma earlier over the coded frequency.

  It wasn’t as reliable as the methods Adeyemi and Alina used on Earth, but it was a step above what normal criminals could access. There were advantages to working for the Intelligence Directorate.

  Erik and Jia arrived at a booth tucked into the back with only one man. His dark clothes helped him blend in even more with the environment, but there was something unsettling about the almost static smile on his face.

  They continued toward the booth, neither surprised when the punishing noise of the bar died to near silence as they sat.

  “I’m a friend of black holes,” the man greeted them.

  “And we’re friends of Singapore,” Jia answered. She found she missed Alina’s literary bent for code phrases.

  He nodded slowly. “The famous pair in my own backyard. I’m starstruck here.”

  Jia didn’t like the sarcasm in his voice.

  “That’s one way to describe us,” Erik replied. “You’re Agent Dalton?”

  The agent nodded again, that near-plastic smile remaining on his face. Jia had never thought she would so dislike someone smiling.

  “That’s me.” The man rubbed his eyes. “I was surprised to hear you two were coming and even more surprised that you’re here so shortly after I was told, which means the Fleet got their toy working. Not that anyone’s bothered to let me know. I guess I’m not important enough.”

  Jia frowned. Compartmentalization was the key to successful operational security, and the ghost sitting in front of them knew that better than most. If he needed to know about the jumpship, Alina would tell him. She didn’t have time to sit around, puffing up people’s egos.

  “We’re here now.” Jia leaned forward. “And we need information. You’re supposed to help us with that.”

  Dalton’s smile threatened to go away with a brief twitch. “Of course you do, so you can do your thing, right?”

  “What’s our thing?”

  “Causing trouble.” Dalton sneered, finally losing the smile.

  Erik chuckled. “I didn’t think taking down threats to the UTC was considered trouble. Or if it is, most people consider that the good type of trouble.”

  “It can be the bad type, too.” Dalton flicked his wrist toward Erik. “Especially when you get two trigger-happy ex-cops wandering around blowing up everything in sight. Venus. The moon. Need I go on?”

  Jia eyed him. “I’m sorry i
f you don’t like how we’ve handled our missions, but I would assume if you know anything about the conspiracy, you understand that sometimes they leave us no choice.” She glared at him. “Or would you have preferred we let them sink Parvati or blow Chang’e dome? I don’t know how quiet it is when thousands of people scream before they die, and if I have to choose between secrecy and saving thousands of lives, I’ll pick the people every time.”

  Dalton chuckled, the plastic smile returning. He leaned back and folded his arms. “Dial it down, Lady Justice. I’m not saying you’ve always made the wrong move, but you have to understand where you are and how that introduces complications.”

  “Last time I checked, we were in Lumiere on Chiron. Care to educate me on what those complications are? We’re not here to upset you. We’re all on the same team.”

  Jia glanced at Erik to ensure she wasn’t going too far. He didn’t look upset, and he nodded back, which was enough for her to continue taking the lead in the conversation.

  “Earth is the center of the UTC,” Dalton began, “but it’s not the entire UTC. Every half-dedicated terrorist, insurrectionist, or piece of scum out on the frontier who wants a shot at Earth needs to go through this system first because they don’t have your special toy.” He pointed at Jia. “No one cares about the secondary colonies or stations, or the tiny smattering of other cities, so they all end up in Chiron. Here in Lumiere, we probably have the greatest concentration of dangerous filth in the entire UTC. Sure, Neo SoCal is big, but there are billions of people on Earth. That encourages the filth to spread out more.” He gestured broadly. “It’s easy to get lost there. Here, they’re tripping all over each other. Insurrectionists, Grayheads, syndicates, guys who got transported and want to skip out on their sentence and return to Earth. Greedy bastards who think they have a good shot at becoming the next Sophia Vand.”

  Jia rolled her eyes. “We get it. You’ve seen it all, darkness, depravity, and greed. It’s not like we haven’t seen our fair share of trouble. We’ve fought things that shouldn’t exist. We’ve dealt with people who make the most vicious rabid animal seem moral in comparison.”