Project Phoenix

by D. C. Fergerson

  Cora leaned in, her voice low. “You’re Lucius, an ancient dragon. You leveraged your wealth after waking up to become CEO of the cybernetics startup Tetriarch in 2061. By becoming the leader in installations of bionic hardware, many of them military, you became one of the richest and most powerful men in the world. You’re now the de facto leader of Germany, the heart of the EU. You awoke from hibernation two years before The Awakening. Once you had prepared the world to accept what was about to come, you rose to dominate EU policy and presented yourself as head of the Dragon Council. Since then, you’ve been chasing through museums, looking for something from the past. My team got too close to the truth and you had them killed. You set me up to take the fall for it with my own government, and now we’re here.”

  The dragon shook his head. “Aww, you were doing so well at first. One moment.”

  He got up from his seat and opened his office door. A chef and two waiters entered the office, rolling a cart with silver trays, glasses, and a carafe on it. They moved fast to the table and set the places for Cora and Lucius, then lifted the trays. Sliced ham and Eggs Benedict steamed off the plate. The scent made Cora’s mouth water. The waiters wheeled out with the same precision. The chef lingered a moment and observed Lucius taking in the spread. With a nod, the chef left the room and they were alone again. Lucius reached for the carafe.

  “Orange juice, Miss Blake?”

  Cora nodded. With all the magic she expended from herself in the past day, she needed the fuel more than she cared to admit. He filled her glass, then his own. Lucius took his seat, setting a napkin on his lap.

  “I did not kill your team,” he said, lifting his utensils. “Neither literally, nor by design. I don’t think you did, either, or else you wouldn’t be calling your target for help. And if you really thought I did it, I doubt you’d be sitting here.”

  “What the hell did my team die for, then? Who did this, and why? What is the object you’re trying to find from these museums?” Cora asked.

  Lucius finished chewing and swallowed. With a smile, he replied, “Who said I was looking for one thing? Miss Blake -”

  “Cora.”

  Lucius bowed his head. “Cora, you seem to think that Tetriarch and the NSA, or you and I by extension, are playing a game of chess in some kind of tournament. We’re not. I am the tournament. I am the arena under which every game is played. I see all of the moves of all of the players and all of their pieces. Even after everyone is eliminated and gone, I am always there.”

  Cora crossed her arms. “Well, aren’t you the modest one.”

  Lucius let out a deep, hearty laugh that reverberated around the room. “You’re as daring as you are beautiful.”

  There he was again. Compliments and friendly banter. It made her feel flush and uncomfortable at the same time. Trying her best to hide it, she stared him down until he continued.

  “In the previous Awakening, I counseled kings and generals. In the First Awakening, I guided pharaohs and warlords. I am not boastful, nor am I a narcissist. I had centuries to perfect my long game.”

  “You didn’t answer my question,” Cora replied. She finally broke down and tried the eggs. The hollandaise sauce lit up her palate, the delicate flavors like velvet on her tongue.

  Lucius smiled at her. “Your face is so expressive. I’m glad you like it.”

  Cora stared back at him, raising an eyebrow. Lucius sighed.

  “Right, we’re not going to be friends. To answer your questions, I would first have to know who was in that restaurant, who hired them, how they knew who their targets were, and so on.”

  “For all of your power and influence, you don’t know any of that?”

  “My investigators have their suspicions,” he replied. “What I cannot have is your government thinking I had any involvement in this. Time is of the essence, and we are losing ground every second we waste. So, I have an offer for you.”

  Cora continued eating, unable to stop once she started. She pushed her food to the side of her mouth and replied, “I’m listening.”

  Lucius cleared his throat. “You serve two masters on opposing sides, as I see it. One wishes to arrest or kill you on sight. The other is me.”

  Cora stared hard into his glowing eyes. “I don’t serve you.”

  “Perhaps not, but your career in the NSA has made you my potential enemy, yet we now have the same interests, which is to get the NSA off our backs and find the truth of what happened in that restaurant,” Lucius replied. He leaned forward and topped off her orange juice. “I am willing to use my influence and power to allow you to collect that information freely, without fear of your government interfering.”

  She sat back and crossed her arms again. “You’re saying you need me?”

  “Need is a strong word,” Lucius replied. “I believe with your mind, your gifts, and your knowledge of the situation, you’re the best person I could have investigating this. There is a car waiting for you downstairs. If we agree on some terms, that car will take you back to the restaurant. You will have full access, and my men will be at your disposal.”

  Cora scoffed. “In exchange for what?”

  Lucius shook his head. “Do I really need to say it? Whatever you uncover that clears your name, you keep. Any other data your team may have collected will be returned to me, and you will forget you ever knew it existed.”

  The file from the wet drive. That was his price. Abandon a year of her team’s work to prevent being arrested for their murder. If that didn’t sound like motive, she didn’t know what did. The situation played perfectly into Lucius’ hands, even if he was telling the truth. It would have been easy to hate him based on that information alone, if he wasn’t so damned charming and attractive. The easy smile and the body of some Greek sculpture of perfection would only go so far - he was still after something more. Her team died trying to find out what he was up to, the NSA wanted a private war over it, and a third party wanted something else.

  “Really, Cora,” Lucius pressed. “I can see you’re torn, but for what? The same government that’s hunting me in my own backyard is now after you, as well. Would it really be so bad to wash your hands of all of this?”

  He had a point. Cora nodded. “Very well. But if I find that you have lied to me, that you were involved at all, know this,” she said, leaning in closer and fixing on his eyes. “I don’t care if it costs me my life. I’m coming back here for you. I will find a way to hurt you.”

  Lucius set down his utensils and leaned back in his seat. “I respect that. You know, it’s funny. You remind me of the older days. In a world of seven billion now, most of them are sheep. You’re a warrior.”

  Cora dabbed her mouth with her napkin and stood up. “I’ll take that as a compliment. I’ll also be taking that ride now. No sense in wasting another minute.”

  “Of course,” Lucius replied, getting up from his seat. He walked her to the door. “Hold out your screen.”

  Cora swiped out her computer screen and offered her hand. Lucius held her hand as he gently typed on the back of it. His hands were huge, making hers look like a child in comparison. His touch was delicate and soft. So soft. He finished what he was doing and pushed her screen away, releasing her hand.

  “You have my direct line, now,” he said. “I want updates in real-time. As you know it, I need to know. Hopefully, the two of us can get this solved swiftly.”

  Cora walked ahead and pushed on the door. Lucius called out to her.

  “One other thing,” he said. His face showed uncertainty, choosing his words again. “To spare you, I had the bodies removed. They are available if you need to examine them. I had to discreetly get them past NSA. They’re at a dwarven morgue in Marzahn until we can arrange for proper care. In the meantime, there are holograms in place at the restaurant for reference.”

  “I...I appreciate that, I guess,” Cora said. She didn’t know how she felt about the news.

  Whether he was playing her for a fool or he genuinely wanted
to see justice done, Cora couldn’t be sure. Like everyone she met since the hotel, camps were beginning to form between those that wanted her dead and those that wanted to protect her. Her only concern as she left the office revolved around whether she’d learn what side Lucius was on before it was too late to do anything about it.

  She offered a respectful bow of her head and left. A Bauer soldier waited for her by the elevator. He nodded as she approached and escorted her back down. Outside the glass, the rising sun competed against the lights of the city for dominance. The ride back to the restaurant would have to be done without warning Johnny and Giovanna. She already knew the risks walking in the building. Being severed from her new team was the least of her worries. Within minutes of exiting Lucius’ office, she was in a luxury car with a driver taking her back to Steakhaus Günther.

  Fading Memories

  The car had passed through four checkpoints to reach the restaurant. The Polizei were thorough in locking out any UNS or press from getting anywhere near the place. Outside the restaurant, dozens of Bauer soldiers kept a perimeter, rifles at the ready.

  The scent of death and copper still lingered in the place as Cora entered the building. Sunlight projected color on both sides of the entrance through the stained glass windows. All of the tables were empty. Only three people stood inside the dining room. A man in the back of the room had set up a rig on the far end of the bar, nearest to where her team was killed. The other two ended their conversation at the sight of her and approached. One was stout, with sandy hair and a thick mustache. The other was slight and balding.

  “I am Inspector Schulz, and this is my colleague, Inspector Richter,” the fat man said. “You are the specialist sent by Lucius, yes?”

  “Sure, we’ll go with that,” Cora replied. She surveyed the room. “Tell me what you’ve gathered so far.”

  Inspector Richter walked up the step to the elevated platform on the right side of the room. He pointed to the horseshoe-shaped booth.

  “This is where the UNS agents were sitting,” he explained. “We believe they were the targets. Two of them were armed. We believe they were hit first. The other side of the room and the kitchen staff were then rounded up and executed. Finally, they located a man downstairs.”

  “Downstairs?” Cora interrupted. “Who was the man? Is that known?”

  Schulz spoke up. “He appears to have been the manager of this place. Yuri Popov, a Russian immigrant. Something was also special about him.”

  Cora put a hand on her hip. “How so?”

  “He was tied to a chair down there. The body showed signs of torture before they killed him.”

  Inspector Richter stepped down. “We also believe some bodies may have been taken. We can’t be sure about that, though. There are blood trails on the street outside the building.”

  Cora shook her head. “No, that was me.”

  The detectives looked at each other, confused. She stepped around them and pointed to the younger guy in the back staring at his holographic screens.

  “Who’s he?” she asked.

  “Ben Weber,” Schulz replied. “Holographic forensics.”

  The man looked away from his screens for only a moment and met eyes with Cora. He gave a limp wave and returned to his studies. Cora sighed.

  “Pardon me asking, Miss,” Schulz said. He motioned his hands up and down her body. “You don’t exactly look like a specialist. Who are you with?”

  Cora looked down. Her t-shirt, jeans, and riding boots didn’t scream professional, that much was true. They could have been referring to her age, though. Her caramel skin and black hair may have also contributed to their assessment. She certainly stood out in a room full of Germans. Still, she took mild offense to the question.

  “Who I’m with is not your concern,” Cora replied. “All I care about is that I have your full cooperation. Do I have that?”

  Cora stared the Inspector in the eye, daring him to challenge her. His eyes dropped to the ground, caving without hesitation.

  “Of course,” he said. “Anything you need.”

  She left the inspectors behind her and walked up to the booth. At the edge of the table, a circular lens of crystal rested on the edge of the table. She braced herself, took a deep breath, and turned to the man at the bar.

  “Herr Weber,” she said. “Please activate the holograms for this booth.”

  The emitter on the edge of the table lit up and projected a photo-realistic 3D rendering of Richard, Toller, and Doctor Nielsen laying at the table. Two more bodies appeared at her feet on either side of her. For hours, she had hoped to purge this image from her mind. Studying it in detail was the last thing she wanted.

  She leaned into the table, resting her arms on both sides of it. She looked down at Richard’s head, grateful she could only see the small entry wound at his temple and not the horror of what the exit wound did to the other side of his face. She turned her head to the left, following the path from his head to the shattered portion of the stained glass window at the front.

  “Can you calculate the bullet trajectory from here to the origin outside?” Cora asked the room.

  “I could,” Weber replied. “But I don’t have any holographic emitters out there.”

  Cora nodded. “I’m going to want that. Get out there and get it done. I’ll check on a few other things while we’re waiting.”

  She walked past the detectives and headed to the bar. She hopped over the counter, careful to avoid the trap door. She wanted to get down there, but she felt the need to confirm Giovanna’s story first. She moved into the kitchen. The smell of carbon burned her nose. The floors were still wet with the cold water from the sprinklers. Her boots sploshed as she weaved around the prep station and headed into the back. The footfalls of the detectives followed close behind her.

  She reached the walk-in freezer and tried the handle. It was jammed. Giovanna had a penchant for stashing people in small spaces and trapping them there.

  “We were having trouble with that,” Schulz said. “Keypad is broken. We called for a locksmith, but we’re still waiting.”

  Cora may have hated technology, but when it came to locking mechanisms, she was trained to be an expert. She examined the broken scanning pad beside the handle. A Kinkler 647, designed to read a person’s NFC chip against the employee database and open the door hands-free. The pad had been smashed inward, likely by the butt of a rifle.

  She turned around to the prep table. She ran back, retrieved a knife and returned to the pad. Partially smashed was not fully smashed, and that was the biggest problem keeping the door shut. With the tip of the knife, she stabbed into the center of the faux-glass panel. A twist and pull, and Cora pried out the entire screen into the palm of her free hand. She tossed it into a nearby trash bin and looked inside the guts of the pad. The main circuit board recessed a few inches into freezer door. The emergency release for this model scanner required a special tool to carefully unseat and pull away the CMOS battery. It held the lock even in the case of a power failure. It was a delicate piece of equipment that Cora began stabbing and jamming the knife into, until she broke the clamps holding the battery down. The lock beeped like a broken toy and the latch clicked open.

  Within the freezer, the airtight seals prevented the water on the kitchen floor from getting inside. The temperature was also set so low that the naked male corpse within did not smell of anything but his own waste.

  “Body,” Cora said to the detectives.

  The cops rushed over to her side. The body appeared to be human, possibly of southeast Asian descent. From his awkward position, sprawled out with his head at an awkward angle, it was likely a broken neck that killed him. Beside the body, a black evening dress. Cora could read the Romero tag in it from where she was standing. She shook her head and took a picture with her wrist computer and tapped her earpiece.

  “Check against PMC registration,” she said. Turning to the detectives behind her, she said, “You’ll want to have this body
sent over with the others.”

  “Shit,” Schulz replied.

  “Match confirmed,” her computer’s voice responded. “Soldier First Class Darany Cheng, formerly Royal Cambodian Army. Current assignment with Vulkan Group.”

  “Well, that story checks out,” Cora muttered to herself, relieved. She tapped her earpiece again. “Send a message to Lucius, ‘Vulkan Group was the PMC that hit the restaurant. Recovered a body. Someone may have escaped besides me.’ Send.”

  She walked out of the kitchen and went straight for the trap door beneath the bar. The stairs were narrow and led down to a small wine cellar lit by a single bulb. It was cramped, the kind of closed space that made Cora tense. The ceiling inches from the top of her head, she felt like every wall closed in on her. She pushed it from her mind and surveyed the room. It could only accommodate four people at most. A single chair sat in the middle of the space. A circle of blood-stained wood rested beneath it.

  “Excuse me, Miss?” a voice called from the top of the stairs.

  “Yes?”

  “I got those emitters set up outside,” Weber said.

  “Thank you,” she replied. “Could you activate the hologram down here, please?”

  “Yes, right away.”

  Within moments, an emitter on the floor projected a man tied to the chair. He had been wearing a white business shirt without a tie or jacket. The front of the shirt soaked in blood from his neck to the belt on his black pants. His face had been beaten so badly, his own mother wouldn’t have recognized him.

  Cora had never been to this restaurant with her team before. None of them had ever even mentioned it. Richard enjoyed spending his money on the team, often with a great deal of luxury. By all rights, this place would have been a dive. Yet, this is where Richard chose to do business, and the manager of this restaurant either knew of that meeting, or knew something else. Either way, he was important to Vulkan.

  Cora squatted down in front of the chair. She was exhausted, scouring her mind for a path forward. Her brain was turning to clay. She took a breath and tried to visualize a better place, a happier place where she could find her center. Instead, images came of black-suited soldiers smashing rifle butts and fists into a man’s face while he pleaded for his life. She reached out and rested her hand on the chair, trying to steady herself. Nausea gripped her as she felt tacky, drying blood still left on the chair. Her quiet place was lost to her, trapped in the moment where this man died.