Commander Gary Drefnig sat in the pilot seat of a Rotohawk truck. His athletic frame was slim enough to fit inside the narrow bucket seats but his height made it difficult not to bang his head on the roof every time he drove over a bump in the road. His bright blue eyes gazed out through the dirt-covered windscreen as he held onto the juddering drive stick with both hands.
The sun had set over an hour ago and the moon was already high in the sky. Much of the city had fallen into darkness. The night drones cast just enough light for him to make out rough outlines of the road ahead. Drefnig leant forwards, flicking a switch on the dashboard in front of him. Banks of spotlights on the cab's roof illuminated the road ahead with bright white light.
'That's better,' Drefnig said, searching the road ahead for potholes. It felt good to be out of the towers. Combat operations made him feel alive.
Major John Entworth sat in the bucket seat next to him, examining a console in one hand while he scratched at the back of his leg. 'I can't get rid of this damned itch,' he said. 'I swear I don't know what's wrong with me.'
'Why don't you get a medical droid to look at it?' Drefnig's long brown hair flopped down in front of his eyes. He held the drive stick in one hand while he pushed it back into place, and then gripped the stick tight again as the Rotohawk's wheels juddered over a rough patch in the road.
'Are you kidding? Those things aren't poking me with their cold steel implements.'
Drefnig pushed the drive stick forwards. The Rotohawk whined in complaint then began to pick up speed. The Old Quarter's dusty roads were almost clear at this time of night. He was hoping it wouldn't take long to reach their destination. He leant back and relaxed his shoulders. He could feel the vibration of the road through his bucket seat.
'Do you know what I heard today?' Entworth said, sitting up straight in his seat.
'I hope this is not another one of your third hand stories about Gail Thompson working on a market stall selling spice cakes.'
'No, that was Rodnig winding me up. This one comes from a reliable source.'
'Who?'
'Well, it was Rodnig again, but he's not joking this time.'
'Okay, tell me,' Drefnig said, his thin eyebrows lowering in concentration.
'There's a new general coming.'
'I heard that too.'
'Why didn't you tell me?'
'I've heard these things before. It could still be several weeks before we find out who's really taking over from Thompson. Until then, none of this is any more than gossip.'
Entworth shrugged. 'Rodnig sounded sure this time.'
The Rotohawk ran over a dip in the road. Drefnig ducked his head just in time to save himself from another bump on the head. His reactions were improving.
Entworth grinned from a flat face. 'Feisty, isn't it?'
Drefnig nodded, glancing up at the cab's roof. It was well known that Rotohawks took a while to get used to. They all handled differently. 'We'll find out if Rodnig's right soon enough,' he said. 'In the meantime we have our duties to attend to. We know exactly what needs doing. Let's get on with it.'
Entworth nodded and reached down to lock his seat in the forward position. He pulled a restraining bar down from the cab roof, wrapping around his chest to hold him securely in place. 'I still don't get why we're looking for this guy. I thought the clean-up squad said he was dead?'
Drefnig shook his head. 'Dead men don't walk.'
'What do you mean?'
'When the clean-up squad entered the basement of the Mekinet News building, they found Rachel Henson lying in the hallway but they only found one body in Riser Trent's office.'
'You told me all this before. Riser Trent wasn't there. It doesn't mean he's still alive. Henson's report said Trent burnt to death. Right? And they found half a pair of legs in a pile of ash on the levels above, didn't they? It's obvious that must have been him.'
'That was too far away. Remember, there weren't any lifts in the basement. Trent can't walk. Do you think he ran up several flights of stairs, while paralysed and on fire, just so he could burn to death on a higher level? I think we can safely rule out that option.'
'I don't know what he did,' Entworth said. 'I could equally ask you how a man who can't walk got down there in the first place. It all sounds odd to me.'
'It is odd,' Drefnig said. 'That's why we're here, to find out what really happened.' Flicking the drive stick to the left, he sent the Rotohawk into a controlled slide around a tight left-hand corner. The wheels tore up the road, sending plumes of thick orange dust into the air.
Something clattered in the cage behind him and a voice cried out. 'Shit, man. I was having a drink.'
Entworth hung onto his restraining bar and turned to Drefnig with a grin. 'It sounds like the boys are getting warmed up.'
'Are you guys all right back there?' Drefnig shouted over his shoulder.
'We're good,' said a different voice, deeper than the first.
Six members of the security forces had packed themselves into the Rotohawk's rear cage before the operation had begun. They had all been sat facing each other on two short benches when Drefnig had closed the rear door fifteen minutes earlier. He suspected that a few of them might have fallen off their benches since then.
'When are you going to learn how to bloody drive?' Trooper Ken Boland said, pressing his sweaty face against a wire mesh hatch just behind Drefnig's head.
It was the only opening between the pilot cab and the rear cage. It was there to allow the driver to communicate with prisoners during transportation. It just so happened that today's prisoners were a bunch of disgruntled security forces, hitching a ride for a combat operation. It was always easier to requisition a Rotohawk truck than to get hold of some of the more modern combat vehicles.
Drefnig ignored Boland's complaints and stared through the clearing dust cloud ahead. The road was gradually becoming smoother and wider. They were entering the outskirts of the Business District. Tall tower blocks rose up on each side of the road, casting dark shadows across the ground. Shiny black windows reflected in the moonlight above. The buildings had an ominous presence in the darkness. This was where the top achievers of Cinnamon City spent most of their days. The richest of the businessmen lived in the Aristocrat Zone. It was a place with its own security, a place that the security forces were not welcome. They were an aloof bunch. They outsourced the real work to their business partners in the city. The true businessmen couldn't bear to be away from the buzz of their next transaction. The Business District was where those transactions took place, and where the next generation would build their companies from the ground up.
Drefnig watched the tall buildings with a curious glint in his eye. Staring through the dust-covered windscreen, he checked the position of the moon. It looked even larger than usual. Several craters were clearly visible, even through the hazy surface of the Dome Shield.
The pale green holomap flashed on the Rotohawk's dashboard, confirming that they were still heading in the right direction.
'What makes you think Trent's here?' Entworth said, wiping dust from his sweat-stained brow.
Drefnig glanced in his direction. 'When the clean-up squad couldn't find Trent's body, they marked him down as missing, presumed dead. I always thought there was something odd about the situation. I did a little investigating of my own. Trent had a brother called Damen. He lived in an apartment directly opposite the Mekinet News building.'
Entworth stuck his head out of the side window, looking up at the tall buildings around them. When he turned back to face Drefnig, he had a thin layer of road dust on his face. 'That's where we're going, isn't it? I still don't understand why.'
'It's simple.'
'Okay. What's this all about?'
'They found Damen's body in the basement. They examined him and confirmed that he was dead.'
'So why are we going to his apartment?'
'When I did some background checks, I discovered that his apartment was still in use.'
'What do you mean?'
'I put some surveillance on it. The lights are never on in the windows, but someone is drawing energy from the apartment's power grid. It's not just a constant usage, like you'd expect to see if Damen had left something turned on when he went out. His apartment has the varying energy profile of an occupied residence.'
'You think someone is living in it?'
'Yes.'
'Maybe he shared the apartment with someone else? Maybe he had a woman?'
'The apartment is listed in Damen's name. I couldn't find any record of it being a shared residence.'
'Those files are crap,' Entworth said. 'I wrote some of them myself when I first signed up. They're full of errors, and most of them are years out of date.'
'True, but the apartment only has one bedroom, and Damen was a loner from what we know. I had an undercover guy ask some of the other residents if they had ever seen Damen bring back any friends or partners. They all said he was alone whenever they had seen him. Most of them didn't like him much. He wasn't the type who makes friends with his neighbours.'
'It's not surprising. Guys like that keep to themselves.' Entworth turned and spat out of the window. 'Is that all we've got? Someone living at the apartment?'
Drefnig shook his head. 'There's more. I know someone's living in Damen's apartment, sitting in the dark, and using his power. I'm sure about that. I thought I'd delve a little further so I put a level one trace on his network connection. It turns out the occupant has been transferring vast quantities of data from an autonomous drone far to the South.'
'What sort of data?'
'I got Commander Parker to take a team down there to investigate. They found a Drop Ranger that had crashed a few kilometres north of Havers Compound. Parker said it had been used as a relay station between a Sphynx-II controller rack and a fleet of net-feed droids.'
'You mean the droids that broadcast the battle of Havers Compound on Mekinet News?'
'Exactly.'
Entworth let out a high-pitched whistle and rolled his eyes. 'Okay. That doesn't sound good. Maybe we're onto something.'
'Since the dead don't draw power, and they don't use network connections to extract data from their previous possessions, I'd like to know what the hell is going on in Damen's apartment.'
'Maybe it's haunted,' Entworth said with a glint in his eye. 'Do you think the evil spirit of Riser Trent has been sent to curse us all?'
Drefnig gave Entworth an even look.
'Okay. Maybe your theory is better. Maybe Riser Trent is living in his brother's apartment. He's ugly enough to want to live with the lights out. Do you really think it's him?'
Drefnig turned and pointed at Entworth with one finger. 'That's what we're going to find out.'