| |
Grimes fled the corridor with a small, satisfied smile on his face.
He had drawn first blood, and his initial pass at the target had proved most informative. His dagger had sliced through Tankowicz’s armor as if it were nothing. He now knew for certain he could kill the giant oaf at any time. This knowledge made the rest of the job far less problematic. He also knew for certain that the black case did not hold the missing memory core. None of them had even flinched when it fell, and Grimes had suspected all along that they would employ a decoy. Richardson was much too clever and experienced to not do so. That left the woman’s backpack or Richardson’s satchel as the other probable locations. He ruled out Richardson right away. The boy lacked the physical skills to protect the device if found out. The woman, on the other hand...
Grimes remembered his previous bouts with that woman. Her speed and reflexes were the fastest he had ever known. She also appeared well-trained, for a civilian. He looked down at the still-smoking tear in his shirt. The flechette had passed less than an inch from his bottom rib. Even at full speed and with the element of surprise, she had nearly killed him. No one could be that fast. It simply was not possible. Nevertheless, Grimes lived in the real world and did not waste any time or energy denying the evidence of his eyes. That woman warranted more care next time, and next time was coming up shortly.
He checked the Privateer tactical feed. Acquiring their private codes had taken some doing, but with OmniCorp on his side nothing was impossible. Sure enough, the target group had resumed their trek toward their ship. With greater speed now, he observed in passing. Grimes grunted in approval. They would be in the more public areas next and with a sense of urgency that encouraged mistakes. No one would risk a shootout in the public areas, and Grimes depended upon encountering limited firepower for his escape. It seemed the Privateers understood this, too. Station security converged on his last known location with a vengeance. Everything was going perfectly.
With a twist of his watch dial, Grimes disabled his clothing’s stealth features for one full second before turning the countermeasures back on. He checked to ensure that the damage to his shirt had not rendered the systems moot and frowned. While there were noticeable gaps in the coverage, it was nothing that would stop the mission. He stood and began to jog while adjusting his hood to ensure its sensor-obscuring weave covered his whole head. As long as OmniCorp continued to spoof a rotating series of counterfeit biometrics through his clothes, there would be no way to track him. He allowed that the hole in his electronic cover might make it possible to pierce this illusion eventually, but the chances of that felt low. Besides, he had given them a little look at his true position on purpose. Desperate for a break, the blip of his position in scanners must have felt like a godsend to the station security teams. Spirited tac channel chatter confirmed that security had taken the bait without a second thought. As planned, multiple squads of Privateers converged on where he was, not where he was going to be. Grimes turned his jog into a run, each long stride pushing him further from the depths of the station and closer to the more public decks. He did not slow until he stepped through a double door into a customs floor adjacent to the loading areas. Endless rows of queues stretched out before him, stuffed with hundreds of bored and irritated spacefarers waiting for a chance to be scanned, questioned, and taxed before leaving Enterprise Station. A wall of sound assaulted his ears in a solid wave of human voices raised in various levels of frustration and indignance.
Grimes let his eyes narrow as his focus tightened. His timing would need to be perfect. Since it always was, Grimes did not mind. He knifed through the crowd in a straight line, targeting the exit to boarding and loading areas. Being with the Privateers did not exempt the enemy from customs, though he expected them to enjoy every advantage in clearing the gates. He need not have worried. The need for care made the fixers slower than his headlong flight, and he arrived with minutes to spare.
He saw them enter from across the deck. The scarred giant walked in front with the lieutenant in tow. Richardson followed, and Grimes felt his pulse quicken for an instant. He let the internal conflict pass and set his mind to his task once more. The cyborg entered with the woman and the scientists next. He fixed his sights on her backpack, confident that this is where he would find the memory core. The little blond assassin came through last, and this made Grimes smile. She suspected something. He could see it in her frown. Grimes could respect a fellow professional, and he reminded himself that this was not the time to test his skills against a peer. He began his stalk, moving between clumps of people like a lion through tall grass. He did not hurry. He did not rush. He was alongside the group in less than a minute. A throng of tourists blocked him from their sight, the frightened group of travelers kept well from the twin glowers of the big mercenary and hulking cyborg.
Now, he thought.
Grimes inhaled, found zanshin, and sprang.
Several things happened at once, and even Grimes with his enhanced reflexes struggled to keep track of all of them. As soon as he cleared the tourists, the woman’s hand began to move to her pistol. Too fast. Faster than him, which he did not think could be possible. Nevertheless, planning for the impossible had saved his life more than once. He started his slide even as her weapon cleared the holster. As he knew she would, the woman hesitated. The CZ105 was an expensive weapon with projectiles capable of penetrating mild body armor. Firing such a weapon in this space virtually guaranteed a civilian casualty, and Grimes already knew she did not have the stomach for that. Her speed made no difference if she declined to pull the trigger.
The others reacted in order of their reflexes. The big cyborg moved next, turning to block his charge a fraction of a second behind the woman. Grimes had chosen his moment well and already knew the monster would not complete his maneuver in time. Mindy was the last to move. She did not attack, but rather stepped in to defend the scientists. She was a professional, and professionals knew their roles. It made her reactions predictable.
The distance between Grimes and the Ribiero woman dissolved to nothing, and his hand extended in a long thrust with his dagger. The woman dodged, and he saw the tight frown on her face as his blade passed by her ribs without making contact. She was right to be confused. Grimes had not been aiming for her in earnest, but rather to make her turn in exactly the manner she just had. She probably figured it out right at the moment his dagger opened her backpack, which made his victory all the sweeter. The black box tumbled from the bag, and Grimes caught it with his left hand. He did not turn, he did not gloat, he did not fight.
He ran.
Grimes poured every ounce of speed he could drag from the steel-strong muscles in his legs as he fled. He flitted through the crowd like a supersonic hummingbird, missing passengers and leaping kiosks with superhuman grace. Grimes did not look back. He knew his destination and how to get there, so there was no point in checking for the pursuers he knew had to be close. At the exit to the boarding areas, he slapped his palm to a reader, which connected his DNA to his boarding pass and opened the door. The vestibule flashed his ship’s docking bay number, and he made note of it in passing. This cost him three-quarters of a second, which felt like an hour considering how many angry killers were right behind him. He darted through the door, which closed behind him. He kept up his run, though he relaxed knowing that the fixers would be slowed by the boarding AI. Perhaps four or five seconds at most, but at his speed that may as well be a lifetime.
His ship was fourteen bays over, an unfortunate reality of the gate schedules. Grimes accepted the risk and ran. Halfway to his bay, Grimes tripped. During the ungainly tumble that followed, Grimes had time to accept that his fall was not accidental. His shoulder struck the deck plate and he rolled to his feet, dagger outstretched. A foot caught him in the guts hard enough to make him grunt, followed by an explosion of electrical agony erupting from his ribs. Grimes rolled with the punch and staggered back. His bone and muscle density mocked the kick to his guts, and the weave of his cloaking outerwear blunted the pain of the electrical shock. His counterattack followed with no hesitation and lightning speed. The humming black dagger traced a darting figure-eight through the air, trailing soft orange light as the air passing the hot edge cooled it in passing. His four slashes were designed to kill, though he was not surprised to see his attacker dodge them all.
“Grimes!” He heard her voice. The woman sounded surprised to see him. Of course she was.
He recognized the Ribiero woman immediately. She must have guessed his route somehow and overtaken him. “Get back!” he commanded.
She did not. She attacked with two low kicks, faster than he could dodge, but not so fast he failed to check them with his shin. He heard her gasp in pain and saw her stumble. His own foot snaked out to graze her chin and she gasped again. The dagger followed but she had already recovered from her surprise. She let it pass by her face and struck a sharp blow to his sternum. The electric fire seared his chest and he grunted, but it did not slow him much. He spun with the blow and returned a back kick at her midriff. He was strong enough to shatter her ribs and rupture organs, yet she proved too elusive for clean hits. His boot just grazed her flank and sent her spinning to the deck. She bounded back up in an instant and attacked again. With a better understanding of her capabilities, Grimes let her come. The shocks from the gauntlets were manageable, if unpleasant, so he did not actively defend them. She was too fast to spar with at range, so enduring her blows bought him the proximity he needed to finish this fight before the big cyborg caught up. He allowed a punch to connect with his ribs, suffered a low kick against his knee, and used the opportunity to seize her by the throat. She twisted in his grip and at last went for her gun. He anticipated this reaction and the dagger in his hand sliced the weapon in two before it had cleared the holster. She struck him twice more, and the shocks nearly dislodged his grip. The time was now. He brought the dagger up to impale her under the chin.
And then he stopped.
His eyes met hers. He saw panic and rage there, but also sadness. He held her, his grip shaking and his muscles refusing to finish the thrust he knew would kill her.
There it was. His addiction. This did not feel right, and Grimes knew why. Cursing himself for a fool, he lowered the blade and leaned his face close to hers.
“You spared me once,” he whispered. “You let me live when you could have killed me.” He tightened his grip, cutting off the flow of blood to her brain. “For that we are now even. The next time we meet, I will kill you.”
Her eyes rolled back in their sockets, and her body went limp. Her head slumped to the side in time for Grimes to see the big cyborg barreling toward him like a furious freight hauler. A prolonged battle with the monster when he needed to be getting off-station was out of the question, so Grimes dropped the woman to the floor and sprinted away. This was even better, he realized. They would stop to render aid to the woman giving him more room to escape. So long as he stayed ahead of the station security details, his escape was assured. With renewed vigor, Grimes stretched his legs to their maximum speed, not caring who saw or how strange he looked to the people around him. He cleared the next four docking bays in seconds flat, skidding to an abrupt halt when he recognized his number. With his boarding area so close ahead, Grimes shoved his way to the front of the line and pressed his palm to the gate scanner. No one objected to the rough treatment beyond angry huffing and shouted insults, sparing Grimes the hassle of harming innocent passengers. The display flashed red, and a polite voice informed him that he was not at the correct ship. Grimes stifled an expletive and read the screen. Somehow, he was off by one bay. He cursed the stupid amateur mistake. Risking a look to the concourse at his back, relief washed over him. He saw no sign of pursuit along the corridors. Of course not. The soft-hearted fools were more concerned with their wounded comrade than the mission. His error was not fatal. Yet. He ran to the next gate, treating the assorted passengers in his way with the same rough treatment as before. At the scanner, he repeated his previous performance. This time, the gate whooshed open and let him pass without incident. Elated, Grimes bolted down the gangplank, through an airlock, and slipped onto the reception deck and the safety of his gate ship. The risk of capture ended with the whoosh of entry vestibule doors, and Grimes let himself exhale a long-held breath. As long as his diplomatic security token remained keyed to his DNA, there was no legal way to stop his escape now.
Nevertheless, he sent a practiced professional gaze across the reception deck. Just because a thing was not legal did not mean his foes would not try. He scanned visual, infrared, and ultraviolet all at once. He saw nothing of interest. Nothing but hundreds of simple travelers milling about the open deck. Some peered into terminals, checking their berth assignments. Others hustled off toward their accommodations with luggage in tow. A few were asking questions of uniformed crew members. All wore the look of normal people about the normal business of space travel. Grimes saw nothing to make him suspect clandestine operators or law enforcement personnel hid among the clumps of tired-looking humans. It should have made him feel better.
Yet something felt off, and Grimes could not figure out why. His stomach fluttered as each detail of the ship pricked at his calm with tiny needles of apprehension. He squinted, though no new or interesting insights manifested for this effort. Still, the feeling only got more noticeable as he moved to an empty terminal. Once again, Grimes scanned his palm, this time to retrieve his berth assignment. He frowned at the result and his stomach lurched again. Now he knew something was amiss. OmniCorp had ensured that he would have a private cabin to better protect the stolen memory core. The screen very clearly indicated that he was booked into a group stateroom with other diplomatic token bearers. A cold prickle began at the base of his spine, crawled up his back, and settled into the nape of his neck. The mix-up at the gate and the erroneous berth assignment did not feel quite like coincidence or human error anymore. Cursing himself for an idiot, Grimes did the one thing he had not yet done up to this point. He actually looked at the name of the ship. His teeth slammed together in frustration with an audible click. Snarling with indiscriminate fury, the assassin yanked his handheld from a pocket. He thumbed through the screens and punched the send key with a fierce scowl.
“Haskille here,” the answering voice said.
“What ship did you put me on?” he hissed.
“Grimes? What do you mean? I put you on the Marigold. Just like you asked.”
“Check it. Where the hell am I right now?”
“What the hell are you—”
“Check!” he yelled.
“Hold on!” There was a pause. “Why are you on the Godspeed? I have your booking right here on screen. It was changed within the last four minutes.”
“Who changed it?”
“Hang on. It says you changed it, Grimes.”
Of course it did. Grimes had known the answer before even asking the question. He accepted his fate, though fury smashed at the walls of his composure like a lunatic in a padded room. There would be no help for that now. “Haskille?”
“Yes?”
“Where is this ship going?”
“Uh... Gethsemane, according to its schedule. Yes. You gate in an hour, and then a nine-day jump to Gethsemane.”
“Did my diplomatic token transfer with me?” He knew it had but felt compelled to ask.
“Of course. Grimes, what is going on? I booked you on the Marigold. I did it myself. Why are you on the Godspeed?”
“Richardson must have found my boarding pass.”
“But your pass is codelocked to your DNA! With a diplomatic token, even! Finding it means nothing. It’s an untouchable, non-transferable asset!”
“He didn’t touch the boarding pass, Haskille. It still works perfectly. He just switched the ship assignment.” Grimes remembered the hole in his jacket and the electric shocks from the woman’s gauntlets. He shook his head while the pieces fell into place. When he spoke again, his disappointment could not be missed. “My ECM gear took damage. He probably scanned me, stole my codes, and found the token. That token makes my boarding rights universally transferable. Once he found that, moving the assignment was child’s play for someone like him.”
“Oh my God, Grimes! What will you do?”
“Go to Gethsemane, I suppose. You will need to arrange a handoff there. Oh yes, station security will be alerted to my arrival as well. Make sure I am not accosted.”
“That won’t be too hard, I think,” Haskille replied. “You are already on a token, so I’ll just escalate it to something high enough to get you past the guards. But after that I can’t do much. You will need to get under cover by yourself. Fleming will have to send a team to retrieve the item.”
“I’m going to burn this comm,” Grimes warned her. “I’ll contact Fleming when I’m in a safe place.”
“Okay. I’ll inform him. He’ll be able to get to you there. It’s above my pay grade, now.”
“Do that.” Grimes killed the connection without further comment. He wanted to be angrier, but the fury refused to come. His pulse thrummed in his ears like tribal drumming, and a bizarre surge of pure exhilaration washed all his doubts and confusion away with a flood of vigor. A game was afoot. A contest between old enemies and even older comrades to challenge his skills. The thought of what came next excited Grimes in a way he had almost forgotten could be possible. He leaned his head back and breathed in deeply. The air left his lungs as an explosive burst of maniacal laughter that startled a family of four waiting their turn for a berth assignment. They scurried away from Grimes with furtive looks.
“Oh, you clever little bastard!” Grimes said to no one at all. He pulled the memory core from under his jacket and held it up to look at it. Outside its carrying case, the black disk seemed far too insignificant for so momentous a chase. But this is often how the game went, and Grimes could not deny that it was fun to play. “But I’ve still got the prize. Fine, Richardson. We’ll call this round a draw, then.”