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“He’s moving.”
James Klebold was in his element, finally. For once beads and flechettes were not flying over his head. There were no enormous warships trying to blast him into atoms. No assassins, marauding cyborgs, or augmented psychopaths were trying to tear him to pieces. With his terminal before him and a network of seasoned espionage assets to command, James could do what he did best.
“Did your people engage?” asked Roland. The giant’s voice burst from the speaker, and James imagined the big cyborg peering at a similar screen trying to comprehend the meandering icons.
“No,” said James. “They are too valuable to risk, and it is not likely they can compete with Grimes, in any event. I do not spend assets stupidly, Mr. Tankowicz.”
“Where is he headed?”
“South. Away from the port.”
Roland grunted in that way James hated. Why people chose inarticulate monosyllables when you could just say what you wanted to say remained a mystery to him. It made the cyborg sound like the gorilla he so ironically resembled. He knew the comparison was unfair and rude, and he would never voice it. James had read every bit of intelligence on Roland Tankowicz in existence. The man was neither stupid nor simple. A bit aggressive and linear in his thinking, sure. However, UEDF testing and benchmarks showed that under stress Tankowicz demonstrated shrewd tactical reasoning and strategic sophistication. He mastered weapons and fighting styles with alarming facility and his appetite for studying the various aspects of conflict was nothing short of voracious. James had been in the field with Roland once before, seen the man in action. His own observations confirmed what he had read. It would be a mistake to think of Roland as a simple brute, even when the giant tried very hard to seem like one. James wondered if this was intentional. Perhaps Tankowicz liked to be underestimated. He filed that hypothesis away for later examination and returned his attention to the operation in progress.
James pressed a comm stud on his terminal. “Saladin, let him see you on the corner of Chastity. We want him to turn onto Clement Row, but don’t push so hard he engages. Copy?”
“Copy,” said a voice from the terminal.
“Where are you herding him?” Roland asked.
“For now, I want him moving South. He’s already calling in the situation to his handlers. Fortunately for us, OmniCorp is using in-house agents and they are not particularly good at this.”
“Can we listen in?”
“No. He’s on the Corporate InfoNet right now. Cracking that would take too long and, in any event, doing so would tip our hand.”
Roland grunted again. “Makes sense. The longer we keep DECO’s presence a secret, the better.”
“Exactly.”
The terminal squawked again. “Saladin to control. He’s made me. Turning onto Clement now.”
“Copy, Saladin. Have Mehmet pick up the tail.”
“Copy.”
“And what exactly is south of the port?” Roland sounded irritated at not having all the details of the DECO side himself. The fluid nature of the situation meant information sharing took a distant second to efficient maneuvering. James assumed Roland understood this, and just could not help his irascible nature.
“The only tram lines that go to Sodom and Gomorrah are north of the port. If he keeps moving south, it becomes more problematic to get there. We know he is talking to his handlers, so we know he is getting fed intel. If we keep moving him south, then sooner or later they will have to abandon that plan until they lose the tail.”
“I’m assuming that to the south is some way of getting to the Underworld, then?”
James nodded, not at all surprised by Roland’s ability to interpret the plan. “There is a Pogo Plane terminal that moves workers and cargo to the more remote settlements on Gethsemane at the southern tip of Port Piety. Any minute now, Grimes will get told to make for that terminal. It requires very little money, has no special security procedures, and is relatively un-patrolled by the Knights.”
“So, after a few minutes of being chased around, that terminal is going to look real attractive.”
“Exactly.”
“How do we get him to pick the Underworld?”
James suspected Roland knew the answer and was just fishing for confirmation. Since he loved nothing more than talking about his plans, James answered anyway. “It’s the only logical choice for him, obviously. Other than the Underworld, his options are limited to food production and processing stations in those biomes that support edible plant and animal life.” James waved a dismissive hand at the screen, and the locations of the mentioned facilities blinked to life with descriptive text. “There is no reason to hop out to an agricultural zone or processing plant. If Grimes wants to be that stupid, I sincerely hope he does it.”
“I suppose hunting him down in an automated factory would be pretty easy, huh?”
“That would be an ideal scenario for us. Your team versus a lone operator in an enclosed space with no allies? We should be so lucky. Trust me, Mr. Tankowicz. He will choose the Underworld.”
“Good,” said Roland. “I’ll get my people down there, then. Gateways bought us a private transport, but we’ll need a head start if we want to beat a pogo plane.”
“Prep yourselves but wait for me to call it. There is still plenty of time for things to go wrong. I want you in Port Piety if we need to start improvising.”
Roland grunted, this time without annoying James. “Got it. Good call.”
James waved him off without looking up from his screen. “Good hunting, Mr. Tankowicz.”
“You too, Jimmy.”
Roland left the channel, and James realized he was sad to see the giant cyborg go. He liked to talk his plans out with competent operators. It was as close as he was ever going to get to being one himself. The romance and adventure of field work appealed to James on a basic level the DECO man knew to me rather immature. Furthermore, he lacked any of the prerequisite physical attributes for such work. This was not a deal-breaker in a universe where a person might submit the body to all manner of cybernetic and genetic modification, so he could not ignore the less obvious obstacles. Even if DECO chose to convert James into a physical powerhouse, there still existed no viable technology for courage, grace under fire, or the ability to stay calm and focused when death spewed forth from every shadow. His real talent lay in analysis and data modeling, and this proved a double-edged sword. James understood he was not mentally or emotionally equipped for field work. He never considered it to be cowardice, as James always did what had to be done to the best of his ability. But seeing the fixers operate up close and in-person reinforced the unassailable fact that his brain would never accept risk and danger the way they did. He made peace with this reality decades prior and carved out a successful career in espionage anyway.
In the dim light of Exit Wound’s conference room, James saw the movement of six skilled espionage assets and one cagey assassin as little more than data points. He applied these points to a mental actuarial table and plotted probabilities. He saw the patterns, applied what he knew about Grimes to the calculations, and gave orders as if ordering pizza for delivery.
“Mehmet?”
“Go, control.”
“Move to the north side of Clement and turn him at Alexander.”
“Copy, control.”
The icons moved on his screen. James did not smile when Grimes turned onto Alexander Row in the exact manner he had wanted. Grimes was a skilled assassin and a brilliant foe. This did not automatically make him a good spy, though. Grimes probably knew about being herded, of course. His handlers definitely knew. What James had not told Roland rattled around his skull like an unruly child. It all came down to what choice Grimes made next. At any point, Grimes might turn and fight. James possessed a healthy respect for the Balisongs, and Grimes had been the greatest of all of them. If the assassin decided he did not want to board a pogo plane, Grimes might choose to ambush one of his assets. He had the skills to do it in a manner that would not alert the Knights too.
He probably would not. He certainly should not. Starting a fight would be a mistake. Right now, there was no profit in such action. The positions of the assets precluded easy engagements, and his men were neither stupid nor foolish. James counted on Grimes choosing discretion due to the value of his package. Any fight on the streets of Port Piety, no matter how discreet, ran the risk of drawing both Knights and Inquisitors. Neither party to this battle wanted that. No professional on the clock would be that rash. Nevertheless, beads of sweat coalesced on his forehead, merging into drops that rolled across his skin in tiny rivulets of liquid doubt. James wiped them away with a sleeve. There were no people in the conference room to witness his sudden nervousness, and for this small mercy he thanked whatever deities might have dominion over such things.
He chose not to mention this, but what intelligence James had found on Grimes’s disposition of late weakened his sense of certainty by an uncomfortable margin. Grimes was not the ice-cold Balisong of yesterday. This was not the same man who led flawless teams of silent assassins on Venus. The public jobs he had taken since those days spoke of a man not right in his mind. The once surgical and efficient assassin had grown erratic and sadistic. Easy apprehensions for a man like Grimes turned into brutal murders that left mangled corpses where intact prisoners would have been more appropriate. James understood the reasons for this all too well. Many men just like Grimes had walked this path before. It led to death and ruin.
Not today, James thought to himself. Don’t go crazy just yet.
So far, it looked as if Grimes remained sane and professional. His icon moved down Alexander Row, and at greater speed than before. James nodded to no one. His handlers must have told him about the pogo plane station. Now they just needed him to get there without turning on the pursuing agents.
“Mehmet, sitrep.”
“He’s moving down Alexander, control. He’s pretending not to notice me, but he knows I’m here.”
“Be careful, Mehmet. Saladin, Attila, Hannibal, converge on these waypoints.” James tapped the screen to indicate where he wanted the agents to go. “If he’s trying to fake us out and head north, I want you to close those routes off.”
The agents replied with various affirmatives, and their icons began to move.
“Steady, Grimes,” James whispered to no one. “No need to be rash. You can still escape.”
The icon representing Grimes stopped, and James held his breath.
“Saladin to control. He just made me.”
“Do not engage, Saladin!” James tried to sound calm and authoritative, like Pike would have. He failed.
The Grimes icon started to move again, this time toward Saladin.
“Control, target is approaching. Advise.”
James felt a new terror clutch him by the guts. If He backed Saladin off, Grimes might try to slip the noose they were tightening. If he let Saladin stand, Grimes could kill the man without a second thought. James knew he should have been prepared for this. In truth, he thought he was. Command meant hard decisions; everyone knew that. Now, when the time had arrived to make those decisions, James sat in his chair gaping like a carp.
“Control?” Saladin did not sound nervous. Saladin was a seasoned professional. He did not get nervous.
James had to do something. Anything. He found his voice. “Attila!”
“Go, control.”
“Reinforce Saladin. Let him see you do it. Mehmet, close distance.”
James held his breath. Showing Grimes a threat posture was a calculated risk. Grimes may well be able to kill all three agents, but this could not be accomplished without drawing the ire of some Knights. The DECO man hoped that this would deter the assassin, because he had just bet the lives of three good people on that very proposition.
“He’s turning, control.”
James did not need Saladin to tell him as much. The Grimes icon again moved south toward the pogo plane station. Relief washed over the DECO man in a cool wave. Grimes had made his choice. In a few minutes the danger would pass. As predicted, Grimes fled into the station and the icon blinked out when the tracking drone lost his biometrics. James let his head fall back against his headrest and blew out a long sigh of relief. After a few seconds he reached out and tapped a button on his terminal.
“Breach,” he called into the team channel. He heard his own voice waver though he did not care.
“Go, control.”
“It looks like he has decided to go for the station. You should get moving now.”
James did not need to see Roland’s face to know it wore a look of bland resolve. His brusque, “On our way,” sufficed.