Cog (6 page)

She walked about a quarter mile along a dirt path that led to denser underbrush, until it faded into brambles. The bare trees provided less cover and she decided it would be her last drop at this location. One of the telegraph poles along the old service road might do.

A decaying bench sat off to the right, half hidden under brush. Several of its slats were missing and the scrolled iron edges had rusted. Thia surveyed her surroundings, then leaned over and loosened the arm of the bench, pulling it to one side. The dog sat and panted. She slid the message into a small hole. The Chinese, too, would be pleased to hear she was in a position to receive information on their shopping list. And she knew there would be a package waiting for her the next night.

She stood up and sneezed. The spores from the evergreens always got to her this time of year. As her head bent, the hairs on the back of her neck stood on end as a searing heat rushed past her.

Pulse weapon!

She dropped to the ground, falling through the white terrier, who barked in protest. Thia squeezed her hand underneath her, drawing her weapon from her inside pocket. Her mind raced.
Who could have known?
Did Neer betray her that quickly? She doubted it. He might be an arrogant SOB, but not a snitch. Wu Ji looking for direct access to her sources? Make himself look good for the Ministry of Security? Anything was possible.

Another shot pulsed and she caught the direction. Two o’clock. Scrambling to her knees, she fired three wide-dispersal shots blindly into the dark woods, sizzling the air, then dropped to the ground. No return fire. Two more shots seared over her, this time from behind.

Fema!

There was another shooter. The dog growled in reply. She deactivated the leash and the dog faded into nonexistence. Thia crawled in the direction of the car. The thorny underbrush scratched her face and caught her hair. A hundred pinpricks needled her skin through her sweater as she pressed forward.

Something rustled behind her and she wheeled her arm around and fired twice. Blue flare cauterized the air, setting the top of the underbrush on fire.

“Aaaah!”

Then silence. Thia waited in the underbrush, straining to hear movement. Her heart pounded in her ears. Pain welled up in her muscles as she tensed and she forced herself to relax and control her breathing.
Breathe, breathe.
Panic was of no use.

She had to find out who was firing at her, which faction. Corporate? Chinese? Pissing off clients was something she tried to avoid, although at times it couldn’t be helped. Intelligence agencies were usually cautious when dealing with free agents. Provoking an agency into issuing a hit was just one mistake away.

The shooter behind her was probably dead, but she’d have to check. She crawled backward, slowly, still listening for movement, until her foot felt something hard. A boot. She twisted around and fired. Burnt flesh. A large red hole that curled black at the edge filled the man’s chest. The nauseating smell of cooked bowels bloomed up.

She kept crawling backward, training her gun on the unmoving form. Her toe tapped his plasma gun. She jerked her toe away, fearful of searing off her leg. She picked up his gun and checked the chamber. Enough energy for five more shots. Her own gun had seven. She crawled back farther, until the dead man’s face came into view.

Kirill Genechko.
A low-level mercenary. Ukrainian. The kind government agencies hired to do their dirty work. Or at least the agencies that hadn’t much experience in wetware, the agencies not involved in intel, like the Department of Agriculture.

Thia crouched low and struggled to prop up the dead man. He had to weigh at least two-fifty and she had to strain not to grunt in exertion.

Another shot scorched past, frying the man’s head, missing hers by inches. She let go and the man fell on her arm as she toppled over, face up. One more blast flew over her, burning her nose.

I must be hot on someone’s ass for them to try this.
She slid her arm out from under his lambskin coat.
They must pay well, whoever they are.

Deciding she couldn’t wait in the bushes forever, she readied the two guns and crouched. She stood and ran in a zigzag pattern back down the dirt path, toward the station. She had to get Neer to a safe location.

Shards of blue pulsed past her, searing her coat. Four o’clock. She leveled her weapons and squeezed off several shots. Two shots answered back, one slicing her shoulder. She bit her lip through the pain and ran, firing behind her until she ran out of shots, then reached the edge of the woods. A vision of her car loomed up. She fell to the ground, shocked.

Neer sat in the passenger’s seat, half his face gone. Burnt black, along with the door. Thia rolled left, behind a large garbage bin. More pulses fired. The station was deserted, patrons no doubt scared off by the gunfire. Footsteps. The gunman approached.

There!

A car sat idling, a beige Reno. One of the cheap imports from Kenya, but any port in a storm. She dashed for the open passenger-side door and slammed it shut behind her, keeping low as she slid in the driver’s seat. Hunching to the side, she engaged the reverse gear and screeched backward, then tore out of the parking lot as blue pulses slashed the air around her. She reached I-1994 and pushed the car to its 300 mph limit. Streetlights blurred past.

She couldn’t even work out the identity of the second gunman, but he was definitely a pro. She had been stripped of her car and her source. A first. There had been more than one and they knew where she was going. The information Neer had access to must’ve posed a danger to someone. The question was, who? There was one place to start looking. Nicholle Ryder.

Chapter 6

Nicholle snatched a bag out of the closet and headed for the transport tube.

“Where are we going?” Chris said.

“Away from here. I don’t have any plans written in stone at the moment. We’ll make it up as we go.”

“As we go?”

They stepped out of the tube and Nicholle jogged to the back of the parking lot. Chris kept up.

“Look, unless you happen to have access to a safe house, I’d suggest you hush.”

She stopped at a small black car and pressed her thumb on the lock. It glowed green and she yanked the door open.

“Manual doors?” Chris said.

“Get the fuck in.”

Chris slid into the seat, his face drawn up in wariness. Nicholle started the car and eased out of the lot.

“With tinted windows, no one should be able to see us. And the car is registered in a foreign diplomat’s name.”

“How’d you manage that?”

“Couple of friends. Check the news, see what’s going on,” Nicholle said.

Chris searched on their names and transferred the images to the car’s diodes. Scrolling text appeared on the passenger side of the windshield:

Nicholle Ryder of American Hologram took a page from her brother’s book. She has been accused of embezzling twenty billion dollars from the company. Her brother, William, was accused of taking fifty billion earlier today, after their father, Geren, was rushed to a hospital when he collapsed at work. Perim Nestor, American Hologram’s vice president, reported the money missing this evening. Police have put out an APB for her.

“That bastard! And I haven’t even met him! We can’t go back. We can’t even call the police. Come to think of it, I’m afraid to call my friends. The ones I have left. The police might have them tapped.”

“I’ve got a friend I can call,” Chris said. “He’ll let us stay for a while.”

b

Dried Earth Boulevard, Wind Rider Way, Burnt Mountain Path—names of streets in Columbia. Like disjointed, random sentences in a pakz-induced haze. Nicholle had heard tell Columbia was a city with premier neighborhoods once upon a time, with tree-lined streets and emerald grass. Now it boasted a run-down mall, dilapidated housing, and dirt-filled front yards decorated with rusted cars.

She and Chris drove through the neighborhoods, passing house after house with peeling paint and broken shutters.

“Nice place,” she deadpanned.

“Not everyone’s an heiress,” Chris said.

She bit down a retort.

“Left here,” he said.

She turned on Canyonhead Lane, onto a cracked asphalt street, where trash littered the gutters and cats’ eyes peered from sewers.

“What’s the address?” she said.

“Here it is. On the right.”

She pulled into the driveway. Nicholle shook as she alighted from the driver’s side. Since the shooting, she had put up a front, but now she was crashing. Her legs quavered as she staggered to the front of the car and leaned against the hood. Her heart thumped in her chest, banging in her ears. Chris walked around and put his hand on her shoulder.

“Hey, you okay?” he said.

“Just shaken. Guess it’s been longer than I thought since I got shot at. Not quite used to it.”

“Well, c’mon. Let’s go in.” Chris motioned his head toward the house, a narrow blue frame affair with dead grass in the front lawn and a leaning Bradford pear tree. The style reminded Nicholle of the pictures she had seen of her great-grandmother’s house back in the late 1900s.

“This one’s your friend’s?”

“Yeah, Corland. Taught me everything I know about wiho mesh,” Chris said.

“I thought you were Geneware certified.”

“I am. But that’s front door. Corland knows the back door, side door, trap door.”

“Ah. Mm, they still have concrete.” Nicholle noticed the cracks in the driveway and sidewalk. Chris cut her a look, and she raised a hand. “I won’t be a snob. Promise.”

When they reached the top of the stairs, a bell sounded from inside the door. Beethoven’s
Fifth
.

A far-away clanking sounded, then grew louder, coming up the street. A red truck sporting flashing yellow and blue lights hovered up the street, then pulled into the driveway, sounding as if it would fall out of midair. Shaking violently, it barely cleared the mailbox, then landed with a loud bang.

The door whisked open and a bald-headed man with heavy brows arched over dark eyes emerged. He wore a black viscous sleeveless shirt that varied its texture continuously, but whose sensors were painfully obvious under the shifting material. The man smiled generously when he spied Chris.

“Chris! You nuch. Long time no see.”

They hugged like old friends while Nicholle visually scanned the man for weapons.

“Hey, man, it’s been a while,” Chris said. “Hey, this is Nicholle Ryder. Nicholle, this is L.G.”

L.G. reached out a hand. Nicholle nodded as she shook it. “Just call me Nick,” she said, slipping into her old persona.

Chris threw her a look, but she shook her head.

“So what brings you here? I heard you landed some mahatma job at AmHo. Didn’t think we’d see you again,” L.G. said.

L.G. walked inside and Chris and Nicholle followed close behind. The hardwood foyer opened to a long hallway with a staircase to the left. Grunge yellow covered the walls, accented with brown marks and small holes. Old-style computers blanketed in a layer of dust crowded the hallway, forcing the pair to walk single file back to the kitchen. Nicholle stepped gingerly along the creaking floor, wondering if it would give way any minute.

The kitchen lay ahead, mirroring the grunge yellow of the hallway. A microgen oven sat on a burgundy counter littered with dirty dishes. A netfridge stood to the right, displaying its contents onscreen: two cases of beer, an apple, and an expired bottle of French dressing.

Nicholle forced her face into a mask of tight indifference, even as she longed to call for a biohazard unit.

“You guys want a beer?” L.G. said.

“No, I’m not thirsty,” Chris said. He turned. “Nick?” His voice dripped sarcasm.

“No, thanks, though,” she replied.

“Cor’s downstairs,” L.G. said.

“Great,” Chris said.

Chris opened the door to the basement and started down the stairs with Nicholle in tow. She had expected a dank-looking room with more cracked concrete and perhaps some exposed wires. Instead, the floor was blanketed with rich brown carpet, offset by beige walls decorated with murals of oils by the masters that shifted one to the next:
La Primavera
by Botticelli,
Daniel in the Lions’ Den
by Rubens,
The Astronomer
by Vermeer. They changed in rhythm to pulsating music that sounded throughout the basement.

A flash of red drew her attention away from the murals toward the middle of the large room. A huge red dragon with two fire-breathing heads clawed at a knight. The knight wielded a broadsword, stabbing the air as it kept missing the weaving dragon’s head. The sword finally found its target and slashed down on one of the dragon’s necks. The head fell off, hemorrhaging blood onto the carpet. The other head spewed a stream of fire at the knight, who raised his shield in defense, letting the fire wash over him. When the dragon’s attack relented, the knight reared up and threw the broadsword at the dragon. Its tail whipped around and batted away the sword, which disappeared at the edge of the carpet. The music grew louder. The dragon leaped forward and landed on the knight, knocking him to the floor, then raised its head with a plangent roar. As the echoes of the roar faded, the music crescendoed and the dragon’s head dove for the knight.

“No!” Nicholle cried. She was embarrassed as soon as she uttered the word, forgetting for that split second that the scene was not real.

The dragon froze, the music stopped, and the knight’s armor faded away to reveal a brown-skinned man with hooded eyes and shoulder-length cornrows.

“Cor. Hey, man,” Chris said. He helped the knight up. Two people’s voices could be heard from one of the back rooms, whose door was ajar. They sounded as if they were arguing.

“Hey, keep it down back there! Jeeb, Chris,” Cor said. “Look at you. All suited up and shit.” He looked past Chris to Nicholle and smiled. He snapped his finger and the music stopped.

“Nicholle Ryder, daughter of Geren Ryder, who invented wireless hologram,” Cor said. “On the run from the cops.”

“Sheesh, news travels,” Nicholle said, slightly taken aback. “But I never stole any money.”

She changed the subject, gestured toward the murals. “You like art? Interesting choice of paintings in the rotation. Any particular reason?”

Cor snorted. “That was left here by the previous owner.”

“Oh. Well, anyway…thanks for letting us in.”

“Chris here just said you needed a place to stay for a few nights. There’s an extra room on the second floor where you two can stay. Just share groceries and utilities, at least for now. Any long-term stay will have to be negotiated,” Cor said.

“Oh, we’re not—” she began.

“Thanks, Cor. We really do appreciate this.” He emphasized the word ‘appreciate’ and raised an eyebrow in Nicholle’s direction. The two voices in the back got louder.

“…been listening? Oron himself decanonized the animated version before he died. It doesn’t—”

“Oron can’t decanonize because he didn’t own the rights. What are you, deaf and dumb?”

“He’s the creator of Colony. His word is law.”

“He’s dead. The production company gets to decide canon.”

“Those idiots? The prequels sucked.”

“Will you two keep it down?” Cor said. The fighting ceased, replaced by various blips and bleeps from a gaming program.

“They go through that every week,” Cor said.

“What are they arguing over?” Nicholle said.

“The show, Colony,” Chris said.

“I’ve heard of that. But isn’t it about thirty years old?”

“It began thirty years ago, but there’s been so many incarnations, it’s hard to keep track. Some people want to accept everything as part of the Colony universe, others only what they like. It’s been the subject of many lively debates,” Chris said.

“Hm.” She didn’t quite get the point of the argument.
To each his own.
“Oh, while it’s on my mind, let me pay you for some groceries.” She remembered the netfridge display, decided she wouldn’t survive long on beer and salad dressing, and wondered if they delivered groceries to this part of town.

“Do they deliver here?”

“Yeah, but you hafta go down to the corner to get it,” Cor said.

Nicholle tapped open a menu. She’d transfer five thousand for the time being. A list of banks glowed down the right-hand side. She picked the National Bank of Kenya.

Zero balance.

“What?” she said.

“What’s wrong?” Chris said.

“Uh, nothing. Probably a glitch.” Perhaps the museum had been late in sending out the payroll, or perhaps Riklo had put in her Family Leave as a separation. She tried again to request a balance but the result was the same. Then she tried to access Zurich Nationale. Zero.

Heat bloomed her face and traveled down her neck. It couldn’t be.
What if—?
She accessed the savings account. Zero. The mutual fund account. Zero. Her fingers blurred in motion as she tapped out the various sequences to access the accounts—Swiss numbered account, fictitiously named account, wingspread investment accounts, IRA, overnight repurchases. All zero. Her stocks were still there, but no bank would lend her money against those. She was flat broke.

Her mouth dried, a hard stickiness that cleaved her lips to her teeth. Her legs weakened and buckled. She would’ve fallen to the floor if Chris hadn’t caught her up by the arm.

“Hey, you okay?” he said.

She said nothing. The last time she’d gone broke, it had driven her back to her brother, forced her to grovel. And she vowed she’d never again be in a position to beg him, or anyone, for help. Chris helped her over to the couch and sat beside her.

“Nicholle. Talk to me.”

“Hey, she OD?” Cor said.

“No,” Chris said. “I don’t know what’s the matter.”

“There’s a free clinic down the road.”

“Thanks. I think she’ll be okay. Nicholle.” Chris tapped her cheek with his hand. “Nicholle.”

“I’ll leave you two alone,” Cor said. “And go tell these guys what canon really is.”

“Knock yourself out,” Chris said.

Even when she was on the street, her father had diverted her accounts, but left some money there. A fallback.
A crutch.
But what would she do now? The only thing she had left was stock. And she couldn’t sell it to anyone except her father or brother.

“I’m broke,” she said.

“You’re what?”

“I’m broke.” It had been kind of him to bring her here, in spite of everything. He could have abandoned her, told her she was on her own, instead of risking his own life to help her. He at least deserved the truth.

“What are you talking about? You’re rich. You have money.”

“Not anymore. All my accounts have a zero balance. Perim, I’m guessing, wiped them clean.”

“Are you sure? I mean you accessed the right—”

“Of course I’m sure. I can’t even afford a fleabag motel.” She fell back onto the couch, sinking into the plastimold, sinking into the surrealness that was her life.

“I’ll check my accounts.”

“Good luck,” she said, sarcastically.

He tapped, punched, scrolled, and poked, but he kept repeating curse words, which told Nicholle that Perim had cleaned him out, too.

“He’s good, this Perim. Did I tell you he was my brother?”

Chris looked at her as if she had sprouted another head.

“It’s true. The family lawyer told me. Apparently, my father had an affair decades ago. My father just found out this week Perim was his. Probably why he made him vice president. But I’m wondering if my father knew about Perim all along and just didn’t want to deal with it. He never really was good at family.”

“Nicholle.”

“And now we’re both broke. I mean, I have about fifty thousand in cash in my bag, but how long will that last?”

“Nicholle, we’ve got four hackers in this house. We can back door Cog and find out where your money is. Or at least get back some of it.”

Nicholle sat up. “You serious?”

“I’m sure Perim changed the security protocols, but I know the system administrator rules for the wall, the algorithms for ciphers, and of course, I left several back doors to Cog.” He assumed a self-satisfied look.

“I knew I brought you along for a reason.”

Chris took her hand in his and squeezed. “It’s been a rough night. You okay?”

“I’ve been chased by a killer, had my friends killed, was framed, and was robbed blind by my own vice president. It was easier on the street. When I was with Tuma, as least I knew where I stood.”

“Wait right here.”