Mina Cortez: From Bouquets to Bullets (11 page)

The only thing she was able to notice from
higher up that she hadn't seen from below was a delivery truck
pulling up to the back. There were no signs of the truck opening or
being unloaded, though three people from inside did come out, and
engaged the driver in conversation. Eventually, she left the bridge
and continued with her delivery. The first was made easily enough.
An older woman at one of the groceries received anonymous birthday
flowers. Mina slipped back out post-delivery as the woman and the
other store employees nearby started speculating.

Moving across the street, she passed by Lucky
Pho's spacious—

and mostly empty—storefront. She did note a
few employees moving about inside, but no actual customers. The
place was amazingly well staffed for a place without much business.
As she passed by the next alley, she noted the delivery truck she'd
seen moving slowly down the back alleyway. At the next footbridge,
a few blocks later, she went back up, scanning past the low
buildings as best she could until she found the delivery truck
again, this time parked behind one of the other stores along the
street. Once again, no sign of any deliveries being made.

Mina crossed the bridge, moving towards her
second delivery. Had she not been looking back towards Lucky on a
regular basis, she'd have missed them. Three men, dressed similarly
to the people she'd seen talking to the delivery driver. She
couldn't tell if they were the same, as she'd been too far away
before, but guessed they likely were. Her chip quickly drew her
attention to small details that didn't fit right. While each wore
similar light jackets, the sleeves weren't quite long enough to
entirely conceal hints of tattoos that reached to the wrists on two
of them. She also picked up signs off of each that they were armed:
well concealed guns, but guns, nonetheless. Remembering the earlier
warning, she made sure not to stare too long, while still keeping
track of their progress.

The three stopped at a few stores along the
way, not too far behind Mina, emerging each time and heading
further down the street. She lost sight of them amidst making her
second delivery, this time dropping off congratulatory 'Just
Chipped!' flowers at a vid-and-file shop. She didn't have quite the
same chance to quickly slip out this time, as the recipient's
mother had to call her from the stockroom to come get the bouquet
herself.

Mina and the Chinese girl spent a few moments
explaining to her parents that they weren't schoolmates, and no,
the flowers weren't from Mina; she was just the delivery girl.
Further assurances she had no idea who they were from, but, yes,
she was very happy for the family. She turned down the offer of
tea, insisting she had to be going. It was just enough of a delay
that she nearly bumped into the three men from Lucky, on their way
into the shop, as she was heading out. Noting them at the door, she
instead quickly ducked back behind one of the shelf units. She
turned her delivery jacket inside out. It would look odd, but the
lining was a different color and didn't have the Emerald City logo
on it. Then she pulled her hood up and tried to keep her head
down.

That was all she had time for before the
shouting started. She tasted aluminum as her chip started
translating for her, with everyone else speaking rapid-fire
Mandarin. The woman who had been at the till insisted they didn't
have enough money. The oldest of the three men started threatening
her. When that didn't change her insistence that they would give
the men everything they had, but it wouldn't be enough, his tone
changed as well.

Mina was still in her hiding spot, unable to
see, but hearing everything. There was a scream, and the sound of a
gun cocking, then another.

Chapter
Eleven

Peeking around the edge, she saw the youngest
of the three men grab the teenage girl. The one who would have been
safe in the stockroom had Mina not brought flowers, she reminded
herself.

A stronger taste of aluminum and hint of
burning in her sinuses told her to stay still and out of the way.
She ignored it. This was her fault, and worse, people's lives were
in danger. She assessed the situation from her hiding spot, peeking
around the corner. Two had their guns out, one pointed at the girl,
the other with a pistol held up, simply demonstrating its presence.
The last had his hand under his jacket, but hadn't drawn yet. Two
of the people in the shop only had to drop or dive to have cover,
but the girl was out in the open.

Mina moved around the shelving unit to get
close to the one with his gun on the girl while he argued with the
woman. When she felt she was close enough, she grabbed one of the
display cases and tossed it out on the floor.

Hearing the noise, the man spun. He got
halfway through demanding to know who was there when Mina burst
into motion. Before his finger could squeeze the trigger, Mina got
to his wrist. She applied a wrist lock even as she lifted his arm
up and away. His finger squeezed reflexively, sending a bullet
whining past her ear. He never got off a second shot before she
dislocated his wrist with a twist, then disarmed him with her other
hand, breaking his thumb and pulling the gun away. Releasing her
grip, she finished him with a quick pistol whipping with his own
gun.

Before he'd hit the floor, she was on to the
next. This one didn't even get a shot off before she'd taken the
two steps to reach him and brought an open hand up under his chin
in a perfect sapping blow. As he was losing consciousness, Mina
shoved him towards the third, directing his fall to occupy the last
assailant. She got to that one before he could get his pistol
entirely out, catching hold of his wrist. A quick impulse ran her
through the basics of the stance he was starting to shift into. She
wasn't sure what style of kung fu he knew yet, but she was sure he
had training. Keeping his hand trapped in his jacket with one hand,
she kicked at the inside of his ankle, rolling it, putting him off
balance. As he started to stumble, Mina directed it, her free hand
grabbing the hair at the back of his head and slamming his head
down on the corner of the wooden vid-store counter.

Without thinking about it, she took all of
the guns, wiped her prints off, and set them on the counter. That
was the point she realized there were four shop employees looking
at her, stunned.

“Call the police,” she instructed firmly. As
she was doing that, she heard a buzzing from the oldest man's
wrist. A few moments later, there was another voice asking what was
holding them up. She repeated her instructions one more time, then
followed a hunch. She left the store, and its bewildered owners,
and grabbed her bike. Then she headed towards the back alley.

Two buildings down, she spotted the delivery
driver, holding up his own wrist near his mouth. He obviously still
received no response. With a paranoid glance around, he noticed
Mina, then yanked the truck door open and jumped in. The engine was
still running, and he quickly tore off down the alley.

Cursing herself, Mina took off after the
truck. She could still feel the burning sensation in her sinuses,
but the chip still let her call up all of her new knowledge of
street maps. She was pretty sure by now that the delivery truck was
the failsafe measure for the people running the protection scheme.
If something went wrong, duck down one alley, and they disappear
into a truck just making its rounds. She'd already drawn too much
attention, but hoped if all the thugs could be brought in on other
charges, the director or Agent Park could at least have an excuse
to interrogate them about what was going on at Lucky.

She quickly reasoned that he would be headed
for the freeway. It would allow him to put some distance between
himself and pursuit. The local streets had too many people
wandering and would require frequent stops. She didn't think she'd
be able to catch up to the truck directly, but she might be able to
cut it off if she could guess its route correctly. Figuring out his
most direct route to an exit, she turned down an alleyway, taking
shortcuts on her bike that a larger vehicle couldn't.

Pedaling as fast as she could, she used every
alley and quiet side street she could to allow her to not need to
slow down. She crossed streets far away from crosswalks and lights
with their monitor cameras, and headed down her best-guess
intercept route. She saw the truck coming as she emerged back into
heavier traffic zones, nearing the on ramp. With her bike, she
couldn't cut through heavy traffic to get to him, and knew if he
reached the freeway, she would lose him so she headed for the
stairs of the last foot-bridge he'd have to pass under.

People jumped out of her way as she biked up
the steep stairway. Reaching the top, she could just see the truck
reaching the bridge. With no time to stop and assess, she let her
chip handle all of the speed calculations and headed for the side
of the bridge. Pedaling hard as she could to get up to speed, she
pulled her feet off the pedals, stood up on her bicycle seat like
some kind of stunt rider, and let her front wheel crash into the
railing. The impact catapulted her off her bike and over the edge.
She hit the top of the delivery truck, and immediately started
rolling backwards to break her fall. The truck's momentum, combined
with the instinctive breakfall, almost caused her to go falling off
the back of the truck, but she managed, at the last second, to fall
forward, finding a few points where metal met metal as
finger-and-toe-holds.

The truck picked up speed from the ramp,
making forward movement difficult. Still, she managed to find
enough hand and footholds to pull herself along. She had to adjust
again to keep herself from going careening off the side when the
truck merged onto the freeway. Car horns blared as people tried
warning the driver someone was on his truck. She did her best to
stay out of his mirrors, inwardly cursing the helpfulness of the
average driver.

She finally pulled herself to the front edge
of the cargo container, near the cab on the passenger's side. She
was almost out of breath, her arms and fingers ached, but she found
enough adrenaline for one more burst of quick movement. She pulled
herself forward and over the edge, managing to grab the mirror and
get a hand inside the open passenger window, while her feet found
the thin running board. The driver startled, turning her way. As he
did, whether out of intent or simply reaction, the truck veered off
the road and towards the metal roadside barrier. Mina pulled
herself up and through the window just in time to keep her legs
from being crushed as metal met metal.

The driver started to pull left, away from
the barrier. Not wanting him back out in traffic, Mina grabbed the
wheel with one hand and yanked it right, keeping them skidding
along the barrier. While fighting for control of the wheel, she
found the parking brake and yanked on it. With a horrendous
grinding, the truck jerked, throwing both of them forward. Mina
managed to stay low, crashing against the dashboard, then under it.
The driver wasn't as fortunate, and his chest hit the steering
wheel. As the truck skidded to a halt, Mina punched the man once
under the jaw, sapping any remaining consciousness. Guided by her
chip, she quickly policed the scene. Everything she'd touched was
wiped, and her hands were pulled up into her delivery jacket
sleeves. As other cars were stopping for a look, she pulled her
arching body out of the passenger side window, hit the ground, and
let herself roll into the shallow ditch. She took advantage of the
spectacle of a car wreck to draw attention away from herself,
heading the opposite way of most people. Her current colors had
been seen clinging to the side of a truck. Using a couple larger
cars for cover, she righted her jacket, fixed her hair, and tried
to move without too obvious of a limp.

She could hear the police sirens approaching,
which brought a new idea to mind. She called Agent Park, instead of
the director. She advised him on what had just happened, without
going into too many details. She figured he could make sure the
driver was taken into custody, for reckless driving, if nothing
else, and that he'd eventually be tied to the other people from
Lucky. He wasn't happy with the attention she'd brought on herself
in what was supposed to be covert duty, but he quickly set about
doing his job.

She turned off her comm and started the long
walk back to the bridge, hoping her bike would still be in the
area. Her comm soon after started signaling she had a call from the
director. Agent Park was doing his job. Mina, meanwhile, on her
first day solo on the job, had just managed to do pretty much
exactly everything she wasn't supposed to.

She wasn't looking forward to taking this
call.

Chapter
Twelve

Mina's parents weren’t happy about her bike
accident, but at least they bought that as a story for why she was
sore and bruised. They gave her the rest of the day off,
reluctantly. As soon as she was away from the shop, she falsified
her location so she'd appear to be heading to her apartment, then
headed downtown. The Director was waiting for her, looking none too
happy.

The woman didn't need to say a word for Mina
to look down sheepishly as she stood across the desk.

“Agent Cortez, I was hoping it was going to
be a very long time before we met face to face again. Having to
call agents in here too often is frowned upon. However, I thought
that perhaps a comm wouldn't get across the gravity of the
situation.”

“I'm very sorry, Director. I didn't mean
...”

“I'm sure you didn't. I believe your express
orders were to not draw attention to yourself. Were they not?” the
Director interrupted.