by Adam Thielen
“Crap,” he said.
“What?”
“Now there’s someone in there.”
“Where?”
Taq pointed his chin up. “Second floor.”
“Maybe a squatter,” Cho speculated.
“Wasn’t there before.”
“Hmm. Okay, let’s get in there. They might know something.”
Tsenka began walking back to the building.
“Hold up,” said Taq. “Through the front door? I thought we were avoiding this.”
“I’m not going to kick it down, probably.”
“Fine,” said Taq. “Let’s be quick.”
Cho turned her head to him as she walked. “Can I count on you for support?”
“I’m ready,” he replied.
“Good. Stay behind me.”
Tsenka walked up a set of five stairs to a small porch in front of the hinged door. She knocked on it, loudly. Her echolocation module used the noise to map the inside of the building and overlaid her vision with the resulting data, giving her a wireframe x-ray vision. The first floor was nearly complete, but the sonar only reached halfway up the second floor.
She moved aside, nudging Taq with her forearm in the same direction, keeping them both clear of the doorway. After waiting a minute, she knocked again, this time harder. The sonar updated her three-dimensional wireframe model, including an outline for the lone resident of the building. Whoever it was had decided they didn’t want to rise from their seat, let alone answer.
The vampire looked back at her mage companion, then back to the door. She pushed on the handle, and to her surprise, it swung open. The interior was dimly lit by LED bulbs recessed into a ceiling decorated with cracks running through most of the white drywall. A large counter stood between Cho and a set of stairs, with a doorway on each side. Agent Cho crept forward, her eye scanning for tripwires, proximity sensors, and other traps.
As she moved, ever vigilant, Taq followed behind, his eyes studying the room itself. He could see spots on the walls and floors that were less faded than the rest of the paint and old hardwood. Other equipment was here, he thought. The mage’s stomach turned over and a bout of anxiety forced his heart into high gear. Something’s not right, he repeated to himself in a near panic.
Cho heard his heartbeat and turned to him. “You okay? What’s going on?”
Taq looked at her with fearful eyes that were starting to water. “I—don’t—know.”
Tsenka wondered if he was coming down from the blood rush. “Taq,” she whispered. “Are you going to be alright?”
Jones closed his mouth and nodded. “Yes. Let’s—” He paused to swallow saliva that had built up in his mouth from the nausea. “—go meet our friend.”
Cho tried sneaking up the stairs, but the first step up creaked loudly. She pulled her XM-23 pistol and stopped. She lifted the gun above her head, activating its camera to see above to the next floor. She lowered it and walked up the steps. Each one creaked. She may as well have been wearing a bell around her neck for how subtle she had been.
She reached the top of the stairs and waited for Taq to join her. Cho held her gun on a woman, now standing in the middle of an otherwise barren room. Taq’s brain was still muddled from his anxiety attack, and he cast a worried look at the woman. His brow furrowed, and he looked around the room, spotting the same unfaded shapes among new ones.
The woman had silver hair that fell halfway down her back. The lines on her face ran deep, but she had maintained a handsomeness, a subtle beauty even, despite her age. Her business suit indicated that she was no squatter. An identification badge hung from a small breast pocket on her navy blue vest. Cho examined the name; Anne Courtemanche.
The woman rested her elbows at her sides but raised her hands up with her fingers outstretched. She otherwise ignored Tsenka and stared at the elder mage.
“Taq?” she queried, her eyes squinting as if to get a clearer look at him. “Taq Jones?”
He looked up at her, then at Cho, then back to the woman. “That’s correct, Ms…”
Tsenka lowered her gun halfway, then raised it again as the woman took a step toward Jones.
“Anne Courtemanche,” she introduced. Anne placed the tips of her fingers on her chest. “It’s me, Taq; Annie.”
“We’ve met before?” asked Jones.
“Oh, come now,” she said with a smile. “We more than met.”
Taq pressed his lips together, studying her face. He tilted his head then straightened. “I’ve… never been here before.”
Anne took another step forward. Her smile faded. “Not here, Taq. Noxcorp territory. Uh, Kansas, it was. You were stuck in that university.”
“I’m sorry,” said Taq. “Please forgive me, that was a long time ago.”
“You’re saying you don’t remember at all?”
“Mr. Jones has been through quite a bit in his storied career,” chimed Tsenka.
Taq shrugged. His nausea had started to pass. “It may yet come to me, but those days are a bit of a blur now.” He held out his hand and Anne smirked, taking it in hers and shaking.
“Even so, it’s great to see you,” she said. “I’ve been following your exploits ever since the Haven attack.”
The mage laughed nervously. “I’ve actually done very little.”
Anne began to protest, but Tsenka cut her off. “Ms. Courtemanche—”
“Please, just Anne. And who might you be? Wait, let me deduce,” insisted Anne. She looked the vampire up and down. “So fierce. You are with my old friend, and that eye cover is distinctive. Agent Tsenka Cho, I’m honored.” Courtemanche thrust her hand toward Cho.
Tsenka looked down at her gun and reluctantly holstered it. She took Anne’s hand and gave it a quick shake. “I’m sorry to meet your reverence with suspicion, but what exactly are you doing here?”
“I imagine,” she said, putting her hands in her pants pockets, “the same as you. I have the glorious job of directing mage affairs for the UTI. My team suspects this building may have been used as an unauthorized research lab.”
“Involving awakened,” said Cho.
“Yes.”
“Your timing… is interesting,” said Cho. “Why now?”
“Ah, right,” said Anne. “My team set up polonium wires around the building, and something had tripped them.”
Tsenka looked to Taq, who still seemed distracted as if he had not heard her. “That would be Taq. He scouted it out earlier.”
“Projection?” asked Anne. “Impressive at your age, but I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.”
Taq grunted, still looking about the room. He stopped and stared at one of the open doorways.
“How long have you known about this place?” asked Cho, drawing her attention off Jones.
“Three days,” replied Anne. “How long have you been in the territories?”
“Less than a day,” said Cho. “We snuck in and want to keep our movement quiet. Can you help with that?”
Anne smiled at Taq. “I can keep this quiet for a while. But I’ll need to escort you around.”
“I don’t think that’s going to work,” said Cho, also looking at Taq.
“Ms. Cho, I’ll lose my job in rather spectacular fashion if the cabinet discovers I knew of your presence, didn’t report it, and didn’t supervise you. Ultimately, it’s your choice which of those actions I take.”
Taq walked into an adjacent room as she spoke. Cho did not reply to Anne’s terms. She followed after Jones, and Anne after her.
“We’re looking for someone,” informed Cho. “You share what you can to help us find her while keeping our presence in the UTI hidden, and we’ll gladly accept your assistance.”
“Good,” said Anne. “Our intel is at your disposal.” They entered the room where Taq followed the walls, glancing up and down. “My team scoured this place. They took DNA samples, scanned for prints, and created forensic models. We weren’t able to glean much.”
“What about
using a seer?” asked Taq.
“No, we did not bring a psion in.”
“You don’t have one,” he stated.
Anne looked down. “No, Taq, we don’t.”
“Very curious, I think,” Jones said, not looking at Anne but at a rectangle of unfaded white on one of the walls. “Something was here, on this wall.”
Cho studied the edges of the outline. “There’s a power conduit behind the wall here. It may have been a screen of some sort.” She stepped closer to the wall, coming up behind the mage. “Taq, there’s—”
“I see it,” said Taq. “It’s blood isn’t it?” Small faint specks of pale maroon decorated the wall just outside the rectangle.
Cho stood and faced Anne. “Whose blood is this?”
“We don’t know,” replied Anne. “It was bleached. We couldn’t get anything from it.”
“Dammit,” said Cho. “There must have been some sort of struggle here.”
“Things went sideways,” said Taq. “So bad they had to abandon the place.”
The three went to the room on the other side of the stairway.
“Who was using the building?” Cho asked Anne.
“We aren’t sure,” claimed the mage affairs director. “The political climate has contributed to a rise of groups looking to exploit awakened.”
“What about Cepheid?” said Cho.
Anne sighed. “That corp certainly deserves their reputation, but they’ve made some reforms. We can’t be too quick to assume they are behind this.”
The next room had water stains on a wooden floor, and outlines that indicated a lot of furniture had been there. They continued to the third floor where indentations indicated a series of cots.
“What cameras cover this area?” asked Taq, fed up with the lack of answers inside the building.
“There’s barely electricity out here,” explained Courtemanche. “We don’t know of any local cameras, but we are looking into satellite captures. That might give us something to go on.”
“Unbelievable,” he breathed. “None of this adds up.”
“Whoever these people are,” said Cho, “they are careful.”
The vampire continued searching the rest of the rooms while Anne and Taq stood two meters from each other in awkward silence. It did not take her long to finish. The three stepped out of the building together.
“You said you were looking for someone,” said Anne.
“Yes,” said Cho.
“I assume it’s a mage.”
“I do not wish to divulge their identity,” said Cho. “But aye, a mage.”
“And likely not a local.”
“Also correct.”
“Another NRI agent?”
Cho turned to Anne. “For now, I think that’s enough about our missing mage. Any ideas on where we can stick our noses next?”
“I should have satellite imagery in a day or two,” said the director. “And I can get you a face-to-face with an executive from Cepheid.”
“I’m not sure that would do more good than harm,” said Cho.
Taq caught up to them and placed a hand on Anne’s arm. “Surely you know some of their lab locations.”
Anne looked down at his hand but did not pull away. She smiled softly. “I may, but Taq, you can’t just go around raiding private property.”
“Taking shots in the dark won’t get us far,” agreed Tsenka.
“If I know where they are,” said Jones. “I can try to scout them. Maybe find traces of our friend.”
“Okay, Taq, I’ll bring you what we know, but as I said, we have many bad actors here.”
“Well,” said Tsenka, “we’ll take what you’ve got on all of them as well.”
“You two make a lot of demands,” said Courtemanche. “Intel I share will have to go through processing to redact anything sensitive. That will take a little time.”
Anne walked with them to the cab. “What do you say I treat you both to dinner this evening? I know a great place overlooking Mahim Bay.”
“I’m not sure—” started Taq.
“We’d be delighted,” interrupted Tsenka.
“Great, I’ll meet you both there.”
Tsenka’s rental car zipped down the asphalt road toward the center of the city. Dead vegetation and dirt haze gave way to a mixture of green and silver. Taq awed at the contrast. Cho sat in the driver seat with the steering wheel fully recessed into the dash. She turned to her partner.
“You really don’t remember her?”
“I wouldn’t be surprised if these things are bugged,” said Taq.
“We wouldn’t have to worry about that if you had an implant like everyone else.”
“I’m too old to have some meat magician scrambling my brains,” he argued.
Cho sighed. “You recognized her.”
“I really didn’t,” said Taq. “But she seemed earnest, so I will take her word for it.”
“She’s part of the government,” countered Tsenka. “I don’t trust her.”
The mage threw an ankle onto his leg and swiveled toward Cho, fighting against the seat belt. “She said three days ago.”
“What?”
“When they discovered this building,” said Taq. “Do you think she was telling the truth about that?”
“My own analysis software concluded it had been abandoned for at least a few days.”
“And yet, you said Desre contacted you today.”
Tsenka considered the implications. “So she wasn’t there, and you didn’t find any other trace of her nearby. She must be in a different city.”
“But she told you to come here.”
“I know, but we are missing something.”
“She’s manipulating you,” concluded Taq. “Maybe she’s captive somewhere, maybe she’s not, but she’s not gotten you any closer to finding her. She has other motivations.”
“I’ve considered that,” said Cho. “But it is still Desre, and I trust her.”
The car stopped in the small lot in front of a building in the shape of an old-world temple, brightly colored with reliefs of Buddha and Shiva carved into stone slabs. The dingy cab looked out of place next to sleek luxury vehicles constructed from carbon-fiber panels and polymer composites. The small cars were paired with bulky tires with deep treads for venturing outside the city, though it was unlikely most of these cars left the safety of the rich neighborhoods.
As the doors opened, Indian synth-traditional music engulfed the pair’s ears. Three musicians sat on stools in the far corner. One swiped through a hologram in the air to provide rhythm, while another tapped tabla drums and the third plucked a sarangi for melody.
Chandeliers with rings of candles bathed the interior in warm light. A real live greeter greeted them as they entered. “You must be with Ms. Courtemanche,” she said, guiding them through a series of sparsely populated tables to the end of the restaurant opposite the music. The other patrons were dressed in fine threads. All of the men wore jodhpuris or suits, one with a tight turban, while a few of the women wore brilliant saris.
The mage and vampire sat at two sides of a brushed metal triangle with Anne on the third. She looked at Taq. “The music can get tiresome, but this place has the best meats in the entire city. Raised, not grown.”
“Humanely, I hope,” replied Taq, to which Anne shrugged.
“This place is a little outside my pay grade,” said Tsenka.
Anne placed her hand on the table in front of the vampire. “Oh, don’t think about that. I will take care of it. They love me here,” she said with a grin. “I come here so often they give me a discount.”
“Free meat?” said Cho. “I can live with that.”
Jones sighed, thinking of what he may soon witness. A waitress handed them menus printed on thick paper. After taking it, the mage ran his fingers over the table as Anne watched.
“Not much tech here,” she said. “Automated waiting has become ubiquitous, so now the fancy pantsers need a way to be different.
”
“Not complaining,” he replied. “When I—when we were younger, paper menus were still in the process of fully dying out.”
“It’s a nice bit of nostalgia,” said Anne.
“Where’s the damn meat?” muttered Cho. “No sorting function.”
Anne took her menu and opened it, placing a fingertip in the desired section, and held it in front of Tsenka’s face.
“Thank you.”
As expected, Cho ordered rare mutton, and Taq tried his best to shield his eyes. Anne, however, watched in fascination.
“Taq, can I get your com’s ID, so I can contact you later?”
“Right, of course,” he replied. “What if I need to call you?”
“I will send a message so you’ll have it,” she said. “Yours too, Agent Cho?”
Tsenka nodded, turning her com implant to discovery mode, finding Anne’s. But the director held no device in her hand.
“You have a neuro-com?” she asked.
“Doesn’t everyone, these days?” said Anne, winking at Taq, who grunted quietly. She smiled at his reaction then turned to Cho. “I had a neural interface implanted long before they became cool. I was a bit of a hacker in my youth.”
“Oh, I bet that’s an interesting story,” Tsenka said while nudging Taq with her knee under the table.
“My wife Kate was—is a neuro herself.”
“I never liked that term,” said Anne. “But Kate Alva is well known, even here.”
“Kate Jones, these days,” said Taq.
Anne frowned. “I heard about her condition. Did they ever discern the cause?”
“They have theories.”
“You know,” started Anne, clasping her hands in front of her. “Our labs are very advanced. Some of the best scientists in the world work for Cepheid. If you want me to reach out to them, let me know. I can be very persuasive.”
“That’s very kind,” he replied.
“Do you have children or grandchildren running around?” Anne asked.
Taq took a drink from his water glass and wiped his mouth. He set his cloth napkin next to his half-finished plate of rice and chicken. “No,” he said. “We were always too busy… and too careful. Then the early symptoms of Kate’s condition appeared, and things… changed.”