by Kyle, Celia
After our meal, we reach the cusp of rich and poor, a swath of taverns, brothels, and pawn shops, which serve both social strata. I check the address for Commander Davenport and do a double take.
“This can’t be right.”
“What can’t be right?” Varia peers over my shoulder at my datapad, even though she knows I hate that and it annoys the shit out of me.
“The address.” I pull away from her, but she just peers over my other shoulder. “It’s listed as forty-one and a half Churchill Lane.”
“So where’s forty-one and a half Churchill lane?”
“Right here.” I point at the bar across the street, a rough looking place with hover bikes parked outside in a row. I half expect a bar stool, or a body, to come flying through the plate glass window at any moment. “That’s forty-one Churchill lane. I assume the half might be an apartment or studio somewhere on the grounds.”
“Who lives in a bar?”
We all exchange glances.
“A raging alcoholic?”
Lokyer’s jibe gets us laughing, and I turn toward the tavern and shake my head.
“Bar or not, I guess we have to go in. It’s not the worst place I’ve ever gone on a pub crawl.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Swipt
I had been dubious about this establishment when we first approached from the street, but on the inside it’s not shabby at all. Someone has spent time maintaining the timber floors, which are polished to a gleam. And the furniture looks both tasteful and comfortable.
A brief flash of panic hits me when I realize the bar is mostly occupied by humans at the moment—humans who happen to be IHC marines. Even those who aren’t in uniform are easily identifiable by their distinctive military issue haircuts.
But my panic proves to be unfounded. The marines don’t even glance our way when we enter. There are other sapients in the bar, such as the table of Vakutan construction workers, or the shifty-eyed Grolgath playing solo Twonk in the corner.
“This isn’t so bad on the inside.” I glance over at Ilya and take her hand.
“Come. Let’s find a place to sit while before we draw attention to ourselves.”
The rest of our quartet follows in our wake as we approach one of the empty tables near the far wall of the establishment. Several holomonitors display BBL games while another features a newscast with a cheerful anchor talking about how synth stocks are on the rise in the Alliance and IHC markets.
A low hum of conversation fills the climate-controlled air, occasionally broken by boisterous laughter. The overall atmosphere is relaxed. This isn’t a singles bar or a hot night club, but a working-class joint where hard working men come to drown their existential sorrows in sudsy brews.
Almost as soon as we seat ourselves, a pretty young human waitress with bright blue eyes takes our order. Lokyer is mesmerized, staring extensively at her shapely legs, which are on full display in a skirt that’s decent by about two inches.
Even after she saunters away to the bar to get our drinks, Lokyer continues to stare at her swinging bottom. I laugh and clap my hand on his shoulder.
“You should go talk to her.”
“What? No.” He shakes his head quickly. “We’re on a mission. And anyway, she’s not my type.”
“Bullshit.” Varia grins at his gaping astonishment. “She’s so your type. There’s nothing wrong with talking to her.”
“That’s silly. I mean, she probably has a boyfriend anyway.”
“You never know unless you go talk to her.”
He turns to Ilya, his lips pulled down glumly.
“Not you too.”
“Yes, me too. Maybe you just need some liquid encouragement.”
The waitress returns with our drinks, Geigerbrau for Varia, some fruity cocktail for Ilya, and Alzhon ale for me and Lokyer. I nudge him under the table with my boot, and he abruptly clears his throat and looks up sheepishly at the pretty waitress.
“Uh…are you from around here?”
I plant my face firmly in my palm while Ilya struggles not to laugh. But the waitress doesn’t seem to mind the cheesy line. She tousles Lokyer’s hair and giggles.
“You’re cute.”
She turns to leave, but Varia catches her sleeve.
“Pardon me, but I was looking for an old family friend of mine, Bruce? I understand he has an address here.”
Varia’s tone is fraught with innocence, maybe a tad too much, but the simple-minded waitress doesn’t pick up on anything untoward about her query.
“Mr. Davenport? Yes, he has an office space here and occasionally sleeps on the sofa, but he’s almost never here. Do you want me to leave a message, or…”
“Oh no, I wanted to surprise him, that’s all. We’ll just have to catch him next time we come through the system.”
Varia pays our tab and tips generously enough to keep the waitress happy but not so much as to make her suspicious. Once she’s out of earshot, the rest of us heave a collective sigh.
“Damn it.” Varia clenches her fist. “This may have been our only lead on either of those two assholes.”
“Don’t forget, we still don’t have any proof that Commander Davenport even exists at all.” Ilya glares at the darkened flight of stairs leading up to the bar’s second level. A sign clearly reads “employees only” in both galactic standard and several league and frontier tongues. “Damn it, I’m sick of all this fruitless scrambling. I’m going upstairs to have myself a looksee at his office.”
“Wait, that’s not a good idea.” I hold up my hand, swallowing hard and checking the room to make sure no one heard our clandestine conversation. “There could be security devices or even booby traps. Not to mention we have no idea what’s waiting for us at the top of those stairs.”
“None of us are trained skulkers, Ilya.” Varia takes a pull from her bottle of beer and shakes her head. “I’m as eager to find out as you are, but there are better ways.”
“Better ways? Like what, exactly?” Ilya raps her fingers on the table in a rapid tattoo. Her eyes flash with annoyance, and the tension is so thick you could cut it with a knife. “Take jobs in the local economy and blend in just in case he happens to come back? You heard the waitress. He’s barely ever here.”
“I understand your frustration, Ilya.” I put my hand on top of her own, but she yanks it away. “But what you’re proposing presents great risk. Not just to you, but to the entire crew, Kilgari and human alike.”
“Yeah, did you see what passes for a detention center here?” Varia peers out the window at the busy street. “Concrete floors, a hole for a latrine. That’s not the kind of place you want to spend any time at all, trust me.”
“That’s only a problem if I get caught.”
I actually sort of agree with Ilya, but I can’t bear the thought of her being put into any kind of danger. There’s likely to be critical information we need up in that office. Leaving here without it feels like a massive failure.
“Let’s think this through.” I drain half my ale in one go and then fix her with a pointed stare. “The office isn’t going anywhere. Maybe we could come back and use the cover of night to slip into the second-story window.”
“You’re assuming this office has a window, which is unlikely if it contains, oh, I don’t know, evidence of fucking illegal shit.”
“Ilya.” Varia reaches for Ilya’s half empty drink. “I think you need to have another drink and calm down.”
“I’m not going to sit here drinking, Varia. But I will pretend to actually…”
Ilya drains her glass and lets out a loud belch. Then she fixes Varia with a bleary-eyed gaze. No doubt she’s a little tipsy after draining that potent drink so quickly, but I can tell she’s hamming it up.
“—it’s all part of my cover. This way, if I get caught, I can just play the dumb, drunk bimbo looking for the toilet.”
“That’s actually not a bad plan.” I nod in approval, but Varia hisses through clenched teeth.
“No, it’s not. It’s a terrible plan. Ilya, you are not secret agent 0014 Flexington Steele. If these people catch you, they might kill you. And unlike Jon Lonerie you don’t have a stunt double.”
“I’ve never even seen those holoflicks. And besides, if a man can do it how hard can it be?”
And she’s off. Ilya rises quickly before anyone can even muster a protest and walks on unsteady legs toward the steps. I cringe, glancing around the bar, certain someone is going to shout an alarm at any moment, but no one seems to notice.
Varia dashes off after Ilya, rushing up the stairs as well. Lokyer and I exchange glances, ready to move at a moment’s notice.
“Stay calm and don’t attract attention,” he says.
I nod.
But I know if push comes to shove, to protect my mate I’ll tear this place apart.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Ilya
My face creases with an annoyed grimace when I hear Varia’s footsteps on the stairs behind me. As she rushes up to my side, I turn in the darkened corridor and hiss whisper through my teeth.
“Two drunk chicks is less believable than one. I didn’t ask for backup.”
“Too bad. You’ve got it.” Varia crosses her arms over her chest and glares at me. “And you can stop whispering. It carries further than a low voice, not that anyone downstairs can hear us with all that racket.”
Varia is stubborn with a capital S. No, scratch that. If you look up stubborn in the holonet dictionary of galactic standard dialects it’s going to have a big, grinning three-dimensional portrait of Varia as part of the entry. I might as well ask Swipt not to have golden skin as argue with her.
“Fine.” I deflate and turn to continue my slow creep up the hallway. The floorboards creak beneath our tread, but not jarringly. Hopefully no one downstairs notices with all the tumult.
The upstairs of the bar features one long corridor with several rooms branching off of it. The first one we investigate proves to be filled with dusty mugs, glasses, and random bits like yard-long sections of carpet. Obviously this is a catchall storage area, and not an office.
My heart pounds in my chest, and I struggle to contain my fear. Anyone could walk in on us, at anytime. Well, I wanted to come along on this away mission. Didn’t I? No point in whining about it now.
Maybe later, when this is over and assuming it ends without our capture or death, I might look back and decide it had been a thrill. For the moment, I’m really regretting my hasty decision to play spy.
Varia comes up to the next doorway and flattens herself against the wall beside it. She peers cautiously around the corner and then relaxes and motions for me to follow. We find a room with a covered grand piano, half its legs busted off at the first joint, and stacks of the comfortable but thrifty seats from the bar below.
Two down one to go. We come upon the final door, and this time I feel we’ve hit paydirt because it’s the first one we’ve come across that’s locked.
And boy, is it ever locked. The topmost one is a lever and hasp, with a padlock through it. Below that is a combination lock on another hasp, and below that lies a magnetic lock with a passcode protection.
Finally, there’s a bar across the door with a chain and an Alzhon puzzle lock. That could be tricky. I give the door a good once over to make sure there are no other forms of security, most especially an alarm. But despite my best efforts, I can’t locate one. This causes me no shortage of anxiety because I can’t fathom why he wouldn’t have an alarm.
“What’s wrong?”
“There’s no alarm, Varia. That’s what’s wrong.”
“So? Isn’t that a good thing?”
“It’s suspicious is what it is.”
“Flexington Steele isn’t this much of a worrywart.”
“He’s a fictional character while I’m very much a real woman.”
Varia peers back down the hallway when we hear voices at the foot of the stair. I freeze stock still, almost afraid to breathe. Are they coming up here? But then the voices recede, and we both relax.
“We have to get in here and quickly.”
“I know.” I start digging in my belt pouch, rummaging pasts screw bits and battery packs.
“What are you doing?”
“Looking for my trusty lockpicks. I never leave home without them.”
“Lockpicks?”
I drag out the small, thin case and snap it open, extracting my torsion wrench and a slender snake. Raking would get these padlocks off in a jiffy, but it’s also noisy. Too noisy.
“Where does a rich girl from Glimner learn to pick locks?”
“Well, my dad kept his liquor cabinet under lock and key. I guess I sort of branched out from there. It was a hobby of mine for a while, almost a borderline obsession.”
I grin as I tease the final pin tumbler in the first padlock and unlatch it. Then I go to work on the padlock holding the bar in place, ignoring the other two for the time being.
“You’re really adept at that.”
“Don’t sound so suspicious—smuggler.”
“Point taken.”
Two down, one to go. Maybe. The combination lock has a key hole on the back, which makes me initially hopeful until I discover it contains wafers rather than pins. I don’t have the right kind of picks for this sort of lock, so it looks like I’ll have to do this the hard way.
“What are you bitching about now?”
“This pain in the ass lock.”
Another noise from downstairs startles us, and Varia and I exchange worried glances.
“I’ll go stand watch.”
“Good idea.”
I lean in close and put my ear against the silver back of the combination padlock. Then I turn the wheel, millimeter by millimeter, listening for the subtle, barely audible click.
It’s not easy, especially with the noise from the bar overwhelming my auditory senses. Varia keeps peering up the hall at me, her lips a tight line. Damn it, woman. I know. I’m hurrying as fast as I can.
At last, the combination lock comes free. Then I wipe the sweat off my brow and stare at the electronic magnet lock.
“You’re the last one. Aren’t you?”
This could be tricky because I recognize this particular model of lock. It’s a Novarian Durzacorp maglock, and if you fail the input the correct code three times in a row, it shuts down until an administrator can open it with a retinal scan. Damn, we know next to nothing about Commander Davenport. A lot of military types use their wife’s birthday, or their anniversary, but what would Davenport use? I only know he really likes adult holovids…
Wait a second. Most of the vids he streamed on his account were of a particular model, Velveteen Skie. On a hunch, I look up her profile while Varia anxiously comes to check on me.
“Are you seriously looking at porn? Now?” Varia shakes her head. “I have to admit, she’s gorgeous. How does she stand with tits that big?”
“Shhh. I’m looking up her measurements.”
“For god’s sake, why?”
In response, I input her measurements into the code pad. It blinks with a green light three times and pops open softly.
“Stop smiling. You’re not that clever.”
“Oh, but I am. And I think I deserve praise.”
“All hail Ilya, master locksmith and possible thief.”
“I’m only here to steal information.”
We enter the room, and instantly I feel we’ve hit the jackpot because the room is dominated by a top of the line IHC military grade computer terminal. Other than that, his office is surprisingly Spartan. No pictures of family, no sports trophies. I guess he really doesn’t spend much time here after all.
I sit down behind the terminal and peer intently at the touch screen. Varia comes to stand behind me, but I hiss and wave her away.
“Get out of my light.”
“What are you even doing?”
“Trying to see if he left fingerprints on his screen.”
“Because the number sequence he uses as a passcode should be the one with the most fingerprint smudges on it.”
“Damn.” Varia straightens up and puts her hands on her hips. “You really are good at the spy game. Maybe we should make you agent 0015.”
“Nah, 0028 because I’m twice the spy that Flexington Steele is.”
“Did you consider he might use the same passcode on his terminal as he does on the door lock?”
I pause in my efforts and then shake my head.
“No way. That’s the kind of thing an idiot would do, and this guy’s a high-ranking IHC…son of a bitch. It is the same passcode.”
I get access to the terminal, and my heart starts to pound. His file system is a bit tricky. It’s not like he labels things by category—treason here, human trafficking there—but I get it figured out in short order. Then I plug my datapad into the terminal and begin the download of all files under Davenport or Zayne’s name.
“Hurry, I think I heard somebody coming up the stairs.”
“Almost done…there we go.”
“All right, let’s get the hell out of here before…”
Varia’s voice trails off, and when I lift my gaze to the door I can see why. An IHC marine blocks the passage with his massive body, and he doesn’t look happy.
I don’t think the two drunk girls looking for the bathroom excuse is going to cut it this time.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Swipt
Lokyer and I have done our level best to appear nonchalant as we anxiously await the return of my mate and Varia. I hate the way our metabolisms eat through alcohol when we’re stressed. It’s like I’m drinking water.
“They’ve been up there for a long time.”
I glance over at Lokyer, and try to keep my face neutral when I respond.
“I know.”
“Should we go and check on them?”
“Not yet…oh shit.”