"Given what we know, he could probably take me himself without much trouble. Why send someone else?" Felix said.
Romulus looked into the sea of people behind him and wondered where Diomedes had gone.
"They knew me on sight," he heard Felix say behind him. "The only times—"
"What the hell you think you're bloody doin'?!"
Romulus had seen the speaker approach from behind Felix, but the smaller man's back had been turned and he showed no sign of noticing until the question had been shouted. Felix turned on his stool and looked the newcomer over quickly. He might have been a ganger—it was difficult for Romulus to tell. He didn't recognize any markings, and the stranger didn't look emaciated like the average ganger. He wasn't huge, but he wasn't stringy, and the blue glow behind his eyes was beyond being merely cheap street implants.
"I beg your pardon?" said Felix after a moment.
The blue-eyed man leaned in closer, eyes pulsing slightly with light and threats. "I said, what the hell you think you're bloody doin'?"
"Oh!" Felix said cheerily. "Having a drink with my friend here, thanks for asking!" Felix glanced at Romulus and smiled.
The blue-eyed man again moved closer, seeming to grow as he loomed. He wasn't bigger than Romulus, but next to Felix the man's advantage in size was apparent. "That's. . . my. . . seat!" he growled. "That's. . . Angus's. . . seat!"
Romulus turned, ready for a fight, ready to come to Felix's aid if need be, but his companion's composure was calm.
"No," Felix replied into Angus's glare. "This is my seat. It was empty, I sat down in it," he said simply. "Find your own. There's two over there."
Angus grabbed Felix by the shoulder and spun him out of the stool, though the smaller man's balance was good enough to keep him from sprawling on the floor completely. Romulus reacted immediately, standing in challenge, but as Angus turned to face him, Felix darted in between.
"You got a problem with that, little man?" Angus sneered. People were watching them now. There would definitely be a fight. Where was Diomedes?
Romulus pushed forward, but Felix backed up against him and held him back. "Yes, actually," Felix said. "I left my drink behind." He darted in and grabbed his glass. "Much better." With that, he turned around and motioned Romulus to the other two empty stools.
Romulus had been expecting a fight. The utter lack of anything at all had him stunned and confused, and he was sitting three seats down with Felix before he knew it. "Who was that?" Romulus asked.
"That, apparently, was Angus." Felix said with a smile as he glanced about.
"I know, but who is he?"
His companion shrugged and sipped his water. "Someone who has a great fondness for his usual seat, I'd say."
Romulus paused, wondering if he'd missed something. "I thought we could've taken him," he mumbled.
"Oh, there were two of us," Felix mused, still looking. "You're probably right."
This wasn't making sense. "Was there anyone backing him up?"
"I don't know, maybe. But they probably would have found some way to make their presence known by then."
"Then why—"
Felix quickly put up his hand and turned to Romulus. "Did I hurt anyone?"
"Er, no."
"Did I get hurt?"
"Well no, but—"
"Is the situation resolved?"
Romulus blinked. "I mean, I guess so, but. . ."
"So what's the problem?"
"Well he. . . took your stool." Romulus began to feel foolish.
"If you're going to get into a fight—if you're going to risk your neck, and especially if you're going to try to hurt someone else—you'd damn well have a better reason for resorting to violence than a replaceable barstool. The thing with using force is even if you win, it's going to hurt you, too. And I'm not talking about bruising your knuckles. That's something you really need to learn if you're going into your line of work."
"But he was pushing you around," Romulus argued.
"Yeah, he was. I'm not saying he wasn't being an ass, I'm just saying that it's just a barstool. Very much like the one I'm sitting on now. My self-image isn't so fragile that I'd let something like that get to me. 'Course, it wasn't always like that."
There was a sudden yell from above and out towards the center of the club. Romulus and Felix both looked to see a large man fall from a catwalk down into a mosh pit and disappear from sight.
"And it seems like our friend Dio's decided to help me out with a little visual aid of his own."
Romulus looked up at from where the man fell and saw his mentor staring blankly down below. Some yelling rose up from beneath where Diomedes stood, but Romulus couldn't make it out.
"I think," said Felix, "that he's just been challenged to a match. If I heard right." He took a drink. "I wonder how many stools that was over."
"You don't even know what it was about," Romulus said with a defensiveness that surprised him.
"No, but I know Diomedes—or at least as much as you think you do."
Romulus said nothing, instead watching his mentor as he made his way across the catwalk to the stairs, and didn't notice Brian until he spoke.
"Well what do you know? You guys are here after all!" The reporter walked up with a freshly reddening welt across his forehead. "When you told me to meet you in this hell-hole I half suspected you were trying to get rid of me."
"Glad you made it," Felix said. His eyes were fixed on Diomedes. Romulus nodded a greeting.
"Oh, don't get me wrong," Brian continued in mock joviality, "I love this freaking place. Where else can you get knocked out in a fistfight and mugged three times before you hit the ground?" The reporter paused to gingerly touch his growing welt before glancing around uncomfortably. "So where's our vigilante?"
"We missed him, I'm afraid," said Felix.
"Missed him?" Brian cried before lowering his voice. "Missed him? Then what am I doing here?"
"What is he doing here?" Diomedes had reached them.
"I called and told him to meet us here before we left Lifesaver's," Felix explained with a shrug. "And I'm sorry, Brian, but he was here when I called. You find anything?"
The reporter scowled, moving uncomfortably out of the way of two men who pressed their way to the bar. "Not too much, and nothing RavenTech. There are a few minor things of interest, but if I'm going to stand around telling you tidbits I'd rather do it outside."
"Take him outside," Diomedes told Felix. "Romulus and I'll keep looking in here."
Felix looked at Diomedes, then to Romulus. "Remember what I said, Flynn. We'll meet you two back at the floater. In the meantime, you know my number."
A moment later, Felix and the reporter were gone.
"Come on," Diomedes told him.
"Where are we going?"
"I have to take care of someone first."
XXI
The brilliant white half-moon traveled through the night. It cast a pale glow on its twin reflected in the glass of the skyscrapers that seemed to meet it halfway in the sky. Below, smaller lights shone, and landing lights pulsed in a lonely rhythm atop the higher rooftops. A police floater rose steadily above the streets on its patrol. Streetlights glowed closer to the ground, and the steady, solitary glow of a camera's active LED turned along the scene. Below, a black limousine's perfect finish reflected them all as the car moved through the streets, slowed to a stop beside the man with the ponytail, and took him inside.
Ken Wallace waited from within as the man, one of his most trusted tools, settled in against the leather. "Good evening, Mister Fagles," said Wallace once the door closed. "Nice night for a walk. Brandy?" He motioned to an empty glass and a bottle.
Fagles loosened his overcoat and nodded in acceptance before taking the bottle to pour a small amount into the glass. "Nice night for a walk. Though I do like your way better, I think." He sipped. "This is good."
"Oh, yes." Wallace smiled. "Simple pleasures."
Outside the window, the c
ity lights gave way to murky blackness as the car traveled out along a bridge floating across the water.
"So," Wallace prompted.
"Everything is ready for the exchange," Fagles answered. "Tomorrow night, eleven p.m. outside their training facility. They've agreed to one guard in each floater. And they're expecting to deal with me."
"And you did tell them you'd be arriving in the limo?"
The man with the ponytail nodded.
"Good," said Wallace. "I'll have two more men with me in here in case they try anything."
"I don't think they will. I believe they have accepted my implication that this partnership may become more lucrative as time goes on."
"I have no intention of that."
"Neither do I, Mr. Wallace." He grinned. "I don't see your point."
Wallace smirked back. "I'm just making certain we're clear."
"Crystal."
"Good. Everything is ready with the product. Your diligence will be rewarded. It appears that all we need do now is wait." Wallace lifted his glass. "And tie up loose ends, if there are any left?"
"The drugs with which we paid your 'associates' seem to be working well. I've managed to get reports of two of them dying from a, quote, overdose."
"Confirmed?" Wallace asked.
"As reliable as can be expected, considering."
Wallace shook his head. "It's inefficient, this idea of yours. Having to rely on unconfirmed second-hand reports in such matters makes me worry."
"As I've said before, what you see as inefficient, I see as simple, safe and elegant," Fagles replied. "We pay them in tainted drugs, they use them, and after a comfortable amount of time has passed, their heart stops. No one's going to care enough to do a detailed autopsy on some ganger passed out in a gutter. And with the delay, do you really think the others even have half the intelligence to connect the drugs to the deaths?"
Wallace shook his head. He didn't pick those punks for their brains. Hell, they didn't even get the right warehouse at one point. "No, but it still irritates me to have the possibility that we didn't take care of them all."
Fagles drained his glass. "What will they do, report you to the police? Even if it didn't mean incriminating themselves in the process, who would believe them?"
"I don't like loose ends. They come back to haunt you. Speaking of which, how is Diomedes?"
Fagles smiled coolly. "Nothing certain yet, but he is looking. I understand that after I spoke with him, he hired a man named Felix Hiatt, so I do think he's taking our offer seriously."
"Good." It was serious, if he succeeded. "Who's Felix Hiatt?"
"Someone with a knack for finding things out. Quite well, from what I understand."
"So they might have a chance," Wallace said thoughtfully. He was becoming glad that his attempt at killing the man a few nights ago had failed. It would be interesting to see the outcome of this endeavor.
"Who will kill whom, I wonder?" Fagles asked, as if reading his thoughts. He grinned again. "I do so enjoy no-lose situations."
Wallace did, too, though in this case he was pulling more for the outcome that would relieve the larger irritation of the two. Diomedes hated him, but the psycho had done more that actually threatened Wallace's plans than Diomedes had. At least so far. He would not have his plans ruined by such an insignificant.
Wallace had received word of confirmation from his ESA contact earlier that day. It was definitely more than just an unusual mineral deposit. Lives might have been lost, but what mattered even more was that there was activity. Secrets. Profitable secrets, and with that came power. It was a promise that he was prepared to invest in.
The limousine continued along the highway, chasing the Moon to the horizon.
XXII
Felix was more than a little concerned about leaving Flynn still inside The Arena, though it struck him as ironic. From a physical standpoint, Flynn was better off than Felix was himself. Not that Felix wasn't comfortable in his ability to defend himself, but Flynn's larger size was more intimidating. Yet it wasn't his physical well being that Felix was concerned with at the moment. On the other hand, there was only so much you could tell a person at once before you had to let their own experience teach them. Felix just hoped experience wouldn't be too harsh.
He followed Brian out of the place, amazed at how much the reporter drew attention to himself by trying to remain inconspicuous. He wove this way and that as they made their way to the exit, trying not to be noticed by the sea of people yet managing to get in the way of nearly everyone with his erratic course.
"Just bite the bullet and push through, Brian," Felix admonished from behind him.
"Bite the bullet, he says," Felix heard him mutter. "Exactly the thing I'm trying to avoid here. . ."
They did make it to the exit without any real trouble, but, Felix noted with some amusement, not before they passed by one particular man more than twice. Felix wondered a bit that Diomedes didn't insist on hearing what little information Brian had to say. Either he was angrier than normal with the one he was about to fight, or his opinion of Brian's help was now close to nothing. Or both, really.
"Well, that was fun, wasn't it?" Brian said as they left the mass of bodies in front of the building. "Come here often?"
"Not if I can help it. Their brunch menu is just atrocious."
Felix looked around, scanning the area with a bit of caution. This wasn't the best place to walk and talk, and while there was probably more violent energy inside The Arena, it was more likely that they'd be chosen as a target while isolated out here in the open. Normally he would have found the irony more interesting if he hadn't been attacked earlier. "Might as well head back to the floater," he said. He led the way. "So you weren't able to find much?"
"Virtually nothing we could use, from the building records. You told me to look for anyone with a RavenTech connection, right?" Brian shook his head as they walked. "Nothing. Not a damned thing. Not in the press files, anyway."
Felix nodded.
"Interesting thing though, there was a convicted arsonist living there." The reporter read from a palm computer. "One Casey Dodd, fifty-four. Served ten years."
"Fifty-four? Well if the arsonist is our 'Wraith,' it sounds like Mr. Dodd might be a bit old."
"He also died in the fire," Brian added. "How's that for poetic justice?"
"An even better reason to rule him out," said Felix, a moment later ashamed of his own callousness.
"Yeah, I thought so, too."
Felix thought he heard footsteps behind them as they crossed the street under a crumbling sky bridge. He glanced around a moment to check but saw no one who seemed to be directly following. His near mugging earlier was making him jumpy. Brian was looking ahead silently, and they walked a few feet more. Felix glanced up to watch a plane fly overhead. "So what is it you're trying to decide about telling me?"
"Hmm? I'm not trying to decide."
"Okay, so?"
Brian cleared his throat. They walked a few more paces. A spotlight arched across the clouds from somewhere to the east.
"I did some talking with a colleague who's looking into the arsons," he said finally. "I'm not her favorite person. I didn't even think she was going to tell me anything when I asked, but I guess she thought that she could get something from me in return. She was friendly enough. But, she doesn't like me."
"What did you find out?" Felix pressed. Were Brian's ramblings genuine, or was he was just stalling?
"It's possible that the arson was a cover for theft. I couldn't get too many details—like I said, she doesn't like me. Or maybe she doesn't know herself, but apparently RavenTech's own investigation found that the surviving debris might not entirely account for everything that should've been there."
"How much?"
Brian sighed and shook his head. "I don't know, exactly. It'd have to be a decent amount for them to notice it gone in the rubble, no?"
"That's a lot for one man to move by himself," Felix thought alou
d.
"And not a very subtle way to hide it, with an obvious arson."
A rush of thoughts hit Felix. He struggled to put them into a sense of order. "They'd be looking for whoever did the arson. Like you said, it's an obvious crime—so it stands to reason that the person or persons who stole the equipment didn't directly set the arson. They paid someone else."
"Well, maybe."
"It doesn't make sense, though. Even if they stole the stuff, they had to get inside. That's a high security warehouse. Anyone able to get in long enough to move the stuff out should be able to cover their tracks better than just burning the whole—" Felix gasped as another thought hit him. "Unless. . ."
Brian stopped. "What?"
"Unless the stuff was never there in the first place. Stolen, or rerouted by someone on the inside, maybe? Destroy the records of the reroute, then destroy where they're supposed to have gone so they're less likely to notice it missing."
"What, you're saying that RavenTech stole their own product?"
"Maybe," Felix said. "Making a lot of assumptions, here, but. . . it fits."
"So why the other fires? Drawing attention to the arsonist instead of the theft?"
"Maybe. Or maybe there were thefts at the other places that just weren't noticed? Or maybe they had a different purpose."
They continued to walk. "I'd say it's a good bet a Dirge apartment wasn't theft."
"And if it wasn't theft, then. . ." The realization hit him suddenly. As quickly as he had it, Felix reminded himself that it was held together by assumption. Still, could it be Wallace? "Diomedes was the target," he announced aloud with a trace of wonder at why he'd dismissed it so easily before.
"Care to explain that?"
A noise from the alley—just the skid of an old can against concrete—made Felix turn suddenly. It was the same alley down which the men who jumped him had fled. He was definitely jumpy. Trying to relax, he was about to answer the reporter when something caught his eye. Felix stopped and peered, enhancing the light with his implants, and saw a leg from behind a corner down the alley. It looked to be an odd angle, but around it was. . .
A Shadow in the Flames (The New Aeneid Cycle) Page 19