Dominance

by Niall Teasdale

  There was silence. The whiskey stopped moving in the glass; the wave on its surface ground to a sluggish halt. Wayden emptied the tumbler. ‘She won’t get to him. He went to Fargo before your warrant came through. He’ll be at his house by now and there’s no way she’s getting to him there.’

  ‘Thank you. I’ll go to Fargo.’ Fox turned and then paused, looking back over her shoulder. ‘Don’t underestimate this woman. She’s ex-NAPA. Computer crime and security specialist. Trained with weapons. She would probably like to make your son’s death long and painful, but I think she’ll settle for dead. And she has nothing to lose now. I don’t think she’d mind dying, so long as she takes Sherman with her.’

  Fox was almost at the door when Wayden spoke again. ‘Whatever he’s done, Captain Meridian, he’s still my son.’

  ‘Tell me that again when you’ve seen the evidence,’ Fox said, and then walked out.

  Fargo Agri-Zone.

  ‘Captain Meridian,’ Pythia said as Fox piloted the vertol in toward a landing, ‘I am detecting multiple persons and vehicles near the exit gate of the airfield. One of the vehicles appears to be an armoured personnel carrier.’

  Fox flicked up the imagery Pythia had captured and frowned. ‘It’s a mobile command and control unit,’ she said. ‘An armed one.’ The boxy, armoured vehicle was big, with wheels taller than Fox was, twin rotary cannons in a turret, and a large array of antennae. It was not the kind of thing police forces really needed to have available, though excuses could be made. There were at least four sedans blocking the exit from the airfield alongside the APC. ‘Can you identify any of the people?’

  ‘Not at this range.’

  ‘Okay. Kit, how’s our backup?’

  ‘Five minutes behind us,’ Kit responded. ‘I did not really think that would be necessary. Mister Wayden has surprised me.’

  ‘I’m not sure this is to do with Wayden. Personally. If the locals have heard why I’m here… Well, I don’t think Wayden’s going to go down alone.’

  ‘This is insane.’

  Fox smiled. ‘Yeah, kind of, but they already tried to scare me off once. They’re running out of viable options here.’ The wheels of the vertol touched down and Fox began working through the shutdown procedure. ‘We’ll go talk to them and see what they’ve got in mind.’

  ~~~

  ‘Hello, boys. You’re blocking the gate. I’d really appreciate it if you moved.’ Fox sat on her Q-bug and waited, even if she was not expecting a reply which involved letting her through.

  The plan in Fargo was different from the one in Detroit. There would be no reasonable way to transport Sherman Wayden from his house to the airfield, so Fox was aiming to ensure it was safe and then Pythia would bring the vertol out to Lake Lida. Of course, she had to get to Lake Lida to do that.

  ‘We know why you’re here, Meridian,’ a voice called out. Fox localised the sound and tracked it to a man standing behind one of the cruisers. He was resting his arms on the hood of the car and holding a pistol aimed at Fox’s chest.

  ‘Edmond Ross,’ Kit supplied. ‘He’s an inspector. His name is on the majority of the narcotics busts made since Wayden took over here.’

  ‘You’ve got some trumped-up charge against Sherman Wayden,’ Ross continued. ‘We all know this is illegal. You’re just trying to get rid of a competitor. We’re taking you into custody on charges of corruption.’

  Fox smiled and transmitted the warrant data on broadcast. ‘I am here to serve a legitimate arrest warrant for Sherman Wayden. The charges are multiple counts of rape, multiple counts of conspiracy to commit rape, two counts of conspiracy to commit murder, bribery of a government official, and probably a few other things we’ll figure out later. Any of you who stand in my way will be charged with obstruction of justice. Move it, or lose it, gentlemen. Oh, and ladies. Sorry, didn’t see you standing at the back.’

  There was some muttering among the uniforms, followed by several of them turning and walking away from the barricade. Two of those were women, but they had probably all bothered to read the warrant details.

  ‘Stand your ground, officers,’ Ross shouted. ‘She’s got nothing to–’

  ‘I have witness testimony and video recordings,’ Fox interrupted. She stepped off her bug and took a step forward. The other change she had made on the flight to Fargo was to get into a combat suit. She had an assault rifle slung across her back, but she made no move to unsling it. ‘I have plenty to see to it that your boss goes away for a very long time. You don’t want to side with him on this.’ Her eyes sought out Ross. ‘But I’m guessing this isn’t really about him, is it, Inspector Ross?’ Ross’s hands tightened around his weapon. ‘This is about all those drug busts you set up and how a real NAPA audit team would find that very few of them are legitimate. Alan Meier was arrested this afternoon. NAPA are going to have to make an example of him and I doubt he’s going to go down alone.’

  Now Ross’s jaw tightened. ‘The subject is resisting arrest,’ he called out. About half of his remaining men took aim and the turret on the APC turned to bring its twin guns to bear. ‘You have ten seconds to comply,’ Ross added, ignoring the fact that people were walking away from the blockade. There were plenty left to take down one woman.

  Fox smiled and shook her head. ‘Did you really think I’d come here without some backup, Inspector?’

  There was a sound, something like what you would get if you combined ripping cloth with a high-pitched shriek. Light flared as something flew out of the sky and slammed into the APC. The missile punched through the side armour and exploded. The shielded windows at the front burst outward and flames leaped out through the shattered glass and the hole the missile had created. There were loud cries and shrieks from the assembled cops, but only Ross thought to do anything: he fired at Fox. A jacketed round hit her chest and flattened against her suit.

  Fox raised her pistol and fired, and Ross’s head exploded into red mist. ‘Would anyone else like to shoot at me? Because I can do this all night.’ There was the clatter of weapons being dropped onto cars and the ground. No one decided that firing was a good idea. ‘Right. Get those damn cars out of my way.’

  As she swung her leg back over the Q-bug, Fox spoke silently to Kit. ‘Have you got names for the people who backed Ross up?’

  ‘Most of them. They did not turn off their implants, or I have facial data.’

  ‘Good. We’re going to leave it up to NAPA to decide what to do with them, but I want them put on watch lists for all Palladium-secured buildings.’

  ‘Cleaning this up is going to be a really thankless task, isn’t it?’

  As a gap formed in the barricade of cars, Fox started the Q-bug forward, dodging around the burning APC. ‘No one ever really likes it when you point out how badly they screwed up. Wayden will be hit hard, even if they’re squeaky clean everywhere else. NAPA is going to have an entire farm’s worth of egg on their faces. Yes, it’s going to be messy.’

  ‘No good deed ever goes unpunished?’

  ‘Yeah, I think that pretty much covers it.’

  ~~~

  ‘House’ was not an especially valid term for what Sherman Wayden had built on the shore of Lake Lida. It was more of a compound with high walls around the perimeter, several acres of land inside the walls, and then the ranch-style building within. That had housing for around twenty people, including a ten-bunk dormitory for a security force, an armoury which had been stocked with any number of weapons NAPA would have considered questionable at best, a garage capable of housing three APCs as well as a few cars, and that was before you got to the more mundane rooms such as the pool, the sauna, the lounge big enough to host a large party…

  The main security room followed Wayden Executive Services’ preferred design for an arcology monitoring suite. Almost everything was virtual, aside from the five chairs the operators sat on. Sherman Wayden surveyed the banks of virtual screens showing various locations around the compound and nodded.

  ‘We k
now she’s on her way,’ he said, ‘but she’s not getting in here without us seeing her.’

  A couple of the operators glanced at each other and one of them, the bravest or the one who had drawn the short straw, spoke up. ‘Sir, we know she has a valid arrest warrant. Wouldn’t it be better to–’

  ‘I am not handing myself over to that cybernetic bitch!’ Wayden snapped. ‘Sending her to bring me in is a fucking insult!’

  ‘Yes, sir.’ The operators were well aware of their boss’s attitude to women. Some of them even agreed with it, but there was every indication that the man was losing his marbles really fast at the moment. There was no way this was going to end well for any of them. Then again, a good outcome was probably going to be pretty unlikely whatever happened. They had already come up with their story, should they end up in custody over this: no one had told them about the warrant and they were defending the property like they were supposed to. Well, it might hold up…

  Then all the lights cut out. The displays vanished along with the virtual control panels. There was a pause of a few seconds and then things began to return to life. Lights came first, then a display showing that the security system was coming back online.

  ‘What happened?’ Wayden asked.

  ‘If you’ll give me a second, sir… We’ve lost the main power line into the compound. Communications too.’ He paused as his keyboard reappeared and he typed rapidly. ‘Looks like the lines were cut about a kilometre out.’

  ‘Meridian?’

  ‘No, sir. We still have a drone monitoring her and she’s at least twenty-five minutes away.’

  ‘It’s the other woman. Lomax.’ Meridian was one thing: Meridian was honour-bound to bring him in alive, if possible. Lomax was here for just one thing. ‘Get everyone on alert. She could arrive any minute and I want her stopped. Is that clear?’

  ‘Of course, sir. That’s what we’re here for.’

  ~~~

  ‘High altitude surveillance is reporting two small explosions about a kilometre from Mister Wayden’s house,’ Kit reported.

  Fox slowed the Q-bug a little and examined the map display where Kit had highlighted the detonation points. ‘Power and communications pylons?’

  ‘The locations correspond to power and communications lines, yes.’

  ‘Lomax is ahead of us. I don’t know how she got here first. Maybe she figured Wayden would run here while I went for him hiding behind daddy. Whatever, she’s here.’ Flicking her attention back to the road, Fox drove the power on the little bug’s motors up to full. ‘We need to get there fast. Preferably before too many people end up dead.’

  ‘If you’re right about Mister Wayden’s reaction to you attempting to arrest him, I would imagine that the casualty count is going to be high anyway.’

  Fox decided not to correct the impression.

  ~~~

  Alarms began to sound and displays switched viewpoint automatically to show the explosions still dying away along the lake-side perimeter. ‘What is it?!’ Wayden shrieked. ‘What’s going on?’

  ‘Detonations at three locations along the wall,’ one of the operators said. ‘Sensors are down in those locations, but we still have visual coverage from cameras further in. No sign of an intruder at this point.’

  ‘I want men out covering those locations. Now!’

  ‘Sir, if–’

  ‘Now!’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ~~~

  Patricia Lomax watched as the five-man guard on the main gate became a two-man guard. She smiled. This was not going to go down the way she had hoped, but it would happen and Sherman Wayden would die. Pat was absolutely clear on that; her old martial arts instructor had told her once that attitude was everything, that she should visualise her goal and see herself achieving it before she started. Well, she could see herself executing Wayden tonight.

  She did not think of what she did as murder: she was enacting justice. Long ago, Pat had concluded that men like Thomas Winsford and Sherman Wayden never got what they deserved. While she was a cop, she had railed at the injustice of the system which let rich men walk free, but there had been nothing she could do about it. Now, those rich men were in an even better position to call the shots where law enforcement was concerned. With Wayden and Palladium basically running the police, there was no way the men who had killed her sister would be punished. But now Pat was not a cop, and she was free do whatever needed doing.

  What needed doing right now was the pitching of a stun grenade into the security post at the gate. That was followed by two streams from an electrolaser. The guards were idiots who probably had done something to deserve death, but Pat had no evidence of their crimes and was not going to kill them. She had, she figured, five minutes before anyone figured out that the bombs were a distraction. Drugging the two guards would keep them silent while she used those five minutes to get to the house.

  Patricia Lomax started running. Her quarry was almost in sight.

  ~~~

  ‘We’ve lost contact with the main gate.’

  Wayden’s head snapped around fast enough to cause actual pain. ‘What do you mean?’

  The operator kept the look of disgust off his face: what the Hell did the idiot think that meant? One of the displays switched to a view of the main gate. ‘Can’t see our guys there. They should be in the booth. They aren’t responding to calls.’

  Wayden’s jaw worked for a second. ‘The bombs were a distraction. Get those men back from the wall. Alert the ones at the house.’ Reaching to his hip, he lifted a pistol from its holster. It was a fully automatic machine pistol, a rapid-fire weapon with a long magazine full of ten-millimetre, hollow-point bullets. Wayden liked to say that he enjoyed the firepower of an automatic weapon, but everyone knew that the truth was that he could barely hit the side of a barn unless he could spray lead in the right direction. He worked the action. ‘Let the bitch come,’ he said, but it was noticeable that he did not leave the safety of the reinforced security room.

  ~~~

  Glass exploded as Pat fired a shotgun round into one of the larger windows on the north side of the building. Yes, she had no desire to execute the guards, but there were limits. Plus there was Wayden, somewhere in this building, and she was not going to use an electrolaser on him, even one set for a lethal charge. If she got the chance, she was going to ram the muzzle of her shotgun right up–

  Bullets sliced through the air as she stepped in through the window. None hit her and she returned fire: a three-round burst from the combat shotgun which tore apart the wooden doorframe ahead of her and caused the guard to jump back. Pat bolted for the door on her right, pushing through into what looked like an office. There was a heavy wooden desk set under a window, a cabinet against one of the walls, and another door on her left which, she figured, led into the house.

  ‘We’ve got her,’ someone yelled from the room she had come from. ‘There’s no way out of there we don’t have covered.’

  Shit! Pat pulled a grenade from her harness and tossed it over her shoulder as she headed for the cover of the desk. If anyone said anything else, she did not hear it: her hearing went dead with the explosion that pulverised the room. She brought her head up over the desk in time to see the second door burst open and the man framed in it. He was carrying an assault rifle.

  Pat jerked her shotgun up and fired a stream of heavy, leaden slugs into the doorway and the man standing in it. There was a scream, barely heard over the ringing in her ears, and then the bullets started coming back.

  ~~~

  Fox pulled her Q-bug up at the gate and scanned around for any signs of life. She found it in the security box on one side, but the two vaguely humanoid heat sources were horizontal and unmoving. It took her a few seconds to check on them – both unconscious, but alive – and the fact that they looked like they had been drugged confirmed what she had feared.

  ‘Yup, Lomax beat us here.’

  ‘Perhaps,’ Kit replied, ‘but I suspect she will have some
difficulty in getting to Mister Wayden. These men are unlikely to be the only guards. There is an APC with a weapons turret parked outside the front door of the house.’

  ‘Okay, tell the strike frame to put some warning shots in the ground in front of the APC. If that doesn’t get it to move or get it evacuated, it’s to be considered hostile.’

  ‘Orders sent. Are we going in on foot?’

  Fox stepped out of the booth and looked out toward the house about half a kilometre away. She was just in time to see light flare as the APC’s turret opened fire, aiming at something in the sky it was pretty unlikely to hit. ‘I guess that takes care of the hostile tag.’ She waited for the impact of twin missiles before starting to run toward the destroyed vehicle. ‘It’ll only take a minute or so to get there.’ She shifted her rifle so that it was slung over her chest as she ran and checked the load in the micromissile launcher. ‘Hopefully, I won’t need the thermobaric warheads this time.’

  ‘You just like using them,’ Kit countered.

  ‘Well, yes, but there’s a time and a place.’

  The sound of gunfire could be heard before Fox even made it to the house. The muffling and echoes suggested that it was coming from the far side, but it would take too long to go around; Fox put several rounds from her rifle into the door and then kicked it open. She was transmitting the warrant data as she did so, and she yelled ‘Police! Put down your weapons!’ as she stepped inside. There was one man in the foyer, and he raised his rifle as soon as he saw her. Fox fired first, peppering the man with needle-thin projectiles driven at enormous speed. His body armour was almost useless against the magnetically driven bullets and he fell, coughing blood as he hit the tiled floor.

  ‘Good start,’ Fox commented.

  ‘I doubt it’s going to get better,’ Kit replied.

  The building shook.

  ~~~

  Pat noted the arrival of data indicating that Captain Tara Meridian was there to serve an arrest warrant for Sherman Grant Wayden. It had come in just as she was throwing a grenade, and it took a second or two to figure out what it was saying because of the detonation shockwave and the ringing sounds. It made no difference. Okay, so Meridian wanted to arrest Wayden. There was no way she would get a conviction.