Negative Return: A Durga System Novella (Durga System Series Book 2)

by Jessie Kwak

  Two days ago, Manu Juric would be standing back to see where the bullets landed, then walking out with the winners. Today, he’s choosing sides.

  And the side he’s choosing is the one currently having the guns pointed at their heads.

  Marisa was right: He makes terrible decisions.

  Toshiyo yawns the mouth of the bag towards Kai, whose expression goes all brow-overhang and pursed lips; he can’t make heads nor tails of the mess inside. Neither can Manu, but it’s clearly not a gun or a bomb. Kai waves her on.

  Toshiyo pulls her complicated-looking hand terminal out of the bag and thumbs it on, touches her earpiece as though waiting for it to pair, which it certainly should have done already. She cracks both ring fingers.

  Manu frowns.

  Seriously? Is Toshiyo Ravi acting?

  He starts to interject again, give Toshiyo that extra second before Kai wonders why things are taking so long, but Jaantzen speaks first.

  “What is it you were unhappy with, Kai?” Jaantzen asks. “The pay? The hours?”

  Kai’s weapon is still trained on Toshiyo, though his attention swings to Jaantzen. Sarah frowns at him. Jaxie shifts her weight. Oriol’s standing loose and ready. Though for what, Manu isn’t sure.

  “What?” Kai asks.

  “You and I, we’ve worked together for years. What did Coeur offer you that I couldn’t? Better pay? Benefits?”

  “She didn’t have to offer me anything,” Kai says. “You think you’re so smart, but I know you came from Brightby orphanage just the same as me. You think you’re so posh in your suits and your fancy wines, but you ain’t nothin more than what I am. Then you think you can buy me like I’m some indentured goon.”

  “I never tried to buy you,” Jaantzen says. His gaze is level, even. His hands are out straight, but his right hand wants badly to slip under his coat. Manu can tell by the angle, by how much closer he holds it, by the ever-widening gap between the thumb and the forefinger while the left stays still as a statue. Kai doesn’t seem to notice. “I don’t do indentures.”

  “‘I don’t do indentures,’” Kai says, mocking. “You never done an indenture, you don’t know what it’s like to make that choice. Lookin down on the rest of us who’ve done it like it’s dirty. It’s the fuckin way of life.”

  Jaantzen frowns slightly at that, and it’s genuine. “You would’ve preferred I put you under contract?”

  Not the time for this conversation. Manu screams at him in his brain, because he can see Willem Jaantzen is genuinely curious about Kai’s employment preferences, and Kai is only curious about how good it’ll feel to finally pull the trigger.

  “Making decisions like you’re a god, like you’re so fucking smart, when what have you done but wore fancy clothes and send others to do your dirty work?”

  “Didn’t I pay you well?”

  “Fuck you.” Kai swings his weapon up for a kill shot.

  Toshiyo cries out.

  Manu pulls his trigger.

  15

  Too Much Drama

  Kai falls, a slow topple back, a stray bullet squeezed from his gun past Jaantzen’s leg, a shower of sparks as it ricochets off the bag of machinery in front of Toshiyo.

  Manu waits for the bullet that will take him, from Sarah, behind them — he hears her swear — but Oriol is faster. He lets a spray of bullets fly as he dives for cover. Manu spins to take her out, but it’s Jaantzen’s shot that catches her straight between the eyes.

  Manu aims his pistol at Jaxie’s head. “You do and you’re dead,” he says.

  She lowers her pulse carbine, raises a hand. “We good, man.”

  It’s over as soon as it began.

  Oriol stands carefully, scanning the room behind them, his weapon at the ready. “Shit, man,” he says. “This is too much fucking drama.”

  “I’ll split Kai’s and Sarah’s cuts between the three of you if you stay on my crew until we’re through,” says Jaantzen, pistol still in his hand, evaluating Oriol’s trustworthiness. Evaluating all their trustworthiness.

  Oriol lifts a golden eyebrow. “Cut of what? This deal gone south, man.” But he’s not casing Jaantzen, he’s turned and is watching the room, body language tense but casual. He’ll take the offer, even if he doesn’t like it.

  “My crew gets paid,” Jaantzen says. His hand’s on his pistol, his finger on the trigger. His eyes are painting a target on the back of Oriol’s neck.

  “He’s good,” Manu says. Jaantzen glances at him. Manu gives him a nod. “And Jaxie’s good.”

  “She’s one of Coeur’s.”

  “She’s with Sylla Mar,” Manu says, and Jaxie lets out an angry yelp. Jaantzen doesn’t look surprised, and Manu wonders if he’s known all along, or if he’s just not that easy to rattle. He suspects the latter. “We’re in.” He gets an irritated side-eye from Oriol, but no argument. “Tosh, you all right?”

  There’s no answer. Behind him, Jaantzen lets out a curse.

  Manu spins to find Toshiyo slumped on the floor, hands pressed to her side, covered in blood. Her eyelids flutter weakly. Manu grabs an extra shirt from his gear bag and kneels beside her, carefully peels back her fingers to press it over the wound. “Stay with me, Tosh,” he says. “Gia’s on her way.”

  A quick glance up at Jaantzen to confirm — he’s already on his comm.

  “Blackheart knows where we are,” says Oriol. He’s kneeling beside Sarah’s body, checking through her clothes. “Thousand marks says she got an alert when cyborg-gal bit it. We need — ah, here.” He tugs something free from her shoulder and holds it up to the light: a hard plastic vial half filled with silvery liquid.

  “What is that?”

  “Coag nanites. Part of the automatic tech system.”

  “How do you know?”

  “You ain’t seen me naked yet. Get me a vein, man.”

  “Boys.” Jaantzen holds out his hand for the vial; Oriol hands it over, then opens up his small medkit and pulls out a syringe. He holds out his hand for the vial, but Jaantzen is still staring at it. “What will this do to her, Mr. Sina?”

  “Fix her enough that we can move her.” Jaantzen’s still waiting. “I ain’t working for Blackheart, I’m working for a living,” says Oriol. “Your name’s on my contract, and Tosh’s the one who’s gonna get us payday.” He shrugs. “Plus, unless any of the rest of you’ve patched up a bullet wound in the middle of combat . . . ?”

  Manu has her sleeve rolled up by the time Oriol’s gotten the vial back from Jaantzen and kneels beside him. The heat off his shoulder is a stark contrast to Toshiyo’s cool arm.

  “Press your thumbs there, Manu. K, Tosh, I need you to squeeze your hand,” says Oriol. The silver liquid swirls like smoke as Oriol finds the vein and depresses the syringe. “Good girl. Manu, hold her tight a sec. The first minute can be pretty shitty.” Oriol grabs Toshiyo’s legs, leaning his weight down just as she starts to kick. “Sorry, Tosh.”

  Manu spares a glance up at Jaantzen, but he’s scanning the room, apparently deciding to trust them after all. “Get on the door,” Jaantzen says to Jaxie. “Gia’s on her way.”

  “So’s Blackheart,” says Oriol again. “We’re gonna sit you up, kiddo.” Toshiyo’s tremors are starting to subside, and Oriol’s got a miniature spray can of wound sealant to replace Manu’s blood-soaked shirt. The foam stiffens into a pliable shield, but he winds a sterile wrap around her torso to hold it in place anyway. “Your color’s better. How’s your pain?”

  “Fucking hurts,” Toshiyo says, the words rasping tight between her teeth.

  “Yeah, that happens. Only thing I got in my kit’s gonna knock you out. And I don’t think we can afford you knocked out just yet.”

  “I’ll be fine,” Toshiyo says. Oriol smiles back, but it’s only for show, Manu can tell. Oriol isn’t sure about that at all.

  Jaantzen is listening to something through his earpiece. “Get her in the van,” he says. “Gia’s meeting us here.”

  “Boss?” Manu shares
a quick look with Oriol.

  Jaxie clears her throat. “But Blackheart — ”

  “Coeur is meeting us here, too.”

  Manu’s sharing a look with Oriol. What the hell? Dueling with Blackheart isn’t the way he’d been hoping to spend the rest of today.

  “Let’s get her in the van,” Manu says.

  In the van, Beni’s slumped on one of the bench seats with his chin on his chest. He looks up groggily as Oriol and Manu lift Toshiyo in, and raises his hands.

  “I’m on your team,” Beni says. “Whoever the hell your team is now.”

  “Good to hear it,” Manu says. “I think we’re gonna need a good driver soon.”

  Beni sighs. “You all done shooting each other out there?”

  “Probably not.”

  “I hate this job.”

  “Tell me about it. Keep an eye on her, and get ready to — ”

  Beside him, Oriol swears and spins back to face the main door to the garage. Manu hears the soft click of Oriol’s rifle, the faint whine of Jaxie’s pulse carbine. The sharp clack of Jaantzen’s machine gun. He turns back to face the open door, aiming with his left pistol and handing his right back to Toshiyo.

  “The red button on the side is the safety,” he murmurs. “Don’t shoot if I’m in the way.”

  “I can shoot a gun,” she says, but her voice is shaking. He doesn’t risk a glance back to see how she’s doing.

  A pair of burly bodyguards stalk through the door first, then the slim, dark silhouette Manu will never mistake.

  Thala Coeur stares down the barrels of a quartet of weapons and smiles.

  16

  Payout

  “Willem.”

  Coeur waves back her bodyguards and steps into the center of the room. A half dozen barrels follow her. And she may be three to four and look unarmed herself, but Manu recognizes the assault carbines her bodyguards are carrying. Those bullets are made to pierce powered armor. A van door isn’t going to do much to stop them. Nor will the light body armor he saw Oriol putting on back at the warehouse.

  Coeur takes a slow, deliberate scan of the room, ignoring the pair of bodies but holding each person’s gaze in turn. Her head’s high, her shoulders loose, like she’s walking into a bout she’s planning to win. Thing with Coeur, though, she’s not brash, she’s not cocky. She wins because she plans to, not because she expects to. Manu gives her a faint nod when she meets his gaze, and he sees her nostrils flare, evaluating whether or not she can count him friend or foe.

  Foe, bitch.

  She turns to Jaantzen last. The gold-tipped ends of her braids clatter together as a handful of them slip off her shoulder.

  “I thought we had a nice plan,” she says to Jaantzen. “Didn’t you think so?”

  “Up until the part where you were planning to hang me up for the Alliance.”

  “Sorry about that, Willem. And I apologize for underestimating you.”

  “I don’t expect you’ll do it again.”

  A long, slow smile. Her gaze sweeps the room once more. “I misjudged your ability to inspire loyalty.”

  “Money can do that.”

  Money did that for Oriol and Jaxie, certainly — but Manu can hear Toshiyo’s labored breathing behind him, thinks of Gia out there somewhere. Thinks about how he’s just sided against the most dangerous woman in Bulari. No amount of money could have gotten him to make such a misguided move.

  “Speaking of money.” Coeur presses a button on her comm. Jaantzen’s own chimes in his pocket. “You’ve got your cash, so bring in your gal and let’s do some business.” Her gaze cuts briefly to Sarah and Kai. “What do you say, we’re even? Looks like we both lost people on this one.”

  “I’m not sure Kai was one of my people,” Jaantzen says.

  Coeur just shrugs. You don’t get as far as she has and still have a sense of shame, Manu figures.

  “But I would say we’re even, Thala. I was in it for the job, you were in it for the goods. We’ve both gotten what we came in for. Except you didn’t get a fall guy to distract the Alliance.”

  “That’s fine. I have a plan B.”

  “Glad to hear you’ll end up all right.”

  “My goods, Willem.”

  Her hand’s at her side, drumming on her thigh low and casual. It might be an unconscious gesture on someone else, but both her guards are keeping one eye on it.

  Manu does, too.

  “Ms. Ravi,” Jaantzen says. “Can you please ask Ms. Até to join us?” Coeur’s nostrils flare at Toshiyo’s name like she’s scenting for hidden prey; her attention falls on the van behind Manu. The guard at her left is tuned to her motions like an augment mech on a factory line; he shifts to sweep his weapon over the van. His right eye is a mercury swirl and he’s blinking strangely, like information is feeding into a contact lens. Could be his scope doubles as a scanner.

  “Got it, boss,” Toshiyo calls from the van. Manu can hear her tapping on her hand terminal, faint under the sound of her labored breathing.

  “Giaconda is on her way,” Jaantzen says.

  And by on her way, he means she’s been waiting in the wings for her dramatic cue.

  “Got your goods, Thala.”

  Gia’s voice comes from the doorway that leads farther into the office complex. She’s got an iridescent case on a wheeled cart that looks like it was stolen from a hotel lobby.

  Coeur breaks into a slow smile. “Thanks, sugar,” she says. Manu thinks he could live to one hundred and never again hear someone call Giaconda “Sugar.”

  “We’ll just be on our way, and you can have your goods,” says Jaantzen. “As you suggested, I think we can say we’re even. But please take me off your list of available contractors in the future.”

  “I’d say I’ll be taking a few people off my list,” she says, gaze sweeping the room again. Again, her gaze stops briefly on Manu. He gives her another slight nod and she looks satisfied. Manu’s attention is on the hand on her thigh. “You’re free to go,” Coeur says. “You have my word. Pleasure working with you, Willem.”

  “Wish I could say the same.”

  Jaantzen raises his chin to Gia, and she gives the cart a kick. It glides, clattering across the cracked cement floor.

  Thala Coeur grins. She reaches for the handle with one hand; her other hand cuts a sharp arc. Her guards snap their rifles to squeeze out the rounds that’ll end them all.

  Manu squeezes his fist on the detonator hidden in his palm.

  The room explodes.

  HORNET TAGS ARE BRILLIANT.

  They’re practically invisible to the naked eye, just a piece of explosive resin the size of Manu’s thumbnail on a patch of transparent adhesive. A bit of ignition, a minuscule receiver. They’re no grenade, shredding through the room with shrapnel. They’re no dynamite. Really, the only way they’ll kill you is if you have a bad heart and don’t know they’re coming.

  But they’re distracting as hell — especially when you’ve slapped a bunch up on big glass panes and shoddy electrical boxes.

  He’s timed the first wave a fraction of a second apart, so it sounds like a spray of gunfire coming from outside the building.

  Coeur has a pistol in one hand, and her own round of bullets sends Manu and Jaantzen ducking for cover. Her bodyguards are slower to react — one has turned to the entrance as though to face a new threat from that direction. Jaxie drops him. Oriol drops the other.

  “Don’t shoot the case,” Jaantzen bellows, and Manu pulls up at the last minute so his shot goes wide and shatters one of the plate windows he hadn’t tagged. Coeur and her mystery case are silhouetted in a glittering hail of glass as she sprints back out the door.

  Outside, Manu hears voices yelling. Coeur’s guys? Police? He’s not interested in finding out.

  “I’d be a lot happier about the future if we’d gotten her, too,” Oriol mutters.

  “Time for a long vacation,” Manu says.

  “Goddammit, Manu,” Gia yells.

  “Wasn�
��t that fun?” he yells back. “Handy, too.”

  “We can talk about fun later.” She shoulders past him into the van. “Hey, Tosh. Hold on, babe. Beni, how you feeling, buddy? You ready to drive?” Beni stares at her with naked fear.

  Outside, the voices are getting closer. Manu runs to cover Jaantzen as he limps towards the van. Jaxie’s joined him, driven by her natural lackey’s instinct to protect the alpha, whoever that alpha may be. “Lotta guys out there,” she says.

  “Then let’s head out the back,” Jaantzen says. “I’m sending coordinates to your nav.”

  They pile into the van. Beni’s in the driver’s seat, eyes on Gia like she’s a feral scrub hyena. Gia’s got Toshiyo strapped to one of the benches and is waving some magic medical wand over her abdomen. “Nice job on the coag nanites, whoever thought of that.”

  “Oriol,” Jaxie says. “How bulletproof is this thing?”

  “Not very,” Jaantzen says, checking his gun. “I hope your reflexes are recovered, Mr. Chav.”

  Beni just snorts. “Bitch can’t steal my touch.”

  Gia laughs.

  “Good to hear. Now let’s drive.”

  Manu sets off his second round of hornet tags as Beni peels out of the garage, and just as a swarm of Coeur’s thugs come piling in. This time — and he’s proud of this one — a pair of tags have just enough power to sever a wire cable suspending a hoist. It drops, sags against the remaining cable, then twists free in a shriek of rusted metal-on-metal.

  Beni swerves out of the way just in time, throwing them all against the wall of the van. Jaxie and Oriol are first to recover, firing out the windows at the gunmen who are still standing.

  Gia hoists herself back to Toshiyo’s side. “How many more of those do you have, asshole?” she growls at Manu.