Scarcity

by Robert Calbeck

  “Then you have one minute,” Vika said, taking charge. “Tell us where the transmission codes are for the satellite dish.”

  “See how easy that was?” the woman said, condescendingly. “Do be honest next time.” Luthor could palpably sense the power struggle between the two massive personalities. Luthor stepped to the side fearing that the sheer force of their wills would crush him if he got too close.

  Vika leaned across the desk and brandished her gun in her good hand “Where are the codes? Tell me now.”

  “Better, you are improving,” said the woman in the same irritating tone; she appeared oblivious to the gun in her face. “The codes are right here,” she patted an unassuming fire-safe designed to hold documents.

  “It seems we have two options,” Luthor said, trying his best to sound reasonable; he doubted force or intimidation would work on this particular adversary. “Either you can cooperate and open the safe, or we can just kill you and force it open. Honestly, it’s your choice, and either way we get the codes. But I don’t really like killing people.”

  “I do,” Vika said. She cocked her pistol unnecessarily as if to make a point. Still the woman remained immutable. She appeared frustratingly impervious to their attempts to get her to capitulate.

  Tanya’s mental clock ticked off the seconds. They didn’t have much time.

  “It seems we are at an impasse,” the woman replied. “You see, I don’t really want to die, but I’m also not inclined to help you.”

  “I don’t see any impasse,” Vika growled.

  Then the door exploded open.

  Luthor fired off shots at the men pouring in as he ducked into a corner. He would not let them enter that room without riot gear.

  “It’s only been one minute!” Vika shouted, taking cover behind the desk. “How did they get up here so quickly?”

  “Strange that I would notice a member of my security team falling off the roof and another shot in my bathroom,” said the woman from under her desk. Luthor fired off another round, deterring anyone from entering.

  “I called for security 15 minutes ago. They were already here.”

  “Keep her alive long enough to get the codes and send them to Qwiz. That’s all that matters now.”

  The safe sat innocently under the desk. Return fire splintered the expensive wood finish.

  “I don’t suppose you’re going to give up because we’re so dangerous!” Michael yelled at the attackers while huddling behind a cabinet on the opposite end of the room.

  The security did not respond verbally, but they did put a few more bullets in the glass, inches from Michael’s hiding place.

  “Not surrendering, huh? Too bad.” Just as he finished, Michael threw all the remaining 126 through the open door. The next instant five men had crashed on top of each other against the side of a desk where the BOGs had stuck. They struggled to reorient themselves, trying to figure out what had happened.

  Tanya yelled and fired through the door at the pile of men. Luthor leaned back in surprise. She’d emptied her entire magazine. None of the five men moved.

  “I told you, I’m all in, Luthor. You were right. Some things are worth killing for, some are worth dying for.”

  For the first time, the Kerchoff woman looked frightened. “You can’t kill me,” she said.

  “Watch me,” Vika growled.

  “It requires a CPI scan to open.” The woman was breathing hard, sweat beaded up on her forehead.

  Tanya grunted and plopped the small safe on the desk and Vika forced the woman’s right hand over the scanner.

  It beeped angrily.

  “What the hell?” Tanya said.

  The screen read “Owner under duress. Five minute lockdown enabled.”

  Kerchoff smiled. “It senses my pulse is too fast. It won’t open.”

  “I know how to lower your pulse.” Vika flipped her pistol around and hit her hard across the head. The woman slumped, unconscious.

  “Can’t we shoot this thing open?” Michael asked.

  “With a 9mm?” Vika raised an eyebrow. “On a safe sophisticated enough to have a lockdown contingency? Not a chance. We will have to wait.”

  #

  Qwiz had known he would probably beat the others to the roof, but this felt like they were waiting too long. Had they been captured? Qwiz had everything ready. It would only take a few keystrokes to send the special report. It would take no time at all.

  If they didn’t get the codes, at least he could send an email to a company somewhere and hope that they might be able to use it. At least then the research wouldn’t be lost forever. The USW would be able to see a copy of whatever he sent. They’d be able to use it, as well as the company.

  Then again… maybe it would be better not to send it at all. With the way that Stalker had pursued them, what would make a company any different? Why wouldn’t he just flatten a company just as completely? He was outside the law, he could do whatever he wanted. The Vanguard would not sentence an entire group of people to death just because he failed his mission. It would be better to not send it at all.

  Qwiz hoped it wouldn’t come to that. He tried his best to think positively, fighting the urges welling up in his gut that told him to panic.

  He heard a soft buzz. Instantly, he clicked his phone. “I think I just got the codes, Stone!” Bill came rushing over to look. A message from Vika’s phone appeared.

  Qwiz cheered, pumping his fist only momentarily. He wanted to get this thing sent. He clicked the message. It read: Wait five minutes.

  “Dang it!” Qwiz shouted. He was frustrated at himself for swearing, but he couldn’t help it, they hadn’t sent him the codes! He realized the soft buzzing from his phone hadn’t stopped. Strangely, his phone remained blank. The buzzing wasn’t coming from his phone.

  “Is that your phone?” he asked.

  Bill shrugged and began looking around. The buzzing persisted, getting louder by the second. Soon, it differentiated into a sort of beat. Too loud for a buzz, it became a fast, rhythmic thumping. The noise continually grew until it had crested the threshold of what Qwiz considered loud.

  “That is definitely not a phone, Quency,” Bill said staring over the skyline. “That is a helicopter.”

  #

  Luthor and Vika fanned out looking for more security. The huge floor with its intermittent desks and permanent walls formed a make-shift maze of offices. It took a while to search. The only positive was that all the civilians fled as soon as the first shots were fired. They didn’t have to worry about unnecessary casualties.

  Civilians? Luthor thought. Unnecessary casualties? I haven’t thought of people in those terms since the war. But I guess that’s what this is now, isn’t it? War.

  Suddenly Tanya shrieked from the other end of the room. “Everybody get down!”

  The entire eastern wall of windows suddenly shattered. Glass sprayed everywhere, and bullets poured into the building as if out of a fire hose.

  A helicopter appeared 30 meters from the building, raining bullets through a pair of mini-guns mounted on its flanks.

  I guess they’ve learned to keep their aircraft out of reach of our gravity wells, Luthor thought. He ducked down under a desk while images of Chinese dragons popped into his mind. He shivered subconsciously. Bullets. Cold. Death. Fire. Blood. Pain.

  The guns sawed off everything in an even line a meter off the floor. Smoke and woodchips splintered in a shower of shrapnel as the relentless guns did their grisly work. Luthor kept his head covered with his hands, knowing it would do no good if any of the bullets penetrated far enough through the rubble to hit him.

  After the longest seconds of his life since Antarctica, the bullets stopped. Ears ringing, Luthor’s flattened stereocilia struggled to interpret any noise other than gunfire. He hesitated a moment and looked around. Sawed-off office partitions were strewn everywhere, papers fluttered lazily from the outside breeze, everything was obscured by drywall dust.

  “Is everyone okay?
” Luthor shouted, his voice muted in his own ears.

  “I’m okay,” called Tanya.

  “I’m hit,” Vika said.

  This is war, now we’re taking casualties. For the thousandth time, Luthor wondered why it was never him who was hit, why it wasn’t him that died. In the whole war he had never received a single gunshot wound. It was so much worse to come through something unscathed than to be hit. The injuries to the brain often lasted far longer than those to the body.

  “I’m coming!” Luthor shouted back. He had to help her.

  “No! Stay down!”

  “I am not leaving you behind!”

  “Protect Kerchoff. She has to open that safe!”

  Michael yelled from the office. “Which piece of her are you planning to protect?”

  Luthor swore loudly.

  “She woke up and made a run for it. Those guns cut her in half.”

  Luthor army crawled back to the office. Kerchoff’s legs stuck out of a pile of rubble and gore. Her top half was nowhere to be found.

  “Try her Mark. Maybe it hasn’t shut down yet,” Luthor said.

  Michael found her arm under what was left of the cabinets. It was drenched in blood and a bone poked out at a grisly angle. He slid her hand over the scanner and shook his head.

  “Apparently, she’s still under duress.”

  “They aren’t reloading,” called Tanya, “the helicopter is flying up.”

  “Oh no.” Luthor breathed. He began to panic, fearing for the life of his friends on the roof. He fired five rounds into the safe. They barely dented the opening mechanism. They weren’t going to get codes to Qwiz before that helicopter arrived.

  #

  The helicopter approached but stayed well away from the edge. Qwiz had just watched it pour bullets into the building 25 stories below, and it looked like it was preparing to unload on him as well. Qwiz grabbed his laptop and huddled under the rim of one of the many satellite dishes, trying to keep it in between himself and the gunship. Qwiz prayed that they wouldn’t risk damaging the multi-million credit equipment. Bill had also guessed as much and crouched behind a raised electronics box.

  As the helicopter moved, so did they, keeping themselves carefully out of sight.

  “Do you think Luthor and the others are alive?” Qwiz asked tentatively. It hadn’t looked good from their vantage point.

  “He’s one hardy son of a bitch. Just like me. And it would take more than a couple of mini-guns to bring me down.”

  The helicopter circled some more, playing a dangerous game of cat and mouse.

  “I don’t really want to wait for these bastards to run out of fuel,” Bill growled. He popped his head out from behind the steel box and began firing at the hovering aircraft.

  “That isn’t going to do anything!” Qwiz yelled.

  “Sure it will,” Bill shouted back. “It’ll make me feel better!” He pulled the trigger twice more. “Maybe if I’m lucky I drop one of those gunners inside.” Two more shots.

  A single, loud crack rang out in reply from the helicopter. To Qwiz, it sounded just as loud as Bill’s gun right next to him despite being 50 meters away.

  Bill cried out and fell backward. Blood and flesh splattered grotesquely away from his shoulder.

  “Goddamn sniper,” Bill groaned, putting pressure on his wound, “not supposed to have a smogging sniper on a chopper.’

  The aircraft advanced, stopping to hover above the roof. Ropes rolled out of the side and men began belaying down them.

  Will you please hurry up, Luthor? Qwiz thought. I have about thirty seconds.

  #

  Luthor watched helplessly as Vika leaned against a pile of debris, bleeding. She’d fended off the first wave of security with the last of their 126. They couldn’t handle the gravity and had been dispatched.

  Another group of men began pouring out of the emergency stairwell. Vika fired off a few shots but these men were better equipped. They wore helmets, shouldered sub-machine guns, and a few were equipped with gelvar, like Stalker’s men. Luthor knew she wouldn’t last long against those kinds of odds. He could see the wound in her side had bled through her janitorial garb, and her face paled by the minute. Luthor and Michael remained pinned down across from her, they could do little but provide occasional covering fire.

  She leaned over a broken chair and fired again. Her aim was off, she hadn’t killed a single man. She reloaded, signaling that it was her last magazine.

  “Damn it, Luthor. We have to do something!” Michael’s eyes were wide with concern.

  “If we move, we die. I’ve counted ten men.”

  “I am not going to let her die,” Michael said over the gunfire.

  “Michael, listen to me,” Luthor said earnestly, “in war, sometimes people die. Sometimes you can’t save them.”

  To Luthor’s surprise a tear appeared in Michael’s eye. “I’m sorry. I know it sounds harsh, but if we try to save her, we will both be committing suicide.” Garcia’s old mantra came to mind. It seemed appropriate. “Don’t be a hero. Just do what needs to be done.”

  “I’m not a soldier,” Michael said.

  “You don’t have a choice. This is war.”

  One of Stalker’s men began inching around to flank Vika. In moments, he would be in position to have a clear shot. Luthor couldn’t even deter him, shooting would draw the fire from at least three other men. Michael saw it too. Luthor could feel his friend charging up his willpower to do something stupid. Luthor put a warning hand on his chest.

  “I’m sorry, Luthor,” Michael put a second hand on the grip of his gun, “sometimes people do have to be the hero.” He leapt across the open ground, gun shots following in his wake. In the middle of his sprint, Luthor shot at the man repeatedly. The gelvar absorbed most of the bullets, but one landed square in the man’s leg and he slumped to his knees.

  At the same time, Vika leaned over and shot one of the men in the face. The bullet penetrated the plexiglass of his riot helmet, killing him instantly. Michael safely reached cover by Vika. But there were just too many. Luthor knew all he had done was postpone the inevitable.

  #

  Six men descended the ropes and encircled Qwiz, guns drawn, though they stayed a safe distance from him. He wasn’t sure why they didn’t just gun him down on sight, but didn’t argue with them. If they were going to let him live, he planned to make the most of it. He sat with his computer on his lap, huddled in a corner made by the main satellite dish and several massive enclosures.

  He wished he had his 126, but it lay next to Bill. Not that he would know what to do with it precisely, but it seemed to help everyone else get away from impossible odds. Having some couldn’t hurt his chances.

  One last man swooped down from the hovering chopper. Qwiz recognized him even in the dark. Stalker.

  Stalker strode forward menacingly. “Give up, Mole.”

  “Make me,” Qwiz realized he sounded more like a petulant 7-year-old than a defiant superhero.

  “I intend to. Unfortunately, I still need you alive. I need to know whom you have told about 126.”

  “I won’t tell you anything.”

  “I did not expect you to tell me here,” Stalker said, a smile playing on the corner of his lips. “But I suspect that after a little aggressive questioning, you will become more cooperative.”

  Qwiz frowned. He had hoped that he would be able to be brave. But torture wasn’t something he expected he would be very good at enduring. Supposedly anyone, regardless of training, could be broken—given enough time. And Qwiz had no training, and Stalker had plenty of time. His father would have said that the only honorable course of action would have been to kill himself. It was the only way to ensure the safety of those he loved. Qwiz’s palms began to sweat as he grasped his gun tentatively.

  “I would caution you against trying anything,” Stalker said. “We have learned from our previous mistakes. Our men are spread out too far to be influenced by your gravity tricks, and our air sup
port remains out of range. You cannot escape.”

  “You goddamn fascist,” Bill growled, the pain of his shoulder obvious in his voice.

  “You will regret that before the end of the week.”

  Qwiz felt his trigger finger itching. He knew what he needed to do. His mother, his coworkers, and anyone he had ever called or texted were in danger. If he did the right thing, he could protect everyone he loved. He needed to kill himself. But he was running out of time to work up the courage to do so.

  Bill didn’t have a gun either. He would have to murder his best friend first then commit suicide. His father’s voice mingled with his dark thoughts: courage isn’t defined by what you do, but by what you are willing to lose. He’d been willing to lose it all. Was he now willing to sacrifice it all? Could he take his own life, along with the life of his best friend for the greater good?

  “Do it, Quence,” Bill breathed.

  Qwiz took a deep breath, the grip of the gun sweaty in his hand. He’d never thought it would come to this.

  “We have a pretty good idea where Tenrel and his team have been,” Stalker continued, the man certainly did enjoy the sound of his own voice. “Questioning them is a luxury. If a few of them die it won’t matter. I only need one alive to eliminate any other acquaintances who know about 126. But you two have been off the radar until now. Who knows who you have told?”

  Qwiz turned back to his nemesis, “think of what you’re giving up.” Maybe he could talk some sense into him. It occasionally worked in the comics, the bad guy would sometimes give up and repent of his evil ways when confronted with the truth. “If you let this broadcast through, it will change the world.”

  “But I like the world the way it is.”

  “What about everyone who can benefit from cheap energy? So many people are suffering because there isn’t enough to go around. Others are starving. There’s a hundred million homeless in North America alone! You can change all that.”

  Stalker sneered. “You don’t get it. I have everything I want. I can do anything I please to whomever I wish. I want this world to remain as is.”