Specter Protocol

by Eddie R. Hicks

  “Did I?”

  “Don’t you remember? When you made Hawk OD?”

  “I remember little about the last couple of hours, honestly.”

  They laughed. And then she pushed Estrella back again, ran her fingers across her chest, down her belly and pulled the sides of her skirt down. Estrella lifted her hips to make it easier. Now she was down to panties and stockings. Piper pulled the panties off.

  Estrella was naked, Piper not so much. She was the prey, a nineteen-year-old getting disrobed by a grown woman almost twice her age, a woman that had complete control over the situation. Estrella was vulnerable, and strangely enough, she liked it. Her fantasy was about to become a reality.

  Piper kissed her again, much more vigorously than the last time. She lowered her lips to Estrella’s neck. Estrella wrapped her arms around her. She felt Piper’s fingers brush through her black triangle of trimmed pubic hair, and slither down to her wet fold.

  Piper stopped and pulled away, asking. “You nervous?”

  “No, it’s just…” Estrella winced. “Wasn’t expecting it to be like this.”

  “Relax.” Piper spread Estrella’s legs apart, smiling at the moist opening. “I’ll show how I want you to fuck me. After that, you gotta show me what you learned. Deal?”

  Estrella returned the smile. “Okay.”

  Piper slid her hand down her panties instead, rubbing furiously, and moaning softly.

  “Don’t need to show me that…” Estrella said with a raised eyebrow. “I know how to pleasure myself.”

  “I know. You use that vibrator while you spread out on your bed.” Piper looked down at Estrella, still playing inside her panties. “Sorry, you’re just so, oh my goddess. I need you to fuck me.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Know what?”

  “About my toy.”

  Piper stopped. Estrella sat up, grimacing.

  “Well, uh.” Piper tripped over her words. “You have one—”

  “And you knew I used it on my bed…”

  She was backtracking. The coke in Piper’s body made her say something she didn’t mean to, and it was all over her panicking face. The mood was dead. Estrella was pissed.

  “You said you didn’t watch me during my private moments when you bugged this place!” Estrella yelled.

  “I uh.” Piper stuttered. “I don’t anymore.”

  “But you did.” Estrella sat up more. Piper backed off, stepping away from the futon. “You fucking watched me get off too?”

  Piper looked aside. “Look, just forget about—”

  “Fuck that! You lied to me, again!”

  “I’m sorry. It was that night when I ran off after scanning you.” Still looking away. “I was curious to learn if you were an enemy or not.”

  “And you didn’t think to stop watching when I did that.”

  “Like I said. You’re fucking hot…”

  Estrella pointed a firm finger to the exit. “Get out!”

  “What?”

  “Out!”

  “Give me a fucking break!”

  “You fucking spied on me when I was…” And Estrella went hard on the vibrator that night. “Fuck you, seriously.”

  “Jesus! You’re overreacting!”

  “Am I? I asked you to reveal all the secrets. Everything. You said there was nothing else. You lied, there was more.”

  “Okay, maybe I—”

  “Just stop! You fucking watched me, probably rubbed one out too. You’re no better than the motherfuckers that bought the porn memory spheres the Skulls forced me to star in. You got off on a production I didn’t agree to be in.”

  Piper gathered her stuff, rolling her eyes as she walked to the exit. She stopped, one hand reaching for the knob, and looked back at her. “I’m sorry, Estrella.”

  “Go call your tart, she’ll keep you company tonight.”

  And she was gone. Estrella groaned, burying her face in her palms. Losing her virginity would have to wait. She rose, walked to her bed, and pulled out her vibrator from the nearby nightstand. Might as well, she figured, she was dressed for a date with it.

  It filled her apartment with a soft buzzing noise when she flicked the switch on.

  Forty-Six

  Miyuki

  It’d been a long road trip. Keeping out of reach of the police, Alliance military, and Yoshida’s army, searching for them, was made possible by the support of Portia and her powers. When roadblock checkpoints appeared, she either used her mind control capabilities, sending all vehicles and military personnel scattering, or could predict where they’d be set up and communicated with Serge which route to use to avoid them.

  This resulted in the truck bypassing several large port cities such as Vancouver, their original destination for their escape from the Alliance since Anchorage was too risky. The hijacked Specter truck arrived in San Francisco, the next port city on their list and the last city before the California Wastelands, according to the chatter Miyuki overheard.

  Serge tapped the dashboard computer screen. “Battery power’s low. Gonna have to recharge soon.”

  Portia nodded and pointed to the left. “There should be a charging station further up.”

  Miyuki stood behind the two sitting upfront. “Is it necessary to recharge when we are so close to the port? It’s not like we need this truck afterward.”

  “If someone were to tip off our location, we might need to flee,” Portia said. “Better to be safe than sorry.”

  “I thought nobody was searching for the truck?” Miyuki asked.

  “They know our bodies haven’t been recovered from the mountains,” Portia said. “And don’t forget, they found the driver of this truck with bullet holes in his head. What do you think will happen if a cop sees us and puts two and two together?”

  “Nothing,” Serge cut in, “because I changed the transponder data and plates before our detour away from Vancouver. This is just a truck that happens to be of the same model, there are thousands of these on the roads.”

  “Still, let’s be prepared,” Portia said, reclining on her seat. “I’m a telepath, not a clairvoyant. I can’t predict the future. I can only guide you through the present.”

  Serge pulled and backed the truck into the vehicle recharging station. He shut the engine off. “Feng,” Serge called out to Yanmei. “Wanna watch me back?”

  She nodded and moved forward, her hands glowed white in preparation for a ghostwalk. “Sure,” she said. And Yanmei was gone from sight.

  Yanmei stood as an unseen ghost with a rifle drawn while Serge left the truck and plugged in two large recharging cables to its rear. The computer screen on the dashboard flashed on with a notification confirming a turbocharge session had begun. The truck’s battery charge percent icon increased by 1 percent every two seconds. Above the screen was the windshield, displaying the many skyscrapers of San Francisco being struck by the sunlight. It had Miyuki grimacing. This wasn’t the port city she needed to be in.

  Miyuki and Portia were alone now. It had the white-haired avatar smiling at her. Portia gestured to the rear lounge, she wanted to talk in private. Miyuki joined her in the back and sat at the small lounge table.

  “What’s on your mind?” Portia asked. “You look troubled.”

  “This is San Francisco,” Miyuki said, looking to the front.

  “Yes.”

  Miyuki faced her. “Los Angeles isn’t far away, is it?”

  “No, it is not, just further south of here,” Portia said.

  “That’s where Estrella Rodriguez is right? The real murderer of my brother.”

  “Yes.” The tone of Portia’s voice changed. She sounded scheming. “Rodriguez’s no longer leased to the Los Angeles Police. She doesn’t have police assistance or a partner anymore. She works alone now, receiving orders straight from Yoshida’s CEO.”

  She paused, processing Portia’s words. Estrella worked alone. Estrella reported to Yoshida. Estrella no longer had police backup as support. Mi
yuki could kill her easily under those conditions, and it’d deliver a blow to the corporation she hated more and more since coming to the Alliance. But she’d need to be in Los Angeles for any of that to happen.

  “But…” Portia spoke, grimacing. “We’re in San Francisco, and not Los Angeles. And since things are going according to plan, we’ll be leaving from the port here soon.”

  “What happens if things don’t go according to plan?” Miyuki asked.

  Portia grinned. “We’ll have to head to another large port city and try again.”

  “Where would that be?”

  Still grinning. “Los Angeles. We can’t return north, that’s where Yoshida and the military are searching. South is the only direction, and south of San Francisco is the wastelands. There are no cities or viable ports there, just an endless wasteland left behind by the war, getting overtaken by the desert. So, we’d have to keep south until civilization returns and that’ll be the Los Angeles area.”

  Now Miyuki was grinning.

  She stood outside, hands glowing white, her body invisible to the minds her powers touched. The MEP gauge on her HUD shrank. She saw the large power cables hooked up to the truck and followed them back to their power distribution units. There were six in total at the recharge station. She ran an optical scan of them all. There was enough power flowing through them to cause a serious electrical fire should they become damaged.

  Her pistol should deliver enough force to damage it.

  Serge and Yanmei stood on the opposite end of the truck and out of visual range. It was the opposite for the various people pulling their cars up to recharge. Miyuki drew her pistol and pointed it at the first recharge unit. She pulled the trigger three times. Three bullets punched holes through it, the cabling and wires within the unit sparked, caught fire, and exploded. The blast drew all eyes to Miyuki. She wasn’t ghostwalking at that point, and it was intentional. She spun and targeted the next unit. And then the next, and the next after that.

  Electrical explosions flung sparks and scattered lines of bolts. The ground shook when the last unit blew. People screamed. Others ran for safety. One man stood his ground, withdrawing his concealed weapon. Miyuki held her glowing hand toward him, waved it in a circular motion two times. Psychokinesis energy lobbed him six feet back. His gun spiraled in the other direction. Miyuki’s MEP gauge dropped to 67 percent because of that.

  “Holy shit!” she heard a civilian cry out.

  “Someone call the police!” cried another.

  And she was ghostwalking again, she had 67 percent left on her MEP gauge to make it into the truck. Serge and Yanmei already had a head start. Miyuki trotted inside, pushing past the mass panic she created. Once inside, Serge powered it on, and sped onto the roads. Miyuki counted at least seven people standing with their phones using its record function to capture their escape.

  She made herself visible again, canceling the ghostwalk effect. Yanmei was furious, cursing in Chinese and grabbed Miyuki by the collar, dragging her into the truck’s lounge.

  “What the hell was that?” Yanmei demanded with a finger pointed at her face.

  “I was… attacked when I walked out,” Miyuki lied.

  Hands on her hips, Yanmei continued the grilling. “And who told you to go out?!”

  “I did!” Portia stepped forward, arms crossed, glossy red lips grinning. “I sensed someone had followed us. You were busy protecting Serge, so I had her do something about it.”

  Yanmei’s finger was in Portia’s face, her white teeth were visible from the frown. “You should have informed me!”

  “I don’t answer to you,” Portia scoffed.

  “This is my operation!”

  “And you’re alive now because I made it happen.” Portia continued, her tone growing firm. She was the one in control now. “Miyuki should be praised. She prevented us from falling prey to an ambush.”

  “Fucking hell,” Serge’s voice from the front roared. “I take it going to the port isn’t an option?”

  Portia shook her head. “We need to leave the city at once.”

  “Oi,” he groaned. “Where to now?”

  “These roads here,” Portia said, joining Serge while bringing up a road map on the dashboard’s computer screen. “It will take us through the California Wastelands. Not a lot of civilians out there.”

  “And from there?” Yanmei asked.

  Portia tapped the screen with a red fingernail. “We enter this city here, Los Angeles. And hope another ambush isn’t waiting for us.”

  Yanmei looked at Serge, her face lost in thought. She glanced at Portia, then to Miyuki. Yanmei held that glare. Fear poked at Miyuki’s spine, did Yanmei figure it out? She couldn’t read her from the silence.

  “Do it,” Yanmei finally spoke. Miyuki wanted to exhale in relief, but that might give her away. She reminded silent and standing with fake confidence.

  Serge sped away, taking the truck out of the city as quickly as it arrived and away from the echoing sirens of police vehicles. They were heading south now, driving on a road devoid of activity, and entering a barren wasteland. According to the screen upfront, they’d arrive in Los Angeles within the next day and a half. A day and a half. She’d be able to meet the witch Estrella Rodriguez soon. All she needed to do was keep her recent actions a secret from Yanmei, the rest of the Specters, and thank Portia for covering her.

  And that’s what she did, after tapping Portia’s shoulder, and signaling with her head to follow her behind into the lounge. The two left Yanmei and Serge alone in the front.

  Miyuki whispered to Portia. “Thank you.”

  “No, thank you,” Portia whispered back. “You just made it easier for Yoshida to recover the prototype.”

  And the truth came out. The shock punched Miyuki hard in the chest. She had to gasp, taking a step backward. Portia used her.

  “You tricked me…”

  “You don’t care though.” Portia’s red fingernail fingers tapped her forehead. “I’m a telepath remember? Some of your thoughts are easy to read. You’re a very emotional woman, hell-bent on avenging your brother’s death, no matter what. You don’t care about this mission, especially after what you saw in the mountains. You question who the Specters really work for. You want Estrella Rodriguez dead. And I want to let you do that.”

  And she couldn’t deny it. Fate guided Miyuki’s hand to take her life, and that brought her the ticket into the Specters team, and then into the Alliance. She was destined for this task, to die and be reborn as what she was, a yūrei, a ghost… a Specter. One that will haunt and kill those that played a part in her big brother’s death: Estrella Rodriguez, and her corporate masters.

  Portia’s intervention was part of the equation. And Miyuki assisting Portia to retrieve the prototype TEK suit was the payment she had to make. With those thoughts in her head, she was okay with betraying the Specters, when thinking back to the massive loss of the lives because of their actions. The Specters deserved this. It was karma taking corrective action.

  Why Portia was so eager to see Estrella brought down when she answered to the Yoshida Corporation’s CEO, was a good question, and it wasn’t because Portia wished to betray the corporation. If so, she wouldn’t be trying to recover the prototype. What did Portia want out of this?

  It was a question Miyuki couldn’t care less to ask. Estrella was about to pay the price for her actions.

  Forty-Seven

  Estrella

  Estrella was standing in Lady M’s office again in the Yoshida towers. She’d been waiting for this meet up for the last two days. M was busy with corporate matters. And here Estrella thought what she was doing as a fixer for the company was a priority.

  Ray still hadn’t replied to any text messages. She wondered if the chaos up north had anything to do with it, though there were no reports of his body found among the dead, or anyone fitting the description of Theo and Bashiir.

  Lady M’s hologram was at her usual spot, standing between her desk and
the window letting in a view of the packed neon skyline as delivery drones flew back and forth. Estrella stood at the opposite end of the desk. Between the two, and floating above the desk, was a holographic video replaying the surveillance feed Estrella got from the Bald Skulls hideout, and the irrefutable evidence Dennis Patterson and a few others was involved. When that video playback finished, the screen turned to three-dimensional images of the neural implants she discovered, the avatar transceiver according to the documents.

  M groaned, drank the glass of whiskey in her hand, and then put her cigarette holder to her dark painted lips. A plume of white mist filled the office with a haze of holographic smoke.

  “Easy to smuggle people around the world when you stamp corporate labels on shit and threaten to sue anyone that opens it,” Estrella said.

  “And you’re sure this is legit?” M asked.

  “Yes,” Estrella said. “From what Geoffrey compiled, Patterson received an offer to sell Regal Genetics cloning tech to your rogue corporate bodies. The money they used came from your biotech division, that’s why no progress was made; they bought the cloning pods in secret. Since Regal axed the project, they left the pods in storage. So, Patterson sold it, took the funds and ‘donated it’ back into Regal, posing as an anonymous donor.”

  “Then he came barking at us for a job…”

  “More like he got pissed off that Regal used the cash to restructure the company, hiring new staff, rather than try again with the cloning project. Patterson left and accepted an offer from someone, who I guess was Ashford.”

  “Again, with Ashford,” Lady M rolled her eyes. “You have any proof it was him?”

  Estrella shook her head. “I don’t. Only proof I got was that your rogue employees wanted the Skulls cloned and used them to kidnap unregistered IW telepaths to feed them into the avatar program. Patterson traveled to Buenos Aires a lot last year but only when an anonymous person wire transferred money into his account.” Ashford if she were to guess but avoided dropping his name. “Your rogue employees paid Patterson to visit Regal’s Buenos Aires lab and had the Skulls cloned.”