Specter Protocol

by Eddie R. Hicks

  Estrella returned home after depositing the check at the nearest ATM. She couldn’t stop smiling at the account balance on the elevator ride up to her apartment. Estrella’s return home had her new roommate leaping up startled, not expecting Estrella to be back so soon, or the fact that she’d catch her peeking at her hand-drawn pictures.

  Miyuki’s face turned red. Estrella held the smile on her face and approached after shutting and locking the door.

  “Yeah, I’m no Georgia O’Keeffe,” Estrella said, taking the hand-drawn pictures. “Geoffrey downloaded some art lesson programs. Been fucking around with it when I’m bored.”

  Miyuki pointed out one picture that drew her attention. “Who is this woman?”

  “That’s…” Estrella grimaced. Miyuki pointed at the sketch of her former roommate. “That’s Yumi. Didn’t feel right not seeing the face of my roommate here.”

  “Kind of like what I am?”

  “Eh, you’re just a guest here until we can get you back home.” She paused at the usage of the word home. To be back home was what Estrella wanted too. Like Miyuki, Los Angeles wasn’t Estrella’s home, Buenos Aires was. She and Miyuki were lost, stuck in the city, searching for a means to their freedom and their chance to return home.

  “Anyway,” Estrella said, backing away to the exit. “Since you don’t have a phone, I just wanted to let you know I’ll be at the arcade across the street. Sometimes, I lose track of time there.”

  Miyuki’s mouth opened with joy. “Arcade?”

  She nodded. “Yeah. You a gamer too?”

  Smiling brightly, Miyuki yelled. “Yes! I’m pretty good at Imaginary Protectors.”

  “No shit, eh?”

  “You play it too?”

  “A few times. I read the graphic novels too. Well then,” Estrella gestured to the door. “Come with me. Let’s see if you can beat my scores.”

  Yumi loved Imaginary Protectors anime too. It’s what got Estrella into it in the first place. With Miyuki as a roommate, it felt as if Yumi had come back from dead, as a ghost, and just forgotten her memories of the past they shared.

  So Estrella’s heart kept telling her.

  Sixty-Three

  Ray

  Ray emptied the last of his beer into his mouth and placed the empty can at the edge of his computer desk. He was home at last, not his true one though he doubted he’d ever see that place again, and after what he went through, he didn’t care anymore. He felt safer here, high up in the skies, the neon glow from outside, and the sounds of children playing on neighboring balconies, all of that combined told him it was over, for now. Nothing bad would come so long as he stayed here.

  One of seven of his computer monitors displayed recently published news articles from the Alliance Star. The article listed his name as a suspect in the recent violence that took the lives of many in Los Angeles and near Anchorage. Piper’s name showed up in a follow-up article regarding the fighting in the Port of Los Angeles and the reports of mind control usage up north. If the world wasn’t convinced Ray and Piper were terrorists, they were now.

  There was a missing person report about John Ellsworth too.

  “Stop reading fake news.”

  It was Piper, and mildly intoxicated laughter left Ray’s lips at her as she returned from his balcony, discarding her secret cigarette smoke.

  “And you need to quit smoking,” he said to her.

  “It’s either this, or I go back to the hard stuff,” Piper said and pulled up a chair next to his. “Sorry, but this new life as a wanted woman is stressful.”

  Ray nodded to the Ziplock bag of marijuana and paper on his coffee table. “At least smoke that, it’d be less taxing on your life support nanites. And sometimes, you laugh for no reason.” Ray closed the news report window. His desktop picture was visible again, a photo of him and Arianna standing close, pressing their smiling cheeks together. “And laughter is something we both need.”

  “What I need is some good news,” she said. “Anything from your hacker friends?”

  “Nothing yet, they’re still shocked Serge did what he did. For what it’s worth, they believe our story. It’s gotten them motivated to comb the net for more information.”

  Ellsworth left the washroom and took a seat on Ray’s couch, his eyes started at Piper in a confused manner. “She still here?” Ellsworth asked.

  “And waiting for Obsidian,” Piper said, nodding. “I’d still like to know why Ray’s contact reached out to one of our messengers.”

  “If I were you,” Ray said. “I’d ask if it’s true Nexus are the leaders of the Specters and Nobuo’s cell. If so that makes you, and those two groups… allies.”

  “I want to assume what Serge and Yanmei said was bullshit,” Piper said. “If my group, Nobuo’s group, and the Specters get orders from Nexus, then why are we ordered to fight them, and they ordered to fight us? Why are we asked by Nexus to free registered IWs, only for Nexus to ask them to attack them?”

  “Yeah, I guess you’re right,” Ray said and reclined back on the chair, hands around the back of his head. “It doesn’t make any fucking sense. I hope Obsidian will explain it all, I’ve done everything they asked.”

  Exactly fifty-three minutes passed. Other than the round of sushi Piper brought back for the three of them for dinner, and a six-pack of beer, nothing happened. Piper snorted. “I’m gonna head out.”

  She stood and went for the exit. Ray spun his computer chair around watching her leave. “Not spending the night again?”

  “Fuck it, feeling homesick,” she said and opened the door. “Call me if Obsidian talks. Thanks for having me stay over, nice to chat with an adult that understands the things we gotta do when life gets fucking stupid.”

  After Piper implying that Estrella wasn’t an adult, Ray suspected a rift had grown between the two, but he just couldn’t put his finger on why. Whatever it was, it couldn’t have been that bad as Piper and Estrella still fought together as partners. But that was it, after the battle at the port, he never saw the two chat.

  And Piper was gone.

  Another hour slipped by as Ray searched the dark web for tips while seven computer screens shined bluish light into his living room. It was late now, well after midnight, and the sounds of people on their balcony had faded, replaced by the random wails of police sirens, and the usual late-night urban noise. To his side, he heard Ellsworth snore, and for a moment Ray thought he should do the same.

  And then his IRC chat opened, a private message awaited his eyes. Obsidian made contact at last. Ray reached for his phone, this was what Piper had been staying for, a chance to ask Obsidian questions while they were live.

  Obsidian: Thank you for your hard work.

  Obsidian: And don’t bother contacting Ms. Taylor. I thought she’d never leave.

  DigiSamurai: You were waiting for her to leave this whole time?

  Obsidian: I have my reasons for doing the things I do.

  DigiSamurai: Is it pointless for me to ask?

  Obsidian: You’re a truth seeker. When you see something of interest, you lose focus wanting to learn more, rather than staying on the correct track.

  Obsidian: That’s why I don’t tell you about my methods. I need you focused and undistracted. Now, more than ever since you lost the prototype.

  He wanted to ask what the big deal about it was. But that was his truth seeker mind seeking those answers. And so, Ray said nothing, the only way to know more was to play Obsidian’s game.

  Obsidian: Tell John Ellsworth to brush up on his knowledge of the pods when he wakes up. He will be working on them again real soon.

  DigiSamurai: Does this have to do with the missing pods from the Skull’s hide and the Kobayashi?

  Obsidian: Missing? I wouldn’t exactly say they went missing.

  Ray typed his next words.

  Where are they? The flashing cursor at the end waited for him to hit enter and send it. Instead, he paused, staring at those typed words. He held the backspace key
until they were gone.

  Play the game man, don’t be the truth seeker. Be the guy that gets to the goal and gets the reward of knowledge.

  Obsidian: Now for your next assignment.

  Obsidian: 28°01′0″S 153°24′0″E

  DigiSamurai: That where the pods are?

  Obsidian: No, that’s Arianna's last known location. You find her and you’ll discover the prototype.

  Epilogue

  Portia

  Portia’s phone was a square-shaped blue light glowing in the darkness of a pitch-black room, held by hands shimmering with white light. She was in a basement, somewhere in the city but she’d rather not say where. She put the phone to her ear, audio-only. Her heels clicked in the blackness, her telepathic thoughts guiding her past the objects that couldn’t be seen without light.

  “Ashford,” she said.

  “I’m safe, don’t worry,” his voice grumbled on the phone.

  “And M?”

  “She doesn’t suspect a thing. In fact, I’ve come to learn she’s been defending me. Her not trusting Mr. Partington has led her to believe my accusations are false.”

  “Shall I continue to pursue Rodriguez then?”

  “Of course, she’s the one that continues to insist I’m not to be trusted,” he said. “It makes me wonder if she’s working with Partington and his associates.”

  She grimaced. It was an expression nobody, not even her captured prisoner could see. “I’ve found no proof.”

  “Yet Ms. Rodriguez appears in places Mr. Partington does. Tell me something, however. Why did you support those, Specters, as they call themselves?”

  “Rodriguez is stronger than I thought,” Portia said, stopping ahead of her prisoner, tied to a chair, their face bloody and beaten, and only her telepathic thoughts projected that to her. “I saw an opportunity and took it. Convince the Specters to eliminate her for me.”

  “It didn’t work,” Ashford said drily. “They still escaped with the prototype.”

  “Not to worry, the Specters have a traitor in their group and don’t know. I plan to reach out to them with that information and kindly remind them who it was that allowed them to escape from Alliance airspace without being shot down.”

  “And then?”

  “Make a deal with them.”

  “Are you sure it will work?”

  “I’m about to find out from my prisoner.” She lowered the phone, smiling at the prisoner, not that Ashford could see her, or the psychokinetic torture she subjected him too. “Isn’t that right?” she asked the prisoner.

  The prisoner replied. “Fuck you, malaka.”

  Afterword

  Wow, this book turned out to be longer than I had originally planned, not to mention took longer to write, hence the longer than expected wait you’d normally expect from my releases. The power supply in my computer caught on fire in the middle of writing this. I guess you can say my writing is so hot it set my computer on fire. Because of the fire, I was without a working computer for a while until I came up with the money to buy a new power supply and replace it.

  Then, weeks later, my computer’s motherboard died. It took me a while to save up money to replace that too. And when I did, I discovered Windows 7 didn’t like it, so I had to go out and buy Windows 10. Let this be a lesson to take the free upgrade to Windows when Microsoft offers it! After that I became sick and spent a week drinking cold and flu medication and doing not much else. By the time I got back to writing, I lost a month’s worth of time and hundreds of dollars…

  Anyway, that’s enough rambling on my part. Thank you for reading and making it this far. As always, if you enjoyed this book, please leave a review, and help others discover the fun you had.

  Next time on Cyber Witch: 2082

  Rebels from the Federation reach out to Estrella with an offer she can’t refuse. Ray is given a chance to see Arianna again under one condition, he comes alone.

  Next up: Digital Coven - Cyber Witch: 2082 book 3

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  Also by Eddie R. Hicks

  Cyber Witch: 2082

  Cyber Witch

  Specter Protocol

  Digital Coven (June 2020)

  Psychic Rush (TBA)

  Contaminated Souls

  Kiss of the Demon Girl

  Wrath of the Demon Girl

  Awakening of the Demon Girl

  Deception of the Demon Girl

  Nemesis of the Demon Girl

  Liberation of the Demon Girl

  Splintered Galaxy Universe

  Splintered Galaxy

  Celestial Ascension

  Uprising of the Exiled

  Equilibrium of Terror: Part 1

  Equilibrium of Terror: Part 2

  Edge of the Splintered Galaxy

  The Siege of Sirius

  Celestial Incursion

  Unsanctioned Reprisal

  Hallowed Nebula

  About the Author

  Eddie R. Hicks is a Canadian author known as a man of many talents, and for good reason. He’s educated in media arts, journalism, and culinary arts, and now he writes dark and sexy science-fiction thrillers such as the Splintered Galaxy series.

  If he’s not working with skilled chefs in the restaurant industry, baking an epic red velvet cake for the hell of it, or playing video games, then he’s in front of his computer doing what he always dreamed of doing since he was a kid: storytelling.