Ben Chaney - Son of Sedonia

“Run it,” said Shima. He sauntered up to the door and wrapped a gloved hand around the latch. Locked . He grumbled, looking over his shoulder at the glowing green Pits behind him. A small light flashed on a few klicks East, bobbing toward them at a gentle pace. A lantern . Shima pressed his throat mic.

“Hold fast, we’ve got a local headed our way. I’m moving to intercept.” Shima crouched and flanked wide around the bobbing light like a stalking cat. It was just a kid. Looked to be a Cutter with his torch and blanket-covered wagon in tow. Six feet behind the boy, Shima’s thigh decided to bind up, dragging his feet through the dirt in the process. The kid whirled, greeted by a limping EXO with machine-gun drawn. Not the most badass ambush, but the kid still looked like he would shit himself at any moment.

“Shhhhhh,” Shima said, “Over there. Nice and easy. Bring your gear.”

The kid obeyed, one hand raised and the other pulling the wagon. They greeted Ackley at the carrier’s main personnel hatch.

“Sir, the ship’s last stated destination was the Themis Facility. Logs for that serial stop there. I sent a query to Themis, but haven’t heard anything back yet. Want me to try and hail Virton corporate?”

“No…not just yet,” Shima said, “Hey kid, what do you know about all this new merch, huh?” The Cutter boy stood rock still, eyes fixed on his toes.

“Nothin’, huh? Not a damn thing? No fancy dressed guys waiting to take a few kilos of the Red Stuff off your friends?” No answer. Shima looked down at the kid’s cutting gear. Grinned.

“Well, you’re here to cut, so cut! Get that door open for me and I’ll give your skinny ass half a protein bar.”

The kid looked at his torch and wagon, then back at Shima.

“Fine,” said Shima, “I’ll just borrow this.” He snatched the torch from the wagon. The boy lunged for it, but an Augmentor boot caught him in the chest. Kicked him into the dirt.

“Let’s take a look,” Shima tapped his temple to cut off IR mode, then dropped his visor. The glass went solid black as he sparked the torch, adjusted the flame, and focused it on the latch. The metal started to glow.

“Boy, I tell you, this thing is a piece of shi—” The hatch door swung open, cold-cocking Shima in the shoulder and face, knocking him to the side. Orange-jumpsuited figures stepped into the doorway. Opened fire. Ackley and two of the others, blinded by the sudden flood of light, were cut down, taking high-velocity rounds through their armor plates. Explosions of blood and twisted metal sprayed over the red-orange soil. The cutter boy yanked the cloth off his wagon and took a pistol from the heap of Slum guns piled there. Shot Shima’s remaining squad member through the neck, and put a bullet through Shima’s bad thigh.

The Sergeant crawled through the bloody dirt to cover behind the manatee’s landing gear. His weapon sat eight feet away, harmless in the stark white light coming from inside the ship. Swallowing hard, Shima bit his lower lip and pressed his throat node.

“Call Headqua—AAAHH!” A hail of metal punched into the landing gear, flinging a chunk of shrapnel into his back.

“Calling John Kabbard,” said the status window in his Neural. Footsteps and clicking weapons approached from behind him. He waited. ‘Beeeeep. Beeeeep. Beeeeep. Beeeeep. Click!’

“You have reached the voicemail of Johnathan Kabbard, please leave your message after the tone.”

“Fuck! John! They’re hiding in the Pits! Something big, John, you gotta—ULLLGHHH!”

“SHIMA CALLING” THE text flashed in the lower-left corner of Kabbard’s vision along with a four-year-old profile picture of Shima. Wasted drunk at the annual EXO Christmas party, shirtless and flexing by the indoor pool. Kabbard reached up, dragged the ‘Ignore’ slider to the left, and resumed watch on the location trace. Despite cruising in the enforcement lane through the Kuwahara Commons, the digits on his ETA ticked down painfully slow. A crime now that he was back at the Zeus’ controls.

“Fuck the speed cap,” said Kabbard into his throat mic, “both of you hit your strobes and follow me.” He squeezed the flight sticks and pressed his foot down, accelerating past the speed cap.

BEEP! The new voicemail tone shrieked in his ear, making him miss the days of handheld communication. At least back then you had something you could tomahawk into a wall.

“Sir, with all due respect, isn’t racing through the Commons with government strobes a little ‘above-board’?” asked Nicks over the comms.

“Follow. Me.” Kabbard said as he flicked his strobes on and pressed faster through the lane. SCPD patrol cars and ambulances made way for him. He glanced at the meandering gold dot in the trace display. It had registered about a half-hour ago in downtown Shibuya, and stayed pretty much still in some chip-trash dump called The Singularity. As the Furies flicked on their blue and whites and throttled up beside him, Kabbard watched his ETA adjust. ‘ Sato calling… ’

Kabbard wrapped his thick-knuckled fingers around a phantom device in his hand. Releasing it, he dragged the “Answer” slider to the right. The congressman’s wide-set eyes greeted him with a flat scowl.

“I’ve been waiting by the phone, John. I hate waiting by the phone,” said Sato, his silver-tongued voice cracking. The phone’s in your head, asshole. You’re always waiting by it.

“Uh yes, sir, we’re closing on the subject now and will have him in custody within the hour. Now if you’ll excuse me,” Kabbard did his best to not talk through his teeth. Reached for ‘Disconnect.’

“Within the hour?! It’s been four since you assured me this would be taken care of!”

Kabbard wasn’t scared of this little man. Sato had impressed him once, but now that the bullshit had been screened away, the visionary Governor was just another bureaucrat who decided on things he didn’t understand, delegated all the real work, and threw a fit if the results didn’t taste right. Useless prick . But this wasn’t Sato’s fault. The recognition flickered somewhere in the back of Kabbard’s awareness, doing nothing to calm him. It twisted in his intestines.

“We’ve got a solid location trace, and we—”

“What?! You mean you’re tracking an active chip?! In the goddamn CITY?!” Sato roared. Even through the color fluctuation of Kabbard’s Neural display, he saw the Governor’s oaken skin pale.

“Won’t be active for long, sir. Nicks is talking to the central server right now installing an intercept algorithm on the trace,” said Kabbard. But he knew Sato’s reaction before it left the man’s lips.

“Meaning… Christ. It’s active and available for anyone to see right now, including the fucking Rindal estate,” said Sato. The Zeus and the Fury ships arrived at the nearest open pad in downtown Shibuya, away from the larger crowds. Kabbard, Nicks, and Andreas stepped out, checked their weapons, then holstered them under their coats. Kabbard kept talking.

“We’ve got no indication that there’s been any transmission to the estate.”

“Actually, sir,” Andreas said, joining the call stream, “the target has accessed—”

“Gotta deal with what’s in front of us. Let me do my job and we’ll have him within the hour, sir. Kabbard out,” Kabbard swiped across the call, ending it. He set his status to ‘ Busy: Try again later ’ then lunged at Andreas, grabbing the snake by the silk tie. Cocked back a shaking fist.

“Undermine me again. Please,” Kabbard growled, inches from Andreas’ crooked, wide-eyed face. Kabbard stared until a bead of sweat rolled down the kid’s brow, then released him.