S Huang - Zero Sum Game

“I swear I’m over twenty-one,” I said reasonably. “I’ll just go, okay?”

“Ma’am, please stay there,” said the female security guard. She pulled out a walkie and started speaking into it.

Okay, this wasn’t great. If the police showed up, I would have a lot of problems, starting with the illegal Ruger tucked in the back of my belt and the grenades in my pockets and ending with being accused of mass murder once someone noticed I matched their suspect. Of course, these morons wouldn’t be able to stop me from leaving; they weren’t even armed. But I wasn’t exactly succeeding at keeping a low profile. I sighed and started glancing around for the best avenue out.

Someone screamed.

I turned to see a dark-skinned, curly-haired woman with her hands over her mouth. “You caught her!” she shrieked at the security guards. “The psycho from the paper! You caught her!”

A lot of people were suddenly staring at us. The security guards looked thrown, as if this was more than they’d bargained for when they’d had the gumption to detain me for suspected underage drinking.

“Everybody stay calm,” declared the female guard.

“Oh my God,” breathed her colleague, the blood draining from his face as he took in my features. “She does look like it.”

“Look like who?” the female guard demanded tensely.

“The—the woman who killed all those people—”

The two guards began backing away from me, clearly deeming that their rent-a-cop duties weren’t worth risking their lives against a homicidal maniac. The woman had her walkie at her mouth again and was speaking very fast. It might have been a coincidence, but I heard sirens start up from not too far away.

A fair crowd of not-very-bright onlookers now surrounded me at a healthy radius. Some people pulled frantically at their children and hurried away; others stared blatantly. I saw at least two people surreptitiously pull out mobile phones.

This situation was not going to get any better. Time to get out of here.

I glanced around. The crowd—how had it grown so fast?—meant making a dash through the parking lot would be tricky. But my back was to the building, and that was child’s play. I spun and leapt. A display of potted plants rose against the wall right behind me; I ran up the shelves like they were stairs and launched myself toward the roof, clearing the eaves in a dive and rolling back to my feet on the flat rooftop. Shouts erupted behind me as I ran. Too easy!

I launched myself off the back of the supermarket’s roof without slowing and landed in another roll in the alley behind it, where I sprang up into a fast jog. Where to now? That was a good question; the composite was clearly good enough for random people off the street to recognize me, whether or not they had any hard evidence from the office building—

Evidence. Oh no.

I’d left a half-drunk bottle of alcohol at the grocery store. One that had my fingerprints and DNA all over it.

Idiot!

They’d be able to put me in the system. I’d get linked with the deaths of the Korean kids at Tresting’s office and who knew how many other places where I’d left some remnant of forensic evidence without knowing it.

Calm down. Will it really mean anything? They’d still have to find you.

But I’d be in the system, my prints and DNA matching a face.

How much would it matter? My information was probably in the system somewhere anyway, I reasoned, if from nothing else than the incident at Arthur’s office. Would it make such a difference that it would no longer be quite so anonymous? That it would now match my mug shot, that it might get linked to Rio’s massacre of the office workers?

I had to go back, I decided. Just in case. After all, who knew what the consequences would be? I might regret it forever if I didn’t, and it would be simple enough to go back, grab the bottles, and dash away again.

I wheeled around to dart back down the alley the way I had come. A quick sprint brought me back toward the rear wall of the supermarket—

I stared in shock. The place was already swarming with cops. Since when did LA response times get so good?

Lights flashed around the corner, and I slipped in between two dumpsters as three police cars screeched into the alley behind me, unexpectedly cutting off my escape route along the ground. Shit. Why did things have to get complicated?

And then a low thrum started just on the edge of my hearing and began building, vibrating through the air louder and louder and louder.

A helicopter.

Seriously?

Okay, this might be…bad.

I might be in some real trouble here.

My brain zigzagged through my options. Unlike most of the people I ended up on the wrong side of, law enforcement never seemed quite like fair game as targets. Well, unless they were dicks, but these people were just doing their jobs. See, Tresting? I don’t always go around killing people. And I had grenades, too! Set a few of those off and I’d have more than enough chaos to escape in.

It was tempting, now that I’d thought of it.

Okay, so Plan B was blasting and shooting my way out of here. I needed a Plan A.

The uniforms were multiplying like the supermarket was a kicked anthill. I didn’t just need a Plan A, I needed a Plan A fast.

A trickle of nervousness bled through me. This could be bad. Most violent situations I ended up in did not happen on busy downtown streets with lots of innocent bystanders, and as for police, I’d never done more than kick the odd uniform in the head while making an escape. The idea of a large number of law enforcement casualties made me…uncomfortable. Not to mention that it was the worst way ever to keep my head down; if I blew up this many cops they’d probably have Homeland Security out here after me.

My mobile buzzed in my pocket.

Only one person had this number right now. It had to be Rio. “Not the best time; I’ll call you back,” I answered in a whisper.

There was a pause. Then a voice on the other end said, “It’s Checker.”

“Wha—this is a new phone!” I hissed. “How—?”

“Oh, I’m all-powerful,” he said. “Hey, so I—”

I didn’t have time for this right now. I hung up on him.

The phone buzzed immediately with a text message: NEED UR HELP

What he needed was to learn to spell correctly. I moved my thumb to turn the damn phone off entirely.

PLS VRY IMPORTANT

I sighed. Checker was the most annoying person I’d ever met. Evading arrest. Will call back later, I texted, and pocketed my phone again, turning my attention back to the problem at hand.

Grabbing the evidence I’d left would probably be too complicated now. Dammit. I could have gotten away clean if I’d just kept walking, and now that I was boxed in, even escape was looking difficult. My hiding place felt more transparent by the moment, and I couldn’t think of any way out that wouldn’t lead to some version of a shootout. Which I would win…but at what cost?

Taking to a roof meant exposure to the helicopter—helicopter s now; a second had joined the first—and trying to cut down the alley would make me the target of the three bajillion and counting cops on the ground. Seriously, you guys went to this much trouble just for me? I wondered if I should be flattered or frustrated that someone finally wasn’t underestimating me.

My phone buzzed, distracting me again. Swearing colorful curses at certain computer hackers in my head, I pulled it out to turn it off.

U NEED HELP?

I stared at the words. It felt like the setup to a really bad joke, one in which the next text would read, “ha ha, just kidding, you’re so stupid.” The little computerized letters burned into my eyes.