Red Shift: The Odds (Censored version)

  Chapter 31

  Tyrol entered the Portico dressed in a sharp tailored suit. It was slightly bulked up by the armour he was wearing underneath, but not so much as to be noticed. He had used a lot of credit to get the engineers to refine the material down to three millimetres, while still being flexible and almost impenetrable. It wouldn’t stop a plasma blast, or a shot to the head, but it made him feel better nonetheless.

  He walked down to the armoured transport behind the Veyron. He opened the rear door and looked in at the eight men in the back. Jay was on the floor, legs and hands bound, and gagged. He muffled something, and got a sharp hit to the back of the head by one of the men.

  “Watch it you damned idiot. If he’s dead before they show, the deal is off. Someone clean his face up before we get there.”

  He closed the door again and walked towards his car. The advanced team would already be at the two main entrances to the Third Quadrant, hopefully out of sight. He hated dealing with these buggers, they smelled and had no culture. Still, they were cheap, and expendable. The second part was what he was counting on more than anything.

  Driving out of the property, he got Loach on the comm. “You there, Loach?”

  “Sure am boss.”

  “What’s going on at the Third?”

  “Nothing as far as I can see. A few groups of derros, but they’ve been there since before you called for the location. If they’re Feds, they’re also bloody magicians.”

  “Keep an eye on things, this is crunch time, my boy. Get us through tonight and the world is your oyster.”

  Loach liked the idea of that. For so long he had been mucking around with losers like Ping; low-rent hackers and techies that couldn’t see the big picture. Who cares about respect from techies and street-hacks, the rest of the world doesn’t give a toss. But people like Tyrol, they’re the ones that make things happen, they’re the ones people look up to. He would be there soon too.

  He saw a few blips on the overhead radar and tracked them. They were surveillance drones. He jumped into the UTF scheduling and saw they were recorded sweeps. He decided to leave them, didn’t want to cause a ruckus this far out from the meet. He tagged them and moved on.

  Ping was on the comm to Cindy. “Yo, Sin, got the drones out there. I reckon we’ve got an hour before the UTF realise I nicked them. I’ll have them halfway across the Pacific by then.”

  “Good Ping, what’s the activity?”

  “Not much A few small groups, I’ll tag them. There are vehicles at the two main entry points to the area.”

  “That will be Tyrol.”

  “Kind of sloppy.”

  “If he is anything like I expect him to be, he won’t be planning on us having the upper hand. It won’t occur to him we hacked the UTF days ago and set up the schedule for drones over every part of the city.”

  Ping liked Cindy. Not in that way, she was way out of his league, and he didn’t kid himself. No, he liked that she didn’t muck around. There was no ‘what if’, or ‘let’s wait’, she was concise and decisive. It was as though she had already thought of every possible outcome and whittled the variables own to the bare outcome.

  He didn’t, however, like Loach. That bugger had sat next to him for a few years at Wing’Tan, pretended to be his brother. He told Ping he’d always have his back, and even gone so far as to say he’d throw himself in front of a gun for him. The bastard forgot to mention he’d be holding the gun.

  “Jack, you got any trouble?”

  “Negative Blake, just cruising and enjoying the star haze.”

  “I’ve got a few street cops around. Not really paying attention to the Beast. I guess they figure I’m just another hoodlum who’s seen too many music holos.”

  “Well the GTX don’t look a lot like it did.”

  “I think it expresses my personality, actually.”

  “I guess so, still ugly.”

  “Time to get serious boys. Ping and I aren’t here to listen to your love stories.” Cindy was being her usual persuasive self.

  “Yes, sir! Twenty k’s out from Third Quadrant, going to take the scenic route, see what I can see. Blake, you go straight to the RDV and get those scout drones up.”

  “Roger.”

  Jack took the old Ryde exit and stopped on the top of the hill. There was nothing around except broken houses and crumbled roads. He couldn’t really understand how this was once the affluent area of Sydney, when it so quickly appeared to have been deserted. The whole area beyond was a patchy mess of lit and dark suburbs, broken highways and crumbling buildings.

  Looking to the right he saw the new city, glowing on the skyline, buzzing with activity. The more he looked at it, the old city was looking like a limb that needed to be amputated. It seemed to be only the few stubborn residents that couldn’t let go of the last century that remained. Of course they would die in time, and the city would disappear, either by nature or bulldozers. Either way, its fate seemed sealed.

  As emotional as the moment could have been, Jack didn’t have time for that crap. If he started thinking about the past, he’d think about his wife and child, and then this whole op would be on one giant downhill slide. Damn, he wished he had a smoke right now. Stuff it, game time.

  As he tore down the old Pacific Highway he thought of retribution. This bugger Solice, and probably Tyrol, had brought all this pain onto him. They were going to pay. He felt he could take them all by himself, but was thankful he had a team behind him.

  “Blake, you at the RDV?”

  “Yes.”

  “Activity?”

  “Bugger all. I weaved around a group at the North entry, they didn’t see me come in. Well if they did, they didn’t mind.”

  “Sin, you on target?”

  “Yes honey, on the hill and watching over you like an angel.”

  “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you were coming on to me.”

  “Screw you, Jack.”

  “That’s better.” Everyone had a laugh. God knows they needed it, the tension was quite rightly rising.

  Jack rode down into the main centre of the Third Quadrant. The sky was clouded over, making the place look more dark and uninviting than it usually was. He saw the odd flicker of a makeshift fire, with the odd hobo hanging around trying to warm themselves. The streets were starting to break up and he had to watch where he was going.

  As he got near the area Blake had pegged as the likely location, he saw bright lights around an intersection with a few men standing purposefully and imposing in their dark coats, not to mention the very large guns at their sides. He saw an armoured vehicle on the opposite side of the intersection, doors open, and a classic 2050 Bugatti Veyron next to it.

  Jack pulled up about thirty metres away from the intersection, helmet on, Betty armed. He marked the two men with guns, and the Veyron, before removing his helmet. Blake pulled up in the Beast just out of sight of the welcoming party, and walked over to Jack.

  “Nice friends you have there, Jack. Think we better get acquainted. The longer we’re here, the more likely we’ll get screwed.”

  “I figured we already were.”

  “Not if Ox pulls through.”

  Jack looked at him, shrugged, and started walking toward Tyrol. He kept to the right, walked casually, but getting into range of one of the armed men. Blake took his lead and had the other one in his peripheral.

  As Jack was passing, he looked at Tyrol’s face. He looked pleased with himself. Tyrol glanced at one of the armed men, and at the same moment Jack side-stepped hard, hitting him in the chest with his elbow. He followed straight through with a head-butt, grabbing the man’s chest and pulled him back for another, before letting him go to fall to the ground.

  At the same time the other armed man started raising his gun, but Blake was far too fast. He jumped and spun in the air, hammering his leg down hard on the man’s arms, breaking the gun free as he landed. The for
ce made the man tip forward. As he lifted his head, Blake had his pistol under his chin.

  Jack spun around Blake, drawing his gun and training it on Tyrol. But Tyrol had shifted and was now at the back of the armoured vehicle, with a bound Jay leaning out and a gun to his head.

  “Nice display,” Tyrol shouted. “Now put the toys away boys and come do some business. This place is already making me feel dirty.” He emphasised the urgency of his request by lifting Jay’s head so they could see he was alive, for now.

  Jack looked at Blake and holstered his weapon before removing the clip and emptying the chambers of both weapons from the ground. Blake holstered his gun, and started walking down toward Tyrol.

  They got midway across the intersection, about ten metres away from Tyrol, when four more men appeared from around the front of the armoured car, two each side. “Relax,” Tyrol urged in an authoritative voice, “just my insurance policy. I’d hate for things to get nasty.” He gave a friendly smile, stood up, and two of the men walked to each side of Jay.

  “So, Tyrol, I believe you are about to exonerate me, and end this rubbish story about me being an assassin.”

  “Correct, my boy, on both counts.” Tyrol walked over to an open briefcase on his car. “In here is a hand written execution order from Peiter Solice I obtained from Russia.”

  Blake and Jack looked at each other. “Hand written? Bit convenient isn’t it?”

  “Not really, very inconvenient actually. You see, Teppop have a phenomenal amount of technology at their disposal. Enough to make them aware that electronic information transfer, no matter how secure, can still be intercepted. If it can’t be decrypted right away, it can be stored for years, if necessary, until it can be.”

  “So what, they write love letters to each other to do important jobs?”

  “Exactly.”

  “Well Tyrol, looks like you have held up your end of the bargain.”

  Tyrol closed the briefcase and walked towards Jack. “So, where is he?”

  “Coming down the street now. Behind you, in the Government car. He will have guards.”

  “That’s OK, I have things well covered.” He looked up and around.

  Jack did the same thing, and saw at least three snipers on the rooftops, and at the same time a group of four ion-plasma drones appeared overhead.

  “Jack, don’t do anything stupid, leave the apprehension of Solice to me, and you will soon walk out a free man.”

  Although Jack was surrounded by more hardware than a military base, he felt a little comforted by that though. He watched the car slowly roll down the road. The windows were blocked out, but they all knew who was in there.

  From outside the zone, Ping and Cindy were frantically trying to keep tags on all of the activity and hardware, while still making sure as few people as possible knew what they were doing.

  “Ping, you got all this covered?”

  “Yeah, Sin, but there are crazy signals all over the place. Loach is doing his best to mask what they’re up to. You got anything there.”

  “I’ve isolated the frequency maps for the drones, I’m patching them over to you now. You’ll be able to take control whenever you want.”

  “Nice. I’ve got multiple scrambled voice relays going on. At least four different groups going. It’s a damned shambles.”

  “Don’t worry too much about what’s going on inside the Quadrant. We need to make sure no one else outside is snooping, and we keep things as contained as possible. Blake and Jack have to sort themselves on that front.”

  The Government car stopping about fifty metres down the road, and the occupants exited. Solice was quickly shielded by all but one of the men, the last running to the right and into a building. Tyrol nodded towards Solice and then turned back to Jack.

  “So Jack, you have brought me Solice, but I still do not see the Biotronics device. It would be a shame to see poor Jay leave this world without seeing his nephew again. Don’t you think?”

  “It’s nearby, safe. I needed to know Jay was safe first.”

  “Probably a wise business decision. Now if you’ll excuse me for just a moment, I have some business to attend to.” Tyrol turned to Solice, put his hand to his ear and talked in a low voice. Jack and Blake stepped back slowly to the edge of the building. Blake looked beyond the Veyron and saw a Government armoured group moving slowly along the side of the building in shadow.

  He mumbled in a low voice to Jack, “Looks like Ox and his crew are here.”

  “Yep, and it looks like Tyrol is checking his boundary security. He’s getting a little pissed by the look of it; Ping and Sin must be doing their jobs.”

  Tyrol put his hand down and shouted to Solice, “Peiter Solice, the man who tried to take down an Alpha.”

  “Tried? I do not believe the evening is over Tyrol. And by the time it is, I will be long gone, and to a lesser extent you will too.” He tapped his wrist and three prop-drones appeared over an adjacent building. He tapped his wrist again, and two groups of four armed men in tactical suits appeared from the end of the alley where he had come from.

  Jack and Blake drew their weapons. Blake was concerned. “Jack, I just lost count of how many parties just turned up to rain on our parade.”

  “Ox and his men to the far end behind the Veyron, Tyrol and his four men between us and them, Tyrol's snipers on the roof, Solice and some G men across the way, with what looks like more of Solice's men from where Solice came, and I think that’s it.”

  “Yeah, it was a rhetorical question.”

  “Rhetorical or not, the answer is, we’re screwed. I’m breaking radio silence, I hope Sin is better than Loach.”

  Jack advised Cindy things were going south quick, and if they had any support to override airborne weapons to use them to take out the snipers on his call. It wasn’t a lot, but it was a start. Their next objective was to get close enough to grab Jay and the suitcase and get the hell out of there.

  Solice and Tyrol were now only ten metres apart. Ox made his move, quickly closing the gap to Tyrol’s men by the armoured car and taking all four out. At the same time, Ox looked at Jack. Jack shook his head, pointed to Jay who was still gagged, and pointed for him to be removed.

  “Tyrol, you are under arrest,” Ox shouted. Tyrol was startled and turned half way between facing Solice and Ox. He grinned and looked at Ox.

  “Ah, you must be Special Agent Jules Oricks. Why, may I ask, are you arresting me?”

  “For collusion in the assassination of Senator John Mac.”

  “Oh. I suppose Mr Solice over here has suggested my involvement? Interesting, considering I have proof of his order to carry out the hit. As a leader of Teppop, no less.”

  Solice tapped his wrist again. “I’m growing tired of all of this rubbish. Give me the decoder and I’ll leave, no one needs to die tonight.”

  “Threats Solice, really?” Tyrol had a smirk that showed he was about to burst Peiter’s bubble. “Look around Solice, you’re out-manned, and out-gunned.”

  “I disagree.” He looked up to the building beside him, and a body fell, landing at Tyrol’s feet. It was one of his snipers.

  Tyrol raised his hand to his ear, moved it away, and back again. “God dammit,” he shouted. It was unlikely he would get a shot at Solice himself right now, better to let someone else do the dirty work now. He looked straight at Solice and shouted, “Jules, I have the proof in the briefcase. Grab that, and Solice is going away for the rest of his life.”

  There was a moment of silence as everyone tried to work out who would move first, when a drone swept down the alley. Solice raised his weapon and shot at Tyrol while strafing to cover. Tyrol rolled to the ground and headed towards the opposite building.

  Jack ran for Jay, and got to five metres away when there was a rush of air past his ear, then a burst of frag from the impulse shot. Jack dropped and rolled under the armoured vehicle. He quickly crawled to the end and came
out looking directly at Ox, who was holding the case.

  “Don’t make me regret this,” Ox said, kicking the case under the vehicle and moving for cover beside Jack.

  Blake had moved into the building on the diagonal from them. He quickly scaled the stairs, gobbing off to Ping and Cindy at a hundred miles per hour to get the drones onto the snipers immediately. He could hear plasma rounds echoing from the roof above him as he kept scaling the stairs. He burst out onto the rooftop to see a drone sweep past a sniper at the other end, cutting him down with deadly precision.

  Blake ran to the end of the roof and slid behind the parapet. He grabbed the dead snipers rifle and looked over. He could see Jack and Ox pinned by three snipers, and Solice’s shadow team was moving down the alley. Solice and Tyrol were still trading rounds where Blake left off.

  “Jack, you there?”

  “Where the hell else would I be?” He was shouting above the gun reports and impulse rounds.

  “You’ve got a team coming at you from the north, and snipers covering most angles. I’m going to distract the snipers, go for the building directly across and work your way back to Betty and the Beast.”

  Blake took aim just above a sniper directly across from him. There was an old billboard that looked like it wasn’t selling a whole lot of Coca Cola anymore. He hit a post and it splintered, the next shot took out the post completely. The billboard fell, hitting the sniper and tumbling off the roof, smashing on the ground.

  The attention got him a huge volley of rounds, slamming into the parapet, spraying concrete chips across the roof. He quickly crab-crawled across the roof to the adjacent side and looked over; Jack and Ox were gone.

  Two drones buzzed past, ducking low between the buildings. Blake saw them make a strafing run towards Tyrol. It must have been Ping. Tyrol saw them coming, and took his aim from Solice for a moment, firing shots at the drones. He clipped one, but at the same time Solice hit him in the shoulder and he fell back against the wall.

  Solice was about to run over to finish off Tyrol, when the second team from Osiris flanked him, going to cover Tyrol. Solice ran into the building below Blake. Blake had seen him go in, but wasn’t sure if Solice knew he was there. Blake tipped the barrel of the rifle over the parapet and brought the last sniper into his scope.

  The sniper was targeting someone on the ground. Blake swept his scope along the range of the snipers angle, and saw it was Jay. He quickly readjusted to the sniper, but saw the impulse rifle kick. Blake flicked his rifle to full auto and squeezed the trigger harder than he needed to, everything dropped into slow motion. He saw rounds hitting the sniper’s body, twisting him with the impact, but he didn’t let go of the trigger. He didn’t hear a thing throughout the duration until the rifle went into cool-down mode.

  Looking back to the ground, Jay was in a pool of blood, with half of his head missing. This day was quickly turning into one big disaster. Why the hell didn’t he just take out the sniper straight away, what was he thinking. He was not trained to make decisions like that, it made no sense.

  There was a thud from behind him, and he remembered that Solice was in the area. Turning, he saw Solice standing at the door to the roof about twelve metres away, gun trained on Blake. He looked down and saw a splintered round fall from his suit, the thud.

  “What the hell,” Solice shouted.

  “Nice suit, huh, arsehole. I don’t suppose you will surrender voluntarily?”

  “Sorry my friend, tonight there will be no surrender from me, and no departure for you.”

  As he finished the sentence he started to move to a group of crates in the middle of the roof. Blake was already on his way there, shooting and weaving his way across to avoid the shots from Solice. He slid across the gravel-top to the side of the first crate. He shot two rounds at the corner of the crate, and ran around two sides to intercept.

  Solice wasn’t there. Crap. Where is he? Blake’s thoughts were a mash of semi-coherent combat strategies and the last few weeks piling down fast. He had to get a grip. Think about your training. Now!

  He grabbed a rope on the side of the crate and back-rolled onto the top. As he rolled, his face felt numb and then a searing heat. He looked up to see Solice’s gun, then a boot kicking right where the shot had been. The momentum threw him, and he rolled with it.

  Blake couldn’t see anything clear as he rolled, he just pointed his gun towards the shadow and shot, hoping to at least distract Solice. He saw the boot coming again, but instead of rolling away, rolled towards it as fast as his shoulder could throw him. The change in timing meant the force wasn’t as hard, and better, it threw Solice off balance; Blake heaved up and knocked Solice off his feet.

  Solice swept his leg as he fell, but hit Blake on his left thigh, the nano-suit easily absorbing the impact. He raised his gun as he rolled, but Blake was already rising and kicked his hand hard, breaking the gun free.

  They both quickly rose and exchanged a volley of tight knee-kicks, elbow blows and punches. Neither of them connected with great force, each deflecting or blocking the other’s attack. Blake was feeling a little faint and had to focus hard not to lose his rhythm. As he thought of it, Solice stepped back, then forward with a lunging front kick, knocking Blake back, rolling off the crate.

  He hit the ground hard, the hazy stars above him actually looked clear for a moment. He looked up, expecting Solice to jump down, but he didn’t. The moment was almost frozen, Blake got to his knees, then heard the high pitch buzz of the ion-plasma drone.

  Blake scrambled to his feet and stumbled, constantly losing balance from the loose surface. The whine of the drone drowned out Solice’s voice. Blake turned to see Solice standing on the crate, gun in hand, staring at him with a grin of satisfaction. He caught the drone out of the corner of his eye, and turned just as it ploughed into him at high speed.

  Blake saw the Drone disintegrating as it impacted, lifting Solice clear through the air and hitting the rooftop, tumbling like a rag doll. Blake scrambled over to see what was left of Solice. His midriff was near torn in half by a rotor, and fragments of the drone were embedded in his upper body. The gruesome mess made him look more like a mangled cyborg than a man. He checked his pulse, nothing.

  “Blake, you there?”

  “Yeah, Sin.”

  “Thank god for that. I lost sight of you and only guessed you weren’t on the flight path.”

  “Well lucky you’re good at guessing, huh.” Blake coughed and spat a little blood.

  “OK, cowboy, rest is over. Jack and Ox are working through the buildings to the south side. They have two teams after them, Tyrol’s boys and Solice’s team.”

  “Where’s Tyrol?”

  “Osiris team have him in custody.”

  Jack and Ox had gone deep into a concrete structured building. Little light was getting through, and they had stopped to almost a snail pace to ensure they made as little noise as possible. Jack’s heart was pumping at a hundred miles per hour. He hadn’t been in a CQB combat situation for a long time, and it brought back all of the buzz and adrenaline he’d forgotten.

  It was near black, but he could see fine, the chemicals pumping around his head had his eyes on overdrive. He could hear rounds still going off behind them, but he knew Blake had things in hand from the rooftop, and Jay didn’t need back up anymore.

  He neared a corner into an open warehouse, stopping and raising his fist. Ox stopped dead in his tracks. Jack raised his other hand, two fingers up, waving to the right, then his eyes. Ox moved off in that direction, while Jack waited. He peered back around and saw two men, loose formation, moving from column to column up the space. He picked up a stone and threw it clear across the space. The two men stopped, looked at each other, and then without talking one moved towards the noise.

  Clever buggers, he thought, one goes down but the other can still fight. He waited until his man was ten metres away and made his move. He rushed out, fi
ring and weaving, knowing he probably wouldn’t contact straight away, but needed to clear the open ground. The Timmy was on full auto and pumping dozens of rounds a second, his target couldn’t move from cover without getting chopped in half.

  The other attacker started shooting in Jack’s direction, but was too far away to get a good view. It was enough, however, for Jack to stop shooting for a moment, enough for his target to move. He saw the movement from the opposite side of the column, and slid onto his hip, other leg out-stretched to maintain balance. But the floor was dusty and he didn’t slow enough, hitting the column and losing balance, along with his gun.

  The target was now the attacker, launching at Jack with a volley of shots, all but three missing. The three that hit were all in the suit, but hit the softer flexible joint under his arm. They didn’t penetrate, but hurt like hell. Jack spun on the ground, sweeping the attacker, and rolled on his arm, trapping the gun. He instantly got a series of hits to the face.

  Jack didn’t let his weight off, but rolled right onto the attacker, locked his legs around him, and head-butted him hard three times. It left him dizzy for a moment, but he could still see the blood coming from the back of the attackers head. He was mumbling and jerking, but with little real force. Jack grabbed his gun and whipped him across the face, the mumbling stopping instantly.

  He scrambled up and found his pistol, staggering to the next column. “Ox, you there?”

  “Yeah, Jack, I got him.”

  Jack walked over and saw the other victim on the ground, a single shot to the head. Ox was standing over him without a single mark on him. He looked at Jack, covered in dust, spit and blood in his hair, split eyebrow and cut lip. “What the hell do you have that gun for if you’re going to play-fight with them?” Ox shook his head then turned, waving Jack over. “There’s an exit up here, it’s near your vehicles.”

  They followed the line of the concrete wall, stepping over broken glass and avoiding the scattering of cans and bottles on the ground. Jack looked out and saw two Fed agents guarding the vehicles.

  “Ox, you got men on our cars?”

  “Yep, two, they’re ours.”

  “I can’t hear any more shots from down the alley. Hope that means Blake’s finished off the others.”

  “If he didn’t, we’re about to walk into an ambush.”

  They moved out, both with their weapons to the side. Jack looked down the road and saw a pile of mangled vehicles, smoke, and a few shadows on the ground of those that fell. It looked like any number of scenes he saw in his urban combat operations back in the day, but this was suburban Sydney, Australia. The whole thing felt kind of surreal to Jack. Perhaps it was the blows to his head.

  “Officer.” Ox spoke with a voice of firm authority. “Is Tyrol in custody?”

  “Yes, sir. Jackson, Phillips and Owens are en route to Osiris HQ with him now.”

  “Good. Where is the rest of the team?”

  “All gone, sir. It was a bloody mess down there. Only Oaks and myself left.”

  “Good.” Before anyone had a chance to register the comment, Ox raised his weapon and shot the two Agents in the head. They both fell instantly, no movement. He turned his gun to Jack, looked him in the eye, and shook his head.

  “I know what you’re thinking, Jack. Don’t even try it. I know you’re fast, but I don’t need any excuse to kill you right now, you’re Public Enemy number one at the moment.”

  “Why did you kill them?”

  “Well, I hardly think they would let me walk away with the tech and the briefcase without question.”

  “What the hell are you on about, arsehole?”

  “Well Jack, you must know that public service doesn’t pay so well. You were a soldier once, look where that landed you.” He paused for dramatic effect, which was lost on Jack.

  “So what, you’re an Alpha’s pet now?”

  “Tyrol? No. He’s too short sighted, too egocentric. No, I’m working with a man who can see the future. Who can see the power we will have.”

  Ox waved his free hand to the ground, signalling Jack to get down. Jack slowly lowered his gun, and began to kneel. Thoughts started rushing into his head at light speed. Why the hell had he wasted the last ten years of his life, only to be finished off by this bugger. The thoughts turned to colours, seeing a flash of blue from behind Ox who was positioning himself for the kill-shot.

  In slow motion, Ox’s head compressed from the right as a boot spun fast from behind. The force threw Ox clean of his feet, he fired a shot, but it went nowhere in particular. He hit the ground hard on his head, and was out cold.

  Ox came to, the world still spinning. He gathered himself and tried to wipe the blood from his eye, but couldn’t move his hands, they were cuffed behind his back. He was in a vehicle with Blake, tied to his seat so tight he thought his chest would collapse.

  “What the hell are you doing, Blake?’

  “Taking you in Jules, you’re a bad man.”

  “What proof do you have?”

  “Well luckily we have two of the best techies on the planet. They managed to get most of what we need. Isn’t that right, Sin?”

  “Sure is hun. We have his movements, meetings with Solice before his assignment to Osiris. Not to mention an anonymous deposit of a fairly reasonable sum.”

  “Doesn’t mean squat.”

  “Not on its own,” admitted Blake. “But we also have Jack’s testimony of your confession.”

  “He’s a fugitive, his word can’t be trusted.”

  “Not a fugitive anymore Jules. It appears Tyrol did hold his word, strangely enough. The briefcase had a hand-written document by Solice for a Teppop hit on Mac. It’s been ratified by DNA analysis, and is off to the Sec as we speak.”

  “Still doesn’t mean didley-squat about me. You’ll need more than that sunshine.” He scowled and gave a grunt of satisfaction, but Blake just laughed.

  “Well, we do have more. Enough to put you away for a few lifetimes. Isn’t that right Sophie?”

  There was a slight pause, and silence in the vehicle for a moment. “How could you do it, Jules?” Sophie sounded as though she was either going to cry or spit needles. Probably both.

  “What are you on about Soph?”

  “Don’t Soph me. I’ve been through the system with a few of our techs. You’ve done a lot to cover your tracks, but not enough. You gave Solice details of Mac’s residence, travel movements and appointments. You’ve also been colluding with him about the location of the Biotronics decoder, and falsifying documents about the Sec’s sign-off for Solice to be a consultant.”

  There was another silence. Blake looked over to Ox and saw his face was slowly dissolving. The staunch and powerful presence of the man was fading as he watched. Jules Oricks was watching his life disappear right in front of him by a bunch of half-arsed amateurs and felons.

  “Oh crap, I forgot.” Blake put on his best Special Agent voice. “Jules Oricks, you are under arrest for assisting in the assassination of Senator John Mac, for providing classified information to third parties, and for the murder of two Federal Agents.”

  Ox didn’t respond. He sat in silence, seemingly resigned to his fate. The rest of the drive back to Osiris HQ was mostly silent. It seemed after all that had been said and done, there was little else that would make a difference right now.