CHAPTER FIVE—PROTECTION DETAIL

“Wait,” Kyle said. “I apologize.” He put his fingers to his forehead. “I’m not that well versed on the intricacies of the nano cell technology, especially in relation to refractive lighting. It’s your own proprietary technology, you say? Could you explain it further?”

After May had secreted herself away—making her escape look like a business call—Kyle knew she was up to something.

So of course he had to stall this guy.

Thalaway’s reaction was exuberant, patient and quietly enduring. He was way too high on the company’s ladder to be explaining these things to Kyle. But of course, when billions were on the table, the lines of one’s job description could blur a bit.

“Why don’t I take you to see our lead engineers so they can better explain these things to you? They can do a far better job than I.”

Kyle nodded vigorously, even though this technobabble-crap was more John’s area of interest. “Yes! Yes, that would be perfect,” Kyle said. He would persevere and maintain an eager attitude toward it all until May came back.

But fuuuck—when is this gonna end?

*

May went up to Halloway’s office doors.

“Oh!” someone cried softly.

May whirled around. “Gods!” she croaked as her hand went to her chest in a reflexive move of pure reaction.

“Oh, I’m so sorry!” the receptionist said, a big smile on her face. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”

May nodded, put on a big smile. “That’s all right. I just…”

“Oh, I’m so sorry, but Mr. Thalaway isn’t in his office right now. You’ll have to wait until he returns—but even then you will need an appointment, I’m afraid.”

She said it like May was some fifteen-year-old who had wandered away from her moneybag parents. “Okay,” May said and slipped behind the reception desk. The receptionist’s eyes widened in surprise but before she could react May moved.

“What are you—“

She grabbed the receptionist by the back of the neck with her right hand while holding her left wrist away from the tactile display. “Open the door, bitch, or I’ll snap your wrist.”

“Excuse me?!” she cried.

“Fuck!” May snapped and smacked the receptionist in the stomach. As she bent over from the mild force of the blow, May pushed her right hand down and slammed the woman’s head into the consol.

As he head bounced off of the console, her hair came undone and she went limp. May let her fall to the carpet before unlocking the office doors. Before she trailed off, she glanced down at the woman and sighed heavily.

May bent and took her by the ankles. She dragged the unconscious woman into Thalaway’s office, her head skidding across the carpet.

As soon as the receptionist was out of view of the main entry, May dropped her feet and kicked the stray stiletto heel that had fallen off.

She went to the computer, noting the dark chamber and the mood-indusing directional lights on various androids, parts and other artistic features through-out the room.

On the wall an Invera-Tech commercial quietly flickered on from the in-ceiling holo-projectors. The holo-display was on and unlocked.

Good.

She put in a secure call to John, but it took a moment to go through since the call was routed out of this area and through their own firewalled buffers and relay stations.

He answered. “Did you find her?”

“Not yet,” May said, noting the mild sound of panic in John’s voice. She felt for the poor muscle head. “I’m in Thalaway’s office right now.”

Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

“I’m coming.”

“Don’t,” she said. “There’s nothing you can do right now except lean over my shoulder and stare at the same things I’m seeing.”

“Can you project?”

“Hells no,” she said. “I don’t have that retinal shit in my eyes.”

“Neither do I.”

“Good,” she said, scrolling through the files. With a heavy sigh, she added, “I wish Lexa was here to help me. She could dredge through all this corporate crap in minutes.”

“Yeah.”

She found her way into Invera-Tech’s deeper company report logs, the backend ones that didn’t show direct communications, but rather coded reports. It was impossible to steal Lexa outright for the most part. They still had her securely stationed in their own mainframes back at the penthouse with various safety buffers between here and there.

What was taken would amount to a copy of Lexa, and even without the source code, this shell of her current self—her mostly up-to-date self—would be worth billions, either to some douche corp or on the black market.

May was no analyst capable of parsing out coded messages in the system, but she knew a thing or two about corporate security systems. Before becoming an Anarcho—even unofficially—she had worked corporate security.

The messages came up through her advanced search.

“I found it,” she said.

“You found Lexa?”

“Wait,” she said. “Not yet. I found the communications.” She followed the backend technical logs to the source files. “All right,” she said. “I’m going to parallel this to you. Wait a sec.”

“All right.”

She connected the playback to her wristlet so the audio communications would be recorded into her device, but also streamlined to John’s. She pushed play on the file.

“Koss.”

“Yeah, boss?”

“There’s a sentient AI in inner lobby 2A that’s unintended.”

“And you’re telling me this, because?”

“I was surprised at first, but when I noticed the AI’s signature ended in a dash-point-thirty-six.”

“What the fuck?”

“That’s what I thought. Want me to lift it?”

“Yes. Make sure you don’t fuck up. I don’t want a third party investigation causing us any trouble.”

“I got it handled.”

“You better, or it’s your ass.”

The call ended

“Shit,” John said. “Who is that guy?”

“That’s Mr. Thalaway. He’s the head of Invera-Tech’s Customer Sales, PR and Corporate Acquisitions departments.”

“It’s a mouthful. What about Lexa?”

“Gonna have to find this Koss guy.”

“Shit.”

“Don’t worry, I’m looking up the personnel records right now.”

“I feel useless,” John complained.

“That’s because you are useless.”

John said nothing.

“Sorry,” May said. “I didn’t mean it like that. It’s just that there’s nothing you can do at the moment.” She brought up the files and found the only Koss in the system. She linked them to John’s wristlet.

“Koss De Brossier…” he mused. “Not a friendly-looking guy.”

“You can say that again,” She said. “Too bad we don’t have his police records.”

Koss De Brossier was thin with heavy creases in his face. He had the eyes of what May thought “killer-like” and a thick goatee of course facial hair. And he was the head of the security response unit.

A heavy hitter.

“I bet this guy does a lot more than provide security for Invera-Tech.”

“I could find out, but at this point, I don’t think it would matter.”

“Can you locate him?”

“Yeah, I think”—she looked up at the sound of a noise outside the door. “Shit!” she hissed.

“What is it?!”

May hung up the call and ran to the receptionist. She grabbed the woman’s ankles again and yanked her back toward the wall. There was a bathroom located that way and she dragged the unconscious woman inside and across the tiles.

“Sorry—but you’re really going to feel all this later.”

As the office doors hissed open, May closed the bathroom door and jumped onto the leather sofa against the wall where she crossed her legs. The woman that entered the office was making a beeline for the holo-displays when she glanced in May’s direction and blinked.

She stopped and her eyes narrowed. “Who are you?”

May did her best impression of nonchalance and boredom. “Kyla Lassernick,” she said, giving the woman her fake name from the biometrics they had installed on their way in. “What are you doing in here?”

“I’m the head of Thalaway’s protection detail,” the woman said, a hint of annoyance in her tone. She was tall, wore grey slacks and sported a haircut that pulled off the best impression of a man.

Heart hammering inside her chest, May tried not to swallow visibly.

Shitshitshit!

The bodyguard put her hands on her hips. “Now tell me what you’re doing in here.”

With the little she could say on such short notice, May quickly blurted out the first thing that came to mind. “I’m here to break heads and squeeze squealers,” May said matter-of-factly in her best bluff possible. She crossed her arms. “There’s been a lot of slack here lately.”

“You were sent here from the internal offices up from high town?”

She’s probing.

Fuck!

“Somethin’ like that.”

The bodyguard looked at her critically. “Uhuh.”

Whelp—failed the sniff check…

May didn’t move to feel for her gun holstered under her jacket. “What is your name?” she asked, her tone one that booked no dissent from getting the information that—by her tone—implied she should have been told voluntarily.

“Xandra Tynez.”

May nodded. “If you find Thalaway, please send him here immediately. I’m tired of being kept waiting.”

Tynez stepped back and nodded, but then her eyes clung heavily to something on her right. May tracked her eyes and realized it was the white stiletto the receptionist had lost when May had dragged her though the office.

The bodyguard glanced up at the Anarcho with a dangerous look on her face.

“As I said,” May explained. “There’s been a lot of slacking!”

The woman chortled.

They looked at each other.

They both reacted as fast as they could.