Before I headed out to Oni’s place, I took a short detour to my pantry. While his place was the best to meet at due to being in Straßbourg rather than Enterprise Ville, he also had the least disposable Income out of all of us. So I had made a habit out of bringing him something nice to drink that would last a while even after the meeting. As I reached the two stacks of crates of beer, I looked for one holding only full bottles.
Carrying it down to my building’s underground car park, I was once again filled with a pang of jealousy for Tamamo and her big fat trust fund. Not that I was missing anything. A lot of what I had was much more upper class than hers. Which was kind of the problem at times like this. Because while most of her drone and tool filled vans would not be out of place anywhere contractors would be expected, the extra fancy executive edition Porsche limousine I got from my Uncle when asking for a Car would stand out like a very sore thumb around Oni’s neighborhood.
After loading the beer into the boot, with a quick command I had the hidden drone compartment slide out. One of the few features that did make up for how over the top the rest of the car was. After quickly checking that the surveillance drone loaded in it was fully charged and operational, I plugged into one of the aftermarket additions I did have Tamamo install. The connection to the small server set up, which replaced two of the three mini fridges the engineers had stuffed into this thing, was stable, and everything had been kept up to date from the repositories running on my servers.
Disconnecting and closing the compartment, I slid into one of the rear passenger seats, and with a quick command to input my destination, the car came to life under the customized and improved autopilot I had installed. As it pulled out of the car park and into traffic, I opened the one remaining fridge between the rear seats. While I would have loved nothing more than crack open one of the cans of premixed cocktails, I instead reached for a can of Pepoke. Activating the seat's massage feature, I began to relax, having nothing better to do until I arrived.
~~~
When I drove past Oni's place on the way to the nearby parking lot Tamamo and I usually use when visiting him, I already saw Ibex’s Harley sitting on the sidewalk.And seeing as the only car in said parking lot this afternoon was one of our speed junkies vans, I was going to be the last one there. Once my car had parked itself, I booted up the surveillance drone. Once it had finished that, it would automatically take off and keep an eye on our cars. taking the crate of beer with me, I locked the car remotely and began the short walk to meet up with everyone else.
Once I got up to the apartment’s front door and knocked, it was actually Ibex who opened the door for me. She quickly brushed a lock of her light brown hair out of her face before grabbing my sleeve and pulling me in. As often, she was still wearing her black and green synth leather Motorcycle jacket with a pleated miniskirt that didn’t get in the way of her very out there goat leg like prosthetics. While I took a moment to take off my jacket, she headed back to the living room to rejoin the others.
Once I followed after her, I was greeted by a very familiar scene. Oni was lounging on his couch wearing an old Tshirt and some jeans. Ibex was sitting next to him. The two were sharing some small talk. Probably either about their prosthetics or their current workout plans. Tamamo was sitting at his small dining table, unloading small cardboard takeout boxes from a larger styrofoam one.
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“Ah, we’re finally all here.” She said once she noticed me, and waved everyone over to join her at the table. “Now food first, plans later.”
Just nodding in reply, I put down the crate of beer next to the table. While we weren’t likely to go through it completely, I knew at least Oni and I would want some with the food at the very least.
“So we got Kitsune Udon for Ibex and me.” Tamamo began as she distributed the boxes of food. “Tempura style fried mushrooms for Oni.” I did not like that pause she inserted as she handed me the last remaining box of food. “Oh and some deep fried cockroaches for Mr. ‘I want real dead animal protein’”
‘Great. Well maybe it won’t be that bad?’ I tried to psyche myself up as I grabbed the first of the fried insects out of the box, other hand prepared with an open bottle of beer. And was very very glad for it. After my first bite, the consistency was already weird enough, like extra crispy fries filled with porridge or something. but the taste was absolutely not for me. Not one bit. Still food was food, and with enough beer I managed to swallow the first mouthful.
“Chilly sauce is in the fridge, hard to miss.” Oni said as my dislike for the cockroach must have been quite evident if even he could tell.
While I didn’t like how hot he liked his hot sauces, that was mostly due to how they somehow managed to erase any kind of taste besides spicy from the food he put them on. Which was exactly what I needed for these stupid cockroaches. After drowning the whole box in sauce, their taste indeed vanished under a comfortably hot mantle of spiciness.
We ate mostly in silence after that. though from the looks on their faces, I was sure Tamamo and Ibex had planned this together. Because Ibex was usually not nearly as fond of schadenfreude as her current smirk would imply.
“So what’s this job you mentioned at lunch?” I asked once we all had finished our food.
“You guys know of that new Satellite powered liquid salt power plant Rhein Energy has brought into service last week?”
“Heard of it, yeah.” Ibex grumbled as she slumped back over her chair, while Oni and I simply nodded in response.
“Well the astronomy department is royally pissed.” Tamamo began to elaborate. “Because those orbital solar collection satellites have already ruined two of their optical telescopes.”
“And that relates to the job how exactly?” Oni asked just what I was wondering as well.
“Well, they got in touch with Électricité Swiss for some donations towards, and I quote ‘Assisting with the restoration and continued operation of astrological equipment.’”
“So they got a lot of money from Rhein’s competitors ‘cause they both want third parties to mess with the plant?” I inquired quickly, hoping I understood what Tamamo was insinuating correctly. “And you want us to be one of those third parties.”
“Yup.” Tamamo said, smiling like the cat that caught the koi from the pond.
“That’s a lot higher profile than our usual stuff.” Oni commented, his voice filled with concern. “Think the closest we got to something like that was when the Italians hired us to stop that drug dealer ring trying to move in on campus.”
“This whole thing? Sure.” Tamamo began to justify herself. “But the job we have been hired to do is much less grand than even that gig.”
“So what is our job in all this?” Ibex grumbled while drumming her fingers on the table.
“We are to get them the list of employees and if possible their schedules.”
“That is indeed much closer to our usual kinda work.” I concurred.
“Still. We are going to go mess with a corp.” Oni countered, arms crossed before his chest. “This better be really worth it.”
“Don’t worry it will be.” Tamamo tried to reassure him, even leaning forward to rest a hand on his shoulder. Which caused some strands of her currently not actually tied back hair to fall into the box her noodles had been in.