DRAFT: Sleepwalker— Chapter 22: Just My Smile To Protect Me

Our-World

My senses spun wildly with vertigo, accompanied by a Doppler-shifting thunder that struck me like a bolt of high voltage and made me feel as if I were being circled by a ten-foot-wide boomerang traveling at fifty miles an hour. The sensation could have lasted for two seconds or thirty. There was also a feeling reminiscent of the first few moments spent tumbling uncontrollably out of an aircraft—when the one-hundred-mile-an-hour slipstream slams into you and completely scrambles your orientation in space. In the next instant, I felt the down comforter, soft and gentle beneath the bare skin of my back.

“The fuck!” Piper croaked in a hoarse voice beside me and sat up with a jolt.

I cracked an eye and looked at her. She was completely naked, the same as me. We were positioned mostly parallel but askew on the bed in her room back on Our-World. The morning sun appeared to be just cresting the horizon, gradually backlighting the drawn blinds of the windows across the room. She was gently probing her right ear with the tip of her finger. As she worked her jaw, she quickly moved her finger to her left ear and shot me an accusing glance. That’s when I became aware of the pressure building up in my ears and worked my jaw to relieve it.

“Do you taste waffles?” Piper said, her voice loud. She was still having trouble with her hearing.

I ran my tongue along the roof of my mouth and smiled. “Maple syrup?”

She raised an eyebrow. Honestly, if she didn’t have an explanation for it, what could I offer? By that point, she was figuring this stuff out far quicker than I was, and we both knew it. I could only shrug.

Piper’s gaze shifted to the foot of the bed. At first, I thought she was just now realizing we were both naked. That wouldn’t be a good sign since that had been part of the plan. If her mind had been scrambled during the Crossing, I needed to assess the extent of her condition and how long it would take for her to recover.

“Did we just break the bed?” She said.

Her attention wasn’t on her physical condition; rather, it focused on the state of the bed. The bed was inclined, with the head raised at a noticeable pitch because the footboard had collapsed, leaving the bottom of the mattress resting on the floor.

I rolled to the edge of the mattress and found my feet. “No,” I said, motioning to the room. “If you remember, we did that the night you…left.”

Piper looked briefly puzzled, her face slowly flushing as the memory returned. I’ll admit, my mind was racing with that recollection too. “It’s been months. You didn’t fix it?” she finally said.

“Months for you,” I reminded. “Days on this side. Days when I didn’t come back here. Remember, I was gone for so long because I hadn’t slept. The first time I finally did, I crossed right back to Wild-Side. At that point, fixing the bed was the least of my concerns.”

She nodded slowly. “Days,” she murmured. “It’s still hard to believe you were gone for so long.”

We were on the same page. We need to finish our work here as quickly as possible. It was crucial to remember that every hour spent here was multiplied on Wild-Side. The clock was ticking here, but it was ticking even faster over there.

“Esker, you there?” I said.

“Welcome back,” Esker whispered in my ear.

“Hey, buddy.” The smile on my face was impossible to hide, and Piper mirrored it. The confusion in her eyes reminded me that only I could hear his response. “Hey, could you switch to speaker? I want Piper to hear you.”

“Hello, Piper,” Esker said through the speaker built into the phone. “It’s nice to finally meet you.”

Piper’s eyes immediately darted to the phone plugged into a power cord on the nightstand by my side of the bed. “You too,” she said with a laugh. “I’ve heard a lot about you.” It seemed to dawn on Piper that she was standing naked at the side of the bed, and her eyes shifted anxiously, searching for concealment.

“There’s a robe on the hook inside the closet door,” Esker said confidently.

I laughed as Piper bolted to her own closet. It was amusing that she was trying to hide from the voice of a disembodied artificial intelligence, especially since the AI had just reminded her where her robe was hung.

“It’s alright,” I said, even though I knew what I was about to say was already undermined by the fact that I was laughing so hard I was nearly doubled over. “He doesn’t care if you’re naked or wearing your Sunday best. It’s all the same to him.”

Piper stepped out of the closet, tightening the belt of her white terrycloth robe. She shot me a laser gaze of admonishment, clearly grinding her teeth.

“Gray is correct,” Esker said. “I can scan multiple spectrums and have recently started routinely using backscatter feedback from surrounding signals as well. This is how I was able to identify the new form of radiation unique to Grays Crossing. Clothing and the human form are of no particular interest to me, if that makes you feel any better.”

Piper glared at me. “What?”

There was an accusation in the response. It wasn’t until that second that I even considered saying what I was thinking. I stepped back and suddenly wished I wasn’t so figuratively and literally exposed. “Well…” I hesitated. “He was there,” I pointed to the nightstand, “when we broke that.” I pointed to the bottom of the bed.

For a few long seconds, Piper looked like she was about to explode. I was on the verge of being ringside—ground zero—for a nuclear detonation. I could see it in her eyes. Then her mask of seething fury melted away. She shook her head and let out a choked giggle. She laughed until tears streamed down her cheeks. “This is hardly the weirdest thing to happen to us this year,” she said, sitting down on the side of the bed. “Objectively, after seeing what the Seeley thought about the human sexual experience, I’m curious to hear what an AI thinks. There could be a paper in it.”

“A paper you could never publish?”

She shrugged. “There’s a lot to explore here once this is all sorted out. None of it can be published but all of it should be captured for posterity. Do you realize that everything is happening for the first time in human history?”

I watched the expression on Piper’s face and reflected on it. This wasn’t the first time the question had crossed my mind, and I couldn’t help but wonder. Was this the first time any of these things had occurred? Was I the first person ever to traverse Branes? That didn’t seem likely. There was nothing special about me. And if I wasn’t special, why should this be the first time?

“Not to interrupt,” Esker said. I was surprised to hear hesitancy in his tone; he sounded uncomfortable. It occurred to me that he wasn’t used to being included in conversations that went beyond the back and forth between him and me. “I could use the latest download when you’re ready.”

The pain at the base of my skull felt like someone had just eased off on an attempt to lobotomize me with a corkscrew that needed sharpening. Adding to this by driving toothpicks to the back of my eyeballs wasn’t at the top of my to-do list, but he made a fair point. A crack of thunder rattled the roof overhead, and I instantly realized just how dark the sky beyond the drawn blinds had become in the past couple of minutes.

“Did we catch Smallwood off guard?” I asked, my gaze still fixed on the darkened window. “It seems we didn’t redirect the storm this time.”

“Ask your questions while you prepare the download,” Esker urged, his tone tinged with a new level of stress. A flash of concern shot my way from Piper. Although she didn’t yet know the AI, his anxiety was evidently easy to read.

I grabbed the glasses off the nightstand next to Esker’s phone and slipped them onto my face. “Hit me,” I said through clenched teeth. The flash of light stabbed at my eyes, the sensation of staring wide-eyed into a sleet storm. That lasted only a second. It was quickly replaced by a stabbing pain along my optic nerves.

“Transfer complete,” Esker said.

I felt Piper’s hand on my shoulder. “That was quick. Tripp said this transfer involved terabytes of data. Is it usually this fast?”

I flicked the glasses across the comforter and worked my eye sockets with the heels of my hands. “Fast can be a relative term,” I mumbled through clenched teeth.

“The data confirms my assumption,” Esker said, ignoring my discomfort. “Piper’s return with you changes the biomass ratio needed to offset the storm fronts. Calculations show that you will need to increase the mobile stores by thirty-five percent to prevent this scenario from happening again. I recommend adjusting by forty percent. This will provide you with a wider margin of error.”

“Bio—what?” Piper stammered.

It was the first time I realized I hadn’t fully explained the camper that had been running interference for me all over the southern and western United States. I was about to get into it when Esker spoke again.

“The care package you arranged seems to be early,” he said. “One of the webcams I’m monitoring at the Borderline just triggered a motion alert. Your shipping container arrived at the designated location, only ahead of schedule.”

Our ability to control the Crossing back to Our-World was the first part of an ambitious and potentially game-altering plan. Arriving at a time of our choosing meant I would no longer suffer the whims of fate regarding how quickly I boomeranged back home. More importantly, the second part of the plan was to see if we could Cross with more than just our birthday suits. The care package aimed to transport hardware across the Brane barrier. If our gear could successfully make the Crossing, we would not only be able to outfit ourselves with Wild-Side tech in Our-World, but we could also potentially cross with gear from Our-World intact. I can’t express how nice it would be to land on Wild-Side with more than just my smile to protect me from all things pointy and bitey.

Piper’s eyes widened. We both glanced at the clock on the nightstand. It was just after three in the afternoon. If the skies hadn’t darkened so rapidly due to the unexpected weather, it would still be broad daylight. “That’s not good,” she said. “The time offsets are wildly inconsistent.”

I shook my head. “At least the location was right.” I swallowed hard as fear gripped me. I realized I had just made a dangerous assumption. “Wait, E. Which camera? Please tell me it landed behind the bar?”

“It did,” Esker confirmed. “However, considering the time of day, it’s unlikely to go unnoticed for long.”

I went to the window and parted the blinds just in time to see the large maple outside Piper’s apartment bending in the gale-force wind. Near-horizontal rain sheeted the expanse of lawn between us and the parking lot, and lightning danced in the cloudy sky. “Tornado alarms,” I mumbled, at first to myself. “E? Can you trigger the alarms in the area around the Borderline? The distraction should keep people looking just about anywhere but the lot behind the bar long enough for us to get there.”

Piper tossed me a pair of jeans, and I started pulling them on. She was already dressed in the same and a dark hoodie. She pulled her hair under a dark Blackhawks cap and slipped an elastic band around her wrist. When she passed me a similar pullover, I heard the distant whine of sirens.

“I might not need to raise false alarms,” Esker commented. “Weather services across the county are already sending alerts. Conditions are perfect for tornadoes, and alerts are being issued.”

---

We were halfway to the Borderline with Piper behind the wheel of my Jeep and Esker navigating, when the weather conditions surprisingly dropped down my list of pressing concerns. I’d lost the debate with Piper about who should drive, which ended up being ideal for all of us after Esker’s latest update from Derek Smallwood. Between the new information and monitoring our flanks for flying, rolling, or flowing debris that could disable our four-by-four, I was extremely distracted.

“No,” I said. “Don’t play the recording; just tell me what has you concerned.” Even as the words left my mouth, I was impressed by my confidence in the AI’s ability to interpret human mannerisms to the point that I no longer automatically second-guessed him. I decided I’d felt this way for some time, even without consciously registering the shift in mindset. Esker has continued to develop in recent months, without question. I suddenly wondered if he was even aware of his personal growth.

While guiding Piper to navigate the hazards between her apartment and the Borderline, I was unaware that Esker was conversing with Derek Smallwood. This call occurred silently, at least from my perspective. When Piper returned from Wild-Side with me, we Crossed together, upsetting the delicate balance we had maintained. Smallwood kept a proportional amount of my genetic material in the RV and on the move so my Crossing wouldn’t generate a storm front that could reveal my location. By keeping a slightly higher amount of my genetic material in motion with him, for reasons we still don’t fully understand, the weather disturbances that occurred when both Breslin and I were in Our-World simultaneously were somewhat mitigated, directing the resulting storm toward Smallwood’s location instead of mine.

Knowing the storm we now experienced was the unintended consequence of Piper returning from Wild-Side with me, Esker reached out to Smallwood to see what the Doctor could do to compensate. For instance, would it be necessary to add Piper’s genetic material to the payload now being carried in the RV, or would they simply need to adjust the current ratio to account for Piper’s mass? I was impressed, first because Esker was taking the initiative, and second because while I was focused on dealing with the current problems, he was solving for future scenarios.

“It was Doctor Smallwood’s response that concerns me,” Esker clarified. “He agrees the severity of the current storm is likely commensurate with both you and Piper Crossing together and suspects we will need genetic material added to his current payload to compensate.”

“Which is what you expected,” I said, my eyes scanning the windward side of the city street. I grabbed Piper’s thigh and hissed, “Incoming!”

Piper mashed the brakes and sent the Jeep into a thirty-mile-per-hour hydroplaning skid that stopped just short of cartwheeling into a wooden picnic table as it blew through the intersection ahead of us. She leaned forward and glanced left and right quickly before slamming her foot back on the accelerator. “That thing was moving like a runaway train,” she muttered through clenched teeth.

My eyes returned to scanning our surroundings. The wipers scraped the windshield at high speed, but even then, visibility was at most two dozen yards. The rain was beyond sheeting, coming down at a forty-five-degree angle, and the sound it made on the Jeep’s soft top was deeply concerning. Something was bound to give soon. I didn’t know if the rain would tear through the cover or if the wind would take the top first—either way, we needed to get rid of the Jeep quickly.

“Eleven minutes to Borderline at this pace,” Esker said as if reading my mind.

A smile tugged at the corner of Piper’s mouth. Perhaps he was reading her thoughts too.

“When I pressed to find out if adding Piper’s genetic profile was necessary,” Esker said, changing the subject, “Doc Smallwood finished my thought about compensating with more of your biomass to save time. He said it was possible but unlikely. He would need to consult to be sure.”

My mouth went dry, and I found my grip on the dashboard tightening even more. “Consult? He said consult?”

“I can playback the recording,” Esker confirmed.

A new wave of nausea churned in the pit of my stomach, and expletives started slipping out under my breath.

Piper turned a corner, drifting the four-wheel-drive like a rally car. By that point, it had become nearly second nature for her. Her head was swiveling from side to side, and she’d found her groove. “I guess I didn’t keep up,” she said absentmindedly. “What’s the problem?”

I swallowed hard, feeling as if I were pushing down the consequences of the words about to follow. “Smallwood shouldn’t be consulting with anyone about this. He helped me solve the storm mitigation issue a year ago. If he had assistance, I didn’t know about it. If he has a partner, he hasn’t disclosed it. If he brought someone in since the start of the project, they might not be on our side.”

Piper shot me a quick look before turning her attention back to the road. “You think the partner he’s working with is Breslin?”

I swallowed once more. “Who else would be interested in this kind of technology?”

None of us knew what to say at that moment. Piper shook her head. I turned my attention back to the windward side of the road. The storm, if anything, appeared to be intensifying.

Esker spoke. “What should I do about my contact with—”

Lightning flashed, striking somewhere on the road in the near distance. The brightness blinded us instantly, and the thunderclap hit the front of the Jeep like an impact with another vehicle. My senses went haywire, and I felt like I was on a tilt-a-whirl. In an instant, I didn’t know which way was up because the Jeep began to roll sideways. There was crashing and crunching. An enormous side impact hit me in the face, followed by who knows how many more minor hits. The next thing I knew, I was pelted with something cold and wet.

---

When I opened my eyes, I instantly understood that I had been unconscious for at least a short time. The Jeep lay on its passenger side with both front airbags deployed and already mostly deflated. My shoulder was submerged in two inches of water. The storm had turned the street into a river, and our wreck was doing little to stem the flow. Piper was strapped into the driver’s seat above me, pulling at the shoulder strap of her seatbelt with one hand while mashing the belt release with the other.

“Are you alright?” I asked, my voice sounding foreign to me. Strange acoustics inside the vehicle resulted from the rain hammering surfaces that were usually shielded from the storm. Gashes and tears had turned the soft top into a less-than-ideal shelter, forming crude gutters that channeled copious amounts of water into the passenger compartment.

Shooting me a relieved, though short-lived smile, Piper said, “Welcome back.” She yanked hard on the shoulder strap once more and pounded the buckle release with her closed right fist while cursing. “You were out for almost two minutes. I’m pretty sure you broke the passenger window with your head before the street had a chance to bust the glass for you.”

I opened my mouth, exaggerating a yawn, and heard—and felt—a pop. It seemed to reverberate through my skull. A turn of my head resulted in the sensation and sound of stepping on loose gravel as bones and sinew realigned as closely as possible to factory specifications. “Explains a few things,” I mumbled. “Are you hurt?”

She slammed her fist against the steering wheel and kicked the underside of the dashboard. “Just my pride. The belt won’t release.”

“My fault,” Esker said, close to our ears. “I locked your belts when I integrated the drive-by-wire system into the emergency maneuver.”

I was sure there was a story there; it just wasn’t the right time. If this were Esker’s ideal outcome, the alternative would certainly be sphincter puckering. Instead of asking, I released my belt and grabbed the folding knife from my hip pocket. My airbag was nearly deflated, but I needed room to work, so I cut it away with a couple of quick swipes of the razor-sharp blade. Then I glanced up at Piper. “Ready?”

Piper nodded and braced herself against the wheel. She held tightly to the top and placed her elbows along the sides, so when I sliced away at the belt, she wouldn’t fall from the seat out of control. Still, everything was wet and slippery, so things didn’t go as planned. There was a gasp as she landed in my lap with a wheezing, wet splat. We laughed, but under different circumstances, it would have been much more amusing.

“What happened?” Piper asked. “There was a flash—then the car went haywire.”

I grinned to myself as I crawled to the back of the Jeep, searching for the emergency kit. We needed to set out road flares before the next car came along and made our wreck three times worse. As I prepared to place the flares in the road, Esker explained the lightning Airbike and his response, which led to the rollover wreck.

The lightning Airbike had blown out a pair of streetlights a couple hundred yards down the road from us. When this happened, a powerline pole supporting a high-capacity transformer was also hit. As the pole fell, it was certain to land in the street—a street that was running deep with floodwater, up to three feet in places. The pole that was in the process of falling in front of our Jeep had an eleven percent chance of stopping us in our tracks there. There was an eighty-nine percent chance that the Jeep would hit the fallen pole, bounce over it, and continue down the street. At that point, the driver wouldn’t have the chance to regain traction or control to avoid swamping the vehicle frame in the floodwater that, by then, would be electrically charged by the fallen transformer.

Piper and I stood at the edge of an old bowling alley, huddled close to the two-story brick wall, just beyond the reach of the worst of the rain. We looked at the rolled, trashed Jeep and listened to Esker’s explanation of the action he had taken by overriding the Jeep’s onboard computer system to literally save our lives by wrecking the SUV.

Apparently, the Jeep hydroplaned into a slide and struck the downed pole. This caused us to roll, which led to the wreck. However, the roll helped the vehicle come to a stop well short of the electrified flood, so while we were a bit banged up, we weren’t overcooked.

Esker responded to everything so quickly that it was the next best thing to precognition. He had reacted instantly and decisively, making the most of a bad situation. There was no doubt our lives had been saved in the process. His complex analysis occurred literally in the time it took for lightning to strike. He had assessed the intricate cascading impact on the environment and then intervened through what I could only assume was a sophisticated real-time hack of the SUV’s onboard control system.

I’d been skeptical about the AI’s usefulness when I was first given access to him. Since that time, he’d proven to be immensely helpful. I’ve watched him grow and evolve, continuously expanding his understanding of our world’s technology at what seemed to be an ever-increasing pace. But when he made that impulsive decision to wreck the Jeep in defense of my life and Piper’s, I realized for the first time that Esker wasn’t just an artificial intelligence. He was simply intelligent—not human, yet no less significant for it.

“I feel like there’s a bad driving joke in there somewhere,” Piper said, shivering visibly. It obviously relates just as much to what we were witnessing as it does to being soaked to the bone in high winds.

I found it hard to laugh at any of this. If anyone was hurt or killed during this insanity, it was on me. This atmospheric disturbance wasn’t just a nuisance; it was a serious concern that we needed to mitigate entirely. Lives were at stake.

“How’s your head?” Piper asked.

“I’ll live.” I was more concerned about retrieving our gear from the Borderline before it was damaged or found. “This storm is the worst one yet. It’s not letting up. No one should be out in this. We need to grab our gear and find cover.”

Piper was nodding and was about to say something when Esker interrupted her.

“Something’s happening at the Borderline,” Esker said. “Multiple County Sheriff’s Deputies have just been dispatched.”

We were two and a half blocks away, as the crow flies. It was close enough to walk from the crash site. I nodded at Piper, who pointed to an alley that led in the right direction. To Esker, I said, “Tell me what I need to know.”

---

The rainfall had eased somewhat when Piper and I arrived at the shopping plaza’s parking lot where the Borderline was located. And when I say it had eased, it is a highly subjective comparison. The rain was falling more or less vertically by that point, but there was still a heavy downpour. The winds had calmed to about half of what they had been. The Sheriff’s Deputies positioned around the parking lot wore ponchos and windbreakers with the county crest and the department’s name emblazoned on them as they braced against the storm beside squad cars at the north, east, and west entrances to the oblong, football field-sized parking lot.

It was just before eight-thirty in the evening, but it might as well have been midnight. The heavy precipitation in the air reduced the visibility of the half dozen functioning light poles in the lot to perhaps a third of their already limited brightness. A dozen poles were spaced throughout the lot at regular intervals, though I’d never seen more than half of them lit at any given time. It was clear tonight wouldn’t be any different, even with the emergency conditions.

Three squad cars were positioned at each entrance to the lot, with an officer standing at the bumper of each car, their attention mainly focused on the outer perimeter. Another car was located about two dozen yards outside the front doors of the Borderline. A pair of men crouched behind the car, bracing themselves against the storm while using the vehicle as a barrier between them and the bar, where their attention remained directed. Three additional units were stationed at the far left of the parking lot—a pair of county-marked SUVs and a squad car. This appeared to be support waiting for direction from the scene commander.

Piper and I stood at the edge of a copse of trees just beyond the northwest corner of the lot. We had some shelter from the storm, but more importantly, we remained hidden from the police.

Esker explained that police reports indicated robbers had attempted to leverage the storm as a distraction and were now holding the bar’s patrons as hostages. An alarm had been triggered, and police responded. It was bad luck for everyone in the bar and us because it was only a matter of time before our container caught the eye of law enforcement. Even more expected was one of the hostages identified by Esker when he reviewed the security cameras inside the bar. FBI Special Agent Al Vincente was among the hostages.

“This is escalating quickly,” Piper said flatly. “Why would you want to go in there? If everyone’s focused on the front, maybe we can slip around back, grab our stuff and get out.”

Esker burst her bubble before I could respond. “Two units have been stationed at the back of the bar to block any escape. One of the units is currently taking cover behind your equipment. Apparently, the transport container provides ideal concealment.”

“Is the officer interested in the container?” I asked.

“No,” Esker confirmed. He is completely focused on the bar’s exit and that of the dry cleaner next door. Another unit is monitoring the two takeout restaurants and the liquor store.

The Borderline anchored the plaza’s east end, occupying a pair of units in the building. To the west was the dry cleaner, noted by Esker. Adjacent to the cleaner were two take-out restaurants: one Mexican and the other Chinese. The liquor store occupied the west end of the plaza. Except for the cleaner, all the businesses were owned by the same entrepreneur, who was positioning the facility to attract the local students living within two square miles.

“What do the police have planned?” I asked. At this point, I assumed that Esker was monitoring the department’s communication.

“There’s a disagreement about the best course of action,” Esker confirmed. “Right now, one side is advocating that the Lieutenant on scene stall until a negotiator can arrive. The other side wants to cut the power and wait for the SWAT team from downstate. Neither will happen quickly, so in either case, this will be a hurry-up-and-wait situation.”

Piper was already glaring at me.

“What?” It was all I could think to say.

“You want to go in.” Her tone was accusatory.

I shrugged. She wasn’t wrong.

“What good will that do?”

I counted off the points on my fingers. “We need to distract the cops and pull them away from the care package out back,” I said, holding up one digit. “Our buddy is in there,” I added, referring to Vincente and raising my second finger. “I’m really curious to see how he made it this far, so why not ask him? If he’s here, we need to find out if he’s alone or just the first in a wave that’s about to hit us. If it’s the wave, we need to know right now so we can grab our gear and react accordingly.” I lifted a third finger. “We have friends in there.” I nodded toward the bar and considered her coworkers. “Neither of us wants to see them get hurt if we can help it.”

Piper stared at me for a moment, then rolled her eyes. “Fine. But how do we get inside? We can’t just walk through the front door.”

I grinned. “Actually, I will use the front door—but I’m doing it alone. I need you out back, ready to grab the gear and hit the sky as soon as the cops pull out of position. I’m not sure how much time I can give you. Esker can coordinate comms, and he has good camera coverage, so that part should be covered.

“Cameras and communication are trivial,” Esker affirmed. “Although the Sheriff’s department lacks a solid reaction plan, the coverage of the ingress and egress points is comprehensive. I don’t see how you’ll get past them if you want to enter the Borderline undetected.”

“I was thinking of the way you took control of the Jeep,” I explained. “All the squad cars look like late models. Can you do something like that with them?”

“In theory,” Esker said slowly. “But it’s not that simple. I had proximity in the case of the Jeep. I used the many radios in your phone to access the onboard control system of the Jeep. I can exploit the squad cars in a similar way, but without proximity, I can’t distinguish one from another. Given enough time, I can enumerate the entire fleet and identify those on scene, then access them through their communication systems. Patrol vehicles are among the most connected cars on the road. I’m not sure I can accomplish it within the timeframe required.”

I nodded slowly and smiled at Piper’s scowl of concern. “It would make life a lot easier if someone labeled each of the cars for us, wouldn’t it?”

Esker’s voice sounded puzzled. Until that moment, I don’t think I had ever heard him confused. “Sure,” he said, stretching the word into multiple syllables. “But…why…what are—”

“Maybe if we ask them nicely, they’ll paint a numeric identifier right across the trunk of each car,” I said with a smirk.

Esker let out an audible sigh. This might have been a first as well. “Sarcasm and frustration are distinctly human qualities. I don’t appreciate either of them.” The last sentence was muttered almost under his breath. “Tell me which car you want me to access.”

“Can you do it?” I asked for clarification.

“I already have,” he said in his customary tone.

“Which one?”

“All of the squad cars that are currently on scene.” This reply had just a hint of, put that in your pipe and smoke it.

---

Our-World
Borderline Bar and Grill
2 Hours Ago

Al Vincente pushed through the glass double doors at the Borderline and noticed that the inside of the smoked glass had been covered with years’ worth of stage bills listing the acts that had graced the stage. Considering the late hour, he’d taken a quick drive around the relatively small university town. It was clear which parts of the city went out of their way to cater to the after-hours student population, and the Borderline had quickly climbed to the top of Vincente’s to-do list. Until the University’s administrative offices opened in the morning, this popular bar for grad students was the best place to start his investigation.

Thunder rattled the glass in the door behind Vincente as it closed, and he was grateful to escape what promised to be an impressive storm, given how quickly the sky had darkened. Over the last six months, he’d crisscrossed the United States three times–no, four. He ran his hand through his short dark hair, reflecting on the countless hours he’d spent behind the wheel of his government-issued sedan. Once this case was over, he planned to sit on the beach for a couple of weeks.

Thank God I’m not driving in the weather we’re getting tonight.

Looking out the windows, Vincente was surprised to see that all of them had been obscured by what seemed to be patron-generated graffiti. Hand-scrawled snippets of poetry, song lyrics, and renditions of band logos covered the glass, in some cases overlapping each other. The overall effect had an urban beauty and suggested that the establishment had been around for many years, if not decades, with multiple generations contributing to the motif.

The bar featured about three dozen tables, with a small stage occupying the wall at the far end of the room. A corridor ran alongside the stage, presumably leading to the restrooms and likely the rear exit. The stage stood empty and silent, while jukebox-style classic rock played from small speakers hanging from the shadowy recesses of the ceiling. Instead of installing drop ceiling tiles, as was often done in such buildings, the designers of the Borderline chose to leave the industrial struts, supports, and HVAC ductwork exposed, painting the steel roof and beams black while highlighting the infrastructure in silver, maintaining an industrial aesthetic. This design contrasted with the traditional maple-topped bar counter, the matching shelves lining the wall behind it, and the weathered, worn chairs and booths throughout.

About two dozen patrons occupied the place, possibly due to the weather or that it was a weeknight. There was space for at least five times as many.

As Vincente approached the cash register, he observed a person in their twenties swiping a credit card and jotting something down on a pad. He displayed his official credentials and flashed a disarming smile. “I’m looking for someone who could be a customer. May I speak with the manager?”

“The manager isn’t here tonight,” the young man said with a shrug. “He won’t be back until next week. Is there anything I can help you with?”

“How often are you on shift?” Vincente replied. He didn’t need a manager. Anyone who worked regular hours and was willing to converse with him was a good starting point. These days, simply finding someone open to talking without involving lawyers made his day.

The guy at the register shrugged. “I work once or twice a week. I’m mostly focused on my classes this semester, you know?”

That was unfortunate. “Is there anyone here tonight who’s full-time? I need to talk about the regulars. It might be nothing, but the sooner I check this off my list, the sooner I can move on.”

Nodding, the guy scanned the room. “You want Amanda.” He pointed to a curvy blonde in a too-tight white tank and a skirt that barely peeked out from beneath the serving apron fitted around her hips. “She knows everyone.”

Vincente smirked, with no doubt in his mind. He waited as the kid at the register flagged Amanda down and introduced them. Amanda seemed hesitant to talk, so Vincente led her to a booth along the wall opposite the bar.

“I really need to work the floor,” Amanda said. She seemed either reluctant to speak with law enforcement or specifically with Vincente. In the few minutes he’d been in the bar, it was impossible to miss the vivacious waitress making her rounds at the tables and socializing with everyone. She was familiar with most and had a social ease coming from being skilled at her job. This suggested she simply didn’t appreciate the one-on-one time with an FBI agent.

“I won’t take up much of your time,” Vincente offered in his most agreeable tone. “I just have a couple of questions for you. I think you’re the only one here tonight who might be able to help me.” He shot a look at the twenty-something behind the register. “Maybe your friend over there can cover the tables for a few minutes?”

Vincente felt Amanda’s penetrating gaze for several long seconds before she thumbed something on her belt and spoke softly. After a pause, she nodded, seemingly to herself. That’s when Vincente noticed the small wireless headset tucked behind her wavy fall of blonde hair. He realized it was the communication system that all the waiters and waitresses wore.

“Jimmy said he’ll cover for a few minutes. How can I assist you, Agent…”

“Vincente,” he said, offering his hand. He pulled out his phone and unlocked the screen. “I’m in town looking for a missing person. Well, sort of a missing person. His family is searching for him. As you can imagine, he doesn’t want to be found. He hasn’t technically broken the law. It’s more accurate to say his family has connections, so now the FBI is involved in the search.” This was a complete fabrication, of course. Vincente and his partner Ingersoll had learned long ago that the people they encountered were likely to have difficulty believing Grady Ledger was guilty of anything worthy of FBI interest. This line of inquiry had a better chance of being productive.

Vincente showed a photo of Grady Ledger and watched Amanda’s reaction. When she first saw the image, there was a flash of something in her eyes that made his heart race. It felt like a rush of adrenaline, similar to when a long shot pays off. Amanda glanced at him quickly, a question in her eyes. “What did you say his name was? He’s cute.”

The elation Vincente felt abruptly hit a brick wall as his hopes were dashed. Yet, there was discomfort in the young woman’s expression—something he hadn’t noticed in her before. “Bobby,” Vincente said, “Bobby Mills.” He watched confusion crease her face. “That’s not the name you expected me to say, is it?”

Amanda leaned back in her seat and shot Vincente a glare. “I’m sorry? What?”

“You were expecting something different,” Vincente clarified. “You know him by another name. Did he go by Gray? It’s short for Grady. That’s actually his name.”

“Then who is Bobby?” Amanda asked, shaking her head. “What’s going on here?”

With a smirk, Vincente said, “Don’t worry about that. Just tell me the last time you saw him. Let’s start there.”

Amanda slammed her hand on the table. “Look,” she half-shouted, and Vincente knew he was about to deal with a scene. “You better tell me what this is about because I’m done talking until I understand what’s going on.”

A shadow fell over the end of the table, and Vincente looked up to see a young man wearing a denim jacket and a cowboy hat. “Is this guy giving you trouble?” he asked with a southern drawl.

“Walsh!” Amanda gasped, starting to slide to the edge of the booth. Vincente realized she was about to exit, meaning the interview would be over. “So glad to see you.”

Vincente raised a hand at the newcomer and gestured for Amanda to stay where she was. At the same time, he was trying in vain to gather his credentials to explain the situation. He wasn’t used to an interview shifting on him so quickly or unexpectedly. The long shot paying off had caught him off guard, and he had been unprepared to be confronted about the deception.

“My name is Al Vincente with the FBI,” Vincente said as he stood from the end of the booth, raising his credentials. He did this expecting to explain the reason for the questioning and possibly to include the newcomer in the discussion. He didn’t expect to stand in time to see a man in a black ski mask pointing a silver revolver at the twenty-something behind the register.

The word FBI had just left Vincente’s lips when he turned his head and spotted a second masked man standing about thirty degrees to his left, presumably guarding the entrance to the bar. That masked man spun around, saw Vincente bringing his credentials to bear, and opened fire with a similar chrome-plated revolver. The first round zinged past Vincente’s ear, while the second struck him just to the right of his sternum, sending him toppling backward into the booth.

---

The team supposedly controlling the crime scene remained hunkered down among three squad vehicles parked somewhat chaotically in a triangle. They might have been using them as a barrier against gunfire should the armed assailants inside the bar open fire into the parking lot, but I suspected they were merely taking shelter from the gusty wind and rain. Chaos erupted when Esker took control of one of the squad cars and an SUV. The squad car was facing roughly northeast, meaning it was directed straight at me from the opposite corner of the lot. This was not ideal. The SUV was aimed almost due west, making it just about perfect for my plan.

“Go now,” I whispered to Esker, ready to sprint from my cover at the tree line.

Esker put the squad car in reverse and eased it slowly from the triangle surrounding the command team working at the open front and back driver-side doors of the west-facing SUV. The vehicle was moving at a meager 3 miles per hour, much to the surprise of the officer behind the wheel and the dismay of the command team, who hadn’t ordered the car to move. The group was even more astonished when the SUV they were operating from began to follow the squad car, even though no one was behind the wheel.

As expected, disorganized chatter erupted across the tactical channel. I watched the officer in the squad car barricading the entrance to the parking lot nearest to me turn to observe the rapidly unfolding spectacle. Predictably, the officers at the lot entrances instantly abandoned their posts to chase the slowly moving runaway vehicles. Because the runaways moved so slowly, they understandably concluded that the vehicles in question were rolling. Consequently, all but one of the officers pursued on foot.

All of this aligned with my hopes and plans. I reached the car closest to me just seconds after it had been abandoned and crouched down beside the driver’s side window. Peering over the corner of the hood, I confirmed that the officer who had left his post was long gone. Cracking the door, I triggered the trunk release and quickly closed it. I aimed to be in and out of the car before the dome light attracted anyone’s attention in the parking lot. The odds were good that all eyes would be on Esker’s diversion, but I had a lot to accomplish before his part in the plan concluded.

I had to act quickly.

As I rounded the truck, I lifted the lid and was grateful to find it well organized. Inside was an emergency roadside assistance kit, a small tactical bag presumably meant to support the AR-15 strapped to the trunk lid, and then there was what I was really interested in. I grabbed the small red bag adorned with a large white plus symbol across the top. Gently closing the lid, I cast a quick glance over the forty-yard stretch of pavement illuminated by one pole and dotted with only a few stray cars and trucks. Then, I dashed toward the front of the Borderline, zigzagging and using the cars, trucks, and vans as cover.

I reached the last car that could provide concealment and stopped. One squad car sat between me and the entrance to the bar. A pair of officers still manned their posts here, impressively focused on the job at hand despite the drama unfolding about eighty yards to the west, where no fewer than nine officers were now trying a variety of creative and futile methods to stop the plodding, slow-moving rogue vehicles from heading toward the ditch at the end of the lot. I watched as one officer knelt, with one behind the front bumper and the other behind the back bumper, each using the car’s quarter panel as a barricade between them and the entrance to the Borderline.

“Take it up a notch,” I whispered to Esker.

“Understood,” he responded.

The lights on the runaway SUV began to flash red and blue at the same moment the light bar on a pursuing squad car lit up and started to strobe. The siren on the car blared with a piercing effect, startling the officers who had been trying to slow or stop the vehicles, causing them to fall from the bumpers and locked door handles. This was the opportunity Esker had been waiting for. He couldn’t risk injuring anyone hanging onto the exterior of the vehicles, but once they were all clear, the risk was minimal. The car and the SUV adjusted their course and accelerated. They had little distance to gather speed, but each was traveling between ten and fifteen miles per hour when they collided.

The crunch of impacting metal and the dramatic squelch of the sirens, which I still assert was improvised by Esker for comedic effect, finally drew the pair of officers from their post at the bar’s entrance. As soon as they stepped into the glare of their car’s headlights for a better look at the incident, I bolted from cover, rounded the back of their car, cracked the door at the front of the Borderline, and slipped inside.

---

I expected to make a covert entry, but having a gun barrel pressed against my forehead the moment I stepped through the door felt overly dramatic. My eyes crossed as I glanced down the eight-inch length of dark steel and recognized the hollow-tipped rounds in the five visible chambers of the revolver.

“.45 caliber Colt Single Action Army,” I said, taking a breath before shifting my gaze to the five-and-a-half-foot tall figure in a ski mask who was shoving the gun in my face. The dregs of a wispy red mustache or beard pushed out from the corners of the mouth hole and bloodshot eyes did their best to stare holes through me from beyond the hammer of the Colt.

“Don’t move,” a gravelly voice rasped. “Hands in the air.”

I smirked. “You’ll need to choose one or the other. I can’t do both.” A few things became instantly clear to me. First, if this was the brain behind the operation, the hostages were either very safe or very, very screwed. Second, this guy wasn’t holding the place up with a classic revolver out of reverence. He likely thought bigger was better and being a little guy, that eight-inch barrel spoke to him in ways better left for a psychiatrist to unpack. That gun was far older than he was. Since the hammer wasn’t back, he couldn’t pull the trigger and shoot me just then, even if he wanted to. It was a single-action antique. And last of all—and this really made me smile inside and out—it turned out that you could see the little guy’s confusion even through his ski mask.

Some incoherent curses came from somewhere behind the bar. It sounded like Russian, but it was too rushed and mumbly to be understood by anyone not fluent in the language. “Damn it, just get him away from the door. And lock it this time for fuck’s sake, would you? We don’t need anyone else just walking in here.” I don’t think the additional statements were translations—more likely the important part of the instruction.

The guy behind the bar was tall and broad-shouldered. Well, maybe not really tall; he was tall compared to the little guy with the Colt at the door. Based on his size, accent, and overall authoritative demeanor, I immediately began thinking of him as Boris. The short guy at the door was Little Red Beard. Boris had a ski mask too, which looked just like the one Little Red Beard wore, along with the guy I saw standing at the door to the hall that led to the rear exit. Maybe they bought in bulk.

Esker mentioned there were four intruders in total, meaning one man was unaccounted for. This meant I needed cool names for the two remaining, so I had my work cut out for me.

About a dozen hostages sat at tables scattered around the bar, with a few couples at two-tops near the center of the space and four in total still at the bar. The rest were in the booths along the wall to the right. This reflected the improvised nature of the robbery as well. Any crew experienced in this type of situation would have consolidated prisoners into a single area, ideally somewhere somewhat confined. Everyone seemed to remain where they had been when the robbers presumably pulled their guns.

This included Agent Al Vincente. He sat in a booth about twenty feet to my right, slouched low in the seat with crimson bar towels pressed against a blue and blood-red button-down shirt. His face glistened with sweat.

Little Red Beard lowered the gun, grabbed me by the collar, and yanked me away from the door. I held my ground, feet planted and hands still raised. The med-pack remained in my right hand, the red cross deliberately facing the room to indicate I wasn’t holding a weapon. Little Red Beard nearly toppled over when I refused to move with him. He was not amused when my soaked collar slipped easily from his grip. His beady, red-rimmed sclera fixed on me as his gun came up again.

Boris snarled from across the room, and I felt the tension rise throughout the space. “Quit messing around, or you’ll be the next one shot.”

“Speaking of which,” I said, wobbling the first aid pack in my hand. “That’s why I’m here. Can you let me take a look at the injured man?”

Little Red Beard appeared to give up on me. I watched from the corner of my eye as he locked the front doors. At one point, he held the big Colt revolver tucked in his armpit because he didn’t know what to do with it when he needed both hands to operate the door locks.

“Let the cop bleed,” Boris said.

That answered one of my questions. There hadn’t been time to determine whether they knew Vincente was with the FBI. Presumably, Esker was aware of everything that had transpired so far, as he had access to all the video feeds. Unfortunately, there just wasn’t time to pose the necessary question before rushing in. If they’d shot him because he was law enforcement, the situation was even more dangerous than I expected.

Esker once again appeared to be reading my mind. “From my best interpretation, Agent Vincente was shot by mistake. Ivan Sokalof discharged his weapon prematurely. This seems to explain why he has been assigned to watch the rear entrance.”

I eyed the slender figure in dark coveralls at the rear of the room. The man was holding a semi-automatic pistol with both hands, more as if he were struggling with the firearm. He paced slowly back and forth. At first, I thought he was alert and on guard. However, looking closer, he seemed to be on the verge of a personal crisis.

Ivan?

I shouldn’t have been surprised that Esker knew who each of these men was, masks or no masks. I had seen him perform more impressive feats with video and data analysis.

“How did you know there was an injured man in here?” Boris demanded.

“They won’t pick up the phone because they aren’t sure what to do next,” Esker explained.

I shrugged. “It’s possible to hear gunshots,” I tilted my head up toward the roof, “even with the storm. It’s a safe bet someone is hurt, right?” I had to be cautious because I didn’t know how many shots had been fired, and I didn’t want them to call my bluff. I couldn’t explain that we’d had access to the video. They would assume the cops had the same. These guys didn’t seem professional, and they certainly didn’t seem stable. The last thing I needed was to add to the anxiety.

Another masked figure emerged from the door behind the bar. The stout figure was almost as round as he was tall. He halted abruptly when he saw me standing there. “What the hell!” He also had a Russian accent.

“This one wants to take care of the cop,” Boris said to the newcomer.

“And you just let him in?”

Boris just glared at the fat man.

“Maybe it’s for the best,” the plump man remarked with a shrug. “Anyone dies, it’s bad for all of us.”

Boris appeared to take his time studying me. He finally stepped up to the counter and shouted at Little Red Beard, “Check him for weapons, then let him work on the cop.”

---

I slid into the horseshoe-shaped booth beside Agent Vincente and across from Tommy Walsh. Little Red Beard was eyeing me the entire time, one hand on the grip and the other twisting the length of the long barrel. Either he thought his actions were intimidating, or he was doing it unintentionally—some kind of manifestation of his situational stress. If it was the former, it wasn’t very impressive. If it was the latter—well, that was something to worry about, and that made it intimidating. I focused my attention on Vincente’s condition and intentionally avoided looking directly at Little Red Beard. No good would come from engaging with him just yet.

“Agent Vincente, it’s a pleasure to finally meet you,” I said.

A tired smile played at the corners of Vincente’s mouth as he slowly shook his head. “If you say so,” he muttered in a dry voice. “I knew it was just a matter of time. I just didn’t think it would be like this.”

“It’s always great to meet new friends over drinks,” I grinned. Nodding across the table, I added, “Speaking of which, good to see you again, Walsh.”

Walsh flashed me his aw-shucks grin and shrugged. “I’d offer a hand, but it’s not really worth getting shot over. It turns out these guys are a little trigger happy.” He tipped his head toward Vincente with that last comment.

“Point taken.” I slid the med-pack toward Walsh. “You were an EMT for two years, weren’t you?”

Walsh unzipped the pack and efficiently laid out what he found inside. “I play doctor every chance I get, too.” He shot me a suspicious glance that lasted only a second before continuing with the preparation. “I don’t recall sharing that part of my backstory, though, partner.”

I didn’t respond. I make efforts not to lie to my friends. Besides, this wasn’t the moment to go into detail.

“Take off his shirt,” Walsh said. “And we’ll need water and clean rags.”

I glanced at Little Red Beard. “You can help with that, can’t you?”

Little Red Beard seemed to be doing his best to eye fuck me. He gripped the Colt as if trying to choke it. His size undermined the effort to intimidate; the comical struggle of red sticking out of the mouth hole of his mask made it look like he was trying to bring the Colt to climax. When he didn’t answer after a few seconds, I slid out of the booth and stepped in front of him.

The little man swung the large firearm in my direction and bellowed, “Sit your ass down!” I eyed the Colt and noted that the hammer remained uncocked. Either Little Red Beard didn’t realize the gun couldn’t fire like that, or he had confidence in his ability to do it swiftly. He didn’t seem like the confident type.

He didn’t seem like the capable type either. I hoped he would be left in charge of my section of the room.

This caught Boris’s attention. He had been in a deep conversation with the short man who was spending his time in the back room. “What’s the problem?” Boris demanded.

“We need water and rags for first aid,” I explained. As I scanned the room and noticed the frightened and beleaguered faces of the dozen hostages, I revised my request. “Since it looks like we’ll be here for a while, why not get everyone some water?”

Boris stared at me, then glanced at the heavyset man beside him. They exchanged a few hushed words before Boris called to Amanda, who was hunched low on a stool at the far end of the bar. “Get them water and rags,” he said. “Then drinks for everyone. Everyone stays quiet, and no one will get hurt.” He shot me a glare as if to say, good enough?

I wanted to correct him and say that no one else would get hurt, but I didn’t want to push my luck. Nodding in thanks, I looked at Amanda. “Do you need help?”

“She can do it,” Little Red Beard said, shoving the Colt in my face. “Sit down and help the pig.”

My desire to take the Colt from the little man was growing exponentially. This crew wasn’t very organized, and they didn’t seem to care. Either they didn’t realize how many cops were outside, or they just didn’t care. The phone had been ringing every ten minutes since I walked through the door. That was certainly the police unit outside trying to make contact. So far, it seemed Boris’s team hadn’t even bothered to pick up the phone. Maybe they thought that by simply not acknowledging the police, they could avoid the inevitable. If not for the storm, the police would likely have already gone on the offensive.

It was only a matter of time before things escalated. I was buying time for Piper to get into position and to connect with Vincente. This was a unique opportunity, and I wanted to make the most of it. I just didn’t want to do so at the expense of the hostages. If I couldn’t figure out where Vincente’s loyalties lay by the time Piper was ready, I would need to put an end to this.

“I’m impressed you found me here,” I said to Vincente. “Can I assume Agent Ingersoll is somewhere nearby as well?”

Sweat beaded on Vincente’s face, trickling down his cheeks and even into his eyes as he studied me. Walsh used a squeeze bottle to spray the gunshot wound on Vincente’s shoulder with what I assumed was sterile fluid from the med-pack. The agent gasped as Walsh brushed away the clotted blood with gauze pinched between forceps. “It’s just me,” Vincente said quietly. “Chris is still chasing your ghosts. He’s clueless.”

“Clueless?”

“I recently read something about technology that replaces one person with another in video footage.” Vincente studied me as he made this statement. “They call it deepfake. One person’s face is replaced by another’s.”

I said nothing; I just watched Vincente watching me.

“Supposedly, it began as a method to overlay a movie star’s face onto a stunt double in big-budget films,” he continued. “It involves serious high-budget special effects.”

“And you think I’m doing it to keep you and your partner chasing shadows?”

Vincente’s head wobbled back and forth as if weighing the idea. “It sounds crazy when you say it out loud. It seems less so when you’ve been running around for months with nothing but video clips to show for it.”

“I’ve heard of deepfake tech,” I admitted. “What they do in movies requires specialized framing, preparation, direction, and camera work. Are you implying I have accomplices? Maybe these guys?” I discreetly waved my hand toward the hostage-takers. “Perhaps you should consider a career writing fiction.”

Wincing in pain as Walsh worked, Vincente shook his head. “I still haven’t figured out how you’re doing it. It’s interesting that you’re using a lot of words not to deny it, though.”

I reflected on the statement and recognized that the agent was using this as an opportunity to interrogate me just as I was doing to him. “Maybe concentrate less on the how and more on the why,” I suggested.

He appeared to consider that. Initially, it seemed like he didn’t grasp the question. To be fair, the hostage situation and his gunshot wound might have hindered his ability to interpret my motivations. “You knew I was here,” he said slowly. “You’ve been watching us while we chase after you.”

I smirked.

“Why?” he groaned, then winced in pain once more.

“You don’t know what Breslin is. You can’t possibly grasp it. You’re being manipulated. I need to know if you’re a proxy being used against me or if you’re working directly for Breslin.”

Vincente was either confused by that or he was an excellent actor. “Proxy?”

“The longer you chase me, the more I learn,” I explained.

He nodded. “So, tell me what you’ve learned.”

“Your partner is dirty. He’s working directly for Breslin. You… I’ve grown less confident in your motives.”

“My motivations?” Vincente looked angry for the first time since the conversation started. “You’re questioning my motives? You’ve sabotaged more than a dozen ATG facilities. It’s my job to stop you and bring you to justice. Why don’t you explain yours for attacking ATG at every possible turn?”

That was the question I’d been waiting for the agent to ask. It all came down to that. A legitimate law enforcement agent would, sooner or later, get around to asking that question. One on the take or one simply looking to kill me wouldn’t care. They would either already know my reason for attacking ATG—or Breslin—or they just wouldn’t care at all.

“Fair enough, Agent Vincente,” I said, feeling more than a little relief.

Vincente gasped as Walsh made another attempt at the wound. I saw blood spurt but was ready, having just slipped into a pair of rubber gloves. I applied a thick pad to the wound as Walsh pulled Vincente forward and checked the shape of his shoulder again.

“The round is still in here. I need to take it out,” Walsh said.

Vincente muttered a string of expletives that had Walsh and me exchanging grins. “We’ll take that as consent to continue,” I said.

Amanda showed up with a gallon of water and the bin usually used for bussing tables. It was clean and stacked high on one side with fresh white rags. “Hot damn,” Walsh chuckled. But it looked like Amanda wasn’t finished yet. She gestured to someone else, and Jimmy stepped up with a tall bottle of whiskey. He set it down on the table with a thud before retreating at a quick wave from Little Red Beard.

“I thought the whiskey might ease the pain,” Amanda said. “Is there anything I can do to help?”

Little Red Beard seemed to be enjoying his chance to intimidate Jimmy and was shoving him back to the other side of the bar. I waved Amanda over and whispered, “That’s perfect, Mandy. Exactly what we needed. If you can do one more thing, we should be set.” She looked me in the eye, and I had confidence that she wasn’t as intimidated by these people as most folks in the room. I recalled that Amanda had been in the bar with Piper the last time someone tried to rob the place, and she’d seen how that turned out. This wasn’t her first rodeo. Wisdom had come from the experience, however limited it was.

“These clowns don’t know what they’re doing,” I explained. “That’s the worst thing going against us. We need to get all the hostages in one place. If the cops come in right now, who knows how many people could get caught in the crossfire? If I suggest moving everyone, they’ll find it suspicious. If you do it, it won’t seem as odd.” I met her eyes. “Think you can do something about that?”

I watched the logic unfolding in Amanda’s eyes. “Sure,” she nodded. “I’m on it.” She turned and walked away. To her credit, she didn’t march straight over to Boris. That would have been too obvious, even for this crew. Instead, she made her rounds, presumably to check on several of the hostages. After a few stops, she approached Boris, who was once again in a quiet conversation with the fat man.

I could hear snippets of the conversation Amanda had with the two men. She suggested that she could better keep everyone quiet and comfortable if they moved to the booths along the east wall. She would serve drinks and snacks from the bar, and if she did this, it would ensure that no one caused trouble for Boris and his people. Boris countered that they had guns to guarantee the required level of compliance. Amanda pointed out that one person had already been shot, which had everyone on edge. Her approach would ease tensions more in the long run.

Ultimately, I’m fairly certain she made Boris think the idea to consolidate the hostages was his own. I couldn’t have done that. It was impressive work.

“How did you do it?” Vincente said.

I forgot where we were in our conversation “Sorry?”

“Ingersoll is running all over hell chasing your ghosts,” Vincente said. “He’s been to parts of the country where I’m pretty sure you’ve never stepped foot, despite the evidence suggesting otherwise. I just can’t figure out how you’re faking it without leaving evidence we can use.”

Walsh nodded that he was ready to remove the bullet. I pushed the bottle toward Vincente again. He had already taken a series of serious pulls on it, but one more good swig would be a smart move before Walsh went after the slug. This was going to hurt. While the kit was stocked with a local aesthetic, apparently, the cops couldn’t be trusted with gear containing anything hardcore. Not these days, anyway.

I thought it might also be a good chance to try to slip through the agent’s defenses. “You want me to share my secrets? That’s asking a lot. I know for sure that Ingersoll is on Breslin’s payroll. I’m still not clear on your intentions. You’ve been dogging me closely, and here you are. You’re the one who managed to find me. How’d you do that? How close are the rest of Breslin’s goons?”

Vincente was clearly in pain, but when I accused him of corruption, he looked furious. “Don’t group me with Chris,” he growled through clenched teeth. “I know he’s got his problems. I even question his loyalty to the badge…but I haven’t seen anything that proves he’s bent. If I see that—”

I waited, but Vincente seemed stuck at that point in his statement.

“What will you do if you see proof that he’s on the take?” It was a crucial question, and it was fair too. Vincente might suspect it, but without any proof so far, it was reasonable for him to be hesitant to investigate too closely, fearing he might uncover something that would place him in an impossible situation. Ingersoll was his commanding officer.

“Damnit,” Vincente said, taking a swig from the bottle. He looked at Walsh. “Just do it.”

“One question before he does,” I said. “How did you find me here? I must have messed up somewhere. I need to understand how you made the connection so that the people I care about don’t get hurt.”

Vincente smiled. “That’s how I did it: a photo of you with that girl, Piper. I tracked her down and planned to ask about you. Before I had the chance, this shit show happened. The next thing I know, here you are. I still don’t understand that part.”

Esker’s voice sounded in my ear. “Piper’s in position. The police are beginning to organize. I think we’re out of time.”

I laughed and gave Vincente a light slap on his good shoulder. “It’s only going to get weirder from here, trust me.”

---

Vasili Rostovich pulled the black ski mask over his cherubic face and wiped the sweat from his eyes. The heist was not going according to plan, and it was all the fault of that damned red-headed fool, Boris. The safe was supposed to be unlocked during business hours. That was the whole reason they’d scheduled the robbery for the evening. Vasili kicked the four-foot-wide behemoth of a safe and cursed at the fist-sized combination lock and plate-sized locking wheel. He couldn’t crack this thing with half a pound of semtex or a dozen sticks of TNT.

“Idiot,” he grumbled in Russian, wondering if the safe even contained the proceeds from last weekend’s sales, as Martin had claimed.

If he’s mistaken about the safe being locked, why would he be accurate about the contents inside?

Now, the police were outside, likely surrounding the building. Boris planned to simply not answer the phone. He reasoned that they had hostages, and this would keep them safe.

Perhaps it was flawed logic.

“Bezumnyy,” Vasili muttered. All of this was insane.

He kicked the bag at the base of the safe. With a sigh, he dropped to his knees and began rummaging through the kit’s contents. The hammer and small set of screwdrivers seemed useless. He paused when he discovered the medical stethoscope and contemplated the device. He’d seen it used in movies and understood how it could amplify the sounds of the tumblers moving inside the locking mechanism. He had never taken the idea seriously and wondered why Boris had included the device in the toolkit.

Perhaps it’s worth a try.

He slipped the ear tips into place and tapped the diaphragm to check the sensitivity.

“Blya der’mo!” Vasili cursed and yanked the device from his ears.

Glancing around the room to ensure no one had witnessed what was not his proudest moment, he repositioned the device on his head. He gently set the diaphragm beside the combination dial. With a slow turn of the wheel, he grinned. The sound of the internal mechanism was sharp and distinctive.

---

Walsh dug the slug out of Vincente’s shoulder with a minimum of additional blood loss. The agent lost consciousness for about two minutes, speaking to his fortitude and Walsh’s skill. Once the procedure was done, Vincente’s eyes were glassy from the pain and the whiskey. Walsh removed the latex gloves and dumped them into the bin atop the blood-soaked rags he’d used to clean the wound and the table. I dumped the last of the bottled water over his hands as he rinsed the remnants of blood from around his wrists and removed what little of the carnage had escaped the ends of his gloves.

Walsh pushed the busboy’s bin to the end of the table and quickly grabbed the half-empty bottle of whiskey. Taking a long pull, he leaned back in his seat. After a deep sigh, he attempted to pass the bottle to me.

“Keep it,” I said. “You deserve it.”

Walsh glanced over his shoulder and chuckled. “I can understand you holding out for a Modelo, but this time, I don’t see it happening.”

“It’s not that. It’s almost time to leave. The cops are about to come in,” I said softly.

Vincente blinked, emerging from the edge of unconsciousness, and became more alert at that statement. He placed his hand on his shoulder as he fought to sit up straighter. “What? How do you know?”

I eyed the agent and tapped my ear silently.

His brows knitted together, and he squinted as he looked at me. Walsh appeared puzzled as well.

“You have comms?” Vincente whispered. His expression was a mix of confusion and hope. “With whom?”

Amanda stood at the end of the table. “You look better,” she said to Vincente.

Vincente was slow to turn and register her appearance.

“He’s doing well,” Walsh said. “A little slow. All the blood in his alcohol stream has him confused. The transfusions helped. He wanted me to thank you for the whiskey, isn’t that right, Al?”

Vincente’s gaze shifted slowly between Amanda and me before returning to Walsh. “Blood in my—” he shook his head slowly. “I’ve lost a lot of blood. I’m sorry. Yes, I feel much better, thank you.”

Amanda smiled. “Under normal circumstances, this would be the point where I’d have to cut you off,” she said, giving a wink. “Since you’re with these gentlemen, I’m going to leave the bottle. I’ll put it on our hosts’ tab anyway.”

Amanda grabbed the blood-caked bin and headed toward the bar like it was just another day. Vincente stared, slack-jawed, first at the wiggle in her walk as she went, then around the room where armed gunmen still occupied their positions. “I’m not feeling too good,” Vincente mumbled. “I think I’m hallucinating.”

I looked at Vincente. He was growing paler. “How much blood did he lose?”

“More than a little,” Walsh said. “Less than a lot. This might be something else. We should get him help soon. A bullet I can handle. This…this could be some kind of allergic reaction. I’m not entirely sure.”

I whispered as I made contact with Esker. “Any ideas what’s happening with the agent, E?”

“I don’t have enough information,” he replied. “The camera resolution isn’t high enough to assist, and there isn’t enough ambient RF backscatter to provide internal biometric information. There are three ambulances on screen; they are his best option.”

“Understood.”

Walsh saw me talking to myself but didn’t mention it. He placed his hand on Vincente’s arm, and the two exchanged a glance. “Give it to him,” Vincente whispered. “It’s our best shot.”

“Lean forward,” Walsh said. “I’ll pass you something.”

I felt Walsh slip something to me under the table. It was a small, snub-nosed revolver. I glanced at Vincente. “Your backup piece?”

Vincente nodded.

“Keep it,” I said, returning the gun to Walsh. “I know where to get another one. Just remember, this thing will be accurate up to about thirty feet. If you have to use it, act accordingly.”

I felt Walsh take the gun back. “Where the hell are you going to get another one?” he whispered.

I slid out of the booth. Little Red Beard immediately shifted to block my path. I stepped around him and walked slowly toward Boris, who was still behind the bar. The three armed men in the room instantly went on high alert as I began to move. I made a point of moving slowly and without any overtly threatening gestures.

“Stop. Sit back down!” Little Red Beard squeaked, poking his gun at me as if it were a knife.

I kept my focus on Boris. He seemed to be the shot caller here, or maybe it was the fat man who had been lingering in the back. I knew the fat man had been attempting to crack the safe in the office. We’d been in here for a little over an hour, and the group had yet to respond to a call from the officers surrounding the building.

“Agent Vincente needs a doctor,” I told Boris. “He’s having some sort of reaction. We need to get him to an ambulance. His condition is deteriorating quickly.”

“Names?” I whispered, ensuring Esker knew I was speaking to him. We hadn’t planned this part in advance, but if I knew the AI, he had already done the research. It was a gamble, but not a significant one, considering how well I knew him.

“Boris Kasanof, age forty-three,” Esker replied without hesitation. “I can provide you with the complete rap sheet if needed. Let me know what you require, and I’ll relay it.”

I struggled to hold back a laugh. Was Boris’s name really Boris? What were the odds?

“It’s time to wrap things up, Boris,” I said. “You thought you could hit this place when the safe was open, but you blew it. Your buddy in the back—”

“Vladimir Rostovich,” Esker whispered in my ear.

“Vlad,” I continued, “can’t crack the safe, so now you’re stuck.”

Boris’s eyes were wide behind his mask. I had read the room correctly, though it hadn’t been hard.

Esker added the final two names to complete the list. “The small one with the phallic revolver is Martin Mahew, and the thin man near the back is Vasili Rostovich, Vladimir’s brother.”

“The best thing you can do right now,” I continued, “is to gather Vlad, Vasili, and Martin and give up before SWAT storms the place.”

Boris remained silent as he walked slowly down the bar and stepped through the gap in the counter. Vasili moved forward from the back of the room.

Martin—Little Red Beard—looked ready to panic. His head snapped back and forth between Boris and me. As the seconds ticked by in silence, the little guy became increasingly twitchy. “How the hell does he know who we are, Boris?”

Boris glared at me.

Seconds passed.

Little Red Beard twitched nervously.

Boris put his fingers to his lips and whistled. Three seconds later, Vasili emerged from the back office.

“What’s going on,” Vasili said after looking at how the group faced off against me.

“How much longer with the safe?” Boris said.

Vasili hesitated before answering. “We should discuss that privately,” he finally responded.

“How much longer?” Boris insisted.

“I don’t think I can open it,” Vasili said.

Boris gestured toward Amanda. “Have her do it,” he commanded.

Vasili was already shaking his head. “We know she can’t. That’s why there’s a drop slot at the top of the safe. No one on the staff can open it; that protects them during times like this.”

Little Red Beard stormed across the room and grabbed Amanda where she sat at the edge of one of the booths. He seized her by a wrist and dragged her back to our gathering beside the bar. “Bullshit,” he whined. “She can do it. We just gotta make her.” He locked an arm around her neck and pushed the muzzle of his massive Colt against her temple.

I saw genuine fear in Amanda’s eyes for the first time since I entered the bar. This was the first moment she truly began to believe she wouldn’t make it out of this. That’s when my patience for the gang of fools finally wore thin, and my plan to take things slower vanished.

I stepped forward and grabbed the fist Martin had wrapped around the Colt and twisted it. I spun his hand, and by extension, the gun in it, in a clockwise direction with all the speed and force my augmented metabolism would allow. And when I did it, I had his hand in a crushing grip. I felt the finger break inside the trigger guard, the joint in the wrist separate, and I heard the radial brake somewhere up the bones of his forearm.

There was no chance the revolver would discharge. Being a single-action with the hammer down, the gun was more useful as a club at that moment than as a firearm… that’s how I used it. The moment the gun slipped from the little man’s hand, I caught it by the barrel and brought the butt down against the crown of his head.

Little Red Beard hit the floor in an unconscious heap.

Boris blinked, staring at me from the wrong end of the Colt before he knew what had happened. I watched his eyes shift from the dark muzzle at the end of the barrel to the cocked hammer and down the single raised arm supporting it. He finally met my eye.

A brief commotion rattled somewhere behind me, then Walsh came into view from my periphery with Vincente’s tiny black revolver raised and aimed at the three remaining Russians. “Give me a half-second warning next time,” he muttered. “You even caught me off guard.” I could hear humor in his words.

Boris dropped his pistol. A moment later, Vasili and Vladimir did the same. Not a word was spoken by any of them.

I heard a wet thwack, and I turned to see that Amanda had delivered a kick to the ribs of the unconscious Little Red Beard. Her face was twisted in disgust as she looked down at her foot. “I think he pissed himself,” she said.

Walsh sniffed the air. “Better check your shoe. Smells like more than piss.”

Walsh checked the Russians for extra weapons while I held them at gunpoint. They had none. Not only had they done a terrible job robbing the bar, but they were also poorly equipped for the heist. Everything about the job screamed unprofessional amateurism.

“Breaching in thirty seconds,” Esker said in my ear.

I glanced at the back of my left wrist and saw a video display in AR where a watch would typically go, clearly thanks to Esker. It showed a camera feed of the bar’s rear. The camera moved as if handheld, showing the back wall, the rear door, and the pouring rain. I instantly realized I saw what Piper was experiencing from wherever she had taken cover.

“Neat trick,” I whispered to Esker. The ability to see what Piper saw was new—or at least new to me. I wondered if he had just come up with it, or if it was something the team had developed over the time I’d been away from Wild-Side.

To Walsh, I said, “The cops will be busting down the door in twenty seconds. When they do, toss the gun and follow their instructions. You don’t want to get shot in the chaos. They’ll be to be amped and everyone will look like a threat. Anyone with a gun is likely to get shot.”

He nodded but kept his gaze fixed on the Russians.

“Keep your gun on them until you hear them breach,” I clarified in a whisper. “Then toss it. At that point, it will be too late for them to pull anything,” I nodded slightly toward Boris.

Walsh gave the smallest of glances. “Done this before?”

I slapped him on the shoulder. “Thanks for everything.”

Stepping away from the group, I headed for the back door. On my wrist, I noticed the three officers shift from their positions behind the oblong container they had been using as a barricade. They assembled at the back door while one of them tucked a walkie-talkie into his pocket.

“Six seconds,” Esker confirmed.

Five yards before the door to the back alley, I hopped and grabbed the matte black steel beam about ten feet above me, pulling myself effortlessly into the air. With the men’s room to the right of the hall and the women’s on the left, I was relieved to see that both had been built with plywood ceilings. It made sense since the restrooms had more complex ventilation and electrical requirements. Given the construction I saw, all of that would be easier to fabricate.

No sooner had I shifted onto the ceiling of the men’s room than a small explosion echoed a short distance beneath my feet. It sounded like the rear door had been completely torn from its hinges rather than just the lock, likely an overreaction on the part of the police department. Maybe they were trying to make up for lost time. Maybe they were just frustrated about standing around in the rain for so long.

I watch the display on my wrist as three officers burst through the door. The instant they passed, I dropped down from the rafter and raced out the back door. Piper was already sprinting toward me from the tree line.

---

It took Piper far longer than expected to make her way surreptitiously around the perimeter of the Borderline. The distraction caused by the runaway squad vehicles was effective, but it only managed to draw the sentries from their positions at the entrance to the lot for slightly longer than it took Gray to enter the bar. If she had tried to cut through the lot on her way to the back of the bar, she would have likely been spotted at the very least and detained at worst. Fortunately, she played it safe and took a wider route around the property, skirting a stand of trees beyond the northeast perimeter. Time wasn’t likely to be a concern since Gray’s plan was to use the hostage situation to interrogate Agent Vincente before neutralizing the hostage-takers.

Piper knelt in the mud six feet inside the tree line, just beyond the short stretch of pavement at the back of the bar. From that position, she could see down the length of the bar’s eastern wall, thanks to the series of sodium vapor lights mounted to the cinderblock wall every twenty feet. Without those powerful lights, the rain and darkness would have obscured anything beyond thirty feet. The back of the bar was far less illuminated. Two smaller floodlights illuminated the back expanse of the bar: one twenty feet to the left of the wide steel door that served as the rear exit, and the other about thirty or thirty-five feet on the opposite side. The dry cleaner and takeout places farther down either had no lights, had dead bulbs, or the officers had turned them off as part of the operation.

A thirty-foot stretch of cracked asphalt separated the back of the strip mall housing the Borderline from a five-foot-high brick retaining wall. Topped with an eight-foot-tall chain-link fence, the fence’s purpose eluded Piper, as it seemed to end where the wall did. Anyone wishing to bypass it could simply walk around the end. It probably had something to do with city codes or some other nonsense. Beyond the fence lay a rugged floodplain, though it was concealed at the moment.

The focus of her attention was the eight-foot-wide box, which sat slightly askew, about two feet from the retaining wall. It stood approximately five feet tall, and although Piper could see it from her kneeling position, she knew it measured ten feet in length. The box was perfectly rectangular and free of any emblems or markings. Its color was flat black, providing no reflection and lacking any obvious means of opening what was clearly a storage container of some kind.

The absence of markings, openings, handles, or lift points might have attracted the attention of the police officers using it for cover if they hadn’t been focused on the hostage situation in the bar and grill just a dozen yards away. Piper wiped the streaming water from her eyes and inhaled slowly. She monitored the video feed displayed in AR along the back of her left wrist and wished Gray would speed things up. Esker mentioned she could listen to events inside the Borderline if she wanted to. But with the storm and at least three officers nearby, she didn’t need the distraction. Esker would inform her if there was something important happening inside. This allowed her to concentrate on her surroundings.

Her surroundings were the issue at the moment. She had managed to identify two officers using their container for cover. On three separate occasions, two heads had poked out to peek at the rear of the building. Esker had assured her that three officers were positioned behind the Borderline. Until she located the third, the bogey remained a risk to both her and their operation.

---

Piper’s patience would have been exhausted if not for the feed from inside the Borderline. Once she identified the third member of the team assigned to the back of the building, she had no choice but to monitor them while they watched the exit. Esker piped the police tactical frequency directly into her ear, allowing her to stay updated on their plans or lack thereof. “Hurry up and wait” had certainly been the order of the day. No one was willing to give the command to breach, and when the hostage-takers refused to respond to calls from the ranking officer on scene, no one was ready to issue an order that would change the status quo.

Gray had communicated a plan B through Esker to stall the police by informing them that an FBI agent was on the scene if they became overly aggressive. That had never been necessary.

All of this would have resulted in boring, soggy downtime for Piper had it not been for the live feed from inside the bar. Esker could show her video from any camera that was part of the security system, but for the most part, she stuck to a video-only feed showing Gray’s point of view. She did switch back to the camera in the office from time to time. One of the robbers was making a nearly cartoonish attempt to crack the office safe—though watching that view for any length of time was a lot like watching paint dry.

Thankfully, she wasn’t cold. The technology the Seeley had integrated into her blood was astonishing in many ways, not least of which was her body’s ability to withstand extreme heat and cold that would typically have been debilitating. She’d been unaware of the capability until Esker explained it minutes earlier. The tech, however, didn’t prevent the constant downpour from frustrating her. While the ball cap kept the worst of the rain out of her eyes, it hadn’t stopped the cotton blend of her hoodie from becoming a drenched mess that felt at least three times heavier than usual, clinging to and hanging from her slender form in a claustrophobic way.

Finally, chatter on the tactical frequency grew frenetic. In just two minutes, the entire on-site police force decided to mobilize.

“Here we go,” Esker said in Piper’s ear.

“Finally,” she whispered as she glanced at her wrist. She saw Gray staring down the barrel of an old West-style revolver. Most of the Russians had their hands raised. One was lying on the ground. She smiled at the almost casual way Gray held the gun and the rock-solid steadiness of his single-handed grip on the antique-looking firearm.

What’s it take to rattle him?

She didn’t think she’d see much that truly knocked him off balance, not regarding the big picture. There was so much at stake. Laughing, she mused that with everything going on in that big picture, a hostage situation was really just a speed bump.

The signal was given, and the three officers slipped from their concealment to position themselves by the steel door of the Borderline. Small charges were placed. To Piper’s surprise, it appeared they were attaching explosives to the hinges and the door lock.

That seems excessive.

The officers moved back to their positions along the wall, two on one side of the door and one on the other. Piper heard the countdown over the tactical channel and glanced at the display on her arm. She saw Gray’s video swing and shift wildly before going dark. A second later, an officer gave the signal, and she heard the sound of distant charges detonating and glass breaking. At the same time, she heard the door several dozen yards away explode and watched as the door sagged before it swung into the rain. She saw the heavy steel door tip and splash into the gathering rainwater.

The trio of officers vanished through the door. A heartbeat later, Gray burst out of the same door, appearing as if he’d been forcefully ejected by the building. Piper was already in motion and reached him at the corner of the transport container. She locked eyes with him but found herself unable to speak.

Gray scooped her up in his arms. Her soaking-wet clothes squelched between them, and she stifled a laugh. They both knew they didn’t have time. She kissed him on the cheek, and they separated just as quickly. Piper circled the container, examining the featureless surface for what she knew only they could see. When she rounded the far corner, a square on the surface near the top corner lit up in AR space. She placed her hand over the glowing indicator, and it disappeared. The entire top of the box didn’t retract or withdraw; it simply seemed to vaporize. She knew it was nanomaterial, designed to disintegrate on command for the fastest possible access to the contents of the container. Before disintegration, the material was as close to indestructible as anything they had on Our-World. If the police had been inclined to try to open the container, they would have faced more than a little difficulty.

Piper placed her hand on the top of the container wall and hoisted herself up and over. Inside, she dropped to one knee and found Gray already there. Dim LED-like lights flickered to life around the perimeter, providing just enough illumination to work by. At the center of the space stood the Hover-Airbike. Gray was already releasing the series of finger-thick restraining straps that held it in place.

Along the wall hung a pair of backpacks. Piper unfastened each from the restraints securing them to the wall and quickly leaned them against the side of the Airbike’s seat. Finally, she grabbed the first of two sets of interconnected rings hanging from another fastener where the bags had been. She turned and handed the first set of rings to Gray.

Piper pulled one ring from inside another, and the next from yet another. Gray was already doing the same. Securing the largest ring around her waist, Piper grabbed the next two largest and quickly snapped them in place at her knees. Afterward, she paused to look at herself. The rings on her knees fit over her jeans without much trouble, but the ones she was about to place on her elbows posed a challenge.

Looking up at Gray, she saw he was in a similar, though less severe, version of the same situation. In the few minutes he had been exposed to the driving rain, his sweatshirt had become heavy with water.

“Will the armor adjust?” Gray asked, casting a skeptical glance at his own body.

Piper glanced up at him from her low position inside the container. She pushed her cap back and scrunched her nose. “You’re asking me?”

Gray shrugged and began to slip out of his sweatshirt. He tossed it onto the floor of the crate with a splat and slipped the first of the last three remaining rings into place—one on each elbow and one around his neck. With a tap on his wrist, the nanoparticle armor washed over his body, taking the shape of the matte black motorcycle-style body armor he’d previously used on Wild-Side.

Growling under her breath, Piper climbed to her feet and attempted to follow suit. Bending at the waist to bring her head close to her feet, she slung the hem of her soggy hoodie to the ground. The inertia and gravity combined helped to peel the thick material loose where it had long since adhered to her skin. She heard and felt the sucking sound the cotton blend made as it slipped away. She’d neglected to remove her ball cap, so that was pulled from the top of her head in the process.

She glanced at Gray when she clicked the second of the elbow rings into place.

“You should do that in slow motion, set to a heavy metal power chord,” he said with a smirk as water streamed down his face. He watched her with unrestrained amusement while she stood there in jeans and a sports bra, her hair doing god knows what.

You’re such a boy.

She shook her head. “Know how long I’ve been out here sitting in the rain, smart ass?”

Piper clicked the last ring around her throat and activated her suit. Though she hadn’t been cold before, she instantly felt the gear’s warmth. Her eyes went instantly wide, and her mouth dropped open.

“Yeah,” Gray said. “I’m pretty sure the suit is trying to dry my pants. The sensation is…interesting.”

Gray scooped up their discarded clothes and stuffed them into one of the packs before slinging it over his shoulders. He handed the other pack to Piper, who put it on without comment. She shifted subtly from side to side like an adult doing the peepee dance while she tried to figure out what she thought of the strange tingle running across her lower body as the armor aggressively attempted to dry her soaked jeans.

“Do you need a moment alone?” Gray chuckled.

Esker sounded in both their ears. “Officers seem to be moving toward the back of the facility. Estimate eighteen seconds.” Piper observed a sense of urgency in his tone.

“Are you driving, or am I?” Gray asked, motioning to the Airbike.

Piper felt a surge of panic at his obvious lack of urgency. “Shut up and fly,” she hissed.

Nodding, Gray hopped onto the seat and tapped the power system to life. Piper threw herself onto the seat behind him, tapping her wrist to activate her helmet. In less than a second, it materialized around her head. She pressed herself tightly against the pack that separated her from Gray and then gripped him firmly around the ribs.

“Good?” He asked, this time over the comm channel inside the helmet.

“Punch it,” she said.

And he did. A whisper-like whistle sounded beneath them, and gravity seemed to quadruple. The machine shot skyward like a demented elevator. Everything went momentarily black—Piper focused solely on holding tight. She felt tethers fasten around her hips and knew the Airbike had responded by activating the automated restraint system.

Gravity normalized moments later, and Piper’s vision became clear. She leaned to the side and noticed they were slicing through the night and rain at a speed she likely didn’t want to know.

Breathing a sigh of relief, Piper reflected on everything they had gone through just to gather their gear. “Well,” she said, “that was easy.”

“Look on the bright side,” he replied. “All of this shows that our next trip to Wild-Side can include little perks like shirts and pants.”

She couldn’t help but laugh.