On The Run

Duane stepped out from the washroom wiping his hands on his trousers. The sanitizer was supposed to dry them completely, but either he was doing something wrong or maybe the stupid thing just — his musing was abruptly halted when he spotted the Banu standing in the middle of the hallway. What the hell is a Banu doing here?

He reached a hand slowly to the stun baton on his belt and firmly asked, “Can I help you?”

A wide smile broke across the Banu’s elongated face, deepening the network of crags there. “Hello!”

Duane quickly checked to see if the Banu’s chest had a ‘visitor’ tag. Sometimes one of the techs would bring in a guest if they had to work on the weekend, and it wouldn’t be too surprising if Eiko had forgotten to comm him from the security desk.

No. No tag. And the Banu was carrying a datapod. Duane felt his pulse quicken. After working as a security guard for eight years at the Behring Applied Technology labs he might actually be in the middle of his first real break-in. Don’t screw this up, Duane.

Calmly, Duane informed the Banu, “If you don’t have security tag, I have to ask you to accompany me to the lobby.”

“Your tag,” said the Banu nodding to the small purple badge on Duane’s chest. “Does it open the doors for all the laboratories?”

Duane slipped the baton from its loop and pressed the primer. “Last warning. This area is for authorized personnel only and I will remove you by force if necessary.”

The Banu simply tilted his head to the side and smiled wider. “Please look at me for the next five seconds. Thank you.”

Duane realized too late that he had forgotten to see if the Banu was alone.

“Damn it, Mas. I told you to wait,” Alex said as she peeled the still smoldering stun-glove off her hand and tucked it into her belt. She had to admit, Klanger had done a hell of a job designing the thing. Too bad the glove was destroyed after one use. Worth the money though, to be able drop someone near instantly. Next time she was on Spider she’d definitely need to see if there were any more for sale.

“You said wait till you found the key. We found the key,” Mas replied, setting the datapod gently on the ground.

“What if this idiot had comm’d for backup or triggered an alarm?”

The Banu shrugged. Alex knew it was useless arguing with Mas about things like this. He was one of the best hackers she had ever known, but trying to get him to stick to a plan was about as useless as trying to get a Vanduul to talk out an issue. Anyway, improvisation was the key to being a good data runner. Knowing that Mas was going to do whatever the hell he wanted had just become a standard part of all her plans.

“I believe he has done both,” Mas said as he rolled the guard onto his back.

It was then that Alex noticed the faint light blinking under the skin of the guard’s neck. Crap, she thought. A deadswitch. Behring must have wired up their security personnel with them. Something happens to one, the rest would soon be on their way. Time for more improvising.

“Can you hack it?”

“I can try,” replied Mas.

Reaching down, he turned the guard’s head to better expose the neck. Drawing a curved spoon-like blade from the small sheath hidden under his arm, Mas carved the deadswitch out. Alex barely avoided being sprayed by a pulse of blood.

As Mas connected a small silver connector cable from his pad to the flashing deadswitch beacon that now lay in a puddle on the floor, Alex used her Pyro to cauterize the wound closed. She had never been one to leave a body count behind. Not only was it sloppy and unnecessary, it tended to make the Advos try that much harder to track you down.

“Mas, instead of deactivating it, can you make it broadcast like the guard is still okay?”

The Banu nodded and continued to manipulate his pad with his long dexterous fingers.

Leaving him to work, Alex yanked the tag off the guard’s uniform and used it to access a janitor’s closet she had passed a few paces back. Sure enough, inside was a scrubber. She carried it back just as Mas was finishing.

“There,” said Mas, retracting the connector. “Healthier than ever.”

“Then let’s put him back on patrol.” She opened up the scrubber’s rear hatch and Mas dropped the bloodied beacon inside the refuse storage bin. A few presses later and the scrubber was happily cleaning its way down the hall. There was still a good chance that the few seconds the deadswitch had been active would be enough to send a security squad to investigate, but if they were lucky, the scrubber’s movements would be enough to convince anyone monitoring that it had been some kind of glitch. Either way, they needed to hurry.

The research lab gleamed with an immaculate shine that screamed money and danger. In Alex’s experience, the only reason that anyone ever kept a room this spotless was when a little bit of dirt would be enough to lose a fortune in research or get someone killed by accident. Of course, with the amount she had been promised for pulling this job, she expected nothing less.

Mas set the datapod down next to a bank of sleek white processors on the far end of the room. If their imposing size wasn’t enough to tell that they were important, the thick coil of cables running into the data hub would have been a dead giveaway. Just about every piece of tech in the place was wired to the computers. He lifted up an access junction and plugged in his silver cable.

“Any issues?” Alex asked.

The Banu swiped at his pad. “Only minimal protection. I believe they are counting on the building’s security to prevent access.”

Never underestimate the overconfidence that comes with owning a big fortress-like building.

After bypassing the preliminary security, Mas opened up a port and hooked the datapod into place. He settled in to extract the data and began humming Could Have Been You, a sure sign that he was lost in the code.

Alex strolled around the room rummaging through the work tables that were home to what she guessed were next generation Behring weapons. For the millionth time, she wished she knew exactly what was in the data they were accessing. The name alone wasn’t much to go by — ‘Project Stargazer’ — but the guy who hired them refused to tell them anything more. Alex still had doubts about whether it had been smart to accept his offer. Though, her suspicion was that the job had been less of an offer and more of an order.

The man, ‘Mr. Grouse,’ contacted them through the usual channels on the amateur ornithologist boards. After all his bonafides checked out, they met at a small cafe on the outskirts of Prime. He’d been easy to pick out thanks to the yellow hat he had promised to wear. Alex had done her normal procedure of arriving early and placing a small pinhole camera on the wall. It was a great way to scout a potential client before meeting and make sure they weren’t sweating too much or hiding an abnormal amount of guns. Neither applied to Grouse, though. He had been as calm as could be. Even more so, his skin had that artificially smooth look, a common side effect from some of the new facial reconfiguration surgical units. Which was surprising because who would choose to make their face that uninteresting? He was like the Human equivalent of elevator music. Even standing across the table from him, Alex had felt her eyes wander away from lack of interest. On second thought, she could see why being aggressively boring might be a good choice considering the work she assumed he did.

After a few minutes of observing him to make sure everything seemed on the up on up, she noticed him reach into his briefcase and pull out a small hand scanner. With a quick sweep of the cafe, he smiled when he spotted the mounted camera.

“Alexandria Dougan,” he had said in a calm, even voice. “I am ready to meet whenever you are.”

Well, that’s a first.

“And if I am not mistaken, that Banu over there wearing the sunhat is your partner Mas Houlan. Why don’t you have him join us so we can discuss our business together?”

A few moments later, her and Mas were listening patiently to Grouse explain that he wanted all the records of a research project completely deleted from the Behring Applied Technologies lab. Before she could even begin to protest, he had told them the payment. It was significantly higher than she would have even dared asked for, even on her most brazen of days. It was enough to put her and Mas on easy street and settle a lot of old debts.

It had made her really nervous.

That’s why she had decided that they would make copies of the project files before they erased all trace of them from the lab’s record. As the old saying goes, never trust a criminal.

About halfway through Mas humming The Day Ahead, the alarm went off. That was disconcerting, but not nearly half as much as the giant turrets that lowered from the ceiling. Alex held her breath, but rather than turn and fire on them, the two turrets took aim at the lab’s door.

It quickly dawned on her why they were still breathing. It wasn’t worth it to risk shooting up all the valuable equipment. The turrets were designed to stop anyone entering or exiting the lab. And stop with extreme prejudice if the large Behring logos on the ballistic guns were anything to go by.

“How much longer, Mas?” she shouted over the blaring alarm.

“The files have copied, but I will need some time to finish expunging the records.”

Okay, thought Alex, let’s see how much ammo these things have.

Reaching into her satchel, Alex brought out her Insta-Friends decoy. She primed it and slid the puck out into the killbox and covered her ears expectantly. A moment later, the decoy went off and the turrets sprang to life, raining bullets at the artificial targets. Got to love Joker Engineering. Half the time the stupid things didn’t work, but when they did, boy, did they work.

Eventually, the decoy died and the turrets spun down. The floor was completely chewed through. It looked like they had been designed to allow the rounds to penetrate rather than ricochet into the expensive tech. Right… ricochets. I probably should have thought of that first… Alex would have to remind Mas to make an extra offering to the God of Luck for her.

She had only brought one additional decoy and she had a feeling that the turrets had more than enough ammo to outlast it. What she needed was a way to force the Insta-Friends to last longer. Scanning the lab, she quickly found what she was looking for: a large half-built laser sat on one of the workbenches connected to an array of batteries. She momentarily considered using one of the lab’s experimental weapons to destroy the turrets but decided that she liked having all her limbs attached too much to mess with an unfinished laser. Instead, she used her Pyro to solder one of the batteries to the decoy and slid the heavy makeshift device into range of the turrets. Once again, the guns sprang to life. It wasn’t until the decoys had begun flickering away, the larger battery finally drained, that she heard the happy clicking whir of empty chambers attempting to fire.

“I am ready to go,” said Mas, strolling confidently through the still smoldering killbox with the datapod. Alex hurried to catch up.

They left the lab not a moment too soon. Drawn by the gunfire, a full squad of guards descended upon it just as Mas and Alex managed to round the corner out of view. One of the benefits of robbing a campus as big as Behring’s is that it took a while to move security into position. If she ever went straight, maybe she would get a job as a consultant and earn big credits pointing out all the dumb things companies did with their security systems.

Leaving the main research wing, the pair weaved their way back through the labyrinthine building to the executive’s office that they had entered through. Alex stopped them at every intersection to ping the path ahead. It would make them stand out on scanners, but it was safer than blindly stumbling into the roaming groups of armed guards.

Thankfully, when they arrived at the executive’s private hangar, it was unguarded and the Belligerent Duck remained just as they had left it. It was one of those interesting facts of life that powerful peoples’ private hangars are considered so off-limits, security guards assume criminals know not to land there too. That was why private hangars were usually one of the first things Alex looked for when she was casing a building. Plus, they usually had little free water bottles you could stock up with in case you got thirsty during a heist.

Alex brought up her mobi and unlocked the Mercury. Mas headed up the ramp straight for datastorage to make sure the pod was safely secured, while she made her way to the star runner’s cockpit.

The hangar doors opened above them and the Duck lifted into the air. The name still made her smile. She had chosen it to infuriate the cocky infoagent she had won the ship from. The pompous prick had the gall to name the ship Razor’s Edge. Now whenever he wanted to buy data off her, he had to comm the Belligerent Duck as a reminder that it didn’t pay to bet against Alex Dougan.

She eased the throttle forward and the ship’s wide swept-back wings cut easily through Terra’s calm atmosphere. A moment after leaving the hangar, the pleasant Crusader computer voice alerted her that they were being targeted. Sure enough, a Sabre with Behring livery was closing in on her tail. It must have launched when the alarm went off.

The comms chirped to life as they were hailed. “This is Behring Security. Land immediately or you will be shot down.”

Great. And it wouldn’t be long before the Terra police joined in. They needed a fast getaway.

“Mas, weapons, now.”

When they had first met, Mas had refused to do anything on the ship that didn’t involve hacking and computers claiming that it “was not his purpose.” It had been close to six months before Alex had stumbled upon a solution that had worked — she had hooked up a terminal from a busted simpod into the manned turret’s seat so that Mas could stare at a screen instead of out the window. That was all it took. Now he was a crack shot.

Mas slid into the weapons terminal, his long legs at the awkward angle all Banu were forced to adopt using Human seats. “How much should I explode them?”

“None! Knock out their radars and I’ll take care of the rest.”

Alex pulled hard and swung the Mercury wide giving Mas time to line up the distortion cannons. The Sabre reacted quickly enough to avoid the first and second salvos. Alex rolled at the last second to avoid their return fire. They were running out of time.

“Get missile lock,” said Mas.

“Mas, we’re not killing them!”

“No killing,” the Banu agreed. “Just a distraction.”

Decelerating till she saw red, Alex brought the ship to bear. After a heartbeat or two had thudded in her chest, she achieved lock and fired two missiles. The Sabre pilot, acting as expected, lit the sky with flares, pulling the missiles off course. Anticipating the brief distraction, Mas fired the turret again. The distortion cannons bit into the Sabre, disrupting its power. There was no way for it to maintain radar and stay flying after a hit like that.

Maxing out the thrusters for all they were worth, Alex sped the Duck away from Behring’s headquarters. However, rather than angling up to leave the planet, she angled the ship towards the nearby mountainous island range. There, she lowered the ship down into a small alcove cut into the beach beneath a rocky outcropping. Diverting power from the Mercury’s shields and thrusters, Mas booted up their reg-spoof. Now, they would be able to fly around incognito for a little while. Should be fine as long as no one looked too hard or took a shot at them. She hoped they weren’t the only ones in the area flying a Mercury today.

It was definitely not their cleanest escape. No way they were going to make the rendezvous now, but Grouse was just going to have to deal with the change in plans. Bringing up her mobi, Alex began a message to their network of contacts. Behring had a lot of credits to toss around. You rob someone like that and they usually made it worthwhile to hunt you down. Leaving the system wasn’t going to be enough. It wouldn’t be long before the Advocacy and a whole fleet of bounty hunters were breathing down their neck. If they wanted to get out of this in one piece they were going to need some extra help keeping an eye out. Hopefully a few of the friends her and Mas made over the years would be willing to lend a hand and alert them if they caught wind of the authorities closing in on the Duck.

Message sent. Now all they needed was somewhere they could hide out till things cooled off.

“Hey Mas, how would you feel about visiting your old Souli?”

TO BE CONTINUED

Duane trat aus dem Waschraum und wischte sich die Hände an der Hose ab. Der Desinfektionsmittel sollte sie vollständig trocknen, aber entweder tat er etwas Falsches oder vielleicht das Dumme - seine Überlegungen wurden abrupt gestoppt, als er den Banu entdeckte, der in der Mitte des Flurs stand. Was zum Teufel macht ein Banu hier?

Er griff langsam mit der Hand nach dem Schlagstock an seinem Gürtel und fragte fest: "Kann ich dir helfen?"

Ein breites Lächeln brach über das langgestreckte Gesicht der Banu und vertiefte das Netz der Felsen dort. " Hallo!"

Duane überprüfte schnell, ob die Brust des Banu einen "Besucher"-Tag hatte. Manchmal brachte einer der Techniker einen Gast mit, wenn sie am Wochenende arbeiten mussten, und es wäre nicht allzu verwunderlich, wenn Eiko vergessen hätte, ihn vom Sicherheitsschalter zu kommen.

Nein. Kein Etikett. Und die Banu trug ein Datapod. Duane fühlte, wie sein Puls schneller wurde. Nach acht Jahren als Wachmann in den Labors der Behringer Anwendungstechnik könnte er sich mitten in seinem ersten echten Einbruch befinden. Vermassel das nicht, Duane.

Ruhig informierte Duane die Banu: "Wenn Sie kein Sicherheitsetikett haben, muss ich Sie bitten, mich in die Lobby zu begleiten."

"Deine Marke", sagte der Banu und nickte zu dem kleinen lilafarbenen Abzeichen auf Duanes Brust. "Öffnet es die Türen für alle Labore?"

Duane schob den Schlagstock aus seiner Schlaufe und drückte den Primer. "Letzte Warnung. Dieser Bereich ist nur für autorisiertes Personal zugänglich und ich werde Sie bei Bedarf gewaltsam entfernen."

Der Banu neigte seinen Kopf einfach zur Seite und lächelte weiter. "Bitte schau mich die nächsten fünf Sekunden an. Ich danke dir."

Duane erkannte zu spät, dass er vergessen hatte, zu sehen, ob die Banu allein war.

"Verdammt, Mas. Ich sagte dir, du sollst warten", sagte Alex, als sie den noch schwelenden Betäubungshandschuh von ihrer Hand schälte und ihn in ihren Gürtel steckte. Sie musste zugeben, dass Klanger eine Menge Arbeit geleistet hatte, um das Ding zu entwerfen. Zu schade, dass der Handschuh nach einem Gebrauch zerstört wurde. Das Geld aber wert, um jemanden in der Nähe sofort fallen lassen zu können. Das nächste Mal, wenn sie bei Spider war, würde sie definitiv sehen müssen, ob es noch mehr zu kaufen gibt.

"Du sagtest, warte, bis du den Schlüssel gefunden hast. Wir haben den Schlüssel gefunden", antwortete Mas und stellte den Datenpod sanft auf den Boden.

"Was wäre, wenn dieser Idiot Unterstützung gesucht hätte oder einen Alarm ausgelöst hätte?"

Die Banu zuckte mit den Achseln. Alex wusste, dass es sinnlos war, mit Mas über solche Dinge zu diskutieren. Er war einer der besten Hacker, die sie je gekannt hatte, aber der Versuch, ihn dazu zu bringen, sich an einen Plan zu halten, war ungefähr so nutzlos wie der Versuch, einen Vanduul dazu zu bringen, ein Problem auszutauschen. Wie auch immer, Improvisation war der Schlüssel, um ein guter Datenläufer zu sein. Zu wissen, dass Mas tun würde, was auch immer zur Hölle er wollte, war gerade zu einem Standardteil all ihrer Pläne geworden.

"Ich glaube, er hat beides getan", sagte Mas, als er die Wache auf den Rücken rollte.

Dann bemerkte Alex das schwache Licht, das unter der Haut des Halses der Wache blinzelte. Mist, dachte sie. Ein Totmannschalter. Behring muss damit sein Sicherheitspersonal verkabelt haben. Etwas passiert mit einem, der Rest wäre bald auf dem Weg. Zeit für mehr Improvisation.

"Kannst du es hacken?"

"Ich kann es versuchen", antwortete Mas.

Er griff nach unten und drehte den Kopf der Wache, um den Hals besser freizulegen. Mas zog eine geschwungene, löffelartige Klinge aus der kleinen, unter seinem Arm versteckten Scheide und schnitzte den Totentaster heraus. Alex vermied es kaum, von einem Blutpuls besprüht zu werden.

Als Mas ein kleines silbernes Verbindungskabel von seinem Pad an die blinkende Deadswitch-Leuchte anschloss, die nun in einer Pfütze auf dem Boden lag, benutzte Alex ihr Pyro, um die geschlossene Wunde zu brennen. Sie war noch nie eine gewesen, die eine Leichenzahl zurückgelassen hatte. Es war nicht nur schlampig und unnötig, es neigte dazu, die Advos dazu zu bringen, so viel mehr zu versuchen, dich aufzuspüren.

"Mas, anstatt es zu deaktivieren, kannst du es so ausstrahlen lassen, als wäre die Wache noch in Ordnung?"

Der Banu nickte und manipulierte sein Pad weiterhin mit seinen langen, geschickten Fingern.

Alex ließ ihn arbeiten und zog das Etikett von der Uniform der Wache ab und benutzte es, um auf den Schrank eines Hausmeisters zuzugreifen, den sie vor einigen Schritten zurückgelegt hatte. Sicherlich war darin ein Schrubber. Sie trug es zurück, gerade als Mas fertig war.

"Da", sagte Mas und zog den Stecker zurück. "Gesünder denn je."

"Dann lassen Sie ihn uns wieder auf Streife schicken." Sie öffnete die hintere Klappe des Wäschers und Mas ließ das blutbefleckte Leuchtfeuer in den Müllbehälter fallen. Ein paar Pressen später und der Schrubber reinigte sich glücklich den Weg durch die Halle. Es bestand immer noch eine gute Chance, dass die wenigen Sekunden, in denen der Totschalter aktiv war, ausreichen würden, um ein Sicherheitsteam zur Untersuchung zu schicken, aber wenn sie Glück hatten, würden die Bewegungen des Schrubbers ausreichen, um jemanden zu überzeugen, der überwacht, dass es sich um eine Art Störung handelte. So oder so, sie mussten sich beeilen.

Das Forschungslabor strahlte mit einem makellosen Glanz, der Geld und Gefahr schrie. Nach Alex' Erfahrung war der einzige Grund, warum jemand jemals einen Raum so makellos gehalten hat, dass ein wenig Schmutz ausreichen würde, um ein Vermögen in der Forschung zu verlieren oder jemanden durch einen Unfall zu töten. Natürlich erwartete sie mit dem Betrag, der ihr für die Durchführung dieses Jobs versprochen worden war, nicht weniger.

Mas stellte das Datenpod neben einer Bank von eleganten weißen Prozessoren am anderen Ende des Raumes ab. Wenn ihre imposante Größe nicht ausreichen würde, um zu sagen, dass sie wichtig sind, wäre die dicke Kabelrolle, die in die Datendrehscheibe führt, ein eindeutiges Zeichen gewesen. Fast jedes Stück Technik an diesem Ort war mit den Computern verbunden. Er hob eine Zugangsstelle hoch und steckte sein silbernes Kabel ein.

"Irgendwelche Probleme?" fragte Alex.

Der Banu streichelte seine Bude. "Nur minimaler Schutz. Ich glaube, sie zählen auf die Sicherheit des Gebäudes, um den Zugang zu verhindern."

Unterschätzen Sie niemals das übertriebene Selbstvertrauen, das mit dem Besitz eines großen, festungsartigen Gebäudes einhergeht.

Nachdem Mas die vorläufige Sicherheitsvorkehrung umgangen hatte, öffnete er einen Port und hängte den Datenpod an seinen Platz. Er entschied sich, die Daten zu extrahieren und begann zu summen, Could Have Been You, ein sicheres Zeichen dafür, dass er im Code verloren war.

Alex schlenderte durch den Raum und stöberte an den Arbeitstischen, an denen sich die von ihr vermuteten Behring-Waffen der nächsten Generation befanden. Zum millionsten Mal wünschte sie sich, sie wüsste genau, was in den Daten steht, auf die sie zugreifen. Der Name allein war nicht viel, aber der Typ, der sie angeheuert hat, weigerte sich, ihnen mehr zu sagen. Alex hatte noch immer Zweifel daran, ob es klug war, sein Angebot anzunehmen. Ihr Verdacht war jedoch, dass der Job weniger ein Angebot als vielmehr eine Bestellung war.

Der Mann, Herr Grouse, kontaktierte sie über die üblichen Kanäle auf den Amateur-Ornithologentafeln. Nachdem alle seine Bonafides ausgecheckt waren, trafen sie sich in einem kleinen Café am Rande von Prime. Er war leicht zu erkennen, dank des gelben Hutes, den er zu tragen versprochen hatte. Alex hatte ihr normales Verfahren durchgeführt, früh anzukommen und eine kleine Lochkamera an der Wand anzubringen. Es war eine großartige Möglichkeit, einen potenziellen Kunden vor dem Treffen zu erkunden und sicherzustellen, dass er nicht zu stark schwitzt oder eine ungewöhnliche Menge an Waffen versteckt. Allerdings galt das auch nicht für Grouse. Er war so ruhig wie möglich gewesen. Noch mehr noch, seine Haut hatte diesen künstlich glatten Look, ein häufiger Nebeneffekt bei einigen der neuen chirurgischen Einheiten zur Gesichtsrekonfiguration. Was überraschend war, denn wer würde sich dafür entscheiden, sein Gesicht so uninteressant zu gestalten? Er war wie das menschliche Äquivalent der Fahrstuhlmusik. Sogar als Alex von ihm gegenüber am Tisch stand, hatte er gespürt, wie ihre Augen aus Mangel an Interesse weggelaufen waren. Auf den zweiten Blick konnte sie sehen, warum aggressives Langweiligkeiten eine gute Wahl sein könnten, wenn man bedenkt, welche Arbeit sie angenommen hatte.

Nach ein paar Minuten, in denen sie ihn beobachtete, um sicherzustellen, dass alles nach oben schien, bemerkte sie, dass er in seine Aktentasche griff und einen kleinen Handscanner herauszog. Als er das Café kurz durchstöberte, lächelte er, als er die montierte Kamera entdeckte.

"Alexandria Dougan", hatte er mit ruhiger, gleichmäßiger Stimme gesagt. "Ich bin bereit, mich zu treffen, wann immer du willst."

Nun, das ist das erste Mal.

"Und wenn ich mich nicht irre, ist dieser Banu da drüben, der den Sonnenhut trägt, dein Partner Mas Houlan. Warum lässt du ihn nicht zu uns stoßen, damit wir unser Geschäft gemeinsam besprechen können?"

Wenige Augenblicke später hörten sie und Mas geduldig zu, wie Grouse erklärte, dass er alle Aufzeichnungen eines Forschungsprojekts vollständig aus dem Labor von Behring Applied Technologies löschen wollte. Bevor sie überhaupt anfangen konnte zu protestieren, hatte er ihnen die Zahlung mitgeteilt. Es war deutlich höher, als sie es gewagt hätte, selbst an ihren dreistesten Tagen. Es reichte, sie und Mas auf eine einfache Straße zu setzen und viele alte Schulden zu begleichen.

Es hatte sie sehr nervös gemacht.

Deshalb hatte sie beschlossen, Kopien der Projektdateien anzufertigen, bevor sie alle Spuren von ihnen aus dem Laborarchiv löschten. Wie das alte Sprichwort sagt: Traue niemals einem Verbrecher.

Etwa auf halbem Weg nach Mas, der den Tag vor uns summt, ging der Alarm los. Das war beunruhigend, aber nicht annähernd halb so sehr wie die riesigen Türme, die von der Decke heruntergelassen wurden. Alex hielt den Atem an, aber anstatt sich zu drehen und auf sie zu schießen, zielen die beiden Türme auf die Tür des Labors.

Es dämmerte ihr schnell, warum sie noch atmeten. Es hat sich nicht gelohnt, das Risiko einzugehen, die ganze wertvolle Ausrüstung in die Höhe zu treiben. Die Türme wurden entwickelt, um zu verhindern, dass jemand das Labor betritt oder verlässt. Und hören Sie mit extremen Vorurteilen auf, wenn die großen Behring-Logos auf den ballistischen Geschützen etwas Besonderes wären.

"Wie lange noch, Mas?" rief sie über den heftigen Alarm.

"Die Dateien haben kopiert, aber ich werde etwas Zeit brauchen, um die Aufzeichnungen zu löschen."

Okay, dachte Alex, lass uns sehen, wie viel Munition diese Dinger haben.

Alex griff in ihre Tasche und brachte ihren Insta-Friends-Köder hervor. Sie grundierte es und schob den Puck in die Killbox hinaus und bedeckte ihre Ohren erwartungsvoll. Einen Moment später ging der Lockvogel los und die Türme erwachten zum Leben und ließen Kugeln auf die künstlichen Ziele regnen. Man muss Joker Engineering lieben. Die meiste Zeit funktionierten die dummen Dinge nicht, aber wenn sie es taten, Junge, funktionierten sie.

Schließlich starb der Köder und die Türme drehten sich nach unten. Der Boden war komplett durchgekaut. Es sah so aus, als ob sie so konzipiert waren, dass die Kugeln in die teure Technik eindringen konnten, anstatt abprallen zu lassen. Richtig.... Abpraller. Ich hätte wahrscheinlich zuerst daran denken sollen... Alex müsste Mas daran erinnern, dem Gott des Glücks ein zusätzliches Opfer für sie darzubringen.

Sie hatte nur einen zusätzlichen Köder mitgebracht und hatte das Gefühl, dass die Geschütztürme mehr als genug Munition hatten, um ihn zu überdauern. Was sie brauchte, war eine Möglichkeit, die Insta-Freunde zu zwingen, länger zu überleben. Beim Scannen des Labors fand sie schnell, was sie suchte: Ein großer, halb gebauter Laser saß auf einer der Werkbänke, die mit einer Reihe von Batterien verbunden waren. Sie überlegte kurzzeitig, eine der experimentellen Waffen des Labors zu benutzen, um die Türme zu zerstören, entschied aber, dass sie es mochte, wenn alle ihre Gliedmaßen zu sehr befestigt waren, um mit einem unfertigen Laser zu spielen. Stattdessen lötete sie mit ihrem Pyro eine der Batterien an den Lockvogel und schob das schwere Behelfsgerät in den Bereich der Türme. Wieder einmal erwachten die Waffen zum Leben. Erst als die Köder zu flackern begannen, die größere Batterie schließlich leer war, hörte sie das fröhliche Klicken der leeren Kammern, die versuchten zu schießen.

"Ich bin bereit zu gehen", sagte Mas und schlenderte selbstbewusst durch die noch glühende Killbox mit dem Datenpod. Alex eilte, um sich zu informieren.

Sie verließen das Labor keinen Moment zu früh. Vom Kanonenfeuer angezogen, stieg eine ganze Gruppe von Wachen auf sie herab, als Mas und Alex es schafften, die Ecke außer Sichtweite zu bringen. Einer der Vorteile des Überfalls auf einen so großen Campus wie den von Behring ist, dass es eine Weile gedauert hat, bis die Sicherheit in Position gebracht wurde. Wenn sie jemals ehrlich wurde, würde sie vielleicht einen Job als Berater bekommen und große Kredite verdienen, indem sie auf all die dummen Dinge hinwies, die Unternehmen mit ihren Sicherheitssystemen taten.

Nach dem Verlassen des Hauptforschungsflügels schlängelte sich das Paar durch das labyrinthische Gebäude zurück zum Büro der Führungskraft, durch das sie gegangen waren. Alex hielt sie an jeder Kreuzung an, um den Weg nach vorne zu weisen. Es würde sie auf Scannern hervorheben, aber es war sicherer, als blind in die umherwandernden Gruppen von bewaffneten Wachen zu stolpern.

Glücklicherweise, als sie im privaten Hangar des Exekutivorgans ankamen, war es unbewacht und die kriegerische Ente blieb so, wie sie es verlassen hatte. Es war eine dieser interessanten Tatsachen des Lebens, dass die privaten Hangars der mächtigen Völker als so tabu gelten, dass die Sicherheitskräfte davon ausgehen, dass Kriminelle wissen, dass sie dort auch nicht landen. Deshalb waren private Hangars normalerweise eines der ersten Dinge, nach denen Alex suchte, als sie ein Gebäude umgab. Außerdem hatten sie normalerweise kleine kostenlose Wasserflaschen, mit denen man sich eindecken konnte, falls man während eines Raubüberfalls durstig wurde.

Alex brachte ihr Mobi zur Sprache und schloss den Merkur auf. Mas steuerte die Rampe geradewegs zur Datenspeicherung an, um sicherzustellen, dass das Pod sicher gesichert war, während sie sich auf den Weg zum Cockpit des Sternenläufers machte.

Die Hangartore öffneten sich über ihnen und die Ente hob sich in die Luft. Der Name ließ sie immer noch lächeln. Sie hatte es gewählt, um den eingebildeten Infoagent, von dem sie das Schiff gewonnen hatte, zu erzürnen. Der aufgeblasene Schwanz hatte den Mut, dem Schiff den Namen Razor's Edge zu geben. Nun, wann immer er Daten von ihr kaufen wollte, musste er die Belligerent Duck verpflichten, um daran zu erinnern, dass es sich nicht lohnte, gegen Alex Dougan zu wetten.

Sie ließ das Gaspedal nach vorne los und die breiten, geschwungenen Flügel des Schiffes durchschnitten leicht die ruhige Atmosphäre von Terra. Einen Moment nachdem sie den Hangar verlassen hatte, warnte sie die angenehme Kreuzritter-Computerstimme, dass sie ins Visier genommen wurden. Tatsächlich näherte sich ein Säbel in Behring-Lackierung ihrem Schwanz. Es muss gestartet sein, als der Alarm ausgelöst wurde.

Die Kommunikationen zwitscherten zum Leben, als sie gerufen wurden. "Hier ist Behring Security. Landen Sie sofort, sonst werden Sie abgeschossen."

Großartig. Und es dauerte nicht lange, bis die Polizei von Terra einschaltete. Sie brauchten eine schnelle Flucht.

"Mas, Waffen, sofort."

Als sie sich das erste Mal getroffen hatten, hatte Mas sich geweigert, etwas auf dem Schiff zu tun, was nicht mit Hacking und Computern zu tun hatte, die behaupteten, dass es "nicht sein Zweck war". Es war fast sechs Monate her, dass Alex über eine Lösung gestolpert war, die funktioniert hatte - sie hatte ein Terminal von einem kaputten Simpod in den Sitz des bemannten Turms gesteckt, so dass Mas auf einen Bildschirm statt aus dem Fenster starren konnte. Das war alles, was nötig war. Jetzt war er ein guter Schütze.

Mas rutschte in das Waffen-Terminal, seine langen Beine in dem unangenehmen Winkel, den alle Banu gezwungen waren, mit menschlichen Sitzen anzunehmen. "Wie sehr soll ich sie explodieren lassen?"

"Keine! Mach ihre Radaranlagen kaputt und ich kümmere mich um den Rest."

Alex zog hart und schwang den Merkur weit, was Mas Zeit gab, die Verzerrungskanonen aufzustellen. Der Säbel reagierte schnell genug, um die ersten und zweiten Salven zu vermeiden. Alex rollte in letzter Sekunde, um dem Rückschuss zu entgehen. Ihnen lief die Zeit davon.

"Raketenabwehr", sagte Mas.

"Mas, wir werden sie nicht töten!"

"Kein Töten", stimmte der Banu zu. "Nur eine Ablenkung."

Alex verlangsamte sich, bis sie rot sah, und brachte das Schiff zum Einsatz. Nachdem ein oder zwei Herzschläge in ihre Brust geschlagen hatten, erreichte sie das Schloss und feuerte zwei Raketen ab. Der Säbelpilot, der wie erwartet handelte, beleuchtete den Himmel mit Leuchtfeuern und brachte die Raketen vom Kurs ab. In Erwartung der kurzen Ablenkung feuerte Mas den Turm erneut ab. Die Verzerrungskanonen bissen in den Säbel und unterbrachen seine Macht. Es gab keine Möglichkeit, das Radar aufrechtzuerhalten und nach einem solchen Treffer weiter zu fliegen.

Alex, der die Triebwerke für alles, was sie wert waren, ausfindig machte, raste die Ente vom Hauptsitz von Behring weg. Anstatt jedoch den Planeten zu verlassen, winkelte sie das Schiff in Richtung der nahegelegenen bergigen Inselgruppe. Dort senkte sie das Schiff in eine kleine Nische, die in den Strand unter einem felsigen Felsvorsprung geschnitten wurde. Mas lenkte die Energie von den Schilden und Triebwerken des Merkurs ab und startete ihren Regensalat. Jetzt könnten sie für eine Weile inkognito herumfliegen. Sollte in Ordnung sein, solange niemand zu hart aussah oder auf sie schoss. Sie hoffte, dass sie nicht die einzigen in der Gegend waren, die heute einen Merkur fliegen.

Es war definitiv nicht ihre sauberste Flucht. Auf keinen Fall würden sie jetzt das Rendezvous machen, aber Grouse würde sich nur mit der Änderung der Pläne befassen müssen. Alex brachte ihre Mobi zur Sprache und begann eine Nachricht an ihr Netzwerk von Kontakten. Behring hatte viele Credits zu vergeben. Du raubst jemanden so aus, und er hat es normalerweise wertvoll gemacht, dich zu jagen. Das Verlassen des Systems würde nicht ausreichen. Es dauerte nicht lange, bis sich die Advocacy und eine ganze Flotte von Kopfgeldjägern im Nacken befanden. Wenn sie in einem Stück aus dieser Situation herauskommen wollten, brauchten sie zusätzliche Hilfe, um die Augen offen zu halten. Hoffentlich wären ein paar der Freunde, die sie und Mas im Laufe der Jahre gewonnen haben, bereit, eine Hand zu reichen und sie zu alarmieren, wenn sie Wind von den Behörden bekommen, die sich der Ente nähern.

Nachricht gesendet. Jetzt brauchten sie nur noch einen Ort, an dem sie sich verstecken konnten, bis sich die Dinge beruhigt hatten.

"Hey Mas, was hältst du davon, deinen alten Souli zu besuchen?"

WIRD FORTGESETZT

Duane stepped out from the washroom wiping his hands on his trousers. The sanitizer was supposed to dry them completely, but either he was doing something wrong or maybe the stupid thing just — his musing was abruptly halted when he spotted the Banu standing in the middle of the hallway. What the hell is a Banu doing here?

He reached a hand slowly to the stun baton on his belt and firmly asked, “Can I help you?”

A wide smile broke across the Banu’s elongated face, deepening the network of crags there. “Hello!”

Duane quickly checked to see if the Banu’s chest had a ‘visitor’ tag. Sometimes one of the techs would bring in a guest if they had to work on the weekend, and it wouldn’t be too surprising if Eiko had forgotten to comm him from the security desk.

No. No tag. And the Banu was carrying a datapod. Duane felt his pulse quicken. After working as a security guard for eight years at the Behring Applied Technology labs he might actually be in the middle of his first real break-in. Don’t screw this up, Duane.

Calmly, Duane informed the Banu, “If you don’t have security tag, I have to ask you to accompany me to the lobby.”

“Your tag,” said the Banu nodding to the small purple badge on Duane’s chest. “Does it open the doors for all the laboratories?”

Duane slipped the baton from its loop and pressed the primer. “Last warning. This area is for authorized personnel only and I will remove you by force if necessary.”

The Banu simply tilted his head to the side and smiled wider. “Please look at me for the next five seconds. Thank you.”

Duane realized too late that he had forgotten to see if the Banu was alone.

“Damn it, Mas. I told you to wait,” Alex said as she peeled the still smoldering stun-glove off her hand and tucked it into her belt. She had to admit, Klanger had done a hell of a job designing the thing. Too bad the glove was destroyed after one use. Worth the money though, to be able drop someone near instantly. Next time she was on Spider she’d definitely need to see if there were any more for sale.

“You said wait till you found the key. We found the key,” Mas replied, setting the datapod gently on the ground.

“What if this idiot had comm’d for backup or triggered an alarm?”

The Banu shrugged. Alex knew it was useless arguing with Mas about things like this. He was one of the best hackers she had ever known, but trying to get him to stick to a plan was about as useless as trying to get a Vanduul to talk out an issue. Anyway, improvisation was the key to being a good data runner. Knowing that Mas was going to do whatever the hell he wanted had just become a standard part of all her plans.

“I believe he has done both,” Mas said as he rolled the guard onto his back.

It was then that Alex noticed the faint light blinking under the skin of the guard’s neck. Crap, she thought. A deadswitch. Behring must have wired up their security personnel with them. Something happens to one, the rest would soon be on their way. Time for more improvising.

“Can you hack it?”

“I can try,” replied Mas.

Reaching down, he turned the guard’s head to better expose the neck. Drawing a curved spoon-like blade from the small sheath hidden under his arm, Mas carved the deadswitch out. Alex barely avoided being sprayed by a pulse of blood.

As Mas connected a small silver connector cable from his pad to the flashing deadswitch beacon that now lay in a puddle on the floor, Alex used her Pyro to cauterize the wound closed. She had never been one to leave a body count behind. Not only was it sloppy and unnecessary, it tended to make the Advos try that much harder to track you down.

“Mas, instead of deactivating it, can you make it broadcast like the guard is still okay?”

The Banu nodded and continued to manipulate his pad with his long dexterous fingers.

Leaving him to work, Alex yanked the tag off the guard’s uniform and used it to access a janitor’s closet she had passed a few paces back. Sure enough, inside was a scrubber. She carried it back just as Mas was finishing.

“There,” said Mas, retracting the connector. “Healthier than ever.”

“Then let’s put him back on patrol.” She opened up the scrubber’s rear hatch and Mas dropped the bloodied beacon inside the refuse storage bin. A few presses later and the scrubber was happily cleaning its way down the hall. There was still a good chance that the few seconds the deadswitch had been active would be enough to send a security squad to investigate, but if they were lucky, the scrubber’s movements would be enough to convince anyone monitoring that it had been some kind of glitch. Either way, they needed to hurry.

The research lab gleamed with an immaculate shine that screamed money and danger. In Alex’s experience, the only reason that anyone ever kept a room this spotless was when a little bit of dirt would be enough to lose a fortune in research or get someone killed by accident. Of course, with the amount she had been promised for pulling this job, she expected nothing less.

Mas set the datapod down next to a bank of sleek white processors on the far end of the room. If their imposing size wasn’t enough to tell that they were important, the thick coil of cables running into the data hub would have been a dead giveaway. Just about every piece of tech in the place was wired to the computers. He lifted up an access junction and plugged in his silver cable.

“Any issues?” Alex asked.

The Banu swiped at his pad. “Only minimal protection. I believe they are counting on the building’s security to prevent access.”

Never underestimate the overconfidence that comes with owning a big fortress-like building.

After bypassing the preliminary security, Mas opened up a port and hooked the datapod into place. He settled in to extract the data and began humming Could Have Been You, a sure sign that he was lost in the code.

Alex strolled around the room rummaging through the work tables that were home to what she guessed were next generation Behring weapons. For the millionth time, she wished she knew exactly what was in the data they were accessing. The name alone wasn’t much to go by — ‘Project Stargazer’ — but the guy who hired them refused to tell them anything more. Alex still had doubts about whether it had been smart to accept his offer. Though, her suspicion was that the job had been less of an offer and more of an order.

The man, ‘Mr. Grouse,’ contacted them through the usual channels on the amateur ornithologist boards. After all his bonafides checked out, they met at a small cafe on the outskirts of Prime. He’d been easy to pick out thanks to the yellow hat he had promised to wear. Alex had done her normal procedure of arriving early and placing a small pinhole camera on the wall. It was a great way to scout a potential client before meeting and make sure they weren’t sweating too much or hiding an abnormal amount of guns. Neither applied to Grouse, though. He had been as calm as could be. Even more so, his skin had that artificially smooth look, a common side effect from some of the new facial reconfiguration surgical units. Which was surprising because who would choose to make their face that uninteresting? He was like the Human equivalent of elevator music. Even standing across the table from him, Alex had felt her eyes wander away from lack of interest. On second thought, she could see why being aggressively boring might be a good choice considering the work she assumed he did.

After a few minutes of observing him to make sure everything seemed on the up on up, she noticed him reach into his briefcase and pull out a small hand scanner. With a quick sweep of the cafe, he smiled when he spotted the mounted camera.

“Alexandria Dougan,” he had said in a calm, even voice. “I am ready to meet whenever you are.”

Well, that’s a first.

“And if I am not mistaken, that Banu over there wearing the sunhat is your partner Mas Houlan. Why don’t you have him join us so we can discuss our business together?”

A few moments later, her and Mas were listening patiently to Grouse explain that he wanted all the records of a research project completely deleted from the Behring Applied Technologies lab. Before she could even begin to protest, he had told them the payment. It was significantly higher than she would have even dared asked for, even on her most brazen of days. It was enough to put her and Mas on easy street and settle a lot of old debts.

It had made her really nervous.

That’s why she had decided that they would make copies of the project files before they erased all trace of them from the lab’s record. As the old saying goes, never trust a criminal.

About halfway through Mas humming The Day Ahead, the alarm went off. That was disconcerting, but not nearly half as much as the giant turrets that lowered from the ceiling. Alex held her breath, but rather than turn and fire on them, the two turrets took aim at the lab’s door.

It quickly dawned on her why they were still breathing. It wasn’t worth it to risk shooting up all the valuable equipment. The turrets were designed to stop anyone entering or exiting the lab. And stop with extreme prejudice if the large Behring logos on the ballistic guns were anything to go by.

“How much longer, Mas?” she shouted over the blaring alarm.

“The files have copied, but I will need some time to finish expunging the records.”

Okay, thought Alex, let’s see how much ammo these things have.

Reaching into her satchel, Alex brought out her Insta-Friends decoy. She primed it and slid the puck out into the killbox and covered her ears expectantly. A moment later, the decoy went off and the turrets sprang to life, raining bullets at the artificial targets. Got to love Joker Engineering. Half the time the stupid things didn’t work, but when they did, boy, did they work.

Eventually, the decoy died and the turrets spun down. The floor was completely chewed through. It looked like they had been designed to allow the rounds to penetrate rather than ricochet into the expensive tech. Right… ricochets. I probably should have thought of that first… Alex would have to remind Mas to make an extra offering to the God of Luck for her.

She had only brought one additional decoy and she had a feeling that the turrets had more than enough ammo to outlast it. What she needed was a way to force the Insta-Friends to last longer. Scanning the lab, she quickly found what she was looking for: a large half-built laser sat on one of the workbenches connected to an array of batteries. She momentarily considered using one of the lab’s experimental weapons to destroy the turrets but decided that she liked having all her limbs attached too much to mess with an unfinished laser. Instead, she used her Pyro to solder one of the batteries to the decoy and slid the heavy makeshift device into range of the turrets. Once again, the guns sprang to life. It wasn’t until the decoys had begun flickering away, the larger battery finally drained, that she heard the happy clicking whir of empty chambers attempting to fire.

“I am ready to go,” said Mas, strolling confidently through the still smoldering killbox with the datapod. Alex hurried to catch up.

They left the lab not a moment too soon. Drawn by the gunfire, a full squad of guards descended upon it just as Mas and Alex managed to round the corner out of view. One of the benefits of robbing a campus as big as Behring’s is that it took a while to move security into position. If she ever went straight, maybe she would get a job as a consultant and earn big credits pointing out all the dumb things companies did with their security systems.

Leaving the main research wing, the pair weaved their way back through the labyrinthine building to the executive’s office that they had entered through. Alex stopped them at every intersection to ping the path ahead. It would make them stand out on scanners, but it was safer than blindly stumbling into the roaming groups of armed guards.

Thankfully, when they arrived at the executive’s private hangar, it was unguarded and the Belligerent Duck remained just as they had left it. It was one of those interesting facts of life that powerful peoples’ private hangars are considered so off-limits, security guards assume criminals know not to land there too. That was why private hangars were usually one of the first things Alex looked for when she was casing a building. Plus, they usually had little free water bottles you could stock up with in case you got thirsty during a heist.

Alex brought up her mobi and unlocked the Mercury. Mas headed up the ramp straight for datastorage to make sure the pod was safely secured, while she made her way to the star runner’s cockpit.

The hangar doors opened above them and the Duck lifted into the air. The name still made her smile. She had chosen it to infuriate the cocky infoagent she had won the ship from. The pompous prick had the gall to name the ship Razor’s Edge. Now whenever he wanted to buy data off her, he had to comm the Belligerent Duck as a reminder that it didn’t pay to bet against Alex Dougan.

She eased the throttle forward and the ship’s wide swept-back wings cut easily through Terra’s calm atmosphere. A moment after leaving the hangar, the pleasant Crusader computer voice alerted her that they were being targeted. Sure enough, a Sabre with Behring livery was closing in on her tail. It must have launched when the alarm went off.

The comms chirped to life as they were hailed. “This is Behring Security. Land immediately or you will be shot down.”

Great. And it wouldn’t be long before the Terra police joined in. They needed a fast getaway.

“Mas, weapons, now.”

When they had first met, Mas had refused to do anything on the ship that didn’t involve hacking and computers claiming that it “was not his purpose.” It had been close to six months before Alex had stumbled upon a solution that had worked — she had hooked up a terminal from a busted simpod into the manned turret’s seat so that Mas could stare at a screen instead of out the window. That was all it took. Now he was a crack shot.

Mas slid into the weapons terminal, his long legs at the awkward angle all Banu were forced to adopt using Human seats. “How much should I explode them?”

“None! Knock out their radars and I’ll take care of the rest.”

Alex pulled hard and swung the Mercury wide giving Mas time to line up the distortion cannons. The Sabre reacted quickly enough to avoid the first and second salvos. Alex rolled at the last second to avoid their return fire. They were running out of time.

“Get missile lock,” said Mas.

“Mas, we’re not killing them!”

“No killing,” the Banu agreed. “Just a distraction.”

Decelerating till she saw red, Alex brought the ship to bear. After a heartbeat or two had thudded in her chest, she achieved lock and fired two missiles. The Sabre pilot, acting as expected, lit the sky with flares, pulling the missiles off course. Anticipating the brief distraction, Mas fired the turret again. The distortion cannons bit into the Sabre, disrupting its power. There was no way for it to maintain radar and stay flying after a hit like that.

Maxing out the thrusters for all they were worth, Alex sped the Duck away from Behring’s headquarters. However, rather than angling up to leave the planet, she angled the ship towards the nearby mountainous island range. There, she lowered the ship down into a small alcove cut into the beach beneath a rocky outcropping. Diverting power from the Mercury’s shields and thrusters, Mas booted up their reg-spoof. Now, they would be able to fly around incognito for a little while. Should be fine as long as no one looked too hard or took a shot at them. She hoped they weren’t the only ones in the area flying a Mercury today.

It was definitely not their cleanest escape. No way they were going to make the rendezvous now, but Grouse was just going to have to deal with the change in plans. Bringing up her mobi, Alex began a message to their network of contacts. Behring had a lot of credits to toss around. You rob someone like that and they usually made it worthwhile to hunt you down. Leaving the system wasn’t going to be enough. It wouldn’t be long before the Advocacy and a whole fleet of bounty hunters were breathing down their neck. If they wanted to get out of this in one piece they were going to need some extra help keeping an eye out. Hopefully a few of the friends her and Mas made over the years would be willing to lend a hand and alert them if they caught wind of the authorities closing in on the Duck.

Message sent. Now all they needed was somewhere they could hide out till things cooled off.

“Hey Mas, how would you feel about visiting your old Souli?”

TO BE CONTINUED