Dualed (23 page)

Is the ability to hire strikers their secret? Do they think their years of elite training will make them ready at all times? Are they being overly optimistic, or is it just fact? That it really is easier for them, simpler?

In the end, it still comes down to only one bullet, one slash. Skill, luck … in death, there isn’t much difference.

I double-check that I have everything. I pat my bag down, then my pockets, feeling for the comforting shapes of my weapons. The sounds of the girls’ voices fade as I step into the lobby, where I’m soon enveloped in the heavy scent of grease. It clings to my skin like a film. It makes my hunger come out of hiding.

I should eat.

I order a combo off the idle menu: burger and fries and syrup water. All of it is bland, filling without actually satisfying. It makes me wonder why I’m trying so hard to stay alive if I just end up eating total junk. Still, I stuff it down, trained against wasting anything. As I eat, I can’t miss the printed blurb on the tray liner:
REMEMBER NOTIFYING WARD CLEARING STAFF AFTER COMPLETION IS REQUIRED THANK YOU THE BOARD
.

When I’m done, I dump everything off my tray, liner and all.

My client’s workplace is only five blocks down, three blocks over. I’m there within minutes.

Forester Finance is just one of the many businesses housed in the tall building in front of me. One glance tells me there’s
at least thirty floors. Normally I would worry about having to go too high, because the higher I go, the longer it takes me to get back down and out. But going inside is not a factor—not this time, with this strike.

The assignment’s already ten days old. That’s how long my client tracked his Alt before deciding he couldn’t complete on his own. Not that the time has been wasted; he’s included enough details on the spec sheet to help me hunt down a hunter. The contents unspool in my mind like a well-read book, but it’s his notes from the last five days that are most significant.

And I will be—I just have to narrow down where.

“Time,” I say out loud as my eyes sweep the area once, twice.

16:48
.

Twelve minutes until the end of the workday … and I know it’s too good an opportunity for my strike to pass up. Routine or not, if he’s staking out the area on the off chance his Alt will give himself away, no way would he
not
wait outside his
workplace. He has nothing to lose by covering his bases and spending a few minutes here to see for himself that his Alt really didn’t go to work.

I decide on a trio of benches near the end of the path that leads to the main doors. Here I’ll have a clear view of what’s happening across the street—and of anyone there who’s also taking advantage of the unobstructed sight line to look back this way, watching and waiting for one person in particular to leave Forester Finance.

It’d be better if the benches were empty, but they’re not. A woman and two men occupy them. Three people to fool into thinking I’m someone I’m not: someone with time to waste. Someone waiting for a friend, or a boyfriend. Not a striker looking for her target.

Two quick, discreet slashes with the tip of the switchblade from my pocket as I walk over. I slip my thumbs into the holes in the sleeves of my new sweater, pulling at the fabric so it stays over my marks—even out in the open, I’m still hiding.

I sit down with an air of affected boredom, my bag hanging carelessly from one arm, my eyes carefully averted. To be noticed as an active would be acceptable; as an idle, I’d be even more nondescript. I pull out my cell, start punching out a text to myself. All the while, I’m aware of the revolving doors on my right, lazily shuffling people in and out, and the storefronts across the street on my left. A bank, a tablet distributor, a shop specializing in custom cells, a train stop.

The sun is lower, gleaming orange and sparkling off the edges of roofs. The edge of the barrier juts out into the sky, far off in the horizon, a giant black cuff.

Less than ten minutes now.

A Leyton Ward train pulls up to the station across the street and unloads a good dozen people. Around me, the benches clear as the lady and the two men get up, leaving to cross the street to board the train. I barely notice because my eyes are drawn to a couple making their way over from the train. They sit down on a now-vacant bench, whispering and laughing together, their shopping bags slipping to the ground as he holds her. They’re young, but not younger than twenty. Completes then. Beginning their lives, with the world at their feet.

How easy it would be for me to say something. That it doesn’t mean everything’s going to be perfect, no matter how much we want to believe it. That life could still suck, that accidents and just plain bad luck still happen.

But of course I don’t. Because I’m watching them and thinking of Chord and all that could still be possible for us … if only I could let it.

My shoulder’s sore. I wish I thought of taking that bottle of painkillers with me from the apartment in Gaslight. I want to believe I would have, if I hadn’t been so distracted thinking about Chord.

Then all thoughts wink out, carefully put away for another time. I see only the last person left standing at the train stop.

My client’s Alt. Eyes half-shielded by a hat pulled low over his forehead, cheeks slightly more hollowed than those in my client’s photo. I see the grip of his gun poking out from the top of his jeans as he lifts his arm to adjust his hat. He doesn’t hide the fact that he’s watching the building next to me.

Slowly, calmly, I tuck my cell back into my bag. Zip it up as
I run my fingers over all my pockets, checking as I always do. Yes, all there. I get to my feet, slide my bag on, check for traffic both ways, and step off the curb.

I’m still torn, even as I start walking. Use my gun, maintain a safe distance, call attention to myself. Or use my blade, a fast, clean stab or slash, hope he lets me get close enough.

Or … throw my blade. No risk of a PK since he’s alone. No explosive boom. Only a flick of my wrist, a spin of steel, then simple retrieval of the weapon. Something I’ve done many times over.

Except—

Except—

I don’t know if I can do it.

I can still see the look in her eyes—my first strike—knowing she’s about to die, not fast, not clean, but painfully, slowly, and by my hand.

My hand, which now twitches against my leg. It slips free of my sleeve and reaches into my jacket pocket.

For my gun.

The decision’s as fast as a breath, as fresh as a new bruise, and I’m only ten feet away with my hand already on the grip of my gun, drawing it out and up, my finger starting to squeeze the trigger with nothing in my sight except the vulnerability of his chest, when—

A girl darts out of the store behind him and runs, laughing and calling out my client’s name, leaping for his Alt—

He turns at the sound, a snap of the head as fast as a reflex, as he tries to catch her—

Both of them, tilting forward, my strike, his distraction—

And I’m too late to take it back, too late to stop the bullet.
It hits the girl in the side. She spins from the force of it, falls to the ground, my strike going down beneath her.

My heart pounding furiously beneath my tainted skin, barely contained by my traitorous bones and inferior muscles, as I run up to see what I’ve done. Never before have I been so far off, miscalculated so badly, as to do a PK. Like Taje … like my mother.

But I can breathe again. Because she’s not dead, or dying, just wounded. Flesh wound, shallow, not fatal. Her hand’s clasped around her side, blood trickling through her fingers, but already she’s trying to sit up, already she’s trying to figure out what happened. Coherent enough, though she stares blankly at me, a dazed expression on her face.

My strike, looking up to meet my eyes as I turn toward him. And I can tell he’s not confused at all about who I am, why I’m there.

I lift my gun again, point it again. I don’t miss again.

Whatever relief I felt at the girl still being alive disappears. Has to in order to make room for dull, plodding determination, which will see me through this completion.

I lean down to check for a pulse. There is none. In the utter relaxation of death, his neck feels as soft as a little boy’s. And his eyes are absolutely clear again.

I walk away, texting my client for the rest of my payment, reminding him to call clearing.

The sky is charcoal gray, almost fully dark. I don’t think of much except that I need to keep moving. Soon I’ve left the business core and find myself closing in on Leyton’s suburbs.
It would have been faster to catch the train on Fortis, but I couldn’t. Too close to the scene.

And I’m too tired to get out of the ward tonight, I decide. I can sleep here as well as anywhere. Probably safer, too … farther from the Grid, from her.

Now I need to find a place to crash. There aren’t many houses around here, only luxury apartments and high-rises for the most part. The lack of individual front entrances makes finding an empty much more difficult; if I even can get inside, it means wandering around all the floors hoping to find something, and still possibly ending up with nothing. I keep walking for a bit, wondering if I should simply suck up my fatigue and head back to Jethro. Then I see a clearing vehicle parked at the corner. In front of an apartment building that might very well be the site of a recent completion.

Drawing closer, I can hear the two crew members talking as they fill out the claim info on their Board-issued cells. They’re standing at the side of the truck, and as I pass by, I bend down to tie my shoe.

“So we’re at capacity right now, and the other ward vehicles are on site elsewhere.” It’s a lady speaking, tall and thin, her voice brusque. She’s still keying information into her cell as she talks to her coworker, an older man with a slicked-back ponytail and arms the size of small tree trunks. “We’ll have to come back in the morning.”

“The body will be okay left in there overnight?” he grunts as he secures a full gurney to the interior so it won’t roll.

She shrugs. “It’s not going anywhere. And her Alt’s already
free and clear. We’ll just lock up, put the tag out, and come back tomorrow.”

“Whatever you say, boss,” he answers. He grabs a white tag from a hook inside the truck and twirls it around his finger. “Be right back.”

“I’ll just finish wiring everything over,” the lady says to him as he starts toward the lobby doors.

But I barely hear her, because I’m walking fast now, staying ahead of her coworker. Thoughts are a flurry in my head. Only seconds to get ready.

By the time he gets there, I’m standing directly in front of the doors. My bag dangles off one hand and I’m searching inside with the other. Muttering to myself just loud enough for him to hear me.

“Where did I put them?” I shake my head in disgust. “I know I couldn’t have left them inside. So stupid of me …”

“You live here?” the guy asks me.

I look up, hoping my feigned surprise reaches my eyes. “Um, yeah, but I can’t find my keys.”

“Well, I have to get inside, so …” He stops talking, clearly waiting for me to move to the side.

“Oh—
oh!
” I slide over hastily. “Sorry, I’m in your way.”

“It’s fine.” He enters the Board-issued master key code and the lock tumbles, gives. He steps in, keeping the door open for me.

I take the door from him with a nod of thanks, feeling relief break through me like a cool tide. Almost there. He makes his way to the elevator, presses the call button, and I bend down, pretending to fumble with my bag. Only when the elevator
doors open do I start walking again, following him inside just as the doors shut behind me. Make sure to let him punch the button for his floor first.

Ninth.

Again, not ideal. A higher floor means it will take longer to get down and out later.

The doors shut. I press the button for the tenth floor.

He gets off at the ninth floor without looking behind him. I’m of no importance, just another resident in another building in which another idle has become an incomplete and must now be tagged.

When the elevator doors open on the tenth floor, I step out and walk all the way down the hall until I get to the side exit. I push the door open and take the stairs down one flight. Reenter on the ninth, just in time to see the back of the crew member disappear into the elevator. The doors shut behind him and I’m alone on the floor, left to search in peace.

It turns out to be apartment 934. The white tag hangs limply from the front door. A press of my wrist through Chord’s disrupter and the lock springs open. I slip the tag off, hang it on the knob inside, and flip the switch for the secondary lock.

The entrance hall opens up to a kitchen and a small front room on the right, and another, shorter hallway ends in a bedroom on the left. Small but clean—definitely one of the nicer empties I’ve ever found.

In the kitchen, the cupboards aren’t too bad, so I’ll have to remember to load up before leaving. I eat two slightly bruised apples from the fruit bowl on the counter and a few slices of bread from the loaf in the fridge. I finish off a bag of
mini-brownies that don’t contain an ounce of real chocolate, and wash all of it down with thinned milk.

In the bedroom, the body of the incomplete lies crumpled in one corner, a bedsheet hastily thrown over her so only her feet show. The work of her Alt, since clearing hasn’t been inside yet. Her toenails are painted in jaunty blue-and-black stripes.

I want to think she wouldn’t have minded an overnight guest.