As we walk back to the station, Aria asks, “That was Henry, wasn’t it?”
“Yeah, it was,” I say. She gives me a look. “Why does it matter? If he helps us finish this, then…”
“Then, he’ll pull you right back in. If not him, then he’ll get someone to do it. He thinks so highly of you. But I don’t know how he will, but he will.''
“That sounds like the city, doesn’t it? We have to leave, but Somerset always pulls you right back in. What more does it have to offer us? What more will it take from us?”
She looks down at the ground and sighs. “I don’t know. I. don’t. know.” Suddenly, she stops, and so do I. She grabs my hands and she looks into my eyes. “After this is all done, take us wherever. I don’t care where we go. Take us to Antarctica, take us to California, take us to Mars, it doesn’t matter. I don’t want you to leave me again. I don’t want them to take you.”
“They won’t. I won’t let them, not again.”
“That means you have to let go of Henry,” she says, with a deeper tone than usual. She lets go of my hands and she starts walking again.
“I know,” I say in a whisper.
The beach transport station always impresses me with its ornate beauty. Somehow it managed to get built in a time where sleek and minimalist architecture was the prevailing style. Only recently did classical and beautiful architecture see a resurgence. Stone walls, not glass. Marble pillars instead of concrete. Murals where advertisements would have gone. Local musicians playing the piano. But still, it had all the modern amenities one could want.
It takes a few minutes to arrive at our home stop. A nice, little platform with shelter. Some conveniences. Coffee dispenser. Other stims available too, but you have to have a script for that. Infrared heater when its cold. A few benches. And from there, it takes a few minutes to get to our low-rise, nestled in a bustling village.
***
Aria is asleep when I get out of the shower. I watch her and her soft shallow breaths, thinking if I should wake her before I leave or if I should let her sleep some more. Moments pass by and I walk out the front door.
The sun lays beneath the horizon for now, but it’s not long before it wakes the village. It’s turning the black night into a deep blue dawn. Not many people are up. Those that are, are those dressed in suits or coveralls. The smell of fresh bread, cigarettes, and diesel linger in the air. Trucks, cargo vans, and luxury sports cars emerge from the underground garage and onto the cobblestone street. The workhorses do this by necessity and the suits do this out of luxury.
While walking towards the taxi stand, I hear a vehicle stopping behind me. A bigger vehicle, maybe a van. I look in the street and sure enough, there’s a van. The driver rolls down the window and reveals a familiar face. He asks if I need a lift. A familiar voice. So, I tell him yeah and I walk over to him and I get in.
“Been a while, you good?” He asks. Franco is his name, I believe, or is it Bronco? I don’t know. I’ve seen him hundreds of times. I’ve helped him move his wife in and out, and his second one in. The picture on the dashboard shows he hasn’t moved on to a third yet. Weird as it is, we just never formally introduced ourselves.
“Good, good,” I say. “You?”
“Good,” he says. “So where ya headed?”
“Guy named Roche. Ro-chay as he likes to say. Heard of em?”
“Roche. So he’s a roach, then?”
“Yep.”
“Never heard of the guy. Got something to do with your disappearance?”
“How did-”
“Aria. Nobody listened bout you being gone. Not the cops n not the media. As far they were concerned, you vanished, a ghost, but you were okay because no one found a body that matched your profile,” he says and looks over at me. “One outta two.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You look awful, man. Like you got attacked by a vampire. Looking like life sucked was right outta ya. And that scar there on ya arm,” he says. “I seen before. Where Roche live?”
He comes to a stop before we leave the neighborhood, and I tell him he’s by the docks, with a pad that has access to Ottaburr.
“Got an easy escape,” he muses. “Tell ya what, it’s right by work, and I’ll help ya corner the rat.”
“The roach,” I say. He shrugs. It doesn’t make much difference to him, of course, but as far as I’m aware, secrecy is his best trait. But to a guy like Franco, rats and roaches must be exterminated. “If you wanted to know why I need talk to him is because he’s the Pharma Lord of Somerset. Say Salus developed a profitable yet dangerous experimental drug, a drug a hundred or even a thousand times worse then the poison they sell over the counter, they’d sell it through Roche and people like him.”
“Sounds like you can’t jus knock on his door,” he says.
“He’s got an open-door policy. The good doctor wouldn’t deny a potential customer,” I say. “He has access to the newest, innovative tech. If you even think about harming him, the next thing going through your mind would be an electrical pulse, frying your brain. Failing that, it’d be a bullet.”
Franco nods and says, “Can’t help there. Gotta ask, what he gotta do with you?”
“Well, someone drugged me. The drugs on my toxo has Salus’ fingerprints all over it and since Roche’s partnership is with Salus…”
“I see,” he says. “How will you get him to give up the buyer?”
“I have a way, but I’ll need your help.”
***
“You,” says Roach in much surprise as he finds me lounging on his leather couch. Smells brand new. Must’ve had an… incident very recently. “How-”
“Am I still living?” I ask. He doesn’t need to play dumb, because likely the client took me here to get a full body analysis. Bloodwork. Mental acuity. Stuff like that.
“Can I?” He asks. From my arcplay, I flick the toxo onto his screens. Death is the last thing he wants because after all, he can’t make money off the dead. Well, that is unless he’s contracted to do so, which is what happened in my case from his response. He says nothing for a few minutes, only emitting the sounds of hemming and hawing, as he flips through the results. “Only came-to a couple days ago, hmmm. Wasn’t supposed to happen.”
"The drugs were suppose to be active until I was dead?”
“Correct,” he says. “They were supposed to kill you. Apologies. Hope you understand.”
“Business is business,” I say. And I hand him a letter that was in Henry’s second folder. “Business is business.”
To be served a hand-written letter, by a guy you were contracted to kill, could only mean terrible news. He doesn’t open it and instead makes a face looking for an answer.
“Your mother-”
“Stop,” he says. “What do you want to know? You get to ask one question, and the answer will be off the record, in a bunker. Say anything more besides the question, ask more than one question, and I will kill you. I will do it slowly. Business is business. Apologies. But they made it personal and you are the messenger. So I’d be very careful with what you say. With that said…”
***
As I awake, we’re going through what looks like an old high-school. I’m in a wheelchair, pushed by someone with cybernetic gorilla arms. Roche is in front. There are sounds of footsteps, slamming doors, and voices. Roche doesn’t seem to be concerned, even unsure if he’s heard them. Then, we go through a locker room and through the gym. Still the noises remain, but they’re getting more and more distant. Some lights flicker, some are dead, and some are bright, so bright that they seem to have been recently changed.
After the gym, we reach the pool room. It is the one I saw when I woke up from the summer slumber. The bodies, the blood, seemed to have been cleaned up, however. Gurneys, vials, monitors, and stuff like that remain, the stuff that makes me certain that I’ve been here, even as groggy as I am.
And then another hallway, one that leads into the cafeteria. The noises occur again, and this time, Roche hears them. He whips around and yells if he anyone is there. He shoots a warning shot and the noises stop. From then, we hurry through the cafeteria and the kitchen, and finally, into the walk-in cold storage. There’s a medical chair there, with blood stains running down and into the drain.
Without a word, the cyborg man picks me up and straps me into the chair. My limbs are virtually useless, but my mind is awake now. The man then goes outside and shuts the door.
Roche turns to me and says, “Now, what is it that you want to know? Remember the rules now. One question. I will be fair if you formulate it in a certain way, you survived when you shouldn’t have, I don’t know how. I don’t know why. So I’m treating your survival was an act of God.”
“Hmmm,” I mutter. A weird, tingling, stinging sensation goes through my throat and jaw. The same sensation goes through my face in general. I say slowly, “Can you tell me everything you know about the person who is responsible for bringing me to you?”
If I had asked “who brought me to you?” then I’m sure I would have gotten the name and that’s it. Likely no good information if I didn’t say “responsible”, because the one responsible could’ve sent a merc to escort me. But now to see if truly he is a man of his word. As twisted as he is and his version of God, he is the most honest man in power in Solton, maybe even in the nation.
“Very well,” he says. He paces around the chair, hands clasped behind his back. “The person who brought you here, is dead as you may have guessed. They are a dead end, literally, and of no use to you. I personally killed him. He was of no use to me. He could not be saved. It makes me glad you asked the way you did.
“So, the person responsible for bringing you to me? I don’t know. I do know who hired the merc. They are still alive, as far as I am aware. Her name is Isla Carver. She is the right-hand to Julius Cannon. She is a sweetheart, reverent, even in backroom dealings, but ambitious and stubborn. She gets her way not through seduction or force, but through hope. Her hands, until now, have been clean.”
He stops behind me, but I don’t have a clue as to what’s he is doing.
“Thank you,” I say.
“I wouldn’t be so sure of that.”