Somnus V - Chapter 33

Kat shifted slightly as she looked in the mirror. The suit was perfectly tailored to fit her, but somehow it just didn’t look or feel right. She’d experimented with it earlier, and the clothier had done exactly as she asked, ensuring that Kat could move quickly and smoothly despite the formal outfit. There wasn’t anything wrong that she could point to, but the entire get up seemed unnatural to her.

 Whippoorwill slipped in behind her, wrapping her arms around Kat’s stomach and resting her chin on her shoulder. Almost immediately, some of the discomfort from staring at her overly formal reflection faded. Kat could feel herself smiling, but she didn’t really remember when the expression had slipped over her face.

 “Don’t worry about it too much,” Whip whispered. “We’ve spent the past month preparing. VodCom probably has some fabricated evidence, but there’s no way that they have enough to actually get a ruling in their favor. Belle’s scary like that.”

 Kat reached down, putting her right hand over where Whippoorwill’s were clasped around her stomach. The warmth of her girlfriend’s fingers seemed to dispel some of the built up concern that had been weighing down on her for the past week.

 Her intuition flashed, and somehow Kat knew that this was a moment she would remember. These couple seconds of quiet reflection as she leaned back slightly into Whippoorwill and let all of her worries fade away.

 Memory was strange like that. Time turned it into a blur of rounded edges and pastel colors, but here and there something stuck out. A moment teaching Michelle how to read. Her mom laughing at a stupid joke back when her father was still alive.

 There wasn’t really anything special about those memories. They weren’t of life-changing importance or particularly traumatic, but for some reason they mattered more and managed to weather the passage of time unchanged.

 “What makes you think I’m worrying?” She asked, leaning her head slightly to lean it against Whippoorwill’s.

 Whip snorted, a puff of air that blew some of Kat’s hair to the side.

 “I have eyes,” Whip answered. “We’ve lived together for too long for me not to realize when you’re nothing but a ball of anxiety. I love you Kat but you’re an idiot sometimes. Most people don’t look at the world with all of its broken edges and irregularities and think ‘I’ll fix everything.’ Sometimes you need to learn to let go. You put too much on yourself.”

 A gentle wave of warmth rolled over Kat as Whippoorwill’s words sunk in. Whip usually was. Still, as much as Kat wanted to let everything slip away, that wasn’t the way the world worked. There were problems that only she could solve. As much as she wanted to turn and run away sometimes, that would mean abandoning everyone else to Millenium and the stallesp’s tender mercies.

 She couldn’t do that to her friends and family. Whippoorwill, Michell, her mother, Jasper, Emma, and even Belle didn’t deserve that.

 Kat’s thoughts paused. Why did she think of Belle? The older woman was a valuable ally to be sure, but she was incredibly dangerous. You might feed and care for a feral dog, but that didn’t make it any safer for you to turn your back on it.

 “I’ll try, but-” Kat replied, letting her eyes close and focusing on the sensation of Whippoorwill gently pressed up against her back. “There are some things that only I can do Whip, and the only way I can do them is to become strong enough that the other companies can’t help but pay attention to me. That means that they’re going to come after me. None of them want the current order to change, and I’m the avatar of that change.”

 The hands around Kat’s stomach squeezed a little tighter, sinking very slightly into her suit and muscles.

 “I know, but be careful,” Whip whispered. “I don’t want to stop you from pursuing your dreams Kat. I know that you’ll turn Earth into a better place once you have the power to do so, but every time I see you get wrapped up in all this corporate violence and intrigue, it scares the heck out of me.”

 “I don’t know why it was different when you were just an infiltrator and I was just a hacker,” she continued quietly. “People were shooting at us constantly and we were always a half second away from death or dismemberment, but it didn’t seem to matter. My adrenaline was pumping and it felt like I was only risking my life, and after growing up in the Shell? Well, the life of a girl that grew up on the street was cheap. Gambling that a corporate goon wouldn’t be able to fry my nervous system as I sliced into their network for a couple of credits seemed like a good deal at the time.”

 “Now-” Whip’s voice trailed off slightly only for Kat to fill in, completing her sentence.

 “Now you have something to lose, Whip. It’s the same for me. When I was a runner, I knew that I might die, but it wasn’t like anyone would come after my family if something went wrong. Honestly? I don’t want to die, but I’m not really scared of it. What I’m scared of is one of the big corporations trying to hurt you or my mother or sister.”

 Whippoorwill squeezed her one more time before stepping away. Kat opened her eyes, turning to look at her girlfriend. Whip was wearing a suit like hers, slightly slimmer and with two buttons rather than three on the blazer, but she looked just as out of place as Kat did, but it hardly mattered.

 None of that mattered though. Whip’s eyes were shining and she was smiling. For that one moment, she seemed as radiant as the sun and Kat could feel warmth pulsing off of her.

 “Then don’t Kat,” Whippoorwill said, her voice growing firm. “Don’t lose me. You’ve prepared for this arbitration for weeks, and VodCom isn’t going to know what hit them. Go in there and rip them apart. They might think that you’re weak and indecisive because you’re a new shareholder, but they didn’t grow up the way we did. You’re one of the best samurai in the world Kat. You might not have any cybernetics, but bleed chrome the same way the rest of us do. You are not a pushover. You grew up risking your life in knife fights while all of these suits hid behind expensive desks in boardrooms. Show them who you are. Show them the price of crossing you. I’ll be right behind you the entire time.”

 Kat stepped forward, wrapping her arms around Whippoorwill before planting a quick kiss on her cheek. When she broke away, all of her anxiety had disappeared like fog in the sun, and for the first time in an hour, her heart was beating at a regular rate.

 “Let’s go,” she said with a smile, turning and walking toward the door to her suite.

 Four guards stood outside, ugly carbines made of hybrid tech clutched closely to their chests. Almost the moment they moved into the hotel highway, Heather got up from a couch to join them, a rifle of her own slung over her back.

 Her chief of security nodded at Kat before leading the two of them down to the waiting motorcade just outside the hotel’s entrance. Another dozen guards stood by in the open, watchful eyes scanning the glass and steel skyscrapers nearby as if they might be able to spot a would-be assassin through the labyrinth of towering buildings.

 Much more effective were the trio of armored cars that surrounded Kat’s limousine. Each one of them had a turret made of transparent metal and staffed by corporate security. More importantly, they had sensor arrays capable of identifying individual insects as soon as they crossed the two hundred pace threshold. Any attack would meet a wall of crude and energy inefficient deflectors that would keep Kat safe just long enough for her guards to whisk her to safety.

 She ducked her head slightly, entering the limo just in front of Whippoorwill and Heather. There was one security officer still inside, a young man wearing a suit and handgun rather than the heavy combat armor and advanced weaponry of the rest of their team.

 “Dorrik will be meeting us at the Hall of Arbitration,” Heather said as the three of them settled in. “He has a smaller team guiding him as he takes in the sights of Morgan Holdings Presents! Manhattan.”

 “Has our intelligence network picked up anything?” Kat asked, glancing out at the skyscrapers through her tinted window. “Ice Cobra could be anywhere, and she’s uncomfortably good at trying to kill me. I’d rather our next encounter be me finding her rather than vice versa.”

 “Nothing,” Heather replied glumly, “and frankly, that scares me more than direct evidence of her trying to pull something. Morgan Holdings Presents! Manhattan is as quiet as a mouse right now. Of course, a proper search is almost impossible without using VodCom’s communication network, but we’ve put together a couple teams with encrypted radios to help smooth things out. Still, as best I can tell, all you should need to worry about is the media going wild. It’s not often that one of the megacorporations sues the other, and the entertainment channels are treating this as the trial of the century. We’ve already had three assassination scares that just turned out to be paparazzi trying to sneak a drone close enough to snap a picture of you and Whippoorwill.”

 “She’s going to try,” Kat said softly. At her side, Whip reached down to squeeze her hand. “Call it pessimism or call it a samurai’s intuition, but Cobra has taken a swing at me every time I’ve left the compound. No evidence just means that she’s better at hiding her trail than our investigators are at finding it.”

 “My thoughts exactly,” Heather said unhappily. “Morgan Holdings Presents! Manhattan is one of the safest cities in the world. Morgan Holdings’ security is everywhere and they’re monitoring everything. It’s one of the reasons that the mega rich use it as a networking hub and vacation spot, it’s the only place where they’re safe from their rivals.”

 “But that security is all using VodCom’s telecommunication equipment,” Whippoorwill responded pensively.

 “Exactly,” Heather said with a sigh. “Even when they aren’t talking, I bet that VodCom will know where each and every electronic device tapped into their network is. No security network is impregnable, and if a motivated infiltrator has access to both your planning and the real time location of all your guards? Well, it’s hard to think of a more efficient way to compromise it.”

 “Delightful,” Kat replied. “We’ve found a way around VodCom tracking us, right?”

 “That’s where Agent Kell comes in,” Heather replied, nodding toward the man next to them. “All three of our smartglasses have been modified. You might notice a slight lag on any queries, but that’s because we are no longer connected directly to the network. Instead, our signals are being routed through Agent Kell’s system which is designed to replicate our signatures to make them seem like he is with us at all times. If anything starts to happen, Agent Kell is under orders to split from our team in an attempt to draw the assassins away from you.”

 The young man’s face tightened slightly, but he said nothing. Working as a decoy would likely be a death sentence. Kat didn’t know what Kell had done wrong or right to get such a vital but deadly job, but she couldn’t help but feel a twinge of pity for him.

 Below her, the leather thrummed as the limousine started up. Its engine was perfectly silent, the product of stallesp technology mixed with the finest terrestrial electric motors. Whippoorwill shot Kat a smile, and she smiled back.

 A couple seats away, Heather settled back into her chair, eyes losing focus as she used her smartglass to activate the convoy’s defense network. Kat opened her mouth to say something before catching herself. There was no way that Heather would complain, but a conversation now would distract her and make her job harder. Given the outstanding terrorists that had made attempt after attempt on her life, Kat decided that it would be better for everyone if she let the security chief focus on her job.

 They traveled in silence for almost five minutes before Heather stiffened. Neither Whip nor Kell noticed it the first time, but when both of Heather’s hands balled up into fists, it was hard to ignore that something was happening.

 Before Kat could think to ask a question, a loud bang shook the car followed by a rattling hiss that she recognized as one of the high speed, low caliber bullets that the limo’s point defense system used on larger projectiles.

 A second later Heather relaxed, shaking her head slightly as she leaned forward to look at the other residents of the limousine.

 “Target is neutralized,” she said quietly. “We think that it was a news drone from one of the less reputable entertainment networks. Car Alpha shot it out of the sky and we used the close in weapons systems to sweep away any of its debris before it could get near us. Every once in a while a particularly wily assassin will fill the chassis of their drone with explosives so that they can take out a target once they relax after a ‘failed attempt.’

 “There wasn’t any reaction,” Heather continued, “but there are a number of other drones outside our cordon. None of them are taking hostile moves but we’re keeping an eye on them.”

 Kat shifted slightly in her chair, the expensive leather of her seat suddenly feeling rough and clinging to the fabric of her pants. Across from her, Agent Kell’s face grew even tighter.

 Ice Cobra hadn’t given up on her. There was no question in Kat’s mind about that. If the other infiltrator had access to VodCom’s communication network, she’d be able to find some weakness in Kat’s defenses. Between Nina, Baker, and Heather, they’d done their best to shore up any gaps they could find in her armor, but defending was different from hunting a target herself.

 Kat’s mind flickered back to her own days as an infiltrator. The prep phase could easily take days, mapping out an objective, figuring out the routes that guards took, the types of security present, and the access points that Whippoorwill would be using to compromise the network. More than that, it would take time for Whip to fine tune and customize her slicing programs for the specific-

 “Whip,” Kat said, her thoughts spiraling down a worrying path. “You said that someone used the VodCom communication nodes to break into the laboratory security like it was nothing, right?”

 “At least until I completely isolated the network,” Whippoorwill replied. “We can still get data out, but it’s only via daily manual downloads. It frustrates the scientists to no end because they can’t communicate with their colleagues in real time, but most of the folks they’re authorized to speak about their research with are inside the compound so they got used to it. It still doesn’t stop them from complaining, but there hasn’t been a serious drop in morale.”

 “Crap,” Kat responded unhappily. “We’ve been so focused on stopping Ice Cobra and minimizing our exposure to VodCom tapping out network that we didn’t think about her having a partner. There’s a hacker out there that’s inhumanely talented. We should assume that any electronics that have any outside connections are compromised.”

 “Crap,” Whippoorwill agreed, brow furrowing s she tried to full process the impact of Kat’s words. Then, she winced visibly. “Double crap.”

 “Heather,” Whip continued, her eyes clouding slightly as she stared blankly off into space, her mind occupied by the electronic world of her cybernetic implants. “I need this message delivered to the laboratory and we can’t use the VodCom network. It’s urgent. We need it in the computer security department’s hands as soon as possible.”

 Whippoorwill reached up to her neck. With a click, she pulled a tiny chip made of copper and steel out of her implant. Without any further preamble she offered it to the security chief.

 “The laboratory is in Chiwaukee,” Heather said slowly, reaching out a hand to accept the fingernail sized chip. “Morgan Holdings Presents! Manhattan is almost a day away. We can get it there by tomorrow morning.”

 “By lunch,” Whippoorwill replied, her voice serious. “Unless I miss my guess, VodCom is going to try and fabricate evidence. Normally, that would be them asking for trouble. Between our experts and the arbitration office’s auditors, someone would catch a mistake and it would lead to heavy sanctions, but given what we’ve seen already from their corporate espionage department.”

 “By lunch it is,” Heather said with a frown. “I don’t know exactly how we’ll manage it, but I’ll send a runner with the chip as soon as we reach the arbitration court.”

 Kat blew out a shaky breath. If VodCom could fake evidence all bets were off. The only advantage that she had left was that the megacorp didn’t know that she was aware of their interference. If they could prove that some of the evidence was fake, that would be all they needed to win the entire court case, but VodCom could simply fabricate its own reports in real time, that was a tall task.

 Her mind whirred. Of course, that was only an advantage if VodCom didn’t know that Whippoorwill had managed to figure out that they were tapping the network, and that was in jeopardy now that the results of the auditor’s report on the refineries had come back. VodCom had to know that Belle and her had pulled a fast one on them.

 WIth that knowledge, any competent attorney would be tearing through their entire case, trying to look for spots where GroCorp managed to hide a key detail from them. There was no promise that VodCom would manage to find any of her important evidence, but at the same time, now that they were looking, there was no promise that Kat’s trump cards would remain intact.

 Suddenly the arbitration proceedings took on a much more menacing turn. Kat had been prepared to walk into the courtroom like a conductor, always one step ahead of her opponents as her attorney led them into missteps and traps created by their overreliance on stolen data, but now-

 The limousine stopped before she could finish the thought. Agent Kell opened the door, taking a step out into the sunshine with a hand on a bulge in his suit that was clearly a firearm of some sort.

“Clear,” he called out after a second, stepping aside to reveal a massive stone staircase that led to a row of marble pillars. Just behind them were a pair of massive doors made from polished wood.

For a second, the doorway was obscured as Heather stepped out in front of Kat. Then, Kat followed her security chief outside.

The moment she was out in the open, shouted questions bombarded her from every side. Walls of reporters, each kept about ten paces away by security from the arbitration court screamed and pressed toward her. Some were asking for her to give a comment on the pending lawsuit while others were begging her to pause so they could take a picture. A couple were even asking her to clarify her relationship with Whippoorwill.

Kat took a deep breath and brushed past them, letting her personal security team clear the way. The trial would be starting in under an hour, and she didn’t have any time to get distracted by the paparazzi. If there was ever a time for her to lock in, it was now.
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