Pirandello/Kruger (Part 2)

Faith quickly jogged to the row of keyboards and screens. The clock was ticking, and she needed to find out what was behind that door before the whole facility realized there was a Runner inside.

Most of the screens were on idle, displaying the PK logo bouncing back and forth. As soon as she touched the keyboard, they all lit up. No passwords, no security, not even so much as a login. At first, she couldn't believe it, but then she thought that maybe PK wouldn't expect anyone to get this far into their facility, although something warned her in the back of her mind that it shouldn't be this easy; she expected a SWAT team to burst in any second.

She dug around the interface until she found a search feature, then punched in Icarus. The result was nearly instantaneous. The screen began to spit out files; text documents, photos, spreadsheets, almost any type of format she was familiar with. Dozens, if not hundreds of files scrolled past and kept going.

"Jackpot Merc," she relayed back. "I think this is the nerve center."

"Whatchya find?" His voice was laced with static. The walls around her must have been thick, even if he had boosted the signal.

"Gimme a sec."

She began with the first files the computer returned and opened them. Nothing but useless spreadsheets that looked like bank statements, others that looked like zoning permits or construction forms, all sanctioned by Callaghan Construction. She moved on to the image files next. The first few were just a couple of snapshots of the city. There were a few locations she recognized; Spaetz Plaza, Harborside Walk, a cut of downtown and the Financial District…all great areas to run, but nothing seemed to be that significant about them. The next few were something that looked like a couple of blueprints for a construction project, stamped with the CC company logo and labeled 'ICR Training'. Something small scale, less than a city block.

"It's all just…plans," she said flatly, paging through more of the same. "Pictures, graphics, money transfers, and a couple of snapshots of the city, places we usually pass through. Like maybe they're trying to get a sense of our routes? And they're building something, too. Whatever it is, they're calling it a training ground."

Merc snorted. "What are they training 'em for? What's left in this city that they haven't been able to tax, ban, or regulate? What the hell's left, huh?"

Faith opened the next image, and that's when it all started to fall into place.

A familiar face materialized on screen. Mid-thirties, dark hair, a soldier's build that was now fine-tuned for speed. She didn't see him nearly as much as Merc.

"Drake?" It was his old Air Force picture from before he was discharged.

"You broke up for a sec, what about Drake?"

Faith accessed the next file. This time, a snapshot of Merc appeared. He was about ten years younger, clean cut. The image was stamped property of Eastside Engineering, his life before becoming a Runner.

She started to access the next files, a pit beginning to grow in her stomach. Kreeg's old Marine photo. Celeste's mug shot from juvie detention from before she combed her hair back and shaved the sides. Then Leaf's pink dye-job, then Jace's dark, narrow features, Trance's hastily-dyed blonde Mohawk with brown roots, Genesis's snaking digital tat across her eyes…more Runners panned by, and finally, there was herself, a picture taken from some camera on some rooftop she no longer remembered. A time before the Runner logo was permanently etched around her eye.

The pictures lined the monitors, each of them detailing their appearance and distinctive features, their possible known whereabouts and possible family. But all of them bore the same text that made her blood run cold:

Terminate on sight.

"Oh God," she breathed as she realized what she was looking at. "Merc…"

"Faith, what's wrong?"

"This Project Icarus…Pirandello/Kruger isn't bolstering the police. They're being trained…to come after us. The Runners. All of us!"

"What?"

"We're what's left Merc. They're targeting us!"

The pictures, the diagrams, the training ground blueprints; it was all to start training cops and enforcers to take out the Runners. Every day, either the CPF or PK was responding faster and faster, showing up at just the wrong time, like they had been lying in wait. What else would all this data be used for? Why else would the Blues and PK enforcers be shooting on sight with heavy artillery? How else did they know where to ambush them on their routes?

She started tearing through the files again. There had to be more. Some link to Kate, some detail that would tie it all together. Her name was listed beneath her picture, but even if it was to draw her out, there had to be something more specific. Why Kate, why a cop, and why Robert Pope?

"Look Faith, you've done enough, you need to get the hell out of there, like right now."

Not yet. Not until she found what she was looking for. She couldn't leave empty handed. There was nothing she could do to take any of what she was seeing with her, if it would even help. Her thoughts drifted back to Miller for a second; was he in on this? If he was, how far did extend into the CPF?

She was browsing files so fast that she almost missed it. A grainy video feed popped up, and just as it was replaced with another spreadsheet, her digging ground to a halt. It wasn't what she saw, it was who. She pulled the feed back up. It looked like a simple security camera, but the timestamp was current.

"Merc, it's that guy, the guy from the mall!" Ropeburn's professional, the one who led her into the ambush at New Eden. The video feed was overlooking the deck of a ship, or a pier, or something else loaded with freight containers. The harbor stretched behind him. "There's a surveillance feed here. He's a on a boat, looks like the harbor. I can barely make out the ship's ID number…looks like seventy-eight, four-four-three…can't make the rest out…" She burned the landscape into her head, memorizing what little she could see for reference. He was in the docks, and that meant he was close.

"Faith, I'm not screwing around, you need to get the HELL out!"

The elevator suddenly churned to life and began to descend. Faith cursed, her way back now cut off with company likely arriving soon, but at the same time the thick blast doors opened, and she got her first look at Project Icarus.

She was right, it was a training ground. From some large inside courtyard or hanger with no ceiling rose an elaborate structure a little smaller than a city block. Straight walls, narrow gaps and corridors, sudden drops and ledges, twists and turns…the minute she saw it, the Flow went crazy. It was better than anything Merc or Drake could have sniffed out for a training ground. The structure was made for running.

Behind her, the elevator clanged again as it returned, snapping her from her gaping stare. Faith whirled, expecting Blues or armed enforcers, but was instead confronted by two lone figures.

They were nearly identical to each other, the only discernable difference their heights. Both wore dark green fatigues with black armored vests, complete with knee, hand, and elbow guards. Their helmets were halfway between a catcher's mask and a hockey helmet, but narrower and curved for speed. It was what the assassin had been wearing, only pitch black. Balaclavas beneath made their eyes stand out, but she was more focused on their belts of equipment, complete with guns and other wicked looking riot gear.

They wore badges, standard CPF identification, pinned high and lazily on their shoulders. The People We Serve, the City We Protect.

Despite their lethal outer appearance, both of their eyes widened in surprise behind their masks, but then narrowed slyly. She could almost swear they were smiling. The taller of the two stepped forward, raising his hands to crack his knuckles. Neither of them went for their weapons.

Faith crouched low at the challenge, but froze. Just the two of them. She always felt confident in her abilities, but something warned her not to stay and fight. The longer she stayed there, the more likely she was going to end up like that motionless body in the interrogation cell. In a flash, she turned, ground her foot on the concrete, and took off running towards the structure. The two enforcers sprinted after her.

Any Runner worth their salt could outrun a cop. Even a novice on the tops could lose a Blue. They didn't tempt gravity like they did, or know the fastest way to move. These two were different. She scaled a small, waist-high ledge. They followed suit perfectly, keeping up their speed. She kicked off a wall, grabbing a higher platform. A heartbeat later, so did they. She moved higher onto the structure, aiming for a small catwalk that bordered the space with a closed door, but no matter what move she pulled off, her pursuers kept up.

Like hunters, she thought, pulling herself up another level, then vaulted across a gap. Trained to move like us and hunt us down. To catch a Runner, you didn't call the cops; you needed another Runner.

It was almost scary how they moved so similar to her; beginners thought running was all about speed, but half of it was endurance. You never sprinted yourself to exhaustion. That was the first rule most cops didn't know, but not these. They broke off from each other, splitting onto different paths. Not chasing. Cornering.

It worked. They knew this particular patch of ground better than her, how the Flow – or whatever they called it – turned or crossed ahead. The one behind her forced her onto a new platform, the second leaping at her from an overhang to her left. Nothing fancy, but it forced her to divert and roll. Enough to slow her down.

Faith came out of her roll, but one of them was already on her. Instead of tackling her, he kicked, sailing through the air just above her as she ducked low. Then the other one attacked. She blocked a kick and then a punch, then struck low, going at the soft spots between his armor. The cop countered, and she ducked and spun, lashing out with her leg and aiming the sweep at his leg. It landed, but just enough to make him stumble.

The first cop was already coming at her again, his fist outstretched. Faith whirled around and duck as a gentle hissss of red mace clouded the air. A whiff of it burned her nose and throat. Non-lethal means, which meant that they were trying to take her alive. She rose and grabbed his wrist, wrenching him at the elbow to flip him forward. He did, but landed on his feet, then twisted her over. Caught completely off guard, her arm was wrenched forward, flipping her onto her back.

The air rushed from her lungs, but she kicked up and over her head, the toe of her shoe catching him right in the solar plexus before he could aim the aerosol at her face. There was a blur of green and black in the corner of her vision, and despite the pain of breathing, she rolled hard to the side as a loud POP sounded. Something metal and sparking ricocheted off the concrete platform, two wires leading back. Tktktktktktktktk. The second cop had his gun drawn. Not a firearm, a taser. He discharged the cartridge and began to load another.

Faith jumped forward as he leveled it again, keeping it pointed away from her. That's when the other one got sloppy and came at her again. She feinted, still holding the cop's arm, then spun and kicked. The metal grill covering his face hurt like hell as it smashed against her instep, but he spun from the blow and rolled away, his mask askew.

The cop tried to punch, but his swing went wide. Faith struck the inside of his arm, trapping it and turning it towards him, then grabbed his hand on the taser. It went off, the two metal prongs lodging into the armor of his chest. The prongs chattered that same tktktktktktk as the cop spasmed violently, letting out a choked gurgle and falling to the ground.

The other cop was righting himself, but Faith didn't stick around. She hopped the next wall as a door on the level above opened. It was another one of those cops, and he didn't even slow down to vault the railing to the platforms below.

She vaulted the next wall ahead of her. The new cop and the other one were back on her tail, following her moves just as easily as another Runner. Even after jumping from platform to platform, they stayed right with her. The catwalk that rimmed the circular room loomed within jumping distance, and she leaped off the platform and mantled the railing, kicking through the door.

Bleach-white walls dazzled her again. The training facility had been brightly lit, but cool grays and beiges paled in intensity to the inner hallways of the facility. She focused instead on the color trimmings while her eyes adjusted, not breaking her sprint. She could hear the sound of quick footsteps right behind her, then voices. Then the gunfire started.

She hadn't seen them with firearms, just their tasers, but bullets were bullets. Security guards, maybe, from a turn in the hall behind her. A round clipped off the wall next to her as she rounded the corner, not daring to look back and lose even a fraction of speed. The hallways stretched on ahead, turning slightly before a glass window that overlooked an alley or a street below. More gunfire sounded behind her after a pause, breaking the glass on both sides. Faith jumped the alley, landing back in the building on the other side. Glass crunched beneath the shoes of the pursuers as they followed.

The hallway seemed to turn into a maintenance corridor, white becoming gray concrete. There was another window at the far end, and beyond that, rooftops. Faith dug in and sprinted as hard as she could towards it, then jumped and curled her body, taking the glass shoulder-first. If it was bulletproof, she was finished, but it gave way easily under her weight.

The fall was short, and she managed to land on her feet and roll smoothly, slicing a gash on her bare shoulder that began to trickle blood down her back. She could hear Merc in her ear, but there was no time to even stop and ask him for a route; she'd left her earpiece on a closed channel. She picked a direction, following the Flow, and started running. The pursuing cops flew right out the window and honed in on her again, undeterred by the broken glass in their suits and armor.

At this end of the facility, the docks slowly turned into low-income housing that bordered the harbor. Lots of apartment units, narrow streets, and easy if not readily seen paths. It would be a matter of speed. She jumped to the next rooftop, then to a stairwell. Up a flight, then over the edge and across another roof, then across to another. They stayed behind her the whole way.

She had to keep moving, forcing them to chase without being able to steady a weapon or close in on her. It wasn't something either of them could keep up. Either Faith would fatigue, or they would.

The buildings widened out a bit just up ahead. Faith jumped to a ventilation shaft that ran along the side. The footsteps of her pursuers thumped behind her, and the shaft sagged a little in its mounting. She ignored the harrowing thought that maybe the vent wasn't strong enough to hold three people, sliding under a low overhang from another crossing shaft. There was one more rooftop, and from there her options were starting to diminish.

A rail overpass loomed just ahead of the roof, a train coming around the bend. Faith set her teeth, breath hissing through as she panted. It was time to find out just how much like Runners they really were. They could practice and mimic their moves all they wanted, but the real question is whether or not they had that crazy need for adrenaline.

She willed all of her strength into her legs. The gap ahead was long, too long for a jump, and there was no solid ground. None that wasn't moving, at least.

Her foot hit the edge just as the train was passing by on the overpass. She leapt as hard as she could, swinging her body into a turn, catching sight of her pursuers behind her. The landing was going to hurt, but she needed every last inch. As she hit the Deadpoint, that funny period where time seemed to stretch, she realized just how close they had been; almost close enough to touch her. Only now they were skidding to a halt, bleeding their speed as she sailed over the edge. She even saw one of them trip and tumble to the ground.

Faith raised her hand and extended her middle finger in a rude salute. Time resumed, gravity forced her stomach up her throat, and she hit the train on her back.

If she had jumped too early, she would have landed on the tracks and gotten pulped by the train. As it was, she bounced hard off the second car. The force of her fall tugged her dangerously towards the side, but she slapped at the metal, digging her fingertips into grooves. Her ankles slipped over, but she stayed on top.

The pain of the impact hit her suddenly as she rolled onto her back, made all the worse by the bouncing metal she was laying on, and she was distinctly aware that she wasn't breathing. Her spine felt broken in half, but since she could feel everything below the waist, she guessed she hadn't paralyzed herself.

The two cops on the edge of the rooftop turned smaller and smaller, both of them watching the train depart until she lost sight of them when the train turned around a bend.

She found her breath, but it was painful. Her diaphragm ached from the impact, and the burning in her lungs from the intense chase only made it worse. Merc's voice was barely audible in her earpiece, lost over the sound of rushing wind and clanging metal. She pressed it deeper to hear better, then shouted weakly.

"Merc, Merc! Shut up, I'm fine."

He ignored her and swore at for a couple of minutes, but she let him. She didn't need to run, since the train was carrying her, and she was too sore to feel like arguing, so she just let him vent. When he was done, he finally asked if she was okay.

"Yeah, I said I'm fine. Still alive. They're like Runners, Merc. PK's been training Runners, and they're pretty damn good."

"Shit."

"Yeah," she agreed. "Get on the horn, warn Drake and the rest of the crew. If these guys haven't been deployed yet, they will be soon now that we know."

"Okay, but I need you back here. I have an idea—"

"No." She shook her head. Not after what she saw on the computer. Not when she knew Pope's killer was in the area. "I'm going after that guy."

Thanks edao for picking up some errors on previous chapters!