"Hang on – do we need to go talk to the contact, or do we have all the details for the job?" Marius's voice called over the speakers while his body was slumped in the pilot's seat, held in place by the restraint harness.
"I think we've actually got all the details we need – location, phone number and contact details…yeah, we're good to go. Technically there's no reason to check in with him unless we want to check him out personally." A few looks were exchanged, but nobody seemed fussed or raised an objection with Kai. "Ok Marius, swing us around, head sorta north-east. Hunter, can we have a course please?"
Hunter busied himself with the computer for a couple of minutes, working out courses, ranges and looking for fuel stops, then hit the intercom button by his seat in the electronics warfare bay.
"Course 282, range 750km, approximate flight time 150 minutes. I'm filing the flight plan now with Moscow regional so we're covered as a legit flight – but it's gonna take me ten minutes or so to wade through all these forms." True to his word, Hunter started working through the archaic and convoluted process of filing in the flight paperwork tying in the transponder for the helicopter and the flight details. He hit a brief stumbling block when they realised that because they were going legit, there were a number of administrative hurdles to jump through.
"Folks – I gotta pay for insurance, flight certification and transit fees. I need some ID and a credit transfer from someone."
"Can't you use the funds on the certified credstick?" asked Aswon.
"No – it's got to be tied to an ID, to complete the chain of responsibility. I didn't realise doing things by the book would be such an arse…." Hunter sighed in frustration. "It's going to come to about three grand, but it has to be sourced from an ID that checks out as legit, which means someone will be tied via the flight records to the chopper's transponder and whatever we do." They spent a few minutes working out whose ID was most likely not to raise any flags or issues, and how to do the transfer – eventually moving money from the charitable corporate account they had set up as a cover into the medical ID for Aswon set up while they transited Iran, then using that to file the necessary paperwork and details.
Once the bank transfers were done and signed off, the rest of the process was smooth – though lengthy, as Hunter completed pages and pages of online forms details their flight plan, cargo, intentions, air-worthiness details and a host of other information. Eventually he was done, and received the automated response from the flight authorities, advising him of his flight plan ID. With that completed, he passed the information to Marius, who appended the details onto the header for the aircraft, allowing the transponder to broadcast details for anyone looking to interrogate them.
In the back of the chopper Tads sat strapped into one of the seats and carefully opened the box, looking at the truffles and salad laid out inside. She carefully lifted a piece of truffle out, taking care not to let anything else touch it and contaminate the surface. She spent the next five minutes carefully sniffing it, wafting the slice under her nose and inhaling carefully, her eyes closed as she tried to mentally capture the scent. It was hard, as the chopper smelt of fuel, oil and sweaty bodies to a strong degree, along with a myriad of other smells like coffee and bog mud – but she'd gotten mostly used to them.
Next she moved onto a small and delicate nibble, letting the truffle roll over her tongue from one side to another. She gently bit down on it, then moved the smaller pieces around her tongue again, detecting a sharper and stronger flavour from the freshly torn surface. Again, she spent time trying to pick up on the subtle flavours and texture of the slice, working to fix it in her mind.
She chewed the first bit thoroughly, seeing if the flavour diminished much as she masticated the fungus, before swallowing it down and washing her mouth out with some bottled water. Once she had done so, she took another bite and repeated the process again, choosing a bit closer to what she thought was the root or stem instead, and trying to detect if there was any change in flavour. When she was done, she carefully set the box to one side, and then started to draw in some mana, concentrating and trying to conjure up a morsel of truffle from the astral energy, creating it as closely as she could to the memory of what she'd just eaten.
As she was testing her creation and letting the flavour roll through her mouth, a thought popped into her head.
"Kai, just a thought. How about trying to get in touch with those guys we met at the quarry with the hearse truck. You know, the guys who ship the dead bodies around. Wasn't their team led by a Swedish guy? Just thinking we might get some local knowledge from him?"
"Hmm, that's not a bad idea. Let me just finish looking at these borders we're going to be crossing, and I'll work something out." Tads went back to her truffle experiments and Kai returned to his planning. The political situation to the west was a mess – following the awakening, the crash, two waves of global pandemics and the rise of the corporations, much of Eastern Europe had balkanised further, creating a horrible patchwork of small nations all fearful of each other and frequently ruled by dictators or parties propped up by corporate backers. Flying across or through them would create lots of extra hassle, but there was an easy answer – at least this time.
"Marius, once we've hit the fuel stop at Veliky Novgorod, I'm thinking we follow the Silk Road north towards St Petersburg, then break west and head out into the Gulf of Finland, ride the border between Finland and the Estonian republics and states and then head out into the Baltic Sea, straight across towards Stockholm. The fewer borders we have to cross and get ID'd on or challenged, the better, and I bet it's a pretty common route too for independent operators." Marius acknowledged, and Hunter worked out a new course and passed it through the systems to Marius and the autopilot.
Their journey north west was uneventful, Hunter spending most of the time working on the location of the pickup point and starting to fill in flight plan information for the Swedish end of things and their return flight. Tads continued to work on creating truffles and trying to zero in her reproductions, and the rest busied themselves with maintenance tasks.
A slight tailwind let them arrive at their destination about two minutes ahead of schedule, and they saw an airstrip laid out not far from the main highway heading north. It was a pretty decent length runway, and there were a series of VTOL or chopper landing pads to the side – all appearing full at the moment. Beyond that, a large bank of fuel tanks were laid out in a line, and there was a small administration building with the control tower jutting from the top – then nothing. No passenger facilities, no local services, no amenities. It was a clear this was mainly used as a fuel stop, not a destination, or even a transhipment point.
They called in and went into a gentle oval pattern, waiting for one of the square landing pads to become free. It only took a few minutes before an Osprey tilt wing lifted off, and they were granted landing rights. Marius put the chopper down with his customary grace and panache, and a local ground crew approached them, fuel hose over their shoulders. Negotiations were quick and painless, and they topped the tanks off, Kai paying the bill of 8685 Nuyen from the money received from Ludmilla. Ten minutes later, they were taking off again, and following the course worked out by Hunter to match Kai's request. It took them about 40 minutes to cover the 200 kilometres to the shore and cross over to the flat and tranquil-looking water. The setting sun sparked off water, reflecting a myriad of colours rather than the blues and greens they were expecting, a reminder of the levels of pollution found in most of the major waterways these days.
They headed west over the water, chasing after the setting sun which slowly sank below the clouds and for a while bathed the front of the chopper in warm golden light. Automatic filters on the sensors took care of the glare for Marius, but the rest of the team were drawn to look out of the windows and stare at the islands passing below, the occasional ferry plying the waterways or private craft sailing back and forth. As the sun finally started to descend behind land, the sky deepened in colour, turning a progressively darker blue, and to their sides they could see a myriad of lights starting to appear from the villages and towns to either side of the gulf.
"Hey, are we going to get hit with that crew-rest nonsense you guys were talking about. Are we going to have to build in rest stops and things?"
"Don't worry Kai, not today. We're doing a short enough journey that it's all fine for a single day's travel – though we're pretty close to the limit. If we were doing a longer journey, then yes we need to start factoring in mandatory crew rest time and things like that." Nadia responded before anyone else could, and then started to describe the various software packages they'd used with her father's business for working out the scheduling of their drivers and delivery vehicles. She certainly spoke with absolute confidence, and nobody doubted her accuracy.
"The other thing we need to work out is where we're putting this stuff. If they're freezers, then I'm guessing they're going to be quite bulky and boxy – so we might not have room to get them down the side of the jeep."
"Is that a problem, Shimazu?" asked Aswon. "Surely it doesn't matter too much."
"I was more thinking if we did get stopped and searched, if they're right at the back, any inspection crew coming up the ramp will reach them first – and we're relying on Tads to try and hide them with her magic. But again, it's the first thing they will pass, and we have to disguise them as something that they wouldn't want to check out."
"Hmm, I see what you mean. Maybe we can try to move the jeep then, edge it to one side?" They looked at the clearance, and realised that while they could indeed move the jeep closer to one side than the other, it wouldn't make a huge difference. In the end they decided that they'd try and lift the freezers straight over the top of the jeep if need be to put them in front, or just leave them behind if they couldn't. After all, it was only a problem if they were actually stopped and searched, and that meant they were in trouble anyway. A quick warning to Marius, and Shimazu got the jeep started and with some careful back and forth moving, managed to get it as far over to one side as he could, making it at least easier to get past on the other side – even if there might not be room for the freezers to get past.
They continued over the Baltic Sea in the dull twilight, serried patterns of whitecaps leading off in the water now they were in more open water. Occasionally they saw the navigation lights of other aircraft – the long range flights high up in the sky peeking through the breaks in the clouds, lower-level local traffic and the occasional long range drone. A couple of times they spotted fishing trawlers out throwing their nets overboard to being the night's work, and one floating chandelier that could have only been a large cruise ship heading for Finland.
They were nearing the eastern edge of Sweden when Marius twitched in surprise. It felt like someone had just stroked down his spine with an icicle, resting it on the small of his back. Then he felt another stroke – the translated sense of the questing radar pulse from astern as it locked onto their craft. Now instead of cold, intense heat, like someone waving a red hot poker over his flesh, as X-band fire control emissions locked him up – then as suddenly as it had started, it was gone. He checked the sensors, but saw nothing at all, no blip on the surface of the sea or any craft in the air.
Every passing second took them closer to land though, and if they were stealthy enough that he hadn't even seen them, that probably made them either military, or pro-grade Shadowrunners – and turning back to investigate either probably wasn't a good idea. Instead he concentrated on their flight path into Sweden and the approach mapped out to Bromma airport. Bromma was only a couple of kilometres outside of the downtown area of Stockholm, but wasn't the main international airport. That was Arlanda, 35km to the north. The airport there wasn't constrained by historical buildings around it and had the room to sprawl and develop, extending the lengths of runways to deal with sub-orbital and semi-ballistic flights to international locations.
Bromma though was mainly a transport hub for freight, used by shipping companies and couriers and fitted their cover much better. They also hoped that the more industrial style of commerce would lead to a lower level of security and oversight, and less interest in their craft. The single runway there was big enough for the freight haulers, and was much closer to the pickup location they had been given.
"Attention everyone, we're now over Swedish soil. Approximately sixty kilometres to the airport, maybe fifteen minutes, depending on landing clearance. We're going to have ground crew near us, so make sure we look clean." Marius's announcement prompted the others to get up and double check their gear, making sure that guns were tucked away and other contraband was hidden and that there was nothing to evoke curiosity on display.
Tads concentrated for a moment, calling on the spirits of the sky to come to her, aiming to have the spirit ready to guard and conceal them if anything happened. Looking out of the window she called the mana to her hoping the spirit would appear on the wing, able to keep up with them without being inside the chopper itself. A nebulous wisp of cloud and hazy air appeared as she expected, but also a disgruntled looking wizened old man manifested in front of her, hands on his hips.
"What are you doing?" he demanded, an edge of anger in his voice. "You want to bring outsiders into our house?"
"No, I was going to get it to stay outside-"
"Oh, I see. Saying I'm not good enough, eh?" It interrupted angrily. "Feel like I can't look after the place, is that what you're saying?" Tads felt the anger radiating from the spirt, and with a wave of her hands let the energies of the spirit out on the wing disintegrate, returning it back to the astral plane and releasing it from her service.
"I'm sorry grandfather, I didn't mean to upset or disrespect you. I just wanted to keep the house safe and make sure we were not taking your for granted." The hearth spirit made a snorting noise, and gave her a dirty look, then vanished, leaving her sitting in her seat alone. "Well, that's not great," she muttered to herself.
They closed in on Stockholm, circling the city to approach from the west down a very specific heading. Marius followed the routing like he was on a rail, while Hunter handled the radio traffic, communicating with Bromma Air Traffic Control.
As they closed in on the city, the quality of their comm-link signal improved, and Aswon sent over the report to Han Lee. It was a pretty good document in his opinion – certainly he'd poured hours of effort into it describing the area, the power line and the effects of the manasphere on the area. He also made sure that in the cover note it clearly indicated that there was a simsense recording of the visit available, which could be couriered over or delivered securely some way that would contain lots of additional information. The data-packet still took a while to send over the cellular link, but was faster by far than trying to send it over the very bandwidth-poor network in Russia that they'd been relying on.
They slotted into the approach path, and soon Marius had them on the ground, landing at the eastern end of the airport in an area designated for private craft. Even before the rotors had stopped, a bunch of technicians and refuelling crew had assembled at the side of the area, waiting to enter.
"How long are we planning to stay here again?" Marius asked.
"We were thinking of staying here until about 6pm – make sure it's properly dark then, and gives our contact time to get the goods to the pickup point." Kai responded. Marius finished unhooking himself from the rigger interface and safety harness.
"I'm going to stretch my legs then and check on the ground crew." He exited the chopper and headed over to the crew, greeting the team leader in English.
"Welcome to Bromma. I'm guessing you want the tanks topping off. While that's going on – want a general clean up? Wipe and clear the windows, make sure the filters are good, visual check for damage, that kind of thing?"
"Sure, that sounds good. And yes please, fill up the tanks." Marius responded somewhat absently while he scanned around the area. "But first things first…"
"Toilet is over there through the red door, turn left." The airport worker responded with a big grin. "Don't worry, it's often the first question we get asked." He turned to the rest of the team and nodded. Half of them grabbed the large hose and headed over to the fuel inlet, while the other half headed to the side where a large set of steps on wheels was located, and started to push this towards the craft. Marius looked back over his shoulder just before he went inside, but everything looked in order, and he went to find a toilet that didn't fold out of the wall or have a shower nozzle over the top that occasionally dripped cold water onto your head while you were trying to concentrate on other things.
Hunter also took advantage of the better comms signals and updated his routing and mapping information, letting the computer cache the overheads available to him and interrogating databases on flight plan filing for several of the Balkan states – just in case they head to divert. He soon had a number of alternate routes worked out back towards Moscow via a number of different routes, with a variety of stopping points at regional airports built in. With that done he sent a text to Julius to see how he was – but didn't get a reply within a minute or two and guessed he was busy with something.
The quality of maps was somewhat variable – at least the free ones were – and that put him in a bad mood, and when he started to come across a number of different procedures for each country he started to mutter under his breath and occasionally let out a curse.
"What's up, Hunter" Tads asked, coming forwards to make sure that they weren't under attack of some kind – or that the spirit wasn't enacting some kind of revenge for some perceived slight. Hunter explained, showing her the matrix pages and the different forms in use by each country, mixing up the order the questions were asked in, making it more difficult to just copy and paste the data between them. "That does look frustrating. Can't you make the machine do it for you? Isn't there a program of it of some kind?"
Hunter looked at her like he was about to say something – but then closed his mouth and a considering look crossed his face. Nadia leaned over from her seat and glanced at the page.
"You know, I think she's onto something there. I bet all the data entry fields probably have tokens and attributes. We just need to write a helper-app that can interrogate the host and recover the attributes, then reach into a custom database we can write to grab the details. Maybe from a profile, that we can swap between for different transponders?"
Tads looked in confusion as the two of them started to speak some kind of foreign language as far as she was concerned. She had no idea what a primary key insertion was or a nested select clause, and she wasn't sure she wanted to – but they seemed happy enough to pass the time, so she left them to it.
Aswon meanwhile had taken a ratchet strap from the box and was carefully working at it with his knife, slowly cutting through the strap and pulling at the loose edges and fraying them carefully, grabbing bits of it with some pliers and straining to pull them as much as he could.
"What are you doing?" asked Kai. "Don't we need that for securing cargo?"
"I was thinking, when we do our pickups and dropoff, we need to have a cover story for why we've stopped. Even if we leave an illusion in place at height while we go down, it's going to need some reason for it." He waved the frayed end of the strap towards Kai. "Hence this."
"I don't get it."
"If anyone calls on the radio, we tell them we had a strap break, and we have cargo shifting around loose in the back, that we need to secure. Flying is making it move and could be dangerous, so we're just hovering while the loadmaster replaces the damaged strap. And now we have a damaged strap if we need to show an inspector."
"Ahh, I see. Great job Aswon, good thinking." Kai spread the word to the team, and they started thinking about the pickup.
Kai and Marius came to find Tads, and the three of them thrashed out the plan for the actual pickup. Marius would fly the course as normal, then slow as quickly as he could to a stop, and let Tads throw up an illusion of the chopper in a hover, while he dropped altitude as fast as he could and put the bird down, aiming to have the ramp already open by the time they reached the ground. The rest of the team would load the cargo, while he stayed ready, the rotors spinning and Tads concentrated on the illusion. If they were challenged over the radio, he would report in that their load had shifted in the cargo bay and was off centre, and their loadmaster was trying to lash it back down into place – hopefully that would buy them enough time to finish loading, power up and get back airborne to merge with the illusion, and then they could drop the spell and resume their flight eastwards.
With everyone aware of what their role was, Kai made the call to the number given to him by Vlad, arranging for a pickup at 18:30. The voice at the other end of the line made a curt acknowledgement and hung up before he even had a chance to say goodbye, but hopefully that was because they were busy making arrangements, rather than being an asshole.
Their two hour window came to an end, and Hunter radioed through to the tower for departure clearance. He listened for a moment, then asked for clarification, a deepening frown forming on his face.
"Ok, standby departure, will look into this now." He changed from the tower frequency to the internal comms. "Ok – we can't have departure clearance because there's an outstanding bill to pay for services. Who did what?"
There was silence for a moment, then a chorus of replies over the team net as they all denied knowledge of any billable activities – except for Marius. A moment passed, then he spoke, almost hesitantly.
"I did take up the ground crew on the offer to clean the windows and declog the filters. How much is the bill?"
"Departure control, this is Kilo-Hotel-Foxtrot-Whisky One-Niner. Please can you clarify the amount owed?"
"Certainly, the outstanding amount is nine hundred and eighty three Nuyen."
"HOW MUCH?"
"I can provide you with an itemised bill?"
"No, no – that's FINE. Here, transferring credit now." He stabbed a credstick into the terminal and keyed in the authorisation code for the charity, watching as funds were sucked from the account.
"Kilo-Hotel-Foxtrot-Whisky One-Niner, you are cleared to taxi to pad four and power to 20%, hold for final lift-off clearance."
"Roger, departure control." Neither Marius nor Hunter spoke, but a moment or two later the engines started up and the sounds of pre-flight activity from the cockpit increased. A few drops of rain landed on the windscreen as a weather front closed in on the airport, the dark raindrops slowly cascading down the windscreen.
They slowly lifted off into the black sky, heading west into the weather front and following the flight path out of the city. As soon as they cleared the outer suburbs, they swung to the north, circling the city in a clockwise direction until they hit the bearing for the meet. The team – except Tads - did a last check over of the loading bay and ensured the vehicle was lashed down tightly, and that guns and ammo were to hand in case the pickup proved to be a setup or they got raided by a third party.
Tads headed into the kitchen area instead, and carefully boiled up some water on the tiny gas burner, then made a fresh batch of porridge in a container. When everything was secured again, she sat down on one of the chairs and placed the bowl of steaming porridge on the table next to her.
"Grandfather? Grandfather, I have something for you? And I'd really like to talk to you." The spirit manifested out of the wall, giving her a dirty look. "This is for you, and also I wanted to apologise for earlier. I was trying to keep us safe, and I didn't want to demand anything from you. That would have been rude. And also, we're heading somewhere to make a collection of goods now – and I may have to cast some spells on the chopper to hide us and keep us safe. I wanted to make sure you were ok with that."
The spirit snorted at her, and continued to frown at her earnest expression for a moment. Then it reached over and materialised into the real world long enough to pat her on the back of the hand, before grabbing the bowl of porridge and starting to scoop it up hungrily.
It was barely ten minutes flight time to reach the location, and they started to descend. On the map they saw the approaching town of Bollmoroa scrolling towards them on the display, with a large golf course to the north of the main highway around the town. Just past the border of the golf course was a large forestry plantation, arcing around a large guest house or small hotel of some kind. The co-ordinates highlighted had them dropping right by the edge of the forestry, as far away as possible from the hotel, and Marius monitored their progress carefully.
"Tads, stand by, beginning descent in five, four, three, two, one….now!"
"Illusion in place and holding position."
The helicopter dropped quickly as Marius expertly manipulated the controls, the rear ramp already dropping as they raced towards the ground. The wheels and the ramp hit the moist grassy meadow at the same moment, and the rest of the team peered out of the rear into the gloomy twilight. On the astral plane, Aswon could see the life signs of the smugglers as clear as day, clustered around a vehicle nestled in close under the trees, and the others could make out the faint movements as they headed their way.
As the smugglers emerged from cover, they fanned out, their submachines guns held ready but not raised in threat. Their vehicle rolled slowly forwards, four large and bulky looking cargo units strapped into the back. Each box was about two metres long, and a metre high and wide, and looked to have a small refrigeration unit built into one end, a few glowing lights showing on the control panel.
The off-road vehicle carefully swung around and backed up to the ramp, stopping just millimetres away from the back of the chopper. As the team moved down to meet them with no weapons visible or signs of threat, the escort let their submachine guns fall on their slings and started to swarm over the cargo, loosening the ratchet straps and then carefully lifting the top modules from the truck and lowering them down to the waiting hands below, relaying the cargo from the truck into the chopper. Unloading continued smoothly, the bulky and unwieldy modules proving to be a bit of a pain to shift from one vehicle to another, and the seconds ticking by.
If felt longer, but only took two minutes from start to finish to get all four containers trans-shipped, and the two teams separated. Not a word had been said by either side, both of them content to concentrate on getting the job done as quickly as possible. One of the team turned though and pulled out his phone, taking a quick shot of the team as they moved the cargo over the UAZ and into the hold, presumably as proof of cargo handover. Aswon couldn't help himself, and turned to pose, giving them a big beaming grin as the camera clicked.
The ramp started to rise and Marius slowly applied power, the chopper starting to ascend into the air and the team at the rear moved to secure the cargo, strapping it down into position.
"Marius, movement ahead!" Tads called from the nose turret, "Over by the building!" Sure enough, a lone figure had appeared from a side door, waving a torch around in their general direction. Powerful as the beam was, the range was still far too long to see them except as perhaps a very dark shape moving in the air – none the less, Marius applied a bit more power, racing them back to altitude and merging with the illusion hovering above. With a sigh of relief, Tads dropped the spell, and Marius lowered the nose, swiftly gaining speed and following their previous course east.
In the rear, Aswon grabbed the bug scanner, and they moved over the four cargo modules in a methodical slow sweep, checking every part of them for stray emissions from homing beacons or GPS trackers – but the cargo seemed clear. With their fears allayed, they examined the modules more carefully.
Each was a smoothly moulded plastic container with a thick hinged lid. They were weighty, having taken four of them to move easily, and had the small refrigerator unit at one end on the long side. They looked to be similar in fact to a family chest freezer, but more rugged and robust. Each lid was secured with a security cable with a snap-off plastic lock, each with an individual serial number. Hunter checked over the power inlet and frowned, then moved to the side of the chopper and grabbed one of the power leads that interfaced with the choppers systems.
"Um, guys – we have a bit of a problem here. Different shape plugs, no earth pins… and I think these run on different voltages. We're not going to be able to plug straight in, even if we stripped back the wires and jury rigged them."
Marius tried to offer some advice over the comms system, but it was clear that the problem was complex enough to require his personal attention. He set the auto-nav on the chopper, following a straight and simple course east bound and asked Nadia to come sit in the co-pilot's seat and monitor the systems while he went into the back and had a look.
They gathered their tools and had a look at the two electrical systems, trying to work out how to convert the power from the onboard low voltage high current DC system to the required high voltage low current AC required by the freezers. Between Hunter and Marius they worked out a convertor, having to cannibalise several gadgets from their stores for the required convertors and modules, power supplies and transformers and then linking them together in a horrible mess of gaffa-tape and breadboard based circuitry.
They were still in the early stages of construction when they heard Nadia shouting from the cockpit – her voice full of alarm. Marius raced forward, leaving Hunter to continue the assembly and slid himself back into the pilot's seat, manually scanning over the instruments while one hand fumbled for the rigger jacks, getting ready to plunge the spiked connector into the socket on the back of his neck. Several red lights flashed across the display, and the flight computer displayed information on the alarm.
"Ok, X-band radar, 1.4 degree bandwidth, at least 200 kilowatts power…crap, that's a fire control radar, means we've been illuminated and locked up." The jack slid home into the connector, and his voice stopped as the response override stopped his meat body from moving, as his consciousness took on his "new" metal body form. Nadia grabbed him as he started to collapse and slide off the seat as his muscles all relaxed, struggling to get him strapped into his flight harness.
He checked the sensors, looking down the bearing of the radar signal, but not seeing anything initially. He wondered for a moment if he should energise his own sensors to get a lock up on whatever was out there – but decided against it as it could easily be seen as a hostile act. Of course, locking up another craft with your fire control radar wasn't exactly friendly – but it had been long enough that if they were intending to fire, they would probably have already done it.
The chopper continued to fly east, and a fuzzy signal appeared on the sensors as he got closer to the source. His systems identified it as a fishing trawler, no more than three to four hundred tonnes and probably only twenty metres in size. He discounted the information instantly – no fishing trawler carried a radar with X or K band radar rather than general purpose navigation radar. That meant whatever the "trawler" was, was either military or private security, and probably built out of stealth materials to some degree and brimming with electronic deception and counter measure equipment.
He thought quickly, and decided that probably his best move was to ignore it – make out he hadn't even detected the inbound signals and just continue to fly his filed flight plan. As a "legitimate" flight, he shouldn't be worried about being tracked or interrogated electronically, and it might fit their cover better to not react quickly to such signals anyway – as if a bored or sleepy pilot wasn't paying attention to his systems.
They flew on, the bearing changing rapidly as they flew near the "trawler" and then started to open the range again. Abruptly the radar ceased, and the warning lights went out, all the alarms stopped and they flew on much as before, three hundred metres above the cold and unforgiving waters of the Baltic Sea. Marius reset the autopilot and then jacked out long enough to adjust himself and get comfy and to reassure Nadia that she'd done the right thing, explaining what each of the systems was and describing why he'd done what he had from a tactical point of view to her.
In the back, Hunter was just about finished the bodged power convertor and was getting ready to plug it in and test it when Aswon raised his hand in alarm, shushing the others and listening carefully. He moved around carefully and ended up putting his head directly against one of the freezers, trying to cut out the background noise of the chopper to isolate whatever had caught his attention.
"Ahh, I think it's ok, but it's a good job you are almost finished. It sounds like liquid settling in the compressor. I just heard the sound of fluid gurgling and it made me a little nervous." Aswon shrugged, but moved to help Hunter carefully move their lashed up rig into position and then connect up the power leads one at a time. Fortunately, the wiring held and the freezers activated one after another, their panels lighting up and kicking the pumps into gear and starting to drive the refrigerant through the heat exchanger.
They flew on, the kilometres streaming by uneventfully. Once again they saw fishing trawlers – this time genuine ones – ferries and cargo vessels steaming along beneath them, and the occasional high altitude track of commercial jets far above them – but their progress was uninterrupted and they made good time with the prevailing winds behind them. As they approached the Russian border, they were hailed and asked for their flight ID and visa details.
"St Petersburg approach, this is commercial freight flight, Kilo-Hotel-Foxtrot-Whisky One-Niner. We have transit clearance with refuel at Veliky Novgorod, continuing at Flight level 1 to Moscow international freight terminal."
"Standby Foxtrot Whisky One Nine." The radio went quiet for a few seconds, then a few seconds more. Just as Hunter was about to transmit and ask if there was a problem, the controller came back. "Foxtrot Whisky One Nine, confirm your flight plan ID?" Hunter read out the sixteen character code carefully, supplying the date and time of filing alongside. Once more the radio went quiet. The rest of the team had also stopped what they were doing and was listening in, wondering if they were going to find life getting interesting all of a sudden.
"Foxtrot Whisky One Nine, got it here. You're cleared at Flight level 1, winds generally 260 at 5 knots. St Petersburg control out." Hunter, and the rest of the team relaxed, letting out breaths they'd been unconsciously holding onto. A minute later they crossed the beach and hit the turning point, gradually turning to a southerly course and heading towards the refuelling depot.
The refuelling stop went as smoothly on the way back as it had on the way out, just costing them another nine thousand one hundred and twenty Nuyen in fuel to top off the tanks. Their transponder and flight plan held up to scrutiny, and nobody gave them any hassle, so they were soon on their way south again, closing in on Moscow.
"So, where is the drop-off point, Hunter? Exactly I mean, not just 'Moscow'?" Kai asked.
"It's in the Otradnoye district on the north side of Moscow. It's inside the very outer ring highway, but well outside the city itself – though I suspect we'll not be allowed to fly direct to the destination without special arrangements. The actual drop off point is this industrial estate just to the north of the main train line here." He indicated on the map, showing the low resolution image on screen and the mass of large industrial factories and warehouses clustered to the north of a major rail route with six parallel tracks.
"So, if we can't drop off there, do we get them to come to the airport, or do we arrange a drop off elsewhere? Somewhere outside the city limits?"
"I would imagine they won't want to go to the airport – too much official notice or chance of entanglements in my opinion, so probably outside the city. Let me have a look." It only took him a few minutes to plot out the airports around Moscow and the flight routes open to them.
"If we head down the flight corridor to Sheremetyevo International, then bank east. Then continue around the outer highway and head for Chkalovskiy regional airport, which handles some local freight and such like. It' should be easy enough for them to meet us at a smaller airport, and then go on our way?"
"Alright, that sounds good." Kai activated his comms and relayed the plan to the rest of the team to see if anyone had any objections or issues with the plan, then gave the nod to Hunter when nobody did. Hunter got busy filing an update to their flight plan, putting in the refuelling stop at the airport and reserving the time slot for their transit around the perimeter of Moscow.
Kai meanwhile got on the commlink and called the drop-off contact, holding his hand cupped around the microphone on the phone to try and cut down on the background noise as much as he could. It rang a few times, then went to voice mail.
"Hi there, this is the courier. We have four boxes of frozen fish to deliver to you. We'd like to arrange for delivery of your produce at a local airport, as your original location was a bit… well, urban. Please let us know if that's not ok, and we should be with you in the next two hours."
About two minutes later, the phone range, the screen showing the number he'd just left the message with.
"You just called, and left a message with me." The voice was thickly accented and sounded surly and more than a little angry.
"Ahh yes, this is Express fish delivery. We'd just like to meet somewhere out of town if we can."
"Can you get the product to the location specified?"
"Well, I'm sure we can of course, we'd just rather prefer to…" Kai was interrupted by the man on the other end of the line.
"Then do so." The line clicked off, leaving Kai blinking a little, and replaying the conversation in his head. There was something about the voice that indicated it was a man used to not being disappointed or argued with. He activated the comms again, and cleared his throat.
"Ok team, checked in on the job, and we're dropping off at the original location. Hunter, let's rework the plan for that."
"Hmm, ok – I see this bit of woodland just outside the outer highway ring, we can probably drop to a hover and offload the vehicle and the freezers, just like we loaded them. Get some of the team to drive the jeep in to the meet, while the chopper heads on to the airport. But of course, we're not going to be in support range of each other, and that means only two people going to the drop-off."
"How far is the drive?"
"About seven klicks in to the industrial estate for the drop off. About thirty five from there to the airport."
"Ok, that's doable. Shimazu and I will go and do the drop, the rest of you stay with the helicopter and head to the airport."
They worked out the route and looked at the freezers and the clearance for the UAZ, realising that they'd have to get the jeep down the ramp smartly, then carry the freezers down and into it. With the weight and bulk of the freezers, they'd be at the limit of capacity for the UAZ, but they figured with the typical care most Russians seemed to show for their vehicles, that wouldn't be out of character.
By the time they entered the more controlled flight corridor near Moscow, they were ready, and had their equipment sorted and were ready to go. Once more, Marius bought the chopper down in a fast but controlled descent, touching down gently in a large clearing near a few burnt out cars abandoned some time ago. Swiftly the reversed the UAZ down the ramp and swung it around, then backed up to bring the load bed as close as possible.
It was more of an effort with less people, but still only took them three minutes to offload the freezers into the back of the truck and lash them down with straps. Tads bought out a large tarpaulin and covered the load bed with the help of the others, then holding onto the corner, started to mutter and concentrate. A moment later the tarp and the freezers disappeared, just leaving a beat up looking truck sitting there, low on the suspension and looking as battered and rusty as a thousand other vehicles in the area.
Kai grabbed his taser and jacket and jumped in the car, not bothering with any more armour than that which drew a dirty look from Shimazu who had packed on an extra layer, and had both his sword and hand-cannon in easy reach.
Quickly the bird powered up and continued on the journey, heading east towards the airport, while Shimazu carefully drove the jeep out of the woods and onto the small and badly potholed road leading south. Once he reached the main road, he found out that while it was wider and better lit, it wasn't much better maintained, and he had to drive carefully to avoid dislodging the load – which apparently infuriated the other drivers of Moscow.
As they drove into the city they saw the grey and brown blocks of hi-rise tenements, large bulky factories and massive signs of urban decay. It was a grim and soul-destroying sight, with very little signs of beauty or love anywhere in the environment.
The drove down the agreeably straight main road, passing a few signs of civilisation such as Stuffer Shacks and McRonalds stores, before eventually reaching the turnoff for the vast industrial estate they were aiming for. As Shimazu signalled and turned into the wide sweeping turn designed for heavy lorries, he saw a flicker of movement up high. A dark figure was watching them over the roof parapet, and he nudged Kai to check him out.
As Kai watched, the figure raised a hand to his mouth, presumably passing on information via phone or radio to someone. They threaded their way into the estate, spotting a few more lookouts each of which seemed to be watching out for them from alleyways, roofs or advertising hoardings.
Grey concrete walls topped with razorwire loomed up on either side of them, guarding huge boxes of bland and brutal architecture. They pulled up at the co-ordinates, at what looked like a steel foundry or other heavy manufacturing plant. As they pulled to a halt, a roller shutter rose noisily in the side of the building and a dozen men emerged, all holding pipes, steel picks or bats of some kind. In the centre was a better dressed man, just tapping a cigarette out of a pack and raising it to his lips, lighting it and sucking in a lung full of smoke with great gusto.
Kai got out of the car carefully under the scrutiny of the men, and gave them a smile.
"Good evening, gents. I have a delivery of frozen fish for you." The smoker in the centre of the group nodded, then gestured with his hand to the back of the truck, his cigarette leaving a trail of smoke as he did so.
Shimazu climbed up on top of the truck, working by feel around the freezers and the flaps of tarpaulin. When he had a good hold on the edge, he grabbed his phone in one hand and sent a text to Tads 'drop spell now'. A few moments later, the material appeared in the world, and with a heave he tugged it to one side, unveiling the contents with all the gusto of a stage magician. Several of the thugs gave a start as metres of blue material and four large freezers appeared in front of their eyes, and Shimazu gave a little smile.
Moving around to the back of the truck, they handed off their various weapons to a designated carrying minion or just left them on the floor, then swarmed over the vehicle, carefully lifting down the freezers one after another under the steely eye of their boss, who just stood watching, slowly smoking his cigarette. Four guys were carrying the first freezer into the warehouse as the last was being offloaded and stacked by the side of the truck. The boss turned towards Kai and Shimazu, flicking the ash off the end of his imported Marlboro.
"It is done. You go now." Without pausing for a reply or confirmation, he turned and wandered into the warehouse, disappearing into the darkness of the facility. Kai and Shimazu climbed into the vehicle and carefully backed out into the road, swinging the UAZ around as the first group of men came back for the last freezer. Kai grabbed a quick photo through the window of the truck, then forwarded it onto Vlad, then called him.
"Hello Vlad. We've just made delivery, I've just sent you a confirmation picture. All delivered ok, on time, and with no official notice."
"Excellent work my friend. It is good, like Wheat in the Sunset. Now I can wait for their call, with head on pillow, like a virgin." Kai frowned, trying to work out just what the hell that was 'like', but no picture came to mind.
"Good, well if you want to send through the cash, I'll forward on the details to you now."
"Da."
Kai slotted his ID, sending over his contact details for 'Dr Arban Erdene', the medical doctor they had worked with when travelling through Iran. It was linked to the medical charity they had set up, which meant it should be easy to rinse the funds through and use for something else.
"I have the details. I will tell Germaine, I am Happy, like Larry."
"Is there anything else we can do for you?" Shimazu shot him a dirty look, shaking his head and trying to remind Kai that they had a job already, down in Africa."
"No, all is good. NO! Wait, yes. I have one thing to ask, like Last Leaf of Autumn Falling. I have something to take to Germaine."
"Ok, yes, we can do that. Do we need to come to you for this?"
"Da, is only a small thing. Not an issue, but I must make sure it reaches her intact. Will be a low paying job, just a few thousand. You can do this for Vlad?"
"We'll be on our way to you shortly, I'll text you arrival time when we've met up with the rest of the team." Shimazu tensed, his hands gripping the wheel of the UAZ in frustration as he heard Kai agree to do some other side mission for someone, taking them somewhere else. The plastic on the wheel creaked in protest as his massive hands started to deform the surface.
"This is good." Vlad disconnected, and Kai pocketed his phone then turned to smile at Shimazu.
"Don't worry, it's on our way, and it's just a personal delivery – like a letter or a parcel or something. It'll help pay for the fuel. It's all cool." Shimazu grunted, then turned his attention to the navigation system as he started to thread his way out of Moscow and onto the main roads leading east towards the airport.
An hour later, they arrived at the freight gate for Chkalovskiy airport, and after slotting their IDs at the gatehouse were directed to the western edge of the airport where the helicopter depot was. It wasn't hard to spot their vehicle – the MI-6 dwarfed all the other vehicles there, easily out massing them by a factor of two. As they drove over the rough finished concrete, the rear ramp lowered, and they saw Hunter and Nadia standing one to each side, looking out and down at them, each with a hand behind their back – presumably holding weapons. A quick wave and a thumbs up from Kai, and they relaxed slightly, and Shimazu slowed and carefully drove up the ramp, bringing the vehicle to a stop on the slotted metal tracking in the back of the cargo area. Already the ramp was rising up behind them to seal them inside.
"All good everyone," shouted Kai as he carefully climbed out of the jeep into the cargo hold, squeezing himself through the narrow opening in the door. "We're going to rest up here I think, then head back south, we have one little tiny pickup for Germaine from Vlad, to drop off on our way south, and we're all done."
The silence in response to his statement was deafening.
Kai checked on his phone, querying the bank details for the charity.
"Hey – but good news. We've been paid the ninety grand from the job!"
Aswon looked up at him from where he had been cleaning his rifle.
"That was supposed to pay one hundred. Not ninety."
Kai's smile seemed to slide a little to one side as he cast his mind back.
"I'm sure he's just going to give us the rest when we get to him for the pickup of this next job. It'll all come out right, I'm sure."